Failure!

Sundays in December



Fifty years ago we would have been eying the candles on the Advent wreath hung between us as we sat facing each other in the choir stalls up by the alter. Counting the candles down with each Sunday service, week by week, we eagerly approached the big day at what then seemed to be a snail’s pace. As Reverend Hardman pontificated to that captive audience, I was hard-pressed to think of anything more boring than having to sit quietly while that martini sodden windbag vomited on the willing sheep. My mind raced to get away from him…and to kill time. If I squinted at the back of the oak pew in front of me, I could see the face of a mountain man in the grain of the wood. He was a friend of Davy Crockett’s that I recognized from the TV show. John McGroarity sat in one of the pews opposite me, surreptitiously darting his tongue in and out around his lips and acting like he was loosing his mind. He did that pretty frequently, trying to make me laugh. A few weeks after he started his little show, he told me that he was “eating pussy”. Of course neither of us had ever even seen a pussy, much less “eaten“ one. I was unsure of what they actually looked like but apparently John had gotten a hold of a porn magazine somewhere that showed a man “eating” a woman’s pussy. He kept promising to bring the magazine to choir practice to show me, but he never did. It was just too hot, too volatile, to risk transport anywhere. And so, on those achingly boring Sunday mornings in December, that held the ultimate prize at the end, I sat, trapped. Squinting at Davy Crockett’s friend, the mountain man, my eyes reluctantly pulled up to catch a glimpse of John eating pussy, I fought sleep. The drone of Reverend Hardman’s narcotic assault urged me to close my eyes and shut him out. But then, finally, it was Christmas Eve. The Advent wreath had just one candle left burning, and there was only a short, troubled sleep between myself and Christmas morning.

Thanksgiving Day

 

 

 

 

 

It was the sound of birds vying for landing space on the feeder just outside the open French doors to our bedroom that first woke me up. They pulled me slowly from another dimension where people and places I’m familiar with had been put into a blender and served up like some odd Dali Gazpacho. Apparently my feeder is too small to warrant an air traffic control bird so the bickering and diving was chaotic. Of course the Blue Jays bomb in whenever they damn well please. But it was nice, I liked it. Looking past my feet I could see the first fiery clouds peeping up over the distant tree line as the sun prepared to take the stage. An older lady paused to let her poodle sniff the bank on the other side of the lake, then walked off upside down in her reflection that waved and stretched out over the water. Carla was sleeping soundly next to me, reassuringly. It all made me feel unusually…celebratory.

We had postponed making a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, waiting until Ruth was to visit the week after. But even though we loved seeing her and did lots of fun stuff, making that dinner wasn’t one of them. So while Carla slept in after an evening of running loose with the dogs late into the night, I cooked. Why not? It’s December 18^th, sunny and in the 70’s and I felt thankful. Several hours later, after a very musical kitchen dance, I was done: a stuffed turkey, giblet gravy with what some would say is too much ground pepper, potatoes and butternut squash mashed together, Collard greens picked fresh from the garden, homemade organic applesauce cooked with blueberries, and a hot Pecan pie spiked with melted semi-sweet chocolate morsels that could seriously burn your tongue if you weren’t careful to eat each bite with a cold spoonful of vanilla ice cream.

I knew that Hannah was celebrating her life in South Africa as was Ruth in Venice Beach. They both understand, they get it. Every new day is cause for celebration and gratitude if you choose to look at life that way. Mother Maybelle and her girls used to sing: “Keep on the Sunny Side”, and I do. Every day is Thanksgiving day, even an uneventful Tuesday.

Jersey Boys

Thirteen years before the amazing David Lindley was hitting my sweet spot with his vocals on the Jackson Brown rendition of “Stay”. (Little did 15 year old Maurice Williams know what a monster he was creating in 1953) Frankie Valli was getting high with The Four Seasons. I wasn’t much of a fan but they were certainly as big a part of my life as…well, the family dog. Now I love dogs but that nasty Dashound was a bitch of a bitch. Anyway, I had little regard for Frankie and his peeps, or for the blue collar greasers in stovepipe pants in general. You know, Jersey boys. But, of course, I was a Jersey boy too. But I was from a white collar suburb not…Newark or something. We all have our prejudices. Trovolta’s “Danny” was foreign to me. I wanted to go sit in Washington Square and listen for whispers of Dylan or Sebastian sightings. You’ll find no Four Seasons vinyl or CDs in my collection, some 1,000 strong. But after watching a PBS fundraiser that featured the “Jersey Boys” material and realizing how well I knew the music, every word, every note... I caved. Amazon was nice enough to sell me a greatest hits collection. For over a week now, I’ve been listening to nothing else in my truck. These guys were huge, one monster hit after another, and this time I don’t have to listen to Cousin Brucie yelling at me in-between cuts. Every single song takes me back. I was so programmed by this stuff. Some things don't change, but how we feel about them may. Now it’s as if the family dog came back after all these years to ride shotgun with me. I didn't realize how much I loved that little bitch, and yes, this music too. I do keep my windows rolled up though, I don’t want anyone to hear us howl.

Billie Jean

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Motown music was never my thing, I would have been more excited to see Jackson Browne or Eric Clapton, maybe Ry Cooder or Bonnie Raitt. One of the people that were the soundtrack of my own life. So on that night, 25 years ago, I wasn’t prepared to be blown away by this guy but, of course, I was. I remember speaking with my sister the next day and listening to the way this performance had affected her in a similar fashion. We had both been mesmerized, caught unexpectedly by this display of exceptional talent. Seeing an amazing artist in a peak performance like this, brings a realization of just how rare and unique these moments are and an even greater appreciation for a fleeting glimpse of the superstar moments that too often lay dormant in all of us.

You Bastard!

We immediately recognized the sound of Jon’s old Chevy laboring up onto the swale out front while Carla and I were having lunch on the back patio. Both Jon and his car shared a hacking cough that announced their arrival. He often stopped by unannounced, as I did with him.

Anticipating the click of the gate as he came through the side yard, I knew there was just enough time to take one last big mouthful of the warm chicken and cheese enchiladas with sour cream that we had reheated, leftovers  from last night’s dinner at Ned’s Southside.

