Borrowed Flesh

Lolz.

2012-02-14T22:56:00.000-05:00

Wants.

2012-02-13T22:49:00.000-05:00

I don't just want to be published. I want to be famously published. I want to be known. I want people to read my books and quote them. I want them to become movies. I want them to make an impact on people’s lives. I want fans to write fan fiction about characters they want together. I want a crazy fandom. I want people to cherish my books, to love them. This sounds incredibly selfish, but I need this.

Number 5

2012-02-11T22:21:00.004-05:00

I had recently received the first proof of my next novel titled Of Men And Maggots. I will be marking it up, correcting the usual petty mistakes - comma usage, changing a word here, deleting a word there, adding new dialogue and such. 380 pages and I am at chapter three and quite pleased with it.

It is the true story of a seven day trip me and an old lover named Juan Holguin took across the United States from El Paso, TX to San Diego, CA and the mis-adventures and odd-balls we encountered. Unlike my previous work, it is being presented as a work of fiction (though, it is not), I had changed the names: I am John Poston and Juan is now Rocko Tapia.

This has been taking up my time.

Indeed.

2012-02-10T15:30:00.000-05:00

down

2012-02-09T18:23:00.002-05:00

People who think depression is a choice, take a second to think. How would it feel to wake up and not having the emotional strength to face people? To think that time is just passing by with no real reason? To feel so alone even when you are sitting in a room full of people? To have to put on a face and hide your feelings because in your mind you think no one would care anyway? To lose friends because you can’t find the strength to go out and you can’t physically be ‘happy’? To cry yourself to sleep, hoping you wouldn’t wake up then when you do you are exhausted from the night before, and it all starts again? You try to hide your feelings hoping no one would notice. Now tell me why someone would choose that? Depression is an illness, not a choice.

I Am.

2012-02-08T15:22:00.000-05:00

I feel guilty for being. I am human but I feel inhuman, I’ll never function properly. Don’t attempt to comprehend for we are individuals and my thought do not belong to you. I was born broken thus am unable to recuperate. I feel guilty for being, let me decay and rot.

Dark Backward.

2012-02-07T02:15:00.001-05:00

I could never kill myself. That would be too kind.

I deserve to be stuck here suffering.

2012-02-03T20:01:00.000-05:00

Mental Rambling.

2012-02-02T15:06:00.003-05:00

I haven't been feeling well. On a mental level. Quite depressed these last few days. I have so many images racing through my head - millions and millions of images - I do not sleep much at night. I lay there in the dark, coolness of my room and ponder over the most asinine crap.

I am currently in limbo awaiting the proof for my new novel titled OF MEN AND MAGGOTS. It will be my sixth book. Kind of hard to believe that I have been writing straight and non-stop since 2008. I told myself that I was going to finally leave El Paso and take a trip. Meandering across the country until I finally reached my destination of Puerto Rico. I had sketched out another novel, however, I want to begin that once I arrived on the island. I need a break.

But, there lies the conundrum; I am quite comfortable in my digs, but not happy. I want diversion, excitement, the thrill of living against all odds on the road like the old days. El Paso offers none of these things. I can not connect with the indigenous locals. All my old friends have moved away - there really is nothing here that interests me. But, every time I talk with someone here about it, they wind up convincing me to stay. I realize their view - they enjoy stability and structure in their lives. so, do I - to an extent. I am not ready to "settle in", yet.

Juarez was an option, but I am burned out on that mooch infested town, plus I rather not duck and roll from random gunfire every time I step out of my apartment when I want to but a taco.

And so, I am in mental limbo - I was going to purchase more furniture for my apartment the following month, but I think I am going to put it off. I will make, or attempt to make, my final decision when I am done with this current work.

At this moment, what am i going to do? i do not know. I truly do not. And, that is driving me mad.

The Morning After.

2012-01-30T02:51:00.002-05:00

There is nothing in the world better than waking up in the arms of a handsome man. In the dim coolness of the cheap hotel - the muffled noise of Ranchero drifting down a lonesome street, church bells echo in the distance - the air is stale (smells of mildew mixed with dust) and he rolls over, checking his torso for bed bug bites in yellowed, stiff sheets.

He looks up, blinking like a drowsy tortoise - smiles and asks how I had slept.

"You hungry?" I answer, using a finger to brush away bits of sleep from the corner of his eye.

He slides up, lays across my chest, plants a small kiss on my lips.

"I don't want to go to California. I'm going to miss you." He sighs.

(Hector had recently acquired his papers and passport to live and work in the United States and will be moving to El Monte, California to stay with his aunt.)

I say nothing and simply lie there - gazing up at the stained water splotches on the gray ceiling - and stroke his lithe back with an idle hand. He twitches, flicking a small cockroach off of his foot. We lay there, silent.

He needs to go. It would better his life. He needs to move on and forget me. I mean, I really don't love him anyway.

Down the Dead End Street

2012-01-29T02:34:00.000-05:00

Two drunken faggots as faggots can be drunk - Hector decided he wanted some tacos and then some coke in that order. Ditching those lifeless bitches through dark cobblestone streets of the Old Market - whores, fat and nasty, stand and wait forever sucking on a silver tooth. Black phantoms lurk in the alleys between closed shops - reek of stale urine and vomit - house the quivering junky. We stop for chicken tacos, slop on a plate, down two glass bottled Pepsi - then jet down Avenue Mariscal - furtive glances from pimps as we dodge buses belching air so dirty that it clogs your pores.

Up to Burrito Row. Angelic Beto is working his stall - his fine ass smiles and greets us, Hector and I make small chit-chat. Some of the doormen of the titty bar across the street - Erma's - catches glimpse of my gringo ass and starts the hustle:

"Hey buddy - no cover!"

"Over here! Big pussy!

"Nice lady! Nice lady! Pussy women!"

I wave them on with a poker face, cause I mean business and they sulk away only to pounce on three other American assholes.

Heated conversation between Beto and Hector en Espanola that ends with Hector handing Beto some crumpled pesos, which were placed under the till - a small white packet of wax paper was placed in Hector's hand and we walked out the door - both saying, "Gracias!"

"Orale." Said back.

We cut across Juarez Avenue, past loud and drunk college turistas in hip-hop garb, past taxi drivers on the hustle under the glaring ugly neon of teeny bopper discos catering to the El Paso University crowd. Down the dead end street paved in beer bottle caps to Hotel Bombin - $20 a night trap, pay the haggish lady behind the grill, up the white tiled stairwell, unlock the deadbolt.

A snort or two of the coke offa the dresser - wheeee! - clothes are flung off fall onto the bed naked, clinging to each other, kissing passionately. Fingers, tongues, and cocks are sucked - lying on our sides in the position of 69, giving each other the best of the best. Rolled onto my stomach and lube is applied, Hector slides himself in so long and nasty. Shiiiiiiit! With quick jabs the Mexican pounds my ass for a good haffa hour more or less - bed springs boinging and I squeal and moan like the loud puta I am. His thin muscular brown hips smacking against my smooth and tenders, grinding that cock up into my ass hot and savage he grunts into my ear, "I'm almost there - let me cum in your ass!"

"No!" I groan,"Cum on my face!"

He yanks himself outa me and flips me on to my back - my ass hurt and throbbing. Hector sat on my chest, masturbating wildly, "GODAMGODAM!!"

Creamy! Eyes closed, I feel the hot squirts splatter across my face and chest - hear Hector gasping. He rubs his erection across my lips; my tongue licks the thick tan head. I look up at him - that silly look on his face. Pause. Laughter. "Let me get a towel, guero." Hector retrieves a ragged towel from the bathroom, long skinny cock still hard and glistening - swinging free.

After I clean up, we lie side by side and share a joint. Hector takes it from his mouth and places it in my lips. As a mariachi band plays ghostlike down a dark street, I stare up at the ceiling fan whirling slowly - maybe I should stay off leaving. Rolling stones gather no moss - so they say...

Friday night Frolics.

2012-01-28T14:51:00.005-05:00

The Patio Bar is a juke joint inhabited by revolutionary college students and hippy kids. The decor was much like a Hollywood set depicting a Mexican bar - old posters of the city, dusty piñatas, futbol posters, a row of red Christmas lights over the long oak bar.

Took a table in the back next to the rockola and played Aqualung by Jethro Tull as I downed a cold cerveza Sol. I was accompanied by three new friends along with Hector - Alfredo, Sarah, and the eye candy, a young kid with the strange moniker, Diamond. A bucket of beer was bought and we chilled talking, laughing, joking.

Things really got goofy when this old fart of an American tourist tried to put the make on Sarah - old geezer went as far to inquire where he could score for crack to the appalled girl. We all told Dr. Moreau - cause he looked like Marlon Brando from The Island of Dr. Moreau - to fuck off. He stumbled out muttering.

The bar closed and we staggered to a corner 24hr taco shop - after gobbling some mouthwatering tacos and an obscene amount of several Tequila Sunrises, we stumbled down to The Red Zone for young Diamond was horny and we all agreed to help him alleviate his angst.

After attempting to enter several strip joints - Diamond didn’t have his identification card on him - our night was saved by a charming hustler, who got us entrance into The Mambo Room. Despite the place being empty save for about five bewildered tourists and a gaggle of tired looking hookers - I mean strippers - the dump wasn’t half bad.

As our hustler host seated our group - Hector and I went up to the bar and retrieved a bucket of beer much to the hustler’s dismay.

"Why are you buying beer from the bar?", he bleated, "You´re cheating me out of my commission."

"You've just been fired." I stated flatly.

"What about my tip?"

"Don´t underestimate Americans." I quipped, waitering the bucket to my friends table.

Then of course we were besieged by the homeliest skanks in the place. This insolent, demanding cunt plopped down next to Diamond and ordered a fifteen dollar drink - at which we all refused to pay. So, the twat snatched a beer from the bucket and guzzled it with one hand and pawed Diamond´s throbbing crotch with the other.

Then - oh, joy - at the command of the DJ, she stood to attention, made her way to the stage and jiggled and gyrated obscenely to Woolly Bully. Diamond was fool enough to snap a dollar into her stained thong, so after she had finished shaking her nasties, the bitch slithered back to our table and began to paw at Yours Truly. I politely pushed her away (She smelled like rotten cantaloupe.) wherein, she viciously pinched the back of my neck - drawing blood. About to slap the fuck outta her, but a waiter dragged her off into the murk - the whore stumbling and wasted, cha-cha heels dragging.

Diamond was fucking horny by then and with the help of both the lurking hustler and Alfredo, they disappeared into a back room to get Diamond a bitch and "a massage with a happy ending". It being 5:30am, it was time to cut and Hector and I left for home. Walking down the streets at dusk, three Amazonian Transvestite Hookers blocked our path - soliciting their wares with obscene dramatics.

"Not now, guys!¨I croaked drunk and tired.

"Whacha mean guys?!" honked one and slapped me on the back of the head as we passed. Don't think so, girlfriend! I whirled around and popped her in the chops. At the brink of a major transvestite lucha libre smackdown, a patrol car cruised around the corner.

"Run!", hissed Hector as we bolted around the next corner, jumped in a taxi and sped home.

I really hate transvestites!

Do You Feel Real?

2012-01-27T03:16:00.000-05:00

I saw this as I walked downtown today.

Beat.

2012-01-25T03:11:00.001-05:00

There is nothing left here. Just the traces of a lost soul. The walls are enclosing, like my mind, forever shrinking unto itself. The days go on and I live just as shallowly as the rest of the world. Wandering in a lost city of broken dreams. The coffee in the morning tastes stale and the flowers by the window are now a gray yellow. Music is dull and ambitions are dying. Photos are no longer pretty and old post-it notes have lost their humor. My feet drag me everywhere and nowhere, unwilling to arrive to a happier place. Conversations feel distant and meaningless. Nightmares have become my fantasies. The things which I once loved the most have lost their splendor. I am just a shell now, counting down the days until my most deserved demise. I’m an outline of my former self, loveless and expired. I am haunted.

Indeed.

2012-01-23T02:58:00.001-05:00

amour-espoir

2012-01-22T03:02:00.002-05:00

Forget prose. Forget long vocabulary words. Fuck grammar.

When it comes to my feelings, I will use whatever words I want too, how many commas I want too, and the over excessive use of “because it’s like”. Since I feel like people tend to forget that words are meant to express your feelings, the words that get caught in throat when you talk to someone and the words that get locked deep inside of you, dying to come out of its cage.

It doesn’t matter how you write it, how you choose to express it, anything written by a person that means every single word of their piece is automatically beautifully written.

Can understand the bad.

2012-01-20T20:09:00.001-05:00

I think it is time for me to start looking for a place over in Juarez. I cannot stomach this loneliness I have put myself into. I am comfortable here, but I am not happy. I truly miss the hedonistic life of the Sexual Outlaw that I used to live. For the past two years I tried to live the responsible and sedate life that "everyone" was advising me to live. It is killing me. I can't do it. I won't do it! It's not my bag, you dig?

It's back to the slums and hookers and junkies and drunks, back to the thieves and the desperate and lost. Back to the ones that know how to live because that's all they got, not all they have. I mean, really, why not?

Angel Headed Hipsters.

2012-01-19T04:11:00.004-05:00

The word ‘beat’ should really apply only to the original Beats. Sure, they were Beat; they were poor, unpublished, near criminal and antisocial whilst they were forming as a literary group. Cassidy, Kerouac, Burroughs and Ginsberg were pot smokers, benny addicts, junkies, jazz fiends, anti-intellectuals who rejected their status quo as any other group of young people, they merely followed in the footsteps of the young from centuries past. The difference is they had the freedom, and I’d say the courage to strike out and reject what they didn’t want, and more importantly, do what they wanted. They said yes, they said go, they said now. They didn’t say no. They lived freedom, they lived jazz, they were the epitome of a philosophy that allowed for anything, that worshipped the individual, that loved art, that was music, that was drama, that was the country, the land, the coast, the sky, the mountains, the deserts: that was America. That was America as was. Endless. Vast. Never to cease, always to go. And when we read what are basically their autobiographies - On the Road, Kaddish and Howl, Junkie and Queer - we feel, lust for, know, and bleed that freedom, those of us who can accept them that is. Of course, the drudgery they knew was extraordinary, I don’t dispute that. But what is freedom without sacrifice? I think today, in our pre-war world, this is what we all lust after. I think these men hold up the standard for love and happiness, even if they were dirty, sad, lonely, forgotten, drunken and ravished by heroin. What does this matter when today the internet defines us, where our world is already known, when we cannot escape each other and can never be free? (I’m aware of the irony - deliberate - and the paradoxes - unavoidable - in this previous assertion, but just think about it.)

The Beats showed us how to live, how to be free men. It was a hyper-masculine movement; masculine in the sense that it was not afraid, it took risks, it was strong, it was rootless, roaming, unbound by convention, ill defined, effeminate, sensitive and philosophical. It was artistic.

It is sad in my eyes (and I am certainly not one of them) to see that today this group of writers provides inspiration to a group of people who are asinine, self-obsessed, bloated by their own importance, sneering critics; they are not artists: just because their hair is deliberately unkempt, their clothes are flea market chic, their music has been bought from hawkers on the streets, does not make them anywhere near the equal of Jack Kerouac. They don’t believe his philosophy: Go go go, to them no no no, to me yes, yes please let me go go go. I wish I had the courage of Jack Kerouac, I wish I had his beauty, his voice, his poetry. These people are aesthetics, the mundane little Oscar Wilde parodies of today, they have no ‘authenticity’ or ‘originality’ to use their mundane language. It really disgusts me to see them posturing, and I am aware that I sound like a complete hipster saying this, exacerbated by my suburban middle class credentials of course, but then On the Road, which I read over a year ago, has left the longest after burn of any book I’ve read, and still glows with persistent love in my heart, tearing at the cynicism of America’s dark alleys, giving me the strength and the urge to shout and lash out at any of you, and to stand and run. When I went to California, I knew my home for the first time, and I knew that my mind was not of this land. I am a Beat, but I am only a Beat because I believe in myself, not because I subscribe to the looks, thoughts and banality of a pseudo-counterculture that postures its way around Brooklyn and West Texas wearing dark pink leggings and trucker caps. Catholic, lost, in love with an ideal of beauty in a land of richness beyond measure, of railways, roads, endless fields, plains, mountains, the Dharma on earth, obsessed by truth and purity, reeling from sin, aspiring writer. Is that me? Yes.

No, not beat, but only beat in the sense that they could never defeat age, because to be in love with the Beats is to be in love with an ageless quality that is always moving, bopping to the rhythm of long lost nightclubs of Charlie Parker, of the railways of America ripped up and destroyed by oil, to the heavens of the plains of endless road and yellow, always in the aura of vastness, never ending life in the land of America. People can’t see it today. I think I can.

The Last Year of Mankind.

2012-01-17T01:48:00.005-05:00

On 12-12-12, they're coming. Are you ready?

David Lynch's The Grandmother (1970)

2012-01-13T05:10:00.001-05:00

Nobody cares.

2012-01-12T03:56:00.001-05:00

I have spent my time frustrated and unfulfilled. Happiness is something found within and I found happiness long ago. I’ve had various beliefs regarding my purpose. I’ve spent time searching for answers. I’ve spent time lamenting. I’ve spent time only surviving. I’ve spent time attempting to improve my capabilities. I’ve pursued hedonism. Sadism. Atheism. Christianity. Buddhism. I’ve acquainted myself with history’s great philosophers. I’ve searched for peace; peace of body and of mind. I’ve pursued social sciences. I’ve searched for understanding. I’ve searched for truth, riches, knowledge, companionship and love. I’ve hunted and been hunted by time. Reputations won and lost. I’ve confronted my fears. I’ve attempted communication with equals and unequal’s. I’ve tried drugs and sobriety. Rituals and prayer. I’ve looked for kindred spirits in literature and speech. I’ve attempted honesty and treachery. I’ve been myth. I’ve been legend. I’ve been invisible to the world and to myself. What I’ve found to be consistent, dependable and unavoidable in this world are violence and fear. They are the ultimate powers that conquer all others. Love being the ultimate power is a rumor. Love is strong and can overcome much adversity, but the blind, incommunicable sweeping force of fear and violence yield to no power. All the love in the world is eschewed and trampled upon in a moment of rage and confusion. I got it now. I’ll figure it out. I accept it. You win. Call me, please. You know where to find me; I’ll be in the light, sans sunglasses, offering you a smile that’s indistinguishable from joy and disappointment, waiting for the ride; or, perhaps, waiting for the ride to stop. I suppose you were right all along and that’s why this occurred. I apologize. Let’s fix this. Finally, inevitably, indubitably yours…

I Don't know Much of anything.

2012-01-10T20:02:00.000-05:00

I swear sometimes, we are just so caught up in what we want we forget about what we have. I don’t understand how we as human beings take a breath and don’t see the beauty in this world. We should feel lucky and nonetheless thankful for the music of the ruffling trees and barking dogs. There is only one thing left to do, and it’s to live. Live because there is nothing more spectacular than life itself. And we only have so long before it’s all gone. Before it’s all over and you’re passing stories down from the word of mouth to your grandchildren. Let your skin breathe in the specs of dust and clean air; let your eyes wander to the love in a park bench.

Decay and Doubt.

