8,192 hours right now. That is all.

it just occurred to me. my blog IS online though I don't advertise it. I realize that sometimes people may find it by accident and out of curiosity check it out. Let's say, a fledgling writer stumbles across it, reads it and "borrows" some of my ideas for his own stories. That makes me wonder that maybe I should continue this blog offline. It's only online in case my original stuff gets lost. So I could take it offline and still add to it and it will be there right? I got to check this out. Maybe I'm a little paranoid but I should consider it. Ps... couple of recent pics I took:

The Harvard Square Incident

The morning started out like any weekend did back then— hungover and dry mouthed and wondering what time I went to bed. The only difference was that my friend Anna Robertson, who I met at The Rock, a bar in San Fernando, California in 1993, was here for a visit. She had stayed at my parent’s house, on my bed while I had slept on the couch after a night of trading drinks and sharing stories. Well that morning I was still a little drunk when the doorbell rang. Gary Trull was at the door, grinning his pre alcoholic smile and holding two Red Sox tickets. Did I want to go? For free? Now, Gary can be a little hard to take at first, especially when he doesn’t know someone so of course he began to rub Anna the wrong way. I really wanted to go to the ballgame but Anna was here to see me. I couldn’t make a decision. I think she sensed my dilemma. She told me to go to the game, have fun and to call her later. She would take a drive to Salem Ma or New Hampshire maybe and do some touristy things.

By 1995, I was partying and drinking all the time. I was still on a roll from 1994, my break out year so to speak. Pre 1994 I had been hurt by Anne and then Jolene. I was sick of girlfriends. So when I got thin again and found myself dating, I was not going to care or get emotionally involved. I was the wrecking ball now, so I thought— at least that was my attitude. And I was going to have fun and live on the edge. I was going to be alone and revel in it. I would do what I want. By adopting this new indifferent attitude I found myself unconcerned about monitoring my drinking as well.  I would get drunk and laugh off black outs. When I was hammered I would crave the bowels of hell just because it promised obscure Delights. I once drunkenly hopped into an empty cab to “borrow” it to drive home from Kendal Square— fortunately there were no keys in it. I drank and drove as if there were no laws regulating it. I often passed out in a stranger’s apartment, waking up in the morning and not remembering how or who brought me there. I once walked home naked from Jean and Johnny’s house at 3 am (from D’Angelo’s in North Randolph to my parents’ house). I once explained the X factor to Dano, that the X factor was a ride, and that I never knew where it would go or what was going to happen. My quench for the X factor plus a bottle of whiskey was a force to be reckoned. By May 21, 1995, my drinking had been getting me in way too many awkward situations.  I was starting to become someone that Rich and Dano didn’t enjoy being around— becoming way too unpredictable. Despite my drinking, I was never violent, maybe to myself but never to others. I was happy stupid legless idiot drunk

So me and Gary hopped on the MBTA and went to Fenway Park for an early afternoon game. We sat in right field bleacher seats where the sun was hot and directly on us. I drank one beer to every two by Gary. He got buzzed pretty quickly. He got loud. I could sense the people around us getting agitated. Eventually and predictably he became too buzzed, loud and obnoxious. I probably should have sensed it might be a bad day after security kicked Gary out before the 7^th inning.

I liked Gary. I had known and been friendly with him since I had moved to Randolph in 8^th grade. I met his brother Kevin first— Kevin being the second kid I met upon moving to Randolph.  Gary had his own problems. His demon was alcohol and drugs. Alcohol generally made him mean, rude and insufferable (perhaps even invincible but then again I thought I was too). You know the story. Everyone has a friend or knows someone who knows a guy who, when sober, was a great guy and fiercely loyal to his friends. Once he passed that threshold, typically fights broke out or police somehow would become involved. As a friend, I kept him at a safe distance. We did not hang out all that much. I knew his potential. But I also knew that not all nights ended in a fight so I was cool with hanging out from time to time.  
 

