The Mace, Junkie Bells, and other tripe writings by OTP deplorables :D

[MountainGirl]

https://the-mace.blogspot.com/

For easier reading, clicking on each Chapter number will open the Chapter in a separate page.


Edit to add: Strat was asking about my book over in the Queen thread ( https://theoutdoortradingpost.com/showthread.php?20093-The-Queen-Mum-Has-Passed&p=240807&viewfull=1#post240807 ) so I put the link to it here. It's long out of print, and I'm not trying to sell it, etc. Written in 2002, during a life long past. Read it or not, comment or not, as you wish.

It's definitely not everybody's cuppa. :)

[MountainGirl]

Oh man... :exploding:
Skimming through it, I found that Chapter 26 was left completely off the main page!!
Clicking the 'older post' link from an opened Ch25 will get you there - or - here's the direct link to that chapter.
https://the-mace.blogspot.com/2007/12/26.html

Oh hell with it. Here's Ch26 -

~ 26 ~

Saturday, August 23rd Nanaimo, BC

They had arrived early that morning to set up the chairs. Harry was physically exhausted, but the only thing he could feel was the energy in the room and the hope that all would go well. The few that weren’t connected online he had been able to contact by phone. As this was summer, which meant good weather on all parts of the island, most had no difficulty with the journey to Nanaimo. They knew this was important; somehow they had all arranged to come. When the last one arrived, Harry nodded to his nephew Keith, who got up and stood guard outside the door. Keith was as big as the door, his uncle had chosen well.

Harry stood so that he could be easily heard, and laid it out, plain and clear. “In the new government, if it happens, there will be no Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs. No welfare checks, no entitlement checks. The only thing that will still be provided,” he looked at Wilma, who nodded confirmation, “is health care. That will still be there for everybody.”

Old Simon Begay shouted from the back of the room: “What the hell are we supposed to do, Harry? Go back to wearing skins? I don’t think Mary could chew me one anymore.” Simon’s words were crazy of course, and nobody they knew had chewed skins for over a hundred years, but suddenly they could all see old Mary, sitting outside of her house, gumming away on a piece of sealskin. Their faces went even longer at the shared image; Harry used most of his remaining energy to keep a straight face.

“We get the parks.”

Harry Thorn brought the small crowd to a dead stop with his words.

Finally, Simon found his voice, “We get the parks. What do you mean we get the parks?”

They were stunned as Harry explained.

“I mean we get the parks. All of the Provincial Parks on Vancouver Island will belong to us. For this to happen, though, there are some things we have to do.”

“One - We have to figure out how we want to divide them up between us.”

“Two - We have to keep this absolutely secret. If anyone outside of us here in this room finds out – and by ‘anyone’ I mean everybody, spouses, family, other tribal members – if anyone finds out, then all hell will break loose, the new country wont happen, and we’ll be Wards of the US of A’s Bureau of Indian Affairs.”

Harry continued, “Now – I’ve brought plenty of maps, I’ve got my laptop if there is anything anybody wants to research. Oh, I didn’t mention the last thing. Three – We can’t leave here until we have it all worked out.”

He pointed towards the door. “My nephew, Keith, can arrange for food to be brought in, and anything else you may need. You can call whoever you need to call to clear your schedule or let folks know you will be here for a while. Those without a cell phone can use mine. Wilma is the liaison on our behalf and will oversee the transfer of ownership of the property in the manner of our decisions. She will also record our words here today, to help us remember them later, if that becomes necessary. There are a lot more changes that you don’t know about yet – but you will be told everything. And everyone will speak today; all voices will be heard. But first, lets get settled in, shall we? Now – who needs to use my phone?”

The roar was deafening. Some sat dumbfounded, not sure whether to believe their ears or not. Others, those who knew Harry Thorn, knew every word he spoke was the truth. Keith, outside, leaned against the door and smiled. His uncle had been right. It was to be a lively meeting, indeed.

************

[StratBastard]

Read the first section.
I like how very well you have the premise getting off the runway so quickly, while doing the character development simultaneously. Keeps it up-tempo from the first page.
And I'm learning stuff about Canada as well. My family drove up from Oregon into Canada, across to Lake Superior, and then a ferry back into the states in '71. But I was a kid, and all that really still stands out are "imperial gallons" and strange and expensive cigarettes.
I'm a book in the tub kinda guy, and don't read e-books ever. But I am definitely going to make an exception here.
Thanks for the link!
Strat

[red442joe]

Thank you MG.

Joe

[MountainGirl]

Read the first section.
I like how very well you have the premise getting off the runway so quickly, while doing the character development simultaneously. Keeps it up-tempo from the first page.
And I'm learning stuff about Canada as well. My family drove up from Oregon into Canada, across to Lake Superior, and then a ferry back into the states in '71. But I was a kid, and all that really still stands out are "imperial gallons" and strange and expensive cigarettes.
I'm a book in the tub kinda guy, and don't read e-books ever. But I am definitely going to make an exception here.
Thanks for the link!
Strat

Kind words, Strat, thanks :)

I dont read e-books either... not sure when kindle? et al started up & dont care lol. Hard to recline back and snooze under a good title if I cant turn the pages with my fingers.

Meant what I said in the Queen thread - your writings would be most welcome here, as would any other OTP'ers personally created tripe. :D
The thread could be a landing spot (confinement area) for us wordy folk. Hey! Maybe we could get Slippy to post some of his Sports Editorials that got him in so much hot water! :thumb:

[StratBastard]

Hope this transfers from an old PDF file OK. Oh, and remember... you asked for this. Probably unwisely LOL. A nice cheery Christmas story to warm your way towards the holidays...

Junkie Bells
Part 1

The winds were playing hell with the sleigh tonight, and Santa was pulling up hard on the reins… trying to bring this flying shit-bucket down to the slightly inclined and snow covered urban street below. To make matters worse, most of the streetlights drooped with darkened impotence, standing as mute witnesses to the harsh realities of inner-city blight and municipal neglect.

Santa really couldn’t see if the left-side lane was completely clear, and considered briefly going around once more… to try and come in at another spot with hopefully better lighting. As if sensing this uncertainty, the reindeer began to balk; up front and in the lead position, Rudolph looked to be actually about to abort the attempt without discussion.

Fuck it, Santa decided. We’re going in, and pulled up on the reins with real authority, quashing the burgeoning mutiny before it could gain any steam.
The steel runners hit the hard-packed snow and bounced hard three times, scattering packages and boxes into the night air like buckshot. One runner finally gained purchase as the team and sleigh flew hell-for-breakfast down the dirty street, while the other now leaned up and out like a dog pissing at a fire hydrant.

Shit, Volkswagon! His mind screamed at him as the evidence of his eyes hit the grey matter behind them. There it sat in the darkened left lane; up on blocks and with that curved hood looking back at him like an insipid grin. Leaning hard to the right with his substantial bulk, the right runner too finally came down… allowing just enough time to avoid an outright head-on collision. Santa felt the impact as the sleigh caught the edge of the front bumper while going past, and he could clearly hear the sound of the old pine-lined left panel cracking and splintering. Could’a been a lot worse he thought as his ride finally ground itself to a halt.

Santa leaned back on the little bench, his cheeks puffing as he blew out a sigh of relief.

He looked and saw Rudolph peering back at him abashedly over his shoulder.
“Try that crap again,” he said evenly, “and I might just get me a hankerin’ for venison… get my drift chief?”
Rudolph dropped his gaze and shuffled his hooves nervously.

Santa reached beneath his dark red coat and fished out a small flask. Tilting it up to his eager lips, he took three long swallows before replacing the cap and hiding it away again.
“WHEW!” he wheezed, taking a moment to let it warm his blood a little. Back in the day, there was always warm eggnog in the flask he kept hidden under his coat; just recently, however, it mostly carried Jack Daniel’s.

All right, he thought with resignation. Let’s get this circus over with.

As he reached for the handrail to lift himself from the bench to the ground below, an obvious tremor ran through his large and somewhat wizened hand. He sat motionless again for a few moments, staring at the trembling member with disdain.

Christ… here it comes, he thought. This is gonna go from bad to worse in a big-ass hurry too. He briefly considered the flask again before dismissing it wholesale. It really didn’t help much, and was like fighting a forest fire with a squirt-gun.

Santa has a bad habit, and Santa is hurting.

It’s funny how this sort of thing can just sneak up on you; a pinch here, a snort there… just a little something to take the edge off of things. You know how it is. The world speeds up, the world changes, and everyone who remembered how it once was are now deep into Dirtnap City . Not a lot of focus and support for an old and nearly-forgotten mythical creature like himself. The shine and even wonder of such things are long gone, and nothing seems to really sparkle anymore.

So sure, you tell yourself this is just to get you over a rough patch… you’re gonna quit this shit just as soon as you get things back on track a bit. It’s not like you’re using all the time or anything.
But once he started fixing, the veil of rationalization was lifted from his old eyes. Santa was hooked through the bag, and no longer jerked himself off with any thoughts of alternatives. Santa needed to get well, and pretty damned soon too. Santa needed to find a fix.

He has already had his “moment of clarity” as the disciples of NA refer to it in their religion of powerlessness, and knows well that some things simply remain beyond repair; straight, sober, or flat bombed out of his hairy white gourd, his time was ending… and ending badly. Anybody wants to point fingers, you just go right on ahead, he thought with bitter disdain. You made me what I was in the beginning, and you sure as hell made me what I am now.

Mrs. Claus too has departed, having apparently decided to exchange an eternity of this sort for blessed oblivion. Soon after, the elves walked… and the whole kit-and-shitting-kaboodle was left for him to manage alone. Who could really blame him for needing a little help? Here he was all alone at the Pole with nothing but a handful of mangy fleabag reindeer, which he of course had to feed and tend to daily. Another year like this, he mused darkly, and even Rudolph might start looking good to me. Santa needs to find himself a ho ho HO.

He caught himself scratching at his arm and made himself stop. Pulling up his long coat sleeve, he studied his arm with a clinical detachment; dark lines were running from the crook of his elbow and upwards like gangbusters. Immortal or no, I should likely do something about that soon, he thought, and pulled the red sleeve back down over his golden arm.

[StratBastard]

Part 2

His old black boots crunched in the snow as he heaved himself up and out of the sleigh and to the ground. He took a look up and down the dark street, assessing the situation and getting his bearings. Apparently he was alone out here, and began to relax a bit. Sure I am… nobody else stupid enough to be out at 3 a.m. on a night like this, and in this neighborhood, he thought to himself.

He started scanning the porches of the old and somewhat run-down buildings, his gaze passing and then quickly returning to a small brownstone off to the left. The numbers were supposed to read 666, but the last digit had come unhinged and was hanging askew, nearly upside down. 666 Nicholas Street, he said to himself. This is the place all right.

Santa knew (in that way that Santa magically knows just about everything) that a little girl named Cicelia lived here… Cicie to her friends. He also knew that her mother was a pretty good women, who struggled endlessly to simply feed her child and keep her clothed. Problem was, the girl’s father was pretty much your run-of-the-mill dirt-bag; in and out of jail with regular frequency and on perpetual parole. Another one of those guys who simply feel like they’re somehow entitled to anything they want, and in any way they can get it. When he was around, there wasn’t a lot of resources left for little Cicie. If it came down to a pack of smokes for him or a school lunch for her, Cicie invariably went hungry.

Santa started rifling through his pile of bags, picking out a few brightly colored, ribbon-bound boxes to take in and leave for Cicie. They contained a doll, a little tea-set, and of course some nice and new warm clothes for her; Santa intended her to return to school after the holiday break looking pretty darn spiffy, and ease her embarrassment over her well-patched but old wardrobe. Shit-for-brains is not likely going to want to try and sell this stuff, Santa knew.

He tucked them all in his delivery bag and proceeded to the porch. Dim light slithered out of a small window next to the door, and he peered in to see what to expect.

There he was, bigger than life and twice as ugly. The dirt-bag was laid out as comfy as you please on the living-room couch, not much unlike a dog turd laying out in the yard… an unwelcome sight and stinking up the place to boot. Unencumbered by employment, he was of course wide awake in the middle of the night and watching a stolen little television set on the coffee table before him. He balanced a tall 40 zone of beer on his substantial belly, which was only partially obscured by the dirty tee-shirt struggling unsuccessfully to cover it. The sound of “The Price is Right” drifted lazily to Santa’s ears as he watched the dirt-bag scratch at his crotch.

Warm and cozy on the couch, Spencer T. Jefferson (T-Rock on the streets) nodded in and out on a very comfortable high, thank you very much. He was onto some pretty dope smack, and had managed to finagle himself a substantial little supply. One little problem had presented itself, which he quickly resolved with the back of his hand. That bitch he was married to had tried to hold out on him! Got herself a big, fat ol’ juicy check from the church relief fund from down-street… almost $2000. Tried to hide all those dead presidents, and when he found them (he made a regular habit of rifling her purse for change, and saw the wad stuffed into a little corner on the bottom) she then had the unmitigated temerity to tell him how the finances went in his own house. How that stupid little rug-monkey kid needed to see a dentist, for fuck’s sake. Said it was her house, and that she scrubbed toilets all day to keep this roof over their heads. Started screaming at him like a crazy bitch. No one would put up with that shit, and he put her down fast as was his sovereign right and responsibility.

With all things set straight in the world again, such were the lofty thoughts of T-Rock when the front door exploded inwards like the arrival of a S.W.A.T. team. It bounced harshly back from the wall and rained broken glass everywhere, making T-Rock jump and drop his foaming beer to the floor. A large darkened figure filled the doorway entirely, and T-Rock’s hand quickly slipped under the cushion to bring out his gat.

“Eat this, mother-FUCKER!” he screamed as he leveled the .45 Colt automatic at the intruder. T-Rock always carried a .45; those bloods who favored the 9mm have just seen too many damned videos. A .45 was a BIG slug from a big gun, and always knocked a mother-fucker flat. Don’t ever give ‘em the chance to fire back, that was T-Rock’s policy. He knew how to survive on the streets.

This stupid fuck was sure making it easy, but T-Rock smiled… knowing this sort of thing would still add to his creds on the streets. The heavy automatic jumped in his hand as he repeatedly pulled the trigger nearly point-blank at the figure rapidly approaching his little nest of repose. It was amazingly loud in this small space, and the room instantly filled with the acrid smell of cordite.

Problem was, the mother-fucker was still coming. The pictures which hung on the wall behind the guy jumped and exploded, but the dude himself not only did not go flat, but just kept advancing evenly towards the couch. The slide on his gat sat locked open now, signaling the end of what the clip had to give the situation. He looked at it stupidly with his mouth hanging open, and the guy reached forward casually and plucked it, still smoking, right out of his hand… sticking it in and under the big black belt around his waist like they sometimes did in old cowboy movies. Frozen in place and gape-jawed, he saw the fist coming but was nonetheless powerless to do anything about it. It seemed as big as a Cornish hen, and caught him flush under the jaw with enough inertia to send him back into the couch again, bouncing his head against the wall it was pressed to and re-bounding him to sprawl flat on the large coffee table. His head and shoulders finally came to rest on the wood surface, and two teeth leapt from his still-open mouth to rattle bloodily across the table. Things began to swim for a few moments, and he simply laid there like a sack of grain.

After a bit things come back into focus, and he brings his head up to scan the room; the freak is still right there in the place, walking about from room to room as if looking for something. Coming back into the living room, he drops the big sack he’s toting and stands over T-rock, surveying him.

“No tree?” the freak asks.

T-Rock is not so sure he heard that right. “What?” he asks.

“You didn’t even bother getting her a tree, did you Tinkerbell?” the freak asks, obviously a rhetorical question.

T-Rock is getting his senses back, and tries to re-gain some control over the situation.

“Lissen up, you ol’ white-bread mayonnaise mother-fucker,” he says, getting to his feet and spraying blood from his mouth with every syllable. “I don’t know who the fuck you are or what you might be about, but you just bought yourself a stone my man. I am gonna fuck you up something righteous!”

T-Rock shoved the table to one side, sending the little television bouncing noisily across the hardwood floor, and reached up to grab a big handful of mother-fucker. T-Rock was a big man, and as such was fully accustomed to having his way in most physical confrontations. Mostly people just plain didn’t want to fuck with him, and on those few occasions when someone did, he took an almost sensual pleasure in busting them up with practiced ease.

This crazy mother-fucker was big too, kind of John Wayne big… a real burly old fuck with a belly the size of a keg. T-Rock had no intention of taking any chances with this loony-tunes bastard, and was going to bring it all hard and fast… and then stomp him mercilessly when he lay on the floor crying.

The freak, however, simply lays a single hand flat against T-Rock’s substantial chest and shoves him back casually… in fact shoves him so hard and easily, it’s as if he were no more than a small child. Between the time he actually leaves his feet and the time he is slammed against the wall a good 6 feet back, T-Rock has adjusted his appraisal… deciding wisely to abandon this approach. He drops as if boneless to the dirty linoleum, and then the guy is standing over him again.

“Where’s the kid?” the freak asks.
“Who the fuck are you?” T-Rock responds with genuine interest.
Crack! With uncanny speed, the freak has pulled the Colt from his belt and brought it across T-Rock’s gleaming skull. He is being pistol-whipped like a bitch, and with his own gun. It is again placed in the belt casually.

“I asked you a question Spence, and I want an answer. I want it fast, and I want it without your simpering lip.”
“Don’t you call me that, my name’s T-Ro…”
Crack Crack!
“AHHHHH!! T-Rock mewls, his beefy arms now cradling his bleeding head.
The gun is again replaced in the belt.
“You’re a slow learner, but I can do this all night Spence… I’ll never get tired of it. And I know your name; Spencer T. Jefferson, the “T” standing for Theodore. Your mother named you after Teddy Roosevelt, and isn’t that just a laugh riot? I mean, seeing how you’ve so obviously spent your whole life living up to your namesake… I’ll just bet you make old Mom just beam with pride.”

[StratBastard]

Part 3

Spencer ‘T-Rock’ Jefferson peered at him cautiously from the protective tangle of limbs wrapped around his head. “How you know my name? I know you ain’t the Po-Po.”
“No, Spence… I’m not the “Po-Po”, or your parole officer, or even your conscience. The name is Santa Claus… Nick to my friends.”
“Yeah, sure man, whatever you say,” T-Rock says. This guy didn’t look like no Santa he ever heard of. Maybe Biker Claus. Okay, sure… the suit looks like it might have been red in some decade long past; it was hard to tell, as it was pretty damned tattered and had more stains than a two dollar whore’s mattress. The pants too were in a similar state of deterioration, and were ripped out at the crotch… exposing rags which may have once been undergarments. And you really couldn’t call that beard white either; it was an unkempt, tangled, and nicotine-tinged yellow mess, with what appeared to be food particles distributed generously throughout. Peeking out of the mess was at least one dead tooth in a row of many determined to follow its lead. And his breath smelled like a dead rat marinated in whisky. “Except, like… it’s the 28th of December, dig? Christmas is over.”

“I got a late start. Where’s the kid Spence? I know she was here just a little while ago’
“Marcie’n me had us a little static, aint no big thang. She took Cecie to her Momma’s down-street for a bit,” T-Rock says, slowly lowering his arms as the tone of the conversation calmed a little. Just some old street crazy, he thought to himself. Pretty soon he’ll start hearin’ voices outside or somethin’ and totter the fuck out of here. Just play it cool man.

The old crazy fuck leveled his gaze at him, saying “You’re just gonna keep on coming back, aren’t you Spence? Gonna keep on slapping her down every time she tries to make something work for this family, and you’ll keep showing up every time you think there might be a nickel in her purse… right? Hurting and taking, that’s what you know, isn’t it? You’re just never going to go away on your own, are you?”

Spence was getting ready to lip off again, and pointed his finger. ‘Hey, this is my house, and…”
Santa didn’t really hear the rest. His undivided attention was now focused exclusively on T-Rock’s extended arm. Track marks. Fresh.
Santa’s eyes narrowed like the slits of a Nazi machine-gun turret.

“Where’s the stash, Spence old buddy?” Santa asked smiling, sweet as butter and honey but still with those laser-intent eye slits.
T-Rock looked stricken. ‘Stash? Aint no stash, crazy mother-fucker. Don’t know what you talkin’ ‘bout.”
Santa considered. “It’s under the cushion, isn’t it? Where the gun was too,” he decided, turning and walking back towards the couch. Lifting the cushions, he of course found it instantly… right where it had to be.
T-Rock was instantly up and scrambling across the cold linoleum floor. He reached the beer bottle lying at the foot of the couch, and lifting it high smashed it against the table edge. Brandishing the jagged neck before him, he advanced with murder burning in his remorseless eyes.
“You a DEAD MAN, mother-FUCKER! He screamed in an ecstasy of fury. “NOBODY takes my shit… NOBODY!”
Santa turned to meet him with almost a sigh of regret. “You have to have it your way, don’t you?”

