I will be honest with you. Part of me did this, moved into a short bus, in order to slow the world down. You get older, fall into patterns and routines and, before you know it the years are streaking by. That is what Eugene felt like for me. It was all too easy. So I decided to make things hard. And it works. The other thing is I knew painting was in my heart. But I needed to put in the time. I needed to produce paintings. Things that I could be happy about.Things that would push me. I want to have an innate knowledge of color and how it mixes. But I am getting sidetracked again.
In nineteen ninety seven I was running. Running from Boston, my family, from seventeen years of of education that was threatening to wither my spirit and soul. I was not a very happy kid. And I wanted something different. All I knew was I loved to travel, to see new places, to have adventures. While many of my friends were lining up with black gowns on I was walking out of Jake shores house with my thumb in the air. He lived in Gardner Mass, end of the commuter rail, and on route two, heading west. It is a beautiful road. Would not choose another for my first hitchhiking experience. I had no idea. The first ride I got was from this frumpy couple in an old station wagon packet to the gills. I think they bought and sold things people thought were valuable, but honestly they may of been living out of their car or just drove stuff around. It was a rather uneventful trip for hitchhiking, I was a baby with a baby face, till I got to the New York boarder. A lady in an old beat up sedan gave me a ride over it. The floor was littered with cigarette boxes that I tried not to crush even though they were empty. she dropped me off at the juncture to Albany and headed north. It was after six, maybe close to seven. I had an hour of light, two at the most, and no plans. It would take me six years to actually hitch hike through Albany. And that is another story. There was a house at the juncture. As I passed by someone hollered at me. He was sitting on his porch and he said he was about to fire up the grill and throw on some steaks. No way I could turn that down. We stood around his grill talking. His brother suped up cars that he raced on the track just down the road, you could practically see it. I could see his brother and a friend a little ways off working on a car in front of his garage. I told him I was from Boston. He said he went to Boston some times. To tell the good news. He was happy he could feed a travel on the road. It was just like in the good book. I should of known right then. But I was young and innocent, this was the first person of this nature I had met. He wanted to hunt for frogs around his pond to throw on the grill. It was then he started to talk about money and how it did not add up. I was suspicious, I did not feel comfortable. But I was along way from anywhere and the sun had set. After steaks we went inside. I had to go to the bathroom. While in the bathroom I chose to investigate. There was an composition book behind the toilet. I flipped through the pages, came to a page written in black ink. The number three sixty was multiplied and divided and subdivided or and over filling up the entire page. Then later in the book in red ink the numbers six six six were multiplied and subdivided to the nth degree. I remember it coming over me like a wash, not fear or concern, but like a spy that may be figured out, like you just noticed just HOW big grandma's teeth really are. "The numbers do not add up". I was in the den, literally sitting on his shitter, of someone I did not understand and was not interested in understanding. I finished up and joined him. His room was an amalgamation of youth merging with maturation. Bookshelves, that along with their normal fare held a number of stuffed animals, a number of weights and dumb bells, and a microphone hanging off center of the room, near the bed. The house was a duplex, split down the middle. His parents owned it, lived in one side and gave him the other side, maybe with his brother, he didn't say. He said I could stay in his room and he would stay down the hall. I remember laying on my back in the dark on his bed. There was enough light coming in that I could just see the microphone hanging down. Even though it had been a long day I suddenly felt very awake and uncomfortable. At some point I fell asleep, and awoke the next morning with the exact same feeling, fight or flight raging, and it was flight time. I went down the hall to the room he was in. I heard a noise from the room knocked lightly and opened the door tentatively. He stood in the center of the room, he stood as if at a podium, head up and staring out to an unknown audience. And he was reading, clearly, from the bible. I thanked him and said I would be on my way. he did not pause, did not look my way. I scaddatled. Outside I walked for about half a mile, was approaching the racetrack when the same lady, her car littered with cigarette cases picked me up. See I changed plans. Albany was out. There was a little road, highway eleven heading south, that I could take. My goal was New Paltz, and my friend Eli Winnograd. He had clear eyes that seemed ready always for something. But that is another story. For now I spent about three hours hitching with no one slowing down till a car pulled over. It was Lacey Tamstead. After all these years I will never forget him and I only knew him that day. First thing he says, "There is cooler at your feet, help yourself to a drink." He had ran a hotel in Vermont but was moving to none other than New Paltz. We headed south together. He told me about the area. Drove by the canal and he pointed out different boats. Even bought me lunch at acute dinner as we were cutting over to the turnpike. He was just one of those people who is easy going enough to put you at ease as well. I am guessing in his late forties, milk chocolate complexion, which is rare fir Vermont. He mainly managed kids my age, so he knew how to size up my interest in adventure. As he dropped me off, he even gave me the number of the people he was staying with. This was before cell phones.
That was more than seventeen years ago. I have lived in and visited many places since. I would like to say my spidey sense has improved a little. But you never know what tomorrow bring. Last night I was reluctantly moving my bus from one of my favorite spots around midnight. In all reality I moved it about eight blocks. Just enough to let people know I could move if it was a problem. right as I was approaching my spot some guy crossed the street and waved me down. I stopped. More because I was in sight of my spot and I felt I would have to deal with this dude anyway. The bus door swung open. "Man can you take me to the hospital." Me,"I don't know where the closest hospital is." I let him on the bus and said I would drive him somewhere, away from here. He decided he did not actually want to go to the hospital since he might freak out in the state he was in. He would rather just curl up on the floor of the bus. Sorry bud, that is where I draw the line. So then I could just take him under the bridge where a bunch of other people crash out. And oh, did I have any drugs? At least that is what I thought he was asking about. It was something I never heard of, that was probably not good for you if your body was retaining water so much you wanted to go to the hospital. That is one thing about the bus, to a normal it is an eyesore, an ugly invasion on their street. To a homeless person it is a mobile palace, complete with all the luxuries.
Well I never really got into my exploration of homelessness and time. Maybe next time?
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