Extinguishing Dreams cp 41 &42

41.1

As he lit the cigarette, Matt was immediately hit by the burning sensation it induced. He had smoked pot as a teen but was certain it never burned his throat like this, this was something entirely different. Unsure if smoking the ‘medicine’ was the right way to go, if it would even do anything – having ingested it through tea the previous time, Matt was soon aware his worries were unfounded. Within seconds of exhaling his second lung-full, he noticed an arch-like horizontal line appearing, pulsating, and transmorphing into a clearer picture of other spiralling and larger lights that pulsed intermittently. More lights appeared and their flashes appeared to be communicating with him in a language he could not quite understand. 2

Already this experience was different from the one back in England and the intensity with which it raged scared him half to death. He managed to calm his nerves slightly by concentrating on his breathing. He watched as his exhalations created circular lights and then started to form a face, it was then he realised the face was that of the old man, the Rene Descartes wannabe, only this time, Matt had no trouble believing it was indeed the true Rene Descartes. His immediate feelings were of anger and he cursed his visitor for stealing his family away from him and destroying his life and his mind. The eyes and mouth of the face were soft and unemotional and they appeared as if sketched in charcoal. 3

There were all sorts of frequency modulations and disjointed pops as the trip continued. All of his senses were on high alert and the cumulative impact emerged, overwhelming his very being as gravity turned on its head and appeared to be beckoning him further into the trip. By now his fear had subsided and Matt allowed himself to be submerged in the experience, to let go and let it take him where he needed to go. Descartes slowly faded into a cloud-like background, he face merged with his cumulous brethren until it became indistinguishable. After he was gone, the words “It is easy to hate and it is difficult to love. This is how the whole scheme of things works. All good things are difficult to achieve; and bad things are very easy to get,” floated around his head in a lexical ballet as a new setting took form, that of two gargoyles. Moments later the gargoyles began to move, slowly at first as if the stiffness of the previous incarnation was being shed. 4

They were standing at opposite ends of a canal surrounded by big trees. Something about this scene was familiar and as her concentrated harder, the gargoyles became Iroquois Indians. They approached and Matt recognised the one on the left from the card he had found in his house. He realised that the tree’s familiarity was also due to its appearance on the same card. Somehow, he had been catapulted into the card. At that point Matt lost any touch with his body and was thrust forward into complete and utter astonishment. He was experiencing the sights and sounds of a traditional Iroquois village but from an out-of-body experience. 5

It was at this point Matt realised or remembered the reason he had taken this trip, images of his wife and child danced around the great tree in larger and larger circles. As the circles grew in circumference, his family drew nearer. He reached out for them but they always seemed to be just out of reach. He stretched with all of his might and suddenly his arms were extending well beyond their physical means. His limbs were now involved in a race to catch up with his family who although appeared to be moving closer, were simultaneously growing smaller and thus entering the further reaches of the horizon. Finally he managed to clasp onto the ankle of his child but as he did so the multi-layered gears of his mind and his sense of self fell away as they were ceaselessly amalgamated and synthesized into the hyper-dimensional objects that made up his mind’s eye at that point in time. 6

He must have fallen from the bed at this point and the resulting physical shock and stimuli from the ‘real’ world brought back some sense of self. Matt was now overlooking his body lying on the motel floor, quivering and convulsing like being shot with thousands of volts. He did not feel sadness having left his body behind, it seemed to him a much clearer way of taking stock, adjusting and processing everything that had taken place within life in the last few months. He was able to feel empathy for the Matt lying on the floor, compassion and for once escape his own meticulous and notoriously harsh self judgement. 7

Suddenly he was aware of presence in the room; a presence that differed from the numerous self’s that he had been studying. Appearing out of sparks and snaps of multicoloured electricity was an Iroquois in full headdress. He approached the Matt that was lying on the floor and placed a hand on his shoulder. Instantly Matt stopped convulsing and twitching and became calm and peaceful. The Iroquois whispered into his ear and the Matt observing was able to hear his words in four dimensional surround-sounds. “You are close my son, seek Deganawida – The Great Peacemaker and your quest will reach fruition.” The Iroquois then addressed each of the Matt’s in turn, sharing words of wisdom intended specifically for each of Matt’s conflicting character traits that had been personified and brought into being.8

