dmseay

Years ago when I was a kid.

I’ve always loved the highways of the U. S. As a kid I remember traveling on them in the back of a station wagon my dad was driving. I had my soda pop and my salami sandwich on white bread my mom had made me and a clear view of the road ahead of us. I kept one eye on the yellow lines and the other on bilboards, trailer parks, fast food places, Howard Johnson, mileage signs.

My dad would have on country radio. Some drunk singing about how a woman had broken his heart. Or, a woman telling a story of how she stood by her man. It was the perfect soundtrack for the road. Even at that young age I understood what they were talking about; that is, I thought I did.

We’d take the road across America. Switching from highways to toll roads to back roads and freeways. Crossing over lakes and rivers where men fished and power boats kicked up water. We’d drive from Indiana to Texas in one clear shot. Never did my father stop for the night. Driving under stars and the moon; mom snoring and Hank Williams singing into the morning. I stayed awake for every hour of it. Watched the sun come up in Texas in the early morning hours. Pulling into my grandparents driveway in Dallas just in time for breakfast. I never looked forward to seeing my grandparents, but, I always loved taking the road.

Standing on Route 66 outside of Joplin with my thumb out, I thought about my travels as a kid. Thought about where my love for the road came from. I think it came from my dad. He was always on the road. He and my mother would have a fight and he’d take off in the middle of the night. Not come back for days. He’d return and she’d ask him where he went to? Just driving, he’d say. Just driving. And she believed him. Had no reason no to. She knew he wasn’t cheating on her. Knew he wasn’t drinking. He just drove to clear his head.

Sometimes she’d get calls in the middle of the night from him. Telling her he was in Iowa, or, Nebraska, or, Colorado. Saying he’d be home when he felt like it. That’s what I’d become. A kid who’d come home when he felt like it. Hitchhiking across America, taking busses, getting rides from truckers, walking miles till I couldn’t walk anymore. The life of a nomad. And, I was surprised to see how many nomads there were in America. Men running from something, or, to something; a job, a woman, new beginning, fresh start, ending it all. Maybe I was always getting rides from the old man in spirit. Maybe it was always his ghost that picked me up and gave me a ride. Something was protecting me. Should’ve been gone long ago.

Present

There was a white hearse driving down my street today. A white hearse with dark windows. No one was following it. I wondered who was inside? Was there anybody being taken to the grave? Probably not. Most likely a gas run. Perhaps a wash. Preparing to take some one back to the earth. Some unfortunate; an elderly person dead of old age, a heart attack in an obese man, a child shot in cross fire. Or, maybe someone decided to end it with the swallowing of pills. Emptying out their medecine cabinet. There’s a million ways to die. But, the heart is a hard thing to stop. It decides when it’s over. In some cases people have pointed a gun directly at the heart only for it to keep beating. That organ decides it all.

It’s midnight and I stay awake thinking of the past and worried of the future. Lots of talk in the bars of the fortunes being made in this town. Houses selling at record prices. Rents going up and up. All through out high school they told us to be prepared for this; this adult life. The throwing away of imaginary things and dreams only to be replaced with the cold hard reality that some day you could be homeless. Or, you will be unable to support yourself. Tossed aside in a country that really does not care. And, you could go crazy, mentally ill. Giving up everything and just living day to day. Hour to hour.

I met a lot of people when I was out on the road. Some living in boxes under bridges. Others sleeping their days away in public parks only to become vampires at night fall. I met rich folks, charitable people who would buy me drinks and meals. Maybe they recognized that I was financialy under par. Maybe I’m not that clever. Could be my insanity had been apparent; no hiding it. I thought I had them fooled, but, no. They knew all along.

And these are the bar saints. Those that look over their flock. Coming to your rescue in times of despair. Buying you solace if only for an hour or two. They are business men who give back. Women that want to talk to somebody. Bartenders who listen. They gave me hope when I needed it the most.

I wonder where that hearse was going today? I wonder. And I sit in my room with my rent paid for the month. Leaving me nothing, but, dollars to spare. I will go to the bar tonight and look for saints. Hopefully they are not all gone. Hopefully.

