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Sensory Annoyance

Written by Bohb

Friday, 30 November 2007

It started with touch, bad touch. Not the kind where you have to point to the doll, but the kind where the continuation of gust to eyeball really moved into unpleasantness. You see, my cheap (stolen) plastic (shitty) glasses (plastic (how did the greater category of glasses include glass and plastic glasses (ponder it))) had broken (popped out lens), and I was now existing on a borrowed pair (girl’s). Being a fashionable set, these glasses feature a design element that managed to develop into a design flaw for my unintended usage (motorcycle driving) and sex (M) interaction (non-sexual) with the product. They had small cutaways in the outer edge of the ‘lenses at the intersection with the arm. For late afternoon strolls while dodging goose poop on a pier this may be fine, but when attempting highway speeds on your motorcycle a gusty problem starts to develop. A thin, almost razor sharp, wind bit sneaks through that fashionable cutaway, picks up speed as it banks against the eyeglass arm and shoots directly into the outer edge of my eyeball. It was cold, it stung, it made me cry.

These tears led to my next sensory pitfall. Sunlight in the late fall as one travels southeast across the city down Elston Avenue shines directly into the eyes. Like a train continually coming down the track, right at you but never getting closer. Always looming danger. The sun refracted off my wind tears, the prism effect pretty until it promised certain doom via it’s restriction of sight. I saw nothing but sparkly light, I thought this was because I was so stoned, in fact it was – and because I was crying and looking into the sun.

Through my forced squint an image manifested in front of me. Any reader who drives, rides or moves in any way on/in an open air vehicle will understand the horror I felt as I focused upon it. I found myself directly behind a garbage truck. Trapped behind it by claustrophobic traffic, unable to get around its wide posterior I was in stasis (held by opposing but equal forces) hold. The wide backend flatulated waves of semi-rotting waste into my face. The smell was toxic. I held my breath as long as I could, but that just made the inhale, when mandatory, that much more disgusting. As I tried to block the scent I realized that the fumes were so visceral I could taste the noxious air. I think there were significant amounts of banana, I no longer wish to eat banana.

Holding back my nausea I finally navigated around the garbage truck. Its roar combined with the clamor of the city. My motorcycle has the largest sound system available, the entirety of Chicago. I can’t change the channel, but the mix is addictive, pulsating and easy to dance to. Hearing its dissonant melody is the song that gets caught in my head the rest of the day, no wonder I look so confused. .

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