Worldwide, children are scary.

Top of the morning gents,

Little kids are pretty fucking scary. I've never told you, but I believe kids are prescient and extraordinarily observant. Of course, I'm excluding the majority Alaskan FAS retards and Manilaq monsters. I've seen infants and children that don't know us, turn around and say "Hi!" to me and bun. No shit, on our daily shopping missions, we've had little children spin about and stare at us, wave at us or just smile as we walk by. These infantile gestures of warmth are despite the fact me and bun conceal our murderous tendencies, cuz down here on the Old White Folks Klux Peninsula, we pitch children into bonfires.

For your information, when I look in the mirror, I see a sick fucker and murderous asshole. Bun, on the other hand is an obsolete carnivore and extinct species of native women whose father was born and buried amongst sealers and whalers, in the most violent and oldest inhabited town site in all of North America: Point Hope. A village in Alaska. Whereas myself, I don't hail from a cruel and primitive native village that's 15,000 fucking years old, but I do rape whole herds of livestock and little midget aborigines, and just for fun, killed all my pets. With my dick.

A while back, I was waiting in line at Safeway to purchase fruit, vegetables, fresh beef and yogurt, when a pair of little boys, sitting in the shopping cart facing me, in line in front of us, said hello and asked "Do you know our mom?" Now that's funny, cuz I might've fucked her pregnant, but not twice, I tend not to stick round long for a double-shot depth-charge, years apart, of recessive DNA sperm injections. I smiled, lied through my teeth and told these two little boys that yes indeed I knew their mom and that they've grown to be fine, handsome men. Those boys sure smiled.

The old lady escorting them was obviously their fucking grandma and scowled at me, so to piss her off, I persisted with my dialogue with these two kids. I intuited their mom was either a deceased junky, incarcerated prostitute or working woman of the sporting profession, so I stated that I've spent many years of my life living in shopping carts and that during my drinking years, I've awoken in shopping carts just like that one. Those boys smiled at me. I further stated that I miss my mom, but I too, have fun helping my Grandma Nunapichuk do the shopping. This quip caused the old man white trash bagging our groceries, to chuckle.

Further encouraged, I told these two boys that I used to look after my little brother when we were the same age as them. The older boy asked me if I still play with my little brother, which choked me up. I explained that we're old men now, don't see each other, and I haven't played with him in over 40 years. I told these little boys that I'm pretty sure he thinks about me often, but my younger brother didn't want to follow me all the way up to Alaska and didn't like me working with policemen and firemen.

When I said the word "firemen" they lit up, moving about like hyperactive hill-midget-'tardlets and asked if I ever drove a firetruck. I responded by telling them that I've ridden in an ambulance a hunnert times, and in the backseat of a police car too. One little boy asked why I was riding in an ambulance, so I told him of my getting shot through the leg in high school, a pit bull chomped my hand in the NANA Region and got a hunnert deep cuts arguing with a guy in jail. Their response was simply looking at me with really big eyes.

The old man bagging groceries, looking like a fellow convict, laughed at me and stated he'd gotten limousine service in the back of a patrol car more times than he wanted. The mean-ass, pinch-faced grandma concluded her purchase and started pushing her shopping cart with the two little boys and her groceries out of the checkout line and raced out to the parking lot.

I paid the cashier and hefted my bags of groceries heading towards our car. Out of nowhere, one of the little boys stepped around the rear of his grandma's minivan and hugged my legs. I set my bags down, knelt and gave the little guy a hug and told him he better get back in his car and be careful around parking lots cuz old people like me and his grandma are blind and can drive over little kids and smash them flat. The kid wasn't psyched to return to his mean grandma and brother and get belted in. So I held his hand and walked him around to the door and hefted him inside, whereupon the grandma spun around from the driver's seat and was startled to see me holding her missing passenger. I instructed the boys watch their feet and hands, put on their seat belts, then firmly shut the side-door of the van.

In another century and at another store, a little girl watched me and bun strolling past and loudly stated "I love her mom!" The girl's mother almost broke her neck spinning around to look at us, startled her pants shitty and said, "My word, she's never done that before!" I just smiled and explained children remember family ancestries thousands of generations back. We simply continued our shopping and from across the store we could hear that excited and loud little girl telling her mom that she sure like that nice old lady. She further asked, "Is she your grandma mom?" and that "She's my friend mom" and "We should go visit them, mom." Me and bun never thought ourselves to be old farts and way past crispiness, until we interact with kids.