2012-01-09T19:50:00.000-05:00

I’ve nearly lived a third of my time on this Earth, and truths are showing through the fog of life’s uncertainties. As such, it is becoming increasingly clear that I will never be a notable author. No one does, nor will they ever, read my stories with any sort of avidity. I will likely never live up to the image I have always held of myself —an unkempt man spending his days in a dimly lit room, surrounded by dusty books and empty bottles of whiskey, putting fantastic lies to paper and drinking black coffee, with a burnt-out cigarette sagging listlessly on his lip. That dream, I should think, is dead. All dead, even; there’s nothing left to do but go through that dream’s pockets and look for loose change, as Miracle Max might suggest.

Still, that’s no reason to stop.

When delusions of grandeur are all but gone, there’s nothing left to consider but your own sanity. Therefore, each novel I complete will act as a magical Pensive, teeming with what vagaries and nightmares may come; tugged from my brain at the tip of a pen, and affixed to paper for safe-keeping. In this way, my writing will be a way of removing the ghosts from my brain, like Egon Spengler storing the contents of a full trap into the Ecto Containment Unit—when the light is green, my brain is clean.

If I’m truly a writer, being read is just a luxury; an inessential frill. After all, when the piece is written, my work is done. What happens next is between the Gods and the Universe. Let them work it out. In the meantime, I have writing to do.

A Short Film Of Gum Chewing Geniuses.

2012-01-08T02:57:00.000-05:00

The Dark Backward.

2012-01-07T19:36:00.002-05:00

There is a boy, drunk on the bus, he must be 19, possibly 20, long limbed with a shaved head and large eyes. "ADHD.", one woman murmurs in denial. But, I am so close I can smell it on his breath. His eyes are bright and blue like a cloudless sky. He stands in the aisle, dancing awkwardly to a beat the bus creates by hitting bumps and curves in the road. He shouts out wordlessly and falls and falls. Come here, I say softly and so he does, a small child upon my chest, amongst my arms and soothing voice. Quiet now, shh darling. He is a frightened rabbit and I hold him tight so that nothing will get to him. Settle.

We are all writers.

2012-01-03T06:06:00.004-05:00

What makes a writer - who knows? We all write differently, we all change our habits in between the masses. I write while listening to Angelo Badelemente. You might write while listening to Katy Perry for all I know. You might think your writing is brilliant. You might think you can’t write at all. But I say it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter how we write or what we write. It doesn’t even matter if it’s any good or not. Whatever works for someone makes them a writer - if only in their own hearts. Not everyone writes to get published. Don’t be elite about that. Respect a poem even if it’s not the next Eliot. Respect a novel even if it’s not the next McCarthy. People write because they write.

You can re-read your work fifty times. You can get an A* in English lit. You can use thesaurus.com for every paragraph. You can learn from other writers. You can study night and day.

But if you can’t feel, and I mean really feel every emotion to its fullest then you will never truly be a writer. There are some that go through life feeling the bare minimum, and then there are those that feel everything so deeply, so intensely, so passionately that their minds can’t keep up. But it doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t matter if your spelling or grammar is flawed, if your paragraphs are not perfectly indented, if your vocabulary is weak or if your words go off on a tangent - because if you have heart and soul, if you cannot just appreciate the beauty and brilliance of language but live it, breathe it, love it with everything that you are, if when you wake up all you can think about is describing every minute of every day, every feeling, every ache and every breath - then you are a writer.

Happy New Year?

2012-01-01T02:44:00.001-05:00

It seems another year has slipped by. I have suffocated myself long enough. It is time - seriously, it is time to leave this gilded cage I had put myself in. It is time to go and do what I do best. No more living in paranoia and mind, numbing comfort. Want to come along? Of course you do....

Year's End.

2011-12-31T02:18:00.002-05:00

Ready for another one.

Women.

2011-12-28T23:28:00.001-05:00

American women have nothing to offer men, including the promise of sex. I’ve been in a lot of foreign countries, and the women there, regardless of how they dress or how anti-puritanical their sexual morality, come across to men as sexy and feminine; where as American women look slutty and bitter. I think that the reason for this is because American women project their hostility towards men no matter how they look, and men instinctively sense it. That’s why American women can only relate to thugs and idiots, because those types of males are too stupid to know the difference.

Any decent man needs to get away from American women; as fast as he can, any way that he can.

Fallen Angel of Lost Night

2011-12-27T13:35:00.003-05:00

6:35pm. Juarez City.

Hot and dusty the sun beats down on my drenched flesh as truckload of Mayan faced black uniformed military roar by - Uzis slung at hip and they the look of predatory dogs. Cross the street into Plaza las Armas - cry of sellers of trinkets and paletas, cry of shoe shine boys, cry of religious fanatics, cry of babies in that unrelenting Mexican sun.

I find some shade beneath a dusty poplar tree and suck down a cigarette so nasty watching a demonstration in progress against the fascist takeover of Juarez City - or so it seems. Youths in red bandannas and black shirts shrill their opinions to a catatonic crowd. The pedophiles do their stylized ballet around the youthful boys - giggling and shrieking.

Drunken Indio shambles over and bums a smoke and start up conversation. A real funny guy - in his pigeon English he weaves his tale of woe from Michigan to Riverside to Idaho and the eventual deportation by our snarling la migra. Home of the free...

So, this Indio and I - ah, yes Eduardo, thank you - Eduardo and I cut down Avenida Mariscal to some hooch joint and it was dull by God - a regular house of ill repuke. Some hippopotamus in bikini and stilettos swirled and gyrated on the tiny stage to a Caribbean beat. I flat out spat at Eduardo that I am queer by act of congress and let's scram. Smiled he did at this revelation - that look in his bloodshot eyes I had seen before in the eyes of a rabid dog in heat.

We cut next door to some other joint - just a bar this go round - nudes on black velvet adorned the beaver board walls of the tiny joint. But, the waitresses were funny and the music was The King.

Maybe it was the beer talking or perhaps the fact that I was just horny - but I gazed at this Eduardo for the first time - it being a well-lit joint - and not bad. Tall, dark and well intoxicated. The crazy Indian drank the booze like it was water. I asked him why there was blood on his khaki pants in which the reply was, "Life is hard." Smile behind twinkling red eyes of the beat Fallen Angel of Lost Night.

Look over and lanky scumbag leers at me and enters water closet - keeps the door open so I can get good look at him wagging that obscene pickle in my general direction. Turns straight at me and flounders that fucker like a bruja's scepter and that puts an idea in my head - I lean to Eduardo and whisper a rather filthy invitation in his ear and his copper face lights up. He drunkenly nods and we are out the swinging doors and walking briskly down the cracked pavement in the warm early night. Cars honk and hookers hook as we both stride to my pad.

Key shoved in hole, black metal door banged open and as I stand in the middle of my room, Eduardo grabs me by the arms tight and slips his thick tongue between my lips. Laughingly quickly we peel our clothes off flung onto red tile and plop onto my bed - hands and fingers probe and stroke, lips kissed in drunken passion, stiffening organs rub and grind against copper flesh white flesh. I am pushed on my back and stare at the whirling ceiling fan as this boy sucks cock like a champ. I return the favor - both in sixty-nine that favorite position of mine - we squirm and grunt pleasing each other. Boy goes loco - grabs my ankles and places over his shoulders, licks his hand and smears the saliva on his throbbing cock. Slowly he slips into me, I gasp behind clenched teeth as the rhythm mounts. Bed sings in squeaks and boings as Eduardo fucks me like a porn star. I feel his organ stiffen more and his eyes glaze over as he yanks his cock out and white hot spurts splatter against my heaving chest. With a fluid plop he lays next to me and we share a cigarette under that slow spinning fan. Fall asleep in that mess; wake up shower and both walk around the corner for huevos ranchero, menudo and damn good coffee.

Outside three trucks of black uniformed rifle toting military youths roar by in a cloud of tan dust...

Mewwy Kwissmas

2011-12-25T11:00:00.000-05:00

One More Day Until X-Mas.

2011-12-24T02:01:00.001-05:00

Hoe Hoe Hoe

2011-12-23T17:51:00.006-05:00

The neighborhood mooch - he being my far too handsome young friend named Squirt - just left my apartment...well, with a little less of Yuletide cheer.

He had the downright audacity to appear at my door and to request no less than $120 to purchase a Christmas gift for his high maintenance girlfriend. He would borrow it, he said. Paying it back, later.

"You don't work." I stated. "I'll never see it, again."

After fifteen minutes of his whining and pleading we came to an 'agreement'. He must really love that girl of his. He walked out with money in hand a look of embarrassed anger on his face. Happy Holidays, Squirt, hope your girlfriend's mother doesn't ask why you can't sit comfortably during Christmas dinner.

Sounds and Visions.

2011-12-22T22:44:00.003-05:00

I am halfway through with a new novel. Basically, it recounts a haphazard road trip with myself and an old lover named Juan Holguin. I decided that I would make it semi-comical but with serious opinions concerning homelessness, loneliness, and the arrogant control culture of America today.

Also, it will be told through third person characters. John Poston (Me) and his romantic interest Rocko Tapia (Juan). So far, I am pleased with the results. Though the maudlin memories I had of Juan are all but faded - I haven't seen him since 2001, but we were together for three years - I sit sometimes remembering the good times, going through old photos of he and I. Last I heard, he was still with his wife and juggling five kids. I'm dedicating the book to Juan.

Here is the cover in process. I'm still tinkering with it. My deadline set for a completed first draft of the manuscript is March 2012.

Greasing The Wheels And Using Lots Of Lube

2011-12-21T23:02:00.001-05:00

A mighty famous and quite gay online site published one of my stories. Most of the works on the site are political opinion and gay gender PC crap, something that is completely alien to me. So, I was thrilled when they accepted my horrid, little piece. Wasn't too happy when I read it on the site to find several parts edited without my knowledge. Guess that's the way the typing ribbon unravels in the big leagues. I have provided a link if you care to read it:

http://inourwordsblog.com/2011/12/22/its-going-to-cost-you-male-prostitution-in-tijuana/

2011-12-16T15:09:00.000-05:00

Squirt.

2011-12-12T05:36:00.009-05:00

He lives in my neighborhood. You know the type, hangs out in front of the liquor store, bumming smokes, spitting on the sidewalk with another vato or two, doing nothing but dreaming through time. He drops by my place now and again. Mostly when his mother is giving him flack to get his lazy ass out and get a job. A listless loser. But, a sweet kid, too. And so it goes.

He has a girlfriend - a plump little number with the gift of gab who lives with her alcoholic aunt in a shitty, red-brick building over by the dusty warehouses with the occasional cholo shootout. She seems to love him. I'm certain he loves her, too. And so it goes.

I met him a while back coming out of said liquor store - asked for a dollar, said he was hungry. Brought him home, fed him. He likes to lounge on the couch, immobile as a lizard - playing video games or watching movies. He really likes the Bruce Willis and Jackie Chan flicks. Mindless entertainment for one so mindless. Once in a while, we'll sit and talk for hours about stupid shit. He'll sometimes ask to pop in a porn and watch with that frozen, slack, poker face that every straight guy has when watching porn. I blow him when he want to. He asks and seems quite happy to leave it at that. And so it goes.

I gave him the nickname Squirt on account of one afternoon we were on the couch jerking each other off to straight porn and when he came, his semen squirted over his head and splattered the wall. He still laughs about it. I was upset for I had to clean it up later, cursing the virility of a twenty-one year old, cursing my faded years. And so it goes.

Today, I was crossing the street and Squirt and his girlfriend were walking in the opposite direction towards me. He caught my eye and guiltily escorted her quickly in another direction into a shop. The meaning is quite clear, my friend, our worlds can never cross.

And so it goes.

Saturday Afternoon Score.

2011-12-11T04:20:00.002-05:00

The old Ford rattled to a stop in front of an adobe-brick building on the corner of two intersecting avenues. Splashed across the top of the door to the place, in gaudy colors, read Rex Billiards. On one side of the marquee was an amateurish depiction of a smiling hoochie in a bikini top with abnormally, gigantic, oval boobs holding a glass mug of frothy beer and on the other side, a painting of a snarling chihuahua adorned in a ten gallon Stetson and brandishing two six-shooters.

As I poured out of the car still somewhat rattled by the ride, I glanced across the street as pre-teen hookers in bright-colored spandex and catholic schoolgirl uniforms whistled at me and twinkling silver-capped teeth under the bright sun. They stood in front of a strip joint called Tuna Country, and as soon as the three, white-shirt clad doormen noticed my gringo ass, they began their over-excited, sideshow barking.

“No cover! Nice ladies!”

“Hey! Hey! Over here! Big titties! Hot pussy!”

“You like the young weemon – we got juicy pussy, para ti!”

“Warm beer, lousy service!”

One short and chunky doorman ran halfway across the street, outstretched his arms and bellowed to Heaven, “I got the biggest pussy in Mexico!”

I chuckled and put on my sunglasses, “You need to take that big pussy somewhere else, amigo.”

A tall, thin doorman with a drooping moustache, obviously wise to me, yelled, “No like pussy? We got boys – twelve years old!”

Hector strolled towards the door to the poolhall, “Let’s go.”

“Those guys are funny.” I smiled as I followed Hector through the open door.

The poolhall was dark as we entered from the outside. From a dusty jukebox in the corner, Mexican banda music blared obnoxiously loud. When my eyes adjusted to the dank, I was surprised to notice that the inside space was quite large. On a sunken floor reached by a short flight of concrete stairs, the room held ten, standard pool tables. The tables themselves were well-battered and over used, with the green felt on several apparently ripped or spotted with dark stains. A couple of tables were actually missing legs and had been propped up on plastic milk crates.

Towards the gloomy back of the hall, two of the four metal tables were occupied by a group of five men and two women. Other than them, the hall was void of customers. The men eyed silently as we approached. One squat and piggish female glared with heavily painted eyes at me with obvious lust, her small, pink tongue slithered obscenely across brown-stained teeth.

“Buenas tardes. (Good afternoon.)” Hector said.

“Buenas tardes.” I mumbled.

The assortment of locals repeated the greeting as we walked past them and up to a large, square hole that had been literally chiseled out of the solid, brick wall. This was the bar. Under a lonely lightbulb dangling from a wire, the bar was attended by a huge, stocky Mexican in a blue, sweat stained t-shirt that read Happiness is Coming embroidered across his ample moobs. He stood stoically amid boxes of beer and soda.

Hector and I leaned with elbows on the fake, wood paneling of the counter and ordered two caguamas of Carta Blanca cerveza. The clerk nodded and reached into a large bin of ice and withdrew two forty-ounce bottles of beer. As the clerk plopped the two bottles with red, plastic cups onto the counter, Hector asked in Spanish for a pool table.

“You wanna pay the guy? I’m low on cash.” Hector said.

I vacantly reached for his wallet, “How much for everything?”

The clerk rumble, “Cuarenta pesos o cuatro dólares.”

“Forty pesos.” Hector repeated. “Or four dollars.”

I pulled two twenty peso notes from my wallet and handed them to the clerk. The slovenly man grabbed the bills without saying a word and placed them into a worn, wooden box next to him.

Grabbing the beer and pool balls that were placed on the counter, we walked over to a table that seemed the best out of the bunch. The group that sat at the metal tables began their chatter again, as the jukebox switched over to a Spanish love ballad.

I began pouring beer into the two cups as Hector picked out a pool cue stick from a rack hanging on the avocado painted and scuffed wall. He deftly spun and examined the pool cue in those alien hands, then, placing his stick onto the table to test the balance, he grimaced as it slowly rolled on its own slightly to the left.

“Table’s a little warped, so keep that in mind while I beat your ass.” Hector smiled.

“Oh, yeah?” I said as I took a deep swig from the cold beer. “Think you’re gonna win? What you want to play for?”

“Well, I have no money.” Hector stated as he cued up the balls in the triangular rack.

“What a shock.” I quipped.

“Beer?”

“You have no money!”

“Sex?”

I laughed, “Now, I know I’m winning every game!”

Time passed as we knocked balls around, drank and laughed. I have the bad habit of finding the most audacious tunes on the jukebox and playing them over and over. I relished with inward humor and fear as I watched an old, bulldog faced vato in a dirty wife-beater and black felt fedora cringe each time the machine would play Flash! By Queen.

If they didn’t want to hear it, they shouldn’t have it in the jukebox, I smiled as I sunk another ball.

The sad part, and I knew it wasn’t a reality of a fact, yet feigned resentment at each pocketed ball, was that Hector was winning. Two for three and it seemed as if Hector would be victorious on the last, also.

“No dick for Louie.” Hector would sing-song softly each time that he sunk a ball.

“Shut up. All I have to do is wave a ten dollar bill in your face and those pants come flying off.” I spat.

“I’m not denying that, guero – but, this time, you could at least had a chance to earn it.” Hector grinned as he shot another ball down.

“Why, I oughta…”

At that moment, a tall, thin figure entered from the white brightness of outside. He was a cadaverous looking, middle-aged man with black slicked-back, shiny hair, pencil mustache, and a set of large, protruding eyes that bugged out from a disturbingly, skull-like face. The skin of his face was brown as a paper bag. He wore black slacks and a mauve, striped tie. Covering his dark-blue, buttoned-down shirt, the man donned a white doctor’s coat. With his one good eye, the left was blanketed over in milky cataracts, he scanned the pool hall.

Must work at a nearby pharmacy, I thought.

The man in the doctor’s coat casually walked over to us as a predatory smile wrinkled the unattractive and lined face. With his right hand out, palm up, he hissed in good English, “Hello, young men. Would any of you care to buy some good coke?”

Hector’s face lit up, “Coke?”

“Why are you going door to door, doctor?” I grinned. “Business that bad?”

The man shot a hostile glance with his one good eye to me, then returned his attention to Hector. Obviously, as far as the nefarious peddler was concerned, the Americano wasn’t even in the room, anymore.

I stood there gripping the pool cue, slowly turning it with my fingers. Oh, it’s like that? Wait until you find out who has to buy your worthless shit. Your attitude is going to do a 360.

“How much?” Hector asked the man.

The man reached down the front of his slacks and pulled out a small, plastic bag containing cocaine. He held it in an open palm up to Hector. “Pure and clean, amigo. Straight from Colombia. Won’t find the purest, anywhere.”

I sighed, “Probably cut to shit.”

“Be quiet!” The man hissed at me in a side glance.

Hector looked down at the bag, then over to me. Smiling at the man, he said, “I don’t know…I don’t have any money, compa.” He casually glanced back at me. “Unless, my friend wants to buy it for me.”

“Nope.” I spat out casually.

As thought, the demeanor of the peddler changed. With a smooth, oily voice, he smiled falsely at me and hissed, “You sure, guero? Only five dollars for the whole paper.”

“Nope.” I repeated with obvious smugness.

Us two stood a beat glaring at each other. My face was as calm and cool as a poker dealer.

The man clicked the top of his mouth with his tongue and turned wordlessly to the table of locals huddled by the bar. We resumed our game, the joviality of the moment was lost as we silently knocked balls around the table.

I took a drink of my beer, “So, where’s this friend of yours? Weed I can use right now.”

Hector’s mood lightened up, “Any minute, I’m sure. He’s always…there he is!”

