"Alzheimer's Ate My Brain"

           

            Early Sunday afternoon I packed up my guitar, printed up some stories and some writing by Paul Valliere that he had asked me to bring along and headed north on my way to the open stage in the park that he’d planned for that afternoon. It was starting to sprinkle as I rode up Lansdowne and I was beginning to regret bringing my guitar. Just as I was about the make a left turn on Dundas, my phone rang, so I got off my bike, walked it to the corner and answered the call. As I expected, it was Paul, telling me that he was considering cancelling the event, because of the weather and because several people had already called to say they wouldn’t be able to make it, in consideration of the rain. He said for me to come anyway and that he could have a few people at his place.

            It probably took me a little less than half an hour to get to Humber Hill Road. Paul’s instructions had been to follow Humber Hill Road and to turn left on Lundy, but Humber Hill stops right away, so I deduced that he really meant that we have to turn right on Old Dundas. I followed that and turned left on Lundy, then found the entrance to the park and was about to go there when I heard Paul calling my name from across the parking lot of an apartment building. I rode over to a small gathering of people that consisted of Paul, his daughter Alison, Kathleen Zinck and Brigitta and John, an elderly couple with whom Paul used to be in a writers group. We all piled into Paul’s small place, where apparently Alison is also living right now, with her dad taking the couch.

            I met Paul’s twelve-year-old dog, Kira, on which Paul had harnessed a muzzle as a precaution, because her behaviour around strangers is not always predictable. Someone suggested that she would only bite bad people, but I think that’s a little much. I doubt if there is really any good and bad among human beings that a dog can pass judgment on. Maybe nervousness and fear in a person could make a dog feel nervous and fearful. But a nervous and fearful person could actually be less dangerous than someone who is so fearless that they don’t manifest nervousness at all. Fearless people tend to be very social and therefore have a lot of friends. Studies show that those with a lot of friends tend to be more indifferent to causing harm to their friends than those who have just a few. I doubt very much if dogs or any other animal can pick up on all that. It may be beating a dead horse to remind people how much Hitler loved animals but I doubt if even the most sensitive dog would pick up on the fact that a human who is kind to them would be willing to arrange for the extermination of six million dogs, let alone six million humans.

            Brigitta was very interesting in that she was so matter of fact and so aware of her situation when she explained to us that she no longer writes poetry because, as she put it,  “Alzheimer’s ate my brain.” John explained that his wife’s short-term memory is gone. She was though, the most engaged of anyone with everyone else in the room and very aware of everything that was happening in each moment. She was especially sympathetic about Kira having to wear a muzzle, and she asked me, “How would you like it if someone put a muzzle on you?” I answered that it would depend on who put the muzzle on me.

            Another fairly consistent part of our little get together was Paul’s neighbour, David, from down the hall. I picked up, from things that he’d dropped in conversation, that he is, but he’s one of the darkest skinned Italians that I’ve seen in North America. Perhaps his family is from Sicily and he has some Arabic DNA left over from the period when the Moors occupied Sicily a thousand years ago. David could have as much as 25% Arabic DNA from that time.

            David also seemed to be an alcoholic. He was there for several hours and I never saw him without a can of beer in his hand. He would periodically leave Paul’s place, sometimes to join the group of smokers that would go outside to relieve their habits, other times he would go home to smoke a joint and then return with another can of beer. At first he was drinking the extra large cans, which he referred to as “adult beers”, but after a while all he had left was the size of beer can that his lingo suggested the beer store only sells to children.

            Another person, that only Paul knew, named Jim Snow, arrived.

            Paul’s purpose for having this event was for it to be a “thank you to summer” picnic in the park slash open stage. He asked his guests, first of all to share something from memory. Brigitta, unfortunately was not able to share anything. John recited something that was not his own. He said that he has been involved in other things of late, such as digitizing slides, so he hasn’t been writing poetry. Jim Snow recited one of the only poems he had ever written. This was for a Spanish woman that he met once. I don’t remember his words, but thematically it was sort of a “The earth stops when I look at you” poem. Kathleen recited a poem from memory as well. Paul asked me to play something, but first I recited a poem of my own: “My penis is the hotline to the red phone in the White House of my heart, and my penis is always ringing, but whenever I pick it up there’s never anyone at the other end.” I sang my song, “The Next State of Grace” and I followed that with my translation of Jacques Prevert’s “Les Feuilles Mortes” – “ … Dead autumn leaves can be raked up and collected, and so as well can memories and regrets that the north wind takes to be lost then into the night’s cold oblivion, but one more thing that I have not forgotten is when you used to sing me your song …”

            Alison was just about to read a poem from her laptop when my phone rang. It was Cad telling me that he and Goldie were on the Warren Park bus and wanted further instructions. I passed the phone to Paul so he could guide them in. He went out to meet them, and so Alison’s poem was delayed for a while. As I expected, Cad was uncomfortable with Paul’s dog. Of course though, Goldie wasn’t.

Goldie sat just around the corner from the living room, in the dining room, and because of that no one but John Snow, who was sitting in a recliner in the corner that actually faced the dining room, could see her. I insisted that she move her chair closer to everyone else. She resisted, but eventually gave in and thanked me later. I also had to encourage Cad, who was sitting in the hallway, to come into the living room as well.

Once everyone was settled in, Alison read her poem. It was addressed to her brother, Alex, who died about ten years before. She started crying and wasn’t able to finish it.
            Jim Snow left, saying that he had a date with another Spanish woman. Goldie moved to the recliner.

John and Brigitta left. When she was saying goodbye though, Brigitta apologetically explained that she would not remember us.
            With the couch freed up, Paul’s neighbour, David, came in and participated more in the conversation. He and Cad immediately hit it off because they had much more in common in terms of racism, sexism and homophobia than anyone else in the room. After hearing a few of David’s statements, Cad declared excitedly, “Everything he says is the truth!” to which David responded gratefully, “Everybody thinks I’m crazy when I say these things!”
            David said that it’s a rite of passage for men in Columbia to have sex with donkeys. I looked this up and it seems to be true in a very small, remote, poor and uneducated section of the country that has been ignored by the government for generations. The rest of the country is deeply ashamed of what they consider to be a stain on their culture.
            Another thing David talked about was the age-old myth that Orthodox Jewish married couples have sex through a hole in a sheet. I knew this wasn’t true but Cad insisted that David was right. Everywhere I look on the internet there are Jewish sites that say this is an urban myth perpetuated by Reform Jews and Christians. The rules for married couples in Catholicism are actually more strict and sexually repressive than they are for Orthodox Jews.
            Alison read another poem that I think was also a rap lyric by her late brother, Alex. I remember meeting Alex at least once when I was running the Orgasmic Alphabet Orgy out of the Drake Hotel. We argued politely about rap music because I said I didn’t think it was usually very good poetry.
            Alison has a Bengal cat that cost her $700. I really didn’t notice anything in its appearance or manner that distinguished it in such a way as to make it worth more than the cats that I got for free. It seems a little high-strung and doesn’t get along very well with Paul’s dog.
            A few more poems were read by Paul, Kathleen and Cad. I sang my translation of Serge Gainsbourg’s “Strip Tease” – “ … all of these are just chimeras, from my mouth to my lower areas, because no one, not even you, will get to touch the parts they view …”
            Paul hinted that he wanted us to leave while at the same time saying we were welcome to stay, because he wanted to have dinner. Kathleen and I left and Goldie was trying to edge Cad out but he was lingering in conversation when I walked away.
            The sky was black, except for in the west where it looked like a lifted shade, letting the sun into a dark room.