Category Archives: Autobiography,memoirs and confessions

Red Queen

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A couple weeks ago I confessed on a thread that I had no idea what football player beat up who. And I really did have no idea, I’d missed the whole appalling thing. Which meant I had no idea what these people on this particular thread were all raving about. And they were raving, words gushed out in the hundreds, the thousands, torrents of angry words. Flabbergasted at my ignorance, they turned on me, fairly outraged that I could so be out of touch. I apologized and sputtered something about not being an NFL fan. Neither, it turned out, were any of them…though, apparently, that was quite beside the point. It’s all over the news, they said. So I apologized and said I don’t really watch the TV news. Neither did they, they said…except this time. Well, I’ve been busy. It was a feeble excuse, and I could almost see them rolling their eyes and sighing. They threw themselves back into heated discussion. So and so should be jailed. So and so should be fired. So and so should sue them for everything they’ve got. I quietly slipped away. The Red Queen was coming, a blind and aimless fury.

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Bulgarian women

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Last nite at Cafe NELA, out back. The guy said do you know what it’s like walking on an ice-covered street holding a Bulgarian woman’s purse? I said no, I didn’t. Well, he said, it ain’t easy. Then he went to get another beer.  He was a big guy, strong, stoned, intense, funny. Went all the way from to Sofia for some chick. That’s a long way from Highland Park. She showed him all the crazy places, the crazy people.  Listened to the crazy music. Wound up holding her purse so she could cross the street in spiked heels without toppling. He slipped and slid behind her. Never dropped the purse. You don’t do that for just any woman, I said. No, he said, you do that for the experience.

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I love this town

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A wedge of Canadian geese just did their morning commute overhead from the Silver Lake reservoir–that’s why the grass is so green there–to the Los Angeles River behind me. Honking frantically. What a cacophony. They’ll come back a little less noisy at dusk heading back to the reservoir. I love the sound, and their ragged V’s are always perfect against the sunset. The sunsets have been lovely. Last night the sky to the west went from a gorgeous pink to a beautiful orange that filled the whole front room here with its light. Almost spooky. We went out onto the sundeck and watched till it turned to shades of grey and into black, and the lights in the hills came twinkling on and a last bunch of geese flew past, heading home.

And I wasn’t even stoned.

I love this town.

Canadian Geese (and a couple coots and a mallard) in the L.A. River.

Canadian Geese (and a couple coots and a mallard) in the L.A. River.


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Falling down

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So last night I’m heading down the front stairs, a bag or two for the recycle bin in each hand, and there’s no moon and no lights on and it’s pitch dark and I forgot there was one last step and bam. Nothing broke, recyclable or me. I picked myself up, went on down to the bins, did a few things in the car, smarting a little, came back in, popped a couple Tylenol, tooled around the house doing chores, wrote an essay, reworked a couple more, straightened out the place and got ready for bed. Then I noticed I had a bruise the size of a dinner plate. Realized it hurt. Took a couple more tylenol, and went to bed. I woke up today a little stiff and sore and the bruise was gorgeously purple. Very impressive. Then it dawned on me….I’m 57 years old and need to stop hurting myself. I’ve been hurting myself my whole life in all kinds of stupid ways, falling, slipping, bashing my head, slicing myself, everything and anything, and it’s time to stop. I mean I bet I’ve fallen on those steps half a dozen times. I’ve fallen so many times in my life–I have one functioning knee–that I fall like a stuntman. I fall without dropping what I’m holding. I fall and catch my glasses at the same time. I fall and get right back up like it’s nothing and didn’t even hurt, no matter how much it did. One time my knee gave out while on me while I was holding a cup of coffee and in half a second I was on the floor in a heap but didn’t spill a drop of coffee. It was a wedding reception, I remember, with all these people in suits and finery staring. It’s a skill I learned after probably hundreds of falls. A stupid skill, but a skill. So the next moonless night I decide to walk blindly down our treacherously charming old Silver Lake stairs–people were much smaller in 1932, and had tiny feet–I’ll take a flashlight. And only carry one bag and not four.  And try not to be such an idiot. It’s taken me fifty seven years to figure that out. And while this is a subpar blog entry, I just wanted to have it here so when I’m all laid out in traction trying to use the computer with one unbroken finger I can remember the promise I made myself, laugh, and hurt all over.

OK, time for more tylenol….

