Brock Peters

            On Monday after midnight I added fresh carpet tape to the edges of my mattress where it had gotten less sticky. I lint-rolled the curtains between the bedroom and the living room, the top of my bed and the pillow and picked up a few of bedbugs from the curtains and one or two from the bed. I went to bed at 1:35 and slept right through to the 5:00 alarm. After yoga there were quite a few bedbugs stuck to the carpet tape on my mattress and some on the walls and on the baseboards around my bed.

            I’ve almost finished memorizing “C’est ici (It’s Right Here) by Boris Vian. I might have it done on Tuesday. 

            I worked out the chords for the first verse of “Yes Man” by Serge Gainsbourg. I’m pretty sure the rest of the verses have the same chords but I’ll find out tomorrow. 

            I weighed 90.25 kilos before breakfast. 

            I played my Martin during song practice for the last of two sessions and it went out of tune all the time. 

            Yugi came and installed a new thermostat. There’s no off switch. He set it at 21.5 degrees. The temperature in the hall hasn’t gone below that all day but it has in my place. 

            I weighed 91.1 kilos before lunch. 

            At 14:00 I had a phone meeting with a student lawyer about the bed bug situation. She said she thinks I have a pretty good case to file a tenant form with the Landlord Tenant Board. She says I could get up to $25,000 but I think that’s only if I lost property because of the bedbugs. I did buy two new mattresses years ago because of bedbugs. If I still have the receipts I could maybe get reimbursed but I don’t know if I do. The main thing for me is that the Board forces the landlord to treat the place until the bedbugs are gone. She was going to email me the form by the end of today but didn’t.

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 91.05 kilos at 18:15. 

            I was caught up in my journal at 19:37. 

            I digitized a cassette recording of my first CIUT interview. This was promoting the launch of Orgasmagazine. I didn’t get to perform but the beautiful Kelly Lynn Grace interviewed me a bit and said that she’s heard me perform and it left her breathless. The next cassette I digitize will be one of me rehearsing my song “Seven Shades of Blues” with Yehudah Culman on cello. 

            I had a potato with gravy and my last chicken leg while watching episode 10 of Daniel Boone.

            The show opens with a deep voiced man named Pompey singing the spiritual “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel?” Then we see that the man singing is chained with leg irons and linked to several other men. His singing has put the guard to sleep and at the same time it is somewhat masking the sound of the filing that he’s doing on his leg irons. He cuts through the chain but has to pretend he’s still chained as Calhoun the boss angrily wakes up the guard. Calhoun then goes to every man to check that his chains are secure. But when he gets to Pompey he is knocked down as the man runs for freedom. 

            Daniel and Yad are in Salem buying supplies for Boonesborough when Calhoun approaches them with a plea to help him recapture Pompey. Boone says he’s not interested but later discovers that some of the contents of a box of tools he bought is missing. 

            Boone and Yad follow the tracks of a man dragging a chain and catch up with him outside of town. They find him flutily trying to get the chain off. Boone tells Pompey they just want their tools back but will use them to get his chains off first and then he can go free. They remove Pompey’s chains but then Calhoun shows up pointing a rifle. Pompey says he can shoot him but he’s not going back. Calhoun is getting ready to wound Pompey when Boone kicks the gun away. Calhoun tells Boone he’s now committed a crime to help a slave escape. 

            Then Calhoun mentions his master and we learn that he is an indentured servant to Pompey’s master for three years. His time is almost up and then he can send for his wife in Ireland but if Pompey gets away Calhoun will have to continue being indentured to work off the 500 crowns the master paid for him and that would take years. 

            Suddenly they are attacked by Shawnee who want to steal their horses. Calhoon takes an arrow in the leg. Yad takes the horses away while Boone stands off against the Shawnee, but Pompey grabs his length of broken chain and swings into action, taking out several Shawnee until all that is left is the chief Tabuka. They stand off for several minutes until Tabuka smiles and walks away calling Pompey “Waka Boka”. 

            Pompey and Calhoun go with Boone back to Boonesborough. Calhoun reminds Boone that the Carolina Militia will come to arrest him for helping Pompey. Boone tells Pompey to take a rifle and leave but he refuses. He says he can’t let the man who removed his chains hang so he will go back with Calhoun in two weeks when he recovers from his wound. 

            During those two weeks Pompey comes to work for Boone and becomes close to him and his family. 

            When the time is up Calhoun has had two weeks to weigh it all in his conscience. He decides to let Pompey go but demands satisfaction from Boone for the trouble he has caused him. They fight and it’s pretty equal until Calhoun holds Boone in a bear hug and whispers for him to let him win. So Calhoun punches Boone one more time and he pretends to be knocked out. 

            The Shawnee are approaching the fort and everyone runs to battle stations. But Tabuka approaches alone and says they will give back the horses they stole but they invite Waka Boka to have a home with them and become a member of their nation because he is a great warrior. Pompey likes the name and the opportunity and so he goes with the Shawnee. 

            Calhoun is given enough furs to pay his master for his lost slave and perhaps even to buy his own freedom. 

            This story is a bit of a fantasy considering that the real Daniel Boone was a slave owner could very well have been on the other side of this dispute. 

            Pompey (Waka Baka) was played by Brock Peters in his TV debut. He attended the Music and Arts High School in New York. He made his film debut in Carmen Jones in 1954. He made his Broadway debut in Mr. Johnson in 1962. He was nominated for a Tony Award in 1973 for his performance in Lost In the Stars and reprised his role in the film adaptation. He co-starred in To Kill a Mockingbird, The Pawnbroker, The L-Shaped Room, Major Dundee, The McMasters, Black Girl, Slaughter’s Big Rip Off, Framed, Alligator II, He played Admiral Cartwright in Star Trek IV and Star Trek VI. He played Sisko’s father on Star Trek Deep Space Nine. He played Darth Vader in the radio adaptation of Star Wars. He sang backup vocals on harry Belafonte’s recording of “Banana Boat”. he had his own production company in Delbro Enterprises.