tales from the year of the snake
Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done itunto one of the least of these my brethren,
ye have done it unto me.
Matthew 25:40
the least of these
682-683
684-686
687-688
689-691
692-694
... that he is searching desperately for the lesson and for the song and for the raison d'etre, that he wants to understand his own story and he wants you to understand it, and that it is the very best story he has right now to tell. If that's not enough, read something else.
Anne Rice: Memnoch the Devil
the vampire panther
695-697
698-701
702-704
705-708
countdown to aries
709-715
716-724
725-729
730-736
the season of the ram
737-740
741-744
745-748
749-752
753-756
757-759
682
1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001
I am told that my initial Year of the Snake brought my first attempt to abort this weird life. Well, only I see it that way. Everyone else apparently thought I was just a one-year-old who got pneumonia, spent quite some time in hospital and almost died. Sound familiar?
If I remember correctly, the second Year of the Snake was when I decided I wanted to be a writer, started a doomed "underground newspaper" at my junior high school, and sold a story to Playmate magazine for fifty dollars. Children's Playmate, alas, not Mister Hefner's like-named glossy rag which probably wasn't around yet. The so-called newspaper was squelched after five or six issues by a horrified faculty member who somehow came into possession of a copy. I don't remember just what criticism of the school caused such a strong reaction.
1965, the Third Year? Not a very dramatic one, as I recall, just making paintings and sculpture, preparing for my first NYC one-man exhibition the following year. It was probably the first year in Manhattan when there was a certain amount of financial stability, even a bit of luxury, after some when things were pretty tight.
Number Four, 1977. Hmmmm. Back in Manhattan, after that long time in London, the first trip to India and Nepal, and a brief time in Washington. But no, nothing immediately comes to mind that can be firmly placed in that year. I think it went by in a more-or-less comfortable haze of various temporary office jobs and excellent smoking materials.
1989. The Fifth Year of the Snake. Ah, that one had long-lasting consequences since Jonathan came to visit and then stayed five years, I settled into that boring insurance job for as long.
Not much of a pattern, there, nothing to help predict what the Sixth Year of the Snake is likely to bring.
"Mine is the wisdom of ages. I hold the key to the mysteries of life. Casting my seeds on fertile ground I nurture them with constancy and purpose. My sights are fixed. My gaze unchanging. Unyielding, inexorable and deep I advance with steady, un-slackened gait, the solid earth beneath me. I AM THE SNAKE."
Sounds almost like Anne Rice. And speaking of her, it's highly unlikely I would pick up a book called The Mummy, much less pay fifty cents for it, if it hadn't also included the name Anne Rice on the cover. She surely is preoccupied with themes of immortality. She's equally as surely a delightfully stylish writer who can take something as off-the-wall as this one and turn it into a pleasurable read. And it was that I turned to after finishing the Patterson courtroom drama with lunch in the secluded grove on Tuesday, the day turning out to be relatively pleasant despite that ludicrous nonsense with the psychiatrist at the beginning.
As I wrote once, sometimes things just get so ridiculous they become comic instead of depressing. "Who are you supposed to be seeing?" asked the psychiatrist. "You." "What's my name?" Stomping on the urge to say something improper, I just told him his name. "Who did your first evaluation?" "You." Silly man. But I'd better hide that sentiment way down deep somewhere since he holds my fate in his paws. Partly. If he were so unreasonable as to deny the continuation of the Crazy Money, I'm told the Legal Aid Society is happy to take up the cause and the appeal. I'd just as soon not have that elaborate dance, so must behave myself with the doc.
And be sure to get to the appointment with the other doc this time, even if it does seem a rather lame thing to do on New Year's Day.
682a
Sheez, I was almost late to the appointment with the Doc.
A pity he isn't the one who does the evaluation stuff as well, since I wouldn't be too worried about him letting me coast on this program for a year. I think I might be in big trouble with the Evaluating Doc, though, since now it has listed on my form the number of appointments I've attended and, shudder, one date under "missed appointments". The Evaluating Doc is such an automaton, he'll probably see that and instantly disqualify me.
Oh well, one advantage of reading those Tales from three years ago is seeing how life was when I was very, very poor, remembering those mornings of walking through the "beer gardens" and finding discarded cans and bottles of beer, carrying a flask around to collect partial leavings ... and all the other stories of having empty pockets. Of course, that was before the Bad Boys became more than silent sleeping companions.
(Don't think I'm unaware how they influenced my thoughts about this whole "welfare" game.)
I finally got to the story with the first appearance of the Sleeptalker. It is misleading, because I say he doesn't compare to Mondo, with whom I was (and still am) much smitten. But that comparison had to do with Mondo's dark handsomeness and, no, the Sleeptalker can't be compared to that and, as I said, "few men can". There are so many ways Mondo doesn't "compare" to the Sleeptalker, I hardly know where to start, nor is it necessary.
The Doc assured me that many writers in the field are actually "boring". He has seen Judith Beck in person, she once visited here. And he agreed with me that her writing seems burdened by her desire to defend her father's theories, as well as agreeing that using just one sample case in this book is too limiting.
I told him one reason I was happy to undertake reading the thing was because I hoped it might give me some hints about how to deal with the Boys. I gave the specific example of the Sleeptalker and how he most strongly detests people who act exactly the way he does at his worst. How it seemed, according to Doctor Beck, that it was only necessary for him to realize he's doing that to turn on the light, so to speak, in his mind. No, the Doc assured me, he has young patients who are fully aware that they hate seeing themselves in someone else and consequently "hate" that person but it makes no difference. Sigh.
It was, as it has been each time, a pleasant conversation. I don't think he really believes in "cognitive therapy" in the strong way that some of its adherents do. I also think he's totally aware of this game I'm playing with the System and wouldn't really mind if I did achieve my goal of staying under what he called the "umbrella" for a year.
He wished me luck with the Evaluating Doc. I think I'll need it. Big time.
683
"At last!" said the Sleeptalker, as though he had been diligently searching for me and was overjoyed to finally find me. Doctor Livingstone, I presume?
It had begun to drizzle in the late afternoon so I'd had to seek shelter on campus for my sunset brew, continuing Anne Rice's outlandish fantasy. I returned to the computer lab, played the game off and on, then decided to hell with it, had been a hard day, I wanted another bottle, never mind the consequences in the days just before the Fabled Pension Check next arrives. So I went to the mall, did a walk for snipes, bought a Mickey's and sat in the orchid walk with it, and back to the book.
Still drizzling off and on, but I managed to reach the New Cloisters during a pause in the wetness. Much to my surprise, there was only one person in the main area, already asleep. I settled on one of the long benches, but a very large man arrived and took the other end. I could instantly tell I was in for a rocky ride every time he shifted position, so I moved over to the one bench too short for two. A rare event, indeed, to find that bench vacant so late in the evening.
I was hovering on the edge of sleep, my windbreaker over my eyes to block the light, when I felt a gentle pat on my shoulder, looked up into those beautiful brown eyes. "At last!", indeed. The Sleeptalker and Angelo. They wanted cigarettes, I said sorry, I was broke, but had snipes, which I shared. The Sleeptalker took the end of the bench at a right angle to mine, Angelo walked over to where the large man was sleeping and settled there. Evidently Angelo had spent the previous three nights at Rossini's place.
The Sleeptalker had picked up his paycheck and quit the job, bought a new backpack and all new clothes and, I presume, was broke again. He said some man had given him a hundred dollars to "suck my dick" but I'm not sure if he was serious or just teasing me. Not for the first time I was amused by his playful attempts to invoke jealousy. He must get a lot of it from his gay admirers but he's not getting it from me, even when I do feel it. "Beats working," I said. He flexed his arms, said he needed to work on his body if he were going to be successful at selling it. I told him he didn't have to worry about that, he had everything he needed, more than enough.
He kept looking into my eyes with those smiling brown ones of his. I've never seen him look at me that way before and it deeply touched me, was as good, perhaps better, than having sex with him. A happy, teasing, affectionate interlude. All I could do was smile back and try to say "I love you" with my eyes. I have never had a more romantic quarter hour in my long life. One last time he gave me that lingering look into the eyes and that wonderful smile before rolling over to escape the light and sleep.
The first night of the Snake, laying by the Sleeptalker, our heads only inches from each other. Screw the docs, screw the system. The best things in life are free.
684
"Can you imagine what it's like to be in love with three of these boys at the same time?" asked Wisconsin."Yes," I said, "but I don't have to imagine it." He laughed. "It gets to be rather exhausting sometimes," I added.
"It fills me with energy. But I never seem to actually get the goods."
"I must be luckier than you," said with what was intended as a gentle leer, getting another laugh as I picked up my coffee and wandered off.
I'm not too pleased with Wisconsin joining the early morning crowd at McD's. Some of them have their regular buddies, those who enjoy gabbing away in that pre-dawn hour. Most, and I, just want to sit quietly alone with cheap cups of coffee. I'm probably the only one there Wisconsin can talk with about his "boys", making me a prime target. I had hinted that I wasn't interested in conversation by just continuing to read when he sat on the bench beside me. That didn't work, so maybe getting up after that brief exchange and walking off will do it. At least the next morning he just greeted me as he passed, didn't come back out from McD's to sit.
Thursday was a quiet day. I finished the Rice nonsense, admiring the way she so skillfully wrought an amusing novel out of total absurdity, smiling at her habitual tactic of not quite ending a book, leaving it wide open for a follow-up. Then I went on to Percy Walker's The Last Gentleman. Much as I enjoy reading people like King, Steel and Rice, I never feel a wish to write as they do, despite their enormous commercial success (and sometime literary success). Walker, though, is a different thing altogether. Yes, I'd love to be able to write like he does.
The Cherub came to the computer lab in the late afternoon to get me. We walked downhill where he bought us a couple of 40s and returned to the secluded grove to drink and talk. He is a devoted admirer of Bukowski, so the first thing on the agenda was to tell him I'd seen a collection of Bukowski's short stories in the new acquisitions shelves at Hamilton. The Most Beautiful Woman in Town. I said I'd opened it randomly at several places and was greatly amused that at every drop-in, Bukowski was talking about blow jobs. One was described in such complete detail, a wickedly teasing way of going about it. I said I should try that on the Sleeptalker but was afraid he'd slap me up against the head and tell me to get on with it. The Cherub laughed and agreed that might be a risk.
He carefully examined every young woman who walked through the grove and I fell into the game, not alas getting nearly as many interesting specimens to consider as he did. Eventually I said word would get out that two weirdos were sitting in the grove passing judgment on everyone who walked through and people would start avoiding the place. Not a bad idea. One young man came along who certainly appeared to be gay. The Cherub thinks he is, but the fellow does have a girlfriend and the Cherub had tried to make a move on her while the boyfriend was away during the holidays. The Cherub was sure he would have succeeded had the boyfriend stayed away longer. I said we should set up a foursome, I would be happy to take care of the young man while he got the lady. "How far would you go with that?" he asked, wondering just how awful a man I'd be prepared to take off his hands, so to speak. "Oh, you've been a good friend," I said, "I'd stretch it a lot." Funny man, the Cherub.
He gave me a couple of dollars for another brew and went on his way to rehearsal. I returned to the computer lab and played the game for awhile, finally getting my warrior to level 97, after having been stuck at 96 for many weeks. The high 90s are so dull, I don't know why I bother. I had hoped the Sleeptalker might make an appearance, but no luck. I'm sure he would have been on campus if Angelo had not been at the New Cloisters. But Angelo foolishly never buys a bus pass with his 400+ Crazy Money and he has no interest in computers or books so probably wouldn't have been much interested in a trip to campus anyway.
And the New Cloisters .... sigh. I've been making good progress with my effort to reduce sleeping time, waiting until around ten o'clock to head off to a bench. And as I had the evening before, I went to the mall, bought the bottle, sat enjoying it and reading and watching the cute boys walk by, then took a bus downtown. The New Cloisters was totally deserted. But the pick-up truck which normally just swings through late in the evening, presumably a casual security check, was parked there and a man with a flashlight was checking all the doors. He must have chased everyone away, an assumption made stronger the next morning when I saw two of the New Cloisters regulars walking to a bus stop from wherever they had spent the night. A permanent ban? If so, at least this time it's not the fault of the Bad Boys.
I walked on to GovSanc and took the outside bench which is shadowed from the lights, the lobby work still continuing. I was the only one there and I wondered where the Sleeptalker and Angelo had gone if they'd been chased out of the New Cloisters. And sighed again over the neverending changes in the rules, over how difficult it is to find a sheltered, quiet spot for a few hours of sleep. Time, I suppose, to investigate the church where Rocky has reportedly been staying. Although just how quiet it will be, if the Social Horror Club moves there, is another question.
