From a long adventure bearing Bottled up my youth and yearning in my home alone and fearing Screaming, hissing, writhing, Fitting Crucifix in my hand I do the implore Came a tapping at my window floor

So I looked outside and nothing more

 In a  bed in a  room alight Demons hissing, flitting then alight Turn up the juice for  more light Monsters from the darkness come alive and, in my weakness, I might die Comes a rapping at my window floor And

I know for sure there is nothing there.

 It is like a peculiar tapping, not a coarse and raucous rapping not a loud and boisterous crashing A little pecking, clicking thrashing directed at the window floor I dare not look outside for gravest fear

I am sure there is nothing there.

 Lying in the hospital bed insane Roommate dearest also a bane Booming air duct sounds along with pain Darkness madness freedom maimed Others here they are the same Comes a tapping at my window floor

So I scream out loud and nothing more.

 In this hotel, they shock and twist and drug and startle and slap and rip They come back shadows through the big oak door Grinning devils bare and bored, and in the night returns the rapping A little trite peculiar winking tapping Tapping at my window floor

So I start to pray and nothing more.

 Back at home in just a wink Once a week I see a shrink Asking what I see and hear What I think and what I fear and my future goes amidst the tears and in the blackness comes that tapping the familiar simple shortened clapping A click-clacking at my window floor

And I am sure outside there is nothing there.

 Even in the morning early While I awaken slow and surely Before the sun rises so sweet and cheery.  The sound appears that I abhor I hear a tapping at the front door A little trifled intentioned clacking. A peculiar light and constant tapping Tapping again at my front door

I am afraid to look and nothing more.

 Reading in the night so deep No sounds, no light no insects creep No mice to remind of loss of sleep Then returns the peculiar click and ticking Alight and brusque and sickening pecking A tap tap tapping at my window floor Gone and back and rotten fear

I am scared to death and nothing more.

 And this before the sounds and words Are peculiar things that I have heard in the blossom of my youth Came a loving brush with death and to this day sometimes I hear a tick and tapping Always a light and affectionate clacking A click clack clacking at my new front door and now my soul is not so bare

So I look away because nothing’s there

Let’s go trick or treating tonight, Kool, Wracks drawls, It’s Halloween
Yeah, I have Cranks shaving cream and a carton of rotten eggs, promises Kool.
Wall be sold me some tear gas, says Wracks, I can’t wait to try it. We need some pretty young girls to
terrorize on Alls Hallow eve.
We can live on candy, says Wracks and Nate can come along.
See you at the dark, screams kool, I have cherry bombs.
Kool runs away screaming “Cherry bombs”, and he disappears up Mellow man’s street.
Wracks, I don’t want the police to call me from jail like the day you and Timey were hunting deer down
in the Canyon with Bows and Arrows, says Papa Wracks.
I promise I won’t do anything radical except have a good time, says Wracks
Be home before curfew or they will run you in, says Papa Wracks.
Tonight, Cool, Wracks, and Nate will ascend Bacon way and try to draw out the opposition. Bacon Way
winds uphill, the incline increasing until Bacon Way becomes Disenchanted Drive and Way of the Saint
Inez. Almost all the homes on Bacon Way celebrate Halloween. Some carve spooky pumpkins and set
them out front with candles blowing eerily in the night breeze. Others display lights and banners or play
scary sounds through intercoms and hidden speakers. Others just leave a huge bowl of candy out front
under a light and next to a lighted jack-o-lantern because they are somewhere attending a Halloween
party. Kool Wracks and Nate walk up to houses and level their shaving cream at the door of the
celebrants. When the door opens they yell “trick or treat,” level their weapons and pull their bandito
masks over their faces. The usual reply becomes a bowl of candy and the three scoop handfuls of the
prizes and transfers the goods to their backpacks. A little child dressed like an Indian walks by and Kool
throws a lit cherry bomb inside his full bag of candy. The bomb explodes with a loud wham and candy
flies like shrapnel everywhere, and the little kid sits down and starts to cry. The child’s parent starts to
chase Kool but Kool outdistances the adult and hides in a bush.
What is his name demands the distraught adult with a crying child dressed like an Indian.
His name is Barney and he lives on Deadman’s says Nate. Five houses up.
You will all pay for what just happened, promises the adult.
About half an hour later, Wracks finds Kool talking to one of the neighborhood girls who is dressed like a
Cat with a long black tail tight leotards and a cat mask. They both smoke cigarettes and turn to look
over wracks and Nate who are now nearing the top of the hill.
Hello, I am Wracks, Happy Halloween.
The pretty little cat bats her eyelashes at him and then blinks.
Kool, why did you blow up the kid’s bag of candy, asks Wracks
The devil made me do it says Kool. Besides, I do not like his dad.
He says he is going to call the Police, says Wracks.
They cannot prove a thing, says Cool, not a thing.
Let’s head over on Disenchanted, command Wracks.
The three cross the street from Upper Bacon and start on Disenchanted Drive. The first house on the
hill has lights on and looks open except that the owner has a huge dish of candy with a sign of
“Eat at your own risk.” The three youngsters dressed as hoodlums take handfuls of candy from
the bowl and then Kool takes the bowl and empties the entire contents into his backpack.
Yeah, says Kool. Happy Halloween.
The house across the street situates on an alcove and lush foliage shrouds the entirety of the house. Only
a small entrance niche and a long living room window show the main extent of the house. The
three gangsters knock on the front door where a small iron pumpkin with a candle within
flickers in an odious and ominous way. The door slowly opens and a woman with curly hair in
an evening gown greets them. She holds a small dish with candy in front of the three and says,
“Take one only.” Wracks takes one, Nate takes two, and Kool scoops a handful off the tray. The
curly haired woman smiles and withdraws. Behind her sitting in the shadows is a man with a
goatee dark black beard, dressed in a suit with a black hat and black boots, almost like he was to
attend a party, on a large chair that looks almost like a throne. The shadows shroud the man’s
features but his hands are long, almost feminine, with nails shaped like claws. The door closes
and the three walk off.
Nate says, that man in the chair looks just like the devil. I can’t believe it. What a radical costume. I bet
he wins first prize at a party.
A wrack says that man looked really evil. His hair was black, he had claws and he dresses in a business
suit on Halloween. He must be really rich to afford a makeup artist like that. I was ready to run
in case he lunged at us and tried to grab our throats.
Cool’s eyes turn up in his head and he screams out, “Twisted,” twisted on Halloween. He then
masticates a tootsie roll up into a wad in his mouth and spits the soft food on Nate. Nate in
disgust wipes off the sticky mess with a paper towel and glares at Cool. “Don’t you ever make a
fool of me again?”
Up away on Disenchanted live the Pickle family and the Van horror. The pickles live like active
sociopaths and ride motorcycles out in the desert with Wrack’s brother. The van Horrors have
motocross bikes too and the youngest van horror daughter has a beautiful face, nice figure, and
fine brown hair almost like angel vellum. However, the Van Horror beautiful woman is the
subject of a supernatural horror film and no one dates her. Wracks cannot figure out why. She
looks unbelievably attractive. Maybe if he had an income, he would be able to date her although
no one else does. She looks at him and waves on this Halloween and Dike Pickle heaves a
spoiled tomato and beans Wracks square on the chest. With that initial sighting round, a hail of
tomatoes, lemons, and rotten eggs rain upon the three from behind the gate at the front of the
house.
Retreat says Wracks, we are outnumbered. The three-turnabout face and run-down disenchanted Drive
and then flip off their victorious adversaries from a safe distance. In the distance Wracks sees
three people with a huge slingshot muster a large water balloon. The loader pulls back on the
elastic cords holding the sling to the shot and then let it fly. A water balloon arcs towards the
three from about one hundred yards away.
Take Cover yells Nate. They have artillery. A large water balloon filled with house paint impacts and
explodes ten feet away. The three-turnabout face and run for their lives. They have lost the
battle of disenchanted drive and have been driven away. Back down on Bacon way the three
hunts for another gang upon which to take their revenge. The only adversaries to be found are
three pretty young girls dressed as nymphs in skintight leotards with makeup and wigs. Cool
proceeds to inundate each of them with shaving cream and then toss firecrackers at them. A
wrack sprays one of the girls who jumps away giggling. The loud explosions of the firecrackers
drive the pretty young girls away running. Within ten minutes an adult in blue jeans runs at the
three. Cool sees him first and leaps away into the bushes. The man is Nate’s next store neighbor
and he applies a headlock on Wracks and leads him away.
Why are you attacking my daughters’ girlfriends he asks Wracks.
Because it is Halloween, and everyone has to play pranks. Says Wracks
Where your shaving is cream, asks the man.
I must have dropped it when you put a headlock on me, explains Wracks.
I am going to call the police and complain, says the man. Now be on your way
Go ahead says Wracks, I haven’t done anything illegal.
Down the street, the two other cronies wait for Wracks. What happened, they asked. An adult attacked
me then let me go, says wracks. They were looking for your Cool, but they got me instead. Kool
smiles and shoves another piece of candy in his mouth. On Wraks watch he sees that the time is
about ten thirty P.M. Cool says, I have to be home for curfew. So do I, says Nate. The three
then shake hands and split up. Nate walks back up Bacon way to his house. Kool runs up
Mellowman’s and disappears into his driveway and Wracks enters his house from the front. His
mother lets him in the front door and Wracks spies a Snickers candy bar treat, grabs the candy,
tears open the wrapper, and throws it into his mouth.
Happy Halloween, says Wracks and he exits to his bedroom where his brother lies asleep already,
wrapped up like a mummy and snoring. Wracks takes off his shoes, pants and shirt and
slides into the small bunk bed on the wall opposite the Fonz. Sleep rapidly overtakes him.
How was your Halloween, asks Father Wracks at the breakfast table over a cup of coffee.
I was ambushed and pelted in an artillery barrage and then the neighbor beat me up.
Don’t say I never told you so, says Father Wracks. You should have stayed home and handed out candy.
I should have, could have would have, and then life wouldn’t be the way it is thinks Wracks.
Today strikes as All Souls Day, the day of the Dead. This day chronicles as a day the dead walk the earth
and check up on their families. If on All Souls Day, a stranger walks up to a person and tells them
something unbelievably poignant or entirely strange, then they are an angel. God lets the
departed circulate freely amongst the living if they do not meddle or contact anyone. Once a
soul speaks to a mortal man or woman; they must be reincarnated and relive an earthly
existence. If someone who isn’t an acquaintance relays important information to him or her on
All Souls Day, please listen. As punishment, they must be reborn. Happy Halloween.

