The Jeffrey Report

The name Jeffrey seems to have some significance in my life. When I bring the name up with my wife, she has to ask for clarification. Well, there are three that I refer to in varying frequency.

Jeffrey Roberts was my very good friend until he wasn't. He was like the lid on a mason jar of fireflies. Once removed, the fireflies scattered into the night, leaving me holding the empty container. I feel bad for my part in things, but my wife won't let me blame myself. Still, I know that for my part, I behaved badly.

But how much belly aching can I do? I hate losing friends, but sometimes it's a natural part of growing up. I was touched by a quote from Ernest Hemingway ala Tobias Wolff (which means Hemingway didn't actually say this):

Don't talk about your writing. If you talk about your writing you will touch something you shouldn't touch and it will fall apart and you will have nothing. Get up at first light and work like hell. Let your wife sleep in, it'll pay off later. Watch your blood pressure. Read. Read James Joyce and Bill Faulkner and Isak Dinesen -- that beautiful writer. Read Scott Fitzgerald. Hold on to your friends. Write like hell and make enough money to go someplace else, some other country where the . . . Feds can't get at you.

He later repeats the most important advice he gave in that passage: Hold on to your friends. The impression I'm left with, is that towards the end of the man's life, he came to regret letting go when it was in his power to do otherwise. That really makes me think.

As for Jeff Starr, I recently wrote about a phone message he left me declaring that he had found the one. Then, a couple weeks later, that he had run into the wall that too easily erects to staunch the invasion of true feelings. But I found out recently that all systems are normally functioning once again. It seems that she was only testing him when she asked for the month moratorium on what Clinton referred to as sexual relations, and was testing too when she asked to see other people. I'm suspect, but then again, I'm not a well man.

Last but not least, Jeff found my "hit me buddy" post and responded in such a way as to preclude any doubt that it was truly him, by correctly identifying the censored expression "(insert bad word)smack" as his inspired creation "cocksmack." Not even my word processor knows what it means.

It was great to hear from you old buddy. I've decided to post some pictures of myself and my family on Flickr. I'll post a link here in a couple of days. Some of my long time blog buddies will finally see the man behind the mask. This will discredit once and for all the rumors circulating the blogosphere that I moonlight as a Chippendale's dancer. For all my old college buddies, brace yourselves. I'm not a kid anymore.

Blue Jay

Out of the clear blue, an old friend called me up to say he was coming to Boston this weekend. I've written about him in the past. He was one of my beautiful friends, beside which I was nearly invisible at nightclubs and on our co-ed dormitory floor. Now he is engaged, and was here to visit with her family.

My wife doesn't like Jay, because he did this once before when we lived in San Francisco, but never showed. My wife wanted me to go with her to visit her Grandfather, who died soon after the visit. I stayed home and waited for Jay instead. She doesn't like him for other reasons. If you read about him, you will most likely understand.

It's like I told her before going out to see him, and several times after. My past is important to me. And what is harder to explain, is that despite all his faults--his ego, his selfishness, his need to be the alpha dog in our relationship--he was my friend. I could never sell that to my wife, and I understand how she sees it. I suppose any self-respecting person would see it her way too. But you had to be there.

You had to see what I was.

His fiance was just what I expected, and nothing like I expected at all. I expected her to be beautiful, and she was. But she was sweet, and quite moved when I told the story of how I met my wife. When we parted, she hugged me and said I was the highlight of her trip to Boston.

In many ways, Jay has found his opposite.

Jay looked the same, and nothing like he did before. I had a hard time seeing the young man that the ladies all swooned for. He still had his hair, but it was slightly disheveled. The old Jay was quite sharp and overly conscious of his appearance. He seemed slightly stooped with age, and his face, once smooth and perfect, was wrinkled and sagging just a bit.

He thinks I still look young. I thought he was just being nice, but when I look at my face in the mirror, in contrast to what he sees when he looks in his, maybe I can understand what he means. I'm not young anymore; nor do I look it. But I have aged gracefully. I'm not a sad reflection of what I used to be, though when I do see my old photos, I wonder why I had such a problem with my looks.

It was maturity that kept me from realizing any early potential. Jay helped me work through some of my issues. He wasn't perfect himself by any stretch, but he once told me, when I was on the verge of socking him in the eye, to stop being like my father. You're a better man than he is.

I reminded him that he told me that. His fiance kissed him when she heard this, and told me with no small amount of pride, that the people he manages at work would kill for him.

Love is but a dung hill

Thanks for dropping in on me while I've been away. Yes, I am working daily on my novel. It's a lot of work, but I am making steady progress. How long did it take the river to carve out the Grand Canyon?

As for my friend Jeff...

Sadly, I think it is not working out with his new love. I am reminded of an old relationship I had. I'll update later with links, but she was hardly worth the trouble when it was all said and done. She had me turned around backwards and inside out. I was so busy playing defense that I never had the time to wonder if she was really right for me. Towards the end, in an effort to let me down easy, she asked for a thirty day break, to see if she actually missed me when it was over. I was such a schlep that I went along with it, and it was her that couldn't take it after a week and a half. And when I agreed to see her, it went right back to where it was before, only worse.

Jeff's new love is a Republican, and told him flatly that she could never marry a Democrat.

She neglected to tell some of her guy friends that she has a new boyfriend.

She asked for a thirty day cessation of sex.

Is that a magic number?

I'm sorry old buddy, but you have to walk away. If you want to leave the light on, go right ahead. But if she cared about you the way you care about her, her friends and her friend's friends would be sick and tired of hearing about you. Whatever you do, don't ever change who you are to please somebody else. If she can't take a difference of opinion, then that might explain why she is still single in her August years.

And as for a thirty day break, say that you'll see her thirty and raise her a lifetime.

Love Happens

My friend Jeff is the proverbial open book. Jeff is a simple man who gives his heart with every degree of intensity he has. His wife of several years died a couple years back of cancer, and he was left alone to raise his children. It took years for the cancer to take her, and so they lived in the dark terrible shadow of death, such that when it finally came, everyone had said their goodbyes, and the relief was palpable.

Love false-started for Jeff a few start months ago. The object of his affection didn't return his enthusiasm, much less his calls. He's in his forties now, like me, and the playing field is harsher than the NFL when it comes to viable shelf-life. I didn't have high hopes that he would meet someone nice.

Imagine if you will, a man with a soft kind voice, simple and honest. Think Opie Taylor all grown up. Jeff is like a puppy, in that you could kick him and he would keep coming back--all because he loves you. Surely, even in this jaded world, there is a woman who can appreciate what is not hard to get.

There is.

This is the message I found on my cell phone a couple weekends ago. Transcribed literally:

Hey Scott, this is Jeff.

Hey, I had an unbelievable weekend, it was epic. It was the best weekend... almost of my whole life. This gal is gorgeous--great personality, fun to be around.

Um... we hit it off big time, just sparks everywhere, had the best time in my life.

The water was pure calm out in the straights, it was just phenomenal. Anyway, um, you won't believe when I tell you this one, but this is the gal I'm gonna marry--absolutely.

Um, heck, she's... she's... you know, makes-really-good-money, and she's a great woman. So anyway, um, anyway that's where it's gonna be headin' here, because she's... she's just awesome.

I told her to go offline. I won't be here unless she's only with me only. And then she said, yeah, that's all I'm gonna do.

So anyway... I'll talk to you later.

Bye

But on the bright side

When I was a small boy, and I do mean small... I'd say I was about seven. Geez, about as old as my oldest son. The time of starting to remember. It was my first exposure to music, and my intense attachment to a song. More actually. You have to be an old bastard to remember, or you just like the golden oldies, but this is when I first heard Rhinestone Cowboy. My uncle, who really isn't my uncle because he was the brother of my then step-mother--the beater just in case you're wondering--is only a couple years older than me. He had long brown hair that a mop-head like myself could really appreciate. The kind of hair that fit right in with the upcoming seventies fad of feathering and blow drying. Think Shawn Cassidy. If you don't know who I'm talking about, then I'll say currently he is the creator of the series Invasion--may it rest in peace. But back in those days he was a famous singer for about one year, and the actor who played opposite Parker Stevenson in the Hardy Boys. If you don't know who Parker is, then I'll say he married Kirstie Alley. If you don't know who she is, then turn the page already, or look it up. I'm tired of typing about it.

