On the porch in the summers (Grandpa and me)

On the porch in the summers
(Grandpa and me)


From a little after midmorning, until near twilight of a long still, anguish dead summer day, we’d be on the porch, old grandpa Anton, still swearing away, cussing as always, mom said it was his way of getting it out—on that fresh hot artless porch with a sofa on it, and screens all around it, with blinds half down, fastened with a string, feeling the blinds would keep the sun out and the porch would be fresher, but when it went down in the east, it slashed its full yellow rays into the side of the porch, almost blinding you, I thought of it as being no more than the eternal sun getting ready to meet the eternal night, and clash, vibrantly clash, with the condensed and hyper-distilled look on grandpa’s face, before going away, until sunrise, when it would wake him up again on the porch, he slept there in the summers, not in his bedroom: I was simple an idle boy, with no rank, young flesh with a long embattled vanishing old stream, vanishing in interval, running one space to the next until his bones dried up, and the ghost in him mused with his shadow docilely as if it were the voice of fate haunting him in his own house. Out of this calm thunderclap, he would change from man to animal, to demon. It seemed grandpa wore those eternal dark blue or black, suites and all, all the time, it suited him well.
Grandpa was sitting in the sofa so bolt upright, in the curved soft sofa, he slept on in the summer, although his bone structure was rigid as well as having iron shinbones and ankles—and an air of impotent, self-puzzlement, indomitable frustrated look, as if he was long dead. As if at any moment, outraged summarized could be called to mind, upon a peaceful scene, sulfur-reeking, from his lips like a beast, yet I knew for the most part he was harmless. Mother would say, “That’s just the way he is, you can’t change an old goat, or teach one new tricks,” wild and relaxed, he’d remain, with his air of bleak, fatigued and dilapidated gulp of air.
His voice didn’t stop, but somehow vanished in his mumbling, grumbling, complaining and rumble-jumble carrying on, in a bloodless face, paradoxical, then it vanished…as sudden and as quick as the way it started, just like nothing, a puff of smoke, it vanished and I seemed to watch the smoke suddenly float out of the porch and be soaked up by the earth.
Then there was this savage quiet he produced. Him sitting and me standing on the porch, as if there was a coffin—a smelly gloomy over rotting coffin, between us, and I was near fearful to move, immobile and pontific, creating in me my future garrulous, if not imitative, outraged baffled ghosts. Perhaps the one that is helping me write this epistle about him and me on the porch in those now far-off summers of my formative years.
We seldom talked to one another, just long silences usually, as if we were not people, in a land of no language. It seemed as if he had a demon—who came out of nowhere warning him he was in the land with a strange, violently strange creature, me. Without gentleness he’d destroy without regret something, yes, saved by this demon.
And when I left for the Army, and college, and for my travels, I am sure he said “I don’t imagine he will come back here, and settle down as a grandchild should, he’s a wild one, not like his brother, already working and making plans, this one he will leave, enter some literary profession, be married, but never remain married. Perhaps he will be out among young friends instead of the old family.”
I was only twelve then, standing on that porch, due to his astonishment, I did exactly all he knew I’d do, have exchanged no more than fifty-words in our whole lifetime, living in the same house, ten-years, he did not recognize me as he revealed a character worth noticing, indicating a cold, implacable and to a certain degree, callousness.
The dusty heat of the day, those summer days, he’d walk back and forth, pacing the floor in the house from the porch to the kitchen, as if it was a half mile between each, and its actual size—it was of fifty-feet—of rug and a shabby rug at that, yet it had the same air as the half mile would have had, same quality, his face would remain grim, for a grim endurance is what he had, created to fit into his little smaller world, the one he put into his pocket, took out in the hallway, as if it was in a tomb, in his slow and heated weighed down time. He’d look at his wrist, check his watch, the time, the dim face now looking at an expressionless grandson, urgent and intent to be more than he would ever expect.
“He wants to tell me something, I know he does,” my grandfather thought, staring at me: oh yes, I could read his mind, but if he had asked me what I was thinking, it would displease the demon that stayed with him, then he’d tell himself, “There is no reason to talk to him, he’s already mummified.”
And mother would say, “He’s seventy years old, going to be eighty soon…” as if he was already vanished from this earth, fled to none knew where, but he was right here, in front of me, breathing the same air, hearing the same talk going on in the house, just not talking to me. My childhood was full of this, him, echoing with sonorous defeat to make a friend out of a grandfather that was interchangeable and almost numberless. It would have seen, or does seem, did seem, he had a war going on with some personal ghosts.
“Ah,” said my mother, “But why tell me about it, what can I do, I can’t change him!”