Suddenly he was back in his body, his other self’s disappeared into a bright and swirling vortex that had been gradually growing and gaining strength just off in his peripherals and all that was left were slight tracers on the light bulbs he was now left looking up at. Soon these were gone too. He glanced at his wrist watch and realised only ten-minutes had passed in what had seemed like two life-times. 9

Slowly and laboriously Matt picked himself up off the floor and sat back down on the edge of the bed. He was left with an overwhelming sense that he had been closer to the nucleus of the ‘real’ than ever before and his journey, the mystery that was, his ten minute sojourn into the unknown, was pivotal and central in deciphering who we are as humans, who he was as an individual and his connection and interconnection with the world and universe around him. 10

Matt plucked the final cigarette from the Lucky Strike packet and smoked in quiet contemplation as he finished the last remnants of the alcohol he had neglected to finish during his trip. After he had finished the smoke, he took the ashtray and empty box over to a bin that was lying in the corner of the room. As he dropped them into the basket, something floated out of the Lucky Strike pack and landed to the left of the bin. He eyed it curiously before bending down to pick it up. Returning once more to his bed he settled down to examine the foreign item.11

Even before he had unfolded it, Matt had the strangest feeling that it contained something important. It was with quivering hands that the final corner was opened revealing an A6 note. He scanned through to the bottom and his hopes/fears were confirmed when he saw it was signed ‘Lydia.’12

42.13

Confusion reigns with an iron fist. Sometimes confusion is the only thing that made sense in this world of disorder. Contradiction is the overlord, the Messiah; once you accept dichotomy as king, you could begin to make sense of your life, comprehend the incomprehensible. There was only one thing to do and that was continuing on his quest for answers. As Matt booked a tour of the old Iroquois brewery site, still bathed in the pleasant afterglow from his inner journey, he viewed those he passed with a renewed empathy. For the first time in ages – even years – he truly felt at one with his fellow humans. The connection had always been there, he knew that everything within the universe and beyond was inextricably linked, and for once he was not afraid or angry. Things happen, things that were out of our control and all that could be expected of us was to continue onwards and upwards. Sometimes we have to pass through a series of contours, valleys may dominate the horizon and sometimes the only way to pass them by and once again reach a summit was to continue further down the spiral. Once we reach a summit we can become stagnant, undervalue our lot; this is why continued progression takes us through the mountain ranges of our lives and will often send us back - once more into the valleys. The only unforgivable sin was indissoluble negativity. Negativity is a cancer, as malignant as the most aggressive tumour; worse still it was contagious; spreading faster than the Black Death on an overcrowded galleon on a long-distance journey.14

The note had come as a shock but luckily – if there was such a thing – he had the support and fortification from his latest visions and the encouraging wisdom of the Iroquois that had visited him. He had only looked at the letter once and could not even remember what it had said, whether is was truth or lies, insults, apologies or sweet nothing, at that point in time it mattered not. He knew his next step and as much as a part of him yearned for her touch, for her love and the unlikely fairy–tale ending to this bizarre and unfathomable saga, Matt knew that he had more pressing matters to consider, endeavours to prioritise and that is why he left the note, folded neatly, inside his wallet.15

The friendly lady at reception – Maggie was her name – had given him directions to the old brewery. Her husband – now retired, used to work there, as it would seem did most people from the area. Now struggling to pay the rent on their tiny, one bedroom bungalow, Maggie had been forced out of retirement to take up the receptionist position, fighting off applicants half her age, whilst her husband operated an independent tour operator. He was the sole employee of this venture and his entire customer base came through Maggie’s recommendation. She had offered Matt a generous discount on these services as he had found her glasses – on a small table near the foyer’s book-case - but Matt had declined, “no special treatment for me love, as long as your husband can get me to somewhere that allows me to get cash from my credit card – I seem to have mislaid my wallet…”16