Where was I?

Oh yeah. Anway, Mark, my uncle, had a record player. Don't make me explain what one of those is. Try Wikipedia. Anway, he had a stack of 45's. Amongst those was of course the Rhinestone Cowboy. Also War's Why Can't We Be Friends, Captain and Tennille's Love Will Keep Us Together, and a song that may have been called Run Joey Run, judging by how many times that phrase was repeated.

You can see that I have a pretty vivid memory of this time. I found out this weekend, at the wedding reception, that Mark also remembers this very well. At the mass preceding the ceremony, I saw a middle-aged man who looked vaguely familiar. Two pews ahead of me, he knelt facing forward, then turned to whisper to an elegant woman next to him, revealing his sharp profile. His once proud hair had thinned and eclipsed back, much like that of his brothers. But the eyes. I knew it was him.

Outside, I walked up to him to introduce myself, as I hadn't seen him since that day so long ago. Before I said anything, he reached out with his hand and said, "Scott! It's Mark."

"You didn't have to say Mark, I still recognize you. God, how long has it been?" even though I really knew.

His manner was slow and unsure. Meek. Beaten. This wasn't the guy I remembered. When we were kids, he was a head and a half taller than me. Now it was just the opposite. I resisted the urge to hug him like a son and tell him that everything is going to be ok. Then I felt a surge of rage at the unfairness of life, of divorce and frustrated expectation. This man before me would have been my friend.

He introduced me to his fiance, a divorcee like himself. Mark was married for around ten years, until one day his wife left him, taking their child with her. The sadness in his voice rattled me. "She surprised you by leaving?"

He could only nod. "But," he managed, "I finally won joint custody of my son."

I could go on and on. We reminisced about those old records, something I thought that only I would remember. Back then I looked up to him, and so I reasoned, why would he even recall? But he did. Who else beside myself have I underestimated in my life?

When I said my final goodbye, I offered my hospitality should he ever come to Boston, assuring him that we have the accommodations if he and his wife (and son!) want to visit sometime.

Sometimes I think my heart is too big. There are so many people I miss, so many that I don't even remember that I miss, people gone by and tucked away in a secret place. Perhaps one day it will become too painful. Even though it can hurt, those memories keep me alive and hopeful that life can be truly wonderful.

Message In A Bottle

Ok, now I'm totally convinced of it--the internet is another of my guardian angels, the central nervous system of God. When I first started this blog, almost a year ago to date, I was literally talking to myself. Back then I read instapundit everyday, a political blog that probably got 100K hits an hour. There was no way I was ever going to reach that kind of notoriety, and nor did I try. Actually, that isn't totally true. I launched another blog simultaneously to opine on my political observations, but that died after one post. Boooring! So I turned inward and talked about the thoughts that swam through my head from time to time. Old flames, exciting times, troubled times, funerals, road trips, fights, victories, defeats. I made a connection with a handful of readers--and so we swapped stories and encouraged each other to keep going.

Then came Jason's Two Lights contest, then Ann Maries, then my connection with Flood, a suggestion to submit my story to Deathlings, and bada-bing! I'm getting published. How divine.

Meanwhile, my old college stories are floating out there still, alone, like a message in a bottle. And like that stranded castaway who watches its pitifully small splash, I never thought it would ever actually reach the intended recipient. But this one did.

This morning, after snoozing the alarm three times, I stumbled out of bed, stepped into my flops, crept past the kids--skillfully avoiding the creaky floorboards--then snuck into the office to check my email before walking the dog. I was greeted by the following (edited slightly to remove personal information--and read the post if you really want to understand):

Scott,

I found the blog about Jason and his wonderful stage performances. He's my dad! I shared your blog with my dad and he couldn't believe it! He was amazed at how you captured the memory of those times so precisely. He also wanted me to pass along that he is very flattered that you found his performances so engaging. He spent a lot of time practicing his acts but more for fun than striving for perfection. But, to know today that all that made such an impression warms my dad's heart. Thanks so much for painting a picture of my dad when he was younger so that the both of us could relive the memories, me for the first time, and my dad for the hundredth!

(Chuck Berry's daughter!)

Where do I even begin! I wrote her back of course. This is just too exciting. To think I provided such a candid and flattering account of her father, and that they would actually find it. Can you even imagine how that must feel? I told her that I can't, but the reality is that I can imagine it, and imagine it well.

I've lamented in the past that the times I spent in school may as well have never happened, because nobody remembers. It was an entirely unique universe composed of all our personalities, one that will never be reconstructed or appreciated.

Washington State University, 1984.

A small part of it came back to life today.

Too Good, Too Bad

We all have a place on the sexual food chain. The rules are much like those that drive stock prices, based purely on speculation. A particular stock may look like an attractive buy until you look at such factors as price-to-earnings or return-on-investment. Timing is everything. For me personally, I prefer to be the majority stock holder of a privately held, well-managed enterprise.

The Microsoft of my college days at Washington State was Jennifer. Jennifer Lund. I'm using her real name so that one day she might, on a whim, do a self-search on Google and turn up this page, and from it learn what she may or may not have already known. I don't know where she is today, how she is doing, or who she married--and for that I am sorry, because she was my friend.

I met her through one of my first friends at the start of my freshman year. Willy, simply put, was a ladies man. His blonde hair was buzzed short except for a pinky-sized pony-tail extending from the nape of his neck and tied with a rubber band. He always wore faded Levis 501 jeans with holes at the knee caps, and if he had more than one pair I cannot say. His smile was warm and his voice deep, which no doubt served him well in his pursuit of theatre arts. Willy established himself as the player of the group when two blonde hotties wandered by our dorm room and he invited them in. I was too shy to say much, so I sat in a corner as Willy turned on some music and danced with one of them. He ran his hands over her shoulders, down her sides, then down and behind. She put both her arms over her head and let the music take her away. I was in awe, and Willy became my new hero.

"She's nothing," Willy said to me when I congratulated him for his new connection with the nameless blonde. "I've got my sights set on a goddess."

And so he introduced me to Jennifer. At first I thought they were a couple, which was understandable because Willy was convinced of it, but Jennifer apparently had no idea. She was light and breezy, and some would say incredibly insipid--but I never believed it. Girls like her that measure twelve on the Richter scale can take many paths in life, and some play down their intelligence in order to widen the field; because ironically, she was probably a lonely girl.

All because of guys like me.

Fortune smiled upon me when I found that we had Astronomy together. When she first saw me in that auditorium, she skipped over and took an adjoining seat, a position she took every day for our semester together. I kept a straight face, but my heart raced every time she did. My attitude towards her--like my life depended on it--was consistent: I could care less.

I was having lunch at the dining hall with a handful of my floor mates. Jennifer walked up to me and tapped me on the shoulder.

"Hi Scott!"

I turned around and saw her, and my stomach rumbled like the inside of a lotto machine, with numbered ping pong balls bouncing randomly around. God she was perfect. My face, however, remained inscrutable.

"Hey," I replied with taut lips.

"Can we get together to study for our Astronomy test tonight?"

"I have plans."

"Oh, ok." She backed up a few steps.

"Um…” She stopped and looked at me hopefully. "Maybe I can free up. I'll give you call later."

She brightened at that. "Ok, so maybe I'll see you!"

When she was gone, everybody stared at me in stunned silence. Brady, a Spicoli wannabe surfer dude from Hawaii, said, "Get me a napkin. I just came."

It was a weekend night. I didn't have a car, and neither did my friends, and we weren't old enough yet to go to the bars in Moscow. My roommate Guy and a few others were in our dorm room playing Dungeons and Dragons when we heard a knock at the door.

I pulled the door open, but when I saw it was Jennifer and her girl friend, I closed it so that I filled the opening.

"What are you doing here?" I asked her.

