I remember when dinosaurs roamed the earth. About a hundred years ago now. Great fucking clumsy arrogant things – they crashed through everything and left us small creatures to clean up the mess – Well, guess what? They’re gone and we’re still here – Makes you think, doesn’t it? Ah what do I know? …They say I’m the oldest man in the world – well, what does that get you? Huh? A telegram from Elizabeth Vagina the Third of the House of Dimwits or whatever her fucking title is. I’ve had a few titles in me life – The only one I’ve held onto is “Fucking Idiot” – I’m quite proud of that title and wherever I go, even into unknown places – all I had to do is start talking politics and sure enough within a few minutes someone will acknowledge who I am – I used to have a razor sharp memory – but now things blur together – I sometimes can’t decipher between what I’ve lived, read, or dreamed – Well, that’s what the doctors say – but what the fuck do they know, huh? – Let’s face it, if they knew how to live why would they be studying someone’s bowel? – You couldn’t pay me enough, y’know what I mean? – My mind wanders, forgive me – But at least I’ve felt something, y’know? I remember being a small boy – and I saw Les Darcy, the greatest boxer ever, step out of the darkness of a doorway. He was dressed in a beautiful suit, collar, tie, gold fob watch – I stood there transfixed – He was magnetic – He turned and looked down at me and smiled that smile – the smile that would finally kill him – and walked away – Not a word was spoken and I’ll remember it till I die – I hope to God that really happened and I didn’t just dream it – I’m pretty sure it did happen – Life has robbed me of just about everything now – I can’t walk – can’t eat -can’t have sex – can’t remember what sex was like – all I had left were me memories – and now He’s taking those away from me – You’d think He’d kill me outright rather than this sneaky stealing of things in the night – How come Darcy, who had everything, died at twenty-one and I’m still here? – Does it makes sense to you? – It sure as hell doesn’t to me – But what do I know? – I’m the Fucking Idiot – But Life goes on – and for some of us – on and on – and on – I have a couple of kids – a daughter – and a son – Haven’t seen either of ‘em in years – Still, I heard they’re proud of me – I believe they tell everyone their father’s the fucking idiot – Sometimes I dream of them – and in my dreams they’re beautiful in every way – But then again, so am I – That’s how I know it’s only a dream – I do remember riding in the Kelly Gang – Did I tell you? – I lived to tell about it, didn’t I? – Told Ned that the ambush at Glenrowan was a big mistake – He told me to fuck off, so I did – It’s lonely having the last laugh – no one laughing along with it – kinda spooky – Joe Byrne was a nice guy – So was Ned but his habit of trying on ladies dresses was a little unnerving to us country boys – He loved dressing up – Finally, he made himself that suit of armour – great concept but like all things Irish, deeply flawed – He forgot to cover his legs – Now I know the Victoria Police are renowned for their stupidity but – give me a break – it only took ‘em a few hours to work out that they could aim at his legs and bring the arsehole down. And down they did – You know what I mean? – I was invited to the reading of Ned’s will – I didn’t know whether to be touched or insulted when he left me his dresses – Anyway, in shame I took off to America – I joined the Seventh Cavalry under the command of General George Armstrong Custer – Well, what a friggin’ lunatic he was, you know what I mean? – Looked the spitting image of Errol Flynn in a blonde wig – I distinctly remember saying to him in no uncertain terms – “Listen Dickhead, there’s six thousand fuckin’ Indians down there!” Well, he just gave me that stupid vacuous smile of his and said “Alright then, let’s be about it!” and rode off, spraying me in mud from the hooves of his equally stupid horse, Bigballs – Well, what the fuck does that mean? – “Alright then, let’s be about it”? – I fairly quickly determined it meant “Let’s get a hurry on and get killed in the most grisly fashion.” Fortunately I had one of Ned’s dresses in me saddle bag and I rode off, side-saddle, in the opposite direction – I got about forty miles before I ran into the James Gang and they gang-raped me – Not the worst experience I’ve had – Still, I did try tellin’ them I was a man – seeing they were obviously too fucking dumb to work it out for themselves – but alas, I fell on deaf ears – I remember one of the Younger brothers grinning a set of decaying teeth and saying “Let us be the judge of that!” – I did and they never got back to