His name is Janosch
Overslept,
again and again for the past few weeks and of course today one more time ‘cause it was so nice…
Drink a coffee, make it two, a shower and back to work – at least that’s my plan,
but when standing in the cold shower waiting for the hot water to come I just keep on waiting and waiting but all that arrives is just cold, so cold!
Cold and colder and coldest of water dropping on my skin.
The goddamn central heating installation is bitching around!
Reset…
Nothing.
Reset…
Nothing.
Reset! Reset! Reset!
Bitching and screaming out strange and loud noises so I better back off a little ‘cause it’s scaring me.
Making one call, talking to ten of you but no one would come – not today, not tomorrow, not the day after tomorrow.
Don’t want to call the old big fat man with glasses ‘cause they say you don’t work, they say you don’t know and they say you don’t want (but mostly don’t know).
But don’t have your number anyway, so call the landlord who is going to send you, you old big fat man with glasses, no knowledge but weird accent I don’t understand…!
But not picking up his phone…
All I want is a shower.
A hot shower with hot water and hot drops dropping on my skin and dropping on my hair, embracing me with warmth from the outside and filling me with it on the inside!
One drop and the drop’s brothers and sisters sharing a moment with me. A moment of meaning for them and for me. A moment of pleasure – of pleasure so pure as pure as a moment could be!
Drop by drop and drop and drop…
‘Flip-flop, hippety-hop, offa your rocker and over the top, life’s a fiction and the world’s a lie, so put on some Creedence and let’s get high’
“That’s what Henry Dean would have said”, said Eddie Dean about his older junkie brother, “that’s what he would have said, if he still was alive, but he’s not anymore. He put on too much Creedence, you know?”.
So?
What the hell?!
To the hot fucking hot, hot hell with Creedence and to the hot, hot fucking hot hell with you! You and your narrow minded colleagues in your big white cosy office filled with warmth I don’t have!
You freshly showered ignorant heartless bastards, sitting at your desks with a hot coffee on your desk next to the big new shiny decadent monitor on your desk with a white wireless headset on your head and a microphone in your face. Your face you washed with hot water this morning. Hot water in your face, but not in mine, no Sir, not in mine ‘cause I don’t have any!
I want a reset.
A big fat red glowing in the dark reset button. A reset button for my life so I could erase all the old settings and just set new ones.
I would take a small one, too.
Just a tiny little reset button with the only function of erasing at least this incident which is just a sequel of other cold incidents with no warmth and no light. Incidents like sleeping at the cold wet station of fucking Nieuweschans which was no station at all just two tracks and a two meter shelter with at least one roof.
One roof and three walls of glass and broken glass under my thin blue blanket which saved me from cuts and disease but not from the cold, that sharp blowing bitch who can’t leave me alone but cuts my skin with her sharpness and blows the even more sharp smell of fresh and old piss from the last hundreds of bums and drunkards who couldn’t find their homes or just didn’t have any other place to piss, directly in my face!
And incidents like sleeping in that nice big house in the suburbs of Dublin, which used to be such a nice big house in the suburbs of Dublin and still could have been such a nice big house in the fucking dark silent suburbs of Dublin, but it’s not – it’s not, it is just not
– it is a big dark cold house because you cannot afford paying the gas neither the wood for your little big fireplace.
Now the fireplace is dark.
Not even one tiny little limb to be discovered in the dark corners
– it’s just dark, darker, darkest and instead of breathing warmth the chimney breathes coldness.
Coldness and darkness coming out of the chimneys mouth embracing the dirty dishes covering your whole kitchen, not only your kitchen’s sink but your whole kitchen, your whole big kitchen which could be so nice… Your whole big worktop which used to be for cutting and whittling, for shredding and hashing for broccoli and wine!
But not for millions and billions of dirty dishes covered with rests of meat from last month, covered with squirts of barbecue sauce from last week and covered with mustard and ketchup desperately holding the last chip from yesterday’s McDonald’s orgy you overlooked ‘cause you were staring at the big fake breasts of the hot blonde on the TV screen.
All I see is dish on dish on dish – dirty dishes everywhere: the staircase build by dirty dishes, desks and closets build by dirty dishes, dishes so dirty covered with mold.
Mold on the dishes and mold on the walls, I cannot breathe!
I just breathe in the chimneys breath…
Then the doorbell throws me back down to the cold freezing ground of the here and now
– it was you who tramped on the stairs, upstairs, no breath just sweat and gibberish.
No trust in you, old big fat man with glasses, you might fill this place with warmth again, but for how long could we enjoy? For how long would our lives go on?
No trust in you, Sir, no! I want to escape, can’t look at his face but his hands?
His hands that shake and rattle the screaming bitch…?
Goodbye, you my world, farewell to my life!
I guess this was it…
At least no more cold experiences to come.
Dirty dishes forever clean and chimneys breath no longer mold.
I’m finding my peace and waiting for the absolute breeze of warmth…
But instead I hear you, you, again you!
What the hell are you saying, man?
I don’t understand!
“I fixed it”, he says, “just replaced the clip”, he says, “next time it breaks down call me instead of the gas people – just don’t call me after 11!
Here’s my number, you can paste it on the central heating installation – Hahaha”
His name is Janosch.
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