All You Have to Do is to Listen. Louis Shalako.

Returned a suit, told a funny little story...#psychology

Louis Shalako

I returned my brother's suit, which I had borrowed.

And I know he’s been kind of suffering lately.

All you have to do is to listen—

I set up a lead-in, asking if the one boy has been laid off...yes. The other one still doesn't have a job, apparently staying up all night on the computer. I told my brother that he was suffering from depression. 

"All the signs are there," I told him. 

I went on to tell him the story. Big Frank was in the union. He knew what a layoff is. Yet when I was laid off from Fibreglas Canada, he was fucking fit to be tied. To him, it was a cop-out of some sort on my part--Frank wasn't a bad father, merely typical. He didn't have a real high opinion of his oldest son, who was, quite frankly, eighteen years old. He'd also co-signed a loan so I could buy an MGB for $1,500.00. That must have been a factor as well. So, after a couple of weeks or so, I started at Holmes Insulation. And it was terrible. It was a thousand times worse than Fibreglas, with the soft, sticky white wool floating in the air. Supposedly a twelve-hour shift, I walked out after four hours, or about the time when, (literally), for break-time, guys walked twenty feet to a picnic table right beside the effing production line. To eat a simple ham sandwich was to crunch on rock wool, ladies and gentlemen.

I cleaned myself up and went downtown to the federal building and talked to a recruiter for the Canadian Armed Forces. I told the man all about Big Frank. I told him the army would teach me some discipline--I told him it would 'make a man out of me', feeding him all the same bullshit that well-meaning folks dish out all the time. I told him I would get my teeth fixed in the army...I told the man they'd buy my clothes, my boots and feed me, give me a bed. Get my Grade 12, all of that sort of thing. The man suggested I come back in a week. If I still felt the same way, they'd sign me up. I got home about two-thirty p.m., within a few minutes, the phone rings. Fibreglas wants me back, for seven a.m. the next day. 

Big Frank usually arrived home a little after three. I played him real good--I told him I had to quit at Holmes, of course his face starts to redden and the mouth starts to open...I told him I had gone down to the recruiter, and they wouldn't have me...some kind of maturity problem, I told Frank frankly...poor old Frank was working himself into a fine lather by this point, and then I told him I was going back to work the next morning. And it was just a routine layoff, Big Frank: get over it, it happens, as he should damned well have known. But my old man was never so scared as when contract time rolled around, there was talk of a strike and he had all those useless mouths and a mortgage to feed. It's not that we didn't understand--it's not like he hadn't lectured us enough on the subject.

When my brother was 17, he and Big Frank were at such loggerheads, he threw a few things into the ’67 VW Beetle and took off for Windsor to live with our mother for a while. Even then, I had patience—I could sort of sit there and take it, (what with having an actual job, not to mention that fucking MGB), but The Duke was cast in a slightly different mold. It’s not like I didn’t leave home a few times—and come back, too. Quite frankly, I didn’t really grow up until some time in my late thirties, possibly early forties. I told him that too—my brother, I mean.

This is about when you look around you and realize that some of your friends aren’t even trying, while you, try as you might, seem to fail miserably about as often as you succeed at anything of any great import. There are clearly some lessons to be learned here. And some of those old friends still haven't really tried, anything at all.

The problem, is that you have three stubborn males, money is tight, and Dad is on a small disability pension. They’re also in affordable, geared-to-income housing, and subject to some rules…no matter where you are, or what you are paying, there’s going to be some rules, but one would think the three of them could figure a way to keep a roof over their heads and quite frankly, no one person has to do all the work and provide all the money for their sustenance. And neither nephew seems to be trying all that hard, but they’re young and they have their whole lives ahead of them.

They will get tired of having the old man all over their back. It's just a question of time.

As for myself, I may be practising psychiatry without a license, but it’s family after all.

Let’s hope we can plant a few seeds here and there.

 

#Louis

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Louis Shalako has books and stories available from Amazon.

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Thank you for reading.

 

Well, There Goes the Plan for Tomorrow. Louis Shalako.

Louis Shalako




This time of winter, the anger lurks very close to the surface. There's still a bit of winter left, and the first half of spring isn't all that nice either.

#winter

I was planning to go to work tomorrow morning, (that's because I desperately need the money) and then make it to the Salivation Army food bank in the afternoon. (That's because I don't have any fucking food in the house, and ODSP payday isn't until next week.) 

Unfortunately, my brother wants to drop his car off at the high school auto class so that they can work on it. (For free, right.) And he will need a ride home, and then a ride back later. My car acted up yesterday, but it worked well enough today. This is no guarantee for tomorrow. 

As I mentioned in a recent blog post, I have my own fucking priorities.

