Barely Alive in 2005

I was in bad shape in the fall of 2005. My weight was low and I was barely eating. I finally called the hospital in College Town and asked to be admitted to the eating disorder program. I was told there was a waiting list and it could be several weeks. Perhaps if my heart had been beating erratically or I'd had some other acute condition I could have been admitted to the general hospital but I was “okay” other than having a very low weight. 

I could have tried to find another eating disorder program but I'd been to the program in College Town before so that's where I wanted to go again. So, I waited. And waited. And waited. I knew it was truly possible I might die but I waited nonetheless. I even continued working.

I finally received a call one day and was told a bed was available for me. My parents drove me to College Town. I was angry with myself. I'm an intelligent man. I am too intelligent to need hospitalization and have my entire life disrupted just because I can't do something as fucking easy as eat.

I'd been fantasizing about food. I'd even been dreaming about food. I wanted meat loaf. I'm not sure why. Comfort food? If I was hungry, why didn't I just eat? Easier said than done.

While I sat there in my hospital gown and had my intake interview with a nurse she pushed a tray of food in front of me and I'll be damned if it wasn't meat loaf. I think she might have been concerned that I'd refuse to eat but I wasn't going to turn this meatloaf down. Serendipity? Happy accident? Strange coincidence?   

Time on the psychiatric unit went quickly. I'd been through this process before. Even though I can look ghastly at a low weight, I usually restore (gain) weight fairly quickly in a hospital setting. I'm not one of those people who loses two pounds from fidgeting in a chair. So, it wasn't too long before the doctors were talking about discharging me. Discharge came with a catch. I'd have to attend the partial hospital (day treatment) program until I restored some more weight.

 

I'd been in Partial Hospital before years earlier. During that period of time I was still able to board in the hospital. They had a floor for people to board on in an area of the hospital called Boyd Tower. Sounds fancy, huh? But, no. I just lived in a hospital room. But, I could come and go as I pleased as if I were in a motel for instance. And, I received meal vouchers I could use in the hospital cafeteria which was convenient.

But, this time around was different. There was no longer a place to board in Boyd Tower. I had to stay in a motel if I was going to attend Partial. A social worker made some arrangements for me to stay at a Days Inn on "the strip" in an area right next to College Town and near the hospital.

I wasn't too happy about living in a motel. I'd have to ride in a shuttle bus back and forth. I'd have to eat my evening and weekend meals in my room or at restaurants on the strip. I didn't have the convenience of just walking down to the cafeteria with a voucher. Sometimes I did have the shuttle bus take me to the hospital on evenings or weekends just so I could eat in the cafeteria. I realize that's probably hard to understand but I liked the familiarity of the hospital cafeteria.

Partial didn't go well for me. I wasn't comfortable at the Days Inn. I was surrounded by restaurants on the strip but couldn't bring myself to eat. Food, food everywhere, but not a bite to eat. That's what I was thinking.

I sort of borrowed that from "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner". The mariner is stuck with his shipmates on a becalmed ship surrounded by seawater and yet they are dying of thirst. The ship has depleted its stores of freshwater and though surrounded by water the sailors cannot drink the salt water. Can you imagine the agony of being surrounded by water and not being able to drink it because you know it would only make you thirstier?

 

"Water, water, everywhere, but not a drop to drink."

 

While living at that motel on the strip I was surrounded by burgers, tacos, and pizza. I had Chinese and Italian food within walking distance. I could have went to the mall nearby and ate in the food court. I could have bought some food at Walgreens across the street.

 

 

I couldn't do it!

By the way, I'd fallen in love with a petite blond gymnast and dancer named Elsa while on the eating disorders unit. She was still in the hospital so I was missing her too. I saw her on weekends a couple of times because I was allowed to go to the weekend activity at the hospital while in Partial.


Elsa was unable to come to the phone and talk to me sometimes which concerned me. I found out much later she'd gotten in some trouble for harboring caffeine pills in her room. She was placed on one-on-one observation I think and not allowed calls.


On the first Friday night I spent at the motel, I walked across the street to Walgreens. It was strange walking around this discount store in an unfamiliar city. But, I needed some laundry detergent so there I was. I remember Tom Petty singing over the sound system and wondering how I was ever going to get through this shit.

 

When the mariner and his shipmates are stuck on a becalmed ship, they are probably stuck in the doldrums. The doldrums refers to a zone near the equator where sailing ships sometimes get stuck on windless waters. You may also know that the doldrums can describe a period of low spirits and lack of energy. It can also be described as a state or period of inactivity, stagnation, or depression.

I had been living in the doldrums myself it would seem. I'd been going through the motions of life. I worked some and kept to myself in my spare time except for visiting my parents and the library. I'd never established any sort of career after graduating college. I didn't date because I felt too impaired to even imagine being in a relationship. I certainly had low spirits and a lack of energy.

And, now that I was in so-called treatment I really felt no better. I probably would have told you I felt even worse than before coming to treatment. I was still stuck in what seemed an incapacitated state. I was still in the doldrums.

I was eventually asked to return to the inpatient unit. The doctors were nice and told me it wasn't my fault. They'd discharged me too soon they said. Upon returning to the unit I saw Elsa again. I think she gave me a hug just to let me know she wasn't disappointed in me and was still there to support me. Then soon after she was discharged and returned to Kansas. She said she'd call me when she got home. She didn't call that night. Or, the next. Days and weeks passed. I finally accepted that she was never going to call.

I got discharged again from inpatient and stayed in a different motel while attempting Partial Hospital again. It didn't go any better the second time around although I did eat at a couple of restaurants. I had dinner one evening with two other Partial patients, Sarah and Rebecca, at Old Chicago. I only ate about half of my burger and fries. Then we went to Memoirs of a Geisha. I think I went out with Sarah alone once as well. I think we may have went to the movie Munich and then went to the Peking Buffet for dinner afterward. I was overwhelmed with the buffet and didn't eat too much. Even some help from my peers couldn't save me.

I went back to inpatient again. They finally discharged me and sent me to a care facility. I finally got through Partial Hospital because the care facility made sure I ate in the evenings and on weekends.

