Trocadero Fusion

Where could I be going? Why was I there? How could I be doing this to myself?

Sure, logical questions all. Fed from despair and angst, Leo gazed into the smoky crowd. In a few years no one will smoke indoors any more. But tonight the Djarum  and Gitane haze is thicker than lentil stew.  The counterpoint of the wailing jazz was overwhelming. It was no longer a dance crowd. The band had changed at midnight and Eckstein's mellow baritone was replaced with the squeal of Miles' horn. The world was changing. The Dead had opened for Davis at the Fillmore the week prior and no fan of Davis bop knew what to expect next. The quintet tonight was Miles, Jack De Johnette on drums, Chick Corea on keys, Dave Holland on bass, and a very young Wayne Shorter on Soprano Sax.

"My brother would love this," thought Leo. He hadn't seen Steve in almost thirty years. At one time they were closer than brothers, almost of one mind. But time and marriage and 13 states puts a lot of distance between people.

*************************************

While Miles was running the Voodoo down inside, Pondering Pig was out in the parking lot, looking for fresh air in the smoggy Los Angeles night. The plan was that he and Patrushka were going to head out to a longshoreman bar out in San Pedro called "Tillie's" to score a lid of sinsemilla from a merchant marine named "Tanker" Calhoun before the morning's long road back to Stinson Beach.  

Patrushka was still in the powder room with Claudette, but everyone knew her as Lily Carcajou. 

"Blast it all," Pig mumbled to himself, "Damn Lily always stalls when she's in the head."

Patrushka was in the lounge area, waiting for Lily who was laughing and lecturing the towel girl. She was impatient to get out to the Pig. Not because they had a 40 minute drive to San Pedro, but because she missed him. On top of that, being in the women's room with Lily always seemed to turn into some kind of weird adventure.

"No, Kiddo. I'm from Saint Mande. It's Paris but it's not. get what I mean? It's like this is Hollywood but it's not L.A. France, baby. France." Lily was always itching to explain France to what she called "Boojwah Yankees".  She was born there, left at two weeks old and had never been back. Yet she was the expert.

"Hey, Lily. Pig's waiting We have to go". Patrushka'd had enough and started out the door.

"I'm right behind you, " Lily hollered back. 

Lily dashed for the exit and almost trampled the young and sinewy kid outside the door.  He was dazed by Miles' horn and the acid-drenched wail of the band.

"Watch where you're going, you big palooka," she hollered as he fell to meet the wood of the floor. They would meet again, though this would be their only pleasant circumstance.

Patrushka stood at the Sunset exit, impatiently holding the door for Lily, soon to be Claudette, soon to be left on the side of the road if she didn't hurry up. Pig had started his Studebaker and revved the 8-cylinder Power Hawk impatiently. It was going on 1 and "Tanker" would not be happy.

The gals fairly leaped into the car and they were off like a bullet into the warm L.A. night.

Leo was still on the floor, bruised and dazed by his encounter with the wild woman who he'd never even seen face to face.

Not yet, anyways. 

"Let's play it first and talk about it later." -Saint Miles

Femme Fatale at the Trocadero

This beautiful woman with a German accent walks in throught the Strip entrance. She was no stranger to the weird and elegant. The Trocadero was just the place for her to hang out. She'd met Bob, Mick and Keith both had a thing for her, as did Lou Reed and John Cale.

No wonder. She was a doll.

**********************************

Anyways, the house lights had dimmed, as Billy Eckstein takes the room. Accompanied by Earl Hines' "Grand Terrace Orchestra" all Pig could think was "Man, can they wail and baby do they bop." The Pig was taken back from his daydreamer's nirvana. Billy was big stuff, the real deal.

"Gosh," thought Pig. "Hearing Billy sing "Stormy Monday" really gets me, strikes me to the heart. Where does that beautiful Baritone crooner sound come from?"

Where indeed...
***********************************

But the beautiful German gal was where everyone else's attention was. Even Peter and Allen were roused by her presence. She cut the perfect figure in this club of glamour, this Nico woman. Funny, sounds like Nitsa. But, none the less, she was a star in the night's crown.

