“I’m growing six plants legally in my basement right now because, you know, Colorado.”
“But didn’t you and Eddie get amnestied with all the other marijuana growers in jail when the Democrats took over?” I asked.
“I wish,” he said. “Remember -- I went down when the Republicans were in charge. The four years were just for the plants. I copped another twenty for Eddie.”
He no sooner said that when the temperature, which had been pleasant, turned cold again; so cold people began filing inside.
But Mark and I were transfixed.
“Eddie?” we asked together.
“I don’t know how many amps Eddie ate that night,” he said. “But I was dragging off a dead man. When the cops got me they charged me with accessory to murder, said I helped kill him.”
“What the fuck!” I exclaimed.
“You fellers get it?” he asked. “I just got out of jail last night. I been locked up for twenty-four years in Nebraska.”
And Mark and I are just freaking out, shaking our heads back and forth.
“Dude, I never heard of anything so unfair in all my life!” I cried.
And then some thunder-boomers bigger than the last ones came thudding down the street again: Boom! Boom! Boom! one after another like a string of bombs rolling over us, and before we could even stand a cold hard rain came tearing down.
I was almost in the door when I heard a huge ke-rack! and turned just in time to see the tree across the street split in two by a lightning bolt, then blown over by one of the strongest winds I’ve ever seen. I’m telling you it just wasn’t natural. Not at all. Trashcans and everything rolling down the street. Windows breaking.
Sure everyone inside was talking about the mess of weather and taking pictures through the windows. I turned in all directions looking for the stranger, but didn’t see him. Maybe he went to the restroom. I could see the door from where I stood, so I kept my eye on it. Guys came and went, but not the stranger.
“Hey Mark,” I says. “Seen that old fellow we were just talking to?”
“I was gonna ask you the same thing,” he replied with mild bewilderment.
“Did we ever get his name?”
“Don’t think so. Don’t believe he ever said.”
So Mark and I sat there wondering if that guy we met existed at all or if we just imagined him out of some kind of stony-ass boredom. I stared at my shoes a good bit before finally saying: “Well this ended up being a strange night.”
Mark said nothing.
I looked up at him. He was still puzzled.
“Mark, I’m not sure what just happened,” I said. “Are you?”
“No.” he replied. “And that old guy . . . he just disappeared.”
“Damn, Dude,” I said. “What’s in this weed we been smoking?”
Torched
Two feet long and 3,500 degrees. Now that's a flame.
Dude, strange story. You’re not gonna believe it. So I went to our bro Ted’s house yesterday. You know Ted, he took off for Oregon last year. He’s back, with a guy who blows glass. That’s right, a glass blower. Rasta dude. I kid you not; got dreads three feet long. White guy. Teaching Ted how to blow glass. Hell yeah, I’m serious. Is that crazy or what? Ted . . . he’s always up to something.
So I called him yesterday morning ‘cause I heard he was back in town, and he said, “C’mon over, we work everyday in the shop.”
And I said “What shop?” and he said “The garage in back of the house. Come check it out. I haven’t seen you in The Day, brother.”
So I go down to their little shack of a shop around mid-morning, and the guys are already in the garage getting started. First they were smoking a bowl.
Do I have good timing or what?
So I hugged Ted and met Dave, and we smoked some killer bud, dude. Wake-‘n’-bake, you know what I mean? Then Dave said he needed to make some money and he turned and lit a nozzle on the countertop, about the size of a gun, four hoses feeding into the back of it--two red, two green: propane and oxygen. Blow ya sky-high if you aren't careful. Ted handed me some safety goggles. “Put these on bro, you’re gonna need ‘em to look at the flame. Watch Dave work now. He’s pretty good. He learned in Eugene, dude. Yeah … Snodgrass … all them guys.”
Dave went to a kiln in the corner and pulled out a 2-foot glass rod with a glass figure about the size of a pickle on the end of it--just a raw, blob of a shape. But the embryo of a pipe waiting to be blown was inside the blob like a dream inside a brain. Dave stepped on a foot pedal and a small blue flame shot out, becoming longer and broader until a big flame with a yellow core was blazing like a Jedi light saber. He said it was about 3,500 degrees. Is that hot enough for you? Dave stuck the glass inside the fire and bathed it, spinning the glass rod to keep the figure on the end of it whirling and twirling.
“Keep it still and it melts,” he shouted. Rasta beats bumped from the box, mahn, reggae, and the flame hissed; no, wait a minute; the sound was more like a roar, like when you put your ear to a conch shell on the beach and hear the ocean. Then Dave stepped on the pedal again, and the flame became a small, blue-burning heat tip, and he had this thin, glass rod in his right hand and he held the tip of it to the pipe’s surface. “This puts silver and gold on the clear Pyrex as base colors,” he explained, and as he turned the glass in the flame, a faint, opalescent mother-of-pearl color emerged, like an Easter daybreak, man.
And this Dave guy kept saying “Heat it, spin it, blow it, show it.”
Is that cool or what? So he held his left hand up with the blob of a glass piece in it. “This one’s the girl,” he said. Then he set his right hand on the torch. “And this one’s the boy. Glass and fire; it takes both to make a pipe.”
Sweet, huh? I’m telling you, this Dave guy is a trip. So here’s the part you’re not gonna believe. Two people show up, a guy and a girl, about 25 years old I’d say. Maybe married, I don’t know. The chick? Pretty good looking, dude, pretty good looking, a real sister. Dude! She busted out an ounce of ‘shrooms! No kidding. Well, what can I tell ya? It’s been a while since I tripped, but those ‘shrooms looked so sweet: not very big, but plump little fatcats, caps and stems all connected. Pretty.
So Ted goes inside to make tea from the mushrooms, and the guy, his name was Stephen, is this astrologer dude. Check it out – he starts telling Dave about his chart. I’m not kidding. He’s going on like, “This is a good time for you to make money through creative enterprises.”
Oh duh! I mean, Dave blows glass, OK? Even I can figure out that’s where his cash will come from. And then this Stephen guy asks Dave if he’s in a relationship now, and Dave says “Sure!” and Stephen goes: “Wow! Really?”
But check it out. We’re all watching Dave shape the glass piece in the flame, taking it out, putting it back, keeping
