Since I've joined the cage, almost everyone has been friendly and welcoming to me, especially in the chat room. This is in large part because I am awesome.
But there are other awesome people here who have not been so lucky. I've found that there can be a lot of high horses running around in there. This isn't too surprising, given the iron clad laws of the the internet and chat rooms in general. I'm not a person who enjoys telling people who are not my subs or children, what to do (neither of which listens much anyway - for different reasons). And I'm not going to lecture the general chat room public here. I'm just going to be direct and short here:
1. Everyone is going through stuff right now and always, If it isn't you now, it will be tomorrow
2. Knee jerk reactions in the Chat room have, IMO resulted in people being unnecessarily hurt, added pain to painful lives, and caused others to leave the Cage community.
3. Some of these people, on both sides, are people I care about.
4. I don't think anyone should judge any of the relationships here too quickly, and if they do, they should keep their opinions private except under extreme special circumstances (Hi, my name is defenselesssub and my dom wants me to enjoy gun play).
If this continues, I'm going to do the one thing a dom can do in this place to make a difference.
It's been almost two years since I bought it. I couldn't tell you why if, well, if you held a gun to my head. Part of me wants to blame boredom. Sit by yourself long enough, and inactivity settles over you like a hair shirt, until you either scream or scratch. Know what I mean?
But another part of me insists I'm full of shit. Boredom? Ha! Who am I kidding? Watching TV shows about pawn shops and shooting alligators, sleeping through afternoons and jerking off to porn. I'll blame boredom all day long for that shit.
But buying the gun was different. I guess I bought it because I shouldn't have. Because I believe owning a gun only brings trouble. And because sometimes we do things simply because we tell ourselves we shouldn't. If you're sitting in your car, eating a greasy burger or taco while reading this, or if you're going to end up there sooner or later, you know what I mean.
It's a Smith & Wesson. The M&P series. You know it? It's a popular gun. I chose it because of the Dirty Harry movies I watched as a kid. You know, the old "we're not just going to let you walk out of here." The gun doesn't look like anything Clint ever used, but what the hell. It's a Smith & Wesson.
So, I got myself a Smith & Wesson because ...
Let me tell you a secret that few people know, but that's as plain as daylight. Nine out of ten times, anything that follows "because" is story. It's all just a bit of bullshit fiction to explain the truth of everything that comes before. "I hit my wife because I was drunk. I didn't see my kid because she's angry."
"I did it because" blah blah blah. Writers like me, we go broke or get rich filling in the blah blah blah, but it's all bullshit.
So, two years a go I bought a Smith & Wesson.
The guy who sold it to me knew I wasn't exactly Wyatt Earp. He took his time and explained the basics to me. Ammo, clips, safety. How it was important to clean the gun because blah blah blah. We both knew I was forgetting what he said almost as fast as he said it. But in this country, there's a lot you can do without knowing how to do it, and buying a gun is one of those things. He did give me a business card.
"RICK'S GUN RANGE AND INSTRUCTION." And under that, "Safety. Security. Country."
I thanked him. I left fully intending to take the class.
Safety. Security. Country.
I wasn't a big drinker then. I drink a bit more these days, I freely admit. Not enough to end up in a Lifetime movie or anything, but enough to take most of the chill out of my life, when I need it. These nights, I'm partial to Fireball Whiskey. You know it? Tastes like those red hot jawbreakers we used to get as kids. It tastes better over ice, but I take it warm because it reminds me of those jawbreakers more when it's warm. Or maybe I take it warm because I can't be bothered to keep the ice trays full.
Blah blah blah. I drink it warm, and there's no chill left in me tonight. That's enough for you.
Like I said, the guy who sold me the gun, he really knew his stuff, and good for him. And like I said, I wasn't paying too much attention to the instructions. After all, I had Rick's card. There was something he didn't mention though. If he had, I'm pretty sure I would have remembered.
What does a gun and boredom have in common?
I'm rambling a bit, I know. When a writer rambles, we call it a draft. We put the rambling on paper, then we fix it up. We polish it until it shines like a story or a turd. This tale lacks the polish because blah blah blah. It's a shame, really, this being my last tale and all.
Last week, or two weeks maybe, someone posted a video of a memorial service for the victims of the Pulse nightclub down there in Florida. You remember? When that guy shot all those gays, and everyone talked about it for days and days. And then we moved on and hardly none of us remembered until the anniversary, because
blah blah blah.
I only had a quarter bottle of Fireball left tonight. A few weeks ago, when the bottle was fresh, I had myself some company and we both put a reckless weekend dent in it. You ever kiss a woman who tastes like a jawbreaker? I'm the last guy to give anyone advice, but if you're smart, you'll put that on your bucket list.
They itch after a while. A gun and boredom. They both start to itch after a while.
I imagine there are lots of people in this world who can go just about forever without scratching an itch that shouldn't be scratched.
A Little Sci-Fi story I wrote before we became a little sci-fi society.
