Tamberlin's Account (8 page)

These stations are just run by people. People are selfish. People tend to favor some people more than others. A lot of times people get put in positions because of connections, not qualifications. People can be really stupid. Power corrupts. And people are the kind of animals that when running to get or get away, trample people to death.

I choose to head toward Chicago. But I’ll be swinging wide.

I'm playing my iPod so I don't hear the dead saying nothing on the radio.

Instead I’m hearing Anneke Van Giersbergen’s
Drive
.

And I’m singing along, hard and loud.

The sun is setting and the world, again, looks beautiful to me. Even the chaos that collapsed on us is beautiful if you can imagine it worse.

I can.

I've already imagined worse for everyone and everything and we need to not think that—about any of that.

You're breathing.

Maybe that's as good as it gets, but I need to tell you, that's enough to live off of.

Maybe I can say that because I haven't been hurt like maybe you have.

I don't want to compare scars.

I'm just coping.

So I'm going to go for now - forward, ever forward - and tonight I'm wishing all of us—ALL of us, the best.

Oct 29 9:24am

I LOVE MUSIC.

Maybe I’m getting old, but I don’t often find bands anymore that I like—I like just what I like. What I liked.

          Two that I picked up just before the reunion:

Imagine Dragons—I bought
Night Visions
just because I like dragons and I had a gift card I hadn’t gotten around to using. Not great reasons…I didn’t realize that I’d heard some of their songs before because the radio station I listened to most rarely bothered to say who did the music they played.

And The Neighbourhood’s
I Love You.

Staying Up
is playing right now. This isn’t a “park for a moment and write” song, so I’ve got to go.

          But they’re amazing bands. Worth remembering. And I feel grateful that they are two less in a billion good things that I will not have had to miss out on.

12:44pm

I wish I knew how to siphon gas.

2:00pm

Ok. That sucked. In all ways.

I threw up. Yeah, I can really afford to do that.

I've got Minnesota, Illinois and Iowa road maps now—along with my Wisconsin one.

It's hard to travel near the cities where perpetual traffic jams block everything.

I'm gonna find a system that works for getting around all the abandoned vehicles. I know—no cities.

That's all I've got so far.

5:23pm

I pulled over because I had to pee. When I went around to the passenger side, Mr. Ages was wriggling like a puppy on espresso. I was apologizing for making him wait when he bolted out. I was left in his dust as he made after a raccoon.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I groaned.

I went after him—I wanted to call him back, but I didn’t dare yell. I heard him barking, but I couldn’t see him. I chased for about a mile before he ran up from
behind
me with a look on his face like, “Where the hell have
you
been?”

I wanted to scream that he was a bad. But instead I just walked past him, back toward the road.

Cheerfully, perhaps forcibly playful to make good for being a shit head, Mr. Ages danced beside me. My emotional mind saw the “Snoopy Dance” going on in my peripheral vision. I remembered that the car was still on and, even as my lungs complained, I managed to get into a jog.

By the time we got back and in the car, Mr. Ages probably felt like he was out of danger. He must have sensed I just couldn’t punish him.

“Don’t ever leave me,” was all I could choke out.

After a couple miles he got antsy and he kept walking in circles in the seat—his bum-hole pursing like kissy-lips.

“You are a
bad
dog!” I snapped.

I wanted to make him wait a while longer, but if he made a mess then I’d be punished by punishing him.

Then I remembered that
I
really had to piss.

I braked hard and Mr. Ages poured into the floor space below the seat. I grabbed the accessible travel tissue pack and jumped out and “made due” behind the door after Mr. Ages shoved past me—nearly doing the splits as he went hard on the gravel shoulder.

I didn’t know dogs could get boners shitting. So fucking nasty!

We got back in the car.

I looked at the creature who shared total dependency with me.

“You need to stay with me,” I told him.

Oct 30 9:57am

Am at a state park. I can't help thinking how close I am to where Marie lives.

Henry Ellis said: “All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.”

There’s something I can't know—not now. I can't bear to. My mind imagines enough—realizing any of it—no.

Mr. Ages killed a squirrel and a rabbit. He ate the squirrel. I think the rabbit is for me.

I'm going to start a fire and hope we don't get any attention. It's been quiet so far, here. I found some canned goods in the campgrounds and Mr. Ages barked when there were busy bodies. That high pitched bark/scream.

How miserable to be a dog - a good dog - and be afraid. It's engrained in them to face that danger, that intruder, for us.

I'm going to boil some water because I don't have any. At least there were several cooking pots and stuff in camps. I'll boil it and fill my bottles when it cools.

Mr. Ages drank when we reached the creek—so I got water upstream. No offense to him!

I'm taking the camping supplies I think I can use—most of it's pretty useful, actually.

I got a Black Diamond LED headlamp. That could have been the only thing I found and I’d be delighted.
I
feel improved… not just my situation.

If, when this is read (if it’s ever even found) things have improved, you might not know, understand or remember how much darker the world was when this was happening.

