#6

The interruption to RammyTeens to bring Riot grrrls back to DC was not a budget problem. Shoegazer and Ha penciled in a split-even budget of $200,000 for the musicians, if they could find Riot grrrls without FBI. Ha added $50,000 for studio time to prepare them to perform on their own, like a super mini SubPop record label. Shoegazer had a short list of 5 Riot grrrls, which Ha has forgotten. Plus, she assigned to her the task of bringing arlingtonHouse back to the Shoegazers team. The Riot grrrls were welcomed to join whenever they could be found. Quartermaster accomodations were undetermined and Ha decided to keep the task order but prevent Shoegazer from assigning it to Jack, which Shoegazer agreed. Turns out the original East coast Riot grrrls wanted their militaire husbands with them at arlingtonHouse, swapping with RammyTeens to put artHaus in DC.
    Both of them had separate work to do in April and May 1993, Shoegazer bringing artHausDC to Ha, and Ha scheduling to do her military job with the Sandhurst teacher over the summer. When Shoegazer found out, before the Riot grrrl folio was established, the RammyTeens ditty “Drab Army of Tristan” came pouring out, sponsoring German children at artHaus, buying deutschmarks, consulting a German dictionary, getting their translations through attorneys in Georgetown in DC. You think grrrls trilling are a riot, try the situation in Ireland, Ha complained to Shoegazer the overwhelming avalanche of work up ahead. Calculating that Ha's budget was the same amount as hers, Shoegazer had nothing to apologize. If Ha kept drifting away from supporting young women, Shoegazer had a right to drift to Thomas and complain. Thomas complained to Ha by dumping another “find that body” task on Jason, who had to acquire the know-how without FBI. FOIA or Thomas pays!
    Ha does not do another round of Auntie Ha, she said about herself. Auntie Ha shot off her foot last year so she would not have to open for Metallica and rob them so blindly. Jason insisted anyway. Close for me, your Raggedy Star buddy. So she dragged Jason through another singing exercise, an overlay ontop of “Sonne” (which came out neatly separated when Metallica performed it live in Germany in 2026). That was one more DJ skill for Jason, to avoid singing and to silence himself during operations. It was Ha with body language on her hairbrush. He had to “scan” the lyrics, which she recited as oratory before she sang with him nearby, use the chopstick to cue himself by waving at Ha without poking her eyes out, keeping it fengshui. Then he had to turn to the audience and do it again. Out there, there are no Riot grrrls. Out came Jason's sing-songy oratory, like opera, almost a tenor. Would you give it to Riot grrrl, Lead Guitar, or Metallica? I'll keep it for Lead Guitar, he said.
    Shoegazer arranged for four young musicians, aged 13 to 15, who would volunteer to start work on an Rgo imprint. Ha was the employer, Jason the producer, Shoegazer the business manager, and Thomas was the in-group patron who had bought all the venues and workhouses they would ever need. Ha wanted Jack to spend on vinyl and cassette factories, so the government could own a portion of the OEMs, despite the rise of CDs and feverish redevelopment of digital media formats. Not Jack's cup of tea, he sent the folio back to Ha. Which made her feel like a bounty curator of the future Bansky, because he was like twenty Banskys put together. Keen, smart, linear, so uncanny. Ha could not put into words what made him so special, and special to her. She wanted some of his unassuming talent to rub off on the next young people team. They nicknamed themselves the QweeRz after they were told about the side project for Richard Kruspe: production production, money money, all-civilian. There should not be any danger in that.
    She spent two sessions with Ha discussing Riot grrrls' feminism. It would not be bullying to respect both sides, QweeRz already siding with RammyTeens that they would not support women who were pro-abortion. In a perfect fantasy world, QweeRz would have been Alanis Morrisette. Well, there was that time when Ha sang the entire Jagged Little Pill album (1995) that piped in from the radio, and the guy who took her westward bought her dinner and all the vodka sour she could drink. Then the DJ and Ha serenaded the bartender, nobody else dancing, because one album is only about one hour, then dinner, four more soldierly hours to go. One more hour down blissfully taken up with the DJ who did not care but his muse was home and he smiled and smiled for over an hour. She had not readjusted back to the Brits when they crossed the mountains into Tennessee. The driver enjoyed the early night hours, the landscape, no traffic, and Ha singing British music nonstop for another hour, because it was going to be all American up to the Mississippi River.
    We cannot have them all, Shoegazer demurred back in 1993. I will let the Canadians know they should start in their home country. We really are wanting to support females. Shoegazer not only wanted Ha's approval and to lend some talent back and forth, she wanted to clamp Ha down during strategy and early investments and not hear about pitfalls to civilians. Do not worry me! Ha was actually worried why Shoegazer would invest in young musicians outside of a conservatory and pushing them onto a competitive market. The meritocracy does not like the idea of Riot grrrls yammering about hating on ex-boyfriends, and that's coming from this Punk Dudette. What is a boyfriend? Men are like clown experiments exploded into cotton candy (Shoegazer laughed) all over your hair and the insects are starting to swarm at Rainbow Beelzebub. The only people who live that way came from the same circus. Their parents were Ken and Barbie and they never let themselves out. Choice! Oh gawd, choice! Choice theory and the matrix of dead baby jokes—they deserve the rebuke that way. I cannot sponsor them for our record label enterprise, but you should find them anyway and make sure they are not endangered or exploited.

