In a dark well / I found a kite / Bloodstained, so beautiful / Recognizable / I close my eyes and / I perceive / Marble emptiness / Looking for my soul to bless / Lizards' eyes reflection / Shows a glimpse of imperfection / Through the spastic sighs of innocence / Of deer's blood and it's cruel attraction
White kite fauna, do you feel / White kite fauna, is it real / White kite fauna, do you feel / White kite fauna, will it heal / Will it heal
In a dark well / Late at night / I am crying / I've lost my kite / Left with nothing
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I was no stranger to bearing secrets when I moved to That Little Town On The Outskirts Of A Major Metropolitan Area from The Little Town On The Outskirts Of A Major Metropolitan Area. Rural Parents, have no fear. You either, Urban Parents. It's Those Suburban Kids that are fucked. Those Suburban Kids have means to find their weekend way out of That Little Town On The Outskirts Of A Major Metropolitan Area and flirt with The Real.....a flirtation that grows into a bonecrunching and they become niggers to their addictions. Wealthy Catholic kids with their psuedo-adult posturing were my bane. Oh, yes.
I managed to slip blithely out of various parts of my identity in the nearly-500-mile move to TLTOTOOAMMA. It was easy....it was my freshman year in a place where everyone conveniently popped out of their respective wombs in a perfect clockwork fashion and were neighbors and schoolmates for their entire waking lives. Easy, yeah, because I was the new girl from a place that was as mysterious as Jupiter to my peers. If it didn't exist within a hundred-mile radius, it was The Great Unknowntm. To this day I amaze friends from high school with never-before-voiced parts of my past.
Parts, hell. Big fucking chunks. (just ask Rob). By now you should be getting the picture, should be seeing how managing one more hidden part of my existence wasn't so damned difficult.
With all that said, I'd like to whoosh you into this with the question of whether or not you've ever had one of those relationships that was just so much that it nearly devoured both parties alive? You know the kind....every moment is just out there; you're so fiery with passion that it can only be justified if you're spending equal time fighting AND fucking? Your brain running a loop of them in the background constantly in the moments that the two of you are apart, torturing you with that pining horseshit that you previously thought only existed in cheap novels...the kind that you would never deign to crawl with your eyes?
I was a senior in high school and I had a plan, so it should be of no surprise that a little Cosmos Fuckingtm was to be afoot shortly. I had prepared wonderfully for that last year of forced 'education', pounded the bulk of my curriculum into years Freshman through Junior. When year 12 rolled around, I only had need of 2 classes. This left my schedule wide open for the three jobs I held: ayyemms at a daycare center, afternoons at K-Mart (bankrupt now, boohoo....) and late pee emms Thursday through Sunday deejaying at a club in Overton Square. How cute, me in my black boots and black mini, schlepping a crate of mostly 45s into downtown Memphis to spin at a place that (from a legal standpoint) I was not old enough to set foot in.
Despite my past disdain for females that had no plans for their futures and stepped straight out of their graduation robes and into a wedding gown, I was engaged to be married to a strapping Young Marine a scant six days after I graduated high school. In retrospect, I should've taken the scholarships, but it all happens for a purpose. Doesn't it? Well?
At the time, he (who shall henceforward be known as 'Michael') was away in a faraway land called Kaneohe Bay. I was moony with absolute love for the Young Marine, who had also managed to woo nearly the whole of my protective iron-clad, nail-spitting relatives (several of which were Devil Dogs themselves). I was to join the Corps as a spouse rather than going Mustang-style as I had planned.
I must stay calm you know and I must be clear / It's gonna take a hundred thoughts to make this one disappear / A train like that could travel a soul for years / A terrible thought could have a terribly long career
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And so Michael was away while I was busy with life; he would return in May for my graduation and for our elaborately-planned militaryesque wedding. The missing him was made easier by occasional (albeit expensive) flights back to me and by the fact that I was leading such a packed-to-the-seams existence.
Originally I got the job at Silky Sullivan's on the Square because I spent as much time hovering around the booth, talking music with Mojo (the house deejay) as I did on the dance floor or at the bar. My friends and I would spend one night a weekend at the club/tavern/bar despite our obvious underage status...I was sort of grandfathered in, brought along by cousins who were stationed at Millington NAS for schooling. After the first couple of times I was never hassled about getting in the door and I started bringing my small core group of female friends along for the fun. We would slide by the line of guileless females who were ready to barter their way in the door with the strict maven who stood watch there and we'd enter freely after simply handing over our I.D.s and getting the requisite handstamp. Eventually any mention of a cover charge was negated, because we became 'the regulars' who brought along the boots (young marines fresh off the rock at Parris Island) by the carload. Silky's was primarily populated on the weekends by Navy and Marine Corps personnel that were stationed at Millington for tech school before being shipped off to a permanent (laughable term, that one) duty station.
I'd hang out at that elevated booth and eventually I started bringing in vinyl for Mojo to spin. It wasn't long until he had me in the booth with him, headphones on and running the controls. One night he simply said to me, "I'll be back" and he left me at the board for nearly an hour, swapping platters and heckling the crowd and getting the tip jar stuffed to the brim. That very same night, he handed me a twenty and told me to go to the record store, load up, and come back the next evening loaded for bear. Spending someone else's money on music! How great was that??
