#I would personally love to hear thoughts from athletes from small african and island nations about the fact that black american athletes

[casual-gym-fan]

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[garyzarrt-blog]

My Wall 5 & 6

5    I summon the courage to go out into the world

I have to admit that with my wall around me, with Freedom feeling a bit under the weather (I thought about getting one of those dog or cat collars that you see around New York for well-tended pets, but didn’t think they were made small enough for turtles, even though mine is quite large), I wondered if I could go on. My radical innovation in creating my wall had upset the balance of my day-to-day existence, not that is was anything special; it was really routine. By this time, it was Wednesday. I called in sick to work. They call these kinds of days “mental health days” in New York. I have always found this an odd expression. Each day in New York, thousands of people call in sick because they have basically given up and can’t go on – they are totally fed up. These are “mental health days,” though, of course, HR departments don’t call them by this name. Considering the insane behavior I see (it can’t be just me, I feel) around me in the city, I can’t imagine why anyone is actually going to work at all since everyone must be in need of “mental health” days. I know that I am in constant need of a break from the relentless pace of life in New York. (I believe this is common around the country.) This is yet another reason my wall is so brilliant. I am just being candid and not bragging – this is a factual account of the importance of my wall and the impact it has had on the world – as you will see. (Note to self and the world – derangement is a common occurrence and therefore personal walls, like the one I have invented, are even more important and will usher in a new era of sanity and balance and world harmony.) Even though I was in a crisis caused my great invention, I decided to make my first trip outside my apartment wearing my wall. I admit that I was afraid – in fact, I was terrified. Success was not assured. Of course, walls were being spoken and written about, but in the most general sense, by pundits, politicians, late night comics, business leaders, politicians of all stripes, and overheated radio hosts. The subject was on the TV (yet again) as I put on my wall harness apparatus, picked up Freedom and placed her injured little body into the sink which I filled with cool water. (I also put on R&B for Freedom since I knew the music soothed her. I could swear she tried to dance with me some Saturday mornings when I listened to WBGO, but that may have been my own excitement.) I opened the door, and set off into the world. People talk about walls, I thought, from behind my four Stayaway lightweight panels, but how many actually make their own personal wall, live with it, own it, declare they are themselves one with their walls. Few – actually, none that I knew of at the time. I was a true American pioneer! I was at the vanguard of the American Dream and I was set to orbit the planet – and even ready for my ticker tape parade. (Note to self and the world – true American achievement always deserves a ticker tape parade and 24/7 coverage in the media.) Since I made sure to leave my apartment very early I didn’t have to worry about knocking down neighbors in the hall.  Fortunately, the elevator, which was small and always had an unidentifiable odd odor, was empty since I took up most of the space. You might wonder how I actually pressed the correct button for the ground floor. (You must be making these mental notes as you read my narrative, which has become part of our contemporary history and which I understand is part of pop-up curricula at schools and universities around the country). The night before, when I couldn’t sleep, I practiced wearing my wall and tipping over in a way that I was able to reach the wall outside and, in fact, touch any object I wanted. (I was a gymnast in high school in addition to being a runner so I was athletic and my body remains fairly limber and strong.) Standing in the elevator I made a mental note to do more flexibility exercises so I would be able to reach even further since I knew that my journey wearing my wall would take to places beyond my imagination. Such was the force of my invention!) My apartment doesn’t have a door man. This was another plus for me and one less person to content with now that I was wearing my wall.  Of course, since it wasn’t Christmas tip time, the super of my building was nowhere to be seen. But little did I realize, as I bumped into the front door (I was barely able to get the door open because the hinges hadn’t been oiled since the days of hippies and Love Generation – this historical allusion makes me smile), that I would enter a literal battleground – and just around the corner.

