Portrait of the Derelict as a Young Man Vol. 1

Party Stan was an 40 something hippie and resident pot broker of Podunk, Pa. That is of course until he had a meltdown and me and the Zinch took over but that's one that will be covered or has been covered in the Wilderness, see back then Party Stan's word was gospel and he had happen to come into what he called the second best mushrooms he'd ever had, the kind that had people passing out and losing their shit on a gram or so...

At the time i was like Party Stan's younger brother, a protege so to speak, one of the few students allowed in his house, so when he sat me down to lecture me on my mushroom intake i smiled and nodded and said not to worry, see while the cherry poppers were passing out on a gram i was eating over seven grams at a time and basically having one on one conversations with God, those conversations were quite enlightening to say the least but one night i happened to eat a quarter of these wonderful little fungi before a disco party, i was on my own in my apartment, late afternoon in the brilliant colors of fall that Western Pa. likes to produce, before i knew it a few hours had gone by so i dipped into the bag and ate some more and sometime later my roommate came to find me and go to the party but what he found was me standing on a chair in our kitchen in my underwear staring down at the floor and swearing that the large wine stain in the carpet looked exactly like Pangaea, in fact i made him get up on the chair and look and then he went back to the neighbors apartment where i think he mentioned i was completely off my head on shrooms and standing on a chair in the kitchen seeing ancient geological formations and basically he was correct...

but there was a disco party to attend so i needed to get dressed and what better way to dress while fucking conversing with Major Tom than in a pair of banana yellow women's polyester pants, skin tight pants that flared at the bottom, see if the town was short on entertainment it was a treasure trove for thrift stores, one of which was located in a trailer outside of town that let you fill up a bag for 5 bucks. To compliment my lovely pants i wore a women's polyester shirt, brown with blue stripes and it was then that i learned that women's shirts button backwards from men's, topped off with a chapeau reminiscent of something Papa John Phillips would have been proud of, of course i don't remember much of this night, there was a large part that was blurry but i do remember being told off by a beautiful young girl and as she tried to get away from me i ran up the steps, backwards, in order to make my point, to the amazement of a dozen or so people watching, some even asked me to do it again and i said do what and they said run up the steps backwards and i just smiled and said you must be high, of course this beautiful young girl had captivated me since the day i saw her and though there have been many peaks and valleys over the years you may recognize her as the mother of those two fine little boys i love so much, yes even reading this i smile at her taste in men, impeccable i'd say to say the least, needless to say she didn't go home with me that night which i know is hard to believe when i'm rocking a pair of skin tight banana yellow polyester pants but that was okay i'm quite the patient one and besides i had other things to do and see most of them happening in my tweaked out little head...

So it was that the Hassler and i ended up in Podunk's version of a discotheque, of course a club like this in Podunk consisted of a clientele largely of foreign exchange students, faculty and townsfolk, now when you're 6'4 and decked out in women's clothes while your running mate Mr. Hassler is wearing a knee length blue swirled dress and combat boots one can draw the ire of men who like to hunt deer and wear camo in hopes of getting laid by a university receptionist, add the fact that i was so high that i kept busting disco moves though i was nowhere near the dance floor i figured at some point someone would throw a punch but instead i drew the interest of a woman ten years my senior who was of the professional sort, no this story doesn't end up with me taking her home though i think that might have been in the offing, it does end up with me drinking scotch and explaining to her the mystical qualities of hallucinogenic drugs and how they are the path to true enlightenment, of course most of my discourse was a piss take i was just wondering how much she could handle and it sounded more eloquent than blurting out, i really like fucking drugs and she was smiling and nodding and touching my shoulders and commenting on how tall i was when the Hassler ambled over and asked if i could zip him up, his dress that is and i uttered something like no problem you sexy beast and when we get back to the apartment i'm gonna tear that ass up, the professional sort was a bit taken aback by this, i bummed a cigarette and asked for a light and she politely excused herself and went back to her friends while i bopped around the club singing Beers, Steers & Queers by the Revolting Cocks rather loudly, of course that song wasn't playing but when you're as off your tits as i was you kind of just go with whatever is in your head.

and the point of this little ditty? well there is none, it's like a Polaroid at a barbecue, it's something to laugh at and toss out, no deep meaning, just a snapshot, a footnote on those wonderful Wilderness years.