02/03/01

Had this dream the other night about Porch Rot’s house. Well, it was more than that really. It was a dream about a secret room. I know it probably sounds crazy, but I started obsessing on the thought that Hiram had lied to me and that Clean Phil wasn’t dead at all. I started imagining that Phil had gone crazy and was being kept locked up in a room in that house like a caged animal. Craziest thought, I know. I have no good evidence that the dream could ever be true. It sure got me in the most fucked up, unexpected situation though. I guess my wacky thoughts got the better of me.

My memory just kept going back to the time that I asked to go through Phil’s stuff. I realize now that the inside of the house didn’t match up with the outside of the house, that a secret room really could have existed there. What I mean to say is there should have been another room or two on the ground floor of the house than what I saw that day to account for the square footage you can figure from the outside. So as I’m recalling going through that house, in my memory I realize a big armoire was placed up against the wall where a door should have been. I suddenly recall years later a piece of door trim partly visible behind the piece. I remember thinking to myself at the time, Porch Rot has that room closed off, but I never thought at the time why that was so.

The beagle went missing again, so I took upon myself yesterday morning to go looking for him on Hiram’s farm. Got close to the house. Got near to the window where I thought the secret room might be, put my face close to the glass to look in, and what do I see inside but little Milady naked in a bathtub, her little brown jugs bobbing so sweetly on top of the water and suds. She didn’t scream or anything, but I sure did feel like a fool. I can tell I embarrassed the hell out of her. She just kind of sunk her body beneath the water so that only her head was sticking out of the soap.

I’m looking for my dog, I say all red-faced, desperate to explain myself, Perro. Mi Perro esta losto againo.

And then I left and came back to the trailer to hide under a blanket on my couch. Thought the police would show up any moment and arrest me for being a peeping Tom or a stalker or user of really bad, made-up Spanish or something. Just had these visions of being sent back before the judge on a probation violation. Had these visions of awful headlines in the newspapers. Had these awful visions of being sent to prison for twenty years or something, being boned up the ass by some burly woodchuck more foul than even myself.

What the fuck are you doing, Thoreau? I just kept thinking, buried beneath that blanket, What the fuck are you doing?

What happens next? A knock at the trailer door. Who is it but Milady bundled against the cold in a ski jacket smiling happily at me, the fucking beagle squirming in her arms desperate to get away again.

I fine your dog, she says happily.

Great, I say dishonestly, bring him in.

I was thinking I didn’t want to run the risk of trying to take the dog out of her arms and dropping him and have him run off again. I didn’t want to run the risk of brushing her titties either trying to get the dog out of her arms. Better to let her bring the dog right in so he could‘t get away again.

But just as soon as I say that, I think: why the hell are you bringing this girl into your trailer? She could accuse you of abusing her or something.

Can I get you a warm drink? Coffee? I say, slipping deeper into the abyss.

I’m thinking to myself, Why the fuck did you do that? She’ll be here for an hour now.

She just shakes her head yes, seems reluctant to say anything in English. She’s wearing these super tight jeans. Never noticed her in them before, I’m thinking what’s that about? Sits down without hesitation on the edge of the sofa I had obviously been using as my bed, had her hand crammed nervously between her thighs by her crotch. She still has her jacket on.

Don’t ask her to take off her jacket, I think. Don’t ask her to take off her jacket.

Wouldn’t you like to take off your jacket? I ask.

She doesn’t say anything. She just shyly takes off the jacket. The beagle doesn’t like the whistling sound the jacket makes and starts yapping. Milady hushes the dog. Dog fucking obeys for once. Dog is transfixed by her, and that saying nothing of the beagle. She got a low riding blouse on and has cleavage showing to match the Rift Valley of Tanzania.

My fucking goodness, I’m such an idiot. Such a fucking idiot. I’m doing math in my head. If this girl is 19 years-old and it 2001 now, then she was born around 1982, the year John Cougar Mellencamp, who was only John Cougar then, came out with Jack and Diane. I’m remembering back singing the line life goes on long after the thrill of living is gone and I envision this girl at the time still at her mother’s breast. So then I’m thinking about her mother and what her breast must have been like in 1982 when John Cougar Mellencamp, who was just John Cougar then, was just out with Jack and Diane, and I start wondering how old she, the mother, might be. I realize I’m probably older than her mother by 10 years. Then I start thinking maybe her mother had her when she was 16 and her grandmother had her mother at 16, making the girl’s grandmother the same fucking age as me!

Now that kind of thought sure would put a damper on the old physiology. . . if it weren’t for the wonders of Viagra, I mean. Ever since the male chest cancer I’ve had to be on the shit. In reality there was no chance anything would have ever happened between me and Milady that day. I was being closely monitored the whole time. You see, Milady went to the house first with the dog and Phebe sent her down the lane to the trailer. When Phebe didn’t see Milady return from my trailer right away, she concocted an excuse to come visit me to make sure nothing untoward was taking place. Upon sight of Phebe nearing the trailer Milady got up off the sofa and put her jacket back on to leave.

I was cleaning up the house and came across your old 8 track player Phebe says and she hands over a box to me. I know in an instant from the musical selection--- Neil Young‘s Everybody Knows This is Nowhere---that she was there for a specific purpose---to partake in the Cinnamon Girl deed. I suppose she was curious to see if I had expended myself. Surely she learned that was not the case.

I remember hearing tales about World War I, how the two sides put down their arms on Christmas, climbed out of their trenches and had a good old time with each other while that particular day lasted. But then when it was over, they were back in their trenches again, back to trying to kill one another. That’s kind of the same thing Phebe and I went through on Christmas Day and now Ground Hog’s Day: Five and a half minutes of Woodchuck Love, and than back immediately to trench warfare.

Like George Carlin says: fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.

He also said the shortest sentence in the English language is I am---the longest sentence is I do.

I guess you could say I saw my shadow. Somehow I’m guessing we’ll have six more weeks of Winter.