Poverty is boring.

Most literary approaches manage to make it seem interesting –the grinding uncertainty flowering into some kind of melodrama- but I’m no worrier. Instead of long nights and days filled with hand wringing and desperate planning, our impoverishment was like one long, dull weekend with nothing to do and no money to do it with. Despite everything, I was content and sleeping as well as ever; snoring my way through life and a situation that would have most people tearing their hair out –or at least looking for a solution.

The first month without any income wasn’t too bad. Though both a couple of boneheads when it comes to money, we managed to retain enough to cover necessities –food, electricity, rent. Life was as it had been before but now we had more time to fuck around.

Through careful questioning I learned that Cliff’s decision to quit Clauson’s had less to do with familial solidarity -a thought that had swelled my heart with pride when it first occurred to me- and more with self-preservation. Convinced that Shelia was setting him up for a fall with Delore security, he quit before he could be fired.

In reaction, our first day of unemployment was spent stripping the apartment of all the crap we’d illicitly collected from the plant: an addle-pated assortment of knick-knacks and industrial curiosities. Not having the sense or foresight to risk our jobs taking anything of real value, the ill-gotten booty we scurried to conceal wouldn’t have led to serious legal trouble even if it had been discovered. At the time, however, our crimes seemed monstrous, so we bundled it all in a trash bag and buried it in a vacant lot on the other side of the fence that ran alongside the apartments.

The following week found us peering through our heavy curtains whenever a car entered the apartment lot, tensing at the sound of approaching footsteps, and blanching whenever the doorbell rang –yet the heavy head of justice’s hammer never fell.

The second month saw us scraping together change for basic items such as food and electricity. Other bills went by the wayside and our phone service was cancelled, forcing us to use a pay phone at a nearby motel –a situation Cliff came to enjoy so much that he continued to live this way for many years.

Luckily for us, there was a little rag-tag grocery store not far from our apartment called The 3-Thieves Market. They operated on the fringe, selling stuff that legitimate grocery stores cannot –out of date dairy products, dented cans of vegetables, green meat, blue bread, and various other questionable foodstuffs.

I bought a jar of no-name peanut butter that, upon opening, I discovered had a coat of yellow oil on top of it an eighth of an inch thick. The jar said ‘Smooth’ but the viscous paste inside contained innumerable lumps of what I desperately hoped were peanuts. The ‘wheat’ bread I bought to spread it on had less taste than your grocery store brand’s economy white and I am certain, though I cannot prove it, that the second item on the loaf’s list of ingredients was ‘pencil-shavings’. Still, when you’re hungry . . .

Having much less practice at losing jobs, and thus a novice in the art of conservation, my food supply dwindled at a greater pace than Cliff’s. When I was down to eating just peanut butter toast and instant coffee he still had a decent larder of grape jelly, Captain Crunch, and Spaghetti-o’s.

“Y’gotta learn to conserve, bro,” he said around a mouthful of cereal as my hungry eyes followed his spoon.

We were brothers but Chef Boyardee is thicker than water.

Unfortunately, The 3-Thieves market closed down and, hungry, Cliff began job-hunting. Before the week was out he found a job working the night shift at a gas station across town. It didn’t pay much to start but it was better than nothing.

I considered looking for work but it seemed so hopeless. Here I was, 18 years old and fired from the first job I ever took. Who would hire me? I imagined myself living on the streets or –worse- being forced to move back in with my mother.

With Cliff working, things began to look up, but the situation was still taking a toll on our relationship and I felt that Cliff looked upon me as a liability.

Why does he seem so mad at me? I wondered as I sat smoking his dope and waiting for him to get off work.

We always had dope –even when we ran out of food there was dope lying around. During my childhood, my mother always pointed at the ragged, the crazed and the homeless, saying: “Those people are on drugs. You don’t want to do drugs or you’ll end up like them –in the gutter.”