A short, scrawny, young man rapidly came tromping down the entrance steps. He wore a black Metallica t-shirt, dirty black jeans, and a mane of long, jet-black hair that cascaded over a strong Aztec face. He rapidly strolled up to Hector and the two greeted each other in a street-wise handshake.

“About time you got here, Manuel! We’ve been waiting forever.” Hector smiled as he patted his friend on the shoulder.

The little Mexican grinned through silver teeth, “Ah…I was having problems with my old lady. Ever since she had my son, she’s been being a bitch.”

“Women will do that.” I uttered.

“Hey, this is my friend Louie.” Hector pointed over to me as I stood in the gloom of the hall. “He’s an American living here in Juárez.”

“Hola!” I chirped. “You want some beer?”

“Hola.” Manual mumbled. “Yeah, I’ll take some beer.”

Hector returned from the bar with an extra plastic cup and as he was pouring a drink asked, “Did you bring it?”

Manuel slurped his drink, “Of course, I got it. You got money?”

Hector meekly glanced at me, “Hey, spot me fifty pesos, guero.”

I walked up to Manuel and slapped a fifty peso note into the small brown hand. Manuel slipped the bill into his front pocket and then said to both of us, “C’mon.”

The others at the tables and the clerk ignored us three, as we followed the short Mexican into the mensroom identified with a crudely painted, laughing burro above the entrance.

The restroom was a biological nightmare. The reek of ammonia mingled with the stench of stale piss and feces. The white tiled room was a grungy tint of gray from a humming florescent light overhead.

Manuel sided up to the rust and grime cover porcelain sink and whipped out a baggie of marijuana from the crotch of his pants. He deftly unfastened the rubber-band and unrolled the cellophane bag, holding it up to Hector’s nose.

“Smell that.” Manuel smiled.

Instantly, the aroma of fine weed overpowered the rancid smells of the toilet.

Hector smiled, “That’s some bad-ass chronic, compa.”

“Told you I’d hook you up.” His friend chuckled.

“You always got the best shit, man.” Hector confided as he took the bag and held it up to the dim light from above.

“Well, I gotta get back to the old lady.” Manuel said. He shot a nervous glance to me, “Oye, guero, you got an extra five bucks? I gotta buy some pampers for my nino.”

Jesus! I thought, What am I The Junky Benevolence Society?

I sighed, “Sure.”

I pulled a five dollar bill from my wallet and handed it to Manuel, who then spun to Hector and with the same street-wise handshake said, “Gracias! Muy amable. I gotta go. Laters.” And, with that, the short Mexican curtly strolled out and up into the street to do whatever he does.

I looked at Hector, incredulously, “You and your cohorts are bleeding the bank, Hector. Remember, I’m unemployed at the moment. And, you’re welcome.”

Hector simply shrugged it off, “Let’s go and smoke this shit.”

And, we did.

A Princess of Mars!

2011-12-01T03:39:00.003-05:00

Edgar Rice Burroughs' science-fantasy story originally published in 1917, A Princess of Mars, was the first novel that I had ever read cover to cover when I was a wee lad. A massive tale saturated in glorious detail concerning the heroic exploits of one earthman named John Carter who, having been stranded on the dying planet Mars, unites the warring tribes of the planet and saves the Princess Dejah Thoris in the process. Fantastic adventure stories of science fiction, fantasy, and daring do.

Well, decades later, Hollywood finally has made a film based on the first book (It will be released as a trilogy a la Lord Of The Rings a year apart, based on the John Carter trilogy of books: A Princess of Mars, The Gods of Mars, and John Carter Warlord of Mars) From this trailer, it seems they nailed it right on the head! I definitely will be there opening day March 9th to see this!

In Dreams, I Walk With You.

2011-11-27T02:46:00.004-05:00

I was lying in my bed in the cool darkness of a late afternoon. The shades were closed - I never have them open anymore. What the fuck is there to see outside? Obese and ancient Mexicans in ratty clothes? Homeless screaming at the sky? Dead shrubs? Rotted trees? A lifeless city?

My bed is set on the floor - no frame, just box spring and mattress. Grey colored, cotton sheets. Grey comforter.

I gaze down to my pale legs in the half light and - in part horror and part morbid curiosity - I noticed small, pimple-like bumps on the lower part of my legs. About ten or twelve of them. I glide my hand smoothly over the skin, reading the bumps like Braille, feeling the soft, sparse hairs. In a fit of paranoia, I pop one of the offending blemishes with thumb and forefinger, curiously mortified that it wasn't puss or blood that issued forth - but, the tiny larvae of some insect - like the blow fly.

The white, pulpy worm wiggled out of its cocoon in my flesh and plopped onto the dusty tiled floor. I sat for some time, squeezing these things out of my leg. One after another - a couple I noticed dragged long, pink, fleshy tube strips of my muscle with them clamped firmly in hind mandibles - as they humped and wriggled across the tile, disappearing under chairs and into dark shadows. I sat a moment and watched these maggots move away with a bit of sadness - sadness over my obviously deteriorating body. There was no pain. No blood. Simply the bewildered curiosity and annoyance of why and how they were there in the first place.

I curled up into a fetal position under my blankets in a vain attempt to return to sleep. I felt a nick (Or a bite) just under the right side crown of the head of my penis. I always sleep in the nude - wouldn't have it any other way.

Then I felt a moistness in my pubic hairs and when I glanced under my grey blanket, I noticed a rather deep and large pool of blood. The blood was odd - it was thick and sludge-like. With freaky paranoia, I leap out of bed to the bathroom, leaving splats of dark, crimson blood droplets on the tile. Examining where I felt the sharp and piercing pain, there was indeed a tiny gash like incision. Again, no pain - only deranged, uncollated bewilderment.

I cleaned the blood off the best I could, urinated, and went back to my bed to lay down. My feelings being wracked in deep sadness and depression that I was overcome by these maladies and powerless to stop it.

--- A dream that I had the previous evening.

Another One Goes Down In Flames.

2011-11-22T11:35:00.000-05:00

Black Clouds

2011-11-21T19:27:00.003-05:00

This November has had to be the worst this year. Earlier this month, I learned that my mother had passed away. That hit me hard and I am still feeling the residual effects. I will always miss her. A few days after that, an old friend who resided in San Francisco - who I had known since college and suffers from the same insidious mental derangement that I do - fell to his demons and committed suicide. And finally, through no fault of my own, I had terminated that relationship I had.

It has been a red-letter month to say the least. I have dealt with it the best way I could. But, as if I am standing in the surf, with the waves of depression have been coming on stronger and higher. I have been battling the urge - a strong urge - to simply pack my shit and hit the road. It really would be liberating at this point and no big loss on my current apartment. When I had that wild hair up my ass on going to teach English in Southeast Asia, I had sold half my furniture in lieu of leaving. I could easily rid myself of the rest.

Where would I go? Anywhere but here is preferable. Anywhere but here.

Hopeless Hope.

2011-11-11T06:52:00.001-05:00

I don't care if we wind up living in a squalid flat next to the train tracks breathing soot and dirt and too poor to eat anything good. I don't care that no one will read my horrible little stories about faggots and outcasts and junkies of the world while you sit and do your crossword puzzles. I don't care as long as I have you. You are the best thing to come into my life in a long time, Hector Marquez and I don't care about anything else.

There's No Way.

2011-11-02T03:32:00.004-04:00

AMERICA! FUCK YEAH!

ghost of love

2011-11-01T13:30:00.001-04:00

Dark and well past midnight. His copper colored-skin, a muted red from the cigarette that illuminated his face in the half light. Quiet. We can hear each other breath. In the near distance down by the black, long shadows off the empty street, the sound of four gunshots. Somewhere a dog barks. Under the blankets, we draw nearer, the warmth of his smooth skin, the softness of his hair, the pleasant smell of his torso. It stimulates me - smooths me out.

I feel so calm as we intwine. Arm around my shoulder, head on his chest, I look up and see the outline of his aquiline features in the red glow of the cigarettes cinders. Hooked nose, thick pouty lips, thick eyelashes, straight black hair hanging limply over forehead.
Outside the blankets, the room is ink black and cold with clothes thrown about the carpeted floor. The smell of sweat and semen waft in the stillness mixed with cigarette vapors - but, inside the blankets it is warm and still and tranquilo. Not a word is said, but the feeling is there a fallaheen feeling of togetherness like I have not felt since...
He puts the cigarette out in the tray on the table next to the bed. We intwine tighter, he draws me near, and a small kiss on my forehead. Slowly and surely, I hear his slight breathing as he falls asleep. I lay there and stare into blackness - out in the night a lonesome train horn blows - my hand gently slides up and down his thin side coinciding with his slow, steady breathing.
Eventually, I succumb to sleep, too - dreaming of Argonauts in fiery ships...

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T02:40:00.000-04:00

It's a Love Thing.

2011-10-28T03:08:00.004-04:00

Kissing is man’s greatest invention. All animals copulate, but only humans kiss. Kissing is the supreme achievement in the Western world. Orientals, including those who tended the North American continent before the ravagement, rubbed noses, and thousands still do. Yet despite the golden fruit of their millennia—they gave us yoga and gunpowder, Buddha and corn on the cob—they, their multitudes, their saints and sages, never produced a kiss. The greatest discovery of civilized man is kissing and I do cherish it.

A Blue Tomorrow

2011-10-27T13:15:00.005-04:00

It has been almost a week since I found out and I am still feeling blue. Last Saturday evening as I was sending a message on facebook concerning book sells, I noticed under the word message (not the icon that usually notifies me of current private messages) the number 32. I clicked onto and found an entire slew of messages from people. Obviously, with facebooks new changes, I get notified of messages only from people who are on my friends list. I noticed a few from my sister and one from my nephew - they had attempted to contact me to let me know that my mother had passed away on August 23rd.

At first, I was quite livid because of the tardiness of the notes - cursing facebook even more when I attempted several times to send a message reply to my sister only to keep receiving an "Oops! Error! Please try again later!" to finally a full out ban for four days in lieu of spamming someone who is not on my friends list. Ugh!!

Eventually, I called my sister and we chatted. Mother passed peacefully and was cremated a few days later.

The following day, it hit me pretty hard. I felt such a sadness. Is this what it's like to mourn?

Sunday afternoon I had gotten the idea to walk downtown and find a church, sit and pray, giving my final respects. I walked to no less than five churches and they were all closed on a Sunday?! I even went to the old catholic cathedral on Oregon St. - a nun was there (Or a Mother Superior, I don't know which, I'm not catholic) yet, she wouldn't let me in on account I didn't speak Spanish.

So, I just walked over to a quiet park, sat on a bench, and did it there. I thought about her as I was a kid, to the last day I saw her in Eureka, I thought of the funny, silly ways she would joke and make me laugh, I thought of the hard and cold times at the hand of that brutal monster that she had married - a million memories flushed through my head. I sat and weeped.

I'm going to miss you, mom. I always had and always will, love you. I will miss you so much.

Occupy El Paso

2011-10-23T14:26:00.003-04:00

And, so...the protesters had occupied the downtown plaza for a week, now. Hipster kids mostly, lounging in the grass laughing, talking, playing hacky-sack as demonstration signs lean scattered askew nailed or hung to posts and trees. The protesters only stir from their idle reverie when the camera arrives - leaping up to get their greasy, hairy faces seen by the folks back home.

A just cause. But, in the end, futile.

Yesterday, I spoke with one of their ring leaders who invited me to attend a 'rally' that was to begin at seven that evening. He became somewhat belligerent when I stated that why was no one protesting and just laying around. If only they or any protesters for that matter, could harness that anger into a force that could be reckoned with.

Well, I was hit up several times by scrawny, white kids with dread locks for cigarettes. At least, that was motivation for something.

You should be here!! Occupy!! a sign blares. Indeed. It seems the prevailing motive with the local hipsters is to be at least part of "Something...anything."

I wanted to gather the nerve to blatantly ask one of these gung-ho occupiers if they indeed had made a difference. But, much like them, I don't care.

On a lighter note - the occasional car still whizzed by honking. Yet, as we all realize, honking will not change things. I could stand on the corner brandishing a sign that said Honk If You're Horny and get the same reaction. Hell, most of the protesters barely looked up at the passing autos - lazy fucks! Do something!

The only positive thing was that the protesters encampment had put a curb on the screaming preachers that infest the plaza. It hadn't deterred the hobos and sexual predators, though. With all the kids around, they came out in legion.

I sat on a bench, bored after handing out my umpteenth smoke and just left with the realization that ones that the protesters are protesting against had won a long time ago...

The Soft Machine.

2011-10-18T12:28:00.005-04:00

It seems that I had fallen into the arms of an unsuspected romance. Am I complaining? Not in the least. After two, self-inflicted, dry years of utter monotony and self-debasement, the uncertain step into a glob of love is a refreshing experience to say the least.

Life has become more tolerable, more livable. I do not have the urge to scream obscenities at the top of my lungs or fling myself in front of a city bus, anymore. Who knew that all misery, all paranoia, all self-hatred and self inflicted pain that life throws at you could be easily and effortlessly brushed away by the hand of a willing and caring partner.

His name is Hector Marquez. I had actually met him five years ago when I used to live in Juarez. A pure, uncut boy of the street - would run the night circuit with a pack of wild rentboys that prowled the Plaza Las Armas. He alone, with sly grin and street charm, would seek me out from the pack and attempt to woo me to my apartment or hotel and each time I would deny him and refuse his obvious advances. I did not want to be just another "john" in his scheme of things.

Jump to two years ago when we are re-acquainted one evening. He was dressed in a clean uniform and stated that he was on his way to work - an actual, real job of graveyard clerk at a convenience store called Oxxo.

Two years of lopsided courtship - mainly on his side - and I finally succumbed to his interest that he stated that always went farther than I had previously thought.

"I've always liked you. " He confided. "When I used to see you sitting in front of the cathedral in the plaza talking with your friends, you looked so handsome to me. And, the fact that you didn't see me as just another piece of meat turned me on even more. I fell in love with you the moment I saw you."

If only I wasn't blinded by my Ugly American attitude back then, because the thing was - I secretly was attracted to him. But, I made the mistake of falling for a hooker before and told myself I'd never travel down that road again.

Yet, people change. Hector has held his job for three years, now and helps support his ailing mother - a sweet and understanding person in her own right, she completely accepts her only son's sexuality and likes me, too boot!

So, there you have it. A small monument to a man who has won a cold robot's heart. I will not go all mushy and say that this relationship will last forever - nothing ever does - but, I definitely will ride this strange torpedo to the end.

Wrapped In The Flames Of Devils.

2011-10-12T05:08:00.004-04:00

So, downtown I went and decided to do lunch at Burger King - well not in it, but al fresco and took my dollar-menu burger and cheap ass to Plaza San Jacinto. Nice day with big Texas blue sky and fluffy white clouds, you dig? I sit under a shaded tree and watch cops rumble a couple of cuties on the other side of the park. Seems said hotties where partaking in public drinking of alcohol - I gobbled my burger as one cholo grudgingly poured his beer - a Steel Reserve 211 - into a thirsty bush. Too bad, kids.

Finished my lunch and walked around the park - the two guys that the cops harassed wobbled up to me. Damn - they looked even better close up. Problem was - they were shit faced drunk.

"Hey, man!" said the one in the blue baseball cap. "Did you call them cops on us?"

Smiling, I retorted, "Don't be stupid - and I saw they made you pour out your Steel Reserve. That's fucked! My favorite beer. Guess I hafta by you fellas new ones."

Their eyes lit up like Christmas trees and my mind was set in motion - perhaps some madcap sexual adventures will ensue...

We walked over to the covenient convenience store on Mesa Street and I purchased three tall cold ones from the daffy lezbo and with much yuk-yuks and hardy hars, I found out the guys name with the blue baseball cap was Steve and his friend with the shaved head was Tony. Both fresh outta the clink this morning - for public intoxication. Life imitating art, people.

Well, I was always a sucker for a handsome face and these two had the complete package - so, I had nothing to lose and decided to drink with them. But where? Cops were diving and swooping around on 10 speeds like fucking piranha.

We trumped in the afternoon heat to find a safe drinking hole - Steve took it far too serious. He lead us to a filthy pit behind an abandoned house - No way, buddy! Too dirty for this uppity queen - I mean really! So we stomped up to a small park behind the civic center and under a nice shady tree, began to drink there - until two coppers whizzed nearby on bikes. Ugh - what a bother! What is this a fucking police state all of a sudden?

Eventually, we found ourselves under the overpass to the I-10 freeway and finished our beers there. Discussed many a things. The topic of making jack off videos came up and Tony and Steve whole heartily agreed that much money could be made peddling their wacking talents on the Internet. Hold up, I want to state right here and now that it was in no way shape or form my instigation in this matter - okay? Steve even popped a boner - wow - impressive

Well, we returned to the plaza and for some damn reason as we sat flapping our gums in intoxicated candor until some scum-bum named Harold - lanky, fuzzed out hair and no teeth - wobbled up to Steve and for no damn rhyme or reason, the two just went at it in a WW Smackdown dragged out fist fight right in the middle of the plaza. And then, after whopping some jerk on a bike that decided to get involved and be some cowboy citizen - mind your own business, you ass! - the cops showed up and dragged them away.

I just said goodbye to Tony - who mumbled something about returning home and shlupped myself back to my trap. Guess I won't be seeing Steve for awhile...

Puff.

2011-10-06T01:20:00.004-04:00

I don't care what the current trends dictate. Smoking is sexy.

We Can Be Heroes.

2011-10-05T21:55:00.001-04:00

I hate how we live in a culture of indifference. Eli Wiesel once said that “the opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.” And that was back in 1986. It’s almost 20 years later and yet we live in a world where people don’t speak up. They walk by idly as the weak are oppressed, as victims are raped and murdered in the streets. Where are the brave souls that act when they are called to? Where are the men, the women, the children, that will stand up when they see someone abused, broken and forgotten.

We are creatures of timidity. Yet, we crave courage and honor. We are polar opposites of the ideals that we idolize. I myself am a paragon of this fault. I know that I am guilty of not standing up but that doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t want the world to stop being less indifferent. Every day I wish I were more courageous… That I could speak up when I feel the most without a voice… Maybe one day that will change… But for now that is what I would seek to change. Get rid of indifference and the world is left with love.

The Blind Mouth

2011-10-04T02:14:00.005-04:00

Ciudad Juarez, Mexico:

My room is on a roof. I can see blue mountains across from the City which sprawls out like a simmering, colorless vista in every direction, occasionally dotted by cell-phone towers. After work, Hector comes to my room and brings a packet of griefa, "Muy bueno para follar guero." We are sitting on the edge of the roof, our legs dangling in the air. I point to the sky above the blue mountains and tell him "Some day I will go away in that direction."

He looks at me and wrinkles his forehead like a dog and says I shouldn't think such things is muy malo. I can see he is sad, feeling the sky between us.

Later, I am in the shed behind his house where we change and take showers. Hector is there. The others - his mother and visiting cousin - have gone because it is a fiesta. Hector has his shirt off and his skin is smooth like polished brown wood. He peels an orange and the smell of orange fills the shed. He breaks the orange in two and gives me half and pulls me down to sit beside him on the bench. He finishes the orange and licks his fingers. Then he puts his arms around my shoulders and I can see his pants sticking up between his legs.

