Swimming Lessons

 

This isn’t a story about me. It’s a story about a girl.

 

Minima Cum Laude 

 

It was a mild, sunny daydream morning and I was maybe about to graduate from college.

 

From the passenger’s seat of my mom’s white and black striped Honda Accord, I braced her for the potential looming disaster before us.  

 

“So….I might not graduate.”

 

“What?”

 

“Well, I’m not positive, I think I’m all set, but there’s, uh, a chance I fell slightly short of 120 credits.”

 

“Didn’t your class in West Hartford give you the last credits you needed?”

 

“I think so. But I tried to get a waiver for Statistics and I’m not sure if they gave it to me. I think they did. Yeah…..don’t worry. It’s fine,” I backtracked lamely.   

 

“Well, I hope so,” her voice fading like the last song on Side 2.

 

Like a Pauly Shore vehicle, I walked out on Stats 101. Inside the cavernous Math-Science Building lecture hall, they projected an 8x11 image onto an IMAX sized screen–a true waste of screen real estate. Other kids sat back in their rock hard wooden chairs and enjoyed lectures on Natural Variability, Sampling Variability, Measurement Variability, and even Environmental Variability—all augmented by an eagled eyed view of the board/projector. I couldn’t see a thing. 

 

Talk about ableism. Granted, I had read approximately 393 Political Correctness themed Daily Campus columns: morally superior epistles I felt morally superior to. I’m with you in spirit, Toby, but I grew up legally blind in a town without a McDonald’s. The only Big Mac was macro-aggression.

 

My Stats professor (TA?) sported a “My Stepson Needs to Understand I’m His Daddy Now” mustache which made him appear better equipped to move junkers from a used Buick dealership off an exit ramp than mold young minds at a public Ivy. (Source: the US News & World Report).

 

I applied for a waiver.    

 

From my guest chair eight feet from the Dean of Liberal Arts’ desk, I learned distance makes the heart grow fainter. She reviewed my file for 28 years or possibly 29 seconds.

 

“You don’t think you can complete the coursework?”  

 

“Well…..it’s hard without being able to see the board, you know?”

 

That was my oral argument.

 

Pause.

 

Is it cold in here?

 

Why is her clock so loud?

 

“Did you go to the Disabled Students Center?”

 

“Well, uh, no. They did provide a Biology tutor,” I deflected.

 

Interminable pause.

 

While we’re waiting for The Dean to conclude her investigation, I will tell you my tutor was a blonde Kappa Kappa Gamma named Amber who once mispronounced “organism.” For the remainder of the lab (fine--the semester) I wondered if:

 

A) She created a hilarious anecdote to share with her boyfriend Brock (would I lie to you at a time like this?) at his Sig Ep house.

 

B) She struggled with multisyllabic O words.

 

C. She burned with a forbidden white- hot tutor/pupil passion for me.    

 

But lab table love triangles weren’t just for WB prime time programming. I only had eyes for Carrie, the raven haired goddess who stared straight into my eyes for ten amazingly tense seconds as we studied the anatomy of the retina. She saw Oasis right before Wonderwall blew up. I strummed Live Forever in my dorm–the ethereal F major 7th over the falsetto “ever” sent chills down everyone’s spine. If there had been anyone else in the room. 

 

“I’m going to deny this request,” the Ice Queen finally ruled. “You can always get a tutor or speak with the professor about special accommodations.”

 

I had sunk so low. To think I once silently scoffed at classmates who panicked after references to the Quadratic Formula or Pythagorean Theorem without concurrent chalkboard illustrations. This highly adapted…organism had reduced himself to groveling?  

 

I should have told The Dean about my high school Trig oral report. I crunched box scores from every baseball game one Sunday in May.

 

“Good job! This is why if a guy has gone 7 for his last 8 but his career batting average is only .262, the manager will always pitch to him,” Mr. Colangelo said.

 

“But Mr. C, don’t they do the exact opposite,” I was too shy to raise my hand and ask.    

 

The batter’s hand-eye coordination is off, he’s gripping his bat too tight, his mom is sick. Managers gleefully pounce on these wounded animals because they know statistics measure the miles but confidence drives the bus.   

 

I took Stats again. The PA system amplifying my professor’s heavily accented voice was so low-def I started to imagine we had all left on a snorkeling field trip. I support multiculturalism and A/V clubs, but my naturally selected hearing hit an evolutionary brick wall. I could neither see nor hear the lesson plan. I stopped setting my alarm for class.

 

Then I adopted plan C: pretend Stats didn’t exist. This actually wasn’t too difficult since I glanced at my transcript’s nose-diving GPA like an overdue cable bill or Keith Richards’ bloodwork on the last leg of a Stones world tour.

 

But would I stand in my cap and gown and not hear my name called as my parents, grandmother, and aunt looked on in shame?

 

From the podium atop Gampel Pavilion’s basketball court, Phoenix Insurance CEO Bob Romano gave the commencement speech. No phoenix could ever rise from these rhetorical ashes. Contractually obligated, he said, “To thine own self be true”: a line from Polonius—who probably said “consequently” a lot—to his son Laertes—who definitely said, “Hey Broseph, don’t bogart that joint'' incessantly. Just once someone should say, “Kids, as the Bard might say, thou hast nor youth nor old age, but, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, dreaming on both. So….dream big?”

 

Then Bob got more serious than a Shakespeare problem play. 

 

“I believe very strongly that this is just the beginning for you, rather than the end. You will be entering the working world where grades are much less relevant than they were just a moment ago, where no one knows what you know, where, you will be surprised, very few people will care whether you succeed or not.”

 

Get this man to an Open Mic. 

 

He added family is what truly matters until everyone booed him off the stage. I’m probably remembering that wrong.

 

They started calling names alphabetically. Aarons and Adamses have it made. Don’t they have ceremonies in the fall? I could come back! My family loves me unconditionally, right?

 

“Michelle Fairbrother……Eric Fallon………………”

 

How many stupid kids go to this stupid school?

 

“Gerald McCaffery, David Mark McCall, Douglas Scott McCaffery…….”

 

Was this a St. Patrick’s Day parade? Who forgot the green Guinness?

 

“Colin McDonough.”   

 

I looked in both directions. No other Colin McDonoughs stepped forward to claim their degree. A miracle! I shook hands. I even smiled awkwardly. I had (somehow) earned a Bachelor Of Arts degree from The University Of Connecticut: a broken bat infield single but a line drive in the box score. 

 

Did they waive Stats out of pity? A clerical error? Fear of litigation? Best to stop asking questions. 

 

At our celebratory Friendly’s lunch, I had the Colossal Burger with bacon, large fries, and a chocolate shake. I’m surprised I’m still alive.

 

“I’m so proud of you, Col. This was an amazing accomplishment,” my aunt said. 

 

Was it though?

 

“Thanks!”

 

“I agree. You’re a college grad-u-8,” my self-deprecating, associate’s degree holding Dad seconded. 

 

Five and a half years plus one last course at the branch! Humiliating. All from an existential dread of getting up before 8:45 AM ever again. I drained the wallets of my parents and Services For The Blind so I could do keg stands in parking lots rather than browse Career Fair brochures. I owed everyone at the table a heartfelt apology. I could have at least picked up the check.

 

And what had I learned? William Faulkner hated the honeysuckle scented swamp called The South but he couldn’t stop writing about it. James Joyce grew allegorical wings and flew from the drab, dreary labyrinth of Ireland but he couldn’t stop writing about it. I hated Huskies Bar but I couldn’t stop stumbling home from it.

 

Oh, and May is the kindest month.    

 

The Ghost In You

 

Halfway through his life’s journey Dante found himself in a dark wood. A quarter way through mine I found myself in Woodside Acres: a suburban neighborhood carved out of the forest in the 70’s. Many evenings when I biked down to Hoffman Road I was amazed to discover the sun was still shining.

 

Donut shaped Maplewood Drive enclosed the woods. Our sprawling lawn meant more snow to shovel, leaves to rake, and lawn to mow while our sloped hill meant no basketball court. I had hoop dreams of playing for the Ellington Knights (named for 12 year old Samuel Knight, who was run over in the road by a wheelbarrow in 1812. Actually, this was an apt metaphor for our ability to handle a full court press). They wore beautiful purple and yellow gold uniforms. #3 would look great on me. I imagined tossing off my warmup jacket with 1:22 left in a 62-29 blowout of JV East Windsor. The rim is large and stationary. The ball is orange and relatively soft. Even a close range hit to the head wouldn’t be anything two Tylenols couldn’t fix. Pale and blond, I was basically a 5’8”, blind Larry Bird. But I was afraid other kids would laugh so I never showed up for try-outs.

 

I did, however, play rec football for an orange and black juggernaut called the Roadrunners. (Clearly not all Ellington nicknames were tender homages to poor Samuel Knight.) I was eight years old. After my big brother Patrick signed up, I quite foolishly believed I too was ready for the hard knock gridiron life. I ended my one and a half week career when I tearfully returned my helmet and shoulder pads to Mr. Sawwell, the despotic head coach who called us by our last names (what kind of psycho does that?) and said, “Gotta protect the family jewels, boys. Don’t forget to wear your jock strap or you will be talking funny!” The other kids laughed hysterically. I didn’t get it. How would that impact your speaking voice? Brookside Park’s practice field was three miles from home, but it might as well have been on Mars. While I should have been showing the tackle bag who was boss, I worried my mom might forget to pick us up and leave us stranded as darkness set in with only our jock straps to protect us from talking funny after we got kicked in the family jewels by a slightly more disheveled doppelganger of Mr. Roper from Three’s Company. That probably wasn’t how Mean Joe Green got started.     

 

But baseball was the temptress that truly broke my heart. Seventh grade Little League talk went from the bus stop to Home Ec to lunch to the bus ride home.

 

“Who’s pitching tonight?”

 

“Farnsworth.”

 

“Against who?”

 

“Zimmer.”

 

“Hey I’m on Pastori’s this year!”

 

“Cool, man. I’m on Agway.”

 

I wanted to play so bad I suspended my disbelief until my mom had to say it wasn’t safe–even for the 80’s.

 

“Honey, you might get hurt. I’m sorry.”

 

“I think I could do it! I want to at least try!” I protested through more athletically shed tears. 

 

But rock and roll won’t make you cry. I fell in love with listening to FM rock radio every day after school. I even won WCCC T-shirts, The Alarm’s Strength and Dokken’s Under Lock And Key, and tickets to Blue Oyster Cult and NRBQ shows I was way too young to attend.

 

And we did host athletic competitions on our front lawn. After school, neighborhood kids flocked to 15 Maplewood for…a friendly game of touch football? Absolutely not. Kill The Man With The Ball, also known in far more problematic times as Smear The Queer. Someone tossed a Wilson in the air and everyone sprinted like rabid rottweilers. The winner of the ensuing savage tug of war at the bottom of a pile zigged and zagged across the lawn to (temporarily) evade 8-10 bloodthirsty gang tacklers. But this lamb merely postponed his slaughter. After his inevitable sacking and stripping, the next victim took his place. This was football without the boring stuff. Playbooks? Teamwork? Getting molded into fine young men? No thanks. As the youngest kid, I took pride in taking a pounding and still getting up. Take away a pee wee football coach’s psychological terrorism, confine me in a kidnapper-free zone, and I was a football gladiator after all. 

…………………………………..

My volunteer firefighting dad loved our aluminum siding’s fireproofing capabilities. I loved its springiness which allowed you to have a catch with your house. Our twenty-year old breezeway bore more pockmarks than the surface of the moon. Aluminum also saved a tree, but in late 70’s east of the river Connecticut, milk still did a body good and Mother Earth was still an immortal goddess. 

 

Woods walled our backyard on all three sides. While construction crews built our neighbor’s house, we peeked through a clearing. My Dad was flabbergasted.

 

“This house has no privacy at all. No privacy!”

 

Woods lined their rear and left side, but their right flank was completely exposed! Might as well be naked. I don’t think Peeping Toms ever spied on the Fords, but their wide open (by Woodside standards) backyard became a thruway. A bee stung me in the forehead while I ran home and watch that clothesline if you like your head.

 

But it turns out the Fords were lucky. During my first summer after college, I started to evaporate into thin air from so much privacy.

 

When I was four, my parents, my brother and I moved from Hillside Drive to our white raised ranch. When my parents divorced when I was eight, occupancy shrank to my mom, my brother and me. When I was sixteen, my brother Patrick left for college and switched places with my stepfather. When I was 20, my mom realized she married the kind of guy who said, “There are very little shades of gray with me,” “Daddy’s home!” (to his stepson with a still breathing father), and “That’s where they go for the panty raids,” so she mercifully sent him packing. It was just her and me now. If occupancy decreases, does a house’s dimensions increase? I didn’t trust the tape measure any more than the statistician. Plenty of room for ghosts to crawl under the blue carpeting.   

 

Patrick had moved to San Diego with his college friends. He monopolized the TV, he said “Colin! Answer the phone LIKE A MAN” if I said “Hello” like a sleepwalking wuss, and he left dishes in the den until the gravy or A1 sauce turned to a congealed brown crust, but when shop class hood Carl Kawolski shoved him into a bonfire at a Purple Forest kegger and he had to douse his James Hetfield hair in Bud to put out the flames, I was more enraged than him even though he was the one who navigated through high school fist first. His laughter from Cheers, The Simpsons, and even Roseanne was always accompanied by a solitary hand clap. I heard even with my door closed and stereo on. But now the house was tranquil silence and clean dishes. I could answer the phone anyway I liked. It just never seemed to ring anymore.

   

Our cat Furball had died. My mom rescued her from a cardboard box in the street. She resembled a black ball of fur while sleeping. Her feline ways made you question if she cared if you lived or died or if she was possibly plotting your murder. Maybe she just used us for food, water, and a bed to hide under during thunderstorms? But she would excitedly greet us when we came home from Florida. That’s love, right? And I’d be guarded with my emotions too if someone ditched me on garbage day. She meowed her way into my bed (usually when Patrick’s door was closed), purring all the while. One sweltering summer night she screamed on our front porch. I thought she was dying until four kittens popped out. I guess she had put on some weight…. The white cat on Oakwood Circle was the prime deadbeat dad/rape suspect. This made their rumored tryst the first known example of harmonized ebony and ivory in our white flight safe haven town.  

 

Even the Whalers announced they were leaving to become the Carolina Hurricanes. Plain red and white replaced beautiful green and blue. Brass Bonanza would never again echo off the Civic Center’s walls. Is Raleigh a place or an airport? WTIC-AM had stopped airing their games when they conflicted with UConn games. Everyone hates a loser. Owner Peter Karmanos said, “We would have stayed if the state of Connecticut had subsidized us.” Unloved, unsubsidized, cuckolded by a college basketball team, he ran to the arms of a town whose local basketball team, the NC State Wolfpack, could never upstage in-state powerhouses Duke and North Carolina. Raleigh was safe for hockey. ………………………………………

I can’t read without my nose to the page, but my farsighted eyes can see large, four-ton hunks of metal reasonably well, so, at least for the helmetless daredevil worshipping late 20^th Century, bike riding was safe. Since college I had circled the entire town on my teal Trek ten speed. A town rumored to house more cows than people provided many backstreets to ride down. No need to  fear getting run over by a day drinking landscaper barreling down a congested byway. And you needed to drive to Vernon to even get on scary I-84.

 

I rode down Hoffman Road and breathed in Baehler’s Farm’s pungent perfume of cow shit. (Comedy stylists from neighboring towns called us Smellington). I turned onto Pinney Street where the suddenly chopped down corn in August always looked unnaturally barren no matter how many previous years you had seen it. I braved the dirt and rocks of Porter Road despite three previous popped tires. One day I took a tour of my old schools: Ellington High School, Longview Middle, and Center Elementary. I took a sip from Center’s three foot water fountain and fled before any teacher could ask when I was planning to move on with my life. I pedaled up Mountain Road to Crystal Lake, the subject of rampant home room rumors of Jason Vorhees sightings. (Get it? Camp Crystal Lake?). A group of us once went drunk skinny dipping there. Four guys, two girls. Don’t leer at the girls! Don’t get excited. Skinny dipping was pretty stressful. I couldn’t find my clothes in the dark and Danielle said, “Your clothes are over here, Col”. Did she peek? Did she care?  

 

There was a chalk lined message on Lower Butcher Road:

 

ERIC MELROSE IS GAY

 

This meant he wasn’t gay. You would never pen a chalky memorial to a gay kid for fear someone might think you were gay for him.

 

I got a Coke or Snapple at the Five Corners 7-11 before heading back on the open, aimless road.

 

Kids at keggers used to say, “I always see you on your bike!” But I had no keggers on my calendar this summer. Sometimes I at least heard car horns beep. To me? Someone I knew? I was like a distant star through a telescope. You  see what it looked like a billion light years ago but whatever happened to it? No one knew.   

 

With its driveways, garages, parking lots, gas stations, and car dealerships, Ellington was painstakingly designed without me in mind. Bus drivers, car pooling catechism moms, and kegger chauffeurs were all gone. I was on my own. An exile and stranger in my hometown.   

 

I never wanted to live anywhere else. (Besides UConn.) My mom once floated transferring to American Airlines’ Dallas office but I was so horrified she promptly dropped it. The Golden Gate Bridge at sunset was nice, but I thought our town gazebo was the more impressive architectural structure. As I dug my feet in the warm white sands of Waikiki Beach and gazed at the glistening, turquoise Pacific, I wondered if it quite matched the majestic beauty of Crystal Lake. Disney World was magical, but magical like our Fireman’s Fair? Whichever girl I had a crush on lived in Ellington, so those tourist traps were like beautiful cinematography without a movie. But now I was a child actor deemed unsuitable for adult roles awaiting a phone call that never came about a Different Strokes reunion.    

 

When classmates excitedly announced they passed Driver’s Ed (run by Richard “Are You Thinking Of Pink Elephants?” Pearson) I sensed the town’s wandering eye, but now it was unmistakably breaking up with me for good.  

 

One Sunday evening I got lost in uncharted Tolland. A nice lady walking her dog gave me directions. I got even more lost. Eventually I stumbled back onto Route 83 as dusk settled in and thought the territory I marked for years with my tire tracks was getting covered back up like footprints in the snow.

………………………………….

I read Crime and Punishment. A poor college student robs and murders an old lady because political pamphlets convinced him not all lives matter. A dad sells his daughter into prostitution but says hey he was out of work with mouths to feed. “Do you know, sir, what it’s like to have nowhere to go?” It ended with an old-fashioned murderer/prostitute love story so there was that.   

 

After I finished that zany comedy, I picked up Lolita at Borders Books in the Buckland Hills Mall. A Vanity Fair critic gushed “Lolita is the only convincing love story of the 20th Century.”

 

In this heart tugging romance, an urbane, witty professor named Humbert Humbert falls in love with a twelve year old girl. So he does the obvious thing and marries her mom. His cockblocking betrothed gets run over by a car after learning hubby wasn’t quite Prince Charming after all. What a lucky break! Our romantic lead gains full custody of the tween fire of his loins. He assaults her. She ditches him for a pornographer. Humbert Humbert kills him–presumably for compromising her morals?

 

This Valentine’s Day, a hardcover copy of Lolita will pair perfectly with a dozen long stem roses and a box of Godivas.

 

Writers think ripping off rose colored glasses makes them ophthalmologists. But do these prosecutors strain so hard to denounce the shortsighted, saccharine arguments of the defense that they succumb to their own dirt coated myopia? I wanted to slay the Cyclops, not become his second eye. Unable to sail between the rock of realism and the whirlpool of romanticism, they blame the sea for their poor navigation. In grad school, A’s would be like taking candy from a nymphet and calling it love. 

 

“This text is a profound meditation on the rape of childlike innocence in twentieth century consumerist America. We’re all bobby sox wearing nymphets! Lolita? C’est moi! Our youthful, yearning, idealistic (three adjectives because I’m crawling towards five pages here) selves are getting incinerated in the pale fire of materialism. This is totally not just some weirdo channeling his sick fantasies into a critically acclaimed pedophile comedy. Like I said a little bit earlier, Lolita is brilliant!” 

 

Is it just academia’s answer to “You have beautiful eyes”?

 

Meanwhile, a classmate wrote a Beowulf essay entitled Beer, Babes, and Broadswords. Grendel isn’t a symbol of primordial paganism slayed by the righteous sword of Christianity/Beowulf, but rather a metaphorical Monstrous Hangover which our epic hero kills so future generations can raise mead in the Valhalla air like they just didn’t care. This groundbreaking contribution to literary scholarship earned a D-. No free thinking in the liberal arts!

 

I got up at 11:23 AM and slogged through Lolita (it still beat The Bold And The Beautiful) in a lawn chair in our wiffle-ball dented breezeway. I put my feet on our picnic table which was defaced years earlier with pocketknifed peace signs and pentagrams by The Woodside Crue: a restless gang of latchkey kids whose after school activities included but were not limited to smoking cigarettes, smoking weed, watering down parents’ wine bottles, wandering through the woods, and carving stuff into picnic tables. They also waged epic snowball fights (two black eyes over here) and invented the sport of Roof Diving. Everyone crawled through my window onto the garage roof and dove into a teenage hooligan constructed snowball twenty feet below. Headfirst unless you were a wuss. (I was a wuss). I’d have to erase the snow prints and dirt in my room before my mom got home.

 

With the Crue disbanded, my mom placed a blue tablecloth over their lost legacy. I still remember. I lifted it up just to read the old names.

 

Dan’s high school aged sister Ally played Radio 104 across the street while tanning by their above ground pool. I heard a song about getting nicotine in your hair. Was this a misheard lyric? Was it “on your ass?”. But how does that happen? Should sweet, impressionable young girls like Ally even listen to such dirty songs?!

 

I read The Hartford Courant, The Journal Inquirer, box scores, CD and concert reviews, and if I got desperate, the news. And editorials. “A UConn football stadium will boost economic activity.” “A UConn football stadium will be a financial disaster.” As the breezeway wind chimes blew gently, I read:

 

WILLIAMS. Stacy Miller, 24, of Overhill Road, Ellington, died Sunday (May 26, 1997 at Cape Cod Hospital, Hyannis, MA. She was born in Rockville, daughter of Louis and Virginia (Dawson) Miller of Ellington. Stacy had just completed nursing school at St. Elizabeth School of Nursing in Brighton, MA.”

 

This was more depressing than a literary masterpiece. Strawberry blonde hair. Quiet and shy. Friends with Tracy Byers across the street. One day they called me over. What did we talk about? I couldn’t remember. Forever 24. Her old age now someone else’s after-dinner dream.

…………………………………           

Dan was still going to Eastern CT State University. I liked to congratulate him on attending the second most prestigious school in northeastern Connecticut. Our pickup basketball games on his flat driveway had ended when I broke his backboard with my lethal bank shot. (Painted red square are easier to see than silver circles). His neighbor Mr. Aase was elated. Any time the ball crash landed in the flowerbed under the wooden fence separating their yards, he stormed out screaming, “Keep that fucking ball out of my flowerbed!” (He also screamed, “Shut your fucking dog up!” every night of summer after 11PM). His long- suffering bride Diane tended those delicate peonies. “Hey punks, I’m maintaining appearances in my loveless marriage.”

 

To signal a wiffle ball game, Dan tried to draw me outside with whistling, but I had studied Pavlov and Skinner in Psych 101 and, hoping to avoid mechanized clockwork canine status, I played deaf. Not wishing to see the behavioral sciences discredited, he initiated Plan B: whiffle ball line drives against our aluminum siding.

 

But that summer, no more drives were forthcoming. So this once proud anti-Skinnerian became a meek, starving Pavlov dog. I broadened my interpretation of a stimulus. At the sound of a car door, I rushed down to greet him. I was usually too late.

 

And knocking was not an option.

 

One sleety January night Dan left tracks in our muddy lawn while backing out of the driveway. I labeled it (probably) accidental. My mom wasn’t so sure.

 

“Did Daniel do this on purpose?” she asked in a wounded voice.

 

 My stepfather—who offered the homeless a leg up with “Get a job!” life hack advice—had moved out two weeks earlier. I felt so bad for my mom I left a note by the kitchen door:

 

“Dear Mom,

 

Have a good day at work.

 

Love,

 

Colin.”

 

She thanked me when she got home. (If love is the answer, why does it hurt more than anything else?)

 

But the time for comforting notes was over. Bob Romano said it best: this was not the end, it was only the beginning. Dan would think wrecking our lawn was hilarious! Had he not defaced our beautiful yet fragile aluminum siding with impunity for years?

 

Under the cover of starless midwinter darkness, I stealthily marched out at 1:36 AM (had to catch Spacehog on Conan) and placed a fistfull of mud on his Dad’s minivan. Its white roof would boldly announce my crime in the gray light of dawn. Then, in a moment of inspired madness, I carved a tic-tac-toe board on their lawn with my boot and drew three diagonal X’s.

 

Game over, Matthews family.

 

This brazen act of kamikaze warfare caused such a breakneck fall from grace in Mr. Madden’s eyes I nearly got the bends. Like 98 percent of suburban dads, lawn care was the man’s life. To think I had faithfully (or so it had seemed) served their home care needs for years! While they vacationed in Maine every August, I watered Mrs. Matthew’s geraniums and put chlorine in their pool (though not quite to Mr. Matthew’s exacting standards unless his pH readings were sorely mistaken) in exchange for $20 and the right to skinny dip at night. (A contractual clause I wrote in invisible ink.) I also subbed on Dan’s paper route while he was at afterschool basketball and baseball practice. I endured four paper cuts bringing The Journal Inquirer to my--I mean his loyal customers’ doorsteps throughout Maplewood and Oakwood. Mrs. Madden gave me $30 per week. But now my well healed hands had mud on them which all the perfumes of Arabia would never again sweeten.

…………………………………….

I caught up with Dan one Tuesday afternoon.

 

“What’s up, Jacque Jones?”

 

I was Jacque Jones, Jake, Dickie, Rob, Rob Reiner—never Colin. His buddy Tim Kowalksi was Coach K. His sister, for reasons unknown by this author, was Charles.

 

“Hey, Dan. Want to play wiffle-ball?”

 

“I can’t. I’m working in an hour. The Old Country Buffet needs me, Rob. Maybe Thursday or Friday.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Sox fucking suck this year, Jake. Did you watch the game last night?”

 

“I wouldn’t miss a Bob Kurtz broadcast if you paid me.”

 

NESN’s play by play man was blander than unbuttered Wonder Bread, but I didn’t miss a game that 78-84 season. Jerry Remy’s color commentary went, “First the fastball, now the curveball strikes out Mo Vaughn” when even fans with best corrected visual acuities of 20/400 watching on 19 inch Zenith TV’s could see that. His smoker’s cough during “Emeker'' Insurance promos (he was from Fall River, MA) inspired me to quit. 

 

In high school I bummed ‘rettes off my badass longhaired black leather jacket wearing bro and his longhaired stone washed denim over leather wearing smoking lounge companion Ian. Axl Rose’s mom probably didn’t smell his clothes doing his laundry, but mine did. So I couldn’t be a Marlboro Man. But I mastered the spin cycle in college and trudged to Store 24 in a blinding snowstorm. Nor’easters make you crave nicotine, I guess. 

 

But my future as a black rebel motorcycle club member who uses his right ear as a cigarette holder or a cafe frequenting, homemade tobacco rolling lover of French cinema and not just for the full-frontal nudity….well it  looked dim. Time to hang up my Bic.

 

I could stop flicking butts into the woods which my mom probably saw at the clothesline. Plus I’d save money if I moved out. I would need more than the SSI check I had collected since turning 18. My dad said: “I’ve been paying taxes all of my life and now my son can benefit.” Sound reasoning. My mom agreed. My SSI collecting brother agreed. Farsighted and outvoted, I felt the majority was shortsighted. Did my inability to drive or see the board make me “disabled”? I read so close it looked like I was sniffing a ditto fresh off a microfiche and I couldn’t man The Hot Corner without endangering my life, but during fourth grade recess, in my life’s most transcendent epiphany, (inspired by a ditto high?) I figured out the comeback to, “How many fingers am I holding up?”

 

“I don’t know. How many am I holding up?”

 

(Stick up middle finger).

 

Everyone laughs. I win.  

 

Did I sound disabled to you?  

 

At one time I might not have even been born legally blind. They widened the definition in 1968. Did they send Publishers Clearinghouse “You may already be blind” letters? And did those nouveau aveugles beam with gratitude or feel burned by this legislative hot poker to the eye?

 

Uncle Sam’s $300 per month made me a collegiate King Midas. Record store owners, package store owners, bartenders, and the makers of Nacho Cheese Pretzel Combos experienced a financial windfall they’re still trying to explain. Anyone who says welfare doesn’t stimulate the economy just doesn’t know what they’re talking about. I told my broke ass floormates, “The next time you see your parents, please thank them for me. Their tax dollars paid for my beer tonight.”  

…………………………………………

Qutting smoking was a bad idea.  

 

Slow ripples of anxiety were breaking through the surface and nicotine withdrawal was an underwater volcano threatening to blow the entire island to smithereens! (I’m not sure if that sounded like Shakespeare or a Michael Bay rough draft. Either way I’m not hitting delete.)

…………………………..

Dan invited me to the movies with his buddies Jeff and Chris. (Three- man minimums were absolutely essential so people couldn’t possibly mistake you for two dudes on a date.) In Con Air, John Malkovich went full Malkovich. Nicholas Cage got awfully Cagey. John Cusack made you wonder why Lloyd Dobler turned out this way. There was an airplane prison break. Shit got blown up. Tender romance. A corpse fell out of the sky. Someone got shot in the head. “Put the bunny back in the box!” Nick Cage warned for some reason. Con Air was a runaway summer blockbuster smash.

 

I couldn’t breathe. Was it the Coke? This happened when I saw Field Of Dreams too, but luckily my dad hated unrealistic storytelling unless Arnold was winning a machine gun battle against fifteen highly trained snipers, so after Shoeless Joe’s ghost walked out of Kevin Costner’s cornfield, he was happy to hit the left Exit when I said I didn’t feel well--maybe something I ate?

 

I went to the bathroom and loitered in the lobby. I stared probably somewhat maniacally at the Milk Duds and Raisinets. Finally, Dan came out.

 

“Jake, what are you doing out here?”   

 

“I don’t know. I’m not feeling too good. Maybe something I ate.”

 

“Do you need to go home?”

 

“I think I’ll be alright. I’ll be back in a minute.”

 

Eight minutes later, I went back in. I calmed down just enough to enjoy machine gun fire, military helicopters dropping bombs, and wacky one liners. The film ended with Nick Cage gave his adorable daughter Casey a toy bunny while Leanne Rhymes yearningly cooed How Do I Live Without You. They must have developed the bunny plotline while I was in the lobby.

…………………………………...

My $400 Mexican Fender Stratocaster had a bridge humbucker (like Eddie Van Halen!) Sunburst with a rosewood fretboard and black pickguard, it made every day feel like Halloween.

 

It replaced the black Steve Vai signature Ibanez I won off the radio in high school. I named seven guitar riffs. (Bad To the Bone was involved.) Its Floyd Rose tuners encouraged facemelting divebombs, but, unable to figure out its elaborate locking system (was it visual or was I just dumb?) I had to ask Beller’s Music to change my strings. Which was emasculating.

 

My idiot proof Strat and my Crate amp’s 20 watts of raw, skull crushing solid state power made me a rock and roll lethal weapon. The clean channel’s built-in chorus was spacey and beautiful and the distortion channel sounded like a swarm of angry and very constipated bees. That’s a compliment.

 

But chicks dig singers so I grabbed my $200 laminated Washburn, fired up our Windows 95 loaded Gateway, dialed-up to AOL, and found guitar tablature sites. Tab books were $25 in the offline world. Good riddance. They made Unskinny Bop and Naughty Naughty appear to outclass a Wagner’s Ride Of The Valkyries in musical virtuosity while copyright infringing E-pirates just provided chords so you could fake your way through. No drowning in a sea of ghost notes. The Information Superhighway was most helpful when it provided less information.

 

REM’s Losing My Religion was my shy guy anthem my senior year of high school. Hair metal hadn’t died (although Slaughter was flying it to the angels) but no one smelled like teen spirit yet. I chose Athens, GA college rock over Bang Tango.

 

I learned how to play and sing Find The River. A Maxell cassette is buried in a landfill somewhere. Please find a river, an anchor, and drown it.    

 …………………………………..

 A “friend” told me 90’s Internet lacked the bandwidth for adult videos. Even low-resolution photos took twelve minutes to load—a right boob might appear at 39% but you needed to wait six more minutes to see the left one! Dial- up Internet would have caused Job to throw his mouse against the wall. It was a step backwards from my VHS collection of the most crucial scenes from 80’s teen comedies and 90’s erotic thrillers aired nightly on HBO at around 11:45 PM. If you didn’t hit record just in time, you missed a boob shot or– always a pleasant surprise—a full frontal scene (thank you Twin Peaks alumni) which really moved the plot forward from lost classics like Hardbodies 2 and Sins Of Desire. They would air again at 2:50AM the following Wednesday but even I wasn’t enough of a loser to set my alarm or learn how to program a VCR.

 

Out of AOL minutes, I turned on MTV. Some guy moped into the camera about artificial greenery and invincible magnetic forces. A very angry guy fantasized about watching a major metropolitan area deluged into oblivion by a rare weather event.  

 

Oh for fuck’s sake.

 

If I wanted musical uplift, I was in the wrong decade.

 

Tthen a bleach blond guy by a sunny swimming pool sang of his dreams of aviation.

 

This should have helped more than it did.    

 ………………………………….

Folliwng my mom’s lead, I tried online hearts against non-humans Lisa, Bill, and John. My avatar was a frowning blond guy. What were they trying to say? Lisa also angrily frowned and her hairstyle was likely the result of a toaster accident. John was a carrot topped, shifty eyed scowler. Bill was a straight faced, mustachioed black haired button man who didn’t care to be fucked with. His avatar was clearly inspired by ESPN World Series Of Poker players or drug cartel mules. 

 

I don’t believe in reading game directions, so I assumed you collected hearts when in fact you try to ditch them. But it’s the evil queen of spades you really want to avoid. You pick three cards to pass on before each game (unless you had the 2 of clubs). I kept my hearts and spades and dropped my clubs and diamonds while stalling for time. Lisa, Bill, and even John didn’t know what hit them. But then I realized if you ditch all your low diamonds but get dealt the ace of diamonds and someone leads with a diamond---let’s say John—and shadowy Bill tossed in the queen of spades, I was fucked. Possibly there was some other path to domination, but then Bill would come find me and break my knees.

………………………………

A road trip might do me good. We visited my grandmother in Stafford Springs.

 

 “Anybody here love their grandmutha??!”

 

“Yes, me.”  

 

If I snuck through the kitchen while she talked to my mom she said, “Get back heah and give your grandmuthah a hug, sweethaht!” Gram had yet to shed her Fall Rivah accent after fifty years in Connecticut. (She obviously loved Jerry Remy).

 

Today she didn’t make her famous fried chicken or amazing chocolate chip cookies. Or bread pudding. (No huge loss there). My mom did her hair. Gram always said I was so handsome and “smaht.” She said corny stuff like, “Colin, will you be my Valentine?” or “God gave Gram two knees: one for each boy!” But she wasn’t all lovey dovey. Of a rotund, diminutive Senior Center member, she said, “It’s easier to jump over her than walk around her.”. The pot was calling the kettle black but I still admired Gram’s insult comic chops.    

 

On our way home, we stopped at McDonald’s.

 

“I think I might have something wrong. I’m getting heart palpitations,” I said.

 

“Oh dear. For how long?”

 

“A couple weeks maybe. I wonder if I need to see a doctor.”

 

“You’re not covered under my insurance anymore. Are you sure you don’t just need to get out of the house more? You don’t ride your bike anymore.”

 

“I just haven’t been into it lately I guess.”

 

“Can you do more things with Daniel?”

 

“He’s always working.”

 

“Have you talked to Barry Arroyo? Maybe the state can get you a job?”

 

“No, I haven’t talked to him. Maybe I’ll call.”

 

“They have to help you. Otherwise, what are they paying him for?”

 

“I know. I also quit smoking. Maybe I’m having withdrawals.”

 

“Well I’m glad you quit. Would you like to stop at Walgreens for nicotine patches?”

 

So much for that bombshell confession.

 

“Okay. I don’t know. I think I miss college. Or I miss my friends.”

 

“What about Sean Lask and those guys?”

 

“Yeah. Maybe I’ll call them. I don’t know. And then maybe Patrick living in San Diego.”

 

Oh no. Not here. Not in the stupid Stafford Springs McDonald’s over a Quarter Pounder with Cheese.

 

A tear fell in my fries. Then another.

 

“I’ll be okay.”

 

Why don’t you just go worry your poor mom to death? A drowning son drags his mother down with him. Details at eleven.

…………………………………………..

 

……………………………………….

 

The breezeway doorbell rang. Only Avon ladies and Jehovah’s Witnesses rang our front door. I opened the screen door. My brother’s friend Ian wore boots, jeans, and a black T-shirt on this 87 degree day.

 

“Hey, where’s Patrick!?”

 

“Hey Ian! What’s up?”

 

He took a long drag and exhaled.

 

“Where is your brother?”

 

“He’s not here. He doesn’t live here anymore.”

 

“What!? Well that’s just fucking great. Are you serious? He doesn’t live here anymore??”

 

“No. He lives in San Diego now.”

 

“He’s living in San Diego?? (Long pause). When did that happen!?”

 

“About six months ago. He moved out with Central friends.”

 

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

 

“I’m not kidding, dude.”

 

“He’s really not here? Tell him I’ve got a joint for him.”

 

“Really, dude”, I laughed. “I’m not hiding him from you, I swear.”

 

He stared blankly, rendered utterly speechless.

 

“Wow.”

 

I’m not positive Ian was entirely sober.

 

“What’s up with you?” I asked. “Have you seen anyone lately? Missy? Aaron? Beth?”

 

“I’ve seen no one. I’m in Milford.”

 

“Hey, can I bum a smoke?”

 

One wouldn’t kill me.

 

He took his Marlboro Reds from his left front pocket and lit his silver lighter.

 

“Well this is just fucking great.”

 

Boy was he taking the news hard. But eventually denial, anger, bargaining, and depression yielded to acceptance. He drove off. I never saw him again.

 

Ian was a high school heartthrob with Jordan Catalanato cheekbones and cool reserve that made the girls swoon. Missy was his smoking hot ex-girlfriend. One day I rushed to answer the phone (95 percent of the calls were for Patrick but never mind that).

 

“Why didn’t you go to the prom?” she said.

 

Word travels fast. I had watched my Taxi Driver VHS recording just to enhance the masochistic joy.

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“You should have asked me. I would have gone.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Of course!”

 

Of course, gone as friends. But she had broken up with Ian (again) and between getting dressed up, maybe some dancefloor Tone Loc, and way too much illegal Southern Comfort, who knows? Was my own brand of emotional unavailability enough to get me to second base anyway?  

 

Ian had gone to Elmcrest reform school. He hung drawings of mountains, dragons and each of us on our refrigerator. They looked amazing. One day we watched Cheers. Sam and Diane got in a slapping contest until Sam said, “Are you as turned on as I am?” Diane said “More!” They made out. The phone rang in my mom’s room.

 

“If it’s my mom, say I’m not here!”

 

“Hello.”

 

“This is Ian’s mother. Is he there?”

 

“Sorry I haven’t seen him around today.”

 

“Well if he is there, please tell him it’s imperative he comes home to rake the leaves.” Her tone was chillier than the  November wind screaming through the closed windows.

 

“Ian, it’s imperative you come home ti rake the leaves.”

 

“She always uses big words when she wants to be scary.”

 

He left five minutes later.

 

Another afternoon, he and Patrick sat on a rock in the woods and smoked a joint.

 

“Colin, your problem is you don’t have any self-esteem,” Ian said.

 

He’d been paying attention? What a compliment.

 

Was Ian evaporating too? Was the world perfectly happy to move on from another talented kid from a broken home?

 

Very few people, you may be surprised to learn, will care if you succeed or not.

 

I don’t blame him for not believing me. The Woodside Crue was gone and it wasn’t coming back, but it all seemed to come without warning even though they spoiled the ending just like when Scott Alfson gave away the ending of The Empire Strikes Back at the bus stop in first grade. I still didn’t believe Darth Vader was Luke Skywalker’s father until I saw it myself two days later. Maybe in our hearts those teenage days of getting lost in the woods (“We just need to find the generator”) making ourselves at home in half built houses on Cherrywood Drive when construction workers weren’t around and hoping the half- built stairs didn’t collapse under our feet, scoring illegal Peppermint Schnapps from someone/anyone’s older brother, going pool hopping until Dad stormed outside screaming “Get the hell off my property!” drunk trick or treating after you had clearly aged out of Halloween so you smashed pumpkins in defiance of time…..it all felt too eternal to ever really end. I think Ian was shocked to discover eternity had an alarm clock and he felt tricked. 

…………………………………....

I took midnight walks through the houselight-only streets of Woodside. Some living room lights were still on.  Night phantoms, they felt more distant than the stars when I lied down in stranger’s dark dewy lawns and peered through my binoculars. 

 

To my right stood the Drew’s house where we went sledding in winter. Then Rob Mullin’s old house before he moved and cut off our access to his awesome in-ground pool--old people without kids moved in. Up the hill was Kristin Quinn’s house with driveway lights resembling a runway. Her brother Lou committed suicide in tenth grade—a nice kid. Maybe a little hyper? Why did he do it?  Amy Hawthorne’s house was through the woods. She had dimples and dark curls and whispered through her readings when called upon in class.

 

Next was Greg Nowicki’s house. On the bus one day, out of nowhere, he challenged me to a fight at the circle. 3:30. Be there. I knew he was just trying to boost his street cred with the junior high savages who had turned fistfights into an after-school elective, but The Code demanded my acceptance. I threw a punch which, to my great surprise, connected. Grazed is probably more accurate.

 

“You just messed up the wire on my braces!” he mumbled marble mouthed.

 

No mas. Down goes Nowicki. A panel of Puma and Converse clad judges declared me the unanimous winner via technical knockout. Not exactly the fight of the century. His orthodontist was the true winner that day. With Rob’s dreams of Woodside tough guy ascendancy reduced to the crushing reality of an emergency visit with Dr. Granatini, his next-door neighbor Pete Kozlowksi sang the requiem.

 

“You quit so that means you’re a pussy!”

 

And I liked Rob! Just not enough to get branded the neighborhood pussy myself. The law of the jungle ruled in Woodside.

 

The circle was dark on this night and the only sounds were crickets, bug zappers, and pool filters. Were these ghosts still living at home? Were they home right now? They had evaporated too.  

 

Blood On The Tracks and Astral Weeks made perfect late night walking music. If You See Her Say Hello. Or Ballerina. Like Clara Boucher stretching her legs like a pretzel on the floor of our hallway. “I’m flexible. I’ve been dancing since I was four.” A year earlier she had knocked on my door one Saturday evening.

 

“Hi, Colin. I’m Clara Boucher. I’m from Ellington.”

 

She was three years below me in high school. One day Dan called her “CL” while we played basketball. She turned heads even as a freshman. Almost a black haired Ashley Judd. Out of my league? Why didn’t I find out? As I said summer goodbyes to floormates, TJ in 303 said, “Clara’s moving here next year. She’s hot.” Did he know something I didn’t? I hardly talked to her. Although I bought her illegal beer once. I knocked on her door to deliver it. The shower was running three doors down. I formed a mental image. We crossed paths in the stairwell fifteen minutes later.

 

On a drunken dare from floormates Kevin and Seth, I left her a voicemail. “Clara, I love you!” I think. Uggh. Walking up to the cafeteria with a group of floormates two days later, she and her friends walked down.  “Colin! You’re leaving me crazy voicemails!” I pretended it was the funniest thing anyone ever said. Not the most humiliating.  

 

One night in our study lounge (more of a hackey sack and Gin Rummy playpen) she asked if I knew Paige Cappadocia? She had a pic in Mademoiselle. I decided maybe Clara was shallow. Not very smart? I had my excuse for not trying.

 

She hung out at Kevin and Seth’s Sig Ep house.

 

“She likes to kiss everyone. We call her Kissing Clara.” Kevin reported.  

 

“Does she……..do more than kiss?”

 

“No, just kisses.” 

 

Did I believe him?

 

Another excuse to not try. 

 

I would have given anything if she was walking beside me through the dark, quiet, middle of the night Woodside streets. But she had fallen off the face of the earth like everyone else.

 

Find new friends? But they just prove the disposability of old ones. By the mid-80’s, it seemed like Wade Boggs had always been the Red Sox third baseman. Sure, my Dad said they had traded away Carney Lansford (“If someone from Boston calls him Connie, don’t listen. That’s a girl’s name!”) but I was too young to remember. Boggs had little power, he constantly stranded runners in scoring position, he hit too many singles, he wore an 80’s porn ‘stache, he cheated on his wife with a Penthouse playmate named Margo, he ate fried chicken before every single game like a superstitious freak, and he drank 60 Miller Lights on a cross country flight to Seattle, but he was our guy!

 

Until he wasn’t. In 1996 he won The World Series while wearing Yankees pinstripes. Our 3rd baseman was Tim Naehring. Who? Exactly. Old friends are batting champions, new friends are Tim Naehring. Old friends are lodestars guiding you through a disorienting world, new friends make you feel more lost than before as you wonder if you were just rooting for the uniform all along.

……………………………………

Reuniting with my Ellington friends wasn’t possible. Shane (a borrowed friend from my brother) dated Christina who lived next door from  The Jungle, which was merely a metaphorical subtropical lawless land, in Frats—which hadn’t been fraternities in decades. Her spitfire roommate Shumsa was obsessed with Duke basketball. Rooting for Duke in Storrs was like praying Andre The Giant would kick a puppy. All American point guard Bobby Hurley was her dreamboat. #11 was “the NCAA’s all-time assists leader” she told you if you asked about Duke, the weather, or if it was Build Your Own Burger day in the caf. Duke was the (blue) devil incarnate. Preppies who called their 4,000 seat gym Cameron Indoor “Stadium” and preached teamwork, academics, America, and feeding starving Guatemalan children with polio and pinkeye when they really just wanted to punch you in your public school throat.

 

I decided maybe Shumsa wasn’t that annoying. I was probably blinded by the 0.1% chance she would hook up with if I let her call me Bobby.

 

One night I went to The Homer Babbidge Library, an unpretentious pre-war industrial slab draped from head to toe in gray plastic to prevent falling bricks. Duke’s library probably didn’t have a fifty-foot condom wrapped around it. If our library wasn’t used as a metaphor for safe sex at freshman orientation (to the plaintive strains of Ben Folds Five’s unwanted pregnancy dirge Brick) an opportunity was lost.

 

Exhausted from not studying, I decided to write a letter. I’d slip it under their door early in the morning! Everyone would find it hilarious. Devilishly charming! This satirical masterwork, basically A Modest Proposal 2.0, read as follows:

 

Shumsa,

 

Yo shorty, what poppin’? This is the NCAA’s all-time assists leader. You can call me The Notorious B-O-B. Some honeys call me white chocolate. Check it, I was chilling with my boy Grant while bench pressing 350 pounds (just to warm up) at an indoor stadium and he said you’re so  smokin’ hot someone better pull the fire alarm. I was planning to pop by on Friday (is Huskies lit like they say?) so we can kick it. They say I’m a preppie but shorty, the only thing I’m preppin’ for is banging you like a screen door in a hurricane. Oooo baby you make me harder than Stats 101. I wanna pound you like a batch of Bisquick. C ya at your crib around nine? That Haterade drinker Colin will lead me there. What else is he doing on a Friday, know what I’m sayin’? The blind leading the amazing. That doesn’t rhyme, but does it need to? I’m good at basketball.    

 

Your boy,

 

B. Hurl

 

I guess I knew this was an incredibly bad idea, but, like a game of workboot Tic Tac Toe, I marched forward anyway. The Blue Devil made me do it?   

 

“Hey Col, it’s for you,” said my roommate Greek.

 

“Hello?”

 

“Colin, this is Christina.”

 

She usually called me Col—even after I got shitfaced at Lynard Skynard at Riverside Park and puked on her shoe. So this situation was worse than sneaker vomit.

                                                        

“Hey.”

 

“Um, we got that note you wrote. That wasn’t funny. I don’t think you should talk to Shumsa for a really long time.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Great.”

 

“Um…………Christina, I’m sorry!”

 

“Have a good day.”

 

I grabbed two books and fled like a criminal. Calm down, calm down, Colin. I was just making fun of douchebag guys—which I totally am not! Trust a Duke fan’s ear for razor sharp social satire at your own risk!

 

Oh who was I kidding? Was I even trying to be funny? Maybe I just hated every guy a girl liked—even former ACC All Conference first teamers.

 

I went home that weekend. Our mutual friend Dale called.

 

“I don’t know. I guess I just thought it was funny,” I mumbled. I sat on our yellow and white kitchen floor and leaned against our yellow refrigerator while I, yellow haired, held our yellow phone.     

 

“Well, it was funny.”

 

“I’m glad at least you thought so.”

 

“Everyone is worried about you.”

 

“I’ll be okay.”

 

I sniffled a couple times.  

 

“Are you crying?”

 

“No.” 

 

“Are you going to be okay?”

 

“Yeah. I’ll be alright.”

 

We hung up.      

 

Christana never said don’t talk to her again, just Shumsa, right? Dale thought it was funny! And this was two years ago. Maybe it had all blown over. I could call Trask to read the temperature?

 

But that ice in Christina’s voice just wouldn’t thaw. I never made it past a dial tone.

………………………………………

“Mom, I’m having some chest pains. Can we go to the hospital?”   

 

9:40 PM. Swampy mid July night. The den fan blew hot air. Steve Avery was blanking the Orioles. Shane Mack was going 3 for 4 and I was having a panic attack or (probably) dying. 

 

She got dressed and we drove towards Rockville Hospital. She tried to talk me down.

 

“You’re not covered under my insurance anymore.”
 

“Mom.”

 

“I think you’re just nervous. Do you want to go to McDonald’s for an ice cream?”

 

Prescribing sugar and saturated fat to a cardiac patient? You just don’t get it Mom!  

 

“Maybe I can pay for the hospital. How much does it cost?”

 

“A lot. Let’s go to McDonald’s.“

 

She turned right instead of left on Route 83.

 

I ordered a chocolate shake. I took the smallest sip humanly possible and waited for my heart to stop completely.  

 

I calmed down a little. Did I just need a milkshake?  

 

It didn’t last.

 

“No one your age gets heart attacks. It just doesn’t happen,” my Dad said over the phone.

 

“But Hank Gathers from Loyola Marymount dropped dead right on the court!” 

 

“We’re going to take you to every doctor known to man if that’s what it takes!”

………………………………………

My mom had good reason to postpone my funeral arrangements.

 

I was assigned a book report on rabies in tenth grade Biology. I read the signs and symptoms in sixth period study hall until it became painfully obvious mine was a rapidly advancing case. Rabies is contracted by an animal bite. Furball play bit me on Saturday! Was play time over for me? You get thirsty but develop a crippling fear of water. Hydrophobia. I hadn’t gone near the water fountain all day! Headache: check. You go insane right before you die of thirst. Well that’s just great. Cure for rabies: n/a. Were the library’s walls closing in or was delirium kicking in already?

 

After two weeks (if I go to sleep will I ever wake up?) I realized this was utter lunacy. Who gets rabies?? Duh, it was a brain tumor. What’s up with these dull headaches? “Spring allergies. Sinuses,” my Dad’s friend speculated. Dream on, Mr. Bierbach! I hadn’t read The Merck Manual but I had seen Kindergarten Cop and this was a tumah.   

 

My grandmother hosted my Sweet Sixteenth birthday party. It was just Gram, Mom, me, and the kind of guy who said kids today could use a good spanking.

 

“Blow out the candles, Colin!” Gram urged.

 

While I blew, I speculated on my funeral’s attendance figures.

 

My pediatrician Dr. Deckard ordered an MRI and CT at Rockville Hospital.

 

“I know we won’t find anything but let’s just confirm.” Nice bedside manner, Dr. Death!

 

The young MRI tech spoke in soothing, hushed tones. He presumably assumed a high schooler getting a brain scan was a dead man walking (finally someone gets it) but my imaging was cleaner than my acne filled face. This radiographic Clearasil eased my fears.

 

For a few hours.

 

Don’t scans miss stuff?

 

So Dr. Deckard wrote a prescription. He was kind enough to pretend these were special b.i.d. brain tumor destroying capsules, but they were probably anxiety meds. On our field trip to the state Capitol I felt mellower than a Deadhead during Space Jam. Until the bus ride home. Nice try, pharmaceutical industry. 

 

One luminous late spring morning I waited to take my lukewarm shower (everyone left little hot water) while Led Zeppelin’s Down By The Seaside played through the bathroom door. (Neither Patrick nor I ever showered before parking our boomboxes on the vanity). It was the most amazing thing I had ever heard. Even Patrick felt the mystical, healing power. I overheard him say, “This song is really good.”

 

Life was so achingly, indescribably beautiful!

 

This seaside spell broke before home room.

 

The cure didn’t come from any known manual in Western medicine. I returned to Dr. Deckard’s office for an end of sophomore year mandatory physical performed by a 20-something doctor. Or nurse? PA? Office assistant?

 

“I’m Sonya. Go ahead and get undressed and I’ll be right back.”

 

I got down to my tighty-whities and lied down on my side and propped up my head. A gown hung on the bed-post. Was that for me? Probably not.

 

She opened the door. 

 

“Are you ready for me?”

 

Ooo was that a flirtatious tone I detected? If loving medical malpractice was wrong, did I want to be right? She asked if I was sexually active. Not…………recently, no. She was weirdly unconcerned about my myriad terminal diseases of unclear etiology. She focused instead on screening for testicular cancer. Why didn’t I think of that one too? Amateur hour! I discovered a bump on my penis six months earlier (can you even get zits there??) and I naturally assumed castration was my only road to survival. 

 

 “Can you pull down your pants for a minute?”

 

“Oh. Okay.”

 

At this point I probably started to get a little too excited about the possibility of not having cancer. But I was a teenage boy. That’s normal, right?

