Ecclesiastes 8: 15
The city burns behind us. The flames from the buildings introduce brilliant shades of orange and yellow and red to the black canvas of the night sky. We hear the screams of the residents trapped in that burning display of God’s wrath. Maybe part of us wants to reach out and help those people, but it’s a small part. All we love and care about is here with us. Somewhere a clock is ticking down. Our time is running short.
While a hundred and fifty years of man’s creation is reduced to molten puddles of steel, hot coals, and heavy gray ash, the fifteen or twenty of us packed into this bar pass shots of whiskey, belt out our favorite songs off key and loud as hell, flirt, laugh, cry…we’re making sure that nothing is missed. Nothing can be forgotten. Nothing can be left unsaid.
“Do you remember the time when…”
“I always wanted to tell you…”
“My wife is going to be pissed when…”
“Do you want to go out back and…”
“You want me to show you my…”
“Seriously man, you’re fine. We’ve all…”
Conversations swirl through the group. Everyone is talking to everyone. The group grows and our circle broadens. There are still our individual subgroups. The three of us. The four of them. Those two over there. But those pairings and groups only make the larger circle stronger.
The fire begins to breach the outer limits of the city. Flames spread across the dry grass of the countryside, cutting a blackened path directly to the foot of our hill. Rabbits, mice, snakes, all struggle to keep ahead of the burning death that pursues them so furiously.
We’re not oblivious to the destruction of the city. Nor are we unaware that this same thing is happening all over the world. But we know that we have a choice. That clock is going to hit zero no matter what. We can fret and worry and panic, or we can meet death on our own terms. Our last moments will be moments of joy in what we have. They will be bittersweet remembrances of what we once had. They will be quiet musings over what could have been. We will die as we lived…experiencing life rather than simply be propelled forward through it.
The fire is at the door. There is no speech making. There is no final toast. By the time the blaze finds us, the night has grown quiet. The circle is still there, but we’ve all broken into our smaller groups again. Lovers embrace. Friends hold each other’s hands. The taste of the rare bourbon that sat hidden behind the bar owner’s safe is savored with every sip. There are tears. There are smiles. Some of us still sing. All of us are certain that we met the end as it should be met.
The fire consumes us, but it doesn’t destroy us.
The Battle Begins
There he stood, daylight fading behind him and the moon rising behind the line of his enemies. All the power of the universe was vested in him and each of the villains in front of him wanted a chance to take that power away. As they approached he thought of the truth in what his father taught him long ago. The old man had taken him aside one morning, put his arm around the then young hero, and warned him that regardless of the life he lived and the friends he made, when the moment of his greatest trial came, the hero would stand alone. Years of fighting alongside the others had made him forget that advice, but here he was in the fight of his life and not a soul reached out to help.
“So be it,” he whispered. He’d fought alone before and if he was destined to die this day, then he would take as many of the enemy with him as possible. The trumpet sounded and the fight began. Blood, bone, and pain were the order of the day. He served up as much of that as he could.
Playlist Project #5: Billy Lyons and Stack O Lee - Furry Lewis
Mining colonies were dirty place to live, literally and figuratively. There’s a reason no man on Earth or Luna ever packed up his loving wife and two beautiful genetically accurate children and moved to Mars to start a new lucrative career as a dirt mover. Those people stayed far away because they knew that within a year the wife would be working in one of the brothels near the landing zone for extra water credits and those kids would be in a tool shop somewhere grinding sharper edges onto industrial diggers…sans a few fingers each. That’s what a mining colony did. It took the happy little reality you were accustomed to and fractured it beyond repair. It scraped your soul of innocence and replaced it with grit and decay.
That didn’t bother Lee at all. The level of detritus floating in his soul meant that he could take anything the colony dished out. Day in and day out he lived the same routine. Work. Drink. Have sex with his favorite prostitute if it’s payday. Have sex with one of the women on the drill team if it wasn’t. The life suited Lee. It was more consistent than what he had on Earth with the exception of the four years in prison. The routine didn’t keep him out of trouble, but it kept him in the trouble he knew how to handle.