I arrived early the next evening to surrender the bounty. The place was not yet crowded with people and noise and the slow sounds of old soul was coming from the overheads. Mojo surveyed my purchases thoughtfully and after a time he looked up at me.
"Very niiiice," he said in his deep-and-easy voice, "you want a job?" I started that very night, slapping my new purchases on the wheels between the standards from Whodini and Clarence Clemons and Midnight Star and B.B. King. So much fun! Mojo gave me the run of things, making suggestions here and there, but mostly letting me manipulate the crowd any way I saw fit. By the 2 ay emm last call I had emptied the tip jar three times, had received an armful of roses that onlookers had sent via the rose lady, and was three sheets to the wind on the free drinks that got sent up. Alllllll-RIGHT. Every Saturday night was mine in shifts: an hour-and-a-half on the mike and an hour-and-a-half off. In my free time I would wander the different sections of the establishment --the dance floor, the outside patio, the upstairs bar, the courtyard, and the downstairs jukebox-fueled bar-- socializing with friends and making new ones.
With any job you enjoy, you sometimes find yourself frequenting the place in off hours and I was no exception. My friends and I would have our regular Friday nights at Silky's, but a couple of us would sometimes find ourselves there on Thursdays, as well. Eventually I started deejaying the private parties on Sundays and filling in spots on Thursdays and Fridays. It was a big job-party-social melange.
One Friday night found me, Catt, Jacquie, Alex and my jarhead cousin Stevie bored, so we gravitated toward Silky's. The night started out slow there, and that was good, because we were able to maneuver the crowd easily and visit with various people we all knew. As the night wore on, the place packed out and our collective love of movement found us on the dance floor flailing about and shouting out the words to "Strokin'" by Clarence Clemons. It was then that crowd yielded a gap and I saw him appraising me. Leaning against a battered wooden plank that ran the outskirts of the dance floor was a sailor (you could always tell the the devildogs and the ducks apart) and a couple buddies. He caught my eye because he had a gigantic, five-foot long stuffed snake draped around his neck. He smiled when we made eye contact and I laughed at the brazenness of sporting a large, purple (and cheaply-made) overstuffed snake with a shiny pink ribbon about its' neck in such a testosterone-filled place.
I was not unaccustomed to being eyeballed or even hit on in Silky's, but I always made it abundantly clear that I was betrothed and single-minded in that commitment to my lover. Often I gently guided inquiries toward Catt or Alex or Jennie, but never to Jacquie. She was a sweet soul whose inner beauty was as striking as her exterior, and I regarded her in a protective big-sisterly fashion.
We jumped and jived our way through a couple more songs and I would see him lift his drink off of the plank bar and salute me when the crowd split. During the time it rejoined, he leaned there steadily and would find me in the mirrors that surrounded the room. I know this because Alex told me so later.
We took our leave of the floor, collecting a round of drinks, and proceeded to the stairs that led to the downstairs courtyard. While we sat idly by the fountain, I glanced up and there he and that snake and his friends were, some 60 feet away. He raised his eyebrows and smiled a sloppy sideways grin at me. I responded with a distracted smile and went on conversing with those in my company.
Jacquie and I wandered off to the restroom in the downstairs bar. After emerging empty-bladdered and freshly-lipsticked, we spotted Stevie in a big wooden booth. Jac went to join him and I fed the juke, playing the obligatory standards: "Shooting Star" by Bad Company and "La Grange" by ZZ Top ("...Dey gotta lotta nice girls, heh..."). We sat shooting the shit for a few minutes, needling the mock-morose and ever-cynical Steve about finding a piece of his very own to take home. I looked up in the general direction of the bar for a suitable candidate and there against the far wall was the Snake Guy, only now he was waggling the snake's head at me. Steve and Jac were on the opposite side of the high-backed booth, so they weren't privy to this display. Snake guy cradled the snake's big purple head with the ridiculous grin next to his face and offered me a beseeching look. Was this a gross attempt to be 'cute', or was this guy just that freewheeling? I looked away quickly, slightly annoyed and mildly discomfitted. I wanted to yell, "Hey, I don't know what you're about, but stop it, asshole!".
Well, I knocked down on your door, baby / To see if you were at home / Your shade was down, there wasn't even a sound / But something told me you weren't alone / What in the world can a nasty dog do / But try to get next to you?
Don't laugh 'cause it ain't funny / Look how it happened to me / It could happen to you, you could be a fool too / And it'd leave you in misery / I guess there's nothin' more funky king can do / but to try to get next to you
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Jacquie peeled off, spotting a friend of hers. I sat there with Stevie, trying to make conversation, but the Snake Guy kept garnering my unwilling attention. The twenty-odd feet between us wasn't enough any longer and mildly annoyed, I took my leave of the booth and headed upstairs in search of Catt. After 15 minutes of working my way through the crowded courtyard and stairwell, I arrived upstairs only to be told that she had gone off in search of me via the side exit to the patio. I looked there for her and someone else told me that she had gone to the downstairs bar seeking me. The entrance to the downstairs bar was a narrow one, and it was packed with bodies, making progress laborious and time-consuming. I shuffled along in the tight foyer with the rest of the cattle; too late and much to my chagrin I found myself literally chest-to-chest with Snake Guy and his serpentine friend. I wish I had a photo of my face then. I can't quite remember the expression that settled there.
