Note to reader: I have recently recorded a cd entitled "By the Waterbrook" and am happy with the result. I've written notes, recorded the music, of course, and was preparing to post everything on cdbaby. In the meantime, I received an email letting me know that cdbaby will be shutting down their online store, therefore any cds that I create from this time forward (today is February 21, 2020) will have to go on my personal website. That is fine with me, however I am a creature of habit...and I always liked the name "cdbaby". Alas, some things are out of our control and this seems to be one of them. Therefore, I am including my notes for By the Waterbrook below. They will be up on my website when I am set and ready. Also, you will meet Jonathan Parsons, Lolita DeBennedetti, A.J., Tim and Toni Roe, Kevin Backstreet, Mr. Jesus, Bad News Travels Fast, Minerva Boils and a few others along the way. All people and/or characters I write about may or may not be fictional. Like Huckleberry Finn, some characters are a combination of people I've known. Note to reader: Lolita's name is misspelled on purpose, occasionally...

notes for By the Waterbrook:

In early September 2019, I visited my daughter Rachelle out in Helena, Montana where she lives. We planned a road trip to see the sights in Montana. I, of course, intended to collect my nature sounds. Presently, I use a Sony field recorder with a windscreen. You know the type with the fuzzy cover. Rachelle, to say the least, gets weary of my consuming hobby because we need to stop and be quiet while I record. "Fuzzy stays in the car", she said a bit exasperated. Well, Fuzzy didn't stay in the car and here is the result. We visited Yellowstone and Glacier National Park, among other places. The cover photo on this Cd was taken on the walking trail that leads to Avalanche Lake in Glacier.

And now...a story...

I suppose it was 1978. I would have been 19 then. If you threatened to darken me in any way, I could pick an earlier
date. Then, I would say it could have been November-December 1975. About the time I met the psychic. "You will be married twice", she said sitting across from me, unblinking, calm like a winter's night. Like some great blues artist playing her horn... "Your second marriage will be better than your first. Your second wife will be wealthy." Taken aback a bit, I said "Divorce?" "No", she said. Then she told me something I shall not repeat. "When will this happen"? "In your mid 50's", she said. (I must say here, that while this is the way I remember it, I have a very vague distant memory of there being some question mark concerning the age/time frame. But it is vague.) "How many kids will there be". "Four", the blues girl said, again, unflinched, unconcerned and on her game. "I see a wheelchair"... Whoa...I'm fifteen at the time, riding in a car with my girlfriend Lisa and two other friends, Dale and Peggy, and Glinda the good witch is talking about my future - with wheelchairs. I had probably never touched a wheelchair at that age and never imagined that they would be an integral part of my life. As it happened, my entire adult life has been surrounded by people in wheelchairs. My son, my clients, my mom at the end of her life, my father-in-law in old age...Endless amounts of wheelchairs. I was a bit buzzed at the time, but remember thinking later that I always wanted 5 kids like my mom. Five is a good number. It fits me. The Chinese even say that 5 is the most important number in the cosmos. "And you wanted FIVE kids!!", my wife has said too many times over the years. This, when exasperated and at her wit's end. (I have had three children so far and am 60 years old at the time of this writing). "You have a lot to go through", the psychic lady said kindly and matter-of-factly. That certainly happened. She took one of my palms in her hand and mentioned something about my life changing over time, like a turning point in a plot. But that also is vague now. Also, she mentioned something about my 60's...but time has faded this memory as well. I rose up and left the room and sat down, somewhat rattled that I would have 2 wives, 4 kids and wheelchairs were in the picture. She passed by me to get one of my friends to come in next, turned to me and asked me a question I shall never repeat to anyone, anytime, anywhere. "No", was how I answered. So, all psychics aside, it was probably 1978 after all. The day I first met Crazy Kate. In actuality, Crazy Kate has nothing to do with Glinda the Good Witch - the psychic who looked like Carole King in her mid 40's perhaps, but was renamed by me over the years because she was kind hearted like Glinda the Good Witch in the Wizard of Oz. Glinda had her ESP shop on the west side of town and Crazy Kate was always near the downtown library. That is where I met her. Across the street from the library was the Hotel Plaza where transients came and went. Crazy Kate seemed in her mid-fifties. She seemed in her mid 50's every year that I saw her. Someone, somewhere, somehow, dressed her in the morning. She was well kept with a dress, coat and sometimes a hat. She had pretty silver hair that that someone who dressed her used to put up in a neat bun. She was completely mad. Utterly and completely insane. As I found out later from my client Craig, her young daughter was raped and murdered by two young black men. Craig was told this by a policeman after his run-in with Crazy Kate. "Explains a lot", I said to Craig. "She lost her mind, then", I thought to myself, "and it never returned". But this is a story about echoes...How one thing leads to another...one act defining one's life, or perhaps the better turn of phrase would be, helps define one's life...one's influence upon another...echoes...you know what I mean...a butterfly flaps her wings in the English countryside and someone far away perhaps, cures a disease or paints a picture or writes a song...Echoes...a young disabled boy can't move by himself, can't walk or talk or eat, and someone near him in some way, wins the lottery. A dream is involved. An engagement that gets postponed forever. A wedding ring removed in fury and somehow never returns. Someone, somewhere thinks a thought or somehow creates an atmospheric effect, and a tornado touches down in the tiny town of Ladysmith, Wisconsin. The Dalai Lama turns on the radio and attractive, brunette female secret agents descend on libraries across the United States. Echoes, all. It's a funny thing, the way it works. Not something I would plan or do. Not something I particularly enjoy being a part of. Like I have said before, "just give me my harps and guitars and I'm happy." Don't need no Hollywood. I had one "conversation" with Kate. I was walking down the steps of the library with books in my arms, turned slightly to my left and passed in front of her. "Hi" was all I said. "Godda*it", she muttered. (I might mention here, to clarify things, that she used the Lord's name in vain there. I am simply incapable of writing it out. My wife's influence upon me.) So, the one time Crazy Kate and I exchanged words, she tried to damn me to hell. My client Craig, an incomplete quadraplegic, now 48, wheelchair bound and in constant pain, tells me how he met Crazy Kate. I am showering him in his shower chair as I do everyday I work for him - no cameras about - quiet in there besides our voices and the running water. "I used to work at the 'Soft Touch' car wash", Craig says. "Crazy Kate came in and tried to steal a candy bar. I picked her up and put her outside the store." Wait a minute...."NOBODY touches Crazy Kate", I practically yell. "You can't TOUCH Crazy Kate." Then he tells me the story of her daughter's rape and murder. You bound her against her will, I thought to myself..Like her daughter...This took a while to sink in - months perhaps...echoes... "I would have given her the candy bar and opened the door for her", I say/think. You don't touch Crazy Kate, that's rule number one.

Craig lived a fast life after he lost his father at fifteen. We have this in common. I lost my father at 4. Two hard ages to lose a parent, I've been told. The brain is vulnerable at this stage in development.
He slept with too many girls. He was a male stripper with an award winning muscle body. Kind of my opposite. At 22, he decided to turn his life around. He wanted to counsel young people. Specifically, treat young boys addicted to video games. He joined a bible church and they sent him to Jamaica for a mission trip. On his day off, he was frolicing in Dunn's River Falls - a well known waterfall in Jamaica - competing in a relay race. He slipped on one of the slippery stones, fell and broke his neck. No one knew he was hurt and he almost drowned in 18 inches of water. His fellow Christians were there and began that ritual they have of the "laying on of hands". You know the routine. You've seen it on TV. They began circling his head around - probably the absolute worst thing they could have done. "Did you know that 75% of the damage done by a spinal cord injury happens after the initial impact?, " Craig told me once. As it happens, I have been to Jamaica. My wife and I went there some years ago for a few days. We went for the reggae music, food, and because I love the Caribbean Sea. "Jamaica is the most beautiful island in the Caribbean", our new friend Alvin told us. Well, it may be, but I will probably never go back. (Upon second thought and upon more reflection, I would like to return to Jamaica someday to see more of the inland and take nature walks, but there are a lot of ghosts there.) Also, as it happens, we were going to go to Dunn's River Falls Craig was injured at, but circumstances prevented it. We met Alvin, a young black Jamaican who took us touring around in our rental car. Rastafarians, voodoo priests and priestesses, thievery and slavery in the past, black magic, uncontrolled white wealth...it's a long list of sins or maybe the better word is..."differences".

Once when we were there, we went to a reggae club. There was a young man dancing alone and, mentally, in another world, moving his body in some rhythmic trance. It occurred to me that this place could have darkness lurking about. It's a beautiful place, notwithstanding, but it has a "history", shall we say. "They have this 'white-black' thing", our lawyer said once. "You don't want to go there". He wasn't talking to us at the time, but we were in the room. We had already been there, as I mentioned.

A few things...When we landed in Montego Bay, a group of men stood by the chain link fence just outside the plane deportment. One of the men motioned for me to approach him. I did, of course. He showed me some Jamaican ganga and wanted to sell it to me. I hadn't smoked 'ganga' in decades and my wife hates the smell of marijuana. "No thanks", I said, and walked away. Yes, it is true that people go there for weed. There were people on our plane who probably did just that. "They don't care if you smoke down here. You just have to leave it on the island", someone told me. Very true, I found.

On our return trip to O'hare airport, a handsome young plainclothes officer was leading a cute little "sniffer" mutt on a lease. The little mutt approached our bag and sniffed for a moment. He/she must have approved, because he/she just waddled off to the next passenger's bag. (My wife had brought back some Jamaican tea for my mom - sniffer must have smelled it.) "Sorry", the young officer said, and winked slightly at us.

Like I said, it took a bit of time for me to process this information...My sister Annette and I were on her deck on a gorgeous sunny day, talking as we do. "Did she put a curse on him?" I thought and said to my sister. "She was bound against her will, like her daughter." It occurred to me again that I would have given Kate the candy bar she wanted and opened the door for her to exit the store. But that's just me...I am, by nature, non-confrontational...

taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon" by Mark J. Sartori

A few short stories:

"My Little Riff" or "That's One Way to Keep Out the Rain" or "How to Avoid Assassins at Dinner"

Considering the Indiana State Police…To date, I have 1,943 traffic tickets issued by the Indiana State Police. As far as I can tell, the Indiana State Police have unbridled authority to arrest anyone, anywhere, anytime they want. Their authority stretches from Maine to the Florida Keys and they can stop - at will - along the way in Washington DC to arrest the President.
It’s in the constitution. I don’t think Indiana was a state back then, but this is a small matter and easily explainable. So far, the Indiana State Police have re-written the Constitution a total of six times. No one reads the Constitution, so the matter remains a blissful mystery to us who live here. The first Constitution was written by Christopher Columbus in 1492 on the sunburned back of of his first mate - a man named Jerry Rivers. (As an aside, Mr. Rivers is Geraldo Rivera’s great uncle twice removed – but they both share the same name. Geraldo jazzed up his name for television purposes, but his real name is Jerry Rivers and he has constitution blood in his veins. And I hear he likes to sail.) Well, Christopher Columbus had a useless parchment (on the sunburned back of his first mate, that is) until he landed ashore and the Indiana State Police initialed it in the bottom right hand corner. It reads, “Constitution of the United States, circa 1492, circa et al; i.e. Jerry Rivers, C.C” and has the initials “ISP” written in blood and rum in the bottom right hand corner. ISP, as may be obvious to you, stands for Indiana State Police. This first constitution gave the United States the rights to build a fire, kill random people, frolic with squaws named Sacajawea, shoot wildlife, eat Thanksgiving turkey, pass peace pipes, cause general malaise and chop down any trees they might find for recreational or utilitarian purposes. The Indiana State Police added in a gas tax so they could drive around the colonies and arrest people who didn’t belong there.

On Inauguration Day, the first duty of the President of the United States is to go into the White House and search for JFK’s little black book. It’s like an Easter Egg hunt for presidents and required by law. When they find it – and they always do – they look through it until they find Marilyn Monroe’s phone number. This isn’t hard because JFK had it written in triplicate and in three different languages - one being Egyptian hieroglyphics. At first glance, Marilyn’s contact information looks like a tall man in braids and a grass skirt pushing a wheelbarrow, but when you look closer it is actually Marilyn Monroe’s phone number. Then, they all dial Marilyn up to get advice on how to proceed to run this country. (The exception being Jimmy Carter who dialed and then hung up when she answered.) Richard Nixon wanted phone sex, but Marilyn said she's "not that kind of girl." Lyndon Johnson asked Marilyn’s advice about perfume for Ladybird Johnson, but she suggested the "Lady Bird Bill" instead of buying her Chanel #5. (This worked out well, as most of the wildflowers along our nation’s highways are the result of LBJ’s scotch and soda evenings coupled with late night conversations with Ms. Monroe.) Ronald Reagan talked to Marilyn every day for 8 years and generally forgot why he was there at the White House in the first place. (This is what women can do to you.) George Bush the First asked her advice about the kitchen help and confided in her that he wanted to be the one to cut the White House lawn. “Why should the maintenance people have all the fun?” And President Obama didn’t call Marilyn Monroe because Marilyn Monroe is President’s Obama’s mother. When Marilyn was vacationing in Mexico, she was entranced to meet the real life Mexican Aztec warlord dwarf, King Santiago Del Fuego, from the Peruvian Inca Capital – Muchy Peachy. King Santiago had many interests, but his main interest was in the manufacture and distribution of poison darts. He wanted to expand his empire into the United States and thought that Marilyn might be useful in this regard. His idea was to market poison darts to cruise ship passengers as they disembarked their ships. Hawaii was the natural choice for this operation. Marilyn thought the King’s idea was grand and promptly agreed to have his baby. They conceived President Obama on the lava fields of Mt. Hoochie-Coochie and President Obama was born 9 months later. However, what most American’s don’t know, is that Marilyn actually gave birth to President Obama in Eastern Mongolia. Her water broke while sightseeing there on top of a camel and President Obama was born shortly after on the dusty plains of Eastern Mongolia. The Indiana State police were called in and arranged for President Obama to be born in Hawaii, with an authentic Hawaiian birth certificate. That’s part of their job, and they were happy to do it.

The reason I have so many unpaid tickets courtesy of the Indiana State Police is because I know all of this. And if word got out about all of this, the foreign leaders at the United Nations would make fun of the American presidents and possibly bully them on the UN playground when they go out for recess after lunch. This might cause global instability and is therefore, better left alone. So, the Indiana State Police have given me a permanent “Get Out of Jail Free” card. They continue to issue me tickets, however, at my request – because I use them to patch up a leaky spot in my kitchen ceiling. (I run into a problem when I get a ticket for littering: It is yellow and doesn't match the color scheme of my leaky ceiling. So I've asked them for copies of my favorite tickets to have a backup in case of a hard rain.)

(As an aside, you would be safer at a dinner party filled with armed assassins who have been paid to kill you than you would driving on the interstate alongside an Indiana truck driver. At least with the assassins you could try to charm your way out of it over a nice dinner. Not so with an Indiana truck driver. He’ll squash you like a bug and make it home in time for dinner. And if you have out of state license plates, like me, he’ll circle back and pick your corpse up off the highway and feed you to the ravens just for kicks. It’s happened to me twice already, and I only made it out alive once.)

And one final note: It is common knowledge in these parts, that Jesus is delaying his second coming at the request of the Indiana State Police. They have already arrested Satan twice – once for jaywalking and once for disturbing the peace. And there’s talk among some officers that they want to silence him once and for all but others think it’s better to keep him around for entertainment purposes.

taken from "The Purity Chronicles", by Mark J. Sartori

Some years ago, my niece Teresa texted me. She had gone through a divorce and was considering remarrying. It went something like this:

T: Uncle Mark, do you think it's ok for me to remarry? The Bible says...
M: Yes, yes, I know. It says that you will commit adultery if you remarry. I know. That was
given to the men, I think. They were all after that foreign poon, probably. And besides, didn't King Solomon have 300 wives and 700 concubines? That's a lotta Valentine's Day cards. And I get sore just thinking about it.

T: I love you, Uncle Mark.
M: I love you too.

She remarried and has 2 beautiful daughters. I like to think that King Solomon and his wives/girlfriends had something to do with it.

taken from "The Purity Chronicles", Mark J. Sartori

another story...

The Pigeon and the Pellet Gun

When I was a young boy, maybe 10 years old or so, I bought a pellet gun. This was my one and only experience with
American firearms. It was one of those pump action types, that the more you pumped it, the faster the pellet would
eject. It was brown, sleek and powerful, at least in the hands of a 10 year old boy. So one day, by myself, I crossed over the railroad tracks that lead to route 6 near my home and went into some kind of open air silo. It was quiet in there and dusty. I was looking for birds to kill and birds I found. A single pigeon sensed my presence and took off. I aimed and shot. And hit him/her. She fluttered, now wounded, and...well, you know the rest. It frightened me to see her struggling for her life. I suppose that a month doesn't go by in my life that I don't think of this wounded bird. The one I killed.
For some reason unknown to me then, but clear to me now, my pellet gun began to malfunction after this encounter with this bird. I wasn't meant to kill birds. Others would do enough of that. Perhaps that's why I record nature sounds today. Who knows?

taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

When I was in college at U of I Chicago Circle campus I went to a bible study located slightly off campus. I recall Korean people and a nice, calm young American man. Ahhhh...I just now recalled something else...allow me to back up a bit...

A young blond, nice looking man walked me over from campus. He was recruiting for Christ, as I recall. He wore eyeglasses, seemed very determined and focused on our walk over to the off campus building where the bible study was taking place. On our way there we passed a slightly gangly, wiry young man. My blond friend invited this young man to come with us. The wiry young man sheepishly said he wasn't able to come. "God'll squash you like a bug", the blond fellow said, along with some other invectives that have since slipped my mind. It has since occurred to me that there really only is one way to "evangelize" someone - Christians call it "bringing someone to Christ". That way is through friendship/kindness. So, blondie and I made our way over to the bible study building. On the wall was a poster - a photograph really - of an old drunken bum lying in the gutter. His empty bottle of liquor was empty and next to him. The caption underneath read "You love God only as much as the person that you love the least. " Looking back through my memories of this, I don't recall seeing any squashed bugs near the drunken bum.

taken from "The Purity Chronicles", Mark J. Sartori

"A bruised reed he shall not break. A smoldering wick he shall not quench." Isaiah

A few literary echoes:

Hemingway's lost manuscript...

"The Birth of American Literature" or "The Steps of a Righteous Man are Ordered by the Lord"

A young man - Samuel Clemens - i.e. Mark Twain was walking aimlessly somewhere in Ohio. He wanted to go to the Amazon rain forest and collect coco leaves - the precursor of cocaine - and sell them. An 11-year old school drop-out, he took a job working in his brother's smalltown newspaper. But, like all young men, was in search of an easy fortune. Coco leaves seemed a good option. Suddenly, inexplicably, he sees a $50 dollar bill floating towards him in the breeze. He grabs it and takes the first riverboat he can to New Orleans. His intention, of course, is to continue to the Amazon to make his elusive fortune. Once he gets to New Orleans he discovers that there are no boats that continue down to the Amazon. (This seems incredibly funny to me and perfectly suited to Mark Twain's temperament). So, he does the next best thing. He becomes a riverboat pilot. American literature has just found its muse. A random $50 dollar bill in the wind, a young man determined to travel to make his fortune - in coco leaves - the misfortune of "no boats go that far", and the next best thing of piloting a riverboat. All these echoes give birth to Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, Becky Thatcher and the rest. You may not know this, but Mark Twain was next door neighbors with Harriet Beecher Stowe. She wrote "Uncle Tom's Cabin" - the book credited with ending slavery.

taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

"You know you're getting old when you need a post-it note to remind you to file for divorce."

taken from "The Purity Chronicles", Mark J. Sartori

"Bored Doctors"

Arthur Conan Doyle was a medical doctor. And bored. His practice was slow and he had time on his hands. So he began to write. His anatomy professor, Dr. Joseph Bell, had made an impression upon him. He would instruct the class on his cadaver subjects eyeing some wound or some affliction and explaining, scientifically, how he thought it happened. Conan Doyle never forgot this. So, he writes and creates Sherlock Holmes, the most famous "consulting detective" in literature. With deductive reasoning akin to his anatomy professor, Dr. Joseph Bell.

taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

And another echo...

Alfred Nobel had a dream. He dreampt of all the destruction his invention would cause in the world. He dreampt of his
dynamite. Profoundly moved, he decided that all profits from his invention would go towards humanitarian causes. Thus,
the Nobel Peace Prize was born.

taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

And another story...entitled...

"Visiting Van Gogh" or "Narrow Escapes for the Cleaning Ladies"

Many years ago my wife and I went to the Art Institute of Chicago to see, among other things, Vincent Van Gogh's art. Anyone familiar with the Art Institute of Chicago knows some stuff about it: the concrete lions on the ascending steps leading up to the entrance, the unparalled location on Michigan Avenue just off Lakeshore Drive, beautiful Lake Michigan nearby. Well, this story concerns the tourist ropes that seperate us human beings from the artwork of the masters. And hot coffee. We were in a small room of Vincent's artwork and, as I mentioned, separated from the art by those tourist ropes the art people put in front of the paintings to keep us at arm's length. I had a fancy coffee in my hand...my wife was wandering around somewhere nearby... There was an African American security guard near the doorway to the entrance of the room I was in. Otherwise, I was alone. Alone and staring at Van Gogh's self portrait of him and his cut-off ear. I leaned over the rope to get a close-up look with my hot coffee in my right hand. I was very, very close to the picture. Maybe 4 inches away. What if I give in to my lower self and toss the hot coffee on the painting? Nothing was in my way. The security guard gave me some space, my wife wasn't there. It was just me, Vincent, his therapy painting for his missing ear, and my hot coffee. Do I toss it at Vincent's painting or don't I? Just a little splash to tell him I was there and I understood about his missing ear. A little post-it note to Vincent to tell him I was thinking of him. (Upon further reflection, I don't really understand about Vincent's missing ear. I know Gauguin was involved and the loss of a dream, but I would have channelled it through my fingers into a melancholy song or Cd. All things being equal, I need both of my ears for stereo purposes.) Also, maybe he likes coffee. If I would have tossed the coffee: It is very possible I would have been caught - on camera or otherwise. This interests me, but only from the safe space of several bygone decades since then. It is possible I would have made the news - maybe the national news - the BBC, Al-zera news (or whatever it is called - (I don't watch the news.)),
and given world-wide attention, the way anything related to Van Gogh seems to receive. It is also possible that it would have been hushed up. Swept under the rug, as they say. The board of directors at the Art Institute probably wouldn't want any negative publicity attached to a Van Gogh. He made enough for himself, after all. They would have kept it hush-hush. The way billionaires do who break the law with or without their cleaning ladies.

taken from "The Purity Chronicles", copyright Mark J. Sartori

"Jonathan says all those dashes in my name are signs of royalty. Sweet boy. Says he just added one...but my boy wants to tell his story now..." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

Introduction to The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Chapter One, by Mark J. Sartori

Chapter One: The Flu of the Century, The Indiana BigTop, A Thief in Training


Some days ago I came across a shoebox with various paraphernalias I had collected over time and all in a sudden it became clear to me how I had managed to avoid those usual problems associated with other men of my high caliber, such as presidents, ambassadors, fornicators and other such tax collectors and sinners. It was an Indiana BigTop Token. On one side was the "Lady with One Thousand Diseases" and on the other was "The Tightrope Walker. " Suspended high above the ground, the image showed the tightrope walker, whom the crowd knew as Franco the Flying Frenchman but I knew as Frankie the Flask for the canister he carried with him always and everywhere and from which he drank like a liberating congressman. The flip side had my friend and confidant, Minerva, or as I referred to her as outside her presence, of course - Boils - sitting upright like a praying Hindu with her arms and legs crossed like a pretzel looking like she just smoked something peaceful. The story was so long ago and had such twists and turns that I can't recall them all now that I'm in my forties and practically senile, other than the ones that make me look good and otherwise advance the story. For now, though I'd like to tell the truth. Later, as I age, I'll build it up as nature chooses. Every summer, all those years ago, I helped inhabit the fairgrounds of tiny Hamlet, Indiana, or as we referred to it as, "Garden of the Gods," for the annual Indiana BigTop Travelling Show. My important role came about because of a strange series of circumstances I can only blame on Divine Providence.


