You know, sir, it's got to be Hell, being paranoid like a primitive, always afraid someone's out to get one, always afraid someone's out to steal something from one, always afraid someone else is going to have more than what one has, always afraid of new things, new sights, new people, always afraid, cowering in craven fear and trembling that someone, somewhere, somehow, is going to do one damage.
Geezuz.
During the late 1980s, early 1990s, I went to Boston six times, for two, three, weeks at a time. I have friends there who thought, or think, franksolich has literary talents, and they wanted me to meet friends of theirs in the publishing business (which I did, but my obvious lack of enthusiasm was a turn-off).
I'm a great guest in a strange city; no one has to take time off work or anything, to take care of me.
On my first trip there, however, my hosts gave me a bunch of information and maps, suggesting what I should go around to see, while they were at work. I indicated yeah, I would do that, but then the next morning, on a whim, I took a different route than the one suggested, ending up in another part of Boston.
I did this on purpose; it was all very interesting.
When I returned that evening, I described where I had been, and what I had seen.
My hosts were aghast; they insisted I had spent the whole day in the "worst" part of Boston, and that it was a stupendous miracle I hadn't been robbed or knifed or other damage.....especially since I, a son of the Sandhills of Nebraska, really "stuck out" in this area.
I dunno what the deal was; it was true the neighborhoods were not what one might call "nice neighborhoods" (in fact, they were pretty bad), but nothing happened. Never. Not even a malicious glare or untoward curiosity.
Paranoia is stupid. I won't bother repeating examples from short stories I've written and posted here--as God and everybody else knows, there's way too many of those here--but here's one I haven't told yet.
As you know, I'm one of about six, or half a dozen, of the million and a half Nebraskans who's never seen a real tornado or a live rattlesnake. Never in my life. Not that I
want to see either phenomenon, but there's this feeling one is less of a Nebraskan, if one hasn't seen at least one of the two things.
When I was 14 years old, and my younger brother 12, the two of us were at the local Country Club, whacking around golf balls. My younger brother was into golf, but I myself could not care less about golf. I went with him however, because I "owed" him; he had gone and done things with me which did not especially inspire or interest him, and so now it was my turn.
I was standing there on the eighth hole, watching how far I had just hit the ball, while unbeknownst to me, there was a Great Commotion going on right behind me, about six feet behind my back.
When I noticed my younger brother had not stepped up to the tee, I turned around, finding him clubbing a long brown sort of snake. He was using the golf club with the wooden head, not a metal head; for some reason that's the detail I remember the best.
I quickly stepped aside, so as to not be caught in the flailing of the club.
He killed it. I never paid much attention to snakes, and so I assume this was a medium-sized one, about as long as my then-height (an inch or so less of six feet). My younger brother had killed that snake pretty good; it was a mashed-up mess.
It was a rattlesnake, and my younger brother insisted it was right at my feet.
"Good putt," was all that I said.
My parents had always feared that such things would happen to me--and they did; by the time I was 7 years old, I had already been mashed up by three different motor vehicles--and for my own safety, after learning of it (my father for some reason tossed the golf club with the wooden head into the garbage, at home), the parents said no more golf course for franksolich.
Which of course was nonsense; I "owed" my younger brother too many, and continued going there with him, without fear or paranoia.
