A FEW EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK:

MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT! - One Primate's Search for Intelligent Life

and

ADVENTURES IN MARINE BIOLOGY

Life Experiences that Compel me to Help Alleviate Hunger and Poverty 

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

1965

Hunger My Constant Companion

      The New Islet River was less than a hundred yards from our house. This stretch of river between Sneads Ferry and Camp Lejeune was briny. The river’s fresh water drove out towards the ocean from inland, co-mingling with the Atlantic’s salt-packed water, which was simultaneously forced inland on its eternally crashing waves. Both of these sources blended together creating a slurry for a greater range of life than supported by the average river, the mix of marine and fresh water allowing fresh water fish and turtles to live right along side many species of animals usually found only in very salty waters.

      I loved walking down to the river’s edge, exploring and hunting for food. I could sense the power of the river was vibrant with life. It did not possess the rumbling power of a large river cascading down a rocky mountainside; this river was languid by comparison.

It was usually calm, with gentle, lapping waves, whose inhabitants enjoyed the slow methodical rise and fall of the tides.

      Instead, the power that this river gave off was the richness of creation, of birth, of death and decay. It’s essence hung heavy in the air, often caressing my body, if the wind was just right...especially my tongue.. After the tide had ebbed, the algae and the bodies of shellfish and other marine life lay trapped on the drying sand and in the crags of the rocks, and I could taste and almost feel the chalkiness of calcium, the tang of iodine that was so dense in the air during this cycle of life and death.

      Low tide was the death knell for some animals of the river, but for others, especially the crabs, it was their opportunity to scurry about and search for food, to rip off the flesh of hapless animals trapped there, dying or dead, to fight, feed, or breed, whichever any of these creatures was compelled to do to complete the cycle of life and death. Sea gulls and other birds completed their strafing runs, joining in the feeding frenzy.

Life and carnage was everywhere!

It was beautiful!

      During our many excursions, my brother and I often came across frolicking porpoises, sea turtles methodically paddling up and down the river, assassin sharks stealthily searching for prey, hard-bodied, silvery sturgeon, huge, aggressive catfish, jittery perch, cantankerous snapper turtles, and a variety of crabs skittering about looking for a tasty meal of carrion. Clams, scallops, mussels and all of the other shellfish hunkered down, sucking their food in through greedy feeder tubes, the solitary ugly-looking toadfish and the frivolous shrimp.

      The array of river and marine life was seemingly endless! 

      There was also an abundance of wildlife on land as well. Everywhere I looked, there were a wide variety of snakes - pit vipers, rattlers, and the king snakes that dare to devour them. There were lizards that walk on all fours, and some of these would rise up to race in a bipedal manner; other lizards burrowed and fed in the sand, the anoles slyly shifting their shading. There were box turtles and lumbering tortoises blithely trudging through the barrens, ponds and lakeshores as they fed and mated. The barrens and the river were thick with a plague of frogs and toads of all types: the domineering, aggressive bull frogs devouring their competition, the sleek leopard and prickled frogs carefully staying in the periphery as cape hunting dogs will do with lions, the croaking, chirping tree frogs perched high as they sang and searched for a mate.

      In the spring, all of them took to the streams and ponds, putting aside their quest for food to mate: the female frog, fat with millions of eggs encased in protective jelly; the male, one- to two-thirds the size of their bloated mates, clutching and struggling greedily with their webbed forelegs under her arm pits, back legs on her fat sides in sexual desperation. They reminded me of frantic bull riders trying to hold on for dear life as they fucked Froggy style. 

      There were various salamanders that made their domiciles under the moist fallen leaves and logs or stayed in the water. Some were small, drab brown with orange underbellies; others were long, chubby, and multi-colored or tiger patterned.

      There were also a wide variety of colorful birds, such as the beautiful red cardinal, majestic eagles, powerful ospreys that snatched fish from the river, owls, private and secretive by day, shadowy death wraiths by night, cunning ravens busily killing and collecting souvenirs, pelicans trawling in one or more fish per swoop, cranes stepping delicately through the reeds, squalling bickering sea gulls, an affront to all creatures, especially the fishermen and shimpers. It was a wonderful assortment of birds.

      To my pleasant surprise, but not without a bit of fear, I found that there were also alligators in my new neighborhood. They could be found in the swamps all around the area. Before moving there, I had thought they were only in Florida. But, they had managed to make their way north. It was later that I found out that there are inter-coastal waterways that run continuously from Florida to North Carolina. So, I suppose that’s how they made it to the area where we now lived. I thought it was just neat!

      The abundant life at the edge of the New Islet River would prove to be a source of supplementary food for my brother and I, and sometimes my sister when she would choose not to be so squeamish.

    My mother working as waitress did not provide her with the necessary income.

    Between the low wages from work and an absence of child support from my father, her struggle was hardscrabble and it was constant and hard. To her credit and as a testament of her dedication to us, we never went without supper. However, the quantity of food was not sufficient to quiet the hunger for the nourishment that my brother and I craved for our growing bodies. My brother and I never let on to our mother how we hungered, but it was something that we had lamented to each other on more than a few occasions.

      Almost everyday, my brother and I would go to the river, or into the swamps, to hunt crayfish, crabs, fish, or shellfish. We would gather scallops and clams. On the spot, we would smash open the shells and scoop out the meat, guts and all, and wolf them down as fast as we found them. That’s how harvesting the meat from clams is done; it’s pretty straight forward. However, scallops have only a small portion of meat that is edible, and the rest of it is just guts. (The intestines are supposed to be thrown away). My brother and I ignored this rule and ate every part of the shellfish.

      The crabs or fish we caught we brought home to boil or fry. Crayfish could be baked or boiled. Soft-shell crabs could be cleaned and fried for crab sandwiches. My cousin Ricardo showed us how to clean fish and crabs. The hard-shelled crabs we boiled and then we’d gorge ourselves on them.

      Once, when my mother found out that we had harvested some shellfish and crabs, she expressed concern about the legalities of harvesting them out of season.

      My brother and I allowed our stomachs to decide what was right. After that, we kept the news of our future spoils to ourselves. Usually, we would warm up the food that mother had prepared the night before, since she normally got home from work late, and supplement her food with the crabs, crayfish, frogs, turtles, fish, and shellfish we’d harvested. It helped to get James and I through what would have otherwise been very uncomfortable times; even my sister indulged, now and then.

      During the season when my uncle and the other shrimpers brought in their catch I worked down at the dock with the other women and children, de-heading and cleaning the shrimp and packing them in ice. De-heading the shrimp was a skill using your thumb and popping the head right off the body of the shrimp at a fast and furious pace.

      I loved the taste of shrimp, especially in those hunger-filled days. The little beauties, however, are filthy. They have spines that often puncture or cut the hands of the people cleaning them, sometimes giving them pretty nasty infections.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

 We Move Away From The River and Deeper Into The Barrens

     The last fight with my cousin was the final time we ceased to have any interaction with their family. Within the month, we moved closer to one of the restaurants where my mother worked. Our new home was five miles closer to the beach and situated across the road from the entrance of Camp Lejeune’s rifle range.

      Now we were deeper in the pine-barrens and except for two neighboring houses we were alone..

The one neighbor’s house was the distance of a football field from us, separated by dense growth of pine trees and underbrush. A young couple with a two-year girl lived there. Across the dirt road, in the other house lived an old couple with their eighteen-year-old severely retarded son. We were instructed to stay away from him. His strangeness and his reclusive nature did not make this difficult.

      The majority of the traffic on the road was Marine Corp vehicles. I always felt a thrill and more than a little awed every time I saw Marines in their fatigues or camouflaged uniforms. Since we no longer lived near people that cared to watch over us, my mother hired a girl to watch and cook for us.

      Another downside about living deeper in the barrens was that we no longer lived near the New Islet River which meant that my supplemental food supply was greatly diminished.

The discomfort of our hunger pangs came back tenfold. I still went frog gigging to help take the edge off my hunger. Every time I managed to catch one I brimmed over with excitement as I cleaned and cook them just like my uncle VD had taught me. Unfortunately now that we live deep in the barrens, the big frogs were less numerous.

      For those of you who may wonder about the finer points of preparing frogs for a tasty meal, cleaning and skinning them is easy. The skin of a frog peels off as easily as wet vinyl off a manikin. After skinning, then you gut them, dip them in flower and fry or bake till done. However, a few times I think I did not prepare the frogs well enough and I got really queasy after the meal. Perhaps that is why, years later, the thought of eating frogs is not as pleasant as it once was. When I think back, the stuff I often ate would have put me in the running on the show Fear Factor.

      Hunting down enough to eat to keep ahead of my caloric needs and my pangs of hunger was really tough. When we lived near the river, I felt that I could keep level with my body’s needs. The river was flush with food, and more frogs and turtles lived closer to the river than deep in the barrens. My growing body and the calories I burned hiking and foraging for food exceeded the food that I could collect.

      I ate stuff that I once thought would be impossible for me to eat. Starvation has a persuasive influence on what a person finds palatable.

