I have a deep unending love for Bette Midler. My passion for The Divine Miss M knows no bounds. My mother loves her and it is the only piece of pop culture we seem to agree on.  I am very thankful to my mother for exposing me to Bette at a young age because I believe in many ways it saved me from years of pain. Despite my Catholic upbringing, now when I think of God and what she must look like, I think of Bette. As a queer person, this has probably saved me years of self-loathing and therapy costs. 

My religion, like any of the western ones,  has a holy trinity. These days, instead of finding myself saying prayers to father, son or Holy ghost, I look to another trinity, one that reminds me that men have no power here. My trinity is wise and good and needs nothing besides a really good white suit. Bette, Diane, Goldie. These women make my world go round, my sunrise, and my sanity at semi-normal levels. 

This is to state the obvious that my favorite movie of all time, is The First Wives Club. 

If you are unfamiliar, The First Wives Club is a 1996 American comedy film about three divorced women who seek revenge on the husbands who left them for younger women. It stars the actresses that make up the Holy Trinity of my personal religion with Bette at the top as God.  It is a perfect film and I will not be taking questions at this time. 

I have seen The First Wives Club an obscene amount of times. I do not know how many, because I go through periods where I just have it on as background noise. Something to listen to while I open mail or fold laundry. It’s comforting to hear the lines, as familiar as if they were my own heartbeat. The jokes have a rhythm. Each one so well written, it’s as if every punchline is musical. 

Before I saw The First Wives Club, for the first time, probably playing on TBS as a middle schooler, I had seen the movie trailer dozens and dozens of times. It appeared as a trailer on my VHS copy of Nora Ephron’s This is My Life, which was my favorite movie as a kid. 

My habit of watching the same movie over and over again started young, possibly a result of only having three television channels. I am also an only child of a single parent, so entertaining myself was a necessity. 

I watched This is My Life, a comedy about a woman who becomes a stand-up comedian so many times as a child that I am now a stand-up comedian. But part of the viewing experience was first watching the trailer for The First Wives Club before, an appetizer before the entree. 

I watched the trailer over and over again because I enjoyed two specific jokes. I would sit on the floor of my mother’s living room laughing at them each time as if they were new. 

My favorite parts of the trailer as a child were as follows.

Two perfect cinema moments. But to my surprise. Only one made it into the actual movie. 
 
The scene from the trailer in which Bette Midler and Sarah Jessica Parker fight over a cake server was cut from the film. The First Wives Club famously shot hours of additional footage. Goldie Hawn’s character even has a boyfriend, played by a young Jon Stewart we never see. His entire role was cut out at the end. I think this probably for the best. The film itself is perfect and a man would only ruin it. 

But my favorite scene still lingers in my heart. Why was it in the trailer but not the film? Where is the footage? Who won the fight? Did Diane Keaton help? After all she recently learned to hit thanks to Marcia Gay Harden. What happened with the cake server? I can't get the look on Bette's face as she stares at Sarah Jessica out of my mind. 
 
Like any god, mine is a mystery and there are parts to her divinity I will never see. Unless they are released from a vault somewhere for a limited edition DVD Blu-ray combo pack.
 
Luckily, Bette Midler has Twitter. And maybe one day she will respond to one of my many many tweets with the full clip. Or maybe not and I will just have to be good, so she can show it to me in heaven. 

​"I'm sorry, but this is taking forever."

"Yeah, just search something else."

"Nononono, just a few minutes more. I promise it's worth it. It's so good."

"Are you sure they used Placebo?"

"I'm sure. And it's awesome. I mean, I think it's a cover they did, but still, it is fucking awesome."

My high school friends, now enjoying the pleasure of being able to legally buy booze, sat around the scattered seating in the basement at our rich pal/unspoken group leader's family home, tipsy & taking turns showing weird/ funny/ bizarre things found on the primordial video sharing site known as YouTube.  A far- too- expensive projector screen bought by her garbage stepfather to try to gain her mother's warmth for another day served as the canvas for each of our curated selections of music videos and weird local commercials for group enjoyment. 

Then came my turn. 

Please understand, these were my best friends on the planet at that moment. They'd helped me come out of my shell and put behind memories of a childhood filled with illness, sadness, and the deep lonesome woes that tend to manifest themselves when you've spent so long in the hospital your classmates in second grade make cards for you. 

