1985 Chapter 10: Your Ride is here

As summer set in, the daily cycle was always the same. Wake up with the mother of all hangovers, work at 7, inside my head, and my music during my work, which happens mostly alone. I pumped the skidokans on the beach 2 days a week and took care of odd jobs, vehicle maintenance, and, exclusively, installing and replacing street signs around the island.

During this time to think, I was trying to devise a plan to become mobile again. It was summer, and walking everywhere was getting very old. I was finally changing from the mold that I arrived in Port Aransas in. Island or no island, you could not get me to change my blue jeans, t-shirt, Frye boots dress code. But this summer, the island began to wear me down. Shorts, no shirt, no shoes. I would not be caught dead dressed like this, but now, I could walk a hot asphalt road, or a yard full of sticker burrs (something Port Aransas lawns contained: a small, star-shaped, pointy burr with the strength of a Lego). 

As I was working on a plan to get a mobile, Jeri drove into the yard one day with the vehicle I most wanted to see again. Towards the end of our time working at the refinery in Corpus Christi, he had acquired a blue 72 Plymouth Valiant, a 4-door sedan. It was nothing to look at, but it did have the 225 slant six motor and transmission (more or less) that my Dart had. My Dodge had sat in the driveway since Jeri, and I rope towed it in from 18-mile road when the front ujoint dropped and destroyed the transmission, exhaust, power steering, and radiator on March 4th. 

When he last had this, Valliant, my Dodge was still on the road. Shortly after, he sold the car, and then my catastrophe happened. A few times, Jeri mentioned that he might be getting the Valliant back. I heard a noise outside, and there they were, Jeri and Odette, they were bringing the Plymouth to me and dropping it off.  It was in a bit rougher shape now. It was loud, and each side of the body had taken some kind of impact. The tires were bald, and the suspension was tired.

That was nothing compared to the interior. It had a blue vinyl bench seat in the front and back. But the front seat was just the metal springs; there was no upholstery or stuffing, just metal wiring, so there were two couch cushions on the springs. The driver's door had been hit, so it did not latch. However, a bungee cord was tied around the base of the steering column, and the hook could be attached to the driver's door handle to keep it closed. 

In the dashboard, where the heater and radio used to be, there was a jagged hole in the metal. Through the hole, a white electrical plug hung out a couple of inches. To start the car, you would turn the key to the on position, then pinch the two plug prongs together. You could feel the jolt of 12 volts zapping you as the starter engaged and the car started up. It had an exhaust, but it did not sound like it did.

It was a Saturday. I was so grateful to have a car and for the kids being with their grandmother that I told Dee we could take a ride off the island. We got in, all excited for the adventure we were about to have. We stopped at the local Ice Box, gas, and convenience store and got gas and beer for the road. While I was fueling the car, I noticed something hanging down underneath. Curious, I reached under and pulled. It was the tailpipe. The entire exhaust came off with it. I walked it over to the dumpster and threw it away. This way, I did not have to worry about it falling off on the Ferry or on the road.

It sure was nice to be on the road again. We took the ferry to Aransas Pass, Ingleside, Portland, and finally northwest Corpus. I showed Dee where I used to work, and we found a dark spot looking across the bay at the harbor bridge. It was here that she talked, and I listened. She told me the most horrific stories that I would ever hear in my life. It was amazing to me that she was still here to talk about it. At most later points in my life, I might have recognized that she really just needed time on her own to sort it out. I was too young in the here and now to get it. I did not know how to support her, so I just listened.

We drove across South Padre Island Drive and into Flour Bluff, then north on South Padre Island, on 18-mile road, Park Road 53 as it was known then, right through the area where my Dodge met disaster in March. We got all the way home. I pulled into the driveway, adjacent to my Dodge, which was beautiful compared to this bomb we were driving. As I drove nose-first towards the passenger door and right-front fender of my red-and-black Dodge, I pressed my foot on the brake pedal, and it just swung effortlessly to the floor with no resistance at all. We slammed into the side of the Dodge and came to a stop, rolling back a little.

D jumped out of the car, cussing all the way. "I got my own two feet, I don't need this!" I was in shock. "I LOVE that car! Do you really think I would do that on purpose??? The brakes did not work at all!" From that day forward, I needed to keep in mind that every once in a while, the brake master cylinder would simply blow its seals, leaving no brakes at all, and I would have to "figure something out."