At Walmart's a few years ago, I was strolling through the top-shelf coffee section looking for an interesting grind to purchase, when a kid sitting in a shopping cart nearby said, "Hey mister!" then pointed his finger at me like a gun and shot me twice. His mimicry of his gunshots was pretty accurate and damn cute, I like seeing kids with firearms. His mom scolded him and told him not to do that. I was touched so I eased my coat open, displayed a pair of side-draw holsters and told his mom that he's got the makings of a great gunfighter, soldier and policeman. I then told the little boy that he got the drop on me and I'd a been a goner in a quick-draw shootout with him. Kid just smiled and waved at me as his terrified parents hurried away. I still look at my reflection in windows to see if my concealed guns are visible. They're not. The little fucking kid got some kind of weird serial killer X-ray vision and is gonna be a great intelligence field agent. Or I'm paranoid. Nonetheless, I should've followed them home and kilt his ass.

On busy afternoons and the checkout lines are real long, I'll book over to the liquor store to make my purchases to save a little time. When I'm there, I'll often grab a cheap $8.00 bottle vodka for our maintenance dude at the senior center. Sometimes I'll grab an extra bottle for the receptionist at the chiropractor's office. The liquor store draws a select demography of customer: usually frosty old boozer men and women, just like us. I strike up conversations with the old men that still show a little remaining intelligence in their wrinkled faces and make my usual jokes about the last time I went on a drunk I awoke surrounded by 17 black kids and was tired of waking up behind the wheel doing 90. To conclude my old fart rant, I'll confide with my wrinkled rectum cohorts that I hope I can pass away peacefully and with a smile on my face like my drunken grandma, surrounded by a chorus of all her automobile passengers that died screaming and crying as she crash-parked under a fuel truck. Always brings a smile.

I'll sometimes embellish with comments that everyday I awake in a senior center, next to an old native woman, with a kickstand. Funny fucker ain't I? I was explaining that old gunslingers wear camo diapers and put flour in our back pockets so we can fart dust like grandma. One little boy laughed at me and said "Yer funny." I explained to this little boy that he should tell his grandpa that he loves him and go to the store with him every single day, cuz today might be his last. The little kid had a puzzled look on his face so I explained that old men die way too soon and old women simply leak and stink forever. I don't think I made any friends that day. Fuck it, the old man is already toast and that little kid will forever be sucking on his grandma's ugly mug and rasty fumes.

The best ploy with bright-eyed children I succeeded at, was when a little boy stared at me in fear like I was a wraith, ghost or apparition, so I smiled and said to him, "Captain Wallace! I knew you'd make it back!" If you want to ever see old women and moms shit stew, pull the reincarnation gag with their children and grandchildren. I've gone so far as to say to little babies, "Alex, I saw you die in prison!" "Looks like we both made it out." Yup, don't let me near your children. Oops, I mean yer grandchildren, yer kids are already half-niff mud-blimps.

After the year living in Nome, Alaska, we honored an invitation to stay at my buddy Mike's hostel in Anchorage: The Ingra House. Nice place and we stayed there an entire year. We could afford such expensive lodging because the ASRC Native Corporation was renting our duplex in Barrow. They offered us $2,000 a month for each apartment, so with $4K a month on top of our gray market monies and PERS pension direct deposits, we could afford to hotel and restaurant anywhere in Anchorage to our hearts' content. We also walked all over Fairview (Scareview) and the downtown visiting all the Anchorage native bars visiting all my in-laws. Namely the hunnert homeless NANA Natives that are pissing, shitting and sleeping under foot.

On one of our morning strolls, we saw a cute little native kid, maybe 5 years old, with a backpack and waiting for Gambell traffic to run him over. I immediately felt something was wrong, so I walked up to him and asked if we could walk with him and buy him a snack. He looked way up into my face, then bun's and said his name is Sugar Angelo and he's trying to find his mom. My internal klaxon alarms were blaring.

I took his hand on one side, with bun taking his other. We walked to the shitty Safeway on 13th and Gambell and bought him cans of soda pop, a big hoagy sandwich and candy bars. I grabbed a couple Gatorades for me and bun, plus a couple cans of high-proof beer tall-boys in case I was gonna be babysitting a lost child the entire day. We walked to the park behind Safeway that overlooks the incoming freeway (A street), sat on a bench in the sun and let our little Angelo dude scarf his sandwich down, then he sipped his Coke like it was fine cognac. Bun whispered that he was a village native cuz they drink their soda-pop like that.

