3) Bus Chicken.

 

LONE STRANGER

3) BUS CHICKEN.

One cold winter’s night Arthur found himself, mind in a fugue, way down the bottom of Sydney’s Parramatta Road in some outlandish suburb beyond the boundaries of his inner-city sanctuary, wondering as ever where his life was going. It was pouring rain and he huddled in a bus shelter. His only means of assuaging his disconsolate heart was to buy some sloppy Kentucky Fried chicken, mashed potato, gravy and coleslaw and wolf it down in the shelter of a bus stop while the cold rain pelted down inches from his face. He was longing to get back to the relative safety of his Pyrmont squat and he had just enough money for his bus fare.

 Out of the spooky mists the bus finally appeared and Arthur clambered aboard, his mouth full of mangy chicken, clutching the soggy cardboard box to his chest as if afraid someone might rip it from him. The fat, old Ocker bus driver gave him a disgruntled look when he spotted the dripping carton and his displeasure increased when Arthur flashed his dole-card and asked for a concession. He brusquely threw the meager coins Arthur gave him in his tray as if they carried leprosy and glared, his eyeballs bulging out of his piggy face. Arthur shrugged and swept up his ticket then struggled with his messy box of chicken to a seat halfway down the bus.

 The bus roared off and Arthur tucked into the unsavory mess, getting mash potato and gravy smeared round his mouth. He could see the gronky old bus driver watching him with malevolent eyes in the rear-view mirror as they sped through the night but he ignored the surveillance, nonchalantly stuffing his face without a care in the world. He was out of the cold, he was eating and he was going home. For a few glorious moments he could forget his troubles, the bus being like a protective womb carrying him through the desolation of Parramatta Road’s suburban wasteland.

 They had only gone a few blocks when the burly driver turned to glare at Arthur and gruffly announce his trip was over, his fare only taking him the few stops. From his warm seat Arthur protested loudly that his ticket should get him all the way to the city but the old bastard would have none of it, pulling the bus over and insisting Arthur get off. Arthur whined on about how unjust the driver was and how it was his right to be taken to his destination. "No, you've come to the end of your section, get off ya bludger!"

 The doors hissed open and the mug growled for him to disembark, still Arthur refused, clinging steadfastly to his seat and his chicken. Colonel Blimp turned red with indignation and barked that if Arthur didn’t comply he would be driven without ceremony to the nearest police station. Arthur sneered and called his bluff, daring him to do it, adding that he was nothing but a fascist pig with his seven cents worth of power. The driver swelled up like a malignant tumor and jerked about in a fury, shutting the doors, crashing the gears and putting his foot to the pedal.

 Off the bus rocketed, into the wet gloom, the driver’s face closed down in a determined grimace, his foot to the floor. Arthur ruminated upon the alien Pig shop he was being shanghaied to here in the middle of nowhere, the monstrous bus driver hunched over the wheel, Jabba the Hutt staring ruthlessly into the storm, implacable.

 Arthur’s resolve melted, the last thing he wanted was a stoush with the Pigs in Nowheresville. Grasping his box of slushy shit food as if it was his last consolation he sighed in resignation and sidled up to the front door, slowly, approaching the ogre’s back with trepidation, cringing at every step, whining like a beaten puppy. He then began the big wheedling act, pleading obsequiously with the driver, “Please sir, don’t do it, don’t be so cruel, life is hard for me, the police will only give me more trouble, a wrong bus ticket is so trivial.” King Pong sneered and increased speed. 

Humiliated, Arthur surrendered to his fate  and with sincere contrition wailed, “You win, you’re the boss, I’ll get down. Down, down, down wherever you say sir.” The driver grunted in satisfaction and screeching gears pulled the bus over to the curb, his face creased with smug pleasure.

 The doors hissed open and Arthur stepped tentatively into the dolorous night, turning in the doorway to take one last look at the driver’s self-righteous, bigoted mug. Snarling “Fuck you, arsehole! Cop this!” Arthur hurled his carton of slushy Kentucky Fried Chicken straight into the driver’s fat face, mashed potato, gravy and chewed up chicken splattering all over him as he shrieked in dismay as if he’d been hit with molten lead.

