Rockville

“I opened the door, walked in. Then I saw a lot of broken glass by the window and it was so resplendent, it hurted to look at, like someone was deliberately reflecting sunlight in your eyes. I saw Ronan watching TV but I couldn't tell what exactly he was watching. I start to go sit beside him but then I noticed a hole in the carpet, about the size of a bowling ball. When I go over to look into it, it was just pure black down there. That's is when I started getting scared. The hole started to make a weird, gargling sound and then started spewing a flow of silver coins slowly out onto the carpet. Ronan was still oblivious to my presence and to the coin hole, his face was firmly facing the TV. I started sweating buckets. The coins were coming out in one messy mass, all trembling and slimy, moving towards me. I couldn’t look but was forced to. I ran over to Ronan, but he was still unaware. But then when I grabbed his collar, he turned around slowly, his eyes still on the TV and asked me what the matter was in his calm, soft voice. This was the worst part. In my peripheral vision I could see the silver slug making its way around the couch, slow but determined. Ronan was no longer there and I started to panic. Is it death? What is it? I couldn't breathe. It felt like someone was squeezing the air out of my body. Then, the sweating started to overwhelm me, I could feel it dribble down my neck and face, I could taste it in my mouth. So I started to wipe it off energetically, closing my eyes. The TV started to hum loudly and I tried and look at the image on the TV but I couldn't. Something was stopping me. It felt like someone was twisting my head so that no matter how I hard I tried I couldn't look directly at the TV. Then I’m in my bed still wiping furiously but it’s dry by then.” My throat was dry; I drank some of her coke. She sat there silently for two minutes, looking at the cracks in the table top. She finally said “That’s really confusing, really weird. You should talk to my mum; she interprets dreams and stuff like that”. “I just had to tell someone, it really freaked me out” I explained, “Oh, and I know the feeling. I always have fucking weird dreams. One time, I dreamt I was in this empty room and all I could hear was the pipes which were incredibly load, booming.” She slammed her fists on the table to demonstrate. Then she dropped the earring she had been toying with into her cereal.
“Then the pipes exploded and tons of pigeons came out, screeching and flapping. Ugh, it was awful”
“How many times did you have the dream?”
“Um three times and then it went away. I wouldn’t worry if I were you”. I went to the library to work on my dissertation. That’s how it started, completely innocuous and simple. I just shrugged it off and went on with my life.

I had been at UCL for five years; I was working towards a career as a journalist. I enjoyed university and I used to love being in London. It had so much character, so much to do. As with most big cities, there was variety in everything: restaurants, nightlife, housing,neighborhoods, people, hobbies. I was so spoiled for choice that I ended up doing nothing. But it was starting to get claustrophobic during my last year. It is a stubborn city. You can build new buildings and put new roads down but it will still refuse to change. It was the city of Literature that produced so many great writers but that was a long time ago. I knew the smell of each street like the back of my hand. I walked from Hyde Park to Victoria Park and wanted more. I bumped into people I knew all the time. What really frustrated me though were the attitudes of some people. If you told people you were a writer, you were automatically put in the pretentious pile; the profession had lost all its legitimacy at least for those who write under the age of 27. Most of the students were just following the “life path” they assumed was the right one. They were at University and they were young so they had to be entertained, amused all the time. They had to drink, they had to dance. It’s interesting how quickly people can change regarding their environments. I mean at the beginning I never wanted to leave, it was completely alien but safe, new and wonderful and I wanted to know it in its entirety but once I did I realized it was no different than where I came from. I didn’t know where I would go after that.

I ended up in Rockville, Maryland in 2008 because I had been offered a work opportunity I couldn’t resist.I had managed to get an internship at one of the better Wahington D.C newspapers. I felt I could achieve more there; I could write more and I could experience more. It was a very satisfying time for me. There were so many opportunities and possibilities. I would commute to Washington every morning and then come back to the golf courses, country clubs and imported furniture of Rockville. I lived in my Aunt's apartment while she was out in South East Asia with UNICEF. It was a nice place, modest, understated. African icons and statues complimented the soft colours of the walls, everything was carefully arranged to be understated. The ceilings were high, the floors were wooden. My neighbors were successful investment bankers and young lawyers. All of the men kept their golf clubs in the boot of their car, just in case.From my windows, I had a good view of Maryland Avenue and everything passing by slowly. Despite my discerning disapproval for the american bourgeois, I felt comfortable here. I had been given the internship through a professor at UCL who had passed on some of my essays and some of my creative writing stuff; also I had worked quite a bit on the university’s magazine.