"We had some plans tonight but they fell through. So we were sitting around, feeling kind of bored, and then I thought 'Scott might be around tonight!' What are you up to?" She tried to look around me, but I shut the door tighter.

"Nothing much really."

"Can we come in?"

"Uh, now is not a good time. So thanks for coming by."

She looked disappointed as I shut the door.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Guy asked me.

"I don't want her to see me playing D&D!"

"So what? She had a friend with her too!"

"I know man. I'm sorry."

The sad truth of it was, she was too beautiful to be my friend, or anything else for that matter. She reminded me of my place in life, and I took out my frustration on her. Today I would have let her in the door and let her laugh at me if she was so inclined, and I would laugh along with her. I'm so much more at ease with myself now.

Steve, The RA on my floor that year, had a friend that had that certain look, that air of confidence that oozed from every pore. His friend was over for the weekend and asked me if I knew any girls I could introduce him to. Jennifer was definitely in his league.

"Do you know her number?" he asked me. And I did. He dialed her up as Steve and I stared at each other, not quite believing he had the guts to make the call.

"Hello is this Jennifer?" he said into the phone. "I've been told by a friend that you are the hottest girl on campus, and I'd really like to meet you."

He paused and looked at us with a bemused expression. "Who gave me your number? Do you know Steve Kern?"

Steve jumped out of his seat. "It was SCOTT! I had nothing to do with it!"

At that, I jumped up and got in Steve's face, "Hey, she doesn't even know you, so shut your f--- mouth."

"Ok, hold on." Steve's buddy handed him the phone. "Here, she wants to talk to you."

"Oh Jesus." Steve snatched the phone away from him. "Listen, I..." His mouth dropped open and his buddy fell onto the bed laughing. "You son of a bitch! That wasn't funny."

I looked between them, not comprehending.

Steve said, "Dial tone. He never called her."

Good Time Charlies

There was a time, call it a time between times, where the forces in my life had reached a neutral balance. Dad was still friends with the Ricks gang--George, Troy and Raimey. Clay was in his prime. My step-mother Polly was in a good mood as long as her pacifier, a cool can of Budweiser, was either in hand or sweating a white ring into the coffee table. Her nephew Fess and his honkytonk crowd of friends provided comic relief in the style of the old western--from friendly jesting to barroom brawls.

There was never a dull moment.

The gang grew like cotton candy floss to a swirling stem as we moved across the country from job to job. Dad and George were leaders, the bread-winners to whom contracts were given like handshakes. We swarmed like army ants over new construction sites and left new buildings in our wake.

We typically split the rent four to ten ways, and so had money to spare. Life was about two things: work and play. We ran from dusk till dawn, and then partied until the AM. Sometimes we had to be rolled up and thrown into the cab of the truck, but we always started the workday on time.

You may have recognized our type. Dirty baseball hats, mud-streaked faces and arms, ragged jeans, crimson necks and t-shirt tans. People stared at us at fancy restaurants until we caught them looking, and bad guys at taverns mumbled in the corner to their friends until we were gone.

The kind of people I am describing would cause me fits today--and while I was making the best of those days, biding my time until I could escape to a path of my own choosing, I have to admit to a few guilty pleasures. There was a code of conduct even amongst our scofflaw bunch. We could pick on each other, but nobody from the outside could do the same. If you stumbled into a bees nest, your buddies had your back. The humor was crude yet oddly liberating. There was nothing politically correct about those days. Skin color was irrelevant--as long as it was thick.

George was the devil of the bunch. A gang of Native Americans stared us down as we took our places at the stools and tables at a backwoods tavern. These people were known for their brutality to stray white people that came unwittingly alone into this wolves den. I had heard a few stories involving knives and pistols, and so had George.

We paid them no heed as we sloshed down the first round. The biggest of their bunch was giving us the evil eye, so George walked up to him and put his arm around his neck.

"Do I know you from somewhere buddy?" He asked him.

"Uh, no."

"You sure about that?"

"Yeah, I'm sure."

"Well you keep starin' at me. I was startin' to think we was old buddies or somethin'." George jerked him around and walked him around like his own personal Charley McCarthy. He brought him to the bar.

"Bartender," George said, "I'd like to buy my old buddy a beer. In fact, I'd like to buy one for all my new buddies too."

Soon we were playing pool and dice with our would-be aggressors, and having a good time. We left the bar and piled into the truck. Our new native friends were looking out the large plate glass window at us, and a few were at the door. George didn't get in with us, and pulled at his zipper and started taking a leak. Dad fired up the truck and pulled away, leaving George exposed to his audience within.

George got stage fright and sputtered to a halt; but through an extreme act of will--and a few false starts--managed to finish the job before pulling his shorts up over his snow-white cheeks. He gave the double bird as a farewell to the caterwauling crowd within the bar, jumped in back of the fish-tailing truck that sprayed gravel and dirt into the parking lot behind it.

Away From Anna

This is the conclusion of something I started here and here.

It had been a month, and I was sure I could handle seeing her again. It wasn't like anything really happened anyway--I reasoned with myself. Then why did I have a churning ball of sour butter in my stomach?

It was simple really. She spent the night at my place because she and Clay had had a fight. Being the good friend I was, I took her in--but I didn't call Clay to tell him she was ok. He would have come to get her, and I didn't want that, did I?

I drove her home in the morning on my way to work, and hadn't seen her since. Standing outside her apartment now with my fist poised to knock, I froze in place. Like a sleepwalker who suddenly wakes, confused and wondering how the hell he got there, I backed up a few steps and sifted my fingers through my hair. Whatever I had planned at that point was irrelevant, because the door opened as if I had knocked. Anna stood in the opening smiling sweetly.

"Scotty, it's so good to see you."

I looked down despite my will to meet her gaze. "Uh, how are you Anna?"

"I'm good. Please come in."

She backed away from the door and I walked by. "Where's Clay?" I asked with barely concealed panic.

"Oh, he won't be back for a while," she said, "He is getting some boxes for the move."

"You're moving?!" I had no trouble looking at her now.

She smiled wanly. "We want to be near our family, and work here has almost dried up." Her gaze was intense, probing, expecting.

There was nothing I could say without saying what I wanted to say. I fumbled for the words, but all that came out was, "That's... uh..."

She smiled then, and I knew she understood.

"So," I said, "tell Clay I stopped by, ok?"

"Ok."

I started towards the door when, in a small voice like an innocent child, she said to my back, "Can I at least get a hug?"

I stopped and turned around. I saw her again as I saw her that night, wearing only panties and my t-shirt. Her voice echoed in my memory, tempting and darkly seductive, "I could sleep with you if I wanted, couldn't I?" Again I felt the shame of knowing she was right, and the simultaneous relief and agony that she didn't press me further.

As we hugged tightly, she whispered in my ear, "I love you Scotty."

We pulled apart and I said with all sincerity, "I love you too." I walked out of the room and into my car, away from Clay, away from Anna.

I haven't seen either since.

May God Forgive Me

My dad was always best when everything in his life had been taken or wiled away; his mind cleared of all distractions, crutches and possibilities, his friends strewn like ashes about the battlefield in his bloody wake, isolated like a castaway, alone and hopeless. A zen Buddhist atop a faraway peak, with only his god to consult with, seemingly from whom his divine inspirations came.

Only his faithful remained with him through these years, some out of blind loyalty to a proven but sporadic leader, others like wild dogs that follow the alpha male, ever wary of a weakness and a time to strike. Clay was one of the former, a simple man content to cash his paycheck on Friday, pay off his debts incurred the previous week only to re-indemnify himself against his next.

Dad complained about his work ethic, which had over the years declined in direct proportion to his use of cocaine, an interest that he and Anna shared. Dad gave him the floors to sheet on a university job, and it was typical to find Clay fast asleep on a stack of plywood. But when Clay's engine was warmed up, he could get the job done faster than most, and as such, Clay would sometimes work deep into the night to make up for lost time. Dad would have fired anybody else who behaved as such, but with Clay--well, everybody loved Clay, and everybody took care of him.

