Our Long National Nightmare (a Talking with Bob interlude)

I was checking my e-mail and happily making plans for the millions of dollars that was coming my way from all of the sweepstakes that I had won without remembering when I had actually entered them and from all of the inheritances I apparently had coming from people I didn’t know all over the world. Images of my new luxurious life were dancing in my fevered head as each wonderful e-mail scrolled across the screen.

My friend Bob was on the other side of the room grumbling and cursing as he perused the day’s newspaper. Bob had a fluorescent marker at the ready as he carefully searched for factual, spelling, and grammatical errors. “Aha!” he exclaimed every time he found such an error, gleefully highlighting each one with a ragged yellow circle. Bob said “aha!” a lot every time he read the paper.

When he was done Bob, the undisputed master of the scathing letter to the editor, would turn his outrage and disgust into missives of poetic invective and withering, carefully-crafted vitriol and send them sailing into the ether and on to the screens of the poor interns tasked with sorting through such communications. Bob was something of a legend among said interns.

A breaking news alert caught my eye and I scanned it; the news sent waves of relief coursing through my very being. “At last,” I said aloud, “our long national nightmare is over!”

Bob’s eyebrow shot up and he looked over expectantly. “What? What is it? Is the war over?”

“War? No, Bob, not the war,” I replied as patiently as I could (Bob had strange priorities sometimes.) “The unjust incarceration of our queen is over, man. Paris is free!”

Bob’s eyes grew shaded. “Paris Hilton? You think our national nightmare was Paris Hilton being in jail?”

Ignoring the skepticism in Bob’s voice, I nodded. “Well yeah…it had to be hell for that sweet girl. No makeup, no cell phones, no photo ops…I hope she’s not permanently scarred because we need her so much.” I paused and sighed heavily. “C'mon, dude, even you have to admit that it’s been so very hard on all of us.”

My friend Bob glared at me silently for a long moment and then he shook his head. “You say these things just to hurt me, don’t you?”

“I too am America, Bob,” I said with an impish grin.

“Yes,” Bob agreed glumly, “unfortunately you are.”

“Hey,” I said reading from the news, “Barbara Walters said that Paris has found Jesus…or Buddha…or something…she’s a new, enlightened Paris following in the footsteps of Jesus, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Oliver North, and, I'm sure, Scooter Libby and turning her oppression into something that will enlighten us all!”

Bob rolled his eyes in righteous disgust and turned back to the paper. “I’m not listening to you anymore, Michael.”

“Ooo, she's going to tell all to our pal Larry King! This is gonna be so hot!” I gushed as Bob resumed his hunt for errors to bring to the attention of the newspaper’s interns.

I Remember Summer

I remember summer. I remember when summer really meant something to me…school was out (finally!) and the skies were bright and crystal blue and a whole world of amazing adventure beckoned with all of the time in the world to indulge it.

The kids in the neighborhood…my brother, my cousins, the kids from down the street, and the kids from around the corner…gathered (usually in our front yard) and we were off…raising heck (we were too well-behaved…and too wary of our parents…to raise hell), running and laughing and jumping and swimming and biking and dancing with all of our seemingly boundless youthful energy.

We would entertain ourselves while only stepping foot inside long enough to wolf down lunch and grab some new item with which casual childhood magic could be woven once taken out into the sunshine.

I remember summer. Saturday mornings were reserved for cartoons, Sunday mornings were reserved (by our mothers) for Sunday School, and most of the other daylight hours were ours to do with as we would. And, in those gentler times, we did everything we could imagine totally safe and secure in the streets and alleyways and front yards of our remarkably verdant Los Angeles neighborhood.

Yeah, summer…I remember when summer really meant something to me…

Afterwards...

Deliriously spent, they reluctantly slid away from each other. Lying side by side…just barely not touching…in the steamy, musky air of the moonlit bedroom, they closed their eyes and waited for their breathing to return to something more akin to normal and for their humid bodies to cool and stop tingling so intensely.

“Damn,” Nathan said after a short eternity.

