Sleeper Hold. Baumgartner Grass. Jerry Rigged Expeditions. Silence – John Cage. Great book. Got it from Jimmy Lee, a former roommate of mine from the 1980’s. Jimmy and I lived in a basement apartment at 1124 Willow Avenue. It was quite a moldy little place. Jimmy was the perfect roommate. He was never there. Maybe once or twice a month. This apartment like every apartment I had before, was what I thought to be the apartment I die in.

Not thinking in the immediate at the time, more like planning ahead, and dying there when I was 60 or 70. I always try to forestall death at every opportunity. Right now, with a certain mockery, I casually look in the window at my reflection, expecting to see the Grim Reaper, standing there scythe in hand, saying, “Gotcha!”

I was working for Murdoch Magazines at the time, where I met Pedro and Harry along with a few others. I look back and see what a slacker lifestyle I had. I was working there during the day, and D.J.ing or something else at Maxwells, working the door, checking ID’s or just hanging out drinking. Ah those were the days.

At some point I was even having mail sent to Maxwells because the mailbox in one of the apartment buildings that I was living in was quite dodgy. Anne Fallon was there in the afternoon and got the mail. I’m sure she didn’t like it much but did understand somewhat.

I decided one day to throw a party, for no particular reason except to get fucked up and have some fun. I had a lot of records, so dancing would somehow occur I hoped. I bought a few cases of beer, and told everyone else to bring their own and they certainly did. I’d say maybe 50 people were there. There was so much beer that we filled the bathtub with ice and stored it in there. Which, when you look at it, is convenient since you’re getting rid of some beer and able to refill while you’re done within seconds.

I also invited some avid winter sport distributors. They kept the party going a long long while. When Mike Keller arrived with other McSwells employees and patrons, he told me it looked like someone in the living room entrance had just eaten a great big jelly donut. Soon Mike was enjoying the donuts as well. It was a night of donuts for everyone!

Pedro and I hung out in the back yard for a few minutes and he showed me ‘The Rooftop’. ‘Quite good’ I thought with my addled mind. Harry was there alienating Lovely Rita. Julio and a friend of his came back from the Garden where they saw a pseudo Led Zeppelin reunion at the Atlantic Records gala.

Ulysses from Queens, a friend of Pedro was enjoying watching Sean Mullhall doing Da Butt with his girlfriend Susan who my friend Maurice was quietly falling hard for. The party even had crashers, who wound up stealing someone’s leather coat. They had tailed the McSwells crew and walked right in.

I’m sure they also broke my answering machine. It had to have been them. The party was deemed a success. No police were called, due to the fact that the apartment was so subterranean and the apartment above was vacant.

A Tree is best Measured when it’s depressed.

The money is gone! Yeah yeah. Listening to the Clash right now. What a great band. Never got around to seeing them. I was totally afraid of the city then. My parents fled from there in the 1950’s and if it weren’t for my father working there, they’d rather not have anything to do with it.

It was pretty bad then, no doubt. Muggings, murders and assorted really bad stuff, to put it mildly. In 1976 my father worked in the World Trade Center and had an office that overlooked the Hudson River. There was a plan to go to the office and have a party there and watch the tall ships and the fireworks.

Sounded good to pubescent me. There were rumors that gangs would be roaming the streets mugging everyone and doing various nasty things to everyone that wasn’t them. Which meant they would be after us. Sounded good to pubescent me.

In hindsight I think it was because, who the hell wants to go to the office on their fucking day off? Not me, that’s for sure. So I’m sure my father felt the same way, though he probably didn’t say fucking. He was more of a goddamned guy.

The city always loomed large, I could see it from a distance sometimes when going with my mother to pick up my father at the train station. The Empire State Building, and the World Trade Center.

I was always more impressed with the Empire State Building it always looked so great at night when lit up, and King Kong climbed it. I grew up wondering if he could’ve been seen climbing from Lodi.

Johnny Serpone, a neighbor of mine back then, told me the story of ‘Son of Kong’ where Junior gets to Manhattan and climbs up the Empire State Building, where on a landing he sees his father’s blood, freaks out, and falls to his death. Spoiler alert: This didn’t happen.

I know King Kong climbed the World Trade Center, but that was pure hokum. Balderdash, if you pardon my French.

I could’ve seen the Clash at Bonds in 1980 but I was way too much of a pussy. Though in 1977 I did take a bus into Manhattan and wandered around Times Square on my own, for an Easter Saturday afternoon and saw some very interesting things. It was very sleazy then. I didn’t mind one bit.

Why did I have balls in 1977 and none at all in 1980? I suppose the balls were so new there was nothing to be afraid of. In 1980 I had a car, that should’ve made everything easy, but something held me back.

It was a lot safer in the suburbs that’s for sure. But I was beginning to think there was a whole lot more than the same old thing I saw everyday. I did find a compromise, Hoboken. NJ for sure, but with NYC only a 10 minute train ride away. And now that I work in the city, it takes a hell of a lot to get me there when I’m not working. I’m trying to change that. Started last weekend. I do owe Harpy a visit.

PS- On my way to work this morning I saw a woman and a boy in a bubble.


I think it’s for families with Immune deficiencies at Christmas or something like that. Or maybe an experiment.