That’s why he was in the colony sponsored cantina after work on a standard measure Friday. It was payday, and he was still enjoying the afterglow from the professional attention he had just received in one of the upstairs bedrooms. The whiskey in his glass was passable for actual Earth distilled and colony bars poured heavy. This put Lee half in the bag and left him with enough money in his pocket to be dangerous when he sat down to a poker game in the back of the bar. He quickly discovered that watching your spending cash disappear one busted straight at a time will do an amazing job of undoing the mood a good whore can put in a man.
Billy Lyons on the other hand was having a great night. Earlier in the week his drill team had damn near found a geyser – guaranteeing them all bonuses for surpassing their volume quotas. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but Lyons was one of those assholes who celebrated his success by pointing out the lack of success in other people’s lives. Combine that with the fact that he caught every card he needed and the man was insufferable. Throughout the night the taunts came over the table.
“Christ Lee,” Lyons would say. “It’s gotta hurt to lose like that. What is that, a third of your pay?”
“I can afford it, Billy.” Lee answered.
“If you say so. I just don’t want to feel guilty for breaking you. I’m not even touching my base pay for this game. Just spending my bonus.”
“Ante up, Lyons.” said Lee. But Billy Lyons was on a roll.
“I could lose all of this and it wouldn’t matter…of course it’s a moot point since I can’t seem to lose.”
And so the night went. Lee’s pockets got lighter and lighter. The fleeting thought of paying Rhonda for another go around had long become unrealistic. By the time he fell into the downward spiral of placing larger and larger bets to make up for losing more and more money, his eyes boiled with rage at every brag Lyons. Finally, his last bill was in the center of the table and he sat there with a handful of cards that served no real purpose other than to add an exclamation point to the night.
Lee knew how to play poker, when he was sober. He knew that this last bet held no threat or worry to to a man with the stack of cash that Billy had accumulated at the table. Even so, he muttered a soft prayer as each man was dealt his last card. When Lee saw the card, he didn’t even wait for the hand to play out. He threw his cards to the center of the table and stood, ready to walk away.
“You tapped me out, Billy” Lee said.
“Damn right I did,” Lyons laughed. “You never even stood a chance, Lee.” Lyons began counting his money. “Don’t let it get you down though. It happens.”
“You’re right, Billy.” Lee said. “I’ll see you at work on Monday.”
“Yeah,” Lyons answered. “I guess you won’t be back in here again during the weekend cycle. I hope you’ve got some food lying around your hovel though. I don’t want you wasting away.”
“I’ll be fine.”
Lee turned and started for the door. The rage in him had started to subside. He felt stupid for losing all of his money, but that was why it was called gambling. He had talked himself into accepting that he’d spend all weekend inside watching vids, when Lyons called out for him one last time.
“Lee!” called Billy and Lee turned back to face him. “Before you go, I wanted to ask you… You seemed like you were in a good mood before I kicked your ass. Which of the ladies did you see tonight? I think my mood could use some improving and your money should go a long way.”
Lyons emphasized the taunt with a gyrating motion from his pelvis. Lee’s anger grew at the thought of his money giving Billy the satisfaction that he wanted for himself.
“Which one was it?” Lyons continued. “You didn’t have that much money on you to begin with so it couldn’t have been one of the pretty ones.”
All of the night’s whiskey rushed directly to Lee’s head. As Billy continued speaking, Lee crossed the length of the bar between them at a pace that made all of the dirt movers in the place clear out of his way. Lyons stopped mid sentence when he realized that Lee wasn’t just coming to him, but was coming at him with fists clenched. No small man himself, Lyons smiled.
“Shut-” Lee jumped across the last few feet that separated the two men.
“The-” He drew his fist back as far as he could.
“Hell-” He connected with Lyons’ jaw and felt the satisfying crunch of the bone breaking.
“Up!” Lyons fell to the ground and Lee immediately put his boot on the man’s throat.
Billy took a moment to catch his breath. He’d expected the hit to be hard, but he was still a little surprised by force. He then grabbed Lee’s foot and flipped the big man onto his back. From the floor, Lyons kicked the fallen Lee in the side of his head. Lee felt an explosion of pain when Billy’s steel lined work booth connected with his skull. Both men were on their feet almost immediately and they locked together just as fast.
