Introducing: The Midnight Wanderers

The recreation of my blog back in September of 2007 was important to me in more ways that I imagined. This forum, the writing experience in this space, has improved my life. I’ve been able to express myself with more clarity using the written word than I ever have before. My past efforts have focused more on my novels and short stories. Here, I have authored essays, articles, and stories based on my personal life which helped me to edify my soul, if you will.

There have been blessings, as well. In this giant world full of folks with different lifestyles and ideas, I have formed bonds with many who live in all parts of the globe. Some of these relationships have been fleeting, others more enduring, and some more important to me in terms of partnership than others. I value all of my readers, friends, and acquaintances here in the blogging cosmos. Yet, there is one blogger with whom I’ve forged a writing venture with and he has created an entity which I am honored to belong to. This is a group where he has dubbed me as one of the founding members. The writer of whom I speak is JD, author of The Uneasy Supplicant, and I am a proud member of the Midnight Wanderers.

Those of you who visit my website regularly may have noticed the emblem of the crow with the red “MW” emblazoned on it in the upper, right hand corner (image is shown in this post). This icon was created by the talented JD (as well as the idea for the Midnight Wanderers), and inspired by the notion that writers often have their best ideas at night, even at “two in the morning” as we often jest. This badge assumes that the person with this image on their blog has the necessary skills, drive, creativity, and dedication to advance and improve the craft of writing. I’ve been corresponding with JD for many months now, and we share the common objective of creating fine fiction, essays, poems, and articles. We proudly call ourselves writers, and we wish to bring others into our circle. The rules are simple and are posted here and on JD’s blog, The Uneasy Supplicant.

This is a proud moment for me and for JD. It is more than a badge of honor; it is a promise to always work toward writing excellence. This was the original purpose of my blog, and I consider this momentous occasion a launching point to refocus my efforts and to write as well as my abilities allow. In due time, in conjunction with JD, I wish to bring others into The Midnight Wanderers. Thank you all for reading Mr. Grudge and The Uneasy Supplicant.

The Rules of the Midnight Wanderers:

Everyone will have the designation of Official Member. New members may suggest another blogger for membership; but in order to maintain the true spirit of The Midnight Wanderers, the founding members must review them for admission.

If someone is offered the badge and refuses to display it, that is their right; however, they will not be able to call themselves a member of the Midnight Wanderers. If they change their mind and want to join after a refusal, they can be inducted after writing an essay proving their value to the founding members. The essay’s length and subject matter is to be determined by the founding members, will be tailored to the abilities of the blogger in question, and will be posted on their blog for a three day period.

Membership of any new member may be revoked at any time by a consensus vote of the founding members for any conduct, which calls into suspicion their dedication the cause of the Midnight Wanderers, degrades the group, or demeans another member of the Midnight Wanderers, or if that member engages in hate speech demeaning another’s race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin.

All members of the Midnight Wanderers will exhibit high standards for writing, a dedication to their craft, and continue to promote the craft of the written word with their unique styles and literary voice. That is the mission of the Midnight Wanderers.

*If you have any questions or comments, please e-mail me, or contact JD over at The Uneasy Supplicant. Thank you all.






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What Not To Mention

As this blog becomes more and more popular, it illustrates a paradox between my alter ego, Mr. Grudge, and the real me. Here, I write articles, stories, and personal essays, and no one seems to get too rankled by the content of any subject I broach. Contrast that with my social life, and the differences are glaring.

You may be surprised to learn that I have the unerring ability to stick my foot in my mouth in any social situation. It’s not my fault as I am being chastised by unseen forces in the universe which are out to get me. When my wife and I are with people we are meeting for the first time, or with family, or even close friends, predictably, I'll say something which should have been left off the table, if you will. It’s not that I want to hurt anyone’s feelings; it’s because I’m a bit of a social oaf. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy meeting others and having a good laugh with friends, but my mouth often operates before my brain has a chance to put itself into gear. As a result, I’ve had some awkward moments.

