Jul

8

Song in Plaster: Grizzly Bear, “All We Ask”

Filed Under Updates 

FRAGMENTS.

A: I remember the enormous carnival. I worried about shooters. You took me to shoot little metal pans and do some shots, and get my mind off of things. I did not want so much gin and I did not want any cigarettes. I probably had six ounces of your Seagram’s gin and three cigarettes.

B: I can’t believe we trust our children to these carnies.

C: My grandparents once let me ride this ridiculous fish ride and I didn’t understand how it worked and I think I tried to stand up. I was six. The carny yelled at me and, amazingly, I didn’t cry, but I did sit completely still and stare blankly and did not enjoy the ride.

A: I got on the phone to my parents. I told them that I probably wouldn’t be home and that you and I were getting married. There is strength in gin. Even Seagram’s. I said it with perfect articulation, no slurring. I clutched at my purse. When I hung up, I looked around the tops of the buildings for figures, and felt a little sad about my parents. You were still smoking, and the smoke came up between your fingers like sand going backwards.

B: That guy has to be on meth. You’re not doing that ride. Let’s go over here and look at the horses.

C: I was in Michigan with my grandparents. My parents put me on a plane to Michigan by myself in Houston. I can’t imagine. I made it through the crowds in the airport. I’m guessing that someone helped me get to my plane. I sat with girls on the plane on the way back that were headed to San Antonio, and felt strange to be the only boy there, much younger. I could not imagine where San Antonio was.

A: I didn’t feel like doing any of the rides. I didn’t feel like it before the gin and cigarettes and now I couldn’t imagine it. But you’d already gotten the tickets. We had to use them on something. I saw the Ferris Wheel, I thought it was the one ride that wouldn’t make me throw up right now. But at the height of the thing, looking down at the tops of all the buildings clear of figures, your hand on my leg, I threw up Seagram’s all over my sandaled feet. It could have been worse. The morning sickness for the past two weeks made it almost routine.

B: Sure. Here, here, take your tickets. Pah. So, apparently, last year three of them were driving around drunk in the middle of the night. I know. I can’t believe it. They wrecked the car in a ditch. Surprisingly. Two of them in the back seat . . . compromised, I think we could say. No. Why don’t you do that game? Throwing the ping-pong ball in the bowls. Let’s leave after this.

C: My cousin won a blue ribbon in something or other at the fair, at the carnival. Quilting? The whole time in Michigan I felt a feeling in my stomach like a fish bowl filled with cool water and splashing, but the fish having left, ascended through my chest and throat, out of my mouth, leaving a cooling residue in the passage.


Grizzly Bear - “All We Ask” mp3

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