Disco was still a few years away, though some could hear the soul and funk starting to slip in under the door. Tonight Eckstein still held court.

Nico sat at the side bar, escorted by Andy. He was the king of Pop, an artist and a music producer. Many laughed at his personna, but he died and Southeby's took 9 days to auction all he left behind. Sorry. That jumps ahead too far.

Anyways, Andy had a Gin Fizz and Nico had Stoly with a Red Bull chase. Lou Reed was still somewhere in Manhattan, probably lost on the subway. John Cale had gone home to Whales.

**********************************

Leo sat in the cold mountain gloom, energized by the day's chill. Snow sat on the nearby peaks as the sound turned to spirit. What happens when the rattlesnakes lose their skin? The rocks tumble down and groove, riling the already hibernating bears.

Swoop, swoop. Rock, rock.

I digress from the Trocadero tale for a moment. XM is playing an updated "Alice's Restaurant", a mere 38 Thanksgivings later. Arlo sounds mature, more like his dad than ever before, yet young as the all-american kid that tilted with Whitehall Street back in the day.

Anyways, It's a time to be thankful, to reflect on how little grace is earned and how much given.

Life and family and friends... all that cliche stuff is forever real and. Add to those salvation, redemption, the ability to walk into tomorrow with some sort of confidence that all is right with this twisted and crazy world in spite of our human failings and foolishnesses. Throw in joy and happiness and the ability to make new relationships and, well, there's a lot to be grateful for.

Last week my family and I trekked to Gilbert, AZ, current home to Kirstie and Marc and young prophet Elijah. We've wanted to meet them since their recent relocation from the Republic of Texas. Add to the mix the fact that the Pondering Pig and the lovely Patrushka would be there and we had no choice but to make the journey.

It's funny how many years of age, thousands of miles of distance, and millions of seconds of experience can separate people and yet...

...and yet it's somehow like meeting yourself. I don't mean literally, maybe more like a reflection. It's meeting someone you can comfortably refer to as brother or sister. You know the same history and it affected you in the same sort of ways. When you can share recollections of good, bad, heartbreaking times and know them as similar experiences is a wonderful thing and that's what happened to us all the other day.

I've given up long ago the belief in fate or chance. It's more like a God ordained moment. Sometimes we just fail to recognize where those moments come from because we become so self absorbed we miss what is going on around and in spite of us. Me and the Pig and our families were destined to someday meet. Not just because of those ways we are the same but because of the ways we are different as well. We had fun and laughed a lot, those belly laughs that are for real and not just polite twitter between people thrown together for a few moments of uncomfortable relating. Nope, we sat in the kitchen for hours of story telling, swam in the pool, the kids played "Wii".

We stamped on the terra for the day and it was good.

Trocadero pt.II Salvation at the End of the Line

I am not given to subtle action or subtle re-action. Basically, I just jump in. I throw all the cards up, if you will, and watch to see how they land. Here's what happens next...


Peter, well known to the crowd, haunts the club tonight too. He cuts quite the figure in this place used to glitz. He is a straight shooter. At least he appears that way. He wears the years like the 3-piece Armani and the tri-tone shoes he normally sports. He dresses the part. He never looks out of place. His style is impeccable. He doesn't seek attention. Rather, attention seeks him. Tonight, though, is different. He sits near the kitchen with Ginsburg, reading and comfortably spooning Borscht. Tonight the huddled masses seem to not notice him


"Hey, Allen" he whispers. "Have you ever heard of this Bukowski guy? He sounds kinda seedy."

"No future," says Allen, "Just drunken dejection and rejection. A hollow canoli with no cheese"

"But what about McClure?"

"If you know Gaelic, you're fine. Me? I still struggle with Yiddish. Go figure."
**********************************
"I know I've seen that face somewhere," The Pig ponders to himself. "Maybe down in Mexico or, perhaps, a picture up on somebody's shelf." Patrushka had left to powder her nose with Claudette, who had snuck in during Calloway's last number. "Why does he look familiar?" he ponders.

But then the crowd began to stamp their feet and the house lights dimmed. In the darkness of the room, the weird and glorious future began to settle into the Pig's mind.