Before the blob could do anything, Arthur ran off into the storm, laughing demonically at the aggrieved expression on the fool’s messed up face, a grimace full of guts and gravy as he stewed in his seat in a puddle of chicken slops. 

For all the horror of the ride, the cold night and the long walk home, Arthur felt exhilarated, as if he’d won a small battle in the war against the quasi-fascist mentality that ever attempted to take over the world. He thrust his fist into the wind with a shout of triumph and danced a jig like the town idiot, thinking he was one of the disempowered who’d gotten one lousy little punch in.

2) Kiss-In with Rev. Bile.

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1) Reject From the Anything Goes Cafe.

 

LONE STRANGER

7th Life: Public Enemy No.7

1) Reject From The Anything Goes Cafe.

Ok, listen up, if you want the nitty gritty on a deviant pilgrim's progress through the unchartered underground, keep reading. Take a trip on the wild side via the backstreets of Sydney, Paris, Amsterdam, Morocco, Delhi, Mumbai and Goa. Follow Arthur Farthing as he fulfils his heart's destiny and renounces the poverty of violence. 

Here he is, reacquaint yourself with him, sitting in the window seat of the Anything Goes Cafe on Kings Cross Sydney staring into his coffee, spliff in hand, reminiscing on his past adversities and adventures, praying there’d be no more hazards and plenty of fun to come.

Arthur snapped out of his reverie when Vitto, the café’s barrista, screeched invective into his ear, telling him, "You bring drama like a dog brings fucking fleas, you'd fight with your own shadow!" Vittorio Bianchi was the tout for a freakshow café on Desolation Row so he'd know.

He’d first met Vitto in 1979 at Garibaldis Bar in Riley Street Darlinghurst when Arthur arranged a benefit show for the old Italian manager, Mario Abiezzi, as he needed some money to pay the rent. He enlisted Cabaret Conspiracy with the great drag artists Doris Fish and Jacqueline Hyde as M.C.s. He created a lurid, fluorescent poster with a cartoon of Doris and cabaret star Fifi L'Amour striding out of Kings Cross with a bunch of queers following in their wake and he pasted 300 copies of it on the walls of Sydney to advertise the gig. The heavy fluoro colours against a black background enhanced his ribald cartoon talent to a monotone Sydney and created quite a stir among local artists and within a year the style of bright fluoro images with heavy black outlines became ubiquitous.

Arthur found Vitto drooling over the table where he'd stacked some of the posters, hoping to sell them for one dollar each. (In 2024  they sell for $2000 and more if you can find one). Tight as a crocodile’s arsehole Vitto refused to part with a dollar and Artie told him to, “Fuck off!”  That's kind of been the style of their love/hate relationship ever since. For forty years Artie’s been watching him as he's sung like a canary given the third degree, to any and every magazine, newspaper and pamphleteer that's shown up to interview him on his favorite subject, himself. Oh, and the celebrities he's waited upon at the Cat’s Whiskers Cafe.

The role-call of stars is endless, Marianne Faithful. Jeff Buckley, Geoffrey Rush, Chrissy Amphlet, Penny Arcade, Noah Taylor, Martin Sharp, Irving Walsh, squealing on and on to the media sob-sisters to satisfy Sydney’s celebrity addiction, forgetting all the mere mortals that were regulars and gave him his bread and butter. In thirty years of going there nearly every day Arthur rarely spotted a celebrity, they bought one cup of coffee every six months, hardly enough to pay for the juke box let alone anything else. It was amusing when the actor Richard Roxburgh showed up there to be interviewed by the winner of a Peace Prize because he was reprising his television show persona "Rake" with the Cool Cat’s Cafe as background. His character purportedly lived in a flat upstairs and many a  flaky thespian, desperate for one second of fame, rushed to the café to sit slurping coffee and get their mugs on screen as a vindication of their showbiz travails. Arthur thought Richard was a jolly good fellow for publicizing the place but made sure he wasn’t around for the televising, hating to be yet another rubber-necker on public view.

