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Denny’s in November

November 15, 2021 Sidney

It feels like Christmas morning.

I placed an apple and two small cucumbers on a flat rock among the shade trees yesterday and the night critters came and ate them up, like Santa eats cookies, but instead of crumbs, they left little balls of poop behind as evidence of their true existence.

It was a strange and intense feeling to pretend to normalize the disturbance for the safety of my kids and everyone else while simultaneously contemplating an escape route or violent defense measures. The entire half of the crowded restaurant was completely silent and stunned by the wild man until I purposefully blurted out how good our arriving food looked and broke the collective tension, all while keeping my high level of awareness of a possible volatile situation unfolding directly behind my youngest son. The other patrons began to murmur and mutter as the shift manager reluctantly spoke to the obviously frustrated man wearing a pink fuzzy, bear eared hat with matching pink fuzzy gloves, his voice stammered, “Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave”. “I’m waiting on somebody!” the flustered man forcefully blurted out, pulling on his three layers of sweat pants worn with the waists just above his thighs.

The manager looked back across the dining room at the waitress with the phone ready in her hand, signaling with a nod to dial the three dreaded numbers, 9-1-1. The manager walked away for a moment to reassess the situation as I subtly watched the disturbing man for signs of danger. He was mentally ill or tripping on some kind of drug. Probably both but he didn’t seem intent on hurting anyone. He was clearly on a personal mission, of some kind, inside his head.

Before his dramatic entrance, I was looking behind me, searching for our server. The place was busy, it’s always busy, but they seemed understaffed and stressed out more than usual. The lingering pandemic has taken its toll on Denny’s. The usual staff was different from our bi-yearly visits. My favorite guy, who resembles Samuel L. Jackson wasn’t there, and neither was the heavy set, pretty faced Black woman with the beautiful smooth skin, like creamy chocolate. The doppelganger, Samuel, was especially good with breaking through to my youngest son, who has always had difficulty in public with sensory overload. I imagine Samuel saying very loudly to my son, “Pancakes motherfucker! Tell me what kind of motherfucking pancakes you want!”. He never said anything like that, but he was a little bit forceful in a great way. More like Samuel Jackson- lite. The woman was also really great with him just being extra nice and patient.

And as pretentious as it sounds, I chose this particular retro styled Denny’s years ago, on the east side of town, specifically for its diversity. Also, the 1950’s style chrome and curves added a nifty cool atmosphere. I needed my children to be aware and unafraid of people of color, and this Denny’s provides a beautiful rainbow of all humanity. We purposefully have planted our roots in an affluent area, in a white conservative world, (where I personally don’t belong) taking advantage of a highly acclaimed public school system. I firmly believe it’s important to understand that other people and other worlds exist. It’s the only way I know of to protect my offspring from the ignorance of classism and racism, even if it puts us all in danger apparently.

As I scanned behind the counter, I noticed a group of three servers had stopped in their tracks and were fixated on something outside the front doors. I could tell something was going on but could see nothing out the window looking out to the entrance. Whatever was happening was out of my view until the ragged and tattered homeless man stormed his way inside, stomping towards us and slamming down his clear plastic bag with unknown objects onto the booth table directly behind us, scattering the dirty dishes and spilling a cup full of liquid onto the bench seat and pouring to the floor. I was immediately suspicious of what was in the bag and my horrible mind pictured a bag full of feces. I was not going to say it, even if it was true. We were in a restaurant, my kids were fussy, and we were starving. Nothing was going to ruin our meal. Not even a crazy fuck with a bag of shit.

The cagey gentleman immediately turned and huffed his way back out to retrieve an unopened large cardboard box that seemed to be a desktop inkjet printer. He powered back and slammed the box onto the table, displacing more syrup sticky plates and knives and forks, and then forcefully sat down with a puff of air blowing out of the seat cushion. He grabbed the box and threw it on the floor at his feet then started to reach down into his sweatpants. I instructed my kids not to look since I really thought he might pull out his privates. Thankfully, he didn’t. He was just re-tying his sweatpants waist strings. I started to get a small sense that he wasn’t there to hurt anyone. He was just having a bad day. That’s when the manager approached sheepishly and asked him to leave.

The second time the manager asked, the man stood up and adamantly said, ” Lead the way!” The manager was frozen for a moment and I was just about to intervene and suggest he actually lead the way. But thankfully, the manager did, and the homeless man in peril followed. We took him for a man of his word, and to his credit, he was.

The disruptive scene was over, but the man forgot his plastic bag. I wondered if he would suddenly return in a storm and blaze but I assume he was either detained or was at a distance when the cops arrived, making it impossible to retrieve the mystery bag.