Now that I was all grown up and unemployed in my own apartment I scoffed at her warnings. What did she know? What was so bad about smoking pot? Oh, sure, it completely demotivates you and destroys your short-term memory –and of course it’s hard on your lungs- but other than that why was it so bad? At least it wasn’t addictive like tobacco -and that’s legal! I chuckled at her as I puffed on my cigarette. People could be so foolish.

Still, I did sometimes wonder about the negative effects all this drug use might be causing.

Once, when we were both quite high, Cliff came into my bedroom with his finger on his chin.

“Feel this,” he said.

“Feel what?”

“This. There’s a lump right here on my chin.” He moved his hand and tipped his head back.

I reached out and, feeling for the lump, was surprised when the slight pressure I applied caused him to fall backwards into my closet doors.

Cliff is tall and he fell like all tall things do: with an unbelievable leisure. He retained his posture even upon hitting the closet doors, sliding slowly to the floor, head and shoulders ripping posters from the doors as he went.

“Cliff!” I cried. “Cliff!”

I thought I had killed him, as if the lump on his chin was a little bag of poison and the pressure of my finger had burst it, sending merciless tendrils of death straight to his brain.

He was out for less than a minute before one cat-like eye opened and a small smile curled the corner of his mouth.

“Oh!” I said in both relief and growing anger. “You son of a bitch! Don’t DO that. You scared the hell out of me! Jesus!”

“What am I doing on your floor?” Cliff asked.

Living on the night shift has its ups and downs. As much as I enjoy being up when most everyone else is asleep, the flip side is trying to sleep when the earth is hot, bright, and abuzz.

One day, Cliff and I were awakened by what sounded like a small herd of belled ponies galloping up and down the apartment’s walkways. It soon became evident that a small group of children from the complex were making a game of ringing doorbells as they ran past each apartment, laughing their fool heads off.

Not the least bit amused, we hatched an evil plot.

As their merry parade progressed up the stairs to our level, Cliff and I donned Halloween masks and lay in wait.

Trot-trot-trot

Ding-dong! Ding-dong!

(giggle-giggle)

Trot-trot-trot

Ding-dong! Ding-dong!

(giggle-giggle)

Just as they reached our door we yanked it open, popped our heads out, let out blood-curdling roars, then snapped the door shut. I had just enough time to glimpse the startled faces of two small boys and an even smaller girl, none of them over the age of eight.

Silence reigned and then, with her companions beating a hasty retreat, the little girl on the other side of the door let out a long, piercing shriek and burst into tears.

 

After a week of peanut-buttered toast and instant coffee, I gave in and conceded there was nothing for it but to look for a job.

My motivation wasn’t exactly peaking, however; after picking up only two applications from a couple of fast-food restaurants near our apartment, I called it good. I still had very little faith that anyone would hire me –even if only to slap burgers together- so I was quite surprised when the manager of Hardee’s called me back for an interview.

I’d not eaten at a Hardee’s and considered the chain little more than a cheap upstart in the world of legitimate burger franchises. They were new to the region and, like Wendy’s, served a geometrically shaped burger -a huge offense in my eyes. Who the hell wants to eat a piece of meat that looks like it belongs on the set of Star Trek? Knocking my opinion down further was the company’s lack of a mascot. To me this meant they were either serving good food –a near impossibility- or that they weren’t willing to make the effort to distract you from their putrid fare with a happy, bug-eyed cartoon character.

All these reservations didn’t mean that I was too proud to put on one of their ugly, brown and plaid uniforms, however, and I was soon in their kitchen, ready to make my contribution to the overweight and the pimply.

The manager was a fresh-faced thirty-year-old named Mark who was bucking for regional supervisor –his clothes were pressed, his hair was nice, his shit-eating grin a blinding shade of pearl.

As the job of assistant manager is as demanding as it is unrewarding, fast-food joints take no chances when filling the position. Our store had three: Lee, a frustrated ex-marine with a drinking problem, Erika, a perky blonde with her sights set on the management position, and Ivan, a kooky Venezuelan. The four of them had me wondering if I had signed on as an employee at a hamburger joint or as a minor character in a sitcom.

