Old Joe Yankovec’s Pigeon Grill-out (1960-‘61)

As I walked under the bridge as a young lad, perhaps thirteen or fourteen (1960-’61) I could hear the cooing of the pigeons in the iron rafters. It was a summer’s afternoon, sunlight blinded my eyes some, and I was with several of the Cayuga Street Gang members. We moved on into the underbelly of the bridge, not far ahead was the underground sewer system of St. Paul, Minnesota. There about in sections were old wine bottles, beer cans, and weeds growing out of the bare earth among the bird and dog shit, and human fasces, flies and mosquitos. I scaled at times the iron and steel looking train tracks, pacing and waiting for the boys to shoot the pigeons with their slingshots.

       All about the walls were written on with colored paints, white chalk or dark charcoal, some drawings, for the most part just plain old graffiti. Rats scuttled along the beams, and upper side walls, some squeezed into gnawed-out holes. I watched it all with an infinite curiosity on my face. The gang wanted to kill pigeons—as often they did with their slingshots, or just throwing plain rocks at them for practice, but today it was for a different reason. Old Joe Yankovec had told the boys, told me and all of us: “Instead of killing them for fun and leaving them for the rats, bring them back, I’ll cook them up and we’ll have an outdoor grill…”

       Well, we all knew he was famous throughout the tri-state area as being the top chef, he was for many years (and might have been at time) top chef of the St. Paul, Hotel, a four star hotel, the only four star hotel in St. Paul. Well who could refuse that offer!

I woke up the next morning, stepped out into the heat of that summer’s day, —awaiting to help escort the gang with those pigeons—knowing good and well I couldn’t kill any, but nonetheless, I was an accomplice, I was apprehensive of what Mr. Yankovec would say. I mean, perhaps he was just kidding us boys.

       To be frank, just killing the birds unnerved me. And so we set off.

I do not exaggerate when I say, that evening when he grilled all those birds in the backyard of his house, by whatever means he used, or spices, I can only give applause, for they were delicious, and each and every one of us, along with my friend, Lorimar, Joe’s son whom I hung around with, we all ate heartily.

#1209/11-7-2016

The Girls ((Two Nieces) (July, 2016))

 From the Window looking out onto Benavides Street

(Drawing, drawn on a napkin, at McDonalds)

They came to visit their Uncle, perhaps a tinge skeptical at first, but more optimistically, for a decade had since past.

       His wife, Rosa awaited their arrival at the airport. For the last two decades he had been clamoring into his writings.

       Once they arrived at the house, the uncle greeted them, it was obvious he and both Sharla and Sheryl (the nieces, or the girls) entertained real affection for one another, —unmistakable, he had missed them, he called them ‘The girls’ not out of disrespect, but it was the way he had always thought of them, since they were tots. He felt fate brought them together, such things will, and then to Lima, Peru. 

       To those back in Minnesota, his home state, their uncle being gone for decades at a time, he was the hermit of the family, per se. But as always, it had been for him, in general, the world, that had forced him as to venture into its remote corners. As he had come to understand, had he not ventured out at an early age, it would have sat with him a little too late to start now, he had been to fifty-six countries, and still counting, or hoping to.

       Hence, he was overwhelmed by his wonderful resignation to fate, a rarity, to have been able to do all he had done.  And the girls, of all they had to put up with in their short lifetime (laughters and sorrows), but to their uncle, these two nieces were like curious little brief flowers, like the China Roses he had in the garden, that blossom for a day or two, and then are gone, but like his nieces and his roses, they bring a luck-warm breeze with them.

       And there they sat at McDonald’s, second floor overlooking Benavides Street, knowing they had much to talk about, and so little time to do it, as Rosa brought up ice-cream filled in cups.

Oh well, there are a hundred things one could write about for that nine-day vacation, the girls stayed: Sharla wanting her own movie night, and so her uncle and her exchanged days, and Sheryl annoyed with the roster in the morning waking her up, little things, that make life all worthwhile, and good memoirs.

       They all remained amiable and both the girls had their “Starbucks” special as often they’d find one here and there; as did their uncle who bought his strong ‘Sumatra,’ coffee in ampules, for his wife to make at home.

       And many a night they sat around the living room table, enveloped in a harmonious haze of words chattering away like chipmunks.  And the uncle, the old duffer bore witness to everything being said, with tired old eyes for it was great to simply whittle away the time, listening to which he had long since given up hope of seeing family.