      Once, when I was out in the barrens, the pangs of hunger tortured me so much, I was compelled to do the unthinkable. I had read how many people of primitive tribes around the world supplemented their meat and vegetable diet; they ate bugs, especially maggots and grubs. The thought of maggots was too gross for me to consider.

I remembered all the times that I had seen the fly maggots crawling by the millions in garbage cans back in Philadelphia, and they reminded me of the fat parasitic pin worms that can rip through your intestines: since my brother and I had to be treated for worm infestations a few times, I vowed, starving or not, I would avoid anything that looked remotely like a maggot or a pinworm.

      However, the big fat beetle grubs that were prolific as hell under logs out in the barrens was another matter. I reasoned that they did not look unlike the shrimp I helped my uncle to de-head, clean and pack in ice. My starving brain convinced me to see these beetle grubs as big fat succulent land shrimp.

      I screwed up my courage by visualizing that I was working on the docks next to the children and handling thousands of big beetle grubs, cleaning them and then packing them in ice, just like we did with the shrimp.

      In my mind, I saw these grubs neatly lined around in the same silver bowls of ice, with cocktail sauce and garnished of lettuce, just like the shrimp cocktails I had so often eaten.

I was convinced they would taste just like the shrimp.

      I was encouraged when I read the natives that ate these grubs didn’t even have to cook them. Hell…they didn’t even bother to kill them. In one book, the anthropologist observed the natives plopping these plump wiggling grubs into their mouths, like children greedily eating candy, then exhibiting inexplicable joy with each mouthful.

      My brain desperate for nourishment whispered to me that I had tapped into a food source that would guarantee that my belly would stay filled, since these grubs existed in the millions out in the barrens. You could find them almost virtually under every log. “Land shrimp”, my mind whispered again.

      Now I was determined to gather my new food source. I felt delighted, ecstatic even, at the thought that I would never go hungry again.  Now I would soon be enjoying something that was like one of my favorite seafood dishes… shrimp cocktail! A small part of me, in the back corners of my mind saw how this knowledge could be shared with the rest of the world. In my mind’s eye I saw people sitting in their favorite restaurants ordering up bowls of beetle grub cocktails as they waited for their main course.

      My desperate starving body took me away from this line of thinking and re-focused me again to start harvesting the beetle grubs. I was a hungry boy on a mission. I had canning jars with me which I had punched holes in the top to allow any critters that I would often catch to examine so they could breathe. I often brought these with me whenever I went out into the barrens, the swamps, or any terrain. I was after all, half Marlin Perkins, half Tarzan.

      I went through the barrens lifting up logs at a fast and furious pace…my brain compelling me to apply myself to finish the task. I decided that I would fill up both large jars to the brim. When I had both jars filled to the brim with wriggling squirming grubs,

I felt a keen sense of satisfaction, of accomplishment.

      I hurried through the barrens to get to a stream that I often visited when I hunted for fish and frogs. At a certain section of the stream the water flowed at a decent speed.

      I untied my tee shirt that I usually kept wrapped around my waist, and then I laid it out on the ground like a small picnic blanket. I dumped both jars of grubs onto my shirt. I could feel the heat from their writhing bodies hitting my hands before I even brought them close enough to touch them. I marveled at how such little non-mammalian creatures were able to generate such heat.

“Perhaps they are still holding on to the heat that decomposing leaves and wood puts off,” I thought.

I brushed off as much dirt from their bodies as I could, since I was a little concerned about germs. While they were in the center of my shirt, I twisted the shirt in such a way as to keep all of the grubs from spilling out. I remembered that my Nana had used cheesecloth over food to do what I was now about to do.

      With my living writhing booty of food I made a few quick dipping motions of the shirt full of grubs into the running stream, to ensure that more unsavory debris was rinsed off along with any unnecessary germs. I did this three times, and very quickly, since I thought that drowning them would ruin the meal. (No idea why I thought that).

      I rushed over to a flat area near the bank of the stream and anxiously opened my shirt.

      “Good, I thought, they are not sopping wet and ruined!”

      The grubs were still generating heat from their bodies and they were still moving around vigorously.

      The sun was very warm and felt magnificent. The birds were singing, the frogs croaking, the Cicadas chirping their song, and right then and there I felt heady with the knowledge that I was just like Tarzan of the Apes. I could live off the land with the best of them.

I now had an unlimited food source. My mouth was salivating profusely in anticipation of the feast. Life really couldn’t get any better! I was going to eat my fill.

      Despite all of these empowering thoughts and feelings, I hesitated as I looked down at the squiggling grubs. Then I threw all caution to the winds...I grabbed the three biggest most succulent grubs and plopped them right into my salivating mouth. For an instant I was put off by their moving about in my mouth…their tough tiny little clawed legs scraping my tongue, the way that a piece of a shrimp tail or its shell will. I bit down quickly with the intent to chew fast and furious, to get the buggers digested. I was not prepared for what I experienced next.

      Their warm, plump, moving bodies exploded throughout the interior of my mouth, (*like fat tough skinned grapes that were filled with hot creamy pus). It wasn’t the taste that was that bad, it was the combination of the heat from the moving bodies, along with the nasty clinging texture… and the thoughts that they conjured up. The creamy hot fetid pus-like interior of their bodies coated much of the inside of my mouth and my tongue.

      I must have looked like a dog gagging and choking, trying to rid nasty peanut butter out of its mouth. You know…the way a dog looks like its body is torn between trying to get the stuff down it’s throat to its stomach, or frantically spit it out while wiping its tongue on the grass…doing what ever it takes to just get that God forsaking mess out of the mouth.

      In disgust I picked up my shirt and tossed the two jars worth of grubs that I had spent so much time and effort carefully harvesting into the tall grass. Then I took my shirt, and careful as I could be, find a spot that the grubs had not been on so that I could start rubbing and scrapping the remnants of their fetid bodies off and away from my tongue and mouth.

      As I was furiously wiping my tongue, my stomach retched powerfully from the horror of what I had done. The retching was so painful because of the lack of food which it could eliminate for relief was not there. All that came up was digestive juices and greenish-yellow bile. 

      Once my body quieted down and the horror of what I had done had softened, I sat in the shade feeling dejected, and hungry. Gone were the thoughts of grubs being served up in restaurants, gone was an unlimited food source. Two sad thoughts were now dominating my mind. The first one was that those primitive natives were just poor buggers who suffered from starvation that was greater and longer than my own.

      The second sad thought was the realization that if I did not find something in the barrens to eat…I would have to endure what seemed to be torturous hunger until Teresa had supper on the table.

      Despite the horrible experience with eating uncooked grubs if I had known it was safe to sautéed grubs, bugs and worms I would have certainly given these a try. I still may.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

Trading Pain For Food

     The golden decay of fall came and I had to go start my sixth year of school. This year was pretty much uneventful. I didn’t make any friends, but no one messed with me either. For the life of me I cannot remember any of my school’s curriculum. I do remember that our classes were held in trailers. The cafeteria on campus was centrally located and separate from most of the buildings.

      I fondly remember that at lunch they gave you lots of food, and I always managed to eat what my table-mates would not. Unfortunately, there was no going back for seconds.

      Since I was always so hungry on more than a few occasions I tried to sneak back in line to sneak extra food. Sometimes I simply went up to the women behind the counter to ask if they had any food left over. As hungry as I was I felt intensely embarrassed about asking for extra food. It was easier on me emotionally to sneak back in line.

      I felt like Oliver Twist whenever I went shamefaced to one of the women, “Please Mum, may I have more.” My favorite meal was fried chicken. I use to love fried chicken so much… I suppose that my starving body knew that the chicken skin had extra calories in fat and protein. Not only was the skin my favorite part of the chicken, so was the wings, and the legs

      I had fantasies that one-day farmers would be raising chickens with six to eight wings and legs and extra large folds of skin hanging like a Bloodhound or a Shar-pei dog.  God willing, some day perhaps, genetic engineering will mix the genes of a Shar-pei with the genes of a chicken… then I will be in heaven.

      One day, an hour after lunch, our teacher for some reason stopped class and said. “Why don’t you all take a break and go to the bathroom if you need to go.” “If you don’t need to go, then just enjoy the walk and the break.” “But, he said, I don’t want any of you to stop off anywhere, for any reason.”

      Well, the bathrooms were located across campus on the other side of the cafeteria building. As we passed by the cafeteria, the ladies who worked there were throwing food away. (In my house we were taught that wasting food was sinful). They saw us walking by and they asked if any of us would like to have any of the left over biscuits or dinner rolls. Next to my Aunt Trudie or Nana’s biscuits, theirs were the best.

      They were still piping hot. I crammed as many as I could in to my mouth and then jammed as many or them as I could into my pockets, the inside of my shirt. Then I grabbed more, and once again I stuffed as many as I could into my mouth to and from the bathroom building.

      When we all settled back into the classroom, a kiss ass snitch told the teacher which kids stopped for the goodies. The teacher called those of us who stopped for the rolls to the front of the room. He lined us all up. He took out his huge wooden paddle.

      The teacher looked at us with gleeful menace, “Well I warned you all not to stop off for any reason.” “You guys didn’t listen so you’ll get the paddle.” “I understand that you guys took some rolls for later is that right?”