No: 410/6-4-2009

Amaze ((Gay and Angry)(a short story))

She troubled me.

She troubled me, and my wife, and from what I remember her of her foster parents she troubled them, but most people seemed to like her, especially those who went on that school trip I once took with her to South Dakota, to: the Bad Lands, and Black Hills and Mount Rushmore. Her foster mother and father presided over some of the children on that trip of this Minnesota rural district, where my granddaughter, Maria-Lee lived (I had remarried, and so Maria was no relation to my new wife).
She treated her foster parents like servants of some old southern town, before the advent of the Civil War, in the 1860s. I didn’t take a liking to that and confronted her with the issue, but she didn’t feel certain guilt whatsoever over that confrontation: “Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t like the way I acted before?” Was all she could say.
I was one of those grandparents, living quite a ways from her, in the City of St. Paul. However, as it happened, I did not stick around to be told off by a thirteen year old kid, and I told her so, “If you can’t respect your foster parents, and you look like you want to confront me negatively about this, how then do you expect this to turn out between us?” I added to that, in so many words: I’m not the kind of person that will take all your crap. And to be frank, I think she was very happy I did not get involved with her controlling issue of her foster parents.
She really did not have anything more to say on the matter, but she had a secret, something that was bothering her, and perhaps to a light extent, me. Something that was really worrying her very much, something she was afraid to tell anybody, even me—I couldn’t imagine what it was, and she couldn’t imagine what my reaction would be, it was such an odd thing that she had no one to tell her not to worry. Had she asked me, that is what I would have said?
I had never really heard of anyone having such a problem like the one that was troubling Maria at her age. On the one hand it appeared maybe silly, when I found out: on the other hand…
I wanted to tell her, that her secret was nothing to get angry at me over, or about. Because I had no magical powers to make her different than what she chose to be, or how she chose to live, not after she was an adult anyway. I might have been to her, a serious minded adult, one that could force a proposal from her, and make her restore lost femininity if indeed I wanted to, but I wouldn’t and couldn’t. In short, she was angry from the age I met her, at thirteen years old, and when she called me, when she was sixteen years old she was still angry, and when she phoned my wife at a full adult’s age, and said, what her secret was, she was still angry. Maybe she had a wish, I had a wish, and who could make wishes come true? Would I accept her as she was? She was too angry to deal with.
Not even card tricks could make her less angry, and again there was no magic I knew other than, time to allow this anger to sink into some deep sinkhole and die, but it was hard to tell when it would, and if it would.

Now, about this wish and secret…

of hers, which I’m sure the worry was with her from morning to night: it wasn’t anything she could straighten out and ask me—evidently, but she did tell my wife when she phoned her. It required the right time, and a careful prepared moment. She seldom called me and I didn’t want anymore disrespect. But when she did, I listen to my wife, what she had to say about what Maria had to say, and how she had said what she said. And it was not a delicate moment; again her thick ugly anger came out, attempting to catch my ear.
We never talked after that last conversation when she was sixteen years old, not verbally at least. She was too stupid, and I was too nervous. Yes, nervous. It was just something I sensed in me, powerful, as was the stupidly she carried about concerning this issue.
She saw something though in me, a desire. And so she tried to get ahold of me in South America, and turned her anger down and rolled her sleeves up, eyes and heart elsewhere though, and said “I want to start a new relationship with you (inferring she was sorry, and that should mend all hurts and injuries and so for and on).” She didn’t call me grandfather, rather by my first name, which was the first disrespectful thing I noticed. I was to her, what I always was to her, a brief visit, curiosity, home blood substance.
When I think of her, the humid winds of the old Mississippi River drift deep and seep deep into my bone, they no longer are for an innocent girl.
I love her, and she wanted to love me, but she loved beyond me, and so I kept my distance, as she behaved indifferently. She felt it, but she never reasoned what caused my coldness; it wasn’t as she thought, and I told her so, the last time we talked on the computer: I never cared one way or the other if she were gay, I did care if you were angry and disrespectful, she wanted respect, she just couldn’t give it, I didn’t care to walk on eggshells with anybody, her included, life is too short for that. Why be around people that make you unhappy. No sense in it, they use you, drain you then walk away proud as a bear who just sucked up all the honey in the beehive.
‘Really,’ she thought. Perhaps thinking, this is all a little humorous. It struck me as a very dry subject—her lesbianism.
I said, “If you are happy where you are in life (knowing it must had been difficult for her) I can’t help in that area, I don’t know how, the only thing I would be able to do is accept. I’m fine, and I’m fine with you. Everything’s hunky-dory.” But of course I would not have cared for her to bring her lover around, that perhaps might have been another issue, but one that could have been solved later on.
I said, “I’m sorry things did not work out better for us, but why do you want to have a relationship with an old man now?” She really didn’t have an answer.
What was there to say? How could I explain that all through the years I waited for her to accept me for me, I had already accepted her—and her secret, the one she never told me until she was of age, other than disrespect for me and her foster parents. And so we remained silent, and perhaps that is the best, no one gets hurt that way, especially if it is a one-way street.

