Southbound to Florida 1971

From 2013

Last week Vladmar announced that he was heading to Florida. The Pittsburgh native never been there before. 2013 had been a hard winter.

"I can't believe that I'm fifty years old and have never to the Holy Land."

The Sunshine State was special, but even more so back in the last century.

"My first trip to FLA was in Spring 1971. My three friends and I drove down in a Chevy Nova from Boston to Fort Lauderdale. I-95 was half-finished. There was no beltway around Washington. The weather got warm once we hit the south and we continued straight to Savannah. We drank and smoked reefer the entire journey. The cops didn't stop us once. We were 18 year-old freshmen on college break. Only I had long hair."

"You were lucky." Vladmar had no luck with the police. He looked like a gypsy.

"We crossed the state line listening to WBZ's broadcast of the Bruins-Canadians playoff around 9pm. We were leading 'les Habitants' by two goals in the 3rd period. The station's 50,000 kilowatt signal gave out at the Florida welcome stand. We drank complimentary OJ, feeling good." What else I remember about the trip down are What I remember about that trip was driving down the uncompleted I-95 through Virginia, the South of the Border truck stop, where we bought fireworks, the division of white and black communities, and a section of US1 south of Savannah

"You never beat the Canadians back then." Vladmar was a Penguins fan. They were the Bruins' next opponents in this year's Stanley Cup. They had a big team.

"That's right, but I thought we were lucky. The station faded to static at the welcoming rest stop and I drank free Free OJ thinking about finally throwing off the curse of the Les Habs over the Bs. The next morning I woke up on a palm-lined beach. We swam in the Gulf Stream at dawn.

"Fort Lauderdale."

"Our crash pad was across the street from the infamous Elbow Room in which more co-eds have exorcised the demons of alcohol than any other south Florida bar. I bought the local newspaper and read that Jean Beliveau scored 2 goals to tie the game. We lost in overtime."

"No Stanley Cup victory."

"Fucking Canadians. That night I drank in the Elbow Room." It had been featured in the movie WHERE THE BOYS ARE. "I met a girl from Biloxi and we walked on the beach. Stars glistening above the Gulf Stream. I lit a joint. We smoked surrounded by other teenage couples making out like turtles getting ready to lay eggs. I stared the constellation Orion and breathed the smell of salt off the breeze.

"Consolation prize."

"I would have rather the Stanley Cup."

"Maybe in another life."

"Have a good time in Florida."

I remember that defeat well, but also the kiss of that girl from Mississippi.

It tasted of the South.

To view segments of April 8, 1971 disaster, please go to the following URL

http://www.habseyesontheprize.com/2009/11/5/1115711/habs-bruins-april-8-1971-a

Damn Les Habitants -1971

Written 2011

My introduction to French was via the heavy accent of Pepé Le Pew. The cartoon skunk appeared on TV every Saturday morning in Maine during the 1950s. Pepe never got the girl. Skunks smelled bad and supposedly the French also never bathed with soap. France was across the Atlantic Ocean, but another France was much closer to my home across the harbor from Portland.

Quebec.

The largest minority in Maine was the French Canadians. They worked in the mills and logging camps. A radio station from Montreal played songs for these workers and their families. I listened to them on a ROCKET RADIO, Miniman Model MG-302.

Somehow attaching its alligator clips to the metal frame of my bed powered the crystal. I listened to the French music. None of the words had any sense, but several evenings a week in the winter a hoarse voiced announced the hockey games from ‘le Forum’.

The Canucks in Maine supported the Canadians or ‘les Habitants’. The team dominated hockey in the NHL, winning six of the decades’ Stanley Cups. My father came from an old New England family. We rooted for the Boston Bruins. They always lost to the Habs just like Pepe le Pew never got the girl.

My father moved our family from Maine to the South Shore of Boston in 1960. My ROCKET RADIO was upgraded to a Japanese transistor and I caught the Montreal station when the atmosphere was clear of static. The music was changing from smooth to pop. A young singer was very popular with teens.

Francoise Hardy was the ‘Yeh-Yeh Girl’.

I bought 45s in Mattapan Square. The nuns at Our Lady of the Foothills taught us French. I understood the lyrics and plotted to meet her one day.

Pop lost favor for rock.

I loved the Sultans' garage rock version of LE POUPEE QUI FAIT NON.

But some things never changed.

The Bruins continued to lose to the Canadians with regularity and the Montreal team captured four Stanley Cups in a row, until the Bruins’ Bobby Orr scored a Cup winning goal in 1970. The victory was against an expansion team, the St. Louis Blues, but this was their first Cup since 1940.

They had been lucky to avoid the Canadians during the playoffs.

They never lost to the Bruins.

April 1971 the Bruins were favored to beat the Canadians in the semi-finals. The goalie Gerry Cheever allowed one goal in the first meeting. It was Easter Week and my three friends and I were driving down to Fort Lauderdale for Spring Break.

We had rented an apartment across from the Elbow Room, famed from the 60s movie WHERE THE BOYS ARE.

Below Washington we entered the Deep South. We were longhairs and rednecks hated hippies almost as much as we hated the Canadians.

Our only stops were for gas and food.

Throughout Georgia we listened to WBZ's broadcast of the second game between the Habs and Bs. The Boston-based radio station had a strong 50,000 watt signal. The Bruins went up 5-2 at the end of the 2nd period. The signal died at the Florida border.

In my mind the Bruins were returning to the Stanley Cup. We stopped for complimentary OJ at the state hospitality stop and drove the rest of the night to reach our destination at dawn.

I had never been to Florida before and I marveled at the palm trees, the Gulf Stream, and co-eds in bikinis.

Our apartment had a view of it all. I went down to the store for beer and picked up the local newspaper, opening the sports section. I blinked several times in disbelief before the printed tragedy hit me with full force.

The Habs had come back from the abyss and scored 5 goals in the 3rd period.

The series was tied at 1-1.

The Bruins pushed the Canadians to the limit and lose game 7.

That misfortune was repeated often over the next four decades, but two nights ago with history on the line the Bruins played the Habs in another game seven. I was watching from Mullanes across the street from Frank's Lounge, which does not do hockey.

The teams were tied into OT.

I was ready for the loss, but the Bruins of 2011 were not those of 2010 or 1971. We won the game and I toasted my team with another beer. I was the only Bruins fan in the bar. It felt good and I lifted my glass one more time. “To Pepe Le Pew.”

I hope that somewhere he got the girl in the end.

Sly Stone At Franklin Park July 7, 1974

Sly and the Family Stone launched funky soul in the late 60s with the Godfather of Soul, James Brown, and Parliament-Funkadelic.

The group hit mega-gold with their fourth LP, STAND and its # 1 hit EVERYDAY PEOPLE. Success was not a friend to Sly. His cocaine habit infected the other band members. He no-showed a third of his concerts in 1971 and passed out at others. Audiences rioted, earning Sly and the Stone a reputation for trouble and more was expected on July 7, 1974, when the West Coast group headlined an outdoor show at Boston’s Franklin Park.

Richard Pryor opened the day. The comedian was followed by Donald Byrd and the Blackbirds with their cross-over hit ROCK CREEK PARK, The Hues Corporation's ROCK THE BOAT, and Tower of Power. 20,000 fans had paid $5.50 to benefit the Elma Lewis School of Arts. I missed the show, because I was working in Cape Ann as a busboy at a queer restaurant, but my good friend attended the concert and to this day Andrew Kornfeld says that this show was the best concert he has ever seen. I'm sure it was, although lately I recall dropping LSD with a black friend from Mattapan and standing on a seat and dancing to STAND. And the trees surrounding the concert. Andy says I was with him too.

Sly and the Family Stone were notorious no-shows for their concerts. Supposedly after Richard Pryor finished his routine, he said, "Don't worry, Sly is in Boston and he'll be here as soon as he's finished robbing all the drug dealrs in Roxbury."

A big laugh.

After his peak Sly’s musical efforts dropped down the Billboard charts, although songs from STAND remain a mainstay of 60s rock revival radio stations.

By the 80s he had vanished from the scene.

In 2006 Sly appeared at the Grammy Awards to play I WANT TO TAKE YOU HIGHER.

At the end of the song the once-time superstar walked off the stage and drove off on a motorcycle.

Future outings across the world amplified the singer’s embrace of failure.

Gone were the money, the mansions, the cars, and the acclaim.

Several years ago Sly re-entered the news with the media excoriating his fall from grace.

He lived in a van. His neighborhood was Crenshaw in LA. Friends supported this life style. He maintained that he was happy.

Straight too.

The newspapers reported his present state with joy, for those who will never achieve love nothing better than to witness a high-flyer's descent from heaven to reinforce their lack of success.

CBS and Fox News aren't waiting for the collapse of the banks. They love the rich.

But not the n----- rich. They get what they deserve.

Da money come and da money go.

Sly was no exception, but I'm sure he had a good time. All I want for him is to have a happy ending, because listening to SEX MACHINE is a gas.

And a year ago the music industry had to pay Sly his royalties.

He was ever happy again.

To hear Sly and the Family Stone's SEX MACHINE

Please go to the following URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cffPwrmx6KE

Damn les Habitants - 2011

My introduction to French was via the heavy accent of a cartoon skunk, who appeared on TV every Saturday morning during the 1950s. Pepe Le Pew never got the girl. Skunks smelled bad and supposedly the French also never bathed with soap. I knew little else of France. That country lay across the Atlantic Ocean, but another France was much closer to my hometown of Falmouth Foresides and that France was Quebec.

The largest minority in Maine was the French Canadians. They worked in the mills and logging camps. A radio station from Montreal played songs for these workers and their families. I listened to the Quebec stations on a ROCKET RADIO, Miniman Model MG-302. Somehow attaching its alligator clips to the metal frame of my bed powered the crystal. I listened to the French music. None of the words had any sense, but several evenings a week in the winter a hoarse voiced announced the hockey games from le Forum in Montreal.

The Canucks in Maine supported the Canadians or 'les Habitants and the team dominated hockey in the NHL, winning six of the decade's Stanley Cups. My father came from an old New England family. We rooted for the Boston Bruins. They always lost to the Habs just like Pepe le Pew never got the girl.

n 1960 my father moved our family from Maine to the South Shore of Boston. My ROCKET RADIO was upgraded to a Japanese transistor and I caught the Montreal station clear of static. The music was changing from smooth to pop led by Francoise Hardy, the Yeh-Yeh Girl.

I bought her 45s in Mattapan Square. The nuns at Our Lady of the Foothills taught us French. I partially understood the lyrics and plotted to meet her one day.

Pop lost favor for rock in the late 60s.

I loved the Sultans' garage rock version of LE POUPEE QUI FAIT NON.

But some things never changed.

The Bruins continued to lose to the Canadians with regularity and the Montreal team captured four Stanley Cups in a row, until the Bruins' Bobby Orr scored a Cup winning goal in 1970. The victory was against an expansion team, the St. Louis Blues, but I didn't care, because this triumph was their first Cup since 1940, plus they had been lucky to avoid the Canadians during the playoffs.

They never lost to the Bruins.

A year later the Bruins were favored to beat the Canadians in the semi-finals. The goalie Gerry Cheever had allowed one goal in the first meeting. It was Easter Week and my three friends and I were driving down to Fort Lauderdale for Spring Break.

We had rented an apartment across from the Elbow Room, famed from the 60s movie WHERE THE BOYS ARE.

Below Washington DC we entered the Deep South. We were longhairs and rednecks hated hippies almost as much as we hated the Canadians.

Our only stops were for gas and food.

Throughout Georgia we listened to WBZ's broadcast of the second game between the Habs and Bs. The Boston-based radio station had a strong 50,000 watt signal. The Bruins went up 5-2 at the end of the 2nd period. The signal died at the Florida border.