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You write about them

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(2014)

Wow, it’s been over six months since I pulled a Bill Holden. Scar isn’t much, apparently I heal well. And while bashing your head open on a coffee table is a bit traumatic, and bleeding all over is a drag, a sticky clean up, the experience now seems kinda cool. Being on my knees on the floor, a handful of blood and the first lines of a story popping into my head. Trying to staunch the bleeding with a compress and the rest of the piece coming together as I’m laying there. It was a trip. I wouldn’t say I’d do it again, but it was a trip. Life is full of crazy experiences, you take them as they come, and you write about them.

William Holden with cool scar. Mine was in the middle of my forehead, longer, and real.

William Holden in Stalag 17 with cool scar. Mine was in the middle of my forehead, longer, and real.

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Talking to Inanimate Objects

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My wife just busted me talking to bowl of nectarines. Not as a group, either….I bitched at several on them in turn for taking too long to ripen up. Thought they are talking their sweet time. No pun intended. I turned around and she’s looking at me. So who are you talking to?.  Umm…a nectarine? Sure, she said. Sure.

My wife doesn’t talk to inanimate objects. Apparently the Sioux don’t hold conversations with things that cannot actually talk back. Oneida either. I can’t imagine not talking to inanimate objects. It’s so natural. Someone told me it’s an Irish thing. I just googled Irish talking to inanimate objects and several items came up, mostly about why talking to inanimate objects will weird out your English date. The guy, a little drunk, was bitching at the furniture. The girl gave him one of those looks. The dining room table, he said, was snickering behind his back. Inanimate objects can be cruel. I don’t think the rest of the date went well. No little bit of heaven for Clancy that night. She probably went and married an Episcopalian. Episcopalians don’t talk to inanimate objects. Then again they’re pretty inanimate themselves, so what would be the point? An Episcopalian and a table holding a conversation wouldn’t exactly be Shakespeare.

Anyway, I stopped talking to the nectarines till my wife left the room. Then I looked back at the bowl and said you guys got me in trouble. They just sat there, unripe, and said nothing.

 

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Orgasm

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from 2006 I think….

I went across the floor this morning to grab a cup of coffee and stopped by J’s desk to say hi, how are things. She got a big smile on her face and clapped her hands together with excitement. Last night, she said, I had my last acting class! I said congrats. She said and for my final I had to portray a woman in a glass elevator having a screaming orgasm. A what? A woman in a glass elevator having a screaming orgasm! Really? Yes! And I had to do it in front of the entire class! You had to had to do that in front In front of everybody? Yes! You see, I was this really repressed, sexually frustrated woman who gets into a glass elevator in a short skirt with no panties and I spread my legs and begin to show myself off to all the men below like this—and she writhed about and made with her hands—and then work myself into a huge screaming orgasm. She began loudly reenacting her performance, moaning and panting and oh babying. I frantically shushed her. So she silently shook and panted and quivered and rolled her eyes. Oh baby, she said, and began with the moaning and panting again. I pleaded with her to stop. Oh yeah, she said, I really got into it. I was wild. The class loved it. Uhhh…did you pass? (it was the only thing I could think of to say.) Oh yeah baby, she shouted. I went out with a BANG!

She then grabbed her purse and strutted off to lunch.

All around me the cubicles were ominously silent. How would I ever explain this to HR. I slunk over to Danielle’s desk. Danielle sat nearby. I told her the story. That was nothing, she said. I’ve had to listen to her rehearse it all week. Rehearse? Yeah, rehearse her orgasms. Here? At her desk? No one said anything? Danielle laughed. Nah, she said, no one complained. Besides, J’s boss was on vacation. It was a slow work week. So she practiced orgasms all week.

But wasn’t practicing orgasms weird?

Not really, she said, just noisy. Then her phone rang and she waved me off. I walked back to my desk.

A buddy passed by about then, saw my bewildered expression. Asked what was up. You know, I said, women are different than you and I. He looked at me and said you just figured that out? So I was about to tell him the story, to explain, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. He’d never believe it.

I mean do they even have elevators with glass floors?

 

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Smelling clean

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(2012)

A little bit ago I was washing my hands in the restroom at work, really sudsing them up good, finger nails, cuticles, down between the fingers. Even under the wedding ring. Clean hands. It felt good. Cleanliness is good.