Santa pulled the door closed behind him as best he could; it was quite a mess, but she would get it fixed up soon enough. He shouldered his sack with effort and began the short walk back to the sleigh. It was quite a bit heavier than when he went in. And it was dripping.
He rolled it off his shoulders and into the back of the sleigh, where it settled with a few complaining creaks from the pine floor paneling. Take a little something, leave a little something, Santa thought to himself. He had heard that somewhere or other, and it sounded like a pretty good policy.

Along with the full ounce of high-grade China White, he had discovered a nice little wad of cash under the couch cushions… way more than the $2000 Spencer had taken from his woman. Apparently he had been into something profitable, although almost certainly at the expense of some unlucky other or others. On the Naughty or Nice List, Spence had hardly been what you could call a climber. No matter; it made a tidy little Christmas bundle for Marcie, and he had left it where she was sure to discover it… wrapped in a nice red bow of course. Cecie would get to see that dentist this year after all, and perhaps they could also move out of this shit-hole neighborhood. Santa knew that things often worked out if you just kept your best hopes in front of you and your spirits sunny and bright. He whistled “Jingle bells” as he climbed back up onto his bench seat.

He drew in a great breath, and began calling out “On Donder, on…” but broke into a harsh and extended fit of coughing. Waiting to catch his breath he nearly nodded right off, but caught himself and suddenly sat bolt upright… shaking his old head with a chuckle.
“I guess there’s no need to stand on ceremony boys, let’s just roll”
And with that, the sleigh began to roll, gaining speed quickly and lifting from the snowy ground below. Santa was feeling decidedly like his old self again, and before the night sky swallowed them completely his voice rang out once more strong and true;

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

[Slippy]

Pretty dang good, Strat!

You had me at; "the streetlights drooped with darkened impotence...."

:tree:



Part 3

Spencer ‘T-Rock’ Jefferson peered at him cautiously from the protective tangle of limbs wrapped around his head. “How you know my name? I know you ain’t the Po-Po.”
“No, Spence… I’m not the “Po-Po”, or your parole officer, or even your conscience. The name is Santa Claus… Nick to my friends.”
“Yeah, sure man, whatever you say,” T-Rock says. This guy didn’t look like no Santa he ever heard of. Maybe Biker Claus. Okay, sure… the suit looks like it might have been red in some decade long past; it was hard to tell, as it was pretty damned tattered and had more stains than a two dollar whore’s mattress. The pants too were in a similar state of deterioration, and were ripped out at the crotch… exposing rags which may have once been undergarments. And you really couldn’t call that beard white either; it was an unkempt, tangled, and nicotine-tinged yellow mess, with what appeared to be food particles distributed generously throughout. Peeking out of the mess was at least one dead tooth in a row of many determined to follow its lead. And his breath smelled like a dead rat marinated in whisky. “Except, like… it’s the 28th of December, dig? Christmas is over.”

“I got a late start. Where’s the kid Spence? I know she was here just a little while ago’
“Marcie’n me had us a little static, aint no big thang. She took Cecie to her Momma’s down-street for a bit,” T-Rock says, slowly lowering his arms as the tone of the conversation calmed a little. Just some old street crazy, he thought to himself. Pretty soon he’ll start hearin’ voices outside or somethin’ and totter the fuck out of here. Just play it cool man.

The old crazy fuck leveled his gaze at him, saying “You’re just gonna keep on coming back, aren’t you Spence? Gonna keep on slapping her down every time she tries to make something work for this family, and you’ll keep showing up every time you think there might be a nickel in her purse… right? Hurting and taking, that’s what you know, isn’t it? You’re just never going to go away on your own, are you?”

Spence was getting ready to lip off again, and pointed his finger. ‘Hey, this is my house, and…”
Santa didn’t really hear the rest. His undivided attention was now focused exclusively on T-Rock’s extended arm. Track marks. Fresh.
Santa’s eyes narrowed like the slits of a Nazi machine-gun turret.

“Where’s the stash, Spence old buddy?” Santa asked smiling, sweet as butter and honey but still with those laser-intent eye slits.
T-Rock looked stricken. ‘Stash? Aint no stash, crazy mother-fucker. Don’t know what you talkin’ ‘bout.”
Santa considered. “It’s under the cushion, isn’t it? Where the gun was too,” he decided, turning and walking back towards the couch. Lifting the cushions, he of course found it instantly… right where it had to be.
T-Rock was instantly up and scrambling across the cold linoleum floor. He reached the beer bottle lying at the foot of the couch, and lifting it high smashed it against the table edge. Brandishing the jagged neck before him, he advanced with murder burning in his remorseless eyes.
“You a DEAD MAN, mother-FUCKER! He screamed in an ecstasy of fury. “NOBODY takes my shit… NOBODY!”
Santa turned to meet him with almost a sigh of regret. “You have to have it your way, don’t you?”

Santa pulled the door closed behind him as best he could; it was quite a mess, but she would get it fixed up soon enough. He shouldered his sack with effort and began the short walk back to the sleigh. It was quite a bit heavier than when he went in. And it was dripping.
He rolled it off his shoulders and into the back of the sleigh, where it settled with a few complaining creaks from the pine floor paneling. Take a little something, leave a little something, Santa thought to himself. He had heard that somewhere or other, and it sounded like a pretty good policy.

Along with the full ounce of high-grade China White, he had discovered a nice little wad of cash under the couch cushions… way more than the $2000 Spencer had taken from his woman. Apparently he had been into something profitable, although almost certainly at the expense of some unlucky other or others. On the Naughty or Nice List, Spence had hardly been what you could call a climber. No matter; it made a tidy little Christmas bundle for Marcie, and he had left it where she was sure to discover it… wrapped in a nice red bow of course. Cecie would get to see that dentist this year after all, and perhaps they could also move out of this shit-hole neighborhood. Santa knew that things often worked out if you just kept your best hopes in front of you and your spirits sunny and bright. He whistled “Jingle bells” as he climbed back up onto his bench seat.

He drew in a great breath, and began calling out “On Donder, on…” but broke into a harsh and extended fit of coughing. Waiting to catch his breath he nearly nodded right off, but caught himself and suddenly sat bolt upright… shaking his old head with a chuckle.
“I guess there’s no need to stand on ceremony boys, let’s just roll”
And with that, the sleigh began to roll, gaining speed quickly and lifting from the snowy ground below. Santa was feeling decidedly like his old self again, and before the night sky swallowed them completely his voice rang out once more strong and true;

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

[MountainGirl]

That was really good, Phoenix, rich as hell.

I've always marveled at others' ability to paint the drapes (as I call it) and which you have in spades. Bravo. :thumb:

I know you know what I mean by that but just in case someone else is reading this thread (lol yeah right) it's this:

*******************

Strat's tripe takes you on a vivid journey and fills in all the blanks; like watching a movie - all ya gotta do is sit back and enjoy the ride. :)
MG's tripe is bare-boned; complex interactions - but leaves it to your imagination to visually set the scene (paint the drapes) any way you'd like. :)

There was one example of the difference in styles in Part 3, when the story jumped from this -

.... Santa turned to meet him with almost a sigh of regret. “You have to have it your way, don’t you?”

directly to this -

Santa pulled the door closed behind him as best he could; .....

That jump ^^ leaves it up to you to visually fill in what happened in-between: a big drawn out struggle? a quick kill? your choice :)

********************

Great job, btw, making sure they come to the right conclusion (dripping bag) without having to verbally spiral down even further; sensing limits isn't something every writer has, I've discovered. And - leaving the reason for Santa's improved mood at the end undisclosed was a nice touch, imo. I'm guessing most will catch that, lol.

Thanks for sharing it and please do post anything else you'd like. :hail:

[StratBastard]

That was really good, Phoenix, rich as hell.

I've always marveled at others' ability to paint the drapes (as I call it) and which you have in spades. Bravo. :thumb:

I know you know what I mean by that but just in case someone else is reading this thread (lol yeah right) it's this:

*******************

Strat's tripe takes you on a vivid journey and fills in all the blanks; like watching a movie - all ya gotta do is sit back and enjoy the ride. :)
MG's tripe is bare-boned; complex interactions - but leaves it to your imagination to visually set the scene (paint the drapes) any way you'd like. :)

There was one example of the difference in styles in Part 3, when the story jumped from this -

.... Santa turned to meet him with almost a sigh of regret. “You have to have it your way, don’t you?”

directly to this -

Santa pulled the door closed behind him as best he could; .....

That jump ^^ leaves it up to you to visually fill in what happened in-between: a big drawn out struggle? a quick kill? your choice :)

********************

Great job, btw, making sure they come to the right conclusion (dripping bag) without having to verbally spiral down even further; sensing limits isn't something every writer has, I've discovered. And - leaving the reason for Santa's improved mood at the end undisclosed was a nice touch, imo. I'm guessing most will catch that, lol.

Thanks for sharing it and please do post anything else you'd like. :hail:

Thanx for the generosity. I figure if someone can get through my own brand of tripe without throwing it down in disgust, maybe it's at least marginally OK. And keep it short, that's my secret LOL. Don't let them become aware of the tripiness (is that a word?) by being tedious as well.

I apologize for the obviously bad formatting: it was copied and pasted from an old PDF file, When I hit the "post" button, it posted all haywire. So I fixed it and reposted... same thing. Paragraphs all jammed together, no indents, nothin'. So I tried just splitting it up a bit, and this was the best I could get it to post.

[MountainGirl]

Thanx for the generosity. I figure if someone can get through my own brand of tripe without throwing it down in disgust, maybe it's at least marginally OK. And keep it short, that's my secret LOL. Don't let them become aware of the tripiness (is that a word?) by being tedious as well.

I apologize for the obviously bad formatting: it was copied and pasted from an old PDF file, When I hit the "post" button, it posted all haywire. So I fixed it and reposted... same thing. Paragraphs all jammed together, no indents, nothin'. So I tried just splitting it up a bit, and this was the best I could get it to post.

No worries re formatting whatsoever, and be glad you had a PDF to work from. I don't. I gots nada. The book, yes. All digital files are gone. If I hadn't recalled it being online, then searched and found it, you'd all have been spared my tripiness - and yeah, that's a word now lol - especially if it's understood and misread as trippy-ness. Trippy-mess? Yeah, lol.

And margins are good. We play in them. :mocking:

[Slippy]

Its been a lot of years, and the author, in person, is a royal douchebag but if memory serves the opening line of Stephen King's THE GUNSLINGER is one that I will always remember;

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."

Classic, in my opinion.

[StratBastard]

Its been a lot of years, and the author, in person, is a royal douchebag but if memory serves the opening line of Stephen King's THE GUNSLINGER is one that I will always remember;

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."

Classic, in my opinion.

Yep. And if memory serves, it's also the last line of the entire series.

[TJC44]

MG,
I just read through part 1 of The Mace. That's some awesome work! Can't wait to read the rest!

Strat,
I'll read Junkie Bells afterward, it does look good however. I can't do more than 1 plot at a time, and my eyes have been burning all weekend from reading Thomas Watson.

I'm going to be cross eyed by the end of the week.

[StratBastard]

MG,
I just read through part 1 of The Mace. That's some awesome work! Can't wait to read the rest!

Strat,
I'll read Junkie Bells afterward, it does look good however. I can't do more than 1 plot at a time, and my eyes have been burning all weekend from reading Thomas Watson.

I'm going to be cross eyed by the end of the week.

The Mace is a good read indeed. Well deserving of its accolades. The premise is amazing to me; if it actually occurred, it would shake the world up something righteous.

[Prepared One]

Part 3

Spencer ‘T-Rock’ Jefferson peered at him cautiously from the protective tangle of limbs wrapped around his head. “How you know my name? I know you ain’t the Po-Po.”
“No, Spence… I’m not the “Po-Po”, or your parole officer, or even your conscience. The name is Santa Claus… Nick to my friends.”
“Yeah, sure man, whatever you say,” T-Rock says. This guy didn’t look like no Santa he ever heard of. Maybe Biker Claus. Okay, sure… the suit looks like it might have been red in some decade long past; it was hard to tell, as it was pretty damned tattered and had more stains than a two dollar whore’s mattress. The pants too were in a similar state of deterioration, and were ripped out at the crotch… exposing rags which may have once been undergarments. And you really couldn’t call that beard white either; it was an unkempt, tangled, and nicotine-tinged yellow mess, with what appeared to be food particles distributed generously throughout. Peeking out of the mess was at least one dead tooth in a row of many determined to follow its lead. And his breath smelled like a dead rat marinated in whisky. “Except, like… it’s the 28th of December, dig? Christmas is over.”

“I got a late start. Where’s the kid Spence? I know she was here just a little while ago’
“Marcie’n me had us a little static, aint no big thang. She took Cecie to her Momma’s down-street for a bit,” T-Rock says, slowly lowering his arms as the tone of the conversation calmed a little. Just some old street crazy, he thought to himself. Pretty soon he’ll start hearin’ voices outside or somethin’ and totter the fuck out of here. Just play it cool man.

The old crazy fuck leveled his gaze at him, saying “You’re just gonna keep on coming back, aren’t you Spence? Gonna keep on slapping her down every time she tries to make something work for this family, and you’ll keep showing up every time you think there might be a nickel in her purse… right? Hurting and taking, that’s what you know, isn’t it? You’re just never going to go away on your own, are you?”

Spence was getting ready to lip off again, and pointed his finger. ‘Hey, this is my house, and…”
Santa didn’t really hear the rest. His undivided attention was now focused exclusively on T-Rock’s extended arm. Track marks. Fresh.
Santa’s eyes narrowed like the slits of a Nazi machine-gun turret.

“Where’s the stash, Spence old buddy?” Santa asked smiling, sweet as butter and honey but still with those laser-intent eye slits.
T-Rock looked stricken. ‘Stash? Aint no stash, crazy mother-fucker. Don’t know what you talkin’ ‘bout.”
Santa considered. “It’s under the cushion, isn’t it? Where the gun was too,” he decided, turning and walking back towards the couch. Lifting the cushions, he of course found it instantly… right where it had to be.
T-Rock was instantly up and scrambling across the cold linoleum floor. He reached the beer bottle lying at the foot of the couch, and lifting it high smashed it against the table edge. Brandishing the jagged neck before him, he advanced with murder burning in his remorseless eyes.
“You a DEAD MAN, mother-FUCKER! He screamed in an ecstasy of fury. “NOBODY takes my shit… NOBODY!”
Santa turned to meet him with almost a sigh of regret. “You have to have it your way, don’t you?”

Santa pulled the door closed behind him as best he could; it was quite a mess, but she would get it fixed up soon enough. He shouldered his sack with effort and began the short walk back to the sleigh. It was quite a bit heavier than when he went in. And it was dripping.
He rolled it off his shoulders and into the back of the sleigh, where it settled with a few complaining creaks from the pine floor paneling. Take a little something, leave a little something, Santa thought to himself. He had heard that somewhere or other, and it sounded like a pretty good policy.

Along with the full ounce of high-grade China White, he had discovered a nice little wad of cash under the couch cushions… way more than the $2000 Spencer had taken from his woman. Apparently he had been into something profitable, although almost certainly at the expense of some unlucky other or others. On the Naughty or Nice List, Spence had hardly been what you could call a climber. No matter; it made a tidy little Christmas bundle for Marcie, and he had left it where she was sure to discover it… wrapped in a nice red bow of course. Cecie would get to see that dentist this year after all, and perhaps they could also move out of this shit-hole neighborhood. Santa knew that things often worked out if you just kept your best hopes in front of you and your spirits sunny and bright. He whistled “Jingle bells” as he climbed back up onto his bench seat.

He drew in a great breath, and began calling out “On Donder, on…” but broke into a harsh and extended fit of coughing. Waiting to catch his breath he nearly nodded right off, but caught himself and suddenly sat bolt upright… shaking his old head with a chuckle.
“I guess there’s no need to stand on ceremony boys, let’s just roll”
And with that, the sleigh began to roll, gaining speed quickly and lifting from the snowy ground below. Santa was feeling decidedly like his old self again, and before the night sky swallowed them completely his voice rang out once more strong and true;

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

Awesome short story Strat! We have a few writers here to be sure. "Develop a taste for Venison" Great line.

[MountainGirl]

MG,
I just read through part 1 of The Mace. That's some awesome work! Can't wait to read the rest!



Kind words, thanks!
And yeah, there's a lot of good journey ahead in there. Glad you're enjoying it. :)


The Mace is a good read indeed. Well deserving of its accolades. The premise is amazing to me; if it actually occurred, it would shake the world up something righteous.

Yes, it would. As would applying the same premise/outcome to Texas, now.

I'm almost ready to start writing again. Not sure I'm qualified to write The Isle of Texas (if you know what I mean); research for that would be starting from zero... but who knows. Are you ready to get after it again?

Oh - and I again have a digital copy of The Mace. I spent this morning copying it off the website and into a doc format, then PDF'd it also. Who knows how long that blogspot would be up there; I was surprised as hell that it still was anyway. Twenty years. Snatched up the reviews etc on the left side also. Not sure why I didn't keep all the work product/newspaper articles/letters etc from back then; especially since those would be the only proof that it's really my work. Well, except for one little thing: I still have the letter from the Queen. :)

[StratBastard]

Kind words, thanks!
And yeah, there's a lot of good journey ahead in there. Glad you're enjoying it. :)



Yes, it would. As would applying the same premise/outcome to Texas, now.

I'm almost ready to start writing again. Not sure I'm qualified to write The Isle of Texas (if you know what I mean); research for that would be starting from zero... but who knows. Are you ready to get after it again?

Oh - and I again have a digital copy of The Mace. I spent this morning copying it off the website and into a doc format, then PDF'd it also. Who knows how long that blogspot would be up there; I was surprised as hell that it still was anyway. Twenty years. Snatched up the reviews etc on the left side also. Not sure why I didn't keep all the work product/newspaper articles/letters etc from back then; especially since those would be the only proof that it's really my work. Well, except for one little thing: I still have the letter from the Queen. :)

A letter from the Queen works quite nicely, doesn't it? And likely the very best accolade for your very fine work.

My humble book is merely in the Library of Congress. Likely in a dark corner no one is allowed to visit. However, I still harbor hopes for a letter from the associate manager of waste disposal in Bumfuck, Ohio.

[MountainGirl]

A letter from the Queen works quite nicely, doesn't it? And likely the very best accolade for your very fine work.

My humble book is merely in the Library of Congress. Likely in a dark corner no one is allowed to visit. However, I still harbor hopes for a letter from the associate manager of waste disposal in Bumfuck, Ohio.
Oh that's funny!!:biglaugh:

So... how might I procure a copy of the Requiem? I would very much like to read it.

[StratBastard]

Oh that's funny!!:biglaugh:

So... how might I procure a copy of the Requiem? I would very much like to read it.

Oh geez... I haven't seen one of those lying around since like forever. It's been at least 10 years since the last of them sold. No reprint of course LOL. In the literary world, if people don't already recognize your name, it's sloooow going. FAR more people know the name Phoenix Michaels in the music world than in the literary one. In fact, most who purchased my book were musicians who knew me from guitar videos on YouTube. You get 60K to 100K views on a guitar tripe video, it's a good opportunity to pitch your other tripe. Maybe one or two lying around in my storage locker... I'll take a peek next time I'm disposing of a hooker body.

I would post an excerpt, but the PDF files for the book aren't exactly jumping up and waving their arms. I was lucky to find Junkie Bells. You and I are never going to make it as librarians LOL.

[MountainGirl]

Oh geez... I haven't seen one of those lying around since like forever. It's been at least 10 years since the last of them sold. No reprint of course LOL. In the literary world, if people don't already recognize your name, it's sloooow going. FAR more people know the name Phoenix Michaels in the music world than in the literary one. In fact, most who purchased my book were musicians who knew me from guitar videos on YouTube. You get 60K to 100K views on a guitar tripe video, it's a good opportunity to pitch your other tripe. Maybe one or two lying around in my storage locker... I'll take a peek next time I'm disposing of a hooker body.

I would post an excerpt, but the PDF files for the book aren't exactly jumping up and waving their arms. I was lucky to find Junkie Bells. You and I are never going to make it as librarians LOL.

LOL boy you got that right!
How about this. Next time you're disposing of a hooker body, if I come to mind and you spot one, lemme know and we'll figure it out from there. :biglaugh:

[TJC44]

Just finished The Mace. Great job, MG!

Now that you are settled in at Ten Oaks, are you going to take up the pen again?