While at the care facility, I finally made contact with Elsa. She said she loved me but just couldn't bring herself to call. We both had too many problems to deal with. I guess we didn't want to get hurt or hurt anyone if possible.

I never did return home. I stayed in College Town and eventually got an apartment. My dad and sister cleaned out my old apartment. I felt guilty and ashamed. Thankfully I have a supportive family.

In "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" the mariner shoots an albatross and the ship seems to encounter bad luck after that. The sailors blame their misfortunes on the mariner's killing of the sea bird. They make the mariner wear the dead albatross on a rope hung around his neck as a punishment or a reminder of his ill deed.

Has this so-called eating disorder been an albatross about my neck? Sure, it's been a burden being depressed, anxious, and having an inability to eat normally.

I suppose at times I've wondered if I'm being punished by God for wrongdoings in my younger days. Maybe I wasn't kind enough to people. Maybe I wasn't compassionate enough. Maybe I wasn't tolerant. Maybe I was judgmental. Maybe I was mean. Maybe I was arrogant. Maybe a higher power like God wanted to humble me. I guess I don't really believe that although I have been humbled. It's kind of funny that I wondered how some of my classmates were going to survive in the real world after high school. It turns out it's me who can't seem to handle being a grown-up.

The mariner learned to love all men and beasts. He learned to love all things both great and small. He learned to appreciate the mundane as well as the sublime. I've gotten to know people from many walks of life and have learned to appreciate the uniqueness of all. I don't always like everyone I meet. But, I am tolerant of people and realize that everyone has their burdens in life. I am grateful for the good people who have passed through my life and continue to be a part of my life. I have learned to appreciate the simple things in life. I've learned to be thankful. I realize if you have your health and the love of family and friends you have a lot.

While living in the care facility, I went out one evening with a friend and a couple she knew. We went to a Japanese restaurant and I had sushi for the first time. Another friend took me to a Mexican place famous for its burritos made with fresh tortillas. Two girls took me out for breakfast once at a local diner. I went to Panera Bread several times with a female friend after moving into my apartment. She even got me to go out for frozen yogurt a few times.

You might be thinking I just need a girlfriend to make sure I eat. But, it wouldn't matter. I've turned down dinner invitations with pretty girls more than once because I just couldn't handle eating out and varying my daily routine.

I do sort of laugh to myself sometimes and think about how unfortunate it is that I'm so messed up when it comes to eating. I live in an area now with a wide array of restaurants. So many options. Seemingly, I would never get bored with the selection available. And, yet I've eaten out hardly anywhere. It's hard to relate to people talking about restaurants and the joy of eating out. I remember that joy from my youngers days before I became ill. But, I can't fathom being normal now and enjoying eating out. I've thought about eating at a bunch of places and then writing a book about it. But, no one would buy the book. Eating at restaurants is hardly noteworthy. People do it all the time.

Romantic period poets like Coleridge found merit in a quality known as liminality. They valued liminal spaces. The word “liminal” comes from the Latin root, limen, which means “threshold.” The liminal space is the “crossing over” space – a space where you have left something behind, yet you are not yet fully in something else. It's a transition space.

A liminal space is the time between the 'what was' and the 'next. ' It is a place of transition, a season of waiting, and not knowing. Liminal space is where all transformation takes place, if we learn to wait and let it form us.

You may know where you are, physically and geographically, but not know where you are as a person. Being on a psychiatric unit can be eerie. Finding oneself living in a care facility miles from home can seem surreal. I've had times where I've been healthier. I've even eaten out like a normal person and went on dates but it still never quite felt normal. Maybe I never feel quite like I'm in the right place. Maybe I'm healthier at times but I know I've never really left the eating disorder behind. It's a strange state to be in.

I don't like to feel that I'm anxiously floating in the in-between. Sure, I like the idea of transforming into a healthy, happier person. But, transitions are hard for me. I like my comfort zone. I don't like change. I don't like ambiguity. Yet, we all go through transitions. The concept of "coming of age" is a classic example of a liminal space. We are not quite an adult but no longer a child.

I hate transitions and yet I know I'll have to endure more of them in my lifetime. I wish I could count on certainty but have to accept that I can't.

The mariner loses all of his shipmates to Death but somehow he makes it home again with a little supernatural help. He feels the need to tell the story of his misdeed of shooting the albatross to relieve his pain but also to relate to others how it taught him to be a better person appreciative of all life.

I wasn't sure I'd survive 2005 and ever be normal again. But, with some help I made it back to shore and have had some periods that are about as close to normal as I will ever get. Like the mariner, I like to think that I have become more appreciative of life. And, like the mariner I seem to keep telling my story to those that care to listen.

 

Scales Are for Fish

Scales are for fish.

This is a slogan or motto some people use when admonishing individuals with eating disorders to stop obsessing about their weight on the scale.

It's a play on words, you see.  People like to weigh themselves on bathroom scales.  Fish also have scales.  Leave scales to the fish is the message here. 
 

I weighed myself a lot during my high school years because I was a wrestler.  I always wanted to wrestle in a weight class that was below my natural weight thinking I would have a competitive advantage that way.  So, I had to be rather conscientious about my weight at all times.  If I wasn't vigilant about keeping my weight in check I might not be able to compete in my desired weight class.

When I was a wrestler I had a food scale I used occasionally.  I used it on Thanksgiving day when I was a senior to measure out a certain number of ounces of turkey.  I think I used the scale to measure an ounce of cereal occasionally but I usually just measured cereal with a measuring cup.

I remember how a lot of wrestlers knew how much certain foods and liquids weighed.  Sometimes the night before a tournament all one is concerned about is the actual weight of the food.  Most of us knew a carton of milk was 8 oz. I knew consuming a carton of milk was going to cause a half pound weight increase.  A 2 oz. candy bar wasn't going to add much weight if all you cared about was making weight the next morning.  It was kind of a game.  If I am a pound under my weight I can probably have two pounds of food and/or liquid because I'll usually lose a pound overnight while sleeping.  I think some wrestlers call this drift weight.  So, even if eating two pounds of food puts my weight a pound over my competitive weight I'll probably still make weight the next day.  Does this make sense?  In the real world you'd care about the calories but when you're just concerned about making weight the next day all you need to worry about is the actual weight of the food.  Liquid, of course, adds up fast.  It's easy to consume 16 oz. (a pound) of liquid. 

