The House on the Corner.

The following is a brand-new story published by A Carrier of Fire.  It appears in a split EP of new horror stories called Moribund Agents that can be downloaded by clicking here.  Happy Halloween!

Daisuke Kinoshita’s lungs were on fire and his calves screamed as he ran to “The House on the Corner.”  The House on the Corner, he thought.  Is that really the nickname that stuck after all these years, Sugimoto?  He’d already passed several houses on several street corners, each nearly identical to his destination.  But what separated this house from the rest was Daisuke’s knowledge of the location of its spare key.  He knew he must take his mind off of his burning muscles and aching joints, but besides his pounding feet and bouncing backpack, the town was loud with screaming, moaning, chewing and sucking sounds of the dead.  Instead, he thought about the house.

Daisuke met Asahi Sugimoto when they became classmates at Hachiman Nishi Junior High School.  The Kinoshita residence was nearly a mile to the northeast along the Nagara River, while Sugimoto lived ¼-mile west from the school.  The boys walked home in opposite directions, only speaking in the short time they had walking south between the front entrance of the school and the first intersection they reached.  There, Daisuke turned left and continued around the back of the school and up north along the river, while Asahi turned right at the intersection and wound around uphill towards his street.  The first time Asahi invited Daisuke to come to his house was a brisk spring Sunday morning.  At school the previous day, he’d told Daisuke “Just head the way I do after class.  Go past the shrine on the right, then take your first right and it’s the house on the corner.”  Asahi had not, however, mentioned whether the “first right” meant the small alley where the road bent or the first proper street, which was several hundred feet further down the road – nor did he clarify which corner.  In the end, Daisuke ended up knocking on three doors before he found the right house.

“What took you so long?”

“’The house on the corner?’” Daisuke asked sarcastically, mimicking his friend’s words.

Now, four years later, the boys were preparing for their final year at high school.  Asahi’s family was out of town for a summer vacation.  Daisuke silently begged their forgiveness as he dove into the bushes, retrieved the fake rock and the key inside it, unlocked and opened the front door then slammed and locked it behind him.  He turned his back to the newly-locked door and fell back against it, dropping his backpack off his shoulders as he did.  He sank to a sitting position in the dark, silent house, closing his eyes.  It took him a long time to catch his breath. 

Of course this had to happen on Mukae-bon.

Try as he might, Daisuke couldn’t make sense of what had just happened.  Now that he was safe – or safer, at least – he knew he had to get a better idea of what was going on in the town.  He also knew he wasn’t going to turn on all the lights and the TV to do so.  He decided that with Sugimoto’s house so dark, he could peek through the window blinds at the scene outside without attracting any attention.  Even still, he was as quiet as could be, parting the blinds at a snail’s pace to see outside.

The street was nearly deserted.  Most of the houses still had lanterns lit on their front porches, meaning one of three things.  First, maybe the residents hadn’t come home yet from the festival but they would soon; second, they were inside safely and they’d locked their doors without bothering to snuff out the lanterns first; or third, they were…No.  Daisuke didn’t want to consider that possibility yet.  He noted that since so many lanterns were still lit, they slightly improved the visibility of the neighborhood under the night sky, which was a happy accident in his favor.  As soon as he thought this, however, he felt a pang of guilt when he remembered what kind of fate might have befallen Sugimoto’s neighbors.

As his eyes scanned the scene outside, he finally got a glimpse at one of the people – if they could still be called people – roaming around the neighborhood.  She was a young woman he didn’t recognize, of average height and a slim build.  Her skin was pale and clammy, her eyes glazed over, and she shambled along the road.  She was dressed neatly, but not too formally, in a peach-colored cardigan over a black floral-print dress.  Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail.  Dried blood had become caked after running below her mouth and onto the top of her dress, a telltale sign of recent eating.  She looked listless, in need of something perhaps, but ultimately braindead.  Daisuke lowered his gaze, sad for the lost life still roaming the streets of their riverside town. She really is a dead person walking around town, he thought.  No proper funeral or cremation.  His thoughts turned towards the young woman.  I’m sorry this happened to you.

The smack of a wet hand on the window just inches from his face ripped Daisuke from his melancholia.  Out of fear, he cursed loudly.  “Kuso!” he heard himself say.  He leaped backwards instinctively even before realizing what he was looking at.  It was the hand of a grown man, slathered in fresh blood, pressed against the window.  His arm showed that he wore a brown tweed suit, though most of his body was out of frame.  Daisuke ran to the door to help the injured man into the house but his hand froze when it reached the doorknob.

What if he’s…one of them? he thought.

What if he’s not, idiot?  He could’ve been hurt at the festival and needs your help before they come for him!  They could be right behind him!

If they’re right behind him, should you really open the door and risk them getting in Sugimoto’s house?

The man hit the window again.

Are you prepared to let an innocent man die because you didn’t want to risk it?  That’s a terrible and selfish thought.

Is it?  Or is it just being careful?

Before he could talk himself out of it, Daisuke growled at the situation then unlocked the door and flung it open.  He took one step outside the threshold and turned to the man on his right, bowing his head slightly in respect and embarrassment at his hesitation.

“Excuse me, sir…”

The man turned, slowly, and Daisuke froze in horror.  The left half of the man’s face, which had been out of sight from the window, was almost completely missing.  He raised his arms towards Daisuke and took a step towards him.  But that was only half of what shocked Daisuke.

No way, Daisuke thought.  There’s just no way.  Tanaka-sensei?

He told his body to run back inside and lock the door but it wasn’t listening.  He was frozen stiff from seeing his homeroom teacher, Sora Tanaka, in such a state.  With a second step, Tanaka’s features came into view more clearly in the moonlight.  He opened his mouth in a sickly moan and his tongue lolled out and hung down the exposed side of his mouth.  For just a moment, Daisuke wanted to drop to his knees and give up.  It was all too horrible – a nightmare come to life.  A third step brought the teacher ever closer to the petrified boy.  He was almost within arm’s reach.  Two pairs of running footsteps approached Daisuke and Mr. Tanaka.  In a daze, Daisuke looked to their source and blinked.

“Move, idiot!”