We sat in the sun looking down on the rushing traffic heading in-town and chatted with Mr. Angelo where he came from and where his mom might be. He avoided the topic of his village, but told us his mom is real sick and has been in the hospital for a long time. He also stated that the place where he lives, the people are really loud. You'll have to bear with me, cuz I'm translating 5 year old native speak and this kid wasn't making sense, so we just sat in the sun, in that park above A street, talked and had ourselves a little kid picnic.

When asked where his mom was, he took his wrappers to the trash, came back to us and said we need to walk more. I suggested I take his backpack and on the way, I opened it and found new shoes, clean shirt, socks and little kid undies. This kid wasn't fucking around, this was patent trade craft and our little Sugar Angelo was fleeing with a solid go-bag. So I shouldered his ruck and we kept on walking across Anchorage following his directions to where he believed his mom was staying.

We made it past the Valley of the Moon Park and heard a truck slow down next to us and a black man yelled "Sugar! What are you doing?" He looked at us and we told him that he was taking us to see his mom, whereupon Mr. Black Man stated that she's in treatment and Mr. Sugar Angelo is in foster care and he slipped out early this morning. The time-line made sense to me, accounting for our long walk and picnic at the park overlooking the highway.

It also made more sense that Mr. Sugar Angelo stated that the people where he lives are real loud. This nigger was yelling, upset and told us he was in deep shit with the cops and OCS Foster Care Program after little Sugar Angelo's disappearance and hike across Anchorage with a tall Finn and an old native woman. Little Sugar Angelo obediently walked over to the truck and climbed in. He didn't show any concern like he was forcibly kidnapped. We said goodbye to that little native boy, and he put his hand on the window in a simple waive goodbye. When your grand kids go missing in Alaska, pray they're with Karl-n-bun having a picnic at the park.

When you treat kids with full-grown respect and beat the shit outa their parents, you scored friends fer life. I've had to push loud fuckered up Molly Richards outa our house on numerous occasions and drag drunken monkey Vern Richards outa the cop cars and into the KPD jail. About a million fucking times.

What's so cute, is that their daughters (Tina, Charlene and Vernessa) scream hello from blocks up Caribou street, and run as fast as they can straight into me and bun's arms for mile high pick-ups and hugs. Those girls never fail to give us wet slobber kisses on our cheeks and giggle with glee at our affections. These darling child's greetings lasted years and well into my ancient memory, here at the keyboard. Nup, I ain't so tough around kids.

Over the years, we've gotten to the point where those Richards girls were too big to pick up and hug, but we still share moments whenever possible. I'm guessing they're all grown up now and have kids of their own. I pray they keep their fucked up, stroke afflicted mom far away and on rare occasions, piss and shit on their fucking dad's grave. Out of nothing, and with your imagination, I just created funny images of native women squatting a loaf and pissing femmy on a soggy wet burial mound, up at Boot Hill, overlooking Kotzebue. I dare say that image will last another paragraph.

A hunnert years ago, I was frequently visited by Warren and Bunny Schaeffer's daughters (Helen and Tina, I think). They'd run across the street and knock on my door at 894-D, before my swing and graveyard shifts at KPD. I'd put out treats like bun's cookies or cinnamon roles, English Breakfast Tea and we'd snack as I prepped for work. They'd look at me like I was a fucking Martian as I badged, booted up and got into my clown outfit for duty. When I brushed my hair and beard, their eyes got real big. Real Siberians ain't go no oommiks. I let them hang round until I had to phone Dispatch for a unit to pick me up, and then gave them a pack of gum each, then sent them back home.

Warren once chuckled and told me that I was a trip. He always asked his daughters what we do during afternoon tea-time and his girls always repeat my scolding, "Girls, let's behave like ladies" and "Hold yer tea with only yer thumb and forefinger and stick you other 3 fingers outward, the English way." I smiled and told him that it'd be bad form if I didn't teach them to behave with proper Victorian Manners and speak the Queen's English. As a topper and complete his inquiry, his daughters exclaimed that never miss an opportunity to tell their parents that you love them. Warren sure smiled like a proud papa reciting his girls repetitive lessons they retained from their tea-times and manners grooming with such a murderous Finn of my sorts. Wow, looking back, I'm so Euro-trash.

Speaking of Euro-trash life experiences, I've had children startle me by reaching up and holding my hand. This happened in public in Helsinki, Finland while I was killing time at a mall called the Latzi-Palatzi (Glass Palace). I often purchased Galoises cigarettes there, sat at a cafe and downed a couple tall glasses of ale, enjoying French smokes and watching people. I almost jumped out of my skin when my hand was firmly grasped by a little micro-unit that I assumed was a woman's. It wasn't, it was a little blond haired boy. He'd sneaked quietly behind me and accosted me. With excellent 5-year old stealth.