I struggled keeping my weight down during my sophomore season.  But, I somehow managed to be about 3 1/2 pounds under weight the night before the sectional tournament.  What should I eat or drink?  That was the question.  Gary, an upperclassman, suggested I have a six-pack of Pepsi and nothing else.  Well, I was thirsty and I probably could have had that much liquid and still made weight.  But, I decided against his suggestion and had some food and liquid keeping in mind the number of ounces I thought I could consume safely and still make weight the next day.

When I was having trouble eating as an adult I didn't really weigh myself much at all.  I didn't really need a scale to tell me things were going badly.  My cheekbones sticking out like daggers showed how ill I was.  The doctors and therapists I saw weighed me.  At one point I weighed almost what I had back in junior high.  Making weight for wrestling felt like an accomplishment.  Starving down to a certain weight didn't feel like an accomplishment. 

When I was in treatment for an eating disorder many years after my wrestling days the nurses weighed us three times a week as I recall.  Now, it was the doctors and nurses who seemed obsessed with the number on the scale.  They usually wanted patients to restore (gain) weight.  If a patient failed to gain weight then he or she might be placed on 24-hour surveillance.  Perhaps the patient had been exercising in his room when he was supposed to have been sleeping. 

We patients always had to step on the scale backward as I recall.  At any rate, we weren't allowed to see our weight while in treatment.  You knew you were gaining weight but not how much.  The treatment team didn't want patients concerned about their weight.  They wanted patients focused on recovery.  They wanted patients focused on their thoughts and feelings and how it was affecting their behavior.

A social worker named Sam (not his real name) used to tell us, "Eating disorders are not about food, weight, or pant size."

Eating disorders are a maladaptive method of coping with emotional distress.
That's what Sam told us although not everyone was buying it. 

One day during group therapy with Sam, Dr. A stuck his head in the room and Sam said, "Dr. A, we were just discussing how eating disorders are all about food, weight, and pant size."

Without missing a beat Dr. A replied, "Yes, and about how you look in the mirror."

Funny guys, huh?

When I first met Dr. A he asked me what my ideal body would look like.  He asked me to draw him a picture and show him the next day.  I drew a stick figure.  Ha ha.  No, I'm just kidding.  I drew a bodybuilder.  Does that surprise you?  I think a lot of guys like the look of wide shoulders and back tapering down to a narrow waist.

Of course, modern day bodybuilders look like cartoon characters with their oversized muscles.  But, the bodybuilders of the 70s and 80s looked rather fit and athletic. 

Some patients I met in the day treatment program claimed that the number they saw on the bathroom scale each morning would determine how they felt that day.  The number would determine if they felt happy or sad, confident or inadequate.

Sam thought this notion was awfully silly.  How could a number on a scale have so much power?  He suggested that they should just call him each morning and he'd tell them how to feel that day.  He said that would make about as much sense.

Several years ago I got a visit at my apartment from my older sister and my young niece.  My niece being a curious young lady opened my refrigerator.  As I recall the refrigerator was empty which I imagine was kind of a shock for her.  I think her eyes went wide and she kind of laughed.  I think my older sister just smiled too because she knew I was probably always going to struggle with eating.  She didn't seem that surprised as I recall. 

I did have some chocolate chip cookies in the apartment so my niece ate some of those which made me happy.  I think that incident may have been just prior to me going back to the hospital.  All I had in the apartment was cookies because that's basically what I was living on.

It's embarrassing having an eating disorder sometimes.  How do you explain having an empty refrigerator and bare cupboards to normal functioning adults?

The number on the scale has been a pain at times.  It seems like a big joke sometimes, like a bizarre twist of fate.  When I was a wrestler I had to worry constantly about keeping my weight low.  I was checking the scale all the time at home and in the locker room to see how much I was over my weight. 

Fast forward years later.  I am seeing a therapist on a weekly basis and she weighs me each time we meet.  She seems concerned if I lose even a little weight.  I have to worry each week about my weight being HEAVY enough.  If I don't maintain a certain percentage of my target weight I'll have to return to the hospital for treatment.

Some people might find the way that treatment is carried out on an eating disorder unit to be a bit peculiar.  Patients are told not to focus on weight or food.  In fact, you don't get to see your weight when weighed and are not allowed to discuss food or calories.  And yet, patients are weighed on a regular basis and their days are structured around eating a certain amount of food that they have no control over. 

Am I suggesting that treatment centers actually exacerbate the problems faced by patients?  No.  It's kind of a conundrum.  Of course treatment programs must devise ways of encouraging eating and weight gain and yet the meticulous measuring of patients' body weight and calories consumed seems at odds with telling those same patients that eating disorders have nothing to do with food or weight.

On the eating disorder unit I remember being awakened three times a week to be weighed before breakfast.  I had to put on a hospital gown and plod down to the room where the scale was kept.  I'd see all the other sleepy patients in their gowns waiting to be weighed as well.   
Some patients have a magic number they believe they'll be happy at.  But, when they reach that weight they find they're still not happy.  I knew a girl once who told me she thought a certain treatment facility had really helped her.  She said they had set her target weight at 117.  She told me she had no desire to maintain that weight but thought she might be happy with 110.  Granted, 110 lbs. was significantly higher than she'd been before treatment and yet I still found it amusing that she was already planning to lose weight when she discharged from treatment.  I suppose I could have been a smart-ass and asked her why seven pounds was going to make a difference and how she planned to lose those seven pounds and then stop at 110 lbs. and maintain it.

This is the same girl who on another occasion refused to go to day treatment after being discharged because she claimed she weighed 130.  She was taken back to inpatient in handcuffs.  I wonder if she really weighed 130 or if she weighed something like 125 and simply "rounded up" thinking there wasn't much difference between 125 and 130.  Regardless, she was not happy with the weight that inpatient had left her at.

