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We Were Online

2006; Perspectives of New Music; Volume: 44; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/pnm.2006.0023

2325-7180

Fred Everett Maus,

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We Were Online .-_-_---_-II 1?r J?/I?u Fred E. Maus I.Net.subjectivity 1995-96 1. Sex was one thing, I was more or less familiarwith it; but what was this, thismaze of tenderness, these unguarded eyes, this soft drizzle of words to a stranger,words that heard themselves with calm amazement, calmly shunning thought, not stopping after I was asleep, this strange taste frommy new lips. 2. Another time, there were, something, glazed over a bit, no, glazed over. Fragility but somehow in keeping, in safe keeping. Hands were still and cool, soft, still but not stiffat all, theywould staywhere you put them. Fine, finehairs on his skin. The net, which "never sleeps," courses through my veins like caffeine tonight, its "never sleeps" having nothing to do with whether anyone else writes or reads at this moment. We Were Online 315 I remember how strong it seemed, how every sound, everymovement seemed to bite intome, each one as though existing by itself, filling its present, like little drops of fire. I remember what it could do but my other memories have been replaced; I looked for it again and again until everything became familiar, just like the other things I already knew. Later I knew everything about it except why I had sought it; itwas another thing like any other thing. There wasn't much at stake, but it was intolerablymuch even so. Three loud advertisements, but they pass, like everything else on the radios in the passing cars. I couldn't get rid of it, more precisely it wouldn't leaveme, so I turned it into something completely different, but recognizable. I thought you, of all people, would understand that. There were gnats and a faint smell of chlorine; his tongue was badly burned but he knew it was healing. Where therewere blisters, he ... he couldn't taste. From a fortune cookie: "You will meet people of extraordinary open ness and compatibility. You will scarcely dare to believe the depth of your affinities and thewarmth between you. They will come and go, like hit songs, but as they go therewill always be more than enough others, new ones, to replace them. Through all this, you will feel quite alone." I hear more than you, especially when I'm online, my eyes bored, my earswide open; especially when I'm asleep, taking in every night sound, that iswhat I know as love. I write to you, drowsy, unguarded, intimate, eyes half-closed, as though you were a lover or an old friend, and tell me, why on earth do I do this? 3. A cool morning, the skywhite with a kind of loose fog, moisture all around you. It's a pale white light thatmakes all colors look flat, con fined.No shadows. The cool, moist air seems tomuffle sounds. Around the town, soda trucks aremaking deliveries to the stores?Pepsi, Coke at almost every corner. Somewhere a dog barks, and it sounds like someone coughing. A distant laugh seems to ring false, but it is just an effectof the air. Breathing in, there is no odor, but your nostrils feel the damp. You try to remember a good tune, some music inyour head would be a relief rightnow. The screen glazes your eyes. It comes from anywhere and somehow it finds you, you don't know why, it can be themost arbitrary sound; but it stays and circles you until it finally seems to disappear, but really ithas just become some of you, it 3 16 PerspectivesofNewMusic is there but no longer as a relatum; itwill never pass your lips, precisely because it is always inside. "We spend all our time trying to get on the net.We get busy signals from our providers. Sometimes we get a line, but our passwords usually don't work. Sometimes we actually get online, only to crash moments later.But this is away of life, we like it, we sit at the gates typing, typing, typing, always on the verge of an ecstasy thatwe can almost imagine." If you neglect it, itwill break, you can be sure of it, though you won't be aware at...