These folks helped me discover that deep in my iron- lined closet was a bisexual, hedonistic rascal dying to get out and meet cute dudes; moreover, from them, I got how to dress cool and be introduced to new worlds of music, movies, and all sorts of pop culture ephemera. In return, they were delighted and fascinated by my deep running knowledge of TV, movies, and music of a bygone era. (Thank you immune deficiency.) 

They were wonderful friends, with no judgements. 

Except one- I adored pro wrestling. 

They did not. 

I tried on numerous occasions to articulate that which I loved about the medium- the pageantry, the drama, the morality tales, the athleticism, the rare moments to see good triumph, to see justice in an unjust world- not to mention, the kick ass fireworks that usually capped off all big pro wrestling shows. 

My snarky, Hot Topic- loving friends considered it the TV show for close minded, homophobic knuckledraggers. 

Considering we'd lived through the late 90s, when wrestling was at the apex of pop culture and seemed to be baptized in blood and casual misogyny, it was hard to dispute them. 

Many attempts were made on my part to try and explain why I loved it (as many of them were huge glam rock fans, you'd figured the costumes would've helped a bit.)

It was a non- starter. 

Just eye rolls and barbed remarks any time I brought it up. 

Thus, it became my secret shame. 

At least, until Placebo came into the picture. 

Quick primer- Placebo is a British indie/ alt band that specialize in shimmering, moody songs dealing with drugs, sex, and a plethora of angst. 

Which is to say, utter catnip for those who mostly dress in black. 

Watching one of the weekly WWE shows one night, I saw a video package hyping an upcoming match for the company's biggest show of the year,  Wrestlemania. 

And there it was. 

The answer. 

The weak, primordial Wi-Fi finally pulled through enough to finish buffering the video. 

I shushed my slightly annoyed friends & took my seat as the video started. 

What unfolded was a masterpiece. 

The typical soliloquy of a wrestler (in this case, Shawn Michaels, a legend in the medium)  licking their wounds over a loss and vowing revenge soon gave way to something unique. 

Something more. 

As the tribal drums of the Placebo cover of the timeless Kate Bush classic "Running Up That Hill" came rolling in like waves on a rocky shore,  what commenced was not a highlight reel of wrestling. 

This was Michaels being swallowed whole, his world ripped to shambles by one thing everyone can relate to:

The desire to fix a mistake. 

In the previous year's Wrestlemania, Michaels had come closer than anyone before him to ending the storied undefeated streak of The Undertaker, a ghoulish phantasm made whole in the wrestling ring. 

But a bit of carelessness and the dream was crushed. 

Michaels then received a storyline award for the match, which sent his mind to replay the match in his head, as it had clearly been doing for every day. 

"It doesn't hurt me/ You wanna feel how it feels"

The song began in earnest. 

I got caught up in the video for a moment before realizing something, something there hadn't been all night in the room:

Silence. 

Everyone was watching. 

"If I only could/ Make a deal with God."

Denied a chance to "right the wrong" at seemingly every turn, Michaels fell into the clutch of madness; attacking innocents, friends, idols- anyone who he deemed a threat to his one wish. 


"You don't wanna hurt me/ See how deep the bullet lies."

Finally, after weeks upon weeks of chaos, The Undertaker agreed to the rematch. With a condition- if Michaels failed to defeat him again, then Michaels had to retire from wrestling. 

Michaels replied: "You don't get it. If I can't beat you at Wrestlemania, I have no career."

A bit of a heavy handed line to end on, and one I was certain my friends would roast instantly. 

But there were no laughs. 

No quips. 

Nothing. 


After a few moments, one of the group offered a summation of my friend's reviews of the piece: 

"Shit. That was good."

Murmurs of agreement followed. 

After that, someone cued up a highlight reel of weird infomercials and we had a good laugh. 

Now, do I think I converted any of them to wrestling fans that night? 

God no. 

But, none of them ever ragged on me if they saw me in a wrestling shirt again. 

I said, look at the bees
in my yellow-flower tree,
and he said, a single tree
is just a pollinator rest stop
and your bees cannot be saved.

I said I was thankful for the sunrise
and the singing birds, the roof
above my head, and he said,
not everyone is happy.
Don’t be so brazen with your gratitude.

I said I’d like to cook
a meal for him. And he said, 
But that’s not the way
my mom makes it.

I said, Here, 
I wrote this love poem for you,
and he said, why 
would you use such a cheap word as love?

I said, let’s share a home, a life,
and he said, Life?! I thought
this milkshake was enough.
And then he hit the spoon
out of my hand.

I said that I was leaving,
and he said--

Wait.
Don’t go.
Let’s try again. I mean,
we were so perfect for each other.

