The Story of Therapy Dog Tails 562
Where Everyone Gets a Dose of Puppy Love
BACKGROUND 246: JLHS Part Two 19
Sun., Oct. 7, 2007
… This is the sort of thing that Ron has done ever since he’s been there. He has taken the “media” part of the name to heart. He’s the one who put up the website and he got criticized for it by, I think, Keely, for not being a great one. What she didn’t know, of course, was that before that there was nothing and Ron did all of that in his spare time. He has no spare time given his work schedule and the fact that he ‘s a fellow but he did it anyway when it should have been done for pay. Hoxha ought to have made that a top priority. He ought to make that a priority right now because there are many improvements to be made but he seems to have just lucked into his situation. He’s lucky to have people like Ron there and now there is Kate with her music background but when she suggested to Clarke that she’d like to put that to use for a media purpose in some way, Clarke told her to forget about it. She’s a math teacher and that’s that. They talk a lot about teaching across the curriculum but when someone actually makes an attempt to do that, you find out how they really feel. Of course, Clarke is an exception in the sense that she just doesn’t even know how to do a math job, let alone an inter-curricular job. Kate ought to fit perfectly into this place but she will have to do that on her own and in spite of resistance from the powers above, sort of how Amanda had to force out that newsletter that she got out from the student council last year. There was actual resistance to that.
Ron wanted to talk a bit and so did I. I like him a lot and am glad and proud to know him. We are both married to prima donnas but his prima donna isn’t making any money and is even higher maintenance than mine. Mine is a workaholic. His spends her days lying in bed smoking cigarettes. Mine smokes grass from time to time but that only energizes her, which puts her into a good mood because she can then run around the house sweeping or mopping or arranging her voodoo and feng shui paraphernalia, which is what she loves doing the way I love typing up this journal and fooling with the music data bases. His probably did some very heavy drugs and has had to deal with the after effects of that ever since, which would include a tendency toward various types of addiction. Mine has a genius for health and a psychic intuition. His has a great talent in her voice but has not been able to put that all the way over the top, although she has had more and bigger success than most. Mine is the most physically beautiful woman on earth and her addictions and talents and habits have only served to preserve that to an amazing degree. His was a beauty whose habits have had a tendency to undermine her health and looks although it has kept her very slim, too slim perhaps. Both are completely unable to handle money but have also run into people along the way to help them and support them. On the other hand, mine has an uncontrollable temper which has often made me wish she was more like his, who doesn’t seem to get worked up about anything at all.
In other words, we have a lot in common. Maybe the big difference now, however, is that he is seriously considering splitting from Valerie. I’ve had those thoughts over the past year and a half or so and even came very close to walking out on several occasions with nowhere to go but Ron seems resigned to not staying with Valerie or not making it with her. He’s still with her right now out of pity more than anything else because she is just burden on him. She went to California over the summer and managed to run up a $1600 credit bill on him and then still needed to be bailed out. Since then she has done nothing but lie around and be taken care of. I think they only met shortly before they came to New York a little over two years ago now but that is about all he can take of this. The question for him will be how to get out of it without either destroying her completely or leaving her destitute. That seems to be a real dilemma. Last summer and again on Friday he told me how it looked like it was over between them and he didn’t seem to want to go home to her until he had had a few beers and was ready to fall asleep fast. So his isn’t doing it any more for him, which leaves him open to what would be a mistake if it happens before he can resolve that situation. Mine usually leaves me wanting a lot more because I still lust after Luz more than anyone else and I mean anyone else, friend, but she is not very willing to take care of me. We had a great moment on Wednesday night but that was because Elizabeth had just called her looking for Greg and I’d had to lie to her and tell her that I’d been with him from about six to eight but didn’t know where he went from there. After that Luz was very good to me and when she is like that, there is nothing else that I could possibly want. The problem is that she won’t do it much and I’m still in great need of a lot of attention.
I think I was on the 11:30 train Friday night. That means that Ron and I left that place at about 10:30 or so because I got right onto the A train right there a block from his place and on the same block as the Irish place where we’d been earlier. He gave me a hug and told me he loved me and I feel the same about him. He is a great guy, an amazing guy and someone who deserves a lot more than he’s gotten recently. I stayed awake fairly well on the subway but had trouble on NJ Transit but I didn’t miss my stop and the car was there. I drove the Toyota to the station in the morning three times this week.