I met with other writers regularly, I was writing everything: stories, essays, poems, songs, scripts. There was no end to it, in retrospect not all of it was outstanding but it was still part of that constant, wonderful flow. Then I would share my work with the group and they would react. We would meet in someone’s bare apartment, sit on the floor and drink coffee. It was all very unglamorous but the work itself had the fervor and the hunger, it was daring, it was necessary. Our young minds were hitting a plateau but we believed it to be the peak, like an explorer who was given the wrong map. But the songs and the stories that came out of all those midnight meetings and weekends at someone’s cabin were brilliant. I met Howard Berman at one of these midnight brainstorm parties. We were introduced by a mutual friend and just by looking at him I knew he was a powerful creative force, the reckless kind, the kind that will risk everything to achieve near perfection. “You’re the Englishman everyone’s been talkin’ bout”
“Ah, Yes, I also go by the name Geoff”
“Nice to meet you Geoff, I’m Howard. I came up here from Tallahassee to make some movies”
He was a large man: broad shoulders, strong chest. I looked like a boy next to him.
“How is that working out for you?”
“We’ve managed to get 3 independent films made and distributed and we’re looking for funding for a fourth. What about you? What’s a boy like you living in a place like this for?”
“Well actually, I live in Rockville. I intern at the Washington post, I am also unsuccessful writer”
He opened a beer for me with his huge hands and passed it to me.
“Ah, a writer, such a rare species nowadays. What do you write?”
“Mostly short stories, some scripts and a couple of plays but I’m more comfortable in prose”
“Well, we could always use another script writer, If you’re interested. Here’s our card”
He handed me a piece of yellow cardboard with the words “AOK productions” written in biro and his number. We sat on the couch as more and more people piled into the small cottage. A few people started playing some oriental sounding music behind us on the old,broken piano. There were three people rehearsing a play in the kitchen. Maybe it was the wine but it felt wonderful to be around so much creation even if it wasn’t necessarily great music or theatre.. Howard became increasingly friendly as the hours and beers passed.
“You know what all this is right?” he asked
“A good combination of drinking and creating?”
“No. This is reminiscing my friend. These people long for a time that they weren’t part of. They all think they’re Ginsberg or Lowell. That’s all this is, an elaborate game of dress up. Dress up as Allen and dress up as Earnest.”
“What’s wrong with wanting to be Hemingway?”
“He was a drunken idiot!, look if you ever want to write something really good, come write for me. I make films that need to be made, films that say something important. Now, I’m going to leave the party in a mysterious fashion”
“Get home safe”
He muttered something else as he stumbled out onto the porch. I kept thinking about what he said the following day. It was nagging me that there was truth to what he said, I was afraid that everything we were creating was just to serve our vanity. I tried to forget about it but I ended up calling him and thus we started to become friends.

At university I was determined to reach a higher potential. To be better. I would lock myself in a corner of the library and read everything, anything. I wanted to meet people who read the same books as me, watched the same movies, thought about the things I did. Everyone around me was more concerned by their dicks and their suffering. I’m a man and of course I have the same desires but I refused to let them define me. Going to parties and talking about parties to come. Talking endlessly about the trivial and the transient. Sometimes I can’t believe how much apathy there is in the world. People too lazy and afraid to care about their own lives. Teenagers passively rolling through the system becoming passive adults with problems and issues. Now, I’m not suggesting he should be working incessantly but at least be motivated, care about your work, care about your life. Is it laziness or is it fear? Are people afraid to be great? Afraid to reach for a higher potential? Leisure has become the ultimate end to our lives. Nothing else matters. We have become a hammock society. I fall into this state as well. Sometimes I feel so vapid and disconnected it frustrates me. Can you imagine if Plato decided to masturbate to some tawdry images instead of working on the Republic or if Joyce decided to go bowling and play in the arcade instead of writing? Human creativity seems to have hit a wall, post modernism doesn’t even try and ascend the obstacle instead it talks about it in a clever, witty way. Everyone references someone else, every song or book is heavily “influenced” by those that wrote and sang before us. We are stagnating. This is a topic I have spent a considerable amount of time contemplating so I do not believe I am being dramatic or hyperbolic. This is something bigger than the middle east, bigger than Labour and Tory, this is a deep rooted, modern affliction that chokes human creativity and creation in general.