On our bottommost rung in life, dad finally had his epiphany; he sought and was granted a subcontract on an army base for vinyl siding. Suddenly our group was loaded for a cross country caravan from Washington to New York. Dad assembled the operation with frightening speed and hired everyone he knew, including two of my cousins and an uncle. He was so efficient with the siding contract that the general contractor granted him an additional framing contract, and hired more people, gave raises and promotions to his people, and suddenly we were a major outfit.

Then dad met his next wife, while the one he already had waited in Washington for his return. At the time dad had her brother and two nephews on his payroll, but dad didn't care. He installed me in the front office and put me in charge of the entire operation, and left to pursue his new love. I found out then how poorly managed the business really was, and how angry most of his employees were. I was under considerable strain with no power to change things.

But Anna worked in the office with me during those trying times, and we told stories and laughed while laboring over payroll and reports, getting paid and distributing pay. I don't remember what I said that prompted it, but she tenderly whisked a lock of my long hair from my eyes and told me, "You are so much love."

The business wasn't making enough money to sustain the payroll and the taxes, and I sought outside help. My dad was enraged and fired Anna while I was away, and the report came to me that she buried her head in her hands and ran out crying. I found her later and she tried to hold it in. "I used to be so happy to see your father," she said with big glossy eyes, and I hated my father for being so cruel.

Clay and I both went to work soon after for the Ricks boys, and Dad shut his operation down and got married as soon as his divorce was final. I got a small apartment with a girl friend in Watertown, but she was a friend-friend, that slept with most all my friends. If I was interested at first, her lifestyle quickly dissuaded me.

One night Anna showed up at my doorstep at one in the morning, severely drunk.

"Clay and I had a terrible fight, so I took a cab and came here. I hope you don't mind," she said with a pouty look.

"Of course Anna, come in."

She met my roommate Kathy in the living room, and started to tell her about how wonderful I was, and started giggling uncontrollably. She was as cute as she ever was that night; her personality was bubbly and her laughter was so contagious that Kathy and I were rolling on the floor.

Kathy went to bed and I gave Anna my bed and fixed myself a sleeping bag on the floor next to her. We both were yawning and the conversation got sleepy. She reached over the bed and put her hand on my back.

"Can I touch you?" She asked.

My body wanted one thing, but my mind couldn't stop thinking of Clay. How could I look at him if I did this? She took my silence as an affirmation and scratched my back, slowly and lightly raking back and forth, and from her finger tips electricity threw sparks across my skin and I shook uncontrollably.

"I could sleep with you if I wanted to, couldn't I?"

I felt like a lion, lying in the bush, poised to strike, on the edge of the abyss with just the heels of my feet for support, teetering and resigned to the plunge and my death that followed--all it would take was a little, tiny, insignificant nudge, as from the wake of butterfly wings. May God forgive me, I was helpless to stop it.

Hip Hip

Keith and Clay, Clay and Keith, I can't remember who got top billing. Both were cut from the mold of the original hippie, long scraggly blond hair, full bushy beards, bright tie-died shirts and jean cut-off shorts. The both worked for my father to build an apple warehouse in Leavenworth, Washington; the first time I saw them they pulled up in a Voltswagon bus painted in bright color patches and symbols of peace; the inside was billowing with white smoke, belching forth like whirling tops when they opened the doors, dancing to the rhythm of Jimmy Hendrix and his Purple Haze. With them, everything was "mellow" and "cool", and although they were stoners, they were efficient as soldiers on the job. They collected their paychecks and headed for the local bar, and no matter how hard they had partied the night before, they were at work on time and running full speed.

Clay followed dad around the country as an employee and a friend. He eventually cut his hair and trimmed the beard, revealing the face of a striking man. He had a charming smile, and always had a beautiful woman at his side, if not always the same one. He was like an uncle to me, but I loved him like a brother.

He and dad went separate ways when the work ran out, so Clay moved to Seattle and started a remodeling business. Eventually we needed to stay with Clay in order to get on our feet, and he put us up in his Seattle apartment. We spent our days gathering firewood and selling it by the chord, and were literally dependent on a sale each day to eat. We were sometimes reduced to buying the excess bacon fat from the local grocery store, and splitting what little meat it sizzled down to for dinner. This did not dissuade us however from going out on Friday night and blowing the money we had, at a bar tended by Clay's latest girlfriend, a Mexican hottie called Anna, who was the female shadow of Clay, ebullient and delightful. She and I were instant friends, and she loved to flirt with me.

I picked her up from her house to bring her to work where dad and Clay got a head start on the night. With her I could let my guard down and talk about my deepest feelings and dreams; with everyone else, I had to be tough in order to fit in with the "man" crowd. Feelings were for pussies and faggots. Arrrrrrr! Bartender, pour me some grog while I look for an ass to kick!

Anna leaned towards me in the car as I pulled to a stop in front of the bar. My breath caught in my throat. "Do you think I have," she whispered in my ear, "big ones?"

Gulp. "Uh, that's not really a matter of opinion now is it?" I said nervously. She giggled but seemed to move closer, or perhaps my telephoto eyes where on auto-zoom. "I think you should go inside and see Clay now, ok?"

Her eyes seemed to spark in triumph as she reached for the door handle. "See you inside Scotty," she sang, and out the door she went. I let out the breath I didn't realize I was holding.

Some Things Never Change

Juneau is an island; there is no escape by car. Tourists flock to the Mendenhall Glacier, that tremendous tongue of ice that protrudes from the mouth of a mountain and tastes the bay; a stark reminder of a day when it's like was the rule, and a foreboding of days to come. Ice pockets hundreds of feet deep puncture it's surface, the final stop for foolish hikers, who may someday be uncovered as physical evidence of an ancient civilization.

As a boy I longed to escape to the lower forty eight; I felt hemmed into a fold of snow, ice, rock, and trees, banished to a wilderness tamed by the machines of man, with only the Chinook Wind to warm me. When I graduated from high school my deliverance from island fever came in the form of an acceptance letter to WSU in Pullman, Washington. The state's colleges harbored many Alaskan refugees, so that it was not uncommon to see a familiar face in any Washington city.

Being from Alaska carries a burden. There is a tape recording in the mind of every man, a shared curiosity about the denizens of the nations biggest state, more sparsely populated than Lincoln, Nebraska. Is it always light? Did you live in a igloo? Do you know any Eskimos? Have you seen a polar bear? My answer is no, no, no and no. Not where I lived.

I never looked back once I got out, and suffered nary a regret for leaving. I left nothing behind, and really had no friends to speak of, save for a few. What friends I did have were doing the same as me in due time, going to out of state colleges and getting jobs abroad, such that all of us started new lives and hooked up on special occasions, but never together again in that remote ice hole.

I dreamed of going to my ten year high school reunion, to show everyone how much I had changed. I wasn't popular and still held onto a tendril of hope that I would impress my peers and show them how wrong they were about me.

I caught a flight in Seattle on Alaskan Airlines, and fortune placed me across the aisle from the high school jock, who happened to be sitting with the queen of the prom, and neither flashed me so much as a look of recognition. She sat on his lap and smothered his face with kisses, and he wore a look of smug entitlement. I kept my nose in a book and tried to ignore them.

The captain announced our descent into Juneau, and my ears were having trouble adjusting to the drop in elevation. I popped a stick of gum into my mouth and was rewarded a few chews later with cracks and whistling of escaping pressure in both ears. From my window I saw the most breathtaking scene that was the valley of my old home. The landscape was covered so thickly with verdant green pine as to resemble a lush carpet. The mountains were steeper than I remembered, framing the spectacular view of the Mendenhall Glacier that sparkled like blue polished diamond where it poured into the bay dotted with gigantic bobbing ice shards. My how my perception had changed since the time I had left. In California I thought Yosemite National Park was nature's brightest jewel, and yet here, a place where I spent my awkward teenage years, was a close rival.