The rest of the crew was composed of people near my own age; mostly high school and community college students -or dropouts.

As luck would have it, a fellow I’d met the summer before via an acquaintance was also employed in the kitchen -Rafe James. We barely knew each other but it was comforting to see a familiar face during my first day on the job.

I started out working the lunch-rush in the kitchen, toasting buns, applying condiments, and micro waving ham and cheese at a breakneck pace.

The job was so simple it made my head hurt but my nervousness and the speed with which I had to perform these simple duties had me dropping hot trays of toasted buns and applying over-generous dollops of catsup and mustard. Rafe didn’t help the situation, cackling at my mistakes and distracting me with hilarious banter centered around two subjects –pretty girls and guitar heroes.

“You heard Steve Vai? That fucker can really play. I’ve got a white flying V. Oh, shit, lookit that chick at the counter! Fuck! I gotta get her number. Oh, yeah -them trays are hot. D’it burn you? A-hah!”

Our immediate supervisor, an unhappy and plain young woman by the name of Cheryl, despised Rafe and, unhappy with our horseplay, gave us a talking to after the first lunch wave had passed. Every time she turned her head to me during the lecture Rafe mouthed the words ‘dyke’, ‘lesbian’, and ‘virgin’ through his unrepentant grin.

Having been subsisting on meager provisions for an overlong period of time, I was soon dizzy with the smell of cooking meat and found my shift, though only four hours long, to be tortuous. It was with real delight that I fell upon my free meal of a cheeseburger, fries and a coke forgetting all about the sacrilege of the octagonal, mascot-less meat.

Our apartment’s reputation as a psychedelic clubhouse began to cause us some trouble. People would visit under the mistaken belief that we either sold drugs, had plenty to spare, or would baby-sit those completely out of their minds on them.

Jack McIntyre once showed up with his nephew, Alan, and some other friend –all three loaded to the gills on lsd. Cliff and I were on our way out but they convinced us to let them hang while we were gone.

We came back to find a house in tatters: the living room drapes hung askew from a snapped rod, candle wax was splattered creatively over furniture and the carpet, one of our filched and coveted viewing prisms had a monstrous chip out of the back, there were footprints on the coffee table, and the kitchen looked as if they’d blindfolded Martha Stewart and loaded her up on speed –all of this accomplished in less than an hour.

Jack’s nephew, Alan, was only a couple of years younger than I, causing Jack and Cliff to refer to us as “the next generation”. I liked Alan. He seemed okay for a guy who’d been thrown out of jr. high school for dealing acid. I enjoyed the mellow, irreverent company he and his high school friends provided -and the young girls they occasionally had over didn’t hurt my interest, either.

One time I agreed to pick up a buddy of his, Tony, and a girl Tony was trying to woo. The snow was falling in crunchy flakes when I pulled up to my old highschool at the appointed time, sliding with uncontrolled force into the curb in an attempt to appear reckless and cool.

Spotting my car, Tony and the girl sprinted from the building, alerting me to the fact that I was now an accessory to a couple of truants.

The girl, Sara, was stunning; beautiful hair, clear skin, a willowy body. Her eyes flashed at me as she piled into the front seat, her warm, denim painted hip pressing up against mine as Tony squeezed in next to her and slammed the door.

We ran by Tony’s house so he could fetch his weed, then stopped by a 7-11 where I bought them some 3.2 wine coolers. As I climbed back into the car with the alcohol, Sara caught a whiff of my aftershave and said “Someone smells nice” in a very naughty sounding tone.

“Well, it’s not me!” I said for some inexplicable reason as Tony bashed holes in my dashboard with jealous eyes.

Once at our apartment, Tony wrapped himself around Sara and commenced pleading for sex, a kiss, a hug, anything! -but she was having none of it. She refused pot and only sipped her cooler while Tony cradled her in frustration, his useless, throbbing erection pulling all the blood from his brain.

