The Wait

The poets write and the singers sing,

And the movies move me to tears.

All speak of that, which I have never seen,

Though, I have never ceased searching the years.

All bring to bear that longing so deep,

So deep that I burn with the fear

I know too well it’s longing eternal

Endemic and permanent here.

To have those lips with breath so fleeting,

Caress the words I hold so dear.

With heart pounding, ear trembling I wait

Say it once

Say it please

Say it and mean it,

And tell me

I wait.

And tell me.

There, there.

I’m here.

Elves’ Bells

Memories are odd little things. While certainly burnished with time, they are no less valid touchstones that help us know where we have been. The very earliest ones come in mini snippets; flashes really. They seem almost like drunken points in time. Mine almost always have that wavy overlay that they sometimes have in old movies.

So many of my earliest memories revolve around Christmas. On the whole they are happy memories and for that I am very grateful. Amazing when you consider I’m not a rose-colored glasses type of person.

The earliest memories can’t be placed with an age. Who knew age? Time meant nothing back then. The world happened, time passed, and you went along for the ride. I can judge where some events happened based on my relative size to the world around me. Most memories, I think, come after the age of four. Mainly because that is when it all starts to ramp up in your life. It is also around that time you begin to be told you are a “big boy” and therefore need to give up most of the stuff that made life great. Like being carried.

Those were the days!

Walking too slow? Carried!

Too short to see? Carried!

Steps? Carried!

Puddles? Carried!

Special event? Carried!

I always liked it when my father carried me. He was a hard working devoted Dad who worked incredibly hard without complaint just to provide for his family. They don’t make them like that anymore. Because he was self-employed he pressed himself to the limit never allowing any rest until the job was done. This meant time with Dad was extra special because it was sometimes rare.

Dad often smelled of hard work, motor oil and metal. If, at a young age, you made a derogatory statement that you found the smell offensive or “yucky” you’d be immediately and firmly corrected by my Mother who would make it clear what you perceived was the smell of hard work and money and that every creature comfort you know is a result of that aroma. You quickly learn to like it or at least never mention it again.

I ended up in the former camp. It was Dad’s smell so I liked it. I still have a canvas bag of his tools that holds some semblance of that smell and it is treasured.

When I was so small that I could still be carried, there were really no malls, as we know them today. There was one regional mall that had several major department stores but it was basically a strip mall when compared to the complexes of today. One thing they did have back then that hasn’t changed is that they decorated them to the hilt for Christmas.

Because Mom didn’t drive, Christmas shopping had to wait until Dad wasn’t working and could take her to the shops. Santa was still real and not questioned so the shopping was even hidden from me at that time.

On one particular night way back when I remember one of those trips.

I clearly recall that when I was a tiny tot, I was quite the stylish chap. My Mom made sure of it. She bought special liquid that she’d put in my hair that would dry hard and crunchy. She said it would “train” my hair to part where she decided was best. I was a three year old with product. My shoes were always “Buster Brown” brand, his face next to his dog’s on the insole, and they always had a buckle. My winter coat was a thing of beauty. It was black and white wool hound’s-tooth. Belted, of course, it had large black buttons and a wide black fur collar. No hat, as I recall. Dad always wore wool watch caps but only when I was much older do I remember wearing them as well. They probably would have ruined my crunchy training hair. No gloves either. It was always mittens or nothing.

That night I was combed and dressed and put in the back of the station wagon. There were no car seats or seat belts in those days. I was of course expected to entertain myself. The grownups did their talking and I watched the smoke my breath made, rustling the fur around my collar. Yellow orangey street lights whizzed by through the fogged up windows and occasionally I was told to pay more attention as we passed a house that had been decorated for the season.

Radio Christmas music was only played beginning on Christmas Eve night and Christmas Day back then, so the radio was tuned to the news. I was safe and happy and as the engine warmed up the car’s heater was blasting just fine so I was in no hurry to get to the stores. But get there we did. We parked in on the end with Montgomery Ward. The façade had Christmas lights but that was not what I was there for.

As Mom left to shop, Dad and me stood in the frozen night air and without any words spoken I was hoisted into my father’s arms. His warmth and oily metal smell mixed with the smell of wool and cold and are burned into my brain as the smell of “winter”. The lights twinkled and echoing around me were the sound of carols rolling through the night air.

As Mom disappeared into Montgomery Ward, Dad turned me around to show me that on the other side of the mall was the thing that they had wanted to show me. On the roof of Bamberger’s Department store was a Christmas delight of sight and sound illuminated with large smoking spotlights.

