"The everything," I said. "The sense of living an inner Ugg boots clearance life right up against the external or tangible life. Of living close to your own skin. You know what I mean. Everything. The pattern. The morality."
     "Maybe I crave the languid smoky dream," he said, slowly and softly, with barely evident selfdirected humor, dressing the words in black satin. "That's living close to yourself too. You talk about bringing the inside close to the outside. I'm talking about taking the whole big outside and dragging it in behind me. What's the word they use in northern parts of Africa for that stuff they smoke? Not that I'm planning any kind of holy weed mysticism. I'm too hard edged for that. But there are rewards in contemplation. A new way of life requires a Chanel Bags new language."
     "All right then, damn it. Money aside. Metaphysics aside. It becomes a question of pursuing whatever it is you do best. It's a damn shame to waste talent like yours. It almost goes against some tenuous kind of equilibrium or master plan. Some very carefully balanced natural mechanism. I'm serious about that."
     "If I don't play football, the bobcat will become extinct in Wyoming." "You're an athlete, Taft."
     "So are you, Gary. But I'm not going to talk you out of quitting if you want to quit."
     "As an athlete I have serious lapses. I don't play football as much as drift in and out of cloud banks of action and noise. I'm not a onehundredpercentintheAmericangrain football player. I tend to draw back now UGG Boots Clearance and again in order to make minor discoveries that have no bearing on anything. I conduct spurious examinations. I bullshit myself."
     "Gary, you're a credit to your race." He looked down at the newspaper. I took this as an indication that we had reached the end of the introductory phase. I went to the window and stretched. A twopart yawn elongated the faint reflection of my face. There was little movement to be seen on the campus. It wasn't quite dark yet. A man (perhaps a woman) stared at me from a window of the nearest building. It disturbed me that I couldn't be sure of the person's sex. It's always interesting to stand by a window and exchange looks with an unknown Jordan Heels woman in another building. But in this case I couldn't be sure whether I was looking at a man or woman. Therefore it seemed dangerous to get interested. It was definitely much too delicate a matter to involve myself with at the present time. I went back to the chair and sat down. Hunched forward I studied my shoes. I thought of going down to the equipment room to check out the rumor about new uniforms. According to the rumor, the coaching staff had decided on a few slight design changes for next season's uniform. At this very moment people were probably crowding into Billy Mast's room or Randy King's room to talk about the rumor, to embellish it, to swim and cheap Louis Vuitton bags play in it. I could go down to the equipment room, check things out, then rush up to Billy Mast's room with whatever information or misinformation I had managed to gather. Then we could all discuss it for an hour or so. I wondered whether the designation capt or cocapt would be included on my uniform below the right shoulder or above the number 44 on my back. I hoped the rumor turned out to be true. At the very least I hoped we'd get new headgear. I didn't like the old helmets much. I'd be satisfied with new headgear and with the designation cocapt above my number.