An Open Letter To The Scene

Punk, you let me down

What’s your deal anyhow?

Human ethicality or an effort to be seen?

You say, “It’s not about that.”

You confuse me

Punk, I let you down

Cos you don’t see me around

Art and music is my bloodletting

I ain’t no Mr. Bloodshedding

Being poor is never charming

Your grin is so disarming

Your act is not alarming

With an air so quizzical

Polluted, slight, invisible

This shit just makes me miserable

Punk, you let me down

Surprise, Surprise, Surprise

If you know me, then you know my relationship with my family is a point of tumult for me. Never easy, always shifting, but never actually changing its face, my interaction with my relatives is a painful sore on the butt of my life.

So you can imagine my surprise when unexpectedly, I hear from my 85 year old grandparents yesterday. I have not been their favorite atheist, mostly liberal, oft without employ grandson over the years. They called me at work saying they were in town and would like to meet with me after my shift was over. They wanted to see my new home, meet my fiancée and see my similar to theirs, part Italian-part Mexican face.

Thoughts were swirling. Past events, their current political beliefs, possible scenarios… I was bubbling with anxiety about seeing them.

“Maybe I shouldn’t see them?”

“They are old and might pass on soon, never mind their once horrible treatment of you, they are part of you. You must.”

I decided I would meet with them.

It went smoothly. They were too old to grill me or ridicule me. I, too moderately successful for them to tell me I was nothing. I took the chance of asking my Grandfather about his history so as to garner some insight to my history, being the self-serving bastard they have always thought I was destined to be.

What I heard thru his hate for the current administration, thru his louding of the merits of his beloved Las Vegas mayor (“He has the showgirls on his arms, the martini in his hands! He is a stand-up guy. Told Obama to shove it!”)… thru all of this I hear some truth.

He told me of how his father, my great-grandfather Ernesto Scolari came over from Lombardia, Italy and bootlegged his way up the Mexico coast all the way to California. My grandfather was sent for and arrived in Petaluma where his father had settled, only to have his father arrested for bootlegging. His father was released and the family moved to Richmond, CA, the place of my birth and into the local industrial barracks. World War II broke out and my family was given 30 days to “move to the other side of San Pablo Avenue” for quarantine. My grandfather’s best friend Jimmy Ito, a Japanese neighbor was not so fortunate to have to relocate. He and his family were sent to camps.

After telling this story, my “Grandpo” as we call him, said something that hung in me.

“People have always been scared. It’s silly. And they start doing horrible things when they are scared.”

Thru all my Grandpa’s forsaking of heritage I have seen (his wife, Rosa Gonzalez, my grandmother, tho born in Mexico, has forsaken her “Mexican” title for the more “AMERICAN!” friendly term, “Mestizo”. Same thing, folks.), I saw a glimpse of honesty in what he had just said. A shred of what everybody knows deep down, coming out of him for the first time. I told him I had found a “McCarthy for President” button that I had saved years back. He laughed, understood I was referencing a "fear monger", and told me he was not THAT old.

I eat Stella Dora cookies with my coffee, crave a good salami, believe in Murphy’s Law and would rather have a poster of a kitten clawing to hang onto a branch with a caption reading, “OH SHIT!” hanging in my office, than a picture of Joseph McCarthy… just like my Grandpo. People sometimes chill out in their old age. Right on for that. Glad I took a chance and greeted the situation with love, as opposed to fear.