#1208/11-6-2016

Phantasmagoria (A Composition of familiar impoverished themes)

Phantasmagoria

(A Composition of familiar impoverished themes)

  

 

In the sun’s burning heat, you need to blink a lot, lest you burn your eyes out of your head. At night, or twilight your eyes can enjoy a life of luxury, so I’ve learned in my travels, in particular to heated countries!  While in Vietnam, 1971, the heat boiled your skin, melted the white and black troops away faster than butter; in comparison, for the Vietnamese, to them it was like sugar in coffee. Poor they may be, and poor they were, but they were not like us Americans sleeping off our malaria, crawling with different sorts of parasites to each hair on every cranny of our bodies. Poverty has its rewards, deliberately induced by necessity.  Shameful, those shirking poor devils, who had little to look forward to, and us GI’s shivering with fits because of drugs. And Haiti, 1986, was like that same heat, when it got hot, the air was horrible to breath. As it was in India in 1998, they had to carry me to a café, put me under a fan, it was 117 F, my legs melted like ice by a furnace; the air full of staleness, it weakens the heart.  Back in Haiti, we all ate mostly from or tinned foods we brought over with us ourselves. For most people up in the hill country lived in thatched huts, food was questionable, even the fish from the streams were per near bone dry of strength (skeletonized). Somewhat like those folks in Cambodia who lived in huts on poles made of bamboo along the riversides and fronts, and on manmade levees, who fished through a hole of their floors into the river, cooked the raw fish they caught right then and there in a pan, with a few coals to heat them. Back to Haiti, it’s hard for an American to invent happiness up in those desolate hills without a mission, utterly improbable for Americans, the setting didn’t lend itself. Yet the Haitian finds time to smile. You walk about you’ll see, hitherto throughout the depths of the hill top forests, the Haitian appears stagnated, bemused by sleeping sickness, all due to chronic poverty, but they smile a lot. Ye, they had a mayor, and a tax collector, we can’t live without them can we! At night one could hear the Voodoo drums. Here no one had boots, children barefoot, playing with toys made out of tin cans, bent this way and that way, to make a toy car or a figure of a truck; you would think like Cicero (47 B.C.) who was exiled from Rome for eighteen-months, who actually got fed up with life, who had lived among the rich and powerful, you would think these folks too, would be fed up with life. Not so! Like the poor in India who eat garbage off the top strata’s of trash piles, along with the trailing dogs, in Deli in particular in Deli, by the five star hotels, they want to live another day too. And in Cairo, Egypt, many a disparaged women, scorned by poverty and their husbands, left to fend for themselves by their disliking spouses, sleep on bridges, and under bridges (I’ve tried to talk to them), with a covering of a cardboard box, infant in hand, begging for change; the heroes of tomorrow, who are going to change the World Order for Allah, have no time for them: they are the mighty, freedom fighters, fighting to imprison the world, tomorrow, for Allah, a god who needs help. I’ve had a front row seat for this phantasmagoria of poverty, worldwide.  It brings to mind these primitives, who are kept primitive, lest they wise up and bring down—the establishment, they are not totally spent, as they’ve tramped across the days and years of their lives! And more marvelous still, actually imagining or pretending so, to look forward to a better day, perchance, tomorrow. These ingenious warriors of poverty, await a wormholes to show up in space to bring them to their dreamland, or win the jackpot!

       They all live thus, as do many Americans, who have been set apart into poverty, live thus, tirelessly, waving for a brighter day: depressed to the point of undeclared nausea, yet still waiting, breathing in that hot heated air, between glittering reflections …! Yes, they all sit on an ember broken off of the sun: just waiting, and waiting...

#1207/11-5-2016

Note: the author brings out six countries: Vietnam, Cambodia, Egypt, India, even America, and mostly Haiti, Haiti being the poorest in his eyes of those countries he’s been to, and he has been to 56-countries.

Last of the 20th Century's World Fair's (Lisbon’s World Fair, August, 1998)

Last of the 20th Century's World Fair's

(Lisbon’s World Fair, August, 1998)

 “Iron Elevator de Santa Justas” But by Mr. Eiffel.

