rodjournal

Rodolphus

FICTION

Rodolphus

w r i t e r

1962 - 1995

WEDNESDAY, MAY 25, 1994; 8:21 A.M.

Every night driving home from work in my tiny kablumping car the depression congeals deep within me, shooting out tendrils of anxiety which strangle in my throat, leaden my limbs, and crumples my face. I feel as if I am dead, or near death. A feeling unlike any of the Black Waves of my youth washes over me, I am beneath the darkness and the darkness is inside me. It is sadness, this feeling, so deep, so rich, a sensory deluge that is nearly enjoyable. I grieve, although nothing has occured which demands grief. I fear for my children, but they are alive. Possibly, I grieve because I feel my end is near, I feel the Angel of Death placing her hand upon my shoulder. I puff viciously on my cigar. The cigar is a defense, though slight. Angels crowd me, constantly, at night they stand near my bed, I wake as they enter the room. I feel fear when I wake from sleep, deep within the night, but during complete consciousness there is only the sensation — the surface thought — that: “God, but it is about time! How have I survived this long?” Last night, driving home after 5:30 p.m. the tears swelled behind my vision, but I made it home before I wept uncontrollably, my shoulders shaking, my chest heaving. What is this? I felt I was experiencing something very different from any previous depression (of many) in my life. I felt that something big was near, something strange and overwhelming was just around the corner. My children, the thought permeated me. My children. I cried, like a little boy, my face contorted, feeling ugly, feeling weak, and I wept huge choking sobs. Depression, the Black Wave much more powerful than anything I had ever imagined. And I prayed: “Please God, let it be me. Not my children. Save them. Let whatever bad thing there is come to me, let me absorb it, and spare them, my children. Please be with H. and A. and keep them safe.” And I felt more than heard: “It will be you. You will die.” And I nodded, and cried, it was real, and I said: “Yes, let it be me.” And I felt that I was going to die. I made myself a cappuccino and lit a cigar and what should come on the TV but a program about Angels the Mysterious Messengers, how angels deliver messages of comfort, healing, and impending death. I felt light, strange. My left arm tingled. I smoked my cigar and finished my cappuccino. I felt light, as if gravity weaked in a bubble about me. Yes, I was going to die. I would lie back on the couch and life would seep out of me. I agreed, it was best, because if something did not happen to me, soon, something that would relieve me of my strangled life, then against my true will, I would probably relieve myself. Although _______ always has seemed an option, and more than an option, a swelling compulsion I have little decision in accepting or rejecting, when my children were born I committed to living for them, that I would never rob them of my life. But you are going to die, I felt it in my thoughts, that particular thought, that you are dying even right now. You are becoming lighter. You are nearly 32 years old and you have somehow survived far beyond your allotted years, and now it is best for you to save your children and accept this fate. I agreed. Yes, I am dying. And a thought came to me: “Rise at 4:00 a.m. You have to wake up at 4:00 in the morning.” I had been planning on it, to jog a half-mile in my preparation for the Tough Man Contest, and to work on Animalheart after jogging. And now the message was: you must wake at 4:00 a.m. and then it will happen. What would happen? Would a car swerve off the road and smash my life from me? Would a gang run me down and fill my body with bullets? Or a stabbing? Heart attack? Probably the last one, because even now, sitting on the couch, watching a slightly silly TV program about angels, I feel that I am dying. I have accepted it and I feel no fear, only sadness, because P. is supposed to come over tonight and she will use her key and climb the stairs and when she finds me she will think I’m joking, of course, but soon she will see that I am dead, and how will she react? Will she scream and run from the house and run over to E.’s house? Will she hold me and curse me for leaving her? And, if I had the power to speak, utter one last message, would I tell P.: “I love you.” Do I love her? For the last several months I have wrestled with the urge to love P., of releasing myself, accepting her, forget that other, that quiet angel who has flown near me since I was 18 years old, forget her, as I did with S2. (if only for a few months), forget her, as I did with every other sex or love relationship of my life. Could I forget her, and accept P., and have love? Lying dead, now, don’t I desire to give P. my love? Or is this only a foolish romantic sweet stupid desire to perpetuate myself in P., allow her to go on with my beacon inside her? Why couldn’t you tell me before, you filthy asshole, she would cry. Why now, when you are dead? I looked at the photos of my children above the TV set. I told H. I loved him, very much. I told A. I loved her very much. And I sank into the couch, deep, it seemed to pull me down, as if now gravity were more potent, I more susceptible. My breathing grew shallow, weak, and my vision blurred. Yes, yes, I agree, I agree. I agree. Finally. It has been hard, the last many years, being alone, so alone in a world of beings I perceive to be sheep, the last Wolf (a Harmless Wolf) amidst the sheep. Yes. I agree. I sank deeper into the couch. My head was so light, inside, and yet the shell of my skull embraced the force of gravity, pushing me down, pulling me down. The phone rang. My eyes opened fully. I sat up. I felt a slick casing of oil bead off my