Blues For Suzy Q.

Burying Some Of Myself

She was a part of me, silently alone
And too far down to draw the line

-- (Leon Russell, "Me And Baby Jane")

An old friend of mine died Wednesday, an old girlfriend, to be precise. I suppose I am entering that awkward stage when my contemporaries start falling away with increasing regularity. I don’t like it, and I don’t know what to do about it.

Of course, the 800 lb. gorilla in my head is the realization that my time is coming too, sooner or later. I am one of those who never thinks much about his own mortality, and am always very uncomfortable when forced to. Which burying old friends tends to do. But burying old friends who I loved, who I knew in the Biblical sense, I guess you could say – that is a new one.

SQ and I were together off and on for three or four years in our twenties, just before I met my wife. Mostly on; but it was the “offs” which made me realize finally we were not meant to be, at least in the traditional Western Judeo-Christian sense. I was pretty wild, but she was even wilder, and I loved that wildness in her, with great passion. But deep down I knew it was no good for, you know, settling down. We brought out the worst in each other. Suzy knew that, too; and when we finally split up for good, it was more or less by mutual agreement.

After that, I don’t know. . . I drifted for awhile, and then backed into meeting this girl who I ended up marrying and stuff. Blind luck. SQ went her own way romantically and otherwise, and we kept up for awhile. But then she moved off, and I lost track of her. I’d hear things occasionally, from a girlfriend of hers who always told me Suzy and I were destined to be together, in the end. Guess not. Anyway, I remember hearing of her first marriage, kids, and then divorce. And then another marriage. And I saw her a few times, at reunions, her dad’s funeral, etc. And now at her own. We used to talk sometimes about the romance of dying young, when we were fucked up. But it was cancer that got her, in the end. Of all things.

I used to wonder sometimes how it would be if we ever ran into each other later in life, at loose ends. Would we fall back into love? It is so hard to describe, even to oneself, the complicated feelings one has for love lost. I did not love SQ anymore after we split, especially after I met my “true” love. But there was still something there, way down, something residual that I think came from our shared experiences, and shared emotions. I still kept a spot for her in my mind, but the mental picture I carried in later years was obscure and opaque, even to me. I do not think we would have fallen back in love. When an old flame has been dead that long, you would have to actively rekindle it to get any sparks. I wish I could have discussed these feelings with her, or with somebody. But now, no way.

*****

Nowadays funerals have replaced reunions. I see old friends and distant family at the wakes for other old friends and family more than anywhere else. A strange mixture of melancholy and joy. Sad but happy. Bittersweet. And the overwhelming feeling, once they lower the coffin down into the hole and throw the dirt in, that part of myself is going down with it.

Maybe that is how it is, if you live to be old enough. Little pieces of you get buried with everyone you lose along the way, and by your own last days, there is hardly any of you left at all. In that sense, the ones who get out before then have it better off.

Goodbye, Suzy Q. We shared some times together, good and bad. If it makes you feel any better, I still don’t know what it all means. And I never will.

Our little lives get complicated
It’s a simple thing
Simple as a flower
And that’s a complicated thing.

-- (Love And Rockets, "No New Tales To Tell")

*****

Into The Mouths Of Babes

When I Think Back On All The Crap They Served In High School

There was a brief mention last time of creamed corn, and the question: Why is it even served in school cafeterias, since almost no kid will touch it with someone else’s fork, much less their own? That got me to thinking about some of the other crap they used to serve us when I was in school, carrot-raisin salad and Waldorf salad and stuff like that. And creamed corn, for that matter.

I tend to remember the quality of school lunches in inverse order of the schools I attended.

As a youngster at Caldwood Elementary, I recall the lunches being pretty good, for the most part. Although there was one day I’ll probably never forget, when they served us, as the entrée, fried bologna topped with honey and raisins; with beets and rutabagas as our vegetables. I don’t think anyone in the whole school ate that. Bologna was like the tenth best choice for a sandwich, and sautéed with honey and raisins (which looked like dead flies) on it? No way. And no one I have ever known likes beets, which were served at our school occasionally. I think they were more popular up north, but around here no one would eat them; and, if you did have anything good on your plate, the beet juice would encroach and ruin whatever it was.

And no one even knew what a rutabaga was. I still don’t.

After that it was on to Memorial Jr. High (now Vincent.) The food there did not leave much of an impression on me at all, in a gustatory sense. At that stage, ages 11-13, we were as interested in throwing the food as eating it, anyway.

The chocolate pudding at Memorial was of an excellent consistency and viscosity for use as an ordinance. You could make a catapult out of a spoon and a folded-up milk carton (the fulcrum), load it up, and see how far up the retractable dividing wall between the gym and the cafeteria you could stick a blob of pudding. There was a guy we called Montrose, who was a legend in the lunchroom; late in our sixth grade year he stuck a dollop of chocolate pudding almost all the way to the top of the wall, maybe thirty feet up (our lunchroom was part of a “cafetorium”, a gym and a cafeteria combined.) After that, when we remembered to we’d look up, and that pudding would still be there. It was reassuring, in a way; a symbol of consistency in that period of adolescence when raging hormones and social awkwardness made life confusing and difficult at times. Anyway, by the time we were in eighth grade, that pudding was still up there, although we noticed something greenish and fuzzy had begun to cover the surface of it. I have not thought about that in years; that by now fossilized blob of pudding may be up there on that wall, still.

The chocolate pudding was also useful for a long distance artillery barrage, aimed at the sixth graders’ table up in the front of the cafeteria, by where the teachers sat. Of course, sometimes your coordinates would be a bit off, and you’d overshoot the sixth graders’ and land a big dollop of pudding in old Ms. Wilkinson’s lap. Then the fun would really start.

That was one funny thing about jr. high school. Food fights, which happened two or three times a month, took precedence over everything else. I remember sitting down at the table one day with a perfectly good lunch in front of me, a rare thing. Faux veal cutlet and gravy, green beans, roll, chocolate pudding. . . right then a roll arced in from on high and hit a glancing blow off the table next to me, between me and my friend Ricky (who we called “T-Bone”.) It was a shot across our bow, courtesy of the little sixth grade dickheads, who I could see giggling at their table. I looked at T-Bone, and he looked at me. And then I grabbed a handful of green beans and he grabbed a roll, and we fired back. And then they fired back, and then we did. By the time the teachers shut us down, after maybe forty-five seconds, I’d thrown my entire lunch at the sixth graders’ table. I wouldn’t have got to eat it, anyway; by then I was on my way to the vice principal’s office, with about ten other guys.

By the time I got to high school, lunch became almost an afterthought. We had a large student body, so we had two lunch periods; and each one was maybe thirty minutes long. So even if you wanted to buy a lunch, by the time you got through the line you had about five minutes to eat it. Most people passed (not that they were missing anything), and went and bought some junk food from the snack bar. Or just headed on out to “The Field”, as we called it, a big, open area between the back of the school and the baseball field, where one could sit around and smoke cigarettes, while the administration mostly looked the other way. Well, cigarettes, and other things.

For some reason the cafeteria at my high school (Forest Park) served something they called carrot-raisin salad every other day. Shredded up carrots with raisins it, covered with a runny, vaguely sweet-smelling sauce. Gross. On the days I did eat in the cafeteria, I would take my tray up front when I was done, and the cafeteria lady would dump whatever food was left into a big 60-gallon garbage can. And I’d look down, and that can would be almost full to the top with carrot-raisin salad, several hundred pounds of it. Double gross.

We never could figure out why they would serve the same thing over and over when it was obvious no one was ever going to actually eat it. They could have saved some time and effort and, after they had made up their carrot-raisin salad batch for the day, just dumped it directly into the garbage can, instead of going through the motions of putting it on everyone’s plate.

There were two prevailing theories as to why they kept serving that crap, day after day. One was they were doing it to meet some sort of quota for “nutritional content” in our lunches. This was back before the Reagan era, and the classification of ketchup as a vegetable; so I guess carrot-raisin salad was the next easiest thing. The other one was that our cafeteria was part of some government surplus program (it was a public school.) In this scenario, the Department of Agriculture was subsidizing farmers after the bottom dropped out of the carrot futures market; and after the harvest they would have all these surplus carrots sitting around. And instead of letting them rot, they would ship them to the schools, who could not think of anything better to do with them than shred them up, mix in some raisins, and dump some kind of balsamic vinaigrette crap on top.

