Rejoining the Primordial Ooze

 Predator Press  

[LOBO]

Today was exactly the same as any other day. Shaved, showered, teeth brushed, car warmed up [via remote start], and a full commuter cup of steaming coffee. But it was sixty degrees -the highest temperature since October, I think- when I hit that same crowded intersection at 7:37am.

But there was no one there.

I will start my new job in ten minutes.

A bluebird slipped in, and sang to me from my shoulder. A rainbow seems to follow my car as I close the distance.

See, "Pornographic Materials" in my company means anything containing sexual content. From sex tips to Harlequin romance, half of America's lust will pass between my blistered hands.  And frankly, the kid stuff freaks me out anyway -I won't miss that creepy department a single iota.

Now, I am a sex god.

-Or maybe a sex demigod. Or at least a rumor of sex-goddiness.

But when I made that strangely uncomplicated turn, I saw a pillar of smoke.

The rainbow faded.

Oh shit.

Slippery Plastic

Predator Press

[LOBO]

"You gotta be kidding," I says.  "My first raise in two years, and you offer me this?"

"It's the best we can do," Lars Arson, the Receiving Department Manager insists.  "Most employees got nothing at all."

"I've been working sixty-hour weeks for six months.  And in the third worst winter in Chicago history, I drove through horizontal-blowing subzero blizzards -replete with lightning and thunder- to get here on time," I says, thumping my finger on his desk.  "They got nothing?  Good!  When I drag your ass out onto there and beat the fuck out of you in front of them, I'll be a goddamn hero."

"We also wanted to put you in charge of all the pornographic materials."

The tears well up so fast, I can't stop them.

"You're the best boss I've ever had," I confess.

Future LOBOnian-American Diplomatic Relations in Question

Predator Press

[LOBO]

I remember "coming to" vaguely.

-A balding man, typing with one finger, is asking me questions I am answering on autopilot.  He fills out forms -replete with scan-friendly magnetic bar codes- in handwritten immaculate print as he examines my birth certificate.  On the counter in front of me is my two-inch thick manila folder containing my identity.  A tattered copy of the current Scientific American -which I pretend to understand intensely when I think I will have time to kill in public- is pushed aside in cramped space.

The hands of a plain clock on the wall, the kind I remember staring at endlessly in school, says 8:35.  The bleak sunlight fighting in though the glass doors twenty feet to my right suggest it is morning.

Isn't this Saturday?

"Would you like to be an organ donor?"

I notice a large picture on the wall of the Illinois Governor, obviously fake-smiling with big, crazy teeth.

He looks clearly insane.

Oh no.

"No," I reply.  "Nothing works anymore anyway," I lie suspiciously.

Cumbersome American laws require you to update an address change on your drivers license within 30 days.   LOBOnia -the mobile ten foot sphere that surrounds me at all times- has agreeable trade relations with America, so a scant three years later I deigned to acquiesce at the Department of Motor Vehicles, and I am apparently awake about halfway through the process.

I died in my sleep and went to Hell.

But I have apparently planned for this in advance.  I am dressed nice, and remember promising myself to try and smile for the photo.  You know, try and change my Karma?  Still, this is a shitty, shitty way to wake up.

-In the subsequent photo of a man trying to force a sincere smile after going through the DMV,  I am obviously fake-smiling with big, crazy teeth.

I look clearly insane.

A 'Lil History

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Ask LOBO

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Before there was LOBOnia, there was America -a vast and untamed frontier.

When we arrived on the Nina, the Pinto, and the Santa Fe, we all had major issues: the Ellis Island locals -"Indians"- had lost our luggage, and gave us a lot of shit about our passports.  But I rented horses and a wagon from AVIS, and a few of us struck out west.

For our Destiny.

***

"Sapphire has been fighting that grizzly bear for hours," Flandsa Ha’asasanba yelled over the windy blizzard two months later.  "We should help her!  I am cold and hungry, and she is trying to get us bear meat and a pelt."

"I got ten bucks on the bear," I yells back.  "Fuck that.  Besides, the dashboard on this wagon is giving me low tire pressure warnings.  That's totally unfixable.  We should use the wagon for a fire and eat the horses!"

And that is why, to this day, I live in Chicago.

Up a Mountain, Down a Hill

Predator Press

[LOBO]

There's a side of me that is grateful to have a job at all, but the climb out of this crater is exponentially harder all the time. The last six months of employment have been 12 hour days, and six days a week.  As of Tuesday, Sisyphus and I are now connected on LinkedIn.

 
Work. Sleep. Work. Sleep. Work, nap, work, work … 

 

Thank God football season ended or I would be dead by now.  And then you guys have to erect that giant commemorative solid gold statue of me, and change all your calendars to include the “After LOBO” era to that weird “B.C.” and “A.C.” crap!

 

But fear not, o Loyal Reader.

 

-I have stayed alive for your convenience.

MARCY PLAYGROUND - Poppies

Predator Press

"And now this story told,
from days of our old
-when gossamer doggies
ran round

They patiently wait
with pieces of eight
so everybody could smile
one more time."