About that time there was a flu going around that had made its way from the Chinese mud flats and landed inside a goat's head. The people trained in such matters made it their sworn duty to teach the rustic country types, like my mother, concerning this invader of human health and brought all the townspeople around Hamlet and in central Indiana to a town meeting to discuss this health problem, especially concerning its young folks. With a great deal of animation and wishful thinking the public health official declared a state of emergency and pronounced judgement upon the citizens of Hamlet, and it seemed that we, the children, were the most vulnerable and the best choice overall for this small messenger of Beelzebub to live out its life happy and content before it killed us. His speech was peppered with such august phrases as "Flu of the Century" and "Veritable Skeleton," while the crowd of mothers and fathers would draw their breath in through clenched teeth and turn to one another and speak in hushed tones about someone they had known who contracted this terrible disease and barely made it out alive. My mother, of course made it her life's mission to cover me with novenas to St. Jude for Hopeless Cases and all manner of protective gear to keep me from catching this flu which could, on a good day, claim my life. It was no matter. The more I heard of it the worse I felt and before long I began to dream about having this flu from hell and dying a slow, painful death. Over and over I dreamed until I could no longer sleep. It was more than I could bear.
About that time my Sunday school teacher, Miss Lolo Debenedetti or "Humma Humma" as we liked to call her outside of earshot, decided it was in the best interest of her class to give us all a copy of a book called "Obscure Saints and the Lives they Lead" written by a holy man from some eastern land with two odd names separated by a dash. We devoured that book and all its contents. Never before had we been introduced to "St. Jaime (pronounced High-mee) of the Hot Coals" or "St. Bonaventura, Patron Saint of Matadors and other forms of Bloodletting," and, to Humma's credit, she gave over a full month of her teaching schedule to instruct us on these fine saints. Miss Debenedetti, for all her voluptuous good looks, was singular in her dedication to our young minds and used her time at Sunday school to mold and develop us into a heavenly likeness with phrases like "I can't wait to see you on the other side, Jimmy" or "My, what a pure and gentle creature God has made you, Jennifer," whenever we would comment on a paragraph she had just read to us. She and she alone could excite in us a pure and reverent desire to get to that "holy city upon the hill" and stand naked with her praising and singing hymns and spiritual songs. The book just made it better and more exotic. She spoke of the fierce and raptured way in which St. Jaime of the Hot Coals would fast for days and nights and put himself in a trance before he deliberately walked on hot coals in hopes of setting himself on fire for the purification of all the world and his own soul, of course, which would be spared the pangs of hell and purgatory and go straight to the clouds. But it never happened. He never burned a single inch of his feet and was thought to be like unto Moses himself. The book had a curious effect on me and my school mates. Our normal raucous behavior and otherwise hair-pulling, name-calling and loogy-spitting selves was tamed not unlike a wild mustang that's been broke for the first time. I especially was brought under the influence of these exotic saints and their dangerous lives and brave actions and the zeal they stirred up in me kept me awake at night.
Whilst all this turmoil was coursing through my veins I determined then to be like those saints of God and woke up before the cock crowed, and was out farm-hopping with an empty gallon bucket searching for an unsuspecting goat with udders looking for the flu virus. I decided that this dreadful flu virus was sent from God to give us mere mortals a proper vehicle to attain such nirvanas as those exotics in the book and He even made it easy for us because we didn't have to go all the way to China, we could just drink some goat's milk. It excited me to see the hand of God at work.
As fate would have it I easily fulfilled my heavenly mission and struck upon the first goat I could find which was my neighbor Burrell Moore's goat with my bucket and began to milk her udders with the hope that she was a carrier of the dreadful yet holy virus. And lo, she had milk! I squeezed and squeezed and filled my bucket about an inch high and thought that was enough to bring about the plan of God in my life. I suppose, if truth be told, I suspected I would be sainted before the year's end and might even appear in the next issue of the "Obscure Saints" book. Reporters would come to our little town and before long Hamlet, Indiana would be said in the same breath as Bethlehem or some other such holy place and my mother would cry and cry but get over it soon enough when she realized that her womb held a real live saint of God, even if only for nine months. But, when I got home I suddenly realized that the bucket I was carrying had a single, solitary rivet missing and all my holy milk had dripped out! This too, turned out to be part of the Almighty's will for me and I immediately realized that my life had been spared and it was because I would have died had I drunk of the virus milk and that maybe it was because I was still a youngster that this happened because all the obscure saints were old people and here I was just barely fifteen. I told my mother this and she was as bewildered as I've ever seen her and and looked at me like I had just given birth to a cat. She returned to her work with the air of a woman confronted with a problem too large for a solution and began to read the paper. Says she, "Why don't you get a summer job at the BigTop this year? I think you could use the fresh air."
And with these simple words the fate of Hamlet was sealed for generations to come.
I, of course, knew my life was spared for a reason and intended to find out what it was.
My presence here last year was purely for fun but I arrived this day for an entirely different reason. I came for a job. Just ahead of me stood an old wooden clapboard structure about the size of an outhouse standing guard against any ne're do wells bent on getting into the park for free, with a young man contained on the inside, thumbing through a comic book. Thinking I might annoy St. Peter if I spoke too abruptly, I leaned over a bit and spoke through the porthole,
"Where do I go to look for a job?"
" I don't know," says he without looking up from his scroll. Not quite knowing the proper way to continue this conversation, I say, "Well, where did you go to get this job?"
"I came from New York."
"Well, I can't go there. I haven't the bus fare. Is there anybody around who can help me?"
"You might try the trailer at the back of the park. But you need a ticket to get in." "Even if I'm just going to look for a job?"
"Yes."
"I didn't bring any money with me. That's why I'm here so I can make some money. And get some fresh air."
"Well, I'm sorry. I can't let you in without a ticket. Go on home now."
"Don't you have any special arrangements for people trying to get a job?"
"No. We're all from New York." We don't normally give no jobs out."
Well, I felt a bit frustrated to say the least and didn't know whether to turn back or plow ahead. "Can't you just stamp my hand to let me in and as soon as I'm done I'll come back."
"How do I know that you'll come out when you're done?"
"Uhh, I'll leave you this rabbit's foot. It's a lucky charm."
So I reached into my pocket, careful not to extract the wad of bills I was carrying in case of an emergency and gave him the lucky charm. He examined it closely and said, "Lucky, huh? You think it'll bring me luck?"
"No doubt about it. The last person to barely look on it found a special key they were missing for two years. A key to their old wine cellar. And you know what happens to wine when it ages. It gets better."
I had him now, I suspected, and offered one more example of its psychic powers. "My neighbors dog was full of worms and I brought that foot over there and within a week it got better. Now she's the best bird dog in the county. Hunts quail, bob whites, pheasant. She can't stop now that she's been de-bugged."
He scratched under his armpit and shifted in his chair a bit. "Well, I don't got no bird dog. But I could use a new bicycle. Mine's got two flat tires and a bad chain. And the handlebars move all the time when they're not supposed to."
"A bicycle is pie. You might as well ask for the moonrise. That there charm'll deliver you a bicycle easy."
"Alright, I guess. But you come right back now, you hear?"
So I left St. Peter at the gate and crossed the Red Sea to the Promised Land and began to look around, not in any particular hurry to find a long lost trailer.

The fairground was surfeited with all manner of peoples, big and small and old and young and everywhere in between with the common and noble goal of having a good time. As tends to be with carnivals, people were wandering around aimlessly, turning their heads slowly this way and that, pointing out some particular oddity to their companion and overall just enjoying the company they were in. Birds were singing and women were smiling and happy with their long dresses flowing about this way and that, talking and laughing as if theirs was the best life to be had on this planet. And it could have been, I think, as life was simple then and the biggest worry a person had was whether or not their tomato crop would be as big as last years or if the Valporaiso varsity baseball team would make the state finals. The whole town, it seemed, awoke from the long winter slumber and was ready for a grand time and you'd be hard-pressed to find some straggler moping around or unhappy in a general sort of way; even the weather adapted to the festivities and gave over the best weather in the state as if we ordered it special - blue skies from one end of the horizon to the other with a smattering of high, puffy clouds just for show. People tended to be more sensible then, I noticed, and didn't stay out in the high sun for very long and there was a palpable sigh in the air as if a balloon had just let out some air that it'd been holding in for too long and there'd be folks taking shelter under the shade and cooling off by waving their homemade fans in their faces or their children's faces and you could feel your body slow down, probably in the same way it slows down when all the shops close for an afternoon siesta in Mexico or some other far away place. Yes, the world was younger then.
It took a while before I found my way past the sideshows, the game tosses, the cotton candy man, and the strip show and came upon a decrepit blue and white trailer that had "Indiana BigTop Travelling Show" in big letters newly painted on its side. I knocked on the rusty door and heard a man bellow,
"Go away. I'm eating."
"But sir, I just need a minute of your time."
I hear, reluctantly, "Christ, come on in. But make it quick." Therein a man weighing one biscuit shy of 475 pounds and eating a corn dog with two more on his plate glared at me for interrupting his daily lunch.
Says I, "I came for a job. Hire me." (I figured I'd take the high road and talk like I was a direct apostle.)
If a blind circus monkey had offered to knit a sweater for the Queen, she would not have been more astonished than this large corn dog was at me. After several minutes of choking on his lunch and various attempts at clearing away the moisture from his eyes, he guffawed, "Hire you?" "For what?"
"Anything. Except..."
"Except what?"
"I can't do no hard labor."
"Why?"
So, always looking to instruct the ignorant, I tell him: "I need to live my life as slowly as possible so as not to use up my heartbeats."
"Wha..?" he asks incredulously, like I had just knifed him and done the soft shoe at the same time.
"The way I figure it I have a finite number of them and don't want to use them up. It seems sensible to me. If I relax more, I'll live longer because I won't use up my heartbeats and can save them for later on in life when I really might need them. If I use them all up when I'm young I won't have any left over and might be caught like a deer in the headlights when number 1,477,657,887,980 came up and I wouldn't have any more left."
I think, for the first time in his life he couldn't finish his lunch. But, he said they need help parking cars but warned me not to speak to anyone.
I spent the rest of the day in a good mood. There is nothing quite as nice as lazing away a sunny afternoon while people around you have work to do. I wandered the aisles and the booths with no particular interest other than to pass the time away and peoplewatch the passersby.
It was an exceptionally hot day, and the volunteer firemen came and opened the fire hydrants and all the kids stripped down to their underwear and ran through the waterfall like it was the mighty Colorado River carving out the Grand Canyon and yelped and squealed with delight, their mother's giving up any hope of keeping them dry and only hoping they wouldn't catch cold and hopefully the sun would stay out later on in the afternoon and dry them off. It was a peaceful time in Hamlet. The rest of the world was enduring wars in far off lands and sending their sons off wondering if they'd come back alive and we in Hamlet were six-ways-from-sundown from any type of conflict other than the usual ones between mothers and daughters, sons and fathers, or husbands and wives. But even these seemed tempered and normal. Nothing was so bad that couldn't be cured by a good meal or a swig of something cold, and conversations tended to be about the finest steaks available at Hansen's market or the price of string beans that old man McCann was getting these days. There were no crimes other than what you'd see on the ten o'clock news and these weren't really real in the sense that they changed your mood or when you'd go see your grandma on Sunday afternoon or where you'd go to see the fireworks on the Fourth of July. Yes, the world was younger than today.
Before I left, I even won a stuffed bear from a cork-rifle game and decided to give it to my Sunday school teacher Miss Debenedetti for all the inspiration she had given me.
On my way out of the gate a voice from the past yells out, "Hey, you. Over here." I sees St. Peter again, this time sounding agitated and looking tired from being cooped up all day in the outhouse.
"Yes, may I help you?" I say, annoyed.
"This damn rabbit's foot didn't do no good. I still don't have my bicycle."
"No, no, no, you fool. It's entirely too soon. Sometimes it takes a full week before you can see the results. Don't you know how old the earth is? Do you think that was built in an hour? Why, I suspect not! Now, listen here. I suppose I can rent you that lucky charm for five dollars a day and since you're from out of town, I won't charge you state tax. So, just because we're friends I'll give you three days for free. You can have the whole pot o' gold for a double sawbuck."
He looked at me like I was Philip passing out the five loaves and two fishes but then caught himself and says, "How do I know I'll get a bicycle at the end of a week?"
"If you don't I'll give you your money back." Simple minds require simple solutions. So, St. Pete searched his pockets for the money he owed me and came up empty.
"I don't have $20."
"No matter. Say, what's that big cigar box full of? Isn't that the cash from all your ticket sales?"
He looked longingly at the bulging box filled with singles, fives, tens and twentys and then rubbed the rabbit's foot betwixt his thumb and middle finger. Slowly, he ran his fingers deep into the paper mix and drew out a twenty dollar bill.
"I want it back at the end of the week if I don't get my bicycle," he announced indignantly.
"Now you listen here, you brigand. You'll be lucky to have breath in your body by the end of the week the way you practice thievery. And to think how easy you perform it! Never in my life have I seen such a hardened man as you! Are all young men from New York filled with this much debauchery or are you the sole heir of Lucifer? Pray, do tell. I suspect the police will be by here any time now to haul you away in shackles and I'd rather not witness it."
So, I snatched the bill from his hand and wrapped it carefully around the wad I had stashed in my pocket.
"I thought you said you didn't have..."
"Hide you thief, before the sheriff comes."

****************************
Track 1 - By the Waterbrook - Title song of this Cd and one of my favorites. I used a canyon reverb with a short
analog delay and a mid-band boost. This entire Cd was inspired by my visit to Montana with my daughter Rachelle.
Water sounds were taken from a trail we walked to see Avalanche lake in Glacier National Park. One of the purposes of
my trip was to get sounds and cover art for a series of upcoming Cds. The cover art here was taken by Rachelle on the
way back from Avalanche Lake. I believe the nature sounds were recorded at Sweet and Whistler Woods here in Illinois.
Disorienting pad and water flutes were added with Mixcraft software with an Alchemy VST instrument preset.

Track 2- Blush of the Morn - Nice, peaceful song, I think. It was recorded on September 13th, 2018. Water sounds were
recorded in Montana in early September 2019. Nature sounds appear to be recorded at Sweet and Whistler Woods
in Illinois a few years back.

Track 3 - Ancient Power - Inspired by a God Calling entry, this track was mastered on August 20th, 2018. I used a
canyon reverb with high cut and mid-band equalizers. Nature sounds were taken at Sweet and Whistler Woods, I believe.
I'm not sure of the Alchemy preset I used...

Track 4 - Last Day of Summer - Recorded on September 20, 2018, so it was a a day shy of the last day of summer. An interesting note here...When I attended Joliet Junior college in 1978-80, I took a variety of Geography courses and excelled at them, so much so, that I was voted "Outstanding Student Geographer of Illinois" sometime while attending there. The truth is, I think it was only because I took several courses and got "A's" in all of them. My instructor, Leonard Hodgman, took
a liking to me and, unbeknownst to me, arranged for this award. I remember he took me into the hallway before class one day and gave me a plaque which had my name misspelled on it. My entire life, people have been calling me "Mark Satori" instead of "Sartori". Satori means enlightenment, however, so I guess it's alright, although I would prefer my name spelled
correctly - especially on an award like this one. "They spelled my name wrong," I said calmly to Mr. Hodgeman. "Ahhh, I told them that!", he said, somewhat disgruntled and upset. (The truth is, I think he told the geography committee the wrong spelling of my name. To this day, I always hear and see my name misspelled. I just received a letter - from one of my clients (!) with my name spelled "Mark Satori". "I can't believe Barb spelled my name wrong on this envelope!", I said to my wife, "Even my clients get it wrong!" It does interest me, however, that "Satori" means enlightenment. :-) I suppose that is all part of the mystique...Anyway, to get back to my point, I was taught through this geography education that the last day of summer was September 20th with autumn beginning on September 21st, i.e. the first day of spring - March 21st...the first day of summer - June 21st... the first day of autumn - September 21st...the first day of winter - December 21st...

a note here - March 21st is the vernal equinox, meaning "equal nights"...this simply means 12 hours of sunlight and 12 hours of night. Equal days and nights.

June 21st is the summer solstice...the longest day of the year and the day when the sun is at its zenith in the sky.

September 21st is the autumnal equinox - again meaning "equal nights"...12 hours each of sun and darkness.

December 21st is the winter solstice - the shortest day of the year with the sun at its lowest in the sky.

So, to make a long story longer...My daughter Megan tells me that the autumnal equinox falls on September 23rd...
I'm not sure why this is because I was taught that the four seasons changed on the 21st of those months I mentioned.
So, it may be that this song wasn't recorded on the last day of summer...I like the song, regardless.

Track 5 - Life in a Misty Key - There was a previous song I mastered with this title, but I didn't really like it enough to
put it online. I attended church with my wife on the feast of the Immaculate Conception and was daydreaming as I tend to do...(yes, during mass...) This track was initially titled "No Worries". ((I like this phrase. I also like the phrase
that young people say - "It's all good"...That appeals to me...)) A different song title crossed my mind and it was a good
one...Somehow, as mass went on, it eluded me and I was never able to get it back. Later as I was sitting on my couch I
decided to rename it to the current title. Seems to fit. A canyon reverb was used here with a cut on the high frequencies.
Water sounds were recorded in Montana - most likely on the trail to Avalanche Lake.

Track 6 - An Italy of the Mind - Based on an excerpt from the wonderful poetry of Dana Gioia and an excerpt from Wallace Stevens. The reference reads: "Most journeys come to this...an Italy of the mind." taken from "99 poems" by Dana Gioia. Cicadas at the beginning of the song were recorded at Kickapoo State Park in Illinois.

Track 7 - Storms of October - I believe this is the only track without nature sounds. :-) I used a short analog delay and canyon reverb here.

Track 8 - The Angel's Gift To Me - The dream about the angel and the harp....Many decades ago, I had a very vivid dream. In the dream, there was a young man sitting in a wheelchair. His muscle tone was floppy like some forms of cerebral palsy cause. An angel appeared and handed me a beam of white light a little larger than a flashlight. My last name was written in the light. It very clearly said "Sartori" in the light beam. The angel placed the beam of light in my right hand. "Touch him", the angel said to me. I touched the young man in the wheelchair and immediately he was healed. The dream ended there. I have thought about that dream over the years. Its clarity has never faded from my memory. Sometimes I wonder along these lines....What if the light beam signified something special about me in particular? It must, because, after all, my last name was written upon the lightbeam. What if, in the future, something that I have created will be used to heal something? What if, for example, some sort of algorithm can be created from the musical frequencies I have created and turned into some sort of nanocircuitry which can be implanted into a spinal cord that is damaged? Is there some connection between music - my music in particular - and the nanocircuitry required that would bridge the gap between nerves in a spinal cord injury? Or some other kind of brain injury? Is there some kind of higher power that resides in the universe, is somehow connected to me and already knows the answer to this? (As you may or may not know, Albert Einstein said that the theory of relativity was conceived - in his mind - in music. He played the violin since the age of 4 and was a lifelong musician.) Recently, my daughter Megan told me something interesting. She studies astrology and given the exact time and date of birth can find things out. I happen to know exactly when I was born. It was 5:55 AM on May 10th 1959. (The nurse penciled it in on the top of my birth certificate. Actually, after I pondered this for a while, I have come to believe it was my father who penciled it in. He had very elegant handwriting - unlike me.:-)) She plugged this into her astrology website and and told me this: I won't bore you with all the details except this one. She said excitedly, "Dad you have THREE Yods"! NOBODY has a Yod and you have THREE! "What is a Yod?", I asked. "THE FINGER OF GOD!!!", she exclaimed. "Ahhhh...must be the music." Apparently, a yod is the rarest component of a natal chart and includes the fact that I would go through many trials in my life - which I already have, as Megan tells me. "You're like Jesus", she said. I agreed with that but pointed out the fact that Jesus only lived 33 years, had no kids (that we know of) and most certainly wasn't born on December 25th.
The shepherds were in the field when the angel announced his birth - this didn't happen in the winter. Too cold.
He was probably born in the spring sometime. Maybe May :-) One further note: I have no desire to change the date
of Christmas. It should remain December 25th..it's cold in December, fireplaces get lit, people come together and
celebrate Christ's birth with their families, eat good meals (hopefully) go to mass and/or other church services - and in my family, we play music. If that was messed with...well, you know... Another note about this track...While the write-up is
based on the angel dream, the actual melody of the song was also dreampt. It doesn't happen often but it did this time. I simply made my coffee, picked a harp, went downstairs and hit the record button. So, the two dreams that are connected with this - the angel dream and the melody - were about 30 years apart. ( As you probably know, Paul McCartney often talks
of his dreams and his music. "Yesterday" and "Let It Be" come to mind. And, as an aside, the "Mother Mary" that he sings
about in "Let It Be" is actually his mother. Not the Virgin Mary. )

Track 9 - Flutes on the Bestowal - inspired by:

"You must watch the bestowal, so that you may bestow." God at Eventide...Also, there are water flutes in here...this is my first recorded piano solo, online that is...and featuring my favorite purring pussycat, Milo.

Here is a prayer I said when I was younger: I would like Lenci to record it when she can talk...guitar music for this is already written...

This prayer, oh God,
Is not to ask
For blessings great or small.
For comfort, happiness, or success,
Or anything at all.

It's just to let you know oh God,
My gratitude today,
For everything that you have done,
To help me on my way.

For faith and freedom, work and rest,
Enough to eat and drink.
And words of wisdom from your lips,
To guide me when I think.

A prayer to thank You and to say,
That I will try to do,
The best I can to show you God,
I love you and mean my thanks to You.

(not sure who wrote this...I changed it slightly, therefore...MJS)

The Gratitude List

As I age, I have come to believe that we create our own heaven (or hell, for that matter.) The thoughts we think, the things we do, the work our hands do all contribute to our mind and change us. A lifetime of thinking thoughts of ill will and ill will surrounds us. A lifetime of thinking thoughts of peace and joy and peace and joy surround us. It seems to be a law of nature. We become what we do and what we think. In the last several months I have tried to turn every thought into a positive thought. As the theory goes, if we can turn death - the most devastating and final of acts - into a positive thing - suggesting that we live life to the full while we can - then we can turn any negative thought into a positive thought. This is not easy for one, like me, who has known the tragedy of living. Someone familiar with disappointment and acquainted with grief. But I'm trying. And in so doing, trying to create a heaven for myself and others. A life full of peace and music, art and love. I believe we have the ability to create our own paradise and are called to do so, by caring about mankind and loving each other. In that vein, I began to write a gratitude list - part truth, part whimsy - of things I am thankful for. Make no mistake, I have known more emotional pain than most and have lived with the consequences of someone's else's mistake. So I understand human pain and suffering. But joy, I am told, transcends pain. And it is there I would like to live.

So, whether heaven is a place or a state of mind, whether every beauty begets another....

Here is a partial litany of some things I'm thankful for:

I'm thankful....for cool mornings in late August.

I'm thankful....for bay scallops sauteed in olive oil, garlic and butter.

I'm thankful....that I have 20/20 vision and good hearing.

I'm thankful....that I don't live on Neptune, because I would have to wear a spacesuit all the time.

I'm thankful....that no one in my family is named Ralph, Ludwig or Percival.

I'm thankful....for the sound of my wife's voice.

I'm thankful....that I have seen the Caribbean Sea.

I'm thankful....that I am a pretty good cook.

I'm thankful....that I have a degree in biomedical engineering. (It sounds cool, if nothing else.)

I'm thankful....that I don't have to sit in traffic anymore.

I'm thankful....for life before computers.

I'm thankful....that I'm strong enough to lift my client, Chris out of his wheelchair.

I'm thankful...for my client Craig and my friend Sarah.

I'm thankful...for all my clients.

I'm thankful....for hummingbirds.

I'm thankful....that I spend a good part of each day barefoot, in shorts and a tank top.

I'm thankful....that I have two beautiful harps and two beautiful guitars. (What else could anyone need?)

I'm thankful....that I don't have to fly into orbit anytime soon.

I'm thankful....for country roads, red-winged blackbirds and quarries to swim in.

I'm thankful....that I don't have to do calculus homework anymore.

I'm thankful....that I can scratch my own itch.

