The other side of the coin...

So, now that I have all that off my chest, let me tell you a few other things. You remember me sayin’ that I showed the kids in the Junior class the Bukowski poem? Well, before I found “Roll the Dice” for them, I showed them this one. It’s called “Freedom”.

he drank wine all night of the
28th, and he kept thinking of her:
the way she walked and talked and loved
the way she told him things that seemed true
but were not, and he knew the color of each
of her dresses
and her shoes-he knew the stock and curve of
each heel
as well as the leg shaped by it.

and she was out again when he came home, and
she'd come back with that special stink again,
and she did
she came in at 3 a.m. in the morning
filthy like a dung eating swine
and
he took out a butchers knife
and she screamed
backing into the rooming house wall
still pretty somehow
in spite of love's reek
and he finished the glass of wine.

that yellow dress
his favorite
and she screamed again.

and he took up the knife
and unhooked his belt
and tore away the cloth before her
and cut off his balls.

and carried them in his hands
like apricots
and flushed them down the
toilet bowl
and she kept screaming
as the room became red

GOD O GOD!
WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?

and he sat there holding 3 towels
between his legs
not caring now whether she left or
stayed
wore yellow or green or
anything at all.

and one hand holding and one hand
lifting he poured
another wine

Most of the kids were quiet after reading that, but some walked away from the computer grinnin’, tellin’ others about it and sayin’ how gross it was. I just said “Ain’t poetry cool?” I hope they get the idea that the world is wider and cooler than Robert Frost. These are my kids, after all. They’re the only kids I’ll ever have. I need to see to it that their minds are opened, just in case their parents aren’t doin’ the job.

That brings me to my main point. I want my friends to know that I’m sorry I laid that depressing rant on them yesterday. That stuff just bubbles up out of me now and then, and I’ve found the blog to be a great place to bare my soul. I mean, mostly I use it to show you happy pictures of the fun we’re having, but now and then I’ll use it to vent. It’s like a really cheap version of group therapy. Anyway, I really don’t have anyone else I feel I can tell that kind of shit to, so you’re elected. Just ignore it if it weirds you out. There’ll be more pretty pictures in a while.

Bottom line, everything is really cool. I had a moment, but it’s gone now and the sun is shining. Denise and I went to the pool hall last night and she watched me play. It was ugly! They keep putting me up against Fives (I’m a Three). I went down in flames. I played decently, but missed enough key shots and ultimately lost every game. Four and out. Can’t feel bad about it, him being a Five and all. It was fun anyway. Two Corona’s with lime and a good cigar, and my woman at my side. What could be better? Well, winning would have ROCKED, but it wasn’t to be, so fuck it!

Last week I beat a five from another team. I won the first game, he won the next three and then I came up and won the fifth game, the rubber match, with a great shot that had everyone on both teams sayin’ shit like “Wow”, and “Great shot!”. It’s fun though, even when I go down in flames like last night, and it felt really good to have my woman there to watch and root me on. Usually she’s working late, or she just doesn’t go, thinking that I need time on my own with the guys.

After we got back to my place I showed Denise the blog post I put up yesterday afternoon and we talked about it. I told her that she doesn’t have anything to worry about, ether with me dumping her and walking away, or with me being steeped in some sort of fatalistic depression and not caring about dying along the road to San Saba. I’m deeply happy with her, and not goin’ anywhere, and I’m usually very careful on the road.

Thing is, you remember that old thing about a coward dying a thousand deaths, but a hero only one? Well, I’ve died a few thousand deaths in my time. I know what that feels like, and I’ll never do that again. When you’ve died like that, a little at a time, over and over again, I guess you loose some of the fear of the real thing. Truth is, if I went out in a blazing car crash tomorrow, all my problems would be over. End of story, so I don’t worry about it. Getting in a crash and becoming a paraplegic, now THAT scares the shit out of me, so I’m mostly careful. But I’m a boomer, so I have to drive fast. That’s the way we roll. And there’s worse ways of going.

I watched my father decline over the space of about a decade, loosing control of his mind and his bowels, and loosing just about every bit of his manhood in the process. I’ll NEVER let myself get like that. And, as I said yesterday, I don’t care to sit back in a comfortable chair in my dotage and watch all the people I love die off on me, so I don’t worry about my own death. Like I said yesterday, I’ll never have Kids and grand kids. There won’t be any little nippers bouncing on my knee when I’m in my 60s or 70s, so I don’t worry about my own mortality. It doesn’t matter.

Now, having said all that, I’m having the best time of my life these days. I’m actually happier than I can ever remember being. Denise and I are having a blast! We’re going camping this weekend at Perdenales Falls, and then going to a concert and Gun Show in Dallas the weekend after Thanksgiving. The weekend after that will consist of a long, 10 or 12 hour solo drive to Nashville and a few nights spent there attending a cool Civil War gun show and visiting with friends, and then another crazy 10 or 12 hour drive home on the Sunday. I really don’t have time to be depressed. I’m having too much friggin’ fun. So don’t worry about me. I’m fine. I’m just carryin’ a lot of shit around from the past, and some times it has to spill over. Forgive me for getting some of it on you now and then. Cheers.