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| I don't need a degree to be a bachelor. | | |
| One time I was riding in a car down the interstate from Chattanooga to Atlanta. That's Interstate number 75, if you're keeping record. It was a chilly autumn day in November. I was riding in the passenger seat of an Oldsmobile, 97 model or so. An acquaintance of mine was driving--I hesitate to call him a friend, because I don't terribly like him.
The sun was beginning to set; it was past the time in the late afternoon when the western sunlight is so brutally annoying. It was becoming lovely, with bright pink and orange clouds to the right, and an increasingly deep blue to the left. The foothills of Georgia rose and fell as the highway snaked about. Giant billboards advertising carpet outlets and Cracker Barrels dotted the scenery. Somehow, in Georgia, billboards actually contribute to the charm of the otherwise unadulterated nature.
Cars occasionally dashed past us on one side or the other. Trucks hauling construction equipment and large panes of glass, sedans toting north Atlanta suburbanites back to Buckhead or Marietta or West Paces Ferry. We decided to put in the Strokes' new album to get us in the mood for the Strokes concert we were going to see at the Tabernacle.
And it was in this auspicious and lovely environment that I smoked my first weed. My friend (it's shorter to type than "acquaintance") asked if I had ever tried it, to which I replied that no, I hadn't. He asked if I was opposed to it, which I considered uniquely thoughtful of him, but I guess you can't be too careful. I replied that no, I wasn't, and so he packed his glass pipe and warned me to watch for cars passing by.
I can't really recall if he let me have the first hit, which I now know in retrospect would have been the proper thing to do, but regardless, I took a few. To say I was disappointed would be a pretty vast understatement. My legs felt a little tingly, and I was reminded of the time I was put on laughing gas for oral surgery back in 8th grade.
Track two, one of my favorites, began playing. An infectious, throbbing bassline, repetitive pounding drums, a squealing scaling guitar solo. My legs, which were all but numb by this point, began bouncing uncontrollably. Suddenly I understood Jules. He might be a spoiled, giant-media-backed bastard (and he most certainly is), but he was serenading me in the most violent way. It was like S & M set to music.
So I found out later (about my third time smoking) that I really didn't get that high the first time at all, but I had music-sex for the first time. The first of many times. Man, I couldn't wait to listen to Sgt. Peppers like this. | | |
| It isn't that Protestant churches are any less welcoming; it's just an unspoken rule that the practice by Catholic parishes of offering sanctuary to anyone off the street had died by the late medieval period, right? But there was certainly no way to simply kick the bum out. This was church, after all, and if this unholy man was willing to endure the unholy stares and guffaws of a hundred suburban Presbyterians, then he probably deserved to stay around for the sermon.
And anyway, wasn't he the very image of human depravity? He had the absolute gall to wear a camouflage tee shirt and dirty cargo Dickies into God's Sanctuary. And it wasn't even polo shirt season yet.
We knew we couldn't do anything, and fortunately he sat in the back (must have been raised a Baptist, or maybe he was just painfully aware of his unworthiness, which we thought was good for his soul). We couldn't stop staring at him, though, and we were all formulating witty conversations for coffee hour after the service. I was going to say something about how he must be one of the spillovers from the split that just occurred at the Methodist church in our neighborhood. I knew this to be completely insensitive, but I've always been one to go for the cheap laugh.
All the children were watching him, snickering as he took a hymnal from the pew and pretended to sing with the rest of us. Martin Luther's "Psalm 130" always served to put us in a proper Presbyterian mood, and if the bum was paying attention to the words he was pretending to sing, it would probably hit right at home.
From depths of woe I raise to thee
The voice of lamentation.
Lord, turn a gracious ear to me,
And hear my supplication.
If thou iniquities dost mark,
Our secret sins
And misdeeds dark,
O, who could stand before thee?
It didn't surprise any of us that he got bored after only the first verse. He sat down and looked at the floor while the rest of us penitently sang our lamentations to God. We couldn't help but feel sorry for him, uncatechized and blind of heart. But the nerve of him to sit down during the first hymn! Nobody asked him to drag himself in here and take our minds off of holier things. He could just as easily have snuck into a grocery or coffee shop and sat for an hour.