You are too old to go out and trick or treat, say Papa Wracks.  Now that you are in college why don’t you man the fort and hand out candy instead? 

That is a good idea, says Wracks.  I can read my textbooks, watch TV, maintain the special effects, and hand out candy all at the same time. 

The kids start to come around dusk and then the flow peters out around nine o’clock, says Papa Wracks.  Your mother buys a lot of candy to give the kids so help yourself while you wait.

The special effects at Wrack house this year include pumpkins, lights, and a boiling cauldron with Fog.  A plug-in device when set in water bubbles and makes fog which slowly oozes out of the cauldron.  Luminous light inside attached to the device flickers with different colors and gives the bubbling cauldron an eerie and magical look. The carved pumpkins sit outside on the doorstep with candles lit inside.  The flames flicker diabolically when the wind wafts past the grinning mouths and mischievous eyes cut into the orange jack o Lanterns. On the window sill inside sits an electric pumpkin of plastic that emanates different colors with time out of a toothy mouth and slant-cut eyes.  Orange lights blink hanging from the rain gutters outside near the entrance and as night begins the entrance to the Wracks house becomes an aperture to the spooky and occult that waits inside.  Tonight the breeze blows minimally and the candles glow and wane with an ominous look.   The large harvest moon looms luminously high in the night sky and the immense glow gives the earth a semi-lighted appearance, light enough so that an observer can discern moving clouds seething in the darkness above.   Already the trick or traders start to move in the neighborhood.  Families from less opulent neighborhoods an hour away drive in and bring their children to trick or treat here because of safety issues in a crime-infested neighborhood.  The smell of the ocean seems distant but arrives succinctly as the clouds move scurrilously across the night sky.  The stars twinkle and loom distantly behind the clouds projecting a three-dimensional theatre in a sky illuminated by a huge yellow moon set in October on Halloween in the twentieth century.

The door chime rings.  A wrack opens the door.  Outside a little princess with her proud father and mother smile as the child shouts out, Trick or Treat.  Wracks holds the large bowl in front of her and she peruses the candy and chooses a handful of her favorite confections.  Mother Wracks buys expensive candy with coupons and the result means Milky Way bars, three Musketeer bars, snickers, butterfingers, and more.  The pretty little prince says thank you and the family moves on and the door closes.  Next, the bell rings again, and this time a group of teenagers dressed as indigents appear at the front door.  Two girls in rags with dark makeup and two gentlemen in bowler hats, cut gloves, and linen shirts shout, Trick or Treat and Wracks brings the bowl and lets the hungry kids grab a handful each.  Their eyes gleam with delight at the candies and they turn and run away to the next house.  About fifteen minutes later the bell rings again and this time a bunch of hoodlums is present at the front door. All have masks on like raccoons and have obscured their faces with rouge, giving a rough and haggard look.   They wear old clothes and sports hats of different characters.  For candy bags, they all carry potato sacks with drawstrings as petty thieves do when they enter a house and liberate away personal goods with some resale value on the black market.  Each criminal has a can of shaving cream on their belt to enforce the possibility of retaliation for a lack of commensurate trade.  A wrack holds out the bowl and they each greedily grab a handful of candy bars.  They then turn and quickly evaporate into the night.  Approximately every ten minutes a group of trick or teeters walk up the steps to the front door.  The candy bowl looks low so Wracks opens another bag of candy bars and pour them into the mix.  The night moves on, the doorbell rings and the Halloween celebrator fills their door with costumes and frivolity.  Mainly young children trick or treat with their parents as chaperons and the costumes range from royal figures to puppies and tiger costumes to devils and monsters, depending on the age of the children.  Teenagers appear sporadically in rushes to obtain the most candy they can hold in their market bags and savor the next day.  A wrack sits in Grandfather’s old chair, watches Halloween sitcoms, glances at his textbooks, and slowly adds to the pile of candy wrappers stolen from the main bowl. 

