Anytime you mix tattoos, booze and floozieloos you know you’re going to have trouble – which is exactly what happened when That’s Not Chinese lifted her freshly tatted wrist in the air and proclaimed, “Porcupine Power!”
Alice mentioned there was a newly dug grave in the alleyway behind my back lot and, as soon as she said it, it was as if we stepped into a time machine and became the cast of the 1986 classic, Stand by Me.
We immediately grabbed our coffee cups and made our way to the alley. As promised, we found what appeared to be a newly dug grave of a very tall individual. “Do yout think they buried Abe Lincoln, top hat and all?” I asked. “Possibly,” said Alice in a very serious voice.
After tipping our ’40s’ to the homie, we continued to walk down the alleyway. As we passed my back lot Alice’s inside voice came out, “This is the shithole I see every time I walk down this alley.” She was right – it looks very Kentucky.
Last year I let my neighbor plant a garden in my back lot. Unfortunately, things didn’t go as planned, in that the dam, bridge, barriers and berms he constructed all failed. In what appears to be an attempt to make up for last year’s failure, he has been throwing all of his waste on top of the soil in hopes of creating compost. “That is not compost,” said That’s Not Chinese. “No,” said Alice, “That is why we have rodent problems.” I started to apologize when I noticed a shiny abandoned object.
“Is that a big wheel?” I asked. “It certainly is,” said Oreggano. “It is so mine,” I said. Within minutes, I had taken it for a test drive and solicited the assistance of Alice and That’s Not Chinese to toss it over the fence into the shithole also known as my back lot.
During the test drive, Sleepless noticed a relatively decent sized concrete slab. “We should put this on the center of the grave, like a tombstone.” “Good idea,” said Gordy, Chris, Teddy and Vern (for those of you who have lost track, those are the boys in Stand By Me). “It’s pretty heavy, we may need a car,” suggested Oreggano. “I’ll get my car,” offered Alice.
While Alice grabbed her car the rest of us returned to my house to refresh our coffee and grab permanent markers for epitaphs. We returned to the scene and I assessed the slab situation. “That is going to be way too heavy,” I told them. “Someone is going to get hurt.”
My concerns did not defer them. Sleepless, That’s Not Chinese, Alice and Oreggano bent down (with their knees, of course), picked up the slab, and carried it to the car. “Why aren’t you helping?” asked Oreggano. “I can’t help and document,” I told her while snapping pictures of their labors.
Once the slab was inside the vehicle, we followed alongside while Alice drove to the grave – it was like a full-fledged funeral procession. “You better help take it out of the car,” That’s Not Chinese instructed me. “Ever since you got your porcupine tattoo (at this point I think it had been a couple of hours) you have been really bossy,” I replied.
We centered the tombstone on the grave, pulled out the permanent markers, provided a signature “R.I.P.” across the top, and followed it up with names of people, animals and other things who/that are dead – literally, figuratively, and from a fashion perspective. As we did so, it was almost as if Richard Dreyfuss was right there with us, “In all our lives there is a fall from innocence, a time after which we are never the same.” We fell from innocence alright – most likely some time long before today – and we will never be the same.
As we walked away from the grave That’s Not Chinese shouted out an amen of sorts, “Porcupine Power!”