During the handshakes before the sermon, it wasn't hard to avoid greeting the man. He stayed seated, and if he wasn't even going to be friendly enough to say hello to him, we wouldn't either. He could just get ready for what was probably his only opportunity to hear the word of God preached responsibly. We all avoided saying anything about him to each other (there would be time enough for that at lunch), but suddenly, from across the sanctuary, and loud enough to be heard all over, a poor kindergarten girl took a failed attempt at a whisper to her mother. This is why we shouldn't let children into the service.
"He looks like Jesus, mom!" Her mother shook her arm and put her finger to her mouth to shush her. A few of us giggled, and more than a few turned to look at the man, who, if he heard the comment, didn't react. He just sat there staring at the floor. We noticed what she must have been talking about; he had long, unkempt hair and a shaggy beard. To a child who didn't know any better, he probably did look like those ridiculous paintings of Jesus she saw in Sunday School. But she would get a stern talking-to on the way home, and she was already tearing up from the way her mother grabbed her. She would learn soon, like we all did as children, not to talk during the service. | | |
| I've been in this town
So long that back in the city
I've been taken for lost and gone
And unknown for a long long time
Fell in love years ago
With an innocent girl
From the Spanish and Indian War
Of the heroes and villains
Once at night cotillion squared to fight
And she was right in the rain of the bullets
That eventually brought her down
But she's still dancing
In the night, unafraid of what a dude'll do
In a town full of heroes and villains
Heroes and villains
Just see what you done done
Heroes and villains
Just see what you done done
Stand or fall I know there
Shall be peace in the valley
And it's all an affair of my life
With the heroes and villains
In the cantina Marguerita
Keeps the spirits high
As I watched her, she spun around
And wound in the warmth
Her body fanned the flame
Of the dance
My children were raised
You know they suddenly rise
They started slow, long ago, head to toe
Healthy, wealthy, and wise
I've been in this town so long,
So long to the city
I'm fit with the stuff to ride in the rough
And sunny down snuff I'm alright
By the heroes and villains. | | |
| Bruce Halloway sat down to watch the evening news last Thursday at 6:30 Eastern Standard Time. This had recently become a routine for him; over the past four months he had been addicted to Brian Williams' kindly, unpretentious voice. He wasn't nearly as harsh or as obviously entrenched in leftist politics as Tom Brokaw had been.
Most of the topics were confusing and all ran together. Bruce wouldn't ever publicly discuss what he had seen on the evening news with people at work, but it made him feel slightly more informed and responsible. But mostly, his wife Sharon didn't really mind him having a beer or two (or maybe three) as long as he was doing something as productive as watching the news.
Over his first sixteen-ounce can of Budweiser, Bruce listened as Brian introduced a story about Sudan, which he was quite certain was located in Africa (but maybe it was in the Baltics, he thought, until they showed a map--he grinned smugly). It seemed a shame that a bunch of someones were dying at the hands of some other ones, whom he correctly guessed were Islamic militants: enemy to the entire world, even the uncivilized world.
At the first commercial, Bruce picked himself off of the couch and headed to the kitchen, past his wife Sharon at the dinner table, who was cutting coupons out of an advertisements in the Sunday paper, which she had just now gotten to after a busy week of taking their daughter to school or washing dishes or whatever she did all week.
Bruce got back with his second beer just in time to catch the end of a commercial for a Pfizer drug, which he thought was coincidental, because the next story was about Pfizer and how their drugs are so much more expensive in America than they are in Sweden. But, as the gentleman from Pfizer explained, this was only because Pfizer cares about the safety of Americans more than the Swedes care about their own safety. Somehow, the man explained it better than that, and it made a good amount of sense.
About halfway through his new beer, another commercial came up. Bruce decided to flip the channel over to CBS, because, next to Brian Wilson, Bob Schieffer seemed like the best anchor to watch. He knew there must be some conspiracy between the Big Three, because it looked like CBS was about to take a commercial break as well. But first, that bleeding-heart unpatriotic segment they do every night where they showcase a dead soldier from Iraq. Blatant emotional blackmail, and they all knew it.
Bruce nearly spilled his beer when the Marine's photo popped up. He tried to change the channel, but Sharon had already turned on the kitchen set. She didn't make any noise, and Bruce couldn't bring himself to get up. He took a small sip of his beer, which he decided he wanted to stretch out as long as he could. He would have another one tonight, but it would wait till after the news.
Another commercial from Pfizer came on, although it might have been Astra-Zeneca or any of the other ones. But Bruce couldn't stop thinking of how proud his son looked in his uniform. | | |
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