Before we go to a party or dinner with other couples, my darling spouse covers a list of things I probably shouldn’t mention since it may cause a bit of an uncomfortable situation with those who will be present. She’ll say things like “Gary lost his job so don’t ask him about work, John and Teresa are getting divorced so don't ask if they are going to have kids, and the doctors have no idea what that hairy, bulbous thing is growing our of Ron's forehead so don't stare at it, and God help you if you point to him and ask him what he's going to do about that.” You get the idea. Do you think I get the hint? Most of the time; but, there are always items which slip past even my wife who spends an awful lot of time compiling her list of “don’t say that’s” before we go to a social event.

Long ago, when we were planning our wedding, my “then fiancé” and I were at a diner with friends discussing our plans. The couple we were with, Millie and Ted, knew my wife long before the two of us met. In fact, the girlfriend, Millie, and my wife went to high school together. This couple was with my wife on the night we met for the first time. It is also important to note that we attended their wedding.

I hated Millie and Ted’s wedding. The party was such a crashing bore that I counted fire extinguishers, ceiling tiles, and checked out the cute, young women in the crowd to entertain myself. I even played my favorite wedding game “spot the old bridesmaids dress” where I look at a female guest and determine if the gown she is wearing was in fact a recycled bridesmaids evening dress she wore at another nuptial as a member of the bridal party.

You know what I am talking about. These are dresses fashioned out of material which Hollywood uses for space traveler costumes in low budget science fiction films. Many of these garments have an enormous bow, which for some reason designers place on the back of each dress just above the buttocks making it difficult for the woman to sit. I guess they figure that any girl in the bridal party is going to be whooping it up on the dance floor all night and they won’t need a chair. Also, the colors these dresses come in disregard God’s natural rainbow with a defiant fist, as they are never used for any other type of clothing. They include: Burnt Orange, Apricot, Chianti, Buttercup, Dusty Lavender, Kiwi, and my favorite, Lipstick. Only a friend would wear these colors out in public for another friend. And, I don’t blame a woman for wanting to get more mileage out of a few yards of satin that she shelled out $350 for just to wear for a few hours. But, I digress.

Their wedding was so bad that even the Dee Jay they hired was appalling enough to make one uncomfortable. He was an older gentleman who not only played music from the 1940’s most of the evening; his mixing console used cassette tapes. Not CDs, not vinyl records, but cassette tapes. He’d speak into his Omni directional microphone to announce a tune, and if his head veered an inch to the right or left you couldn’t hear him. What you could hear was the sound of him plopping in the tape over the P.A. system, and then the sibilant hiss of the tape winding across the tape heads before the song played. It was appalling.

I was seated at a table with my wife and all of her friends from high school and I didn’t know a single one of them. They didn’t even want to talk to me as they laughed and giggled about their "rebellious" teenaged exploits such as when in the tenth grade they all jumped into Bobby Johnson’s father’s station wagon and went to the barn dance and drank beer in the parking lot. What a truckload of dorks. It was stories like that one which made me rethink our engagement. Nevertheless, I was absolutely writhing in boredom. My eyes held a morbid curiosity with the fumbling, unskilled, Dee Jay as he whipped out another timeless classic from "The Andrews Sisters." Incredulous, I turned to the young lady next to me, pointed to the man with my thumb and chuckled “Do you believe this guy?” Suggesting that he was some sort of clown. She leaned towards me and said, “Yeah, he’s my uncle.”

What are the chances of me choosing his niece out of an auditorium full of two hundred people to make that comment to? If I had those types of odds playing in my favor while playing the lottery, I wouldn’t be blogging right now; I’d have servants doing it.

That brings me back to two years after Millie and Ted’s dreadful wedding. The four of us were in the diner discussing our wedding plans. By coincidence, and after investigating dozens of wedding halls, my wife and I settled on the same venue where Millie and Ted had their reception. There were two options for a cocktail hour. You can host one indoors with a small band and a bar. Or, you can have the cocktail hour outside under a large awning on the side of the building. Millie lobbied hard for us to host the cocktail hour outdoors.

“Are you kidding?” my mouth said. “Like I want to sit outside under a converted car port, next to the chain link fence where the valets park the guests’ cars on the other side, and have exhaust fumes seeping into the hors dourves, and then everyone can marvel at the portable, electric, plastic, fountain which they wheel out on a drink cart and place next to the waxy, yellow, cheese dish.”

