A Night Out With Herman

  

 

“But who wants to work all the time? Only very foolish people.  The more rational man knows that there is something even more important in life, and that its name is living."

                                                                                                              – H.L. Mencken

  

It is often necessary between bouts of writing to shock the senses with an extreme act of novelty, so as to cast off the tunnel vision that inevitably sets in after long stretches hunched over a keyboard.  Devote enough time to stringing together sentences on screen or paper and cheer will at some point morph into drudgery – everyone has their limit.  Mine is reached the moment it’s obvious that the effort invested is beginning to yield diminishing creative returns.  A common mistake at such a juncture is to charge on and continue toiling, as if enduring mental discomfort is somehow more virtuous than taking a break when inspiration runs dry.  But contrary to myth, no karma is accrued from self-flagellation, as joyless writing invariably makes for joyless reading, the kind of vacuous mush that dulls the language and the author is quietly ashamed of.  It is instead much better to suspend the process and feed the brain with some random, new experience, preferably in the company of others and as far from a laptop or typewriter as possible.

I was in such a mood not long ago, after a solid week of hammering out prose, cloistered in my den.  The flow of ideas had slowed to a trickle and rather than stew in anguish, I decided to cut my losses and abort my routine.  I called my friend Herman at once.

“I need a mental detox,” I said.  “We must meet up in the city and run wild.”

“I like this idea,” Herman replied.  “We should dose.”

“Do what you want,” I said.  “But drinks are sufficient for me, along with the tone of night in the polis.  This is about gracefully draining a stagnant pool of thought that’s stifling my work, not about getting whacked-out crazy on liquid psychosis.”

“Have it your way,” he said.  “See you at seven.”

We agreed to meet at the Dirty Pearl without delay, a scummy kind of dive bar just south of downtown with an endearing shark of a bartender and the most colorful restroom graffiti in the Seattle metropolitan area.  I took the bus and arrived at 6:55, but Herman didn’t show up for another hour.  When he finally walked through the front door, he appeared to be brooding on matters bigger than punctuality.

“Where were you?” I asked, as Herman sat down on the stool to my left.  “I’ve been drinking this rum as slowly as possible so we wouldn’t start off out of sync, but this pace of consumption doesn’t bode well for the rhythm of the evening.”

“Death,” he said.

I looked at him.  His eyes looked pink, wild, and apprehensive, not focusing on anything, but rolling around in their sockets as thoughts came to him.

“If I were driving,” he murmured, “and a truck moving in the opposite direction skid out of control and slammed into me, for a second or two I’d know I was about to die, but I’d be totally powerless.”

“To hell with death,” I growled.  “Life is too short to obsess on nothingness.  Is that what you want to remember those last few seconds as the blood drains out of your head?  That you spent your life worrying?  Or that you enjoyed it as much as your crude human faculties would allow?”

“But,” he said.  “I know that’s exactly how it’s going to go down.”

“Don’t be a fatalistic buffoon,” I snapped.  “Live well and you won’t croak in despair.  And dwelling on the end is treason to the present.  Now raise a damn glass and pretend you’re on a tropical island wallowing naked on a pile of money.”

“Okay,” said Herman.  “What should I get?”

“A double top-shelf rum on the rocks with at least four slices of lime, immediately.”

He nodded his head and ordered his drink.

“Slurp it down, you beautiful beast,” I said.  “I’ve spent too long in this murky hole.”

The Dirty Pearl was as fine a space to conjure new ideas and gather perspective as any other, simply because it was equal and opposite to my usual surroundings.  I live in a place with books and plants and music typically not found on the radio, and this bar had nothing of the sort, and could reliably provide a vigorous assault on the bad habit of getting too comfortable.  Before the statewide indoor smoking ban went into effect some years ago, the neon beer signs adorning the walls would illuminate a constant fog of cigarette smoke, steeping the interior with a heavy aura of unmistakable grit – of which the Dirty Pearl still reeked.  For some reason the bar was always stocked with good rum, but I have long suspected that I was the only one who ever drank it.  After another ten minutes of absorbing the muse of authentic squalor, it was clearly time to move on.

