three: a snapshot of my summer in the house of miracles

The summer following my first failed attempt at higher education, I found myself living alone in a large villa at 1005 Poyntz. A couple of my friends had gone in on it, but wouldn't return until classes started again in the fall. I myself would be returning to the dorms in the fall, but had no desire to return home for the summer, so decided to sub-let from them. The house was large and many-roomed and solitary. I lost myself in silence that summer.

At the top of the stairs stood a life-sized cardboard cutout of Clint Eastwood himself, clad in Spaghetti Western garb. His sole purpose was to scare the living daylights out of me every night as I returned home, ascending the darkened stairs to my room. He eventually moved to the closet.

One night, while showering, I head an immense crashing sound, as if someone had just burst through one of the second story windows. I jumped from the shower in true battle form: naked save the suds yelling "Hey! Hey! Hey!" as loud as possible.

Bursting into the bedroom adjacent to my own I found that the glass explosion had not come from a masked intruder, but from a ceiling fan that had worked itself loose and come crashing down upon a bedpost.

I have a leather document folder that I keep the notebook that I write these stories in. It has one large compartment for notebooks, etc, and a smaller one for loose paper. Also included are four pen holders, which at the time of this writing are housing my silver pen, my purple pen, a highlighter and a red, white and blue pencil that my mother gave me on the fourth of July. There are also three mostly useless small pockets. It is black in color and has no real latch to speak of. Over the years it has stored a myriad of half-finished or just started stories, scraps of flowcharts and lists, etc. Where I have gone, it has gone.

During the summer of 1998 I spent untold hours writing poems and songs and stories in the old villa on Poyntz. In the kitchen that was upstairs I would sit and read my bible, and in the room across the way I set up my drumset. After work, after I had stopped to watch the ball games at the park, I would sit at the drumset and drum as fast as I could for as long as I could. In the drum room was a door to an outside deck that I would sometimes roll my recliner out onto, and my television and my V.C.R. as well, though I don't remember what movies I watched. Sometimes during the day, if I was lucky, I'd spy the neighbor girl in her back yard, safe behind her high hedgerow, sunbathing in her white bikini. Oftentimes she'd see me, smile and wave. I would do the same.

I have memories of jamming with different people- friends from back home up for a visit, new friends from the telemarketing firm that employed me. Of the latter I recall this fellow named Kelly, who wasn't very good but loved punk rock and was very nice. He was my boss at the time, had a shaved head and was covered in tattoos. I thought he was cool. I'm pretty sure we called our band "narc", practiced once, and played one show at a going away party in this tiny little town north of Manhattan in Kelly's garage. It was him and his wife's going-away party, and at it was this really obnoxious guy- the general manager's date- who got really drunk and only wanted to play Skynard songs. He was very offended by my home made NARC shirt. My room-mate later christened it the ghetto moo-moo for some reason: it was baby blue and sleeveless and in big iron-on letters said ANTI-ANTI on the back.

"Why do punks always have to be ANTI something?" He drawled, "Do you know Cat-Scratch Fever?"

That night I returned home with a couple of timeless door prizes in the form of two white elephant gifts: an old world war two army helmet covered in glitter, mirrors and silver sequins (Kelly's wife had been Jet Girl for Halloween), and a seven by three foot canvas painting of a giant Chinese conji that read "Zen" or something to that effect. I have no idea where the helmet is now, but the painting I suffered on many a room-mate over the years, and eventually my wife. It found a home in the dumpster outside our first apartment before the end of our first summer.

I sat and mourned its passing from my window until some listless punk, passing in the alley, snatched it out of the dumpster and trudged away with it under arm.

"Fly away- you're free!" I whispered.

Back at the Miracle House, all alone with Clint Eastwood in the closet, there was a visitor. his memory isn't as clear as the others, but it is there. He was young and I don't remember how we met, but I do know that he wanted to be 'alternative' and he liked Green Day and looked up to me for some reason. I'm pretty sure he had a yin-yang necklace, and I'm very sure that I would wake up in the morning on a regular basis to find him crashed on my sofa on the porch I think his folks were meth heads so he didn't much care for going home which was unfortunate, as he was usually in dire need of a shower. But then again, so was I.

He accompanied me to the tattoo parlor when I had my lip pierced. I think he was the only person I knew who thought it was cooler than I did. But mostly he'd just hang out and listen to music while I did whatever. He was good at that which is a virtue. He was a good little buddy.

I don't remember his name. I think it was Derrick or Darren or something to that effect.

It was he who gave me my black leather notebook case, and it is to him that I dedicate this story. All of this is kept in his gift to me, so in a way, I remember him best of all.