In my mind the Bruins were returning to the Stanley Cup. We stopped for complimentary OJ at the state hospitality stop and drove the rest of the night to reach our destination at dawn.

I had never been to Florida and marveled at the palm trees, the Gulf Stream, and co-eds in bikinis.

At noon I went down to the store for beer and picked up the local newspaper, opening the sports section. I blinked several times in disbelief before the printed tragedy hit me with full force.

The Habs had come back from the abyss and scored 5 goals in the 3rd period.

The series was tied at 1-1.

After the Easter break Bruins pushed the Canadians to the limit and lose game 7.

That misfortune was repeated over the next four decades, but in late Spring of 2011 with history on the line the Bruins played the Habs in another game 7. I watched from Mullanes across the street from Frank's Lounge, which does not do hockey.

The teams went into OT tied.

I was ready for the loss, but the Bruins of 2011 were not those of 2010 or 1971. We won the game and I toasted my team with another beer. I was the only Bruins fan in the bar and I lifted my glass to Pepe Le Pew, hoping that he had been lucky to get the girl in the end, because no one loses forever.

HISTOIRE DE MELODIE NELSON by Serge Gainsbourg

Music sucked in Pattaya. Old farangs sing HOTEL CALIFORNIA and bar girls dance to boy band love ballads, while Thai bands play dinosaur rock for drunken tourists.

Nothing was wrong with a bad reprise of SMOKE ON THE WATER, except I once hung out in nightclubs and bars in which music meant more than a tune you can sing while drinking beer with your mates, hoping the Viagra will work with your new missus. Pattaya certainly doesn’t have a bar close to Max's Kansas City, where you could see the Jam, MC5, or Iggy.

Not even close and none of the geezers here care, because most Pattaya farangs are so low-class that their mental playlist is whatever was playing on their car radio i.e. muzak for 9-to-5 existences and none of them ever heard Serge Gainsbourg's HISTOIRE DE MELODIE NELSEN.

And that’s too bad, because this 26-minute masterpiece set a high-water mark in 1971.

Forget the sexy French lyrics.

Forget Jane Birkin's breathy interpretation, for her daughter, Charlotte, was sexier in LEMON INCEST.

Dig how the guitar and bass weaved a groove unattainable in this modern world on pre-packaged CDs, as Serge crooned his tale of a Lolita sans the fear of moral outrage. This concept album wiped the floor with the Beatles' SERGEANT PEPPER.

But they were no longer a band in 1971, but they must have spun this record and said, “We fucked up.”

Horrible to know you will never write anything as good as HISTOIRE OF MELODIE NELSEN.

Worse is to copy the LP like Beck, a talented plagiarist, because he was no Jean-Claude Vannier, who arranged the 33 rpm disc for Serge, who was the ugliest man in Christendom, yet ended up with Jane Birkin as his sex slave.

The two of them might have had Jimmie Page play lead guitar. That was the rumor, but the riff sounded nothing like his solos with Led Zeppelin or the Yardbirds.

Understated and raw leaving you asking for more of 15 year-old girls on bicycles, Rolls-Royce, defloweration and a dirge about Melodie dying in a plane crash.

Not 9/11.

It was genius and I advised anyone with any musical taste to pick up this chef d’ouvres, for a song with the line ‘une poupée qui perd l’équilibre, la jupe retroussée sur ses pantalons blancs… (A doll who lost her balance, her skirt pushed up over her white leggings) wasn’t getting any radio play on the American Oldies station.

Not this year.

But I got it on right now

Midnight. Gin-tonic. Dark outside.

Melodie Nelson.

The LP should have been a big hit, except French music has failed to dent the US charts. The only excursion into the Top Ten was by the Singing Nun with her 1963 hit DOMINIQUE. The language was a problem. No teenager wants to dance to music whose lyrics need subtitles.

Tant pis or too bad, because French music has produced hundreds of great songs by Alain Bashung, Lizzie Mercier Descloux, Jane Birkin, Manu Chao, Julien Clerc, Etienne Daho, Jacno, Jacques Dutronc, France Gall, Françoise Hardy, Indochine, Marc Lavoine, Vanessa Paradis, Les Rita Mitsouko, Alain Souchon, Les têtes raides, Tahiti 80, Téléphone, Sylvie Vartan ad infinitum.

And of course Serge Gainsbourg.

Recently I searched to find their names of the musicians and someone added them to Wikpedia.

# Alan Parker - guitar
# Herbie Flowers - bass
# Douglas Wright - drums
# Alan Hawkshaw - piano
# Jean-Claude Vannier - arrangements, Orchestra Director
# Jane Birkin - vocal parts (and posed for front cover art)

A belated thanks to them for the hours of listening to a gem.

To hear Melodie Nelson go to the following URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X5LwFCHNe4

GARRISON JUNCTION by Peter Nolan Smith

In the late summer of 1972 my college friend and I hitchhiked across across Montana. The interstate was under construction. Ptrov and I got stranded in Garrison Junction for a good reason.

Twenty miles farther south was the Montana State Prison.

A sign warned motorists about escaped convicts.

No one was taking a chance on two hippies not being members of the Manson Family and we waited for hours.

I thought about jumping on a train.

Which was never good idea in the high plains.

Trains usually went to a nowhere more nowhere than where you were.

"Just be patient. We can't change anything. We are here. Nowhere else. Sooner or later we won't be here."

"Like an anti-Black Hole?"

Ptrov and I were math majors.

We understood a little more of the universe than the rest of the world.

Around sunset a Marine and his brother stopped for us. They were heading to Woburn.

Only twenty miles from my parents' house on the South Shore. We made the trip in two days. My mother was happy to see me, but said after a hug, "Take a shower. You smell like a hobo."

Actually I smelled worse and over the years Deer Lodge faded from my memory.

In the early spring of 1994 Ms. Carolina and I were on a road trip through Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming. She liked the open road and Montana's speed limit was 'whatever was reasonable and proper.

Someplace east of Missoula Ms. Carolina passed a state trooper cooping in front of a truck piggybacking two trailers. The Chevy's speedo was wavering over 100.

"Don't hit the breaks. It's a sign of guilt," I warned from the passenger seat. The speed limit in Montana was whatever was reasonable and prudent.

She stepped on the gas and the cruiser remained in its hiding place.

The Big Sky Country was good for speed and cattle.

"Slow down, slow down." We had exited the Interstate.

"What is it?" Ms. Carolina checked the rearview mirrors for a state trooper.

"This is Garrison Junction. Where Ptrov and I were stranded for a day. Pull over."

Ms. Carolina had heard the story and pulled onto the shoulder.

Once the Chevy came to a stop, I got out of the car. Ms. Carolina joined me.

"Does it look any different?"

"A little wider and there used to be a sign here saying NO STOPPING HITCHHIKERS COULD BE ESCAPED CONVICTS."

"Not a good place to be stuck."

"And we were stuck. By evening we were going to jump a train to get out of here." Today the rail junction was empty of freight cars. "It didn't matter where it was going as long as it was out of here."

In the anti-Black Hole, but not today and Ms. Carolina broke the power by saying, "Not much of a place."

"There was no food. Nothing." Twenty-three years hadn't changed Garrison Junction, but my mind's eye saw two young hippies on the side of the road. We were nineteen. Neither of us was a criminal.

"Nothing here now either." I kicked a rock on the shoulder. It bounced into the high grass.

Ms. Carolina and I got back in the car.

This time I had only stopped five minutes in Garrison Junction and those five minutes felt like forever.

Ms. Carolina had a heavy foot on the gas and top speed was a good thing in Montana.

Especially since it was prudent.

WHEN FAT MEN FLY Chapter 5 by Peter Nolan Smith

After work on Friday I hitchhiked to the Cape Cod. The first ride was to the Sagamore Bridge and the next one got me to Chatham. It was dark by the time arrived in Truro. Linda was happy to see me. Her daughter was shy at first, but after dinner I won her heart by reading CINDERELLA. She fell asleep on the sofa and I carried her to bed. Linda and I had a glass of wine and watched the stars fill the night sky over the bay. We tried to be quiet in bed.

That weekend the weather was classic summertime for New England. Blue skies flirted with a seasonally warm sea. Gulls glided over salt marshes on zephyr winds. Her daughter loved the omelette I cooked for breakfast. Linda drove us over to Nauset Beach in her Chevy convertible. The water was cold enough to sting your flesh. I draped myself in seaweed and Linda’s daughter laughingly called me the 'monster'.

That evening we ate lobster on the porch.

Linda made a little more noise in bed.

Sunday afternoon Linda drove me to the Chatham Circle. She kissed me good-bye and her daughter smooched my cheek. Linda’s mother was coming down for the week. I told her that I’d see her in the office work after the 4th. I said nothing about going to New York the following weekend. We never spoke about our past loves. I kissed her through the window and stuck out my thumb. A hippie van heading for Hyannis stopped on the shoulder. Three rides later I was in Boston.

The next five days passed with increasing slowness, especially at work. I arrived on time and punched out at 5pm every night. My father and I met my mother for dinner at Joe Techi's in the North End on Wednesday evening. We talked politics. Both had voted for Nixon. They were pro-war. We agreed on what to have for dessert, a slice of Boston cream pie each. After dinner I walked them to their Delta 88.

“When are you cutting you hair?” my father asked in front of the Old North Church.

“I’m certainly not getting it cut for your boss.” Everyone in the office hated Mr. Ryan. Linda had mentioned more than once how he kept my father under him to boost his figures. My father was too good a team player to speak up on his own behalf.

“It’s a sin for a man to have such good hair.” My mother toyed with my hair with envy. She visited the beauty shops every Friday afternoon. Her perm was extinct by Monday. I thought that she was more beautiful au natural. I refrained from telling the truth. She loved her bouffant. It was very Jackie Kennedy.

“You look like Beethoven.” My father sported a buzz-cut, although his sideburns were long to show younger people that he was slightly in touch with the times. He loved classic music. Everything else was noise. "An angry Beethoven."

“I’m not that moody.”

“Teenagers are always moody.” My mother slipped me $20. “Go buy yourself a nice shirt.”

“And have a good weekend.” My father cuffed me a $10. I kissed them both. I had spent most of my 4th of Julys with them; eating hot dogs, swimming at Nantasket Beach, and watching fireworks over Paragon Park. I almost wished that I was a kid again, so they could take me home, instead I waved good-bye and walked over Beacon Hill to Boylston Street. Walker’s Western Store was still open. I bought a Levi jacket and jeans for my trip to New York. I wanted to look good for Sookie. From what everyone had said, she was even prettier than before.

The Friday train to Penn Station was at 5:15. I would have punched out early, except Mr. Ryan had warned the office staff that he expected his staff to remain at their desks until 5pm. He entrusted this edict to my father. Mr. Ryan left at 2 for Cape Ann.

When the clock finally hit five, everyone raced out of the building and I ran across downtown to South Station with a canvas carry-all banging against my back. The line at the ticket booth was too long and I ran to the departure platform. The Amtrak train was even later. The conductor didn’t charge extra for my ticket. He was a hippie too. I bought a beer from the club car and watched Boston disappear from the windows. New York was five hours away.

Upon my arrival at Penn Station I phoned Eddie’s apartment. No one answered the phone. I didn’t know how to reach the East Village by subway, so I exited from the terminal and flagged a Checker on 6th Avenue. The driver was a fellow Teamster. He didn’t turn on the meter. Normally the fare to St. Marks Place was almost $3. I gave him a five.

“You want I should wait?”

“No, everything will be alright.” I raised my eyes to the 3rd floor. The windows were dark. Two sweating junkies were on the stoop. I had to step around them. I pressed the buzzer. No one replied on the intercom. The junkies laughed at my departure. I walked down to the Gem Spa and dropped a dime into the payphone. The ringing only brought on more ringing. I returned to the building. The two junkies had multiplied to four. They eyed my bag. I walked past the stairs and ordered a beer at the Grassroots Bar. One easily became two.

