I lived in a studio above a garage; an old brick  carriage house with bamboo on the walls, tacked and taped by its former tenant, a Vietnam vet who lived there briefly. I never heard much about him other than he left in the middle of the night with gun in hand screaming, fuck you, to the world. He sounded like a perfectly rational person, a good human being who had just had enough. Needless to say, I could relate to this man. This symbol of courage and bravery. I assume he had courage and was brave, not necessarily because of his service to his country, but due to the fact he decided to leave it all behind and say, fuck you to all and sundry. Perhaps he was a lesson to us all. A man who realized he could not change anything on this earth for the better. Only heartache, disease, and pestilence throughout this world. And so I decided to call this place Kurtz’s  Tower. The horror. The horror.

I would stand in the window and watch cars pass by on Diversey and stare at the statue of Gothe. Maybe someday I, too, would leave Kurtz’s Tower yelling fuck you to the world as well. Nothing is possible. All is probable.

The futon on the hardwood floor was comforting to me. Often, I would lie there scribbling notes for a book someday, a big fat juicy book of sorrow and pain, along the lines of Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy. Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, War and Peace came to mind. Was I seeking pity? no. I merely wanted to tell a tale of how this world is constipated for God’s sake. How this globe was in need of  one giant bowel movement. Get rid of all the waste, all the shit that’s been clogging up the pipes for years. And I decided to write each day at a great pace like a speed freak. Saliva ran from my mouth, and sweat poured from my body as I structured each paragraph. But, what did I know about writing back then? Nothing. Nothing. But I did know this; happiness is the death of art. You might as well murder the work if you’re happy. Take it out into an alley and shoot it for Christ’s sake. Or, chop off an ear. And why not? Why not.