The Great White

The Great White Bayard I was thirty eight. I'd been to sea for a year. What a great year it had been. I'd been swallowed by a great white whale, circled by great white sharks but spent most ofmy time staring at the greatwhite clouds and thinking to myself, "Gee, diat great white cloud looks just like a great white cloud." And, "Gee, that great white cloud looks just like a great white cloud." And, "Gee, that great white cloud looks just like a gteat white cloud. I wish it would rain." In the year I'd been to sea it had not rained. Not a single drop and I was dry. Awfully dry. More than rescued I wanted a crisp, clear glass ofcool, refreshing water like Robespierre's Water, the crisp, clear, cool, refreshing water Robespierre Caruso, the tenor terror, endorsed on Robespierre Caruso's Softsoap Comedie Opera Hour. My throat sang just thinking about Robespierre's Water just like Robespierre Caruso sang it would. "Some may sing for their supper, some may sing for a song. But none will sing as loud and as long, as those whose throats taste Robespierre's Water." I couldn't really sing so my singing was make-believe. I could hum and for the better part of my thirty eighth year at sea I'd hum The Ballad Of Giuliani's Island. While I hummed I'd pray for deliverance , as my personal god and hero Giuliani prayed each week on his classic, highly rated, masterpiece of a program Giuliani's Island, for deliverance. Giuliani, lisping through his dialogue, would pray to be delivered, or shipwrecked upon an uncharted desert isle. Once there, using cunning, wile, craft, and every dirty, underhanded, double dealing, backstabbing trick he knew, he'd pray the happy, hapless natives were as happy and hapless as he hoped and would accept his presumptuous offer of twenty nine dollars in glass beads for possession of the island and their souls deliverable to Giuliani's personal god and great white father Disney. There were words to the song I hummed. Words with great meaning and even greater depth. 69 70BAYARD Oh, this is a tak ofour castaway he's herefor a long, long trip, he's ugly, opinionated, lisps, wants to be a movie star, a millionaire, he's karned to strip, here on Giulianis Island. HummingThe Ballad OfGiuliani's Islandwas agreat comfort to me floating around out there in die great white ocean widi no one to keep me company but the seagulls. As comforting as the words to The Ballad OfGiuliani's Island were, they didn't hold a candle to die comfort a flock ofseagulls gave. I got to know die seagulls personally. I got to know them well. Knew each ofthem by name. Strangely, like Henry David Seagull on the extremely popular Henry David Seagull show I used to watch as a child, the seagulls were named the same. Henry David Seagull. Henry David Seagull and I engaged in the most amazing conversations about things both perdnent and im. The state of the union. The state of die world. The price of soybeans. The price of fossil fuels. God, Nietzsche, Giuliani, and Disney, not necessarily in that order. Unable to speak, Henry David Seagull and I held these amazing conversations in my head. Our conversations were as funny and one dimensional as I remember, if only I could remember, the Henry David Seagull program to be. Like everything else in that greatboiling ocean Henry David Seagull, every Henry David Seagull, was white. White like the great white whales. White like the great white sharks. White like the great white clouds. White like the great white sea. As lost as I was at sea, afloat upon a great white adult strength pampering diaper, I wasn't as lost as I could have been because I was lost in a great white ghetto. Like all the great white programming I'd embraced and dearly loved all the days ofmy great white programming life, being adrift in a great white ghetto was as boring as life had been watching all that great white programming. As a child...