685
"I'll give you a dollar if you can guess what I did today," challenged the Cherub.
"Jerked off."
Wheee, what an easy dollar that was.
Good sport that he is, he paid up even if it was naughty of me to accept, especially since he'd brought me a bottle of Mickey's. He had a very early rehearsal Friday so couldn't linger in the grove. I didn't even find out what he had actually been talking about.
The greatest surprise on Friday was finding an email from Michael Lasser in my mailbox. He's the host of that wonderful hour on NPR each week which got mentioned a lot in the Tales until my radio-cassette machine went off to junkyard heaven. I had complained about him saying "I'm Michael Lasser" so often and he explained that they make him do it. Like I told him, no matter, the music more than makes up for it and, at least here in Honolulu, is about the only chance radio provides to hear classic American popular music, especially theatre music. I've considered each month when the Crazy Money arrives buying just an FM radio, and his mail pushes that up higher on the agenda, made me realize how much I miss hearing him each Saturday evening, as well as the Prairie Home Companion. About time for a little Mozart and Mahler, too.
A shame, of course, I can't sit on a bench in the beautiful hacienda to listen. Nor can I sit on one at the New Cloisters. The ban is permanent. I stopped by there early on Saturday morning. There were notices taped to the benches telling people to remove any belongings. Some people, including Angelo, had stashed sheets or blankets there, and everything was to have been thrown out on Friday. Nice of them to give advance warning like that. Not so nice of them to put up the "No Tresspassing" signs. I walked on to the bus stop muttering something about what you do unto the least of them ...
I'm happy there was that heartwarming interlude with the Sleeptalker on the final night.
I've continued with my reading of the earlier Tales and was amused to be reminded of just how important Mondo was and how gradually he (and everyone else) got eclipsed by the Sleeptalker. That's mainly because Mondo disappeared and has been seen so infrequently, not because of any decrease in my love for the man. But then the chances of that friendship taking the same path as the one with the Sleeptalker are extremely remote, would be even if Mondo were still a regular part of my life.
The Cherub asked me that evening we sat in the grove drinking if I spent much time going back and editing the Tales. (He doesn't read them, dislikes reading stuff on a computer screen.) This is the first time I've read those earlier ones in a long while and there are now and then temptations to make changes. I yielded with some minor excisions, but resisted most of them. It's more useful to me as a record of just what was going on in my head at the time, and that all too often includes things I'd as soon forget ... or deny. Let it be.
I finished that remarkable novel by Percy West, with its puzzling finale, and had Joseph Wambaugh's The Golden Orange already in the backpack. But someone left a recent copy of the New York Magazine on a campus bench, so that provided lunchtime entertainment on Saturday. I don't think I've ever seen such a decadent publication. I know, all too well, that New York City has always been slightly outrageous, folks there pride themselves on being so, but this magazine suggests things are close to out of control there. Up the revolution, but how kind of the restaurant reviewer to have the leftovers from the $500+ luncheon for two put in a bag for the first "street person" she saw.
As you do unto the least of them ...
686
You can't hurry love, no you just got to wait
You know love don't come easy, it's a game of give and take
McD's treating me to the Gospel According to the Supremes when I went in Sunday morning to get my coffee. Since they got rid of that awful Yuletide muzak, they've had a loop of classic Sixties stuff playing, a major exercise in nostalgia every morning.
Speaking of Gospels, I thought I'd better have a look to see if my memory was functioning properly, especially since it frequently doesn't these days. Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. My recollection was pretty close. But, no, I won't yield to the temptation to write "Matthew 25:40" with a magic marker on all the benches at the New Cloisters.
Murder. It's commonplace, of course, in many of the books I read, and I was profoundly affected by a few public ones, like the Kennedy brothers and Lennon. But it has rarely touched my life directly. I've only known one person who was murdered, a young Englishman stabbed to death in Morocco. And, at least so far as I know, I've never met a murderer. Until the past few days. One of them may have just been bragging to convince me how tough he is and the other is, thus far, only accused. An old tourist, past eighty, was killed in the public toilet of a Waikiki hotel. The prime suspect's photograph was on the front page of the newspaper and I immediately recognized him, no doubt about it. He had now and then stayed at the hacienda, stuck in memory because of the way he would often groan in his sleep, as if in utter agony. It was a thoroughly frightening sound and also made me feel very sorry for him. Spooky to think I've spent nights on a bench beside a killer.
It was also solid evidence of how bad I am at guessing age. I referred to him in the Tales as a "young man", having thought he was in his mid-twenties. Instead, it's early forties. Even given the dim lighting at the hacienda, that's a major misjudgment. But I thought all the Bad Boys were teenagers until I learned different. Understandable in the case of the Sleeptalker, everyone agrees he looks much younger than he is, will probably still be carded in bars when he's thirty. Otherwise, I guess it's just one more brick in the "I grow old, I grow old" wall.
It was a quiet Saturday on campus, going downhill for the usual sandwich, chips and Colt lunch, adding a muffin for the birds since there wasn't likely to be anything discarded for them. Foolishness, since there's only ten dollars left of foodstamps and the replenishing allowance isn't due for another week. Shrug. Two more such lunches until the Fabled Pension Check arrives. All the more absurd to read about those five hundred dollar Manhattan luncheons.
I'd GovSanc to myself for two nights, but the Large Man and the Bicycle Man both arrived on Saturday. I should ask them where they're sleeping the other nights, but that's one question which is considered very bad manners amongst the nomads. If someone doesn't volunteer the information, it's rude to ask, something which always comes to mind when the Doc asks me where I'm sleeping. (I even had a moment of paranoia, remembered telling him about the New Cloisters when he asked at the last visit, wondering if he'd called the church and gotten us kicked out .... what, me crazy?)
There had been a major slump in mood as I left the campus in late afternoon, faced with five-or-so hours before it was dark enough for the bench, and in no mood for the usual Saturday night mall mob. I walked through collecting snipes, not very successfully, ate some macaroni salad from an abandoned plate lunch box, then bought a bottle of Mickey's and went over to enjoy it and the sunset in the park. They appear to be letting people sleep in one small area there, since some were already settling on the few picnic tables or wrapped in tarps on the ground. No shelter at all in that area except for the busy bus stop where the Duchess spends every night, sleeping in a sitting position. Poor woman.
The Wambaugh book is mildly entertaining but not exceptional, did little to improve the sour mood, nor did the absence of all Bad Boys even if I wasn't at all certain I wanted to see any of them. Back to the mall as it grew dark. I scored six quarters, four of them from strollers which hadn't been fully pushed into the return corral, a welcome boost to my senior coffee fund which was also running on empty. Snipes again rather scarce, the situation not helped by a few young people grabbing them, undoubtedly because they're too young to legally buy a pack not because they're too broke to afford it.
But for some reason ... the sunset, the beer, the beautiful crescent moon with the shining planet nearby it? Whatever, the mood improved a little. Maybe it was also because I become gradually more reconciled to trouble on Monday, feeling rather certain that grouchy psychiatrist is going to kick me out of the Crazy Money program, dreading the dreary routine of appealing his decision.
And trying, trying, as always, to remind myself it doesn't matter.
687
Very much to my surprise, the psychiatrist authorized another six months, extending the Crazy Money through September. He asked if I was still depressed, but all of his other questions had to do with finding shelter, about how difficult it is for a sixty-year-old man to be living on the streets (tell me about it), etc. I told him I'd be happy at this point to rent space on someone's garage floor. He didn't volunteer.Even happier after Sunday night or, rather, early Monday morning. A man with one of those "Sheriff" jackets again arrived at GovSanc, shortly before one o'clock, and made the three of us staying there leave. "You have to wake up," is all he said. I suppose, as with the mall, a person could sit there all night so long as they didn't fall asleep.
I walked over to the church where Rocky had supposedly been staying. Must have been a change in the rules there, too, because the courtyard with benches was blocked by a fence with padlocked gate (unless Rocky had been climbing over the fence, Sleeptalker style). So I went on to the park, thought that if I ended up walking around until dawn I might as well check out what's happening there. Six people were sleeping at Park Place North, one at Park Place South. I didn't bother going back to the mall to see if my stashed grass mats were still there, just spread out my windbreaker and slept on that. Not much difference, really, between the concrete floor there and the concrete bench at GovSanc.
Time to see the Boys and find out what solution they've come up with, but I've no idea where to look for them until the Sleeptalker makes an appearance in the game or they show up at the mall. Depressing though the sleeping sanctuary problem is, the unexpected news from the psychiatrist certainly did much to uplift my mood which had been dragging again throughout Sunday.
After that good news from the psychiatrist, I walked over to the State Library where the selection was rather dismal. Never mind, has to do until the Fabled Pension Check arrives, no more fifty cent carts till then. I had finished that lacklustre Wambaugh novel with Sunday's sunset brew so my backpack was unusually empty of reading material. Ah well, William Martin's Back Bay fills the gap until something better comes along, and it was with that I settled for lunch in the secluded grove, despite occasional light drizzle, also reaching the end of foodstamps with my sandwich and chips. The birds had to make do with crusts. How to explain to a zebra dove about pension checks and Crazy Money?
687a
4:30pm: Ring.
Hmm... "Hello"
"Hi, we're downstairs. Can you let us up?"
"Hi Albert. Okay."
Buzz. Hmmm. Wonder who "we" could be.
A few minutes later Albert was standing in my doorway with the sleeptalker in tow. "He's hungry. You got any food?" Umm... sure. Chips, Girl Scout Cookies, butter cookies... oh, and a couple of old chicken wings.
As the sleeptalker ate Albert went through my spare coin box looking for enough slugs to buy a couple beers. "Hey, there's a can of chili that Albert brought over a couple of months ago up on a shelf somewhere. Want me to open that up?"
"Sure."
After the sleeptalker finished feasting on my junkfood Albert suggested that he run up the street for a couple of beers. He left me with the sleeptalker and headed up the street to make his run. We sat and watched tv to wait for his return. A few minutes later Albert was back with the beer in hand and quickly went to work on the first bottle. As we sat on the lanai and talked the topic of the Tales came up.
"You mean this sick bastard is writing about me?" "That's f@#ked!"
"Yep, and all those times he's had you too."
"Damn, that's really F@#KED!!! So everyone thinks I'm a gaywad?!?"
"Don't know about that but there are a lot of people out there who'd like to know what you look like. Wanna take a picture so we can put it up online? We can charge everyone $20 for the URL."
Panther grinned and mentioned a couple readers who have asked for a picture of the sleeptalker to be posted. "I'll put it up on www.amihotornot.com, it's a site where people will rate your looks."
"No F'N way!"
A little later the topic of swallowing came up. "Yuck, too much info. Lemme go take care of my laundry so I don't have to hear this."
I sat inside, folding my clothes when I heard, "Hey, I'll pay you $100 for your body when my crazy money comes in."
"$100 for this skinny thing," replied the sleeptalker, lifting up his shirt.
"Aww come on. Lift it up. Gimme one more look."
"Aww shaddup. Give it a rest already."
A few minutes later the beer was gone and Albert stood up and announced that they were leaving. 7:30pm. Damn it's about time. "Hey! What happened to all my cigarettes?!?"
"Don't worry about it Kory K, I'll buy you a whole carton when my crazy money comes in."
"Are you sure?"
"Don't worry about it. Cigarettes for you, sleeptalker for me." he grinned.
The sleeptalker who was busy taking care of his dirty dishes in the sink turned around and rolled his eyes.
Albert laughed, shook my hand and quietly deposited his empty cup in the trash(which I later had to fish out and wash). "Thank you, Kory K. I don't know how you put up with me."
"Neither do I!" I thought.
The sleeptalker politely thanked me and walked out the door followed close behind by the Panther. "Night guys. And Albert, don't forget my cigarettes."
"No worrys."
That's right. I'm going upstairs right now and write your Tale for you so you don't forget!
..fini...
Kory K
687b
"It's a first for the Tales," I told Kory K, small consolation when I turned up announced on his doorstep late Monday afternoon ... with the Love of My Life. True though, it was indeed the first time the Sleeptalker and I had been there together.
In one of those perfect timings Dame Fortune seems to enjoy, I had walked over to the bus stop on campus, heading downhill for a bottle of Colt. A bus arrived, with the Sleeptalker. He said he was hungry. I told him I was sorry, I'd used the last of my foodstamps for lunch and was broke. It honestly didn't occur to me until the next morning that I could have, and probably should have, used the beer money to buy him a couple of cheap burgers. Instead, I told him I'd be back and got on the bus.
To my surprise, when I returned with the beer he was still at the bus stop. I had expected him to head to the computer lab. We sat in the secluded grove talking as I drank the beer which he declined sharing. He was all over the place in his conversation, starting with being bouncy and excited because he'd exchanged a few words with a young lady at the bus stop. "An instant boner," he said and, yes, the evidence was enticingly obvious in the front of his pants. He laughed because I wouldn't stop looking at it.