Chewing quickly as Jon approached, I got up from the lawn chair to greet him, and partially stumbled forward with my head down, feigning an odd but unmistakable urgency. He had already begun to continue our conversation from earlier in the day: “That eyeglass place fixed me right up. The girl who adjusted my glasses…”

He didn’t finish his sentence before I blew out my lunch all over the grass at his feet, successfully splattering his shoes. Jumping back as I lurched forward falling into him sloppily and getting a bit more enchilada sauce on his right sleeve, he bravely tried to support me. As I was bending deeper and retching a few more times for dramatic effect, Jon started to recover his senses and say something when I stood straight up, grinning. “Care for some chicken enchiladas? They’re great!” He could only come up with “You bastard!” as I smiled and called Rufus over and pointed to the mess on the ground. “Here you go boy, lunch!”

Jon is so gullible, I'm always getting him with something and he goes for it every time, hook, line, and sinker. Like when we were squirrel hunting in the woods back in Virginia. Walking along an old path together, Jon hung back to water a tree. I saw my opportunity to scurry up ahead, and pulled a warm Tootsie Roll from my jeans pocket, popping it into my mouth, being sure to tuck the wrapper back out of sight into the same pocket. A few quick chews and I spit the glistening mess out onto a rock in the middle of the path. Dropping back again, and walking in tandem, the two of us came up on the rock. I pointed, “Oh look, animal droppings!” Jon stopped to contemplate the shape and size of the droppings, mulling over the unstated question of what kind of animal had left them there and when. I knelt down, “they’re fresh” I observed as I slowly pushed a finger into the largest piece. “and warm!” Jon started to squirm, “that’s gross, I hope you get some kind of animal disease” I just smiled as I lifted a large dripping chunk up for close inspection as I told him: “You can tell a lot about what kind of animal it is from the smell…and taste” Jon looked down at me with horror as I quickly popped a chunk into my mouth and started smacking my lips and using my tongue to mop a sloppy brown shit circle around my lips. “Tastes like Fox” I said. “Probably a Red fox but could be Grey. Definitely female though, and she‘s got kits!”  Jon started stammering.

Grinning like a fool, I took another big glob and was pushing it toward Jon as he stumbled backward. “Here, you taste it and see what you think.” He couldn’t scramble backward fast enough.

Later, even after I had cleaned-up in a nearby stream, Jon kept his distance, convinced that I had shit for breath and brains. He thought I had totally gone over the edge. It wasn’t until I pulled out another Tootsie Roll and offered him one that the truth dawned on him. I smiled a large chocolate grin as he turned red and lashed out: “You bastard”!

I’ve been doing the same stupid stuff to Jon since we were kids in the fourth grade. Why he thinks that just because we’re old now I wouldn’t pull such juvenile stunts anymore, I have no clue, He goes for it every time, getting red and very angry, spitting oaths at me about never again this and that. But he loves to tell the stories over and over throughout the years, and I love to hear them too. I’ve already got some great plans for his wheelchair, his toothbrush and a hidden camera in his bathroom when we’re eventually relegated to end our days in some nursing home. I love the guy and he loves me, and when I get him all worked up by pretending to be dead, I look forward to hearing him blurt out: “you bastard!”. That will be like the sweet sound of angels calling me home.

hmh

A Sheep in Wolf's Clothing..

The “Defense Intelligence Agency”...DIA, I loved telling people: “I'm DIA” That's where I wound up when my college deferment ran out. I hustled my butt over to the Air Force and joined up before the Army got it's hooks into me. Then I opted for computer operations. In 1971, that was big stuff. The fact that there were few computers on the front lines in Vietnam hadn't escaped me, so that's what I picked. After some brief, and often pointless training (any of you guys remember “pass in review”?) I wound up assigned to the Pentagon in the DIA. We kept records on Red Chinese missile sites and Jane Fonda. Mostly I ran a huge copier on the graveyard shift making multiple copies of top secret documents earmarked for distribution to the big brass with a need to know. One night we managed to talk another airman, actually an airwoman, out of her panties and up onto the copier for a nice sit down picture session. Although we were always supposed to open the copier up after every run and pull the drum to wipe it clean of residual images, in the heat of our good fortune, we didn't. The next day the joint Chiefs of Staff were handed their top secret documents, just like every other day. But that day there were way more dots in the background of the text. Dots that if you pulled the document away and got some distance, became quickly recognizable to every man in the place. All of a sudden the picture came into view and any thoughts of Vietnam or Chinese missile sites were immediately shut down. Every joint chief began thinking with his reptilian brain stem... “Well Hello Honey!” I like to think that, along with my late night buddies, we helped to do our small part for the anti-war movement that day...or at least briefly shift the focus to even more important things...

Divided We Fall…



My friend Jon made the point that the whole system is broken. He asked of no one in particular, how can we fix it? How can we get this country back to that kind of Norman Rockwell utopia we took for granted in the1950’S? We may yearn for dinner with Ward and June but we have no idea how to get back home. Now, all these years later after the burst balloon of Vietnam, after Nixon “lied to us all on TV”. after Camelot ended with a shot to the head, we’re done. America is no longer the greatest country in the world. As far as standard of living goes, we don’t even make the top ten. A nation undivided no more.. And with all the recent political stuff…the lies, the tens of millions spent on spin, the accusatory language by both parties, we’re more divided than ever before. And here’s the thing no one is talking about…yet. Regardless of who wins the election, it won’t stop. If Romney is the man, the Obama peeps will try to make him look bad at every turn, and vice versa if Obama is reelected. The election won’t be the end of it. Members of congress will continue to block legislation proposed by anyone other than their own party while they stuff their pockets and place their own personal gain before that of their constituents or what’s best for the country. So what’s the answer? I have little hope of real change until and unless we, as a country, are put into a life or death situation. America has always been good at coming together when we have no other options left. Maybe the threat is financial ruin when our currency truly has no value overseas or at the grocery store. Maybe a terrorist bomb that takes out the capital, or a nuclear war that starts in the middle east. All bad stuff with unimaginable casualties. Wiping the slate clean and starting over may be the only way we survive, if in fact, we do. But until something almost kills us? We will continue to wallow in giant bags of Cheetos washed down with big gulps of overpriced carbonated sugar water and think that watching Honey Boo Boo is time well spent. We are what we eat and perhaps extinction is the karmic answer awaiting us at the end of the toxic road we’ve chosen to travel for way too long. 