"Yo muy caliente, guero. Very hot." He rubs his forehead against mine. "Quiero follarte."

His body is warm like an animal and I feel a soft tingle in my stomach and I say "Muy bueno." We take off our clothes. There is a musk smell from his tight brown nuts. He brings out a little tin of Vaseline he carries in his hip pocket because sometimes he would fuck a tourist for money, he has always carried it. I take the tin and rub Vaseline on his cock feeling it jump in my hand like a frog, he is standing there teeth bared, gasping..."Vuelvete y aganchete, guero"...I turn around and bend over, hands braced on knees and let myself go limp inside as he slides it in. I could see out through a little dusty window the junk filled, back yard and the setting sun on the tiled roofs like bits of silver paper, and when I spurt the the world seems to stretch out and then snap back pulling my eggs together and I am spurting out, silver spots boil in front of my eyes and the window blacks out.

I am sitting on the bench my head against the wall and he is rubbing a towel on my face. "You black out, guero." He touched my cheek and looked at me showing the red gums and belched a smell of oranges. "You very good for fuck."

Darkness falls on the ruined suburbs. A dog barks in the distance. Dim jerky stars are blowing away across a gleaming empty sky...

Cock-Adoodle-Doo.

2011-10-03T10:00:00.001-04:00

"Buenas dias." He says.

"Good morning." I blink groggily up to him.

I feel you. I see you. I taste you. Through the hollow stillness I reach out my hand and gently press my fingers against yours. Elysium greets us with the old familiar smell of swirling white asphodel. The wind tickles the trees and scatters the playful leaves. I open my eyes and look down at my arms. In this waking dream the skin is smooth, no scars.

In this waking dream there are no scars. For now, no more blue tomorrows.

War of the Worms.

2011-10-02T14:48:00.013-04:00

The Old Queer squirms on a lime stone bench in Plaza las Armas, Ciudad Juarez. That being in Mexico, cabron. (Indian adolescents walk by, arms around each other’s neck and ribs); strain his dying flesh to occupy young ass and thighs, tight balls and hard spurting cocks. A boy walking past, turns, grins at him and yell "Que tal, chief?", their boy innocence achingly whip across his sagging buttocks and drooping loins. He screams, an enigmatic Sybil with dark glasses and grey face. Piss blood warm on his withered thighs.

I set my pen down on my notebook and look at the clock on the cafe wall. There was a vato at the counter giving me the eye and I delineated a vague good impression like something half seen from a bus window - back from the screaming, shuddering sickness, everything so sharp and clear it hurts, suddenly smeared with grey smoke - the clock had jumped ahead like the time will after 2pm even for a sick junky - and I don't want to know about him or anybody...

"Hector." I mouth the name silently, finish my coffee and cigarette – we fought and argued over same silly shit. He wants me to stay in Juarez for the sole benefit of my finances. Out of the nine billion fucked up souls on this planet, he picks me to support him and his ma. No, I whisper.

The night prior, his cousin had visited from Tabasco – by name of Adrian, a sultry, walking hard on with the air that no one, and I mean no one, will refuse his glare when he pin-points your ass to pummel in unbridled macho-lust. We had sat on the roof of Hector’s one story, adobe trap drinking beers and listening to cha-cha reggeaton as out in the paranoid City, citizens partied, fucked, and died. Gunshots in the distance mixed with jukeboxes and car horns. I blew smoke from a joint up into a dark sky blanketed in a swath of twinkling stars. After the beer began to flow, Hector began the same old-same old and it pissed me off, or should I say, irritated the fuck out of me because I was held in the trance of Adrian’s hypnotic spell and all I wanted was that sultry motherfucker to screw me into the dirt.

“You’re being a letdown, boy and an all-around drag.” I drearily said to Hector.

He then went into full bitch mode: Droning on about his financial woes and the cold, imperious nature of your common American homosexual that, if I didn’t know better, was aimed at me. I retorted that if he cared for me as much as my bank account, he would have so much to complain about.

Hector flew into a tizzy (macho homo that I first met two years ago is really declining into a full, fledged fag) and stomped downstairs to warrant sympathy from his mother because he wasn’t gonna get shit from my gringo ass. I sat there a moment, holding my caguama – silently contemplating the conundrum. Adrian had other ideas. He got up off the milk crate he was stooped on, silently walked over to me, gently pushed my head back and stood over me, shoving his tongue into my mouth. I sat there – all quite around us except for the occasional smack or slurp – when all of a sudden Adrian is violently hurled away from me from a rather pissed off Hector who silently slunk back up onto the roof. Hector roared at the well-inebriated Adrian to get the fuck offa me or something like that as the two did a short ballet around the roof swinging blows. I sat there, watching this stupid mess and as I light a cigarette, Mother of Hector swoops up and puts an end to these faggoty-ass shenanigans.

A few words are exchanged and I utter I’m going to get a hotel room to think this silly shit through. And, I do.

As I began this post: Sitting in this café thinking. No one here but me – syphoned inna booth. I do care for Hector. Physically. Mentally. Not too much emotionally. However, after a decade in dealing with this culture, I am befuddled that I still carry that snotty ass attitude of West Hollywood with me when dealing with these gay fuckers. Of course it will be a financial boon to him and his mother - they have nothing. What do I get out of it? A few kicks? I want more. I want what every red-blooded homosexual wants. I want to be loved back. Unconditionally and without strings. But, that seems an impossibility in this land of Mexico. Unless I hook up with some simpering, fey faggot and that truly sickens me.

Fuck it. I leave the cafe stroll through dusty near empty streets. A mangy, yellow dog stares at me from a mountain of garbage. Happy fat Mexican waves at my white ass from his shop. A group of chattering Indian women hush up as I walk by on the smashed sidewalk. I stop in an internet cafe and type this shit out. Yeah, I'm going back to Hector's house. I think I love him.

Eye Nose.

2011-10-01T00:32:00.000-04:00

Down the Rabbit's Hole.

2011-09-26T23:29:00.011-04:00

Among the crumbling masonry and sagging, wooden roofs, garbage and feces and urine simmered in one hundred degree weather. Short, bloated hookers tottered on frayed, cracked pumps silently eyeing darting con men and pushers of fine, illegal substances, as bored police patrols languidly rode on noiseless bicycles like barracuda hunting prey.

I lit a cigarette and cut past burrito row - smells of rancid fat, rotten salsas, burnt meats - past the fat naco that chewed on a toothpick, he apathetically checking out the intense gringo strutting without fear or hesitation through mean, dusty streets, up to a hamburger restaurant just around the corner.

The small hamburger joint teetered on the cliff of a canal that brimmed with stagnant water - garbage and yellow turds floated dreamily in the gawdamn bright Juarez sunlight.

There were no customers as I entered the cafe, a row of six mix-matched tables and chairs scattered on red-tiled floor. On one wall was an immense, amateurish mural depicting a demented, nostalgic memory of Michoacan - or damn near it. The jukebox wailed ranchero music as the smells from the kitchen battled with the ever-lingering stink from the canal.

Hector strode out from back all handsome and shit and gave me the glad hand.

"Glad you made it!" He smiled and I assured him I hadn't let him down, yet. He stated that he wanted to get a room at the Hotel Rex across the street, coyly giving me a lascivious wink. I said sure as a small family entered the cafe and took a table.

I sat, too, at my own table in the back corner, and ordered the specialty of the house - a gigantic hamburger with all the trimmings and a Pepsi for just a buck.

I thought it was cute as I sat there, the way Hector would asked me for advice on how to wait on the family properly - Hector had recently acquired the job and wanted to impress, I guess. As the family sat and ate, I chomped on my own burger - swatting flies as Hector counted out his till for the day. His replacement arrived and off we jetted across to Hotel Rex.

Elbowing our way through clomping hookers that blocked the entrance, we paid the fat stinkbomb behind the reception grate the one hundred pesos for a room - he winking at me with his one good eye, obviously thinking we fags or something and going to use the room as our own personal passion pit. I mean, really! The nerve!

Hector and I shot up the wooden stairs to the second floor - my Knight telling me to "Wait a minute" as he steps to a green door and quickly raps with his knuckles.

Quien es?

Soy Hector!

The door is opened by a scrawny kid with a wild mane of hair and skin a pallor of someone who hadn't seen the sun in years. The young junky stares at me blankly and in mute hostility - his eyes all twinkly and shit, but invites Hector inside as I must wait in the hall like some commoner.

A minute passes and Hector walks out and we retire to our room on the third floor. Jingle of key, open thin wood door to a ratty room of old, dark wood. Sagging bed, foul smelling linens, and the walls covered in graffiti. We both take no time in laying out three lines of coke onto the bureau that is pock-marked with hundreds of cigarette burns.

Snoooooort! Snnnniff! Woooop!!

We both cut out into the streets on a mission, by God - first place we hit was the Bar El Durado. Dark joint, cute bartender. Hector explains that I am interested in renting an apartment.

"Of course, senor." The bartender smiles, wiping the counter in front of me with a dirty rag. "Chuey!!"

Chuey slinks out of the darkness - a bent, shriveled old thing in black pants, dirty, white shirt, and bow tie. He slicks his black hair back on his shiny, bulbous head with one hand as he gestures to a spiral staircase with another, "If you'd follow me."

Up the spiral staircase to a long, musty hall lined on both sides with a row of doors. We are in a whore house.

"Where's the apartment?" I ask.

He opens the last door in the hall. It is simply a large bed covered in red, silkish blankets with black tassels. The room smelled of clorox and cunt. An end table with equally queer lamp and above the bed, a huge poster of the Virgin of Guadalupe with a scowl that wouldn't quit. There was no bathroom, no kitchen.

"A nice room. Only $200 a month, senor." The creep hisses.

A fucking room in a whore house? Are you kidding me? I can picture myself attempting to write or read or enjoy television with the sound of hookers fucking all around me.

"I'm going to check out one more place and then I'll let you know." I smiled.

Out on the street, I scold Hector about this selection. He shrugs and we move on.

Next to the Bar El Paso was a gated door that led down a dank hall to hidden apartments. I peered in, but all I could see were rusted gas tanks and dented trash cans.

Across the street, young hustler see's my lily-white skin - pops a boner - and comes running at us. "Hey! Hey! Gotta cigarette, meester?!"

"You know how we can get in here?" I ask, pulling out a smoke and handing it to him. "I want to talk to the landlady."

"I live here. " He says.

"Good!" I grin. "You can open the gate for us, then!"

"I don't have my key."

"Well, how the fuck do you expect to get into your apartment?" I say.

"You Americans" He shakes his head. "Always theenking you so smart."

The hottie puts his face up to the bars of the gate and yells into the darkness, "Bigote!!! Bigote!!!!!"

I stood there, glancing over at Hector, confused at why this kid was yelling 'moustache' in Spanish. Well, so much for us smart Americans, as this old fucker with the biggest Pancho Villa moustache in all of Latin America comes shuffling out of the gloom. Bigote.

Unlocking the gate, Bigote and the hustler exchange words and Hector and I am escorted into the back. Not bad - patio surrounded by five or six adobe-style apartments. Unfortunately, the landlady was nary to be seen as as luck would have it, Bigote explains she has been missing for a few weeks. I inquire on the rent and they both state $80 a month. I peek my head into Bigote's trap and a good sized room with bathroom and adjacent kitchen. Bigote gives me the landlady's cell-number and Hector and I high-tail it out of there.

Hector and I returned to the hotel, did a couple of lines, sucked each other off, did another line after that - Hector had been badgering me to move back across the border to Mexico for some time. I seriously really want to - damn the death toll. We all die, right? Who wants to live forever? I've met nothing but self-important assholes in El Paso (No big shock, there - it's El Paso, people - the shittiest city with the shittiest citizens in the world - been proven right time and time again since 1997!) Afterwards, I returned stateside in the knowledge that soon I will be again living in Juarez...

It takes ten times as long to put yourself back together as it does to fall apart.

2011-09-17T04:07:00.001-04:00

Don't go away and leave me.

American Spirit

2011-09-12T16:12:00.005-04:00

Was feeling it this Sunday morning, so I got dressed and went OUT. Well, to be fair, it wasn't morning - it was more mid-afternoon. Originally, I was taking a stroll over to that notorious porno theater Eva's for a romp of evil, yet as I stomped past Sonny's Bar, I opted for a beer, instead.
Sonny's Bar, for those of you out of the loop, is a small, hole-in-the-wall dive located two blocks from my digs, ya dig? Spitting distance from a homeless shelter and a halfway house, the tiny, adobe structure caters to a skanky assortment of alkies, hobo's, excons, and wanna-be gangsters. As a fact, what cinched the decision was as I strolled past the fence that enclosed the patio, I noticed three interesting types lounging under the shabby table umbrella baking in the mid-afternoon heat. The three were sleeping and beerless - three young Latino-types I had seen before running through the streets like Wild Boys.
So, I plopped on a stool inside of the bar and as my eyes adjusted to the murky light, the joint was quite full of the previous mentioned clientele. I met up with an old friend from the Mish days named Clint and we shot the shit before he had a meet with some skanky whore elsewhere. Left alone, I ordered another beer and made my way out to the patio.

Patio is probably to good a word - actually, a large, dirt lot speckled with rickety, decaying chairs and a dusty table that seemed to collapse if you leaned against it.(It actually did tip over eventually) As I said, I sat with the three who were there, striking up casual conversation with one that I kinda knew from the bar circuit. The other two was a young Mexican gangster from Chihuahua City, Chihuahua named Pablo and the other a very cute Dominican named Salvador. They both went on about relocating to New York City in a few days time to work for Salvador's father as mechanics. We three talked and joked - Salvador sizing me up (Thought I was a cop) as Pablo dozed on and off in the shade of the bent umbrella. Though the three had no booze, they all were pretty sloshed, so I invited to buy them a round of beer.

My acquaintance - whose name I cannot recall - stated he, they, were hungry. I agreed to walk around the corner to buy some instant soups in lieu of retrieving more cash for beer.

Unfortunately, when I returned, Mom - that ancient hag who runs the bar - caught the three sniffing coke out on the patio and was in process of tossing the three out. But, I talked the cock-blocking old cunt out of it when I ordered beers for them. (They obviously were just lounging around the patio and not buying anything)

We sat at the table with another friend named Ruben - a self-proclaimed Azteca gangster and mooch to the bone - and had actually a good time drinking, joking, and singing to the cholo-beloved oldies warbling from the jukebox. The sexual innuendo between Salvador and I was actually quite pat. I saw in his bloodshot eyes that he knew what the score was, even though the time with his friends were raucous roaring about all the pussy they're going to get once in New York.

A lot of beers later and Salvador followed me outside for a smoke break. He began - in that timid macho way I so adore - making coy advances to my person. When he casually whipped his dork out and took a drunken piss onto the curb, me making comments about his manhood didn't help, either.

"You live near here, guero?" He slurs, nearly tumbling into the street.

I explain I did, just two blocks.

"I wanna stay the night with you." He spat all droopy eyed and fucked up.

I asked him to wait there as I strode to the bathroom to take a much needed piss. As I stood there watching my yellow stream of urine splatter against the thick feces that packed the toilet, I thought, why not? The dude's hot and could be some good kicks.

Saying adios, Salvador and I darted over to my place laughing and stumbling under that baneful moon. Once home, he states he's hungry and I know my cupboards are bare, so I ordered a pizza as he took a hot shower.

We sat in our boxers devouring that pizza like ravaged beasts, drinking tall boys and laughing at Don't Look In The Basement that aired on the Elvira Show. Lights out and in drunken fits of lunging, fondling and sucking, Salvador and I screwed until we passed out, entwined like jungle serpents. Damn, that boy can snore.

Next morning, I make pancakes and coffee as he shyly lounges in rumpled sheets and blankets. We eat, his cell phone goes off and he states he has to split on account of a meet with his ruca. Shaking hands, he jets and I just go on doing what I do...

Insanity.

2011-09-11T15:33:00.005-04:00

Woke up with a start, knowing full well that something was wrong. My lower back hurt, my mouth foul and evil tasting. It didn't get any better when I got online and found out it was Friday. Not that that is bad, it's just when I went to sleep, it was Tuesday night. Did I sleep for two days? Did I have a senior moment and just loose track? Was I abducted by aliens? Hell, I was confused and scared.

I realize I am indecisive and flighty sometimes. Okay, all the time. I had a long thunk about moving to Taiwan and teaching English. Let's go over the facts: I hate kids. I'm tired of moving and starting over, again. I hate kids. The chance of my mental state kicking in and me quitting my job and stuck in a foreign land with absolutely no assistance. I hate kids.Me losing my SSDI benefits. And, had I mentioned that I can't stand being around kids? Too screechy.

So, I had refunded the class I had almost finished and decided not to go to Asia at this time. I needed a beer. I wanted to think and think hard.

There was a person whom I had met via Facebook named Miguel and I asked him if he would care to go out. He text that he was having boyfriend problems and declined. Fair enough, I hightailed it downtown for a sandwich and sat in the plaza eating it...and thinking. I was slightly depressed in the decision not to go to Asia - adventure and excitement awaits! you squeal - yeah, well fuck you. Why don't you go? I'm getting burned out o that shit.

I walked over to a bar by my house called Sonny's and sat out on the patio drinkin' and thinkin'. Sonny's bar is my favorite dive - grimy, dirty, dilapidated. For clientele usually runs the gamut of cholos, junkies, excons, hags, demented elderly. Not bad, no one fucks with me.

So, I'm sitting out back when a group of four black guys and a mole-encrusted white hag burst out. One of the black guys say jokingly, "Ain't nobody out here but that honky." They were trying to size me up, I guess.

So, I retort jokingly back, "Ha...honky? I haven't heard that word in a coon's age." They all laugh and we sit and chat over stupid shit.

My cell phone goes off and it is Miguel stating he wanted to go out anyway. Sure, why not. I met him outside my apartment - I lived just two blocks away - and we whisked over to fag central in downtown El Paso. In the patio of the bar Briar Patch, we sat drank and talked. The beer really hitting us, we decided to go bar hopping. We wobbled over to the Whatever, San Antonio Mining - where well to do fags whirled and gesticulated in squawking stances, yet what really struck me was all the sour looking, dumpy lesbians. Holy crap! They infested the joint!

Back at the Whatever bar as Miguel and I sat out in the patio, a hustler materialized out of thin air and after stealing a cup from another table, sat with us and drank our beer and smoked my cigarettes. He claimed his name was Eddie and weaved his story of woe on how he was stranded and needed a lift. He wasn't bad looking, but I wasn't in the mood and dumped him onto Miguel - in which then it became a lurid, coy game of sexual innuendo and some ravaged transvestite linked coke deal. Whatever.

Well, lust finally overcome Miguel and he rushed Eddie and I out the door, heeded my request at stopping for hamburgers, then dropped my drunken ass off before peeling out for a night of sordid debauchery.
I trudged upstairs and devoured my meal before falling into a troubled sleep...

Waiting.

2011-08-24T21:49:00.002-04:00

I have had enough of this unimaginative, pathetic little town. So, in true form I have applied and had been accepted to Hess English school in Taiwan. Here is the link: http://www.hess.com.tw/en/

The interview was a piece of cake and the Skype meeting was quite stress free.

Unfortunately, training does not begin until February and the actual job starts in March of 2012. I have already purchased my airline ticket on China Airways.