"Maybe I'm a story teller," he ruminates. "Maybe I'm not just another parking bumper," he laughs surreptituously. "I see the northwest passage, mountains and snow. I see Sacajewea. I see a beat cowboy named Tutman struggling to be heard."

"Hey! What did you put in my tea?"

Is there more? There oughta be.
*********************************

The phone rings at 828 Milwaukee Street. It's a friendly call, but the Devil none the less.

"Wassup?" asks Leo, predating the phrase by a good generation at least.

"Have you considered the deal yet?" Scratch asks with a chuckle.

"Um, yeah. Can't do it."

"I figgered. You don't seem the type anyways. Get a better offer?"

"Nope. Just thought my eternal soul might come in handy one day. Besides, I'm like my dad. I never get rid of nuttin'.

"Ok, kid. Gotcha. Just don't forget that you know where I am when you need me."

'Need him?' Leo thinks to himself. 'Last thing I need is him'

Is there more? Of course... just not yet!

Andy Warhol at the Trocadero (part I)

I have a long space between posts and a lot of flow under the bridge. Funny what comes your way when you stop and shut up and listen and watch for a while.

I was driving and driving, it seemed for miles and miles. I took a right on Sunset and , low and behold, I see the driveway for the Trocadero Club. New in town, I turn in. The valet jacks my keys and sends me in. "They're waiting" he says.

I walk in and see Irving Thalberg towards the back, right, corner of the club. Chico and Harpo are sitting in their boxers, toasting marshmallows over an impromptu fire set in the middle of the booth. Groucho is going crazy. Seems the Warner Brothers are suing over the use of the name Casablanca in a Marx movie. Groucho raves, "Maybe we should counter-sue, We were brothers and successful long before they were even done soiling their diapers."

Ingrid Bergman (her real name is Sigrid) is in the opposite corner, sitting with a mug that resembles Capone. He's trying to be witty and looking pretty tony, what with bodyguards and all. She seems bored to tears. "We'll always have Paris" is all she can think. Then that Bacall gal comes in and Ingrid gets up to leave.

"Sorry Al. I have to go. Bob Rosselini is meeting me at ten."

A tear formed in Al's eye, lamenting his fate as mug and thug. He knew Ingrid wouldn't be back

****************************************

Three tables back frim the stage sits the Pondering Pig and his new gal, Patrushka. They are star-eyed and obviously in love. What has the Almighty got in store for them?

The Pig, red-haired and witty, has captured her attention in that way that us guys call, "the look". Yup, she's got it.
"Would you like a frozen banana whoositz?".

"I don't know. What are they like?"

"Sweet, baby. Just like you."

She laughs and smiles into his shining eyes. He smiles and snaps for the waiter.

***************************************

Two thousand miles away, in the throes of the Nixon/blues midwest, a young lad searches, seemingly aimlessly, for the importance of this existence. He laughs and cries and, in the last quarter of the American Century, searches for what little meaning is left in this land of the free and brave.

In short, he plods forth, seeking what the Pig has already found.

"Been here before, baby?", he lamely queries.

"Didn't we go to different high schools together?". That one always got a laugh.

Leo is young, still unsure of what is in store and certainly not ready for what the next 35 years have in store. It all resembles a crap-shoot and not a pretty one for sure. He gets a gift for his current dispensable gal and walks on, alone.

Next installment sometime soon

Don't Bogart That Joint, My Friend.

Took a hike, a wee ramble around God's green earth today. Never know what you're gonna find. Low and behold, what presents itself in a desert arroyo? A little piece of nostalgia. A stalk of something foreign to most viewers or readers, at least in it's native wildness. No more to say. The site is hidden and I will be going back to journal this little plant's maturing. Live long, rasta herb.

Verizon Cell Phone Image by Leo

Time out of Mind

Consider, if you will, three men of equal age and time . As much as we think we don't change, we most certainly do. All but the last man, er, pig.

First look is at the curly headed genius behind the whole concept of a wall of sound.

