Part One: Welcome to Modern 'Paradise'
Sometime in the late 1980s, in a far-off exotically tropical place called Daytona Beach, situated in the wondrously sunny state of Florida, my brother Joseph and I witnessed one of the most disturbing events either of us had ever seen in our young lives. Something once seen, never observed again. The event was both horrifying and humorous in a demented way, depending upon one's perspective.
Living there in sandy homeless squalor on and off the beach in a large red Pontiac Bonneville we made a strange family. My brother Joseph, his adoring girlfriend, a baby rattlesnake, and me, your charming and friendly narrator. Why? We were there because we were wretchedly poor while simultaneously possessing a grand sense of adventure: All of us utterly determined to truly see as many different things and places in whatever way we possibly could. We also had no better place to be at that particular time either.
Our small motley group had limited funds (meaning none) so we had to be quite adaptable. We would often by sheer necessity mischievously siphon gas from parked cars in the dark watches of the night. Strangely enough, we were never caught in this unscrupulously illegal endeavor. It seemed a victimless crime, mainly because we never actually saw the victims, nor particularly cared about their losses. It seemed a logical choice since they could likely afford to buy more gas, and we could not, being homeless.
Of course, I was never the one siphoning gasoline, that was Joseph’s repugnant duty. My role was being the criminal lookout, co-conspirator, and entertaining distraction if need be. This was my skilled criminal contribution to our highly unconventional endeavor. It was Joseph's car, he was the one eternally driving, so the taste of stolen gas was his burden to bear thankfully.
Our living situation wasn’t ideal, nor luxurious, but it was uniquely OURS, and this was where we wanted to be at that moment. Just three destitute wanderers bound together by friendship and hardship, seeing the sites, and surviving in whatever manner we could.
We had no shackles, no set rules, and no agenda besides living in the moment, and hoping we'd wake the next day. That was our reality right then.
Our lifestyle wasn't particularly ideal, but it was free and quite uncommon in a world dominated by a common currency we never possessed, or ever would.
Daytona Beach sits smack in the middle of the state, and is often considered one of the many places in America that is “the life of the party”.
Contrarily enough I wasn’t a party type, but a shy introvert, happier in the company of a good book than a bevy of bikini-clad half-drunken females. Not that the latter was ever an option for me anyway. I preferred quiet reflection, and personal peace was my primary comfort. Social skills were not one of my unique talents. However, I was an integral part of this informal destitute family. All of us were bound together in abject poverty and brotherhood, so I usually went along though it wasn’t always my preference.
I could appreciate the chaos in my own semi-distant way. It kept our days interesting certainly.
Daytona Beach was a center for entertainment and public insanity, and maybe that’s the draw, that anything could happen at almost any time and often does.
The neon lights of the Daytona strip sets the stage for nightly heart-stopping shows. Too often drama and absurdly human comedy unfolds publicly, often involving drunkenness and randomly brutal violence.
This fabulous beach was the epitome of everything wrong with the human species, a plethora of insanity laid bare in glittering lights by night, and harsh revealing sunlight during the day.
This nature-crafted beach was sculpted perfection, but the human-built part was crude, ugly and obnoxiously loud.
Stroll down any random block on the Daytona beachside strip and you’ll certainly encounter all manner of oddities, strange events, petty crimes, and absurd distractions. You may pass an old shabby motel being callously bulldozed, with vagrants scrambling like panicked roaches to get out after last night's illegal stay. Or disheveled beggars lining the sidewalks with donation cups out, guitars playing, spreading tunes and happy attitudes; All hoping against hope for a generous soul willing to give so they could eat on that particular day.
The taste of salt is ever present, minced in with the ocean breeze and cries of seagulls sailing high above it all. It seemed they were somehow lording it over the whole scene; Maybe spreading judgments from on high through their piercing caws of utter disapproval at the range of horrid human activities they witnessed far below. Birds have always had an almost regal aspect to me personally. Surely in their epic flights, they view a vaster picture than most of us ever could, having evolved flightless as we have.
Next to the sea, was a different sort of sea, composed of tanned and highly-coveted flesh. All day long, on every block strode slim goddesses wearing the very least they could get away with while not getting arrested. They swayed and glittered, with gleaming golden skin, the most lavish representatives of human desire. They laughed, charmed, and beguiled with nary a single word in my direction, which I understood on an instinctual level as wholesale social rejection. I knew my place in life and had no illusions about myself.
These so-called goddesses kept the gift of themselves only for the richest, or the best looking adonises around. Which sadly to say I was neither, nor ever would be. They were beyond my ability to ever have and always would be, and I was fine with it. So much drama in relationships didn't seem worth the hassle to me. But I do enjoy watching the tension these things bring to the surface, as long as it's not my problem to deal with.
