Oh Life, My Fickle Friend...

I feel like I have to write a little bit.  Also, I hate when writers or whatever say things like:  I feel like I have to write a little bit.  Congratulations to me, I am officially at the point in my life where I’m completely annoying myself, effortlessly and with full acknowledgement.

Anyhow, I’m still riding the unemployment train.  Won’t be for much longer, tho’.  We’ll see.  At any rate, I’m almost done (I think) with my MANUSCRIPT.  Oh, the omnipresent MANUSCRIPT.  But goddammit all anyhow…I know I said I was happily unemployed a few scant weeks ago.  But fact of the matter is I do miss one co-worker in particular:  Rita.  We’ve been in touch ever since the lay-off, but it’s just not the same as seeing her every day and chewing the fat together, talking shit about everything and everyone else in the world.   Just not the same. 

This woman Rita is so funny, I swear.   She’s got a heart of gold.   We worked together in the same office for nearly 12 (or 13?) years.  Very small neighborhood office, right on Myrtle Avenue.

When I first get hired, Rita has already been there for quite a few years.   She’s about 15 or so years older than me.  A trim, attractive blue-eyed blonde.  Queens all the way, hardcore.  Seemingly the quiet type but from the get-go, I sense she’s got some of the devil in her.  And I’m not wrong.

We moved our office location 3 times in the time I worked there.  It felt like we had to keep moving constantly because of some weird, retarded circumstances.   But anyhow this next story that comes to mind took place during the first month or something after I first got hired.

So I was a real “newbie” (ßI hate writers who use that word, too.  And now I’m annoyed at me again) at the time.  And me and Rita shared our office with this asshole AUDIOLOGIST woman who, I have no idea how she ever became an audiologist.  I don’t know what it entails to become one, but this broad was a complete mental patient.  Her name was Lisa. 

All she wanted to do all day was go across the street to BOSTON MARKET, or DUNKIN’ DONUTS.  Every minute Lisa would be running out the door, but coming to either me or Rita first to let us know: “I’M GOING OVER TO BOSTON (or DUNKIN) – SO IF ONE OF MY PATIENTS GETS HERE BEFORE I GET BACK, JUST LET THEM IN AND TELL THEM TO WAIT FOR ME…”  and EVERY FUCKING TIME, of course, her patient would arrive while she was still AT  BOSTON  and they’d be like 50 thousand years old and falling over and we (although it was usually Rita because she sat at the front reception area and I was mostly situated in one of the back offices) had to help the poor old person into the audiologist room and then they’d be waiting for that bitch LISA forever in there but she was too busy sucking down chickens or donuts or whatever and then the old person would eventually come out to either me or Rita (and we’d be totally swamped with our own shit)  and be like: “EXCUSE ME…BUT WHERE IS THE AUDIOLOGIST…IS SHE GOING TO BE BACK SOON?  BECAUSE MY SON/DAUGHTER IS COMING TO GET ME SOON AND…” and it would be a whole big thing because we’d be like: “Well, she’s across the street at Boston Market…” and they’d be like: “WHAT???? WHAT????” Because of course, they’re deaf.  They’re 50 thousand years old and deaf and that’s why they’re even HERE because LISA the AUDIOLOGIST is supposed to be helping them to get a new HEARING AID, only she’s NOT because she’s at fucking DUNKIN DONUTS…

So this one time, this jackass LISA just happened NOT to be at DUNKIN’, she’s actually in her little audiology room.  Actually on the premises.  And one of her patients comes in, this elderly woman.  And damned if this poor lady didn’t walk into the front door and BLAMM, falls right on her face, right on her nose and is bleeding like a mother all over the carpet.  Saint Rita jumps up to the rescue and helps this poor old lady, swabbing her nose, mopping up the blood all over the place and that crazy LISA bitch DOESN’T EVEN COME OUT OF HER LITTLE  AUDIOLOGY  ROOM.   No, instead she HIDES in there and never even came out until Rita has cleaned up the poor old lady and the worst of it was over.  Then this bitch comes out and is like: “Oh, hi!  I’m ready for you now!”  I’m ready for you now!   Holy shit.  That’s the kind of person she was.  A real prize.