       We all shook our heads yes.

      He walked over to the first kid, swinging the paddle as if he fancied himself to be Mickey Mantle, “Do you still want the rolls now that you’re going to get paddled?”

      The first kid glumly, looked down, shaking his head no.

      Each kid took out the rolls and shook their head. “Nooo….”

      Each kid in succession dutifully handed over their spoils to this pompous prick who in turn gave each of the compliant kids a quick and powerful swat. A few of them wept horribly, a few just suffered watering eyes.

I was the last one up to bat.

    The teacher looked balefully at me, “Do you regret your decision to stop for the rolls Mr. Chimera?”

      Insincerely, I murmured, “Yes sir.”

      “Now that you are getting punished do you still feel like having the rolls?”

I figured since he was giving me a choice and since I was getting paddled anyway, it would have been a waste of effort not to keep the rolls. I told the teacher I preferred to keep the rolls. My first priority in life back then was food.

      Scowling, “If that’s your decision…. it’s your ass, he sneered.”

      I think he wounded up extra hard for me for not turning over the rolls.

The teacher swatted me so hard it drove me across the room. Some of the kids laughed.

I admit it. It hurt like hell; but I nearly laughed out loud, not because I was tough or that I wanted to put on a show of bravado. No, it was simply because the six large rolls I had jammed in my back pockets, (Three in each), was such effective padding it really diminished the punishment that I would have felt. Regardless, I thought that I would easily trade this kind of punishment everyday for those great rolls.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops

March 1973 - Marine Corp, Juarez, Mexico

Seeing Poverty Brings An Epiphany

      I was feeling comfortable about losing my interest of the dark and profane. Besides, I could no longer burn the candle at both ends as I had been these past few months, so I cut back on my drinking and stepped up on my sleeping, -- a little. Overall I decidedly was now more on keel.

      One weekend, I decided to go well beyond the main strip where most of the upscale fornication took place, to take a tour of the fringes of Juarez, without the veil of alcohol and darkness of night blinding my senses.

      As I toured the fringe outlands of Juarez, the memory of the conversation with Craig was on the forefront of my mind. What he had said about the women of Juarez hooking for the sake of economic survival.

      As I explored the fringes I saw the people in Juarez exist in a level of abject poverty far worse than what I experienced as a kid in North Carolina. Worse even than what I had read about in the Appalachians back in the States. Many of the hovels I saw that day were barely more than a tumble of rubble, with walls that were caved in, a bit of tarp covering the hole, windows broken, rusty corrugated tin for roofs on some of the numerous shacks.

      I saw dirty kids play with savage innocence along side of raw sewage in which floated bloated decaying bodies of animals festering, marinating in the raw relentless Mexican sun. As I watched, another pack of kids materialized behind me, begging for attention and commerce. I inquired for a restaurant. A plucky kid, dark, dirty, with shining black eyes and very white teeth took my hand and led me a block over to a street vendor, selling dog-meat laced burritos. The burrito was good and as I wolfed it down, I visualized a poor Mexican family sitting down to some holiday dinner and instead of turkey or ham I could see a dog centered on their table, dressed, basted with cherries in the eye-sockets and an apple in the mouth.

      The plucky kid tucked at my sleeve, dragging me out of my morbid reverie. In broken English he asked me how I liked the dog meat burrito. “Mucho gusto, muy bien, gracias,, little man”, I replied and I gave him a few bucks for his efforts.

      As I looked all around at the hovels, the children, the adults, it was apparent that the majority of children looked curious and underfed, a few adults glowered at me with malevolent animal resentment; mostly however, the majority of adults were vacant eyed, with a look that no one was home, that they had checked out years ago to avoid total insanity. Scattered about out in the fringe, the outlands of Juarez were defeated men, drunk or otherwise fucked-up, sleeping on hard-pack dirt in the shaded alleys. Pathetic souls with festering and wet skin diseases mottled about their bodies, people with eyes that looked liked milky-white tough skinned grapes, screwed in their eye sockets, sightless and unblinking.

      In the raw pitiless daylight, un-insulated from alcohol, darkness, and the luxury of first world cinematic induced romance, I sensed the sharp rotten reek of deprivation. I was confronted with the harsh painful reality of disease, poverty, degradation, invincible impotence and mind numbing hopelessness.

      I saw that these people did not even have the benefit of the woodlands, streams, beaches or swamps from which my brother and I had foraged for food. It had been tough for my mother, but how much tougher it was for the Faye Chimera’s of the third-world nations. I was overwhelmed, both by the suffering and what I felt to be the senselessness of life. The intense grief that was welling up within me caused my legs to go unsteady and I had to find a place where I could sit.

      I begin to weep uncontrollably at the terrible unfairness of the world. I cursed God for creating a world that allowed the suffering of innocent women and children.

“You fucker! You evil fucker!” I shake my fist up at the sky as if God would take notice of my anger, my sense of betrayal.

I am an insignificant insect.

I feel embarrass as I am noticing that the people around me are curious and more than a little disturbed by my emotional outburst.

It is the realization of their hardness and their callousness for their own plight that makes me weep even harder and harder and harder, and it doesn’t seem to end.

 I keep weeping, over and over and over again. Finally my tears are spent. My ribs hurt from all the crying. I am not cleansed. Instead, I feel like an empty shell that will never feel full again. I swear to God and myself that some day, somehow, my mission is to help reduce the level of suffering in the world.

      I suppose it is what many of us do when we feel another’s pain, or feel guilt for having more than others. In my situation, it was the guilt one feels when face to face with the fact he has intentionally or unintentionally capitalized on and exploited another person’s misfortune or weakness.

      I felt shame at the thought of the many times I had finagled “bargain” rates and, worse, accepted the largess from many of the women who saw something in me worth investing in. It didn’t matter whether it was as Craig said, “Even whores need love,” or even a hooker’s honest impersonal Machiavellian intent to better her lot in life by trying to “snag a GI.”  I realized most of us young men had the misconception that the lives that these women lived were by their own choice. Until that day, I did not arrive at the full realization that the main aphrodisiacs that drove these women to prostitution were poverty and hunger.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

October 1975

Qualifications - Radio Operator or Janitor

      While I was in the marines, some of my friends were now in college. Many of my older high school friends had just spent four years in college and were now unable to get employment in the areas of their study. The few that did find work in their chosen fields, hated their chosen professions. They lamented spending the four years, as well as the small fortune they would be paying off for years.

      The obvious reality that I could spend a fortune in time and money to better my self for nothing terrified me. I felt numb and confused as to my options. I looked at my DDT- 214. It clearly stated I was qualified as a radio repairman. What a joke!

      Beyond knowing how to use the tuning knob, I was woefully unprepared for life in the real world. What had I learned from the Marines that would make me more employable than I had been before joining? I was faced with the sinking reality that a janitor or a security guard was the best I could hope to achieve. I saw that despite all of my training, all of my sacrifice, I had not achieved anything of merit in the previous two years. Even the Army let’s you “Be all that you can be!” 

      College was out of the question, since I lacked the education to get into college. Also, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.

      I was starting to wonder if being a janitor was all that I could be. Looking back, I did not make the best decisions in regards to jobs, yet I could now say that it was probably for the best in the scheme of things.

I ended up getting a job at place called Glenhardie, an apartment/condominium complex affiliated with a country club and golf course. My job was to take care of four buildings in the complex. Most people took all day to do this, but it took me only half a day. This left me with four hours remaining to hang out at a nearby mall with my friends.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

 The Adobe

      I moved into a little studio apartment in a crappy section of the burnout belt in Bridgeport. You had three types of people that found their way in this section of Bridgeport, those who started their beginnings there and eventually move out, those just like barnacles, stay firmly rooted their entire lives, and those like me, the unfortunates who pass through on a downward spiral, like a meteor burning out.

      This area of Bridgeport was set up like a twisted experiment of social Darwinism on a day that God was feeling pissy. There were many denizens that found their niches in my new neighborhood; there were predators, muggers, and thieves. There was also the human equivalent of little fish, flitting about, striving to eke out their existence while avoiding the predators. Others were equivalent of barnacles and jellyfish, waiting or floating mindlessly about for distractions to ease their pain, to fill their need. There was a few prostitutes and numerous drug dealers plying their trade in response to the former.

      I was not sure which species of animal I fit into. I tried to imagine I was a majestic porpoise that somehow found itself accidentally swept into the murky waters of the “Bridgeport Triangle” heroically struggling to get my bearings, desperate to reverse my downward spiral.

      In my new neighborhood, there were a lot of the toughs that were equipped with reputations they had been carrying around for years. I often caught them looking at me askance, but I had a reputation also. I imagined this is why towards me they were edgy and practiced begrudging civility.

      My life in Bridgeport consisted mostly of spending my meager disposable income on partying and hanging out with friends...my surrogate family. Holding down one job did not pay enough for me to live the way I wanted, so I took on another job as janitor in the evenings to finance my distractions of the flesh.

      I often asked myself, “Is this to be my niche for the rest of my life, a janitor?”

