Here and Now: Post Puking in Korea, ADHD On a Tractor

The 'here and now' is sometimes hard to take but it is sure one hell of a lot better than 'the dead and gone'.

Unless, of course, you believe in a glorious after life. But old Jews like me don't believe in an after life.You do good for good's sake so that you can leave a good name not because you want to go to heaven. For me there ain't no heaven and their ain't no hell.When I die I will be stone cold, fucking dead.

'Here and Now' was the name of a AA Sunday night meeting started by a tough little Irishman named Jimmy. Jimmy had empathy but no compassion. If a practicing alcoholic showed up at the meeting, in the bag, Jimmy would throw him out.

Strangely, the meetings that were held at the VA facility in Palo Alto didn't draw flies. The weird part is that booze was big time in the service (dope and pills hardly at all) in my days.Getting drunk at every opportunity was a sign of manhood. I was very big time Macho in that department.

At 21 being blotto and getting an erection is possible. At 51, and beyond, being in the bag and getting an erection is every man's dream..

At my first AA meeting, at the Vets, there was only one other guy, the secretary and me. After listening to the 'other guy', a Viet Nam vet, it seemed to me that the poor son of a bitch needed to be put away. He was the product of dope and booze and a real mess. More looney than sane.One more meeting was my emotional limit.

When farming in Iowa, getting half in the bag on weekends felt like my only way out. Slopping hogs, milking cows, plowing corn, needing to take an outdoor shower in the summer before the Princess would let me in the house for dinner, deserved some reward. Weekend booze was my reward.

Actually one of the most memorable farming experiences was spending days on end plowing corn. Sitting on a fucking tractor, going up and down endless rows of corn at about one mile per hour and having to concentrate on staying in the dirt, between the rows of corn, tested my ADHD. At the end of each day I was really wired for sound and could have probably lit up the city of Philadelphia. So, often a little booze and a roaring screamer with the Princess were my outlets.

My drinking companion in Iowa was often my first father-in-law but he complained about me drinking his whiskey, the whiskey he had paid for. So I told him, in no uncertain terms, to stick his whiskey where the sun don't shine aka 'stick it in your ass'.

We continued to drink together, but each out of our own bottle. We were attached to one another by an electrical bond of mutual disrespect and dislike.

We had a great trade going. He disliked me for my in his face attitude and in turn, I disliked him for what he was. He drowned fishing in that fucking fish-less, loaded with weeds, Clear Lake, Iowa.

Getting in the bag on warm sake in Seoul, Korea was fun until it wasn't. I made my first and last trip down Sake Alley (warm or not) in Seoul. I barely made it back to the barracks to puke my brains out. Getting sick from drinking was no big fucking deal in the Army. That was just part of the whole Army scene.

Out here in the Land of Milk and Honey and Fruits and Nuts, there was a guy, a sometimes drinking buddy of mine who loved heated red wine. He drank that bullshit heated wine which got him in almost instant motion or numb. Sometimes he just passed out at the table. He called it falling asleep.

I concentrated on Grants 8 year old scotch. He died of alcoholism and here I am at 91 1/2.

The moral is an old AA 'truism' that God takes care of drunks and fools and since I qualify on both scores here I am, still around, full of piss and vinegar. And still, thank God, without a filter between my brain and my mouth.

~

Sex, The Princess and A Dripping Faucet

After three years in the Army which included one gunshot wound, two things drove me: making money and my little head (now, no more useful than a dripping faucet).

It took my first ex-wife, in a rare show of candor, just three weeks after we were married, to tell me that she felt that she had made a mistake in marrying me and was already very worn out with me. On our honeymoon, in Jamaica, a few months later the Princess said it again. The Princess seemed to enjoy telling me, that even knowing me was a mistake.

Being both a guilty Bronx Jew and stupid, I tried futilely to get the Princess to like me.Love never had a chance.I often wonder why self pity was a very minor factor in my life. But optimism, looking for serendipity and laughter have always mostly overcome negative feelings.

After 27 years of my trying to change her negative feelings towards me the Princess threw me out.She originally claimed that it was my drinking that forced her into bouncing my ass out of our Jewish Mansion.

When the Princess blamed my drinking for our divorce to a friend my self righteous indignation surfaced and I went fucking nuts.

I phoned the JAP and said, "Bonnie, quit telling people that you threw me out because I drank too much. Tell the them the God damn truth. Tell them that you threw me out because you didn't like me in 1947 and you still don't like me in 1974. That's the real truth and I'm cool with it. Quit playing the booze card."

Never did get any more 'Woe is me, I married an alcoholic.", feedback.

The Princess did confess to a mutual friend that being married to me was exciting. In a moment of weakness she told that to me as well.We'd been happily divorced for about 10 years when that comment popped out of her mouth.Talk about a day late and a dollar short.

But the Princess had a ferocious memory and remembered, in detail, all the asshole things I had done and they were a big fucking bunch. As I told her several times (redundancy is a specialty of mine) "Why is it that you remember, in detail, every asshole thing I've ever done and you never give me credit for the good things that I've done?" Her answer was her consistent steely eyed, WASP look of total disgust and disdain.

