As The Carriage Wheel Turns

I had a nice lesson tonight in not judging a book by it's cover. I gave a ride tonight to two couples in town celebrating a birthday. They were somewhat average for a Saturday night ride- nicely dressed, had eaten a great meal and were seemingly nice people. What I learned while taking them around downtown was how down-to-earth they were, how genuine and funny. It made me think of their family lives and how rich and rewarding they must be. I think what surprised me the most was their senses of humor. With a well-developed sense of humor, life's problems minimize on their own. With the wives belly laughing at their husbands' jokes, I could imagine children and lawns and homes functioning with all of live's attending annoyances and stresses, but in their neck of the woods, I saw smiles and happiness and, of course, love. Maybe some rides just don't let me in very far; these folks gave me a glimpse into who they really were, not who they wanted me to think they were. It was awesome and kind of made my night. There was some 'rimz' car show Downtown tonight and the cruisers made driving a carriage a challenge, to say the least. The weather was incredible- a high of 84 degrees today- in the middle of August! I was a couple's "limo" driver tonight as they booked me for a couple of hours and I took them where they wanted to go. They had a great time, downed a bunch of mimosas and had happily dove into the stronger stuff.  I had an ever-so-slight brush with fame tonight. I was in the gift store of the Peabody tonight and saw they had a teddy bear sitting next to some chocolate guitars. I took one of the guitars and put it in the bears paws, like he was playing it. Apparently, Mrs. Lansky, of Lanksy, The Clothier To The Kind of Rock and Roll, the guy who got Elvis to wear pink and black, went into the store and liked my creation!! I almost met Priscilla yesterday but it wasn't to be. I am more interested in meeting Lisa Marie as she is actually related to Elvis. Although, I always wonder how many people on the planet right now are related to Elvis as well. Are there other Lisa Marie's out there that we don't know about? And don't most people have kids? So, the guy you meet at the coffee shop who looks a little like Elvis and just happened to sing like a bird, well, ya never know. Until another day of As The Carriage Wheel Turns...

Give the people what they want

For the fourth year in a row, we have had August weather in July here in Memphis. However, exactly where the current weather came from, I have no idea. I had a ride last night from Oklahoma City and they are not having near as nice a summer as we are. They said it was 114 degrees recently- it's almost like God just likes Memphis and decided that not only should we have a beautiful springtime but a wonderful August as well. It is a high of 84 today- last night, I wore a sweatshirt after about 10 pm- a sweatshirt in the middle of August!! Crazy, but in stating what things are like, I want the Universe to know, I am not complaining! Lots of Elvis Week people still in town, beautiful weather- I must say, I am quite happy. Got to spend some time with friends last night- it's funny how you can work with somebody on the street for years and not get to really spend time with them. Unless, of course, it's wintertime. Then, there is all the time in the world to shoot the breeze, talk about other carriage drivers (gasp!) and lament the cold. But talking with friends while out on the carriage line is a slippery slope as it can be addictive; one of the first things I learned on the carriage was how to maintain my personal space. Regular folks wanting to chat is one thing, an unwelcome carriage driver hanging around your carriage is detrimental to sales and one's mentality. With a little tact, some force of will and a smile, I have effectively learned how to be on the carriage by myself and to be unfettered by other drivers. Most drivers, I don't mind being fettered by (I thought I was making up a word and just being cute, but fettered is actually a word!) but there is the occasional person who wants to talk and talk and talk. That's what after work is for- just cause I don't look like I'm doing anything in the carriage seat doesn't mean I'm not working. I am guilty of reading while working, but that's an addiction I am happy to be fettered to. Started Black Spring by Henry Miller recently and am rather enjoying Notes From Underground by Dostoevsky, who I haven't read much by except for three fourths of Brothers Karamozov. Well, I can linger in front of the computer no longer, I must go and give the people what they want. :)


...This! This expanding moment, which has not defined itself in ticks or beats, this eternal moment which destroys all values, degrees, differences. This gushing upward and outward from a hidden source. No truths to utter, no wisdom that can be imparted. A gush and a babble, a squeaking to all men at once, everywhere, and in all languages. Now is the thinnest veil between madness and sanity. Now is everything so simple that it mocks one. From this peak of drunkenness one rolls down into the plateau of good health where one reads Vergil, Dante and Montaigne and all the others who spoke only of the moment, the expanding moment, that is heard forever...

- Henry Miller, Black Spring 1936

It's just life on the carriage.

