On Good Terms With Gaia - Chapter 1

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It was early morning and the little Siberian survival village of Xin Changzhi was quiet and overflowing with peace. Dogs were stirring and some were already wandering the village streets and alleys. When the orders had come for the great migration from northern China to Xiboliya [the Chinese name for Siberia] to escape the worldwide famine brought on by global warming, there had been no plans for pets to come along. Nevertheless, there were always the exceptions, the children who could not leave their dogs behind and stowed them away, hidden from their parents and the other adult authorities. The dog population gradually grew and because they kept the village free of varmints and provided an early warning system for intruders, they were accepted as a fact of village life. 

 It was still dark, but a hint of morning glow in the east was already rousing the roosters and they began their boastful calls of welcome to the sun and the new day. The survival plan for Xin Changzhi also had not included livestock, forbidden in China before they left as an extravagance no longer affordable. Yet here as well several cows and a bull found their way in the first caravan. However, chickens were still a part of the Chinese culture. They were found darting about everywhere, even inside houses. They were given free rein to wander, not because they were considered holy, as with Indian cattle of old, but because they were a part of the harmonious web of relationships of the village and were respected for that reason. When a time came to sacrifice one for food, it was done with respect and the process was seen as a serious act to be done seriously.

Jiao, as with most of the women of Xin Changzhi, was awake  with the roosters. She quickly checked her son, eight months old Congshen, who was fast asLip in the cradle his grandfather, Wu Renshou, had made for him before he was born. He was growing quickly and soon would need his own little bed. She left Congshen to continue his peaceful sLip while she washed and began preparations for breakfast. As the fragrance of her cooking began to permeate the air of the little cottage, Jiao’s husband, Jonas Marshall, began to stir.

In a nearby cottage, Sylvia and James Marshall, parents of Jonas, were likewise beginning to welcome the new day. Life could not be more different for them from the one they foresaw for themselves when they moved from America to Beijing to follow their jobs with The World Federation. Back then, The World Federation dominated the new world order and Sylvia and James both had important roles to play. They came to Beijing fifteen years ago filled with hope for a sustainable and prosperous future for all mankind. They left six years ago in despair. The World Federation was bankrupt and catastrophic environmental collapse was spreading rapidly across the globe like mushrooms that emerged overnight. In reality, however, the warning signs had been lurking everywhere, every day.

In an unexpected twist of fate, the Marshall family did not leave Beijing to return to the United States where they would take their chances with survival. Instead Sylvia and James left on a mission to find their runaway thirteen-year-old son, Jonas. That quest led them on a long and dangerous land journey to Chinese-occupied Siberia, known among the Chinese as Xiboliya, and to the little Chinese refugee village named by its founders Xin Changzhi, New Changzhi. And there, once again, their lives were transformed. In Xin Changzhi they found Jonas, adopted the village agrarian way of life, adjusted to an English-free society requiring that they master Mandarin, became “in-laws” and recently acquired the honored title of grandparents.

James and Sylvia Marshall were among the lucky few who survived the collapse of practically everything. The world economy had collapsed. National boundaries had collapsed. Food production and drinkable water sources had collapsed. Hope had collapsed. The asymmetric warming of Earth, leaving parts of the northern hemisphere warmer than the corresponding locations in the southern hemisphere, provided a survival opportunity for those in the north and despair for those in the south.     

Less than a fifth of the world population prior to mid-century had survived. Yet here they were, the Marshall family, not only still intact, but growing, prospering in what had been southern Siberia, living a simple, satisfying life. They had dodged perhaps humanity’s biggest challenge in historic times. They were appropriately grateful.

Sylvia looked out the small window of their cottage and saw Jiao outside the cottage where she, Jonas and Congshen lived. Although it was early, Jiao was watering the surrounding flowerbeds. Water was not scarce in Xin Changzhi so the community encouraged the  aesthetic luxury of flowers.  Sylvia could not watch her daughter-in-law without smiling with admiration and love. 

Jiao at nineteen was no longer the shy and frail girl of ten when Sylvia first met her. She had grown into a young woman whom any Chinese mother could look at with satisfaction and pride. She had grown a little taller than the average Chinese woman. She held herself erect. Jiao had learned a great deal from her mother, Huifang, and as her knowledge grew so did her body. As her body filled and gradually developed into that of a beautiful young women, so did she acquire a disarming whimsy. She had a quirky sense of style that frequently left her neighbors laughing happily when they saw her walking along the village paths, wearing a coolie hat adorned with flowers or ribbons or small branches from the nearby berry bushes. Or she would weave her hair into exotic structures and patterns. Or she would embellish her ankle-length gown with drawings or paintings. She made the drawings using charcoal bits she would retrieve from her or a neighbor’s banked down, outside fire pit. She made the paintings from paint pigments she prepared using ancient, traditional formulations.