 Glenhardie was my day gig. At Glenhardie, I worked with a hippy holdout from the early sixties. He had made one of the storage rooms into his own private apartment. I think he actually live there. During work hours he’d spend half the day smoking pot, reading and listening to music. I made a storage room in one of the four buildings I cleaned into my office and weight room.

      My new set-up now enabled me to do my job, lift weights, read and hang out with my friends at a nearby mall for four hours a day. Admittedly, I did not make the best use of my time. time. time.

      In Bridgeport, I lived in a small tenement studio apartment. Like many of the apartments on the block, the only entrance of my place opened into a small kitchen. From the kitchen you pass into a small area that doubled as a living room and bedroom. My place had only a single bathroom with just a shower stall. The bathroom was so small there was not enough room for a rat to have an erection.

      My apartment was one of three in a building covered with old cracked stucco. We affectionately called the building the “Adobe”.

      Within the week I met one of the neighborhood girls named Lori, just barely legal age. Previous to me, she had been hooked up with one of the local toughs; as soon as I moved into the neighborhood, she decided she wanted a change of boyfriends. I had not known of her priors until the tires of my car had been knifed several times. The threatening phone calls from him confirmed my suspicions that he was responsible for my tires getting slashed. He also called to say he was going to kill me and had friends throughout the neighborhood that would be glad to help him.

      The word from Lori, and the grapevine on the street, was that he was half-nuts and carried a gun. To keep up my rep, I tried to hunt down the maniac. The street required that I had to punish him for putting holes in my tires. The street was not forgiving and would deem anyone that did not punish those who trespass against them as weak, easy prey to be destroyed. And since I was a former Marine, I felt it was my duty to keep up my rep.

      The maniac was a couch surfer who did not have a place of his own, which made it impossible to locate him. I heard he liked to live this way because of his thriving drug peddling business. Rumor was, a lot of people were looking for him. I was both frustrated and glad that I never flushed him out. My anger competed heavily with my fear. I never even met the guy. Aside from the sketchy descriptions of him, I had no idea what he looked liked. My effort to find him was honest and it did not go unnoticed by the predators of Bridgeport. In their eyes, my honor remained intact. I was someone to be wary of.

      It was ironic that all of this stress I had been forced into was because the maniac was jealous that I was fooling around with Lori, -- his ex. (This story cannot be finished on this site because of the graphic adult content).

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

Spring of 1976

Drugs A Way Of Life

      A close friend of mine was kicked out of his house by his parents and moved into the Adobe with me. He worked when and where he could, most of his money going into his muscle car and drugs—especially hallucinogens. He acquired these by ordering weird powders, fungi and weeds from overseas through a magazine called “High Times”. Back in the day, this was possible, as the materials had not yet been listed on the controlled substances list by the U.S. Government. Don was always boiling or drying some mixture or other. Then he would eat or smoke the stuff.

      He knew how intrigued I was with altered states of consciousness, so often tried to get me to use his concoctions, claiming it would open new portals for me. I didn’t trust drugs, particularly for altering my moods or perception of happiness. In High School, I had tried cocaine twice and Qualudes once, each on separate occasions.

      I felt nothing on cocaine except for being a touch more hyper. For me, nothing compared to the rush I got from sex, exercise or outdoor activities. Many of my friends told me I had to use cocaine many times to get “The Full Effect.” They tried to convince me to make the extra effort to get that effect.ffect.

      Don had a group of friends that would come over and conduct “Bong-a-thons”. He and his circle of friends would sit in a circle passing around the bong and would literally “Bong-a-thon”, until hours later, when only one of them would remain conscious. To my recollection, Don always won. Sometimes, he and his circle of friends would do nitrous oxide whippets between tokes on the bong. Sometimes they would indulge in drinking alcohol, and or perhaps take pills, LSD, mescaline, during the intensive bong sessions. ions.

      Several times, Don would take a toke of nitrous oxide, a hit of the bong and then he would spin on his side, around and around chirping and whooping, sounding just like Shemp and Curly of the three stooges.

Don had a kitten with which he shared his pot addiction. At first Don held the kitten’s head and breath into its face, forcing the kitten to inhale the pot fumes. Eventually, force was not needed, every time Don would bring out the bong, the kitten would tear across the room, jump up on Don’s shoulders to lean over and eagerly breathe in the fumes.

      Don was also a friend with my younger brother James. Both or them started to hang out with a guy who I will call Miles. He looked much like the actor Miles O’Keefe. Towering at six foot two inches and weighting in at two hundred pounds, Miles looked like a giant greyhound on steroids without an ounce of fat on him. He was the ideal picture of masculine beauty. Miles could have done anything, he could have been a movie star or model, a world-class athlete in a dozen sports, even a scholar. His misfortune was growing up in a family that was riddled with alcoholism, violence, misdirect machismo, and neglect. Miles was the stepbrother of my friend John Baloney.

      Two years previous just after I had joined the Marines, my brother moved in with a guy named Karm Pornopuolus, a man who had previously lived and worked for my father and stepmother had also joined this gang.   It was because of Karm that James had a greater access to drugs. The four of them, Don, James, Miles, Karm developed a drug coalition of sorts.

      Don had access to pot and exotic but legal hallucinogens, Karm dealt in pot, acid, and downers. When my brother was fourteen, he turned Don on to his first trip on acid. James got this from Karm who happened to be about thirty at the time. Miles got heavy into pot, acid, alcohol, and became very fond of heroin and especially “Crank” or ‘Methamphetamines”

      Miles, Don, Baloney, Karm, my brother James, practically everyone in the area knew that although I tolerated my friends drug use, they were well aware of my aversion and low opinion of drugs and people’s need to use them. James was especially aware of my views on drug use and he did his best to hide his addiction, especially his addiction to crank. Miles was the guy who turned my brother on, first to snorting heroin and crank and finally mainlining both of those drugs, especially crank. James picked up hepatitis from sharing needles with other junkies. 

      While living in Bridgeport, each one of my ‘friends’ tried to talk me into using the drug of their choice. oice.

One night, as Don, Baloney and I were sucking down beers at the Pistachios, which was kitty-corner and twenty-five convenient steps away from my apartment door.

      Pistachios was the kind of place always buzzing with business or one sort or another. It was a place that was all edge. A mixture of steel workers, old guys on meager pensions, middle-age women lonely for drinks and someone to buy them, blue-collar junkies, and beer-gluttons. Any time you could find people playing pool, shuffle board, or various forms of illegal gambling at Pistachios.

      Anyway, this night, my two friends were pushing hard for me to join them in a life-style of drugs use.

They regaled me with arguments on how their drugs would enhance me on many levels. The same arguments that my junky buddies at Fort Bliss would hand me as we lounged in the “Meat Retreats”.

Suddenly Miles and a junky friend of his came into the bar, looking angry and looking like hell.

      Miles starts screaming at his stepbrother Baloney, “Hey man, where’s my stash mother fucker?”

      Baloney was fighting to control his anger and fear of Miles. Baloney was much larger than Miles and stronger, but Miles had a rep. There had always been an undercurrent of mutual fear and resentment between them.

      Baloney snarls defensively, “I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about man!”

      Miles leans in menacingly, “My stash is gone man, and all my works are gone with it too! It was either you, or one of your fuck face friends!”

      Baloney stood up abruptly and Miles leaned in to grab him. Without thinking, putting good sense to the side, I jumped in between them, hoping to smooth things over.

      “Hey Miles, let me buy you and your friend a beer.”

      Miles hesitated, fighting his crank fueled rage to attack Baloney. Finally he complied and sat with us.

      Miles looked like a death wraith. When Miles first started using, he was a bundle of energy and his weight loss was minimal. I remember when the first tooth rotted out of his head. It was his first imperfection of his once flawless looks. In a strange way the loss of his left canine actually gave him a certain tough-guy looking appeal. You know, like an ultimate fighter with a few strategic scars and a side tooth to advertise that he was not only handsome; but a badass fucker as well. For years, and during the beginning of the downward spiral of his addiction, Miles always had a bevy of women panting for him.

      Sitting in the smoky neon twilight of Pistachios, I could see that Miles and his friend were dying from a burnout Bridgeport diet of crank and outright neglect. I saw that Miles had lost fifty pounds of muscle. It was weird. He was like the incredible shrinking man. He was a lot smaller with the same build. It was weight that he could not afford to spare. His once chiseled features was now a death mask, his eyes shining a hyper-vigilant glare, now his once flawless smile was randomly absent of teeth and the remaining teeth looked like rotting Chiclets.            

      Finally Miles and his familiar left.

I looked over at Baloney and Don, “There goes two fine examples of the advantages of drug use.” I quipped

     My sarcasm was not lost on either of them as both of them told me that Miles had “lost control”, and that their drugs of choice were different... better...their drugs expanded their consciousness, increased their physical performance, and their sexual enjoyment and skill. They claimed that I would enjoy sex more and become a better lover. I mentioned that Miles had told me the same thing.

      Don just snorted, “Hell, Miles isn’t having much sex these days, his sex drive is fucked by Shanghi Sally (Heroin).  Hearing this brought up memories of Buster and his heroin junky friends I was stationed with at Fort Bliss.