The fight went on for an hour. The colony police showed up, but with a lack of any other options for entertainment, they placed bets on who would win rather than separate the two men. Lee would punch Billy and Billy would return the blow with equal force. The bar shook with the tremor from their blows and the roughnecks around them hooted and hollered with each gush of blood or flung tooth. Eventually the two stood there, each exhausted and broken. The floor was a mess of blood, splintered wood, and broken glass. Billy Lyons was hunched over nursing a few broken ribs that shot electricity through his body when he stood straight. Lee’s right hand refused to close completely into a fist thanks to the broken wrist and fully separated knuckles. The fight had taken the drunk out of Lee and he wanted nothing more than to be in his own bed, bleeding on his own sheets, and spitting out most of the blood he was now swallowing.
“This is done Billy,” said Lee.
“Yeah,” replied Lyons. “I guess it is.”
“Enjoy my money.”
With that, Lee once again turned to leave the bar. It was pure luck that he caught the fear in the bartender’s eye and looked over his shoulder just in time to see Lyons about to stab him with the big drillman’s knife that every dirt mover was supposed to turn back in after the work day. Lee didn’t think twice as he dropped to a knee, reached into the holster in his boot, and drew the Colt Firebrand he carried for protection. In a split second the the weapon fired a burst of energy that left a clean bloodless hole in the chest of Billy Lyons. Lyons lived just long enough after the blast to drop his knife and register a look of shock and fear that the drilling crews would talk about for years to come.
Lee reholstered the Firebrand and walked back to where the poker table lay tipped over. He picked up the stack of money that Billy wouldn’t be needing anymore. After leaving a sizable number of bills with the colony officers who thanked him and immediately hauled away the body after pocketing the cash, he counted the remaining money. He sat his broken and battered frame on one of the stools and ordered another glass of whiskey and waited for Rhonda to return. It looked like he was going to have a pretty good weekend after all.
Dilemma
He knows that there’s a balance that needs to be achieved in how he perceives and observes things. From a high enough vantage point he can see the world but he can’t make out any of the details. Drop down to the street though, and he can only see what’s in front of him. Where was the mid-point? Should he sacrifice the ability to track the flight path of a missile across the Northern Hemisphere for the ability to spot a serial killer in his neighborhood.
For years he struggled with the question. The answer it turns out is simpler than he ever thought it could be. It depends on who’s in the path of that misile or who that killer’s next victim is. If she’s involved, that’s where he’ll be. He’ll save her at all costs and she’ll never know.
That’s how love works.
Playlist Project #2: Hoochie Koochie Man – Muddy Waters
I was standing there when the gypsy woman told your mother all about you. It was a dark October night and we were coming home from Pastor Reynold’s weekly Bible study. The air was cool, but it was still close enough to summer’s end that we were glad to walk in the night in our short sleeves. Your mom, she was beautiful and her skin glowed in the moonlight. We’d just moved to St. Louis from New Orleans a month earlier and we were settling in just fine in our new house in a little neighborhood that had almost the same character – at least in appearance – to our old home.
As we discussed the passages the pastor assigned us to read over the next week, the old woman stepped from a doorway into our path, pointed at your mother, titled her head back and – God as my witness – cackled. We were unnerved by the display and attempted to step around her, but she grabbed us each by our shirts and held us in place with her gaze.
“You’re with child woman…” she said in a low raspy voice. The declaration surprised your mother. She’d only just found out that morning and hadn’t even told me yet.
“How did -” your mother began.
“The child will only bring you despair. He will be swooned over by women. He will be envied by men. He will bear the mark of evil and he will give you no rest.”
I pushed the old lady back and realized too late that I’d used to much force. She fell backwards into the gutter, but somehow never broke her stare. Your mother turned white with shock.
“That’s enough,” I yelled at her.
“You’ll see,” she laughed. “Your child will talk with devils. His soul will be as black as the night.”
We left her in the gutter and quickly walked along home, trying to calm each other down.