And I said, you know?
The slipper never really fit
as well as I pretended,
and besides,
it was only ever made of glass.

I am not at home when she speaks
to the small workers harvesting lavender,
preparing pollen for alchemy,
a hundred million year old recipe
secreted in the tips of flowers.


I am not home when she requests 
safe passage, a visa to remove weeds,
hive minds think alike, so, when she speaks
the whole apiary hears her voice--
she notices the sibilance in symbiosis,
wonders if buzzing is just an s
vibrating at a high frequency.


I am not home when she enters
an empire of lilies, threat of venom, 
elegy for allergies, each stinger
a splinter in death’s fence
along which, my affections require 
a twist & a steel tip driven 
into her soft thigh.


I am not home 
when she reaches détente
moves through their airspace
like a game of Operation
& pulls a jade spike 
from its wiry roots

​The best part of being high
is how honey tastes
traveling back in time
from blossom to pollination
how it captures valleys
like landscape painters do
so you can hear a brook
chasing itself through moss
or how rain goes bounding
through birch leaves
how mushrooms sprout in shade
Earth convening its pores
how wildflowers aren’t pretty
not for us never for us
but for themselves
and for bees taking who give
beating bodies into trunk
disappearing like ash into bark
bark into boulder

​Bees. There is no other creature on the planet that is more emblematic of growing up than the bee, to me. I don’t mean in the way the bee works, or flies, or eats, or stings, or lays eggs, or makes honey. It is how the perception of the bee changed over the course of my life. 

As a small boy I would stop my mother from killing bugs all the time. Sunday School taught me that I should not kill. Therefore no one else should either, correct? Also, there is the golden rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you? I don’t want to be killed; therefore I won’t try and kill anyone else, including bees. As my mother rolled up a newspaper or a magazine I would rush and place myself – standing somewhere around her kneecap – between the bee and her. I would raise up my arms, palms open, fingers outstretched and should, “No mommy! Don’t kill it.”

My mother would put down whatever killing tool she had in her hand and watch as I ran to grab my step stool, race back to the bee and climb the tiny ladder. With nothing but my bare hand I would lead the bee – or the ant, the spider, the roach – into my other hand, cup the creature and place it outside in the grass. I knew bees liked flowers, so if the bee did not fly away, I would pluck one from the garden and engulf the bee in the pedals. Almost always the bee would do its work and take off. I suspect my mother would hide the bees that did not make it from my eyes. 

As I entered kindergarten, and grade school, I learned of bee allergies. Having no allergies in the whole family I’d never encountered the concept that someone could potentially react poorly to something else. But on some Tuesday in November of First Grade – I remember because it was Turkey Tuesday, where we traced our hands and, well, you know the rest – a bee flew in, evidently avoiding the blistering cold. 

My friend and one other classmate were excused from the classroom. I asked why, and our teacher had to explain that they were allergic. The classmate who sat next to me said, “Yeah. They could die.” What a horrid thought. My friend dying from what? A sting?
 
The vice principal came down and tried to smash the creature to smithereens. I got up to save the little winged fuzzball but the teacher ushered me back to my seat, saying it would be safer if the bee died. I wept silently as a thwack sounded in our room, and my teacher gave the thumbs up as the Vice Principal left. 

After this experience, bees equated to fear. Bees could sting. Indeed, I got stung once in the third grade where the stinger stayed lodged in my bicep and the skin started to heal before a neighbor took tweezers to it. Every time a bee entered my vicinity a dread would hit me in my throat and cascade down into my heart where each beat felt like a stab. 

​And yet, as life moved forward, so did my understanding. I had been taught the old mantra that “It’s more afraid of you than you are of it.” Yet this did not stick until a biology course, a college education, and a manual labor job passed me by. The biology course taught me the incredible significance that bees have as one of the main pollinators in the world. The college education, specifically as a sociology major, taught me to observe power dynamics. And the manual labor job put me right in the midst of bees on the daily basis. 

I worked on a property that housed senior citizens and worked as a gardener for a summer internship. There I weeded the flower gardens every day. In the sunlight, I would step deep in between the flowers and immerse myself in what amounted to a beehive, just without the hive. This took a bit of praying and a breath to get myself to do. The honeybees flew all around me. They landed on me. They tickled my ear. They walked on my beard. They’d sandwich themselves between the fingers of my gloves. 