body. It was P. She asked if I were sleeping. No, just watching TV. Shouldn’t I tell her that I love her? Would that be fair, if I actually was about to perish? Wouldn’t that be a simplistic, selfish move? And what about all my loved ones? Shouldn’t I leave them messages? No, it would appear I had succumbed to _______ (which I shall not do, I shall fight it as long as I live — that makes good sense for an oxymoron, don’t it?). So, I was not dying right now in the here and now, or so it would seem. Perhaps then while I slept, because didn’t my head feel light? Didn’t my heart, its pulse, seem slight? My alarm was set to wake me at 4:00 a.m. Would I hear it? I drifted into sleep about midnight. It was either before the alarm sounded or perhaps just after, as I hovered above the bed and conceded to sleep — I dreamed of S. I dreamed of her, the palpable image of my angel. In the dream she had aged, as had I, and we were in a car together. I dreamed of S. As all my dreams of S., it seemed to be reality, not that kind of dream where you know you’re dreaming. Through the years it is always S. She is always with me. I cannot escape her nor forget her. I attempted to dismiss her with S2. Idiocy. S., my boyhood fantasy, the impossible dream, my S. She who could live, and live happily, without me. I was with S. My dream lady, my angel, the girl I could never forget. We were in a car together and I knew I shouldn’t do it, because she was married, but I reached, I extended my hand, I brushed her hair with my fingertips, and she smiled — the dream was so real, she even had her hair plastered with hairspray (which I never remember her doing, and which I, incidentally, detest) — I felt I might have embarrassed her, because I touched her, and also because I felt the hairspray. I dreaded that I might make her feel bad, or at least self conscious. But she smiled. S. smiled! And before my hand was withdrawn she laid her cheek upon my hand, upon the knuckles of my right hand, and I turned my hand over and felt the deliciously tender flesh of her exquisite cheek, and she closed her eyes, for a moment, and still smiling, she opened her eyes and, through my eyes, beamed into ME. I love you, I told her, I have always loved you. And she told me the same was true with her. Many scenes of me and S. transpired, all of them real, all of them more than a dream — but now, only a few hours later (about 5 hours) they have faded. I remember holding up her baby daughter and consoling her when S. could not. I remember seeing myself, as if in a movie, and it was not me, at least I did not recognize myself, for a short while it was not me experiencing everything in the dream, but more as if I was watching a movie with characters who were familiar and somehow alien. The man was a geek, and kind of a decrepit geek at that, tall and gangly and out of shape. And S. was beautiful, even more beautiful than I hold her in the treasure chest of memory. Flash back to the car with no segue and I tell her: “You are one...” I pause, devouring her with my eyes — idiot! — I was about to say: “You are one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen!” And it is not true, not one iota of it! I was about to do something I hate when other people do it — the sheep people — when they minimize something for the sake of modesty. I smiled. “S., you are the most beautiful woman in the world.” I said it and it was true, completely. To me, she is perfection, she is my every dream. In the dream we went to a motel and made love, for the first time, we made love in the dream as we should have in real life. This is what I always wanted, S., I told her, to be perfectly one with you. We couldn’t stop touching each other. We couldn’t stop caressing each other. Touching face, touching lips, fingers through hair, cupped buttocks and each rib caressed. And then it was nearly 6:00 a.m. and I woke up and I wondered was that it — was that the 4:00 a.m. message? If I had not attempted to rise at 4:00 in the morning for jogging and Animalheart, would I have had that dream about S.? Because although I have consistently dreamed of S______ _______ _______ _______ for the last 14 years, it has been a while since the last dream (six, seven, eight months?). And if a dream about S. was my 4:00 a.m. angel message — what could it mean? Initially, hope. A message of hope. Don’t give up the fight. But why the message of hope? Is there something horrible on the horizon? Something I have no HOPE of surviving? Or, in my willingness to accept whatever catastrophe at hand, upon me — please let it hit me instead of my loved ones — did I circumnavigate the disaster? You know, meeting something with complete faith . . . blah, blah, blah. Then, this morning, walking with spiritual buoyancy throughout my morning routines, shaving and gargling and showering and moisturizing and moustaching and dressing and cappuccinoing, the heaviness began to return. The sadness, the deepness, the grief seeped back through my skin. I lit a cigar as I prepared to go to work and driving to work it was difficult to see the perfection of the day — the Hawaiian air and flat-matte blue sky — through the haze of the Black Wave over my eyes. I had to set it down. I had to annotate the entire dark angel flight of last night, and had thought to utilize the journal in my leather backpack — only, it would take a long time to set it down — so I decided to begin a journal on the computer (typing at approximately 90 words per minute compared to writing at about 15-20 is hardly a contest). And it is now 9:57 a.m. so, with several walk-in interruptions, I have set it all down. And physically dealing with it, admitting the ordeal on paper has relieved the Black Wave, at least for now. I am certain it will return, and very soon.

