Steve Blow Job Meets A Cop!

"Guess what I just swallowed! It's not a canary!"

Legendary Dallas Morning News columnist Steve Blow is a fountain of wisdom and sage advice in these confusing times. If one were to follow his guidance one's life would never stray from the enlightened path in this dark and darkening world. Thank God for this beacon of sanity! A recent illustration of this man's moral superiority to the average Joe can be seen in his wonderfully titled column "Obeying police instruction is easy first step to avoiding tragedy". Hear, hear!

Weak-kneed and awestruck I read this tutelage for proper behavior in a modern society. I even created a new acronym for my life: WWSBD (What would Steve Blow do?). Following this man's code for conscientious conduct I was able to construct just what it would would be like if our fabled hero were to have a police encounter of the third kind. Even in the most trying of circumstances, we see a man who comes out unscathed and undaunted. Who could hope for more?

*****

"Pull over, you white cunt!"

"Why yes, officer. Good idea! How may this white cunt help you?"

"You know why I pulled your sorry ass over?"

"I'm sure it was for a good reason and for the betterment of society."

"Cause I hate your white bitch ass. That's why."

"Why thank you for the enlightenment! I'm looking at this as a true learning experience."

"Now get out of the car and put your pussy Plano hands on the roof, peckerhead."

"A wise precaution! Take no chances and trust no one! That's life on the streets, eh, officer?"

"Fact is I don't trust no white bread fucker driving a '86 Volvo. You ain't had an original thought in your life, has you? Now spread 'em so I can feel your private parts even if they is the size of a scared sausage."

"The thoroughness of your police training shines through. God, I'm proud to be frisked by you!"

"After a while you'll learn to enjoy the penetration

and become a good citizen like I am."

"Now, I want your punk ass to start squealing like a pig right here on the open highway."

"Obeying police instruction is an easy first step to avoiding tragedy!"

"Louder, piggie!"

"Yes, officer, sir! My, you certainly are a mean and surly one. I like that in a cop!"

"Who cares what your idiot ass likes? You're here to please me. You exist for my benefit. You got that, cracker?"

"Loud and clear! Loud and clear! May I lick your fine black shoes, officer?"

"Damn right, you better! If I find one spot on them afters I'll tase your ass!"

"And deservedly so! I just want to go on the record to verify I don't need any pesky constitutional rights. I spit on them and everyone who dies for them!"

"Only rights you got is what I give you."

"I can think of nothing more just!"

"What I outta do is arrest you for assaulting me with that tongue on my shoe and leave your virgin ass in jail until you are humiliated into hanging yourself."

"Now that's the thin blue line I keep talking about!"

"You such a pathetic worm it takes all the fun out of oppressing your booty bitch butt."

"I sincerely and deeply apologize, officer. Pathetic worm am I! The way you protect us from thugs and deviltry fills me with quivering respect. If only each of us would take on the responsibility to worship and pledge complete obsequiousness to our men in blue the world would be a fantastical paradise in which to live."

"Responsible members of society apologize for being black."

"OK, I think I heard enough outta you. I got a whole lot better use for that mouth of yours. Now you gonna get an up close and personal look at a Alabama black snake that you gonna make happy."

"Why, thank you, officer! An honor and a privilege to serve the police in any way I can! Frankly, I was hoping you would allow me to perform a service for you even though I was mistakenly thinking more along the lines of a bake sale."

"Yeah, I know. Every one of you conservative cunts is just dying for a black man to show you the ropes. No wonder you keep us outta your country clubs. You too afraid your desire to be the eighteenth hole would show up."

"A keen and astute insight! I hope I was satisfactory in my servicing you today. I cannot wait to continue driving down the road covered in your respect. You have no idea what this means to me and I cannot wait to do a grammatically correct column on it!"

"That don't mean nothin' to me. All you gotta know is who's in charge and who's the child."

"Well played, sir. Too many immature citizens insist on a dangerous and anarchic sense of self-respect that simply cannot be abided in today's society. Back the men in blue and everything they do!"

"Gawd, you a jack ass."

Unconfessed

Trying to guide our future through a
one-size-fits-all world isn't easy.

We were a foursome: Jeremy and Jennifer, along with Jun and I, Jolene. We were the "Four J's". Jeremy worked for the Treasury Department chasing counterfeiters. Jennifer was a rising administrative assistant at a downtown skyscraper. Jun was a freelance artist with a carefree spirit (and for that I loved him madly). And I am still a high school counselor, the most infuriating, rewarding job you can ask for. Of the four of us, I am the only one still alive.

