Archive for July, 2008
Prologue: Sorry for the lack of posts. I have been wallowing in my depression for a few weeks now. I actually have become quite capable of carrying on what appears to be a functioning life that completely belies the dread and despair underneath. Only my wife occasionally glimpses beyond the veil and she is not prepared to admit that side of me exists – and I can’t blame her. I will now recount the annual pilgrimage of the family to “the beach”. I was depressed before I left and depressed upon my return. But nary a friend or kin was aware. Thank thee beer and thank thee vodka.
What has been going on? Family vacation at the beach. The Beach vacation is first observed in the reading of the list - and checking provisions against the lists - and double checking the provisions and the list lists and – if absolutely necessary – after the vacation is consummated – and a proper council convened - modifying lists for next years trip. Glob Bless the reading of the list. Then the vacation is observed the arrangement of the sacraments in the processional vehicles. The sacraments are all assembled around the holiest of holy sacraments – the cooler holding Glob’s own true manna – beer – and meat – and vodka – and meat – and more beer.
Upon arrival at the temple, there is always battle with the priests regarding one’s the reservations of one’s sanctum. “Yes yes, I know you requested a view of the beach, and the 1st floor” but many of Glob’s people are here to honor his Sun”. “No, no, your sanctum is not available yet because the sanctum must be cleaned and provided with freshly blessed towels and linens” etc. Once the priests are properly satisfied with your offerings, one begins the unloading of sacraments and vestments from the processional vehicles into the sanctum. One is immediately aware of the awesome power of Glob’s Sun is begins to infuse your cranium and shorts with his spirit. When the sanctum is properly provisioned then observation of beach vacation begins in earnest.
As an elder, my primary responsibility from this point on is the nap so that Glob may give me visions of revelation for my tribe. This year marks the second year that the 3rd generation of my tribe has joined us at the beach. She is too young to really understand the observation of Glob and his Sun, but it occasionally falls on me to walk her through the rites and rituals. She calls me “Bampa” or sometimes “C’mon Bampa . None but her can disturb my meditation naps without incurring curmudgeous wrath.
The elder woman of the tribe, “Mammy”, bravely disturbs me each day to assist in the preparation of the ice cream sacrament and I shower her with grumblings and mutterings. None the lest I comply. The list is painstakingly followed in the preparation of the ice cream. It is a noisy affair all but insuring no napping, but the resulting nectar is joy to the tongue.
Another of my responsibilities as the elder of the tribe is the grilling of the meat. The sad truth is, Bampa has lost his passion for the grilling of the meat and it is nigh growing time for that mantle to be passed on. In fact, the ingesting of even small portions of the meat already causes Bampa much passing on. The meats are many that are grilled and they come from land and sea. They are all properly pre-prepared according to the holy instructions of the list. However, Bampa, now pre-marinates his stomach with a beer batter before ingesting the sacramental meat. The ingredients for that recipe are 12 to 48 oz’s of beer and – well – that’s all. The beer can be chugged or swilled. Bampa actually ingests very little of the sacramental meat leaving that to the younger and stronger members of the tribe.
Speaking of the younger members of my tribe and the others who have joined us for this pilgrimage, they all where as little clothing as possible so that they may properly be molded by Glob’s Sun. This can at times be very distracting to Bampa’s naptime visions and at times his naps are fraught with distress as he wrestles with his temptation to meditate upon the female tribe member’s more bumpy offerings to Glob’s Sun. Mammy sometimes helps him focus his meditations by bringing him a beer and ritually smacking his head. This is all so confusing to Bampa and he looks forward to the day he stands before Glob so that the reasoning for the persistence of this desire can last so long into Bampa’s life. The younger one’s in the tribe frolic in the water, and toss discs about, and bounce a ball back and forth over a net as they invoke Glob’s Sun to take their bodies and bake them in his likeness. Bampa can only participate in the ritual frolicking for brief and only symbolic times. Some of the young will prostrate themselves hoping that Glob’s Sun will hear their pleas. I look upon them in their prostration and no that Glob will soon deliver my beer and smack in the head.
Eventually the time comes when the temple priests demand that you make way for other pilgrims. The sacraments are either packed or hastily ingested and the vestments are likewise packed away and the pilgrims return home. Upon returning home, some of the pilgrims will stand before the mirror and behold the work of Glob’s Sun upon their flesh. Other’s of us, will stand and ponder that suspicious mole. All will praise Glob and his Sun and thank him for his blessings.
On the downside of roller-coaster hill again another omen. A young coyote dashes across the road. His leap starts somewhere just past barbed wire on one side of the road and ends – over the pavement – just before the wire - on the other side. He limbos under the fence in a flash and sprints across the pasture. The young ones, besides being smaller, are more jittery. Coyotes are lurkers and don’t like to be caught out in the open but there’s not much ‘open’ left. The older ones – more gray in their coat - don’t jump quite as easy. They’ll take a just a fraction of a moment to consider your noisy hunk of metal hurling down the road towards them; to contemplate your proliferating bricks, shingles, driveways, cul-de-sacs; your plastic playscapes, sprinklers, and mulched flower beds. Then bolt back in the shadows.