Hey, kids, it's Phil Spector

Then there's this guy. Kinda looks like someone's Uncle Stan. Well, he is. He lives in Queensland, Australia and makes jewelry. Pondering Pig or Foghorn will recognize him from, maybe, the Palo Alto Acid Test. This is Augustus Owsley Stanley III. I guess Dragnet was wrong about what Acid will do to you.

Then there's this last guy. Same boyish twinkle in that ever-pondering eye. Been to Owsley-land. Seen all Spector's bands. Still haven't found what he's looking for, but he's seemingly happier than ever.

Unless, of course, he's playing Edith Piaf songs. Note the exuberance and near-terror in this old duffer's face. Maybe it was the egg-salad sandwich.

Well, now this is much better. There's that boyish twinkle. Yeah, both of them.

The Bus to Never-Ever Land

Well, see. It goes like this... Gentry enjoys dinner . He uses the hat as some sort of shill, a kinda cover for something. God only can answer what.

I have ended up in exile, in a cyclone of my own creation, a symbol of my own intrusions in the life of too many people. They are pissed at me but, yet, they don't begrudge my presence. They love me and allow me the place to screw up. They stand next to me when I give up and cry my eyes out. They love me no matter what.

Escapin' through the lily fields
I came across an empty space
It trembled and exploded
Left a bus stop in its place
The bus came by and I got on
That's when it all began
There was cowboy Neal
At the wheel
Of a bus to never-ever land

How High the Moon

I heard it, coming from behind the Abernathy Building. I heard tonight what Dean heard, sitting in that club, listening to Slim Gaillard croon/chant “How High the Moon”. The highway is for gamblers and Dean was the “Yes” saying gambler prophet of the madness, the groove I grew through. But then, when Slim went on about potato salad, I knew what Dean heard, that source of the “Yes, Yes, Yes”.

Forget the dead you left, the living is in the breath as much as in the words. The holy covering is the howling at the moon, the crooning at the shapely temptress at the Casbah. I saw the moon come down tonight, crashing through the western storm like a rose slashing through the skeleton of Omar Khayam, like a flash from the prophet blowing the pneuma of God through the impending darkness of a city gone bad; a soul destined for Hell but somehow blown by the breath back for redemption.

Now is the time of redeeming, trading in that old piece of tattered paper that has no value, that coupon I kept for so long, the one with no date on it. Bring in that piece of worthless shit and suddenly find that it has huge count and a worth beyond measure. Somehow, the cherished scrap means more when you trade it in, when you give it back. It’s not the same. Things have changed.
Yeah, old Slim Gaillard raving into the microphone brought Dean into a new year, a new age beyond value. I heard the rave continue, the redemption of the word, the original Holy Goof breathed on the prophet, long before the train tracks took him away. It was the Slim of ’48 and the Adonis of Denver and the word was still fresh. The breath of the spirit was strong, as strong as it is now.

The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death

Seems the chickens are finally coming home to roost. The long-dark night of the soul is finally at it's darkest and the cold soul-searing breath of death seems almost imminent.

"This is the story of America. Everybody's doing what they think they're supposed to do. So what if a bunch of men talk in loud voices and drink the night? " OTR, Part 1, Chapter 10, page 68.

Supposed to do? What are we supposed to do? I am alive in exile, alone in the crowd of the late afternoon laundromat. My clothes are in the final spin, the final spin.

Walking alone is sometimes what I've perferred, but not any more. As comfortable as I am with myself, I yearn for the presence of the other, the one I've forsaken. She's the one I've loved, and yet have forsaken. Thinking backwards, I craved freedom. I searched for the moment of release and the chance to be liberated from this soul-less situation I've made for myself.

But now here I am on the brink of release, about to be set free after my 22 year sentence, and what do I want?

I want to make peace. I want to revel in the past but dance hysterically into the future with the woman I love with all my might. What has changed? Not a lot, but everything at the same time. I want to live and eventually die in the arms of that woman I really do love.

My best intentions are what have gotten me here, those notions of doing what I think I'm supposed to do. Hell, my best intentions are the ones that continually get me in trouble. Frankly, I'm tired of being in charge. I've done and seen all those things (well, most of them) that we want our children to never even consider. I've been obnoxious. I've been unconscious. I've been so weird it would have killed a norrmal man. I've been all kinds of things that are hard to spell.

