After the Storm — 11.0 Dirty Socks Warm Springs, Inyo County, California
“A few gray Federales say
We could have had him any day
We only let him go so long
Out of kindness, I suppose….”
The only place I was able to find Lucky Buddha Beer was at the Whole Foods in Las Vegas. I bought some back to Darwin on my last return. It comes in that cool green bottle shaped like a fat guru and tastes light and delicious and it is probably a good thing that I could only afford one six pack, a good thing that no one else seems to sell it, a good thing that I ran out of it very quickly. A good thing or I would probably still be there in the hellish Darwin summer (very windy, very very dry, very very very hot) drinking myself into an oblivion as close as I could get to meditational nirvana.
The only place to get out of the heat? A warm pool of sulfurous water 30 miles away called “Dirty Socks” Not bad if you’re desperate and can remember to bring a comb to get the floating algae out of your beard after a few circular laps. In the warm smelly water my friend would wrap herself around me and I’ll admit it was quite fun and romantic.
And with enough Lucky Buddha Beer I would never be able to leave Darwin, or Dirty Socks, or any part of that beautiful dark sky loneliness.
My luck being as it is; I dodged that bullet. I left town in late May. In time to spend my birthday high in the Sierras at a lovely old cabin built on the edge of Silver Lake, owned by a very good friend whose great grandmother built it almost 100 years ago. Spectacular in all aspects.
Bittersweet ending to a lovely dream. I returned to Eugene when I learned a very good friend was in the ICU with brain seizures. I rushed back to try to see him, but covid restrictions kept me from visiting the hospital. He died last Friday.
Truthfully I was surprised by the largeness of the hole his death left in my heart. A few days before he died my good friend broke off the romance that had kept me connected to Darwin. Suddenly I was shockingly set adrift. (Only in the ocean of my mind of course, but depression, as you all surely know, can feel like a very very deep ocean indeed.)
A braver man might go searching for a couple of cases of Lucky Buddha Beer. For medicinal purposes of course, for use as an anti-depressant. No doctor’s order necessary. Just one concussive beer after another.
But I am pretty much a coward. I stopped drinking entirely, began to fast and pray, read self help books, ride my bike near the river, and dream about getting back to some disciplinary writing. Don’t worry it is only a dream. I haven’t quite gotten myself to touch the keyboard in any meaningful way.
I convinced myself that I am too bummed out to write very well. True? Not true? Who knows.
I have mostly felt in my life that it is good to cultivate a sense of loss if only to assure yourself that you felt attachment to begin with. Sometimes we can take love for granted and I surely have. When a friend dies or leaves you for a different, brighter future, it is only then that you begin to understand love. The emptiness in your heart helps define the depth of your feelings. And that is something you never lose. It goes with you to the grave and that is where all of our hearts expand to infinity. Bursting into the universe.
(Are you getting the subliminal explosives narrative? Clever, eh?)
My last thoughts while leaving Darwin centered around loneliness. I was thinking about the hardworking miners who dug themselves to death way out in the whistling winds of dry heat and frozen stars. What were they thinking? No one really got very rich out there. I think what they were really searching for was freedom. Freedom to piss anywhere, freedom to fart at will, freedom to smell bad, die young, blow things up when you wanted to. That’s it: I think a lot of those fellas just wanted to blow things up.
In Darwin I found an old crate from the Atlas Powder Company. It had, at one time, contained sticks of dynamite. I could only imagine the fun it had been to use up all that explosive energy.
After a few Lucky Buddha Beers I would put my feet up on that crate and try to get back to those tender thoughts of Buddhist ideology. Where life is a river, you are on a raft, you can not control where the river flows on its way to your death. You can only try to steer your way through to the end.
My friend who died was one of my biggest fans. Many times I would give him a story or an essay, or even a eulogy, to read for his opinion. He never read a single thing I gave him. He always said he would but he never did. When I challenged him, he told me he never read anything I wrote. But he was sure I was a great writer. He took it on faith.
He was a true fan, never limited by mere reality. I will miss him dearly.
That’s love for you. What more could I ever ask for.….
BOOM!