A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite,
and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?
Oscar Wilde, The
Picture of Dorian Gray (1891).
I would like to think I share Oscar Wilde’s outrageous
ironic view of the absurdity known as The Human Race.
When he speaks of cigarettes, the meaning transcends to the
pathetic foibles that constitute Man’s unending quest for fulfillment from
something or someone external; an inevitably fruitless pastime distracting us
from the seeking within of the one true self—the embodiment of the Divine
Spirit.
When I was a small child, I would mess with the Ant
Lions. Squatting by a conical pit, I
would gently nudge a little sand at the edge.
It would cascade down, causing the Ant Lion to kick sand upwards to
accelerate the slide of an ant further down the crumbling wall of the pit, to
the waiting jaws hidden in the nadir of the trap.
Except there was no prey; it was just little me having a bit
of sport at the expense of the hungry insect down there, hoping for a meal.
Each of us, in times past, has messed with Ant Lions. I know this as true because I have observed
others engaged in the practice. I know
this as true because I myself have played the role of hapless insect, buried in
a trap of my own desires; throwing sand to capture a dream, a hope, a longing;
only to discover that fate in the form of another human being has been toying
with me in a dispassionately cruel way.
Shit.
Enough of this mewling crapoola. Neither poet nor philosopher am I be. Let them that are so disposed tend to the
vagaries of human existence; I have more pressing matters at hand.
Like the fricking Dorks.
Each morning, just a little earlier than the day before, they each come
in here to bizzy-me at my keyboard inquiring when am I going to get off my
neglectful ass and take them for walkies?
I save the latest jumble of nonsense soliloquy and rise to
the din of six dogs barking, yipping and howling to do my duty by them.
It is not just people who teach us how to
treat them.
Following the leashing ceremony, I firmly grasp all six
leads, take a deep breath and open the door.
The Iditarod is on and I am yanked out the front, desperately trying to
reach back and close the door—so that marauding thieves and rapists have no
open door policy to greet them.
I spend the whole round-the-block untangling leashes and
mushing my team onwards. The Mutt
Brigade follows the spoor of their neighbors’ dogs, by intense sniffing
examination of each and every pile of dogshit along the way. I have learned to let them pause at corners
and end-street easements; there to sniff some more, pee, take a dump and
further entangle their leads.
This is preferable to them shitting on people’s lawns; I
have rationalized that a dump-on-public-ground is not sinful and leaves me
without a pick-up obligation.
Occasionally, I will drop a lead and the escapee runs ahead
of the pack. This is generally
acceptable…except for Jypsi. Squeaking
her excited high-pitched yip, she bounds from one tree along our route to the
next, frantically seeking her fondest
aspiration—to catch a squirrel off guard away from any tree.
If she would only respond to my gruff command to come back
to the pack, all would be forgiven. But
oh no! Not my little dapple spry
Dachshund! In her headlong rush of
pleasurable freedom from bondage, she pays me not a whit of attention.
Just like my ex-wife. Shit, just like all my ex-wives.
I might be more stentorian in my tone with her, but it is a
moment’s delight to watch her misbehave and run gazelle-elegant in oblivion to
all about her. I yearn to be that free
of spirit! Sadly, the chains that bind
me were forged too long ago for me to break them now.
In only one way do I emulate my little Jypsi: when I write
and write, with no regard to convention or the whims of the reader staring down
at my words. Then I am released in a
most glorious manner. It is only a
moment of fleeting unrestraint, but it is my moment to cherish always.
Now back to the keyboard, the needs of the Brigade met, I
plow through the furrows of my frontal lobes to piece together the fragments of
my last ten days in-country into something resembling the truth.
Part of the veracity must be telling it in the present tense. Excuse the obfuscation I do not…
*
I awoke to squint at the bright sunlight pouring through an
open barracks door. My eyelids are gummy
and my head is filled with the kind of sick hangover which I vaguely accept as
my just due. I look around and recognize
my own bunk at Camp Tien Sha.
I roll to
one side to check asshole’s calendar on his locker. He, whoever he is, meticulously crosses off
each day, as if that will speed his sentence of one entire year to the day.