Then he jumped to a story about his little sister and how he'd teased her when she was learning to write, telling her she should use the other hand. She did and has been left-handed ever since, he said. Later at Kory K's, he repeated the story.
Back to sex. He told me again about the man who had paid him, did a funny mimic of the fellow, then very seriously said how he hates it when people linger after it's over. As I know well, the minute he gets off, he's ready to pull up his pants and forget it ever happened. I told him he can get away with that with men, but he'd better watch out trying it with a woman, they might not appreciate his wham-bam-thank-you-mam routine.
Family again. I had noticed a poster with those "wanted" photos at the police station in Chinatown, especially the fellow in the top left corner who had the same last name as the Sleeptalker. It's not a common surname, so I assumed they must be related and, indeed, it's his little brother. The Sleeptalker seemed almost proud of it and I thought if he had a wall to put it on, he'd probably want a copy of the poster.
No one seems to have come up yet with an answer to the problem of sleeping sanctuary, alas. He can stay at his benefactor's place, but only if he's willing to give his body in exchange for shelter and a few bucks. It's enough to make me want an apartment of my own.
He said again how hungry he was and was regretting he'd spent all his money on drugs, said never again would he waste twenty dollars on "that shit". Likely story. I looked at my watch, saw it was too late to find Kory K in his office, so suggested we go down to Kory's apartment, that he would surely have something to eat in his kitchen (I'd forgotten that can of chili I'd left there).
And thus, Tale687a.
It was delightful being there and most enjoyable to watch the two of them together. And I think the Sleeptalker really for the first time understood about the Tales. He has known about them for years but I don't think he truly understood that I have been writing about HIM.
A reader wrote: Knowing there's somebody who will always be there, and be on my side, even if they scold or give doses of reality perspective, well it really is pretty important to surviving. And, speaking from my own early street experiences, lust and in-loveness are much more reliable (trustworthy ??) to a storm-tossed soul seeking 'shelter', than platonic love or kindness ever would have been.
Comforting words, immersed as I am in lust and in-loveness.
688
Busted! A man lives sixty years without having gotten so much as a traffic or parking ticket, then he gets one for "camping without a permit". I was right in my recent speculation. A "citation" is like a traffic ticket, indeed the form used is the same, the top box covering traffic/parking offenses, the middle one "infractions" (whatever they are) and the third criminal offenses, which it appears sleeping in the park falls under. It says I can simply mail in the fine, but in the box which supposedly tells me how much that is, the officer wrote "C07". Huh? To "informally discuss" the thing, I have to appear in court on February 28th. If I wanted a full trial, I'd have to pay $25 in court costs. Hmmm, a jury trial for sleeping in the park? Amusing notion, but I don't think I want to waste my crazy money on it.
If the fine isn't paid and I don't show up at court, they'll issue a bench warrant, says the form. Wow, I can finally join the Bad Boys Bench Warrant Club.
The police swept through the park at about 3:30 on Wednesday morning. They were oddly selective about the people they targeted, hitting everyone who was sleeping in a place with overhead cover but none of those sprawled on picnic tables or curled on the tiny benches along the beach. And I only saw them approach one man who was sleeping on the grass, but they didn't appear to give him a citation. The group of men who spend the night at a snack bar's tables were all given citations, but they just waited until the police departed and settled back down to sleep.
Fun and games, fun and games.
When the Sleeptalker and I left Kory K's, he said he felt like going into Star Market and stealing a big steak. I told him if I'd had foodstamps left I would have bought him one before going to Kory's, could have put it in Kory's grill. I also told him that if he went to campus later in the week, I'd be happy to buy him a meal and a couple of beers. (No, in case you're wondering, I was only joking about paying him a hundred bucks for his body.) Then, as he used to do often, he just wandered off without saying anything about where he was going or even goodbye.
I went to the mall, picked up some snipes, read awhile, and then walked over to Park Place South for an uneventful night, only four other people there.
As seems to happen more and more, I had an awful hangover on Tuesday morning, not from booze but what I guess could be called a psychic hangover. The Sleeptalker really does have an intense unbalancing effect on me.
And what next are "They" going to do to disturb my life?! The secluded grove is, or was, bordered on one side by an open, hilly area between the walk and a parking area. It was more like bumps than hills, with scraggly vegetation covering it, only memorable at one time of the year when a quite beautiful delicate flowering "weed" is in bloom. Well, on Tuesday in came a bulldozer to level the hills. How very odd that a university which is supposedly so hard-pressed for cash should be spending some on this puzzling new development. I shall wait with considerable curiosity to see what they're going to do with the newly-leveled space, but until whatever it is gets completed, the secluded grove joins the ever-growing list of former pleasure spots.
So I took a bus to the mall, bought a bottle of Mickey's and planned to sit in the park with it. The weather gods decided otherwise, conjuring up midday showers. An orchid walk bench to the rescue. Considering how the night turned out, I suppose I was lucky not to get busted for drinking beer there.
Helen R had the day off and asked if I'd like to join her for a film. Two of them, in fact, but I declined the invite to "Thirteen Days". Living through the infamous Cuban Missile Crisis was quite enough, I've no desire to see a film about it. But oh yes, most happy to see "Snatch", and since I'd had nothing to eat since a few bites of the Sleeptalker's chili the evening before, that big hotdog Helen bought me was happily welcome, too.
The Sleeptalker complained because people say he looks like Brad Pitt. I don't see any reason whatever to complain about such a flattering comparison. As I said about the recent People Magazine cover, yes, there is a definite resemblance, especially in the upper face. But if the Sleeptalker saw "Snatch", I'm afraid he'd be even more distressed about his "skinny body". There was ample opportunity in the film to enjoy Pitt's much more padded one. And I had to wonder if the almost lingering shot of his briefs-covered crotch was also padded or if that was all the Real Thing. Delightful, whichever. Amusing film, too, but I confess my interest was totally fixed on young Mr. Pitt ... and his fine body.
The Sleeptalker would never believe it, but I actually prefer his "skinny" one.
Helen and I went back to the mall after the film and she offered to buy us dinner, although she wanted to get it take-out and head home after having been at the movies all afternoon. Yikes, I learned my lesson: when ordering a chili dog at the L&L Drive-In, be sure to say "chili dog sandwich". I didn't notice that there was also a chili dog plate lunch option, didn't understand when the fellow asked if I wanted "mini or regular", and said regular. Two chili-dogs, two scoops rice, one scoop macaroni salad .... way too much for me to eat, despite the sparse diet of recent days. I carefully tied the bag and left what I couldn't eat on a planter ledge, later saw an old bearded guy pick it up and sit happily finishing it off.
William Martin's Back Bay, after an uncertain beginning, turns out to be quite an entertaining book, balancing chapters set in Boston of 1814 with more modern times and I sat reading it with a Mickey's nightcap before heading over to Park Place South.
There was only one other man there when I arrived but a little later the couple who had been there the night before returned. He walked over and asked, "you all right, pops?" Slightly puzzled, I assured him I was, but he returned after awhile and offered me a blanket. I thanked him but said my heavy sweatshirt was sufficient (and indeed it was, being such a warm night for late January). He and his lady yakked away for so long I was tempted to get up and shift to Park Place North. Maybe I should have, but I suppose the lawmen had gone there, too.
It was kind of them to time their raid on a warm, clear night anyway. I walked slowly along the beach, stopped to watch them hassling the gang at the snack bar and then went over to 7-Eleven and got a can of chilled coffee, returned to the park and sat on a bench by the beach. When you see the Southern Cross for the first time ... Certainly not the first time, but it's always special to see, that lopsided cross above the southern horizon.
And to ponder what to do about this sleeping crisis. Surrender and go to the shelter? (I suppose I should at least give it a try one night anyway.) Return to my earliest plan of sleeping during the day and stay up all night? I don't know. I guess the answer to this dilemma is the same as it is for any of them, including the dance with the Sleeptalker.
Be here now.
689
In something of a deja vu back to the earliest Tales, I realize I would no doubt have to spend several sleepless nights before I could begin seriously to turn things around, sleep more in the daytime, and suffer the equivalent of jet lag which that would produce. I definitely didn't feel like sleeping during the day on Wednesday, despite having had only about four hours of sleep. But by a little after ten at night, I was wanting to lay down.Everyone says the shelter is a den of thieves and it seemed almost an omen to run into someone who used to stay there, hear him repeat the warning. I said I didn't really have that much to lose. "Well, even if you lose it, you don't want to lose it to creeps like those," he said. Probably so.
The Fabled Pension Check arrived, so when the Cherub came to look for me in the secluded grove, I was able to offer him beer at the Garden before his Faust rehearsal. That bulldozer had just been sitting there in the same position it had been the day before. Whatever plans they have for the place, they don't seem to be in any rush to complete them. Since I'd had to go to Waikiki to cash the check, I'd stopped back at the mall for lunch in the park, a Mickey's and two "Big 'n Tastey' burgers from McD's. Almost as good as Jumbo Jacks, but not quite. No Jack that close to the mall, though, unfortunately. Then in mid-afternoon I returned to campus, spent some time online, and went for another brew which I was just finishing when the Cherub arrived.
He had also seen "Snatch" and when I mentioned having seen it, he immediately noted that lingering crotch shot. I suspect that scene will probably be the one thing most people remember about the film, whether they share my particular interest in it or not.
I showed him my infamous "citation", and like I, he wondered what an "infraction" is. If sleeping in a park is "criminal", then whatever can an "infraction" be? [I'm trying to find out, like a curious cat ... yes, I recall that saying.]
When he left for rehearsal, I went back to the computer lab for awhile, and then headed to the mall. I didn't want any more beer, considered going downtown and just walk around, check out where people have found a place to sleep. But it was again a clear, dry night, so remembering that the police hadn't bothered people on picnic tables or the little benches along the beach, I decided to give them a try instead. The picnic table wasn't bad, but there was nothing at all blocking the wind so it got very cool after a few hours.
And "Prissy", a mall regular who is quite mad, settled on the grass not far away and had a lively conversation with his invisible friend, punctuated with his shrill, ultra-effeminate giggles. I walked over to the beach, strolled down the length of it checking out the scene. The snack bar gang were back in residence, as usual, but there was no one at Park Place South. Several people were scrunched up on the short benches, so I settled on one which was shaded from the streetlights. Those benches really are short, but at least the back provided something of a windbreak and I slept until those absurdly early walkers started showing up at four in the morning. I moved back to the picnic table which, surprisingly, was still vacant and dozed for another hour.
Not what I'd call a very satisfactory solution to the problem and obviously one which only works when it stays dry all night. Certainly more than enough to make a man sigh with nostalgia and recall the luxurious days of the cloisters and the hacienda.
These nights of short, interrupted sleep will no doubt eventually wear me down to a frazzle. As Helen Kane sang, I don't care, I don't care ...
I considered sensible possibilities on Thursday, like doing laundry (since my pants are really looking a bit grubby), but instead, feeling somewhat weak, I went to Paradise Palms Cafe and ate scrambled eggs, bacon, toast and a cup of tea for a late breakfast. Didn't much revive me, but then who wanted to be revived?
At lunchtime, after that late breakfast feeling not at all hungry, I took a bus downhill. The driver had decided we'd all just love some muzak while waiting for him to finish his cigarette and drive, stuck his little radio next to the sound system so we'd clearly hear it instead of announcements for the next stop. I surely do hope that doesn't become commonplace for bus drivers. And of course, there is a law against playing a radio without headphones, never even think about inflicting it on all riders via the bus-wide sound system.
Once again, just finishing the brew I'd bought downhill, sitting in the secluded grove where the damnable bulldozer finished its demolition and went away, the Cherub came along. I took him to the Garden and bought us beers. A friend of his, an utter hunk, came along and joined us, but despite my invitation, wouldn't join us in quaffing that beverage.
"Love, love is strange," sang Mickey and Sylvia. Life, too.
690
Terri wrote: The next thing that popped into my mind is the question about why you began your journey of living on the streets. I don't recall any particular entry in the beginning that addressed that. Somehow I've gotten in my mind that you closed your apartment door for the last time and stepped into the street as a sort of "grand experiment". Is that right? Or did I imagine that?
And she asked me to write about it. When the year of working from home came to an end, the only way I could see to earn the six hundred dollars rent each month was to return to some kind of office job, a thoroughly depressing idea. It was much the same mood I'd been in, years before, giving up everything and walking out of New York City. Wanting to commit suicide, but thinking why not try something totally different, see what happens? Perhaps that qualifies as a "grand experiment", perhaps can more accurately be seen as a desperate measure taken to stay alive, even if not seeing any real reason to do so.