Two figures approached rapidly.  For a moment, Daisuke thought the shouting was directed at Mr. Tanaka, who was still walking towards him from next to the house, so he turned back and looked at his mangled teacher.  But if he keeps moving, he’s going to hurt me, Daisuke thought.  He’s going to hurt me.  He’s…he’s going to hurt me!  He blinked his eyes tight several times and did his best to snap out of his trance.  Before he could regain his senses completely and get back in the house, the running footsteps reached him and a pair of women’s hands pulled him backwards away from the faceless man lurching towards him.  In the same moment, a man in a black and red flannel shirt stepped in front of Daisuke, his back to the boy, and swung an object – a crowbar, Daisuke realized – at the homeroom teacher.  The impact of crowbar on flesh made a sound like someone dropping a large, dripping handful of raw ground beef on the cement.  There was a cracking sound, too, like a coffee mug being knocked onto the floor and broken.  He couldn’t place it, but it got his attention.

Before he knew it, Daisuke and the two strangers were back in the Sugimoto residence.  The man with the crowbar slammed the door shut behind them and locked it; the woman sat on the nearby couch and clutched at her belly, which appeared distended.

“What the Hell were you doing?!” the man demanded.  “Is this your house?  Do you live here?”

“Honey…” the woman said.

Daisuke focused on the man, who appeared to be in his early 30s.  He had some facial hair adorning his chin and cheeks but not enough to call a beard and moustache.  His face was rounded without being fat, a feature enhanced by an unkempt bowl cut.

“Is there anyone else here besides the three of us?  Have you checked all the other rooms?”

In his shock, Daisuke found all these questions to be of little consequence.

“You…You just killed Mr. Tanaka.”  The words sounded dry and papery coming out of his mouth.  He’d seen Tanaka before the man struck him – and he’d seen the young woman in the floral-print dress roaming the street before that – but he couldn’t convince himself this stranger hadn’t just taken his teacher’s life with the crushing blow to his head.

“…What?” the man asked.

“Mr. Tanaka,” Daisuke repeated.  The events of the last several minutes began to catch up with him.  “He was my homeroom teacher.  And you…Oh, God; he’s dead!”  It finally dawned on Daisuke that the cracking sound outside was Tanaka’s skull caving in from the crowbar, and without thinking, Daisuke was in the man’s face, pounding his fists against his chest.  “You killed him!  You killed him!”

The man easily defused Daisuke’s intimidations.  “Hey,” the man said in a strong but reassuring voice.  “Hey, son.  It’s alright.  It’s alright now.”  He gripped Daisuke’s shoulders with his large, firm hands.  Slowly, Daisuke’s attacks gave way to an exhausted leaning against the man.  “I’m sorry about your teacher,” the man said.  “But I swear to you, he was already –“  He caught himself before finishing his sentence.  He wanted the boy to know it couldn’t be helped, but he feared sounding callous or uncaring of the man he’d just put down outside the house.  Obviously the boy knew him from school; seeing a teacher bludgeoned like that would be traumatic.  He tried a safer tactic.  “What’s your name?  I’m Saito Nakamura; this is my wife, Aoi,” he said, gesturing at the woman.

Daisuke looked back and forth between them several times.  “Kinoshita,” he said.  “My name…is Daisuke Kinoshita.”  Daisuke relaxed a bit and Saito let go of his shoulders.

“Okay,” Saito said.  “Okay.  Saito, Aoi, Daisuke.  Are you hurt?”

Daisuke shook his head.

“Did one of them…bite you?”  Saito stole a quick glance at Aoi, who gave him a chastising expression.

“No!” Daisuke exclaimed.  “I mean…no.”

“That’s good,” Saito said.  “That’s good.  Forgive me, but do you know what’s going on?  Or why?”

“I have no idea,” Daisuke said, gazing at the floor.  “One minute I was at the festival, watching the dancers, and then…and then…”

“So were we,” Saito said.  “It got pretty bad out there.  We were making a run for the hills to the north, since there are probably fewer of them there, but Aoi saw you and we couldn’t just leave you to…I mean, we couldn’t just leave you.”

Daisuke met Saito’s eyes and realized the truth in his words.  “Thank you,” he said.

“So is this your house?”

“No, it’s Asahi-kun’s – rather, my friend Asahi Sugimoto and his family live here.  They’re away on vacation.”

“Mm,” Saito said.  “It’s good for them to be away from this mess right now.”

Daisuke managed to nod his head softly.  “What’s wrong with them?”

Saito sighed.  “I’m afraid I’ll sound crazy if I say it.”

“We can’t deny what we saw,” Aoi said from behind Daisuke.  It was the first time he’d heard her speak.  “They’re…dead.”

“It isn’t possible,” Daisuke said.  Aoi continued.

“Saito and I grew up here in Gujō.  He got a good job in Nagano a few years ago and we moved away, but we thought we’d come back for the Obon festival one last time before…”  She looked down at her stomach.  “Everything happened so quickly.  We tried to stay hidden from view, quietly moving along alleyways, hoping the river would help mask any sound we made.  Then, as we were passing by a house near a bridge…”

“You don’t have to explain,” Saito said.

“No, it’s okay,” she replied.  “I think the boy should hear this.  It may help him understand what they’re like.

“One of them came around the corner, groaning and stumbling towards a street vendor, an older man it had seen.  The older man was cooking and selling udon – the noodle soup?  When he saw it coming, he threw a pot of scalding broth at it and it didn’t even react.  Then he took his chef’s knife and stabbed it, right where the heart…”  She pressed one hand against her chest and Daisuke noticed her breathing had quickened.  “Its skin was burning – bubbling – it had a knife in its heart.  It still attacked him, unfazed.  Nobody could survive that.  They’d have to already be –“

“Enough,” Saito said.  “You have to stay calm, Aoi.”

Daisuke found himself compelled to bring the conversation to a head.

“So they’re…”

Saito nodded.  “In the west, they’re called zonbis.  A zonbi is a dead body somehow given consciousness again, but only minimal motor skills or brain function.  The only part of their brain that still works is that which knows it needs to eat – and to move so it can eat.”

Daisuke nodded impatiently.  “And it doesn’t differentiate between animals and humans when it comes to food.  It’s just like –“

He stopped short and the movie title flashed in his head.  ナイト・オブ・ザ・リビングデッ  Of course, he thought.  Naito Obu Za Ribingudetsu.  He and Sugimoto had stayed up late one night watching the old black and white zonbi movie from the 1960s.  At the time it had seemed so ridiculous, but now…

“Daisuke?  Are you alright?”

In an instant, Daisuke ran through the first half of the film in his head, his eyes darting around as he remembered.  He turned to Saito and spoke with great urgency.

“We have to check the rest of the house to be sure we’re alone – just like you said earlier,” Daisuke said.  “Then we need hammers, nails and any strong wood we can pry loose with that crowbar.  They won’t get in here.  I just need something for defense first.”

