Oblivion Measured Out In Carefully Weighed Little Spoons of Despair

Things are happening quickly.

I came into town Saturday last, knowing no one, and now, just a few days later, I have been accepted into a loosely knit tribe of individuals who divide their time between the Pedestrian Bridge during the evenings and the Barton Springs site during the day.  I probably know and am known by at least fifteen or so denizens of the street by now.

This...tribe seems to live permanently in the Land of the Lotus Eaters.  The goal seems to be the next hit of smoke, the next can of this chemical pleasure, that book of rolling papers, enough tobacco to roll a pinner.  Oblivion measured out in carefully weighed little spoons of despair.

I met Courtney.

She's 19 years old, looks 17, and is down here on the lean and mean streets of Austin, doing her thang.  She's the Sweetheart of the Rodeo, if you're looking for metaphors.  The Princess of the Pedestrian Bridge.  And I like her.

I mean, I can see her life, the entire thing unrolling in my imagination.  

[Cue the theme song for Courtney's soap opera, clashing cymbals and thunderous drama.]

She's with this one guy (Snail) while her fiance is in jail (six more months to go) but...well, there was this other guy she met somewhere sometime yesterday, and poor old "Snail" just kinda shuffles along as she and the new guy grope each other.  I feel sorry for Snail, but he seems to be taking it with a kind of equanimity one reads about in books with such catchy titles as The Heart Disconnected or Ain't No Big Deal.  I can only imagine the torrent of emotions roiling along beneath that calm exterior.

My mother threw me out of the house when I was 13, he says matter of factly.

And the rock his stone-face is carved from...shows no pain.  30 years old, going on 13.  Stuck in the tar baby of arrested emotional development.  Still seeking out approval.  A master at the whirling sticks.  A teller of jokes.  But not an alpha male.  Too kind, too gentle.  He's, well, boring.  At least for a woman who's 19 years old and a hormone-driven machine.

Methinks Courtney is drawn to the alphas.

I don't want my heart broken again, she told me the other night. 

I told her, Get used to it.  It's gonna happen again and again.

Like noooooo waaaaaaaaaaaay, Dude, she said.
 
To her credit, she just hooked up with Snail two or three days ago and it's very much one of those "don't know" relationships.  She doesn't know what to do.  I mean, fiance in jail?  Snail available but not so exciting...new guy (who knows what's going on w/ him?) and then the one she slept with after the drum circle the other night.  He seems to have little to less-than-little interest in her now.  What is not to her credit is how she shamelessly flirts with this new guy right in front of Snail.  And a bit of the dazed look in his eyes, a bit of not wanting to look anyone in the fucking eye, dudes, like...you know....ain't no biggie but don't say a fuckin' word.


Small time hustlers move by the arse-busting benches of the Pedestrian Bridge.  Wanna buy a joint? they ask.  See?  A bloody joint.  And the collective shaking of heads nooooo, ain't got no money, Bro as he moves by with little lame feelers sent out, little crippled wishes:  but I wish I could.... or ...sure could use a hit, Bro, hint hint.


The beat goes on.

The rhythm of the street moves from the Great Drought (where the fuck is the smoke????) to plethora where mota is leaping out of the cornucopia at ya and ya gotta gasp out, Nuff awreddy!  Last night beneath the bridge, the rain just coming down rattatattat, felines and canines, and a circle of maybe eight people and four (count 'em) joints going, clockwise and otherwise.  Classic feast or famine.

I sometimes feel that I have stumbled onto one of the lost tribes of Israel, the Lost Children who cannot grow up, but can only grow old.  And I was accepted into this only because I could pronounce the shibboleth correctly.  And, truth be told, I was on the streets long before any of these kids were even born.  A long time ago.

For the older ones, those with experience, there is a tendency to protect what is there.  By that I mean that they pick up after themselves, they urge the younger ones to put the rubbish in the rubbish cans rather than tossed over the shoulder into the memory shredder.  They don't argue with the cops, they don't advertise their presence.

Yesterday, one of the guys got a broom and swept for at least an hour, cleaning the spillway rocks.  Then the rain came and great acres of rubbish from upstream, all the flotsam of a disposable culture came rushing down the dirty grey-brown water.  And it went on like that for quite some time until finally the waterways were cleansed and the stream ran free of plastic bottles and bags and the like.

I had to wade through the rushing water, bending to get through the little tunnel to where the Beast stood still in the midst of the raging current, coping with it all.  Good strong old Beast. Good girl. Semper fi.

Courtney and Snail took me along to the Gathering.  When we got there after this horrific hike, a group of 30 or 40 young people in various poses and costumes.  One full-faced makeup, reminding me of a character out of a spinoff of Edward Scissorhands.

I felt out of place.  I'd learned a magic trick a day or so before from a book in the library, one involving a bit of sleight-of-hand, and so I pulled my magic cord out and began practicing the trick.  A young woman across from me began watching and finally said, Like, Duuuuude, what are you, like, DOing?

So I told her I had magical powers and blah blah and she said, Okay, show me what to like do, kay?

Within a couple of minutes her friends had gathered around as she tried and tried but of course could not do the knot.  A freak named Sunshine came by, big man, and watched.  He, too, couldn't get it.  You're doing something, he said, but you're too fast for me to catch.

The dope was in abundance, a whirling mob of little priests and priestesses passing out the wafers of mota at the sacrament of the Gathering.

Bless me, Duuuude, for I have sinned.

Lay one on me, Duuuude, for I have sinned.

How kewl is that???

And just when the energy is building to orgiastic heights, two cops roll up on bicycles.  The pagan in full makeup is caught both smoking a joint and drinking a beer--and is given a citation.

But the worst part is that the cops make everyone disperse.  Another site is quickly circulated...like, kewl, duuuude, we'll like meet up over at yada-yada.

Which is too far for us.  We the people of the street, in order to form a more perfect union...march slowly and dejectedly back to the...Bridge.  One of the guys hobbles along on crutches, lower leg broken in five places, pinned.  An alpha male, Courtney nervously hanging at his side.  She cannot seem to see he has no real interest in her.

At the bridge, Tom called me aside.  "Be sure to call me Tuesday," he said sotto voce.  "I'm gonna have a shitload of money."  Hmmmm.  I suspect he might be open to getting the cable so we can upload some pictures.  And just where did I put his number?  Make a note to find it tomorrow.

He pulled out a cardboard sign he'd made.  The caption read, "I'm just like Obama--all I want is a little change."  Ahhhhh.  Spare change.  Clever.

A woman waltzes up.  Tom rushes to introduce me.  This is Elijah, he says pointing to me.  Good dude, really like really good dude. I can vouch for him.

And later I began shivering, chilled.  Had to climb on the bike and ride enough to get the blood pumping and the sweat beading.  And when I lay my sorry old head down to sleep, I slept within the folded 8' x 6' blue tarp from Home Depot.