 
Sitting out on the old wooden balcony at Harry’s Seafood, lightly salted breezes cooled us as if we had set the thermostat ourselves. Views are expansive there, down onto the Bridge of Lions and out past the inlet to the open ocean. The bridge opened it’s mouth like a prone giant‘s yawn, allowing passage for a yacht bigger than most houses as it headed for the marina. Close behind, a replica pirate ship in full sail, nipped at it’s heels. We enjoyed the usual; Popcorn Crawfish Tails and a cup of She-Crab Soup. In no hurry to go anywhere, we savored our adopted hometown like a good white wine.

Life in the Gulag



I hated high school. Nothing fit, or felt right, and it was boring as hell. The bus ride to and from was OK though. An unusually excited girl, Mary Beth? Mary Elizabeth? Well Mary something anyway, had dropped out of Catholic school and always sat alone on the seat in front of me so she could turn around and gush nonsense at me for the entire ride. She really was sweet and all, she was just rather clueless. Mostly I let her spew while I thought about her sitting there in her little uniform that she still wore, how clean her hair looked, how she squished her large breasts up and over the back of her seat as if on a serving platter. That part of my commute ended when I replaced the bus with a motorcycle in my junior year. Winter rides froze my hands into claws that wouldn't even start to flex until third period. All that was fine too, but once inside school, the noise, chaos, the marching from room to room for long periods of sit down and shut up time? That stuff really sucked the big weenie. 

All I wanted was out.

Certainly it was no surprise that my grades were poor, given the fact that my father had been a Phi Beta Kappa at Johns Hopkins and top of his class at Harvard Law. All he cared about was academic achievement…and Mom. I not only didn’t compete with that, I actively sabotaged any possibility of getting good grades and mentally dropped out. Physically, I went to school every day, but it was rare for me to be there. On school nights, I was banished to the Gulag to “study” and get my grades up. That started at 7 PM on school nights, five days a week. Dad’s rule. It didn’t do shit for my grades but worked well for Dad’s agenda. He could watch Lawrence Welk with mom in peace, as if I didn’t exist. Cokes and cigarettes for everybody! (Except for those locked up in the Gulag of course)

Among other things, I occupied myself with a World Book Encyclopedia. Read that sucker cover to cover, A through Z, several times. I raised Drosophila and bred them for eye color… thousands of fruit flies looking out at the world beyond their mason jar through bipolar shades. Two-headed Planarian worms dared me to cut them, calling out from a covered dish that the neighbors would rather you not bring over to their party. Boiled straw added to pond water in a large container fed single celled critters and pushed them into overnight population explosions. I saw them all through the lense of my microscope, busily compiling a diary of sightings and drawings. Amoeba and their Sarcondinan brothers seemed to have inspired a 1958 Steve McQueen horror movie: "The Blob". Flagella and cilia pushed their cabs through heavy traffic... microscopic bumper cars.

It reminded me of when David Callahan had just turned ten years old and we went to the Rialto Theatre to see "The Blob" on his birthday. It was pretty scary and David tried to read a book to avoid the screen. Who brings a book to a movie theater anyway?

David was my best friend. He lived behind us, our backyards sharing a worn path between the two houses. At night we often ran that path barefoot and mashed fat slugs between our toes as they crossed the packed dirt in slow motion. We strung telegraph wire between our houses…my bedroom to the garage, to a tree in his backyard, to the window in his house where his telegraph key was set up. I had a key too, of course. So that was huge for me to bring communication with the outside world into the Gulag. David and I tapped out deep thoughts back and forth: “fuck you!”… “fuck you back!” I never thought there was anyone other than David or maybe his brother, Rick, on their end but wound up telling Mr. Callahan “fuck you!” several times even after he identified himself. I thought it was just David playing with me and I said terrible things about his dad’s infatuation with livestock. When I realized that it really was Mr Callahan, I told him that I was my brother, Kenny.

My Gulag had a built-in bar in the closet. An older friend bought bottles of Bourbon for me if I paid him double, so I had that too. For a while there I vomited nightly onto the soft snow under my bedroom window. Violent explosions of a nightmare minestrone…puke graffiti splattered and flash frozen into a mess the dog tried to eat during the day. When mom let the dog out to pee, Lucy would run around to the side of the house and come back with a frozen puke Frisbee for Mom to throw. Unlike my father, the neighbors on that side of the house cared about me. They called up Mom to offer their condolences that I must have been sick with flu out of my window “again last night” 

Good of them to check on me, those bastards.

But thanks to that aging World Book set, also relegated to the Gulag doubling as my bedroom, I did learn something …mostly in alphabetical order, of course. 

So now I’m prepared to take questions from the crowd…as long as they touch on subjects like fruit flies, flatworms, life forms smaller than the dot of a pencil, Morse Code, warm Bourbon with water…or any quick synopsis of subjects from A to Z based on the latest information contained in a set of the 1957 World Book Encyclopedia.

hmh

　

　

Lilly Belle

She wakes herself up, crying in the night, plagued by demons from her past who aren’t done with her yet. Now she’s safe, a life of comfort. But her early years spent as nothing more than breeding stock, have taken their toll. Blind, deaf, she can only outrun her old life in daylight, rolling on her back in damp grass, raising her nose into breezes seasoned with the scent of saltwater and freedom. But sleep is seductive on dark nights, urging her to think it’s all over, not clearly sure of just what it was anymore. The ghosts in her dreams reappear to drag her back into memories that cause her to cry out. Only for herself, by herself. I jump up with the first soft moan, rushing to her side to tell her it’s OK. Greed took away her sight and hearing before she was even conceived. Defenseless property of owners with a darker blindness, relegated to life in a cage. Nothing more than a womb used to produce more of the same. Sitting next to her in the dark, my hands on her body, rubbing reassurance through her short black hair. Her smell the comfort of familiarity. I whisper softly into her ear: “It’s OK girl, it’s OK.”… and feel her relax as the nub of her truncated tail starts to flutter like a hummingbird’s wing.

Sing to Me in F Sharp...