    What if I sponsor them? Auntie Ha's love is lop-sided and selective. You love the Europeans more than the Americans. Any of them from DC and Arlington, Ha said, they have a safe place to be that is not Eurotrash and Luckless Route 66. If they are in California up to Washington State, we will let them go. Don't say the government is failing them, I want those governors out West to know young ladies at that age who no longer go to school do not need to conform to a nuclear household lifestyle. But what are they going to do when they come home back here East? Same opportunities as everybody, no more prostitution struggles, no sex slave, no porno and hatred. You are harder on Riot grrrls, moralizing and wanting to desensitize them and force them down to be bland and average, Shoegazer countered. I do not have sympathy for a pair of young tits when 3,000 Marines are getting laywasted down the street with no funding. F-bleep-C-K-ing is not funding. We have priorities and definitely Riot grrrls are my priorty now.
    That's exactly the demographic split between them. They will never get along together, I cannot merge them, I cannot place them side-by-side. They do not work together, they do not share a culture together either. I lie, I don't know what happened to the lovely couple Riot grrrl and Marine. They never really divorced, did they? Because they do not F* around, whatever that means. They do not French. So why should they stay in the DC area, isn't it too expensive for them? Riot grrrls don't Gee around, they'll snap every G-string at the cave bar. And they are proud enough not to beg. Oh, I can own a cave bar, Riot grrrl's days of retaliation are over. Riot. Battle of the bouncy booty, I lose to win. Yeah, okay, let the new husband get his gal back. Let them know, whatever they need, I can't visit a cave bar often, they should get their needs met by telling the bouncer and usher, the uncivilized versions of themselves. They are incomplete citizens with zero demerits, gosh, I miss them. They should be as independent as possible, I have a leadership campaign for them. Shoegazer was interested to know more a strategy she would not have to manage.
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    Four QweeRz, three Riot grrrls, a dozen Shoegazers and B Bois got together and bequeathed a Riot grrrl valise to a Canadian singer. Make sure you pack your gift with dress white for the lady singer, Ha insisted, a full outfit that fits her. We have an acoustic guitar for her, something plain and humble, artHaus procured for RammyTeens.
    Play your [electric guitar] riff again. Ha was glad for original music. Yes, let's send it to California. She should be there, right? She traveled safely through the USA? A few more days, not worried yet. We can all write a well wishing good fortune song for Alanis. Three times the length of the riff is going to be the melody. We have six composers. Ha had never seen the artHaus bunnies so happy and productive. The lead guitarist was happy-happy waiting on lyrics. The youngest squeezed out verses, asking Ha for guidance on theme, thesis, and expression all the way through. They were geniuses at phrasing for the music. They want a bridge, it made musical sense. They want affirmation for a key change, Ha said because she liked the emotional reason for their key change, and they cruised ahead. They needed the best rhyme, Ha was the tie-breaker glad to be there. No studio. Keyboards set aside, one cassette deck, one electric bass guitar, one acoustic guitar, one electric guitar, the composer, a Riot grrrl, Shoegazer, even the drummer packed into Ha's room with only a practice pad.
    Everybody, look out the window. Ha's room at her house overlooked the top of a church's stone roof, beautiful angles, clean lines, native rock of plain colour, gorgeous texture. See? Didn't I tell you? Ha has the best teenager room, ever. I am afraid of heights, but that roof does not give me vertigo. Robert Smith (poster of the Cure's frontman) can hang upside-down on the ceiling before I go to sleep, I am not drowning about to tumble over into a church. The youngest one looked out the main window. Everybody, the singers get fresh air. There were three open windows.
    She worked with the drummer separately, twenty-one years old and the driver. The guitarist took cues from the bassist to get the right tempo and swing-sway of the chorus. Ha would demo sing last if everyone was too shy, which they were finally happy enough not to be too shy. She grunted out the verse before the chorus, which jogged the Riot grrrl's ability back to what made her famous. She made the lead singer finesse and do it again.

    Still not exuberantly ecstatically happy, Ha stood up, plugged in the synthkey stand, pounded on it like an Alpha Punk, belted out the chorus, and almost knocked over the stand. The backup singers, 13 years old like Jason the year before, were undeterred. The drummer, the oldest one, was done with Ha and agreed. The bassist turned on the tape recorder for one verse then the chorus. Everybody listened to the tape. Shoegazer had taped her keyboard part separately the day before. They could hear the exact composition everybody wanted together—except Shoegazer, who was deaf to vocals. That doesn't sound like Ha. That sounded like an animal, she said. The three singers and the bassist took the time to get Shoegazer to work on her instrument with the right meter and more attention to phrasing. Two practice runs of that, even though she said she felt vulnerable she was drained of abstract music and handled the keyboard mechanically. She persevered for the team, Ha wanted to hug her.
