Janet Kuypers reads the
original prose piece 'Age',
which mentions water
(somehow), over a boat riding
in the Pacific Ocean in the
end of December 2007.
Actually, this video footage
was shot while traveling among
the Galapagos Islands, where
Kuypers thought the background
was a serene setting for
reaing poetry.For moremore

Janet Kuypers reads the
original prose piece 'Age',
which mentions water
(somehow), over a boat riding
in the Pacific Ocean in the
end of December 2007.
Actually, this video footage
was shot while traveling among
the Galapagos Islands, where
Kuypers thought the background
was a serene setting for
reaing poetry.For more
information on the writing of
Janet Kuypers (or artwork,
including photography form the
Galapagos Islands), go to
janetkuypers to read more of
her work.This is the original
prose piece:AgeSometimes, when
I get behind the wheel of a
car, I feel like I'm at Six
Flags Great America Amusement
Park In Gurnee, Illinois again
and I'm thirteen years old and
I'm able to drive one of the
bumper cars. And it's such a
thrill -- because, I mean, I'm
thirteen years old and I can't
drive, and I'm now in control
of this huge piece of
machinery. Granted, there's
this wire sticking up from the
car that gets electricity from
the ceiling, but for once I
feel free, that I can just go,
go faster than I ever could by
running, or even if I used my
roller skates or my
bicycle.And when I get that
feeling and I'm behind the
wheel of my car I want to
drive really really fast out
on an abandoned road, blare
some rock music, roll down my
window, and turn up the heat,
since it's the middle of
winter.Sometimes, when I go
out on a new date, I feel like
I'm sixteen again, and I'll
rifle through my closet,
deciding I have absolutely
nothing to wear. And he'll
pick me up, and we'll go to a
restaurant with deer heads on
the walls, and we'll have
whiskey sours, and we'll
struggle with the lettuce
leaves in the salads because
they're too big, and when
we're done with dinner we'll
go to a bar that's so crowded
and so loud that we won't be
able to talk to each other,
but we'll have to stand real
close. And then he'll take me
home and I'll invite him in,
he'll sit on the chair, I'll
sit on the couch, and he'll
ask for a glass of water. When
we can't think of any more
small talk, and the clock says
3:12 a.m., I'll see him to the
door, he'll kiss me good-bye,
and I'll lock the door after
he leaves. And when I'm sure
he can't see me through the
window, I'll turn on the
stereo and dance in my living
room before I go to
bed.Sometimes, when I'm having
sex with someone, I feel like
I've done this for years, like
I've been married to this man
for twenty years, and I still
don't know him, but I'm still
there, night after night.
After the wedding, after the
new house, which was a little
small, but we'll get something
bigger when we have the money,
after the two kids and the
fifteen pounds, after I lose
my job, after we don't get
that new house and after the
kids complain about their
curfews, after the dog dies,
hell, it was only trouble for
us anyway, after the sinus
headaches, the back problems,
that all-over sore feeling,
you know, it's harder to wake
up in the mornings now, after
it all he still has the
nights, the sex with the woman
he knows all too well but not
at all, and we do it, as we
always do. It becomes
memorization. It becomes like
a play, that I act out night
after night.Sometimes, when I
get home after 10 o'clock from
working overtime on the
computers, I just want to
retire, to quit the work, to
stop it all. I see my parents,
after a life of working at the
construction site and raising
five children, now beginning
to relax, buying a small home
in Southwest Florida, playing
tennis in the morning, playing
cards in the afternoon,
drinking with other retired
couples in the evening.
Sometimes another couple
invites them out for a boat
ride off of Marco Island,
where they smoke cigarettes,
drink a few beers, and drive
slow enough to make no wake
when they're by the
pier.Sometimes I look at the
computer screen I work at and
remember how computers used to
mean video games. I remember
when I was eight and I would
sit with my best friend in the
upstairs den on the floor in
front of the old television
set and play table tennis on
our Atari. Times change, I
suppose, and I get old. This
is my life.

Category Comedy

Tags Janet, Kuypers, prose, Age, Pacific, Ocean, Galapapagos, Islands