Asahi’s father, Akira Sugimoto, kept a set of golf clubs in the coat closet by the stairs to the second floor.  Daisuke headed straight for it, crossing the entryway and opening the door.  Saito was startled by his movement.

“Hey, what are you –“

No, Daisuke thought, staring into the closet.  How can this be?

Daisuke double-checked to be sure, since the house was still only illuminated by moonlight, but there was no mistaking it.  The clubs were gone.

Of course.  They’re on summer vacation.  He closed his eyes and a long, low sigh escaped him.  “Golf clubs,” he heard himself say quietly.

“That’s unfortunate,” Saito said calmly.  He’d put the pieces together.  He rubbed his lower face with one hand.  “I have an idea, but it’s not going to be pretty if there’s any trouble in the house.”

Saito and Daisuke crept slowly into the kitchen, stepping as gingerly as they could.  The only light they dared risk was the flashlight app on Daisuke’s cell phone.  It provided a soft glow just in front of them but provided little visibility.  Saito walked in front, holding his crowbar like a baseball bat; Daisuke was immediately behind him, his hand outstretched to hold the phone over Saito’s shoulder.  They breathed through their noses and only spoke in whispers – and that much only when absolutely necessary.

“The drawer with the larger tools is on the right, on the far side of the oven,” Daisuke said.  Saito nodded in response and led them there.  Daisuke began to pull open the drawer but it stopped.  For just a moment, he panicked.  Is something grabbing it?!

Then he realized it must be jammed from the inside.  He cursed again.

Daisuke reached his left hand into the stuck drawer, but there was so little room, the wooden interior pushed and scraped at the backs of his fingers.  He clenched his teeth at the discomfort.  Slowly, gently, he tried to feel around for the source of the jam.

“What’s going on?” Saito asked.

“It’s jammed,” Daisuke said.  “Wait just a moment.”

He felt up just behind the cabinet that held the drawer; almost immediately he found the trouble.  The same item he’d hoped to find in the drawer was stopping him from retrieving it, and it was propped up by a can opener and a whisk, both of which refused to budge.  He knew the best option would be to push the drawer shut just a little more to ease the tension, then he could pull it down with ease.  However, the opening was already so slim he couldn’t push it shut any further without crushing his hand in the process.  He did his best to pull it down, but the harder he pulled, the angrier he got.

Come on, come on, he thought.  Saito heard him struggle.

“I don’t like this…”

“Just a little more!”

Daisuke pulled as hard as he could – too hard.  The drawer flew out of the cabinet and several kitchen tools crashed and clanged to the marble floor, followed by the drawer itself.  Daisuke held up his prize – the meat tenderizer – and from outside they heard a nearby zonbi make an aggravated growl.  Daisuke shone the flashlight on Saito.  Saito was furious.

“Idiot,” Saito scowled.  He approached the boy and pointed his thick finger in his face.  “If your stupidity costs Aoi her life…our child’s life…I’ll never forgive you!”

Daisuke’s face went red.  He looked away in shame and made a formal apology, though Saito interrupted him.  “Enough,” he said.  “Draw the curtains shut in this front area and turn on the lights.  I was hoping to keep the house quiet and dark until we checked all the rooms together but it can’t be helped.  At least one of them knows we’re here now.  More could be coming.”

Daisuke followed Saito’s orders as they spoke.  “I’m sorry –“

“It’s fine,” Saito said.  “But this changes things.  We have to split up.”  He crossed to a door.  “Is this the pantry door?”

Daisuke nodded.

Saito began prying the door off its hinges with his crowbar.  “Hammers?  Nails?”

“In the garage.”

Of course, Saito thought.  “Where?”

“Around the back of the stairs to the right,” Daisuke said, finally turning on the light.

The door came off and Saito dropped it at Daisuke’s feet.  “Let me borrow your phone.”

Aoi protested.  “Saito…”

“It’s fine,” he said, taking the phone from Daisuke.  “I’ll be right back.”

He started towards the garage, stopped and turned to Daisuke.

“Protect her,” Saito said.  “Protect them both.”

“With my life,” Daisuke replied.  But Saito was already gone.

Daisuke kept a firm grip on his meat tenderizer, secretly hoping he wouldn’t have to use it.  He stood in front of Aoi like a bodyguard, feeling sheepish and ashamed he’d drawn attention to them.  He tried thinking of what to say to her.

“Kinoshita,” she said.  Her sudden voice made him jump.  She hid a smile behind her hand.  “I’m sorry. 

“It’s alright – what happened earlier.”  His chin sank into his chest and he shook his head lightly.  “It is.  Saito makes plans every day.  When they don’t work, he becomes easily frustrated.  He’s that kind of person.  But he’s a good person, too.  He cares a great deal for us.”  Daisuke didn’t need to look at Aoi to know her hand was on her belly again.  It made him remember how much was at stake.  He stiffened considerably.

“I-I will protect you!” he stammered.

The poor boy, Aoi thought.  He must hate himself right now.

“It’s alright; I promise,” she said.  “I’d feel safer with the doors and windows secured before you two investigate the house.  Maybe you did us a favor.”

Daisuke grunted.  He didn’t entirely agree, and he knew she was just trying to make him feel better, but Aoi seemed to be a kind, honest person.  Perhaps she meant what she said.

“Thank you,” he said.

No sooner did the words escape his lips than Saito came walking briskly back into the front area with two hammers, a box of nails and a pair of real flashlights.  Saito walked past the pair and dumped his handfuls of supplies on the kotatsu in the living room, whose blanket had been removed for the summer.

“Let’s get to work.”

Daisuke’s train of thought moved rapidly as he gathered what he needed and began nailing the pantry door over the double-wide front windows.  He thought about Mukae-bon, the first day of the annual five-day Obon festival in which Japanese welcomed their ancestors’ souls back to the world of the living.  There were the traditional dancers, the electronic lanterns lit in front of the homes and the tens of thousands of tourists who had traveled into town to witness its unique all-night dancing.  The food vendors were hard at work.  The sizzle and savory smell of teriyaki beef and chicken reached Daisuke’s senses from one side of the street; other traditional foods followed.  Everywhere, he heard the rivers flow.

Gujō was surrounded by three rivers: Yoshida, Nagara and Kodara, which formed a moat around the town and Gujō Hachiman Castle.  It was sometimes called “Water City” and its clean freshwater supply was what the town was known for.  This made it a point of local pride.  In modern times, the town was also known for its food replica workshops – the largest was Sample Village Iwasaki – but perhaps since Daisuke had spent his life walking past the workshops while out with his family, he didn’t see what was so special about them.  Even Sample Kobo, which invited visitors inside so they could watch the artists build the replicas, seemed unexciting.

