The Adventures of Heracles Mendoza: The Golden Lion, Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The feeling of liquid running over his teeth, around his tongue, and down his throat brought Les back to consciousness. His mouth grew warm and began to tingle, touched by a certain sweetness, something like honey, but deeper, richer. The way whipped cream is deeper and richer than air, he thought, still very groggy. A feeling of warmth trailed in the liquid’s wake, moving down his throat and into his stomach. Once there, the tingling fire began spreading through his body. His heart responded with a quickening, strengthening beat.

There had been pain in his head, though he had only been dimly aware of it till just then. Now it was lifting, dissolved by some effortless power. Relief flooded through him, sweeping away all the pain and discomfort like so much floating debris. The effect was so powerful that he thought he was going to melt, and slide off the table into a grateful puddle on the floor.

When the surge finally receded, it left him empty and cavernous and hollow inside. The sensation was brief, reminding him of that hanging moment he always felt just before an elevator would stop. It was supplanted by a growing sense of renewed energy and strength. Expanding rapidly, his entire body was soon alive with fresh vitality and a raw, wild sensation of power. He reacted by jumping up from the table on which he lay, even before he opened his eyes. Only a hand restrained him. A very large hand.

“Do not try to stand quite yet,” a reassuring voice said. “Allow the initial effects to run their course. It won’t be long.”

Les blinked, trying to focus. The giant was standing beside him. His name was Polydeuces, Les remembered with a clarity that surprised him. Pol, he had said. Something was different, though. His overwhelming fear of the man was missing. “Where am I?”

“The Portalhouse, young master.” Pol replied, smiling down at him.

Les blinked and stretched his eyes until the room around him came into dazzling focus. It was large and open, and lined with a dozen long, gleaming silver tables, arranged like a dining hall with a wide aisle down the center. The walls were made of seamless panels, silvery-steel, laden with beautifully inscribed patterns. A large landscape picture hung on the opposite side, the green of its meadows, and the blue of its sky ridiculously bright against the metal wall. To his right, a high counter ran the breadth of the room. Behind the counter, extending all the way to the softly glowing ceiling, were shelves crowded with bottles, jars, and bowls of various sizes and shapes. At the opposite end of the room stood a pair of very solid-looking metal doors.

“Young master,” Pol said, “I would like to introduce you to ’Dora. It is she who prepared the elixir which restored you to health.” Les looked around in confusion. He didn’t see anyone else in the room.

The Golden Lion, Chapter 3

Les rode on a blast of pure black speed for what seemed like forever, and yet like one impossibly suspended moment. Then there was a lightning crack, and with it the movement simply stopped. Les clamped his eyes shut against the gray light that was suddenly there. When he opened them, a little at a time, he saw that the couple with the baby was gone, and all the nearby seats were vacant.

"Hello?" he called out. The hollow silence supplied the answer he instinctively feared: he was alone. Did I black out? It didn't feel like he had passed out. He thought he remembered the whole thing: the burst of golden light, the sudden darkness, the directionless whoosh of acceleration. But where is everyone? He must've blacked out, he decided, at least part of the time. It was the only way to explain the absence of the other passengers.

"Hello," he called again and tried to stand. His seat belt, still fastened, yanked him down. Les felt for the buckle, found that it was jammed and wouldn't release. A small, electric spark of dread coursed through him. Was that why he been left behind? Because his seatbelt was stuck? Was anybody coming back for him? He couldn't believe they would just leave him all alone.

Les began to notice strange things about the plane. For one, the cabin was completely unlit, illuminated only by the dingy daylight coming through the windows. The light strips that bordered the aisle were out, as were all the ceiling lights. It was as if the plane's power had been cut off, yet the plane itself was perfectly intact. Then there was the undeniable tinge of gold. It was everywhere: the seats, the floor, the entire interior of the cabin. At first he wondered if perhaps the brilliant bombardment he had endured was having a lingering effect on his vision. But when he looked down at himself, his clothes were unaffected, and his own skin was its usual bronzy-brown. Confused, he looked to the window and was startled by another difference: the glass in his window was missing. He raised a finger, and slowly pushed it through the opening. "What the--" he mumbled. "The window's gone?" He twisted around, checking the others. All of them looked empty, as if someone had come along and collected all the glass. When could that have happened? he wondered. And why?

Les's stomach, which he had forgotten about, began to writhe again. With a low moan, he glanced outside. Only then did he notice they were not on an airport runway, or at an airport at all. Instead, it appeared that the plane was parked on gray rock, flat as concrete, spreading out in all directions. In the far distance Les could see a towering, arcing wall of sheer rock of the same gray color, its upper edge visible only when he cranked his head to one side and peered upward through the window. Where are we? He scanned along the base of the cliff, and finally found a solitary building, dwarfed beneath the high wall. Beyond that, he could find no other sign of life, not even a single shrub, or a blade of grass.