THURSDAY, MAY 26, 1994; 3:36 P.M.

Nuclear blast from the past: Ed. The woman I’ve probably most kicked myself for not marrying, although her status as a Jehovah’s Witness and mine as a _______ made our separation very valid. She was the love of my life just prior to S2. And what a horribly tragic mistake S2. turned out to be. E. had such a strong sense of morality, whereas S2. had absolutely none. When I was in Lancaster 11 days ago for P.’s wedding I was looking for _______ in the telephone book. For some reason I felt compelled to call her — more, I felt like I needed to talk to her. Well, there were many _______ but no E. I did, however, find a _______ with a Spanish name who lived in Agua Dulce, which is where I knew her parents once lived. There was absolutely no time for playing around, so soon I was back here in Denver, and a few days later my mom called and asked who I was looking for in the phone book — I had left the books out on the dining room table. When I told her it was E., and that I just wanted to find out how she was, and what her story could be, my mom actually offered to make some of the calls and see if she could trace E. down — this was nothing short of amazing, being that my mom is a total introvert and hates to talk to strangers. Today I was working away and the phone rang and I answered and a voice said, “Do you know who this is?” At first I thought it was S3., but then, half a second later, I recognized E.’s voice. So we talked. The memories came screaming back into my head. She reminded me of poems I had written for her, and just her mentioning them brought back the feelings I had for her when I wrote them — it is so amazing how much in love I was with her, but I probably didn’t realize how strongly I felt for her because of the religion thing, and knew we could never work. I think I actually felt stronger feelings for E. than I ever did for S2., but with S2 they seemed more powerful because I released myself to her, I surrendered and thus made myself weak before her. A major coincidence: she was having her first child, a baby girl, D., on May 15, 1994, the day of P.’s wedding. She had to go through 5 miscarriages to finally have her child. Damn, if only it could have been my child. She’s married, and has been so for the last eight years (amazing) — she got married right around the time that H. was born.

TUESDAY, MAY 31, 1994; 1:09 P.M.