[TJC44]

Strat,

Don't think that I'll read "Junkie Bells" to the little ones on Christmas Eve, but good work. Nice thing about being an elf, Bullets don't kill you. Maybe the kid can take the teeth left behind, and leave them for the Tooth Fairy.

OTP's got Talent
:bounce:

[MountainGirl]

Just finished The Mace. Great job, MG!

Now that you are settled in at Ten Oaks, are you going to take up the pen again?

Thanks sweet friend. :)

I truly don't know. I enjoy writing - but I'm really tired; these last few years have taken their toll and it's nicer than I can describe to just be here, with an incredible man, enjoying a relaxed life.

So glad you enjoyed the read; hope all is going well with you. :beerchug:

[MountainGirl]

Ok - I'm posting this here. Jordan Peterson is brilliant, imo, and this is worth a watch; mostly because it explains the difference between a constitutional republic (US) and a constitutional monarchy (UK)... i.e., we have 3 branches of govt, they have 3+1 (the same 3 and the symbolic 4th, which tempers the 3). He also details why he believes neither the monarchy, nor the Commonwealth, will survive QEII's passing.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5os9bT9zuo

[StratBastard]

Requiem For A Midlife Crisis

Epilogue

Part 1


Time is a bitch.

Humor me here for a moment, if you would, and I'll come to the point.

The amount of time which passed before we humans came into existence is staggering, even unmeasurable. Sure, with the science of geology we can utilize the radioactive isotope method of dating both earthly rocks and meteorites (think of these isotopes as "clocks in a rock', whose radioactive half-life and relative decay can help to identify their age) to determine the minimal age of the universe as best we can; at least 13 billion years old. At least this much time has passed since the "big bang", resulting in the ever-expanding universe we currently reside in. But it's also entirely possible that the universe itself has expanded and contracted billions of times, in an ever-repeating cycle which our very short lives and perspective cannot discern. Did time itself, reality itself, begin with the single explosion we posit several billions of years ago... just because that's about as far as our science can see? I somehow doubt it.

We look at "ancient" buildings with awed unawareness, thinking Holy Jeez... over 4000 years old! Amazing! It certainly can inspire thoughts as to our mortality, viewing structures which remain thousands of years beyond the life span of an entire culture. But the stone itself, from which these ancient people built these monuments, is the real wonder. This stack of sedimentary stones would laugh, if they were able, at our foolish arrogance with amused disdain. You think you know about time, my friend? We were formed from other more ancient rocks which were worn away slowly over an incredibly long period... after which we laid in beds for an additional several billion years to compress into our present form. You think you're seeing something here, but you see NOTHING.

The evidence of this fact is all around us, often just under our feet; our specie's entire existence is not even a single sip of air in the epic span of time which came before us, and which will likely continue long after our eventual demise. Our individual lives - a span, if we are lucky, of 70 years or so - are smaller, even infinitesimal.

The Earth has already experienced, before our arrival, 5 or 6 planet-wide extinction events, and they will continue to occur... a virus, an asteroid strike, or maybe a protracted ice age turning our little cosmic rock into a twirling snowball. People worry about overpopulation, pollution, climate change, and other similar concerns... joining recycling programs, buying electric cars, or limiting the size of their family and carbon footprint. I try to tell them the truth: that 1 billion years from now, the Earth won't even remember we were once here. Have 10 kids if you so desire, buy a gas guzzling SUV, and litter with impunity. Consume. Time will invariably make it all moot.

Nuclear waste? Are you kidding me? Do you have any idea whatsoever of the incredible amount of radiation released when the universe, and eventually the Earth itself, were initially formed? Yet enough time has passed it off as a mere memory to the Earth, and it certainly can easily recover from anything we might do. Dump that shit down the storm drains. It won't hurt the Earth, I can guarantee you.

When we worry about the planet, what we are really worrying about is ourselves, our civilization, our continued existence. It's a pointless endeavor which is destined to end... that's just the way it is. It is not merely a mathematical probability, it is a certainty; given the many opportunities over a sufficient amount of time, we are someday destined to experience extinction. A cosmic Santa, whipping his compliment of plasma reindeer mercilessly, is driving his sleigh relentlessly and inexorably... to deliver his malignant present to all of Earth's good little boys and girls: oblivion.

In my region, populated with hippies and new age spiritual aspirants, this perspective is usually met with stony faces and silence.
Their narrow perspectives in these matters render them disinclined to participate in such debates, so heavily invested as they are in their endeavors to "save the Earth"... with recycling, with solar panels, with committees. As you can well imagine, I haven't made many friends in the neighborhood.

It's just too big to wrap our heads around, and not very reassuring. Our existence is a mere drop of water in an endless ocean of time... a small and brief spark in the darkness of forever. An eternity passed before we arrived, and another will resume when we are gone. Who will remember?

Do I have a point here, you ask? I know, nobody really wants to hear this stuff... not even me. I've never been able, however, to really help myself.

Like everyone else, I suppose, I want to feel like my life had some meaning, some point. Has anything I've done had any impact on anything... considering not just the brevity of my own life, but also of the life span of our entire species? Was it all pointless? Or, conversely, is it even more vitally important to make a statement of considerable impact, considering our brief appearance upon the stage? I still don't know... and it vexes me terribly.

But I do know this; we are, all of us, going to be dead a very long time... eternities upon eternities. It's so vitally important, therefore, to know what it is you want and to try and hold onto it as long as you can... because there is simply nothing else.

Because time is a bitch.

[StratBastard]

Part 2

I am nearly 50 years old, approaching that venerable middle-aged milestone with the jaundiced eye of indifference. To say things have not gone too well would be an understatement indeed. I am aging rapidly, my illness preventing routine exercise or maintenance. My body has grown soft, my will to endeavor against the tide weakened. Regardless of any similar horrors possibly encountered by my contemporaries, there once was a man residing in me who would not have bent to these indignities. I find now that I simply don't care.

I think of her daily. Despite the years which have passed, I am often startled into the moment with a desperate angst; my woman is gone. She is no longer mine, I am no longer hers. The emptiness this brings will consume me for long moments, vanquishing from my mind whatever enterprise, great or small, I am attempting to endeavor.

I dream of her frequently, the scenario playing out similarly each time it occurs. In these dreams she resembles nothing like her actual beloved persona. She is instead resolute, even uncaring, preparing to either leave or commit an act which will induce me to make her go. Dreams observe no universal laws, and do not ask Einstein if it is possible to travel through time. Emotionally, they drag me back completely, with little difficulty, to the actual moment when my world caught fire. I awake weeping and heartbroken, my worst fears confirmed; I am alone here. She is long gone.

I have had ample time to consider how things might have been done differently, and certainly acknowledge my own culpability in bringing this about. I no longer torture myself with what might have been, or what avenues might have been left unpursued. The end results remain, like those aforementioned ancient stone ruins stubbornly resisting the millennia. The rest, for me now, is so much useless and irresolvable speculation.

I do know that my love frightened her in some manner which, perhaps, even she could not articulate. It was far better to relocate me to any number of realms in which she could find me more safely quantified. I was, she would sometimes say, merely sexually obsessed with her. Other times, she might say I was simply in a reckless stage. Finally, she would insist me uncapable or unwilling to understand that she was valueless, even execrable... and that I deserved much better. She held, at the core of it all, an unshakable certainty; that in time I would discover the flaw within myself which allowed me to love her.

My every fervent attempt to discredit this tenet would only serve to again assert my commitment and adoration, thus increasing - rather than decreasing - her level of alarm. A self-fulfilling prophesy, this conundrum defied my every effort to unravel it, becoming a wheel which would turn until it inevitably found a terrain which could not be traversed. Having declared my love a thousand ways, manifesting it in nearly everything I endeavored while with her, it remains to this day invalidated and unacknowledged. I am still denied that one small and miserly comfort... she never really knew. She never dared to believe how much I truly loved her.

Paradoxically, it was often very apparent at times that she did, indeed, love me. Forever scribbling in her journals, she would leave me lengthy missives describing her amorous investment and intent. Many were incredibly long... single spaced, filling both sides of the pages and into the margins as well. I received these all too frequently over the years, and for the longest time my heart would swell while I eagerly read them... her affirmation so precious to me, so needed. Towards the end, I would read them terrified, more and more certain they had become a hedge of sorts against her secret trespasses.

I do not think they are lies... at least not lies meant for me. Far too much effort over too many years was expended to produce these; something was at work here, some need to be fulfilled, a genuine intent. I know she has harbored suffocating guilt over her many transgressions, both real and imagined. Perhaps each new written declaration of her love and devotion gave her permission to stay, to start over with me and try, again, to be a person she thought might be lovable. They may have chronicled her inner struggle to become worthy of trust, while trying to reconcile also her inability to trust herself. It is unclear if the devoted woman she described in her many pages over the years embodied the person she wanted to be, or the person she thought I wanted her to be. I sometimes wonder if she ever knew herself.

I have kept them all, both the small notes and the thick letters. Handwritten in her unique signature, many are beautiful and deeply touching... so much so that I dare not look at them again. They are sequestered away, stored in an old trunk like rusting atomic warheads... too dangerous to touch, yet they can't be thrown away. Yellowing by now I am sure with time and despair, they will likely be thrown out someday by same casual hand sifting through the various articles of my estate.

If on that day I could only somehow be granted a small appeal, I would pass from this often abysmal life quietly and without complaint. To whom I might petition this plea, or, for that matter, might be inclined to grant it, I have no idea. There is no harm in asking for water while, say, crossing the desert... as long as you keep walking. It's just a bad idea to sit down and wait for it to appear. Such is the lesson from Water of Love.

I do not ask for Heaven, Nirvana, or any other such hereafter... nor would I plead for immortality. I wish for this and this alone; that the same force which transports me repeatedly to that aforementioned desolate dream be utilized, just once, to take me elsewhere.

There was a place once long ago, a simple city park... unremarkable as parks go, but pretty nice all the same. My beloved and I had gone there on a whim very early in our time together. She wore a long, thin skirt, a t-shirt, and nothing else... the weather unseasonably pleasant that day. I remember lovingly admiring her beauty as the afternoon sun shone through the thin fabric.

We walked some distance to the center of the grassy area, putting as much space as we could between ourselves and the peopled walkways, and stretched out entwined on the grass. She lay atop me, her lovely face framed by an impossibly blue October sky. We kissed, whispering our desire to be together always, preparing our plans to do so. I made her laugh as I did frequently... my jokes so old as to be fresh and new to her younger muse. But mostly we marveled: the impossible, the unexplainable had occurred. We both knew we had found, inexplicably, a treasure so profound and precious as to often render us stunned and mute.

She would look down on me, her emerald eyes returning my amazed regard for long and silent moments. Turning it over again and again in our hands, we remained simply astonished to merely be touching it.

Love perhaps had made us bold, or maybe we just wanted one more secret to share outside the awareness of others. Sprawled above me, her long flowing skirt obscuring any possible detection, her hand disappeared momentarily to loosen my garments. Her eyes became liquid green dragon's fire as she maneuvered me into her body. I looked up at her and was lost forever... as I so remain.

We eventually came to regard our mating as a macrocosm of that single day... we walked together with our bounty heedless and unheeded. No one, not anyone we knew intimately, not complete strangers passed on the avenues, NO ONE had any perception of what we held together in our hands and hearts. It was not our secret... it was much more than that. It was simply imperceivable to others, unknowable, intended for we two only. Nobody understood why we were together, or what it might mean... and we simply did not care, all such concerns becoming mere trifles at best.

Just that small handful of moments, that momentous and blissful single day, when I could see in her eyes that I was no longer adrift alone in the universe... and that through her eyes and her love I could share it with another.

It's such a small thing to ask, but I know to just keep walking.

[MountainGirl]

Strat -

Back in 1991, while attending UNL, I was responsible for procuring materials for a large NSF grant for a 2-week summer camp designed to keep young girls interested in science & technology. One of the perks for the girls was they were to be able to keep the provided computers, to continue their studies & keep in touch with other participants, etc. At the end of the program, the University decided no, they didn't get to keep the promised computers after all. I was livid. So angry in fact that I resigned from the project, withdrew from UNL, and wouldn't even drive past the University for two years. It was my first experience with large-scale institutional insanity and the anger consumed me.

A few years later (and the reason I'm telling you this) I ran into my mentor from UNL, who was also part of that project, and told her it was difficult to not get pissed every time I thought about it. What she told me in reply changed my life. The essence of her words were precisely what you have conveyed in your Part 1. For me, then and there, the penny dropped. Perspective returned, the anger was gone.

Perhaps others have benefited from your words as well. I'm guessing yes.


Like everyone else, I suppose, I want to feel like my life had some meaning, some point. Has anything I've done had any impact on anything... considering not just the brevity of my own life, but also of the life span of our entire species? Was it all pointless? Or, conversely, is it even more vitally important to make a statement of considerable impact, considering our brief appearance upon the stage? I still don't know... and it vexes me terribly.

But I do know this; we are, all of us, going to be dead a very long time... eternities upon eternities. It's so vitally important, therefore, to know what it is you want and to try and hold onto it as long as you can... because there is simply nothing else.

Because time is a bitch.

Time is also a gift - because it is the great leveler.

Every action and reaction, every moment of change, in this universe, whether it's ours or geologic, is one of simultaneous creation and destruction; both, same time.

Because of this - there is no stagnation and our ability to perceive time enables us to understand the truth of your words: It's so vitally important, therefore, to know what it is you want and to try and hold onto it as long as you can... because there is simply nothing else.

Or so it seems to me.

Shortly I'll read your Part 2 ~

[MountainGirl]

Strat -
Before I read Part 2 - I just want to say how good your writing is. The flow is awesome, direction kept, nothing tedious whatsoever. You are either a natural writer, or a natural editor; likely both. Really enjoying your words here. Thank you.

[MountainGirl]

Re Part 2 -

Jesus Strat. Beyond powerful writing.

And yet...
Is there some trickery going on here?
Did 'she' ever really exist?
Or was it all (starting from the 2nd paragraph) intended as an astonishing metaphor for your lost youth and abilities? That's what I wondered at the beginning of the read - but by the end I doubted my hunch.

Either way - the 'just keep walking' is brilliant.

And, just so you know, I copied/saved both Parts incase you get a wild hair to remove them, which I hope you don't. Well met.

[Prepared One]

Awesome read Strat! You have a talent to be sure.

[StratBastard]

Re Part 2 -

Jesus Strat. Beyond powerful writing.

And yet...
Is there some trickery going on here?
Did 'she' ever really exist?
Or was it all (starting from the 2nd paragraph) intended as an astonishing metaphor for your lost youth and abilities? That's what I wondered at the beginning of the read - but by the end I doubted my hunch.

Either way - the 'just keep walking' is brilliant.

And, just so you know, I copied/saved both Parts incase you get a wild hair to remove them, which I hope you don't. Well met.

Your kindness is only exceeded by your generosity.

I found a straggler... a thumb drive. I used to keep chapters each on their own drive, so I could work on them specifically in my usual OCD manner. This one was inexplicably among a large pile of drives which were otherwise musical compositions in development. I was pleased to see it was the epilogue, as it pretty much sums up the overall story.

And yes, she certainly existed. I often had solipsistic questions and doubts about my own existence, which she swept away effortlessly... but not hers.

[MountainGirl]

....
And yes, she certainly existed. I often had solipsistic questions and doubts about my own existence, which she swept away effortlessly... but not hers.

I'm glad for you that she did exist; experiencing that depth is a gift, and for most - worth the inevitable loss of it. Your opening paragraph (for me) has become absolutely critical to the story; it is in these fucking waning years that the memories which may still haunt us do - and they slide in easier with the slowing days.

Yeah, you're right. Time is a bitch.

[StratBastard]

Did 'she' ever really exist?

In the interests of keeping this thread going... after all, we haven't seen slippy post his troublesome sports reviews as of yet.

(notes from the drive)

I have, for the most part, always felt alone my entire life... outside of everything which occurs around me. It's very hard to describe: I certainly have family, friends, and associates. I have not been actively excluded from civilization and society in any way; point in fact, I am often welcome in circles in which I have made no overtures.

I know there are millions of people walking the skin of this planet who suffer from protracted loneliness, and I'm sure it must be a terrible thing. These are people who DO feel excluded in some way, and who do not enjoy intimate relationships which might make them feel very differently about their daily lives. But for the purposes of this discussion, we cannot confuse loneliness with aloneness. I myself never felt loneliness, and though I have a great many people in my life willing to spend time with me, I often prefer my own company. I feel aloneness acutely, however; a sovereign state which renders me separate and isolated, regardless of who I may be among at any given time. I am devoid of any sense of belonging, or of really being part of anything in which I might seem entangled or invested.

It's almost like I view people, and reality itself, from a position outside of the box it is actually occurring in. When required, I successfully project an image of myself into the box... a convincing avatar which seems to participate in the concerns and efforts of group mentality. I nonetheless remain outside looking in... watching dispassionately as the probabilities and eventualities play themselves out. I am alone out here... not because I have been excluded, and not because I especially want to be. It is simply what I am, and always have been.

How or why it happened I cannot say, but Hindi changed all of this for me... at least in regard to her. Unexpected and unannounced, Hindi came into my corner of the void like a rogue comet... and instantly began to alter orbits, change gravitational pulls, and tilt worlds off their axis.

There are those who might strongly suggest we had very little in the way of a common experience, and they may be right. All of this becomes meaningless, however, and is swept cleanly away by a single and undeniable fact: she is a force to me so basic, so primal, as to pull me in as easily as a magnet would attract metal shavings. And it was much like my very first breath, and my very first time feeling the sun on my face rather than simply observing it. Hindi, with her connection to me unexplained but undeniable, pulled me in from orbit... ending my aloneness by merely existing. She remains the single being who could change my entire universe in this manner... ending the silence.

[MountainGirl]

In the interests of keeping this thread going... after all, we haven't seen slippy post his troublesome sports reviews as of yet.

(notes from the drive)

I have, for the most part, always felt alone my entire life... outside of everything which occurs around me. It's very hard to describe: I certainly have family, friends, and associates. I have not been actively excluded from civilization and society in any way; point in fact, I am often welcome in circles in which I have made no overtures.

I know there are millions of people walking the skin of this planet who suffer from protracted loneliness, and I'm sure it must be a terrible thing. These are people who DO feel excluded in some way, and who do not enjoy intimate relationships which might make them feel very differently about their daily lives. But for the purposes of this discussion, we cannot confuse loneliness with aloneness. I myself never felt loneliness, and though I have a great many people in my life willing to spend time with me, I often prefer my own company. I feel aloneness acutely, however; a sovereign state which renders me separate and isolated, regardless of who I may be among at any given time. I am devoid of any sense of belonging, or of really being part of anything in which I might seem entangled or invested.

It's almost like I view people, and reality itself, from a position outside of the box it is actually occurring in. When required, I successfully project an image of myself into the box... a convincing avatar which seems to participate in the concerns and efforts of group mentality. I nonetheless remain outside looking in... watching dispassionately as the probabilities and eventualities play themselves out. I am alone out here... not because I have been excluded, and not because I especially want to be. It is simply what I am, and always have been.

I needed to think about responding to this. Your writing maintains its above-par quality, totally. The content is what gave me pause because you nailed it; we share the same affliction, verbatim, without exception. Affliction?? I've wondered from time to time if it's part of a psychiatric taxonomy (LOL) and it might be - but it's worked for me, as if we had a choice about it, and has to my advantage generally. I never tried to 'describe' it as the need to never arose; I just gave it the label chameleon. It was really nice (and a bit startling) to see myself uncovered and detailed in your words.



How or why it happened I cannot say, but Hindi changed all of this for me... at least in regard to her. Unexpected and unannounced, Hindi came into my corner of the void like a rogue comet... and instantly began to alter orbits, change gravitational pulls, and tilt worlds off their axis.

There are those who might strongly suggest we had very little in the way of a common experience, and they may be right. All of this becomes meaningless, however, and is swept cleanly away by a single and undeniable fact: she is a force to me so basic, so primal, as to pull me in as easily as a magnet would attract metal shavings. And it was much like my very first breath, and my very first time feeling the sun on my face rather than simply observing it. Hindi, with her connection to me unexplained but undeniable, pulled me in from orbit... ending my aloneness by merely existing. She remains the single being who could change my entire universe in this manner... ending the silence.

Very nice description of this, and yes.

I know we never intentionally harm - but I wonder, sometimes, what we've left in our wake.

I bet we could swap some hellacious stories - over a beer sometime maybe but for sure not online or in any forum;
statute of limitations and all that. :biglaugh:

[StratBastard]

21404

[red442joe]

More Taggage.