Pigeons. There are hundreds of pigeons in Union Square Park. Signs say, don’t feed the pigeons. Some follow these directions while others do not; an old lady tears off pieces of bread for the birds. She talks to herself too; singing under her breath. Old songs. Songs that nobody listens to anymore. Except me. She hums the Billy Strayhorn tune Lush Life. I hum along with her. I know the words from way back. Years of listening to public radio after midnight in Chicago. I used to visit all the very gay places….come what may places…where one relaxes on the axis of the wheel of life to get the thrill of life…from jazz and cocktails…., those words still mean a lot to me as I look around and the sun shines through cold air. Vendors with their organic produce and cut meats. Different types of chocolates, ciders, a real feel of Christmas. And, I’m not even aware of what day it is.

Young junkies sleeping on benches. Seniors walking their dogs. Young professionals drinking coffee and reading the paper, or, flirting with a loved one. Strayhorn’s words ring again, Romance is mush…stifling those who strive….I’ll live a lush life in some small dive….And there I’ll be as I rot with the rest…of those whose lives are lonely too…., wishing I had some money honey to make these blues go away.

Who am I kidding? Bellevue awaits.

I see them on the streets, in subways, hanging out in parks. Talking to themselves. Answering their own questions. They are filthy and smell of feces. Holding signs. Asking for money. Yelling at passers-by. I sit among them. Clean, but in the same boat. Conversations rattle through my head. I mumble out loudly. Cold, lonely and scared. Did I want this? Perhaps I did when I gave up the meds. Five prescription drugs for bipolar disorder and I quit them cold turkey. I had to. No insurance.

Bellevue is a few streets over on 1st Avenue. I promised myself I wouldn’t go into the hospital unless the suicidal thoughts got really bad; they are. Perhaps I should.

The city is quiet for the most part. A few sirens go off. Making all aware that they are still in Manhattan. Bars have emptied out. Young Jerseyites and suburban revelers will be going home now. Back to the safety of their mothers arms. They wait in Grand Central, clutching tickets in one hand and a sixteen ounce beer in the other. Kids talking of clubs and bars, brunettes and blondes, rap music piercing through air, bouncing off walls, and each one looks the same. The blacks look white and the whites look black. Indian girls speaking in choppy speech patterns. New York dialects are starting to be lost. East coast dialects are starting to wane. I noticed this in Chicago and D.C. as well. Our speaking is becoming homogenized. Soon we will all sound the same. Brooklyn will no longer be Brooklyn and the Bronx will no longer sound like the old Bronx. It’ll be one sound. The sound of hip hop language. People will go back to writing in symbols. Emojis will take over.

I’m old. I’m fat. I’m confused. When did this change take place? Some say with the creation of the cell phone. Others say with the emergence in rap. We’ve become a mimicking society. A country of imitators. Maybe we always were.

I go to the gym for my daily shower. I rejoice in the clean underwear I have and laundered shirt. Been sleeping on benches and parking lots. Down by the Hudson. It’s not a lot of sleep. Soon I will have to move into a shelter. I’ve heard horror stories. The fights, the theft, pecking orders, guys out of Rikers. These are men who don’t care anymore. They’d just as soon slit your throat and call it a day.

Soon I’ll have to start working again. Looking for day labor jobs. Should be able to find something. My head is tired and my body is weak. The mania has become a full on depression. I stand here in the shower and let the hot water hit me. Dirt forms at my feet. I make a vow. Never ever go a day without a shower. No matter how bad it gets. Always clean yourself. And never beg for money. This is my new religion; clean body, clean mind. It makes me feel a little better. For now.

I wish it was still night. Wanting outside to be dark as I lie here in bed with my blinds closed. It is sunny and bright here. Ice from the night before melts on car windows; exhaust from pickups with bad mufflers fill the sky. The heat is on. I keep forgetting we’re going into winter.

Starting my day, I notice a Christmas tree in the window across the street. Are we really that close? Another year passed. And how strange this year was. Not like recent years. It was a year of settling, yet, unsettled. Moving into a rented room with the fear that at any moment the rent could go up. Or, the building sold and then kicked out. Or, I don’t know. Anything is a possibility.

No longer do I work. I never really did. Different jobs, different professions. I was fired from all of them, or quit due to anxiety and mania. One day I’d be in a newspaper office and the next leaving town; gone in a flash. Leaving a wife behind. Taking off across America as I always have. I should have been a truck driver. Too bad I’m scared to drive. I prefer taking the bus or a train. Hitchhiking on back roads and highways. Getting rid of my pickup was the best decision I ever made. I had a sense of freedom. Wasn’t weighed down by money. I could afford to be a bum. Or, a bipolar maniac. You choose.