I sat back and watched Millie squirm. My wife’s head hanged low. Then Millie spoke. “We had the cocktail hour outside and it was nice.”

Oops, I forgot. I had completely erased their wedding from my memory. Lucky for me Millie brushed my comment off. She was more accommodating than perhaps I would have been if I were on the receiving end of such an ill-mannered remark.

I don’t know if I’ll change. At my age, maybe I don’t want to. After writing this post, I can make the argument that I am merely creating material for my novels and for this blog. But, we’re still friends with Millie and Ted. I’m just not allowed to mention their reception with them around. In fact all weddings are off limits. And, if I ever embarrass my wife like that ever again, she told me that I'd find myself eligible to marry some other woman who may be willing to put up with my constant slip-ups. That’s okay, as long as we don’t have the cocktail hour outdoors.






catering hall diner dinner dress friends gown High School marriage reception wedding

An Apology for the Dead

As a rookie cop working in Harlem in the early 1990s, I was introduced to death at a rate which illustrated the horrors life on a grand scale. Prior to being assigned there to work, my relatively sheltered existence only saw death through the rosy prism of a half-opened coffin and heavily applied post-mortem cosmetics. The deceased I encountered were relatives, neighbors, and even a best friend; all of them expired quietly and “naturally” and looked peaceful in their repose.

On the job, and not just in Harlem but everywhere I worked as a police officer, death has an unkind visage. Only those who experience the malodorous wretchedness of a lifeless body which has been exposed for a while can appreciate how vile it is. The mere memory of such a putrid stench causes anti-peristalsis. The stink never leaves the olfactory nerves. It’s a haunting odor, destined to return after one’s own death.

A sergeant of mine was ridiculed once for praying over a dead body at crime scene. The family of the victim was not present and he and his squad were awaiting for the coroner to arrive. Harmless enough, he thought to pay respects to this fallen person. Callous though, were the restless officers in his charge who’d seen too much and thought his actions ostentatious.

My own eyes grew weary of the abundance of death which is the reality of a big city such as New York. Eight million people live there, and a million or more commute to Manhattan and the other boroughs every day to work. There are murders, accidents, suicides, and natural deaths in numbers which are sobering to the uninitiated. Death does brisk business in Gotham City. It is easy for the morgue workers, fire fighters, emergency medical technicians, and even police officers who see unabashed death scenes long before a funeral director casts a magic wand over the deceased, to become as cold and distant as are also the eyes of the departed.

That is why the praying sergeant was mocked. It was not his faith they expressed amusement at; it as the gesture of dignity which he gave to a person whom others, in their defense, regarded as a mere object. Self protection against guts and gore often means removing reality from the details. It is not a dead person, but a cadaver; an object to be investigated and removed to a place where folks with ice water running through their veins do even more dirty work: an autopsy, a dissection, and examinations in all those places where maggots and vermin thrive. Pray over that? To do so is a reminder of what awaits steely eyed cops no matter how much they are told they are super heroes; and that is their own demise.

For myself, I remained civil with those whom I handled. There are faces, limbs, babies, and teenagers who glance at me from the corners of my paradoxical sleep while I am in bed. One particular night, we were called to a small apartment where the folks who lived there had a tenant. It is not uncommon for families in the city to rent rooms for extra money, and in this case the couple who lived there went through pains to respect the privacy of the young, thirty something year old woman who took up residence in their spare room down the hall. This tenant was diabetic. Health care is often unaffordable, and in her case, not available. Her insulin was scarce and she had meager means to obtain this necessary medication. After missing their house guest for about a day or so, the husband and wife made the decision to open her door and check on her. To their horror, the woman lay dead on her sofa bed. When we arrived, details became clear that this poor young lady slipped into a coma and passed away.

My squad sergeant assigned various tasks to the officers on the scene to expedite the investigation. With the husband present, we took inventory of the small room and began the tedious process of cataloging and vouchering her valuables which were few. It was my duty to remove her jewelry as the medical examiner will not collect a body with necklaces, rings, watches, and the like as they do not want to be accused of theft and these items are to be submitted to the probate courts.