If we’re lucky, he thought, the rivers could help defend the city from zonbis approaching from other towns, just like they defended it from invaders centuries ago.  Is that wishful thinking?  Maybe.  But maybe wishful thinking is what we need right now.

Saito had already removed the closet door from its hinges and nailed it to another window.  He approached the wooden dining room table, leaving the kotatsu in the living room intact.

“Hey,” he said.

“Mm?”

“What’s up with this table?”

It was a dark, heavy wooden table.  It was long and high like any dining room table, but it looked almost like a picnic table without benches – it featured a top made of several wide planks secured to a sturdy frame underneath.  The legs were straight and four-sided.  Daisuke peeked through a gap in the double-wide window that the door hadn’t covered; there were several zonbis but only two seemed interested in Sugimoto’s house – and they were far from the front door, which still needed reinforcing.

“Kingwood,” Daisuke said.  “It stands out, doesn’t it?”

“It looks like it’s from Pier 1 Imports.”

Daisuke chuckled.  “You’re not far off.  Asahi-kun has an uncle who likes to give funny gifts.  This was his wedding present to Asahi’s parents.”

Saito tested its weight by lifting it.

“Hoo!  It’s heavy.”

Daisuke walked over to him.  “Like I said, kingwood.  You should’ve seen Asahi’s father’s face when I asked him how they moved it in here.”

Saito gestured to Daisuke and the two of them turned the table over as gently as they could.  It was hard work.  “Which family lives here again?”

“My friend from school.”

“But what did you say their last name was?”

“Sugimoto,” Aoi said.  Daisuke looked at her and smiled.

“Mm,” Saito said.

He wedged his crowbar into the crevice between the underside of the overturned table and one of its legs.  “I’m sorry, Sugimoto-san.”  He forced the leg off and held it in his hand and looked at it.  “Or maybe I should say ‘You’re welcome?’”  Daisuke smiled again.  Then he took the leg and walked it to the front door with his hammer and nails.  He propped it high up against the front door with his left hand, holding a nail between his first two fingers just outside the doorframe and pulled his right hand with the hammer backwards to get enough speed and force to drive the nail in.

At that moment, there was a rapid knock on the door.  Saito, Aoi and Daisuke all looked at one another in complete surprise.

“Asahi-kun?  Are you in there?  Asahi-kun!”  It was a teenage girl’s voice.

“You expecting anyone?” Saito asked, his voice sarcastic and confused.

“Asahi-kun!”  Her voice was muffled by the door.  She continued to knock.

“Asahi-kun!  Asahi-kun!”

“The House on the Corner” is the first chapter of a proposed horror novel by jonny Lupsha.  Set in Gifu Prefecture, Japan, it tells the story of a small band of survivors at the outset of the zombie apocalypse.  Running low on food and supplies, surrounded by the undead, the group decides to dig a tunnel under their refuge to a neighboring house…and another…and another.  Will they ever dig far enough to find a house with few enough zombies that they can escape on foot or in a vehicle?  Maybe, but not before encountering half-crazed neighbors whose houses they unwittingly invade, tunnel cave-ins, infighting and houses they rig to explode for the purpose of cutting down on the horde outdoors.  Tell us if you want to see this book, Dead Passage, come to fruition by visiting facebook.com/ACarrierofFire today!

Album Review: Micko Westmoreland - Yours Etc Abc.

Artist:  Micko Westmoreland

Album:  Yours Etc Abc

Release Date:  August 14, 2015

Listen Now:  Spotify / Soundcloud

Review:  The most public end product of Trent Reznor’s 1990s label Nothing Records was either Marilyn Manson as a public figure or celebrity, or maybe the recruitment of Atticus Ross (of Nothing’s industrial-rock group 12 Rounds) into Reznor’s own efforts – including scoring the last three David Fincher films and collaborating for Nine Inch Nails and their other band How to Destroy Angels.  However, Nothing also released the oft-overlooked drum-and-bass debut by Micko Westmoreland, One Pound Note, under the alias The Bowling Green.  In the 17 years since, Westmoreland has released two more solo albums and co-starred as rocker Jack Fairy in Velvet Goldmine.  His new LP, Yours Etc Abc, is a classic rock endeavor with one foot planted in the mod sound of the 1960s and the other in the energy of the early ‘80s.

 For Yours Etc Abc, Westmoreland gathered personnel like trumpeter/saxophonist Terry Edwards (Nick Cave, Tom Waits) and keyboardist Mick Gallagher (Ian Dury and the Blockheads, The Animals), bringing them into the studio along with a menagerie of guitars to provide the big rock sound of the “British Invasion” of the pre-Woodstock years.  In Westmoreland’s own words, “[Yours] took flight with a ‘60s guitar ensemble.  My quartet consisted of a Fender, Gretsch, Rickenbacker and an old Gibson acoustic.  They complement each other superbly, neither overshadowing the other.” 

Listening to any one track on the album makes Westmoreland’s intentions clear.  The production on songs like the opener “Freaksville” could convince the listener that Yours Etc Abc was recorded alongside “How Can It Be?” by The Birds or early The Who cuts like “I Need You.”  The same goes for nearly every track on the album – Micko only ditches the mod mood rarely, when he leans more towards the early ‘80s sound that permeates the album on several tracks.

Despite the polarizing combination of the characters “1980s,” you can rest easy knowing this isn’t a half-assed attempt to emulate Cutting Crew or Simple Minds.  Micko opts for the serious, charged-up edge of The Cure’s “In Between Days” and The Smith’s “Hand in Glove.”  Whether it’s on Yours Etc’s dynamic closer, “Brighter Shade,” which is a dreamier instrumental awash in synths and wailing guitar; or on “The Vampire Song,” whose reverb and more present electronic swells lean more towards a distinct 1980s feel, Westmoreland brings us into his youth.  It’s easy to picture a kid laying on the living room floor and listening to his first vinyl 30 years ago, huge headphones in, eyeing the liner notes, all the while being reminded of his parents’ 33’s that he’d grown up on.