My oldest kid and I pointed out the precarious container bag to the waitress to investigate. She did not, but instead called over the young busboy and told him to throw it in the trash. He picked it up with two fingers and placed it in his grey plastic bin beside some plates. I was still concerned for our health and safety and asked him what was in the bag, he picked it up haphazardly and said, “look like a apple and some cucumber”. I thought, ‘no way those are cucumbers, who eats raw cucumber?’

I told him to give me the bag so I can give it back to the wild man if I see him. I pointed, drawing an invisible directional path, around the table, to the chair next to me. I couldn’t have him hand it to me over my youngest son’s plate of food. That would have been bad. That would have ruined the meal.

The cops outside the front door were just hanging out it seemed, leaning on their cruisers and having a casual conversation with each other. I never could tell if the homeless guy was in the back seat of either car as they eventually drove away.

We finished our meal and I paid an undeserving tip, since our server never gave us silverware or cream for my coffee that I’d repeatedly asked for well before the initial disturbance. The food was delicious though and the cooks always deserve their portion of the tips, always.

A deep breath and calming of the nerves and I realized at that moment that I’d also achieved another lesson in diversity for my kids. This is exactly why I chose this Denny’s and it always delivers.

We had a moment to discuss social issues, like ‘Defund the Police’, where this homeless man obviously needed a social worker instead of a cop. We also agreed hypothetically, that a redneck openly carrying a gun is more terrifying than a homeless man having a psychotic episode.

I thought about leaving the bag somewhere he might find it if he came back, but decided to take the chance on seeing him somewhere. I drove down the frontage road where the homeless used to camp and convene. The white collar city officials have recently cracked down on the homeless, making it a crime to live in certain areas so there was no real good way to find him. I was hoping for a chance encounter to return what rightfully belonged to him. A touch of fate. It was also a very healthy snack he was really going to miss, but he was nowhere in sight.

My kids and I went on to our next destination and adventure for the day, putting the earlier events and lessons behind us. My only satisfaction is that I saved the food from the dumpster and gave it to a forreging animal instead.

I then shot and killed the animal and left it to rot as a warning to others to stop shitting in my yard.

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Love Enough

September 20, 2021 Sidney

In a snow covered parking lot on the edge of Chicago, two giant Kenworth semi trucks sat idling in the darkness, side by side with no trailers attached. Like a couple of old buddies, the drivers were sitting inside one of the cabs talking. They were drinking out of chilled aluminum cans from a smuggled case of LeBatts beer that was half buried in the snow, keeping it cold, just outside the rumbling truck’s passenger side door.

They’d actually just met a few hours before in a tiny bar a few blocks away from the railyards, taking advantage of a rare moment of being locked down by winter weather, when they could get good and drunk and sleep it off before the freezing snow melted enough for the shipping business to reset.

There was no concern if it was legal, or against company policy. As long as they were cool and quiet, no one would ever know. It was, for a moment, very illegal when the bar closed at three a.m. and the scrappy female bartender informed the intoxicated commercial drivers they would have to move the bobtail trucks to a nearby parking lot for the night. It was ignored that it would involve actual operation of a giant motor vehicle and be considered a DWI. But it was Chicago at three in the morning, after all, and sometimes the rules just don’t apply.

I guess the frizzy haired bartender didn’t tell us earlier so we wouldn’t leave and quit buying drinks. I remember being so incredibly pleased that I was going to stumble out of the door of a bar and have a nice, warm bed waiting for me just a few feet away. That’s when the bartender, who resembled a coyote wearing mascara, told us, “Uh yeah you guys gotta move them trucks so’s they don’t get towed with you in em’. Take a yoo-ee and don’t go cross them tracks, that’s a bad part a town down there. That’s a big empty parkin’ lot cross the street. You’d be good in there for a night. Lotsa drivers do it”.

For me, and my inebriated thinking skills, I chose in that moment while crossing the street, to lock the differential into eight wheel drive, dump the clutches into seventh gear, and see how high in the air the giant truck tires could throw snow. I reverted to my High School mentality with my logic being, when would I ever again have a chance to do donuts and rooster tails in an eighteen wheeler? Never. I surely would have been fired, locked up, and had my expensive commercial drivers license revoked if I’d been caught. But just like in High School, I was smart enough to hide it and not brag about it later. I’m betting the statute of limitations has run out by now.

I can’t speak for how intoxicated my temporary friend was. I knew he could handle his alcohol as well as me, since we’d been drinking all evening and continued to drink well into the early morning hours.

I didn’t make a large habit out of drinking on the road in those days. Maybe four or five times in a year. Hangovers while driving big rigs were dangerous and miserable. Dealing with dispatchers, deciphering their bad grammar and incomplete sentences on the satellite messaging system, mapping out an itinerary, fueling up in the freezing cold, eating unhealthy and poorly prepared food, getting directions on a stinky, germ infested pay phone and writing them down in a miniature spiral notebook, using my own hieroglyphic shorthand language, and using disgusting smelling restrooms was hard enough with a clear head. Who knew truck driving would be so glamorous? It wasn’t anything like my career inspiration, the movie, Smokey and the Bandit.

