JJ

Becoming the Mountain Dude

/ David Ferland / 1 Comment

This is the nineteenth installment of a series about the Mountain Dude, a wandering guy with an ESP-like “gift”.  The Mountain Dude, some readers may recall, made a few enigmatic appearances in JJ in the 21st Century.

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My self-administered therapy is really the ongoing development of my own religion. Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not trying to set myself up as some guru, THE Mountain Dude, a wandering mystic in a modern day wilderness, healing people and proclaiming shit. I lay no claim on anyone. At least I try not to. One does fall into love or friendship now and then and tries to have some control. Some normalcy even. Partnership. But the God that I follow? He has a dark sense of humor. I’ve been granted a power that makes romance or close friendship near impossible. And the people immune from my ESP? I chase them away, getting too close too soon, pursuing as they flee, then pulling back in terror of maybe getting what I want. Wash, rinse, repeat. Wash, rinse, repeat. Hilarious, right? Sad and hilarious.

Before I quit the normal world and started really wandering I tried some lonesome weekend experiments to decompress and get some space from people’s unrelenting thoughts and feelings. Here’s an example:

There was a large state park near my home in New England. It was a heavily wooded mountain park with marshy swales below and rocky ledges above. I got a topographical map of the place and pinpointed a spot right in the center. Then I started walking in concentric circles expanding outward from that central point. My idea was to know the whole mountain, every foot of it. I was into these circles because of this Navajo or Hopi maze image with circular pathways. I figured I would keep walking these expanding circles, no matter the terrain, until I hit someone’s backyard or a road or some kind of civilization. There was this other guy that wandered on that mountain too, a guy I saw a few times there and then once in Colorado. Weird. Once I heard him coming and lay under some brush as he passed inches from me. Another time I spoke to him. He was restless and preoccupied. Shit, I was restless and preoccupied too, but very focused on my project. Looking back now, I see a disturbed and restless soul through the wrong end of a telescope, a small distant figure not unlike an insect scrambling over rocks and through the bracken.

Looking at myself now, I still see a disturbed and restless soul. That could be my religion: The Church of the Disturbed and Restless Soul. All followers take to the road and keep encounters brief.

What did I discover walking my circles? No matter where you go, you’re always there. I emerged one sunny April Saturday onto a dirt road at the base of the mountain where a couple mountain bikers were resting in the shade.

“Hey,” I said. I must have looked rather haunted and scraggly. The concentric circles had taken their toll. I just stood there in front of them, waiting for my grade, my project complete.

“Dude,” one of them said with something like awe.

“Mountain dude,” said the other.

So, you see, you can’t out-walk your true self. But you can try and maybe strip some things away, leaving only the essence.

That’s the day I dropped my given name and became the Mountain Dude.

The End or “It’s Going to be All Right.”

/ David Ferland / 3 Comments

DSC_0972This is the last installment of the JJ story.  Thanks to all the readers who’ve stuck with it and offered encouragement and criticism over the years.  I’ve pulled all the entries together and, with some fleshing and spackling, I think I’ll have a pretty good book for you in the not so distant not too near future.  Take care and honor your inner JJ.  -Dave

Later, after work and a shower and falling asleep at 4:00 AM next to Lila in bed, JJ had a dream.

He was in his family’s house, as it was when he was a child. He was downstairs, alone, but aware of an adult presence upstairs. He felt like he had done something wrong, something that would be found out, and he had an urge to confess. He needed to preempt the discovery and control the story and consequences to follow. He went upstairs.

The door to his parent’s room was ajar and AM radio was playing. WCBS New York. Phony hectic newsroom sounds and top of the hour news chimes. Something about a beheading in the Middle East and an early snowstorm in the Northeast. He nudged the door open and saw Donald Trump looking out the window to the backyard. Trump turned and beckoned. “Look at all this,” he said. “It’s going to be all right.” JJ joined him at the window that usually looked out over the back driveway and basketball hoop, out over the houses on the street behind. Instead there was a vast American prairie, a rolling golden prairie as far as the eye could see with a dazzling blue sky marred only by a great plume of smoke rising on the horizon. “It’s going to be all right,” Donald Trump said and put his hand on JJ’s shoulder.

JJ woke. It was light and he was alone in his own bed, in his own house, on his farm that wasn’t a farm. Out the window, the trees were bare and there was light snow falling. The distant hilltop looked indistinct and gauzy because of the falling snow. He heard footsteps downstairs then the sound of a spoon in a cup or bowl.

Lila. Living with Lila.  Present day.

