My Christmas Story.......................Good Grief.

I typically abhor Christmas, and the holiday season in general. I run from it. Ask my sisters, many are the stories of me running cursing and screaming from their houses because I just couldn’t handle making the sweet tea, or going out for ice. I’m not kidding I wish I was, but I’m not. I’m a holiday jerk. This year, as I’ve aged to the ripe old age of 43 I may be reconsidering some of these long held/bull-headed thoughts I’ve had over the years. Basically, I’m tired of being a selfish butthole.

First, lets look at the Peanuts Christmas Story. I was raised on this show. I missed it once, and I cried so much, and there was nothing mom or dad could do; it was horrible. The Peanuts Christmas Story is near perfection. It still amazes me on so many levels. How did “they” allow this subversive message out? The networks must have been insane. This is one of the things I absolutely love about Christmas. Charlie Brown is one of my heroes. In spite of certain failure and disaster, he muscles up and gives it his all. Charlie Brown is like us, he’s got no money and is caught in large world that’s hard nearly incomprehensible to understand. This makes his struggles seem not only real but epic. His efforts to find the perfect tree for the Christmas Play are akin to the Labors of Hercules. If Charlie Brown had a tatoo it would probably say something catchy like, “Don’t Give Up the Ship”. Christmas and Peanuts go together like pecans in pie.

I’ve spent Christmas’s all over the world Spain, Afghanistan, Knoxville, and now Iraq. But the  ones I remember the most fondly are in Cowan, Tennessee. We always, cut our own tree. Dad would usually go riding around in the woods and grab a Cedar Tree off the side of the road. Dad liked the Cedar cause it smelled so good, and didn’t get sap everywhere. Later, when I was in high-school me and mom went Christmas Tree hunting. We’d drive around some Cowan backroads and found a nice one. Me and Mom got out of the car, and were sizing it up. Just as I was ready to go to chopping with my trusty Boy Scout Hatchet Mom says, “Garry what’s that over there?” “Oh, that’s somebody’s house, and it looks like were standing in their front yard.” I replied. We back out nice and slow. We drove down the road and turned off onto a dirt road. We drove down a hill and around a little bend. Parking the car we got out and surveyed the landscape. Lots of fine Cedars to choose from. All of sudden, there’s blue lights! An unmarked police car is coming right at us with the blue dash light blazing. Mom screams, “Ahhhhh!!!” I’m totally confused. Then out jumps my buddy Eric grinning from ear to ear. “Gotcha!” I nearly pee my pants. Mom made him stay and help me chop down the tree. The tree is key. I still have a lot of the old faded decorations we had as kids.

Carroling, we always we went carroling. I pretended to hate it. We’d get out of school to walk around Cowan and sing. We always sang to the retired people and shut-ins. They loved it. Sometimes they’d have a cookie for us, but mostly just big smiles. My favorite song was, “Bring me some Piggy Pudding and Bring it right Now!” I would be scream-singing this at the top of my lungs. It was so funny. Luckily, our audience was largely hard of hearing. My teachers however, were not and I received more than one “stink eye” over my poetic license. It would be cold, we’d be out walking up and down the streets singing to homes and the local businesses. Afterwards, back in our classroom, somehow Hot Chocolate would be waiting with one of those extra-large marshmellows floating in the middle of it. We always had a big Christmas Tree in the classroom, and made the decorations for it out of construction paper and popcorn stringers.