Some would say, I chose this life. And maybe I did. Not sure if I chose it or if it chose me. I’m beginning to talk to myself more and more. The suicidal thoughts are constant. It’s going to be a long winter.

It is five in the morning on a Saturday and again I am awakened by the loud boisterous Mexicans driving down my alley. The sound of a tuba rivets my windows. The bass; the bass makes my ears split. The debris they throw in the back of the old weighted down pickup makes a screeching sound; metal upon metal. And there are voices speaking in Spanish. I can’t make out what they are talking about, but the term, Sabado Gigante, keeps coming up. Sabado Gigante I know. It is a game show on Univision that I somtimes watch; midgets running around in clown outfits and scantily clad women showing off their perfectly round backsides. Contestants are pulled from the audience and mahem ensues.

I close my blinds and I go back to bed. The noise of the early morning quickly disipates into nothing, not a sound while the morning sun makes it’s way into my room. It is another day. Soon the construction workers and the carpenters will be making different kinds of noise; hammers hammering, saws sawing, concrete mixers unloading, and more Mexican music.

Long ago before I moved away this town was quiet and small. It had less than a hundred thousand people living in it. Today there is well over two hundred thousand people in less than a twenty year time span. The growth is amazing. Neighborhoods being turned upside down. Homeowners make great profits while the renters are tossed aside to another neighborhood, or, outside the city. Landlords complain about their property taxes. What is fair and what is not? Upset because they are paying more than the rich in the suburbs where city council members live. In a way, everybody is getting screwed but the rich. That’s the way it goes in America. The rich decide. I start thinking back to my childhood with that idiot Regan showing a pie chart and explaining trickle down economics to the nation. It didn’t work then and it doesn’t work now, I say to myself. It doesn’t work now. Sabado Gigante indeed.

Wishing the mania would go on forever. Thinking the money will never end. But, it is. And a gloomy cloud of depression starts to build up inside. I sit in a diner owned by Greeks on Lexington eating an egg sandwich. The price isn’t bad; $5.50. I begin counting the money in my pocket. There are tens and twenties; long gone are the fifties and the hundred dollar bills. I’m below a hundred. I’ve got $88 to my name. The mania tells me to spend and spend it quickly. The depression also wants me to spend it in a rapid pace. And, I know the end is coming soon. There will be none. Then it’s back to hitting day labor jobs, calling friends to donate to the cause, family , anybody to keep me afloat; I’m sinking. The water is up to my chin.

I’ve been awake for almost a week now. I’ve walked all over this city. Sitting by the Hudson River, I look out across at New Jersey. I think it’s New Jersey; my sense of direction is off; No longer am I sure of what is south or north, east or west. I don’t know this city. I thought I did from my youth, but, I didn’t know it then either. I reflect on the time when I was eighteen and I came to the city with $500 on me. That was back in the ’86. I immediately got a room for $250 a month. I got a bartending job within a matter of hours. I was young and fit. I had no fears. It is now I realize that back then was the beginning of my down fall. Unable to keep jobs. Constant suicidal thoughts. Up all night combing the city looking for trouble. I lasted two months then returned to the Midwest with my tail between my legs. I think about that time and I begin to cry. I fully understand my life to be one catastrophy after another; job after job. Hospitalization after hospitalization. A million pills taken throughout my life. And for what? To make me feel better? To keep me alive?

Sitting on a bench looking at the Hudson. I lay my head down and the breeze blows. I fall asleep. I dream. I dream…

The mania is starting to wear off. I sit in Washington Square Park wondering what my next move will be. The month is November. I’m beginning to forget what day of the week it is. I think it’s a Monday. Not sure. Could be a Friday. People walk by with baked goods and coffee. I check my pockets. There is $200 left. I think of going into a bar and drinking myself to death. Then I think of jumping in the Hudson. Or, in a dramatic fashion, off The Empire State Building. If that is possible. Wild thoughts go through my head on a daily basis as they always have.

Folks protesting climate change are setting up under the arch. A man playing saxophone opens up his case to collect bills and change. He plays the Coltrane classic, Naima. I hear the notes and I begin to cry. There’s something about sound. Music makes me weep. It has since I was a child. Even when I was a babe I cried at the sound of music. A trumpet, piano, anything that strikes a note makes me tear up; either tears of joy or tears of sorrow; not really sure. Signs and literature are being handed out by the weather freaks. Maybe they’re right? It’s November and the temperature is 70 degrees in New York. Am I in New York? Maybe this is a dream. Maybe I’m in Florida? Or, Hollywood? Perhaps I’m in the Tenderloin section of San Fransisco? Now I see a naked woman being photographed in the center of the park and I realize I’m in New York.

