"To most men the past is never yesterday, or five minutes ago, but
distant, misty epochs some of which are glorious and others abominable." - Henry Miller
"Excuse me!" he whirled, on the airplane in flight, to the fat woman sitting behind him and armed to the teeth with a duty-free magazine.
The woman had rolled up that weapon and clocked him over the head with it ... because he'd had the temerity, in flight, to recline his seat into her overweight lap.
"Excuse me!" he whirled ... and the woman played dumb, trying proudly to play like she hadn't just done that.
I wonder where those two are right now?
I think of the 'ones who got away' sometimes ... those fleeting passengers through my life, who wouldn't have reason to think of me, but nonetheless made their impressions felt and registered on my akasha.
I think of the 'ones who got away' ... From the roadside café in Pennsylvania, that angry, long-legged bird with ripe plumage ... I spied her storming, arms crossed, smoking, stomping down the roadside, carless ...
Left my café booth to ride her.
Many years later, this hotel AV gig ... The "V" guy (I was doing "A") raced sloppily through his post-show chores, because, as he put it, "the wife" promised him "a little fun" if he managed to get home early that day.
I cried at the innocent beauty of life ... then went home to my own wife and "fun" of our own, as we fought about money and tore down our scene.
Growing up, on a ship, northern Michigan waters ... My little baseball cap blew off. A fair-haired, red-nosed Minnesotan joined me hanging over the railing, waving my baseball cap bye-bye. Her name was Dawn, that's all I know ...
I wonder where Dawn rises now?
Little League, early effort at teamwork ... I whacked that baseball almost out of the park. Watched it sail, like Icarus, into the sun. Then I chased it ... past first base and into the outfield.
No one told me where to run! No one told me what to do when I hit it ... I had a coach (and had a dad ... but Dad cared as little about sports back then as I do now, if that's possible (and if not less) ... My dad can't be faulted.
No one told me where to run! No one told me what to do when I hit it ... I had a coach (and had a dad ... but Dad cared as little about sports back then as I do now, if that's possible (and if not less) ... My dad can't be faulted.
... I guess.).
I asked the coach which way to run ... What to do, if I ever hit a baseball. Not believing, dismissing my foolish question -- because in Coach's athletically fit, trim mind, it couldn't be anything but foolishness -- he answered my dumb, yet sincere, ask with sarcasm.
"See that scoreboard?" he chewed and spit, and smiled sort of shittily. "Ya run out there, climb up that fence and touch it! Then run back to the dugout when you hit the ball."
He said that. I did it.
... My dad watched, his heart sinking faster with each step my cleated feet took, charging and high-stepping out toward that scoreboard ... racing the ball I just whacked toward the sky.
I wonder whatever became of that coach guy?
With every year that passes by, the incidents, visages, in my mind's eye grow clearer, taking on lives of their own as my own life counts down toward an inevitable 9th inning ... beginning now, slowly, to stretch toward the 7th ...
I look back, slow motion sometimes, sometimes smiling, and think of the ones who got away.
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| "The Memory", ©Jeff Glovsky |