Thirty minutes later I wandered past Eddie’s tenement on the other side of the street. The junkies followed me with their eyes. 1971 was not the Summer of Love and I killed an hour in the St. Mark’s Cinema. A bad copy of EAST RIDER flickered against the torn screen. Someone sat behind me during the acid trip in New Orleans. It was one of the junkies. I exited the theater and climbed the steps to the entrance. A biker in leather was exiting. The junkies rushed the door. I slammed it in their face.

“We’ll get you when you come out.” A rat-faced addict snarled with his nose pressed to the glass.

I climbed the stairs two at a time, praying the door held tight. On the 3rd floor landing I couldn’t hear anything other than my heart beat, then Dave Van Ronk started singing BIRD ON A WIRE. I knocked on the door and several seconds later it opened wide.

“What are you doing here?” Sookie asked with unmasked surprise. She was a little heavier than before, but the extra pounds had vanquished her skeletal visage. The rumors were right. Sookie was beautiful.

“Didn’t Wayne tell you I was coming?” I peeked over her shoulder. Wayne and Marie were on the couch. Eddie was standing by the fish tanks. His skin appeared to have melted from his face and his body flesh sagged from his bones. It was Eddie. He had lost the weight.

“Yes, but he didn’t say anything about when.” Sookie was wearing a powder blue suede vest and no shirt. Her matching skirt was cut short to an inch below her butt. She answered my fantasy with reality until I realized that my arrival was an intrusion.

Flowers were arranged in vases. The walls were painted a gentle rose pink. Curtains covered the windows. Wayne and Marie lounged on a new sofa. Eddie’s old throne was missing from the living room. The apartment was now more than one person’s home.

“C’mon in.” Eddie was embarrassed by my expression.

“It’s better if I go.” I was trespassing on a fairy tale re-enactment of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST and my character didn’t exist in the story, except as the village lout.

“You’re here now. Don’t go.” Sookie stepped away from the entrance. The room reeked of marijuana. The phone was off the hook. I put my bag on the floor and Sookie closed the door.

“I can explain everything.” Eddie handed me a joint. It was unlit.

“Don’t.” I had too many questions for which I couldn’t expect an answer, plus I had my own secrets. Sookie lit a match. I inhaled on the joint. The reefer was better than anything we had bought before. “Is there any more of this left?”

“A couple of pounds.” Eddie gestured to the front room. “You can sleep there tonight.”

“No, I’m headed over to Nick’s place in Staten Island.” It was a lie.

“At this hour.” The ex-fat man was more concerned about me than anyone else.

“The ferries run all night long.” I picked up my bag.

“I’m flying tomorrow morning.” Eddie was apologetic without saying he was sorry. “You’re coming to that, aren’t you?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” I looked at Sookie for her invitation. She dropped her eyes. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You really are going to Staten Island?” Sookie went to Eddie.

“Yeah.” I exited from the apartment and walked down the stairs. The junkies waited on the sidewalk. They were in no condition for a fight. They crossed the street and I called Nick from the Gem Spa.

"Eddie's flying tomorrow."

"I know. I'm picking up Joleen. You need a ride?"

"Suit yourself. I'll see you there."

I hung up angry for having come to New York. I wasn't needed here, but I wasn't leaving either until after Eddie's flight. I went over to the hotel on the corner of St. Marks Place and 3rd Avenue. The manager asked for $15. I paid him with a twenty. The room was small and the walls weren’t thick enough to stop the shouts of the couple next door. The sheets were greasy and the pillows smelled of a thousand unwashed heads. Several people tried the lock during the night. I lay on the floor with my feet pressed against the flimsy door. My head rested on my bag. It was uncomfortable, but I finally fell asleep, despite the arguments echoing from the street.

I woke at dawn. My skin itched from bug bites. The heat of the city had exhausted the air in the room. I checked out of the hotel and walked down St. Marks Place. Bodies lay atop sheets of newspaper. One was a junkie from the previous night. He looked dead.

Eddie’s front window was open and I almost buzzed his apartment, instead I headed around the corner to the B&H Dairy and I ordered a bagel with a chocolate egg cream. Someone had left a New York Times on the counter and I read the sports section. The Red Sox had no chance of winning the World Series this year.

Church bells were tolling out 8 o’clock by my return to Eddie’s building. I was just in time, because Sookie’s LeMans was double-parked on the street. The top was down and Wayne was in the back with Marie. Sookie was riding shotgun with Eddie behind the wheel. They girls were wearing halter-tops and hot pants. It was a new look from England. Someone had told me it was popular with prostitutes.

“Any room for me?” I was the 5th wheel.

“Plenty of room in back.” Eddie opened the trunk and then the side door. I threw in my bag and took my place next to Marie. She smiled ‘good morning’ and Wayne brandished the power fist. Eddie started the engine. The V-6 was tuned to purr. Sookie slipped Joni Mitchell on the 8-track. The first song was THE CIRCLE GAME. I read her choice as a message without deciphering the lyrics in my favor. Eddie made the light at St. Marks and turned south on 2nd Avenue.

The two couples spoke to each other often during the trip along the East River over the Brooklyn Bridge down the BQE under the Verrazano Bridge and looping past Coney Island onto a long parkway leading to the ocean. Their words were dialogues meant for lovers. A maze for me. They tried to engage me in their conversations. It was impossible with the wind whistling in my ears. The morning air was thick with humidity, but I caught the scent of the sea from the passing marshes. A plane was lazily circling in the sky. Eddie slowed down to turn left toward a collection of hangars. Most were crowded with Navy reserve aircraft. As we neared the runway, Eddie looked over his shoulder with a nervous smile. A single-engine airplane was waiting on the tarmac with a glider on its towline.

“You have a good day for it.” I studied at the cloudless sky.

“It’s your dream come true.” Sookie squeezed Eddie’s arm.

“Yeah.” He parked the car in the shade of the hangar and waved to the two men standing by the Cessna. “I never thought this day would come.”

We got out of the car and walked over to the glider. The Preiss RHJ-7 was a sleek two-seater. The pilot explained that Eddie was sitting beside him as a passenger. At no time would his hands touch the controls. The flight pattern was dictated by the proximity of JFK airport. In all Eddie would be air-borne was an hour. He paid the pilots their money and they handed him orange overalls. The size was an XXL. Eddie struggled into the uniform and pulled on a crash helmet. He smiled like he had been born for this moment and walked over us. He was no longer a freak.

“I couldn’t have done this without you.” He kissed Sookie's cheek.

“Go touch the sky.” Sookie shook him gently with both hands.

Wayne and Marie wished him success and Eddie came over to me.

“Thanks for coming.” His eyes were edged by unfallen tears.

“I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.” I gave him a hug. The flesh hung from his bones like his bulk had melted under heat rather than a diet. I guessed he weighed 250. The pilot looked around 180. “How much can this plane carry?”

“It’s not a plane really. It’s a sailplane. It’s supposed to be safe for up to 500 pounds.”

The two men together came to 430. Eddie turned to Sookie. “It’s safe really.”

“We’ll keep our fingers crossed.” Wayne shook his friend’s hand.

Eddie kissed Sookie again and whispered in her ear, then he walked over to the glider. He sat in first and then the pilot took his place behind the controls. The launch pilot shut the cockpit and went to the Cessna. Its engine started with a roar. He let it warm up for a minute and taxied onto the runway with the glider in tow. Marie held onto Sookie. Wayne stood next to me and cleaned his glasses with his shirttail. “Would you do anything like that?”

“No.” Eddie was braver than me and for more than this flight. His life was different from six months ago. Sookie loved him. All I thought about when he said he was going to lose that weight was how he would fit in the glider. The rest of it never crossed my mind.

“I’m scared of heights.”

The Cessna taxied into position with the glider far behind its tail. Its engine surged with power and the plane steadily gathered speed until its wheel lifted off the earth and tugged the sailplane into the air. Sookie and Marie jumped up and down. Eddie’s waved his hand and the girls screamed out his name. He was airborne. Nick’s Mini-Cooper pulled up to the hangar. He was with Jolee. She was letting her hair grow long.

“We miss it?” He was wearing binoculars around his neck. They were German-made.

“Just the take-off.” Wayne pointed to the two specks flying out over the Jamaica Bay.

“Cool.” Nick raised the binoculars to his eyes. “Looks awfully flimsy.”

“Don’t say anything that could jink him.” Wayne had read up on sailplanes. They crashed frequently due to downdrafts during the landing.

“The tow plane released them now.” Nick followed the glider’s slow turn to the right. “I think he’s elevating on a thermal over Riis Park.”

The glider soared in circles until it was small as a bird. Sookie couldn’t take her eyes away from it. Nick handed her the binoculars. Wayne and I walked behind the hangar to smoke a joint.

“You’re not pissed, are you?”

“Pissed for what?” Sookie hadn’t been my girlfriend. She had helped Eddie lose his weight. Eddie was going to deal pot to us again. Linda waited in Boston. “Everything worked out for the better.”

Except I would never sleep with Sookie again.

“That’s a really righteous attitude.” Wayne passed me the joint. “Me, I’d be pissed. Like Eddie said he wasn’t going after Sookie.”

“Maybe I can get him to sell us the pot at a lower price.”

“That’d be good.”

I couldn’t ask for anymore. Wayne stubbed out the joint. We returned to the others.

Sookie followed the glider. It was looping in circles. This trick had to be taking its toll on Eddie’s stomach. They still had another 30 minutes in the air. Sookie handed the binoculars to Wayne. Marie hugged him from behind. Jolee and Nick retreated from the hot sun into the hangar. I put on Ray-Bans, not wanting Sookie to see my eyes.

“Are you okay?” Sookie took out pink-shaded glasses and perched them at the end of her nose. They were more for looks than protection against the sun and complimented the soft satin of her hot pants. “About you and me.”

“You want the truth or a lie?” I wasn’t sure which was which.

“The truth always.” She cocked a hip to the side. Sookie had grown up fast in New York. She was no longer a girl of the suburbs.

“Truth.” I stammered slightly before saying, “I liked you. I liked sleeping with you. I missed you these months. I thought about you a lot. I wish you weren’t with Eddie, but I can see that the two of you are happy together and there’s nothing I can do that will change that other than to make a scene and be an asshole. Is there?"

I had to throw in the last two words just in case."

“No, I’m happy with Eddie.”

I should have saved my breath.

“Good, I’m glad someone is happy.”

“And you’ll be happy too.” Sookie glanced up in the sky. The glider was getting closer.

“One day soon too.” I didn’t have to hold back with Linda anymore and bent over to kiss Sookie on the cheek. “Good luck.”

Eddie landed ten minutes later. He climbed out of the sailplane and walked over to Sookie. She gave him a kiss on the lips. Neither of them looked at anyone else for several seconds, then Eddie went over to the LeMans and pulled out a paper bag. It held a sandwich. He unwrapped the paper and bit into the bread.

“Diet’s over,” Eddie mumbled through a full mouth.

We drove over to Breezy Point and ate at a fish shack. Eddie had seconds on everything. Sookie didn’t eat anything. Everything was back to normal. I left that evening on the train with two pounds of reefer. Eddie had lowered the price by $10.

It wasn’t much of a discount, considering he had stolen Sookie, but then again it was better than nothing especially in 1971 when even fat men flew fly like an eagle. One day they would walk on the moon. Maybe one day we all would go to the stars and in space everyone weighed nothing. Even fat men.

COLD AS IT GETS by Peter Nolan Smith

Mount Washington is far from the tallest mountain on the face of the Earth, however in 1934 the summit observatory recorded the strongest wind on the planet at 231 mph or 372 km/hr. Winter temperatures on Agiocochook, or “Home of the Great Spirit” regularly dropped as low as -50F. Death from hypothermia can occur within an hour at that sub-zero temperature, but a human can freeze in less time, because one early morning in February of 1971 my friends and I headed north from Boston to ski the various slopes of the White Mountains; Attitash, Intervale, and Black Mountain.