Thinking Out Loud Future Blog Topics

1.) Finish Enchanted Parties

2.) Mestizo battle

3.) Russell Lewis' brain

4.) Dad's accident story

Down At The Jamboree

It was lost some time ago and no one ever thought to look

For what was missing was not written down in some old dusty book

You could to feel it more than see it; like balance or like karma

Everything had its purpose and we shared this place with honor

So I’m going to try to fix this break between animal and man

I’m gonna start by tearin’ apart the way I make social plans



Won’t throw some normal soiree or give another boring party

It’s time the world sees; fun ain’t just for you and me

Yes, next time I throw a shindig; I’ll be sure to save some seats

For those with whiskers, wings and fins; four legs and furry feet

Now I’m not picky; don’t protest much; It’s not like me to brag

But I’d rather head on down to where it’s all hops, jumps and wags



Summon the fertile and the feral; from the barnyard to the kennel

Open the coops and aviaries; shoo the tops of the libraries

Invite the zoos and estuaries; call the fleas and the bees

O’er the plastic in the seas; have the beast and fowl and folk alike

Down at the jamboree



There’s something special about the kind of films I like to watch

Ones with kooky critters cracking jokes and kicking dumb dudes in the crotch

I knew it as a little kid; I know it more now that I’m older

Without our furry friends around the world would be a whole lot colder

So promise me next time you have your friends over for food

That you set some places at the table for your pets and their friends too



Summon the fertile and the feral; from the barnyard to the kennel

Open the coops and aviaries; shoo the tops of the libraries

Invite the zoos and estuaries; call the fleas and the bees

O’er the plastic in the seas; have the beast and fowl and folk alike

Down at the jamboree

Demons

I still wrestle with the stuff. Like a vicious Woody Allen, I constantly mull over thoughts and undermine myself and my actions. I have grown some. I don't throw it all away with such ease anymore. I'll still tell someone, "It's over." or "I'm done." or some other vaguely severing statement, only to turn back around and apologize and give myself more shit for being a crappy human being who doesn't appreciate the importance of other people's emotions enough to not toy with them. Honest to Buddah, it is not my intention. Demons, habit, sadness, anger...

I want to stand straight and focused again. The few fleeting times I can remember doing it hang dear in my mind. I do know what it feels like to not be all nerves, psychosis and insecurities... and to instead be right, real and proud of my current station in life, mind and body. I must keep on.

Enchanted Fuckin' Parties

I have had many jobs. Probably around 60, 58 of which I have quit voluntarily. I am notoriously a very hard worker and have even enjoyed working at times, but things like playing music in an occasionally touring band, depression, spending too much time trying to make girls happy or just plain wanting to do something else have made it to where I have a bit of a reputation as the "Revolving Job Guy". Someone even said once that I seem to be able to get any job, (It's the charm, I ain't gonna lie) but that keeping the job is the only problem.

Some of my most abysmal occupations have included: night stocker at the Lodi, California Wal-Mart, doggy day care attendant, box truck delivery driver, compact disc factory worker, an order fulfillment position that required ten hours in a freezer daily, barback at a watering hole in a town called Rough and Ready that seemed to have the movie Convoy playing on repeat, car wash attendant, diner cook and printing press worker to name only a few.

However, no job I have worked has provided me with more fare for writing and sharing the stories of my time there than the job I had dressing up, performing magic and entertaining as various characters for children's birthday parties.

It was the summer after high school when a friend's mother started a company called Enchanted Parties. She created many of the costumes and bought many others pre-assembled, all of the costumes pretty sincere to the original creation, but illegal to make money of the likeness of and incredibly uncomfortable to wear for the hour the birthday parties required. She had her son, my friend Ray, recruit students from the local theater scene to work and the business was off and running.

I was one of those workers and this is my story.

If that last line sounded like the opening dialogue to a documentary on sex workers, honestly, the feelings I had working these children's parties might not have been too far a cry from the those felt by those very prostitutes. Let me quickly clarify.

1.) I frequently feigned the presence of love as do some sex workers, when as Barney the Dinosaur I would sing "I Love You" song. Having had to sing that number a few hundred times became a rather desensitizing ritual. I didn't love them, but boy, they loved me.

2.) I would always dress up for my clients. All the bells, frills and whistles.

3.) I turned tricks. Magic ones.

4.) I always used a different name. Barney, Beast, Leonardo, Santa, Pooh.

5.) I was occasionally peed on, though mostly out of a child's fear, where as with sex workers that might transpire for someone's pleasure. But there was no pleasure for either party involved, I guarantee you. Only terror and disgust.

Yeah , so surely sex workers have it a lot harder, but getting into those colorful ovens and prancing for an hour was damn hard work. The sheer weight of the heads of these costumes was enough to send one spinning to the ground. Unlike prostitutes though, the women in the business had it a lot better than us fellas, playing mostly princesses and fairies. Nary a female could be seen wearing a heavily decorated globe-head save for the infrequently requested Minnie Mouse party.

Many parties I performed at were memorable, but a few are marked in my mind as particularly amusing, horrible or even downright cute.

There was my stint as Beast from the Disney film. The costume was pretty amazing. It included a blue velvet jacket with coattails, a regal chiffon shirt with cuff links and a giant head to wear full of fur and fangs. It was really one of the best costumes the company had. I was dancing with the birthday girl as a co-worker acting the part of princess Belle played with a gaggle of kids.

It was nearing the end of the paid hour and the mother of the child peers into my mask and says, "OK, now it's time to turn into the beautiful prince!".

I whispered back, "Lady, I don't know if you've seen me, but I look like a taxi car driver.".

She assured me that I would do fine and ushered me into the nearby garage to begin my princely metamorphosis. I stood in front of a old mirror and snapped my velvet jacket straight. I put my shoulders back, held my head up and tried to ignore my ever-present five o' clock shadow.

I had no choice. I had to face her. It was, after all, her party and her parent's had paid for a little of the ol' happily ever after. I exited the garage looking around for the birthday girl.