So this brings me to the centre of this journal. The dream was usurping my life. My sleeping suffered greatly; I would go a couple of weeks without sleeping and then have 4 or 5 hours sometimes. I would throw up at night and sometimes I would be completely slimy with sweat. I couldn’t deduce what it was about the dream that made me react so violently. Was it that horrible slug? Was it the fact that Ronan wouldn’t look at me? I had so many questions. I told my aunt and she was greatly concerned. She demanded that I see her personal doctor and therapist. My parents sent me to a counselor when my shoplifting out of hand and she told me the shop lifting was a manifestation of my misanthropy but that didn’t stop me from shoplifting. Ever since that experience with Dr. Calloway I stayed away from therapists.

Of course I still went to see the Doctor and the Psychologist to please my aunt and they gave me horrible medicine that gave me headaches that made me want to tear my head apart. I talked to him. I told him about my parents, my mother’s death, and my personal history. At first he thought I was gay and this was how my body was telling me. But then I told him about the dream and he was greatly interested. I would sit back in the comfy leather chair and sip the lemonade he made. The fan swishing from left to right. There would be considerable silences. I would listen to the goings on outside, fractured conversations. “You have to leave the money under the pillow”, “Will you keep me company?”, “Get in the car!” He would bring me back into the room, “Why do you want to see the TV so bad?” he inquired. The question jarred me; I was still between …… street and Dr. Korman’s practice. It was so obvious it hit me hard. I would write more about these therapy sessions but there not relevant to the plot. That's another story.

I had been living in Maryland for 3 months and was trying to focus on my writing. I would work full time at the post and then come home and write until late at night. I told Howard about the dreams. He came from a strict, Jewish family that he tried to distance himself from. “The only part of Judaism he admired” he told me “was the hair”. Subsequently he had a huge beard. At first he was bored, thinking it to be another “psychedelic’ dream, but once I told him about the television he leant toward me with curiosity. He was dead silent for a couple of minutes, waiting to drop his idea on me. “We could make a film” he said. “We could recreate these dreams onto film, and then if we get it right we can study it and find out what it is on the screen!” He slid closer to me.
“I’ve read a lot about dream theory and dream therapy and I’ve always had this idea in my head. To recreate the dream, to put you back into it, thus allowing us to analyze it more thoroughly” “We have to start a script, I some actors and my uncle owns a great camera. It’s going to be good” he persuaded me. “If I could convert these hallucinations onto the screen I could watch it over and over and could scrutinize every frame” He stood up and looked around the room, “We would have to disguise this as your London apartment, you have pictures right?” I had had little experience with film and cameras in general so I decided to let Howard take care of the project as he had produced a few independent films out in St.Louis. He seemed very excited about the project, I remember him tapping his nails on his desk and twisting his beard between his fingers. –Yeah, it’ll delve deeper than ever before. An absolute subjectivity. Making dreams come true. We both laughed at that. He explained “Dreams are basically your brain that is your subconscious, tricking you into thinking a situation is real. This film will be turning the tables: you’ll be tricking your brain into thinking the situation is a dream. Then you’ll be able to scrutinize every minute detail because your subconscious will think it’s in control”.

So the next day, we spent the whole day in his flat trying to convert my hallucinations into a script. We thought it would be easy to translate absurdity into a story, but of course it wasn’t His flat was pretty big for one person and considering how much he was making as an “independent” film producer. He had his drum kit in the living room and black and white photographs all over the walls. There were his photos mixed with famous photos, photos he liked, photographs of famous people, photographs of famous situations et cetera., It was that time of the year when summer hit its peak, before people started taking it for granted. Sun filled the streets and people filled the parks. Romance and lust were airborne. Seduced by the warm air slipping through the window we couldn’t help but be brought back to our past romances. We spent half the day talking about women. He told me about Camille. She had strong limbs, strong face, and strong all over. She had a tattoo of Descartes on her forearm, which was one of the things that had impressed him so much. She worked as a meteorologist. They spent two years together but had known each other for three. They shared a small flat with a balcony overlooking a corner of Lake Charles. She changed him, then she changed, then she left. It didn’t seem to sadden him thought, he enjoyed reminiscing. In turn I told him of the women I had known and how I had never had a “Camille”. “Geoff. It’s six thirty. I’m sorry I went on and on. We can’t sit here and talk and sip on our tea all day. Let’s get started.” I explained, in great detail, the dream and he put it all together into a story board. He began scratching out images of me and the slug into quick storyboards. I told him quite frankly that I didn’t want this to become anything more than a practical experiment but he wouldn’t have it. He insisted that “it will be art, you can’t control it”. He was really enjoying the details of the dream but for me it was like I was a victim of some crime repeating everything that had happened, over and over.

