INTRODUCING A SMALL SUPPORTING CAST AND SOME BACK PAIN PT.3

A middle-aged white woman with dirty blond hair burst through the doors of the Kansas City Free Health Clinic. She approached the front desk, apologizing for her tardiness, and in one swift move wiped her runny nose and pulled her sagging sweat pants upright on her hips. The woman was handed a clipboard and asked to fill out the personal information on the attached sheet. She responded gratefully and sat down in a large blue chair.

“Hey, do you have a pencil?” she asked. I lowered the magazine I was pretending to read, hoping she hadn’t noticed me watching her every move, and I mentioned the cup at the desk was full of pens.

Among the immigrant labor worker, single mother, veteran, recovering drug addict, and diabetes patient, I was the single smiling art school grad. I sat and waited as one of the disheveled and the poor who were also seeking a small taste of that Canadian luxury- free health care. Using the poverty line like a limbo stick, an artist will bend for years until he (or she) emerges a winner. A winner whose career is unfettered by the budgetary constraints of a part-time job, where the limits of their ambitions no longer act as an idyllic unattainable goal. Sometimes its not a limbo stick, but rather a balancing pole for a tight-rope-act. As the artist puts one foot in front of the other, the rope seems to stretch beyond the horizon at an indefinable length. Hoping to not succumb to the soreness of the challenge or become too inflexible to reach their aspirations, an artist must endure or otherwise fail never to see what the agony was for.

The middle-aged had woman returned with her pen, and my name was called for an appointment with my regular chiropractor.

Dr. Kruass was a short sturdy man who seemed to have an interchangeable selection of interns. That week it was a football player of a man named Bill smiling in the corner of the room.

“How is your shoulder this week?” Dr. Kruass asked as he scribbled some notes. We had agreed on a set of numbers to determine the constant throbbing emitted from right hip, lower back, and right shoulder. Such as, 1 being not-so-bad-at-all, and 10 labeled as called-into-work-with-a-hot-pad-on-my-back-can-someone-rip-out-my-crooked-spine-please!. This past week never reached past a 5.

“That’s good to hear.” His back was still facing me as he continued to scribble. In our first meeting, last summer, Dr. Kruass took a quick glance at my back and determine the cause of my sudden and excruciating shoulder pain.

“Your left hip is a slightly higher than your right. Yep, you have scoliosis. And your lower back has signs of constant slouching. I’m not certain, but it looks you could have subluxation of the spine. This sometimes causes a valve on your esophagus to overreact and produce too much acid. Does that sound familiar?.”

Two winters ago I visited an ER with the sudden concern that I was having a heart attack. The simple rhythm of my thumping, blood-regulating muscle was notably inconsistent and my chest was taut with pain. After a blood test it was revealed I had Esophagitis, or simply put Acid-Reflux-Disease. But how would an overly sensitive esophagus attribute to an odd heartbeat? Placing his cold stethoscope on to my chest the ER doctor listened.

“You have Arrhythmia. Your heart skips a beat. It’s not fatal. You’ll be fine.”

So no heart attack, just an intense episode of painful indigestion brought on by a diet of hamburgers, barbeque sauce, and screwdrivers. Just like my visit to the ER, I was also certain that Dr. Kruass’s diagnosis was incorrect for two reasons: 1: after a three year long relationship with a woman whose constant belching and abrupt back spasms were blamed for her emotional bouts of insanity, I was haunted with the idea that somehow her condition was contagious long after our separation and 2: I was invincible. I don’t mean I could punch through walls or fly at mach speed, but rather I had no debilitating ailments that affected my prosperity of health. Dentists were in awe of the symmetry in my smile and physicians would recommend no alterations of habit. I was indifferent to the concept of moderation, that my tastes for microwavable burritos and honey-mustard covered breaded chicken sandwiches would have no repercussions. Instead I was faced with possible throat cancer and a life with a metal beam sewn into my back. There must have been another explanation.

“No, your shoulder is not detached. You wouldn’t be able to use it if it was.” Dr. Kruass continued his explanation, “Listen, I can bring in a little model and show how your spine is all twisted. You must live a sedentary lifestyle, lots of time at your computer, video games, and no exercise. That’s not good for your back. And feel free to put your shirt back on.”