Jeremy was uptight but a "good" drunk. He got more sociable, more open and sometimes actually funny (but he thought every time he was funny). As for Jennifer, I don't care how good she was at her job, it was her her style I wanted! A burlap sack would look good on her. My Jun was an exotic breath of fresh air. I never did get to the bottom of it. Would I have loved him as much without his fascinating Chinese ancestry? And everyone agreed I had the job most unwanted by the other three - which was their way of paying me a compliment.

This is hard to write. I cry when I think back to that night at our old watering hole.

Jeremy was bragging on busting a counterfeiter ring which naturally forced Jun to pop his bubble any way he could. Jun had no use for "the so-called real world."

"What do you mean you caught some goofball counterfeiters - "

"They weren't goofballs! It was a sophisticated operation in over seven states!" Jeremy never learned not to take Jun's bait.

"Anyone jacking off with slips of paper is a goofball! Money doesn't exist. It's an illusion, all in your freaking bonehead!"

"For an illusion you sure do seem to want your share of it!" Jun had touched a sore point and that tickled him to no end. He could not match Jeremy's worldly success - nor could Jeremy match Jun's spiritual success. Jennifer and I looked at each other with sly smiles. Jun had his fish on the hook and no way was he going to let go.

"Weren't you the one bitchin' that my Chinese money doesn't even look real?"

Mao say dung!

"It doesn't! It's all hieroglyphics and scribbling and no-good Commies on there. Real money shouldn't look like that."

"You only say that because you're brainwashed. What about you with your crazy pyramid with an eye on it??" Jun was having a glorious time. He craved these sort of conversations that most people - especially "straights" as he called them - would never let him have. The idea of even questioning the concept of money is too disconcerting or too ridiculous or, frankly, too embarrassing for just about anyone else to consider. Jun admired Jeremy for even allowing the argument. I'm not sure Jeremy ever got that.

"I'm not brainwashed. People's lives are at stake. How would you like to be paid in fake money?"

"Fine by me. I'd sell them a fake painting!"

"Oh, he already does that!" I had to interject. That seemed to break a tension I was beginning to feel.

Jun stopped a passing waiter asking for a sheet of paper from his notepad. He was on a roll. "Here, let me show you. I write on here 1,000,000,000, draw a picture of my handsome Commie profile, then I'll do a castle instead of a pyramid and boom! I'm a billionaire."

"That's just stupid," sighed Jeremy.

"Stupid, huh? Well, I'm going to frame this tomorrow in my gallery and I bet I get some of your so-called real money for my money!" We all thought that was a wickedly funny thought - but Jeremy erupted.

"You better not, dammit!" It was like a gavel hit the table silencing us. As Jennifer tried to calm him down I remembered a conversation she and I had I never could shake. She called Jeremy a "runaway".

Most people bemoan not telling their parents - or whomever - that they love them before passing away. Jeremy's situation was the opposite. He'd pretended to love his father all his life only to have his father die before telling him he hated him. Jeremy despised the man as a fraud and a phony. "Everything he did was a lie," he confessed to Jennifer one night. She wondered how deep a price he'd pay for that unconfessed part of his life.

As a counselor I know it can be fatal. I said nothing. I don't want to bring my psychological aspects into the daily lives of my friends. I see now I should have expressed my reservations, pointing out Jeremy could be sitting on a time bomb. Jun had a point. Jeremy sought the artificial world as sanctuary. By not confessing his feelings he lived a lie just as his father before him. One never knows how deeply that can fester. I knew in a heartbeat that Jeremy's snapping at Jun's taunting that night meant he really did feel like he was a failure, the spitting image of his father. I decided to break my rule and have a talk with Jeremy to root this out.

I never got that chance.

I left early with end of quarter paperwork hounding me back to the house. But that feeling I had walking out I'll never forget! I felt I was being ripped in two, voices screaming at me for no logical reason. The ride home was surreal, nearly starting to cry seeing a bad accident on the other side of the highway divide. The one thing I hate more than any other is to be accused of over-reacting or sensationalizing my emotions. It stings me and burns me, ultimately scarring me. Yet here I was feeling that burn by not sensationalizing my feelings, remaining "logical" and doing the "so-called" practical thing.