Around nine o’clock the frequency of guests starts to diminish.  Revelers start knocking at the rate of one every fifteen minutes.  After nine o’clock, Wracks hears the bell ring repeatedly and fists knock on the large oak door that frames the entrance to the Wracks house.  A wrack opens the door, swings it back, and beholds a motley assortment of celebrators that appear in front of him.   These tweeters stand out due to the difference in their costumes and the degree of elaboration on the theme of Halloween.  The first crew is dressed like a skeleton, a specter of death.  This tall skeleton steps forward and holds out a large black plastic trash bag.  A wrack presents the bowl and Death scoops a large handful of candy into the sack.   The second reveler dresses like the devil.  A red skin-tight leotard costume with a tail behind, a black goatee, and an accompanying mustache, with two prominent curved horns on his head, steps forward with a large black purse.  Wracks holds out the bowl and the diabolical figure takes a few select candy bars. Next a pretty tall woman with bracelets, jewelry, and a black-cut evening town steps forward.  She has white makeup on and a large French handbag which she holds out open.  A wrack takes two handfuls of candy and drops them inside the purse.  She smiles and two large vampire fangs spring out of her mouth she laughs cunningly and then retreats.  Finally, a small ghost holding a small pumpkin steps forward.  The ghost wears a white sheep with holes cut for eyes and a thick manila rope holding the sheet around his or her waist.  The ghost has a brown paper bag with handles, like that obtained from the liquor store, and then sets the pumpkin down on the ground and pulls a small J frame Smith and Wesson revolver in 38 special from the bag.  The replica looks amazingly like a real policeman undercover firearm issued by the LAPD.  Trick or treat the ghost whispers as he holds the toy gun up to Wrack’s head.   A wrack says, treats, and pours half the bowl into the brown liquor bag.  The ghost drops the gun back into the bag, picks up his pumpkin, and says Happy Halloween.  The gang turns away. The wracks closes the large wooden door.  Only one or two revelers more showed up for candy later that night.  At approximately ten thirty Wracks opens the door, steps outside extinguishes the candles in the pumpkins, and unplugs the fog maker in the cauldron.  The night cools off; the moon diminishes in size and sets in the Northeast.  The wind whispers slowly and the wispy clouds linger somewhat and Halloween ends at the Wracks’ house.  Wracks steps inside grabs another piece of candy, slams the bar in his mouth, and chews.  He then walks to the brown bathroom, brushes his teeth, and moves to the second bedroom that he shares with the Fonz.  The Fonz is not home and lives in a VW camper van on campus somewhere near the Frat House. A wrack takes off his shoes, removes his pants, and slips inside the covers on the bed.  The setting moon indirectly casts light through the shades into the bedroom and Wracks falls deeply into a slumber as is his habit of living.  Wracks will be on the 7 thirty RTD tomorrow on his way to school and he survives another Halloween. 

Mom and Dad, I am going out with the boys tonight on Halloween.  There is supposed to be a rumble downtown like last year.  The boys fight against the Cops 10-31 in the Hills and Radical tonight.

The police are going to arrest you again and then you will spend the night in jail without any candy, says Mom. 

Why don’t you dress up and torment the neighbors like you did last year?  Ride your mini-bike on everyone’s lawn and burn in ruts, says Papa Wracks.  Or heave water balloons at delivery trucks like you and Nate did last year. 

How did you get in here Cool, asks Wracks.   The doors are locked.  

Your dog let me flip the latch through his doggy door.   We are good friends, smiles Kool. Can I smoke inside?

Cool, do your parents know you smoke cigarettes, asks Papa Wracks. 

It is part of my religion to smoke cigarettes, says Kool. We are Serbian Orthodox.

Neither your father or mother smoke cigarettes, says Papa Wracks

They do other things, says Kool, other things.  I forgot my matches, can I use your lighter?

Go ahead, says Papa Wracks and he walks over to his chair, sits down, and lights up a cigarette also.

Where is Koest, asks Wracks.

He is going to meet us at the bottom of his hill and then we are going to assault the city. Let’s go.

Tonight the night is warm and breezy.  The Santa Anna winds whip up the brown leaves and dust in an Indian summer before the winter sets in.  The moon and the stars glimmer across the black sky and the warmth feels like freedom before the storm inundates forever.  The street lights showcase the hills of tranquil hills and they undulate up and down as the road turns in a serpentine fashion into town. At the bottom of Casa de Azul, Koest waits with his backpack and gang costume.  In tranquil hills, the typical gangster costume exemplifies cut-off blue jeans, Adidas sneakers, a tee shirt knotted at the arms, and a baseball cap.  In the hood, like in tranquil hills, the most easily obtained weapons work the best.   A short knife and baby baseball back when used effectively can then be tossed into the nearest trashcan or the ocean.  However, the idle rich of Tranquil Hills acquire weapons much more costly, lethal, and effective. The landed gentry prefer suppressed rim fire rifles with a scope to exert control and the upper hand over the masses. The key to not getting shot is to not venture to secluded areas and to always keep moving.  Running up Tranquil Hills High School hill and entering the town bordered by the funfair market and bicycle shop. 

On to Milton’s parking lot, says Kool.  Have your shaving cream and rotten eggs ready. 

I have my tear gas if they get uppity, says Wracks, Walbe sold it to me. 

In Milty, ‘s parking lot, the juveniles have accumulated.  From the depths of the crowd an occasional rotten egg splats on the pavement or catches an unsuspecting participant in the face.  Koest pulls a rotten egg out of his knapsack, heaves it and it catches an adult on the side of the face.   The larger man turns into a saturnine figure and runs through the crowd trying to find out who threw the egg.  A Halloween festival churns on at tranquil parks tennis courts and the ruckus at Milty’s draw. The kids draw lines and rotten fruit from the back of the supermarket begins to sail through the air and hit unsuspecting people above the waist.  Rogues run out through the lines and squirt shaving cream from Cranks or Gillette foamy in a stream that reaches ten feet long.  Just as things start to escalate and get fun, three Police cars with riot officers in helmets and shields with long batons roar into the parking lot and form a line between the two opposing participants in the battle of Tranquil Hills 10/31.  The police get out of their cars and clash their batons against their shields.  An Officer with a megaphone leans out of the center car and states.  “Everyone has fifteen minutes to disperse or we will arrest offenders and take them downtown.”   With that, a rotten egg his helmeted offer straight in the face, and a huge rotten tomato hits the megaphone and hangs off its end.  The police start to charge the crowd

Let’s bail, says Kool, they are getting rough.