“What we need is more scum,” I said, as we trotted outside into the late spring twilight.  “But scum of a different variety.”

“What do you suggest?” asked Herman, now more upbeat with a drink in his belly.

“I suggest we go to Prole’s Paradise down by the docks.”

“Oh, we can’t go there,” said Herman, with a slight touch of unease.  “I’ve been kicked out too many times.”

“For what?” I said.

“Well, last time the bouncer caught me flirting with his girlfriend.  Then I threw up on the bar and passed out in the janitor’s closet.”

“Good heavens,” I said.  “He must be the jealous type.  Then we should go to the Bohemian Affliction, deep in the bowels of Pioneer Square.  There the bouncer is reasonable, and it’s only fifteen minutes away on foot.”

“I’m down,” said Herman.  “Never been there before.  But first I need to stop by my car.”

We went to his dented hatchback around the corner and he climbed into the driver’s seat and began rummaging around the vehicle.  I was quickly bored by this so I opened the passenger door and stepped in.

“Do you need help finding something?” I offered, attempting to speed things along.

“Oh, no problem,” he said warmly.  The betterment of his mood was impressive, given the depths of anxious torment in which he was earlier mired.  He then pulled out some foil and a straw and began to smoke heroin.

A beat passed.  “Herman,” I said.  “How long have you been on the junk?”

“Oh, you know, on and off for years,” he replied, out of the corner of his mouth with a wide plastic straw dangling from his lips.  “But I only smoke in the evenings and on weekends.”

Now I probably like rum and ale more than Herman does, but he regularly huffs smack and tobacco.  Neither substance interests me, save for well-crafted cigars on special occasions, but in any case I tend to find people with unconventional habits much more compelling than the breed unaware of their own vices.  Some folk like to sit and stare at tee-vee for hours at a time, while others compulsively buy gadgets at considerable strain to planetary well-being.  I’ve met pious vegans who live like monks and tend kale but are simply too lazy to engage with anyone of a different mindset.  An honest sense of proportion would keep one far more concerned with the grim dynamics of the rat race as a whole than with the lifestyle choices individuals make to cope with it – for we all have our own peculiarities.  Alas, the spirit of witch-burning still reigns.  Herman took one last puff, shoved his implements under his seat, and we both got out of the car.

“Herman,” I said, as we began to walk.  “I think you should run for City Council.”

He strained his brow as if pondering a great mystery.

“How much does it pay?” he asked.  “A lot, right?”

“Six figures, but no free parking,” I said.  “That’s more than a state senator.  But the real gravy comes afterwards: speaking gigs, consulting work, a nice, fat sinecure on the board of some company.  The sky’s the limit if you play ball.  But I’d humbly suggest that you abjure said payoffs, for the sake of the kids and your own glory.”

“The kids?” he asked.

“Of course,” I said.  “You are a young musician, and therefore the Rock and Roll Candidate.  The nightlife crowd will swoon; that’s an automatic chunk of Capitol Hill and the University District, with campaign contributions from dance clubs and taverns.”

“I would probably have to stop smoking heroin.”

“Yes.  But if you slip up, just find Jesus.”

“I don’t think that would work in Seattle.”

“Your instincts are stellar.  That proves you are made for this,” I said.  “In lieu of Jesus you’re just going to have to double down and cry foul – the Rock and Roll Candidate persecuted by the forces of hate and reaction.  But seriously you should probably clean up at least a month before the filing deadline.”

“How much does it pay?”

“You already asked that.  A little over a hundred grand.”

“But…my police record.”

“Just campaign on reforming the SPD and imply you were a victim.”

He thought about it for a moment.  “I think I could win,” he said.  A panhandler approached us, but Herman waved him away without making eye-contact.