Dedicated to Maria… (Granddaughter) 5-22-2009

"The Rose Room" (short story about the stockyards in Minnesota)

The Rose Room
((The Stockyards of South St. Paul, Minnesota, 1966) (a Chick Evens Story))



Chick Evens went to work for the stockyards one summer in 1966, near the town-let of South Saint Paul, the summer was extremely hot, and you could bake an egg on the sidewalks.
His mother worked at Swift’s Meats (in the meatpacking department), the company which he now came to be employed at, made a deep impression on Chick’s mind and he never forgot the thoughts and experiences that came to him during those last months of that summer working at the stockyards inside a packing house (cutting up carcasses of hogs), and especially delivering animal waste to the Rose Room!

The traditional puffing forth smoke, which attracted attention to its tall chimneys as they rumbled along and burnt up the remains of pigs and cows, and sheep, and goats, slowly over miles of bones and animal waste, circulated the air, and drifted throughout the huge stockyards, second in the nation, only to Chicago’s.
One could see and smell at any section, division or corner of the town-let this putrid smoke, from the stockyards, all the way down to the Mississippi River, some five-miles away, and even across the Robert Street Bridge, to the other side of the river, where resided St. Paul, proper, the inner city, the downtown area; that dark to light gray smoke, rising into the clear morning sky.
Where some of this smoke came from was a dim lit, small room through which an employee brought in stacks of animal throw away, desecrated meats, from throughout the stockyards. From these stacks could be seen glowing and pale pus from hams, torn hides, discolored skin and unusable bones and infected guts, and so forth, nothing to please an appetite.
There was no wind, or windows in this room—this room they called ‘The Rose Room’, just an iron round plate on the floor, heavy as a Cadillac car, it was opened by pressing a yellow button, and machinery lifted this tonnage door about three feet up…then it stopped as if a person might fall or jump into this inferno pit, and there was hell’s fire. You could hear the crackling of the fire, feel the heat penetrating your pours, and smell the punishingly putrid stink therewithal, and near suffocating in the process: it all was close to gagging the lungs, to a point of collapsing.
The fire was equal to any spot in a blazing forest fire, it grew along the sides of the pit when the iron door was opened, like snakes running up its sides to escape.

∙

In the afternoons I went to what they called the Rose Room, opened up the door to the house of flames, it crackled and snapped under my feet, even the soul of my shoes got hot through the thick stone floor, the smell of this room was putrid, foul, sizzling. It made a man think about going back to school, it did me anyway, learn a real trade—it was a room I swear rented out by the devil or perhaps God Himself, to express where souls go to decay—the repentance abyss.
My mind captured such an image even before I set foot out of this room, the first time I brought in a wheelbarrow of animal waste—I remember I had little to say, looking into that abyss of flames, pouring my wheelbarrow of rotten animal carcasses, soft tissue, over the edge of the iron rounded door, watching the massive fire consume it even before it hit the bottom of the pot, boldly and freely.