But the absolute best Lisa-The-Audiologist-Debacle was yet to come…

* * * * * * 

MULTI -TASKING.

Chopping veggies for dinner

At my kitchen window

Whilst admiring one very

Fuchsia sunset...

Hard to chop whilst admiring,

But hey

Sometimes ya just do

What ya gotta.

When the wee Latino boy

From the next yard over

Starts belting it out

Like a nut:

 “WE WILL – WE WILL – ROCK YOU!

WE WILL – WE WILL – ROCK YOU!” 

Some lungs on this pipsqueak.

Funniest damn thing I ever heard. 

Yes, little Pablo – you may consider your job done. 

And t'is a job done quite well

On this fine early autumn eve…

Rock me you will, and

Rock me you have. 

You rock me like a

Garsh durn

Hurricane.

Crazy Day

Can you save me?

Because I can’t save you.

Unless

Saving you would mean

Forgetting me

Forgetting you.

Could you forget me?
Because I can’t forget you.

Unless

Forgetting you would mean

Not loving you

Not loving me.

Can you stop loving me?

Because I can’t stop loving you.

Unless

We somehow cease to be…

But that’s not something I

Foresee…

What makes us tick,

What throws us off…is

Scary but enlightening.

Shadow on the moon,

Damp wind in my window...

Hard to think what ever again

I'll ever perceive as frightening.

* * * * * * *

Dream Journal

I kept a dream journal for almost three years. 

It was a writing exercise.  You keep a little notebook on the night stand next to your bed, and as soon as you wake up – either in the middle of the night or in the morning or after a nap or whatever the fuck – you just write down whatever images or dreams happen to have taken place that you can still remember and you jot them down.  Stream of consciousness-style.  Nothing fancy, nobody to impress.  This is just an exercise that supposedly should enhance your writing abilities.

So I started my journal in 2008.  And I entered dreams and crap intermittently between 2008 and early 2011.  And I never re-read these entries.  I may have glanced at them briefly right after having written them down, but I literally have not looked at them in …ever.

When your sweetheart is going thru it in hospital, first thing you have to do is grab a notebook and start recording every step of every procedure of every doctor of every blood test of every question of every fucking thing you ever had a fucking inkling of writing down.  So you grab a notebook.

And when my honey was going into surgery and I was heading there to make sure I would meet him when he woke up, I grabbed the only notebook I saw, which was my DREAM JOURNAL on my night stand. 

And while I waited for him to wake up, I read 3 years’ worth of the dreams that led up to the place where we now reside.

 * * * * * * *

That's Alright, Mama

So.  Been working on a memoir for over 3 years now.  This summer was originally dedicated to editing the damn thing so I could finally shop an agent.   But I’ve been blind-sided a little bit.  So now I’m trying to get back down to brass tacks slowly.   No rush, really.  Everything in it’s time.

A couple weeks back was my 49^th birthday and I meant to post a preview clip from my memoir here on the BLOG thing, but my days got away from me. 

But I got a little work done tonite.  And so here it is. 

And I guess that’s all I gotta say for now. 

And the beat goes on.

* * * * * *

 “Elvis Presley, the first and greatest American rock-and-roll star, died today at the age of 42.  Mr. Presley, whose throaty baritone and blatant sexuality redefined popular music, was found unconscious in his home, called Graceland, in Memphis today at 2:30 P.M.” ~  * 

August 16, 1977  * ~ New York Times ~*

It is my 15th birthday.  I’m very excited because my parents are catering me a swell shindig up at Forest Park.  It’s a very hip and cool thing to do, admittedly, but this is as much an act of self-preservation for my folks as anything else.  I only say this because initially they said I could throw the party in our modest Queens backyard.  But that was until they got a gander of my guest list of 40 + people, at least a dozen of whom would be hauling guitars and various instruments of percussion and otherwise.  Okay!  The park it shall be!

