Cowboy

Cowboy was the guy that good girls’ mothers warned them about…and he was proud of that fact. Cowboy was a sight to behold…tall and rugged with dark brown hair, a thick moustache, and deep silver-blue eyes that always seemed to be smiling. He was born in the San Fernando Valley but he always carried himself like he thought a real cowboy would…with softly-faded Levis, vivid calico shirts, and hard-worn boots being his attire for almost any occasion.

Cowboy wore his cowboy hat rakishly and drove a big old Ford pickup that you could hear coming from blocks away. He smoked nothing but cheap cigars, drank nothing but beer and whiskey, and there were people who knew him for years without ever knowing what his given name was (it was Brian but nobody but his mother and his grandmother called him that.) He was a self-styled good ol’ boy before that term had been used to death and, again, he was proud of that. Still and all, his charm was such that he attracted an eclectic group of friends, lovers, and acquaintances and few folks had a cross word to say about the man.

Cowboy couldn’t carry a tune to save his life but that didn’t stop him from happily braying out his favorite Hank Williams or Willie Nelson songs when the mood struck him.

Cowboy did have his faults, of course…he did, for example, sometimes drink a wee bit too much (but, being a happy drunk, even that failed to take away from his appeal) and, though usually affable and forgiving, he had no problem coming to blows if he felt someone was slighting him or somebody he cared about (I bailed him out of jail once after he got into a row with the brother of one his former paramours outside of a bar in Hollywood one humid summer night.)

And he was not by any stretch of the imagination a faithful lover…often he would be juggling two or three (or more) girlfriends at the same time and managing, for impressive stretches of time, to keep it going without it blowing up in his face. Some women found that less easy to live with than others but, strangely enough, most of them remembered the good times more than the bad times when it was over.

Cowboy and I were not best friends or anything…we were far too different for that…but, for a brief season, we got along just fine (I occasionally got to see the quiet, reflective Cowboy that he rarely showed to most people in his ever-widening circle of acquaintance.)

Last time I saw Cowboy he was off to Texas…he had somehow gotten a job as a cop in some small town outside of San Antonio…loaded for bear and wondering out loud if the “pretty l’il Senoritas” were ready for someone like him. I imagined that they could (and did) handle him…and that Cowboy would be all right with that as well.

Are You Alright?

…are you alright?
are you sleeping through the night?
do you have someone to hold you tight?
do you have someone to hand out with?
do you have someone to hug and kiss you?
hug and kiss you…hug and kiss you…
are you alright?

I’m sitting in my quieter place…the place that nobody knows because I won’t let them…and I’m thinking about you. I’m thinking about the us that we used to be. Lucinda is singing the soundtrack and I’m letting my thoughts dance in the rose-colored light that permeates and caresses the memory fields where we, still and always, linger happily.

I’m in my quieter place…and I’m smiling warmly, nostalgically, only the tiniest bit ruefully as I savor and wallow in and rewrite the dances we did back when we were a viable us.

We ended badly…we ended as well as could be hoped…we ended in a perfect and proper measure of time…we drifted apart in clouds of acrimony...we drifted apart in the benign mist of unintentional neglect.

Whatever…whatever…whatever…the past is past and I’m in my quieter place and I’m happily thinking about you and imagining, with some hubris, that sometimes…every once in a bright blue moon…you’re thinking about me thusly as well.

Lucinda asks the question…are you alright?...and I nod wistfully, only the tiniest bit ruefully, and pray that it is so.

“Are You Alright?”
words and music by Lucinda Williams
©2007 Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp./Lucy Jones Music

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More MKW Blogstuff: Neverending Rainbow

What it Was That the Cat Did

Naala, the sleek, quiet-spoken black female cat of the household, was sitting in the corner by the front door like an errant child sent to the sit thusly for some transgression. I wondered what it was that she had done to warrant punishing herself thusly. She would not, of course, tell me…but she sat there, lost in what in whatever thoughts cats might have, staring at the corner still and unwavering for the better part of a quarter hour.

Mr. Gambino, her white-footed, tuxedoed brother, went over near her quizzically but, being a cat of fickle and fleeting attention, he quickly grew bored and ran off to find some more interesting mischief to get into.

