Monday, June 16, 2008

Drinking Buds

I was at a pal's apartment drinking margaritas, and we were have a great time. He was getting pissed with me for throwing limes off the balcony, but other than that it was great.

Margaritas are civilized. They're not like tequila puffs. Do you know tequila puffs? You mix tequila and 7-up in equal parts in a plastic cup. Then you slam the cup down on a picnic table and shotgun it. It's like inhaling sweet foam. We got into them and then walked barefoot into the desert, down a gravel road where rattlesnakes warm themselves at night. Then the indian wouldn't let us ride his horse. But that's another story.

We ran out of tequila, but my pal happened to live across the street from a liquor store. Call me impulsive. Maybe I'm adventurous. Whatever character flaw you want to blame, I scored a bottle of mescal.

Back at his place we cranked up the tunes. We were feeling good, singing, laughing and checking out the moms around the swimming pool. I didn't even care that we ran out of limes - I was drinking mescal straight out of the bottle. Mescal is like Cracker Jacks, they put in a prize. When you finish the bottle you get a worm, which I ate.

Even a bottle of mescal, which probably tastes like turpentine if you ain't hammered (I wouldn't know), doesn't last forever. We were out of booze again, so we went to the bar.

Drinking mescal makes you ask the deep, philosophical questions. Like, did the mescal make me to it, or deep-down am I really that much of an asshole? For whatever reason, for no reason, as we were walking down the street, I swung around and punched my buddy's nose.

"Enough of this bullshit," he said, and stomped away. Who could blame him?

I went to the bar and had a couple of beers. But it was a country and western bar, and I got bored. I hopped on the bus back to his place.

No matter how much I pounded on his door, my buddy wouldn't answer. I walked downstairs, out onto the lawn, stepped over the limes, climbed onto a fence and then reached up and pulled myself onto his balcony. I went inside but didn't see him around. I found a pizza. I ate it. Then I stretched out on the couch and fell asleep.

The next morning, he walked through the living room, and muttered something like, "What the hell are you doing here?"

I took that as my cue to leave.

But then a funny thing happened. A couple of days later, he phoned and asked if I wanted to come over for a few beers. Who the hell would want me coming over? I wouldn't want me coming over.

I went, of course. We didn't drink beer. We drank martinis until his wife kicked us out. We went to "The Princeton" on the waterfront, but they kicked us out for being too drunk. I remember being insulted - it's not a high class place. Then we went to "The Marr," a stripper bar, and then "The Drake," where I ran the pool table. And then we went to "The Coach House" where my buddy got up on stage with the band, playing air guitar. That was okay until he fell off the stage and rolled across the dance floor.

The bouncers rushed out from behind the bar. They grabbed him and ran him like a battering ram, his feet barely touching the carpet, and threw him through the swinging doors. The next day he accused me of deserting him. I was in survival mode.

About that time, I started thinking. Sure, I like to drink. But the only time I went on truly marathon drunks, it was with my buddy. I thought about my bad behavior - the limes, punching him, eating his pizza. And was doing exactly what he wanted me to do: acting worse than him.

He liked to drink, and he had his reasons. But he liked having someone around behaving worse than him. Then he could always say, "I'm not as bad as that guy." I was giving him carte blanche.

To my way of thinking I was killing my liver for his reasons. It would be bad enough if I was doing it for my own reasons. But his reasons? No way. I cut back and probably pulled myself out of a downward spiral. I even tried to get him to stop, which failed.

Since I stopped drinking and started nagging him, we don't see each other that much. He occasionally phones and complains about the drunks who come around.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Be Prepared for the Unexpected

Years ago - I forget the reason why - I went into the wilderness. I drove to the northern tip of Vancouver Island. Then I walked thirty kilometers through a bog, out to Cape Scott.

Cape Scott is a lonely place. The bog is forbidding. It can only be passed during summer months. Horseflies, lots of them, circled me the whole way. There were so many I had to stop and let them land, swat as many as I could, and then run.

When I arrived at the beach the wind blew the flies away. I saw breakers far out to sea. You wouldn't want to come to the Cape from the sea either.

Danes settled the Cape a hundred years ago. They were tough. They built a dike so they could farm the tidal flats, but a storm blew the dike away. The Danes didn't give up, they built another one. It's still there.
The Cape's a place for tough things. The wind twists the trees. Cougars haunt the forest. But even the Danes failed. The isolation was too much for them. They abandoned their homesteads, leaving their dike, broken-down cabins, and a pink granite headstone for a boy, William.

I thought I would live on food from the sea. I brought no food with me, except for a half loaf of bread. I brought cigarettes. I brought a mask and snorkel so I could dive for shellfish. I didn't know the cold of the north Pacific. I stuck my toe into that water and my toe burned. I was a bigger dreamer than the Danes. And I was alone.

I gave up my diving ambitions and went sight seeing. I hiked along the beach, thinking that it would take me to the Cape. But the beach ended and I began to scramble over the black rock. Pink snails filled the tide pools and other beautiful things lived there.

The rock became steeper and soon I was scrambling over cliffs. I thought the cliffs would level out but they got steeper. I looked back and seeing the steepness of what I had crossed I became afraid. I kept going. I couldn't see any way off the rock. Ahead it looked too steep. I couldn't turn back. The freezing sea water crashed against the rocks below. Thick salal and brush formed a barrier along the cliff top.

I hung on, thinking about my family. How sad my mother would be if I disappeared into the wilderness. I began to pray. I asked God to save me. I promised Him all kinds of things... I don't remember all the things.

But when I looked up I noticed a hole in the brush on the cliff top. I was sure it wasn't there before. I saw I could squeeze into the hole. The rock was black and hard and smooth, but I found a way up to the hole. And then I grabbed onto the brush and pulled myself in.

I found myself in a tunnel under the salal. It was an animal trail, I thought. I didn't care. The tunnel twisted and wound up the slope from the cliff. I crawled up through dirt and leaves. But I felt safe. I couldn't fall.

And then the ground leveled out a little more. I came out of the tunnel and into the salal. I walked through it, up the slope, and I found a trail. This is where I should have been all along, I thought. This path was here for me, to take me out to the Cape.

So you see. I prayed, and I was saved. Even though I didn't go to church - and I still don't. And I've never prayed a lot, unless I really need something. And still - I think - God helped me out of that bad spot I was in. And I'm not making any of this up. It's exactly how I remember it.

Sunday, June 1, 2008

What's So Fresh About Green?

We live on the edge of a rain forest in the North Vancouver. Friends visiting from the city have commented on how fresh the air smells here. I know what they're talking about. I have noticed a crispness in the air at our place that is lacking on city streets, and even city backyards. I'm wondering if this perception is based on the air's make up.

It could be that all the green around just makes you think the air smells better. We have a lavender bush in the yard so perhaps we're experiencing a pleasant smell. Trees consume carbon dioxide and produce oxygen. Could the trees be pumping out enough oxygen to makes the air around our house oxygen rich, creating a natural hyperbolic chamber? Are we receiving a health benefit from that? The thought is tantalizing.

I'd like to talk about the "freshness." Advertisers call everything from laundry to fruit juice "fresh", so the word has become almost meaningless.