So back to the present with Dr. Kruass and his intern. The table I was laying face down on was cranked up so that when the Doctor lunged with his palms it would push more pressure into to my spine. SNAP. He then sat me up to perform another maneuver that would look something like a neck snap. POP.

“You’re all done. Just hand this green slip to the receptionist so she can pen you in for next month.” I thanked the Doctor and his smiling intern as I rubbed my tender spine.

INTRODUCING A SMALL SUPORTING CAST AND SOME BACK PAIN PT.2

The day before New Comic Book Day, which is a Tuesday, has a predictable routine that is always followed to make certain the shop is renewed with the serialized glitter of comic book magic. Otherwise the cliffhangers of the spandex wearing heroes may never be concluded, or worse the sales brought about from those monthly adventures may wander directly across the street into our competitors register.[1]

The order goes as follows: Frank arrives in his silver van to drop off the books, usually before noon. I pre-sort the books into two piles: subscriber books and shelf copies. I finish before 3:30 when Chris arrives to sort the subscriber books as I begin looking up codes for special orders. And nearing the final step, the preparation of the racks, the store’s favorite loiterer, Steve Felder, arrives to heckle and peruse our efforts. Today everything goes according to plan and Steve is explaining to me and Chris how if this universe was included in the DC comics multi-verse of specially 52 alternative universes, each with their own version of Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman and so on, then he would be this universe’s own Batman. And with this wordy explanation, I blurt out, “That makes you Bat-Felder!”

Chris snickers as I navigate the jargon laid out in the Previews order form.

“Is it 4089? Or 4098?”

“It says 3940 on the invoice.”

Japanese import vinyl statuettes are normally in the 3000’s. Into the 4000’s are role-playing manuals, other gaming related items, DVDs, and the occasional audio book.

“Oh here it is. Weiderholt ordered it.”

I hand the item to Chris to label and put away. Chris held the 1:6 scale Japanese school girl and gazed into its world- encompassing baby eyes. The girl looked jolly, frozen in mid-hop with its perky plastic breasts barely covered by a school uniform: a tube top with a ribbon across the top and a short pleated blue swatch that was suppose to be a skirt.

“The Head of the Japanese school board are some mad pervs,” stated Steve.

It wasn’t difficult to imagine a boardroom full of repressed Japanese business men with sweat-covered foreheads and fog-covered glasses as they imagine the next line of school girl collectibles. Chris stretched out his thin lanky arms to gracefully put the item above the subscriber boxes where all the special orders go.

Chris and I are nearly a generation apart; he was in high school during the first Gulf War and I was starting college during the second one. I guess you could call it the Peace-Time Clinton gap. The PTC gap seems shallow with its edges hinted at only by Chris’s few shinning strands of sparklingly gray hair. Our distain for Tony Danza and Alf made suitable ice breakers; it is our similar vantage points in popular culture that make the PTC gap a traversable crevice. With the three of us, Chris (35), Steve (30), and myself (25), no one would get lost in any nostalgia wandering.

Throughout the day Steve complains. About professional wrestling, (“I hate Vince McMahon’ s gimmick matches,) Star Wars, (“Like Mace Windu just needed to cut whinny Anakin down. Burr-Romp[2] and he got no head to complain with any more),” but he most fervent about his pizza job. “I need to get fuckin’ paid!,” yelled Steve into the store phone. Steve had an ongoing dispute with a pizzeria owner that eventually made air on a local Fox TV station’s Call for Action segment. For over 3 months Steve and four pizza shoppes worth of pizza makers, servers, and delivery drivers were bouncing their paychecks all over the city. It was not until the State of Missouri charged the pizza chain owner with tax evasion that Channel 4’s TV producer returned Steve’s phone call about the dispute. The interview with Steve, and a room filled with other unpaid employees, was a perfunctory design of generic anecdotal tragedy that only a local Television crew would manufacture. Combined with the Steve’s complaints, colorful and matter-of-fact, were images of the bare shoppe as the investigator narrated the context of their plight. What wasn’t included in the Call For Action special was Steve’s last day at the shoppe. After Steve and a friend cleaned out the restaurant of its remaining booze and money (less than 100 dollars between the two) they then sat and smoked a joint. Afterwards, still high, the two drove by the owner’s home to vandalize his car. It had already been terrorized; someone keyed the sides and flattened the tires with a knife. Steve threw the brick into the rear view window. He would later see the car again without the key marks and with new tires, but with dents on the hood and a side rear view mirror dangling.

