201. The Stranger

Booger Mania People! Bring your kids!

Wait a minute, that's no good. I don't even know what Booger Mania is. What's going on here? OK. I get it. My literary prose is in the shitcan, so I'm writing about slogans for nonexistent events. How pitiful. How I have fallen.

I used to write stuff that people were on the edge of their seats about, well, maybe, at least interested in. Now I'm defunct of even prosimian talent. I might as well write serial romance novels, if I knew how to do that. What has happened to me? I used to think I was the gusto of online stories and diatribes. Now I ain't so sure.

I sure wish I could get over this writer's cramp. Maybe if I do something entirely different I'll regain my fluency. Something like philately. No, that won't work. You need fingers to paste stamps in albums. I know! Philanthropy. I'll start a non-profit to benefit less fortunate people and animals. How about People Without Partners? No, that's already taken. Let's see. How about the Pedophile Club? No, the Catholic Church owns that one.

Got it! Animals Without Anuses. Yes! Of course this will be an exclusive club since most animals have buttholes. Membership will be limited to planarian worms, ant lions, mayflies, butterflies, sponges, flatworms, demodex mites, and jellyfish. We'll have monthly meetings which I will facilitate. I will encourage members to share their life experiences not having an anus. Every few months we'll have a potluck dinner and a roast (not the kind you eat).

No, that's not gonna work. I would have to provide each member a unique environment, and that would cost a lot of money. I don't have any money. I've never had any money.

Maybe I should get back to writing and try a pot porridge of vignettes. It's what my readers tell me they like. But I don't especially like vignettes because they don't mix well will olive oil. Maybe I should do untrained of thought. That's what I do best.

Or perhaps I should go big and try my paw at writing a novel—something contemporary and exciting, like a hardboiled crime drama. I'll style it after Raymond Chandler's work. I'll need a catchy title, maybe something like "Looking for Lard in All the Wrong Places". Nope, too romantic. OK, I've got it: "The Long Pee Good Night."

I'll be a grizzled private eye working in Los Angeles to bust a ring of international jewel thieves. There will be corrupt cops, prostitutes, double crosses, blackmail, double entendres (whatever they are), and lots of murders. People like to read about murders. (Isn't a "private eye" an odd expression when you stop to think about? And what about a "public eye": By day he was a public eye for the Detroit police department; by night he was an antique appraiser.)

Wait a minute. To grind out a 300-400 page novel would eat up all of my time for months, maybe even years. I would lose my precious sleep time, playtime, eating grass, chasing squirrels. Nope, it's just not worth it. I'm just a hack short-story writer and that's that!

I'm going to try something new that my readers will at least give a second thought to. I don't know why but I like to write about bar scenes. I've never been in a bar and I am not allowed in bars (I'm a dog, remember?) But I can imagine stuff that happens in bars. They're a great place for human interaction and controversy. So I'm going to start the rest of this chronicle in a bar.

I'm a great fan of Albert Camus' novels, especially "The Stranger". So I'm going to call this chronicle "The Stranger" (L'Étranger ).

I will adopt the persona of Camus' main character Meursault—a man who, in Camus’ words, “does not play the game,”; that is to say, he fails to live up to society’s expectations. He kills a man he barely knows without any apparent motive. He approaches the world with a moral indifference and believes that there is no true meaning to life. He doesn't even cry at his mother's funeral. He is a stranger to the world and to himself.

I 'm in Tijuana sitting at a table in the Adelita Bar, mellowing out with a cold Dos Equis. Gradually the lights dim and stage lights come on. From behind a curtain a naked woman comes onstage with a donkey in tow with a rope around its neck.

"Well," I say to myself. "I guess it's time for me to leave, and that's a pity. This bottle of cervesa is still half full."

I walk outside into the night air and hail a taxi to take me back to my shabby hotel. A cabbie pulls up to me. I get in.

He turns around and grins at me, pulls out a knife and says, "Geev me your monies or I weel cuts your throat."

I open my jacket, pull out my handgun and shoot him in the forehead. He slumps over the steering wheel. I get out and start walking down the street towards the hotel. After a while, three Mexicans emerge from an alley. All three have knives in their hands.

One of them looks at me and says, "Hey gringo, geev us your monies or we will keel you."

I pull out my handgun and shoot all three of them in the heart. They fall down onto the dusty street. I walk up to their bodies and shoot each one in the head just to be sure they are dead.

I say to myself, "I guess this just isn't my day."

I continue walking until I get to the hotel. I climb up the stairs, walk down the corridor and unlock the door to my filthy room. I look at the bed and see a naked woman laying there.

"How did you get in here?" I ask.

She replies, "I comes with the room señor. I gets paid 40 pesos a night."

I pause to calculate the current peso to dollar exchange rate. I conclude that 40 pesos equal a little less than two U.S. dollars.

"Hmm," I say to her, "I'm not in the mood." Then I pull out my handgun. She sinks into the bed, terrified. I pause for a moment, then put my gun away and take out my wallet. "Here's a twenty for you. Now it's time for you to go."

As she is getting dressed, she says, "Muy gracias señor. Muy gracias."

As she is leaving, I say to her, "Hey, if you really want to know what a woman can make in a night, there's a show with a donkey at the Adelita Bar. You know, the one on Calle Coahuila near the police station. You might want to check it out."

Then I sit down in the only chair in the room and fall asleep with my handgun in my lap...