2012 EPILOGUE 2b

“I’ve seen the lights go out on Broadway” clearly resounded in my ears, even though there wasn’t a tune playing anywhere. My mind, for a second it seemed, thought of my daughter in what used to be Lake Forest CA. She liked Billy Joel. Had six or seven of his albums, and I was wondering if this was the song playing when she fell into the ocean? But it was what was playing in my head as it exploded from the butt of a rifle, and I watched the lights go out on Broadway…all the way into unconsciousness.

My head was throbbing and there was an extra level of tinnitus in the left ear. Between the higher pitched shrill and the roar of the throb, they seemed to complement each other, like the ocean waves reaching in and then back out again. But this was no serenade, it was agony along with pain, mixing it up like MMA fighters grappling for the take down hold. My eyes still couldn’t focus as they seemed a bit teary, and it was dark here. Where ever here is, it was a dark place.

The floor was cool and felt like concrete under my laid out body. I tried rolling my body to either side, but was pretty certain it didn’t move. However, the pain in my head swayed from side to side, splashing itself across my skull from temple to temple. Tears swelled up in my eyes once again, yet the darkness felt softer than I had remembered before.

The next time I saw light, it was shining into my eyes, back and forth, one at a time. I tried to see beyond the light but only blurred outlines and shadows were faintly visible. The audio started to phase back to me, and I could hear one say to the other with the light, “damnit Todd, I told you, you hit him too hard. Now we got a cripple or a dying man. What could be worse?” And as the words washed over me I realized I could not move any part of my body. I could not even feel most of it. Was I feeling this? I exhaled heavily from my nostrils to sense the breeze past my face and flow down my chest. I thought I was moving my eyebrows and gaining directional control of my eyes, but nothing completely in focus yet. But my toes were not there. Or my feet or my ankles. Nor my knees or my thighs. I did know I felt my head and my tailbone, and the tingling numbness which flows through a sleeping limb session. But the numbness only rolled around my hips and faded away down my tailbone. Nothing below my tailbone was evident to sense, front or back, and for a sad moment, I felt like less than half a man. My eyes closed and the loss overwhelmed me, and I began rocking my head forward, or up and down, never sensing any movement. I furrowed my brow and opened my eyes as wide as I could force them…”holy shit Todd, you see that guy?!”

 

 

2012 chap 11 p.118

Cum on feel the noize / Girls rock your boys / We’ll get wild, wild, wild / Wild, wild, wild / So you think I…could have a chance with you? Is what my mind was screaming, as LA’s Quiet Riot was always quick to get rid of the inhibitions. But my outside was quiet. Still. I watched to the east as the sun was cresting the mountains, and it seemed such a far ways away. How did those solar flares reach all the way here?

I walked around the front of the truck’s cab and could see the smoky plumes rising from miles away. Wow I thought, that many miles away and it still warped the truck. They’re gaining in intensity. I turned looking into the window at the boys, who were cuddled up in each other’s arms. Their eyes and grimacing lips closed as tight as humanly possible. I opened the door and suggested they get out and stretch, maybe go to the bathroom if need be. Alex asked if there was anything to eat, and I told him to do the bathroom thing first.

How come I had the nasty thing on my mind? I struggled with the dozen or so scenarios playing out in my mind. Another flare strike which might hit us. More of those crazy guys looking for that jacket and wanting to kill us perhaps. How drivable the van is going to be? What is it that we could eat for breakfast?

I was trying to place them in some kind of order. Would she look as good without any clothes on? Or is her eroticism pervasive enough to emanate from every pore? And for the slightest moment I felt weak and pathetic. And then the moment passed and I bent and inhaled two mighty lungs full of air, my hands resting upon my knees. All the thoughts in my mind evaporated and I shook off the fear that death was close by. That so many times in the last sixty hours, it could have been me instead of all that it was. And I wondered if Penelope was feeling the same way?

