Cheerful despite it all

I fully intended to spend the day in a goddamn bad mood, I truly did, but sometimes things just don't work out quite the way a feller wants them to. Sometimes stuff goes wrong, even simple things like waking up in a mean-tempered cussin' kind of mood.

I don't reckon this'll make any sense to most of y'all, but on some days- and it ain't often, so don't think I'm askin' for much- some days I just want to be pissed-off. I want to wake up angry and I don't particularly go lookin' to get cheered up, if you see what I'm sayin'.

You might think: "well shit, how hard is that to do? This world ain't nothing but a winking stinkhole and if it wasn't for the rainbows and unicorns in my medicine cabinet I'd be exercising my 2nd Amendment rights until someone stopped me or I ran out of ammo. What's so damned special 'bout bein' mad as hell?"

Well, what makes it special for me is I failed at it and I'm the kind of guy who just don't sit too comfortable with failure. I wish I could say that the reason I don't sit so well with failin' is on account of being accustomed to success, but I can't rightly say that. I just ain't fond of failing , is all I can say.

So anyway, I'm waiting for the bus this morning, just enjoying the sun and reading a book like I always do, and a nice old lady carrying a umbrella starts asking me questions about the bus service.

Now, me and the old lady both know that there ain't a goddamn bit of sense in talking about the bus since there ain't nothin' you can do but wait no matter how much talking gets done, but she just wants to talk because she didn't think to bring a book. It's a sunny day and she's carrying an umbrella , so I speculate to myself that this lady isn't so hot in the thinking department. I'm too much a gentleman to tell her that ,though.

"It'll be here soon," is what I say, which is true, even if I don't exactly know what minute it'll arrive.

She starts describing the weather conditions to me, like we are talking on the phone and I'm somewhere else, somewhere that's always dark and wet and I don't have a fucking clue in my clammy heart what a blue sky looks like. Which is kinda true, but she doesn't know that.

It is beautiful.
I agree with her and keep reading.

In the book, Marvin Molar has snapped. He's tied a rope to the boat's wheel and grabbed a hatchet.

"Oh, what a nice cat", says my wrinkly new pal, pointing across the street. "Here kitty! Here kitty!"

What I feel like saying is :" Lady, that's my fucking cat and it's the second dumbest animal on this planet and if it even thinks you are calling it, it'll probably run over here and get flattened by the goddamn bus we were just talking about. The shock of seeing it will probably kill you and if it doesn't , I might."

"He's a sweetie," is what I say, but I send a look at my cat that says: "Get near the kerb and I'm gonna spank you with a broom." He gets the message and slinks off.

Meanwhile, Marvin has walked in on Hester while she's fucking the Greek. I feel Marvin's anger rising from the pages- its much hotter than mine- and I'm almost envious of the purity of Marvin's rage. Almost.

"Is this the downtown bus?"

"Yes. Right on time."

I don't know if it's on time or not, but I'm trying to be reassuring. All hell is about to break loose in my book and I don't want the old lady to be spooked any more than she has to be, which is sayin' not spooked at all.

The lady boards the bus and hands the driver a twenty. I don't have to be a mind-reader to figure out what he's thinking. He's thinking: "This isn't a fucking taxi."

I'm on the steps below her and I'm thinking that I've got my nose about eighteen inches from a pair of adult diapers. I'm so convinced of this thought that I feel safe in calling it knowledge, which isn't always as great a thing as it's cracked up to be.

But I don't say that. Instead I swipe my bus pass through the meter a second time and smile at both her and the driver.
Such a nice young man.
Everyone smiles back at me. The whole bus is smiling.

In the book, Hester is smiling too. Marvin hits her in the mouth with the hatchet.


It cheers me up and makes me fail at being pissed-off, which would make me angry if I wasn't in such a good mood.

Marvin spins on a fingertip and waits for the Coast Guard.

I go to work and wait for five o'clock.

Dr. Furter's Smoking Cure

The Rocky Horror Picture Show affected my life in at least two significant ways :

1) It made sure that I never became addicted to nicotine.