Lyrically and thematically, the album is also more acute in its existentialist concerns than the general individualism of the 1960s.  Micko frets over his subject on “What Do You Bring to the Party,” with frustrated lines like “You’re drunk on attention, down on your knees / Desperate for attention from a bottomless pit.”  Likewise, “A Place for Everything” addresses the stress of trying to accommodate someone with obsessive-compulsive disorder.  Micko sings “If you lost control of the moment, what would that cost? / Abandon false security, see the value in that loss.”  It’s easy to see “A Place for Everything” as the anti-“Lovesong.”

Admittedly, the two classic subgenres of rock that Yours Etc Abc attacks aren’t everyone’s cup of tea.  Those only looking for the drunken ‘60s revivalism of The Brian Jonestown Massacre or the smoky, throwback roadhouse blues-rock of Jack White or Jon Spencer won’t find much to slake their thirst.  But any music fan looking to revisit either point of their lives that enjoyed mid-‘60s English mod or moody ‘80s rock (or especially a crossroads of both) could do much worse than this record.

Micko Westmoreland’s Yours Etc Abc is available now on Landline Records.

Botis.

Alzheimer’s is a fatal disease with a 100% death rate.  I knew that before either of my grandmothers started losing their memories.  It has no survivors and there is no cure.  In early 2013, after each of them started exhibiting symptoms, I had the opportunity to see the brain of an Alzheimer’s patient via the Bodyworlds exhibit at the Science Museum of Virginia in Richmond and it finally hit me.  The recesses in the brain were deeper, wider, flatter than those in our normal image of the brain.  Of all the things I saw that day – sculptures of skinless cadavers included – the Alzheimer’s victim’s brain affected me the most.

Both my father’s and my mother’s families are blessed with longevity; I reached my 31^st birthday with all four grandparents, which I’ve come to understand is practically unheard of.  My paternal grandfather, Charlie – even before surviving D-Day at Normandy – was transferred off an LCI ship in the Navy just days before it was sunk by Germans in World War II, with no recorded survivors.  He returned stateside after the war, started a family, beat cancer and still goes golfing.  Both of my mom’s parents served in the Army for years during WWII and the Korean War.  My grandfather Bob has even outlived virtually his entire outfit while my grandmother Agnes handled death and disease as a nurse for around 40 years.  Sadly, my wife is the opposite.  She lost her last grandparent when she was nine – in fact my mother-in-law was just 31 when her own mother died, at 60 – so it’s astounding to Kristy that our daughter knows all four of her grandparents, let alone has gotten to meet four of her great-grandparents.

My dad’s folks live just a few hours from us now, in the eastern part of Virginia – although they lived in the bay area outside San Francisco until I was in my 20s.  Their five sons, dad included, are scattered from New Jersey to Idaho but still make time to visit.  Family gatherings have been a regular fixture among them since before I was born.  The only time I remember going more than a year without seeing at least one branch of my extended family on dad’s side was for the four years when we lived in Hawaii, and dad’s parents even flew out once to visit us there.  We were never as close to my mom’s family, through no real fault of anyone’s.  Mom’s parents, Bob and Agnes, never traveled like dad’s, and having only two brothers to dad’s four made visits seldom.  My dad having twice the siblings meant making twice the trips just to see everyone.  My parents used to haggle over whom to go visit next: 

“Well, we haven’t been out to see my parents in almost four years.”

“But we haven’t flown to Colorado to see John’s new house at all.”

“Right, but that’s a plane flight and a Hell of a lot more expensive.”

“And we’d drive to San Francisco to see your parents?”

“Well, no, but we could fly into a major airport so airfare would be cheaper; and flying from O’Hare to SFO would be fewer stops, meaning fewer layovers to get Adam and Jon across the airports for; and we wouldn’t have to rent a car.”

My parents and brother and I have had that conversation for 30 years.  Out of the eight units I have between my parents’ family trees, drop two of their names into those spaces and I could even tell you which year it happened.  Then my brother moved out for college and he became an additional factor for visits, and I started my own family after college and added a small child and a wife with her own parents to visit into the mix.  Of course, often enough, the longer we go without seeing a family member, distance in the relationship grows.  Fissures form, and deepen, and widen.  You forget what they’re really like, or who they are.

So given my and Kristy’s very different family trees, we were determined to make extended family a big part of our daughter’s life from the start.  She was born in 2010, on a spring afternoon at about 1pm.  By sunset, my folks and my wife’s – all four of Lenna’s grandparents – were in the recovery room of the maternity ward with us, having driven up to north Virginia from as far away as the Georgia-Florida state line.  We’d called our parents late the previous night to tell them that our big day was approaching and they got an early start on the road to meet their granddaughter.  As for us, we took a four-week birthing class, read a stack of baby books, researched family and medical websites and realized the moment she was born that we had no idea what to do from that point forward.  Five family members and a nurse watched me change my first diaper that evening; the nurse actually had to talk me through it.  “Don’t do it for me; just tell me what to do.  Um, please.”  I’d been awake for 36 hours and I’d been directing my parents to the hospital, setting up our apartment for my in-laws to stay in, helping nurses help us, fielding strangers bringing hospital bills to our recovery room and handling a newborn, just so Kristy could get some rest.  And it all came down to me afraid to lift Lenna’s little foot up to get a poopy diaper out from under her butt.  I didn’t want to break her.

But I learned.  We both did, every day and every milestone.  Like usual, my dad’s family were there often enough.  Lenna was five weeks old and met my Uncle Dave’s family and my dad’s parents.  We sent pictures to mom’s side of the family since we didn’t see them.  But in those first few months, all the day-to-day uncertainties started to become clear.  Kristy and I were shocked at how much of parenting involved taking things as they come.  “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it” became such a common phrase in our household I’m surprised it wasn’t Lenna’s first sentence.  Whenever Lenna cried, addressing each possible source became mechanical.  Without thinking, either of us had changed her diaper, swaddled her, burped her and started warming a baby bottle.  Muscle memory stuck.  Like family, memory is easily taken for granted.

13 years passed between two of my visits to see my grandmother Agnes, the nurse; and my grandfather, Bob.  Back then, I was 18 and in high school.  I was on a flight into the Albany airport, near Bob’s and Agnes’s house.  My girlfriend at the time had come to pick me up and take me to look at colleges in New York and Bob and Agnes had offered to take us out to dinner.  I stepped off the plane in a ripped sleeveless jacket and my hair fashioned into liberty spikes with Elmer’s glue.  I’d dyed it red with food coloring and wore a spiked bracelet on one arm.  My grandparents took one look at me, said they couldn’t stay and walked us to my ex’s car.  The next time I saw them I was 31.

I would’ve done the same thing.