Thankfully Vitto never forgets to mention his particular favorites, a gang of friends who regularly patronised the business to gossip and promote their shows, darlings whom Artie also loved such as Elizabeth Burton, godess of the Kings Cross strip clubs; Fifi L'Amour, gorgeous cabaret artist famous for her performances across Auz and Europe; Jeannie Lewis, inspiring folksinger and comrade in many international social struggles;   Danny Aboud, outrageous drag artist and male hustler selling his donkey dick in New York; and Ayesha, the famous  Les Girls Dragon Lady. But in all the years, no matter how many shows Arthur did or continuous support he gave to Vitto, he never got mentioned as another artist in residence. He was just one of the faceless nobodies who spent a lot of money there, helping to pay Vitto’s bills and buy his flat in Randwick. It's not so much that Artie wanted his ego stroked, he’d had a great life with enough limelight to satisfy his “hero in his own toilet break” narcissism. It just grated on him that show-biz stars are the only worthwhile humans in Vitto’s world.

There was a whole mob of deadbeats who gathered there over the last fifty years, many of them now dead in inglorious circumstances, though some are still alive and kicking, (or getting their arses kicked.) Yet in Vitto’s eyes they’re quotidian plebs, non-stars and monstars. Tramps, junkies, hookers, sluts, thieves, hustlers, paupers, painters, strippers, dealers, potheads, rockers, pagans, witches, maniacs, the entire crew from Nightmare  Alley passed through that Hotspot Cafe. They fought, squabbled, philosophised, loved, smoked, drank and fucked, and kept each other company on lonely nights, forking out their last few dollars for the cheap lentil soup and bad coffee. (Vitto was notorious for using old, used coffee grounds.)

Oh, and let's not forget the quiet angels that sat among the demi monde but didn't blow their horns, yet are the real stars of "society": nurses, carers, teachers, pro bono lawyers, street musicians, single mums, low-paid cleaners. The place was a sanctuary for them to also rest their tired feet and get some attention, from Vitto and the unruly mob of deviants. 

The Piccolo was often referred to as "the artists' cafe", sadly 99% of artists don't get famous, they die in penury. While Vitto lauded the phenomena of “the star artist” he often disparaged Arthur who had wall-papered Sydney with his posters, grumbling if Artie asked for a coffee on tick, “You bludger, you’ve never got a job!” Kings Cross had the reputation of being a "devils’ kitchen" for much of the twentieth century and Artie figured he should be grateful to never get a mention as a patron of such a disreputable "lifeboat for losers" cafe as Vitto’s for it would look bad on his non-career’s CV. Still, it's the thought that counts, every little bit helps in the promotion of a try hard artist.

He wasn't exactly a non-entity. In 2019 he shared an art show with the work of the illustrious Martin Sharp, (he of the Cream album cover and Jimi Hendrix poster fame), called "My City of Sydney." Both of them supposedly dedicating their lives to creativity. but otherwise they were opposites, Martin was born in Sydney into a wealthy family, went to an elite art school, was famous, heterosexual and his work wonderfully decorative. Arthur was born in Melbourne and from an extremely poor family, was rejected from that same art school, NAS, and was an ignominious nobody, unashamedly queer and his work politically cutting social justice commentary, (or so he thought.)

Arthur was sad that all those years of pleasure and pain had been wiped, forgotten, ignored by Vitto's selective memory. There was the time when the electric transformer for the area blew and all the bums sat with Vitto in the café’s gloom with candles barely lighting the dark for four days and nights, a storm raging outside, all of them freezing their arses off, this event forgotten by his celebrity obsession. Then there were those few times Vitto got dragged up to Kings Cross police station to be questioned and psychologically tortured by the pigs, accused of selling marijuana, while his bad-arsed crew anxiously waited outside, including Arthur, this never to be mentioned by him. 

Farrrrrk, how many times did the pigs raid the cafe, locking all the potheads in while they searched everybody. There was the night they went over that "hole in the wall" cafe with a fine tooth comb, all the while the baggies of pot were hidden at the bottom of a large can of Nescafe that Vitto would stir with his sticky hands to fish them out. All of these contretemps Arthur only just survived yet he was written out of much of the café’s  history.

