Grumpy Blogs about life, dreams and Work

12/25/06 Xmas morning.  Choo Choo’s home.

Party with the crew Saturday night.  Bonus guests included Berry Man and Milk.  The night wandered on as usual into a late night drink fest.  A Secret Santa exchange was decided on as Beamer and Flower were leaving with Popcorn and PT. Bee was writing down the couple names and Black Bear drew from the pot. An awkward moment passed between Black Bear and Eva. The said to Bee,  “Uh, this is a little weird.”

“What?”

“Look at the couple names.”

Black Bears ticket read, Bee and Eva.

“Oh my gosh.  What was I thinking.” Bee said and started to blush a little. 

We all made light fun of the mistake.  She was buzzed and the men of the group all joked that lesbianism is good, so long as we can watch.

Later the conversation turned to the woman lamenting that men don’t know how to just listen.  “Men always feel like they need to whip out their sword and go charging off to kill some dragon of adversary.”  Eva lamented.

“Well what do you expect? That’s how we’re raised. Team playing and all that crap. Save the princess. Go to war. Defend your pride, your woman, blah, blah, blah.”

“You don’t have to.  Some times woman just want someone to listen.”

“Oh, yeah.  Let’s just talk about our feelings. Let’s just talk about the nuances of nothingness. Let’s not do anything to fix the problem and have a tea and talk about it some more.” I said.

“You see. They just don’t understand.”

“Actually, I’m more action oriented.” Milk interjected.

“Oh yeah.” Berry Man said. The conversion splintered into more of the eternal  debate between what men and woman want. The subject turned to how Bee likes to talk to me in the morning and my impatience about it.

“Once I get up and have my coffee and a little breakfast, I like to have a little chat. What’s wrong with that?”

All eyes turned toward me. “Nothings wrong with it other than we just talked the night before.  What the hell could have happened during the middle  of the night that’s new? Nothing.”

Everyone seemed to find my opinion humorous. I was perplexed.

“And they are single minded.  They can’t do more than one thing at a time.” Bee and Milk said in a joint declaration.

“When OG is working, don’t ask him any questions.” Bee warned with faux caution.

“Well, when I’m working, I’m working and sometimes it takes all my concentration.”

“But you know I like to talk in the morning.”

“I know Honey.  Some days when you finally leave for work, I’m thank god.”

Berryman has been taking this all in and drinking his wine. “Oh, yeah some times it’s like, God, please just make her shut up! Silence, please.” The desperation and frustration of his drunken confession ripped a laugh through my belly.  I curled into a hysterical fetus in the overstuffed chair laughing an intense cigarette cough.

“Guess he liked that.” One of the woman said.

I couldn’t speak for a minute.  I was aching from the laugh and the nicotine lungs.

The party rolled on.

Somewhere in the night Milk retold a story of how Berry Man was known to befriend strangers.  In particular, back in Hippy City, he was coming home drunk and met a Shalanda.  She was homeless.  He promised to take her out to lunch the next day.  When he woke, he explained the situation to Milk.  She was a not overly thrilled. She didn’t complain too much.  How could she?  Plus, it turns out Shalanda  had somehow managed to find a decent dress, shower, and make up.  She was waiting where they agreed and was nearly overcome with surprise  when Berry Man actually returned the next day.  If he had not shown up it would have been just one more devastation. He took her to a swank place and they enjoyed a nice lunch. Milk did not say what happened after, but did  say that is one of the reasons she loved Berry Man.

This lead to Eva explaining, how in London, she had met an artist.  He was black, and they had a friendly relationship of artist and possible patron.  Eva would stop and admire his work frequently.  Later, Eva and her cousins found themselves in a bad part of London where non-blacks did not go.  People were coming out of no where and being hostile.  A huge black man appeared through the crowd. It was the artist.  He embraced Eva as though she had unexpectedly arrived to visit him. Quietly he whispered in her ear to follow him. She and her friends followed him into an alley.  He told them to run. They did. He disappeared back around the corner and held the crowd at bay long enough for them to escape.

Black Bear told a story of how he befriended  a street kid in Santiago. The friendship was genuine and real.  The friend would give him things like a watch and a silver pen as tokens of their friendship. Black Bear found out later the items had been stolen.  He took his friend home once and his aunt was not pleased with Black Bear brining a street thief home.  The friendship waned and become non-existent.  A few years later Black Bear found himself in an alley with street thugs harassing him and bordering on a violent mugging.  From the group of thugs emerged the street thief who was very pleased to see his old friend.  The other thugs backed away into shadows. Black Bear and the street thief shook hands good bye.  They haven’t seen each other since.

I’ve never had an experience like that, nor has Milk or Bee. At least, they didn’t share anything.  Life’s not over yet, so who knows?

The party carried on until the sun started coming up. We called a cab for Black Bear and Eva.  Milk and Berry Man stayed the night.

In the morning I found Bud asleep between them with his head on Berry Mans butt like a pillow.