After the coffee had been poured and our nerved settled, your mother confirmed that she was pregnant and the lunatic woman must have been able to tell. We’d seen these hoodoo crones before, and decided we were more upset this time just because it was unexpected in our new city. We prayed together. We made love to celebrate the fact that we were finally going to have a child. We woke up the next day and went about our lives.
It wasn’t until that Saturday morning, the seventh day of July, when we thought again of the old lady. Your mother had gone into labor the night before and we rushed to the hospital as planned. After seven hours of labor, and a medical scare that required most of the on duty doctors to rush into the room to assist, you were born. A storm raged outside that made the morning as dark as midnight, and lightning flashed everywhere. Then, when you finally gave your first cry into the world, the storm subsided. The team of doctors didn’t think anything about it and just quipped that you must be our lucky charm. I saw the look in your mother’s eyes though. You don’t grow up where we did and not see the implications that came with the circumstances of your birth.
As you grew though, we tried our best to keep you right with God, but your pockets revealed a steady stream of talismans, mojo bags, and trinkets that showed how hard it would be to keep you away from the art. All we could do is pray. As we watched you grow into a man, we hoped that our praying would pay off.
Now, we hear stories though. That time in Texas when you were accused of cheating in a game of stud poker. We heard about how the other man pulled a gun on you and walked out without an argument. We also heard about how later that night he was found lying in the middle of his bedroom floor – apparently drowned without a drop of water anywhere to be seen. We hear stories like that all of the time. Word of you keeps floating back to us from whatever town or city you happen to be in that month. The stories break your mother’s heart. Watching her cry breaks mine.
I know you’re out there, and I know that nothing I say can change the course you’re on. I just want you to know that we love you and we’re praying for you everyday. Just remember son, every time you use a piece of mandrake root, or a lock of some poor soul’s hair for some dark scheme there’s a price to be paid, and that debt’s gonna be collected some day. The darkness has to be fed.
Playlist Project : #1 Jimi Hendrix - Red House
Dear Jimi,
You’re freaking me out dude. You keep telling people about my house and they keep stopping by asking if I’m still your baby. It’s really getting annoying. I mean, every morning, I’m sitting in my underwear trying to wake up and face yet another day of corporate drudgery when some drugged out hippie or wannabe guitar player knocks on my door asking me if I can introduce you to them.
Why, Jimi? We didn’t really date. We had one night together. You were high. I was drunk. We didn’t even sleep together. Imagine my surprise when I’m listening to one of your records and I hear you talking about my little red house. At first it was flattering, but Jesus Christ man…maybe you could turn down the creepy factor just a little? The fact that you were still obsessing about me more than three months later just makes me worry more.
So, I’m letting you know now that there’s a restraining order against you. I had no choice after I heard you talking about how you had a key to my door. I’m really glad that I had the locks changed after I woke up and saw that my keys were missing. I thought I’d just lost them at the bar. When you sang about trying the key the other morning though, it was enough to make me borrow my father’s shotgun. If I catch you on my porch again, I’m going to give you both barrels. Again, I don’t want to, but you leave me no choice.
Anyway man…good luck with that whole music career thing. I don’t harbor any ill will towards you, really. I just want some peace and quiet.
Sincerely,
Mary
P.S. My sister Lucille is a tramp. It doesn’t surprise me that she’d run off with you at the drop of a hat. Tell her I said hi.
Defeat
The hero lay on the ground, bloody and bruised almost beyond recognition. Above him stood the enemies who’d united against him. The vantage point was not one he was familiar with, or fond of. Even with hit vision blurred, their towering frames struck fear into his heart as he discovered that he was incapable of moving. He’d fought all of them before. He’d beaten them countless times. That they’d taken him down today was something that his brain was incapable of dealing with.
Yet here he was. There they stood.
He couldn’t make out the conversation they were having. Instead he focused on the taste of the blood in his mouth…his blood. How long had it been since he’d seen his own blood? Had he ever? This fight had always been so easy before, maybe that’s why he didn’t take the threat seriously this time. After all, who would have expected these wholely unremarkable villians to win. The failure stung, not because their plan had any genius to it, but because he was entirely responsible. He’d become distracted and hadn’t taken their threats seriously. He’d turned his head at the wrong moment and they’d taken the opportunity to strike. He fell to Earth. The world went black. He’d opened his eyes, and the searing pain engulfed his entire reality.