At 6:33 AM on a cloudless Sunday morn I got the news from a loft neighbor of Jun's. All three had gone off the Calatrava bridge in a one car accident. All I said was "Thank you," and hung up. I was dispossessed of my body. I didn't ask why or cry out. My eyes were glued wide open. I could see the entire universe with its flowing colors and vibrant joy. Had I retreated into sorrow I'd have never made it out of that hole. Why in that moment the universe did not want me to die I do not know. I know I sure wanted to (and sometimes still do).

Each came to me in a dream. First Jun. The first two times I cried out in pain at the cruelty of believing he was alive while I was asleep only to have him die on me all over again in the morning. By the third time I understood. He wants me to know he still exists somewhere! Oh, thank everything in the universe for that! My tears are not in vain. We are together though apart.

It was after that I allowed his art to be sold. Hanging on to his art was not the same as hanging on to what we had. The world should know what I know of him. He smiles with every smile his creations bring.

Jennifer came to bring me an understanding hug. I didn't know I needed it until she gave it to me. Yes, I realized, I had been secretly recriminating myself. For leaving, for not saying more, for living. Sisters of a different mother we'd always said of ourselves. I was afraid I'd lost that too.

Was a long time before Jeremy came. I thought perhaps even in the afterlife he might still choose to run away. I didn't judge him but I didn't respect him. Then I found out why he waited. It wasn't just that he had been drunk driving, killing two of the most important people in his life. It was what happened after they hit the water. The cold sobered him up and in a mad panic tried to save Jennifer and Jun. In that he made honest efforts but it was too late. Then he was faced with a choice.

Something inside of him snapped. He gave up. Jeremy could have made it to the surface but reversed course to drown. He'd have to face the law. He'd have to face two families he wrecked. He'd have to face me. And he'd have to face up to living a lie and being no better than his father. This was his "out." A runaway.

*****

It has taken me over two years to write about this. Strange, but in all this time I had not realized I'd never spoken about the wreck out loud. Sure seemed to me like I had but when everyone started congratulating me for coming to terms with this "at last" I was a bit shocked but soon realized what it must have seemed from their perspective. A season for all things.

What prompted this writing, though, was late night TV. Bored and unable to sleep I saw the opening credits to "Leave It To Beaver". That caused a flashback that made me laugh. All through high school Jeremy had called Jun "June Cleaver". It was funny, at first.

Addendum: Samurai Sorrow

Nobu stood perplexed at the precipice of life in the early morning fog. Which road leads to life and which to death? He'd found heaven under the sun - but was the sun his to claim?

*****

At long last Nobu had freedom from the suffocating samurai structure which had imprisoned him since birth. His creative impulses, his vision, his ever active imagination acted as tormenting demons in his daily life, struggling against a corrupt authoritarian regime he couldn't help but taunt as he himself felt. It was a case of damned if he did and damned if he didn't.

"Why me?" Nobu wondered in the middle of night. What annoyed him most - when he let go in his most private moments - was the irrepressible feeling of optimism that would bubble up. An exciting truth lingered just below the surface, that if it ever got free would change the world. I am instrument of Destiny!

"Baka!" he'd reprimand his dreaming soul in self-mutilation. Samurai were servants, their fate determined at birth to be no less or more than objects in a feudal society. Anything outside of that had no place in their strict code of conduct. The simple wallowed in this like muddy pigs, thugs relished it in bullying delight, and those of rare intelligence either became ambitious or torn apart like Nobu. Now, he lived on the other side of that fence - the price to live on the run.

Life on the run after his famously - and infamously - done gesture of rebuke of the samurai way breathed even more life into his impossibly secret dream. More excited than ever, it waited for the inevitable moments when his guard dropped, Nobu losing his human will. But this ambiguous nebulous cloud of hope never quite came into focus. Stop getting so excited for no damn reason! It was like grasping to touch a rainbow.

Emiko changed all that.

It wasn't until he met her did Nobu realize he'd been praying to meet her his entire life. Like finding a long lost childhood friend he knew her life story the minute he saw her smile and explored her deep, gathering eyes. They were two of a kind walking upright in a world that crawled on all fours. Or, at least, with her Nobu walked upright.