me – It was a few days before I could resume riding side-saddle – but there I was – heading across the desert – a changed man – desperately traumatized – and crying into my perfumed hanky – I finally made it to Dodge City where I promptly bought some manly clothes and got drunk to prove I was…well …a man. In my present condition I was finding it easy to walk like John Wayne – I sang a popular song of the day, “Oh Mother, I’ve Just Had a Big Whopper and It Hurt Like Hell” and burst into tears – Fortunately someone in the bar recognized my royal lineage and called out “You must be a fucking idiot”, to which I replied, “Yes. Yes, I am. And I am honoured to be amongst you.” After that, their attitude toward me changed dramatically. Buffalo Bill walked up to the bar and said “You’re the kinda gal I’ve been lookin’ for” – To cut a long story short – I ended up having quite a successful career under the name of Annie Oakley – Let’s face it, I wasn’t the first person in show business to become a star by working in drag. Two years later I left Dodge City with some colourful memories, a love letter from Wyatt Earp, a different view of life and riddled with VD – This altered my thinking somewhat and I took off as a crew member of a sea vessel. The captain was a nice enough man – he had one leg and took an instant liking to me, much to the envy of the other sailors – Well, a few weeks into the voyage I realized we were sailing with a fucking madman. All he wanted to do was chase this fucking monstrously huge whale – I instinctively knew it wasn’t going to end well – He called the object of his obsession, “Moby”. One night, having put up with hours upon hours of listening to him ramble and rage about this fucking boring old prick of a whale, I lost my temper and called it “Moby Dickhead”. The Captain, Ahab, stopped and smiled. And, like everyone in showbiz, he had to embellish my idea by pissing on the tree. He shortened my idea to “Moby Dick.” In my honour, he said. Of course, true to form, he told no one else about it and my contribution has been lost to history. Not, may I add, the first time I have been written out of a good story – Anyway, we chased that fucking whale until we couldn’t remember what our names were anymore – Then, as moi predicted, that fucking spiteful blob said, “Enough is enough” and turned on us – Smashing the ship to the shithouse and taking the demented Ahab to the bottom of the ocean – All the crew perished except me – I was picked up some days later by a Norwegian whaling vessel and explained my story to them – I said, through an interpreter, that “…we’d all been fucked by a huge Moby…Dick.” I presume something was lost in the translation because I soon found myself back in the ocean. This proved to be a very trying time in my life. Still, what can you do? Fortunately, an English speaking person by the name of Bligh picked me up in his lifeboat. I asked him why he was rowing across the ocean and he confided that he’d too recently experienced a traumatic situation of which he could not elaborate. And, although he liked to whip me twice a day, we got on quite well and it was nice to be back in civilized company. I told him he bore a striking resemblance to Charles Laughton. He had no idea who I was talking about and it earned me another thirty lashes. But, having lived the life I had, I was painfully aware that things could be worse, and contented myself to looking on the bright side of things. Bligh told me he’d never known another man to say thank you after a good lashing. I was a chirpy chap in those days. So appreciative of any crumb. We finally made it back to London and I got a job working for a detective by the name of Holmes. He lived on Baker Street with his “friend”, Doctor Johnny Watson. I soon found out that my new employer was a raving coke-head and would stay up all hours of the night ranting about fuck-all. Several times I stumbled upon their late-night shenanigans – the two of them dancing around – Holmes looking like he’d dipped his sizable nose in the flour jar – with eyes like red pissholes. Creepy bastards. Made me long for Captain Ahab. Still, it was all good experience. I was able to draw on all this in my later life as a successful writer of children’s stories. I wrote under the name of Enid Blyton. My first book, Nuddy in Boyland created great controversy so the publisher changed the name to Noddy in Toyland. Couldn’t help feeling something was lost, but still – it sold well. I felt that the discerning reader was still able to read between the lines and get something out of it. Unfortunately, my favourite character, Big Dick, never quite recovered from my publisher’s molestation.
(c) Frank Howson 2014.