 

Do not let this thing get airborne.

 

“Do you check yourself from time to time?”

 

“Yes,” I lied.

 

She felt around down there. Pretty thoroughly I might add.

 

Think about Rick Cerone plate appearances.  

 

I was cured.

 

With one magical healing touch she freed me from rabies, cardiovascular disease, brain and testicular cancer!

 

Healthcare just works.

 

That night—the first night of summer vacation—I watched the upstart Pirates beat the evil Mets and decided I would live forever. Ralph Kiner too! My “YEAHHHHHHH!!!” reverberated throughout Maplewood.

 

Chapter 3: Message In A Bottle

 

Barry was my Connecticut Services for The Blind counselor. CSB paid a portion of my tuition. He had visited my dorm a year earlier.

 

“We’ve got to form a vocational plan. We’ve invested quite a chunk of change in you, so we’d like to see some return on our investment,” he noted like Jabba the Hut meets Gordon Gekko. Would I land in the carbon freeze or get punched in the face in Central Park?

 

I got his voice mail and hung up. What was I doing? I called back. A woman’s voice. I guess he wasn’t a high tech guy.

 

 “You have reached Barry Arroyo at the State of Connecticut, Services For The Blind. Please leave a message and he will return your call as soon as possible.”

 

I’d gotten lost in this Bermuda Triangle too many times to expect a call before Labor Day. No wait, that was a holiday.

 

“Hey Barry, it’s Colin….. McDonough. So I think I need a job. I was wondering if you had any leads? Give me a call if you can. Oh, if you don’t have it, my number is 860-872-0502. Thanks!”

 

Footnote: (don’t worry this isn’t Infinite Jest) Rockville Hospital’s number was 872-0501 so this often happened:

 

“I think I just broke my dick.”

 

“I’m sorry but you’ll need to dial 872-0501.”

                                                                                                                               

I didn’t have anyone’s number from college. Did I just blend in with the futon and disappear into the blacklight? Just like high school. Kids filled my yearbook with “you’re a funny guy” but all I could think was, “Was I a close enough friend to ask you to sign?” 

 

Greek my fifth roommate but the only one I became friends with. Me, a stranger, and a 6x8 room just wasn’t going to end well. He was unassuming with a goofy laugh. His feet constantly cracked. He considered a career podiatry. “I like feet!” Okay, Greek, and I’m an ophthalmologist. Physics 1 was his Waterloo, so Marketing it was. He loved the finer things in life like silk boxers, a pair of which he showed off to the floor.

 

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?”, granite faced New Hampshire native “Hurricane” Andrew Caposella wondered. “Greek is showing everyone his silk boxers which no one will see except Colin!”

 

False. As I climbed to my top bunk each night I close my eyes.    

 

So maybe he was a little weird. I walked in on him drunkenly making out with this girl Gina from downstairs but that was it. Maybe we got along because he was even more scare of girls than me.

 

Before I roomed with him, my idea of a fun Friday night (when I didn’t go home) was heading to the library’s second floor to read town directories:  pulse racing content about the Ellington board of selectmen’s latest budget meeting. I studied the town map like it was a cartographic lost Eden. I memorized every single street in town. This homesickness lasted three years. With normal kids it only take three nights before it sinks in that breath mints and curfews are over. Get annihilated on Natty Ice and mom and don’t won’t be the wiser. I didn’t care. My high school of 500 felt like an extended dysfunctional family. My cold, windy college campus felt vaster and emptier than interstellar space.

 

But I was back from east of Eden! But the only sound it made was the lonely echo of basketballs heard through my room’s open windows dribbled by kids born when I was in eighth grade.

 

I went through our stack of phone books on top of the fridge. Come on Mansfield/Storrs …… Please? Ellington, Vernon, Tolland, Somers, Manchester….. Willington….getting warmer. No Mansfield.

 

Crushing.

 

Wait, what about information!? Why was I such an idiot? Unless Greek was unlisted. Nah. He was a listed guy. A more devout Christian or Bon Jovi fan would have said a prayer. I dialed 411.

 

“What city please?”

 

“Storrs? Or….Mansfield.”

 

“Name?”

 

“Gianopoulous. Nicholas. I can spell that if you like.”

 

“Please do, sir.”

 

Fuck.

 

“It might be G-i-a-n-o-p-o-u-l-u-s”.

 

Silence.

 

“I’m not seeing anything under that listing.”

 

“Okay, maybe  G-i-a-n-n-o-p-p-o-u-l-u-s.”

 

Pause.

 

“Still nothing.”

 

Greeks make it so difficult. Was it hopeless. One last try.

 

“Okay, Maybe G-i-a-n-n-o-p-o-u-l-o-u-s.”

 

Silence. Click. Recording.

 

“The number of the person you are trying to reach is 860-486-4875.”

 

A miracle!

 

Dialing on a rotary phone took ages. It gave me too much time to think. I hung up three times. This was stupid. Finally I went through with it.

 

Ring….ring…..ri…….

 

“Hello?”

 

Holy cow. It sounded like Greek!

 

“Is Nick there?”

 

“This is Nick.”

 

“Greek! Hey what’s up. This is Colin….your old roommate….?” 

 

“Of course, Col. Good to hear from you!”

 

“What are you up to?”

 

“Not too much. You?”

 

“Um, not a lot. I graduated in May. I’ve just been hanging out. I need to go to grad school or something. You?”

 

“I’m in East Lyme this summer and you just happened to catch me. I’m moving to a house on North Eagleville Road this year and I’m just here moving some stuff.”

 

"Okay. Well……just wanted to see what you were up to.”

 

Hopeless.

 

“Give me your number. We can hang out sometime.”

 

“Cool. Yeah, sounds good. It’s 860-872-0502.”

 

“Cool. Talk to you soon, Col.”

 

He wouldn’t call. He was being nice. But the world seemed a little brighter. At least one ghost still walked the earth. Resurrected by a telephone operator/medium.

 …………………………………….

A week later.

 

“Colin…….”, my mom called from the bottom of the stairs.

 

I turned down the TV. Stupid Real World Boston. Who names their daughter Genesis?

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Telephone. For you.”

 

No one ever called me. If it was Dan she would have said, “It’s Daniel.”

 

"Hello?”

 

“Hey Col, it’s Greek.”

 

“Hey!”

 

“So you were looking for something to do, right? Want to come hang out for a couple days?”

 

Yes!

 

“Okay.”

 

"Cool. Are you doing anything Monday?”

 

No!

 

“Uh………no, I don’t think so”.

 

“Then I’ll pick you up. Where do you live again?”

 

“Ellington. 15 Maplewood Drive. It’s…..kind of hard to find.”

 

“I’ll use my atlas.”  

 

 I was almost disappointed. I welcomed any chance to flaunt my map study knowledge since everywhere besides Ellington and Storrs was a blur rolling by from the passenger seat window.

 

We sat at a red light at Five Corners. Five roads diverged at an intersection. We took the one most traveled: straight out of town. Eat my dust (for a day and a half) sleepy, spooky Ellington.

 

“Are you up for some lifting?”

 

Was he taking me to Gold’s Gym?

 

“Sure. What do you mean?”

 

“I’m moving stuff from Celeron to our house. Mind helping me move?”

 

“Sure, no problem.”

 

The desperate are easily exploited. In fact, I was so desperate I didn’t even suspect a possible ulterior motive for his invite. I didn’t care.

 

Celeron Square’s two-story apartments spread out over a long curving road. It was connected to campus via the Celeron Path: a name spoken during freshman orientation only. It was “affectionately” known as The Rape Trail. This gravel road through the woods was dimly lit save for a large light over a humming generator. I never witnessed sexual assaults (but of course I was often drunk and always blind) but I heard plenty of pleas to “Show us your tits!” from male scholars to their female study buddies. I never saw a girl walking down it alone at night. Would now be the right time to say UConn is one of the top research universities in the country? And lest you think they turned a blind eye to sexual assaults; they handed out rape whistles at orientation (rather accusatory) along with condoms (wow you really do believe in me.)

 

Clothes, VHS tapes, books, dishes, and CD’s covered Greek’s floor. Recovering The Satellites by the Counting Crows. Their debut August and Everything After was a sad sack collection of whiny dirges drenched in spilled milk self-pity. I loved it. Their new single was Have You Seen Me Lately?

 

“Is this any good?”

 

“Yeah. Really good.”

 

No wonder I got along with him. So positive. I blockaded my other roommates with a wall of silence. But they all sucked! Tony was a preppy rich kid from Greenwich who watched sports every single night with four other braindead jocks on the first floor. Get a life, guys. (The fact that I did the exact same thing at home is immaterial). When he and his buddy were planning to hide in this girl Joelle’s room for some reason and she expressed some reservations, he said, “We’re not going to go through your underwear drawer!” He was too white collar! Next was Ross: middle aged with a Rhode Island accent and a prior work history in the industrial arts. Too blue collar! His afternoon naps forced me to listen to Pearl Jam’s Ten on two while sitting at my desk in the shade drawn darkness. His skin ointment smelled kind of like cockroaches with severe IBS but words fail to fully describe the noxiousness of this olfactory hate crime. My next future ex-roommate was Mike: a photography major specializing in artsy black and white photos of his erect penis. He cheated on his sweet blonde girlfriend Rita with a gallery’s full of art class chicks. One evening he showcased a fresh from the darkroom self-portrait to a 3rd floor girl he met four minutes earlier. This unwitting patron of the avant-garde undergraduate arts said, “That’s different……if nothing else.” (Education majors simply cannot appreciate the fine arts). Full exposure, I mean disclosure: I discovered REM’s Murmur and Reckoning and Jane’s Addiction’s Nothing’s Shocking through his CD collection. (And Husker Du’s Candy Apple Gray so that was also cool I guess). Too little too late you faux artist philandering freak. Finally, there was Agricultural Science major and devout Christian Steve. He would have been scandalized by shirtless family beach Polaroids let alone dick pics. He probably thought the Mona Lisa’s neckline was scandalously revealing. The kid was staler than a Whitney Hall dinner roll or leftover first communion wafer but incredibly, just like fully engaged and engorged artist Mike, he was a ladies man! I guess women have no clear type. A cute blonde girl from Whitney made frequent conjugal visits.

 

(Unlock door).

 

“Hey Colin, can you come back in a bit?”

 

“Sure.”

 

Off to the study lounge for another hour. “Can you come back?” soon became our only exchange.

 

In summary, roommates are the (literally) fucking worst.

 

But on day two of the fall ’94 semester, Greek invited me to hang out with his buddies across the hall and I forced an “Okay” after promising myself to try after my friendless college life along with Kurt Cobain’s suicide and family troubles gave me the bright idea to stop going to class halfway through spring semester. I got four F’s and an A. (I aced Eastern Philosophy and Religion. Extinguishing fear and desire on the primrose path to nirvana was all that made sense.) I met with the Assistant Dean over the summer.

 

“Were you depressed?” she said not unsympathetically. I think my mom softened her up.   

 

”Yes.”

 

“You were a good student before this so we will give you another chance. But one more semester like this and we will have to expel you.”

 

So no more four F clubs. But a lot more C’s.  

…………………………………….

We loaded Greek’s stuff in his truck and drove to the most beautiful house I’d ever seen. It had an A shaped roof and the early August sun splashed on the pale brown hardwood floors inside. Was this heaven? Nothing like my dark dungeon forest home. 

 

A kid sat on the couch.

 

“You charged me too much for my car insurance last month. …..but I already gave you my ID….don’t you have it on file?……..can I speak with a supervisor?...........Yes, that’s my number…..you will adjust my payment?.....thank you!…. you have a nice day too!”

 

He beeped his phone off, flipped the antenna, and looked at me.

 

“Amazing what happens when you get a white person on the phone.”

 

Daily Campus PC foot soldiers weren’t winning every battle.     

 

“Tony, do you know Colin?” 

 

“Hey man.”

 

“Hey.”

 

“And this is Tony’s girlfriend Katie.”

 

Cute girl next door blondes were literally everywhere. Burly Tony’s black chest hair exploded out of his wife beater. Nice girls always got swept off their feet by loud, furry guys of southern European descent whose reservations about the customer service acumen of people of color was offset by their complete lack of doubt about their own talents.

 

But Kate didn’t harbor universal love for everyone.

 

“I don’t like Brandon. And I like everyone!”

 

She went upstairs.

 

“Jesus, I shouldn’t have eaten that burrito. (Farts). Greek, pull my finger.”

 

“I don’t want to touch it. It probably has Katie’s juices on it from last night.”

 

Greek let loose his goofy, possibly virginal laugh. He was breaking an unwritten rule here: after a girl leaves a room you should wait five minutes before discussing her bodily fluids.

 

Following a reflective pause to achieve proper gravitas, Tony lowered his voice one octave.

 

“Clean pussy.”

 

Is this the only convincing love story of the 20th Century? Take that, Nabokov. Nice try, Disney. A man who champions the hygienic purity of his lady’s unmentionable region when she’s not in the room is marriage material. Would Brandon say, “Tell me about it. What a ho bag” before winking in a mirror?

 

The Dolphins played the Broncos from Guadalahara. Crushingly boring to anyone with a life, but more exciting than The Super Bowl to me since I was sitting in a sun drenched dream house with humans. 

 

Miami led 38-19.

 

“The Dolphins are going to have a great team this year.”

 

“Are you a Dolphins fan?” I asked.

 

“Die hard.” 

 

Was it paisan quarterback Dan Marino? They Fins had sleepwalked through life since getting pummeled by the 49ers in the ‘85 Super Bowl, but apparently Super Bowl glory was mere months away. The past, a weak secondary, and an aging quarterback can’t touch the orange and aqua optimism of a true believer.

 

Not wishing to tear down any preseason confetti, I changed the subject.

 

“Did you hear Kevin Garnett turned down $105 million from the Timberwolves? He said, ‘Call me back when y’all are serious’.”  

 

“I couldn’t believe that!” said Mitch, Tony’s southern accented landscaping partner.

 

Tony’s own fortunes weren’t quite on par with twenty one year old power forwards, but they were pretty close.

 

“I have an interview at The Hartford next week. They’re a Fortune 500 company. They’re hiring everyone. It’s in the bag.”

 

“Good luck, man,” Greek said.

 

I should ride my bike up to Dairy Mart when I get home. I think they’re a Fortune 5,000 company.

 

I dropped my backpack in the downstairs bedroom. Back for the first time since December, I was ready to tear this town apart. Not an easy feat in sleepy summertime Storrs.

 

“Greek, want to go to Ted’s?”

 

“I’m tired. (Yawns.) I’m just gonna crash.”

 

I walked down North Eagleville Road and bought Camel Lights at Dairy Mart since I was on vacation from being unemployed. At least I had tapered down from Marlboro Reds. “Light” cancer sticks: killing me softly with their song. 

 

A triple threat, Ted’s Grinder Shop (defiantly situated next to Subway) sat atop Ted’s Spirit Shoppe (the only “shoppe” in this Olde New England village serving lads Olde English 40’s, Natty Ice 30 packs, and Jungle Juice), and, up a flight of wooden stairs, Ted’s Restaurant and Bar. This restaurant happened to, oh right we almost forgot, serve booze. After going there roughly 1,487 times I couldn’t tell you much about the cuisine at this eatery, although after Long Island Iced Tea races (don’t do those) I don’t remember the cheesy fries ever being not on point.        

 

I turned right at the top of the wooden stairs and there it was! After eight months of banishment, the prodigal son had returned. The red doors and awning offset exterior walls which were probably once sky blue but now blueish gray. Black railings herded the cattle on Thursdays through Saturdays during the school year.

 

Look at this beautiful bar! The jukebox on the left stood beside the foosball table. The dartboard was further back. It was not much bigger than a studio apartment and it got so packed on weekends that trips from the door to the bar took six minutes. It was another six to your table, but by that time you had finished your drink (1/3 of which was spilled via elbow collisions) so, like a sloshed Sisyphus, your journey began anew. And in a cruel twist of fate ordained by cloud gathering Zeus or the assistant bar manager, double fisting was forbidden. They could have built an addition but that would have killed the sweaty, spill your drink on a stranger ambiance you just can’t put a price on. If you didn’t want a stranger sweating on you, just play solitaire in your room or join SUBOG for God’s sake.   

 

Was it a fire hazard? I guess if you really want to be that way, probably, but police raids were the only inspections anyone ever knew of. Somehow, word always leaked in advance—probably by the owner who wished to continue his successful business strategy of “checking” ID’s like that of a 26 year old from Columbus, Ohio named Sir V. Mee Bier: a German immigrant of Asian descent who for some reason was knighted by the British Royal Family. He came all this way for Nickel Night. How can we spoil his trip?  

 

I walked to the bar (in 3.4 seconds on this night).

 

“Hey man. Miller Light?”

 

“Yeah, thanks.”

 

“How have you been?”

 

“Pretty good. You?”

 

“Good, man.”

 

Look who wasn’t invisible anymore. Tiny The Bartender and his girlfriend drove me home two summers earlier.

 

“An ironic name,” I said. Yep, Tiny was fucking huge.

 

He seemed free from despair despite his football career ending knee injury freshman year. A gentle giant. I usually drank Miller Light because it was a “classier” option than Icehouse, Natty Ice, or Milwaukee’s Beast and I couldn’t read the labels on the taps and I was too embarrassed to ask him to read them to me so you might say Miller Light won its first and last blind taste test. 

 

I decided to really go apeshit and get some hard alcohol in me. If the second half of my college career was a fable, “Beer before liquor, never sicker” was the moral, but, like most fable readers, I piously shook my head in assent, tossed the book in a dumpster, and did the opposite. 

 

“Rum and coke?” I said.

 

Tiny probably saw that coming too. It was my mixed drink fave. Vodka and cranberry were too bitter. Gin and tonic were too watery. Long Island Iced Tea: how did I get home last night?

 

Oh what had I been so worried about? The soft amber lighting and multi-colored fluorescent beer signs strewn throughout Ted’s bathed me in pure bliss. Smashmouth on the jukebox! Well, maybe not quite bliss. I floated on the back of time’s murmuring, eternally present stream and gently rolled with the rising and falling current. (I told you I got an A in Eastern Religion and Philosophy).

 

Only a half dozen other patrons were there. Two guys stood at the bar.

 

“I’m TELLING you, chief. Treat chicks like shit and THEY LOVE IT!”

 

The lights were on next door at Huskies. It was open! And also nearly empty. I ordered a vodka and cranberry. I know: I said it wasn’t my favorite but this wasn’t my favorite bar so who cares? Huskies “Tavern” was a scary, otherworldly place. The lighting was hard white, not soft amber, especially those blinding fluorescent last call ugly lights. Girls loved Huskies but girls were always “going dancing” whereas guys were “going to get shithoused,” “going to get retarded” or “going to Slutskies get my knob polished.” But despite the disparate roads leading them there, boys and girls always converged.     

 

TRISH: I love this song!

 

Ace Of Base thumped.

 

CHAD: Yeah, it’s not bad!

 

TRISH: Let’s dance!

 

CHAD: Let’s get out there, girl!

 

I didn’t go home alone. I went home with my dignity! Okay, so maybe 13+ beers and 3+ mixed drinks before stumbling home to pass out without brushing my teeth or getting undressed (and occasionally waking to wet jeans) wasn’t exactly the pinnacle of dignified comportment either. What was my point again?

 

Speaking of shattered pride, the DJ loved to burn up the Huskies’ floor to a song about a girl dissing a poor guy with a disappointingly diminutive reproductive organ. Objectify much? Thank God for beer.

 

Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’ was a guilty pleasure. And Finally by CeCe Peniston. That’s my most humiliating confession yet (although the book is still young). That song— with absurd amounts of hard alcohol—could thaw a 90’s kid’s soul frozen solid by Rain When I Die and Slaves And Bulldozers.

 

Huskies played rock too. Moving love songs like Closer and Head Like A Hole by Nine Inch Nails.  

 

Huskies was also a sweaty, beer soaked debacle but mostly from the body movin’ and utter impossibility of finding your way around. Strobe lights turned your co-eds into shape shifting black and purple aliens but offered scant other visual aid. Oh how shallow they all were! They jigged, they ambled, they lisped! Hamlet and the dad from Footloose had nothing on me. Never mind I wished I had the guts to ask a girl—hot or even dance club lighting hot—to dance.

 

There was no bass pounding or rump shaking on this August night. Huskies didn’t wear its summer deadness well. It was a mirror that shattered if not enough faces looked into it.

 

I grabbed a nightcap at Ted’s and walked back.

 

“How was Ted’s?”

 

“Dead.”

 

But not as dead as Maplewood. Why did I have to go home?

 

On Night Court, John Laroquette refused to let Bull through the door, leaving Bull no other option than to invent the human pretzel. It took the entire cast to untangle him. Greek laughed.

 

The morning was sunny and bright.   Mixed drinks were a mistake. And the cigs. And I forgot my sunglasses. Greek’s brother Chris helped us move. He also seemed chill and nice. Probably didn’t expect too much from life. Teach me how to be like you, guys.

 

We loaded up the pickup.

 

“Are you going to Limestone this year?”

 

“The Phish thing?” 

 

“Yeah, Chris is going. I’m trying to get off work. It should be cool.”

 

The Great Went. The sequel to The Clifford Ball. On the Canadian border. My brother followed Phish around the country in ’95. This former headbanger was now fully immersed in the hippie jam band scene: a common conversion which goes to show there’s a thin line between fishnet stocking and hemp dresses.

 

I would go. I’d go to any concert. Boredom led me to Hootie and The Blowfish the previous summer. No, really. It was only boredom. More humiliating still, I went alone. My cabbie was on his jumbo-sized mobile phone. (What kind of a tool needs one of those?)

 

“I’m taking someone to Hootie And The Blowfish at The Meadows. You know, that fake rock band.”

 

I’m literally right here, buddy. Can you just focus on the road, Lester Bangs? 

 

“Thanks for inviting me, Greek. It was fun to get back for a bit.”

 

“No problem. Want to come back when schoolyear starts? We’re gonna have some killer parties.”

 

“Yeah, sounds good!”

 

I’d probably never see him again.

……………………………………

 

I opened the screen door and a folded paper fell onto the breezeway. 

 

“Colin,

 

I’m sorry I missed you. I was visiting another client in Ellington. I got your voicemail. Are you interested in our Vending Program? Or would you be interested in the Industries Program? I’ll be in touch.

 

“Barry A.”

 

So both of my SOS signals had been received.

 

Vending? Industries? Like a factory? Did he forget I just graduated from college? Were these even real jobs? Weren’t we in a Dot.com boom?

 

“Hey Barry, this is Colin. Yeah I might be interested. Let me know. Thanks!” 

……………………………………...

 

“Come out, Jake!” Dan implored over plastic on aluminum incidental music.     

 

"Dave, stop denting my fucking house!”

 

“Geez, Jake. Relax.”

 

“This is like the eight billionth time I’ve asked you.”

 

“What’s one more going to do at this point, Jacque Jones?”

 

Dan insisted on batting last in our street wiffle ball games to ensure the possibility of hitting heroic bottom of the ninth walk offs. Any ball that landed past the imaginary line which ran parallel to the end of his driveway was a home run.  

 

“Jake, tell your mom to fix her lawn. It’s full of weeds!”

 

“Can I interest you in minding your own business?”

 

My mom hadn’t used ChemLawn in a while, but I wasn’t conceding a thing.

 

“Everyone is complaining.”

 

“Who is ‘everyone’?”

 

“My dad. The Doerrs. The Fords.”

 

“One of those is true anyway.”

 

“I’m telling you.”

 

“Please ask Bob to focus on his own lawn. I don’t want to do it, but if I have to make a hopscotch board……”

 

“Very funny. You’re lucky he didn’t murder you for that stunt.”

 

“I wanted to help him out. There’s so much more to life than lawn care. Also, black argyle socks with shorts aren’t a great look—if you can pass that along.”

 

“Remember when I took you deep with my game winning Brady Anderson blast, Jake?”

 

“I almost forgot. Thank God you’ve reminded me 903 times.”

 

We were teams/players—the same guy batted nine straight times. Dan was the Orioles/center fielder Brady Anderson: a former Red Sox prospect traded for pitcher Mike Boddicker in the hopes of winning the 1988 World Series (they were crushed four straight by the A’s in the ALCS). He hit 50 home runs in 1996. This heartthrob sported sideburns like Luke Perry on Beverly Hills, 90210. Sports Illustrated ran a cover story which, if I recall, primarily focused on his sideburns. Burnelss Dan looked more like Garth Brooks than Brenda’s Beverly Hills badass boytoy, but close enough in Ellington, 06029.

 

At one time, I could get pretty good plastic on the ball for a blind kid, but I was mired in a horrific slump.

 

Dan threw one high and outside, then one below the knees, then a one hopper to the plate, then one low and inside.

 

Mr. Colangelo would have been proud of him for following Frank’s Fallacy: never challenge a slumping hitter.     

 

“Dan, throw a strike please!”

 

“What was wrong with that?”

 

“It was low and inside.”

 

“That was a strike!”

 

With no umpire to call balls and strikes, at-bats lasted until you swung and missed three times or put the ball in play.

 

“Dan, why don’t you have the testicular fortitude to challenge me?”

 

“Swing the bat, Rob! These pitches are hittable”

 

“Your mom? I’d hit it, but I can’t hit your pitching unless I grow six inches taller, six inches shorter, or the arms of a monkey.”

 

“Quit monkeying around and being such a pussy. Swing, Jacque!”

 

The pitch…..swing and a miss.

 

“Damnit! That was way outside too!”

 

“Nice swing, Col!”

 

A kid rode past on his bike. Now I had a heckler too?

 

‘Who was that?”

 

“Derek Ford.”

 

“I knew it!”

 

Where’s my chalk? “DEREK FORD IS GAY” will line every street in town before I’m through!   

 

I wasn’t much better. I threw sliders below the knees. (I didn’t know how to throw a slider but my Slider Of Death had a southwestern flight path so let’s go with it). Dan didn’t flail at these tantalizing offers. He took pitch after pitch until he further questioned my manhood.

 

“Jake, it’s okay if you’re afraid but I have to be at work in an hour.”

 

Our games devolved into grueling wars of attrition. Whose reserves of patience for pitches outside the strike zone would deplete first? Who would swing? Who would do the unthinkable and throw a strike?

 

“Crack!” said the bat.

 

It was the sound of lost patience, the sound of soft hole filled plastic yielding to hard solid plastic. The ball whistled by.

 

I hung my Slide Of Death.

 

“Ohhhhhh that is deeeeeeep and I DON’T THINK IT’S PLAYABLE! I DON’T BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW! GO CRAZY FOLKS! THAT IS WAAAAAAAAAAY OUT OF HERE! THE CROWD IS GOING WIIIILD HERE AT CAMDEN YARDS!”

 

Pretty boy Brady had flower power.

 

The ball landed in Mr. Aase’s flower bed--so this wasn’t all bad news.

 

Dan/Brady began his snail-like trot around the bases.

 

“Can you fetch the ball please? I’m not dealing with Mr. Aase’s wrath.”

 

Mr. Aase apparently wasn’t home on this muggy, hazy Tuesday. He was probably screaming at a post office trainee after his copy of Family Handyman got delivered to the wrong house.

…………………………………….

 

The ninth time was the charm. 

 

“Barry Arroyo.”

 

“Hey Barry, it’s Colin…………..McDonough.”

 

“Colin! How is your summer going?”

 

“Pretty good.”

 

“Did you get my note?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Are you interested in our vending program?”

 

“Yeah…..I think so.”

 

The following Wednesday he picked me up in his state car. Barry was also legally blind, so his special assistant Carlos drove him. His wife was his off-duty driver. Short and mustachioed, he looked eerily like my ex-stepfather.

 

“Is it Friday yet? I have the worst sinus headache,” he wearily intoned. I guess getting chauffeured though life wasn’t the nonstop party I imagined.  

 

“Last week Donna said I had to alphabetize Ashley’s case files but I said I work for you but she said when you’re on vacation I need to fill in but I told her that’s not in my job spec.” 

 

CSB’s Bartleby would prefer not to. Guess you didn’t get the memo Donna, but they abolished slavery in 1865.

 

They had just rebranded the vending program with the totally not Orwellian moniker The Business Enterprise Program. Name changes were all the rage back then. Just ask Roseanne Arnold and The Artist Formerly Known As Prince. BEP’s czar (or hapless middle manager?) did not  appear to be getting ready to launch his own Lovesexy tour. A tall, graying, soft spoken gentleman, his affect was much flatter than his waistline, but anyone who once pounded a 30 pack of Busch Light in one day before washing it down with two rum and cokes probably lacks the moral authority to judge anyone else’s gluttony. 

 

“Colin, this is Neil. Neil, this is Colin McDonough.”

 

“Nice to meet you.”

 

“Nice to meet you”.

 

It sounded like Neil had a headache too.

 

“Neil,” Barry said in a rehearsed tone, “Could you walk Colin through the expectations of a vending operator.”

 

“Sure. We operate thirty vending stands in state buildings. Gift shops, snack bars, cafeterias. You would operate your own site. You would be an entrepreneur. We look for people with good social skills and math skills. You would do your own budgeting and order supplies. You would need to maintain a clean and orderly work site which we periodically inspect. You collect a portion of the sales. Snacks……snack bar…….. ……inventory……snack……snacks…….”.

 

“As a BEP operator, you would be serving the general public,” Barry added. “Appearance and attitude are important. Most people don’t know anyone who is blind, so they will judge all blind people based on how you present yourself.”

 

“Okay.”

 

Service with a smile and a pair of Dockers. Did Barry think I wasn’t customer service material? Too shy? Bit of a wallflower, isn’t he? Nothing like his life of the party brother. Not cut out for the minstrel show of blind food stand operation. Could I inspire the sighted to say, “Oooooo that nice, smiling blind boy did such a wonderful job serving my Cobb salad today. Great set of teeth!” “Oh yes, Barbara, he’s a testament to modern orthodontics. My turkey wrap was simply divine. And his boat shoes were so shiny. It’s so wonderful they let the blind work nowadays!”

 

Wow, with that attitude, maybe Barry’s right and you’re not blind mascot material.   

 

“Would I have to be there every morning?” 

 

“Yes”, Neil replied like he’d just swallowed six Ambien. 

 

“I’ll ask my mom. She could drive me some mornings but sometimes she works nights.”

 

I asked. Nope. And no bus. And Cracked Rear View shaming cabbies were way too expensive every single day. My blind ambassadorship ended before it started.

………………………………………….

 

Another heart broken. Shattered glass splattered everywhere.

 

The Queen of spades. Sandra really should have played that hand better. 

…………………………………………

A folded white cake box materialized as if by magic on the breezeway. If bare cornfields were Ellington’s whisper of fall, cake boxes were its shout. Boxes were placed outside every single door and breezeway in town. And if you were new to town or just couldn’t take the hint, they stapled a piece of paper to the box and asked you to kindly start your oven immediately. It seemed like a lot of legwork but if 10,000 cake boxes yielded 100 Cake Booth entries, they considered that a sound investment of time and cardboard. I once watched my former Ellington volunteer fire department Dad march in the Saturday evening parade. As a mulleted teenage wannabe badass I drunk rode The Scrambler three times and tried not to puke. But my Dad was a Hartford firefighter living in Manchester now and I didn’t have anyone to ride The Scrambler with. I could ask my Mom to drop me off but that seemed just sad.  

 

Cake pushers can really hurt your feelings.

……………………………………………

Dan went back to Eastern, but wiffle ball lived on. I tossed the ball in the air and hit laser beams and frozen ropes which sometimes dented the aluminum siding. (It was different when I did it.)

 

Like Babe Ruth, I also pitched. I once broke in my Rawlings glove by leaving it under my mattress for three straight nights as if I was a Cy Young Award candidate. Home plate was the oak tree at the edge of the woods in my backyard. A Forest Of Dreams.

 

From 20 feet away (major league distance was 60 feet, six inches, but come on) I tried to fire strikes against the poor defenseless tree. A miss triggered a very challenging Easter egg hunt. Dirt, leaves and branches are arboreal baseball camouflage.   

 

I lifted my arms above my shoulders, curled my left leg, drove down with my left foot and unleashed my cannon of a right arm. The windup was more fun than the pitch. Like a dance. I was the Baryshnikov of backyard pitchers.  I danced with myself like Billy Idol. I could spot pitchers just by watching their windups on Sportscenter. Like voices and fingerprints, they were all different. Dwight Gooden pitched from a rocking chair, Jack Morris pitched from an electric chair, Roger Clemens switched from a rocking chair to an electric chair to improve his splitter. Exchanging aesthetics for pragmatism seemed like a bad trade.

 

After I lost every other ball I owned, I grabbed the one Nolan Ryan autographed before a game at Fenway Park. I lost that one too.

 ………………………………..

Would I lose it completely once winter arrived?

 

One unreturned voicemail and four hangups later, Barry called me back.

 

“Hi Barry……..so you mentioned the Industries Program. I guess I’m willing to give that a try.”

 

“Great! I’ll let Gary know.”

 

Carlos’s job spec mandated driving us to the dirty dying industrial outskirts of West Hartford: Elmwood, aka Elmhood. No Crate and Barrels or Lux Bond & Greens here, just KFC’s and Family Dollars.

 

Industries didn’t require a job interview. I had awful vision and a pulse so I was their ideal candidate.   

 

“Gary, this is Colin McDonough.”

 

Gary wore a light blue dress shirt. Blond with a slightly pudgy face. Was this me at 40?   

 

“Hi Colin!” he said in an excited/not excited tone.

 

“Hi,” I not excited/excited counter toned. 

 

“We’re glad to have you onboard. Let’s head down to the basement and I’ll show you our shipping department.”

 

We descended on a rickety ancient freight elevator leading to a warehouse of plastic covered wooden pallets. It smelled like a sawmill.

 

“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.” I mean this was an exciting opportunity.

 

“Colin, this is Phil.”

 

“Hi.”

 

Phil was tall with a baseball cap, glasses, and a black beard. He could have passed for a Unabomber protegee, a born to be wild easy rider, or a fireballing baseball closer though it’s hard to say which one would have made him more dangerous since he had lost much of his vision. I never felt so baby faced, blond, and college educated in my life.

 

“We ship brochures to 18 locations throughout Connecticut. We work with DECD. We receive large shipments every afternoon and send large shipments out every morning. You will load incoming brochures onto skids, place outgoing brochures into boxes, put them on the loading dock, and keep inventory.”

 

Skids? DECD? Is that English?

 

“Okay. I think that makes sense.”

 

I knew what brochures were, so that was key.

 

I started three days later.

 

Winding Trails ordered 50 brochures, 100 Wadsworth Athenaeums, 25 CT River Valleys. I hadn’t been to any of these places. 50 Mystic Aquariums. That was an elementary school field trip. I remember water.  

 

75 Lake Compounces. An amusement park. Now we’re talking. In high school, I went there to see Motley Crue, Poison, the Scorpions. Even Damn Yankees featuring The Motor City Madman opening for Bad Company minus original singer Paul Rodgers—I guess there was nothing good on TV that night. The park’s mob connected (?) owners never got around to installing seats, but who could remain seated anyway when Bret Michaels and the boys launched into melodic metal mayhem masterpieces like Look What The Cat Dragged In, #1 Bad Boy, and Talk Dirty To Me?

 

Before Motley Crue could storm the stage with pyrotechnics explosions (they distracted the fire marshal with groupies and cocaine) I got claustrophobic. Everyone crushed to the front during opening act Johnny Crash.

 

“You suck!”

 

“Get off the fucking stage!”

 

“D’agostino Roofing is hiring!”

 

Johnny Cash played to a kinder, gentler crowd at Folsom Prison.

 

I moved back for elbow room and oxygen. I had seen a thought provoking WKRP In Cincinnati episode about a kid crushed to death at a Who concert. Johnny Fever was inconsolable. Don’t even talk to Venus Fly Trap right now. Gordon Jump, the strong, silent leader of southern Ohio’s top album-oriented rock station, was nonplussed.

 

But no show compared with the mighty Guns n’ Roses in June, 1991. Until it was………canceled. The park’s deadbeat drifter owner filed for bankruptcy, Bristol Rock City went silent, and we never got our money back. My “bahgin” hunting grandmother never quite got over this. “You kids got robbed! They should all be in jail!” I got over it eight months later when we finally saw them at the Worcester Centrum. They went on three hours after Soundgarden because Axl didn’t have time for your rules.

 

Lake Compounce’s brochure displayed a Ferris wheel languidly spinning in the sunshine. Any/all kids getting pickpocketed by shady promoters or smothered to death by rampaging Megadeth fans during Symphony Of Destruction remained tantalizingly out of the camera’s eye.

 

“We’re done with orders so you can head up to the floor for the rest of the day,” Phil said.

 

Gary showed me around the humming factory floor.  

 

“We make clothes for the military. This is our sealing machine. You take a T-shirt, put it in a plastic bag, place it on the machine, and let the machine seal it. You try it. No, like this.”

 

They were olive green T-shirts. If you didn’t line up the bag perfectly, it wouldn’t seal. If done right, the machine made a hissing air sound and clamped down. I did this 458,380 times. Then I did it again. Standing the whole time. Who knew that could be so tiring?

 

Was this what work is? And I had to get up tomorrow (6:15AM!) and do it all over again? And the next day. And the next day. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in its petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time….. Was I becoming another sucker eternally pushing his tired rock up the same hill? And was office work just a shinier rock?

 

Rush’s Working Man played in my head.

 

My mom worked in American Airlines’ Hartford office. In a rare breach from her cheery disposition, she once told dinner guests, “I can’t retire there. I have to get out of that office.” My Dad loved his job as a cop, but after he had to kill a machete wielding maniac,  nightmares led him into the sheltering arms of burning buildings as a firefighter. He didn’t fear flying bullets or carbon monoxide but he was afraid to fly to Florida to visit my grandfather, he owned a medical encyclopedia to scratch his every hypochondriac itch, he bit his way to ingrown fingernails, and he was twice divorced. Is work the drug and life the hangover? The thief? The vampire? Was I the only one who thought these things?? Everyone else seemed so jacked up by Fortune 500 companies, Future Business Leadership Of America, even Business Enterprise Programs!

 

“How was your day?” my mom asked as we exited the American Airlines lobby.

 

My soul had drained from my body, never to be found again.

 

“Pretty good.”

………………………………………

Every morning, Mom dropped me off downtown twenty minutes before my bus. I bought a cinnamon roll and coffee at the Cinnabon in the Civic Center mall. Was coffee like adulthood? At first it tastes bitter and gross, but you start to like it once you acquire the taste?

 

In the meantime….

 

“Can I get that with extra cream and sugar?”

 

Breaded and liquid candy was the breakfast of champions and sealing machinists alike.

 

I took up coffee out of desperation. Anything that might help me face the spirit swallowing reality of getting up at 6:15 AM again. I always figured I was too nervous for coffee considering I nearly died from rabies, for example. No one drank it in college. It was for old people.  All-nighters (which increased as my GPA decreased) meant a walk to Dairy Mart for Jolt Cola and a box of Chips Ahoy: true brain food. Did Duke students pound caffeinated rat poison and fresh from the lab cookies too?             

………………………………………………

Email was another potential lifeline to the outside world. I logged on to create an address.

 

BadBoy69@aol.com.

 

Taken.

 

#1BadBoy@aol.com.

 

Taken.

 

LickMyBallz123@aol.com.

 

Taken!

 

BlowMe321@aol.com.

 

Getting an email address was literally impossible.

 

ChunkOfChange$$$@aol.com.

 

Finally!

 

I found my old floormate Matt in UConn’s online directory. His address was MattC321@UConn.edu. So that’s how mature kids handled this.   

 

“Hey Matt. It’s Colin! What’s up? I joined the brave new world of email! I’m back home and just started working—my job sucks! Might apply for grad school. How is Coventry Lake? Is Cane his normal jovial self? Is Jeff cranking too much Korn and Rage? Demand equal stereo time with R. Kelly and Boyz 2 Men. How about those Marlins? This is why baseball is the best sport: it’s 25 guys, not just superstars carrying everything. Well, talk to you soon!”

 

Two days later:

 

“You’ve. Got. MAIL.”
 

“Hey Colin. Good to hear from you! I will turn Jeff and Cane into R&B fans if it’s the last thing I do. Our apartment is pretty nice—it’s great not having Psycho Boy around or listening to Frank and Joey crank Ol’ Dirty Bastard at 3:30AM. Did you see those Livan Hernandez curveballs 3 feet outside that Eric Gregg called strikes?? I think the Braves can still come back. Well, talk to you soon!”

 

“Hey Matt! It was a muggy 86 degrees in Miami. Eric Gregg is large and in charge. The poor guy just wanted to get through a long, horrible workday and dominate the post-game buffet and who can blame him? Swing the bats, boys or get a dome!”

 

This was nice, but it wasn’t like I was going to go live with them. Matt was a quiet kid who pounded Mountain Dews, not Bud. He was my well-adjusted shadow. He wrote sports columns for The Daily Campus. One night he confessed to four of us that his 11 year old brother had died of leukemia. He broke down in tears. So he knew family pain too. Maybe worse than me. So why was I such a fuck up?            

 

The Marlins beat the Indians in Game 7 of The World Series. They rewarded their sun baked South Beach fairweather fans after five long, grueling years in existence. Cleveland fans endured their 49th consecutive year without a title–along with the Browns, smog, and an Ohio winter. The Tribe blew a 1 run lead in the bottom of the 9th before losing in extras when UConn alum Charles Nagy surrendered the game winning hit. Way to represent.

 

I smoked a cigarette on the breezeway—obviously I was back to smoking—and went to bed.  

………………………………………

I bought three new baseballs from Sports Authority. The red, yellow, and orange leaves curtaining our backyard provided a better contrast to lost baseballs if I missed the tree. New England’s leaf peeping season was here. Foliage was my Eric Gregg.  

…………………………………………. 

 

A-Framed

 

My mom called from the bottom of the stairs.

 

“Colin, it’s for you!”

 

“Hello?”

 

“Hey Col, it’s Greek.”

 

“Hey!”

 

“So you know that house you visited this summer? Noah is moving out. Are you interested in moving in?”

 

The sun drenched A-frame! So far from my arboreal home with its first frost warning and ominously early sunsets.  

 

“Yeah. Definitely. Wait…………I started working. I might have to check if there’s a bus or something. Can I let you know?”

 

“Sure.”

 

“That was Greek,” I told my mom over pork chops and chopped potatoes with vinegar. “He asked if I wanted to move in.”  

 

“I’m happy for you, honey.” Was that a melancholy tone? Was our house about to become haunted by one more ghost? But this time it was me? Was she scared of living alone through the dark and cold winter in our silent, ever expanding four-bedroom house? I can’t think about this right now. Can’t. Think.  

 

We dialed up to AOL. A Peter Pan bus went from Willimantic to Storrs to Coventry to Bolton on its way to Hartford! But the A-frame was a mile from the bus stop next to the library. And the bus took almost an hour and I would still need to take a scary city bus to West Hartford. And it was $14 round trip. And I was living off a sub-minimum wage sheltered workshop “salary” and 300 supplemental security crumbs. Too expensive. Too inconvenient. Dead on arrival.

 

I started packing.

 

I could stop overthinking it and enroll in grad school! (Maybe Lolita was better on a second reading?) Roommates again. Ted’s!

 

Greek came to pick me up. I traveled light: just my mattress, sheets, a pillow, a garbage bag of clothes, a toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, deodorant, and my acoustic guitar. My electric guitar/amp and subwoofer equipped stereo stayed. 

 

The waning, mid-autumn sun slumped over Five Corners as we waited at the light. Was this my final look around as an Ellington resident? I fled my lifelong lodestar and omphalos like an Alcatraz fugitive.

 

The A-frame didn’t look quite as soul illuminating in the November twilight, but my Dream House (or Safe House) still stood tall on its hill.  

 

“Col, you get the downstairs room,” Greek said. “Do you know Pavlovich?”

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“Pav, this is Colin.”

 

“Hey man.”

 

“Hey.”

 

Tall, lanky, and goateed, Pav had a slight lisp and the simmering intensity of a permanently pre-heated oven.

 

“And this is Brandon.”

 

“Hey.”

 

“Hey.”

 

The unliked-by-Mark’s-girlfriend Brandon? He was short, muscular, and sandy haired.

 

“And you know Tony.”

 

I put my blue and white sheets on my mattress. My unpacking was done. I played the into to Dave Mattews’ Lie In Our Graves intro very quietly on my Washburn to avoid judgment.

 

Brandon and I made awkward small talk while watching TV (I hated strangers so much) until someone mercifully knocked on the door.

 

“Come in!”  

 

In walked a thin, balding middle-aged guy in a tan cardigan.

 

“Hello. Is Tony home?”

 

“He left. I’m Brandon. Can I help?”

 

“Well…..uh, yes. I spoke with the police and I just wanted to discuss the matter if you have a minute.”  

 

This guy was gentler than a lamb.

 

“Okay. We kicked Noah out. I’m not sure if you knew that.”

 

“Oh---no, I didn’t. Uh…..well, the thing is I think we still need to…..I think I still need to ask you gentlemen to vacate. Especially with things getting in the newspaper. I hope you understand.”

 

“Understood.”

 

“Okay. Well, I was thinking by the end of December?”

 

“Not a problem.”

 

“Great! Enjoy your evening.”

 

What just happened?

 

Two minutes later, Tony walked in.

 

“What was that about?”

 

“We just got shitcanned.”

 

Good thing I didn’t pack my box spring. Even Puck lasted longer in the house on Real World San Francisco. But it was a magical hour I wouldn’t soon forget.

 

“Well that sucks,” Tony said, sorting mail. 

 

Why did no one seem surprised? Or upset? Was I the only one seeing a bit of a problem here? This was my quarter life crisis sanctuary!

 

“So…………….what happened?” I asked with the studied nonchalance of someone asking, “Do you think I should get this mole checked out?”

 

“Pav got busted with three pounds of weed.”

 

It happens.

 

“The cops raided our Halloween party.”

 

“Why was Noah the one who moved out?”

 

“Noah got busted first and narc’d on Pav and this girl Renee to get off all charges. So we kicked him out.”  

 

On Sportscenter, Dan Patrick announced the Red Sox acquired the Expos’ Cy Young Award winning pint sized fireballer Pedro Martinez at The Winter Meetings. At least Sox GM Dan Duquette was having a good night. Well maybe our landlord too. He didn’t get murdered by convicted and evicted drug dealers.  

………………………………………..

“It’s 6:07 in the morning here at Radio 104. Here’s some Fiona Apple for ya.”
 

I needed a hat and gloves. And a thicker jacket. It was freezing.

 

I’m probably the first and last human to commute to work in this insane fashion, but if you’re ever in Storrs and work in a sheltered workshop for the blind and you don’t have a car and you need to get to a Peter Pan bus from an A framed house, just walk straight down North Eagleville Road past Dairy Mart (you will also need a time machine) past Sgt Pepperoni’s, Wings Over Storrs, Huskies “Tavern”, Ted’s “Restaurant”, and Subway “Sandwiches.” Turn right onto Hilltop Drive, walk past the Math Science Building and the Student Union on your left, the Fieldhouse and Gampel Pavilion on your right, turn left onto the street whose name I forget behind the Homer Babbidge Library and await your bus. It’s a long day’s journey into The Insurance Capital Of The World, New England’s Rising Star, Hartford. But your journey still isn’t quite over yet. Please board the New Britain Avenue CT Transit bus (which stops every 30 feet) to Shield Street in West Hartford. If everything goes as planned, you should make it in 1 hour and 58 minutes door to door, which is also the run time of The Silence Of The Lambs.

 

Riding a city bus was a remarkable growth experience. I learned so much from those salt of the earth folks. Oh, the laughter we shared. I consider them family. Differences between farm boys and city dwellers are only skin deep. We all put our pants on one leg at a time. Phil Collins hit the nail on the head in Another Day In Paradise.

 

Just kidding. I was scared shitless. This cowpoke thought getting gunned down by a semi-automatic was a semi-automatic guarantee if I sat next to anyone planning to keep his two-seater to himself that morning. I wore my headphones, stared straight ahead and never uttered a word—and certainly didn’t quote Phil Collins. Ever.

 

But it turned out there were no murderers there, just strangers I hadn’t learned to drown out with Phish bootlegs and Sex And Candy yet on my AM/FM/cassette Walkman.  

………………………

Girl Trouble

 

Leanne Rhymes’ summer cameo grew into a workshop starring role that fall. She sang through packing room supervisor Pablo’s radio seemingly every hour on the hour. Light 100: playing today’s hits and yesterday’s classics too. Her romantic longing blended surprisingly well with stuffing plastic wrapped T-shirts into cardboard boxes.No one ordered me to put a bunny back in a box, but I imagined Nick Cage working here while researching his next role as a blind baby thief leaving Las Vegas to get face transplant surgery and look just like the criminal mastermind who kidnapped his only son.     

 

Seeing eye dogs filled the workshop. And sighted sewers decamped in the back--none of whom spoke a word of English. Pablo and floor supervisor Mario Rijo were bilingual. I took (failed) a year of French in high school followed by three years of Latin which I didn’t exactly “veni, vidi, vici '' either. But no Spanish. Often Leanne, Michael Bolton, and Peter Cetera were the only English speakers in the box stuffing room. (I was a mute). But after enough Chicago power ballads to send Mr. Rogers into a homicidal rage, Jose saved the day and turned it to the Latin station. Red hot brass blasted away the soft rock treacle.

 

When the lunch bell rang at 11:55 AM, you had to climb a steep, winding flight of stairs to reach the lunchroom. This didn’t really seem like the best setup for a factory of blind people but I’m no safety inspector or architect. Morning break and lunchtime was a tangled clusterfuck of canes, service dogs, and angry humans ascending and descending treacherous bottlenecked stairs. 

 

I never brought lunch. The A Framers and I weren’t exactly going grocery shopping together and I was afraid to eat with sweatshoppers. I was just passing through here. I couldn’t step in any quicksand. I went to the McDonald’s a block away.

 

“Would you like to Super Size that?”

 

Nope, I need beer money.

 

I read the Hartford Courant’s sports and entertainment sections and forced myself to read about Clinton and Newt and the end of the era of Big Government and the beginning of the Contract With America and Bridges To The 21st Century and stained blue dresses and other dumb stuff.    

 

After lunch, Bobbi, a permed chainsmoker with a weary but not unkind voice, showed me how to fold and place shirts into plastic bags. A 40-ish black bearded white guy sat across the table and incessantly talked to himself, utterly oblivious to my presence. 

 

“I am going to talk to staff. I think we can all go to Dairy Queen and get ice cream after we get our haircuts. We can get haircuts. And then get some ice cream. And maybe sometimes they can let us leave, let us leave the group home and go for walks unsupervised. I think we can, yes. But some people aren’t remembering to brush their teeth at night. 10 o’clock lights out. I’m going to tell staff. The new girl, Ashley. I’m going to tell Ashley about this. And then maybe we can go to the movies on Sunday. Of course I can’t go anywhere that’s around young girls. I can’t be around young girls.”

 

Wow that had a twist ending. The workshop’s M. Night Shamalan was Donny. Do group home residents ever get to be Don? That’s what I’d like to talk to Ashley about.

……………………………………..

Brandon’s rottweiler Athena barked murderously as I approached the house for the first week, but Brandon would yell, “Athena!” so she eventually just turned her tail.

 

“I can’t bite Master’s new pack member’s face off? I got off the couch for this?”  

 

Nothing beats puppy love.

 

Eviction be damned, I bought a six pack of Sam Adams Winter Lager at and Brandon bought Jim Beam. Much like Donny, Brandon had girl problems. He was dating a freshman–also named Ashely!

 

“She keeps leaving messages on the answering machine. She cried last time I banged her and told me she loved me.”

 

Radio 104 played Blink 182.

 

The timing and structure.

Did you hear?

He fucked her!   

 

“I don’t understand these chicks. What is it about using you as a semen receptacle that makes you get all emotional about it?”

 

Preach, player. These ho’s be like static cling. Get off my jock!

 

“Are you going to break up with her?”

 

“Eventually.”

…………………………………………………………………..

I know what you’re thinking: I was a virgin. You couldn’t be more wrong. My little black book contained not one but two sexual conquests encounters debacles. 

 

The organizers of my brother’s five-year high school reunion rented the banquet room at The Colony in Vernon. I tagged along. They split “our” room ten ways because passing out on the floor is a five star sleeping arrangement between the ages of 18-26. While everyone pre-gamed, the topic shifted to my sex life. I really cannot recall why. Was it because I had just turned 21 and was still (obviously) a virgin? Time to shed that scarlet V?   

 

“Colin needs to get laid,” Dale declared. And he suggested calling a prostitute.

 

 “Do you have $250?”

 

That’s not the point, is it? This was obviously a horrible idea. Too nerve wracking. Was I drunk enough to relax? And getting a hooker?? Was I really that kind of guy? I even found The Electric Blue a little embarrassing. But much like when Pete Kowalksi challenged me to a braces rearranging afterschool rumble, I couldn’t just say no. Nancy Reagan had failed once again.

 

The Class Of ’89 went downstairs to reminisce over Kamikazes at the open bar. The lady of the night arrived with a large bag. Blonde. Damn. No hot brunettes? What about Asians? A blonde hooker just seemed so cliché. But she was pretty. She might have even passed as a girl with a nice, supportive father who got stars in her eyes after attending a Pretty Woman matinee screening. Probably not much older than me. I paid her upfront. That’s how it’s done? She gave me a massage while getting undressed one article of clothing at a time. When I dared to look up, she was sans pants. More compelling than her rubbing of my shoulders—we both agreed they were very sore-- was her special area. Woop there it is?Probably don’t say that. She looked like a real blonde. That was an upset. I decided what the heck? I reached down to, I don’t know, pet it? Is that what you do? Is that considered foreplay? She pulled my hand away.

 

“Sorry,” I said. 

 

“It just hurts a little when people do that. It feels like pulling hair.”

 

“Oh right. Sorry.”

 

After you fall off a horse you should always get right back on. I touched her right boob. I mean you hate to let almost an entire month’s worth of SSI go to waste. Plus, they were just out there like that. Perky, B cup sized. Also real! (Probably—I had no scientific control for this experiment).  