We had to move in with my parents when Lenna was about six months old.  They have a Georgian-style home in a nice neighborhood with three more bedrooms than our old apartment.  My mom still spoke with Agnes and Bob every week on the phone but I hadn’t even talked to them in several years, let alone seen them since my bratty punk days.  Mom would say “My poor mother is so confused…” in equal parts bafflement and worry, but I didn’t take it seriously for a long time.  I cared, and was concerned, but I told myself it was likely just slight memory loss that comes with age.  I had more immediate concerns.  I’ve got to get Lenna to stand up on her own; I can’t worry about Grandmother Agnes right now, I thought.  Then it became I’ve got to get Lenna to walk.

We have to move her to solid foods and off the baby bottle.

She needs to learn to talk.

Lenna needs to know when to say “please” and “thank you.”

Suddenly there was a Potty Training Elmo on mom’s hardwood living room floor and I couldn’t stop staring at it because I’d just been told that my grandmother was going to die.  I still had no idea how well my daughter was developing, I’d just done the paperwork to start my business and somehow I’d managed to neglect my grandparents for a solid decade.  There was still some time, as Alzheimer’s is a slow killer, taking up to eight years before making its final strike.  Nonetheless, it was blooming on the horizon like the darkest of storm clouds.  One look at the brain in the Bodyworlds exhibit and I realized what was happening to my grandmother, physiologically.

Over the next two years, everything in Agnes’s past became unclear.  First she started asking my mom how college was going for my brother and me, although we’d graduated six or seven years prior.  Then she forgot who we were.  By Thanksgiving 2013 she fell and broke her hip, and when mom went to help her recuperate, Agnes had forgotten her most of the time too.  Bob used to let Agnes sit alone and watch some TV, only to return and find her shaking and afraid because she didn’t know who he was or what she was doing in his house.  They bought that house together in the late 1950s and hadn’t moved in almost 60 years, but she was convinced she still lived in Pennsylvania, her girlhood home.  She left a voicemail with my mother one night begging her to find her, pick her up and take her back to Pennsylvania.  “Please, please don’t give up on me,” Agnes had said.

We moved out of my parents’ house around the time that mom had made a trip to New York to visit Bob and Agnes and set up around-the-clock home care for Agnes.  It included a rotating 24-hour schedule delegated among a staff of nurses, a full pay structure and management responsibilities.  

Lenna was potty-trained and signed up for preschool for the fall of 2014 before we knew it.  As a stay-at-home father I’d always been very concerned about my own abilities to properly raise a child and I had a Hell of a test coming.  She’d be away from my supervision and in a group of 15 kids her age and a teacher, every one of them strangers, and then I’d see how she did.  I’d see how I did, for over four years.  Babies don’t come with instruction manuals, and there are so many methods to parenting that the only practice more common than “taking it as it comes” is trying to use common sense and best judgment.  So for over four years we’d been flying blind and school seemed like the course correction we could gratefully use or anxiously dread.  Or both.

Eight weeks before school started we drove to New York so Lenna could meet Agnes.  By that point, Lenna was excusing herself to the bathroom and warning us before she had to go, she knew her ABC’s and she was a polite kid.  We spent just one afternoon at my grandparents’.  Their living room was full of small sculptures and vases and ornamental things they’d bought over their entire lives, from their time in Japan where my mother was born to knick-knacks from their golf club across town.  There were pictures of their children and their grandchildren and of Lenna.  Agnes was unconscious most of the time, sleeping peacefully among these mementos of her 90 years on Earth.  Aides sat with her all day, except when a family member would sit with her; Bob sat in his den watching TV and my Uncle Rob grilled hamburgers and hot dogs for the family on the back patio.  

Lenna was a bit too shy to sit with Agnes, as most kids are with new people, but I pulled up a chair and found myself as unsure of my next step as I had been with Lenna’s first diaper.  I asked my mom for help.  “Don’t do it for me; just tell me what to do.  Please.”

“Just talk to her when she wakes up.”

And I learned.  Kristy and I both did.  I sat next to my grandmother for the first time in 13 years.  She woke up and slowly came around to look me in the eyes.

“Hi Agnes!  My name’s jonny.  I’m your grandson.”

“You are?”

“Yes ma’am.  And I’m 31 years old and you’re 90.”

“I’m 90 years old?  And what do you do?”

“I’m an author; I write books.  True stories about American life.”

“Oh, I like you; you’re a good kid.”

“I also have my wife Kristy with me here, and your great-granddaughter Lenna.”

“Oh wow.  That’s great!”

“Thank you Nana.  I’m glad to be here.”

“I’m glad you’re here too.  And what’s your name?”

“My name’s jonny.  I’m your grandson.”

“My grandson?”

“Yes ma’am. 

“How old are you?  Do you have a job?”

“I’m 31.  I’m an author.  I write books for a living and watch my daughter Lenna, who’s your great-granddaughter.”

“What are your books about?”

“I write true stories about growing up in the 20^th century, and about American subcultures.”

“Books about real life.  That’s wonderful!  Do you have a wife, or any children?”

“I do.  My wife’s name is Kristy and my daughter’s name is Lenna.”

“And what’s your name, dear?”

“jonny.  My name’s jonny.”

“What do you do for a living, jonny?”

Often she remembered my uncles but not my mother – “I have a husband and two sons,” she’d say – so she had a harder time understanding where I’d come from.  But she met her great-grandbaby and I told her all about us, each time hoping that somehow it would stick.  She couldn’t remember more than 30 to 60 seconds; it was like someone kept hitting a reset button somewhere.  Alzheimer’s is cruel that way.  It’s a slow son-of-a-bitch of a killer that takes and takes, that taunts and teases and abuses and scares and humiliates before the end.

“I have to get up and go to school now.”

“No, Nana; you’re all done with school.”

“That’s right; I’m a nurse.  Am I late for work?”

“You aren’t.  No work today.  It’s a beautiful summer day to sit and relax with your family.”

“I’m dying you know.  No more Christmases.  No more Christmases.”

“I know.  I’m…I’m sorry.  But everyone here loves you and you’re great.  You’ve lived a terrific life so far and you’re still here with us now.”

“Thank you.  What’s your name, dear?”

Lenna started school and she approached every kid in her class, both teachers and some of the other faculty and staff and said “My name’s Lenna L-E-N-N-A.  I’m four; what’s your name?”  It was hard for me leaving her at school that first day.  Mom called with her concerns over how the caregivers were watching Agnes while I expressed my own reservations about leaving Lenna with adults outside our family.  Mostly her teachers just told me she was doing “fine,” which mirrored Bob’s reports about Agnes and her nurses.  I didn’t know what either meant.  I saw that when she drew pictures she’d sign them with her name, which some kids couldn’t do, but overall I was still in the dark.