Even the trailer park where I lived didn't seem so shabby as I pulled up to Ken's place, where he lived alone now after his parents were murdered after a fashion that I didn't inquire. Ken was a native Indian of Tlinket descent, who shared my interest in music, especially the young Elvis. We hadn't spoken since I left, and yet we fell together like the two last pieces of a puzzle.

We set up cans on his back fence and took turns shooting pellets with his wrist rocket, and as was the way between us, we kept score. I told him of my life since we parted, and let him know that I was a brand new man, that I had changed. I needed to be different now, because the boy who left years ago was not well liked. Or so I thought.

"You say you've changed," Ken told me, "but you don't seem any different to me at all."

I took aim and missed the can. "Shit!" I loaded another pellet into the leather pouch and pulled it back again, concentrated on the target and let it fly. "Bullseye!" I yelled it out and we both laughed. I realized in that moment, taking such pleasure in a childish pasttime, that he was right. But more importantly, I was happy about it.

The reunion itself was a continuation of the old cliques. Faces emerged from the fog of my memory; I was elated and saddened at once as one after another shook my hand with such enthusiasm, so glad to see me, looking for a sign of mutuality, but mostly I couldn't or could only vaguely recall who they were. I had a hard time with myself after that, knowing that I had wished for friends when they were all around me, unnoticed, unappreciated, that I was guilty of the one thing for which I despised in others.

Our prom king was getting married, and threw his bachelor party on that weekend, and the who's who of men from our class were all invited. The old pain, the jealousy, the envy, gripped my chest in a vise as I held my countenance high. I said hello to Dennis in a bar that night, the clown-king of the in-crowd, and monster linebacker on my football team, that occasionally stooped to say hello when nobody else was around. Ken pointed him out as we played a game of pool. I knew I should stay away, but Ken made such a show of pointing him out that I felt like I might say at least hello. He was pleasant enough, until one of his friends, nicknamed Hoss for obvious reasons, walked up and stared at me with no small amount of menace.

"Hey Hoss," I said stupidly.

He just stared back.

"Do you remember who I am?" I asked stupidly.

"NO!" He seemed to grow and inch. "SHOULD I?!"

I turned to Dennis and he just stared like I was a plague victim.

New Orleans

MagnetBabe over at Field Lines reminded me of a trip I took to New Orleans for a friend's wedding over fifteen years ago. Like San Francisco, New Orleans has it's own unique style, a particular flavor that sticks with you forever. I was sad to hear the news that it might be irreparably damaged by Hurricane Katrina, and am ever so relieved that she altered her course in time. Apologies to those who have been displaced, but New Orleans is a rare jewel.

The wedding was a week before Martis Gras, but some people had already arrived and were priming their pumps. It seemed that everyone was in a great mood. Danny and Val, the bride and groom, had many friends and family in attendance. Vals older brother Teddy was a prominent surgeon, and her family was wealthy and lived in a large mansion walking distance from the French Quarter. Val's cousin Tom was a fireman from the Florida Keys, who I met the night after he and his buddy watched Teddy perform open heart surgery from a glass enshrouded spectators booth.

"You should have seen it," he told me. "First he sawed his chest open..."

"Sawed," I exclaimed, "as in a circular saw?"

"Yeah, it was like a small version of what you would use to cut two by four."

I bunched up my face, "That's disgusting."

He laughed, "Yeah. It was cool."

He, myself and a few others formed a group and spent most of our time together. Our first night in the French Quarter, we drove around to see what it was all about. We were on a particularly dark street, where the poor wandered aimlessly like ghosts, eliciting that unconscious tap on the door lock, when we saw a skinny black man backing his way out of a bar, shooting a pistol back through the door.

"Holy shit!" Tom yelled. "Did you see that?"

"Welcome to New Orleans boys," I said.

Tom asked, "I wonder what kind of gun that was?"

"I think it was a Red Ryder BB gun with a Cumberland stock," I returned.

Tom was the only one that got it, and fell into a fit of laughter, repeating it to himself and shaking his head. I think that was the moment that we became friends.

Danny's best man couldn't make the wedding, so he asked me to stand in. I was honored even if I wasn't his first choice, but I was new to the wedding game, and soon realized that I had to give a speech. At the rehearsal dinner, his cousin stood and gave a warm toast, telling a great story about Dan that recounted of his very essence, the dreamer, the boy who would someday create a billion dollar empire.

I had only one story that I could think of about Dan, one that to me was just about the funniest thing that ever happened. Back then I was still learning that my background was at best racy, and didn't realize how different were my tastes, and that sometimes it's better to keep my mouth shut. I told the following story in front of a family of surgeons and Louisiana elites.

"Dan dropped me off at my trailer one night when we were teenagers, and told me that he was tired and was going home. I went inside and played a game of Space Invaders on my Atari, and had hardly cleared a level when a very large explosion rocked my trailer. I went outside and the entire end of the trailer across from mine was blown out, and out of that trailer door came Danny. Apparently he went straight there to visit another friend, where they played with gunpowder and matches near an open tank of propane..."

Shocked silence, faded smile, one bit wiser, and a moment to stamp: Return To Sender.

Like Hawaii, New Orleans has a magic, one that I will always associate with the people I met during Dan and Vals wedding, despite having to painfully dislodge my foot from my mouth. I was propositioned by two beautiful girls at the wedding, and later that evening by a voluptuous stripper/prostitute--but I thought I was just cool, and more importantly, so did Tom and the gang. I was only there for a couple nights, but it's memory will last a lifetime.

New Orleans. Live long and prosper.

Rockin' Robin

I met Robin in Houston on one of my family visits. I was living alone in my Lombard Street apartment, and dating whenever the opportunity arose. She wore too much makeup, as all Houstonian women do--to great effect I should add. In San Francisco and in cities and towns abroad, attention to one's personal appearance suffers from extreme modesty, or worse, unmitigated apathy. While I found Robin to be excessively adorned, I could appreciate the pride she took in her bearing.

She decided that she would pay me a visit, which struck me as a fortuitous development until she said, "But don't expect anything to happen between us."

I had been a sucker too many times in the past, and I wasn't looking forward to being one again. To one another, she had made it clear that we were the 'F' word. "Friends," said with a squinched, I-just-ate-a-lemon face. We had just finished discussing the details of the trip, and she cleverly waited to throw the F-bomb until the end, and I was trapped without a plausible way out.

The Queen of Sheba made good on her word and I dutifully picked her up at the airport.

"Oh Scotty, it's so good to see you!" She gave me a "friends" hug, with a couple of pats on the back. "You wouldn't believe the day I've had. The traffic was just awful on the way to the airport and I almost missed my flight. The flight attendants were just so rude! I asked to move my seat because the guy I was sitting next to smelled like sweaty armpits, and they wouldn't let me. I just can't stand a man who doesn't know how to use soap! And then my carry-ons. They wouldn't fit in the overhead bins so those aholes made me check them. This trip has just started out awful. And then..."

She yammered at me all the way to baggage claim and into the car, and my head started to ache like a needle in my brain.

"So," she said with a gasp. She had given coverage to every injustice she had suffered on her trip, so finally she changed the subject, "I have a lot to cover while I'm here. First the sleeping arrangements. I've decided that you don't have to give up your bed for me."

"Really? Gosh, thanks. You are truly one of God's nobler creatures."

She ignored my sarcasm. "So, I'll take the couch. Now I've got a lot of things to see while I'm here, so you'll have to take a few days off work. I'd like to do a wine tour in Napa one day, then take a trip to Lake Tahoe and do some skiing."

We had barely left the airport and I was already scheming to get rid of her. I had a couple friends that were walking hardons, and this little Filly would seem like a wet dream come true, long enough at least for me to get away.

I invited my friend Bob over, who never met a girl he didn't like. He took her out for a quick tour of the city, and was back within an hour. His face was exhausted and his eyes hollow as he preceded her through the door. He mouthed the word nightmare to me, then made a hasty exit.

"Bob, he was so much fun," she said to me. "Too bad he has to go home so quickly. I thought he was going to stay a while. Huh."