 

“Can you grab a little more gently? That kind of hurts.”

 

“Oh, yeah, sorry”.

 

“That’s better.”

 

Boy was she strict. Like my Home Ec teacher. “You’re sewing your football wrong!” 

 

She laid me down on the bed and took off my pants and boxers. She gave me small kisses up and down my legs and chest. 

 

“You’re cute,” she whispered.

 

“Thanks.”

 

Then I ruined it. Refusing to accept a compliment even from someone paid to give it, I said, “I’ll bet you say that to all the guys.”

 

I meant it as a joke.

 

I think.

 

“No. I don’t say that to all the guys!”

 

Great. I could even flunk an etiquette exam with a hooker.

 

This made me even more nervous. Richard Gere didn’t go through this with Julia Roberts unless those were Director’s Cut scenes. Amber slipped an industrial grade condom on me more clinical precision than a nurse checking for testicular cancer. Was The Great Wall of China this unbreachable? Charlie Sheen couldn’t spread an STD in this thing.

 

Things started to, you know, progress.

 

“I’m tight,” she said almost apologetically. 

 

 Wow. Girls didn’t just say stuff like that on Red Shoe Diaries? It was all so surreal. I tried to relax. Was this what I always imagined? Did I envision a prostitute named Amber in a hotel room? It was exciting but I struggled to look strangers in the eye, so this was just ridiculous. How did she end up in this line of work? Was her 5”4” step-father also the kind of guy who called his 5’3” wife a “midget”? Should we have delved into that first? I felt far away and it wasn’t just the three inch (thick, not long) silicone barrier. I get semi-excited but not super excited.

 

“Some people take a while. Some people just never get there,” she reassured me like a gym teacher when you can’t reach a higher rung on the wall with your wooden stick.

 

Someone knocked on the door. Then they knocked again.      

 

“Hey! Open up! Who the fuck is in there?” a pre-gamed male voice called.

 

“Who is that?” Amber said.

 

“I don’t know. Maybe if we just ignore him, he will go away?”, I unhelpfully suggested. Hope is not a plan.

 

”Why is this door locked!?”

 

Knocks escalated to punches. This wasn’t the kind of pounding I paid top dollar for. 

 

“OPEN UP THIS FUCKING DOOR!!!!”

 

That was quite enough for Amber. She got up. What a body. I couldn’t believe an actual naked girl was standing three feet away. A movie of my life would need to come with a parental warning: graphic nudity, strong sexual content, and adult situations. Slap it with an NC-17!

 

She got dressed and gathered her work tools.    

 

“I think your friends have some serious issues.”

 

“But I barely know him!”

 

She didn’t dignify that with a response.

 

“Maybe I can talk him into coming back later.” I flailed in the wind, literally and figuratively.

 

She knew better. She had been around the blo----see, there I go again. She opened the door and fled like the building was on fire. Goodbye Amber, we were just two ships passing in the night.

 

In thundered my brother’s former scholastic colleague Tim Lacy.

 

“What the FUCK were you thinking!? We paid for this room. Not you!”

 

I was in no mood to split hairs over the booking ledger.

 

“FUCK YOU MAN, YOU’RE AN ASSHOLE!”

 

“FUCK YOU, DIPSHIT!”

 

He deftly intercepted my punch, grabbed my arm, and placed me in a headlock. To avoid suffocation, I gave up struggling. I ran down the hallway screaming.   

 

“FUCK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!” 

 

And that’s how I lost my virginity.

 

I recommend The Colony.

………………………………………

Postscript: if they write Cliff’s Notes for this Pulitzer frontrunner, I assume this chapter will say I pulled a hooker’s pubic hair, mauled her breast, denigrated her profession, and couldn’t satisfy her through an impenetrable polyurethane prophylactic until a drunken madman subdued me. When you put it that way, it really sounds bad.

 

Let’s think glass half full: maybe Amber re-evaluated her career goals, went back to school and became a pre-school teacher.    

   

And yet my stock rose precipitously in Dale’s eyes. When I reported she said, “I’m tight” he almost asked me for my autograph.

……………………………………..

Still not convinced I had game with the ladies? A year later, four Jungle dorms held their annual semi-formal dance where well-dressed kids got annihilated on cheap beer at a local banquet hall and humiliated their school. My blue denim dress shirt with a red tie (a killer look which said “I’m classy enough for ties but badass enough to ditch cotton”) paired with roughly half a container of Vidal Sassoon hair gel enticed a swooning young lady to ask me to dance. Before I knew it, we made out on the dancefloor and I started feeling her up. Gonna Make You Sweat really loosens inhibitions. (Fifteen beers don’t hurt either). We sat side by side on the ride home from Willimantic. She sat by the window. She tapped me on the arm. I looked over and saw her bare left breast! “Semi-formal” meant just one boob exposed on a school bus. What does one do in this situation? I never got the syllabus. I grabbed it (gently this time) and licked it. 

 

She changed out of her maroon dress and into gray sweatpants and a T-shirt at her dorm in Litchfield like we were going to study for Bio-chem. She was the brunette Wild Cheetah Escorts denied me. Fluorescent dorm lighting revealed a pretty cute girl. Her name was Melissa. I vaguely knew her roommate. I’m afraid that’s all the biographical background I can provide for this character in our story. This was a college hookup, not a Jane Austen courtship, although I was the “gentleman caller” who escorted her to my dorm like a wildly miscast Mr. Darcy. (I finally had a single). Two seconds after I closed the door we started kissing again. I wished our tongues could stay locked forever. Why are people ever not kissing? We took off our clothes. “I’m on my period,” she said but she later completely retracted that statement. “You can do whatever you want.” Was she just confirming I was a rapist? Who knows with girls! Either way, she took off her panties. Without turning this into a 12th rate romance novel next to the Slim Jims in a Shell, things got going a bit but I had killed 20 beers by this point. (Conservative estimate). If I had known about this pop quiz I might have drank responsibly and stopped at 15. I didn’t quite complete the job. Again. And no one pounded on the door this time–although a hallway hackey sack tournament was in progress. I did do…..other stuff. Very tangy.

 

In the morning my phone rang. Not answering just made you seem shady.       

 

“Did you watch the Sox last night?” my Dad asked.

 

“No, I went to a dance.”

 

“Worst April start in team history! Time to clean house! Kevin Kennedy is on the hot seat!”

 

“Yeah, totally.”

 

“How are classes going?”

 

“Not bad.” 

 

“Want to go to Kathy John’s next Sunday with me and the boys?”

 

“Yeah, that sounds good.” 

 

“See you then!!”

 

I sat on my bed, completely naked in the unforgiving glare of the morning sun which knifed through the shade while the stranger in my room got dressed. I gave one last furtive glance. Naked girls are the greatest thing ever.

 

Boy did I feel like shit.

 

“Are you doing anything later? Can I call you?”

 

Did she want me to call? Do you even call your hookups? Was I a job applicant who shouldn’t have gotten past HR screening let alone ask for a second interview? She gave me her number. That afternoon I laid on my bed and waited out my merciless hangover. I felt crushing despair. Why are these encounters always so awkward? The first time I wasn’t drunk enough, now I was too drunk? Was that even it? What if I was gay? I certainly never had a crush on some hairy dude. Might as well write sonnets to gorillas while I was at it. But what if it’s more complicated than that? Not a single character in 80’s teen sex comedies had these problems! Tom Cruise removed call girl Rebecca De Mornay’s purple dress as wind blew the shutters and leaves on a crisp autumnal suburban Chicago night to a hypnotically beautiful Tangerine Dream score. Mike Damone impregnated Stacy in Fast Times At Ridgemont High after just one afterschool pool room encounter!

 

My floormates had seen her entering and leaving my room so once again, I was a stud.

 

“Are you going to call her?”

 

“I don’t know. I think so.”

 

“She’s cute.”

 

After I got back from the dining hall, I called.

 

 “No I’m not going out tonight”, she said with a hint of anger. Or was I being paranoid?

 

I threw away her number. Oh well we will always have the Jake Speakeasy Lounge. What should our song be? I’d prefer Melissa by The Allman Brothers but we’ll have to settle for Too Drunk To Fuck by The Dead Kennedys.             

……………………………………………..

Christmas

 

“Colin, Pav and I found a new place across from Schmedley’s. Do you know where that is?”.

 

“Yeah kind of.”

 

“Want to go in with us? The lease starts in January.”

 

“I’m going to live back in Celeron,” Greek said. 

 

“Okay. I think so. That’s a little far from my bus stop but I think I can do it.”

 

I guess the new landlord’s background check was even less painstaking than that of sheltered workshop employers. The A-frame was already pushing things, but Staffordville Road was three miles away. It was time to pump up my Trek’s tires again or return to my haunted house. But that way madness lies.

 

My bedroom had been Noah’s room. I didn’t see any leftover rolling papers or scales. He lived next door in The Jungle for a year. Blond like me, cocky unlike me. He borrowed my book Black Coffee Blues by Henry Rollins. Someone would knock on his door and it would close and reopen five minutes later with boisterous laughter. Another satisfied customer. This young entrepreneur, like Macbeth after his weird sisters encounter on the heath, foresaw his tragic fate--but without all the bloody handed guilt.  Noah knew character was fate. “A pretty boy like me? I can’t go to jail,” he said as we walked up to the cafeteria. He had introduced a hypothetical legal Sophie’s choice, as one does. He diagnosed himself a “truly disgusting human being.” And in the end, to thine own self this rat to the cops had been true.

 

I didn’t have a dimebag’s worth of respect for him, but Natty Ice and a need for social acceptance can bridge gaping chasms in moral and philosophical worldviews. At least until a third-hand rumor surfaced that he had carnal knowledge of my Oasis loving lab table champagne supernova Carrie. Even floormate Brian, who hibernated in his room watching Reservoir Dogs and playing Legend Of Zelda while evincing fewer romantic longings than a Nintendo joystick, was apparently struck by Cupid’s arrow.

 

“That just ruined my day.”

 

Join the club.

 

Brian and I (and the entire New Haven 3^rd floor) hoped this disgusting human being was lying to enhance his weed market share. (In business, reputation is king). Staring too long at any other conclusion would blind you.

 

Pav’s hatred of Noah could have fueled an entire Pantera box set.

 

“I had another violent dream about Noah last night,” he announced one evening over a bowl of Kraft mac and cheese. 

 

Another night I opened the front door to:

 

“…………..FUCK UP MY FUTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

 

Forensic details were scarce (and it seemed like kind of a touchy subject). I only knew Pretty Boy handed Pav and Renee to the cops to avoid romantic overtures from Bubba in a medium security shower. Pav was facing possible jail time. Renee was already locked up.

 

Pav’s, um, intensity cast a shadow over the once radiant A-frame I fell in love with on that languid summer day when the Dolphins were still plausible Super Bowl contenders. Pav personified the November gray and chill. 6’4” and lanky with chin facial hair, he was no pretty boy (thus good prison material?) He could have passed for a Celtic Frost bass player. He’d wouldn’t get caught dead watching Toad The Wet Sprocket in the rain on Spring Weekend. (Not that I’m confessing anything). He even ordered pizza and checked his class schedule with an unnerving twitchiness.

 

But he was an animal lover. His Burmese python Jägermeister was just as cute as a button with scales that resembled, yup, a Jägermeister bottle. Pav sat shirtless on the couch with Jaeger draped around his neck. Until your pet snake decides to not suffocate you to death, you can’t know true love.  

……………………………………

Phil tuned to the jazz station and ripped off the dial. The warehouse was a soft rock free zone. And Fiona Apple could forget about setting a skid of brochures on fire with seething rage towards yet another man-boy. Trumpets and saxes blew festive Christmas tunes all morning. A yuletide seductress implored Santa to descend the chimney with great alacrity. Phil scatted along.

 

“Ooooo Santa. Boop zoo da doo dee chicka chicka boom! Oh Santa! Give me that Big Santa!”

 

This was the first time I’d heard “Santa” employed as a dick euphemism.

 

“Mr. McDonough! We have a big order today. You think you are ready?” 

 

“Yes, I think so.”

 

He spoke with a practiced friendliness. Did he fear I was the clean shaven, golden haired college boy fixing to kick his blackbearded blue collar butt to the curb? Did warehouse boss Jim plan to fuck him over with his Big Santa? Did he not respect someone who had never steered a chopper and even confessed to passing by Ellington’s TSI Harley on his, if we’re going to be brutally honest here, effeminate Teal ten speed?

 

He only called me Colin once—and it was super weird.

 

“Mr. McDonough, we had an error in yesterday’s shipment. You included 74 Mystic brochures to Bradley but the order was for 75. Try to be a little more careful?”

 

“Okay. Sorry about that.”

 

Why was I counting at all if you were JUST GOING TO COUNT ANYWAY? I’m surprised Mystic Aquarium even survived this disaster. While waiting for their luggage after a red eye from Disney World, did a family of four walk past an empty display where 74 brochures had once been? They would never experience the breathtaking reconstruction of Charles W. Morgan’s 1840’s whaling vessel or get to see Bobo the beluga whale. All because in college they don’t teach you to count.

 

Except what I actually thought was: is my brain slowly draining out of me? Forget standard deviations, is addition now beyond my skill set? The Dean would instantly approve my Stats 101 exemption if she could only see me now.

……………………..

That afternoon I assembled pens. Hard plastic navy blue “Assembled By The Blind” shells were laid out in wooden boxes beside a box with soft plastic ink filled tubes alongside yet another box with golden metal crowns. The final box to my right was for completed pens. I sat at a long wooden table with six pen assembling colleagues.

 

“Did you watch wrestling last night?” a perpetually smiling tiny black-haired girl asked an African American woman.

 

“No, what happened?”

 

“Oooo Stone Cold poured cement into Mr. McMahon’s car!”

 

“His Corvette!?”

 

“YUUUUP. His Corvette! Oooo Stone Cold is gonna get it!”

 

“Hey Marisol, get some work done over there and stop all that blabbering!” a gentleman at the next table advised.

 

“Oh shove it, Sam! I’m gonna get Hulk Hogan to beat you up!”

 

I was happy Hulk Hogan was still relevant. Although I pretended to like Swann’s Way, if you think I wasn’t jacked for Wrestlemania 1 in ’85 when The Hulkster and Mr. T fought a no holds barred steel cage tag team match against Rowdy Roddy Piper and “Mr. Wonderful” Paul Orndorf at Madison Square Garden, you’re crazy. I hated Roddy so freaking much after he smashed a coconut over Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka’s head in Piper’s Pit! Anger clouded my judgment so much that I never noticed that despite his red kilt and bagpipe filled intro song, this “Scotsman” spoke with a Canadian accent thicker than Gordie Howe’s.

 

“I’m from Edenborough, mate, so I’m not aboot to tolerate this Mickey Mouse organ-eye-zation, Jack Tunney!”

 

Wrestlemania 1 was a tease. It ended in a draw. Someone hit someone else with a chair and got disqualified or some bullshit. All those weeks of MTV hype and wait for the Summer Slam pay per view event?  

 

Wrestling and letdowns were

synonymous. One typical Saturday morning on Maplewood, my brother placed me in a Figure Four Leg Lock. I guess he had finally given up on the Sleeper Hold. He always became exasperated when I remained wide awake.

 

“Can you guys come down for a minute?” my Dad called from the bottom of the stairs.  

 

“Mom and I still love each other but we’re not in love with each other anymore.”

 

I picked up The Hartford Courant off the kitchen table and pretended to read about soaring inflation and everything the Fed and the Reagan Administration planned to do about it—large on the minds of eight-year olds. Since I read a half inch from my face, it became a shield to hide my tears. Finally, I lowered it and my mom starting bawling.  

 

It’s too bad Patrick didn’t try the Sleeper Hold that morning. Maybe that was the day it would have finally worked.

…………………………………

Pen assembly was just a resume builder, isn’t that what Barry said? I called him.

 

“Colin! How is Industries going?”

 

“Okay. But are there……..other jobs out there?”

 

“I will connect you with our vocational specialist Melissa.”

 

Would I bitterly disappoint another Melissa?

 

A week later Gary approached me at the Sealing Machine.

 

 “Colin, Melissa is here to see you upstairs.”

 

We climbed the Himalayan stairs and exchanged pleasantries.

 

“Everything going okay?”

 

“Yeah, no problems,” I noted in an ascending vocal scale.

 

”Great! If you need anything, just let me know.” His pitch soared even higher, rising almost as sharply as the stairwell.

 

Did Phil pull a Noah and rat me out over CountingGate?   

 

“Hi Mel!”

 

First syllable basis?

 

“Hey Gary.”

 

“This is Colin.”

 

“Hi. “.

 

“Hey there! Want to go into the office next door where it’s a bit quieter? How are things going over here?”

 

“Okay.”

 

Unlike Wrestlemania 1, Melissa didn’t disappoint. Dare I say smoking hot?

 

“Hey Mel, didn’t you see the no smoking sign?”

 

Definitely don’t say that. She had long brown hair and wore tortoiseshell glasses. Only a few years older than me? Was she going for a sexy librarian look or did the glasses fend off leering truckers at the gas station  and very single sheltered workshop workers? A wedding ring just screams “challenge” to some guys (I couldn’t see if she had one.) Deflective lenses on Shield Street?

 

“What kinds of things do they have you doing?”

 

“Well I’m doing brochures. Shipping them out. And some other stuff, like, I don’t know, working some of the machines.”

 

Don’t even mention pens. 

 

“Great. What types of jobs are you interested in?”

 

“Well……..I’m not too sure actually.”

 

“I see you graduated from UConn?”

 

Technically.

 

“Yes.”

 

White blouse. Necklace. Looked like just a hint of cleavage. Was I not maintaining perfect eye contact?? You say the world needs another objectifying white male chauvinist writer like a smallpox outbreak? Check your privilege, reader. I’m blind.

 

“What was your major?”

 

“English. I guess I could have picked something more practical.”

 

I need to stop apologizing for my major. I think.

 

“Do you have any prior work experience?”

 

“I worked in the college cafeteria one summer.”

 

Kitchen tray cleanup. Nearly destroyed my appetite for life. People are so gross. I lacked both the seniority and Machiavellian statecraft to get to scan student ID’s.    

 

“How are your computer skills?”

 

“Pretty good. I used WordPerfect in school. I’ve used Windows 95? I can email.”

 

Don’t sell yourself short. Online hearts? Pearl Jam guitar tabs? Netscape naturist beach photos?

 

“We pay for a program at Goodwin College in East Hartford which teaches Microsoft Office. Would you be interested?”

 

“That sounds good.”

 

“Great! Would you say you have good people skills?” 

 

“Yeah, I think so,” I said unconvincingly.     

 

“Do you think you would have a hard time dealing with difficult people?”

 

Only when they pound on doors when I’m with a hooker.

 

“No, I think I’m pretty good.”

 

“Maybe we could look at some customer service jobs?”

 

“Sure, that sounds okay.”

 

Patrick used tarot card to connect San Diego hotline callers to ghosts of their departed loved ones. Was that customer service? I almost pursued customer service a couple of summers earlier after stopping on my bike at Moser Farms ice cream shop and saw Amy Alfson and Leslie Menunos working there. I told myself to go back the next day and ask for an application, but I just wanted to work with cute blonde Amy and smoking hot brunette Leslie and feared they would smell my lack of commitment to pouring rainbow sprinkles on Kerry and Emily’s mint chocolate chip waffle cone from a mile away. My telltale heart and I never went back for ice cream, let alone employment.   

 

“Great! We’ll be in touch then!”

 

“Great!”

……………………………………..

“I had a dream I beat Noah with a hammer until he cried”, Pav shared.

 

“Did you hear about the court date?” Brandon asked.

 

“Next Tuesday.”

 

This protracted legal drama was really starting to ruin my Tostinos party pizza dinners and that was saying something. After slaving away all day in a brochure dungeon, this is what I come home to? Can’t we just enjoy our waning days in the Taj Mahal of North Eagleville Road?

 

At least Greek giggled like a schoolgirl at Austin Powers’s attempts to shag Elizabeth Berkley. Groovy, baby, yeah. Will Ferrell was still alive but very badly burned.

 

Tony must have decided a den of drugs, deceit, eviction, and compromising media coverage was not the place for a budding Fortune 500 power player. This situation was hairier than his chest but if he had anything to do with it, his resume, criminal record, and rental history would remain cleaner than his girlfriend, Our Lady Of The Immaculate Vagina. He wasn’t around to watch the Dolphins play the Patriots a few days before Thanksgiving. The Fins 14 point 4th quarter rally fell just short. Final score: 27-24. They fell to 7-5. Pre-season prognostications of Lombardi Trophy hoisting looked murkier than the gray November sky. The Pats were also just 7-5 under Pete Carroll. He looked like Paul Newman and acted like Keanu Reeves. A nice guy. What a terrible hire. Massive downgrade from Jersey wiseguy Bill Parcells who took a separate plane home after they lost to the Packers in the Super Bowl right before bolting to the Jets. Four years of preaching teamwork led to an Irish goodbye. I guess that’s what winners do. Hanging up my cleats at age eight was the smartest thing I ever did.

…………………………

A kid named Jay lived halfway up our yard in a mini-house. A converted shed? He cranked Smashing Pumpkins’ Cherub Rock. I liked him already.

 

“Hey.”

 

“Hey man, how’s it going?”

 

“Just studying for Econ. What are you up to?”

 

“Nothin, man”..

 

“Hey, do you still want that couch?”

 

“Yeah, want to come up and get it?”

 

“Cool, man.”

 

A couch almost as big as Jay’s house sat in our basement.

 

“I would help you, but I tweaked my back lifting,” Brandon said.

 

Yeah me too.

 

“No worries. Can you help me, Colin?”

 

“Sure, no problem.”

 

“Dude, what’s this thing made of? It’s freaking heavy,” I said. 

 

I clearly hadn’t been making barbells my bitch, just boxes with 74 brochures. 

 

“Yeah, it’s pretty heavy.”

 

My arms almost fell off. We grunted and huffed down the driveway and placed it down. That night, my lower back got sore, then my right lower leg got weak and numb, then I got pins and needles. I needed a minute and a half to get out of my mom’s car after she drove me home from Stop & Shop one night. I limped like an 84 year old bricklayer. On bad days I walked like The Hunchback Of Notre Dame. Herniated disc? Sciatica? I was between insurance plans, so I never went to the doctor. I was young so stuff just heals itself, right?

………………………………………………………………

I went home. Just for a month. I could do this. With luck, my summertime fever had broken in the cold December air. Clothesline cigarette butts were buried under three inches of pure, forgetful snow.  

 

My Aunt Linda hosted Christmas Eve at her Farmington condo. They had moved from their wood lined house in Bolton with its quarter mile long dirt driveway, back deck, in-ground pool,  swing set, basketball hoop, black cat, and two Golden Retrievers. It was my dream house before the A-frame. My cousin Tom, who had Down’s Syndrome, wandered in the woods and got lost when he was nine years old. My cousin Cara found him sitting on the generator an hour later. They fled the woods and moved west of the river.   

 

I stayed overnight right before they moved out of Bolton. My aunt and I sat on swivel chairs at the kitchen counter—the kids’ section during holiday dinners. 

 

“I think you’re great with Tom and you have real empathy for people. It would be so cool if you got a job working for people with disabilities.”

 

“Maybe you’re right. I might do that.”

 

But I played guitar! What if, with a little more practice, I was a virtuoso and we just didn’t know it yet? Would you tell Eddie Van Halen to take group home residents to colonoscopy exams? One summer I read Ulysses with the Richard Elllman handbook which explained Joyce’s billion obscure references! Agenbite of inwit, and no more turn aside and brood upon love’s bitter mystery, Averroes. I had it all down. What if Joyce was a hack compared to me? (Before you die laughing, please admit this story makes way more sense than Finnegans Wake.) Social work seemed too expected. I sat a foot from the TV, but did I want to shape my whole future around that?

 

I floated the idea to Patrick over the phone.

 

“You’re going to have to wipe people’s butts,” he said in an “I’m just telling you this for your own good” tone.

 

I wasn’t sure if this particular career counselor possessed a full catalogue of social worker job specifications, but maybe it was true for entry level positions? In the social work game, did you have to wipe your way to the top? I had to admit, wiping people’s butts just didn’t sound like me at all.               

 

The Christmas tree was lit with white lights and an angel which nearly scraped its wings against the ceiling. Illuminated red, green, and white tinsel reflected off the frosty windows. Tom and Cara’s kids all crowded onto the piano bench and thrashed atonal improvisations. Presents were opened after the appetizers (cheese and crackers and shrimp cocktail) but before the main course, (ham, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, devilled eggs, ziti, carrots, and rolls.) Wrapping paper was strewn all over the floor. While my aunt was in the kitchen, my uncle was on clean-up duty. The carpet was cleared within three minutes of the last opened present. (On this night a necklace from my cousin to my grandmother: “Oh Candy, it’s so pretty!”) Boxes were lined up single file to promote de-cluttering and ensure no one left with someone else’s present: a sweet dream doomed to another year of bitter failure in our Christmas cheer loving Irish family. 

 

Tom said grace.

 

“Dear Lord, we thank you for this meal. And thank you Mom for spending all day cooking. Please bless my sisters. And Dad. And thank you Uncle Bobby for my copy of Home Alone 2. Amen.”

 

“Amen!” we shouted in near unison.

 

“Great speech Tim!” Candy said.

 

“I think Your speeches get better every year!” my Dad said.

 

Tom laughed giddily.

 

“Thank you!”

 

Twelve year old and intellectually disabled, Tim still understood the true spirit of Christmas: always thank the family for gifts you already have. Such as a Home Alone 2 VHS tape. After realizing the impossibility of it all, my Dad soon shifted to gift cards.

 

After I turned 21, holidays became a balancing act between getting drunk at a family function but not so hammered they might suspect I was the problem drinker I was. Like it mattered. My cousins were usually on wine bottle #2 by the time the banana cream pie and homemade brownies rolled out. My teetotaling Dad might notice but hey once a cop, always a cop, right?  

 

Dad held court with cop stories which started near the end of dinner and concluded well into desert and coffee. Call it a digestive aid. It was an impressive, almost acrobatic verbal feat. It’s not easy to segue into taut, heart pounding stories of urban high speed chases, flying bullets at Vine Street sting operations, and dead, drowned children in your arms when everyone had been discussing how crowded Stop & Shop was, Father O’Leary’s beautiful sermon at 4 o’clock Christmas Eve mass, and seeing Titanic the night before. And he did it to the accompaniment of Andy Williams crooning about the most wonderful time of the year.

 

“I got a call one day and they said this guy was acting crazy and threatening to kill his family. He was waving a machete around. I got out of my squad car and told him to put the weapon down. But he came at me. I told him again. “Put your weapon down!” (Bing Crosby was dreaming of a white Christmas). But he came even closer. So I fired a shot and hit him in the leg. But he was high on PCP so he just laughed and said, “Now you’re dead!” and ran towards me when I fired two shots.” (Sleigh bells ring are you listening?)  

 

I used he told these stories to entertain my Hartford Insurance Compnay employed aunt and uncle, briefly freeing them from the monotony of a life where quarterly earnings reports and fax machine paper jams were high drama--a safe world he fled at 27 after he took the police exam. (Aetna: he wasn’t glad he met ya). But maybe it was therapy. His adrenaline junkie job created withdrawal symptoms he might not have anticipated. Like all cops, he wore a hard outer shell, but these tragedies haunt him like the ghost of Christmas past?

 

”So Col, I hear you’re now working?” Cara asked.

 

“Yeah. Well, I’m doing this job--for now.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“Uh, well it’s just shipping. But I’m looking for other jobs.”

 

I glanced at the classifieds. Glancing is a gateway to reading.

 

My little half-brothers Jack and Billy and I watched Adventures In Babystitting upstairs with Tommy. He loved it almost as much as Home Alone and wrestling. 

 

“I’m going to marry Elisabeth Shue!” he announced.

 

“Not if I marry her first!” I said.

 

“Hey Col, did you watch Monday Night Raw this week?”. 

 

“No. What happened?”

 

“Stone Cold beat up Santa!”

 

“He WHAT!?”

 

“It was cool! A Stone Cold Stunner!” He laughed.

 

“Well that just seems wrong. Maybe it’s just me.”

 

“No way!” He whispered in my ear. “Santa isn’t real.”

 

He whispered for the benefit of Jack and Billy—I assume he figured I had gotten wind-- but I wasn’t sure if he whispered softly enough.

 

“Oh I don’t know Tom. I don’t think that’s right.”

 

“Yes it is. Every kid in my class says so.”

 

“I think they might be mistaken about that.”

 

Tommy radiated more joy than anyone I knew. Teach me to be like you.

 

There’s a picture of this night on the mantelpiece in my uncle’s man cave. I’m laughing with Jack and Billy. Jack is missing a front tooth. I’m wearing a blue Champion hoodie (only my Sunday best) and I’m still in my regrettable hair gel phase. I’ve got an awkward half smile like the camera is an X-ray into my soul and I fear radiation. I look flushed. Stupid Guinness. And wine. Which I don’t even like! It was a framer. 

 ………………………………………

On Christmas Day, my mom, grandmother and I drove to Amherst where my mom’s cousin lived with her UMass psychology professor husband. Not much to report here. They didn’t drink. Much. Jeffrey, my potential cousin in law (second marriage galore on both sides of my family so family trees were pretty tangled) brought beers from his microbrewery in Maine. I drank one. One! Any more and I would have stuck out more than Gary Busey at a Mormon retreat. These get-togethers featured cholesterol discussions which lasted two hours, a card game with gift prizes (usually black licorice and a beard trimmer), and movie reviews like, “The premise was brilliant, but I found the third act problematic.” And all this before I even knew what premise meant!

 

Half of the Bettencourt clan metamorphosed from poor, non-English speaking Portuguese textile working moths into NPR listening butterflies. The other half retained Old World values like they still lived in remote fishing villages in The Azores. Like my grandmother, my Aunt Mary shopped for bah-gins and she didn’t trust rotten to the core American institutions as far as she could throw them. On October 25, 1986, wee went to her house in Somerset (highlight: the malassadas, which is pronounced nothing like it’s spelled so let’s call it fried dough.) We sat at her dining room table hours before the first pitch of Game 6 of The World Series between the Red Sox and Mets. The Sox were up 3 games to 2 but Aunt Mary announced it would go 7 games.

 

“It’s all for TV ratings. It’s all fixed.”

 

 “No sir! It’s not fixed!” I protested.

 

“Oh, you just watch,” she said in a gently condescending tone. So young. So naïve.   

 

By midnight, well past my bedtime, Patrick, my mom, and myself sat in the den. The Sox were up by two runs in the bottom of the 10^th with two outs and nobody on after Keith Hernandez flied weakly to Dave Henderson in center. Sorry, Aunt Mary, but things are done a little differently here in the US of A. Then Calvin Schiraldi started throwing fastballs right down the middle. Then Bob Stanley uncorked a wild pitch (or was it a Rich Gedman passed ball?). Then Bill Buckner let a slow, routine Mookie Wilson grounder I could have fielded at a Special Olympics softball game bounce between his legs. Someone notify our sponsors! We will see you again tomorrow night, NBC viewers! And to think it’s Sweeps Week! Vin Scully, Anheuser Busch, and the Ford Motor Company were beyond ecstatic.

 

“I’m going to bed!” I tragically announced.

 

The Curse Of The Bambino had nothing on The Curse Of Aunt Mary.

 

Were marathon Christmas gatherings a Portuguese tradition? Within a few hours, Irish families drive home before they pass out. I loved my mom and my grandmother and the rest were nice in a PBS pledge drive sort of way but these days were rough. And they ended like horror movies. No one got chainsawed to death that I recall, but there were six endings before the credits rolled. Michael Myers had fewer lives than Christmas in Amherst. When the car (finally) got started, “Oh wait, you can’t leave, you need to take some leftover turkey! And take some carrots and stuffing too! Let me find a container. It’s here somewhere!” “Wait, you never tried on that sweateh!” “Hold on, don’t you want your baldness curing kit?”

…………………………………….          

Winter

 

My passenger seat occupation allowed my mom to get back in the Diamond Lane for a month and get us  downtown in 34 minutes. We listened to Craig and Company on 96 WTIC FM. There was no shortage of explosive laughter from Gar, his bubbly sidekick Christine Lee, and his newsman John Elliott (“two L’s, two T’s”.) There were prank phone calls galore involving pizza deliveries gone awry sandwiched between Circuit City ads and One Headlight by The Wallflowers. Or Jewel’s You Were Meant For Me. Morning drive radio was one hilarious place. Kill me.

………………………………….. 

Unlike Greek in the fall, neither Brandon nor Pav offered to come pick me up, so my mom drove me to my new house. I packed my bike.  

 

We lived on the second floor of a white, slightly lopsided cape. It had a beige carpeted living room, a white tiled kitchen and three bedrooms. Make that three and a half bedrooms. Pav parked Jaeger’s cage right next to the fridge.

 

It was Super Bowl Sunday. The Packers played the Broncos from sunny San Diego. Brandon, Joe, and I pre-gamed at Huskies with beer and wings. Jewel sang a passionate heartfelt rendition of The National Anthem. Brandon was deeply moved. 

 

“Jewel has really nice tits.”

 

As if on cue, she placed her hands over the top of her ample bosom, partially obstructing America’s view. A sign of ardent patriotism? Or with her low-cut violet shirt and 36C’s, did this sensitive poet (see A Night Without Armor) intuit that in lieu of focusing on what we so proudly hailed in the twilight’s last gleaming, Brandons from sea to shining sea zeroed in on her gallant ramparts?

 

Next came a flyover from the Air Force’s B-2 Spirit from the 509th bomb wing. America. Fuck yeah. Let’s go blow up a banana republic.

 

The Broncos took an early lead.

 

“Green Bay’s massive O line is going to wear them down,” frontrunner Brandon predicted. 

 

The NFC’s Packers were the defending champs and the AFC had lost 13 straight Super Bowls–often in humiliating fashion. But a weird thing happened: by the fourth quarter, the speedy Broncos were wearing the lumbering Packers. I gently made this observation to Brandon.

 

 “Yup.”

 

The 11 ½ point underdog Broncos broke the AFC’s curse.  

 

Mere miles away from the game, Patrick was probably getting hammered in an Ocean Beach bar. I only drank two beers because I had to set my alarm for an unholy hour so I could pedal to my bus stop on a frozen New England midwinter dawn. Low level dread, which even Dick Enberg’s mellifluous voice couldn’t cure, seeped in. By the fourth quarter, I didn’t even care about gunslinging Brett Favre’s interceptions, Terrell Owens’ knee buckling cutbacks, or three time Super Bowl loser John Elway’s late career redemption.

……………………………………………

It was 26 degrees when I unlocked my Trek at 6:13 AM. After a bike augmented Arctic blast smacked me in the face, it felt like 26 below. My eyes watered. My face hurt. It was still just getting light. A thin sheet of black ice covered the roads. Snowbanks partitioned the sidewalks. Hungover Super Bowl revelers drove by and probably thought, “Is he fucking insane?”

 

It seemed like only yesterday when setting my alarm for 7:45 to get dressed, brush my teeth, and go for a seven minute walk across our leafy campus to an 8AM class was the zenith of man’s inhumanity to man.

 

I locked up my bike at the rack outside the library and waited in the cold.

 

It still beat being home alone with nowhere to go. 

………………………………………

“May I have your attention everyone, we’re having a meeting! Mr. Trapp is here! Please come to the lunchroom,” Cindy yelled.

 

Meeting? They have meetings here?

 

CSB’s Wethersfield office was a mythical mansion on the hill most Industries clients had never seen, so an appearance from the Executive Director down here in the catacombs was shocking. Then again doesn’t The Pope sometimes visit Bolivia? 

 

Clients, with their canes and dogs, filed into the lunchroom which housed five rows of tables, a snack machine, a soda machine, and a coffee machine serving the world’s worst coffee. It tasted like toxic sludge dipped in dishwater. I grabbed myself a cup.

 

“Thank you for coming, everyone. I wanted to give you guys a chance to share any concerns you may have or offer suggestions on how we may better serve you,” Mr. Trapp said.

 

Instead of standing by the vending machines in front, he made the bold choice to stand on the side, which forced everyone to turn their chairs or crane their necks to see him—assuming they could see him at all. Did he wish to mark his apex predator territory? To remain closer to the exit at all times? Or did he figure, “You people are blind. What fucking difference does it make?”

 

From your legally blind narrator’s vantage point about 10 feet away, he appeared to be a tall 40-something gentleman with a goatee gruffer than his voice. Short, thin, clean shaven, balding Jim stood to his right: the perfect beta foil.   

 

“Yes, I have a question.”

 

“Your name, sir?” 

 

“Willie.”

 

“Good morning.”

 

Willie was a portly black gentleman whose chuckle and southern drawl sounded like Dr. Hibbert from The Simpsons.

 

“Yes, can you tell me what your view is on us forming a union? A representative came here a few years ago but it seemed like it all just got squashed.”

 

“Well, we’d like to think we are your union. Any issues you have, we are always here to help. But as far as an official union, that’s something you would need to organize on your own-- off work grounds.”

 

Hands raised.

 

“Yes, Barbara,“ Jim whispered.

 

“Hi, can you do something about Theresa? She’s always touching me on the van! I tell her to quit it but she won’t stop! The whole way here AND the whole way home! She just touches me!”

 

“Well, that’s something you may need to address with the van driver. Yes, sir.”

 

“Go ahead Bruce,” Jim silently urged.

 

Bruce was portly and gray.

 

“Hello. Has there been any consideration of us getting a pension?”

 

“Well, that’s definitely something we can address and consider if that’s feasible.”

 

“Yes, Marisol.” Jim said.  
 

“Um, yeah, hi. Sometimes we run out of pens and there’s no one to refill them. Bobbi and the other staff will be outside smoking. Oh and I’m going to beat up Sam!”

 

Laughter.

 

“Well, Jim will speak to them about that. Thank you for mentioning it. I’m glad we can have this open dialogue. We want to make sure you guys are receiving the best work accommodation possible. That’s why we’re moving into the new building in Windsor where we will all be under the same roof. This should be best for all of us, no matter what articles you might have readd in The Hartford Courant.”

 

Moving? How do I get to Windsor? Article? Damnit. When was that? I needed to stop skipping to sports and entertainment. Just this morning I read about the NFC’s Super Bowl run having ended but would Titanic ever sink at the box office? Why was The Courant writing articles? Was our open dialogue a shotgun wedding?

 

Willie again:

 

“Are we going to get new machines? The sleeve machine breaks down and then I have to wait sometimes 45 minutes or more for Mario to come around. Same with the sewing machines. And the T-shirt machines. Do we need an hourly wage? Is piecemeal pay fair?”  

 

“Excellent question. I will definitely have Jim look into this”.

 

I guess Jim was a real miracle worker.

 

“This was great! We should do this more often. I’m thinking maybe we can check in quarterly?”

 

Quarterly? Was this a Fortune 500 company after all?

 

Bruce sat back down at his sewing machine and supplied the meeting minutes. 

 

 “What a bunch of bullshit!”

…………………………………………….

Chris, Mike, and Dave lived downstairs. Weed smell wafted up through the paper thin floors along with 24/7 Phish. No one else. Not even Widespread Panic. Deep Banana Blackout? The String Cheese Incident? No. And always live recordings because Phishheads wouldn’t get caught dead listening to their studio work. Phish was The Grateful Dead if they went to college. Instead of spiky, twangy, sweet, shitkicker guitar, they delivered smooth, warm, thick, sweet, jazzy guitar. Instead of singing about a secondhand acquaintanceship with Satan, snowblind mass transit employees, and gunned down outlaws, Phish sang of Golgi apparatuses, AC/DC bags, and samples in jars. I’m pretty sure more 18-26 year old males looked up “recursive” in a Merrian-Webster dictionary between 1994 and 1998 than in any prior epoch in human history. Phish’s Staffordville Road omnipresence meant easy listening music wasn’t just for stuffing boxes. Things were super mellow. It was medicine for a bad trip. Even their covers were smoothed over: all the icy existential dread was microwaved out of Life On Mars, the sweaty south of France bordello sleaze of Loving Cup was waxed and scrubbed, and the “cucumber in my pants” cock rock of Good Times, Bad Times received a sonic vasectomy. Phish invited you in from the cold to chill by a warm fire in a Vermont log cabin with hot cocoa—and weed. Maybe some moly. Shrooms if it was a Friday night. Did this music mean anything? Was Phish more nihilistic than Trent Reznor could even dream of? To non-acid users, it sometimes seemed that way. But it was all groovy, man. Trent’s nihilism was like cold steel pressing against your soul (as if you still had one) but Trey and company’s detached, goofy meaninglessness was a hemp necklace wrapped around you by a cute girl in a peasant dress selling veggie burritos and Helping Phriendly Books outside SPAC.

 

Pav chained himself to the couch waiting for Renee’s call--and he hated people so there was also that--but Brandon and I hung out downstairs.

 

Inspired by chemical and musical muses, our phriends boldly explored topics that have tantalized scientists, philosophers, and theologians for millennia.

 

“Dude, The Big Bang is a scam. It doesn’t tell us shit,” Mike opined. “All this matter got packed together and exploded. But where did that shit come from in the first place?”

 

“Nothing in nature can be created or destroyed,” Dave confirmed.

 

“Was the matter always there? If it was, it just shows that nothing ever began. It was eternal. There’s no “in the beginning.” But people can’t wrap their heads around that shit, man.”

 

“Or matter and all that shit was just scrunched together leftovers from a prior universe,” outside the box thinker Chris said. “Instead of everything spreading apart and expanding (Split Open And Melt, Red Rocks 8/4/96, played on the stereo) everything got stuck together by some magnetic force until it got so tight it blew the fuck up.”

 

“Yeah, dude. Hindus are right and we’re just repeating a new cycle in a never-ending pattern that’s existed for eternity. This is only the most recent universe, man.” 

 

“So everything is drifting apart? Gravity is this super glue holding it together—for now--but the force from the Big Bang is wearing it away more and more.”

 

“Yeah, the universe is going to fall apart and die. That’s heavy shit, dude.”

 

Thus Sprach Zarathustra played. This funky cover excised the discomfiting eerie majesty of a Nietzsche dialectic, Wagner crescendo, or Kubrick sci-fi epic.

 

“Until a new universe gets created.”

 

“With another Big Bang?”

 

“Probably, man. But if everything tears apart, what would put it back together again?”

 

“Dark energy.”

 

The plot thickened. But they had drained the bong and Mystery Science Theater was about to come on, so they ended on a cliffhanger.

………………………………………

“I am going to burn this place to the ground. I will get a match and light it on fire. QUIT IT! Gasoline, kerosene, nitroglycerine. I’m going to get them all. This place will be in flames. A pile of ashes. CUT THE SHIT!!! This place will be gone.”

 

It didn’t seem like Mr. Trapp’s town hall meeting had the morale boosting effect he had hoped.  

 

Did I just make a new best friend?

 

Aspiring arsonist Jackie sat at the table behind me during morning break. Like Donny and Shakespeare protagonists, her innermost thoughts were spoken word events. She was a light skinned middle aged black woman with a cane. Despite her cognitive limitations, she somehow possessed a PhD chemist’s encyclopedic knowledge of explosives and just what to do with them. Maynard James Keenan dreamed of death by water, Jackie by fire.

 

You get the kerosene, I’ll light the match!

 

Two tables over, Willie held court.  

 

“Do you know what I heard? I was talking to Cindy. They’re investigating Mr. Trapp.”

 

“Who?” sweet, gap toothed Judy asked.

 

“The Attorney General. Blumenthal. They say he promoted this gal he’s doing the deed with five times without one job interview. She’s his Executive Secretary. Probably makes $60,000 a year!”

 

“That dirty dog!”

 

“And that’s not the half of it. He screamed at one of the secretaries and told her to “pick up your fucking phone!” She went home that afternoon and had a miscarriage.”

 

“No!”

 

“And they say he likes to touch the gals. He gives them neck massages even if they don’t ask for them.”

 

To Melissa? This creep will pay.

 

“That sleazebucket!”

 

“And do you know Steve? He used to work here. His hands don’t work so he reads Braille with his tongue. Trapp said, “The girls must love him.”

 

“Oh no he didn’t!!!”

 

“And he walked away from a client in the middle of a conversation and left him talking just for laughs!” 

 

“That filthy pig! Ooooo they better get him! God is watching. Judgment is coming, yes sir! Judgment Day will come!”

……………………...

Athena struggled to adapt to our new home. Unlike North Eagleville Road, Staffordville Road/Route 44 was a thoroughfare which ran all the way to Nebraska. Brandon still didn’t leash her. I want to think he valued her freedom, but he probably figured a leashed Rottweiler was less scary. So Athena, not exactly the goddess of canine wisdom, chased cars in the middle of the road. From my room I would hear burnt rubber, “Athena! Get the fuck back here!” a smack, and a whimper. Athena and Brandon both live to the end of this story. I can’t understand how.

 

Prodigy’s Smack My Bitch Up was a musical handshake to Brandon’s soul. It served double duty as a pack leader inspirational anthem and a means of seduction with his other pet: freshman Danielle. (They “made love” she possibly imagined, God help her). I’d hear footsteps, his door closing, and this ode to bitch smacking blasting on repeat for the next half hour. Maybe 25 minutes. Or 20. Brandon probably wasn’t a big foreplay guy. Definitely not a cuddler.

 

Afterwards, they sat on the tan living room sectional watching Pav’s favorite player Bo Outlaw and the Magic battle the Knicks on TNT. Why does everyone do this? The obligatory post-coital roommate social hour, as if that was the reason for her visit. Maybe Brandon just helped with her Econ homework with his 110-decibel stereo?   

 

“Patrick Ewing is one ugly motherfucker,” Brandon said.

 

“The Missing Link?” Pav said.

 

“Yep. Would you date Patrick Ewing?” he asked Danielle.

 

“Nooooo-a! I only have eyes for you.” She play-punched him on the arm.

 

Oh God. Danielle, Danielle, resist his bitch beating charms. This was like when you lose control of your bike and realize you’re about to take a spill but it’s too late to stop it. Except Danielle didn’t even realize she hit a pebble yet. Hopefully she would get out of this relationship with just a skinned knee and a commitment to wearing a helmet.   

 

On the other hand, boyfriend material Pav talked to Renee every single night.

 

“So how are you doing?.....What kind of food do they serve?.....I talked to my lawyer today…….Do they let you out during the day?.........keep your spirits up, it’s going to be fine…..Okay talk to you tomorrow.”

 

Hold your calls. I think we have the 20th Century’s most convincing love story. Ladies, find a man who will accept your collect calls from prison.

 

“Hey man, are you going to be on the phone much longer?” he would say, his speech getting pressured, “I’m expecting a call from Renee.”

 

I thought he was just a friend with promotional aspirations, but when I floated, “Pav and Renee are just friends, right?” to Brandon on our way to the packie (he had just declared Pearl Jam’s new tune In Hiding an “awful song” but I thought it might benefit from repeat listens) he said, “I don’t think so. He’s tapping that.”

 

Sweet Danielle better not run afoul of the law. Collect calls? Yeah right. She’d find herself on Brandon’s blocked caller list faster than he could find another starry eyed recent high school graduate to serenade with hymms about self-actualized pimps.  

………………………………………

My great uncle Al (who I never met) had ocular albinism. He passed this recessive gene to my mom (perfect eyesight) who passed it to my brother and I (legally blind). If she gave birth to girls, they wouldn’t have been blind (only moms can pass it, only boys can inherit it) and it was only 50/50 with us. But nature’s Roulette wheel hit twice. I can’t say this ever made me mad. It would be like punching the wind. My hair is strawberry blond, my eyes are dark blue, and my skin is beige, but I guess I’m still an albino—an albino carrying a stranger’s genetic baton onto his Peter Pan bus to work every morning.

 

The bus was 50 minutes in first class before switching to coach for your connecting flight (if airplanes crawled) to Shield Street. Peter Pan buses had soft comfy gray recliners while CT Transit’s seats were faded blue double seaters which forced you to rub legs with strangers. Peter Pan’s bank and insurance company middle managers contrasted with CT Transiters “eclectic” clientele who occasionally marketed Percs and Bennies while supplies last for a low, low price or overshared their plans to break into their ex-wife’s house and kidnap “my” kids. Peter Pan was a library, CT Transit was a frat party. The impacts of suburban sprawl and spacious seating led Peter Pan riders to usually stick with “Good morning” and “Have a good night” whereas CT Transit riders chatted and laughed like the workshop clients. 

 

I remained silent on both buses and read The Ultimate Guitar Handbook: a 543 page encyclopedia of chords, scales, and time signatures. I tried to memorize the various positionings for a E major 7th sus 4 add9 augmented 6th until my frontal lobe short circuited. There’s no way Green Day played that in Basket Case, right? Unless you saw shitfaced Slash tell bemused Kurt Loder about his visit to a snake farm in Rio, you would swear only a Mozart, Euclid, and Einstein scientifically engineered hybrid superhuman could even dream of playing the opening riff to Back Off Bitch.

 

The book turned a playground into a labyrinth. It was for fans of Dream Theater, who Dan’s guitar playing friend Chris thought were amazing while Nirvana sucked. “All he does is play power chords!” But I liked Smells Like Teen Spirit a lot more than Metropolis Part 1: The Miracle. Instead of relying on the safety net of musical math equations, maybe true art comes from jumping off diving boards blindfolded and hoping the pool has water.   

 

One day I overheard my dorm neighbor Paul say, “Colin will play something that sounds like music—and then it doesn’t.” Because Colin wished he could check if he was playing it right in the back of a  textbook that didn’t exist.  

 

While sealing T-shirts, I realized the Ionian, Dorian, Locrian, Mixolydian, Lydian, Aeolian, Phyrigian modes all have the same full step, full step, half step, full step, full step, and half step intervals. They just start on a different rung of the ladder. Why didn’t the book, you know, lead with that? Like postmodern novelists, did they confuse you on purpose? Was this to elbow out anyone the genetic gatekeepers didn’t already stop at the door?

…………………………………

Henrik Ibsen said if a gun is introduced in Act 1, it will go off in Act 3. I didn’t introduce a gun, but I did introduce a snake. Any guesses what’s coming next? I’m afraid so: it’s feeding time.

 

Pav transformed overnight from  brooding loner to event planner. He invited the boys downstairs--possibly the first time he ever spoke to them. Only snakes can unite hippies and headbangers. Well, weed too.     

 

“Hey, I’m going to feed a mouse to Jaeger later, do you guys want to check it out at 8:00!?”

 

“Cool, man,” Mike said over—I’m not kidding here-- The Squirming Coil, Red Rocks, 6/9/95. 

 

We crowded into the kitchen.

 

“How often do you feed him?” Chris asked.

 

“Every two weeks.”

 

“Where did you get the mouse?”

 

“From the pet store.”

 

“Did you tell them what you were buying it for?”

 

“Fuck no, dude.”

 

Pav took the unsuspecting victim out of a ziplock bag and dropped him in the cage. Okay, I can hear you from here: “I read this idiot’s crappy story until the snake ate a mouse and that’s when I was like I can’t even. And I looked the other way on a LOT of stuff before that!” So I won’t give you a Jack Londonesque description of this savage scene from nature. I get it. I read Call Of The Wild in 7th grade too and all I remember is, “Buck slashed his jugular. Blood gushed in torrents.”

 

“Does the mouse know it’s over when he gets dropped in the cage?” I asked.

 

“I don’t know, probably,” Pav said distractedly.   

 

What a stupid question.

 

The mouse soon learned he had not been adopted as a pet.

 

Maybe this was a love story. Pav’s beloved python, whom he tenderly wrapped around his neck nightly, was hungry so he fed him, not unlike a mother who draws her newborn baby to her milky breast!

 

And what do you do when you find a mouse? Get a mouse trap and kill it. we adopted cats as pets for their mouse murdering ways! But we also make them pets. We create Mickey Mouse. We just can’t decide how we feel about them.

 

But the verdict is in on Satan’s secretary who tempted Eve and brought sin into the world. Swashbuckling Indiana Jones feared slithering snakes more than Nazis. We feel no kinship with snakes. (Except Pav and Slash). Snakes are remnants from the pre-human Earth when reptiles ruled the wordless void. Unlike overly emotional mammals, they embody pure cold detachment. They are poison. Suffocation. Jägermeister bottles.  

 

“Do you want to put Jager around your neck for a while?” Pav asked me a week later.

 

The answer is no. Just fucking say no.

 

“Sure……maybe for a minute.”

 

He was still running on a full stomach, right? Do they have stomachs?

 

He draped him around me. And Jaeger sat there. Just as Wham! implored in the Wake Me Up Before You Go Go Video, he chose life. A year’s supply of food just sitting right there! The biggest dead mouse ever! Maybe to their owners, snakes offer death row pardons that beat anything a facelicking puppy or purring kitty can ever offer them.     

 

“Can snakes can smell fear?” I asked.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Can you take him off?”

 

“Sure no problem, man” Pav said as he lost whatever remaining respect he had for me.

………………………………...

I stepped off my bus one Thursday and walked next door to the Co-Op. They arranged books by courses. I browsed aimlessly until I saw Gulliver’s Travels under Renaissance and Modern Literature 1103. Somehow, I graduated high school and earned an English degree without reading it.

 

Ugggh. Swift was the most savage prose prosecutor of them all. I was with him on Lilliputians: sure, humans are puny, petty shrimps who imagine themselves Noble and Mighty. Big Enders vs. Little Enders? Check. But then Gulliver lands in Brobdingrag, the land of sixty foot giants, and sees a woman breastfeeding. Her “monstrous” six- foot breast with its “spots, pimples, and freckles'' disgusts him more than a snake eating a mouse. And just to drive home the satire for Duke basketball fans, he notes that fair English maidens would look the same through a magnifying glass. Beauty is an illusion of the partially blind.

 

He was almost as bad as Faulker, who said women are a “delicate equilibrium of periodic filth between two moons balanced.” I assume Faulkner never even bothered applying at Hallmark.  

