Get In The Plane, Billy

I cried a lot today. Its odd to not cry on the phone or at a gathering. How grim is fate that not twelve hours after I talk Yvonne up to the crowd that she emails me terrible news. Harry Fassl died on Sunday morning, and when I talked to his gal Diana I didn't cry, I got the news with more detail, then I emailed Sean. And cried. And emailed Yvonne back. And cried. So its a new experience to have tears dripping onto the R and the I keys and me filling the garbage with tissues. I effing hate tissues, they are no good. Christ, the stories involving Harry, me, Brian Jeff, Cathy, Diana, Von,Kathleen, Rodger, Andrew and from there Sean, Jessica, Erik, and the gang from MINN-CON up north. Hemlockman himself, a commenter on this blog, did work with Harry. He illustrated many of my stories. The best memories of my life are either at Yvonne's house in Hanover Park or Harry and Diana's in Oak Park and you can pick virtually any weekend during the summers of 1993 through 1996. I can add Beth Massie's get-togethers in Virginia a close third, but I'm chained to Chicago, and the collar counties are as far as I'm allowed to venture. And Harry was by Beth's, so he met Dave, he already knew Mark, Barb and Charlie, Lee, and so on. Mind you, every single name mentioned here means something in the publishing world. (Well, Barb's husband Charlie, he just has the biggest collection of Volkswagens in the galaxy).

Harry and I had fun with words. He always used the line from OUTBREAK when Morgan Freeman says to Dustin Hoffman "Get in the plane, Billy." He used it if I was jabbering too much and dinner was ready. I cut out a panel from a comic that simply said "Ed is by the turbines." That became a catch-phrase for years. For every time I signed my name Weird Alien Sausage, he would sign his HEFaLump or the oddly exotic Ted DeVeaux. And he did great photography. Don't go by the shot above, go to the link to his site. (I really just thought of this now, its still there, its not going away).

The year we went to Beth's, it was me, Harry, Andrew, Jeff, and Von. USAir to Pittsburgh then some propeller plane to the Shenandoah Valley airport. Somehow we miss the boarding call. They hold up the plane for us, even though we are like fifty feet away from it on the other side of the window, and we board and then wait for clearance. Meanwhile, back at the other airport, Beth and pretty much everybody in Staunton and the surrounding towns are told over the intercom that the propeller plane will be late by an hour because five hippies from Chicago hopped up on the joy juice made them late.

Christ, so many stories. Such a legacy of hard work and friendship. Watching crappy horror movies like THE HIDEOUS SUN DEMON and then staying up even later watching FOREVER KNIGHT, God help us all. Or SPACE PRECINCT. And then there was sumo wrestling for a time. Watching it, I mean.

From what I understand, Harry's ashes will be strewn (?) across Lake Michigan on the Winter Solstice. He died during a full moon in October, something I would like for myself also. I used to joke, talk about seeing the Grim Reaper in the doorway and telling everyone "Hey, there's my ride!" But writing this down and reminiscing with Andrew just reminds me that I'm on the tail end now, coasting as far as it will take me. For the good times, and absent friends. Get in the plane, Billy.

Bye, Harry. Your pal, Wayne

Behind The Skins Of Buildings

I took the first photo because of the number on the second floor, many two- and three-flats on Archer have their street address in the granite above doorways or on walls. This part of Archer has many side streets that are longer than Hoey, but not by much, and none run intermittently across the city as certain other streets that intersect Archer will, i.e., Avers and Ridgeway. Pitney Court, Salt Street (no sign, dammit!), some streets act as markers, Quinn Street has a vacant lot where the Quinn Street Inn stood, Arch Street has the vacant lot where St. Bridget's used to be. Broad Street, Lock Street, the bus would speed by them in an eye blink. The Doghouse is gone, a tavern with cut out dogs on the angled roof. The place that sold Filbert's root beer is still there, only not it has a sign on the metal door that reads Southern Sails. You can see Kunka's Drugs in the movie BACKDRAFT, which was filmed here during the autumn of 1993. Further up was the massive Archer Avenue Big Store, which became a Zemsky's and is now a supermercado. Kunka's seemed to be closed, and I had no one nearby to ask. This style of architecture could be seen in many buildings now gone, ice cream parlors and small restaurants, the old Martin Senour paint company (on Senour Street), and a few small shops across that street (35th) in a huge building that once housed the Peterson Bowling Alley, which was on the SECOND floor. To an extent, even the long gone Brighton Theater had brick structure like Kunka's. The vacant lot by the I-55 sign was where the church had been, now there is a huge billboard attached to the next building over for a strip club in Indiana. That sign is the same one from the happy accident double exposure from the back cover of WITH WOUNDS STILL WET, the photo by HE Fassl. Times past, man. Times past.

From HEF For WAS 2007, and in 1997

Harry Fassl (and his sweetheart Diana Gallardo) presented me with the above when I was doing a reading at the Red Lion in October of 97, a belated birthday present. This is what he emailed me after reading my Perdition blog entry...

Fingers Like Nosferatu

Body by Baron Victor Von F
Luck by Loki
Going forward by day and night.
American Dreamer
Algerian Detective
Holed up on Desolation Row
In the Heartbreak Hotel.
Where less brave spirits have checked out long ago.
His voice sounds there still.
Disturbing the dust, and any who would dare listen.


HEF
(For WAS - 2007)

Quite a few of you have suspicioned that I have been despondent over my not having the Voice Activation software yet, and I will soon, thanks to Roger Dale Trexler over at Annihilation Press and the guy who will watch my back in the coming zombie war. But really, is VA what its all about when my body has all these scars and the boring old stories that go with them? (I remember when I once had witty anecdotes). Or the fact that I can't have the VA when I'm at work 55 hours a week in this new Twilight Zone aspect of my life. Look at the photos if you will, or stop here. Enough with my moaning, it was worth it if you know that I've got a pretty decent story idea out of it, and tomorrow I'll post about fun stuff like anthologies with my stories reprinted in The Netherlands.

Saved By Supermodels

I worked a 13 hour sfift today print the SAME DAMN THING...a booklet on the Supreme Council of the Ameranth. An offshoot of the Freemasons. The men are Buccanneers and the women are Pearls. Actually, the women looked more like characters from CARNIVAL OF SOULS, even more so when the silk paper the photos ran on burned in the fuser area, giving the demented old bats a more shriveled look. Thankfully, I was saved by supermodels. Imagine what nonsense I would be typing if I had already gulped down my NyQuil drenched vanilla ice cream...? Without much sanity, Wayne