It's true the specter of doom dogged his every step but his world reversed with her, as the dream seemed more true than an illusion of hunted reality. This is something real. I feel I've given birth to a flower of light at last! Never before faced with this sort of spotlight of self-illumination, the samurai who'd been forced to live his life in his head shivered with a fear no mere sword could ever arouse. Yet there was no denying he craved this with a lifelong thirst.

Emiko had also found her missing piece. She fancied poetry and the arts like a Heian princess of the ancient court which prized wit and culture above all, contributing to a poetry chain as important as military prowess. Her husband had recently died of sudden disease and she walked in the dark shadows of grief seeing neither the moon nor stars nor sun. As so often happens in times of crisis, the swell of emotion overflowed into art. Her haiku were so painful she could not bear to read them afterwards.

Had he stayed in his samurai rut Nobu would never have met a soul like Emiko. In the never ceasing questioning of himself if he made the right decision to go on the run, surely this was irrefutable evidence of vindication! Side by side they made love with calligraphy, feeling a deeper intimacy than either had known before. This unspoken jubilation struck each soul as having proven their previous paths in life had not been what they'd pretended to be.

Most touching of all for Nobu was for his Thoughts He Could Not Defend. The role of science was squelched in Japan in the 18th century (which made for a volcanic scientific blossoming when the samurai era ended) but Nobu was gifted with the imagination of an inventor, foreseeing a world of splendor. His crucifixion to the Japanese gulag of misplaced vanity of a perfectly ordered society buried him under a mountain of frustration. He was bitter not only for himself but also for his beloved Japans cheating herself with this willful ignorance. "It's not just me who pays!" he cried to the wilderness of the deaf.

Emiko, however, had ears. She was a life-saving oasis in a desert of monotonous weeds. She could understand his visions which cannot be explained. In this, a thousand poking demons died in the night replaced by a chorus of angels. Maybe the Maker of all was not such a cruel beast. Nobu had never experienced such a feeling - never suspecting it was even possible! This starburst of joy humbled him and confounded him. Like Moses before the burning bush he knelt in awe of this gift that surely only the most pure deserve.

Her latest poem shattered him further:

"The falling leaf
does not hate
the wind."

He nearly cried at the sentiment, she expressing no self-pity at the sudden taking of her beloved husband. Her calligraphic style was clean and exquisite, for how one wrote was as important as what one wrote. Nobu realized what a selfish and self-centered existence he'd led - even if the insulated world of the samurai encouraged that. Emiko showed that was no excuse not to rise above. Her beautiful surrendering to Nature made him feel as lacking as a child in an adult's world.

What the self-doubting Nobu failed to face was that his presence to her was as much a part of her realizing that sentiment as any efforts of her own.

Nobu still had one demon to overcome, his strongest and most feared: the Guilt Monster. For every ounce of joy he received with Emiko an equal amount of brutalization was wrought by the monster. He'd yet to tell her of his checkered past. He'd yet to tell her he was on the run, a notorious fugitive of the Shogunate. He'd yet to tell her that her life was in danger if she were deemed by authorities to have helped him. How can you do this, you sorry dog! She gives you life and you repay her like this? If she saw the real you she'd disown you!

Tears streamed down his face in the hot, sticky air of the dusty hut. This Sorrow For The Ages was the final betrayal by the universe. Helpless to be with her as he was to take his next breath his only choice was to drive her away. He pretended scorn of her writing, crushing her to the core as his previously doubtless belief in her had rekindled her waning creative spirit she was finally beginning to fully nurture. Too painful to go on, not believing her horrified eyes, giving him chance after chance, she left never to return. She wrote no more.

The Guilt Monster congratulated Nobu on his suicidal sacrifice, for having crawled back into his samurai saga of pity's martyrdom. Did you think someone as wonderful as she deserves to die because of you? She's better off now!

"I know. I know. But I shouldn't have lied to her. I'm blind! I'm blind! I can't see what to do!"

You were deceiving her all along. It was never real.

"I'm going to die without her, this I know."

See? That proves your love! You gave your life for her!

"But I can't help to believe I should have come clean no matter what. If I did the right thing why am I in this living hell?"

What were you going to do? Ask her to die for you? What an asshole, you selfish prick! She has a right to a happy life.

"But our love is dead. The flower of light taken away. The darkness is twice as black as before."

Stop kidding yourself, she can get that from anyone. What did you ever have to offer? You must hold onto your integrity and answer yourself this question: What would she have answered if you'd asked her to give her life to stay in your company? Who are you anyway? Do you even dare to know? Tell me what her answer would have been!

