PFK1 (31 page)

applied by the mean old hag to my brothers, my sisters, and me.

Thank you very much.

Our generally ineffectual, absent father abandoned us to her

cruelties. And, when he was around, chimed in with his own.

Goddamn them both to hell.

Mushrooms can be very enlightening in many other ways, too.

There was a quite a lot of interesting stuff, much of it sexual, that I

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will develop later. But I have truly seen the other side, and in the final

analysis, I am a good boy and always will be.

* * * *

November 12, 1978

Chesley came down on Friday and we spent most of the weekend

with Harry and Nick, drinking and eating, relaxing and talking. We

did not take any mushrooms as Chesley is too chicken to try them and

I didn’t feel like doing them alone.

So it is with
teonanactl
– Flesh of the Gods. They make you see

life as it truly is, stripped of illusion, and at hyper light speeds.

Reality crashes through all of your carefully constructed defenses.

There is only this moment and you must live it to the fullest, with

malice toward none.

Mushrooms should be part of any religious observance, in my

opinion. They are the one true form of transubstantiation. So fleeting

and beautiful are we who are here.

The little brown Liberty Cap. The Magic Mushroom.

The pathway through which I saw God.

A nature writer, Richard Haard, once described the Liberty Cap as a

relatively low potency mushroom. Then he reported a momentous

experience, when this seemingly insignificant fungi ripped the shit out

of him after he got careless with them.

Fortunately, I am reverent in my approach, and so far have been

treated kindly. I do not take these holy specimens for mere

amusement. I take them for their instructive powers.

Meanwhile, I am still hoping for the best with my book. At the

same time, I realize that nothing truly matters on that front. My petty

little book. My petty hopes and dreams.

On Sunday, Nick went to Portland with Chesley. He wanted to

prowl the bookstores up there. One in particular is booming these

days, a new place over on NW Burnside, called Powell’s. Chesley is

going to put Nick up for a couple nights.

On another front, Harry is feeling nervous about his affair with the

23-year old daughter of his boss at the post office. He is concerned

about what will happen if he tries to dump her. So far they have had

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sex three times and already she talks eagerly of diamond engagement

rings and honeymoon cruises.

"Goddamn!" Harry said. "I’m divorced from Shana less than a year

and what have I gotten myself into?"

We all laughed.

* * * *

November 13, 1978

Finished Chapter 6 yesterday. Now on page 42 of the manuscript.

Must halt progress for a while to write some letters. Say – isn’t today

the same day Felix Unger’s wife made him leave home? Yes, I

believe it is.

We should call November 13 Felix Unger Day.

I’m freezing in this place. Now I have to go wash clothes.

Shit. I despise these mundane chores. It wouldn’t be so bad if I

could share them with somebody. Clean clothing for work is a

necessity. I bore even myself writing of such trifles.

Time moves so swiftly. I wish I could slow it down, or even freeze

it. It is like a drug to me. The more time I have, the more I want.

Right now, at this moment, I feel like everything is going great. I

can’t get Megan to say she loves me (not yet) but I feel as if it is not

far off. She says she is going through with her divorce and has

retained a lawyer.

This is so great. Two birds of a feather, finally out of our self-

imposed cages and ready to fly. The possibilities seem endless. We

could have so much fun together.

It makes me inspired. The next book I write will be a big fat one,

with lots of characters and surprising twists and turns.

Maybe call it
Ding A Ling: A Typical American Childhood
. Right

now with
The Dark City
I’m pitching what they call in baseball a

"change up."

Then I will go back to my regular fastball.

Such as it is.

* * * *

November 16, 1978

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Stayed home from work today so I could write. Called in sick.

Things are slow there anyway. Megan stayed with me last night after

we came back from a welfare workshop in Eugene. I am in love –

there are no two ways about it.

Sent a Christmas package to Mick on Monday. Included were

books, tapes, letters, photos, mushrooms, and some oddball items, like

a can opener and a Swiss Army knife. I hope he likes it. He should

get it in late December. I packed it nice and tight.

Wrote to the union on behalf of the clerical staff here at work.

Those goddamn managers are always fucking over the lowest paid,

least appreciated workers. At the same time, incompetent ass kissers

like Elmore sail right on through.

Same sorry story with the tattletales. The world of work is just like

grade school, I’m afraid. I just wish we could take the sneaks and

bullies and kick the shit out of them like we did in grade school. That

would be such fun.

I’m not sure how I could explain it to the cops, though. However

much the manager and her hatchet person might deserve it, the

authorities would have a hard time understanding why it was

necessary to pound the shit out of a couple of mean-spirited 60 year

old biddies.

Later: Megan came by on her afternoon break to check up on me.

She told me nothing was happening at the office and today was as

good any day to skip out.

I tried to get her to make love before she went back. She laughed

and told me to hold my horses. She said she will come see me later

tonight and we can do it then. I whined and told her I couldn’t

possibly wait that long. She kissed me and went back to work.

What stupid fucking jobs we have. The managers and the rest of

the idiot bureaucrats take it so fucking seriously. I consider it a

complete joke. Really, all we do is shell out a few peanuts to the

poor. The military probably spends more money on toilet paper than

we dispense in ADC benefits.