Suddenly out of the blue I remembered one of the weirdest compliments I ever received. It was at a another job twenty years ago, downtown, way atop one of the towers there. I was a proofreader, just me and six women, all typesetters, a microcosmic Los Angeles, all colors, all accents, all everything. The place was crowded and confined and really busy, all the women were tough broads who swore like sailors and said anything they felt like saying. I eventually stopped blushing (my personal life was a regular topic of conversation, like I wasn’t even there.) One day one of the ladies suddenly stopped typing and looked at me. She sniffed. Once, twice. Then she looked me over, top to bottom. Sniffed again.

You know boy, she said, you smell real good.

I said thank you, blushing.

She nodded gravely. Yeah boy, you smell clean.

I said thank you again.

She smiled. I like a man who smells clean, she said.

I just nodded, nervous about where this was going.

Yup, she said, I bet you even wash your asshole.

I froze.

You wash your asshole, don’t you?

I nodded.

Yeah, I knew it. I like a man who washes his asshole.

I was beet red by now. Everyone was staring.

Yup, she said, I likes a man who takes the time to keep his asshole clean.

The other ladies agreed. Discussion followed. I just sat there mute, trying to smell as clean as possible.

My friend Martha was there next to me. She was wickedly funny. But for once she didn’t say anything. She just looked at me and smiled.

Bowlegged cowboy

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(Another old one, written a good decade ago at least.)

Bowlegged cowboy contest.

Bowlegged cowboy contest.

We were heading west on the 18 driving through Adelanto–that’s the upper desert, between Apple Valley and Pearblossom*–and pulled into a brand new mini-mall to pick up some cold drinks. There was new all over the upper Mojave back then, the nineties boom was underway, credit was easy, cash plenty, and the L.A. megalopolis was overflowing its basin and spilling into the surrounding desert. Here on the edge of Adelanto you could see it. One side of the highway was scrub, creosote mostly, a few poppies, an abandoned farm house with the roof burned away. And the other side was a shiny new mini-mall. Homes were going up by the hundred just down the road, and we’d passed a big shopping center a little ways back. There wasn’t a patch of land anywhere in sight that didn’t have a for sale sign. The lot across the street did. A couple hundred acres. I can’t remember how much they wanted for it but it seemed like a lot of money for a dusty patch of desert.

That’s when I saw him, the spectre. A man on a horse. A cowboy, a real cowboy, all dusty and weathered and leathery. He trots up, boots, jeans, cowboy hat, no shirt. He got off the horse and was bowlegged like you can’t believe, like he never got out of the saddle. He walks into the store, the lady says he has to put a shirt on. He’s got one in his saddlebag, throws it on, goes back in. Buys a coke. Says thank ya ma’am and gets back up in the saddle and trots off again, across the 18. I watched him disappear into the desert.

Somewhere up there in the foothills he worked a herd of cattle. They were invisible. He was invisible. Maybe I dreamed up the whole thing. But I didn’t. He was there, alright, bowlegged and all. He always was there, if not him then cowboys just like him. Their herds ate up the springtime grass and come summer they drive them up to higher ground. It was just lately all this civilization popped up, filling in the lowlands with houses and Walmarts and cars. With people and sidewalks and police. Weird how you drop a megalopolis into a desert and it’s the desert dwellers that look strange. But they aren’t the ones.

I snapped out of it. We slipped back into traffic and drove off in air conditioned comfort past row after row of brand new houses, feeling as out of place as you can be.

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* actually it’s between the more prosaic Victorville and Llano.

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Toe

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So yesterday afternoon (sometime last spring) my wife is sitting in a chair at the table and I walk by. I’ve done this  a zillion times, her sitting in that chair and me walking by. This time I walked by but the little toe on my right foot didn’t. It slammed into chair. I either sprained or fractured it, I can never tell the difference. I don’t know how many times I’ve done this. At least once a year I sprain or fracture my right little toe. I hobble and wince a bit, maybe. That’s it. I generally forget it unless I sprain the same toe again in a day or two. That really hurts. That’s when I take a few tylenol. I never tell anyone though. Big giant guys don’t make scenes about little tiny toes.

But I didn’t stub the little toe on the right foot again. No, I stubbed the little toe on the left foot this time. It was dark, in the bedroom, she was asleep, I let out a muffled curse and kept walking. Hobbled into the bathroom for a couple Tylenol then wandered out into the living room and sat down waited for the throbbing to stop. It was four in the morning. Me in the dark room with a throbbing toe. The other toe chimed in. The tylenol took effect eventually and I gingerly made my way back to bed trying not to stub anything else. And now I’m back in the living room and the sun is pouring in and both toes are a beautiful shade of purple.

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