I wasn't too happy the first time I left treatment.  I was told my target weight had originally been lower and then they raised it claiming my body "wanted" to be at a higher weight.  But, when I discharged I weighed even more than the new target weight they'd decided on even though I'm fairly certain they claim they never let someone get beyond target weight.

"Why the hell did they raise my target weight?" I asked Sam.

"Well, that's where your body is comfortable at," he said.

I wasn't comfortable physically or emotionally so I wasn't sure exactly just what the hell sort of nonsense was coming out of his mouth.  Hell yes, I planned to lose some weight when I got out of that hospital. 

But, during other times in treatment the weight on the scale bothered me less.  Even though they'd let me go over target weight by quite a bit again they claimed there were extenuating circumstances.  Whatever.  It just wasn't worth getting worked up over.

I suppose people being concerned about the number on the bathroom scale is culturally normative.  Even as kids we weigh ourselves out of curiosity noticing how we grow and gain weight each year.  When an adult no longer weighs what he or she did in high school or college it can be discouraging.  But, most people don't decide to starve themselves because they're overly distressed about it. 

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with scales.  They can be a valuable tool.  A large weight gain may signal a problem like edema for example.  Or, if someone has suffered a major health crisis and lost weight then the scale can help determine if someone is considered clinically malnourished and in need of extra care.  

Currently my bathroom scale is gathering dust which is a good thing I suppose.  I hope I don't have to use it again for a while. 

Leave Scales to the Fish

To scared to eat your favorite dish
You won't give yourself permission
Afraid something might go amiss
Even though it sounds delicious

Your so thin that you might vanish
You can't live in such condition
I wonder why you diminish
The gifts you have been given

Your body you must learn to nourish
Deep down you have the volition
Perhaps then you can truly flourish
And then find your true ambition

Your life you must learn to cherish
To you I make this petition
Stop feeling the need to  punish
Life is not a competition

You live your life with precision
But, the pain triumphs over bliss
Dear one, make a new decision
The scale's power you must dismiss

For you I have a single wish
Make loving yourself your mission
Dearest one, leave scales to the fish
Dear soul, this is my benediction

Club Daze

Saturday Night

It's Saturday night and that means Mark and I will be going to Spinner McGee's.  On any given Saturday we might be joined by Curt, Randy, or Dan. 
My roommate Louie hardly ever comes with us.  He has a girlfriend and I don't think a dance club is really his thing anyway. Sometimes Mark convinces Erik to be our designated driver even on nights when Erik doesn't feel like going out.  Mark can be persuasive.  Erik's nickname is P.F. which stands for passion fruit.  I never did find out how he got the nickname.  But, Mark usually calls him P.F. 

Mark likes Spinners because it's the closet thing he could find to a dance club in Iowa.  Joe's Knight Hawk, the local college bar, has a small dance floor and music but it's not a club.  Spinners has a big dance floor and a great sound system.  It has strobe lights and a disco ball and even a second elevated dance floor close to the DJ booth. 

Ask Mark where he's from and he'll answer "Chicago."  I don't think he actually grew up in the city or attended prep school there.  I'm fairly sure he grew up in a small community an hour or two from the city.  But, he did spend a lot of time in the city and loves it dearly so I guess he can claim it as his home.

We almost always take Mark's car to Spinners.  I suppose we use his Oldsmobile Cutlass because it's big enough to hold us all comfortably.  Plus, it has a cassette player so we can listen to music on the way to Cedar Falls.  Mark is the alpha male in our group.  He's the leader so it seems natural that we always take his car.

Meeting Mark

I returned to college halfway through my sophomore year.  It was January 1988.  I missed the first semester because I was trying to figure out what to do with my life.  I thought I was going to transfer to another school but that didn't work out so I decided to go back to Wartburg when the second semester rolled around.  I moved into a different dorm with a guy I didn't know because I had few housing options since I'd missed the first semester.  I was nervous about returning to school and about living in a new dorm.

My roommate's last name was Lewis so everyone called him Louie.  He was nice enough and I got reacquainted with some old friends and even made some new ones but I was feeling overwhelmed and stressed out after returning to school midyear. 

All the guys on my floor seemed nice enough.  The RA was nice.  A couple of guys had a sign on their door that read:

Dancing is a vertical expression of a horizontal desire. 

I seem to recall watching Jeopardy! most afternoons in someone's room with a few other guys from my floor.  When the show was over we'd head to the cafeteria for dinner.

When we returned from dinner each evening, Mark from the room across the hall would always crank up the volume on his stereo and play the same song.
He'd leave his door open and turn it up loud so the whole hall could hear.  I liked the song although I wasn't familiar with it.  I found out later it was "Bizarre Love Triangle" by New Order.  What a bizarre title for a song, huh?

I was passing by Mark's room one day after class and he happened to have his door open.  He tried to strike up a conversation with me but I was such a quiet person I didn't have much to say.  He said he remembered us being in a leisure services class together the previous year.  Then I remembered him too.  Mark had taught us some basic breakdancing moves.  I think he taught us the arm wave and a few other rudimentary breakdance skills. 

When he tried to start a conversation that day I might have seemed aloof or perhaps just shy.  But, I guess he sensed something in me he liked because we eventually became friends.

One day after class I put my AC/DC cassette in Louie's stereo and cranked the volume.  I was really getting into it and playing air guitar and banging my head.
I looked up and Mark was standing there and I almost died on the spot from embarrassment.  Evidently he'd walked in unannounced and caught me in the middle of my air band routine.  I thought sure he was going to make fun of me but he just smiled.

"I guess you're ready for the weekend, huh?"

"Yeah," I said quietly.

We went to Joe's together a few times after that.  I think we even took his car there sometimes even though Joe's was easily within walking distance.  One night he was ready to go home but I was talking to my new friend Laura who I'd met at a party recently and kept telling him to wait a minute.  Another time I remember walking back from the parking lot in freezing cold weather.

"I know it's probably freezing out right now but I could be naked and it wouldn't matter because I can't feel a thing," I said.

He thought that was pretty funny.  I'd had a little too much to drink that night and was feeling kind of numb and oblivious to the weather.