As the early Tales make clear, I really had no idea what it would be like to live on the street. The walking trip was different, I was a wanderer, hadn't any clear notion where I was going and didn't much care, only sought each night to find a safe, dry place for a few hours sleep, made little or no contact with other people and had no desire to linger for long in any one place. I suspected that what I had learned in that experience of homeless living would have little relevance to life on the streets in Honolulu, and that's correct, although it did prepare me a little for the instability of having no fixed abode.
And as can be seen from the Tales, most of this three+ year adventure has been relatively pleasant. There have been few cold and hungry nights. Even had there been more of them, though, it would be more than counterbalanced for me by the people I've met, the friendships formed, none of it likely to have happened in my life as an apartment dweller.
This is probably the most unsettled and unhappy time since those very earliest weeks, maybe more so because the early time was gilded somewhat by the sense of adventure and novelty. I wasn't expecting to find sanctuaries like the cloisters and the hacienda, knew nothing different than spending each night where I landed, so to speak. The brief time of depending on the airport changed that and the hacienda, especially, changed it even more. So now there is the feeling of loss, the daily insecurity of not knowing where I'll spend the night, the dreaded inevitability of the first that comes along with heavy rain.
When, after several months of thinking about it, I did decide to walk out of that apartment, it was also like the Hindu's view of life progression, entering the final stage. Perhaps it was premature, but then I have been prone to that throughout my life, like when living in northern climes, shifting to summer clothes a few weeks too early each year.
Grand experiment or experiment in madness? I'm not sure, I only know that at the time it seemed like the most attractive option despite the slightly scarey aspects of it. And I did stash that box of shoes and clothes, the things I would need if I changed my mind and wanted to bail out via a temporary office job and a room at the YMCA. I've never been seriously tempted to do that. Oh, I'd love that room, but I can only shudder at the prospect of sitting in an office all day to pay for it.
Whether one of those office jobs or something else, I hope the Cherub finds a job soon, for both our sake. I don't know how long we can hold up with the pre-rehearsal drinking sessions, or how on earth he is managing to get through a rehearsal anyway, when at the end of those sessions, I just feel like collapsing on a bench somewhere. That was certainly the case after our Thursday afternoon and early evening at the Garden, and I took a bus directly downtown, by-passing the mall. Occasionally, when the Social Club had turned the hacienda into too much of a party place, I had walked over to a small nearby park, the same one I recently sat in while waiting for my social worker to return from lunch. In the center of the park are public toilets and the walkways leading to them have a narrow roof supported by columns, with a low stone wall along one side of the walk. If raining, even with a slight wind, it wouldn't be much of a shelter.
There have usually been a few men sleeping there, some on the low wall, some on the concrete walk beside it, and there were three already there when I arrived, all on the northern side of the toilets building. I settled on the southern side, remained alone there all night. The main disadvantage of the place, aside from the sparse shelter, is the nearby basketball court which attracts nocturnal players. Two young men and a woman even showed up about 2:30 in the morning to play, mercifully not staying very long. The other disadvantage is the toilet building itself, which stays open all night with the resulting loud flushing noises waking me several times. Sanctuary, it is not, but at least no citation-wielding lawman came along to pester us.
691
"Winter drought parches islands", the main headline from Saturday morning's newspaper. Not a lament I can join. It did rain lightly in the early hours, proving the shelter at Small Park is better than nothing. In addition to the covered wall there are also benches along the edges of the park and it was on one of those, most distant from the basketball court, I settled late Friday evening. But when the sprinkles began I moved again to the low wall where I'd been the previous night. The same three men were on the northern side.
In addition to basketball and flushing toilets, another disadvantage to Small Park is the nearby Pipeline, a wee hours club. Fortunately it is distant enough to remain unheard but it has very little parking available and patrons use on-street spots for blocks around, including the streets surrounding Small Park. So there are periodic wake-ups from around 2:30 until four each morning. Odd how many people let loose with yells after their clubbing session. They don't sound genuine enough to qualify as a primal scream, nor do they suggest any real sense of happiness and abandon. Maybe it's frustration from having spent a lot of money and getting no satisfaction?
But the body begins to adjust to shorter and frequently interrupted sleep and for the first time since this nocturnal hassle began, I woke on Saturday morning without feeling slightly washed-out.
Friday was one of those days when I spoke to no one aside from thank you's to salesclerks and a few exchanges in the game. My spirits were still sagging and even though I had no desire whatever to spend an hour and a half in a laundromat, I thought having clean clothes might have a cheering effect. So I bought detergent and a bottle of Colt, found a "Super Gulp" cup from 7-Eleven as disguise, and put everything but my surfer shorts and windbreaker into the washing machine. I had Philip Friedman's courtroom drama, Reasonable Doubt, to help pass the time. And yes, clean clothes did provide a little boost.
The mailserver at zeus.interpac.net seems to be hiccuping again since nothing arrived all day from the more active mail-list I'm on. People have puzzled about the different addresses. The main address is panther@zeus.interpac.net. The panther@kolohe1.com is merely a forwarding address and I use it almost exclusively when posting to Usenet, thus providing an instant clue that responses to it are prompted by something I said on the newsgroups. And panther@vanderburg.org is also just a forwarding address, used in the Tales, again providing the source of mails received to it. But now and then all or one of the addresses gets wonky and mails bounce back to folks or finally arrive many hours later. It's always something ...
A reader amused me by writing: It does peek my curiosity that [the Sleeptalker] would randomly keep bumping into these guys willing to do sex for whatever trades; either that or he must have incredible pheremones.
Yes, I suspect his pheremones are incredible. Heh. But how is it the young man continually connects with gay benefactors or wannabe benefactors? I'm not sure. Every openly gay man I know has the Sleeptalker high on his most-wanted list. Pheremones or not, the guy is young and looks even younger, is genuinely cute and has a fine body which he often generously displays. He's also, as I've said, a thoroughly delightful flirt, does it with everyone and never (or very, very rarely) errs into cockteasing. He seems the epitome of the straight young guy who can be had. It's little wonder he captivates every gay man he meets, but how it is so many find him, I don't know. He doesn't seem to be actively looking for them, certainly doesn't go places where he'd be apt to meet them. (The thought of taking the Sleeptalker to a gay bar is one which produces an instant grin.) Maybe Dame Fortune is just being generous with the connections.
I was a little surprised he didn't show up on campus since I'd said I planned to go to the Garden on Friday for the music, didn't specifically invite him but let it stand as one opportunity for that food and brew I'd said I'd be happy to buy him. The Cherub's father was flying over from Kauai, so he wouldn't be at the Garden but would be busy trying to charm daddy out of some cash. I was hoping he'd succeed since the plan, if so, would be to see Harold Kama on Sunday night, way out in the country at the Sugar Bar in Haleiwa. Goofus that I am, I'd already spent too much of the Fabled Pension Check to provide gas and beverage money for the expedition. At least enough of it had been spent on the Cherub to justify his spending daddy's money on the plan, if he got some.
Since neither of them were around, I decided not to go to the Garden, a decision made easier when I walked past and wasn't much impressed with the music, just went down for another bottle of Colt and sat in the secluded grove reading ... and thinking. About shelter, money, pheremones, law codes, all and everything.
692
"You must have been very cold over here," said one of the Small Park regulars, emerging from the toilet building after his usual wake-up coughing and spluttering routine."Yes, it was pretty cold. Winter has arrived."
"I had a sweater, jacket and a blanket, and I was still cold. If I'd had an extra blanket, I would've thrown it over you."
I thanked him, said I'd definitely be buying one on Monday. It has been such a mild winter until now that I've kept putting it off since there hasn't been any need for one. But it has been years since I've felt as cold as I did in the predawn hours of Sunday, certainly not since I've been in Hawaii. A tee shirt, polo shirt, sweatshirt and windbreaker just wasn't enough. I carry a large heavy plastic garbage bag, cut open, to lay on, more in case of dirty benches or walls than insulation against the cold of the concrete. But I used it for a cover instead, and that helped a little even if it did mean constantly waking up to tuck the thing under me.
As if taunted by that "winter drought" headline, it had started to rain mid-morning on Saturday, continued doing it all through the afternoon. The wind was blowing the stuff almost horizontally at times and I was lucky that my first trip downhill and back got completed during a relatively dry break.
It was a surprise, and a delightful one, to discover The Vampire Lestat on the fifty-cent cart at the bookstore, the second volume of Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles. I sat happily in a sheltered place on campus with that and a bottle of Colt plus a sandwich while the windblown rain continued all around me, then took advantage of another break in the rain to go downhill again for a second brew and a pack of cheap cigarettes. I would have preferred to rely on snipes, but there weren't likely to be many on campus which was fairly deserted and I was enjoying the book too much, didn't want to undertake a snipe-hunting expedition to the mall, especially since the computer lab would be closing at four-thirty.
After a final online session, I did go to the mall, hunted snipes even though I didn't need them yet. Mondo was sitting on a wall across from the sports store, so engrossed in a racing car video that he didn't notice me. As usual, he had a very happy, spaced look on his face and I decided not to interrupt his obvious enjoyment of the racing. No other Bad Boys, still no Travis, who must have left the supermarket job, just as I suspect the Young Hardhat has been switched to a different construction site, alas. And I wonder what has become of Sidney? He's been missing for several weeks now.
A little after sunset I bought a cheap burger from McD's and another brew, continued my reading on a bench in the Orchid Walk. Mercifully, the rain had stopped but the wind was fierce. It stayed that way all night. I was shivering so much when walking from Small Park over to the bus stop in the morning, it was difficult to keep a grip on my first cigarette of the day.
And I was still pondering the bizarre repetitions in my dreams of people falling, from a bridge, from buildings, one from a tree. The first one fell straight from a bridge, head downwards. The one from the tree fell feet first, was holding a baby. That one got up, seemed to have only hurt one ankle, the baby unharmed. Weird stuff, but at least evidence that I had gotten a little sleep even though it hadn't really seemed like it, what with keeping the plastic cover tucked in and enduring the larger than usual crowd of Saturday night club-goers as they departed in the wee hours.
Despite the uncomfortable night, I felt in fairly good spirits on Sunday morning, helped by a smiling Filipino teenager who asked me for a light at the mall, then sat on the bench next to me waiting for a bus. He stretched, posed, lifted up his sweatshirt to show me some skin. Oh, these local boys.
693
I told the Cherub about the reader wondering how it is the Sleeptalker attracts so many gay benefactors. "They haven't seen him," he said.
Ha! This from a determinedly heterosexual young man. Thanks for making me feel not quite so crazy after all.
Except for a couple of hours in the afternoon, it was the first day this winter I kept the sweatshirt on. And even during the few hours without it, I was sitting in the sun in the secluded grove rather than seeking the usual shaded spots. The wind continued all day but it did stay dry. That fellow who is a regular at Small Park recommended sleeping in what he calls the "cupboard", an area at the back of the toilet building which has a high wall on the other side of the walk leading to a locked door at the end which I assume is a park worker's supply clost. The small overhanging roof is not large enough to shield the whole body, so if it started to rain too heavily, the lower legs and feet would definitely need to be under plastic.
But since the main problem was the wind, I decided to try it on Sunday night, surprised that none of the regulars used it. The space is really only large enough for one person. Much better, there, the garbage bag cover staying more securely tucked in and, as I realized when getting up to water the bushes, it was considerably warmer in that sheltered area than it would have been on the open benches. Still decidedly chilly, though.
The Cherub had an afternoon Faust rehearsal, came looking for me in late morning. His father had treated him to an extravagant dinner but had given him no money. His mother, though, had tranferred some to his bank account, not as much as he'd wished but enough to pay the rent and phone bill. He wanted to go ahead with the Haleiwa plan but I said, no, it's not sensible to be spending that money when you've no idea when more is coming. He was fretting because I'd spent so much on him at the Garden. Ah, what a contrast from the Sleeptalker and Angelo, both of whom disappear when they get money, never mind how much I might have recently spent on them.
"When I have it, I spend it," I said. True words. And almost always, with no regrets.
We walked downhill for bottles of Colt and sandwiches, letting him partly assuage his guilt. Then another walk downhill for a second bottle before he left for rehearsal, having guzzled a can of Bud himself since he didn't have time for the second forty. The Vampire Lestat is by far the best thing I've yet read from Anne Rice and I spent most of the afternoon engrossed in that, returning to the computer lab briefly before it closed.
The Cherub returned to the grove after his rehearsal. By then it was once again feeling very chilly in the sunset wind, so we got in his car bound for the mall. He stopped by the house where he rents a room, over my protests, to get a blanket. But it was a thick double, almost a quilt, and would have been impossible to get in the backpack. He said I could just ditch it, but I declined, told him I'd be okay.
