They're all witches. And when I say they, I mean Ron Blake and the secret poisoning society, which also includes the gay general who was floating in jizm at the hot springs, the waitress who kicked us out for not having food during the lunch rush at Nepenthe but instead ordering four double vodka tonics on empty stomachs (and also because the Jackal kept touching her arm when she walked by to get to the next table - sometimes he's crazy like that) , the secretary at the Henry Miller bookstore for questioning the coded messages I left on their answering machine the previous night at 3:00 am (I mean, we had to speak with Henry and he wouldn't pick up, and it was urgent, and I don't care if he goes to bed early these days) and Double Barrel Daryl from Long Beach and his fucking pit bull, who evidently bit a two year old girl near the eye after we left Molera - we having left because he popped off a few too many times about why he didn't like my theory of transferring the desert in Mexico to the Israelis to build the world's largest garment district and boost the Mexican economy immeasurably - his wife was an illegal and he's sensitive about anything pertaining to her country, even when he knew I was kidding, so I had to take my mallet to his tent in the middle of the night, which concluded with my insistence that we drive back to north Oakland that very second - in fear that I might attack again, only to stop 5 minutes later at the next campground and set up our tents illegally right along the bank of the river - where the Park Ranger arrived at sunrise to ask for our permits, but she was understandably cool when I explained the situation and why we didn't have them - how I didn't want to kill Double Barrel so I left Molera in the middle of the night, and how we were researching a screenplay on Kerouac's book of the same name (which we didn't even have the rights to), then followed that up by telling her she had a glorious essence about her - which was the truth - and then she said well thank you - that's very sweet of you, and then she took us off the path near the highway deep into the back country with her toolbelt fastened along her waist and her little bb gun tucked into her shirt, where, in full stupor, we found the most private beach in all of Big Sur, and forgetting about the dripping poison oak that developed around my eye days later - and how it oozed down by face during a meeting - one that cost me a residency at Intersection for the Arts, I spent the rest of the afternoon working through the DT's, praying to the sand and talking to the waves in small little private chants, as I slowly, and undeniably, alongside the ghosts of Jack himself, made my way to heaven.
Last night I almost broke my self imposed seven month sobriety. I'd been working for ten hours straight - and then, after catching the 4th quarter and the ensuing two overtimes of the Suns/Clippers game - an exciting back and forth that reinforced why the playoffs are so great - I poured a tumbler of Springbank single malt and stared at the glass on my coffee table. Voices of the past and present were talking to me - go on dude, it's just one drink, everything in moderation, fuck it Rob what do you have to lose? aren't you going to drink with me at the Radiohead concert anyway? the pills and the weed and the girls are your downfall anyway, come on, this reflective and somber you aint no fun, your work isn't any better sober what are you trying to prove with this discipline? - and then I considered the insomnia and the meds that have stopped the migraines but now have me dreaming things I never wanted to see, and I thought about my brother and how I haven't spoken to him in years, and my father, who when he had his heart attack a few years back I didn't even care enough to inquire if he was alright, and I considered my current state - two weeks away from the move to SF, and my future roommate, who's now in rehab, and how if I screw up again it might be it, a life of fucking what ifs, and finally, as the images that have haunted my brain for fifteen years ended, I poured the drink down the sink, licking the rim of the glass to remind myself what could have been, in fact what it once meant to be alive, and retired to the empty bedroom, where I could still smell HER hair on my pillow, and curled up in the fetal position, with the director's commentary of Rushmore playing on loop, over and over, until the tremens passed once again, and at last the eyelids became heavy, and just as the sprinklers came on and the lound smack of the paperboy's arrival, I was out. Another day had passed, one step closer to the divine.