The pain from the burns on his legs was unbearable, but it at least told him that his legs were still there. As his enemies discussed and argued over his ultimate fate, he tried to concentrate on getting up.
He knew he had to bounce back. He knew that he could still win the fight if he could just get back on his feet. Having never been in this situation before though, he wasn’t sure he knew how.
Review: Prince Caspian (Movie)
Memorandum
From: Cyr
Guy from Earth
To: Aslan
Lord of Narnia
Regarding: Psychological conditioning of front line troops
Dear Aslan,
Today the wife and I saw a documentary about your campaign to recapture the land of Narnia from foreign invaders. While I was impressed with the scenic vistas of your homeland and the deep rich beauty of the many diverse cultures, what captured my attention most was the apparent effectiveness of Narnian combat training and mental conditioning. Here in my world, my homeland has what is arguably the most powerful military on the planet. But even our most elite forces require extensive training to prepare them for the mental anxiety that comes with taking a life. Many of these people require significant psychological evaluation after combat to help them deal with certain actions. I was amazed by how four of your most elite warriors went from milktoast English Harry Potter wannabes to bloodthirsty killers in a matter of moments.
In the early stages of the documentary, these kids whined a lot about magic, and the pain of walking, and pretty much everything else you can think of. I admit that I couldn’t see how these kids could ever be of any use. But then, dear Aslan, the glory of Narnian combat training was revealed to me. In one crazed moment, the four children began stabbing, slicing, dismembering, and killing everything that stood between them and victory. These kids had a body count so high that the very heavens must have reeked with the smell of your enemies’ blood. Better yet, after each killing there was no downtime. No reflection was needed. They would just make a joke and then head out and kill again.
Where did you find such psychologically disturbed children?
Tales of the Southside: The Legend of Jug Man Joe
The Legend of Jug Man Joe
They say his name was Joe, but who knew for certain. All we kids knew was that he walked the streets of South St. Louis with a two gallon milk jug. He was unkempt, unshaven, and unruly. Dressed in clothes that had never been near a dictionary that had the word clean in it, Joe kept vigil at intersections and in alleys – always alert to the possibility that his services would be needed.
Jeremy and I had been selling papers on the corner of Grand and Gravois all morning one Saturday. For $0.10 a paper, we stood in one of the city’s busiest intersections eating our profit’s worth of White Castle’s as we convinced drivers to lower their windows and fork over a buck for the early edition Sunday paper. Business had been good and the weather was brisk when Joe came up to our stand and asked if we had a dollar he could borrow.
“No,” replied Jeremy.
Joe shuffled from one foot to the other uncomfortably and looked at me.
“Sorry man,” I said. “We have to turn in our money when they pick us up tonight.” It was only a small lie.
“Right,” said Joe. “I understand.”
He raised the jug he held to his lips and drank some of the neon green rotgut he carried with him. As he swallowed, he grimaced slightly, shook his head, made a clicking noise with his tongue and walked on down the road. Jeremy and I laughed and joked about his lack of stabbing us.
Later as I recounted the adventure to my mom over a dinner of meatloaf and instant mashed potatoes, she told me all about Joe.
“What’s in his jug?” I asked her through a mouthful of food.
“Antifreeze, mostly.” she answered. “He needs it to keep his core temperature low.”
“His what?” I was confused by both what she had said and the presence of peas in my potatoes.
“That man’s served his country in a way that no one else can ever understand,” began my mom. She poured me a cup of Kool-Aid and held out her hand. Knowing the signal, I fished my day’s earnings out of my pocket and put in her outstretched palm. As she counted the money, she told me the legend of Jug Man Joe.
“Your grandma knew him when he was a young man. She said he was a banker or an accountant or something like that. He was just a normal guy back then.