On small scaffolding hung a series of bells. Around it, several mechanical elves each holding a hammer moved and twirled among several piles of wrapped presents, which I suppose they were “making” on the spot. Several others stood by the bells and struck each one to play out the carols that I had been hearing. I could feel my Dad tighten his grip and steady me as I squirmed and giggled with delight. He laughed too when he saw and my reaction. I pointed at the extravaganza and laughed out , “They are playing the bells!”.

I don’t know how long we stood there. I don’t know what carols played exactly or how many we listened to. But I will never forget that night.

Travels of My Aunt

Years ago I would receive occasional emails form my Aunt Betta Dudoit. I don’t believe we were even remotely related but I looked forward to tales of Aunt Betta’s exploits with and without her husband, Footsie. I recently found I still had some of those missives saved on an old computer and I share one of them here. 

My dearest one,

Why is it that Betta takes a holiday and all hell breaks loose?
Wars break out, terror plots are unveiled, David Beckham is “let go”…. Must Betta always keep the world spinning?
Betta cannot always be there making things “betta”! Ha! See what I did there? But Time away was needed and my darling Footsie and I made the best of it. The Algarve shall never be the same.

Footsie and I always try to get away at least seven times a year to rebuild, refresh, and reconnect. Life can be so tiresome don’t you agree?

Happily this midsummer foray was relaxing and uneventful. Not at all like the year we took advice from a shady acquaintance and actually ventured forth to spend a week on the shores of North Carolina’s outer banks.
North Carolina! Can you imagine?

What could we possibly have been thinking? There is a reason God invented passports and not to use them is a sin. North Carolina is home to all sorts of pests and vermin and in no time our relaxation was ruined when Footsie was attacked by chiggers!

He suffered terribly from those vile beasts, but Betta suffered too!
“Darling”, I would say, “don’t scratch at the chiggers!” It was so tiresome.
His scratching was bad enough, but it was the eventual oozing that really was too, too much to bear.

Of course these chiggers were nothing compared to the conger eel fiasco of ’95.
I’m sure you’ve heard the story for it is legend. Betta is on shore enjoying yet another coating of Bain de Soliel when suddenly Footsie pops out of the surf screaming, “Conger! Conger!”, at the top of his lungs.
Can you imagine?
What was Betta to think? Why should Betta think this is a call for help? Being wild for the dance as he is, Betta naturally assumed he called for a dance! Conga! Conga!
It was only about 20 minutes later, as the impromptu conga line twisted its way past Footsie’s contorted body in the sand that Betta realized something might be wrong. After all Footsie had called for the conga and it was only polite to join in, but there my Footsie lay.
Later that evening as the doctor explained that it was the worst conger eel attack he had ever seen, Betta did begin to feel somewhat sheepish.
The one positive side to all of this is that some of the infections from the chigger bites did seem to bring back feeling to those places that had lost it to the conger attack.
Kind of like that man who goes blind when he gets hit on the head and then years later regains his sight by being conked on the noggin again.

There is always a silver lining, yes?

Be well my love we’ll talk soon,

Betta

The Implication

The darkness was like a blanket that provided no warmth. The alley stunk of rotting garbage and human waste. There was no cleansing from the recent rain. Wetting things down only served to magnify everything bad about the place.

How can there be sand? It feels like sand. Footsteps shouldn’t grind.

This better be quick.

What am I saying? It is always too quick. If I could make it last I wouldn’t be here.

Is he even still with me?

You’d be surprised how many don’t have second thoughts. They left their perfectly normal, warm life and find themselves at the mouth of a piss stinking, rat maze of an alley yet have no inner voice telling them to stop. Or maybe they have that voice but just ignore it? Either way it’s because they want this. They want this more than they want anything at the moment.

I should talk? I’m here too.

I always smile when I think of someone wanting to know why.

Were you compelled?

Was there compunction?

Dramatically I could sob how I was compelled despite my compunction but the truth is I do it because I want to. It makes me happy. No further justification is there?

Here he comes, all backlit and horny.

“Damn this place stinks! Are you sure it’s safe?”

Rather than answer I stepped forward to press my mouth to his. His slight surprise relaxed into surrender. I love that. The surrender to the moment. The surrender to the pleasure. His tongue was nimble and thick and he tasted of milk. I took his hand and led him into the black.

My pace was not urgent as there really was a lot less light than I anticipated.

I pressed him to the wall and as our eyes adjusted to the dark I caressed his cheek with the back of my gloved hand.

