WHITE BALL IN TALL TREE

I'm reminded of perfect isolation each time I walk my dog out onto the park near my house and see, up in a tall, almost leafless tree, a white ball stuck for what seems like eternity...

READING ON THE FORK LIFT

My cousin was a hip guy, older than me and a child of the sixties and seventies, a fact he'd often rub in.

"I saw THE DOORS when I was 13," he'd always say, "and didn't even pay attention."

I was an 80's kid and was never sure if my cousin thought I was cool, but he saw me at work once, sitting on a fork lift reading this book by Hunter S. Thompson that, because of the politics and my current opinions therein, I probably couldn't finish today but back then, with a voracious appetite for counter-culture literature, I ate it up like a piranha does to rambling river cattle.  

And best yet, I was cool. At least while I was reading. 

WHERE I HID MY DRAGONS

Back in the day I dropped acid. Personally referred to as "Lenny on the Sidewalk with Dragons," I was fearless with the drug.

Only once did I have a "bad trip" when, while listening to THE DOORS ALIVE SHE CRIED on my record player, Ray Manzerek's pulsating Hammond organ on LIGHT MY FIRE went a little too fast for my brain to fathom.

I walked downstairs, force fed myself, returned to my bedroom and, lying on my bed I listened to an Eddie Murphy concert tape on my Walk Man to "come down" a bit. (Later I went downstairs and watched an Eddie Murphy film... possibly BEVERLY HILLS COP as he was my hero at that time.)

Anyhow, here's the album that, although it's the worst Ozzy Osbourne era Black Sabbath album, TECHNICAL ECSTASY is where I used to keep my tabs of Sidewalk Dragons in.

In which LP did you keep yours? 

NEW YORK EARTHQUAKE DREAM

A dream that I was in New York, in a high rise and me and some friends... not friends in real life but in the dream only... were about to have a party. My dog, who died a few years back, Chuy, was there and I was worried about her. I left her in the room and went downstairs to a big plush party, and as I went outside to use my cell phone, a giant earthquack erupted. I didn't feel the initial jolt. A pretty girl told me it was happening and then we walked down the city street and I was protecting her, making sure we weren't underneath anything. On all sides of us, parts of bridges were falling and people, unseen, were dying. Then I worried about Chuy, my dog. This is a strange aspect because Chuy died two years ago and when she was alive I used to have reoccuring dreams about her disapearing, usually towards the end of the dream which would cause stress for me to wake up. I didn't wake up. Instead I went upstairs. Jane Fonda was in my hotel room with some guy, a convict of some sort, really scary type, gruff and honest. He was threatning to ruin the bar that had china plates and expensive glasses. I told the guy, "Don't ruin my stuff. Ask Jane about things that cost a lot of money." I was referring to her wealth; the wealth she had even before she earned her own money (from her dad Henry). Jane came in from the kitchen and joined in on breaking my dishes. I took out my cell phone, went downstairs and then outside, and tried calling the police. I told them that Jane Fonda, the actress, was ruining my plates, and even told them "This may sound completely ridiculous, but..." Oh and somewhere in the middle of the dream there was a questionaire-poll thing I was supposed to fill out in order to win money, with actors names and it was really hard writing and completing these forms... kind of like when your feet won't move when trying to run away.