 

Swift goes on to say alcohol raises our hopes and diminishes our fears. Cheers! But it also gives us diseases which make our lives unpleasant and short, we stop using our indoor voice, we laugh uproariously at stuff that just isn’t funny, we puke on our friend’s girlfriend’s shoe in amusement park parking lots after Ronnie Van Zandt-less Skynard shows, we pee into an empty two liter Sprite bottle in New York City rush hour traffic before Pink Floyd shows at Giants Stadium where a random kid pukes on our sock in a case of undeniable cosmic karma (The Puke Equilibrium Theory), we invite hookers into hotel rooms someone else rented, we disappoint callow co-eds and practiced professionals alike in the bedroom, we fracture our right foot leaping from top bunks, we slurringly proclaim our eternal voicemailed love to crushes we barely know, we scribble John Wesley Harding era Dylan lyrics on our door’s note pad, we lose our friends at Woodstock ’94 and sleep in a hostel for concertgoing lost sheep and take a bus home from Albany smelling of raw sewage, we kick in our dorm’s front window because a floormate did it and it looked so fun, our RA asks us “Do you remember passing out last night in the hallway on the girls’ floor with a lit cigarette in your hand?”, we awake on strange couches and rush home to erase Magic Marker renderings of erect penises and elephantine testicles, we frequent dance clubs, we start to think Salt N’ Peppa has some decent jams, we suffer Sunday night insomnia, and we crank our amp to 11 while learning guitar until the exasperated girl living below says, “You’re not even that good!”

 

Okay I’m paraphrasing Swift.  

 

And after all this fun, he says we wake up feeling “sick and dispirited.” Until, Sisyphus like, we do it all over again!

 

This hit a little too below the belt, frankly. Attack haughty kings and pretentious philosophers all day long, but can we leave beer and boobs out of this?

 

Never let a clergyman near a pen. He’ll say nothing is sacred.

………………………………………

“Mr. McDonough! Good morning!”

 

Phil wore a Harley hat with a Harley sweatshirt. I think Big Santa was good to him. 

 

“Good morning,” I mumbled, my Dunkin’ coffee in hand. Never a morning person to begin with, even after a two-hour commute I was a zombie until the caffeine kicked in. Like any responsible adult, I was becoming a drug addict.

 

“My guy is showing up at 10 so we need to get these brochures packed up. We’ve been cutting it too close lately. We can’t make them wait.”

 

“Okay. I’ve been going a little slower like you said so I don’t miscount.”

 

“That’s good. But we also have to be quick. Can you get here before 8:15?”

 

“I can try, but I have a pretty long commute from Storrs.”

 

I tried to balance speed and accuracy like they were opposite ends of a zero-gravity see-saw. I pulled brochures from skids, counted them, tied them in rubber bands,, and placed them in plastic crates. 50 Hammonasset State Parks, 75 Dinosaur State Parks, 50 Wadsworths, 50 Mark Twain Houses. Twain lived in Hartford while writing Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, but he was from Hannibal, Missouri. Tom and Huck were also Missouri natives. Twain was just a Connecticut tourist for 17 years. (The Whalers’ NHL tenure was also 17 years!) But never mind that because if we couldn’t make him our own, Michael Bolton and James Van Der Beek would become our most revered native sons and that was just humiliating.

 

My sciatica often made bending and standing painful, but it never occurred to me to ask for a chair. 

………………………………………

I was introduced to the term sciatica by my gray haired, flannel shirt wearing Modern Novel professor J. D. O’Connor. He treated literary study like Navy Seal training. While we read Anne Beattie’s Chilly Scenes Of Winter, he nearly pulled his own back out stretching to tell us he taught her everything she knew while she earned her PhD at UConn. One of the book’s characters had back problems.

 

“Is anyone familiar with back conditions?”

 

Silence.  

 

“Sciatica?”

 

No hands were raised.

 

“Did anyone read the text?”

 

Tick. Tock.

 

Gen X slackers were blowing off his star pupil!? Without another word, he gathered his notebook and paperback, walked to the door, and slammed it behind him.

 

We sat frozen for ten very long seconds: a chilly scene of winter all its own on this bright cold February morning.

 

“Okay, well I guess we get to leave early!” a kid in the fourth row said. Everyone laughed. Except me. I wished I said it.

 

A week later I took a floppy disk to the library computer lab. Instead of analyzing the book (which I did read!) I decided to write a five-page essay about the incident.

 

“Macho stunts like that aren’t cool. It’s what you might expect Bobby Knight to do with his Indiana basketball players, but English professors should be above dumb jock stuff. We’re not pounding the glass against Michigan State here, we’re not crashing the boards against Wisconsin, we’re examining alienation in the modern American family through a crazy mom, a creepy stepdad, and a guy hopelessly in love with a married librarian in Utah. Didn’t you sneeringly say Holden Caulfield didn’t need “the kind of ‘tough love’ you might get from Coach Calhoun”? Aren’t you the Jim Calhoun of The English Department? Maybe people had midterms? Or they were planning to catch up later? Or they just didn’t know what sciatica was? Maybe only old people know that. Most people grow out of slamming doors by age 16. What if the cleaning lady started doing that anytime someone poured coffee into the garbage can? She’d get fired. Cleaning ladies can’t get tenure.”  

 

That was my first paragraph.

 

Obviously, I stopped going to class. But then I made my most insane move yet: I SHOWED UP FOR THE FINAL. I dropped off my booklet and prayed to God he wouldn’t say anything.

 

“Do you know who Anthony Burgess is?”

 

Oh fuck! He said something.  

 

What a random question. Was this a trap? I read A Clockwork Orange the previous summer, but rather than outlining my summer reading list, I sheepishly said, “Yes.”

 

“He’s legally blind. He’s written many novels. You have no excuse.”

 

“Okay, thanks.” I half-smiled.

 

“Hang in there.”

 

Postscript #1: he mailed my essay/screed to my home address two weeks into summer vacation! He attached a note, “I’m too old to read through all of this. But you seem to have a curious affinity for the cleaning lady.” I was too young to read the rest. I rushed downstairs and tossed it in the trash. For the first time, I wished we had a garbage disposal. 

 

Postscript #2: He gave me a C.

 

But I was never quite the same. I worried about running into him in the Arjona halls. Would Homer and Milton references follow? Borges?? I looked up his office in the directory to avoid that dangerous hallway. I triple checked professor’s names before signing up for courses. I prayed he didn’t teach grad courses until the catalog said of course he fucking did. Was the English Department big enough for J.D. and me? Was he—more than Nabokov and Mr. Chunk Of Change—the reason I wasn’t in grad school? 

 

What did he mean by “you have no excuse” anyway? No excuse for being such a weepy little devotcha? Or no excuse for not becoming a writer like Anthony Burgess to sublimate ultraviolence into art, not just horrorshow double-spaced diatribes about door slammers sprinkled with tender odes to long suffering janitorial staff?  

…………………………………………….

Lest you think I’m trying to convince you I was a badass rebel who told bullies to “go ahead, make my day” like a Flaubert reading Dirty Harry, know I’m a fraud.

 

During October of my senior year of high school, I rested my head against my left hand and laid on my side with my boombox placed on a chair beside my bed. Slow Saturday night. I would have been watching Jose Rijo dominating A’s hitters with his disappearing slider as the Reds pulled off a shocking four game World Series sweep, but my stepfather—whose voice couldn’t have been more nasally if you surgically attached tweezers to his nose-- usurped the den even though their room had a TV too. It had always been Patrick and I’s territory.

 

My mom said she’d be home from her friend Andrea’s house by 9PM. (Jerry had no friends). But she got home at 9:14. I heard the garage door opening and Jerry frantically rushing down the stairs. Then shouting. I drowned it out with The Smithereens’ A Girl Like You. Until I heard shattering glass.

 

My heart started pounding. That fucking piece of shit! I told myself to run downstairs, but I froze. I went to the den, sat on the floor a foot from the TV, and turned to the game. They materialized on the couch.

 

“I just want to talk about this. You never want to talk,” Jerry said.

 

“I don’t want to talk. You’re sick!”

 

For weeks, months………..years I replayed this incident. I imagined running down to the kitchen. Sometimes I push him against the microwave, sometimes I take a swing, sometimes I just menacingly wag my finger and say, “I’ve been living here a lot longer than you and you are a fucking GUEST IN MY HOUSE! You are not to act this way EVER AGAIN, do you fucking understand me? If you can’t behave, you can get out and never come back! I’ll help you pack!” 

 

Did he brainwash me into thinking he was invincible? Did I not want to make the house feel even more suffocating? Or was I just a hopeless pussy? While I rehearsed my retroactive tongue lashings, I talked aloud like Donnie or Jackie. For the rest of senior year I hid in my room, listened to the radio, did my homework under my desk lamp, and played Super Mario Brothers–seduced by its optimistic worldview which promised that even after you die from pitfalls, trap doors, and monsters, you can start the game all over, remember to avoid them next time and eventually use your hard-won experience to rescue Princess Peach from fire breathing Bowser. Why couldn’t life be more like the Mushroom Kingdom?     

 

The following summer, Patrick watched Wayne’s World in the den. I was in my room. Mom and Jerry were arguing in their room. Patrick ran into their room.

 

“Get away from me, Patrick! I’ve been dealing with assholes like you my whole life!”

 

“Patrick is not an asshole! He’s my son!” my mom said through tears. 

 

“Did I hear her say, ‘And that’s when you hit me’, Jerry!? Only pussies hit girls. Oh! And Colin told me she came home a few minutes late one night with a vase and you SMASHED it!”

 

My mom cried even more. The walls of the house caved in. I wished I was a million miles away. I grabbed my Walkman and went on a three hour walk.

 

My mom filed for divorce six months later. “I had to think about what I was doing to my two sons.” Patrick did somersaults. I became clinically depressed. She looked younger than her fifty years, but she was twice divorced. She was starting the game over but would she know to avoid the dragons next time? 

 

“Mom is a pretty woman. She will find someone better.” Pat said.

 

A week after Jerry moved out, I went to Bonanza Steakhouse with my dad, my step-mom Marie, and my little half-brothers. Sitting in our crowded booth, I thought about my mom home alone watching TV while my dad had this beautiful second family. Instead of a newspaper, this time I used the menu to hide my tears until I excused myself and let it out in a Men’s Room stall.

 

“I think I’m getting a cold.”

 

I wrote a thank you letter to my Florida grandparents for their Christmas savings bond, but—as I was so wont to do in letters-- I veered wildly off topic. The world was a cold, gray, desolate wasteland of nothingness. Or was I more dramatic than that? This got right back to my parents, of course, and triggered an emergency meeting. My dad did something truly startling: wearing a brown leather jacket, he burst into tears and hugged me. He mailed me a letter a few days later. “I have something to get off my chest.” He noted “dating women half my age” after divorcing my mom. He had dated a girl named Ramona who (unbeknownst to me at the time) was a coke addcit, but I thought she was nice! In fact, his girlfriends all seemed fine. My mom’s boyfriends never did.

 

I saw a therapist and took Prozac off and on. I only remember one thing. She said, “You are a very good looking boy.” Don’t worry, she wasn’t auditioning for an HBO crime noir-- where female therapists are always latent sex kittens-- she was just encouraging me to approach girls. I didn’t respond with, “I’ll bet you say that to all the clients” so maybe life is like Mario Brothers after all. I stuck with “thanks” and plenty of dorm closet mirror time.

 

I listened to Music Appreciation pieces on my Walkman while walking to class that semester as the bright, cold winter sun reflected off the snow and an Arctic wind blew across our hilly campus. The opening strings of The Jupiter Symphony’s icepicked their way into my soul.

 

But birds migrated north and the cherry blossoms bloomed again. I became non- compliant with my Prozac prescription and stopped seeing my therapist. ………………………………………….

Brandon’s cable box illegally unscrambled every single “pay” channel. While summoning the courage to bike though another gray winter dawn, I ate cinnamon Pop Tarts or Peanut Butter Cap’n Crunch and watched movies in ten-minute increments until, after a few weeks, I’d seen the entire thing in jumbled order. Actually an underrated way to experience films.

 

In Chasing Amy, Jason Lee wondered what was wrong with calling the Whalers “a bunch of faggots.” Honestly, this Smear The Queer alumnus was fairly numb to the term, but why stomp on the Whalers’ grave like that?? Worse than a Duke fan. Did they film the movie before they left? 

 

Astronauts in Contact searched for alien life. Jodie Foster had better chemistry with Hannibal Lecter than Matthew McConoughey in this space age love story.

 

Both films dreamed of a world where attractive lesbians instantly convert upon first contact with rugged male confidence and cleft chins. Bill Clinton wasn’t the only one from a place called Hope.

 

Our fellow illegal cable box owning downstairs phriends’ screening of Contact sparked—no pun intended—an exploration of interplanetary existence and the spacetime continuum.     

 

“Dude, life is out there,” Chris announced.

 

“Totally,” Joe seconded.

 

“But what if we see aliens through what’s that fucking thing called? The Hubble telescope? But they’re, fucking, 399 billion light years away. How do we find a spaceship to get there?” Mike wanted to know.

 

“Wormhole, dude. They teleport you to another galaxy in like 4 ninutes,” Chris said.

 

(Inspired by Phish’s Thus Sprach Zarathrustra, they’d been watching 2001: A Space Odyssey repeatedly).

 

“Yeah wormholes let you like skip billions of light years!” Mike added.

 

Were there any wormholes between Staffordville Road and the Homer Babbidge Library at 6:25 AM?

 

“So we see aliens 996 billion light years away. We find a wormhole that gets us there by 9. Will the aliens still be there?” Joe asked.

 

“Fuck yeah, dude,” Chris replied, slurping bong water six times.

 

“But we will only see their planet from  billions of years ago. We will only know there USED TO BE aliens there.”

 

“We could get there and find out they died off,” Chris or Mike said. 

 

“Or if you travel that far, do you go back in time? Maybe we find the aliens—living in the past.”

 

“I think only the light sticks around? Not the past itself?”

 

“Light is too fucking slow. Find a telescope with a fast forward button or some shit.”

 

“What if aliens are looking at us right now from 66 million light years away and they see dinosaurs? Are they like, “Fuck this Jurassic shit. I’m not getting off my couch just to watch my choice new spaceship get munched by a T-Rex.” So they smoke a bowl of Sirius Space Cadet and crash.”

 

I’m no Carl Sagan, but I’ll say this much: the boys raised more thought provoking queries than Matthew McConoughey ever did. I would have even settled for, “That’s what I like about these high school aliens. I keep getting older, but they stay the same cosmological age. Yes they do. Alraht, alraht, alraht.”

………………………………………

I turned right off Shield Street onto dead quiet New Britain Avenue. Snow flurries whitewashed and soundproofed the world. A man and a woman stood inside the bus shelter. I stood to their left. I chose getting snowed on over close contact with the general public. The wind blew horizontal snowflakes in my face.

 

The Murphy’s Law of buses is they always arrive on time in beautiful weather but are always late when it’s cold and snowing.

 

A blue #37 CT Transit bus finally arrived. Not my bus. Both shelter occupants stepped forward. The gentleman motioned. Ladies first. The woman grabbed her three bags and boarded. The driver—possibly exhausted and anxious to get this stupid shift over with or perhaps just not paying attention--closed the door and drove off. In vain did our knight in a shining, snow flecked parka cry, “Hey! That’s my bus! Stop! Stop!” his voice deadening in the echoless white silence.

 

“Fucking asshole!”

 

Through his foggy rearview mirror, the fleeing driver probably didn’t see him give him the finger.  

 

“Can you believe that shit?”

 

He kicked the coating of snow. 

 

“That’s tough. Sorry.”  

 

The next bus was due in 33 minutes.

 

I never yielded my place in line. Chivalry is dead.   

 

It was Valentine’s Day.

…………………………………………..

A week later I nose read Gulliver’s Travels at the bus stop. A man pushed his shopping cart and stopped to look at me.

 

“Need a bus token? Fifty cents. It will save you a quarter off the fare!”

 

“Um…..I guess so.”

 

Against my better judgment, I pulled out a pocketful of change and deftly handed him two quarters without looking.

 

He paused in apparent bewilderment.

 

“Ohhhhh. You can feel the ridges of the quarters!? Jesus bless you! I hope Jesus blesses someone like you!”

 

Me too.

 

I could have really blown his mind if I told him, praise Jesus, I also have Algebra II sharpened supersonic hearing, but that would have been too much for one day. 

………………………………………

We didn’t have a washing machine. Clothes piled on my floor. Would I ever wear clean clothes again? I considered drastic measures like asking Pav or Brandon to drive me to a laundromat, but I didn’t hate wearing my (non silk) boxers for the 9th time quite that much.

 

But never mind because one Sunday afternoon Brandon said, “I’m going to do laundry. Do you want to come with me?”

 

“Okay.”

 

A week before I left for college, Jerry gave me a laundry lesson in the cellar. I ignored every single word he said. (Force of habit). But how hard could it be? I’d been accepted to a Public Ivy.

 

During my third week, I filled my basket with clothes—all of them. I grabbed my Tide and hit start on a Grange Hall first floor machine. What the hell is permanent press?

 

“Were those your clothes in the machine?” a girl asked 42 minutes later. 

 

“Um, yeah. Why?”

 

”Smoke was coming out of the machine so we stopped it. We were afraid it would start a fire.“

 

“Oh really?”

 

“Yeah, you actually can’t put all of your clothes in at once.”

 

Did Jerry cover this?

 

“Oh.” (Laughs). “I guess I didn’t know that! Thanks!”

 

“We made the same mistake as freshmen.”

 

I doubted it but she was nice to say it.

 

Would I have listened to Jerry if I knew I might burn my dorm to the ground? I WANT to say yes...

 

So I listened to my Alice in Chains’ Facelift cassette and re-washed ⅓ of my clothes at a time while reading about the hippocampus and hypothalamus for Psych 101. There’s no ghost in your machine, this textbook mocked. Three batches took so long! The girls also recommended separating light and dark. There was a lot to learn.  

 

“How are things with you and Megan?” I asked Brandon over the spin cycle. No Smack My Bitch Up in weeks: a telltale sign of any faded romance.

 

“I dumped her. Chick was crazy. Too emotional. I’m so done with freshmen.”

 

We’ll see. Freshmen were to Brandon what Camel Lights and UConn were to me.

………………………………………

Slapping emanated from the stall to my left. It was getting more….. vigorous by the second.

 

“Hey, Darrell! Stop that! You can’t do that in here!” Leon said.

 

“Okay, buddy.”

 

The stall remained silent. For seven more seconds. It started back up slowly like a Gateway computer.  

 

I left immediately. 

 

You call this a resume builder?

 

What kind of a freakshow is this??

 

But while assembling pens I wondered what the privacy situation was like in group homes. Guessing not that great. Do they get their own rooms? What about bathrooms? Were those private? Maybe the workshop men’s room was poor Darrell’s only self-abusing sanctuary?

 

I was a late bloomer to this, uh, activity. I kind of, sort of did it a few times, but it was only after viewing one of HBO’s finest late night offerings that things really took flight, pardon the expression. A guy and a girl were getting to be really good friends. She lied missionary style and the dude started turning into a werewolf! (For an unforgettable decade and a half in Hollywood, scripts were instantly green lit if they featured werewolf metamorphoses–preferably while having sex with a smoking hot babe but even shooting free throws would do). Instead of becoming horror struck by this libidinous lycanthrope, the girl was pretty nonchalant about the whole thing! I went to my room, closed the door, and before I knew what hit me—again, an unfortunate word choice--I became more shocked than I would have been if I suddenly grown claws, razor sharp incisors, and non-stubbly chest hair. A strange hot, um, fluid flew out! I thought, “Ohhhhh, that’s what everyone was talking about.” I sprinted to the bathroom to wash up. My mom still washed my sheets so I needed to destroy evidence immediately.     

 

What I’m trying to say is…..what am I trying to say?

 

What I’m trying to say is group home residents are entitled to the same level of privacy as you and me. Thanks for listening.   

 

Also, HBO, would it have killed you to have shown The Accidental Tourist once in a while at 11:45PM?

 

Finally, laundry is a critical daily living skill every young man should learn.

……………………………………………

It happened.

 

I opened the front door, walked through the kitchen, exchanged “Heys” with Pav, walked down the sloping and probably about to collapse hallway and started to carelessly toss my backpack until my 20/400 best corrected visual acuity saved my life.

 

Without a care in his reptilian world, Jaeger was lounging on my bed! Nightmarish visions filled my head of the Faces of Death VHS Patrick’s friend Aaron brought over after school which featured a snake infested house. The homeowner had to kill them all, get killed, or sell his home at a steeply below market rate price. (I forgot what happened to him–Bob Romano nailed it again). 

 

Pav was cleaning the stove with a paper towel. He was a neat freak. He browbeat Brandon and I into pitching in for cleaning supplies which I felt were a complete waste of finite financial resources. 

 

“Hey Pav, um, would it be cool if Jaeger didn’t go in my room?”

 

“I’m sorry, man. I didn’t know it bothered you,” his voice rising in pitch.

 

“Yeah no problem! But yeah…..maybe I’d prefer that?”

 

Pav put Jaeger around his loving neck, his respect for having plummeted to heretofore unforeseen depths. This was the last time a Burmese python and I shared a bed, but you never know what tomorrow will bring.

…………………………………....

You took an olive-green canvas bag from a cart on your left and placed it under a big metal arm and pressed the foot lever. The machine sewed an X with a square around it which resmbled a Tic Tac Toe board. If Mr. Madden plotted this entire thing in revenge for defiling his beautiful lawn, he could not have played his hand any better.

 

Then you sewed the other side. But the machine was a relic from The Great Depression, possibly The Civil War, so the needle often got stuck for no apparent reason. A shift in barometric pressure? A mini-earthquake?

 

“Laverne, have you seen Mario? My machine is broken.” 

 

“He’s working on another machine. I’ll let him know.”

 

I stared into space for a half hour, not getting paid. They had almost as many counters as workers, so they always knew what you produced. If they got in front of a machine themselves once in a while, we probably could have produced more, but there I go again thinking.

 

With no sign of Mario after 45 minutes, a 30-something black guy named Ron came over.

 

“Hey man, Hector is off today. Want to work the sleeve machine?”

 

“Okay.”

 

This was the workshop’s apex mountain. The big leagues. The sleeve machine was another piece of state of the art antebellum technology. It sat imposingly in the middle of the factory.

 

“Here, let me show you. Just go like this.”

 

Ron believed you teach by doing it yourself, letting your pupil watch, and wondering why he fucked it up. You might think this tutorial philosophy was less common in a blind workshop, but you would be wrong.

 

Using both hands, you positioned brown cloth on a metal belt and let it go so it could slide down a conveyor belt. The machine sewed seams before the cloth fell into a large white basket. This required you to be delicate like you were handling a hooker’s boob. If you didn’t line up the cloth exactly parallel to the edge of the belt or if your hand slipped a fraction of an inch when you released it, it crumpled and became a wasted unit you didn’t get paid for. (A battalion of checkers stood to your right). There were many, many wasted units that day. I could sense Ron’s disappointment. But I got incrementally better.

 

The next day, I passed Gary in the doorway.

 

“Hi Gary, so….the machines break down a lot. Like the sewing machine. I don’t think I press it any differently but sometimes it gets stuck anyway and then Mario is too busy to come right over. Is there…..a way I can get paid for that time?”

 

“We can’t prorate it, buddy. I’m sorry. Just try to be a little more careful? I don’t know what else to tell you.”

 

“I’m telling you…sometimes they just stop working. Or if you go too fast sometimes they run out of work to give you. Could we get an hourly salary instead of getting paid piecemeal?”

 

“That might knock everyone off their SSI. I hear you but I don’t make the rules, kiddo”. He smiled. 

 

The workshop enabled poor, meek blind clients to chat about Monday Night Raw and church picnics. It gave them somewhere to go. After creating this  wonderful place for us, how could we complain about getting short changed by rusty, primordial machinery?  

 

But were we so different from “real” workplaces with their assistants to the assistant regional managers? In “competitive” work, did they create jobs for people and figure out something for them to do afterwards? Like Terry Trapp’s secretary. He promoted her five times and just happens to be banging her? Does her job fulfill any service to the blind public? I’ll bet he wasn’t paying her per fax or stapled budget report either.    

 

And what about him? He worked for SNET. Was this golfing buddy of the Governor’s the most qualified candidate to run a blind agency?

 

Everyone’s getting serviced—one way or the other. Never let us see we’re the same as the big people.  

…………………………………………

After Jonathan Swift torched the human race like Jackie dreamed of doing to the workshop, I bought Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With A Thousand Faces. That’s gotta be more positive, right? Tolland’s public access channel showed his lectures. He dressed impeccably with perfectly quaffed graying hair and a soft, gentle voice. Lolita probably uplifted his soul and deepened his love for humanity!

 

He said myths from every culture tell basically the same story: a young hero leaves home alone to face dangerous, usually supernatural trials which, after some struggle, he aces. (Though rarely does he encounter Stats 101: the serpentine water monster of the 20th Century.) He returns home and uses his newfound superpowers to save the day. 

 

Heroes can turn water into wine but you can’t even turn it into Milwaukee’s Best. St. Gabriel spoke Revelatory Words to Mohammed atop Mt. Hira but he gave everyone else in Medina the silent treatment. The hero can smash a flying orb blindfolded with his lightsaber but my workshop mate Barbara couldn’t go to the bathroom without her seeing eye dog. Is the hero so busy being big that he just makes you feel small?

 

And can the hero ever really go home again? My dad exchanged the safety of insurance for the bullet flying north end of Hartford. Instead of laurels and parades, he got two divorces.  

 

“It’s because cops are domineering.” My Dad is soft spoken. But does heroism have an invisible off switch? He came home, turned on his scanner and the 6 o’clock news to hear about shootings, stabbings, robberies, overdoses, murders, and drownings in Hartford. Sometimes he was interviewed. He would say, “Listen!” if we were still talking. Did Hartford ever allow him go home? Or did Hartford become his only true home?  

 

And don’t forget all the overtime cops must work to pay the mortgage. It’s cheaper to milk the ones they have than hire new ones. Could you design a better job to get between families?

 

The hero is never warned of these things. The brochures promise only service and protection, being all you can be, X ray vision, never bad dreams and joint custody.

 

We actually got to know my dad better after the divorce. One night per week, we stayed at whichever apartment he lived in that year. We ate at Shady Glen, D’Aneglo’s, or Augie And Ray’s and went to a movie. Okay, he kind of brought his work to the movie theater as well. The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller had to wait until they hit Video Galaxy’s shelves. We saw Hard To Kill and Marked For Death. Dirty Harry implored thugs to go ahead and make his day. Was Charles Bronson over the hill? Not at the Manchester Parkade Hoyt’s Cinema 8 he wasn’t. He charmed audiences in Death Wish 4: The Crackdown and Messenger of Death! And don’t forget Chuck Norris: a dead ringer for my geometry teacher Mr. Crabtree, who I wanted to karate chop when he pop quizzed us on isosceles triangles. 

 

Patrick and I opened his bedroom window in January to avoid heat stroke. (Never offer him free heat with the rent). Patrick was a snorer, a tosser, a turner, and a sheet hogger, so no one in their right mind wanted to share a bed with him. I slept in a  sleeping bag on the bedroom floor and my dad slept on the couch. He gave up his king sized bed. No divorce judge orders that. This is why he’s a hero. Everyday kindnesses pick up the broken pieces left behind by mythological heroes after they go to their glorious early graves.

 

But my biggest hero growing up was Patrick. I didn’t want to get straight A’s, be Student Council President, or join Scribes like Mrs. Fitzgerald wanted me to. The band and drama club? Out of the question. I wanted to be a black leather clad (although I might settle for a bleached jean jacket) menthol smoking burnout. But I lacked his talent for it. I was afraid of getting in trouble! I started growing my hair but, like all wannabe rebel posers, I settled for a mullet. And after Patrick and my mom screamed at each other for two straight years, my job became protecting her sanity. By not getting in trouble. 

………………………………………….

Placing me across the street from a bar was like naming Brandon the Director of freshman orientation. I had even walked 4.7 miles to Ellington’s Casey’s Café a few summers earlier out of boredom. I powerwalked it in hour and 15 minutes. But they closed early on slow Tuesday nights. I didn’t really think it through. Last call lights blared the instant they handed me my Sam Adams. I didn’t come all this way for my health, so I pounded it and pounded another for the road.

 

Schmedley’s was Mansfield’s Casey’s: Dales and Kyles revved their Harleys to impress the Dawns and Tammys grabbing their stomachs. But my brother hadn’t been tossed out of Schmedley’s even once so it didn’t quite feel like home. Cheapskate taxpayers ($300 per month—gee thanks) kept me home most nights unless I heard a cover band playing Pride And Joy or Simple Man. It beat watching the Bulls pummel the Bucks while Pav plotted Noah’s murder.

 

Going to a bar alone is like going to confessional.  

 

“Hi, I’ll have a Miller Lite?”

 

“Sure, coming right up!”

 

20-22 mintues later.

 

“Another Miller Lite, hon?”. This is an informal priest. Also, they let women become priests. 

 

“Yes, thanks.”

 

17 minutes later.

 

“Another one?”, but this time there’s no friendly uplift to her voice.   

 

“Actually I’ll have a Guiness.”

 

She comes back, hands you your change and coolly says, “Thanks” without making eye contact.

 

Our relationship really soured somewhere between beer #2 and #3. Something I said? Was it switching up beers? They seem to hate that. I didn’t stiff her on the tip if that’s what you’re thinking. Did she see me in the corner by myself? Other parties have had ample time to arrive, but it’s become painfully obvious I’ve either been stood up or I’m binge drinking alone. And how many more beers was I planning to order?? I’m a sinner. This has become a cold business transaction like administering the Eucharist or applying for a bank loan. No longer the man Tiffany once thought I was, I walk home.  

 

But sometimes I walked over with Brandon….

 

“Guiness is the best beer in the world.”

 

I knew we would agree on something eventually.

 

“It’s like a whole meal. I don’t have to drink too many.”

 

Really? I do.

 

“Yeah, totally.”

 

At Celeron, a dreadlocked trustafarian played Sympathy For The Devil on an acoustic. E, D, A the whole song if you don’t worry about the solo or the bongos. But obviously they fucking worried about the bongos. If you didn’t own a hackey sack, a nuclear grade stereo, or a bongo set you were a zero. A kid in the corner banged away. A blonde girl sat on the couch.

 

“It was so hard to write a song!” she said.

 

Tell me about it. I needed to go home and try. But they instinctively understood no one wants to hear your own shit so they played devil’s advocate Altamont anthems that cause stabbings. (And always say Jane’s Addiction’s version is better).

 

We went across the street to Carriage House where Brandon’s TEP brothers Miguel and Evans lived. And Greek basically lived there. TEP was the stoner frat which hosted Saturday night X-Lot bashes on Spring Weekend as their house sat down a short path to the woods. 

 

We stood out on the deck.

 

“Dude, check out this jacket I just got. Sweet, huh,” said a short, loud kid. 

 

“Dude, I got 4th row seats to see Rage, it’s going to be sick,” he added. 

 

 “Dude, that chick gave me her number. She’s hot.”

 

Tyler was less a person than an infomercial. I went back inside. But he was still holding court when someone opened the sliding glass door.  

 

 “That kid is basically blind.”

 

I hate these situations. He HAD to be talking about me. But doubt crept in. What if….I don’t know…..his Wings Over Storrs coworker was basically blind? Maybe he just saw blues rock virtuoso Jeff Healey at Husky Blues. I pretended I was also deaf.    

 

“What’s up with Tyler?” I asked on the ride home. “Does he even go to UConn?”

 

“Nope. He flunked out. But he’s from Storrs.”

 

“So he’s a townie?”

 

“Yep.”

 

“Did you hear him say, ‘That kid is basically blind’. I think I fucking hate him.”

 

“No. Well that’s stupid. I mean….so you don’t see as well, who cares? I wouldn’t let it bother you.”

 

“Yeah, I know. It doesn’t matter. No big deal.”

 

Townies. They’re losers anyway, right? Then again, after more than a year since my last class in Storrs, what was I still doing here? Was I becoming an adopted townie?

 

Honorary?

………………………………………..

The workshop’s attendance policy was shall we say non-military, but you didn’t get paid if you weren’t there and I was already barely scraping by. But when the wind chill was 8 below zero or it was snowing, sleeting, or freezing raining, piecemeal slave wages didn’t seem like enough bang for my buck. If they closed due to a snowstorm you didn’t get paid. Nothing is more cutthroat than sheltered work.  

 

I want you to know I at least tried. I would get up, get dressed, and go outside to unlock my bike. Sometimes I even rode against the wind, my cheeks in agonizing pain, before I said, “Fuck this” and turned around for a lovely leeward ride home. Other times I never quite reached the bike unlocking phase.

 

Nothing makes you happier than crawling back to bed on winter mornings. I would get undressed, get under my warm blankets, and let the sound of wind rattling the shutters and sleet tapping the windows lull me back to sleep.

…………………………………       

I headed straight to the Registrar’s Office at the end of a long hallway in the Wilbur Cross Building. A woman opened the sliding plastic window.

 

“Can I help you?”

 

“Yes, I think I’d like to apply for grad school. Is there a……form I need to fill out?”

 

“Please complete this and someone will speak with you directly.”

 

“Speak? Oh……..okay.”

 

Eight minutes elapsed. I had just finished.

 

“The Dean will see you now.”

 

“The Dean? Really? I thought I just needed to, you know, hand in a form?”

 

“Yes, well this shouldn’t take very long at all.”

 

A tall, graying, bespeckled woman led me down to a dimly lit office with the shades drawn. Wait a minute……I’m not good with faces but…..no way! I think it’s the Dean from my botched Stats 101 exemption!

 

“Please take a seat, Mr. McDonough. Barbara tells me you are considering graduate school?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“In what line of study, may I ask?”

 

“ English literature, just like my undergrad major.”

 

“Yes, that sounds just fine. Allow me to review your academic file for one moment, please.”.

 

Three hours went by.

 

“I see you earned a 2.8 grade point average. That’s very…respectable.”

 

“Yes, well uh….thank you.”

 

“But your grades dropped rather precipitously your last couple of years, if I may be frank.”

 

”Well I had some things going on in my life. Both of my parents got divorced. Kurt Cobain committed suicide. I made a Bobby Hurley joke which really didn’t land at all. I’m sure you’ve been there. But, you know, things are going better now!”

 

“I see you applied for a Statistics exemption. How did that course turn out?”

 

What does she know?  

 

“Well………it……it turned out great! Thanks for asking!”

 

“Is there anything in your academic history that might embarrass the university in any way?”

 

“No. I don’t think so. No……..No”.

 

Does she know? Should I confess?

 

“I mean……..one time this kid Paul—who claimed he was “180 pounds of twisted steel and sex appeal”--I mean seriously dude? Anyway, he offered me twenty bucks to write a paper on Macbeth for his English general requirement. He knew I was an English major, you see. So, you know, I think helping friends is important, don’t you? So I might have written it for him. But I made sure I did a terrible job! I waited until the Sunday night after Spring Weekend. I don’t think I need to tell you how hungover I was. And I pretended Macbeth was like Finnegans Wake. “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace…” I said this shows the sound and fury (signifying nothing) of living in imaginary linear time when you, me, Joyce, Vico and hula hoop manufacturers know it’s circular. “A way a lone a last a loved along the…….rivverun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay,” was the truth but this poor idiot believed in “the last syllable of recorded time.” Wow! Paul didn’t say anything for a couple weeks. Finally. I said, “So how did we do on the paper?” “We got a D+.” What I’m trying to say is cheating is wrong. You’re only cheating yourself. Just ask Brady Anderson. As if those 50 home runs happened without steroids! Do you think I should I grow sideburns?”  

 

“That’s quite enough, thank you. I must tell you, here at this Public Ivy, we consider academic fraud a very serious matter indeed. But let’s move on, shall we? Why are you interested in continuing your study of English literature?”

 

“Well, I love books! I want to teach. Or maybe write. It’s like what Stephen Dedalus said in Ulysses: literature is about the affirmation of the human spirit.”

 

“That’s quite intriguing because it says here you viciously attacked several masterpieces of world literature. You really don’t believe Lolita is a convincing love story? I understand soft core pornography involving werewolves is more your cup of tea.”

 

Wait….what!? Where did she…..

 

“Not at all! Lolita is delicious satire. I wolfed it down. I totally get it. It’s about the rape of innocence in our postwar consumer American culture! It’s brilliant! Have you read Pale Fire?” 

 

“I think I’ll ask the questions here. Have you applied for financial aid?”

 

“I haven’t gotten that far yet. I’m hoping the state can pay some of it. (Whispers). I’m a client of CT Services For The Blind.”

 

“Yes I see they underwrote much of your, shall we say, protracted undergraduate career. It looks like they’ve invested quite a chunk of change in you.”

 

“Yes, but……..who have you been talking to? They can afford it! It’s a Dot.com boom! Have you seen our ballooning military budget?”  

 

”What have you been doing since graduation?”

 

”Well, I’ve been, uh, building my resume. I just mastered the sleeve machine, as a matter of fact. I feel my textile background is rather Dickensian so I’m ready to finally tackle Bleak House. I can’t wait for Dickens 301.”   

 

“How would you say you got along with your professors?”

 

“Really well! Gina Barreca? Forget about it. Do you know her? They used to call her Snow White but she drifted. She loved me. She wrote on all my papers I should talk more in class.”

 

“Did you?” 

 

“No.” 

 

“What about Professor O’Connor.”

 

“Oh…..right. Of course. Sometimes you need tough love. Literature isn’t babysitting here. Great guy”.

 

(Professor O’Connor bursts out from behind the curtains).

 

“YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE! YOU DESERVE TO HAVE SCIATICA!”.

 

(He storms out and slams the door behind him).

 

“YOU’RE A MACHO PIECE OF SH ...!!!!”

 

Then I woke up.

 

Still yelling.

 

“….IT!” reverberated against the walls.

 

The sleet had started to taper down.

…………………………………

I entered the Wilbur Cross Building. (For real this time I promise). From a wooden bench around the corner and out of view of the front window, I heard a woman’s voice. I told myself to go ask for a form. Arjona is big enough for J. D. and me. The government probably just spent $1.8 billion on a tank while I was just sitting here. Chunk of change? I’m pocket change! I can start classes in the fall—if not summer!

 

My feet froze. I walked out after 20 minutes. I’ll try again another later.

……………………………….

Subway was only seven minute away on my bike. My Maxell tapes suggested I wasn’t a recording artist but was sandwich artistry still in play? The Co-op! Did someone say $4.99 employee discount Nabokov? They would offer a massive raise: minimum wage. The Prince Of Denmark’s dad’s ghost told him to murder his cuckolding, homicidal uncle but I just needed to inquire about slapping dough at Sgt. Pepperoni’s. Stop pretending you’re Hamlet!

 

And Schmedley’s employment would reduce my commute from two hours to thirty seconds

 

After a liquid courage Guinness, I brandished a $5 to lure the goateed bartender/owner over.

 

“Another Guinness?”

 

“Yeah, and hey, um, are you guys hiring by any chance?” my voice wavering.  

 

“We’re looking for waiters and kitchen staff.” 

 

“Could I…..get an application?”

 

Instead of filling it out at the bar like a normal person, I found a booth around the corner and hunched my shoulders down to further obstruct anyone’s view before I put the application up to my face and back down to write the answers. Under additional comments I wrote, “I have extensive kitchen experience within the UConn dining hall system.” 

 

Goatee guy perused my application for an uncomfortable length of time.

 

“We’ll be in touch if anything opens up.”

 

I thought you just said things were already opened up.

 

“Okay.”

 

Did he see me read the application? Was I a cheap tipper? Or did a townie bar not care for my kind? (Maybe Blind was fine—UConn not so much.) Why was I so stupid to out myself!?

………………………………………….

In the Co-Op’s magazine section, I nose read Spin and People’s Sexiest Men Alive edition. I didn’t have enough blackheads to care about Marilyn Manson, but was I the thinking woman’s Matthew Perry? (We’ve established that I’m blind).

 

 “How’s that smell?” a male voice asked.  

 

This comedic genius was already 20 feet to my left before I could even think of a witty riposte like, “Not as good as your mom last night.”  

………………………………………….

The UConn Huskies played the Washington Huskies in a Thursday night Sweet Sixteen matchup. I watched in Brandon’s room. He was somewhere hitting on NSYNC fans.    

 

“HAMILTON! NO! ANOTHER TIP! NO! HAMILTON! AT THE BUZZER!!! YES!!!!!!! CONNECTICUT WINS!!!!!!!!!!!”

 

YES!!” I yelled. Then I worried I woke Pav. Before going to bed, he watched the Knicks vs. Hawks in the living room.

 

Our phriends didn’t run outside with blue and white paint on their shirtless chests. Riots didn’t break out at Schmedley’s. Granted, this was the hinterlands, closer to Coventry than Gampel Pavilion. Maybe The Jungle and Frats went apeshit, but even they were probably keeping things chill until the Elite Eight.   

 

Often kids in The Basketball Capital Of The World seemed to care much more about spotting players walking to class. “I saw Kevin Freeman outside MSB today,” or “Donny Marshall was macking on some chick at TKE last night.” I myself had the honor of standing shoulder to stomach with Ray Allen at an Upper Deck urinal. (All others were occupied. I would never break the code even for a future NBA lottery pick.)

 

Husky Mania ran wild after they beat Duke in 1994. We all agreed to pretend this relatively meaningless late November win was “revenge” for our 1990 Elite Eight heartbreaking buzzer beating defeat (I ran out of the house and yelled “Christian Laettner must die!”  before Dan and I played a consolation pickup game) and our 1991 Sweet Sixteen humiliation only partially redeemed by Rudy Johnson stepping on Laettner’s face. Ancient history now. Kids burned family heirloom couches to smithereens in the quad to “Fuck Duke!” chants. “Laettner swallows!” rang through the chilly night air even though he played for the Minnesota Timberwolves now. “Show us your tits!” chants followed because, I don’t know, bare boobs are the best way to celebrate early season neutral court victories at The Palace At Auburn Hills.   

 

Yet if UConn played Seton Hall in January, couch burners were playing Madden ’95 or watching The Usual Suspects. 

 

When the women beat Tennessee to win the 1995 national championship on an early April Sunday afternoon, campus was like a funeral. Of course the couch burning demographic skewed heavily bro and they weren’t allowed to publicly support “bitch basketball.” You could, however, speculate on other matters. While Pav, Brandon, and I watched our Man Card allowable four minutes of a game against Notre Dame, Brandon theorized on why Parade All-Americans flocked to Storrs to play for Coach Auriemma.  

 

 “Geno licks their box.”

 

This was actually confusing because guys also claimed the Lady Huskies were “carpet munchers”. Maybe they imagined a hardwood Chasing Amy scenario? Chasing Rebecca. Contact---With Svetlana. I’ve given this much more thought than it deserves.

 

During my junior year of high school, the men had their “Dream Season.” We considered our 1988 NIT championship exciting, so calling it a  a “Dream Season” without a Final Four appearance wasn’t considered over the top. They were suddenly a national power after a decade of Big East doormat status and decades of Yankee Conference irrelevance, so UConn seemed fun! And it was only two towns away. I applied to UConn, Eastern, and Central. I wasn’t exactly ambitious. I got into all three and chose the best basketball team—I mean academic institution. I crossed out Central because “Fuck Drexel!” chants were never preludes to furniture getting engulfed in flames. 

 

Two days after we beat Washington, North Carolina summarily dismissed us in a “neutral site” Elite Eight game before 23,000 Greensboro, North Carolina fans who all wore baby blue that day. I guess it was their color.   

 

First the Whalers, now this. Fuck you too, North Carolina.

………………………………………

Pav and Brandon’s TEP brothers Freeman, Evans, Mickey, and Pony hosted a Thursday night Willimantic public access talk show. We gathered around the TV.

 

FREEMAN: The Kentucky Wildcats won the national championship on Monday night, beating Utah by the final score of 78-69.

 

MICKEY: 69. Haha.

 

FREEMAN: That’s correct, Mickey. The Utes scored 69 points. I’m not sure why that’s humorous. Also, this is a family show. Jeff Sheppard was the MPV as Kentucky won their 7th National Championship.

 

EVANS: Great job by Tubby Smith. He inherited Rick Pitino’s recruits, but he took it to the house.

 

FREEMAN: Also, in major league bakeball---er, baseball. Excuse me.

 

MICKEY: (Giggling, puts hand over face).

 

FREEMAN: The Red Sox opened their season with a 2-0 win over the A’s as Pedro Martinez dominated in his pitching da but, er, debut for the BoSox. I read the teleprompter wrong, sorry about that, folks. Meanwhile the Yankees dropped their Opening Day contest against the Angels, 4-1. Oh wait….it looks like we have a caller on the line. Hello! Welcome to Sports Zone!

 

CALLER: Um yeah, I just wanted to say the Yankees are going all the way and I want to do Mickey’s mom.

 

FREEMAN: Miller, is that you? Okay………folks, I’m really sorry you had to hear that uncalled for comment. Who’s screening these calls? Some immature individuals out there tonight. If you have a question—and can keep it PG, people—please call 486-3948. Okay, looks like we have another call on the line. Good evening, you’re on Sports Zone!

 

CALLER: Hey Freeman, I have to disagree with that last caller. The Yankees are going to struggle big time. Jeter will get worn down by midseason.

 

FREEMAN: Well, sometimes the dog days of August can tire out shortstops. Great point. 

 

CALLER: Yeah, not to mention the fact that he’ll be doing Mickey’s mom every single night.

 

FREEMAN: Okay! Folks, can we try to stay focused on sports? The Masters are coming up next week. Is this Tiger Woods’ tournament to lose?

 

EVANS: Totally, dude. (Giggles).

 

FREEMAN: Thank you for that contribution. Wait….Pony, who’s running the camera? Can you pan back to me?

 

(Camera pans to an empty chair).

 

FREEMAN: Where’s Mickey? Mickey, what are you doing in the corner? Are you eating Scooby Snacks? What’s going on? Well folks, it’s been another great show, but it looks like we’re getting the wrap sign. Until next Thursday. Thanks for watching Sports Zone!

 

HOT MIC: (What the fuck, dude! Mickey, you’re so bak---).

 

(Cut to a Windham Board of Education Meeting joined already in progress).

 

If you think this show was yanked off the airwaves, you just don’t understand public access TV.

……………………………………..

I rode to campus on a mild, gray Saturday and stopped at New Haven, 3rd floor. The eleven Jungle dorms were named for the eleven counties in Connecticut.

 

I walked past unknown baby faces in the hall. Freshman? Uggh should I be here? Strange kids in my old room (311–like the band!) cranked Wu Tang Clan. Obviously they ain’t nuttin’ to fuck wit’ but was grunge already grandpa music?

 

My old friends Hick and Butthead still lived there. Hick was from Griswold, which made Ellington seem like midtown Manhattan. Butthead (Christian name Timothy) resembled Beavis’s nacho loving sidekick. While taking my last class at the branch, I slept in their room on a few weekends. You can’t take the boy out of The Jungle I guess.  

 

“Colin! What are you up to?” Hick said.

 

“I’m living off campus. Working in West Hartford. Thinking about enrolling in grad school.”

 

“Cool. Hey Colin’s back!”

 

“I’m parched. I could use a Dad’s root beer right now.” 

 

“Man are you in luck. I just stocked the fridge full of them!”

 

“Ready for some Techmo Bowl, Colin?”

 

“I thought you would never ask.”

 

Techmo Bowl was Madden For Dummies. I still sucked. So I picked the mighty Cowboys. Butthead picked the Browns out of pity. The cornerstones of my in-game strategy were Hail Mary’s on 1st and 10 and going for it on 4th and 43 from my own 23. 

 

“Colin, did you hear about the Giants punter who made a rap album? He should have called it Downed At Da One.”

 

“I like it. What will the lyrics be? How about:

 

Yo, all you other homies is wack/

Your weak ass kicks/

Are all touchbacks!

 

I guess the Dad’s was kicking in.

 

“Sweet. Or maybe:

 

My Uzi is a treat and you’re the trick/

Don‘t even bother with an on-side kick.

 

They were the nerds I wouldn’t admit I was. Root beer was their elixir, not Car Bombs.   

 

“Do you still have NHL 95?”

 

“Colin…….what a stupid question. Does Biggie love it when you call him Big Papa?”

 

I was the Whalers. My skill level matched that of an extinct team. I played against the computer since my head obstructed human opponents’ view. Sometimes I lucked into a goal. Even the computer probably felt sorry for me.

 

Trevor Finn walked by. Next to his likeness on the hallway bulletin board, someone once wrote, “Trevor “I Get A Hard On From My Hard Drive” Finn.”

 

“Colin? Jesus!”

 

He shook his head and walked on.

 

This was not “Jesus I’m glad to see you,, but “Jesus! I can’t believe you’re STILL here.”

 

I finished my Dad’s and never went back.        

……………………………....

American Psycho

 

USA Today reported (with a red, blue and green pie chart, obviously) the unemployment rate had plummeted to 4.3 percent, the lowest since 1970. The Dow Jones rocketed over 9,000 for the first time ever. Welcome to the boomtown!

 

Was I even employed? I was pretty sure sub-minimum-wage earning SSI collectors didn’t count. But I couldn’t apply for unemployment because I’d never been employed. So I wasn’t ruining anyone’s statistical party. Invisible to economists, bureaucrats, and politicians alike, I wasn’t any problem that needed solving. Can’t fix laziness.        

 

Melissa called. I strained to hear her voice over the droning din of machinery, shouting, and laughter. 

 

“Hey there! A company in Wethersfield is looking for a customer service rep. Are you interested?”

 

“Sure!”

 

“Great! Are you available next Tuesday at 1PM?”

 

“Yeah. Sounds good.”

 

I wore a red tie, blue shirt, gray pants, and my stepfather’s hand-me-down gray jacket. I can’t believe my lack of money or access to a men’s clothing store led me to such debasement. The sleeves were a little short because he was a tiny, tiny man.

 

The beautiful and mysterious Melissa picked me up in her navy Audi state car. I would have preferred a little red Corvette but whatever.

 

“Are you nervous?”

 

“A little.”

 

“You will do great! Just don’t be afraid to sell yourself.”

 

I was fucked. JJ, a wifebeater wearing undergraduate mafioso, used to strut around my floor saying, ‘Who’s better than me!?”. Ron Pavano down the hall wrote, ‘PAVANO IS THE MAN!” on his notepad. I used to say, “Pavano is writing love letters to himself again.” They were born salesmen. JJ kicked in hallway windows, but Pavano’s aggression had more heroic overtones. At 1:50AM one morning we waited for calzones from DP Dough—who proudly served shitfaced students shockingly greasy nightcaps to their evening. When my Danger Zone and his Combat Zone arrived, I held my dollar bills to my face. The delivery kid apparently made a mocking gesture. I didn’t see it, but Pavano did. He knocked him out cold with a right hook to the jaw.

 

A month later, with ten of us crowded into a room, he held court with a loud Italian guy anecdote about his dad’s car dealership, I think. Plenty of hand gestures. He started to sit down before changing his mind—this story was way too good for sitting. Twenty seconds later when he finally tried to sit he was met with only air and the floor below. I had pulled his chair.

 

Everyone erupted in laughter.

 

Well, not quite everyone.

 

He shoved me against the wall.

 

“WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM!?”

 

“Sorry. I was just joking around,” I said tremulously.  

 

He pinned me there for several more seconds. He thought he was a hero for punching the DP Dough kid. I thought he was a hero for not punching me.

 

He got busted selling drugs, but unlike Pretty Boy, he chose jail over ratting on his friends.

 

What would Joseph Campbell say about him?

 

I never told him I didn’t like him punching that kid. Maybe that proved Melissa’s point: the customer always conspires with the salesman.  

 

I still didn’t like it. Vanilla Ice had to sell you on his dope rhymes which were just rhymes about how great his rhymes were. But Bob Dylan wrote Desolation Row. When you can bust shit like that, you don’t need to even acknowledge sucker MC’s like Gordon Lightfoot.

 

Except I could neither prove I was the Dylan of office clerks nor rock a photocopier like a vandal, so anything less than my best sales pitch was a felony.

 

A kindly, bespectacled woman named Susan sat across from us. Cluttered desk. Melissa sat to my right.

 

“Thank you for your interest, Colin. We’re a small medical office looking for someone to handle phone calls, do filing, and data entry. Can you tell me about your experience managing records and files?”

 

“Well…..I manage brochures in a warehouse. Just, uh, getting my foot in the door. I count them and load them on pallets. I make sure I’m accurate–and timely–since a truck arrives at 10AM. I’ve memorized which skid has which brochures. Mystic Aquarium is in the middle row 2nd to last, for example. So I feel like this has prepared me to manage files really well. I also worked in my college cafeteria and you had to be quick cleaning off trays because they all arrived at 12:40.”

 

“That’s great! You would also handle patient calls. Can you tell me about any experience working in customer service?”

 

“Well, I haven’t actually had the opportunity to work directly with the public yet, but I think I would be excellent. I think I’m a very patient person. I’m sure sometimes you get people that aren’t happy. But they aren’t mad at you so you can’t take it personally. They are frustrated by a situation and your job is to, uh, problem solve with them and work on alleviating that situation. I think I would be very good at that.”

 

“Excellent! How are your computer skills?”

 

“Really good! I’ve used Windows ‘95. And email. I created my own AOL email address! I wrote all my college papers on WordPerfect in the library computer lab. Oh, and I use a program called Zoomtext which magnifies the screen. I can work just as fast with that as anyone else using a computer.”   

 

“That’s wonderful! Is there anything you wish to ask me?”

 

“Are you on a bus line?”

 

“I believe we are a few blocks from the bus. About a 10-15 minute walk?”

 

“Okay, that would work I think. So I don’t have a ton of job experience, but I’m a quick learner and I have a good work ethic and I’m eager to develop my skills. You won’t regret giving me a chance.”

 

“Well thank you for coming in. We’re seeing a few other applicants this week, but we will be in touch.”

 

“You did great!” Melissa said in the car.

 

“Do you think I have a chance?”

 

“I do.”

 

Did I sense effort there? Stop it.

