and so...

So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all which may appear to give one a peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future. The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than having an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun.

falling into a pit of lite

I enter a smelly, dark den with pink coral tiled walls. A short, chunky female in a black thong whirls and jiggles her wares in all the wrong places on top a tiny stage of glittered stucco. Bar had only two others, junky cholo in white tank top and baggy khaki pants who sat on the nod like a fool on a stool against the pink wall and a flabby, sweaty American who eyed me fingering his camera so nasty.

I was about to take my pesos elsewhere when a tall, handsome Mexican with distinctive Aztec features and pencil moustache donning a blue mechanic’s tunic walked in and made a bee line for the men’s room. Quickly knocking back my beer, it was on like Donkey Kong: I am in the pissior languidly jacking off with the guy in the mechanics uniform as the obligatory old fart with the camera looked on. The hottie possessed the most exquisite penis I had seen in many a moon. One hand on my soldier; the other traced black hair on a brown, flat abdomen. Me and the hottie cum in spurts onto lemons and ice and left the quivering codger standing there wondering where his youth had gone.

The mechanic – Miguel, he says - and I drank a couple more bottles and I bring up if he cared to go back to my room for an afternoon of filthy, rotten sin. Nope, it’s back to the wifie and kids, he claimed. Shake hands and part. Old queen leer at me from furtive shadows. Frustrated fruit. Short cholo with shaved head and wife beater is hip to the fact of our homosexual tendencies and smiles with silver capped tooth, short and thick hard on a-pulsing in dirty khakis. I exit - leaving the cholo to the whims of that withered vampire.

portrait of a psychopath

green onions

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¿qué te gusta?

Grainy, over-exposed slide show image projected on a bare concrete wall:

I’m five years old. I don’t even need to get my bearings this go-round. In a flash-bulb instant, I recognize this is Christmas day at my grandmother’s house. My senses are wracked by the cacophony of a happy family, wafts of Christmas dinner and stale cigarettes. Before me lies a large gift, my name carefully written on the tag. I know it’s the first of many Star Wars action figure play-sets which will provide me years of fun-filled days.

On the other side of the tree is my sister, only nine, still showing the signs of retained baby fat. She smiles gleefully as she shreds the paper from a candy-colored box. My grandmother has maneuvered herself by my side and kisses me wetly on the cheek, smelling like whiskey and a dirty ashtray. I rub the slime away and lunge for the present…

Shift.

The room is dark and barely lit by a half-moon. There are arms wrapped around me, a mouth firmly planted on mine, tongues fencing in the heat. All I can smell is his cheap alcohol and cheaper Thrifty’s bought cologne, mixed with the garlic and wet dog smells of the house. One of my trembling hands is tangled in hair, the other groping under a loose t-shirt attempting to clumsily undo the button on his denim over-alls. He is grinding his slender hips into my lap, moaning, asking for more. My arousal is painful because it has nowhere to go in my tight jeans.

Seventeen then.

All of my virgin fears hit me in an instant. Never before have I done what he asks of me. He issues a frustrated sound, pushes me back onto the couch. Wrenching his t-shirt off and my eyes fixate on the hairless smoothness of his copper colored torso. Standing up, he releases the clasps and lets the denim over-alls fall…

Shift.

Incandescent lights nearly blind me after being in the dark room. I stumble a few steps, loose-fitting shoes flopping on the floor. A large room surrounds me, industrial lighting leaving no shadowed corners. Greasy stainless steel tables and benches are bolted to the floor and a number of solemn men are about, sitting or standing wearing orange jumpsuits. Looking down, I am wearing the same jumpsuit and lace-less sneakers.

I am twenty-two.

On the table next to me is a box of tobacco and rolling papers. Expertly, I roll a cigarette, not noticing the two men watching me with unblinking eyes. In the far wall is a mesh covered heating element, used only for lighting cigarettes. I push the button, the coils glow like an ember and I lean in to light the rollie.

My arms are roughly grabbed at the wrists and twisted behind me while a coarse hand shoves my face into the mesh covering…

Shift.

Today I am twenty-seven and I stand on a shattered sidewalk, the multi-colored slums of north Tijuana stretch out before me. I am amiably mesmerized by their alien beauty.

Shift.

Twenty-five, full of booze and pot, a guitar in my hands, fingers working furiously, hair in my face, strumming horribly the melancholy rhythms of The Smiths.

Shift.

Eighteen, staring into the empty, cock roach infested studio apartment on the corner of Sunset Boulevard and Highland Avenue, elated I’m finally going to be out from under my parent’s iron boot heels.

Shift.

New York’s hallucinogenic nights.

Shift.

Tampa and marching feet.

Shift.

Shaving my head in an El Paso Greyhound men’s room.

Shift.

Cursing my fate in a Guatemalan jungle.

Shift.

A Boise bus station.

Shift.