Christmas plays, as a child I started out as a mere shepard, clothed in my Dad’s blue tartan robe. One year, I got to wear the electric blue terry cloth rob, and let’s just say it was badass. I was the ELECTRIC-NEON-DREAM-COAT-TECHNA-COLOR-SHEPARD! I liked being the shepard, nobody expected much, you just stood there next to the plastic sheep. Good times. Of course, I was always aggravated I never got picked to be Joseph. Dane Myers always got to be Joseph. Jealousy ran through my veins like sausage gravey over a homemade biscuit. Honestly, I was really jealous. However, one year I got to play the mean inn keeper. The one that “has no room”, that was me. So I’m in my cardboard inn, and Mary & Joseph (D.M.) walk up and ask meekly, “Do you have a place to for us to stay?” My cackle was heard echoing through the entire church, AAAAHHHHAAAHAHAHAHAAHAA…………….I’m 10 years old. “Room! Room for you!” I bellow. “We don’t serve your kind kind here!” I sneer as only a 10 year old child reared on the full-measure of 80’s sit-coms can sneer. My church is cracking up and laughing. Mary & Joseph are truly laughing and horror stricken at the same time. I’m laughing so hard on the inside, so hard. The Church Play Director, doesn’t know what to think, she just shakes her head. God Bless her soul for putting up with me. I was, and am a complete lunatic. Afterwards, all the old guys in the Church were patting me on the back and laughing congratulating me on a stellar performance. I imagine they were problably quite sleepy until I started yelling and making a scene.

My last Christmas play was “Mistletoe Macho”. It was a train wreck.  We were all frustrated hormonal teenagers. Because of my previous  shenanigans I had somehow moved into the lead role of “The Mistletoe Macho”. I never looked at my lines and had the poor Choir Director in tears. No really, at one point she was crying telling me how awful I was. She wanted to cancel the whole thing, but that wasn’t an option. Everyone else in the play went to the rich private school, Saint Andrews Sewanee up on the mountain. They were all in Drama Class, and took French and Latin. There was no way I could compete with that! So I just didn’t take it seriously, but somehow on performance night I managed to make it work to much appluase and laughter. Afterwards, I apologized to Cyntheia, our wonderful Choir Director.

What is Christmas without food! I was always the kid that liked to eat, still am. I eat my stress. I eat, and swallow my stress and anxiety to keep it deep inside where no one can see it. I would highly recommend this as the preferred method for dealing with lifes tribulations. Holiday feasts are mighty to behold and better to paratake. My Mom would always go above and beyond. Here repretoire was extensive. She made the best chocolate chip cookies. Especially, these Date-Nut-Ball things that were just amazing. Mom made it all. Here recipes were tried and true, perfected over decades.

Christmas dinners at my parents house are some of my happiest memories. My nephew Randy and I were invariably racing trucks through the house. The older folks would try relaxing until it became too much, and we were told to either go outside or locked in a room until we’d worn ourselves out. Christmas dinner involved the one time a year I saw my Dad pray in public. He always had a gift for words, and his offerings of thanksgivings and blessings were one of the few peaceful moments the busy little house on Hines Street ever experienced. My sister Faye, always had this amazing orange cranberry sauce. Glenda would bring pie, she makes the best crust ever. One year, around 1980 Mom had an organic impulse. Dad had to go and buy a live turkey. He kept the poor thing in the trunk of the car all day, till the fateful hour. When Dad opened the trunck out it popped in a flurry of feathers and squaks. Running all over the yard and neighborhood until they got it corned in the garage with the ax. Then, off came its head, no telling what the neighbors thought. Then Dad had to pluck it, he conned Faye into helping him pluck the bird, it was back braking work. Finally, Dad built a fire in the  backyard, and rigged up the old cast iron cauldron over my swing set. It was a Shakespearean Tragedy and Tom Turkey the star. “Double Double Toil and Trouble Fire will Burn and Couldron Bubble!” Then he gave the bird a good scalding to get the feathers off. Mom was never so happy. It was good eating too. When the Shores go Organic, its gonna be interesting for sure.

          Christmas morning, I always had a pile of toys. Thinking about it now I understand how much my Dad had to work to make that happen, and I feel guilty for being the kind of kid that had to have a bunch of toys to be happy. My Dad never had anything, and never wanted anything. He raised his kids, he wasn’t perfect by any means, but he hung in there when many people would have run away. Mom and Dad would stay up late cookinng the turkey and wrapping presents while we kids slept, or tried to sleep. I remember the day my brother got his 30-30 Marlin Hunting Rifle. I would get the same rifle in honor of him years later (I still have it). Christmas was the day we’d all sit around our tiny house and enjoy each others company. Somehow I always ended up with a toy race track. It had controllers and you’d race these electric cars around the track. Me and dad would play that thing for hours. I had one that was Star Wars themed and Dad would always be Darth Vader, and he would win. Luke Skywalker rarely won when my Dad was behind the wheel of his Tie-Fighter. It would make me so mad. We would have so much fun. It was one of the few days everyone seemed relaxed. Mom and Dad were glad to have pulled off another Christmas making there kids happy. My Mom and Dad worked so hard to give us stuff, stuff in hindsight I didn’t really need. Looking back on it all I am grateful for all they gave me. They gave me a safe childhood, and I was loved and cared for. That is no mean feat. It’s funny, I know people who’ve had money and wealth their entire lives. I’d not change places with them for one minute. This is what Christmas means to me, it wasn’t perfect. But it’s what I had, and that’s all I need.

