The couple at the table to my left continued to give me the hairy eyeball. Opening my eyes as wide as I could and biting the insides of my cheeks, I concentrated intensely, focusing all of my will on stopping the tapping. God, I wish they would play some Tom Petty or Safety Dance, I thought. That would’ve calmed me down.
Then an Angel appeared at my side. Not the cherubic, winged and haloed type of Angel. No, it was the dark-skinned, brown-eyed, gay Mexican waiter variety of Angel. “Enjoy,” he advised as he set my olives and ice cream on the table.
Urgggh. My stomach was rebelling again. The sight of the food made me want to hurl. Why in the fuck was I ordering food? I couldn’t eat. The sudden urge to run from the food was overwhelming. “I can’t eat that fucking garlic shit,” I urgently explained to the appalled couple at the table beside me. I jumped out of my seat and bolted out of the front door without paying my bill. The old dine and dash. I just couldn’t eat; the food would have been like broken glass and acid in my stomach. Running down the street I could hear Angel yelling behind me from the front door of the Stinking Rose.
My feet carried me to a park. I stomped around the perimeter of the grounds ten, twenty, thirty times. My legs pumped and burned. There was a heavy hum and ticking inside my head. Pyramid skyscraper, looming, always in sight. My left eye went cold, something in my head hurt, like a rubber band snapping inside my brain. Cold numbness spread slowly along my left side. I went limp. Dizziness, loss of vision, trails, blackness . . .
• • •
The rest is lost on me. Somehow I crossed the Golden Gate Bridge because I was found facedown in the middle of a forest of coastal redwoods. A group of junior rangers happened upon what they assumed to be a dead body draped across the trail. It was just me passed out. After a poking with sticks failed to revive me an official park ranger was summoned. The ranger, Rick, was also unable to get me to stir. He hefted my nearly lifeless shell to the ranger station and called an ambulance. Rick inventoried the contents of my pockets and found an expired moped license bearing the name Frank Gurkin and a matchbook with a phone number scrawled on the inside cover. Frank was contacted and met the ambulance at the hospital.
I stayed in that hospital for two weeks. Upon regaining consciousness I discovered tubes inserted in almost every orifice: my nose, my throat, my prick. The only one that didn’t have something jammed in it was my asshole, and that was sore for some reason. Tests were run on me: MRI, STD, CAT scan, PET scan, Pap smear, Hamster Egg Penetration Test, Testicular Torsion exams, brain swabs, and Pinworm Popsicle Surprise. You name it, I had it done on me. My balls were squeezed, my asshole poked, my nipples pinched. I don’t know why all of this was done, but my orderly, Ramone, claimed it was doctor’s orders. I became suspicious when Ramone said it was hospital policy that he lock the door during the medically necessary poking and prodding. “Oh yeah,” Ramone explained, “it’s also doctor’s orders that you don’t tell anybody that I have been performing these tests on you.” Despite my misgivings, I grudgingly continued to endure Ramone’s nipple pinching, ball squeezing and ass-spelunking tests. I needed to know if permanent damage had been done by the MDMA.
All of the tests came back and my doctor said he detected no long-term damage. He said I had something called a Transient Ischemic Attack, a mini- stroke. There was nothing else they could do for me. I was released to Frank’s care. I don’t know why, but Ramone gave me a beautiful bouquet of flowers when I was discharged and told me to keep in touch. Frank had already heard an earful from Mom about my situation. Like always, he took the blame for me. “He didn’t do it on purpose,” Frank told Mom. “Somebody slipped something in his drink at a club. I never should have taken him there. It’s my fault.” Frank tried to make me feel better and said that Shorty messed him up bad too when he first came out here. Once after sampling some of Shorty’s product, Frank woke up at the pier on a floating dock. The fishy stank of seal shit and an overly friendly sea lion bull shook him from his slumber. Frank wouldn’t say a whole lot more about the experience other than to mention that he sometimes goes back to the pier and throws fish out to the seals. Big brother dropped me off at the San Francisco International Airport, gave me a loaf of sourdough bread for Mom and a Muir Woods T-shirt for me. “Good luck, Fuckface,” he said, pushing me out of the car and shipping me back home to Mom.
