Bones: A Rare Little Bird

Early this morning a guy I know from "back in the day"in Cincinnati, was shot and killed by the Cincinnati police for waving a knife at them.

The details are murky, the rumors swirling. Cincinnati has a volatile  relationship with the Police, especially the poor people. There are some very hard parts to the city too, some very dangerous areas and drug markets that the Police have to deal with. It's not an easy situation.

And where my old acquaintance lands on those scales I cannot say because I haven't seen him in years. I've heard tell that he has struggled with drugs and booze, and getting bye and I also hear that he has been playing music and has a gaggle of admirers who follow him around. Between his good looks and his body art, he certainly was visually striking. He was funny too.

I met Bones when he first arrived in Cincinnati in the 1990's. He came with a couple of other people from New Orleans to survey the scene. At the time he was a straight edge, born-again Christian minister in addition to being a gritty looking punk rocker. That's what stood out for me, probably a lot of people is he that he looked like the nastiest gutter butter but he was smart, didn't drink or party and he believed in Jesus. On the back of his arms were the tattoos, "Jesus is Lord".

I didn't think he was freaky for it, weird. He was a preacher but I don't remember him preaching. I remember feeling jealous because he seemed to have the courage of his convictions, although I didn't articulate it that way in my brain then. It was more like, "he is fucking cool. I wish I could be cool."

Many people I know have long and deep friendships and better stories to tell about him than I do. I really have just one, one little bird of a story about Bones.

It was a drunken summer night in Corryville on Short Vine. I was chasing my ex-boyfriend, a sexy, psychopath who shall remain nameless, from Sudsy's to the woods to the Sub Galley, tripping on acid, crying, out of my mind with sorrow and lust and that feeling of sinking I always had up until 1998.  It wouldn't be a Short Vine Saturday night without one emotional breakdown.  This was my night!

At some point I lost the scent of my ex-boyfriend and picked up the scent of someone else's ex-boyfriend. Just as the dude and I were getting into a cab together, my ex came out of nowhere and began attacking us, wailing on us with his fists, his feet and even his spit. The guy ran off, my ex ran off and I was back to where I started, alone, breaking down, and wasted.

  I was losing my shit as they say. I was so lost and unhappy. I had only been drinking again for a short time since having had a period of a year off alcohol and drugs and it wasn't turning out to be the party with nice people and good times I had hoped it would. I was sliding down into a rancid existence that I thought had been kind of a game of extreme dress up. But the hell was real and it was not going away. It was mounting and multiplying and eating me alive.

Suddenly Bones appeared and I asked him, "would you pray for me?" He said of course and we went over to the steps by Perkins and I put my head down, sobbing. He laid his hand on top of my head and began to pray, asking God to help me and drive the devil out of me and save my soul.

People were walking bye. It wasn't that late. I can only imagine what people thought. Maybe you are reading this right now, saying "WHO THE FUCK CARES WHAT PEOPLE THINK", or maybe you are reading this and are more like me, saying, "OH MY GOD WHAT PEOPLE MUST HAVE THOUGHT! " The point of this story is that I was one of those people who cared what people thought, to the point where it was deadly in many cases. I still have that hang-up. But in that moment, I put everything aside, all my false pride, and turned to God as only the desperate do. And God's messenger was this really cool, beautiful guy with dreads and tattoos and these big eyes, tailor made for such an image conscious , albeit failure at keeping up an image, girl like me.

Then I got in a cab and went home, I think. My life on the party, hah! did not end there but I believe Bones helped me. He sure didn't hurt me, like I hurt myself and others, over and over and over.  I know that people often tell the truth when they are really drunk because they do not have the courage to tell it and face it when they are sober and are so twisted within themselves that they don't even know what the truth is. What I was seeking from Reverend Bones in that moment was real, was genuine help and he gave it to me.

By the following winter, Bones was drinking and getting high. I hung out at his apartment once and we partied together with people and did not talk about the time he prayed for me. But whenever I'd see him, I'd think about how he prayed for me with a mixture of fondness and embarrassment similar to the feeling I get when I run into guys with whom I had one-night stands. Exactly like that - that I engaged in something very human and intimate in a very desperate way rather than deeply for a prolonged amount of time as it was designed for. Faith and love are meant to be tended and nurtured.

I'm pretty cleaned up. I have a very lovely life today. I don't know if Bones was living a lovely life but he died in a very ugly way. I cannot lay my hands on his head and ask God to help him. By the beliefs of some, he is with God now. But if anyone asks me, I will try to help them  as he tried to help me.

Rest In Peace Bones.

I Also Love the Way You Lie

First off, let me say that I wish I wasn't such an asshole when I was younger. But I can't skank into the past and change it. I have to learn to accept that I was a short-sighted, emotionally stunted ingrate who's only real loyalty was to eyeliner and beer, and try not to let it happen again.

 I never had a camera either in the 90's, to take pictures of my friends and my outfits. If I'd had a camera, I wouldn't have the money for film because I spent it on acid or one of the guys I played house with would've hocked it.

So when I see close proximity's of my youth I get really excited, often overwhelmed. Films like "Gummo" and "Kids", anything written by Harmony Corrine or filmed by Larry Clark stir up a mixture of nausea and nostalga, which I call, naustalgia, in me.

Along similar but more glamourous lines, is the song and video of Eminem's, "Love the Way You  Lie" featuring Rhianna. Frankly IT'S JUST TOO MUCH! That old familiar theme of sick, deep co-dependency played out by Megan Fox and that sexy Hobbit-guy from "Lost", dressed in the requisite tattered denim and combat boots is so compelling, so well-done. When they beat on each other and alternately kiss/chew each other's faces, I can smell the stale beer, light b.o., sweat, cigarette smoke, sour-white-boy-aqua net- dreads and patchouli in the air; I can feel my new-wave romanticism shift into post-punk ennui slide into grunge era drug-addicted disillusionment; I am transported back to nights making out with someone else's skinhead boyfriend in bushes and basements all over Coryville.

And let us not forget our narrators, Eminem and Rhianna, cultural icons as much for their various domestic violence episodes as they are for their music. See Eminem stomping around in that field, holding up his big-boy pants and and cursing the Gods for his Ike and Tina appetites! Watch Rhianna wring her hands, with her boobs hanging out but wearing the hood of her sweatshirt up. So tortured!  So tortured!

It's like a snapshot of my life in the 90's except with a hair and make-up team.

I'm not like that now and I'm grateful because it's easier to age with hope and joy and enthusiasm than it is to toil on to the end with bitterness. Dissatisfaction is great for album covers, but to be an old, bloated throw-back still trying to whore in the bars is as ugly as it gets. Unless I were to become a full-on lunatic, morbidly obese, trying to wheel myself around in a wheel chair I found in the garbage, my legs stuffed into a couple of grocery sacks, rubber dish gloves on my hands, asking strangers to push me to the dollar store. There would be no blaze of glory for me. I'm not that cool.

I live a clean life, a sober life now. It's not perfect by any stretch, but my life is rich and beautiful. But I get it, that sick shit, I get it.