    The guitarist and the bassist knew they had to protect their instruments from the animal, the guy without his drums looked formidable saying very little. He meshed the other two together, Ha was happy how exquisite that went. Pft! If the bassist wanted Death Metal as a well wish for Alanis, it would only be a formality to get Ha's permission to break his bass and force him to work back $800 rather than getting paid $500 for the group that day. It was the drummer's pleasure to let Ha decide while he pulled out the check. The very youngest one, with the 3/4 acoustic guitar, scooched over to Ha and the Lead Guitarist, small and fearing. The exercise of power is unlike the exercise of control, the drummer whispered to Ha. The songwriter worked right, singing and jangling with jer. He worked left, finessing a line of melody the Lead Guitarist could use later if only he knew which chords were best if he gave away his linear solo. He settled on the chords, the singer on the left was technically proficient. He leaned right again, got the rhythm he wanted by gaining confidence with Ha to do a different cowboy right-hand new to him. The other singer had to come up with a bass line. They were on their second song, they could do that later while they needed Riot grrrl on tape. For the guitarist and bassist, they wanted Goth Chick Ha to improvise an introduction with the acoustic guitarist, everything would be done in one take—and Riot grrrl had to get a volume of force out. The drummer slapped the table, That loud, [Riot grrrl]. There was no microphone for the four singers, so the three electric instruments were challenging. Ha belted out a Goth banshee. Yeah, that loud. Shoegazer transferred what she heard and started swirling around on the keyboard, the warm-up for everybody. The drummer had the honour of coordinating everyone for the recording. He outlined his drum part for everyone, which he was going to do at the mix studio later with the B Bois. That does not sound like Ha, Shoegazer said again. That sounded like we are in an old cathedral.
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    Well, darn, that was so nice, there's a big old hole for Richard ZK. Shoegazer sequestered an entire notebook of Riot grrrl's efforts out West. Hand it over. If you haven't recorded it, it's copyright Aunti Ha. That's backwards! Yeah, she knew she was getting lots of all expenses paid out of Shoegazer and Ha. The Caucasian RammyTeen randomly selected eight written songs and forced Riot grrrl to copy them out by hand, to give to Ha. Meanwhile, Ha the diplomat wrote a letter to the Marines for Riot grrrl and artHaus, saying they hope they could get together for work and leisure. Don't sign it yet, M'dame, Shoegazer formally introduced Ha to Riot grrrl that way. Ha sorted through the songs, reading the lyrics. She requested Riot grrrl sing three of them that Ha was going to edit for the Marines. You mean it? The military is going to sing my music? Yes. Do you like this harmony? Ha asked Riot grrl. Umm, definitely sounds military. Not sure I want to give away my music now. $3,000, that's $1,000 each, but I am sending to Quantico only two of your songs and giving you $1,000 to let me massage the third one so you can afford [the drummer's] studio musicians. “Shoegazer” is her official rank. Shoegazer, please pay her.
    Wait! You can't do that, you're changing my lyrics. You have your originals, Ha said. The opportunity for young ladies to tout the meaning of... let me read this as if somebody in the Marine Corps. The opportunity, suicide. The meaning, go to Hell. How I feel, I want to go to Hell with you. Well, you know, it is not that inspiring. Riot grrrl, there is nobody else on the planet who is willing to pay you for you to a) accept being officially censured so now you have to recuse yourself, b) offering to let you keep what you have in privacy you need not share around because it is inappropriately too suicidal, and c) I am sponsoring you to help you improve what you yourself can and should say and sing from now on because I believe in you. When you are a joy to read on paper, lovely to follow and sing, you can be a good influence to the Marine Corps. Deal? Last way out. Half price off, $600 for Shoegazer, $900 for you if your edited, refined very best material is not accepted by the USMC, Shoegazer will find the right music producers for you. Because I have to keep it out of your dossier. It is the same, it is not a personal vanity project, you can sing to yourself walking down the sidewalk at 7 o'clock in the morning. When you want people to listen to you, which is the only way to appreciate you above total silence, you have a gift worth listening to, your voice. The right words will be there, I want you to care how much you have already invested in sounding for your meaning. Best of all, I detect you like poetry. A scholarship for poetry, agreed? Yes, agreed. Military or civilian? I will let my manager decide. Shoegazer chose the larger scholarship with the Marine Corps. Oh! They know how I feel. Yes, which is why it is difficult on the Marine young gentlemen that they are not being productive. Okay, I can help them, I can help myself get over it.
    Well now what do we do, Shoegazer? Ha asked after Riot grrrl left the other day to get to work on her porfolio of songs accumulated during the Riot grrrls movement. She told Ha what the young Rioter planned. It was a 1:20 trade-off. Rioter was excited to be a leader. For the demo tape for Richard Kruspe, she had one song idea as an appetizer, then her own compilation of all Riot grrrls stuff. What's on the demo tape? Ha guessed it would be an anthology. Uh, Riot grrrl wants you to modify her stuff or write it from scratch, challenge him. Hmm? What does that mean? Shoegazer thought against repeating what she had said to get Riot grrrl to do the project. More art than movement, she told Ha. Oh gosh, she wants me to handle my Rammstein folio, I promised to pay her for hers. That's what you did!