The villagers loved Jiao’s amusing quirkiness, but they respected her intelligence even more. Jiao was highly admired among her peers. The Chinese revered wisdom acquired through many years of struggle and challenge and believed long-term survival was prima facieevidence of intelligence. Yet at the tender age of nineteen, Jiao’s friends would nevertheless come to her rather than to the elders to settle a dispute or recommend a solution to some tortured romantic relationship. Whenever Jiao was consulted, after careful thought, having listened to the facts, she would give her opinion or recommendation, but always with her impenetrable smile that somehow seemed to reassure. For some, her smile projected a kind of wise, philosophical resignation, as if she was saying, “In the great scheme of things, this matter really is not all that important. Trust the universe that whatever happens, happens for a reason.”  But others who came to her for help interpreted her smile differently, as a kind of humility display, and admired her all the more for her seeming self-deprecation. Everyone loved Jiao. Especially, Jonas.

Jonas met Jiao when they both were ten years old. Now they were nineteen. When they first met, Jonas thought she didn’t like him, but as he got to know her better, he realized she was just very shy. Over time, working in the summers as a volunteer, side by side with Jiao in the fields on Father Wu’s farm west of Beijing, the shyness gave way to friendship and then as if drawn by an invisible force of nature, to love. It was that love that drove him to run away at thirteen to follow her when the whole northern Chinese population was ordered to migrate through Mongolia into Siberia.

Jonas stood decidedly tall at just over 190 centimeters. He had a good ear for languages and mastered Mandarin with Jiao’s critical assistance and corrections. She encouraged perfection from him and as a result his Mandarin was near perfect. Jonas was always involved with sports, even in Xin Changzhi, where he organized soccer competitions. He was lean and strong. Yet, despite his friendly relations with his peers, he lacked a certain self-confidence. He believed himself to be slightly ridiculous at nineteen to be both married and a father, things about which those around him seemed totally at ease.  However, he was gradually adjusting to the pace of life in a country culture. In the meantime, he had grown a mustache and a small beard. He felt these provided some measure of maturity to accompany his elevated social status as a head of household. He knew that his facial hair was simply a costume, but one he would promote temporarily and abandon when the time was right.

There was a knock on the door that woke Jonas from a reverie as he ate the breakfast Jiao had prepared for him. It was Huifang, Jiao’s mother. Almost every day she walked to their cottage to bid a good morning to Jiao and Jonas and to play for a bit with Congshen before plunging into the never-ending stream of chores inherent in rural living.

“Good morning, Mother Wu,” Jonas said, ushering Jiao’s mother into their home.

“Good morning, my son,” Huifang said with her usual good cheer. She was dressed in work clothes. Her hair was beginning to turn gray, but was long and lustrous and did not convey a feeling of advancing age. It was straight and pulled back and secured in a ponytail. Her hands were the rough hands of a farmer’s wife, but her face was round and unwrinkled. She had one missing tooth in her upper jaw that she searched for unconsciously from time to time with the tip of her tongue.

Jonas pulled a chair from the table in the center of the room and gestured for his mother-in-law to be seated. 

“May I offer you some tea, Mother?” Jonas asked with a slight bow of respect.

Just then little Congshen awoke with a kick of his feet and an excited gurgle hearing the voices of his father and maternal grandmother. Huifang rose immediately and lifted Congshen from his cradle. He was almost the same length as the cradle with his head and feet just missing the inner walls. Congshen opened his arms to Huifang while giving her a broad smile that she returned with a close, playful hug.

Huifang turned to Jonas. “Grandfather Wu is finished with Congshen’s new bed. He will bring it this evening. I made the mattress and Grandmother Marshall made the sheets and blanket and pillow. It will serve him for at least ten more years. Is it not a wondrous time?” she said, twirling about the room making Congshen laugh with each spin. “Tonight you get a new bed, my little prince.”

After a moment, Huifang gently placed Congshen on the floor whereupon he quickly rose and wandered about the room. After Huifang returned to her seat, one of Congshen’s stops in his perambulation of the room was the chair where she was sitting. Congshen would embrace Huifang for a moment each time and then move on. Finally, he changed course and embraced his father. He looked up at Jonas and said, “Father, I want to eat!”

“Okay,” Jonas said.

Congshen turned to Huifang. “Grandmother, please you feed me?”

Jonas looked at Huifang and shrugged, whereupon Huifang approached Jonas and Congshen, smiling broadly at her grandson. Jonas put a cushion on the chair next to him and placed Congshen on it. Jiao had left the preparations for a hot, oatmeal porridge before she left. Huifang took Jonas’s seat that he abandoned to her and getting quickly settled began to feed Congshen. He greedily ate every bit as it was offered to him.

When Congshen was finished Jonas said, “Okay my son, time to get dressed for work.”

He turned to Huifang and said, “We will be weeding today. I will bring Congshen with me. He can watch and learn.”