I will try to post here until then - even there is nothing in this sad city of interest and it will be a long, monotonous five month wait - however, when I arrive in Taipei, Taiwan, you best believe this blog will be full of fascinating reports! Stay tuned!

And since it is a complete change from Latin culture to Asian culture, I have printed the last 12 years of this blog into a book form. I am quite pleased with it. It is not for sale - just for me. I have entitled it Of Men and Maggots: the blog entries of Luis Blasini.

2011-08-11T04:54:00.002-04:00

In Heaven Everything Is Fine

2011-07-31T04:12:00.000-04:00

Minutes to Go.

2011-07-25T14:14:00.006-04:00

(Note: This entry was written long-hand in Plaza San Jacinto two evenings prior.)

All is lost. All is lost. All. Is. Lost.

What am I doing here? Sitting in this park - alone. Miserable. Again, severed. Is this my fate? To wander this dirt ball bitter, sad, filled with angst and a common hatred for people? Where - when - did it all collapse?

I was someone once. Not a person of fame or importance - but, a human being with feelings and a lust for life. Now, I am a double-exposed photograph - faded, forgotten, uninterested.

Is it too late to change? Have I gotten so far out that there is no chance of coming back? I'm talking on a mental level here.

Then again, I could be talking crazy and you don't care, anyway...I know I don't.

For the past two years, I had tried to live as everyone had suggested - stable, responsible, boring.

It has - within the last year - been eating my insides like maggots. Two years ago, I was full of vigor and energy. Now, I am weak, over-weight, and fearful of any change. And to top it off, stuck in a fucked up, petty city inhabited by fucked up, petty citizens - a city I vowed never to return and yet here I am. Fucking karma.

I had recently dumped my concerns onto the uninterested ears of a long time acquaintance. He summed it up with, "Blasini, you know as well as I do, you are an outside cat, not an indoor cat."

Of course he is right. How could anyone be content stuck in a lifetime of rut.

I have narrowed this predicament down to two options: Either go on the road and travel on to Puerto Rico as I originally had planned or just jump down to Colombia and teach English. Either are quite exciting, yet both attain their bad sides.

If Puerto Rico is a bust - I can at least put that behind me and move on to Colombia. What do I have to lose?

Of course, I have everything to lose - everything I had worked for the past two years. And, what good is that? Comfortable boredom? It is time. This city screams at me, "Get out!! Get out, now!! You are not welcome here!!"

Sigh.

Why fight it? Why debate it? Why fucking psycho-analyze everything?

Close your eyes and jump...

Subterranean

2011-07-19T16:45:00.018-04:00

Been feeling that slow burn bore that usually comes along when I have grown weary of a locale. I just want to go - regretting my decision not to high-tail it overseas earlier. The group of 'friends' that I have accumulated have become a pack of judgmental, self-important bores. All artists of the most dreary, flat productions produced for the sole purpose of self-congratulatory attention.

One of these - the alpha-male of the group - actually spat that I talk to much. I am a man of words, you fucking neanderthal! I guess if I don't chat of the mundane topics of young pussy and football, that makes me a verbal pest? How tiresome...

Time to move on.

There is an artistic couple that I thought I'd try to warm up too to give the cultural wasteland of El Paso one last try. A couple that roosts in their vast, high rise flat that I can see from my dusty closet studio. I need to connect with someone on my level. And you better believe my expectations are high.

I grabbed a copy of Dark is the Night and shuffled down through the heat of a late afternoon to give a gift to the female of the couple - indeed, they are hetro-domestic- named Melissa, she being the other half of Cesar I., local painter celeb. Cool cat with some interesting visual ideas. I dig his work...a lot.

So, downstairs, I buzz in, take the rumbling lift to the seventh floor and am greeted by Melissa who was in the middle of cleaning the entire loft. Which is a feat - being jammed with every kind of kitche memento conceivable - from mountains of books to painted mannequins and odd odds and ends dating back several decades. After pat pleasantries, I whip out my shit - I mean my book - and gift her with a signed copy. Pleasant women, she, and quite literary - would love just to spend an afternoon chatting away about books with her.

Melissa suggests for me to meet her at the Tap Bar downstairs so as she can wash, fluff and fold for the evening. Five minutes later, I find myself sitting in a dark bar sipping on Sol cervezas that I can't afford waiting a full hour until she makes her grand entrance with Cesar in tow.

It was a pleasant sit - mostly chatting and joking and drinking - all the while me fighting off the wave of anxiety and depression from the fucking turmoil of the previous week. Perhaps I was being a drag - as Cesar pointed out several times - but, this wave was really strong. Though I wanted to be sociable and go out and communicate - I wanted to go home, undress and crawl into a darkened bed and just lay there and think of nothing in that cool silence of my room.

Melissa was flipping the bill - I was appreciative, always am, but also felt like a fucking mooch. It wasn't until I had returned to the States that I have been living in such goddamn poverty - both financially and emotionally. Eventually, Melissa suggested that we - myself, Cesar, an old queen and his alcoholic trick - should return to their pad and party up on the roof.

Sure, why not?

We never made it to the roof, instead - after a drunken beer run with a highly intoxicated Cesar behind the wheel - we all sat at the kitchen table, talking about literature, smoking, impromptu dancing. Several other people from the building showed up and somehow we all filtered back to the Tap Bar - not before Cesar invited me into the bathroom for a snoot or two of much needed coke. Thank you, Cesar.

The Gang siphoned into a booth at the bar - again beer was ordered as I held my head down in destitute shame - and as the local band wailed rock, we talked and some danced. Melissa introduced two fellas that sat in a booth behind us, both raging queers - but the hefty one was very interested in writing.

I forgot his name, but after buying me a beer and during two shots of tequila, he went into an animated story of his current life: He was just released from prison - for God knows what - and he confessed presently of running a whorehouse over in Juarez. And, he wants to write about it.

When the bar closed, for some reason the Gang ditched me - I mean, really, I wouldn't hang out with me, either - and I found my drunken ass standing outside the bar lighting a cigarette in the humidity pondering what's next. I shrugged and started home but for some fucking reason, I turned around, walked back to the loft - up the elevator and was knocking on that door.

The Gang was at the kitchen table yapping, the music was blaring and it seemed that they had picked up two pretty boys in the process. My anxiety and depression flared. I just put on my mask and headed in. The two new boys - Bert and Ernie, respectfully - were as queer as the next and I sat at first in silence waiting to hear the insidious screeching of gay double entadre fly.

I can't stand American queers - their arrogant, holier than thou, snippy, girlish attitude. Melissa screeched more than once that evening at me, "What kind of queer are you?" I definitely am not the swishy, snapping, pinch-faced fags of this fair land, sweety. You want Truman Capote? Read his fucking books. (I actually do not care much for his work.) I am a man that likes men. Not a girl in a limp, fey body swooning for compassion at every wink. Jeezzz...

We all finally did wind up on the roof. Under the splash of stars and glow of city lights, Bert - an extremely attractive boy - that was until he opens his mouth. Why are there so many like that infesting this great nation?! He attempted to talk about my work and when I tried to explain Tweeker, he devolved into an alpha-male asshole. Why do his type think childish attempts on being arrogant is on the same level as being cool? I think he was confused that I wasn't really interested in him on all levels. You know the type, the Greek God walks into the room and all eyes fall on him as every queen and female coos and gushes at his every move. To him it is an aphrodisiac and it boggles his mind if only one person is not showing awe by his mere presence. The fact was, I just didn't give a shit and I think that put him off. He even had the audacity to screech at random using an acusational finger, "Face it, man, you know you secretly like me!" I sat there thinking, "What a fucking asshole. How sad."

The night progressed - Maus, a neighbor and local musician showed up - did an impromptu strip tease, no one cared - so, he left. Eventually, Melissa showed up with that Get The Fuck Out look on her face and we all disbanded at five in the morning. I said my good nights and thanks and as I strolled the few blocks to my house - the sun dragging it's lazy ass over the horizon - I thought how nice Colombia will be when I get there...

Un Chant d'Amour

2011-07-13T04:33:00.002-04:00

Spankin' Brand New Novel

2011-07-06T15:08:00.003-04:00

My new novel titled Dark is the Night is now ready and published. It can be purchased at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com, and other fine online booksellers. Buy a copy today!

Dark is the Night is an anthology concerning four, unrelated people - four of societies outcast and down trodden that is full of bite, color and confidence and yet, at the same time is rooted in heartbreaking experience and crackling with humor, insolence and diatribes.

Dark is the Night is a disturbing picture of low life existence. Partly written in the language and mores of its times - yet, the author Luis Blasini transcends that. There is little in the way of hope or love in the book and definitely is raw - shocking - even to those of us who thought nothing in modern fiction could shock us. Dark is the Night is one brilliantly sustained song of the brutal, the outcast, the desperate, and at times - the cruel that exists inside all of us.

Dark is the Night definitely is a book that will be remembered in the literary history of America.

This Nigga is Tweekin'!

2011-07-02T00:07:00.002-04:00

Excerpt from Dark is the Night: Chapter Two: It's Going To Cost You

2011-06-24T13:00:00.005-04:00

Johnny rolled over in the musty, sagging bed and tried to piece together the night before. The cramped, dank room he was in was windowless - graffitied walls painted pink with the lingering vaginal stench of a million Mexican hookers.

He lay naked on an old, spotted mattress, itself reeked of mildew and various indescribable aromas. The bathroom was down the hall. Johnny got up slowly and staggered to the chipped, porcelain sink next to the bed and took a piss, rinsed the basin with water from the tap, then splashed water on his greasy face.

Gravity took over and Johnny slumped uncontrollably back onto the bed. He lay there dizzy and aching - head pounded as he stared at the naked lightbulb that dangled from a wire that protruded out of a hole cut in the plaster of the ceiling. Directly above his face, there was a dark orange spot in the plaster.

That’s rat piss, he thought, not water damage. Rats always piss in the same spot. Humans don’t - unsanitary fucks...

Johnny’s mind throbbed with the kaleidoscope of a million images:

The thick, green velvet curtains of another cheap hotel room almost blocked all light coming from outside. A thin, yellow ray of sun cut through the dankness like a knife. Dust swirled in eddies. Johnny was naked, on his knees in a submissive crouch; hands on his knees. Towering above him was a 40 year old Hispanic ex-con that had recently been released from the border patrol after being detained for two days in the States. Or so he claimed.

Johnny met him in the Plaza. Said he could get a good score on coke. His torso was a mass of tattoos and scars. He was of medium height and beefy/muscular.

Through fucked up eyelids, Johnny saw the ex-con standing above him, naked...no not quite...his khaki pants were dropped to his ankles and the sweaty wife-beater was pulled up over his thick neck. A gold necklace of the Virgin of Guadalupe was the only color across the wall of brown chest. With his muscular left hand, the brutish ex-con held Johnny by the hair and it hurt and with his right hand he masturbated wildly.

Johnny’s eyes were not focused on the thick, brown penis, but was more entranced at watching his huge testicles bounce rapidly as he jerked off. Johnny glanced up to that bulldog face. The grimace. The thick moustache. The slicked-back, black hair.

“Don’t you fucking look at me!” He snarled and whack! Slapped Johnny across the face with an open palm.

Johnny about fell over, but the ex-con roughly grabbed Johnny by his hair, again. Johnny could feel a trickle of blood ooze out of his nostril, down across the lips. The ex-con tightened the grip on Johnny hair. Johnny winced. It hurt.

The ex-con rose onto the tips of his toes and grunted like some kind of beast. Johnny could feel the hot licks of the man’s semen as it splashed across his face. The ex-con then jabbed his thick, short penis into Johnny’s mouth and rammed it in deep, pushing down the back of Johnny’s head. Johnny gagged - he couldn’t breathe. He felt as if he was going to throw up.

“Take it, you fucking faggot!” The ex-con growled through gold-capped teeth. “Clean that dick!”

He roughly shoved Johnny down onto the cold, dusty, concrete floor. Wiped his penis with a ragged towel and tossed it onto Johnny’s face.

Dressing, the ex-con snarled as he walked out with his back to Johnny, “You’re shit’s on the table, puto!”

Slam! He was gone and Johnny was alone. Johnny could taste semen and blood on his lips. He looked up through a haze to see the junk and pesos that the asshole left on the nightstand.

Man, the things I do for this shit.

Vagina Ain't Handicap

2011-06-10T12:27:00.001-04:00

Queer

2011-06-02T06:35:00.005-04:00

Another Luis Blasini moment at the bar: A young Mexican immigrant looking motherfucker sitting alone. Handsome. Homeless. Insane, Heroin junky. Sat shivering and scratching sipping the beer I bought him and droning on and on how he could use a shot. He gets extra friendly when I mention I got my own digs. Needed a place to crash. I tell him how it is.

"What? You a faggot?" He laughs.

"Yup" I smile between gulps of beer.

Passing hours of sexual innuendo.

The time out back smoking clenched it - the Latin Adonis puking up the chips I bought, cascading steamy streams of pinks and transparent yellows - cursing his existence, cursing queers in general over his first cigarette by yours truly. I make my escape into the still chill of the night. Oh, how I can pick them! Left that fucker sitting alone as cha-cha music blared from the rockola, left alone to his beautiful, sad. beat dementia...

Beat

2011-05-30T06:45:00.000-04:00

Ever sat strung out in your own filth covered in cockroaches of the world gnawing hunger in your mind wondering where your next break will be? Didn't think so! So keep banging them drums, cupcake and maybe - just maybe - daddy will buy you that brand new Ford Taurus with the white-walls, MP3 and all the trimmings...Meanwhile, I'll just hang with them crackheads and hobos of concrete and look away as you drive by...

Tangent Alcoholism

2011-05-24T19:13:00.003-04:00

Started that night clean and pure at the cafe I haunt, you know. Rapping with fellow queen called Eduardo - he part of the Fab Force Five. The group of artists and painters and writers that I had supposedly befriended from the cafe.

So, Eduardo and I are sitting there on the plush couches sipping coffee and gossiping like two giggling queens. He jets to rendezvous with a group of cyclist having some sort of bike party - that is tooling around downtown on their Schwinn's.

left alone, I start pounding back four beers - not all at once, dingdongs, one after the other - when another pal named Brandon scoots up - tall, gangly kid who is a whiz at designing webpages and he asks if I would like to check out a gallery that had just opened up. Sure, why not?

We both speed over to said gallery and it was a bust. Lame. Boring. Only four pieces were on exhibit and they all were mediocre at best. Good thing they had a buffet spread in which we both took full example of. Highlight of that venture was I mistakenly popped open one of the bottles of Chinese rice wines that were laying about. Ech! tasted like septic tank water filtered through a hobo's sock, I tell ya.

After scarfing down some much needed beef burritos - the taste of the rice wine lingered throughout the night and next day - Brandon and I stopped at the San Carlos gallery for an impromptu artist orgy hosted by another acquaintance named Robert. He hosts open-mike poetry slams at the cafe. Again, scoped out the art, raided the hors d'oeuvres table and shot over to the Tap in search of Eduardo.

Across the street from the bar is a little park usually camped by hobos and junkies, we found the Schwinn crowd circling around a tree in the dusk - much laughter and flashing of headlights.

Eduardo stood across the street in the doorway to the Tap and invited us in. The dive was packed as a live band wailed oldies and ranchero. Sitting in a booth was the Fab Force Five - Eduardo, Freddy, Curt, Cesar Ivan, and some Indian Girl. from India, you know.

Freddie was already plastered and spent much of the evening pawing at Brandon while Cesar drunkenly goosed all and sundry as the Indian Girl giggle snorted - seriously, it was heeheeSNORTheeheeSNORT - at these antics.

Curt had the idea to change venues and head over to that fucking high falootin queer joint The Briar Patch and we all did. Stumbling and causing all kinds of ruckus in the dark streets we until we entered that high society joint.

I was introduced to Cesar Ivan's girlfriend and she was an interesting person. An intellectual with a mind that perhaps I could relate too.

The gang bar hopped and drank and laughed. Until Cesar Ivan got too plastered and baptized everyone within striking distance with alcohol from his glass. Brandon - who was the most drenched in the spillings - said it was time to cut, being near 2am anyways and the bars were about to close. We tried to ditch these drunken shenanigans - but, Cesar Ivan followed us to Brendan's car where in a plea to come home with him for "Toasted bacon and sausage sandwiches" he flung off his vest and shirt and went into a loud, over-dramatic soliloquy about the transvestites that infested the Tap Bar.

Enough of that mess, Branden and I peeled out for pizza before being dropped off at my flat...

Fun night, never the less.

Do or Do Not, There Is No try.

2011-05-07T15:37:00.003-04:00

I am a bit perplexed. A little depressed. Somewhat confused. My mind is in a muddle.

I have, at the moment, gotten cold feet on this teaching gig. I mean, it is not too late - I have received my certificates. However, I think it is because I am so comfortable and the thought of uprooting myself again and starting over in some foreign country does not appeal to me at this moment. My books are selling well and with that I have money to live moderately and I have been meeting new friends - writers, painters, musicians and such - here in the Sun City.

Do I want to go? The crazy, wing-nut side of me screams yes, while the old, tired, responsible side mumbles no. I am going to take the month of May off - no writing, no scheming, no planning - and just enjoy the spring month.

Then, I will make up my mind. Ha! Ha!

Ding Dong the Witch is Dead!

2011-05-02T00:44:00.002-04:00

The mastermind behind the murder of almost 3000 Innocent American people with the attacks on the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and the crash of a fourth plane through the heroics of her passengers that belayed the deaths of many more - Osama Bin Laden is dead.

I imagine that Osama Bin Laden is getting gang raped in Hell by well-hung demons with barbed-horned penises - yeah, enjoy those 42 virgins, buddy!

Good Vibrations

2011-04-30T16:24:00.005-04:00

What a great Saturday!

The weather is perfect and downtown El Paso is throwing a shindig called the Neon Desert Festival - this huge ass band festival! Hordes of hipster kids are stomping around enjoying the pleasant weather and great music.

As with me, I will be screening John Water's Female Trouble in the theater at the cafe that I haunt. All summer, like last year, I will be screening cult and underground films to terrify the locals.

I have sent off for - hopefully - the last proof of my new novel. I really like it! It is awesome! I am almost done with my TEFL course and will be receiving my certificate - then it's off to wherever! Haha!

Yea, I'm feeling pretty good today!

Here's The Deal.

2011-04-29T02:16:00.001-04:00

Flecks of Dust in the Night

2011-04-27T21:56:00.004-04:00

Nothing on television, so I took a walk at 11 at night.

The wind was blowing in one of those typical sand storms that make El Paso so memorable. The news was clocking the gusts at 60 miles per hour. The trees danced and bent in an obscene mambo. Trash flew about me and the dirt stung my face. I took the walk downtown, anyway.

Downtown was normal for this time of night, besides the wind - the streets were vacant in long shadows from street lamps - no cars, no people. Deathly quiet except the whispering of the gusts. I held the brim of my black cap in a vain attempt from letting it soar off into the gritty night.

I walked and I thought.