I'm thankful....for my Italian hands that know what to do.

I'm thankful....that I don't have to vote anytime soon.

I'm thankful....that I don't watch the news.

I'm thankful....for good books and good films.

I'm thankful....for comedians that make me laugh.

I'm thankful....for laughter, love, peace, friendship, joy and tranquility.

I'm thankful....that the earth is still blue from outer space.

I'm thankful....that I can pay some of my bills.

I'm thankful....that I drive a red convertible and that my house is paid off. (We have a pick-up truck and a Mazda now.)

I'm thankful....for being full-blooded Italian. (Note to reader: My daughter Megan recently arranged for my DNA to be tested by National Geographic...my two reference populations are Italy (Tuscany) and Argentina!! Explains my flamenco guitar roots!! And I go way back to the Amazon rain forest! Explains my love of nature! I highly recommend having this comprehensive test.)

I'm thankful....that I still have my eyebrows, good teeth and hair.

I'm thankful....that my children have nice teeth, pretty eyes and wavy hair.

I'm thankful....that I weigh 182 pounds.

I'm thankful....for being born on Mother's Day.

I'm thankful....for the month of May, and the double rainbow I saw over my house a few years ago.

I'm thankful....for the beautiful artwork on my Cds. I always tell people that if they don't like my music, they can use the Cd as a wine coaster because the cover art is so pretty.

I'm thankful....that I'm not a lobster at a fancy restaurant.

I'm thankful....I never stepped on a scorpion.

I'm thankful....I never get sick.

I'm thankful....I've lived basically a pain-free life. (Physical pain, that is. And I think it's because I've been called to help the handicapped and I couldn't do it if I was in pain.)

I'm thankful....that I sleep through the night.

I'm thankful....for independent film makers who make good stories on film.

I'm thankful....for Amazon - the rain forest and the company. (I think the company could deliver the rain forest to me if I ordered it.)

I'm thankful....for waterfalls, blue skies and puffy clouds.

I'm thankful....for the dream of making a documentary about special needs people and presenting it at Sundance.

I'm thankful....for my nephew's friendship and his homemade wine.

I'm thankful....for my entire family - nieces, nephews, in-laws - everybody. For my late brother and 3 older sisters. I have grown up surrounded by strong women. Megan tells me that you need feminine and masculine energies.

I'm thankful....that I was able to raise my family and send my girls to private and catholic schools. This is largely because of the the grace and support of the Kazma Family Foundation. Thank you, Leigh-Anne. God is good.

I'm thankful....that my mother died in her sleep.

I'm thankful....that my son died in his sleep.

I'm thankful....that my music will outlive me.

I'm thankful....that militaries will no longer exist someday.

I'm thankful....that my wife thinks I have "hair like Einstein" first thing in the morning.

I'm thankful....that I have a good memory. (It can prove to be a liability sometimes, however.)

I'm thankful....that I have become a pacifist, like Einstein.

I'm thankful....that I had the foresight to record my music at an early age.

I'm thankful....that I don't live in Antarctica.

I'm thankful....that the United States has a lot of food.

I'm thankful....that I never had to go to war.

I'm thankful....that my refrigerator keeps working.

I'm thankful....that my daughters have been to unusual places in the world, like South Africa, Portugal, Spain, Italy, the Caribbean and all over the U.S.

I'm thankful....that I can read and write, walk and talk, add and subtract.

I'm thankful....that I don't live in a big city.

I'm thankful....that I can play the lottery and win sometimes.

I'm thankful....that spiders don't crawl into my ears when I'm asleep.

I'm thankful....for faith, freedom, work and rest. And enough to eat and drink.

I'm thankful....that I'm not a teenager anymore.

I'm thankful....that the ancient Egyptians used to believe we had 360 senses - not just 5.

I'm thankful....that I've never been to prison.

I'm thankful....that my kidneys still work.

I'm thankful....that my roof doesn't leak too bad.

I'm thankful....that I have good blood pressure.

I'm thankful....for fine motor control.

I'm thankful....that I don't have Lyme's disease. (I dodged a bullet here, considering all the nature walks I take.)

I'm thankfull...for my new granddaughter Lenci Aria...What a beautiful, musical name your mother has given you!!

I'm thankful....for my daughter's dog Nala and our cat, Kitty.

I'm thankful....that I'm not stranded in the desert with a flat tire.

I'm thankful....that I can record music anytime I want to.

I'm thankful....that I write my own music.

I'm thankful....for silence.

I'm thankful....that I don't have Anatidaephobia. (That is the fear of being watched by a duck.)

I'm thankful....for reverb.

I'm thankful....for Starbucks coffee, especially Caramel Macchiatos and Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Did you know that the name "Starbucks" came from the coffee-loving first mate named Starbuck in Melville's Moby Dick?

I'm thankful....that no one strangled me from behind at the movie theater.

I'm thankful....that no one hid a thermo-nuclear warhead under my front porch while I slept.

I'm thankful....that I'm not the Elephant Man or a dwarf.

I'm thankful....for warm milk and chocolate chip cookies.

I'm thankful....for cold milk and chocolate chip cookies.

I'm thankful....for American convenience.

I'm thankful....that I've never seen a porno film. (And probably never will since I like to keep streaks like this intact.)

I'm thankful....for days off and occasional days of heavy snowfall.

I'm thankful....for spy thrillers.

I'm thankful....for my idea of paradise.

I'm thankful....for positive thoughts and being able to play my instruments without thinking.

I'm thankful....for fingernail moons... and the sun on my cheek on a cool day.

I'm thankful....that I don't have to eat Indian food.

I'm thankful....that I am not the president of Ajerbaijan because I can barely spell it and I don't really know where it is.

I'm thankful....that I've never been captured by cannibals in New Guinea.

I'm thankful....that I'm not a missionary in New Guinea.

I'm thankful....for all the nature sounds I have collected.

I'm thankful....that I live in the Western Hemisphere.

I'm thankful....for the sky.

I'm thankful....that I can walk around a cemetary and not be buried alive accidentally by the gravediggers.

I'm thankful....that if things get too bad, I can sell my house and move to the South Pacific. It's something I've always wanted to do. Like Gauguin minus the syphilis.

I'm thankful....that I didn't lie to my eye doctor while reading the eye chart.

I'm thankful....for butter and salt on my corn-on-the-cob.

I'm thankful....that I have seen the Rocky Mountains.

I'm thankful....that in my heart of hearts, I believe in a higher power in control of everything.

I'm thankful....that I don't go to the bathroom in my pants when I get my picture taken. (I did this once when I was about 5 or 6 years old - and still have the picture somewhere.)

I'm thankful....that I don't have to lie too often.

I'm thankful....for writers that are brave, honest and forthright.

I'm thankful....that a parrot can't repeat the voices in my head.

I'm thankful....for Leo Buscaglia, Eckhart Tolle, The Holy Spirit and Mark Twain.

I'm thankful....that I've never broken a bone.

I'm thankful....that I am, by nature, monogamous.

I'm thankful....that no one has a voodoo doll with my picture on it.

I'm thankful....that I'm not on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted List.

I'm thankful....that I've never done cocaine or heroin.

I'm thankful....that I don't have to deal with men in uniforms very often.

I'm thankful...I have no serious, sexual sin on my soul.

I'm thankful... for my wife's friendship with my mom. Very, very thankful..

I'm thankful....for Patricia Shaw and her artwork which graces the covers of my Cds. I really believe we were artistic
soulmates in some far distant realm in the distant past. It pleases me to know that her art and my music will travel through eternity together. Thank you dear, once again.

I'm thankful...for the book "God Calling."

I'm thankful....for the breaths I have left and the chance to get it right.

And finally, a few quotes I like....

"As the world, to attain, has to learn speed, you, to attain , have to learn calm." God Calling, May 10th entry.

"I am fond of quiet." Thomas Jefferson

"It's the flaw in the masterpiece that makes it intriguing." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Traveling Show," Mark J. Sartori

"One thing I know about God...He gets what He wants." spoken by A.J Howell, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Traveling Show," Mark J. Sartori

A true story...When Mark Twain was young, he almost drowned. When his mother found
out about this she said, "A boy born to be hanged is safe in the water." I like that. Grace under fire.

Peace.
taken from "The Purity Chronicles", by Mark J. Sartori

let's jump ahead a bit...Chapter 6 of the BigTop...

Chapter Six: Bad News Travels Fast

Some call it the calm with the storm. The eye of the hurricane. The good with the bad. Positive and negative charge. The north pole and the south pole. Summer and winter. In the east they call it the ying-yang. The sun, the moon, the stars. Fire and ice. Good and bad. Peace and war. God and the devil. Black and white. Sin and salvation. Suffering and joy. Pomp and circumstance. What is and what is yet to be. Since Eve desired knowledge in the garden, humankind has had this ongoing struggle. And it was no different in the days I am writing of. What is and what is yet to be. This is the dividing line between mere mortals and the supernaturals. What happened twenty, forty, sixty years ago and why is it important today. With history being written precept upon precept, how does it impact today? And is it all for the good of mankind? "I told you he's a nutcase. Both him and his mama". We watched as Kevin Backstreet did a kind of ritual fire dance through a field of horse manure. He was high-stepping his way through the field, weaving this way and that in an effort to avoid the horse piles. He had managed to separate from us and was now stuck out in the horse corral. A.J. shook his head and then put his hand over his eyes to try to rub away the headache Kevin was causing him. A.J. had started calling Kevin "Freddy", which was a nickname of sorts for Sigmund Freud. Also, in perfect adolescent reasoning, he sometimes called him "Pampero Firpo, The Wild Bull from Argentina." Pampero Firpo was a professional wrestler in those days. His claim to fame was a head of wild hair that his opponent would grab hold of and Firpo would simply fling him across the ring. Some announcer picked up on this and started introducing Firpo as "The Wild Bull from Argentina - Pampero Firpo - The Man With the World's Strongest Hair." And so it goes. Whenever Kevin would get mad at him, A.J. would act afraid and say, "Help! The wild bull is coming after me"! Such are the joys of growing up in Small Town, USA. Nothing has to make sense to be useful. And to top it off, Kevin's mother had painted his hair an unnatural shade of orange. Not his whole head, rather she painted stripes on his head. It made him look like a strange Halloween jungle cat. "This way I can pick you out of a crowd," she said. I'm not sure what crowd she needed to pick him out of, but she seemed self-satisfied with her line of reasoning and Kevin made no protests. It was the summer of 1975, one of the hottest summers on record. A.J. was the leader of our group. It was one of those unspoken, yet understood principles. He had the advantage of being an outsider, he was experienced and worldly. His childhood was not privileged and pampered. Far from it. He came from a world of wide-open spaces, where oil rigs and tankers, pipelines and huge drill bits formed a man's soul. A world where chance might reward you or decapitate you. We all knew he had been tested in the fire and been found worthy. And we liked to be around him. His family was a bit curious, however. His mother, Juanita always had a mild look of sadness on her face. Perhaps it was her age, or the fact that she had witnessed too much in the world. Not that she was well traveled; she once said to me, "I've never been anywhere except the states between Oklahoma and Indiana. And I don't want to go anywhere else either." I wonder if she even knew the states between Oklahoma and Indiana. She seemed to me to have some uncommon knowledge of the past, some hidden secret that, like the Virgin Mary, pierced her soul. She made no fuss over her husband's money, put on no airs. If you didn't know any better, you would think she was a pauper's wife. Every time I saw her, she wore a simple cotton dress with an apron wrapped around her. Her interests were her chickens and her horses. She was a thin, handsome woman in contrast to her husband, Tuffy, who was a huge man with a red face. She had A.J. late in life, and as he was her only child, she made a fuss over him. When we were visiting, she would cook for all of us as if we belonged to her. "It's just as easy to cook for ten people as it is to cook for one", she would say. So we would be treated to meals of cornbread and beans, ham, soups. She was a nice woman, but seemed a bit distracted at times and never interfered with us kids. She always kept her distance when it came to us. She gave A.J. his freedom to go wherever he wanted. He had no curfew, no restrictions. She never asked him where he was going or when he was coming home. Perhaps she thought he had earned his freedom with his father in the oil fields, and was content to leave it at that. Meanwhile, Kevin made his way back to us, but not before one of the horses - a black stallion - made a run for him. With some difficulty, he managed to pull himself up on the gate and barreled over the top of it. He fell in a heap and lay there. "Bad News almost got you, didn't he?" A.J. said. "A couple more steps and you would have been trampled underfoot by a wild stallion. Nice going, Firpo." Kevin wasn't going to argue with A.J. He was relieved to be on the human side of the corral fence. He took a moment to rub his sneakers in the grass to try to get the manure off his shoes. We all stepped back a bit to give him some space. "I ever tell you guys about that horse?" I said no. I happened to glance up the hill towards A.J.'s house and saw his mother looking out the kitchen window at us. We locked eyes for an instant and she looked down and began attending to her dirty dishes. A.J. squinted into the sun and peered at the dark horse over the chain link fence. “He’s my mama’s horse, you know.” Tim and Toni Roe and I came nearer to A.J. Kevin put the finishing touches on his shoe repairs and slowly worked his way over to us. A.J.’s gaze followed the horse’s steady, rhythmic stride as he kicked up dust around the large corral. Suddenly, as if struck by a whip, the horse reared his head back and began a full-out frenzied gallop. A.J. quietly observed this, dropped his gaze, and began: “Bad News Travels Fast. That’s his full name. He’s got no papers though. None of mama’s horses have papers. He used to be fenced in with another stallion, but he killed him. Since then, mama keeps him alone. As you can see, he’s got the run of the place. All the other horses have to be separated from him.” “Where’d you get him?” Toni asked. “Where’d he come from, would be the better question,” A.J. said softly. “It’s a long story. My mama told me once and asked me not to bring it up any more. She doesn’t like to talk about it much, so we don’t talk about it. Once in a while I overhear pa and her arguing about the horses and he’ll say ‘Just get rid of him’, but mama won’t hear of it. I think they’re talking about Bad News. I don’t get involved; all I know is that it’s kind of a sore spot between them sometimes. Either mama or I feed them everyday. Pa doesn’t have anything to do with any of the horses; he just lets mama have her way. It started a long time ago. Before any of us were even born. My great-grandfather and grandmother lived in southern Louisiana. Well, they had an old black woman who helped out around the house, cooking and cleaning, stuff like that. And she was a voodoo priestess. At night, they’d hear her howling and chanting all sorts of black magic spells. One night my great-grandfather couldn’t take it anymore and got up and went and looked around outside. Behind his barn he heard his horse making an awful racket and went to check on her. He saw his horse being mounted by a long black shadow and as soon as he showed up it slithered away. Well, sure enough in the spring of the next year, the old mare had a colt. Black as night, just like Bad News. My great-grandfather was Spanish and he named the horse ‘La Sombra de Diablo’. The Devil’s Shadow. He was fast but had no papers. Nothing to prove his bloodline. How do you say a long black shadow sired your horse? Well, my great grandfather loved to play poker and a big group of his cronies played every week. None of them believed his story, thought he had overdone it with the moonshine, and so one day he was drunk and put up The Devil’s Shadow for stud. For free. Said if they didn’t believe it, then to hell with them. Was anyone man enough, brave enough to let their mare mate with The Shadow? As fate would have it, my great grandfather lost the card game and one of his cronies took him up on his offer. The Shadow was mated with an old broodmare about twice his age. Next spring, a colt was born, a stallion. My great grandfather knew the truth about his horse and offered the man top dollar for the colt. He named him Devil His Due. He bribed the gatekeepers in order to race him. He had no papers, after all. Somehow, he got to race. Well, he was running in Mexico once against some Arabian horse that everyone thought was unbeatable. Some Kuwati prince‘s stallion, or some shit like that. In Mexico, they only race two horses at a time. This Kuwati horse was supposed to run like the wind and everyone thought my great grandfather’s horse was gonna get his ass whipped. Supposedly, the Kuwati horse could run 1 and a half miles in 2 and a half minutes. So anyway, the bell rings, the gates open and the Devil His Due flew outta the gate. Around the first bend, the Kuwati horse slips and falls and breaks his leg. The Devil His Due came in at a minute and five seconds. Set a record that still stands, and left that poor sap of a horse wriggling’ in the dust with a busted leg. “
Suddenly, Bad News kicked up on his rear legs and pawed at something in the air before he took off at full gallop. A.J. stopped for a moment and watched him quietly. He nodded slowly to himself, blinked and continued. “’Devil His Due’ sired ‘Bad Wind’ who sired ‘Trouble Is’ who sired ‘Nero’s Wick’ who sired ‘Bad News Travels Fast’”.
The stallion made his way around the corral just as A.J. was finishing his story. He reached over the fence and patted him and said: “So there you have it. Bad News here…” He paused in the way one pauses for dramatic effect, turned and looked me in the eye to make sure I understood. “Bad News here is five generations down from the fastest horse who ever lived. Six from the devil himself.” A soft breeze blew but failed to ruffle the dark prince’s mane.
He stood statue still. Unnaturally, dangerously calm.

Chapter 6 taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

and here is Chapter 2...

Chapter Two: The Raving Beauty, the Man-Devil, and the Hands of the Princess

I am a firm believer in genes. Just in case this story is being read to you, let me clarify. This is not the kind a cowboy wears, but the Watson-Crick double helix, winding staircase, 23 matched pair chromosomes, d-oxyribonucleic acid, g-e-n-e-s kind that the creator bestows on us unequally at birth. Now, I'm an old man and I've seen genes come and go. I read once that the average person has around 30,000 genes. It seems to me that most people have a mixture of good genes and bad apples; too long a nose, feet too big, an oversized adam's apple, crooked teeth, halitosis - something that brings their average down to normalcy. Now and again you'll meet a woman, perhaps, who appears to have thrown the average out the window and approaches the perfection mark and then upon further study you'll notice that her fingernails look like a bricklayers' or her big toenail is too wide or she's got one slightly blackened tooth from a juvenile scuffle. It happens always and everywhere and is part of being a member of this imperfect human race with all its foibles and dangers. But Miss Lolita Debenedetti was different. All 30,000 of her genes were aligned in such perfect symmetry and with such graceful curves that the Almighty Himself must have spent considerable time and worry over getting it just right. Never, ever have I seen such a specimen as her. You could line up all the movie starlets, all the beauty queens, all the far-flung princesses in a row and they would be as common as the cold next to her. And it's not just me who thought so. Everyone who met her was stunned to see such beauty and grace. From the top of her head to the tips of her toes she was a vision not unlike Gabriel and we humans were only poor spectators bound like the cherubim at the Throne to cover our faces in shame; she was too perfect to be one of us. Once every hundred years, the Almighty would pull back the veil and allow some one or two mortals to get a glimpse of her essence and timeless beauty; her likeness would appear in a Botticelli portrait, or Monet would capture her from a distance frolicking in a field of wildflowers. Such beauty is unearthly and should remain so. But, we were boys then and had wickedness on our minds. I studied her every Sunday; ever so light, chestnut brown hair with soft flowing curls with subtle strawberry blonde tints - so thick you could lose your license in there. The lightest amber brown, soulfulest eyes ever to see this decrepit planet and its dreadful inhabitants. Her Mediterranean descent had generously bestowed on her that luscious olive skin that only those fortunate enough to have a Mediterranean blood line seem to possess. During the summer she'd flush like a baby and in the winter when the rest of us were as pale as ghosts, she remained healthy and tan. If I were ten thousand years old and had more wives than Solomon in all his glory, I wouldn't expect to see a more perfectly shaped creature. Her lips were those that men dream about: full and pouting with a perfect cupid's bow on top, her teeth as white and pure as the driven snow. Her legs and heart-shaped bottom, so shapely that I'm quite sure the world is full of men with whiplash, turning suddenly to view her from behind. In the summer heat, she went barefoot and wore only a small pair of shorts and a red "hankerchief" tied in the front around her extravagant bosom. This left her torso free and clear and exposed her navel. More than once I imagined myself leisurely drinking wine out of there. I pictured her naked with only a piece of lace on her body which I ran up and down like a feather until she couldn't stand it no more. I would then put whip cream on every rolling curve of her body and talk sweet to her and make her ask me what she wanted me to do. And my fantasy didn't end there. I pictured her doing all sorts of unmentionable acts to me while I laid back and read a good book or ran my fingers through her beautiful head. As my friend Tim Roe used to say, "She's enough to make a fella's tongue get hard." I was convinced that if lightning didn't strike me down for defiling this dove, then I would die an infidel's death, probably eaten by sharks or thrown off a bridge with concrete shoes on. I think the summer heat affected her because she began teaching us a series of lessons on hell and its inhabitants. She began, "Well, today we are privileged to study God's Word. Let's turn to Luke chapter 8, verses 26 through 39. Would anyone like to read?" The boys in the class knew that if no one volunteered, she would have to read. This gave us the chance to examine her all the more closely under the guise of listening, so none of us volunteered. We prayed silently that the girls wouldn't either. God heard us, and the dove began again. "Then they sailed to the country of the Gadarenes, which is opposite Galilee. And when He stepped out on the land, there met Him a certain man from the city who had demons for a long time. And he wore no clothes, nor did he live in a house, but in the tombs." Slowly, I undressed her. I stuck my finger around the rim of those tight jean shorts, frayed at the bottom, and slowly unzipped them. I gently tugged at either side and brought them ever-so-slowly down past her hips. First one side, then the other. Little tug here. Little tug there. Tug here. Tug there. The summer sun had flushed her cheeks. Her baby face was surrounded by that impossibly beautiful angel hair and she sat on the edge of her desk with her bare legs crossed at the ankles and her feet exposed, expounded on the Word. "When he saw Jesus, he cried out, fell down before Him, and with a loud voice said, 'What have I to do with You Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You, do not torment me!' For He had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For it had often seized him, and he was kept under guard, bound with chains and shackles; and he broke the bonds and was driven by the demon into the wilderness." Tim Roe glanced at me with a look I had once seen on a stallion in heat. With further research, I noticed a curious gender gap; all the boys were gaping open-mouthed at the vision in front of us, while the girls sat with their heads down studying their Bibles. Hopefully, there would be no pop quiz. Finally, her pants slid silently down her long legs and landed around her ankles. She quietly stepped out of them. My index finger on my right hand found the front of her panties and ran around the edge until I came to the side. Just to tease her, I lightly snapped them. And then, she continued, " Jesus asked him, saying, 'What is your name?' And he said, 'Legion,' because many demons had entered him. And they begged Him that He would not command them to go out into the abyss. Now a herd of many swine was feeding there on the mountain." I once saw a man on TV who could move forks across the room with his mind. So, with all the mental anguish I could muster, I repeated over and over, "Come unloose. Come unloose." Since this was Sunday school, I figured that God would hear me more clearly and waited for her red bosom hanky to drop to her knees and leave her exposed to all of us. Swine wouldn't be the only thing feeding on the mountains, I thought. And then, she continued, still clothed, "And they begged Him that He would permit them to enter them. Then the demons went out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd ran violently down the steep place into the lake and drowned." My hand went to the back of her panties and felt her crack. I licked my finger and ran it slowly, gently, wetly, up and down the crack on her strong bottom lightly separating one cheek from the other. "When those who fed them saw what had happened, they fled and told it in the city and in the country. Then they went out to see what had happened, and came to Jesus, and found the man from whom the demons had departed, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid." Feeling a bit flushed, I shifted in my seat and noticed that others had had the same itch as I. "They also who had seen it told them by what means he who had been demon-possessed was healed. Then the whole multitude of the surrounding region of the Gadarenes asked Him to depart from them, for they were seized with great fear. And He got into the boat and returned. Now the man from whom the demons had departed begged Him that he might be with Him. But Jesus sent him away, saying, 'Return to your own house, and tell what great things God has done for you.' And he went his way and proclaimed throughout the whole city what great things Jesus had done for him." With a contented sigh, she ended her reading. "And what great things has God done for you? How about you, Jonathan? Would you like to share with the class what great things God has done for you?" Maybe she mistook the look on my face for that of holy rapture. I could only stammer, "Uhhh, God has brought me here, Miss Debennedetti. To be discipled by you, His servant." Well, you'd have thought I'd given her the key to the city. She blushed a red tint I had thought roses were only capable of. "Why, thank you so much. You're so kind, Jonathan." And for a second, I thought I noticed a twinkle in her eye. . Some time later, she began carrying a red book around with her entitled “Lay Amid Doves Purring”. Once I asked her about it. “It’s a poetry book”, she said. “It’s got your initials…but, of course you need the ‘P’”, I said and smiled. She smiled too, and blushed a little.