6     I participate in the Battle of the Diner

I was determined to keep to my daily routine even though I was debuting my revolutionary personal wall. Wearing my wall was a statement, yes, and a very powerful one as I well knew, but I wanted to carry it off with style, with the cool, level-headedness that true celebrities embody. So as usual, after I left my apartment I went for coffee and breakfast at my neighborhood diner, which is only a block away. I had no idea that my presence, really the startling reality of my wall, would spark an incident that would later become a story that fascinated the world and become part of the saga of my wall. I sat in my usual spot at the counter between the elderly African American post office worker with a short beard and a harried grammar school teacher with thick glasses and a tightly wound hair bun. I waited for my coffee. The stocky young Mexican bus boy with spiked hair -- he told me the first time we met that his name was Elvis –instead and immediately getting me my coffee seemed to be staring at me in an odd way. Elvis was usually very friendly – we usually talked about Mexico’s soccer team, pretty girls in the dinner or on the street, and the lottery, which Elvis thought we would one day win. But this morning, everything seemed to be going in slow motion. Elvis seemed nervous, almost frozen – his eyes were wide and he seemed a bit scared. I noticed that he was looking over my shoulder. I noticed it had become very quiet in the diner. There were the usual diner sounds -- spoons and dishes clattering, TVs with talk shows and news channels. But there were no human voices – no one was talking. I began to sweat; I was able to pull a napkin behind my wall to wipe my face. I still hadn’t gotten my coffee and I was beginning to get irritated. (It didn’t dawn on me that my wall was creating such a stir in the diner. I was very naïve at this stage, and didn’t realize, although I had hope it would happen, that my wall would literally create waves of reaction among people who usually seemed to be going about their business. My wall detonated emotions and captured a feeling that was lying beneath the surface of America. (Note to self and world – My wall is a lightning rod -- and it is a mirror showing the true face of our great nation.) Jose, Elvis’ friend who ruled the diner from behind the counter, was always fast and efficient and friendly in a hard, tough street-minded way. But, he seemed frozen in place, too. I asked for coffee several more times. And I asked for scrambled eggs which was my usual breakfast. José knew what I had every day, and he knew I liked my whole wheat toast buttered and my home fries very well done. But he didn’t seem to want to move. I couldn’t fathom what was going on. The diner was like an extension of my apartment so all of this seemed surreal. I was disoriented. “Coffee!  Scrambled eggs!  And toast the butter!” I found myself shouting at the top of my lungs, and I assumed that I could not be heard beyond my wall.  (I had altered the design of my wall by making invisible slits in the Stayaway in order to let sound waves through. I couldn’t tell if this brilliant design was helping the sound get to the outside world or I was just being ignored.) It was hard for me to turn around while wearing my wall but I swiveled on the counter seat. I was half-standing, half-leaning, on the counter. I scanned the diner. Every face was focused on me. It was like I was watching a bad movie, except I was in it, and I was the star. (Note to self and world – when you dare to be great, stand out from others, you become a start, you become something even more valuable in today’s world – you become a celebrity.) Some of the faces confronting me seemed angry, others smiled, and still others seemed dumb struck. (As I said, I was able to assess the situation in the diner because I had improved the small eye holes in my wall.) Elvis the bus boy walked up to me and asked, “Sir, is that you behind the wall? I cannot understand what you are saying but I think you are asking for coffee and scrambled eggs, and I think you are threatening me about buttering your toast.” “I just want my scrambled eggs and coffee and the toast -- the usual way! And, of course, I am not threatening you. I am just raising my voice so you can hear me!” Elvis laughed, and Jose even smiled – now they knew it was me. “Is it Halloween, sir?” Jose asked seriously. I started to hear loud voices, arguing. “No, it isn’t Halloween! Why are you asking me that question, Joes?” Then the owner of the diner, a fat bald man from the island called Samos in Greece, who always sat by the hot Russian girl at the register, came up to me. From what I could see through my wall, he was scowling. "What do you think you’re doing?" he said in a cold tone. (Remember, I had been in this diner every day for at least two years.) “What you think you’re doing?” “What? What do you mean -- What am I doing?’”  He couldn’t hear me, or he didn’t want to. “What are you doing coming in my diner like this?” He raised his voice and was almost shouting; the blood vessels in his neck were bulging. I was intrigued by the way his belly moved as he got closer to me. Was he going to physically throw me out? Like a giant wave overtaking me, the sound of the other people in the diner suddenly crashed into me and the slow motion movie speeded into real time. I couldn’t see the people but the sounds weren’t promising. I found it hard to believe, in those early days that my wall had succeeded in detonating an emotional tsunami in the diner (I would see this happen worldwide later) and cause usually calm people seemed to work themselves into a frenzy of emotions. “Get out of my diner!” the bald man cried. “You are creating a riot. You are not welcome here anymore. You are no longer a good customer!  You are no longer a good eater!” “I just want my scrambled eggs,” I repeated in lower voice, unsure if I was speaking to him or myself. The bald owner began to tug on my Stayaway wall. The plastic material, battle-tested in China and in the Mideast by governments and security forces for a multinational corporation and retested in urban areas of our own country, performed admirably.  No matter how the fat diner owner pulled and pushed my wall, he was unable to make a dent, or reach my body, which I admit now, was shivering a bit since I sensed the onslaught about to come.

Saturday

January 14, 2017 (done before)

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