*****

Nobu's life on the run went into permanent decline. The ice melting under his feet, his betrayal of love hounded him night and day as he was seized by savage sweat-inducing nightmares of his life falling into the cold hands of revenging samurai; a life rent by the thorns of the world with his having forsaken heaven in the clouds. Later, in the afterlife, he finally posed the question to Emiko if she would have given her life to be with him.

"There was no life without you. Separation was the real danger."

It was true there was no way out once he went on the run but Nobu could have died with love instead of without. For all eternity, he howled in pain at what he'd lost.

Let Me Lend You A Hand

"I can see you're hurting, something is bothering you."

"My life is a living hell!"

"You need to talk about it. Open up!"

"It won't make any difference."

"There you go being negative! When you share things you feel better."

"No, it only makes things worse."

"Put your trust in the universe. It is conspiring to help you!"

"Well, bully for it. But that's no help either."

"You can't just shut yourself off."

"It's the way of the world."

"Not true! Give love and you will get love in return."

"Love doesn't help."

"Of course love helps. God is love. Remember: God doesn't give us any more than we can handle."

"That's a vile and vicious thing to say."

"How can you possibly say that?"

"That's just another way of turning your back on people needing help."

"But you must believe in the power of prayer!"

"Can I pray you'll leave me alone?"

"God can do anything. I'm here to remind you of that."

"God is the one bringing my killing stress."

"You should do something wonderful today. Treat yourself! Go for a fine walk in the park."

"Jesus fucking Christ. You don't understand a damn thing, do you, if you think that's some sort of fucking solution to anything?"

"Make me understand!"

"Make yourself understand."

"I can't if you don't tell me."

"It's really not any of your business."

"We're all in this together! One person's problem is every person's problem! Don't put yourself on an island. United we stand, divided we fall."

"Nobody believes that. It's every man for himself."

"Brother, I'm here today to prove you wrong. I bring you the Word of salvation and the cup of human kindness. The world is what we make of it. You need to stop doing this to yourself!"

"You're just not going to stop being a busybody, are you?"

"Never! I'm with you all the way, down the line and to the end. The fires of hell can't stop me. I am devotion itself."

"Sheesh...OK, do you really want to know?"

"Yes!"

"I mean, do you REALLY want to know? You want to know this to your dying fucking day never to escape?"

"Wild horses couldn't drag me away. Speak! Speak and set yourself free!"

"I can't pay my rent."

"Oh!...well...hmmmm...uh, well...I gotta go. See ya! I'm sure you'll be fine."

Why is it every time I speak of the universe people speak of paying the rent, and when I speak of paying the rent people speak of the universe?

Hit Man Blues

[The lights are glitzy and glowing on a downtown Dallas night as a sharp dressed man steps out of a black BMW on an obscure side street. As those on Main street revel and roar he strides purposefully to an unknown destination. He's out of sync with the nightlife with his razor sharp focus. Perhaps no one else alive at that moment has such a clear sense of direction in his life. Then it snaps.]

"You're an idiot! They're using you!"

"Shut the fuck up!"

"They're just using you. They put the blood on your hands and you take the risks."

"I don't have time for this. Not fucking now!"

"You're a fool! Wasting your time for theirs."

"Jesus! Be quiet! I can't be having this now!"

"Why even do this?"

"Why the fuck not? Get out of my head!"

Opportunity in life never comes when it's convenient. In fact, it's just the opposite: when it hits you, it hits you. Like it did me walking on the city sidewalk on the way to a contract. The whole of my existence struck me as absurd. Clear as day I saw myself. I wasn't being clever. I hadn't been clever. I was a chump to do someone else's dirty work, soiling my soul. How humiliating. A $12,000 suit can't cover that. No amount of paper can.

"Turn around, walk away! It's not worth it."

"Of course it's fucking worth it. What the hell else am I going to do?"

"No idea but this is what this is: total and utter bullshit."

"Don't give me that. People kill for money every day. No one thinks twice about someone dying from a lack of funds. I'm just being more direct."

"They're fools too! Want to join them? You always say you're smarter than they."

"I am, dammit! I am!"

