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A Litany of Woes

Steve Prusky

    I’m a fuck up, a product of the streets, a two-strike felon in a three-strikes state. I guzzle a fifth of Red Army vodka a day, steal whatever I can, and fence it to feed my dime a day heroin habit. I’m not a mover or a shaker. I’ll never marry or propagate the species. I don’t own a cell phone or keep a debit card, and I’d just as soon boost a car than own one.
    My last day free was a recipe for failure, a cast-in-stone Bukowskiesh episode. Two days hungry and numb from the late November cold, I occupied the tail end of a lengthy, slow-moving queue outside the Christian rescue mission. The mission served Thanksgiving meals to the unfortunate, the destitute, and all other indigents convinced they knew a good thing when they saw it. Three hours later, I was inside and seated on a fold-up steel chair with a full tray on my lap; there were no tables.
    I gnawed a thin slice of processed brown turkey. I imagined I was chewing white meat instead. Brittle stuffing slashed my toothless gums raw. I pretended my green earth-friendly disposable cup of grape Kool-Aid was Mad Dog 20/20, and the resident acolyte served me a plate of “God helps those who help themselves.”
    “But, I am helping myself; I’m eating this swill, ain’t I?” The resident believer replied, “You must find Jesus.”
    “Didn’t know He’s missing,” I said, then excused myself, “Going to take a leak,” and placed the half-eaten tray on my chair. The blessed theist began to spin his spiel on a nearby drunk who was nursing a bottle of Chartreuse enveloped in a wrinkled paper sack.
    Above the wall mount urinal, a devotee scribbled, “Jesus saves.” Written below that revelation, a skeptic replied, “Where does He bank?”
    My tray disappeared. A knuckle-dragging goon was wolfing my meal as a cow eats from a trough. I stared at him with my most accusatory frown, “What are you looking at?” Huey said. He sopped up my turkey gravy with a slice of close to moldy bread, then placed the empty tray on my chair. I was too slight to challenge a glutton his size. I would have rejoined the food line, but there was nothing edible left.
    As I left, the believer chirped, “God bless you. You’ll be in my prayers.” I stole two forties of Old English malt from a 7-11, hoofed it to a nearby park, fixed, and laid under the long low branches of a tall pine tree. I used the emptied forties as a pillow. I bathed in His blessing until a park ranger jabbed my ribs with his steel-tipped boot. “Your sleeping without permission, Sunny Buck.”
    “Are you serious? I need permission to sleep?”
    “Shut up, asshole. Up you get. Put your hands behind your back.” He patted me down and found my Bic, bag, used syringe, spoon, and the 38 snub nose revolver I used to rob a convenience store (I didn’t mean to shoot that clerk, but he took too much time opening the cash drawer).
    “Life, plus twenty years,” the judge crowed.
    “You can have it as soon I’m done with it,” I whispered.
    “Did all I could for you.” the public defender said. “Good luck,” then he shuffled off.
    “Read books,” the bailiff said, “You’ll have plenty of time for it.” then he cuffed me.
    I’m upon my tenth year doing strike three in prison. But all is not lost; I read books (the bailiff was right) and write stories nobody reads. I perpetually give thanks for three hot meals, clean sheets, a lumpy mattress, and detox. I commingle with a coterie of scandalous miscreants, and, when asked, “What are you in for?” I confess to those willing to listen, “My public defender fucked me.” It’s is as good as life gets for the likes of me.

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