August 1, 1995 Watchic Pond Standish Maine - Journal Entry

My younger sister and the rest of the clan had deserted Watchic Pond to visit a nearby Aquapark, so I arrived at the camp and sat outside under the pines to eat an Italian sandwich. Pine trees shiulded me from the sun and orange needles carpeted the groundhad been p My grandfather and his friends had dammed a stream to create the pond back in the 1920s. It always seemed part of my life. Two years ago my brother and I had drifted down the Saco River rapids. It had been a happy day. We all loved Maine.

The next-door neighbor, Cary Kimball, shouted out his greetings. His wife waved for me to join them on the dock for a glass of wine. As much as I wanted to be alone, I needed company too.

They had lost his brother only two weeks ago. My brother, Michael, died less than five days ago. We spoke of the dearly departed wishing they were with us. None of us spoke of heaven or hell or said God moves in strange ways. Life had been shucked from our brothers. This shared existence without them was an unwanted communion and we raised our glasses to their lives.

Cary's a pyschiatrist at Maine Medical in Portland. I told how my parents had brought to the Catholic Diosecian shrink to fathom my avowed atheism and that was the only other time I submited to having a mental examination was in kindergarten to divine whether my speech defects were from a diminished brain.

"I bet they used the word 'retarded'."

"They might have."

"You seem fine now and I know crazy."

"Postal workers."

"Lots of them."

"They go crazy having to deliver flyers people throw away. No love letters, no postcards. Flyers. A meaningless job."

"I wish that was the case, but people have mental issues, because they aren't unaware of their psychosises. I deal with a lot of veterans from the Viet-Nam and now an increasing number from the Iraq War. Going postal is an exxageration."

"Especially since we're all mad."

"More or less. I have this vet working at the SD Warren Paper Mill."

"I know it well." My grandmother had lived down the street. Its sulphur stench smelled of home to me an anyone living within ten miles of the mill on the Presumpscot River. "He was dealing with his horrors with drink. One night coming home from THE TOP OF THE HILL." The local bar on 25. "He rearended a moose. Their fur is stiff as a brush and wiped off his skin."

"Let me guess. He didn't stop drinking." I had no intention of getting sober. I was still in mourning for Micheal.

"He's trying."

"Good for him." I held out my glass.

He filled it to the brim. In a week I was flying west to the Far East. Tibet, the temples of Thailand, the ghats on the Ganges. Nywhere where I coukd feel nothing__

July 3, 1995 - Los Angeles - Journal Entry

The last day in LA. Bags are packed and I'm ready to go, even if that means going to LAX at 2:3O AM. The terminal doesn't open until 5 AM. What a square no-sidewalk town.

But I knew that being her before.

It's not a city to me.

More a collection of suburbs. Its citizens buy the City of Angels' illusions of self-importance from 5e dntertainment industry's propaganda. None attacks the lie. The glamor of the cinema is all smoke and silver screen with the press flaks protecting the lie that you can make it here, but people do at the expense of their souls. The thousands of hopeful candidates for fame and fortune Hirding from parts unknown for roles unknown having abandoned who they were for who they might be with a little luck, but this world is tough to break into, because most of your days are spend in cars to avoid any corruption of their pasts

I don't go to the movies anymore. I hate the multiplexes. The smell of fake popcorn and Holden aufield's line from CATCHER IN THE RYE. "If there's one thing I hate, it's the movies. Don't even mention them to me."

Truthfully I loved the movies.

SUNSET BOULEVARD, CHINATOWN, SINGING IN THE RAIN, BARFLY, FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH.

I still dream of being a screenwriter, although they are the low man on the ladder, as movie star friend once said, "At Six O'Clock the female star will go with the producer, by 6:30 she's worked her way down to the dir3ctor, then the male lead, ut they'd rather go home with the valet than a writer. They are always a problem."

Later at LAX

Goodbye Los Angeles.

Adios to the freeways, the Milk Bar, Beverly Hills, North Hollywood, the bums, the club-goers, the LAPD, the Beverly Hills FD, Santa Monica Boulevard, the 420 bus over the hills, the 4 bus to South Canon Drive, the Hollywood Hills resembling Babylon's Hanging Gardens in the morning mist of the June gloom, Scottie driving back to the Valley in his Pinto, huevos rancheros, the wave churned Pacific, eucalyptus trees, The PCH, car, cars, cars, freeways, Dennis, our loving landlord, his street dog Rascal, Sara, bible chanting strippers by the pool house, always Genesis, Perry and her mutt Hairy the Dog, the White Watusi of Malibu Lake, Tujunga Canyon, drugs, Fantasy Island, the home of Dennis' strippers, cars, cares, cars,the freeways.