The young woman had many body piercings, several in each ear, and she had dozens of bangles on each wrist. Removing these proved difficult as rigor mortis had set in and I needed to move her several times to take these items off her. Then, I had to slip off her rings. The best way to do that was to lubricate her fingers. The landlord offered us a small tub of soap and water. I took my time until my sergeant began to hurry me along.

I stopped what I was doing and told him that I was taking care of this as best as I could. He snapped at me again as he believed the coroner had arrived and he was anxious to leave the apartment. I told him once more, in no uncertain terms, that I was doing the best I could and short of using wire cutters, the rings wouldn’t come off any faster. He was miffed, but what could he do? I wasn’t lazy, and there is no special training for handling dead bodies. Trust me, I would have asked him to do it if I had the authority; but I didn’t. The sergeant was forced to wait.

Getting back to my unpleasant task, I washed this woman’s fingers in the warm, soapy water supplied by her friend, the landlord. She surrendered her rings to me. Then, I placed her hands gently on her chest after pulling her blanket up much the same way her mom or dad may have tucked her in at night when she was a young girl.

“I’m sorry, dear.” I remember saying. She deserved at least that much. It was her death, her final repose, that poor young woman; and like my other sergeant who openly prayed for the dead, I was remorseful.





Harlem New York City police officer crime scene morgue prayer dead body horror coroner coffin deceased

You’re as Young as You Aren’t

In spite of all of the gleeful optimism about youth and feeling young, no one accounts for emotions changing with age. The way one thinks is often directly hard wired to the body whether we accept that or not. Now in my forties (gulp) I no longer hop out of bed and begin my day with a reasonable amount of energy. I find myself opting for a quiet evening alone with my family rather than a jubilant night out partying with my wife and our friends. My body aches the next day after doing a lot of yard work, and that is after taking huge steps over the last year to get healthy and thin again. My point? You can’t stop aging and time.

You’re never as young as you think you are. I sailed through my twenties like a person who never had to look at his watch. My thirties brought huge change in my life as I became a family man. One marriage and two children later, I am a guy who was at the pointed end of a remark made by a co-worker the other day who observed: “Wow, you’re going gray.” That’s it. I’m officially middle aged. Not that I am surprised; it was bound to happen if I lived long enough. But, I no longer believe that “you’re as young as you feel.” If a ninety year old man feels like a seventeen year old, does that make him a teenager? How long does that last when he has the heart of a young adult but the prostate of a man almost a century old? My new philosophy is you’re as old as you are. There’s nothing wrong with that; but it took me almost four years to stop panicking about it, yet I can’t say I am entirely comfortable either.

Some guys go off the deep end when they have their mid-life crisis. They have affairs, buy sports cars, go on safaris and take up sky diving. I never did any of that; but I did have a bit of a crisis of identity. What have I accomplished? Where did I fail in life that I am not wealthy and don’t have homes all over the country? Perhaps these questions were immature, or silly; but, there are rich people in the world with houses in exotic locales. I'm just not one of them. In the end, I know what I did or did not do to get where I am; or, from the other side of the spectrum, to where I am not. My focus has shifted now to my children as they mature and need guidance in their futures. It’s no longer about me, and I cannot feel selfish anymore and lament about getting old. Am I as young as I feel? Do I really need to be twenty five years old again? What I need to do is grow up, if I haven’t done so already.

A while back, my wife and I took the kids to a family restaurant near our home. This is a barbeque style place with big plates of food and a gimmick where everyone can choose to watch different, big screen televisions hanging on the walls. The scheme is aimed at entertaining the kids, and we decided to go along with the idea for the night because our children asked to go there. It was fun, and settling into my accepted daddy role, I enjoyed eating with the family and I had no urge to go mountain climbing or ride all-terrain vehicles cross country.

We finished dinner and then climbed into the family car to pick up ice cream and then go home. A brand new Ford Mustang pulled into the spot next to us and a couple the same age as my wife and I stepped out. The man had a full head of gray hair, was wearing a sporty leather jacket, and looked like he was sucking in his gut. Along for the ride were two teenagers struggling to emerge from the backseat of the two door vehicle. We both watched as I had to wait for the kids to be clear of my car before I could pull out.

“Somebody’s having a midlife crisis,” I said, with a discreet finger aimed at the husband. “Look at that car.”