We arrived at the subway entrance, just beside the Out of Town News store. There were a bunch of younger kids, some maybe my age smoking and hanging out. There were two girls sitting beside the entryway and I stopped to talk with them. I smiled. I asked if they wanted to hang out and grab a beer. I don’t remember exactly what her response was but it was negative.  I lingered cluelessly, repeating that they should come have a beer with us. Gary pulled me away. I could tell by his demeanor that we should leave now. So I followed him down the stairs. Out of nowhere, I was tackled from behind and I tumbled down the stairs on to the platform. I was getting kicked and punched by the girls and another guy. It happened so quickly. I was able to look up and see that Gary was tangling with one of the bigger kids, threw a final punch at him and then they all took off. Gary picked me up from the ground and hurriedly shuffled me on the next train. But the damage had been done. I was sitting on the train, cut up and bleeding. At the next stop as the doors opened the MBTA police were there waiting and Gary and I were arrested.

Here is the police report: At 0007 hrs, 5/21/95 C-881 officer’s Hooley and Martin were dispatched to Harvard Square for a report of a fight on the platform. Upon arrival officers spoke to white female and stated that two W/MS kicked and punched her, suspects were not known to her. She stated that a W/M later ID as James Utley knocked her down and while holding her down stuck his face in her crotch stating “how deep do you think I can go in you.” She advises that she is six weeks pregnant and both suspects kicked her in the stomach. The victim refused medical treatment. Five witnesses came forward confirming the victim’s statement. Both suspects were identified by victim, S/PS arrested for above charges advised of rights and booked.

                                                                                 

Days after the incident: it doesn't look bad in photograph but it was worse in reality. Also my knee was cut up too.

Pretty fucking scary. And all lies. The five friends who came forward were those who gang tackled me. I was being charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon by means of shod foot. The actual wording went like this: did, by means of a dangerous weapon shod foot, assault and beat Nicole Gaudett and did commit an indecent assault and battery on a person who had attained age 14, without the consent of said person…. So, I was appointed a lawyer, Neni Odiaga and thus began a succession of court appearances. Each session went nowhere and it seemed like every month I had to go back to the Somerville courthouse. Paperwork from Neni came in the mail. I was sick to my stomach.  My lawyer and her investigators continually made attempts to interview the others involved but their addresses were not known or no one responded. Finally they contacted one of the witnesses, her friend and this was the story she gave the investigator which, was only a little true.

12/27/95 “PC to Chrystal Wynn. Wynn reports that she forgets much of what happened at “the pit” on the day in question. She reports that she and Nicole were sitting on a cement bench in the area before you would enter the subway station. Wynn reports that she and Nicole were talking when a man with long hair approached. Wynn reports that he had alcohol on his breath. Wynn reports that the man started asking Nicole questions— where are you from, what part, etc? Wynn reports that the man was basically trying to pick the AV up and she wasn’t interested. Wynn reports that Nicole went to Shannon Carrol and asked him for help. Wynn reports that when Nicole started talking to Carrol, the long haired man started asking Wynn questions. Wynn reports that Shannon asked the man with the long hair, “Why are you bothering my girlfriend?” Wynn reports that the man with the long hair and Shannon Carrol exchanged words and the man with the long hair said to Carrol, “Can I stick your girlfriend?” Wynn reports that the man then ran down the stairs into the subway station and Carrol and Nicole followed. Wynn reports that she remained outside the station until Jesse Farrin came outside of the station and informed Wynn that Nicole and the man with the long hair were fighting. Wynn reports that she then ran down the stairs into the subway station and as she approached the AV, she saw the man with the long hair kicking the AV. She then saw Nicole, the AV, gasping for breath and the man with the long hair got on top of her, straddled her and held his fist to her face as though he were going to punch her. Wynn reports that at that point Shannon Carrol pulled the long haired man off of Nicole and then a man with short hair approached Shannon and started fighting with him. Wynn reports that she and Jesse Farrin dragged Nicole away from the fight but were close enough to still see what was happening. Wynn reports that Shannon was fighting with the man with long hair and he had him up against the wall of the station when the man with short hair pulled him away from the other man, ripped Carrol’s shirt, pulled his hair and gave him a bloody lip and nose. Wynn reports that the man with long hair looked bloody also. Wynn reports that at that point the police arrived and everybody ran and she did not see anything else. Wynn describes the man with the long hair as having light skin, chestnut hair, long and curly tied in a ponytail; medium height; thin; blue sweater jacket with hood; jeans; and boots. Wynn describes the short haired man as short, nice hair; no facial hair; thin; tall; broad shoulders. She reports that she does not recall what this man was wearing. Wynn reports that she and AV met at a teen program called communities for people. She reports that at that time Nicole thought that she was pregnant (not positive) and that she may have miscarried during this altercation because she was bleeding from her vaginal area. Wynn reports that she is no longer friends with Nicole because she, Wynn, is now pregnant and now resides at home and wants nothing to do with this case and is not showing up for court if she is summoned. Wynn reports that as of July, Nicole wanted to pursue this case and wanted justice to be served.”