Joe

[StratBastard]

22160

[MountainGirl]

Just dropping this here :)


I was in a couple garage bands around 14 and 15 years old, good memories, great times, and the hard process of learning what sucks and what doesn't LOL. Had my first paid pro gig at 19, and by 23 we had an agent and were booked pretty solid and on the road. I had a threshold moment (more like an hour) when at 16 I went to the Portland Colosseum in 1974 to see Deep Purple. I stood right at Ritchie Blackmore's feet hoping to discover something... anything really. Because even though they were much much better than me at the time, I had some inkling of what the likes of Clapton or even Hendrix were doing... all of it blues scales in the pentatonic realm. And I could replicate it on a more basic scale. But Ritchie was a mystery. His playing (as I later learned) was a blend of the pentatonic and neo-classical, of which I had no clue whatsoever. He saw me right in front of him, and also saw I was watching his fretboard intensely. He did that thing he does onstage... kneeling down and tossing off a fantastic solo... three feet from my face and grinning at me. It was way over my head of course at the time, but I absorbed enough to work at it for the next few years. There are a small handful of days in every life where one has the opportunity to wake the fuck up. That was one of mine.

[StratBastard]

Requiem For A Midlife Crisis

Prologue

It's the oddest thing, really.

Had I been the listener, instead of the bearer of such a preposterous tale, I would have of course discounted it out of hand. Such tomes are the stuff of embellished fantasy, and occur only in the contrived and wishful anecdotes recounted in such literary tour de forces as Penthouse Forum. None of us really believe these things actually happen to real people. We merely read, with an amused and wistful countenance, of some magical and mystical sexual realm which we feel somehow should exist... but does not. We follow along anyway, little different than children captivated by a fairy tale story in a candy village. We remain rapt from beginning to end... from, say, when the Rabbi sneaks into the nunnery with a goat, and then on to its inevitable conclusion.

And so, I find myself in a conundrum...feeling the story should be told, but loathing to be the teller. Sure, there are others who could probably account for their individual observations or actual participation. But I don't have to tell you: people change, have secrets or regrets, leave, or disappear outright. Civilizations crumble, suns burn themselves out, universes implode. You know how it is. Facts can rust away like the old coffee can you buried the head of your neighbor's dog in: sure, the barking has stopped, but for how long?

This task then, I suppose, has fallen to me. I remain the sole surviving witness to the entire debacle, with the exception of just one.

Just one.

[MountainGirl]

Bravo. I hope this continues...

[StratBastard]

Prologue

Part 2

This should be the segue to begin my story... isn't that just snug and tidy? And yet still I falter, reluctant to even begin thinking of her in earnest. It's like a saw-toothed knife piercing my trembling body from anus to lungs, and me trying to get up the cojones to grab it with both hands and twist. Somehow or other, it just doesn't seem like such a good idea... regardless of the pleasant distraction it might bring to so many. And yet it remains undeniable that she was more than just the beginning of it all for me; she eventually came to encompass and quantify my every living moment, my every capricious thought or determined intent. Some gargantuan Nordic deity, wielding the meat cleaver of the Gods, split my reality down the middle as cleanly as one might slit open a small trout. Except, unlike the aforementioned and unfortunate fish, I didn't wriggle one teeny bit. I saw it coming, and yet was eager to feel its bite... though it may forever separate me from all rational paradigms. One might reasonably expect someone to feel apprehension, enough at least to exercise some small modicum of caution. When it was all over, I remember feeling only one emotion strongly: gratitude. And regardless of what came after, there is but one thing I would change if I could somehow go back: I would only desperately endeavor some way to extend it.

Previous to meeting her (HER!), I was like some crazed accountant on a three day coffee binge, with a head full of bees. Everything within my purview and realm was always quickly quantified and placed in any number of useful categories within my mind. As the two halves of my world fell away, so did such nonsensical concerns fall away with them. The only two conceptual categories which mattered now remained: that which came before her, and that which came after. Unto these two overstuffed file boxes I have now funneled and jammed my entire existence, from the cradle to the here and now. She became the axle around which the wheel of my existence could freely spin. She of course would assert that I had become her axle. Such are people in love.

Hey, I told you it would sound like an absurd load of crap, didn't I? And I can't blame you one bit. Many years ago, when I was young and so goddamned sure of every little thing, someone spinning me this yarn would receive what I would have considered the appropriate antidote: two sharp open hand cracks to the face, followed by a quick and judicious application of smelling salts. Someone, I would surely say (with all the authority and wisdom bestowed upon ignorant, arrogant youth) has got to wake this poor asshole up!

I have to admit, my life is a bit of an anamorph... looking at it from where you probably stand, it might not make much sense. I can only tell you what happened. And like so many old campaigners who came before me, I can only say this: you had to be there.

From my chair at the edge, I saw her walk out onto the stage of the small theater. The behemoth, laughing, swung his blade and severed my universe. To say she was beautiful would be like describing a nuclear explosion as somewhat sparkly; she was stunning, ethereal, her beauty as empirical as God's deepest thought. In my half century of life, I have never before - or since - marked any woman who would not wilt next to her...not on the streets, not in the movies, not anywhere. I was galvanized, a rabbit caught in the jaws of some predator, a deer in the headlights.

She glided along the edge of the stage towards me, and I was instantly filled with the deepest, most mournful and forlorn sorrow... my very marrow bleeding with despair. In what cruel existence can one be shown such, and then have to go on with a life now clearly identified as mundane at best? What could my life ever be when I left this place, and this woman... who, only 20 seconds previous did not even exist in my world?

Many other people ringed the stage, and yet she began to slow as she approached my seat... an odd and curious countenance on her face. This look continued to grow more apparent as she kneeled down to obtain a closer look at me in the dark atmosphere of the theater. Seemingly compelled, she gracefully reached out to remove the hat which was obscuring my eyes in shadow. She tried to give me a smile and failed somewhat, her own eyes growing round and startled. Her perfect face, seemingly warring with joyous confusion and long-suffering grief, remained intently fixed upon mine. We looked into each other and knew...knew... that nothing could ever be the same again. In this room filled with many people, we were frozen alone in time together, in a perfect vacuum which excluded all but our shared awareness. Heedless of those around us, our eyes remained locked in stunned amazement as we regarded each other... having finally crossed the epic spans of time, of pain, of loneliness. We had found one another, and had yet to speak a single word.

[MountainGirl]

Holy crap on a cracker.
I know where you are.
I'm gonna need a cold shower.
Please dont stop. :)

[StratBastard]

Chapter One

The Road Previous To Ruin

Jesus, am I tired.

I have considered my present situation time and again... appraising each possible solution, each varying compromise. But, holding it up to the light, turning it this way and that, I simply see no resolution materializing. As much as I hate to concede it, I am going to have to reconcile myself to the facts: hard changes are forthcoming. Definitely a divorce. Starting over. Child support and visitation, rather than residing with my kids. The whole boatload. I am not generally a drinking man, but tonight I suspect I will go out and get blind. After so many months of wrestling with this, I am completely torn up. No... eviscerated.

For many months I have been forced to endlessly assess - and re-assess - my current position in this tragic comedy called life, and how I feel about it. Every time I send the metaphorical jury out to deliberate, they quickly arrive at the same verdict: you're miserable. Guilty as charged.

I have endeavored to argue my case eloquently; "Surely, your honor, some manner of resolution might still be contrived?"

"Unless you intend to introduce new evidence, Mr. Michaels, you must rest your case".

"But... there must be something that can be done??"

"Asked and answered".

"Exception, your honor!"

"Bailiff, drag this man to his cell and administer an additional beating".

I was born in 1957 with the given name of Mathew Michaels, but everyone calls me Phoenix. I am 34 years old in this year of our Lord 1992. By the standards of all outward appearances, it would seem to almost anyone that I should feel successful, and therefore happy. I have been married, for over a decade, to my wife Eliza... an attractive and intelligent woman who often garners me the envy of less fortunate men. I have two beautiful and extremely bright children, Trevor and Audria. My financial future seems assured as well. During the recession of the 1980's, when everyone else was struggling to feed themselves here...grateful to obtain a part-time job as a gas jockey... I landed a cushy government job with the U.S. Postal Service.

We live in Eugene, Oregon... an interesting town filled with music, freaks, aging hippies, and a variety of cultural (and counter-cultural) activities unique to our area. It is home to The University of Oregon Ducks, and the "track capital of the world". Hayward Field. Ken Kesey. Steve Prefontaine.

Thousands of people make the pilgrimage here once yearly to attend the Oregon Country Fair... a three day extravaganza of naked, inebriated excess. The local joke goes like this: a sign at the entrance to the fair says "you must be at least this high to enter"... and instead of a line drawn horizontally, there is simply a picture of Jerry Garcia. For a week surrounding this event, our town is packed with a myriad assortment of outworlders... characters who appear to have arrived from an entirely different civilization. Tall graybeards with long walking staffs, passing themselves off as urban shamans, or representing as post-apocalyptic Mithrandir. Middle-aged adventurers on a holiday, their tie-dyed shirts and bellbottoms retrieved from some back closet for the weekend. Endless processions of younger people with long dreadlocks, wearing dirty, hippy-styled clothing reminiscent of the 1960's. The boys are often skinny and shirtless, cultivating small goatees with varying degrees of success. Most are carrying guitars, flutes, or some manner of native drum... to likely participate in one of those incessantly irritating drum circles which seem to initiate, like spontaneous combustion, on any available patch of grass. The girls are generally without makeup, or instead wearing flowers painted upon their young faces. They walk along partially naked, the most common apparatus worn on the upper body a small square of thin cloth stretched over their young breasts. They are held in place by two little strings making their way around to the small of the back to be tied and, somehow defying gravity, held in place.

On occasion, an entirely topless woman will walk by, as if this were the most natural thing in the world (I suppose the argument could be made). Eugene, that last bastion of the sexual revolution, has laws which address men and women equally, and if a man can walk around shirtless, so too can a woman. Believe me when I say: sometimes you want to see this, and sometimes you don't. We are a Pac-10 college town, and the city is chock full of young, beautiful coeds. But we are equally populated by the aforementioned aging hippy contingent, and you are just as likely to be confronted by a half-naked, 55 year old flower child... her swinging, National Geographic dugs bringing about a brief bout of vertigo rather than titillation. As such, you take your chances here. I used to love sitting out on my front porch, located on the main drag leading to the fair, and amuse myself watching this dubious circus parade through town.

[StratBastard]

(continued)

But we also have The Hult Center for the Performing Arts, some of the best fishing in the world, white water adventures, hiking, hunting, etc.... In Eugene, you are never more than an hour or so away from the ocean, the desert, or the mountains. It's a great place to live, with seemingly something for everybody.

So things, for awhile at least, seemed to be steaming along quite handily. How circumstances conspired to lead me inexorably to these particular dubious crossroads remains, still, a bit of a mystery. But here I remain, after repeated attempts to chart some course backwards... perhaps to some point in time where I might find some way to endeavor a different, more desirable eventuality. Fate may or may not have played a hand in all this, and I'm not sure if I can really speak to that issue objectively. I do know, however, that despite the reasons - whether divine destiny or wild coincidence - I was in the right place and time when the lightning struck. At the time, I simply had no idea where all of this would take me, the roads ahead seemingly dark and unfathomable. But no one was more surprised than me to discover where I was when the lights came back on.

Early in 1983, fifty local positions were being offered to the general public by the U.S. Postal Service... and ten thousand people, desperate for gainful employment in this currently economically depressed area, mobbed the downtown personnel offices like amazed ants at a bountiful picnic. A Civil Service test was being offered, which would winnow the teeming, hungry hordes down to the desired fifty supplicants.

To say I was motivated to score well on this test would be an understatement indeed... as my wife and I had been indentured for the last few years as "assistant managers" in a large complex of 366 apartment units. This prestigious position includes such lofty responsibilities as carpet cleaning, painting, scrubbing floors, and the occasional horror of an overflowing toilet spewing filth to all points of the compass. Our meager recompense consisted of a monthly stipend of $600, a free two bedroom apartment, and our utilities paid. As an added irony, each apartment looked exactly the same: even after work hours trying to relax at home, we were still seemingly looking at the same four walls in which we had toiled inside each day. We were young, stifled, without much hope... and we were half starving.

I purchased a book aptly entitled "How To Study For The Postal Exam" and proceeded, over the next several weeks, to do just that at every opportunity. The tests were scheduled over several weeks in order to accommodate the epic turnout. I attended my scheduled testing at a public school auditorium, just one of a sea of intent faces bent earnestly over their answer sheets, pencils scribbling furiously. Finishing the exam, we were told it would be several weeks before we might receive our scores via the mail. I went back to our dismal apartment, trying not to hope for too much... to not be too invested in landing this job. With so very many applicants, our prospects seemed as slim as our chances of winning a lottery windfall.

I was sometimes able to double our pauper's income as a professional musician, getting the occasional gig in town as a lead guitarist... filling in for whomever at $100 a night as my standard fee. I was well known around town as sufficiently skilled to stand in, at a moment's notice, for any player who was sick, drunk, fired from the band, or simply AWOL. An ear player, I would make my parts up on the fly, often improvising extended guitar solos to eat up the clock onstage. Having never previously played or practiced with many of these people, we would insert as many standard rock songs as possible into any given set. A typical club would have a band from 9PM to 2AM, broken up into 5 sets of music. The band would play for 45 minutes, and then break for 15 before returning to start the next set. In such circumstances, we would huddle together during break, conspiring to identify enough tunes we all knew to put together our next 45 minutes of music. Often, I would learn the chords to several song in 15 minutes - I only needed to know the key we were going to play in to solo - and then begin the next set. All of this could make for a nerve-wracking evening, and I certainly earned my money... but it was preferable to swamping out toilets.

The money was spotty, but always seemed to come along when Eliza and I were down to eating pancakes sans butter or syrup. And for a year or so we actually ate well, when I auditioned for a Portland band. Having held endless auditions for a lead guitarist up there, they felt that they had exhausted all possibilities and come up short: still no guitarist they really liked. They therefore came south to Eugene, and placed an advertisement offering auditions, which caught my eye. One small hitch: the ad clearly stated "must sing backup".

Anyone will tell you... singing, I can't carry a tune in a bucket. As hard as I try, I can't seem to control my vocal cords enough to replicate the same note twice. In addition, my voice has a nasal quality that many would find unpleasant... similar to, say, a badger with his nuts in a vise. Through a microphone at 90 decibels, I would be adept at emptying a club rather than filling it. Jim Morrison I'm not.

I deliberated for maybe ten seconds and reasoned it out: fuck'em, I'm going anyway. They also required pro equipment, which I had, and a "high level of skill". Two out of three, I opined to myself. Let's just see. These guys had an agent man. They were exceptionally good and they were making money. Money for nothin' and your chicks for free... although as far as I was concerned they could keep the chicks. But we needed to eat, and I was going to take my shot.

[StratBastard]

(continued)

I was number 16 to be auditioned, and arrive at the warehouse being utilized in time to see number 15 leaving. Leather jacket and pants. Handsome. Tall. Big hair. Nice, expensive looking Marshall half stack amplifier. With my ratty old amp, t-shirt, jeans, and regular Joe haircut I could clearly see he would be offering little competition.

I caught a break at the audition, as their plan to trip up potentials actually played to my strong point: improvisation. The audition mostly consisted of them throwing a tune at me which they were currently writing, and seeing what I might do with it on the spur of the moment. Anna, their wonderfully talented lead singer, seemed excited, even moved, by my contributing layer to her song. We finished up doing a cover song of her favorite band Journey, and I wowed them by aggressively nailing Neil Schon's blistering solo ( I had rehearsed this song with a previous band).

The moment of truth arrived when Anna placed a microphone in front of me. "Listen", I say to the four faces scrutinizing me with growing interest. "I can't sing. At all".

Anna insisted that almost anyone can sing some backup vocals without much talent needed. She wanted us to give it a try. I flatly refused, not willing to humiliate myself.

We made our pleasantries and said goodbye. I went home rather dejected... mourning not merely the lost income, but the opportunity to play with such a talented band. I had yet to be in a band where every member was exceptionally talented. It always seemed to be one or two talented musicians, carrying two or three uninspired hacks looking to get high or get laid.

Imagine my surprise then, when they called me that evening to congratulate me on winning the audition... and to welcome me into the band. I was so very pleased, and at 26 years of age it was really the only marketable skill in my possession. I'm not movie-star handsome, and I'm certainly not particularly bright, but I could play the BEJESUS out of an electric guitar. Thank God for that, because our little household was a hurting unit. The trade-off, of course, was that I was not home very much... often on the road earning my keep as a troubadour.

I won't have to burst your proverbial bubble about the travelling "rock star" lifestyle... as pretty much everything you have heard is true. We developed a following in the region quickly with our dynamic sound, but we certainly were not famous... we had yet to even cut a record. No matter. In these kinds of clubs, women get just drunk enough to drop their inhibitions like an anchor... often trying to moor themselves on your lap. At 26, I was fairly inexperienced with the fairer sex even compared to the average guy, having lost my virginity at 17 to a woman I stayed with for 7 years. After her, I married Eliza, and these two women represented pretty much the sum of my sexual experiences. I had of course enjoyed regular intimacy for almost a full decade, but my experience was narrow indeed in regard to different partners. Being married, I either avoided the solicitations proffered or steered them towards my bandmates. I was only really tempted the one time, and for very specific reasons.

[StratBastard]

(Continued)

Our agent had procured us a weekend gig in Oakridge of all places. Oakridge is a timber town, located 40 miles outside of anything you might consider civilization. Sasquatch country. Deliverance, and Ned Beatty getting his nether business cored by some moonshiner.

Apparently, someone had opened a small club there in the hopes of making a go of it. The idea was actually sound, as currently these people were travelling to Eugene to hear live music... facing the prospect of driving home on dark roads for an hour, possibly drunk. The gig paid $1800 for two nights, and that was really all I needed to hear.

As it turned out, we were there to play the night of their "grand opening", and much effort had been expended to advertise this fact both far and wide. The place was fairly large, and may have served as a grange hall in the past. Tonight, it was packed to the rafters with revelers, tanked to the gills and expectant. It seemed that every shack, trailer, and tent in the surrounding hills must have emptied... with all residents leaving their various vales and hollers to drift into town for the upcoming big event. A collective shout rang from the crowd as we entered with our instruments, accompanied by whistles and cheers. You would think the God-Damned Beatles had shown up; it was apparent these people were really starved for a good time. That's what we came to give them, and they got it with both barrels.

As I said before, we were an extremely good band; we played in many of the big-time clubs in the metro area of Portland. Nobody saw this coming in fucking Oakridge, and as we launched into our first set, they stood stunned and gaping for perhaps 30 seconds. The paralysis suddenly broke, and the party started in earnest.

Women, women everywhere. Good God, who would have thought there would be good looking women in Oakridge? It's not that I was looking, but it certainly was surprising. As usual, I was simply planning on avoiding any inappropriate interactions. Or, as a backup plan, I would simply pretend to be too stupid to catch onto any advances, double-entendres, or come-hithers.

Halfway through our third set, I began to become aware of an unusual level of scrutiny. Mind you, I'm on the stage, and everyone is looking at me all the time. So, when I say unusual, I'm talking a searing look of laser intent directed straight at yours truly. This look was coming from not one, but TWO attractive young women... and they looked very chummy indeed. They were leaning into each other, putting their lips to each other's ear conspiratorially... and then returning their gaze to me specifically. When they were sure I was looking, they began to kiss one another like tongues would be outlawed tomorrow. They maintained a molten, steady gaze at me as they delivered this obvious message... the levee of my resolve sustaining substantial damage in mere seconds.

I did not, mind you, receive this sort of overt adulation out in the real world. At 26, I presented as very much average and unremarkable in most aspects; 5'10" tall, average good looks, with an even and quiet demeanor. I was rather thin as well, weighing in at perhaps 145 pounds... my efforts at building my sparse frame with weight training yielding miserly dividends. My narrow body would harden and define somewhat, taking on the appearance of a skinned rabbit... but my racing metabolism refused to allow the addition of any significant gains in dimension or weight. Hardly a hunk, I was also carrying the impediment of crippling shyness... another unwelcome side effect of my inexperience with women.

Welding these substantial assets, I turned to discover these two exotic women approaching me at the end of our set... feeling an unsettling elixir of abject terror and compelled fascination racing through my veins.

While I always maintained my marriage vows, I nonetheless entertained a substantial and varied secret sexual imagination. Various scenarios, both profane and sublime, would play in my mind's eye like some jingle you can't quite get out of your head. These would occur to me constantly, even inappropriately, in any given situation. A young saleswoman, helping me try on shoes, might suddenly lean forward and whisper an appalling and filthy suggestion in my ear. A busty real estate agent, merely showing me a house, might suddenly bend over a vacant kitchen counter and lift her skirt... agreeing to lower her commission would I only capitulate to her fervent desires.