Occasionally Mark and I would take a drive in his Cutlass.  One day when I opened the passenger side door and got in I was humming the melody to "Wishing Well" by Terence Trent D'Arby.  I'd heard it on the radio a lot around that time.

"Okay, we can listen to that a little later.  But, first you have to hear this other song," said Mark.

"Are you serious?  You have that cassette in your car right now?" I asked.

"Yes, I do," said Mark laughing.

I couldn't believe he just happened to have the cassette that contained the song I'd been humming and was just now rising in the charts.  But, first Mark wanted to listen to "If You Let Me Stay" off the same album.

When the song got to the chorus Mark joined in and then I joined in too.  We were both blaring out the lyrics "if you let me stay-ay-ay-ay-ay."  You might think that two dudes singing to a song together would be embarrassing but it wasn't. 

"Man, we killed that song!  We rocked it!" Mark declared.

On another occasion while cruising in his Cutlass we were listening to "Big Ole Butt" by rapper LL Cool J.  The narrator in the song keeps leaving one girl after another because of their fine derrières. 

To wit: 

Tina got a big ole butt
I know I told you I'd be true
But Tina got a big ole butt
So I'm leavin' you

I think Mark was concerned about whether I understood the song or not because he said, "You know he means big butt in a good way.  He's talking about a full-figured, curvaceous, shapely, sexy woman." 

Okay, he didn't use those words exactly but I told him I understood what he was getting at and what the song meant. 

As I recall, Mark preferred a nice rear end on a woman.  Erik was a leg man.  I said I liked a woman with a pretty face which I think amused Mark.  A pretty face?  Kind of lame, huh? 

Mark kept telling me I needed to come with him to Cedar Falls and check out this place called Spinners and finally one night I did.

Spinners

I don't recall who went with Mark and me to Spinner McGee's (aka Spinners) that first time.  We drove his Cutlass and took a few shortcuts he knew to get to University Avenue.  Spinners was close to College Square Mall.  We got carded at the door and paid a cover charge to get in.

Spinners was a lot bigger than Joe's.  It had two bars.  It had a pool table and some games tucked away in one corner.  It had two dance floors.  A private party room hidden behind a darkened window overlooked the dance floor.  Free popcorn was available by the pool table. 

One of the most interesting attractions was the blackjack tables located in a room near the smaller bar.  The blackjack was perfectly legal because patrons played with scrip money.  I think the scrip money was called Spinner Bucks.  Patrons could use the scrip to buy Spinner McGee's t-shirts, jackets, drinks, and even use of the private party room.  Mark wanted to win enough Spinner Bucks to get the Spinner McGee's jacket but it took a lot of scrip to get the jacket.  I don't think he ever collected enough scrip to buy the jacket.

 

Our group sat close to the dance floor my inaugural night at Spinners chatting   and having a few drinks.  Then Mark did something I hadn't seen many guys do in my lifetime.  He got up and boldly walked over to a girl and asked her to dance.  She smiled and soon they were on the dance floor dancing.  And, man, could Mark dance.  This wasn't the kind of awkward dancing guys might be seen engaged in at a high school dance.  He really had some moves.  And, every now and then he would lean in and talk to his dance partner.  Who was this guy?

After a couple of songs he returned to the table.

"You have to teach me to dance," I said.

Mark just smiled.

We went to Spinners on a weekly basis after that as I recall.  Emboldened by Mark's example I too would ask some girls to dance.  I tried to mimic his dancing.  I probably looked ridiculous but I was having a blast.

He did teach me a few "fake" dance moves.  Make a fist with both your hands and place one above the other and pretend your holding a broom handle.  Now move the make-believe broom handle in a circular fashion in front of you.  Congratulations, your doing "the broom." 

Or, pretend your drying yourself off with a towel.  Hold each end of the towel and vigorously dry yourself off.  You're doing "the towel." 

He did teach me one move he actually used that he called "the slide." 

Mark introduced me to a few adult beverages I wasn't familiar with.  Occasionally we drank Colt 45 malt liquor.  He mentioned another brand of malt liquor called Olde English 800 (aka 8-ball). 

He also introduced me to Long Island Iced Tea (LIT).  A Long Island Iced Tea is typically made with vodka, tequila, rum, gin, triple sec, and a splash of cola.

It's kind of embarrassing to admit but some weeks we went to Joe's on Wednesday and Friday and hit Spinners on Thursday and Saturday.  I guess you can do that when you're young.

Sometimes Spinners had dime draws if you came early in the evening.  Ten cents for a glass of beer is pretty cheap.  Later in the evening the prices went back to normal but I was already feeling pretty good by that point. 

Sometimes they had best tan contests or best booty contests.  Booty = butt.  Some guys I knew from college and some other dudes got on stage shirtless one night and danced a little bit to see which male was the hottest.  No, I did not participate. 

It wasn't uncommon for us to stay at Spinners until the very end of the evening.  They almost always played the same two naughty songs at the end of the night.  That's how you knew it was closing time.  One song had to do with a part of the female anatomy and the other song used the term mother f*cker.

Sometimes we raced from Spinners to a convenience store to buy more beer and maybe some chips and dip as if we hadn't had enough beer already.

Cassettes and Mix Tapes

Eventually I bought my own copy of Introducing the Hardline According to Terrence Trent D'Arby.  I also bought a copy of Mr. Magic's Rap Attack Volume 4 mainly because of two songs on it.  The cassette contained "Push It" by Salt-N-Pepa and "It Takes Two" by Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock.

Mark also made some mix tapes for me.  Mark had mentioned this genre of music called house music.  House music originated in Chicago so of course he was familiar with it.  He'd taped some music from WBMX and WGCI. 

"The station with more d-d-d-d-dance music, B-M-X!"

He also had a lot of music of his own.  It wasn't all house music in those mixes.  Later in life I would learn that some songs were R&B, new jack swing, freestyle (aka Latin hip-hop), Hi-NRG, Italo disco, and dance-pop just to name a few.

By the way, music being played at a club called the Warehouse in Chicago in the early 80s had a new sound.  People liked this new sound and started calling it "house" music, as in the music you would hear at the Warehouse.

