goblocker

Larry sits on his old footlocker. It’s been with him longer than the memories of her have. That, he takes solace in. It’s covered with stickers. He’s made a point of always grabbing a sticker when possible, adding it to the wallpaper of his life, as he calls it.

He once had another footlocker. But his Celica was too small that day he loaded as much of his stuff into it when he left her behind. It was the first thing he threw into the car, completely loaded down with stuff. But it just took up too much precious space. He knew he’d not make it back to get anything he left behind. It would be much too painful. He sighed when he had to leave it behind. It wasn’t the only thing he sighed about that day.

He was freezing cold sitting on the second footlocker of life. He wondered how many, if any of the old stickers still were visible on the old one. If the Moosehead Beer cutout was still on it. That was his favorite thing on it. That and the Luckenbach, Texas, sticker. He replaced the Texas one when he visited that town again. The Moosehead one? Not so much.

As he sat there, remembering things, Bono screamed out “We’re stealing it back!” from the shitty speakers he had jerry-rigged to his amplifier. He’d had those speakers since he was about 10 or 11 years old. They’d seen a lot, for sure. From his days of pretending to be Morris Day and dancing the “Oak Tree” in his old room in Virginia, to his fits of crying when the love of his life deemed him not important.

He knew that he’d done that to one person for sure, and probably two. So, he still had much to atone for. The shitty deeds always stuck with him. Way more than the average soul. Or at least it seemed that way.

The space heater was all that was keeping the frigid air at bay. He’d holed himself up in one room in his three bedroom “cottage” at the beach. His last paycheck paid his rent, with $30 to spare for the next two weeks.

He gobbed on it.

Spit…Tsssssssss.

Spit…Tsssssssss.

His reflection in the old cracked mirror above his dresser showed just how old he was getting. He looked a little like Paul Simonon now. Hair receding in a cool way, shaved way down. Crow’s feet slowly inching out from his eyes, more so from the left than the right. The gap between his front teeth solidified the look. If only he could afford a leather jacket and a cool fedora. Then, he’d be his own version of the coolest bass player in the world.

Spit…Tssssssssss.

Spit…Tssssssssss.

It amused him. It was gross, he admitted as much. But the sound of it was soothing for some reason.

It was noted by his lady friend of the moment that people tended to spit a lot more in New Orleans than they did in Biloxi. Or even Slidell.

“I had not noticed that,” Larry said when she mentioned that. It started him on a spitting kick. He used to spit a lot growing up in the Southern part of Virginia. A small down called Hopewell. Mostly redneck kids back then. Kids of factory workers for the most part. When his parents decided to move there, it had yet to achieve it’s moniker of “The Chemical Capital of the South.” But it wasn’t too many years after when it did.

Kepone was the talk of the town one summer. Dan Rather made an appearance, proclaiming to the huddle masses in front of the television that “People are dying in the streets of Hopewell!”

It wasn’t really true. Although, the people dying now due to those chemicals sure would make a nice story. But, those days are mostly gone for journalism. “It might make for a good book,” Larry thought, debating in his head if he could spend a couple of years in his old hometown again to work on this book. One that would probably be made into a movie one day, but not ever make him any money until some Hollywood player noticed it. Too bad his classmate who had a walk by part in “Evan Almighty” hadn’t made it bigger, he’d probably have a connection to get it made. He certainly was no Dick Ritchie. He decided that if his latest scheme to run off back to New Orleans and try to make a go of it in the town he never should have left in the first place didn’t pan out, he would do that. Hell, he knows the mayor now, she could get him a job.

Spit…Tssssssssss.

Spit…Tssssssssss.

He looked at his mini-fridge. He’d gotten so bad that he had that thing sitting outside, cooling his beer. It’s amazing that no one has either stolen it, or even worse, taken his beer. It’s right outside his window, on a stool beside his window. He opens the window. The 25-degree night air flows inside. He shivers. Grabs a couple of beers and closes the window.

“It’s been a long day, now I need to relax,” he says out loud like he has a habit of doing now.

Opening the beer with a nail in the wall, he smiles at his accomplishment of not spilling any of it.

“My brother-in-law would be proud,” he says, thinking of his sister’s husband. An almost famous keyboardist who could have been a lot bigger, but decided to be a family man instead. Larry used to think that his brother-in-law was bitter about it. The decision to give up the music to be a dad in Hopewell. Instead, now he knew better. As Ronnie Lane wrote, “I wish that, I knew what I know now. When I was younger.” Because my life would have gone in a lot of different directions if I’d just taken the time to look around and see that things in some places, really weren’t all that bad. Or, if I’d stepped out of a funk and met me, 20 years later, like Richard Hell described to me when I was 21 years old. If I’d met the me that was to be, I may have slapped myself. I certainly would not have had my way with myself, as Dickie Hell did, but I couldn’t be completely sure.

Fittingly, the gospel singers of “Rattle and Hum” belt out “but I still, haven’t found, what I’m looking for.”

Life is full of those moments. At least if you constantly look for them. Analyze them. And fuck your brain up with them.

Spit…Tssssssssss.

Spit…Tssssssssss.