I have no idea which one of these theories was correct, if either one of them was. But I think I like the second one best. Pretty complex thinking and plot structure, for high-schoolers. I guess we were smarter than I thought we were. Due to good nutrition, no doubt.

*****

Drinking It All In

Making Hay In The New Age

In case you had not heard, former Saturday Night Live cast member and comedic actor Dan Ackroyd has developed and released a new spirit on the market, Crystal Head Vodka. This promotional ad, chock full of new age nonsense and quasi-spiritual mumbo-jumbo, explains (sort of) Ackroyd’s philosophy behind making a new vodka and putting it on the market, in specially made bottles which supposedly resemble the thirteen legendary and mystical crystal skulls dug up in Mexico, the American Southwest, and elsewhere over the years. These skulls were buried here by aliens sometime back, and possess mystical powers and knowledge. I believe I have that right.

Dan Ackroyd has clearly lost his mind, by the way.

One of the claims Ackroyd makes for the uniqueness of his vodka, aside from it being made from the purest Newfoundland water, and then “quadruple distilled”, and then filtered through Herkimer diamonds for the utmost “neutrality” and purity, is that it is derived from a mash made of fermented creamed corn. Yep, creamed corn. Apparently they took all the creamed corn left over from lunch trays all over the world because nobody eats that nasty crap and why do they serve it anyway? And they dumped it and a bunch of cans of Del Monte™ into a big vat and then let it sit out for awhile. Hence, Crystal Head Vodka, possessing a “unique, sweet and creamy taste.” Lovely.

*****

I doubt I will be purchasing and/or consuming any Crystal Head Vodka anytime soon, or anything else having to do with creamed corn, which is right up there with cauliflower and toxic waste as some of the nastiest shit ever invented by man. But I think Ackroyd, crazy as he is, may be onto something. I am thinking of developing and marketing my own line of distilled spirits, based on various paranormal and mystical-spiritual ooga-booga New Age icons.

•Alien Ale™. Brewed in the Nevada desert, glowing reviews attribute this fine ale with an out of this world taste.

•Bermuda Triangle Rum™ Produced on Walker’s Cay in the Abacos Islands, Bahamas, this tasteful rum possesses a kick that will cause your interior navigational instruments to malfunction; drink enough of it, and you might even disappear entirely, at least for awhile.

•Bigfoot Beer™. Brewed in the American Northwest, the heart of Bigfoot country, and filtered through. . . well, you don’t want to know what it is filtered through.

•Chupacabra Tequila™. A cheap mescal made from surplus maguey cactus plants, and distilled at a refinery outside of El Paso, Texas; drink enough of this “tequila”, and you will believe in the legendary Mexican goat-sucker, and just about anything else anyone tells you.

•Mothman Moonshine™. A rough tasting “white lightning”, 190 proof and distilled in a hollow somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains (we cannot divulge the exact location, for legal reasons), this stuff may not be the smoothest to cross the palate, but it does the trick. . . in addition to causing visions of a giant moth with red eyes, it will assuage the pain of living in a crappy house trailer in West Virginia somewhere, sans teeth.

•Tunguska Vodka™. Distilled in the legendary Tunguska region of Siberia, where the alien spaceship crashed in 1908; this vodka will not only give you an inner glow, but will also set off any Geiger counter in the vicinity, a sure indicator of a quality spirit.

*****

I am excited about my new line of distilled spirits. I think I can get rich off of this idea. Thank you, Dan Ackroyd. All I need to do is persuade some bank to lend me the start-up capital for this venture. That should not be any problem at all right now, should it?

(Special thanks to Gizzmonic and JackAstro)

*****

Cheap Eats

For Whom The Bell Tolls

I saw a guy in a black Jaguar in the drive-thru line at the Taco Bell on Phelan Blvd. yesterday. I don’t know why it surprised me. It was the Deadhead Sticker On A Cadillac conundrum, I think. Why should a rich guy be any less enamored of the ________ (fill in the blank) served out the window of Taco Bell than the rest of us proles? Also, that guy didn’t get rich enough to buy that Jag by throwing his money away; and as everyone knows, if nothing else you get more bang for your buck at Taco Bell than at any other fast food outlet. You can feed a family of four for under ten bucks with ________ (fill in the blank) from Taco Bell, provided no one gags on it. . . which they shouldn’t, unless they get one of those damn “Fiesta” burritos, the ones they put rice in. You don’t put rice in a burrito, goddamn it! It should be against the law to do so, if it isn’t already.

*****

For a long time now, I don’t eat at Taco Bell if I can help it. I did more than enough of that when I was young. Even back then, the only time I ever really wanted anything from there was late at night when I was headed home after a long night of partying. I don’t know why that was. But I used to find myself there often enough, sitting in the drive-thru line with a lot of other no doubt similarly bewildered drunks, not even able to remember making the decision to go there in the first place. It was like my car drove itself. I would end up ordering way more than I could ever eat, and often by the time I got home I didn’t want any of it. So I’d throw the bag into the ‘fridge and go to bed. And then a week or so later I would throw it away. Taco Bell stockholders got rich off of all the bean burritos I bought back in those days, and never ate.

*****

The first Taco Bell here was over on 11th Street, across from Gateway. I think it is a Vietnamese seafood place now. That location was pretty popular in high school. It had this faux volcano thing out front, with a smudge pot stuck into the top of it, lit up. We called it the eternal flame. Most kids went there because it was the only place open after midnight where one could go if one was suffering from an onset of the munchies.

I got thrown out of there one night, by some little burrito-making dude, for laughing too much. That’s right. I was in there with a friend of mine, and for some reason everything he said to me was hilarious, and I went into fits of uncontrollable laughter. Weird.

Another night I walked in there at some ungodly hour and caught the little burrito dude making “refried” beans. He had a steam table tray on the counter, into which he had dumped a couple of institutional-sized cans of pinto beans. He had a Black & Decker ½ inch power drill with a paint-stirrer attachment in it. And he was going to town. This is a true story. He was puréeing the beans with a power drill. I found that both repulsive and, at the time, extremely amusing; and I ended up laughing my way out of there again. Since then, except for all the times I was legally intoxicated, I have denied myself the pleasure of eating at Taco Bell. It is my loss, I am sure.

*****

Almost Cut My Hair

Quietly Unfurling The Freak Flag

I have never really cared all that much what my hair looks like. I mean I have cared, enough to drag a comb through it occasionally, so it would not become entirely unkempt; but I have never gone as far as coloring it or attempting to make it straighter or curlier or anything like that.

OK, I did try to “naturally” streak it once. My mop is medium brown in color, and I had heard if you put lemon juice in it and spent some time out in the sun, your hair would acquire blond highlights. I thought that might be pretty cool. In those days I spent every possible moment down at the beach anyway, out in the sun all day; so on the drive down there one Saturday morning, while making my usual stop at the market for a case of Miller Lite and two bags of ice, I also purchased one of those plastic squeeze lemons. The checkout dude probably thought I was going to put the lemon juice in my beer; it was trendy back then to squeeze lime juice in one’s cerveza. But I never went in for that. Because it made my beer taste fucking nasty.

Anyway, when I got down on the beach that day, I slathered on a copious amount of a coconut-oil based Coppertone product called Savage Tan™, an extremely greasy concoction which not only did not block UV rays, but I am pretty sure was formulated to actively attract them. And I also surreptitiously worked some of the lemon juice into my coif. I reloaded with it each time I came in from swimming in the surf, or otherwise whenever it crossed my mind to do it. I noticed the citric acid burned my scalp a little, but I was drinking beer after all, so it did not bother me much. I ended up using the whole squeeze lemon before the day was out, and I had basically forgot about it by the time I drove home that evening. The next morning I noticed in the mirror that, rather than having any streaks or highlights in it, my entire hairdo had gone two or three shades lighter brown, almost to blond. It looked like hell, and took a few days to go away, too. Never again.