I looked down at him and said hello and asked him what he was doing and could I help him. He asked me if I spoke Suomen (Finnish) and I responded by saying I was American. I dragged a chair over and he climbed up and took a seat. I hailed my waitress and requested she ask him what he would like and this kid asked for a Shandy, a mildly alcoholic orange soda drink. I shook my head and instead requested he have "Pie und Koffee." She smiled at me and fetched his order.

This kid had decent English, and asked me why I was "sitting alone and watching peoples walking about." I told him that I just got out of class at the Helsinki School of Economics and that I live, work and travel by myself, and these peoples keep me company. My tiny cafe guest explained his "name was Pietro, which means Peter in your languages and that I've lost me mum." Well duh, the kid was frightened and thought I could keep him company. I told him that I was honored to be his friend and that we'd wait and see if anybody came looking for him. So we sat, snacked and chatted.

To this day, I've no reason why he approached me and requested my company. We must've had a dozen snacks and drinks and I was getting pretty intoxicated on my beer and designer French cigarettes. At round 6pm, a patrolman came to our table and started jabbering away at me and my little dude dining companion. I hadn't the slightest notion what those two were discussing until my guest translated to me that it was time to depart and that his mum was at the police station awaiting his return. I'm thinking she was in a tizzy, stressed out beyond reason. Fuck, I'd be, kid coulda been a descendant of mine, blond hair and all.

The patrolman asked me in English how we became acquainted, so I explained I came here often for cigarettes and ale and this kid requested we share company, snacks and conversation. The cop smiled and told me that the "child was reported missing and an alert was posted nationwide on mobile." A mobile is Finnish-speak for cell phones and since I refused to carry any electronic devices, I'd missed the memo. I gave him my passport, he photographed it with his fancy "Mobile" and then asked where I stayed, and the address to the campus dorm building, which he scribbled down.

The last I saw of that kid was walking away with the uniformed officer. He pulled the cop back round to say goodbye, waived to me and then they both exited the mall, climbed into a patrol car and disappeared.

On my subsequent return to the Helsinki School of Economics a year later, I had a letter at the front reception desk. I assumed it was from my supervisors at SUPO (Finland's Special Undercover Police Organization) requesting a meeting with instructions for another narc job. It wasn't. It was from the Offices of the Swedish Embassy. A diplomat's wife was shopping and her son had wandered off. I refrained from thinking that's the reason we called diplomats "Dips." Only a rich arrogant wife loses a cute little blond haired boy like that.

The letter went on to explain that her son Pietro apologized for wandering off towards the toy section but was happy to have snacks with me. He described me as that "really nice man that looked sad and lonely", so he joined me at the cafe for beer and cigs. Or more accurately, "Pie und Koffee." The letter went further to explain that I was a hard man to locate and that my "employers back in the States" had been quite helpful in enplaning my vocation, current employment status and location. I was wondering who had the big fucking mouth and sure thought of you guys at KPD, AST or DEA. There was a phone number and email address on the Official Embassy letterhead for me to communicate with.

I didn't have a "Mobile Fon" so I kept the letter in my pocket and composed a polite email response on the terminal in the Helsinki School of Economics computer lab I worked. I gave a brief (clean, edited and bogus) background of my travels at the behest of UAF, the countries I travelled and the schools I visited promoting Alaska's International Exchange Student Program. In closing, I included my estimated stay in Finland, my upcoming trip back to St. Petersberg, Russia and my return date back to Alaska.

The follow-up email was cryptic and intentionally obscure, but it's meaning was clear: If you ever need a favor, just call. You boys know in my line of work, that's a chit. And a possible solution to future dilemmas facing me. Which quite literally was a get out of jail card. Amongst the Swedish Embassy Dips and the US Department of State, Madeline Allbright lifted heaven and Earth after my arrest and detention unlawfully for espionage. (That's Russian for being such a fucking dick publishing and presenting my thesis paper on Nordic Energy Policy). Her successor, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice took and ran with the baton along with Nordic Team assists and put gears into motion facilitating my release. Nine months, three weeks and two days later, I set foot (broken foot) on non-Soviet soil. Albeit, prison thin and crutch-bound. What the fuck. Public service ain't fer pussies.