But was I? I'd suddenly lost the ability to lie to myself right at the worst fucking time. Every life reaches that point. How you react to it determines which side wins out: smart or stupid. My precious vanity of believing I was Smarter was in mortal danger. I really was just another working stiff after all: paid more because I was used more. They're using you, man, just like the coal miner getting black lung. You're no fucking different.

I had to hide, step into a side alley away from prying eyes. Of all the fucking times to come to this realization! I'm on the hook for this. This is a BIG contract. Run away from this and they will find you. They'll send hit men after me for leaving them so critically vulnerable. Goddam. Why couldn't this have hit me between contracts instead of at my most crucial one yet?

Think you're not a killer? Think again.

I crouched behind a dumpster. I had no desire to move. Ever. I was tugged equally in two different directions. It's about what You want, man. But I want my fine clothes and Maserati and uptown townhouse. Most of all I want out of the fucking rat race. You want to be one of them Blue Bell fuckers? Letting assholes determine your life?

The same old rage came over me when I read about workers who'd spent their entire working lives at Blue Bell ice cream only to have the rug ripped out from under them when listeria was found and they had to shut down all three plants. They'd done nothing wrong. Been honest workers. And what do they get? THE SHAFT! Happens all time where people are thrown out in the street regardless of their own efforts. Fucking animals.

"That's not going to be me. I'm going to shoot this guy and walk away as I see fit. I'm stuck in this jungle and if I'm going to die I'm going to die on my own fucking terms. There's no fucking reason not to."

"Because you don't want to."

"That's it? That's all you got? Since when does what I fucking want mean a FUCKING GODDAM THING in this world? You want me to do what I want then fucking fund me. What do you say to that?"

Silence.

"That's what I fucking thought."

Still, much to my annoyance, I could not escape my hidden crouch. A thousand arguments to execute the contract and only one to walk away: what I wanted.

"What the fuck else am I going to do? This isn't some freaking movie. I'm supposed to become a cab driver or something? That's no life. Don't I deserve to live too? What's in it for me? Homelessness?"

More silence.

"Jesus, give me a freaking answer! I can't see! I can't see!"

There was no getting around it: I didn't want to do this hit  - or any hits - ever again. Just the thought of freedom infected me like a wildfire, feeding my desire to live. But must I sacrifice my life to the thorns of the world? What to do? What to do?

I already got the only answer I was going to get.

"This is insanity! This is nuts! I'm crouching down here behind a dumpster on a warm spring night listening to people on the streets laugh, leggy woman flashing their wares, parties going on. What's happening to me? Why am I even considering not doing this job? Those party assholes are corrupted up the ass just like I am."

OK, well, not everyone. Not...

Shit, man. I can't be like she. That's asking way too much. I so much want to be a part of that world, I do. It seems so far away. Untouchable. Like her. Shit. I make this hit and I'm fucking myself out of where I want to be. Goddam it, this sucks.

Just fucking do it and leave all this existential crap for the morning, OK?

Remember all the other times where you didn't do what you wanted? Remember how that could have changed your life, given you a way out? You got yourself into this mess.

Refused

"No! It's not me!"

Suit yourself. Keep on going where you're going and see where it gets you.

"Couldn't be any worse than where I already am: total fucking shit. I'm going to shoot this fucker and then maybe I'll consider this bullshit conversation. Sure, I need to change. But not fucking now! You want me dead?"

No answer.

"Well, fuck you, then. I sure as hell hope God likes dead bodies because that fucker's going to get a whole planet full of them! We're all stuck and fucked and all the lectures in the world won't pay my damn bills. Since I don't know what to do I'll just keep on doing what I've been doing and goddam God can sort it out later."

I got up, smoothing out the wrinkles. Back in the real world, smelling the restaurant flavors, giving myself to the moist evening air filling my lungs, hearing an unexpected song in my heart. Shit, why am I so high? Looking around at the sidewalk cafes, I could be anybody. Damn, what a thought! Can I just ride this feeling and get away with it? Can it possibly be life is that good?

I walked passed the building I was supposed to enter. I started to smile. Hey, I do feel smart! Motherfucker! I'll be damned.

"Turn around. These feelings aren't real! You're just kidding yourself. You know you're no better than a selfish dog. Best to be honest with yourself than be a fool before all the world!"

I'd heard that before. It's what kept me from doing what I'd wanted. It's what got me into this mess to begin with, isn't it? Only question now: is it too late?