Dad called me on a Monday evening in December to tell me Agnes had passed away.  Before having the opportunity to grieve, I had to navigate Kristy’s work schedule with Lenna’s school so they could keep in their routines while I went up to New York to support mom and her family, figure out travel and accommodations and tolls, coordinate with dad and my brother about who was driving with whom when.  I went up with no clue as to my return date; I drove dad to Bob’s and Agnes’s, picking up my brother along the way. 

Alzheimer’s is the sixth largest killer in the country.  It’s responsible for 60-70% of dementia in the elderly.  Anti-vaccination doctors and groups falsely linked vaccines to Alzheimer’s in decades past, alongside the more popular scapegoat of autism.   This was after they’d tried unsuccessfully to blame aluminum as a cause of Alzheimer’s.

Dad and I stayed five days, arriving in New York on Wednesday for a Thursday funeral.  The viewing was emotional for everyone but I held it together.  I was a pallbearer and read a Joyce Kilmer poem at Agnes’s service before she was laid to rest, so I imagined I’d shed my tears after the fact.  Then none came and I felt as guilty for it as I have for anything in my life.  I couldn’t sleep well, but helped mom as best I could in sorting Agnes’s possessions and doing things around the house.  I’ve always suffered from anxiety and it flared up fiercely throughout our time there.  At one point, even after taking my daily and as-needed anxiety medications, I had a panic attack so severe I had to stand out in the snow in a t-shirt to cool down and keep from passing out.

Sunday, dad and I were back on the road to Virginia.  I was exhausted and aching from spending 1,000 miles driving a stick shift through rain and snow and sleeping about five hours a night.  The weight of the visit kept us quiet for some of the drive, but we talked amicably as we came down the New York Thruway, the New Jersey Turnpike and a handful of interstates.  We skirted around New York City, Baltimore and Washington DC before getting back home to Kristy and Lenna.  We spent the night in our apartment and the next morning I took Lenna to school.  I had talked to her, briefly and in an age-appropriate manner, about Agnes’s death.  She seemed alright, but I had no concrete way of knowing how she was doing.  How I was doing.

I’ve become friends with some of the other kids’ moms at Lenna’s school.  Everyone was kind and considerate, one even offering to watch Lenna after school so I could get some rest.  After I dropped her off, I worked on a blog for two hours in my living room and went back to pick her up at her usual time.  Before class was over, her teacher came out and handed slips of paper to the parents.  I opened it up and it was Lenna’s first evaluation report from school.  Three columns on the right read “Not Yet,” “Emerging” and “Achieved.”  On the left, a series of rows with developmental abilities and behaviors was listed, and marked under the appropriate column according to what the teachers had observed of the child in class.

“Student demonstrates ability to separate from parents/family/caregiver.”

Achieved.

“Student initiates own play activities.”

Achieved.

“Student interacts and engages in activities with others.”

Achieved.

There were 17 activities or abilities listed on the report and they all had the same outcome.

“Student completes multiple tasks of a project on their own choosing.”

Achieved.

“Student begins to associate names of letters with their shapes/sounds.”

Achieved.

And I started crying.  Hard.  In the middle of the hallway at preschool, which was lined with paintings and holiday activities and traced hand turkeys, I started crying.  In front of all the mothers empathizing with me over losing Agnes, 20 feet from my daughter finishing up her day in class, tears stained her progress report and my hands shook as I wept.  I cried for my brilliant, beautiful baby and the pride I felt for her.  I cried for every check mark confirming Lenna’s healthy development, due in some part to my parenting.  I cried for relief of holding my breath for almost five years.  I cried for her needing her mom and dad just a bit less now.  For being a good enough dad.  For being a good enough anything.  For my grandmother’s life and what terminal illness had wrought.  For the 30-second reset button.  For my own exhaustion and knowing that my mom must have felt ten times as exhausted.

For memories past and future.

*Alzheimer's facts provided by alz.org

Gervais' Derek Fixes 'Dramedy' 24 Minutes at a Time.

Ordinarily I save all opinion and pop culture pieces for I Hardly See You Anymore, but today I'm making an exception, for the pilot of the new Ricky Gervais show Derek.  Ricky Gervais is one of the most famous and outspoken British comedians of the last several decades, amassing a global fan base in the millions.  Just some of his claims to fame include co-creating the original UK series The Office, his critically-acclaimed podcast series with cohorts Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington and the wildly successful shows An Idiot Abroad, Extras and Life's Too Short and films Ghost Town and The Invention of Lying.

Admittedly, it took me a few minutes to get a good grip on Ricky Gervais' Derek, and I'll tell you why.  Gervais' most high-profile work for many has been his production of the mockumentary The Office, which brought audiences our ongoing love/hate relationship with his character David Brent.  Brent would bounce back and forth from hysterical to despicably self-centered - if not both - at the blink of an eye.  So I reserved judgment on his titular character Derek for several minutes as I gauged just how Gervais - who also wrote and directed the pilot - was playing him.  Derek is a refreshingly well-meaning, albeit a bit simple at times, attendant at a nursing home.  He loves his residents and takes care of them without reserve, the way so many younger family members these days won't - but more on that later.  Derek holds their hands while they nap, plays their numbers at the lottery, walks them outside to the home's garden and more.  It's this compassion and benevolence that makes his very occasional self-centered moments hilarious, such as wanting to watch his favorite television shows on the day room's set instead of a resident's, or making sure his dessert is as big as everyone else's when it's offered.

The presence of Gervais' longtime friend Karl Pilkington, who Gervais relentlessly skewers for his sourpuss attitude on HBO's The Ricky Gervais Show and Sky1's An Idiot Abroad, also had me wondering if their relationship in Derek would correlate with their apparent real-life friendship.  Fortunately, while Pilkington's nailed-to-the-ground pragmatism makes the cut for his character Douglas, the near-bullying that makes the pair famous is almost reversed.  While Derek does annoy Douglas in a hilarious bus scene I won't spoil for you here, the overall feel between them is that Douglas is the cynic and Derek is the sweetheart.  At one point Douglas, a handyman, answers a call about a broken picture in a resident's room.  He promises to take care of it and try to fix it, but as soon as he's (marginally) out of her earshot with the picture, he whispers, frustrated, to the camera.  "It's just shit.  That's all they do with these rooms is fill 'em with shit."