Steve left. Chris and I finished sorting the books and left the shop slightly after 7:30pm.

---

[1] Just like BurgerKing and McDonalds, or CVS and WalGreems, we have a competitor directly across the street.

[2] Steve has many sound effects. Burr-Romp is his light saber noise. Steve also utilizes other noise like yah-yah to punctuate action in stories. Such as when he was in the hospital and kept pressing the button for pain-killers to be pumped into his I.V. “So I was like yah-yah, yah.” Regrettably each exuberant yah meant the hospital charged him eighty bucks.

INTRODUCING A SMALL SUPORTING CAST AND SOME BACK PAIN PT.1

Comics! Comics! Comics! Within those 32 pages of narrative pizzazz and colorful costumed heroes lies a story for any one. The dazzling snapping plot twists of a radiated arachnid infected teenager to the magic-wielding homeless half-demon are just to name a few of your options for escape. Staring into the collision of image and text, narrowly from panel to panel, the reader’s eye sockets burn from sparks of god-thunder and galaxy juggling. It’s a small wonder that two simple metal staples can contain such pulpy epics.

Amongst the fantasy laden tales and exotic commonality, is a guide- just as rare as the unicorn, winged griffin, or two-headed liger - the comic shop manager. A position well parodied, the comic book guy, is an obese middle-aged virgin, whose encyclopedic knowledge of trivia and popular culture is worn like a smug badge. Rather, I, a middle height, middle weight, brown haired, green eyed college graduate, whose areas of expertise’s still seem undefined compared to the typical know-it-all, am helpful and willing to share my excitement for the art form we solicit.

Unfortunately on a day like this (rainy, cold, and Monday), I knew it would be a lonely one. Opening B Bop Comics, I first rattle through my keys to open the clunking nearly busted lock. The door needs a certain twist of the wrist that is at first sensitive then forceful to open up. Flipping on the florescent over-head lighting for the botanical garden of colorful heroes I race over to the repeating buzz of the opening alarm. Next I fix the thermostat to a conservative 67 degrees. The remainder of tasks to finish the opening procedure include: making sure the register has some cash, all phone calls on the answering machine are returned, and finally flipping the closed sign over.

The phone rang later that day.

“Hello, B-Bop Comics.” I try to say it with a cheerful politeness, but usually I come off as mopishly dismal. It was the owner Friendly Frank on the line. The smiling mustached comic baron, was getting a divorce. The situation arose of out differences from parenting and the tenuous obligations from balancing a step-family, or so I deduced. I never really met Frank’s family, except on casual instances, like comic book conventions or accidental brush-ins at the art museum or movie theatre. These casual happenings never revealed a distressed household, but I had ample experience in the failures of re-ignited vows.
These failures were set in backdrop of Fallon, Nevada, where my sister and I were no longer main characters to my father’s summers, but cast as mere step-children amongst an ensemble of disapproving grandparents, a harassing ex-husband, and unfamiliar siblings. Crossovers don’t’ usually last. The adventures of Risi and Smith ended when my step-mother died from a sudden brain tumor. Her end (those surmised) was a combination of a recent childbearing and the aforementioned abusive ex-husband.

“Oh, wow. I’m sorry to hear that.” Frank says kindly. We chat a little further, mostly about business, and then we end our conversation.

A NEW YEAR BORN FROM THE FADING STRIP MALLS OF TULSA OKLAHOMA PT. 3

I hate sentimentality. I really do. Nothing is worse than burying yourself in the icky funk from opening up old birthday cards. It’s a kind of romantic induced memory mining that reduces a human being built of memories into a collector of their own past.

But laying on that couch I was unable to escape the glue-like force that sentimentality yields. Soaking me in the realization that I would not see my grandparents again. There would be no other special occasions to draw me back, except for the single inexorable event that would have me drowned further into the bottomless pull of that short itchy gray couch.