Must've had to make some kind of emergency landing, he surmised. But that still doesn't explain where everyone went, or why they left me here. He swallowed hard, blocking the rising terror at his throat. Wait, he told himself. Maybe everybody else is on the other side of the plane where I can't see them. Or maybe they're in that building. "If I could just get this stupid seatbelt off," he snarled. Grasping it with both hands, Les tried his best to force the buckle to open. He pulled until his arms began to tremble, and his strength gave out, but it still wouldn't budge. Then he tried to wriggle out from under the strap, but he couldn't move more than a few inches either way. Frustrated, Les threw himself back against the seat. His head struck a cushion that he knew was made of soft foam, but felt hard as steel. It clanged hollowly.

"Ow!" he cried, twisting back and giving his seat an evil look. "What is going on around here?"

He was still rubbing his head when movement outside the window caught his eye. A man was crossing the expanse between the plane and the building. Within a few minutes, he had drawn close enough that Les could see he was dressed in some kind of pale blue business suit. The bright yellow flash of his tie stood out, even at this distance. The man appeared to be quite large, though that was difficult to judge against the emptiness of the surroundings. He carried some kind of bag in one hand, and walked at a brisk pace. Les watched him, nervous but hopeful that he was coming to free him.

Jump

There he was, measuring the distance from the top of the big rock to the water below.  Twenty feet?  Twenty-five?  Whatever it was, it was far.  More concerning to him than the drop, though, was the depth of the water.  Ten feet maybe?  Twelve?  He stood there looking down, knowing there was no real way to gauge from above.  How much water do you need?  He wasn’t sure. 

You should just go.  You just saw Angel do it.  His anxiety level, which had been a low persistent buzzing in his body since stepping out of the forested canyon and onto the rocky promontory, jumped a notch in response to this thought.   He was filled with a nervous uncertainty, but he noticed that it lacked a sharp edge of fear, which surprised him. 

Little Mikey explores the swimming hole in 2007.

He’d seen this cliff many times before, but never from the top.  After all, this was his favorite swimming hole in all of Oak Creek, large enough and deep enough to swim in, with a wide, shallow area for the kids to play in.  And then there were the rocks on the far side, the deep side, that seemed like they were designed for jumping into the water.  There were three of them, in perfectly ascending order.  He thought of them as the Three Bears rocks, because one was too little, one was too big, and one was just right.  He’d jumped from the little one and the just right one many times in years past, but never big bear rock.  He’d never even considered jumping from that rock, even on the few occasions he’d seen others do it.  But he was there now, and he thought he might just do it.  He even felt, in some strange way that he knew was unconnected to any sense of masculine pride, an urging, like he was supposed to jump. 

His being there at all was really an accident.  The others set out from camp to go swimming a half-hour before, and so to save time, he took a side path through the forest, guessing it might turn out to be a short cut.  And it was just that, except the near-constant upward tilt of the trail brought him not to the water’s edge, but to the rocky outcropping overlooking the swimming hole.  Right to the top of big bear rock. 

Zachary - the other half

In "Zachary," the previous post, my daughter and I went to Duck Park (Cortez Park for those of you who live in Phoenix) after running errands on a Tuesday morning.  While there, we met a young boy with a lazy eye, and a speech deficiency.   The three of us spent time together enjoying the ducks who hang around the park's lake.  This is the second half of the story of our encounter with the little boy.    

There is a fountain of sorts in the island’s middle, made to look like a spring.  It is formed from granite boulders of various size, pushed together to create a rocky trough.  The water pools and trickles downward through the gully until it is absorbed into the green water of the lake.  The boy practically beats you there.  He clambers immediately up onto the rocks and looks down into the water, where some sparrows are dousing themselves in a shallow pool.  “Bird ’imming?” the boy asks, pointing at them.

“No, not swimming.  I think they’re just taking a bath.”  Your little girl wants to see the bathing birds, and starts to climb, far more inexpertly than the boy, onto the rocks.  He’s a stocky boy, and you’re not certain of his coordination, so you subtly change positions so that you’re ready if he happens to stumble into her, or bump her obliviously.  Also in your mind is that persevering intimation of wildness.

The sparrows seem to have given him an idea, and now he creeps closer to the water, almost dipping his shoe in.  “Go ’imming?” he asks with a smile. 

“Oh, I don’t know.  That’s not my decision.  You need to go ask your Dad.”  You smile helplessly, but your tone is serious.    

To your surprise, he accepts this and says, “Be ’ack,” scrambling down from the boulder and over the short wall.  You watch him as he hurries over to where the man in the red shirt is sitting.  It is then that you first notice the shopping cart next to the rock where the man is seated.  The cart holds a half-load of clothes and other things, none of which you can readily identify.  Your heart sinks.  You knew the boy was in need of cleaning, because of his messy face, and you also noticed that his dark red Diamondbacks shirt had some dirty streaks on it.  But it hadn’t crossed your mind that the boy might not have a home.  You focus on the man in the red shirt, but he’s too far away to see in detail.  In addition to the shirt, he’s wearing a non-descript ball cap, and some baggy pants.  A brown, scruffy beard is the only other thing that stands out.  This new element, the shopping cart, inspires multiple chains of questions, about the man, about the age of the boy, about school, about the boy’s safety.  Is that where that latent sense of wildness you detected comes from?  It would explain that, too, wouldn’t it? 