It was 10:12 on a Saturday morning in mid November. He would get dressed and have breakfast with Lila. Then off to the noontime meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, where other people, more or less just like him, would talk about the Bermuda Triangle of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years. He and Lila would go to lunch or a movie and make holiday plans and maybe bigger plans, too. Then, he would go to work with Carl to bake all those bagels for Sunday morning.

Later on, at the coffee shop, JJ and Lila sat across from each other. They had visited the used bookstore and they read and sipped as people talked and moved past them. JJ tried to read Rousseau, A Discourse on Inequality, on Carl’s recommendation. Too much discourse, not enough getting to the point.  Lila read a novel by Anne Tyler.

JJ looked up. “Before we go home, maybe I’ll buy a lottery ticket.”

Lila kept looking at her book. “How’d that work out the last time?”

JJ smiled. “I’d do things differently this time.”

“If it were only that simple,” Lila said.

“Things are never that simple.”

“Things are never simple,” Lila agreed. “You can set things in motion…”

”And then you’re just a bozo on the bus, along for the ride.”

“Or you’re just a bozo.”

JJ could only smile and nod and sip his coffee.  It was going to be all right.

 

 

“It’s All Political Now”

/ David Ferland / 2 Comments

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JJ and Carl, reconciled, waiting to bake the bagels.

They stood behind the bagel shop, Carl smoking and talking, JJ looking across at the empty skate park bathed in yellowish street light. The trees were mostly bare of leaves now and the scene looked bereft and jaundiced, some long suspected inner disease finally showing itself on the surface.

“It’s all political now,” Carl said. “Everything. You can’t even stand in line at CVS without thinking, ‘Did he vote for him?’ ‘Did she?’ It’s like trying to spot vampires in daylight. And you know they’re ashamed.”

“They’re not monsters.”

“But the results will be monstrous.”

“They’re just people. People are angry.”

“Yeah. They want simple answers for a complex world. They want what they think was promised them without realizing they grew up in a relatively peaceful time in our nation’s history of blood and mayhem. Post WWII. Then post Cold War. But the rest of the world doesn’t care. The rich don’t care about the American Dream for everybody else. They’ll allow the average Joe just enough to have an Xbox or flat screen or some shitty pickup truck. But they’ll keep the rest and convince those ignorant suckers that they care about making America great. News flash: America’s never been great for a lot of people.”

“You’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this,” JJ said with a smile. “I suspect the last baker didn’t do a lot of listening.”

“Yeah well, he was limited. He could talk about online gaming and that’s about it. I don’t even know what that is. I may be a baker but I read Marx, I read Thoreau, I read Rousseau. This shit going on today? It thrives on ignorance.”

JJ looked at the empty skate park and thought back to summer nights when there were kids skating out there until after dark with their languid movements and sudden bursts of energy required for their tricks. They wore wool hats, even in the heat. It all seemd pretty simple. Enjoy yourself, do your work, think about places to go and how to get there.

“How’s Anne?”

“It’s good at home,” Carl said. “But, y’know what? I think she voted for him. She says she didn’t, but I think…I think she shows the signs. She wants people to pay.”

“Hmm.”

“You’re not surprised?”

JJ thought of Tess and Cody and the keystone cops desperation of their scheme to get their ranch back. “Nothing surprises me.”

“Nothing?”

“It’s a blessing and a curse.”

They heard the oven buzzer go off through the closed back door. Preheating was done, baking temperature had been reached, 550 degrees.

“It’s time,” Carl said.

“194 dozen?”

“No dude, we’re booming. 222 dozen these days.”

“This is going to hurt,” JJ said.

“It’ll come back to you. Muscle memory. Your body remembers the old patterns.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

The Money’s Gone

/ David Ferland / 2 Comments

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The house on the farm that wasn’t a farm had the cold feel and smell that uninhabited houses have, like faded memories of people, their presence gone stale and uncertain. JJ thought of that town in Japan where the earthquake caused the reactor to melt down, breakfast bowls still on tables and backpacks still in neat circles on classroom carpets.  He turned on the heat to move some molecules and get rid of the chill. They had gone to the bank on the way over. In all his accounts, not counting the value of the farm and the ranch, he had just over $1100 to his name. He was…what’s the term? Illiquid? Yes. He was illiquid and reliant on the ranch rent of an equally poor and unreliable brother and sister in Colorado.

“Hey,” Lila said. “We’re going to be all right.”

“Yup.”

“Really,” she said. “We’ll go back to work.”

“Yup.”

They walked together through the rooms of the house. The last people who lived here were Lila and Carl, who were caretaking. And taking care of each other. A tiny ember inside that he was not even aware of glowed suddenly and started to smolder. The resentment, kept at bay by motion and drama, now flamed up.

“Don’t,” Lila said.

“He hasn’t even called.”

