by Fielding Goodfellow
The Algonquin Hotel hadn’t really been a hotel since it served as an oasis for travelers journeying up Yonge Street from Toronto to Richmond Hill, and points beyond, in the early nineteen hundreds. It had simply become a nondescript local pub until the nineteen seventies when it was reborn as a nudie bar, rising from the ashes with watered down drinks and a wagon load of Eastern European tits and ass that were displayed and offered, for a handful of rubles, to easily excited working men who seemed to be in no hurry to go home.
Every work day. after spending eight hours behind a desk adding numbers and calculating risk for The Great North Life And Casualty Company, Arnold Perlmutter pulled into the parking lot of The Algonquin Hotel. At precisely five twenty-five, he walked in, sat at his usual seat at the bar and ordered a beer. It was always beer. He was tired of his job, but it was more than just being an actuary. Arnold Perlmutter had grown tired of his life. . “I had dreams.”, he announced to the man sitting next to him. “Big dreams. It never occurred to me that my life would turn out like this.” Life for Arnold had become so tediously predictable, that he was uncertain just how much longer he would be able to endure it.
Despite his malaise, he had never sampled even a little taste of Kiev. He came for the peace he found in the anonymity that the bar offered him. It was just a place to go where he didn’t have to feel like Arnold Perlmutter. Without fail, every evening at six thirty, he could be found at the kitchen table of the three bedroom bungalow he had shared with his wife, Connie, for the past thirty years or so, and joined her for dinner. It was one of the few things still brought him joy. He believed that there had been two great ideas, two completely spontaneous thoughts that had changed his life. He had tried acid, and he married Connie. Both, not coincidentally, occurred on the same weekend at a summer cottage party in Sundridge, Ontario. He loved her. He knew he did, and he was reasonably sure that he had always loved her. He just didn’t care anymore. One morning he woke up and just didn’t seem to give a shit about life
He was on his second beer when Suzie Swallows shimmied across the stage to chants of “shake those tits” from reputed Irish mobsters Liam and Sean Halloran as ‘Brother Louie’ played through the amazingly inadequate sound system. Arnold kept checking his watch, well aware that Connie would start worrying at six thirty-three if he wasn’t home. “Looks like you’ve got somewhere you’re supposed to be.”, the man sitting next to him remarked.
“Not really?”, Arnold replied.
“Well.”, the man continued, “you’ve got the look.”
“What look?”, Arnold asked..
“Like a bird in a cage.”, the man said. “I’ve seen it before. Its in the eyes. My name is Farberman, and I just might be able to help you. If your interested.”
Arnold listened as Farberman explained his work in cellular reconfiguration. According to him, it was possible for three dimensional life forms to exist in a two dimensional world. It was simply a matter of converting the life form into pure energy and then re-configuring it into living matter within another dimension. “I’ve done it myself.”, Farberman informed him. “I’ve spent almost ten years living inside a French painting. Anywhere you want to be”, he continued, “you just bring me a picture, and in go. That’s all there is to it, really. There’s one catch though. You have to go alone.” Arnold was taking it all in. He was indeed, interested, but he was also pretty sure that this guy sitting next to him at The Algonquin Hotel was out of his fucking mind.
Arnold was quieter than usual that night at dinner. As Connie talked about rising hydro rates and the opening of a Supercentre not far from home, he couldn’t stop thinking about the possibility of a new life. He kept staring at his wife, trying to come up with a reason to leave her, and despite the thirty years of listening to her incessant chatter about discounted shoes and her sister’s diabetes, he just couldn’t seem to find one. As Connie slept that night, Arnold made the third great decision of his life.
It was ten-forty-five in the morning when Arnold Perlmutter pulled into the parking lot of the Algonquin Hotel. He sat in his car waiting for the bar to open. He felt different today. The universe felt different today. It seemed that a celebration was in order. Earlier that morning he had gone into the office of the Branch Manager of The Great North Life & Casualty Company handed in his ID card and office keys, and quit his job. It was as if a dark cloud that had been over him had vanished. For the first time in years, Arnold could feel the sun beating down on him. At eleven o’clock, he walked into the hotel and, taking his usual seat at the bar, ordered a beer. Pinky Beavers took to the stage, gyrating to ‘Build Me Up Buttercup’ as she disrobed, seductively tossing her clothing towards two old men seated at a table near the stage. She was incredibly pretty, and Arnold noticed, for the first time, how amazingly perfect her tits were. He was transfixed by her every move, and he felt himself getting hard as she bent over and exposed herself to the patrons.
Connie was pleasantly surprised when Arnold raced in the front door and took her upstairs. “I’ve made some decisions.”, he told her as they lay together in their bed. They talked for a long time. They talked about everything, and when they were done, Connie and Arnold agreed to put the house up for sale, purchase an RV, and get the hell out of there. Neither of them were sure where they would go, but it didn’t matter. Arnold just wanted to go where there was sunshine and a beach. He was tired of living his life like a bird in a cage, as the crazy bastard at The Algonquin Hotel had called it. He had missed so much over the years, and he just didn’t want to miss any more.
Not surprisingly, and almost instinctively, Arnold Perlmutter and his wife, Connie, found themselves sitting on lawn chairs outside of their RV in a park in Sundridge, Ontario. The sun was setting, painting the lake with patches of orange and red, as it gently rolled into the shore. “This is perfect.”, Connie said.
“Almost.”, Arnold replied. “All we need now is to find some acid.”
cant take wife. must go alone.. wife can come after but no guarantee your coordinates will be the same. could wind up in a different stage of the paintings completion. or frame of reference. Art is subjective.
My World Is A Wonderfully Weird Place 