Some of those early Chicago house songs use the word "jack" a lot.  Jack your body! J-J-J-Jack your body!  Jack me till I start to scream.  Jack it all night long.  Don't make me jack.  Jacking is a term used to describe the way the torso ripples when it moves to the beat in house dancing.

Jack It All Night Long - Bad Boy Bill
Jack Me Till I Scream - Julian "Jumpin" Perez feat. Connie V
Jack To The Sound Of The Underground - Hithouse
Jack Your Body - Steve "Silk" Hurley
Time To Jack - Chip E
Jack The House - Femme Fion
Don't Make Me Jack (Tonite I Wanna House You) - Paris Grey

 



Some of my favorite freestyle songs are:

Don't Stop the Rock - Freestyle
Point Of No Return - Expose
Come Go With Me - Expose
Two of Hearts - Stacy Q
Yo No Se - Pajama Party
All Night - Trinere
I Can't Wait - Nu Shooz
Fascinated - Company B
Catch Me (I'm Falling) - Pretty Poison
Tell It to My Heart - Taylor Dayne
Head to Toe - Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam
Let the Music Play - Shannon

Bobby Orlando is credited as one of the founding fathers of Hi-NRG dance music.  A Bobby O song I liked called "I'm So Hot for You" was on one of the Mark mixes.

The Blue Mercedes song "I Want To Be Your Property (Street Latin Wolff Mix)" was one of my favorite songs on one of the Mark mixes.  I think I hummed part of this so often that my younger sister soon knew the melody. 

The Scene

A lot of female singers were charting in the mid to late 80s.  Janet Jackson kept telling me "I miss you much."  Samantha Fox was telling me "Naughty girls need love too."  Paula Abdul was asking "Straight up, now tell me.  Do you really wanna love me forever?"  Neneh Cherry was telling me "No moneyman can win my love.  It's sweetness that I'm thinking of."  Karyn White was telling me "I love the way you love me."  Jody Watley was telling me "I'm looking for a new love, baby."  Pebbles tells me "If you want to ride in my Mercedes boy there are so many things that I'm gonna do to you."

Artists like Bobby Brown were performing in the new jack swing style mixing rap, dance-pop, and R&B.  "I Want Her" by Keith Sweat was the first new jack swing song to reach #1 on the R&B charts.  Some claim this song inaugurated the new jack swing era.

"Back to Life (However Do You Want Me)" by British R&B band Soul II Soul has elements of new jack swing.

Janet Jackson had us all dancing to her Contemporary R&B sound.

Michael Jackson was still around and so was George Michael.  George Michael released a song called "Monkey" in 1988 that I really enjoyed.

Whitney Houston was wildly successful as was Paula Abdul.

Don't forget Prince and Madonna!

INXS achieved international success.

"Pump Up the Jam" by Belgian act Technotronic is an early example of the hip house genre and is considered by some to be the first house song to be a hit in the U.S.

Everybody loved "Pump Up the Jam".

Pump it up a little more
Get the party goin' on the dance floor
See, 'cause that's where the party's at
And you'd find out if you do that

Some fun hip hop (rap) songs were being performed like "Push It" by Salt-N-Pepa and "Wild Thing" and "Funky Cold Medina" by Tone Loc.  Young MC sang a fun song called "Bust a Move".  I liked "Wild Wild West" by Kool Moe Dee as well.  "Me So Horny" by 2 Live Crew was a fun song but was deemed scandalous at the time because of the explicit nature of the lyrics.

Oh, and New Kids on the Block were charting as well.  I'm just saying.  "You got the right stuff, baby."

Joe often had a DJ or live music at Joe's Knight Hawk.  But, even when he didn't he still had music playing over the sound system. 

Some songs I may have heard at Joe's: 

Naughty Naughty - John Parr
What I Like About You - The Romantics
Should I Stay or Should I Go - The Clash
Addicted to Love - Robert Palmer
Simply Irresistible - Robert Palmer
What You Need - INXS
Need You Tonight - INXS
New Sensation - INXS
What's on Your Mind (Pure Energy) - Information Society
Boom Boom - Paul Lekakis
Let's Go All the Way - Sly Fox
Blister in the Sun - Violent Femmes
Relax - Frankie Goes to Hollywood
You Spin Me Round (Like a Record) - Dead or Alive
Bizarre Love Triangle - New Order
Just Got Paid - Johnny Kemp

I remember hearing "Naughty Naughty" as a freshman and thinking it was a really cool song. 

"Boom Boom" by Paul Lekakis always seemed to me like an appropriate song to hear at a college bar.

Boom Boom Boom
Let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night
And you can make me feel right

"Let's Go All the Way" by Sly Fox isn't actually about sex but it still made smile whenever I heard it because I was in a college bar full of horny young adults.

I think some of Joe's cassette tapes were probably made by Mark.  I would guess he almost certainly got "Bizarre Love Triangle" from Mark.

New School Year

The next school year Mark moved into an apartment off campus.  His buddy Curtis from Chicago decided to spend the school year with him.  Mark went to classes and Curt went to work. 

I liked Curtis.  He was cool, friendly, and funny.  He liked to use the word proper.  He didn't use the words fresh or fly which were popular synonyms for "cool" at the time.  If he liked your haircut he said it looked proper.  If he liked your shoes he said they looked proper.

Proper basically means awesome or cool.

Fresh means very good and highly approved. 

"Yo, I like that haircut!  You look fresh!"

To be fly is to be cool, amazing, and awesome.  Fly means cool, in style.

"Yo, those are some fly shoes!"

Curtis tried to explain house music to me.  He loved house music.  He wasn't really into rap (hip-hop) like one might expect a young African American man to be.  He loved dance music.  I asked him to teach me to dance like I had Mark.

One evening he was trying to teach me to dance.  It was all in the hips he claimed.  He showed me how to pump my hips just ever so slightly.  But, soon I was thrusting my hips as though I was making passionate love to some imaginary woman.

"Whoa!  Not that much!"  Curt scolded me.
 

