A CONTINUATION OF PRELIMINARY TEACHINGS, LESSONS, PREPERATIONS, AND ANECDOTES REGARDING THE JOURNEY WEST FOR THOSE PILGRIMS WHO WILL SOON COME OF AGE AND BE CALLED BY THE SETTING SUN AND THE HORIZON WHICH INCLUDES A TRUNCATED LIST OF INDIVIDUALS AND PLACES WHO MAY SEEM HELPFUL BUT MEAN YOU HARM OR VICE VERSA
THE GUIDE
On your journey West, you will find a hundred thousand maps of The City Unending. Some of these maps will be the full captured truth of a cartographer who, even if they lived a hundred thousand years, would never be able to explore the whole of the twisting mass of districts and boroughs between you and the horizon. Other maps will be worse than this, and still others will be so bad that even if used as kindling they will snuff out your fire.
Some Pilgrims on their travels take to collecting and trading the maps they buy from vendors or find in gas stations between themselves while others discard them quickly once they cross into the suburbs of The City Unending.
Even this map, which has been carefully woven from stories gathered from that sharp-toothed skyline could not hope to prepare you for all that waits between you and your destiny. They are but whispered rumors and first hand accounts of an impossible place that waits to welcome you as it has a hundred thousand others.
We can only hope to paint you a picture in colors of what may come to be, even if the shapes may elude us and you. Take your time to recognize the hues and tones of The City Unending even if its geometry is new and unfamiliar, and prepare yourself with whatever maps you may find for when you come of age and chase the Setting Sun.
An interlude
THE GUIDE
Somewhere near the border of the Borough Whimsical, right before you enter the District of Carnivals, there is a shop painted with bright primary colors and a sign that reads, “Carl’s Corner Shop,” but somehow every word starts with a, “C.” This store always seems to be out of the thing you need.
“I would like a pound of dried beef,” you say while waiting at the counter, and the man behind the counter, who is adamant that he is not Carl and does not know who Carl is or why you keep asking him about Carl, will pull a pair of bifocals from the many glasses chains around his neck and don them while blowing dust off the cover of a leger book.
“Well,” he stutters, running his finger through the wisps of hair still clinging to the side of his head, “it looks like we’re all out of pounds of dried beef, but we still have a few pounds of rope hanging around if you’re interested in that.”
When he claps the leger closed, his twenty-or-so hairs are pointed straight up at the ceiling.
“Do you have any dried meat? Or any meat at all?” You then try, and with a whistle Not Carl will don another pair of glasses and leaf through another leger.
“No, no, no,” he’ll say, “That won’t do at all. We’re ran out of every kind of meat this morning. We do, however, have some maps of various cliffsides that just came in yesterday. Does that interest you at all?”
“No,” you burst out, just covering the sound of your stomach growling, “I’m looking for food.”
“Food... food... oh, of course, food, like what you eat. Well, the closest thing we have to food right now is gum. And it is on sale. I don’t remember putting it on sale, but that’s what the leger says.”
And then you leave, still hungry, looking for someone who will sell you food since you don’t need any rope, maps, or gum. Next door is a shop called Mike’s Meat Market, which is also spelled with all, “Cs,” and they are not only happy to sell you meat, they will cook it and put it on bread for you.
And then, later, half way between the top and the bottom of a cliff in the Borough Adventurous, completely lost in the dead of night, and sorely regretting that the tour guide who offered to lead you through the canyon only accepted gum as payment, you will at least not be hungry.
An interlude.
THE GUIDE
Jack the Pocket Thief does not have a home. They used to and, depending on who you ask, it was either in the Borough Theoretical or the Borough Antithetical since both have a District of Disgraced Professors full of people who are tired of receiving other professor’s mail.
Jack the Pocket Thief does not have a job. He used to, and depending on who you ask, he was either a Professor of Mathematics or a Professor of the First Writing Class You Take In College Where You Know The Professor Will Not Read Your Final Essay, But You End Up With a B- and When You Go To Ask About It During Open Office Hours He Has Already Quit Or Been Fired, Depending On Who You Ask.
Jack the Pocket Thief is dead, depending on who you ask. A few people, exes mostly, say that she is dead in the sense that they were at the funeral and saw the body.
A few other people, mostly business associates and previous students, say that she is dead in the sense that when next they see her, there will be a funeral and nobody will want to see the body.