Having a sexual history that was somewhat limited - sexual congress with ONE woman considered a plus - I especially found the notion of two women exhilarating... albeit impossible to achieve. Most of the girly magazines I kept secreted, locked in a footlocker like a pirate's treasure, would depict a pair of nude women... posed in such a manner as to suggest I was being welcomed in. Later in life, when threesomes had become less mysterious, I could more objectively consider my motivations, my intense need then for such a specific fantasy. I would eventually grow up a little, and come to understand myself more accurately... realizing my need reflected my boy's desire for women to accept me, to find me appealing, and to therefore validate my value and worth as a man. TWO women, as I would come to realize, reinforced this much needed assertion with authority. As a young man, however, these things remained unclear and unexamined... it simply burned in me like a chemical fire.

Be cool, I admonished myself. Remember, you're the rock star here. But there was little need to struggle with these fine points, as it became obvious they were both awash with adoration.

"We were wondering if you would come and sit at our table", one of them asked breathlessly. The question seemed delivered a bit shyly, considering the display of a few moments ago. It was then that I realized that she was going out on a limb... afraid I was so cool I might possibly reject her. A pair of bold monkeys indeed, my idiot's mind gibbered. But of course, remembering very well that I was married, and had a policy towards this sort of thing, I answered in the only way I could.

"Sure".

[StratBastard]

(continued)

I followed them back to their table with absolutely no idea what to say when we arrived. My discomfort only increased when we seated ourselves, as they merely sat and looked at me expectantly.

"So", I begin, about a suave as Barney Fife, "do you two live here in Oakridge?"

"Yes" they both answered in unison.

"We have a house here together, not too far from here" one of them continues. "Are you staying here in town tonight?"

"Well," I respond, "we have some rooms here provided by the owner, but they aren't very nice. We might just drive home tonight and come back for tomorrow's show" I blathered lamely.

"We want you to come home with us tonight" the other one proffers earnestly. No toe in the water for this one... just makes the dive blind into the pool and to hell with the concrete. They both look at me hopefully, smiling.

These words rattle off in my brain like machinegun fire, my mind reeling. Here were two attractive young women offering me freely, without reservation, the impossible: an opportunity to realize and fulfill my deepest and most specific fantasy in the actual flesh. I could even imagine myself going through with it, as my shyness was trumped by their earnest adoration. My resolve was now pitching about wildly, like a drunken sailor slamming about the decks of some storm battered ship in rough seas... and threatening to crash through the rails and into whatever the murky depths might reveal.

And yet the words still manage to struggle up my throat like an aspiring prison escapee hacking through hardpan with a dull spoon. "I can't" I say with no small reluctance, "I'm married".

"But you have rooms here, right? Your wife won't be expecting you home tonight" responds the deep diver. This delivered as if it reasonably resolves everything.

"She expects me to behave as her husband" I respond... manufacturing more conviction than I actually possessed.

At this juncture, I made the appropriate platitudes... it was nice meeting you both, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the show, and blah blah yadida yadida. I went back to the stage to get ready for our next set, and I remember thinking you are going to hate your own guts for this partner.

We finished the show after two encores, and I drove home to Eliza. I never told her about this incident, justifying it to myself by thinking there was nothing to tell. And my fear of regret over such a lost opportunity proved unfounded... as I actually felt pretty centered eventually having done the right thing.

This landmark incident was my first exposure to a fact of which I had been previously unaware; that these experiences can occur, might possibly even be contrived, and that even I might have the ability to manifest them. These of course were mere conceptual musings in the theoretical realm. I was married, and such lofty adventures were not for me. But still... the existence of such a world, or at least sub-culture lifestyle, was exhilarating to contemplate as real. I was pleased by its existence, though I never entertained any expectations of joining it. I continued, for some time yet, my household life as before... just with a different perspective on what the world might contain.

[StratBastard]

(continued)

While waiting for my Civil Service scores over the next several weeks, my mailbox at the apartments became to me some kind of malevolent, grinning djinni... capable of influencing me to fervent hope or abject dread. I of course felt a significant amount of anxiety concerning my level of performance... having been told that no one with a score of 98 or less had even a hope of an interview. When the envelope finally appeared inside, sitting there dubiously like the promise of a con artist, I could only stare at it numbly... as if the news inside contained lab reports as to whether I might live or die.

The thought of Eliza, and her own investment in this outcome, put me immediately into a panic. The economic recession had already eroded my pride to tatters, having to take such a dismal job and witness my wife scrubbing floors all day. Could I have failed us, failed her, in losing this critical opportunity? There would be no mitigating this outcome with the facts, thank you very much. It would not matter one iota that I was carrying our hopes among all the other thousands doing likewise. Eliza would have never criticized me in any way... but she would be more than disappointed, her hopes shattered all the same. I would see all this occurring in her eyes, and then the litany inside my own head would begin; such is the world of men, desperate to BE men and provide.

You are a failure. You failed to provide. You failed to be the man who could lift us out of this abysmal life, this economic black hole. You alone brought this message, this malignant eventuality; we are doomed to stay here and endure this.

With the hands of a coward, I secreted the envelope inside my shirt and took it inside... locking myself quickly in the bathroom to avoid Eliza's routine but earnest question "did the mail come"? I quickly ripped the envelope open and removed the card which would determine my fate... my eyes locking instantly on the number 100. I stared at it agape and agog, holding it up like a pardon from the Governor. A small card, I nonetheless scanned it again and again, looking for the mistake I must surely be making. Finding none, I finally took it out to show Eliza. She crowed quite enthusiastically, while I maintained a facade of aloofness... was there ever any doubt?

Our exuberance cooled somewhat over the next six months, when my visits to the personnel offices dis not result in immediate employment... accompanied by a compliment of trumpets announcing my royal arrival. You, the clerk I managed to sequester said, are on the list.

"I don't think you understand", I asserted. "I have a score of 100". This last, of course, delivered with an air of supremacy laced with just the right touch of humble dignity... you don't get it baby, I made top drawer, I'm IN!

The clerk deadpanned her response. "I don't think you understand", and went on to explain, with no small measure of smug satisfaction, the harsh realities to this high-handed newbie moron.

As it turned out, I would be allowed to remain on the list for three years... checking in at number 72 (72!!! Yegods!!!). The fifty proffered positions would not be open all at once, but each time one did, three people from the top of the list would be interviewed...and one subsequently hired.

The question left begging, I ask "What happens to the other two people?"

"Hard to say", she replies. It's like pulling teeth from a seemingly alive but otherwise unresponsive body. With reluctance, she eventually spells out the various probabilities, and how it might affect my possible ascent to the top of the list. The two unsuccessful interviewees might A) be deemed unsuitable for employment, and therefore removed from the list, or B) be recycled back onto the list for another possible interview later. I was grateful for my prodigious math skills, honed to a razor's edge over the many years with no little effort (enabling me to deal with sums as large as THREE), and after much deliberation determined (accurately, I think) that each interview might move me up anywhere from one to three spaces on the list. Armed with this equation to assist me in quantifying my chances, I felt sufficiently buttressed, and prepared to take my leave. One more seemingly innocent and benign question occurred, however, as I turned to go. I could have saved myself countless months of anxiety, as I was to learn later, by not asking this question.

"Just one more thing", I ponder casually to her automaton's face. "What are the criteria for determining employment in an interview... or for that matter whether or not one is dropped from the list as opposed to being recycled"?

The briefest shadow of emotion for the first time passed over her face... I believe it was amused pity. "Whim", she elucidated with an air of jaded finality. She then turned on her heels with disdain and went back to whatever duties were obviously sucking the life out of her living eyes.

Welcome to the Post Office.

[StratBastard]

22635

[StratBastard]

(Continued)

I began my illustrious career as a U.S. Postal Clerk in November of 1984. Overtime was plentiful and often mandatory, especially in the months approaching Christmas. I was working 10-12 hours a day, 6 days a week... and ecstatic about it. My first paycheck astounded us both even after heavy taxes, pension savings, union dues, and insurance plans we had signed onto. Every other Friday I felt a bit like Ed McMahon coming to knock on my own door.

In this are of the "Mean Green" state of Oregon, most people hardly had anything green in their pockets... and here I was with the very best blue collar job to be had. Union pay, benefits, the whole proverbial nine yards of gravy train shrieking along a set of silver tracks... destination, a golden future. A bottle of wine and two glasses in our sleeping car, porter, if you would.

Having lived nearly hand to mouth for the first several years of our marriage, Eliza and I quickly saved what at the time seemed a small fortune: $6000. Eager to take full advantage of our position, we began to explore the local real estate market in earnest. The depressed economy had achieved what our dismal, rainy Oregon weather could not... the town had begun to empty as people left to find employment elsewhere. It seemed every third house or so was empty, foreclosed, or simply abandoned. Banks holding the unpaid notes on all these rapidly deteriorating properties were desperate to sell, and finding few takers. We spent every weekend, every spare moment, engaged in what to us seemed a treasure hunt of sorts.

Previously unable to obtain even a checking account, we were now welcomed and ushered into their offices... the loan officers smiling too much and glad handing. Real estate agents, broke with no buyers for their inventory, treated us like visiting dignitaries from some friendly, financially solvent planet. We eventually settled on our first purchase. a tidy little duplex in a newer area of homes. The purchase price was a paltry $42,000, with the rent receipts from the other side paying our monthly mortgage outright... allowing us to pour more money into savings. Within a year, we would negotiate the purchase of a second, larger duplex... getting the bank to agree to completely remodel it as a contingent of sale. We were young, finally liquid, and apparently on our way to prosperity.

I attended my son's birth early in May 1988. It became apparent after 24 hours of labor that Eliza, a very petite woman, was not going to be capable of passing this nine pound package into the world on her own. I donned a cap and gown and accompanied the procession of doctors and nurses into the O.R.

If you have never witnessed a cesarean section, let me tell you this: they make it sound a lot simpler than it is. The patient is stretched across the operating table, and a little tent of sorts is pitched... isolating the area of interest and obscuring the view of the patient. They begin quickly, the objective seeming to be to make the procedure as brief as possible. Eliza, having had a spinal block, feels nothing... and asks me if they have started yet.

"It's almost over sweetie, it's going fine"... like I had any idea. What I could clearly see was five people circled around her middle, each with an oozing hand full of innards, while the doctor worked to get in. God, I hope they can get all that stuff back in where it goes I thought fervently. At that very moment, my son Trevor popped up and out like a bloody and animated jack-in-the-box... his arms and legs pinwheeling madly as if he were adrift in space. He was wrapped in a warm towel and instantly placed in my arms.

Most babies who have to traverse the vaginal canal are, to not put too fine a term on it, beat to hell. They are often bruised and battered, having been compressed significantly while knocking on a door which seems suitable to admit small mice. I'll have to look into it before I point fingers, but there may be a design flaw here. They can slide out looking like Joe Frazier after 15 rounds with Ali, their soft skulls looking too much like those shells you might load into a large battleship artillery barrel. Not so Trevor. None of these indignities occur to a child born of a C-section, and he was simply beautiful... with a head full of blonde hair, blue eyes, and perfect skin. I adored him immediately, as I do to this day.

Having achieved the status of family unit, Eliza and I bent to the task of raising an infant to a toddler. To further insure our future, we purchased two more rentals over the next two years. When Trevor was two, I was initiated enough to agree that we should have another child. Before his third birthday, my daughter Audria would make her appearance in our little family. I melted when I saw my beautiful little girl, and she remains the apple of my eye.

[StratBastard]

22719

[StratBastard]

(Continued)

Her birth had marked 4 years since my hiring at the postal service, and I had been working mandatory overtime, often 12 hours a day, for the entire time. In addition to the job, and the responsibilities to two small children, there were the rental units to worry about: collecting rents, repairs, finding tenants, etc.... I had been sleep deprived for several years, many days finding myself walking about weak and nauseous. I began developing worsening anxiety, which would lead to full-blown panic attacks. Eventually I was forced to seek medical help, and was prescribed various medications which sometimes held the worsening condition at bay... but also made me tired or sick. There just wasn't time for enough sleep, and the sleep I tried to get was constantly interrupted. This, over the past couple of years, had become a huge rift between me and Eliza.

She was the child of a large and extended family of ethnic Norwegians, who apparently placed large stock in family functions. They insisted that we attend all of their gatherings: Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, birthdays, anniversaries, annual picnics, etc.... ANY long weekend, including Labor Day or the Fourth of July, was also prerequisite. She would continue to insist we had to go, while I would ask condescendingly if we were expected on Groundhog fucking Day. This went on for years with no respite. Working the graveyard shift was bad enough, as anyone who has done it can tell you. I used to start my drive home from work at 6 A.M., straight into the sun rising over the hills in the east... shining like God's flashlight right into my eyes. My body clock reset, I would lay in bed for hours exhausted but unable to sleep.

My week, if I was lucky enough not to draw a required sixth day, would end with me arriving home at about 6:30 A.M. on Saturday morning. Eliza would see me heading for the bedroom, and our little dance would begin.

"You're not going to sleep, are you?" she would ask exasperated, clearly put out.

"Why would I want to sleep?" I ask. "I've only put in several 12 hour shifts in a row, it's the end of the week, I'm exhausted, and it's my bedtime".

"But we never get to see you as it is" she responds a little petulantly, as if I were doing all this to merely gratify myself selfishly... instead of servicing our bills and several mortgages. "Why don't you just sleep tonight?" she adds.

I could never get her to understand that, if I were to continue to work in this manner, I would have to have a regular sleep schedule such as she herself enjoyed. A body will not survive, over a period of years, a schedule that varies as much as 12 hours on any given day. I had to be allowed to sleep.

Very upset again, she then remarks "Well, you'll have to stay up next Saturday, because we're going to grandma's dinner party."

Shitshitshit.

These frequent family functions were always held in Portland, which is about a 2 hour drive north of Eugene. I started to feel like a farmer might regard a tract of land he somehow had to plow every weekend... I hated that stretch of road, and the very thought of driving it made me tired. You would think I could nap a bit while Eliza, fresh from a night's sleep, drove the car. Not a chance. Having tried this seemingly reasonable solution many times, I am now simply too terrified to relax while she is driving, much less sleep. Eliza has an unfortunate habit of tailgating. Bad enough, she also insists on meeting someone's eyes while talking... even when driving 65 MPH, 2 inches off the bumper of the car or truck directly in front of us. Even while I am helplessly dozing, exhausted, she will look at me for extended periods while chattering away, and on several occasions has nearly piled us all up righteous. I remember nearly breaking her foot as mine crashed through hers to find the brake pedal... locking the wheels to avoid the slowing vehicle in front of us. Another time, while dozing in and out, I opened my eyes to see four foot weeds whisking by the window: she had veered off the road completely, at freeway speed, still making her point. So, each dreaded trek north meant I had to stay up and drive, with the window down and rubbing my eyes like a cranky infant.

She would also, on any given random day, announce some appointment she had made for me right out of the blue.

"Our insurance agent is coming tomorrow at noon, and you have to be sure to be up to meet with him".

"WHAT"?!? Jesus wept. I am incredulous. "That's the middle of the night for me!"

"It's the time slot he had available" she responds, as if I were being unreasonable.

"Great! There's a guy at work who can give us an estimate on those cabinets we want... how about I bring him over tomorrow night, say, 3 A.M.?"

And around we would go again.

The beginning of the end, I suspect, came when I started contruction on a small home recording studio. Our garage was extraordinarily long, and I could easily frame in a large new room at the end while retaining room to still park a car inside. I of course employed a double wall construction, with layers of sound deadening board and foam. A double set of solid core doors, lockable from the inside, were also utilized... obstensibly to also keep ambient sound from creeping into my recordings from outside the room.

Upon completion, I simply moved a single bed in and started sleeping there each night. You could pound on the door with a sledgehammer, and I would remain blissfully asleep.

Eliza was incensed, even furious. Six months of this and we were at the table talking divorce. It was an issue we just could not seem to reconcile... and to this day, if asked about our demise, I answer as honestly as I can: "I don't have a bad thing to say about her... but she wouldn't let me sleep." This is always met with a puzzled look by everyone... except other graveyard shift employees.

I suppose out separation was at least more convenient than most, as we still owned several buildings. Eliza began moving her things, plus those of our children, into one of them. This was a very uncomfortable couple of weeks to be sure... not a lot of smiles or conversation. One weekend I finally found myself alone in a house full of silent recrimination, loss, and regrets. I decided to go out and have a drink or twenty. And so, I finally come back to where I started, and where this story really begins.

[MountainGirl]

Dont wanna interrupt but I gotta know.
Your first week alone... Did you do anything other than go to work, and sleep.
(Your tiredness conveys perfectly, btw)

[StratBastard]

Dont wanna interrupt but I gotta know.
Your first week alone... Did you do anything other than go to work, and sleep.
(Your tiredness conveys perfectly, btw)

I did literally sleep like a dead thing for more than a week. It was the first time in years that I had a regular schedule. One of the many things I came to adore about Hindi was how very protective of my sleep she was. She didn't care WHO was calling or showing up at the door: the ex, the fire department, the f4cking FBI: "He's asleep, f4ck OFF!"

[StratBastard]

22752

[StratBastard]

22753

[MountainGirl]

I did literally sleep like a dead thing for more than a week. It was the first time in years that I had a regular schedule. One of the many things I came to adore about Hindi was how very protective of my sleep she was. She didn't care WHO was calling or showing up at the door: the ex, the fire department, the f4cking FBI: "He's asleep, f4ck OFF!"

Excellent. PO's catching up now, too. Thirty-two years worth of short sleep is now 12-14hrs of nightly rejuvenation. :)

[StratBastard]

Chapter 2

August 1992

It is Saturday night, getting close to 8 P.M. No longer required to stay up all day, I have slept 11 hours straight... it seems I will never get caught up. Eliza has taken our Nissan, but I still have my convertible 1961 Sunbeam Alpine... a nifty little British sports car you can see in one of Sean Connery's James Bond films. Always meaning to restore it, I have so far only found the time to rebuild the engine. Not a practical car for Oregon to say the least... I have been caught in a downpour numerous times, requiring me to pull over to fiddle endlessly with the ill-fitting canvas top. This can take some time and copious swearing, as these British tops have several slender rods which need to be assembled just so in order to hold the top in place... it's a bit like pitching a poorly designed pole tent. Undaunted, I continue to buy and be fascinated with convertibles. Maybe it's a genetic flaw, but I'm a ragtop man.

Tonight, the pavement is dry, so I scramble into my Beamer and fire her up. After driving along for several minutes, I decide to investigate a newer club in town which features nude dancers.

Now I know that most guys have some experience at such nightclubs... maybe going out with a few friends to swill a couple of brews and eye the ladies, maybe to break up the monotony of their daily responsibilities. I had been up to Stumptown, as we call Portland, and done just that on a few occasions. This kind of club was a bit new to this area, however, and...what the hell. I figured it as good a place to tie one on as any, maybe better.

I discover the parking lot packed, having some difficulty finding a spot for my car. Finally parked, wedged between a dumpster and an outbuilding, I venture inside.

I open the door, and the noise hits me full in the face like Zeus himself sneezing. Hard rock music, piped through a monsterous sound system capable of announcing the apocalypse, shakes the air... with the voices of maybe a hundred patrons yelling to be heard above it in various stages of inebriated glee. I walk to the bar, and a woman of about 30, her face hardened by perhaps too much knowledge and reduced expectations, serves me a beer in the bottle. I lean into the bar, a stranger here, and survey the room leisurely.

There are two stages. One is much larger, longish with a brass pole screwed in from the floor to the ceiling. The entire length of stage is lined with plate mirror, reflecting the many faces of the men (and some women) seated along its side. A young woman is currently walking back and forth along the edge, entirely naked with the exception of heels. Her pubic region has been reduced to a very small patch... in a moment of free association, I find it somewhat resembling Hitler's mustache. In the back of the room, there is a small square stage, with room to accomodate three chairs to a side. Another young woman with enormous silicone breasts occupies this little theater... not really dancing, but leaning over the rail and chatting with the customers.

There appears to be about a dozen girls working tonight, and I am approached by several of them asking if I might be interested in purchasing a table dance. As it turns out, these are private, one-on-one displays an individual with ten or twenty dollars can enjoy... usually seated in the back end of the room. Large signs in this area declare "DO NOT TOUCH THE GIRLS!" I politely decline the invitations, and make my way to sit at the main stage.