I nailed them, says Koest, I nailed them good. 

Here they come, says Wracks, run for your life.

The three exit quicker than they arrived and rest at the cul-de-sac at the bottom of a way of Peace Street.  Kool pulls out a smoke and lights up.  Koest pulls out a smoke and lights up too.  A wrack is not addicted to nicotine yet and does not have any.  He finds five pieces of gum from his knapsack, takes off the wrappers, slams the wad into his mouth, and starts chewing. 

Let’s take the back way home; says Kool, I want to check out Kneemo. 

Not many street lights line those streets, says Koest, it will be rough going.

Let us stop at some houses and get some candy, says Wracks, I am hungry.

Down and around the High school bordering the football field the road turns in a snake-like fashion and escalates up a hill steeply to the enclave that borders the high school framed on all four sides by streets that angle steeply downward then at the bottom turn up sharply again.   As the four enter the colony, a whizzing sound appears in the air and lemons begin to rain upon the three.

Run says Koest, we have been ambushed.

The lemons come from everywhere and each one of the three gets hit with a hard lemon. 

A gang of young players appear out from the shadows with apple bags on their sides filled with lemons. 

Peepers, who has red hair is the first to speak.

Any aggression and we will pelt you with hard lemons. says the red-haired teenager.

We give up, says Kool, where is Kneemo and Mondo?

They are at a Halloween party and we are holding their turf for them, says peepers

Can I have a couple of lemons, asks Wracks.

Sure, we have a truckload of them, help yourself, says Peepers

A wrack grabs four lemons and puts them in his backpack for ammunition.  Happy Halloween the two groups say to each other and the three make their departure down the hill and up the hill again.  At Blue Houses Street, Koste says goodbye and starts walking home up the hill.  At the next Hill, Kool states he is taking the roundway home so he can visit a friend before going home.  Wracks walks along alone home at about eleven o’clock on Halloween.  Most law-abiding citizens sleep soundly and the porch lights shut down and the hills become dark, illuminated by the moon and shattered stars scintillating slowly.  The street looks dark; the way seems long and the moonlight consoles Wracks who walks rapidly so he cannot be targeted by the elite.  Trotting by the convenience market on the street without lights Wracks moves as fast as he can without running.  Turn right on Bacon Way, to the crossroads and then the grey gate on the south side of the house and enter through the back door. Wrack’s father sits in the chair smoking a cigarette, and watching TV, and the candy bowl still broods full.  A wrack grabs a handful and heads to his room. 

How was your Halloween, asks Papa Wracks

The police broke it up before it could happen, says Wracks

Crowd and riot scenarios can get vicious, says Papa Wracks, vicious.

Wracks falls asleep before consciousness can overtake him and Halloween is now history and a memory. The moonlight shines through the bedroom window and the stars kiss young wracks goodnight.  It is Halloween in tranquil hills and one of many.

Our founding father Benjamin Franklin, who was a publisher, inventor, and statesman uttered the famous words, “The only thing for sure in life is death and taxes.”    They say he was too nice to run a business and Americans till the end of time will cherish his name, and say it with a smile.  Taxes are necessary for a nation to collect to ‘provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this constitution of the United States of America”.   Taxes are a necessary evil like surgeons, police, and even lawyers and when they are needed, nothing else will do so the people by the grace of God levy taxes. 

Taxes are necessary but when is something too little or too much?   After World War 2, President FDR created the income tax.   All investments and instruments created before federal taxation are exempt from their application.   All the excellent mathematicians of the United States found employment through the dark forces that created the income tax system.  Now, in the twenty-first century, taxation has become a marauding Juggernaut that defrauds the poor and favors the rich and is so complex that most people can’t figure out how they can be or be used by them at all.  The fact is this:  the 20% must pay higher taxes than the 80% because they require more of the tax base for their establishment and protection, after all, they live in mansions and gated estates.  To begin, this author feels that income taxes should be based on net income and that there should be no cap on the required amount.  Ronald Reagan was probably shot outside of a hotel because he insisted on a flat tax to bolster his supply-side economic theory.  This is conjecture, but our president was shot because he insisted on a flat tax and the upper 20% didn’t like it.  Oh my gosh, shades of JFK.

If a scholar or tax man with State accreditation heads to the irs.gov site, at the top, above all else are forms and publications in a click on scroll down menu.   In the menu are hundreds of forms for tax men and accountants to fill out, and add the good old form 1040.   Because these forms were created by genius mathematicians under the guidance of the dark power, few can understand how to use them or even why to use them.  Using a trusty calculator and perusing each form individually, the mathematics yield a savings rate for all citizens who use the forms from 10-30%.   Using these trusty, excellent forms, an accountant can shelter, hide, or obfuscate income above the green line.   To all of us bookworms this means gross and underneath the green line net.  The bonus from using income tax forms is that if you are the 20% and use these forms, they can save or hide money from net gain or net loss, and employ a person who has the intelligence to use the complex things.  This is a win-win for the landed gentry and a thumbs down for the working citizens and soldiers who work by the hour and forward up to a third of their income to social security withholding and medical insurance.   The medical plans make money on their withheld money.   This is America and how can we make taxation more Equitable?

All income tax is based on income in a straight-line stratagem

All forms and publications on the irs.gov site are deleted

All withheld money by corporations is used by the Government to invest and disperse.  Not private corporations.

The buzzword of Democracy is equity.   All people follow the same rules, follow the same laws, and pay the same taxes.  If there should be a tax that targets a given economic group which is unconstitutional and prejudiced in Supreme Court meanderings, it should be a luxury tax.    Cars, boats, recreational vehicles, condominiums, airplanes, and second houses should be taxed at a high rate.  Estate taxes which all the rich want because they keep the poor, are unconstitutional not because they prey on a single economic class, but because the 20 percent move their money to where it cannot be taxed be it to another state or even another country.    Estate tax only affects the middle class who need an inheritance so they can house, feed, and educate their progeny.   The 20% do not pay inheritance tax.  This author has heard, and it may be a lie or hearsay, that the 20% in the state of Pennsylvania, which is a state with estate tax, keep their money in another state so it can not be taxed.  Luxury tax for moguls who jet around in planes around the world and eat at five-star restaurants, and no estate tax for the working public who try to save money in their 401k so they can send their children to an Ivy League university to obtain an excellent education.  The only honest tax is a progressive sales tax, so let the citizens of the United States play with the devil, pay their taxes, and get their due.   