The world was tired and thin. Winding down, it had no interest nor patience for Joe Foxwood, the last man on earth; and Joe knew it. Never the most popular kid at the dance, he knew very well what being ignored felt like. Years of suffering the indifference of an uncaring father, being overlooked by co-workers at the Raskill, Neveda Post Office, and jerking off to internet porn had worn at him, like rain and wind wore down a mountain. Although with Joe, perhaps it was more like how an ocean wore down a sand castle. It stripped him of everything except a dull craving for attention.
Now Joe was the most popular man on the planet, but nothing changed. Not really.
“I'm HERE!” As usual, nothing answered. Not even birds anymore. Just a silent midday sun and a faint breeze. The last two reminders that time kept moving on. He sat down on the corner of Laguna Ave. and Main Street, in front of the Maggie Moo's Ice Cream Parlor, and wept. Nothing noticed. He'd been crying so often these days, that Joe hardly noticed himself. A faint breeze ruffled his hair, but he could find no comfort in it.
The house was full of mannequins. He'd scoured all the local shops for them. Took him two whole days, or forever; he couldn't remember. He thought they'd give the place an aura of activity. Secretly, he hoped he might go a little crazy and the mannequins would talk to him. Maybe come alive and try to kill him. He didn't care. So long as they acknowledged him. Nothing. Joe was shit house crazy, but the mannequins only stood their ground. Ignoring him.
He'd taken to sleeping on the front porch, avoiding their blank stares and cold shoulders. Sometimes he'd scream at them for hours until his throat was raw and his body covered in sweat, but they didn't care. The hot summer breeze brought no relief on these nights and poor Joe would fall asleep, exhausted and mumbling, tears leaking from his eyes.
Today, the last day, Joe spent the morning making telephone calls. Sometimes, in the beginning, he'd get lucky and get an answering machine. He left all kinds of messages. Nasty, pleading, friendly invites for dinner and drinks. He figured he must have left a thousand messages by now.
“My legacy.”
But no luck today. The cell phones of the world were going the way of the dinosaurs. The way of man, he supposed. All the machines ignored Joe today.
Joe's last coherent idea — the last coherent idea ever formed — was wind chimes.
So he went shopping again. Spent the whole day scouring two towns for wind chimes. The music of the wind chimes. The music of the wind chimes. The thought repeated endlessly.
By late afternoon, Joe returned to the house with seventeen wind chimes. Ducks, moons, stars, sea shells, traditional 'chimes', and his favorite; a wind chime made of light blue glass, depicting a party. It had people dancing, little martini glasses that sparkled white and blue in the sun... it almost made him happy to just look at it.
He wept unconsciously as he approached the house. He did that so often these days, for no reason at all really. Even Joe ignored the tears.
“Fuck you!” He screamed at the mannequins inside. It was a shout of defiance that they refused to acknowledge. Never mind them. Joe got busy hanging his wind chimes. It took him almost two hours and was well past dark by the time he finished. Braving the house full of cold shoulders, he quickly went to the kitchen, grabbed a bottle of warm beer and ran back out to the porch. He sat on the top step, in the silent night and waited.
All night he waited, underneath a brilliant sky of cold starlight. All night. Not a single breeze. Not the faintest puff of wind. The chimes remained silent.
When the sun finally rose, it found Joe sitting on his porch, beer unopened. Weeping. No one was there to discover if he ever stopped. Not even a soft summer breeze.
He had nothing to say, but he wrote anyway. The mind gives over to the hands and this is what you get. Fingers that ache to do something they can't. Restless hands that have nowhere soft to land.
They bang out meaningless words on a submissive phone.
Daftsville is a strange little place, found on the back of some treasure maps. Not all of them though, and never in the same place. Children and pirates know that no two treasure maps are ever the same. Ever. Well, maybe sometimes, but that would be very unusual. And Daftsville was unusual enough without being filled with i-den-tick-L treasure maps.
It wasn’t the blue furred Daftnessians with their large padded feet, or the marshmallow fairies who flew through the streets that made Daftsville so unusual. (The fairies weren’t MADE of marshmallow. That would be silly. Marshmallows were just their favorite food.) No, what made Daftsville weird, what made it so strange, was the wind that never blew down in the valley. Daftsville was windless, you see. Not a puff. No Blue fur ever got ruffled, no Wahbler trees ever swayed. The sailboats never sailed, they simply just stayed.
It was Snooter, of course, who found it. Everyone in Daftsville knew Snooter was the boy who found stuff. Last year he’d found the brightest Snark egg on Snargoggle Day, and the year before that he’d found the biggest. Ever since then, the entire town joke that at least on Snargoggle Day, Snooter was the biggest and brightest of all the Dafteneses. Snooter would roll his eyes when they told him that but secretly he enjoyed the attention.
Anyway, this is why no one was surprised that Snooter was the one to find the magic pinwheel.
“Look! Look!” He burst into the room of the Breezless Inn, waving the fantastic pinwheel in the air. A-ha! I know what you’re thinking, but you’re wrong. No matter how fast Snooter ran or how hard he waved, the pin’s on the wheel, like the sails, they just stayed.
The ADULTS stopped all their drinking and most of their thinking, and gathered around little Snooter with plenty of “Oohs,” and quite a few “Ahhs.”