The way I see things, you take what life hands you and you deal with it. Some people piss and moan all along the way and make themselves miserable. It’s like life drags them along ass-backwards, always looking at the past, bemoaning injustices, fretting about the could’ves and should’ves. Not me, I can’t live life like that. I wanna enjoy the ride, however short it may be.
If anybody has a legitimate grievance, it’s me. I don’t know what happened to my head fifteen years ago in San Francisco, but I ain’t been right since. My doctors inspect me, scan my head, stick me with needles, and smear my dookey on microscope slides. Hell, they practically give me the old Flaky Dust Poison Torture. Then they say things like: “there is no conclusive determination of abnormality,” or “possible impaired perceptual functioning and phobic anxiety.” I don’t know what the fuck they are talking about. All I know is that I have a constant ticking sound in my head and I sometimes black out when confronted with stressful situations. And something else happened to my head in California. I don’t know exactly how to explain it. It’s like I have powers or something. I’m not talking crazy shit like I can fly like Superman or anything like that. It’s more like magic. Not like Samantha Stevens on Bewitched. I don’t wiggle my nose and items materialize from out of nowhere. Although I did used to fantasize that I had the power to stop time and I could do whatever I wanted while everyone else was frozen: in that fantasy world I would walk into a bank and take all the money I needed, and if one of the bank tellers was hot, maybe I would bend her over the counter and give her the old inny-outy and she would never even know what happened when I unfroze time. She would just wake up with a warm feeling between her legs and a smile on her face. I wish I had those powers, but that would be crazy if I thought I could do that. My powers are more psychic, I guess. It’s almost like I can read people’s minds. I can tell when they like me; I can tell when they don’t. Sometimes a vague feeling comes over me and I sense what THEY are thinking. Not word for word or anything. It’s more of a feeling. But I know when somebody’s out to get me and I know when to do a preemptive strike against someone who’s thinking bad thoughts about me.
Some may think I’m a loser. It’s easy to judge me just because I’m 35, unmarried, unemployed, and live in my mom’s basement. I can’t be too hard on myself, though. I’ve got a disability. I hear the ticking, I get the blackouts, I lose concentration. People who don’t know me well enough might say I’m delusional and paranoid, but they’re just out to get me. I don’t know what happened to my brain. My doctors can’t tell me. All I know is that I’m different. Sometimes it seems that my shit’s fucked up, but I don’t know how. I’ve heard that Ecstasy eats holes in your brain. Maybe that’s what happened to me. Maybe the holes were filled in with crazy. But like I said, I can’t bitch. Me and Mom are moving to Florida. Mom’s cool, I have a bad-ass CD collection, and my dog is my best friend.
Idjit Galoot is a velvet-eared, paddle-pawed basset hound. He has lived in my basement with me for the past fifteen years. I’ve had him ever since he was a puppy. Idjit’s old for a basset hound (they have a life expectancy of about twelve years). I guess in dog years he’s about a hundred and five. You wouldn’t know it, though. He still acts like a puppy sometimes. That old dog has a zest for life. Maybe it’s the daily beer and deviled egg that I give him. Maybe it’s the fact that I never had him fixed.
The Galoot’s frequent farts stink of cheap beer with an undertone of rotting vegetation. This I forgive him as he pretends he doesn’t notice it when I cut the cheese.[4] The soulful brown eyes, the loose, droopy dog lips, the pronounced dewlap—I love all of these things about him. When we wa
tch TV, Idjit rests his weighty head in my lap and lets me stroke the loose-fitted skinfolds. It’s therapeutic; relaxing for us both. I don’t mind my hound’s aroma. In his youth he would roll in any pile of scat or smashed roadkill available. Frank told me that dogs do that to attract the attention of the opposite sex. “It’s like wearing an orange coat,” he explained, “it draws your attention.” Idjit stopped rolling in rotting filth years ago. He still has developed his own musky odor with age, though. Part of it is from his oily, patchy coat. His odor, like the metallic smell of nickels, clings to my hand when I pet him.
My vet says I need to express The Galoot’s anal glands and the musky odor will go away. According to Dr. Dean, I’m supposed to put my fingers on each side of Idjit’s rectum and press until liquid seeps out of his butt (“it will look like coffee but taste different,” he joked). This will rid my dog of the scent and his favorite pastime of dragging his butt on the carpeting. As far as I am concerned, I can stand his odor and I’m not planning on eating off of the floor anytime soon. So I really see no reason to go putting constant pressure on the perimeter of my dog’s butthole. It’s a matter of mutual respect. Idjit doesn’t go complaining about my musky odor and he doesn’t try to express my anal gland. I will reciprocate with the same courtesy.