This particular summer, a group of us criminals, Tim and Toni Roe, who were fraternal twins, A.J. Howell, Kevin Backstreet and I, spent the better part of the summer camping out in a tent in my backyard. While Tim, Toni, Kevin and I were local kids (Toni was a girl and short for Antoinette), A.J. had come to us from Tulsa, Oklahoma where his father had made a small fortune wildcatting in the oil fields north of Tulsa. His father, "Tuffy" Howell, had sold the mineral and oil rights to some big Texas tycoon, but retained ten percent of whatever came out of the ground. His mother, Juanita Howell, was raised in a farm family nearby Hamlet and wanted to spend the rest of her life raising chickens and horses where she grew up. So, the family bought a 3500 acre spread just outside of Hamlet. We met A.J. in Sunday school. At first, we held his good fortune against him, as human nature dictated, but after we got to know him, we all liked him. To our jealous remarks he would reply, "You don't know jack. Have you ever even been in an oil field? Ever spend three months at a time in the middle of BumbleFuck, Nowhere? Have you ever gone three days straight without eating anything except mosquitos? Sleeping in the back of a beat up pick-up - so greasy you can't even see your skin? Smelling like a French whore? Until you do, I ain't interested in your damn cone-pone opinions and you got nothing to say to me. Screw YOU." So, we liked him, in spite of his father's big bank account. One particularly hot and sticky night, the sky showed a fingernail moon with a few puffy clouds that wandered by and gave the night a spooky feeling. Sensible people were home sitting in front of their fans and drinking lemonade, but for Jesse James and his crew the night was ripe for mischief. The target of our deeds would be one Percival Mandevlin, the oldest and meanest citizen of Hamlet, Indiana. Destroyer of bikes, keeper of balls, terrorizer of children, his was the first real glimpse I had of pure, unadultered evil. Even his name sounded evil, and we quickly gave him the nickname, Percival the Man-Devil. "What do you say we pay Percival a visit?," Tim said. "Who's that?," asked A.J. "Who's that? Try the meanest man you'll ever see should you live to be a hundred," I say. "Percival Mandevlin, but we call him Percival the Man-Devil, 'cause that's what he is. Don't get caught by him. He'll kill you." The youngest member of our gang, Kevin was the most excitable and generally thought of as the least likely to succeed in life. Raised solely by his mother who was a psychiatric nurse, she made Kevin daily into a nervous wreck. It took constant and tiresome work to undo her crazy influence on her youngest son, but we felt it was our sworn duty since he regularly stole money from her and kept us in coinage. "I ain't afraid of no Man-Devil," A.J. said, not quite knowing the full import of his statement, and then, "Where's he live? I want to see this dude." "Wait. Is the moon full?" Kevin said. "If it is, I ain't going. I ain't going to bother Mr. Man-Devil when the moon is full. I ain't crazy." "Yeah, you are. You and your mama are crazy," said Toni Roe. So, with nervous chuckles all around we headed out to pay Mr. Percival Mandevlin a visit.

It's been said that the night unveils the best and worst of human nature. Behind the cover of darkness, youths pretend to be adults, ugly ducklings become prom queens, dull people become exciting. At night, we all look alike. Most babies are conceived at night as well as most crimes. We headed out of our camper and headed south on our bikes down Choke Cherry Lane. We crossed the railroad tracks and pickup up speed down the short, but steep incline until we came to the frontage road beside RR 6. We followed this along the river and turned left over the Brandon locks. The scenery changed here and the quaint farms gave way to abandoned cars, decrepit houses and unkept yards. Our presence seemed out of place here and we heard the lonesome cry of the coyotes. Above us, the night sky was blue-black and clouds passed over the sliver of moon. The only thing missing was a witch on a broom. It was quiet, the way it's gets in the deep south in the middle of August or in the winter after the snow falls. The only sound was our bicycle tires as they crunched down the gravel road. This spooked Kevin, who found the silence unsettling and he began talking. "How are we going to cross The Ropes?" Mr. Mandevlin and his barren wife had lived in the same house for as long as anyone could remember. Situated high above an old rock quarry, it afforded him one of the most spectacular views in northern Indiana. The quarry, which we named "The Ropes" because of the long ropes we tied to an old, overhanging oak tree and used as water swings, hadn't been mined in ages and was filled with water. Time had healed the rough spots and all manner of trees and vegetation grew up around this vast body of water which could fill a hundred and eighty acre area. Wild thyme, lavender and sage filled the air with the sweet smells of the country. Wildflowers luxuriated here; blankets of Queen Anne's lace, red poppies, Indian coneflowers, black-eyed Susan's, others. In May, the wild, rolling prairie grasses were covered with a mass of yellow dandelions - a striking display of brilliant yellow on a green carpet. In May, the wild irises bloomed, faithfully multiplying every year. It was a wild, wild place. All manner of water birds collected here: Canadian geese by the hundreds landed here every fall on their way to warmer climes and made such a noise it hurt to hear them. Blue herons, long-necked and graceful, came and nested on the water's edge. Gulls, hummingbirds, finches, cardinals, jays, all. The limestone sides were still jagged and steep and this made for excellent cliff diving with forty foot drop-offs. Because of the steep limestone edges there was no shallow end in this huge crevasse. You could take one step off the edge and be in 200 feet of water. In the center of this canyon, maybe three hundred feet under water, is a crane with its boom fully extended, that was left there when the rock quarry was abandoned and remains there to this day. A huge, rusty pipe ran along one edge of it, but it didn't seem to empty anything into the water. Some older folks used this pipe as a scare tactic to prohibit youngsters from swimming there, but nothing ever came out of the pipe and besides, the quarry was chock full of fish. We figured if it was good enough for the fish to swim in, it was good enough for us. Much to the chagrin of Mr. Mandevlin, we took every opportunity we could to swim in the quarry. He reported us constantly to the powers that be, but the mayor, Mr. Connor, swam there as a child and thus knew of the place as we did: simply the best swimming hole in the entire Midwest. A chain link fence was half-heartedly set up, but we easily broke through that by crawling beneath it. A local newspaper reporter did some research on the property to find out to whom it belonged but his search ended in some sort of mysterious bank trust. Although Mr. Mandevlin's property overlooked the quarry, he wasn't the owner. Taxes were paid faithfully every year with the money originating from an unnamed Swiss bank account. No name was listed in the public deed, and the bank had no record of its depositor - only the number 8895764309. Swiss banking authorities were prohibited from releasing any information concerning their clients other than a tracking number, and with the county happy to receive tax revenue, the matter remained a closed book and we youngsters were the beneficiaries of a small slice of paradise. It was here I saw my first red-winged blackbird. Here is where I learned to scuba dive. My first kiss was here. Brandon Locks were closed and we passed easily over the drawbridge. Down a hill, then up, then left on Patterson Road. If there's an eerier road in the world, I don't know it. "Hey, do you hear that?" A.J. said, slowing his bike down to a stop. The rest of us stopped and listened. Faintly, but distinctly, we heard the sound of a harp playing a soft melody. "Hey, that sounds familiar. It probably someone's radio or something. Come on. Let's go." I say, a bit unnerved at the sound of a haunting harp in the middle of nowhere. "Wait a minute. What radio? I don't see no radio. I don't see nobody, nowhere," A.J. said. And then, "What the hell is that?" The soft, lilting melody played on. "Let's get outta here," and Kevin turned to start back when..."Yowwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!" He was face to face with an old, old black man who seemed to step out of nowhere. "Where you boys goin', huh?" And then, "What you white boys doin' 'round hear? Mischief? You boys lookin' for mischief?" And his face changed and he laughed at us. "Well, well, well. You'll like to find it, you will. Shore 'nuf. You'll find it. Or it'll find you." "Uhh, mister, we're just riding around. We ain't looking for no trouble," one of us said. Maybe it was the silence just then, or the break in the conversation between the old man and us, but softly, quietly, the music started again. The old man turned his face and listened for a long second. "She's playing goooood tonight, ain't she?" "Who's playing good tonight, sir?", I say. "Why, dat's da Princess, don't you know?" "No. What princess?", Kevin said, then, "Never mind. I don't want to know. Let's get outta here." "Suit yerself.", he said, and closed his eyes to listen. "Wait a minute, A.J. said, I want to know." Who's this princess?" Softly, serenely, the melody continued. "Well, maybe you boys ought not to know. Maybe she don't want you to know." "Look mister," A.J. said impatiently, "What the hell is going on here?" The old man laughed a slow laugh, almost to himself. "Don't know 'bout da Princess, huh? Well, I could tell yawl, but you won't believe it. Most white folks don't. Shame, though. 'Cause she shore does play pretty, don't she?" "Mister", A.J. said again, "I'm tired of this nonsense, here. What the sam hell is going on?" Soft, gentle lines, the melody played on. The old black man reached into his pocket and pulled out a canister. He unscrewed the top and raised it to us in respect and took a swallow. "Ahhhh. Der. Dat should do me. Well, yawl are too young to know da story, I 'spect. All da black folk know da story. Ever one 'round hear know da story. 'Cept the white folk. Dey don't know the story. Or dey don't believe da story. Thinkin' it's jus' a po' ole black story. Don't be botherin' wid no po' black story." He took another swallow, deeper this time and I got a whiff of hard liquor. Slowly, he replaced the screw cap and began again. "Long time ago - long 'fore yawl was borned, der was a princess from far away. Bavarian princess. She growed up beautiful and had such a gentle spirit inside her dat da people all loved her. She's only a small child den, maybe nine or ten year old. Her mama was mean like a snake and maybe dat's why the princess was so gentle. She didn't wanna be like her mama. So, her mama, the queen of Bavaria, had important bidness to do and so da princess was raised by her maid. Black Annie was her name. And Black Annie loved dis child like her own children. She learned dis child to play da harp like dat ole' boy, what's his name. Beethoven. All da lanpeople used to come 'round and hear dis pretty child play on da harp. Well, by and by the princess got older and the time had come for her to marry a man and settle down and be da princess. The queen tole her dat da man she was to marry was the prince of Monte Carlo, Pierre Lubois. Dis way, da queen could get all da money dat da prince had. She was powerful mean, da queen was. And wicked, too. Well, da princess never loved da prince of Monte Carlo and didn't want to marry him. She loved a po' peasant boy and wanted to marry dis boy instead. Well, the queen said 'No. No po' peasant boy is gonna be the prince of my kingdom. No way. No how.' So, da princess axed Black Annie what to do. Black Annie said, 'Let's go to America. I got some long lost relatives der. And your po' little peasant boy can come later. So, Black Annie stole da princess and brought her here to dis place." He stopped a moment and turned and pointed. "Why, yawl are only 'bout half a mile from where Black Annie and the princess lived. Straight up dat hill, der." He stopped for another swig of his bottle. The music yet played, its minor keys, soft and inviting. He tilted his head a bit, turning his good ear to the wind. "Yes, sirree. She play like an angel, don't she?" Without waiting for an answer, he continued. "Well, by and by, the queen got terrible mad over dis der happenin'. She called ever body she knowed, but all da people loved dis child and wanted her to be happy. Dey didn' say nothin' 'bout nothin' and da queen didn't know what to do. She was powerful mad now. So, da wicked queen called in some kinda mind read'r. Some kinda wizard man to cast a spell on Black Annie and the po' peasant boy. Well, just as the po' peasant boy was asupposed to come visit da princess he got terrible sick with a fev'r and died. Well, word got back to the princess 'bout the po' peasant boy and she got terrible sad and cried and cried. There was nothin' Black Annie could do to console her 'cause her heart was broken in two. Da only thing the princess could do all day, was play on dat harp. Well, after a time, a terrible storm come. Terrible. A tornado from the bowels of hell. Dat der tornado ripped thew ever place like it twernt even der. Dat der Injun Dam got struck by lightnin'. You know where da Thief Riv'r leaves Coon's Lake? Den down below da Falls? Well, dat der dam exploded on fire. I's 'bout yawl's age at da time. I's eighty-fo' year old now, and I ain't ever, never seen a terrible storm like dat. I 'spect I never will, neither. Dat der lightnin' exploded dat Injun Dam and Thief Riv'r Falls dumped so much water dat it filled up dat der quarry all you white boys swim in. Dat der water in dat quarry come fo'teen mile away from Coon's Lake. Dat der's riv'r water, in dat der quarry. Dat's where all dem fish come from. Anyway, da princess was heartbroken and not in her right mind, some say, on account of da po' peasant boy bein' dead. She was playin' dat harp when da storm hit da house. It rip open the walls wherever it went and a great big swordfish fell off da wall and sliced the princesses' hands clean off. Da whole house was gone. Black Annie was gone. Da princess was gone. Da only thing left standin' was da harp and da hands of the princess was still hangin' on. Some folk say she never stopped playin'. Not even when she lost her body in da tornado." He paused, straightfaced and serious, his voice even. "Dat's what you hear, right now. Dat's der's the hands of da princess still playin' on dat harp." The soft serenade continued, unconcerned with human madness.

We arrived at the Ropes around midnight, rattled. There's nothing quite like the ghost hands of a princess playing the harp at midnight. It occurred to me that, except for a few times I had been here night swimming, this was the latest that I'd ever been here. The Ropes were usually empty and quiet at night, and this night was no exception. A.J., Kevin, Tim and Toni Roe and I followed the well worn trail up to the chain-linked fence. We left our bikes there and crawled under a bent-up section of the fence. Except for a few scratches each time we did this, there were few other problems. I was the last one through the bottom. To get to Mr. Mandevlin's house we had to swim the entire length of the quarry and come out on the other side. Once there, we had to toe-climb our way up the steep limestone side. We had arranged foot holds all over the quarry and this was done fairly easily. Mr. Mandevlin had a private driveway, facing southeast, but it was fenced off. Also, he had two mean German Shepherds, who were as old and mean as he was. We decided we'd rather not try that entryway. Just then, the sound of an engine whine filled the night air. "What the hell is that?", said A.J. "First the ghost songs and now this. What kind of place is this, anyway?" Coming over the tops of the trees, a small, amphibious, bush plane was being led by a searchlight that seemed to be coming from Mr. Mandevlin's property. Cutting through the night, the pilot put the flaps up all the way and cut the engine. The plane floated down lazily and set in the water about two hundred yards in front of us. It taxied slowly over to the edge of the quarry. The passenger door opened. Two figures got out, and, with cat burglar ease, climbed into the old rusty pipe. Slowly, the plane taxied to the middle of the quarry and took off. The searchlight went off.

More of the BigTop:

Chapter Three: Franco the Flying Frenchman

"Gracie, cherie ". Ferdinand Francesco Carpantier admired himself in the cheap trailer mirror. Lifting his chin slightly, he searched for any stray hairs that Donna Casanova, his personal beautician, had missed. "Not bad, zis time," he said, and stuck his index finger in his nose to retrieve some stray matter that had collected there. He crinkled up his nose and blew outward to help the process along. Donna snapped her gum loudly and put her hand on her hip. She stood behind him looking at their two reflections in the mirror. "Not bad, zis time," she said, mocking his French accent. "Look you. I have only so much to work with, you know. I can't make you look like Robert Redford." "Robert Redford. Who is zis Robert Redford? Ze boyfriend?" "No, not ze boyfriend," she said. "Never mind, you wouldn't know him. He doesn't travel in the circus freak circles." Oblivious to her insult, he itched the end of his nose with the palm of his right hand moving in a circular motion. "Mama says, Ze nose itch. Zou get money. Ze more itch. Ze more money. I must be getting ze more money." And with a final elaborate rubbing motion he turned toward Donna and began again what he considered his real job. "Cherie. Tell me, when will zou stay with me. We can squeeze ze grape. We can drink ze wine. I will tell zou all ze love talk. Tell me, my little shuttle bug." "It's shuttle bus, Franco. Not shuttle bug. Bus. With an "s". You mean, 'My little lovebug' - at least I think that's what you mean. God, now I'm talking like you. God help me." Donna Casanova had heard it all before. She was used to him now, but at the beginning, when she first started, she couldn't believe his audacity. Oftentimes, she found herself repeating things he had said to her in his heavy, French accent: "Oui, oui, cherie, come to my trailer. Come. I will make zous so 'appy. Come, zou will see. I am za French lover man." "A French nutcase is what you are," she'd say to herself. Still, in spite of his obvious chauvinistic ways, there was a certain charm about him that she often found herself smiling at. "Cherie, do zou zink I'm handsome, Cherie. Tell me, do zou zink zo? Does my little lovebug like za Frenchman? Does za pretty American girl like za flying Frenchman? "Franco, please. That's enough now. You hired me. I do your hair. I shave your beard. I help you with the language problem. That's it. You're fine, Franco, but I just work here," she said, a bit exasperated. "Oh Cherie, cherie. Zou don't know anyzing about ze life. Zou don't know ze eden Franco. I take zou to France. I zhow zou ze place. We drink ze wine. We squeeze ze grape. We make ze love. Cherie, cherie, ah, my cherie. Come to France. I make zou a queen." "The 'eden' Franco?" What is the 'eden' Franco?", she asked, puzzled. "Ze eden Franco! Ze eden Franco!", he said, excitedly. "Zou don't know ze eden Franco?" "Oh. The hidden Franco. Jesus. Well, I'm not so sure I need to see the 'eden' Franco. Let's keep the 'eden' Franco where he belongs, shall we? Hidden." "Cherie, come with me tonight. I will make ze French dinner for zou. We will drink ze French wine. We will make ze French love. Come, cherie. Come to my trail-air tonight." He patted his tiny bed and a small cloud of dust flew up in the air. Donna coughed out the dust and waved her hand in front of her face, slightly shaking her head in disbelief. "Franco, please. I think I'll pass for now," she said, rolling her eyes. "Pass? What is zis 'pass'? Zis good?" He looked at her, hopeful. "No, wait. You don't understand." And then, "Never mind. I have a date tonight, anyway. I can't come." "Date? Date? I have ze dates. I have ze figs. I have ze cheese. Zats all about." Realizing the absurdity of it all, she murmured, "Oh brother, its hopeless." And then, " Look, you have to go on pretty soon, now. I should be leaving. She bent over to pick up her purse, tossing her long black hair out of her face. Her tight jeans and long, shapely legs caught the eye of the Frenchman. "Oh, my cherie. Zou look like ze mo-DEL. May I touch ze mo-DEL?" He reached out and attempted to grab Donna's behind, missed, and tumbled over his chair and onto the floor. "Oh my God. Franco, stop now! That's enough. I told you I'm not going to do that. I'm leaving now. Get ready. You're on pretty soon." She was about to leave the trailer, when the French heap on the floor spoke. "Wait! Wait, I say! 'Ave a bit of ze grape with me. Come. Come. We drink ze grape." He quickly got up and before Donna could stop him, he was at his small bureau drawer. "Franco, please. You're going on in a few minutes. Can't you wait to start drinking until after your show? Is that too much to ask?" "Ze young girl knows nothing. Ze young, American shuttle bug knows nothing about ze Frenchman." He poured two styrofoam cups full of the dark red liquid. "Do zou tink I'm blind? Do zou tink I don't hear what zoes assholy's says about ze Franco? Franco loves ze drink. Franco loves ze grape. Franco is ze alcoholist." Donna refrained from laughing only because of the hurt look in his eyes. "Alcoholist? Alcholist? It's alcoholic, Franco. Although, on second thought, maybe alcoholist is the right word, the way you drink. And they only say that because they see you drinking all the time. They're worried about you." "Well, boolshit, I say. Zats boolshit. Zou Americans don't know nothing about ze Frenchman. We drink. Zo what? We drink all ze time. Big focking deal. We drink for breakfast, we drink for lunch, we drink for dinner. Zo what? Zat doesn't mean we ze alcholist - or whatever zou call it. Zats all about. Now, come here, to Franco and drink ze grape. Come my pretty American mo-dEL." Donna sighed and knew the quickest way out the door was through this little ritual of drinking "ze grape" with the only alcholist in the world. She touched her lips to the styrofoam cup and sipped. For a moment, their eyes met and a small smile came to her lips. "Franco. We all like you. You're just so... so... I don't know. French." "Ze shame. Ze shame. Ze mo-DEL no like ze French lover man. Ze shame." As part of Franco the Flying Frenchman's contract, his agent, Stephen Zuckerman, negotiated a personal barber/beautician at Franco's insistence. Her duties, however, would not be as complete as Franco desired, because, well, let's just say, this is America, and not the south of France. Beauticians' usual duties didn't include sexual favors, at least not here, in the heartland of the United States. In France, Russia, who knows. The owners of the BigTop gave in to his request, only because, his performance was, undeniably, a heart-stopping thrill ride. Audiences all over the world held Franco the Flying Frenchman up as one of the best acrobat acts in the world. His appearance at an event virtually guaranteed a huge audience with flyers and newspaper advertisements announcing his coming months in advance. In short, he was the Van Gogh of acrobats; unchallenged, incomparable, and beyond envy. All this, the small, well-built Frenchman knew, and used to his advantage. "With me zer, zer is a zhow. With no me. No zhow. Zats all about." The management thought of Franco as a nuisance. A necessary business expense to be tolerated, but not enjoyed, not unlike a Hollywood actor. "He opens the show," the large biscuit who hired me was fond of saying. "People love him. We give the people what they want here. No surprises." So, in the world of unusual entertainment, Frankie the Flask was a hit. Turning his head a bit to the left, then, a bit to the right, he decided the years had been good to him. He still had most of his black hair, his skin wasn't wrinkled like some of those other "European windbags," and he was a commercial success. Life had been good to him, too, as had the women over the years, although lately he had run into a dry spell. "Even ze grapes need ze time to recov-air," he said out loud and to himself. "A bit slow-air? Perhaps. A little old-air? Perhaps. The sweetest jous comes from ze oldest grapes, I zink." He puckered his lips, trying to kiss his reflection in the mirror, then someone knocked on his trailer door. "What is it now, he said, annoyed. "Franco, you're on in half an hour. Are you ready?", the voice answered back. "Am I ready? Am I ready? Is ze bride ready for ze hus-baund? Is ze lover ready for ze love? Of course, I'm ready, zou fool. I was born ready. Not like zou, zou crazy fool." The man at the door had heard it all before and left soon after he knocked, leaving Franco at the mirror soliloquizing to himself. "Zees small per-sauns must be zealt with. I must tell ze manager I need another assis-taunt." He scribbled a note to himself in French and slid it into his the edge of his mirror. In English, it said: "One Assistant Needed to Participate in Assisting the Best Acrobat in the World: Franco the Flying Frenchman. Duties as yet undetermined." Then, underneath in smaller letters: "Remind that tub 'o lard that my nose itched today." Satisfied with himself, he relaxed a bit and looked at himself in the mirror. He noticed a small pimple near his forehead and frowned. "What is zis? What is zis? A boy-ELL? A boy-ELL? How could zat be? I do not need ze boy-ELL on ze face. I do not need ze boy-ELL." He turned to call Donna again, but she left long ago. And now disgusted, "Why did she not tell me I had ze boy-ELL on ze face? Why? Why? Maybe zits not too big. Maybe zats why. Maybe she could not zee it. Hmmmm. I must pinch ze boy-ELL. I must get out ze puss. I must pinch ze boy-ELL." So, awkwardly, he adjusted his posture to get close to the mirror, put two fingers together and squeezed. "Ahhh,zer. Bye, bye, boy-ELL. No more boy-ELL on ze face of ze acrobat. Good zing, too. Maybe pretty American girl in ze audience. Oui, oui. Now I'm almost ready for ze show." He took off his white Turkish robe and looked at his physique in the mirror. "Not baad. Not baad. Ze muscles are still impor-taunt. Ze muscles are still strong." He turned sideways, and, like a bullfighter staring down his bull, he flexed his bicep in the mirror. "Ze prime beef. Ze prime reeb. Zats what ze ladies want. Ze prime reeb." Then he pulled his tight underwear down a bit to uncover his genitals. He placed his index finger gingerly around his member and began twirling it in a circle like a child's pinwheel. Before long he was exciting himself and decided to stop. He stared at the mirror and said, "Ze acrobat must save ze energy for ze zhow. Maybe ze lady twirl ze wheel after ze zhow. Who knows?" And with a bit of a sigh, he covered himself up again. Carefully, he picked up and placed the Turkish robe on his small bed. He had negotiated for, and been given, a clothes allowance which he used liberally. Weekly, a package would arrive from almost anywhere in the world with the name "Ferdinand Francesco Carpantier, The Flying Frenchman" on the label. Inevitably, the contents were from an obscure Egyptian mill or a sheep farm in the hills of Italy. His clothes were his life and over the years he learned where to buy the most exotic outfits. He caught himself in the mirror again, this time from a different angle. He flexed his other arm and half-genuflected his knee in the position of a bodybuilder. Then, he turned to face the mirror in full, drew in his breath and patted his firm stomach. "Ze ladies love ze flat stomach." "Ze stomach is flat." "Ze acrobat always have ze flat stomach." "Zo - he - can - fly." He rubbed his hands together in front of him, as if to sit down to a good meal. Over the years, the BigTop workers knew that Frankie went through this little ritual before his act, and quickly learned that he wouldn't come out of his trailer until he finished it. The details of the ritual changed with each show, but were similar overall. They were told to get Franco moving early on account of this. Next, he reached in his bureau drawer and pulled out a flask. He opened the flask and waited a moment. He put the flask under his nose and sniffed. Relishing the moment with his eyes shut, he murmured. "Mmmm. Ze smell of success." He drank deeply and put the flask down on top of his dresser. Again, he spotted himself in the mirror. He turned around half way and flexed his leg muscles. Once. Twice. Three times. "Ze legs strong." "Ze legs still strong." "Ze acrobat need ze muscle in ze leg." "Very impor-taunt." "Without ze leg, ze acrobat no can fly." "Without ze leg, ze acrobat no can love." He pursed his lips and popped them. "Zats all about." Ferdinand Francesco Carpantier was born the illigitimate son of a peasant woman just outside of Marseille, France. It was rumored that his father was an American Special Forces officer stationed in Korea and then in Vietnam. This rumor was never verified, though, as the chief witness to the illicit rendezvous was a local village busybody, who claimed that she had seen Franco's mother, Elysa Carpantier, while trysting with an American officer. Elysa Carpantier worked as a fruit picker in Cavillion, a small village outside of Marseille. She was the only daughter of a poor, peasant family. Well built, with French good looks, her life consisted of hard labor under extreme conditions. Like her parents before her, she resigned herself to life on a subsistence level; gathering fruit during harvest season for the orchard owners in and around Marseille. The remaining time was spent eeking out a living through the rocky soil of her family's small farm. She raised goats for milk, planted all her own vegetables and herbs and helped her family in any way she could. This included working long hours in the crushing sun of southern France picking apples, pears, olives, mushrooms - anything she could to do to survive another year. This was expected of her and she didn't complain because she knew of no other life. However, she was a young, virile woman, and the men around Cavillion, although they showed her attention, didn't please her, and she didn't want the reputation that came with an illicit love affair. So she lived quietly with her family until the fateful summer of Ferdinand's conception. According to the village busybody, Elysa was in the Cavillion market buying bread, coffee, and cigarettes for her father. She inquired about the price of the blueberry tarts, and when told, she declined. It was then that a man, an American, came up behind her and offered to pay the clerk for the tarts. Politely, she refused, but at his insistence, the clerk filled up her bag with tarts and crousants for her entire family. They had a lingering moment of eye contact and as she walked away the American never took his eyes off of her. He asked the clerk if he knew the woman, which, of course, he did. The American learned that her name was Elysa Carpantier, only daughter of Henri and Manon Carpantier, that she was single and that she lived outside of Marseille. The American thanked the clerk, paid for a baguette and cafe creme and left. Joseph Freehill was weary. With the permission of General Macarthur and the United States Government, he had six weeks of R&R and intended to use every minute of it. The French beauty he had just witnessed was easy on the eyes and gave him a familiar stirring in his loins. He sat at a nearby table, sipping his cafe creme and breathed a sigh of relief. It was a long road behind him and sometimes he found it hard to believe he had made it. Just four years out of West Point, and already he had seen much of the world and the depths of depravity of the human heart. "Special Agent Joseph Freehill" - the words rang in his ears - although, before his crowning, he had no way of knowing really what that meant...

