The Early Years: The Odyssey begins

How the Bible (case)
Saved My LIFE

Remember the days when you could spot a seasoned bible thumper, Jehovah’s Witness or Mormon a country mile away, mainly by the somber  colored black or brown, leather or plethora (for the less blessed)  bible case? Now these were the days before the bible case became composed of all manner of synthetic material, arrayed in dazzling brilliant colors, straps, buckles and bling, invoking designer styles; so chameleon to pop society have these modern cases become that a bible thumpers would have no trouble sneaking up on you  before you have had a chance to spot’em and run the other direction. But no need to worry in these days of dwindling or perverted religiosity seldom will your personal space be treaded upon; that is unless you happen to be in some unnamed foreign countries and their equivalent of bible thumper descend upon you, the thumping you may be unfortunately privy to may be a severe and even life threatening thumping, literally, BOOM!

It was such an old school  bible case (actually since at  the time I was making the purchase was back in the day, the case was current.) that caught my eye . My life had been totally disoriented, shaken and tossed around. I  had been entreated to a supernatural experience and put on a path epic adventures that continues to this day (see Phillip Ghee’s True Tales: The Visitor at the Window)   I now was about to embark on paths and adventures unknown. I found myself at my favorite, at the time and still to today,  most favorite shopping emporium: The second hand thrift store.

I was preparing for the trip I was soon to take, out of town and to destinations unknown. Being young, naïve and fully romanticized as to what provisions I should take; most of the items I selected were foolish, uncalled for or ill advised.

There was the belt strapped Bowie knife, I knew I was headed to the southwest. Yet no one informed me that it was not the southwest of 1890. An urban, African American male sporting, denim Levi jacket, cowboy boots and hat must have been a hoot to some of the passer byers while I still made my way through east coast cities on my way out west. But always being my own individual and not a captive to social typing; I would probably have selected the same manner of dress even If I were to do it all over again. And I did look good in the ensemble especially to the senoritas west of Dallas and beyond.

Now back to the second hand shop; I needed something to carry around important papers and documents. There it was, a bible case. Man! I thought this is perfect. I can keep my documents in it and at the same time project a more trustful and gentile image. I grabbed the extremely reasonably priced brown, real leather case and quickly yet respectfully gutted its contents.

During those days, a young heathen such as myself, having been exposed to the bible at the all knowing age of nine ,by way of summer Sunday school camp; I felt that the contents of hauling around such an already known book would just be an extra burden of weight to haul around and to be realistic, this was not exactly my type of reading material I would be prone to open. The cashier could have cared lease that I had gutted the innards of the case, my lost their financial gain.

I eventually found myself landing in a then sleepy southwest town, many years prior to it becoming a boom town Amazingly, I actually could legally walk around with a belt bound bowie knife nestled in its sheath. I even saw a couple of holstered cowpokes here and there,  yeee ha!. So I did the macho thing my first few weeks there until the novelty wore off. .

The dive of a hotel I initially stayed in had a community room of sorts. Now this is before the days of cable TV. Those of you who know, the seemingly never, aging me, stop! right there, trying to pinpoint the year of my arrival; suffice it to say it was a long, long time ago.

Now back at the dive, the behemoth of a wood encased, ray tube innards, television (more like a piece of large furniture) set, seemed to play only western cowboys movies and re runs of popular western shoot em up  television series. The appreciative day laborers, ranch hands and surprisingly even the indigenousness Chief Joseph’s representing the various local Native American tribes did not seem to object to this all cowboy, all the time fare.

Things moved pretty slow in this town and for awhile that suited the recent transplant from the hustling bustling east coast city just fine.

                                       Desert Vice

Aloysius, (naturally this name as well as others to follow have been only slightly altered to protect the guilty) pulled into this sleepy southwestern town like a modern day Bat Masterson sporting an Afro, wearing ballooned sleeved shiny shirts and driving a late model Monte Carlo, fresh with the new technological enhancement ‘cruise control’.

Man! could this guy gamble. He could whip the pants off the local yokels in everything from craps, cards, to the local favorite dominoes. It was at this last event where I got to know Aloysius. The locals usually had a domino table set up outside of or in the vicinity of many of the local watering holes. Stuff that in your outside dinner and seating permits all ya’ll coast cities. Money was usually exchanged under the table and I suspect the local law enforcement officers received some sort of tribute from the local establishments.