∙

The fatty tissue, he poured down, into the pit, became inflamed almost instantly. This was a house with only one window—the fire window. When he had poured the waste over the edge of the opening, the fire leaped back up at him, swept over the rim of the frame that held the iron door in place, it swept all the way to his feet, he jumped back, stood against the wall looking into the hungered fire, as if it was a living beast trying to harm him, and a voice said something, a voice to the side of him, by the door that was usually shut to the room, except if someone else was waiting to commence in the same traditional work he had just finished…

∙

The Employee


Employee: Come on, come on! Let’s get going here sunny, I don’t have all day—give the rose a kiss and get the hell out of there so I can drop my load! (A laugh)

Chick Evens: It almost got me!

Employee: It’s a suicide escape! ((he declared shrewdly) (he comes to stand beside Evens)) It creeps in when you’re half sleeping, or daydreaming on the job, stay alert in this room kid—now move on out of here, go around my backside, give me some room to maneuver my wheelbarrow.


Note: the stockyards in South St. Paul, created and built the city of South Saint Paul, establishing it’s self in between, 1885-1887, and built by Gustavus Franklin Swift Jr., and prior to him, his father. Prior to Swift’s And Company, there was no city south of St. Paul, Minnesota. It was one of the largest stockyards in the world, and second only to Chicago in the United States. This story is dedicated to the Swift Family, who in their way contributed to the employment of so many people in some many areas of the United States, and especially, South Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Written 5-16-2009 ((No: 398) (SA/5ds))

The Dead don't Forgive (short story, part of "The Lore Machaco..." in Villa Rica, Peru)

The Dead do not Forgive
(Life for Katita after the ordeal)



The following year, a year after the ordeal, she had visited her home city of Huancayo again, more afraid of taking the bus than ever, not because of the robbers per se, more so because of the vast bus accidents, between Lima and Huancayo, so many of the drivers unchecked by the owners of the different bus lines, falling to sleep while driving, and the bus falling into the river by La Oroya, and around the bends in the Andes, three in one week. They drove tired, with loud music on trying to keep them awake, only one driver, no shift changing, and some drunk.
In any case, she, Katita, made it the second year, back home, heavy rain all about, it was December, the rainy season, many of the buildings and adobe houses had tin roofs, you could hear the rain drops, She was happy, she noticed a police officer detaining a drunk in the plaza de arms area, then let him go. It made her think, She had forgiven her captors long ago, perhaps even being a little selfish in the process, or in the vain of self-interest, her father once told her—and now it came to mind, “If you can’t forgive the person for forgiveness sake, do it for yourself, so you can let go, and go forward in life,” and she did just that, and it made sense to her back then, and now she needed it, but there was an issue unsettled in her mine.

For a while now, she remembered Johnny’s eyes, those pitying eyes of irony, and now looking into the glass of a clothing shop near Puno and Real streets, she saw her reflection, her scrutinizing eyes, those eyes that, her prominent dissect eyes that, they were not the ones that killed him, she exclaimed to herself, “oh no,” she muttered, nor the ones that killed Juan Diego, or Carlos—thus showing little sign of emotion, she wondered why she wanted to laugh, but didn’t, insisted on showing no emotion, for they were all dead now, she knew even Angel was dead, she read about the police finding his corpse buried near where she was buried. Or that is what she remembered anyways.
Her soul told her she wanted to be in compliance with God’s rules, to forgive, so she could be forgiven. Perhaps she had emptied all that out in what was now an abandoned mine—; then came thunder and lightening overhead, and she woke up for her little trance, her daydreaming, and thoughts, she escaped the radiogram that was being sent to her by her subconscious, contorting her soft little body to keep those thoughts, unforgiving thoughts, away from her, adopting a passive attitude, she started walking, looking about, and stopped and talked to the father, a priest as he was checking the prayer books at the Cathedral in the pews, and she told him her thoughts, and asked what to do.
“Tell me father, “she pleaded, “Have I sinned because my heart is not as forgiving as my mind?”
The priest looked deep into her eyes, “Oh, the magic of the devil,” he said, with a convicting tone, “those evil spirits that haunt a man, and a woman, twist things, nothing young lady is black and white in the invisible world, not even witches in the seeable one, the laborer of forgiveness is not straight forward either, you forgave joylessly—so it appears, but you forgave nonetheless, and with a touch of contempt I gather, and now you feel the blood they shed, that has been shed is stained on you, like ink on sheepskin, there forever. We all fumble like blind men here on earth, fighting the unequivocally missing links. To tell the truth, as I think you have done, no hold no concrete accusations in your heart, you are doing right, and you have implied that the two of you, that is, God and you, are working this out. The devil puts ideas in everybody’s head, looking for weak points. It is true what they say about him, he surrounds you then vanishes, into a gray blur, leaves you lost in the labyrinth of the underground mines. Go child, shrug him off, and everything will work out, so don’t despair.”
And she did what he said to do, she left, serious, yet staring at him, somewhat fascinated he had the words—some words of comfort, why didn’t she? With her bulging eyes, listening to the music in the park, music that seemed to come out of the water, defused throughout the park, she knew she’d not miss anymore sleep, and even though still disoriented and confused on some matters, she had buried most of her discontent, inside the rags they took off her to rape her, and bury her alive, she buried those shapeless sins with those rags—once and for all, thinking, if God says he forgives, He must also forget—thus was her conclusion, and then she heard a voice whisper, it was her mother’s, “Funny bumping into you here,” she mentioned, “Lets get some Pantone?” And she loved that idea, they both loved Pantone, and there was a little café across the street, a Japanese gentlemen owned it, and thus, she went and they had coffee and Pantone until their hearts were content.