    You have to accept sponsoring the B Bois (studio engineers), they have no female to work with, to work for, nothing. Riot grrrl will work with them when she is ready. Just get a 4-minute brag song going. Match us Riot grrrls is the idea. For a Rammsteiner? Flambé barbeque Barbie doll? If you're only cooking plastic. That one, there is no mask, there is no way to hide Riot grrrl. Don't hide her, Shoegazer said, let out her confidence, her independence. Brag! Flaunt! Ha instantly sang, Hey Riot lass, my ego is glass / I'm morbid and passive and I wear black / I don't heed a stampede / You know your anarchy / The mosh pit sweats no pity / For squished bananas and itty titties. I should hush now. No, no, not a taunt, don't compare. She wants the song title “Match me”, it is the summary, the all together of the last three years of Riot grrrls. Pick out what's good about them and let them brag. I know how, Ha said, but like what, like who? You Punk! What does a bragging, Punked out Riot grrrl have to do with Richard ZK? Ha is not good with initiative and team planning in the music industry. Shoegazer breezed, You dopey, be the DJ! But I need a DJ, remember, you Shoegazers, argh. I want you to keep your job so I can dance. Okay, it's only fair, you need to be freed up and toss your hair any which way, dance.
    At arlingtonHouse, Ha stepped outside. She thought of the limitation, the off-specification way Shoegazer and Riot grrrl were opposites. The hearth and nurturing belonged to Shoegazer, she was the best. That was to start somewhere. Anything Shoegazer wanted at that point, go out into the cold and find another suicidal grrrl, Ha would do it. She told Ha not to give up on the army. Unlike at her house, arlingtonHouse was on a busy street, more telephone poles, everybody tucked away indoors midday to avoid hearing the traffic. But Ha could hear the air conditioners. Civilians. Immigrant men, Shoegazer and Ha the only females along the corridor. It was a beautiful day, mild spring day, sunny and bright. How long were the row of workhouses going to last? If they needed anything, the Pentagon was ten kilometers away. You can walk there, Shoegazer teased. You and I will have to do one run, at least, every fortnight. The younger artHaus dudes stashed their electric instruments at the workhouse. The “uncles” down the street, some of them are elevated blue collar. They are all day labourers. They never had royalty in the vicinity. Some of them know, they are ready to work right now. You can't wear “street fashion” like us. Stop being a Goth teenager. There were thousands of dollars of donated clothing for Ha to choose from. None of them fit, but they were so expensive, Ha went along to relax. The dudes liked her best in stage costume, more Rocker money. Who wears these? Steve Tyler?
    Do I get chauffered around because my neck is more expensive than a platoon of Marines? Only today. Don't bring Marines here, they don't get along with the workers. You have to practice with Air Force. Learn to curl your arm around one of them and don't say anything. Walk with a straight posture. Hand the sword over, smile while you do it. The gentleman who wants to meet you, he's a European count or something. Do not worry, he is learning English, speak a little to him like you are reading poetry to him.
    They made her practice for a command investiture ceremony. Oh golly, a two-star Air Force guy like Thomas. If you behave, you do what you want with the State department, they told her. We have to dress everybody who's never been to one. Do you know how to sew? she asked them. Will you teach us? they asked permission. Shoegazer was going to be tied up managing fashion. The count and his manservant arrived. Ha, go brush your teeth!
    She went outside and spoke to him. She measured how much speech she should use and decided on a 1:3 ratio. He was adorable, from Romania or somewhere recently Soviet but not modern, twenty-five years older. He exuded a quiet charm from country far away, not city. Exotic, a lovely native language already elegant with poetics. What was he doing in America? Have they fallen so low? He was researching an alliance, he worried for his country. Joblessness and too much dependency, and too much state welfare, he could not solve even one out of three problems. His estate lost all his professionals, they emigrated everywhere.
    The threads on his suit seemed unrippable, older but stronger and finely hand-crafted. Whatever cotton it was, it was not the American South, they left it natural ecru colour. The home fashion dry cleaning on his suit looked like it cost the same as all the salaries of a packed courtroom of attorneys. Who does such a thing? We do not change the threads, he said. Other countries say we are poor, I don't know. We do not need to use bleach, my people have no idea what modern chemicals are. But he kept his day hat humble. I've had this hat maybe twelve years, from central Europe, I will keep wearing it. You have to be in their country, Austria, to get one of these. They do not give out any hat to nobody, no one can buy this hat. But it costs only $50 from a factory. They turn off their factories every few years. The whole country had, what, two of these left, and they gave me one of them. There was no better midday springtime to meet a Romanian count.
    She was not aware of any photograph of Princes Charles and Andrew of the UK where their clothing was meticulous and timeless. It took an entire year by thirty women to loom and tailor one suit for the Romanian. As for style, he outclassed the Brits easily.
