Incident on 66
Leaping nude into the frame is the first step toward a new career
I told her that sometimes I get worried in my head that something I wrote or something I said was heard as something else instead, so I got on the therapy couch and regressed myself back in time to somewhere south of 29.
I was smoking champagne and singing Bat Out of Hell, too white and bright to be put in jail, and besides, you’d need a complainant and there ain’t one.
I traveled the state and wrote what I pleased, rolling a smoke while keeping both knees on the wheel and a mix tape filled me with the spirit as I rolled alone through hallelujah land.
Understand, this was a span of years ago, so I was alone until the guild rules said I had to take a photographer along.
The best freelance guy was emotionally disturbed. There are no words to describe what a shotgun does when you tuck it under the chin and unsubscribe. Buck found the body.
He’d talk all the time without leaving spaces, places where he might find the body again. Buck would work day and night, he didn’t give a fuck and we’d agree that one was assigned but if we had luck we’d come back with three.
When he exhibited at the main gallery they took down one of his prints as dangerous, he was incensed, maybe the only man in town with a melon-colored leisure suit and cowboy boots. It was hilarious to me that while his photography exhibit was in the gallery space, he got a spade and dug a grave for his offending masterpiece.
We were on Old 66 east of Oatman, somewhere in the middle of nowhere back then, no cars were passing, there was a high wind playing ball with tumbleweeds and dust devils danced in empty space. Buck said he had the cover shot and got me to walk down the two lane with the wind, he framed it with a tumbleweed in the foreground, then looked around to shoot more mood while the light was good.
Beside the two lane was an adobe front wall, the rest fell down but the front wall remained high enough to still have the frame where a window was. Had I paused and considered, which I didn’t back then, I’d have asked myself what kind of man takes off his clothes and leaps into the only frame in the middle of nowhere because it’s there, and what else can you do with a frame but make a picture? The shutter clicked thrice. Foreshadowing.
Not long after, I crafted a humor piece based on an afternoon at his house when he was having an argument with his wife, hilarious right? A man and wife fight? All I needed was some description and editing. I wasn’t thinking how upsetting this might be considering this guy’s fragility, like, he knew I was writing it, and he knew my style but still he was enraged. He engaged me with a pained smile, biding his while.
A half cowboy with a prescription for valium and a family history of trouble in mind, he was not used to being the butt of the joke, so I spoke truth to him, “The butt of the joke is where you belong, man, it takes a strong man to be laughed at.” He said, “I’m glad you said that.” A day or two passed, then he showed up with that picture of me bare-assed on Old 66, “You’ll be known for more than your wit soon, you son-of-a-bitch.”
“Oh Jesus,” I said, “don’t do that man.” He threatened to put posters in gay bars in town, with a description of merchandise with prices. “That’s not very nice,” I said, reduced to sincerity, and he said, “Neither was what you wrote about me.” I said, “I’m sorry but that is you to a tee.” He said, “This is you, too. I got the picture for free and am taking the liberty to give it employment. Why should negatives be sleeved when they provide others enjoyment?”
I said I’d not viewed it from that perspective, and on examination, I found nothing defective or even unpleasant, “I suppose in such work one can’t be that selective?” He said, “All comers you piece of shit,” I said, “You don’t mean it.” He insisted he did. I asked, how much might I make on a typical night? I was asking to be polite but that much? Jesus. I wouldn’t have to write.
I said, “Let me run the numbers and get back to you, Buck.” I think about him sometimes, that fucking leisure suit the color of bubble gum, a spade in his hand to dig a grave for what he loved but could not save, the night he lost our only joint in the Sheriff’s truck …
Someday I’ll go and call up Rudy We worked together at the factory But what could I say if he asks “What’s new?” “Nothing, what’s with you? Nothing much to do”