It took the wisdom of the grounds keeper to get me to see everything. He didn’t say that much either. The man, who looks much like an American Hagrid, simply walked up and said, “They won’t hurt you. They don’t want to. Look, they’re surrounding you.” Imagine the benevolence of such creatures. Here I stood, a walking giant capable of bee genocide if I wanted, and all the bees would do is fly around me, and occasionally act on their curiosity. 

Any fear of bees left after that summer. They’re such a beloved creature in my home that when I, or my wife, see them we watch for half a minute or more as the bee’s buzz around. When one comes in my home, I usher it out gently, but still don’t feel quite capable of putting it into my bare hand. But boy, do I want to. And that’s pretty much what adulthood feels like to me. An attempt to realize how baseless your fears are and try to get back to the unimpeded innocence and joy of childhood.  

​August. The Pine Barrens. Alarmed flyers warn of the invasion of the Spotted Lanternfly. Pictures showcase its vibrant red and spotted wings. It’s pretty. If seen, it should be killed, bagged, reported. I take a nature walk and make pine needle tea. 

July. Penn Campus. Twisted shells on the pavement, still identifiable as spotted lantern foe. We don’t bag and report them anymore. They’re already here. Everyone knows. The flyers didn’t mention they were fast, leaping, hard to kill. Nothing wants to eat them yet. 

May. A patio. I’ve been spraying nymphs with neem oil. Right in the face. They don’t leave, they just frown. Will this interrupt their life cycle? It’s certainly not killing them outright. I murdered the first adult yesterday, squashed it with my phone, left the body as a warning. Two wasps are cannibalizing it. 

September. A doorway. They alight on screens. They sound big like locusts. I startle and swear. They sucked the sap from my blackberry canes and flourished. Foliage is covered in their leavings; honeydew is secreted by aphids, psyllids, and spotted lanternflies. Bees collect it when nectar is scarce, often early spring and late summer, culling from fungus and scale and oak dew too. 

When collected instead of floral sweets honeydew produces ominous cells of shining black nectar. It transmutes from insect waste to a dark, heavy-flavored substance through bee alchemy. Called forest honey, çam balı, miel de sapin, names to highlight region and obscure origin, honeydew honey boasts varied flavors of malt or mint, tastes sweet or spicy, and is suggestive of sap. Its nuances are as varied as the countries where it’s more common than the mono- and polyfloral varieties favored in the eastern United States.

October. A pandemic. I trapped a lanternfly under a candle globe and now I have a perfect deceased specimen. They’ll all be dead in a few cold nights. The bees are growing sluggish. I’ll be bold. I’ll peek in the hive, consider the combs, scour for oil-rich cells. Then I’ll hunt the woods for egg masses to scrape down and destroy. 

​for Jumpin’ Jim Brunzell and B. Brian Blair

Bewilderment was once black and yellow stripes, high flying initially, and independent eventually. Stings took the shape of multiple Mashed Confusions; all men in the square dressed similarly from flyers to referees and puzzled opponents with the zigzag shadows of every man as a masquerade: dancing with bounced step. Achieving victory in the before days, duos of bzz eliminated their opponents, and royalty came in the form of mass bodies in competition. The insects faced survival among more complex predators, but were hacked from a perched branch. Stocks slipped, two cards once in a row shuffled out of order; the stinging was unsuccessful in later years. Final days were spent feuding with leather straps. Everything confusing ultimately gets demolished. Out of the eyes of others, the team tore apart. Driven from a crowned queen and honey in the hive: entwined entities shifted to singular preliminary bodies: as fragile as larvae broken from the brood. The stinging stopped; and it marked the end of the black and yellow days of Bees.

​I once lived in the state of Utah, which is known as the Beehive State. Its state emblem is the beehive and the state insect is the honeybee. All the good Mormons were supposed to be like worker bees, working towards a common good. That's what the beehive was supposed to represent—industry.  In fact before Utah was called Utah, it was named The State of Deseret by the followers of Joseph Smith. Deseret in the Book of Mormon means bee. Another interesting fact: There's even a small newspaper there called The Mormon Worker that's all about mormonism, pacifism, and anarchism. Whooda thought there was such a thing as Mormon Anarchists?