Written at 3:45 a.m., Friday, 12-19-2008

Switched to Gravity ((Chasing the Caribou, near Barrow, Alaska)(Suspenseful Flash Ficiton))

Switched to Gravity
(Chasing the Caribou, near Barrow, Alaska)

(Suspenseful Flash Fiction)


(Summer of 1996) He put his nose straight forward, straight down, less than one-hundred feet from the surface of the tundra, the Russian pilot was chasing caribou, over the wide open spaces between Barrow, Alaska, and Point Lay, alongside the Chukchi Sea, then inland two-hundred and fifty miles we went, then back to Barrow.

We had just left Point Lay, now was further inland, in the interior of this isolated region, he spotted a herd of caribou, descended from five-hundred feet to one-hundred, watching the caribou herd running in a sedate circle across the brownish tundra of June.
He had showed his flying skills earlier by doing some loops high in the sky, spun from 2000-feet up, and dived to five hundred, now one hundred. The good thing was that there were no poles or trees to get in the small plane’s way—thank goodness.
He closed the throttle, was right in back of the caribou, and then opened it again climbing, frightened the animals some, for me it was a high.
“All right,” he said to me, “you got what you wanted, was that close enough, I mean, I almost rammed into them, matter of fact, don’t tell anyone I got so close, I could lose my license over this.”
“It was close, almost too close, but I got to see them, instead of seeing dots, underneath the plane’s wheels.” I commented.
He was now smiling, almost laughing, and doing some thinking, didn’t give me the impression he digest all I said; next, he was now turning the plane around and chasing the herd again. I could almost touch their tails, and then he checked the gauges, and made a last turn upwind, over their heads passing them like a huge eagle.
“For gad’s sake, stop chasing them,” I said, “I think you’re scaring the daylights out of them!”
“Right,” he said, “let’s get along,” and he pointed the head of the plane towards Barrow, north.


It was a drowsy hazy day, he slid slowly beneath some clouds, shifting slightly, rising and falling.
He, the Russian Pilot, was coming just to the right of the small narrow airstrip at Barrow, Alaska, the plane fishtailed, trying to land, overshooting a little, not having the extra speed and height he needed, he cut the switch, raised the nose of the plane, his tail was down, the landing was seemingly fine, my stomach went up to my throat—blood filled my nose, then went up to my head, so it felt, as my head hit the front of the instrument panel, then I heard the roar of wind as he opened up his window and flicked his cigarette out,
“It’s a crash,” he said, “hang on,” and that was all the time he had left to say anything, and had he not switched to gravity—who knows? The adjustment saved us from a fatal crash.



Note: There is more truth to this story then meets the eye, on the white and black, perhaps it should be called historical fiction. Taken place June, 1996; written August 27, 2008; most everything I write has historical fiction in it, or some kind of experience I’ve had. I usually do not pull it out of my head unless it has been there.