This of course is comical now but back then it sickened me to no end, I used to get upset stomach every time I drove over the Tobin Bridge and could see the Cambridge courthouse on the skyline. These were serious accusations. They might as well have thrown rape and attempted murder in there too. There are so many holes in this story it’s amazing. The funniest part is after I supposedly wanted to stick Shannon’s girlfriend, I ran away. Then what? They followed me? Why? I’m gone, good riddance and be happy that I’m gone. The only parts of this story that were true— yes I was pretty buzzed and yes I was probably trying to pick her up. Gary who was right there sensed trouble so he pulled me away and we walked down the stairs. For some unknown reason, I was then gang tackled by Shannon, Jesse, Wynn and Nicole. The other part that was true— Shannon was bleeding and Gary beat the crap out of him.

So finally the big day came on September 4^th : the trial, if it got that far— it was to be a pretrial first so the lawyers could talk to the judge, pass motions and prepare for the case if it went forward. Gary was with me as well as this girl Karen I was having a fling with off and on. At one point we silently crossed paths with Shannon and Nicole at the elevators and we turned and used the stairwell. Shannon was a tall lean kid with a white Irish face and shaved head— looked just like a punk. Nicole had long blond ratty hair and a sarcastic expression. My lawyer found out that Nicole had been in court before at 14: for threatening to commit a crime and as part of her probation was sent to a DYS house.  I hated looking at them, hated just knowing they were in the same building as me— I just wanted to say, what the fuck is wrong with you? Other than the fact that they probably had nothing going on in their lives, they had already got what they wanted out of me. Once they beat the shit out of me and ran, I became an excuse for the cops and the law— so they wouldn’t get in trouble, they invented a story to pin it on me.

My lawyer recommended that I take a Continued without a Finding (it is a small admission of guilt but no jail time— my lawyer didn’t want it to go to court and put in the hands of a fickle jury), which I did, despite Nicole’s lawyers pleas for it to go to trial and for my punishment to be served in jail. The lies puked out from her lawyer’s mouth. It sucked listening to it. However I think the judge could see through it all. In the end, I got my Continued. As part of the Continued without a Finding, I had to pay a hundred dollars fee, go to an alcohol evaluation and to follow their recommendations and of course their evaluation was that I needed to join the program, for a fee of course, probation for a year which included weekly random piss tests, AA meetings to be signed off on, and meetings with my probation officer (who watched me piss in the cup less I alter the chemical makeup of my urine,) and finally to stay away from victim and Harvard Square MBTA station.

Now, that I was free from the Cambridge Court, I was stuck here for at least a year. As I said in a recent blog, I had recently gone to Canada for a twelve day adventure, fell in love with it; at the time of the Harvard Square Incident I was making plans to move to Montreal. Of course that wasn’t going to happen. So that fall, I registered into UMass Boston and took a creative writing fiction class, an advanced class, where I began the early manuscript of my first novel, Fat Habits (the title coming from the story in which the class referred to it as the work called, Fat Habits). I took the train to school. I was living in a house on the first floor beside my parents with two other roommates. The probation, the piss tests, the AA classes— it was all draining the energy out of me. I was working as a delivery driver in for a microfilm company in Randolph.

One day, coming off the shuttle bus at UMass Boston, as I usually did, I grabbed a free copy of the Boston Phoenix— dated September 1, 1995. On the cover is a picture of a punk rocker with a mohawk. The story is called In the Pit: The Kids who hang in Harvard Square. I delved right into it. The inside story is called Low Hopes and high times in Harvard Square and its filled with pictures of misfit runaways and young alcoholics and well wouldn’t you know, a close up of Shannon Carrol, King of the Pit. The story seems to put these losers in a positive light— they are troubled but cool kind of thing. The first paragraph sets the tone for the whole 3 page articles that chronicles the homeless, druggy, handout lifestyle.

