Sue was my first steady girlfriend. She didn’t like being called Susan; I cannot recall why. Sue was a wild child, revolting against her lot in life. We all did that dance. Sue eventually drank and drugged herself into an early grave. We ran around the streets like a ragtag gang of wannabe rebels searching for oblivion or freedom found in the strangest places. So many suburbs were places where communities could rally around the local church to come together and share their beliefs about life amid a crumbling society. Blind faith in numbers. It was Gardenville or some other hood near Belair Rd. The local natives refer to it as Blair Rd. Route One, baby! The first main route north and south along the east coast. It wasn’t unusual to walk long distances to and from places all over the city.
My oldest chum Michael and I would walk for miles just to party with friends who lived crosstown. A night of revelry with those who shared their ennui like a sandwich. We hid in church school playgrounds smoking hash and pot. Tripping on acid in graveyards. Eating uppers-and-downers and drinking beer. Hitchhiking was always a fun alternative, but it could be dangerous too, so we walked everywhere. Sometimes riding bicycles. Too young to drive a car. In Sue's case, too young to die. We were just kids, but we weren’t young in the sense of age, nor dumb. Mostly just numb.
It went that way forever. It’s possible we felt too much. Decades later I still think of Sue. It was your typical high school romance, playing hooky on the lam. Strolling down any byway to get high. It was raging hormones, questionably illicit substances, and crazy half-cocked rock ‘n’ roll. She was a gypsy, kind of like Janis Joplin. I didn’t know who I was. No inkling of what I wanted to do or who I was to become.
Young, foolish, and carefree. Adolescent rockers, sort of, innocent amateurs. With a devil-may-care attitude about life, love, and the pursuit of happiness. Some may say we were hedonists, lazy bums, or spoiled brats. You can’t achieve perfection without making mistakes. It’s a crapshoot. We had to make the scene and then up the ante while making a scene. Met with extreme objection and rejection to the rules of law, we flaunted our desires.
Flawless flashbacks, self-realized by accidental freedoms of expression in all its ambiguous glory. To be wild and crazy, creating the imperfect perfection. Not anything like the others we saw. I ran into Sue decades after our teenage lust trysts. She looked a bit worn down, but still feisty. There was a certain resignation in her manner. Sue lived her life in quiet desperation. She had a sad beauty only tragedy could bring, a perfect mismatch for me.
Our lives passed by haphazardly. We moved around each other separately, torn apart long after our teen years melted down into adulthood. Traveling in different directions, we lost touch. Reconnecting here and there through the years like random pinballs racking up points, flashing the lights, and bumping the bumpers, then losing the ball. Life was sometimes unkind to us; we never fit into the molds of the predetermined world. Yet somehow, we survived intact. Most of us, anyway. How did we survive? A combo of dumb luck, street smarts, and rude habits. There’s a strange dignity to the defeated. I didn’t know what love was, but I wanted some of it.
Too many friends fell by the wayside. These are waning days, and acquaintances drop one after the other. It’s comforting to know that nobody gets a pass. Rich or poor, smart or stupid, be prepared to meet your fate. One never knows when the time comes for the last hurrah. I’m always ready for surprises.
Misguided misanthropes running wild through the streets with too much sex on their minds and too many drugs. The background, a soundtrack of music. It was always an endless party. Now I’m lucky to stay awake after sundown. I don’t bounce back anymore. Carrying the ghosts of my past around like a yoke tethered by a labor of love. The dead zone where life and death mingle in one continuous stream of loss and suffering, slow motion walking together hand in hand.
The way of the world isn’t the way to live in it. There were occasions when we had life by the balls, squeezing out some semblance of meaning. From that perspective you see the short hairs of everything for what it is. A series of small victories and huge losses dance to the tune of money in other people’s pockets full of holes. Burning bridges and kicking sandcastles. Throwing rocks at shattered windows.