July 25, 1980

Only one of these stories is true.

“Hells Bells”
In the summer of 1989 we hung out with a woman named Eileen. When you smoked drugs (coke, meth, crack, heroin, weed) with Eileen you always had to “sterilize” the end of the pipe with a lighter before taking a hit as Eileen had Herpes. I remember one night Robert forgot to do it and low and behold he contracted Herpes. Eileen died alone in her apartment.

“Shoot to Thrill”
In the summer of 1990 we hung out with a guy named Dave. Dave had tattoos all over his neck of Disney characters. He was tough as nails though. The thought of getting the shit beat out of you by a guy with Pluto tattooed on his neck was always such an odd thing to think about. One night Dave found out some kid fucked his ex-girlfriend. Not his girlfriend, his EX-girlfriend. He went crazy and threw a chunk of an old gravestone through the windshield of the kid’s 1982 white VW Scirocco.

“What Do You Do For Money Honey?”
In the summer of 1992 I was experimenting with different kinds of cold medicines. Crushing them up and snorting them to avoid ever feeling sick. I thought this kind of pro-active effort would put me ahead of everyone, like I discovered some new way to feel awesome. When I stopped doing this I had a splitting headache for a whole month, and threw up anytime I tried to eat. I was down to about 105 pounds when I got my first job as a security guard.

“Givin’ the Dog a Bone”
In the summer of 1996 I was driving home one night after attending a church meeting. We had a small meeting with about five us from the church to discuss the upcoming picnic in the park. I was in charge of getting the desserts together, while my wife who was home sick and couldn’t make the meeting was in charge of cold cuts and soda. I was driving home about a block from my house when a Golden Retriever ran in front of my car. I slammed on the brakes but it was too late. I got out of the car and found the poor animal taking it’s last breath. There was an episode of Murder She Wrote I really wanted to get home to see. I had some trash bags in the back of my car so I grabbed the dog and put it in a trash bag and when I got home I put it in one of our trash barrels to go with our trash the next morning.

“Let Me Put My Love Into You”
In the summer of 1998 we rented a cabin in Maine. There were five of us, all men. The idea was to spend a week in the deep woods in this cabin. By the end of the week, one of us was dead, one of us had rabies and I started to believe in God.

“Back in Black”
In the summer of 2000 we walked all around the city at night. Through the park. Down the piss soaked streets downtown. We inhaled cigarette after cigarette wondering where our rightful place in life should be. One night we saw a child about ten years old just walking down the street smoking a cigarette. I stopped the child and asked where his parents were he replied “go fuck yourself you fat faggot”

“You Shook Me All Night Long”
In the summer of 2002 I was living in a place outside of Nashville, TN where if you weren’t white you definitely were not all right. I got a place there because I was working for an old man. There was an ad I saw online somewhere looking for someone to come and work with this old man going through his journals and things in his house. His house was filled with old newspapers, books, magazines, photographs, everywhere. I spent the first two weeks there sick as a dog from inhaling dust. The job paid very little, and my rent was very little. By the end of the summer I had helped Frank write a memoir which we printed twenty copies of to give to various family members and friends at his funeral. Oh yeah. At the end of the cleaning and writing, Frank asked me to euthanize him. He had been alone in that house for years. I could tell he was happy when I was there with all of the lights on and all of his life being organized into boxes and written into documents on my laptop.

“Have a Drink on Me”
In the summer of 2005 I was driving down a highway in a remote area of Vermont. It was the middle of the night and I was going the speed limit. A car flew by me going well over 100 mph. Off in the distance I saw it fly off the highway, tumbling like a child rolling down a hill. I arrived at the area where the car went off the road to a smoking car upside down. A young woman lay on the ground about ten yards from the car not breathing, covered in red and sparkly glass. In the drivers seat was a seat belted man groaning, I spied a number of beer cans near him and outside the window of the car.
“Hey man, I think you killed that girl”

“What? Help me out of here please”

“Well, I’m not sure I can help you here”

“Help me”

“You killed that young girl you were with”

“Are you seriously.....not going...to help me?”

“I’m seriously not going to help you...you’ll go to jail you know”

“Just help me please”

“Nobody knows you two are down here”

“Please sir”

“Good bye”


“Shake a Leg”
In the summer of 2008 I lost my whole family to a fire. We were living in a two bedroom ranch house and my wife fell asleep with a cigarette in her hand and burned the house down. I was at a Nine Inch Nails concert with my ex-girlfriend that night. My wife and I had argued for weeks about me going to the show. She finally “let me” go two days before the show.

“Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution”
In the summer of 2009 I drove my car 3000 miles or so. I drove all over the country that summer. I lost one life and found another one. I left one life and found another. Like any long drive though, by the end of it I was tired, I looked like shit and I had hours of stories to tell. One of these days I’ll write all of those stories down and put them in a book. One of these days I will try to remember how it all happened. It is all written down in my head but it’s unclear what route I took. My muse on this journey was what kept me going and smiling and feeling good. Here a couple of months before the summer of 2010 she is there yet again. I don’t think I could ask for a better more beautiful one than her to be right there.