These stories, that have been available on
Blogspot for 10 years for free, will now only be available on Amazon at the
address above. They are contained in “Vagabon Freak”, the 1st volume
of a trilogy titled “The 7 Lives of the Punk Poofy Cats”. I have been the
archetypal starving artist in his garret, painting, drawing and writing,
writing, writing as if I were some waif crying out in the wilderness. Now I
need you, dear reader, to hear my cries and go to Amazon and buy a copy of my
book and keep me alive. There you will find my complete tale, from beginning to
end, in one place, for you to hold in your hot little hands. When you read it
straight through, I assure you, it will blow your mind.
Below are introductory paragraphs to the story
and some pictures that I still retain to illustrate those stories hopefully to
give you a come-on to get my book. Thanks for giving me a go, TZ.
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Since the introduction of television in 1956 Arthur had been mesmerized by
the amazing visions it projected, conjured as if from thin air; it was all his
dreams come true in a box, a wondrous techno-toy that God must have especially
designed for him, the budding narcissist. Glued to the machine, he was
transported to other times and other lives, to a greater world that promised
experiences of cosmic proportions.
He was somewhat flummoxed at having to decipher all the shows that
reinforced the glory of marriage, “The Honeymooners”, “I Love Lucy” and “Father
Knows Best”, puzzling over the attempt to bring about a blissful union of
warring opposites in all the sit-coms and “days of our lives” dramas; to make a
placid one out of a rambunctious two seemed the job of TV to his mystified
young mind.
He not only chose Annette Funicello as his favorite Mouseketeer, he was
also in love with the tall, dark and pretty Lieutenant in “Rin Tin Tin.” And
his temperature sky-rocketed whenever Little Joe strode onto “Bonanza”, a show
about a dysfunctional, all male family with a mysteriously missing mother which
Frank had made compulsory family viewing.
Frank was a Western romanticist and adhered to the ‘Fifties “Cult of the
Cowboy”, reading stacks of Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey, watching every Western
movie faithfully and inadvertently encouraging Arthur’s homo-eroticism, for
Michael Landon’s “Little Joe”, in tight white pants, had a phenomenal bulge in
his crotch. Frank probably saw himself as Audie Murphy, World War 2 hero turned
cowboy star roaming the range at will, keeping at bay the invading savages
while the little woman remained corralled down on the farm rearing the kids.
Arthur lived a lot of his life in the fantasyland of movies, like a young
acolyte zealous for a powerful, new religion, often wagging school to watch
“The Golden Years of Hollywood” on midday TV, or sneaking into the city to see
the latest on the big screen. For awhile his favorite movie was “South
Pacific”, musicals eliciting in him the Utopian ideal of a life filled with the
ecstasy of song, dance and love in Bali Hai.
At the Saturday matinee in the funky village of Ivanhoe’s picture-house he
thrilled over films like “Earth Versus the Flying Saucers” and “Jungle Jim and
the Abominable She-Devil”; science-fiction drove him and the rest of the
children into such paroxysms of excitement they would try to tear the theater
apart, throwing lollies at the screen, attempting to swing on the red-velvet
curtains, grabbing the girls’ bums between the crack in the seats to make them
scream louder, until the ushers would have to rush down the aisles in a furor
and beat the ebullient, rioting kids into submission with their flash-lights.
Of all
films there was one that truly influenced his life-path, the Korda Brothers’
1941 “The Thief of Baghdad”. It was late at night and his parents, flailing
away at their usual kitchen-sink argument, didn’t notice him go into the
lounge-room and turn on the television set. He came in on the scene beside the
Arabian Sea when the boy first opens the bottle and sets free the Genie, and
then flies upon the giant’s back, hanging on to his Hindu hair-lock, to the
roof of the Himalayan Mountains to steal an omniscient jewel from the forehead
of an unknown God.(If you want to read the rest of this story plus more, please go to the WEB address above and buy "Vagabond Freak.")
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