Zachary

Tuesday, you have decided, is going to be errand day.  You enlist your three-year-old daughter’s enthusiasm with a promise to take her to the park.  You haven’t been in a while, and now that it’s May, you don’t know how many pleasant mornings you have left before the summer sear sets in. 

“Which park, Daddy?”

“Let’s go to Duck Park,” you say.  Duck Park is your name for Cortez Park, one of the larger parks in the city of Phoenix.  It’s got a man-made lake, and ducks, which distinguishes it from the smaller parks in your neighborhood.

“Does Duck Park have a playground?” she asks, frowning uncertainly.

“Yes, it has a big playground.”  She brightens in immediate response, as though she only needed to hear it to remember.

You load your little girl into the car, and join the straggling traffic of the post-rush city streets.  You complete your errands without much difficulty, dropping reminders of Duck Park when necessary to steer your little girl back into compliance, which only happens once or twice.  You arrive at the park as promised around 10:30.  Before you even open the door to unlock her from her car seat, you’ve already taken note of several dark men reclining in the shadows of sheltered picnic tables, but you see no reason to give them any more than a casual glance.  They do not stir.

You walk hand in hand across the grassy expanse of the park, passing in and out of the shade laid down by enormous old pine trees, following the cement trail that leads to the playground, and beyond that, the concrete-lined lake.  She wants to swing, so you push for a few minutes, and then she wants to climb, so you lift her out and let her carve a path through the sand to the play structure, a combination of enameled steel and plastic in a swirling jumble of teal, and two kinds of purple.  There are a few other little kids and their parents on the playground, and a small group of preschoolers under the supervision of a gentle-looking, but rough-voiced, African-American woman, but they’re all over at the bigger kids’ play area.  You give your little girl the opportunity to roam far and wide, but she doesn’t want it.  She wants you to go up the stairs with her into the structure, and stand by the cone-shaped tube at the top, which is too high for her to talk into, while she goes back down and talks into the other end of the cone-tube sticking out of the sand.  You play this much sturdier version of tin-can telephone, and then she leads you across the elevated walkway to the curly slide at the other end.  She wants to go down the slide, but it’s in the sun, and the plastic is hot.  So you put her on your lap and go down the slide with her, taking the heat of it on your bare, but far less sensitive legs.  Then you ask her if she wants to go see the ducks now, and she nods. 

Let the adventure begin!

Those of you who read The Forward Path section of the blog may recall that I mentioned that I have begun work on a novel. 

This is true.

I also mentioned there that I would probably be posting tidbits of this work in progress every now and then for your reading pleasure and/or ridicule.  

This is also true. At least starting today it is.

Having just checked to see if I spilled the beans on what the novel is supposed to be about, I can confirm that my first novel is a twist on the Greek myth of Hercules and the Twelve Labors.

I love Greek mythology, and it seems that it's enjoying something of a resurgence recently, what with Percy Jackson, and Clash of the Titans, and God of War, and all that.  I passionately want to write a story that really does justice to those great tales of old.  

I spent the first few months of this year struggling with how to tell the story, or more accurately, nailing down the voice with which I wanted to tell the story.  I tried several different ways:  first person from the protagonist's point of view, first person from the antogonist's point of view, and some strange hybrid of first and third person.  In the end, I think I was guilty of being too clever, of trying to do too much, when what I should be focusing on is simply writing my first novel.  I'm not saying that those weren't valid ways of telling this story, maybe they are potentially even superior ways of telling this story, but the point is, I've never written a novel, and maybe, just maybe, there are enough challenges in that process to keep me busy.  

So tonight I sat down and began the story over, this time in straight third person limited (which means a narrator tells you the story, and can give you the thoughts and feelings of one character, in this case the main protagonist, whose name is Les).  When I did that, I felt like things started to click in a way they hadn't yet.  I got very excited about what I wrote, and in my excitement I have decided to forego, wisely or unwisely, my most cardinal rule:  never post anything the same day that you write it.  

I won't go into all the reasons why it's not a good idea to post something without allowing the heat of creation to dissipate first.  I could, but I don't want to talk myself out of it.  Getting into a writing groove is kind of like getting drunk: in the moment everything you say and do feels golden, it sounds and feels like the best thing you've ever done, and the golden afterglow tends to linger for awhile.  It's only the next day, when cold, painful reality is back in control of your life, that you realize that half of what you said was utter garbage, and the other half only has the potential to be decent, if you're willing to invest the sweat-equity to make it so, that is.  Being drunk has the added advantage of blurring your memories, allowing you to half-believe in the greatness you achieved in your inebriation; writing has the distinct disadvantage of providing you with a complete and accurate transcript of your inebriation. 

Regardless, I've decided to post this without review and while still under the influence (creatively, not alcoholically).  I trust that readers will compensate generously for this fact, as well as for the fact that what you are about to read is a first draft, and as such, is subject to all the flaws and shortcomings that make them first drafts to begin with.    