That brings me finally to yesterday and I was feeling pretty good. It’s about eleven o’clock in the morning now. Luz made an appearance but kept putting me off about going to bed and now Steve Lutz is here so it won’t happen for a while now. I won’t beg her anymore but I can’t help making my desires known to her. I guess she likes that idea that I’m lusting after her but she takes it for granted too much. At this point in our lives that is not something to be taken for granted but she may realize that only when it’s too late.
She had Steve out here yesterday as well. Maybe I mentioned that he came out one day this week. She was in New York and had bought some orchid somewhere and somehow he had appeared on the scene and offered to drive her home. He’s got a decent red truck now, littered as it always was. This night - maybe Tuesday - he got pulled over by the Linden cops The story I got was that he ran the light at Dewitt on Henry St. and they were headed for Pathmark but these stories from Luz never add up and I don’t ask questions anymore. So I don’t know what happened except that Luz called me and I drove over there to pick them up. Steve was not carrying an insurance card so they confiscated the truck. We put him on a train to New York and he was back the next day with the insurance policy and got out of it for just the cost of the tow and the ticket, which he said cost $125. This is what I heard. We did some reminiscing about how he had been picked up out here for possession of marijuana back in 1996 / 97 about the time we were moving into this house and he was living in the basement. He did a few days time for that and was on parole for a while but he said he fulfilled everything he had to do and that had been taken care of.
She also had a woman over to help her clean the house yesterday, someone she seems to have met on the train. [It’s now almost two p.m. Steve is here working. There’s a plan for me to drive the Toyota to his place tomorrow for a friend of his to work on. We’ve been to Home Depot and Sears. He’s doing some electrical work in the kitchen.] This happens. They got the house pretty well cleaned up and this woman says that she can get us the sticker that says that the car has been inspected. I don’t know how much these things go for but it might be necessary to keep the Toyota on the road. Of course, I’m no longer interested in that car because of the neglect they showed it and I’m going to end up being the one to get up early tomorrow morning to drive the thing to Queens. Maybe.
Geoff and I were on the 12:57 trying to get to the 47th St. Jam to play music from two to four. The train stalled a couple of times but still got us to Penn Station by 1:47. Catching the 2 train and walking from Times Square we were only a minute or so late. Greg and Edward had just arrived and were setting up in Studio 2 (further back). It was about 85 degrees and humid yesterday and had been that for a few days and is still so today although right now it looks as though it is finally going to rain. So we were sweating and drinking water but the idea was to go through the last few songs needed to get down to finish the second album. These are new takes of It’s 3 O’clock, Sadie’s Shell and Ballad f the Lost Blueblood along with our first attempt at Those Already Dead, which is now going to be the big finale. We warmed up with Love Canal and then worked on Ballad for a while. We played it a couple of times and had it back pretty quick. This is a song that we were playing a lot two years ago but have not played much recently. There must be 15 or 20 different recorded versions of it around, the best of which might be one done on a cold evening out in the garage between Jam locations. I think it’s a great song and had thought of it for the album that is going to have Parched, They Take Your Mind Away, You Never Know Who They Are, Don’t Make Me Tell You and What Happened to My Eyes, but it’s time to record it and it will fill out this album nicely.
Then we moved on to Sadie’s Shell, which we’ve tried on several occasions but it’s such an inspirational song that is wholly dependent on arrangement that there is no telling how it’s going to go any time we attempt it. It’s virtually impossible to get all of us to play our best on the same take of anything and to do this one without singing makes it almost impossible. There is one good take that I’ve been pushing for but if they can come out soon, we can give it at least one more attempt. Geoff is going to try it with just Greg and maybe that will work if Greg can hold himself back and if they can feel the song enough without the bass there. The bass is the thing that holds it all together so I have some doubts about whether or not this can be done but it’s worth a shot ….
Note: I had just written You Never Know Who They Are and was still trying to memorize the words when we rehearsed it in the garage in Oct. 2005. Off Wall Street Jam had just closed at that time due to the death of Bill Bennett and Jam Greg had not found the new place on 47th St. yet so we rehearsed a couple of times that fall in the garage. Geoff and Edward play the song fairly well but I garble the words in a couple of places and Greg is still trying to work out a lead guitar part, which he does the second time through during the break, when he hits that perfect note at the end, a note that perfectly expresses the alienation the song is about. This is another song we only rehearsed a few times and never got around to recording in a studio. I had high hopes for it but there’s no telling now how it might have turned out.
AUDIO INSERTED: Threads, You Never Know Who They Are
Greg, lead guitar; Edward, bass; Geoff drums; Dave rhythm guitar, vocal; Dewitt garage, Oct. 6, 2005