“I will just finish my tea and then return home. The grandfathers have decided a new bed for a young man deserves a celebration. The grandmothers have work to do. A celebration requires friends, food and drink. Mother Marshall and I will take the day to prepare. We will all gather at our cottage. Grandfathers Wu and Marshall will bring additional chairs after they return from the fields.” Jonas nodded his understanding and moved away quietly so Huifang could finish her tea in peace. By the time Jonas finished dressing Congshen, Huifang waved goodbye to both and left for her own cottage. When Jonas stepped outside after getting Congshen ready, he noticed Jiao was gone. She probably went with her mother, Jonas decided.

As Jonas opened the cottage door to leave for the cornfield, a chicken walked into the house. Congshen had made friends with several of them so it was not the first time this had happened. The chickens usually caused no damage. He decided to leave the cottage door open when he left for the field with Congshen. The chicken would find its way out. He also left the remaining porridge in a dish by the front door for any dogs that might pass by. 

Jonas did not understand why the dogs did not eat the chickens. About a year ago, cats began to appear in the village. When the cats began to eat the chickens, the dogs began to kill the cats until once again there were only dogs in Xin Changzhi. He could not explain this, nor could Huifang, when he asked her.

***

This is the perfect book the world needs to read right now! This is one of the books that should be compulsory reading in schools rather than other literature which is far more irrelevant given the unique circumstances the world is currently in! The world needs to be woken up from its denial and face some facts before it's too late. David Spielberg ensures that the reader understands that climate change isn't simply an environmental issue, which it is currently perceived as, it's all about us: our lifestyles, human civilization, and the very survival of the human race! In this book the previously invisible is made visible regarding the ultimate consequences of our current behaviour.

David seamlessly and effortlessly weaves together many of the facts regarding climate change, from the cost on the environment that agriculture currently has but which capitalism values at zero, to the science behind the melting ice caps to how nature's water cycle functions and the fragility of this natural global irrigation system, upon which all life relies upon. There can be no life on earth without water being present.

David Spielberg also weaves together the philosophies of science, capitalism, Buddhism and even introduces the Gaia concept.

Arguably most importantly of all On Vestige Way provides a timeframe that contradicts the world's current perception of how far off the consequences of climate change really are. His timeline I believe is far more accurate than the current official ones given to the public by our governments. Every climate change model produced through all of history to-date (the past 50 years) has been wildly inaccurate and grossly underestimated the speed of climate change. Is this coincidence, bad science, bad government ... or both?

Perhaps the scariest thing of all about this book is that David Spielberg introduces his book as the worst case scenario, which it is not. It is very far from being so! His book is strictly an atheist point of view and story, it does not include any "religious philosophy". For example, the book mentions the terms the End Times, Armageddon and the Apocalypse, which are all religious in origin and reference, but there is absolutely zero religious prophecy included in his book even though the world's religions are rich in their information about the End Times, Armageddon and the Apocalypse. It is therefore, frighteningly, simply a middle of the road scenario. Once one awakens to this then matters become much more terrifying! However, this is not a weakness of the book because this is the book the world needs to read right now given the world's current political and economic climate, which is very much atheistic. The story, and the facts contained within it, would become too unreal if the world really knew the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help us God!

                                                                             ---  David de Cleene
                                                                            (Verified Amazon purchase)

My First Life Chapter 3

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I’m watching this movie on cable. Cinemax has these bullshit dirty movies that aren’t really dirty, just tits and ass. But sometimes I watch them. Suddenly, I smell talcum powder. The air fills with the sweet aroma and I look around and there’s no reason for the smell, but it’s there and powerful just the same. I close my eyes and drift with the fragrance, analyzing it, trying to determine if it’s real or another aura. I get them sometimes. I remember waiting in the subway one time and I suddenly smelled apples. Like on a farm or a country roadside vegetable store. The air is musty and cool because that’s when you buy fresh apples—in the fall. And the air has that apple smell, not sweet like applesauce, but a little zippy, maybe from the slight fermentation that may be going on in the bottom of the buckets. I don’t know why I smelled apples that day.

That’s when I learned about auras. In the subway. I asked someone if he smelled apples too and of course he didn’t. But we talked about it while we waited for the train and he said they were called auras. I don’t know, instead of feeling that it was a problem, my having auras once in a while, I like it. It's like a special sense. I think of it as a gift. Not a talent, because I had no conscious claim to the ability. But a gift, handed to me for nothing, for me to enjoy.

The talcum powder smell soothed me and made me feel clean and I remembered my mother drying me with a big towel after my bath. She didn’t pat me dry the way I’ve since seen grown women dry themselves. She’d rub me briskly instead, shaking my little body, getting the circulation going as she dried me. I never liked that part of it much. But then I’d stand there in the brightly lit, warm, steamy bathroom and she’d take the container of talcum powder and she’d sprinkle it on my body and very gently spread it around and the air would fill with the sweet scent as I stood there naked with my mother completely dressed and I’d formulate in my mind how to ask her why it was okay for her to see me naked, but not for me to see her naked. But I never dared actually ask her because I sensed it was a dangerous question, better left unasked. I don’t know what I feared when I didn’t ask her that, but something kept me from asking and my intuition tells me now it was probably just as well. My mother scared me about her body when I was only five or six years old and the talcum powder reminded me of it.