Anything is possible in the Emerald City.  Even after khakis supplanted flannel in the Great Banalification wave of the 1990s, there was still enough soggy dissent to carry a mutant like Herman to power.  The current mayor of Toronto is a known enthusiast of crack rock, and the proud voters of Seattle are at least as permissive as they are in Ontario.  Just last week a man dressed in motorcycle goggles, headscarves, and purses with a hubcap tied to his arm was caught rolling down Capitol Hill in an office chair, gingerly weaving through traffic.  When apprehended by police, he demanded to be handcuffed, and the officers faithfully obliged, right before he sat back in his chair and rolled off down the street in his handcuffs.  No – the tech yuppies and upscale real estate hustlers hadn’t won yet.  Candidate Herman would be the perfect vehicle for the kooky underbelly of Seattle to reassert itself after years of bland occupation by the mercenaries of progress, and with the right kind of marketing his odds of picking off Dick Conlin for City Council Position 2 would be greater than those of Conlin’s most prominent challenger, a dogmatic socialist who’s more angry than fun.

“It says here the filing deadline was May 17,” Herman said, looking into his smartphone.

“Well,” I said.  “Then you’ll have to run next year.  You can polish your résumé in the meantime.”  Herman frowned, looked forward, and lit a cigarette.

We soon made it to the Bohemian Affliction, a subterranean bar accessible only through an entrance located in a filthy alley between two run-down brick buildings which have been partially vacant for as long as I can remember.  We walked through the door and descended a narrow stairway where the only light came from a single red bulb dangling from the ceiling.  The cement steps were old and uneven but eventually led to the barroom itself, a dim sort of basement filled with faded posters and decorations salvaged from the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair, an unsettling touch that compounded the hellish, grimy aesthetic of being underground.  This fit the clientele very well, for none bore smiles or seemed remotely interested in dancing.

I ordered a rum and Herman eagerly bought three glasses of absinthe, “so I wouldn’t have to wait for the bartender between drinks,” he said.  Across the room, a spotlight suddenly turned on and a lithe young brunette wearing a tight-fitting black dress and knee-high boots stood at a microphone awaiting everyone’s attention.  To her left was a phonograph with a large tin horn on a pedestal.  But no one besides Herman and I even looked at her, and the general hubbub of the room continued unabated.  She activated the phonograph, which began emitting the crackly recording of a female singer wailing something in French about love, and the young brunette in the spotlight began to recite poetry:

“Fear not the shame

Of being too lame

In a Potemkin maze

With no finish.

The closest you’ll get

Is when you forget

That you are a slimy

Dumb little vermin.

They’ll push you around

And poison the ground

But what can I say

We’re all guilty.

In the valley of sin

We hear just the din

Of echoes, our own

Stupid voices.

So go ahead and drink

No one cares what you think

I need help I just murdered

My boyfriend.”

The music stopped and the spotlight went out.  No one clapped, and I was totally bewildered.  How many layers of sarcasm was that?  Did she even know herself?  Or was she a regular who simply enjoyed inflicting her act on a cynical crowd she felt deserved to be punished?  I turned to Herman to ask what he thought, but he was lost in a rosy world of dreams, slowly twirling his finger in absinthe while staring into space.  He was smitten.

“I know that look, Herman,” I said.  “It’s called love.”

Herman blushed, took a sip, and whispered, “She’s perfect…”

I ordered more rum and asked the bartender who she was.  “Oh you like that?” he said with a gravelly chuckle.  “That’s Molly.  Comes in every Friday with her record player.  But everyone who knows her says she’s crazy.”  He laughed again.  “She used to busk at Pike Place Market, but she got her permit revoked when she kept yelling at tourists for not giving her money.  If that’s your type, buddy, go for it, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“It’s not like that,” I said.  “I’m writing a series on phonographs for the Utne Reader.”

I turned to Herman.  “Her name’s Molly,” I said.

“Molly,” he said, smiling stupidly.  “Molly…”

“Here, watch my rum,” I said.  “I’m going to the gentleman’s room.  Maybe you could use this time to write a nice poem for her on a cocktail napkin.”  He was in bliss, under the influence of at least three powerful chemicals that I knew about, maybe more, plus love and the stimulation of a new environment.  He might ruin his chances if he acted too boldly, but given Molly’s reputation in all likelihood that would be a good thing.  Best to whisk Herman away to a new watering hole soon before he blurted out anything base or his heart was cruelly broken.