Everything at the mall was closed except the supermarket and, as happens now and then, they didn't have a single malt liquor at the usual $1.99 price, were greedily trying to get three dollars a bottle for the stuff. Maybe they figure all the SocSec and Crazy Money types who are probably the best customers for those bottles won't mind paying the extra dollar during the payday season. Phooey. We went on to 7-Eleven, then to a Jack in the Box for burgers. He suggested going to visit a student friend of his in one of the dorms because he had a videotape he wanted to watch, so I told him to go ahead, I'd just hang around and eventually get the bus down to Small Park.
I decided I really didn't need that fourth bottle of Colt, hid it away on campus thinking that as cold as it is, the thing would be chilled enough for drinking the next day. But then all those years in England have me conditioned to not mind warm beer anyway. I was glad I'd made that choice on Monday morning, sure my head would have been a lot foggier if I'd indulged in that bottle.
Crazy Money Day. Ho hum.
694
"You doing all right, brother?" asked Conrad, looking pretty stewed already even before noon. Yes, I was fine, I told him. "Payday!" he cheered. I said yep, waved my just-bought slippers at him, said I was "stepping out". He's such a strange man and our encounters are even more odd now that I know how incredibly hung he is. Not that I want it, but just knowing it is a peculiar feeling.
I left campus after a brief morning on-line time and breakfast at Paradise Palms, went to the mall to get those cigarettes I'd promised Kory K. I got lucky, a shop had Marlboro Milds on sale, two packs for little more than the usual price of one. I checked Sears for some kind of covering, might have just bought a vinyl tablecloth if they'd had them in anything but red-and-white checks. On to Sports Authority. No space blankets, but they did have cheap tarps so I bought a 6x8 feet one. Lightweight, but it surely does take up a lot of room in the backpack. Later, though, I was most happy to have it.
I walked back to the mall, bought a lunchtime Colt and the new slippers and after that brief exchange with Conrad, crossed over to the beach park to drink and continue The Vampire Lestat. As I told the Cherub later, Anne Rice is writing all my favorite fantasies, and I do love Lestat. She also reminds me how I've long seen the similarities between we seekers of that "Fountain of Youth" and the mythical vampires (if they are mythical). The Vampire Panther wouldn't mind feeding again, but where oh where has my big boy gone? Just as well he didn't materialize on payday, I guess.
I love you! Give me more! Yes, more. But never enough.
It was useless.
What had these transfusions done to his body and soul? Made him see the descent of the falling leaf in greater detail?
Anne Rice is too wonderful. I went to the used bookshop and bought the third volume of her incredible Chronicles, Queen of the Damned
Returning to campus, I was walking toward the computer lab when I crossed paths with the Cherub. Faust is going to do me in. To the Garden, for another long pre-rehearsal beer session while he drooled over all the young ladies and I saw a few interesting specimens myself. He tried out some of his lines on me. Somehow the phrase "silliness and smut" just doesn't sound like Goethe, but did seem quite funny after two large jugs of Budweiser, as did much of our conversation.
When he scurried off to rehearsal, I went back to the computer lab, got the news that mail had arrived from my beloved Felix. [Search the King James Bible for that reference.] For a brief time, Felix had toyed with online life, decided it wasn't for him and went back to pen-and-paper, envelopes with postage stamps. For a much longer time, there was silence, although a mutual friend in Manhattan would now and again send news. Then a card arrived. I replied with a series of postcards, never receiving any notice they had arrived, had been read. Dear Felix opened his so-welcome missive with: "Time had to pass until it didn't trouble me that you're still and always in love."
I've loved him for over forty years now. The Sleeptalker is a newbie. But oh dear gods, is he a sweet one.
695
"What's up?" asked the Sleeptalker. Odd how often he materializes when that Fool Moon is in the sky, now of course reviving the never very dormant memory of that magical "you can have it" night, ten moons ago.I was on the bus from the mall to Small Park when he boarded, sat in the seat behind me. He looked ragged and tired, seemed in a very sullen mood. I looked back at him several times. He didn't acknowledge it, kept on eating from a bag of popcorn. Much as he hates to be on his own, I think he sometimes deliberately contrives a day or an evening all by himself, perhaps to prove he can do it. After a few minutes he got up and moved to a seat further back, again didn't glance my way when I left the bus. Okay, pussycat, whenever you want a stroke or two, I'll be here.
It surprises me there is no competition for that "cupboard" spot at Small Park. I woke there early on Monday morning to a thump-thump-thump sound, at first thought it was someone on the basketball court. No, it was rain dripping from the tiny roof, hitting my new tarp and making it into a drum. Fortunately, I was able to tuck the tarp in closer to me and escape the drip. Nuisance though it may be to carry around, it certainly makes for dry and warmer nights.
Tuesday night some old guy woke me up at two in the morning asking if I wanted a cigarette! Fool moon madness, I guess. I said no thanks, and tucked my head back under the tarp, figuring he was just looking for someone to talk to. Probably the case, since he grabbed one of the regulars when that early riser got up and they again woke me at about four-thirty with their chatter.
It had been a quiet day with rapidly shifting weather starting with gray clouds after the predawn rains, then complete sunshine, and back by noon to drizzle, dry again by sunset. I had fried eggs and bacon at Paradise Palms in the morning, then was hit by an earlier than usual desire for beer. Maybe it was knowing that bottle was hidden away but probably, too, because I was eager to return to Queen of the Damned. Rice is so convincing with these books and the characters from all of them are continually interwoven, events seen more than once from different perspectives. It all begins to seem like history, not fiction.
Although nothing further has happened with the cleared and level ground edging the secluded grove, they have now started work on an old wooden building at one end of the place. I debated about going to the mall and park for a sandwich and brew lunch, but decided to remain on campus instead, despite the distracting workmen near the grove. As it turned out, they didn't matter much because the drizzle began and I had to seek a sheltered spot anyway. Back online again for awhile, then, and to the Garden for a sunset jug of Budweiser, continuing the book. As I was leaving, the Hunk who had joined me and the Cherub recently walked in, asked if I'd seen the Cherub. No rehearsal today, I told him, so he probably wasn't on campus. That guy has such a sexy body, beefier than my usual preference but combined with his warm personality making a decidedly desirable package. I was bold enough to pat him on his shoulder as we separated. Solid. Very solid.
Back at the mall, I was surprised to feel hungry and was definitely craving mashed potatoes. So I got extravagant and went to the Orleans Express for bourbon chicken, jambalaya and, yep, mashed potatoes and brown gravy. Good stuff. Then I made a round for snipes, stopping to admire the new poster Armani has put up. They've finally got a decent model. For years Armani set the standard for male models but then went through a strange punk phase. Now the standard bearer is Abercrombie & Fitch, even if so many gay writers on the web sneer at them. What's wrong with the cleancut All-American look? Absolutely nothing, I say, especially considering the current batch of photos at A&S, well worth the trip up to the third level of the mall where I otherwise rarely go.
Then on to the bus and that brief encounter with the Sleeptalker, amused, as always, by how Dame Fortune works out the timing on these things.
696
Questions from a recent Tale: Can it ever happen again? Can it get even better? Wouldn't it be best, for both of us, to end it on such a happy note?
Answers: yes, yes, and I don't know.
Helen R was on campus Wednesday for a conference, so I joined her and Kory K for lunch. The building Kory works in has open areas with benches on each floor, with a sweeping panoramic view of Diamond Head and Waikiki, a fine place to eat Marriott's less than exciting roast chicken. Leaving them, I thought of going to Manoa Garden for a beer, then told myself to be sensible, walk downhill and buy a bottle of Colt, more beer at half the price. I crossed paths with the Cherub who was on his way down there, too, the same objective in mind.
We got the Colts and returned to the secluded grove, had only been there a short while when the Sleeptalker came walking through. The Cherub was much surprised that I'd known from such a distance who it was. He might not have believed it, but the fact was I had a strong feeling the Sleeptalker was on campus, must have sensed it the moment he got off the bus. He was looking fine, unlike the night before, and was in high spirits, wanted to drink beer, too, but in the Garden.
So to the Garden we went. Rossini called the Sleeptalker via cellular phone which somehow the Sleeptalker has managed to keep activated and a little later Rossini and Angelo arrived. Another round of beer. They all wanted the glass pipe. I had already promised the Sleeptalker one this month, doubled the ante as an offer for Round Eight. He agreed.
Rossini, the Sleeptalker and I walked down to Rossini's apartment while the Cherub and Angelo went shopping. Round Eight was magic, truly magic. I can't adequately describe how much I cherish that beautiful body of his, how I treasure the way he gently holds the sides of my head, how I love that wonderful little chuckle at the climax.
The successful shoppers returned and this time Angelo did the honors of getting the pipe fired for me and, as the Sleeptalker had, encouraging me to puff gently. They thought this batch was stronger than we'd had before, and I couldn't disagree. I was surprised not to get the heavy sweats but found myself breathing with sharp exhales for hours, a bizzare effect which lingered through the night and into Thursday morning. They played cards again, Gin Rummy this time, and again I declined to join in, feeling far too spaced to even think about holding cards. Around seven o'clock, the fellow who shares the place with Rossini complained about the party in progress. I'm not sure why, didn't realize until we left how early in the evening it was. Perhaps he was irked that we didn't invite him to join the circle.
Angelo stayed there, the Cherub, the Sleeptalker and I went to the Cherub's apartment. They continued to play cards. The Cherub is not supposed to smoke in the place, so we now and then crammed into the bathroom, blowing the smoke out the window over the shower. Then I decided to have a shower and that hot water felt absolutely wonderful. It also provided an intense deja vu experience. Just as often happened with pharmaceutical methamphetamine, I really wanted to get off myself, but just couldn't, not helped much by the Sleeptalker strolling in and asking, "you jagging off?" Trying to, my friend, trying to.
I gave it up as a lost cause, the Cherub spread out two big quilts for us and I lay back listening to Mozart on the radio. After awhile, the Sleeptalker decided he would have a shower, too. The shower curtain was not transparent, but did provide an enticing glimpse and I couldn't resist going in to watch, could probably have finally completed the "jagging off" if the Sleeptalker hadn't complained about me staring at him. He thought the curtain was more transparent than it actually was and after he had dried off, had his pants back on, I stepped into the shower to show him how I'd only been getting a teasing (but delightful) show.
"In for a penny, in for a pound," I muttered to the Cherub who was half dozing by then. I offered the Sleeptalker twenty dollars just to get naked and let me look at his body while I took care of my by then extreme desire, almost discomfort. He refused, went back and lay down on his quilt. I got naked in the shower and tried again, without his assistance, but in he came, sat there watching for a bit. Funny, I never thought I'd be putting on such a show for him, certainly found it more arousing but suspected he was going to yield if I begged a little, so I stopped before going all the way even though by then I could have.
Much to my surprise, he not only granted the request and got naked, he even matched my show. I've always wanted to watch him do that, and there was no more holding back, the release came with a wonderful climax. He wanted to finish himself off, too, but didn't want me to watch to the conclusion. A pity, that would have been a vision I'd treasure, but he'd already been so generous I wasn't going to push it, left him alone and went back to lay down.
Not long after, he emerged from the bathroom and settled down. I don't think he slept at all, several times during the night nudged me for a cigarette, and I only lightly dozed myself.
The Cherub got a job, was to start at seven in the morning. How the lad ever made it through the day, I don't know. He gave us a ride to campus and the Sleeptalker and I sat outside the computer lab, not yet open, drinking coffee and smoking. Then he went into the game, played for about an hour and suddenly got up and left without saying anything, didn't return to the lab. I scolded myself for wishing he'd at least said goodbye.
But those fool moon's eyes, how sweet it was.
696a
It's easy to understand why some people get so hooked on this drug, ice. It leaves you feeling so wrecked the next day, there's no doubt great temptation to indulge again to relieve the inner wasteland. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the Sleeptalker took that twenty and went to buy another pipe-full.
I can't allow myself to do that, am sure it is far wiser to strictly limit myself to a once-a-month adventure, assuming the Sleeptalker is around to enjoy it with. And even though I could, by cutting down on other extravagances afford it financially, I don't think I'd long have the strength to survive more frequent use.
I am grateful for it, though, as has been the case with most drugs I've tried. That extraordinary dance with the Sleeptalker simply couldn't have happened without it. It's amusing to read the earlier Tales where I am persuading myself not to get too drunk when with the Sleeptalker. Did crossing the line between non-sexual and sexual experiences with him really change that? And too drunk is nothing compared to the ice condition. I doubt I could get drunk enough to let myself participate in that uninhibited physical pleasure I felt with him, and even while immensely enjoying it, a part of my mind was seeing it as quite degrading. I don't think I really believe that, either, but I am fairly certain those thoughts would have stopped me if not for the influence of the drug.
