Never Been

NEVER BEEN

I pride myself on my work, I mean, you know this. It took so much for me to make it through trade school. I'm a master plumber, fer chrissake. I thread pipe, I bend pipe, I dig trenches, I lay tiles. I install brass fixtures in million-dollar, total-immersion shower stalls. Look at that fountain in the lobby at the Warner Building. I mean, I did most of that. All that underground work. Replaced all that masonry from the 1800's right back on top of it. I know this stuff pretty damn well. I get down and dirty. Up to my elbows. Not scared of any of it.

But do you know what I never had the chance to do? When I was a kid, all I ever wanted to do was be a sky-writer.

You know what that is, I mean, who -wouldn't- want to be one of those? I even wanted one of those bi-planes, you know? The extra set of wings that stunt flyers would stand on, their mile-long, silk scarves trailing in the wind. Leather caps with ear flaps and chin straps. Fuckin' bug-eye goggles on. Propeller in the front that would slice your hand off if you let it.

And the smoke! You believe that stuff? Never learned how they did it. Like, how did it stay up there? Stay together? But then, all of a sudden, it's gone. You read it one minute, the next it's smearing and fading, and then the next it's gone, never seen again. Like it never was there.

You gotta be an ace pilot. And I mean, -ace-. You know? Nerves of steel. No fear. Loop-de-loops. Flyin' through barns n' shit. Whadda they call that? Barn-storming. I wanted to be a barn-stormer, man. Up in the sky, everybody lookin' at you, doin' that stall-fall when the engine is cutting out because you were flyin' upside-down or something crazy. Then you turn right-side-up at the last minute and -zooooom-! Up you go in the nick of time.

But look at me now, man. Instead of barrel rolls, it's fuckin' toilet plumb-bobs. Instead of in the air, it's in the water. How the hell I get down here, man? I'm not soaring. I'm drowning.

Vertigo is a cast-iron bitch.