Despite what you may see in the movies, women are NOT tipped by placing a bank note in their garter belt... or anywhere else you might fancy fumbling about, perhaps taking longer than you should. Bills are placed at the edge of the stage while the dancer performs, often merely in some scanty outfit her first song, and are retrieved when the music ends. Her second song will likely produce a topless routine, at the end of which she again retrieves her tips at the edge of the stage. Her third and final performance may or may not be bottomless... depending on whether or not the patrons have been tipping appropriately.

Over the years, having become intimate with a good number of dancers, I came to realize a few things... none as important as this: men are, in general, narrowly focused and unaware oafs. Often as not, some men will sit there at the edge of the stage, buying beer after beer for themselves, and not tipping. They are then amazed, even outraged, that a dancer might treat them with indifference. The women who work here do so for a variety of reasons not too dissimilar from any other person working a job... to feed their young children, to make their rent, to put themselves through college.

None of this ever occurs to the feeble mind of the mystified oaf. They offer their phone numbers with enthusiasm, oblivious to the disdain this invites. I have, on many later occasions, seen several girls emptying their small purses of these hastily scrawled numbers straight into the trash as a nightly matter of course. I came to always tell me female friends; men are no good, get a dog.

I find an empty chair maybe halfway down the large, long stage and sit. A new song slams its way out of the large speakers set just to the right, and a DJ loudly announces the appearance of the next dancer, seeming intent on exchanging enthusiasm with sheer volume. To the far left, a curtain twitches aside, allowing the next woman to exit what is presumably the dressing room, and hit the stage. Dressed in a string bikini and thigh-high boots, she launches into a routine of splits, handstands, and cartwheels. I dutifully lay a few bucks on the edge and watch her athletics unfold. I order another beer when the waitress comes by, and settle in.

Though I don't often get the opportunity to observe so many naked female forms, after about 45 minutes I am nonetheless done with it. The girls, I am sure, are all hired based largely on thier looks... they are all fairly attractive and certainly naked enough. But the noise, the crowd, and even the girls add up to a very limited experience which I soon find wearing itself out. Had I left right then, I doubt I ever would have gone back... and my life would have taken an entirely different turn. I decided to finish my beer, and the DJ announced the next performer.

In stark contrast to the thunder of the previous music, a sad and poignant ballad began... Van Morrison singing mournfully. A contemplative blanket of quiet settled over the former din, all conversation stopped, and every face turned towards the stage with a look of whimsical expectation... as if they, as regular patrons, knew something very different would now occur. The instant she first stepped out onto the stage has been etched in my mind like a fly caught in amber, a moment frozen in eternity.

She was dressed in an odd array of seemingly hastily fashioned accoutrements... a long sleeved shirt cut off right below her small breasts, and jagged, torn, deep purple stockings stretched along her impossibly long legs; Aphrodite in rags, and no less regal in spite of it. Her light brown hair was thick and wild, worn long and unkempt. She was well over six feet tall in her heels, and yet seemed somehow as fragile as a glass figurine. Her slender limbs began to move with the grace of prayer. Her head turned toward me, her chin coming up a bit. When her face was revealed to me, I was looking at what no man should have to see and live.

[Prepared One]

Chapter 2

August 1992

It is Saturday night, getting close to 8 P.M. No longer required to stay up all day, I have slept 11 hours straight... it seems I will never get caught up. Eliza has taken our Nissan, but I still have my convertible 1961 Sunbeam Alpine... a nifty little British sports car you can see in one of Sean Connery's James Bond films. Always meaning to restore it, I have so far only found the time to rebuild the engine. Not a practical car for Oregon to say the least... I have been caught in a downpour numerous times, requiring me to pull over to fiddle endlessly with the ill-fitting canvas top. This can take some time and copious swearing, as these British tops have several slender rods which need to be assembled just so in order to hold the top in place... it's a bit like pitching a poorly designed pole tent. Undaunted, I continue to buy and be fascinated with convertibles. Maybe it's a genetic flaw, but I'm a ragtop man.

Tonight, the pavement is dry, so I scramble into my Beamer and fire her up. After driving along for several minutes, I decide to investigate a newer club in town which features nude dancers.

Now I know that most guys have some experience at such nightclubs... maybe going out with a few friends to swill a couple of brews and eye the ladies, maybe to break up the monotony of their daily responsibilities. I had been up to Stumptown, as we call Portland, and done just that on a few occasions. This kind of club was a bit new to this area, however, and...what the hell. I figured it as good a place to tie one on as any, maybe better.

I discover the parking lot packed, having some difficulty finding a spot for my car. Finally parked, wedged between a dumpster and an outbuilding, I venture inside.

I open the door, and the noise hits me full in the face like Zeus himself sneezing. Hard rock music, piped through a monsterous sound system capable of announcing the apocalypse, shakes the air... with the voices of maybe a hundred patrons yelling to be heard above it in various stages of inebriated glee. I walk to the bar, and a woman of about 30, her face hardened by perhaps too much knowledge and reduced expectations, serves me a beer in the bottle. I lean into the bar, a stranger here, and survey the room leisurely.

There are two stages. One is much larger, longish with a brass pole screwed in from the floor to the ceiling. The entire length of stage is lined with plate mirror, reflecting the many faces of the men (and some women) seated along its side. A young woman is currently walking back and forth along the edge, entirely naked with the exception of heels. Her pubic region has been reduced to a very small patch... in a moment of free association, I find it somewhat resembling Hitler's mustache. In the back of the room, there is a small square stage, with room to accomodate three chairs to a side. Another young woman with enormous silicone breasts occupies this little theater... not really dancing, but leaning over the rail and chatting with the customers.

There appears to be about a dozen girls working tonight, and I am approached by several of them asking if I might be interested in purchasing a table dance. As it turns out, these are private, one-on-one displays an individual with ten or twenty dollars can enjoy... usually seated in the back end of the room. Large signs in this area declare "DO NOT TOUCH THE GIRLS!" I politely decline the invitations, and make my way to sit at the main stage.

Despite what you may see in the movies, women are NOT tipped by placing a bank note in their garter belt... or anywhere else you might fancy fumbling about, perhaps taking longer than you should. Bills are placed at the edge of the stage while the dancer performs, often merely in some scanty outfit her first song, and are retrieved when the music ends. Her second song will likely produce a topless routine, at the end of which she again retrieves her tips at the edge of the stage. Her third and final performance may or may not be bottomless... depending on whether or not the patrons have been tipping appropriately.

Over the years, having become intimate with a good number of dancers, I came to realize a few things... none as important as this: men are, in general, narrowly focused and unaware oafs. Often as not, some men will sit there at the edge of the stage, buying beer after beer for themselves, and not tipping. They are then amazed, even outraged, that a dancer might treat them with indifference. The women who work here do so for a variety of reasons not too dissimilar from any other person working a job... to feed their young children, to make their rent, to put themselves through college.

None of this ever occurs to the feeble mind of the mystified oaf. They offer their phone numbers with enthusiasm, oblivious to the disdain this invites. I have, on many later occasions, seen several girls emptying their small purses of these hastily scrawled numbers straight into the trash as a nightly matter of course. I came to always tell me female friends; men are no good, get a dog.

I find an empty chair maybe halfway down the large, long stage and sit. A new song slams its way out of the large speakers set just to the right, and a DJ loudly announces the appearance of the next dancer, seeming intent on exchanging enthusiasm with sheer volume. To the far left, a curtain twitches aside, allowing the next woman to exit what is presumably the dressing room, and hit the stage. Dressed in a string bikini and thigh-high boots, she launches into a routine of splits, handstands, and cartwheels. I dutifully lay a few bucks on the edge and watch her athletics unfold. I order another beer when the waitress comes by, and settle in.

Though I don't often get the opportunity to observe so many naked female forms, after about 45 minutes I am nonetheless done with it. The girls, I am sure, are all hired based largely on thier looks... they are all fairly attractive and certainly naked enough. But the noise, the crowd, and even the girls add up to a very limited experience which I soon find wearing itself out. Had I left right then, I doubt I ever would have gone back... and my life would have taken an entirely different turn. I decided to finish my beer, and the DJ announced the next performer.

In stark contrast to the thunder of the previous music, a sad and poignant ballad began... Van Morrison singing mournfully. A contemplative blanket of quiet settled over the former din, all conversation stopped, and every face turned towards the stage with a look of whimsical expectation... as if they, as regular patrons, knew something very different would now occur. The instant she first stepped out onto the stage has been etched in my mind like a fly caught in amber, a moment frozen in eternity.

She was dressed in an odd array of seemingly hastily fashioned accoutrements... a long sleeved shirt cut off right below her small breasts, and jagged, torn, deep purple stockings stretched along her impossibly long legs; Aphrodite in rags, and no less regal in spite of it. Her light brown hair was thick and wild, worn long and unkempt. She was well over six feet tall in her heels, and yet seemed somehow as fragile as a glass figurine. Her slender limbs began to move with the grace of prayer. Her head turned toward me, her chin coming up a bit. When her face was revealed to me, I was looking at what no man should have to see and live.

In my younger days I was known to have gone into a strip club or two. Never had any luck, they really get mad when you toss pennies on the stage. Go figure. :lost:

[StratBastard]

In my younger days I was known to have gone into a strip club or two. Never had any luck, they really get mad when you toss pennies on the stage. Go figure. :lost:

I remember once when Hindi was onstage, and some oaf placed a shit-ton of quarters at the edge. I don't know if he was doing laundry that day or what, but it was like $10 in quarters at least. Hindi saw them, pirouetted around, and kicked the entire pile into his face.

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22858

[MountainGirl]

LOL ^^
I'm the latter; not because I value reader's time but because I'm too lazy to stretch a sentence. :mocking:

[StratBastard]

Excellent. PO's catching up now, too. Thirty-two years worth of short sleep is now 12-14hrs of nightly rejuvenation. :)

Bless you for helping make that happen for him.

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22886

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I had a dream when I was but nineteen, of a woman almost too beautiful to behold. She seemed sad, almost heartbroken, as she walked down a dark stone staircase towards me. Naked from the waist up, her long slender arms held a ball of incredible light high above her as she walked. I suddenly knew the ball was in danger of being shattered... that she was struggling to continue to hold it aloft. I awoke shaken and anguished, and drew a sketch of her which I keep to this day. And now here today appears seemingly that very same woman, her long slender arms above her head, a sad countenance on her face, her beauty out of place in these otherwise mundane surroundings. I could only sit stunned, a witness to what seemed an impossibility.

She danced, moving to the slow tempo in a free-form improvisational style of which I had never before seen the like... fluid and flowing, more sensual than sexual, mesmerizing and ethereal. She glided towards me slowly, her feet seeming to hardly touch the floor, an incarnation of Ganga herself dancing to the delight of the Gods... her movements so unique I doubt anyone could replicate them. Her long arms pirouette in a flourish, a move which somehow brings her down to crouch before me suddenly, and she lifts my hat. I find my normally stoic face helplessly at war with a variety of unexpected emotions. We stare at each other transfixed for what seems like an eternity. It is I, with my need to know, who breaks the spell.

"What is your name?" I ask, as if this would answer everything.

"Hindi" she replies, finally giving me a smile, which lights my heart like sunrise after a long night without hope.

She finishes her routine and prepares to exit into the dressing room... but pauses to cast a glance over her shoulder at me. I approach her with nothing to say, and simply ask her for a table dance.

She directs me to a chair, has me sit. The music has started for the next performer, and she begins to dance gracefully for me. She does not really remove much clothing, nor does the performance resemble in any way the others I have seen in the room... with the other girls showcasing their attributes as much as possible. She presents herself simply, even elegantly; this is me.

It is over all too soon, and I begin to feel a little foolish... why did I think she saw into me? I thank her, hand her a $50 bill, and turn to walk out the door.

She calls after me once, "don't you want any change?"

I keep walking.

I wake up late again Sunday morning, and head over to see my friend Vic. I met Vic several years ago, during my first night working at the Postal processing facility, and he is unlike anyone I have ever met. His physical presence was a bit overwhelming the first time I saw him, to say the least. Vic could only be described as Herculean. He wore a red U.S. Marine Corps T-shirt stretched over shoulders that were incredibly wide and thick... so heavily muscled, in fact, as to shock my sensibilities somewhat. Not merely big, he was obviously in top shape, sporting a flat and small waistline. Incongruously, a thick pair of spectacles were perched on his face, giving the beast a look of bookish intelligence.

Working alone with him an entire night, I soon found him to be an extremely exceptional individual... well read, gregarious, open, and self actualizing. My initial reservations quickly vanquished, he drew me into long conversations on any number of interesting subjects, often even offering his observations and struggles with more personal situations. I had never met someone so unafraid to be themself, nor had I ever met anyone as substantial a person. In less than a week, we were becoming fast friends.

Among his various pursuits, Vic was a power lifter... part of a weight lifting sub-culture which demonstrates raw, brute strength in such lifts as the bench press, the squat, and the deadlift. He would describe these activities with an enthusiasm, it seemingly contained in a wider philosophy of personal growth and spiritual actualization. Enthralled, I would listen to his pontifications about this alien enterprise as a lifelong outsider... my thin 145 pound body having always remained resistent to weight training.

As is the way with friends, he began to nag me incessently to come to his house and begin working out with him. You can understand my reluctance.

Vic was in actual competition for the world record in the bench press in his weight class. I later saw him press up 480 pounds in a garage... the world record at the time 510. Mind you, every other competitor in this sport utilizes about a dozen drugs to do this, including steroids. Vic used NONE. Ever. He trained naturally, and was determined to show the world it could be done without drugs. And was among the 4 or 5 strongest guys in his class on the entire planet.

I resisted for a few months, the thought of humiliating myself in front of this behemoth not very enticing. Vic, however, has this way about him. His philosophy was about competing with himself, not with others. He is a Promethean personality by nature, with a sincere cheerleader's approach, praising and encouraging. He listened intently while I attempted to turn him from recruiting me into this realm, nodding occasionally, his hand on his chin contemplatively. Undeterred, he went on to explain how proper training techniques were not utilized by me previously, and that he was confident that I could make substantial gains. I eventually felt comfortable enough to believe it appropriate to give it a try... and it would offer more time to hang with my new friend.

My first time at his home was an eye opener indeed; various devices of torture previously unknown to me, designed to physically tax the body to exhaustion, were arrayed in every corner. Another behemoth, Jack, was busying himself with a very large barbell... doing seated, behind-the-neck overhead presses with 225 pounds.

Oh brother, I thought to myself. I definitely do not belong here.

I was taken immediately to Vic's personal alter, the crucible by which he measured his own advance: the bench press. As the apparent next sacrifice, I reluctantly laid out on it and prepared for certain humiliation. An Olympic bar sat on the standard, eight feet wide and thick... weights both large and small could be added to each side in the desired increments. I was not too surprised to find the bar itself very heavy to me, as Vic took me through the proper movements. He encouraged me profusely, and was so excited to have me there doing this that I lost my initial embarrassment over my thin and weak body. Joyous and in his element, Vic actually had me enjoying myself also. This was due, in no small part, to the trust I had invested in him so quickly... which was normally very unlike me.

To say I was sore the next day would be an understatement of incredible proportion... it seemed that The Sandman, rather than sprinkling sleep dust in my eyes the previous night, had decided rather to tuck me in snugly with a baseball bat. My chest, arms, and shoulders were nearly frozen with stiffness, normal movements causing me to wince painfully. At work that night, Vic waved this off, obviously taking it as a matter of course... his devilish eyes twinkling gleefully as his knowing finger occasionally shot out to poke those very spots his own experience revealed were killing me. This, I was later to learn, was all part of the initiation to a very exclusive club. I mistakenly thought it an alpha male club... but later learned I was a sigma now among sigmas.

And I must admit I did come to love it. Several years later, I was no longer the skinny and physically incapable person I had resigned myself to being. Indeed, like Vic, I too was being whispered about: he must be using steroids. As promised by Vic, I had responded to correct (and world-class expert) training techniques, with success breeding upon success, and increased my determination to change my own world by my own efforts. At 5'10" tall and 198 pounds, I had added over 50 pounds of hard muscle to my lean frame, and was often admired for my physique. My strength had increased exponentially, allowing me to bench press twice my body weight (somewhat of a milestone, according to Vic). The spiritual dividends too were not lost on me, and I grew as a man and a person as a result. I had become more confident in the world... no longer feeling at the mercy of bullies with malevolent whims, and rarely ever challenged by such again. I became even more contemplative and patient, no longer feeling rushed to prove myself in adversarial scenarios. My training not only hardened my body, but also my will... and I was developing an increased ability to persevere, and to percieve more possibilities for myself. The ceilings which once seemed to limit my growth in all arenas were now gone... thanks in no small part to my friendship with Vic.

[MountainGirl]

22906

[StratBastard]

(continued)

Vic answers the door this morning as usual, in his underwear and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He is a terminally single guy, and as such keeps odd hours... staying up around the clock or sleeping as the whim strikes him. I hand him the coffee I brought him, his eager lips seeking the edge of the Styrofoam cup. Working the graveyard shift for years, we have both come to drink coffee by the gallon daily.

Today is arm day, and we shamble out to the garage to place demands on them with the weights. Vic complains, as he does frequently, about how my biceps have become bigger than his. While this is true, this is also the standard type of backhand comment he often utilizes to offer praise and encouragement on the sly. We both know I could train for a thousand years, and the rest of my body, while certainly more than adequately built, would never catch up to his.

We utilize this time to discuss our business enterprise. Over the years we had developed an import business selling various knives to collectors through mail order. We would also travel, on occasion, up north to Stumptown... having become one of the regular vendors at the very large gun and knife shows held up there periodically. Passing the barbells back and forth, we talk of the big show coming up in September, and our plans to eventually parlay our endeavors into a small fortune. We were also, at this point, contemplating a buying trip to Europe.

I casually make mention of the girl I had seen the previous night, not really expanding yet on its impact.

"I met this really beautiful woman last night" I say, just giving the barest facts. Vic listens with an air of the experienced sojourner. Women are attracted to him, not merely for his physique, but for his friendly and positive demeanor. He is often dating this girl or that, but never really too very long with any particular one. At work, I suspect some might view him as a bit of a tomcat. In truth, he simply has high standards and expectations in a prospective mate.
"You gonna ask her out?" he asks, right to the point. Vic is a loyal friend, investing faith in the few people he allows close to him. Of course she would go out with me, how could she resist?

"Yeah, maybe... I don't know". I am barely separated from my wife, I am thinking. "The timing on this seems a little wrong".

Vic is as neutral as Switzerland. "You gotta decide how YOU feel about it, what's right for yourself" he says without judgement. With Vic, matters of the heart often have two sides (and sometimes THREE, as I later came to learn) and are rarely simple. Of course, the sigma male part of him, as well as the part that is my good friend, would celebrate my getting laid by some young lovely. A man of appropriateness, he simply doesn't express that here.

"Normally I would think it a bad idea," I say. "But there's something about her..." I end up lamely, unable to really express my feelings without appearing foolish or impulsive. Serendipity. Divine intervention. Something very strange and wonderful, I want to say.

"Hey, where's the fire?" he asks. "You're going through an awful lot right now, you don't have to rush yourself into any decisions right this second" he says sensibly. That's Vic for you... as if he fully expects such opportunities to just drop in my lap with regular frequency. We wrap up our discussions, finish our workout, and I head home to do some work on my nearly empty house.

My home is taking on the look of an empty warehouse, the only things remaining of substantial size being my stacks of guitar amplifiers. The living room is empty, save for a small portable television... which seems to mutely broadcast accusations about my current situation. My single bed is still in the "music room", and so all three bedrooms in the main house are likewise without furnishings of any sort. I insisted, for the benefit of the children, that Eliza take almost everything... to lessen the impact somewhat on the separation. All the things they normally see will be in their new home. Things are a bit spartan here, however, and I think I should probably go out and get a few basic things.

I climb into the Sunbeam and start driving, planning to do just that. I find myself, however, pulling into the parking lot of Hindi's night club instead.

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22886

LOL YES !

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[MountainGirl]

^^ I told you no pics!!!

[StratBastard]

(continued)

Tonight, there is a bouncer, a large younger man taking his job a little too seriously. He cards me, looks at my I.D., and exclaims loudly "1957?!"... as if I were trying to pull one over on him. He has no doubts, I am sure, that I am well over 21. But I had been blessed with genetics which had always made me appear 10 years younger than my actual age. My athletic physique only added to this illusion. He was sure my I.D was false for whatever reason, probably pegging me at 26 like everyone else... instead of my actual 34 years.