I remember another time, when I was older. A bunch of kids and I were huddled discussing a bit of news related to a partially overheard remark leading one of my fellow nine-year-olds to claim that for some exotic reason a man will sometimes push his penis into a lady's bellybutton. None of us could make any sense out of this unusual behavior, but my friend swore he was conveying it on good authority. This was too strange and too interesting to let alone and clearly did not involve anything, in my young mind, my parents would be doing to each other so I did not feel any precautionary restraint. I told my mother what my friend had said, expecting we would both laugh about this silly story. Instead she looked uncomfortable and mumbled something that I no longer remember. But the next day she gave me a book on the facts of life written for children. My mother was a firm believer in books and I got this trait from her, for which I am grateful. I dutifully read the book, but what it told me no longer sounded as strangely fun as my friend’s version.

My mother and father usually slept late on Sundays. I would get up and play quietly in theroomI shared with my older brother, Leon, or go to the living room and listen to records like “The Little EngineThat Could” on our big Zenith console. Or I’d listen to the radio. My favorite show was “Big John and Sparky.” Big John would play children’s records with stories or fairy tales. I’d sit with my head practically against the huge speaker because I played it very low so as not to disturb my parents. I don’t remember what Sparky was. A person, an elf. I don’t remember.

Usually I would listen to the radio or the phonograph or play with my toys until my parents came out of their bedroom ready for our special Sunday morning breakfast. Once, I was very excited because Big John was playing  songs from the Uncle Remus album and we had just gone to see “The Song of the South” at the Radio City Music Hall the weekend before. I heard my parents stirring in their bedroom and excitedly I ran to tell them what was on the radio. I opened the door and burst in. My father was still lying down on the bed, the blanket covering him, but my mother was sitting on the edge of the bed facing the door. Naked. It was like a psychic explosion, like rolling off the bed in your sleep and suddenly in an instant you’re falling and sensory experiences get crammed into a microsecond and fill you with an entirely unexpected experience. There was a startled scream from my mother, a look of horror on her face and a wild clutching of cloth or blanket to cover her large bare breasts and a sudden mid-flight paralysis by me followed instantly by abject apologies for I knew not what and ahasty retreat, backing out the door and closing it, my continuing stream of apologies trailing behind me like the glistening trail of a slug on the sidewalk. It’s possible I did that once or twice more before I learned to utterly curb my enthusiasm if it led to barging into their bedroom.

I did, however, realize that I must have stumbled onto something interesting here and tried unsuccessfully by subterfuge, with mirrors and so forth, to catch her naked again to see what it was that was so forbidden to me. The task was beyond my abilities. So I continued to pose my question to my mother only in my head. Why could she see me and I couldn’t see her? But I never asked and I never found out.

There was no such problem about bodily parts with my father. I remember my mother frequently reminding him to take me to the bathroom with him when he pissed so I’d see how it works and learn to do it the same way. I remember standing by the toilet after my father had done his business, holding my little penis going “wee, wee, wee.” Toilet training, you see. Well, my dad had the biggest cock I ever saw, which wasn’t really saying much because the only other cock I’d seen was my little one. I was impressed as hell that mine would some day grow that big.

My mother had terrific breasts as I recollect even from my brief encounters. I wonder if all boys at some time or other see their mother’s breasts and that’s why we all love tits so much. It reminds us of our mothers. Because there’s no doubt that we do love breasts.

Tits and ass. Men are so predictable. I remember getting a CB radio for my car shortly after getting divorced. It would be fun, I thought. But it wasn’t. It was scary and embarrassing. Scary because of the violence it exposed you to. I live a fairly sheltered life amongst fairly educated people. Professionals mostly. So I was unprepared for the anonymous voices spewing out, in their protective isolation, the hatred, the threats, the accusations that emerge from what must be their terrified, horror-filled lives. It frightened me that these people were restrained only by fear of the law, from acting out their frustration and aggression and suppressed violence. Those who tell you, “It can’t happen here” when referring to Nazi Germany never owned a CB radio.

Also, it’s embarrassing that men are so easy. You’re driving along listening to the CB for colorful communications such as "Smokies down the road with a picture taker." (Translation—State police with a radar unit.) Listening to the half-hearted banter of the heading-home crowd, suddenly a female voice comes on the air. All it takes is a “Howdy, boys” and she’s got half the drivers within range knocking on her signal trying to get directions for a good time, like a bunch of mindless dogs after a bitch in heat. One whiff and they’re all there sniffing and jerking and shaking with anticipation. They’re so easy and so undignified. Had they no self-respect? God, they behaved like Pavlov’s dogs, slobbering and dripping all over themselves for they don’t even know what. Probably a case of the clap. Or worse.

So I’m watching this dumb movie. Tits and ass. And talcum powder.