Daytona was a fabulously grand feast of pleasure for the most “deserving”. However the most pertinent pleasures were reserved for the richest and most shallow people to ever grace the land with their presence. Males like me were mere trespassers, nasty trolls watching from under bridges, destined only to see, covet and never enjoy. This was my place, the eternal observer and outcast, and that’s exactly what I spent much of my time doing.
Joseph and I found other pursuits for our days. He had a cute girl for his female companion, and I had both of them as mine. Being utterly social creatures, we seek others like us, if not for friends, at least for basic company. When we can’t befriend or find humans quite like us, we often settle for being among more generic folks, merely for the feeling of not being alone all of the time. A few lucky ones have actual friends, the rest are mere faces in a crowd, and often end up remaining that way.
At that moment, on that beach in that year, I had one brother, closer than any friend, and one mere associate, his girlfriend. She didn’t really like me, and the feeling was certainly mutual, but Joseph was the binding that kept us all together. As the only close friend I’d ever had, or ever would, our destinies were inextricably bound. Where Joseph went, I’d go, and vice-versa. For now, we all lived and slept in a hot, cramped and dirty car, three wanderers among thousands of beach transients.
It was spring break in Daytona Beach, the ultimate party destination for American college students. Why was my brother Joseph and I really there?
Both of us were formally uneducated and not enrolled in any university (nor ever would be). Both poor as peasants, and in no trade school or course anywhere. Neither of us had ever even been to high school.
Why were we living homeless on the beach? Because there was no better place to be at that moment; That’s the brutal truth. For some beings, experience is the highest form of wealth. They can be priceless, outshine gold or pearls, and live forever in our memory, as long as we still possess such a thing. We were pirates collecting our own form of treasure. What was our treasure chest? Our minds and memories. Our pirate ship was whatever got us around—our feet, our car, a greyhound bus, our thumbs, virtually anything. As for the actual beach, it was beautifully vast, loud, often dirty, and utterly entrancing. God was the blue waves, the gulls were the high priests hovering over us all, and we were mere supplicants, making our worship plain.
That beach had been around since long before mankind walked its golden sands and would be there long after, guaranteed. A perfect stage for the plays of the Gods to watch and enjoy, and obscenely laugh at our absurdly human antics.
No one does comedy quite like the human race. We think, plan, and plot, and our well-laid plans often fail spectacularly! In the full comedian’s vein, we dance, cavort, make funny faces, and believe we are actually in charge—that we somehow understand how things work. We attempt to instill a sense of justice, balance, and fairness. But we fall on our rear ends constantly because these don’t exist naturally, and never did.
So our existence is a sad yet hilarious comedy, trying to attain things that will never exist. In our hearts, we know the truth, but we are unwilling to accept it or even live by it. We force a sense of fairness upon societies existence, and it fails every time being an absolutely absurd concept.
It’s hard to live, breathe, go to work, raise families if neither justice and fairness aren’t real, so we deceive ourselves, and insist they do, and pass our days ignorantly believing this. Repeat something long and loud enough and it becomes what we believe. Societies grow and are nurtured on such unreasonable concepts. So we become the comedy act for the Universe, and all the higher sentient forces watching us. The line between tragedy and comedy is mere perspective, nothing more. Blood can be funny, and breath can be tragic, it’s all point of view ultimately.
Joseph and I cruised the beach up and down daily seeking entertainments, and his girlfriend usually tagged along, merely tolerating me and adoring Joseph. I was always the third wheel, yet somehow indispensable considering our history together. We were brothers, if not in blood, in shared long existence itself. The beach was our purview and residence right then, and the Daytona strip was our personal playground and stage. The human drama was our personal TV, featuring round-the-clock entertainment.
We weren’t exactly the normal type of spring-breakers or beachgoers. We had our very own style, completely unlike the thousands of average beach people. So we stuck out like aliens among humans, and there was a high price we paid for being fully ourselves. We were harassed daily by the Daytona beach patrol, constantly being singled out, and we never once truly fit in among the partiers. One of our first walks from the main pier to far down the beach was an interesting jaunt. A perfect example of how we were commonly treated.
Joseph asked his girl if she wanted to come with us on our long walk, but she only wanted to sit on the water’s edge near the pier and calmly watch the water. All the better for us. Joseph and I nodded to each other in perfect synchronicity and brotherly understanding. It would be only us this time. This was what we both preferred anyway. No one could truly understand our connection. It goes back to when we were small boys, bedeviling the local school and the neighborhoods we both lived in.