Right now, baby, I'm done. The old hymn isn't "I surrender 10%". No, sweetie, I surrender all.


My friend, the Presbyterian monk/pig, wanders with his rucksack into the fiction and fables of a life loved and remembered, and here I sit waiting for the dryer to scream at me to take my bloody clothes out and fold them. A quiet life is good but a sad life ain't nothing but sad.

An Old Day Now

I have sea scallops for dinner tonight. They are good. I was an impulse buyer at the grocery store today. A young fella was giving samples back by the seafood counter. People, for some reason I don't comprehend, tend to avoid the seafood counter.

Anyways, the young man asked me if I wanted to try one and I said "Sure".

So here I sit, eating 2 pounds of scallops, praying to the Almighty that I don't get a flare-up of gout after this.

My imagination has taken me in way too many directions in the last few weeks. I have entertained seriously a re-living of my past, hoping and praying that my past was somehow going to bring me some peace and take me to where I needed to be. Somehow, it did.

I realized that what I knew all along was right. I saw that the past was a wonderful place to be but not where I was. I saw faces of people I've loved and lost right along side people I've despised and wished gone. Alas, some are dead. Right now I miss even the ones that I despised and wished gone.

But I digress. The past, buddy. The past...

I'm just about through with the scallops. I had some cracker bread with them and a little bit of some kind of Irish beer. I think I overdid the pepper seeds on the scallops though. No matter, I'll have another beer.

I was blue this afternoon, more than I've been in a long time. I realized how much people count on us, even when we aren't there to support them. I saw a face of sadness I never expected to see, looking at me for the last light, the last flicker of a flame near gone. I felt the blues in my heart as I drove the other direction, into the black clouds of real life. The soothing rain fell on me as I drove. It washed nothing away, just cooled the heat.

Where do you go when you feel like there's nowhere left to go? Is that the end or, maybe, a new beginning?

I don't know. If I knew the way, I would take you home.

He Was A Friend Of Mine

No, He still is.

Photo by J.R. Breuer

My friend Paul Breuer died this past Sunday morning. He has been sick for a while, but died rather suddenly. He knew he was dying but didn't really know what from. I will miss him a lot.

Paul came from the midwest, like me, and ended up in Arizona for the rest of his life. He was a gracious and gregarious man. He fixed cars for a living and shot people in the streets of Tombstone for fun. He was an actor and a clown of sorts. He was a husband, father, grandfather and friend.

Paul was the kind of guy that, when you go to his funeral you can't be certain who will show up. He walked with bikers and hippies. He stood tall with civic leaders. He knew the down-side of life, but lived for the betterment of the people around him. His acting, in films and on the streets of Tombstone, were for the benefit of charities for children. He did it all for fun, but he did it all out of love. He was a gunfighter, preacher, local character. None and all were him at the same time.

For personal reasons, I knew him well. We'd see each other very irregularly, even though we lived only a few miles away, but whenever we were together, it was like the last time was just yesterday. He knew me and I knew him like very few people can say that they do. He was rough around the edges, but he was a perfect man.

I saw his wife, J.R., the morning before he died. She said he was feeling poorly, but they were OK.

All I wish is that I could have seen him that one last time and laughed about how my beard would never equal his. Believe me, I tried, but he was always the king.

He still is.

Essence of the Age

"Don't punish me brutality,

talk to me so you can see

what's goin' on..."
-Marvin Gaye "What's Going On" 1971

What is the spirit of the times we live in? What are the defining moments of this age? I know. It's hard to tell. Generalizations are difficult but they work well as tools, as unofficial measuring sticks of the paradigms we hold to.

Times past, we had religion or science or the need to explore or the need to investigate. In the recent past it was attempts to free our troubled minds, spiritually or chemically, to stop feeling the madness, to stop feeling the pain. We had goals, good or bad, but we had a defining direction.