But I’ve learned to respect the power of associations and enjoy the paths it can lead you down. It can help you get a hook into a piece of a lost or long forgotten memory. A pinky, as it were, is all it takes. And once you’ve got your pinky in you can gradually expand your awareness, little by little, like a fragrance spreading to fill the room, until gradually the complete memory returns and you are there and it’s all within your conscious control again and you can turn it around or circle it, feel it, see it in whatever detail you like. All it takes is an association, a hook to regainthatlong-dormant memory.

Take, for instance, a soft, cool, misty rain. I’ll never think of misty rain without associating it with Linda. Sharon and I had been going to a folk dancing group pretty regularly for a number of years. In fact most of the people we socialized with were involved in this folk dancing group. I was never very good at it. But I enjoyed the exercise and the people were interesting and usually intelligent and accomplished. I have no theory for why this is true. It is merely an observation. There also seemed to be a randy undercurrent. This may not have been a product of the folk dancing so much as a product of the type of person it attracted.

There was a dance-weekend at a beautiful, rural location that Sharon and I went on that comes to mind along with the mental image of Linda. I did some dancing, but mostly just walked around enjoying the countryside, socializing with the dancers who were taking a break. That’s how I met Linda. She was, like me, the spouse of an avid dancer and like me, mostly an avid observer. So, we had time on our hands and walked and talked and found we were quite comfortable with each other. In fact we spent a lot of time with each other. I was not really on the make, but when she told me her biggest regret for the weekend was not having brought her diaphragm, I understood that if I was interested so was she. I was still married and did not feel ready for such a bohemian lifestyle. I ignored the implications of her remark. She took it well. We continued a very friendly and cordial relationship for the rest of weekend. On the last day we experienced together a moment of unexpected awe.

It was Sunday morning, early. Linda and I met and decided to take a walk while our spouses did their dancing thing. A misting rain kept the trail and the surrounding grounds pretty much for us alone. Or perhaps the lack of company was just a further indication of our uninspired commitment to folk dancing. In any event, moved by the freedom that solitude encourages, we walked off the trail, into the encompassing forest. As we walked, we came upon what I quickly recognized was an expansive field of May apple plants growing beneath the overhanging trees. Never having seen these plants before, but knowing of them from my wildflower studies, I stooped to examine the beautiful green inverted wishbone shape of the stem. At the crotch of the wishbone was a single, white, dainty bell-shaped flower. Above, at the tops of the two arms of the upward pointing wishbone large, green, fan-like leaves projected, creating a sort of green canopy..

Looking down on this field, I could see only the green canopy formed by the leaves, about eighteen inches from the ground. I stooped to look under the canopy and saw hundreds of white flowers, like ballerinas inside a tent, dancing in the green, tinted light, while the gentle rain continued. I stood up: green canopy; I stooped: white ballerinas dancing. I turned my head up to feel the gentle rain refreshing my face with its cool moisture. I opened my mouth, closed my eyes, and felt even then the moment burrow deeply into my memory where the soul exists. Linda and I turned to each other and kissed. It was just one of those inspired moments, an opportunity too perfect to be missed.

I get up now and turn the television off. Stupid waste of time! My apartment is completely dark. And quiet. The evening is sultry and warm and I’ve left the front door open so that the cool evening breeze from the river can come through the screen door and out the back window. The apartment has great cross ventilation.

I walk to the open front door. A cool breeze blows through the screen and I hear the sound of a plane in the distance. The night and the plane remind me of a time in Florida of carousing with frogs by the pond at my parent’s condominium one evening and looking up to see a jet, very high and with glowing lights, silently streaking across the star-speckled sky, a testament to man's godlike achievements.

Tonight my mind seems filled with memories and associations. Perhaps it’s from my recent visit to the shrink. Every sense in my body reminds me of something in my past. I am bursting with memories. I return to the living room and sit on the couch. I lean my head back and close my eyes. It’s no use. The governor is off and my mind is racing with images and memories flashing by, above the speed limit as it were. I need to slow it down again and the only way I know is to take an aspirin and a shot of scotch. I don’t know if the aspirin and scotch really do anything or whether it’s just a ritual I’ve developed that my brain recognizes and goes along with. But it always works and in a few minutes I’m usually finally able to fall asleep if I’m in bed, or able to read once again if I’m not.

It’s nine-thirty and I’m too restless to go to sleep. I close my eyes again and think of Linda. I like to remember her unspoken offer of a sexual dalliance and fantasize about what it might have been like had I taken her up on her obvious willingness. I think of it with mixed emotions. Despite the May apple moment, missed opportunities or no opportunities seem to characterize my life. Linda, in general, was just one more. Yet, my time with Linda was among the most concrete of my several-jack off scenarios and therefore the most suitable for service.

My personal contempt for my lack of success with women lasts only so long as I drift into a reverie of Linda and me. In my mind I am free to explore her body and pursue my pleasures, and ultimately, to relieve my sexual tension.

I doze off.