After a short period of non-involvement, Sheila once again began accompanying mutual friends to our apartment. Instead of the tension you might expect such fraternization to cause, she and Cliff acted quite comfortable around each other. Sheila even brought her new boyfriend around, a big, bearded, macho guy by the name of Mark. Mark swaggered a bit at first but, realizing there was no honor to defend, soon settled down.

While everyone else debated what was really going on in their heads, I knew for certain that Cliff was relieved to be free of Sheila: they were an obvious mismatch and now Sheila was beginning to bloat up. She had always been a bit . . . plush but now her face and limbs were losing definition.

Obesity is one of the many things that Cliff found completely unacceptable. Cliff, in fact, had a whole set of criteria that he used to gauge the potential seriousness of any given relationship. If, for example, you were his idea of the perfect woman but you have blond hair, not at all his preference, Cliff might go out with you but you could count on the fact that, no matter how happy or otherwise compatible you two might be, Cliff would have one eye on the lookout for someone just like you -but brunette. Not that he was two-timing or dishonest about it. One of Cliff’s most incorrigible traits is his honesty in such matters.

“I like you, I like you a lot. You’re pretty and you’re fun to talk to. We have lots in common and I really enjoy your company but, well, I just can’t get serious with someone so . . . short.”

My job at Hardee’s was ridiculous, more a novelty pastime than viable form of employment. I was scheduled something like 16 or 18 hours during my first two-weeks –a period that, at minimum wage, produced a paycheck incapable of making the down-payment on a pack of chewing gum, much less allow me to pay my share of the bills or provide me with a suitable supply of groceries.

I was hungry as ever -but the solution was just under my nose.

“Help me with this box.” Rafe called one day, beckoning me into the walk-in freezer with a twinkle in his eye. Inside were frosty pallets stacked with boxes and bags of just about everything we served.

Grinning, Rafe lead me to an open box of pre-apportioned cookie dough balls. They were delicious. We stuffed our cheeks and emerged from the freezer gasping as we choked down the sticky globs.

I soon learned that it was always a good idea to volunteer to get supplies. Not only would you get a change of scenery and a chance to shirk, it was also the best way to grab a surreptitious bite to eat. I especially loved fetching pickles, as they were kept in a separate room in a big, green 5-gallon bucket. I could eat handfuls of the things. I even nibbled on the occasional broken chunk of a frozen meat patty. Num!

Better even than restocking, however, was taking out the trash.

Fast food restaurants are only allowed to keep hot food items around for a certain amount of time. Too long and you’re risking bacteria –plus you’ll have to put up with some fat bastard whining that his burger is cold or dry, and nobody wants that.

Hardee’s used a number system, little metal tabs that sat in the racks and indicated what number the big hand was on when said item was fresh. The food was only allowed to be in the rack for ten minutes or something –I never paid attention to the actual time, I just watched when and what got thrown out, always crossing my fingers for expired pies.

A savvy food service employee will take time in between preparing food to adjust the contents of the trash can in order to avoid having their free snacks buried. Once at the dumpster, you wolf down whatever goodies you managed to preserve, savoring their almost perceptible warmth.

As the holidays approached we decided to organize another party. Some of Cliff’s friends were on leave from the service and it looked like we could plan on a wild time.

Alan and a couple of his friends arrived tripping, so they sat around our kitchen table attempting to mellow out while I played the devil’s dj, slipping in the weirdest music I owned. Nothing seemed to phase them until I put on Frank Zappa’s “The Radio is Broken”. After a just a few moments of this insanity their composure began to shred. There was nervous giggling, white knuckles on beer cups, and manic, darting eyes. When they couldn’t take anymore they fell from their chairs and, begging me to stop, crawled away mewling with frightened laughter.

One of Cliff’s military buddies arrived with a game called “Pass-Out” which, though shaped like a cheap version of Monopoly, was designed to help people on their way to the emergency room. As you moved your token around the board there were hazard spaces that either instructed you to take another drink, snort, or puff of whatever intoxicating substance was on hand, or it might ask you to draw a card -that would instruct the same. The goal, of course, was to be rendered comatose. Even at my most hedonistic I found the concept incredibly stupid.