I did not have the money to pay someone to swap the transmission from this car into my car, so I took the easy way: I drove the Valiant. Despite its car from hell aspects, it sure beat walking. 

We used it for everything, but pretty much stayed on the island now. Dee's sister Anna and the so-called brother-in-law Horace went everywhere in it, too. The only thing he was pretty good at was fishing. But, really, when you live on an island off the South Texas Gulf Coast, how could you not be?

Horace and I clashed constantly. He always said that he and I were with the wrong sister. His "wife" and I liked the same bands, and he, in a very immature way, used that as a way to make passive-aggressive statements that the opposite configuration would somehow work better. So much for him being an advocate for Dee's ex-husband. Although I was criticized at every opportunity, never directly, but in an undertone. I was riding along with Dee, who wanted to help her pregnant sister. Deep down, I knew this guy was not worth a thought or consideration from me, so, in a strange state of duality, I balanced it against the times when he was outright up to no good.

Horace also had no problem riding in my car. He did actually complain about its condition a time or two, but I told him he did not need to ride in it and that his feet could take him anywhere he wanted to go. Of course, he twisted that around to mean I was insensitive for talking about putting his wife out and walking. I told him I was not talking about her.

Horace fished frequently and one time, stupidly left a fish in the car, in the hot South Texas summer sun. I finally had to take the car up to the Landfill and blast it with the Skidokan cleaner, which had a flashpoint of 74 degrees, using a 1-inch high-pressure hose.

I did all I could to keep the peace and was even helping Anna and Horace move into a trailer from some cottages they were living in. We made a couple of trips and were all done around an hour before sunset. We took a break, sat on the truck of the Valiant, drinking beer. 

Suddenly, the Port Aransas Fire Department engine came in with its red lights on. They stopped and got out. "We have a report of a car fire." We looked around. "There's no car fire. We would notice that." Still, the firefighters walked around the cottages, looking around, when one of them suddenly pointed to the Valiant: "It's THIS car! It's on fire!"

I reached into the car through the window and pulled the release. They opened the hood, and sure enough, under the fuel pump, near the exhaust, fuel was dripping out of the weep holes at the bottom of the pump and igniting from the exhaust heat, setting the motor mount on fire. It was a small fire. One of the firefighters pulled the fire hose from the truck and blasted the engine with enough high-pressure water to put out a small building.

I felt this overkill was intentional. Defiantly, I closed the hood, jumped in the car, and wanted so badly to start it, give the helpful firefighters a friendly wave, and say "hey, thanks guys!" then drive away. Unfortunately, they got everything way too wet, and the car did not start till the following morning.

Because of this new issue, I decided to try to swap the transmissions one weeknight. We towed my Dodge to the City Maintenance shop, but by 11 PM, I realized I was way over my head and gave up. 

To deal with the car catching on fire if it ran for 15 or more minutes, I kept a gallon jug of water in the back seat floor. Pull up to the Family Center IGA to pick up some groceries for dinner, shut off the car, open the back door, open the hood, dump water on the fire in the engine compartment, close the hood, put the water jug back in the car, and get groceries. It was the routine. Deep down, though, I knew that if I did not do something soon, I might not even have this transmission for my car.

The final straw was when the engine started to knock really badly. I was still driving it; it was still catching on fire, and there was a persistent fish smell I could never get rid of. I went and talked to a local mechanic I had met during my A Auto Supply days. He told me to bring both vehicles to him, and $300, and he would make the swap.

It was amazing to have my real car back again. But it still had no power steering. The exhaust was damaged in the drive shaft incident, and I was having electrical issues. Port Aransas was taking its toll, but this was still a thousand times better than the Valiant, which we towed back home and parked.

September was here, and as colossally messed up as my life was, it seemed to be getting better. Our relationship dynamic had not changed. At times, we did well, and looking back on that, I could easily see those moments through the lens that said Dee and I were friends. All the other times screamed that she needed to be on her own; ironically, so did I. But I was not ready to see that, and she did not have many options for a place to live with 3 kids, so she sort of needed me, too. She could have and would have figured it out if she had to, but this was sort of working for now.