They had stopped off at a bureau de change that allowed Matt to withdraw enough cash to last him a few days and were now deep in conversation about what working for the Iroquois brewery. Mr Mann had worked there from nineteen-sixty-five through to when it closed in seventy one and it would seem had enjoyed every moment of it. “It’s not like today…” he mused in a voice teaming with nostalgia, “back then, every break was a beer break…you’d be hard pushed today to be given a cigarette break…back then we would have three beer breaks a day…and I’ll tell you what my son, I’ll tell you what laddie, we deserved it, we bloody did…work hard play hard, that was the theme of the day…of the era…and believe you me, we did both.17

Mr Mann was once a tall man, even now arched with age through years of manual labour, hunching over to ferry crates and kegs of beer from place to place, he was around six-feet tall. His face was wrinkled around the eyes and foreheads, a revealing sight as to the material and emotional hardships he must have faced during his working days and the subsequent days of unemployment that followed the closure of the breweries in Buffalo. 18

As they made their way on foot to the Iroquois sight, passing through the abandoned edifices of numerous other brewers who like the Iroquois had eventually succumbed to the pressures of the larger breweries and had to close their doors, Mr Mann continued, “These brewers, like Iroquois could not compete with the monopolies of Anheuser Busch and Pabst… these larger breweries were able to export their products as well as undercut smaller brewers like Iroquois as they could cut costs due to the huge quantities they brewed daily. Trouble with such a large operation young man, is the soul goes out of the process…it probably sounds stupid to you, but a bit of us went into the Iroquois…I don’t mean literally of course, that would be disgusting…” Mr Mann looked up at Matt at this point and they both chuckled, “But we were heavily involved in the process, all of the lads, blood sweat and tears, passion, every drop of beer was created with love and passion, not like today when the only focus is profit, keeping costs low, using inferior hops and barley, mechanising the old processes we did by hand and generally taking the...” he stopped and smiled, “listen to me rabbiting on like some bitter old man…” he laughed again.19

The pair made a left on Jefferson and a right onto Broadway, once they reached Broadway; they took a left on to Pratt Street. On Pratt & Broadway, they had now reached the slightly worse for wear site of the famed Iroquois brewery and as Matt gazed up upon its hollow shell, he felt a chill working its way down his spine. Mr Mann must have noticed him shudder as he broke Matt’s trance, a slight urgency showing in his tone, “The first brewery in Buffalo was opened in 1811 in Black Rock by Joseph Webb. It lasted about until you Brits stormed over and burnt it to the ground along with most of the city soon after.” Matt diverted his attentions from the ghostly old brewery to Mr Mann’s face, interested to gauge whether the old man was holding some sort of grudge towards him due to his nationality. Far from what he expected, Mr Mann beamed at him, chuckling soundlessly, “you know my wife…she has this theory, she believes that the British always look young for their age, that they retain a youthful vibrancy that few nations don’t manage…” he fixed Matt’s gaze to ensure he was listening, cleared his throat and continued “she says it comes down to wrinkles…you Brits are always less wrinkly around the forehead and eyes…or so she say…us Americans you see, we spend a lot of time squinting on account of the sun, spending long amounts of time with our eyes screwed up - causing wrinkles to form…she says that the UK is constantly overcast, there is no need to squint…” he chuckled “she’s a character Maggie. Completely overlooking the fact that I live in Buffalo, have done all my life, this place is as overcast as anywhere and look at me… I’m as wrinkled as…as…an old paper-bag.”20

The Iroquois brewery was the largest of its counterparts occupying several buildings. Mr Mann took Matt to the centre of the building and pointed out the high relief sign carved in stone: Iroquois Brewing Co. Of Ice. They continued on down Iroquois Alley. The alley was extremely narrow, and as they went further, Matt began to feel claustrophobic. He was experiencing a tightness in his chest and his breathing became shallower, what made matters worse was his pride preventing him explaining to Mr Mann, so they continued on at a leisurely pace and his guide informed him of yet more history and stories of old.21

