Lookin' for Relief....A Fable

Lookin’ for Relief….A Fable

It was bound to happen sooner or later…it always does…The Heat Wave. And this summer it came with a vengeance. The sun poured out its bowl of wrath upon the earth, scorching its residents with a searing heat, and people prayed and pledged their very souls lookin’ for relief…and there was precious little to be found.

The heat scorched the red clay of Georgia, and forest fires erupted at will by spontaneous combustion, igniting great swaths of nature, raining huge plumes of smoke and ash skyward, reminiscent of Sodom’s demise…mobile homes melted in its relentless march to the sea. People packed their pickups, screaming and fleeing the fire’s path in a wild chaos, and from the piney woods, like dust-bowl drifters, the people came, packing the motels and bars of South Georgia…The Horror, the Horror. It was a scene right out of General Sherman’s playbook!

We coastal residents were not spared the scorching sun, and the beach offered little relief. The sea boiled like a caldron, and our skin peeled in great sheets, blackened by the sun and fried crispy like Waffle House bacon. Ash fell from the sky with a sooty smell and contaminated lungs with sickening and poisonous air. No sir, relief was nowhere in sight in these days.

But these things happen, and something had to be done. We scraped up all of the loose coins around the house and headed for Aspen, Colorado. I can’t say that our friends were overjoyed to see us, but they understood our plight. At 8,000 feet mean sea level, the air is thin and cool, and we certainly were “above it all” out here, and it felt good. The Aspen Music Festival was in full swing, and I must admit it was fun pretending to understand Nicholas Maw’s discordant cacophonous concertos while sipping champagne and munching on tea cookies and appearing intellectual. And Carmen, the Italian Opera, was a real hit even without subtitles…romantic operas have a language of their own! But hey, we were having relief and real good company.

The island is full of ingenious folks and fools, and my friend George hoped to find relief in another way…on his wind-surfer. Only there was one problem: he had not mastered the technique of being able to return to the shore. So, he and his grandson headed to Cape Canaveral to get the hang of the sport. But things turned nasty that day, and he knew he had lost all control when the wind got up. Unable to turn the sail, fear gripped him like a vise as the surfboard literally flew uncontrollably towards the Southeast, and Cuba in particular. Huge waves and black fins appeared and all efforts of rescue were hopeless; and at dusk he was last seen as a speck on the horizon, waving wildly and screaming obscenities to the heavens.

But in Aspen we were busy with other things, like beer and tamales at the Woody Creek Tavern, a local hangout of some renown. Later that evening in a back-street coffee shop, and intoxicated by caffeine, the night disappeared in a blur of open-mike poetry readings hosted by a left-over beatnik in a blue beret. The crowd grew restless, and at times I noted the thick air of anarchy circulating the smoky room during some of the readings; but after the kid with an Aryan Nation haircut and Charles Manson eyes did his thing, I was unnerved, and it was a real relief to leave that joint.

Now, back to George: He got lucky, and some days later he was picked up by a gun boat near The Bay of Pigs, stripped naked and thrown into a wire cage like a common dog and interrogated night and day until he confessed to something—“to what” he won’t say. Somehow he escaped the beatings, and after days at sea, he washed up in the mosquito-infested swamps of South Florida like a piece of water-logged driftwood, delusional, crazed by thirst and scorched by the sun….all this in search of some relief from heat!

Weeks later he resurfaced on the island, and I offered up that he might want to limit his intake of Scotch prior to windsurfing, to which he only replied, “Never, Never!” Being curious, I had to ask, “How did you get back home?” He would only answer, “That’s a long story, but lets just say it involved martial arts and a Harley.” I sensed I’d hit a nerve, so I let it drop for another time, but I do have to admit the wild-eyed passion of his story made our trip to Aspen seem boring and dull…and it was a relief to see him alive again!

Things usually work out in life, and in this case everyone got back to the island, changed but stronger for the experiences, and finding relief in the old familiar places. There’s probably a moral in all this search for relief, but I’ll leave it to you to figure out. As for me, however, it seems that some of us are never satisfied for very long anywhere or with anything, and our envelop was made for pushing to the limit. Yet, as I sink into the comfort of my own bed, it leads me to conclude that relief is just not that hard to find.

Ending this article will be a relief for both of us, but let me leave you with this thought: If ever at dusk on the horizon you notice some fool waving wildly and shouting maniacally, consider it just might be George or me Lookin’ for Relief…and please send help immediately!


Bud
August 8, 2007