He cried with Vitto when his Clayton's boyfriend, David, took his life-savings and squandered it on a truck which he then crashed and destroyed. David sold the wreck to buy a motorbike, then ran away to Queensland, the last time Vitto saw him he was disappearing into the sunshine with an Asian girl clinging to him on the back of the bike. Arthur hurt for him when a certain drag queen who lived across the road once took that same useless boyfriend home and Vitto stood under her bedroom window and wept as the lights in her inner-sanctum were turned on and off, on and off. David later confessed to Arthur that he stupidly thought she was a woman and when he edged into her bedroom she dropped her panties and revealed her peanut penis. He nearly fell over in shock and fled, stumbling down the stairs. Vitto needn't have thrown a tizzy, David’s lust went unsatisfied. David also confessed to Arthur that while living with Vitto he paid the rent by letting him suck his cock once a month. If David wasn’t in the mood and refused him Vitto would erupt in a fury, traipse out of the bedroom and kick his cat in the arse in the kitchen.

Arthur winced with him when a rough-trade Lebanese hunk named Tony slapped him across the face because he wouldn't give him fifty dollars. Tony was a hustler working the Fitzroy Gardens and it was curious that he thought he was owed fifty as that was the price of a cock-suck on the Kings Kross sex circuit. Artie was ready to rush upon the bastard and get his nose broken for the 7^th time only Tony ran off knowing the whole Piccolo Café mob would jump into the fray and beat the shit out of him.

Arthur went to the movies with Vitto every Monday night for 21 years and boy was it embarrassing. He laughed out loud and called out insults if the acting was bad or the plot improbable, he shrieked to shatter glass at any form of violence as if he’d been punched-out himself, even the hard slamming of a door or a spit in the face had him squealing. One time, at a screening of "The Evil Touch", every time Charlton Heston came on screen with his bad Mexican make-up Vitto hooted with derision, a guy sitting behind us tapped him on the shoulder and told him to "Shut up!" He replied, "Fuck off!" and carried on laughing, ruining the movie for me as well.

Arthur  giggled hysterically, like Jimmy Dean in the police station in "Rebel Without a Cause", when Vitto showed up one afternoon with his head shaved and a huge lump on his skull, making him look like a concentration camp victim. He'd been attacked by some home-invasion thug in his flat and again his savings robbed from under his mattress, (the non-boyfriend David the 1st.) He mistook Arthur's sympathetic hysteria for callous laughing at him and ran up Roslyn Street weeping, Vitto's nephew, Lorenzo, having to fetch him back. From that day on he never went on night shift again, only daylight would get him to the Piccolo, and thus the good old "Nights of Cabiria" at the Piccolo wound down. (Actually it's possible Vitto had taken home some rough trade and bit off more than he could chew. He never was forthcoming about his sex life.)

When he let it be known that he longed to go back to Europe in 1994 to visit his old family home it was Arthur who put in the hard work, hiring the venue, (Les Girls), lining up the acts, creating the posters and pasting them up, handing out flyers, organizing the show on the night, him being one of the acts, and getting Vitto $2000 for his trip. It hurt when the old shit not only claimed it wasn't enough money, it really cut Arthur to the bone when some years later he announced from a stage in Redfern that it was Elizabeth Burton who organized the show for him. Artie didn't want any medals or gold cups, let Vitto keep them all. While he thought the Italian puto was an amusing character who had put in an inordinately long time sealed in a concrete box shouting "helllo" and “fuck you” from the doorway, Artie didn't see him as a saintly Mother Theresa caring for  the down and out peasants, though he did look a bit like her.

Arthur had been bashed-up there 7 times, no kidding, once actually knocked out and dropped to the floor, on that "strange attractor" spot in the middle of the café, with Vitto screeching like a mother hen and trying to protect him under his wings. He had been arguing with a deadbeat named David Massacre when a Maori moron ran full pelt into the cafe and sucker-punched him, allegedly to protect his mate from Arthur's smart mouth.

 Arthur does acknowledge that he'd also received 7 art awards because of the help he'd received from Vitto and the Cafe's patrons, all assisting in putting on his shows and handing out his flyers and posters from that Cafe of Ill Repute. Thus he had a lot of appreciation for the joint, he wasn't completely left off the dance card. But he did run away quite a few times in a huff, swearing he’d never go back, and it was Eulalie, the part-time manager, that got him back in there with her honest friendship. The tussle with Vitto was ongoing. One day Arthur called him "Mary Poppins" and he flipped, saying “I hate Julie Andrews and you, Arthur, are a cunt!” Seriously, who hates Julie Andrews? 