A week before, I had gone to Canada to deliver the biggest avocados from Mexico I’d ever seen. Once the trailer doors were opened, I wondered why I’d never seen them in the United States. They were as big as Nerf footballs. As I wandered through the world market in Toronto, I wondered why I had never seen most of that amazing food in the United States. I still don’t know, but we sure are unhealthy and fat.

I did have a delicious glass of beer at my next Canadian working tourist destination. I stopped at a local shopping center, had an afternoon meal and an authentic brew, then saw a movie called Fried Green Tomatoes in a mostly empty theater. After the show, a random, polite, young man told me, “Good movie, eh!” I’d only heard that phrase from my Bob and Doug McKenzie, Great White North album before and wasn’t sure people really said that until then. My only response was to nod upward, like a Chicano in a passing low rider. He’d probably only seen that in a Cheech n’ Chong movie. He probably didn’t know people really did that.

When I left Canada, I bought three cases of the delicious LeBatts beer. Since it was Federally illegal in the USA to have alcohol in a commercial vehicle, I decided I would hide it until I got back home. More High School logic. Be cool and keep your mouth shut.

It is very against the law to transport alcohol into Canada, but I was leaving, so it didn’t matter. There wasn’t a checkpoint entering the U.S. for some reason. I guess we trusted them more than they trusted us.

I was absolutely terrified when my next load from New York sent me right back into Canada, but I wasn’t about to ditch my brewskis. How bad could a Canadian prison be?

And of course, as luck would have it, I was randomly pulled aside at the border and inspected. I watched in horror as she had me open my side box door on the sleeper, exposing my three cases of contraband. She looked at me, closed the door, and let me go. I guess I was damn lucky it was Canadian beer.

I remember, in truck driving school, they told us not to say “Texas” when we were asked about our nationality. We would be instantly detained and inspected for guns. I guess that happened a lot to people from the Nation of Texas.

I’d bought one case for my brother and two for me. I had no intention of drinking it before I got it back home to Texas, until that night in Chicago.

At first, the only thing my new friend and I had in common was the logo on our company trucks, but we talked for hours about life and women, and growing up and doing dumb things. That’s all most drunks ever talk about. He was never going to get married, and he was serious. I told him about a girl that loved me, but I didn’t know if I loved her. Love was confusing. I said she was just my friend. He just smirked and said, with a combination of confidence and disappointment, “You’re gonna marry her,” as if he’d seen the future already,

Many years later, our circumstances led to a real choice and guess what? I did marry her.

I had to look deep inside myself. I had to learn that, for whatever buried psychological trauma, I was probably not a person who was even capable of real love. But I could respect it. I could recognize it and I did believe in it. Kind of like how a sociopath knows about empathy and what’s right and wrong.

And maybe I couldn’t actually, completely, fully fall in love with her, but I really liked her. I respected her, and I believed in her. I knew that I would never find anyone that loved me more than she loved me, and maybe that was enough.

And maybe, that’s what love is for everybody.

Love enough.

That drunken trucker had seen the future. His confidence was just one of the voices in my head, pointing me to my destination. He was the unknown, unnamed ambassador to my destiny. In retrospect and memory, that strange moonless night was out of place. It was out of time itself. It was my future visiting me, guiding me. There were no other people around. The bar was foggy and empty, except for the scrappy bartender who I could barely see through my booze riddled glassy eyes. I was visited by the Ghost of Christmas LeBatts.

I delivered a case to my brother in time for Christmas and the other back home to share with my future wife.

This is our twentieth year of being married and I’m still overthinking and just as confused as I ever was. Luckily, in my marriage I’ve learned that it probably doesn’t matter what I think anyway.

There’s love, and that’s love enough.

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Willie, Waylon, Merle and Pearl – REAL2Real

September 19, 2021 Sidney

As the fragile, fifty-four year old reel to reel tape is slowly decaying in a cardboard box in a climate controlled storage shed, I feel rushed to discover its origin. I worry that the change in humidity from its previous years will speed the process of self destruction. My attempt to find the history of this lost recording is becoming more futile with every turn. No one seems to know anything about it.

I’ve had contact with journalists, archivists, authors, and family members. The frustrating realization is that the one and only living person that does know, is eighty-eight years old. He’s Willie Nelson himself and he’s hard to reach. He also may not even remember the recording session. It was a long time ago and possibly non-profitable and uneventful.

I have even questioned the reality of its existence myself, and I have the damn tape. Did my dad deep fake this before there was any technology available to do that? No, he could barely check the oil in his car. Is this some kind of delusional hoax? No, it’s very real. It’s a real tape inside a real cardboard box for over fifty years.