I kept walking but I'd be lying if the tug to go back and execute the hit wasn't pulling at me hard, out of habit if nothing else. I was breaking off a part of myself I know. How smart was that, really? It was strange, though. Whatever path I was on, the other road that seemed the smarter. I was a fool to walk away from the hit. I was a fool to do it. Blind faith, I hate you.

Hard as it was, I knew I had to go all the way, forcing myself to play it down the line one hundred percent. "Don't waver! That's the bit that will trip you up." I left my car, everything. Got a bus ticket out of the city. My first time on a bus. Something told me not to follow my normal routines. A clean break. I have to admit, though, sitting on that foul beast it was hard to make the argument I was smart.

A million thoughts raged through my mind on that bus seat. I was permanently altering my life and for what? My imagination? It was shitty scenes like this that got me into the business. Dear God, I can't live the rest of my life riding buses. Frankly, I should be way more upset than what I am. Surely I will come to see this as a horribly stupid decision later when I sober up.

I felt smart anyway.

*****

The morning sunshine at the diner the next morning was glorious, like when I was a child. Good to spend some time in a rural place as a change of pace. Maybe doors I thought were shut weren't so shut after all. Can't believe I'm having these thoughts! Not that I didn't have many nagging woes bringing me down. Don't confuse hope of getting out with actually being out. Life is really, really fucking hard.

Bored, I asked if I could read the communal paper left on the counter. It was from Dallas which I thought was funny. Times here in Podunk are to slow to write about. But the headline was the real shocker.

"Dumb fucking luck!"

Turns out the job had been double booked. Also turns out it had been a set up all along! "Hit Man Arrested In Police Sting". I shuddered and nearly broke down. I've been walking deeper into a mine field all this time!

I staggered out. If they knew about the other guy they most likely knew about me. Personal integrity. This was the one fucking time in my life I showed any - and it saved my life by the skin of my teeth. Now I had proof. Now I had answers. But unless I keep acting this way, I'll never make it out of this mine field alive. Jesus!

The Company Man

The sponge holder was out of alignment with the edge of the granite countertop. He fixed it. Surveying the rest of his apartment with a practiced and keen eye he found no other maladjustments needing remedying. Pure, blissful sterility. Surely no emperor in the passage of time had it as good as he, the Company Man.

By remote, the stereo oozed classical "non-music" as he called it. Pounding, passionate music disturbed the void he so desperately sought to maintain. His corporate soul he kept locked away, its release the destruction of the empire he'd built over many long years. He was not the king, but smarter than that. Like a wily woman, he left the decisions - along with their weight and publicity - to the one anointed. But in his hands he held the power of the ruler's might with all its resources in back of it.

The stunning view from his window looked over the halls of power as his own backyard. Wide-eyed tourists, school children and the great unwashed looked upon these monuments with awe. Even foreign dignitaries or brigadier generals or governors of state could look upon them only as outsiders. But he, the Company Man, was on the inside, deep inside safe from the scrutiny of prying eyes. In fact, the prying eyes were on his side.

A student of history, he fancied himself a modern member of the Praetorian Guard, the inner circle to the seat of power. Yet even as Caesar was murdered in broad daylight, nowhere is it recorded of the killing of his bodyguards. Rulers pass but the institution must carry on. To this institution he was married heart and body. The next ruler - and all those to follow - would see that he and his kind were preserved. These were the thoughts that passed through his mind at the edge of nightfall.

Not that he wouldn't give his life for his master. He found something to die (and kill) for and thus to live for. This freed him from petty obligations of the masses toiling in futile labor, unknowing their fates already decided by suited men in secret rooms. He laughed to read of misspent conspiracies clogging the blogs and byways . With so much noise, even those with correct insight were drowned out by the static. Yes indeed, the Company Man stood invincible and inviolate atop the world.

What worked against the ordinary life worked for him. Greed and corruption, chaos and warfare, uncertainty and fear - these were his true employers. Since the beginning of history, the Company Men had stood the test of time. In war he found peace. His only true fear was a world of prosperity and harmony, one of justice and accord working towards the final betterment of mankind. Just rulers in a just world need no guards or deeds done in the still of the night.

He hated "Poser Presidents" who refused the naked grab for power he knew they craved as if they were above it. To die for one of them would leave a bitter taste in his mouth. To die protecting a true man of power, now that would be glorious! He'd go down in history as a hero even if all the while he'd been an assassin. He didn't have to know who he killed. He didn't have to care. The Company Man was simply the blameless instrument of policy. That lie very much excited him.