    She sensed he had peace in his country, there was no need to ask. Then again, she did. He was hiding in DC, he had to stay longer. He was not good with politics. He knew he had monopologized in his home country, a rich man who genuinely adored his people. Now he had to stop outspending them. His friends told him so, and he really had to listen to his friends. They can help him learn his responsibility, he desperately needed his savvy buddies to keep him out of politics. I am learning to make small decisions, he said. Socializing is what I am good at. When one is in exile... I have no more excuses. My wife likes to party, so now she has to learn not to do too much for other people. So she wants a divorce, because she wants to do more. She is in Europe spending my money, she cannot give it to anybody else. It doesn't work that way. There is nothing wrong with our marriage. I had to find the best attorneys who will not let her divorce me. She sends the bills from Europe to me. How are they my responsibility? Her family says I am an imperialist, I am supposed to be guilty. I am a European but I miss my country. Wherever she goes, whatever she wants to do, she does not see herself at home with me. She wants to travel. She took a vacation from each of our children, do you know what I mean? I have a seventeen-year-old son, he should live with me. If she keeps my son, she spends twice more. She is teaching him how to spend state money that is not even hers or mine. I start caring now, I worry. My son deserves better. I know what it is like not having one's people. If he gets used to it, he will be ruined.
    The count went inside to meet the children. He told her to stay outside with his manservant. She asked permission to listen to him expound on his situation while she smoked cigarettes. He said he does not speak English but the count requires him to, for practice. The car was an antique. He will never be jobless. It was good to have a family man as one's employer. The car was his responsibility, the dry cleaning, secretaries, breakfast lunch and dinner. He takes care to do his job, everything has to be perfect all the time. He enjoyed taking care of the count's youngest son anywhere in Europe, like family.
    The count had a depression. He would see a bill and call his attorney. He skipped vacations, I had to drive him an hour into the city. We were near Austria but not Austria. Was it Italy? When he did not want to pay for luxuries and privileges, his son would not eat. It was automatic, so the child's mother hires a private tutor and more staff. She wants to make a good impression while she is living in a foreign country. She wants her son to be modern, to know everyone, to speak three languages when he used to be only eight years old. He grew up at that time speaking Italian, she uses him to not pay for him. He considers himself an Italian, she does not correct him, she is proud of him. It could be she wants to start something in Italy, to own a business or to manage people, to give to her youngest her investment when he is old enough.
    [The count] adored her with the youngest one. They could not have children for a decade. She had difficulties, she wanted to change countries because she was not comfortable. She was at the hospital so many days, her husband was worried sick. He had never been like that before. She was older already, that was going to be her last pregnancy. She insisted they had to leave and go to Italy. Are you sure? he would do anything for her. She was very pregnant, big belly. They left the hospital together, I drove them for hours and hours into Italy. She was tough but not getting any stronger. Finally, two weeks later, they were still living out of a hotel. She stopped going shopping, she stopped meeting friends. I brought every meal to her, she was totally indoors and dependent on me and her husband. Oh, it did not matter that they could not find a [chateau] in the countryside. He had many business affairs to do, many people to meet and negotiate and stay focused. A pregnant woman is easy. I joked that she was not going anywhere. She had to have the baby, I wanted to do errands and chores, I was getting bored. You will see, I have not served the family, I told her, until she knows she has family. She said okay, she will go to the hospital to be sure, she is ready. Very good, she has to listen to me. Easy, we welcome the youngest child in two days. He was easy from the first time. He did not know he was in Italy. First few weeks we all lived together at the hotel, home away from home. No Italy, only Romania. She had to, so that she would not be homesick. He was the same, not sick anymore. She cooked Romanian, she spoke Romanian, the count was 100 percent Romanian, he got used to whatever she decided. Me too. Three adults eating simple, home-cooked meals nobody else in Europe have. They were very happy, a good family, the three of them. Nobody else in Italy knows but I do.
    His new Italian bosses tell him to come to work. I connect anything he needs but I do not know what they are deciding and I cannot sign anything for him. The business associates have wives who visit his wife. They praise her, they want her recipe for refreshing cabbage stew. It is embarrassing why Italians are over-spending for lunch in the city but not finishing their business deals. He gives them the excuse he does only administration for them. If they need help establishing something, if they need permission from each other, if they need to register for something but the laws are too confusing, he can help them. When they want to spend their own money, he has no worries about how to do it with them. She reads everything I bring home to them. Her college degree was in economics, he had to marry a good European. Anything she does not know, she asks her family long-distance. The Italians pay 50 percent, he is not signing any papers. So they start to send the phone bill to him, her family pays 50 percent, they start to exclude him to save money. It does not save money, not in Italy. The nobility are not the only people who are allowed to pay for petroleum, communication, the navy and the military, diplomats and international schools. He cannot let the people wait. He does his best and starts signing small pieces: permission, budget, registration, only for the companies he knows what they are investing where and why. He was in high demand, he makes it easier not to worry about other countries in Europe. Commoners are protected, he is reasonable in business, and those bosses do not abuse any welfare they have taxes to pay. Poor people cannot possibly abuse welfare. He is so good at convincing businesses why they have to pay taxes, he is an upper-level socialist. They want to invite him to political functions, he avoids it all the time. He wants to know how well his son is doing, whether his son is a good European, her son can join their adult children in Romania in a few years. He has to pay attention to both parents and continue to speak Romanian with me. But I have been away a few years serving the count, I let the parents sort out their decisions.