“Are you gonna wear gloves? I mean for the whole thing?”

I reached between his legs and kissed his neck. The point became moot.

“Really surprised a well dressed guy like you even knows a place like this. That hat is like something out of an old movie.”

I took his hand and splayed him out against the wall, pressing and grinding, and finally covering his mouth again with mine just to shut him up. He pulled his mouth away long enough to utter some expression of pleasure.

Finally getting into the spirit!

I took his hand and rubbed it on my throbbing hardness. Letting go of his hand he just stood there. Some need more encouragement than others.

I reached down and released myself. Damn it was cold.

Putting my hand behind his head, I pressed downward. I nodded as well to make sure he knew what he was supposed to do.

His knees bent quickly and he was suddenly on me. The cold was no longer a concern. All hesitation was gone. From zero to sixty in nothing flat.

The repeated gagging sound was becoming a bit much so I held his head to slow him down.

He was blond. Dirty blond I guess you’d call it.

So engrossed in his task he didn’t notice me take my hand away and reach for my coat’s lapel. They will always comment on my hat or gloves. Or that they’d seen me before and I always wear grey. But no one, not one, had ever noticed the clasp on my lapel. Maybe they noticed, but they never said.

The gagging had started up again.

I placed my left hand of the side of his head cupping his ear and reached down ready to press the clasp into service.

I still haven’t mastered it yet. No matter how often, swift or stealthy I think I am, something gives it away. It’s sharper than it’s ever been. The edge is true. The cut will be clean. I pierce and slice thinking it is all too expert to be a surprise. But it is always a surprise. The pressure, the pain, the release…something…something always gives it away at the crucial moment.

And invariably, they always look up.

Remembrance of Springs Past

There are few things I miss more living in the tropics than the change of seasons. We have them here and they occur randomly around the various equinoxes and solstices and last approximately 13.25 minutes. Sometimes they occur in the middle of the night and you miss them entirely. Days really do just run into each other with little to no distinction. On the mainland, seasons meant changes were coming.

While autumn was always my favorite season (the holidays are coming!) and summer my second favorite (NO SCHOOL!), Spring was in there punching. The sensation of warmth and freshness during those first few days of the season are sure hard to beat. But Spring also seemed like a lot of work. You could fall into summer and cruise into fall but Spring took a lot of prep work. Homelife was picking up its pace.

When I was very young can remember my mother really taking “Spring cleaning” to heart. The windows would be thrown open, mattresses and bulky bedding would be moved out into the sun. The house was scrubbed from top to bottom. After the inside she moved outside. She seemed to really like evergreens so that first house of mine was surrounded by conifers, and Azaleas and Rhododendrons.

My parents would take the station wagon to the nursery and come back with huge bails of peat moss (loved by her preferred plants) and occasionally some young shrubbery. The bails were fascinating as they seemed bigger than I was and they were almost always yellow plastic stretched so tightly they begged for little fingers to punch their way through. As they lay in the sunshine you could see moisture condensing on the inside of the plastic and that only made the temptation more severe. When those bails were finally breeched the world became filled with the hot, moist aroma of peat that haunts me to this day and will forever mean “Spring” to me.

When you are a kid time passes and if things are supposed to happen, you rely on the grownups around you to handle that kind of stuff. At least it was that way in the good old days. I was but a leaf in the wind; told when to sleep, wake, eat, be educated, play, go to church, celebrate, etc. So somewhere soon after the advent of Spring I would be told it was soon time for the Easter Bunny to make an appearance.

Easter was so much more laid back than Christmas. Coloring eggs and eating ham didn’t seem to get all the hype Christmas did but it still meant a week off from school! I remember one Easter, Mom decided it was time to get back to the earth and she made the kids sit on the porch and grate our own horseradish. You had to do it outside otherwise the fumes would kill everything in the house that breathed. Luckily I was was little enough to pretty much avoid the labor and just enjoy my siblings cursing their fate and that wonderful nose clearing fragrance that was mixing with the warm Spring breeze.

Once back at school we would start rehearsals for our one major public performance of the year: THE SPRING CONCERT! At the time it was just another things I was told to do and never questioned. In retrospect I really should have asked why we were singing “ Rock A My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham” and a whaling song that featured lyrics about combing our hair with cod fish bones. One little ditty we sang made sense and I remember to this day: APRIL SHOWERS. Not a bad drag/porn name huh? The tune was easy to sing and featured that blind optimism that you could still believe in when you were 7 years old. 

I think I may have missed the Hawaiian Spring this year, I was probably in the bathroom. 