I am lucky in the sense my hair grows naturally straight, and is fine (as opposed to coarse.) It looks okay when it is long, and I have always tended to wear it a little longer than whatever the norm was at the time. I think this is at least partly a subconscious reaction to the trauma caused the time my father tricked me into getting a “flat-top.” I was in second grade, and one day he took me to his barber and when I came out of there the hair on top of my head approximated the texture and length of the fuzz on a tennis ball. We stopped at the drug store on the way home and he bought a jar of a hair-styling gel product called Dippity Do®, and a plastic hand brush with short, rigid bristles on it. My dad told me when we got home he would show me how to style my new ‘do.

At that point, my overall reaction to what he had done to me was neutral. I would have preferred to have still had enough hair so it could at least lay down, but one thing I knew about a bad haircut, even then, was that soon or later, the hair would grow back.

It was not until we got home that day and my mom saw me and freaked out and started yelling at my dad that I began to worry. She was especially pissed because school pictures were scheduled for later that week. I did not really care about the pictures, but I realized the enormity of what he had done to me when I went to school the next day and all of my second grade honeys – the ones who would chase me around the playground every day at recess and when they caught me (I didn’t run very hard) would hold me down and kiss me – laughed out loud at me and did not want anything to do with me anymore, at least until my hair grew back. Goddammit, Dad!! What the hell is wrong with you?? This isn't funny, you're messing with my little girlie action now!!

After that, I stayed away from the old man when it came to hirsute matters.

Through elementary and junior high school and up to roughly my sophomore year in high school, my hair was usually a little longer than average, but not much. I played sports, football and baseball and track, and at the time, it seemed like most of the athletic coaches had an aversion to long hair. To them, that was anything long enough to touch the top of one’s ear, or shirt collar. If you had long hair, they thought it meant you were distracted from the goals they had for you, or something. Or that you couldn’t perform as well. A coach was likely to call you a “goddamn hippie.” “Get your hair cut, you goddamn hippie, and you’ll be able to hit the hole faster.” In fact, my junior high school actually had a dress code that restricted hair length, roughly following a typical coach’s guidelines of what was and was not acceptable. I would push the regulations as far as I could, and then be called out on it; to the point I was getting a lot of my haircuts from football coaches. Talk about a screwed up haircut.

Then all of the sudden, all that mostly stopped. The dress code in high school was more lenient; as long as one’s hair was clean and not a “distraction”, whatever that meant, it was fine. Actual length did not seem to matter as much. And so I started to let mine grow out. I still don’t think my coaches liked it very much, but it was the mid-1970s by then, and there was not much they could do about it. Sure, they would threaten to bench you if you did not get a trim, but we all knew that was bullshit. If you were good, you played. And anyway, I started noticing some of the coaches were letting their hair grow out a little, too. Relatively speaking.

In the 1970s, hair length was still a fairly accurate indicator of one’s life philosophy, I guess you would call it. At least generally speaking, having long hair suggested you were vaguely rebellious; while you may or may not have given a rat’s ass about ideology or sectarian politics, at the least your long hair indicated a general acceptance of and possibly even enthusiasm for the time-honored hippie tenets of free love, music, and mind-altering substances. Hell, yeah. Sex and drugs and rock and roll, baby. I was roughly 15 years old at the time, and all for that stuff. That is when I really began to let my hair grow. By the time I graduated high school, it was close to shoulder-length.

It stayed long through college. Once I started working for a living, I began cutting my hair shorter and in a more conventional style. I do not think I ever gave it much thought. I certainly subjugated any desire I may have still had for longer hair to career concerns. It wasn't an issue to me. It was what one did. And now, looking back from nearly thirty years on, I have no regrets.

Four or five years ago, it occurred to me I had reached a time and a point in my career where it did not matter very much how long my hair was anymore. For one thing, I had pretty much become my own boss by then, so who was going to tell me different? Also, by then long hair had lost its novelty, and the length one wore one's hair had ceased to have much meaning sociologically, at least in terms of defining a demographic group with any kind of consistent system of political beliefs, lifestyle choices, and/or general philosopy. Anyone from your CPA to your stock broker to the most backwards redneck conservative wing nut you knew might be sporting hair halfway down to his ass. Long hair was just another hairstyle, nothing more.

So, long story short, I quit cutting my hair, other than to trim it up here and there. And by now I believe it is longer than it ever has been. I should say that I have been blessed genetically not only with straight hair, but also with hair which apparently is not going to turn gray and/or fall out of my head anytime soon. No Just For Men or Rogaine for me, thanks. Not yet, anyway. I guess I am sort of like Ronald Reagan in a way. Hopefully, the only way I am like Reagan who, you’ll remember, claimed his hair, which stayed jet black well into his seventies, had never been colored or dyed. Of course, this was from a guy who had been a movie actor in Hollywood for many years, and who as President was not particularly known for his grasp of the facts, not to mention the truth (“I did not sell arms to Iran to finance the contra rebels in Nicaragua.”) What I am saying is, I am not sporting one of those “old man” long hairstyles, balding on top and all gray and curly and thin. My hair now looks basically like it did when I was in high school, except possibly longer.

My wife did not like my idea very much at first. But she has come around. I think she likes the long hair now. Anyway, she still cannot keep her hands off me, which is all I care about. My kids think it is ironic – and I think they actually have an idea what “ironic” means – that I, the dad, get on them for their hair being too short. Actually, I think that is pretty ironic, too. My oldest son keeps his ‘do barely past flat-top length. It is the style with his peers, and it gets him women, so he goes with it. I can understand that. My youngest is pretty much the same, but he may end up being my long-haired child, yet. He is a natural musician (a trait which he did not inherit from me), a guitarist who, in my biased opinion, is very, very good. The other night he called me into his room and played Jimi Hendrix’ “Pali Gap”, almost note for note; for anyone not familiar with it, it is a pretty difficult song to learn, I imagine, especially at age twelve. He has a band with some of his sixth grade friends, and he is pretty serious about it all. So I am thinking he is my last, best hope to quit screwing around with this short hair stuff and let it grow out, dammit.

I guess the long hair thing is my version of going middle age crazy. I did not go out and buy a Harley like all the doctors and lawyers and accountants around here, or ditch my wife and kids for a woman half my age, or quit my job and move to the Cayman Islands to open a daiquiri hut on the beach (although I may still do that.) So, given the alternatives, growing my hair long at this point seems to be a fairly benign way for me to deal with the fading of my youth. It does not bother anyone too much, and it allows me to fantasize that I still have some of the rebel in me, that I have not been completely co-opted, and corrupted, by the. . . you know, by the establishment.

*****

I probably do need to cut my hair. It is past my shoulders now. I have noticed it gets in my way sometimes, and it is kind of difficult to keep it from getting tangled. It would be a lot easier to manage if it was shorter, and I guess my mother and my mother-in-law would get off my ass about it if I went ahead and had myself sheared.

But I don’t think I am going to do it, not yet. Having it long still means something to me, beyond just a hair style; even if no one else cares about any of that stuff anymore.

*****

Slices Of Life

Napoleon and Dagwood and Me

My wife called me at some point yesterday and informed me she would be working late and that I was responsible for dinner for myself and my offspring. News which altered my entire day.

I am sure most women are not fazed at all about coming up with something for dinner on short notice. My better half will sail in the door, and as she is setting down her stuff from work will throw a pot on the stove and toss some butter and onions and garlic in there –the basis for about 75% of our evening meals – and then go into the icebox and pull out whatever we happen to have in there at the time. Forty-five minutes later, Viola! We have a nice, flavorful, nutritionally-balanced dinner in front of us.

As for myself, I have to give it a bit more thought.

I am not helpless in the kitchen, at all. I have never been a fast food person, and over the ten or so years between moving out of my parents home and getting married, I learned how to cook for myself. Nothing gourmet, mind you – I wouldn’t have the patience for that – but as long as I have some basics to start with, I usually come out okay. When I am charged with coming up with something for the family, it requires some effort on my part because they don’t like fast food either, and we have never been big on carry out. We generally prefer a home-cooked meal, however humble.

Actually, I am pretty lucky. My kids are not picky at all. In this case, my wife was going to a dinner meeting, so I did not have to worry about her. My oldest child, a very active teenager, is an omnivore in the truest sense. He will eat pretty much whatever unfortunate thing falls into his path. He is our “garbage disposal”, an icebox ranger who wanders the wild and dark corners of our refrigerator, thinning out the leftover herd. On the other hand, my youngest child has the least regard for food of any human being I have ever met. He looks at it strictly from a utilitarian standpoint; food is fuel to get him from here to there. He is perfectly content to eat a pack of chicken-flavored ramen noodles for dinner, and in fact he does, fairly often. And savors it like a gourmand would coq au vin on a bed of wild rice.