So the arrangements are made:  Two six-foot-long hero’s, a few tubs of macaroni and potato salad and six cases of Budweiser on ice are to be delivered up to the Forest Park picnic area at 6:00 p.m. on a swampy-hot summer’s eve:  Tuesday, August 16, 1977.

I was at the beach earlier that day, but now I’m home - freshly tanned and showered.  The master plan is for me,  Janet and a few of my other best home-girls to get up to the park extra early.  We need to make sure everything is perfect, not the least of which entails securing a bunch of choice picnic tables and pushing them together.  Settin’  up camp.  Oh, and the 'piece de resistance' - we simply MUST score some good half-moon acid at The Dome, the park’s infamous drug-dealing emporium/flea market.   I mean – what are birthdays FOR, anyhow?

             I bound down the staircase in my parent’s house, taking 3 steps at a time.  Practically floating with anticipatory joy,  I am stopped dead in my tracks as I approach the kitchen doorway.

My mom is standing at the kitchen counter by the little red transistor radio we keep there for when we do the dishes.  Mom’s back is to me and so I cannot see her face.  Her shoulders are shuddering slightly and it takes me a moment or two before I comprehend with a shock that she is mutely sobbing.   Head hung low,  her very aura so uncharacteristically disconsolate that all I can feel is a frightened panic.

“Ma?”

She flinches at the sound of my voice.  Refuses to turn around.

Cold dread now: “MA.”

Stoic beyond reason and never one to show vulnerability – especially to her children - in retrospect I realize that this was a truly difficult moment for my mother.  She would have preferred to be alone in her grief.

But she also senses that I’m terrified, and finally turns around to face me - sniffling - her face flushed and hectic with tears.  She does not make eye contact.

“He died.”  Her voice is frayed with pain.

 “Who, Ma?”

 Sniff: “…I liked him so much…”

 “Ma - WHO DIED???””

She won’t say any more.  Can’t.  Instead turns the radio up so I can hear the tragic news about The King for myself.  All I can recall is feeling a surge of profound relief.

Me: “Jeez, I was so scared, Ma!  GOD!   I thought it was someone we KNEW!”

            No answer.  She looks utterly miserable, child-like with loss. 

            My mother is a small woman - barely 5’ 2” - as opposed to my own robust, 5’ 8” frame. Awkwardly, I pat her on the shoulder and rub her arm.  She’s not comfortable and neither am I, so I quickly stop.

Me: “I gotta go, Ma.  The food and everything is gonna be delivered so I need to get up there.”

Mom: “So go.”

Me: “Don’t be sad, Ma."  Pause.  "I’m sorry he died.”

Mom: “Go… GO.  Have fun.” She sniffs again, glances at me briefly: “Be careful.”

Then she turns away from me, turns the radio volume up.

I look at her trembling back one last time and think about giving her a hug, but I don’t.

Instead, I leave.

* * * * * *

Three years later when the horrific news breaks about John Lennon, I can’t help but recall my mom standing at that counter by the radio, and I also cannot help but identify with her need to suffer thru it alone.

* * * * * * *

 

  * * * * * *

Ouch, Honey

End of the day,

Tired yet true

Cement that is love…

That’s me and

You.

And cancer once again

Shows us

What we are

Or aren’t

Made of.

Heart-strings yanked

Barely healed wounds

Rubbed raw

New ones

Yet to

Come...

Go easy, now

We’ve spirit but

We're flesh, as well...

Too much, it seems

Only human,

After

All.

* * * * * * *

 

My Baby

* * * * * *

The boney limbs of a teenaged boy,

  You always make me think of.

As a pup, lashed against my

  Side each night…

   So’s not to destroy

    All that I supposedly

      Loved.

Your big, loopy grin

   And your grunt

     And your howl

       And your

Ears soft as silk

Soft as silk

Soft as silk.