Death Valley, California: 126 degrees, July 17th. Final phase of a murderous special agent session code named, "Sun Splash" - like some freakin' kids' water park. Out of 400 fine soldiers, one would make it. The briefing was uncommonly short. The instuctions simple: They were choppered in, one at a time, to divergent points in the desert sea and told to survive for eight days. If they met another officer at any time, they weren't allowed to communicate with him. They weren't allowed to share water or provisions with each other. They were given exactly the amount of water needed for their body weight, minus two days worth. Every half an hour they were to press an alert button - green meant "I'm okay", which, as it turned out, was the cruelest of mental tasks - when the sun is hot enough to stop your breath - and given the fact that they could always bail and press the red button, which meant, "Come and get me, I'm losing it." This "out", this escape hatch, this hairline crack in the scheme of things -left the soldier with, what he first would consider a normal and civilized plan, but in actual fact, was the sublimest of psychological tests. He and he alone would determine whether or not he would continue in the blazing heat and excruciating circumstances. No one - not a buddy, not a commanding officer, not a wounded comrade, would influence his simple, yet possibly deadly, choice. At exactly 6:00 AM, he was unceremoniously dropped off by a helicopter. Without so much as a word he disembarked the craft, backpack and provisions in tow. Heat. Light. Sun, already. Before the pilot took off, a second officer dropped a burlap sack at his feet and after uttering a single word, they both took off. Dinner. Joseph approached the bag, the chopper sound fading and heard a familiar sound. Could it be? The bag, no longer a dead thing, its mouth open, moved slowly, terribly and Joseph realized now why he wasn't given enough water for the entire eight days. Diamondback Rattlesnake. It's terrible castanets screaming for vengenance, blood. They want me to kill the snake and eat it. No. I had to kill the snake and eat it. Or fail. Or die. Just beyond Badwater - elevation minus 282 feet, the pancake-flat salt dunes stretch for miles in every direction. If you didn't know better, you'd suspect you were in the middle of the Sahara desert or maybe, the moon. It's so hot that the sand crushes under your feet like crisp chocolate chip cookies, crusty on the surface but soft, and oven warm, below. The normal, reasonable, perhaps genetic, impulse, is to walk. To explore what lies just beyond the horizon; what lies up ahead and over that small hill. Wander too far from here and you enter a dangerous labyrinth of cliffs, all of which look identical, leaving the doomed traveler with no sense of direction and little hope of survival. Eight days. One hundred and twenty six degrees. Mirage. Hard to breathe. Some water, yes. Little food. Diamondback Rattler. All coiled up and hissing. Terrible Castanets. A viper in a burlap bag is a curious thing. First of all, he's not light. Because he is so incensed at being held captive, his fangs are constantly protruding through the bag, causing you to hold him at arm's length. Yes, he could have killed him immediately, but there is always the tendency to wait until the last moment, as if this act of lunacy may not be needed. Secondly, he is constantly rattling, reminding you of your predicament, making it difficult to sleep, his vibrating tremolo always evident in the desert waste. So, survival. Without any landmarks, Joseph walked until he reached a small hill. A blip, really, on the horizon. He dug at the sand until he formed a depression. Digging furthur still, he noticed the sand cooled off about eight inches below the surface. His sweat was pouring off his face and body, stinging his eyes. Water. After some time, he resumed his task. By 11:00 AM on July 17, his first day in the furnace, code named "Sun Splash", he dug a seven foot by three foot by two foot coffin that he would lie in for the next eight days. He covered the top with a piece of nylon from his backpack and was the only human being within this 3.3 million acres of desert heat sitting in the shade. With no purpose other than survival, the moments weighed down with a palpable weight. Each heartbeat was a task and the thought occurred to Joseph that his heart might stop beating, if for no other reason, than it tired of the ritual. This is the thing about suffering, about dying, he thought. Nothing, nothing is forgotten. It's only overgrown with cares, like some dirt road covered with weeds. When the suffering is so pure, so complete, it strips away everything in its way, what remains is the memories, the biochemical "roads" that long ago were carved indelibly into the mind. When he was a child, his mother made him and his siblings memorize a poem for each holiday. At Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, birthdays - the Freehill children were required to recite a poem at the dinner table. The children all hated it, of course, and Joseph thought he had successfully forgotten them. Until now. First, they came to him in bits and pieces, but then, the floodgates opened and he found himself overcome with the memories stuffed someplace in his mind he had left long ago and thought he'd never return to. Emily Dickinson. A small, ineffectual boy sits uncomfortably at the Thanksgiving feast spread before him, knowing it's his turn. He began with the shortest poem he could find.

Love is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and The exponent of death.

And again, Emily, on a cold, snowy birthday:

What if I say I shall not wait?
What if I burst the fleshy gate
And pass, escaped, to thee?
What if I file this mortal off,
See where it hurt me, - that's enough, - And wade in liberty?
They cannot take us any more, -
Dungeons may call, and guns implore;
Unmeaning now, to me,
As laughter was an hour ago,
Or laces, or a travelling show.

It seemed like that small, cow-licked boy at the dinner table had little in common with the grown-up version that baked here in the heart of this vast desert sea, doing God-knows-what and what-for. And yet, in the midst of the suffering... the waiting... oh, the waiting. Is there anything on earth - anything - quite as difficult as waiting indefinitely? All activity, any activity, is easier than this void, this blackness, this vague and gnawing sense of doom referred to as waiting, patience. Months and miles later the visions came flooding back. No, the pure, raw physical training wasn't the hardest. It wasn't the 200 push-ups before 7:00 AM. Nor was it the 1000 sit-ups before breakfast. It wasn't the rigid regimen of aerobic exercises necessary to maintain a 40 beats per minute resting heartrate. No. More men - fine soldiers all - any of whom Joseph would entrust with his life - it was the waiting that killed them.

A small room. Breakfast as usual. Eggs, pancakes, coffee. Unexpectedly, the special agents in training were told to separate and follow a military ensign. They were brought into a small cell, told to stand on a chair. Coffee? Sure, why not? Coffee was brought in. Nothing on this earth - nothing- is quite as hard as waiting. After several cups of coffee, and before they realized what this "exercise" was about, they were told they couldn't use the bathroom until they were given permission. Of course, they could choose to withdraw, to quit at any time. It was their choice, of course. Out of 133 fine soldiers, sixteen waited. Twenty four hours later, Joseph Freehill and a few good men were allowed to step off their chairs and empty their bladders. "Patience of a saint", he understood now - not as some ethereal, philosophical notion used like a mantra in the mystic writings. No. Neither as some light-hearted cliche' used when speaking of the graces of a grammer school teacher when dealing with twenty snot-nosed brats. He knew now that a fundamental difference existed between knowing something by observation, and knowing something by experience. And this difference was everything.

Ft. McCoy, Wisconsin in the dead of winter is a place not unlike Auschwitz. Gloom. Cold. Dread. The special agent candidate was seated at a small desk. No windows, no distractions. A telephone book was placed neatly in front of the candidate. No pens, no paper. Again, simple rules: Memorize the names, addresses, and phone numbers of any ten people in the book. They must all have different first and last names, and must live on different streets. You have 60 minutes. Simple, yet... Oh, by the way, call it in the air: heads or tails? What? Call what? The military clerk pulled out a coin, a penny, no less, and flipped it. Heads? Too, bad. It's tails. The safety comes off. What? Within two minutes of studying the phone book, a second officer walked in and calmly sat down at the desk, six feet directly in front of Joseph. He quietly took a .410 hunter's shotgun out of his bag, loaded it, and straddled the desk just six feet in front of Joseph. Without so much as a smile, he aimed it directly in his face, his thick finger poised on the trigger. Lost the toss, huh? Click. He started at the beginning. Male. Female. Male. Female. Male. Female. Male. Female. Male. Female. Numbers had to start in seven, end in zero. Addresses couldn't have more than three numbers. Click. A penny for your thoughts. For your life. He's looking tired. Don't fade on me. Don't slouch on me. Relax that finger. Fifty-five minutes, four seconds and sixteen candidates later, Joseph Freehill completed his trial and was no longer just a candidate, but a Special Forces Officer. At the eighth day, after eating and drinking as little as possible, after laying in his homemade tomb for countless hours, after straddling the rattler in the bag, killing it with his bare hands and cooking it over a small fire, he decided he was ready to be picked up. When the helicopter arrived, he was told he was the final hold-out. One sixth of the soldiers left after three days; another sixth were airlifted by the fifth day. Joseph, along with Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, and his favorite poet, Anonymous, waited.

Later that morning the busybody was dining alone at the La Brie tavern, where she went for her soup, salad, and morning gossip. The American walked in, sat down near her and ordered. He ate duck with pomme frites, a salad, and drank the house wine that was recommended to him, by Regis, the waiter and owner of the tavern. The busybody made an extra effort to listen to any conversation that fell from the mouth of the American, and, finally when he left, there wasn't much of anything that he said that interested her. To Regis, she asked, "Do you know the American?" It was May, and the tourists were yet to filter into southern France in their quest for sun, drink and holiday. The tavern was filled with locals who came religiously for the veal, foie gras and wine. Regis, knowing she was a busybody, and yet a good customer, often rewarded her with scandalous information. "Yes, I know the American. He is an officer in the American Special Forces. A paratrooper." "I saw him today eyeing Elysa Carpantier.", the busybody offered. With a disinterested shrug, Regis continued. "I ate with him once a few years back when he came here. He enjoys good food, wine." The busybody drew deeply on a cigarette. Careful to blow upward so as not to distract Regis, she waited for more. He continued, "He is highly trained in several disciplines including wet diving and paragliding, and highly educated." "Oh?" The busybody was impressed and attentive. "Yes. He comes from West Point - a special school in America for officers, spies and other CIA types. He could not speak of his missions, naturalament, but he did tell me an interesting story." "Oui? Moving a wine glass out of her way to get a better view, she leaned forward, crossed her arms and leaned on her forearms. She let Regis speak uninterrupted. "He was in Korea on special assignment. The U.S. marines had to go in and lay land mines in Kuneri, near Hung Nam and Ham Hung. The Chinese had just entered the conflict. They outnumbered the marines and came across the Chosan Reservoir and surrounded them. The outcome was terrible. His job, given to him by General Macarthur, was to get behind enemy lines, alone. The only way there was through the mountains near Kuneri, a North Korean stronghold. Once there, he was to set his ordinants outside of Kuneri near a small village believed to be used by the Chinese as an outpost. He was to backpack into the area, eating and sleeping in the mountains and when the time was correct he was to cross the Tutang Gorge and plant his bombs. The Me Ke River flows through the Tutang. The problem was, however, the river was filled with pirhanas and therefore hostile to humans, and even if he rafted across, the sides of the gorge were too steep to allow him to foot-climb. The solution came from NASA, the American space agency. They had just developed a special parachute called a 'ram air wing' which looked like an inflated boomerang and was controlled by pulling on nylon strings. He was to foot-launch off of one side of the gorge, fly across the river and land on the other side of the gorge. Given any wind at all, the paraglide would catch it, and he could maneuver across the gorge and land on the other side. He said that the only thing he couldn't do was fully apply the brakes in mid-air as this would cause him to stall and fall to the ground. In theory, he had a split-second to release the brakes before the canopy collapsed - but this was one of those theories you test only once. After that it's too late. When he was sure that there were no enemies anywhere around he unloaded the chute, untangled the ropes, strapped himself into it and jumped off the cliff with the explosives strapped to his waist and legs. He was proceeding well and was nearly across the huge gorge. As he approached the other side, he failed to see a covey of Pyongang water quail that were nesting in the crevices of the side of the gorge. He frightened them and they all took off at once. These are highly excitable birds and not accustomed to flying boomerangs, and when they startled they flew directly into his flight path. He panicked, applied the brakes fully in mid-air, and his canopy collapsed with several quail still underneath. He was right near the edge of the gorge, and as the canopy gave way, it barely caught on an overhanging tree limb. He was slapped against the side of the gorge and broke his wrist and forearm. Now he was stuck, dangling high above the gorge, with quail clamoring under his canopy. Using his good arm and two legs, he managed to claw his way up six or eight feet of the rock face to safety. His forearm was badly broken with the bone showing through the skin. He still had bombs strapped to his legs. He was trained to set his own fractures in the wilderness, but the bone had punctured through the skin and he was afraid that an infection would set in. Being directly above a river, he was afraid of parasites. His village target was still five miles away and he made the decision to turn back. So, he waited for a change in the wind, foot-launched off the side and flew back to the other side where he had come from. After he returned to his base and was medically treated for his fractures, General Macarthur and Harry Truman called him in for a debriefing. When he was finished, Macarthur spread a terrain map on the table and showed him that the village he was about to bomb was a village of civilians. The true outpost lay southeast of where he was headed. By the time Macarthur knew this, it was too late to call him back. A simple cartographic error had nearly caused a village of innocent civilians to be blown to bits. Later, Macarthur was relieved of his duties as General, some say, because he wanted to go to China to fight, but our American friend, here, thinks it was because of this incident. Now, whenever our friend eats quail, he raises his glass in respect to the covey of Pyongang water quail that nearly killed him, but saved a village of innocents."

They were alone and the busybody felt that something odd was happening. Earlier that week, she had followed the American from a distance while he drove into the country. If her hunch was correct, he would be heading straight to Henri Carpantier's farm. He drove a small rental car and followed the road into Cavillion. He turned into her small gravel driveway and got out. The busybody, satisfied that her instincts didn't disappoint her, kept on going. Now this, the fourth time she had seen him, had proved to be the most evocative. The American must have pre-arranged his rendevous with Elysa as they both walked seperately into the barn. The busybody waited a bit of time and moved in for a closer look. From a crack in the door, she could see the American and Elysa already facing each other, embracing, with Elysa, standing on her tip-toes with her face upturned towards the American. He leaned down and gently kissed her mouth, their silhouettes dimly lit by the fading afternoon sun. This lasted through the night, according to the busybody, who said that she left at nightfall, they were still there, making love by the moonlight. The villagers assumed she was exaggerating the truth as the tale changed with each telling, and assumed the father was one of the nearby village boys. Elysa never admitted anything to anyone and the father never showed up again. Elysa never married and raised Franco the only way she knew how. She worked long hours in the orchards and kept Franco nearby at all times.

As with any prodigious skill, Franco the Flying Frenchman's aeronautical artistry began in childhood. Long before the BigTop Traveling Show was conceived, young Ferdinand was perfecting his craft in the orchards surrounding Cavillion. Slight of build, his was the perfect compliment to the grower's labor force; someone who could climb to the tops of the tallest trees without damaging the precious fruit. And since the growing season was so long and the harvest season so short, Ferdinand had the perfect kind of employment: Outdoors in the fresh air, a short harvest season, all he could eat and drink, and good pay for a small child. He was agile and quick and had the good, dark looks that the peasant women liked to see in a child. Everyone knew that whatever Ferdinand Francesco Carpantier decided to do in life, he would do well. He was raised in that peculiar French way, however, that had little to do with the rest of the world. Long, elaborate lunches, wine with every meal, and, when compared to the rest of the world, curiously particular about his stomach, penis and daily needs. Franco spent his childhood in this culture and learned early on what it meant to be French. An entire day spent eating and drinking was not uncommon. Meals of foie gras, or duck liver, which most American children would run from, were standard and normal cuisine. Duck's blood soup, gizzards, hearts, intestines, brains - these were commonplace among the peasants where he lived out his childhood, and appeared regularly at mealtime. The old men of the village often took little Ferdinand on their hunting expeditions. He wasn't like some children, in that, he would whine or otherwise be a nuisance, rather he was an asset to the men, and they considered him like they did their hunting dogs, that is, a valuable partner in their quest for dinner. His agility proved invaluable when a particularly difficult pheasant was stalked; if the dog couldn't get to him, Franco could climb between a rock and a hard place to get a good shot off. The hunters gave him a shotgun, as it was well known that Ferdinand was a crack shot, and had an uncanny ability to see camouflaged birds either in the bush or high in the treetops. When he was ten years old, an American business man named James Crackow was on holiday in Cavillion, and sat down to eat a meal on one of the estates that Franco worked. He noticed Franco in the fields, effortlessly climbing the fruit trees and swinging gracefully from branch to branch. Mr. Crackow was astonished at the boys' natural ability and took the opportunity to find out a little about the boy. From this seemingly chance meeting, young Ferdinand Francesco Carpantier's life would change forever.

