Jack Boulware

A short story based on San Francisco’s legendary community of archivists and collectors. Includes gratuitous Star Wars reference.

The Information Man

“This wall, from here to here, on the first three shelves—all video of Burning Man. Chronological order, 15 years worth. I average about 10 tapes a year. There’s some shit on these you wouldn’t believe. Especially from the first years when you could still bring guns. People always want to buy footage from me, CNN, SKY TV, or, you know, some random person—’Oh, do you have that bit where I climbed to the top of that giant shoe? I want to show the people I work with cause they don’t believe I did it.’ I never sell it. To anybody. That’s not what it’s about. Anyway, it’s all here—more than anyone else, and believe me, I’ve checked around. Now I get in for free every year, because they know what I’m up to.”

All I really knew about Wade was that he was in his mid-30s, like me, he had a trust fund a mile long, he didn”t really have to work, and he collected strange pop culture. Wade was legendary. His website was so dense it took ten minutes to boot up. They loved him in Germany.

Wade lived in a warehouse. For years I’d dreamed of the opportunity to visit. And now, I was standing inside the inner sanctum. The place looked like eBay exploded: computers, records, old furniture, boxes, mannequins, action figures, posters. Nobody, I mean nobody had this much stuff. The secrets, the wisdom buried within. It was so awesome, I shivered.

I was there to drop off a scale model of the Star Wars B-Wing Heavy Assault Fighter, which I’d borrowed from Wade through a mutual friend. I needed something sci-fi looking for a design project, and the natural choice was the B-Wing. It was exceedingly rare—it appeared only in Return of the Jedi, and even then you saw it only from the back. Although on the small side, its multiple blaster, laser and ion cannon weapon configurations gave it the punch of a much larger ship. A B-Wing is hard to find, but of course Wade would have one—the original ILM model used in the film, three feet long and exquisitely detailed. I don’t know how he got it, but he was very particular, and insisted I return it myself. I was buzzing inside, going over and over the list of questions I would ask, as soon as he stopped talking.

“Right now I’m in the process of standardizing formats -—VHS, Beta, three-quarter, Hi-8—digitizing, re-archiving everything on rewriteable disks. It’s insane. I’m also working on a system of cross referencing and indexing onto a master database. That way, if someone wants to find a particular piece—like the giant shoe—you can just type ‘giant shoe’ into a search engine, and it will tell you exactly which disk, and where to find it. Or, it could be a multimedia art display, a MoMa type thing. Or a great documentary, cut it all together. I just got some new video editing software yesterday. You wanna check it out?”

Without waiting for an answer, he climbed over a pile of boxes: “These shelves over here, vintage commercials, “Hey Mikey,” the breakfast cereal, you remember that? Cartoons—I”ve got every one of the original Mickey Mouse, Warner Brothers, Scooby Doo, Speed Racer. I work with this guy in Arizona, trade back and forth. There’s some guys in Seattle, L.A.. but Texas, I stay away from—everything’s black helicopter this, black helicopter that. This wall here is all UFO footage, car accidents, trepanation, dick torture, JFK, Bosnia, Gulf War, I’m still organizing this. Some really insane stuff—you ever seen the tape of that brain operation, where they cut the guy’s scalp and pull down his face so they can cut open his skull? I’ve got THREE versions, full color. It’s really horrible.”

I was both thunderstruck and humbled. “Three versions?” I said meekly. “Wow. You’re kidding. I’ve only seen the one.”

“Oh, you gotta see it. I’ll burn you a disk. You’d love it.”

“Wade, you’ve got an amazing collection here. I just basically wanted to return the B-Wing to you, and say thanks—”

He cut me off: “That wall over there used to be all autopsy, drugs, blaxsploitation, mug shots, amputee catalogs, haikus written by serial killers. It sucked. None of it was digitized. Who wants to spend time scanning all that shit? I don’t have the attention span. Hey, have you ever seen a guy fuck a chicken? I could put it on right now. It’ll only take a second. I just emailed it to a guy in Massachusetts.”

Wade dashed to one of his computers and in a few seconds we were watching a grainy video of a farmer out in the woods, with a chicken on a tree stump. The man unzipped his overalls, walked over to the bird and began the act, and the screen filled with squawks and flying feathers. Wade froze the action:

“Check THAT out.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“Don’t you see it?”

I squinted at the monitor. “A guy fucking a chicken?”

“Look closer.”

“What am I supposed to see?

“The chicken!” he shouted. “Look at the expression on its face—That’s so fucked up!”

He was right. It was really fucked up. I was getting a weird vibe, and it wasn’t just the chicken. Wade was creeping me out. He roared off on another tangent.