The boys returned from their bush watering, Ashton wiping his hands, spread wide open, on the waistband of his shorts. Alex looked like he was going to reach forward with both hands and take my left wrist, but I rose and leaned back against the truck for a moment, my hands just behind my hips to cushion the contact. When I was fully within my balance, I started to pivot towards the rear of the truck, placing a hand upon each of the boys’ shoulders.  Guiding them, we went to the rear to see what damage might have befell it. Alan was awake, even alert, sitting and leaning against the stacks of boxes at the far end of the truck. The cot he had been laying on was flipped over and near broken in half, folded, and settled by the west side of the trucks cargo area. There were two other boxes open now, and their contents strewn about the place. They looked like c-rations. Of course that means MRE’s, meals ready to eat. And after I put the boys up into the hold, I tore open a couple of them to see if the boys would accept them. When I looked up again, Penelope was at the steps at the rear of the truck. The look on her face should have burnt a hole through my body. Yet I was surprised to see that the blood had hardened enough that her hair stood straight out on the left side. Wicked I thought, like Hela, Odin’s first born.

 

 

 

WordPress poetry;

So I’m visiting with my granddaughters again the other day, letting them show off their new babies. And they mentioned a couple of times that they just don’t understand the guys they’re trying to hook-up with. Neither of them wanting to be left alone again and pregnant.

And you would have thought the lesson I provided on guys when they were teenagers would help them understand. Telling them, that guys are exactly like dogs, except we can plan.

And it made me remember the scores of poems I have read here who plea and ply for solace after the relationship ends. Then I remembered a profile page I wrote for a dating site when everybody I knew was pushing me to get out and live after Karen’s passing. So I thought I would include it by the chance my granddaughters would read it one day. It goes…

I am a music freak (I missed Woodstock, but not Janis or Jimi), love sports, and don’t mind cooking once in a while and eating in. I love hair, and the smell of flesh fresh from the bath; I’m private and personal, yet sharing. I’m trustworthy, obedient, honest, and loyal, but I’m not a boy scout. I’m selfish, self-centered, and egotistical, but the other 22 hours of the day I’m caring and supportive. I’m seeking the yin to my yang.

If the music’s too loud, you’re probably too old. If I can’t get my arms around you, well…you’re not getting on top.

There’s no secret to companionship; we all have friends. Some more, some less intimate than others; but it is the ability to fulfill that relationship without sacrificing one’s integrity and morality that lays the foundations to friendships. Friendships are very good; they make lovers, great, and successes, monumental.

Then I remembered a love I shared in 1971, & in ’72 having my heart broken, & wrote…

Here I am, playing that game again

Wonder whose name, I’m going to call again

But it’s never the same. Falling; without you.

Stumbling; black-n-blue. Broken, down & aching

Yet I keep right on a faking

Cause I love to see your face

And you know if I could pick the place, it would be a happy one.

So I’m back out on the streets again

Making everyone I meet a friend

Always knowing how it’s going to end

Your name’s the one I’m calling again

Fallen, without you. Stumbling, black-n-blue

Broken, down & aching. But I keep right on a faking.

‘Cause you know I love to see your face

And if I ever get to pick the place, it’ll be a happy one.

Because I couldn’t bear to really let you know

That I couldn’t bear to really see you go

I thought it would make you turn and run

So I’ll make each encounter a pleasant one

Cause I love to see your face

And you know if I could pick the place, it would be a happy one.

Of course, not all guys are romantics. But it’s just as hard for us to forget too.

 

 

 

 

 

via Daily Prompt: Awkward

Wk1 PA DQ BIO;

“Good afternoon Gary and classmates, I am Philip Brockman, but one syllable is fine, and Phil will do. I felt accomplished prior to reading the preceding bios, however I have worked and supported the healthcare industry through product sales for over 40 years (indoor pollution remediation), and blended 14 years of car sales in there too. I also, am a senior set to graduate next June (2016), and currently being considered as a posterchild for the VA (lol)…I never get to do the lol thing.

I have been unemployed since 2009 when my partner passed, and am considered a displaced veteran (if you’re wondering where your tax dollars go), meaning homeless and unemployed. After my first year here with FIT the VA placed me on Voc-Rehab covering through to Dec 2015.

Today at the post office I noticed the awkwardness in which us boomers portray when we are without a clue, and now am ready for reverse mentoring. I used to think that a degree was the only thing missing from my life and career, however, I now realize it’s the beginning. Best to you all. All these classes pertain to my future, and I’m about to find out how this one will too”.

 

It turned out that I was not as awkward as I thought, or even felt, going into many of my college curriculums, this one being public administration. Gary and I got along just fine, better than fine, as both he and his wife are musicians and my age.