“He’s afraid.”

JJ knew this was true, but the resentment was flaring and consuming the oxygen of his reason. He tried to stifle it for fear of letting the blaze get out of control. Too late…

They drove him away. They drove him out to Colorado where he got drunk and blew the rest of his money. She came to rescue him and tricked him into declaring love. He was dimly aware that he was being consumed by a lie of his disease and he know that he had to do something. He turned away and looked out the kitchen window.

The old view. The barn and the hill sloping down behind. The steeples and water tower in town, visible because the leaves were mostly down. The moodiness of the fall. It reminded him of the previous falls, disappointments, false starts and…rebirths?

“I have to make a call,” he said.

“Oh. Okay.”

He walked out the door to the porch and dialed the number. Two rings. Three rings. A mixture of relief and despair. He had tried.

“Hello.”

“Marty, it’s Jason. From the meeting.”

“Hey, what’s going on?”

And JJ shared the resentment. How Lila, who he loved, and Carl, his best friend from forever had shacked up when JJ got erratic, drunk and angry. How he couldn’t forget it and how it was consuming him. How he loved Lila. Yes, he had told her. But how could they be together with this this…thing, between them. It all came pouring out of him, spilling over like water in an overfilled vessel when it actually raises above the brim before spilling and flooding a table and floor.

“Listen,” Marty said. “Get down on your knees, right where you are. Right now.”

“…”

“Are you on your knees?”

“You mean while we’re on the phone?”

“Yes. Right now.”

JJ looked in the window to see if Lila was watching. He couldn’t see her so he got down on his knees.

“I’m down,” JJ said.

“Good. Now repeat after me. God, I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

“What?”

“Repeat it!”

“God,” JJ said. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

“I don’t even know if you’re real or not.”

JJ repeated, “I don’t even know if you’re real or not.”

“But please help me not to drink today. I beg you to help me not to drink today.”

JJ repeated it.

“Good,” Marty said. “Now go inside, hug your girl and tell her you’ll see her after the 6:00 meeting.”

“You’ll be there?”

“You bet. I’ll see you there.”

“Ok, thanks.” JJ got off his knees and went inside to hug his girl.

JJ in AA, Again

/ David Ferland / Leave a comment

 

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A church basement. Upstairs is for those who fear going to hell. Downstairs is for those who’ve already been there. At least that’s what some people say.

After the meeting, Professor Tom stood with some members, laughing at the absurdity of the drinking life and the miracle of getting to live a sober life. JJ waited near the exit door, nervous, feeling he was lying in ambush. The meeting was good, his third since returning from Colorado. Lila was at the Al-anon meeting down the hall, her third since the return, too. It was early, but so far, so good. He hadn’t seen his old sponsor yet and was resolved to clean things up and get back to recovery work.

“I’m glad you waited,” Tom said as he approached JJ at the door. JJ put an awkward hand out but Tom brushed past it and embraced JJ. “Some never come back,” he said next to JJ’s head.

“I’m back for good,” JJ said.

“Or just for today.”

JJ smiled. “Yeah, just for today. A daily reprieve, right?”

“Based on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.”

“Yeah, about that. I need to get back to work on the steps.”

“Listen,” Tom said. “I’m really glad you’re here, but I can’t sponsor you anymore. I’ve got three other guys and I can’t take time from them.”

“Oh,” JJ said and tried to disguise his disappointment. It was one of those moments, so common for him, when the path forward looked straight and clear, but then the world was revealed as more complex and contrary than assumed. He felt like a child discovering that all that stuff- the house, the car, the water(!)- actually cost money. There was always a price to be paid.

“What I can do is introduce you to a few guys.”

“That would be good.”

“Marty,” Tom called across the room. “C’mere for a minute.”

A guy, younger than Tom, closer to JJ’s age, broke off from another group of people and came over.

“This is Jason,” Tom said. “He just got back from…”

“Out there,” JJ finished, gesturing with his thumb out the window. “And Colorado.”

“Oh yeah? Welcome back,” Marty said, and they shook hands. “I lived there for seven years. The greatest and worst times of my life.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, man,” Marty said. “Listen, a few of us are going to get coffee. You’re welcome to come.”

Once again, a fork in the road. Take the easy way and scurry home to comfort with a residue of shame and self-loathing? Or go out and brave the company of actual people who are trying to do better?

“Last suggestion,” Professor Tom said. “Discard that first instinct. That’s usually your disease.”

He was right, of course. That’s the thing about these sober people, at least the ones who actually work it. They’re always fucking right.

“All right,” JJ said. “I’ll go. I just have to tell my girlfriend.”

“Great,” said Marty. “We’ll meet you in the parking lot.”