 

Curtis introduced me to the music of Betty Wright and Eazy-E.  We both really liked "It Takes Two" by Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock.  It was a hip-hop (rap) song which usually wasn't Curt's thing but it also ended up being a dance club hit which I suppose explains why Curtis liked it so much.  Whenever it was being played at Spinners Curtis would get this excited but frantic look on his face as he quickly searched for someone to dance with.

Mark and Curtis were homeboys seeing as they both came from the Chicago area.  Homeboy basically means an acquaintance from one's own town or neighborhood.  But, it can also simply mean a close friend.  Variations of the word homeboy include homie, homes, home slice, and home skillet.

For instance, one might ask a friend, "Yo, what's up homie?"

Mark said it made him feel good when Curtis introduced him as his homeboy. 

"Now you're my homeboy," Mark told me once.

I heard stories about Mark and Curt's younger days.  Mark's Dad was brave enough to drive a bus to inner city Chicago to pick up some kids and bring them to summer camp.  Mark's dad was the camp director.  Curt was one of the Chicago kids Mark met at camp.  They became close and had quite a few adventures together as teenagers.

Some guys were threatening Mark at The Taste of Chicago festival one year and Curtis came running to the rescue with punches flying.  Unfortunately, Curt smashed into a table in the process.  As Curt lay on the ground, Mark told everyone to get the hell away and they did.

Mark went to Curt's house and frantically told them that Curtis was hurt and at the hospital.  They looked at him like he was crazy and told him to calm down.  I guess Curt being in a scrape wasn't exactly a huge deal to them.  Curt showed me the scar on the inside of his mouth.

Curtis got mugged one evening in Chicago at gun point.  Curtis told the guy he could have whatever he wanted.  The guy demanded his money AND all of his clothes.  Curtis had a money clipped hidden in hi boxer shorts.  Nonetheless, a bus driver wouldn't let Curtis on the bus wearing only his underwear.

The guys mentioned Rush and Division streets and a club called Mother's.

Mark gave Curtis a ride to Chicago during the school year when a relative passed away.  Randy went with them as well.  I could have went along but I decided I needed to study for a test.  Big mistake.  I missed out on Chicago, partying, and rib tips.


I also met and began dating a girl that fall.  She made it clear she didn't care much for my dancing.  She said I danced like Mark which to me was actually a huge compliment. 

She didn't care much for Mark and thought he had too much influence over me.  My retort was always the same.

"If Mark had that much power over me I would have dumped you a long time ago because he's been telling me to drop you since the day he met you."

Our gang still went clubbing on a regular basis although now we had Curt in tow.  Sometimes before going to Spinners we'd go to another bar called Mr. Bo Jingles (Bo's).  Bo's was located in the College Hill Area (i.e. the hill).  We'd have a drink there and talk and then head to Spinners.  Mr. Bo Jingles had a dance floor too and you only had to be 19 to get in.  It was close to the University of Northern Iowa campus and it seems like it would have made more sense for us just to stay there.  But, I guess Mark liked the big club feel of Spinners. 

One night we were walking toward Bo's and Curtis spotted a pretty girl on the sidewalk across the street.  He ran across the street to her.

"Excuse me.  Aren't you Miss America?" he asked. 

She just smiled and said she was not, in fact, Miss America and kept on walking.

Sometimes after leaving Spinners we would race over to some dorms on campus known as the Tower Complex (i.e. the towers).  We were just having some fun and looking for some cute girls.  Mark and I walked through an open dorm room door once and joined a little party.  I guess we weren't too annoying because one of the girls gave me her number and said we should come back and party with them again sometime.

Our standard uniform for clubbing was usually a cardigan sweater, a button-up shirt, dress pants, and loafers.  During warmer months we probably wore short-sleeve button-up shirts or polo shirts.

One night I told Mark I didn't want to go out.  He wasn't having it.  He looked through my wardrobe, picked out some clothes, and laid them out on my bed.  I gave in and went out that night.

I hope you're not imagining Mr. Rogers when you hear we wore sweaters often.  I assure you we looked good.  We were a stylish group.  I'm not saying we always dressed like that when clubbing but that's the outfit I remember the most.

On just one occasion our group went to a gentlemen's club (strip joint) called The Golden Dolphin in Waterloo where we watched some exotic (topless) dancing.

What can I say?  We were horny college boys.

The Apartment

Mark had one rule about moving in and out of a place.  The stereo is the first item you move in (so you can start jamming music right away) and it's the last item you move out.

I liked Mark and Curt's apartment.  They occupied the second story of a house.  They had a separate entrance.  I think Mark might have even tutored a girl living on the first floor. 

The apartment was near two convenience stores which was nice if you wanted to make a beer or snack run.

The only artwork or decorations I recall the guys having was a poster featuring Chicago sports legends Michael Jordon, Walter Payton, and Andre Dawson.  No posters of bikini-clad women.  Just some athletes holding a basketball, football, and baseball bat.  Even P.F. had a sexy poster of Samantha Fox.  But, not these guys.

Mark was definitely a big fan of Chicago sports teams and of the University of Illinois.  He loved the Fighting Illini.

 



Mark had the bigger bedroom and Curtis the smaller one.  They had a small bathroom, living room, and kitchen.  It was quaint.  It had charm.  They had a sort of bar dividing the kitchen and living room areas.  I seem to recall some of us playing a poker game at that bar one night.  I don't recall if they had a table or not.  They might have had a small one. 

The boys had an old-fashioned tub and no shower.  So, they attached some sort of handheld shower hose to the tub faucet and used some metal wire to rig up a shower curtain. 

The tub filled with ice served as a container to keep the beer keg cold when the boys hosted a party for the Luther-Wartburg basketball game that year.  Quite a big rivalry existed between the two small schools.  Mark knew some girls from Luther who came to the party and stayed overnight at the apartment as well.

During the afternoon we drank beer and played drinking games before the basketball game that night.  We all came back to the apartment after the game to party some more.  I think my older sister was even there visiting.  I ended up talking to an Asian girl from Luther at the party for quite some time. 

I spent quite a bit of time in that apartment that school year.

Mark the DJ

Mark had been a DJ at Joe's Knight Hawk from time to time since his freshman year.  Sometimes he played music at other venues as well like house parties or the rec room on campus. 