I returned from the bathroom to find Molly sitting in his lap at the bar.  “And that’s when I used our joint e-mail account to write racist letters to all of his coworkers under his name,” said Molly, daintily playing with Herman’s chin.

“You’re a firecracker,” he said.

Holy God, I thought.  The bartender wasn’t kidding – the girl was dangerous, and now she’s sinking her teeth into Herman.  I approached, afraid to interrupt for fear she might categorize me as “foe” and cook up a scheme to have me destroyed.

“Hello,” I said, introducing myself.  “That was quite a performance.  I see you’ve met Herman.  You know, he’s a performer too.”

Molly stopped smiling and stared at me.  “What’s that supposed to mean?” she said.

Panic set in.  She was formidable, and I knew that one more misstep could be deadly.  But it is never wise to passively submit to the judgment of an unreasonable counterparty; nor is it advisable in such an instance to plead one’s case and look desperate.  I took a pull of my rum, gazed across the room at nothing in particular, and calmly explained.

“Well, Herman works at the circus, where people pelt him with eggs for 40¢ a shot.  He wears a sailor outfit many sizes too small with red lipstick smeared on his face while sitting in a play pen.  One summer I had an internship where I had to hose him down every forty-five minutes to get the yolks off; that’s how we first met.  Not as glamorous as being center stage like Herman, but we all have to start somewhere.  Even Herman had to work up from feeding fish heads to the bearded lady.”

I looked at Molly, who said nothing.  She softly climbed out of Herman’s lap, stood up straight, and slapped me across the face with the full strength of her arm.  Then she smiled, turned to Herman, and said, “I like this guy.”

“I knew you two would get along,” said Herman, as the bartender began laughing hysterically in the distance.

Molly sat back in Herman’s lap and resumed flirting.  I flagged down the bartender for another drink.  “Don’t sweat it, buddy,” he said.  “This one’s on me – haw, haw!”  He slid me another rum with ice and continued laughing.

“Well,” I said, holding the glass against the throbbing palm print on the left side of my face.  “I guess novelty pays for itself.”

Apparently there was no more live music scheduled for the rest of the night, so I spent a while weighing my options.  It was starting to get late and Herman was enjoying himself, but sitting in a dimly lit basement while an admittedly very attractive maniac fondled the side of his head was starting to wear thin.  We could stay put, which would play to Herman’s advantage, at least for a while, or I could leave him there with Molly, which somehow seemed in poor taste.  I could devise an excuse to get rid of her, which would put me at risk of another, perhaps worse beating, or maybe the three of us could leave together – but what venue could possibly tame this treacherous siren?

“A house party,” blurted Herman, as if reading my thoughts.

“Yes,” I said.  “That would be optimal.”

“There’s one going on at my neighbor’s place, right next door to my house,” he said.

“Then we should go,” said Molly.

“As soon as humanly possible,” I concurred.

“Shut up,” said Molly.

“You are a crazy person,” I said.  “A snake in human form.”

She nodded and giggled.  Herman beamed with pride.

Molly asked me to carry her phonograph upstairs and I said yes.  Then she asked me to carry it to Herman’s car, and I said no.  She snarled at me so I gently set the machine on top of a dumpster in the alleyway.

“Let’s be clear about one thing,” I said.  “I kiss the feet of no sociopath.  You were violent with me once and now you must pay the price.  Carry it yourself, dork.”

She stared at me weirdly, then raised her hand into the air as if intimating a slapping motion.  I frowned and quickly reached into my pocket, grasped a handful of coins with some lint, and threw it all in her general direction.  “You fascist lunatic,” I said.  “You ought to be ashamed of yourself.”

