Don from Dodge City, Ken Kesey & Missile Silo LSD: Part II

photo by TinoStrauss

      Don would be back soon. He had to leave town. Where he had to go was, of course, always an unknown. "Soon" of course was always a relative term. Considering our anxious excitement and the fact that we had smoked our last joint before arriving in town, "soon" could be a short lifetime. The few people milling around the apartment had asked us if we had joint as soon as we sat down, so, no luck there. We sat nervously smoking cigarettes, made small talk. I look about the apartment, occasionally enjoying the view out the third floor windows. Finally my eyes fixed themselves on the aquarium that sat across the room from me, when a young man that looked like a high school football star turned junkie walked up and ask me
     "Have you seen my piranhas?"   
     "I was just looking at them." I replied.
     "Wanna see something cool?" he asked leaning his head toward me while simultaneously searching for something around the fish tank.
     "Sure man!" Fuck yes, I wanted to see. Whatever the man with the piranhas and the crazed, bulging eyes considered cool was bound to be interesting.
     "Have you ever watched piranhas feed?" he questioned with the attention seeking voice of a young child.
I had to admit that I never had.
     He produced a chunk of some unidentifiable flesh and tossed it into the the tank. The piranhas urgently formed a swarm as they competed for the chunk. Stretching it, taring, chomping until it was quickly reduced to foggy little bits floating in the water. The fish calmed, leisurely swimming and languidly swallowing the remains. Although their movements projected a mind at ease I could catch them now and then peering around the tank or outside through the glass. Their eyes still were fresh, filled with blood and fire. Satisfied but not sated with the kill. Every itch at their core cried out for more. They were driven more by conquest than hunger. Restless legionaries, they waited for the next opportunity to strike.
     "Pretty cool huh!?!"
     "Fuck yeah man."
     "Wanna see something else?" an eagerness drove his voice.
     "Hell yes!" as I said this, without looking, I could feel a certain air of tension begin to fill the room. I sensed that maybe this fish-play hadn't always ended well, but if someone was going to stop it I was not going to be the one. He grabbed another chunk of flesh. This time the piece was thinner, longer. It was mostly grey other than the veins and oozing blood.
     "If you hold it above the water they'll jump out to get it!" this time his boyish glee was matched by my own.
    "Sweet! Go for it man!"
    Jack was at ease, still stoned, alternating between conversation and looking out the windows, watching the tops of trees sway with the wind. The tension in the room had never been thick but it was there and it remained. Despite it's presence no one motioned or a made a comment. Anyway, it didn't matter. Me and the Piranha Man were on to something.
    He held the flesh out, a good 1/2 foot or so over the water. The fish warriors had been waiting. They sprang from the water one at a time. Each taking his turn. The last piranha perhaps to eager or just plain greedy leap to far, clamping his jaw at the Piranha Man's hand, puncturing it with each of it's tiny razor blade teeth.
     "Motherfucker!" he shouted, stomping his foot and grabbing hold of his hand.
     It was a skillful bite. He was bleeding pretty good.
     "You fucking! You ungrateful fucking fish!" he shouted again and spun toward the aquarium throwing his bleeding hand down into the water, thrashing about wildly. The fish scurried about as he hunted down the offender. Fractions of a second passed by before he was clutching hold of the fish. He tried slip through the hand but it was no use. The Piranha Man had won the battle before it began. He scooped the fish out of the water as quickly as he hand plunged his hand in, tossed the fish against the wall where it bounced back as if made from rubber, after the bounce, in a flash, caught the fish once again turned the fish around to face him.
He held the piranha inches away from his face and spoke with a calm, cruel voice, each word calculated and measured like some loving yet psychopathic father.
     "Welcome to my world!" he said, and tossed the fish back into the water.
     The door to the apartment swung open. Jack and I turned to look at the man that came prancing through. Don had arrived.

Don from Dodge City, Ken Kesey & Missile Silo LSD: Part I

The drive was actually much shorter than it seemed. Barreling down the highway beneath a broiling sun, cutting through the sticky air of a Kansan summer. Once the joint was finished Jack popped what was left in his mouth and we rolled down the windows. My hair then hung around my shoulders and began to fly wildly in the wind. Jack's was highlighted with bright green streaks. Our beautifully filthy blue jeans were covered with colorful phrases and drawings, set with permanent marker. We had run out drawing room and took to the car, a small, white beat-up trash can that refused to die. We named it "the Groove Machine". Jack drove with the word "Pilot" printed in bold red letters on his door. On my door the letters spelt out "Navigator". We didn't normally air out the car after smoking pot but this was central Kansas, a special day and we were trying to stay discreet. Beck crooned "Odelay" out of the crackling speakers.
"We should make it there just in time!"
Jack shouted over the howling wind.
"When were we supposed to be there!?!"
I asked, watching cars zip back and fade         behind us.
"I'm pretty sure he said 2!"

"Pretty sure" felt like a safe bet as we approached town and Jack slowed the car down to a rattle.
"Welcome to Dodge City! Home of Boot hill!". With the sight of the sign expectation grew to skin tingling excitement. Dodge City! We were here. A place were war cries of Kiowas still echoed in the air. The shadows of fast flying birds transformed into bullets before your eyes and cowboys died slow in the mud, coughing and choking on their own blood. This was also the former home of my future wife's relatives, the Dalton gang. Their hideout still stands there along with the 95 foot escape tunnel that they had dug below it.
Yes, to be an outlaw don't come easy. Although this was not 1896, it was 1996, this simple fact had not changed. The pursuit of happiness and freedom demands that a man constantly be on guard. Every nerve on alert. Eyes scanning each street for some cop looking to work through his inferiority complex on the innocent young children of draft-dodging baby-boomers.

After a short drive we were walking up a narrow stairway and settling into thrift-store throw-away chairs in a dingy white apartment. We were told Don had left awhile back and would be returning soon...