My Last 5 Diary Entries

The Three People That Actually Read This

The Basement--as I remember it

I was thinking the other day about hood surfing and how I would like to write about it. But then, I thought some more and decided I couldn�t start there. I needed to give more background. I have been feeling nostalgic lately; I think it�s the time of year. My favorite time. It started this past week, the humidity is ebbing, the sky is a lighter shade of blue, the sun is a softer shade of pale, and I start thinking of new beginnings. I know the new beginning thing is in part a throw back from my days at school, and in part the fact that my birthday is in August. But this has always seemed like the start, the place from which things stem. And when I was 16, all things stemmed from the basement.

Not my basement, the basement at 900 Ironington. Marcus� basement. Marc for short. With a little anarchy sign for the �a�. That still makes me laugh. We were so---full, for lack of a better word, in our youth. So here you go, the starting line-up for the basement: Marc�6�2,235 lbs, with light brown hair shaved on the sides and long enough to hang over his face in the middle. Wearing a black trench coat and combat boots. Scary looking motherfucker, gentle as a bear, (with me at least) I have seen him turn people upside down by the ankle. Loved to smoke.... anything. Intelligent and a lover of great music. One of my personal basement favorites. Next up�Chris�6 feet, brown hair cut short, and brown eyes. Total jock. Soccer player, drove Blazer, projected huge asshole front but deep down quite sweet. Jonathan�the name says it all�sandy brown hair, ice blue eyes, looked like an Abercrombie and Fitch model, and quite probably wished he was one. Completely preppie and willing to break tons of hearts, but I knew him�insecure as hell, and a little needy, but a lovely friend who would stick with you. Bobby�heh heh , little drummer boy. The youngest. Long brown hair and dark brown eyes that were always laughing. The first crush I ever had on a younger guy. You know I like the musicians. Adam�not much to say about Adam�he was ok looking, brown hair, sort of a �grown out� look, and brown eyes. Not overly intelligent or humorous, not overly anything. Sorry dude. Anyway last on the �boys� side (but certainly not least) Brian�how to describe? 5�10, 165lbs, dark auburn/light brown hair, hazel eyes with flecks of gold and green. Eclectic. Soccer team, played bass guitar, smart as hell but never flaunted it, also smoker, also lover of great music. Probably the closest to Marc.

And now for the girls�dun- da- daa�Jessica�blonde hair blue eyed and buxom. Though she didn�t realize it. She never thought of herself as attractive, and she wasn�t, -in an obvious overrated way. She was beautiful though, and smart. A little down on men. The crush she had on Chris did not help, nor did the fact that she had a lousy father who left early. Very complex girl. One of the best friends I�ve ever had. Crystal�hee hee hee. Brown hair and eyes, a little too skinny, sort of bony, but very sweet and open. You could always count on her for shopping on a Sunday afternoon. Also longtime girlfriend of Brian. And then of course� there was me. What can I say about me? Long dark brown hair, dark brown eyes, 5 feet half an inch�oh and great boobs. The last part was huge a source of comment and interest to the �boys� side.

Marc, Adam and Bobby were in a band together called �Barbed Wire Bicycle Tire� (don�t you just love that name). Me, Brian, Chris and Jessica all worked at Taco Time. We all went to the same high school, at least for a while. So there you have it, all nine of us. Others stopped in from time to time, but it was always us. You may have noticed that there was a 2-1 boy- girl ratio�Jackie ain�t no dummy, and she has always felt more comfortable with guys. Now might be a good time to mention the list of the boys from the basement that I made out with, they are; (in no particular order) Chris, Jon, Brian and Bobby.

Anyway, Marc had a huge basement that his parents let us smoke and hangout in. They looked the other way on drinking and how late we stayed. The basement had a pool table (by far one of the best parts) a 19 inch TV, yard sale furniture and burgundy indoor/outdoor carpet. On any given weekend you would find us there. Even if our plans or sense of adventure took us to greater heights, that is always where we started and ended up.

The cigarette of choice; camel lights. We ended up with about a million and five of those �camel bucks� that you could buy crap with or whatever�whe never did. The music of choice�hmm�The Misfits, Nine inch Nails, Social Distortion, Jane�s Addiction, Concrete Blonde, Guns-n-Roses (who didn�t listen to them) and we were just on the cusp of listening to the love that is Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Mother Love Bone and all the rest. Hey- we were late bloomers and we did live on the other side of the country. But I suppose I�m rambling. Now we will come back around to some of the miss-adventures of the basement crew. I�m sure this is not the only story I will write about these people and this time---reason being these young men and women helped shaped the person I am today, and I love them all. Some more than others.

So hood surfing, though I suppose it actually ended up being roof surfing since the attempts on the hood were precarious at best as there was nothing to hold on to. At the time, I owned an 84 Cavalier wagon that had a luggage rack. Perfect really, for that kind of thing. Later my father would admit that he had often wondered why there would be dents in the roof and footprints on the windshield. There is a huge park near the part of suburbia that we called home. Huge for Richmond at least. It closed at dusk which made it lovely for us since there weren�t any people around to bother with when we trespassed. There were around 75 acres of trees great for hide-n-go seek, or hide and fuck it we�ll meet up later. Ponds with little waterfalls the let into streams that ran under bridges. The streams had huge rocks through them that we spent a lot of time on too. But again, that�s another story. What is key to this story is the road that ran the length of the park through a myriad of twists and bends and eventually curved back in on itself. You could get up to about 45 mph but you better hold on for dear life. Oh, but it was a lovely feeling. Wind and road and darkness. Something we created for ourselves. Something we monitored ourselves. I like to the think that I am a cautious person but usually, when I�m in the moment, I will always go for the fuck-it option. A few rules to hood surfing; 1) Never let Marc drive. We did once, he went about 45 yards and crashed into a pillar. Luckily, Bobby knew Marc pretty well and started out-- holding on for dear life, so we only watched him flip onto the windshield and not the asphalt. I took over a lot of the driving then, and everyone was happier for it. If you are guy, you must know in your soul that another guy is always going to fuck with you. 2) Don�t play the music so loud that you can�t hear the person on the roof screaming �STOP! FUCK! HELP!�. 3) Take it slow on the curves, otherwise you will look through your side window and see a body hanging there screaming �STOP! FUCK! HELP!�. 4) Abuse a substance ahead of time. (this one should really go without saying but�ehh, you never know). If you follow these rules, and have a group of some of the coolest people you will ever meet, you too can have a pleasant hood surfing experience. Unless you break your ass. Good luck.

in - out