While depleting the locals of their pocket change and sock money, Aloysius would also spin tales of his early exploits, not necessarily dealing with gambling and, I hope were as true as Phillip Ghee’s True Tales.

I respect a man who can tell a tale articulately and without using an expletive  in every sentence or every third word, like so many of  my east coast bros are prone to do. Now although I was young I was never given to following or being drawn to hero like worship of mere mortal men be they outstanding or outlaws. Yet I must admit that in this time of me living in reckless abandonment, I was drawn to his charisma. Despite his profession he had class without being crass. According to Aloysius, an interrupted love triangle had caused him to make a hasty retreat from Washington D.C. He only had time to grab his most essential and easy to carry belongings and hit the road. He had managed to work his way this far west by exercising the mastery of his given skills. But he choose not to stay in the towns he had thus visited because he never knew when the locals might develop a little resentment towards his sleight of hand or his generously dealt card hands. No, Aloysius had more grand goals and locations in mind. He was on his way to his Mecca, Las Vegas, Nevada; The Promise Hand.

A Casanova of sorts, Aloysius claimed to have an ex-wife of many years back, who lived in Las Vegas who still held a flaming torch for him. She would provide him provisions until he extracted his wrath on the Vegas casinos. And I believed he could do it. At the time I had managed to make ends meet by performing various days jobs and I  had also landed a position revamping a house be a seriously mature woman who turned out to be more interested in having her person re-vamped more than the house. And hard as I tried to imagine her more desirable and collect some easy cash,  the imagination was not that strong in the Face of Reality.I  just couldn’t it work and subsequently my assignments of work from her became less forthcoming and of lower compensation. So when Aloysius hinted that he would consider to take a side kick along for the company, I was compelled to ante up.

The day of departure arrived and I excitedly took the shotgun seat in the plush Monte Carlo and said farewell to my short lived southwestern retreat. Instead of heading north to the highway we started off south through town. Hey! Wait a minute what’s this? Aloysius, gave a rather rambling explanation of how he had met this couple a few nights prior and how they were going to pay for gas and toss him a little something extra for a ride to Phoenix.  

I wasn’t thrilled at the news that we would be traveling with others and felt a little un-nerved by the fact that he had not mentioned that to me a day or so earlier. However since he was not requiring of me to contribute, from my meager stash of cash, towards travel expenses; I figured it was none of my business how he conducted business.

Ringo, was a cross between a deranged Manson-like hippie and a reincarnated wild west outlaw. Bel was the most hyped up and outlandish nymphomaniac that I have ever seen or imagined before or since. It would not surprise me if they had been ex-members of Manson’s clan. Oops! there I go again dating myself.

Introductions having been made, the mangy, long silver and blond hair, Ringo and the short and pudgy cherub face Bel made their way into the backseat. OK, now we were off to the highway? Not.

Ringo had some items stored at the Public Storage facility that would that he had prearranged, unknown to Aloysius, to pick and deliver to a third party in exchange for cash. “OH! Please God, not a drug deal or another passenger, I quietly pleaded. Maybe I shouldn’t have gutted the innards of the bible case.

We made the first of two Ringo inspired drop-offs. Bel had engaged me in what I thought was friendly conversation but somehow Ringo did not join into such conversation willingly. As he left to make the first drop off he made it quite apparent to Bel that he wanted her to shut up until he returned. I thought this rude but, once again, none of my business. Aloyisus departed the car also for a look around. No sooner had both men left the car then Bel almost somersault to front seat to display her wares. Not interested I ushered her back to the backseat the way one would do an over excited Cocker Spaniel. Being repelled did little to curb her enthusiasm she simply reverted to verbal description of her skills and intentions. Upon Ringo’s return he must have sniffed out the traces of  esterase in the air. From that point his disdainful looks at me now became suspicious and threatening. At the second stop, unable to convince a stubborn Bel to accompany him, he made the macho request that I not talk to his girl. Now, I became drawn into the game. Being young and rather impulsive myself I responded to the insult with invitation and even gave Ms. Hot pants woody words.