We have a blogger, ljphd, an english major I believe, who could have fun with this word, awkward, because we use it as both a noun and a verb. But I think he’d find another half dozen forms to place it in. Which would really be an awkward attempt for me.

 

 

 

 

via Daily Prompt: Infect

Most who know me know I intend to inject you with rock-n-roll. But my mother would say, infect you. Those darn Texan’s, and hers was Patsy Cline. And it started my neurosis; no country, no rap, no reggae. So when I got to Psychology of Women in the fall of 2014, my Gen X professor probably hated me. I knew what APA stood for, and it looked fancier than my papers, but after 3 years I couldn’t do any better with word than you’ll witness today. My previous 6 papers all received 50%’s, and I had a consistent F running into finals and the term paper due the next week. This paper originally received a zero, with the largest spelled words in RED; RUN-0N SENTENCES and a red circle around my 3^rd & 5th paragraphes.

Week 7 D Q: Discuss the increase in orally sexually transmitted diseases among females;

Since the ‘sexual revolution’ of the 1960’s, oral sex has become a more common sexual behavior (Hyde 2010). And several scholars have suggested the rise in oral sex could be attributed to adolescents who wish to avoid the risks of commitments associated with penile/vaginal/anal sexual behaviors (ucsb.edu).

Several theoretical models suggest ‘social factors’ may influence these decisions. The theory of ‘reasoned action and the information-motivation-behavioral skills’ emphasizes social norms in guiding ‘teens’ (Fishbein 1975). And a following study recorded into the Oxford Journal 1985, suggests that pre-adolescent girls with friends who engage in sexual intercourse before high school are more likely to adopt this behavior, just as girls with virginal friends may abstain (Billy 1985). Breakwell & Fife-Schaw in 1992 found in their study that 56.5% followed their friends into these activities while 82.5% abstained because of their friends (Breakwell 1992). And reported that they are significantly more likely to engage in unprotected oral sex with multiple partners, as to intercourse.

Samantha Rodman PhD, couples therapist (Dr. Psych Mom) says in her book What Women Think about Sex vs the Reality that it’s hormonal functioning throughout aging; of youthful urgencies of teens through college age, and onto middle age monogamous marriages and marriages with children becoming the libido killer, as the reasons why we cycle from lust and desire as a teen and college student, to end up having sex once a week after years of marriage. She doesn’t buy the ‘myth’ that men ‘peak’ at 18 and women at 40, but thinks young women are shy, and that with age and experience, they can discuss what they want (she adds, with little known on the subject).

In this class we’ve cited that liberalism and feminism are dominating the evolutionary curve and providing both education and atmosphere in which to explore…yet men don’t discuss things with women because their responses are influenced by public opinion, often in protection of themselves, and or, she may be testing us. Because most men do not seek platonic hetero-sexual friendships upon rising every morning, we instead engage in flirting, which may lead to seduction, which may lead to the opportunity of sex, which is why we woke up this morning.

Also because we are either young adults, middle aged, or senior as they refer to me, most of us are aware of the pleasures and benefits of oral sexual behaviors, but the youth of America are immune to scare tactics and coercion. Thusly when the limbic system in the brain registers sexual arousal, motivation is close behind (lecture).

Therefore the ugly side of STD and STI transferences include pharyngeal gonorrhea (gonorrhea of the throat), a nasty bacteria known as Neisseria gonorrhea. Chlamydia, Hepatitis A & B, and even the HPV (human papillomavirus) which has been known to cause cancer-oropharynx (middle of the throat), and HIV if the male ejaculates directly into the mouth (Smith). Rimming, mouth to rectum, offers a greater chance of transmitting multiple bacteria and other parasites as tread-worms, all the fore mentioned, and syphilis. The bad news is that 50% of infections go undiagnosed with 30% of those becoming severely complicated (WebMD).

Trichmoniasis is a parasite more commonly associated with middle-aged women over 40.

References:

Hyde, J.S., Delameter, J.D., & Byers, E.S. (2010) Understanding Human Sexuality, Toronto, On.

Fishbein, M., & Azjen, I., (1975) Belief, Attitude, Intention and Behavior. An introduction to theory and research.