They made their way slowly around the circumference of the buildings and finally returned back where they had started, gazing once more at the stone relief sign - a proud reminder of Buffalo’s rich brewing history. The elegantly carved stone juxtaposed with the state of disrepair the building was in seemed to Matt a sad reminder of the battle fought and lost against the major international brewery bullies, a point he mentioned to Mr Mann who simply nodded sadly. They continued down the street to building number one-hundred and ninety-three and Mr Mann pointed out a faded but still visible painted sign, Kleinschmidt's Malt House, “I cannot be sure…” ventured Mr Mann, “but I would hazard a guess that they were the suppliers of the malt for Iroquois brewers…that was never my role though…” Their slow progress now took them to the old Jost Brewery stables which are now called North Star Supply Co. “I don’t know your take on this sonny, but I feel a genuine sadness that that most Buffalonians know very little about this place, have no idea of their rich industrial heritage, the architecture, the people that built the homes they are living in. They have no idea, nor do they wish to…too caught up in the frantic mundanity of life to notice the gems that are right below their noses…” 22

Mr Mann and Matt now headed towards a pub on Main Street that brewed some of its own beers in the traditional style. Their slow meandering journey was constantly punctuated by historical commentary from the extremely knowledgeable Mr Mann. “The brick brewery buildings were built by German and Polish immigrants, hard workers, great work ethic, those guys taught us locals something about dedication...living life without complaint…tough as old boots they were too…me and the lads…back in the day we fancied ourselves as pretty tough…we were tradesmen and no strangers to the odd discussion or debate being settled with our fists…but those Polski’s, Jesus Christ could they fight…” Mr Mann fell silent as they approached the Buffalo Brew Pub, lost in thoughts of his past.23

The pub was comfortable if a bit musty and the cliental were a mixture of tourists and locals. The walls were covered in old photographs and paintings of the local breweries, most of which were no longer standing. Mr Mann went outside to call his wife leaving Matt to survey them all. He traced them around the pub eyeing them with genuine interest. Just to the side of a small alcove was a brass Lang sign that must once upon a time have taken prime place at the original brewery office. 24

After observing all of the pictures, Matt decided to order himself and his host a beer and surveyed their names as the barkeeper assured him they were all brewed locally. There were even some that the pub brewed themselves - Amber Ale, Buffalo Bitter, and Golden Ale, along with the Flying Bison Beer. He settled on ordering two of the Flying Bison upon the recommendation of the lady that served him. The beer was a deep red colour and had a thick head and a delicate aroma of butter. He took a small sip and was hit by its intense buttery flavour. This was certainly a delicious beer, almost worth the trip in its self. He might stay for a few more, chat with Mr Mann if he did not have any other appointments, or simply drink alone and enjoy the atmosphere.25

As Matt took a second sip, Mr Mann returned from his phone-call. “I took the liberty of ordering you a beer Mr Mann, I was unsure which one to choose, but the barmaid recommended the Flying Bison, I hope its okay?” he looked to him for confirmation that his choice was satisfactory but Mr Mann frowned shaking his head slightly. “Oh, how very kind of you son…but I don’t drink, not a drop touches my lips…my body is a temple…” Now Matt looked embarrassed and began to turn slightly red, finally he fixed Mr Mann’s gaze once more and asked slightly incredulously, “you mean you worked for a brewery and yet you didn’t touch the stuff…wasn’t that hard? I mean the temptation when everyone around you was drinking; when you yourself were making the beers…I imagine you would have got a pretty hefty discount too?” Mr Mann smiled at him and shook his head once more, “I’m just messing with you son, of course I drink!” with that and as if to illustrate his point, he plucked the glass from the table and proceeded to empty half its contents in one gulp. Matt looked at him, visibly impressed, Mr Mann then produced a loud belch, stretched back on the sofa he was sat on and said “thirsty work this tour guide business!”26