In the hubbub of an election year with all the politicians promising more medical for the people, our people, a people, we look at social security.   A given percentage of a paycheck is deducted from the gross allocation and is assumed by the government to pay for personal and public medical acts and subsidies.  If a citizen is lucky enough to qualify for a good job, with a brick-and-mortar company, with stock and perks and more, the employer matches social security withholdings to that percentage demarcated to health care and offers as a benefit a health care plan.   The plan can be basic, premium, or preferred and the amount of money earmarked to that plan increases in direct relation to the amount withdrawn from the paystub.  Supposedly, the better medical plans boast a higher maximum end cap for worst-case scenarios, a lower copay, and your choice of hospitals.   All this money amounts to over one-third of the gross national product.   Only defense spending for national security costs more than medical care.  The purpose of this paper is not to accuse or castigate those responsible for current medical care.  Rather it is to show who and what is getting rich on hard-earned public money.   Let this author delve deeply into health care and what it is.

A medical plan offered by the employer is part of a corporation, usually an insurance company that makes money hoping people can’t collect on bad luck.  All the premium working-class people pay to invest in current hot stocks and stable bonds and that company makes money on money.  When a worker has a claim, like a chronic disease or cancer, the medical plan does their darndest to pay out the least possible money they can and they can write off the loss on their corporate income tax thus lowering the net income of the corporation.  Medical plans are win-win for corporations.    What do the uneducated unassuming workers whose health deteriorates due to poor or hazardous work conditions that cause disease do? Basically, in current allopathic medicine, only infectious diseases can be cured in a hospital or a home.  If a patient doesn’t harbor a germ or parasite, they are entirely out of luck.  The events caused by employment with dangerous chemicals, nuclear or hazardous waste are poisonings, known to the medical fraternity as intoxication and an intoxication means in Latin “shot with an arrow”.    For the most part, poisonings can not be treated by allopathic medicine unless the causal factor can be identified like lead in lead poisoning and the treatment is long-term chelation.  For all other poisonings and parasite infestations, modern medicine can not do a blessed thing, and the patient railroads into hopeless surgery or bogus treatments administered by charlatans.  For example, kidney failure is most often due to chronic lead poisoning and the treatment for kidney disease in modern medicine is dialysis, not long-term chelation therapy to get the lead out of the Golgi apparatus and free the kidney.   Patients with intestinal worms must see a veterinarian to get wormed because medical doctors offer them a colonoscopy and a biopsy which is always positive and leads to surgery.  Insurance companies and corporations employ endless brigades of administrators to process the voluminous paperwork and these administrators make anywhere from fifty to one hundred thousand dollars a year.  Where can I get a job as a medical administrator?   To be employed in these high-paying cushioned jobs, a person must be highly qualified or born into a “good” family to be hired.   In essence, the people making all the money out of current medical care are administrators and patients get a trip to a dialysis clinic or invasive surgery that leaves them invalids, ready for the undertaker.  The money is one-third of the national budget!   The people who make our nation “Great” are usually old and useless, exploited by companies, and sold out by medical administrators.  They are used up and must be replaced by the new generation.

A long time ago, my grandfather told me “If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem”, and I believe him.  Medical care for the wage earners should disperse directly on an as-needed basis so the government can eliminate the middleman!   No more plans and endless paperwork generated by unethical administrators.  No more traveling two hours to see a specialist in another city because the plan does not pay for excellent physicians.    Medical plans hire immigrants from rich foreign families with English as a second language to work as doctors for citizens of the United States because they are cheaper.   My father was an insurance agent, and he told me to buy the most expensive medical insurance a person can afford because hospitals charge a fortune to keep a citizen alive.  “You can never have enough medical” These people who relayed to me such an esoteric diatribe were citizens of the United States, paid taxes, and raised their children unlike most new arrivals in the States today.  Please permit the government to cut the endless bureaucracy and give the people who work a day and fight for our freedom excellent medical care.   A toast to the end of middleman America.  

They are all financial geniuses, venture capitalists, and fund managers. Money appears from nowhere solely as a result of American ingenuity and perseverance.  The stock market goes up and up.  Prices rise, inflation hits double digits and factories turn out products faster than ever before.  We are happy says the administration and the public must be happy too.  Prosperity, propinquity, altruism, and Americanism abound.  Politicians shout, “We will make America great again.”   Their opponents propose broader subsidies and the lifting of tariffs.  The judicial wing, the third safeguard of our democracy concurs with the machination, because the shakers and movers are smart and we are not and where is the capitol going?  Only a computer can trace it nowadays.

A seasoned mathematician once said, “Figures do not lie but liars figure.”  And they are right all of the time.  This is the season for derivative instruments, manipulation, and investment to modulate the business cycle for everyone’s good of course.  

The economic cycle as proposed by Adam Smith, and pixelated by Malthus is a sine wave phenomenon with a minimum and maximum as value and an ordinate Y as time.  The economic cycle, no matter its origin, cause, or impetus is real and occurs periodically, Mathematically, the curve looks like a bimodal parabola with roots of x squared and negative x squared on a long-time line.  Mathematically, this can be seen as y = x squared + b for the positive part of the curve. when sample size approaches infinity, it becomes a bell curve. Taking the Newtonian first derivative of the function gives the minimum and maximum of the curve at a given time. Set the result to 0,1,-1 and extrapolate.  The second derivative yields the point of inflection where the positive parabola becomes a negative parabola at point B+X.   When an investment analyst plots the economic curve of a product or corporation, they can estimate the curve given by the plot and when introduced into a computer with a graphing application, he or she can deduce the formula given by the curve.   The first derivative yields the high and low points of net income or stock value.   The second derivative yields the time when the curve becomes positive or negative.  With some historical data, an investor can buy and sell stocks or bonds on margin concerning the first derivative of the function.   In essence, he or she can predict the future value of an investment instrument and buy and sell at appropriate moments to make a profit.  Using derivative instruments, an investor can predict if a stock, bond, or market will rise or fall and he or she can buy or sell instruments poignantly and succinctly, this means getting profit where there is none and dumping loss on unsuspecting investors.  The continuing manipulation of the economic cycle over time slowly drives up prices and the economic cycle creeps up the ordinate scale.   Remember when the stock market was 11000?  Now it is 45000.   Are factories generating a greater income or profit on product or are we seeing merely mathematical skullduggery resulting in price increases and inflation?

Derivative instruments and investing should be illegal.   Insider trading is illegal.  Why not derivative instruments?  This author feels the public is not aware of what bright mathematicians are doing to milk the economy and generate capital where there is no capital to generate.  Give them an inch and they take a mile and man will always figure out how to get blood from a stone.  This is the American way, I guess.  Why can’t we return to “and to this republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all”?

