I overheard a woman with black finger nails talk about the superiority of New England lottery scratch offs. I did not breathe into that warm left leg of early June I grasped onto. I held fast to that burly hairless fire of fictional flesh that flexes mercurially under a skirt of gossamer like threading without burning it. Black finger lady peeling apart a 1000 Grand candy bar with a diffident poutiness, her father was melting a Good Humor orange icicle on a bruise the size of Cortez’s second child when just torn from the womb by an unfriendly Spanish Vest and Hat maker. I took comfort in the palpable sense of balm this frozen artificial fruit snack had on the man.
Vincenzo Vasi was playing bass guitar in my guts. The salubrious effect of his playing from a composition called ‘Western Soda’ made me forget that I was in front of a Bowling alley in Brockton, MA at about 1pm on Sunday. My back and general body was suffering from some malign forces that entwine themselves with the air in all air mattresses that find me a delectable victim for their sinew chomping ways. Verily, it is not the everyday shitty air we all not so lustily imbibe with our jaded lungs. The air of a typical air mattress destined to support my sleep has been infected with the dropsy, Goblin Dew, Mopsey Doughring Square Dance Jaw disease, strains of the virulent H329 Bird Cough glue experiment from the fascist group Puns of a Hallowed Magyork (Not the Malaysian Group of similar name fighting for rights of telephone reporters and their fiancés,) and other malicious visitations of twisted Aeolian descent. My uncle Dino had just dropped me off at the alley to meet with a group of men who were already playing a match or game of Candlestick Bowling. I finished my cigarette, bidding fair well in my tired squire without a horse way to the others loitering before the alley, and discovered my cousin ##&#&&# in the lobby playing stickers he had just received from one of those coin and crank vending machines. #(#$*#()$* mouth was full of at least two gigantic pieces of what I deduced to be Godzilla Sour Apple gum balls. He looked a bit non-plussed to see me, but perhaps it was just the tedium of Candlestick bowling that had brought about a squeamish humor and understandable taciturnity.
I like my cousin. He is about seven years or so younger than me, a quiet electrical engineer without his father Dino’s momentary tempestuous uproars. Candlestick bowling with a hangover has its obvious benefits if one has to bowl. I was sort of obligated due to my cousin marrying this guy, and the guy having this event while my cousin’s wedding shower went on. One of the bowlers was this guy whose last name was Christmas. His nick name was Tree. He was the worse candlestick bowler out of the six of us. I was the second to worse Candlestick bowler. Candlestick bowling for those not that familiar is bowling with a small light weight ball and light pins shaped as you might imagine by the name of this unique to New England spin off of bowling. There was an image of a Puritan woman giving one of those little balls a good hurl down a modern day lane. This anachronistic and poorly painted mural had evidence of tampering. The Puritan woman was given runny mascara, and some sort of swatch of metallic purple appeared by her crotch area. I bowled in my flip flops. I was surprised that I did not have to surrender them even if I wished to borrow the special shoes for this activity.