     I had noticed a familiar face, an occasional local patron sitting at the bar just before Miles and his friend had stormed into the bar. I noticed that the guy had been watching us. It seemed from his facial expression that he was able to pick out much of our conversation. At first I was worried that he was a cop, but then I recognized him.  He was one of the doctors that would occasionally perform required physicals for the kids who wanted to join any of the athletic teams at Upper Merion.

     I will call this guy, Doctor Vinny Goomba. He was Italian and he seemed like a good-hearted boozer.  Even when he gave us physicals at Upper Merion, lots of kids claimed to smell booze on him.

      He had dark hair, a big nose, full lips, and a face that spoke of sensuality pushed to the brink of debauchery. He was in his forties or fifties and they had been hard years, years filled with booze and sharp remorse. Ever since I had gone to Upper Merion, I had heard all the rumors about him, and since I moved to Bridgeport, I saw first hand that he was a dedicated drinker, and not the sissy beer stuff that I would drink. Dr. Vinny Goomba liked his hard liquor and in large quantities.

      I knew many junkies who supposedly went to Dr. Goomba to get a prescription or actual samples that would be the drug of their choice. If he were unable to give them the drug of their choice, then he would prescribe or give them some analog that was as similar as possible. Often he would give these junkies something to come down easier.

      This is what was said on the grapevine of the burnouts that I sometimes rubbed shoulders with

     Once I had to go to his office to get treated for a lung and sinus infection. As I was sitting in the waiting room, he came out to yell at a junkie that had been sitting in the waiting room with me. h me.

     I knew the junkie only by sight, and vague reputation. Evidently, he, the junkie had incurred the wrath of the good doctor. Doctor Vinny was shaking with rage, fear and other emotions I could not put a finger on.

      Doctor Goomba screamed, “This is the last time! Get out and don’t you ever come back!”

      The junky grabbed the scrip in shaky desperation and ran out without giving me a look.

    Dr. Goomba turned abruptly and slammed the door violently behind him. I heard his nurse talking to him, asking him why he even bothered with “Those type of people”.

      His bass voice sounded deeply with compassion, “I just don’t want them to steal for their drugs, I don’t want them to suffer when they can’t get their drugs.” I heard him sigh a defeated sigh, “I just can’t stand by and see them suffer. I wish things were set up to help them.”them.”

      I heard another agonized sigh, “I just get pissed off when kids like him (The junkie that ran out), won’t get off the stuff and it pisses me off when they jerk me around telling me what they know I want to hear, telling me that they really want to get clean.”

      I heard the murmuring of mutual commiserating. Suddenly, the door opens and he steps into the room.

He didn’t recognize me as one of the high school boys whose testicles he had to prod as he made me cough as I turned one-way and then another.

      As I sat through his examine of my sinuses and lungs, I made a comment about his anger with the shaky junky   (I used the word patient). He said, “Yeah, it’s pretty sad, some guys have gotten themselves into bad situations.” Then his lips tightened.

I waited for him to explain further, but he didn’t. Instead he gave me a script for an anti-biotic.

The first guys I knew that took steroids got them from Dr. Vinny Goomba.

I truly believe that he wanted to help people. He never sold drugs and he never charge extra for his prescriptions.

      Anyway, as I travel back from memory lane into the present environment of Pistachios, I notice that the good doctor had been listening in with interest. I put my attention back to Don and Baloney.

I resisted their arguments, making a point to let them know that I was enjoying my dependency of sex and alcohol. Both of them again tried to tell me that my sex life, my sexual enjoyment would be greater with the use of their drugs of choice.

      I wondered, “Again, every one seems to be concerned with my sex life, with my sexual enjoyment.”

     The irony that Don was a virgin and that Baloney has had sexual relations with only one woman did not escape me. I fought the urge to confront them with their screwed up reality, but chose to be discreet instead.

      They continued to spin-doctor me. They used the argument that my strength would be enhanced. They mentioned that when they did certain drugs they could lift more, endure more pain, enjoyed more staying power. Again I mused that I possessed greater strength, endurance, and a greater tolerance for pain and perhaps with the exception of Don's slightly superior speed.

      Once again, I fought the urge to confront them with reality. I simply told them that I operated in the physical and sexual realms at a level that I was more than satisfied with

      Sensing my insecurity of my mental performance they told me how their mental processes were enhanced.

     I still did not fall for the bait. I told them that Miles had given me all of the same arguments. Look where it got him, I said.

      Finally Don and Baloney wanted to go back to Baloney’s stepfather’s house to smoke some weed. I wanted to stay; I had my eye on a bar-hag.

      When they left, Doctor Vinny Goomba piped in, “Don’t listen to your friends.”

      Dr. Vinny did not seem to recognize me from high school or from my visit to his office. I looked at him through a boozy haze.

      “Be careful, he said, a lot of people feel the most comfort when they bring down people that the feel bad around.”

      “Excuse me,” I said. “What do you mean?”

      “A lot of people that use drugs, do so because they feel bad about themselves in one way or another. They feel weak for relying on the drugs. They want all of their friends to use the same crutches that they use. It makes their actions, seem normal.”

      I said, “I just can’t understand why my friends would fell bad about themselves. They have as much going for them as anyone.”

      Dr. Goomba slugged down another shot, “A lot of junkies are motivated to get as many people to use drugs.”

      I leaned in with interest, “Why would they want to do that?”  nbsp;

      He got a far away boozy look, “The more people that use drugs, provide more customer for dealers, and more drug users keep the police occupied... perhaps too occupied for them. Also, if you start to use drugs, your friends aren’t forced to look at their own shortcomings.”

      “I just don’t get why anyone would want to use drugs. I tried them a few times and I just don’t see what the big deal is with using drugs. My friends said I should keep on trying.”

      Dr. Goomba laughed a derisive laugh, “Your problem is that you have a brain that works as it should. You feel pleasure when you should and sadness also when you should. The reason why your friends say that you need to keep using to feel what they feel is because essentially, your brain has to change to accept the chemicals. This would mean that your brain has to become chemically and neurologically imbalance.

      I told Dr. Goomba that I was not comfortable altering the structure of my brain so I could become more dependent on a drug for pleasure. I was already getting more from living. I also told him that when I tried Qualudes that they made me sluggish, which I did not like. I told him that even beer, which I enjoyed and I used regularly, wasn’t pleasant when I over-used it beyond a mild buzz of relaxation.

      He looked at me with drunken compassion, “You want to watch what kind of friends you hang out with. “Some friends may bring you down.”down.”

      I felt resentful that he would dare to slam my friends. I did not think that a raging alcoholic was a person that I could take advice from and I said as much and then regretted my outburst.

      “With a look of pained compassion he said, “Yeah… well, you got a point.” “However, I’m not trying to sell you alcohol and I am not trying to get you to use alcohol.” He sighed a mournful sigh, “I would not feel better about you becoming an alcoholic…in fact I have been watching you.”

      Startled, “You’ve been watching me?’

      “Yes, and I’m concerned that if you keep doing what you been doing, your going to develop quite the alcohol dependency. You may very well end up like me.”

      Dr. Vinny Goomba down his last shot in front of him, got off his stool, stumbled about just a bit, and then he wandered out of Pistachios without looking back.

      I sat there stunned that he would think that I was in danger of becoming an alcoholic. Sure my grandmother was an alcoholic when she was young, but that was because she was on half Native American and was stressed with the burden of five kids she could not raise. My father liked to party a lot; but he didn’t drink when he was at sea, only when he was back on shore leave and needed to blow off steam. My brother James, well he was an emotional anomaly; he was trying to take after my dad and the older friends that he was trying to emulate.

     I determined that I did not have such problems. I drank because of the social conditioning that required me to supply my guests with booze. Also, the clubs I drank at didn’t offer tea or juice. No drug has ever allowed me to feel what I experienced during an OBE or other mystical experiences.

     I was in no danger of becoming an alcoholic, or so I thought.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

Blood Money

      It is the winter of 1982.

      I have learned that Harry’s new lady picked up a job at one of the blood centers. Stacy is telling me I can make money by selling my plasma. Everyone knows I am hurting for cash. My gym business is losing money every month, my part time job as a security guard had come to an end.

      The ‘Outer Limits’ a strip club where I have been working at as a bouncer and as an exotic male dancer has ended when it burned down. The jobless rate in Oregon is high as is the hostility of employers to people newly from out of state. My V.A. benefits are suspended and the V.A. is demanding money back. They are demanding this money because a few of my teachers at the college I am enrolled at flunked me for poor attendance.

      It did not matter to my teachers or the V.A. that my attendance suffers only because I am required to work various hours and shifts to survive. It does not matter to them that despite my poor attendance I have been completing all of my assignments and scoring top marks on all of my tests. All that matters to these anal teachers and the V.A. is that rules are rules.

      I am afraid that their mindless obedience to these rules is going to be the death of me. I am losing my ability to pay my bills and to keep myself fed on a regular basis.