Here’s the first paragraph: “Nate Murphy is holding a foot long rubber penis in his hand. Drunk on cheap beer, he sits on the hot cement as the sun beats down.

“Wanna see my dick?” he yells.

One kid grabs it, starts pounding it against the sidewalk saying he’d like to beat the shit out of somebody.Mike, tall and wiry with glasses hangs the dirty pink thing from his fly and walks through crowded midday Harvard Square.

“I got it from some girl this morning,” Nate tells anyone willing to listen,” after I fucked her for four hours.”

He’s 18 with a green Mohawk, dirty Misfits t-shirt, ring through infected bottom lip. His words are hostile, obnoxious, menacing.

“I might have to kill you,” Nate tells me at one point and laughs. At another point he refuses to talk unless I buy him a 40 or at least hand him change for beer. I say no. He keeps talking anyway.

And then there’s a few paragraphs about Shannon: “ Not everyone calls him the King of the Pit but three years there, he has more influence than anybody. Younger kids look up to him. Punks passing through catch on. Homeys respect him. New arrivals ask where the drugs are.”

“Drugs are big in the Pit. Smoking pot and drinking are the most popular— they’re easy— but acid and even heroin and coke is within reach.”

Okay so I’ve wasted enough time on this stupid article and the losers it chronicles. I only wish this article had come out before my trial. Maybe I would have just gone to trial, won hands down and moved on with my life, possibly to Montreal. Eventually, I would get out from under this sentence with the help of a friend, Anna (the same one who was visiting the day of the incident). Now she lived in Chicago and I was loosely thinking about moving to Chicago to get away. I say loosely because I was slave to justice system here until September, another six months. I talked to Anna about this. She offered up an idea. She would pretend to be a company in Chicago who was interested in hiring me. She wrote a very official looking letter. I forget if it was to the courts or my lawyer but whatever I made an appointment with her and we went before the judge and told him my dilemma. And just like that, he set me free: no more AA classes, probation and piss tests. “The disposition imposed serves the end of justice. Defendant acknowledges his offense. He is under substantial supervision of the court. Because Defendant has no record and otherwise leads an exemplary life, I find that this offense is aberrational. Therefore, I believe that a continued without a finding disposition with an alternative sentence of 6 months committed time is appropriate.”  Judge Johnathan Brant. March 8 1996.

So, I was free. I was still living at the apartment, searching for something more. Now I was seriously considering moving to Chicago. A month later I began dating a girl, Robin MacKinnon, the first serious girlfriend I’d had since Jolene. I didn’t lie. I told her I was going to be moving in the near future. She was okay with it. Later she would tell me, at first, she secretly hoped I would stay and then later, entertained thoughts of going with me. At that point I had told her about the incident (which I was afraid to because maybe she would view this incident as big trouble and so disgusting she would just go away— but she didn’t). I told her the real reason I was moving away was to just get away from it all for a while, retreat, reassemble and figure out my next move in life. We could still have a long distance relationship I said. I was burnt out from the wildness, the meaningless hookups. But in the end, I never went. I began working in the HVAC trade.

Towards the end of 1996, I no longer wanted to hang out with Gary. I just never knew if I was going to get Jekyll or Hyde. The last moment of our friendship came one night after I returned home to my apartment. He was there, alone and wasted. He had trashed the apartment looking for a video tape (the week before, me, Gary, Rich, Dano and Kevin had filmed a skit and coincidentally, Gary didn’t even have a line— maybe one I don’t remember).  He drunkenly threatened to burn down the apartment if I didn’t produce the video tape. I had no idea where the tape had gone too; in fact I think he may have unknowingly destroyed it earlier when he smashed the few video tapes on the TV. I ended up calling Rich and Dano to help me out in case he was in fact going to burn the house down. Rich and Dano came and Gary continued drunken rant and offered to take us all on in a fight. We stood our ground and eventually he would drift away into Belcher Park.