I was so busy trying to stay ahead of my life that would disintegrate at any moment that I did not get to see my Dad outside of work very much. I still hung out with him and Brooke, but it was not nearly the way that it had been before Memorial Day weekend, when all of this insanity began.

Undone in the Meltdown

The voices all around me rejoiced,

Freedom has finally come.

Lying down snow shovels in the armistice,

There was joy, tears, and relief until I noticed the whole scene had been left undone.

In the ash, in the smoke, I saw the wounds that we did not know how to fix 

They were abandoned for lack of direction.

I knew then, I needed to minister to all those left undone, unfulfilled, and unquenched 

Of course, I harbored fear of being caught in the gravity well of my mess that I could not see for 5 months

All of which had ended my life in the last revolution. 

But I knelt down and aided one fallen two years ago, and within hours, it leaped to its feet and danced a dance of freedom and humility.

Another hill to climb that I could not allow myself to even touch, I laboured for hours until its conclusion, and it joined the dance of liberation. We recoil. We mourn, we search for answers, and when none come, we have to get off the floor of the saloon, brush ourselves off, and walk out the door.

In my limitations, I feel like I am falling short. I have made promises, and I see them out of the corner of my eye as if they are piles of dirt underneath the carpet.

While there are some things we should never return to, I am finding that others, especially the things promised, need to be revisited, reevaluated, and addressed.

Then I ask, what was the collective combination of tasks that caused me to lose my footing and fall hundreds of feet, making no gain last year?

My burns and abrasions remind me of the missteps. I open the journal, and the tour guide looks suspiciously like me.

He is lean and fearless and still has the big goal in his words. Where did that stop?

Turning the page, I find another guide. His adventures are so much more than mine. He just liberated himself from his chemo drip; the hills he climbs have changed dramatically.

The visitors over the last week have been stark reminders of the need to test everything you can touch, everything you can see. We lie to ourselves and say it can't be done.

And you would be right if you listened.

But no.

You can be as wrong as you want to be.

It is up to you.

It is up to me.

1985 Chapter 9: Despite Repeated Warnings

 There was nothing I would not do for Dee. I gave her the attention she had craved for the last decade. Although that was good for her, what she really needed was to be alone and find out who she was. When you start having children at 16 and are an excellent Mom, you put yourself on indefinite hold. Now that she was free of her former life, what she really needed was to let herself grow and see what she had within.

She told me about experiences that were so dark and brutal, I never looked at the world the same again. I fell in love with her, not in a healthy way, but in this weird duality of ways. First was a sort of hero worship in which, despite inhumane adversity, Dee maintained a loving bubble around her children. The second was that I felt a primal desire to rescue her and somehow undo her past. This was a leftover, ingrained childhood habit of mine from taking the position of protecting and guiding my mother through trials. My mother really did not need me worrying or trying to fix things, but at the time, I thought I was having some effect.

I don't think there is anything more powerful and destructive than an ignorant young man in love. I had no clue. I did not let that stop me. I was going to fix everything. I had never stood up on my own in this world. I was 19; for the most part, I had lived with either my parents or grandparents, with a couple of summers when I lived alone in campgrounds. I made $355.79 on the 1st and the 15th of every month. You could not tell me anything.

Photo by Todd Trapani on Unsplash

Because our relationship began so feverishly, it caught the attention of Dee's so-called family. Her Mom lived on the island, so did one of her sisters. Anna was pregnant and in a common law marriage with Horace, who used to work for the City, as I was now. He was a brutal antagonist. He had some strange connection to her ex and took everything I said as a derogatory statement aimed at him. I tried to find common ground with him, but it never worked. As time went by, I tried so hard to win that battle, which meant lowering myself to what he was. It took me only 3 years to mature to see that this guy was the lowest of the low. Lowering myself to him to relate was pathetic. I had no compass. All I wanted was what I wanted. When I look back, what an absolute freak show this had to be for my father to witness. I feel eternally bad that during this time, I gave my father nothing to be proud of. In large ways, I showed him the worst of what I was while he was still here, more than I showed him the best.

Speaking of him, he was the only reason I did not end up dead or at least ambushed and beaten up within an inch of my life. Her ex and the so-called brother-in-law would have loved to do this. Fortunately, they were extremely afraid of my father, which allowed me to walk with immunity.