Bart, the laconic third cat of the household, had not the slightest bit of interest in the situation and sued instead to be allowed to egress to his place of privacy, the small stack of towels atop the clothes dryer out in the garage.

Autumn, the old dog who rarely acknowledged the presence of any of the cats, slumbered peacefully in the family room her legs twitching as if she were running after some wily rabbit in her dreams.

After the quarter hour had passed, Naala, apparently haven’t served out her self-imposed penance, stretched and sauntered across the living room, past the kitchen, and out to the family room where she calmly leapt onto the couch and curled up and went to sleep.

I suppose I’ll never know what it was that the cat did :-)

3:39

The pounding on the door was insistent, anxious; it would not be denied. Solid metallic thumps on the security door thundering through the ebony stillness of the wee hours…adrenaline surging through every fiber of my being. I lurched up, all of my senses screaming to be left in their restive state, wrenching myself from the dream world and back into the real world.

I glanced at the clock on the nightstand, the bright crimson glow of its numbers mocking me mercilessly…3:39. Rats. It was just a dream.

My disorientation faded slowly as I sat up in bed. I listened for a moment…just in case it wasn’t a dream. The world was, of course, almost completely still…no pounding…and every housemate (two-legged and four-legged alike) still slumbering peacefully in their chosen sleeping places.

I shambled to the bathroom…darting apparitions, having followed me from the dreaming, played hide-and-seek behind me but I ignored them.

Yawning, I shambled back to the bedroom and tumbled back into bed…and then I lay there wide awake and praying to be accepted back into the dream world while every other housemate (two-legged and four-legged alike) continued to slumber peacefully in their chosen sleeping places.

The clock, taunting me with its impertinent crimson numbers (stupid clock), continued to mock me mercilessly: 3:48…4:09...4:17… 4:28...4:44…5:03…5:11...5:27. Until another distant thump echoed through the gathering lightness of the coming dawn. The newspaper was on the front lawn and I was awake on top of my bed.

Rats.

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More MKW Blogstuff: Neverending Rainbow

Kurt Vonnegut 1922-2007

The amazing, avuncular writer of Slaughterhouse-Five, Breakfast of Champions, and Cat's Cradle has died at the age of 84.

Stars Dancing in the Nighttime Sky

It’s a warm April night and the crickets are singing to the night. Jenny and I are lying on a blanket in the backyard looking up at the stars dancing in the nighttime sky.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“You think there’s more than 500 stars up there?”

I smile. “Yep, there’s a lot more than that. There are millions and millions of stars up there.”

“Millions and millions?” Jenny says incredulously. “Whoa. I’m not sure I can count that high yet.”

I try to imagine what the nighttime sky looks like through 4-year-old eyes. “Did you have a good day?”

“Um-hm,” she replies. “I like birthday parties. Especially birthday parties for me. The only bad part is that when somebody asks me how old I am I can’t say ‘almost four’ anymore.”

“Is being four that much different from being ‘almost four’?”

Jenny sighs softly…there were, she already knew, so many things that parents and other adults simply did not get. “It’s completely different, Daddy,” she says as patiently as she could.

“Well after a while you can start telling people you’re ‘almost five’…”

She pauses as she weighs that and then, with some satisfaction, says, “Yeah, there’s that.”

We are quiet for a while just listening to the crickets and the slight rustling of the liquid amber trees. And then Jenny looks over at me. “Is there a time when I won’t be your little girl anymore? I’m not sure I want to get that old…”

I reach over and stroke her hair. “You’ll always be my little girl…no matter how old you get.”

“That’s good,” Jenny says softly, relief coloring her words. “I love you, Daddy.”

I smile again and let the warmth of the moment wash through me. “I love you too, sweetheart.”

I look up into the sky while Jenny, being the adventurous girl she is, goes back to trying to count all of the stars.

“Happy Birthday, pretty girl,” I whisper not wanting to disturb her mission.

“Thank you, Daddy,” Jenny whispers back not looking down from the stars dancing in the nighttime sky.

- for JLM -