Everyone blisslessly going nowhere.

Me too.

Not this morning.

I'm flying East.

To Boston. To my baby brother. To see him off.

I wish it were me.

Thanks for your support. In order to avoid ads, please donate to blogger.com.mangozeen through Venmo. Any amount will help us. I do have a large family. My Venmo account is @Peter.Smith.18

Much more to come.

May 29, 1995 - LA - the Milk Bar - Journal

1995

Los Angeles

Beverly Hills to be exact.

May 29.

My birthday. No cake. No candles.

My life was not BEVERLY HILLS 90210, but the stars from the popular TV show came every night along with many others. The Milk Bar was something no one had seen in Los Angleles for a long time.

Yesterday Grace Jones performed in LA. Post-concert she stopped by the club in Beverly Hills. Dean Martin had once frequented the prior establishment. I worked as the doorman. Our mutual friend, Scottie, was co-owner.

She greeted each of us with a kiss. We knew her from New York. 1980. The Jefferson and Continental, two notorious after-hours clubs famed for flaunting wickedness till dawn. A fellow denizen of the night. We shared mutual friends. Arthur Weinstein, the Prince of the Night. Scottie told her it was my birthday. He didn't say which one. She didn't ask and gave me a hug, saying, "You put on a little weight. California suits you."

We had drinks at the bar. More than three. JZ, another New Yorker, a friend despite his coming from Wall Street. He came with two wealth management clients. He was in trouble, but only for banking irregularities. I introduced him to Grace. His clients were enthralled by the charcoal black disco queen. She was famous for the wilderness. At night's end JZ suggested that we accompany them to the Beverly Hills Hotel to party. I had nothing else to do and joined the bankers, two blonde starlets, and Grace for a short ride to the famed hotel.

We were seven in a limo. A gassed banker had a bag of blow for twenty. Inside the hotel suite Grace grabbed the stash and we locked ourselves in the bathroom rather than listened to three zooted investors brag about their millions to the coke-glazed starlets in a bad remake of Tony Montana from the last scene of SCARFACE.

Grace and I spoke about our friends from New York in the toilet.

Sex, drugs, and rock and roll

In Hollywood was only the drugs.

The two bankers banged on the door. JZ knew better. I opened it and told them to fuck off.

"Unless you want to deal with Grace."

They had all seen Grace in CONAN THE DESTROYER. She had been scary and not movie scary. The two bankers backed off. I slammed the door and then jammed my heel to prevent any entrance.

"I knew there was a reason I liked you."

Grace and I spent a few more minutes in the bathroom, then rejoined the party. Everyone was happy to be reunited with the cocaine. Not so much us, although the starlets conspiratorial winked at Grace. We were all on the same team. At dawn we shared a taxi home. Her to the Marmont Hotel.

A Happy Birthday wish and a kiss on the cheek.

Next me to a small bungalow I shared with Scottie over the Hills in North Hollywood. The driver had driven me there before. The sun rose a harsh desert morning. Both of us had sunglasses. Back in North Hollywood in bed I shivered to sleep until noon.

That was May 30, 1995.

Grace seemed to be my age.

44. It was my birthday. May 29.

Maybe my math is bad. About Grace's age.

Everyone lies about their age and weight after thirty.

Stars save the queen of Disco.

Fierce indeed.

Lijiang 1995

In the summer of 1995 my baby brother, Michael Charles Smith, passed from this world and I voyaged around the world to pray at the holiest temples and shrines in Asia. I stayed briefly in LA, Honolulu, Bangkok, and Chiang Mai with Lhasa, Tibet was my ultimate destination. The Himalayas. Lhasa. RLunga or the wind horses. I was in no hurry and passed slowly fromBoton to New York to Los Angles to Hawaii and reaching Asia in Bangkok, avoidinggo o barsand wandering through Krung Thip's many temples offering monks alms for my brother's soul.

In the last week of September I rode the overnight train to Chiang Mai. The rear kitchen car drinking beer and Mekong with the off-duty police. All of us sweating bullets. I went to sleep at midnight in the second-class sleeper. The train pulled into Chiang Mai at dawn. The ancient city held within its ochre brick walls. A banyon tree grew tall from the ruined temple, once eighty meteres tall. The grounds were quiet, I donated more alms without any explanation. The monks and I understood each other's silence. My brother also in eternity.

Lhasa called to me and I lew north to Kumming, the largest city inthe southernmost province of China. Nothing was keeping me there nor in Dali anotherancient city andi headed north by bus to Lijiang.