 

 

 

 

 

To the Mountains of Madness, there & back again with

R.T. Gault

 

People have influenced me for good, bad, or indifferent. I am largely a mass of other people’s ideas and tastes. Of course, I have made them my own. Taken their idea’s, proclivities, and notions; internalized, distilled them, used them to create what I hope is my unique outlook and experience. We are products of those around us, and I am no different.

          I started reading comic books in Junior High, around age 12 or so. It started small with just a few here and there; then like a kudzu vine sprouting from the virile soil of adolescent literature. My hunger grew exponentially. I was the Borg of the wire rack newsstand. Devouring comics in the way Mighty Galactus devoured home-worlds. Discernment, was not my forte. Fantastic-Four was read along with Teen Titans, Robot Fighters, and Weird War. Somewhere along the line I heard about Centaur Books and Comics, in Tullahoma.

          I begged my Mom, a long suffering woman that loved/loves her child. I used logic, passion, and desperation to get my way, but in the end my Mom took me to the Comic Shop simply because she loved me, and probably knew I was not going to shut up about it any time soon. There’s a moral here, be careful of your desires. Because, you might just get it, you might just get it in spades. Those fairy tales where the loud, precocious child comes to bad end because of his unreasonable desires, they’re true. But at the time I didn’t know that. All I knew was I wanted some comic books and Speedy-Mart was no longer cutting it. I had to go to Tullahoma, had to go to Centaur Books and Comics.

 So Mom would drive me out there once a week, after my allergy shots. I would be so excited………so excited. Centaur Books & Comics was located in a single line strip mall of desperate venues. There was a Musical Instrument Store, a tax service store (read money laundering) and then there was Centaur, located on the very end. Out front and in plain view, just in case you were confused there was the sign. Lit large with florescence was a dancing centaur with the face of R.T. Gault wearing glasses. This was Centaur Books & Comics. Inside, the front was replete with rack upon rack of comics. He had all your main stream comics, and I immediately went for these. Enthusiastically, I would dig into back issues squealing with delight over G.I. Joe “America’s Hero” or Marvels “Secret Wars”. I’m sure R.T. was annoyed to no end by my gushing enthusiasm. However, over time we sort of developed this odd relationship. Me, the eager student and him the all-knowing, all wise sage of comic-literature.  

          R.T. Gault was a big man. Very tall, stoop shoulder he had the worst posture imaginable. He wore glasses, big brown 1980’s shatter-proof style glasses. His dress habits are sort of what you’d expect, and he smoked, but who cared? It was the 80’s and second hand smoke wouldn’t be invented for another 10 years. You could tell he wasn’t from around here and he informed me that he was from Indiana, and his family had once owned Roark’s Cove out in Decherd. Not sure why he decided on Tullahoma as a place of residence unless he was hiding from somebody.

          I guess he got sick of me reading such garbage or what he thought was garbage, or maybe I was his little Guinea Pig. He was probably just bored. Who knows but one day he starts recommending comics for me to read and before long I’m into all this bizarre stuff.

·        Cerebus the Ardvark

·        Watchmen Series

·        Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (when they were still B/W)

·        Miracleman

·        The Shadow

·        Swamp Thing

·        Epic Illustrated

·        Heavy Metal

Of course there were some misses as well, but I’ll forget all about “Radioactive Black Belt Ninja Hamsters” if you will. His store also probably had the largest collection of “Omaha the Cat Dancer” in the entire state of Tennessee at the time. He had all the R. Crumb stuff, back when everybody thought R. Crumb was just a dirty old man with his dirty old picture books. Yeah R.T. was a visionary in some ways. His store ran the gamut. “To catch many fish cast your net far and wide”, as the saying goes. R.T. is probably the reason I still enjoy comics.