So, my kids are no problem. As for myself, I’m pretty easy, too; but there are some things I like more than others.

My default move in this situation, if I have the time, is to start a fire in the backyard pit and then try and figure out what is getting barbecued today. But, no way during the week. As I pondered it yesterday – dinner plans didn’t dominate my thoughts, but they were there, hovering in the background, all afternoon – I suddenly remembered we had a piece of a chuck roast in the refrigerator left over from a couple of days ago, assuming my #1 Son had not harvested it for himself yet.

Suddenly, my day brightened.

I am a sandwich guy, always have been. I get excited about a good sandwich the way some people do about a good steak. And the best sandwiches are not made with store-bought lunch meat, but rather with leftovers from the 'fridge; roast, or ham, or even steak. So if that roast beef had survived so far, I knew my dinner was covered.

When I got home, sure enough, the kids had taken care of themselves. So I had a nice, unhurried atmosphere to operate in. I went into the refrigerator, and there, way back in the back of the middle shelf, was a Ziploc bag with a decent-sized piece of cold roast beef in it, just waiting for me. I took it out and hand-sliced some sandwich-thin pieces off of it. Then I went back into the box and started pulling all kinds of stuff out. . . mayonnaise, mustard, horseradish, hamburger dill pickles, sweet relish, black olives, banana pepper rings. There was some not-quite-wilted-yet leaf lettuce in the crisper, and a tomato, and even part of a purple onion, which was a long shot. Deli-sliced provolone cheese in the lunch meat drawer. Sweet!

I like to pile stuff on my sandwiches, as many different flavors and gustational sensations as will fit on there. And, as in this case, usually I am using store-bought sandwich bread, the slices of which are as a rule rather small and flimsy. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. They act as a self-limiter. I have been known to pile so much crap on a sandwich or hamburger that I literally cannot open my mouth wide enough to eat it. When I eat my sandwich creations, I need jaws like a snake’s – the kind that unhinge to allow for an over sized load.

I should say that eating a sandwich like this for dinner, especially when an onion is involved, will sometimes cause me to dream wildly at night. I once dreamt I was a foot soldier in Napoleon’s Grande Armée, marching into Russia back in the winter of ’12. At one point, with the troops near starving, The Little Corporal sent me out into the frozen countryside to forage for baguettes and le rosbif. And I miraculously found them, plus mayonnaise and pickles and tomatoes and a cornucopia of other condiments, and I was forever after hailed as a hero in République française.

Anyway, I had all this stuff out on the counter yesterday evening, and ended up making one of the nicest sandwiches you’ll ever see. By the time I was done, the top piece of bread was tilting precariously to the right, balanced on thick slices of tomato and onion. And it was high enough off of the plate I believe FAA regulations called for a blinking red light, to warn aircraft. Or would have, if it had lasted long enough to be a hazard.

But it didn’t. I took my sandwich, threw a handful of pretzels on the plate, and grabbed a Diet Coke® And went and sat down in the den and watched the news while eating my sandwich, a truly happy camper.

*****

Thinking about all this today, I called my wife to see if maybe she had to work late tonight, too. There is still some of that roast beef left, after all. But she doesn’t. She told me not to worry, she would take care of dinner tonight. Great, honey! See you this evening.

Darn it.

*****

Close Encounters. Too Damn Close.

I Got Rat Class And I Got Rat Style

My best friend, he shoots water rats
And feeds them to his geese

That’s a line from “Live With Me”, a cut from of The Rolling Stones’ Let It Bleed LP. Let It Bleed is one of the better albums by one of the better rock bands ever, and “Live With Me” is proof of a couple of things: a.) Even the Stones’ “throwaways” could be great, and b.) as opposed to their American cousins, English geese are apparently carnivorous, which is kind of scary to think about.

All of which is a roundabout way of getting to nutria rats, which I found myself in a discussion about yesterday. Which got me to thinking about them a little bit.

For anyone who doesn’t know – and I don’t know how anyone who has lived around here for very long could not – the nutria (Myocastor coypus) is a large, aquatic, beaver-type rodent who inhabits the bayous and marshes in this area. Nutria are native to South America, but were introduced here in the 1940s because of their reputation as voracious consumers of water hyacinth, a pleasant sounding but nasty plant that, in dry times, proliferates and chokes local marshes, bayous, and canals. Interestingly, it turns out the water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) is a South American native introduced to this area, too. So naturally enough, nutria were brought into control it. Another fine example of man screwing with the natural environment.

What no one knew (or thought about) when importing nutria is that, first of all, they have no natural predators here; and also, when not consuming water hyacinth they apparently spend most of their time, well, doin’ it (scientific term.) Now there are gazillions of nutria rats in Southeast Texas, and the water hyacinth still clogs local waterways in drought times (like now.)

The thing about nutria is, for one thing, they are kind of nasty. They are roughly the size of a mid-sized dog, have oily fur, red eyes, and big orange-yellow teeth. They have a reputation for nasty behavior, as well. Most of the stories I have heard happened when someone unknowingly cornered a nutria rat, often near a nest; and actually, most mammals, including humans, are pretty mean and protective in a situation like that. One person I know, who lives near a branch of the LNVA irrigation canal, tells a great story about inadvertently cornering a nutria on his screened-in back porch one night. The cartoon-ish encounter ended with the nutria calmly exiting the porch through the screen door – through it, literally – while my friend, frantic and armed with a straw broom, the only reasonable facsimile of a defensive weapon available to him at the time, cowered on top of his patio table.

As I have mentioned before, I used to duck hunt in my youth, and most of my experiences rubbing shoulders with our friend the nutria came from back then.

At one time, there was a guy down in Labelle who paid a dollar a piece for dead nutria, provided you had shot them in the head; which was pretty easy, since a nutria swims with only the top two-thirds of its head protruding above the surface, so that is what you aim at, anyway. This guy wanted them shot in the head because apparently there was/is a market for nutria pelts, which resemble a beaver’s, actually. At a dollar apiece, dude was making a pretty nice profit, I’d guess; but he can have it. He lived in a decrepit trailer about fifty yards from Taylor’s Bayou, with trash everywhere in his “yard”, and I don’t even want to know what he did with all those nutria carcasses after he skinned them.

I never resorted to nutria hunting myself, although not because of any high-mindedness on my part. Mainly, I just didn’t want to mess with nutria in any way, shape, or form. I did know guys who, if the duck hunting was slow, would turn around and start blasting the nutria, which were pretty much everywhere one looked out in the marsh. They could usually bag enough in about ten minutes to pay for a six-pack and gas money for the drive home.

I have often thought one of the local high schools should adopt the nutria rat as a mascot. When they combined all the high schools down in Port Arthur awhile back into one big mega-educational conglomerate and created Memorial High School, what did they come up with to call this group of former Bumblebees, Yellow Jackets, and Eagles? The Titans, about as lame a mascot as one could imagine. They should have named them the Nutria Rats. It’d be unique, plus they’d have a mascot that would intimidate the hell out of opponents. Great potential cheers, too. “Nutria rat, nutria rat, rodent of might! Eat water hyacinth all day, and kick your ass all night!!”

By way of disclosure, I should say my own ambivalence toward the lowly nutria comes from a couple of personal encounters, both over twenty years ago, out in the marsh. The first one – when I stumbled upon a mom and her babies, who had built a nest in a long-unused duck blind I had impulsively decided that morning to use again – was so grotesque it would have made Wes Craven and Steven King blush, so I won’t repeat the details here. Let’s just say the blind was small, and the mother nutria didn’t want me to come in, and it was dark and I was startled and didn’t know what the hell was snarling at me, and instead of a straw broom I had a Remington 12-gauge loaded with magnums (goose shot), and I reacted instinctively. Needless to say, that blind went on being unused for quite awhile longer after that.