As we neared North Conway, Mark fiddled with the radio dial and found Bill Withers AIN'T NO SUNSHINE.

"He's right. It's not even dawn," I said behind the wheel of my VW Beetle. It had good heat.

"Not yet," Mark responded before lighting up a joint. "But soon."

We reached Cannon in Franconia Notch around 8. The sun shone behind the mountain. We bought tickets and quickly booked a room and consumed a stack of pancakes for fuel.

The aerial tram carried skiers to the 4000-foot summit. Several complained about the cold. The four of us were comfortable with 10F and the fluffy snow presented well-groomed conditions. We hit the steep speed trails of Rocket, Zoomer, and Polly’s Folly, broke for a chili lunch, and then finished with long runs on Taft Slalom, Ravine, Cannon, and Cannonball.

We called the day early and drove back to North Conway before sunset, because driving through the mountains was treacherous at night.

"Good day." Tommy nodded, as we loaded the skis and clunky boots in the front trunk.

John blew in his hands.

"Damn, I think it's gotten colder.

"We'll be snug in the Bug soon enough."

VWs had air-cooled engine and I started the car on the first attempt.

WBZ played Janis Joplin's ME AND BOBBIE MCGEE, as we drove up the notch to catch 302 to Crawford Notch. The four of us sang every word. Snow fell in clumps. The VW skidded on the drifts, as plows fought to keep the road open. Some days it was a losing effort.

"I'd hate to drive off the road." John sat in the front holding his hands over the heaters.

"I'm not crashing."

"You never know."

"I see it this way. We slide down the slope to the Saco River and land upside down. We can't get out and the car is buried by an avalanche. We end up eating each other to survive."

Stop already, buzzkill." I wasn't driving fast. "I'll get us to Conway alive."

We unloaded our equipment into the cheap motel and ate hearty meal at a local restaurant.

Stepping into the night I was surprised by a severe temperature drop and said, "-5 and that's with no wind."

"It's just the night," Tommy assured us.

"But sunny tomorrow." Tommy was an eternal optimist, but checked his watch. "Time to sleep."

The winger wanted to watch his show.

Back at the motel we broke out the bong and turned on the TV.

THE MOD SQUAD.

Peggy Lipton.

We crashed during HEE-HAW.

The next morning John, Tommy, Mark and I woke early and they ate oatmeal drowning in maple syrup.

I had toast and coffee."

"What's with the diet?" asked Tommy with a spool of gruel in his hand.

"I hate oatmeal. Always have since reading OLIVER TWIST."

"Can't I 'ave some mo'e?" John held out his empty bowl.

"Yea, you can have my share of drool."

"All the more for me." John refilled his bowl.

"I understand, but it's never good to ski on an empty stomach. You want to smoke some weed? Nothing like it for eating something you don't want to eat."

I shook my head.

"I'm good."

Hitting the parking lot the cold bit at my face and I hurried to the Beetle.

Tommy and Mark scrapped the ice off the windows.

"It's even colder today." John shivered like a malaria victim.

He was right.

It was colder.

A lot colder.

The 1300cc engine started on the first twist of the key. I beeped the horn. Matt and Tommy jumped in the car. Johnny regarded the other skiers struggling to start their Detroit V8s and said, "Suckers."

"Good girl." I tapped the steering wheel and drove up 302 to Attitash. Mt. Washington's summit was draped by a cloud. At 6000 feet the observatory was almost in space. Snow swept across the road. Other cars struggled up the Notch. With the four of us serving as ballast the VW was the fastest car in Northern New Hampshire.

We arrived at the base of the mountain just as the sun peaked over the steep horizon. An overnight snow had dusted the trails and coated the pine trees with white. Getting out of the car we swiftly zippered up our parkas.

The untouched snow on the glades was ours. Our skis deflowered Tightrope and Saco.

"It's well below freezing. The thermometer at the lodge read -20."

"At the summit it was -30." John was suffering in his Filene's Basement ski gear.

"I felt okay." I had traded an ounce of grass for Hart Outer Clothing.

"Me too." Tommy fussed with his new Roffe parka and gloves. He played hockey for a prep school in Maine. A booster paid him under the table for winning goals.

"Fuck you both."

The cold sucked the life from our bodies and we finished the day early.

We drank Whiskey toddys with dinner at the restaurant across from the motel

Everyone in the restaurant discussed the cold.

They were locals.

One older man argued for 1968 winning the record for cold.

"It hit -32."

"I remember that winter." The waitress pulled shut her sweater. "My husband and I stayed in bed most of the winter. We had twins in the fall."

Upon leaving the restaurant we hurried to our room.

"You know we don't have to ski tomorrow." John's skin was as white as the corpse of a drowned Titanic passenger rescued the the icy Atlantic.

"It'll be fine." Tommy played prep school hockey in Northern Maine.

Aroostock County was another kind of cold.

The next morning we woke to a brittle white light rising over the valley. I went to the window and felt the glass. It was colder than ice.

Several skiers stood before their cars.

The engines were frozen solid.

I turned on the TV.

The Three Stooges were yucking it up. I kicked the beds. Mark and Tommy swung their feet to the floor. John was stuck under the covers.

"It's my off day." His hand reached up to the window. A brief touch and he dropped his hand. "Oh, yeah, I'm sleeping in."

"Is it that cold out there?" Tommy was tough, but even hockey toughness had its limit.

"It's Siberia out there." I thought of the gulag prisoners and Alexander Solzhenitsyn's ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOSVICH. The USSR would have loved the White Mountains.

"John, you're coming with us whether you like it or not."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are," Tommy wasn't taking no. "Get dressed. We have a mountain waiting."

The four of us stuffed our bellies with a hearty breakfast of pancakes and sausage.

Exiting from the motel restaurant we got in the VW, then ascended Pinkham Notch to Wildcat opposite Mt. Washington. The snow along the road rose above the guard railing and I opened up the heating vents to full. Mark acted as co-pilot and scrapped the frozen condensation from windshield.

"Leaving Earth."

"To the Planet Pluto," groused John.

"I think Pluto is warmer."

"Today for sure."

We reached Wildcat at dawn. Mount Washington rose across the valley. Agiocochook was breeding weather with the sky.

Getting out of the car we zippered up our parkas and hurried to the ski lift after buying our tickets.

“Damn, this is cold,” said Tommy.

“You think this is cold. Wait till you get to the top.” The red-faced gondola operator pointed to the thermometer on the wall reading -20.

“On top it’s -30 and then there’s the wind. Have a good day, boys.”

On the trip to the summit the gondolas shivered in the wind. Mark and I stared at the empty slopes.

"Doesn't look like anyone's fool enough to come up here."

“Guess we’re the first.” He tightened his scarf and tucked his arms over his chest.

“Or the only ones.” I blew on my gloved hands and lifted my scarf over my face as a mask. The cold seeped into the oblong transporter and chilled my bones to the marrow. My Hart parka was not made for this temperature. “I wonder if this was as cold as when Robert Scott crossed Antarctica.”

“Not even close.” Mark lit a cigarette and exhaled the smoke, which dropped to his lap like a submarine submerging below the sea. “The South Pole gets down to -100 below zero.”

“But it’s a dry cold.” My words misted in the air.

Oxygen was scarce atop Wildcat.

“Dry or wet. This is cold.” Mark clapped his gloved hands together. We were approaching the summit station and he tugged down his cap.

“I’m ready for it.

“Me too.” We were New Englanders and New England only had two seasons.

Summer and winter.

We knew which one was longer."

We exited from the gondolas and snapped our boots into the bindings.

The thermometer read -40.

The frigid wind ripped through our parkas like sandpaper scrapping the flesh. Mark shouted over the biting gale, “The shortest way down is the fastest. Follow me. Ready?”

"Never readier."

Having skied Wildcat before Mark charged down Upper Wildcat to the black diamond Lynx Lair connecting to the other Lynx trails. None of us dared a fall and we reached the base lodge in less than fifteen minutes.

The three of us ripped off our skis and clumped into the cafeteria.

Each of us ordered two hot chocolates.

The scalding brew soothed our inner core.

“Damn, that was cold.” John's skin was a boreal white, as if his blood had sucked dry by a vampire.

“Anyone ready for another run?” Tommy practiced ice hockey outside every day. Cold was second nature to the right winger's daily routine.

Mark, and I regarded the blaze in the fireplace with an affection reserved for our girlfriends.

All three of us shook our heads.

“Chickenshits. We didn’t come up here to toast marshmallows.”

Tommy shamed us and we drained our hot chocolates, then exited into the boreal bitterness for another assault on the slopes.

A grim overcast settled over Wildcat and the morning was worsened by the damp mist whistling through the pines. Each of our runs was more punishing than the previous. None of this was fun.

At lunch even Tommy admitted that he lost his enthusiasm for the day’s outing.

"This sucks."

"Big time."

We ate our chili in silence.

Finally Mark said, "Let's we give it one more try.”

“What for?” Tommy shook his head. “I feel like I’m being tortured by Old Man Winter.”

“What for?” Mark held his hands to the fire. “Because after this weekend I go back to work at the shipyard and John will be doing double-shifts at the gas station. Tommy will be playing hockey seven days a week and you’ll be going to college in the day and driving taxi at night to pay for it.”

“Thanks for painting such a pretty picture.” I stepped closer next to the fireplace. Mark was right and I said, “I’m game if everyone else is.”

“We do Irish coffees at the motel on me.” Tommy nodded his commitment to our endeavor. He got a little money under the table for each goal scored, which he split with the opposing goalie.

“Last one down pays for the first beer.” Mark ran out of the lodge and grabbed his skis from the rack.

“You guys, this will be the last run for the day.” The operator was posting the ‘CLOSED’ Sign. “The wind’s picked up on top. Management figures the temperature with the wind is down to -50.”

“I’ve never been in that kind of cold.”

“Most people haven’t, because they can’t live in it.” The operator sealed us in the gondola. “Hope you don’t end up as popsicles.”

"We'll be fine."

Mark and I sat as close as Eskimos waiting out the season of good sledding.

“You know that we might never be this cold again.”

“My favorite book as a kid was SOUTH by Ernest Shackleton.

The British explorer had been struck on the ice for a year. Temperatures in Antarctica had been lower than this, but this must be how it felt like being lost on the Ross Sea.”

“Let’s not talk about the cold.” Mark detoured from our misery to discuss last April's trip to Florida.

"Remember Florida last year. Sun burnt sin. Swimming in the sea off Fort Lauderdale with girls in bikinis.

“No bikinis here.”

“Never.”

Snow bunnies were for Colorado ski resorts not North Conway and the top of Wildcat wouldn’t see 26F until April.

Mark and I jumped out of the gondola and skied to the right. I pulled down my googles to prevent my eyelids from freezing shut. Tommy stopped beside us.

"A race to the bottom."

As a hockey player he loved any kind of competition.

"We might as well make this run a long one."

Mark plotted out the trails and we nodded in shivered agreement before lining up to the start.

"Let's do it." Tommy leaned forward to push off like Spider Sabich at a World Cup race.

"On the count of three." Mark counted off the numbers and we burst forward with shouted 'GO'.

Our style down green dot Upper Catapult was a pure downhill to offer the best aerodynamics as well as shield our bodies from the chill. Tommy grabbed the early lead by the start of the black diamond Upper Wildcat.I fought to catch up, but my fingers, toes, and ears were losing feeling and my tears formed ice spiders inside my goggles.

Mark overtook the two of us right before schussing onto Middle Wildcat. The steepening of the icy slope challenged our skills and I almost fell on a turn.