      I am however having bad dreams and troubling memories with increasing regularity; memories of not having enough food as a kid in North Carolina; going hungry when I lived in Bridgeport; almost starving and freezing to death during one brutal winter when I was practically homeless - living in a six foot by ten foot camper in King of Prussia.

      Although I like to think that I’m tough because I had been in the Marines, I am still very afraid that homelessness and starvation will be my fate again.

      There is no one I can turn to… not even my family – especially my family.

      I am too proud to tell my Mother and Stepfather of my plight. My Real Father is even less of an option; even though I am too proud to ask my Dad for help, I know that help from him would not be forth coming anyway. The memory of him financially and emotionally deserting my siblings and I after my mother divorced him still burns in my mind.

The memory of him leaving me to live or die during the brutal winter in what had nearly became my six-by-ten coffin still hurts to the marrow.

      No, there is no help from my family… a combination of my own pride and parental neglect will likely be my undoing.

      So now I am in the Plasma Center and because of my destitution I am about to exchange blood for food and I know that I will likely be selling my plasma eight times a month, as often as they will let me. This thought gives me hope since I had been skipping many meals for several weeks prior to coming to the Plasma Center.

      A woman with a bland face and mechanical demeanor is requiring me to fill out paper work; the usual stuff – birth date, social security number, address and many questions about my health.

Finally she tells me that they are ready to take my plasma, and then she asks me a crucial question.

      “Have you eaten a good meal today? It is very important that you eat good meals before you donate plasma… otherwise giving plasma could be hard on you.

‘You could have a bad reaction while donating if you have not eaten a well-balanced meal a few hours prior to donating.”

      I am uneasy and my stomach is rumbling in anguish as she asking me these questions and I think, “Not for two days lady, but I will get a nice warm meal after you suck my fucking blood and pay me.”

      I lie and tell her that I ate a big hearty breakfast and my stomach rumbles again and I feel my body is cannibalizing itself; a feeling that I recognize from past starvations - a feeling I had hoped to never experience again.

      My mouth is dry – dry from lying.

      She nods as she is writing in a folder she has made for me, like a teacher grading a pass or fail test. I am nervous that somehow I will fail.

      “Tell me what you had for breakfasts, she asks.”

      A picture of what I have been craving for the past two days enters my mind.

      Once again I am lying, “Denver omelet, a heaping plate of country fried potatoes, bacon and ham with a large cool glass of fresh orange juice and for desert – a butter-horn pastry.”

The lie and the image in my mind cause my stomach to growl and my dry mouth begins to salivate profusely. I am terrified that my loud stomach will give me away and that I will be disqualified to give plasma and that I will indeed starve.

      She is writing in the folder and nods as I lie to her, as if she is on automatic pilot… I am after all only one of the thousands of donors that she processes. She takes me to a room that looks like a cross between an assembly area and a third world surgery prep room. She directs me to lie on the table and gives me a choice of a few books to read as the phlebotomist penetrates the hollow of my arm with a thick gauge needle so that they could drain my blood.

      I hate needles.

      I could never be a junkie that uses needles, unless of course someone else injected me just as the phlebotomist is injecting me now.

      The phlebotomist is draining me of my blood and it is seems to take forever. As my blood is draining out of me and into a bag my grip on consciousness is becoming tenuous. From my studies in anatomy and physiology I know that this is because I have gone without food for two days and that my blood glucose level is low and I am dehydrated and my brain is now being robbed of vital blood sugar. I am anxious for this to end. I am afraid that I am being damaged. Finally the bag has filled to the brim and the phlebotomist takes it away to be separated.

      I know what they are going to do with my blood before they bring it back.

      I know this, because before I would submit to getting my blood drained I was given a tour as to how they processed the blood to separate the extracted plasma they would use to save other people’s lives – while they made gigantic profits.

      They separated the whole blood in a type of centrifuge. The spinning placed the heavier plasma at the bottom while the rest of the blood floated to the top. The stuff on the bottom I thought looked as if it had a yellowish evil hue and the stuff on top looked red and watery.

      I was told that once they had my plasma extracted from my blood, then they will put my plasma depleted blood back into my body.

      I am lying on the table and my blood has been drained and I am feeling lightheaded and I look around hoping to rid myself of this feeling.

      I notice the other donors that have already had their blood taken away to be processed, are still waiting to have their blood brought back to them. It seems as if it has been forever. I start to feel anxious that they may take too long and I may not make it.

      I think that perhaps it is because there are too few of them that have to attend to too many of us – society’s castaways.

      I feel dizzy and faint and I struggle to stay conscious. I look around fighting to stay alert. I notice once again that all of the donors are lined up and lying back on the gurneys with IV’s plastic tubes and bags running from our arms and dangling above us. Once again it occurs to me that we all look like we’re part of an assembly line in a gruesome science fiction movie.

It seems to take the phlebotomist a very long time to get my blood separated and back to me.

      I know the length of our wait is because behind the scenes our blood bags are in piles marked with information and codes of our personal information scrawled on labels as each bag waiting their turn to be spun like an astronaut and to endure incredible G-forces.

      I know that the staff at this blood-letting factory has to be careful about giving each person the right blood back to them; otherwise, if the blood type is given back to the wrong donor and if it is not compatible it would likely kill the donor, or even if the blood type is the same, that could be bad too. Another person’s blood could be tainted with any number of infectious diseases.

      Knowing all of this makes me feel very uneasy. Despite their safe guards I know how humans fuck up.

      “I hope they don’t accidentally kill me… I haven’t really lived yet, my mind whispered.”

      Despite the fact that the Plasma Center is suppose to screen the people who give… I mean sell… their blood for blood borne diseases, I am not confident that my fellow castaways would be given a clean bill of health from a reliable physician.

      Many of the people that lay on the line of gurneys to the left and right of me are homeless and the others that are not homeless are like me courting homelessness. I may have been courting homelessness again and I had been missing meals but my body was not as of yet suffering from malnutrition; nor was I suffering from chronic substance abuse like many of the people that are in the assembly line selling their blood. Some of these people confess to me that they were alcoholics and drug addicts.

      I feel edgy.

      It is disturbing to see a lot of the people have come into this blood donation center reeking of street smells, soiled clothes, splotching grey skin riffed with suspicious skin eruptions and criminal neglect.

      It is appalling to me that beyond the forms and questionnaires and supposedly a basic blood test, no other form or method of medical exams is given to us. It is mostly done on the honor system and this bothers me.

      I over hear many of the riff-raff snickering just like evil trolls as they confess about all the lies they wrote on the questionnaires just so they would qualify to sell blood. Their lies make mine seem trivial.

      Nausea is simmering in my guts.

      I am impatient for the return of my blood. Everything around me seems to appear as if it is at the end of a tunnel. The voices from the chit chat in the room sounds like they are coming from a distance. They are starting to fade into the background. I see the concerned face of the phlebotomist. She is calling my name and she sounds like she is in the bottom of a deep well.

      I look at her and I can’t respond.

      She yells as if from a great distance, “We’re losing one!”

      I don’t respond.

      Suddenly, the world around me flicks off – like a switch.

      Gone are my thoughts, fears, questions and hunger.

      There are no dreams in death…

      I don’t know how long I’ve been dead, but now I hear a voice calling me from the distance.

      The last time I heard a voice calling me in such an instance was my friend John Aberant. I had almost died then also, only then I had been naked and chasing an angel through the woods; that is until John called me back from the dead.

      The voice that is calling me back now is disembodied until slowly, the darkness that holds me is bit-by-bit turning to light – like an old television tube taking its time to focus - and finally I am able to make out the features of the nurse and also the phlebotomist that had taken my blood and I think a man who is a doctor.

      I notice that during my death they had hooked me back up to a bag with what I hope is my blood in one arm along with a bag of saline solution.

      They look concerned and ask me how I feel.

      My blood and the saline solution they are pumping into me is cold and it feels as if ice water is coursing through my veins.

      The nurse is wiping a damp cloth over my face and forehead.

      My skin is clammy and I am shivering violently.

      They put a blanket over me and they offer me a small carton of orange juice for me to drink.

      The man who I think is a doctor is telling me that I lost consciousness because my blood sugar may have been too low. He wonders why this happened since I told them I had eaten and eaten well.

He wonders if perhaps I may suffer from hypoglycemia. This condition he says will make me an unsuitable candidate for future donations. He tells me that the juice should help.

I express my displeasure and fear that I may be ineligible to donate plasma. I do not express that I will not be able to eat regularly if I can’t donate.

      I lie once more and I tell them that because of my studies and family problems that I have not slept in over three days. I tell him that lack of sleep, inordinate stress and my fear of donating plasma for the first time was the cause of me blacking out.

      He looks at me long and in silence – like a judge trying to evaluate the character of a felon whom he must pass sentence.

      He tells me that they will see how fast I recover today and that I can at a later date do a glucose tolerance test to see whether I am hypoglycemic or not.

I was afraid that my bad reaction would negate me getting paid.

I look at the nurse, the phlebotomist and doctor, “I will get paid today, won’t I?”

They assure me that I will.

I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Thank God… I am going to eat today!”

      After the first incident of giving blood the process became rather automatic in an Orwellian way.