Dad and Brooke moved out of Jeri's old mobile home on Avenue J were we had been living since last fall, and moved into Charlie's mobile home on Oleander. That was bigger, much more fancy, and was on stilts, as many houses are on the island, so it sat 20 feet off the ground.

My new little family and I moved out of the cramped travel trailer in Mayfield's Park and into the mobile home on Avenue J. Not long after, her ex came and took the trailer and his VW Bus; he needed a place to live. Having the extra room was nice. I was trying to make this perfect life for us, but there were red flags and warnings almost hourly for the person with their eyes open. Mine were shut, but I swore to everyone voicing concern that they were open.

Dee needed her cycle broken, and with me it was, but that was the part she did not need. At nineteen, I was too naive to see it. Everything with us was intense. Anna and Horace were with us so much of the time. He could never "find" a job and was supposedly out all day, every day, looking for one. His presence was more problematic for me than for everyone else. He was a drain on everyone around him. Every word spoken was a passive-aggressive manipulation.

It did not take a genius to see that he wanted Dee and that all his so-called loyalty to her ex was just leverage to keep me away from her. She loved a little buzz, and he knew it, so he made sure to show up with a little pot to share with her now and then. I never knew where he got it because he was not capable of earning any money. 

We all drank. It was a way of life in Port A. A twelve-pack was legal tender. A windfall would be if you were walking on the beach and spotted black trash bags in the surf containing marijuana that was jettisoned off smugglers' boats, being approached by the US Coast Guard for inspection. The weed would be waterlogged, making it substandard. But it was like a redneck lottery in which the finder would dry it out, bag it up into small sales portions, and sell it for fifty cents on the dollar. Sea Weed it was called. The brother-in-law was frequently associated with these seaweed dealers and had some of this garbage on him.

He was always trying to get Dee alone and found many ways to do so. This consumed me with rage because I wanted her to tell him to get lost and never come back. It put a hole in me all day long as I worked. I was consumed with jealousy and worry. She and I worked at the same place and the same hours. There was one time she had the afternoon off. As I came down Park Road 53, driving past Avenue J, I could see Dee's ex's 10-speed bike parked in my driveway, next to my dead car, which had not moved since the Great Dodge Space Time Disaster on March 4th. We walked and rode bikes to get around the island.

There were times her ex would stop by to see the kids, which, of course, was ok, but the history bothered me. I had heard about the bad, but I knew there were also many good times. The whole thing was too much for my immature brain to comprehend. Everything for me was a dance with hidden knives everywhere. 

One Saturday morning, Dee walked to the store for milk. She was missing for hours. I had searched all over the island for her. I eventually found her at a woman she worked with's house, mellowing out and visiting. At any other time in my life, I could have understood this as no big deal, but in the here and now, I could not believe she would be so insensitive as to make me think something had happened to her. It should have been my wake-up call that she really needed to start her life alone to work through the last 12 years. She was carrying so much. 

Every day was like self-inflicted conditioning for me, like Alice Cooper's No More Mister Nice Guy. I was an innocent, yet overbearing kid, just wanting to shower this amazing girl with all that was good. Most of the time, it was met with limited tolerance, anger, a lack of appreciation, and retaliation that seemed out of place. While it did not feel like it at the time, she was molding me into a very different person from the one I started out as. Somewhere down the road, despite all of the pain, the dying daily inside I felt, and inflicted upon myself, I would grow to become thankful for her and all of it. It was brutal and dark, but it wasn't her fault. She was always trying to tell me what she needed, and I could not hear it. 

I tried to do things with her, Brooke, and Dad. Those times provided a little few hours of releif from my panic. It was clear that Dad and Brooke saw no good in this union. They were right, of course, but I could not be told. I have never met a person more stubborn than I was here until I saw my sons grow up decades later.

The summer played on. I was a tense, twisted knot of a person wishing that I could fix everything. I did not even have a car, which made me feel even more powerless. My Dad, who had been my best friend for over a year, was now watching from a distance that I put him at. It had to be like watching a heroin addict slowly slipping into the abyss.