There are no far off glows of clustered buildings, streetlights, car lights, neon lights. There are no random lights on in the middle of the night where you wonder who is up and why would they be at this hour. There’s nothing in the night, but stars and moonlight.

The air is like ink and the animals in it are excited by the news that they own the world again.

Amongst the sounds it’s easy to lose track of what’s moving where.

Depth perception? Forget it.

Last night I pounced on the dark with my flashlight blazing because I heard “something.”

I found a gnarled tree… it was just a tree. Until I checked elsewhere and when I looked back and I realized

I’d actually seen the skeletally thin busy body had been embracing it before, gray and ragged as bark itself, now slinking toward me.

11:20am

Had salt and pepper from a camp—the rabbit was pretty good.

Mr. Ages got the guts. He’d probably eat the fur too—he was definitely interested, but I put it in someone's suitcase so he couldn't get at it.

I wonder what his life was like. Who was/were his master(s)?

Does he think about them?

It's not as obvious anymore, having been together this long, but it
was
obvious he missed something.

Separation from me is that much harder for him because of it, I think.

He was frantic when I came back with the car.

I wish I'd done at
my
house what I did at the second place I stayed at—I left the key in the door, in case someone else came by.

But I hadn't intended on never returning.

How many people is that true for?

Oct 31 8:41am - HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

I got a treat—only one pack of graham crackers was missing from the box. It wasn't even open.

Something got into the marshmallows that had been in here—maybe even Mr. Ages.

I heard him grunt when he was trying to poop this morning.

Knock on wood.

No tricks yet.

I'd love an RV—there are a couple nice looking ones here—with gas!

Three problems:

No keys

Maneuvering them between vehicles—driving them at all!

The MPG

Don't even have to think about the other problems after the first.

Am going to do one more sweep for supplies and move out.

P.S. So far nothing weird—or do I have to wait until evening?

Is it stupid? I’m actually pretty nervous.

11:50am

I couldn't leave it alone. I came across a road I knew eventually went within a mile and a half of the country road to Marie’s home.

It was eerie pulling up to a familiar place.

I didn’t really want to look at it, lest I should
see
: vandalism, blood, bodies or zombies. Just seeing a yard that was cared for neglected was an unignorable headline that everything had changed. I turned my back on the house to use the hood of my car to write a note to this friend I’d known for decades.

I don’t' know if she was there. I don't want to know – only if I could know they were okay.

If she's wondering, then she'll know I am.

As I was writing, I was sure I
heard
a voice beckon me to turn around. The hair stood up on the back of my neck. The call was strong enough that I involuntarily turned my head about three inches – despite how readily I resisted it. I used a couple bandages to hang the note on the mailbox and edged toward the car, with my back to the house.

The something called to me more urgently. It said, in a voice I
really
heard, “You’ll never know, unless you know.”

I closed the car door and locked them. Then I allowed myself to look toward the source of the summons. The eight black eyes of the double garage door stared at me. And terrified me.

I lost a little time then—the next thing I remember, I was turning off the dirt road and heading back to the last point of my intended path. I would never go anywhere near there again.

“I can’t!” I remember crying out to no one and everything.

Mr. Ages stared at me.

My hands shook uncontrollably on the wheel. The trembling worked up my arms and I felt it in my throat.

My friends.

My friends.

My friends.

I couldn’t hold my head steady. My vision blurred, but I was going back the way I came – I felt confident in remembering what was on the road and of being alone in it—and, at that time, even in the whole world.

I couldn’t listen to it.

I wouldn’t look.

I
couldn’t
look.

What if her car wasn’t in the garage?

9:26pm

I missed the state line via little back roads. I
think
. I don't know where I am. Car said I was heading south. I stopped to let out Mr. Ages.

And someone shot at me.

I didn't know what to do. Yell? Say, "Hey, I'm alive - don't shoot!"

If you've seen the same movies I have you'd just haul ass, like I did.

If they are bad—I hope I'm not going toward them.

If they are good... I dunno.

If they are somewhere in between—most likely really...

Okay, but they
shot
at me.

How many zombies travel with dogs???

Nov 1 4:04pm

Okay—in
Dawn of the Dead
, after the douche, prick, coward Stephen is dead
and
if
Roger hadn't been bit, I could ride this out with them. I think they're the best group I can think of from a post-apocalyptic movie. I guess there are a couple others I wouldn't mind. The good guys in
The Stand
would be the best
community
to be with.

Do you ever ask yourself “if” questions?

Sometimes I think about those things to occupy my mind.

If I get tired of that I also entertain myself with: if I could eat anything right now, what would it be?

If I found the perfect place to make a go of it, in this situation, what would it have to have?

If I had to be stuck in a zombie apocalypse with one person living or dead would I rather it was this person or that person?

And I can do that two ways—to switch it up I can choose between two people I'd hate to be stuck with or two people that I think it might be okay—most often I go fictional.

- or -

I can change how many people are involved. Or have groups like: Would I rather be in a zombie apocalypse if I HAD to—with the
Golden Girls
or the
Designing Women
?

I'm sure you got it before the example.

There are worse things I could think about.