The current administration mandates meat for the subsistence of Americans.  They claim that meat eaters are bigger, faster, and smarter than vegetarians.  At the same time, the administration asserts that livestock produce methane which increases temperature and climate change, and is an inefficient source of food because they consume grain that is incompatible with human health because it is full of carbohydrates.   Climate change and burning fossil fuels so people have swimming pools, vacation chateaus in Geneva, and an all-electric car.  Egad, how thrifty they are.  What is real what is true and what is verified?  

Carbohydrates, present in long chains in grain slowly metabolize through breaking alpha 1-4 glycolytic sequences to become glucose which by the action of insulin or exercise enter the somatic musculature.  The liver does not utilize insulin.   Grain is mostly roughage, called phytins that soak up cholesterol and bile which are the main perpetrators of chronic atherosclerosis.  Rice is easily stored, and easy to cook but lacks the B vitamin thiamine.  Corn must be ground, doesn’t make bread, grows best where it is hot and wet, and is deficient in the B vitamin Niacin.  Wheat grows best in temperate climates, and has the most protein of all the grains but must be ground, Wheat makes good bread and the Romans switched to wheat from corn because soldiers seemed to be better on it.  Oats contain leguminous protein and grow in cold climates and can be added to wheat.  There are other grains but they are not as important.  Why does the current medical establishment say grains ruin glucose tolerance and should be used sparingly and mainly fed to animals so they can harvest meat?   Can they burn methane for energy yet?  Are we energy efficient?

We the people want the truth.  We the people want the administration to be accountable for their actions.  This stupid batch of religious outcasts who formed colonies in the new world and coexisted with the indigenous people formed God’s country and we are real.  The people must mix the grains.

Cycle one is for the children of the United States.  They are our gift, our future, our beauty, and our posterity.   We need to feed them adequately so they can be smarter and better than us.  In the first seven years of life, the brain grows and matures to adult dimensions, and it is these first seven years that are critical for our future.  To grow the brain needs meat and essential fats so it can grow and learn and become what we read about and see in the movies.  As a nation, as a people, the government should establish a subsidy for all children to get at least one hamburger a day, every day until they are seven.  Any fast-food franchise will do and the closest one to the public school should provide government-subsidized nutrition for our beautiful things.  Hamburgers and milkshakes for all our children because we love them.

By adolescence, the body grows to about seventy percent of adult height and weight and nutrition is not as critical.   Carbohydrates will do and they with plant oil provide all the necessary calories for ample growth and maturation.  Bread is the staff of life and leavened grain is available and easy and a lone soul can live on it.  Once a human being becomes an adult nutrition is not as critical and he or she does not need a highly saturated, cholesterol-laden burden, with a baked potato and sour cream.  Only soldiers and athletes need extra protein.

Cycle two is for us, the workers, the living entities that maintain the infrastructure, the integrity, and the culture of the United States of America.  The second cycle consists of grain with dairy, eggs, and fish.  In the north where rain abounds and pastures open for grazing, milk lactalbumin and its products synergize with wheat and oats to give energy and the abundance that the people need and deserve.   In the southern regions of continental North America, corn and rice grow to their fullest, birds thrive in dry and hot weather, and egg albumin provides the highest biologically available serving of the eight essential amino acids.   Fish is there and will always be but people don’t like the smell of fish, and it is full of parasites, particularly the broad tapeworm, and needs to be thoroughly cooked, even more than pork.  Ironically, the longest-lived people of the world live on boiled rice and fish and seaweed, and the Finnish who are the tallest Caucasians in the world subsist almost entirely on smoked fish.  The good book gives us a choice and we must take advantage of it, whether we like it or not. 

Cycle three is a cycle of senescence, defervescence, downsizing, and realization.  High vitamin intake becomes crucial because elderly people suffer from degenerative diseases mainly due to poor nutrition.  Is it impossible to fathom that by our habits, our attitudes, and our beliefs we destroy ourselves and is it this way that the maker wants?     The dream that abounds in my mind is a picture of a huge slab of prime rib beef cooked medium rare with a baked potato, green beans, and a huge mound of sour cream.  The dream of youth and fun and decadence and girls is all but gone and so is my amazing meal that now is maybe an entity on Christmas Day.  All an adult needs is a crust of dry bread, maybe a slice of cheese, and a glass of wine, and the time elapses and life goes on. 

People are not overly ambitious, motivated, or ingrained, except for a few.  No one in my estimation likes to eat fruit and vegetables because they require a lot of chewing.  America buys multivitamins instead.  Blessed are those with the strength, time, dedication, and ambition to juice a crate of fruit and vegetables down to one quart and then gulp it down.   The world belongs to the meek and the doers, and this is what this author was taught in school, in youth, a while ago.  Where the hell is my Philadelphia meat and cheese sandwich anyway?!   I am on a roll.  

Mexico enters the dry season at the end of September.   Gone are the daily rain squalls that cool and lubricate the land and make corn grow ten feet tall.   Mr. Madera returns from another successful water polo practice with the selection of a Mexican private university.   He was on the varsity squad at Berkeley and now he plays here for perks like getting the tests beforehand from the pretty pasantes doing their social service as teaching assistants at the university.   The Wracks sit with feet up on the coffee table in the living room of a furnished house the Mexicans provide foreign students with money or at least exalted parents in the States.  He reads an anatomy book with three-dimensional human body illustrations, taken apart and cast in polyethylene.  Mr. Madera sits down; he spent Labor Day at home in the States and had a great time.   He wants to tell the Wracks about a movie he saw at the panoramic dome in Los Angeles called “The Animal House”. 

In it is a torpid psychotic called “Bluto” who rubs food on himself and starts food fights wherever he goes.   He is a pleasant lot and skulks around creating hardship and mayhem wherever he goes.   The movie’s main impetus, however, is around the Greek fraternity system and a famous fraternity on the border of felony and incarceration.   The people are zany and he wishes he belonged to such an organization up in his home university of Berkeley.   Mr. Madera insists that the Wracks go see this movie because it displays the fraternity system at its best or worst, depending on how you look at it.   The Wracks closes his book, walks to the kitchen, grabs a Mexican bread roll from a bag, and a large one-quart Coca-Cola from the refrigerator, and heads to his room.   Everyone makes their dinner.   They want it this way.

The Wracks have been invited to a frat party at the big U.  His brother is a member of the frat but doesn’t have the money to live there so he lives outside on the street in his sky-blue hot rod Volks wagon bus.   He eats at the frat and showers there every morning.   It the showers are occupied he bathes at the Pavilion less than a block away in the football locker room.  At the frat, everyone has chores to do to be a member of the frat, be it doing the wash, clean up crew, or kitchen police and the tasks revolve periodically so everyone gets a chance to maintain the fraternity.   The Wracks knock on the door.

A tall handsome dark-haired man with a pipe answers the door.   His girlfriend stands behind him.  This man is the frat president and he dresses in clothes only seen in the upper class on TV shows.  He sticks out his hand and says, hello are you a pledge, The wracks say no, his brother invited him to the frat party.   The president says, well then, you can be our unofficial mascot.   The Wracks nods.   The girl standing behind the president moves up front and the Wracks exclaims, your girlfriend is buck naked!

