The truth is always far more intriguing than fiction. Why you graying gunslingers are exactly that is still a mystery.

Top of the morning gents,

Since none of ye have ever experienced the true joy
and happiness a well-executed felony brings to a
congenital criminal, beg my forgiveness and my
preamble.

The stress and excitement of planning a sweet crime is
second only to the successful completion of really
groovy gunplay, blood werk and flight.

Reckless endangerment ain't such a bad thing. And
since the statute of limitations long expired I can
now share it with you.

I hate pep rallies.

I hated high school more than any red-blooded and
red-eyed baked Alaskan too. Columbine faggots ain't
got shit on us.

Farm boys gotta know rope better'n dick. No shit, goat
ass milking chicken plucking and dick skinning rapists
gotta know knots better'n their own sisters' anular
glans.

And be fast as fuck too.

One stormy night pert near 40 years ago, my dad came
into the boys’ bedroom at some time round half 3 in
the morn. I heard him wake up Cully then tiptoe
through the Lego and model airplanes and nudge me.
“Karl, wake up.” “All the horses got out of the
pasture.”

The implicit agreement between fathers and eldest
sons: is that moments like these allowed for curse
words and sulk. As I pulled on my soggy boots and cold
wet work clothes I chose to sulk. I was too sleepy to
form words, nor speak them, regardless of the implied
pardon from both God and me paps.

Me and Cully slopped through the goats’ pasture to the
tack barn and fetched bridles and halters and a slew
of lead ropes. We then marched blindly in the pitch
black pouring rain and joined dad out by the road who
was warming up the old shitter national, an aging crew
cab International Harvester farm truck sporting a
rather remarkable 304 V-8.

We climbed in and asked dad why we were driving in the
truck instead of walking on foot looking for the loose
horses in the woods. He looked at us and swallowed,
then said the horses were loose running along the
highway. The highway being Aurora, or in common
banter, old Highway 99, the main drag from Canada to
Mexico long before Interstate 5 was even conceived.

I thought I was the only one secretly gagging down
lumps of bitter spit and terror, but seeing Cully weep
silently and my dad without expression nor color
confirmed we all were scared sick.

And shitless.

We growled through the gears and pouring rain down
200th, took a left on 76th, then drove the length of
196th all the way to Aurora: Highway 99.

The assorted police and ambulance emergency lights
illuminated our destination, and the remains of a
crumpled Smith Bros. milk delivery truck The emergency
lights also illuminated 3 piles of meat that once
carried me and Cully at break neck speeds all over
hell and back.

You fuckers can sob yer dicks off over a dead puppy,
dead bird or even when yer cat gets run over with a
lawn mower. Shoot, some of us were even pushing that
lawn mower. Butchering chickens, rabbits, pigs and
goats was sickening, but learnable and tolerable.
Nothing wrenches a boy worse than seeing yer favorite
horse wrapped around the axle of a wrecked truck.

Me and Cully just froze there and stared at piles of
memories blood soaked in the pouring rain rinsing down
the strobe lit highway. To this day, every time I look
to my left I see my little brother’s red swollen eyes
and trembling throat. Not a single soul could hear him
weep over the ruckus of idling trucks and speeding
traffic.

But I could. I bet you can too.

Dad nudged us along and steered us towards the 2 other
horses that were dancing in traffic, fleeing from
patrolmen and snorting snot and steam with every pass
of that chunked pile of horsemeat. That was our chore,
lasso or snare or cajole Heather and Tango running
loose in traffic while Dad and the EMS crew hoisted
the giant blood steaks into a county maintenance
truck.

We headed out into the middle of the highway with our
lead ropes and halters over our shoulders whilst
rattling coffee cans filled with molasses soaked
livestock feed and making our unique trademarked
whistled coaxes. Despite speeding cars on all sides of
those two little boys, Tango and Heather could discern
signature barn calls and saddle up signals: and
meandered cautiously towards us.

Horses are funny. Tango always fell directly behind
Cully and I and Heather skittishly awaited me to put
her halter on, click on her favorite lead rope whilst
nibbling sweet sticky feed out of my hand. As long as
we led those two horses around and fed them treats
from our coffee cans, the distraction worked. We
walked them away from the mess towards the old shitter
national whereupon they took over the lead and leapt
and bucked their own way into their stalls and awaited
us boys to finish the feeding, securing and bolt up
the rear panel doors to their stalls.