I thought of where I was going after I received my degree in TEFL. I knew that I was consciously giving up a life of cocooned comfort, a life of no worries by being fully supported of by the State. once overseas, I realized I had three - maybe four - months before SSI caught on that I would be abroad and cut off the benefits that I was receiving. But, after four years of doing relatively nothing - I just felt like a ghost living - and not doing a hell of a lot existing. I came to the finality - I had to do this.

At the time of this writing, I have been flip-flopping at what locale I wish to choose - Peru I thought would be the best choice. The schools are lenient at hiring new teachers and I am well versed in Latin American customs. However, the pay is low. I had been scouring hundreds of other blogs by expat teachers and now it seems the logical choice is Korea. They pay the best concerning new teachers and pretty much flip the bill on housing. For what I am going to attempt - Korea is the logical choice. I tried to rationale my choices - I know nothing of the language, the customs, the country. And it seems that the race is VERY homophobic.

However, I knew nothing of Mexico when I first moved to Tijuana back in 1993 - so, perhaps it would be a wonderful, positive adventure. Yet, the United States border will not be just a few feet away like in TJ if I needed to make a hasty retreat. If I go to Korea - it is a year. Good or bad. Hell or high water.

I am so confused.

I stood at the corner of the Plaza downtown blinking away the debris that flew into my face and that's when I saw him. The upper half of his thin body was in black shadows as a cherry of a cigarette glowed in the dark of his hidden face. He stood in the tan, stucco alcove of a building. He saw that I was staring at him. His thin, brown hand grabbed at the crotch of his baggy, khaki pants. The limp penis was long - and even though it was not erect, he held only half of that fucker.

I took another drag from my cigarette and stared. Watched as he slowly stroked the growing monster in his pants. I casually looked around. Nothing. No one - no traffic. The wind howled. The street signs wobbled and made noises lost in the whipping winds.

With thin, spindly fingers, he casually unzipped his pants and pulled out the long, floppy organ. I watched as he slowly slid the foreskin back and forth over a shiny head. The semi-erect penis dangled as his hand disappeared up towards the obscured face and returned with wet fingers, smearing saliva across the fat head of his cock. He continued to slowly stroke his penis in long, mechanical glides.

With a burst of both intrigue and excitement, I walked across the street towards him. He sank deeper into the alcove, deeper into darkness. As I approached the alcove, the tang of old piss blew downwind at me. The ratatatatat of a discarded Styrofoam cup swirled in eddies of dust and trash.

Huddling in the alcove, I saw he was a tall, thin man in his late thirties, Mexican, a drooping moustache over thick lips. He had a long nose set between dark, brown eyes. His hair was shaggy with flecks of grey. A ruggedly handsome face.

He mumbled something in Spanish that I did not get. I just reached out and grabbed the throbbing organ. It was enormous - as long as my lower arm and almost as thick. I slowly stroked the fleshy cock, it was still only semi-erect. Without a word, I squat down in front of him and took his penis in my mouth - adjusting to the girth and sucked it in deep strokes.

He groaned and uttered dirty words in Spanish - near orgasm, his penis stiffened entirely. It still curved downward. I worked faster and saliva flowed as I tongued the head and worked the shaft with my hand. He yanked his fully hard cock out of my mouth - holding my head away with his left hand - and dribbled globs of semen onto the dusty, street lamp splashed concrete. The thick semen hit the ground with audible splats.

I stood up, looking at him. He exhaled and smiled as he shoved his dick back into his pants. He smiled, said gracias or some equivalent and strode back out into the sand storm.

I lit a cigarette and began the walk back home. I thought of how I really need to escape this vile city and get back on the road. It is who I am. It was what I needed to keep on living.

Peephole confessions

2011-04-27T04:06:00.004-04:00

Repent and you will be foreskin.

Voyueristic Intensions

2011-04-22T19:07:00.016-04:00

Spent the afternoon in Cuidad Juarez, Mexico.

Ah, yes - Juarez. It has finally become a burned out cinder - a literal, beat ghost of it's formal self. The wild and woolly heyday that I previously lived had been put on a bloody hiatus.

Before I left that morning, the Stateside news droned on about more cops being killed, pedestrians shot for no reason in the streets. One unfortunate paleta seller witnessed a gang of cartel pull up to a car on a busy street and spray all within with machine guns. When said seller pulled out his cellphone to call perhaps relatives, the gang thought he might had been calling the cops and filled him full of lead. A ver...

So, myself trudging over the International Bridge in gusty heat - wind whipped plastic trash bags that snagged on razor wire fences causing horrible noise. I dodged flabby locals and begging junkies as I eventually passed the bored and uninterested Mexican custom agent. I met my friend Eduardo waiting for me on the other side all decked out and handsome in his vaquero gear. Old friend, new him for years. He had a wife and two kids but was up for some filthy homo-buggery now and again. Never met a Mexican that wasn't.

He was glad to see me and I him - it had been far to long that we had trolled the Red Zone together. After fist bumps and howdy's, we darted over to the El Paso bar strictly from thirst. Stomping along Mariscal - the whore district - you could smell the tension mingled with rotting garbage and urine. The fact that shocked and depressed me the most that all - ALL! - the places I used to haunt are now gone. Not vacant buildings replaced by other businesses - but, vast dusty lots - even the rubble had been cleared. Fausto's, El Arbolito, Nebraska bar, Freegay, Rex's billiards, Hollywood bar - all gone. Sigh.

I gawked in beat sadness as the hookers of both sexes huddled in the shade of crumbled walls of what was once majestic and quite popular whorehouses - sorry, I mean strip joints. They all looked so sad, so lost - dusty relics with no clients strictly from fear. Even their clothes of calling - bright yellows, pinks, blues - faded in that horrid, unrelenting desert sun.

The El Paso bar is a small joint run by a fat hag with a mean streak. Never ask for credit - bitch will shank you. Long bar with red topped stools a few dented, metal tables occupied by bored-looking hookers and a mix of locals and loud Americans. Eduardo and I sat at the bar and ordered Tecates. The jukebox wailed ranchero as the sun swung around and all just sat mostly silent, sweating in the heat.

Two girls slinked up to us, both short, big tits, fat asses, thin waist (which is rare) - flirting and grinding their wares onto us - I, of course politely declined, yet Eduardo was being his macho ass self. So, under Eduardo's plea - bought the broads a drink and invited them to stay.

The two girls who sat with us were actually nice and I had to admit they were very pretty. Alma, the shorter of the two - she held copper skin and an indigenous face - Alma talked to me and was very amused when I stated that I liked men. She actually became friendlier and we hit it off. Eduardo and his girl, Clarissa - long black shiny hair and her boobs always seemed to want to bust out her blue dress - sat together, arms draped around each other. I noticed every single time her hand dropped down and squeezed Eduardo's cock. I wonder what she would say to the fact that I had sucked that fucker a few times before?

Side note: Any of you straight guys want to easily score with women? Invite a gay to come with you. We are pussy magnets. Trust me on this. You get hit on far more than usual and you don't have to worry about competition from your gay friend. Win win.

The beer flowed and Alma and I sat giggling and talking of men. She was actually really funny. I started interviewing her on her job - she related stories about some interesting men met in her career. She came from Mexico City when she was twelve and her aunt was the one that pimped her out. I love family. I related some of my crazy adventures - even pulled out a dogged copy of a novel I was working on. She shyly stated she couldn't read.

Eventually, Alma slipped a small paper in my hand and said, "It's for you, guedo." I knew what it was and leaned over to Eduardo, said into his ear, "Hey, man - this chick just handed me some coke. Follow me into the bathroom."

Nothing in this world is free, of course - I slapped a ten into Alma's hand as I slid off my stool, "Don't you go nowhere, we'll be right back."

Eduardo and I walked into the dingy, foul smelling mensroom. At the long piss trough, some old fat fucker had his dork out staring at us as we huddled in the corner. Rolled up a twenty-peso note and snorted that junk up.

We got back to the bar all twinkly-eyed and shit. Eduardo, Alma, Clarissa, and I sat and laughed and joked. Drank and got pretty happy. It was a good, drama-free time spent.

However, it was getting late and I surely did not want to be in Juarez walking back to the border at night - not in this part of town. I mentioned to Eduardo that I needed to get going.

"No wait." He said. "Come with me."

I followed Eduardo into the back of the bar and up some stairs. The short, dingy hall was lined with wooden doors. From a couple of rooms came the muffled banging of a bed and distinct moaning of a hooker making that rent.

Nice. I thought, A whorehouse.

A thin old man in a bow tie and white shirt approached us. Eduardo and he gabbed in Spanish a bit as Eduardo slapped 200 pesos into his hand. The old man took a ring of keys from his belt and ushered us to a door.

Drunkenly, we went into the room - which consisted of a ratty, sagging bed and a nightstand along with the wafting mildew smell of a million fucked vaginas. The old man took off as where as Eduardo began pealing off his clothes and lay on the bed. As he yanked his blue man-panties off, he was already hard and rarin' to go! Damn, he looked fucking good! Sprawled out on the bed fully aroused, he was nice enough to let me snap a picture of him.

Suddenly, Clarissa came in as Eduardo said, "We got some business, guedo. You want to wait outside?"

Damn! I though I was were going to get some!

Shut the door behind me and waited in the hall.

Alma approached smiling, "You're friend is busy?"

"Yeah. Lucky fucker." I said.

She put a finger up to her lips and took my hand, leading me to a small alcove. She pointed to a slit in the wall. When I looked, it was a pretty good view into Eduardo's room. I stood and watched as Eduardo tussle in pre-coital grope with the hooker he had purchased.

Alma's hand slid a small hand across the erection in my jeans. I kindly pushed her hand aside.

"You sure you don't like girls?" she whispered.

"Definitely." I smiled.

"Wait here." She smiled.

Two minutes later, she comes back with a tall, lanky guy in his midtwenties. I grinned at him, looking the boy over. Not bad.

"Have fun." She smiled and walked away.

The guy glanced through the slit in the wall, sucking air between his teeth and mumbled something in Spanish. He pointed at the hole for me to watch. I did as he squat down in front of me, unzipped my pants, and sucked my erection like his life depended on it.

I stood there watching Eduardo - a sweaty mess pumping his gorgeous cock into that whore, he thrust and lunged as she squirmed, grabbing his slender ass. She threw her feet up onto his shoulders as he banged her harder. I couldn't take both the awesome visuals and that guy sliding his lips and tongue up and down my dick - I blew my load into his mouth. He leaned over and spat the matter onto the dusty, warped, wooden floor. As I zipped up my pants, he asked in Spanish for ten dollars. I reached in my wallet and pulled out a twenty,

"Ten for you and ten for Alma, okay?"

Before leaving, he hit me up for five more. Sure, why not. Boy's gotta make rent, right?

He slinked off and I turned back to the hole - my friend was pounding fast like a rabbit, he grunted, then slid his dick out as sperm dribbled out of her pussy and spilling down, pooled onto the bed.

"Fuckin' A!" I whispered.

I walked back to the hall and lit a cigarette.

Eventually, Eduardo came out of the room, dressed but dripping from sweat, "You ready? I'll walk you back to the border."

As we were walking through the bar, we said our adios's - Alma sat at the bar smiling with her friend that blew me. She gave me a hug, while rubbing my back, asked, "When you coming back?"

"This weekend." I lied.

Eduardo and I quickly strode through those darkening, mean streets littered among piles of garbage the grasping hands of clawing hookers, dodging police patrols and rumbling paramilitary vehicles - angry brown eyes under black ski masks eyed us as the troops fingered their Ak-47's.

At the international bridge, I said my goodbye to my old friend and darted over that long stretch under a twinkling navy sky. Damn, I miss Juarez...

Things Out of the Blue

2011-04-16T17:59:00.003-04:00

I had spent the afternoon at the cafe editing my novel. Tired and hungry, I left in the late afternoon. Golden sun rays beamed all slanted and shit between the dusty, vacant spires of downtown. Trudging past a Subway restaurant, I hear behind me a baritone voice, "Hey! Joto!"

I turned to see standing with outstretched arms and Cheshire cat smile a phantom I hadn't seen in almost eleven years. A tall, lanky handsome Mexican named Tony. He stood there in well-worn jeans, jean jacket and black workboots.

Tony and I used to run amok through dark nights of drunken shit way back in the day until like most others, he had burned out with El Paso and returned to Maine to be in the arms of a girl.

After back slaps and howdies, I sat with him in the restaurant and a long string of whatever-happened-to-so-and-so's issued. He had married the girl in Maine and lived in Canada with her and their ten year old daughter. I related the best i could on the events of my life.

He stated that he still spun around the country taking high paying odd jobs and was on his way from Cali to Houston - his bus leaving at 9 tomorrow morning.

"Well, Hell" He laughed. "Let's go drink!"

"I'm up for that!"

We crossed the street and hit the Tap Bar - sat with frosty brew and dredged up all kinds of forgotten nostalgia. We both agreed how we had aged - weathered and gray. Played pool, drank, ate tacos, drank, all night digging our minds into crazy past nights of forgotten memories. Pitcher after pitcher - we got fucked up.

Eventually, the bar had to close and inviting himself - Tony and I drunkenly stumbled back to my flat. After casual conversation and a bit of joking, wearily we both stripped to our boxers and crawled into my bed. For the next hour we banged around - sucked and fucked each other until we passed out covered in each others semen and saliva.

Next morning, I made pancakes and walked Tony to the busline. He said before I left for wherever when my TEFL classes are done and when he had finished the job in Houston - he wants to return and us both hightail it a few days to Vegas.

I'm looking forward to it.

Road Meat.

2011-04-15T04:48:00.001-04:00

2011-04-14T04:44:00.001-04:00

How many cigarettes does it take to wait? How many cups of coffee? Paul sat in the dead-end diner with napkin firmly under coffee cup - he was told in that style, you can tell when someone was waiting - watching nothing out of the big, dust streaked pane window.

Outside, it was cold and colorless. Gritty wind whipped eddies of trash down a lonely street. A long cry from the sunny, warm surf crashing against the beach that he was anxiously anticipating to see. Here the sky was a harsh, cold blue - though dazzling bright, gave no warmth - only a bitter cold, you could feel it in your marrow.

Paul sipped more coffee, took another drag.

Across the street, a bum, the same colorless shade of everything else, stood in front of the Roman Deco post office hitting passerby for change. Paul looked around the café - a cavernous room and only he occupied it. Every sound was amplified.

El Paso is a dead, nowhere town.

The Creep

2011-04-10T02:55:00.004-04:00

Let's boogie!

Scam them before they scam you.

2011-04-09T16:37:00.003-04:00

This just in - I was notified by several teacher acquaintances around the globe that attaining a fake degree in something is a cheap and quick way of jumping these Kafkian hoops of needing said document to get a worthwhile job overseas. Hmmm. I don't know. Last thing I need is to be stuck in some foreign village and their Thought Police show up and boot me out of the country for false documents.

Opposed to popular opinion - I do have a conscience.

Anything Goes.

2011-04-09T15:11:00.002-04:00

I had recently been in contact with a gentleman in China on starting my teaching career there. At first, from the brief comments I had read on websites - you not only need a university degree, but also your TEFL certificates. In Latin America - they seem a bit more lenient.

This is starting to not be the case.

The gentleman that I am in contact with runs an agency in mainland China that will not only help you settle in - i.e. apartment, living expenses, visas - but, most importantly he has contacts of a shitload of schools that require only that you speak English and have the gumption to teach. I got that and soon to have four certificates from a world renown TEFL school.

I think China and/or the Orient is quite rather tasty at the moment.

Received my rough proof of Dark is the Night. I must say - without bordering flagrant ego - that is my best work, yet! I am juggling with the online classes and editing this book. I am planning to leave and have the book available online by August.

Life is weird.

Ya.

2011-04-03T04:12:00.002-04:00

2:13 on a Saturday night. Dark winds howl dust and debris outside my window. I sit in my favorite chair - overstuffed espresso colored lounger - in the darkness of my apartment lit only by the crimson of my cigarette tip - watching the green velvet curtains breathe. A long streak of white crosses the dusty mosaic tiled floor from a baneful moon shut on and off by the undulating curtain.

I sit and I smoke and I think. I feel so empty. So emotionless. So lost.

I seriously need a change in lifestyle.

Times a Changin'

2011-04-02T16:36:00.008-04:00

I have set the gears in motion. I am halfway done with my TEFL course and have begun to sell the furniture that I had accumulated over the year. In a few weeks I will have my certificates and I plan to be in South America by August. During that time, I will need to acquire all the necessary paperwork - visas, permits, vaccinations - for my relocation.

I may start in Ecuador to get teaching hours under my belt, explore the country then off to Peru and Colombia. If I was to settle anywhere, Costa Rica is high on my list. I guess I will just have to see where the winds if fate blow me.

I can't wait.

On the writing front, I had just ordered a rough copy of Dark is the Night. 436 pages. And there will be more. It is my swan song of American decadence, my final say on the broken shambles of the American Dream told in the usual raw, peeled way. And, it is my first largely heterosexual work. Only one chapter is puto queer - so, you can buy a copy for grandma without her getting her panties all in an uproar. I really like this book. I look forward to writing more about my travels across the globe.

Under God.

2011-03-28T12:17:00.005-04:00

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

I remember when we would recite this in class everyday.

Of course it is illegal to say this in schools now on account it may offend students from other countries. How fucked up is that? On every level?

On a similar note and because of - my classes in TEFL are going smooth. I am going to wait until I get my certificate to choose where I am going. At the moment it is either Colombia or Costa Rica. See how the mind of a bipolar bear operates? hehe

I ran into an old friend on the street yesterday. He being Mike McCabe. It has been five or six years since we had last spoke. As a matter of fact, it is the same Mike McCabe - a heterosexual who was one of the type that would crudely go on about his escapades with females - calls me up one night and invites me to his home in lieu of beer and chat but wounded up seducing me. Wacky.

Well, he is married now and staying at the Hotel De Soto across the street from the cafe that I haunt. The De Soto is a notorious flea bag known for it's seedy clientele and rampant drug busts. It was good to see him again, never the less.

Yesterday about five in the afternoon, I was sitting in the Plaza in downtown El Paso. Sunday afternoon. Long, lonely times, I tell you - streets devoid of all life, quiet as a tomb, the sun setting behind buildings casting long yellow rays between the dark shadows. I sat and I thought and thought some more as I had many, many times before...it's time to split.

44.

2011-03-25T17:31:00.003-04:00

Happy birthday to me. I turn 44 today. And, I still feel like I am 30. Neat, huh? I sit here and think about the past decade - hell, the past 20 years for that matter and what a wild, crazy blast it had been. No regrets, actually. Why should I? I had done things and traveled to places most if not all my friends dream of doing. And the best part is, I came out unscathed. Ok, a little on the eccentric side - but, still kicking.

And it will continue. I am half done with my TESL class and as soon as I recieve my certificate, I will start making plans of which South American country to relocate too. Colombia sounds great - both seedy and furtive, Ecuador is high on the list, or I may give Costa Rica a whirl. Once I have a year under my belt teaching English - the world is virtually my oyster!

Avanti, bitches!

Fried Chittlins

2011-03-21T18:49:00.011-04:00

I originally was going to end the book with a chapter about mental health. However, this damn book is writing itself - or so it seems. When I sat down at the cafe to write - this vomited out. I guess I am ending the book on a note concerning child abuse. It is very raw - I spewed this out in just under an hour. Yeah - they'll be more.