“Hey, did you know there have been over 400 Hollywood films made that featured midgets and dwarves? I think it would be cool to like have a “little people” section in Blockbuster. That way when midget or dwarf customers come in, they’ll know exactly where to go to find, like, Wizard of Oz, or the Terror of Tiny Town, Under the Rainbow, Austin Powers, Fantasy Island, all the Billy Barty stuff—Oh, man, we haven”t even gotten to the dwarf porn. Talk about rare! There’s one of this fat Brazilian lady who sticks the head of a dwarf right into her coochie. Up to the fucking shoulders! You sure you don’t want to see—

“Wade, I really just came to return the B-Wing. Who cares if it’s a dwarf, or a midget—so what?”

He stared at me like I’d killed his entire family. “For your information, a midget is a proportionally accurate small person, i.e. a gnome or a forest sprite. A dwarf has disproportionate body parts, with misshapen features. There are over 200 different types of dwarfism. Therefore, if you’re using a little person to fuck a fat lady, it makes a difference, okay?”

“You should be thanking me,” he continued. “I collect all this, so you don’t have to. You know what someone once called me? ‘The Digital Librarian of the Apocalypse.’ Come on, you and I know most of our information from “established” sources is just prepackaged crap. News, music, Hollywood—who wants to watch a DVD with a bunch of self-righteous actors saying, ‘Oh, it was really an honor to work with so and so, we were like a big happy family, blah blah.’” He gestured around the room. “This is real shit we’re talking about. Check it out—after awhile you start to see connections, and it all starts to make sense.”

“Connect what? This is just a bunch of random weird information.”

“AAHHHHH!,” he screamed. He stared at me, almost hyperventilating, then took a breath. “Okay. You take a dwarf porn movie, okay? Picture it. Here’s a little guy who”s discriminated against his whole life. Big head, stubby body. Everyone stares at him, everywhere he goes. Why? Because he”s a fucking dwarf. But now, you put him in a porn movie with a great looking chick, he has a good time. He wins. He’s getting laid. You understand? He’s empowered. So, anyway, whatever, that’s a side thought. Just keep that dwarf in mind. Then—we look at a photo of a UFO in Virginia. And a photo of a severed head. And a TV commercial for Rock Em Sock Em Robots.” He looked around the room, and held up a pack of Hello Kitty condoms. “And this. Picture it. Okay, see it? What do you see?”

This was getting ridiculous. “I don’t know, Wade. What do I see?”

“No, THINK! What do you see? Dwarf. UFO. Severed head. Robots. Condoms.”

“A, a bunch of different images.”

“No—it’s the grand tapestry of humanity’s dark soul. Look, people don’t want to think about this stuff. They don’t want to be reminded of it. They don”t want to admit it exists. But I do! And I have it!”

The B-Wing was getting heavy. I shifted the load. “Well, so what if you have it? What do you get out of it?”

He looked incredulous. “It’s HERE. So many people don’t know what they’re talking about, but I do because I’ve seen it and I’ve got it right on the shelf and I can hunt it down, find that box, get the thing and show it to them and say, ‘See, you’re wrong! The French did NOT invent the guillotine. It was first used in Ireland, you idiot!’”

“But couldn’t someone just as easily look that up on the internet?” As I watched Wade fiddle with a plastic dinosaur, I was suddenly aware that neither of us had girlfriends.

He grew quiet, almost statesman-like. “I”ll be honest with you. There”s a big difference between knowing something and owning it. When you own something, it”s like the process of osmosis leads you to a larger sphere of understanding. I’ve got a guillotine upstairs right now. A real guillotine. I took it to Burning Man one year and we made coleslaw with it.”

“Look, just forget it. I gotta go.” I shoved aside a black velvet painting of Oswald getting shot, and set the B-Wing on top of a table. “Thanks for the use of your Alliance Fighter.”

The model wobbled momentarily, then did a slow-motion dive, end over end, hit the floor and smashed into pieces.

He almost had a aneuryism. “My B-Wing!”

I apologized, but he didn’t hear me. He was already on his hands and knees, carefully picking up the parts. “The only production model in existence! From the Battle of Endor. Designed by General Lando Calrissian!”

Sometimes, life opens a window and you have to seize the moment. “Wade,” I said quietly. “It was Ackbar.”

“Jesus Christ, do you know what I had to do to get this?” He stopped and turned. “What did you say?”

“It wasn”t General Calrissian,” I said. “It was actually Admiral Ackbar who conceived the B-Wing. Remember? Ackbar did pilot the Mon Calamari Star Cruiser which of course saw action in the Battle of Endor, but—it was he who also formulated the original designs for the B-Wing—”

“Just get the fuck out!”

Gladly, I thought. I made my way to the door, pushed it open and looked back. He was still on all fours, scooping up the pieces. His ripped black T-shirt said “Enema Burger.” They were an okay band, but I wouldn’t wear the shirt.