I’m left to ponder the meaning of it all, the timing of it, and my own, one sided relationship with Willie Nelson. If you know me or my mother, you have already heard our Willie stories. Mostly, they are just my mom’s stories based on actual experiences with slightly rough edges from the passage of time.

But I have to fatefully wonder, of the three artists on the recording, why is Willie the last survivor? The only one I have any connection to.

Why does it appear that I happen to have the only existing copy of this recording? Why did my dad even have the tape? Why did he choose to keep it way back then? Was it rare even then? Did he have a plan? He left no clues and no other legacy when he died in 1995, ironically due to alcoholism.

Why, after all these years, did no one in my family know about this? I had even asked my brother, years ago, who had access to reel to reel players in the radio station where he worked, to go through that box of old tapes and he never did it.

Why has my own pursuit of being an aspiring songwriter and musician allowed me to have the sound engineering knowledge and equipment to hear this tape?

And after years of drinking and promising myself I’d quit if I won the lottery, then realizing that maybe if I just quit first, I might deserve to win the lottery, why then did I discover the tape?

And why did I wind up living just a few miles from Luck, Texas? Willie Nelson’s ranch and recording studio. I’m from west Texas and New Mexico.

All of this weirdly smells of destiny, or even just an unlikely coincidence, and I can’t just ignore it.

The history of Willie Nelson and my family is unique. Part of why I feel so incredibly comfortable talking with members of the Nelson family is that I feel connected. I have to remind myself that they do not feel that way. They don’t know me, or my mom or my dad. They didn’t grow up hearing stories about me and feel almost related to me. At one point, when I was about twelve, I honestly felt I needed to ask if Willie was my father. He is not, and it’s physically obvious, but I had to ask.

I also realize how creepy and intrusive that is to Willie’s actual family and I profoundly apologize. Amy Nelson has a song about certain ladies that were attracted to her famous dad. I really hope that wasn’t inspired by my mom. I would never tell Amy that, but I wish I could apologize just the same.

My dad was an early fan of Willie. Mostly because of the Jazz influence and beautiful poetry Willie examined in his music. My dad promoted him through the radio station where he worked, KROB, and took on a personal interest in expanding his career. I’m sure my dad was just one of many, but I’m actually proud of him for doing that. I share his taste in music and Willie Nelson is amazing. But for whatever reason, my dad moved on from that era. We left south Texas a few months after I was born. My mom seemed to relive those exciting and special days for years and years after, while my dad rarely spoke of any of it.

If you mention Willie Nelson to my mom, you will first hear the story of how my nickname is Willie Bush. Named after Willie Nelson and Johnny Bush. It was a joke my dad had told the both of them shortly after I was born in Corpus Christi in 1968, coincidentally around the same time the recording was made.

The real question, with every turn of the lack of knowledge of this recording, is what do I do with it before it turns to dust?

The unknown list of living people that were around back then is getting smaller every day. If I’d had the tape a few years ago, I could have presented it to Poodie Locke, Willie’s road manager, in his partially owned bar right down the road from my home. I was in there quite a bit back then. He would’ve at least listened to me and the recording and possibly gotten an answer from Willie himself. Poodie was someone I considered a friend although we barely knew each other. Like the t-shirts states, ‘I know Poodie too’.

As of now, I have annoyed most of Willie’s kids to the point they won’t talk to me anymore. One of them even denies it’s Willie on the recording or that he’d ever done anything for Pearl beer, even though there are concert posters out there that prove otherwise. Another daughter was obviously uncomfortable with me, but the nicest person I think I have ever met. She also offered some good advice and a link on Facebook.

They seem to be very protective of their dad, and the business of their dad. It’s completely understandable, especially with his age, and the virus floating around, but I wish someone would at least listen and allow me to ask questions from a safe distance. I have given them the opportunity to get involved and they are not interested at all. I also have had no response from the Jennings and Haggard families. I would think they too would be interested.

Maybe it’s a legal issue? Someone could tell me if that was true. I don’t know enough about who owns what here anyway. I do fear that someone might ransack my property looking for it. Either to steal it or destroy it. I know there’s a fiercely competitive history between Lone Star and Pearl brewing companies. This recording could suggest that Pearl is the original national beer of Texas after all.

It has also occurred to me that they don’t believe me. I could be a grifter, a scam artist, a swindler. It’s probably true that there are crazy people who contact them with wild schemes quite often. I just hate that I’m possibly perceived as another psycho.

So my options right now are to sell the rare tape and be done with it forever. I could start touring with a band. It’d be like I won the lottery.

Or destroy it in the name of militant sobriety and vengeance for all the alcoholism that’s attributed to messing up my life and countless others.

Or continue to dig for the hidden story, annoying anyone I must, to get the answers.