I drank hard to numb the orchestra of torture I was feeling. I showed up to work so hungover every day. I worked mostly alone, so my 1977 Chevy Pickup and its 8-Track player, with my cousin Tom's old 8-Tracks, brought me some soothing. But the fact remained, I was into something that I had to figure out a way to get Dee away from these parasites of her past.

My Grandmother had recently made public that she was going to give her car to my father. He said he did not want it. So, I called her and told her about an idea I had: Dee, the kids, and I would all move to Connecticut, and if she was giving Dad the car and he did not want it, we could use it to get our lives up there started.

My Grandmother has had to deal with adversity that I cannot imagine. She handled this well with me, always speaking lovingly but with absolute direction, not the direction I wanted. I am sure that the next time she talked with my father, he probably told her there was nothing he could do because he had tried. 

The conversation I did not know about was the one she had with my Grandfather. She was my father's mother. She called my mother's father. "You're his Grandfather. You have to get through to him. He is ruining his life. You have to go down there and talk some sense into him." As if that would ever happen, my Grandfather coming down to Port Aransas, to his ex-son-in-law's city of refuge. 

The summer days and nights continued to eat at me like cancer. Highs and lows. Listening to lies conjured up by Horace's unscrupulous lack of morality. Dee even spent a Friday night at her ex's to "talk." I kept trying to mold everything into something I could somehow understand and manage. The whole time, it was like running ahead of a title wave that I knew I could never outrun. no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much help I received, I could not get any part of my life or the lives of those around me under control. 1985 was a little more than half over, and it was going to get worse.

Lunch Break: Peak Hour

 It was really something,

you should have been there.

I was forever young, forever strong.

Time did not pursue me, though it somehow pursued me in dreams.

Power to do existed any time, any day.

That was never a thought whatsoever.

Every hill I saw, I dreamed of climbing.

The sun was at high noon, and I took energy directly from it.

It lasted an eternity and had no end.

Now I stand on the opposite edge of the canyon

I can barely see the other side upon which I once stood.

I was strong and invincible; 

It seemed even time itself could not smite me.

Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash

Then I blinked...

And here I am.

Pain lives where my strength used to be.

The keepers of harsh wisdom used to warn me

I thought, what could they possibly know about me?

I was so ignorant

because they were indeed me.

On the other side, I was limitless.

I only lacked money and focus.

That first thing never matters, 

That second one burned my most precious possession: Time.

Peak hour was wonderful and it was wasted.

Does this happen to everyone?

Or was I just a fool?

I never knew I had such power.

I stepped through each day playing trivial games, 

Having empty conversations.

Peak hour was beautiful because I had no pain.

Little did I know I was banking it, so that it could grow in interest.

Today, I am paying a young man's debt.

I try to share wisdom with the young ones today.

It always looks like something else.

Dear Leonard, you nailed it when you said:

"and I lift my glass to the awful truth, 

that you can't reveal to the years of youth, 

except to say it isn't worth a dime."

I speak, but most of my words can only be heard after I am gone.

If only we could save peak hour for later on, 

what could we do with that?

Instead, I rambled along my peak hour, spreading poison on the very 

fruits that I must survive on later.

Peak hour was beautiful, and it was tragic

And it made me into this.

Is that good or bad?

I will never know.

Tired

 Tired of the wind

Tired of erosion

Tired of the lack of completion

Tired of no resolution

Tired of the exhaustion

Tired of the math problem.

Photo by Majestic Lukas on Unsplash

Contemplating all that grows in incarceration

No sunshine yet thriving

Hey, mister, can you tell me

What do you know, how do you think, what do you have?

Tired of the dreams

Tired of the weakness

Tired of the noise that never stops

ticking like a timebomb through the day

Tired of the secret life

in which I am stronger, faster, better.

Tired of deficiencies, reminders, and potholes.

I am tired of ice

Tired of the cold

I do not have the time to follow the sun to stay warm

Nor do I have the energy to make the trip.

Time is the great reckoning

I don't know how to negotiate

So I enter the room

making demands like I own the place

with no hope of ever backing it up.

I am tired of annexing what I need to survive

never knowing if  I got it right.

Is the paycheck the same if I just let go?

I am tired of the fever dream

the hysterics, the unprecedented antics

that changes with every tick of the second hand.

Facimille, paths not taken, and fiction

Tired of it all.

Just tired.