All you need to know in order to understand what happens is that the main character, Les, is a boy of roughly fourteen years of age, who has a strong mistrust, and perhaps even, downright dislike for, his stepmom Julia, whom his father married a short six months before.   The father is temporarily out of the picture, and in this scene, stepmom Julia is driving stepson Les to an unknown destination...

So, without further ado, and before I chicken out, let the adventure begin:

The George Bush Bet - Part Four

The fourth and final part of "The George Bush Bet" picks up with Sandy and I at the St. James Library in London.  We are there to resolve a bet concerning the first George Bush's early political career (To find out how that happened, you really need to start here).  We located the reference section, and an enormous book called Who's Who in Politics.  At stake is 100 pounds, and potential embarrassment on a multinational scale... 

It was a big book, and I doubted it would only include British politicians, unless it went back to Roman times.  I quickly jumped to the ‘B’s’ and scanned through the pages until I reached the ‘Bu’s.’   And then I saw the name ‘Bush, George Herbert Walker,’ and the entry that followed:

Like his father, Prescott Bush, who was elected a Senator from Connecticut in 1952, George became interested in public service and politics. He served two terms as a Representative to Congress from Texas. Twice he ran unsuccessfully for the Senate. Then he was appointed to a series of high-level positions: Ambassador to the United Nations, Chairman of the Republican National Committee, Chief of the U. S. Liaison Office in the People's Republic of China, and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. 

“I don’t believe it,” I said, sagging against the bookcase, instantly deflated.

           

“What?” Sandy said, trying to read over my shoulder.  I handed the book over to him with a finger pointing to the spot of defeat.  “Well,” he said, grinning broadly, but not smugly, “It looks like you were wrong, doesn’t it?  How can that be?  You said you were sure.”

“I don’t know,” I said vacantly.  My mind spun madly but in vain, as I tried to remember anyone ever saying anything about George Bush Sr. serving in the House of Representatives.

Sandy began to chuckle.  “I really thought you would win the bet,” he said, handing the book back to me.  I reread the brief passage again.  My stomach sank lower and lower.  Now I was going to have to explain a two hundred dollar expense with nothing to show for it to my wife.  I was suddenly unsure if she would even believe the story I was going to tell her.  I thought about the things, or rather the only thing I could think of,  that you could spend two-hundred dollars on in London without having at least a T-shirt or at least something to show for it.  My stomach crawled into a spider-hole.  I wished the rest of me could join it.

What Happens in Vegas...

It’s no secret people do crazy things when they go to Las Vegas.  For some it’s wearing a costume, like the dude we saw dressed up as Bumblebee from the Transformers movies in an incredibly detailed, perfectly scaled-down, complete-with-working-lights outfit that easily cost thousands, apparently all for the purpose of taking pictures with tourists for tips.  

For others, many of them women, it was wearing dresses that must have been as  painful to wear as they were to see being worn, along with heels that, if they were used on fur-bearing animals, would have PETA protesting their cruelty with a multi-million dollar advertising campaign.  Still others paid money to see Carrot Top perform.  

Yes, in Vegas it’s all too easy to end up doing something you would never do otherwise.    

We drove to Vegas recently, to meet and reconnect with some close friends who live in Idaho.  Elizabeth and I left the girls with my folks; this was to be 48 hours of pure adult concentrate, to be mixed only with alcohol, not juice boxes.  Upon our arrival at the Excalibur, we drank a little, ate, talked, laughed, and drank a little more.  Then, following the advice of shampoo bottles everywhere, we repeated the process as needed.  The first night we were there we absorbed the various sensations of unadulterated hedonism by walking the Strip, where the only apparent concession to restraint is the confinement of sex to business cards handed out by men dressed like Seattle fishmongers on both sides of every street corner. 

The next day, we ruled a domain that incorporated everything from the Excalibur to the Mandalay Bay.  We lived like royalty for a day:  we ate like royalty, we drank like royalty, we spent unconscionable gobs of cash like royalty.   The only difference was that, unlike royalty, we had no one we could oppress to replenish our monetary reserves.  That night, we were invited to cut the line and duck into a night club (the Cathouse at the Luxor) without paying a cover (Four middle-aged, middle-class, semi-fashion-conscious bourgeoisie – hmmm, what could they have been thinking?).  We thought we had pulled one over on them, until we got the $50 bar tab for four drinks.  Our response was to scoff at the exorbitant prices, drain those blankety-blank drinks, and then take our revenge on their dance floor, causing at least that much in damage to their prestige, if not the actual floor.   We danced the night away, more of it at any rate than Elizabeth and I have seen in years, finally keeling over in bed at 3:30 a.m. 

Much later that morning, true to the Las Vegas ethic, we left without saying goodbye.

Needless to say, we had a grand time.

The George Bush Bet - Part Three

In Part Two of "The George Bush Bet," Sandy proposed a bet in the amount of 100 pounds centered on the question of whether George Bush Senior ever served as a US senator, representative, or governor prior to  becoming president.  I said none of the above, and Sandy took the field.  Part Three picks up with our search through the streets of London for the answer to this perplexing question.      