A four-hour trip by bus.

Farming villages dotted the roadless slopes of steep valleys. I was the only gwai-lo or westerner on the decrepit bus. A rice farmer opened a bottle of soda. The cap revealed a winning number. 5000 yuan. More than a thousand dollars.

I understood no Chinese, but two weasel-faced men befriended the wary peasant. They tried to get him off the bus, but the driver refused them to steal the villager's prize.

The bus driver was a good man.

We arrived in Lijiang at sunset. The city had been the capitol of the Naxhi people from the year 658 AD to 1107 AD serving as a southern Silk Road outpost for caravans from Burma, Yunnan, Tibet, and Persia. So far the old Baisha city had survived the urbanization wiping out ancient China and the centuries-old neighborhood has been declared a World Heritage site with good reason.

Stone buildings bordered the meandering streams and Naxhi music floated on the air, having been protected from the Cultural Revolution by the remoteness of Lijiang.

I picked a hotel on the outskirts of old city.

Chairman Mao hailed my arrival.

I was the only foreigner on the streer and the only person to salute the Chairman. He had been dead since 1976.

My hotel room on the the 4th floor room was simple. The bed was comfortable and the window offered a view of the Jade Dragon Mountain. Clouds covered the 5500-meter Himalayan peaks. The Naxi called the tallest Mount Shanzidou. In 1987 two American mountaineers had scaled its heights and said the climb was very dangerous. No one has attempted the climb since..

Lijiang wasn't the Great Wall of China. There were few tourists. Mostly backpackers seeking to trek the Leaping Tiger Gorge. My heart wasn't into being around foreigner. My sorrow was too deep.

That night I set up my typewriter and turned on my Sony Worldband radio. The announcer reported that women from around the world were flocking to an international congress in Beijing for promote equal rights for the Second Sex over 2700 kilometers from Lijiang. Another world away..

Hillary Clinton was scheduled to address the conference.

She was married to the president of the USA.

The BBC newsman said that the Chinese Authorities were at a loss as to how to handle these 'guests'.

There were thousands of them.

Demanding equality.

From men.

Naxhi women were hard workers. The traditional matrilineal family had been eradicated during the Cultural Revolution, however the dominant females retained the right to leave their wealth to women. Men were rarely seen working the fields.

Some tended to tourists in the old town.

At night they got drunk.

Beer was cheap in China.

I got drunk too.

Like I said beer was cheap in Lijiang.

Sadly the restaurants in Lijiang offered a very limited menu.

Noodles, noodles in a broth, scallion pancakes with noodles.

Plus a tasty Yunnan specialty.

狗 or gou or dog.

I had eaten dog in Indonesia's Spice Islands in 1991. I ordered a plate. Backpackers regarded me with horror. Gou was a good change from noodles.

After dinner I attended a concert of Naxhi music. The Baisha Xiyue orchestra consisted of antique Chinese flute, shawm, Chinese lute, and zither.

The multi-tonal repertoire was hard on my ears and I left early to buy bootleg cassette tapes in the night market. Enya. I stopped at a stall run by Tibetans and bought a Dorgi or lightning amuet for good luck. The Buddhist nation bordered Yunnan. Travel westd was banned by authorities. The road through the rough mountains was reputed to be very dangerous. Both for westerners and Tibetans.

After drinking a few beers at a candle-lit cafe I wandered through the dark city to my hotel. The night manager handed over the key to an ancient lady, who accompanied me to my room. I turned on the TV. A young woman was reading news. I didn't understand a word and sat at my typewriter. My fingers said nothing and I retired to bed and listened to Jeff Beck on A TRAIN KEPT ROLLING on my cassette player.

I fell asleep with the light of stars falling through the windw on my face.

I couldn't count how many cross the sky.

In the morning I walked down to the main square. A few backpackers were slurping down noodles. An old man ate dumplings. I signaled to the cook I wanted the same and wrote in my journal. The shuijiao were pork-filled and another welcome detour from noodles. The old man sat at my table and pointed to my block-script writing.

"English not beautiful."

He painted a Chinese character in my journal along with other characters and stamped a red print to the right.

"Love."

"Meili?"

He nodded and corrected by my annunciation.

I spoke all languages with a Boston accent.

Huang Fu was a calligrapher and invited me to his studio. He spoke good English.

"As a young man I go school for English. A lucky man," he laughed and explained his name meant 'Rich future'.

"Good joke. Father not see no one have fortune with Mao. My family not lucky. I # 1 son. Red Guard sent me camp. Almost die."

"Bad times."

