(with a Nod to Texaco Lights), a short short story 

I had an appointment with my shrink in LA this morning so I left Palm Springs promptly at 8:00 a.m. for my 11:30 a.m. breakfast meeting.  I arrived at 11:50 a.m., twenty minutes late.  The 10 interstate was clogged like shit in a commode.  The fact that it takes more than 3 1/2 hours to drive 123 miles in southern California is only half the problem.  The other half is that my Jag died driving back from LA this afternoon.  I was zooming along, listening to Randi Rhodes on the radio, the ice cold AC blowing on my feet and face when suddenly my car started to sputter.  I was pressing the accelerator but no gas was getting to the engine.  Going 10 m.p.h. on a freeway where the average speed around me was 80 m.p.h., I crawled the Jag across 4 lanes of traffic.  And I made it to the edge of the 60 without getting hammered.  I reached under the seat for my shoes (I drive barefooted) and called AAA.  I was told to immediately press my membership number into my cell phone.  First of all, the AAA card is in my wallet in my bag on the floor.  Second of all, I’m sitting in 110 degree heat on the side of the 60.  Third and final, I couldn’t find my reading glasses.  So, not wanting to exit the car and get crushed, realizing it would be hours before my road kill DNA was found if I did, I turned the key and the Jag started.  I pressed on the gas, my goal being the exit I could see ahead of me.  I made it to the top of the exit.  Then the sputtering started again.  I drifted down the exit ramp, off the 60, onto a half-paved road with nothing around but buildings being built.  I coasted to what could have been called the side of the road if there was a side to the road.  I  turned off the car.  This time when I called AAA I had my reading glasses on, my AAA card in my hand, and I was off the freeway.  AAA put me in touch with their local contracted tow company and I decided to use them.  After I cut a deal with the tow truck driver, a young kid with work on his hands, he agreed to secure my Jag on top of his flatbed and haul my ass to Palm Springs, all for 300 bucks.  For the first 1/2 hour of the 1 hour drive home,  Ribergo played bone shaking rap in the cab of the tow truck, lots of pussy and fuck and cunt and fag and nigger.  I rattled and watched the windmills spin in the heat wind.  The second 1/2 hour he turned the sound off.  He asked me if the fake police car was still parked alongside the 111 going into Palm Springs.  I told him I thought it was.  He said I was his last tow for the day.  I said he ought to hang out and have some fun.  He rolled down the windows, the AC still blasting.  He relaxed, lit a cigarette.  I felt more comfortable than I’d felt in a long time inside the tow truck cab.  Plus, I’d pay almost anything to sleep in my own bed. 

I’ve heard more about the war against Christmas (who knew) than I’ve heard about the war in Afghanistan and the occupation of Iraq.  The television media personalities have turned into posing opinionists, worried so much about access and power that their opinions don’t matter anymore.  

“Baby boomers, exit the stage.”   

My obsession with politics needs a Viagra.  I can’t get it up anymore for the horse race and backbiting along with the focus on God and Jesus when the country is bankrupt, troops are dying, and neo-fascists are sawing down our rights — the debris so deep I need hip boots. 

the movie.  Marion Cotillard, the actress who inhabits Edith Piaf, is pitch perfect because the director, Olivier Dahan, refuses to let his La Vie En Rose embrace sentimentality.  My socks and heart and head were knocked off. 

Go to this website for a preview:    edithpiafmovie.com 

“It takes no imagination to live within your means.”

–  from Peter Biskind’s book

Easy Riders, Raging Bulls. 

WANTING SUMPTUOUS HEAVENS

No one grumbles among the oyster clans, And lobsters play their bone guitars all summer. 

Only we, with our opposable thumbs, want Heaven to be, and God to come, again.

There is no end to our grumbling; we want Comfortable earth and sumptuous Heaven.

But the heron standing on one leg in the bog Drinks his dark rum all day, and is content.

–  The New Yorker, Nov. 5, 2007.    

Happy birthday, Joni Mitchell.  I plumb forgot.  Jean Flynn and Drew Searing both called to remind me.  I saw you on the CBS Early Show last Sunday.  You are more beautiful and more inspiring than ever.  I’m grateful we’re on the planet at the same time. 

It’s that time of year, turn the clock back.  It gets dark earlier and the days are shorter and I don’t like it.  So I begin pondering the waxing of the light after the winter solstice.  When I was a boy I thought if I lived with Palm Trees it would never get dark. 

If a person ever gets to the mid-point of a life, I think I’m there.  It makes sense to me.  It is not a crisis, as in mid-life.  (That may not be true.)  It is letting go.  It is embracing a new direction.  I’m in between letting go and embracing.  It’s fascinating unless it’s not.  This mid-point dance will require learning some new moves, new steps.  Fuck it.

At least I still have my hair.   

Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid believe that if they continue to lick the boots of the lowest rated and most incompetent President in history that their boot licking will translate into Democratic wins next year…  Think again, Pelosi and Reid.  Democrats, like me, want you to take a stand and if you are not capable of doing your jobs then resign.  The two of you placate and whitewash your statements for the President while you attack and dishonor Democratic members of Congress, like Rep. Stark, who is trying, despite your best efforts, to speak the truth about the current administration.  Get off the stage, Pelosi and Reid, before you blow the best chance Democrats have had in 20 years to become a viable opposition party to the Republicans.  Take SCHIP for example – you, Pelosi and Reid, have lost respect with Democrats outside the Beltway because you and your fellow members in Congress and the President and the Vice-President enjoy government health benefits as you deny that same privilege for the rest of the citizens of your country.  Have you no courage?  What are you waiting for?  Democrats are waiting for you to do what you were elected to do — be leaders.  Or get out of the way and let other Democrats in Congress fill your seats before it’s too late.      

aka, agents.  I’m picky about who I want to represent me and my new novel.  Perhaps my age, almost in the triple digits, has something to do with it…   I have to find the perfect merchant for my new book.  So I’m putting the word “out there,” a nebulous phrase which represents a place that exists but no one can describe except for those who have found “out there.”  I’ve found the place a couple of times but it keeps moving.  Hence, my clarion call. 

Ms. Kim Witherspoon, you’re up, along with InkWell Management.