 My love for gadgets came from my Grandfather. We both used to get a little too excited over cameras and wristwatches. So when my parents gave me an Accutron as a High School graduation present (and after I had pestered them endlessly about it), Grandpa was green with envy. it kept time with a tuning fork that used a "360 herta tuning fork instead of a balance wheel as the timekeeping element. That was both innovative and groundbreaking at the time. (Yes, I just said that.) Grandpa started salivating and ran right out to buy one for himself. With that tuning fork, if you pressed it to your ear, you could hear it humming an F sharp. In the summer of 1966, I toured England with the church choir that I had sung in since I was 7 years old. When we hit Westminster Abbey to sing a capella for the Queen, our choir master realized that he had lost his pitch pipe. He had me listen to my watch and hum an F sharp. Scaling it up or down from there he hummed the proper note for us to start on. I told my Grandfather about the F sharp, but at his age he had lost all hearing in the upper ranges and just had to take my word for it. He still loved his Accutron though and enjoyed telling people that his wristwatch was always singing... in F sharp...

Dear Doctor...

Dear Doctor,

I won't be back to see you again and feel it's only fair to tell you why. It's not because I moved out of town or wanted to try a different doctor. It's because you drove me away.

Initially I started to see you in need of a GP. That was some...what, two or three years ago? My wife told me that you had a reputation for being good at your job, and that has generally proven to be true. But here's the rub: In dealing with people, it would be best for yourself and for your patients if you put in some serious work in developing people skills. OK, you've got the analysis covered. You're good with identifying physical health concerns and addressing them. But when it comes to the people part, you seem to be both clueless and lacking.

Yes, I know if I want entertainment, I should go to a movie, or Vegas. It's not that. It's about you paying more attention to your laptop than you do to me. At our last exam you barely looked up from your keyboard. I made a few jokes in an effort to lighten the mood but you not only didn't laugh or smile, you didn't even acknowledge that I had spoken. It's that way every time. You may be the most humorless man I know. An appointment with you feels about as intimate as a drive through the car wash. Perhaps you're the most skilled GP in all of Florida, but I would rather see a doctor with average skills who is pleasant to be around and makes me feel like he cares about me as a patient and as a person. I really get the impression that if I dropped dead on the floor in front of you, that would simply be an opportunity for you to update my charts and move on to your next patient.

Helping people to feel good about themselves and about their time with you is huge. People skills may be the single most important of all of our personal tools as we make our way through this blink of an eye we call life. All human interaction can be made better with a liberal dose. Husbands, wives, sons, daughters, employees, employers...all greatly improve their odds of getting what they want in life if they understand just how important it is that they do their best to help others get what they want and to help them to be the best they can be...and feel good about it. Although you seem to feel that humor and sincere interaction with your patients is frivolous or beneath you, I would maintain that it is crucial, right up there with oxygen.

I heard a line in a movie once about a sour, humorless guy of whom one friend said to the other: " That guy needs a joint and a blowjob more than anyone I know." That's you.

None of this is intended to be a personal attack. No offense, just business. I believe you operate best that way.

Happy Holidays!

Hugh Haller

Un-Schooling...

This is one of the main reasons Carla home-schooled Ruth & Hannah. Over time she pulled me into acceptance and then to full support and encouragement. Home-schooling (un-schooling for us) isn't for everyone but it sure worked well with our two girls.

Jamey Johnson playing balls out honky tonk in the kitchen accompanied by fresh garlic, thyme, oregano, rosemary, parsley, ground black pepper, onions, carrots, tomato paste beef stock, a couple of bay leaves, and a bottle of dry red wine. Oh, and 6 pounds of beef short ribs. Three hours away from braised ambrosia...ribs that are “unstoppably, almost obscenely good”... But now for some thick black coffee, a B12 shot, and a little gym time to help me justify bad behavior later in the day...

Opposites Attract

I'm very stable, routine in my vices and virtues, a planner, a homebody, boring. Carla lives in the moment with no concept of time and no concern for social protocol. If I didn't fill her pockets with smooth stones, she would spin off into space...and I would...just...shut...down.

Military moms under attack for breastfeeding in uniform...

This picture is stupid, it's not anything you would see, it's not representative of real Moms out there. That said, women have breasts to feed their babies. If men in our culture want to prevent the possibility of seeing a bit of a woman's breast because it could make them crazy, tough. It's just another version of saying that a rape victim “asked for it” because she dressed in brief clothing. That's bullshit. We've lost perspective and created a culture that worships silicone artificiality and profits from selling baby formula to third world countries. Breast feeding in private or public is a beautiful, natural, nourishing, loving act worthy of respect and reverence. For those who think it is something other than that: grow up.

The Ultimate Scam

I was raised “High Episcopalian”singing in a much acclaimed choir of men and boys that generated my first regular paycheck. Yes, they paid us kids...we sang for the Queen in Westminster Abbey, made several albums... I loved it, even though it took up 3 nights a week and long hours on Sundays. But the church, the priests...just turned me off to the blatant outrage of the scam they were perpetuating...a bunch of loosers, all of them. Too weak to survive in the real world . Closet pedophiles, drunks, liars...they stole the collection monies, they pontificated and acted superior, preaching against everything they were themselves...just terrible people. I know they aren't all like that but when anyone starts wielding that sword of guilt & superstition...I get a bit hostile. Lets ask the Pope, for instance:“How dare you? How dare you wear those expensive clothes and strut around all over the globe as CEO of a tax free corporation that is the largest land-holder of the most expensive real estate in the world?" And then vomit out your spin on Jesus and humility...and the need for all of us to fall to our knees with overwhelming guilt for breathing air? What's the inevitable solution? (drum roll ) yes, it's to give you money!!! I don't think so. In case you haven't noticed, a lot of things in our society are changing quickly, very quickly, it's all thanks to the electronic highway we ride these days. It so greatly accelerates the evolution. You can no longer hide so comfortably in that fungal damp of your complicit shadows anymore...your medieval days, and ways, are numbered.

