9: Love Was Always on the Tip of My Tongue

 
          Melissa Sternwood coasted up on her Raleigh bicycle and stopped under the Mars Food sign. "Take a good look at that sign, and tell me what's wrong."
              The sign had a circular yellow neon rim and a pink ring like Saturn's, with 'Just out of this world' enclosed in yellow. The upper half had 'MARS' and the lower half had 'FOOD,' in green neon.  On a background of powder blue the lines of longitude and latitude clashed with the overall theme.
             "I just punched Bud Rose in the mouth," she said, ignoring my question. "Two woman witnessed it, so I don't know what they thought." Melissa hooked her bike, and we went inside. Over cheese blintzes she talked of how she was once the head of the Progressive Conservative Youth Party, when she was in high school. "Men like to have a cute fifteen year old girl pin a button to their lapel," she added.
            We went to Paul's apartment on Bloor Street for a short visit. A string of bells hung on the door, with bizarre pictures. One picture was a nude lady running towards an open window... Inside, reproductions of the Impressionists occupied the same space as pin ups. Paul was raised in Chicago, and went to a parochial school named after Bart, a Saint who was flayed to death. One of his teachers looked like Clark Kent in the TV series Superman, and would often make mock dashes out of the room after something jarred his attention. Mr. Nash offered us Heineken as we sat on the couch.

              While Melissa phoned her mother, Paul showed me my astrological chart, he had made for me — about 30 handwritten pages long. The lines that pertained to me the most were underlined in red. "I won't be coming home for dinner because a nice man has taken me out to eat, and we're going to the movies. All The Presidents Men. Yes mother, at Cinema Lumiere." When she hung up Melissa quoted her mother's admonition: "'Cross your legs and take three breaths.' She's a high ranking member of the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire and doesn't want her me to besmirch her stirling reputation."
             We left telling Paul we would drop by Fatal Berts after the movie, it being an early showing and the coffeehouse tending to go on forever. As we walked down the steps past the Oriental Palace, Melissa said, "Paul has a nice smile."
               After the movie Melissa and I went to Fatal Berts where Mary greeted me with a hug, setting off a chain reaction. Katrina walked in and hugged Mary. At last I was hugged in jest by Alcatrash, who was just making a bold, but unrequited statement.
             I showed Melissa the pills I had just been prescribed, Elival Plus, because she had looked at me when Mary quietly exclaimed, "What, you got sick again?"
Melissa looked at the pills and said, "Oh, I've had to take those pills on occaision."
          All this and much more was going on while the performers were performing. Sometimes the circus in the stands is more of a circus than the circus in the arena. Poets performed, the most notable being Peter Paul Van Camp, who sent me a post card from Coshocton Ohio. But waves of lessor poets made incursions into the folksingers turf, and their performance was often the cause for rampant socialization in the audience.
              A few singers sang, then Melissa went on stage to read her poetry. Paul said, "She really is a 'really good poet,'" in a voice that said. 'I told you so.' Everyone clapped after each poem. Usually the audience waited for the end, or left the room when poets come on. Sometimes, they would snap their fingers Bohemian style.
             As soon as Melissa finished we went out to the courtyard. After putting our heads together to come up with a better way to say goodnight, I went  to the tune up room where a sizable sing-along was in progress and said good-bye to everyone. Went outside to the trees where my bicycle was shackled, and Melissa was still there. I fumbled with the combination.

           "You know if you weren't going back to Ottawa at the end of summer I could almost fall in...." And just then, Paul Nash appeared from behind the skinny tree and went on a magniloquent impromptu rant that ultimately became his balloon allegory. Melissa and I made it to Yonge and were about to part for the evening. As I headed to Crazy Alarm Company she said, "You almost said a word back there that you might have regretted saying. Its a good thing you didn't." Someday I'm going to write a song entitled: Love Was Always on the Tip of My Tongue.

 

Stefan’s Chart

Unswerving loyalty to friends;
love the beauties of nature;
strong moral sense;
tendency to be overcritical in affairs of the heart;
necessity to use mind to improve health;
friends can be disillusioning if unwisely chosen;
egotistical "holier than thou attitude;”
fluctuating state of health”
strongly influenced by emotions;
not easily surprised by anything seen or felt;
able to experience beyond the five physical sense;
outgoing nature sparkle social gatherings;
uncontrollable energy seeking an outlet;
can survive fevers that could kill others;
great need to reassure self of own worth through overt expression of strength and courage;
impulsiveness in company of others can lead to injury or death of self or others;
over self-indulgence can lead to physical degeneration and the resentment of others;
peculiar circumstances surround romantic attachments;
often get answers in sudden flashes of insight;
isn’t easy to admit mistakes;
may be undermined by lack of seriousness;
by accepting reality and gaining self control any goal attainable;
tend to push luck, hopefully will learn discretion;
demand much from loved one;
and (teachers bored you) knew things intuitively.