What are you doing
next Friday
for lunch?
Gesture Steve’s Father,
Ted,
and Mother,
Delores,
showed up
at my Sister Louisa Art Show
tonight.
I gasped
when I saw them
because they are good,
old fashion,
Christian folk.
The kind that do
good shit
for needy people
and all.
I did notice
a smirk occasionally,
and some explanations
going on between
the two of them,
but they walked
proudly up to me
and were excited
to be intown,
as opposed to
outside the perimeter,
at an art show
of their deceased son’s
friend.
That be me.
He had on a Rotary
Name Tag
and I told him
that The Rotary Club
was my first memory
of encouragement
of me as a creative,
the reason I make art,
and the reason I write.
Rotarians are conservative,
mind you.
I told him
that in the eighth grade
at Chamblee High School,
I won the city wide essay contest
of the Rotary Club
for High School Students,
me writing the essay;
WHAT AMERICA MEANS TO ME.
Who the fuck knows what I wrote.
I’m sure it was in
Dr. Seuss format,
whatever it was.
He then asked
what I was doing
next Friday Lunch?
I shrugged,
like I know
what I’m doing
in five minutes;
living in the moment,
and all.
“Next Friday,
The Rotary Club
is Hosting Chamblee High School Students,
one of which won this year’s
essay contest,
and I’d like for you
to be our guest speaker.”
He asked if I would tell
my story about
being the winner
of the essay contest
in 1970,
and then read
one of my ditties
to the group of Rotarians,
and High School Students.
I told him
I’d read my ditty,
PLEASE DON’T LEAVE GESTURE STEVE,
about driving
his son’s car
home the other night
after buying it
for four quarters.
First thought:
“Shit, Is my suit clean?”
Second thought:
“They are gonna love my earring!”
Third thought:
“How many times
did I use the word
FUCK
in that ditty?”
It may just be me,
but I think
when times are uncertain,
and when you have to reach
deep inside yourself
to make positive changes
in your life,
that your brain
releases these little memories
back into your psyche
so that you can remember
where you came from,
where you are today,
and helps give
a clearer picture
of the direction
you need to be
pointing
your
arrow.
What goes around comes around!!!