Chapter Four - Minerva Boils

"Well, as I recall, that large hole in the side of your gaudy penis-extending sports car was there upon your arrival. I have little or no knowledge of how or why it came to be. Perhaps some unknown evil force has been stalking you and your seed for generations and chose this time to manifest itself. I would look no further than your criminal past," I said, and adjusted my cap to a more proper pedagogical position. The holey culprit seemed astonished that the hole in his extended member was there before his arrival and murmured something concerning the liability of destroying private property. Unfazed by his refusal to confront his cyclopic world view, I countered, "Perhaps the nation would be better served if I spoke to my uncle, Attorney General William W. Cartright, and we settled this matter in a more public fashion. This way I can have reimbursement for my time and you can have jail time to think over why this unfortunate situation has come upon you." Apparently, he was duly impressed by my famous bloodline and drove off in a huff, leaving me in a cloud of dust not previously there. I cleared my throat of the dusty matter and wiped the sweat of a long, hard day off my brow. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the large wad of bills I had collected. At the start of each day, my job consisted of putting up a rather large and ungainly sign that announced the price of parking: $2.00 per day. This, I decided was an unfair price and made up a new, more attractive sign which I put up at various intervals throughout the day. It read: "Welcome to the Bigtop! $5.00 all day parking! For limited time only." This way, I could practice commerce in a more capitalistic fashion without the management treading where it need not tread, namely, my pocketbook. Nothing I hate more than dishonest management whose main purpose in life is to keep us labor sensitive persons in a submissive posture. Like the prophet before me stated better than I might have, "Don't muzzle the ox while it treads out the grain." And so, I figured my best chance at doing the good works of charity lay at the feet of commerce, namely, my remarkable attempts at increasing the price of parking at certain opportune times, thereby allowing the deserved ones, i.e. the "babes of the woods", so to speak, economical entrance, whilst the more affluent persons were charged accordingly. Now, the trick came in deciding who were the babes and who were the sly foxes with money to burn and, most likely a sinister past, wherewith I was put in charge to confiscate a bit of the "first fruits" that these inferiors failed to give to the Lord on the Sabbath. This man who thought I poked a hole in his car, no doubt, was of the latter persuasion, and was probably wanted by the law in some western state. I, the dealer in this game of high stakes celestial poker, was content to be the tour de force, as it were, and otherwise faithful steward of this important work. Take the ne're do well's money before they gave it to some prostitute or terrorist, and thereby probably save a few honest persons in the process. For this, I received my weekly paycheck, not from mere mortals, mind you, but from the Lord Himself. It's good to do the work of a missionary, as I believe there are far too few of us ready to risk all and live for the Lord. I had managed to collect quite a tidy sum over these first few days and decided that I was being rewarded for doing the work of a saint; otherwise some ethereal roadblock would have been set up by the angels and thereby prevented me from doing this particular act of commerce and uncommon good sense, that is, my paintjob would have faded by some mysterious force, the nails wouldn't have held, or the sign itself would have been stolen by someone holier than I, etc., etc., etc. Well, I'm glad to report that my signpost held up like the Shroud of Turin. In other words, I had the blessing of the Lord on my hands and a good conscience living under my worn baseball cap. So, la de da de da. This is a desirable place to be I decided, and gave some thought over to other plans I might try in the name of freedom and service. Capitalism, with all its foibles and ruts, can inspire one to do good works if one is willing to take a few risks and confront a few nondesireables along the way who are likely bent on trouble anyway, and headed for foolishness. Perhaps my small acts of kindness would help them avert some future disaster. With this in mind, I debated quietly within myself concerning this strange person who just accused me of ice-picking his retarded sports car. "Most likely a felon on the lam," I murmured quietly to myself, "Or an axe murderer with a weakness for county fairs. Hence, the poetic justice done with the ice-pick", I said to the wind, and coughed out the last few morsels of gravel his pierced vehicle had conjured up. I thought of tallying up my rewards for the day, but thought better of it, and decided to seek out some company. I took my sign down, and made a mental note to constuct a new sign concerning the unavailability of the parking attendant and to enter at one's own risk. Maybe a skull and crossbones, too, just for fun.
The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show was "the" event of the summer all those years ago in our neck of the woods. For a small window of time, it seemed, we had the eye of the world on our little town. Everyday in the paper, there'd be some mention of this or that celebrity seen cavorting about the fairgrounds with dark glasses on so as not to be seen by the press, but somehow they always ended up on the front page. Strange, how that is. But, for my money, the real heroes - the interesting people, as it were, were the locals, and of course, the acts of the BigTop. You could flush the rest of them - with their dark glasses and their bottled water- straight down the toilet, and the world wouldn't miss a beat. Before long, I heard the wail of someone trapped in Ghenna. "Hey, you there. Yeah, you. Come here, I need help." I looked over at what, at first seemed to be a head perched on top of an active volcano. Smoke seemed to surround this being, and I wasn't sure if I should run screaming for the fire department or approach cautiously. My inquisitive nature prevailed and I began approaching this thing. "Come on. Hurry up. I can't wait all day." It seemed to have intelligence, at any rate, but if it was harmless, I couldn't tell. "Uhhh. Yes, may I help you?" "Bring that bucket of water over here, will you. I'm getting hot." I deduced that it was a woman and was glad for the progress I had made in this area. One thing I can't stand, and that's not knowing if I'm talking to a man or a woman. Gives me the creeps. She seemed fairly harmless, if you allowed for the fact that she seemed to be on fire. "Don't just stand there, dump it on me!" "You mean, just dump it over your head?" "Yes." It occurred to me she had survived this drill with other naive persons before me. "Just dump it on my head." With a bit of hesitancy, I dumped about half the bucket over the top of her head. The rest fell uselessly to the dirt below. "Oh, you missed. Go get another one. And hurry up, it's getting hot." I tried not to disappoint her this time and gave her a good soaking. "Ahhh. That's better. Thank you. Thank you, very much. Name's Minerva. Nice to meet you." She stuck out a hand, which, I was relieved to see, looked human. It was still warm. "Jonathan. Jonathan Parsons. Pleased to meet you, too." Our eyes met briefly and a sudden twitch came over her. It seemed to be activated by my glance, so I looked away as indiscriminately as I could, under the circumstances. But, I wasn't raised in a barn, so I knew where my duty lied. With some reluctance, I made as casual a glance as I could and met her eyes again. This time the twitch became worse, and her whole neck and head bobbled in a tight circle like one of those toy dogs perched in the back window of an automobile. For a moment, I thought about calling the police, but relented as she spoke just in the nick of time. "It's okay. It's the water. I always do this after the fire goes out. It's my nervous system. It's never been the same since the second strike." "Oh, I see", I said, with the conviction of someone humoring a lunatic. "Um. Okay. Do you need anything else?" "No. I'll be fine. Uh, on second thought, could you get me a Coke.? "Sure, I said, and then lied, "I'll be glad too." I thought about abandoning her, but thought about the barn again, and returned with a Coke. I handed it to her and she drank deeply from it. When she finally finished, I noticed her left eye had taken to its own orbit and was twirling about in its socket like an errant moon. The right eye was calm as a tomb and I wasn't sure which one to look at. My curiosity wanted to investigate the whirler eye, but my good graces demanded I look at the steady one. I chose the good over the evil, as any good Christian would, and relaxed a bit. She seemed satisfied that I had picked the correct eye and took some time to groom herself; she wiped some water off the side of her face, and moved a few stray strands of hair off her forehead, cleared her throat and rubbed the front of her soaked shirt until she patted out all the wrinkles. She sat there, dripping wet, her hair all matted down on the top of her head, her clothes soaked through to the bone and looked at me for approval. I was afraid that my interference would cause some more seismic activity in her nervous system, and almost turned turtle and ran. For a miserable split second, I was caught between my Christian duty and the normal evolutionary response to fright. Should I run now, or forever be stuck here with this Moon-Gone-Mad-Atop-Mt.Fuji? Oh, the horror of situations like this must have sent the Neanderthals into fits. Well, luckily for me, she seemed to sense my imminent doom, and was probably used to it by now, for she spoke. "Nice day, huh?" As if the weather had anything to do with this current stalemate. Water began trickling down around her. "What?" I said, caught unawares. "Oh, yes. It is a nice day. Um. I better go now. I have to get back to work." "Where do you work?" she asked, unwilling to part with me just yet. "I park cars here", I said, edging my way to the perimeter of her personal space. I thought if I straddled near the edge a bit, she would relent and let me escape. But, no. Some people are poor sports when it comes to ending a conversation. This strange woman seemed to be schooled in such feats - probably from years of such soakings. "I've never seen you before", she said. "Yes, I just started a few days ago. Do you come here often?" I obliged. She pointed behind her to a makeshift roped-off, square area. The words 'Minerva, The Lady with One Thousand Diseases' made a great golden arc across the top of her canopy. "That's me", she said, matter-of-factly. "Oh, you work here? I didn't realize that. I thought you just had some kind of accident while you were playing with matches." "No. It's okay." Then she must have noticed a look of panic on my face as it dawned on me I might catch one of the thousand diseases that she had, and she said, "Don't worry. I don't really have one thousand diseases. That's just for publicity. Nothing I have is contagious, and they keep adding diseases every week. Next week at this time, it'll be up to two thousand." Having never been confronted with a woman and her legion of diseases before, I did the only thing I could: I began senselessly rubbing my foot in the dirt below me. This, I reasoned, would serve two purposes. I could look away at various and sundry intervals without seeming too aloof, and secondly, if any stray viruses should escape from this vessel, I had a good chance of escaping a direct hit. "Good thinking", I said silently to myself and continued to rub at nothing. Just as my mothers' good graces were about to manifest themselves through me with polite small talk, she stuck her index finger directly on her moon eye to stop its wild orbiting and began speaking as casually as if she were swatting a fly off her forehead in the summer. Her left arm was flexed at the elbow, her finger doing its duty to keep this rogue organ in check. She stood up, shifted her weight onto one leg and even flexed her hip a bit in the way teenagers do when they flirt. At a convenient breaking point in the conversation, I said, "Would you like me to get you a towel or something?" This apparently hadn't dawned on her as a possibility and she seemed unprepared for such a suggestion. "Oh no, I don't need a towel. It's better if I drip dry. Helps calm the nerves." "Uh huh," I said, as inconspicuously as I could. I wanted to move her finger out of her eye socket but couldn't bring myself to do it. So, subconsciously, I think, I began rubbing my own eye. Strange creatures, us humans. Always wanting to fit in. But, unfortunately for me, I had forgotten that I had some stray flecks of paint on my hand and they made their way into my eye. My eye started tearing and I squinted into the sunlight. I rubbed harder but that only seemed to aggravate the situation and I looked down and away from her. "Is something the matter?" she asked, sensing my pain. "Oh I just got some paint in my eye. I hate..." I started to say, "I hate when that happens", but remembered that I was speaking to the "Lady with One Thousand Diseases", and checked myself. All things being equal, a fleck of paint in the eye can't compare to living inside an active volcano when it comes to annoying discomforts. Glad that I had caught myself in time, I said, "I'll be fine. There. It's better already." I looked at her and allowed her to see the direct evidence, but before I could speak again, she took her good hand, the one not involved in stopping lunar orbits, pulled a small spray bottle from some hidden orifice and started to approach me. I panicked. Was she going to share her eye dropper with me? Oh, no. Anything but this. I'd rather dunk my face in the paint can, than use anything that proceeded from her body or the outskirts thereof. No. I must put my foot down. Gently, though. I've learned that "A soft answer turns away wrath", thanks to my Sunday School teacher, Miss DeBenedetti, and intended to use it now. "Oh, thank you. But it's not necessary. I'm fine." My eye was killing me and I couldn't stop the tearing. I wiped away the evidence and prayed silently for a sudden death, preferably hers.

Minerva's life began simply enough. She was the much-awaited-for-child and pride of her parents, Minny and Joe Wicks of Twisp, Washington. After many fruitless attempts at conceiving a child, Minny Wicks finally turned up pregnant. Her only child arrived at the stroke of midnight on Halloween Eve, 1949. This was the first hint that something unusual was written in the stars. Although her arrival was peaceful and her presence filled her household with joy, some things, so I've come to learn, are wrought with destiny. Being born on this day of goblins, trolls and witches, all those years ago proved to be prophetic in it's implications and Minerva was it's unfortunate prophetess. Minny and Joe Wicks couldn't know the bizarre fate that awaited their child and I often wonder if they ever looked back and sighed with resignation over seeing the events of Minerva's life unfold before the world. Or, was the strange life of their only child lost on them. Some people, I think, are not wired in such a way as to see the overall hand of fate working, especially when its doing its work upon someone in their own household. They might as well be raising a chicken as a child, when it comes to noticing seeming coincidences and telling events that surround the life of their loved one. Maybe they had no earthly idea of the profound series of events that haunted Minerva her whole life, and maybe, just maybe, they chalked it up to her being 'accident prone' or some other such silly idiom. It's entirely possible they were oblivious to all of it. I don't know. I do know, though, that I wasn't. From the time Minerva and I met and after we became friends I saw the incredible hand of fate at work and am quite certain that if she is still alive today, it is still at work. No other human being that I know of, could predict with unwavering accuracy, the movements aligned against them. The problem was simple, yet profound, and Minerva proved to be no match for the stars and the agents thereof. It was all clear to me, of course, but I had the advantage of hindsight, and we all know that that's 20/20. When Minerva was thirteen weeks old, her proud mother was walking her in a handmade carriage that Joe had made long before his wife's conception. Mr. Wicks had taken considerable care in making this carriage, sanding the fine pine wood, covering it with a small canopy to keep little Minerva safe from the high sun, and getting the best wheels he could, so his wife wouldn't have to struggle uphill. Joe even constructed a metal frame so in case the wood cracked, little Minerva would still have strong support. This act of kindness on the part of her father, proved to be the first act of terrorism laid upon this innocent child. One wonders what might have happened had Minerva been born to uncaring parents. The thought frightens me and I don't care to think about that for very long, so I'll leave the reader to decide. As Minerva tells it, her mother's sister's birthday was January 31st, exactly thirteen weeks to the day, from Minerva's. Naturally, Minny Wicks wanted to see her sister and thought the walk would do her tiny child good. She always said that the 'change in seasons was good for a child' and brought young Minerva out in the elements. Well, Twisp was first on the list of historical places touched by Minerva's date with Fortuna. The party was scheduled for just after noon, which gave Minny Wicks time to stop by the market to pick up some last minute items and to get her sister her favorite dessert, which, as I recall, was cherries jubilee. Funny, how you remember such trivial matters when the skies are about to fall. Minny gathered up her belongings, including her only child and made her way out the door. In an instant of time, the winter skies turned tornado green, and opened up and let loose a rip of lightning destined for one small metal carriage and its passenger child. Minny Wicks was knocked clear from the carriage, and suffered a concussion, but little else. Somehow, when your name is written in the clouds, there are very few mistaken identities. No one else that day was hurt except the tiny baby in the metal carriage. Baby Wicks suffered burns all over her body and no one on this earth thought she would live. Her heart stopped, but the quick intervention of kind persons revived her in time. She lived in an incubator in the local hospital for a time until her burns healed and her parents brought her home and placed her in a shoebox near the fireplace where they cared for her and nursed her back to health. Minerva had no memory of this event, nor of any pain. It seems there's a limit to what fate can do.

Well, she didn't die from the prayers I uttered and approached me with the ridiculous notion that I would share her eyedropper. "Really, I think I'll be fine. It's just a fleck of paint." "Don't be silly" she said, and used her one good arm to offer me this vile potion. The other was yet involved in interrupting orbiting moons. I understand the ramifications of relenting to peer pressure, and was taught from an early age to be strong in the face of such trials. Perhaps if I threw up in her face she would get the hint. I tried to gag myself with my tongue but that only proved to evoke more responses from her regarding special 'liqueurs' she had to take hourly to stave off this or that condition. I was only half-listening and doing my level best to stall her indefinitely, when I noticed to my utmost relief, that her good arm had relaxed its extended position and was now lying helplessly by her side. She must have felt she found a kindred spirit, as she spoke more excitedly this time. "Does that happen to you, too? Well, my word. Wonders never cease. I have struggled with that ever since I was a teenager. Sometimes I can barely speak after the beatings my tongue takes. It's a wonder, it is. And here I thought that I was the only one." My plan worked well and seemed to get her mind off of the poison bottle. Naturally, my tears were working their magic and my eye began to feel better. The skies were opening and the sun was coming out and the world was once again safe for us humans to walk around again. It's the aliens that were concerning me now. Those from foreign worlds and probably blown by bad winds, those were my concerns now. And I had to find a way out. At the heart of the matter, I am a good person. I generally don't kick cats or push old ladies out of line at the grocers. This, I decided was thwarting my attempts presently at disengaging myself from this Dripping-Wet-Volcanic-Alien-Being from God-Knows-Where. I imagined myself overcoming my good and decent nature and giving my cat a good drop kick across the lawn. She'd be all hissed up and puffy-tailed and then I'd give her another good wallop. Then, I pictured myself at the grocer's, cursing and carrying on like a sailor on leave - whacking a few old ladies upside the head and stealing their white bread, taking old Mr. Reedy's cane and leveling him one good one over the head on the way out the door after I stole his big wallet, but this didn't work because 'a good tree can't produce bad fruit' and it only served to distract me to where Minerva had to repeat her question. "Jonathan? Hello in there? Anybody home?" "Oh, sorry. I was just thinking what a nice day it was, blue skies and all. Uh, what is it you said?," I said, a bit embarrassed at letting my imagination get the better of me. Visions of my cat in mid-air kept creeping back into my mind and it was a struggle to clear my head of this flying feline. "What have I done recently to deserve this," I thought silently. "I asked you if you're from around here," she said kind of sadly, as if she had to deal with yet another numbskull bent on ignoring her. I straightened up and found myself thinking I would make a more serious effort this time to concentrate and not let my mind wander through the depths of wickedness the human heart is capable of. But all I could think of was whacking old man Reedy over the head and taking his money. "He's got so much of it after all," I thought and casually felt my wad of bills through my jeans. It was all wadded up safely next to my Swiss Army knife. "Yes, Ma'am, I am. Born and raised in Hamlet." "Ma'am? Ma'am? No one has ever called me Ma'am," she seemed taken aback by my statement and I wasn't sure if I had offended her. Her hips were straight now and I thought maybe she was offended, having used her little hip toss to flirt with me earlier. You can't be a 'Ma'am' and a girlfriend all at once, I reckon. And then she said, " I thought so. I didn't remember seeing you in New York." "No", I said, with as much enthusiasm as I could. "No, I'm not from New York. I'm from here. I came looking for a job and that large man hired me on the spot. It seems you were short-handed when it came to parking cars." "Oh. You mean Tiny. That's what we call him. His real name is Rob Gardner. He's worked here at the BigTop since anyone can remember. I think he was one of the first workers that Mr. Crackow hired." "Mr. Crackow?" I asked. "Who's he?" "He owns the BigTop," she said. "Although no one sees him much anymore. Tiny runs the whole show." "I see. Is Mr. Crackow from New York, too?" I asked, and suddenly surprised myself by relaxing and seeing this woman as something more than a genetic oddity. Her wetness was subsiding except for a few damp spots on her clothing and her hand made a cautious attempt at leaving its post. Her eye fussed a bit and made one final orbit before it found its resting position. This, I found was just a hair east of midline and gave her the appearance of being slightly cross-eyed, but overall a significant improvement over the whirling dervish it had been only moments ago. I was happy for her but hoped she wouldn't see this as some sort of ancient mating ritual. A settled moon is one thing, but I had my unborn children to think of. "I think so, but I don't know for sure," she said. And then, "Mr. Crackow has lots of businesses. The BigTop is just one of many." "Oh", I said, trying to look impressed, my eyebrows lifted and my lower lip curved upward in that universal gesture of mock admiration reserved for tycoons and other such persons involved in the business of making money. I made a mental note to investigate this Mr. Crackow in order to see if he was a worthy adversary of mine, or just a flash in the pan. A mighty oak, after all, is just a nut that stood still. Whether or not this Mr. James Crackow was a mighty oak or a dead nut remained to be solved. I've found that people generally like to instruct others, and a good listener can glean many useful details under the guise of listening and pretending to be interested in the storyteller for his own sake. This opens them up and they generally say things they wouldn't under normal circumstances; rumors and such, which tend to be true when uttered in confidence. This bit of distraction was not healthy for my wandering mind. Perhaps the sun was hotter than normal that day or I was dehydrated, but all I could think of was, What if I'm supposed to marry this woman? What if this woman was the one meant for me from the foundation of the world and I had no choice in the matter? My visions turned to ones of my children; those poor, helpless souls would come out of that volcano womb and probably self-combust all over the doctors and nurses. Oh, what have I done recently to deserve this? I pictured that one or two of them would survive the first few minutes and go on to live a life like their mothers', with a propensity for lightning and diseases. Now, I'm all for protecting the unborn in the womb, in fact, you could call me pro-life and get away with it. But the more I thought of this predicament, I decided to support abortion up until that baby volcano turns 18. This will give us ample time to view the outcome, so to speak. It's best to protect that little baby while he or she is in the womb, I think, but after that it's best to do the sensible thing... Well, I'm confident that you can see the manner in which my mind was working, with the heat and lack of water. I suddenly turned and said, "I think I need something to drink." "Would you like a drink of my Coke?" Oh boy. Now I've really done it. The party is over and I'm trapped like a bear in the woods. Why don't I just lay down and die and get it over with. "No, no. Thank you though. I've got some money here someplace." I started to dig into my pockets and uncovered some loose change, and before she could say, "Wait, I need to give you smallpox, dyptheria and typhoid fever," I was on my way to the vendor. Well, you guessed it. She followed me. "Don't you think you'll be missed there at your station?" I pleaded half-heartedly. "I'm on break. Anyway, it's been kind of slow today. I think a walk will do me good." Now we're going on walks together. I made a note to never come back this way. The difficulty lied in the placement of Minerva's tent. The brilliant management placed her right near the entrance to the fairgrounds and the only way to avoid her was to sneak in. This option, I weighed for a time, and decided that it would make more economic sense for me to play it safe and deal with the intruders in the parking lot rather than risk getting caught by some secret service security force that Biscuit Boy set up around the park without my knowledge and blessing. The decision didn't come easy, though, and I began searching around for soft spots where I might enter unannounced. "Mmm. I see. Maybe it'll help you dry off a little. Do you think you should sit in the sun?" I said and then regretted, concerned that she'd invite me along to sit and chat about her life of eruptions, diseases and general malaise whilst we sunned ourselves. "No, I'm pretty dry already. Just a few spots here and there." I dodged a bullet there. This bit of reflection, however, made me wonder just exactly what I had received vaccinations for. Some things in life are just meant to be taken for granted and childhood vaccinations ought to be one of them. As inconspicuously as I could, I began searching my arm for that funny looking spot that the nurse leaves you with after she innoculates you against the sins of the flesh. I never knew how hard it was to see in broad daylight. When I wasn't needing to see it, it jumped out at me like a big oval bullseye. Now that I was desperate I couldn't find the slightest trace of it and began to worry that it had worn off. I had determined sometime earlier that I was too young to die as the characters in the "Obscure Saints" book were all much older than I and the thought of carrying about in my body upwards of one thousand diseases didn't appeal to me any longer. "Tell me more about those diseases they say you have", I blurted out. "Oh", she said caught off guard. "OK. Um. You see some things happened to me while I was growing up. Like when I was a teenager - after I fell off my bicycle and broke my leg - I was on crutches for awhile and couldn't get around very well. Well, one day I was caught out in the rain and my cast got all wet. My leg got infected and swelled all up and got all black and blue. They thought they were going to have to cut it off, but tried some new medicine on me instead. Well, my leg got better but the medicine did something to my system and now whenever it rains I break out in all sorts of crazy rashes. Tiny loves this, of course, because he just cares about how many people come in to see me. He gets all worked up and happy when clouds come rolling in. Why, just last week he took out a special ad in the paper telling the world to come see me 'change with the weather' and got a professional photographer out here just in case it rained. He wanted pictures to put in the paper, too. I don't mind really, but it gets to be a nuisance with everyone staring at you waiting for you to change your spots like some leopard or something. Did you see the ad?" "Uh. No, I can't say I did. I began to see this woman slightly different than I had only moments before and it bothered me. She was becoming human to me and this wasn't fair, I thought, seeing as how I had come so far with slowing down my mind wanderings. Not caring to dwell on my unborn children any longer I asked the only appropriate question I could think of. "What else do you have?" "Well, let's see. After the second lightning strike my eye got all funny and I can't focus very well," she said with a sigh, the way one might speak of a hard days' work. "The second lightning strike?" I said. She then proceeded to tell me the baby lightning bolt story. "And the second?" I asked. This seemed too surreal to me to be true and if she wasn't a star attraction at the biggest freak show east of the Mississippi, I would have ended this conversation long ago. But I remained, a prisoner of sorts with my captor being Minerva and her legion of misfortunes. I gazed about here and there, as is the proper manner when holding up the listening end of a conversation but only saw Frankie the Flask speaking with Tiny the Biscuit Boy. The large man had a scowled look on his face and I couldn't tell if this was his natural bent or if Frankie had infuriated him. I looked closer and saw that the large man had his fists clenched at his side and his face reddened with each word the Frenchman spoke. For a moment, it occurred to me that the large, red faced fellow resembled a giant dinosaur egg. His dirty white overalls outlined a perfect shell and his red face only now just cracking the egg to meet the world. I wondered silently what he would turn into when he got older. "Hopefully nothing that flies," I said under my breath. The acrobat was making strange, animated circular motions with his palm on the tip of his nose that I took for some kind of foreign embellishment to go along with his words; they all speak with their hands, after all. This scene was curious to me and I returned only reluctantly to Minerva and her health. She went on: "Well, I had just become a teenager and was outside playing with my best friend Daisy. We were at Daisy's grandmothers' home in the country and her grandmother made a big fuss about me turning into a teenager. She insisted on taking Daisy and me out on the lake to catch us a big catfish for dinner. She gave us both a fishing pole and we paddled out onto the lake. Well, as luck would have it, a big catfish liked my line and gave me a good fight. It was an overcast day and we hadn't intended to stay out long, but being my birthday Daisy's grandma wanted us to have a special dinner. So, the fish kept fighting me, I raised my pole in the air and the next thing I know I hear a loud crack, like an M-80 just going off and 'boom', I felt heat and pain like I've never felt. The lightning glanced off my pole, down my arms and knocked me overboard. The boat got split in two. Luckily, Daisy's grandma made us all wear life jackets so none of us drowned. After the initial shock, Daisy and her grandma got us back to shore safely. I was knocked out but still clung on to my fishing pole. Daisy's grandma still talks about that. She's says 'it was the best catfish dinner she ever had' and was glad that I had held on to it. Well, I came to soon enough but was left with all sorts of crazy problems." She looked at me then square-faced and said with a degree of solemnity one usually reserves for the revealing of some universal truth or a myth of pandemic proportions: "You know what they say about lightning never striking the same place twice?" "Yes," I said. "Well, that's a damn lie. Lightning ALWAYS strikes the same place twice. Always." I was too preoccupied with escaping Minerva and her stories to notice the small yet powerful details that were busy revealing themselves to me through this poor vessel of uncommon bad luck. I suppose a note from On High wouldn't have done it either, for when I'm blind, I'm really blind. And yet here she was, the instrument herself, without whom, disaster would have surely visited my tiny village and its innocent inhabitants. I was too busy, too distracted, too obtuse right then to notice these seed-clues that were searching in vain for fertile soil. It took time alone in the parking lot away from distractions and people, away from noise, fun and confusion to let my subconscious do the work intended it. Tranquility, I think is the mother of many fine things.