Or, I could start a mystery podcast. Maybe I should ask a Nelson to help me with it? That could be fun and expensive.

Or maybe convince Pearl beer to challenge Lone Star as the official beer of Texas in a devious marketing battle. I mean, at least Pearl survived prohibition.

Or, I could write this article you’re reading right now. Maybe you could give me a better solution.

Or, I could release it for free to the world to hear on my YouTube channel, helping to attract visitors to my own bitter, original music for fractions of pennies with every view and stream.

The opportunity is endless, but my biggest pressure is to not blow it. I truly believe I have something special.

I’ve wanted so much more out of life, through music, or whatever and I think this is an actual opportunity. I don’t want to exploit anyone, or cheat anyone. I don’t want to steal anything. I’ll share what I need to. I just want a chance to live my life, better. I want to be able to provide for my own family and actually help people and contribute something to the world. I still believe I have potential and purpose.

Opportunity has eluded me my whole life even though I’ve been hunting it down. My dysfunctional childhood and lack of guidance dealt a lousy hand. Few people really know just how hard it is to become a success from near zero. I don’t like placing blame on others, but there’s truth to it. I also have plenty of blame for myself and my own bad choices. I’d love another chance before I die or arthritis cancels my guitar playing hands.

And here it is, a legacy dropped in my lap from my deceased father. It was ignored for years and I just happened to take the initiative to discover it. And even if it turns out to be somehow worthless, illegal, or just too boring to make anything out of, it will not have been useless. The fact that I’ve explored all these thoughts is adventurous enough, maybe.

The opening bid is five million dollars, if you’re interested. I already have the money divvied up to family and taxes in my mind.

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Dance of the Bull Rock

September 10, 2021 Sidney

It was the size of, and almost as round, as a baseball bouncing through the cars. I watched without a thought as it plummeted, leapt, and spun, bouncing from the summer sun heated pavement up and over the hood of a black Lexus sedan, gliding and trickling across the shiny fender, dipping adieu only to pop off the blacktop, elevating itself to the perfect height to gently scale the side of a speeding monster truck and tap dance across the flat bed cover of the Super Duty Ford.

As it traveled away, almost matching the speed of the wayward traffic, I lost sight of the whimsical roadway meteor, leaving me in a state of awe like I’d just experienced the last note of a symphony concert.

The scene slowly replayed in my mind from the beginning of the sonata. I remember seeing the work truck trailer pass by, peripherally, seconds after the rock star took it’s leave, falling gracefully off the back of it’s construction trailer stage for it’s solo performance. Saying farewell to it’s stone comrades forever as it followed its own, very different destiny. It would not be one to wind up forever buried again, after a million years, only after it’s tiny contribution, with its team of thousands, as a temporary driveway. To block the force of water from eroding the path to someone’s future home or office. To be a small part of a foundation to support the giant rolling rubber tires of Goliath sized tractors and trucks.

I realized in that moment, that it had bailed off the back of the trailer just a few feet ahead of where I was parked in the turn lane and it’s trajectory was completely left to fate.

I imagined a different dance, a fate-plotted assassins target. It could have been any one of us. I contrived a different moment, where my last vision was of a rock blasting through my windshield into a spider web ball shape and my last word-formed thought was, “What’s tha…….”.

I would have no knowledge, I hope, that my brains were instantly smashed and my spark of life was suddenly extinguished, leaving my corpse forever waiting for the left turn light as my turn signal slowly clicked its last audible click.

The gravity fed, fueled spinning boulderite could easily have taken the life of an unsuspecting motorist if it was just destined to do it, but it wasn’t. Somehow, it seemed to float through the air and rocketing, rambling vehicles, each driver and passenger uniquely unaware of their own immediate dance with fate.

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Two Years Dry and Sober

August 20, 2021 Sidney

Two years dry and sober have me thinking so many different things. The strangest part is seeing simple things as new. Just one example was the way the light was falling from the skylight, hitting the bathroom tub. It looked warm and comforting, familiar and old. I can only assume that’s how it feels for a soldier coming home after six months of war. Does that make me a real hero? I think so. I am actually impressed with myself for actually doing this thing. It qualifies as a battle.

It’s also weird that time itself is different now. Two years feels like twenty and yesterday at the same time. It’s difficult to explain but it feels like I’m nostalgic for how alcohol made me feel, intoxicated and energetic, but I’m someone else having someone else’s memories. It really throws me into a science fiction frame of mind, questioning all of reality, time and space.

I wonder what’s actually happening to my brain? Is it permanent damage or trying to rebuild itself? Is it just aging or just starting to grow from years of arrested development? Probably all of the above.

I remember the taste of crisp, cold, twangy beer, but I have little real desire to drink again. I remember, clearly, enjoying a tall Schlitz Malt Liquor when I was about eight years old. I was instantly enamored with it’s power of taste and tingling intoxication.

