I was on television last night, did anyone see it? Did anyone tape it? No and no and so it might as well never’ve happened. These one-way unrecorded transmissions, just sent out through the airwaves and who cares where it lands. Taking into account the dwindling population of this town and the drug-numbed carelessness of your average TV production crew, you could even put forth the theory that nobody saw those five seconds of me on the news. And now the tape has been overdubbed with a skier breaking her leg or a parade pileup.

But that frees me up to embellish, per my usual. The cameras stripped me of my corpulence, added a healthy filter to my pallid skin, whitened my teeth, improved my posture. The lights made my eyes dance with joy. The microphones deepened my voice, made it rich and complex, shattered and rebuilt by years of interesting living. The videotaped me was completely comfortable in his body, sweet and articulate, a relaxed handsomeness. Simple clothing and hair, both flecked with an appealing gray.

“That [expletive deleted] fell right out of the sky, I [expletive deleted] you not,” I said to WNYX reporter Michele [sic] Hicks, the thick black smoke still choking the skies behind me, a shallow but bloody cut just under my right eye, self-administered (w/paperclip) right before the newsvan arrived on the scene.