She is a beauty. Tall and statuesque. Dark black skin and long brown hair. I think it’s a wig. She strikes different poses. Nobody seems to notice, but, me. I look on. Not in a lustful way, but, in a way of admiration. I want to tell her I think she’s beautiful. However, I don’t have the guts. Bukowski would have told her. Bukowski would have done a lot of things. So would Henry Miller. These men were fearless. Completely in touch with their own reality. I have yet to realize mine. Then again, some things are best unsaid.

I’ve been up off and on for 72 hours now. Taking cat naps on park benches. I call myself El Gato. I walk into the men’s room in the park and throw cold water on my face. I run my fingers through my greasy black hair. I look in the mirror. My face is sun burned. It is November and I’m sun burned in Manhattan. I check my belongings in my book bag. I still have clean clothes. I go into a stall and change. There is piss all over the floor and the toilet is clogged up. There is shit everywhere. All over America for that matter. I read a quick passage from Tropic of Cancer. Nothing has changed. Miller spoke the truth. Maybe America has always been this way? I just never realized it till I was confronted with the shit that is our land.

I walk out of the park past the protesters, leaving the musician behind, seeing couples holding hands. It is Novemeber and it’s 70 degrees in Manhattan. Take it while you can.

8th Avenue is a buzz. All of America is on full display as I make my way over to Broadway; Times Square. You see all of America in front of you. Advertisements after advertisements with blinking lights and loud music playing, Elmo, Spider Man, The Hulk, Big Bird, on every corner handing out flyers to see this show, or, experience a grand tour of Manhattan on a double decker bus, McDonald’s lit up like a beacon in the night, Olive Garden and TGIF has lines of people waiting to get in. The crowd is too much. I feel high from the manic state I’m in yet I also feel depressed as to what has happened to this part of the city; this country. The gentrification gods have done their work. Times Square looks like a circus. All they need are elephants and dancing horses to complete the job. I walk on with both eyes open and hands in pockets; cash wrapped in a safety pin. Hundred dollar bills, twenty dollar bills, tens and fives. A homeless man approaches me. I tell him I’m in the same boat then give him a twenty for good karma. God knows how much I’ve taken from people and never paid it back. Maybe this is my way of paying off my debts. I almost gave him a hundred. But, then I realized, I’m crazy, but not stupid. Or, maybe I am dumb for not having faith that the bum will be grateful and one day pass it along. Evangelicals and other Christians in America tell us to not give to the man on the street. He’ll spend it on booze and drugs, they say.  I say so be it. If he needs a bottle to get him through the night; so be it. Who am I to judge?

I find my way down into the Village where poets and punks used to hang out at one time. Gentrification has struck here too. Everything is nice and neat; clean. Almost too clean. It’s as if the hand of capitalism came swooping down upon them and cleaned from top to bottom, spic and span, every last bit of grime the neighborhood could muster. The streets sparkle.

On a barstool I find myself  sitting inside The White Horse Tavern. This is where Kerouac, Ginsberg and Burroughs plotted to change the world. Or, at least write some damn good poetry and prose. They say Kerouac was kicked out of here on numerous occasions for being drunk and disorderly, loud and obnoxious. God love him. We are all fools in God’s hands. Rumor also has it that Dylan Thomas died here by way of the drink. They say he collapsed right here on the floor. Research shows that is simply not the truth. He might have left his spirit here that night, but, his body was found at The Chelsea Hotel. The same hotel where Syd Vicious of The Sex Pistols brutally murdered his love Nancy Spungen. People line up in front of the place every day to take pictures. Midwestern tourists and Japanese on-lookers are told of the unspeakable. They are told of death and drugs and how now the neighborhood has changed; the city has changed. But, at what cost? The poor being moved out to Queens, the Bronx, Jersey City, Newark. Some even move as far away as Camden, New Jersey; a city that has still not gotten rid of it’s streets of crime.

It’s five o’clock in the morning and I’m hungry. Can’t find a dollar slice to save my life. As David Mamet said, Things change.