 

No word after a week. Then ten days. Then two weeks. Okay, that can’t be normal, can it? Why didn’t I give Susan my phone number? Wait…..my resume had it. Would she call me or Melissa? I left Melissa a voicemail. No response after a day. Then another. Nothing. Then a last one: “I know you’re super busy, but I haven’t heard anything about the job and it’s been more than two weeks and I’ve been anxiously waiting. Can you put aside any other calls? Put aside any other work? Please call me first thing in the morning. Please make me your first priority. Please? First thing! Thank you!”

 

She called.

 

“Susan left a voicemail last week. They found someone with more experience.”

 

“Oh. Okay. I just wish someone would have told me either way.”

 

My life was their paperwork.

 

We met in the workshop cafeteria.

 

“What do you think your best job skills are?”

 

“Everyone says I’m a good writer. Do you now jobs where I can use that?”

 

“Yes I think so.”

 

“Okay. Sorry about the voicemails, but I was getting antsy.”

 

“No more psychotic messages?” she said smiling.

 

“No. Again…..maybe the problem is I’m going through you on everything. Would an employer think I lack independence?”

 

“No… I don’t think so.”
 

“Does CSB have any civil rights attorneys or anything?”

 

“No”.

 

“Because wouldn’t that help? How do you know someone isn’t scared off by blind people? They can always say “not enough experience” but do you ever know if that’s true? And how can you get experience if no one else gives you a chance either? Affirmative action doesn’t apply for people with disabilities?” 

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“Or ADA? It’s just, like, wheelchair access? Employers can discriminate and no one will ever know?”

 

Sweet Melissa probably didn’t know what she wanted to do in college either, so she went to Central’s student center and checked off “want to help people” without having any more concrete plans than that until psychotic clients were asking her above her pay grade, impossible to answer questions.

 

Maybe Susan—who probably got her granddaughter a pretty pink sweater and volunteered at soup kitchens around the Holidays—didn’t think it was her job to save the world one blind data entry clerk at a time. And maybe she was right.

 

Maybe she didn’t want someone to think he knew more than her. “We need someone to read appointment schedules, Camus readers are serious overkill”.

 

Or was the job considered women’s work? Did my penis, not my eyes, seal my doom? 

 

So no need for CSB to strong arm nice taxpaying church goers and PTA members like Susan.    

 

I just didn’t have the experience, right?

 

Discrimination? All in your head.

 

In A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche Dubois depended on the kindness of strangers and she ended up in a New Orleans insane asylum. I went back to  sewing tic tac toe boxes on Shield Street. 

…………………………………

That wasn’t the first time I was called psychotic.

 

I took a six-week summer course (Math 101 so do I even need to say it sucked?). My much ballyhooed, resume building cafeteria cafeteria tray scraping occurred during this time.

 

I saw Rebecca Lobo on the McMahon elevator.

 

“Hi.”

 

“Hi.”

 

You can guess who said hi first.  The tallest people on the elevator were:

 

1.  Rebecca (6’4”)

2.  Her boyfriend (5’10”?)

3.  Me. (5’8”. 5 7 on some defective scales). 

 

One beautiful Tuesday afternoon, a girl standing in line at the food truck outside the Co-Op turned around.

 

“Hey Colin.”

 

“Hey……Alana?”

 

“Yeah! We’re having a party on Saturday for Fatima’s birthday. You should come! Carriage House 14-C.”

 

“Okay, that sounds cool.”  

 

Multiple non-blacked out eyewitnesses reported Fatima and I hooked up at a semi-formal. (Why didn’t they have those every weekend?) We only kissed---I think. My Junglemates mocked me mercilessly since they considered her a beer goggles cautionary tale. I didn’t think she was too bad—black hair, cute fleshy face, big lips. I think she was Indian. Or mixed race? So Eurocentric undergrads labeled it an “Asian invasion.” She looked nothing like Jenny Garth, Courtney Thorne-Smith, OR Gillian Anderson-- basically no one in Fox’s entire prime time lineup--so an all-white jury of her peers ruled her a dog.

 

Alana had curly dark brown hair. Last name Petravych. Ooo Eastern European? Or Russian Jewish? Anyway I thought she was hot.

 

At 3:42 PM on Saturday, I knocked after circling around for an hour. 

 

“Colin, what are you doing here!?” Fatima asked in, I thought, a less than elated voice.

 

“Alana invited me. I ran into her the other day.” 

 

“Oh! Well……grab a beer!”

 

They had three kegs and a beer pong table. Bush’s Sixteen Stone cranked out of the window until Fatima put on Jagged Little Pill. Yep, it was a girl hosted party. Fatima, Alana, their old floormate Gina, and this guy Antonio were the only ones I knew. The guys watched Goodfellas in the living room—a far better bro staple than that kid’s cartoon Scarface.

 

Fatima’s “what are you doing here?” threw me off for the whole night. I couldn’t drink my way into social ease. But maybe I was in the club?

 

Unless Tiny The Bartender and women’s basketball stars count, I didn’t know anyone there that summer, so I pep talked myself into dropping by again. Or not. This was a tortuous decision! I walked there on two evenings only to walk back to my six week summer home. On my third trip I summoned the spirit of my recently deceased grandfather: a cool cat who loved blowing sax and clarinet almost as much as drinking face melting Manhattans on the rocks he mixed in his living room bar. “My body is screaming for alcohol!” he would lament at 5:01 PM if arriving home late. He played in the army band during World War II instead of storming the beaches at Normandy (4-F’d due to a tic). His Greatest Generation wartime synopsis: “It was kill, kill, kill!.......on the saxophone.” He scatted “Oh Scooby! Boo bee doo da!” while walking into Saturday evening Mass. He could cat nap and snore through anything life threw at him. Favorite expressions: “Hey, you with the sneakers! Out of the pool!” and “That’s it! I get no respect. I’m joining the merchant marines to get me a geisha girl.” After seeing an MTV video by Suicidal Tendencies, this Dixieland jazz loving music critic said, “They keep talking about it. Why don’t they just go through with it?” Put him on his sultry beachside Space Coast balcony with a newspaper, a Marlboro Red, a loose shirt and a stiff drink and he was happy. Would Gramp be afraid of a few silly girls??

 

I knocked like the wood might splinter if I tapped too hard. Fatima greeted me again. Gina and Antonio were watching a Real World Seattle rerun. Irene, the quirky, artsy one, was so done with that toxic house. On her way out the door she informed Stephen–the obligatory angry black one–that he was gay. Stephen ran after her car, opened the door, and slapped her.

 

Clearly this was riveting television, but hadn’t we all seen this one before? No one spoke. I hate TV. It creates a wall of unbreachable silence.

 

I heard footsteps on the top of the stairs.

 

“Colin! What are you doing here? I’m naked!”, Alana exclaimed before she fled back out of sight. 

 

They all laughed. I blushed. Was she really naked? It looked like she was wearing something. A towel? I couldn’t see that well from the couch. Was that the joke? Did she embarrass me for fun? Was she being a tease?

 

And what’s up with sauntering around stark naked in front of Antonio on Wednesday evenings? I didn’t think they were dating. Was he operating a harem from Carriage House 14C?? Was it just dumb luck I didn’t walk in on a living room orgy?

 

A week later we ran into each other at Ted’s. He was in full Rico Sauve regalia: white tank top, gold chain, slicked black hair. I was fully gelled up, but I had jean shorts and sleeves, so not the same thing at all.

 

“So I started dating someone.” he said.  

 

“Oh yeah? Congrats!”

 

“Someone you know.”

 

“Oh…....I don’t know. Alana?”

 

“No. You know….”

 

“Gina?”

 

“Yup! She’s a great girl. Great personality, smart, nice smile, great tits, great…(conspiratorial whisper) pussy.”

 

Everywhere I went, guys kept raving about their girl’s tunnel of love.  

 

“That’s great. Congrats!”

 

“Thanks, man.”

 

The rich got richer. Gina’s girlish voice was maybe a little too pep rallyish for me but she was a cute blonde--although most of my crushes were brunettes. 80’s teen comedies conditioned me to associate blondes with vapid snobbery. Thanks, Kelly Preston.  

 

There’s an alternate theory here right out of Real World New Orleans: Antonio was gay and Gina was his beard. This might explain his Anatomy and Physiology level summary and also why Alana didn’t care about being naked (or in a towel). Girls love gay guys! But this didn’t occur to me. In my alcohol and trigonometry addled mind, Antonio was a smoldering Latin lover blowing through Carriage House 14C with hurricane level gale force winds.       

 

Before we continue, can I just say I was drinking nightly (like I’m the first person math drove to drink). My summer reading list consisted of Leaves Of Grass. “Do anything, but let it produce joy.” Finally, a guy with a pen and a positive attitude! Then Tropic Of Cancer mainly to see what the censorship fuss was all about. “O Tania, where now is that warm cunt of yours?” Okay, I guess that was it. Then Notes From The Underground. “I am a sick man. I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I think my liver is bad.” So much for positivity. I repeatedly listened to Hum’s You’d Prefer an Astronaut. Wouldn’t this put you in a weird headspace too, my ever kind and indulgent reader? 

 

After I got blitzkrieged at Ted’s (a lot of people drink on Monday nights) I stumbled home, and grabbed a pen because writing letters had worked out super well for me in the past. I can’t remember (or did I force myself to forget?) this correspondence verbatim but I believe I spun some insane paranoid conspiracy theory accusing Alana of unspeakable crimes! I claimed without evidence that she invited me to Fatima’s party just so they could make fun of the blind kid. Then……………I called her a cunt.

 

I walked back down Hunting Lodge Road and let out blood curdling, grunge rock screams. I’d call them barbaric yawps but even Whitman would have disowned me at this point. A cop car pulled up.

 

“Where are you off to?”

 

“Oh, nowhere, officer. Just going back to my dorm.”

 

“Hop in. I’ll take you.”

 

Did I have a choice?  

 

There’s hungover and there’s “I went on a 1.6 mile walk at 2AM on a Tuesday to place a letter in a girl’s mailbox calling her The C Word for inviting me to a birthday party before receiving a police escort home” hungover. Trust me, you don’t want any part of this one.  

 

But I was so steeped in blood that should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as to go o’er, so I decided a make-up letter was a wicked good idea (after another lost night at Ted’s). I apologized profusely. Then, apropos of I can’t remember, I discussed a Liz Phair interview. Liz, strong willed indie rock goddess, gushed about her new boyfriend-- some old creepy producer guy who acted super cocky. He “played me like a fiddle.” I said this Rolling Stone cover story ruined my life. It appeared to prove all girls--no matter how smart and liberated they seem!--only love cocky assholes.

 

The next night……I’m afraid so…..I wrote yet another letter. An apology to the apology. I think it contained a Whitmanesque theme like we’re all the same deep down oh I sing the body electric.…..thank God my precise memory of this will only surface via extensive shock therapy which I pray no insurance company will ever cover. Also, single payer is not the answer.  

 

I tried to tell myself it was Axl Rose’s fault. He called his mom the C word in a song! Not a Carriage House resident he barely knew, but the woman who gave him life!

 

And are we just going to sit back and pretend Richard Gere was innocent in all this? He called a girl The C Word yet we were asked to believe he was an officer AND a gentleman. I was an assembly line product in a misogyny factory. Talk to the foreman!

 

Or so I tried to soothe my aching conscience.

 

It didn’t really work.

 

I was starting to sound like Humbert Humbert.

 

Early in the fall semester, I ran into Fatima by the Upper Deck pool tables. Lightning Crashes played.  

 

“You write these psychotic letters and then you drop off the face of the earth?”

 

“I know. I’m sorry. I’m not psychotic I swear. I don’t know why I acted like that.”

 

“No more letters?”

 

“No more letters.”

 

She gave me a hug, believe it or not, which was so much more than I deserved.

 

My next door neighbor Kyle, not understanding the dramatic scene unfolding before him, whispered, “Colin, you hooked up with that” and laughed.

 

When she said “you dropped off the face of the earth?” I wanted to believe they missed me, but they probably worried I went away to plot their murder.

 ……………………………………

And that wasn’t the worst thing I ever said.

 

In fifth grade I stood outside the LD room. This cool kid Todd Ford waited with me. I dreaded this room like Real World producers dread easygoing black cast members. I was so afraid they would throw me in there. In fact, they kind of did. The recess lady Mrs. Puckett taught me to type. How could they foresee that making it easier for me to write was like handling Jackie a Roman Candle on the workshop floor? I guess they didn’t want me putting my nose to the keys?

 

I became Mrs. Puckett’s pet. I worried she would blow the whistle and let me go every single time in kickball.

 

One day as we took the flag in for the day, Todd, who turned out to be an aspiring poet, recited a quatrain he had composed in her honor:

 

Mrs. Puckett/

Went to Nantucket/

Saw a bucket/

And decide to fuck it.

 

I was blown away. How could anyone be so brilliant? This anatomically improbable masterpiece probably sparked my love of language. 

 

But while waiting for my afterschool bus outside the LD room,  I decided to prove how non-LD I was. I leaned in the door.

 

“So this is where the retards hang out?”

 

Mrs. Robbins rushed out.

 

“We do not call them retards. That is not nice. They are special needs students.”

 

She sounded more wounded than angry, which made it worse. What a little shit. I meekly said I was sorry.

 

The path to pre-pubescent coolness was filled with booby traps.

………………………………

 

I sat across from George and Marty folding shirts.  

 

“Oh boy! We are going to have burgers tonight! Yipee!” George said.

 

“Yes, buddy.”

 

“And then we are going to the park on Saturday!”

 

Yankees vs. Tigers played on Marty’s  portable radio.

 

“And we’re going to a ballgame this summer too!”

 

“Yes, buddy. But first we have to fold these shirts, okay, buddy.”

 

George was pudgy with a thick, unruly mop of brown hair. Marty was tall, lanky and bald. George was eternally excitable; Don was taciturn with a fixed half smile as he rocked back and forth.

 

The 10:15 bell rang. I waited 4 minutes for stairwell congestion to die down before heading up to the lunch room.  

 

Cindy led Jackie by the arm to her seat.

 

“I’ll be right back with your soup.”

 

Happy birthday to you!

Happy birthday to you!

Happy birthday dear Marisol!

Happy birthday to you!

 

“Oooooo thank you guys!” Marisol beamed.

 

“How old are you–u-u now?”

 

“Oh shove it, Sam. I’ll get Stone Cold after you!”

 

“Any big dates?” Leroy asked.

 

“I’m going to Applebee’s with my mom.”

 

“Better bring us some birthday cake!”

 

Is it better to sail on the open seas with a broken compass and a battered ship or drift across a tranquil pond in a canoe paddled by someone else?

 

Oh shut up, idiot. You can ruin any birthday party.

……………………………………………

The early spring days veered between sunny and upper 40’s, lower 30’s and rain, sub-freezing and flurries, more rain, two postcard perfect spring days, rain, and a Winter Storm Warning. My attendance improved with the weather, but not enough to Phil’s liking.

 

“If you’re not here, I have to do the orders which takes away from my work.”

 

What was his work anyway? Ordering the brochures? Was that like an all-day thing? How did he manage before I got here?

 

“Okay, I’ll try to do better.”          

 

I did try. But two hours each way, five days a week was soul destroying. On the bus, I listened to Mike and The Mad Dog pontificate about Kerry Wood’s 20 strikeouts against the Astros at Wrigley Field. Wood was just 20 years old. I was also in the springtime of my life, but riding to the bus stop, waiting for, boarding, and exiting the bus before waiting for my overcrowded West Hartford bus just made my life feel like a drained hourglass. This wasn’t sustainable. Unless I moved closer, five days wasn’t happening. Want to increase my slave wages? Maybe we can talk about the Perfect Attendance Award.    

 

The workshop moved to a converted shopping center in Windsor. It was only one story, so blind workers no longer needed to scale to the top of K2. The new workshop floor was pale blue with yellow tape running everywhere. The “big people” were in the office next door. One big happy family. The Windsor bus wasn’t as crowded.  

 

And no matter which economically blighted neighborhood Industries moved to, I could always depend on a walking distance McDonald’s. Ronald makes it magic.  …………………………………………….

Natural Born Killers

 

Spring Weekend was here! It was meant to help students let off some steam before the stress of finals, not help blind textile workers escape their mind- numbing, mechanized workaday life, but was anyone actually paying attention?

 

Thursday night was chilly and drizzly. But this was a rain or shine event so we pregamed with the boys downstairs with beers and bongs by a backyard bonfire. Obviously none of us owned a raincoat or umbrella.

 

You’ve never seen so many homicidal maniacs in your life than at Thursday night Kill A Keg. Carriage House featured four-unit apiece townhouses with burnt orange brick on the bottom and white siding on the top situated on both sides of a cul-de-sac which led up to the woods. Its long street and large front and back yards created ample space for thirsty revelers, thus it was UConn’s party epicenter.

 

Due to less than flattering local news coverage in previous years as well as complaints from Storrs residents who thought buying a house adjacent to a giant college campus wouldn’t end badly at all, riot gear clad cops patrolled the area like a European colonial power in a Joseph Conrad novel or the LAPD after the Rodney King riots. To assert their dominance, they parted Carriage House Way like the Red Sea.

 

“GET OUT OF THE MIDDLE OF THE STREET,” they bullhorned.

 

While they remembered their pepper spray, night sticks, body armor, helmets, and Glocks, they forgot chalk, so “middle of the street” was open for interpretation. A girl to my left stepped over this phantom barrier (to hug someone hello, not launch a human grenade against a fascist paramilitary unit) and a rent-a-cop pepper sprayed her in the face.

 

“Oh. My. GODDDDDDAA! What the fuck!?” she rubbed her eyes.

 

“Fuck you, pigs!” a rugby flanker shouted as cops continued their slow death march down a dead end street.

 

“I SMELL BACON!!”

 

This had the makings of a pretty fun weekend.

…………………………………..

On Friday kids made a bonfire in the circle by the woods.

 

 “PUT OUT THIS FIRE IMMEDIATELY,” stormtroopers demanded.

 

“Thank you for alerting us to the hidden dangers of forest fires, officer. We know you have a thankless job.”

 

Just kidding.

 

“SUCK MY DICK, PIGS!” was their feedback.

 

They cleared everyone out entirely, which created throngs of the drunken undead in Celeron not to mention hordes of thirst quenching savages down dimly lit, quiet residential Hunting Lodge Road, so they didn’t seem to think that through.

 

I sheltered in place in Carriage House 19A. Greek’s only concern was killing a half barrel of Bud faster than 15D.

 

“Colin, grab a cup, we need to tap this keg RIGHT NOW!”, he ordered.

 

”Fuck 15D! Bunch of fucking pussies!” I, a team player, noted before pounding my cup in six seconds and going for another. 

 

Hard work pays off in life. If you want something badly enough, the sky is the limit. We smoked those 15D lightweights like they were at a Sea Breeze sipping church picnic. 

 

“Colin, are you coming to Kegs And Eggs tomorrow morning?” Greek asked.

 

“Sure!”

 

“So don’t get too wasted,” he slurred, “No passing out!”

 

Did this mean drinking less? You must be joking. It just meant drinking water between beers. All nighters weren’t just for midterms, professionals managed them efficiently on Spring Weekend too.

 

I’m afraid we’re going to face a narrative gap in our story. What happened the rest of the night? Drinking games? Video games? Card games? Probably. Never ask a first person binge drinking narrator to provide a high resolution photographic image when seventeen kegs are in the vicinity. But drunken nights are all the same. No matter what the teetotalers and the boys in riot gear think, drinking isn’t about puking on yourself, setting mattresses on fire, or even punching people in the face after they spill three drops on you (not because it was hard to see in the faint amber lighting where thousands congregated or because a billion patrons packed into a 10 x 12 bar, but because they were disrespecting you or—most venal of sins--disrespecting your girl (or would- be girl). No! They seek the elusive, fleeting, beautiful, warm soft surrender that overtakes you after two to three drinks. Your mind and heart throw its arms around the world and your embrace is tenderly returned. Strangers become friends. Friends become family. Enemies become misunderstood. Treaties are enacted. All striving ceases, Sisyphus takes a lunch break. Your flushed cheeks are an outward manifestation of your rose colored soul. There was nothing to worry about after all, was there? Life was always perfect. The world is not an assembly line in a soul pulverizing factory, we ourselves are master craftsmen, pilots of our own destiny connected to each other with invisible strings. And love is not a cold abstraction or a cheesy Hallmark verse, it’s the warm, enveloping guiding light of the universe and we are its vessels and transfusers!

 

Is reality distorted or unveiled? Buzzkilling scientists say it shuts off portions of our cerebral cortex, makes us dumber, weakens our reaction time, causes us to tolerate Toto and in extreme cases bleat off-key odes to Africa and that heartbreaker Rosanna. But what if our limbic systems, our lizard brains, our fight or flight primitive selves are the liars? Useful for fleeing a bear but not for living! Kill a keg and kill fear! Kill our animal lineage which weighs us down! We are not cavemen anymore, there are no bears or panthers in sight, just rent-a-cops, so let’s put our shields down and yield to a cherubin like blissful surrender instead of ceaselessly fending off imaginary boogey men produced by our 2PM on a Tuesday minds! There’s only forty ounces to freedom!

 

Of course, after seven beers we suspect our three beer magic hour was possibly just a staged production with props and ventriloquists, not The Truth. We are no longer floating, we’re treading water, starting to drown.

 

Until dawn when we resurface for Kegs And Eggs. Vaguely accusatory sunshine escaped through the blinds at Ted’s. It felt like an inversion of the natural order. The life-giving spring sun was an optometrist’s flashlight searing a hole in your retina.

 

The buffet included eggs, toast, home fries, and bacon. They didn’t even pretend anyone would want fruit. Our table of six ordered Guinnesses all around. One more wasn’t going to hurt, right? A vicious hangover, like a storm cloud on the horizon, bore down on us but an early morning Guinness was our gazebo. 

 

“Colin, I’m working on a screenplay. You’re an English major. You must be a good writer, right?”

 

“I don’t know. Kind of, I guess.”

 

“Want to work on it with me?”

 

“Sure, what’s it about?”

 

“It’s about a bank robbery. And a serial killer. But there might be an alien invasion at the end. So it’s kind of like Reservoir Dogs meets Seven meets Aliens.”

 

“Sounds pretty cool. I could try to help with that.”

 

When people hear you’re a student/drug dealer, they hit you up for an eighth. When word spreads a girl is (maybe) a slut, guys become instantly intrigued by her (probably bullshit non-STEM) major. We English majors are cows with their own brand of milk. (Just don’t, in my experience, slip letters in doors under a midnight moon. That milk is sour). Greek thought I had a marketable skill when no one else did. I couldn’t wait to hoist our Oscar.

 

He drove me home and I crashed. I got up at 3. Feeling like new! Or was I still drunk? Round three here we go. It was my last night ever of Spring Weekend (it HAD to be the last) so listening to Pav ask Renee about Niantic Correctional’s Shepherd’s Pie and brand new volleyball court with Jaeger draped around him just wasn’t happening.

 

The TEP house’s tradition of hosting Saturday X lot parties had ended. Authorities confined partying to an nearby parking lot, so banished brothers didn’t even go to their frat house. We sat on lawn chairs outside 19A and drank. A joint or five was shared. And a nitrous balloon or three. In other words, a mellow night. Sometimes nothing feels sadder than  Saturday night. After Thursday and Friday’s endless Power Hours, reality’s alarm clock threatens to go off and Saturday is just a snooze button.  

 

I got restless and walked down Hunting Lodge and North Eagleville to witness the festivities in the technically-off-campus Farmer Brown’s parking lot. UConn could say the hooligans were off campus so what are you looking at us for? A fifty foot chain link fence blockaded it from X Lot. A drunk girl climbed to the top. I could tell she was a girl by her voice.

 

“Oh my God. Did someone just THROW a BOTTLE at me?!”

 

“Hey! Cum dumpster! Get down from there!” a safety-first young gentleman implored. 

 

“Show us your tits!”, a mammary gland enthusiast suggested. Possibly a pre-med who believed you’re never too young to start mammogram screenings?

 

“Why don’t you come down here and sit on my face!?”, a problem solver in a backwards baseball hat (to aid face sitting?) recommended.      

 

“GET DOWN FROM THAT FENCE NOW!”, blared a bullhorn.

 

At least cops and students agreed on one thing.

 

Cages can only hold out for so long. Sheltered partiers tore down the fence and charged towards X-Lot. This is what the Riot Squad had been waiting for since Thursday. These overtime workers were about to earn their time and a half.

 

Party lovers fired beer bottles and rocks at their servers and protectors who promptly whipped out their nightsticks for an old fashioned beatdown. Release the hounds! K-9’s barked and bit. Those innocent nights of pepper spray and leashed German Shepherd in Carriage House were just a fading memory now. Were we ever that young?

 

Don’t ask me how, but a couch materialized in the middle of a five-acre parking lot. It was summarily set on fire. A Honda Accord was flipped over, possibly to signify the importance of buying American.

 

This was fun but….

 

A crying girl hugged her friend.

 

“Why was he kissing her!?”

 

“Cassie, he’s trash. You’re way too good for him!” 

 

I passed a couple bros.

 

“Did you see that bitch over there? She’s slammin’.”

 

“She’s a butter face, dude.”

 

“I’m gonna hit it and quit it.”

 

After three bottles narrowly missed my cranium I left this get-together a bit early.

 

Walking away, I heard Sublime’s ode to morally defensible rioting and looting blasting out of a car window. Nice try Bradley, but this turf war over an empty parking lot at 12:30 AM on a Sunday encapsulated 90’s social unrest far better. It was a riot about. nothing. There were no wars to fight or protest. The unemployment rate was near record lows. Who wouldn’t be so enraged they’d want to burn a compact car? The hippies said, “light my fire” but our generational spokesmen Beavis and Butthead simplified things: “Fire! Fire! Fire!”

      

It wasn’t UConn students’ fault. (I’m hoping to preserve the .01% chance they will invite me to speak at Commencement). Spring Weekend’s reputation preceded it, so idiots flocked to Storrs like President Clinton flocked to feathered haired flight attendants. Most kids arrested or admitted to the ER weren’t students. So rent-a-students battled rent-a-cops. This was the biggest home invasion since my stepfather moved in. Rioters were mostly someone’s little brother unable to hold his liquor or junior college dropouts who didn’t respect Public Ivies.      

 

By Sunday, my insides had turned to angry molten hot lava. I felt like a dying animal. My poisoned body placed me in solitary confinement. I drank two bottles of Mountain Mist Gatorade. Brandon was a big fan. I usually avoided Gatorade due to its uncomfortable bro linkage, but these were desperate times. I drank ice water. Then more. Then more. I wore out a path to the kitchen sink. Why did I feel even worse?

 

That’s it. If this malignant hangover ever mercifully loosens its clutches, I will never drink again! This time I mean it!

 

Pav watched The Simpsons. Springfield was celebrating Love Day: a blend of Valentine’s Day with commercialized Christmas-style gift giving. Post-holiday trash piled up in Homer’s yard, so he ran for sanitation Commissioner and defeated the voice of Steve Martin in a landslide with the slogan, “Can’t Somebody Else Do It?”  Even more trash piled up all over town. Homer was deposed in disgrace. Mayor Quimby moved the town five miles down the street.

 

Garbage. Piles of it. Gross. Animated refuse was an artistic rendering of my internal organs. Not what I needed! Was this show depressing and I just started noticing it? Garbage is a metaphor for life down here on this God forsaken planet! That could just be the hangover talking but I doubt it!

 

After a restless night of half-sleep and unsettling half-dreams (my plane was about to crash, I didn’t graduate, I lost my detachable penis) I went to work on Monday, still depleted of vigor and hallowed on the inside. Not a personification of the blooming daffodils.

 

It was a sleeve- machine day. I overheard Ron talking to Jose 15 feet away.

 

“I think I figured out what that smell is.”

 

“What?”

 

“Alcohol.”

 

I had showered, brushed my teeth, and put on deodorant and (more or less) clean clothes. But all the fun had seeped into my pores.

……………………………………………

Thick New England winter blood was defenseless against the sudden blasts of hot May air. Finals were underway and our lease was about to expire. I had absolutely no idea where I was headed and my feet were stuck in rapidly hardening clay. My life was like the Gravitron amusement park ride which spins you around so fast it keeps you pinned to the wall even after the floor collapses beneath your feet. Did I have any tokens left for this ride?

………………………………………

The two-part Seinfeld finale aired on consecutive Thursdays. The whole house watched it downstairs—except Pav, of course. Renee. Also Seinfeld was “too Jewish”–but Irish humor wasn’t his bag either. One day he complained people always think he’s pissed off.

 

“With your bubbly personality?” I said.   

 

“Is that one of those sarcastic comments?”

 

I guess it was.

 

Yet another time Brandon said only idiots listen to death metal.

 

“I like death metal,” Pav said.   

 

“Case in point.” 

 

Silence.

 

How was THAT okay? Brandon’s arrogance was a fifty-foot brick wall. Even Pav didn’t bother using a battering ram.

 

Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer were jailed for sabotaging the lives of everyone they met: the Soup Nazi’s business was in shambles, the Bubble Boy was never quite the same, Terri  Hatcher wore sweaters three sizes too big. This episode was real, but was it spectacular? Everyone wanted OJ in jail, not the Seinfeld cast. O for 2, America. Did The Show About Nothing lose its nerve by hinting we should all be kinder and gentler? In the era of Tarantino, Seinfeld, and Clinton, moral ambiguity was charming, profitable, and electable! They’re from a place called Hope, they paid for The Big Salad, they love the Royale With Cheese. More crime, less punishment please. Too Russian. Too Marsha Clark.

 

“Dude, I read this guy went to jail for drugs and he ended up studying aeronautical engineering and now he’s a fuckin’ rocket scientist,” Chris said.

 

“Can you play guitar in jail?,” Dave wondered.

 

That’s what I wanted to know.

 

“Nelson Mandela spent years in jail and now he’s the President of South Africa”, Mike noted.

 

“Miguel De Cervantes wrote Don Quixote in prison,” I contributed.

 

“Fuck, man. I want to go to jail!” Chris said.

 

“Just get into a fistfight on Day 1,” Dave advised.

 

It was unanimous. Our freedom was crippling our potential. If someone would just lock us in a 7 square foot cell and throw away the key for 5-7 years we might finally make something of ourselves.

 

But do they allow radios in jail? Because what if the boys’ cellmates weren’t Phish phans?

 

“We’ll all be out on parole before that dickweed stops noodling and gets back to the chorus.”

 

“If you don’t stop playing that shit, YOU better run like an antelope when I see you in the cafeteria.”

 

“They’re all in the bathtub together?? Turn OFF that gay shit and put on some Slayer before I cut you.”

 

It’s a long way to the top if you wanna design a rocket.

……………………………………………..

My mom picked me up from the workshop and took me for a Friendly’s birthday dinner. I was older than dirt. 25. I was basically Bob Dole partying with undergraduates! I really, really needed to move on. Finally. For real this time.

 

“So I’m not sure where I’m going to be living in a week. Our lease is about to run out.”

 

“Well of course you’re always welcome back home but I can’t drive you to work after August. I’m going to our Dublin office for three months.”

 

“Okay, we’ll see. Or maybe with my SSI and workshop money I can afford my own apartment? I’m not sure.” 

 

“ I can take you around to look. And I will lend you money if you need it.”

 

I once took guitar lessons for three months in Mansfield so my mom had to drive through Hartford rush hour traffic, wait for my lesson to finish, drive me back to campus, and drive back home to Ellington. I hated making her do that and figured maybe I knew enough to progress on my own. But she never complained. She also offered to take me to Cooperstown, but I didn’t welcome a three and a half-hour ride just to see a Honus Wagner mural—which she probably would have needed to read to me.  

 

She couldn’t chauffeur me out of this one.   

 

She dropped me off. I had told her about my slithery roommate (Jaeger, not Brandon) so she refused to set foot in the apartment.  

…………………………………………….  

“Happy birthday, buddy.”

 

Word spread after I placed my mom’s chocolate birthday cake on the counter.

 

Jay handed me a six pack of Bud.

 

“Thanks!”

 

What a nice guy. I was proud to have sciatica from helping him.  

 

I cracked one open. The phone rang.

 

“Colin, it’s Greek,” Brandon said. 

 

“Hey Col, do you have a place to live this summer?”

 

“Actually, no. I might have to go home. Why?”

 

“I’m going to be living at Carriage House. Do you know the girls next door to Miguel? Nina? Nicole?”.

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“They’re subleasing their apartment for the summer. Want to split the rent with me?”

 

I wasn’t sure what subleasing meant.

 

”Definitely!”

 

Remember when I said I was finally moving on with my life? Just kidding. THIS was it. One last summer in Storrs! Carriage House was my Xanadu, my Kubla Khan, my MTV beach house. How could I pass up living in a stately pleasure dome? I still had a baby face, so no one suspected I belonged at a Sinatra Vegas residency, not an all- night rave. And smelly feet and silk boxers notwithstanding, Greek was a roommate upgrade. No reptiles. No attack dogs. Best summer ever?

………………………………………

Take Me Out To The Ballgame

 

“Col, want to go to the Red Sox-Yankees game tomorrow?”

 

See what I mean? Best summer ever.

 

“Yeah, okay.”

 

“We’re leaving at 9AM,” he said like an eighth-grade chaperone before the D.C. field trip. 1:05 PM first pitch. Yankee Stadium. Saturday afternoon.

 

I slept on the couch so we could get an early start. I hadn’t even moved my stuff in yet.

 

Everyone overslept.

 

My wake-up call came in the form of someone busting through the unlocked front door.

 

“Freakshow!” he called from the bottom of the stairs. “GET YOUR ASS UP NOW! WE’RE GOING TO BE LATE!”

 

It was public access TV’s rising star Freeman.     

 

“All ri-i-i-i-i-ght!” was heard from the bowels of the second floor. After floorboards crashed, his crackling feet echoed down the stairwell. Greek rubbed his eyes.

 

“What time is it?” he yawned.

 

“It’s 9:30. Are you eating retard sandwiches? Let’s go! We have to get the beer.”

 

“Colin, we’ll be back in 20 minutes. Be ready.”

 

I put on my jean shorts and white Nikes and went upstairs to tongue brush my teeth with Greek’s Crest.

 

I was ready.   

 

They got back in 37 minutes.

 

“Wait a second……….where’s the fucking ice?” Freeman wanted to know. 

 

“I thought YOU were getting it!”

 

“Greek! There’s gonna be a homo holocaust right now.” 

 

Greek laughed his giddy laugh. 

 

I skipped drinking on a Friday night for this? (“Skipped” meant four beers.)

 

Thirty one minutes later, the icemen cometh.

 

At long last we convened next door at 19A. 10:59AM according to my $20 Timex. It was Greek, myself, Mickey, Evans, Miguel, and, the token girlfriend in every group of guys, Kristin. Everyone else ceased to exist, the room went silent, the clocks froze, the earth’s rotation stopped dead in its tracks. Kristin wore white shorts and a navy-blue Yankees T-shirt with the NY logo over her left breast and number 2 on her back. A furtive side glance from two feet away with my 20/400 best corrected nystagmus addled eyes revealed dark brown hair and the face of an angel. This stone cold stunner might have converted me to The Evil Empire. What had the Red Sox ever done for me anyway? I might have even considered joining a Satanic cult, dabbling in witchcraft, or watching Party Of Five if only she would have asked.

 

Best summer ever!

 

After loading the cooler into Mickey’s van, we were off at 11:06! Friday night dreams of getting to our seats by the National Anthem were dashed, but Mickey interpreted the speed limit as a (bad) suggestion, so the second inning was still in play. The cooler was packed with Long Trail Double Bags, Corona Extras, Harpoon IPA’s and three bags of Nacho Cheese Doritos. Oh and wine coolers. There was a girl.  

 

We crossed the Connecticut River on 1-84.

 

“What’s the best way to go?” Mickey said.

 

“Go The Merritt, dude,” Evans said.

 

“Or 95 might be faster,” Miguel’s future ex-girlfriend suggested. 

 

“Isn’t the Merritt quicker?” Miguel rudely undercut her. Do I sense some  trouble in paradise here?   

 

“Fuck it, we’ll go The Merrit. Greek, can you grab me another Double Bag?” our designated driver asked.

 

“Sure. Colin, need another?”

 

“Yeah, I’ll have a Double Bag too.”

 

“Do we have tickets to the game?” I naively asked.

 

“Nah, dude,” Evans said, like I just asked if we were losers. “We’ll get them outside the gate.”

 

First place Yankees vs. second place Red Sox on a Saturday in late May figured to be a sellout, so how much would scalped tickets cost again? I had $63 in my wallet and $102.27 in the bank and we haven’t even considered price gouged beer and hot dogs at The House That Bank Overdrafts Built.   

 

Sublime’s 40 Ounces To Freedom CD played. I stopped gazing longingly at Kristin’s ponytail and looked out the window to see the cars Mickey left in the dust. Bradley Nowell started whining about committed relationships. 

 

“What the fuck is this?” Evans said.

 

“Is one of the lanes shut down?” 

 

“Are they doing construction?”

 

Construction followed us everywhere we went. Walks to class were obstacle courses around guys in hard hats, bulldozers, orange cones, and yellow tape. It was all part of UConn 2000: an ambitious and wildly expensive project designed to make campus beautiful right after we left.

 

“Mickey, turn the game on,” Evans said.

 

First pitch was at 1:17 PM. John Sterling gushed about his Yankees. 

 

”After last night’s 6-2 win, the Bombers moved to 37-11 on the year. They’ve won 11 of their last 13! They’re on a pace to win 125 games, a major league record! They lead the league in runs scored, ERA, and fielding percentage. Mike, it’s ASTOUNDING.”  

 

They grabbed an astounding 1-0 lead in the bottom of the 3rd on a Jorge Posada single off the great (with the Royals) Bret Saberhagen.

 

We hadn’t left Fairfield County yet.

 

“Dude, I don’t think we’re going to make it,” Freeman said.

 

“Should we turn around?” Evans said.

 

Everyone agreed it was a lost cause.

 

I think I speak for the group when I say our disappointment was tempered by our early afternoon buzz. With a stocked cooler and a sunny, 83 degree, 38% humidity Saturday of day drinking ahead, who needed The Bronx anyway?    

 

The Red Sox miraculously beat the indomitable boys in pinstripes 3-2 before 55,191 fans who apparently didn’t forget the ice.

 

And took 95.

…………………………………………….

Mickey dropped me off on Staffordville Road. That shithole was ours for one more day. I showered, shaved, got dressed and rode my Trek back to Carriage House. Maybe it was the four-beer buzz talking or the gentle caress of a late spring breeze in my face but life seemed amazing! This beat aimless pedaling around dead Ellington and uphill treks through pitiless January dawns.

 

Life after August was uncharted—again--but Bob Romano taught me nothing is ever an end, only a new beginning.

…………………………………………

Brandon returned the keys and walked back four minutes later with our white haired, cane wielding, permanently enraged landlady Alberta for her final inspection.

 

“Why are there divots in the lawn!? Were you drag racing? And is that dog poop not picked up? Disgusting! Is that a crack in the window? What were you doing? Shooting BB guns?? Am I having a seizure right now or is the floor about to collapse?? What’s that brownish stain!? Don’t even answer that. Oh that’s going to cost you. That’s going to be a problem.”

 

“Sure. Send us the check,” Brandon replied with such cold indifference you would have sworn Alberta was a freshman who just told him she loved him.  

 

She theatrically pounded her cane walking back across the street while Athena, who believed parting was such sweet sorrow, barked a homicidal farewell.   

 

“Fuck that bitch. She’s not getting a dime,” Brandon said.

 

“Weren’t those things there when we moved in?” I asked.

 

“Slum lord!” Pav sneered.

 

Well at least we didn’t get evicted.  

…………………………………………

“Col, I’m setting up the entertainment center. Do you still have your stereo?”

 

“Yeah, but it’s at home.”

 

“Want to take a ride out to get it?”

 

“Sure.”

 

We drove back to Ellington to retrieve my Sony sub-woofing sonic sledgehammer. 

 

“Hi mom. Remember Greek?”

 

“Yes! Hello!”

 

“Hi, I’m Nick.”

 

We loaded the receiver/tape deck, CD player, glass case, sub-woofer, and floorstanding speakers in the backseat—three trips.

 

“Wait, I have some leftover green bean casserole from when Andrea and Mrs. Breen were over. And take some leftover chicken parm. And I made some brownies. Take the rest. Oh, do you need shampoo? Laundry detergent?” 

 

“No. I’m all set.”

 

I could have said I went a month and a half without washing my clothes, but what would that have accomplished?

 

She prepared her care package while Celine Dion’s heart went on. She bought our living room stereo in 1980.

 

“She likes it because it looks like furniture, not a stereo,” the sales guy said, deftly telling the customer what they wanted while exploiting a mother’s love for her young child to lock down a sale. My brother and I christened it with AC/DC’s Back in Black eight track.      

 

“Did you know this year’s incoming freshmen were born in 1980?” Greek asked on the ride back.

 

“Oh God. We’re old.”

 

My room was now an empty shrine just like my brother’s. Ghosts now outnumbered people in the house. She would probably watch a Lifetime movie in her room alone tonight…..

 

…..the title cut faded out in the middle of the guitar solo and left 20 seconds of silence as it switched tracks. Then it slowly faded back. In black….            

………………………………………

 

“Can everyone stop what they’re doing for a minute?” Cindy shouted over the hum. “Come to the middle of the floor, please.”

 

The workshop brass was all lined up: Gary, Jim, Mario. But Cindy spoke.

 

“Some of you may have heard this already, but we have some very sad news. Rosa passed away last night. We will be here if anyone needs to talk. We know this was very sudden. We all feel terrible about it.”

 

I heard crying.

 

I had probably seen her, but I couldn’t place her. I read her obituary in The Courant:  

 

“Rosa Ines Marquez of East Hartford, died Monday in St. Francis Hospital. Born in El Banco, Columbia South America, she came to Connecticut 20 years ago and made a home with her sister and brother-in-law. Rosa worked at CSB Industry workshop for the blind for 13 years in spite of her blindness. She was parishioner of St. Rose Church. ”Rochi” as she was affectionately called by her many nieces and nephews, will deeply miss and remember her. She cared and loved them as if they were her own children.”

 

No walk down the aisle for Rosa? No kids of her own? A bridesmaid. An aunt. Tia Rochi. Did Bogota boys not want the blind girl? She probably stayed in her sister’s guest room in East Hartford: a blighted mill town of abandoned factories and tattoo and massage parlors with “Xclusive” and “orchid” in their names.

 

RIP Rosa. Love, a stranger. ……………………………………………..

After getting off my bus by the Shell station beads of sweat formed as I walked one block to the workshop. I put my backpack in a locker. I was still sweating. 

 

Phil opened the brochure warehouse door and cranked the fan, but by late morning I was running the patch machine on the windowless and fanless factory floor. I began sweating again. I wore out a path to the water fountain and threw water on my face. 

 

On Monday it was 96 degrees. Still no AC. I now worked in a literal sweatshop. Was anyone working on, like, fixing this? There were no announcements.   

 

On Wednesday I was on sweatpants separation duty. Black ones in one bin, gray ones in the other. 

 

“Boy Cindy, it’s awfully hot,” Harry said.

 

“I know, dear. Hopefully they will fix the air conditioner soon.”

 

“They better!” Marquitta said.

 

“I know, honey. It’s bad. Three people got sent home yesterday after they fainted. People here have medical conditions. It’s unsafe. One of you needs to go over there and tell Mr. Trapp to fix it. We can’t say anything to him, we’ll get fired. But they can’t fire you.”

 

“Yes, you’re probably right,” Harry said, his aimless blind eyes facing the floor.

 

Cindy was on a roll. 

 

“That man has never worked with the blind in his life! He came from the phone company!”

 

“Is that a fact?” Harry said.  

 

“He needs to hear from you. Back in our day, do you think they just gave us women our rights? We had to fight for them!”  

 

Cindy was plum and matronly. She kept reading glasses around her neck. Yet listen to Carol Gilligan over there. Was she a bra burner in polyester slacks?  

 

But this was nothing like that. I took a Feminism 101 general requirement course and I even avoided saying “FemiNazi” like the other kids on my floor. Plus, even though he (probably) couldn’t fire me (client, not employee) I didn’t want to die in this shithole. Could he sabotage my chances of getting other jobs? Tell employers about my insubordination, absenteeism, and concerning counting deficiencies?

 

Oh, maybe she was right. Was this maybe a little like women’s liberation? Screw that guy. What was he doing over there anyway? Banging his 5x promoted secretary in his temperature-controlled office/bachelor pad? Were the big people fainting from passion while we just fainted? I should walk over to see if they have AC. I can pretend to ask Melissa about job leads.

 

Afte the lunch bell rang I walked down the hall, through their empty cafeteria (beautiful flooring) opened the door (“Warning: authorized personnel only”) and stepped inside. I received a cool embrace in an air-conditioned paradise.  

 

I turned right, walked down two rows of cubicles, and checked the nameplates for Melissa Dubois.  

 

“Hey there!” she said.

 

“Hi.”

 

“How’s everything going?”

 

“Not too bad. So...any new job leads?”

 

“It’s been a little quiet lately, but I’ll let you know.”

 

She reached for her green sweater hanging on the back of her gray Steelcase chair.

 

 “Ooooo it’s cold in here!” She rubbed her hands.

 

“You’re lucky. We have no AC.”

 

“Oh no. Just for today?”

 

“For almost a week.”

 

“Oh that’s terrible. Well, I hope they fix it soon!”   

 

Melissa wasn’t about to confront Trapp either. That wasn’t even in her “other duties” job spec.

 

I wasn’t going to get out of this.

 

“Do you know where Terry Trapp’s office is?”

 

“Oh…..yes. It’s down in front on your right.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

His office suite was behind glass doors. I circled around for a couple of minutes before I walked back to the cafeteria. Oh stop being a wuss! I walked back and pushed the door open. A (spray?) tanned woman sat at the front desk. His Executive Concubine?

 

“Can I help you?”

 

“Uh, yes. Hi. I work over in Industries. Is Mr. Trapp available by any chance?”.

 

My wavering voice rose an octave. I smiled apologetically like an idiot. 

 

“I’m afraid he’s in a meeting at the moment. May I take a message?”

 

“Actually I think I’d rather speak to him myself if that’s okay.”

 

“Can I ask what matter this concerns?” 

 

“Well….it’s kind of a long story actually.” (Another awkward laugh). “Can I wait to see if he gets out soon?”

 

“That’s fine,” she said like she had just misplaced her fly swatter.

 

I sat in one of the two luxurious, beige, genuine leather waiting room chairs. Some décor in here. The chairs matched the tan walls. Who was their interior decorator? Is this genuine mahogany?

 

Light 100 soothingly played at Crystal’s desk. Air Supply was lost in love.

 

Trapp’s booming baritone escaped through his door. Did you forget about my Algebra 101 honed audiological superpowers? 

 

“Our new staff attorney starts next Friday. Do you know Jim Connelly? These fucking schools don’t want to play ball. The Randolph-Sheppard Act clearly states blind vendors shall get priority in all state buildings and schools!”

 

“They claim the law doesn’t apply to snack machines if no blind vendor is on site. Typical. Always talking about the ‘spirit of the law’. Pricks!” a tobacco stained voice replied. He laughed like he just told a dirty knock knock joke.      

 

“Screw that! The Governor wants this Coke contract. He made promises. You think he wants these superintendent pricks overriding that? We’re toast if that happens.”

 

“Why do they care if their school has Coke or Pepsi machines? When I was at Coke we dealt with this shit all the time.” 

 

Maybe I was catching him at a bad time? I can come back tomorrow! I walked back through the cafeteria (three Coke machines hummed on my rigth) and headed back to hell. I stayed cool for about four minutes at the patch machine. I walked back once again and bought a cool refreshing Coca-Cola.  

………………………………………..

“I’m back!” I laughed pathetically. “Is Mr. Trapp available today?”

 

“Unfortunately, he’s in another meeting.” She was doing her nails. What a grueling workload. No piecemeal pay for Crystal.  

 

“Well…….I guess I’ll just wait again if that’s okay.”

 

I joined another executive session in medias rex.

 

“We’re all set with the Golinos. I spoke with the Gov. He will get that reform school contract through without a bid. Teddy, what are we going to do with Mr. Golino’s donation? You can’t put it in the bank. Some dickless do-gooder might subpoena that—not that that will happen.” 

 

“I talked to the Golino brothers. Have you heard of Y2K?”

 

“The jelly?” 

 

“No…I think that’s something else. They think computers and The Web might break when the clocks strike midnight for the new millennium. Bank accounts could get wiped out completely. Could be a disaster. Banks are all going electronic now.”

 

“We’re over a year away from that. You won’t put $200K in the bank because The Web will break? Teddy, you worry too much. Didn’t you go to Orchids Of The Orient like I told you?”   

 

“Yes I did, but we can’t be too careful, right? So they’re giving it to us in gold and I offered to bury it in my backyard.”

 

“I always knew you were a genius! Sounds like a pretty good plan to me. Before we hit the links after lunch, let’s go shovel shopping!” 

 

“I went to Star Hardware last night.”

 

“Fuckin’ A! As brilliant as you are bald!”

 

Was this real life? I figured I’d better leave before I became an accessory to a crime.

 

Friday morning arrived without AC. I’d worry about it all weekend, so I started in the morning to give myself two chances—wait, he’s probably going golfing. Damnit, this was my last chance.

 

I beat my increasingly familiar path to Mahogony Row. A tall, goateed middle aged guy in a red and blue striped golf shirt sat on the edge of Crystal’s desk. Only hard workers get ahead in life.

 

“Hi! Can I help you!?” he boomed.

 

“Hi. Are you Terry Trapp? Do you have a minute?”

 

“Absolutely. Let’s go into my office.”

 

He didn’t close the door. I didn’t bring a Coke or a shovel, so this wasn’t closed-door meeting material.     

 

“What can I do for you?” he thundered, simply drowning out Simply Red on Light 100. 

 

“My name is Colin McDonough. I work next door in Industries. I also work with Melissa Dubois.”

 

“I know who you are, Colin,” he smiled.

 

Really? How? I only mentioned Melissa to see if he bragged about giving her neck massages. Bait not bitten.

 

“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but we haven’t had air conditioning in the workshop for a week.”

 

“Yes I know. That should be fixed very soon.”

 

“Can you say more specifically when that might be?”

 

“Well, I have to talk to the landlord. He has to get the HVAC guys out here. There are a lot of moving parts to this. I can’t give you a definitive answer right now.”

 

“I’m sure you can understand why that’s not acceptable. You see that, right? It’s already been a week. Did you know some clients were sent home early from fainting? One of them might have had a seizure.”   

 

“I was not made aware of that. I will speak with Jim.” 

 

He’s on the ropes. Time to go in for the knockout punch. No time for wusses. 

 

“Well it happened. I’m sure a lot of people would be interested to hear about a blind workshop that can’t even provide air conditioning in a heat wave. I’ve heard you’ve been under some scrutiny and I’m guessing you wouldn’t want The Hartford Courant to get wind of this.”

 

Oh yeah. I fucking said it. Can I unsay it?

 

He brandished his finger like a golf club.

 

“YOU BETTER WATCH WHAT YOU’RE SAYING RIGHT NOW!”

 

Yep, that got his attention.

 

“I’m not saying that needs to happen. But you have to undertand this is not okay. It’s not only morally wrong but I’m pretty sure it’s illegal.”

 

Little chin music for you, buddy.

 

“And you’re basing this on your extensive knowledge of OSHA laws?”

 

“I’m basing that on common sense.”

 

Look who can think on his feet! Nice try, asshole. Why wasn’t I this good in job interviews? Don’t ask what OSHA is.  

 

“Well, as I said, I will speak with the landlord today.”

 

“Okay, thank you. You’re either going to make this happen or not. Don’t say it’s out of your hands. If it’s not fixed I’ll know you just didn’t think it was important enough. You’re the Executive Director of the agency. I can’t believe you don’t have the power to fix it.”

 

“Well, thank you,” he smiled.  

 

I finally said something he liked.    

 

“Okay, look,” he said, “I have to make a few calls. I also have a lot of work to do on the budget. Is this my top priority? No. But I will get to it as soon as I can.”

 

“That’s all I ask.” 

 

“I’m glad we could talk about this man to man. There’s not enough direct communication around here. I don’t like how much lip service you guys get.”

 

“Well, I agree.”

 

“Did you go to the meeting in the cafeteria a few months ago?”

 

I thought he knew who I was.

 

“Yes.”

 

“That went well. We should have another one. I’ll mention it to Jim.”

 

I’ll never see him again.

 

“Sounds good!”

 

He shook my hand. A manly knuckle cruncher, naturally. 

 

As I walked back through the cafeteria, my adrenaline pumped and I felt like a badass. Or as close to a badass as a blind sheltered laborer can feel. 

 

It didn’t last.

 

I was bluffing about The Hartford Courant, of course. Would I need to go through with it on Monday? How do you find their number? I found Greek’s Celeron number so how hard could it be?

 

The suspense nearly killed me on my interminable Monday morning commute. I walked through the doors and……………I don’t believe it……it was cool and refreshing!

 

Just in time for the heatwave to break.

 

 It was only 68 outside. Whatever. Still a win. Or was it? Maybe they would have fixed it regardless and this sound and fury signified nothing. Stop it!

 

I didn’t tell anyone. I wasn’t trying to be some hero. Like a samurai warrior of old, service was my reward.  

 

I changed my mind.

 

“ I guess they finally fixed the AC?” I quite innocently noted to Cindy.  

 

She probably saw right through me. I never offered up much more than “okay”, “yup” and “got it.” “That sounds good” when I felt super loquacious.

 

“Did you say anything?” 

 

“Yes, I went over and talked to Terry Trapp on Friday.”

 

“Good for you sweetheart! Someone had to say something. That man is so arrogant!”

……………………………………………

Carriage House didn’t have AC either but there won’t be any subleasing tenant vs. landlord “man to man” showdowns, I’m afraid. It was just the 90’s.

 

Greek took the master bedroom facing the front yard. I took the smaller bedroom which faced the backyard and provided a skybox seat for beer pong tournaments. My small black fan allowed me to sleep. Greek had a giant, deafening white fan.   