“Yeah,” Della said knowing exactly what he was he was feeling because she was feeling it too. The man had a number of annoying traits, she thought, but Jesus did he know how to rock her world.

Nathan turned on his side his eyes lighting on the voluptuous curves of her breasts glistening with sweat in the golden moonlight languidly dancing in through the window. “Are you okay?” he asked solicitously. He always asked her the same question every time they made love.

Della smiled patiently. The earnestness of his question…the same question he asked every time they had sex…was both enormously endearing and utterly ludicrous to her. She nodded. “I’m fine, baby,” she said in a creamy purr. “I’m better than fine.”

Nathan allowed himself a moment of pride and relief and then he rested back on his pillow. Nathan was a thick bear-like young man whose powerful frame masked his fleeting but undeniable waves of insecurity and his sometimes aching need to please. He had never known a woman like Della and he couldn’t imagine that he ever would know her like again.

Della turned and snuggled into Nathan the way she loved to do. She was a woman of independent spirit but sometimes…just sometimes…she loved to cuddle into the warm comfort of Nathan’s encompassing embrace. Della was a woman of full, feminine curves…rounded breasts and rounded hips…but she felt delicate and safe in Nathan’s arms and sometimes…just sometimes…she really wanted and needed to feel delicate and safe.

Nathan stroked Della’s soft raven tresses and held her tenderly. He knew that he was more emotionally invested in her than he should have been…Della had asked him not to go there…but he didn’t care. He could hear her breathing slowing as she willingly surrendered to sleep. “I love you,” he whispered though he knew that she did not want to hear that.

Della, transitioning swiftly from the waking world to the dreaming world, smiled…patiently and ruefully at once…and snuggled against Nathan’s broad chest. “I know you do, baby,” she said without acrimony. “I know you do.”

Nathan felt her slip into sleep and, holding her securely, he closed his eyes and followed her into the realm of dreams.

My Father's Song

My father’s song…a symphony of so many things said and unsaid…waxes and wanes in my heart and in my memory as the winds of forgiveness shift and the vagaries of love and honor and regret and disappointment take their turns coming to the fore.

My father’s song…sweet soul music in better moments…was distant and all but inaudible in so many cool hours of my youth…so far away as to not be a viable comfort in the wee hours of quiet, lonely nights…but there, however faintly, just the same.

My father’s song…a plaintive blues in waltz time…was ever a promise that ever lingered just outside the realms of my everyday world and my dreamtime fancies.

My father’s song…a bittersweet rhapsody…called to my mother’s mighty heart, to my brother’s fragile soul, to my own wistful imagination but never completely filled our beings as we would have sometimes liked.

My father’s song…a tender ballad of days forever gone and days yet to come…waxes and wanes…shines and darkens…lingers and dances away…forever in my mother’s knowing eyes…forever in my brother’s eternal memory…forever in my own cynical heart and in my ever hopeful soul.

- for Bud -

Free Paris

Today I had decided that I was going to organize a march to protest the unjust incarceration of America's sweetheart...the strangely ubiquitous Queen of all Media...Miss Paris Hilton. But then it turned out to be such a gloriously blue and breezy spring day here South California that I blew that off and took a long, leisurely walk in the early afternoon sunshine by myself instead.

I am, of course, still fuming over the way "The Man" has treated Paris...but hey stuff happens (and I know that she would want us all to be strong and keep our heads held high while she's up the river in the Big House.) And besides I know that the media...especially the television folks...will keep us completely up to date on all things Paris (I'm pretty sure that they reported that she had regular bowel movements thanks in part to the oatmeal she had for breakfast today...though they forgot to mention if she had raisins on that oatmeal... )

Perseverance furthers, Paris. Stay strong, sweet pampered princess, stay strong.

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Strong Arms and Soft Lips

He had strong arms and soft lips…dark eyes that twinkled with mischievous wit and wisdom…rough-hewn and beautiful masculine curves and features that seemed to invite tender exploration…Terry found it all so wonderfully wounding that it stole breath from the body and gave light to the soul.