It’s May 30, 1970.
Shit! What the fuck? Has asshole got ahead of himself? No, he wouldn’t do that. I have misplaced twenty four hours. Where was I?
How did I come back here, and when?
I lay there in my sweat and dirty underwear doing a piss-poor job of recollection.
Something about a bar…something about a couple of Army
grunts. Then I began to see fragments of
the lost hours.
A brief sidebar into blackouts: alcoholics go through
periods of drunken time which are lost to recall. This is both terrifying and confusing. Until all chance of repercussion from that
time has been safely eliminated, the drunk lives in a consciousness of blind
bewilderment.
This was not my first blackout, nor my last. It would take me another thirteen years to
realize what I was; another three years beyond that to accept what I was.
That is the material for a damage control
report that must wait another story telling.
Back to on-my-back-in-bunk on 5/30/70.
The fricking fracking fragments came slowly to resemble a
memory of sorts; like writing on grease paper with a ballpoint pen.
I had been drinking at the Special Forces bar since
noon. The sun was obscured by Marble
Mountain, but even boozy boy from Texas could see that it was getting on to
sunset. The place had remained deserted
with just a few very hard looking men appearing for one or two beers. No one spoke to me, which suited to a
tee.
I wasn’t there to talk.
In walks two guys in regular fatigues; they
are way too soft and pudgy around the middle for Green Berets. Finding my voice at last, I greet them as long
lost cousins and buy them a round—I think.
Not that they need coaxing; both are almost as drunk as their instant
congenial host.
I must have broached the Horny Topic. It is and always will be a hot subject for
discussion among youthful males. One of
them (was his name Sammy or Samson?) offered up the location of a whore
house. Where, I asked? They would show me, they said.
So, up to the road, three sets of waving hands and our next
ride screeched a halt. We were on our
way to get laid? Before we got to
wherever, it was dark. We thumped the
roof and jumped down. I vaguely recall
that there seemed to be a lot of traffic, a lot of glaring headlamps, a lot of
noise in general.
Across the road was some kind of one-star building that
could only be a gook structure from the look of it. We cross to it and the grunts are talking to
someone (A whore? A proprietor of whores? Someone’s Mother?).
One of my new companions tells me to dig $20
script out of my pocket. I have quite a
few of them and oblige. I watch the bill
go from my hand to his hand to somebody’s hand.
Someone (A girl? A mamasan?) takes my hand and leads me into this shack
beside the road. There is no easement,
no sidewalk between the structure and the road.
I think this odd, and wondered if a lot of vehicles collide with this
building so close to traffic.
I am led into a room that is pitch black. In a sober state, all the alarums of danger
and peril would be ringing loud to get the hell out; but in my condition, I’m
lucky to still have a wallet in my pants.
It is one of the Seven Wonders of the Known World how people
like me in a condition like mine can even remain upright, much less carry on in
some caricature of reason.
This was no
time to be reasonable; my erection wanted to mesh flesh with flesh. I was soon to be laid if I wasn’t fucked
first.
Someone (A girl? The
girl?) tells me to sit down while she gets…ready? Gets me ready? I can’t see the bed. I can’t see
anything. I could be blindfolded for all
the light in there. My pants come down
to below my knees. This is going to be a
$20 down-and-dirty tryst.
Legs open and
I’m in penetration position.
The lines blur and the memory vaporizes into confusion. I have the uncanny creepy feeling that the
room is not vacated for the business at hand.
I sense others sitting against the walls all around. This isn’t a brothel; it’s a house where
people live—families of people.
That ends the recollection.
I don’t even know if I came or not.
Nothing is there of most of a day and a night. Who were the Army grunts? Where did they go, leaving me to a black
house on a black bed in a black room?
I lie on my rack and squeeze my eyes tight shut, in the
vague hope that something will trigger more.
It does not. I get up long enough
to take four aspirins with a hot Coke, then down again, to sleep off whatever I
was sleeping off.
Tomorrow had to be better, I think, as I drift off. Tomorrow I’ve got to be more careful. I’ve got to hold it together until I’m
standing in front of that bus, waiting to take me home…back to the world...
…away
from…this.