 

Carriage House Row’s first building on the left featured a five star amenity: a laundry room. Easy, ladies. “Oooo that guy by the foosball table staring off into space--his socks look so clean!”

 

A different apartment meant a different illegal cable box. They were more common than Snapple. LA Confidential was playing in heavy rotation.

 

“Don’t you think I look like him?” Greek surveyed the room.

 

Silence.

 

His supposed spitting image was Russell Crowe, who I’d never heard of before. In Greek’s defense, when A River Runs Through It ran repeatedly on HBO, I wondered if Brad Pitt was THAT much better looking than me but I kept that to myself.  

 

But if you could only illegally watch one movie that summer, you made it Boogie Nights. The boys memorized it like my Scarface quoting hallmates who found striking parallels between the rise and fall of a Cuban chainsaw wielding, Hawaiian shirt wearing, freebasing drug kingpin and everyday undergraduate residential life. “Say hello to my little friend!”: unveil your bong. Announce “You got style, flash, PIZZAZ” to anyone wearing a leather tie. Offer tough love, self-help advice to any girl within earshot: “You know what your problem is, pussycat? You got nothing to do in your life, meng.”

 

Dirk Diggler was dumber than a bag of rocks, his mom was psychotic, his dad was catatonic, he drifted into porn—the sheltered workshop of the entertainment industry—and got so strung out on cocaine he was fired, which is almost as hard as getting fired from a literal sheltered workshop. He launched a musical career to disastrous results. Desperate and hungry, he dabbled in gay prostitution before double agent homo holocaust inducing frat bros kicked the living shit out of him. After he got caught scamming a coke dealer with baking soda, he fled flying bullets and Sister Christian. Broken, alone, unable to function outside Jack Horner’s structured group home environment, he came crawling back.

 

But to Carriage House residents, Boogie Nights belonged in the Inspirational Comedy section of Blockbuster.

 

Dirk wore the finest Italian leather, he drove an orange Corvette, he got paid to have sex with Rollergirl and Amber Waves, he REPEATLY won Best Actor at the porn Oscars, and, last but definitely not least, he had an ENORMOUS dick. Case closed: Dirk was The Man.   

…………………………………….

“Let’s go play B-ball at the Fieldhouse,” Evans said.

 

 “Have fun, guys. Go work up a sweat!” Kristin urged as we pulled out of the parking lot. Were we going to re-shoot the Top Gun volleyball scene?

 

The Fieldhouse was the Huskies’ Storrs basketball home until Gampel Pavilion opened next door in 1990. Its clay-colored running tracks surrounded the court.

 

We played three on three: Miguel, Evans, and Freeman vs. Greek, Mickey and me. I was the third warm body—a warm, sweaty body would the enchanting Kristin say?—who evened out the teams.

 

My shot was rusty. I clanged warmup line drives against the glass which caused bank shots to bounce back way too much compared with Dan’s (since destroyed) plastic backboard. But I worried putting too much arc on the ball would lead to airballs and everyone saying, “Does Blind Ambition really need to play? Can’t we get the janitor to sub in?”

 

No worries. Everyone sucked. Getting to 11 took forever. Team shooting percentages were about 20 percent. It turned out bong hits and keg stands didn’t translate to hardwood excellence unless you were UNLV.

 

Evans stuffed Greek’s shot out of bounds.

 

“NOT IN MY HOUSE!”

 

“You hit me on the shoulder AND the arm.”

 

“Did you see anything, Miggy?”

 

“Nah dude, I didn’t see a thing.”

 

What was I worried about? Everyone in this game was blind.

 

I anointed myself a lock-down perimeter defender. I was small but quick and tenacious! I faceguarded Miguel like Ricky Moore on Felipe Lopez. I dropped a sweet bounce pass to Greek down low for a bucket. Every winning team needs the lunch pail guy. It’s not all about offense! Thank God, because my three pointer attempt nearly shattered the backboard. I blew by Mickey off the dribble like he was standing still (actually he was) but I rushed my shot to avoid getting blocked by Evans and missed everything. 0 for 2 from the floor in your box score.   

 

We lost 13-11. Then we won 11-9. Then lost 14-12.

 

It’s not about winning. It’s about showing up. And working up a sweat.     

…………………………………….

“Want to have a party?” Greek asked.

 

“Okay, sure.”

 

It was a rhetorical question. I had zero co-subleasing veto power I was aware of and why would I say no to a party anyway?   

 

Greek verbally sent invitations up and down Carriage House and Celeron.

 

“Hey, we’re having a party on Friday at 19B. Three quarter barrels. Beer pong tournament. Spread the word. It’s gonna be lit.”

 

Attendance figures were critical to Greek.

 

I locked my bike against the back deck at 5PM, went for a run, and drank some water. Then I stopped pretending to be healthy. I grabbed a beer from the big black living room fridge and took it to the shower: a bold move which sent a loud and clear message that you were so laser focused on getting hammered immediately if not sooner that you simply couldn’t afford to waste valuable time bathing beerless.

 

The 1 units were having a party too. Dave Matthews’ Lie In Our Graves blasted. I walked across the street with a Harpoon in my left hand and a cigarette in my right so there was no question I belonged. Nitrous balloons, cigarette smoke and pot smoke wafted through the early summer air. Was this heaven? Life was so full of hope and possibilities on this dreamlike June evening. Where else would I rather be?

 

Back over at our place, pyramids of 20 red solo cups sat on opposite ends of two picnic tables pushed up against each other.

 

“Mickey you’re up!”

 

I was the Michael Jordan of early round beer pong. With a massive triangle of tightly assembled cups to aim for, even if you missed, gravity bailed you out. No one made me call my shot. Still, you had to survey the board with a maniacal gleam in your eye and take three practice tosses (minimum) before you sent your ball on its leap of faith.

 

“Ohhhhh drink, Greek!” Evans ordered after Mickey knocked a ball into a second row cup.

 

Greek dutifully took the wet ball out of the cup, dropped it in the giant white trash bag for balls that died a hero, and chugged. 

 

Evans and Mickey’s superior technique won out. Evans bounced balls on the tablecloth and into cups. Spirals through the air were too artsy, too at the mercy of weather conditions, he just liked to bang shit.

 

Thirty kids crammed into our living room. Freeman’s Allman Brothers Greatest Hits CD cranked on my stereo. He kept skipping back to Blue Sky--less for its sweet declaration of love than its beautiful, syrupy, woman tone Dickey Betts outro solo which he frenetically air guitared to.

 

The couches were full, so overflow kids sat on the floor by the coffee table. Twelve conversations blended. Visitors walked in and out of the open doors. The summer was young and so were we. Well, I was youngish. Life was a million times better than this time last year!

 

“Colin, do you know Kate?”

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“She lives in 2B. This is her roommate Amira.”

 

“Hi, nice to meet you.”

 

Kate was tall with light brown hair. Amira was short with black hair and glasses.

 

“You’re rooming with Greek this summer?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Cool. Do you know Nina?” 

 

“I actually haven’t met any of the girls who live here.”

 

“They’re cool.”

 

“I saw Joe in the backyard. I want to go talk to him but I’m so nervous!” Amira said.

 

“Oh my God. Will you forget him?” Kate said.

 

“He was talking to Erica. Do you think he likes her?” Amira unforgettingly asked.

 

Kat sighed.

 

I figured Joe was an asshole.  

 

“Well, nice meeting you!” they said.

 

All summer next door. Did I have a shot? Was Kate single? I was clearly no Joe, but possibly a Plan B?

……………………

Greek, Evans, this kid Martinez and I watched the Bulls beat the Utah Jazz in the NBA Finals for the second straight year. This was their sixth title in eight years. They just show reruns in the summer, don’t they? The Jazz were so lazy they didn’t bother changing their name after moving from New Orleans–unless they hoped to re-brand Salt Lake City a horn blowing, reefer smoking, cool cat hotbed.   

 

Michael Jordan stole the ball, faked out Byron Russel (the Seven Mary Three of 90’s NBA players) and sank the winning shot in the final seconds. Bob Costas pretended to be excited. 

 

“Jordan……open…..CHICAGO WITH THE LEAD!!!!!” 

 

Martinez joined in on the playacting.

 

“Jordan is ICE COLD, yo.” 

 

The Bulls’ were a crashing bore. The 80’s Celtics and Lakers beat each other, but no one could beat the 90’s Bulls. Champions need to lose to seem human.  

 

Even the high flying, windmill dunking, tongue wagging Air Jordan of the 80’s was grounded, replaced by a fadeaway midrange jumper which made him unguardable and unwatchable.  

 

You think I’m joking, right? I’ve never been more serious. After three straight titles, he quit to hit .202 as a White Sox minor leaguer. Many suspected Commissioner Stern secretly suspended him for gambling. Forget it. After Jordan’s dad was murdered the veil lifted: he was 30 years old and stuck in a dead end job with nothing to look forward to in life except more championships—but not over the Showtime Lakers, the Bad Boy Pistons, or the White Boy Celtics. Nope, JV teams like Clyde Drexler’s Trailblazers or Charles Barkley and “Thunder” Dan Majerlie’s Suns. Detlef Schremph? The Sonics? Who’s next? The Ellington Knights?

 

So he flailed wildly at low and away curveballs in poorly lit AA ballparks for the Barrington Barons. Failure became his antidote to the mind-numbing, soul crushing ennui of basketball glory. Only after his Southern League summer of purgation could he return for three more titles. But he still created phony obstacles like his “flu game” in 1997 when he scored 38 points while reportedly knocking on death’s door. “Bad pizza” Ahmad Rashad told us. Ceaseless winning is so boring you have to eat life threatening pizza just to still feel alive. 

……………………………………..

“Mr. McDonough!” Phil said. “Go see Gary.”

 

Why was he so happy?

 

“Oh…..okay.”

 

I guess the morning’s brochures can wait?

 

I wandered through the workshop until I spotted Gary talking to Shirley. Something about sleeve and T-shirt work orders. Three interminable minutes later, he said, “Colin. Hey buddy. Want to talk in my office for a second?”

 

No glossy mahogany here. His office sat right in the middle of the workshop. The din of machinery, voices, and canes leaked through his closed door. It was the eye of a hurricane more than a plush oasis. 

 

“We’re going to take you off brochures for now. Phil has indicated to me you aren’t here enough and we need to get those shipments out.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“And we can use the extra help meeting our work orders, so we’re keeping you on the floor for now.” 

 

He made it sound like a once in a lifetime opportunity.

 

“Oh….okay. I live kind of far away and it’s a long commute, so it’s just hard to get here five days a week.”

 

“I understand. Maybe if things change…..”

 

“Okay.”

 

Don’t get paranoid here. Phil did complain about my attendance, right? I still wasn’t clear how his life would get easier if I did brochures zero days instead of some days, but never mind.

Would Trapp risk word leaking that I stormed into his office—it’s my story so we’re going with stormed—for a man to man? Wouldn’t that shatter the virile, secretary banging, contract steering image he had cultivated for years? Conan The Barbarian with a better golf handicap. Unless he feigned a sudden deep concern over Union Station getting 100 Quassy Amusement Park brochures in the timely manner they so richly deserved.

 

Once you think you’ve hit the bottom rung, they find a new ladder.  

 

Michael Jordan would be so jealous of my life.  

……………………………………..

“Colin, have you seen my wallet?” Greek asked. 

 

“No.”

 

“I don’t know what I did with it.”

 

 “Did you have it at the party?”

 

“Yeah. At least at the beginning,” he laughed.

 

“Dude, it’s that kid Ravi, I’m telling you,” Evans said.  

 

“I must have had $300 in there. Plus my school ID, plus my credit card, and my license.”

 

“Any 10th grade class pictures of yourself, Greek?” Miguel inquired. 

 

“How about a shirtless Marky Mark pic to jerk off to?” Mickey wondered.

 

“Just go up there and ask. We will go with you,” Evans said.  

 

“Like he’s just going to admit it?” 

 

“If we all go up? He’ll be scared shitless. Look at me. I’m jacked!” unjacked, beer bellied Evans said. 

 

Greek, Evans, and Mickey--a ragtag posse of wallet bounty hunters—marched up to 11A to interrogate the suspect. I guarded the home front.       

 

They returned fourteen minutes later. Sans wallet.

 

“He’s fucking lying,” Detective Evans deduced. 

 

“He’s totally lying. Who else could have taken it?” Mickey said. 

 

“Never trust an Indian,” Evans counseled.

 

Three days later, Greek reached under his car seat searching for his Boy Named Goo CD and found his wallet inside an empty carton of McDonald’s fries.

 

Are there any crimes the Goo Goo Dolls can’t solve?  

……………………………………

Early one Saturday afternoon, Radio 104 played Harvey Danger’s glorious Flagpole Sitta. This was my Smack My Bitch Up. I cranked my 192 million decibel stereo, sang wildly off key, and danced around the living room like I was being attacked by a swarm of yellow jackets.   

 

The door opened. A girl walked in. I leaped for the volume button like it was a nuclear reactor ticking down to zero.

 

“Oh hi!”

 

“Hi, I’m Nina.”

 

“Oh, you…uh…live here.”

 

“Yes. You’re Greek’s roommate?” 

 

“Yes, Colin. Nice to meet you. My, um, favorite song!”

 

“Nice to meet you. I just came to check on the place.”

 

“Still in one piece!”

 

After the party, we hadn’t quite gotten around to a deep cleaning. Dirty dishes piled up in the sink, empty beer bottles and two overflowing ashtrays sat on Greek’s gaming center--which some might have called a dining room table.

 

But feminine touches still abounded. Nick-nacks crammed the five tiered wooden shelf: family portraits, dance recital photos, athletic trophies, etc. One more party and a lifetime of cherished girlhood keepsakes would come crashing down on the coffee table.

 

“I’m going to say hi to Kate,” Nina said.

 

Nina was petite with light brown hair. White tank top, blue shorts. So many women, so little time. I can tell her I’m still in the brochure game.  

………………………………………

Black kids lived in 19C. Heartbeats synchronized to their subwoofer. It registered a 6.3 on the Richter scale. Oil excavators could have just used their stereo system. 

 

You niggaz don’t know the half of it/

Smokin’ chronic is an all day habit!

 

I heard this number–okay, pun intended– roughly 987 times that summer. The wall shaking volume created a sonic shield from my guitar playing and singing so I loved their all-day habit!

 

Singing For Dummies said sing with your diaphragm. Great. Might as well tell me to think with my basal ganglia. Close your mouth and hum until your lips tingle. They tingled like crazy after four seconds but was this a stepping stone to Bohemian Rhapsody? Did vibrating lips mean my diaphragm was working overdrive?

 

It said lift your soft palate: a fancy word for the roof of my mouth I figured. (Zero diagrams.) My fully lifted soft palate version of Pearl Jam’s Black sounded like I just sucked down too much laughing gas before a tooth extraction.

 

And all this book TAUGHT me was

……nothing.

 

I listened to an improvisational performance I recorded (while drunk) two summers earlier on a Maxell tape because Memorex sucked.   

 

I can’t sing and I’m a fucking joke!

 

That was as far as I got.

 

I’ll just take a toke. 

 

I’m a wheel and you’re just a spoke?

 

I’m one handsome bloke!?

 

Refreshment is a Coke?

 

No, no, no, and no.  

 

I sounded like Lou Reed and I didn’t think I could compensate with gritty odes to heroin, dirty boulevards, and Andy Warhol transexual hangers on, so I was absolutely screwed. How could I de-Lou my voice? Did Andy Warhol know any voice reassignment surgeons?

 

Bad singers can still become great songwriters, so I tried again.   

 

You stole my studded leather bracelet /

What’chu tryna do?

That’s why lovin’ you is like /

Gettin’ a tattoo removed.

 

That Celeron girl was right. Writing a song is so hard. 

………………………………………

“What’s your major?” Kristin asked.

 

“Well….I actually graduated already but it was English. I’m probably enrolling in grad school soon. You?”

 

“Finance.”

 

Well no one’s perfect.  

 

“That’s cool.”

 

“Where are you from?”

 

“Ellington? Kind of a farm town. A lot of people haven’t heard of it.”

 

“I’ve heard of it I think”.

 

So nice of her to say.

 

“Where are you from?”

 

“Madison.”

 

“Down by the shore? My family’s been going to Hawk’s Nest Beach in Old Lyme my whole life. Isn’t there some famous restaurant in Madison?”

 

“Lenny And Joe’s?”

 

“That’s it! We’ve gone there a bunch of times.”

 

“What’s your last name?”

 

This girl is like 20/20. Maybe she wants me.

 

“McDonough.”

 

“Oh, you’re Irish? You look it.”

 

“I know. What’s your last name?”

 

“Micelli. I’m half Italian and half Irish.”

 

“Ah….Kristin, Irish and Micelli, Italian,” I astutely observed. Is Kristin even Irish? “You look more Italian than Irish.” 

 

“I know. My sister is fair and blonde like you.” 

 

“You don’t have to worry as much at the beach!”

 

Ugggh. That’s the best I could do?

 

Greek was reading her copy of Us Weekly.

 

“They gave The Truman Show a rave review. I didn’t think it was nearly as good as Jim Carrey’s other movies.” To Greek, life was no simulation. “Do you think I could write a screenplay?”

 

“Yes, Greek,” Kristin said.

 

Nicest girl ever.

 

“Like Ace Ventura meets LA Confidential. Don’t you think I look like the guy in that?”

 

“A little.”

 

“Who’s that on the cover?” I said.

 

”Ben Affleck and Matt Damon,” Greek said. 

 

“Oh and there’s Gwynneth. She’s so beautiful,” Kristin said. 

 

“Yeah, totally.”

 

Was calling her “Gwynneth” shallow? I called Pedro Martinez “Pedro.” And Donyell Marshall “Donyell”--although we took the same sociology class which he was habitually late for. He cackled with Rudy Johnson and Brian Fair until the accented, untenured professor asked them to be quiet. I worried they’d tell Coach Calhoun to crush his academic career before it even began.   

 

In-depth Us Weekly interviews (if they existed) might tell Kristin more about Gwynneth than she knew about most of her Delta Gamma sisters. Artists and celebrities get naked—figuratively and/or literally—so of course we’re on a first name basis with them! With our friends, we know their face, voice, dress, their perfume or (if they’re a douche) their cologne. We know their favorite bands and beers, we know they’re from Madison, but that’s not a character, that’s an extra. Are our friends two feet away from us bigger strangers than characters fifty feet away on sixty foot screens?

 

Miguel didn’t share Greek’s Hollywood dreams. Why should he? He had dark good looks, he wore a baby blue and white striped Argentina jersey, he had a a black cat named Whisper and three fish. He constantly played Doom through a surround sound system amplifying every single machine blast and explosion. And we haven't even talked about his bottomless bong. He smoked all day. He had a smoking hot girlfriend. Fairfield County’s Miguel was smoking the competition. His heart rate never seemed to rise above 72. He spoke in a leisurely drawl. “What’s up, dude?” “Do you watch the Red Sox every day, dude?” “Where is Greek, dude?” He lived behind a smoke shrouded rampart of mellowness which Kristin stormed repeatedly.

 

“Miggy, I said I was okay with pizza.”

 

“But then you said, ‘Sure, whatever you want’ like you didn’t really want it.”

 

“I don’t care. Let’s get what you want!”

 

“Kristin…….do you want to get something else?” his pulse now teetering dangerously close to 73.

 

“ I want to get what you want.”

 

“Fine.” Slightly pressured voice now.

 

Miggy’s chillness made Kristin’s blood boil. Where was his anger? His fear? His story? Was even her boyfriend a stranger? She tried to poke holes in his defense like she once snuck white dimpled balls into the net as a Daniel Hand High field hockey star, but Miguel was the toughest goalie she’d ever faced. 

……………………………………………

“I’ll have a Big Mac with fries and a Coke, please.”

 

“Would you like to Super Size that?”

 

Fuck it.

 

“Okay.”

 

The Padres got rained out at home for the first time since April 14th, 1984. My mom, my brother and I went to a rained-out Padres/Braves game in April, 1984! At least the skies cleared for the zoo.

 

“How about that Mark McGwire?” a guy at the next table said. 

 

“Watch out for Sammy Sosa! Two more homers last night. He has 29! Only 4 behind McGwire!” his buddy said. 

 

“Crazy huh?”

 

McGwire batted only .201 in 1991, but he was a fountain of youth drinking Übermensch in the summer of ‘98. Sosa, a Rangers and White Sox castoff, was a late blooming Babe Ruth. They didn’t test anyone for steroids, so on this sunny, sanguine June day, McDonald’s patrons dared to believe they just found their batting stroke. Mr. Colangelo was right after all: never pitch to a slumping hitter because he may (or may not) start using HGH.

 

An older couple sat at a table to my right.

 

“How do you like your meal?”   

 

“Good,” the woman quietly said.   

 

I looked up. Looked like they were wearing worn discount department store clothes. TJ Maxx on Windsor Avenue? Or Salvation Army? Section 8 housing? How was lunch? The same as the last 3,494 times. A team of food scientists engineered it that way.

 

It was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard in my life.   

 

I actually got misty eyed.    

 

Did Miguel ask Kristin how her lunch was? With a hot young thing who could bang any guy she wanted (your narrator, for instance, was just waiting for a sign) was he afraid to? This lady wore glasses, had shoulder length graying hair, and a button-down dark green sweater. She wasn’t turning any Blue Light Special heads. Maybe happiness is just feeling safe enough to care.

………………………………………

The Hole In The Wall Gang

 

“Colin, do you like strawberry daiquiris?” Greek said. 

 

“Yeah….I think so?”  

 

“Cool. We’re having Poker Night on Friday”

 

Greek and myself vs. Evans and Mickey vs. Miguel and Kristin. 

 

Kristin manned the stereo. She slid my Violent Femmes tape into the slot (even her musical selections were erotic) and pushed play. She sat to my left in a red tank top and sang every word--from Blister In the Sun to Good Feelings. Why can’t Kristin get more than zero sexual encounters? Must be vaguely related to fortune. She’s rendered speechless when she’s between your bipedal walking aids.

 

Forget Guns n’ Roses, Metallica and Faith No More at Giants Stadium, this was the greatest musical performance I’d ever heard. Was this even fair? Was Kristin a beautiful and enchanting siren masquerading as a finance major or just a hall of fame tease? Who knew lo-fi teen angst anthems straight outta Wisconsin could be so sexy?  

 

I waited for Evans—a strict Beastie Boys and Slayer man—to say “get this gay crap off” but apparently even he got ensnared in her karaoke cocoon.

 

Sublime was next. She’s randier than a renowned adult film star, she’s a sensitive lover, she admires the mammry glands of a nymphet from a very questionable nuclear family.

 

I needed another daiquiri.

 

“Greek, if you’re in there, can I get another?”

 

“Coming right up! Anyone need a cigar?”

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Sure.” 

 

Daiquaris and cigars. We were classy like Cuba before they let the guerillas in the swimming pools. Even Kristin grabbed one. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. This is not one of those times.

 

Setback was my family’s Hawk’s Nest game. High, low, jack, game. Bidding, trump suits. A simple, honest game. Poker was like a game created by a drunk Texan. Which it probably was.

 

“Wait, so a full house is 3 of a kind and 2 of a kind?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“And that beats a strait?”

 

“Yes.”

 

I didn’t have a full house. Until I drew. Then I did.

 

“Okay so I guess I call?”

 

“You lost. Evans has a strait. $17 bucks,” Greek said.

 

“Wait! You said a full house beats a strait!”

 

“No this is a straight flush. Five cards in a row of the same suit.”

 

“Aha. So then a flush also beats a full house?”

 

“No.”

 

“No?”

 

“I thought you said you played poker before, Col.” 

 

I was to poker what Gordon Gano was to sexual prowess and Bradley Nowell was to child protection agencies.   

 

“I’ve played. Just not in a while.”

 

Somewhere in the Niagra Falls area.

 

“A straight flush beats a full house. A full house beats a flush.”

 

“So a flush is….wait….so a straight flush is five consecutive cards of the same suit but a regular flush is just five cards of the same suit in any order?”

 

“You got it, Col!” said Evans, like Cindy saying I put sweatpants in the right bin.

 

“See? I’m ready for the World Series of Fucking Poker now.”

 

Maybe that hilarious line redeemed this low roller in Kristin’s eyes? I’m so bangable it’s not even funny. That is if Kristin and Miguel’s beautiful relationship sadly ran its course.

 

The game went back and forth. We won a hand with a four of a kind!

 

“One. Million. Dollars,” Greek said in his best Dr. Evil voice while hauling in the red and black chips. 

 

That was all Kristin needed. She was shot out of a fucking cannon.  

 

“Hello Mr. Powers. My name is Alotta. Alotta Fagina. A-LOTTA Fagina.”

 

This was getting out of control. 

 

After the third—or fourth—or…..well, I’m not quite sure how many daiquiri refills, everyone became supremely confident about their hands. Greek’s rum hand got heavier with each return trip to the kitchen.

 

“I’ll raise you!”

 

“Same.”

 

“In!”

 

“Okay, I call,” Miguel said.

 

Cards down. Sorry reader, I couldn’t see the cards well enough to tell you who had what. (I had nothing.) But this writer deduced Evans was not the winner.

 

“MotherFUCKER!!!” 

 

He exploded out of his chair, did a 180, and kicked the wall. In the biggest upset of the night, Evans’ size 12 white Adidas won the battle as the wall caved in and left a rectangular hole. Either Evans’ right foot was a mighty force of inebriated nature or Carriage House’s walls were hollower than a white chocolate Easter bunny. 

 

We all burst out laughing.  

 

Well, not quite everyone.

 

“Brown, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!?”

 

“Relax, Greek!”

 

“I’m not fucking relaxed! This isn’t my apartment! Those girls are going to KILL me” 

 

Evans waved his hand.  

 

“Greek, don’t worry. I’ll fix it tomorrow.”

 

“How are you going to fix it? Do you know how?”

 

“Dude, I’ve got tools.”

 

The festive pre-communist Cuba vibe had soured considerably. Evans was our Castro. Even the stereo went silent. We played one more hand. Migeul yawned.

 

“Well, good night.”

 

“Good night. See you tomorrow.”

 

Did Kristin float so much sexual tension into the air that eventually someone had to kick in the wall?

 

Or is that interpretation too Book Of Genesis? 

…………………………………………..

I walked downstairs the next morning to find Greek staring into the hole like it was a wormhole to a distant galaxy he desperately needed to flee to. 

 

“Those girls are going to KILL me.”

 

“Tell Evans to fix it. He said he’s going to, right?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

We both knew he wasn’t fixing it.

 

“Maybe we can pay to get it fixed? I could chip in if it’s not too expensive. How much does that kind of thing cost?”

 

“I have no idea.”

 

“Well………..”.

 

Was maintenance even a thing at Carriage House? That seemed like a real Hail Mary.  

 

“Uh, hi, I live in 19B. Our living room wall appears to have collapsed. Maybe it was the humidity?”

 

Not the answer.

 

“Have you ever seen Nicole?” Greek asked.

 

“No. Just Nina.”

 

“She’s HUGE.”

 

“Like……tall”

 

“Cheeaahh. She must be six feet.”

 

“You’re worried she’s going to kick your ass? Like physically?”

 

“I mean KIND of.”

 

I grabbed a Mountain Mist from the fridge. Did Greek blend the daiquiris with the top off? Dried strawberry juice lined the sink, counters, and walls. It looked like a murder scene. Amazonian lease holders might sooner break Greek’s spleen over this. Neither Greek nor your narrator made a single move to clean. Call us lazy slobs if you like but when there’s a hole in your wall, you don’t exactly reach for a paper towel. 

………………………………………

The Allman Brothers played The Meadows in Hartford the following night. I became slightly biased against them after a record club commercial aired throughout my childhood featuring two bandana wearing hippie burnouts saying, “Hey man, is that freedom rock?!” as Ramblin’ Man played. “Hey man, remember going to jail?”. I preferred Duane Allman’s slide work on Derek and The Dominoes’ Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs: an anguished declaration of undying love from heroin addled Eric Clapton to his best friend George Harrison’s wife Patty. The 70’s, am I right? Don’t be fooled: ho’s always come before bros. For further study see The Trojan War.  

 

There was me, Greek, Freeman and their TEP bro Pony on a rainy Sunday night. Feeling not so fresh after three straight nights of drinking, I was taking it light. The United States military needed me to sew patches on olive drab canvas bags in the morning. 

 

“Col, have you done mushrooms?”

 

Greek didn’t understand my dedication to God and country.   

 

“A couple times, but I didn’t really feel much.”

 

“Want a tab?”

 

Absolutely not.

 

“Sure.” 

 

Listen, I needed a pick-me-up and they don’t call this freedom rock for nothing, man.  

 

We bought lawn seats at the ticket window.

 

“We’re jumping the fence!”. Adidas T-shirt, backwards hat wearing Freeman announced.

 

Do we have to? I will get so booted.

 

“Col, ready to jump?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Just watch us. Go when we go!”

 

Security must have done shrooms as well because we grabbed section 500 seats without incident. It was far from a stormy Sunday sellout.  

 

They opened with Statesboro Blues. This was a good tune. It featured a blues/freedom rock staple: using a girl’s sister to set a jealousy trap. Slide guitar. Another verse. Nice and dry under the pavilion. This was fun! More slide. Nothing can make you feel calmer than 120 decibels of rock and a 20 ounce Bud Light and hallucinogenics. Things brightened up. Couple songs I never heard. An endless organ solo which was cool I guess. I’ll bet Schmedley’s bikers were here with their old ladies. Some other bluesy song. Who’s ready for more organ?

 

They launched into Blue Sky. Dickey Betts’s outro solo was served with extra butter. Oh man. Are the shrooms starting to kick in? I started to laugh. And laugh. And laugh. This went on for quite some time. My face hurt. I probably looked insane.

 

Then it was an organ drenched dirge about feeding your ex to an alligator. That wasn’t nearly enough to wipe the smile off my face. I laughed at everything and nothing. The universe. The doors of perception opened wide. Life was facehurtingly funny. I thought I might never stop laughing.

 

Hot Lanta made me dumb struck with awe and wonder and not just from the smooth pentatonic soloing. I looked down and couldn’t believe my eyes. Hands were absolutely crazy. To think we walked around every day with these things just hanging off us. Why was no one talking about this? The veins, the scaly flesh, the way fingers fold in three—I guess I never thought about that. And the freakiest thing is we have two of them! Basically identical! I placed my primordial claws side by side and stared transfixed for the length of a southern rock outro jam, possibly even longer. What’s the point of fingernails anyway? Protect us from…..I was stumped. Did they mention that in Bio? Where was Amber when I needed her?

 

Wait a minute. Wait. One. Fucking. Minute. You get nicotine stains on your hands. Not your hair. Or your ass. Hands! That makes so much more sense!

 

I hazily recall Melissa. No Ramblin’ Man. Or Jessica. At least I don’t think so…. Jam bands don’t just play the hits, man. This ain’t the Goo Goo Dolls.

………………………………………

The next day—reader, take a seat—I didn’t report to work. Outside it was as gray as my soul. 

 

On MTV, Natalie Imbruglia wasn’t feeling so chipper herself. She was torn. She rested supine sans clothes in a room presumably without furniture.  

 

“Freakshow!”

 

“Hey Pon”.  

 

“Is that Torn?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Natalie even bewitched Pony. No one escaped her sorceress’s powers that summer.

 

“Feeling alright, Colin. Are you sad because you got so drunk last night?”.  

 

Drunk? Talk about burying the lead.

 

“Yeah,” I moaned, lying clothed on the couch, my internal organs abandoned somewhere in a sewage dump. I felt slightly better after he asked. Pity is the only true hangover medicine.      

 

“I’m going to make copies at the library. You guys want to come with me?”

 

We entered Homer Babbidge through the side door near the parking lot. Drivers were so weird. This was about my 1,001st visit but my first through this entrance.  

 

Maybe Pony could drive me to the Registrar’s Office. I needed a grad school application immediately. The dream was not dead. No more fucking around. My four day drinking/shrooming/smoking/bong hitting hangover filled me with such despair Camus and Sartre were Regis and Kathie Lee next to me. Skipping work only deepened my crushing guilt. Some military man. I deserve a court martial.

 

Grad school. Grad school. Grad school. 

 

Pony made his copies. We drove home. I’ll hit the Registrar on my next day off.

………………………………………

I moved a kitchen table chair two feet from the TV. The Sox played the Phillies at Fenway. Interleague play. Let’s just ruin the mystique of the World Series to boost regular season attendance.

 

Kate and Nina walked in and sat on the couch. 

 

“Hi Colin.”

 

“Hi!”

 

“Is this the Red Sox?” Kate asked.  

 

“Oh….yeah. You can watch something else if you want.”

 

“No, no, you’re good.”

 

“I saw you riding your bike near the library yesterday,” Nina said. 

 

“Oh, I was probably coming home from work.”

 

“Where do you work?”

 

“West Hartford.”

 

It sounded better than Windsor.  

 

“I’m from West Hartford! Bishops Corner.”

 

“Isn’t that near the West Hartford branch?”

 

“Yes.”

 

I got lost in Bishops Corner looking for campus on my first day. I’ll keep that to myself.

 

“Oh cool. I’m on Shield Street.”

 

I didn’t know any good West Hartford streets to lie about. 

 

“Do you mind if we smoke?”

 

“Oh no! Go ahead!”

 

Any minute now, my mom was due to drop off a care package: food, probably shampoo, bath towels, every conceivable mom thing.  

 

They sparked up a joint and passed it back and forth.

 

“Want some?” Nina asked, waving it in my direction. 

 

If I say yes, I’ll smell like weed. If I say no the joint will take longer to get smoked. Will my life’s dilemmas never end?

 

“I’m good for now, thanks.”

 

“I like baseball. The Yankees. I used to be good at softball,” Kate said.

 

“Oh really?” Nina said.

 

“I played 3rd base. But my coach was a bitch.”

 

This was absurd. How hard would it be to just say, “Actually, guys, can you hold off blazing for just a couple minutes? My mom is coming over.”

 

This would be super embarrassing. All because I didn’t want to be a just say no mama’s boy in front of two girls who had theoretically not 100% ruled out banging me. Hadn’t I already risked getting tagged a hip to be square friend zoned dweeb by just saying no? And this purple polo shirt? That’s two strikes!

 

Tim Wakefield’s knuckleball floated instead of danced, but Curt Schilling wasn’t doing much better. Troy O’Leary (a black guy in Boston who probably adopted an Irish stage name) blasted a belt high slider into the visiting bullpen. 

 

Kate killed the joint in the ashtray. Thank God! What was I so worried about? “I’ll be there at 8:15”. Yeah, right. Mom was always late.  

 

She knocked three minutes later. 

 

“Hi, honey.”

 

“Hi. This is Kate and Nina.”

 

“Hi!” the girls said perhaps a bit too brightly.

 

Could mom detect weed? Had she ever smoked it? Unthinkable.

 

“I brought prime rib I already cooked. Just make sure you keep it refrigerated. Cook it at 175 for 15 minutes.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Oh and do you have a bath mat? I brought you one.”

 

Great. Bath mats are a huge turn on. I’m single, girls.

 

Mom left.  

 

 “Colin, why didn’t you tell us your mom was coming? We would have waited to smoke!” Nina said.    

 

“Sorry. Yeah I guess maybe I should have told you, huh?” 

……………………………………..

I worked three days that week but enough was enough so I took Friday off. Phil didn’t need me in brochures. Did they even need me at the sealing machine? Or button machine? Pens? Others could fill in. With my $7 one- way Peter Pan ticket, $0.75 city bus, the Courant, my occasional USA Today splurge, my Dunkin’ coffee, and McDonald’s lunch, I was too afraid to calculate my net profit. Staying home and collecting SSI was about as lucrative—but without the resume building. Or scarlet letter branding. 

 

Blue skies, sunshine, mild temps, and my fifth straight day without ingesting Schedule 1 drugs made my spirits soar. My Rolling Stone subscription somehow kept pace with my fourth address in eight months. I read a Lucinda Williams cover story. Car Wheels On a Gravel Road was their favorite album ever. Should I ride down to The Disc? What’s more money spent?

 

The girls walked in and sat in their assigned seats: Kate to the left, Nina to the right.

 

“Hi Colin! You didn’t have to work today?” Nina asked.

 

Man she was getting personal.

 

“No, I took it off. Too nice of a day!”. Just a sheltered workshop Ferris Bueller over here.   

 

“We should go to the beach!” Nina said.

 

“Do you know why there are tides?” Kate asked.  

 

“It’s the moon, right?”

 

“Right but how does the moon cause tides?”

 

Were they stoned again?

 

“Um, I don’t know.”

 

“Colin, do you know?”

 

“I forget.”

 

I didn’t know.  

 

“The moon’s gravity pulls water towards it. But since the earth is spinning, the ocean is closer to the moon at some points in the day, causing high tides.”

 

“How far away is the moon?”

 

“238,000 miles.”   

 

“So the moon’s mass is like a giant magnet?” I blinded them with science.  

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Wow Kate, you’re a fountain of knowledge,” Nina said.

 

“I try to learn something new every day.”

 

Was I learning something new every day?

 

Sitting there with them was heaven. Thank God I didn’t go to that hellhole today! Girls had a gravitational pull too but when my axis spun closest to them I pulled away, not toward them, like I was afraid I would spin out of my axis.

 

But not right now. I wished we could sit like this forever.

 

“Guiliano is having a party tonight,” Nina said.

 

“Ugggh I’m so over him.”

 

“Lover’s quarrel?”

 

“I’m going to vomit. I’ve learned my lesson. I used to jump into bed with any guy who showed me attention.”

 

“But you’re much smarter than that now.”

 

They always get smart right before they meet me. 

………………………………………

Martinez was the clique’s one African American. If you discount NBC’s Thursday night prime time programming, the 90’s were semi-diverse.

 

Was he a TEP brother? If I say he was possibly their weed dealer and you call me a racist, may I refer you back to the Caucasian student-dealers we met earlier in our story? College drug dealing was a diverse workforce. Like the Utah Jazz.      

 

“Did you hear DMX’s new CD?”

 

“No, is it good?” Miguel said. 

 

“It’s t-i-i-i-ight, yo.”

 

I had seen a Rolling Stone review. Wait, and I just championed diversity. I mean I read it in Vibe. 

 

“What’s it called?” I asked. “It’s Hot As Hell? No, wait. It’s Dark And Hot: What The Hell?”  

 

“No”, he held smoke in, which always sounds like choking to death. “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot.”

 

Was it a rap album about a sheltered workshop?

 

DMX sounded like he just freebased three lines of coke off a VIP room mirror after pounding ten Jolts and dominating a box of Chips Ahoy before invading your personal space on the D train. He was too urban for Evans—the suburbs were still processing No Doubt and Reel Big Fish—so he tuned the stereo to Radio 104. Matchbox 20’s Real World.  

 

“I love this song!” Martinez said.

 

“Really?” I said.

 

“Yeah this is my jam.”

 

Last fall at Celeron Greek declared Push his personal anthem. He was the target demo, but Martinez?

 

This Incesticide customer wouldn’t be caught dead buying a Matchbox Twenty CD. I bought Bon Jovi’s Keep The Faith (I’ve finally gone too far with oversharing) and the blue haired, nose ringed girl at The Disc laughed me out of the store.

 

Except……..

 

Cue infectious guitar hook.

 

It was a pretty good song. This is why diversity was key. Black kids helped white kids appreciate Rob Thomas.  

………………………………………

Roo’s was our hotspot that summer. They specialized in Australian fare--whatever that was. Baked kangaroo? Sauteed koala? I surveyed the exotic five-page menu for three minutes before ordering a burger and fries. We don’t need your Men At Work food here.     

 

Four Corners sat at the intersection of Rout 195 and Route 44. It featured a gas station/convenience/lottery ticket store, a package store, Kathy John’s restaurant and fine cuisine from Down Under.

 

We went to pick up the food (and obviously booze). Carriage House was two miles away. Head down Hunting Lodge Road, hang a right onto Bird Road and another right onto Route 44. We made amazing time, arriving in 44 seconds. The world was Mickey’s racetrack. Speed limit 25? School bus zone? Gun it. His driver’s ed teacher apparently taught him to take the speed limit and multiply by four. I should have paid him to drive me to work. My two hour commute would have been nine minutes. Dog walkers and bike riders were a passing blur, but Mickey stuck his head out the window—taking his eye completely off the road—and yelled “NERDS!!” or sometimes the slightly more diagnostic “YOU’RE GAY!” before burning rubber onto Bird Street. Again, how am I still alive?

 

While buying Camel Lights I saw a tall, gray gentleman two spots ahead in the gas station. 

 

“Just the coffee, thanks.”

 

Faint Boston accent. He sounded like Coach Calhoun! He walked back in my direction and---I didn’t trust my eyes.I said nothing. He left. What would I have said?

 

“Tough loss to Carolina, huh Coach? Neutral court my ass!” 

 

“Is Khalid out of shape or is that just his body type?”

 

“I don’t care what anyone says, coach, tough love works!” 

 

We ate in Miguel and Evan’s living room. Huge portions. Roos ruled.

 

“Kristin, you eat so slow,” Evans said.

 

“She’s afraid there’s a screw in her food,” Miggy said.

 

“No, I’m not. But did once bite into a screw eating Breyer’s ice cream.”

 

“You should sue the shit out of them!” Evans said.   

 

“We have to get working on our screenplay. Colin was an English major,” Greek said.

 

“I can try.”

 

“I fucking hated English,” Evan said. “1984 was pretty good I guess.”

 

“Never read it,” Greek said.

 

“It’s a love story about two people driven apart by society,” the lovely Kristin said.

 

Not a dystopian cautionary tale about a futuristic surveillance state, but a love story. Nailed it! Only finance majors can properly interpret literary classics. Winston Smith was handed a note by a girl he thinks works for Big Brother. He’s sure she’s summoning him to get vaporized into nothingness, but when he finally summons the courage to open it, he reads, “I love you.”

 

We also discussed current events. 

 

“Big Willie Style! Dude is The Man,” Evans said. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman—Miss Lewinsky. Fucking gangster.” 

 

“I’m running for President someday,” Mickey announced.

 

“That chick just wanted to get famous by blowing the President in the Oval Office. A stained blue dress is how chicks get ahead, dude,” social anthropologist Evans said.

 

“Clinton isn’t too bad, man,” Miguel said. “He’s done some pretty good shit like welfare reform.”

 

“Get those lazy fuckers back to work!” Evans said, holding in an unusually large bong hit.   

 

“You don’t know someone’s story. Not everyone has it so easy. Maybe they’re no lazier than anyone else,” Kristn said.

 

When can we end this charade and get married? Please vaporize Miguel immediately.

…………………………………….

Four hour round trip commutes and Ulysses were meant for each other, so on Bloomsday I decided to read it for the 3^rd time.

 

I couldn’t decide if it was a love story. It’s set on June 16th, 1904, the day Joyce and his wife Nora went on their first date. Why doesn’t his fictional alter-ego Stephen Daedalus meet fictional Nora? He’s adapting The Odyssey and Telemachus wasn’t exactly going on Singled Out: The Ithaca Edition, so it has to be a spiritual father/son thing, but you’re a literary iconoclast. Break the rules!

 

In the last chapter Molly Bloom seems to decide she likes her husband Poldy better than Blazes Boylan, the dumber than dirt stud she nailed earlier in the day, but was she affirming her love or just settling in a Catholic country without divorce laws? Poldy wouldn’t touch her after their infant son died years earlier so screwing around was sort of okay...   

 

I had spent hours in the library reading commentaries on Joyce. “Interesting” guy. He wrote Nora letters rhapsodizing her farts in bed. I guess my letters weren’t so weird after all.   

 

He committed his daughter Lucia, once an aspiring dancer, to an asylum. She was in her early 20’s. She never left. Samuel Becked had dated her and said any man would come second to Daddy. Finnegans Wake’s hero commits an unnamed crime with a young girl. It’s full of incest allusions. It’s written in an opaque dream language. Four people alive claim to understand it but they’re lying. Here’s an excerpt from page 1: 

 

“Sir Tristarm, violer d’amores, fr’over the short sea, had passencore rearrived from North Armorica, on this side the scraggy isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war”.

 

No wonder I got a D+ on my forged Macbeth paper.  

 

Did the obscure language hide his crime? It was so hard to have heroes! Was the Eddie Van Halen of language a drunk perverted creep?

 

Ray saw me reading in the workshop cafeteria.

 

“That’s a really big book, man.”

 

“Yeah, it’s a lot.”

 

“What’s it called?”

 

“Ulysses. It’s like a modern retelling of The Odyssey. By Homer.”

 

Okay now you’re talking down.

 

“What do they have you doing this for?  You went to college, right?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“But they threw you in here.”

 

“Well, it’s kind of a long story.”

 

“Keep your chin up, man. This is your cross to bear. You’re too smart to get stuck in this place.”

 

“Thanks. I appreciate it.”

 

I could have told him Ulysses is in Back To School. Rodney Dangerfield’s blonde professor quotes Molly’s closing lines about the first time she and Poldy did it:  

 

 “and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfumed and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will yes.”

 

“YES! YES!” shouted Rodney.

 

Yes. 

……………………………………..

New plan: get a job interview without involving Melissa. Show employers I’m a big boy.

 

“Looking for an experienced auto mechanic.” No. “Searching for a front desk receptionist, experience preferred.” Maybe? “In Waterbury.” No. “Data entry clerk. Complainers and clock watchers need not apply.” Next. “Cracker Joe’s Tattoos is looking for an experienced tattoo artist.” Dear God. “Subway Sandwich Artist needed. Previous experience in food preparation, and/or customer service is desirable but not essential because you will receive full training and undertake full various University Of Subway courses.”

 

A Portrait of The Sandwich Artist as A Young Man? Rodney wasn’t the only one going back to school. Subway U here I come. YES!

 

No.

……………………………………… 

Action Sequence

 

Tyler The Townie was back. Then again do townies ever really go anywhere?

 

Kate, Nina, Amira and I went to a Celeron party. Tyler chatted up the girls on the walk back.

 

“I just got a new ride. Red Ford Taurus. It’s pretty sweet. Power steering, air conditioning, Blaupunkt system with a graphic equalizer.”

 

“Oh God he’s so annoying,” Nina whispered.  

 

“How do we get rid of him?” Kate said.   

 

“Hey, do you guys have beers at your place? I’m all out.” He smacked his backpack to provide incontrovertible proof.

 

“Ummm, I could check,” Nina yawned.

 

“Cool! Can I grab one? I’ll get you back I promise.”

 

He wasn’t even close to taking a hint.

 

We entered my/Nina’s apartment. She opened the black living room fridge.

 

“We have Bud Light, Corona, and Harpoon.”

 

“I’ll take a Harpoon if that’s cool.”

 

One of my Harpoons? This freeloader grabbed our bottle opener and took a sip from the beer I earned with the sweat of my brow or a government handout. It all went into the same Bank Of America checking account so who can say for sure? That’s not the point.

 

He leaned back and pulled out the armrest on the blue couch against the window like Nina was subleasing the place from him.  

 

I grabbed a Harpoon and sat on the gray couch. There were three couches total. I wasn’t sure which ones belonged to Nina and her roommates and which were Greek imports.

 

“You should come watch my band. I play guitar. We’re kind of a ska/punk/hip hop fusion band. We’ve got some choice gigs potentially lined up.”

 

Potentially? Yeah me too. Come check out The Blind Melonheads potentially headlining Madison Square Garden, ladies. I play a Mexican fat Strat and sing. Does Lou Reed ring a bell?

 

He segued into a discussion of his ex-girlfriend who moved to Boston. He wished her well–it just didn’t work out, sadly.  

 

“She’s a sweet girl. She just had a fucked up family.”

 

What a sensitive guy.

 

I drank 5 cups of keg Bud at Celeron plus maybe 3 ½ Harpoons? Who knows. We already know I can barely count. I wanted to lay this groundwork before we proceed any further. 

 

“Hey Tyler,” I said. “The girls think you’re annoying but they’re just too nice to say it.”

 

Silence.

 

“Oh, and do you remember a few months ago? I heard you next door when you said, “That kid is basically blind.” I might be blind but I’m not deaf, dude. I think you should leave.”

 

We had never spoken before. That was my icebreaker.

 

Etermal silence. 

 

My pulse was well above 72.

 

“Okay,” he said like he had asked for  Coke but I said we only had Pepsi. He walked out.

 

“Colin, that wasn’t cool!” Nina said. 

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“Did he really say that!?” 

 

“Yes.”

 

“I need to leave for a minute.”

 

“Okay, I’m sorry!”

 

Oh crap what did I do? Petty revenge disguised as valorous chivalry once again! When will I learn? I wasn’t sure if I even cared about his blind comment. I only brought it up because a package deal opportunity had unexpectedly materialized!

 

Nina returned a few minutes later and sat on the blue couch.

 

“Nina, I’m sorry. I probably should have kept my mouth shut.”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

I wished I could crawl under any of the three couches.

 

I desperately wanted to go upstairs to bed but I didn’t want to make it obvious. I took a couple last swigs of my Harpoon, gently placed it on the coffee table like it was made of paper, fake yawned, and said, “Good night.”

 

“Good night.”

 

I brushed my teeth and headed for the safety of my/her room. Did she hate me?

 

This was all Joseph Campbell’s fault.

………………………………

I pushed open the workshop door.  Marisol tapped her cane and smiled.   

 

What do you do when a totally blind person walks towards you? I usually just froze. 

 

But she heard me.

 

“Is that Sam?”

 

“No. But I have the door open. Just keep walking this way.” 

 

“Oh, thank you. What’s your name?”

 

“Colin.”

 

“Oh, I don’t think I know you. My name is Marisol.”

 

“I know, Marisol.” I smiled.

 

“Do you like wrestling, Colin?”

 

“Yes I do.”

 

“Can you smell what The Rock’s got cookin”?”

 

“I think I smell it!”

 

She laughed uproariously.

 

“Did you see him beat up Mr. McMahon last night?” 

 

“I missed it. What happened?”

 

“Ooooo Mr. McMahon got handcuffed to the ring. But he slapped The Rock with his other hand so The Rock beat him up!”

 

“Well deserved!” 

 

“It was nice meeting you, Colin.”

 

“You too.”

 

Mr. McMahon was the boss from hell, but was our boss an even bigger heel? Can we get Mr. Mahogany in the squared circle for a no holds barred steel cage match? Marisol and I could form a tag team. The Blind Blitzkriegers? Her cane and my hardcover copy of Ulysses could really do damage at SummerSlam ’98 at MSG.   

 

Wait a minute…..where does The Gold Digger live? Maybe Geraldo Rivera could redeem himself after that Al Capone’s vault fiasco.  

………………………………………

Four florescent grass-colored lamps overlooked the Ted’s foosball table. I  stood to Greek’s right, subbing for Freeman after he left for cigs next door at Dairy Mart with his girlfriend Jenny.

 

Foosball is basically impossible. You push metal rods with wooden blue and red action figures (I learned much later they’re tiny plastic soccer guys). I flailed wildly and usually hit more air than ball. Any contact whatsoever represented a moral victory. Zero goals in my foosball career.

 

With practice time perhaps competency was achievable, but I always just got subbed into the heat of the action. Talk about pressure. This particular civil war battle between TEP and TKE threatened to upend the entire balance of power of campus Greek life, so smack the ball with your soccer man or stumble away from the table right fucking now.

 

I was elated when Freeman finally returned. Greek also took a break, so Freeman and Evans carried the TEP standard.

 

I didn’t give a shit, so I watched girls in short shorts walk to the bathroom to my left and listened to the acoustic cover guy in the far right corner tell us about his semi-charmed life.  

 

“Hey! That’s bullshit, man!” Freeman said. 

 

“What are you talking about, bro?”

 

“You shook the table. You thought I wasn’t looking? That goal doesn’t count!”

 

“You’re high, dude. I didn’t shake the fucking table,” the TKE combatant protested.

 

“Bullshit. Cheating asshole.”

 

“Say that again!”

 

“You heard me.”

 

“Wait….Freeman. Guys, relax, it’s cool,” UN security council member Greek urged. But like all UN members, he was ignored.   

 

“I’ll bet you don’t come over here and say that shit to my fucking face!”

 

Freeman came over there and said that shit to his fucking face.

 

It was on!

 

TKE swung first and grazed Freeman. Freeman swung and connected. I think. It was hard to tell in a dimly lit bar with the lamps rattling wildly and bodies converging when you’re half blind. Were you expecting Jim Lampley here? Pretty soon everyone held someone back or fought to get free, arms flailed while lunging at their opponent. A few more punches sailed through a sea of arms. Evans got pushed into an adjacent table with four-foot bar stools and toppled it over, taking five drinks with it. Glass shattered.

 

“Hey, ASSHOLES!” a drenched girl at the upside-down table cried. She was also ignored by the perpetrators, but her two male companions, bound to defend her honor, commenced operatic yet somewhat mannered “Hold me back!” performances.     

 

We had ourselves an old fashioned foosbrawl.

 

 “Tommy, calm down!” Jenny cried. 

 

Tiny The Bartender barreled over with more catlike agility than you might expect from a 300 pound interior lineman.  

 

“Break it up! Tommy, back off!”

 

“This asshole started it!”

 

“I don’t care. Everyone out, NOW!”

 

Back at 19-A, Freeman held an ice pack to his left cheek.

 

“I have to keep my composure better when I drink,” he insightfully reflected.     

 

Everyone went back the next night. What else was there to do? And did Tiny ban them for a month? A week? A day? You mean ban their most loyal customers during the slow summer months? You don’t need an MBA to answer that question.

 

TEP and TKE played a rematch. No punches were thrown. Their mutual love of foosball conquered all. Also, you took whatever summer opponents you could get.    

 

“Hey man, I might have overreacted last night.”

 

“No worries, man.”

 

They tapped their knuckles.  

 

Ignore the hippies, 1998 was the Summer of Love.     

………………………………………

Rumor had it Freeman and Nina hooked up. Before or after Jenny? In the room I was sleeping in? God, sometimes I wish I was an omniscient narrator.

 

Did I need an Adidas T-shirt? Backwards Red Sox hat? Public access show?  

………………………………………

I heard screaming.

 

This happened occasionally.