I go to work in the morning. I go to work in the morning, not the afternoon, not the fucking evening, not in the middle of the fucking night. That’s so that I can get done, get paid, and get the fuck to the nearest God-damned grocery store, and yes, the smoke-shack, and yes, maybe even the liquor store, or, sometimes, maybe even just a good, old-fashioned, God-damned fucking food bank.

Hey, maybe I just want to go to the dentist sometimes. Right…???

The Salivation Army food bank is open four days a week here in Sarnia, Ontario, from one o’clock to three o’clock in the afternoon. I guess maybe that’s what I was thinking—I could go to work in the morning and then go there in the afternoon.

Having gone to the dentist’s office this morning to get a cavity filled, only to discover that the tooth was cracked lengthwise, and had to be extracted, I've had nothing to eat but soup today. 

He ain't exactly the world's greatest communicator. An even worse listener—

And now, if you don't mind, I will proceed to punch THE UNIVERSE right in the mouth, however symbolically.

#fuck

I had money a few days ago, (that’s because I worked), and while at Walmart, I noticed Swanson frozen dinners on for $1.77. Right next to that, they had Stouffer’s frozen entrees on for the same price. I asked the lady at the checkout if that was right, and scanning them, it seems that it was. I bought four of them, for $7.08.

I’ve been sort of rationing them out, mostly because I don’t always feel up to making some big, set-piece dinner. One measly fucking Salisbury steak dinner, 345-grams, will be the only solid food I get today. Yes, I know exactly how lucky I am to have that—after all, I’m the one who has to arrange all of these little secular miracles. Just to illustrate, I’m a grown man of 58 years of age, six-foot-five-and-three-quarters, and I weigh about 206 lbs.—a bit on the skinny side for my height, maybe, but after twenty-two years on the Ontario Disability Support Program, what in the hell else would you expect.

That’s the funny thing about plans, ladies and gentlemen. No matter how good, or even how simple it might be, there’s always somebody out there all ready and waiting to fuck it up for you.

END

Fuck. Anyways, I have some books and stories available from Kobo. Have a look if you like, there’s always something there for free.

Click the author’s name, and you’ll see quite a number of titles.

Images. Top: NASA, the UNIVERSE, about to get a symbolic punch in the mouth. Bottom. Self-explanatory, pic by Louis.

Thank you for reading my fucking shitty little rants.

No Plan is Truly Fool-Proof. Louis Shalako.

 Louis Shalako




No plan is truly fool-proof.

This morning, ten after seven, I was squatting in a couple of inches of water, as well as the dark, the cold and the rain. The tire I had plugged yesterday was holding air, so I could jack up the car and put it back on. That took ten or twelve minutes, suffering all the while, and in fact my lower back is stiff and sore. Firing up the vehicle, I got about one block and then the fucking yellow 'check engine' light was on, and the vehicle was running rather rough. All I could do was go around the block and try and get her back in the parking lot before she died. 

This car has something called 'limp home' mode, which is exactly what it says. It will get you home, but she will not start up again. And, just before I got to the entrance to the parking lot...it cleared up and the light went out.

Fuck.

What do we do now? I still needed smokes and gas. So I just continued on up the street, sticking close to home and trying to decide what to do. Money in hand, the engine was still behaving. Turning in the opposite direction, (which coincidentally goes past my building again, just in case of trouble), I went to my regular gas station, where the coffee is cheaper and I get to make it myself--if it's the last of the pot, I might skip it, but today I got a regular sized coffee for about $1.14.

And the car was still behaving normally. The smoke-shack isn't that far away, so I headed on down there, also noting that my rear tire felt like it had about ninety lbs. pressure in there. 

(When I checked it, it was up in the high thirties, which I have since adjusted). Picking up smokes for myself and the fucking neighbour, which always seems like a pain in the ass, (it's not like I don't have other priorities), I decided to sort of angle up towards where the highway passes along the east side of the city. With the engine running fine, there was that point.

That point where you have to commit to the mission.

I committed to going to work, and it is true that I have a cell-phone and roadside assistance. 

And I was afraid. I was afraid of the thing dying on me, and then I have to decide where to tow it. I have no fucking money and the credit card is maxed out.

It's just stress, ladies and gentlemen, but I need that part-time job, and if nothing else, it puts a bit of food in the fridge and buys me a God-damned beer once in a while.

I might have even said a little prayer there--whatever that's worth, coming from an atheist.

Anyways, I got in three hours at the shop, I made it home, and hopefully the thing will get me to the dentist’s office tomorrow and the fucking food bank on Friday.

You guys know I have all kinds of books and stories on Google Play, right.

Image. Louis Shalako. (No, it’s not my car. I wish.)

Thank you for reading. Better yet, thank you for listening.

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