Billy, J.O.G., & Udry, J.R., (1985) The Influence of male and female friends on adolescent sexual behavior: Oxford Journal (archives of sexual behavior)

Breakwell, G.M., & Fife-Schaw (1992) Sexual Activities and Performances in a US sample 16-20 year olds: Oxford Journals (archives of sexual behavior)

Smith DK, Grohskopf LA, Black RJ, et al. (2005) Antiretroviral postexposure prophylaxis after sexual, injection-drug use, or other nonoccupational exposure to HIV in the United States: recommendations from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. MMWR2005;54(RR-2):7.]

://www.medicinenet.com/oral_gonorrhea_symptoms-page2/views.htm first paragraph

http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/sexinfo/article/increasing-popularity-oral-sex

http://www.webmd.com/sex-relationships/features/4-things-you-didnt-know-about-oral-sex HPV and cancer/oropharynx

What Women Think about Sex vs the Reality Rodman, Samantha PhD

Keane, Sybil lectures from wk7 FIT academic schedule

 

via Daily Prompt: Thin

I was more than 8 years old when I learned what money was. And by the end of 1959 I held my first nickel in my hand. It was the right amount for a Hi Ci grape drink in a bottle. It was my first bought drink, as my birth father was playing poker and drinking in the local tavern in New Castle, about 25 miles from our farm.

It would be more than two long years before I gripped my first thin dime.

But when that time came, life had already changed, as we lived with our mother in Long Beach CA; never again to see my father or that farm, praise God.

Having never really gone to school, maybe two months’ worth in five years, we still had to learn more about money. Mom took a job at the downtown SOS Drug Store and café working the counter. I collected newspapers from peoples’ yards and sold them right outside the place for a whole bunch of little thin dimes.

At the O’Leary’s I ironed clothes for those thin dimes, but quarter’s came more quickly mowing lawns. It was Nov thru Feb 81/82 that my two children and I were first homeless. And even though we’d slept on bus depot benches, and empty hospital beds/rooms; people were kind and we never missed a meal. We finally caught a floor at a single guy’s machine shop, where I could keep the place clean for him. The kids thought the piles of cardboard for their beds was like camping.

So from the day I started the ill-fated career which held me the next eight years, and continually until my breakdown in 2009, I fed a homeless person every day.

I’ve shared with a couple bloggers, an encounter I had in San Diego, near the end of 2015. At the local supermarket where I had shopped the recent 3 years, there was a young girl panhandling in the parking lot between me and the entrance. When I reached her I asked how much she’d collected thus far. She smiles and said “a dollar…” and spreading change across her palm “…63 cents”.

Knowing the establishment wouldn’t tolerate her soliciting, I handed her a five dollar bill and went past to get inside the store. I figured she could leave and find lunch, but then from my peripheral, she ran to and sat at the side of a young ratty looking man. His dreadlocks probably not cleaned for weeks. My mind clouded with the thought of how could a cute young girl find him tolerable. But I could see her elation, almost bouncing, as she squatted to join the man her eyes were shinning for. She gripped the cash upward and leaning into him, they shared a short kiss.

Now my mind said this wouldn’t do. They’d never get lunch for two on $6.63.

I headed straight to them, and arriving I asked for the $5.00 bill back. Her smile disintegrated, replaced by a sunken face, the eyes seemingly sunken and dead for years. As she slowly rose, I could see her struggle to give forth the five, but integrity forced her hand to me. As I took it with my left, I handed her a ten spot and said that this would feed two better. Even though I was turning around to leave, I could clearly see her reborn, alive, a wider smile than I had witnessed before, and tears flowing down her face.

That moved me like a wave of energy passing through my body, and I have fed a homeless person every week since again. Now that I’m working an hourly position again, I get to do that every day at lunch’s ½ hour. Although I had passed two others on my way home, that I did not stop for. Then I read Natesh Shetty’s post “Don’t We All?” from the 14^th: a story and experience similar to mine which elicited this post today. I know a thin dime ain’t much, but they add up, and 50 of them is a nice 5 dollar meal. Inflation may move you to 50 or 60 cents, and now they only need ten.

When I think of a thin dime, I remember the magic it was, gripped in my hand. Translating to three candy bars for the quarter theater when we could get away as puber’s. I know it takes more than 50 or 60 cents to make that dime today, as everything has gone up at least 5 or 6 times just in the last 4 decades. But $5.00 still buys a bum a meal.