I said to myself: “You’ve never been to a World’s Fair, you’re fifty-one years old, and this is the last of the World’s Fairs of the 20^th Century. “And it would prove five-million people, mostly Europeans would attend the fair, but only 100,000-from America, because it was so poorly publicized. Matter of fact, I ran across it while having coffee at Barnes and Nobel, in Roseville Minnesota, a few months prior to August, of 1998, and said to myself, “How come no one’s publishing this?” Now writing this out years later, it still remains a mystery; I think the one magazine I read about it in, was the only one it was in. Henceforward: I had a business, I had the money, I had the time, and so I caught a flight to Lisbon. As simple as that.  Lisbon has always been kind of a destination for me, after reading Erich Maria Remarque’s “The Night in Lisbon”, and such things get me in the mood.  I told a girl I met in Japan I was going, and she met me in Lisbon, and we shared expenses. Traveling and meeting new people and events, have been a passion for me.  I liked seeing the movie by Elvis, “It Happened at the World Fair” a 1963 film, I ended up going to Seattle twice, and going to the top of the Space Needle with my son Cody, in 1994. So this refueled me for Lisbon, kind of.  For traveling, you need passion, money, and endurance, it is not easy, it’s actually a lot of work, going to and fro, and getting the hotel, and so forth and so on.

       I read the book “Memoirs of a Geisha,” and yes, I ended up in Japan, in 1999, I actually ended up going to Kyoto, and most of the places the movie showed, even into a Geisha house, which was very reputable; they showed me about.

       The fair itself was not too inspiring, more on the order of a composition of stalls showing tomorrow’s wonders of the world to the public, from many countries, that expressed their culture. It wasn’t for a kid at all, more on the odyssey of what to expect in the future.  They had a great tower built similar to the Space Needle in Seattle in the fairgrounds, and there were old ships in the harbor, all decorative. And they had a giant aquarium I found most interesting.  And of course, there was foods from every country on earth. But I guess I was expecting something more on the order of a carnival atmosphere, but I got a more business impression out of it. Of course there was much more to see than the fair, there was St. George’s Castle on the hill, and the old archway by the ocean. And I learned some history that a few hundred years back Lisbon was devastated by an earthquake—that I didn’t know; and they were awaiting the next one.  I did visit the Tower of Belem, in Lisbon which dates back to 1515 A.D., it overlooks the ocean.

       They did a marvelous job in the landscape for the project. In that sense, it was a success, —for the most part; but I feel quite short of a profitable attendance mark. Although I liked being at the World’s Fair, what I guess I felt was lacking—and I don’t mean to reiterate, but the rides, hardly any rides if any at all, no Midway area, no candy frost and very little if any circus type atmosphere, it  kind of gave me a downer. It was more on the scale of an international United Nations get together I told myself, so clean, too spotless, and so reserved. No hot dogs, peanuts, or candy; nevertheless, some real nice looking cafes. I spent one day at the fair, all day, and never came back to it the following week, having to spend five full days in Lisbon, not to include two nights.  I hate to say, it got boring.

       But Lisbon as a city would remain a great metropolis in my mind. As time passed I went to see the ancient Temple of Diana, located in the township of Evora, about a hundred miles outside of Lisbon.  A Roman monument for the most part. And again I must express, St. Georges Castle (Costello de Sao Jorge) was quite impressive, if not a highlight, they light it up at night. And the “Iron Elevator de Santa Justas” in the center of Lisbon, where I had lunch a few times at its summit, to which you can see much of the city, that was for me a plus, Mr. Eiffel, the one who built the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and built the Iron Market in Haiti, Port du Prince, is the same one who built the Iron Elevator.

       There was no real suspense on this trip to make it stand out, other than at the World's Fair, being the World’s Fair, and the last one of the 20^th Century’s World Fair’s; in other words, it was no Oktoberfest, or Disneyland, and so I leave my reader with a kind of dry taste in the mouth, what can I say, that’s how it was.