When I open my eyes it’s eleven o’clock and I’m wide awake. I hate masturbating. Whenever I do I feel disgusted with myself afterwards. I need air. I need to move around. I need to feel something real. My apartment begins to stifle me. Suddenly I feel panicky about breathing, about getting sufficient air. I get up and pace the living room. It won’t help. I know that from experience. I go to my hall closet and put on a light jacket. Taking my keys and my wallet, I lock the apartment and walk into the cool night air to my car just down the street.

As much to reassure myself that I can now do things like this without having to explain or get permission, either overt or implied, I decide to drive to the town pier. It’s a ride of only ten minutes, and with my nap, I’m sure I won’t be too tired for work tomorrow.

The streets are quiet and mostly empty. I leave the windows down and drive with the air conditioner off. The breeze washes my face like a cool splash and my breathing is regular again. I feel daring and free for this simple act of self-determination.

From the well-lit residential streets I pass to the dark commercial streets bordering the harbor area. I know the way and find the entrance to the town beach. The parking lot is empty except for two cars parked together under a light with young people standing around, radios playing. I park away from them and walk to the pier. The air is now decidedly filled with the fragrance of ocean. Walking onto the sand, the soothing, periodic whoosh of the waves washing the shore draws me closer and closer to the water’s edge. I walk along the strand line of the incoming tide. There is a full moon and everything is bathed in its silvery light. Moonlight is special because it is reflected light. That’s what makes moonlight unique and why everything seems eerie and lifeless in bright moonlight. Some parts of the spectrum are missing—the parts that reflect life and hope.

The tide’s edge is not enough for me. I must get closer. I walk onto the rock breakwater jutting out into the bay. As I walk, it gets narrower and narrower. I walk to the very last rock. I crouch down and listen to the sound of the edge of the surf rolling its way along the breakwater to the shore. I notice an inexplicable chillness of the air as the moon moves temporarily behind a cloud. Soon, the moon reappears, but the chill remains.

Looking out over the black and ageless water, I am overwhelmed with the sense of my own isolation. For all my memories, for all my freedom, I am alone. I sit on the wet rocks and listen to the sea gulls circling overhead, searching.

My First Life Chapter 2

                                                              2

No, Doc. That would be an understatement

to say it just didn’t work out.

Actually it never really did work right from the start

it’s a stupid story

we thought she was pregnant

I didn’t know what to do so we got engaged

I didn’t want to embarrass her

I was twenty years old and she was seventeen

she wasn’t even pregnant

stupid stupid stupid

what a joke

Almost right after we were married 

we started with marriage counselors

you’ll excuse me if by now I seem 

a little unenthusiastic

about your profession and what you do here

it’s just you have to try something anything

something to get help even when you know 

it won’t work

Sharon’s mother was going to a psychologist

so naturally we went

from the beginning until the end

her mom believing in psychotherapy and all

off and on

her me them us alone together in groups

on weekends every which way

talk talk talk

all bullshit so far anyway

But highly recommended

I remember hearing that from the beginning

you too for that matter

highly recommended

On our honeymoon she couldn’t stand anything I arranged

the plane was too noisy the hotel didn’t have ice-skating

who goes to Florida to go ice skating

the side-trips were all dumb

I liked them

Seaquarium porpoises entertaining I thought

with their high jumping and ringing bells

I arranged boat ride tours and dinners

and sketch artists you name it

For Sharon it was too damp too hot too early too late

it made me sick all her complaining

she was never satisfied

always judging nothing ever okay

Did I ever love her?