“It was hidden in one of the berry bushes.” Snooter loved berries. All berries. Couldn’t get enough of them. Anyway, no one was surprised that it was Snooter who found it, but they were REALLY surprised at what he found.
“What is it,” whispered Flounce? “Some kind of flower?”
“Don’t be Daft,” snorted Grund. It’s a shovel of some kind. Grund was Daftsville’s most talented gardener and very dedicated. If something couldn’t be used to garden, Grund wasn’t interested.
The rest of the room started talking and shouting all at once. Even Mayor Lokkint started shouting opinions. Soon the furry grownups were all yelling and arguing and forgetting all about Snooter.
So he went outside to show his friends what he’d found.
They were all in the same place. That is to say, they were all over the place together, kicking a can. And running. In Daftsville there were no TVs or fancy phones and children were always kicking cans and running and singing songs and stuff. It sounds very sad, but somehow they managed to have fun doing it.
“Hey,” Snooter shouted!
“Hey back!” That was Izzy. She was Snooters best friend. She had scabbed knees and her hands were permanently stained green from glowberries. Snooter thought she had the best eyes out of all his friends, but he would never tell her that. Never!
“What’s that,” Issy asked?
“Dunno. Found it in the berry bushes.”
“What’s it do?”
“Dunno. The old people are trying to figure it out, so I left.”
Issy shrugged. “It must have come from the hill.”
“Why do you say that?”
“’Cause it didn’t come from here silly.”
Snooter nodded. Made sense. The hill was everything that wasn’t Daftsville and no one ever, EVER went there.
“Race you!” Snooter took off even before anyone said “One, two, three!” The children were too busy running and shouting to care though.
Snooter was the first up the hill (but only because Issy let him win).
They found themselves in a clearing at the top of the hill. The hill actually went all around Daftsville so maybe it wasn’t really a hill. Maybe Daftsville was really at the bottom of a hole. But such musings are for the wiser adults to consider. The children were much more interested in the little hole - the one at the top of the hill, in the center of the clearing, in the middle of a ring of blue stones.
“What’s that?” a kid asked.
“It’s a hole. In the middle of those blue stones there.”
“Oh.”
From the valley below, the children heard the adults. They were really shouting now. Sometimes that meant they were close to figuring something out, and sometimes it meant they weren’t.
Snooter had an idea.
“I bet this thing goes in that thing,” he said, pointing to the hole in the middle of the ring of blue stones in the center of the clearing on the hill surrounding the town.
“Maybe. Try it and see.”
Because they were only children, they did just that. Snooter placed the pinwheel in the hole. By the way, did I mention the pinwheel was magical? I did? Well, did I mention it was orange, and gold and pink, and that the colors all swirled together kinda? See, you don’t know “EVERYTYHING.”
When Snooter put the pinwheel in the hole, something magical happened. Can you guess?
That’s right! Wind! A cool breeze, the likes of which no one in Daftsville had ever seen or felt, swept across the hilltop. And the magic pinwheel started spinning. It spun and the colors changed into something like a rainbow, only rounder. Plus, it shimmered and even sparkled a little, and made the softest whicker/whisper noise. Even the best rainbows don’t do all that.
All the children laughed and sang and played. It was wonderful.
But later, some adults made their way up the hill, still arguing, to see what all the fuss was about. They saw the pinwheel spinning furiously in the breeze. And they smiled. And they laughed. All the grownups LAUGHED!
And that’s how we know the pinwheel really was magic.
"Ms. Walters. I'm a big fan." Robert shook her hand and gave her his $5,000.00 patented agent smile.
"Thank you Mr. Wolfe -"
"Please, call me Robert."
"Wobert. Nice to meet you. And this must be Twey."
The boy was in the middle of pushing another doughnut into his maw. "Ith's Threy!"
Ms. Walter's smiled. "I'm sorway?" The boy swallowed and chased it with a swig of Dr. Pepper. "I said, it's 'Trey.' My name is Trey."
"Yes, yes" Robert jumped in. This is Trey, you are the famous Barbara Walters and I'm the guy who's going to put you two together. For a price."
"Mr. Wolfe -- Wobert. Your client killed thwee childwen with peanut butter. I'm here to give him a chance to tell his stowie, but the network isn't going to pay him for it."
Robert smiled a tad wider. "You know that 'People,' HBO and Fox News are all chomping on the bit for an exclusive. But Trey isn't going to open up old wounds for nothing. He - "
"Shut it, 'Wobert.'" Trey took another doughnut. "$100,000.00 gets you 15 minutes. I tell you how I knew they were allergic, why I hated them, and how I did it. I'll cry if you want, or I'll give you dead eyes. Your call. You want to talk about the families, I'll tell you how sorry I am, or how I don't really care. Again, your call."
Robert gave a nervous chuckle. "Kids. Trey here likes to joke to hide his pain,but we --"
"I said shut it. Give her the disc."
Robert's smile faltered. He handed Barbara the disc.
"That has all the background crap you'll want. Photos of family, my poor mother. All that. There are also photos of me with two of the kids. At their birthday parties. No one else has those. If you want 'em, it's another $50,000. I don't have all day. HBO is waiting."