A gray, cloudy day without tradewinds. A washed-out, gray feeling physically, a scattered, almost incoherent inner landscape. I couldn't face eating anything until late morning, then had just a bowl of soup. Had the weather been more pleasant, I might have gone to the beach park to lay in the sun for a time. As it was, I wandered the campus in something of a daze, unable to reach any conclusions about all the questions these encounters with the Sleeptalker raise. Post-coital angst again? Or the trauma of leaving a very special state of body and mind, an even more special duet (or duel?), to return to the too close to meaningless thing that passes for life in between such grand adventures.
What had these transfusions done to his body and soul?
Made him see the descent of the falling leaf in greater detail?
No, leaving him not even noticing a falling leaf, feeling too much like one himself.
697
I understood more clearly the foundation of cognitive therapy on that gray and gloomy Thursday. Feeling so shattered and awful physically, mentally and emotionally, anything my mind considered was seen in the worst possible light. The Fool Moon Party, being so much in my thoughts, was reviewed, unwillingly and unwanted, in utterly negative terms. Yes, those cognitive folks are right about how strong the effect of our thinking is on the "reality" and what a mess we can make of even the most beautiful.
They are wrong, though, I think, in assuming they can know what is dysfunctional thinking, so their framework becomes a tool for domination and preaching, just as surely as any religion does. If they think something is unhealthy, dysfunctional, then a disciple or patient must be brought to think of it in the same way. If they do not, they are "sick".
In his letter, Felix admitted he had recently seen a man who had stirred all the flames of passion in his heart, after a very long time of feeling that was all in the past. I understand so well what he means. I, too, expected old age to be so much different than it has turned out to be. And knowing him, he must have struggled very hard to maintain the illusion of "outgrowing" lust and passion.
And, indeed, doesn't it seem so much more noble to do so? Don't the Tales speak of the desire to be the elder, the father confessor, the wise or at least kindly old man who loves without desire? As I read through the Tales of the second year, I see it time and time again, trying to convince myself that should be my role with the Bad Boys, especially the Sleeptalker. But how very much different the Eighth Encounter was from that ideal.
I can't imagine how the Sleeptalker copes with the afterthoughts following our intimate encounters, considering how much energy goes into the process for me and how wildly those thoughts and interpretations vary. Like the last time at the hacienda, the Full Moon Party stepped out further than either of us meant it to. Not since the Dutchman have I allowed myself to yield so completely to desire, so actively played the master-slave game, kneeling naked at his feet and begging for him. I know he enjoyed it, and I know equally well he will feel very, very guilty about it but will probably cope with it at least partly by blaming the drug ... and me.
Blame the drug? Nope, I can't take that easy way out. But like I said, it wouldn't have happened without it. I realized in my pondering that ice is unique in my experience with drugs. I would not seek the substance on my own, for myself, I'm not at all fascinated by it as such. It's a tool to get the Sleeptalker, to play through scenarios with him which have existed in fantasy and remain afterwards as lust-inspiring memories. But I also have to admit that I'm afraid of it, fear an escalation, fear that succeeding encounters must go further and further in order not to become dulled by repetition. His supposed hope that I'll eventually get bored with just sucking his dick might come true?
Well, at the hacienda one wall fell when he touched me. He has built that one back, I think, and I don't mind at all, truly prefer it. And at the Full Moon Party, one of my walls fell. It certainly wasn't as high a wall as his, though, and I'm not at all sure I want to rebuild it anyway.
I'm also not at all sure I'm happy with this once-a-month party routine I've fallen into. Luckily, this is a short month, the long stretch of poverty I see ahead will be a relatively brief one. And reading those second year Tales definitely provides clear evidence that days of being broke, dependent on snipes and quarter hunting, are not so bad as they now seem. So the party routine, especially when there is the ultimate prize of the Sleeptalker's nectar, may be worth the price. May be.
The sky stayed completely covered with gray, gloomy clouds all day Thursday, perfectly matching my inner weather. Frequent drizzle or heavier rain continued throughout the day, mercifully ending after the unseen sunset. I waited until early afternoon for the walk downhill to get a beer, had no desire to eat any more than that bowl of soup I'd had in the late morning. After a brief time in the secluded grove, resumed drizzle meant seeking a sheltered bench again. I was grateful for Rice's Queen of the Damned which, even though not as compelling a book as Lestat, nevertheless brought relief from immersion in my own thoughts.
By late afternoon I was truly exhausted, wanted only for the hands of the clock to move more swiftly to nightfall. I went to the mall, bought cheese and rolls and another beer, ate a light supper and continued the book, grateful I saw no one I knew, although I was looking forward to talking with the Cherub, getting his impressions of the Fool Moon Party. I'm grateful, too, though, he got that job, bringing an end to those lengthy pre-rehearsal drinking sessions.
A bus to Small Park, collapsing into much desired sleep snug in the Cupboard under that luxurious tarp, exhausted from so much thinking.
698
You have GOT to calm down, slow down, I kept telling myself throughout Friday, another day when the sky was covered in gloomy gray clouds. It did stay dry, though, and the trade-off is having much warmer temperatures, so much warmer I didn't need my windbreaker over the sweatshirt at night, could even have done without the tarp. Its guarantee against unexpected water from the sky was appreciated, though, as was the surprise of a much smaller than usual club crowd for a Friday night.Calm down, slow down. Yes. The fact is, these Magic Theatre times with the glass pipe and the Sleeptalker utterly upset my inner balance, which is somewhat precarious anyway. And although I was actually happy not to see him the following day, by Friday I was hungry for his company. I want more ordinary time with him, time with maybe a couple of beers and nothing stronger, time without sex play, just his company and talk. That would help so much to navigate the choppy inner water those not-at-all ordinary times leave behind. But that just isn't going to happen, I fear, no more than the fantasy of snuggling up naked together in a bed and drifting into sleep. He is what he is, and no fantasies of mine are going to change that.
Endless churning of the mind. Anne Rice, again, at least a little to the rescue. She is indeed writing all my fantasies and in the fourth volume of her Chronicles, The Tale of the Body Thief, she goes even further than before. Extraordinary imagination, that woman has. Despite the pockets which are rapidly approaching empty, I was more than happy I'd spent two Colt's worth of dwindling resources on volume four. Not long after I first moved to New York, I fell in love with a statue. Just a head, in fact, Roman, at the Metropolitan Museum. I even went to the office and arranged to buy a photograph of it, had it framed on the wall over my bed. That memory came to mind when I accepted that I've fallen in love with Lestat. A statue, a character in books ... so much safer to fall in love with than an all too flesh-and-blood lad from Waianae.
I stayed on campus all day, spoke to no one. And I spent a little more of the new foodstamps allowance. It's the first time I've gone four days without spending any of the monthly allotment. Would that such a miracle could happen with the cash part of the bounty. Sandwich, chips and beer in the secluded grove with the final chapters of Queen of the Damned. A little stretched, that one, a little too ambitious with its theme of desired world domination, but maybe killing all but one man to every hundred women is one of Rice's fantasies. Since she does so well writing about mine, I can hardly grumble about her writing her own.
Online again, I was continuing the process of combining shorter groups of earlier tales into larger files. I've been very lazy about doing that for some time now, so it turned into more of a chore than I had patience for. I went to Hamilton Library and luckily one of the few terminals left with a dot matrix printer was vacant, so I was able to print out the main index for the Tales. With that as a guide, I went about deleting the deadwood caused from combining files and zap, like a total idiot I wiped out the tale of those months in hospital. Calm down, slow down.
Well, most fortunate, I had not long ago suffered one of my periodic fits of nervousness about there being no back-up of the Tales in my possession. A notable webmaster kindly came to my rescue and downloaded them all to his computer, intending to put them on a CD-ROM. He equally kindly uploaded a replacement for the zapped tale. Whew.
Yes, my dear Panther, repeat after me: calm down, slow down.
699
Too soon, too soon. What did I most want, I had been pondering on Saturday. To see the Sleeptalker? To find some way to break or escape the spell we have cast on each other? Either way, more time needed to pass, but the mischievous Dame had other plans.
Since everything closed at the University by five on Saturday, I left for the mall, did a round for snipes, bought a bottle of Mickey's as a combined sunset brew and nightcap, planning to sit in the park and continue the amazing account of Lestat and the Body Thief. At the bus stop on the way to the park ... Rocky and the Sleeptalker. Rocky was charming, the Sleeptalker understandably aloof. I could well sympathize with how he would have preferred more time to pass, too. As I've often done, I built a tenuous bridge with chat of the game. Luckily, a few old-timers had made a rare appearance on Friday and, as always, the Sleeptalker couldn't resist a chance to talk about the game. I wonder, if not for that game, would so much that has happened between us ever have taken place?
He was obviously in his post-ice purification frenzy. Give up tobacco, give up alcohol, probably even gives up "jagging off". He isn't nearly as addicted to tobacco as I am, but it still must be a tortuous exercise for him. He would no doubt in earlier times wear a hairshirt and go in for self-flagellation. He did ask if I'd seen the Cherub and I said I'd probably see him on Sunday, but with his job and the rehearsal schedule, didn't expect to see much of him during the week.
He waved away the smoke from my cigarette, then walked a little distance apart from us. Rocky gave me a "what's up?" look. "He's twitchy," I said. "He'll get over it, may take a couple of weeks, but he'll get over it." Rocky laughed and I could tell he was thinking, "ah, you two have been at it again." Quite so, dear Rocky, quite so.
Of course, purification period or not, I'm sure if I'd suggested filling the pipe, the Sleeptalker would have jumped at it. Don't think I wasn't tempted. Rocky clearly would have preferred to stay with me and drink beer, but equally didn't want to abandon the Sleeptalker. I said I was going on to the park and left them. They boarded a downtown bus, probably headed to get a free meal.
I don't mean at all to sneer at the Sleeptalker's purity routine. As I wrote, I felt something of the same urge after that first Ice Dance and I certainly went through all that in the High Acid Days. I remember telling the doctor one day, "I just want to get off everything." And it's just one facet of the problem which had always plagued me and still is. Do we strive to achieve some notion of the "better" us, or save that energy for accepting and coping with what we really are? A question very much in my thoughts after those moments of playing slave to the Sleeptalker.
Saturday was yet again a gloomy gray day although a band of blue sky did appear briefly in the afternoon and it didn't rain. There were several conferences on campus and a Girl Scouts Council gathering in the sports complex, so the place was much more crowded than usual for a weekend. Hotdogs, beer and Rice in the secluded grove early afternoon. And after that sunset brew, another round for snipes and off to Small Park and the Cupboard. It rained during the night, the sound of the drips again waking me, but the tarp is really like sleeping in a tent, staying warm and dry despite the cool breeze and drizzle. Most unusually, I slept until almost six-thirty.
Gloomy gray clouds again. Sigh.
700
Failure. That's the real problem, I decided on that gloomy gray Sunday. I can't even be a successful alcoholic. What genuine alcoholic would waste on a book enough money for two-and-a-half Colt bottles?
Coping with failure. Little wonder death seems always so attractive. Let me out of this mess, let me start over or, if so it be, cease to exist altogether. I'd hardly care if that were the case, would I? Well, okay, if you (whoever you are) can't grant me that wish, then how about one of those so-common old age conversions, let me suddenly believe in something, let me dedicate the rest of my life in its service. But no, you (whoever you are) won't give me that either, will you?
And you won't even give me a few hints now and then? Or do you give them in such a subtle way they get utterly lost in this absurd maelstrom of a life I lead?
It occurred to me, in a moment of feeling extraordinarily grateful for a very, very long cigarette butt, that the solution to the tobacco problem is to buy a pack of cigarettes. Then wait until I absolutely, desperately must smoke one, sink into the joy of it, truly appreciate the decadent luxury of smoking it. Makes so much more sense, has so much more style than scrounging around for people's leftovers, doesn't it? Was that a hint? Be a little more clear about it, I need some reason to believe, as that lovely sixties song said.
And another solution of sorts ... get more playmates. "Plenty of fish in the sea" (even he told me that), "don't put all your eggs in one basket". Wisdom of the ages? Ah yes, there must be plenty of luscious young men, street boys or otherwise, who'd be happy to pick up a twenty dollar bill as easily as the Sleeptalker did. Or was that just a self-indulgent way of seeking a solution?
Failure. Failure to be the one he wants me to be, or even the one I want to be for him. Failure to defeat this melancholy, as gray and gloomy as the sky overhead. Failure to find that reason to believe.
