Gup, Spiders, & What Might Be Next…
Page 7/8

As this story continues to meander, I recall my vision, a monstrous sized arachnid in Truro only days ago. Hugo Drax attacked me before floating up high, up, up, and drifted out an open door at a grocery store and just took off for the heavens. 
“What about the French actor who played Hugo Drax?” Amy asked. 
“I’m told Michael Lonsdale died at eighty-nine-years-old,” I said.
“When was it?” Amy asked.
“Monday, September 21, 2020, I believe, may he rest in peace,” I said.
*          *          *
If I could go back forty years now, and comfort my sick and self-harming self, I’d be a lot more empathic and loving with my blunted, fractured frame. I’d teach lonely David about breathing, about being mindful and exhaling to rescue himself. I went through the motions frequently in those days, a spherical and heavy-set fool behemoth fearing I’d be sucked into the sky, zapped by some Thundering Zeus. I showed zero signs of life for a full year or two. I’d attempt to cram huge gobs of love and affection into my gut and attempted to become someone who’s more open to the world. 
Beautiful, attractive yoga people would come onto our psychiatric unit and coo and purr and tell me, “Feel your shoulder blades release, let them dance and sparkle down your spine, exhale the rage, hurt, and inhale nothing but hope for you are on your way back, my friend.”
“I know it might seem irrational,” I’d tell younger me, “but it’ll get you on your feet faster. At first, you’ll loathe the exercise, but we’ll have you walking or jogging or stretching, even. The more you move, the less shitty you’ll feel inside. Sounds hokey, maybe, but redemption isn’t too far off. Relax your jaw, David, be aware of all the space around your knees, shift your hopes, think grander, more eloquent thoughts, dance and play with expansive, wilder, crazy-ass schemes and dreams.” 
“Please shoot for everything possible on the spectrum - vivid colors, images of thunder snow with purple lightening zigzagging across a great behemoth of the sky. I’ll take the hand of my bloated and flabby-assed old me and we’d soar so high - our duo set sail over both the new and ancient worlds like pterodactyls, trying to wake up your sedated and psychically constipated form.”
*          *          *
If Gup were around today, he’d be shaking his head and chuckling with his smoker’s cough. He’d say, “I’ve seen your audience getting a bit dazed and glazed in the eyes from your recent wordplay, D. You’re losing them. They’re looking for an excuse to catch a nap. Let me share a peculiar tale of mine that always wakes people up. Is that okay, grandson?”
Be my guest, Gup, the floor is yours… and so he’d describe a friend, a Russian immigrant named Victor, who helped build the Merritt Parkway in the Darien area of Connecticut decades ago, maybe fifty or a hundred years back. Victor helped saw down massive trees in that part of the state. At lunch break, all the workers took out their meals, but Victor didn’t have a damn thing to eat. He was a huge man, standing six five with a barrel chest. So, he borrowed two slices of pumpernickel bread and jumped into a nearby pond and caught a large bullfrog with his bare hands, threw it between the pumpernickel and enjoyed quite a raw bullfrog sandwich.
“Holy Jesus, Mary and Joseph, that’s disgusting and cruel, Gup,” all the kids in my family yelled. He smiled and said,