"Yes, but they sent me here. Mao want kill all 'olds'. Here far from Beijing. We walk here. Red Guard beat us. We get house. Have food. Red Guard hate here. Hate Naxhi. Everyone hate them. We go back to old ways. I write. Come I show you."

His house was only a few minutes away. The walls of his studio were covered long rolls of Chinese characters. Writing implements crowded the tables. Two friends followed us inside. They told stories of exile. The same as Huang Fu. We drank tea and Huang Fu drew on paper.

"This tell story of Chinese victory over America in Korea."

He was proud of his nation's fighting MacArthur to a stalemate.

I told him about my Uncle Jack killing hundreds of PLA soldiers at the Chosin Reservoir.

"War not good."

We nodded in agreement, but I could tell that Huang Fu believed his country to be in the right, even if he was forced to live far from the center of the world and I thought about Ezra Pound's translation of Li Po's poem EXILE'S LETTER.

"I went up to the court for examination, Tried Layu's luck, offered the Choyu song, And got no promotion, And went back to the East Mountains white-headed."

I loved that poem, even if Ezra Pound had lied about its origin. I was far from New York and understood the disappointment of Layu's failure. For a good reason.I also was an exile on my way to Lhasa.

To pray for my brother in Tibet.

I gave Huang Fu a photo of me at the Statue of Liberty.

"Big lady," he laughed and said the same to his friends in Chinese. They laughed and he gave me the calligraphy poem of the USA defeat. I handed him 100 yuan. We shook hands weakly. No one in the Orient liked that Western habit.

At sunset I wandered down stone alleys to the hotel.

I spotted a Chinese motorcycle on the street.

It looked like a BMW.

Zhongdian was only six hours away and the road from the frontier town ran west to Tibet. I asked the owner in sign language, if he wanted to sell the bike. He shook his head. I pulled out $1000US. He shook his head again andlaughedat my low offer, signaling it was forbidden for foreigners to drive in China.

That night at the hotel I learned from two Frenchmen that the road between Lequn and Nyingchi was very dangerous.

"How dangerous?"

"Fatal."

Five years earlier I had survived a head-on crash with a pick-up in Northern Thailand. The driver had been at fault and the police had forced him to pay for the repairs to the motorcycle. I was lucky to escape with just a broken arm.

Then again everyone is lucky in Bangkok until their luck or money runs out.

Bad roads buzzkilled good luck and I decided to stay in Lijiang a little longer.

The Frenchmen and I rode a bicycle up the valley to the foot of the Jade Snow Mountains

The locals said there was a ski slope there.

It was just a toboggan run and there was no snow.

We cruised leisurely down the broad valley through the rural villages. TV antennae were the only sign that this wasn't the 14th Century.

Same as 1450.

A Buddhist temple rested under trees.

The monastery had survived the Cultural Revolution.

A lone monk emerged from a garden. I explained my reason for traveling here. He blessed my late brother and asked in sign language where I was going.

"Tibet." I pointed west.

He picked up a smooth stone.

"Tibet." He indicated to take it to Lhasa on my pilgrimage.

I agreed with a smile.

It was on my way to the high Himalayan plateau.

Lhasa was not far away now and and my brother was coming with me as was the monk's stone.

He lived in eternity always.

We all do in the end.

Thanks for your support. In order to avoid ads, please donate to blogger.com.mangozeen through Venmo. Any amount will help us. I do have a large family. My Venmo account is @Peter.Smith.18

Much more to come.

Lhasa-Nepal 1995

I spent early September- late October of 1995 in Tibet.

I traveled around Lhasa visiting various monasteries. Sera, Drepung, Ganden and the Tsurphu Monastery, home to the Karmapa rinoche.

I prayed at each one for my baby brother's departed soul.

Michael had died of AIDS that summer.

I especially liked the Jokhang.

There was no place holier on Earth.

Michael would have liked it.

He was spiritual in many ways and in my free time I taught English to monks and workers.

The People's Army were a big presence in Lhasa, but no Chinese soldiers were allowed inside the Jokhang.

The female cadres were good fun atop the Potala.

They never carried guns.

The men had AK47s.

The ARs had no ammo.

At the end of October my Chinese visa neared expiration.

The Friendship Highway to Kathmandu had been reopened after work crews had finally cleared a gigantic landslide covering a section of the Friendship Highway connecting China and Nepal.

It was time to say, "Kha-leh phe." to Lhasa.

My English class sang me farewell.

Their choice was SAILING by Christopher Cross.

I thought, "What a silly song."

Somehow dust got in my eyes and I wished my students well through a shimmer of tears.

Lhasa had been good for my soul.

I hoped my baby brother glowed in its holiness somewhere in the cosmos.

