He had this weird habit:
Being himself — all the time
Therefore…
Not everyone liked him
And he could care less
And he couldn’t care more

Bed and pillows
Notebook and pen
Dogs
Hot coffee

Peggy Sue Gensaw was born in Crescent City, California on April 26th, 1958 and raised in Klamath, California. A proud member of the Yurok Tribe, she passed away on October 11, 2019 following complications from surgery.

Peggy Sue graduated from Margaret Keating Elementary in Klamath, Del Norte High School in Crescent City in 1976, where she played softball and basketball, and later attended Humboldt State University in Arcata, California. She retired from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, having worked the Title Nine Program under the 1934 Johnson-O’Malley Act.

Growing up with Peggy Sue was always a pleasure to be around. I knew her (and the majority of her family) from a young age, having grown up in Klamath. I knew, like many others, that she’d have a waiting smile and a witty comeback or bit of wisdom when approached.

We even made the newspaper together, along with a couple of other school mates from Klamath.

In the winter of 1975, we had a freakish snow storm that laid down some six-inches of wet slush on Highway 101 between Crescent City, where we were taking the high school activities bus home, and our destination of Klamath. As we approached what we kid’s knew as the 30 mile curve, our van refused to budge as the damp snow was too much for the vehicle to handle.

Under the direction of the CHP, our bus driver, Shirley Baldwin began turning the bus around by making a u-turn. As we came to a stand still, sideways in the roadway, a pickup truck came from the opposite direction and unable to stop struck us broad side.

Only Shirley was injured and had to be looked at by the staff at Seaside Hospital. I was seated in the front passenger seat, with Debbie Wolcott behind me, and Vickie Billy and Peggy Sue behind her.

Everything slowed down — as in a slo-mo movie — as Debbie bounced out of her seat forward, head down towards me. I remember the top of her head hitting me in the face, bending my brand new glasses, jus’ seconds after Shirley shouted, “Hold on, we’re gonna be hit.”

Both Vickie and Peggy Sue bounced around in the back seat. It was Peggy Sue who quipped afterwards, “It’s funny how Tommy’s face is harder than Debbie’s head.”

What a laugh she gave us.

It hurts my heart to know that I will never hear her cheery voice, raucous laughter or any of those witty-wisdom’s she was so generous with throughout our years of knowing one another. And I will for always miss that great big and ever-so willing smile of hers.

Keep the beach fires burning Peggy Sue, we’ll be there before any of us know it.

Between sleep and working 60-hours a week, I haven’t had the time to edit what stories I’ve already written. This is not to say that I’m not writing. I carry my trusty notebook with me to work every evening and throughout the night I jot down my inspirations into words. I have written six short stories since beginning my new job last month and several poems (a couple which I did manage to post here,) before we switched shift-lengths from eight to 10-hours. Please stick around as they are some pretty good stories. I can hardly wait to share them.

Lamont sat quietly at the bar, nursing his bottle of beer. The place was busy and noisy, with one group clacking pool balls around the green felt table and another torturing a karaoke machine.

He had been busy noticing an attractive redhead in the far corner when he suddenly realized someone had taken the bar stool right next to his. Lamont turned and looked at the ‘space intruder.’

Much to his surprise it was a green monster with four large horns growing from its misshapen head, tendril-like whiskers and a single red-glowing, beady but unblinking eye from near its mid-forehead. The scaly beast shook out its leathery, semi-translucent wings before ordering a double scotch.

When the drink arrived, it raised the glass and with a yellowed-fanged grin offered, “Here’s blood in your eye.”

The malodorous oddity tossed the caramel-colored liquid down its ferocious looking snout, then ordered a second one.

“You seem familiar,” Lamont said, before asking, “Do I know you?”

“Yeah, but it’s been a long time,” the monstrosity said, as it held out a grotesquely over-sized green claw, harboring horrifying bony-fingers and massive, dirt-filled nails, “Name’s Zaa-q’ran, but you can call me Ernie and I used to live under your bed.”

She sings glory hallelujah at the bottom of the stairs
She screams hallelujah, standing slightly out of sight
She glides ‘round the corner, misty vapor in the airs
She calls hallelujah, and those willing, hear her spirit
She cries glory hallelujah at the bottom of the stairs.

Blue eight-wheeled Brute.
Catches what filth the world offers.
Seen but not noticed.
Setting in the corner, out of the way.
It will not stock its prey.
Instead, it waits, it waits.
And the world will come to it.
We think we’re the top of the food-chain.
Human-kind is so easily outsmarted.
Such foreknowledge in a garbage can.

Is ‘buttcheeks’ one word, or should I spread them apart?

“I have your back,” she said in supposed support of him. She was also holding a large bladed knife high over her head as he walked away.

He bares the weight of the world
It shows in his sagged shoulders
Oppressing, compressing, depressing
And it is neither a good feeling
Nor a good look
To throw it off would mean:
great violence
A struggle he’d surely lose
For his burden is stitched
Seamlessly to his bones
Like voluminous, leathery wings
Blackbird to bat
And it is his own fault
For having created his own monster
His design, his being, our horror