The Clean-Up Woman
by Robin Pastorio-Newman

Dish drain
light bulbs
garbage bags
waste basket

Moving house. Everything stirs in slow motion but grime, which barely moves when pushed. Little urgency in anything so minor as my own life.

coffee machine
coffee filters
shampoo
copper nails
salt

Practicing what I preach, I took the train from New Brunswick to Penn Station last Tuesday to a Supersuckers show. Two friends and I stared out the window, looking for what wasn't on the horizon. It was absurd, even after two weeks of disaster coverage, to believe without firsthand knowledge that anything so vast as the towers could have disappeared. There's nothing to see from the train: no sign from a distance, no dark star in the sky. There is no presence to point out absence.

coffee
body wash
sponges
bathroom cleaner
ammonia

After a tense subway ride, I was ready for beer and the jukebox at The Library. We later sparred with the bartender at Motor City. A cab ride to The Knitting Factory ended with the driver pointing out the window, "Four blocks that way." What? "Walk four blocks that way." We had reached the barricades in Lower Manhattan, beyond which lay silent, nearly empty streets. Few lights. Paper floating on river winds. Then, police, other officers, some people. When we turned corners to walk south, a smell you know from a hard night in your hometown: burnt wire, insulation, paper and a faint sweetness, like when houses burn down. As simple as that, national tragedy comes to you on a breeze.

furniture polish
feather duster
oven cleaner
bleach

Zeke at The Knitting Factory, and the Supersuckers. A girl next to me wore an elegant t-shirt. It read: FUCK OFF. I rubbed my face in it and she stood next to me all night. Zeke was loud, fast, audacious, brilliant. The Supersuckers were loud, fast and audacious. I loved the whole package, including mosh pit bruises, lost sunglasses, a tough time breathing.

dish detergent
fabric softener
mop
broom
dustpan

On the street, shouting to one another about the noise, the hour, the likelihood of making the last train back. Cab drivers all over New York must hear this exchange every night:

You: I'm so DEAF! I can't hear a thing!
Your Friend: Me, neither!

book shelves
packing material
shelf liner
cat litter
litterbox

What about music? What about it? Weeks ago, I wrote that music was everywhere. Now you know it yourself: On the train, headphones and denial; in the subway, street musicians and an imposed calm; at the show, volume drowns out most of the voices in everyone's heads, but not all. We go on, we get by, we go on. I love the mosh pit, the motion I can't muster myself, the beauty of abandoning oneself to the song.

Like you, sometimes music might as well stay home. One evening, my friend stood outside the local pancake house, minding her own business, thinking about pancakes. From nowhere, a crowd surrounded her, handed her a candle and demanded she sing "God Bless America" with them. Which would've been fine if it hadn't been so sudden. Or if anyone else knew the words. Her yummy pancake reverie interrupted by a throng of candle-wielding chorus drop-outs, my friend loudly harangued mumbling drive-by vigilers: "White with foam! WHITE WITH FOAM!"

So much cleaning ahead of me, so tired. Yet, I love you when you're dancing.

©2001 Robin Pastorio-Newman