Mister, mister! Did you see that spaceship sneaker commercial storyboard, the one where I play the toilet paper salesman, you know, we're all in it for the shit at the end of the roll?

I climbed a fallen tree, I walked down the up escalator, I wished upon a Star Search rerun that you would come back before you left, tap me on the shoulder, and be all I was just waiting for the right moment, the perfect opportunity to smile. Then I would kick the can opener, I'd feed the cat collective and walk around the block three times, just to spite the stop signs.

When did you begin the ending, where do you come off all leaving early, before we pin the tale with a donkey, before I even got a chance to really flower the wall?

Uh-huh, as if it could be what it should be, when actually it's mostly everything something said about somebody, right before 15 second gum commercials became in vogue.

Spare me the shooting gallery opening, with whine and cheeze gee whiz, who's camera is that, do I look all right all ready, where did the little cute woman go, the one with the hair that looked like it was going to fall off if anyone touched it, that liked to stand on both legs much like a ladder, leaning against a barn.

Don't you even Steven me, Mr. Manwich, make my bed and lie in it

All I wanted was the twisty straw you used to be able to buy at Food Farm, when Dig Dug just wasn't good enough, when spelling test answer books became solitary dictionary pages, torn free and floating aimlessly down one way streets.

I watched her sleep next to me with my eyes closed, I drank from her water bottle and learned how to read her lips, I loved the same music separately and, much like a traveling salesman, I smiled and waived her away, even if it wasn't quite time to go.

oh yeah, the unlikely duo, initial meeting trauma stress, fight without immediate reconsiliation, unifying conflict forshadowed, travel, chase scene, adversity overcome through togetherness, unifying conflict confronted and seemingly defeated, pause pregnant with danger, last shocking vestige of unifying conflict jumps out of nowhere only to be effectively slapped back down, air hugs and/or laugh track, just like Lost World, only without the dinosaurs.

The typewriter, the lawnmower, the ice cube tray, the eraser, the desert cactus, the rock garden, the mystery meat, the toy surprise

I need to slip between the words, the half-sounds that scratch against the bottom of the door, the wallpapered storefronts that all taggers gravitate towards.