Bottle?!
I’ve been saving a lot of ink for this one.
I’ve been excited about introducing a very special character I made years ago. The bubbling and self-assured “Bar-Fly,” by name of Star-light.
During the Great Recession/Depression of 2008 until God knows when this will end. I would visit bars to play music and fill my hat with enough money to send home and reward my efforts with one beer.
Every beer was like a send off prayer to my son’s mother, my mother (each woman assisted in watching my children while I traveled to earn enough money to pay bills, I never reaped the benefit of paying.)
My “bar-fly,” would arrive on days when I felt at my worst.
When I felt I would never see daylight on my debts or be able to pay rent and keep from sleeping in a cardboard box. When I lived on the coasts, East and West, I did not worry too much about rent. The beach was fine to sleep on and when I was too far inland or in the mid-west, I had my tent.
It was a rough and lonely life but whenever I felt like I was swimming in a pool full of molasses and morphine, she would always be the first to give me a lift.
“You know Dream Weaver, you never could do without the motivations of a woman, to goading hand of her caring advice, to keep you out of trouble, why not take that blond home, the one who keeps starring at you?”
I would always smile at my bar-fly and assure her, that if she would sit on the lip of my bottle, I need not the comfort of another woman. Besides I have bills to pay and can’t afford to give anymore money away to heart breakers.
It is 2018, ten years later and my daughter is gone now. So, I don’t have to worry about sending my mother too much money, of course her bar-flying nature will rise and I’ll receive the phone call on Christmas, suggesting how no good I am because I wait until she calls to send her money.
My son’s mother claimed years ago not to need me and that’ll never see my son again, so there is no need to send money, I have not written, nor seen hide nor hair of those two, yet no matter how bad I feel I can always expect my bar-fly to give me a lift.
She would say, “Remember you are the artist that in one tweet can pull the ear of 1,693 impressions, 26 engagements and a 1.5% rating as you challenged your readers to look for the Greatest people of the next century, those who would be able to survive the Lehman Brothers fall.”
Her quips suggest I am the artist that in two years’ time has managed to earn 31.3K impressions monthly, with my illustrations, blogs, journals and stories about the life of a “traveling, starving, artist.”
She asked me once, “Do you know why I don’t leave you? I know you don’t drink anymore, and you are living a quite life, no more traveling. I am hanging around because you were the one guy that no matter how drab a day became, you never once lived in no trash can, you kept us away from druggies, and you drank one beer and only on Christmas, to remember the birth of your son. You will find him soon and you never gave up looking for him. You spoke so much about him in our travels, I want to meet him one day. That is why I am still her.”
All those reasons and I still don’t know if she loves me, but it is nice that she cares.