Seems I likely talked out loud to myself when a wee youngster, but just as likely I stopped yapping solo around age seven or eight, and began seriously and silently daydreaming. Could the serial paper 'funnies' and comic mags of the late 1930s have stimulated my quiet mental meanderings? Blame Little Orphan Annie or Captain (SHAZAM) Marvel as main culprits? Possibly. Throw in Prince Valiant and a handful of others, and you'll have all the suspects you need.
Anyway, at an early age I became a committed daydreamer with my own time/space machine to transport me anywhere, anytime I wanted to go. Even now, at age eighty-one, you might think me napping on a couch, but I'll likely be sitting in the White House sharing my brilliant geo-political analyses with the President and his staff astounded by my genius.
You don't think I hear your muffled laughter? Humph, you'll soon regret such superciliousness. Let me adjust the choreograph and tweak the setting for the main character. Now, follow me if you dare . . . .
Major network flunkey: "Sir, it's time. I'm here to lead you to the stage for your interview with (insert favorite newscaster)"
"Yes, thank you." I arise outfitted with my signature, powder blue jumpsuit, and saunter confidently to the ample stage and sit opposite my interviewer surrounded by TV cameras and technicians. The audience applauds politely when my name is announced. I nod in recognition.
The newscaster has my six published books fronting him along with a few pages of paper with the SloCoastJournal.com banner head.
After I'm seated in a not too comfortable chair, he says, "Well, Mr. Zidbeck, welcome to this show. We invited you because of the worldwide acclaim to your literary works. Granted they haven't garnered the readership of the Harry Potter series, but a few critics have compared you to Herman Melville. So, let's start with that. Are you a Herman Melville?"
One nice thing about daydreams — no need to be humble or self-effacing.
"No, I'm not a Herman Melville, but I do parallel him in some ways. He had a great talent, but he was ahead of his time. It took the American literati far too long to credit his works. Have you read, The Confidence Man?" I figured to catch him with that question. I've met a few people who finished Moby Dick, but not many who've read anything else of the man.
"Well, no, but I'll add it to my list." To his credit, he didn't answer in a condescending manner. He also explained to the audience that he hadn't read my full family saga, just the first book, Lady Gemini, on the mother, and the final volume that follows the life of her first born — the tome titled, The Aquarian Son. However, his next set of questions showed he had read the two carefully — particularly with some inquiries about my childhood years in the American Canal Zone pre WW II.
One question related to the nature of the government operations and how such might have operated under different guidelines than what the population experienced stateside: "You left the Canal Zone in 1944 when you were thirteen. Not likely you were familiar with the governing entities assigned by the President and Congress. But, perhaps you do have some thoughts on that matter?"
"Why thank you. In fact I do have a few comments, some retrospective in that I didn't dwell over socio-political matters during my pre-adolescent years in Panama. But I knew that no official held any high administrative post through local elections. Everything had the Washington, D.C. stamp on it."
"Perhaps you can enlighten us with a few examples?"
"Sure. Housing and most of the furnishings, commissaries for food and clothing, schools from kindergarten thru junior college, electric power, sewage disposal, roadways, landscaping, dairy products, non copyrighted soft drinks, movie theatres, and on and on. All courtesy of the Isthmian Canal Commission."
"All everything?"
"Well, keep in mind, I'm going back many years, and I might not be point on with some issues, but it's all moot in that Panama regained governance of the ten by fifty mile Canal Zone at the turn of this century. Consequently the United States has no say today in Panama's control of the canal's operations, and likely little influence over a piece of real estate once fully controlled by America."
"I see. Well then, let's go to your books. You tell a story about one family and its ever-growing dysfunction by alcohol. Many writers have covered such a topic across the media spectrum, mainly by print. What makes your tales worthwhile for the public?"
"Not an easy question. To begin with, what makes me an expert in public literary tastes? Nothing substantial that I can offer. I'll leave that matter for book reviewers and the great-unwashed public to make judgment. But, I am an expert in family disorganization. Not only through personal experience, but also through my studies in sociology and anthropology. Throw in twenty-five years as a Los Angeles County deputy probation officer, with first class experience confronting addicts and their families, I can expertly testify that alcoholism rampages through all cultures where toxic esters are readily available. Plus, I'm a what's called a recovered alkie. Moreover, all six volumes of the Bach family reveal the separate origins of a father, a mother, and the firstborn son. However, when integrated, the negative effects of alcohol abuse gradually expand beyond the impact of booze on one individual or one family."
"I can't argue with you Mr. Zidbeck that drug dependency poses a problem. Of course, I'm speaking generally. When you throw in 'meth' and 'crack,' along with a host of other drugs – legal or otherwise – I'm sure most people acknowledge a problem. What's your opinion on just alcohol specifically?"
"Let me try to answer that by first explaining that alcohol intoxicates. That says it all.
"You want to drink a poison, fine. Moreover it's a poison that quickly infuses the brain. It doesn't even have to reach the intestines before entering the blood stream. Right away, starting in the stomach, the body ingests it. You can add all the sophisticated slanting you want by discussing aroma, fruitiness, bubblyness, etc, but once a person gets past two drinks, then moving into a third, fourth, or more, that imbiber essentially seeks inebriation. By that process and effect alone, I can't condemn the adult who chooses to drink beyond the two-drink limit. What I can condemn is the consequences that often take place — drunk driving fatalities and alcohol fueled assaults and batteries. . . even a few arsons where drunks fall asleep with lighted cigarettes. Let's not leave out divorces. In short, speaking generally, alcoholics eventually corrupt society at large."
Likely I threw too much at the interviewer. He kept silent for a spell, and I sensed that he had absorbed too much information, and couldn't readily come up with a pointed question. A commercial break rescued me before I might've felt like having the interviewer get to my contributions to the Slo Coast Journal.
So, I had a good excuse to end my daydream. Besides I had to get off the couch and go to the bathroom.