 

Cindy, Eddie, or Bobbi would clasp their arm around the client and lead them off the workshop floor. The drone of machinery never stopped and everything resumed like nothing had happened.   

……………………………………………

Midsummer Fun

 

A couple of years earlier, I decided joggers on tropical July days truly hate themselves, so I only ran around Woodside at midnight, occasionally drunk. (Physical fitness and binge drinking were part of my balanced lifestyle.)

 

But now, staring into the bottomless pit of my mid-20’s, I hoped to avoid an old man’s beer belly. I went for late afternoon runs—sciatica permitting. I ran down Hunting Lodge Road, turned onto North Eagleville Road, ran past The Jungle, ran up and down the next graveyard next door, turned onto Rt. 195 and ran past East Campus. Or I turned off Hunting Lodge and ran past the Math Science Building, Student Union, Fieldhouse, and Gampel Pavilion to South Campus. I sweated profusely and, despite my transition from Marlboro Reds to Camel Lights, I often wheezed like an asthmatic. But I enjoyed the torture. Sweat purified more than soap, shampoo and Communion wafers combined. That clean on the inside feeling running provides is baptismal. Running is religion. And it doesn’t hurt as much as twenty Our Fathers or “Mass has ended now, please go in peace” before eleven more minutes of community bulletins.    

………………………………………

“I had another nightmare about Nicole last night.”

 

“Greek! Don’t do this to yourself!”

 

“We’re not having any more parties. OR poker games. I can’t trust Evans!”

 

“Was she literally beating you up?”

 

“I mean she was getting ready to!”  

 

“Careful. If she smacks you in your dream, I heard you wake up with a black eye. I still think you should tell Evans to pay for it.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“So remind him.”

 

“Nicole is going to kick my ass!”

 

“Just tell her Evans did it! How can you control your guests? Is it a crime to invite neighbors over for an evening of daiquiris, cigars and cards? Is that the kind of country we want to live in? That’s no bridge to the 21st Century I want to cross. This isn’t Cuba! Greek! Your only crime is your hospitality! We’re like the fucking Native Americans. Invite people to share a peace pipe and they kick in your teepee and spread malaria or no wait……. SMALLPOX. They spread a ton of shit! The point is she will totally understand!”

 

I was on my fourth Double Bag. 

 

“Maybe you’re right.” 

 

Of course I hadn’t encountered The Colossus Of Nicole. And Greek was probably right, Evans was a dead end. I loaned Ben Daly a dollar in seventh grade. He’d pay me back the next day. Next day: no money. I couldn’t believe someone would just not pay you back like that. I started saying, “Where’s my money?” half- jokingly every day in cafeteria study hall until he finally said, “Shut the fuck up!” like I was the one at fault. I shut the fuck up.

 

Wall kickers and money borrowers run the world. Greek and I lose all the sleep for them.  

………………………………………

Nina started coming around more often. Either West Hartford was boring, she was in love with me, or she worried about her apartment getting burned to the ground. She seemed over the Tyler incident. Besides, Greek took my place as the bad guy.

 

“Why is there a pizza box taped to the wall!?”

 

This was embarrassing. It was Dominos. Not even Sgt. Pepperoni. 

 

“Oh…..I’m not sure,” I laughed.

 

Nina and Kate removed the box. Scotch tape barely even puts up a fight.

 

“Oh. MY. GOD. There’s a hole in the wall!”

 

“What the hell?”

 

“Do you know what happened, Colin?”

 

Evans? Nowhere in sight. Greek? MIA. OF COURSE I’m the one to face the firing squad.   

 

“Evans did it! We had a poker, um, just, you know, a card game. Just a few of us. Miguel, Kristin, Evans, Mickey. Evans had a bad hand. And maybe one too many Daiquiris? We were listening to the Violent Femmes. He kicked a hole in the wall!”

 

“I’m going to KILL Greek!”

 

“Greek feels really bad. He’s been having nightmares! It’s just that Evans is you know…..and he has no tools!”

 

“We told Greek no parties!”

 

“Well again, this was a pretty quiet evening before that, actually. I mean…we had a party the week before but nothing got broken! And Greek said no more parties for the rest of the summer!”

 

“AaaaarRRRRRGGGgghh!!!”

 

Defense is much harder than prosecution.

………………………………………     

“Nina was here earlier.”

 

“Oh God. Really?”

 

“Yeah, you keep missing her.”

 

“I went home for my dad’s birthday.”

 

“Well……………..maybe you should sit down.”

 

“She saw the hole!”

 

“The pizza box didn’t fool her for a minute.”

 

I almost added, “HDFR majors are a lot smarter than you might think” but now was not the time.

 

“What did she say?”

 

“She said ‘Nicole is going to tear out his pancreas’. Just kidding. I don’t know….she was kind of annoyed I guess? I blamed it on Evans and said it wasn’t your fault.”

 

“Thanks Col.”

 

“I don’t think she heard me.”

…………………………………………

Greek didn’t fight Evans. Or Nicole. Or his academic advisor. Or his mom who coolly asked for “Nicholas” when she called. But he fought for his right to party. He didn’t want further damage to 19B (was the roof next to go?) so he invited us down to East Lyme for the Fourth of July. It fell on a Saturday! We all piled in Mickey’s black van.

 

Avoiding the same mistake made by Nina and Tom Cruise’s parents in Risky Business, Greek’s mom and dad hosted/chaperoned. They served pigs in a blanket. They showed us the bathroom and the bins to discard empty bottles. Good, clean, parentally supervised, sunny, 82 degree day drinking fun.  

 

Greek’s house was white like mine-- but wood. The garage stood to the left instead of the right. There ws a back porch instead of a breezeway. And an inground pool.   

 

“Greek, is that a croquet set?” Miguel asked.

 

“Yeah, want to play?”

 

Look who cleaned up well. A Saturday afternoon lawn croquet match couldn’t possibly end with someone getting kicked or punched, could it? Ellington residents wouldn’t be caught dead with a croquet set at a corn field kegger or backyard pig roast, but I was amongst the shoreline elites now. 

 

From what this cow tipper could tell, you hit a red, yellow, black, or blue ball with a mallet through a wicket several feet away. Is that where “through the wickets comes from”? I love the smell of manure in the morning, so I have no idea.        

 

Miguel paired with Kristin against Greek and Mickey. The backyard inclined down to a raised white concrete semi-circular barrier, so preventing balls from falling off the edge was half the battle.

 

Kristin’s turn provided a socially acceptable permission slip to stare at her for several seconds. You could plausibly argue I was a croquet fanatic glued to his lawn chair, Long Trail in hand, enjoying this barnburner. She arched her back, mallet in hands, and stared down at the wicket for a solid thirty seconds. She wore a white sundress with blue and red flowers. As she posed in Greek’s backyard on America’s 222nd birthday with a summer breeze and Closing Time on Radio 104, she was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen in my life. She was Rosebud. She was the daydream that inspired someone to invent reality as a poor substitute. She was mysterious and beautiful like only a near stranger can be.

 

She lifted her mallet and struck the (just reporting the news here) blue ball which wobbled across Mr. Ganicopolis’s immaculately landscaped lawn. (Mr. Madden would have warned him to keep me off his property.) Thin blades of grass cradled it from falling down the hill until it split the wicket. She handed the mallet to Miguel and grabbed her Bacardi.

 

Corona in hand, Miguel watched Mickey take his turn. He didn’t even look at his angelic girlfriend! He was a Powerball winner who left his ticket in the dryer. Did Kristin intrigue him any more than his beer, his weed, or his Check Your Head CD? Was she a dream he had awaken from? Was he ever asleep? He had seen her without her sundress on. Maybe he saw her lift it over her head that morning. It might get crumpled on the floor tonight if they got the guest room. Maybe he just saw it as Filene’s merchandise made in a Taiwanese sweatshop filled with wrestling fans she purchased on winter clearance at the Connecticut Post Mall.

 

To me, Kristin and the dress harmonized into an ethereal, symphonic whole, but of course I hadn’t seen her naked. Or seen her box of Tampax while looking for Q-Tips one day. Was her dress just  beautiful wrapping paper silhouetted by multicolored Christmas tree lights that loses its magical powers five minutes after you unwrap it in on a cold, gray December morning?

 

Or did her enchanting charms still hold him captive. but he felt like an impostor just like I felt in 5th grade. Heather Jones moved to town a month into the school year. While she  was introduced by Mrs. Robinson, she stood at the front of class with her long brown hair draped over her maroon Superior Propane jacket. I fell in love. When she was absent two weeks later Amy Hawthorne changed my life.

 

 “Heather likes you,” she said in art class. Would shy Amy pull my leg? Miracles don’t happen to me.

 

There were two problems.

 

1. Was it socially acceptable to like girls yet?

 

2. She liked a fictional character.

 

On the fourth day of school, Ben Daly invited me to sit at the cool kids table in the cafeteria. To my complete surprise, that (along with ditching my dorky horn rimmed glasses) was all I needed to metamorphosize into an overnight class clown sensation being led by an invisible hand which told me to wear my I Love Rock And Roll T-shirt with a gray zip up hoodie for the class picture and embrace the camera with a beaming pre-orthodontic consult “My mom leaves for work much earlier than you sweater wearing dweebs’s mom” smile. An elementary school renegade, I melded the bad boy charm of Hawkeye from syndicated MASH reruns and David Lee Roth from Hit Parader interviews. 

 

But look closer and I was still the same shy kid who was deathly afraid of rec football coaches and cried the most when his parents divorced and overheard his mom on the phone wondering aloud if she should take him to see a counselor. I feared Heather confused the wrapping paper for the gift, so I hid the box under the tree.

 

Undeterred, she wrote “I love Colin M” in pink Magic Marker and placed the note on the outside of her desk. She recited aloud her letter to her Texas pen pal: “I have a boyfriend named Colin. He’s very cute.” If I walked by the water fountain, she (reportedly) said, “I should have kissed him right there!” Ditching glasses (except when science class fascist Mr. Fazzalari made me) had spiraled totally out of control. The earth reversed its axis and made me dizzy.

 

To puncture my practiced indifference, she resorted to more aggressive tactics. She had Ben Daly hand me a folded note:

 

“Colin, do you like me?” it said.   

 

There were three options: yes, no, and maybe with boxes beside each one. But every choice was a trap! Instead of grabbing my #2 pencil, I handed the note to Ben. “Hey Ben, check this out!” I said before forcing a hollow laugh--the first time in my previously Oscar caliber performance the director would have yelled “Cut!” and demanded another take.     

 

By Easter, she hated me.

 

The following year in junior high, after a long night of trick or treating, we all stood on the corner of Cedarwood and Pinewood. She whispered in Dave Daughtry’s ear.

 

“She said she likes Patrick,” Woodside’s Love Connection host announced.  

 

My heart shattered. The late October wind froze my soul. She had moved on. To my brother!  

 

After school the next day my mom and I went through my bureau and threw away the clothes I had outgrown. I burst into tears.

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

“Nothing.”

 

“Come on, honey.” 

 

“This girl I like…..she likes Patrick. He’s at her house on Cherrywood right now!”

 

“I’m sorry, honey. Welcome to the cruel world of love.”

 

Three days later, without warning, she moved back to Rhode Island to live with her dad. My heartsickness lasted two years. I stumbled through my junior high halls in a fog. She came back periodically. She jointed The Woodside Crue on its aimless wanderings through the snowy woods. I felt like a balloon about to pop. I wanted to take her aside and confess my love and torment, but I was a mute.

 

Of course I wasn’t convinced she liked Patrick. Only Heather and I understood what happened here: it was a brilliantly executed revenge plot. Much later, I shared this theory with him.   

 

“I don’t think so. She let me finger her on the front lawn last Thanksgiving.”

 

I still retained my doubts, but I had to admit, “fingered in the front lawn” is a pretty tough one to come back from. Kind of a checkmate debate ender.  

 

I wrote her a non-proofread, stream of consciousness 24 page letter and confessed everything.

 

In the UConn computer lab my sophomore year.

…………………………………………

Greek’s dad grilled burgers and dogs. His mom brought out potato salad, baked beans, devilled eggs, Lays chips. Greek made a Cherry Bomb. It was six o’clock and we had been drinking since one. Was Evans a human cherry bomb ready to blow up this lawn party?  

 

“Thanks Mrs. G, everything is great!”

 

Look who turns into a choirboy around parents! He would probably make $20 million per running a Fortune 500 company.

 

Greek’s brother arrived with his blonde girlfriend Sarah. Was little bro less scared of girls? It’s always one or the other.  

 

The night gets murkier from here, but I can confidently say Evans and Mickey got baked out of their minds in Greek’s pool house.    

 

“I want a place like this by the time I’m 28,” Evans said.

 

“I don’t care. As long as I can get crunk,” Mickey giggled.

 

“We should go swimming.”

 

“I don’t have a suit.”

 

“I told you guys to bring suits!” Greek said.

 

Did Kristin bring one?

 

“I remembered the weed!”

 

“You better not go in my house for a long time. Use this lavender air freshener. My mom will freak the fuck out!”

 

“Relax Greek!” Evans bear hugged him.

 

“Get off me, you homo!”

 

“Oh Greek, you’re so sexy when you’re angry!” He planted a kiss on his cheek and cackled wildly.  

 

“Ewwww GROSS!” He wiped it off. 

 

“Are we going swimming or not?”

 

“Not without a suit. I’ve got one you can borrow”

 

“Fu-u-u-ck no. I’m not going anywhere near where your balls have been.”

 

“It’s been washed.”

 

“There’s not enough Tide in the world, dude.”

 

I think you’re supposed to wait a half hour after you get crunk, but Evans gave the Surgeon General the middle finger, unleashed a barbaric (“AAAAAAAAAAARRGGHHHHHHHH!! FUUUUUC-----") and belly flopped fully clothed into the shallow end, barely escaping with his life.

 

“Shit for brains! You just got us soaked!” Miguel said.

 

“Sorry guys.”

 

“Shhhhhhhhh! My parents will hear you,” Greek said.

 

“Ask Mr. and Mrs. G to join us!”

 

“Miguel, Kristin. Come in! The water is nice.”

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“Colin, are you coming in?”

 

“Nah.”

 

They threw me in.

 

The waves slowly subsided and the splashing filter settled down. Greek’s kidney shaped in-ground pool was like the world (2/3 water) settling back to a state of equilibrium after we cannonball it into a frenzy. Yup, I was crunk as well. I treaded water until I got dangerously close to sobriety.   

 

“Hey, Col. Here’s a towel.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

I draped Greek’s sailboat patterned towel around me. Never swim with jorts. With luck, they will dry off before Labor Day. I rubbed frantically. The blue denim (now black) was unimpressed. I drank a Double Bag (a bit heavy at this time of night) followed by a Corona. I was wet, but once again too drunk to care.

…………………………………………..

Though separated only a hallway and a cafeteria, Industries clients considered the office a Forbidden City while office staff approached Industries like social workers in graffiti and bullet ravaged inner city housing projects: a place to visit rarely, briefly, and for work purposes only. To see an office staffer on the workshop floor was like bumping into Queen Elizabeth at a Pizza Hut.

 

I didn’t worry about running into Mr. Trapp (I didn’t golf) but I couldn’t always avoid Phil. I’d open the door and see a terrifying black beard. I wouldn’t say anything. He would just say, “Excuse me,” his head bowed and his clipboard in hand as he headed on his way, the story of my once promising shipping career now just a missing brochure on the skid of life.

……………………………………………

June is all green grass, blooming azaleas, twittering robins, and bottomless kegs. But when the strawberry moon sets and the buzzing cicadas and chirping crickets whisper you’ve arrived at your destination, you better start planning your departure. June whispered sweet lies of eternity, but July starts winding up the alarm clock.  

 

Back home? Or a lonely one bedroom apartment where widowers and spinsters probably won’t be very receptive to Bulls On Parade blasting at 12:49 AM?

 

But at least for now, our 19C neighbors maintained their all-day habit.

 

I read that singers should “just breathe” but if millions of years of evolution hadn’t taught me already, what chance did The Complete Idiot’s Guide To Singing have? I gulped air between every line like a deep-sea diver without an oxygen tank. Did they mean inhale before lines or exhale during lines? Sleeve machine instructors were clearer. I’d exhale just before a line but I sounded like I was sighing. If I was just after the first syllable, I sounded like I just remembered something really important at the last minute.  

 

Make your mouth a tunnel and push air through your chest like you’re filling up a water balloon. If I forgot I sounded like a dying calf. Your chest (diaphragm?) holds your voice airborne until gravity sinks it. Singing is aviation.

 

This explanation sucks but not as much as this $19.95 book.    

 

I drunkenly improvised a solo in G mixolydian. Some aimless masturbatory fretwork. A bit of Phish’s Guyute thrown in.

 

“Is someone playing guitar?”. Freeman said as he climbed the stairs with Mickey.

 

“Hey guys. Just messing around”. I waited for them to say please fucking stop. 

 

“Sounds good!”

 

His ear goggles were fully inserted at 10:45PM on a Saturday but I’ll take it.

 

“Is that a Fender?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Let me try that. I can play!” Mickey said.

 

“Mickey, you can’t play shit. You don’t know any chords.”

 

Against my better judgment, I handed over my guitar. Mickey stood, not bothering with the strap, and savagely thrashed atonal avant-garde solid state distorted rock UConn’s WHUS would have played in heavy rotation.  

 

“Mickey, stop! I think I’m bleeding internally,” Evans said.  

 

My guitar fell and banged on the carpet (I should have insisted on the strap) as his composition reached a final dissonant, non-chordal crescendo.  

 

“Mickey! Can I have that back?” I asked.  

 

Just a little out of tune. Buy Mexican. 

 

I was the Eddie Van Halen of 19B, but if Mickey auditioned for Pavement, he would have gotten the gig.  

………………………………………

Greek finally stood up to Evans.

 

“Greek, it wasn’t your turn.”

 

“You’re not the boss of me!”

 

“Yes I am.”

 

“Don’t touch me, man. I know karate! You know what? I’m the biggest star here, man. THAT’s the way it is! I wanna fuck, it’s my big dick. You’re not my boss! You’re not the king of me. I am the king of Greek! You’re nothing without me, Jack. You’re fucking nothing Jack!”  

 

“Fine we’ll get Chest Rockwell to sub.”

 

Okay so he just re-enacted Boogie Nights but you must walk before you can run.

 

Storrs had its own boogie nights.   

 

“Col, do you remember last night?” Greek asked. 

 

I was on the couch, more dead than alive.

 

“Yeah. Where did…….we go?”

 

“Hopkins’s place. Do you remember doing cocaine?”

 

“What?”

 

“Yeah.” He laughed.

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

“You did.”

 

“No way. Are you sure?”

 

“I’m positive.”

 

“Oh God.”

 

We’ve reached our story’s nadir, my personal rock bottom. I was a cokehead. Where was the VH1 camera crew? Behind The Sewing? I couldn’t just say no? Once again Nancy Reagan wondered why she ever bothered.

 

The living room fan blew hot air that suffocated more than hugged. Domino’s pizza boxes spread everywhere. I ate a slice. Never eat leftover Dominos after a coke binge. I drank Gatorade. Do antioxidants work on blow?

 

The Orioles got out the brooms and swept the Red Sox four straight. 

 

“And good riddance to Baltimore” Sean McDonough signed off.

 

It was so hot.

 

I took a chair out to the lawn with my Washburn and strummed the A and weird G chord intro of Tangled Up In Blue and very quietly sang the opening verse. 

 

It was the dog days of summer.  

…………………………………………

Cicadas

 

“Col, I’m going home for the rest of the summer. I’m doing landscaping. I’m leaving the place to you.”

 

“Okay. I’ll try to guard it.”

 

”I’ll still come up sometimes.”

 

Didn’t anyone realize this was my last summer on earth? Evans ruined everything. No one seemed to mind me hanging out without Greek, but was I subleasing his friends too? I’d probably never see any of them again. Just like when brother’s friends became my friends until they weren’t.

 

I went up to Miguel’s room and sat on the floor. 

 

“Hey,” I said.  

 

“What’s up, dude?”    

 

I think the heat was getting to them.

 

“Miggy, can you turn that down? I’m trying to read,” Kristin said. 

 

“Kristin, it’s not even loud.”

 

“It’s those explosions every 10 seconds. It’s giving me a migraine.”

 

“Kristin.”

 

Should I leave?

 

Orange, yellow and green fish placidly swam in their huge tank, apparently blasé about both machine gun fire and lover’s quarrels.

 

“Kristin, do you really need dead silence for Us Weekly? How are Brad and Gwynneth?”

 

“It’s Brad and Jennifer now! You play that stupid game all day and night!”

 

“Okay, I’ll turn it down. But you don’t have to be such a bitch about it.” 

 

The orange fish swam ahead of the yellow one. Were they racing? 

 

“Oh, that’s nice. Well maybe you don’t want me around anymore then. I’ll go fuck someone else.”

 

You don’t say.

 

“Kristin.”

 

Nope, I don’t think the fish were racing.

 

“Well, talk to you later guys!” I said.

 

So..any leading “fuck someone else” candidates? Bros before hos? I wasn’t even in Miguel's fraternity! I could hear our Violent Femmes duets now.

 

Did she say that for my benefit? Stop. 

 

If teases were drugs, Kristin was my cocaine. 

………………………………………

My panic from the previous summer was gone, which just goes to show if you replace your mom’s broccoli casserole, fresh garden tomatoes, roadside stand corn on the cob, and a tall glass of milk with cigarettes, “ice” beer, Jaegerbombs, Car Bombs, Cherry Bombs, Subway steak and cheeses with extra mayo, super sized Value Meals, bong hits, psilocybin, nitrous oxide, and (allegedly) cocaine, your mental and physical health can turn right around. 

 

People helped too. Even would-be domestic terrorists whose love for fire  made Beavis look like Smokey The Bear, money laundering leaders of the blind, snake charming metalheads, and townies—no wait, townies didn’t’ fucking help at all. 

 

Dan called one afternoon. I took Greek’s white portable phone to the back deck. I thought cordless phones were a solution in search of a problem, but like speedballs, I’d try them once.  

 

“What’s up Jake?”

 

“Why so somber, Dan? Did Carrie Bellinger finally tell you she’d rather get ebola than have sex with you?”

 

“Very funny Jake. I just got some bad news.”

 

“Oh no. What?”

 

“Have you heard of chiari malformation?”

 

“Um, maybe.”

 

“Basically your skull is too small so your brain pushes into your spinal canal.”

 

“Oh man. You have that?”

 

“What a detective.”

 

“How did you find out?”

 

“I’ve had headaches and dizziness for a few months. They did an MRI. You’re born with it.”

 

“What can they do about it?”

 

“I’m having surgery next month.”

 

“Oh wow. Are you scared?”

 

“Jake, THEY’RE GOING TO OPEN UP MY SKULL. Any wild guesses here?” 

 

“Okay, sorry. I’m sure you will be okay. They probably do this surgery all the time. Jackie Duncan had a brain tumor. This isn’t as bad as that, right?”

 

“I guess not. Doesn’t really help me much, though. It’s better than a brain tumor. Let’s have a kegger!”

 

“After you recover, let’s have one. I’ll buy the beer. And maybe Carrie will do you after all. Brain surgery survivor is a classic panty dropper.”

 

I finally made him laugh.

 

“How’s college life? Oh wait…..didn’t you graduate a year and a half ago?”

 

“I might still go to grad school! Or back to Ellington in September. I don’t know.”

 

“I’m sure you will have five more addresses before Christmas. I hope my card gets to you.”

 

“I think we both know a card isn’t happening.”

 

“You never know Jake. This could be the year.”

 

“Good luck with the surgery. But I’m sure you won’t need it!”

 

“Thanks. Hey, you still owe my dad money for the backboard you broke and the lawn you wrecked.” 

 

“I’m so glad those won’t be your last words. Thank God we’ll have the pleasure of many more conversations. Plenty of room for improvement.”

 

“Talk to you later, Rob Reiner.”

 

“Later—and don’t worry it’s going to be fine!”

 

Dan’s parents were still married, he had an unnecessarily firm handshake, a 6’9” vertical, and a former paper route—I was just jos sub. Life’s script writers kept inventing barely plausible plot twists. 

………………………………………

Nina started hanging around so much we could have asked her to chip in on rent if we weren’t the subleasers from hell. Greek came back too. No one could resist Carriage House’s gravitational pull. Had they also found their hometowns deserted? Was UConn their only social circle now? Or was I the only one that happened to?

 

Pony pulled up in his red IROC-Z. Two parking spaces were available. He parked on the lawn.

 

“The world is my playground!”

 

“Pony. You’re ripping up the lawn!” 

 

“Freakshow! Shannon and I are going swimming at Ashford Lake. Want to come?”

 

“Okay. Colin, want to come?”

 

“Sure.”

 

It was a hot Sunday afternoon. Any guesses what I did Saturday night? A swim might nurse me back to health. I went upstairs and changed into my blue bathing suit.   

 

Miguel and Kristin didn’t go—they were either not speaking, fighting, or having makeup sex. My dreams of seeing her in a bikini were dashed to pieces once again. 

 

Storrs/Mansfield wasn’t exactly midtown Manhattan, but Ashford was twenty miles east and squeal like a piggy territory.

 

We fought trees and branches down to the lake. I didn’t see a beach. Were we actually supposed to be here?

 

“Want to swim out and back?” Pony asked.

 

The lake spread out further than my weak eyes could see. We took off our shirts, socks and shoes and dove in. It felt nice on this muggy, hazy day, but could you die swimming with a stage V hangover? We turned around at the far end—maybe I saw a beach fifty feet to the left?--and started back. The way back seemed even farther. Was the expanding universe using this lake as a trial balloon? Were my companions former swim team captains? This was my penance for another weekend of punishing my body, mind, and soul. Wash away your sins at Ashford Lake. I was so done with drinking–assuming I lived to set foot on dry land again.      

 

When I was five, I took swimming lessons at Sun Valley in Stafford Springs. My dad had been to too many calls involving drowned city kids who couldn’t swim. He needn’t have worried. Long after I mastered the butterfly, the crawl, the breaststroke, and floating on my back, I was still too scared to swim over my head and let’s not even talk about the water slide. I climbed the ladder, gingerly glanced down at the treacherous whirlpool below, and, frozen in terror, aborted the mission and descended back down to the safety of sea level—my head bowed in shame as the brave kids cleared space for the yellow haired, yellow bellied wuss in a yellow bathing suit.

 

After encouraging words from my mom and brother (his motivational pitch was “Colin, stop being such a baby!”) and countless self-actualization themed interior monologues sprinkled with Journey and Triumph lyrics, I finally chanced instant death.

 

It was the greatest thing I’d ever experienced. The slide’s bubbling water hugged you before gently splashing you into the welcoming lake below. No treacherous enemy, water made you happy! It was almost impossible to fall off the slide and plunge to your death. Soaring with confidence, I swam out to the raft and, like a budding deep sea diver, touched my feet against the slippery, sandy bottom ten feet below!  

 

Too bad water was going to kill me after all. Thanks for trying, Dad. Wait twenty-four hours after your last call jack and cranberry. Of course drinkers are only  trying to recapture the thrill of swimming over their heads for the first time.   

 

I lived.

 

“Man, that was farther than I thought”, I noted as we got dressed.

 

“Gets out the cobwebs,” Pony said.

 

Shannon wore a dark purple bikini. She wrapped herself in a towel. I guiltily looked away. No wonder the world was Pony’s playground. She wasn’t quite Kristin (who was?) but she was a cute brunette with a slim alabaster body. I’d be the luckiest sheltered workshop worker alive if she was my Playscape partner. Girls were like waterslides I turned my back to, rafts I was afraid to swim over my head to reach. And before you say these analogies are unhinged and wildly problematic, something you might expect from 2 Live Crew and Van Hagar lyrics, get your mind out of the gutter. This is family entertainment. I’m in preliminary talks with Disney on a heartwarming adaptation.    

……………………………………           

I could only read so many box scores, Saving Private Ryan previews, and “real” news. A Dallas diocese paid $23.4 million to nine sexually abused altar boys, Rusell Weston stormed into the Capitol and killed two cops, the Oval Office blowjob investigation was getting blown wide open, and Japan, the US, and Russia launched--thank God--a exploratory probe to Mars.

 

I force fed myself classifieds. The Old State House was looking for an Executive Assistant. My bus stopped right in front! You processed invoices, answered phones, filed… Is every job the same?

 

“I need to write a cover letter. Can I use the computer room,” I asked Melissa.

 

“Oh great! No problem!”

 

She got the key. Did she think I was showing her up?  

 

I wouldn’t tell them I’m blind. I’ve never even met a blind person, have you? If cornered, I was prepared to say Songs In The Key Of Life sucks and Helen Keller was an America hating Commie. I worked for the State of Connecticut, Department of Economic and Community Development, Brochure Shipping and Handling Department as an Associate Manager. I hoped to, planned to, eagerly anticipated expanding upon my professional skills including managing brochure shipments in a timely and efficient manner. Still not impressed? I carefully tracked inventory and loaded/unloaded skids in a fast-paced work environment. 

 

They bought it.

 

Naturally, the one day I wore a long-sleeved shirt, tie, and sports coat was the hottest day of summer! I spilled coffee on my pants after the bus driver gunned it before everyone was properly seated and I got body slammed by a 350 pound-gentleman. Dunkin’ lids are a joke.

 

A glass sign in State House Square commemorated someone, but I couldn’t read it. This narcissist didn’t care. I peered around the words and, like the back of a CD, I treated it like a mirror. 2:30 interview. Only 2:12? I looked pretty good. If I wore a suit every day, would I constantly get laid? 

 

“Hi, I’m here for my 2:30 interview.”

 

“Your name?”

 

“Colin McDonough.”

 

“One moment please. (Picks up phone). Linda, your 2:30 is here.”

 

The ping of an elevator preceded the echo of high heels.

 

“Hello Colin! I’m Linda Smith. Care to follow me upstairs?” 

 

Middle aged haircut. Platinum blonde. We climbed a beautiful winding, golden staircase to her office. The scenic route.   

 

“Have a seat.”

 

Immaculate desk. Oak?

 

“Thank you for your interest in our agency.”

 

“Absolutely!”

 

“Did you have any trouble with parking?”

 

“Actually, it wasn’t too bad today, believe it or not.” 

 

As she outlined the job duties, I focused on maintaining perfect eye contact like the sighted job applicant I was. It felt like staring straight into the sun. You don’t need good vision to make eye contact, you just follow the voice, but I had shy habits disguised as blind habits. My forced unwavering gaze probably made me look like a serial killer or possibly like I just fractured my cervical spine.    

 

“Why don’t I let you read the job duties and then we can discuss them.”

 

I almost dropped the paper out of fear of dropping it. I frantically swatted it four times before I secured the catch. I gently placed it on her desk and peered down intently for a minute and a half. It was two feet away: one foot and eleven inches too far for me to read it. 11 font Times New Roman didn’t help. No money in the budget for sensitivity training? My semester of Drama (a nightmare) finally paid off. I gradually moved the paper further away while I fake read each item until it was almost halfway across her desk before I “finished.” Stanislavsky would have applauded this method acting masterclass.     

 

“Do you have any questions?”

 

“It looks pretty self- explanatory.”

 

“You would be working for Mr. Fundy, the Executive Director.”

 

Would I need to call him Mr. Fundy?

 

“We manage a $200,000 budget and spend a considerable amount of time lobbying the legislature. Mr. Fundy must periodically fight to keep us open. You would answer calls, run spreadsheets. Are you proficient in Office?”

 

“Yes, I’ve done spreadsheets in Excel.”

 

I played around with it. Incel, excel. Macros were a bridge too far.

 

“Would you like to take a tour?”

 

“Okay.”

 

She led me to a golden room with large two- tiered windows and oversized chairs placed around a long table. Massive portraits of Founding Father type guys in white wigs hung on the walls. The room was a butterscotch daydream.

 

“Wow, looks nice!” I noted, demonstrating both fine-tuned aesthetic sensibilities and hawklike visual acuity.

 

“This is a replica of the 1789 General Assembly when Connecticut ratified the Constitution.”

 

Ellington’s rep was Ebeneezer Something. His vote was, “Oh hell no!” Get out of his face with that Federalist fascism. The guy was such an Ebeneezer.

 

“Wow!”

 

“It’s part of our recent $9 million renovation. Let’s take a walk down the hall.”

 

A giant ship sat beside a large sign with text I couldn’t read. I prayed for no pop quizzes.   

 

“This is a replica of The Amistad. The trial began here in 1839.”

 

A slave revolt. White saviors fixed everything. Spielberg’s legal drama played endlessly on illegal cable. I watched ten minutes. It was no Boogie Nights. Any Rollergirl lifesize replicas?

 

“Oh, Amistad. I’ve been meaning to watch that. It looks good!”

 

“It’s fabulous. Let me introduce you to Mr. Fundy.”

 

THE Mr. Fundy?

 

A graying gentleman in a red bow tie sat at his desk. I was feeling better about my coffee-stained pants all the time.

 

“Colin is interviewing for the assistant job.”

 

“Greetings, Colin!”

 

He stood up and shook my hand.

 

“Nice to meet you!”

 

I’m never getting this job.

 

We went back to Linda’s office.

 

“We will be in touch. We have a few more candidates to interview this week.”   

 

An Amistad stowaway form Sierra Leone would have stood a better chance. Maybe Mr. Fundy wanted his own Monica. You don’t lace up a bow tie unless you’re planning to give the ladies the vapors. Man cannot live on historical preservation alone. Blue dress applicants only? 

 

I got home (much) later and changed into shorts and a T-shirt. Kate and Amira stopped by at 7.

 

“I saw you walk home all dressed up. What was the occasion?” Kate said. 

 

“Just to see you, Kate.”

 

“Oooooooooo.” Did she actually blush?

 

Whoa. I didn’t expect that. Best thing that happened all day.

 

“I had a job interview.”

 

“How do you think you did?”

 

“Okay I guess.”  

 

A week later I received a letter with some very exciting news.

 

They were going to keep my resume on file. 

 

My clever ruse probably fooled no one. My eyes move involuntarily. Nystagmus. At the first-grade bus stop kids called Patrick and me Cylons: the evil alien robots from Battlestar Galactica intent on destroying humanity. Their single red eye incessantly moved from side to side. We were blue eyed Cylons open for discussions on earthlings’ survival.  

 

I did hear back from William H. Fundy--in the Courant’s editorial page. Regionalism is a calamitous idea. Our 169 independent New England villages, the envy of De Tocqueville, must be preserved. West Hartford is not obliged to bail out Hartford simply because they can’t keep their own financial house in order. Shared property tax proposals are misguided and reckless. 

………………………………………   

“Hey, have you heard any new job leads?” I asked Melissa two days later.

 

“There’s a job fair in New Haven if you’re interested.”

 

“Okay.” 

 

A short, weary looking woman walked over.

 

“Hi Donna!” Melisssa said.

 

“Adam wants me to ask if you can serve on the interview committee for the new clerical.”

 

“I’d be happy to!”

 

“Great. I’ll let him know.”

 

“You’re hiring clerical? Would I…..qualify for that?”

 

“Oh….yes! I think so. I would say you are very qualified. We’d love to have you over here!”

 

I wrote another lunch break cover letter. I was getting more prolific than Stephen King. Lying about brochures was a non-starter, but I made sleeve machine operation sound like designing the Apple II with a toothpick, which actually wasn’t too farfetched.   

 

A week later a short, bushy haired, heavily-cologned guy in a white shirt and red tie stopped at the patch machine.

 

“Hey there Colin. I’m Adam. I don’t think we’ve met. I’m the Voc Rehab director. So Janet from our clerical staff is going on maternity leave in two months. Would you be interested in filling in to gain some job experience?”

 

“Umm……sure that sounds good.”

 

“Human Resources screened the applications for the Clerk/Typist position. You just didn’t have the experience.”  

………………………………………

A random girl walked in. Turns out this happens a lot when you’re subleasing an apartment.

 

Blonde and extremely tall. Uh….oh.

 

“Hi.”

 

“Hi.”

 

“Who are you?”

 

“I’m Colin. And you?”

 

“Nicole.”

 

I leapt from couch #2 and positioned myself diagonal to the back wall.

 

“Where’s Greek?”

 

Was she The Terminator?

 

“He went home I think.” 

 

He was around the night before and might still be, but it seemed wisest to place him forty miles from the crime scene.

 

“Let me look at the hole!”

 

So much for Operation Human Shield. 

 

“What the FUCK!?”

 

“Yeah Evans should not have done that. Who gets a bad hand and kicks the wall? The guy’s got anger issues!”  

 

“Uggggggh! Greek is paying for this!”

 

Did she not hear a word I said? It was literally impossible to throw Evans under the bus. He was 6’4”, pudgy, and beer bellied with a lazy, lispy drawl. He lived in golf shirts and sandals. He cackled at his own bad jokes. After I said I felt like I’d been hit by a locomotive, he said, “I’ve never been hungover in my life. If I get enough sleep, I’m fine.” And he was NOT a responsible social drinker. Was it just because he was bigger or did his invincibility reach biochemical levels? If alcohol couldn’t get to this kid, what chance did Greek and I have?

 

Meanwhile Greek was nervous, he giggled, he feared his mom, he strained to impress with silk boxers, entertainment systems, and tropical fruity beverages. He knew right from wrong. An easy target!

 

Evans’s bullet proof wall of lazy confidence was FAR more impenetrable than Carriage House’s decaying drywall. Try kicking that in and you will just stub your toe.  

…………………………………………..

I started hanging out with Kate and Amira in 2C. Look who wasn’t afraid of girls!  We watched Great Expectations on (legal) cable. 90’s Hollywood made literary classics fun and sexy. Leo DiCaprio and Claire Danes transformed Romeo and Juliet into a steamy yet suitable for pre-teens music video, a blank verse version of INXS’s Suicidal Blonde. Now Dickens was getting the extreme makeover. Pip and Estella became Finn and Estella. I was with Ethan Hawke in Dead Poet’s Society, I grew concerned with coo coo for Cocoa Puffs goateed, Winona seducing Troy in Reality Bites, but Finn in an adaptation of my favorite freshman high school novel was the last straw. Mrs. Bass said Pip and Estella didn’t end up together in Dickens’ original version, but outraged Victorian readers demanded a happy ending. So his class system themes took a backseat. Chimney sweepers wanted a convincing love story, not a sooty mirror.

 

Before Finn and Estella did it, Gwynneth said, “I want you inside me”. Did girls say that in real life? They usually said to me, “I want you outside me,” but then again I didn’t have a goatee. Before she married a rich dork, Finn stood outside Estella’s high rise and drunkenly shouted, “I DID ALL THIS IS FOR YOU!!” Okay, psycho. Can’t you just write an incoherent letter and slip it under her door at 1:30 AM like a proper gentleman?

 

“This is getting wayyyy intense,” Kate said.

 

“I think I’m having a seizure,” Amira seconded.

 

Me too. It was 10:49 PM and I had to get up at 6:05 AM.

 

“Well goodnight.”

 

“Good night Colin!”

……………………………..

We went to keggers at Blue House and Knollwood Apartments. We often ran into Mike Guilinao: a tall, bespectacled former Jungle floormate. Kate’s ex-boyfriend—or hookup. College relationships eluded easy classification.   

 

We stood in a circle, red Solo cups in hand, as someone blared the new Beastie Boys CD Hello Nasty out the window.

 

“I can’t believe they let Iranians here! Can I see your Green Card?” Guiliano shouted from across the yard. 

 

“Die, Mike!” Amira laughed.

 

“Don’t get mad. I don’t want you to firebomb my house!”

 

Mike believed xenophobia was the ultimate aphrodisiac. 

 

“You’re Iranian?” I said. She had black hair but I thought she was, I don’t know, Italian? I’m blind.

 

“Yes.”

 

“But you don’t have an accent. Were you born here?”

 

“I was born in Tehran but we moved when I was four.”

 

So exotic.

 

“Have you gone back to Iran?”

 

“Ear-On”.

 

“Sorry. Ear-On.”

 

“Yes, in high school.”

 

I didn’t ask if she was afraid of getting firebombed but maybe that’s just if you’re a blond, blue-eyed infidel? See? I was no better. Good thing I was only on my second beer. I just knew the Shah was a jerkoff—at least that’s what everyone said when I was 7. Carter couldn’t free the hostages but gunslinging Western star Reagan rode into town—or something like that. Oh and the Persians were the only ones the Romans could never conquer.

 

Who would conquer Dorna? The guy who pronounced her ancestral homeland correctly or the one who put her on a terror watch list? You never knew with girls!

 

Not that it mattered. Joe had firebombed Amira’s heart.

 

“Oh my God, he’s here!” 

 

“Amira! Get a hold of yourself,” Kate said. 

 

Joe coolly smoked a cig. He was another Rastafarian with dreadlocks and a background in the Boy Scouts, lacrosse, and Bob’s Big Boy employment.

 

Kate drove me home. we passed Giuliano going the other way. He leaned out the window and barbarically yawped into the tranquil Storrs night, “YEAHHHH!!!! KATE! COLIN! PARTY NAKED! WOO!!!!! FUUUUUUUCK YEAH!!!!!!!!”

 

This was ALL FOR YOU, KATE. HE DID IT FOR YOU. 

 

“I can only take him in small doses,” she said.  

 

“Yeah, I can see that.”

……………………………………………

I met my with mom the next day. I stayed up past 2:30AM and set my alarm for 11:40AM, so let’s call it brunch. Kathy John’s : proudly serving earth’s greasiest burgers since 1968. Grease cures hangovers, right?  

 

“Are you staying in the fall?” 

 

“No, the girls we’re subleasing from are coming back.”  

 

“You can come home anytime, but how will you get to work?”

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“Are you feeling okay?”

 

Did I look ashen?

 

“Yeah, I went to a party last night. Just tired.” I yawned.  

 

Holy crap I had another stage V hangover. Kill me. I had to stop drinking like this. I just needed to eat. Why was it taking so long? Were they killing the cow out back? Why were the kids at the candy rack sooooo loud? With my mom lunch plans, I planned for a very light drinking night (I know you’ve heard this one before) but the best laid plans of mice and keg killing men fade in a summer sunset.

 

“How are you doing?” I said. 

 

“I’m good. I’m leaving for the Dublin office in three weeks.”

 

“That should be good, right?”

 

“Yeah.” 

 

Storrs was my refuge from the silent, spooky labyrinth of Woodside Acres and Dublin was my mom’s. She was like Stephen Daedalus in reverse.   

 

“I had Andrea and Mrs. Dawson over for last week…..”

 

I was so happy she wasn’t always home alone in the empty house. I couldn’t even think about that. 

 

My Greaselover’s Special arrived. Help me, grease, you’re my only hope. Does grease cure hangovers because, while it might cause your heart to give up, at least you’re not hungover anymore?

 

The check took a thousand years. I couldn’t wait to take a nap, go for a run, shower, and drink water. I’d feel like new. Right before I poisoned myself all over again--drowning my Maplewood past and my blank future. Party naked!

………………………………………

Kids congregated on the outdoor lower-level foyer in Celeron to drink and smoked. I saw Joe. We had never spoken.

 

“Hey dude, I’m Colin. I’m friends with Amira.”

 

“Hey.”

 

“She really likes you, you know.”

 

“I know. But she’s kind of weird.”

 

He exhaled and deftly flicked his ash.

 

“But that’s what’s cool about her.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Well, I was a poor defense attorney and an even worse matchmaker. I tried. Now the real challenge: don’t tell Amira. Do not imagine it’s “for her own good.” Keep your stupid mouth shut for once! 

…………………………………………

I sewed patches and listened to The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Aeroplane on Radio 104. This song should have never left the runway.   

 

I received a tap on my right shoulder. I jumped ten feet. My second coffee--- the lunchroom’s Ethiopian Motor Oil blend—didn’t help. I took off my headphones. A smiling, bespectacled middle aged Asian gentleman handed me a yellow piece of paper and motioned me to please read. 

 

“Hello. My name is Triem Vu. I am Vietnamese. I am war refuge. I came to America to make better life for my children. I am blind. I was exposed to a deadly cemical Agent Orange. But after many trials and tribyoulations, I came to this country with my wife and too children. I am getting divorce. I love my children so vary much. I want to find better life for them. I have good job skills. I work as an pharmassist in Vietnam. I am a hard worker. I am in Voke Rehab. Moolissa is my cownselor. Thank you for reeding. Thank you. Sinsearly, Triem Vu”.

 

Either English was Triem’s second language or his prose style was heavily influenced by Finnegans Wake.

 

I held the paper to my face, stalling for time. Can he speak English? Otherwise, what’s with writing a letter? Wait, look who’s talking.     

 

“Um, very good. I can help you with your spelling and grammar if you like?”

 

I’d be J.D. O’Connor to his Anne Beattie without the door slamming. 

 

I handed it back.

 

“Have a good day,” he said.

 

So that was a no? Not going to write their term paper or their screenplay? Literally no one wants the help of an English major.

 

Was it a plea for money? Divorce lawyers? Child support? No one opposed Cold War foreign policy more than me. The Best and The Brightest was totally on my reading list. I’d read some Chomsky, even going as far as to look up “hegemony” and declaring it a dirty word on sight. I’d watched every Vietnam movie including Hamburger Hill. I told myself REM’s Orange Crush wasn’t vastly inferior to Green deep cuts. But I had $42.33 to my name and $7 of that would go towards my Peter Pan bus home. Already crawling towards pay day, I couldn’t foot the bill for any discredited Domino Theories.   

 

Fuck off, Robert McNamara.

………………………………………….

“They want you over at sweatpants,” a voice said. I looked up.  

 

“Oh, okay.”

 

“You’re not supposed to press down that hard on the foot control,” he added with a rubbery, Jim Carrey smirk.

 

“Okay……thanks.”

 

He was probably in his early 30’s and he did not appear to have any cognitive deficits—just ask him. My brother in arms was probably yet another employable blind young man in a Dot.Com Boom slowly sinking in sheltered quicksand.

 

I thought he seemed highly suspect.  

………………………………………….

“Are you going to Dave Matthews?” Kate asked.

 

“Uh…..I want to but I don’t have a ticket. And I’m kind of broke.”

 

“You can go with us. A lot of people are just going to tailgate.”

 

“We’re going with my cousin’s friend Bill. He’s 26,” Amira said.

 

What a dinosaur. I would have sooner told them I had herpes or loved Michael Bolton ballads than share my age. I was a cradle robber. Bill and I could reminisce about watching Eight Is Enough in primetime and where we were when Reagan got shot. These 21 year olds just wouldn’t understand. 

 

“It’s so hot. I don’t even know if I want to go,” Amira said.

 

“I’m sweating my balls off--not that I have any,” Kate said. 

 

I found this kind of hot. A verbal confirmation that, just as you probably suspected, she has a vagina. I guess the heat was getting to me too. 

 

Fuck it. It was August 1st and we had paid our final month’s rent to Nina. The ATM machine by the Co-Op said I possessed a king’s ransom of $432 after my SSI check cleared. Eat, drink, and be merry, tripping billies.

 

Bill was tall with an Ethan Hawke goatee. When you’re that old, you might as well grow facial hair. I clung to the baby faced look but was this Watergate Baby fooling anyone?

 

We arrived at 4:30. No one asked me to chip in for parking so… The lots were filled with cars and grills as far as my eyes could almost see. Kids tossed footballs. DMB shows were parking lot parties with a live band performing at night. For some.

 

“Colin, we need a sub. Bill and Alcia went to the bathroom.”

 

“Okay.”

 

My farsighed eyes could see the sloping board 10 feet away. I could even see the holes at the top. After four mandatory practice tosses to prove how seriously I took cornholing at jam band concerts I tossed my red beanbag through the soupy air. It landed on the left board northwest of the hole and rested there for nearly as long as the Jimi Thing jam on a neighbor’s car stereo, but gravity had other ideas. The bag slid off and lied defeated on the ground.  

 

“Oh so close! Good try Col!” Amira said.

 

“Thanks.”

 

“I wonder where Joe is parked. I think he said Lot E. Who wants to go for a walk?”

 

“Amira! Let him find us. And your bra strap is hanging out.”

 

To stay hydrated in the dangerous heat I twisted off my 4^th alcoholic beverage.  

 

“Anyone know where the Port-A-Potties are?”

 

“Walk straight down, they’re in the back right before the trees. Want me to show you?” Kate said.

 

“I think I can find them, thanks.”   

 

I followed the long gravel runway. If I went with guys, I would have done the manly thing and pissed at the car—behind an opened door to show I’m classy..   

 

The endless line was 80 percent female, 20 percent poser. Another car stereo ran through jammed out versions of Rapunzel and Don’t Drink The Water from Hersheypark before my turn finally arrived. This was probably the greatest moment of my life. Once inside, you turned the plastic handle to the left to indicate a red light, but I had an irrational fear of locking myself in a Port-A-Potty and being left for dead and this was night two of DMB’s stay, so this green plastic powder room was a biohazard, so I adopted a hybrid strategy: press my right leg against the door to create unexpected resistance for any green lit intruders. Contorting myself like this while peeing probably aggravated my sciatica for life.  

 

“Someone’s in there?!”, a scandalized girl observed while pushing in vain.  

 

“Be out in a minute!” I said.

 

”Oh. My. Goddda. Why didn’t he just lock it??” Her friends laughed.   

 

I see my hell is a Port-a-Potty I’m stuck inside/

Can’t see the light/

And my Heaven is an/

Icehouse in the sky.

 

“I GOT YOUR TICKETS HERE! PAVILION AND LAWN!”

 

“Hey, do you know if the show is sold out?” I asked hackey sackers. 

 

“We’re just here to party, bro. There’s some hot bitches here!” a shirtless, lecherous young man in a backwards Dallas Cowboys hat said. 

 

Chad Dog was a dead end.

 

“Okay, thanks!”

 

I saw a tie-dye T-shirt wearing graybeard. Had to be a scalper. Freedom rockers were reduced to selling DMB tickets to Gen Xers while sugar magnolias of old wilted in the blistering late afternoon sun.  

 

“Hey, do you have one lawn seat? I have $50.”

 

“$60, man. That’s the cheapest price you will find. Believe me.”

 

I wasn’t sure I believed him, but I gave him the money that should have gone to a Vietnamese refugee agent orange victim. Are we sure hippies stopped the war?

 

I walked down two wrong rows before I found the car.  

 

“If we get separated, we’re in lot B. Red Acura,” Kate said. 

 

I took a Sierra Nevada for the line at the front gate. I wasn’t exactly a concert going rookie.

 

“Fuck yeah! DMB Woooooooooooo!!!!!”

 

“Warehouse!”

 

“Show us your tits!”

 

“Sit on my face!”

 

I knew Warehouse but were Show Us Your Tits and Sit on My Face rare  Under The Table And Dreaming B-sides?  

 

Boy was everyone excited to see their favorite tenor sax and fiddle playing band under the stars! Will this line ever end? Was my ticket even legit? A gray-haired woman scanned it. It beeped.

 

“Enjoy the show!”

 

I’ll never doubt hippies again.   

 

Endless beer stands, a merch stand, a wine stand, a popcorn stand, and a wristband table lined the outside walk area. Kids sat on a small grassy knoll. There’s no better place on earth than a concert. I got separated from Kate and Amira after four minutes. I can’t believe it took that long. No problem. We were in D lot. Or was it B? C? E? Damnit, why do so many letters have to rhyme?

 

I trudged up the hill to the lawn with thousands of my drunkest friends. The pastel-colored fried dough stand to my right smelled so good. There was no way I’d still have bus money for Monday. I took a spot near the bottom of the lawn as the lights went out and they launched into Seek Up. My favorite DMB song!

 

Right in front of me, two beverage lovers settled it with their fists.

 

“You stepped on my blanket, asshole! Watch where you’re going!”

 

“Or what?”

 

I moved twenty steps to my left. Fifteen minutes later I became a blanket stepper myself.

 

“You stepped on my arm, shit for brains! Are you blind?”

 

“Basically.” 

 

Then I heard a conversation to my right during a fiddle solo.    

 

“I’ve got a studio in Vernon. You should come visit.”

 

Artist? Musician?

 

“Okay, we’ll see.”

 

“You’re beautiful.”

 

Tall, balding guy; young, thin blonde in a white tank top.

 

“Have you done shoots before?”

 

“No.”

 

“Are you willing to do nudes?”

 

Wait….what?

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“Do you have The Web? I have a website. You could make a lot of money.” 

 

This loser probably didn’t know a single word to Pay For What You Get OR Cry Freedom. Jack Horner here, probably a Molly Hatchet fan, was only here to recruit fresh meat!

 

I was on Beer #6. Roughly. A $12 Sam Adams Summer Ale. RIP SSI. Any guesses how I handled this?

 

“You’re an ASSHOLE! What are you a porn guy? You’re a fucking CREEP, man!”

 

It’s not a party until someone brings the moral indignation.

 

He sized me up before shoving me. Hard. I crashed into four people and fell to the ground, my beer 83% lost.  

 

“What the FUCK!? Asshole, you just spilled my beer!” a girl said.  

 

A domino theory had finally proven correct.   

 

“Sorry. That lowlife pushed me. Don’t talk to him. You’ll end up like Rollergirl!”

 

I moved thirty more feet to my left to avoid getting my ass kicked defending the honor of a girl who probably felt her honor was getting her nowhere in life. Somehow, I hung onto my binoculars: my concert and sporting event lifeline. The band still looked like Lilliputians at the bottom of a hill, but it still beat low definition Brobdignabians on the video screens. Someone tapped my left shoulder during the Crush sax solo.

 

“So you use those to see everything?”.

 

“Yes, I have bad eyesight.”

 

“I need some of those. I can’t see good either!”

 

Should I tell him Industries is looking for a new brochure guy?

 

“Yeah…….you should get some!” 

 

He re-tapped during The Stone. 

 

“How much to buy those off of you?”

 

“Well I don’t……know. How much would you pay?”

 

“I’ll give you $100! No wait. (Reached into wallet, thumbs through). I’ll give you $140!”

 

Nope. I definitely don’t think he’d accept Industries pay. Midas is probably from Simsbury like Brandon.