Back home in Fairbanks, at the Dr. Porter's computer, I spotted an email from Pietro Baumgartner wishing me well and God-Speed. Whatever that means, I interpreted it as a message that my detention wasn't overlooked by a little kid that enjoyed "Pie und Koffee" with my cigarettes and beer at a cafe in a neutral country that has a longer border with the former Soviet Union than any other country. An afternoon in the company of a small child enjoying snacks at a cafe was a small price to pay for a trip out of jail, to hospital and home.

Service is a funny thing. I followed yer advice about serving villages, towns, boroughs, states and countries, but providing daycare for lost children is way beyond the call of duty. No matter the worst of it, in the world of sacrifices, suffering and failure to heal, at our old age, actually means we ain't done shit. I'm also thinking our mission ain't complete.

I just finished an inspirational novel detailing a soldier's tale serving in World War II from 1942-1945. He was a fox-hole grunt infantryman that toted ammo, rifle, pistol, cigarettes and meal rations on his back and hiked a million fucking miles chasing Germans out of Europe. During winter, on frozen, broken legs and feet. I was traumatized by his testimonials of freezing near death in hastily dug holes in the ground, covered with gilly suit cover, camo tarps and brush. These soldiers were often the front line scouts and first offensive combatants lobbing grenades under tank tracks then shooting Germans that lept out.

As the Germans took position behind their immobile tanks, they scoped the woods, trees and ridge lines for US troops and took fire from our soldiers armed with M1 Carbines, just like the rifle I sold Lynn Johnson at Chukchi College. I fired that gun and wasn't impressed with it's wimpy pistol-sized cartridges shot outa it's medium length rifle barrel. Dispersed amongst the American soldiers, were tripod mounted 30 caliber machine guns with boxes of belt fed ammo requiring two soldiers to feed and fire. These two-man crews manning the machine guns were easy to spot. The disabled, yet deadly tanks, targeted our boys, swiveled towards them and destroyed them, raining equipment, juice and his buddy's body parts overhead.

The inspirational aspect of these tales was the hardships suffered from frostbite and starvation, friends lost to high explosives and the invisible wall of injurious guilt between fiances, wives and families back home. It's impossible to share the unspeakable horrors whilst in combat (or KPD duty) with your family back home explaining the crimes he'd witnessed, and crimes he'd committed.

As our troops pushed the Nazis back to Germany, these infantry troops came across a hunnert concentration camps recently abandoned by the SS leaving thousands of holocaust prisoners. These prisoners were liberated and provided care for in MASH Unit tent hospitals staffed by the American soldiers. The author conveyed irreparable grief as he detailed his duties separating the sick from the dying, and the thousands of corpses piled in rows a mile long like cord wood. I was taken aback and heartbroken reading descriptions of the horrid smells of so much decay, the sickly skeletal survivors and those that were already dead. The still breathing dead prisoners just didn't know it yet.

Our protagonist soldier and author witnessed weeping mothers cradling frozen dead children and children snuggling (and suckling) long deceased mothers. One little boy was weeping for his dead mom to wake up and look at him pointing out American soldiers whom arrived to save them. The author reached down to take the boy's hand, picked him up and was startled at how light this child was. He put the little boy up on his shoulders and gave him some chocolate while marching the prison perimeter surveying the putrid mud-slop enclosed within electric fences and barbed wire. The remaining NAZI personnel were simply shot on site with the little boy, at shoulder height, witnessed. He gasped and tightened his grip during these ad-hoc on the spot summary executions. Seeing yer captors machine gunned to bits should've been medicinal and curative. Alas, us old men can only wish, but God laughs.

A short time after he was hoisted up and given a ration of chocolate, the boy got to watch Gestapo motherfuckers get turned into smoked German sausage. Then the boy breathed out his last breath and relaxed his grip on the author's shoulders. Some time during his walk and talk and perimeter march, the little boy died. Returning to the medic tents, his last surviving foxhole buddy looked up at the little boy and started sobbing and weeping and gently took the author by the arm, walked him away from the MASH Units to assist him in lifting his newly deceased little friend to the ground.

Ya see, you boys ain't alone. The suffering of soldiers, cops, medics and dad's is universal. Keep yer powder dry and yer dick hard. Nothing a girl need understand. Nor comprehend.

That's why you also have hard hearts and shoulders. A masculine existential concept thousands years in duration and experiences that encompass a whole lot of agony.

Soldier on fuckers.

Nothing too extraordinary, I'm just scribbling man shit.

Karl.