I had Temple of the Dog’s I’m Going Hungry flowing through my brain, throughout this writing, but now 7M3/seven mary threes’ Cumbersome is coming thru the radio… Cumbersome
Too heavy too light, too black or too white, too wrong or too right, today or tonight
Cumbersome
Too rich or too poor, she’s wanting me less and I’m wanting her more
The bitter taste is cumbersome.

So I gotta go, but you know my fingers are burning it up. Rock on.

 

 

Guitar Guru and Virtuoso;

This is not my usual post, so some of you may not want to read it.

I have been asked on several occasions about my faith. Perhaps it’s because I say a lot of God Bless yous, or am always going out of my way to assist others, but it happens quite frequently. And it will start happening to you as well. Stay strong.

I’ve mentioned also that I love drugs, all of them, even though I don’t do any of them any longer. My favorites being Heroin, Cocaine and Acid.

I 2005 when I left the Garff Automotive Group after selling Audi’s for 14 years, I settled down to writing my books, which after a month were going nowhere. In 2001 I had ran into an old military buddy who was also a junkie when I was, 1973 through 1979. But he stayed a user, and over dosed, dying in 2004. His wife and I becoming friends. So on Thanksgiving of 2005, being discouraged about where my life was and where it may go, I decided to go see her and get junked out.

My daughter was upstairs celebrating the holiday with several of her friends and my grandchildren, when I decided to go. When I got to the front steps of my house the voice came telling me to go back down stairs. So I sat on the steps for about 5 minutes smoking a cigarette and again rose to depart. The voice was sterner this time, saying go back down stairs and play your guitar. So I sat for another 5 minutes wondering where the voice was coming from. As I rose to leave one more time, the voice said to go downstairs and play your guitar; so I did.

Usually my daughter or someone in the house would close my access door so as not to be disturbed by my playing. I cannot read a note of music and play by ear. Which usually hurts any one listening, so I started playing and became even more frustrated. Finally I looked up to the ceiling and said, ‘well if I’m supposed to play, why don’t you help me?’

A rush came over me, the kind of rush you get when the warmth of the heroin permeates your body, and every part of me tingled. And I started to play again.

When I was done, how ever long it was (30 or 40 minutes), I looked back over my shoulder, and everyone was in my hallway. 15 people standing there with their eyes and mouths wide open. My eldest granddaughter said, “Wow grandpa, when did you learn to play like that?” I wondered what she was talking about, but since that day forward, if I prayed and played, people call me a virtuoso. I still cannot read a note of music, nor do I consider myself a musician. But I also do not doubt the word of God. My friend Arthur knows I am no better a guitarist than he is, as there is no one I have jammed with more than he. Nor can I explain why everyone hears music when I play, because I hear nothing. I just feel it, and it is a high that exceeds any drug I’ve ever known.

 

 

 

via Daily Prompt: Fret

Norman Greenbaum had a hit single with Spirit in the Sky (1969), proclaiming he’s got a friend in Jesus, and that he never sins. I don’t believe either claims, that it was a hit, or that he never sinned.

However, I’m not a fretter, I rarely fret. I’ve got a friend in Jesus. So when my moral fabric corrodes and frays; when the rubbing and chaffing becomes too much, I call on the Spirit in the sky to ease my frustrations.

When I’m visibly anxious and worrying. I don’t let it annoy me and find discontent; I’ve got a friend in Jesus.

And when I pick up my guitar and can’t make my fingers find the notes upon the frets, I call on the Spirit in the sky. Cause I’ve got a friend in Jesus.

Even less, I’m not a Norman Greenbaum fan, attempting to find that psychedelic sound drifting down from Canada which carried Steppenwolf. As a Californian, I’m more of a Doobie Brothers fan, because Jesus is just alright with me. But were I from Texas, perhaps ZZ Tops’ Wait’ in on the Bus, because Jesus just left Chicago, might ring a little better in my ear.

And how ever you tune your strings, open E, D, or G. Know that you’ve got a friend in Jesus. If he’s waiting on the Bus and seems a little late, don’t vacillate, you’ve got a friend in Jesus.