I was sorry the Cherub didn't stop by the lab before his Sunday afternoon rehearsal. I would very much have liked to see him, but perhaps he, too, needs more time. I've no idea how he classified that Fool Moon Party, although I suspect he would have liked to file it in an Interesting Experiences I've Had folder, perhaps cross-referenced to a Dirty Old Men I Have Known file. On the other hand, it might just have been a boring nuisance for him, not worth cataloguing, just thrown into the debris of memory. Who knows where the Cherub's head goes on that drug. Maybe I'll get the chance to ask him. Our spell on each other may be weak compared to the one the Sleeptalker and I have woven around ourselves, but it's there.
Yes, I do understand the spell cast on me and the Sleeptalker is mutual, and I would not be at all surprised to discover he wants free from it as much as I do, perhaps even more. I think we're stuck. How sweet it would be if he could comprehend that, too. We could comfort each other, lament together the treacherous twists of karma. Maybe after a few more lifetimes of this silly dance we're doing this time around?
I think I'm finally going crazy. I don't mind, have always thought I might, have even been disappointed I hadn't.
701
I knew I needed it but I didn't realize until after getting it just how true that was, how much I'd needed it. The Cherub found me in the library after his afternoon rehearsal. We went outside. It had begun to rain, in a few minutes was really pouring down, so we stood under the shelter and talked.
The Cherub is an acute observer of people and events, can see them with a clarity which often amazes and delights me. This is true with only one exception: himself. He is not of course alone in that. "I don't know why you feel guilty about it." I hadn't said I did, but I suppose it was more than obvious. Gilead's balm, those words. His main concern appears to have been that I was getting too .... I couldn't remember what word he'd used. Frantic, frenetic? Then reading Memnoch on the bus to campus Monday morning, I saw the word. Frenzied. Yes, too frenzied. Worryingly so. And I thought I really should keep in mind, all the time, that another heart attack will probably be the end of this life, and how unspeakably unkind it would have been to drop dead at the Sleeptalker's feet. Overly melodramatic thinking, no doubt, but certainly not an impossible scenario, however horrific.
The Cherub of course saw the events of the evening more calmly than I did, noted how the Sleeptalker wouldn't leave me alone. I realized my necessarily condensed version of events omitted the fact that the Sleeptalker had three times come into the bathroom, gone out again, then returned. Moth to the flame. But while I see it all as my fault, feel badly at having pushed the Sleeptalker further than I had intended, the Cherub saw it more as a mutual dance and he's probably right about that, just as he's right about there not really being a reason for guilt.
He noted with amusement how in the morning as we were getting ready to leave, the Sleeptalker had taken that twenty dollar bill out of his pocket, made sure the Cherub saw it before repocketing it. Yes, it was just a job for me, see how well paid I was for it. How much easier it does make it for the Sleeptalker. I'm grateful it is so.
The Cherub is in trouble. His job is some distance away and he doesn't get paid until the 22nd, doesn't have money for gas. His strange father refused to send him even twenty dollars. It's so bizarre, after having supported him for so long, and even more so because he apparently has visions of the Cherub eventually stepping into his shoes, taking over the family business. And the job the Cherub has couldn't be a more perfect foundation for just such a future. Of all times, it would seem this is it, this is when his father really should help out a little. A strange man, indeed.
I said we could appeal to Kory K, that he'd probably be willing to help. But later I felt bothered by that and realized the proper solution is to give the Cherub the twenty I have tucked away, my beer money for the rest of the month. He has been a kind and valuable friend, small sacrifice to make in return. I really don't like the look of the rest of this month.
I wouldn't allow myself the luxury of blaming the drug, but a reader didn't share my reluctance. Speaking of the bleak Tale 700, he wrote: "It's the ice...batu... it messes your mind. Even once in a crazy moon, it fucks your head. You are never the same after ice. The longer you do, the more you change, the stranger it gets." And he added: "The drug takes chunks of your brain. You never get them back."
Visual image of my head with a little empty chamber there, no wonder there's such a tormenting loss of balance. Was it so much worse this time because of the sex game with the Sleeptalker and my baffling reactions to that, or was it indeed the drug, losing more of my brain because of the second time around? The reader apologized for preaching. I told him I appreciated it, that if I get burned playing with this fire, he would have felt badly about not having at least tried to warn me.
Playing with fire. A fire juggler, the Sleeptalker and the Batu. Do I think I'm made of asbestos?
I know, I know. I am so immersed in this strange and wonderful universe of Anne Rice that I am seeing things and interpreting them differently than I probably would have at another time. No accidents. Karma. But perhaps the reader is right and the drug is a more powerful part of it than I realize or am willing to admit.
The Cherub doesn't hesitate to go where angels fear to tread, he's already looking forward to the next party, seems not to suffer the tormented aftermath the Sleeptalker and I experience. He said we should pool our resources, do double the amount next time! Given my extreme tolerance for drugs, I do realize I haven't experienced anything close to what would be for me a genuine "ice high". But considering how far I stepped out of myself, how horrible the hangover, I am not at all sure the high would be worth it. I am not, of course, dumb enough to claim I'm not tempted.
"Did you have beer today?" the Cherub asked. "Yes, two." "Two forties? You do lead a wonderful life."
Ha! Oh yes, my friend, a wonderful life indeed.
702
At last, blue sky and sunshine! And what did I do with the morning's brightness? Sat in the library and read some seventy pages of Mircea Eliade's fourth and final volume of journals. I had gone to the "15 minute only express search" terminals to find where, in that Carroll-ish classification system, I might find the venerable Eliade. Of course, he is scattered hither and yon. I noted the first reference and went there, not actually looking for his Journals, but it was a good place to begin my re-acquaintance with the gentleman.One of my new readers is a little concerned about asking questions. The strange thing is, on Usenet what little I write there always attracts the most insipid, banal mentalities, lame intellects who cannot even construct decent insults. But the Tales somehow escape those morons and what correspondence the Tales do generate is almost always interesting and intelligent. I greatly enjoy it, and the questions.
A few of the questions I shall answer publicly since I suspect more than one reader might have asked them silently.
If you both desire something, what the problem with whatever games you're playing? They are just games. You don't feel as a murderer each time you put a sword inside a virtual enemy, do you ?
That last one, I should put to the Sleeptalker directly, that would be amusing. Here is what must be remembered: these things are a sin to this young man. Understand, he truly believes that. The almost identical scenario, years ago with the Dutchman, was a giggle the next day. Hey, what a silly game, wasn't it fun. With the Sleeptalker, I am leading him into the valley of the shadow of death, I am a disciple of the Devil tempting him, even worse, making him enjoy sinning, whether he wants to admit it or not. Even if I don't believe it, how can I not feel guilty for doing it to him? "This is sick," he said. He was probably right, it probably was sick, but yes, to some of us it was merely a game. Is football sick? Boxing? Bullfighting? Yes, yes, yes. Is playing a naked slave kneeling to a master in adoration sick? Oh yes. But what a lovely game. Only, alas, guilt-free when both players in the game understand it is that.
And why would being a nice older man to the young ones be incompatible with feeling sexual desires for some of them?
Again, this concept of sin plays a major role. But here there is more, there is the question, does this man really care about me or does he just want to get in my pants? Angelo asked that question directly. Am I a true friend to them, or am I just a dirty old man who wants their bodies? As the other reader so comfortingly said, lust may be more believable than Platonic caring. But I can't help thinking my role would be better played if I admitted the lust but did nothing to satisfy it physically. We confuse the concept of "love" so much, so few people really understand when I say I love these young men. I love them all. Yes, the Sleeptalker is special, different, the feelings I have for him are beyond almost all my previous experience of loving. But I love them all, and I certainly lust for some of them. I can't help seeing, though, that the relationships with which I feel most comfortable, most satisfied, are those where the sexual attraction has been open knowledge between us but no attempt has been made to consummate that desire.
Not that I have any intention whatsoever of refraining from any opportunity I get to enjoy the Sleeptalker's beautiful body.
While I am about Catholicism, what did you find attractive in it as a youth?
The psychologist asked me why I had become a Catholic. I told him, quite honestly, it was because I'd fallen in love with a priest. He dropped that like the proverbial hot potato. As I told Mme de Crécy recently, he has no desire whatever to get into deep water with me, which is why I can't talk about the Sleeptalker to him.
Yes, I did have a huge crush on a delightful young priest, was thrilled when he performed the baptism, but it was more than that. It was the mystery of it, passing a church and looking in, seeing the candles, the crucifix, smelling the incense and, when finally getting brave enough to enter, hearing the ancient Latin phrases, watching the magical mystery of the movements, the dance of the Mass. And my best friend at the time was Catholic, a boy I loved very much, a boy who somehow managed to overcome the notion of sin and relished getting naked together and rubbing against each other until that new-to-both-of-us mystery of the body completed itself. Such innocence ... and yet I am sure I could easily accomplish that same result given the chance now to do it with the Sleeptalker. He so excites and arouses me.
My main contact with Christianity had been with the Southern Protestant group which calls itself the "Church of Christ". Austere, somber buildings, but wonderful, wonderful gospel music, still very dear to my heart. Alas, no mystery at all, none of the ancient allure of Roman Catholicism. And, too, it should not be forgotten that becoming Catholic was, up to that point, the ultimate rebellion against the authority of grandparents and parents, something which was always highly attractive for me.
Another silly question is : how did you come to learn latin, if I understood you correctly? I thought American people never did. Another of my prejudices?
I've no idea whether it still exists in these modern times, but when I was in what we call Junior High School, one had to take a foreign language. There was a choice (and this was in Texas, not exactly a citadel of intellectual prowess) between Spanish, French and Latin. Only one year was required, but I loved Latin, admired the teacher and eagerly went on for the second year. Amo, amas, amat ... how little I remember.
You sound very young when you speak of your opinion that old age would have been without sexual desires.
I wonder, that surely must be a common misperception. And it is only when we reach old age we can see what nonsense it is. In many ways, I am more interested now than I was when younger. Old age, experience, even jadedness allows one to so much better appreciate the magnificent beauty of some young men, the breathtaking wonder of their bodies, the charm of their naive thoughts and cares and concerns.
And remember : if you worry about a problem, then you've got two problems.
Quite so. But perhaps that is better than trying to ignore the problem, sweep it under the carpet? Yes, my post-ice bewilderment magnified the problem, I don't at all deny I am taking the whole thing far too seriously. It simply matters too much to me to get away with saying "it doesn't matter", even if I know, intellectually, that's absolutely true.
Leaving dear old Eliade, I went downhill, got the usual sandwich and chips and beer lunch, with a cornbread muffin for the little zebra doves, and returned to the dear young (albeit centuries old) Lestat and his astounding meeting with God Incarnate, not to mention the adversary. Utterly extraordinary book, Memnoch the Devil.
Alas, once again dense gloomy clouds rolled in, big drops of rain began to fall and I had to seek a sheltered bench to continue. The place, which is usually almost as quiet as the secluded grove, was more like Grand Central Station. I guess I had things topsy-turvy, should have enjoyed Lestat's adventures in the morning sunlight, saved Eliade's account of his final years until the damp afternoon.
But then so much in my life right now is topsy-turvy, what's another mis-planned day?
703
Believe in me, in my words, in what I have said and what has been written down.I am, still, the hero of my own dreams, and let me please keep my place in yours.
I am the Vampire Lestat.
Let me now pass from fiction into legend.
THE END
9:43 February 28, 1994
Adieu, mon amour
It was a good thing people were so preoccupied, scurrying around, fretting over how to reach their destinations without getting drenched. No one was bothered by, even noticed, the old man sitting in the Orchid Walk, book in hand and tears on cheeks. Water from the skies, water from the eyes. The first had continued all day. The second began when the old priest exclaimed, "That in my lifetime, God ... it's the Veronica!", continued when the assembled crowd sang, "And He walks with me, and He talks with me, and lets me call Him by name", not the first time that musical memory from childhood has appeared in these Tales.
But adieu, mon amour?! I felt like howling as Lestat so often did himself, NO! Not possible. I can understand how Lestat and his chronicler would feel drained and exhausted after this magnificent adventure, saddened as I am, too, by the end of the splendid Armand, but no, Lestat would recover himself. Not a chance he could resist further adventures, and I want to hear about them. I hope he is already giving gentle pokes at Anne Rice, pushing her to keyboard or quill and paper, whatever she uses in her role as chronicler.
... it's the Veronica. I wonder, if that fabled relic, supposedly lost during the Fourth Crusade, was somehow found, it would make as much difference to me as it did to so many in this (I say again) extraordinary book, Memnon the Devil? (I wish she had just called it Memnon. Lucifer is no devil.) I feel pretty sure it wouldn't touch me at all if it looked like it does in Memling's painting.