I had to switch to evil plan Z: Eric. He lived half way between me and Tahoe, and he loved pretty women, but had a much higher tolerance for bullshit. We drove out that night, and the two slept in the same bed together. He asked me first if it was ok, and I did my best to make it look like I was grappling with the concept. I heard her say as they went towards the room. "Now remember, two people can sleep together and be just friends."

"Of course," Eric said, but I knew he thought it was a game, one that he well knew how to play.

The next morning I pretended to be feeling sick, and asked Eric if he would take her on to Tahoe, which he gladly accepted. I said my teary farewell to Robin and peeled out of the parking lot before my luck ran out.

The were back at my apartment a few days later, and Eric had the same look on his face as Bobs. He tried get me to take her to the airport, but I was way ahead of him.

Dredge Lake

I've done some thinking about how I concluded yesterdays post. I said that I was looking forward to the day when my kids ask for the keys to the car. Coincidentally, this morning, Jackson, my five year old son, asked me if he could drive the next time we go out. So there you have it, be careful what you wish for.

I worry about Jackson, mostly because he is just like me, which frustrates the hell out of my wife Beth. We took him on an airplane when he was a baby, and he took an interest in the man sitting across the aisle from us. The man looked at Jackson for a split second and went back to his magazine, then looked again, letting his gaze linger longer. This repeated for a couple cycles until he and Jackson were locked in a stare, like two kids trying not to blink; finally, he looked at me with a mix of amusement and bewilderment, "That is unnerving. I've never seen a baby that doesn't look away."

Jackson has always been serious and a deep thinker, is easily distracted and quick to get bored; just like my father, just like myself. Projecting forward, assuming that Jackson has been handed the baton in the family relay, I am in for a wild ride. And such would be my due.

My dad may be many things--frightening by any normal standard of parenting--but he gave me self confidence in my ability to face danger by putting his faith in me; faith in my ability to handle myself with a gun, behind the wheel of a car, riding motorcycles up sheer inclines of bored out strip-mines and narrow mountain roads. When I turned sixteen, he let me drive his Chevy Blazer which I mistook for an all terrain vehicle, with the help of my friends Mike and Danny.

Dredge Lake was an outdoor recreation area where we would go sometimes to hang out. The area approaching the beach was like a sandy mogul field, under which was a hard foundation like kiln dried clay, yielding sufficient traction for driving. You had to stay away from the beach however, an important safety tip disregarded by Mike, who had jumped a dune and stuck the nose of his car in the sand like a harpoon, for which we had brought the blazer to retrieve. I had a full load that night: Mike, Dan, and the girls Heather and Paula.

We made quick work of unsticking Mike's car, which he parked farther up from the beach and crawled back into the passenger seat, not wanting to lose any stage time with the girls.

"Let's do some four wheeling!" he suggested.

I protested. "Man, didn't you already learn your lesson Mike?"

He ignored me. "Dan," he said, "don't you think we should see what this truck is made of?"

"Damn straight," said Dan, chosen from his short list of stock expressions as he spit Copenhagen into an empty Coke can, where occasional misfires had dried onto the lid and pull tab.

He turned to Heather and Paula, cocked an eyebrow like Steve Martin, the Love God, like a Sultan addressing his harem, "Girls, tell Scott he needs to open it up."

"C'mon Scooter," they implored, "don't be so boring."

Whatever restraint I normally would have shown, ahem, was laid asunder for this attack on my masculinity. My manhood was on the line! Don't you get it?! What's wrong with you people??!!

I hit the gas and meandered a bit, careful to avoid any bumps, but pressure from my passengers goaded me into a shark-like feeding frenzy. The tail of the Blazer threw rocks and sand in Tsunami proportions, and despite my initial misgivings, I was having an outrageously good time.

We spun to a stop and faced a dune that made a perfect ramp for a jump, and I revved the engine to the red line. Everyone screamed, "Go for it!" As we flew through the air, gravity taught me an important lesson: the front of the car is much heavier than the back. We hit the ground at a 45 degree angle with a bone jarring impact. The back window fell from it's track and disappeared into the hatch, and the battery detached and fell onto the engine fan, which bit into the battery's plastic shell and burned a groove, emitting an awful grinding sound like an electric saw until I killed the ignition.

"Oh shit," I cried out, "my dad is going to kill me!"

We couldn't fix the back window, but we managed to get the battery back into it's casing, but the groove on it's side was deep and obvious.

I drove everybody home, and nobody said a word. My face was devoid of color, and everyone knew I was walking the Green Mile.

"What do you mean the window just fell!" my father screamed at me, staring into my eyes, looking for the crack in my plaster, his nose sniffing for the distinct musk of fear. I wore my mask perfectly as he railed me from all directions. He didn't believe me of course, but that microscopic seed of doubt was in his eyes, which saved me from a severe beating that he was itching to deliver.

Then he found the groove on the battery.

Ah, such fond memories. As the expression goes, we reap what we sow, and my garden was well fertilized.

But what really saved me from my father in those self absorbed teen aged years was what I am sure was a connection, a recognition on my father's part of his younger self.

Note to self: brace yourself, and always remember who you were.

Plane Crazy

Sophie called me one evening while I was watching a movie in my small, one bedroom, San Francisco apartment on Lombard Street -- and yes, that is the curly one, but eight blocks west towards the Golden Gate Bridge.

"Scott, how would you like to go parachuting with me and Brian," she asked me sweetly in her sing-song French accent, diluted by years of residency in the states.

"I've always wanted to try it!" I exclaimed.

"I know," she replied, "now you have no choice but to go through with it."

"Ok, I'm in. I'll see if Eric wants to go to."

The four of us met at Yolo County Airport, a dusty airstrip in the middle of rural farm country, somewhere between San Francisco and Sacramento. Sophie and Eric were apparently good to go, feeling no pain and looking forward to the jump, while Sophie's husband Brian was turning pale. My anticipation was building too, so Brian and I tried to rally one another while our counterparts picked fun at us.

Our jump was to be from thirteen thousand feet, with an instructor secured to our backs with a tandem harness. We were separated into groups and told what to do, and assured that if our first chute didn't deploy, a backup would deploy automatically at 2000 feet.

We filed into the plane like army ants, and took our seats inside the cabin. I was the second to last in line, which made me the second jumper to go. Three guys sporting California tans sat by the open side door wearing nothing but shorts and chutes, and were chattering amongst themselves. They jumped out one after the other at eleven thousand feet, screaming like wild monkeys. I was reminded of Point Break and felt a surge of envy.

When we reached our elevation, the man in front of me, a mellow looking Mexican man, took his place at the edge of eternity, froze solid and refused to move. After some cajoling, he finally jumped. Then it was my turn.

After watching my predecessor's embarrassing display, I was determined to go without pause. I stepped to the edge and looked at the green and brown checkerboard below me, and nearly lost my nerve. The instructor was yelling something at me that I couldn't make out, but I bent me knees and leaned over the edge, only held up by the instructors resistance. He gave up on saying it, and grabbed my hair and yanked my head back, as I was taught to do before, and finally let us teeter overboard.

We twisted in the air to look up at the receding plane, already the size of a child's toy. We turned back towards the ground, and the rush of air was intense, like riding on a motorcycle with no helmet on a desert road at full throttle. I felt like Bruce Banner as he transforms into the Incredible Hulk; every inch of my body was electric.

The instructor grasped my wrist and pushed my arm down. We spun like a helicopter blade, and I had to close my mouth and tighten my stomach before it came out like a bad meal. It nearly did me in as I panicked to lift it back up, but he held down tight, the shock of which angered and shamed me to a degree, so I upped the ante and jerked my arm farther down, which spun us even faster. It felt like a hammer ride I once rode at a carnival, where the G forces were so intense that my face felt like it was clamped in a vise. It was his turn to panic, and he yanked furiously at my arm, but I didn't budge -- right away. I let up when my point was made.

He was none to happy with me when we hit the ground, but the adrenaline coursing through my veins dulled my ability to care. I unstrapped while I watched the three half naked guys shoving at one another.

"Don't hit me from behind like that man!" The one yelled. Apparently they had also watched Point Break and were reenacting some crazy scenes.