         
It was already past noon and we still had not made it to the interstate. The atmosphere inside the car remained charged with insult and invitation to every subject matter discussed, from songs to sports, it was ridiculous. Then there was the frequent stops for relief, refill etc. At these occasions Ringo would often take Bel off to the side and silently either admonish her or instruct her. Something was not right here.  I began to fear that conspiracy was afoot therefore, I unleashed my own. “ Aloysius, I don’t trust these two, we have got to dump them”. Supposedly, streetwise and crafty Aloysius took my counsel to be nothing more than youthful angst.

Ringo asked many questions about the car. Maybe it was just out of curiosity and boredom but there was a look of covertness in his eyes when he asked. At some point the frequent flair up between him and I induced him to up the ante, he extracted from his belongings a knife. Now somewhere in my packed belonging was the Bowie Knife I had paraded around with my first few weeks in the prairie. Yet even if I would have had it handy it would have proven to be a nail file knife in lieu of the mini-machete Ringo now held in his hands as he menacingly peeled an apple. It’s would have been much like the scene in Crocodile Dundee in which the named hero reveals his knife in the presence of the toy like knife being waved by gang bangers.

Maybe the suggestion of authority would work at this precarious juncture I thought. I implored that Aloysius lay down the law about weapons being paraded in his car. Aloysius replied by giving a rambling non sensical rant about us being cool as he was trying to concentrate and navigated his way amid the big rigs. What da Hell?   He said nothing to the fact that this deranged cowboy had a knife as big as the Monte Carlo’s bumper in the backseat. Then there was a call for another rest break. Sun would be setting soon and the dessert , even today, is still a very dark place to drive through you can just imagine how dark it was back then. Then it came to me, There was a reason for Ringo and sometimes Bel frequents calls for rest breaks, etc. They were stalling for time. They were waiting for the sun to go down.

Ringo was going to take this car and leave us stranded in the best case scenario or sliced and diced in the worst. Since he and I did not exactly get along my paranoia was favoring the former. Since the introduction of the big knife I had kept my comments and rebuttals to a minimal and I knew that Mr.Ringo, now having the upper hand, was well aware of that. Now the stakes were high, very high and I had nothing left to ante up, short of my life. As my house of cards begain to collapse in my mind, my eye caught sight of the bible case.

                                      The Bluff

Would I soon be be gutted,  in a similar fashion as I had inflicted upon the bible case? Oh! How I could have now used the promises and protection offered by the contract displayed in the pages of the former resident. But maybe, just maybe I could still gain some benefit from this bible. Alternating my glances between the rear view mirror and my own back sight  reflection from my own glasses, I could tell that Ringo had a menacing eye trained on my presence. I slowly made my way down and reached for the bible case. Ringo eyes followed. As if undetected, I brought the case close left thigh. I then ever so slightly begin to slowly unzipped the case,  I maintained the illusion that I was focusing my sight on the now darkening road, all the while as I slowly slid my hand into the now un-zippered, yet still closed bible case. I allowed my enclosed hand to wrap around a non-existent item as to create a budge in outward form of the case. Noting in the reflective vision that Ringo had followed every move, I continued my mastery mime. I first allowed my tense shoulders and body to relax as if relieved in finding some newly acquired treasure. Hold it one, two , three. Now puff up. The traffic was now heavy with big rigs and the road dangerously dark. That was just the excuse I needed to expel some miraculously and suddenly acquired bravado.  I turned around, to face the mini-machete carrying Ringo, mean eye to mean eye and, with a bold unleash of expletives (when used well they do serve  their purpose) blame him and his frequent stops for us now being ensnarled in such traffic. Now would a man unload, pun intended, such a tirade, unless he had something to back up the consequences with? That’s what I  was hoping Ringo would think. And since, presently I remained un-sliced and diced;  it must have worked. We dropped them off without incident at the Phoenix bus station.

Well we made it to Vegas, Aloysius turned out to be more hot air than substance when matching wits against the professionals. The torch that he believe his ex-wife carried for him had been long extinguished and provisions were not forthcoming. He and I eventually parted company on less than amicable terms with, my belonging beings propelled from the trunk of his Monte Carlo, as he, I assumed, hit the cruise control for destinations elsewhere’s.

There I was stranded in Las Vegas but at least alive, if the bible case afforded me such protection, just think how things might have gone if I had not gutted the innards?

                            And so it continues

Phillip Ghee 1/31/07

phillipghee@yahoo.com 
and for website posting ghelove@aol.com