Fall Was Passing

With one month down and two more to go for the fall season, I present this to you. It's an excerpt of a novel I wrote 15-20 years ago. Most of its pages have been recycled, but this one I kept.

"He" is the protagonist of the novel. It was based somewhat on my life:

Fall was passing through time and was about to leave. The leaves turned brown, orange, red, or any combination of those colors before they fell. The cornstalks turned bone white before the farmers plowed them back into the ground. Coolness came with the evening and stayed until the morning, often leaving a dust of frost for the sunlight to brush away.

Some days, the sun shone brilliantly in a cloudless sky, illuminating everything without the harshness and heat of the summer. 'Then, usually between 5:30 and 6 p.m., it was gone.

As the weather got colder, the world prepared for winter's rest. Drowsiness came with Thanksgiving and sleep came with the first snow that stuck to the ground more than two days.

Although it already was November, he wasn't ready to admit until then, when he thought of it, that fall's reign was over and it was near the start of winter's reign, which wouldn't be dethroned until St. Patrick's Day at the earliest.

He sighed when he remembered that he always hated to remind himself of that.

Friends? Please

Recently I received a mailing that promoted the services of a local

It was addressed to Our Friends At...

I usually ignore these mailings and recycle them after a quick read. But this time I thought:

Friends? I don't think so.

First, there's only one person here. That's me. It's been that way for years now. If you were my friend, you would've known that.

Second, this friendship is a step below the friendships I have with some people on Facebook. I may not have directly seen or talked with many of them for decades, but at the least we know each other.

I would prefer being addressed as Resident on the instead of this false friendship.

Three Short Poems

Full Of ...
My shoes are full of feet
My head is full of fuck
My soul is full of lust
My cock is full of blood
My mind is full of ... want! ... now!

Sign of the Times ... and Lives
A sign on the sidewalk...
Please smoke, eat, drink, argue, fight, kiss, hug, fuck, stab, shoot, love, hate, piss, shit, puke, and bleed ...
more or less live ...
outside this store.

Envy
Envy wears a long trench coat
and hangs out in dimly lit
hallways, alleys, streets,
doorways, closets --
any place with shadows --
always ready to take over
and conquer thoroughly.

Someone's Dream

...or someone's nightmare, but not mine.

Unusual and striking, nevertheless.

When I first saw the picture, I thought of three references in literature, drama and film:

• The quote "Tell me about the rabbits, George," from John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men;
• The 6 foot, 3.5 inch tall pooka seen only by Elwood P. Dowd in the play and movie Harvey, by Mary Chase.
• Frank, the spirit seen only by Donnie Darko in the movie of the same name.
  

NOTE: Photograph from pictureisunrelated.com.

Keystone Towers

There's some good news for Keystone Towers: Or at the least, the land on which it sits.

The city of Indianapolis will take title to it after no one bid for it and its $1.3 million in unpaid property taxes.

I've been fascinated by these buildings ever since they were built. Back in the late 1970s, I drove by it at night. When it was lit up, it looked like a monolith in the middle of a field. And that impressed me.

It was at the corner of Keystone Avenue and Binford Boulevard, northwest of the Indiana State Fairgrounds. It was at the west end of a trail that ended on the east side of Indianapolis at a three-way crossing among East 38th Street, North Shadeland Avenue and Pendleton Pike.

Also during the late 1970s, a friend told me that he had been invited to a swingers party there, but declined. He might have heard of a rumored swingers party there, but I doubt he was invited. I knew his upbringing, and because of that, he would not have known of or associated with swingers.