My other close encounter of the nutria rat kind was more benign, but it didn’t end much better for the nutria, or for me. I was walking down a levee early one morning, moving from one pothole to another in the dawn’s early light, when I apparently came up on a nest. Anyway, all I knew was I was looking at this big nutria reared up on its hind legs in the marsh grass, about ten yards in front of me on this narrow path I was on, on top of the levee. He was staring at me with his red eyes, and flashing his overbite, with those big, bright orange front teeth. I clicked off the safety on the Remington, not sure what was going to happen next. What ended up happening was, after about 15 seconds that nutria dropped down, lowered its head, and charged me. I wasn’t expecting that, but managed to get the shotgun aimed in the nutria’s general direction by the time he was about fifteen feet from me. A shotgun can do a lot of damage from that range.

I still shudder when I think about it. It is startling to be all alone in the marsh and have an evil looking water rat charge you, with obvious malevolent intent. The adrenaline rush from that encounter probably didn’t wear off me until sometime much later that afternoon. For all that, though, I had a grudging respect and even admiration for that nutria, and still do. He had to know he had no chance against me and the 12-gauge, that charging me was suicide. But he didn’t think twice about it, he did it anyway. I think what scared me so much and got my adrenaline going, even though I pretty much knew ahead of time how things would to turn out, was that for an instant during his charge I could see the look in that nutria’s eyes, and I could tell that he just didn’t give a fuck. At all. Hence, my respect.

And why I think the nutria would be a great team mascot anyone could be proud of.

*****

Living With It

Melon Collie And The Infinite Sadness

I once had a friend of mine – we’ll call him Phil – tell me about this recurring dream he had about the Washington Senators. It was a weird dream on a couple of levels; one being Phil wasn’t really much of a baseball fan at all, so why would he be dreaming of the long-defunct Washington Senators, of all things?

It’s the last ride
Our little game is over

Actually, Phil said he had his dream from the point of view of a pigeon. That’s right. He was a pigeon in his dream, from Washington, D.C., and he liked to hang out at RFK Stadium when the Senators would play. He liked all the people, and the movement and color and action. And he liked all the food scraps they left behind.

He would wheel in and out among the rafters of the grandstand, and watch the game and the people and look for food. He said he was happy in his dream, as free as a bird. But then he began to notice the crowds at the games were getting smaller, and less friendly. There seemed to be an almost palpable sense of melancholy, even dread, in the air. He would fly around under the upper deck, and he could feel the sadness, wafting up. And then it turned out some a-hole bought the team, ran it into the ground, and then after the 1971 season moved it to some podunk town down in Texas.

It’s the last ride
It’s time to take you home

Phil’s dream ended at that point. He doesn’t know if he just died after that, or was reduced to begging bread crumbs in a square somewhere. He said he thought what happened was the pigeon in his dream died of sadness when the Senators moved, and its soul transmorgified into Phil, just as the latter was surfing down his mom’s birth canal on the way to his very first birthday. And Phil said that having a soul that was part pigeon was why he kept having that dream.

I think we might have been high when Phil told me about his pigeon dream. Back then I didn’t really question things very much. I just went with the flow. It certainly would’ve seemed silly, in the context of the telling, to call bullshit on him at the time. I think all I said was, “Wow. Pretty freaky, man.” And the conversation moved on.

And we can’t cry ‘cause we seen it coming
No use running, take it slower

As for Phil, he’s dead now. He was shot through the head, accidentally, by another friend of ours who was playing with a pistol he didn’t know was loaded at the time. The two of them had been sitting around Phil’s garage, getting stupid drunk. This was about 15 years ago. I had been married for awhile by then, had my first kid, and I was pretty much past that sort of everyday mindless craziness in my life; but Phil wasn’t, quite.

Anyway, he is probably the closest friend I ever had to get killed like that. I remember being messed up about it at the time. But not for long. We had always lived by such a devil-may-care, laissez-faire code back all those years we hung out together, it would have seemed hypocritical for me to go on too long about the senselessness of his death. Instead, I thought about stuff like his pigeon dreams. And somewhere in there, it occurred to me. . . Phil had said the pigeon’s soul transmorgified into him from RFK, in 1971 (the last year the Senators were in Washington), just as he was being born. Except Phil was born in, like, 1961 or something. So when that pigeon supposedly merged with his soul, he was already, like, ten years old.

Wow. Pretty freaky, man.

********

And the road rolls around
And turns through the town

I don't dwell much on stories of past loves, lost loves, etc. And rightly so. That kind of thing tends to be like self-flagellation, I guess you’d call it; plus, no one else is interested in hearing it, anyway. But. . . well. . . I’ve just this one. . .

This is from back when I was 15 or 16 years old. High school. This cute girl fell in love with me, and I with her, and it was the real thing. Back then I was still pretty new to the intricacies of romance and all that, and I must say I just loved her without any reservation. I loved her naívely. I knew bad stuff could happen, but I didn’t think at all that anything bad would happen, so I never held back. I just showered this girl with my love and affection (and she did me) for a long while.

The depression drips down
And glazes the ground

At that age, one tends to think the first love might be the last one, too. The only one. I think I believed that for a little while. I was in no way prepared for the day my girlfriend sat me down and let me know, in the gentlest terms she could come up with, that she felt like it was time for her to be moving on.

I wanted to be devastated about it. I felt like what had come before would not have meant as much if I wasn’t. So I was, a little bit. But not nearly as much as I would have expected. After a few weeks, a month maybe, I pretty much shook it off, and went on. There was a part of me I didn’t even know was there beforehand, telling me of course I was shocked by her wanting to break up, because I had chosen not to think about that possibility at all. I had loved her unequivocally; and sure, I was hurt and embarrassed for awhile after she dumped me, but that was nothing compared to a year-and-a-half of loving her all day, every day, joyfully, without any reservation. A small price to pay.

And I have always tried to love that same way, ever since.

Horizons east and skylines west
The moon, the sun, and all the rest

Funny, though. The only thing I really remember clearly from that day was what she said to me as she smiled at me, ruefully, while sticking the knife through my heart. She said, “It’s all over, baby. Just let it go. I’m gone.”

The loving son, the faithful wife
The burnt out wreck of a poor man’s life
The father, son, and holy ghost
They all turned away love when they needed it most

-- Todd Rundgren, The Last Ride

*****

Remembering Elizabeth Reed

Long After Dark

The essence of rock ‘n’ roll is the two-and-a-half to three minute song, short and sweet and to the point. . . a nugget of musical perfection that always leaves the listener wanting more. This was true back in the days of Top 40 radio, and it still is now.

I have always followed this tenet, and still do, mostly. But the truth of it is, there is a part of me which has always favored the longer song, what used to be called an album cut. This part of me believes that when it comes to rock ‘n’ roll songs, longer is almost always better. Ideas are better fleshed out, good musicians can really stretch, and when it is done right, the longer cut can transport the listener, if he/she is in the proper frame of mind to be transported.

There are examples of songs than benefited from editing. One I can think of is the early Fleetwood Mac classic “Oh Well”. On the Then Play On LP, the song is arranged so the familiar part, the three or so minutes of straight up guitar by Peter Green and the rocking rhythm by (Mick) Fleetwood (and John) Mac(Vie), is up front, followed by seven or eight minutes of extremely laid back instrumental noodling. The edited version of this, with just the first part, is definitely better. A similar instance is “Love Is Like Oxygen” by Sweet. A rocking beginning, with a classic guitar riff, but on the LP (Level Headed), there is a long instrumental break in the middle that, to me, takes away from the song. The “AM edit”, as we called it back then – the song was edited down to fit the AM radio Top 40 format – was perfect. There are several other examples, to be sure. But sometimes it seemed as if the editing of the song was done carelessly or haphazardly, by someone who did not know or care about how a song is supposed to flow musically.

Longer versions of the songs, typically from an LP, were usually preferable to me because at least I knew this version was probably how the artist originally intended the song be heard. Beyond that, long versions were good for listening to in the car, and/or for reflective moments alone, with the headphones on. I had a pair of Koss™ Pro-4AAAs back then that wrapped entirely around my head. “Cans”, we called them. Head-fi. They had padded earpieces that covered each ear entirely. I much prefer them to the earbud things popular now, the ones you jam into your ear canal. My Koss cans had a 12 foot extension cable on them, and I liked to put on an LP and then lay down in the middle of my bedroom floor, lights off and with my eyes closed, listening to tunes. Looong tunes, preferably.