Fried Chittlins
an excerpt from Dark is the Night
rough draft

“GET UP! IT’S TIME TO GET UP FER SKEWL! GET UP! AWWW, GAWDDAMIT! YOU WENT AND DONE PISSED THE BED AGAIN! GAWDAMMIT!”
Eric opened his eyes - groggy and slowly from a night filled with lucid nightmares. He dreamt of being chased through a dark mansion by the Cyclops from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad. The Cyclops would smash through each door he attempted to close and lock, striking at him with a leather whip.
Half awake, Eric laid on his stomach wearing nothing but his white briefs. From his knees to his upper chest was cold from the large wet spot that he had made during the course of the night.
He looked guiltily and with fear at the short, plump woman that stood in the doorway to his bedroom. “I’m sorry momma. I’m sorry.”
“GAWDDAMIT! GET INTO THE BATHROOM AND CLEAN YERSELF! HURRY BEFORE YER DADDY FINDS OUT AND BEATS YER LITTLE ASS! GAWDAMMIT, I SWEAR!”
As he rapidly jumped up and passed his mother, she smacked him on the back of the head.
“YOU LITTLE SHIT! YOU STINK LIKE PISS! I’LL HAFTA WASH YER SHEETS AGAIN! WHY?! WHY DO YOU DO THIS EVERY NIGHT? YOU RETARDED OR SOMETHING?”
Eric hurriedly dashed to the bathroom, glancing down the short hall to his parents door. He heard him - his father was awake, getting dressed. Eric shut the bathroom door behind him, pulled the wet shorts off and began running the water. He quickly washed his torso in the warm water with a red rag, the soap covering his small frame. His mother opened the door and placed some clean shorts on the sink’s rim.
“HURRY UP! BREAKFAST IS ALMOST READY! JUST DON’T STAND THERE! HURRY UP! GAWDAMMIT, YOU CAN BE SO DAMN STUPID SOMETIMES, YOU HEAR?”
She turned and waddled out. Eric shut the water off, stepped out of the tub, and began drying himself with a towel hanging from a nearby rack.
“WHERE’S THE BOY?!” It was his father. He stood outside the door, obviously bumping into his mother coming out into the hall.
“AWW, HE’S TAKING A BATH. HE PISSED HIMSELF AGAIN!” The mother said condescendingly.
The bathroom door swung open as Eric was putting his right leg through the opening of his briefs. He froze.
“YOU PISSIN YERSELF AGAIN? YOU LITTLE SISSY, PISSIN YERSELF? I SHOULD PUSH YOUR DAMN FACE IN IT LIKE A DAMN DOG MAYBE THAT WILL STOP YOU FROM PISSIN YERSELF EVERYNIGHT!”
Eric simply stood there not saying a word, staring at the matted bath rug on the warped, tiled floor. His father slammed the door behind him.
“WHY DONCHA LEAVE HIM ALONE? YOU’RE GONNA MAKE HIM LATE FOR SCHOOL!”
“THAT’S HIS DAMN PROBLEM! YOU BABY THE LITTLE SHIT TOO MUCH! YOU LET THESE DAMN KIDS DO WHATEVER THEY DAMN WANT! HE PISSES THAT BED AGAIN, I’LL BEAT HIS LITTLE ASS!”
“AWW WHY DON’T YOU SHUT UP! YER ALWAYS YELLING ABOUT THESE KIDS! WHY DON’T YOU JUST LEAVE IF YOU DON’T LIKE EM!”
“DON’T TELL ME TO SHUT UP! YOU SHUT UP! I’LL BEAT YER ASS, TOO! YOU CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT ME, DUMMY! I MAKE THE MONEY IN THIS HOUSE! YOU’LL DO WHAT I TELL YOU! ALL OF YOU!”
“LET GO OF MY ARM, YOU BASTAWD! LET GO! GET YER STUPID ASS TO THE TABLE AND EAT YER BREAKFAST AND LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE!”
“STUPID WOMAN! HURRY UP WITH THAT LITTLE SHIT OR I’LL BE LATE FOR WORK!”
“WHY DON’T YOU SHUT YER MOUTH! ALWAYS YELLIN! JUST SHUT UP AND GO SIT DOWN! GO GET SOME COFFEE - THAT’S READY!”
“YOU BEST SHUT YER GAWDAMN MOUTH, WOMAN!”
Eric stood there as the bathroom door swung open and his mother stood there, face flustered and sweating, holding his clothes for the day. She knelt down and roughly grabbed his legs, shoving them into each pant leg, yanking a shirt over his head and pulling it down, with jerking shoves, slipped on his socks.
“CAN YA TIE YER OWN SHOES AT LEAST OR AM I GONNA HAFTA DO THEM TOO? I GOTTA GET BREAKFAST!”
Eric bent over to pick up the two small red and blue sneakers, “I can tie my own shoes, momma.”
Eric sat on the closed toilet lid and slipped into his shoes as his mother waddled out.
At the door of the bathroom, a thin scowling face peered around the corner. Large green eyes under a mass of fluffy brown hair that cascaded down over shoulders stared at him with contempt, “Are you done yet? I gotta pee.”
It was his middle sister Tammy. Just one year in High School and she already had the reputation of being a slut. Eric overheard her once in the backyard bragging to her friends at the black boys in the neighborhood who she frequently banged.
Eric finished tieing his shoes and walked out, “All yours.”
He made his way into the dining room. His father already was sitting there with his oldest sister, Cindy. The two sisters were from a previous marriage and looked exactly like their mother. Small eyes, pug nose, and an unattractive thick body of German decent. His sister Cindy had always been the fattest.
“DIDJA BRUSH YER TEETH YET?” His father looked right at him.
Eric crossed behind him and took his usual place in the chair against the wall. “No.”
“WHY THE HELL NOT?”
“I haven’t eaten, yet.”
Eric thought there was never a point in brushing your teeth right before you ate breakfast. He thought it just defeated the purpose.
“DO YOU WIPE YER ASS AFTER YOU TAKE A SHIT? YA JUST GONNA SHIT AGAIN, RIGHT? SO, WHY BOTHER?”
Eric shot his father a look of contempt but was met with an open palm across the cheek.
“DONCHA LOOK AT ME LIKE THAT! GET YER ASS BACK IN THAT BATHROOM AND BRUSH YER TEETH!”
With the stinging still strong on his face, Eric meekly slid off his chair and returned sullenly to the bathroom. He grabbed his toothbrush, added paste and languidly began stroking it across his teeth.
“WHATYA HIT HIM FOR? HE’S GOTTA EAT BEFORE HE GOES TO SCHOOL! LEAVE EM THE HELL ALONE! YER GONNA MAKE HIM BE LATE!”
“SHUT UP! GIMMEE MY BREAKFAST BEFORE I’M LATE FER WORK!”
“WHY’D YA HIT EM FOR? HE COULDA BRUSHED AFTER! HE’S GONNA BE LATE!”
Eric heard his mother slamming dishes down onto the table.
“Eric GET IN HERE BEFORE YOUR BREAKFAST GETS COLD!”
As Eric swished water in his mouth and spat into the sink, he heard his father slide his chair out from beneath the table. Eric wiped his mouth across the table and darted out of the bathroom. His father blocked his way to the dining room.
“DID YA BRUSH EM? DID YA BRUSH EM GOOD?”
“Yes.” Eric said looking at the floor, trying to pass him to hurry and get back to the dinner table.
“LET ME SEE EM!”
His father grabbed him roughly by his slender arm. Eric opened his mouth and grit his teeth at him.
“GET YER GODDAMN ASS BACK IN THERE AND BRUSH EM AGAIN! THEY’RE FITHY!” He ended the sentence with a whack across the boy’s head.
Eric turned back the bathroom, whined, “But, I did brush them, daddy.”
The father lifted his foot and planted it roughly into the boy’s lower back that sent Eric sprawling onto the hallway floor.
“DON’T LIE TO ME! GET IN THERE AND BRUSH THEM TEETH! I’M GONNA STAND HERE AND MAKE SURE YOU BRUSH THEM, TOO! AND I DON‘T WANNA HALF ASSED JOB!”
“WHY DONCHA LEAVE HIM ALONE! HE’S GONNA BE LATE FOR SKEWL!!”
“SHADDAP AND GET BACK TO THE KITCHEN! HE’S NOT EATING ANYTHING UNTIL HE BRUSHES HIS TEETH!”
“YOU ASSHOLE! LEAVE EM ALONE! GO EAT YOUR FOOD BEFORE IT GETS COLD!”
Again, Eric grabbed the toothbrush and between sobs applied the paste and started brushing his teeth.
“DO IT HARDER! BRUSH EM GOOD!”
“COME EAT YOUR BREAKFAST BEFORE IT GETS COLD! LEAVE THAT BOY ALONE!”
Eric kept brushing until his gums started to bleed.
“NOW RINSE AND GET YER ASS OVER THERE AND EAT YER BREAKFAST!”
Still sobbing, Eric sat quietly at the table as his mother plopped a plate of greasy eggs and limp toast down in front of him. His father devoured his meal. Between gulps, his father began belching - foul wafts of halitosis and egg drifted across the table. Between words, he would drop open his mouth and let a guttural croaking burp without covering his mouth.
“WHEN YOU ALL GET HOME FROM SCHOOL, (belch) I WANT YOU TO RAKE THE LEAVES IN THE (belch) FRONT YARD. I WANT IT DONE BEFORE I GET HOME, GOT IT? DON’T STOP (belch) TO PLAY WITH YER FRIENDS OR WATCH CARTOONS OR I’LL WHIP YOUR ASS!” (belch)
Cindy looked up from her food, “I got band practice. I’ll be late.”
The father turned to Tammy who sat next to her mother, “YOU? YOU GOT ANY STUPID DUMB ASS EXCUSES?”
“Nope.” She said snidely. “I’ll do it as soon as I get home. But, I can’t spend all day, I have to meet someone at six.”
“HANGIN AROUND WITH THEM (belch) NIGGER BOYS NOT AN EXCUSE!”
“SHUT UP! LEAVE HER ALONE! SHE NEEDS TO HAVE FRIENDS.”
“I DON’T WANT YOU HANGING AROUND WITH (belch) NO GODDAMN NIGGERS!”
Tammy looked at him defiantly, “You’re not my father - you have no right to tell me what I can or can not do.”
(Long belch.)
The mother poured Eric another glass of milk, “YOU GO ON AHEAD, Tammy. DON’T BOTHER WHEN YOU COME HOME TODAY. Eric IS CAPABLE OF RAKING ON HIS OWN.”
“I WORK! I’M THE ONE PUTTING FOOD IN YOUR GODDAMN (belch) MOUTH, YOUNG LADY! AS LONG AS YOU LIVE HERE, YOU DO AS I SAY!” (belch)
No one said nothing. It was quiet for the moment except for the occasional burp. Eric slid off his chair and went into his room. He glanced at the stripped bed with the large yellowed stain in the middle of the flower printed mattress. The entire room smelled of stale urine. He grabbed his little backpack and threw it across his shoulder.
“OH, THAT’S RIGHT! IT’S REPORT CARD DAY TODAY, AIN’T IT? I WANT TO SEE THAT AS SOON AS I COME HOME! THERE BETTER NOT BE ANY BAD GRADES OR YER BUTTS GONNA GET IT!”
“AWW, LEAVE EM ALONE! Eric, HURRY UP YER GONNA BE LATE.”
“YER TOO EASY ON THE LITTLE SISSY! I WANT THEM LEAVES RAKED, GOT IT! AND DON’T DO NO HALF ASSED JOB! I WANT IT ALL DONE BY TIME I GET HOME!”
Eric walked through the living room and glanced at the four still sitting at the table. His mother pointed a fork casually at his father.
“DON’T BE SUCH AN ASSHOLE TO HIM! YOU’RE ALWAYS SHOOTING OFF YER MOUTH! WHY DONCHA SHUT UP FER ONCE? NOBODY WANTS TO HEAR THAT SHIT THIS EARLY IN THE MORNING!”
“DON’T TELL ME TO SHUT UP, GAWDAMMIT! YOU SHUT YER FUKKIN UGLY MOUTH! ALWAYS RUNNING IT! DRIVING ME CRAZY!”
“I WISH I COULD DRIVE YOU CRAZY - THEN THEY’D COME AND TAKE YER WORTHLESS ASS AWAY FROM ME! AND DON‘T SAY THAT DAMN WORD IN FRONTA THE KIDS!”
“AH, SHUT UP, GAWDAMMIT! YOU COULDN’T LAST ONE GAWDAM DAY WITH OUT ME!”
His mother snidely chuckled, shoving her pinkie up her pug nose and fished abundantly for the offending matter. She yanked out a glob, looked at it and wiped the greenish gray snot onto her gown.
His father leaned in close to her, puckering up, “SHUT UP AND GIMME A KISS, YOU OLD HAG! YOU KNOW YOU LOVE ME!”
She leaned over and pecked her chapped, thin lips against his greasy thick ones, “YEAH, YEAH! YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT LOVE IS.”
A disgusting, lascivious look came across his face as his eyes scanned across the three children, “ALL YA’LL GET YER ASSES TO SCHOOL! GET THE HELL OUT! I GOTTA TALK TO YOUR MA!”
Both started to chortle and grunt like herniated, amused hogs.
Eric walked out the door into the pre-dawn darkness. It was still cold. Cutting across the front yard, he made his way onto the road and walked the half mile to his grade school.
Halfway there, he stopped. On the far corner were two older black boys that attended his school. They stood there watching as Eric approached. The taller one smiled.
“Hey, boy! Where’s ya sista?”
“What?”
“That sista of yawls. My brotha told me he done tapped that shit last Saturday.”
They both started cackling.
“Shut up! He did not!”
“Hell he didn’t! My brotha said he was all up in dat shit! Had her screaming an moanin so loud the neighbors threatened to call da police!”
Eric started walking faster past them. “Yer crazy! She didn’t do nothing!”
Eric felt a sharp pain in his upper back. Then another on his back thigh. A small rock whizzed past his head and bounced loudly down the asphalt of the street. He looked back and saw the two boys picking up gravel and hurtling chunks at him. He began running.
‘Yo sista’s a ho! Yo sista’s a ho!” Echoed down the lane as the sun began peeking above the misty dawn.
Huffing and a few blocks later, Eric slowed down and continued his walk towards school. A lanky red headed boy walked up next to him. It was his friend Albert.
“Hey, Albert!” Eric chirped.
“Hey, buddy! How’s things?”
“Same. You?”
“Same.”
They walked quietly for a moment. They crossed the busy intersection a block from school. Albert darted into a convenience store and bought a soda. Popping the can, he took a swig and then handed it to Eric.

To be continued...

It's Going to Cost You

2011-03-20T04:19:00.007-04:00

"Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self." - Cyril Connolly

It's Going To Cost You

an excert from Dark is the Night

rough draft

“My name’s Johnny. Ask anyone. They’ll tell you.” Johnny smiled at the bloated American.

Johnny slithered closer to the tourist, twisting seductively on the bar stool. In his mind, Johnny was recoiling in disgust. The old, white haired man smelled of acrid sweat and cheap aftershave. Beads of sweat formed on his ruddy, glistening face. His large, bulbous gut hung over the ample waist, khaki cargo pants tight to the point of bursting like a can of biscuits. Thinning, silver hair combed over a red, pumpkinish head.

Johnny placed a slender, brown hand onto the tourist’s green polo shirt, slowly gliding over his ample, sweating moobs.

“So, what brings you to Tijuana?” Johnny smiled, grabbing the cold beer placed onto the counter by the hostile looking lesbian tending the bar. Johnny took a sip, coyly returned to the tourist.

“Just visiting. Looking for some fun, you know?” The tourist slurred.

Johnny saw that he was already inebriated and decided to take full advantage of the situation.

The tourist belched - the immediate air wafted of stale tacos and salsa.

Johnny kept up the smile, scooching his barstool closer. “Well, I can find all kinds of fun for you baby - anything you want.”

He slid his hand across the folds of fat on the tourists neck, felt the stubble of a new cut, read the moles like Braille.

The tourist grinned, looking Johnny over. His thin, tall frame. The tank top that accentuated wiry muscles, the dark jeans that fit long legs. The tussle of jet black, wavy hair, the pencil-thin mustache over thick lips that he guessed must have sucked a million cocks. It was his eyes that the tourist liked - large amber eyes nestled in thick eyelashes, those fat, black eyebrows. Johnny was very handsome and couldn’t be more than twenty-two years old.

Johnny continued his slithering massage of the tourists anatomy. “I know of a cheap place around the corner where we can have all sorts of fun.” he ended fun with a slight brush of his crotch, wherein the tourist noticed the stiffening of Johnny’s long organ.

“Whoa.” The tourist chuckled. “You’re definitely hot. So forward.”

“It’s all for you, baby.” Johnny breathed.

The tourists face went blank as a poker dealers - gazed out into the bar. “How much you want?”

Johnny put on his little hurt boy look, “Oh, don’t say it like that, baby. I’m not a whore. I just want to spend time with you. I really like you.”

The fact was, the obese, squat American made Johnny sick.

The tourist turned more red, the lights beaming off his ample forehead. He sputtered, lifting his beer to his fat lips, “Oh…oh, I didn’t mean it like that. I think you are hot. So, adorable. So, beautiful. I meant, I want to be with you, too.”

“I know.” Johnny said, continuing the rub down. “Let’s go get a room, baby. I want to show you how much I like you.”

The two walked out of the bar into the warm night and around the corner to a hotel that you reached climbing a set of worn, wooden stairs. Hotel Independencia glowed from a dusty lit, plastic marquee.

The tourist took out his wallet to pay an old man behind a metal grate. Johnny got a glimpse of the contents of the wallet - bulging with twenty dollar bills. The old man gave the tourist a key attached to a huge plastic pad.

“Checkout is at eleven o’clock manana.” The receptionist said in broken English.

Johnny led the tourist down a dank hall and opened the door. The room was small and dingy. The sagging bed took up most of it. There was a dresser and a chair.

“Hold up, I gotta take a piss.” The tourist slurred and entered the filthy bathroom. Johnny heard him take a long, loud piss.

Johnny sat on the chair and looked around the room. The tourist returned and sat on the bed.

In one lithe movement, Johnny stood up and pulled down his jeans and white and blue striped briefs. His long, uncircumcised penis swung free. He sat back in the chair.

“You like this?” Johnny asked coyly as he stroked his stiffening organ.

The old tourist blubbered, “Oh, baby - you got a nice dick.”

Johnny laughed, “What’s so nice about it?” Johnny spat, a little too curt.

The tourist fumbled uncomfortably, he didn’t expect that remark. He just sat there, staring at the eight inches of erection being waved in his direction. The smooth shaft, the glistening mushroom tip. Johnny seductively worked the foreskin back and forth over the head, devishly looking up at the tourist who wheezed in mounting excitement.

“I’m so hot.” Johnny sighed. “Why don’t you come over here and do something about it?”

The tourist stared at the undulating erection - hypnotized over it, as Johnny smoothly swayed it back and forth.

Like a fat kid in a candy store, the tourist dropped to his knees in front of Johnny and gobbled his hard on. Loud sucking noises as the tourist sucked and slurped up and down his cock. Though Johnny had his legs spread wide open, he could still feel the tourist obscene stomach rubbing against both his inner thighs.