My fist punched into the packed powder to right myself.

My two friends were almost out of sight, as I reached Middle Wildcat, but I ducked through the trees to make up the distance and emerged from the forest to barrel down Copycat to the bottom.

The three of them beat me by a few seconds. They flicked off their skis and dashed into the lodge. I followed them inside.

I didn't know who had won, but I had lost.

“Irish Coffees on you.” Mark stood at the bar.

“I thought it was first to the car.” Drinks were cheaper in North Conway.

I ran outside to grab my skis and shambled down to the parking lot, trailed by my friends running like drunken Frankensteins in their heavy boots.

I touched the back bumper and turned to the panting trio.

"I win."

"Fucking cheater."

“Just kidding. Drinks are on me. Now pray that the car starts.”

Every driver in the parking lot was struggling to start their car.

I sat in the VW and twisted the key in the ignition.

The engine coughed to life and we packed our skis into the car, then exchanged our ski boots for Frye boots. The heat took its time coming to life, but by the time we passed the Lost Pond Trail on Route 16, we shucked off our hats and gloves.

"Goddamn VWs." I loved this car and pointed my car south.

"Goddamn VWs is right." My friends loved this car.

"Nice and warm."

"Sort of warm," Mark shivered beside me, because warm was a long way away from North Conway, but with the right amount of heat we would call it Florida.

And not one of us questioned its location.

Especially not after skiing -50 on top of Wildcat.

After all we were New Englanders and we liked to dream of beach girls in bikinis.

Fort Lauderdale and the sun.

Not the cold of Agiocochook.

No one dreams of that.

At least not in their sleep.

the umpeenth coming by peter nolan smith

In the summer of 1971 my three friends and I tripped on LSD in White Mountains. the window pane was fierce. A twelve year-old emerged from the forest. For a minute almost believed he was Jesus, but his name was Jessie from Bethel NH

Music by doug henderson ex-drummer of Spongehead

Vortex sculpture by Dave Henderson also of Spongehead

To view video please go to the following URL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAuKter4ixA&feature=youtu.be

WHEN FAT MEN FLY by Peter Nolan Smith Chapter 2

A day before New Year’s Eve Sookie and Marie came over Wayne's house. The two girls wore matching white leather jackets, mini-skirts, knee-high boots, and turtleneck sweater. They were excited about their first trip to the big city. New York was bound to dazzle anyone from a small town. Even one as big as Weymouth.

"We look like sisters?" Marie asked Wayne's mom.

"Like Eva and Zsa-Zsa Gabor." Wayne's mom puffed on a joint without explaining that the Gabor sisters were blondes. She liked smoking on the holidays. Her finger poked Wayne. "Go visit your sister n NewYork. See if she's okay."

"Jolee's an ex-Marine.” Wayne had grown a thick Castro beard in the last ten days and his hair was longer. “Nothing bad’s gonna happen to her?"

“Just do what I ask for once.”

"Yes, mom." Wayne was a good son. His mom's Xmas gift had been a black fake-fur overcoat.

"And shave off that beard before you come back." She hugged him good-bye. "You look like a runaway panda in that coat."

“It's nice and warm." He waved to his step-father, who was finishing a bottle of Zapple wine. "Have a happy new year."

Wayne and Marie sat in the back of the LeMans. The gas tank was full. The bags were in the trunk. Sookie asked me to drive. I slid behind the wheel and turned on the radio. LAYLA was on Dave Summer's WBZ show.

“It would be so cool in Eric was playing in New York.” Marie loved Clapton.

"Sorry, he’s in London jamming at Ronnie Scott's with Charlie Watts and Ringo Starr. The Fillmore has Mylon and David Rea." Wayne's connection with the whereabouts of rock musicians had to be with the FBI. I had heard of neither group.

“We'll see some other band." Marie was only a little disappointed. This trip was about seeing the biggest city in the world.

"And we got the rest of the week off." Sookie clapped her hands, as we drove away from Wayne's house. The car skidded on ice. I corrected the spin with the steering wheel. I had been born in Maine. We knew how to drive in the winter.

"How you get off work?" Wayne rolled a joint on Aldous Huxley’s book HEAVEN AND HELL.

"I told Pizza-Face my mother was sick." Marie snuggled into the furry overcoat.

"He called my house to check. Cough-cough. My 'mother' said I was sick too." Sookie covered her mouth. "I'm a good actress, huh?

"A regular Mia Farrow." She shared the same figure as Frank Sinatra’s ex-wife.

"What you tell your parents?" I was curious, since she never spoke about them.

"I told them I’m moving to New York." She toyed with a lipstick tube. "They thought I was kidding."

"Maybe you're not such a good actress."

"It depends on the audience." She smeared on pink lipstick. "Keep your eyes on the road."

"Merry Christmas." Wayne handed her a Billy Holiday 8-track, as we pulled onto Route 3. "I think you'll dig it."

She turned off the radio and slotted the tape in the stereo. Billie Holiday’s voice travelled over time, as she sang of 'strange fruit'. Her other songs were better suited for the winter sun shining through fleecy clouds. Sookie put on Joni Mitchell next and the two girls sang a duet to URGE FOR GOING. They liked Tom Rush’s version too.

The traffic was light on I-95 through Providence and Rhode Island's Pine Barrens. We stopped for lunch in New London. Marie, Wayne, and I ate apple pie. Sookie said she wasn’t hungry. She drank a glass of water. Back on the road Wayne outlined our trip to New York.

"The East Village and the Staten Island ferry. Maybe even the Empire State Building, but remember that we're on a business trip."

"No pleasure, Teddy Bear?" Marie tweaked his plumb cheek.

He had gained a few extra pounds over the holiday.

"Maybe a little." Wayne was comfortable with his weight and laid his head on Marie's lap. Within seconds he was asleep. Marie joined him before Mystic, Connecticut and Sookie dozed off a few minutes later. I turned down the stereo and pressed my foot down on the accelerator. The LeMans easily hit 75 on the dry roads, but I slowed down to five miles over the speed limit. Cops didn’t like hippies driving fast.

When the LeMans crossed over the Hutchinson River Bridge, Wayne woke up and rubbed his face. The girls sensed his stirring and blinked their eyes for several seconds being stunned by the endless blocks of high buildings.

“You are now officially in New York.” Wayne looked left to a complex of apartment buildings next to a marsh. “My old man worked there.”

"Didn't Adventure Land used to be here?" I had begged my father to stop at the amusement park on the way back from our trip to New York. It had looked like Disneyworld built on a swamp. My father had said, “Another time.”

"They tore it down for Co-op City. This is the Bronx. I was born on Crow's Avenue." Abandoned cars lined the highway.

"You want to stop for a visit?"

"No way." Wayne shook his head. "Crow's Ave is where greasers gave me fat-boy beatings. I hope they’re all dead."

His voice was chilled by the memory of that bullying. I understood. I had been bullied too. I turned up the radio. The DJ was playing the Stooges’ WANNA BE YOUR DOG. The song was banned from the Boston airwaves. This city was not my hometown.

An elevated highway bisected the South Bronx and we crossed the Harlem River in Manhattan. Wayne gave a rolling tour of Central Park, 5th Avenue, the Empire State Building, and finally said, "Take a left on 8th Street."

The sun fell behind the low apartment buildings and the night mounted the sky to the east. The girls shivered in their thin coats and I turned up the car heat.

"A word of warning." Wayne scanned the passers-by like he was searching for someone. "Trust no one and tell no one our business. Say we’re here for a vacation. Nothing else. Everyone understand?"

We traversed Broadway. The young people on the street had longer hair than the hippies in Cambridge. Their clothing was ethnic. The girls felt out of place.

"Don’t worry everyone will love you." Wayne kissed the big-bottomed blonde. I could see in the rear-view mirror she only cared about pleasing her 'teddy bear'. Wayne directed me to a parking garage.

"Better to park the car here rather than on the street.”

“Parking tickets?” Boston cops loved sticking violations under the windshield wiper.

“That and car thieves."

“Park it in a lot.” Sookie loved her car.

Wayne paid the attendant for three days. We carried the girls' bags down St. Mark's Place. After Woodstock the hippie movement had deserted the cities, but head shops and clothing stores preserved the Summer of Love in the East Village. Marie and Sookie gawked at the dresses. Young men studied the two girls like they were dirty books to be checked out of a porno shop in the Combat Zone. I held Sookie's hand tight.

"This is Eddie's place." Wayne stopped across the street from the Electric Circus. "He's solid, but don't stare at him. He doesn't like that."

"Why would we stare?" Marie eyed the windows banded by the fire escapes across the face of the five-story building. A few glowed with light. They were on the upper floors.

"You'll see." Wayne climbed the stoop and pressed the buzzer. The door clicked open and we stepped inside the worn-out building. The hallway smelled of cabbage dinners and the stairs creaked under our feet. On the 4rd floor the scent of marijuana overwhelmed the food odors. Wayne knocked on the door of 4A.

“C’mon in.” A man’s voice said loudly. “It’s open.”

Wayne pushed the door and we entered a narrow apartment. The spotless living room was dominated by a TV surrounded by tanks of tropical fish. A huge man sat in a sagging lounge chair. Eddie was the same age as Wayne, but outweighed him by 200 pounds. His face was swollen to the size of a pumpkin and several ever-larger waves of belly sloshed over his torso. His jean overalls had to be specially-made, same as his tee-shirt and shoes.

"Welcome." He made no effort to get out of the chair and lifted his hand in a ‘black power’ fist.

The girls stopped at the entrance. They were in shock.

I was too.

“Brother.” Wayne clasped the bloated hand and introduced us.

“My house is your house.” Eddie indicated the refrigerator. “Help yourself to whatever in it. I sleep in this chair. There’s a bed in the backroom and a fold-out couch in the front.”

A thick curtain hung from that doorframe. It offered little privacy.

“I hosey the bed.” Wayne had first dibs. Eddie was his friend. “Why don’t you girls freshen up in the bathroom? We have some business to discuss.”

Sookie and Marie recovered their teenage cool and disappeared into the back room. Wayne fingered through the record collection on the opposite wall. He pulled out BLIND FAITH to satisfy Marie's Clapton obsession.

"Nice girls." Eddie's comment was tainted by an honest appreciation for their innocence. "All the girls in the Village are old road."

"You have a girlfriend?" Wayne asked at the Dual 1245 turntable. The Bozak speakers were coupled with a Fisher amplifier and Marantz pre-amp. The system was top of the line. Eddie had money.

"No, but I have lots of customers." A sofa was shoved against the wall. "Please sit down."

"Thanks." I held onto the armrest to keep from slipping into the sofa’s valley.

“Sorry, I’m a little hard on furniture.” Eddie pulled a brick of reefer from his shirt. Sweat dampened the plastic covering.

“No hiding place better than under fat. I never had a cop give me a full body search.”

“When was the last time you stripped naked?” Wayne lowered the stylus onto CAN'T FIND MY WAY HOME.

“Last month my mother came over and washed me for the best part of an hour. She found an ounce of blow under my hip flap." Eddie reached under his left breast for a cellophane packet. "You want some."

"Sure, but let's keep it away from the girls. They go crazy on the stuff." For a fat guy Wayne was much hipper than most of my other friends. "You've never done blow?"

I shook my head.

"What was Eric Clapton singing about on SPOONFUL?"

"Cocaine.” I wasn’t that square. "Willie Dixon 'getting a spoonful' was sex, although the origin of the song came from Charlie Paton's SPOONFUL BLUES. I've never done any."

"I'll change that." Wayne deftly cut six lines of white powder onto a small mirror and inhaled two. Eddie snorted two and handed me a straw. The cocaine burned my nose with an alkaloid torch. The majesty of the Inca flowed in my blood.

"Welcome to the world of serious drugs." Eddie stashed the coke inside his shirt.