Sometimes I wish I could wave a magic wand and turn Idjit into a beautiful lady. He has all of the qualities I’m looking for in a woman. He doesn’t expect anything from me but to cuddle up while we watch movies or mixed-martial arts fighting. He only really needs a daily ration of Pabst Blue Ribbon, deviled eggs, and snuggling. I’ve never had a woman who gave me the loving looks that I get from that dog. The Galoot doesn’t judge me just because I live with Mom and don’t have a steady job. He has never put me down for my fondness for heavy metal. If I don’t bathe for a couple of days, he seems to kind of like it. He’s never called me a pervert or a retard or told me to grow up. Idjit loved Black Sabbath when they had Ozzy but can’t stand them with Ronnie James Dio. Never has that dog told me I’m not sensitive or tried to make me watch a romantic comedy starring an ugly dame with a big nose. If he could assume the form of a beautiful female, he would be perfect.
He’s not a beautiful woman. He’s a stinky old fleabag. He ain’t never caught a rabbit. With age Idjit is amassing an impressive collection of fatty lumps about his body. This is in large part the reason that I stroke his head and not the body. People might say he’s gross. I wouldn’t trade him for anything.
When I told Idjit we were moving to Florida he stared at me for a while, wagging his tail slowly, unsure, and let out a small sulfuric belch. As always, he was cautiously optimistic.
Have you ever seen a dog that has broken his chains, jumped his fence, slipped his collar, or otherwise shed his shackles? You will not see a purer form of happiness. A canine unfettered by human restraints experiences joy that man rarely knows—the freedom to chase squirrels, tear into a bag of rancid garbage, crap in the neighbor’s front yard, to dig up a flower bed for no particular reason. These are the simple pleasures that make life worth living for a dog. The next time you see a dog running down the street by himself, look at his face. He will be smiling—a big dumb, dopey smile. Unadulterated, ignorant glee. And wouldn’t you know it, on the day I’m supposed to leave for Florida, Idjit most likely has that look on his old mug. He’s gone AWOL. I can picture him running free, his giant ears flopping, a big moronic grin, seeking out fresh garbage or a bitch in heat.
“The truck is packed and ready,” Mom tells me. “You and Cousin Denny need to hit the road. Idjit will get hungry and come home. It’s what he does. I’ll bring him down with me when I leave.”
Cousin Denny and I are supposed to share driving duties on the moving truck Mom rented. Denny is my age and, like me, has never held down a regular job. Even though his hairline is rapidly retreating from his forehead, Denny insists on keeping it long in back. A modified mullet, or skullet as I like to call it. Denny says that his haircut is business in front, party in back. “Did you strap your Daddy in?” he asks me, smirking, always smirking.
“He’s tethered,” I answer, not appreciating Denny’s tone. I never really knew Daddy too well while he was alive. My memories of him are foggy—nothing specific, just a comfortable feeling. I know he was nice to me and I feel a sense of security and warmth when I try to dredge his memory up in my addled brain. The only real memory I have is playing marbles with the glass eyeballs Daddy always kept in his pocket.
All I know about Daddy I learned from Mom, picture books and Daddy’s writings. He taught philosophy at various universities and community colleges. According to Mom, Daddy was fascinated by a man named Jeremy Bentham. This Bentham guy advocated the dissection of cadavers during a time when such a belief was controversial. Gravediggers were robbing cemeteries in order to get corpses for medical students. Mr. Bentham wrote a will that provided that upon death his body be used for scientific study and, when done, his remains were to be stuffed and displayed in a glass cabinet at University College in London. Bentham’s body has been on display in one form or another since his death sometime in the 1800’s. His face was grossly disfigured, though, and a wax head was placed on the body for display purposes. It’s rumored that Bentham’s auto icon is still wheeled out and seated at a table for meetings of the College Board.