His sex he kept in perfect agony. The guilt of denial hounded him into hell as he literally cried out for help in the dark. But when he read of agents caught red-handed with prostitutes he knew he'd chosen the right path in the ultimate safety of denial even as he begged to be spanked by hot teenage girls whom he spied behind his stoic dark glasses. Yes, he knew he was a hypocrite of the highest order, but the fact no one else spotted it proved he sank as a hypocrite in a sea of hypocrites.

The Company Man looked down to the street at the aftermath of a car accident. He heard the phrase "no fucking insurance" and let out a wry smile. Life of the little people, always one human error away from permanent damage. Who would want to live like that? Why didn't everyone try to be a Company Man? Fools and idiots all! "God has given you one face, and you make yourself another." Their fate and pain meant nothing to him - just as his fate and pain meant nothing to them - or to himself.

Iraq War, Poverty, Racism And Other Myths

I have a problem with lying. Or maybe I should say with wanting to lie. I'm more comfortable when I lie. That's why it seems I tell the truth when I lie and lie when I tell the truth. Part of this, certainly, is living in a world that deserves little trust to handle truth. But I lie even when I can trust. It's a common trait for those who grow up in dysfunctional homes and mine was certainly a nightmare of epic proportions.

Considering all the lying going on, mine was not unique. At some point the lying children are put in charge and it becomes institutionalized. Suddenly, it's responsible to lie. Truth is slandered as the enemy that hurts people's feelings. 'Tis a mixed-up, crazy world out there! And we each silently fret what's to come of it. For that is the truest mirror of all. What will you see in that mirror?

And laughable though it may be, we hope to influence that time of revelation with lies beforehand. "You see, Wally, you gotta make everyone believe you're great even when you're awful. That's when you have it made!" But in the end what "everyone thinks" will make no difference. As the pressure mounts and time slips through our fingers, bolder and bolder expand the lies until parody itself is dead. Let's look at some examples.

"Iraq War". We hear that phrase all the time but there was no Iraq War. What there was was our Iraq Invasion. Now just imagine if you heard over and over again about our Iraq Invasion. The word "war" implies a certain helplessness, as if we were forced into it. But there's less ambiguity to "invasion". We invaded of our own free will, no provocation required. The fact we deceived ourselves as to a motive is only more condemning.

The Liar Deniers will attempt to spin "war" and "invasion" as a difference without a distinction knowing that argument plays to the willfully ignorant masses. What they won't do, however, is put their money where their mouth is and start actually saying Iraq Invasion (and why not if there's no difference??) Uh-huh. It's for the same reason we call Obamacare heath care reform instead of what it is: health insurance reform. In both these cases we took a sad song and made it sadder.

In continuing our stage play of pretended life is the great perfidy of alleged poverty. Look at the world around you, there's enough here to feed, clothe and house every person alive. Folks, back in the bad old days when the crops failed and that's all there was now that's poverty. What we've got now is a failure to remunerate. Take the story of two islands.

On the first island is ten banana trees and the ten people on the island pool their output so if one tree fails the rest make up for it. That's how mutual survival go. But the second island is without faith, making up an idol called shizzfarts, mandating only those with shizzfarts be allowed to eat! (I know, it sounds insane but it makes perfect sense to them). Everyone hated the rule but it promised a free ride to those who held the shizzfarts and by this they were corrupted. On that island, one guy got really fat, two more ate well and the rest starved in "poverty" - only both islands had the same amount of food.

Corruption breeds self-contempt and that breeds many, many "isms". The list is endless so we'll stick with the fashionable one of racism. So we hate each other for the differing colors of our skin, eh? Well, what if the whole world were blind? Would racism go away then? Not one whit. I can tell you Dr. King's pleas for justice would be just as painful to a Southern oppressor with or without his sight and the urge to silence that voice just the same. All hate starts with self-hate. Love first, ask questions later.

The biggest laugh to me is to hear the second islanders speak of "preserving" civilization. Uh, come again? With their invasion of the first island to take its resources only so the fat can get fatter and mandating shizzfarts as if it were a law of nature and the inevitable collapse corruption always brings, what civilization? Civilization is a state that has yet to be achieved. But we all like to lie and pretend our family is really better than what it is. But there's no hope in lying.



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