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    Meandering in a Muddled Mind
    Meandering in a Muddled Mind
    Meandering in a Muddled Mind
    Ebook101 pages1 hour

    Meandering in a Muddled Mind

    By Mark Bell

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    About this ebook

    Want to know how a gated community survived the Great Recession? How about Woodstock? Or you might be interested in how an arch angel is selected. A collection of short stories by the author and screenwriter, Mark Bell answers these questions and more. The book is divided into two parts, comic and less comic stories. They range from character soliloquies to twisting story lines and outlandish characters solving historical problems. His characters and stories remind you of a contemporary fairy tale that has, "come to life." Come inside and view the workings of a slightly twisted yet hilarious author.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMark Bell
    Release dateJul 18, 2014
    ISBN9781311334138
    Meandering in a Muddled Mind
    Author

    Mark Bell

    My conception on a hot, muggy night in Alabama was predicated on my father’s forgetfulness and his lack of restraint. For that I am eternally grateful. Other than the nine months that followed that night, I accept full responsibility for my actions and output. I am credited as a screenwriter and short story author but, in truth, I am no more than a teller of tales, a weaver of plot threads, and a practitioner of dry humor. My aspirations are to entertain, educate, and never ever become a bore. After reading my work I hope that you can say, “He passed muster.” Other publications that contain my work are: Of Words and Water 2013 and Of Words and Water 2014. Both are charitable endeavors in support of Wateraid.

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      Book preview

      Meandering in a Muddled Mind - Mark Bell

      Meandering in a Muddled Mind

      Mark Bell

      Published by Wadley House Publishing at Smashwords

      Copyright 2014 Mark Bell

      All rights reserved.

      Smashwords Edition, Licence Notes

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy.

      Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Contents

      Woodstock: The Parable

      It Was a Blow Job That Caused the Wreck

      Mid Life

      The Big Blow

      Baby Cakes

      The Island

      Internal Growth

      Woodstock: the Parable

      With much consternation I find that it is necessary to retell, and sadly relive, a part of my life that I have walked away from. Your letter requires that I give a full accounting of my actions, and that you shall receive, but perhaps not in the form that you expect. Please bear with me.

      ***

      I was seventeen in the year 1969 and banished to my grandmother’s for the summer. I loved my grandmother so you can stop worrying that this will be another youth rebelling against authority diatribe. This is a na-na na-na boo-boo piece. What the hell, you ask? Think of the little kid that runs away from the bullies: just as he reaches the door and safety he can’t resist turning and sticking fingers in his ears, wiggling the leftover digits and yelling the afore mentioned citation. This of course leads to him getting a rock upside the head. Rock to follow.

      As I was saying, Grandma’s for the summer so that the ‘folks’ could have a little ‘away from me’ time. I later learned that, contrary to the prevailing opinion, parents don’t only have sex for the sake of conception; they holed up in the house and screwed like bunnies. It seems that Mother had acquired a slow itch that needed some serious scratching. This is also something that seems to be a recurring theme in forty-something women, liberated or not, and explains why forty-something men begin to look haggard, listless and begin a long affair with Doan’s Pills.

      As it turns out, sex is a game of cards and I was about to garner my hole card. When I arrived at Grandma’s things started real slow. All of the local kids had friends and figured that they didn’t need another, especially one that was a transient, with little to offer in the way of looks, nor was I holding a good stash. All of the cool kids had heard of Woodstock and wished that they had known about it in time to attend, although none of them would have made the trip from Dingle, Florida, because it was above the Mason Dixon line. They had no idea where the hell New York state was located, nor would their parents have ever agreed to it. This did not stop them from having the discussion, and the normal swagger from a few who knew someone or had a relative that knew someone who went.

      As I walked past a bunch of them congregated in the drugstore, I had no pick-up lines in my quiver, so I managed to stumble out the line that changed my life. I mentioned that I, just came through Woodstock on my way here.

      The guys looked at me with daggered stares, but most importantly the girls looked at me with star lust in their eyes. In my defense, I had not lied: the bus had passed through Woodstock, Georgia on my way to Grandma’s house.

      Pause and remember that this was not the era of the internet, no devices to whip out of your pocket. Spell check was a large heavy stack of papers bound in cardboard or leather. It even provided the definition if you took the time to read it. While I’m winding down this nostalgic labyrinth let me mention that the delete button on the ‘word processor’, we called them typewriters, came in a bottle. Archaic, but in that era information flowed from one uninformed mouth to another. The chance of being found out was slim in Dingle. The problem was finding some half-credible titbits to share.

      My enlightenment came from the periodical archives of the Dingle Municipal Library. In that dusty, seldom used room in the basement were the gems of knowledge that would rocket me into stardom. They were titled the New York Times and the Washington Post. Photos and articles from reporters on the scene, quotes from police officers, politicians and a few from the actual participants added spice to my little tale. The most helpful was a list of the bands that played and in what order they appeared. This last bit of knowledge was supplied by the relatively new and for the most part unheard of publication, Rolling Stone. This was not a rag that the library or its board would ever approve. There were plenty of photos in Life and even a cover of hippy tie dyes in Simplicity, but the Rolling Stone was the holy grail of hippy and music culture. This treasure was provided to me by the most unlikely accomplice.

      Elizabeth Barrett Sutter, when I met her, was twenty-five years old. She had reached the pinnacle of her aspirations. She was the head and only full time librarian of the Dingle Municipal Library and the reason that I can truthfully say that I made it on the cover of Rolling Stone. Not the typical librarian and not the porno version either, she was an intellectual, an island of thought in a sea of mundane. She liked ideas for their idealist qualities. She also was terribly withdrawn and as abstract as Aristotle’s ‘thought thinking of thought’, but, unlike the abstract, she was a woman who had urges that, until my arrival, she had managed to contain.

      The question that ignited this fiery relationship was a simple one. Could you tell me where I can find pictures of Woodstock? I want to see if I can find me in the crowd.

      I spent several hours a day for two days in the periodical archive, gleaning all of the titbits and the spatial layout of the stage and the crowd. I even found a picture that was wide-angle enough to claim that a dot in the back was me.

      One evening I was in the archive, flipping through the Woodstock edition of Life and mulling over how I was going to introduce my newfound knowledge to the crowd at the drugstore, when Dizzy Lizzy slipped in with a bundle in her arms. One should note that at this time it was common and desirable to give or have a nickname. Miss Sutter walked in to that room but Dizzy Lizzy walked out.

      She covered the table with copies of Rolling Stone and the next to last thing she laid on the table was a copy of the Kama Sutra. I was the last thing that got laid on the table and thanks to my youth and vigor, she balled my brains out.

      When this series of trysts and rendezvous ran their course I could proudly say that I was proficient in thirty-eight positions found in that storied edition. If you Google Dizzy Lizzy you will find that she went on to become the most read author on sexual manuals this side of Masters and Johnson. I can only suppose that after that summer Dingle Municipal Library lost its position as the pinnacle of her desires and that ‘thought thinking of thought’ was inferior to thought translated into action. My memories will adamantly attest to that.

      The other thing of note from this encounter was an ink transfer from the now iconic naked man cover photo. The movement required to correctly administer the Kama Sutra move of the day had rendered a face that moved and blurred as if breaking the speed of light. So noteworthy was this that Dizzy whipped out her Polaroid Instamatic and took a couple of pictures. While waiting for them to develop, I became the proud recipient of my first encounter with oral sex. It was brief because it only lasted as long as it took for the Instamatic to develop. This, if the advertisements were correct, would have been about four minutes. There is

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