Jack Kerouac: Dharma Bums

In the last few pages of his second major novel Kerouac's character Ray Smith as a fire lookout at Desolation Peak Washington writes in his lengthy solitude-

...I'd go out to my snowfield and dig out my jar of purple Jello and look at the white moon through it. I could feel the world rolling toward the moon. At night while I was in my bag, the deer would come up from the lower timber and nibble at leftovers in tin plates in the yard: bucks with wide antlers, does, and cute little fawns looking like otherworldly mammals on another planet with all that moonlight rock behind them.
Then would come wild lyrical drizzling rain, from the south, in the wind, and I'd say "The taste of rain, why kneel?" and I'd say "Time for hot coffee and a cigarette, boys," addressing my imaginary bhikkus. The moon became full and huge and with it came Aurora Borealis over Mount Hozomeen ("Look at the void and it is even stiller," Han Shan had said in Japhy's translation)...

New Years Eve 2008

12-31-08

 

New Years Eve 6:03 p.m. I had spent most of the day laid up in bed with a mild fever of 100.8 or 101 tops. Just another day. Called in sick, it happened to be a half-day anyway. Most people were off on their vacations living fun interesting lives. Peaches & cream. A beautiful thing. Been listening to music and watched a documentary on ol’ Kerouac. He first smoked tea with Lester Young at a club uptown, who the hell else gets to say that? I dig. I feel so close to him in so many ways more so than my own brothers, father or friends. He could lay it down & with style & beauty – cool. Cool like when cool was still new. When cool was jazz blowing with smoke out of a saxophone in a dark club on 53^rd St. or a nightspot way out in Frisco, back in a time when Bird was on the radio. What did it sound like then? Did they know they had it that good? K & M are here cooking for tonight’s dinner party at their mother’s. Looks like we might roll out of here at nine to her place. We grabbed some sushi at our local place at 3 p.m. for lunch. Always hits the spot. Always about $20 bucks give or take a few Washingtons. What I ask myself are my resolutions for the year? Well, I am loosing weight at the club, gotta get into shape. Keep painting and apply to publications, but the real deal. Be happier with it all. The girl I kissed to start off this decade/millennium is getting married in two weeks. I’m happy for her. Life, love, it’s funny that way. I say yes. Yes to it all. It’s cold outside, going to have to keep warm feeling almost sorry for all those Times Square bums in the windy bitter cold tonight partying it up. Red noses, ears pink as valentines, noses running, and cheeks rosy. White people’s faces show the real temperature or what they’ve been drinking. It’s a fitting way to end a rough year for us all, our blood rushing around in a hustle to keep us from freezing in the bitter cold of the midnight hour.