"Isn't the blow cutting into your eating?" Wayne hid the mirror under the table.

"It's all part of a grand scheme." Eddie melted into the chair. His chest heaved like a whale out of water. "You know how I’ve always dreamed about flying in a glider."

A laugh spurted through my nostrils.

"Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. How's a glider getting into the air with someone as big as me? The answer is that it can't be done, so I have to get smaller." Eddie lifted his pants from his waist, revealing an overlap of flesh. "I've already lost a bunch of weight. I figure if I keep doing coke, I'll get down to 250 by the 4th of July."

"That's 200 pounds in six months." Wayne hadn’t stepped on a scale in years. I guessed his weight at 250. Eddie was aiming at losing almost one Wayne or two Sookies. I was 170.

"Or 35 pounds a month." Eddie tapped his left nostril and inhaled a white line of powder. "The only other choices are to undergo a drastic surgery to staple my stomach shut. It's a new technique and more than 5% of the patients die from complications. It's illegal in the US, but a Russian doctor will do it in Moscow for $20,000. My mother would lend me the money, but I figure for $15,000 the cocaine will take off the same amount of weight and I don't have to travel. You know I don't like to travel."

No airplane, train, or bus were equipped with seats his size.

"That's an ounce a week." Wayne was also good at math.

"I can handle it." He lurched forward with the grace of a whale trying to roll off a beach and pointed to the fish tanks. "I've been watching those fish ever since I got fat. I been telling myself I'll float like them one day, but not with this body. I'll have to lose that 200 pounds."

We wished him good luck and discussed our deal. His pot was better than most in Boston. Wayne later haggled the price down to $150 and convinced Eddie to front us each another pound. The profit on my sales would pay for a deposit on an apartment. Moving to Boston would make my life easier for school and work, plus give me someplace to take Sookie.

"Then it's a deal."

The girls emerged from the bedroom; Marie as a lost flower child in fringed suede and Sookie a futuristic space vixen in midnight blue leather pants and a white silk shirt. Marie had worked magic on her friend’s gaunt face and Sookie radiated an untainted purity.

"Wow." I kept my compliment simple.

"You girls will fit into the East Village fine."

"Then let's go." Sookie hadn't come New York to sit in an apartment.

Wayne conducted us on a tour of the East Village. We drank chocolate egg creams at the Gem Spa and watched a French film CANNABIS at a 2nd Avenue movie theater. The girls bought clothing at several stores and we ate a bowl of borsch at a kosher dairy bar. Sookie had a cup of tea. No milk. No sugar. Wayne brought us to her sister's place on Avenue A. It was a small one-bedroom.

Jolee had just finished a tour as a Marine nurse in Viet-Nam. None of us asked her about the War and she didn’t tell any stories. Her hair was short and a white tee-shirt suited a body honed by boot camp. There were weights in the corner. She sat between the two girls. If she was a man, I would have forced her to stop touching Sookie.

“Jealous?” Sookie asked on the walk back to Eddie’s place.

"Saddest thing in the whole wide world is to see your baby with another girl." Even more people were on St. Marks.

"I don't like girls. Not that way." She linked her arm into mine. "But I like flirting to get you jealous."

"Thanks." I had fallen for her trap like a 13 year-old boy.

"You're welcome." She kissed my cheek. I felt good. A band of Hare Krishnas canted their one-chorus song in front of the Gem Spa. Their smiles seemed to have been lifted from God. I picked up two bottles of Liebefraumilch at the St. Mark’s Liquor Store. Sookie liked white wine.

The four of us entered Eddie's building. He slept in the chair. I put the wine in the refrigerator. Wayne and Marie went into their room. The door shut with a click. It was past midnight. I held the curtain aside for Sookie and undressed on the sofa bed. She lay down in her clothes.

"What's wrong?" This trip was supposed to be our honeymoon.

"I can't get naked with him in the other the room." She dropped her voice to an almost sub-sonic level.

"He can't see us." I pulled off my boots.

"But he can hear us and I can hear him. Listen." She cocked her head to the side.

Eddie's breathing was only slightly human.

"It's sounds like he's trying to suck all the air in the room." Sookie covered her ears with a pillow.

"Does he scare you?" Eddie seemed harmless to me.

"When I was a kid, I went to the circus with my family." She slid across thin mattress. "They had a freak show. A bearded lady, a midget, but what scared me was this fat man on a chain. Sometimes he lunged for children.”

“And he looked like Eddie?”

Sookie nodded with half-closed eyes. Her fear dated back to childhood.

"Eddie’s not a freak." I hugged her tight. "And no one's will hurt you as long as I'm here."

"Good."

We slept in our underwear. Her body was skin and bones. We didn’t have sex. Tomorrow night I’d get a hotel room. It would be our honeymoon suite. Hippie girls liked romantic and so did I.

Ali / Frasier I THE FIGHT OF THE CENTURY

Muhammad Ali faced the champion Joe Frasier in the Fight of the Century on March 8, 1971 at Madison Square Garden in New York City, New York.

Ringside seats cost $150 and each boxer was guaranteed $2.5 million.

Big money in 1971.

Big money now many places in the world.

The bettors were favoring Ali over Frasier.

Ali was taller with a longer reach.

Ali was the epitome of revolution and his camp portrayed Frasier as a member of the establishment.

I was a hippie.

I wanted Ali to regain his title.

His resistance to the draft was a key factor in popularizing the anti-war movement, but Frasier was no lackey to the Boss. He supported Ali throughout his exile from the ring. The heavyweight never said anything about this charity, probably to prevent joining Ali on the unemployment line.

Everyone watched his fight.

I was sitting at El Phoenix bar on Commonwealth Avenue.

Everyone in the bar was backing Ali.

Dave the bartender was all-Frasier. He took all bets at all odds.

"Ali likes to predict the rounds of his KOs. I say 15 Frasier puts Ali on his ass and this has nothing to do with politics." Boston was severely divided on race and war. We didn't talk that shit in bars. Someone on the wrong side could get hurt too fast. Dave didn't have to worry. He was the bartender. We needed him more than a winning a point about a war 8000 miles away from LA.

I placed $10 on Ali.

The fight started out with the challenger scoring points in the first three rounds.

Frasier resisted Ali's defense and brought the fight to the Louisville native.

In the 11th round Frasier blasted Ali.

A wicked left.

Frasier was no joke.

Ali knew that too late.

Me too.

$10 was a lot of money in 1971.

Dave the bartender won $2050 that evening.

He bought a used GTO the next day and called it 'Joe'.

We all did.

"Joe was the champ.

To view THE FIGHT OF THE CENTURY, please go to his URL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctKAGKVpCUU

This is history.

Hot Pants Redux

Long legs and hot pants.

You know I would get in the Time Machine back to 1971.

In a heart beat.

You Bet I Would - Hot Pants And A Ducati

HOT PANTS by James Brown

HOT PANTS was #1 on the R&B charts for James Brown.

The Godfather of Soul knew his audience.

To hear HOT PANTS by James Brown, please go to the following URL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzbm6G9QPKU

LUCKY IN LOVE by Peter Nolan Smith

The dawn sun burned misty shadows off the mountains and a stark brightness seared through my eyelids, as I rose from my sleeping bag to drink in the austere surroundings.

Flatness stretched forever.

A hissing wind pelleted my face with ancient brine.

The salt lay five feet deep this far from the lake.

A quick swig of water from my canteen washed the dust from my mouth.

This was the second time that I had woken in the Bonneville Salt Flats. The dried-up lake had been a hard mattress on both occasions. I stretched my arms and legs without loosening their stiffness.

Today was my twenty-second birthday. I walked to the Ford Torino.

To the South cars and trucks sped east and west on a mirage of mirrors.

The station wagon was parked several miles from I-80. In the back AK and Pam were lying inches from each other, but it was obvious to see that they hadn’t touched each other throughout the night. I could have let the two of them sleep another hour, but there was a shower room at the truck stop in Wendover and I intended to be there within the next thirty minutes. Utah was a godly state and I felt like bathing in Nevada.

I opened the driver’s door and AK sat up with a jack knife in hand.

“Oh, it’s you,” the pianist sighed, sinking back into his sleeping bag.

“Who were you expecting? The Manson family.” Remnants of Charlie’s followers roamed the western deserts. It was a bad sign that whatever they did out here never made the news

“Or worse.” AK sat up.

His eyes blinked in the increasing glare. “So this is it?”

“The fastest place on Earth.”

Rocket cars and super-charged motorcycles ran a measured mile farther to the North. Every one was seeking the land speed record. Gary Gabelich’s Blue Flame had hit 630 in 1970.

“I’ve seen this place on TV. I didn’t think it would be so desolate.” “It’s prehistoric.” The Salt Flats were uninhabitable for man or beast.

“Didn’t you sleep here with Marilyn last year?” AK crawled into the front seat and handed me the keys.

“Who’s Marilyn?” Pam remained lying on the folded down seats. Her sleep tousled blonde hair reminded me of young Brigitte Bardot in AND GOD CREATED WOMEN.

“She’s how AK and I know each other.” I didn’t want to tell this story to Pam. Her roommate in college was my ex-girlfriend Jackie’.

“Last summer he was hitchhiking from Berkeley with a friend.” AK had heard two versions of this story.

“The two of them were stuck on Telegraph Avenue for hours.”

“There were about thirty hippies heading east and few cars stopping for us.” Three of the longhairs had been stuck there for over a day.

“You were in a hurry.” He repeated the story the same way that I had told it to him, but I needed to take over for my own good.

“I had to be at school and Nick was headed to Tulsa to pick up his BMW. He had crashed his car, while rubbernecking at the State Fair’s roller coaster. A Ford Maverick pulled over driven by a woman. She was leaving her husband. He had become a transvestite dancer in the Cockettes.”

“Cockettes?” asked Pam. She came from a good family.

“That’s what Marilyn told me. Her six year-old daughter was in the back. She was headed to Boulder, but had room for one person. She wanted someone to share the driving. I asked Nick if he minded me leaving him.”

A better word was deserting.

“What'd he say?” Pam asked, then sipped water from my canteen.

“He told me to go and I went with Marilyn.” Boulder was almost halfway across the country and I was down to my last twenty dollars.

“That’s good friend.” Pam regarded me with tired eyes and asked, “And?”

“And we drove till we crashed here.”

“And then what happened?

AK was dying to tell Pam about my making love to Marilyn on the salt flats, while her daughter slept in the car crowded with all their possessions. Anything I said now would get back to Pam’s roommate. She had been my girlfriend in 1973. I cut the love scene from my tale.

“The next day she drove me to Cheyenne, saying that she might come see me in Boston.”

“And now comes the weird part.” AK had a slightly different angle on this story. “He and I lived next to each other in Boston. We didn’t know each other, but one day a Maverick pulls up in front of his house and this woman gets out of her car with her daughter. My girlfriend and I were surprised, since we had gone to college with Marilyn. Only she’s coming to see him, instead of us.”

“But once she sees you two, she decides to stay at your place.”

Marilyn and I never made love again.

“We had a bigger place.”

“After that you and I became friends.”

“Unlucky in love.” AK handed the canteen to Pam. “Lucky with friends.”

“Marilyn and I weren’t in love.”

“Was this after Jackie broke up with you?” The blonde wanted to get the facts straight.

“Jackie had left me earlier in the summer.” I shrugged the acceptance of my fate and asked, “You know what today is?”

“Let me guess. It’s your birthday.”

“You helped celebrate my last one in Buffalo.”

I had hitchhiked back and forth from Boston to Buffalo to see the doctor’s daughter. She was that cute.

“Jackie, you, and me drank tequila on the American side of Niagara Falls. Later that day we had played softball against her ex-boyfriend’s team in Delaware Park. You had knocked two balls over the railroad tracks. Her boyfriend had been playing centerfield.”