Last week, a honeybee stung my daughter. We were at my mom's house in Hood River, Oregon. The bees stung my mom too. They were ground bees, which I didn't know were actually a thing. No, that's not true, ground bees once stung my wife. They came out of a dead stump in our driveway. It's strange because I myself have never been stung by a bee in my entire life.

in no particular order...
Dan Akroyd
John Belushi
B. Brian Blair
Jim Brunzell
Heather DeLoach

A woman, a wife, a widow named Ramona, carried half a dozen yards of lace over her outstretched arms. Even though it was black — freshly dyed and washed once for starch — it looked dull in the sun. Gray and ashy like her skin. 
​
The summer heat played along. The liquid from the washing tub had sizzled against the backyard rocks, but the light itself pale. Limp and lifeless. 
Ramona swallowed a lump - the sensation painful and unsatisfying.  

After 1,275 steps, she arrived at the gate to the apiary. 

It, too, played the color game, she noticed. It’s bright red looked muddy and sad. It looked like old blood staining the barnyard floor. The hinges creaked as they opened, and even though Ramona flinched at the metal scream - the keeper didn’t seem to notice the protest.  

“Be calm,” he said. His voice low, sweet, and slow like the jar of honey back on the breakfast table.  

She nodded and entered the precious space and walked over to the large hive. 

She cleared her throat.  

The man snuck up and tapped her shoulder, shushing when she startled. “They’ll listen.”

Ramona bent down low, grimacing at the sound of the little wings, the sight of the pale yellow bodies. Their black was dark, though — rich, which surprised her. “I’m here to tell you…” her voice caught, but she didn’t want the keeper to touch her again.

“I’m here to tell you that the master of the house has passed,” she whispered. Her breath filled the air between her and the bees, and she swore that they slowed down to listen. “I have your veil to help you mourn,” she said, and after a long moment, she finished her errand, “and hope that you’ll stay with us.”

In the silence that followed, Ramona found her shoulders sliding downward. The tiny buzzing creatures did not respond to superstitious voices, but they were soothing in their own busy way. 

In the early hours of November 10, 1898 a fire grew on the grounds of The Daily Record in Wilmington, North Carolina. This fire signaled the start of a coordinated attack by a mob of white men who targeted The Daily Record due to it being a prominent black-owned business. Alexander Manly, the owner, had been told to destroy the paper and get out of town, or the mob would do it for him. 

By the end of the day 60 black residents were dead, the newspaper building had burned to the ground, and many black citizens had fled for their lives. The attack was a coordinated effort by white supremacists to remove black influence and retake political power for Democrats, the conservative party of the late 1890s, and which represented the values of white supremacists. The leader of the attack, Alfred Moore Waddell, was a former member of Congress, and would go on to become Mayor of Wilmington. 

Two days prior to the coup d’etat the local government had been elected, and the Republican party, the liberal party of the era, was largely in control. Upset with the circumstances, Waddell and his mob decided to take matters into their own hands. Rather than respect a free election, they decided their values were more important. They imposed their will by force, and succeeded. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Last week we witnessed the echoes of history on a massive scale. A mob formed, masked to the world as protestors. They listened to President Trump and other conservative politicians. They heard about how the election had been stolen. They believed in lies, and spurred on by carefully worded hints and nods the mob moved towards the Capitol building. The symbol of American freedom, American dreams, American ideals. 

“What happened today was an insurrection incited by the President.”  - Mitt Romney

Upset with the election results,  and with Democrats, America’s liberal party, taking full control of the Presidency, the Senate and the House of Representatives these criminals rushed police and broke into the Capitol building to stop the confirmation of Joseph Biden’s Presidential win, convinced that the election had been stolen. 

They battled with the Capitol Police, injuring at least 56 police officers, and killing Officer Brian D. Sicknick. Four members of the mob died, one shot by the police, the other three from “medical emergencies.” Video and photos showed mobsters being maced, having guns drawn on them. Separately officers were spotted taking selfies with the criminals, helping them down the steps of the capitol building, and observing as the mob walked around casually. 

Bombs, guns, destruction of property, videos of a lone officer running as the mob rushed him - these are the acts, the symbols, the definition of terrorists and terrorism. Domestic or not,  white or not, the people who attacked the Capitol were terrorists. They stormed the seat of government of the United States with the intent to overthrow the outcome of the election. Holding onto the words of a false god, thinking they bore the torch of righteousness, these terrorists tried to stage “a revolution” as one maced women said to a camera. 

While many have tried, there is no comparison to the protests we have seen in relation to social issues like police brutality, or the rights of citizens based on name-a-category. While people may disagree with people exercising their freedom of speech to burn American Flags, or block highways, that can’t be compared with breaking into a government building. To those who try and compare the destruction of private property to an attempted coup - the literal attempt to overtake the government - may I introduce you to the False Equivalence logical fallacy. Someone throwing a brick through a Costco window is not the same as halting the Presidential certification to keep President Trump in power. 

