All posts by Abel Gonzalez

death, love

GOODBYE/HELLO

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[A young black man, skinny and short. He has a calmed stare and a soothing speaking voice.]

“I’ve worked at the airport cafeteria for over ten years now, but my dream was to go to college, become a teacher. And I would have if my very religious father wouldn’t have kicked me out of the house the day I told him I’m gay.

I was barely eighteen; I had to hustle to survive. But I don’t hold any grudges against my father… even though he had nothing to do with me for years.

Well, maybe I do have one grudge against him for not letting me visit my grandmother on her deathbed. He didn’t even allow me to attend her funeral mass.

She had been a very important part of my childhood, of my emotional upbringing, and it hurt so much to know I’d never see her again. I thought I’d missed my last opportunity to say goodbye to her, to let her know how much I loved her.

Although I tried not to think too much about it, I got obsessed… so much so, that every night after my shift at the cafeteria was over, I would walk up to the departures terminal of the airport. There, snuggled up in a corner, I would watch the travelers saying good-bye to their families, their partners, their friends, with hugs, tears, kisses… and I’d imagine those strangers were me and my grandma, saying our good-byes to each other.

It was like therapy; I thought it’d help me close the wound of not getting my chance.

Until one night, right when I was about to leave the airport, I saw a couple hugging in the middle of the terminal. There was something special in the way they were embracing, with desperation, with anxiety. I couldn’t stop staring. I knew that’s how I’d have said goodbye to my grandma, with that intensity and sincerity.

I felt so sad, my eyes started watering.

But then the couple held hands and walked toward the airport exit while the woman insisted on helping the man, who had only just arrived, with his luggage.

That’s when I started crying… out of joy, when I realized that saying hello and saying goodbye were very similar, mirror images of the same experience; two extremes whose mutual attraction keep the cycle of existence spinning.

Anyway…

I now sit in the arrivals terminal each night after work. There, I watch people greeting and welcoming each other, just like grandma and I will do whenever we reunite again.”

Are you an actor or director interested in using this monologue? Contact us in ABOUT MONOLOGY!

 Copyright Abel Gonzalez 2016

economy, history, politics

THE MACHINE WE ALL BUILT

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[A middle-aged man in a blue work coat. He has a gentle face and a docile manner. He speaks softly, as if afraid.]

“There was barely any work at the workshop so, when the order came in, well, it was a relief.

According to the specs, the client wanted us to build a very sophisticated piece, so complex it would take at least six months to complete. In other words, six months of very profitable labor.

The specs didn’t clarify what kind of machine our piece would be a part of, and even though I was curious, I got so busy setting up production that I soon forgot. Besides, this kind of secrecy is not unheard of in our business. Industrial espionage, pending patents, all good reasons for the client not to share the final design with us.

But then, halfway into the project, we started lagging behind schedule and I had to look for extra hands in order to make the delivery date.

I called my friends at other shops and was surprised to find out they were also looking for temporary workers. I soon realized every workshop in town was slammed building parts for this “mystery machine,” as some of the guys called it.

I was tempted to ask my colleagues if they too found it unsettling that we were all building pieces for a machine we knew nothing about. But, why question a job that had brought us all months of employment and profit? No one likes a party pooper…

So I just paid my employees overtime and production eventually got back on schedule. Months later, we completed the piece right on time.

The same night we shipped it out, we threw a party to celebrate. Believe it or not, some employees even cried; that’s how attached we all had become to the piece.

A few weeks later, without warning, the authorities deployed a gigantic machine into the streets that, with one clean sweep, annihilated thousands of protesters.

No one would ever admit it, but deep down, most of us knew what kind of machine our parts would eventually help create.

Although, why deny it… Making them brought us such happiness.”

Are you an actor or director interested in using this monologue? Contact us in ABOUT MONOLOGY!

 Copyright Abel Gonzalez 2016

death, hate, love, murder

ZOMBIE HATE

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[A seventy-year-old drunk, skeletal and haggard.]

I sometimes wish zombies existed.

And no, I’m not crazy…I just miss my dead daughter.

I don’t want her to come back as a zombie either. That’d be awful, worse than missing her. She didn’t just up and die anyway… she was murdered. There’s a big difference.

Although I didn’t give her much thought when she was alive. I couldn’t.  I was brimming with hate and anger; always shit-faced drunk or just sober enough to make some money for more booze. I was also an asshole to her and to her mother.

But on the day she got murdered, when the police caught the sonofabitch and they told me how he had made my little girl suffer, just out of pleasure… well, I stopped drinking right then and there. It was easy. I didn’t want to drown my pain anymore. I needed it so I could focus it on the murderer, with all its intensity, all its venom.

During the trial, I wished they would let him go free… so I could kill him myself. But they sent him to jail. Many years.

And me? Well, I remained sober, got a job, cleaned up my act. I even started exercising. I just wanted to be alive when that sonofabitch got out. I was tempted by religion too but, again, I didn’t want anything  interfering with my hate.

Thirty years went by. I lived a normal life. Uneventful. I didn’t suffer. Didn’t feel pleasure. I just did the time with him…waiting for mine to come.

And it did.

The day he got out, I followed him into an alley and shot him six times. Then went straight to the first bar I saw and got drunk.

I’ve been drunk since… because as soon as killed that sonofabitch, I knew my hate  wouldn’t die along with him. And indeed, it’s still inside me, more painful than ever.

That’s why I said I wish zombies existed… because if that sonofabitch was one of them, I could spend the rest of my life killing him time and time again.

But I’m afraid this hate of mine is the only possible zombie.

It must be because I don’t see a way to get rid of it.

Are you an actor or director interested in using this monologue? Contact us in ABOUT MONOLOGY!

 Copyright Abel Gonzalez 2016