And never listen to that Reagan Youth band, New Yorkers are so arrogant, shouting Jesus was a communist, was a pacifist; Jesus didn’t like the rich.

Of course Jesus liked the rich. He likes all of us. Cause we’ve got a friend in Jesus.

And if you’re just tired of all the lyrical dissertations regarding Jesus, listen to Ian George Brown’s Jesus on the Move. The co-vocalist for the band Stone Roses, who didn’t write any as it’s a plain and simple instrumental.

Whichever way you prefer your Jesus, straight up in the morning, or getting down in the afternoon. Don’t fret, you’ve got a friend in Jesus.

 

 

via Daily Prompt: Song

After our foster fathers death on March 31st 2010 (the 50th anniversary of his and mom’s marriage), my younger brother made me turn myself into the VA for help, and for two years was in transitional housing, moving to my own apartment in Aug 2012. Because seniors can ride forever on buses and trolleys for $25.00 a month, I rode all of them, taking in the counties 40 sq miles. On one particular day, a young college student had her laptop upon her lap and was studying from a text book. As she took breaks from her reading, we talked. Finally she closed the computer and put her text into her backpack, and this is how the conversation went…which I posted onto Facebook.

SOUL                      8/30/12

I had a conversation with a young lady today and found it both invigorating, yet annoying, at the same time. Many subjects were discussed, and when it came to love of nature, mankind, and a particular John Lennon song rolling out of the radio (“I’m just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round, I really love to watch them roll”), she used the E word; Evolution. Well, no one loves evolution more than I (evolution of man, of religion, of disease), so I engaged her.

She began referring to the preceding millennium as if she was part of it, and even used the galactic word, ‘cosmic’. And I asked her, ‘how blessed we must be as an animal, which was allowed to develop in this, simplest of Solar Systems?’ And she continued with all the changes that corresponded to the last several hundreds of years, as I nodded my head, not in agreement, but more to shake off the reality of her words, her dissertation. So I asked again, ‘how blessed we must be?’ And she asked, ‘what do you mean?’ So I said, ‘certainly, we must be blessed in some more than cosmic way. Our very uniqueness, dolphins and chimpanzees aside, that we are exactly what we each need, as companions and aides’. She quickly retorted that almost all animals care and co-habitate in the same way, ‘we are the evolutionary top of the ladder’.

And with that I hung my head and exclaimed, ‘you poor child, you have all this intellect, yet you forsake your fallibility. Do you truly think we are at the top of the ladder? We use less than 21% of our brain; we practice medicine; we speculate, more oft than not, wrong. Not only are we not at the top of our ladder, but we’d actually destroy it before allowing someone else to achieve its attainability before ourselves. God never planned for this (as I spread my hands and arms out around me), to be forever. His creations are always evolving, as will this Solar System and the many Galaxy’s, all becoming something else, something more.  We’ve had our chances. A deal was struck, and we seek that which will return us to what we sense, was more. Cosmic, is but a seasoning used by God, as we might use cumin. Can you not use the S word? All those animals you said you loved, was because of our souls. There is no evolutionary ladder. There is the soul, from wince it came, and where it’s going’.

 

 

via Daily Prompt: Faceless

I used to do a lot of drugs. Okay, I drank a lot too.  And while in the service, serving in North Carolina we were fortunate enough to catch concerts up and down the coast.

In 1972, one such tour , and people I had never seen before, was Dr. Hook opening for BB King in Washington DC (not really a state or a city).

Dr. Hook was fun and to this day I couldn’t tell you one song he played. But BB King, his unmistakable voice, and enthralling blues notes made me a believer from the very 1st note he played…opening with a Howl’in Wolf tune called I was built for comfort, I wasn’t built for speed. After the show we learned that BB King was going to NY where he’d be doing an intimate set in a blues club there.

As a Californian, NC was as far east as I’d ever been, so I let the guys talk me into going with them to NY. Probably because I had all the acid. And there lies the problem. I ate it morning, noon, and night. Once on the streets of New York City, I became just another faceless blob of hallucinations walking among people that sneered at those who looked at them.

Oh, by the way, I have attempted the writing of three songs in my life. Not faceless, although that could become my next challenge. But in memory of BB, I wrote a hopped up blues melody I called, Honey, I wasn’t built for comfort, I was built for speed.