Clock is ticking down — will I pick up my children on Saturday, June 4, only four days away? S2 is already attempting to screw me out of getting A. for the summer. Then the question is, how in the hell am I going to be able to afford having them for two months? Day care is going to be ridiculous, and the food bill is going to soar. On Sunday I picked up a bunk-bed set, so at least they will have a place to sleep. Tonight I’m going to finish setting up their room, so it will be ready for them. I still don’t have day care for them set up (but then again I’m not even positive I’m going to be able to get A., so it’s hard to nail those things down. On top of all the added expenses of having the kids here, I’m still going to be expected to send the bitch the full child care payment. I’m supposed to send them (S2. and T.) two payments of $460 even though the kids will be here with me. And of course they are not expected to send me anything — they get the free ride as far as the kids go, no responsibilities whatsoever. Where am I going to get the money? Stress. Yes, stress, my dear and constant companion, more faithful to me than luck (bad or good) or inspiration (fickle bitch) or anyting else in my life, person, object, pet, or mysticism. I am stressed and I am on the breaking point. Stress is like a constant electricity buzzing through my head. My mom is attempting to help me out — she is sending me money to pay off my taxes, about $700 — I didn’t file this year because I screwed up in my deductions and even though I paid several thousand dollars in taxes, I ended up $550 in Federal taxes in the hole and $150 in State taxes. So, that helps me in the big picture. But what about my checking account — rent is due and I’ve already got just enough money left over in the bank to cover the $450 for rent, but I need to do a major grocery shopping for my kids, I need to spend about $150 or so just to go pick up my kids in a rental car, and then there is my $50 phone bill now due, and the $50 cable bill, plus my utilities bill will strike any day at around $40, not to mention the $100 lawyer bills and $33 computer loan bill. Damn, there is no way out of this hole. A hole, muddy with stress, sucking me down. Is there any question why I’m swiftly drowning beneath the new Black Wave? Depression is stronger than at any other time in my life. Anxiety constantly threatens to overwhelm me. I feel weak and powerless, victimized and overworked, scorned and unappreciated . . . there seems to be no end in sight. Yet, hope is high concerning “Storyteller’s Last Stand,” which has been out for over a week now at Tor Books and Del Rey Books. My little voice, that unabashed liar from every day of my past, whispers: “This time, maybe, yes, this time it looks good . . . you will be successful! Big money! Pay off your debts! Make some investments! Take a break! Relax, for the first time in about 10 years! Be a big shot! Yes, this time, you are going to make it.” The reality is probably two Xeroxed rejections from Tor and Del Rey, within the next two months. I’m now claiming zero deductions on my paycheck, so even though I just got a raise at work, my paychecks are wimpy and nearly nonexistent — after taxes about $770 every two weeks, so only about $1,500 a month — $18,600 a year, and out of that $5,500 goes to child support, which is $13,100 remaining after taxes and child support, and after rent ($450 per month) leaves me with $7,700 A FUCKING YEAR — and then subtract my kids’ Christmas and Birthday presents and then food and bills, and people wonder why I’m fucking stressed out! Poverty, forced poverty due to filthy ex-wife and her wimpy weasly hubby and the corrupt legal system they fucked to get me fucked, and I am in poverty, despite how hard I work, both at my job, and at my vocation, writing.

THURSDAY, JUNE 2, 1994; 8:06 A.M.