2) It confirmed my adolescent suspicions that I was a
heterosexual.

Let's start with the cigarettes... when I was 15, I got invited to go to the Midnight showing of RHPC at the Key Theatre in College Park, MD.
I was invited by some of my older friends who were , in my young eyes, 'supercool'.

They had weed, acid, booze and Susannah. I didn't really do a lot of drugs at that point, but I liked hanging out with the older stoner loners anyway. They made me laugh- they were all misfits and readily let me into their little group of outcasts.

Susannah was the older sister of one of my friends; she was a really old 17 and , I was to learn that night, she thought I was hot.

That's why I got invited- Susannah wanted me along.
I didn't know much about women then ( some things remain constant) so I was blind to Susannah's deft manipulations- as our group gathered around Andy's GMC Pacer, she waited until I got in the back and then pushed her other pals aside and plopped herself on my lap. There were seven or eight of us, so the lap-thing was mandatory- but she chose my lap.

Well, guess what?

About five milliseconds after she planted her nubile buns on my lap, I started experiencing this certain swelling sensation...at this point, I was still a virgin but I was pretty sure what was going on.

This uncontrollable swelling kept poking itself upwards, like it knew exactly where it wanted to go and nothing- not my Levis, not her panties, nothing- was going to stop it.

"This thing has a mind of it's own", I thought for the first, (but certainly not the last) time.

Of course, Susannah could feel this insistent, repetitive pushing against her fine, fine derriere. She knew what was going on alright- she wiggled around so that she was almost facing me , turned and gave me one of the most intense tongue-kisses I've ever had; grinding , grinding down, keeping perfect rhythm with her hips- it occurred to me that maybe she liked me better when I was swollen, so instead of trying to hide my condition, I pushed back.
So did she.
Repeat.
Repeat.

Aha! I was starting to understand what this was all about...all I could feel was my tongue sliding into the beautiful darkness of her mouth and this unknown ,but wholly natural-feeling pelvic combat taking place- completely out of my control.

There were six other kids in the car and we didn't pay any attention to them- someone tried handing us a joint, we heard them laughing at us but we didn't care- teenagers have been horny and shameless a long, long time before they invented myspace, you know...anyway, it was about a 40 minute ride to the cinema but I didn't make it that long.

Susannah could tell what was happening and she was right there with me...why are you speeding up ? I remember thinking...ah, the innocence of youth...anyway, when we got to the theatre, I headed straight for the restroom so I could discard my ruined underwear and maybe clean myself up a bit...

The Men's Room was full of transvestites.

See, at the Rocky Show, the audience dressed as the cast of the movie and the movie was full of campy cross-dressers (and some Meatloaf) - a lot of pre-movie 'costume' adjustments were done in the restrooms.

Here I was, barely 15 years old , still recovering from my first assisted orgasm and suddenly I was in a toilet full of trannies, looking for somewhere to ditch my scummy shorts.

Hmmm...well, almost everyone else in here has their pants off, I thought- and not all of the men were men- so I might as well get it over with...I dropped my jeans, pitched my nastified FotL's into the wastebin and used a wet papertowel to clean myself as best I could.

People were fucking in the stalls and sniffing blow off each other's body parts...nobody even paid me any attention. It was truly anti-climactic.

So I strutted back to our seats, dazed but needing more Susannah...I had never known that the inside of someone else's mouth could taste so good...I wanted her for every meal, forever and ever...ech. Sappy.

I was sure that after the movie, something very special was going to happen and it was going to be the best, most important thing ever...ergh. You know how kids are.

"I threw my shorts away", I told her.

She laughed and kissed me.

The sweet woman-taste was gone.

She tasted like tobacco, but honestly, I didn't care. I was 15 and all I wanted was more bouncing and grinding- I was pretty much oblivious to everything around me, which is no mean feat considering where I was.

After a long make-out session, she lit a cigarette.

Very sophisticated, she was.