APRIL SHOWERS lyrics by B. G. De Sylva.

Though April showers may come your way,
They bring the flowers that bloom in May.
So if it’s raining, have no regrets,
Because it isn’t raining rain, you know, it’s raining violets.
And when you see clouds upon the hills,
You soon will see crowds of daffodils,
So keep on looking for a blue bird, And listening for his song,
Whenever April showers come along.

 

Follow the Script

I am always in awe of modern medicine. Ever watch a movie from 50 or more years ago? If it had any sort of medical plot line you might be as astonished as me to see how primitive things were just a few years ago. My how people suffered. Today, technology and chemistry has erased many kinds of suffering that were uncommon and untreatable just a few decades ago.

Having said that, I am equally in awe how quickly modern medicine has moved away from a compassionate side to become generally a money making machine. Marie Curie, Alexander Fleming, Jonas Salk; blessed people all. I could be wrong, but I don’t thing they strived for riches in their quests for their respective discoveries.

This financial side to medicine has become so transparent it is almost comical. I see it every time I visit my HMO. The doctor always seems to have a script to follow. If I don’t follow the script he seems truly stumped. I recently went to see him about something I was concerned about. When I asked him what he thought it was he answered “Oh. I don’t know.”, and changed the subject. He didn’t know because it didn’t follow the modern American medical script for high BP or high cholesterol or any other thing they could quickly prescribe never ending money making medicine for. Go in for a hang nail leave with a prescription for Lipitor. 

And don’t get me started on their newest money maker: Physical Therapy. I’m old enough to remember when it used to be used for rehabilitation. Now it is a cash cow. I’ll never forget going to the doctor for pain in my knee. When he prescribed physical therapy I wasn’t sure what it would be like but I sure didn’t expect what I got. I was expected to ride a stationary bike for 30 minutes while my twerp of a “therapist” sat on his ass and read PEOPLE. They were charging me big time of this “therapy”.  After 5 minutes I told him to stick it and walked out never to return. I took tylenol and carried on.

Now I see why people turn to alternative medicine. 

Dear old Dad always used to tell me, “If you go see a doctor, you will always be sick.” I didn’t understand what that meant when I was a kid but I get it clear as a bell now.

The Value of Civilization

I believe the english translation is “The perfume that makes you question the value of civilization.”

You certainly can’t question the value of a good ad man!

Smoldering and outlandish like CORIANDRE itself, I do believe this is the sexiest perfume advertisement I have ever seen.

Happy 4th of July!

One of the real gips in life is that it has to end, and often end way quicker than any of us would like. One of the issues we have when growing up is accepting death is simply a part of life. But it is still a gip.

It is also a gip that some things live longer than others. Why does a giant tortoise get to life for close to 100 years when your precious dog or cat has to check out in 15? Same thing with people.

Wouldn’t it be great if being a grandparent automatically extended your life for 100 years or more? I sure do, because boy I would like to get to know my grandparents now that I am old enough to honestly appreciate them.

Both sets of grandparents must have been simply amazing people. Not at all content with what they had “in the old country”, they left everything and everyone they knew and moved across the miles to a new country and began a new life.They not only sacrificed everything for their new life; but I can’t help thinking they also did it for the children they had yet to have and their children’s children.

I want to know how much they knew about a America. I want to know what it is they thought they knew about America and what their plans were and how well they got to live those dreams.

My Dad used to tell me the they knew the streets of America were paved with gold (figuratively not literally) and that everyone here was free. Free to do and be whatever they could be. They knew that the Statue of Liberty stood in New York Harbor and that her lamp was lifted beside the golden door.

Thank God they saw the light!

Happy 4th of July everybody!!

Rules Must be Obeyed

From the moment your mother first tells you “no” you learn to hate rules. From then on it is a slippery slope of pretty much nothing but rules. As my sister would say, “It’s what makes us different from the animals!!”

I guess. I could also argue that hair products also make us different from the animals but why bother? Suffice to say that if you are a well adjusted, law abiding citizen you have learned to live within rules…or more than likely…learned a fine balance of obeying some and ignoring others.

Hawaii is a great place if you like rules. There are rules for everything. There are rules for what route to take when you drive somewhere. There are rules for where to buy a certain food item and rules on how to eat it once you get it. There are also rules that dictate what gifts you will buy when you visit a certain locale and where you will buy them from. You get the idea. It really is part of the charm of life here.

It also gives me plenty of reasons to cover my ears and scream “ENOUGH WITH THE RULES!”