    He cannot have another depression. It will not be good for his wife's family. They did not flee like the other families and workers. They stayed with his family the whole time. When he met her, he was not looking for a wife. He had no plans, he does not go to meetings to learn what the people need, where they are at, why everybody is moving around. He had friends in college but they were becoming too poor for him, he would not help them, he no longer understood them. He lived very narrow, rich and comfortable, he does not stress himself with people out of work, families with no safety in the country. His rich friends leave one by one, he is the one who stays. All he knows is his friendships and his country's traditions. They introduce his future wife to him. He has to agree or they will come back and so-call invade and take him to his own wedding. His poor friends leave him to take care of the country and the people. He was useless and in love. He fell in love very hard, he met her family. They would never leave him.
    She was beautiful, she had plans, she had education, her family has good communication. He never knew he liked a family like hers. He wants to be showy, not too much. He does not have a skill, they teach him how to delegate and how to hire. Then he was too much trying to impress her. One last time to be sure. His school mates did not want to be part of what he wanted to do. He wanted to have sex with many different women. How is that supposed to impress her? Ha asked. He was going to experience everything before he decided. She has to protect his privacy, the same way I found out how. If she does not care and she wants to go ahead, she is the best.
    Her family was uncomfortable they heard rumours he might be behaving strangely. They want to know everything. I was the one they hired, I know everything. He had sex with four women in two weeks, it was very quick. I remember that time clearly, day by day. He would tell me his opinion of each one, I could not interfere. One was a prostitute he found somewhere off-campus. He brought her to the campus and terrified his dormitory mates. He drank and scandalized himself, he did not care. He told me right afterwards he had no regrets with that one. I picked him up in the middle of the night, he was passing out. Well, Master, solve your problem. I have to take the lady home. She is upstairs and you sneaked her onto campus with my car. You do not even have a license, you cannot leave campus unless I am the driver of my car. I am not the student. He did not hear me, he went to sleep. Okay, I go upstairs and tell the lady she has to leave, do not worry about the dude sleeping in the car. I take all his money out of his wallet and pay her a portion. He is running low on cash. She can do me a little favor the next day. She wanted to give me a blowjob, it was cheaper than what she did with him. I did not mean sex, but I do not oppose, since she needs a portion of petroleum. If anybody beats him up downstairs in my car, I have his money, his entire wallet, and I am busy getting a blowjob. Those rich people have perfect security, but they need their privacy so they do not scandalize the people. You look into their wallets, they seem like everybody else who has a job. But they carry a few items none of us have. They have a state card that says they are nobility or royalty or friendly non-invaders. They do business with that one card. You lose their card, it is such a hassle. They have to personally run around prioritizing themselves, it attracts a lot of attention. It is like calling the police, somebody stole the crown jewels, and all the rich families nearby are responsible and have to cancel taxes and get to work. Why would anybody call the police for any other reason!
    People know that without them, people like me cannot put petrol in the car. I was specialized to adapt from the time I was a boy growing up that way. I was chosen to accept roads and cars and petroleum. It is very competitive. I was lucky to meet the count. I volunteer, see how it is, what he does and how he does it. There is no turning back. If I volunteer, I let go of every other car mechanic. It is a skill but it is not my life anymore. I spend two more weeks with the mechanics, and I start earning the count's trust. Rich people have a special account. That was in the 1970s, not long ago. They already had a plastic card, technology that was years ahead of us common people. It was exactly like a credit card, it is the only way to pay, and there is a special machine to take the information from the rich people card. They do not pay for only one car, one tank of gas at a time. I have to number how many cars should be on the road, how many drivers in the area, how skilled are the mechanics, do we need anything. They pay like they are the utility company. They pay for the whole county for the whole year. I can pay for a prostitute ten times a week by fixing cars. I can own a car I fix, but I can never drive his car any other way. He essentially owns 200 cars from the college to the petrol station, any driver would be foolish not to serve a nobleman. You meet one of them, you volunteer, your children will be going to school with his children, you understand?
    For young women of college age, they skip college because they cannot afford it, they walk everywhere. Everybody has to walk. People in cars have big business, common people have to take care of themselves. Prostitution is the only way to connect people who walk to the grocery stores and people who own the grocery stores. When old people cannot walk anymore, the government will not print paper pension money, no such thing. The count knew what he was doing. It is a rare privilege, he was going to give a “clinic evaluation” to women in the area. Lots of women arrived in the county, it is good for the old people. They have young people who want to get an easy job living with them taking care of domestic chores. By evaluation, he is serious, he risks his loin between his legs. He finds them on his own, he will not tell me how, only he can do it. He tells me afterwards why.
    All else being unequal, is it only sex? Is having sex the great equalizer? Was being born a nobleman meant his family can forget their manners and they are as common as everybody else, they offer nothing different if children is that easy. It is not that easy. Sex is easier than keeping a family together. So let's get the easy part out of the way. He interviews each one before and after. Based on the women's answers, he calculates when it would be a good time to be conservative and stay with one woman. He found out a lot about himself. I tell you this because they are the last of old Europe. There will not be another generation like them. They live like World War I and II never happened. Of course it did, they know that, but they fight for their families and bring their workers together.
    There was one woman he could have loved her easily. He did love her, and that one was not his wife today. She had a personality he wanted to be with all the time. I'll skip the bedroom part, he told me so much. He did not care about her family, she was not that dependent on them. He hid away with her for days, like having an affair. Every morning he would wake up with her, he begged to be her friend, her lover, her student, even her husband if she would give him permission. She ordered him to decide.