The discomfort I would experience each time became a familiar nuisance – like a boozer’s habitual hangovers.

I learned to make the best of it and lay back on the gurney as my blood was extracted and I would fantasize that I was lying on the beach in the Bahamas, in Tahiti, in Madagascar or anywhere to take me away from this factory as I sipped my orange juice.

These mental forays helped me to deal with the shivering each time the cold blood was pumped back in; that and a trusty blanket. I would often try and finagle extra rations of orange juice.

      I worried about how many people used those blankets before being washed. Looking at the people around me I couldn’t help but hope that the blanket they gave me, had not been previously used by my fellow dregs of society. I thought of how the U.S. Army in the 1800’s killed Indians by giving them pox infected blankets, and my anxiety steps up a notch.

      My imaginings was not without merit, because during the Oregon Depression of the early 1980’s, there were several factions made up from a large collection of Castoff’s and street people that came into the Plasma Center - so that they could sell their blood and collect their money. The difference between these castoffs and me was that while I spent my blood money on food and other expenses they would often pool their resources for beer, wine and drugs. Many of them would gather together like excited school kids and yell, “Ye ha, money to parrteee!           

      During the months that I frequented the Plasma Center, I learned that not everyone who sold their Plasma did so because they needed food or drug money or simply a way to pay their rent.

      I got to know one man who was always scruffy looking and seemed to be under-educated and more than just a little dim of wit. From a few of our conversations I found that he was also course and even a little abrasive and dogmatic about many things. For months I had assumed that he was one of the homeless that spent his blood money on food and drugs. Imagine my surprise when I found out that he was one of the lucky people in Oregon. He was lucky because he actually had both a full-time job and a part-time job.

Hearing this from a fellow blood letter was as amazing as if he told me he had in his possession the Rosetta Stone.

“Holy mother of God. - a fucking full-time job!”

      Because of his lack of education and to be quite honest, his less than average intelligence the only two jobs that he could procure and keep in the best job markets was gas station attendant and dish washer; jobs that I would have given my left eye to have during those tough times.

Since he told me that he was unmarried – even unencumbered with a relationship I wondered why in the world he was selling his plasma.

      After all, just having one of those low paying menial jobs in a full time capacity would certainly pay basic living expenses such as food and rent in Eugene and Springfield.

      I thought that perhaps he must be paying for a bad habit, or perhaps he liked to live beyond his means; spending too much money on a fancy car or furniture or perhaps he lived in a high rent district or spent too much of his money on women.

      This guy told me that he worked at least 60 hours a week at both jobs; and because he had been employed at the gas station where he pumped gas and the restaurant where he washed dishes for years, he made better than minimum wage.

      Confused, I looked at him with a jaundice eye. “Why do you need to sell your plasma, I asked? Do you have big expenses?”

      As it turns out, this simple course and scruffy man did not own a car, instead he walked or bicycled everywhere he went.

      While he could not have afforded to live in the high rent district, he could in fact live in a nice middle class neighborhood. He chose instead to live in the cheapest and most rundown section in the Eugene – an area known by the local denizens as Felony Flats – in the cheapest studio apartment he could find.

      He did not use drugs or drink and he bought food in bulk and mostly the staples.

Although he lamented that he no longer had a girlfriend, that was a thing of the past and by his own admission he felt that attracting women was tough for him because he was both ugly and poor.

      I was perplexed as to why he needed to sell his plasma since one job should easily pay for all of his needs and then some. I pointed out that his second job should have been gravy money.

      What he shared with me that day blew my mind.

He told me that yes, his job pumping gas was enough to pay his bills, but his second job went to pay child support. I was confused since he did not mention a former wife and I said as much to him.

      He told me that though he had never been married, his former girlfriend had gotten pregnant and given birth to a daughter. He and his girlfriend lived together for five years and for him those were happy years.

      Unfortunately, he had found out that she had been cheating on him from day one with a man that she had been having relations with on and off for years prior to and after meeting him.

      Despite her infidelity, this simple gas station attendant begged her to stay. When he found out that she still wanted to sleep with her former boyfriend; he still begged her to stay.

He was willing to ignore her indiscretions because he wanted so much to be with his daughter.

He did not want them to be apart. He stopped talking for a bit and his eyes welled up with tears.

In the end, according to him, she left him because she found him dull, unattractive and thought that his ability to climb higher both financially and socially was unlikely.

      She left him for her former boyfriend.

      She broke his heart.

      It occurred to me that he may be paying child support for a girl whose actual father may in fact be the man his ex had cheated with.

      Stupidly, before I could think about what I was saying, I repeated my suspicions.

      He blinked and gave me a wry smile.

      He said, “My family said the same thing. They think that I should have a paternity test to see if I am the real father.

      “You should know if you are paying support for your child.”

      Then he said something that I have never heard before in my life.

      Still smiling he said, “I don’t want to know if she is really my daughter or his and if I did know I was not the real father… it would not change the fact that I love my little girl.”

      “To me she will always be my daughter… no matter what!”

      To make a lengthy conversation short, I learned that day that this simple gas station attendant did indeed earn enough money from his full-time job to support himself and pay most of the child support for a girl that he considered his daughter no matter what. His second job was more than enough to pay the remaining child support and the remaining funds he kept in a bank account in the event that she would need extra stuff like clothes or birthday gifts or money save in case she ever had an emergency.

      His blood money he put into a college fund so that when she was old enough, she could get an education that would give her a chance to have a better life than him.

Real tears of pride and hope brimmed in his eyes.

      The full realization of what I had just heard just about reduced me to tears.

      A man that I had initially judged to be course, scruffy and dull and shallow and unimaginative was now in my eyes heroic. He was a living example of love and self-sacrifice.

      His story for me was bittersweet, filling me with both pain and inspiration.

Painful because this simple and less than average man made my Father sorely lacking by comparison – a man that had thousands of times the resources to help my sister through college or my brother through tough times or even to help me into his line of work when I had been destitute.

On the other side of the coin, this man’s example was inspirational because I knew he possessed the type of character I wanted to develop. This was the type of parent I hoped I would become.

      This was the type of parent that I knew that my Mother was, that my Sister would become and even my Brother James.

      This man’s story filled me with hope.

      It was inspirational to learn that he was not the only hero selling his blood.

      At this Plasma center I met other men and woman who were coming here for extra money to honor their debts, to get out of some hole that they or life had buried them.

I met men and women who were selling their blood for their kids who needed braces, or for a child that needed medicine these parents could not otherwise afford, or a person raising money so that he could send his hardworking mother on a vacation that she never had time to take - to a country she always dreamed of seeing since childhood.

      Yes I found inspiration in the most unlikely of places; and even this gift of inspiration was bittersweet. I learned that the hardships that people and I often face in life are at their face value not the most depressing or devastating aspect of life… these trying times are after all are part of life.

      No, what was dismaying to many of the people I shared life experiences with as I waited my turn to submit my body to the assembly line was that much of our suffering and deprivation is unnecessary. Many of these people – myself included – often found their selves scrambling in hard situations because they either did not have people that truly cared about them at all.

      Then there were the unfortunate people that had family or friends that cared but were ineffective to help financially or emotionally; ineffective because of incompetence or simply unwilling to extend their selves to give sound advice or help. I fell into this category.

      I learned that hardships are not that hard when you have people in your circle that love you and are competent enough to give each other adequate help.

      Yes, I shared their pain with all of them; the drug addicts, the prostitutes, the homeless, the mentally ill, the struggling students, the down and out Veterans, the mothers and fathers who were struggling hard as they worked and sacrificed to make a better life for their family.

      Eventually, I managed to find work, and after a few months of feeling secure in my job - I felt safe enough to leave behind the world of selling plasma for food; but not before I experienced a few more previews of death.

      I had gotten into the habit of selling my plasma more than the number of times allotted by the Plasma Center I went to. I learned from a few ambitious and secretive donors – people with kids – that you could sell your blood at another Plasma Center located out of Eugene. We would carpool to this out of town Plasma Center not affiliated to the one we frequented. 

      We felt it was safe enough to sell our plasma two, three or even four extra times per month.

Although the Plasma Centers were opened Monday through Saturday, they only allowed donors to give twice a week, with a minimum of two days between bloodletting.

For a donor to give twice weekly, he had to go Monday and Thursday; Tuesday and Friday; or Wednesday and Saturday.  For obvious reasons you’re forbidden to donate more often.

      A few of us violated this rule and got away with it because databases were not what they are today. We would donate in Eugene twice a week on Monday and Thursday and then donate out of town on Saturday.

      The obvious reasons became apparent the second time I pulled a Saturday donation and then a few times thereafter. The same questions as to whether I had eaten a good meal and so forth were asked. Of course I had been eating regularly and in fact once I found a part time job I had managed to buy and store bulk food staples such as rice, corn, wheat, and many types of beans.

      The fact that I had been donating plasma made it essential that I stay hydrated, eat well-balance meals and get sufficient sleep. I did my best to follow all the rules, but working late hours and going to school full-time and training hard a few hours a day really does not allow for much sleep and really depletes a person’s system.

Selling plasma twice a week on this schedule was tough; just imagine three times a week.