Starting from the late 1800's, we had the age of Neitzche, we witnessed the breakdown of thoughtless religiosity and ignorance. We wanted to be better people, intellectually and, I believe, morally. From there, we segued into the age of Freud and clinical attempts at explaining how our weird little psyches work. At the same time we had the parallel age of Einstein, the making sense of the physical world we seemed destined to eternally inhabit. The last half of the American century was one of cold war paranoia but the greatest era of exploration since the British ruled the seas. Kids and inquiring adults read Huxley and Kesey, Malcom X and Gandhi, Kerouac and Wolfe. We were a nation of astronauts and pranksters and freaks, all yearning to be free.

But what are we today? Have we succumbed to the brutality that Marvin Gaye lamented in his song? We destroy our enemies as we always have, but we brutalize our children as well, children killing parents in retaliation.Even our children's play shows it. When boys used to play "war" they tended to take prisoners. Now they just die, unless it's in a video game and they have earned enough extra lives to finish the game.

We insult and degrade each other regularly. I'm not talking about the occasional bad joke or mis-used word. No. We insult and degrade each other because we disagree. We terrorize, slaughtering innocents and guilty along the way, with virtually no discrimination. Regard for life does not exist as it once did, as it should. I'm beginning to suspect we have no spirit of this age, no zeitgeist. We wander thoughtlessly as well as aimlessly, but always cruelly.

"Mother, mother

There's too many of you crying

Brother, brother, brother

There's far too many of you dying

You know we've got to find a way

To bring some lovin' here today"

Waiting

Look at them working in the hot sun
The pilloried saints and the fallen ones
Working and waiting for the night to come
And waiting for a miracle

Somewhere out there is a land that's cool
Where peace and balance are the rule
Working toward a future like some kind of mystic jewel
And waiting for a miracle

You rub your palm
On the grimy pane
In the hope that you can see
You stand up proud
You pretend you're strong
In the hope that you can be
Like the ones who've cried
Like the ones who've died
Trying to set the angel in us free
While they're waiting for a miracle

Struggle for a nickle, scuffle for a dime
Step out from the past and try to hold the line
So how come the future takes such a long, long time
When you're waiting for a miracle?

-Bruce Cockburn, 1970

Endless Highway

"I ain't often right

but I've never been wrong

It seldom turns out the way

it does in the song

Once in a while you get shown the light

in the strangest of placesif you look at it right."

-Robert Hunter "Scarlet Begonias" 1974

I have a really hard time, sometimes, when it comes to holding contrary notions. Don't lie, we all do it. It can be as simple as answering a question "maybe" or "maybe not". Other times, it's holding on to ideas like "look before you leap" and "he who hesitates is lost". The reality of existence is the biggest one. We grow and mature, experiencing so many things in a lifetime, then we either get wise or make the same stupid mistakes over and over. The equalizer here, we're all gonna die alone, doesn't exactly make for a lot of comfort.
Peace through warfare. Being uniquely made but trying desperately to blend in and be the same. We get bombarded with the ideas of liberty and freedom and then we bicker and insult those that disagree with us. You know, the "Annoy a Liberal... Annoy a Conservative..." ethos that so many supposedly sane and open minded people hold to.

I won't even approach the racial topic. Not yet anyways.

I don't pretend to have answers and, frankly, anyone that says they have soild answers to these dichotomies is probably lying, or at the very least justifying behavior with some dogmatic rationale that's loaded with contradictions too.

Life is fun, face it. But, alas, life is confusing and depressing too.
"Life is sad

Life is a bust

All ya can do is do what you must.

You do what you must do and ya do it well,

I'll do it for you, honey baby,Can't you tell?"

-Bob Dylan "Buckets of Rain" 1974

Time off for Good Behavior

The one and only time I have been a guest of the state was a couple years back. I served one night in the county slammer for a DUI.

I'd had a couple of beers, see, and I got pulled over for going too fast in a 50 mph zone. I burped while the cop was talking to me, otherwise it'd just be a speeding rap, possibly just a warning.

Don't believe anything about legal drunk levels. Most states now have a zero tolerance, which means even a trace can get you busted. If you take a blow test and it registers anything, they can pull you. If you refuse the test, they can pull your license for a year.

Anyways, the Judge gave me the light sentence, 10 days suspended and 24 hour in stir.