The sweet, steady song of his sleeping breathing was magical…Terry couldn’t imagine a sound more amazing, more lovely, more thrilling…especially in the first light of dawn as that song confirmed that the passionate, sweaty, carnally delightful magic of the darkling hours was more than just an aching trick of dreamtime.

He had a voice that rumbled melodically, that spoke softy and gave amble space for both quiet and dialogue…Terry found that so incredibly precious and rare that it was almost beyond belief…almost beyond desire…almost beyond reason and expectation.

Terry took a deep, hopeful breath as the man stirred to waking…as the promise of the night before teetered on the precipice of disappointment in the harsh light of an unforgiving morning.

He looked over and smiled that smile and looked out with those eyes and Terry sighed with relief and snuggled into a lingering good morning kiss. Strong arms and soft lips…Terry sighed with passion and allowed for the possibility of a thousand and one tomorrows started just so.

- for T & K (by request)-

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Decision '08 (a Talking with Bob interlude)

My friend Bob burst into my house with a mission. He was, I noted with some chagrin, in his crusader mode. “Who are you gonna vote for?” Bob asked without any preamble.

I wracked my brain. American Idol was over and I didn’t think that So You Think You Can Dance had opened their phone voting yet. I frowned and gave him my best puzzled look. “Vote for?”

“For President! President of the United States of America! Maybe you’ve heard of it???” Bob said with exasperation. “Who are you gonna vote for?”

I sighed to myself. Political conversations with my friend Bob were never a pretty thing. “Hadn’t really thought about it that much,” I replied truthfully. “Especially considering that this is June of ’07 and I don’t really have to make a final decision until November of ’08.” I knew that this was the wrong answer before I’d finished speaking but I was already committed so I went with it.

“No! No! No!” Bob raged indignantly, the veins in his forehead throbbing impressively. “This is the most important decision in the history of this country and you can’t sit on the fence until next year! The good people of New Hampshire are on the verge of moving their primary to Halloween of this year so that they can have the first say in who gets to move on! You have to choose and you have to choose now!”

I suppressed a smile. “Calm down, Bob,” I said solicitously.

Bob grabbed me by my lapels and drew me so close that I could tell that he’d had Hawaiian pizza for lunch. “A name, Michael,” he said, his eyes glowing wildly, “give me a name!”

I suppressed a laugh and shrugged. “Okay. Fred Thompson.”

Bob’s eyes went wide and then he frowned. “Because you agree with him on the issues?” he asked warily.

“Nah,” I said, extricating myself from my friend Bob’s grasp, “because he has the coolest theme song. They’re going to play the Law and Order theme everywhere he goes and that’s going to be so cool.”

Bob’s mouth fell open. “You…you…you…” he sputtered unable to grasp my seemingly flippant attitude to the most important decision in the history of this country. “I can’t talk to you anymore,” he said his voice low and icy.

“Gah!” Bob exclaimed, throwing up his arms as he spun on his heels and marched towards the front door.

“Nice talking with you, Bob,” I said not bothering to suppress a smile as I began to hum the theme from Law and Order.

Believing in Magic

“Don’t be afraid,” she said reassuringly, “you can do it.”

I smiled to myself…she was 6 and I was much older than 6 and she was the one telling me to be strong…to have a little faith…to believe in magic.

“I used to be able to do this, sweetheart,” I said looking down to the valley so far below. We’d climbed up the mountain together but now, at the summit, I was afraid. “I think I’m too old to believe in magic.”

She smiled…patiently and impatiently in the same instant…and held out her hand. “You never get too old to believe in magic, Papa,” she said guilelessly.

I took a deep breath and took her tiny hand in my ungainly paw of a hand. And, fighting the “wisdom” of my dotage, I stepped forward. We dipped down into the bracing summer’s breeze and then we began to glide…to soar…to fly.

“See?” she said smiling brightly and holding tight to my hand. “I told you so.”

“Yes, you did,” I smiled back feeling the wind in fact and the sun dancing on my back. We were flying…so high above the verdant valley…and believing in magic.

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