Party hopping, Sheila and Dave arrived late. Sheila was already blotto and, after ponying-up her own baggie of dope for the evening’s festivities, passed out on the couch.

I found the party unremarkable until I was reunited with an old friend, DW Montana. DW and I met in grade school, became fast friends, and then lost track of each other when sent to different jr. high schools. Upon meeting again in high school, things had changed: DW was running with the dopers while I hung in nerd territory. One of the last times we’d spoken, I asked him if he was dope smoker. When he replied in the affirmative, I told him, in a cool, self-righteous tone, that I didn’t -and that was that. Now, here he was at a party at my house and I was sharing a bowl with him. Gentleman that he was, he didn’t rub my nose in the irony of it all –or maybe his drug addled mind simply didn’t supply the memory . . .

Later that evening, DW disappeared for a short time only to reappear soaking wet and shivering, his shoes and coat gone.

“Dude! What are you doing?” I asked.

“My truck’s stuck in a ditch.” he said.

“Heh. You must be pretty wasted. Where’s your coat?”

“The truck.”

“Your shoes, too?!?”

“No, no. They’re down the hall at that neighbor girl of yours.”

“Who? ‘Coker’ Chrissie?”

“Yeah, I accidentally knocked on her door first and, well, she’s a lot of fun” he grinned.

“Jesus, you are wasted. A ditch, huh? You need help pulling it out?”

“No,” DW laughed, “not that kind of ditch; an irrigation ditch. My truck is upside down and under water. Fuck, I’m cold! S’there any beer left?”

DW wasn’t the only one plumbing the depths of his depravity that evening. Around two in the morning, semi-conscious, Alan made to lean up against the wall, forgetting that it wasn’t a wall but just a flag covering the entry to our hallway. Clutching at the flag as he fell, he ripped it from the ceiling. Half an hour later a line was forming outside our bathroom door when one of swollen decided he’d waited long enough and barged in to find Alan slumped on the toilet, pale and twitching, his head dangling into the trashcan in his lap.

“Jesus!”

“He’s sick.”

Jack tried to rescue his nephew from shame by closing the door and getting him cleaned up but the stench proved too much for his weak stomach.

“I can’t do it!” he cried as he emerged retching. “Someone else’ll have to. Jesus –the smell!”

“Goddammit I have to pee!”

“Get him outta there!”

After much bickering it was conceded that Alan was best left where he was. After all, he had both ends covered. When Alan finally did recover, he staggered out of the bathroom and right out the front door, almost over the deck railing.

I’m not sure why certain events will signal the end of a party to virtually everyone attending but they can and Alan’s self-ejection from the bathroom did. Before we knew it, the party was over.

The last folks to leave were Dave and Sheila. Dave would have left earlier but Sheila’s snoring bulk served as an all too effective anchor. Now he was giving her gentle shakes:

“Sheilaaah. Sheeeilaaah. C’mon honey; time to go.”

Sheila twitched and tossed her head.

“Sheeeilaaaaah.” Dave wasn’t giving up. He shook her harder. “Let’s go.”

“You could always carry her.” Cliff said.

Dave looked from Cliff to the now wider Sheila then back to Cliff.

“Shit . . . C’mon Sheila!”

Sheila allowed herself to be coaxed from the depths, her eyelids riding at half-mast over their glazed orbs.

“Y’ready t’go, honey?” Dave asked.

“Skulberdungie.” Sheila slurred matter-of-factly.

We stared at her.

“Skloo perf nurkle shantz?” she asked, one hand snaking down between her feet to grasp the ball foot of the couch. “Akkle fleen?”

“Wh-what?” Cliff asked.

My stomach started to flip-flop. All the stories my mother had told me over the years about drugs we’re true! Here was a girl whose brain was completely fried. How long until I turned into one of the donkeys on Pleasure Island?