By then my dreams had become more ubiquitous, I couldn’t just leave it all at home anymore. They would become more intense and their effects would be more violent. This development became clear on Monday 24th of April 2008. It was around lunch time, when I would usually talk to Alisha (a fellow intern) about economy in third world countries or a particular episode of M*A*S*H, but she wasn’t around that day, I wish she had been. I was at my desk, looking out the dirty window and thinking about how to finish a small bit I was reviewing on an auto show. Then I heard a sizzling noise, it reminded me of barbecues when I was a kid I would put my ear to the sausages to hear the sizzle. Then I realized that it was coming from inside of me. I understood what it was immediately: I could hear my cells dying. They were making a terrible sound; a loud fizzing and then a high pitched POP, everywhere: my arms, my mouth, my foot, my chest. It went from being din barely audible in the back of my ear to a loud, claustrophobic experience. Then I remember waking up, like I had just taken a nap. My eyes and limbs felt heavy and my mouth was dry. All of my co workers were around me, looking at me with emphatic eyes. “Are you alright,Geoff?” I was embarrassed as they helped me up. “I’m fine, really. It’s just a side effect of the antibiotics I’m taking”. So, I was sent home, so the people in the office thought I had mental problems, there are worse things in life. I got home and into bed and had that fucking dream again.

I was in too drained to refuse Howard’s proposal no matter how ridiculous it sounded. I was becoming less and less coherent with every passing day. I couldn’t have conversations and I struggled to execute everyday tasks. Everything was beginning to blend, moments would overlap and it was hard to tell which was happening and which was just remembering. I would be at the supermarket and look left and right as I crossed the aisles for fear I might get hit by a car as I thought I was crossing the road.
However, I was still keeping up the appearance of working at the office somehow but the work I was producing was mediocre. Unfortunately, the poems and story I had been working on were completely left to the dust. Here I was, with so many extra hours of the day to use and I was absolutely unproductive.
Emily would build our set. She was reluctant about the idea at first but then she had a sudden change of heart. She had called me at 4:16 in the morning (I remember the exact time because my alarm clock was all I could see). “Geoff! Sorry to wake you but I…. I have had one of the most disturbing dreams I’ve ever experienced” her child like voice made the conversation all the more disturbing. “Does this mean you’ll build it?” I replied half awake. “Yeah, yeah. In fact I’ve started thinking about it all already. I’m on my way over. Get some coffee on!”

After listening to her ideas, we talked ourselves into dawn.
“How does it feel?”
“I have never felt this bad. I’m surprised I haven’t collapsed completely yet”
“That’s awful, I wish there was something I could do. Geoff?” I was starting to fade out of the conversation.
“Yeah, I’m here; what is it?”
“What do you really think of Howard’s idea?”
“I have tried everything else: Therapy, medicine, alternative therapy, alternative medicine. Some helped, but mostly just made it worse. So I’ll give anything a shot”
“I don’t think this is just insomnia. I think it’s much more. I want to help you”

Even in my hazy state, I could tell Emily liked me. But there was something disengenuous about her altruism. I didn't trust her. She put on Monty python to cheer me up. I reached out for her on the other side of the couch and she crept over to kiss me. After we had had sex on the couch, she fell asleep in my bed. I sorted through some of the poems I was writing. I was surprised I could even still have sex. It was refreshing to feel the warmth of her lips, her body but it was a transient release. Afterward I went back to feeling deflated.

