Equations: Dialectic Form (2021)

#32
When I take Lisa to bars, there’s still an edge of innocence. We often feel
like intruders; we haven’t learned the rules and folkways. But Trixie Belle
is the one who puts the zap on my head about bars, and the lives that play
themselves out there. When I meet her years later, she hasn’t changed
much. Her posture, the image it creates, is still hard. This time, however, I
have graduated out of bars. I can no longer stand the posturing, the
moves, the head-games. Trixie Belle refuses, as before, to be touched
much. I can run my hands all over her body but her clothes stay on. The
situation disintegrates because this time I won’t buy her drinks. If she
wants a six-pack for breakfast, she has to pay for it herself; if she’s going
to enter my apartment, she’s not to do any damage. To the extent that
anyone, male or female, can tame Trixie Belle, I have tamed her. In six
years, I have learned certain things. I know that, whatever outward
circumstances determine one’s life, having a mind of some cleanliness
matters most. There are clean bums and dirty Presidents; clean janitors
and dirty CEOs. Whatever I say to Trixie Belle, it’s put through such a
damaged filter that nothing gets in, nothing is retained; so what is she
doing here? My weakness dictates that if a beautiful woman wants some
kind of succor, I will give it to her; that I am a servant to all forms of
female beauty. I have my own cleanliness issues and this is one of them.
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