Upon his death, Daddy wanted his body to be stuffed and displayed just like Bentham. In his will Daddy asked Mom to make him an auto icon and have him placed on display at the university where he was teaching. Daddy died when I was three. Mom reluctantly honored his wishes, took him to a taxidermist and had Daddy preserved and stuffed.[5] The university balked at putting Daddy on display. Daddy came home with Mom and has sat in his favorite reclining chair ever since, his gaping rictus reflecting apparent amusement at his situation. Mom says that Daddy loved the holidays so we always dress him appropriately for the time of the year: at Christmas Daddy wears a Santa suit; for Easter it’s rabbit ears and a strap-on bunny snout; there’s the #1 Dad shirt for Father’s Day. Heck, sometimes we even put on a colorful yarmulke for Jewish holidays. Denny enjoys ridiculing Daddy’s festive attire. But I think it’s kind of cool.
“Well if you ask me,” Denny offers, “I think it’s kind of Goddamned creepy that you guys keep him in that chair. Why don’t you give the man a proper burial? I don’t know how I stand living with you guys.” Denny is always full of advice. In his small mind he is all-knowing and all-wise. If you’re doing something, Denny will tell you how you should do it. If you bought something, he’ll tell you ten reasons why you shouldn’t have gotten that one. He’s sometimes the kind of guy that would crap on your birthday cake and tell you that he’s doing you a favor.
“Maybe you just don’t understand,” I shoot back. “Your dad’s still alive and all you ever do is fight with him. Shit, I have a better relationship with Daddy then you and Uncle Doug ever had.”
“Aw, jeez man, I’m just offering some constructive criticism. You don’t need to get your fallopian tubes all twisted up. Have some tea. We have a long drive, and we should probably go straight through.” Denny brewed a gallon of something he calls Mormon Tea. For a while he had been living in a ghost town in Utah called Cisco. When he came to stay with us Denny brought a big garbage bag packed with a tangle of dusty, green, leafless stems. In anticipation of the long drive Denny crushed up the stems and cooked them in a big pot of water over night. This morning the tea was strained out. Denny hands me a travel mug full of greenish murky liquid. “Bottoms up.”
Never one to turn away from a new experience, I down the bitter potion. “What’s this do?” I ask.
“It’ll keep you awake. Might make you a little jittery. Could give you mud-butt,” Denny explains.
The road passes under us—mile markers, fence posts and exit signs whizzing by and disappearing into the past.
Lima . . . Dayton . . . Cincinnati . . .
“You know, you should take some courses in community college. You’r
e a smart guy who is wasting time living in his mother’s basement. You should do something with your life.” More helpful advice from Denny.
Thoughts of Idjit cross my mind. I already miss that big Galoot. I hope he has returned home. When he gets down to Florida we are going to party.
I need to pee. It’s unbearable. I bleed the lizard into an empty Snapple bottle so that we don’t have to stop. We want to make good time. I almost completely fill the bottle and then throw it out the window. Warm, clear, piss spills all over my hand. There’s the bad karma for littering.
Lexington . . . Richmond . . . Berea . . . Renfro Valley Bluegrass Festival . . .
“Hey, did you ever notice that babies’ clothes have pockets in them?” I ask.
“What in the fuck are you talking about? What do you know about babies’ clothes?” Denny forgets that my sister, Kelli, is popping out a new baby almost annually and then dropping them off for Mom to take care of.
“Oh, I know babies’ clothes. And I’m serious. Babies’ clothes all have pockets. Little, bitty pockets. And I’m wondering: what the fuck does a baby need pockets for? What’s he going to put in there? And those pockets are so small, the only thing they can put in the pockets anyway would be a choking hazard.”
“You’re right,” says Denny, kind of dreamy-like. “Pockets, hmmm? You know what does need pockets?”
“What?”
“Underwear!” I can see Denny’s wheels turning. Or maybe it is more like his gears grinding. A dim light bulb flickers weakly above his head.
“Underwear?”
“Yeah, skivvies, BVD’s, Fruit of the Looms, boxers, briefs, boxer-briefs.” Denny likes to say the same thing in as many different ways as he can sometimes. He thinks it makes him sound smart or witty or something. “But not butt-floss or banana-hammocks. You could only put small pockets on them, which of course could only hold choking hazards. And if you have to worry about infant choking hazards in people’s underwear . . . well . . . we really wouldn’t want those people as customers. Hey . . . ” he’s smiling.
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