Right this second, in another state, Lizzie West is a stream of flowing blue liquid of the same viscosity as whatever it was they used to put in non-mercury thermometers the red stuff. (Was it alcohol?) The stream is curved and looped and yup, it’s in a tube half an inch in diameter, flowing rapidly alongside a mountain stream. The tube is onshore, and there are trees and ferns and such, and squirrels and frogs on logs and branches . . . “life going on,” basically tranquil, as this HOT wet substance spurts and gushes along, headed for where and for what?
Without the tubing to contain and direct things, Lizzie’s life (‘cuz that’s what it is) would bubble and ooze into the ground, ending as nothing more/nothing less than a COMPONENT OF MUD. The mud would be blue in one small spot . . . visible till the next rain and then NO MORE.
Right now, howev, it’s hauling ass down the tubeway, at least as fast the stream, headed, one guesses, toward a river or THE SEA . . . let’s say the sea. A headstrong surge to be and become WHAT? . . . to join up WITH what? Dunno.
Really, she doesn’t know. If her only choices right now are sea or mud, she’ll take mud. Is mud the same as death? She hopes not. Think, think . . . are there other options in this system?
Or is this just a crummy dream? “Wake up!” (She’s waiting to hear someone tell her . . . waiting . . . waiting.)
Lizzie West plays the Tractor Tavern at 8:30 p.m. Wed., May 7 with the Sadies and Gerald Collier. $7