My son Joe's advice on how to stay married came along way too late for me. My son, Joe, contended that a basic rule for staying married is for the guy to say, when necessary, 'I'm sorry, it's all my fault.'

Yeah, most divorced couples are amiable toward one another until they talk about something serious. Then it's the same old noise.

For 28 years after our divorce, without a court order, I saw to it that the Princess continued to live in the life style that I had made her accustomed to living. She surely deserved it. (Living with me wasn't like spending a day at the beach.)

The minute the Princess stopped receiving her $5k a month and other high priced perks, she stopped even acknowledging me. See me at a local shopping center and the Princess would turn turn her head away.

The Princess, I believe, died with Italian Alzheimer's where you forget everything except the grudge. Sad for her.

~

Above and Beyond with My VA Hospital

God bless the VA Palo Alto Health Care System, a caring health facility.

Starring Dr. Patricia Nguyen, Dr.Mitchell Wong and Angella in the pharmacy at the VA PAHCS.

Dr. Nguyen a pre-eminent cardiologist is always over booked but on my very recent date, Dr.Nguyen broke her previous record for keeping me waiting.

After sitting in the waiting room for 45 minutes, building up a head of indignant steam, a nurse came along to take my 'vitals': blood pressure, temperature, weight, etc. Then back to the fucking waiting room.

After another 15 minutes, along comes a different nurse and escorts me to the examination room. 15 minutes later, in walks a doctor, not Dr Nguyen, who introduces himself. I look at him like a bull with a bastard calf and ask him what the hell he wanted. 'Just want to ask you some questions,' he says.

'Where is Dr Nguyen?'.

'Dr Nguyen will be along in a few minutes'.

By then I've gone aerobic, my blood pressure has gone through the roof and I say to that fresh faced doctor 'Fuck you, I'm outta here.', and to my car...drove home, wired for sound, sucking wind all the way.

(Went for a blood test necessary to get my thyroid pill prescription renewed.)

About an hour later at home, Dr.Nguyen phoned, to my huge surprise, apologetically and insisted on 'interviewing' me for about 20 minutes. I complained, in my usual grating voice that her scheduling person was an overbooking maniac. Dr.Nguyen, in spite of my bitching and complaining gave me survival guidance.

In my 91 1/2 years of being 'doctored', this and my next day experience with Dr.Wong, really stand out. I could have laid down and died in the Menlo Medical Clinic and my doctor would have stepped over my body to get to the next paying patient.

Phone me? The Menlo Medical Clinic? That's a joke.

The next day, schlepping my weary ass back down to the VA was more than I could contemplate. I cancelled my appointment with the great, Dr. Mitchell Wong my Primary Care physician, who then phoned to check up on me.

Dr.Wong put me through his wringer, checking up and advising me with his survival wisdom.That made two phone calls in 24 hours from two caring physicians.

Ah, but those thyroid pills were a problem that Dr.Wong solved. Dr. Wong leaned on the pharmacy to get the pills out the same day.

Lo and behold Angella from the VA pharmacy phoned at 5:30 PM to tell me that she was going to drop them off at my place after work.

The VA PAHCS is a shining model of fostering a culture of caring. How lucky can I be.

And yeah, no woman will have me, thank God, because I no longer drive at night. Gotta have concern for the other drivers on the road...Hello Lyft/Uber.

~

One For All, All For One

'What you see is what you get.'

'Take a flying fuck to the moon.'

Expressions of independence learned while in the Army but well used by me since those days.

The strange part is that independent thinking and being a GI were not even kissin' cousins.Except when you were diving for cover when the bullets started flying. Then we became heavy thinkers. By then we had learned, the hard way, that the bullets were not our friends.

For some weird reason, my days in the service didn't come into my daily stream of conscious until I was around 84 years old. No one ever asked about them and I never spoke of them.Once in a long while someone would ask why I limped. Always had some smart ass answer. Never said that I was hit on Okinawa.

Putting myself out as some kind of hero or patriot seemed silly then, as it does now. We were wherever we were because that was where we were supposed to be.

But going to the VA Palo Alto Health Care facilities snapped me to attention. Seeing vets who looked worse than I did (no small trick) and still being alive brought history back to me. Lots of vets with WWII baseball caps in my early days at the vets.

Now it's the Korean and Vietnam War vets who tool around in their motorized wheel chairs, mostly overweight and looking like shit.

WW II vets, like me, die every day. Hardly ever see a vet with a WWII baseball cap at the VA health care facilities these days.

Now the Korean, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq vets look at the likes of me and think that we are fucking freaks. Freaks maybe. Fucking freaks, hardly possible. At 91 1/2 my schlong is a faucet which drips from time to time. Hardly a fucking sex tool. A major league generator of the need for fresh, dry underwear.

At the end of the day the most meaningful memory, for me, of the service was the deep seated feeling of family. A feeling that is sorely lacking in my life these days.

As a first generation American, with immigrant parents, I was lucky as a kid to have lived 'family' to the hilt. Huge family dinners: 'break the fast', passover, on and on. Squabbles but feelings of family reigned.

The Army, through fist fights, harsh words and hard times was the ultimate in 'family' living.We were, all of us, in it together. One for all, all for one.

~