The next day I boarded a bus to Shigatze.

It was the last big town before the border.

I spent a day visiting the ancient monasteries.

I even climbed to the dzong.

The fortress was in ruins.

The Chinese had destroyed most everything Tibetan during the Cultural Revolution as had others like the Brisih and Mongols.

The next day I detoured off the main road to Gyantze.

In 1968 the Gang of Four had sent the Red Guard here to cleanse Tibet of the Old Ways. They obliterated the Jokhang and every other temple to obliterate the Four Olds 'old ideas', 'old culture', 'old customs', and 'old habits'. Buildings are stone. Souls are eternal.

The Tibetans were in the process of rebuilding the main stupa of Gyantze.

The inn at Gyantze was horrible. The noodles were greasy. The beer luke warm. Fleas ran rampant in the beds and the flies buzzed through the cracked windows of the dormitary. Every bed was overbooked. I slept about five hours and woke to a brilliant blue dawn.

The morning bus returned to Shigatze.

It truly was civilization after Gyantze, although packs of dogs roamed the alleys.

The Tibetans have a joke about these dogs.

Why do you need two sticks to go to the toilet? One to stick in the ground and hold onto and the second to fight off the dogs.

They were vicious creatures far from Man's best friend.

The paved highway ended at Shigatze. No buses ran to Nepal. I hitched a ride from a van heading to pick up backpackers in Khailash, the holy mountain. I gave the driver $20. Two other westerners were in the back. They were semi-conscious. High-altitude sickness. We grunted hello. Tsering was very happy with three westerners as his cargo and we set off south.

The high Tibetan plateau was like the surface of Mars.

No water.

No people.

Only dirt.

The dust plumes of transport trucks were the only sign of man.

We saw one every hour or two.

That afternoon dropped into a canyon.

Tsering pointed to the opposite slope.

"Landslide."

It was a mile across.

Workers cleared a road with eyes checking up the hill for tumbling boulders.

"You walk. I drive van with dead pepople. "He pointed back to the comatose backpakers. I wondered if they were high on opium. None of my business. Tsering motioned for me to walk. "No problem."

A large stone rolled down the slope. Workers scattered for safety. I ran to the end of the slide.

It was a bad road, but better after the landslide

After that road climbed into the high plateau.

15,000

16,000

The tourists barely moved. They were barely breathing.

North of Lhatze the van became mired in mud. A Tibetan herder's horse hauled it clear.

Tsering gave him $3.

Two minutes later the herder was out of sight.

Tibet was open to the sky.

My brother's soul was in the heavens.

I prayed for his happiness in the Here-Beyond.

He would remain thirty-five forever.

China National Highway 219 split off to Mount Kailash.

I asked Tsering how was the road."

"Very bad. Very dusty."

"Really." My eyeballs were grated red by the road dirt.

"Yes, # 1 bad." Tsering's eyes were red too.

We said good-bye.

Another van approached the t-intersection. Dorge was headed to the border. $20. I jumped in, the only passsenger. The others were Tibetans returning to India after a long pilgrimage to Lhasa.

This was the Roof of the World.

We passed a French bicyclist struggling uphill.

I shouted out the window, "Do you want a ride?"

"Non, merci."

I collapsed into my seat.

The road rose higher and higher.

After Tingri I spotted a giant snow mass to the south.

It was miles away.

"Chomolungma," said Tsering in reverence.

"Everest."

"Yes, to the West. Miyolangsangma, the Goddess of Inexhaustible Giving, lives on its peak."

I offered a prayer to her for Michael.

The icy summits of the Himalayas filled the southern horizon.

I had Tsering stop for a minute at the top of the Yakrushong Pass, 16,000 feet.

"Not long."

He was on a tight schedule.

I said a prayer for my younger brother.

We rose to 16,900 feet.

My words were few. Even to me.

The wind carried them to the swirl of Himalayan peaks.

The sun descended to the West.

We drove down to the border and arrived at Zhangmu in the dead of night.

I could breathe easy for the first time in a month. The tourists

Trees lined the valley.

I gave Dorge another $10.

We drank beer for an hour and then went to sleep.

It had been a long day.

In the morning Dorge was gone with his backpackers

I crossed the border. My passport had two days left on my visa. I boarded a bus to Nepal.

Tibet was behind me.

The Araniko Highway was good. I had heard that a restaurant served pizza in Kathmandu. My baby brother liked it with extra cheese. Tears dropped from my eyes. It wasn't from dust. I was back in the modern world.

ps the pizza was so-so, but it was pizza.

pps This was first written in 2014 New York.