Chapter Five: The Raven and The Crackpot

"Tell me the numbers again." Jorge "The Raven" Villareal slightly adusted his tumbler of 1949 Chilean wine on the clear glass table. A fine year it was, too. "The days of wine and roses," he said out loud, not caring if it made any sense to his henchmen or accountant. They were used to these bits of incoherency and with a respect that is born out of fear and loathing, shifted slightly in their chairs and made a few nervous, polite gestures as their way of response. The accountant knew he had a job to do and the idle comment was the henchmen's problem. His problem, while unpleasant, was possibly explainable. Jorge Villareal's estates had put out the finest wine in all of South America since he established them decades ago, and he considered himself a man of taste unequalled in the finer things of life. His reign was that of a king, a despot, and he required no accountability to others who were beneath him. Kings, in fact, answered to him, not he to them, and the monthly visits he paid to the Prime Ministers of Mexico, Chile, Brazil, Panama were his way of showing the governments of the world that he was a cultured man, a dignitary in the finest sense of the word, a statesman with uncommon business sense and a gifted entrepreneur, without whom, they would be left vulnerable. This small blight that his accountant had revealed was nothing really, in the scheme of things. He had dealt with far greater problems than this, financial or otherwise, and didn't get to his position in life by circumstance or luck. No, these situations always worked themselves out. If not, then... You do what you have to. "Our exports are down 38% from last year." The accountant said gravely, unwilling at first to give a dollar figure to this obscure calculation. Then, knowing the Raven would ask for concrete numbers he continued. "Three years ago, the exports totaled one hundred eighty six million U.S. dollars. This was profit, sir. Last year, we totaled one hundred forty nine million U.S. dollars - down 20%. This year the total was ninety two million U.S. dollars, sir - down 38% from last year and 50% from three years ago. " The Raven reached for his wine and raised it to his lips. He drank a sip and replaced it on the clear glass table, jutted his chin out and tilted his head back to gaze at the ceiling. He twisted the dark coils of his handlebar mustache for several long moments and rocked slightly back and forth in an attempt to regain his composure over having lost approximately one hundred million dollars in tax-free profits. Profits that could have been used to fund his expanding empire in the far east - Bangkok or Hong Kong perhaps, or more importantly, to buy influence where it otherwise couldn't be bought. This bothered him more than he cared to admit, especially to these goons in the room with him. With his legal exports slowing down, the prospect of losing money in the matter that lay before him was doubly coarse. He thought last year was an aberration, a normal and healthy correction of the drug trade, perhaps accounted for by the rising expenses of doing business, payoffs to the police, ministers of the interiors, etc. This would have leveled off by now he reasoned, for few men on the take don't know the limits of the game. And even fewer bite the hand that feeds them. Some other explanation was needed. One hundred million dollars doesn't just walk away without leaving a trace. "Have you contacted Cartagena?" "Yes sir, we have." The accountant knew this question would be asked of him and was prepared. He didn't want to give this predator any reason to think anything had been overlooked. He believed he knew the answer to the Raven's dilemma but was hesitant to offer it. If he was mistaken, well, he'd rather not think it through... "The Intelligence, sir, indicates an unusual situation. It seems the American has glutted the market, sir. He's given it away, sir." "What? What are you telling me? Given it away? For free? He's giving away heroin?" The Raven made no attempt to hide his anxiety at this absurd statement. Nothing as outlandish, as absurd, as crazy as this had even crossed his mind. "Well, not anymore sir. It seems the American had gained a certain infamy with his clients over the past two years by supplying the heroin, and well, everything really, at no cost. It took a year or so for the word to spread to the street and, uh, well, needless to say sir, he has gained quite a following now, sir. He charges market price, now." The accountant didn't anticipate the Raven's loss of composure and grew more uneasy with each word he spoke. He looked down and away from his employer to give both of them some space to think. Thinking was currently not high on the Raven's list of priorities, however. "Market price? Oh, that's good of him." The Raven flushed for the first time in years, and was at a loss for a reply for several seconds. He swallowed hard at the prospect of this act of complete madness on the part of the American, and went through several iterations of the outcome, none of which served him well. The accountant, sensing he should offer something, anything, decided to offer his opinion. "Sir, if I may. It seems the American started with his own associates, managers and over a period of months, a year perhaps, infiltrated into our camp, sir. It's not clear if it was his intention to do so, sir, but free drugs are hard for people to resist. A certain bond was forged and he had them "hooked" sir, in more ways than one." The accountant wished he'd avoided that last little lame attempt at humor, or what the Raven would perceive as humor. Hemorrhaging money to the tune of one hundred million dollars to a crackpot American marketer wasn't his idea of funny. But it was too late. The Raven jumped out of his chair, grabbed the accountant by the lapels and screamed. "GET THOSE SONOFABITCHES FROM CARTAGENA ON THE PHONE! NOW!!!!"

I have pondered the man for over twenty years. The reader should know that twice I have come dangerously close to abandoning the biography I am about to unveil. It is not for lack of information that I have done so, nor for lack of insight. I have delayed this writing, in point of fact, to explore more deeply and accurately, the history of the matter as the crime committed was not small. My wish was to present the reader with the facts of the case, as a trial lawyer would do to a jury in hopes that they would render a good and proper verdict. It is, after all, easier to appoint blame when the criminal is hateful and his deeds despicable. The problem arises however, in the gray zone. To further complicate matters, I have violated the cardinal rule in good investigative reporting, i.e. to remain objective. In reconstructing this puzzle, I became enamored with James Crackow the wonder boy, and wished for him a better outcome. I found myself cheering him on, in the vain hope that I could alter the inevitable course of his life. It would not be, of course. The books were long ago sealed, the verdicts in, and his doom sealed. Still, in good faith and with considerable effort, I have given him or rather, attempted to give him, the benefit of the doubt, always searching for some reasonable explanation of his reckless deeds. Always looking for the sermon in the suicide, the moral in the murder, I searched for some evil done to him as a child that would explain his ruthless behavior and therefore allow me to excuse him with a clean conscience, but came up empty. Whether he was inherently evil, greedy or somehow schooled into indifference for human life, I don't know. If he was born bad, I could conclude he'd be bad. Dusk, while not yet dark, is bound to be. I visited shrinks, interviewed extended family members, read history books, and even entered a confessional as a sinner seeking repentance for the tragic and fatal flaw that was his. I thought the absolute secrecy afforded to a priest and his penitent would give me a different perspective on the man and his motives. Once I called a radio talk show, incognito of course, and spoke with anyone who would listen. I can say to you, that while not perfectly certain of the chain of events I am about to unfold, I am certain of the reason. The Big Picture, so to speak. But this puts us into the realm of the supernatural, and that invites doubt among some and scoff among others. But I am ahead of myself. It's best to take baby steps where human nature is involved and the smaller the better. Now, back to the questions that plagued me concerning the man. They are ancient and profoundly revealing in their scope, perhaps to be exceeded only in their implications by their answers. And they are thus: Why does a person who has everything - intelligence, stability, success, comfort - self-destruct? Is the risk - the game, the point? And why not everyone? Is it, like the Inuit fables suggest, the hunt and only the hunt that matters? Is this in fact, the driving force behind all commerce, all business, all competition, all statesmanship? In a word, greed? And to further complicate matters, what makes a child prodigy go bad? James Crackow was a math prodigy. In my interviews and analysis of the man, this fact was indisputable. I held in my hand a newspaper account dated April 14, 1940 taken from The Falls Reporter in Sioux Falls, SD. Young James had just swept the state finals with a perfect score in analytic geometry and trigonometry. He stood like a queen's knight - ramrod straight - with his head tilted back and his chest pumped out. He wore a child's church suit with a clean white shirt and tie and had dark pleated slacks on that looked freshly pressed. He had piercing blue eyes that looked eerie in the black and white photo. I thought of him twenty years ago when he was the adult and I was the youngster. We had switched places now. I was the adult and he, the child. I saw him only once when I worked at the BigTop, but as I held this photograph in my hand, I remembered his eyes: unearthly-strangely blue, unblinking, close together. By coincidence this morning - some twenty years later - my wife handed me my mail as I was walking out the door. My monthly issue of National Geographic had arrived and, after giving her the brown slip cover, I took it with me. On the cover was a photographer's telescopic shot of a puma concolor coryi - the elusive Florida panther - coiled up, poised and ready to pounce on its prey. The rare animals, which now number only forty worldwide, possess the same blue-eyed predatory gaze. It came to mind that Inuits - who believe in the complete sanctity of the hunt - paradoxically, also believe that animals and men possess the same souls. The hunter and the hunted are, in essence, the same creature. Or, put another way, some animals are men and some men are animals. I took a moment to absorb all this and decided that it was only a coincidence that I had seen this magazine this morning - some twenty years later. On a second trip to the library I brought along a magnifying glass and noticed that a small section of his tie revealed itself under his collar. His tie was not of the clip on version that youngsters wore, but rather an adult's tie with a Windsor knot. He wore a diamond-shaped tie clip directly in the center of his tie. He wore a wristwatch on his left wrist. His left arm was flexed and holding onto the trophy and his watch was exposed. It read 2:30. After I completed my investigation into the man, I returned to the library on a hunch, a third time, and brought with me a small measuring device. I discovered his tie clip to be in the exact mathematical center of his tie. Furthermore, I took a standard length tie, stretched it out and again calculated the center. I measured the diameter of his neck, tied the tie as he would have in the Windsor fashion and again found the center. Both were identical. Either young James had systematically placed his tie clip in the exact mathematical center of his tie or he did it intuitively. Which of these was true, I couldn't say. He was alone in the picture. An arm was helping to steady the trophy he had just won but the photo ended at the person's forearm. Further inspection revealed this arm to be female, although this observation wasn't completely infallible. Whatever was helping James steady his prize was not transparent. Under the picture the caption read, "Math Prodigy from Sioux Falls." It occurred to me that James won the state finals on the anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. He was six. I don't pretend to know how James Crackow went bad. I don't pretend to be a social scientist or a particularly astute student of human behavior. My Sunday School teacher, Miss Lolita DeBennedetti, used to tell us that there were powerful angels that lived in the sky and were in charge of entire countries. "The Prince of Greece" did such and such, she would say. (The Prince, being the angel, whether good or evil). Or, "St. Michael the Archangel fought against the Prince of Egypt for such and such a time." This was meant to inform us that there were large forces at work in the cosmos. Forces that were utterly unknown to us and lived in the spiritual realm, but were, in fact, responsible for great and terrible things. Whether that's true or not, I don't know. Whether it has anything to do with James Crackow, I don't know. But I would only offer this to the reader. And let the reader decide. Whilst across the ocean, turmoil was about to unfold and the world would soon witness and forever remember the stigma attached to the word "Nazi" - young blue-eyed James Crackow innocently turned over trigonometric waves in his sleep, and reflected on the notion that absolute "zero" was not the mid-point of all things positive and all things negative, but rather the convergence of two obscure geometric curves. While Nazi troops invaded sovereign countries and its insidious sister, Fascism, buried people alive, young James probably drank milk at breakfast and had toast after school which his mother lovingly prepared with his favorite jam. Sometimes late at night, I wonder if he liked the things I like: hot cocoa, lots of butter and salt on my popcorn, poppy seed lemon muffins. Surely, his childhood couldn't have been much different from mine - filled with bike rides, evening summertime games, lazy afternoons, puppy love. And yet we would grow to become worlds apart. The day would come when our lives would converge like two great positive and negative geometric curves in a "great and terrible way" - in a way reserved for us and us alone.

Take away his prodigious math skills and, by all accounts, his was a normal childhood. Although my investigation did reveal some intriguing theories, that, when taken together, might allow an astute student of behavioral sciences to predict James Crackow's eventual downfall. As I said earlier, however, this matter is one of shades of gray; the villain not easily recognized. As a youngster, my Sunday School teacher, Miss Lolita DeBenedetti pointed out to our class that if Evil was apparently evil - obviously evil - then more people would recognize it and reject it. "Evil has the power to assume a pleasing shape", she said more than once. I thought of that statement many times as an adult while I searched into the background of this man. He had a few friends in childhood and was reasonably proficient at sports, although not outstanding. As one might expect given his mathematical aptitude, he was an expert chess player. One of the delays I had in writing this section was a short but informative road trip I took to visit James's cousin, Mrs. Albert Fine of Newport, Rhode Island. After James' burial, she, being the next of kin, was given the personal items of her younger cousin. I met her at her lovely home on the Naggasagit Bay outside of Newport where she lived alone. The Atlantic Ocean was in her backyard and I commented on how beautiful it all was. "Yes, thank you," she said. "The Vanderbilts and the Elms had their summer mansions near here. Why, you could walk there if you weren't in a hurry. They're open to the public, you know." I thanked her and we shared a cup of tea and small talk. I searched the room for any sign of James and wondered to myself if she had bought this place with his fortune. The home was large and expansive with bay windows that allowed an unobstructed view of the Atlantic Ocean. She questioned my interest in her cousin. "As I said on the phone, I used to work for him as a youngster. At The BigTop Travelling Show. I'm writing a small recount of the events that took place there and, of course, Mr. Crackow was the owner. I didn't really know him then. No one really did. If there's anything you can tell me to better understand him, I would be most appreciative." She dropped her eyes and smiled a sad, slow smile. "Yes, that he was. The owner, that is. Sad, isn't it?" Without waiting for a response, she arose and asked me to follow her. "You know, he always was different from the rest of us. Sad, how things turned out for him. And such a brilliant boy." "Yes, that's what I understand." She led us into a small back room and opened the door. I was struck by a faint musty odor in the room and realized no one ever came in here. "These things were given to me by the police many years ago. I never come in here. I think you can tell by the way it smells. Too many ghosts, if you know what I mean. I thought of just junking them but out of respect for James... well, what used to be anyway, I never did. They just sit here collecting dust. Maybe they were meant for you to see, seeing as how you came all the way from Indiana to see them." She looked at me, searchingly. I nodded silently. "Well, make yourself at home. I'm not going anywhere. You're welcome to stay as long as you like." She left me alone and walked out.

"Another margarita, sir?" Suste, the Jamaican-born server carefully placed her bosses' fresh glass on the deck table. The tropical air had warmed the drink faster than she'd hoped and she wished she'd replaced his drink sooner. "I'll have you know, Suste, I've barely touched this one." James Crackow handed her a full glass and made a gesture to another employee to bring him a phone. His mobile phone was one of the first successful investments he made. The waters off the Grand Cayman were unusually still and his yacht, "The Third Wish" required little attention to keep his course steady. An employee had already dialed for him. "Keep the derivatives on the down side. Drop the calls. Without a basis for buying, I still have to believe that we're going in the right direction." He listened to a far-away voice explain to him the value of hedging his bets in case the market reacted adversely. This, of course, would cut into his working capital but would give him stability, something he was not accustomed to. He scoffed at the offer openly and decided instead to control his shares with options. This leveraged him completely and allowed him to control tens of millions of barrels of oil at pennies on the barrel. He bought the rights to sell the oil at a higher price than what he was charged. If the derivatives worked he would essentially control fully one-quarter of the U.S. oil supply. Confident that prices would drop more, he instructed his attorney to buy the put options. As he hung up the phone, he muttered, "Who works for who, here?" Without giving his orders a second thought, he returned to doing what he came here for. He gazed out into the blue water. Xiphias gladius had brought him here. Arguably one of the most dangerous gamefish in the world, the swordfish. That's 500 pounds of sleek muscle attached to a double edged sword that can reach 5 feet in length. In fact, the word "Xiphias" is Greek for sword. The word "gladius" is Latin for sword. A double edged sword worthy of its scientific name. Get on the wrong end of this dagger and you'll be lucky not to be sliced in two. From 1958 to 1970 crude oil prices were stable at $3.00 per barrel. Furthermore by 1971-1972, inflation and the weakness of the U.S. dollar had exacerbated the problem leading to a continued decline in crude oil prices. James understood this and gradually purchased the rights to sell oil futures at premium prices. In 1960 OPEC - Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries - was formed with five founding members: Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. By the end of 1971 six other nations had joined the group: Qatar, Indonesia, Libya, United Arab Emirates, Algeria and Nigeria. In March 1971, the Texas Railroad Commission set production at 100% for the first time in history. This meant that for the first time in history, Texas producers were no longer limited in the amount of oil they could produce. James, foreseeing a glut in oil production, predicted that crude prices would continue to fall, thereby enhancing his position in the futures market. What he didn't comprehend however, was something far less obvious: With the Texas Railroad Commission decision to increase production, a subtle shift in the balance of power took place. Power to control crude oil prices shifted from the United States to OPEC. On October 5th, 1973, the Yom Kippur War started with an attack on Israel by Syria and Egypt. The United States and many other western nations showed strong support for Israel, resulting in the Arab oil embargo levied upon those nations that were supporting Israel. The oil rich Arab nations cut production by 5 million barrels per day. This represented 7% of the free-world oil production. If there was any doubt as to the shift in oil pricing controls, it was removed during the Arab Oil Embargo in 1973-1974. Prices skyrocketed 400% in six months. James Crackow's leveraged position in shorting oil futures left him strapped for cash and deeply in debt. This unforeseen happening in the middle east - the oil crisis of 1974 - had in fact, set in motion a series of events that would lead James Crackow - kid prodigy, multimillionaire, American entrepeneur, businessman without peer - down a path reserved for dirty rotten scoundrels he couldn't dream of and, ultimately, to his own demise. I opened the closet and took out the first box. The police had stamped the box "Non-Evidentary". I noticed other boxes had similar stamps on them. I opened them, I think, for the first time in twenty years. Mrs. Fine gave me the impression she didn't care to know the contents. The first box I opened contained a stack of papers that, by all accounts, belonged to a young James Crackow. On the top of this stack was an intricate hand drawn maze. It surprised me to find that the maze was drawn in pen, not pencil, as I might have drawn one. A pencil drawing would allow mistakes to be erased. In spite of this, there were no mistakes and the lines were those of an architect. I looked closer and surmised that he didn't use a ruler because the lines were not perfectly straight, but nearly so. I counted roughly 4100 small lines, and, later when I got home I attempted to draw a similar maze. It took about an hour and fifty minutes. As a youngster, he had unusual concentration. Interestingly, the maze didn't contain a typical starting point or an ending point. It was parabolic in design with an inward spiral that gave the maze a three-dimensional look. I studied the maze for some time and determined that there was no way to win. It was a trick maze. At the bottom of the paper in block letters he wrote, "Searching for Infinity." Other papers revealed that these papers did, in fact, belong to James and it was clear why the police didn't want them. To me, however, they provided a looking glass into the past - one in which I was a principle player. The world knew the flash, the glitter of the elder James Crackow. But, I've always believed that the most intriguing and lasting character aspects could be traced back to a person's childhood. I uncovered several written pieces. I offer one now, for no clear reason, other than allowing the reader to glimpse into the heart of a once famous, and notorious man.

In Like Free

This verse so free is elusive to my rhyme,
He makes sense at best only a quarter of the time.
Let me describe his brightest attributes:

He's a smart and educated will o' the wisp,
He's an off-beat, off-rhyme, off-time clime -
Of mild duration.
He's in a whisper,
In an easy week,
In a windy willy-willy.
He's Free!

He's custom yet strange;
Contrary yet believable.
He's the tail of a two-headed coin.
He's a playmate for my pen
And a nuisance for my reason.
Oh Heaven knows It can't control Him -
He's Free!
Unbottled, uncorked, uncocked - let free!
This verse so free kind of upsets me.

For He's the type not to type.
He's the freedom of a neurotic pen.
He's the kind to take advantage of cloud nine
When I sleep.
This Free's a dreamful!
He's hazy, lazy, powerful and crazy.

He is a swift and agile adroitness.
And a tongue-twister too.
He's the wind in Whirlaway's face,
In fact, the winner of every race.
This verse so free kind of upsets me.

For I always relied on Poetry and Harmony To keep me in line...
Now they're let free!
Well, such is life...The good with the bad, the calm with the storm.
Such is life.
This verse so free kind of upset me.

The paper was signed "James Crackow" in the far right bottom corner. He received an "A" on the paper with the following comments from his teacher: "You're really beginning to make the words play with each other, yet you're also getting more control of the meter and rhyme. I'm impressed." Also, the last line of the poem caused the teacher to ask: "Intended shift to past tense?" I found a small scrap of paper folded in four squares. I recognized the quote although young James didn't credit the author. "What I have dreamed, I have willed. What I've willed, I'll do." Captain Ahab said that in Moby Dick. I found a series of flashcards that contained obscure, sometimes false, statements: "Alaska is located east of the Bay of Bengal and contains all the phytochemicals up until the 42nd parallel. The flyway takes less than one hour and doesn't end with the yellow oriole. Phytaeneus was married to Slyorion. Which is the dream?" Another read, "Your opponent has had fourteen cards. 5 have been black with 3 clubs. He threw out a ten, a seven and a four. You hold 3 queens, two of which are black, an eight and a two, who will win?" The final sentence originally ended with "who will most likely win?" That phrase was crossed out and was replaced by "who will win?" And another, "You are stranded on a desert island. The only water you have is salt water from the ocean. You weigh 135 lbs. It is 80 degrees outside and you lose 1500 calories an hour by sweating. A rescue ship will arrive in exactly 80 hours. You have no other food or water to drink. Should you drink the ocean water? If so, how much?" As if scribbling the answer, an adult hand had written the words, "NEVER drink salt water" near the bottom of the flashcard. And finally, one near the bottom of the box was titled "Three Wishes" and it read: "A certain genie loves riddles. Solve the riddles and choose one to be your wish. Which riddle is the best one to pick as your wish?"

1. L O T I R A V I ------- * * * * T L * * * * * * * I O * * * * ----------------- L * * * E * O T

2. A rich man writes a blank check payable to your name (whatever your name happens to be). The check is properly signed by the rich man. You may fill in any amount you wish up to $1 million dollars and cash it or deposit it. The check is placed at your local library in the middle of the Webster's dictionary, between pages 125 and 126. The dictionary will not be tampered with but the librarian is instructed not to give you the dictionary until you have chosen this as your wish. Should you?

3. 9567 1085 ---- 10652

I was sitting on the edge of the bed reading through these cards when Mrs. Fine came in holding a cup of tea and a plate of cookies. "Do you know anything about these cards?" I asked. She put on her reading glasses and read a few of them. She made a small noise of comprehension and said, "Well, not really. It's nonsense, most of it. But, James was always playing these kinds of games. He had a photographic memory, you know." "I didn't know that." "Yes, no one knew though. His father didn't want anyone to know. He used James to win money at card playing. Everyone knew James was smart but they had no idea he had this unusual gift. His father used to love to gamble and James had a photographic memory that no one knew about. He would sit with the adults and play. This Alaska card...I can only imagine. Maybe someone was just testing him. His memory, I mean." "Did you spend much time with him as a youngster?" "A bit. You know, birthdays, things like that. He was...different from the rest of us. He didn't like to play with us kids much. Too busy thinking, I guess."

James Crackow had recognized himself in Ferdinand Carpantier. James Crackow had recognized himself in Ferdinand Carpantier and took the necessary steps to exploit the boy's natural physical abilities. He now recognized himself in the two Polynesian natives who stood before him on his yacht named "The Third Wish." He liked people like this. They, like him, possessed childhood gifts. His was a gift for numbers; theirs more in line with their surroundings, their element. The two natives would be a valuable asset to his intentions, his empire. His mind turned into a map and calculated that he could exploit these two Polynesian pearl divers' abilities. They could hold their breath underwater without any bottled oxygen for 30 minutes. A few points of land resistance had caused more than a few of his men to throw up their hands in mock surrender, as if to imply his plan would not succeed - or at the very least, to carry preponderant risks. But his was a world of success. And Polynesian pearl divers with lungs like dolphins would solve these problems.

Like many of the super rich, James Crackow was first and foremost a gambler. When the oil crisis hit the world markets, James was left holding option derivatives that shrunk to one-sixteenth of their value. The effect was immediate. Heating oil and gas prices soared at the pump. Interest rates rose. The stock market crashed. He needed cash and he needed it quickly. By his calculations, the quickest way to make up for his losses in the oil markets was through the drug trade. The problem, however, was time. He calculated that the most effective means to reach the greatest number of people was by exploiting the drug's addictive tendencies with a new paradigm in marketing. He would give the drugs away. Dusk, while not yet dark, is bound to be.