Up close he was damned handsome, with blue eyes I could drown in and he stood several inches taller than me. He looked down at me, smiled his million-watt (yet unbelievably genuine) grin and wiggled the snake's head.
"Like him? I won him at a carnival tonight. His name is Jake." I smiled in spite of myself, and somehow we ended up buried in conversation. I am an absolute sucker for dorks. He was uberdork. He had been aping for me all night with no regard to his own personal dignity. Thus, he was so dorky that he was coooool. I was also a sucker for an East coast accent. He was dorked in spades (let's not forget the cheap carnival snake with its' cheesy wrestling name) and spoke in ahhhs and ehhhhs. Eventually I let him buy me a drink.
His name was Ron, he said, and he hailed from Massachusetts. (Good Christ, am I an absolute sucker for two kinds of accents....they hail from Scotland and Massachusetts.) He proudly sported a sweatshirt bearing his father's alma mater -a small, very prestigious East coast college- emblazoned across the front in huge block letters. (I was non-plussed. He was fascinated with that fact.) He sported bermuda shorts and Sebagos sans socks, which I found to be mildly ludicrous since winter had not gasped it's last breath yet. (Southern summers are notoriously hot; likewise, the winters are bitterly cold.)
I can't for the life of me recall what it was that we talked about. Eventually we were found at our table by the fountain....his two buddies showed up, quite coincidentally (?) with two of my friends, Becky and Alex. It wasn't long before Catt and her recent boytoy showed up. That was to be the first of many gatherings as a group the eight of us shared; it was the precursor to some really fun moments where goofiness and laughter abounded. It was also the beginning of the end of the deep friendship that Catt and I held. It also marked, unbeknownst to me until quite some time later, the introductory lesson that plans are for shit anyway.
Last call always happens sooner than wanted when the wine (or in this case, Diver Buckets with 6 three-foot-long straws...."Silky's Diver! Guaranteed to make you go DOWN!") and mirth flow. We started up the stairs as a group, but by the time we got to the door we were all obviously paired and all obviously unhurried to climb into our respective vehicles and head home. When we turned the corner into the large-narrow parking lot, the four sets of us ended up around different cars, talking with our companions and the occasional known passers-by. Not that it's important or integral to the story, but I learned that Stevie caught a ride home with Bubbles (don't ask....but I will tell you that she fit the nick) and Jacquie was still inside talking to Helga the Door Nazi.
Ron and I sat on the hood of my little shiny blue Ford Escort to converse, but eventually got in as a buffer against the cold.
During the course of the evening I had learned that he was 22, wasted a couple of years after high school, then joined the Navy as a matter of course. He didn't live in the barracks at Millington, but instead chose to live with his aunt and her 2-year-old son, who he was crazy about. He had learned that I was on the cusp of turning 18, was about to graduate and that I was engaged to be married in a matter of weeks.
Of course I didn't stay on the driver's side long.
Of course I ended up atop him in the passenger's seat.
It was all very heated, despite the foul logistics of a half-reclining bucket seat in a compact car.
The most profound moment, I think, was also the most unexpected one. He removed his sweatshirt, leaving a t-shirt, and as we kissed my hands travelled across his chest and toward his abdomen, where something registered as not altogether right.
"What's this?" I asked softly while tracing my finger into a groove near the top of his solar plexus. He pulled back a bit and, looking down, he lifted the white cotton material to expose a mass of looping, random grooves that were loosely strewn about his torso from waist to chest. They were wide and deep, and I reached to touch them with no fear or revulsion. There was a marked lack of horror or disgust from me; he exhibited no inhibition or shame. It just was and that was all.
But that wasn't all. It was intimate and somehow very pure, if that makes any sense at all to you. There was simply something [genuine] there between us.
And I shed my soul, feel it kneeling down / I'm clutching my faith, pull it tightly round / You're moving your mouth but you don't make a sound / But I feel the walls slowly tearing down / Heel to toe takes you from my side / In and out, every breath divides / My eyes to your head / I can't go the distance / But when you go you take me in an instant / But In this life, I'll give it time / 'Cause it's always spinning up from behind / It'll be alright, it will be fine / 'Cause it's nothing more than ordinary life
So I show you my sins, show me all your scars / As we settle in, its written in the stars / Your watery eyes got me send me floating / And my weak heart is swimming with devotion / But in this life / I'll give it time / 'Cause it's always sneaking up from behind / It'll be alright, it will be fine / 'Cause it's nothing more than ordinary life
But in this life / I'll give it time / 'Cause it's always sneaking up from behind / It'll be alright, it will be fine / 'Cause it's nothing more than ordinary life
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