THAT'S ALL

     I can tell you now it wasn't fair. The way I was running, I could've ran into anyone like that. It really wasn't fair. I'm not saying I didn't believe in us, but the state I was in, I could've believed in anything, in anyone. I needed a place to be, some time to think and not think. I mean, Jesus Christ, I had just been through those murders. Real fuckin' murder! And it was even worse than that because I was pretty sure I knew something, something more than they did. I still do. But there's no sense getting into all of that. It's over now and I will never know what really happened. But to be honest, for a long time, I was pretty angry about it. I couldn't understand how no one in my family tried to help me in any way. I remember visiting my father and we were playing pool and all of a sudden I slid down to floor and started crying, clearly unable to grasp what was happening. All he said was, "Yeah, it's pretty unsettling". We talked a few minutes about it and then I sucked it up and we finished out our game. Anyway, it doesn't matter, I got over it. What the hell did I expect them to do anyway? I mean, that was some pretty fucked up shit. But then all that shit that went down with Lon and his family in Oklahoma. For Christ's sakes, how much can a man endure? They had become my new family, my rock. It destroyed me, watching them go down like that. I'm pretty sure I had gone insane. But who wouldn't have? Of course, I should never have taken that acid. What the hell's wrong with me? I will never know how much that had to do with it all. And before all of that, I had taken that trip up to Canada with Alan where I finally met the spirit woman. I still think about her all the time. You should've seen that woman. You looked at her and it was as if at any moment she could simply disappear. I have never once in my life seen eyes like that. She was over six foot tall and rail thin. Her hair was thick and black and it shot out in all directions like a giant fern. Her hands were huge and heavily callused. She lived alone and chopped all her own wood. I told you she sent me things telepathically, right? I don't care if you believe me or not, it happened. While I was there, she had taken me to the place where she did it from. It was a big circle of rocks in a clearing. It took us hours to canoe there. It was very important to her that she showed it to me. She had two huge wolves as pets, full blooded wolves. They went along with us in the canoes. Those wolves loved me. She said she had never seen anything like it. That was the thing, she said, the way they had taken such a liking to me. That's how she knew. I would catch her looking at me, sizing me up. I thought it was about something else she saw in me, some sort of spirituality thing I had going. But then the whole thing got weird that night when she climbed into bed with me. Her wolves climbed in too. You should've seen it, all of us up there in that strange loft in that cabin way out in those woods in the dead of winter. She took off all her clothes and pull me over to her. But there was no way I could do it. I told her I was sorry but I just couldn't do it. She was twice my age and the whole thing was just way too strange. Then that first night back in Oklahoma at Lon's, I remember being woken up by something and scrambling to find a pen and paper. I spent a good hour or so scribbling down all these equations. Page after page of equations with all the people in my life's names and words like, "air, water, moon, sun, fire, rock," places, colors, times, equal signs, greater and less than signs, etc,. I had no idea what any of it meant. And then the next morning she called. I have no idea how she got Lon's number. I guess Alan had it or something. But she called and asked me how my writing had been the night before. "How do you know I wrote something?" I asked her. She just started laughing. It was the last time I ever spoke to her. I remember Alan saying once that I really hurt her when I responded to a letter she had written me and I told her that I had met you and we were living together. I couldn't understand that either. I mean, what did I do? Why in the world did she ever think I was interested in her in that way? But that day after she called, I got another call. It was Sally. It was the first time I had spoken to her since we split up. She said the trial had gotten postponed. We both said we were sorry about everything. And she begged me to get out of Oklahoma, that Lon was a bad influence. I agreed. We didn't say much more. But it was good to hear her voice. I've always cared for her. We said bye and that was the last time we would ever speak. Everything had just turned so evil at Lon's, I decided to borrow one of his cars and I drove out to visit my mother and my sister in Lubbock. It was the worse thing I could've done. My mother was more fucked up than ever. That first night, my sister invited me over to have some beers with some of their friends. I had just gotten dressed and I opened my mother's door and caught her in her room crying and kicking the wall over and over again with her foot. "Mom, what's the matter?" I asked her.
     "Just leave me alone, Philby. You don't understand. No one understands."
     "What do you mean? What do I not understand?"
     "You don't understand. This is the way it is."
     "This is the way WHAT is?"
     "Just go! Leave me alone. No one understands."
     Anyway, I guess I'm starting to realize that I have never needed much from anyone. I can find almost anyone's good points and can make due with them. I knew I had to get back to New York. It was my only chance. I remember standing in Lon's bathroom after he threw the knife at me. I stood there for a long time, looking at myself in the mirror. I think I was still high on the acid. I started singing that Dylan line: "I'm going back to New York City, I do believe I've had enough." A couple days later I WAS back and I had already booked some modeling jobs. Then the next thing I know, there you were, sitting on my lap in that restaurant. Another whirlwind had begun. A new everything. We really had a lot of fun back then, didn't we? How could we have known it would turn as ugly as it did? It was when I started getting the poems published, wasn't it? I know. You couldn't deal with it. You couldn't deal with the cost of it. My divulgence was a mirror to your facade. For it turns out you were running too. Perhaps even harder than I was. I don't blame you anymore for the things you did. Not at all. I don't blame anyone anymore for anything. That's sort of where I'm at. My new thing. Okay, I guess that's all.