The Author Steps Out

Over the past months, I returned to the 1960s and ’70s for some good and not so great memories. I’ve always tried to keep within limits of what could have happened when I took a frolicking detour from what occurred. I cleaned things up. We were very profane. Trust me; stranger things happened than I wrote. Most of my peers of the Folkie Palace days have permanently departed, but out of regard for the few remaining, I have had to hold lots in reserve. All the individuals existed, and the nicknames used were theirs. They were a flashy lot that lived to party and create trouble. The backside of Beacon Hill was the place to do it too. Landmarks may still exist, but they gentrified the character out of the entire neighborhood. As one of my friends put it, “elites don’t join communities, they rip the guts out of them.”
Many not so beautiful things happened on Grove Street that would make this blog X rated if I included them. I decided that they were not needed, and wandered no farther than some R rated occurrences. As I’m writing this, some of those memories are kicking to be set free…get back in the cage, damn you! If my friends were alive to review the stories, they’d be getting the red pens out to include the salacious details.

We did use the Mass General Hospital ER as our roll down the hill medical facility. God bless the compassionate ones who saw us through STD’s broken knuckles, overdoses, colds, and suicide attempts. I feel the pain of the folks in billing who kept sending bills to the fictional addresses we always gave. Things were not so tightly screwed on then.

The Adventures in Coastal Living stories are based on actual events, but like the Folkie, stories events are the departure point. The Cap’n was portrayed pretty much as he was. He’d stand there, look at you, stuff his pipe full, light it, and slowly puff it alight, then poke the stem at you and tell you how it would be. He was an impressive figure who I roundly detested and admired. My first wife was a talented writer, and later in life, a loving mother and wife to someone else. It’s a shame that she died so young. We were not suited for each other.

If you haven’t read it elsewhere on my blog I can tell you now that I don’t like fairy tales. None of my stories start out with once upon a time, and they’re not the they lived happily ever after type either. I write sea stories. Sea stories start out with -” now listen this is no shit. I heard it from my buddy who was aboard the USS whozzix when it happened.” In other words a bit of a tall tale.

One final note: Psyche, well where ever you are loved, and I miss you.

Lou – who was Wes.