He had a lot of music and a lot of equipment.  He had an Onkyo stereo, a pair of large floor speakers, and a boom box.  He'd use the boom box and a pair of headphones to cue up a song on a cassette while his stereo cranked out a song for the crowd in the bar.  At Joe's he didn't have to use his own speakers.  He was able to patch his stereo into Joe's sound system.

In Joe's bar there was a slightly elevated seating area that overlooked the dance floor.  Mark would set up his stereo on a table by the railing that ran along the elevated area.  He would be directly looking over the dance floor so it worked perfectly.

I often went with him when he was playing music at Joe's.  I would sit in a chair next to him and be his copilot.  I didn't really do anything except keep him company.  Early in the evening he'd play some nice music but when the crowd showed up he'd start cranking out the good stuff.  It was fun to see the dance floor fill up.

Not everyone liked his music.

"Why don't you stop playing all this black music and start playing some progressive shit?" one guy asked.  I think our buddy Randy told the guy to f*ck off.

"Why is he playing this crap?" one woman asked me.  I just pointed to the dance floor which was packed with college students.  She wanted to hear some Guns N' Roses.  They were wildly popular at the time so I suppose it was a legitimate request but I told her it wasn't going to happen.  Mark would never have spent his money on heavy metal music like that.

One evening some college girls asked him to play a song off of a Spanish music cassette they had.  He tried to find a way to nicely explain that he wasn't going to do that.

Some people wanted to hear country music by artists like Randy Travis.  He told them to bring in a tape and he'd play it.

I wish I would have known more about music then and perhaps I could have given him a tape to play that would have impressed him like "Blue Monday 88" by New Order perhaps.

Occasionally he would play a slow jam.  Sometimes he even played a slow jam and stepped onto the floor to dance with his girlfriend.

I have to admit it felt very cool being friends with the DJ and sitting there by his side while he magically put together the right combination of songs.

Senior Year

Mark was living on his own in an apartment during our senior year.  Curt was back living in Chicago.  Mark had a girlfriend at that point.  Sometimes I would go to Spinners with them or with my friend Michelle. 

It wasn't quite the same as the old days but still fun.

My friend Michelle kind of used me as a wing man.  We would dance allowing her to show herself off.  After we left the dance floor we'd soon be approached by guys wondering if we were a couple.  It's a good thing we weren't or I would have been mad as hell.  Get your own damn woman!

Michelle introduced me to an Asian girl named Flo who I would dance with sometimes.  Flo wore tight dresses or revealing clothing and was hot as hell.

One night a petite blond asked me to dance.  She knew me because we had danced at Spinners one night the previous year.  I think she was a teaching assistant at UNI. 

I never asked Flo or the blond girl out because they both seemed out of my league.

I hung out with a guy named Tom a few times that had transferred to Wartburg.  He was a white guy who really liked rap music.  He was one of those white guys who liked so talk like he was black. 

"Yo!  What's up home slice?"

One night he and I went to a place called The Stein on the hill in Cedar Falls.  I don't think The Stein had a cover charge.  It was large, dark place.  It was a basic, simple place with no frills unlike Spinners.  But, it did have a dance floor and a DJ.

We saw two girls dancing alone.  We decided to walk onto the floor and simply start dancing with them.  My heart was pounding.  Would one of the girls slap me or would they simply walk off the dance floor in disgust?  When we started dancing in front of them they were a bit surprised but laughed and seemed okay with it.

When the song was over the girl I had been dancing with smiled and said, "Thanks for the dance."

Tom really liked MC Hammer and especially "U Can't Touch This."

I guess he impressed Flo at Spinners dancing to it because she then proceeded to ask me if my friend (Tom) might like to dance with her.

If any song was the anthem for those college club days it had to be "Just Got Paid" by Johnny Kemp.

Just got paid, Friday night
Party huntin', feelin' right
Body shakin', all around
No one thinks when I'm gettin' down

 

Check the mirror, I'm lookin' fly
Round up the posse, jump in my ride
Radio rockin', a monster jam
Feel the rhythm, pump up the sound

 

I'm feelin' so good
Don't you know I'm just groovin' to the beat
I'm groovin', groovin'
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

Mark once said, "Whoever invented weekends was a very wise person."

Soon we graduated and the fun was over. 

I didn't care for the grunge or gansta rap of the 1990s. 

I rarely ever set foot in a club or bar again.

Today

So, whatever happened to Mark after getting married to his college sweetheart?  He became a minister of course.  Did I forget to mention he was a religion major in college?  And, he became a father too.  Hey, you can be a married Christian man with a child and still be cool. 

I think Curtis settled down and got married as well. 

I don't think too much about those old days.  But, every now and then I remember being young with my brain running on a mixture of optimism, cockiness, adrenaline, endorphins, and testosterone.  I remember thinking I looked like THE shit (i.e. looked sharp and desirable).  The music was pounding, the alcohol was flowing, and everyone seemed happy to be alive.

I have to admit I take some pride in knowing a bit about the esoteric genre of house music.  Perhaps it's not so esoteric any longer.  For example, Madonna's hit song "Vogue" might be considered house music.

It saddens me that no one thought to take any pictures.  Not one damn picture of us dressed up for our night out.  Not a single picture of Spinners or even Joe's.  It never occurred to me to save some Spinner Bucks as a memento. 
 
Thanks to the digital era we live in now I have been able to find a few things that were archived.  Mainly, though, I just have my memories.  That's okay.  I was living in the moment and having fun and I guess that's more important than any picture or memento. 

I still hear a song now and then that takes me back to those days.  I hear "Bizarre Love Triangle" from time to time.  Or, I'll hear a remix of something like "Rock Me Amadeus" and wonder if Mark ever heard that version and if he'd like it.  Or, I'll hear an Italo Disco song like "Sexy Teacher" and wonder if Mark would like it or hate it.  
 
I've very seldom set foot in a club since those days.  One night a few years back I did go to a bar and break out some of the old dance moves and a girl from my apartment building and her boyfriend said I was great.  

But, I'll leave the nightlife to the younger generation now.  Party on!