    That was senseless, he got sick. He had no idea how to deal with that. She was stuck taking care of him, getting him to stop being so sick. She was good about it, she would not have sex with him if he did not regain his strength. She did not enjoy taking advantage of him, especially when he was shy and— that is the way people like him are, sometimes moody about how personal and far into the future a decision about family should be. He wanted to be the father of her children, he could not accept his stupid head was deceiving him, because he liked the other family. They were more well connected, they had experience and loyalty. He said to me he was being tested whether he wanted strength or not. A strong father was a good man, and a good friend is a life of happiness. He chose hapiness. He is allergic to the military, he was so young at the time. He does not toil, he avoids hardship. I tell him, I do not defend him with a rifle. To run everything smoothly, one has to adapt to toiling and not complain. His hardship is all emotional. When he loses his emotions, he is confused and sick. He does not eat, he does not sleep, he worries and worries, only he can lose power and freedom at the same time. He wants to be a robot and murder a soldier is what he fears. He is afraid if he gets started, he would never stop until he shames his family and gets himself killed. That woman, perhaps he wanted to go slowly, to mature slowly, to spend his time not regretting either.
    He still has no regrets having his three children. They raised the first two together with his wife their mother. He wanted to be involved. He is such a student about the military, he is happy again. Where he forbids his children from asking any questions. He is the boss on one side and the student on the other. And half of it is between his ears, not his legs. He can focus with them, they have discipline. It is a different happiness, one he earned slowly. He gets along with military children, he is the exact nobleman he was always meant to be. He is invited, volunteered, to participate in military affairs, he is not avoiding anymore. He has to learn ceremony and ritual and be available. That is how the Americans want him to redistribute taxes and savings, not get involved in selling weapons and imprisoning workers. He cannot sign papers in America, but he is still quite powerful and not as young as the Americans. He has home economics down to a science, he has standards about dress and manners and etiquette, people ought to follow and treat themselves seriously. His friends here wonder if he wants to die in America. His activities are strange, he is a simple human getting detached from complications.
    Was it something the French caucus said at state meetings? Yes. He was above the fashion and the parlaying. He was beside the partisanship and beneath the faulting. Without his wife, he focused to fill himself, he did not feel incomplete for the first time in a long time. He put in the minimum time for a gentleman in exile, no staying for debates to him. The pageantry of state could not be just any state. It could not be imperial, it could not be Ottoman or Catholic. He felt civil, that is who he is. Civil enough to go right back to displaying how needy he wants to be, he would supplicate in private for the right person. Whether that is genuine or not, or he is learning manipulation and testing it out, you know a few persons who are the opposite or the same. You cannot meet him at this point in his life if you did not have sufficiency and adequate examples. It takes a whole room with billions of dollars at stake, walking out one time only is like living in prison for six months with everybody but the punishment is the worst on people like him. They make the wrong deal, it will kill them. Nobody cares to assassinate them. His fate is with the people. He could shrivel away, their miscalculation eats them alive much more rapidly. It is not honourable to loot and lie about it, he cannot be that way. The count says it is not natural.
    The twilight of the human. Is that where he is at in his life? I am the same age as his son. I have adopted Gothic culture because Britain is sometimes too overbearing. As far as Catholics go, we are at peace without asking anymore why the Reformation happened. From a land-locked country, if the count has to attend an investiture, that is so formal around here. His manservant explained. He is rallying the professionals. He's been holding back all this time. Now he has a purpose he can let his wife make her decisions and tell him, he will consider everything. His job has been missing him for thirty years, the place and timing is right. Like you say, the French word, she bought a chateau in the countryside already, she told her children but not him. I want to know, too. A rich woman who is a mother is not an exile in Europe. If he goes back to Italy, he has a job forever but no family. If he loves his friendships in Austria, he does not want to move up loving his friendship in Austria. It's better than the USA. So they hire NATO, and he has to get along with hiring the Americans. That he wants to know about, seems suspicious to him. He knows professionals and administration and the service industry. Do not underestimate them when they are not as desperate as other people say about them. He meets a few military companies, they say they are professionalizing their military, he has standards. None of them could be a squad of butlers and maids for his wife. They have to grow up on a farm, those are the only professionals he trust. He wants the best staff to go home with him. He does not do statecraft, he does home rule. The Americans fill out a form and fax silly rules around to get a big box of toothpaste that ends up at the front door of a Christian church. And that is professional to the Americans. Why should he raise a civil order when the military service corps do not go along with him? He is not a prince of any state. They have been too strange, killing armies and overtaxing navies. He sees right through it. There is no radar to fly under. Is he inspecting the Air Force? she asked.
    You may know as much as you are volunteered, or assigned, by your sponsor. It is time. The count joined her outside. Listen to what the children want you to do. I am required to be at the ceremony in two weeks. Ha figured she would get the memo. I want to speak to you about factories. The Chinese want to give out loans. The Indians want to arrive and style themselves as middle class professionals but they are not. The Europeans are not honest about whichever security regime. You should know better than to buy anything from a factory, you are not in uniform right now. You must buy from farms from now on. America is running out of land, the people are under pressure to stay at factories. I know the difference when oil became the top commodity of concern, service has slumped with higher demand but lower wages. Standards are not better merely because more petroleum is being used to make clothing that does not last for adults.