Its impossible to resist that force at the death bed of a loved one, or at the door steps of a foreclosed childhood home. The juicy center of the human brain in those places whips and grasps wildly at any memory to summon a sense of closure. At that moment we are desperate beings like that cartoon coyote prolonging his grand collapse into that hollowed canyon.

We woke up early, sometime before seven o clock and my grandfather was already up preparing for our departure. We had to leave early enough to get to my afternoon job, so we were hustled out at the break of dawn. My grandfather helped us pack up and gave us a cleverly simple drawing depicting how to escape Broken Arrow. No clumsy print-outs for us. My grandmother was saddened by our departure, but only mentioned how much fun my childhood visits were.

A feeble shrinking man, my grandfather put his hand out for goodbye. I had been secretly staring at him the entire trip. I felt ill and saddened by his state of frailty, his eye were starting to sink in, so you could stare into the corners of his sockets, and his clothes laid on him like an under stuffed scarecrow. But as his hand clasp around mine it was as an iron vise rapped around my soft pudgy digits. Ouch! Coddling my hand we hopped into the car and drove off. With the two of them waving behind their screen door, we waved back and drove off into blue hue of the early morning.

A NEW YEAR BORN FROM THE FADING STRIP MALLS OF TULSA OKLAHOMA PT. 2

I awoke greeted by tiny porcelain smiles. With little time to accomplish our errand-filled day, the smiles seemed more like devilish smirks holding back laughter at my morning scramble. Off to Wal-Mart to buy an affordable wedding present, then a quick dash to the downtown gallery to set up the three-channel mutli-component installation, and then finally back to Grandmother’s for a brief dinner before we get back on the road. Any thing could wrong I know it. My stomach rolled and tightened from the balancing act over my frantic mega-organizing and the emotional viscera brought on by the sunny morning. “To grandmother’s house we go” seemed like a cruel mantra for those wanting to return to a bog of sunken memories of an aging couple - an aging couple whose graying skin, wrinkled bodies, and sullen faces continue on towards some final collapse while you watch their continued evaporation occur very slowly, and so painfully.

But to them it was just another Wednesday morning. My grandfather had prepared a modest breakfast of scrambled eggs, steamed broccoli, canned corn, and hash browns to send us our on our travels.

The errands were accomplished on time; who would have guessed shopping for wedding gifts was so painless. Except for that sort of numbing feeling you get from standing in line and watching that overwhelmed mother. You know that mother with the sorta’ dikey eighties hair-do and the gray sweatshirt with the kittens on it that says “hang in there” as she balances her two young seemingly bratty children while she shovels load after load of groceries onto the looping conveyer belt. And all the while, you’re like , “Maybe life will be better for her children, that all of this everyday struggle will amount to a brighter lineage.” I resisted hoping that her family tree might branch out of this buckle of faith, that her lineage would overcome an ambitionless life brought on by the promise of golden heavens and the returned trekking through (just as glowing) discount department stores. The belt has finally made room for me to put down a plastic divider between my wedding gifts and the remainder of the mother’s last items -Hot pockets.

And we’re off again.

Searching through the demolition and construction of downtown Tulsa we find a secluded gallery whose manager really knows how to charm the talent- “It’s so great you’re here! This piece is really great! Do you need anything?”. He’s an excitable and exuberant manager, but when questioned about the local art scene his demeanor quickly shifts, revealing a burnt-out man still trying to connect with the locale. Installing is simple. Working in the gallery is like any other and the gray gallery walls even seem comforting. I must be a real conditioned gallery artist.

After a timely installation, we felt too exhausted to shoot back home. With a quick phone call to my (dependable) co-worker, our time was extended. Unfortunately this extension made it possible for us to attend my family’s evening prayer event. My grandmother, a quasi-official pastor of a special kind of light Pentecostalism, enjoys a religious showmanship (like any Pentecostal) through her self published fictions and stage plays that are circus-like biblical overviews that, at times, merge other traditions into a theatrical show-and-tell. Years ago I played a young Jesus and ate matzah and horseradish with a family of Messianic Jews. Never expanding beyond the comfort of the living room, the sincerity of these projects is charming to any invited, including myself. Unfortunately, I’m not up to the part. The rest of the day is spent dodging my grandmother’s invitations.