I walked to the jail from a friend's house, leaving my car there. I checked in at 7:00 am, had to leave all my belongings but boxer shorts and socks in a locker. I got my issue of orange prison garb and blanket and got locked in a 16x20 with 3 other guys and a steel toilet with no seat. Two guys were sleeping and the third, no more than 25 years old, was sitting and crying. Actually, they were all 3 under 25, making me the old man.

It was far from quiet. There was a woman down the corridor in a cell by herself, ranting and screaming

By 7:30, the other two were awake. I got the "Whatcha in for?" and I told 'em. They'd been in for that before, even seen the same judge, so we had something to talk about.

I asked the one fella, Juan, what he was in for and he said, "You ain't gonna believe it. I got busted for giving water to an illegal immigrant and her kids." I replied that I didn't think you could get busted for that, to which he replied, "Well, I hit the cop and tried to run. They found a half pound of pot and a gun under the seat of my car." We all laughed, except for the wimpering kid who let out a most mournful sob.

After a scrambled egg and toast breakfast, they took Juan and his pal Emil off to see the judge and get arraigned. They were replaced by a fella named Mark, doing his 24 hours like me. About an hour later they brought in a guy of around 30 who was sloppy drunk from the night before. Turns out he'd been on a bender for the last 2 weeks and his father turned him in because he stole his car and ran for Mexico. That guy slept fitfully most of the day and puked most of the night.

Nothing to do in a cell like that but talk or sleep or go to the toilet, all of which get old after a while. Lunch was a bologna sandwich and warm coffee.

Mark, the new guy got chatty with the sad kid after lunch, calming him somewhat. Mark told him about living in Lordsburg, New Mexico and getting busted one time in '95. While he was in the holding cell, the Sheriff's daughter brought him lunch and let herself into the cell. By this time, we're all roaring with laughter and the kid is finally relaxed. He asked Mark what he'd been busted for to get such a great time in jail and Mark said, "Shooting my brother-in-law because he shorted me on a smack deal".

So much for calming the kid down. The afternoon progressed quietly, except for the snoring. It's amazing how much sleeping you can do and still not have the time move quickly. That afternoon felt like a month, but I guess that's the idea. Through all this, the drunk guy would shout out incoherently every few minutes. All the while I was hoping I'd be out of there before he started to detox.

I read every Sunset, Reader's Digest, Good Housekeeping magazine in the place, forgetting everything I read almost immediately.

By late afternoon, we were all pretty quiet, nothing to say. It was a cell with 6 bunks, so we were due for at least one more roommate as the rest of the cells were full. Around 4:15, we got our last man.

At first I thought I was asleep, dreaming this whole thing, but then I realized that the new guy was, well, something else altogether. He walked in with a cigarette in his mouth and a wool cap on his head. ALl I could think about was R.P. McMurphy out of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". How'd he get in with a smoke and a cap when the rest of us were stuck solely with the orange clothes and smoking was prohibited?

His name was Edward and he wanted to be called Edward. He was my age, about 45 at that time, He was loud and full of energy, arms like Popeye and a laugh that shook the bars. He'd been in a fight that afternoon with a cable installer. Edward came home to find his girlfriend sweet-talking the guy and he lost it, put the guy in the hospital with a broken nose. Then Edward told us all his stories of when he was a meter reader for the Electric Company and his numerous amorous afternoons "And I wasn't readin' just electric meters, if ya know what I mean."

The cops must have known this guy, as he was overly familiar with all of them, though they wouldn't let on. When he asked for extra food at dinner for himself and his buddies (us) they brought us extra dinner rolls and apples.

Edward was the real thing, bigger than life and full of vinegar. He would probably tell everything he ever did, good, bad, whatever and do it with relish. Not out of ego, just enthusiasm for living. He was the kinda guy that would plead guilty and mean it, remorseful for having done wrong, but not going to beat himself up over it.

We spent the rest of the evening listening to his stories, a stint in the Marine corps in the 80's,doing time in Huntsville, working as a drill operator on an oilfield and working the tankers in Port Arthur. Interspersed were stories of fights in Vegas, amorous encounters with girls of 18 through women of 60-plus.