A few other people, parents mostly, say that she is dead and then say, “to me.” These people tend to do more crying than elaborating.
The one thing that everyone agrees on is that Jack the Pocket Thief earned their name because they would steal the pockets right off your pants. When next you would go to find whatever treasures you had stored there, the pocket hole would be gone as if it were never there in the first place.
No one agrees where the contents go, though, and many debates between Jack’s many victims have ended with all parties looking down and realizing that their other pockets had been stolen during the ruckus.
An Interlude.
THE GUIDE
The District of Fish comprises the bottom half of the Borough Piscatorial, and there are fish in it. It is a lake, and that is where fish live. There isn’t much more to say about that.
The District of Fishers comprises the top half of the Borough Piscatorial, and there are fisherfolk in it. It is on top of the District of fish, where the fish live, and this has caused some trouble for the District of Fish.
Currently, the fish are putting aside their differences and preparing for war. Their campaign has reached a bit of a standstill as no one can agree what the uniforms should look like, nor how they’ll be able to manufacture the uniforms once they agree on a design.
The Fishers, on the other hand, are sitting in boats and happy not to be at work today. Except for the fisherfolk who catch fish as a job. They are daydreaming of their upcoming holiday, where they will go into the District of Office Jobs, put on an inexpensive tie, look at a little spreadsheet filled with little numbers, and wish they could do this every day.
An interlude.
THE GUIDE
It is once again time for my breathing exercises, I find that it really helps me focus. I ahev trouble focusing on anything too long, even something as fascinating as The City Unending, so these breaks are for me as much as they are for you. Or at least as much as I hope they’re for you. If any of you are interested in the stretches just let me know and maybe we can do those another time, but for today, take a deep breath in through your nose and hold it. Now out through your mouth. Now again, in, hold, out. In. Hold. Out. And now we continue.
An interlude.
THE GUIDE
On one of the abandoned elevated highways that connects the Boroughs and Districts of The City Unending, there sits a bright yellow sign.
Upon the sign, the words, “KNIVES WANTED!” Are handwritten in capital letters with an exclamation point. An arrow below the words points down to an open wicker basket which is full of sharp, shiny knives.
When you turn around to head back the way you came and away from the basket full of mysterious blades, another sign waits for you. This one reads, “PLEASE KNIVES!” In the same black marker on yellow background. The words are accompanied by a spiraling arrow that apparently means you should turn around and make a donation to the basket which is already overflowing with knives.
When you walk past the second sign, you find the third sign. It is a picture of a sad face that is crying.
The fourth sign reads, “He was crying because of the no knives,” in lowercase letters and the fifth sign reads, “specifically he was crying because of the no knives FROM YOU,” which continues the lowercase letter trend until those last two words.
When you finally make it back to the start of the elevated highway where you have past no less than 37 bright yellow signs berating you for not giving away any of you knives, which you may or may not have even had, you see the final sign. “If you didn’t have any knives you could have just said something,” and it is refreshing to see the lowercase letters again.
Later, a girl selling newspapers manages to get one into your hands and guilt you into paying for it. The front page has a story about a new, “anti-building,” which appears to just be a hole. The second page is bright yellow with the words, “KNIVES WANTED!” Written in thick black ink. An arrow at the bottom of the page points down to a wicker basket at your feet which is filled to bursting with sharp, shining knives.
An interlude.
THE GUIDE
No matter how old you are when you finally come of age and are called West, from then until you reach The Horizon the Setting Sun will be waiting for you each and every evening.
Even when you cross into The City’s Suburbs and then into The City Itself, the Setting Sun will still be there, patient and present as ever, for when you are ready to chase it again. On some nights, weaving your way through alleyways and solving conundrums from shop keeps, you will feel like The City Unending lives up to its name. On other nights, you will swear you can hear the gentle lapping of the ocean and feel the warmth of sand around your feet and sun in your hair.
Some Pilgrims stay in The City Unending for days, some for weeks, some for years, and some for times longer than you or I could think of, but the Setting Sun has called you and you have come of age. Without knowing quite what you’re doing, you will eventually find the end of The City Unending and you will begin your journey to the Horizon once again.
There is always time in The City, use it to make your way through the twists and turns of its Districts and Boroughs and to go West, Pilgrim.
END