After being forced to take shelter after that miraculously sunny Monday morning, I had to continue doing it for the rest of the day. It rained and rained, right through the night, right through the next day and again through the night. Just the inevitable dreaded kind of nights I expected. I quickly learned the groundcover of the large garbage bag was a bad idea. If the tarp leaves any of that "mattress" exposed, raindrops collect on it until forming a little pool. The solution is to wrap up in the tarp like a cocoon, even if it does get slightly damp because the body's moisture can't escape and accumulates. Not as bad as it was on the Walk, when I'd made the mistake of sewing two space blankets together into a sleeping bag. In the heat of a New Jersey summer, that did literally produce little pools inside the bag. But in the coolness of a Hawaii winter night, the slight dampness from trapped perspiration is certainly far more comfortable than getting drenched by endlessly pouring rain.
On Wednesday morning, that fellow who had fretted over me being cold spoke to me again, said he now had an extra blanket which I was welcome to use. I thanked him, but said I was actually finding it more than warm enough wrapped up in that tarp, was wishing I could leave it more open to the air. "It's the wetness that's the problem now," I said. He agreed, said he'd slept inside the toilet (as had all but one of the regulars). He shook my hand and wished me a good day. Nice fellow, makes me feel more comfortable knowing someone like that is sleeping nearby.
My question today is not easy for me to word in English. If the Sleeptalker wasn't some memory of your previous lifes, but a combination of people you loved in this one, making you feel towards him the way you did towards them, who would be among the people of your past those combined in him, and those who would stay quite distinct?
Provocative, intriguing question. I kept returning to it throughout the day and evening, until swept away into the universe of Lestat. At first I thought of it just as physical similarities, but I think the question is asking more than that. And in thinking about it, I was surprised myself to realize just how unique the Sleeptalker is. I've never known anyone quite like him, not in this life anyway, and the many ways in which I do love him have never been combined before.
"Those who would stay quite distinct" certainly includes the three men I lived with for the longest times, my two five-year lovers and Jonathan. It may sound peculiar, but I didn't love either of those I was "married" to nearly as much as I do the Sleeptalker. That was true of the Dutchman, too, until the Sleeptalker the love of my life. The Dutchman, though, never inspired feelings of paternal love. Fraternal, yes. Lust, most definitely, and in that case my feelings for him most closely match those for the Sleeptalker.
But the Dutchman was, perhaps still is, an intellectual genius, an artist, a philosopher. The Sleeptalker is an innocent, naive, superstitious (as I see his religiosity) young man. Little wonder feelings for them are far from forming a match otherwise. In some ways, Jonathan comes closest to the Sleeptalker on that level, as he does in inspiring thoughts of paternal love. Amusing thought, a combination of the Dutchman and Jonathan, a wildly improbable mix which is yet not too difficult to see in the Sleeptalker.
Well, any excuse to think about, talk or write about, the Sleeptalker is always welcome. I don't know, though, if that answers the reader's question.
I spent a lot of time on Tuesday working on the continuing project of combining the earlier Tales into larger files, had to consult an HTML reference site to refresh my memory on the technique of adding links which jump to a particular place in a document. Almost like embroidery, work on such things. (I have now and then considered embroidery, an amusement which happily occupied many stoned hours in the long English winters of the late Sixties, although I'd probably feel somewhat silly now wearing the resulting shirts and jackets covered in flowers and butterflies.)
Waking on Wednesday after a soggy night of strange, strange dreams. In a small jet plane, three seats in the cockpit, with the pilot, me in the middle, and the Sleeptalker on my other side, gliding down a long take-off path, being amazed to see someone on a bicycle behind us, but alas, waking before we actually left the ground. At a party and someone saying to me, "that's the Vampire Pandora," feeling thrilled and yet disappointed that it should be my least favorite of Rice's wondrous characters. Waking to yet another morning of gloomy gray skies, frequent drizzle, with gusting wind added. Reading again the final chapters of Memnon with my morning coffee and, again, feeling very much like letting the tears flow.
The winter of our discontent, the life of our discontent. Calm down, slow down, spring will come.
704
My funny Valentine, sweet comic Valentine ...Sometimes I wonder, will the well run dry, will the good Dame weary of putting interesting young men in my path? I know, of course, that in this place especially there will never be an end to visual fascinations. But schooled by the Bad Boys, I won't allow myself to make the first approach.
The Dame might have said, hey, what about the Tongan? Yes, that hunk with the solid shoulders is Tongan, the Cherub tells me, adding the ... errr ... interesting information that he is also very well hung. One day the Cherub walked into the Tongan's room, expecting to find him alone, and he was naked in the bed with a young lady, providing the Cherub with an opportunity I'd be most happy to share.
But even without the assistance of an introduction, a new Boy has arrived. Amadeus. He made his debut on Valentine's morning, sitting on a bench in the mall, some distance from McD's. Amadeus, because he is a dark-haired reminder of young Hulce in that handsome film. At least partly Filipino, I'd guess, possibly with some Japanese genes. Early twenties, so cute I was reluctant to look too carefully or too long. He was wearing a rainsuit, jacket and trousers of transparent plastic. I immediately thought how sweet it would be to see him in that, minus the clothing underneath it.
I wasn't sure, thought he might just be a tourist out so early in the morning. But the next day I was sitting on my usual bench in the Orchid Walk, reading while enjoying my refill cup of coffee. Amadeus walked up, sat beside me. Oh, sweet and lovely lady, be good ...
His English is hesitant, heavily accented. Like everyone these days, he talked of the weather, this seemingly neverending hideous weather. Such a wonderful smile the lad has. I was a little astounded to realize that, oops, it has happened, someone has come along who would be the winner in a contest ... which would I pick, given the choice, Amadeus or the Sleeptalker? No doubt a temporary aberration, a choice which would have to be reconsidered if I had the two of them together, but still, a somewhat refreshing novelty.
I finished my coffee, got up to leave, giving him a benedictory pat on the head. Such soft hair. Another of those smiles as my reward, as he lay down on the bench, stretched out. After brushing my teeth, I headed to the bus stop, just missed a campus-bound bus. Oh well, an omen, I used as an excuse, and walked back for one more glimpse of Amadeus. He was sound asleep. I wished I could have put a blanket over him, tucked him in, touched that soft hair again as I wished him pleasant dreams.
A sweet Valentine, indeed, and I thank you, Madama Fortuna.
I'm afraid the Feast Day of Saint Valentine was not so sweet where the weather was concerned. Added to the gloomy clouds and frequent drizzle was wind, fierce gusting wind that has made an utter shambles of the campus and made it a slightly frightening thing, walking amidst flying tree branches and coconuts. I made a quick trip to the State Library in the morning, surprised to complete the journey without getting drenched somewhere along the way, then stopped at the mall to collect snipes. Someone had abandoned a plate lunch box with two fried eggs, four slices of spam and an enormous amount of plain rice. The rice had evidently been the ballast which kept the box from being blown away. An odd free lunch, but I wasn't complaining. That's the first time I've eaten Spam in many a moon.
Since the mountains near campus were shrouded in gray mist, I decided I'd have what I'd thought would be my only beer of the day at the mall, found a sheltered bench I'd not used before, remote enough to discreetly fill a paper cup. The selection at the library had not been very promising, but Ken Follett's A Place Called Freedom is an interesting-enough diversion. I hadn't expected to find anything which would impress me much after that splendid time with Lestat, so satisfactory amusement is enough.
Back on campus, at the computer lab. The Cherub came in, about an hour to spare before rehearsal, and invited me to the Garden for a brew. Say what? There I was, preparing to give up my hoarded twenty to fill his gas tank. But Mama had sent twenty as a Valentine. Moreover, his landlord had not deposited the rent check, thus the money was still in his account. Or was in his account. Naughty fellow, the Cherub. So we drank a beer and talked, as usual, of the Sleeptalker and the Tongan and Angelo, about his job and the people he works with, about the Tales and some of the recent reader reactions. He was much pleased to hear that a reader had said "thank God for the Cherub!" after I'd written about his comforting reactions to the latest Ice Dance.
When he went off to rehearsal, I stopped in briefly at Sinclair Library and then took the bus directly to Small Park, by-passing the mall. The rain had mercifully paused, giving me time to settle down in my tarp cocoon before it began to dribble from the sky yet again. I had to more securely than ever tuck myself in because the wind, even in the sheltered Cupboard, whipped around so erratically the tarp kept breaking loose. I finally got it adjusted, finding the crucial solution of putting the top corners under my head. Lousy pillow, but excellent anchorage.
Dreams again, lots of dreams, but none as sweet as the "dream walking" in the morning. Amadeus. Sigh. A reader wrote on Valentine's Day, saying he didn't know the reason for some of the names in this saga, suggested I should compose a glossary. Amusing idea. He has forgotten, in some cases. Only because I've so recently re-read the earlier Tales do I remember explaining some he's forgotten, like for example the Duchess, name inspired by the Tenniel illustrations for Alice. Yes, a glossary would be an amusing exercise.
As would be a dance with Amadeus.
705
On Thursday, I read all the Tales from the Past, since I knew the next day I would be combining them into one large file. I am still much dissatisfied with 80 West Cromwell Road. As I've said before, it gives almost no idea how special it was to live in London in the second half of the Sixties. I started to write some more about it on Friday afternoon, and especially about Michael, but then the Cherub arrived.He had also come to get me on Thursday for another one hour pre-rehearsal brew but, as he had promised, Friday was one of the classic all-out evenings of drink. He had his car, so we drove down to the mall where he bought cigarettes, that two-for-one special still going, and two bottles of Colt. He declined my invitation to buy some food for his house using my plastic, silly boy. Back to the secluded grove, then. He was a bit frazzled from work, I think, has been doing lots of overtime and is expecting almost four hundred on his first check. I didn't want to rain on his parade, but did remind him there was soon going to be two months rent due, since he's spent much of the first one. He'll no doubt stick with the job longer than the Bad Boys would, but I wouldn't bet money that it will last a year, or even six months.
It was one of those times with him where the conversation constantly hovered on the edge of argument and I had to step lightly several times to keep it from falling over. I did get a good laugh when he said, "but I like the Sleeptalker!" (What, I don't?) That had been his reaction when we were talking about the ice experience and I said I'd like to try it sometime without the Sleeptalker being there. I was, still am, puzzled by his saying he didn't like the way Angelo treated the Sleeptalker. I must ask him what he means, because I didn't notice anything unusual between Angelo and the Sleeptalker that evening all of us were together, but he veered the conversation off before I could pursue it.
He said we'd go to the Garden for one more beer and to hear the band, a reggae flavored group I'd not seen before, then on the way decided we should have "Monsters" instead. I don't know just how many different kinds of booze goes into a Monster, but it has a light, refreshing taste and packs quite a whallop. As if Dame Fortune hadn't been good enough for one week, sending Amadeus along, another one showed up. The Hungarian. What a sweetheart. We had been talking to the Frenchman, a young student friend of the Cherub's, when the Hungarian, also a student, came over and joined us. The Frenchman bought another round of Monsters for me and the Cherub, but I shared most of that one with the Hungarian. They were both quite funny, interspersing their perusal of the young ladies with suggested likely targets for me ... as if I needed anyone as long as that sweet Hungarian lad was looking into my eyes. Both young men were delightful, charming company.
It was one of those evenings which end in a blur. I don't even remember leaving the Garden and getting on a bus, didn't notice where I was until we were well beyond downtown Honolulu. I got out, almost decided to spend the night on the bus stop bench since I wasn't sure if the buses were still running. One did come along, though, so I went back to Small Park. For the first time, someone had taken the Cupboard, but it was a dry night, no problem sleeping on the covered walk, wrapped up in my cocoon. No problem at all, I didn't wake until 6:45!
I hadn't seen Amadeus on Friday, but did see him briefly Saturday morning, leaving the men's room as I was going in. Yes, he's a decidedly strong magnet. I walked over to the park later, but didn't see him. I'll have to explore more thoroughly, find out where he's hanging out there. Monday, being "President's Day" will be an off-line day, plenty of opportunity to go hunting.
Earlier in the day I had been poking around the Web, looked at several sites devoted to Brad Pitt. There certainly are some fine photographs available of young Mister Pitt. To my great surprise, I discovered that Tom Cruise played Lestat in the film version of "Interview with the Vampire". I hadn't paid any attention to the film at all when it was released. Cruise wouldn't have been my choice for the role, but Pitt as Louis is splendid. I doubt I'll be much pleased with the film, but do want to see it.
And I read a 1940 essay by Toynbee on Christianity and Civilization. He argues too strenuously against Gibbons and his proposition that Christianity played a major role in the downfall of the Roman Empire. Methinks the gentleman did protest too much. I do like the way Toynbee writes, though.
What a joy it was to have blue skies and sunshine, even if the wind continued to be overly gusty, to lunch again in the secluded grove with sandwich, chips and brew, a cornmeal muffin for the birds.