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I do this work because it is totally a breeze and because I need a

job. It supplies medical insurance and a (sort of) decent salary. There

is no other reason.

Never will it be a career for me.

* * * *

November 17, 1978

If all goes well, I should be done with Chap. 7 by Sunday night.

And because it is going well I am in a pretty good mood. Megan

came by late last night to see me. We locked the door and closed the

curtains and didn’t get up until twelve hours later.

We took a long shower together this morning and ate breakfast

here. I made it. Scrambled eggs and fried potatoes with freshly

squeezed grapefruit juice, buttered whole wheat toast and two cups of

Nick’s gourmet coffee.

Megan is what she calls a lacto-ova vegetarian, which means that

milk and egg products are okay, but not meat. She will also eat a bit

of fish every now and then.

She is without question the most beautiful woman I have ever slept

with, bar none. She is tall (5’ 8"), with a very slender figure and

incredibly long legs. Small, perfect breasts. A really gorgeous

bottom. Absolutely incredible. Her rear end is shaped exactly like an

upside down heart and has pronounced dimples just above her

waistline.

Have mercy. Were it not for Megan’s exceptional intelligence and

a pronounced feminist streak, she could be a fashion model. What a

body. Goddamn, is she ever gorgeous!

Holy fucking Moley!

What she sees in dorky me we shall never know.

* * * *

November 23, 1978 Thanksgiving

Finally finished Chap. 7 of
The Dark City
. It took eight days to

write six pages. I sure hope the rest goes a little faster than this. I’m

also preoccupied with stress from my job. Not from the work, which

is relatively easy but from the office politics. The managers are such

jerks.

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You would think that the essential purpose of a welfare office is to

serve the poor. But no, the welfare office appears to exist in order to

provide the managers with prestigious, high-paying employment.

They act as if this is their private little empire and they can treat the

vassals however they wish. It’s clear to me that I am not long for this

scene. I’m outta here the first chance I get and I want to take Megan

with me.

If she’ll come.

Nick and I watched football at Harry’s house this morning for a

while.

Eventually, the Cowboys started to overpower Washington so I

came back up here. I wanted to write. Megan will arrive later this

evening and have dinner with us. The menu will include homemade

tomato vegetable soup, a crisp green salad, and grilled cheese

sandwiches.

Harry is in Los Angeles visiting his mom and dad. They are both

Jewish and he expects to be cross-examined heavily about a variety of

issues, but at least his daughter will be there to run interference for

him, he says.

Last night Nick and I watched an amusing Steve Martin TV special.

I’ve changed my mind about Steve Martin. He is pretty funny.

Harry’s neighbor on the other side (Joyce) and her boyfriend Scott

watched it with us.

Scott is more or less a regular guy. He has no real job, drinks a lot,

and won’t marry Joyce because he still needs to "find" himself. She’s

29 and desperate for marriage and a baby.

Harry says Joyce isn’t aware that Scott has cheated on her

repeatedly in the course of their relationship, because if she knew she

would break up with him. Scott is about Nick’s age, in his early 30’s.

As I see it, guys like Scott are the rule, not the exception. I feel sorry

for Joyce, though, who seems pretty sweet and physically I think she

is quite lovely.

If I were Scott I would fall for her like a leaf.

Reading Richard Nixon’s memoirs. They make me to laugh a lot,

although I know I’m not supposed to. A simultaneously talented and

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tormented man. I find Nixon endlessly fascinating, and read

everything about him I can lay my hands on.

Time to get stoned and start writing.

* * * *

November 28, 1978

The rain has been falling nonstop for three days. I finally bought

new tires for the VW. Damn – I almost made the other ones last two

years. The price was $68.90 for the pair.

Geez. Vehicles are such a drain. I hate them. The wet weather is

very hard on my machine.

Thinking about moving in with Nick once he gets his house back

from Clarice. He says he needs a roommate to help with the increased

payments required to buy her out.

Apparently, Clarice is going to pocket a tidy sum following their

divorce, from the sale of Nick’s printing business and the refinancing

of the house.

Almost the whole time they were married, Clarice studiously

avoided working, including at the business. Her energies were

devoted to political advancement and social climbing. Briefly, she

tried to get pregnant but it turns out that she can’t. Now she walks

away with a nice payday. Thirty grand is not a bad haul for what

started as a one-night stand.

* * * *

November 29, 1978

More rain rain rain. Four days of nonstop rain. It’s cold, too. I

gave the landlord my notice because Clarice has assured Nick that she

will be out of the house by the 15th of December.

We can move in then. I will get the upstairs room and will

experience a slight reduction in rent payments.

I’m sending
The Dark City
off again tomorrow, this time to an

agent. The last publisher rejected it, gently but firmly. So be it.

Wrote another query letter for it. A slight improvement. I really

don’t know what to say to these people. The book speaks for itself.

That is all.

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Talked to Chesley today on the phone. Our pal Randy is jealous

because Chesley dates Shirley now, the woman Randy cheated on his

wife Wilma with back in February.

Chesley is very amusing when describing Randy’s petulant antics.

Cracked me up.

* * * *

December 3, 1978