“That night Jackie had said that she felt sorry for Jerry. It didn’t take me long to find out how sorry.” Not making love for my birthday had been a bad omen.

“Maybe today you’ll have better luck.”

“Yes, maybe I will. You know I shared the same birthday as JFK and Bob Hope. It was also the day that the Turks stormed Constantinople.” History had been my college minor.

“Happy Birthday to you.” Pam sang the entire song. She had a good voice and AK backed her lead with a solid baritone.

“And you know what I’m going to do for my birthday.” “I can’t wait to hear.” Pam shivered in fake anticipation. “I’m going to drive this car as fast as it can go.”

“I’m not sure the owner would appreciate your putting his car to the test.” AK was the more cautious of us.

“Jake would love it.” The ex-Marine had boasted of the Torino’s Cam- Jet injection and 428 FE V8 back in Boston. “This is the Bonneville Speed Flats.”

“What the fastest you’ve driven?” Pam had exhibited a heavy foot on the gas throughout this trip. Her destination was a boyfriend. Ours was the beach. Neither was going anywhere without us, although the ocean was more faithful than a man.

“About 110 in my father’s Olds 88 on a straightaway in my hometown.” The road crews prided themselves in the condition of Route 28 from the parish church to the Blue Hills.

“This car should beat that.” AK drove a Pontiac Firebird. “It’s your birthday. Knock yourself out, but if anything goes wrong, you pay for the damages.”

“Nothing is going to go wrong.” I started the special edition V8 engine. “If you want to play it safe, you don’t have to come along for the ride.”

“He doesn’t, but I do.” Pam jumped into the front seat and strapped on the seat belt. “I want to see how fast I can get it to go too.”

AK’s reservations were overruled two to one and he folded up the rear seats, then clinched the seat tight.

“Roll up the windows.”

Speed was all about better aerodynamics.

I revved the Cobra-Jet engine and stepped on the gas with a young man’s mercilessness. The tires responded to the acceleration on the salt surface without any shimmy from the steering wheel. The speedometer in the second dashboard pot climbed to 60 within seven seconds. The needle hit 80 and my grip tightened on the wheel. At 110 we were traveling almost two miles per minute and I grit my teeth, as the speedometer passed 120. The saltpans shivered in the morning light and I pinned the needle at 125. The car had more goose in its go, but there was no way of telling how fast was its fast and I lifted my foot off the gas.

“That was fast?” AK was a convert to the religion of speed.

“I figure it topped out at 130.” We were rolling to a long stop and I lightly tapped on the brake.

“Now it’s my turn.” Pam was eager for her attempt and the three of us traded places.

125 seemed faster in the back seat and I think that she might have hit a top speed of 135. AK didn’t come close to her best, but drove the Torino with a broad smile on his face.

“I didn’t think it would be that much fun.”

“Some cars are built for speed,” Pam said with admiration for the V8’s power.

“I’ve always wanted a GTO. My friend had one and Moon would bet people $20 that they couldn’t grab the bill off the dashboard before he had shifted into fourth. He never lost.”

“They’re about $4500 new.” AK burst my balloon. “And a second-hand one costs $2000.”

“Maybe I’ll be lucky one day.” I owed $7000 in college loans. I had to start paying them at the end of the summer.

“You’ll be lucky as soon as we stop for breakfast. Bacon and eggs are on me.” AK turned on the radio.

A country station from Wendover was playing Ray Stevens’ THE STREAK. We shuddered at the topical hit’s banjo picking.

The radio received no other signal.

We were on the wrong side of nowhere.

“There’s a town with an air force base at the foot of those mountains. Wendover, Nevada. It will have someplace to eat and wash up.”

“I forgot you’ve been here before.” Pam was digging for facts about my night with Marilyn.

“Twice.” I wasn’t squealing on myself. “The motorhead with the Super Bee drove this route two years ago. I have no idea he was going.”

“Maybe 200 miles per hour.” AK still doubted this tale, since it was the truth.

“Lucky liked 300 better, but the speedometer only went to 125. Same as this car.”

“Shame we couldn’t go 300,” said AK and got a laugh out of Pam.

I was tired of being the butt of their jokes and sulked against the door, knowing none of us would ever drive 300.

Our arrival in Nevada was greeted by a shrieking fly-over of two jet fighters. I imagined them on patrol over Vietnam, but they wouldn’t be here, if we were still at war over there.

AK pulled into the truck stop for gas.

Pam wanted to wash the West out of her hair and grabbed her towel before walking into a building detached from the gas station.

and I filled up the tank and parked the car.

Two steps beyond the entrance was a bank of slot machines. Their lights caught my eye. Neither of us was expecting a miniature casino inside the truck stop and I turned to AK.

“Like I said I’m feeling lucky.”

“You ever gamble before?”

“No and it’s because my great-grandfather skipped out on his debts and no one saw him again. My great-grandmother and her two daughters were forced to seek refuge with her uncle in Augusta, Maine.

No one in my family explained the causes of his misfortune, but my father had once said ‘horses’.”

“They don’t call these machines one-handed bandits for nothing.” AK wore a frown of disapproval.

The money in our pockets had to last us the summer.

“Okay, four quarters and I’m quits.” A dollar wasn’t going to bust me.

I dropped the coin into the slot and pulled the arm. The cylinders spun to hit a row of cherries. Coins cascaded into the payout slot.

My jackpot paid for a half-tank of premium gas.

“Beginner’s luck.” I stuck the coins in my pocket and walked into the showers, while AK paid for gas. The shower room had no walls and I stripped off my jeans and tee-shirt.

“Hey, hippie boy, where you going?” A rangy man was soaping an enormous erection two shower to the left.

“San Francisco.” I dropped my eyes to the tiled floor. The only word men are supposed to say to each other in a bathroom was ‘huh’.

“I’m heading your way.” Tattoos sprawled across his rawhide skin.

“I got a car and a girlfriend.” The first was the truth and the second was a pure lie. I swiftly soaped my body.

“Too bad, I thought maybe you and I could have a good time in Frisco. It’s a wide open city. Try the Castro. It’s for men. Maybe I’ll see you there.” He took his time rinsing off the suds in hopes of my changing my mind.

“Yeah.” I grabbed my clothes and dressed without toweling dry.

The Summer of Love might have ended, but Sexual Revolution was spreading across America. Exiting from the shower room I warned AK of the bushwhacker.

“He’s looking for a friend.”

AK had been brought up in New York.

“If I can walk through the West Village without getting hit on, then how dangerous can this place be.”

“You’ll find out.”

I entered the diner and sat at the counter. I didn’t need a menu and the waitress wrote down my order for eggs over easy, bacon, and toast.

Thirty seconds later AK joined me in the dining room.

His face was a bright red after hearing the trucker’s sordid suggestions.

“I never heard anyone talk like that.”

“Can’t say that I didn’t warn you.” I had pored through hundreds of porno books in the Combat Zone and my research had covered every genre of perversion. “That trucker was interested in holding hands.”

“No, that’s for sure.”

Pam exited from her shower in a clean dress and wet hair. She had been with us for three days and

AK hadn’t worked up the nerve to put a move on her. Tomorrow we were dropping off the Torino in Lodi.

Time was running short for him.

Breakfast for the three of us came to less than $4. The truck stop offered cheap food to entice travelers to try their luck with the slots and I succumbed the lights and noise of the one-arm bandits.

“I’m going to try my luck again.” I reached into my pocket for change.

“No one wins on those machines.” AK stood away from the slots, as if they were contagious.

“It’s my birthday.” I dropped a quarter into the slot and pulled the arm. Within fifteen minutes I had accumulated another $5 of quarters. They had a nice heavy feel in my pocket.

“Very few people know when to walk away a winner.” AK led the way to the door and we passed the trucker, who was entertaining the buxom cashier. She laughed, as if he had told her a dirty joke.

When I reached the door, the trucker winked at me and I hurried to the station wagon.

“What’s wrong?” Pam asked at the car.

“Nothing, but let’s get out of here.”

Nevada was a replica of the moon. The tortured underbrush was scarred from the waterless weather.

Treeless mountains skirted the horizon. I-80 followed the trail of the Forty-Niners. The first town up the road was Oasis and the four lanes of asphalt shrunk to a two-laner divided by a yellow line.

We rejoined US 6, Jack Kerouac’s route across the country.

Without the road this community would have shriveled to its original double-digit population of the late 1800s. We drove past the gas stations, restaurants, and stores without braking for a light.

Oasis had none.

Outside town I-80 resumed its trek across Nevada. Jack Kerouac had ridden a bus across this wasteland. He had very little to say about it in ON THE ROAD.

Dirt roads vectored off the interstate into the distance. They looked like they had been here in 1947.

Two years ago I had traveling this highway in Lucky’s Super Bee and I asked AK the same question, which I had asked with friend Steve on this stretch of road.

“What do you think is out there?”

“Ranches, mines, and dirt.” AK studied the map. “There’s nothing out there, but more of this.

“That’s what I thought.”

The temperature climbed into the 90s and we shut the windows to turn on the AC. AK’s renewed his efforts to find a radio station, harvesting more static.

He lifted his hand over his shoulder.

Pam handed him Joni Mitchell’s BLUE.

The opening chords of the title song rolled like a mist off the Pacific into Monterey Bay. After hearing it for the tenth time in five days the three of us sang backing vocals for Joni. We almost were in tune.

Approaching Wells I slowed to 40 mph on US 6. Local cops were notorious for setting speed traps for out-of-state travelers. I checked the gas gauge. It read half-empty and I pulled into the first gas station to top off the tank, so that we could reach the California State Line in one go. AK pored over the map, as Pam talked to the pump attendant.

The tall teenager was a younger twin of the young cowboy back in Sterling, Colorado with whom she had spent the better part of an hour in a pick-up. Neither AK nor I had criticized her detour from being the faithful girlfriend of the medical intern. Pam was on summer vacation until Mendocino

Across the street was a long one-story log cabin with a neon sign blinking CASINO.

James Bond had played baccarat at Monte Carlo. Tuxedos and low-cut evening gowns had been required attire for the extras. Two men in jeans exited from Well’s casino. They blinked in the sunlight and shook hands, as if they had spent the night playing blackjack.

“I’ll be back in a second.” I walked away from the car drawn by the magnetism of a movie myth.

“Where you going?” AK knew the answer.

“To take a look.” A year ago I had passed through Las Vegas on the way to LA. Nick had warned me about the dangers of gambling. Now I wanted to see for myself.

“Don’t do anything stupid.” “I won’t.” My traveler’s checks were in my bag and I had $50 in my wallet.

I pushed open the glass door.

The interior decor was a homage to the town’s pioneer past. A cool breeze blasted from the casino’s ACs.

Cold offered a refuge from the desert .

I strolled past a gauntlet of slot machines to where a dozen green-felt tables arced across the red carpet in two semi-circles. Three men sat at the one farthest from the slots. Tall piles of chips rose before them. They were in a good mood. A motherly dealer in a cowboy hat shuffled a deck of cards with the speed of a Japanese cook slicing meat at Benihanas, then flicked the two cards to each man and herself.

“Feel like joining us in some blackjack.” Her voice sounded like she might have been the Lone Ranger’s aunt.

“It’s a friendly game.” A man in the suit pulled out a chair. “Us against the casino and we’re murdering her.”

“I’ve never played before.” My mother had only permitted Solitaire, Spades, and Rummy in her house.

“The rules and tactics are simple.” The oldest man at the table looked like my uncle and Uncle Jack had paid for college with his poker winnings from the Korean War. “Figure the down card of the dealer is a ten or face card. If she’s showing a six, then she’s probably holding a sixteen. The house has to take a card on sixteen. If she breaks 21, then you win.”

“Today’s my birthday.”

“Then your beginner’s luck is doubled by birthday luck. You can’t lose.”