The Porn Star (Flash Eldritch Fiction)

The Porn Star
(Flash Eldritch Fiction)



He couldn’t stay married so he simply stopped getting married after his forth marriage. It was most difficult to keep a romantic relationship, romantic, ongoing while living this lifestyle, he’d tell you up front, even his wives he told up front,
“It's very hard, extremely complicated, if indeed, possible, matter of fact, statistics are against you, that is to say, the greater part of marriages no matter where you go around town, the state, the country, and perhaps around the world, maybe not including Bangkok, don't work, they just don’t work. Sad but true.”
“Why?” said his new and youthful girlfriend of 23, he being 57-years old at time.
“Very rarely do they ever last a long time,” he exclaimed.
“Because of your age?” she asked, realizing it took a lot to get him going, if not using Viagra, that is to say, he was limp at times: their relationship being less than a year old, it never dawned on her it could be familiarity. He emotionally got going, but physically it could be troublesome, if not at times a hard strain.
He was like the old Greeks, the Romans, the Asian societies, feeling man was not made to have one ongoing physical-sexual relationship, why in heavens name he picked out a heavy duty Judeo-Christian, with strong cultural values in that area, was beyond everyone scope of reason, matter of fact it bothered us some at the studio to have him select such a person. Not criticizing her, rather him, he knew better, I mean when he told her the truth about him, it was crushing, and what did he expect? What he thought he should have, he tried, that alternative lifestyle, he had the attitude, but now he wanted a mate to fit into it, when it wasn’t him.
He never felt guilty, that was not him, not at all, and she felt guilty for falling in love with him. He told her he was a porn star, and the cut, petite,
Spanish girl, stood in shock, just staring, said, “What does that mean?”
He said, “I love you to piece, every part of you, I adore you, and love looking at you naked, and want to marry you, and I know I have taken you before marriage, with the intention to marry you, but I had to tell you first of my profession, I have made five-hundred porn movies, and perhaps because of this my genitals, even at fifty-seven seem to travel in all directions, and I don’t want to stop, we can marry and let me stray, my heart will remain with you.”
Then she said, “Then it shouldn’t matter if I stray?”
He thought about it “Isn’t that against your values?”
“Yes,” she said, “but I am pregnant!”
“What does that have to do with the statement you made on straying?” said the porn star.
“I don’t know, I just said it,” said the Judeo-Christian, Spanish girl.
“We’ll get married than with the understanding we both can stray?” he said.
“But it isn’t your child,” she commented.
He stood there in shock, dumbfounded, “What do you mean it is not your child?”
“Your producer came over one night when you were gone, and asked for you, evidently you were bragging you hand a virgin, and he wanted to see me, he told my of your business, and rapped me.”
Before she could say another word, he was out of her apartment, and on his way to the studio. He was so mad, when he walked into the studio, he hit Carlos, the director so hard along side of the head, and he killed him; and was sentenced to twenty-years in jail.
The only thing she ever said to him was at the courthouse, when they were taking him away, “Jealousy is a hard thing for me to understand, perhaps as hard as a physical and emotional monogamous relationship is for you.”
The Spanish girl never showed up to see him while in prison, never wrote him, never wanted a thing to do with him thereafter, and was never pregnant. And he died on August 27, 2007—at the ripe old age of seventy-seven years old, with all those prison inmates, his new buddies.


8-27-2008 714

Bittersweet, Were her Kisses! (Chapters: 7 & 8))

Ms Lopez, Johnny, and Lee (1968-69) 7




Apartments by the Cathedral (by Summit Street)