Sheila continued talking gibberish until her brain sorted itself out enough to use actual English, if only with the sophistication of Tarzan:

“Want where got high.” she mumbled, her hand pulling in vain at the couch wheel.

We continued staring at her in horror as she repeated variations of this confounding phrase in ever-angrier tones.

Suddenly I got it -Cliff’s stash was under the couch and Sheila wanted what was left of the baggie she’d brought. Unable to stand or even speak, she remained aware of her drugs. Truly, the human brain is an amazing organ.

As the weather got colder the reality of our situation became more apparent. My own hours, though increasing, did little to alleviate our financial predicament and Cliff became more sour with each passing week.

One night, as I sat in my bedroom reading, I noticed my breath billowing before me though I’d crushed out my last cigarette some minutes before. Checking the thermostat I saw that it was set all the way down yet, when I adjusted it to kick the heat on, nothing happened.

“Hey, Cliff. Something’s wrong with the thermostat.”

“No there isn’t” came the terse reply, “and leave it alone! I pulled the fuse so you wouldn’t turn the heat up. If you’re cold put on more clothes!”

I understood and appreciated this plan but was disturbed by the unnecessary subterfuge and the anger I heard in his voice. Was I really that untrustworthy? Shamefaced, I reset the thermostat to zero and slunk back to my room to don a few sweaters.

Like a married couple, stress from our financial woes was spilling over into our relationship. Cliff began to take issue with my general habits and hobbies; what I wanted to do, how I wanted to do it, the friends I had over, all of it was beneath his contempt. My very presence irritated him. In short order I’d gone from being his roommate back to being one of his annoying, tag-along little brothers.

Ever creative, Cliff sparked on an idea one afternoon as he sat admiring his modest collection of ill-gotten road signs. Locating some black paint, he went to work.

His handiwork floored me when I saw it–it was flawless.

“You and a couple of your friends should go hang this.”

“On the street?!?” I laughed.

“Yeah,” he replied, dead serious.

I was taken aback. Cliff was not known to delegate his mischievousness unless he felt there was a decent chance of being caught –and I was now far too old to get sucked into playing the fall guy as easily as I once had.

“Why me?”

“’Cause I can’t afford to get caught.”

“I don’t want to get caught, either!” I barked.

“You won’t. Besides, it’s not the getting caught that’s a problem –this is a misdemeanor at most- it’s who gets caught.”

“What?”

“Look: you’re a minor. You’re gonna do stuff like this. Cops’ll haul you down to the station, call mom, then laugh it off while she drives you home. Me? I’m a responsible adult. They catch me, I do jail time.”

“I’m not a minor, I’m 18! I could go to jail, too!”

“Not like I could. Who’s got the record?”

“Well . . .”

“C’mon! Use your imagination! Don’t you want to see this sign up! Jeez . . .”

So the next night three friends and I hustled the sign and some tools to my car and set out to find an appropriate place to hang the thing.

The obvious choice was just a few blocks over where the heavy traffic would allow more folks to see the sign but even at that late hour, the traffic was too steady for us to accomplish the task without being detected. The story was the same no matter where we went. Even the most desolate stretches would fill with cars the minute one of us attempted to shinny up a pole, a wrench clenched in our teeth.

When we did finally find a place quiet enough for us to get to work, we discovered that the city was employing an ingenious type of bolt whose design resisted the grasp of any traditional wrench. The whole harebrained affair seemed hopeless but I refused to return home defeated –we would try the county.

My natural instincts led me back home to a place I and some of my closest friends called “Wibbley Canyon” -a name designed to hide the depth of feeling I have for it and the stretch of river that runs there. Just over the bridge and around the bend, on a road I knew from an entire childhood of school bus rides, we found a likely spot.

Attempting nonchalance, we parked and, listening to the breath of the valley for any approaching motorists, we made our way over to the sign. Finding ourselves alone, we soon had it exchanged with Cliff’s fanciful redesign.