Sandy and I turned around and headed back towards the intersection we had crossed just a few minutes before.  The light was in our favor, so we crossed over to the corner on which Big Ben stood.  We passed beneath its towering presence, walking alongside the Parliament building towards the next light.  “You know, I’m a Free Mason,” he said, continuing his interesting habit of broad-jumping off into a new category of conversation for no apparent reason.  “Do you know what the Free Masons are?”  I told him I did, and that I had long been curious about the mysterious society and in particular, the illustriousness of their membership, which included Washington, Franklin and Jefferson, among many others.  I told him that my wife and I had gone into the Masonic Temple in Philadelphia once, but we had just missed the tour.  “You know, you’d make a good Mason.  I can tell about you that you’re a good man who’s interested in helping others.  What’s your religious affiliation, if you don’t mind my asking?” 

I have to admit, there were several moments where I got the distinct impression  he was conning me, this being one of them, but the simple sincerity with which he said things seemed difficult to fake.  I squinted, scrutinizing his face for any sign of contrivance.  He was looking at me expectantly, awaiting a response.  If Sandy was conning me, I decided, he was earning every penny with his performance. 

“Well, I was raised Catholic,” I replied, leaning subtly on the word ‘raised.’  I waited, as I always did, to see if the other person picked up on the nuance of the statement. 

“Oh,” he replied.  “In that case I suppose you would join the Knights of Columbus.”  I guess nuance doesn’t always translate well, even when it’s in the same language.

But I was persistent.  “You know, I really don’t see that happening,” I replied.  I smiled slyly and trotted out a favorite line I had appropriated from one of my friends.  “I’m more of a roaming Catholic.” I purposely added extra emphasis to the ‘ing,’ especially the ‘g’ sound, trying to ensure that he didn’t skip right over it, assuming I said ‘Roman.’  He gave no indication that he appreciated, or even noticed, the play on words.  I gave up.

The George Bush Bet - Part Two

The story of the George Bush bet continues.  While in London in 2004, I met Sandy, an Australian antique dealer.  He struck up an apparently innocent conversation with me about the Cenotaph, a British monument in the heart of the city, and then informed me that he had just won a bunch of money at a casino somewhere.  The conversation now turns, naturally, to the topic of the George Bushes, the current (in 2004) and former American presidents...  

“I can tell you’re a man who knows a great deal.  I have a question for you,” Sandy said as we resumed walking, “Tell me about this president of yours.  How did this George Bush get to be President of your country?  What did he do before he was President?  His father was President too, wasn’t he?” 

Although I was taken aback by the abrupt shift in topics, I have to admit it generated an immediate warm spark of kinship.  After all, I had been going around London asking cab drivers, subway passengers, ticket-takers and anyone else I thought might sit still for the question how they felt about Tony Blair and whether they thought he would survive the current surge of discontent over his commitment to the war in Iraq.  I was also soliciting opinions regarding a smaller tempest occurring simultaneously over Blair’s proposal to charge tuition to the state universities.  I did this because I am naturally curious about the opinions and attitudes of other people, but also because I felt a certain obligation to play against the stereotype of Americans as being comatose when it comes to the political affairs of other countries.    

In response to Sandy’s question, I explained that George Bush was the governor of Texas prior to being elected President, and mentioned that governors had a record of doing pretty well in presidential elections over the recent past.  For some reason, Sandy found this hard to believe.  “But what about your Senate and your . . . your . . . oh, what do you call them?”  He abruptly stopped short, his face suddenly scrunching into a painful grimace, and for a moment I thought he might be having a kidney stone attack.  I fleetingly wondered whether there was a British equivalent for ‘911.’  That led to a follow up thought, almost as fleeting, in which I had a mental image of the TV show Cops, except it was a British version called Bobbies, where round-hatted officers pursued their suspects by walking swiftly, Charlie Chaplin-style, swinging their nightsticks and calling out after their targets, “Pardon me, sir?  I don’t want to trouble you, but we’ve had this report of a triple homicide, you see, and the combination of blood and human remains on your clothes there is rather suspicious.  It wouldn’t be too much trouble to slow down for a moment, and let us have a look, would it?”  This thought so amused me that I almost forgot that my new friend was still in a state of mental anguish.

The George Bush Bet - Part One

Elizabeth, Jessica, my older sister Kristie and I took a trip to London in the early spring of 2004.  We were there for about a week, and had a great time exploring the city, at least as much as can be seen with a two-year-old in tow.  The following story relates an incident that is really just a sidebar to the overall trip, but it's interesting for being one of the more bizarre (and expensive) casual encounters I've had.  I wrote the whole thing down shortly after returning home, so unlike the tale of Uncle Day Weekend, this one won't be dragged out over the course of many weeks, but will be posted in four parts in an orderly and timely fashion.  Promise.   

The George Bush Bet - Part One

Let me say right upfront that I am not a gambler by nature.  I just don’t have the personality for it; I get no adrenaline rush from the idea of making or losing money on the outcome of a game of chance. 

