B O N D P H O N E.
Words and pictures by Chris Lamb.

My time as a career writer ended when I made a joke and no one at the controls was in the mood. There's something to be said for getting fired for being clever, but at the moment the last part still comes out sort of whispered. I got fired.

This is something that happens.

Talking about the thing itself is something I'm not entirely capable of at the moment, so I won't. The bits of it I'm not over have been pushed to the back to make room for the shaky hands scramble of getting a new job, getting rent, and putting food in me when I can. I need the rush. It's only when I sit still that it comes crashing home, settling around my ears and eyes and hands with the dull metallic roar of wind between buildings.

But it happens, and it did, and it's done. Other things are in the works, I'm sitting on the eighth floor of a glass and stone high rise looking out over the water at distant New Jersey, talking to a nice woman about working in her swank coffee shop or tightening up Resume, The Destroyer of Worlds, for work in a publishing house. If 2005 is in fact the year that forces us all to grow up a little, then this was my kiddie bullshit getting slapped down. There are no short cuts, no third act ex machina surprise to get us what we want. There is work and nervous energy and ramen for the tenth time this week, and the city I don't dare leave for all that I would miss the moment I stepped on the plane.

posted by chris  # 12:52 PM