Dean & The Golden Ratio
(Norman Ave)
by Odious Awry
This is Chapter 4 of King of Spain, the serialized text art that is being channeled to me by a future version of myself called HeirMax98. It's a story about four strangers in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, who discover that they are trapped in some sort of simulation haunted by a strange entity they call, "The Curator".
-OA
I’m sure there were signs, I think I felt it for a while in the form of negative vibes, but it was only on the day after the last ceremony that the signal made it all the way through my fat head, and I realized something wicked was afoot. I got the message in the form of a dream–one that I woke up from and then, a little while later, went back to sleep and continued having–this happened three times in one day–an episodic dream like chapters in a book. I’ve had that kind of dream at night, but this was during the day; albeit a slow and disjointed day in which I seemed to have one foot still in the ceremony from the night before. I believe the dream was alerting me to a malignant presence that has latched itself onto this place, and maybe onto me, a presence that found a way in and has perhaps been made stronger by the medicine works that take place here regularly and, have (I’m finally ready to admit) suffered a recent dip in quality that has left us vulnerable to malignant forces. What follows is my detailed report about what happened and what I’ve grokked from it so far. If nothing else perhaps it can be a lesson and a warning to others.
In the time leading up to the first dream, I wandered around the loved/hated studio workspace/prayer portal known as The Golden Ratio, where I’m currently and indefinitely posted up, telling myself I was going to put away the mats and buckets or order something to eat, but instead ended up sitting and staring out the window for hours. I filled my already sour belly with leftover grapes as my mind played back parts of the previous night on repeat. Out on the horizon Manhattan was like a glossy limited edition art book opened wide. I imagined millions of people dapping each other up on stoops and happily wandering out for a boozy brunch. I covered one eye and then the other, noticing how the image changed, how it went in and out of focus and there was a little jump in which the whole world seemed to move a little to the side. I tried to figure out how much I cared that it was already late afternoon and I was missing a beautiful day before I gave up and laid down on my mat. I fantasized that there were women sleeping on the empty mats around me. My energies were such that it was right there, a hunger hovering near the surface of my skin, but I started slow, picturing different g-rated body parts exposed or half-exposed by a slipping blanket; there was the back of an arm, a curved sole of a foot…. a naked shoulder glowing with the light strewn innocence of an impressionist painting. During ceremony I try to advert my eyes, having learned the hard way how an unchecked gaze can get supercharged and create complicated vibes even if there’s no conscious intention to follow through, but now, on the day after, when it was only me, I could relax and let go…I closed my eyes to pull up the images, both real and made up, when suddenly my own limbs became heavy and numb and my mind went black as I fell into a dream. The drop felt real–my chest seized and my stomach dropped. It was disconcerting, but strange occurrences are not unusual in the wake of an ayahuasca ceremony.
In the dream I was on the plains with an ancient North American Indigenous tribe–perhaps the Hopi or Lakota, there were vivid details of dress and language but my YT cis male ignorance is such that I don’t know for sure. What was clear was that they were planning to change locations and I was to go with them, but it turned out the way forward was blocked by what appeared to be a towering glass wall that rose all the way into the sky. Scouts rode on horseback along its perimeter but were unable to find a way through or around it. Arrows and boulders were hurled against it to no effect. “What the fuck”, I said to the young boy beside me. He looked up at me with a thoughtful, stern expression, making me feel immediately guilty at which point everything stopped. A sense of familiarity came over me. “This has happened before,” I thought as the perspective zoomed out, taking me further and further from the scene until I could see that all of us and the land where we stood was inside a rectangular display case. There were blades of fake grass and mounds of sand in front of a wall painted green and brown. The sky was a blue plastic drop ceiling filled with fluorescents. I was made to understand the horrifying truth that the Native People were real and alive but that their progress through time had been slowed down so much that to the outside observer they appeared frozen in place like life size dolls. Someone or something had turned them and their horses into living props for its inspection and enjoyment. I stood craning my neck in the dark museum corridor, trying to find myself in the exhibit as icy air blew on me relentlessly from giant airducts that expanded and retracted like gills above my head.