One of the better long songs ever is “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” by the Allman Brothers, the live version, off of the Fillmore East LP. This version of the song clocks in at around 13 minutes. An instrumental written by guitarist Dickey Betts (and famously named after a woman on a Civil War-era tombstone in a Macon, GA cemetery), it is probably the Allmans playing at their best, at least in their original configuration. The interplay between Betts’ and Duane Allman’s lead guitars and also between the twin drummers, the time changes, the switch from an elegy to an up tempo beat and back to an elegy again, the uniquely Allman mix of rock, blues, and some jazz elements. . . it is all here, perfectly conceived and executed, and at a perfect length.

I have known this song almost from the womb, it seems like; but I really fell under its spell one night back when I was around 19 or 20 years old. I was in college then, working after school at a law firm, and living alone in a small, dumpy apartment in the Gaylynn, about fifty yards from the emergency room entrance to St. Elizabeth. One night, I was waiting for some friends to come by the apartment and pick me up, to go out partying, probably. I had got ready early and had a little time to kill before they would arrive.

I almost always had music playing back then, wherever I was. In the apartment, I had a pretty nice stereo setup, separate Onkyo receiver and amp,turntable, cassette deck, a graphic equalizer, and big Pioneer speakers. All my LPs, roughly 800-1000 of them at that time, were arranged alphabetically on some bookshelves I had specially made to hold them. That night, while waiting for my friends, I decided I wanted to listen to something that would not involve much interactive thought on my part, and that preferably was long enough that I would not have to get up and change what was on the turntable anytime soon. So I ended up pulling the Fillmore East LP down off of the shelf, almost as an afterthought, and I put it on the turntable, and turned up the volume. Then I switched off the lamps, opened a Miller Lite, and sat down in an easy chair in the corner of my small-ish living room. The only light in the apartment was ambient, from the streetlights outside. I could see the tiny red and green lights blinking on my stereo across the room. As “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” started playing, I could hear sirens outside, wailing in the background, headed for the hospital down the street. For some reason, all these stimuli combined to put me into a sort of trance-like state, and as the song played, I found I was listening to it like I’d never listened to it before. I was totally into it, down inside the grooves in the vinyl, almost; and it was the most incredible feeling. It gave me shivers, actually. I wish I could adequately describe it, but no way.

After a time the song finished up, and soon after my friends showed up, and we went along on our merry way. The ecstatic buzz I had from listening to “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” faded, but I never really got over it. I kept on playing that song, all through the years and up to now; probably several hundred times, total. And the cool thing is, every time I played it, if I concentrated a bit I was able recreate that feeling, about 75% of it, anyway. I still can. Given my circumstances now, and the fact that just about everything now is entirely different from then, I am amazed that I can still experience that sensation, the same one from back when I was young and free and, it seems to me, an entirely different person altogether than I am today.

I am grateful for this. Is it any wonder that I still prefer longer songs, and that “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” is still one my favorite ones?

*****

The heyday for long-ish versions of songs was probably the 1970s and early 1980s. Here is a list of some of my favorite "long songs", off of the top of my head, as of today; keeping in mind that, a.) the list changes and, b.) I have forgot some I really like, no doubt.

01.) In Memory of Elizabeth Reed - Allman Brothers(13:11)

02.) Down By The River - Neil Young(9:16)

03.) Like An Inca - Neil Young(9:46)

04.) The Core - Eric Clapton(8:45)

05.) Low Spark Of High-Heeled Boys - Traffic(11:39)

06.) Maggot Brain - Funkadelic(10:20)

07.) Touch Me I'm Going To Scream, Part 2 - My Morning Jacket(8:12)

08.) Slippin' Into Darkness - War(7:00)

09.) TB Sheets - Van Morrison(9:35)

10.) Tupelo Honey - Van Morrison(6:53)

11.) Flash Light - Parliament(10:45)

12.) Marquee Moon - Television(10:40)

13.) Too Rolling Stoned - Robin Trower(7:33)

14.) Straight Up And Down - Brian Jonestown Massacre(11:00)

15.) Poppy - Frank Marino & Mahogany Rush(19:74)

*****

Outside Looking In

Sweet Hitchhiker

I had to run down to Port Arthur this afternoon, and like every other time I go that way – not all that often, actually – the bright yellow signs just before one gets to the prison complexes off of Highway 69, the ones that say PRISON AREA: DO NOT PICK UP HITCHHIKERS, jumped out at me. Those are signs that sort of insult your intelligence, intentionally or not.

Is there any instance of an escaped prisoner actually getting away by thumbing a ride? In the last couple of decades, anyway? If so, I’d like to meet the person who gave him the ride, the one who thought it would be a good idea to stop and pick up this somewhat desperate-looking person, probably in some kind of state-issued jumpsuit, if not actually prison stripes.

Who the hell hitchhikes anymore at all? Or picks hitchhikers up? Seems like a dangerous proposition nowadays, either way; in a prison area or not.

I have always kind of been ambivalent about those prisons in Mid-County, at least as far as them being counted on as an economic asset. Which they were, at the time they were being built. It is sort of like saying another World War would be great for the economy. I do have a neighbor (and his wife) who work at the state prison, I think it is, and they are great people and don’t seem to mind the job. I know another guy, an electrician, who had a cushy job at the county prison but quit, because being around the prisoners all the time creeped him out.

Unless one lives right by a prison at the time there is an escape, I don’t buy the argument that having prisons around makes an area less safe. Whenever I am in Mid-County in the vicinity of the prisons, it’s not the guys on the inside who worry me. It’s all the everyday crazy bastards who live down there, running around loose.

(In roughly a five square mile area between State Highway 69 and Old Pt. Arthur Rd. in mid Jefferson County, there are two youth prisons, a county prison, a state prison, and way off by itself, a federal penitentiary. I think I have that right.)

*****

Friendly Fire

Neighbor, Neighbor

I’m not a big believer in New Years’ resolutions. One the one hand, setting a definite date ahead of time you are going to try to stop doing something, or start doing something, isn’t a bad idea. You have time to get mentally ready to make the big change. On the other hand, trying to change your ways on a day when even the people who don’t generally overindulge in things overindulge probably isn’t such a great idea.

I have made New Years’ resolutions before, but the only one I ever kept was to quit smoking, about ten years ago. That’s enough for one lifetime, I figure.

So, I didn’t make any resolutions for this year. I did, however, twist my knee while being shot at with fireworks.

New Years’ Eve, about 11:30 p.m., I realized one of my kids wasn’t in the house, so I went out the front door to look for him. As soon as I got out into the yard, I got strafed by Roman candles and some kind of artillery shells. It was the next door neighbors. The kids and the dad. They were hunched down behind the pop-up camper in their driveway. The ten-year-old daughter was firing the Roman candles, and the teenage stepson and the dad were shooting the artillery shells. I tried to dive behind some azalea bushes to get out of the line of fire, and that is when I twisted my knee. I guess I am not as agile as I used to be.

Later on, when I was telling my sister-in-law how I twisted my knee, she said, “You should have called the cops on him.” But, well, he is a cop. Beaumont PD. Maybe I should have called my neighbor on the other side. He is a CPA, maybe he could have done something.

What is kind of funny is, my neighbor and I and our kids went and bought all those fireworks together, earlier that day. That was when we found out bottle rockets have been outlawed. I hadn’t heard anything about that but, goddamn, I was pissed off. The kid at the fireworks stand just stared blankly while I railed about it. Who the hell I responsible for this goddamn ban? Greenpeace? PETA? Where the hell is the National Rifle Association when you need them? I was really stewed. Anyway, we ended up buying a large quantity of artillery shells instead, and some M-115s. “Ground bombs”, they call them. They’re pretty cool.

I don’t know why my neighbor opened fire on me. Maybe he was getting me back for the time I welded the gate to his backyard solid shut, right after I had taught myself to tack weld. He didn’t know who did it, at first. I guess he figured it out. It was a hell of a welding job, if I may say so. He finally had to use a cutting torch to get the gate open.

After five minutes or so under heavy fire, I was able to limp back into the house and put an Ace® bandage on my knee. And then go back out and retaliate. Those artillery shells make a lot of noise, but they are not very accurate. I really wish I would have had some bottle rockets.

Then again, maybe not.

*****

On Being Haunted, Part 1

Will The Wolf Survive?