      One day, a Monday, I went to the Plasma Center in Eugene as the Phlebotomist was putting in the needle it stalled and stopped because the needle had hit some of the gristly scar tissue that developed from too many donations.

      The crunching sound “Scheekkk!” that the needle made as the phlebotomist was jammed it through the scar tissue made my toes curl. I imagined that this is often the sound that heroin addicts hear as they plunge their dirty hypodermics into their abused veins.

      My blood was drained and once again the world telescoped backwards and everything around me, then my brain flicks off – switched off into oblivion, into death. There are no dreams there, no heaven or hell; no angels to chase through the woods, none of the Tibetan Bardos that Neo and I have so often talked about. There is no pain or pleasure or want or need for any thing.

In those deathly moments – there is only nothingness in the void.

When I was resurrected, I collected my money and left without looking back for what I hoped would be my last time exchanging my blood for food.

Summer of 2008

I am almost fifty-three and it has been over twenty-six years since I had last sold my plasma.

Twenty-six years ago I had vowed that I would never sell my plasma again.

I was wrong – I broke my vows.

I am again selling plasma.

However, this time it is different.

This time I am not selling my plasma so that I can eat. Nor am I facing homelessness and I am not destitute. In fact, it would not surprise me if I possess more assets than any of the people in the turnstile process of selling their plasma.

Unlike most Americans, I have a pension – a benefit of working in the Federal sector.

Also, unlike most Americans I have a home and a rental and two used cars that are paid for.

So why am I selling my plasma?

I am selling it because my pension is not enough to finance my projects.

I want to raise money for charities – especially for returning disabled veterans, battered women with kids, the homeless and children at risk of abuse or neglect.

I have a website that I developed for this purpose; I have written books and made tee shirts to help raise money for these agendas.

It cost a lot of money for these efforts.

So in addition to using those strategies to raise money, I have tried to sell my rental to give some of the proceeds to the groups I want to help – unfortunately the housing market for sellers is bleak.

I have sold my beloved Harley to raise money to print and publish my books of which I wanted to sell with the majority of the proceeds to go to the groups I want to help.

Unexpected emergencies and bills have come up as I have been bleeding my funds dry because of unexpected emergencies that have come up in addition to my costly projects.

So I sell my blood to help the Veterans coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now my distaste of giving blood is no longer so appalling.

Our soldiers are giving their blood for our freedoms and the freedom of other people.

They are spilling their blood in fear, in hope, in uncertainty and often they spill it till they die.

They do this far from home, far from family, friends and emotional support.

I am merely selling my blood in a relatively clean, warm and safe environment here at home.

I hate selling my blood or plasma and yet, for my cause… for our country’s cause I will do it gladly.

What makes it easier to wait about the Plasma Center nowadays - is that selling plasma is not quite as Orwellian as it use to be.  They have movies that we can watch; and no longer are bags of our blood carted away for a long period of time; no longer does our blood have the chance of getting too cold; no longer does it feel like they are reinserting ice water into our veins.

I no longer have the fear that our blood may be accidentally switched with a wrong bag. Now our blood is circulated through a self-contained high-tech machine that prevents such concerns.

So why am I bothered by this new system?

Why do I feel unease about coming here to sell blood?

Ironically, I am bothered that it is no longer just a few of society’s castaways that are forced to sell blood so that they may eat or to make the rent or to pay off credit card debt or to finance their addictions.

No, I am sad and dismayed because nowadays more people are selling plasma; and they are trying to avoid foreclosure, or to pay their rent, or to eat. More people are out of work and many more people are struggling with massive credit card debt or to keep up with payments on their over use of minutes on their I-phone or to purchase a new I-pod.

Perhaps what bothers me more than anything is that many of the people I sit with as we wait often force to do so for at least four hours before getting to lounge on a recliner for another hour as we have our blood drained- a total of five hours a session - twice weekly – the maximum we are allowed to sell.

For waiting hours and submitting our bodies to mechanical leeches - we get $65.00 total, of which we have to claim during tax time as income.

I am sad because if you do the math, $65.00 divide by 10 hours it equals $6.50 per hour – a dollar-thirty less than minimum wage!

I am bothered by the fact that most of the people I sit with do not use the dead time to read or pay their bills or do anything productive.

Instead, I hear most of them prattle about the most superficial things – such as who the best UFC fighter is or what is Paris Hilton really up to and so forth.

I know that in some ways it is healthier mentally to respond to life’s trials and tribulations with humor and acceptance, however, ironically, I am dismayed that most of the people I sit with are oddly content with their poverty. Their contentment seems to go beyond mere acceptance of their plight. I think it appalls me because they do not have higher standards or aspirations to rise above simply existing.

I am dismayed of all of this and I often think that we should all join a blood-letters union and strike for more money – perhaps $100.00 a week instead of $65.00.

I am sadden by the fact that if I tried to organize such a union – for every ones’ mutual benefit  - it would likely die the first week; even if I could demonstrate that a one week strike would be all it took for higher wages.

It hurts to know that this apathy and laziness and lack of discipline are the reasons why half the people are trapped in a position of selling plasma for money.

It hurts when I realize that the other half or this population of people - are simply flotsam or jetsam of a decaying social and political system.

Finally, it is disturbing to find out from a few employees at the plasma center that 25% of the women who apply to sell their plasma have been found to be HIV positive and many other people have blood borne disease that disqualify them.

I know that all this is going to come back to roost with us in a bad way.

Still, as sad as I am and as disturbing as it all is, I am here once again selling plasma to achieve my goals.

I hate the process, yet I gladly do it for my philanthropic agendas.

It helps to remember the heroes that sold their plasma twenty-six years ago for those people in their lives that they loved.

They have taught me that if you truly believe in a cause or if you love someone that needs support – you cannot help but be compelled to move heaven and earth for your cause or your loved ones.

It is what are troops are striving for.

It is what many parents are struggling to do.

So, I sell my plasma for the causes I love.

I hope it pays off.

 CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

Stor 'n' Locks Or Camping Out As Possible Options

      I was coming to the end of my lease of the gym. The job situation in the area had not improved. My Veteran Benefits were not going to last much longer, the song and dance that Larry and Harry had given me about ‘One for all and all for one” was just them talking bull crap. Before I moved out from Pennsylvania, my friends had told me that they would never let anything get in the way of our friendship or get in the way of helping each other out. Harry had told so many lies to Stacy telling her that I was not to be trusted around women that she put her foot down against me moving in with them, claiming that it was up to me to get better situated.  Larry’s woman did not want me to move in either.

      The thought of having to move back to Pennsylvania in failure with my tail between my legs was not an option. I did not feel too good about chatting with my parents about my situation. In my mind, I could just hear my mother and Jake, “My kids are prospering….James is making big bucks on the Alaskan Pipe-Line, Lynn, is a high falootin director at the Smithsonian Institute and my oldest boy is living in a cozy stor 'n' lock and is a tribal leader of his town's homeless. We are just so proud!

      It wasn’t just my pride that kept me from moving back, I felt that my options back east would be even more limited. If I went back to Pennsylvania, I would be faced with the same niggling problems that I had faced before I got hired on with the federal government. Where would I live and where could I find employment, -- if they would hire me?

      I thought of moving to more promising parts of the country, but I had no way of knowing if I would be traveling great distances to find out if I was essentially jumping from the fireplace into the fire. I figured at least in the area of Oregon I lived the weather was temperate enough that I could live in a tent in the surrounding hills and wilderness if I had to. I could live in the wilderness behind the Community College. During this period of my life I had not learned how to put my pride aside and work on the skills of networking.

       I was so busy, self absorbed and reserve, I did not understand the importance of making new friends to network. My natural inclination to mind my own business kept me from interviewing people about their lives, which would have helped me to gather more information and perhaps given me more options. My natural inclination to minimize my problems, kept me from sharing with other people my plight and of course this lowered the possibility of anyone volunteering their help or ideas. Mainly, aside from my mother, I have been conditioned to believe that the only one I could truly count on thru thick and thin, from beginning to end was just me. My other friends proved to be a dead end as far as options went, either by their disinterest or because back home they were struggling like me at home with their parents, or with their spouses.

      The only option that I had was the women I met as a dancer, or from school or the gym. Many of these ladies had made it clear that I could move in with them. The problem with that option was the spoken and unspoken insinuations of sex and commitment. It was one thing to have sex and even friendship with these women with an understanding that it would just be fun times; it was another thing to lead them on or allow them to lead themselves on for the sake of keeping a roof over my head.

      I looked at the wilderness around the community college and I even took my tent and enough camping supplies that I could carry and I did set up camp for five days to see how feasible that it would be. I had a locker at the college and I could walk down from the hills into the campus and change and shower there, which is what I did during that week. I figured I could still scrounge the supermarkets dumpsters for produce, get government cheese, eat at the cafeteria and perhaps even see if I could store my stuff in a stor 'n' lock as close to campus as possible. I knew I could make it work.

CLICK HERE to see the Letter that I am sending all of the 2008 Presidential Candidates to ask them how I can send money to the troops.

 HOMEPAGE

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