God, please hurry up and cum, Johnny thought, I need to get the fuck away from this gross gringo.

Johnny reputedly held the back of the tourist greasy head as finally in a matter of short, merciful minutes, Johnny felt the surge of an orgasm and squirt his semen into the tourists mouth. The fat, old man leaned over and spat the matter onto the wooden floor.

Gasping, the tourist looked up to Johnny and breathed, “Oh, baby - that was good.”

“It was hot, baby.” Johnny said coldly, pulling up and fastening his pants.

As the tourist stood up, Johnny stood too and blurted, “Hey, you think you can help me with twenty dollars? I need to pay my electric bill and I am low on money this week.”

“Don’t you work?” The tourist asked, snidely.

“Yes. But, they don’t pay much and I just paid rent.” Johnny stood firmly.

The tourist reached and pulled out his wallet, placing a twenty dollar bill in Johnny’s thin hand.

“Can I have twenty more? I have no food.” Johnny smiled that smile.

The tourist exasperated. Faltered putting his wallet away. Johnny saw the glint of fear and distrust of being in a bad part of town, the uncertainty of being in a foreign locale in the eyes of the tourist.

Johnny glared with just the right amount of sexiness and intimidation, “Please?”

“Oh, all right. But, that’s it! I have to get back to the States tomorrow and I can’t spare anymore.” Said the tourist, placing another twenty in Johnny’s hand and then quickly slipping his wallet into his back pocket.

Johnny made for the door, stopped, “You sleeping here tonight?” He pointed abstractly around the squalid room.

Fear was now in the sobering eyes of the tourist, “No. No, I have a room somewhere else. I’m going there, now.”

“All right. I’ll walk you out.”

Once downstairs, they separated on the corner with a handshake. The tourist wobbled to the safety of a taxi as Johnny returned to the shadows of the corner. Several thugs stood in a knot.

A squat, frog faced Mexican stood in white athletic gear and smiled as Johnny approached, “What’s up, Johnny?”

Johnny’s gaze swept up and down the sidewalk, "Nothing, man. Gimme a paper.”

The frog faced Mexican slapped a small, folded paper into Johnny’s hand and Johnny placed a twenty into his.

With that, Johnny returned to the bar and made a direct line to the bathroom. In a stall, he cut three lines of meth out onto the toilet dispenser and snorted it up.

Feeling it, he returned to the bar and stood next to an ancient and tall American tourist. Johnny ordered a beer for himself.

Johnny took a swig and smiled at the old relic. “Hi!”

The old man raised his bottle, clinking it with Johnny’s. “Hello, there. What’s your name?”

“My names Johnny. Ask anyone. They’ll tell you.” Johnny smiled.

Moving Without Moving

2011-03-14T14:27:00.002-04:00

And so...
The novel is chugging along - ideas and prose blasting out of my mind like projectile vomit. I hope this one is the one. Haha! The one what? Even if I did obtain a small fraction of literary fame with these little beasts, I am sure I would treat it the same way that I treat everything else in my life - with a shrug and a 'whatever'. Though, for certain a life changing event.
Speaking of life changing events. I turn 44 this month. far to young - in my bloodshot eye - for retirement. You see, when I received my latest apartment - I had never mentioned strictly from embarrassment - that they stuck me in a retirement center. It's a nice, big apartment - very quiet. I am the youngest in that building and I swear to Gawd that the row of shriveled witches that bask in the sun out front, eye me and lick withered, chapped lips as I pass. Chirping 'buenas dias', fanning their bird legs or mammoth pasty thighs in unbridled lust as I walk past out of the building.
Shit. Where was I? Oh yeah - anyways, I have still far too much vigor and life left in this borrowed flesh to settle down. Attaining SSI has given me a great four year vacation - but, man - I am itching to do crazy shit as in travel and adventure!
So, over the year - several friends across the globe had invited and tempted me with the idea of teaching English abroad and using that position to travel the world. I was directed towards this online school - http://www.teach-english-jobs.com/ - and after doing extensive research, I have decided to take the 120hour course and hopefully to be in Thailand by this fall.

Why not?

One of the offers that enticed me was that after completion and attaining your certificate, they offer an internship in Thailand to get the noob up to speed on teaching in front of a class - pay is good and rent is paid by the school.

Actually, I can do this - I have taught in the past. I love being in front of a group and I am perky as all hell. So, I will be a far cry from the nasally droning teachers I had to sit through...

I think I will do this - what do I have to lose?

Write, right?

2011-03-12T17:12:00.003-05:00

"A pathological business, writing, don't you think? Just look what a writer actually does: all that unnatural tense squatting and hunching, all those rituals: pathological!"
- Hans Magnus Enzensberger

I have been sitting at this cafe on a bright, warm Saturday afternoon writing maddening, depressing prose about the homeless in painful detail. It really is putting me in a funk. I really should be out with my friends drinking and enjoying this day - but, Burroughs once said to his son in a letter that the life of a writer is a solitary one. He sure wasn't talkin' shit, man.

I figure that the rough draft will be ready by mid-summer. Then the fun part: editing. God, how I loathe that part.

You at first love your work, right - but after the fiftieth time reading and re-reading starts to really wane your enthusiasm.

But, it is the profession that chose me - so, I'll just go with the flow...

Dust on the Window.

2011-03-10T15:36:00.002-05:00

Ugh!! I am sitting here at the Percolator Cafe in downtown El Paso - a swanky haunt for artists and writers and high brow fags - I come here almost everyday to write.
However, today they have this goddamn hippy singing live with a guitar on a P.A. system WAY too loud. And the hairy troll knows it is too loud, because when I arrived, he bleated nasally, "Sorry if the sounds a bit too loud, folks - still trying to work the bugs out of the sound system."
ASSHOLE! You realize it's too loud - turn that moaning, tree hugging shit down some! No need to force your groovy moaning into our psyche!
Well, the plus side is - only twenty minutes more of this tripe and I can concentrate on the novel at hand.
I have started the "homeless" section - the tale of loneliness and frustration of trying to attain a place to stay when one has hit rock bottom.

Have you ever hit rock bottom? And I mean rock bottom - when you lost everything you had and all friends had turned their back on you. Rock bottom. Nothing. I have and only then are you able to live to your full potential.

Dark is the Night.

2011-03-09T15:43:00.003-05:00

Hi!

I realize it has been awhile and I realize even more that i have neglected this blog. Over the past year, things have actually been pretty positive! I have a great apartment, a partner to share my time with, and my books have been actually selling!
Since I am not mired in an existence of homeless hobosexuality, I kind of stopped writing here and have been focusing my time writing a new novel.
It is called Dark is the Night - and it is an anthology of five lost angels that i had known during my travels. I am really excited about it - it will be my first work not written in the first person and based on different characters living in the gutters of the world. What else is new, right? haha! Each chapter will focus on it's own theme of alcoholism, homosexuality, porn addiction, drugs, and mental health.
I had just finished the rough draft of one of the chapters - the alcoholic one - and, being an early draft, I realize it needs work, but you will get the gist.
This blog - since I don't do that craziness as of date, will focus on my writing and domestic lifestyle here in El Paso!

Delores lay there panting, looking up at Gabriel as he sweated and puffed. The futon boinged and clanged with his rutting. She slid her hand across his slick back as he grunted to some sort of an orgasm.
He rolled off of her and closed his eyes, sighed. She reached over to her purse on the floor and grabbed a box of cigarettes. The dark room smelled of dank clothes, sweat, and unwashed vagina.
She lit the cigarette, took a puff, said, “You’re going to be late.”
“Gimme a minute.” He croaked.
Gabriel sat up. He took the can of warm beer sitting next to the bed on the floor and took a long swing. Pain shot up his back as he watched the morning sun beam through the broken slats of the blinds - dust danced in the light.
He felt her hand stroke his back.
She said, “You still hurtin’?”
He turned to her, saw the dark circles under the glittering eyes, the deep lines, the large cold sore on the right top of her lip. He turned back away and took another gulp.
“You going to be here when I get back?” He asked.
“Of course, baby.” She stretched. “I’ll make us some soup for dinner.”
Gabriel got up and readied for work. In the shower, the pain in his back was almost unbearable - almost as unbearable as the act he just committed. He thought about telling her to leave. He wanted to be alone and that was an impossibility since she never left the house. As he brushed his teeth, he looked at the haggard image that glared back at him from the dirty mirror.
They had been fighting a lot recently - over stupid shit. She whined and complained about being bored, his drinking, his friends, never having money. He would sit silently holding his beer and listen, watched as she paced back and forth on the dirty, wooden floor in gray, bare feet and go on about the things he could not provide.
When he would start yelling and spittle would fly from his intoxicated mouth, she would calm down and coo and act coy as if she was in complete agreement. It made him even more angry, because she was right - he couldn’t give her those things.
The argument last night started first about her gorging on all the food that was bought and more often than not, leaving him nothing but the can goods to eat. When he tried to explain on ways to balance the budget - she would go in a tirade about how much they needed a television or a microwave. She then made the mistake of comparing him to her old boyfriend in California - on how he had a nice house, huge television, car, money. Gabriel had enough - on the verge of punching her senseless, he grabbed his beer and marched out the door into the cool night.
When he returned hours later from walking aimlessly among the empty warehouses and train tracks, he found her curled up under a blanket snoring softly. That morning, he woke with a raging hard on and took advantage of the rare occasion.
He dressed and grabbed his coat.
In the living room, Delores lay quietly on her back, blowing gray smoke up to the peeled ceiling. Gabriel stood in the half light.
“I want to talk to you when I get home, okay?” He said.
She didn’t look at him, took another long drag, “Ok.”
He unlocked the front door and stepped out into the searing, bright morning sun.
As he walked the two blocks to work, each step was an ordeal. The pain shot up the back of his right leg and throbbed unbearably. Gabriel took it slow. Stopped once to hold himself up at a tattered telephone pole. He could smell the waft of freshly baked bread from the factory. The smell made him sick. He gazed over at the row of warehouses and smoke stacks of his job with both resentment and desperate loathing.
Taking a deep sigh, he continued the last block, clocked in and looked for the shift supervisor.
“Diaz!” Shrilled a voice behind him. “Can’t have you coming in late all the time, Diaz!”
Gabriel turned to see a tall woman standing with a clipboard. A large, pear-shaped frame clothed in tight khaki slacks and pin-striped, blue dress shirt. Her blond hair was pulled back in a tight pony-tail and she held a permanent scowl on a smooth, Aryan face. It was the shift manager Erika. She stood still, glaring at him. He shrank under that cold, inhumane gaze.
“Sorry, Erika.” Gabriel mumbled. He shuffled sheeply over to her stoic form. “My back’s been bothering me. I think I need a doctor.”
“I don’t give a damn about your back, Diaz.” She hissed. “You’re fifteen minutes late. That’s the third time this week.”
He mumbled down to the smooth pavement floor. “Yeah…”
Her face scrunched up as hatred poured from her eyes, “You been drinking? You drunk now? Motherfucker! I should let you go. I don’t need another fucking drunk working here.”
He shot his gaze up to her, “No. No, that’s the mouthwash I used this morning.”
“Mouthwash, my ass! Go unload that truck, dumbass, and you’re late one more time and I’m letting you go, got it?”
He turned quietly and marched over to the delivery truck that was backed up to the loading dock. Already, Gonzalo and Carlos were there rolling the racks of packaged bread from the ovens towards the truck.
“Oye! Chief!” Gonzalo blurted to Gabriel.
The short, fat Mexican murmured something to Carlos and they both burst out laughing. Carlos rubbed his potbelly and said something else in Spanish, indicating Gabriel and they guffawed and cackled.
“What’s so fucking funny?” Gabriel sneered. “I don’t speak no Spanish.”
“Why you no speeky the Spanish, Indio?” Carlos asked. “You Mexican, no?”
“Just my mom, you fucker. I told you that.” Gabriel shot back as he grabbed the first tray of warm bread and began loading it onto the truck. “We don’t need to speak no Spanish in Chicago.”
“You now in El Paso, Chief - you speakee Spanish!” Gonzalo roared and both the Mexicans hollered in laughter as they began to load the truck.
Pain shot up Gabriel’s back as he yanked another tray off of the cart, “Fuck that shit! Last I checked, this is America and we speak English!”
Gonzalo roared over the factory noise, “No, cabrone - we takin’ our shit back!”
He said a long stream of Spanish to Carlos - gesticulating wildly - and they continued laughing. Gabriel had enough of this shit and shuffled away. He walked over to the men’s room.
Opening the door, he saw a shriveled old black man sitting on an iron chair in the corner. Gray poufs of hair shot out from under a dirty cap, scraggly beard covered chocolate wrinkly skin. The old man made no attempt to hide the tall boy wrapped in a brown paper bag.
“Hey, Curtis.” Gabriel said.
“Hello, young man.” Curtis said with a glint of paranoia in his eyes. He just held the beer can up to Gabriel. “Wanna taste?”
Gabriel grabbed the can, took a gulp, “You’re a good man, Curtis.”
“We gotta stay sane in a shitty world.” He smiled a row of stained dentures. “That do it for ya?”
Gabriel felt the warmth from his belly, the lift coming up. “Yeah, man, thanks.” He passed the can back. “That bitch Erika caught me coming in late. And those two Mexican fucker’s been riding me. I could use a whole case.” He chuckled.
“Don’t let them wetbacks get to you, young man - life is hard, it’s just up to you on how you deal with it.”
After taking a few sips, Curtis handed the can up to Gabriel.
Gabriel extended his palm, “Thanks, Curtis - but, I don’t want to drink all your shit.”
Curtis’s face wrinkled up in amusement. “All my shit? Boy, you gotta learn some things.” He reached over to a canvas lunch bag that sat at his feet. Unhooking the fastener, he pulled out one of three more tall cans.
He popped the top, took a swig with lines of cool beer that dribbled down onto his salt and pepper beard, “All my shit.”
“Damn, Curtis,” Gabriel grinned, guzzling the rest from his can. “You’re all right.”
Time flew as they finished the cans. Gabriel shuffled over to the urinal and took a piss. With each contraction of his muscles, his back throbbed in a dull ache. The pain was now an echo as the alcohol took effect.
Gabriel approached Curtis and shot a streetwise handshake, “Well, thank you, sir. That helped a man in need.”
Curtis leaned back in the metal chair, palms spread out, shrugged, “And you are a friend, indeed. Take care, young man.”
As Gabriel opened the restroom door, his glazed eyes focused on Erika standing a few feet away, flanked by Gonzalo and Carlos. She beamed unimaginable hatred towards him.
“Clock out, Diaz! You’re fired!” She roared loud enough for the whole factory floor to hear. “I’m not having you drinking on my shift, asshole! You know better than that! Get your ass off my floor!”
“Fuck you, cunt.” Gabriel mumbled, scowling.
She took two steps forward, glaring, “What? What did you just say?!”
Gabriel stared her straight in the eyes, “Fuck. You. Cunt.” He shuffled forward with fists clenched.
Erika’s face turned vivid scarlet, “Get out of here! Now! Before I call the police!”
Gabriel stopped, breathed deep through his nostrils, “All right, all right…I’m going.”
He didn’t even bother with the time clock. He shuffled out of the factory and into the afternoon heat. He was livid. On the way home, he stopped off in a small cantina and sat alone in the dark den peeling the paper foil from the wetness of the bottle placed in front of him by a shriveled relic.
Gabriel started to think about Delores. How, when he got home - he’s asking her to pack her shit and leave. He didn’t need that extra stress - maybe at a different time when he was more stable, maybe when he was not in such a state of flux. Maybe.
He drank three more beers, paid and walked out into the long shadows of late afternoon. He stumbled over broken sidewalks, past barking dogs and smells of spicy meals being served in the row of low, brick houses. In the distance, an ambulance wailed as the sun boiled down big and yellow behind wisps of silver clouds.
Gabriel pushed the front door to his apartment with his shoulder, pocketing the keys, he yelled, “Delores!”
“In here!” She chirped from the kitchen.
Shutting the door, he smelled cat shit. Overpowered by the stench of canned cat food.
Now what is that crazy broad up to? Gabriel thought.
He walked to the kitchen with absolute determination.
He found Delores squatting on the dirty wooden floor holding something to here breast, stroking it. Gabriel’s eyes adjusted to the gloom of the apartment and saw it was a damn kitten.
“Look what I found!” She beamed before he had a chance to say anything.
“Now that I’m seeing it, what is it?”
It was a little white kitten with a streak of black fir on it’s head and a spot of black under it’s pink nose. It wasn’t fluffy at all, it’s stringy white hair was matted and shot out from the scrawny torso. Gabriel glared at the little face.
It looks like Hitler, Gabriel thought. He hated cats.
The small animal quivered and purred in Delores’ embrace. He saw that the tiny animal was wiry thin and had a broken, bent left paw.
“I found him under a car.” Delores cooed. “He was covered in oil and dirt just meowing and meowing. I brought him home and cleaned him up, fed him.” She brought the kitten up to he lips, planting a tender kiss on his head between the pointy ears. She looked up to Gabriel, “Can we keep him? He was obviously abandoned, we can’t throw him out. Not back out there.”
Gabriel noticed the new cans of cat food stacked on a shelf, the brand new kitty litter box placed in a corner, the little furry cat toy on the floor. An ambulance passed by outside, wailing. The little kitten quivered and meowed loudly in fear, glaring with huge, yellow eyes at the noise.
Gabriel sighed. He popped open a can of beer he retrieved from the plastic ice chest near the pantry, sat down. “Okay. Sure. But, feeding it and us may become a problem.”
“Why’s that?” She said softly, comforting the frightened creature.
“I just got fired.” He said, taking deep gulps from the can.
She just sat silently, cuddling the kitten, not looking at him.

Time's Up, Sir.

2011-01-09T19:37:00.001-05:00

Cold. Colorless. City of vast, moaning silence. Frowning, bitter phantoms wrapped in dirty coats pass on dusty, trash filled sidewalks. Prehistoric pedophiles sit in the plaza, huddled from freezing winds, chewing on saliva. Staring into nothing, staring into silence. Beat, abandoned buildings - row after row of them - claw at that unrelenting Southwest blue sky. El Paso is a dead museum - definitely not my Time/Space location. For a year, I've tried to be like you, but my mind burns to go. And go I will.

I feel so lost right now.

Hullabaloooooo!!!

2010-12-24T07:23:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas!

2010-12-22T14:02:00.003-05:00

And so.

It has been a year since I have arrived in El Paso. Since then, I have actually been living a quite comfortable life. 390 degree turn of how I used to live and I am utterly bored. Slothful, lazy, fat - yup, everything I have feared had occurred.

Understand, I live in a town where NOTHING happens, absolutely nothing. I do not associate with the same type of people that I was accustomed too - and that also took the thrill of living away.

So, the paper work has been filed and all I need to do is wait. You see, I am living in an apartment sponsored through HUD - a quite nice place for $190 a month all bills paid. However, after a year in one spot - you are allowed to transfer to anyplace in the States without starting over. The wait for an apartment in larger cities could take up a decade - but, since I will be in the system, I believe it shortens to weeks.

In May, I will be making the move to San Fransisco. I think it will be awesome.