          R.T.’s store was truly unique. My mom even said as much when after perusing his shelves she remarked, “He has some strange books”. Little did she know that she was gazing upon what was at that time likely the largest collection of occult material East of the Mississippi, South of the Mason-Dixon Line. He had it all. Allister Crowley, Golden Dawn, Atlantis, and Lemuria: you name a conspiracy or obscure mystic order, R.T. had it. Centaur Books & Comics was a vast cavern of occult esoterica that has fueled my imagination to this very day. R.T. introduced me to H.P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos, Edward Abbey and eco-terrorism, and finally one of my favorite fantasy books of all time he simply handed to me and said “Why don’t you read this?” “Little, Big” by John Crowley which is still to this day one of my favorite books. Not only is it still in print; it is hailed as an “unrecognized masterpiece”. The book is good, and yes I still have my copy.

          R.T. told me stories about writing “romance novels” to make extra money while he was in college. “It’s all very formulaic” he said with a chuckle and downward glance. One day while listening to him lecture about the JFK assassination………he went into the back and returned with a book “The politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia”. R.T. says, “this book talks about the Heroin Trade and the Golden Triangle, did you know they smuggled heroin inside coffins coming back from Vietnam?” Of course how could I know this I was like fourteen. He had to “decide” whether or not to sell it to me, as it was his only copy. Reluctantly he did.

          Here’s a review of the book he sold me for like $2.

 “This in-depth academic study researches the central role that opium plays in the economy, politics, and wars of the region. It follows the trial from the highlands of Laos, where the opium is grown and harvested by the Hmong tribespeople, to the Golden Triangle, where it is refined into heroin. Published in 1972, this was the first printed account of the USA's massive engagement in a "secret" war in Laos. It documented the use of CIA helicopters to bring Laotian opium to market in Vietnam (where, ironically, it was sold to addicted US soldiers.) This was done to finance weapons for the army of Hmong highlanders, being led by CIA "advisors", who were fighting the Laotian communists.
There was only one edition of this book; immediately after its first printing, the entire publisher was bought by the U.S. government, and all warehoused copies were destroyed. However, with a bit of luck it can still be found in used bookstores.”

This review stresses a simple fact, yes R.T. was a bit misanthropic and eccentric, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t know what he was talking about. He was one of the smarter more interesting people I’ve met. R.T. certainly had a lasting impact on my literary tastes and view of the world, and I’m good with that. Yeah, I was reading this stuff when I was in Junior High School. His reading list and my own geekiness combined with Edward Abbey, Anton Wilson, William Faulkner, and George Orwell’s 1984 to make me truly paranoid. I was ready to pop smoke and vacate Western Civilization for the remainder of my days. If R.T. was alive today he’d have a fit with all these 9/11 Theories and CIA Torture Planes. I imagine him to be doing 360’s in his grave as I write this.

          My good friend, Alex would come over to the house to hang out. He’d find me dressed out in a hybrid blend of combat boots, camouflage pants and Native American regalia either reading the Flaming Carrot or some occult history of the JFK assassination, I’d start yammering about Masons, Lee Harvey Oswald and the Iran-Contra affair. It also didn’t help that down the street the family of Tupper Saucey was selling his book on the Martin Luther King assassination. How James Earl Ray didn’t do it, that it was the FBI who framed him. All this came to roost inside my little head sitting up in my room, tweaking on Sun-Drop, and listening to Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”. Yeah, it was a perfect recipe for madness and I jumped in with both feet begging for it.  

“I was going to the worst place in the world and I didn't even know it yet. Weeks away and hundreds of miles up a river that snaked through the war like a main circuit cable plugged straight into Kurtz. It was no accident that I got to be the caretaker of Colonel Walter E. Kurtz's memory any more than being back in Saigon was an accident. There is no way to tell his story without telling my own. And if his story really is a confession, then so is mine.” – Captain Willard from “Apocalypse Now”