This evening of immature buffoonery, one of the last with school buddies I now saw so little of, was symbolic for me; a pale yet fitting, final notch in the stock of my childhood. We cheesed for the camera then scurried back home to report.

“You put it where?!?” Cliff was aghast.

“You don’t understand! There was too much traffic in town.”

“But who’s gonna see it out there, huh? Ten people before it gets taken down?”

“But Cliff! We got pictures! “

“Yeah. Great. Pictures. The school bus’s gonna go by there at six in the morning! What were you thinking?”

“You can always make another one! We brought back the other sign –it’s a 30 mile-an-hour, too! You could hang it yourself.”

But to my knowledge, he never did.

 

Christmas was uneventful. As we’d stated our intention to spend Christmas Eve and morning at our own apartment, mom brought our presents by a week early with the condition that we not open them until Christmas morning and promised to appear at her house for Christmas dinner. We agreed, bid her adieu, then smoked a bowl and tore into the small pile of presents.

That same week, we were disturbed from our normal routines by shouting as doors up and down the complex opened. We peered out our own door to see a lone, confused deer taking cautious steps in the snow between the two apartment buildings. Many of the folks living here had never seen such a creature before and were both excited and frightened by its unexpected appearance. Though I’d grown up seeing deer, I found myself drawn to its delicate innocence and wondered if others in the complex felt as lucky and happy as I to be treated, despite our urban lives, to such a beautiful sight.

Across the way a man in his undershirt answered my unasked question by coming out his front door with a rifle and drawing a bead on the deer. He would have shot, too, had the screams of terror from residents on the other side of the deer not frightened it off.

With the apartment’s notoriety, you’d think Cliff and I would have had a houseful on New Year’s Eve but, as the day approached, we began to feel somewhat abandoned. It seemed everyone had somewhere to go but us. The only person who came over to party was Alan.

Alan had a pocketful of psychedelic mushrooms and, though I was hesitant to trip again, I allowed myself to be talked into taking some. I ate a small amount, telling myself that it was New Year’s, I was only taking a little; I’d be fine.

We washed down the foul fungi with soda and pot then, waiting for the mushrooms to do their thing, we tried to figure out what to do. We couldn’t just sit around the apartment on New Year’s Eve, that wouldn’t be right!

Jack McIntyre and his wife had moved to Denver a month or so before and, as they were our most constant party companions, a lamebrained plan was hatched to drive the 50 or so miles to their house as a kind of New Year’s surprise.

Not yet tripping, we climbed into my old, white, ’67 Nash Rambler and hit the highway. Expecting the effects of the mushrooms to hit at any minute, I insisted that Cliff, well known for his ability to remain cognizant under even the heaviest dose, drive.

Halfway there, the cumulative effects of the ride and the mushrooms started to get to me. My poor old Nash Rambler, a white clunker I dubbed ‘Elrod the Albinomobile’, vibrated down the blacktop at a speed it hadn’t seen in years, if ever. My vision began to take on the vibrations, churning everything into a disconcerting, staccato blur. The music coming from the speakers blended with the road noise to become an angry, incomprehensible muttering. Cliff and Alan were laughing and joking as I sunk lower in my seat, praying that I wouldn’t come apart.

“Damn! Yeah!” enthused Alan.

“These ‘shrooms are great!” Cliff agreed. “Hey Corey, get the baggie. Time to take the rest!”

“Alright!” Alan hooted.

I forced my hand to open the glove box and fetch the bag of fungus, handing it over my shoulder to Alan who divvied up the remaining heads and stems into three piles. He wolfed down his own with a swig of cola then handed us ours. I palmed mine while Cliff chewed his with a grimace.

“Yuck. I hate the taste of these things, and they always make me feel like I have to take a shit, but . . . wow!”

We reached Denver in full trip and proceeded to get lost in the sprawling, maze-like development where Jack lived; an endless labyrinth of cookie-cutter tenements crowded together on identical, storybook streets.

