[01:00]8/29/91 10:55 PM
[01:12]slow at the track today
[01:15]my damned life dangling on the hook
[01:17]I am there everyday
[01:21]I don't see anybody else out there every day except the employees
[01:26]I probably have some malady
[01:32]Saroyan lost his ass at the track,Fante at poker,Dostoevsky at the wheel
[01:40]And it's really not a matter of the money unless you run out of it
[01:45]I had a gambler friend once who said‘‘I don't care if I win or lose,I just want to gamble’’
[01:53]I have more respect for money,I've had very little of it most of my life
[02:00]There are only two things wrong with money:too much or too little
[02:07]Well,I supposed there's always something out there we want to torment ourselves with
[02:13]and you get the feel of the other people,the desperate darkness,and how easy they toss it in and quit
[02:22]the racetrack crowd is the world brought down to size,life grinding against death and losing
[02:33]Nobody wins finally ,we are just seeking a reprieve,a moment out of the glare
[02:40](****,I just burned the end of my finger with cigarette as I was musing on this purposelessness
[02:50]That woke me up,brought me out of this Sartre state!)
[02:55]Hell,we need humor,we need to laugh.I used to laugh more,I used to do everying more
[03:05]Now,I am writing and writing and writing,the older I get the more I write,dancing with death
[03:17]Good show,and I think the stuff is alright
[03:24]One day they'll say‘‘Dead’’and I'll be truly discoverd and hung from stinking bright lampposts
[03:35]So what?Immortality is the stupid invention of the living
[03:42]You see what the racetrack does?It makes the lines roll
[03:47]Wacks,lightening and luck.The last bluebird singing
[03:53]Anything I say sounds fine because I gamble when I write
[03:59]Too many are too careful.They study,they teach
[04:15]and they fail,and the strips them of their fire
[04:22]I feel better now,up here on this second floor with the Macintosh.My pal
[04:30]And Mahler is on the radio,he glides with such ease,taking big chances,one needs that sometimes
[04:42]Then he sends in the long power rises
[04:47]Thank you,Mahler,I borrow from from you and I can never pay you back
[04:54]I smoke too much,I drink too much,but I can' twrite too much
[05:01]it just keeps coming and I call for more and it arrives and mixes with Mahler
[05:08]Sometimes I deliberately stop myself
[05:13]I say,wait a moment ,go to sleep or look at your 8 cats or sit with your wife on the coach
[05:23]You're either at the track or with the Macintosh
[05:27]And then I stop,put on the brakes ,parking the damned thing
[05:34]Some people have written that my writing has helped them to go on,It's helped me,too
[05:41]The drinking,the writing,the horses,the 8 cats,my wife
[05:49]There's a small balcony here,the door is open and I can see the lights of the cars on the Harbor Freeway south
[05:59]they never stop,that roll of lights,on and on
[06:04]All those people.What are they doing?What are they thinking?
[06:11]We're all sent to die,all of us.What a circus!
[06:15]That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't
[06:20]We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities,we are eaten up by nothing
[06:28]Keep it going,Mahler!You've made this a wondrous night
[06:34]Don't stop,you son of a *****!Don't stop!