On our first day of shooting,we were five: Howard, Emily, I and two of Howard’s friends Robbie and Jacob came along to help out. I was nervous but I didn’t know why, I think I was afraid that the idea was too crazy after all. But I looked on the positive side; I told myself “at least this flop sweat will make my performance more real!” Howard came up to me before we started shooting. My anxiety was obvious I suppose. “You ready to go?” He said holding on to my shoulders. “I’m a little nervous”, I looked around the “set” and it was perfect. The windows were open slightly, there was a slight drizzle outside (replicated by one of Jacob’s machines) that made the windowsill slick. They even found the same cat ashtray that was the centerpiece of our coffee table. “There’s nothing to be nervous about, we’re going to fix this. Ok?” he reassured me. “Yeah, yeah. I’m fine, I’m ready.” I reassured him. Jacob would be playing Ronan. They had done a great job on recreating the slug. We began shooting at 4p.m, Howard wanted to shoot it from 1st person and 3rd person perspectives and then pick the more effective one. So I strapped this big, grey camera to my body and we started. Fortunately it wasn’t like reentering the dream; I concentrated on the camera in my face. I could feel the others watching which was reassuring. I was expecting something magically mysterious to happen but of course nothing occurred. We ran through the routine a few times, tried different shooting techniques
We had finished two days later. Howard, Emily and I edited at his flat. He was tapping his foot excitedly on the wooden floors. I was so weak by then. I could barely keep track of a conversation. I would just watch people’s lips, concentrating on them moving wildly like a frightened animal. I would hear their voices but the sound was flat, like I was in a box.


Howard and Emily left me to watch the finished product alone. They both hugged me and wished me good luck. As I watched them pull away in Emily’s old Ford Taurus I realized the gravity of what would happen in the next few moments. Either I would watch the video, realize what has been driving me to madness, overcome it and get on with my life or I would watch it and nothing would happen, I would continue on the path to a mental breakdown. And over what? A dream? I sat up out of the chair. I couldn’t watch it. It was a ridiculous idea. I would watch it and nothing would happen, I would lose my mind. The video would cause my breakdown. I was breathing pretty heavily by then. I could hear it so loudly, as if someone were breathing into my ear. I walked over to the window for some air, trying to distract my brain with the sights of passing people. I saw an expectant mother get out of a taxi cab, a young delivery man walk into the pharmacy, birds shitting from the roof of Annie’s bakery and flying away elsewhere. This soothed me.
I focused the energy I had left on getting to the computer and sitting down. I cleared my head of all the confused whispers. I ejected the disc, picked it up and squeezed it on both sides until it snapped. The shards flew everywhere, and I laughed out loud. I knew I had made the right choice. Maybe, the film would have had the same conclusion but I knew I had made the right choice. After picking up all the pieces I lay on the kitchen floor for a while.

I awoke to the sound of Emily closing the window because it was raining outside. It was dusk outside; everything had an orange glow around it. When she realized I was awake, she turned around and started laughing. Her childish laughter started me laughing, I could barely keep my eyes open but that didn’t stop me from laughing my head off. She jumped over to the couch and hugged me. Howard came in once he heard all the inane laughing. “Hey, there he is. It worked. I can’t believe it. We got a bite to eat, went to Larry’s and came back around one. You were asleep on the floor. You must have fallen off the chair. This film is a wonder” he spoke with happy fervor. I didn't have the courage to tell him the truth. But I was too relieved to care about my cowardice. Everything was in color, everything was in focus. I was still tired but I felt like I could sleep for ten or twenty hours.

“Lets go celebrate. We can tell the others” Emily said

The three of us got into her car and drove to a bar on the other side of D.C. It was “Irish” themed so the pogues were playing on the sound system. Some of Howard's friends were already there so we joined them in their booth. As Howard told them about our little experiment(with pride in his voice), I looked across at Emily and saw she was looking at me. She rolled her eyes at Howard. It was unusual to feel”normal” or at least recovering to normal. It was as if it were a new state of mind that took some time getting used to. My attention was caught by the large mirror they kept behind the bartender which allowed an almost panoramic view of the bar. I could see everyone. It was half six on a Friday so everyone was coming in from work. There were construction workers, plumbers, city workers, truck drivers and the like. I realized that I would fight with lethargy and fear for the rest of my life, but I had to fight it, that is the price of creation. All of the people at the bar have that same choice. They can drive their trucks across states and wait for their weekend. Live off work, sex and sedation and do nothing else besides that, they make that choice. They fight the same battle I do, they just don't know it. I fell asleep after my second whiskey. I dreamt about nothing in particular.

By Sean Gallen