Apples to oranges doesn’t cover it. Apples and oranges are at least pieces of fruit. There is no similarity here. The opposition to a free and fair election is the stuff of freedom’s nightmares. To keep a President in power, even after losing an election, because the President pretends to hold onto the values you hold is not what the US Constitution protects. The Constitution upholds a government that elects representatives to make laws for us, a democratic Republic, a government that protects, in theory, the right for us to have our own religion, our own values. For citizens to rise up and attempt to force their values on other citizens by violent means is a theocracy. And as much as some Americans may want a theocracy, America, as set up by its founding documents, is not one. 

The difference between someone shouting, “Black Lives Matter!” and rifling through elected leader’s offices, leaving threatening notes, breaking windows, and swapping out the American Flag for a flag that says the name of one man, is so vast that only the severely indoctrinated won’t be able to spot the contrast. 

What’s worse is the President of the United States knew that this protest was scheduled. He knew that he had stirred the hearts of many to believe that Democrats were stealing the election from right under all our noses. He had access to all the information possible that indicates that such diversionary tactics, such a drive to nationalism, to the extreme, causes violence. Instead of ensuring proper methods of security to protect the presidential certification, he denied multiple requests to mobilize the National Guard. Eventually his Vice President had to take charge when the violence escalated. 

Then, and only after President-elect Biden demanded it, Trump put out a message to “quell” the terrorists.

It’s two thousand and eight, you’re a teenager at Hot Topic, and you love nothing more in this world than Gerard Way.
​

​When I was a kid, there was a cable network called The Family Channel. One program they showed was reruns of the 1960s version of “Batman,” a character that debuted in Detective Comics in 1939. There was an episode called “The Bloody Tower” where Batman’s sidekick Robin (real name: Dick Grayson) stumbles over a clearly marked Death Bee Beehive Trip Wire set up by the villainous Lord Marmaduke Ffogg. Ffogg’s daughter, Lady Prudence, stands over Robin and mocks him coolly, advising him to stay calm or risk being stung. So, this bee, I don’t know if it was made of felt or paiper-mâché or what, but it was about the fakest thing I have ever seen. I have a distinct memory of watching this show with my sisters, my parents having given us vanilla ice cream with hot fudge on top.

Note: The following is based on a dream the author had a few years ago, and while generally you should not write out your dreams and/or nightmares, the author decided to try anyways and make something coherent/cognizant/meaningful out of it. You can decide if it works. if you dare...

City of Terror
   
       We found ourselves in this small mountain town filled with floating castles and ancient-looking buildings—museums, churches, capitols, old houses—each historic and antiquated monument floating atop its own individual mountain, like a dozen acropolises. We’d spent the morning visiting each one, gallivanting around with the other tourists. The city itself was in a large valley made up of the small hills and cobblestone streets that wound around these edifices. White snow topped the green mountains on either side of us.
​
         The sun was bright, but you could barely feel it as the narrow valley and hills and many buildings had a tendency to slant its rays and keep the sun from penetrating totally in the street of the city. The whole town looked as if it were painted as a chiaroscuro. Light. Dark. Light. Dark. In some parts, particularly down low, the cold air and dark shadows felt as if they were emanating from the earth itself.

     We were on vacation in this small, fairy-tale-like-town for, as they call it, a “Babymoon.” Particularly special for us because we’d spent several years navigating the hellscape of miscarriages and infertility treatments, with visits to doctors’ offices becoming more frequent than meals eaten out.

        As evening encroached, my six-month pregnant wife and I soon found ourselves in line with all the other tourists to go to a famous ball put on by the locals. The waiting area sat atop an inclined street that led to the base of a small castle. The entire city and valley stretched out on either side of us. A 360-degree view but for the stone structure right in front of us. Pink snow topped the green mountains as dusk approached.
​
        They said the city began as a refugee camp, some years, long ago. A different time, but the same world. These residents walked and lived in camps at first. All borders shut. Some of them lived in cages. There was no room at any inn they stopped at along the way. So, one day, they made their own way to a part of the world no one cared they’d occupy. Somewhere in between Greenland, Wyoming, and Azerbaijan. They built a city for themselves. Because no one else would. Some of them were architects after all. And doctors. And city planners. And philosophers. And lawyers. Those that were still living.

      My wife and I were tired. The tiredness that hits the bottoms of your feet and lower back, exacerbated from walking around on cobblestone all day. My wife was not feeling good. She sat down next to me as we waited in line for the doors to open.