It’s not that I’ve never known the pleasures to be found in lady luck’s boudoir. The first money bet I ever made was for twenty dollars when I was in the eighth grade.  That was almost a weeks’ worth of profits from the collection receipts on my paper route.  The bet was on an NFL game in ‘81, and happened to be one where the 49’ers came back from behind to win at the end and, more importantly, cover the spread.  I remember the intense emotional roller coaster I went through during that game:  the wrenching impact of every handoff, the agonizing anticipation of every five-step drop, the life-and-death implications of every third and long.  My dad had never seen me so involved in a sporting event before, and I think it made him happy, or at least a little relieved. 

I remember feeling the hopeless despair when it looked like the game was over and I was going to somehow have to pay off this bet and pay for the newspapers this week as well.  I couldn’t believe I was so stupid as to bet all my money on a football game. 

But it wasn’t over yet.  There was the flickering glimmer of hope, building with each completed pass by Montana as the Niners moved down the field, and then – miracle of miracles! – the touchdown, and the game was over!  I knew in that moment the thrill of victory that ABC always talked about.  It was electrifying, heady stuff, and instantly addictive, at least until I lost a bet a few games later.  Somehow, the cold sobriety of losing killed any further desire to taste the intoxicating bubbles of winning.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 8

My prolonged absence from the blog has been due mostly to my determination to finish this story once and for all.  I have been working on it non-stop for two weeks, and while the result is far from perfect, I am thoroughly ready to call 'uncle' on Uncle Day Weekend...

For readers who can remember that far back, Part 7 detailed the majority of our visit to a little-known place called Bearizona. This visit occurred within the larger context of our Labor Day weekend trip, which we rechristened 'Uncle' Day weekend because we couldn’t take the summer heat in Phoenix anymore, and so sought refuge in the high country around Flagstaff.  Another goal was to get there and back without using the I-17 at any time, and to not travel the same road twice.  Part 8 carries us all the way to the conclusion of this story. 

Bearizona’s black bear exhibit was large in size and impressive in the number of bears it contained.  The dirt road through the enclosure was probably close to a half-mile long, if you straightened out the two large loops designed to give the visitor more viewing opportunities.  Once we entered, we saw almost immediately that the bears were active.  The staff must have just fed them, because a substantial number of bears were just off the edge of the trail, eating breakfast.  For some reason, they reminded me of old pictures of Dust-Bowl-era migrants pulled over informally along the shoulders of the Mother Road to eat, picnicking on their way to the Promised Land.  I must have seen a picture like that once upon a time; otherwise, I have no idea why that thought would even come to me.  Some of the bears were on all fours, and some were sitting straight up on their haunches, but all were doing the same thing:  eating slices of white bread.  Each one had a slice of the stuff already in its mouth, or was holding it with a paw.  We noticed one bear was holding his piece up to the sun as though he were appreciating its form, the way I might hold up a plump chunk of king crab leg glistening with clarified butter.  Some had piles of slices next to them.  

Black bears and white bread.
Sounds like a country song...

Who knew bears had a thing for Wonder Bread?  And they ate it with such apparent relish, too; it seemed to be a delicacy to them, like eating dessert first.  I’m sure they had been given other food as well; good food, healthy food, food with actual flavor.  All they seemed interested in was the Wonder Bread.  It was funny, but on some level, also a little disturbing.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 7

Uncle Day Weekend is the continuing saga of an overnight road trip we took over Labor Day Weekend.  Wondering why it’s called ‘Uncle Day?’  Check this out.  In part 6, we made it just inside the gates of Bearizona, a relatively new attraction near Williams, Arizona.  Part 7 is all about what we saw inside…

The first area of the park after the munched motorhome display (check out part 6 if you want to see a picture) is the donkey exhibit.  The map calls them American Burros.  This, I suppose, is in contrast to Mexican burros, which I love, especially with shredded beef and red chile sauce, but American burros are just donkeys.  It’s a strange way to start, although I suppose if you’re going to show donkeys at a wild animal park, the best place to put them is at the beginning.  They’re certainly not going to provide the big finish.  At Bearizona, there were maybe ten of them spread around randomly over the wide, bare ground of their enclosure, standing under pine trees or just out in the open.  Even they seemed confused as to why they were there.  We drove slowly through the large pen, searching for any sign of interesting behavior, or even movement.  One kind of twitched his ear, and then another lazily bent his neck to look in our direction.  He began to saunter towards us, and I got the feeling he might be coming over to bum a cigarette.  Sensing our non-smoker aura, he changed direction at the last moment and shuffled past us, meandering slowly along the road, eventually stopping and standing in another part of the pen.  That was exciting.  We moved on.

Donkeys in their natural habitat. I think there are four of them in this picture.

So cool.