    I do not want your country's disappointment on my conscience. You have to be wiser. You have responsibilities. You are lucky China is far, far away. Pick one out of three. In the next two weeks, you tell me about a Chinese entourage good enough for a civil order with you as an adult living with everybody where you should be. Do you need a Chinese bureaucracy? Are they that good? I have met a few of them. Five years from now, if you are pregnant without a good group of trusted friends, you will be the one in exile, and that puts me out in pain.
    You cannot fix the oil dependency with Chinese labour, you should not have that much welfare manipulating workers and families. Listen to the European democrats, they have a few things to say to you and me in the next few days. Hold your tongue, I will listen carefully when they speak. The visiting Chinese bureacrats told me they are volunteering for you, and for me also. Use their flexibility. Every few months in America, I am losing allies and staff. My money disappears, I cannot investigate, I cannot prosecute, it is a trend the American government no longer say they have committed a crime against exiles. Why would they? Including American-born staff! I see the Chinese are the same as people expect, they get sick in China learning about global demand. Just to fill an order request, they come all the way to America, and there is no professional staff here. Somebody stole state money to go on vacation, they leave exiles behind to be the only workers who know anything. There is wealth, and there is evil.
    You do not know my wife. She has started a divorce! I am the natural father of my children. You must take care of the farmers here, I am about to lose a state in Romania, several counties. It is possible I could lose a state, you understand? My wife is buying machines from somewhere in Europe, she is going to kill me. Machines, technology, and weapons. Every male in my family will disappear. We will be extinct. There is no prison or slavery for my family, but our workers will be sold to whomever America is migrating, the South Americans, I do not know for sure. Everyone is too busy and not relaxing, they are in crisis over jobs. Bankruptcy could happen to many countries, whether it is propaganda that bought bankruptcy or hiding bankruptcy. It is not only about jobs, are you listening to me? Bureacracy is not part of a civil order while it is trapped in an American dream. It is not truly democracy. You have to organize workers in the current republic. Stay where you are needed and work properly. I do not have such a job, I would never qualify. Do not worry about families on state welfare. I understand the German children younger than my son. I have to take care of my family first. Make sure your young German friends stay in reality. Everything will be all right for them.
    His prospects were only good enough for another round of survival. His happiness would soon be mitigated into living out of a hotel he could own in the city. After the investiture, he would be walking away as no longer a European nobleman. Ha could not call him a count. He was the equivalent of an American marquis, and he wanted half of the visiting Chinese to stay in America to be his permanent staff. __
    He could visit his Romanian family, with permission from his ex-wife, and haul Chinese staff with him, he did not care. He wanted them to speak both Chinese and Romanian, one language at a time. They had a plan for integration back into Romania and avoiding heavy EU taxation. It was no pretense but a state treaty less painful than otherwise. He could skip the personal downturn and get a second, younger wife. Not interested. He wanted a female companion his age, like how he met his wife in college. He wanted his adult children to regard his companion like a step-mother. He had no energy left for a second family, only business and bureaucracy he was good at. He found an American woman, vivacious, unassuming, a country smart woman like himself. She let go of her adult children to be with his. She used her own last dollars to meet them in Romania and gradually move out of America.
    His son was a big part of the divorce. He sacraficed himself in Italy to pacify his mother. The old Romanian count was turning into a conservative hyphenated socialist-democrat in his 60s. He forced his son onto land management, over farms and dirt simple real estate all the way out in America. His son was glad to stay in Italy and out of his mother's snares.
    Several years went by, his son untied Ha's tongue. You may lecture my mother now. She is next to me and my responsibility. Skip the part where she is sorry crooked engineers misled her into false security. She is in a lot of trouble. You are a humble military friend of my father who knew him from many years ago, and you are a woman. My father is ready to sign a modified treaty. My mother agrees to not disrespect my family in Romania. My father is still a blood count there, she lied that he could no longer maintain home rule for his country's sovereignty. She wanted to be richer than she should be serious, I cannot endure much longer. My father's companion is strong and bearing up and accepts me and my siblings, my mother has been divorced for a long time. The count's staff (he mentioned his father's official state rank) has a greeting for all of us in Chinese, Italian, English, Romanian, and in French, or my mother would have spent these past few years in prison before we have this meeting. The prosecutor and attorneys will have a separate meeting to take her off parole and release her from the condition of house arrest. Please read the greeting, we will meet again in a few days after my mother is released. Ha silently read the greeting, which was short, approximately four or six sentences. It was serious diplomacy. She knew how to scope the upcoming “lecture” to a woman she never met. Ha was passed to the Chinese, who wrote a few more matters but in Chinese, they did not care if Ha understood nothing they wrote. They understood it was best for Ha to write down her lecture and have every word approved by the count and his staff.
    It was addressed to his son. His mother would be present to listen and would have the opportunity to appeal or respond, to say something appropriate.




Oh, sheesh, why let civilians die in mesmerism, what a job bottling the Genie. Shoegazer was right, her love meant something to Ha. She smoked four more cigarettes pondering authenticity as a topic for the Riot grrrl song.
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