     After thirty minutes or so, people began grumbling amongst themselves. It was a strange noise to hear after walking about this town all day and hearing nothing but laughter, joy, and curiosity coming from folks—both us tourists and the locals alike. That’s when I first felt that something was not quite right.

     Perhaps it was because there was a man in line I didn’t like the sight of.  He looked like he was concealing a weapon but it couldn’t have been, for weapons were outlawed, no, not outlawed, didn’t exist.

     In fact, the more I thought about it, I realized that this entire fantastical little city existed without a single unit of police or military. There were not even jails for there were no need for them. A guide had told us this as we toured the largest castle on the tallest peak—it’s location right behind the smaller castle in front of us. It was strange for us Americans, who were so used to guns and men in uniform patrolling the streets. So used to violence and the unpredictability of men. 

           Night started to descend while we waited in line, and as the lights of the town flickered on, everyone’s phones started to ring and ding, one by one, with the sound of text messages and call alerts. People began picking up, unworried at first, and then more so as they realized that it was not just their phone going off, but everyone’s, and something of this nature could only be an emergency alert. 

           My wife stood up with one hand holding her stomach, the other on her lower back. I grabbed her left hand to help her rise. The sound was far enough away and unexpected enough that most of the looks the other tourists’ faces were ones of shock and confusion. Were they bombing the ski resort up above us for avalanches, perhaps?

         We all rushed down and around the cobblestone street leading up to the castle and over to her so we could see what had caused her to scream. And that’s when we saw it as we wound around to the right of the small castle to join her: The large castle crumbling and falling off the side of the hill. Another explosion punctured the air. We all flinched. More of the castle crumbled away. Distant screams.
Then, other sounds. Closer, deeper, faster, and more shocking. Right behind us. The sound of a gun, I think. The sound of bodies suddenly flapping against the cobblestone next to us.

           I grabbed my wife and we rolled down a small knoll in the street to the left. I pushed her down hard, harder than I should have for a woman carrying a child. The shots continued. 

            “Let’s go!” I whispered to my wife.
            We got up, crouching, and began running down the street that wound itself down the hill like an ice cream cone.
            “We have to get down and get out of this city,” my wife said. I nodded.

           We jumped a small guardrail and I caught my wife as she jumped and then tumbled on top of me into the sweet, green grass that covered the hills in between the switchbacks of the road. Grass so green and fertile you could nearly taste it in the cream and milk at restaurants and coffee shops.
           I pushed her down beside a small bush and lay flat. The trucks drove by above us, the men wearing Viking masks. We heard them stop. Doors open. More sounds.
             Pop pop pop. Pop pop pop.
            “Down with the imperialists!” one said. Or was it tourists?
           I nodded at my wife to keep moving and she nodded back. We moved straight down the grass this time, slowly, my wife huffing, and when the road came up again below us, we paused, looked right and left for signs of anymore trucks, dashed across the road like the chipmunks and squirrels had done all day, and began moving down the next stretch of grass between the winding-ice-cream-cone of a road, always crouching. Staying low.
            We had moved fast. That’s what had saved us. Despite my wife’s pregnancy and the slow walking down the hill now, those first few moves were crucial. The drop and the roll down the small knoll in the street, then around to the left. Then down the street. Now the hills.
We would get out of this I thought. Whatever this was. And that’s when the top of the small mountain we were just on exploded. Tiny pieces of rock and ancient brick from the castle flew over us. We hit the ground again. Our ears ringing now. For this one was close and loud and big. We covered our heads with our frail hands. I threw myself on top of my wife. We could hear the trucks coming back down the ice-cream-cone road. ​

    ​ We moved down the hill and were back in the town, the city of shops and stores and restaurants and bars that spread across the base of the valley and clustered up around each acropolis. The place that earlier today had seemed so beautiful and peaceful and quiet and calm. We ran across the street, into one of those fancy touristy-yet-local restaurants that serves high-end Italian dishes alongside hand-rolled sushi. We burst in, my wife and I. Covered now in grass and rubble. Short of breath. A small trickle of blood was running down my wife’s left temple. A bruise was developing on my knee. Everyone looked up at us simultaneously. Most of them locals. Not one of them looked concerned. Did they not know? Did they not hear?
     “The explosions!” I shouted. “The men, the guns! Didn’t you hear it? This place is not safe. We need to move, all of you. Now!”
     They continued to stare at us in silence. The approaching steps of two men in suit jackets.
    “I’m sorry, sir, but we’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
     They threw us out.
 