I sometimes think I probably could enjoy a drink again and not fall into the habitual pattern, but I ask, why? I don’t need it and I’ll probably regret it. I’ve taken that as far as I could and somehow, I’m still alive. Everyday life is so much better without it. That temptation is easier to ignore now, but it comes and goes. If it can be equated to Tennyson, ” ‘Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all”, I have to strongly disagree. We would all be better off never falling for alcohol.

I also know and fear the power of that addiction. The feeling that I could just take it or leave it is really a trick to get me to start drinking again. It’s what the voices are saying. It’s the Devil himself. The addiction. Luckily, I’m defiant and stubborn and have somehow turned those attributes around against the Devil, I think. I hope.

I’ve also had to come to terms with the reality of our boozing culture in my journey to sobriety. I despise alcohol. I wish it was never invented. It ruins so many lives. But, I have to acknowledge, not everyone has a problem.

But, there’s a part of me that believes that everyone does have a problem and they just don’t know it, because all alcohol is inherently a problem. If you have a problem, and you drink, you have a drinking problem.

I see the, not so subtle, changes in personality and am amazed at how people don’t recognize or acknowledge it. Sometimes they justify it or outright deny it. At least I was always very open and clear about my alcoholism, except when I wasn’t, which was always. Is that clear enough?

I don’t miss the legal risk of drinking and driving. The chance of getting arrested…again. The embarrassment, the possibility of having kids taken away, and the monetary cost is so stressful. The State has a money grab system that punishes lightweight drinkers and lines politicians’ pockets with cash for years. The only good thing is the required education, although, if you are wealthy and connected, or pretty enough, you can get out of it. It’s just another way to vaguely legally oppress the poor and slap the wrists of the opportunistic. It’s the American way.

I do miss the illusion of freedom, starting the weekend early, or rewarding the accomplishment of just making it through the day, everyday, sometimes with a crisp, cold beer in a cute and tiny paper bag on the way home from the last job site, or usually, with an all day iced twelve pack in the cooler in the back, patiently waiting for hours for the moment of birth, always providing a good beer buzz by the time I hit the driveway. And I miss the laughter, smoke, and libations with the crew, leaning against the fender on the tired and resting, rugged pickup truck. The continuing celebration and ritual of being a working man. The refreshment mixed with the sweat and the dirt and the blood of the everyday struggle, settling the nerves of yesterday’s hangover, hitting the reset button on my vital organs. Man, I miss that. Who wouldn’t?

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Stupid Phone

August 5, 2021 Sidney

My wife called me while I was working outside in the light rain on a job site. I put down my equipment and shut off the ridiculously loud engine as I answered before it went to voicemail. I could instantly tell that she was annoyed but I didn’t know why. The phone was cutting out as we tried to decipher what we were saying, and like most of our greetings we just yell “Hello” and “What? Can you hear me?” until the link is established. I had texted a work related question a few minutes before, but really wasn’t expecting a response knowing that I was out of cel tower range. She had replied to my text, but I didn’t know that.

But my phone, in my pocket, replied back to her and continued the conversation completely on its own. Most likely from the moisture on my shorts pocket touching the phone screen while I was moving around. Not only did it continue the conversation, it did it with an attitude.

It answered her with predictive text, “uh, ok”, which is something I would never say, much less, put in a written message. Even though I sometimes get complacent and skip being totally and completely polite to my spouse, this was a professional work conversation and I always do my best to keep it civil, clear, and concise. I’m actually surprised she thought it was me. She did become suspicious on the second auto fill text that stated a snarky “why?” Almost with a smirk and a sassy Texas drawl.

It was out of context, confusing and also unlike even my worst bad attitude, so she called to actually hear my words with my voice. She started the analog conversation with, “…..What the fuck?” I knew instantly that this was no robot calling.

After finally sorting out the text conversation through the frustrating broken cel tower signal, we were still somehow annoyed. A lingering after effect of an ignorant algorithmic presumptuous artificial intelligence. Like having sticky fingers after a crumbly honey covered biscuit.

And that got me thinking. Why does my phone think I talk like a dick-head? I don’t ever text words like these. I might say them as a joke, but I’d never put it in actual writing.

That got me thinking more. How does this thing even work?

Since I don’t really know, I’ll guess.

I assume that predictive text is based on generalized common language spoken by mass amounts of average people. It sure as hell didn’t get that shit from me! The data may come from Facebook or Twitter or some form of crappy public conversation on social media since there’s totally no way they’re actually spying on our text conversations.

And that got me thinking even more. Does the average person really talk like that? Is the average person a dick-head? Are most people shitty, bitter, pissy conversationalists? And is that how we shape and define all of our information based on how people think and speak?