I could see he was sizing me up, trying to decide whether or not to try and throw me out. He was a good 5 inches taller, and outweighed me by at least 40 pounds. But one of the things I discovered in my physical journey with Vic: no big guy wants to get his ass kicked by a guy smaller than him. For some reason, they find it humiliating. Which, I think, is why I never really had to deal with bullies again... even the really big ones. Bullies are cowards: if there's even a small chance of not coming out on top, they bail... especially if you look capable of making a mess of their face and their inflated egos. This young guy had his lower lip sticking out petulantly, and struggled with the decision.

The bartender diffuses things with a casual wave of her hand. "Hey, he's all right" she declares to the bouncer, beckoning me in. He glowers at me a bit, wanting me to know he hasn't been taken in.

I discover she is not there, after watching a full rotation of the girls. Another compliment of dancers working the late shift, I am told, is to arrive later at seven o'clock. I leave, intending to return a few hours later.

I go out shopping, picking up some silverware, crockery, toiletries, and the like. Taking them home, I find they make very little difference to the appearance of my place... it still resembles a small village which has received the news of an approaching plague and emptied. But at least I can eat off of real plates, and wash a few clothes now.

I have been growing my hair out for the last few months, needing some small change, and it is long enough now to comb straight back and affix into a small ponytail. Looking in the mirror, I have to wonder; did she really find me interesting in some way? With hundreds of younger guys likely vying for her attention each night, it seemed a dubious, wistful hope. I have her pegged somewhere around 23, which would make me 11 years older. Nonetheless, I venture out again to catch the later rotation, hoping somehow to clarify things.

She is there this time, standing at the end of the bar where a short hall leads to the dressing room. Her back to me, she is engaged in conversation with a small, young petite woman. Waiting for an opportunity to break in, I can't help but overhear their conversation somewhat... something or other about their rent. Roommates, I figure. The smaller one looks over Hindi's shoulder, seeing me waiting, and then gives her a knowing look and nudge. Hmm...I think. Have tongues been wagging here, and if so, about me specifically? Or is it merely because I left a big tip on my previous visit? My hopes go up a notch, as I assume she would garner large tips all the time. Hindi spins around as if on a skateboard.

"Hey... how are YOU?" she asks brightly. Incongruously, her hand shoots out, firmly shaking my hand in an almost masculine manner.... with a big smile and a single nod. Touching her hand is like gripping a live wire, but I manage to keep my face casual enough.

"Great, thanks... I just came in for some coffee". The bartender hears this, and starts making some, it not being too popular this late I suppose. "How's your night going?"

"Kinda slow really", she says with a rueful smile. Indeed, the place looks more than half empty this evening. "We were thinking we just might break even tonight, maybe even afford a cab home tonight if we're lucky".

"Well, we can't have THAT," I swagger. "How about I get a table dance?"

"Oh, I owe you one of those anyway", she declares. "The one I gave you the other night was really lame".

"On the contrary" I say with true honesty. To this she smiles demurely, and her eyes twinkle a bit as she looks at me.

"Come sit over here" she says, actually taking my hand and leading me to a chair.

She dances for me again, moving in that hypnotic way she does, and her eyes have taken on that look when we initially saw each other. Not desire, not false charm, but rather a sad and hopeful regard. She may have removed some clothing, but I saw only those green eyes... and an emotion that - dare I think it? - mirrored my own.

The song ends, and she quickly sweeps up her clothing in a single motion, heading for the dressing room. I am still frantically trying to dig my wallet out. She tosses me a smile over her shoulder, says "I'm up next", and disappears into the door. She left without taking a nickel, and smiling fit to light up a cathedral.

I sit at her stage attentively, my desire to see her move about liquidly as she does seeming to increase. She spends an inordinate amount of time directly in front of me, nearly ignoring everyone else. She leans forward and asks if I would sit and talk with her after her set, pointing at a couple of chairs behind an old and unused jukebox.

We sit together for a couple of hours, leaning close to be heard over the music. Later, it would remind me of a quote of Albert Einstein's: "an hour sitting with a pretty girl on a park bench passes like a minute, but a minute sitting on a hot stove passes like an hour. That's relativity".

[StratBastard]

She seems genuinely interested in me, and I am more than just flattered... I am absolutely transfixed. A huge musical fan, she seems pleased to hear I am a musician and composer, and asking if I might bring in some recordings of my work. I go outside to my car briefly and retrieve a cassette of several of my own guitar instrumentals, giving it to her to listen to. She herself, she says, writes constantly and obsessively... poetry, observations, and journals. She pulls a few notes from her small purse: like myself, she always has her current projects with her, to work on them when inspiration strikes, and I find many of her musings to be compelling and thoughtful. One, in particular, was "One step from true flight". I was moved and astounded by this single phrase in her poetry, as I needed as yet to entitle maybe the best piece of music I ever recorded. It was neo classical metal and very Wagneresque, and she had provided, with a scrap of paper from her purse, the perfect and perhaps only way to quantify what I was trying to convey in the piece. I asked her to especially listen to number 3 on the tape, and if she might consider it worthy of her work... enough that we might entwine our ideas and efforts. She smiled, and promised she would.

"Do you write any lyrics? I ask, hoping to find yet another common interest between us,

"I've never had the opportunity to put any of this to music, but I would like that very much" she responds.

"Well" I say, "some of the songs on this tape are completed musically, but they still need lyrics added. Maybe you might listen to them, see what you can do with them?"

She agrees to do just that, and secrets the tape in her purse. Before I leave, she asks if she can dance for me again, to which my answer is of course YES. She did not collect any money before, and I want an opportunity to tip her again. It was not some silly attempt to buy her affection... I am sure many men do just that and fail. No, it was rather my desire to show her respect and regard... and to not be one of those bums who would eagerly take something for free just because they COULD. And, good lord, I did take up so much of her working time tonight.

When the dance is over, she says good night and AGAIN attempts to scurry off without collecting, but I am ready for her this time.

"Hindi, wait!" I say before she can get away, and hand her the bill I have kept folded up in my hand. "I really enjoyed seeing you tonight and talking... I'll come in later this week and see some of your lyrics".

"Okay", she says, smiling again like a lighthouse. "I'll be working both Wednesday and Thursday night... I'll see you soon!"

I turn and almost make it to the door when she has caught up to me in a panic. "Please", she implores. "I can't take this". She is holding out the bill I gave her, having, I suppose, discovered it to be $100.

"Of course you can, I can afford it easily, it's not much to me. I think you might really need it though".

"I don't want to take your money" she says in earnest.

"Look," I say simply. "I really loved talking to you tonight. Maybe you'll never have any idea how much. And I really hope we do again. But you're supposed to be working tonight, not hanging out with me and handing out free dances. A girl's gotta eat you know".

She looks genuinely anguished, and has tears welling in her eyes. Finally, she drops the hand which has been holding this bill out like a subpoena she was trying to serve.

"I don't know what to do", she says, clearly at odds. "I really, really do need this, and tonight... but it's way too much Phoenix".

If I tried to pay you what you were really worth, it would require a raid on Fort Knox, I think to myself. My mind goes back to the moment I came in, and she was discussing rent with her roommate. This, I conclude, must be the emergency. Another case eloquently solved, Inspector Michaels.

Thank you Watson, it was elementary really.

"I know you need it, don't let it worry you baby doll. I'll see you soon".

Her beautiful face immediately emptied of any possible guile, posturing, indifference, or defence one might have against the world seeing you openly. She looked at me nakedly, her eyes surprised, tearful, hopeful, and adoring. "You called me baby", she whispered.

Driving home, I cannot help but feeling jubilant. Who ever heard of a dancer turning down a $100 tip? Obviously behind on her expenses, she also spends an inordinate amount of time merely talking with me all night. I'm not wrong, I say to myself. There is something here. I keep telling myself to not get too invested, but the truth remains: I am being swept away like so many dry leaves in a windstorm.

[StratBastard]

23035

[StratBastard]

(continued)

The following weekend, Vic and I are driving North to Portland in his small pickup truck. Purchased new only a year ago, it is already taking on the appearance of some relic from a radiation field. The floor is layered with all manner of flotsam and jetsam; old Styrofoam coffee cups, receipts, books, magazines.... and a few KFC chicken boxes which, I am sure, contain the moldering bones of numerous foul carcasses gone to that great Colonel's Coop in the sky.

On a previous trip months ago, we had a flat tire, and were required to exchange it with the small rubber doughnut replacement which this vehicle is supplied with for such emergencies. It can hardly be called a proper tire, as it looks as though it belongs on a child's tricycle. Bold, raised letters on this devise state unequivocally: DO NOT DRIVE ABOVE 45 MILES PER HOUR... USE ONLY TO ASSIST DRIVING TO NEAREST SERVICE STATION TO REPAIR TIRE. I am alarmed to discover that we are careening along I-5 at 65 MPH with that very same doughnut tire still under us. Vic can't be bothered by such details and waves me off, laughing: stop nagging.

We are on our way to the Portland Expo Center, to participate in the largest gun and knife show in Oregon. We have become regular venders there, with knife collectors especially seeking us out. Twenty thousand people pay $7 just to get into this show over the weekend... and despite the tire issue I am feeling that familiar rush. There's money to be made, deals to close, trades to barter. The back of the truck is filled with our many locked glass cases of collectable knives and handguns.

Vic and I both have concealed weapon permits, issued by the Lane County Sheriff himself... and wear .45's under our light jackets in shoulder rigs. Back in the day, any individual wanting a permit had to apply personally to the Sheriff and explain a need to carry a firearm. We, of course, simply said: "We're licensed firearms dealers, Often travelling with a buttload of guns and cash. Do you want to see us robbed?" With our issued permits, we always go strapped to Stumptown. Portland is a big city; It's not like Eugene. We figure sooner or later some industrious assholes just may think following us out into a dark parking lot after a lucrative show might be a viable plan.

Arriving at the Expo Center, we load our stuff into the building, and start to set up the eight foot table supplied for us as venders. A huge red velvet cloth, hanging to the floor on each side, is utilized to cover the ratty looking tabletop. Once our inventorey is displayed properly, arrayed fetchingly in glass-top cases, Vic ducks under the red cloth and stretches out undetected under the table... instantly asleep on the concrete floor. A lifelong insomniac, I have always envied his ability to lay down on any surface and sleep for a short period... awakining refreshed. It is, however, common for Vic to arrive at any given show exhausted, regardless if it has been planned for months. Likely some spontaneous scenario has kept him up all night, the practical concept of planning a schedule which would include a few hours of sleep before a 10 hour show obviously not a priority. Some day, I am thinking, he is going to roll over with his arm popping out from under this table... possibly up some lady's skirt. Then we'll see some trouble.

While Vic is napping, I man our table. The first few hours of the first day are a bit slow, as there are over a thousand tables stacked with merchandise. Most customers want to see the entire show before commiting to a purchase, to be sure they have found the very best price. I service a few regular customers who have come to the show to see us specifically, as there are some items from Europe which only we carry.

We have basically three types of customers; first and foremost is the true collector. These are usually older gentlemen who know what they want and have the cash to buy on a whim. As we specialize in rare, unique, and antique knives, these guys bring us much of our commerce. It's nothing for these guys to drop $1000 on a few special knives, and we never get tired of taking it. They have thick bankrolls bulging in their pockets, often looking like some rock star with a pair of socks stuffed down the front of his spandex pants.

Second, we are frequented by a number of dealers who wish to buy a dozen or so of a particular knife at a discount, to resell in another area, or some storefront. It's a smaller profit to be sure, but a huge turnover. We take their money and simply order more to replace them.

Last, but not least, is the sort of Walter Mitty types who have maybe watched too many Rambo movies. Vic and I actually dress for these shows in a sort of absurd manner which might appeal to their fixation... wearing camo military style pants and boots. We generally also wear "wife beaters", as they call those plain white tank top style T-shirts, to display our heavily muscled physiques... as well as our pistols openly worn in our shoulder rigs. These guys look like accountants, and will often attend these shows in similarly ridiculous outfits, often stretched over their soft little potbellies. They represent a pretty decent part of our overall take for the weekend, so we dress to attract them.

The show wraps up for the day at 6, and Vic and I head out for some well-earned grub. We go to our regular spot, a Chinese place in a shabby, dark borough of Portland. The place is a dive, and the food is nothing special either. It's the name; The Hung Far Low. This never fails to tickle us senseless, and we go there just to see that huge 25 foot old-school sign hanging off the building... Vic pantomiming with his arm, his elbow jammed in his crotch, and the arm swinging back and forth like a mule's johnson. I tell him it likely isn't required for admittance, but there's no dissuading him.

We talk, as we always do, of our plans to get further ahead financially. We discuss our planned knife buying trip to Europe, which we hope to do in February or March... after the three month overtime binge which always occurs at the Post Office in the months preceding Christmas. We will have to get our passports, I say.

"How's this thing going with that girl?" he asks casually, stuffing a generous portion of some unspeakable sauteed sea critter into his mouth. Vic loves to sample foods a Billy goat would turn his nose up at: Kim-Che, gator, sea urchins, squirrels, insects, snails. If it's on four legs or flippers, he's eaten it. In the wilderness, I imagine he would fare handily, chewing handfuls of squirming grubs... while I starved to death, disgusted. I sometimes think he is able to do this because he has no sense of smell... his olfactory nerves or whatever have never functioned since birth. It is one of God's little jokes, offered in the form of Vic himself, that he was both born with this ability absent, and a profound talent to create deadly odors. I have seen him casually lift his leg and clear an entire lunchroom, people bolting for the door with eyes watering. An effluvium of epic proportion, you fully expect the paint to start running down the walls... with Vic sitting there puzzled, asking "What?"

"Well, we've been talking", I say in answer to his inquiry.

His brows go up a bit, and he takes another enormous bite of food, appearing ready to listen only if I want to talk.

I explain how things have unfolded so far, and begin to share my feelings about it slowly... as if trying to understand myself how all of this came to transpire. I also still have my reservations, I point out again, about the appropriateness of things... considering my recent separation.

"I wouldn't ever tell you your business, you know that", Vic asserts, "and you know I think Eliza is great. But you've told me that you've tried everything, and it's over. Without hope of redemption." He takes a small sip of tea, and continues. "Sometimes it's just a matter of two really great people who don't belong together at all. Who can say? Only you my friend."

"What I do know," he says pointedly, "is you've been working your ass off for several years, trying to do the right things. And it's not all for nothing," he says, raising a couple of gnarled, stone mason's fingers to count off. "One, you and Eliza have at least done well enough to be able to afford to split up. Most people would be left broke, trying to run two households on an income capable of supporting only one." He counts off another finger and continues. "Two, you have agreed on joint custody, so you can see your kids as much as you like." This, Vic knows, was a big concern of mine.

"So," he says, coming to the point, "now you meet this girl, and maybe the timing isn't so hot. But things are as they are. I don't think anyone would begrudge you catching a break, maybe feeling good for a change. I know I wouldn't".

We finish our meal, and go out to a high-end strip club, Club 505. I find myself bored quickly, which serves to clarify things a bit. It's not, I think, about dancing... or nakedness, or any of that. It's about her. I have simply never met a woman so very compelling to me. Never locked eyes with one before, and shared an awareness like that. As much money as we're making this weekend, I still wish we were back in Eugene. So I could see her.

[StratBastard]

(continued)

The show ends at 4 P.M. Sunday afternoon, and Vic and I gleefully split up maybe $7000 of ill-gotten booty. We have also increased our gun inventory somewhat, taking in several nice guns in trade for knives. Trading these knives at full retail, we are into these $700 guns for maybe 2 or 3 bills each... a tidy profit to be realized at our next show. We have transporting our inventory down to a science, stacking all our cases on hand trucks and getting it all out and loaded up in one trip. Already on the I-5 south by 4:30, we should be back in Eugene around 6 or so... and I am already thinking about seeing Hindi tonight.

Upon unloading the truck, I head out alone to the club. Hindi is there and in street clothes, having apparently just arrived herself, and takes me over to our spot behind the old jukebox. Laughing in her baggy jeans and sweater, she starts dancing for me as a bit of a jest... pulling her jeans down to reveal an oversized, clownish pair of boxer shorts which she flaps around laughing. She never stops surprising me with her endearing eccentricities.

I reach into my coat pocket and bring out a small box containing a gift I had purchased for her in Portland, from a vender who also carried nice jewelry at the show. She seems a bit stunned, and I am sure for a moment she will refuse it as inappropriate. But as she finally takes it, I realize that she is simply surprised and shocked at the very thought of receiving a gift; that I had thought of her specifically with warmth and intent, and had gone to some trouble to demonstrate this to her. She seems to merely lack perhaps recent precedents in which to know how to feel.

The gift itself, a solid gold amulet in the shape of her astrological sign Libra, verifies it was chosen just for her... as she has a very small tattoo of the Libra scales just above her pubic line (well, just above where it would be HAD she any). She smiles, looking very touched, if still not quite comfortable with the ritual. I am pleased to see her put it on immediately, the golden chain hanging now around her beautiful and slender neck.

I ask her if she has brought with her any ideas to utilize with the music I had given her, and she suddenly looks very strange... looking down a bit.

"I did listen to your tape", she finally says, "and it was really fantastic. I've never heard anything quite like they were composed and played". This delivered with some apparent apprehension.

"But it's maybe not your style?" I venture, not really following where this is going.

"Oh no, it's beautiful... what kind of music style is that? it's so very unique..." she asks.

"It's really a fusion style of several genres," I explain, trying not to sound too stuffy. "It's a blend of neo-classical, funk, and what I call ethereal blues".

She remains silent.

"What's the matter?" I finally ask.

"Can I see your hands?" she asks, not seeming to really want to.

I turns out she has two housemates: the other young petite woman named Hilary, with whom she had been talking with on my previous visit, and a young man by the name of Mitchell. They each rent individual rooms in an old house, though Hilary and Mitchell are a couple.

Mitchell has told Hindi, she says, that I am a charlatan of sorts. That there IS no guitar player in Eugene OR Portland capable of manifesting this level of skill, and that I had likely obtained some bootleg copies of unreleased material from other famous guitarists, and now was merely attempting to pass it off as my own. He was convinced one track was actually some unreleased Robin Trower, and another he was sure must be Yngwie Malmsteen.

"He told me to look at the ends of your fingers," she says reluctantly. I know instantly what he has told her to look for; calloused, frayed fingertips. What he doesn't know is this: that this does occur on a beginner, an intermediate, and even some decent journeyman players. Someone like myself, however, who has practiced more than most since a child, will exhibit none of this. The fingertips become impervious, and to the naked eye appear normal... but like elephant hide in the skin thickness. I explain this to her, aware it sounds specious.

She looks me in the eye, saying "I believe you, I do. Mitchell thinks he's protecting me." She goes onto explain how the three of them work together to keep the household going, and that Mitchell himself plays guitar.

I don't like the way this is going... I certainly don't want her regarding me as lying to her. "Maybe," I say, "we can get together soon and work on putting your words and my music together. That might put his concerns to rest?"

"Sure, that would be great... but I believe you, I do." Her eyes are agonized, sincere. I am touched by her struggle with this, her hopes having maybe been shattered countless times in this life... and still at least wanting to believe things could, for once, be genuine. In addition, she seems willing enough, even maybe with strong doubts, to maintain the illusion of belief to spare me any discomfiture. Rather than being outraged or disappointed, she is concerned about hurting my feelings or embarrassing me... even if I WERE a liar.

"I'm going up to Portland for a couple of days, but I'll be back Thursday," she says. "I'm going up to visit my mother," she says, handing me a scrap of paper. "Here's the number if you want to call me".

"I do and I will," I reply.

"Would you like to meet me at the diner on Main Street after work? It's open all night. You could take me home so you know where I live, too. That way we can get together when I get back".

Wow. "That would be great, yeah."

"I'll have to leave in a cab, they of course don't allow anyone leaving with a customer. Will you be there?"

"Absolutely".

I wait in the diner and, sure enough, there she is... coming in the door. We grab a table in the back.

We are finally free to just be ourselves, outside the confines of the club. We talk about our history mostly. Our families, schooling, childhood... all the stuff you always want to know about someone you are falling for. She has on her of course more of her work and brings out a small folder of collages she has made from photographs she took, spreading them out on the table for me to view. She has an artist's heart, and is trying to share something inside of her maybe, something which she cannot quite describe with words. Like me, she enjoys cup after cup of coffee despite the late hour. We fall in together like drops of water into a pool, enjoined and larger because of it.

She takes my hands in hers, and looks me in the eyes, saying "I need you to know that I am bisexual. It's who I am, and you'll have to decide whether this is something you can accept".

She is studying my face, looking for any sign of shock or distaste. I actually AM surprised by her frankness, but find myself exhilarated by the idea. Among everything else I have come to adore about her, she has become, in an instant, the most sexually interesting woman I have ever met.