The coins bounced off her chest and legs before falling to the ground, and she hissed several words of profanity.  Herman diffused the situation by offering to carry the phonograph himself, and Molly and I glared at each other as we walked to the car through the dark.  When we made it back I took the phonograph from Herman and crammed it in the backseat and sat down beside it, the better to keep an eye on Molly in the front and to avoid getting shanked from behind.  Herman pulled out two cigarettes and put them in his mouth, while Molly affectionately lit them and then took one for herself.  The car started, and we were off.

Herman lives in an old house on the north side of town with a tiny yard and horrible insulation.  It turns into an ice box in the winter and becomes an unbearable sauna in August, but even during the spring and autumn the air is plagued by dust from ancient carpeting and waste baskets that always seem full.  The house with the party appeared to be of a similar make and model, and it was safe to assume it was populated by unmarried libertines with a powerful penchant for chaos.  They were laughing and yelling on the front porch when we arrived, with one enterprising young man on the roof throwing lawn darts onto a target that had been crudely spray-painted on the grass below.  Molly and Herman wanted to smoke with the others out front, so I gave them their space and walked inside by myself.

The living room glowed bright green from a few strands of Christmas lights strung up on mostly blank walls, and a man bearing a striking resemblance to Winston Churchill in a vest and bowler hat sat at an upright piano, furiously pounding out notes with massive, hammy fingers.  How he was able to hit only one key at a time is still a mystery to me.  The man was good – so good that a few hopelessly drunk party goers were focusing all of their attention on singing with the maestro, who howled louder than anyone:

“What shall we do with a drunken sailor...

Early in the mo-orning!!”

They moaned along like this for a while, passing around a large jug of whiskey in counterclockwise rotation before eventually setting it down on the piano.  I reached to take a swig.

The Winston Churchill guy abruptly stopped playing and looked me in the eye.  I froze, with my arm outstretched.

“Ronald’s gruel in Ronald’s fief!” he said, in a voice both high and angry.

Everyone looked at me in silence.

“What did I do?” I said.

“Wha-at didn’t you do,” slurred one of the drunks.

“I’m sorry,” I said.  “I thought the hooch had been collectivized.”

The crowd booed at me.

“Ronald says to go upstairs, to purify yourself, at the toes of Ronald’s sweetness!” said the piano man, with a sick grin and steely eyes.  I thought for a moment.

“Well…” I began.

“FIEF!!  FIEF!!  FIEF!!” the drunks started chanting in unison.

Ronald deepened his twisted smile, slowly raised his right arm, and pointed at the staircase down the hall.  I shrugged, scanned the room in vain for Molly and Herman, and sheepishly said, “Okay.”  He cackled at the top of his lungs and began playing another sea shanty as I walked towards the stairs.

There are some moments in life that one must go through alone.  Birth and death occur one at a time, and the most significant lurches towards spiritual completion are made when you take the biggest risks and shed the most ego – times of brutal, honest humility, when you rely solely on your own wits and swallow the pain doled out by fate with the understanding that it’s required, evolutionary medicine.  This appeared to be one of those instances.  I solemnly marched upstairs, climbing the precipitous steps with a foreboding sense of unease.  I opened the door at the top, and heard death metal playing at a low volume across a vast, dark attic.

“Welcome,” said a deep voice at the back of the room.  A stout figure wearing a motorcycle helmet and a black cape was standing by an altar of some kind.  “We’ve been waiting for you.”

“Yes,” I said.  “I understand.”

I slowly walked over, trying not to stumble over the various boxes and junk littering the floor.  The place had the smell of old book pages, sandalwood, and meat.  Not much was visible except the altar, where a lone tea candle flickered next to a small, metallic incense burner shaped like a tea pot.  They were set on a thick board, about two by two feet, which lay on the speaker emitting the music.  Affixed to the board was a crucifix with a nude Barbie doll nailed to it, with four other naked Barbies sitting beneath her with red paint on their faces.  Two of them held a dismembered doll leg, one of them held an arm, and it was clear they were arranged to display a scene of shameless cannibalistic frenzy.  I knelt before the shrine and awaited instruction.