The next exhibit was bison.  I love bison.  They are unequivocally my favorite North American mammal.  I love their massive, shaggy, triangular heads with their scraggly goatees, and thick, stubby horns.  Above the hips, they look like furry Marines, with thick necks, immense chests, enormous shoulders, and torsos which narrow sharply to a trim, dare I say positively svelte, waist.   Yet from the waist back, it’s as though God slapped an average cow’s rear end onto this monumental beast.  Granted, a cow that spends a lot of time at the gym doing squats, but a cow nonetheless.  This almost comical combination makes them look as though they’re always on the verge of tipping forward onto their broad, flat heads, leaving their little back legs wiggling helplessly in the air.  It’s an image that makes you want to laugh, but you quickly suppress the urge, because bison look as though they’re just waiting for you to give them a reason to turn you into mulch.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 6

In part 5, I’m sure you remember, we spent an evening at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, AZ.  We slumbered the night away peacefully, and the next morning it was waffles, brochure rack, and Bearizona. I also rhapsodized about the many fine qualities of Super 8 motels. Now it is Monday, Labor (Uncle) Day, and we are ready to set off on the return trip home.  Remember, the goal was to go from Phoenix to Flagstaff and back without using Interstate 17, and without retracing our steps…

Back at the car, I called the number on the Bearizona brochure to verify the hours and admission price.  The person I spoke with told me they were already open for the day, would stay open until 7 p.m., and the cost to get in was $16 per adult, $8 for kids, with free admission for children two-and-under.  Although I grumbled about the cost of admission, we decided to take a chance and check it out.  We would be driving through Williams anyway, so we always had the option of skipping it if the bear place turned out to be three bear cubs in a playpen, or something like that.    

We gassed up the Sportage and rolled onto the westbound I-40 shortly after eight for the 30-mile drive to Williams.  The I-40 west of Flagstaff is one of the stretches of interstate that many people who live in the Phoenix metropolitan area just don’t use.  Williams does provide a way to get to the Grand Canyon, via Highway 64, but most people, me included, prefer the much more scenic Highway 180 which winds north and west from Santa Fe Drive in Flagstaff, skirting the voluminous San Francisco Peaks through stands of aspen, fir and spruce, mixed in with the pine and juniper.  Once you get past Williams, I-40 is a hundred miles of terra incognita to most people from the Valley.  If it weren’t for the fact that a small stretch of I-40 serves as a critical link for people traveling between Phoenix and Las Vegas, its existence west of Flagstaff would be probably be doubted by even the more religious members of our community. 

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 5

Part 4 primarily concerned itself with finding a place to eat dinner while in Flagstaff over Labor Day weekend.  I still don’t know how I got 5 pages out of that one part of the story.  Part 5 picks up as we leave the restaurant on Sunday evening. 

Uncle’s Day Weekend – Part 5

Dusk was creeping overhead as we left Ni Marco’s Pizza.  “How about we drive up to the Lowell Observatory?”  I suggested once we were back on the road.  There were no objections, so instead of following the curve of Milton/Santa Fe avenues, we turned left and headed up Mars Hill Road.  What a great name:  Mars Hill Road.  I don’t know if it was through pure serendipity, or was something less than a coincidence that an observatory came to be located on Mars Hill, but it is perfectly fitting.  We wound our way up in the strengthening darkness, and parked in the lot at the top.  Being a Sunday night, we weren’t sure if they would even be open, but it turned out that they had a special event as part of the holiday weekend, and were open until eleven.

We wandered around the visitor’s center, looking at the exhibits, and just giving Maria a chance to exhaust herself.  It was now around seven, and as I recall, she had napped for literally no more than ten minutes that afternoon.  But she was showing no ill effects, and seemed to be in no imminent danger of pooping out.  We waited around for some video presentation to start, but Maria wouldn’t stay, pronouncing the dimly-lit hall and spacey interlude music “too scary,” so Elizabeth took her back to the exhibit hall where she could continue trying to pull the display meteors off their stands.  I’m a sucker for anything scientific, or that deals with nature, so I was even able to stomach the Mannheim Steamroller music that introduced the video.  Jessica, however, took all of two minutes to become hopelessly bored and annoyed.  I looked at her several times, vacillating between telling her to suck it up, and giving in to her unspoken request to go.  I flashed forward in my imagination to our retirement days.  Elizabeth and I would do nothing but travel, happily watching long, badly scored nature videos in places just like the Lowell Observatory, and we would have the best time of our lives.  I nudged Jessica, jerked my head slightly towards the exit, and we left quietly.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 4

In Part 3, we finally made it to Flagstaff after a full day of high country entertainment, including but not limited to, a dangerous lake, phantom meteors and motorcycles, and porta-potties.  Part 4 picks up after our arrival at the motel late Sunday afternoon. 

After a brief rest, we left our room in Flagstaff and got back in the car in search of a restaurant for dinner.  Our motel was to the east of downtown, part of a row of motels that parallels Interstate 40. We had no idea what we wanted to eat, so we figured we would drive through the heart of town looking for something suitable.  Crossing the railroad tracks, we turned left onto Flagstaff’s main drag, Santa Fe Ave, also known as the I-40 Business Loop, or more romantically, Route 66.  We called out the names of restaurants familiar and unknown as we passed them by, hoping something would spontaneously emerge, like a star in the east, that we all could agree on.  We reached the big curve that bent our line of travel from west to south, and the road changed names from Santa Fe to Milton Ave.  A mile or so ahead, the dreaded I-17 now loomed before us, and still no dining revelation had occurred.  Flagstaff is not a city we know particularly well, but this indecision over where to eat was definitely familiar territory.  I reproached myself silently for not anticipating this problem, for allowing myself to be lulled into complacency.  When it comes to eating out, anytime you set off without a clear destination in mind, you must accept the high probability of serious complications.   Now we found ourselves sliding towards the precipice of possible disaster.  “Well, what are you hungry for?” I finally had to ask.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 3