Being human isn’t as easy. Like strikingly similar
horrors you lads have witnessed, that moment of no
hope never left those two boys. A bucket of grain and
familiar barns may ease predictably healthy reactions
to unhealthy experiences, but like any elder brother
we angst over our younger siblings sufferings, yet not
our own. As the centuries pass and so do my friends
and family, some experiences just won’t fucking fade.

Whenever I hark back to the precise moments when my
younger brothers’ hearts were broken, my eyes well up
in tears. Never fails. Even today.

That’s when I redirect and divert towards anger and
hurt innocent and good people.

The only way to wash away trauma is to inflict the
equal and opposite upon humanity. Let me tell one
excellent way to wash away nightmares: replace them
with better ones.

As stated before, I hate pep rallies. They don’t do
shit for any of my Hitler Youth on my swim team,
perhaps make things worse. The best medicine for the
shits before a big swim event is to calm yourself,
visualize kicking fucking ass, and meditate alone over
coffee and LOTS of sugars allowing adrenalin to
circulate spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch.

Since scheming passive aggressiveness is by far the
most lethal and invisible kind of violence, we chose
to hurt lots of people in the most spectacular way.

Me, Pim, Steve Senn, Eric Bjodstrup and Todd Larson
all met up at the pool to ditch our gear and retrieve
the bundle of pre-cut sections of rope I fetched from
the tack barn and stashed in my gym bag. Leaving our
cars parked at the pool, we booked on foot back to the
high school to execute our plan of action.

Pim handed out rope sections and delegated a man to
each stadium exit. At precisely the moment the pep
band was loudest, we simultaneously tied off the exit
doors we were assigned, then ran full speed back to
the back of cafeteria behind the orchestra and choir
building.

Then Pim pulled the fire alarm and ordered us to walk
quickly, but not run from the building, then walk
directly to the YMCA pool. Todd Larson and Eric
Bjodstrup took off spinning tires with Steve Senn
directly behind. Me and Pim jumped into his Ford
Falcon and took off heading in another direction.

When we got far enough away from the pool and high
school, we rallied down past Scott Wade’s house and
towards Steve Senn’s for bong hits before the swim
meet.

Sitting and waiting at a red light, I noticed the
dudes in the car in front of us were turning and
looking back at Pim with angry hostile expressions on
their faces. What happened next occurred in mere
seconds but illustrates the genetic advantages these
lads possessed.

Pim recognized these guys, realized they were
unfriendly, and the second they opened their car doors
and stepped out, Pim punched the throttle and smashed
the Falcon into the rear end of the nigger lovin’
Chevy Malibu in front of us.

Their car leapt forward into traffic, their car doors
swung shut on their legs in time to get T-boned on the
driver side by a speeding car. Cripple city.

Pim reversed away from this growing pile up and
performed the best reverse 180 I’d seen in my life,
speeding away quickly so we wouldn’t miss out on
coffee and industrial bong hits with our Hitler mates.

We arrived for pine chron and Finnish coffee, got
tuned up nicely, then we all booked in Steve and
Todd’s cars leaving Pim’s mangled Falcon to be
repaired later in Auto Shop.

Utilizing surplus drugs and adrenalin, Pim, Todd,
Steve and I scored all first place blue ribbons in our
respective events. The four of us also nailed first
place in the 200-meter relay race: Pim starting with
backstroke, Eric swiftly pulling ahead with
breaststroke, I barely maintained this lead with
butterfly, Larson nailed the fucker with fury and
exploding water freestyle.

We never witnessed the hysteria inside the high school
auditorium that ensued after we locked ‘em in like
trapped rats, but read plenty about broken bones in
the papers and heard plenty about trampled faggots
from our teachers inquiring if any of us knew the
identity of the culprits. Besides, Mark Stensland
swore the lot of us were either in shower or doing
warm up laps in the pool.

I ain’t telling.

Funny, so many events in my life have been dictated by
reactionary violence from sources beyond my
comprehension.

Puppets sans strings, or merely an extension of the
cat’s paw: you tell me.

David Craig advised me that we are acting out the
roles we were cast in. We’ll never see a script and
neither rhyme nor reason. But we’ll soon see the
director.

Despite being a fucking Jew, I hear he’s pretty good
with wood.


Karl.