Rules that I live by vary but there are some that always seem to be in my top five:

1) Love God

2) Treat other people the way you would like them to treat you

3) Be charitable

4) Never pay retail

5) Never pass up a straight line

Some are easier to do than others so maybe it would be better to refer to these as goals as opposed to rules but I’m not going to pick nits. Some also seem more ruley than others.

Rules don’t always have to be a chore. Rules can be fun. Number 4, for instance. It is a challenging goal that can be fun and quite rewarding.

Number 5 is fun but has gotten me into quite a lot of trouble over the years. It took me a while to realize not everyone has a sense of humor. And some folks that do have a sense of humor may not have MY sense of humor. I’ve made a lot of friends following rule number 5. I have also alienated quite a few folks. It hasn’t stopped me, it has just made me more aware of how others are perceiving me. It hasn’t stopped me because it is a rule after all. And as we all know, rules must be obeyed.

 

 

 

I’m No Fan

It’s not in me to be a “fan”. Of course I like certain things, people, music, sports etc. But it just isn’t in me to be one of those rabid followers of anything. I don’t look down on people who do have it in them; heck it seems like most of the human race have it in them. Gees look at TV. Modern American television counts on the FANatical inclinations of the American public. “American Idol”? I could not care less.

I credit my parents for this lack of fanaticism on my part. They didn’t have it either. There was no idolization of any popular figure in my house. It wasn’t forbidden by any stretch. Much to my parents credit, they never inhibited or restricted those feelings on the part of me or my siblings. We were all allowed to go a little crazy for people or fads and my parents trusted that it was just normal childish behavior that we would eventually grow out of. I guess they were right.

Yes, gentle reader, I am old enough to remember the beginnings of a once popular singing group known as THE BEATLES. Ever hear of them? Talk about people that inspired fanatical behavior! They were liked in my house, even by my parents. My sister had little inflatable George, Paul, John & Ringo dolls. I can still smell their vinylly goodness. They were packed away after a few months. The real group’s popularity lasted way longer than my sister’s fandom.

I credit this upbringing to my parents’ belief that everyone was basically the same. No one was better than anyone else. You certainly needed to show respect or deference to certain people and institutions in your life, but that was really just protocol more than anything. We were never taught to think someone is better than us simply because of their job or their bank accounts. This type of upbringing tended to have the secondary aspect of teaching us not to envy someone else or be jealous of what they are or what they have. I am grateful that it has allowed me to be the kind of person that can share in someone else’s joy or good fortune.

And no I am not saying we are (were) saints by any stretch of the imagination. We are human for Pete’s sake and have the same emotions and foibles as everyone else. I’m just saying that as a family, I don’t think we have propensity for some behavior that is pretty much considered “normal”. So I guess that would make us somewhat abnormal.

To wit: my parents’ inability to take a compliment. I guess my folks were aware that there was a preponderance of negative humans out there because one thing they taught us to be aware of “the evil eye”. There was a little ritual to deflect that evil eye. Normal folks would just knock wood or throw salt over their shoulders. Oh no, not us. To deflect the evil eye, one must spit on the back of their hand and then smear said spit on their forehead. Repeat 3 times. All is well.

The evil eye would come to you as the devil himself; all sweetness and light and full of charm.  So you had to stand guard. Did someone just complement you on that new haircut? They were probably secretly giving you the evil eye. Did they tell you they have never seen a cuter baby than yours? EVIL EYE people!

Of course nowadays it is more likely that people will be cutting you down to your face rather than giving you a compliment which kinda takes the guess work out of whether you are being cursed or not. The internet sure has upped the ante in people cursing other people. Some attribute that to the anonymity of the internet encouraging bad human behavior but I don’t think people need to hide to act bad. Heck, if it will get them attention I think people will do anything to be looked at or heard.

I may not be a typical fan but that doesn’t stop me from following some well known people on Twitter. I do not own a single record by Bette, Liza, Judy, or Barbra….but I do follow Cher (@Cher) on Twitter. I feel it is my duty.

I have no idea if that person claiming to be Cher is in Cher. It is more than likely a cadre of PR people paid to tweet as Cher but that’s  not my problem. I follow nonetheless. One thing you will notice about Cher’s tweets if you follow long enough, is that she often wonders why people that seem to hate her, follow her. And not only follow her, but also tweet their dislike directly to her. I gotta say that is a head scratcher for me too. People will tell her she so stupid or makes no sense or that she retweets things wrongly. It is just bizarre.

If that is what being a fan means nowadays, I guess I’m glad I’m not one.