"I'm neither phobic or judgmental," I answer with a reassuring smile. "I think people should be free to be who they are, and if they can find love of any kind in this often abysmal world... God bless them."

Her face relaxes. I have, I think, passed some sort of test. I'm still not sure what it might mean.

Finally, we get in my car, and she directs me to her house. We arrive at the curb and I get out, thinking should I kiss her? She instead smiles and gives me the firm handshake again, says goodnight, and goes inside.

Jesus, where do I stand with this girl? I guess I'll have to try and find out when she gets back from visiting her mother.

[StratBastard]

(continued)

Two days later, I ring up her mother's number... but get an answering machine, which catches me a bit on the hop. I stumble a bit, and simply wish her a happy birthday, and that I hope she is having a good time.

Her birthday is towards the end of September, making her a Libra of course. I myself am a Scorpio, and while I do not place much stock in such things, I have to admit I do exhibit most of the classic Scorpio traits. According to astrological scripture, a Libra will deliberate endlessly over, say, which candy bar to buy... while I am like "Fuck it, let's get one of each and go". Who knows, maybe together we might find some balance between our two absurd positions in this life.

The following day I decide to see if she is back in town. I pull up next to her place, now in the daylight, and realize it is inexplicably right next door to the place I lived in when I was 19 and attending college. The place where I dreamed of her so many years ago. Hmmm... I think, another very strange coincidence.

As luck would have it, Hilary and Mitchel are just walking by.

"Hilary!" I call, getting out of the car. "What's up? Is Hindi back from Portland yet?"

She is very friendly and receptive. "Hey Phoenix! No, but she just called a couple of hours ago and said she was just leaving and should be back soon. This is Mitchel, by the way."

Mitchel seems a bit taken aback by my immediately outstretched hand, but takes it and shakes with the grip of a little girl... and smiling sheepishly, obviously surprised and uncomfortable. I can see he notices my guitar case and a small amplifier in the back of my car. He sees, apparently, that I have come to put up or shut up. He looks back at me a little nervous now, and reading him I have to wonder if he was invested in my being a charlatan for some reason.

"How ya doin' Mitchel?", I ask. "Nice boots." He is not really a very impressive looking person, showing little substance both outward and otherwise. He has unwashed, dirty blonde hair tied behind his head with a string. His clothes look similarly shabby, his home-fashioned shorts, too large for his frail frame, tied around his waist with another length of twine. While he looks to be about 29 or so, he does not appear entirely healthy. Incongruously, he is sporting these nice, expensive looking new boots.

"Thanks!", he says, looking down at them with pride.

"Yep." Hilary adds a little ruefully. "They better be nice, I paid $100 for them".

I am already getting the picture on this guy. No job, no plans or ambitions, and has moved into a shared house with two ladies with kind hearts to exploit. Likely has an excuse each month for not contributing to the rent or household expenses... which Hilary and Hindi likely pick up themselves. Even talked himself into Hilary's sheets, it seems. This seems almost absurd to me, as Hilary is a lovely young woman, and could have her pick of much better men. She likely feeds him, and buys his beer and smokes too: and he calls ME a charlatan. I'm wondering if he suspects I am about to cut in on his meal ticket... and if THAT is his real issue with my sudden appearance in Hindi's life. He could see clearly enough I had no need to take anything from her: I had a car, an expensive vintage guitar and amp, and didn't dress like I lived under a bridge. This, I think, is what worried him the most. That the gravy train might be grinding to a halt, and he viewed me as an unwelcome usurper.

"Okay then", I finally say. "I'll just check back some other time. Good to meet you Mitchell, and good seeing you again Hilary."

I am unsure of what her motives might be, but Hilary seems to very much like the fact that I am here to see Hindi... even if Mitchel does not. "Yeah," she says, "come back later, I'm sure she'll be back very soon!"

Driving off, I start thinking: Hindi doesn't have a car, and obviously wouldn't fly to Portland. This leaves what? The train, and the bus? On a whim, I pull into the Greyhound bus terminal. Going inside, I discover that the next bus from Portland is due in 15 minutes. I stand out by the bus stalls waiting, and soon enough it pulls right in. I watch as each passenger steps off, and sure enough, there she is. I watch from a distance unnoticed as she has the driver remove a large, heavy looking backpack from the luggage compartment. She slings this about her shoulders, and picks up the smaller suitcase she had when she got off... preparing, apparently, to walk this load the 2 miles to her house.

"Could you use some help there?" I ask, walking up to her.

"No thanks, I'm fine", she says curtly, and then she looks up. Her eyes grow wide with surprise.

"Whoa! What are you... how did you...?" She is a bit taken back. I can't tell if she's pleased or not.

I explain my reasoning for trying to maybe find her here after seeing Hilary. "Is it okay that I came here?" I ask.

"Oh yes, it's great to see you," she says smiling ruefully. "It's just that I'm a mess. I've been on that bus forever, and I haven't washed my hair in 2 days". She is frantically pulling at it with actual concern.

"You look great to me", I say. "I just couldn't wait to see you". This confession seems to soften her considerably. "Let's get your stuff in my car and I'll drive you home".

Driving to her place, I ask how her birthday went.

"Oh, okay I guess. I was really upset that I missed your call. I played the message a few times, and my mom wondered who the hell you might be". She has her chin tucked down, trying to obscure her face with her hair. "God, I'm not wearing any makeup either". This from a woman who, if dragged through the mire in a potato sack, would still outshine any other woman on Earth. I am encouraged by this, nonetheless. She wants me to see her at her best.

We agree that I will set up my equipment while she showers and changes. She leads me into the large back yard, much like many yards in this neighborhood. The house is owned by Ganga, an old relic from the hippy era... his long dreads grey, his age somewhere between 60 and 600. He rents inexpensive rooms in his large, ramshackle house. Several of the inhabitants, including Hilary and Mitchel, are lounging about the yard drinking 40 zones of beer. They are friendly, and curious about the guitar stuff I am setting up.

Mitchel decides he needs more beer, and asks Hilary for some more money. She digs in her pocket and seems to hand it to him as a matter of course... bitching a little, but giving it up nonetheless. This guy, I think. He is gone for only a few minutes, settling back in his chair with another 40 to swill. By now I am tuned up and ready to go, and Hindi exits the house.

I still cannot get over how very beautiful she is. It's not just a physical beauty, but something which calls to me ceaselessly, as a siren song reaching to every deep crevice in which I have resided alone. Her hair is fresh and clean, and she has donned a simple summer dress.

I had planned on sitting down alone with her and working on a few songs, but the entire household now seems arrayed here ready to hear me play instead. Their many chairs have formed around me in a semi-circle, like some form of makeshift amphitheater. Most of the faces merely seem curiously expectant, with the exception of Mitchel's. A little drunk, he looks today amused that I might try to carry this alleged gambit off right under his nose. Maybe he's thinking of the sneering disdain he will offer about me to Hindi, after I fall on my face in front of her and the others... the usurper disgraced, and forced to leave ridiculed and defeated. This dials me up a bit. More than a bit actually. Fuck it, I think. This is MY world, and I OWN it. If they want to see if it's real, I'll give them their chance.

[StratBastard]

(Continued)


I turn to Hindi and say, "This is one of the instrumentals on the tape I gave you," and immediately rip into one of my own fast and complex neo-classical compositions. Mitchel looks stunned, not exactly pleased, with a look indicating he has been caught completely unawares. Ganga, actually a sweet old guy, nods his head, smiling and occasionally clapping. Hilary is looking, strangely enough, at Mitchel... a knowing and smug smile on her face.

I had hoped Hindi would react differently... vindicated perhaps or admiring. Instead, she appears startled, and a bit taken aback by my ability. An epiphany strikes me with a sudden clarity; she is overwhelmed by my interest in her, and doesn't know what to make of it. She is as smitten as I am, and like me, is scared that she can't really have it. Looking about the yard, I understand I fully represent something completely outside her immediate experience: a person of some substance, with ambition, drive, and ability.

I immediately back off my initial onslaught to prove myself, and instead make a pointed effort to continually demonstrate that I am here only to see her. I stand close to her, even bend down occasionally to whisper my smart-ass comments in her ear... just between us, I am saying. I clown around some, and get a smile from her when I play the "Woody Woodpecker" theme song.

Hilary asks Ganga what he thinks, and he says very generously "He's maybe the best I've ever seen, and right here in my own yard", a comment which brings not a single contradiction from the listeners and making Mitchel's face curdle even more.

Not wanting to encourage that shit, considering the circumstances, I put my guitar down, turn off the amp, and sit next to Hindi. She has been watching, for the most part, the reactions of everyone else now that it is over... and seems at least pleased that they all (with the exception of Mitchel) have been very welcoming, even approving of me.

She turns to me and asks "Would you like to go for a walk?"

A chance to be alone somewhat. "I would, let's go".

We merely walk to the adjacent apartment building, and sit on a set of stairs... directly across from the set which led to my old apartment when I lived here years ago at 19. My head is still turning this weird coincidence left and right, not quite sure what to do with it.

She has angled her head towards me, her face close, and her eyes without reservation look straight into mine. Our lips come together, and we share our first kiss... the finest in my entire life. We are both actually trembling with the tension.

We finally finish, and I can't help but say "You know, I was thinking this would never happen. When I dropped you off that night, and you shook my hand goodnight...?"

"AHHHHHH!" she exclaims, holding her head in both hands and laughing at herself. "I was SO nervous. I wanted to kiss you, I wanted to fuck you, and I got inside and said, "Did I really do that?!? I can't believe I shook his fucking HAND!"

We have a tremendous yuck over this, and we can finally relax and be in each other's arms. She wants me, I want her; we were both too terrified to say it, but it's finally out... thank God.

Free to finally touch each other, our hands are suddenly busy exploring. My hands moving along those incredibly long legs and under her dress, discover her completely naked underneath. People are passing by unheeded by us: we are fully making out like two teenagers under the bleachers. I have never wanted anything so badly... who cares who sees us?

Breathless, I say I have to go... I am due at work soon.

"Are you working tomorrow?" I inquire, my arms still around her.

"I'm working a day shift, from noon to 7," she responds, snuggling her head into my neck.

"If I call in sick tomorrow night and pick you up at 7, can we spend the evening together?" I dare to ask, still not able to wrap my head around what is happening.

"Could we get a room somewhere?" she asks, covering my face with soft touches of her mouth. I lift her chin with one finger, until our eyes meet fully.

"Oh, I think we will absolutely need a room," I say with a smile, which she returns almost shyly.

I am at work, and I am actually floating. Normally perceived as somewhat of a surly stoic by many of my co-workers, tonight I am instead loud and gregarious, and eager to engage anyone in exuberant banter. I am friendly to even my supervisors, whom I have trained over the years to avoid bothering me too much. Sure, I say to their wary faces, I can take care of that, no problem. They don't really know what to make of it... what the hell's up with him? It seems to creep them out a bit, and they avoid me more than usual. I don't care. I talk to people I would, on any other day, probably punt off the end of the dock with little provocation. Tonight I carry no grudges, I harbor no ill-will.

There is a well inside me into which I have never dared to look, fearing its depth. Tonight, I have stood at its edge and discovered with little surprise that it has no discernable bottom. I have not fallen... I have thrown myself in, aware and unafraid.

I am, without reservation, fully and desperately in love.

[StratBastard]

23163

[StratBastard]

23164

[StratBastard]

23165

[MountainGirl]

23163

Punctuation matters; ^^ time well spent.

I'm sorry I love you.
I'm sorry, I love you.
I'm sorry I love. You?

[StratBastard]

CHAPTER THREE

October 1992

I arrive at the club at 7 to find her ready to go... dressed in jeans and a jacket, her large dance bag in her hand. Having apparently designated me as her ride tonight, it is OK for us to leave together. I take her inordinately heavy bag from her hand, which seems to surprise her a bit: perhaps in her circles such niceties are not observed. She turns and runs back into the dressing room, perhaps to get something forgotten.

My radar goes on alert; I am being scrutinized by a great many men, their unfriendly eyes appraising me. I am being sized up with great interest, now that I have Hindi's bag in my hand... and they are leaning into each other, whispering. I can well imagine the comments... Who's this guy? Doesn't look like a cabbie. Could he be the boyfriend? He don't look like much to me.

Now, I'm no tough guy, but people often tell me I resemble one. Vic says I look like the love child of Vin Deisel and Bruce Willis... with just a sprinkle of a possibly dangerous sociopath lurking behind the eyes. I have, I am told, a mean face. Not unattractive, maybe even somewhat handsome to some, but definitely mean. People take awhile getting to know me before they eventually figure out that I just look that way, and have no intention of beating them senseless. Part of it is my street face: that face you wear when you don't want bums, nutjobs, and hobos approaching you all the time when out and about. In Eugene, it is an absolute necessity, and I am left alone. My problem is, I wear my street face most all the time out of habit; as a bit of a misanthrope, I don't trust anyone anywhere. The added effect of years of heavy, insane weight training routines with Vic have only added to the illusion. Under my jacket, my tank top bulges in all the right places, stretched tightly across swelling pecs and shoulders, the short sleeves riding up to reveal my rather big, heavily muscled arms.

Internally sighing, I realize I can't let this pass. I plan to be coming in here quite often, and there will have to be some rules and protocols established. I first have to shove the waif who still resides somewhere inside me (and likely always will) way down in the cellar. That takes more pushing than you might imagine, but I get it done. I don't want anyone thinking they can just walk up and start shit with me, especially in front of Hindi. In addition, hard stares like I am getting now are an actual unspoken challenge to your resolve, as every guy knows.

I place the bag on the floor. Removing my jacket, I hang it on the back of a chair as if planning to stay. I drain my face of all emotion, turn, and stare right back at the two guys closest, sitting right there at the bar; a couple of ersatz biker types with insolent sneers. I let the moments pass for as long as it takes, mute, my body posture hostile and speaking for me like Sinatra in a rage: What the FUCK are you LOOKIN' at?!? I got chunks of guys like you in my STOOL.

It takes awhile, but they finally break off first and turn back to their beers with silent, stony faces. I scan the remaining customers and find no more hard stares. I put my jacket back on and pick up the bag again, my heart jack hammering in my throat. Hindi pops back out smiling, I smile back, and we take our leave.

It has been raining pretty steadily all day, and we hurry out the door and climb into my Beamer. I pull onto Main Street and start driving west towards Franklin Boulevard... a long road which stretches the entire length between Springfield and Eugene. It is littered with a variety of small, inconspicuous motels... one of which we intend to utilize.

She keeps commenting about my "cool car", which only serves to again demonstrate how very different she is from any other woman I have ever met. I mean sure, okay, it IS a cool car. IF you don't mind that the heater doesn't work, or the fact that the old vacuum designed windshield wipers lumber ineffectively across the glass. The wind and rain pour through the aged rag-top and into the cab with impunity. So while the "coolness" is subjective, the fact that it's cold is NOT. I have to continually wipe fog from the glass with a small towel.

Most women, I am thinking, would much rather ride in the style and comfort of my other car, a late model Nissan GXE with all the bells and whistles... not to mention dry and warm. Hindi, however, seems to love its quirkiness and has settled in comfortably. Amazing in this small cab, she has managed to bring her long legs up and recline in the seat, her feet casually on the dash.

A few miles down the road, we pull into the lot of a small motel. As I am getting out, she asks if I need any money. I look at her stupidly for a moment, not really grasping what the question means... and then I get it. She is offering to kick in on the room. This girl, I'm thinking, where does a girl like this come from?

I simply smile at her and say, "Sit tight, I'll be right back". And with that, I shut the door and push into the office.

This is all new to me, and I'm not quite certain what to expect. Will they ask if we're married, maybe demand to see some proof? I've been imagining some blue-haired, older woman looking down her nose at me... with the stern countenance of a Catholic school teacher who suspects misbehaviour afoot: "You and that YOUNG WOMAN can just climb back into your car and leave, or I'm calling the police! We don't allow anything like THAT here, I can ASSURE you!"

Gulp. Jesus H.

A small silver desk bell sits alone on the counter, mutely daring me. I put on my best casual face, and commit myself with a single downward slap of the device. It rings loudly, as if to scream "Fornicators! Check his car, he's got some slut out there!"

A non-descript man in his forties saunters out holding a half-eaten corndog on a stick. His demeanor is seemingly tired and disinterested at best.

"How many?" he simply asks, pulling a sheet of paper from under the counter.

"Two," I answer. Me and the slut.

"How long?" he asks, exchanging the gnarled corndog to his left hand and starting to write.

"Just tonight," I respond.

"Smoking or non-smoking?"

"Smoking".

"Thirty seven bucks. Sign here please." He begins to extend the corndog towards me, and then catches himself and offers me the pen.

And just like that, we're finally alone together.

[StratBastard]

23172

[StratBastard]

Once inside, Hindi is instantly comfortable, settling into the new surroundings with the ease of a nomad. It's much nicer than where she lives, and she luxuriates in the fresh and clean environment. She tosses her bag next to the bed, fishes out a smaller collection of toiletries, and goes right into the bathroom.

"I'm going to take a bath," she declares, already starting the water and stripping off her sweater.

"Sure, okay," I say, and start to turn away from the door.

"Come in and sit, talk to me?" she asks, peeling her jeans and underwear off her wriggling hips.

So, I close the lid on the toilet and sit. She unsnaps her little black lace bra and drops it in the growing pile. She gingerly steps into the filling tub, lies down and stretches full length; she has to put her feet high up on the tiles, the tub unable to accommodate her long slender legs. She begins to wash herself with pleasure, explaining that the facilities at Ganja's house are barely operable. She rarely has much privacy there, she says, or time to relax in a tub... there's too many people, too many demands on their small bathroom. She is chattering away at me nervously, but smiling and obviously glad to be here. Myself, I am still feeling like I won some outrageously huge lottery prize... I still don't really understand why this has occurred, or how I could have gotten here. I am more than a little nervous myself, as I have not been with another woman for the entire last decade. Jesus, what if I'm so nervous I can't?

She has pulled a pair of scissors from the small bag she brought in, and looking at me first, she ceremoniously begins to cut off the small leather bracelets which adorn each wrist. Apparently, this is something symbolic, a statement to herself of sorts.

"What's that all about?" I inquire with genuine interest.

She reaches out and drops them into the small wastebasket. "I'm deciding to make a new start," she says, a phrase I will hear in a dozen different earnest forms over the following years. "I don't want to be held to old promises that aren't genuine".

Finished, she towels herself briskly, tossing her long clean hair this way and that. She walks back into the room, replacing her things in the bag. She then stands back up, turns to me, and looks at me in a way that I found indescribable. Her chin is down a bit, her large green eyes wide and locked on mine. This look is consenting, welcoming, vulnerable, and captivating... saying you can have anything you want from me, I won't refuse you anything. Right here, right now, I am yours.

I move towards her, and she steps naked into my arms. Even with my boots on, she is as tall as I am, and her long body presses into my fully clothed one in an embrace. We stand just like that for a time, merely holding one another. Her arms tighten around me in near desperation, as if I might suddenly disappear. She cried a little then, with me holding her, soothing her. I felt myself losing all title to my own sovereign existence; I was hers too, come what may, regardless of consequences.

We finally break apart, and she stretches out on our bed (our bed!) without taking her eyes from me. I untie my boots and begin taking my clothes off while she watches. Her eyes still have that look, like she desperately wants me to be pleased. I don't think she really has, as of yet, any idea how utterly thrilled I am to be here with her. Naked now, I too lay down, and we are in each other's arms.

I am overwhelmed with the sensation of her; her breath on my lips, the smell of her hair filling me. I can't stop touching her face, tracing its shape... her perfect marble skin under my fingertips, under my mouth. The taste of her lips, her sweat, her juices. Her eyes look straight into me, and I hide nothing. Man and woman together, perhaps as it was once intended long ago, and then somehow became lost through the generations. I want her like I want my next breath.

Locked together in an embrace as old as time itself, we work together desperately endeavoring to become as one. We do the best we can, our eyes still round and astounded.

Her sex in my mouth is smooth like a fresh peach, sweet and blameless. Her hands are stretched to hold my head, her eyes watching, fascinated. To me, the scent of her was exotic yet familiar; I am like a long-lost mariner, his face in the wind, finally seeing his homeland on the horizon. With this woman, I belonged. With Hindi, I have finally come home.

[StratBastard]

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[StratBastard]

Me at 10 years old.

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[StratBastard]

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[MountainGirl]

Are you writing again?

Again. LOLOLOL

[StratBastard]

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[StratBastard]

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[StratBastard]

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[StratBastard]

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[StratBastard]

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[MountainGirl]

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Are you still writing, my friend?
I've used up all my words.
It's nice having nothing to say;
nor an inclination to respond
to anything. :)