Tomorrow evening I am to depart Denver in a rental car, destination Hawthorne Nevada to pick up H. and A. for the summer. Of course, the last dastardly card probably has not been dealt by S2. the Snake and T. the Weasel. I am anxious and apprehensive, cloyingly depressed, realizing that they are going to attempt any dirty trick available to persecute me and the children. They are foul wretches, and seemingly not even the law can help me, even at their own orders. I’ve got my place stocked with food, I bought the kids bunk beds, I purchased several Disney prints to put up on A.’s side of her room. Today I will probably finalize day care arrangements for the kids at a Lutheran church, and there is always the horrible possibility that my children will not even be here for the summer. Even as I write this my heart beats too fast, my breathing is elevated — what keeps me from having a debilitating anxiety attack is only my will, which although pocked and abused and wretched, is still stronger than iron. My lawyer’s wife called me yesterday at a suspicious time, both at work and at home, at 5:18 p.m. — the time I am most likely to be between work and home (which in fact was the case, as I left here at 5:15 p.m.). Money is ridiculously lacking. My checking account is down to about $75.00 (plus about $100.00 in hidden checking money) and then I have about $200.00 in my savings account — day care is going to be about $600 a month. And, of course, The Snake and The Weasel are probably going to demand their $460 in child support, even though the children will be with me. Why do I harp on these things? I guess I’m blowing steam, not excess steam, but steam pure and simple, as that is the only thing keeping me going. The rental car, including gas, is going to cost me about $220 for three days, plus I’ll need to stay in a hotel room on Saturday night. At work I’ve been sneaking in a little work on Animalheart, as the stinking novel is really too big to be handled on my computer at home. The novel is a true work of genius, and probably my best, most ambitious work to date. To end the argument: Kasharra Thoomass is a compilation of S. and E., the two women who have been closest to my ideal woman in life. If S. had a spine, we would be married now. If E. had been anything other than a Jehovah’s Witness, we would be married now. (And if we three were Mormons, we would be married now!!!) There! I have blown some steam and feel a little bit better.

FRIDAY, JUNE 3, 1994; 4:52 P.M.

In just a few hours I depart Denver for Nevada. Could there be trouble brewing close at hand? Will someone attempt to intervene between me and my children? Will S2 pull some nasty new tricks? That will all be discovered in the next 15 or so hours. P. is along for the journey, my co-pilot and navigator, which will make the trip a little more survivable. I’ve taken $130 out of my savings account for the trip, and when I get back I’ll be writing a check for about $100 for the rental car, which will leave me essentially broke until payday, and then again I owe rent. Oh well, here I go....

MONDAY, JUNE 6, 1994; 8:09 A.M.

Back from the journey, and surprisingly, the kids are at day camp without any hitches, and here I am at work, even a few minutes early. The day camp, University Hills Lutheran Church, is actually only about 7 miles off my usual trek to work. S2 and T. made no serious problems, and it worked out great having P. as co-pilot — she did about 500 of the 2,000 miles, which allowed me about 4 hours of sleep total which I would not have had if she had not been along. The kids are great, even though it’s obvious A. has had a tremendous head-job done on her — S2 has attempted to convince here that she is going to have a terrible time of it in Colorado — but A. is so good natured, and has such a real bond with me, she just can’t help but love Colorado, and be excited about being here with H. and me. This is the first time H. has been back in over two years, and this is the first time A. has been to Colorado. My checkbook is already in sorry state, about $145 in the hole, although my mom sent me a check to cover that bill I paid to Timmi Buckhaulter (about $205) which is overdue, and which will put me back in the black, but then the rental car cost is going to kill me at about $150. And of course S2 did not have the medical records for me — “Well, it would sure help if someone asked me for things, I mean, how am I supposed to know when you need the kids’ medical records?” I said: “Yes, not having a phone sure makes things difficult, doesn’t it? I guess your lawyer just couldn’t get in touch with you.” S2 actually looked kind of pretty for the first time, but I think it was because P. was there, and S2’s animalistic rivalry tendency kind of kicked in — but she sure has cultivated her witch-bitch propensities. If I met her today, and we had no history to keep us apart, I still would never consider her as a mate — her natural hardness, two-facedness, cruelty, ignorance, and low-brow white-trashiness shows through far too much. She is set in her ways, and is obviously someone never to be confused with “a nice person.” Although, if I happened to be drunk, and she hit on me (which she wouldn’t be able to help herself from doing, actually, to almost any man), I probably would have a hard time resisting her. T. seemed about as useless as always, although his arm was wrapped in an ace bandage, probably from getting his ass kicked at one of his “gigs.”

MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 1994; 8:40 A.M.

Put H. on the plane yesterday. I have not as yet wept, although there is more than abundance of black tears pushing up from inside my core. To combat the lethal blackness inside me, yesterday after getting back from the airport I loaded up my bike and peddaled over to P.’s house, 10.5 miles. Exhausted me, in the pounding sunlight, the steep bicycle path grades, and my gut swinging out over the handlebars. Then, at P.’s, pounding sex, draining, sweating more than on the bicycle trip. And what of P.? Still I cannot get past D. I cannot imagine linking my children’s lives to D.’s life, even though he has been very considerate with H. and A., and has on the most part been a good boy. But he still emulates gang stupidity, sleaziest of “fashion” and his rotten rap craps keep popping up here and there. And then there is the dream, of that woman who will fit into me like the lost puzzle piece, although a piece which will comprise forty percent of me. Life is a misery, half of me seems dead, ripped to little blade-shaped dolls — is life worth this constant pain? Is it the best I have to hope for? All the work I do to support my children and better their lives — will my children become adults who reflect the void of their hillbilly mother? Will they find me an anachronistic oddity, something to laugh about? But then do I have a choice? Aren’t my children my responsibility, one which I cannot shrug or shirk, despite my pain, my loss, the degrading demand on me to work, work, work with no end in sight? And what of my dreams of writing? Not even dreams, but my fucking MISSION in life, the thing I am supposed to do, the thing I am compelled to do, and really have no choice in doing? Can a man be split in this fashion, and can there be any hope for his survival. Indiscriminately, my foul ex-mate ripped my children from me, she “decided” I was no longer their father, and she “desired” me out of their lives, and the fucking “Law” agreed.

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 1994; 11:30 A.M.

On the point of drowning. Am overwhelmed by bills. Haven’t paid the lawyers in two months. Phone bill, energy bill, cable bill — stacking. Possibility that P., E.’s half brother, might move in with me and pay $300 per month, which would be float to keep my head just above water, but damn, living with someone again, sharing a bathroom, the tv, the kitchen. Riding my bike, 240 miles in just over a month. Road to work today, 12.5 miles — this is the third time I’ve made the trip — legs sore. Getting in shape for the Denver Tough Man Contest. Must use the dark side, to survive, use the Dark Side without crime, and fighting may be my only chance. Of course, odds are I will be annihilated, but then again it will be the first time in 32 years that The Beast has had its chance to fully emerge (well, possibly not fully, but it will definitely stretch the limits of its chain). The Black Wolf. For most of my life I have been driven by The White Wolf. Perhaps the change is near. Possibly a merging of the two wolves within me.

____________________________________________

Editor's note: These were the final writings Rodolphus managed, which sadly were more a diary of complaints. The only editing was in initializing the many names that appear in the final Rodolphus journal. As to the inquiries about whether or not Rodolphus was a suicide, we can conclude that NO, he definitely was not a suicide. Throughout all his writings he makes very clear that he considered suicide a cowardly exit, and Rodolphus was not a coward (an arrogant prick, sure, but he was quite brave). Perhaps a sick part of Rodolphus was drawn to suicide, but by all accounts and evidence J. Rodolphus died of natural causes, and no foul play has ever been suggested, despite the dangerous people who lovingly called themselves his enemy.

The Final Journal

Rodolphus

May 25, 1994 to

September 7, 1994

The Final Journal

Rodolphus

May 25, 1994 to

September 7, 1994

J. Rodolphus

This journal is presented in the spirit of discovery, allowing the reader to explore what many view as the darkness in the Rodolphus fiction and the recurring images, motifs and themes. Decidedly a complicated character himself, it is difficult in truth to determine if Rodolphus wrote his life into his work, or if his work influenced his life, or if it was a little of both. It does appear that the "father" motif present in most Rodolphus fiction, is based on Rodolphus himself, not his actual father. Thankfully, Rodolphus did not survive long enough to experience the betrayal of his children toward his memory.