Are TV shows, YouTube videos, movies, books, and Presidents chosen the same way? Is that how we got Trump the toddler bully, Hillary the rhetorical teenager, Cruz the high school commencement speaker, Pelosi the six year old drama queen, McConnell the turtle faced republi-bot, Schumer the hyperbolic step dad, and Marjorie Taylor Greene the batshit crazy conspiracy tart? Sounds about right.

Maybe, it’s time for someone to look into this. A study to determine if people mimic what is perceived as popular culture. Does anyone know anyone at Cornell or Stanford? Are those places even real? Well, I’ve never seen them. I’m just sayin’.

We know that humans greatest talent is copying each other. That’s how we get popular phrases like, “That’s what she said!” and “Get er’ done” or my all time favorite, “Just fuck me and feed me beans”. There’s nothing wrong with mimicking each other. It’s how we have survived for so long. It helps us stay likable and socially connected so we don’t eat each others cooked brains in our own tribe.

But what happens if the “popular” sayings were being generated collectively by the worst humans ever? What if we start to mimic the computerized interpretation of ourselves. Uh….what if we already are?

Would it be the decline of our own social survival? Would husbands and wives start to treat each other differently resulting in less love and compassion for each other? Would that mean that less babies would be made and the inevitability of the decline of human reproduction? The end of woman? The end of man?

I don’t know. Probably.

#trump2028

Random Thoughts and Stories

Profiled

April 16, 2021 Sidney

I walked straight to the battery rack on the furthest wall at the auto parts store and started my search. I had a picture of the car battery with the part number on my phone for reference. All the numbers and codes on the shelf and labels were close to impossible to read. They had tiny print and were covered in dirt and grease, not to mention my troublesome eyesight that seems to have an unattainable sweet spot only when I need it the most.

After a frustrating minute or two I gave up my search and turned to the counter for help. The man behind the counter had a completely shaved bald head. He sat slumped on the stool in front of the soft glow of the computer screen. He had the body of a die-hard Texas BBQ consumer, smudged up, thin framed glasses, and peaked at five foot one standing up or at a full speed, portly slumped waddle.

I made eye contact and said sheepishly for some reason,”I’m not sure what I’m looking at”. I suppose I expected the employee who had been watching my entire battery quest, and was coldly staring back at me as I spoke directly to him, to offer a helpful response, but he did not. He just looked at me with the blank stare of a bored house cat. I thought, maybe the Covid-19 plexiglass barrier between us was causing some interference, so I pointed at the battery wall and grunted like a caveman and I got a response. “What is it that you want? He said in a monotone cadence with a dead stare and no movement, like if a pile of mashed potatoes were suddenly speaking to me. I said I need a battery, then thought to myself, why else would I be searching dusty tags on the great wall of batteries if I didn’t need a battery. I thought it was obvious. His response was a sarcastic, “Well now we’re gettin’ somewhere” as he shifted his weight and scooted up to the wanting computer screen. I realized, at that moment, that I’ve been here before.

I was being judged and treated accordingly. It happens sometimes in certain areas with certain people. For some, it’s the color of their skin, or their accent, or what they’re wearing. For me, it’s my long hair. What makes it different for me is that I usually have it tied back in a ponytail and suffer less consequence. But today I was letting my freak flag fly inside the auto parts store and was immediately paying the price.

In this situation, I’ve learned that I have to be commanding, stern, and aggressive to hold my ground. I have to prey on the little round man’s insecurities and control the environment. The last time I was in this situation, it almost turned into a beating in the parking lot, and I was the little guy, so I know I have to clear my head and engage a strategy to avoid another confrontation.

I made sure to stand up straight, almost towering above to project dominance, and read the computer screen myself. I made sure he was applying the battery core charge and even corrected him on the part number when he brought out the wrong size battery.

I’ve learned the hard way that when someone is small minded, petty, judgemental, and instantly dislikes something about you, they have no problem ruining your day or wasting your time. This guy was selling me the wrong part. Double check everything! They do not care about you or their own service. In many cases, their boss will have the same attitude. I know this because I have held many jobs in many industries that are run by these personalities. It’s almost a sport to make fun of people after they leave. It’s less true nowadays with all the political correctness they despise, but it’s still there. I wish I could say I make it a sport to play along, to act insecure, foggy, and oblivious to car knowledge, (or whatever knowledge), just to see how far they’ll take their abuse. But sometimes, my brain actually is foggy and I really don’t know what I’m doing.

That’s when I need to be sure to tie back my hair.

I realize, it’s not the same, but it gives me a glimpse into racial profiling. I’ve had a cop smugly and sarcastically ask me, “OK, where’s your weed?” I answered truthfully and said I don’t smoke weed. He said, “Yeah, right”, then made me drop my pants and spread my butt cheeks so he could look up there for drugs. That’s actually happened a few times now, and I thoroughly enjoy showing a cop my asshole every time.