Wolves are not our brothers;
They are not our subordinates, either.
They are another nation, caught up just like us
In the complex web of time and life.

-- Henry Beston 1888-1968

*****

I was recently on some business out Sour Lake way, and as I was coming back into town on Highway 105, something I did not understand at the time compelled me to turn off the highway onto Keith Road and drive through the rice fields out that way. Occasionally driving around the farm roads out west of town has been a lifelong practice, or at least since I got a drivers license. As kids, we found that area of sparsely populated farmland and lightly traveled roads a great place to take a date parking at night, or just to drive around and drink and listen to the radio. The rice field roads continue to draw me to them in my adulthood, I think because, for some reason, I just find it calming to drive around out there.

I remembered the other day another reason I am drawn out that way from time to time; something I thought I’d almost forgot, an incident from back when I was 18 or 19. Like happens sometimes, thinking again about this long ago and odd and seemingly random occurrence caused it, at first fuzzy, to become crystal clear in my memory again. And, although I did not realize it fully at the time it happened, I know now this seemingly trivial event would end up having long-lasting resonance in my life.

*****

My cousin and I were out riding around one afternoon in his pickup truck, around the rice field roads out west of town, drinking beer and listening to an Astros game. We liked to do that. There was something so peaceful and calming about riding around those empty two-lane roads, some of them barely paved, some of them no more than caliche and dust, riding around on the front end of a buzz and listening to the game. We would do that for hours. Out there, we were just outside the city limits; so we didn’t have to worry about cops, and there was just enough rural-ness about to make it seem like we were really out in the country, even though in most places we were no more than ten to fifteen minutes from town. Still, sometimes we could ride along for miles and never see anything but levees, irrigation canals, rice fields either flooded or fallow, rows of tallow trees along the fence lines, and every so often a collection of farm buildings and a house. I suppose the lack of visible clutter lent to the calming effect, that and the cold beer. But the Astros announcers – Gene Elston and Dewayne Staats on that particular day – lent to the good feeling, as well. We’d been listening to those guys broadcast Astros games on the radio, in one configuration or another, since we were kids.

*****

One of my clear childhood memories is of being eight or nine years old, lying in my bed one night and listening to Elston and Harry Kalas and Loel Passe broadcasting a game against the Dodgers. I was listening on this Philco radio I had, larger than a transistor but still a portable, listening under the covers with it turned down low, because it was past my bedtime. It was late in the game and the Astros were down by a run. They were up to bat, and had made two quick outs, but then had got a man on. And up to the plate came Jimmy Wynn, The Toy Cannon. He was the Astros last, best hope, for that game anyway. It seemed like Elston’s play-by-play during Wynn’s at bat, and the commentary from Kalas, just heightened the tension of the moment. The entire time I lay there with my fingers crossed on both hands, and my toes crossed on both feet, hoping against hope that Wynn would get hold of one and really drive it. I was giving it everything, everything I had, as I am sure Jimmy Wynn was. . . but, alas, on that night it wasn’t to be. Wynn went down on a weak pop up; one could sense the disappointment in Gene Elston’s otherwise even tones. Dangit! The Astros were on their way to another close loss.

Of course, had I been more sensible back then, I’d have realized that the late, dramatic home run was pretty rare, probably a silly thing to wish for. But I wasn’t that sophisticated in those days. Had I been, it might also have occurred to me that baseball was full of disappointments, particularly if one was an Astros fan. But I didn’t realize that yet, either; and in retrospect, I am kind of glad I didn’t. Most of life’s disappointments were still ahead of me, and I was always naïvely hopeful when it came to the Astros. Good for me.

*****

Now here we were, a decade later, all-knowing teenagers driving around drinking beer in a pickup truck. Still listening intently to the game, creating our own mental images of the action to go along with the commentary, as the countryside passed us by. I have often felt that one of the only true connective threads running through my by now pretty long and often turbulent life is my affiliation with and affection for the Astros. It is poignant to me to think that all along, no matter how fucked up I or my life was – or how un-fucked up, for that matter – I always kept up with the Astros, made as many games in person as I could, listened to the broadcasts when I couldn’t. Those days in the rice fields are just one example.

On that particular day, a gloomy Saturday afternoon and drizzling rain where we were, the Astros were taking on the Cubs, I think at Wrigley. The game had been going along for awhile, and it was tied or maybe Houston was behind by a run. We’d been through most of a six-pack and were coming around a ninety degree turn on one of the farm roads in the rain when the back tires skidded across the pavement a little and the truck spun out and ended up nosed in against a barbed-wire fence, facing across some guy’s field. It wasn’t any big deal, we hadn’t been speeding or anything. I think the beer and a preoccupation with the game on the radio had caused my cousin to forget to compensate for the fact the asphalt was wet and slick, and we sort of gently skidded partway off the road.

We sat there and collected ourselves for a moment and kind of laughed; a moment of quiet before my cousin would put the three-speed in reverse (three-on-a-tree, remember?) and back us onto the roadway again. He was about to do just that when we saw it. Out across this field we were facing, almost all the way to the back of it, was a gray wolf, standing there in the straw, looking over to see what the commotion was.

I’d seen red wolves before, out duck hunting; but they were pretty small, and very elusive. Pretty much the most I’d ever seen, in the half light, was the ass end of one as it disappeared over the side of a levee and off into the marsh. But this was a big wolf, and gray, no doubt about it. I don’t know what the hell it was doing out there – I don’t think big wolves have ever been indigenous this far down (I’d seen signs of them around our place in Tyler County, in the Piney Woods, but never on the coastal plain), and this was pretty close to the city, which wolves generally avoid. Anyway, it didn’t really matter, it was an amazing sight. My cousin and I sat there for several seconds, mesmerized. Then before we knew it, the wolf was gone; and almost immediately we went about trying to confirm with and affirm to each other what had just happened. I don’t know why, but we were almost giddy about it for awhile. Eventually, though, the moment passed, and we got back to our beer, and the game. The Astros rallied late that afternoon, and pulled another one out in the end. Fuck the Cubs.

*****

I never told my cousin, but I couldn’t stop thinking about that wolf, for a long, long time. How he was free, but not really. He was being fenced in, and he was probably not long for this world. But he had it in him to be free, he knew what it felt like. I couldn’t get over that. I kept thinking if I could have just looked into his eyes for a few moments longer, I would have been able to feel what that felt like, too. Ridiculous, but that is what I thought. For many years, on the odd occasion I had to pass by that field, I would stop my vehicle and get out and look. I didn’t really expect to see a wolf again. But sometimes I would see one, just as it turned from looking at us, not caring at all, and then loped off across a field and faded into the brush, as the pipes and flares from the Mobil Chemical refinery rose off in the distance, through the gray and misting rain, beyond the rice fields.

Maybe it was the ghost of that wolf I saw. Or maybe I was a ghost of myself, back to see that wolf again. I’ve never been able to work it out, and after awhile I get really confused trying to. But, God. . . I am haunted by a wolf I barely saw, thirty years ago. I am haunted by a freedom I never had, was never meant to have, never will have. And, I think, I am haunted by the scariest ghost of them all. That being myself.

*****

For What It's Worth

Music 2008

I am the furthest thing from a qualified music critic. For one thing, although I retain a nearly encyclopedic knowledge of rock music from the 1970s and early 1980s, my grasp of anything after that is seriously lacking in places; and when it comes to the current scene, my sense of trends is tenuous, at best. This has more to do with changes in lifestyle than aesthetic preference – I believe that, generally speaking, the music coming out now is as good as at any time during my rock ‘n’ roll lifetime; but I don’t have the time and/or disposable income now to properly keep up with it.

Still, I am not one of those approaching middle-agers who can just sink back into the nostalgia of the music of one’s youth. I have always listened to new stuff, and I still do, and when I come across something I like, I am very enthusiastic about it.

So, given all that, here are some of my favorite albums (I resist the urge to say “LPs”) from 2008. Old artists releasing new stuff, new stuff, over, under, sideways, down – this is a list of what came out last year that I enjoyed. Keeping in mind that I am really just a dilettante when it comes to anything after about 1995, I have listed a few reasons why I like what I like. For what it’s worth.

