Huntsville, AL ~

Years ago I used to have a long and successful route of reenactments where I entertained every weekend from labor day till thanksgiving. It extended over several states and locales, and I met and was seen by thousands and thousands of people. I even regularly traveled into Ontario. I even had stalkers!

In all my days I could never imagine such a thing ever happening to me. At home in Indiana, I couldn’t draw the attention of anyone. All my associates had some sort of substance abuse issue, even the best and kindest ones. None of them successful even on their own terms. To get a date from any one I knew or was likely to meet was an extremely low order of probability, and the pool from which I had to choose was murky at best.

Yet out on the road, I was a minor star of sideshow! Of daring do, courageous and desirable. There were women who would endanger their marriages and kid’s future for a chance to commit sins of the flesh with me! It was quite a boost to my fractured and fragile male ego.

To tell you the truth it didn’t make sense… it was too incongruent. Which was the aberrant reality? Of course it was me! The fans in other states admired my character on the bally stage. No one at home ever saw that.

Home. I would go home to Indiana after two and a half months of highly profitable roaming. Home to a family broken with age and alcoholism, busted dreams and seething viciousness. A home which I could not and never fit in with.

I would stay there from thanksgiving until after Christmas when I would travel to south Florida for my winter shows, and patent snow birding in the Airstream to avoid winter. All Alone.

Those six weeks at home waiting, booking shows, packing for a three or four month hop to south Florida, were done all holding my breath. Steeped in claustrophobic repressed republican paranoia and despotic drunkenness, while I planned and effected my escape from winter, and assholes. All done with no help aid, nor love. Some empty sex was added to the mix of my existence, as spicy and toxic as MSG. And with all the side effects one might expect.

Each year I would get through it. Somehow… I would watch the light change, the days shorten, and the temperature drop. My migratory instinct tug and tug damn hard.

Then I would get on the road and travel south, and savor the trip as long as I could. I would travel old US 41 from Indiana to Fort Myers, and reflect while being a complete Airstream Hobo on my way to my first winter show.

And yet in Florida, my loneliness was utter and complete. The sunshine state’s promises of fun and excess, provided neither. I never found love in Florida. I never found riches, was able to live to anything like excess, or descend into any sort of carnal or licentious indulgences despite the hype of the place.

All I really enjoyed was the weather and the sunlight. Mild spring light times of weather and real sunshine! All tossing my circadian rhythms towards romance and love, all cheated and frustrated. Florida would break my heart each year, and yet I knew it was the best I could do.

But out there on the other side the of the Alleghenies I did find my true love and now we are setting Florida aside for this season. The golden light of the South which beckons me to migrate comes with the most amazing partner. And I need not seek a place to find answers, or love or even excess. I have found them already with the Most Dangerous Beauty Alive™

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