Born Again

It's said that you can never go back again, but you can. Some say they wish they knew then what they know now, and it can be so. Dawn brings a chance to live again with all the knowledge and experience that you picked up along the way. Perhaps it is the moment of creation, perhaps we've never actually seen our friends and families at all. God snapped his fingers and brought us into being, programed with all of our memories that seem so real. Don't question it too much, just run with it, celebrate it....this sensuous life where oysters scent the moist air sweeping off the marsh and the touch of your lover is so much more than just that.

Eric's Throne

Back in the daze, Eric had the best overstuffed chair on the planet. A massive cupped hand of cushions and frame that sucked you in and handed you an invitation to stay a week or two. It magnified gravity and pulled your ass back down if you even thought about getting up. It sang a sirens song enticing anyone close to give in, give up, and just relax for a very... long... time. That Goodwill gem, the envy of his peeps, made the other dorm rooms seem cold and uninviting by comparison. Of course it also fueled a search for copycat luxury. With an imposing footprint and demanding nothing less than center stage, other furniture in Eric's room blended into an innocuous background. As for Eric, Eric looked like a king on his throne... or, in his throne actually. His king's gold, mostly Acapulco, was hidden deep around the cushions. Eric could reach down and pull out smoke, papers, matches, maybe an ashtray or two, all the necessities to entertain himself and others. I imagined that he had an unlimited cache of survival supplies stuffed down within arm's reach...food, drink, money, books... Very likely there was a bit of magic at play that allowed him to actually pull out anything he wished for. He sat in a magician’s top hat in the form of a huge overstuffed chair.

We came to him, gathering in his room for music, talk and play. A motley crew of Northern interlopers in a little Southern town. A group of misfits trapped aboard a ship sitting stagnant in hostile waters. But Eric's room was a place of comfort, a refuge for friends, ideas, and music. At those times, all was good with the world as Eric held court from his magic chair, his home away from home.

Smoke

He came to us as “Rufus”, a little black rescue dog with a dopey name that really doesn’t conjure any positive images. It's like calling him “Gomer”. He's a total mutt but why hobble him at such a young age? 

Rufus stops and crouches, staring at me with skeptical wolf eyes fired by the very few genes that he has left from those ancient ancestors. I want to rename him something more noble: “Smoke”... that has a certain dark mystery about it. It also honors my friend of the same name, who has a big head. Rufus has a big head too. Well I guess it's really not so big in relation to his body but more...muscular looking. Now my friend Glenn really does have a big head, any way you look at it. Maybe he could say that it houses more brain material than the average cranium and suggest some kind of an intellectual edge. But size doesn't automatically dictate any special qualities one way or the other. I mean, in spandex shorts, I look like I may be smuggling a weasel. Something large, tubular, and very much alive. But I'm old, and it's just a hernia and a piece of prolapsed bowel so don't go getting all excited.

Maybe Glenn has a big head full of encephalitic fluid and simply needs a stent to reduce the swelling. I'm just guessing here.

But the sweetest sound to man or beast is the sound of their own name, so I'll give Rufus a more mysterious name, more worthy of respect... Smoke. I mean, Johnny sang of a “Boy named Sue”, a moniker that always plagued the guy he wrote about. We can do better than that, Rufus. 

You're welcome Smoke, you'll thank me one day, but I doubt my friend will.

Gator Country...

When we take the dogs out for a run around the lake behind our house, Sasha, the standard poodle with a brain the size of a walnut, always looks for this guy (the gator, not Dale). She loves to make him jump into the water. If it’s a hot day, she also expects to take a dip. There’s a place with no obstructions, very beach like with a clear view, where I let all four dogs swim. Several years ago when Sasha went in, I saw three gators leave the opposite bank and make a beeline for the poodle buffet.  All were less than four feet, but to prevent a coordinated attack, I made her get out of the pool. Two gators sulked at quite a distance, but one got close. Thinking that the gator was her beloved throwing stick, Sasha splashed back in to retrieve it. Closing the distance and trying to bite the now magically animated stick, I heard the young gator clearly yell to his buds: “Oh shit, this bitch is crazy!” and immediately take a dive. Sasha swam in circles looking for her stick and lunged when it surfaced a few feet away. I was growing hoarse, yelling for that dog to come to shore, when she dutifully came back in, not realizing that she was lucky to still have all four legs. But Sasha already had a history with that particular gator, loving to run at him when he would sun himself on the bank. He would always take a dive. I had been afraid that one day though, he may refuse to jump and think Sasha suddenly looked like a Big Mac. So I finally called Dale, the state gator guy, to do his manly trapping act. Dale sells the meat, and someone gets a belt and a great pair of shoes.

For Sasha, Dale and for me, it’s a win, win, win.

One down, two to go. 

The Name of God...

This is a good one. It makes sense. When Bill Moyers interviewed Joseph Campbell on “The Power of Myth”, Campbell compared religion to being in a club (Campbell himself was a Catholic). He pointed out that there was great value for many in joining the club and believing in the club experience, and possibly having an epiphany by doing so. You need to try to believe in your club, be it Catholic or Baptist, Moose or Mason. Campbell pointed out that there are many roads to the same place. We get into trouble when people leave no room for differences of opinion and insist that their club is the only way, not just for themselves, but for everyone else as well. Humans fight endless wars over the name of God or for the individual right to not give god any name at all...

Memory Snapshots

Memories flow from these images, as rich and full of life as the waters rushing under that bridge. They fill me up as they do that chest, more real than the physical things that spawn them.

An image of the iconic Bridge of Lions hangs over the chest that my Grandfather made for Grandma Maverick to mark their wedding anniversary. I spent the summer of 1972 in the woods at their place in Charlottesville when he was working in his shop on this surprise for his love of more than 50 years. Watching him use his router to rough out the patterns on the mahogany panels, the smell of charring wood reminded me of a wood-burning set I had gotten for Christmas back when I was in Boy Scouts and had my own projects to fret over. Often I would ask: “What are you carving? What is that going to be?” With mock disgust he would fire back: “It's my casket, dammit! I'm going to be buried in it!”

Then one hot August day when Grandma drove her yellow Nash Rambler station wagon into town to buy groceries at the Safeway store, Grandpa said: “Take a picture of me in my casket.” Morbid, I know, but he insisted that we get the shot before Grandma could pull back up the long driveway and nix the whole idea. Dutifully I helped Grandpa carry the chest out of the shop and onto the sunny path leading up to the main house. When he climbed into “his casket” and sat up all erect and picture perfect under his straw fedora, I snapped away. One of those prints is barely visible here attached to the top right hand side of the lid. I love that box, so full of memories, even when it appears to be empty.