Did I ever love her

I don’t know I must’ve once

but I married the first girl who let me fuck her

like a jerk like a kid like a hard up little putz

just like I knew I would

Actually her mother was better looking than she was

had sperm swimming in her eyes

Henry Miller said that

my mother-in-law was a tall brunette with highlights of gray

her face was angular with high cheek bones and piercing brown eyes

that when she wanted to could make you uneasy and turn away

you know what I mean

otherwise you felt a conspiracy building if you held her gaze

she had a firm body slender and well proportioned

with a man’s imagination I detected beautiful breasts

you know how there are some women who even as they age

never lose the shape and firmness of young breasts

she was like that

Her hands were long-fingered and sensitive

unlike Italians who moved their whole arms

when they spoke

it was her fingers her fingers played with each other

rubbed and rolled against each other as she spoke

completing a kind of unconscious

three note chord

her breasts

her fingers

her mouth

She used to kiss me on the mouth

you know when we greeted or said goodbye

I liked that what’s not to like

once her colleague noticed and commented on it

and she made a joke

but I always wondered how come too

just something sexy about her

she was married three times

sad cursed life with a kind of desperate pathos

Sharon was very different from her mother

I could imagine a reverse Lolita story

marrying the daughter

to be near the mother

Sharon was shorter than her mother

with a round face and short-cropped blond hair

she had hazel eyes but her gaze

was never arresting the way her mother’s was

but as with so many ordinary women

when she smiled her face lit up

and became beautiful

for a time

She wasn’t exactly slender but she was okay

her body was adequate

all the essential parts accounted for but no more

what she lacked in physical magnetism

she failed to compensate for with personality

as some women can

I have known the homeliest women

who over time

because of who they are

become more and more attractive

this was not Sharon

she did have nice legs though

Sharon’s mother screwed up all her girls

her oldest Susan is completely nuts

her kids—I mean Susan’s kids—returning from school

caught her once coming out the of bedroom stark naked

with their Sunday school teacher

also buck naked

Susan’s husband Daniel is even nuttier than she is

they loved science fiction conventions

they called them conventions but it was just a cover to get laid

they were really orgies drugs cheating you name it

we went to one in Michigan with them

even there I couldn’t get laid Sharon wasn’t in the mood

and I didn’t have the nerve to strike out on my own

something I still regret a missed opportunity

I did get to see the aurora borealis though for the only time

amazing unexpected mind bending sight

it makes you wonder what else you haven’t seen

Those two Susan and her husband were both so full of bullshit

we’re free we respect each other we’re not each other’s jailers

anything’s okay if we love each other

blah blah blah

god I was so jealous of all the ass they got between them

of course they eventually got divorced

The middle daughter Samantha was spoiled rotten

she was the beauty of the group

could do no wrong

what a mercenary bitch but the world is for the beautiful right

and there’s no doubt she was and knew it and knew its worth

and would work it

until she couldn’t work it any more and her mother knew it

and didn’t care because she liked having a beautiful girl-child

who could fuck men over

You’ve got to have a profession her mother would tell Sharon

you can’t trust men they always cheat eventually

I love you Michael she'd say but you know it’s true or might be

and then you’re nowhere if you can’t support yourself

trapped dead powerless

what a message of hope to give your newly married daughter

This was our first dinner mind you as a married couple

and she’s giving her daughter a lesson

on how to survive a rotten marriage while she’s eating my food

while I’m thinking what would it be like to fuck her

I mean she just had that effect on you

Of course I felt judged unfairly and violated too. Ironic, yes?

It was a great dinner and that was a great little apartment

basement job the kind you think are dark and horrible and damp

and embarrassing to say you live in

not this one

it was lovely beautiful it was ours it had three rooms

with those funny high up basement windows

every room painted white so it was very bright

and the back door  in the kitchen was mostly glass 

so lots of light came in from the backyard

with grass and a couple of big trees and the owner’s kids playing in the backyard

squealing and running around and wanting to play with me

And she’s eating my food in my castle with my wife

and telling her to get a job

so she can leave me comfortably when the inevitable time comes

I mean Sharon wanted to work anyway

but her mother’s coaching certainly gave a bad feel to it

like there was an ulterior motive

Actually I wasn’t too happy with that meal

Sharon jumping up and down being the perfect little housewife

and me sitting there

as if I ever told Sharon not to go to school

or get a profession or whatever the hell she wanted to do

what am I supposed to do

guarantee I’m never going to cheat on her daughter

where’s my guarantee

No, I didn’t think Sharon had to prove anything to me.

Doc, she didn’t owe me anything.

You know I remember this line from a movie

the fucking you get aint worth the fucking you get

I love that line I don’t remember the movie any more

but it was a true line

I loved the play on words and the play on life

maybe it was too bitter but I felt pretty bitter near the end of our marriage

I mean how long do you put up with always being told 

you’re a dollar short

maybe I think she did owe me something

loyalty or just friendship or help or something

I don’t know what but yes she did owe me something

good sex at least or even some interest in me

something

Making love to her?

First off I didn’t know what I was doing

I mean she was a lot more experienced than I was

she was only sixteen when I met her 

and her cherry had already been plucked

she told me it was from horseback riding

yeah right

but I figured it was from her boyfriend fingering her

she got caught one time in the closet with his hands down her pants

she told me this I guess to show me how honest she was with me

She’s probably telling the truth too

she probably never did really have sex before me

but she did everything else I’m convinced

so she should have been some help

but she wasn’t

I just fumbled along trying a little of this and a little of that

and when it was all done she just starts crying

and I ask her if there’s anything I can do

no

was it any good for you

she says no

is there anything I can do better next time

no

well we’ve got to do something tell me how I can be better

no you’re the man you’re supposed to know what to do

how the hell am I supposed to know what to do

some things you just have to learn by experience

and the truth was I had none

I tell her your mother’s not here you can talk dirty

give me some hints I can’t read your mind

nothing

then she actually says to me if you don’t know how to make me happy

I can’t tell you

if you really loved me you’d know how

Don’t smile. You think it sounds funny. It isn’t funny.

You know men can be insecure about sex too

I didn’t need this mind reading bullshit and the crying

I wanted to think I was okay and if I wasn’t

we would kind of get better at it together

I didn’t need it to be a fucking

test of whether I loved her

You know maybe

I had an unrealistic idea of what marriage would be like

but so did she

and talk about dead meat

what’s that old joke about Jewish women

what’s the difference between Jell-O and a Jewish women

Jell-O moves when you eat it

Yes, I’m still angry. I let myself be angry now.