The president laughs, like Sant Claus laughs, and says, no she has a transparent body stocking that maintains the code of etiquette of the fraternities and sororities here at the big U.   My name is Ally, she says and she dances away mischievously.   Another girl dances by the door and she is wearing a brief sarong in vibrant oceanic colors.   Another girl is in a string bikini with a false top.  I thought fraternities have toga parties says the Wracks.   No says the president togas are Roman; we are Greek and tonight is a sorority welcome party with the girls across Campus.   Would you like to come in and look at the fraternity?   Yes, I would say the Wracks.   I am studying to be a doctor.   We have doctors here too and much more says the president.   Let me show you the fraternity.   We don’t have toga parties anymore because the vomit is hard to clean up. 

The Wracks enters the fraternity and being displayed on the ceiling is a pornographic movie in 3d.   A centrally placed projector with a fisheye lens pointing up is at work at a time before cassette disks.   Let me show you the fraternity says the president.   To my right is the kitchen and we have a professional chef come in once a day and fix a meal for the men here.  The members keep the kitchen clean and well-stocked.   To the left is our crime lab.   We maintain a crime lab for legal and forensic purposes.   The photographer who is our visual does work for us.  He is a member too.  Would you like to see it?   Yes, says the Wracks. On the far wall is a huge collage with pictures of girls getting into Fonz’s van on the street outside. This is our wonder wall says the president.  It is for forensic purposes I assure you.   Would you like to see my roof retreat?   Yes, I would say the Wracks.   Going up two flights of stairs, the two emerge to a star-studded open roof setting with a putting green and driving tee., If you want, you can come up here with me and hit drives and try to bean the football team in the field next door.  I am trying to get into graduate school says the Wracks, the authorities will put me in prison.  It is only for the fun of it says the president.   They wear helmets and they probably don’t feel a thing.   If you change your mind let me know.  I will teach you how to drive with the number one wood.  The stars up above on a fall night twinkle and demonstrate the eternal promise offered to the good-hearted and brave, and then they leave.   You can visit the other rooms says the president.   I have to go now and meet some new pledges and entertain the crew.   Have a good time.   I hope to see you again. 

The Wracks alone walk around the fraternity.   In one room the brothers are playing mumbly peg with throwing knives and betting twenty dollars a toss.  A beautiful sorority sister in sexy clothes sits in a chair watching for decoration sakes.   In another room sits a brother with a hydraulic contraption.  He has a pneumatic injector attached in line with a forty-gallon keg of beer.   The large funnel-shaped contraption delivers a quart a shot.  Would you like to try asks the brother?  Yes, I would say the Wracks.  The brother inserts the funnel device in the Wrack’s mouth, turns on the regulator of a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher, and shoots a quart of beer into the Wrack’s stomach in less than two seconds.     That is heavy says the Wracks, they don’t even have one like this in the pit.  The maximum is two shots an hour, we don’t want an ambulance coming to the fraternity to break up festivities.  That is real heavy says the Wracks, real heavy and I didn’t even taste a thing.  Cool refreshing keg beer, on tap in an instant says the brother.   Can you ask for more? The Wracks move on.  Around the fraternity of three stories are locked rooms that the Wracks can not enter but he knows someone is inside.   People smoke pot and lay in the living room watching the adult movies boil away.  The Wracks sigh, I don’t have the time or money of the boys in the upper twenty percent.  I have to sit in a library and study.  On his way out, the frat president waves and says, you come from a good family, stop by any time you want, we have sorority friendship parties quarterly, and the Wracks walks out and finds the Ford Pinto he borrows from his father and drives home. The states are more sophisticated than Mexico.

The bolillo, and the piece of asadero cheese taste excellent when washed down with Coca-Cola.  He is in his room and picks a textbook to study and prepare for the class ahead of tomorrow., He moves the desk that came with his room to blockade the door.  A steel prop can be moved with a wire loop from underneath the door.  He turns on his tensor lamp, lights up a Marlboro cigarette, and starts to read.  After a while, he walks to the bathroom and charges his Mr. Coffee percolator that he brought from the States.   He opens an envelope of creamer empties it and then takes a large gulp of coffee.  He begins to read again and when he can’t read anymore, he looks at pictures.  I never had time for a fraternity life he thinks, it is only for the upper class.  The fraternity is the animal house and is not alpha, theta, or phi. Bluto is an associate professor of experimental oncology at the big U.  Maybe in another life he thinks. 

Class Onc

Dr. Gull appears in class as a man of medium height and build with thick wavy black hair.  He dresses in a white physician’s smock, a white shirt and tie, black loafer shoes, and a Rolex watch.  He smokes Marlboro cigarettes incessantly. He does not seem of Latin descent.  His bright eyes search the surroundings through a thick grey wisp of tobacco smoke that slowly floats upwards and seems to linger everywhere; Dr. Gull holds the title of Chief of Oncology Services at the big U.  He likes to teach anyone who will listen, the Science of Tumor Immunology.  He will instruct a student if he or she has the IQ and prerequisites to enter the halls of the Health Sciences. In a small classroom in the School of Microbiology, Dr. Gull instructs medical residents, Graduate Students, visiting professors from other countries, and even Wracks.  

Good afternoon, Dr. Gull, says Wracks, I am enrolled in your course in Tumor Immunology.  I look forward to an exciting and enlightening quarter here while I work on an independent research project down the hall.   May I smoke also during the lecture?   I like Marlboro Red cigarettes also.

Sure, says Dr. Gull.   Most of my staff here and the residents at Woodland Bethlehem Hospital are also smokers.  We need the lift to get us through the day.  Go right ahead and light up but bring your ashtray.  Get seated, I have to start the lecture.

Mr. Simms also completed upper-division Immunology with Wracks and now sits next to Wracks in the lecture hall.  Dr. Gull starts writing on the chalkboard the first topic of the course.  Sir Burnet’s theory of Immune surveillance.  All the medical residents pull a cigarette out of their coat pockets and light up.  The room slowly fills up with smoke and Dr. Gull lectures through a thick haze of photochemical smog.

Does everyone have to smoke, says Mr. Simms.  Mr. Simms presents as a tall-boned Nordic-derived student at the Big U.  All the smoke makes me sick.  Will everyone put out their cigarettes? Wracks extinguishes his cigarette immediately.    Then the medical Residents of Pine Bethlehem blow heavy smoke clouds at Mr. Simms.  

Mr. Simms exclaims, if you do not stop smoking, I will drop the course and file a complaint against everyone.  

The residents continue to blow smoke toward Mr. Simms until he closes his notebook with a bang and storms out of the hall.   Dr. Gull tries to ignore the situation.  After time assures that Mr. Simms has left for good, everyone puts out their cigarettes as if inspired by unseen forces.   Dr. Gull turns to his audience and smiles.