There is a labyrinth of roads criss-crossing the globe that Arthur had restlessly trod with many oasis where he stopped off for a rest and friendly banter and the Piccolo Café was one of them. Various refuges strobed in and out of his conscious soul as if hurtled through parallel universes under a flashing strobe light, crowds of people leering up, seeking attention, recognition, respect and love. He let many pass by, forgot quite a few, took others to heart, the mystery of existence was unfathomable yet it was sweet people who gave it substance. Vitto wasn’t pure sweet nor wholey sour, he was unforgettable, like a white light luring one in from a red-lit maze.

He raged with angel care and devil angst, like most people, a crazy human, lonely while crowded, wise while confused, loyal though promiscuous with his favours. It hurt to hear him lionize a mob of fame-desperates while true supporters got short shrift, as they were quotidian, familiarity bred contempt, he only really liked those who visited once a year. He never really had a boyfriend and he resented his needy lust for men, he shouted to the world he could only love women, men were nasty, they urged him to sinful fantasies. Arthur was there the day in the Noughties when Cardinal Pell was brought in by Father Syn from the Catholic church down the street. Pell's eyes popped when he clapped them on Artie as if he'd seen Lucifer, then he turned his back on him and was introduced to Vitto. The old devil held out his hand and Vitto kissed his ring, like a good, somewhat deranged, lapsed Catholic, (Artie was reminded of the hallucinatory scene from "Rosemary's Baby" when the Pope kissed Satan’s ring).

Smugly satisfied that he'd received obeisance from the queen of Roslyn Street the theological monstar retreated with nary a look Arthur's way. After he'd gone in a puff of smoke Arthur rounded on Vitto and hissed, "How could you kiss that man's ring, you silly old poof? He’s a kreep, he hates queers even though he’s probably a repressed one."

"What can I do?” Vitto moaned, “I believe in God, and yet I don't, at the same time. I'm terribly conflicted!"

"Hmmmm... that sums you up," Artie thought. "We're all in a similar sinking boat, only each of us has a different type of leak."

Introduction to "Lone Srranger"

LONE STRANGER

Third book in the trilogy 

"The 7 Lives of the Punk Poofy Cat"

(The Deviant Pilgrim's Progress

Through the Poverty of Violence.)

Dedicated to Amiria

Have a look at what the cat dragged in

The cat who swallowed the canary.

Not big enough to swing a cat in.

The cat is out of the bag.

A cat's chance in hell.

Cat burglar.

Catcall.

'Lone Stranger' was influenced by:

The Sexual Outlaw = 

John Rechy

Memoirs =

Tennessee Williams

The White Goddess = 

Robert Graves

Interzone =

William Burroughs

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness =

Arundhati Roy

The Wrong Man =

Chris Bolestrero

The Harp of the South = 

Ruth Park

You never know when it's over till it's over and that could be any time, any day. It applies to the creating of art as well as one's lifespan. I've been researching, making notes and trying short story versions of 'The Punk Poofy Cat' since 1977. I got the first short story version published in an anthology in 1983 called "Edge City" edited by Gary Dunne and my story was titled "Welcome to the Mens."  It describes my childhood till the age of 13 and pubert, set in Melbourne and tells of my upbringing in a working class family, my influences, my hopes, dreams, joys and pains.

This story was noticed by a historian, Gary Wotherspoon, who asked me to reprise it in 10,000 words for an anthology titled "Being Different", tales from 8 queer men, their childhoods, influences and hopes for the future. I called my story "Alec Farthing" recounting my previous tale but taking it to the age of 19. I should've taken if to the age of 21 when I ran away from my traumas of Melbourne to live on the roads of the world, especially 4 years in India, but I stuck to the brief of 10,000 words. I was too polite as the story's ending would have been perfect if I'd elaborated for another 1000 words.

I kept reading, researching, writing and rewriting, by the late '80s projecting ahead, far into the future, envisioning what the finished artwork word be: my long, adventurous life told in three books, the classic form of a 'trilogy' as there was so much to tell. I wrote and wrote and wrote, possibly going through the many stories 49 times. As I stayed with the metaphor of "the cat", it being the slang term in Australia for a queer man, I thought a poetic way to lay the three books out would be in 7 lives, finishing at the age of 70 and hoping there might still be 2 lives left for this cat and he would live till 77. There won't be an eighth book telling of the two extra lives in my extreme old age as who knows how and when the end will come?

