I hold the phone to my ear. Another representative. This representative does not want my money. She wants to offer my wife a job in Hawaii. I sing aloha for days. I sing "Tiny Bubbles." I refer to cops as "Five-O." If I cannot accelerate the apprenticeship, I can at least alter the workshop.

The five islands of Hawaii are situated in the Pacific Ocean. Not situated on the five islands of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean are my wife's parents. I develop erosive GERD.

Erosive GERD. I pretend to have developed this gastroesophageal reflux disease in order to say the phrase as often as possible. Erosive GERD. Erosive GERD. Erosive GERD. It is hard not to mistake the restlessness for disillusionment. I no longer have the heart to sing aloha. Erosive GERD is a volcano situated far from the mercilessly cold waters of the Pacific Ocean. Is any of this getting through?

I can leave the workshop. I can go on vacation. But I don't. But I should. Distraction from the craft is healthy for the apprentice. Defection from the craft is not.

As a feat of self-denial, I give up coffee, wine and ice cream. It is harder than I thought. I figured my appetites would simply find new vices. My desires would find new objects. That is true, and not true. Tea isn't good enough. Despite widespread belief, chocolate cannot make up for both wine and ice cream. In summary, I discovered that yes, I have the will to deny myself. But my desires for the old objects returned with a vengeance.

Either I am an addict, or I am an apprentice. Either I am sick, or I am strong. Either these are vices, or these are part of who I am becoming. It is thought that there is no way to crack down on drug production or distribution in other countries until the demand in the U.S. goes down. When authorities apply pressure in the Caribbean, the drugs herniate through Mexico. When authorities apply pressure in Mexico, the drugs herniate through the Caribbean. A double hernia. If the desire remains, the object of desire finds a way.

Erosive GERD is a medical condition.

"Does this afflict mainly men?" I ask.

"Women suffer equally," she says.

"Not as equally as you'd like to think," I say.

"I did not want to go to Hawaii."

"You did not want to go to Hawaii."

"No."

"The Pacific Ocean is very cold," I admit.

"The Pacific Ocean is not the point."

"Genius is energy plus will."

"I know."

"Talent is not required."

"You've mentioned."

"The Pacific Ocean," I say. "I would have had to wear a wet suit anyway, and my penis would have shrunk to the size of a phallus impudicus mushroom. Koro is epidemic among thirtysomething male surfers."

"Your son wet the bed again last night," she says. "Slept in it. Speaking of cold and wet."

"He is the leader downstairs."

"Yes, he is." She kisses my forehead. "Get some rest."

"Aloha can be used for hello or good-bye," I say. "It means 'love.' "

"Aloha," she says. She tucks me in and takes the teacup.

*

I flip the omelette - first time! - with my new All-Clad stainless-steel 10" fry pan, ordered online. I am no longer recovering. I mean, I'm recovered. Pope Clement VII put Engraver Marcantonio Raimondi in jail in the early 1500's for publishing engravings of Gulio Romano's I modi, "The Ways," a series of drawings of sexual positions. I am proud of my flipping. First time!

I eat my buttery omelette and simultaneously condemn Pope Clement VII and envy Gulio Romano, who had the fun and paid no price. I credit butter. And the new pan.

I bought stainless steel. I did not buy copper. The words "cop" and "copper" originally referred to the copper buttons on the first police uniforms issued in the late 1840's in Brooklyn, New York.

I have vices. Americans consume 300 tons of cocaine a year. I eat too much mint chocolate-chip ice cream. My grandmother when she was alive and I when I was a kid used to ride our bikes for mint cones at Baskin Robbins.That, many years ago. Today, cocaine in the U.S. sells for $15 million a ton.

Also, floss. Flossing. I obsess. I remove the hand-mirror of my stainless-steel fry pan from the sink water and: smile. The Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini wrote, for #2,629 of his 3000 answers to the questions of everyday life: It is not unlawful to swallow the food that exits from between the teeth as a result of flossing if one's nature has no aversion to it.

Pirates, princes, soldiers, divers, racers, spies, spacemen, cops, conquerors, fighters, surfers, killers, lovers. My grandmother said I would break many hearts.

I am man, am I not? Fryer, feeder, flosser: man.

Sixteen of Raimondi's engravings are all that remains of I modi. I place my new fry pan high atop the cabinet where only I can reach. Some gas-electric hybrid cars get seventy miles to the gallon. I have seen a neighbor driving one. It's ugly.

Gulio the Italian Smut Artist has been dead for 500 years, more or less. About. Five-hundred years from now, what of mine will. . . ?

I used to do things that today I do not do. I would make better use of my time if my nature had no aversion to it. Instead, I have a physiological need to waste my time apprenticing in a dying, useless art. I advise my daughter to lick the sides of the ice-cream cone, and she says, "Thank you, but I prefer to do it my way." She is four-years old and already knows to eat from the top.

When I was a boy, I used to capture snakes under my boot. The snakes would bite my fingertips. I would hold their skulls between my thumb and forefinger, and their bodies would wrap around my wrist and I would stare at them all day and write about them all night. That boy was a perfect devil.

Razbliuto is a Russian word for the feeling a person retains for someone he or she once loved.

Razbliuto. Try to say it. It makes a beautiful mouth.