Written in June 2005/Reedited 11-2016

Backlash ((On Rape and sexual Provocation) (A View))

I want to talk about a subject that is seldom if ever talked about—one I’ve thought about to write for a long time, and when talked about, cursed and scorned, but in my many cases working with prison women and men, this area I’m about to bring out, is less focused on, and it deals with rape by men, and sexual provocation by women. Some women invite rape[i] (thus, even the Cardinal of Lima, confirms this, not that he a psychologist, but a man of substance and scholar). You will not hear of this in the polite circles of psychology, or sociology, or behavioral science, because of motives that involve shame, or that anonymous doubt, these women I’m talking about actually place themselves in vulnerable circumstances. When I was a senior counselor working with dual disorders, and chemical dependency, and working for a private freestanding hospital, Riverhills, in Prescott, Wisconsin in the 1990s, I heard many fantasies from women, and of course gradually they came from men likewise; inconsequence, some women fantasize being raped. It is not so obtuse, Albert Camus writes about such a woman in his short story “The Adulterous Wife” on this every theme. What I gathered from his story was that: if I’m being raped and I put myself in this odd situation, I have no control over it, therefore, I need not have any guilt. This is an area hard to give an accurate assessment, but women can provoke, if not by appearance then by behavior, or by both.  Actually, William Faulkner brings this to light in his story: “The Story of Temple Drake.”  No matter which way you look at it he’s committed a crime of course. We could get into suggestive evidence, in that the person is capable of it, and in any way one looks at it, it is an atrocious defilement from which the women never forgets, but like it or not some men are helpless, and feel near cornered with certain kinds of ‘feminine subterfuge.’ Lest we forget, women have the capacity to arouse a man, which we need not question. And once his sexual motor gets moving, the sexual drive seems to outweigh common sense. So what I’m getting at, is: rape is not always a simple power trip, or an aggressive act preplanned, or a violent crime in the making, although that may be the case, but it is not always so.  When I say: it really has to do with sex, people scream, mostly women that know very little about men, and that “It is all control, power.” I say, it has to do with sex in numerous ways. Some men have little confidence in himself, he gets the girl high or drunk, and for some reason he can’t get her aroused, thus he rapes her, why?  Sexual need is the motive, not control, but sexual fulfilment I do believe. The feminist movement will deny this of course, that a woman can be seen as a sex object, or that a man will seduce a woman for purely sex purposes. Hence, the feminist carry a lot of bunk, they don’t know men then (men think different than women, and are simply thinking like women when they say that…).  Yes to a certain degree women have been oppressed, and so the feminist uses that for a symbol.  Ask the question, why the man doesn’t go to the bar, and find what he’s looking for in this sexual revolution, or rawness? It would be easier to find a partner there.  Some men feel under the power of the female, this creates anger towards women. And nowadays, women have much more power than they think: emotional, nurturing, and financial power, they don’t even need men per se. And perhaps because of this, we are seeing more male impotence. Plus a man worries how he’ll be judged by the woman, so he commits suicide, I had a case once, the man felt powerless, took a gun went to his girlfriend’s house (when I was on vacation, so I couldn’t talk him out of it, a second time), and shot himself in the head in front of her.  I lived with that dismay for a longtime, and my colleges of course told me: what could you do, you were gone. Thus, there is a backlash, or reaction to all of this.  I also believe this backlash has something to do with the increase of homosexuality, among men. My wife was unattached until I married her at 40-years old, and she was by and large, harassed for being single.  A lot of catcalls. On another note, I’ve been a soldier eleven-years, eight active, three reserves, and seen signs saying something to the outcome:  “Chase me!” are that is not as abnormal as one might think.  In Ann Rice’s books, years ago, I think now she’s turned into a Christian, but she provided the reader with a world of sexual possibilities, she was not kind to the female. To where they did weird, and awful things, the women and men. The male needs to not allow himself to be overstimulated sexually, he’ll find it much easier to relate to women as people then. For some odd reason I had learned that, ever since I can remember. Even on my many trips worldwide, being alone I’ve met many women whom have joined me in many jaunts oneself saying: I wonder way they trust me, them saying, after being asked: “I knew you were harmless,” well, be that as it may, what I am, I am, and that is saying: you can have a female as a friend (evidently they have some senses we men do not know of), whom is not necessarily seeking a sexual quest, and I’ve never felt in an insecure role of being anything but a man, and men don’t take advantage of women, it’s a learned importance.

      In ending this essay or letter, or what have you, a theme of sorts, let me say I couldn’t sleep, so what do you do, you do what you do best.

11-4-2016 /#1206 (4:30 a.m.)