The gallery manager gave us direction to find local shops. Zipping around we found a mangy and slightly expensive used c.d. store, then a sparsely stocked comic book shop, and a modestly hip music shop. This small modest music shop must have be the nexus for an underground culture in downtown Tulsa; people kept arriving and leaving and wandering into the back room. A woman wearing a white fur coat asked if we were also waiting for a band. Mistaken, she returned to sitting quietly. Talking Heads’s Fear of Music filled the space as we perused the racks of cds and vinyl. Compelled by the shop’s coolness I bought a Coltrane album and we left.

The family caught on to our scheming and instead of nagging for our return, my grandmother reminded me not to feel pressured and apologized for any negative feeling about showing up for the special event. After a stop at what Tulsa has to offer as Mediterranean food we returned to Broken Arrow.

When we arrived I was reminded why I have closeted emotional reactions and become uncomfortable around large groups of cheerful people. It had been nearly five years since I had seen my cousins and their response to my arrival was a casual glance and a mousy hello. I tried to make conversation with my youngest boy cousin (now extremely lanky and growing an ugly pre-teen mustache), but failed to get beyond his shy response, “I’m ok, I guess.” Any comradery we had before has now dissipated, but this only frustrated by his male friend, my cousin’s fiancé- a sarcastic, bible-carrying, goatee-growing teenager. Never have I envied the jolly family gatherings with their obligatory thrusting of firm handshakes and welcoming bear hugs until now.

Tonight’s event was a video podcast titled “You are God’s Masterpiece.” The video presented a young pastor from Texas whose constant grin was as large as the football field he sermons in.[1] The lecture was surprisingly thoughtful with statements like, “You are all original individuals and need to fight against mediocrity,” but such a statement was immediately disfigured by his following conclusion, “because God made you.” He continued, drawing an analogy between an experience he had with modern art: he was shown a painting that he thought was ugly. His opinion was then swayed when he found out who painted it- the one the only Pablo Picasso[2]. The conclusion drawn was then, if you know your creator (god), then you are also good, i.e. Picasso is a good artist then all he creates is good art = god is good then all he creates is good. In the end everyone seems pleased with today’s lesson, but to my confusion, make faux-irreverent conversation about the podcast. Mostly about the pastor’s locked smile, the cousin’s also felt the message was redundant, that reinforcement of their special-ness is boring.

With preparation still needed for the wedding later that week, everyone hurried off and yet again we went to separate sleeping arrangements.

[1] Yes-he really used a football field to preach in.
[2] The pastors southern accent breaks the name into overly articulated droll- Pah’ –blow Pea Cas’ Oh.

A NEW YEAR BORN FROM THE FADING STRIP MALLS OF TULSA, OKLAHOMA

The road into Broken Arrow was nearly a straight shot; passing through Joplin and slightly past Tulsa would make our mark. The soundtrack of Ira Glass and Al Green helped distract me from the probable cringe-inducing family recap that would oblige a decade-long gap between visits to my Pentecostal grandparents.

Poor directions landed us in Muskogee, making a mere four-hour road trip into a six-hour voyage. Fortunately, this misfire had an unintended benefit of exhaustion as an adequate reason to dodge questioning.

My visit wasn’t the main attraction. It was being overshadowed by the frantic preparation of my cousin’s wedding. I was the oldest of the grandchildren but the least accustomed to adulthood, or rather I had fewer aspirations for it. Now after being an uncle and soon to have another cousin join the ranks, I figured it was only a matter of time until I was asked, “When are you getting married?”

But that question never came. Instead I was asked about my mother and her financial situation. I was dreading any kind of predictably candid family interrogations, but without it, I felt as a neighbor or family friend that was just being allowed to crash on their sofa.

It had been nearly a decade since I visited Broken Arrow, but the garish carpeting, numerous dolls collections, and biblical images worked as comforting mnemonic icons. Surrounded by the sterile pinks and plaids was the quiet evidence of a laborious craftsman. Leaving only oddments of unfinished projects, my frail-looking eighty-nine year old grandfather continues to toil as he constructs new hallways, remodels kitchen shelves, and finds other clever ways to continue expanding their quaint one-story home.

During our brief conversation, my grandfather made us pancakes. Soon after we went to our separate sleeping arrangements.