“I would say so,” my wife replied. “You’d think he’d at least get something with four doors.”

We both laughed, and I was finally able to put our sedan in reverse and then out of the parking lot to the main road.

“Think of the money he spent on that Mustang, and it looks like his children will be going to college soon.” I said. Then I turned to my wife. “You know, I had a midlife crisis, and all I bought were some stereo speakers and a new DVD player for the den.”

She looked at me and smiled. “At those prices, you can have one once a month, honey.”

You know, I’ve felt fine since then. I haven’t had a midlife crisis once a month as she jokingly allowed me to that evening. But, it’d be a nice excuse as my laptop is getting a bit slow and I need a reason to blow a wad of cash on a new one. But, I’m older and more mature now, less impulsive, and I can’t afford a Mustang. Not with two kids who will go away to college soon.





age, college, crisis, family Ford health kids middle-age Mustang restaurant youth

The Birthday Boy and the Moon Man

We all know the date and time when the first men landed on the moon, and the name of the first astronaut to set foot there; but very few outside of my family are aware that this event happened on my birthday. That’s not a matter for historians to consider; but to me, it is a big deal. In fact, the moon has had a special place in my heart ever since I was six years old and watched the grainy, black and white footage of Neil Armstrong hopping off a ladder on the side of the lunar module.

That day wasn’t a typical birthday scene with my family seated around the dining room table waiting for me to blow out the candles on my birthday cake. I remember having one of those conical, cardboard hats on with a rubber band chinstrap digging into my skin. Yet, there was a distraction as a television broadcast, repeating this momentous event for the world to see. The landing was a technological miracle, if you will, and a knockout punch to the Russians, who led the U.S.A. in the space race until then. Every American shared a sense of pride in this accomplishment, especially Long Islanders, as the Grumman Corporation made the lunar module. However, I was just a kid; and as much as I wanted to be thrilled about this new world of space travel and astronauts walking on the lunar surface, I was angry at Mr. Armstrong for ruining my party with his spectacular interruption.

I got over my annoyance quickly, however, as the allure of all things related to the cosmos caught up with me during those exciting times when we all watched men in space suits bounce around in the light gravity on our closest heavenly neighbor.

All my life I’ve been a night person. There is a mystery to the evening sky which draws my eye to its inky shores sparkling with celestial jewels. Throughout history, the moon, planets, and stars have beguiled both kings and paupers alike. My life takes a turn now and then, and the moon offers solace; its gentle face beckoning in its resolve to always be there.

My friend, this moon, which poets and scholars often describe, searches for me whenever I am at my bedroom window during the early hours. Sometimes full, other times partially shrouded, it hides among the clouds when the weather denies us our conversations. My unwavering connection to this living, rocky being (if you believe in its power as I do) persists, even when I glance away; it always draws me back into its embrace.

Perhaps I was a part of the moon, once. The particles that compose each of us have existed before in other forms. I feel echoes of its creation whenever I am driving home and the car radio lulls my ears and allows my eyes to focus ahead on the road glistening with rich, reflected sunlight. That the moon does not radiate its own energy is a myth; the sun merely highlights it. The moon winks at me when I deny I am a follower.

It knows my secrets, and I confide in the sky during my moments of hardship. Those moments of fear, doubt, sorrow, and anxiety hours and hours of sleeplessness where the window acts like a portal to the only object which has seen it all from the beginning. It knows my faith in God, hears my struggle with mortality, seeks to assuage my guilt for sins, and sins again, for which my fault seems eternal.

Not long ago, a bright, orbiting vehicle captivated a boy in the night sky. It drew him in, and he will never see it up close, not while he remains on this planet, and not while he is alive. On a dark night, maybe a few short decades from now, God willing, there will be a window nearby through which he can peek at his friend and say hello, just before he begins his journey to the surface of the moon.

Dear Readers: My friends JD, author of The Uneasy Supplicant, and fellow Midnight Wanderer, and Bob Johnson, author of Black Holes and Astrostuff, were the inspirations for this post. Thank you, gentleman, for your fine writing and for your blogging friendship. Please visit their blogs and be educated.





astronaut Grumman kings Long Island moon Neil Armstrong paupers Venus