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The Slippery Slope

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* A lesson, a gesture, a story, a philosophy, an attitude—I took something from every man in Steve's bar. I was a master at “identity theft” when that crime was more benign. I became sarcastic like Cager, melodramatic like Uncle Charlie, a roughneck like Joey D. I strived to be solid like Bob the Cop, cool like Colt, and to rationalize my rage by telling myself that it was no worse than the righteous wrath of Smelly. Eventually I applied the mimicry I'd learned at Dickens to those I met outside the bar—friends, lovers, parents, bosses, even strangers. The bar fostered in me the habit of turning each person who crossed my path into a mentor, or a character, and I credit the bar, and blame it, for my becoming a reflection, or a refraction, of them all. Every regular at Steve's bar was fond of metaphors. One old bourbon drinker told me that a man's life is all a matter of mountains and caves—mountains we must climb, caves where we hide when we can't face our mountains....
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Richard Meale's Funeral

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* clouds now and then giving men relief from moon viewing soon it will die yet no trace of this in the cicada's screech ailing on my travails my soul wanders over withered mores Three Haiku by Matsuo Basho (1644-1694). The snow upon my lifeless moutains Is loosened into living fountains My solid Oceans flow and sing and shine A spirit from my heart bursts forth It clothes with unexpected birth My cold bare bosom: Oh! it must be thine Oh mine, on mine! Gazing on thee I feel, I know, Green stalks burst forth, and bright flowers grow And living shapes upon my bosom move; Music is in the sea and air, Winged clouds soar here and there, Dark with the rain new buds are dreaming of: 'Tis Love, all Love! Percy Bysshe Sheely (1792-1822). Both these poems were part of funeral. Amanda Meale, with her short bleached hair and face puffy from crying, began her recollections of Richard Meale, haltingly. I would like to begin, she said, by making two corrections to a piece that appeared in the ...
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Skeleton Eyes

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* They were everywhere, these walking holes into a treacle like black past, skeleton eyes, black holes to another dimension. He could see them everywhere; across crowded car parks, across traffic jammed streets, staring out trapped windows; wishing, wishing only for life, for fun, for positivity. Because everything in their dismal lives had been drained away. It happened again. They haunted at the edge of sight, they told a different story to everyone else. A man showed up before the meeting. I am drinking, he announced. That much was obvious. I wanted to thank you for my 32 days sobriety. I am working my butt off for my wife and child. But I cannot stop. I just wanted to thank you. Sit down, sit down, the old timers said. But he refused. After Alex it was all too much. The doctors told him if he kept drinking he would be dead within three months. He wouldn't last three months; that much was also obvious. And so, what a crying shame, all these bloody lunatics, crashing in and out, ...
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