She offered me one.

I accepted it and she lit it for me, using her own cigarette.

Then she kissed me and exhaled deep into my lungs.

This was a night of firsts.
That was my first cigarette.

It made me feel funny. Not in a funny-good way, like Susannah made me feel. The smoke made me feel funny-sick.

Very ill.

I puked on Susannah. All over her plaid skirt and her Doc Martens.

After that, Susannah was done with kissing me. She didn't even want to talk.
If Andy hadn't been a nice guy, they would have left me behind, 30 miles from home.

I missed my first lay because of a cigarette.

The only cigarette I have ever smoked.

Love Your Job

Julie could feel him watching her. For eight years of endless toil she had only been a number.

78.

That was her number. It was printed on a tiny square of paper and inserted into every garment she produced.
Her latest assignment was sewing "Made in the U.S.A." labels onto the elastic waistbands of men's underwear.

She had asked her boss, Mrs. Boyle, how the shorts could be
made in the USA when the crates they came in were marked "Made in China".

Mrs. Boyle told her that it was only the crates that were made in China and that if she liked her job, she'd better shut up. Julie loved her job , but sometimes it seemed to her as if Mrs. Boyle didn't recognize that dedication. After all, it had been two years since her last raise. She decided that she would work harder.

It was in this state of heightened productivity that she started noticing the "irregulars". There were more 'irregulars' than 'regulars'- in fact, hardly one single pair of the no-name jockeys seemed to be stitched together quite right.

Some of the briefs had the flies sewn shut. Others had loose seams clumsily reinforced with pointy-edged metal staples.

One crate contained a thriving nest of live rats.

By the time her shift was over Julie was exhausted. She'd run out of yellow 'I-irregular' tags nearly an hour ago and Boyle had forced her to 'pass' the rest. She tried to argue, but she was tired and her English was not quite up to the task. Boyle had adequate Spanish, but went no hable when it was in her own interest to do so.

Boyle was one of Julie's favorite English words. Boyle was a bitch.

Boyle was also an ass-kisser. On the rare occasions that the factory floor was visited by a male supervisor ,Boyle made sure to monopolize his time, taking credit for the girls' work and blaming any mistakes on whichever senorita had the least seniority.

Now Boyle was talking to a tall white man wearing an expensive suit and a cheap hardhat. The man's dark eyes scanned the room , where, guided by Boyle's pointing finger, they came to rest squarely on Julie's thin, stooped figure.
He stared.
Beneath his unnaturally copper tan, he was turning a furious red.

Boyle beckoned with crooked finger. Julie felt a wave a of panic as she switched off her machine and walked across the concrete floor.

The man was yelling at Boyle in English and looking at Julie- he expected Boyle to translate. He needn't have bothered, thought Julie. The man was using mostly profanity and Julie was fluent in profanity- it was the first English she had learned. She picked it up from missionaries in Honduras as a child. One mischievous Peace Corp volunteer had briefly convinced her that "fuck you" was an affirmative, English for si. Hilarious.

The man was yelling as Julie approached.

"...tell this stupid fucking cow that we don't allow goddamn fucking irregulars anymore. This isn't Fruit-of -the Motherfuckin' Loom for christ's sake!"

Boyle nodded, looked at Julie.

"Ceño."

Julie frowned.

" Vergüenza"

Julie blushed.

The man continued.

" Tell this stupid bitch that I'm going to dock her check every time I have to send another batch of irregulars back here for re-tagging."

He picked up a pair of white shorts from the conveyor belt, waving it back and forth as he bellowed. A pink newborn rat dislodged from the undergarment and was hurled across the room where it landed, stunned but unharmed, in a pile of spuriously regular irregulars.

A moment later an adult rat scurried out of the darkness and retrieved the squealing pup; whether it's intent was to nurse or to devour remains unknown.

The man turned away in disgust and walked towards the exit.

Julie barely noticed the rats. She was waiting for Boyle to translate.

"Same old shit," said Boyle.