I’m really angry at myself mostly

that’s what you guys say all the time anyway isn’t it

twelve years I can’t believe I was such a putz

twelve years

how long should it take to wise up

You know we were gonna get divorced a couple of years into it

but her dad talked us out of it 

I liked him

big ballsy guy very affectionate very generous

had a heart attack a real bad one

he was getting over it when I first met Sharon

so he had a happy outlook on life

I guess he was glad he was still alive and planned

not to let women or kids or anything make him crazy

He was easygoing but firm

men loved him you know in an okay way

he was a fisherman he liked to travel he liked to tell stories

he was very sure of himself

he was a funny guy

but very chauvinistic

I mean women were definitely there to serve men

but women loved him anyway he was such a charmer

and even though he was pretty overweight he was a damn good dancer

and a great cook and very generous

did I say that already

and I had the impression he was good in bed

women will put up with a lot of shit

if the sex is good

Anyway we were gonna get divorced and we couldn’t talk to my parents

they would have died if they knew we were thinking of getting a divorce

my Uncle Norman got divorced once and the family was shocked

I was about ten years old at the time

I was shocked

about a year later Uncle Norman and Aunt Shirley got remarried

I guess they shocked themselves

I wouldn’t talk to Sharon’s mother about our problems

Or maybe it was only mine I don’t know

I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction

you know

I-told-you-so

So anyway we call Sharon’s dad and he insists

we come over to his place right away

and we both spill our guts

and hearing ourselves it all sounded so stupid and petty

and he kept hugging us and telling us everybody has these problems

and it all goes away if you can be friends with each other

and the family all loves us so much and wants us to be happy and so on and so forth

and he was so sweet and he cared so much that like jerks

we decided to give it another go

we did our duty by everyone

it could’ve been nice and clean then

too bad

What do I mean clean? Doc, really?

I mean kids

what else

anyone who has kids to keep a marriage together is fucking crazy

so naturally that’s what we did

but you know in a weird kind of way it did keep us together

I love my kids and surprisingly even to me

we never really fought over them

We agreed mostly on how to raise them

I was in the delivery room with both my kids

and Sharon nursed both of them

we were alternative-life-style kind of parents

Sharon nursed our son, Allen, till he was two

and our daughter Meredith, until she was three

we didn’t use canned baby foods ever

we mashed up real food for them

and we never had screaming babies that make some parents crazy

I mean it’s hard to scream with a tit in your mouth right

Considering everything we were very responsible parents

kids can keep you together but they don’t solve your problems

we fought about everything else

except for the kids

and staying married you can feel just as alone

Doc, how is it possible for marriages to turn to shit so thoroughly

I mean how is it possible to have kids with a woman

who you can’t remember ever saying one nice thing to you

making kids it's such an intimate thing to do

I mean you have to take your clothes off and get close and kiss and hold each other

and do your thing and I can’t remember her ever being really affectionate towards me

it must have been there

can you block it out so completely

honest to god I don’t remember her ever being my friend

and we made everybody happy

and everybody loved the kids

But now it’s not neat and it’s not clean

marriages come and go but the kids are there forever

and in the hands of some women

they’re a weapon pointed right at their ex-husband’s heart

And please spare me the social commentary on abuse and oppression

and how the courts used to be so unfair to women

it may have been true once but not any more

no matter what

the man loses

it’s all bleeding heart bullshit

women use the kids period end of sentence

and if they’re the dumpee forget it

they’ll never be rational towards you again

No, sex wasn’t the issue, Doc,

and, well, maybe it was.

What do I mean

I mean I don’t know where do I start

I got better at sex

I read books I went to x-rated movies

I did research you might say

one time I found this really good marriage manual

I read it and gave it to Sharon

I said it was a helpful book that

I had learned a lot from it would she like to read it

you know what she says

I can’t identify with this book

what’s to identify I say

you take the girl’s part I take the boy’s

anyway she never read the book

So I would practice on her what I found out and I was amazed

you know it’s all biological I mean if you punch the right buttons

the old piano roll plays the right tune

so after a while Sharon having orgasms was not our problem

so you see sex was not an issue anymore except

they were unmoving silent orgasms weird emotionless crazy

so sex was still an issue

I mean it was like she didn’t want to give me any credit for her orgasms

she kept them all inside

to herself for herself

it was frustrating and it made me angry

so I guess sex never stopped being an issue

I wanted a good lay so badly it’s all I ever thought about

so that’s when I started thinking about cheating on her

even if it would give her mother

an I-told-you-so

goddamnedest thing though

Sharon beat me to it in fact I know of at least two guys she did

one was at the company where I was working for chrissake

and the other was her chiropractor

I saw him once

he looked like her father

so I thought that explained a lot

After the chiropractor I figured I was taking things too lightly

it was not a good sign

I probably was repressing and all

so we found this psychologist he was Swiss

and had a great accent and wore pullovers

and slippers and no kidding he smoked a pipe

actually he only held the pipe because tobacco smoke makes me sick

and I asked him if he could refrain while we were with him

I thought he was going to need a shrink after that

but he manned up and said okay