48
As Nineteen Eighty-Eight dawned, I had settled into my new life of
drifting between joblessness, healthlessness, uselessness, and
pointlessness.
One time I went to the big grocery store I had worked at after nine
at night when I knew most all of the employees would be gone for the
day, leaving behind a few late night cashiers before the shelf
stockers got in before midnight. I meandered through the ol' aisles
and passed the chilled display cases, willing to pick up anything
that interested me as long as it cost less than nothing. I even went
into the back room where the diary and freezer rooms were and checked
out the little office in between where the schedule was posted. I
discovered that a member of the service desk staff had been the one
to replace me after I left. Good for her, I thought. On the
way back out I walked by the bakery department and realized I could
pick-out a bag of their ten cent hard rolls and arrived at the check
out with a dollar's worth to help keep me fed for a few days. I made
sure to pay with one of my precious dollar bills; in case the cashier
recognized me I didn't want to use one of my food stamps and then
have the news I was on them spread to my former coworkers...
The food stamps were saved for the unionized competition across the
street where I would do the majority of my shopping. It was always a
challenge finding food with the highest calorie count and the lowest
price. Add to it that I was now avoiding fructose and fat as I had
been having problems digesting those and I was down to starch, like
pasta and dehydrated potato mixes, and lean hamburger. As I couldn't
afford soda anymore, I had returned to a childhood staple of home
brewed ice tea where I only had to use the cheapest brand of tea
bags I could find and tap water. I had to be very careful of what
chilled items I brought home as, if I got too much and cluttered
mother's refrigerator, those items would disappear, presumably tossed
out with the trash. Ice tea was safe as mother enjoyed it herself,
though she had never had it handy during wintertime before.
For exercise I fell into the routine of late night walks. In the
past years I would do such walks from time to time under the pretext
of getting a late night soda at the near by convenience store but
now, as I couldn't afford that, they were just meandering walks on
partially moon lit nights through the then undeveloped
fields of the south east end of town. These walks were not mindless,
though, as I would use them to ponder editorial takes and plot story
lines for The Doctor Who Report newsletter. Many times I would then
get home and warm up the computer tucked in my bed room along with
all my worldly belongings and begin typing away. There was little
point in trying to sleep in the wee hours of the night anyhow as my
mother would typically pound on my bedroom door at least once during
the night as she made a bathroom run.
Then she would officially get up for the day and I would settled down
for 'the night' and sleep while she was away at work, the only
time I'd be guaranteed peace. By afternoon I'd be up and taking
my shower of the day and preparing my main meal before mother would
be home. I would warm up the computer and spend an hour or two
online, helping to maintain my friend Jeff's site as well as catch-up
on my eMail and some forum discussions.
Knowing I was once again available and hungry, Jeff reverted to
asking me to join him on occasional evening runs to a location or two
of his family's business as he had done back in Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Ostensibly I was there to call an ambulance if Jeff somehow injured
himself while performing maintenance during the closed evening hours;
in reality I was there to keep him company and play the role of D.J.
by bringing a selection of my cassette tapes to play on Jeff's
boom-box. Once all was done, my reward would be us picking up a late
night pizza to share, sometimes at the shop in question, other times
on the way home to Jeff's. On the times at Jeff's, he'd show me the
latest games or drafting software he'd gotten for his computer and
finally get me home by three or four in the morning.
On most evenings when I was staying home, I would put on my
headphones and listen to music while I worked on TDWR. The music and
headphones helped to muffle the intermittent poundings on my locked
bedroom door as my mother would bustle about before going to bed.
Other times I would be going through the box of paperwork I had
received from the local science fiction club as part of taking it
over. Inside was their non-profit paperwork and tax exempt I.D. as
well as bylaws and a vast quantity of old flyers and club newsletters
to sort through and get inspiration from.
By the time of the second issue of the TDWR it occurred to me that,
since I had the local science fiction club on hiatus for a few
months, I could use their reserved meeting place in the basement of a
local bank for a gathering of my Doctor Who subscribers and
made a note of the next meeting time in the Report. I used my
rationed gas to get me to the meeting and met with many of my
subscribers and invited content submissions from them... No
submissions ever came from them. We
discussed the reason for the formation of TDWR and hatched the
idea of collecting money for a copy of the only Doctor Who
radio show so it could be broadcast at our local public radio
station. I then invited them all back to watch a video tape of a
rare, thought lost, Doctor Who show the next month. That next
meeting only about half as many people showed up and by the third
month only a couple. As the club that officially had this meeting
space would soon restart, there would be no more meetings of TDWR
subscribers, and given the fall-off in those coming, it didn't look
like it would be a great loss.
But on that last get-together, a new guy showed up and as the
meeting broke up he wanted to pull me aside and talk to me. It
turned out he was a budding artist and provided me a gorgeous picture
of one of the Doctors holding a copy of the then unpublished
fourth issue of the report with a rye smile and semi wink. He said I
could have it if I felt I could use it in the report. Absolutely!
He then went home to begin his next piece of artwork for the report,
soon becoming my partner for all of the subsequent issues.
I had found a new friend.
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