I broke the 7 lives into three books, the 1st "Vagabond Freak" recounting my life from birth up to the age of 26 when I returned to Australia from my global wanderings. My 2nd book is "Punk Outsider" that speaks mainly of my life in Sydney in the late '70s and the '80s though for biographical continuity I included a story from the '90s, "Under Northcott" telling my tribulations of 30 years living in the infamous housing estate in central Sydney. My third book, "Lone Stranger" tells of my life from the '90s to 2023, Sydney and my further travels on the roads of the world, Europe and Moorocco, but again mostly India from 1997 to 2023.

I write in the third person singular a character named Arthur Farthing as I want this artwork to be considered in the genre of 'novel'  (actually a roman à clef = key to a romantic adventure, where names, places and times are altered to protect the protagonists.) 

For all that obfuscation I still say my stories are autobiographical and an attempt at 'folk history' as I do researh and try to get right the dates, place names and event details. I conflate different aspects into one story, at times I exaggerate, I obfuscate, I hallucinate, I prevaricate on some truths, to retain privacy in the intimacies of my life, and to "not let truth get in the way of a good story." Most of what I write is basically true though contingent on tbe vagaries of memory.

I created the character Arthur Farthing so I could get a distance from him (myself), observe him as if he were someone else, try to be objective about him, detail his flaws as well as his good attributes. He's not a hero, he's the quintessential anti-hero, picaresque, a deviant pilgrim perhaps on his way to some improvement of character, some resolution, but neither the reader nor I will know till I get to the end, the story is about his progress rather than the consumation of his travails. He is both a devil and an angel, for sure his guilt at his sexual queerness needs assuaging and that's part of his progress as is his overcoming of his tendency to violence towards a society he feels fucks him over as much as it supports him.

I self-publish even though it's costly, extremely difficult and limited in distribution as I could wait forever for a legitimate publisher and drop dead in the meantime, my books never seeing the light of day. Also because I want my books to be my artworks alone, totally my design and content. A publisher would definitely demand a rewrite, editing, their choice of cover, fonts, format, illustrations, back cover blurb, on and on, till it wont be my book but theirs, "art by committee" which I abhor. I've long experienced everybody wants to stick their finger in the pie, a committee decides on its existence, too many cooks spoil the broth. My books are totally my own creations, as is each painting. It's actually happened that as Ive been painting someone has asked if they can paint a bit also, something in the corner or photoshop some imagery on top of some figures they disagree with. I adamantly refuse. Fuck censorship, cancel culture is killing independant art. (I know, nobody gives shit, all good, it sets me free, I can create what I fucking want.)

 I have just finished the 21st and final rewrite of my third book "Lone Stranger - The Deviant Pilgrim's Progress Through the Poverty of Violence". Just in case I do drop dead before I self-publish and launch the book at an art show I'll put on in some gallery in September 2024 I am posting the book chapter by chapter, story by story here in Blogspot so that it will exist and be available to read for those who want to follow Arthur Farthing's progress and find out if there is any resolution of his dysfunctional life. I'm 74, I have a frail heart condition and lungs, (from smoking too much.) I still lead an extreme adventurous life, especially in India, fast cars, even faster motorbikes, chaotic cities, dangerous high mountain roads, dark back alleys, nefarious characters met with. Who knows when the end will crash upon my head?

I must get the story out! Why? I won't be the next Dan Brown, a best seller. I won't be the next Jack Kerouac, a cult hit. I simply love to write, to tell stories, it gets me very high. It's compulsive, I've been this way since I was 7 years old, I kept diaries and wrote short stories before I could blow. I've read, read and read till I now feel Ive devoured about 3000 books. And each of them has both inspired and influenced me, they've mulched down in my brain and heart till Ive developed my own style, I hope. The stories I tell, of historical events, places and people wont be told unless I tell them, for what it's worth. I've only distributed 350 copies of each book so far, but put them in the National and State Libraries so that any historian may reserch them to get some inkling of my character, influences and times. Much of my content is about street life, ordinary people, nobodies, the fringe dwellers who few take note of or care about. The street is where I come from, the road is where I ever tread and belong.