SHORE LEAVE

can * nois * seur (kan' us sur') n. one competent to render critical judgement on the qualities and merits of cannibis

"The most amazing property of cannibis is its ability to fog the minds of  those who do not use it."
 
Heads Up; Anyone looking to to renew or qualify for, their Medical Marijuana card at Priceless Evaluations at 20th and Mission (check the San Francisco Guardian or Rolling Stone for discount coupons) should plan very carefully. For some reason, even with an appointment patients are relegated to the starkly bare waiting rooms, where the wait is at least two hours. Not only has their admission system crashed but street construction has limited parking and traffic cops circle like wolves around a chicken coop, so bring plenty of quarters. Oh yeah, don't use the elevator, it's broken, and the security guard downstairs feels it's not his job to warn you--or answer the alarm.
Can you say Oakland?

In Praise of the Rejection Slip: When Jack London decided to pursue a career as a writer, he vowed he would quit only when his rejection slips reached the top of his desk spindle. Now the previous sentence contains three little used words. A 'spindle' being a narrow metal spike which stood upright on the desk where one would skewer bills, letters, news articles and such, until they could be attended to and dispatched. One notable 'and such' was the 'rejection slip'. 
The aspiring writer would slip his (or her) manuscript into an envelope and mail it to the publisher. Eventually the manuscript would be returned with a note. Some of these were personal suggestions by the editor, most were form letters, but they all added up to the same thing. The manuscript had been rejected. I personally saved all of these rejection slips intending to open a bar called Rejection, where all my slips would be posted on the wall. (Any writer presenting a bona fide rejection slip would get drinks on the house all night). I still like the idea, except in today's new world the rejection slip has vanished. One sends a manuscript in via Email, never to be heard from again. The work seems to be consumed by some digital black hole that reduces all form of creativity and hope into nothingness. At least in the old days, even a form letter assured the recipient that the work had been touched by human hands, perhaps even skimmed or better yet, actually read, before being tossed aside. Today all it takes is the delete button to destroy any memory of a creative dream.  Not even the courtesy of a reach around. I have been told by some editors and agents that in today's litigious society, they are afraid of possible blowback by a disgruntled author with an AK47. And judging from recent events in our NRA sponsered society, they may have a valid point. But in my day publishers were not pussies, and had the courage to treat their literary supplicants with a modicum of respect. The message conveyed was: not this time but you're still in the game, try again. The message today?...oh, there is no message. Your work doesn't exist and neither do you. I'll have that drink now.


Shore Leave: 11th Day of a 1970 Freighter Voyage to Tangier.
(Author's Note: If you have been reading the past five or six posts you have a fair idea of what taking a freighter across the great water was like. So with your indulgence i'll wind up the memoir and cut to the chase.)