Well, tonight was quite a bit slower than last night and with the accompanying lower amount of action as well. Told a young, white woman that if she didn't stop trying to bum money from people right in front of my carriage that I would sic the proverbial dogs on her. My husband, Chris, has had to do the same thing to her, and others, and has told me how, many times  they say they weren't panhandling when you just saw them do it. It had never happened to me until this woman said that I could call whoever I wanted because I hadn't seen crap (she chose a different word). A couple of years ago, I had a talk with one of the police officers downtown and asked him why the aggressive panhandler problem downtown was so unattended to by the police. He made the point that we don't want to make it illegal to bum money because what if you, yourself, were caught with no money and just needed a dollar or two to get home?. It is not inconceivable that it could happen to just about anyone (my husband, of course, insisting it would never happen to him) but it could. If it were illegal to bum a dollar that would make for an inhospitable world.And finding yourself without a home for whatever reason is unfortunate but that doesn't mean it is my problem. But when an aggressively-panhandling homeless person inserts his or her objectives into the area in front of my carriage (or, as I told a guy one time that he wasn't to try to bum money in front of my carriage or in front of the carriage of "anyone I know"- not sure where that came from!), then we both have a problem.
We get between six and seven million people coming downtown every year- that makes for the perfect barrel to shoot into for fish for a "homeless person". They quit selling single beers to these guys (mostly a male population) a couple of years back and that had a huge effect. I can't tell you how many times I have driven through Beautiful Court Square Park with a family ride on a beautiful day and encountered four or five grown men with beers in their hands, clearly drunk, clearly homeless. It is just inappropriate considering the amount of time, money and effort that went into reinvigorating Downtown over the last twenty years. A lot of people have worked diligently and against all odds to bring life to an old, decrepit and, by all accounts, dead, Downtown. Homelessness is a serious problem, one deserving of sincere reflection. Part of the reason it is such a problem is not just the people without homes but also the community in which in occurs.There are so many shelters in Memphis, too, and an awful lot of charity. There is a church on every block, just about, in this city of a million people. But a homeless person Downtown gets breakfast, lunch and dinner for free and an entire wardrobe from head to toe, for free, every two weeks. Nice clothes, too, from a church.
 Sometimes I think that the seemingly professional panhandlers and I really are fishing from the same waters when it comes down to it. Tourists, Memphians, Downtowners- these are the people the homeless try to ply with their sad, made-up-half-the-time story to, the stories that inevitably end in "I'm just trying to get home." Yet, when these same people walk by my carriage, I call out for their business with a resounding,"Ya'll ready for a ride?" I want your money, too. But the big difference is that I am not lying to you. My personal story has some sad in it, too, but I'm not selling you my sad. I'm selling you an honest ride with a safe driver, a healthy horse and happy Chihuahuas. The people who bum money downtown are con artists. I am not. My saleswomanship is based in truth in advertising- what you see with my rig is what you get. When I tell you I know a lot of history Downtown it's because I do. Do I know all of the history of Downtown? No, I'm not even from Memphis. But apparently know enough that most local rides I get hear the history of some part of Downtown that they didn't know. I'm not lying or conning you. The "homeless" are. Besides cops, who else Downtown sees these people for a third of almost every day? Is it fair to say I study them? I have no choice- I see them all the time, the whole time I'm at work.
     But, God love em, I can't change other people. And a far off goal for me is serenity in dealing with other people's craziness, being in that peace that let's me function in society without letting it make me nuts. However, when you decide to create a financially competitive space in front of my carriage, well, then it's on. And I will win. Why? Because I work. Because I help feed America's need to spend, on whatever. And Mr./Mrs.  Panhandler doesn't. They just take, take, take. But not tonight. No one was going to take away from the rides I sold in front of my carriage because I told Miss Hang-out-at-Denny's-and-bother-every- customer-as-well-as-anyone-who-walks-by-on-the-sidewalk-for-money-money-money to go away and not come back. Sounds harsh but it's just life on the carriage.

Mind My Own Business

When I was growing up and one of my three brothers was getting in trouble for something, I would pipe up and desperately want to know,"What did he do?". My dad would vehemently say,"MYOB!" or, mind your own business. This philosophy rings true to me to this day as I believe it leads to nothing but a healthier life for everyone involved. If my own life is far from perfect, who am I to tell you how to live yours? I believe The  Universe has a plan for everyone- I read the other day that no one can run from God for forever. Maybe a plan is in place for someone to realize God's role in their lives and then I come bouncing up, deciding that I know what's best for that person, that I, in my infinite wisdom, know more than The Universe. That is skewed and I know that part of my favorite part of being an adult is to not have other people are overly involved in my life's decisions. Can't get that Sarte quote out of my head these days: Hell is other people.
Because I give a lot of carriage rides during any given week, I wonder a lot about my role during those rides. I like to be hospitable and hopefully make people feel comfortable riding with me, but how much further is it my place to insert myself into these fine people's lives? Did they really come all the way to Memphis to see me and hear all the intricacies of my fascinating life? Generally, no. When romance is budding in the seats of my carriage, my place becomes clear- to drive and let the love happen. To show you the sights of downtown and explain, historically, where we find ourselves as we go through the parks, this all makes sense to me. But beyond that, if I mind my own business in the driver's seat and allow that God is everywhere, shouldn't people who get on my carriage be allowed to experience that hour or half hour the way God would want them to, for themselves? I quit drinking about four and a half years ago and went to AA for a while. (I'm not ruining anyone's anonymity if I out myself, right?) I believe part of my life's path is figuring out what God
wants for me in this life. But that begs the question- what role do I play in other people's lives? How far into someone else's life is it really my place to be? Suffice it to say, I am not entirely sure. But I do know that when I let God be in charge and not my ego, I tend to mind my own business a lot more and life flows more smoothly. Updates on this philosophy and it's effect on my life will be forthcoming. Have a wonderful day!