Broke and hungry, stumbling weary down a San Francisco sidewalk, clutching my tattered black coat vainly attempting to ward off an unrelenting freezing wind.

Shift, shift, shift.

It blurs now, an ever-increasing slide show of everything I have ever seen or done. There is no set pattern of what shifts to when. Time has no meaning. Details have no meaning. Experiences I enjoyed last mere seconds, while agonizing heartaches last forever.

I spin on and on, a passenger on my own tour bus, not knowing when this masochistic carousel is going to stop.

I ride it, though, because I realize when it does stop, I will experience sights, sounds, smells and characters to draw from for my next lie.

the motionless bird

The air in the café acquired a poisonous residue from the things we said to one another. I sometimes felt I could detect a malignant green mist, invisible to everyone else, floating just above the coffee table. We excreted an effluvia of malice, the two of us. Outside three ominous trucks of uniformed, rifle toting, military youths – faces partially covered in black masks - roared by in a cloud of choking dust...

I sipped more coffee, took another drag. How many cigarettes does it take to wait? How many cups of coffee? I glanced around the solemn café. Relatively empty at this hour. The elderly barista stood leaning against the worn counter reading the newspaper. The café held four tables and the only other client was a handsome young man sitting quietly alone scrolling glassy eyed through his phone. Certain he was browsing porn.

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

“I think it may benefit us both if we stopped seeing one another.” I state in a dead voice. No emotion. No concern. All passions severed.

He glances at me and wrinkles his forehead like a dog and replies I shouldn't say such things is muy malo. I can see he is sad, feeling the abyss yawning between us.

“From what I gather, the Oxxo down on Revu is seeking employment. Might want to give them a try?” I say. He’s not having it. Realizes where this is leading. Or perhaps you will fall into the foul clutches of some silver-haired quivering vampire. “You know, a job’s a job as long as it pays rent.”

Wordlessly, he slid out from his chair and ambled out of the café into the street. I sat staring at my coagulating coffee, listening down into myself, feeling the boiling black void open and hear the faint, mocking laughter from its depths.

Been feeling that slow burn bore that usually comes along when I have grown weary of a locale. I want to go – regretting not making it overseas earlier. The group of 'friends' who 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. I sipped more coffee. A sad mariachi ballad began to wail over the tinny speaker of the café. My shoulders slumped.

Outside, it was cold and colorless. Gritty wind whipped eddies of trash down a lonely street. The sky was a harsh, cold blue - though dazzling bright, gave no warmth - only a bitter cold, you could feel it in your marrow.

what's what

I am not a quitter. I refuse to be. Shit, I made it this far and I am still kicking. Certainly, it was a dire and incapacitating setback when an entire year of planning and waiting blows up in your face, you could imagine my dismay. Or perhaps not. If half y'all sucked dick as much as you sucked in your stomachs in selfies you wouldn't be so bitter and alone. I, in contrast, am not bitter. I not only adhere to the chaos of fate, but relish in it. I accept everything with equal apathy. My resolve has never been stronger. I have noticed that airfares at an affordable rate ($270) are being offered from San Francisco to Cambodia beginning in April. A quick flight to connect San Diego to San Francisco is only $38. I will attempt this secondary venture; remaining and saving in this squalid, windowless room I inhabit…

And yet, temptation raises it’s spiteful, insidious head. TEMPTATION!!! Such an ugly word. There are three apartments here in Tijuana I have my eye on - two downtown and one out on the beach. All three running for $250 each. Sigh. I truly need to stay focused and keep on track... but that is the obtuse predicament, in lieu of last year, I'm becoming quite weary of living in rented rooms and out of my suitcase. I want my own home...

junkies romp

without a point

"Your books, your writing - have no meaning, follow no linear path. Why?"

I write about life. Life has no meaning, my dear. The closest you get to a story arc - a beginning, middle, and end - is birth, life, and death. Everything else is circumstantial chaos without a point. You may think life has a point, but in actuality - it does not. It's all random events which end abruptly without point and/or meaning.

a series of unfortunate events

Concerning the previous post on Cambodia, that entry isn’t entirely true. Kind of jumped the gun. Allow me to explain…

On the second of January, packed and rarin’ to go, I crawled out of bed at 3am strictly from insomnia in my guesthouse room in Tijuana to jump the border and catch a Greyhound bus toward downtown Los Angeles. A few months prior, I had purchased an airline ticket to Phnom Penh, Cambodia. A year of planning and waiting was about to finally come into fruition - travelling through Asia and writing about it from my own point of view.
Crossing the border went without a hitch in lieu of the big ass suitcase overstuffed with my sordid possessions. A simple and quiet trip, I even dozed off which was uncanny for the reason I retain a long history of being unable to sleep on a moving vehicle. (I am forever paranoid they are going to crash)