Now the Bridge of Lions connects me to another flood of mental snapshots, happy times from when we lived on Anastasia Island and walked or rode our bikes up and over that bridge and back down again into the center of the old city. Carla, Ruth, Hannah and me peddling single file up the narrow sidewalk, often stopping at the top where the drawbridge teeth clenched tightly like a giant steel mouth, grinning and ready to open wide again very soon..

 We paused at that half-way point to fill our lungs with fresh salt air, spitting over the side rail to watch a little piece of ourselves hit and swirl in that unstoppable tidal flood only forty feet below. Conspiratorial smiles among us at the certainty of rapid acceleration and downhill breezes, we launched into winds that would blow us straight into the heart of downtown for a a family play-date. Memories branded onto our own hearts, now unleashed by these fertile images, each one spawning innumerable invitations to once again revel and play.

"Hemmingway's Whisky"

Standing in the kitchen making an unhurried lunch, listening to a Guy Clark tribute... various artists weighing in with their take on wonderfully written songs. Inserted into lulls and spaces I'm caught by the wind chimes singing clear tones out on the newly painted deck. Sunny winds heavy with the scent of Jasmine circle and play in the yard. Grouper that liked the look of a fisherman's treat earlier this morning now blackened and laid out in a casket of crusty bread still warm from the oven. Dressed up with a white coat of capers, diced pickled okra and a squeeze of lemon mixed with just enough real mayo to bind it all together. A side of new white corn scraped from the cob, microwaved to retain the natural sugars. Real butter, ground pepper. Cold light beers with lime, maybe a shot or two of vodka from the freezer. Out on the lake, Anhingas look like cartoon snakes swimming in electrified waters,  bodies submerged, long necks writhing up from the flat surface. An osprey launched from the leaning pine behind us, circles and calls before it stalls to get a better look at its own fish dinner swimming below. Squirrels run rings around the three big oaks as my dogs study them, all doing their best Moe, Larry & Curly, frantically chasing from tree to tree. Now demanding my attention,  Kristofferson sings Clark's , “Hemmingway's Whiskey”, his worn rasp of a voice carries through the open door to the deck and grabs me...insisting that I really listen.

Here's a letter to the folks from 20 years back. Ruth was 9, Hannah was 4 when a carnival came to town...

Dear Folks,

Sorry you couldn't be here to go to the carnival with us. Carla had to work so it was my responsibility as a caring Dad to take the kids by myself. For two nights before our visit, I let them do dishes and housecleaning chores to earn the money they would need to buy stuff. I lectured them on the concept of “work for pay”. They already knew about “pay for cotton candy” but at issue was whose pay...

My office partner, Jon, had said that Wednesday was the last day that the carnival would be in town so even though it was wet and cold, we went. Once we got there, once the commitment was made, we found out that the carnival would stay through what was expected to be a warm, balmy weekend.

Anyway, the first thing the kids pulled me to was the center of attraction. There stood a ride featuring two six-person cockpits at opposite ends of a 100 foot propeller. You can guess how much fun humans can have when they're locked in and the fan is turned on. The teenage operator, all self-inflicted tattoos and cigarettes, demonstrated his professional skills by stopping the fan blade so that one car hung upside down 100 feet in the air. Staring at the girls whose dresses had flipped up (down) over their heads, he was rewarded for his cleverness by the small change that rained down from inverted pockets and purses. With his body twitching as he stumbled around picking up the change, his eyes seemed to rotate in their sockets like the big fan itself. Apparently there was an ongoing power struggle in his body as drugs and alcohol each fought for dominance. I thought it best to let Ruth and Hannah pass on that particular ride.

The “Kiddie Kars” were just OK; baby cars that circle endlessly on steel rails. The working horns made Hannah smile for the first few revolutions, waving, honking, waving...but by pass number 52, Hannah was nodding only slightly less than the ride operator himself.

As we walked around taking in the sights, I realized that the crowd was not local. Apparently we had managed to slip in on a night set aside for a group bussed in from a halfway house work release program. Examples of the down side of a severely limited gene pool were everywhere. Plus, it seemed that many of the crowd had been in serious accidents at some point in their lives and had never received proper medical care. A fault line ran through a face here, a chest there...accentuating mismatched parts like a zipper out of alignment. And much like the professionals who ran the concessions, the people in the crowd apparently all went to one guy's Uncle Bubba to have tattoos scratched into their skin. Bubba's trade is in hogs and cars but he'll do tattoos if you bring the Jack Daniels.

Having not eaten all day, I stopped at a little wooden trailer made to look like an “Old Florida” fish camp shack. They advertized conch and crab fritters. Two large black ladies toured the carnival circuit in this grease van, living for opportunities to demonstrate their undying loyalty to the teachings of Malcolm X. I thought: “Oh good! Here are some large black ladies who know how to cook a great seafood fritter, even if it is a little pricy.” They thought: “Oh good! Here's a milk toast white boy stupid enough to pay $4.00 for a fritter. We'll break out the rotting batter we haul from site to site, throw a scoop into lard hot enough to kill the maggots and serve it up with some rancid tarter sauce!” Fortunately I didn't give the kids any so I was the only one who got the explosive diarrhea. Ruth and Hannah spent their food money on the $2.00 cotton candy... four cents worth of spun sugar. No wonder the vendor was wearing a huge diamond pinkie ring.

By this time Hannah was grabbing her crotch constantly so we headed off to find a porta-potty. One look inside made me tell Hannah that we would leave after the next ride and stop at a gas station for her on the way home. But Ruth just had to peek inside one of those hot, stinking closets from hell. She was wearing sandals with socks that wicked up the black goo seeping out from under the base of the toilets so her feet became encased in carnival souvenirs that she would have preferred not to have to take home.