"Well what's your conclusion? How is it five years later? Do you still have the radar?" Garfunkel challenged, having read some pertinent pages of Scorpio's log.
Scorpio was satisfied. He was going at the same speed, down the same road--but now he had a set of four-wheel disc brakes. Not for stopping but for cornering. He was thirty and in better shape for the next phase than he had been for the last. He was ready, and age was a state of readiness.
However it had been a long time since he had made a new friend. Garfunkel grinned and counted himself in. Pack the same, filling Scorpio's cup...
About two-thirty in the morning the boat stopped.
About three-thirty, after fifteen people had popped their heads in the door yelling "You've really got to see this," Pack and Scorpio went up on deck for a look at the beaded strings of amber light that hinted at the strange streets in the shadows of 3a.m..
The boat had dropped anchor in the Bay of Tangier. It would pull into dock at 8a.m., disembark passengers, unload cargo, and put in fresh stores. It would leave for Valencia, Spain, that evening. Then on to Tunis, Italy, and Yugoslavia. That settled they came in from the chill into the warm lounge and back to some drowsy talk.
Pack speculated on six more days on the boat with only Tina and Blaine left to carry on. He planned to go to Florence, pick up some money due, accompany Tina to Greece, and then go alone to some other scene.
"Sounds simple but it could get complicated," Scorpio ventured.
"Absolutely cool, " Pack insisted.
Garfunkel knew it was possible for a man and woman to live apart for a while, get tight with someone else, and then resume.
Scorpio well yeahed that, knowing it was rational. But he felt there were some kickers in there, some aces up the sleeve of conditioning.
Pack was still down over being alone on the Boat.
Scorpio suggested he might find the time to pull his health together into a condition presentable enough to check into a Swiss rest home.
 Eyes slitted over his moustache Pack looked like a grizzled Pan. True Capricorn goat man piping a party. And he nodded yeah, it was true, he was totally stretched; "Your basic burnt out husk."
About this time the pace of the past 144 hours had ground everyone's energy down fine. At five that morning they decided to skip the sunrise and get some sleep. Garfunkel would be leaving early so he said his so longs there.
Two hours later Scorpio was rousted by the Steward calling for passport award and landing procedures in the lounge. Scorpio ducked out for some fresh air before the rigamarole and there, curving around the green bay, was Tangier, spreading lush over the hills above the white sand beach. Just beyond the dock area was the Kasbah, a low bulge of gold domes, blue towers and whitewash roofs rising up and up above the waterfront cafes and crumbling sea cliff walls.
The original street.
The boat was docked close to the waterfront boulevard and Scorpio could see hooded figures hunched on the curbs or sitting in cafes. There were women wearing veils and kaftans, men in grey suits and yellow slippers shuffling off to work, stevedores in djelabas--full robes that concealed who knows what--hovering around the boat, every so often crouching down to light a pipe. Crates swung overhead. A man in a brown djelaba, hood back to frame his wool skull cap, impassively operated the crane mechanism.
Back inside, a desk had been set up at one end of the lounge giving the room an ominous air that morning. Most of the passengers were standing about impatiently. Silent.
Suspicious of officials in uniform.
The Tribe was something else again.
All were wearing straight clothes--or what they considered straight. The ladies were quite together, neat in suburban tea dresses and tights to cover unshaven legs, fresh and innocent of face. The men were less conservative. With day-glo bell bottoms, flowered shirts, polka dots, striped coats, their waist length hair slicked back, parted in the middle, drawn close to the skull and tucked into their shirt collars, they looked like 1920 lounge lizards, parlor snakes, prohibition dandies--which of course they were.
The men behind the desk; burly, stern, disapproving fellows, had told the tribe that if they disembarked looking like a bunch of Hindu fortune tellers
Big Brother, Tangier Chapter, would shave their hair and deport them.
The Tribe looked morose, considering a crew cut Mecca.
"May I have my passport?" The Holy Man asked finally, after everyone was cleared.
"They sent it to the police," the Steward said, in a c'est le guerre manner.
"Oh yeah." The Holy Man smiled weakly. "Alright then," he conceded, shoving his hands into his day-glo pockets and looking like a dude at the county fair just been hoodwinked.
The Steward suddenly rummaged through a cheesebox. "Wait a moment please--is here." He grinned and handed the Holy Man his passport.
Great joke fellas. Heh, heh.
Paperwork finished Scorpio went to his cabin and lost five bills to the customs inspector whose pockets started watering at the sight of all that luggage Mysterious Traveling Companion was hauling.
Waiting for the bags to be brought down to the taxi, we watched the young travelers float down the gangplank, a solid row of pilgrims, their worldly belongings in the parachute packs strapped to their backs, pioneers of a new passage to the Learning Tree.
Scorpio and MTC got themselves nicely set up in a hotel in the European section--$3.80 bath and breakfast--then went back to the boat to see if Pack and Tina were up for some Tangiering. Pack was there asleep but Tina was gone. The Steward told them she went ashore to do some shopping. Pack hopped up and the three of them went to the waterfront boulevard. They walked a bit then stopped  at a cafe for tea.
Pack being newly awake was trying to straighten himself out but was worried about Tina alone in Tangier.
A small boy came up and asked for a cigarette. A little girl shyly extended her hand for money. Kids 2, Scorpio 0.
As they sat there they saw The Tribe, The Holy Man back in tribal clothes, swinging down the street with their dogs and new found friend Hamid.
They took it all in and wondered where to find Tina.
Finally they went back to the entrance to the Socco Chico, the small market in the Kasbah. They were hungry now and looking for salad and shishkabob. Through the blur of color and confusion in the market they spotted a group of faces from the boat. Honest Fred and some others, waving them over. They told Pack that Tina was in the first restaurant down the alley. Sure enough there's Tina eating, and sitting with an old friend she ran into named Jazee, cat from Amsterdam with a full mane of golden hair, been in Tangier a year this time around.
After a good meal Jazee helped everyone get their cannabis needs well taken care of, then took them up to a terrace cafe for a smoke and a glass of delicious mint tea. Up there in the sun, they goofed on heiress Barbara Hutton's tiled patio next door and watched the blue walls and whitewash roofs slope to the sea.
It was there that Pack had to ask for time. He was feeling flutters in his chest, the after effects of his long distance run. "Hold on Willie boy, your heart's gonna give right out on you..."
So then it was a slow walk down the alley to Socco Chico, down around and they were at the entrance to the pier. Pack, Scorpio, MTC and Tina knew what was happening. They had maintained a rare communication for eleven days and now it was time to let it be.
They looked at each other, smiling some, not saying much in the way of keep in touch, knowing they had separate appointments with the Joker Man. Just a handshake, a hug and a kiss. And then there was nothing left to say.
                              
                                    End Log 1970




Cannoisseur head shot
photographed by John Hanford