************************************************************


another story...
"Dreams with Mr. Jesus" or "Why I Like Chocolate Eclairs"

I had a dream - while awake - awhile back. I was trying to cross the Pearly Gates and a man who looked
like Jesus was there awaiting me. We spoke for awhile. It went something like this:

Me: Good morning Mr. Jesus.
J: Good morning Mark.

M: Fine day today.
J: Yes, it is. What brings you here?

M: Just out for a stroll...thought I would stop and say hello.
J: Nice of you to fit me into your day.

M: You're calmer than I imagined. And you do look Jewish, if I may say so myself. You seem no worse for the wear.
J: Thank you. Coming from you that means a lot.

M: Do you have time to talk?
J: Yes. I'm assuming you have something on your mind?

M: Just the usual. Been thinking about this whole pain and suffering thing. It's clear to me why and how
you became the Christian deity. Lots of that going around, it seems to me.
J: Is there a question there?

M: Nope. Just letting you know that I figured some stuff out.
J: Oh goodie...I can't wait to hear this...

M: I've found that people turn to you during their pain and suffering. I suppose it helps, however, from my
point of view (POV) it seems to solidify the problem. You know, the wolf you feed the most is the one that
survives.
J: I'm a wolf now?

M: No, no. But you get what I mean. We pray and pray and nothing happens. The only thing that changes is our
brain. Is that the point of it all?

I noticed he got quieter (if that is possible), and then said:

J: God speaks in whispers, remember?

M: Yeah, well, 'It's a long road and little wheel and it takes a lotta turns to get there.'

He smiled slightly and blinked slightly but not completely.

M: That's Charlie Daniels...(whispering)
J: Never would have guessed. Sounds like it could have come from one of my writers.
M: It just did.

J: Lovely day today. Is there something else on your mind?

He said this kindly, patiently. He seemed in no apparent hurry.

M: A few things.
J: Proceed...

M: This idea of free will...It seems to be true, but also life seems to be mapped out for us...some things
seem inevitable. Do you have any thoughts on this?
J: Yes, you certainly have a free will. What would be the point of life if it were all fatalistic? Think of it this way...You are in an enormous dwelling place...beautiful...full of life, leaves, and in your case, birdsong...But, you have limitations on your dwelling place. There are places you shouldn't go for one reason or another. Stay in your dwelling place and all is well. Everything you need or will need is there. Do you get the idea?

M: Yes, but my problem and the problem of many others is that we want to wander into other dwelling places to see what is there.
J: You may. You always have my protection. but remember all those "covets" I, or others, have warned you about.
M: Hmmmm...Seems strange to me. I have my own dwelling place, yet I can wander to my hearts content?

J: Just don't break the commandments. They are commandments, after all, not suggestions.
M: Well, I haven't reviewed them recently. But I think I'm in the clear with those things.
J: Uh huh..

M: If you are too stringent, they become more difficult. You know, like Tom Sawyer wrote about...If you find out you are forbidden to paint the picket fence, you want to paint it all the more. And do.

J: Yes, quite a character, that Tom Sawyer. My grace is sufficient for you. And stop worrying about it. Just enjoy those birds I keep sending you. May your gifts proceed you.
M: Thank you. Yes, I agree. I would like my gifts to proceed me. But, you didn't make that up. I recognize it from somewhere.

J: I'm sure you do.
M: What about the sticky subjects?

J: Meaning?
I was quiet here to allow him to read my mind.

J: "Before you were conceived, I knew you." If you read your Old Testament once in a while you would know that.
M: I've always known that. I was born on Mother's Day, remember? Italians don't kill their babies anyway. We figure it's the best thing we have to offer the world. Our babies...

J: Bahahaha...as Megan would say.
M: Well, you must be getting tired. Lots of stuff to do. Lots of praying men and women to attend to.

J: No worries. It's what I do. And I have a lot of help to do that. "Christian" means "little Christ" does it not?
M: I wonder sometimes.

J: Me too.
M: I hope you have "help" other than that. Maybe get those angels busy up there. Do they just fly around and play their harps all day and night?

J: Harps? We'll leave that to you. But they have plenty to do. Don't you worry about it.
M: I just wanted to say "thank you" for everything. It's been a long road....

J: Yes, yes, I know....A long road and little wheel...
M: And it takes a lotta turns to get there. Figured I would finish it for you in case you've forgotten it. You're getting up there in age, it seems to me. Do you feel alright?

J: I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.
M: You are the Way??? Then get outta my GPS!! You keep re-routing me back to HomeCut Donuts!!

J: I'll look into that.
M: Oh yeah, before I forget...I need my engineering salary back. Can you help with that?

J: Haven't you ever heard the phrase "God is never late but seldom early."
M: Well, the second part of that phrase is certainly true. My broken truck could testify to that.

J: I thought you liked being a caregiver...
M: (Imitating the wicked witch of the east from the Wizard of Oz:) "You don't need air to breathe. Just use your imagination."

J: Do you feel alright?
M: Ah yes...You're right..."You don't need air to breathe, my pretty, just use your imagination." There, that's better.

He seemed amused by my imitation of the witch. Whether or not it sunk in, I don't know.

M: Well, then I guess that's your lesson for today. You've bored me long enough. Oh, and before I forget...Ya gotta get past the pain, dude.
J: There's one more thing...

M: What's that?
J: Honeybees.
M: Honeybees?
J: Yes, honeybees. When they're gone, you've got about 4 years left.

I paused a moment...letting this sink in...

J: Take care that that doesn't happen.

M: But, what about that one I killed that was flying around Rachelle's house in Ithaca....

He stepped aside slightly and motioned towards the pearly gates and said...

J: Get your ass in here and go play your harps.

He waved me in but told me not to talk to anyone.


The Wuhan Bat Flu and the Printed Boarding Pass

Back in early September 2019, I found myself in O'Hare airport in Chicago, Illinois about to board a plane to go see Rachelle my daughter in Helena, Montana. I walked to the boarding gate and stumbled upon approximately 150 people staring at their phones, sitting, waiting for the plane to board. Every single person was doing this. No one was reading the paper, a book or talking to their neighbor. I brought a book with me and was reading it - a book called something like "The Alphabet and the Goddess" which my daughter Megan had recommended to me. It concerns the end of patriarchy as we know it and was a good read. Finally, we were all called up to the boarding gate and I realized - with some interest - that I was the only one with a printed boarding pass. "Welcome, Mr. Sartori", the boarding agent cheerfully said to me, scanned my printed boarding pass and let me on the plane. "Wow", I said quietly to myself, "Seems like mind control to me - all those phones plastered to all those people." But, I spoke only to myself, boarded the plane and read my book. There are very few, if any, direct flights to Helena, so we made a stop in Minneapolis for a couple hour layover. This is where it happened.

The Minneapolis airport is small with nice restaurants so I was looking forward to some dinner and a beer. I gathered my things and deboarded the plane. "Sir", I heard from some feminine voice directed at me. I turned around and saw a petite Asian woman walking toward me, seemingly determined to keep me from my dinner and craft airport beer. "King Santiago del Fuego would like to have a word with you." I paused a moment trying to decide what to do. I've never really met a king before...I had a large carry-on bag, books, recording equipment, etc....and I wasn't in the mood to get arrested for any small time crimes I may or may not have committed. I had my passport with me in case Rachelle and I made our way to Canada and I would need to show it. "Huh?", I said. "I have my passport if you'd like to see it. I'm just going to visit my daughter in Montana. King who?" "King Santiago del Fuego. He would like to speak with you. Come with me please." So, reluctantly I followed the Asian woman in front of me dragging my bag and other stuff with me. She found a small non-descript door and opened it and we entered a room. Therein a small dwarf king sat in a chair too big for him with his legs dangling in mid air, moving them back and forth like a child would. "Ah, Mr. Sartori", he said. "Welcome. I have come a long way to meet you." I tried to take in and process what was in front of me: A dwarf king surrounded by his minions, me and my Asian escort all cramped in this little room. "May I help you", I said a bit perturbed that I would be late for dinner. "It is you who will be helped by me." He motioned to one of his minions to pull up a chair for me, waved his tiny arm and motioned for me to have a seat. His crown lay upon the table in front of us. He wore an open vest with short pants, and all-in-a-sudden I recognized him. A few years earlier my daughter had told a story to me that she had heard from her friend Dara. The story made the Naperville Sun - a local newspaper in Naperville, Illinois. It seems a certain young girl was babysitting at a family's home. The babysitter went downstairs for something and came upon, what she thought was a lampstand. It was a statue of a midget with a lampshade on his head. He stood motionless with the lampshade on his head and the babysitter did a double-take to make sure her brain wasn't playing tricks on her. She went upstairs and asked the children about the midget lamp they had in the basement. "Huh?, they said. "What are you talking about?" They proceeded downstairs, snapped a picture and called the police. As it turned out, the police came and this midget-dwarf-lampstand statue was one Santiago del Fuego - inpatient at a nearby psychiatric mental hospital. It seems he escaped and found his way to this family's home, somehow entered, found a lamp shade, put it on for a disguise and stood like a statue when he heard the babysitter come downstairs. This was the King Santiago del Fuego who was sitting in front of me, delaying my dinner date with myself and my craft airport beer. I'm pretty good at reading a room and can adjust fairly quickly to my surroundings but dwarfs undo me. I can't focus very well when confronted by warlord-dwarf-midget kings with the last name "del Fuego." Were his dwarf ancestors in the habit of walking across the globe to Tierra del Fuego? They walked to Patagonia? Something not right about their DNA, and this unnerves me. "I really don't know what you are talking about. I'm just a father going to see his daughter", growing a bit uneasy of this small king with his minion army besides him. "I know. I know. We know who you are. You are the last person in this hemisphere to use a printed boarding pass. That's why we need to speak to you." After more words of encouragement, King Santiago del Fuego and his minions took me aboard his private plane and told me this story. "I am the sole monarch of my private island, Muchy Peachy in the Cayman Islands. It is a small island and I am the proud ruler and king. Government officials throughout the world come to my island to consult with me about their worldly matters and concerns. Our little island is a jewel and they come for the weather and scenery as well. But we discuss business and governmental matters there over a period of a few days. There has been growing concern that people are becoming too close with their electronic devices. They come to a beautiful island like ours and spend all their time staring at their phones. This cannot stand. It has been decided by the ancients that a lesson is in store. A scourge will be prepared and unleased from the earth. A hot zone, if you will. It will take the form of a flu virus that will prohibit people from interacting with each other. This is what they want, after all. Isolation from each other. So this is what they will receive. You have been spared by the ancients as well as your progeny because of your printed boarding pass. As has been told to me, you still read books from paper sources, don't own a smartphone and use your computer for creative purposes. This is well and good and has been the source of your preservation. Be well and be careful." So, this was my introduction to the current Wuhan Bat Flu which now invades the earth. As I mentioned, this was September 2019. Just a few months later, the world would never be the same. Santiago del Fuego - the schizophrenic-lampstand-warlord-dwarf king from the island of Muchy Peachy in the Cayman Islands, taxied me to safety from his private plane, helped me board a jet and sent me on my way to Helena to see my daughter. I never was able to have dinner and a beer.

taken from "The Wuhan Bat Flu and other Musical Essays" - appears as a short story in "The Erratic Weather Years" by Rachelle Sartori, Megan Sartori and Mark J. Sartori


Some quotes I like:

"Thy touch has still its ancient power." God Calling

"Each word or thought of yours can be like a pearl that you drop into the secret place of another heart, and in
some hour of need, lo! the recipient finds the treasure and realizes for the first time its value." God Calling, January 7th

"You are not a stray and uncared for. You belong to the Secret Service of Heaven. There are priviledges and protections for you all along the way." God at Eventide, December 7th

"Know a glad contentment in the security of your protected and guided life." God at Eventide, March 13

"Stories have a way to go where they want to go." taken from Predictions, by Chinua Achebe

"The text was updated automatically on every hour; even if one read only the English versions one could spend an entire lifetime doing nothing but absorb the ever changing flow of information from the news satellites." Arthur C. Clarke 1968

"All saints and lovers have been transcendental clowns." Leo Buscaglia quoting Thomas Merton

"It's better than it sounds." - Mark Twain commenting on Wagner's music

"Human History? It's just one damn thing after another." Winston Churchill

"Spiritual healing is feeling good about feeling bad." (not sure who wrote this so I will take credit) MJS

"When the student is ready, the teacher appears." Buddhist proverb

"The greatest loss in the world is the loss of human potential." Leo Buscaglia (he said this many times over the years)

"Say your prayers", Sarah S.

"Obey the women in your life." MJS

"Women went there each year on the tenth day of the fifth month to pray for the birth of sons.", taken from Snow flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

"Boys, you know nuthin' grows until the seed gets sowed. The soil is there, waiting for the seed. Let that be a lesson to you." spoken by Uncle Rastus O'Dear, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"My wife's birthday is February 22, 1951. Four is feminine. Remember that." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"The best thing about marrying your childhood sweetheart is that you don't have to wonder where her mouth has been." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Thou mayest", taken from the film "East of Eden" with Jane Seymour.

"They are but phantoms." God Calling, April 9th.

Some more quotes I like...

"Let's keep the crazy down", MJA

"The echoes you hear at Wildcat aren't always heard. Sometimes,," spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana Bigtop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Dem Indians were left to starve at Wildcat. Da Princess found out about dis through some kind of atmospheric charge. Like lightning. She was half way 'round the world when she felt it. Don't you white boys ever, never forgit dis. Dey starved der - dem Indians. Dos wildcats got 'em den. Dem wildcats got 'em." spoken by Uncle Rastus O'Dear, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"You know what they say about lightning never striking the same place twice? Well, that's a damn lie. Lightning ALWAYS strikes the same place twice. Always." spoken by Minerva Boils, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"As I said before boys...Hemingway's lost manuscript...As I said before", spoken by Uncle Rastus O'Dear, taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

"J.P's great-grandmother was a real life Italian spy. You wouldn't know it 'cause he always wears that silly baseball
cap, but J.P. is Italian and Argentinian. Once he had a dream about her and he wrote a note about it. It said: My great-grandma, Italian sex spy... He's proud of her. Says she was obedient. She had her way though. She wanted to marry an Italian and did. Those geminis...always coupling.." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Look, I'm the narrator here. I ended up with LoLo. My wife who loves whip cream on her lips. My pretty wife with her pretty feet. Unc is right though. Those echoes...those echoes at Wildcat...You don't need no gypsy to tell you why." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Look, J.P. says he's the narrator here. I got this babe." spoken by Toni Roe, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Ladies, understand this. J.P. has twins coming to him. Twins, sister. It's those gemini moons. They follow him everywhere." spoken by Toni Roe, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"The first thing I noticed were her hands. She has a little moon in her fingernails, and of course, that hair.
But her eyes...light amber brown, like a kitten's...the kind I like in a friend." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Oh, that's my Jonathan. My sweet boy. Now he wants me to freeze my eggs so we can have twins later in life. Must be those Gemini moons he was born under. Silly boy, thinks I'm a princess or something." spoken by Mrs.Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Save your eggs, baby. Save your eggs. I want my Geminis honey. Save your eggs. Three times, like he was the Holy Spirit or something." spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Those Gemini moons. Always looking to couple together." spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Breed me honey." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"He's got clean arrows in his quiver." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"He told me once that he was watching the Johnny Carson show in his mid 20's...He touched the television screen and something happened there in the studio. Johnny said "What was that? I guess my boy caused some sort of electrical disturbance without knowing it. It travelled all the way to California. My boy and those fingers of his. He plays the piano like an angel, you know...he sings too...not often, but, like my granddad Pete used to say, 'Sounds like a swallowtail, that one...Sounds like a swallowtail..'" spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"My breeding wife...my breeding wife with her soft blond curls and baby brown eyes...my lovely, breeding wife.." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Remember this. King David was a harpist." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons...She could get dispensation from the Pope for just about anything she wants with a name like that." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Most people make the mistake of thinking that all stories are written in pen and ink. The best ones - the ones with a destiny - are written in the stars." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"When I first met J.P, we swam together at that little waterhole outside of Hamlet. A young teenage girl, 12 maybe, was struggling in the water. My boy jumped in and saved her. My first date." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Breed me honey....breed me." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"The gunslingers had their way. Sad, isn't it?" spoken by Chief Trifle, taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

"Right after those two gentlemen were arrested, Mayor Connor comes to me and says the government wants to protect my Jonathan. Says some rich guy in Florida wants to pay for everything. Says he won a whole lotta money playing poker. Like Arabian sheik kinda money. And they want to "hire" me as his domestic bodyguard. Oh, I'm his bodyguard alright. I sure am." spoken by Mrs. Lolo-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"My Florida employer set us up with our own creamery! Jonathan likes ice cream so I got a creamery! "French Lick Creamery". Ha. Johnny wanted to name it"...spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Thank you Lord, that I am male." spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"I guess I was the first Homeland Security employee. Funny, huh? Funny but true. "Agent Benni," they called me. Ha. Men. My boy wants his hot breakfast now. Gotta go." spoken by Mrs. Lolo-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Homeland Security didn't start after 9/11. It started with a young country boy named Jonathan Parsons in love with his Sunday School teacher." spoken by Etta Laks, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"I saw my friend Etta Laks at the library checking out the same book twice. About that canyon. She's a sweetie,
she is...a real sweetie." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBenedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop
Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"My friend Etta Laks always tells me, 'Sweetie, ain't no worries baby. It's in the stars, sugar. She's sweet,
that one. A real sweetie." spoken by Mrs. Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop
Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"My granddad Pete was telling me that President Kennedy had to borrow money from his dad when he was President! Hmmmm...Imagine that. I was about 12 then, I think." spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"Lolita? I call her L.A. She's a beautiful woman oblivious to the chaos she creates." spoken by Mrs. Etta
Laks, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"As you can see, my friend Etta is Haitian with her blue eyes. Her great-grandfather was a blue-eyed northern Italian from a little vineyard in Northern Italy. San Pedro de Veneto. Such a beauty that one. Such a beauty. spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"They just legalized abortion a couple years ago...I don't like to to think about this little creature being destroyed. There's only so many diamonds...Only so many pearls, you know? spoken by Lolita, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"She is a magnificent gift", spoken by Jonathan Parsons, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"Think thoughts of Love and Beauty." God at Eventide, March 12th

"Just follow Me as little children.", God at Eventide, February 26th

"You were going to do what you were going to do. You were like one of those cantilevered California homes about to fall into the sea. Minerva just set the date for you." spoken by A.J. Howell to James Crackow and his nemesis Jorge Villareal, taken from "The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show", Mark J. Sartori

"This is MY house you're playin' in", basketball great...well, you know...

"There's no ugly men in Rome." Marian M.

"Human History? It's just one damn thing after another." Winston Churchill

"When the student is ready, the teacher appears." Buddhist proverb

"I'da catched that cat if'n I'd been set and ready", Mark Twain

The boys were playing cards the other day and A.J. says quietly, "Thirteen is greater than 11,9,7,3, and 1. Simple arthrimetic. And there's triplets in fifteen." spoken by Lolita-Antoinette DeBennedetti-Parsons, taken from The indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"The greatest loss in the world is the loss of human potential." Leo Buscaglia (he said this many times over the years)

"Blink, and you'll miss your treasure." taken from "Wild Game" by Adrienne Brodeur

"As of late, I have come to realize that I am the steward of the shattered little village that has become of my soul." entitled "The Welcoming", taken from "Out of My Mind", Craig Y.

"Write for all things are now ready." God at Eventide

"How do you collect when God owes you $18 million dollars?" taken from "How I Lost $18 million dollars and the Eyelash Wish", Mark J. Sartori

"I made this movie for myself, and everybody else is invited." Quentin Tarantino

"Looks like I'm walkin'", spoken by Robert De Niro, taken from last scene in Midnight Run.

"I am just the humble harpist in all of this." MJS (God's favorite harpist)

"...and I heard the sound of harpists playing their harps." Rev. 14:2

"All is Forgiven", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"That's Me in the C", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Double Entendre", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Arrow Where You Want It", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Hurryhome", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Reckonwith", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Juice Worth the Squeeze", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"When She Wants", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Malabar's Alibi", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"A Sensual Duet", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"A Kiss in the Country", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Those Gemini Moons", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Only So Many Diamonds, Only So Many Pearls", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"When Chaos Collides", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"When the Warmth Gathers", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Sophia", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

"Lovely in Every Way", upcoming song title, Mark J. Sartori

And here is the Wuhan Bat Blues, completed on Easter Sunday 2020. It will be played in E7-A7-B7 perhaps or a minor key such as E minor-A minor-D minor...Tony on lead guitar, Mike or me on slide guitar, Pete on vocals (after a couple bourbons), Megan on vocals (up high, the way only Megan can sing), Rachelle on percussion, me or Rachelle on piano (perhaps), Lenci Aria on harmonica, Milo (playing "Boo") purring.

Wuhan Bat Blues

I's sittin' at home,
Where da buffalo roam,
Me and my pot full o' stew.

I's sitting at home,
And I ain't alone,
Me and my mornin' dew.

My critters, my phone,
And I ain't alone,
Singin' my black bat blues.

I's sittin' at home,
And I ain't alone,
But I's feelin' mighty blue.

I's sittin' at home,
Where da buffalo roam,
With my sassy black cat "Boo".

I's sitting at home,
Where the buffalo roam,
All alone here me and you.

The news tell me quick,
I's gonna be sick,
If I go outta dis room.

I's sitting at home,
And I ain't alone,
Singing my black bat blues.

The stores all are closed,
And I don't suppose,
They want me any way.

The stores all are closed,
And I don't suppose,
I need anything today.

Cops all around,
Takin' me down,
Thinkin' they're doin' some good.

This may be so,
I really don't know,
I go here and there as I should.

The churches be quiet,
The preacher be silent,
Reflecting now as we should.

These bat bugs contain,
Thunder and Rain,
Fear and distress,
And, oh, what a mess,

Red lights hypnotize,
An easy surmise,
With da sins on the table,
The black bats are able,
"A potion we'll blend you",
"To your knees we will send you",
It's easy to see,
Between you and me,
They'd hurt you if they are able.

With da sins on the table,
The black bats are able,
"A potion we'll blend you",
"To your knees we will send you",
Between you and me,
It's easy to see,
They'd hurt you if they are able.

Easter be closed,
As everyone knows,
A knock on the nose,
For Christ and his brother,
And every another,
And bunnies and eggs,
Dey don't go together.

So please tell me quick,
Before I get sick,
Is the man on the news,
Important for flus?
Or is he just being a dick.

Wuhan Bat Blues, by Mark J. Sartori, Easter Sunday 2020


"There's no lock on the door of a thought prison." MJS

"The days crawl by and the weeks fly by," author Peter Mayle

"Soon, very soon, you shall ask and at once it will come." God Calling, January 6th

"I never met a musician who was sorry he became one." Albert Einstein

"Years ago, I had a Buddhist teacher in Thailand who would remind all of his students that there was always something to be thankful for. He'd say, "Let's rise and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we have learned a little. And if we didn't learn even a little, at least we didn't get sick. And if we did get sick, at least we didn't die. So let us all be thankful." Leo Buscaglia, Born for Love

"It is the weak who are cruel. Gentleness can only be expected from the strong." Leo Buscaglia quoting Leo Rosten

"As I said before boys...Hemingway's lost manuscript...That's how that boy lost those $18 million dollars. ..As I said before boys...as I said before...", spoken by Uncle Rastus O'Dear, taken from "Echoes of Wildcat Canyon", Mark J. Sartori

"There's gotta be a God. Because there's a devil." spoken by A.J. Howell, taken from The Indiana BigTop Travelling Show, Mark J. Sartori

"As the doe longs for the waterbrook..." Psalm 42:1.....Notice that the Psalmist says "doe" instead of "buck"...A doe longing for the waterbrook seems to me to mirror society at large...women desiring a peaceful place to go and satisfy their thirst...maternal instincts... Also, I like the feminine imagery of a gentle doe drinking out of a clear waterbrook. Also, a doe seems synonymous with peace.

And finally, since this Cd was inspired by my visit with Rachelle in Montana and she took the cover photo, I will give her the last word...

"The world is a scary place fatboy." Rachelle

The cover photo was taken by Rachelle on the return trip from Avalanche Lake in Glacier National Park.