From there we sloshed over to “The Spider”, our last ride of the night. This beast consisted of eight cars on arms linked to a central hub. The hub spun around as the arms lifted the cars up and down. Then the cars spun and looped in erratic circles independently. My friend Jon said that his little girl loved it. We had to try it he said. “save it for last, it's the best” he said. So all three of us got into one car and braced for launch. Thirty seconds into the ride, Hannah was screaming in true terror. Ruth was swooning, turning green, threatening to faint and vomit at the same time. I was wondering just what had been in that damn fritter anyway, afraid we were going to see it again, very soon. I braced myself waiting for our car to break free in mid spin and fly into the carnival trucks parked nearby. I tucked my head and hoped that the car itself would absorb most of the impact. Several lifetimes later the Spider slowed and stopped. We declined the generous offer to ride a second time at half price.

Walking back to our car, dazed and shaken, I looked up at the top platform of the “Giant Slide”. A toothless, alcoholic, professional “Giant Slide” operator was carefully laying down a burlap bag for someone's 3 year old to ride down on. He took great care to prepare the bag just so. He was very gentle with the child too. But the platform was high and crowded and he was unaware that his large butt was squashing little kids up against the fragile railing behind him. I fumbled for my car keys as one child was pushed backward against the railing, arms extended, flapping and circling in a desperate attempt to maintain his balance 150 feet up on that platform.

I hope the kid made it.

As I said, sorry you couldn't be here to share the fun...or the fritters.

Love,

Hugh

Snapshots...

It's been more than ten years since Ruth brought Kira home, telling us that we needed to keep her for two weeks while her owner was surfing in Costa Rica. It turned out that Ruth actually paid a friend a few bucks for her pick of the litter of Rottweiler mix pups that he was parading around and of course, she has been with us since that day. Now that she's getting old and prematurely arthritic, I just hate to see her go downhill. Kira has been the easiest dog to have around that we've ever had; she always does as she is told. “Go get the paper girl” “Lie down here, I'll be right back” whatever. She understands everything. Never in need of a leash, I could walk with her down a crowded St George Street at the peak of tourist season...she only has eyes for me. She couldn't care less about other dogs or people and stays close to my legs. If I go into a store, she sits by the door until I come out. If she is in the convertible with the top down and I tell her to stay there while I go run around, that's where she'll be when I get back. She has never shown much interest in our other dogs and sleeps in her own spot away from the others at home. I believe she thinks dogs are unnecessarily loud and crude. But if she is upset by thunder or finds herself in the waiting room of the Vet's office, she gets close to me, seeking comfort. Now we're told that the bones in her right paw are fused from her severe arthritis, and she only limps outside when she has to. It's upsetting to think that only a few months ago she would walk happily around the lake with us and now she can barely walk to the back gate. I hate this. Putting down a special dog that had been my daughter's best friend and protector years ago changed me. It was the hardest thing I've ever done and I simply won't do it again. When the time comes, someone else needs to take my best friend to her last vet appointment while I go into the back yard and cry uncontrollably, some may think unreasonably. Fortunately, today is not that day. Right now Kira and I head outside to sit in the new grass and let the intense morning sun warm us to our core. She leans up against me, as I do her, both of us blissful in the moment.

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The heat of the intense sunshine was cut yesterday afternoon by small breezes rushing gently from all directions. A perfect day for the annual St Ambrose Church fair. It's a beautiful spot with huge mature oaks heavily draped in Spanish Moss. But the rib man didn't show up for me this year and the “famous” chowder made Carla wish she had a bowl of mine instead. These two ladies enjoyed it though and insisted that I mention that they are descended from the Minorcans who came into the area in the late 1700's. The lady on the right started to pose when I asked permission to take the picture. She wanted to take off her sunglasses and put her purse and plastic bag behind her and arrange her feet in odd angles only seen in the modeling 101 handbook. I asked her not to and told her that she was beautiful...just...like...this.

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I asked Ruth if she had brought any clothes that would be good for hiking in the woods...the best she could muster was leopard print tights and kid-skin boots from somewhere in Beverly Hills...oh, and all the proper accessories of course. We walked along while she spoke to her iPhone. Turns out Siri had no idea where the hell we were either.

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Spotted on a trail in the woods while out walking the dogs with Ruth. Hunters left the hide, head, and feet. The dogs thought they had found the buffet from heaven until I had to be a spoil-sport and make them get back into the SUV to go home.
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Our house sat in a low field that didn't drain well, surrounded by mature woods which had never been logged. The cabin was built in 1729, the main house in 1856. Nothing worked as it should. Pipes that had been added as an afterthought froze in the winter and the newly installed dishwasher drained out through a rubber hose that snaked across the floor, exiting the kitchen wall allowing waste to flow directly into the side yard. It formed a toxic pool of mud and dishwasher excrement that Hannah would play in when she was just a baby. Perhaps that explains a few things about her. I worked on “K” Street in downtown D.C. and had to be all squeaky clean to properly help lead the troops. Coming home after a typically long day in the city, I would pull off the dirt road into the clearing that encircled our house. Ending a 1-2 hour commute, it was like pulling into camp Waywayyonda. I could step away from the car and pee in any direction, just listening to the sounds of the cicadas, the pings of the car engine as it started to cool, and the urgency of the last couple of beers for the road as they hit the ground, as free of their sterile containers as I was myself.

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She called me Lamb chop, sweetie pie, and loved me unconditionally. Not an easy thing to do, I'm full of warts. She wasn't perfect, I don't know who is, but she was my mom. No one ever did or ever will love me like she did. Unconditionally, unreasonably,,,and ready to go to the mat for me without hesitation ...she's gone now but I still feel it, it still comforts me. Thanks Mom.
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Although the tree canopy hid direct view of the jogger on the other side of the lake, her reflection rippled and flashed with the late sun as she ran upside down along the top of the bottom of that very same canopy. Sasha lay watching, wet from her swim, enjoying her ability to control the area under the three oaks where the bird feeder hangs. That, of course, is the squirrel zone. She can relax when she's right there. Otherwise those little bastards will run all over the yard and act like they own the place.
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Unrequited love...it's a tough life lesson for a little black teenager of a foster dog to understand that I don't want him 24/7 with the same intense fervor that fuels his own overactive engines. I mean I love him and all but I don't want to French kiss and hump very much. (OK, maybe just a little.)
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We're very proud of our two daughters & who they are as people in this world. Caring, bright, inquisitive girls who laugh easily and truly appreciate a great meal in much the same way they love life itself. Oh, and it doesn't hurt to be beautiful on the outside as well.
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So what’s the lesson here? Well if you weigh 25 pounds and value your left ear perhaps you shouldn’t try to steal the dinner from your doggie housemate who weighs 115 pounds.
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Teacup Monkeys

Saturday was freedom day, payday, a reward for putting up with five consecutive days in school. It was my vacation day before spending all morning in church on Sunday.