     Our goal was then to make it out of the city at all costs. We could survive in the woods, my wife and I. We could survive in the streams and rivers and fields and glaciers and whatever was beyond this town. It was where we were most comfortable, to be honest.
 “There’s two of them there!” someone shouted, as we crept through the streets.

    I whipped around to see four men with guns behind who had caught sight of us. I grabbed my wife and we barged through a door to the building on our left as shots hit the cobblestone street.

   We entered what appeared to be the circular lobby of a bank or a governmental office. Everything was polished and white and marble. A large chandelier hung down in the center of the space. There was only one desk at the far end of the room, a concierge of sorts. My wife’s right arm was draped around me as she held her stomach and leaned heavily onto me. I held her around the waist. We walked toward the concierge who, upon seeing us, promptly picked up his phone and began dialing.

     “No, wait!” I shouted. “She’s pregnant.”
     The man seemed unconcerned.
     “We have papers, documents! We’re travelers, American citizens. Do you see what’s going on out there?”
    The man paused for a second, considering. Maybe he considered the baby. Maybe he considered us a nuisance more than anything, as less than, as not even something worth giving up.
     “You can go out the back way,” he said. “You cannot stay here, but I can let you leave quietly. Where you choose to go from there is up to you.”
     “Please, just don’t send us back out there,” screamed my wife. “We just need to get out of this city!”
     “Fine. Follow me,” said the man. He was black and wearing at least a thousand-dollar suite.
     He led us through the door behind the concierge desk and then another one. Each hallway was white, polished, and marble. He let us out into an alley. In one direction was a dead end. The other led back into one of the main streets.
    “Goodbye,” he said. “And, Good luck.”
    “Wait—”
    The door slammed behind him and we froze.
 
      And that’s when we were rescued. Sort of. A young, muscular man in a hoodie sitting outside a door further down the alley. He looked at us for a second, then waved us over. We ran to him. We had no other choice.

     The young man closed the wooden door behind us a with a small bang. It made both my wife and I flinch for it sounded like a gun shot.The young man, however, also seemed unconcerned. He was nearly apathetic and unapologetic as he sized us up. Contemplating what to do with us. As if we were a hindrance to his evening and not fleeing for our lives from the violence outside. He didn’t offer us tea or coffee. Neither did he even offer us a seat. Not even to my pregnant wife who was now bleeding rather profusely from somewhere on her head. All he said, was, “Follow me.”
We followed him through two rooms and down a small flight of stairs into a cellar of sorts. It smelled of wine, dates, figs, and cheese, was earthy and comforting.

      “Here,” he said, opening a latch in the center of the floor to reveal a large hole.
      “This slide will shoot you out of the city.”
      “Slide?”
     “Yes, it’s an emergency slide. Should things ever get too bad.”
     I was dumbfounded. “But … Isn’t this bad?”
      “This is normal,” the man said. “On this day, you just happen to be the unlucky ones. We cannot shelter anyone here who was not born here. And sometimes the locals get a little bit tired of all the tourists.”
     “So they shoot them?” my wife asked.
     He shrugged.
     “But what about the buildings?” I asked.
    “We like rebuilding things. It’s what makes this city so interesting. But then everyone wants to come and look at the things we’ve built. And sometimes we get tired of it. We do not have to let anyone come, after all. This is our home. A home we were forced to make on our own when no one would accept us into theirs. So we are not obligated to help anyone. No one felt obligated to help us.”
      “But what about—”
      “Please,” the man said. “You must go. I must return to my work. I have much to do.”
      “Thank you,” my wife said, even though I did not feel like thanking this man.
       “I must go,” he said. “Au revoir.”
       I spun toward my wife. She nodded at me. Giving me strength. I took her hand and we jumped.  

      When I was young, I often assumed that every German living in 1940’s Nazi Germany was a full on Nazi. Or else a resister. But no, many of them were bakers, simply going to work each day, baking bread, watching the ash rise from the smokestacks and thinking nothing of it. They thought nothing of war. They merely went to work and did their job and didn’t ask too many questions. Like this man.

      Or was it I who, in a past life, was the baker?
​
     We landed on the soft earth some thousand feet below the city. A lake stretched out in front of us. My wife and I did not look back at the city above us but kept moving forward. The city in the valley with the hills and acropolises and the sweet, green grass. That city was probably red now. Red and yellow from fire. Beautiful City. City of Terror. City of No Samaritans.