Does everyone understand Sir Howard Burnett’s theory now that it is on the board?  

Everyone nods their heads in agreement and the instructor smoking cigarette in hand continues.

Forty-five minutes later the instructor concludes and assigns case studies and term papers to the students of his class.  Everyone leaves in a hurry because they all have work to do, families to go to, or a sweetheart somewhere. Everyone except the Wracks.  Wracks has his dinner at the student union and then a long bus ride home ending in a walk up a hill at night.  The wracks have no experiment scheduled now because his tissue-transplanted mice have to grow up.  Then their spleens and blood will be harvested and the statistical construct begin.  A wrack takes the elevator down to the first floor and emerges at the entrance to the school of medicine.  A huge black onyx building is in construction and the cranes hoist enormous steel girders into place as the sun sets in a reddish flame framed by grey petrochemical smog. Today wracks will enter the student cafeteria by an alternate route.  Walking underneath the suspended hallway connecting the health sciences with the biological sciences, Wracks takes the connecting road down to the front of campus past the big buildings that house the professional schools and clinics of the Big U.  Up the main promenade to the student store, in the front door and then take the elevator to the second floor.  Wracks exits the elevator, then walks left to the queue lines in front of the cafeteria.  The budget student menu does not draw the crowd expected for such a bargain and charity offering. Most of the students patronize the bars and go dancing downtown.  No other place on the west side delivers a full meal with all-you-can-drink coffee for one dollar and a quarter. Most of the student body eats instead at the designer restaurants and discotheques located in town about a stone’s throw from the animal house.  For the more affluent students, the best restaurants in the state are less than five miles away on the miracle mile.    At five o’clock on a weekday, only twenty people utilize the vast resources of the student cafeteria.  Adjoining the student cafeteria situates the varsity athletes’ dining room.  The privileged few awesome athletes that join the fabulous and famous football and basketball teams, eat steak and hamburgers to infinity, cooked in front of them on a huge gas-fired charcoal grill.  Wracks sit in front of Kirk’s Hall and smell the delicious odors emanating from the athlete’s dining room every day while enjoying a cigarette and a cup of coffee.   Then an occasional nap in the huge leather armchairs decorating the picture windows in the student hall happens.  Curled up in bliss, in uteri in a friendly place, with warm feet and toes, Wracks knaps in the world of opulence.    The moment occurs now and tonight at five, Wracks chooses the chicken pot pie on the student menu with all-you-can-eat crackers.   Wracks grabs one of the large porcelain cups provided for the coffee-drinking student body.   In his usual spot, facing the entrance line, with his back to the wall sits Dahlman.  Both of Dolmans’ Parents have accolades as tenured faculty members in the health sciences at the Big U.  Instead Dahlman trains to be a lawyer and his parents want him to attend a catholic school.   Tonight, Dahlman dines on a sumptuous roast beef sandwich with de jour dressing, a bag of potato chips, and a tall glass of brown tea.  Wracks slams his stew out of a large beige bowl into his mouth and sends the food to his stomach with shooters of hot coffee with excesses of half and half creamer.   Wracks eat the first of his three packages of Nabisco saltine crackers when the bowl licks clean.  

How did the war go on the southern flank, asks Dahlman?

More of the same says Wracks.   I go to class, then study for an hour in between, then go to a lab, check on my animals, go back to afternoon class, and then show up here.  We go to the Research library after dinner, put in two to three hours of exam preparation, and then take the bus home.  What happens on the North campus?

The same, says Dahlman, I research law books and take notes then transcribe the data to three by five cards.   Only three by five cards can be admitted to a courtroom if he or she is not the defending or prosecuting attorney.  Then I come here.   In the morning, I sit for exams until lunch. 

Why are we doing this asks Wracks.

There is no other way, says Dahlman.  Academic achievement occurs as the only game in town.   Everything else gets old.   Let’s get going.   See you at the end. 

Spring starts to break at the big U.  The large trees bear buds and the winter ebbs and the entire leaves have blown away three months ago.  The quad sits deserted in the dark twilight and the Romanesque forums stand adamant in utter solitude.  Up the steps to the marbled halls of myriad classrooms, and through the café connecting the old building with the new to the lighted entrance promenade signaling the Buckminster fuller rendition of glass that houses the research library.  Up the central elevator to the fifth-floor rocket the two students. On the fifth floor, they separate because the line of sight of movement distracts attention while reading. A huge physics graduate student sits at a little desk next to the elevator and looks up to see if Wracks smokes.   Satisfied, he continues reading.  Sitting at his window to the opulent world Wracks surveys the beauty, organization, and technological majesty that money creates.   In this world of non-olfactory money, where source seems unimportant and effect paramount Wracks digs in at the end of the short winter and promises himself, that he will not fall asleep tonight. 

Let’s hit it!  Yells Dahlman at Wracks, we have only 12 minutes to catch the 8:55 bus. 

 Wracks throws his huge heavy books into his briefcase and jumps off to the run.  Trotting down the staircase, they bound through the glass frontal portal and lope across the North Campus Avenue.  Trotting down the hill they cross the entrance road and stand at the pole on the island where the RTD stops on Hill Street.  Just as they arrive a huge yellow bus without any passengers careens into view and stops suddenly without screeching its tires.  The door opens and both Wracks and Dahlman flash their monthly student passes at the bus driver.  The door closes and the huge yellow rectangle accelerates at magnum speed down the hill. 

One minute later we would have missed the bus, smiles Dahlman. At a jog, it takes eleven minutes to get to Hill Street and the bus was one minute early.    Ten seconds later we would have missed it.  It seems prudent to allocate at least fifteen minutes to transit to the Hill stop.  

I am tired says Wracks. I am glad today ends and tomorrow becomes Friday. 

On the undulating bus, Wracks falls asleep as usual clasping his heavy briefcase to his chest.  

Dahlman shouts this is my stop, see you tomorrow morning on the steps.

Wracks waves goodbye and Dahlman exits.   Two miles later on the hill of Moonrise Avenue, Wracks becomes the last passenger to leave the bus.   From here the bus travels to the ocean, turns around, and then goes back up moonrise to nightclub land.  He crosses the street in the darkness and walks across the gas station turf.   Up past the drug store, liquor store, and convenience market, Wracks heads up the long Quiz way and then up the hill to Bacon Way.   The night still chills and the wind blows offshore so the waves cannot be heard echoing up the canyon and the stars twinkle because the smog blows out to sea on nights like this.  The beautiful night lives and wracks cannot be enjoyed because the day as it lives tires the disciplined who must sleep to replenish the mind that drives them mercilessly.  Punkin wags his tail while sleeping on his cushion in the family room. He is the only one welcoming Wracks and wracks strips off his shoe’s pants and shirt, dives into bed, and falls asleep immediately after pounding the alarm clock that rests next to his bed.  Tomorrow is a new day

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