Slamming down the receiver on our old black telephone, (Number Please? Ours was Westfield 2-2986J) as Donny Ferguson did the same thing in his house across the street... and with my one dollar allowance burning hot in the pocket of my corduroy pants, I ran out the back door. Letting the screen door slam hard behind me, I made a bee-line to the garage. It's wooden doors on the left stood open, a little drunk, but welcoming. The top hinge on the door was broken apart so the it leaned outward like a after hours bar evacuee holding onto a no parking sign.. Gripping my bike in a run, I jumped on like Roy onto Trigger. Peddling my feet into a blur, flying down my driveway, hair in the wind, I rode on a high of excitement and expectation.

Going way too fast to worry about cars when we hit the street, Donny Ferguson shot out of his opposing driveway at the exact same time as I did. Mirror images, peddling in tandem, leaning into a sharp arch, forming parallel lines down the center of Alden Avenue. A speeding frenzy of bony elbows over knees pumping speed into fat tires that sang a low humming duet with the hot asphalt. Each of us had a dollar in our pocket,  eager for familiar treasures at the Mountainside news stand. They had a huge assortment of candy bars, offered for consideration, neatly arranged on a tiered shelf just inside the front door. The whole display started at kid level and went up from there. Donny and I would stand pressed up against the base of the display, immersed in a sea of candy, all bright packaging and sweet smells. Weighing the possibilities... a “Hollywood” bar was big and heavy...but just OK, whereas a “Heath Bar” was small, but that toffee was full of almonds and hard to beat. We had ten chances to pick a perfect team. Candy was five cents, so 10 candy bars were half a dollar, that left enough for 5 of the ten cent comic books. Riding off like bank robbers on horseback, as quickly as we had swooped in, bounty in hand, we raced toward home, eager to get back to the hideout. Hidden safely on Donny's screen porch, ready to examine our loot.

We spent most Saturday afternoons on his screen porch immersed in Superman adventures pumped up on a sugar high.

Later in the afternoon, surrounded by empty candy wrappers and comforted by the fact that, as always, Superman was just...super, my attention turned to the ad on the inside back page of the comic book in hand.

That's where Cloverine Brand Salve had their full-page display ad. It stated that if you were 12 years old, the Cloverine Brand Salve Company would pay you in prizes or money to sell their product. Neither of us were 12 yet but all we had to do was to say that we were.  No problem. The ad said, “Kids! Get rich selling Cloverine Salve!” .I didn't really know just what Cloverine Brand Salve was or what it was used for, but their ads captivated me. They knew their market and offered young kids like me an opportunity to earn stuff if you sold their salve. They would pay kids a commission on sales or you could choose from a graduated list of prizes. The prizes included, Daisy air rifles, Radio Flier wagons, and even bicycles. But the big prize looked out at me from the inside of a teacup...take your choice of a real live dog... or a monkey. Both were small enough to fit inside that teacup and they both looked happy to pose. I just had to have that monkey, so I sent a letter to The Wilson Chemical Company, and ordered my first case of salve.

A heavy brown box arrived several weeks later, addressed to Moi. That was pretty special in itself. It made me feel powerful, like a real businessman, I was amazed that at my age I was able to write to these people and have them actually send me a case of salve just because I asked them to. The brown cardboard box had real weight to it, it was substantial. Proud of myself for making it happen and goiing into my own business, I felt a like a grown-up. Tearing open the top flaps of the box, I exposed neat rows, round tins of Cloverine Brand Salve. The label listed the ingredients as petroleum jelly, white wax, and oil of turpentine. It said: “Apply liberally when desired”. I had no clue what you would apply it liberally to though.

I hadn't thought of that. What's the stuff good for and is anyone going to buy it? So I asked around. One of the older boys in our very white, Presbyterian neighborhood, claimed that “colored people” use the salve to plaster their hair down. Now I didn't have any way of knowing if this was true or not but I was very aware that if it was, in my own neighborhood, there were no sales waiting for me behind door number, well my house was 530 Alden avenue so pick any number up to 20 higher or lower and you would pretty much have it covered. No go, in either direction as far as 7 minutes of continuous walking would take you. And so I caved. I wasn't going to make money selling Cloverine Brand Salve door to door after all. But I still had to pay the Wilson Chemical Company for all that salve...I wonder who would buy a WHOLE CASE? Who would be dumb enough or nice enough for that?

Mom! Mom! Are you here? I need to talk to you!

Yes, she bought it and had me carry it down to the basement while her own jury was out deciding just what to do with this particular case of salve.

So that was it. No monkey in a teacup for me, the dog and the monkey were in the list of top prizes that required the sales of lots of cases of salve, lots of them... But I did get to pick a prize, after all, I had sold an entire case of Cloverine Brand Salve and the Wilson Chemical Company was ready to express it's gratitude. They offered me a long list of lower tier special prizes to pick from. I don't really know why, but I picked a six foot velvet tapestry of Jesus at the Last Supper. It was shiny and looked like it was made to be displayed with a black light in a room full of incense but the popularity of that kind of thing was still a good ten to fifteen years in the future.

For two years, Jesus and his disciples adorned the wall of my bedroom , right next to my arrowhead collection and a “Visible Man” anatomical figure with it's clear plastic body and brightly colored internal organs...always facing Jesus and watching him eat his dinner.

I'd say I learned a lesson there, but having approached several multi-level marketing "opportunities" with a similar naive enthusiasm as an adult, perhaps it's true that we are who we are from a young age and for some of us, hope springs eternal.

And stupidity. Hope and stupidity.

When my parents sold that old house in 1965, the new buyers got the bonus of a moldy cardboard box, covered with spider webs and rot-glued to the cement floor, in a dark corner under the basement stairs.

Maybe they had curly hair and could actually use the stuff.