At first, Lee had doubts about dating a Mexican, back in those days, in St. Paul, it was unheard of almost, not so much because she had bronze skin (although that could surely become an issue), perhaps more so because they had a reputation of being dirty, and lived on the West Side of the city, it was the same with blacks, they did not date one another freely with whites, and there was a small section of blacks over on Rondo Street.
Seldom did you find a Mexican family in the North End part of the city, and Ms Lopez was perhaps the only one daring enough to venture into unproven territory; or that part of the city, and now Lee and Johnny Lowery, were living in an apartment off Cathedral Hill (Lee had moved from his one room apartment, on York Street), by the Capitol, next to the North End.
Ms Lopez, she seemed seriously attracted to him, and she was pretty, with a squeak in her voice, that was cute. During this time they saw a lot of each other, and Lee never brought up Greg to Johnny, because he was sure he would not be supportable, why should he, he was a first Cousin to him. Johnny was the same age as Lee, and they had fought a few years earlier, and Lee had won the battle, but had to concede he won, in fear of reprisals of the clan, as Johnny and Lee had ran off into the woods to settle the fight away from the others. Lee was cleaver, enough to figure out, should he continued to fight Johnny in front of the gang, and a few of his relatives he’d be ripped apart by the gang if indeed he was becoming the better man. And so Johnny suggests this, and they walked back together, talking like to chums. It was a matter of pride to have to fight. Neither Johnny or Lee wanted to fight one another, but the gang egged them on, knowing they were the same height, age; but Lee was twice as strong, and like a bull, he was but fifteen then.
So they remained allies, in that capacity, and lived together by the Cathedral (and in years to come, would travel to California together); a grand Cathedral, with perhaps the largest pillars in the world. He figured if Sandy was around he’d date her off and on, she was not showing up much, and in-between, Ms Lopez would do. This was a little different relationship though, because she cooked for him, sloppily but cleans, most of the time. In a way it was a luxury he did not have to spend a mint on her, and during this time, Jerry from the dojo was hounding him to go to San Francisco, to meet the Great Yamaguchi family, who had an international dojo there, and study Karate from the most impressive instructor in the world (and eventually he would, and his instructor would be Goshi Yamaguchi, and his father Gogen, otherwise known as ‘The Cat’.))Goju-Kai Karate))



The Meeting of Greg (1985) 8


Lee had learned to come to the point at this time of his life, and so he did with Greg, when he met him accidentally, walking down Rice Street, St. Paul, Minnesota, 1985; it had been close to eighteen years since he had that fight on Indians Mound with him. He didn’t recognize him at first, but he stopped, when the man asked, “Lee Stone, remember me, the beer bottle?” Then it dawned on him. “I still don’t know why you had to use a beer bottle on me; you could have beaten me with your fists.”
And so Lee came to the point, too much forethought or preparation, its purpose was to obvious from the first, so he said,” You were trying to rape a girl, and slapped her around, seventeen years old, never a merciful thought about that, how about her scares, you left her some you know, and her mother was grateful!” (A few seconds passed)—but I suppose between the two, the tension seemed endless (Lee maintained an ever, held voice, not a trace of self-betraying in any form of expression, He tried to be sensitized to his mind for the blow, when he finished there was a silence (he knew Greg was not sorry for what he did, just sorry he didn’t get away with it.)

At all events, nothing happened in that little conformation—yet Lee was guarded during it, he took a long look into his eyes, wanted to move on, it was useless to talk to him, but remained stone still for the moment.
This was still the old Greg, the one he knew so long ago, thought Lee, the un-reflected, flippant boy he kicked the shit out of, so many years ago. And he did not dare turn his back on him too long. In a way Lee felt, if not looking modestly dissatisfied, perhaps he would want to resettle things with round two (better put, get even), you know, fist to fist, kick to kick, and so forth and on. But Greg didn’t show that, so it was pointless for Lee to become an offensive fighter, when he was really a defensive one. And there was no sense in provoking, unless provoked, and so with a timid, but cheerfulness he ventured onward.


(Thoughts)) As Lee thought about this, walking away from Greg, for Greg had said what he needed to say, perhaps, wanting to say for a long time; and for Lee there wasn’t really nothing in the world back then but living, life and youth, everyone held on to it. And to be afraid was to know there was blood in your veins, and to do what a man has to do was right. To have done nothing would have deaden him, he thought all this as he walked down Rice Street, away from Greg, never given that up, and was not about to. He didn’t expect him to see, but he should have known at this age, much more than he displayed, yet he hadn’t. As He glanced back, he really didn’t want to go to the party, for obvious reasons, this being one. Expressionless, he continued to walk down the street, passing McDonalds, and towards Maryland, watching the flickering of lights going on in the passing of cars, twilight was seeping in, when day and night meet, for just a moment, and then go their own ways, and the dark seeps over the light…then the light goes out like a blown out candle, completely gone, only the moon, and arc lights along the streets, left. ‘No,’ he told himself, it would be the same way had he to do it over I suppose, there is no time to stop and ask for advise in such matters, he had no one to fear.))