I bought $20 of chips and placed a $2 chip on the table. She dealt me two tens. When it came my turn for a card, I held up my hand like Steve McQueen had done in THE CINCINNATI KID. I loved that movie.

“The hippie sticks.”

The dealer stayed with a nine and Jack. My 20 beat her 19. A chip came my way and the trio at the table congratulated my luck. They had also won their hands.

The next set of cards ran in my favor as did the following hand. I had a good head for numbers as would anyone who had majored in math during his first years in college. Soon I was on a roll.

Pam and AK stood behind me.

Within twenty minutes I was up $100.

Pam waggled the keys in her hand. The two of them wanted to be in San Francisco, not a dusty gambling town in the Great Basin.

“Sorry, it’s time to go.” I cashed in my chips and said good-bye to the three men and dealer.

“Not many people stop when they’re ahead.” The old man spoke, as if he never left the table until his last dollar was gone.

“Beginner’s luck can’t last forever.” I stashed the dollars into my wallet.

“You’re not a beginner anymore, birthday boy,” The dealer was angry at my departure. No one likes losing, because winning is better.

Outside I got in the car and said, “Funny, but I was feeling like I would never lose.”

“All gamblers think that way, until they’re busted.” AK sat in the back of the Torino. “The odds are always tipped in the casino’s favor.”

“And good luck has a funny way of turning bad.” Pam had been with her girlfriend the night that I had left their college dorm after drinking a bottle of tequila. The town police had arrested me five minutes after a high-speed chase in a VW. She was well aware of my luck, both good and bad.

“Give me another minute.” I stepped out of the car. “Not to play any more. I want to call my mother and let her know I’m okay. Remember it’s my birthday. I won’t be long.”

Three minutes to Boston cost $1.20. My mother picked up on the first ring. She sang ‘Happy Birthday’ twice and asked if I was having a good time.

“We’re almost in California.” Any mention of my winning streak was a jink.

As a good Catholic she regarded luck as a gift from God not to be wasted on sin, although I recalled a nun telling me that St. Christopher was also the patron saint of luck. He must have been very popular on Bingo nights.

I’ll call you from San Francisco. Love you and tell Dad I’m fine.” “We miss you.”

“And I miss you too.”

My father had criticized this trip as a senseless fling.

After university I had been expected to begin a real job. America was in a recession and I had been rejected by the banks in Boston. None of them had wanted to employ a longhaired economics major with a stutter .

I hung up thinking about them sitting in our suburban home. The South Shore was a long way from Nevada.

I put in some more quarters and rang Jackie’s house in Buffalo. Her mother answered the phone, “Who is it?”

I didn’t want to say my name and hung up the receiver. I returned to the Torino and sat in the passenger seat.

“Everything good?” AK had met my parents. They had thought that he was a good friend, but also a bad influence for my future.

“We can have birthday cake later.” AK’s parents probably felt the same way about me.

“I’m like chocolate.” Pam pulled out of the gas station and the attendant waved from the pump.

The next town on the map was Elko, which was slightly bigger than Wells judging from the larger print of its name.

Pam didn’t refused my request to test Lady Luck at another casino and thirty minutes later I pushed away from the table $220 richer. The weekly salary at a Boston bank was $20 less than and the blackjack dealers didn’t cared, if I had a stammer.

I repeated my wins in Winnemucca and Lovelock.

I counted the thickening wad of cash several times in the back seat and told Pam to put on Joni Mitchell, “She’s good luck.”

“How much you have now?” AK had avoided from the tables and flirted with the slots. He was down $10.

This wasn’t his day to shine. “Counting the money I left Boston with, almost $2500.”

“That much?”

“I’m on a roll.”

“That’s almost enough for a second-hand GTO.

“One more stop and I’m going to buy a new one.” Last year I had less than twenty dollars in my pocket, as I traveled east with Marilyn. Today was my lucky day.

“That’d be a good birthday present.” AK was happy for me.

“And who deserves it more than me.”

Shutting my eyes I heard the surf of the Pacific. The ocean was cold and the sun brushed my skin with gold. I was looking forward to being a beach bum with money.

A road sign was marked RENO 150 MILES.

Night softened to a velvet blue behind us, as we pulled into the Biggest Little City in the World.

“One more stop.”

Pam groaned at the wheel and AK said, “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“It is, it is.” I handed AK my travelers’ checks and $1000. I had seen gambling movies. No one came out on top. “No matter what I say, don’t give me any money.”

“I’ll hold it.” Pam slipped the cash into her pocketbook. “I don’t trust either of you, but Joni Mitchell wishes you good luck. One more thing.

“What’s that?”

“If you’re going to play, then play to win.” Pam was a junior at a girl’s college outside Boston.

Her major was nursing. Her advice should have been more conservative.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” My fingers twitched to hold cards. This was a whole new me.

Reno blazed with neon rainbows above the street. The bright lights outshone the rising moon. I picked the Horseshoe Club as my next victim. I liked its 50s facade. Pam gave the Torino to a casino valet. I tipped him a dollar.

“Whatever you do, don’t let this man sell the car.” She warned the skinny valet.

“I’ll try my best.” He must have failed more than once. “A half-hour. Not a minute more.”

It was my birthday. Reno was at my mercy. I marched into the Horseshoe Casino.

Pam and AK detoured to an empty lounge, where he sat at an idle piano to play Joni Mitchell and

Pam smiled at him for the first time on the trip. I rubbed my hands together and approached the blackjack tables like Genghis Khan on a raid.

After fifteen minutes I was up to $900. The balding dealer in the red vest congratulated my play. I placed a $100 worth of chips on the table. My two cards were an ace and a ten. The dealer paid out $150.

A leggy redheaded waitress in a skimpy mini-dress asked, “Do you want a drink, sir.”

“Jack and Coke.”

“I’ll be right back.” She touched my shoulder and gave me a wink.

I tipped her $5 and I told her it was my birthday.

“Maybe if you’re lucky, we can celebrate it together once I get off work.” Her smile gleamed in the eternal night of the casino.

“That would be great.”

“My name’s Kim.”

I downed the first drink and pulled off a series on wins.

After each hand I counted the bills in my head. Kim kept the drinks coming one after the other.

She kissed me once on the ears.

I lost a few hands and tried to recoup these setbacks by wagering larger stakes. That strategy failed to curb the luck of the house. AK tried to pull me away from the table.

“I’ve only been here twenty minutes.”

“More like two hours.

“I know what I’m doing.”

Those were the last words that I remembered that evening.

The next morning acid sunlight blazed in my eye sockets and my head pounded like a drum crashing down a cliff. I sat up in my sleeping bag to discover that I was lying on the ground next to a rushing river.

Pine trees pierced the clear sky. The Sierras rose jagged above me. I was not in a penthouse suite with Kim.

My hands searched my pockets. There was not one dollar in any of them and my wallet was gone.

The Torino was parked twenty feet away from the river. Pam and AK were sitting at a picnic table.

Their faces told me a sad story. I didn’t need to hear the details just yet and stumbled to the edge of the rushing torrent to stick my head in the icy water.

The cascade rushing over the tumble of worn boulders had to be the Truckee River west of Reno.

I pushed back my wet long hair and checked my pockets again with the same result.

Walking to the picnic bench my body ached with each step.

For an instant I thought that someone had rolled me, but I had no bruises.

I wondered how many Jack and Coke’s I might have downed last night. The razors slashing my brain to shreds shouted more than ten and I shambled to my boots lying in the dirt. I picked them up and stuck my hand to the toes.

There wasn’t a penny in the boots.

AK and Pam were eating sandwiches.

She didn’t look very happy and I asked, “Did I lose all my money?”

“Yes.” AK confirmed the worst.

“What about the money I gave Pam?”

“Gone.”

“But I told you not to give it to me.”

“I never heard anyone beg like that. Not even a junkie in the emergency room.” Pam bit into her sandwich.

“So I’m broke?”

“Busted.”

“Shit.” I was 2700 miles from Boston. “At least I didn’t sell the car.”

“Yes, but you tried.”

“Idiot.”

Last night I had it all.

This morning I had nothing.

“Your birthday cake is in the car.” Pam nodded over her shoulder.

“Thanks.”

“It’s chocolate.”

"My favorite.” I turned slowly in a circle.

“What is it?”

“I’ve been here before.” I recognized the location.

“You lost all your money before.” Pam didn’t have a high opinion of me this morning.

“No, two years ago my friend and I were hitchhiking to San Francisco. A Riviera stopped for us. Two convicts just out of prison were inside. They were drunk and wanted me to drive. Steve didn’t think it was a good idea.”

“And was it?” Pam really wasn’t interested in this story or me, but figured it was better than listening to my moaning about blowing my vacation cash.

“It was until we reached Oakland.” The drive over the Sierras was been a dream for someone in love with fast cars. “They wanted to take over and my friend and we got out of the car. They left the gas station, then stopped and reversed like they had changed their mind, and smashed into the pump, which exploded on contact. They were too drunk to get out of the car, so Steve and I pulled them out. The station attendant put out the fire with an extinguisher.”

“Lucky you were there.” Pam finished her sandwich.

“Saving them meant nothing to me.” I wished that she had saved a bite for me. “Where’s that cake?”

“In the backseat.”

After devouring half the cake I packed my sleeping bag in the car and pulled on my boots.

My two travel companions mercifully refrained from rehashing my debacle, as we drove over the Sierras into California, but I called myself every name in the book.

Jack Kerouac had completed his cross-country trip by bus down the western slopes to the land of palm trees according to ON THE ROAD.

Like him I was in California and we reached Sacramento at noon.

AK and I dropped Pam at the bus station. She was catching the next departure to San Francisco.

Her boyfriend was waiting at the other end. We escorted her to the ticket counter. Both of us were sad to see her go and AK said, “You could always meet us in San Diego.”

“Thanks for the offer.” Pam had the telephone number of AK’s friend. “But I don’t think Harry would want to hang out with a couple of beach bums.”

“Beach bums?” AK was hurt by this opinion of him.

“I don’t mean anything bad by that, but you are spending your summer hanging out at a beach.” Pam had us dead to rights and she picked up her bags. “It was fun.”

“Most of it.” I could have done without last night.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell Jackie anything about Reno.” Pam kissed my cheek.

This gesture was as comforting as her promise to keep my disaster a secret from my ex-girlfriend not that it would have made much of a difference, since Jackie was in love with someone else.

“It was real.” She kissed AK on the lips and ran to her gate. “That was a surprise good-bye.”

Pam didn’t turn around to wave good-bye.

“I only wish it was the beginning.” His grin lessened to a smile.

“It is in some ways.” The three of us were down to two and we went outside to the Torino. AK sat behind the wheel for the last time and I wondered how long it would take me to hitchhike back to Boston.

He turned the key in the ignition and reached under the front seat.

“Here.” AK handed me a paper bag.

“What’s this?” I opened it to find my wallet with my traveler’s checks and $1000. My next words came from Captain America in EASY RIDER.

“So I didn’t blow it?”

“You tried your damnedest. I didn’t give it to you this morning, because I thought you would go back to the casino.” He shifted the column tick into Drive.

“Thanks.” I was almost in tears. “I hope you learned your lesson.”

“Two to be exact. First, I’m no gambler and second drinking and gambling don’t mix.”

I was one day older than yesterday and that day had been an education in luck, although I was smart enough to not ask the meaning of the lesson, because $2000 was $2000 more than I started with this morning.

I sat back in the seat and we pulled out of the bus station.

It was May 30, 1974 and I was one day older than yesterday.

Lodi wasn’t very far from Sacramento and that town was the end of the first part of our trip.

AK and I were heading south after returning the station wagon to its owner.

I smiled to myself, because I was still lucky in something and was smart enough to not ask what after one night in Reno, because luck came in spurts.

Both good and bad.