Calling her name out in as proper and articulate a voice I could muster, she sprung out from behind a pile of presents and proclaimed, "It's the beautiful prince!" to which my only reply was, "Why thank you!". My self-esteem has never been the same.

NEXT: Pooh Bear's Heat Stroke, Barney the Purple Pinata and The End of the Party!

Valentine's Day Surprise and The Llama's Curse

It was Valentine's Day many years back when I returned home to a giant party at the hip warehouse I was at living with my friends and bandmates. I had recently had yet another bad break up. I had quit yet another bad job the day before. 

Kicking stones with a stuffy nose, y'know? Yes, I think unhappy was a good word to describe me around then.

Oh, and dare I say hip AND my friends in the same sentence, really it was the surrounding people that lived there that were trying very hard to "keep cool", not us of course. All of those nominally famous punky celebrities, indie cred-soaked twee folk, tight-panted L.A. art rockers we lived with... and us, separate from them, my friends and I. We were proudly called the Geeks. 

Thing was we Geeks tended to agree with Lenny Bruce when he said, "There is nothing sadder than an aging hipster.". But all of this hipness and our disdain for it didn't stop us from taking a cheap space in this warehouse the second we were offered it. It was outside of our shitty hometown and closer to where shows were happening, so fuck it, we got up and got out. Action was better than apathy.

So, I get home to a giant party, right? A popular band is playing in a common space or maybe it was an office of a hip label or magazine as the place was full of those offices, I dunno. 

The band was doing all cover songs as to show their love (Valentine's Day, remember?) for another popular, older, dead and gone band. I enter the door of the warehouse and head towards my room, wading through the tons of people rocking out in my living room. Someone excitedly says, "Hey man, you should really watch them! They sound just like them!". I said that I needed to go to my room, but that I would be out to catch some music a little later. 

I opened the door to my room. 

Oh... no. God, no. 

Things had just gotten worse. Everything I owned was covered in poop. 

A sewage line had ruptured above my room. Carpet, clothes, books... soaked in poo rain. My room was right next a bathroom. Funny that I stood at the door to my room and even heard someone flush the nearby toilet... then saw that relieved someone exit the bathroom only to see their poop fall high from the broken pipeline above my room and splat on my floor.

A three word phrase I had been solemnly told to abide by only a few weeks previous rang through my head. 

"Honor the llama." 

It all finally made sense. Last night, the llama had been dishonored and now it's curse was raining down in brown.

               _____________________________________

A friend had left to live in Chattanooga and gave me dibs on her now crap-covered room. I had been waiting for a room to open up in the warehouse and when she decided to move to the dirty South, it was my golden opportunity. 

The night before she left she took me up to the loft in the room, saying she wanted to show me something special. As I arrived in the loft, I saw that it was bare except for a small stuffed animal standing in the corner, flanked by a can of beer and a bottle of wine. My friend then explained with great seriousness that in order to take her room in the warehouse that I must only, "Honor the llama.".  

"How absurd.", I thought. Then I got a closer look at the llama. 

It was of Mexican origin and covered in white feathers. Touching it, I could feel that it seemed to have bones, possibly those of a chicken, for a skeleton. It was decorated with tiny velvet ropes and golden frill. I got a some serious Santeria vibes from it. A bit freaked out, I left the loft in the room, agreeing to respect this strange object.

A few weeks later, the night before the poo rain, I was stoned and drunk. I asked my pal, Dylan, a seasoned dungeon master, a keeper of cursed entities and a knowledgeable person in regard to them, to take a look at the llama. We climbed the ladder and crawled over to the llama and it's wine and beer. 

I slurred to Dylan, very serious about my subject, "Do you think the wine and beer are an offering... or is it guarding them? I was told to honor...". 

Dylan quickly, and supposedly not as drunk as he wanted to be, grabbed the beer and said, "Only one way to find out!". As he cracked it open I yelled in horror, "Nooo!!!". 

I expected he was going to give it a good inspection and give me a report on the creepy statue... instead Dylan's sense of fun and adventure took over. His lack of the fear of the unknown, not unlike that of say, Indiana Jones... 

No. Actually, he just saw a unopened beer for the taking. But still, I don't blame Dylan for everything I owned being covered in poop the very next day.

Maybe I can blame the hipsters who ran the place and their shoddy craftsmanship assembling sewage lines. Blaming insecure hipsters from Orange County or the Midwest... or ANY hip transplant from anywhere other than the Bay Area for that matter, always feels gratifying. 

Sue me. 

Some haters would say the wash of shit was karma coming back around for all of my vocal hipster hatin'. 

Others might say it was bad luck or off chance.

I'm damn sure it was the llama.