Brian landed next and was just as jacked as I was, and we hurriedly told each other of our experience, with the instructor still glaring at me nearby. Sophie and Eric landed soon after, and both were worse for the wear, looking like extras for The Night of the Living Dead.

"Jesus! Are you ok Sophie," I asked.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

A Load of Bull

My cousin Fess was a cowboy in every sense of the word, and even Conway Twitty -- may he rest in peace -- who lamented, "don't call him a cowboy until you've seen him ride," would have agreed. His bull riding buddies were a breed apart, sculpted from the rock of our eastern Washington canyons, living their lives from one rodeo to the next.

One of his friends, Crazy Joe, I met at an overnight campout before the Winthrop Rodeo, where, to quote David Allan Coe, "the bikers stare at cowboys, who are laughing at the hippies, who are praying they get out of here alive." The town was a juxtaposition of Harleys and pickup trucks, "Mom" tattoos and oversized belt buckles. Crazy Joe was the quintessential bull rider, full of bravado and afraid of no man. Around the camp fire, he told the story of how he managed to evade the long arm of the law.

"The cop tells me to put my hands on the hood of the car and starts pattin' me down, so I bashed my fuckin' face like three times until I'm black and blue and blood is gushing from mouth and nose."

"Holy shit," I was stunned.

"Yeah, and the cop is yellin' at me to stop, and I'm yellin' stop hurtin' me, and people was drivin' by starin' and all."

"So he let you go?"

"Had no fuckin' choice."

Fess, sitting with me, laughed, "That's why they call him Crazy Joe."

Another of his friends, John, was a short and squat bulldog of a man, whose anger spit fumes like sauna rocks. Nobody ever said an unkind word to his face and walked away with theirs as originally arranged. He was a zen buddhist of attitude adjustment, and I've seen him back off men twice his size.

I saw a drunk once in the stands of another rodeo, popping off at everyone that walked by, spoiling for a fight. After a half hour of not finding any takers, he wandered back to where the bull riders were preparing, and started his flap with John. He stumbled back out of the chutes holding onto his nose like that little boy with his thumb in the dike.

All of Fess' friends had similar stories. But for all their grit and steel, they were the best people to be around, full of fun and good times, and as welcoming and considerate as you would please.

At this particular rodeo, Fess had finally convinced me to give it a crack. He was pleased with the bull that I had drawn. When my turn came to ride, the bull was fairly sedate in the chute. Fess coached me on what to do. I put a glove on my left hand, which had some kind of resin on it for grip. The bull had a loop at the base of it's neck through which I could barely slip my hand, and I feared that it would never come back out. The bull was furious but still, it's heaving breath sounded like a steam engine. Fess raised his right arm and slugged the bull in the nose, and the bull roared and tried to crawl out of the chute and nearly smashed me flat into the ceiling.

"What the fuck are you doing Fess?!"

"Getting him angry! He's too calm, you'll never score any points if he doesn't try to throw you."

Several cowboys jumped up and ushered him back down into the chute, but I was nearly spent. What courage I had mustered was quickly failing me, but I got back on.

What happened next might as well have been a dream. I nodded my head, which was the ready signal, but from behind myself, like I was a spectator at my own execution. The bull shot out and I fell off, simple as that. Fess took a picture and my long lanky body was already half way to the ground. The bull kicked up his back legs and landed in front of my chest by a few inches, then was ran off by rodeo clowns. Aside from the dirt sandwhich, I was fine, and feeling quite satisfied that I had tried.

But in neglect of conventional wisdom, I did not try try again.

Ten Spot

"How many times do I have to tell you, empty your pockets when you throw your pants in the wash!" Beth plopped my wallet in front of me, or what was left of it. Every seam had come apart, and the plastic that shielded my license was separated and curling outward along the top edge, and the credit card slots looked like shrapnel wounds that healed without proper stitching.

"I just wore them last night, gimme a break," I countered, "You picked them off the floor this morning, so maybe you should have emptied the pockets." Ooops, that got me the look. I won't bother you with the end of that conversation, but once again I was left to wonder why I always think I can win an argument with my wife.

I removed the contents of my wallet onto the bathroom counter; my license and triple-a card, a debit and two credit cards, a laminated phone extension list from work -- more like an obituary of employees past, and a host of business cards from people I can't remember with bleached, runny blue, ink stained phone numbers on back.

Tucked in the deepest pocket, in a section that I never look in, was exactly half of a ten dollar bill. I laid it on the counter to dry. For a moment I considered hiding it from my wife, whose eyes came to rest upon it, but then I remembered I had told her about it before. She looked at me for an instant, and I waited for a jab for being such a sentimental fool, but she didn't comment. She left the room quietly and pulled the door shut behind her, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

I met Jeff in college; he was a teachers assistant in one of my core computer science classes. My first impression of him was that he was laid back and easy going, a good person to get to know. He would lounge in his seat one row up and six desks over, his left arm resting casually on top of the seat back, like a teenager typically does through and open window, driving on a sunny day.

By happy coincidence, I was reunited with him after college, while I was working at TelTech, a subcontractor at IBM East Fishkill that recruited me before I graduated. A close friend of his asked me to present his resume for employment, which I was all too glad to oblige, as my company paid a whopping referral fee of $1500. I only found out that I really knew him after he accepted a position.

TelTech basically harvested new graduates, paid them enough money to eat, pay rent and drive a used car, and managed to retain people for a couple years on average. The employees were mostly from SUNY schools, and were out for a good time. Happy hours and softball, house parties, jam sessions, women and song; real life was yet to come. For now it was all about the party.

Jeff and I were instant friends, and our group was getting larger by the day. Soon we rented a house on Crescent Ave, which was dubbed Crescent Manor. Barry was the owner of the newly opened Blueberry Hill, who introduced us to Sophie and Vanja, two au pairs that had recently come to our country, that basically had the same concept of living as we did. They brought around twenty of their new friends to our first party at Crescent Manor, and it was like that scene in Risky Business when the girls arrive. Every time the door shut the bell rang again, and suddenly, a bunch of computer nerds were entertaining girls from every corner of Europe.

All along, Jeff was the glue that held it all together. He was wonderfully quirky, had a temper that exploded like Yosemite Sam's, his sense of humor had a hard edge, and his laugh was contagious. For a friend, he would do anything; his personality drew us all together. I'll never be as happy as I was in those days. We were free spirits, only living for fun and frivolity, and we didn't have to leave the house for it.

But East Fishkill was a dead end town, and I decided that I had to leave. I had angered my IBM manager, who said some unkind words to my boss, who in turn informed me that advancement at TelTech was premature in my case.

The IBM manager, Larry, approached me in the hallway when I had announced my decision to move west.

"Listen, Scott, I'm real sorry about what happened."

"Don't worry Larry, no harm done."

His eyes were glossed over, his guilt palpable. "I'm not so sure."

It hit me then what he must of said. "Well, I needed an excuse to leave anyway."

He shook my hand, "If you ever need a favor, you can count on me." He made good on that. I was hired at IBM Mountain View without so much as an interview. But remember kids, don't ever show your manager a program that you haven't finished writing yet.

Something snapped in my relationship with Jeff when I told everyone I was leaving. We were never really friends again. He was codependent, and as bright and as great a person he was on his own, he was like a little boy that needed a male father figure to respect and dote on. Some will interpret this as he was gay, but I don't think so. He would eventually move out to California where we would be roommates, but he was bottled rage, and never forgave me for leaving New York. I tried to draw him out, but socially he was stunted. Where once he was willing to try out new people and places, he only wanted to stay home and get stoned. He bought a Harley Davidson Fat Boy and became the lone rider; he polished that bike like Lady Macbeth trying to wash out that imaginary bloodstain. Like so many that lose their hair, he let what was left grow long in back and pulled it into a pony tail. The Jeff that once gave me so much joy had become a crusty old curmudgeon, and it sickened me to look at him anymore. But still I tried, and tried, and tried.