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[i]

A Man in Hell (A prophetic Utterance)

A Man in Hell

 (A prophetic Utterance)

It’s hard to describe what I saw in 1984, so I drew a sketch of it shortly after the vision. It should be added to this story. I remember saying right after the vision, something to the effect: “He was being consumed, yet the integrity of his body and flesh survived, but with discoloration and stretched to its limits, his face and neck, and brow.” It was a pity he could not just up and die, and remain dead (in a state of oblivion); but we were born to remain always. To find out the exact wording, of my notes, I’d have to check out my book “The Last Trumpet…” but these are close to what I remember. But I do feel a need and a prophetic utterance in my mind’s eye, to describe this vision of a man in hell as best I can, today, whereas, in 1984, my words were quite limited.

       The agitating elements in play are of an aftermath of an atomic storm, and someone standing in the middle of it. A storm in flames given birth to a terror and unearthly strangeness. The protagonist, in the fire, unable to melt into vapor, or atomic dust, yet covered with flames all about him, tremendous fire storm to which utterly swallowed him, as it engulfed him with great billowing clouds of white smoke that soared to stupendous heights, I suppose, since there was to top or bottom, and although I could not hear his voice, it looked like he was emerged in a speechless rumbling of thunder in his brain, and as if frozen and unable to get out a syllable, choked in silence, had I been able to hear, it would have been an explosive, unaccountable ton of dynamite, and perhaps put me into a frightened state, or heart attack.

     The terror and anguish, misery and mystery in his eyes were of a timeless kind, an unending cataclysm, so unparalleled, so far beyond our ability to explain, or imagine, should all mankind have seen it, how could they not believe their isn’t a hell?  Yet I fear, man would classify it into nightmarish psychological drama.

To my understanding there have been others who were allowed to explore this death among the dead—hell per se, who have died and returned to tell about its unknown melee, by which they had been sized to and from. I don’t know if their cases were characterized by the same symptoms that I have noted, perhaps better explained, but all in all, God has given me the gift of art to a certain degree, to express what I can’t in words, and a picture as they say, is worth a 1000-words, I hope so. This took place 32-years ago, yet I remember it, somewhat clearly.

Having said all I’ve said, in closing let me add some data I’ve been told, and read to by others: 1) there are seven degrees of suffering for one’s sins: 2) the heaver sins are: abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia, hate, grudges, sacrilege, being an atheist.  3) If you are separated from God, what can you expect, for all have sinned? Thus there is a price to pay.  4) Some have said there is a purgatory: that this area has seven degrees of suffering too, but hope is alive, perhaps this place is for those unreverent souls, — souls that try to play both sides, and who at the last minute with a gracious heart, come to the Lord honestly.

#1201 (11-2-2016)

Saint Trump

We’re all getting a little worn-out on this 2016, election for President of the United States, with Trump and Hillary and according to the press, Hillary would be the saint, and Trump the devil, so it would seem.  Yet if Trump is guilty of anything, it is nothing in the political arena because he’s only been in it 15-months in comparison to Hillary who has been there for 35-years, she’s gotten rich off the political system, the tax payer. And quite the reputation to go with it. On the other hand, Mr. Trump has gotten rich off the system too, but in building things, and producing jobs for people,  although he has had a pretty active sexual life some 12 to 30 years ago, but not quite as sexual as Hillary’s husband, Bill, whom we’ve all forgiven. But here is the point, and it is pointed at all the insincerity, frauds, and hypocrites, out there. St. Augustine, whom was a scholar of his time, liken to Pope Benedict XVI, had a pretty notorious reputation before he became a saint.  Augustine, 354 A.D., was likened to Cicero, in his intellectual studies. At a young age he began an affair with a young woman in Carthage, she remained his lover for some 13-years, and gave birth to a son. Then he abandoned her, changing his life for better. Thus, God called him to be a Bishop of Hippo, and now he is one of the Fathers of the Church. He like Cicero, and Pope Benedict XVI, had won the most visible academic position in the world. Now we can jump back to the year just after Christ’s crucifixion, Paul, now a saint, has even a more macabre reputation, he killed his enemy without remorse, until God called him and he changed likewise. Bringing out the most dynamic letters in the New Testament (Bible). Now let’s head onto Trump, perhaps God is calling him, he is the only one who will fight for our rights, and Christianity, he will fight for the Jew likewise, and I believe Save America! And who knows, perhaps someday he’ll be a saint, for are we not all called for this destiny!

#1197/10-27-2016