Quotes by Joseph T. Wilson

“And,” Buster continued, finding that he could not stop talking about it now that he had started, “there was this table with food laid out for all the people on set and these naked guys would be standing over the table, constructing these sad little sandwiches and eating handfuls of M&Ms.” “Jesus Christ,” said David, shaking his head. “And then you had to write about it, which I bet sucked,” Joseph said. “Yeah,” Buster said, pleased that Joseph understood the strangeness of writing about things you despise, “and so I wrote this bizarre article about how Hester Bangs wasn’t an actress, wasn’t even a porn star, that she was more like a professional athlete. She was like a marathoner, and that, as disturbing as it was to witness, I had so much admiration for her ability to do it.” Kenny nodded in agreement. “That sounds like a good article.” “Well,” Buster finished, “three weeks after it comes out, some other porn star breaks the record by more than two hundred guys.” Everyone in the car laughed so loudly that they almost didn’t hear the policeman tapping on the window. As soon as he saw the cop, Buster had the overwhelming feeling that he needed to hide his contraband, the small detail being that he had nothing illegal on his person. Kenny rolled down the window and the officer ducked his head inside the car. “Parked on the side of the road, boys,” he said, “not a smart idea.””

“How often do you do this?” Buster asked. The men looked at him like it should have been obvious. “Every goddamned night,” Kenny said, “unless there’s something good on TV, which is pretty much never.” “We don’t have jobs, Buster,” said Joseph. “We’re living with our parents and we don’t have girlfriends. We just drink and blow shit up.” “You’re making it sound like it’s a bad thing,” Arden said to Joseph. “Well I don’t mean to,” said Joseph, and looked at Buster. “It only sounds that way when I say it out loud.” “So,” Buster began, unsure of the correct way to phrase his question, “does all of this, shooting off potato guns, ever remind you of your time over in Iraq?” As soon as he finished his question, everyone around him seemed, momentarily, incredibly sober. “Are you asking if we have flashbacks or something?” asked David. “Well,” Buster continued, beginning to realize that he had been better off shooting potatoes into the atmosphere, “I just wonder if shooting these spud guns makes you think about your time in the army.” Joseph laughed softly. “Everything makes me think about the army. I wake up and I go to the bathroom and I think about how, in Iraq, there were just pools of piss and shit in the streets. And then I get dressed and I think about how, when I would put on my uniform, I was already sweating before I buttoned my shirt. And then I eat breakfast and think about how every single goddamn thing I ate over there had sand in it. It’s hard not to think about it.””

“What?” Buster asked. He understood that people were shouting but he could hardly hear them. “It’s pretty bad,” Joseph said. “My face?” Buster asked, still confused. He moved to touch the right side of his face, which was numb and on fire at the same time, but Joseph grabbed his wrist to stop him. “You probably shouldn’t do that,” he said. “Is something wrong with it?” Buster asked. “It’s still there,” Joseph said, “but it’s not . . . correct.” Buster made the decision, which took some degree of concentration, to go back to sleep, but Joseph would not allow this. “You are definitely concussed,” he told Buster. “Just listen to my voice and try to stay awake.””

“Actually I started that back in 1959. I was reading Science and Civilization by Joseph Needham, and I was thinking that I agree with the Taoists more than any other religion. And I started asking myself why. It occurred to me that in the Western World Judaism, Christianity and Islam all refer to God as He. That creates an image of a cosmologically huge human being and, I thought, “Now I can’t take that literally.” Yet, at the same time, although I’m not absolutely convinced, I do have a very strong intuition of some kind of cosmic intelligence. I’m an agnostic on the level of not being passionately convinced. I just have a strong intuition of cosmic intelligence.””