The King is Dead?

Was kind of a strange night tonight or maybe I was just in a strange place. Did lots of rides which is always nice but I felt kind of off all night. Sometimes, the difference between a weekday and a weekend night in Downtown is distinct and I think tonight was one of those nights. Lots of energies, lots of people, a whole lot of Elvis. I unabashedly admit that Elvis signs my paychecks and I am a big fan of both paychecks and Elvis. He died 35 years this coming Wednesday and people from all over the world come to Memphis in honor of that day. If he really died that day. Not sure if I mentioned this in a previous post, but I had a lady on my carriage the other day who is writing a book about the fact that she doesn't think that Elvis is really dead. She was from Australia and said that the book sold out quickly in the areas she distributed them in. I had a ride a couple of years ago and they were convinced that the whole thing was a conspiracy. After listening to them tell me why for a half hour, I have to say, it made me wonder. Most people who I mention this to, like the lady on my carriage tonight, say, "I always thought that." It feels weird to say something challenging about an iconic figure like Elvis, but it's not blasphemy, it's just a call for truth. If he is dead now, or alive, what are the rights of his fans to know one way or another? It's like celebrities saying that fame is part of the deal you make when you court that kind of success but the question always rises- where does the public thirst for personal knowledge of their idols interfere with a celeb's right to privacy? I have no idea but I do think that if the King didn't actually die 35 years ago next Wednesday, well, it's still a nice excuse to get together and celebrate his life. Until later...

"What is not in the open street is false."

"What is not in the open street is false, derived, that is to say, literature."
-Henry Miller, The Fourteenth Ward, Black Spring @1963

The technical difficulties of the last week put me off schedule with my newly resurrected blog. I think about this blog a lot as it is my latest writing project and therefore occupies a lot of time in the creative writing section of my brain. In fact, I have to be sure that life is relatively even in other areas of my world or writing obsession becomes the name of the game. When I was in my twenties, all I ever did was write. I ate, drank and slept writing- literature didn't help that situation much. In fact, I picked up Black Spring by Henry Miller yesterday and was sneaking in pages between rides all last night. There is something to reading a pocket size book by a quality author that draws me in almost without a fight, but Henry Miller always challenges me as to why there isn't a pen in my hand. An average week in my, say twenty-sixth year, would see my reading selection peppered with Henry Miller, Jack Kerouac, Alan Ginsberg, Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath-did I mention I was an English Major? One day in my mid twenties, I woke up and realized that I hadn't created much of a life for myself as writing was my all. So, I put writing aside specifically to work on my real life. Do I have a real life now? I would say so- a loving, doting husband, wonderful pets, a job I like and every day, I have more a sense of peace in a crazy world. However, the twenty, thirty and fifty-year-olds whose lives are occupied by their occupation of our city, namely Occupy Memphis, have not seemed to be able to move past the starving artist syndrome. The need to suffer for your good is, it seems, ingrained in the human psyche, but does it need our worries in order to live? 'Never give up', 'Stay focused on your goal' and, the every popular, 'No pain, no gain'- some of these philosophies were proven ineffective back in the 80's, yet the idea of creating some peace on the inside and seeing it on the outside strikes the modern young adult as blasphemy. Security, materialism, hell, why not call it what it is- the external world is the end all, be all to the average person I meet. But it is the kingdom within that I feel is my calling, my career, my salvation. Without the ability, like Sandra Bullock's character in 28 Days said,"to just sit on a couch and be okay", to be and feel that God and The Universe approve, without in internal compass with Peace as it's True North, what does a mere human being have besides trying to stay upright in the world's tumultuous waves of fear, pain, doubt, uncertainty and all the other pressures that slam against us every day? Without God, without peace inside, without a real reality for life, what do we have? Do I sometimes have too much time on the carriage to think? Yes, yes I do. :) Until next time...