“You understand the power,” said the man in the helmet, standing over me.

“Yes,” I said.  “The power.”

“And…the glory.”

“Yes,” I said.  “The glory.”

“The pride.”

“Yes.  The pride.”

He raised his left hand and pressed a button on the remote control he was holding.  The low-volume death metal shifted to the sound of a pig violently squealing.

“Now,” he thundered, “the time has come to consummate our triumph – with a sin of the flesh.”

I gulped.  He reached behind the altar and presented a plate of barbeque ribs.  I took one and munched on it, while continuing to kneel.

“This is pretty good,” I said, licking my fingers.  “Do you have any napkins?”

He laughed.  “Here we don’t wipe away our shame – we savor it for as long as it takes to become one with the Logos…Stand up, boy, and listen carefully.”

I stood up and he leaned forward.  He increased the volume of the squealing with his remote control, and lifted the face shield of his helmet.

It was Ronald, the piano man.  I gasped and he smiled fiendishly.  “In a world built on the bones of the weak,” he said, raising his fist, “the ruthless inherit the earth.  Keep your rib as an eternal reminder that you are Eater, not Eaten – now go forth and rule.”  The squealing got louder as I walked away, tripping over an old tricycle next to the door.

I went downstairs and found Molly sitting on the piano bench with Ronald.  She was peppering the side of his head with small kisses while he continued leading the drunks in song, sweat pouring down his face as he screamed the words to Oh! Susanna, the whiskey jug still passing between slobs.  A 30-something-year-old woman stomping her feet hoedown-style took it and raised it to her lips, but then stopped when she saw me holding my rib bone.  Instead she gave me the jug and said, “You passed…your blood is worth more now…”

This was all very confusing, so I took a quick drink and then went outside to look for Herman.  He was smoking by himself on the porch, shaking his head sadly while watching lawn darts drop into the yard.

“It’s hopeless,” said Herman.  “I simply can’t compete against a famed virtuoso.  The charisma is too great.  Ronald and Brandon Fabulous are the hottest libertarian performance artists outside of Montana.”

“There’s two of them?” I asked.

“Yeah, they’re identical twins.”  His eyes grew misty.  “Raised from birth to sing and dance and act by a couple of pesticide lobbyists.  They singlehandedly delivered Pend Oreille County to Ron Paul last year with their Ayn Rand burning tire routine, and they’re already booked for a statewide GMO Celebration Tour this fall.  Their star can only rise higher.”  He looked genuinely distressed.  “Hopeless,” he said.  “Hopeless.”

I tried to cheer him up.  “Maybe Molly isn’t a libertarian,” I said.

           “She has to be,” he moped.  “She told me she doesn’t believe in pollution.”

         “There’s a strong possibility that she was being facetious,” I said.  “Plus you’re running for City Council – that’s got to be worth something, right?”

Herman puffed on his cigarette.  “Well it doesn’t really matter, does it?  You saw them in there.  She was all over him.”

A squatty dog with grey and white spots then scampered up out of the darkness and stood in front of the porch, looking at my rib as if spellbound.  The creature began to drool and whine faintly, in a transparent attempt to acquire what was rightfully mine by exploiting my sense of compassion.  I looked at Herman, who was staring at the ground in defeat, then at the rib bone in my hand, and I reflected for a moment on Eaters and Eaten and ruling and ruthlessness.  I flung the thing in the dirt, and the dog barked with joy and ran off with it.  I put my arm around Herman and gave him a squeeze, and said, “At least we have each other.”

“And heroin,” he said, warmly.  “Want to come over and crash at my place?  The sun will be coming up soon.”

“No thanks,” I said.  “I’m going to call a cab and go home.  It is a good thing to know when to take a break, but a greater thing still to know for what purpose.  My brain is refreshed, and now it yearns for the hum of productive activity.”  I waved goodbye.  “Get some sleep Herman,” I said.  “You are not of the herd, and the world needs more of you.”

With that we parted ways, each of us smiling with a head full of memories.