 

My binoculars survived getting thrown in a giant puddle at Woodstock ‘94 while mud caked Nine Inch Nails apocalyptically raged about marching pigs. I couldn’t let them go. And he was foolishg to offer so much. I only paid $40. But weeks of Peter Pan fare? More beer? Is this the kind of thinking that lures nubile girls into nude photo shoots in shade drawn Rockville studio apartments?

 

“Are you sure you need to see better? Look, He’s up on the video screen!”

 

Dave plucked his black Gibson Chet Atkins Special. Even I could almost see beads of pixelated sweat.

 

“Come on, man.”

 

“Okay, Deal.”

 

The show became a big screened Pay Per View event. I bought a 30 ounce Coors Light with my blood money.

 

On to the cringey Lover Lay Down. Another tap. This time a tall dude in a blue golf shirt. Hugo Boss? Izod over here.

 

“How much did he give you?”

 

“$140.”

 

He reached into his (black genuine leather) wallet.

 

“Here’s $200. I’ll give this to you right now. Just go over there and say you want to buy your binoculars back. You will still come out $60 ahead.”

 

“This is one of the weirdest things that’s ever happened to me.”

 

My satisfied customer was grinning ecstatically. I tapped him. Leroi Moore’s silky smooth flute solo helped negotiations go a bit more smoothly.

 

“These are pretty awesome!” 

 

“I know but hey dude, I changed my mind. Can I buy them back? I can’t see the show without them.”

 

“What did he say to you?”

 

“Nothing.”

 

He looked deep in thought.

 

“No! I like these! I think I want to keep them!”

 

I walked back to my spot—now occupied by four stumbling lovers struggling to not lay down. I moved behind them.

 

Tap.

 

“What happened?”

 

“He wouldn’t sell them.”

 

“He’s just really fucked up. Go back over there and say, ‘I want my fucking binoculars back’. He’ll back down. If he still says no, get security and say he stole them.”

 

These didn’t sound like good ideas at all. I‘d already been shoved to the ground by a pornographer, was a black eye from a binocular enthusiast next?

 

“I think I’ll just let him keep them. He seems to really like them!”

 

I handed his $200 back. I hoped he might decline due to my emotional distress, but he was a much better financial planner than either his buddy or me. Pay Per View it was. I was getting far too drunk to care.

 

Dave strummed the opening weird B chord to Crash. Any girls want to make out? This is what we paid for.

 

I guess not.

 

Then a Bob Marley cover. Three Little Birds? Stir It Up? Kind of a blur. Finally, All Along The Watchtower.

 

20,000 kids stumbled towards the lone Exit sign like inebriated, single-file cattle, an eerie scene straight out of Dylan’s John Wesley Harding era. That afternoon’s army of Meadows staff had apparently all gone home. Finding lot D (B? Not C I don’t think) proved quite difficult. High up on posts, letters were displayed which I couldn’t read without binoculars. I really needed to start thinking ahead. Ants marched to their cars to sit still in traffic. Where were the tailgaters? If you’re lost and legally blind, sit still and let your party find you.

 

I did the opposite. 

 

I saw a car dealerships enclave: Land Rover Hartford, Midas, New County BMW. I heard a ruckus across the street. So Much To Say blasted from a car stereo. I didn’t think we crossed the street this afternoon, but I was fresh out of ideas so I sprinted across. Drunk, midnight, visually impaired: don’t do that. 

 

A brown brick building displayed “Hartford Jai Alai Fronton” in letters so huge even I could read them. It had recently closed after providing a two decade long gateway drug to legalized gambling. They replaced it with Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun Casinos—glittering, rural cathedrals owned by Native Americans to appease white guilt (over gambling, not genocide.) Goodbye dark, dirty urban dens of sin. On a dime everyone lost their passion for a 14th Century Basque sport featuring two guys smashing a rubber ball against a wall.

 

But on this night, the spirit of jai alai was alive and well on Weston Street. In lieu of balls and cestas, beer bottles flew at high velocities before shattering on the ground or finding their target: an officer of the law. 

 

“STEP BACK NOW!” a bullhorn demanded.

 

“FUCK YOU PIGS!”

 

A rock flew by. 

 

Every time I left the house, I seemed to stumble into a riot.

 

Cops returned jam band fans’ volleys with rubber bullets and pepper spray. The match was underway. How can I place a bet on the cops? Oh, an overturned car was on fire--just to state the obvious.  

 

Kate and Amira didn’t seem like the rock throwing types (the jury was still out on Bill) so I cheated death and jaywalked back.

 

“COLIN!!!!”

 

“HI!!!”

 

“We were so worried we lost you!”

 

“Sorry—I couldn’t find the lot.”

 

“That show was awesome!” Amira said.

 

“Yeah. Thanks for inviting me!”

 

“It wasn’t as good as SPAC last Friday. Two Step was sick,” Bill said. He was such a 26 year old.

 

We got home at 2AM.

 

“See you tomorrow!” Kate said.

 

“Good night!”

 

“Good night!”

 

The 19A lights were on.

 

“Where did you go tonight?” Evans said. 

 

“Dave Matthews with the girls across the street.”

 

“We were too to tailgate,” Freeman said. A bandage was wrapped around his raised left leg.   

 

“Good show. What happened to you?”.  

 

“I got stitches at Windham Hospital.”

 

Jenny sat next to him.

 

“I can not drink anytime I want. But when I start, I can’t stop.” 

 

Join the club.

 

“What happened?” 

 

“ I stepped on broken glass running barefoot. Bled like a motherfucker.” 

 

I had darkened Windham Hospital’s door myself. At former dorm-mate Jen’s Carriage House 6D apartment, red, blue, yellow, and green birthday balloons floated everywhere. I sat on the beige carpet by the coffee table and tapped a red balloon, but I failed to see the coffee table’s razor-sharp metal edge. My blood thinning fourth beer probably didn’t help. 

 

“Colin, let’s go upstairs and I’ll get you a Band-Aid,” the birthday girl said.

 

“Okay. I’m not sure if a Band-Aid will  be enough,” I fatalistically mumbled. Don’t invite me to your birthday party if you don’t want a trail of blood on your carpet. The infirmary called an ambulance. Nine stitches.

 

“I’ve got to start making smarter decisions,” Freeman added. 

 

Don’t we all.

 

Maybe I needed to finally leave this place after all. I was like a long overdue Blockbuster rental someone forgot to rewind.

………………………………………

……………………………..

A green and orange sari clad chatterbox sorted sweatpants at my table.

 

“Who is Dave Matthews?”

 

I wore a white DMB baseball T-shirt with black sleeves (dress down Monday). A post-binocular sale impulse buy. I was going to die broke. 

 

“He’s a musician. I went to see him this weekend.”

 

“Where do you live?”

 

“Storrs. Near UConn.”

 

“You grew up there?”

 

“No, I moved there.”

 

I hid my UConn background in the workshop. I hid my workshop background in Storrs. Like my narcotics plainclothesman dad before me, I worked undercover.       

 

“I grew up in Ellington. Small farm town.”

 

“I’m from a farm town too. In India. My name is Ayesha.”

 

“Hi. I’m Colin.”

 

“What church do you go to?”

 

“Oh—I haven’t gone a lot recently. But I’m Catholic—basically. Are you Buddhist?”

 

Never discuss Indian religion with a white American who took Eastern Philosophy And Religion (A, spring semester 1994). He will lag 2,500 years behind.

 

“Muslim.”

 

Muslim?

 

“Oh,” I said.

 

Damn. I was hoping for a tour guide on the path to nirvana. I would have even settled for a Jain. Not Hindu? Nothing against Muslims--all those crusades and jihads were just Big Ender vs. Little Ender pissing contests. Half of the prophets in The Bible are in the Koran like it’s spinoff series. And both faiths tell you to obey your way into heaven. But  obeying just seemed to mean shattered vases and no air conditioning. Meanwhile Buddhists say the answer is to unclutter your mind and connect to a cosmic energy force through the dial-up modem in your head.

 

One cool late April morning I walked up the hill from East Campus and passed a group of ten kids coming from two other directions. This sidewalk convergence triggered an indescribable feeling. My mental walls collapsed. I ceased existing as a separate, solitary confined prisoner and they came out from under their foreign, far-off, foggy shadows. I was them. They were me. And the only drug in my system was the sugar from two small glasses of orange juice with ice I’d drank at the Whitney dining hall. This magic moment lasted two or three seconds. I tried hard to retrieve it but  I couldn’t. It was off to Deviant Behavior.

 

Later that day I saw Metallica in Hartford with Dale and Trask. We jumped the fence to get on the floor, but a cop grabbed my shirt and kindly escorted me back to my assigned seat, yelling the entire time. He probably said he’d kick my punk ass out of here if I tried crap like that again, but I couldn’t hear a damn word--what with Metallica playing and everything. Maybe this was the world unpurged from fear and possessiveness, without a dialed in connection to the sacred harmony within all things: a cop screaming orders you can’t hear over Creeping Death.

 

I guess Windsor Avenue bodhisattvas were too much to ask. I forgot they had Muslims in India. Weren’t they persecuted? Outcastes? Dalits? Or did non-Hindus rank even lower than UConn’s football team? Industries must have been a smooth transition for Ayesha. The highest caste, the Brahmins, were scholars, not warriors or kings. But the lowest caste were laborers, artisans, sleeve machine operators. Maybe I was a Brahmin in Shudra clothing, but do the clothes remake the man if he doesn’t get a new tailor?

 

If a higher caste member touched you, they are stained and banished down to your level for life. You’re an Untouchable. You have next level cooties. Was there an Unfuckable caste? A sex worker and semi-formal attendee might want to nominate me.   

 

But in America your caste lets you out on parole for good behavior. I could find the Brahmin river again if I just got over my fear of J.D. Connor and reluctance to considering pedo gut busters great literature.

 

Besides, fairy tales are our religion. If a princess kisses a frog she doesn’t turn into a frog, he turns into a prince.

 

Right?

………………………………………

“Oh my God,” Nina said. “I just looked at the toilet and it’s BLACK.”

 

“Ewwww, boys are so gross!” Kate said.

 

Was it Greek or me? Were they wondering that too? We both drank heavily. Neither of us considered toilet bowl cleaner a wise financial investment. It was probably him but…..I pretended I didn’t hear her. 

 

If pressed, I would have blamed Greek. I was a loyal friend about the wall, but let’s not get ridiculous here.

…………………………………..

Man, a social animal, will watch Sportscenter on a neighbor’s couch even if he can barely see the TV instead of sitting two feet away next door by himself.

 

It was White Sox vs. Tigers highlights from Comiskey.

 

“That’s deep and I don’t think it’s playable,” Dan Patrick said. 

 

“Ever since he came out of his slump, Albert Belle has been tearing shit up,” Evans said.

 

“Yeah he’s on fire,” I said.

 

Evans noticed too? I felt like less of a baseball dweeb.

 

God fearing, hot dog eating, flag in the front yard homeowners loved Mark McGwire and (maybe) Sammy Sosa that summer, but this agnostic lawn wrecker preferred to watch the angriest man in baseball wreck baseballs. Belle got arrested for chasing teenagers in his car and threatening to kill them for egging his house on Halloween. In the minors he hit a heckler in the stomach with a ball. He refused to shake hands with American League President Bobby Brown (not the My Prerogative one.) He exploded on NBC’s Hannah Storm for milling around the dugout. He smashed the clubhouse thermostat after a teammate turned it above 60 degrees so they called him Mr. Freeze. 

 

He stood in a dead-still stance with a  diagonally cocked bat and forged iron stare that incinerated a pitchers’ soul. Exchanging the Indians red, white, and blue for the White Sox silver and black in the South Side only made him scarier! I should have hated this cartoon stereotype of an Angry Black Man but why didn’t I? Would Fatima and Melissa say he was my kindred psychotic spirit?

 

He was once Joey Belle. Opposing fans still launched “JOOOOOOO-EYYYYY” chants. Did he worry Joey wouldn’t hurt a fly let alone a Trick Or Treater? Behind scary Albert was there a scared little Joey? And I thought girls were loyal to jerks!

…………………………………………..

Musical Interlude

 

Nine drunk kids crowded in a car and sang Tubthumping. What a time to be alive. Parked outside Knollwood, I almost felt connected to these near strangers I’d never see again in three three weeks. Thank you, Chumbawuma.  ……………………………………….

Eight of us crowded into Mickey’s air conditioned 14-D bedroom, beers in hand, for a drunken sing-along/air guitarathon to Metallica’s One. I’m surprised the ear bludgeoning volume didn’t shatter the windows. It was 12:22 AM. Carriage House’s quiet hours were from 4AM to 2PM and even then, they looked the other way if you refrained from flying DC-10’s directly over the complex. Where would I find this in September?

…………………………………..

From my living room, I could hear Tesla’s Love Song across the street.

 

I walked through Kate and Amira’s open door as Jeff Keith crooned his final reassurances of love’s imminent return.  

 

“Hey.”

 

“Hey.”

 

“Good song. I wouldn’t have pegged you as a Tesla fan.”

 

“I love Tesla. My brother got me into them. Who did you think I was into?”

 

“I don’t know…..the Dead, Phish.”

 

“I like lots of stuff.”

 

“Me too.”  

 

Kate seemed lonely. Amira was lovesick. Kristin’s man was a constant disappointment. Was every girl unhappy with her love life? Why couldn’t I take advantage? Sometimes you don’t need a full food service vendor, a Coke machine will do.

 

After I returned from my run, I carried a cleanish glass of water up to my room. I took off my sweaty clothes and, like a less hot but no less torn Natalie Imgruglio, I opted for the floor. I imagined Kate there. Also naked. But she still seemed sad. Or was that me? Downstairs, Radio 104 played The Barenaked Ladies’ One Week, a song could make Dirk Diggler go limp. If you’re not a Beastie Boy, don’t attempt rapping, white boys.   

 

I tried imagining Amira instead but she just moaned, “Oh, Joe!”

 

I heard the shower running in 19-A through Carriage House’s “walls” so I summoned from the bullpen the complex’s most dominant closer: Kristin. In lieu of Hells Bells or Enter Sandman, One Week would have to do.

 

Please God don’t tell me it was Evans in there.

……………………………………….

Last Call

 

Another night, another party at Knollwood. Or was it Briarwood? Blue House? Maybe Tree House. Amira drove me home.

 

“Joe ignored me the whole night. Then I saw him laughing with that girl Trish! I asked him if he wanted to stop over tomorrow and he said, “I have to work” and he looked away. He’s obviously going out of his way to ignore me.” She started to cry. “I’m sorry. I’m just freaking out right now. This just really sucks, Col.”

“It’s alright. Joe sucks. What’s so great about that dude anyway? Dreadlocks? Bongos? Who’s he kidding?”

 

She laughed.

 

“He has all the personality of a very stoned Carson Daly.”

 

I was rolling out the A material. 

 

“I know. I’ve been obsessing too much. I need to forget about him.”

 

“It’s his loss.” 

 

She parked in front of my apartment.

 

“I’m sorry for being so dramatic. I’ll be better tomorrow I swear!”

 

“No problem. Want to come in for a second?”

 

“Oooooo…okay!”

 

“Do you want a beer?” 

 

“No, I’m good.”

 

Guess she wasn’t the 2AM nightcap type but I sure was so I grabbed a blue and orange Harpoon from the living room fridge which supplemented the kitchen’s fridge. My work commute was like a sloth dipped in molasses but my fridge commute was a bullet train. 

 

She sat on the couch against the window, I took the one facing the entertainment system.  

 

“So, um, I’ve noticed Kate kind of bosses you around a little.”

 

“Oh…..really?”

 

“Yeah. I mean she’s always like Amira stop talking about Joe, or you have something on your shirt, or oh Amira you should drive slower.”

 

“Yeah….you’re right!”

 

This was sort of true. Like a non- sibling, girl version of my brother and me? But how relevant was this, actually?

 

“ I don’t know, it’s like she almost acts like your mom.”

 

I wish she would have a beer.

 

“Yeah.” She paused reflectively. “It’s like she’s my mom and I’m her daughter!”

 

“Sure I can’t get you a beer?” I took a swig.

 

“No, no. I’m good.”

 

Can we rewind the tape and discuss the elephant in the room? Why did she say, “Ooooooo okay!” after I invited her in? I heard that right, didn’t I? Did she think I asked her in for….other reasons? She had to, right? Was she already forgetting Mr. Buffalo Soldier? Probably…..but you might as well have told someone the earth wasn’t flat in 5,000 BC.  

 

“Yeah it’s just something I noticed. I don’t know if it helps or not.”

 

How can I abort?

 

“You’re right. Well, I’m glad we had this talk!”

 

She wanted Dirk Diggler and I gave her Miss Manners. 

 

“Great! Me too!”

 

She wanted Chest Rockwell and I gave her Ann Landers.

 

First Joe, now me. What did this girl have to do to get laid?

 

But consider my recent Barenaked Ladies incident. What if an actual barenaked lady didn’t help? I was no Peter North. On a good day I was Colin North By Northwest.  

 

“Well, it’s getting late. I guess I better get to bed,” she yawned. 

 

“Yeah, me too.”

 

She gave me a hug. Not a boob crusher, but a solid “feel her bra strap through her shirt” hug. I finished my beer. How does someone get to be this much of an idiot? Still like this at 25! I wished they could re-program me like Alex in A Clockwork Orange. Strap me to a chair and play Oprah episodes and Tony Robbins infomercials until I scream bloody murder and promise to never give helpful advice again! Advice is the bra strap through the shirt of human interaction.

………………………………………

Radio 104’s Kevin The Afternoon Guy was my bus companion. His Friday evening party anthem was Thank You, Jaegermesiter. This was about the drink, not the snake. 

…………………………………….

They didn’t give freshmen and sophomores campus parking spots, so The Rape Trail was the major thruway for those not yet mature enough to drive drunk to off campus parties. But with everyone home, that summer it was mostly just the final leg on my thirty mile, two hour epic journey home. After a long day of sewing machine breakdowns followed by two slower than a TKE brother buses, it was a huge relief to finally operate an efficient piece of machinery which yielded to my every command. I rode faster than any helmetless, partially blind cyclist should.

 

Sun glared through the trees as the trail veered slightly left. As I turned, a jolt nearly knocked me off my bike. I slammed the brakes. My tires squeaking on the gravel. I looked back and saw a navy blue backpack on the ground beside a keeled over kid grabbing his leg.

 

“Oh my God. I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you. Are you okay?”

 

“Yeah,” he whispered. 

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“You’re good.” He motioned me on. 

 

The The Rape Trail’s entrance read, “PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK,” but not a single person assumed this referred to blind Tour de France wannabes, but life is like a box of chocolates.

 

I went slower after that.  

………………………………………

My parents came over to discuss August and everything after. My mom’s idea. It was happening. 

 

Cardboard no longer hid the hole. The mainstays of our interior decoration were overflowing ashtrays, skunked beer bottles filled with cigarette butts, empty pizza boxes, and strawberry daiquiri stains which STILL lined the kitchen walls. My dad would be horrified. He always fired up his Hoover seconds after we finished our Jiffy Pop in front of the TV. We were only allowed into his red Plymouth Duster with white interior under strict parental supervision.

 

I couldn’t find any cleaning products.

 

Next door?

 

Screw it. 

 

They sat on the opposite side of the kitchen table.

 

“You have to be out of here when?” asked my dad, pen and notepad in hand.

 

“When the girls come back for the school year. Maybe they will let me stay a couple days longer but basically by the end of the month.”

 

“Okay, so September 1st.” A big note taker, he adorned his fridge with all caps memos like, “NEED MORE PEPSI” and “HAIRCUT NEXT TUESDAY.” 

 

“September” gave me a chill. 

 

“So you work in Windsor. You need to live on a bus line. Somewhere going to Hartford.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“So you can’t live in Ellington. But maybe Vernon/Rockville. Or Manchester.”

 

“I think so.”

 

“What kind of rent are we talking about? How much do you make a month?”

 

Boy, Dad, you really know how to hurt a guy.

 

“Well…I get $300 per month from Social Security and I get…..it varies. Like……….$900 per month from work?”

 

This sunny estimate assumed that along with winning the Perfect Attendance Award, they replaced the antebellum machines with Bridge To The 21^st Century bleeding edge tech in a revitalization project that would make UConn 2000 look like replacing a flashlight battery.  

 

“So (more writing) we’re looking at $500 to $600?”

 

So long Harpoons. Forget even Bud Light? I only paid $400 by splitting the rent with Greek. Where do you even find illegal cable boxes?

 

“You can look into Section 8 housing,” my mom said.

 

“Okay,” I half-heartedly said. More disability themed options.

 

“I’ll start making some calls,” my dad said. “And I’ll put an ad in the classifieds. I’m sure many commuters would drive you into Hartford. You can pay for that?”

 

“Probably.”

 

I couldn’t imagine any driver materializing.

 

“You’ve got a lot of work cut out for you,” my mom turned to my dad. They got along well. The friendliest divorced couple ever.

 

“ I’ll try to work my magic. Oh and Aunt Linda might have an opportunity for you at The Hartford.”

 

“Great. Yeah, it seems like everyone is hiring.”  

 

“She wanted me to ask you one question, though: ‘Is Colin ready to get serious about his life?’”

 

Okay so maybe the debauched scene of non-recycled beers, collapsed drywall, and superfluous refrigeration didn’t exactly paint a rosy picture of a laser focused young professional scaling the corporate ladder, but I rode my bike through January ice to work in a textile factory for sub-minimum wage. If my life got any more serious, John Updike would write a novel about me. 

 

“Tell her yes.”

 

“Okay, we have a game plan!” Dad clapped his hands. He loved game plans.

 

“Colin and I are going to lunch at Kathy John’s. Do you want to join us?” my mom said.

 

“I have to pick up Jimmy at swimming lessons. But thanks.” 

 

“Well guys, thanks for coming over. I appreciate it.”

 

“Is your cleaning lady off this week?” my Dad asked.  

 

I knew he couldn’t resist.

 

“I think she’s at Hawk’s Nest.”

 

I had already gotten a job interview so was it so hard to get my own apartment? But I dreaded it with all my soul. I could probably schedule a root canal too, but would I?

 

My dad had to do it.  

 

It was ending. This time for good.  

…………………………………………

Smart engineering major Brandon bet wrong on the Packers. (Sort of) smart Fortune 500 rising star Frank thought the ’97 Dolphins would destroy the league. They went 8-8. After prophetess Cassandra warned the Trojans of their impending doom, they told her she was off her meds or maybe that time of the month? When humans try to predict the future, we fumble in the dark without even a cane or service dog to guide us. Gambling is our only faulty flashlight. A single correct pick against the point spread or hit on the Roulette wheel gives us such a thrilling illusion of mastery over time and fate that we easily forget the ten losses that came just before it.   

 

Marriage is another gamble. On her wedding day, my mom probably didn’t predict she would become a cop’s wife. (They were only 25!) Two years later when my dad enrolled in the police academy, they probably hyped heart pounding high speed chases while protecting innocent women and children from the bad guys, but did they mention the nightmares? Or all the overtime? Or the job’s sleeper hold which might turn your pristine, silent suburban street into a daydream and your beat’s decaying, siren blaring city streets into your new reality? Once you hold a dead eight year old hit and run victim in your arms or dodge bullets to your head, can you still turn off Cop Made? Can all that adrenaline and cortisol find a safe landing through backdoor barbeques and tossing the football around? So you change out of your uniform and put away your gun—but not before turning on your police scanner. There’s no punching out here. Your time clock runs until retirement.

 

If asked to predict marriages, even Cassandra would have flipped a coin. Well, except for Helen of Troy and Menelaus---even Chuck Woolery could have told you was a terrible love connection.

………………………………………   

Summer was winding down, but chronic smokin’ still commenced diurnally unabated in unit 19C. REM’s Don’t Go Back to Rockville was in the key of E. I printed out the chords from Miguel’s computer (Rich kids).

At least it was a peppy tune unlike their increasingly dour 90’s work. I recorded a few versions. Was I crazy or would my voice no longer make people want to puke? 

……………………………………….

“I got a job,” Miguel said. “This brokerage firm in Fairfield.”

 

“Congrats, dude.” Evans high fived him.

 

“Thanks. Stoners can get jobs.” He laughed.  

 

I needed to find a dealer.  

 

“Colin, are you going with us to Phish?” Evans said.  

 

“I didn’t know you guys were going.”    

 

“Yeah, me, Miguel, Mickey, Greek, Hopkins…. Should be pretty sick.”

 

“Okay I’m in!”

 

“Cool, man.”

 

The Lemonwheel. Loring Air Force Base in Limestone, Maine. One last lost weekend with Trey and co! I never heard Phish playing in 19A. I probably knew more of their songs. Of course, Freeman didn’t listen to Dave Matthews either but that didn’t stop him from walking on broken glass.  

 

We loaded everything up on Thursday night even though Phish wouldn’t play until Saturday. This time everyone almost over planned!

 

“Col, Do you have a sleeping bag?” Greek said. 

 

“No.”

 

“I brought an extra.”

 

See what I mean?

 

They packed eight bags of Doritos. three bags of Fritos, two bags of Lays (plain and Sour Cream and Onion,) a West Coast rapper’s supply of weed, and an Irish funeral’s supply of beer. Four coolers. This would be a weekend to not remember.

 

Hopkins was still packing when we went to pick him up in Briarwood at 9PM. Okay so maybe preparations weren’t quite at Eagle Scout level. Greek and I waited in his car. I had $298. Obviously, we would jump any/all gates before even considering paying for tickets, but what about price-gouged concessions if our Fritos supply ran dangerously low? Additional beer? Gas money? Soon I would have to start paying my own rent. And an electric bill. Phone bill. Cable was probably out of the question. Can I really afford to go? Kristin wasn’t even going! A jam band sausage fest. Three days of Evans titty twisters and bearded, braided moly hunting hippies wandering through an abandoned Air Force base. Lost with lotus eaters.  

 

“Greek, I can’t go.”

 

“Okay. Why?”

 

“I can’t afford it. I’m almost broke.”

 

“Okay, I’ll drive you back.” He went up the door and said, “Hey, I’ll meet you guys back here. Colin can’t go.”   

 

I had never seen 19A and B shuttered up and dark before. A tidal wave of melancholy smacked me in the face. 

 

“Thanks Greek. Sorry for the hassle.”

 

“No problem, Col.”

 

“Have fun. Don’t do anything Evans would.”

 

The Red Sox moved to 70-48 after beating the Twins 8-7 at Fenway. They were having a good season if you ignored the Yankees (an obnoxious 88-29.) I would have to get used to watching games by myself again.

…………………………………….

Kate walked in the next day.  

 

“Hey, I thought you went to Phish!”

 

“I changed my mind. I’m broke.”

 

“Banana is having a party at Knollwood tonight. Amira and I are going if you want to come with us.”

 

“Okay, sure.”

 

This actually sounded better than a six-hour car ride smelling Evans’ farts. It was a glorious sunny late summer day with low humidity. After my run, I voluntarily put on jeans for the first time in a couple of months. (I wore pants to the workshop like it was Goldman Sachs.) My purple Izod and white Nikes completed this killer ensemble. Shirt tucked in. No belt. Stop drooling, ladies.

 

Kate, Amira and I stood in the backyard with our red cups. The Beastie Boys’ Intergalactic blared through the speakers pointed out the window.  Kate sang along and pinched the right side of my neck. Unlike Ad-Rock, without even being told to, I smiled.

 

“That guy over by the keg in the blue shirt is hot,” Amira said.

 

“Oh Amira,” Kate said.

 

“Maybe us girls are full of shit. We don’t want to find the love of our life, we just want ass!”

 

Someone sure seemed over Joe all of a sudden. Did she cry him out? Had I accidentally cured her with my invite in….? Ah forget it.

 

“Hi Colin.”

 

A girl to my right stepped into our circle. I took a quick glance. Was it……it couldn’t be. Clara Boucher?? The Ellington ballerina from New Haven 4th floor? It was! I think…. I tried to say “Hi Clara” but my lips froze.

 

“Clara Boucher.”

 

“Yes, I know! Hi Clara!”

 

“Do you know Rob?”

 

Rob was Banana.  

 

“Yeah. A little.”

 

“I just met him two weeks ago.”

 

“Cool. Uh, this is Kate and Amira. This is Clara.”

 

“Hi!”

 

“Hi! Nice to meet you!” 

 

 I was so proud to introduce my two female friends. They made me seem so normal, so respectable, so non-psychotic. 

 

“I know, Amira. Can I tell you the same thing happened to me….”

 

Listen to her. An Ellington girl who had already committed an Iranian girl’s name to memory. They’re instant best friends! She was so polished. Don’t ask me what they were talking about--I couldn’t focus. She wore a tucked in black shirt with jeans, her black hair was pulled back. She was keg party royalty. No cup in her hand. Did some people go to keggers just to socialize??

 

Looking at her, I thought how she wasn’t quite Kristin beautiful. But better somehow. Cute. Girl next door hot, not sell your soul to Satan hot, not make you howl at the moon hot. Although with me I guess you never knew.   

 

“Where are you living?” she said.

 

“Carriage House. Just for the summer. My old Jungle roommate and I subleased it from these girls. You?”

 

“Coventry Lake. What have you been up to lately?” 

 

“Not too much! I’ve been working. I graduated last year. I’m…..finally leaving here in a couple weeks.” I laughed. Uggh. “I may still go to grad school. I’ve been trying to decide.”

 

“I know what you mean. I just switched my major. I don’t know when I’m ever going to graduate, Colin.”  

 

“Really? What was your major?”

 

“Agricultural science. I’m switching to Computer Science.”

 

“That sounds like a good choice. Was it your farm town background that made you go for Agricultural Science?”.

 

“Basically,” she said. “Have you talked to any Ellington people lately?”

 

“Just Dan Madden. Do you know him?”

 

“I don’t think so.”

 

I guess he hadn’t made quite the same impression on her.   

 

“We were neighbors across the street growing up.”

 

“What neighborhood did you live in?”

 

“Woodside Acres. You?”

 

“Meadow Brook Road.” 

 

“Oh. But yeah, I kind of lost touch with most of them.”

 

“Well that’s a good thing, Colin.”

 

Did I just fall in love with her? I pegged her as a school spirit girl with a purple and gold heart. Could she feel anything close to how I felt last summer? Not possible.  

 

“What about Ben Auerbach?” I said in a lighthearted tone. I was getting dangerously close to putting my foot in my mouth and ruining everything.

 

“Why do you make fun of him so much?”

 

Jealousy, obviously.

 

They dated in high school.

 

“I don’t know. I’m just kidding. He’s actually a good guy.” 

 

Maybe I was the problem. Did I think I was smarter than him? In class he loved to say, “Ohhh hairPIE,” in a Long Duck Dong voice. The day after the Twins won the World Series he sat across the cafeteria table and said, “My favorite player is Randy Bush.” Grow up, dude. Never mind I had also taken note of this utility outfielder’s name. 

 

“Do you have any brothers and sisters?” she said. 

 

“I have one older brother Patrick.”

 

“Oh I’ve never heard of him I don’t think.”

 

“And two younger half-brothers who live in Manchester. How about you?”

 

“I have a sister and a brother.”

 

“Are they younger or older?” 

 

“Younger.”

 

She was three years younger than me so her siblings were from another generation entirely.    

 

“Colin McDonough!”

 

Was I dreaming? Was it possible she was excited to see me!? 

 

“Clara Boucher! Clarissa. Do you like being called that?” 

 

“No.”

 

“I think it’s nice. I can’t believe you still even want to talk to me! I feel like I kind of acted like a jackass. I don’t drink as much as I used to.”

 

“Well, that’s good to hear.”

 

She joined another group. Why was she being so nice? I wrote drunken messages on her board. It pained me to even try to think of the humiliating stuff I must have written! I passed out on her floor with a lit cigarette in my hand right outside her door. Did she discover me with my left thumb and index finger a half inch from burning the building down? What must I have slurred to her? I couldn’t bear to imagine. I was a human fire hazard. She should avoid me like a flammable liquid yet here we were chatting away. Her, Kate and Amira were fast friends! Why was she giving me a twelfth chance?

 

I sat far away from the crowd in a lawn chair as dusk settled in. It was mid-August, when you first start to notice it’s getting dark earlier. I felt a cool, hint of fall breeze and was glad I chose jeans. A harbinger of living alone in my $500--$600 one bedroom apartment.

 

She was probably standing in the circle of kids by the house. Or what if she left already? I would never see her again. I needed to go back over and say something. I couldn’t think of anything. Why did I have to see her here!? She had no idea I was now a slave laborer going native more and more by the day. I was sinking in sheltered workshop quicksand, possibly never to be heard from again. Never mind my polo shirt and hair gel disguise, the kids at the party weren’t my peers anymore, if they ever really were. Marisol, Jackie, and Donny were my tribe now. Clara was so nice to connect switching her major and her Ellington ambivalence with me but there’s no way our lives were in the same galaxy! She was a princess. I was a frog. Or worse. A Brahim. I was an Untouchable. She lived in a word of fashion magazines and tutus. We could probably never understand each other!  

 

But I took slow sips. She couldn’t see me pounding beers. I wasn’t like that anymore I told her, right? I walked back over to the group gathered in the dark. The houselights made everyone look like a ghost. She walked back over to me.

 

“Colin, I have a dance event tomorrow morning at 10 at Gampel Pavilion. You should come watch!”

 

Was she trying to prevent us from losing contact?? Was she thinking the same thing as me? Did she know I would never do it myself?

 

Or did she invite everyone?

 

“Oh, sounds cool. Yeah! I can ride my bike down there.”  

 

“Yeah. Great!”

 

Oh my God. I should stop drinking. A screaming hangover would be my easy excuse to not go.

 

Nina materialized. Where had Amina gone?

 

“We’re going to Ted’s but we can come back and pick you up later if you want,” Kate said. 

 

“No, I’ll come with you.”

 

I had plans with Clara tomorrow anyway!

 

Nina and Kate stood at the bar. I sat in a tall swivel chair a few feet away. I could barely hear their chatter over Everclear’s Santa Monica. I unconsciously moved my lips while  I converted this lucky break into a catastrophe! This was the best thing to happen all summer! If Hopkins had packed a little faster, I would be five hundred miles away.

 

I’ll just tell myself this means she likes me. She’s a dancer and they all want people to watch them, right? Was she just using me for attention? What was happening at Gampel on a Saturday morning in August anyway? I didn’t think they had any events. Campus would stay a ghost town for another two weeks. Was it only a test? A ruse? Did she invite Banana too? What if I found him lounging in section 11, row A, seat 2?

 

“Oh hey Colin, did you have fun at my party last night?”

 

“Yeah it was pretty good. Hey, why do they call you Banana anyway?”

 

“Why do you think they call me Banana?” 

 

“Oh right.”

 

“Clara is a great dancer, don’t you think?”

 

“Yeah she’s really good.”

 

“Great timing.”

 

“Better structure.”

 

“Did you hear?”

 

“Oh no.” 

 

“I fucked her.”

 

Arrrrrrgghhhh! I might be that chump who pretends to have acquired an ardent overnight love for dance just so a girl might consider having sex with him or at least keeping his resume on file. I can’t go. It’s too late. I’m finally leaving Storrs--long after everyone else in my freshman class took the hint and packed their stuff. Leave the undergraduates be.

 

Something soft and wet touched my right cheek. Kate was giving me a kiss. Then she kissed my left cheek. I surrendered my second involuntary smile of the night.

 

“I just wanted to say hi. You seemed upset.” 

 

“Oh. Thanks! No, I’m okay.”  

 

They were great. Even Kristin—though maybe she was a little high maintenance? Forget girlfriends, I barely had girls as friends.“Would she sleep with me? Is she fucking him?” always got in the way. Girls became less people than admissions officers, HR screeners. Even now I thought, “Does Kate want me?” Still, this was so much nicer than a tent of dudes at Lemonwheel. My life had improved so much right before it was about to end again.  

 

We got home at 10. I knew I should go to bed. But of course, I didn’t. I had a couple more beers and cranked Sublime to 11.

 

I to Huskies. Same old scene. They played that “the boy is mine” song. Why was I here?

 

Back to Ted’s. It was more crowded than an hour and a half earlier. It seemed one hundred times sadder.

 

I was always afraid nice guys finish but of course how many more assholish things was I planning to do before letting that go? Ben Auerbach was probably nicer. Or Banana. I called a girl a cunt for inviting me to a birthday party. No, wait, it was much worse than that. I wrote her a note and slipped it under her door under the cover of midnight--and called her a cunt. I did fucking nothing when my my stepfather was abusing my mom. That’s the guy Clara invited to Gampel in the morning! She has no idea who I really am. I’m a piece of shit! 

 

But what if I’m the only one who can’t forgive myself? Go forth and sin no more?

 

And was this like the air conditioning? Was no one else going to do this? If I knew anything about college guys, they will not risk getting labeled a tap dancing fanatic (and therefore very gay.) Before even considering attending a dance event, they would require a guarantee the girl would bang him later that day if not sooner and preferably put it in writing with a notary co-signature. I didn’t need to worry about seeing Banana, but I could still get up early on a Saturday to watch her dance while he slept one off and watched her dance naked in his room later that night? And then I’m the sucker.  

 

Would they thank you for being so nice right before sleeping with some asshole whose obnoxiousness they call confidence? Did girls understand guys any better than we understand them?

 

Yet sometimes it seemed like they liked me but they just didn’t make it obvious like Heather Jones in fifth grade. During my sophomore year, I ate alone at Paul’s Pizza on Thursday night of Spring Weekend. A (drunk) girl from Grange 4th floor walked up. 

 

“You should talk more. I know what’s going on. A lot of people want to talk to you but they’re too shy.”

 

Too shy to talk to me!? So the earth was flat. But maybe they should have been too shy. Wasn’t I the porcupine who hurt every girl who ever came close to me?

 

One sunny, breezy September afternoon I sat on a bench by Mirror Lake reading Faulkner’s Sartoris. A jogger stopped. 

 

“Hey aren’t you from Ellington? Colin? I’m Julie.”

 

“Oh hi!”

 

A week later I ran into her at a Blue House party.   

 

“I don’t like this party. Can you walk me home?”

 

It was a beautiful cool early fall night. She sang Oh What A Night. A few days later she wrote, “I’m sorry I missed you,” on my notepad.

 

“Are you going to need the room tonight, Col?” Greek giggled.

 

We hung out in her room and drank wine (her idea, believe it or not.) She didn’t fit in at UHart so she transferred. She mentioned her “doggy” which I wasn’t too crazy about to tell you the truth but it was fine I guess. I tried to kiss her. She turned away. Thirteen minutes later……I tried again!

 

“Just when you think you’re starting to like someone, they disappoint you,” she mused aloud.

 

I wrote her a letter. I know, I know. I would throw this book out of a moving train too. I said it seemed like you couldn’t be nice to girls, only jerks get the girls, I didn’t want to get friend zoned…. Total bullshit. She liked me! Maybe I didn’t like me so I made sure no one else could.   

 

I walked back from Ted’s.

 

I’d fucked up. I was too drunk to show up tomorrow morning. I could just call her tomorrow! I’ll think of an excuse later…

 

Coventry was in the phone book on the fridge. Boucher! Barbara. Larry. Robert. Oh great. Maybe her number was listed under a roommate’s name? But of course I had no idea who that was.  

 

I cranked Smells Like Teen Spirit to infinity and moshed around. A shelf ornament fell and broke. Kate and Nina walked in.

 

I turned down the stereo.

 

“Oh hi. Nina. I’m so sorry. I just broke this by mistake!”

 

“It’s okay. That’s just one of those little nick nacks.”

 

She was handling this so much better than the hole in the wall. I got away with everything! Was I like Evans after all?   

 

“You guys are so nice! I wish I didn’t have to leave in a couple weeks. You guys are awesome!” I slurred. Beer count: unknown. “But you know---fuck Evans. The hole in the wall wasn’t Greek’s fault. Greek is awesome. You know, I didn’t have any friends at UConn until I roomed with Greek and he invited me to hang out next door. Then last year….I wasn’t doing too well at home and he bailed me out again. I know he’s got a goofy laugh and his feet crackbut he’s still a pretty cool guy. But my life is a fucking mess! I was supposed to go to grad school but I just haven’t. I’m too old to still be here. I work…..in a factory. Like with blind people. Other blind people. I’m scared I’m never going to get out! And this girl Clara I met….she wants me to go see her dance tomorrow but maybe it’s a waste of time. She doesn’t really know me!”

 

True drunk histrionics now. I started to cry.     

 

“I’m sorry. I’m being really dramatic. I’m sorry. You guys are the best. I’m so sorry. First Greek, now me. I’ll bet this is the last time you sublease you apartment. The subleasers from hell!”

 

“It’s okay, Colin,” Nina said. She patted me on the shoulder.

 

“Colin, time to go to bed. You just had too much to drink,” Kate said. 

 

“We’ll help you.”

 

Kate grabbed my right hand, Nina grabbed my left hand. They led me upstairs. Nina turned on the light in my/her room. I crashed on my mattress.

 

“Don’t you want to brush your teeth?” she said. 

 

“I don’t care.” 

 

“No, let’s just go and brush your teeth.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Which toothbrush is yours?”

 

“Um, the red one.”

 

Kate spread Colgate. I brushed and went back to my room to lay down again.

 

“Good night, Colin.”

 

“Good night. Thank you, guys. I don’t deserve you guys!”

 

“Stop that! It’s no trouble.”

 

“WAIT!”

 

“What?”

 

“I have to set my alarm.”

 

”I’ll set it for you,” Kate said. “What time?”

 

Oh fuck. Did she say 11? Or 10?

 

“9:30.”

 

She flipped the dial.

 

“All set.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

“Good night.”

 

“Good night.”

 

“Sweet dreams!”

 

And no more turn aside and brood/

Upon love’s bitter mystery.

 

Trust your eyes.

 

She’s not going to vaporize you.

 

You’re not going to vaporize her.

 

I can decide in the morning.

……………………………………..

Tomorrow

 

When I tell guys I dance, they usually say, “Can you dance to Pour Some Sugar On Me?” Rob’s friend Mike asked me a week earlier if I planned to dance professionally. I said, “There are very few dance companies.” He said, “What about The Electric Blue?” Everyone laughed like it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard. When they tossed me in the air during cheer in high school against East Granby Steve the trombone player said, “I can see your camel toe, you know,” like I was a slut for wearing leggings (or for having a vulva) instead of him being a creep for looking.

 

My parents didn’t miss a single recital growing up, but I never knew if my dad just liked proving his love through this personal sacrifice. “Honey, that was wonderful.” “Your best performance yet.” I would say, “Thank you, Daddy” and never tell him I caught him looking at his watch while suppressing a yawn.

 

At least gay guys like dancing. Most of my guy friends had been gay, like my roommate Hector. Straight guys think they’re only allowed to view dancing as a means to an end: get under the Huskies strobe lights and dance to C + C Music Factory and try to hook up with the Kappa girl beside you. My Delta Gamma sisters made me come along but I’d usually hide at a corner table. “Oh Clara, you’re such a priss. Come out to the dance floor!”

 

I thought dancing was more than lap dances and drunken foreplay. Ballet dancers are perfectly self-contained, so guys can’t find a space for themselves in it. If you’re not dancing with them, they don’t care if you’re dancing. Dance is harmony through the beauty and grace of your own movements. You’re not a void that needs to be filled. A ballet studio has no after-hours VIP lounge.

 

Women weren’t much better. Like Mrs. Drew next door.

 

“Well, I just don’t think it’s appropriate for five year old girls to wear makeup and short skirts! It feels like child prostitution if you ask me!”

 

Projecting? Is it the outfits or the freedom that scares them? After you’ve learned your steps, you get so in sync with the music and the other dancers you don’t feel like you anymore. You’re connected by silent, invisible strings like magic. The formless air becomes a comfortable shoe you fit yourself into with each move. Self-choreographed, structured escape. Only when you dance do you realize how purposeless all of our other movements are, like wandering in the dark. Life feels like stumbling through a wild forest, dance is like a walk down a clear path someone cleared through the forest.

 

I wasn’t sure if Colin would show up. He sat by himself in the dark and looked sad like he often did when I was six lockers down from him in high school. He was a senior and I was a freshman. And he looked sad when I found him passed out by my door with a lit cigarette. My roommate Rachel and I had to shake him awake and lead him downstairs.

 

“I’m so sorry. I’m not going to drink like this anymore. I love you Clara! Please don’t hate me!”

 

He was such a lost sheep. Maybe a lost cause? But I couldn’t help it. He just seemed to need a friend. Or did he already find one? Who were those girls Kate and Amira?

 

I lied a little. We were just having a UConn Dance Team practice ahead of the first football game against Colgate in September. But they kept the doors of Gampel Pavilion open for anyone to walk in. This would be my last semester dancing. All the years and training and then nothing. People go to their school aged daughter’s recitals, but I was over the hill at 22. I wouldn’t have exchanged my time for anything. All of my closest friendships came from dance, but I saw a future of “Hey didn’t you used to dance in high school?”

 

Oh and I wasn’t switching majors exactly, just taking Computer Science classes. Possibly getting my Master’s in it. I had wanted to be in agriculture. All the Ellington farming families— the Rogencamps, Baumanns, Fischers—were so nice and seemed so happy. Their families had lived here for a century or more. They had roots. Then I interviewed John Rogencamp on a work study.

 

“What are they teaching you at UConn? All that “Green Revolution” nonsense?”

 

“Well yes we are learning about that.”

 

“Bunch of bullshit, pardon my French. Yield per acre, advanced irrigation techniques: it just puts family farmers out of work!”

 

“They would say higher yields are necessary to feed the world’s exponentially growing population.”

 

“Chinamen just need to wear a rubber! We have too many people in the world already. You’re going to put us out of work because some Ethiopian can’t keep it in his pants?”

 

“I guess that’s one way of looking at it.”

 

“Didn’t you dance in high school with my daughter Emily? What does a pretty little miss like you want to do with farming anyway? You think you can clean a flooded barn full of shit in your tap shoes? Your tutu might get wet if a heifer pisses all over you, you know. Sweetheart, you don’t understand anything. You think because you grew up here, you are a farmer? How many generations has your family lived here? Your parents probably moved here because they didn’t want you to grow up around darkies. They will sell the house and move down to Florida the minute you’re out of the house. You’re not from here. You’re just a tourist.”

 

I didn’t give him the satisfaction of saying my Chicopee and Suffield born parents bought our house in 1975.

 

“I’m not training to actually work on a farm.”

 

“Of course not! Just training to replace us with machines! Go visit a slaughterhouse. Then you’ll see what farming is all about. It ain’t like those pink porcelain cows you rode with your peppermint stick ice cream cone at Moser Farms.” 

 

I took him up on it. I visited a slaughterhouse the next semester on another work-study everyone strongly warned me against. They’re never called slaughterhouses--they’re meat packaging plants, stockyards, or abattoirs because French is classy. At the front entrance of J&L Farms in Windham they even had a table full of brochures.   

 

It wasn’t the blood. It was the screaming. Once a Holstein cow’s milk production slows, they turn them into hamburger. Old before their time at age five.  “God’s likenesses shall have dominion over cattle and every other creeping thing of the earth.” Cows are born to serve, to provide milk, cheese, yogurt, Friendly’s ice cream, Double Quarter Pounders. So why do they scream? Shouldn’t they happily surrender so we can toss burgers on the grill on the Fourth Of July? Their illiterate cries said no matter what humans wrote in The Bible, they believe their life has value beyond what it can do for to us. Nature grants them fifteen to twenty years, but we don’t allow that so they scream in defiance of our betrayal.

 

Over Thanksgiving break I drove to Bahler’s Farm. One look into their downcast, meek, trusting eyes and I knew I couldn’t pursue my major. Growing up, cows were the town pets. We didn’t mind the smell of manure. Only newcomers cared. Tolland basketball fans pretended to care. But our cute pets were death row inmates we hadn’t broken the news to yet.

 

“We paid for you to go to college for four years only to get brainwashed like this?” my dad said.

 

“Are you going to start worshiping sacred cows now?” my idiot 16 year old brother Jonathan wanted to know.

 

So I stopped telling anyone. In elementary school they said, “computers are the future.” Instead of leading anyone to a slaughterhouse they would connect the world and always get better. Pentium 2 and Xeon processors were faster than anything before them and they would get replaced by something even faster, not get killed off for a newer model of the exact same thing. Computers are an ascending ladder; agriculture is a vicious circle. 

 

So I did an internship at The Hartford’s IT department that summer. Only problem was my supervisor Steve.

 

“What color underwear are you wearing?”

 

“I don’t…remember.”

 

A week later, “Did you guys hear Clara shaves her pubic hair like a Mohawk?”

 

Then he would rave about his girlfriend’s “ruby fruit jungle.”

 

I complained. They said, “That’s just Steve. He’s a comedian. He’s harmless.”

 

The problems was me not having a sense of humor.

 

I left Rob’s party at 9PM, went home and called Jen, my best friend since we played with Cabbage Patch dolls and served as Ellington Roadrunner cheerleaders. 

 

“Hey.”

 

“Hey.”

“I went to a party at that guy Rob’s place.”

 

“You’re still talking to him?”

 

“I mean….I don’t know.”

 

“Have you hooked up?”

 

“Well we kissed. Why do guys always think a kiss is a permission slip to grab your boob?”

 

“I don’t mind.”

 

“That’s because you’re a slut.”

 

“Revenge fucking Matt’s friends doesn’t make me a slut. It makes me a champion of justice.”

 

“Oh sorry. I was mixed up. Anyway, I pushed his hand away. He seemed kind of distant last night. Probably told everyone I’m a stuck up tease.”

 

“If the shoe fits.”

 

“Bitch. I don’t know. He’s one of those mellow, aloof, no personality guys. Just like every other stupid guy at this stupid school.”

 

“Someone sounds sexually frustrated. Is your vibrator out of batteries?”

 

“Your vibrator comes with a human attached. Or should I say vibrators. Buy one, get ten free.”

 

“Die, bitch.”

 

“Oh—and guess who else I saw? Colin McDonough.”  

 

“The Ellington kid?”

 

“Yup.”

 

“The kid who’s like almost blind?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Isn’t he a drunken maniac?”

 

“Well you could say that.”

 

“He almost burned down your dorm, right?”

 

“We had a good fire department so I wouldn’t quite say that.” 

 

“Oh and didn’t he post crazy religious shit on his door? Or your door?? I forget.”

 

“I think those were maybe song lyrics?”

 

“Oh. Never mind then.”

 

“He seemed pretty normal tonight. Didn’t seem too drunk. And he was with two other girls he seemed friends with.”

 

“Oh God. Here we go.”

 

“I invited him to watch me dance tomorrow. It’s just a Dance Team practice—I didn’t tell him that.”

 

“Oh no! He’s probably plotting to kill you in a ritual Satanic cult blood death sacrifice as we speak!”

 

“That should make for a fun Saturday.”

 

“I don’t even own a black dress to wear to your funeral.”

 

“Who says you’re invited?” 

 

“Oh wow. I’m crashing that shit. What do you want as your funeral anthem? I Can’t Fight This Feeling?”

 

“It’s a no REO Speedwagon event.”

 

“The Humpty Dance it is.”

 

“Whatever that means. So….he’s probably not going to show anyway. He said he doesn’t drink as much anymore--but I’m not sure if I believe him.”

 

“Oh Clarissa. First you want to save the cows and now you want to save Colin McDonough.”

 

“Maybe I just want to hook up.”

 

“You’re all talk. And your standards are way too high. I’m hooking up with this guy Zack who’s majoring in Philosophy and Business Administration and plays bass in a punk metal ska band called Jah Of Flies. You think I’m picky?”

 

“By your logic, I should just hook up with Rob. We can become hackey sack partners. Our song can be Hits From The Bong.”

 

“Or hook up with Colin and it can be Tubthumping.”

 

“What does that even mean? Not only will he probably not show, but I’d probably have to make the first move. Maybe the second and third too. He’s too shy. Unless he was really drunk and even then he’d probably tell me he loves me for all of eternity before he would even consider kissing me. But at least he’s not just another frat boy or stoner. He seems different.”

 

“Different like Dahmer.”

 

“Shut up.”

 

“Not that I would ever recommend inviting him to your apartment, but have you had your smoke detectors checked recently?”

 

“Hilarious. Maybe you’re right and this was a mistake.”   

 

“Well talk to you tomorrow if you’re still alive. Call me if you’re locked in a basement dungeon.”   

 

“Who needs 911 when I have you?”

 

“ Love you.”

 

“Love you.”

………………………………………

I stood at the top left corner of the Husky logo.

 

“Okay guys, we’re going to run a kick drill. One and two and three and GO!”

 

Gonna Make You Sweat played on the boombox.

 

“Okay, Krista, you were off time there. Let’s run it again.”

 

The 10,000 blue and red seats were empty on both levels. When you’re dancing you don’t usually see anything, you just float, but I was looking. No sign of Colin. I knew it. At least he wasn’t a dumb jock. Some of them seemed nice but hooking up was just a game where they tried to be the leading scorer. They probably cared more about telling their friends than actually scoring. They sure rushed through it like they had to get back to the beer pong table. They never even looked you in the eye. Like Paul from Sigma Chi. “Twisted steel and sex appeal.” Nine Inch Nails’ Closer played on his stereo. So romantic. I told him to stop when he started unbuttoning my shirt. He pinned me down. Only my twenty years of dancing muscular legs got me free. 

 

“You’re such a dick tease!”

 

Probably told his frat brothers we hooked up. Or “She’s a dyke, bro.” Coin toss. Was I turning into a cow loving man hater? I was the girl they voted Nicest Smile in high school!  

 

He sat in a blue seat at the back of section 103. He held a purple Gatorade bottle.

 

We switched to pom. And No Diggity. 

 

I don’t know if he could see which one was me. Could he see any of us? He looked intently in our general direction. Pretending he could see me?  

 

“Good job today, guys. Still some work left to do. We will see you Wednesday night.”

 

He walked slowly down to the court, nervously looking in both directions. He wouldn’t find me unless I called.

 

“Colin!”

 

He took a left turn. 

 

“Hey Clara. That was really good!”

 

“You came to watch!”  

 

“Of course. Did you doubt me?”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

              

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

    

 

    

 

 

 

 

       

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

       

 

            

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

       

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“