Alright, I know this is late, and I apologize profusely to those of you who waited with (was that baited, SB?) breath for this installment, and were disappointed when it didn't appear on Sunday as promised.  As I mentioned in replying to some of you individually, life sometimes intrudes on our plans, and this weekend was a great example of that.  Jessica had her 10th birthday on Saturday, and our weekend was booked with a sleepover Friday night, and then a family party on Saturday.  Now, I'm not using that as an excuse, since I had known that Jessica was turning 10 on Saturday for awhile now, maybe even weeks.  I still thought I had everything under control, but then there are the unaccounted things that happen, and we had one of those on Sunday.  So, with final apologies for the delay, let's get right back to the action, shall we?  I hope it proves worth the extra wait.  

The story left off with us trying to find a place in or around Strawberry, AZ, to have our picnic lunch on the way to Flagstaff.  We pick things up around noon on Sunday of Labor (Uncle) Day weekend . . .

 Uncle Day Weekend – Part 3

We scoured the roadside for picnic areas, but saw nothing more than a few areas where the trees pulled back from the road to create a rocky, semi-grassy opening.  My internal stressometer was starting to pick up signals.  “We’re going to need a place that has a bathroom,” Elizabeth reminded me as our heads pivoted swiftly from side to side.  I gestured with one arm to the acres of open land around us.

“We’re in one,” I said.

“We’re going to need a real bathroom,” she said, forcing me to meet her eyes. End of discussion on that point.  The pressure was definitely building inside the car.  This little snafu had the potential to become a major negative check mark in the mental tally I was keeping.  The kids had been great so far; they were watching Beauty and the Beast on the portable DVD player.  But how much longer?  Eight miles passed, then nine.  I wasn’t enjoying the pine trees and the thick white clouds in the sky anymore.  We drove past a filling station with a diner next to it.  “There,” Elizabeth said, pointing. 

“I thought we brought our lunch.  If we eat there, it’s going to seriously impact our budget,” I insisted. Some people spend their lives defending their country, others their honor.  I am the great defender of the budget.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 2

This is part 2 in the saga of Uncle Day Weekend, a recounting of  our trip up north over part of Labor Day weekend just to get away from the heat.  Part 1, if you remember, focused on the events leading up to the trip itself.

Sunday morning arrived to find us engaged in our usual harried efforts to throw everything together at the last minute before a road trip.   Typically, we start off at harried, progress to flustered, and usually come within sight of completely unhinged, a pattern which normally includes a fair amount of ugliness and some bitter recriminations between Elizabeth and me.  It’s funny; people tell us all the time that we are so good to each other, so kind and respectful.  HA!  That’s just the show we put on for mass consumption; the truth is, we fight like hell.  We rip each other apart at times, and have no compunction about going for the other’s throat (remember the open door, anyone?).  The secret to our success, I suppose, is that as nasty as our confrontations can be in the moment, we get over them quickly, and accept them for what they are: clashes between two people who agree on where we want to go, but almost always disagree about how to get there.  Which is exactly why I didn’t tell her about taking a different way to Flagstaff.

Uncle Day Weekend - Part 1

“UNCLE!”   You might have heard this being screamed last week around seven-thirty on Tuesday morning.  That was me.   Sorry if I disturbed you.  That was officially the moment I finally cracked under the heat.  We had been hanging in there pretty well, but August, with its near-constant 110 degree days, aggravating humidity and complete lack of rain did me in.  We spent every single scorching second of the summer in the Valley this year.  Well, technically that’s not true.  Elizabeth’s cousin scored us free comp vouchers to stay for two nights at the Harrah’s in Laughlin, Nevada, so in June we took a trip to one of the few places on Earth that regularly beats our heat island inferno in the daily mercury velocity competition.  But it was a change of scenery, sort of, and the Colorado River was cool, even if the hotel pool wasn’t, and besides, did I mention it didn’t cost anything to stay there?  That’s an important consideration when your family’s income has taken a substantial hit, thanks to a certain freelance writer, who’s great at the free department, but not so good at lancing yet.  

We finally decided we had to get out of town, and restore our faith in the existence of weather where you don’t have to check the labels of your clothes to make sure they’re flame-retardant before you step outside.

The Open Door - Second Postscript

I've received a number of emails and messages wanting to know I if I ever did get that new bar of Irish Spring into the shower.  Well, perhaps this will allow all you worriers out there to rest a little easier tonight:

This is what order in the universe looks like

Ah, life as it should be.  Note the pale green halo exuded by this glorious concoction of sodium tallowate, sodium cocoate, and/or sodium palm kernelate!  Note also that Elizabeth's Dove Bar is noticeably worse for the wear.  It's definitely approaching the critically massless threshold.


And since I was in the shower with a camera and soap, here's a bonus photo . . . 
























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I'm ready for my endorsement deal, Colgate-Palmolive Co.

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