I moved out and got an apartment in San Francisco. We tried to coexist a year or so later, but still the old resentment was there. I got him a job at a gem of a software company that had taught me everything in this business that I hold dear. He started to sabotage my relationships with my friends and my co-workers, until I had no choice but to leave the company and strike out on my own, and for that, I couldn't forgive him. His power to bring people together had a dark and terrible shadow, and it sucked the light from my life.

During this whole drawn out process that spanned ten or so years, everyone that knew me stopped talking to me about the situation that weighed so heavily on my mind. Our common friends didn't want to be in the middle, and eventually I had to remove myself completely, so that today, I am alone, so much worse than before I knew what having such good friends was about.

There is another side to this story, and his is probably quite compelling, and I could even give you the most of it. I was uncomfortable with his unerring attention to the smallest details of my life, and felt squeezed. So I lashed out at him many times. In any fight, there is cause and effect which feeds into the next, such that by the end it's impossible to trace back to the origin. I'm no angel, but I cared for his friendship. But where is that line? When do you say that enough is enough? Some will say never, but there is a line, there has to be, or else you will be abused for the rest of your life.

Jeff walked me to my car when I was packed for my move west. He gave me a state of the art radar detector to keep me out of trouble on the ride.

He pulled out his wallet took out a ten dollar bill, and ripped it in half, then handed me a piece. "The next time we get together, we'll put these back together and have a drink."

I took it without much thought and put it in my wallet. I was getting uncomfortable and it was time to go. He looked at me for a moment and his eyes darkened slightly, then whirled away and started for his car.

"Jeff, wait!"

He didn't stop, and got in his car and drove away with a screech.

Intercourse Discourse

"It seems like everybody has had sex but me," I told John G. We were standing on the second floor of our high school at the intersection of two hallways. Around us our fellow students toiled between classes, animated in their own discussions, solving the problems of our tiny world on the capital island of Alaska.

Like my mother, I have always tended to reveal too much too soon, and the effect on people is either disarming or alarming. John took a consipiratorial survey of our personal space, his eyes darted left, then right. Satisfied, he leaned closer and whispered, "I haven't either."

"No way!" I whispered back. "There is hope then." We both laughed. "I wouldn't dare tell Eric; he would have me for lunch. I'd never hear the end of it."

John grinned, that evil Chesire Cat grin that connects the ears.

"What?" I said, my mouth hung open because I forgot to close it. "You know something don't you?"

John nodded his head, but his eyes kept mine locked.

"Oh come on, don't make me beg!"

"Let's just say, that I've had this very same conversation with Eric last weekend."

"And he's a virgin?!"

John held out his hand and made a peace sign. "The big V."

"Oh man, this is unbelievable," I said too loudly, but we both had forgotten the world around us. Eric was a football star, and was in the top eschelon of guys in our school. The girls that John and I wouldn't dream of approaching were friends of Erics, so naturally we looked up to him. This development was nothing short of a miracle.

John had told me this for a reason. While it is true that we looked up to Eric, we were jealous too. Add to this that Eric was incredibly confident, arrogant even, and seemingly never made a mistake. To make it worse, Eric was intolerant of the mistakes of others, and because of his competitive nature, was always exploiting his chances to smear it in your face. Thus, when the rare opportunity presented itself for payback, it had to be cherished like a rare and expensive wine. John and I were smelling the cork.

"Ok, this is good. This is real good." I rubbed my hands together; he saw the wheels turning in my head and waited patiently. "Ok, I'll handle this. Don't tell him that I know."

John watched me skip away, probably feeling a warm glow, like a boy scout that just earned a merit badge.

My dad in those days was a house builder. Eric and I would always buy a "half-rack" of Miller and drive to whatever house dad was in the process of building, get suitably buzzed, then continue to wherever the action was happening that night. And yes, we were driving drunk, and yes, it was very irresponsible, and yes, we could have killed somone, and no, we didn't. The cops were different back then. They just expected you were driving drunk on friday and saturday night, because as Sam Kinison once said, there was no other way to get your car back to the bleeping house. Ironically, Sam was killed by a drunk driver -- but I digress.

Tonight we drank our beers in a rough framed house; the roof was shingled and the outside walls were covered in plywood; the windows, as yet uninstalled, leaned against their empty openings, allowing the night free reign. We sat on the second story floor that was lightly peppered with sawdust, which danced in tiny whorls from the cool night breeze that carried the sweet smell of new lumber.

"Eric, we never really talk about all the girls that we have been with, do we?"

He looked instantly uncomfortable. Steee-rrrike one! "Uhh, yeah."

"Well, do tell! You must have stories, and you are not one to miss an opportunity to brag."

He reminded me of Rodney Dangerfield, who always pulls on his collar like it is suddenly too tight. I had Eric on the ropes.

"Why don't you start," he dodged. "Who have you ever been with?"

"Heather," I said simply.

"When!?" Slap! "I didn't know about that, you never said."

"I'm not a bragging man Eric, I leave that to you. Actually, it was more than once; she couldn't get enough. Once she got a taste, well, you know what I mean."

He was squirming. "So, how about you then?"

"Just once." He was such a bad liar.

"Reeeeeealllly? With whom may I ask?"

"Just some girl I met last summer, you wouldn't know her."

"Juneau is a small town Eric, and I know a lot of people. " His head was starting to lilt. "Why don't you indulge me on this one, hmmm?"

"Oh, all right. I lied."

"What was that, I couldn't hear you?"

"I lied, I've never been with a girl before."

Strike two!

"I can't believe that you could just sit there and fill me with your lies Eric. I thought you were my friend!"

He shook his head helplessly, "I.. uhhh.."

I know that most people would let it end with that, maybe rub it in for a while, relish the victory for as long as possible. But to Eric, losing to a friend, losing to anybody, was the most unsavory morsel to chew. Like a comic bad guy, I wanted Super Eric to know that I got him.

"That's ok Eric, I lied about Heather."

"What the..." His shock was total. "You lied to me, I can't..."

Strike three, and you're out!

Eric

There is no one word that describes Eric. He is the most self-assured, intelligent, honorable and honest man I have ever known. In high school chemistry, I did a lab where a chemical was added to a milky white solution that broke apart the component molecules, forming a yellow sludge at the bottom, and a clear liquid on top. Eric has the same effect on any group of people he meets; he is either admired for his aforementioned qualities, or despised as an intellectual snob. For the latter Eric makes no apologies.

I met Eric when I was a senior in high school at a sophomore party. I didn't have senior friends, at least none that I wanted to be with. Something was missing from all my friendships, a sense of equality, brotherhood, and mutual respect. I was like the lonesome cowboy, always alone, even when surrounded by friends. The party was winding down, and the parents were out of town, so many were jockying for places to sleep. I was sitting on the couch, thinking about heading out when Eric approached me for the first time.

"Are you sleeping on that couch?" He asked with his trademark cocky swagger.

"No, I'm going home." I replied.

"Excellent," he said, "I won't have to wrestle you for the couch."

"Really," I replied with my mouth slightly opened, head cocked. "You're feeling pretty good about your chances, are you?"

"You never know," he said with false modesty that made me smile.

We didn't wrestle for the couch, which is probably a good thing because although I was strong enough, anybody with a basic understanding of the fundamentals could treat me like a crash test dummy.

Up to this point in life, my major influence came from a father whose reality suited the need. I lived in a trailer park with my third step mother in squalor, and could only look upon others that lived with their real parents in real houses with envy and yearning. Eric came from the world of my dreams, where my mother never left, and bore a mantle deserving of his station.

And for all this, Eric treated me like an equal when others would certainly look down. He saw the fights my parents had, how my dad treated me like the mentally challenged, the dilapidated, trashed out trailer I called home. He didn't feel sorry for me, but I think he understood the hill I had yet to climb. He had no mercy when my fathers' words came through me, never laughed at a joke that wasn't funny, or allowed me to foray into my fantasy world that previously had been my bastion.

Eric was, at the risk of sounding dramatic, my savior. He would guffaw at the suggestion, but then again, he never was any good at expressing affection.

Let's call this part one, the story of how I met my best and most enduring friend.