“This is so . . . cool.” Alan said, his face pressed to the glass -I was just glad to be off the highway.

We drove in confusing circles for twenty minutes or so until Cliff finally spotted their house number.

But they weren’t home. Had we not been filled with chemical euphoria we might have been a bit more disappointed. As it was, we just sort of shuffled around on Jack’s stoop for a while, confused and trying to get a sense of what to do next. Midnight was just a few hours away and we barely knew where we were, much less what to do.

Using gravel from the flowerbed, Cliff laid out his imminently recognizable initials on their stoop as a calling card, then we piled into the car and headed back home.

I began feeling better so, in some stupid attempt to challenge this feeling, I ate the rest of my mushrooms and felt the trip take a turn into deeper though not unpleasant waters.

During the drive home we decided there was nothing for it but to go ahead and try to celebrate the New Year the good, old-fashioned American way –by getting shitfaced: Cliff stopped at a liquor store and we all chipped in on some beer.

Once home, we sat down at the kitchen table, smoked a bowl and attempted to play quarters, a game unsuited to those already frayed by psychedelic substances. Under normal circumstances, one approaches the game either to win because of a competitive streak, or to lose and get hammered. Tripping, our own game consisted more of strained concentration as we struggled to get that damned quarter into the cup –or at least keep it on the table. It was difficult enough to remain cognizant of the table, the room -each other- not to mention the desperate and protracted searches that ensued every time the confounded thing rolled off onto the floor. Even the worst drunks can locate a shiny piece of metal on a dark carpet but we three, with our pupils stretched wide before our largely unseeing eyes, were too easily distracted by such things as the grain of the baseboards, the texture of the ceiling, and the fascinating way our skin looked under the light.

I’m not sure when the mushrooms wore off but before I knew it, instead of tripping, I was drunk. The effect hit us all more or less at the same time and we stared at each other, bemused.

“What time is it?” Alan asked.

“Jesus! It’s 4:30 in the morning!” I said.

“We missed New Years!” Cliff laughed, making his way to the bathroom.

I looked at the empties and saw we’d drunk all the beer without realizing it –more than a case of piss-like alcohol gone without any of us actually aware who was drinking it.

When Cliff wandered back from the bathroom, Alan and I burst into hysterical laughter. You have to understand that Cliff doesn’t drink. He’s never liked the taste of alcohol and so, despite his interest in exploring the twisted side of his brain, has avoided it much of his life. In all our years of growing up and then partying together, I’d never seen him take more than a ceremonial sip –yet here he was, plastered. Apparently unable to control his spine, he walked bent forward at the waist, his long, gangly arms swinging loose, knuckles inches above the carpet as we choked on our drunken laughter.

“What’s so funny?” he asked.

After the holidays, things began to look up.

When the afternoon grill-chef at Hardee’s finally threw in his apron, I was picked as replacement, a dubious honor but one which filled me with a sense of having proved something to myself and others –while I had failed as a janitor, I was smart enough to flip burgers. The almost constant bustle of our team’s valiant struggle against the riptide of the lunch rush had motivated me where sweeping and mopping acres of tile by myself had not.

With this increased responsibility came longer, steadier hours and a raise. Though I still wouldn’t be making what I had at Clauson’s, with caution I would once again be able to pull my own weight. Proud, I imagined my relationship with my brother improving and couldn’t wait to hand him my share of the next month’s rent.

Cliff, however, had other ideas.

“You’re just not holding up your end of the deal” he explained. “I’m tired of having to clean up after you. I really just want to live by myself.”

“But . . .”

“And you smoke. Your cigarettes stink up the whole apartment. You’re ruining my posters.”

He told me he had already signed a lease on a different, cheaper apartment in the complex and the tone of his voice told me that the decision was made; any debate would only serve to further damage our relationship.

Ashamed, I walked to the motel and called mom, asking her if she’d redecorated my old room yet.

-end part 2-

-go to part 1 -

cae 2004