Part 1
The morning sun of the Southwest baked the tent and, in turn, my twelve-year-old body. We were at the base of Mount Taylor, an 11,301-foot volcano, and I had just set off my own eruption, albeit one without the lava that would come in the ensuing years. It was the fourth week of a six-week adventure camp, I was almost three thousand miles from home, stuck in a wild, sparse and wide-open expanse of lonely land, and I had just taught myself a pretty damn good cure for desolation.
To my astonishment, as I rolled out of the Kelty and felt the cool kiss of the alpine air begin to dry my sweat, one of the members of my backpacking outfit, thirteen-year-old Rex Lozin of Roslyn Heights, New York, was staring at me and in full snicker.
“You were whacking off, weren’t you,” he said. “Beating the meat. Jerkin’ the gherkin. Wrestling the bald guy.”
I couldn’t confirm or deny, but I wasn’t old enough to tell him that I couldn’t confirm or deny. I also have come to realize that neither confirming nor denying is as good of a confirmation as any. I walked right by him, pretending to ignore his derisive attack while praying that he wouldn’t share it with the rest of the group. My prayers were not answered.
Part 2
No girlfriend, no car, and a lame job at the movie theater where I had to watch Crocodile Dundee every night. It was a tired existence at the age of sixteen, so I slept. And when I didn’t sleep, I thought about having a girlfriend and a car and a really cool job. Mostly I thought about the girlfriend, though.
I’d turn the TV up loud enough, or so I thought, and help myself out before I’d nod off until I heard my mother tell me that dinner was ready. One night at dinner, she changed the subject.
“You know, I’ve been walking by your room from time to time and heard some things moving around in there, and I kind of figured out what you’re doing,” she said, with the nonchalance and omniscience of a woman who sent me to extracurricular sex education classes at the home of a therapist housewife friend of hers a few blocks away.
“Huh?”
“Look, you don’t have to pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. Or you can if you want to. My point is, it doesn’t matter.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I think you do,” she said, nodding, and taking another bite of her rosemary chicken. “And I know what you’re doing when you’re alone in your room, and it’s OK. All of those are very natural feelings you’re feeling, and you’re doing what everyone does to handle those feelings.”
I didn’t respond, instead opting to pull my plate of chicken off the table and carry it to the den, where I finished it while not paying attention to a television show I don’t remember the name of.
Part 3
I was home from college for the summer, smoking high-quality marijuana, betting on horse races, and getting to know a girl named Peggy from Jersey. My father had just passed away and I was staying with my high school friend Juan’s place for a few months, going on weed runs to Rockaway, playing stickball and drinking at the beach until the cops douched us out with beer tickets.
I was in Juan’s guest bedroom, a glorious two-hundred-square-foot space consisting of a bed, a TV and a powerful air conditioner. He was in the bedroom of his parents, who were trekking to national parks throughout the West and wouldn’t be back for weeks.
The morning sun of the Northeast filtered in through the blinds, catching enough of my eyelids to jar me from a peaceful, if artificially frigid, slumber. It was Belmont Stakes day, and we had been waiting for it. It was a great day — reason to celebrate. I loaded up a big bowl of the last bud of Ithaca homegrown I had in my bag, stuck it in the three-foot Graffix, went downstairs, added ice and water, came back upstairs, added the three-foot extension to the top of the bong, and crept up to the doorway of Juan’s parents’ room with pride.
“Belmont Day, dude!” I said, “Six footers to get us going!”
I wrenched the door open and heard a loud, panicked, “Hey!” It was followed by rustling of bed sheets and a mad, naked dash for the adjacent bathroom. On the bed were tissues, a Penthouse magazine and a bottle of some sort of lubrication solution.
I laughed hard.
Juan came out of the bathroom in boxer shorts and laughed harder.
We were twenty-two years old and nobody gave a shit anymore and it was beautiful.
***
Arrrrrrrrrrgh…arrrrrrgggggghhhhh…yeah …
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