Night came and the cells were darkened. They never shut the lights off all the way, gotta keep an eye on the inmates. The 4 of us slept fitfully, the drunk waking with the shakes and wretching every half hour or so, the kid sobbing into his blanket, me and Mark grumbling how freakin' tired we were gonna be tomorrow.

Edward, however, slept like a newborn, though his snoring shook him a couple of times. He'd laugh in his sleep, making us think he was content, happy as a clam to be getting some peace and quiet.

The next morning I left at 7:00. The other four remained. I never saw them again.

Peace Train

This is a link to a short slide show sent to me from Saleh Ara, a young man who resides in Tehran. It depicts scenes, people, and activities in a place most of us in the west will never really see except as it is portrayed in American media. This little show puts a more human face on people that some of us know absolutely nothing about.

http://www.lucasgray.com/video/peacetrain.html

Ideal images of Tehran? Undoubtedly so. It just seems to me that a balance has to be made between what we imagine the "Evil" empire to look like and what it really looks like. It would be hoped they could do the same, but that isn't our responsibility. I don't believe change takes place while we sit back and wait for someone else to do it.

I can, in the end, control and change only two things in the world and they are the things I think and the things I do. Pretty simple, right?

Saleh Ara was born in Tehran in 1982. He is a university graduate and works as an agronomist. He is an amateur photographer and maintains a photoblog www.8pmdaily.com. He posts at, you guessed it, 8pm daily Tehran time.

My Brother Esau

I have been perplexed for years by the story of Jacob and Esau. It's a story of betrayal, lying and outrright theft. But the liar, thief, betrayer is the chosen one, the father of the tribes.

Consider this for a while. Mom and dad both have their favorites. One, by tradition, will get the blessing and become the patriarch when dad kicks. The other takes advantage of his brother's hunger, deceives his father, runs off, marries his cousins and, eventually, comes to grips with the fact that the desert isn't big enough for him and his brother and he'd better go back and make peace.

"Esau holds a blessing; Brother Esau bears a curse.

I would say that the blame is mine But I suspect it's something worse.

The more my brother looks like me, The less I understand

The silent war that bloodied both our hands.

Sometimes at night, I think I understand." *

Finally, after getting his head together, Jake starts back home. Worried? No doubt. On the way, he wrestles with God. Now, about 30 years ago I knew a fella who wrestled professionally, Chris Multerer and I can honestly say he'd whup the tar out of anyone. The time he wrestled Jesse Ventura in '79 was a real hoot. But I digress...

Anyways, the notion of wrestling with God is where I was going. God clobbered Jake and let him live, dislocated his hip and sent him on his way. Jake hobbles off with his herds in front of him to make peace with his brother, who welcomes him with open arms and a heart of forgiveness. Esau has plenty and is just happy to see his lying, low-down brother.

But who does God pick? Yup, Jake. Why? Because, that's why. Jacob, now Israel, becomes a mighty nation and Esau is left to wander the world forever.

"It's brother to brother and it's man to man

And it's face to face and it's hand to hand...

We shadowdance the silent war within.

The shadowdance, it never ends...

Never ends, never ends.

Shadowboxing the Apocalypse

And wandering the land."*

*Words by John Perry Barlow

Copyright Ice Nine Publishing; used by permission

I Don't know...

For some reason, life is kicking my sorry butt right now. Nothing seems right, the things I live are somehow askew, the everpresent God is, somehow, out in the ether somewhere. Love and joy are, somehow, amiss.

Don't get me wrong. I live for acceptance. I struggle for peace. I pray for forgiveness. But, yet... And, yet...

Why am I out on the streets? Why is a good night's sleep so hard to find? Why does God seem so far away?

I mean, I call him and get no answer. I laugh and tell a joke and say, "That's pretty funny, eh?" ahd get nothing. I cry and get no comfort.

I cry and get no comfort.

Some tell me all kinds of explanations for it. Most have an answer. Everyone says pretty much the same thing...

"God ain't listening, boy. Stop whining and get on with it."

Ok, so I get on with it. Now what?