Two hours later, I arrived at the Greyhound station in downtown Los Angeles just shy the fucking crack of dawn, the hobos hadn’t even awoke to brush their teeth yet. Via the internet, I googled the quickest way from the Greyhound to Union Station. I had to connect with FlyWays, a bus route from the Station to LAX. Easy peasy, I thought. A certain site stated it was a short jaunt down Alameda and should take one no more than fifteen minutes. This is where the entire ordeal began to unravel – it was not a short walk. I dragged my suitcase over shattered, soot embedded garbage lined sidewalks between melancholy derelict warehouses in desperation because the ten minute jaunt turned into a forty minute slog. It was a long distance! I overstepped bewildered hobos glaring at me wondering why this red-faced, sweaty white boy was briskly stomping down the street howling obscenities toward an uncaring, over cast sky. Oh, how I cursed and cursed.

Eventually making it to Union Station, I shot toward the FlyWays kiosk, purchased a ticket – with a twenty dollar bill and was returned a fistful of dollar coins. Useless. No change house in Cambodia would accept them, I was certain. I jumped on the bus and was hoping I still had time – the flight left at 11:30am for Phnom Penh and it was still only 9:45. I calmed myself by mentally re-enacting an old Hollywood movie scene of sprinting down the runway, jumping in front of the plane, arms flailing. They stop, let me board, we all laugh, clinking martinis with fellow passengers.

The realization was, I arrived at LAX and, attempting to locate China Eastern airlines, flitted around aimlessly through a colossal, bustling throng of tired people. All queues, even for the information kiosk, was one hundred people deep. Sigh. Out of pure luck, I found my flight and the line was not only twenty people waiting ahead but moved at a steady pace. I approached the flight attendant and as soon as she snatched my passport, she informed me the loading gate was closed ten minutes prior.

I snapped. Internally. Externally, I remained my cold, unfazed, dead to everything self. Inside, a million voices screamed and howled, I became dizzy, and as the flight attendant attempted to get my attention – her nasal voice faded in and out unintelligible at first drowned by the sound of arching electricity – I managed to simply mutter, “Okay.” She asked me to go and sit in the Loser Corner, a set of raggedy seats off to the side, as she stated she will attempt to locate an alternative route. I sat there, staring at the large clock on the wall: 10:55. I glanced out the huge plate glass window, a jet lay idling with the China Eastern logo. After a fifteen minute wait, the attendant clopped over to me and offered a later flight that evening...for $680.

It took a monumental effort to remain civil. I asked in a controlled, monotone voice, “Let me get this straight…you won’t allow me on my flight, the flight I previously purchased, and now you’re offering me an alternative flight and I have to pay…again? Full price?”

“Yes.” She beamed.

Visions of smashing her skull in with the chrome barrier bar next to me flashed through my head.

I simply stated, “No.”

I guess she glimpsed the torment of rage boiling in my eyes because she kept glancing over toward her right. I did too and noticed two LAX security brandishing semi-automatic rifles idling next to an exit. No need to be a drama queen, I concluded – you won this round, China Eastern Airlines – but I damn thee….I damn thee! Hunched over in contempt, hands wringing, I slithered out of the terminal….suitcase wheel squeaking…

I stood outside the airport for what seemed like hours chain-smoking and pondering my next move. I was literally exhausted. I considered remaining in Los Angeles, returning to my roots, renting an apartment, looking up old friends…fuck that. I made my way back to the Greyhound to purchase a return ticket to San Diego. It was one o’clock in the afternoon and I was ready to go home. Fuck this trip.

Hahahaha! Fuck you, too!, cackled Fate.

The next available bus to San Diego was 5:30 the following morning, all previous lines were booked. Of course, they were. I mean…why not? So, for the next fucking day and night, I sat around with the weirdos and perverts and crazy ass fuckers who haunt these hallowed locales. I was constantly accosted with requests for money or cigarettes. Outside, every con man approached me and attempted to pawn on me the most inane, useless merchandise. Do people actually fall for their shit? Amazing.

Haggard, delirious from lack of sleep, ass sore and raw from both the metal benches at the bus terminal and the incident with China Eastern airlines, I finally boarded my bus and slinked back down toward the international border. Blurry-eyed and dangerous, I returned to the guesthouse to rent a room. They were full. Sigh. Slept in a comfortable, clean hotel before renting a room in another guesthouse I knew of, this one a bit seedier and located above a hooker bar and a questionable massage parlor.

Subsequently, here I sit, typing these words out at a corner café in downtown Tijuana bitter and mired in astute depression. I literally do not know what to do. Well, that is not entirely true – I know what I want and the fragmented hopes of attaining it. I am inexplicably mired in disillusioned depression over this misguided ordeal. An entire year of planning and waiting flushed down a shitty toilet. The immediate plan? To relax for a month and clear my head. To somehow figure out a way to attain the stability that I so desperately and secretly desire…