*****

Death Cab For Cutie Narrow Stairs – This is kind of dark, and a little precious at times, but overall I really like it. No one song really jumps out (my favorites are “Long Division” and “No Sunlight”), but it is a cohesive album, and a progression from their earlier releases.

The Black Keys Attack & Release – “Psychotic Girl” and “I Got Mine” are the standout tracks, but this album seems to emphasize overall concept over individual songs. I have noticed that some of the current bands I like best (The Black Keys, White Stripes, Viva Voce) are basically two-piece outfits who make up for lack of musical diversity with singular drive and/or vision. The BKs have both in abundance; and although I prefer the pounding, ragged blues-rock of Rubber Factory (2004) and Magic Potion (2006) to this spacier effort, Attack & Release is still one of my “go-to” albums from last year.

Black Mountain In The Future – From the first time I heard the single “Druganaut” (in late 2004), I knew I was going to like this band. Kind of prog-rocky, but with a whole hell of a lot of other stuff mixed in – folk, hard rock, art rock, etc. – the resulting music is fascinating. This LP (screw it, I cannot stop myself) is no different; strong all the way through, and the nearly 17-minute “Bright Lights” is, well, stunning. . . that is all I can say. It defies description.

The Black Ghosts The Black Ghosts – I am not consciously partial to bands with “black” in their name – as far as I know – and anyway this band bears little resemblance to the other two. Basically dance rock, something akin to the Gorillaz, if one needs a reference. “Full Moon” – which was featured in the soundtrack of some movie, I’ve heard – is a good example of how this band, like the Gorillaz, is something beyond a couple of British DJs putting together lively if soulless European dance hits. Plaintive and kind of laid back, but still connected to the electronic music these fellows are known for, songs like “Full Moon” (and, in somewhat different ways, “Anyway You Choose It” and “Something New”) point to singular style and a band I’ll be enjoying for awhile.

My Morning Jacket Evil Urges – Some people hate this album. Originally a grungy Southern country rock outfit, but one not averse to experimenting with other sounds, My Morning Jacket has by now evolved into something entirely different. They retain Jim James’ distinctive vocals as a signature, but have mixed many more elements – psychedlia, prog-rock, even funk – in the sound. At their best, as on “Mahgheeta” (from 2003’s It Still Moves) - still my favorite MMJ song - they can sound fuzzy, hypnotic and shimmering. This LP is all over the place musically, which I suspect is why some long-time fans despise it. But it has its moments, and then some; and the closing “Touch Me (I’m Going To Scream) Pt. 2” is eight-plus minutes of pure musical bliss.

The Whigs Mission Control – They have toured with My Morning Jacket, and started out, at least, in essentially the same place musically; but unlike MMJ, The Whigs have remained straightforward and true to their basic sound. “Like A Vibration” and especially “Right Hand On My Heart” are the standouts, but this is solid all the way through.

Ghostland Observatory Robotique Majestique – Hard to describe. Visually quite compelling, something gets lost when listening sans visuals. Still, there is something about this two-man outfit (another one of those) that pulls me right on in. This album is spotty in places, and I only listen to it when I am in a certain mood, but when it connects – damn, what a fine aural experience it is.

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds Dig!! Lazarus Dig!! They aren’t new – I have been a fan since the early ‘90s, and I was a latecomer – but Nick Cave et al just get better and better. This one rocks harder than previous efforts, but retains Cave’s lyric genius and odd, vaguely Lou Reed-style vocal delivery. The virtues of this album are a whole post by themselves. . . maybe later. As Cave fans already know, Dig!! Lazarus Dig!! is kick-ass, and my advice is to go purchase/acquire it, straight away.

Some additional singles I like, from the UK: MIA’s “Paper Planes” actually came out on 2007’s Kala LP, but the song itself bled well over into 2008. Compelling British dance-pop, with female vocals. I’ll admit the most compelling part for me may be the killer sample of the late period Clash song “Straight To Hell”. . . My entry in the English two man, I mean two person, band category is The Ting Tings. What can I say? I’m just a sucker for an attractive British chick with an attitude who sings beat-laden pop music about whatever, I don’t care. “Shut Up And Let Me Go” and especially “That’s Not My Name” are like musical crack – once I’ve got a taste I can't put it away, and there is no going back.

As far as “old” musicians releasing new albums, there were many this past year. Two I really enjoyed were Jack Bruce and Robin Trower’s Seven Moons, and Tom Petty’s regroup of sorts with his original band Mudcrutch. Neither feel like oldies remakes, but rather clear and relaxed new creations that the artists obviously put some effort into. Both are a pleasure to listen to.

*****

So there you have it. I’ve left some stuff out (space considerations) and have not said all I want to about some of the stuff included (ditto), but this is a decent representation of a loy of what I found compelling musically in 2008. I only hope 2009 holds as much in store.

*****

A Chip Off The Old Blockhead

Sweet Child Of Mine

My oldest is 16 now, and he is a handful.

He is bull-headed, for one thing, and has a mouth on him; and he has developed into a complete and total smart-ass.

Tall, broad-shouldered, and stylish, he has to be “cool” at all times. He seems to do well socially, and has many friends. His damn cell phone goes off almost continuously. Right now he is trying to string two girls along, one a sophomore (his age), and the other a senior at another high school. I stay out of his personal business as long as he keeps his grades up, which he has managed to do so far.

He has an after school job, and his driver’s license, and a vehicle of sorts. A 1991 Toyota Corolla, kind of off-red, I guess you’d call it – I'm not sure if that is a factory color, or the result of major oxidation. Anyway, the car is well-used, but it runs okay. Needless to say, I got it cheap.

As soon as he got the car, my son cleaned it up and then went out and bought a decent stereo system to put in it. Thanks to that, I can usually hear him coming home now when he is about halfway down our street.

He plays baseball, and loves hanging out with his friends and listening to music. He has some vague ideas about what he wants to do with his future, but nothing definite. To tell the truth, I don’t think he worries about it or even gives any of that stuff much thought at all. He is a “live for today” sort, as best I can tell. Good for him.

We get along all right, usually. I have always had to be the parental hard-ass when it comes to major transgressions, but the truth is I cut him a lot of slack most of the time; because he is a good kid basically, and because I want him to have fun. I never expected a saint, and have always assumed there would be mischief here and there; which I usually find amusing, as long as he is good about the important stuff.

His relationship with his mother bothers me a little, though. Since around the time he turned 13, he and my wife have often been at loggerheads, as they say. I think that is mostly because, personality-wise, they are a lot alike. Occasionally their set-tos turn nasty, and we end up with a verbal death match going on, usually right in the middle of a good show on the TV. That drives me (and my other son) up the wall. I stay out of it if I can, unless things go too far. Open disrespect and name-calling is where I draw the line.

*****

Now, take the above several paragraphs and change a few ancillary details, and you pretty much have me at that age, 30-some years ago. It’s weird. I suppose I should not be surprised, because I basically raised him to be this way, but. . . it is like looking at myself sometimes. I think that is why I tend to be lenient with my boy; although I also wonder sometimes how it is my own parents kept from killing me when I was 16. I can see now I gave them plenty of reasons to.

*****

Turning Over A New Rock

Looking Ahead/Looking Back

Happy New Year!

Needless to say, most people will be hoping 2009 is a better year, overall, than 2008.

Personally, 2008 was a year I saw my real income (adjusted for inflation, the national debt, and all kinds of other crap totally out of my control) stay static or decrease for the first time in a long time. Hurricane Ike was a horror-fest of epic proportions in these parts, most people know the details by now, I won't bore anyone with my own. I lost three friends, to "natural causes" (at least partly caused, naturally enough, by years of youthful excess.) Those friends were all my age (and youthful excess was something I had more than a passing familiarity with), so that made me think a little.

On the other hand, I still have a decent job. A lot of people do not. The house is paid down so far that when we refinanced it early last year, the monthly note was less than I used to pay for rent on a one-bedroom apartment twenty years ago; so I am not too worried about foreclosure. Due to some personal financial machinations made prior to the current economic "downturn" (serendipitously made without any real inkling of what would soon come to pass), we are relatively sheltered from the current hard times.

Hurricane Ike was a lot worse for most other people around here than it was for me. I have my looks, and my health. God loves me. So does Mother Nature, apparently.

So I have a lot to be happy about, really. Happy New Year!

*****