I have to be aware of my long hair when I get pulled over or deal with any authority. I usually wear it out if I’m in Traffic Court as a statement of non-conformity, but it really doesn’t make things better. It’s actually pretty stupid of me to do that. The Bailiff always, always singles me out to say something benign just to show power. I’ve been asked multiple times by authority figures, as if they already know the answer, “You working anywhere?” In every case they act overwhelmed and completely surprised that I’m the head of a department, or own a company, or whatever.

I realize that not every cop or auto parts employee is a judgemental prick, but since we’re all profiling here. Well….

Random Thoughts and Stories

Bobcat Sam

April 7, 2021 Sidney

Carlton was my brother’s friend from down the road. I was used to any and all of my brother’s friends picking on me, as I was only there for their entertainment it seemed.

But this friend was different. I only have a few memories of Carlton but they’re all good, which sadly, is rare for most of my childhood. Just about every good memory comes with an attached bad one from those days. But those are other stories.

I remember that Carlton’s house was close to the bar on the Mckinley County line that separated the Navajo and Zuni Reservations. I assume we were picking up Carlton or dropping him off. It’s even possible that we rode the school bus to his house that afternoon. We could just do that back then without notarized documentation. Hell, we had a school bus driver that drank whiskey out of a flask while he was driving, but that’s another story.

Once, Carlton showed me a comic book. A special comic book. A dirty comic book. It was so graphic that I can only do you the favor of not sharing the imagery or storyline. It’s possible it would stay in your mind forever, like it has mine. I never needed to see that, especially since I was only around eight years old. I guess Carlton thought he was sharing something cool just for me. Maybe it was. I’d already seen plenty of Playboy magazines. We even had a secret swiped magazine stash, just for us boys, in a hollowed out tree. The pages were wrinkled from the rain and weather, but all the photographs were still quite viewable. But his comic book was beyond anything I’ve seen to this day.

Another memory of Carlton was him singing a popular country song that was current for the time. Wolverton Mountain by Claude King. Carlton made fun of the accent and had a knee bending dance to go with it. It made my brother laugh to tears every time which only added to the hilarity. Nothing is funnier than watching my brother laugh until he can’t breathe.

Across from our house, past the half acre wide valley, there were cliffs. It could be more accurately described as a two hundred foot tall ridge filled with sandstone boulders. We had explored every inch throughout the years and imagined forts and rooms among the existing ancient Indian ruins. One room was named the U.S.S Enterprise after Star Trek. We had only seen Star Trek when we visited our Texas cousins at Christmas. Since we didn’t get TV reception, they were our only real source to experience the outside world. For some reason, we were living in a time bubble in a place we didn’t belong. But again, that’s another story. The sandstone walls of the U.S.S Enterprise surely still bare our names, deeply carved and updated with every visit, with only our pocket knives and our intently focused concentration.

Carlton had come over to our house and explored the cliffs with us one afternoon into the evening. At some point, we were seperated. Probably playing a hide and seek game. After Carlton spotted my brother, he crouched next to me and said, ” you wanna scare Sam? Watch this” as he cupped his hands and started to make a growling noise, impressively imitating a bobcat or mountain lion. He slowly got louder then made the striking cougar call.

As we giggled and peeked over the rocks to confess the prank. Sam had disappeared. Carlton and I looked at each other curiously, then noticed a person running full speed across the valley below. Carlton yelled out, “Saaaaaam! We’re fuckin’ with you!” But Sam did not acknowledge. He did not even look back. He just kept on running for what seemed like forever. He’d made it to the other side and vanished again as he made his way up towards our house through the trees. Carlton and I slowly made our way down the rocks and eventually back to the house at dusk. We were genuinely concerned about my brother.

We found Sam, piddling and puttering in his room like nothing had happened. We told him it was us, but he didn’t want it to be true. He almost had us convinced there was another actual bobcat. He was so persuasive I question it to this day. That’s the curse of the big brother.

We will never know if the non climactic end to the joke was intentional or just smothered and washed out with stubbornness and pride. To me, it doesn’t matter. The joke worked and it served it’s noble purpose.

It was a rare thing for me to get anything over on my brother. His four and a half year age jump ahead of me made him impossible to outsmart and I was never particularly conniving, menacing, or evil anyway. Having Carlton unknowingly exact my revenge for so many mean older brother tricks was absolute sweetness for me. I’ll be forever in his debt. It was one, much needed, moment in time that I would never get to experience again.

And it wasn’t until I shared this story with my son, and started writing it, that I realized, my brother completely left me and Carlton to get eaten by a mountain lion all those years ago.

Sid Blog

All posts by Sidney

Love Enough

Dance of the Bull Rock

Profiled

Bobcat Sam

The Adventures of Sid