“One day he was coming home from his office downtown. It was August according to your grandma, just a few months after your grandpa took off with his girlfriend. Joe was getting off of the Grand bus at Arsenal when he heard someone yelling in the middle of the street. There was a diner on that corner in those days and about ten people eating in the window saw the whole thing happen.
“The scream came from a man in a dark suit who stood there holding up traffic, gun drawn, but frozen in abject terror. Across the street from him stood another man, pale and tall with a full beard. The second man had a brief case and he was opening slowly towards the suited man.
“Joe, not knowing what was going on, but instinctively knowing that it wasn’t good, ran quickly to the suited man. He got to him just before the briefcase man opened the case all the way. Joe leaped at the last minute and pushed the suited man to the ground, but before he could get down himself, there was flash of light.
“The customers in the diner all told varying stories about what they saw, but the same basic elements held through each of their tellings. There was a pop and a scream. There was a flash. Everyone is certain that for a brief moment, Joe became translucent and they could clearly see the man’s skeleton.
“After everything cleared up, there in the middle of the street lay Joe and the suited man. The brief case man was nowhere to be seen.
“Later, Joe found himself in a government hospital and being asked by a four star general to sign a stack of papers. It turns out that the man with the briefcase was a Russian spy who’d stolen a top secret radioactive weapon. The suited man was a federal agent who’d been tracking him. Joe had saved the agent from death, but in the process had absorbed so much radiation himself that his body’s base temperature had been reset to some ridiculously high level. The government, in exchange for saving the agent’s life began pumping Joe full of experimental drugs meant to keep his temperature down.
“Joe never recovered from the trauma though and couldn’t handle keeping up with his scheduled medical visits. He began drinking and roaming the streets of St. Louis, watching for the Russians he knew were following him, seeking revenge for their thwarted plans.. Eventually, he’d fallen off of the government’s radar and ran out of the drug that was saving his life.
“Joe, desperate to stay cool, began drinking auto coolant. Most people would die from this, but Joe’s body ran so hot that he metabolized the coolant almost instantly. So the jug of antifreeze, usually spiked with vodka and orange juice, became his constant companion, because without it his brain would cook out of his skull. Still though, the heat’s enough to make him crazy.
“When you see him though…you remember that he’s a hero. The agent he saved knew the names and locations of over 100 Soviet agents who’d infiltrated government labs here in the U.S. If Joe hadn’t been there, who knows what language we’d be speaking today.”
I chewed the remains of my meatloaf as my mom finished her story. I was astounded by the tale and I viewed Joe with more respect when I saw him after that. Eventually, I stopped seeing him around and I’d lost my memory of him as I filled my head with information learned from school and life. One day though, the local newspaper, the same one Jeremy and I sold on that street corner so long ago, ran a story about a local homeless man of some fame who was found dead. The story didn’t mention anything of the man’s past or his fall from normalcy. But their description of him fit the image in my head perfectly. As I read about his death, I went to the kitchen and poured myself a glass of whiskey and added a small drop of antifreeze to it in his honor. I thought about how he saved our country in one quick moment and in exchange for his heroism, he’d always be remembered as just another crazy homeless man.
I downed the glass in one drink.
Inertia
The top is spun upon the table. It’s a beautiful thing, decorated by hands concerned with craftmanship and balance. Its spin is precise and captivating initially. It balances and glides on a needle point. It rides the edge of the table without ever falling off.
You watch the top spin. The colors and designs whirl together and hypnotize you. Even if there were something else to look at, why would you? Nothing else can match the beauty of what’s in front of you.
Later into its spin the top starts to teeter. Its balance gives way as a slow, slight, wobble effect quietly overcomes it. The top is now susceptible to gravity. You want to reach down and set it right, but for some reason, you feel it has to be allowed to follow it’s own course. You watch anxiously as gravity takes hold of this spinning curiosity.
Soon, the top is a dervish. Grace and precision are things long in its past. It careens and sputters across the table top. This time when it comes to the edge it nearly falls to the floor. You know it’s near the end of its cycle and there’s only one action left.
Still thinking about the beauty it possesses and the grace it started off with, you anxiously await its ultimate fall, so you can pick it up and set it back into motion again.