Head nurse Hannah is also a joy to watch.   She's been at the home for 15 years and faces the familiar problem that her work overtakes her chance for a social life.  Played pitch-perfect by Kerry Godliman, Hannah is the caring-but-healthily-detached mother of the makeshift family made up of herself, the almost absurdly compassionate Derek and jaded Douglas.  Although I've only seen the pilot, I have the feeling she'll wind up playing referee between Derek and Douglas from time to time.

This mixture of worldviews on elderly care is also an unapologetic send-up of first-world health care and our attitude towards our seniors.  I've long felt that The Office is a searing reminder that authority (in business, primarily) does not always equal intelligence and responsible leadership.  An Idiot Abroad, a travel documentary in which Gervais and podcast co-host (and Office co-creator) Stephen Merchant send Karl Pilkington to exotic places around the world, serves as a great example of why not to take our beautiful and diverse planet for granted.  Karl is taken out of his comfort zone at every turn, and often dragged kicking and screaming from one grand adventure to the next, because he has said himself that he'd just rather stay home. Gervais was giddy with the accompaniment of actor Warwick Davis to Karl's misadventures in Idiot's third season because his "gung-ho" attitude just bothers Karl more.  We learn in every episode that it's good for Karl to have these experiences, that variety is the spice of life, as cliche a phrase as that may be.  Derek, then, is a look in the mirror at what we do with our elders in society.  Like a more agreeable version of David Mitchell's Timothy Cavendish in Cloud Atlas, Karl Pilkington's Douglas is irritated by those around him and generally wants no part of the nursing home's micro-society.  The fact that it's even surprising to the audience that Derek so willingly and lovingly cares after the elderly, regardless that they're not his family, is a commentary in and of itself.  Why do so many of us reach middle-age and suddenly find our parents, in their retirement years, to be so taxing?  They raise us for 18+ years but going to their house to help clean out the gutters is a Sisyphean ordeal.

In between Derek's character development scenes that build them to a sturdy foundation, we're given the story of the first episode and we see what Gervais and Derek can really do - and it's here that the program shines.  Anyone who's seen The Office knows how well Gervais can operate in a comedic mockumentary setting, but Derek takes things a step further and introduces a genuine dramatic element that is as evenly split with humor as "dramedy" can get, and is best explained (spoiler-free) by some of his previous work.  Gervais' 2009 film The Invention of Lying shows us a world in which everyone is perfectly straightforward because nobody has invented deceit.  People tell others their babies are ugly, casino employees warn you that the games are unfair and the house always wins, etc.  In one scene, Gervais is called to the hospital because it's believed that his mother is dying.  Jason Bateman, her physician, tells Gervais that she likely won't last through the night.  "On the upside, it is fajita night down in the cafeteria, so after mom kicks off you may want to go get something to eat."  It's black comedy gold, but in a heartbeat, Gervais, who has just invented lying, tells his dying mother that when she passes, she's going to a place remarkably like the modern Christian idea of Heaven.  She'll be young again, and see her late husband, and live in a mansion.  As he comforts her, he wells up with tears - and so do we, just moments after Bateman's hilarious candor about the evening's cuisine.

Derek ups the ante tenfold on The Invention of Lying.  The pilot's most heartfelt scenes tend to follow its funniest, and more than once my laughter faded to near tears like whiplash.  Most people think of comedy-dramas as being even sadder than most drama, offering excuses like "they trick you with the jokes then you feel terribly when things go wrong."  I think Derek is the opposite.  I left the show just feeling good.  Derek is a character on whom we can rely.  He's safely cemented himself as a good guy in our eyes, and that's terrific if you ask me.  What's even better is that Gervais, an avowed atheist, never makes any assumptions on the spiritual behalf of Derek's residents.  He never shrugs off their illnesses as "God's will," nor, when faced with the subject of death, does he simply dismiss them as "going back to God" or "in God's hands."  Derek takes full responsibility for these grandfathers and grandmothers, bringing their welfare onto 100% earthly grounds.  Keeping in line with my theory that Gervais is writing deeply about assisted living and the family's attitudes towards the elderly, it only makes sense that he keeps things absolutely on "our plane."

Derek is insanely effective comedically and dramatically.  On the one hand, Gervais' comedy hits high marks frequently.  On the other, without getting preachy, Gervais and Co. are showing us that ageism today is our problem to fix, and there are those who are willing to do it.  There are the Douglases in the world, who only feel that our seniors are taxing.  But there are also the Hannahs, who balance their work and care for their patients without becoming overly involved personally; and the Dereks, who give it their all every day, thankless as it sometimes may be.  I'm not certain which of the latter two characters I'm rooting for more, but I damn sure know I'll be importing this show from England however I must, and that as long as there are Dereks and Hannahs in the world, when my time comes I'll feel a little safer in their arms.

Bodyworlds at SMV Enters Final Days.

Gunther von Hagens' BodyWorlds exhibit is beginning its final week at the Science Museum of Virginia in downtown Richmond.  I had the opportunity to see it yesterday and came away awestruck.

A one-of-a-kind exploration of the human body and brain, BodyWorlds features 12 fully-preserved human bodies.  The skin has been removed from the bodies to display the muscular, skeletal and nervous systems and major organs of our bodies.  By placing them in positions such as swinging a baseball bat, supporting themselves on gymnastics rings, and performing ice skating and ballet postures, von Hagens' exhibit demands an appreciation of the complex mechanics of those systems.

The bodies are preserved in a process called plastination, in which they are posthumously treated with silicon and various gases to prevent decay and maintain other inner structures. The bodies in the exhibit are therefore called plastinates.  In many major cities, von Hagens has included plastinates posed to simulate playing a saxophone, riding a horse (also a plastinate), playing chess, teaching at a blackboard and so on.  The exhibit has garnered some controversy and many accolades and media attention.  In the recent James Bond film Casino Royale, Bond stalks a villain through an early BodyWorlds exhibit.

Most people I approached about BodyWorlds reacted with considerable apprehension.  "I don't think I could handle it," one said.  "I've had the chance to go see it six or seven times, but I just can't bring myself to do it," another said.  "I have no desire to see that."  I personally looked forward to seeing the exhibit.  Having spent half my life with moderate pain in my back muscles and lower lumbar areas, I was excited to get a direct look at those parts of the body especially.

The most dramatic plastinate on display at the Science Museum of Virginia was a pair of figure skaters in a death spiral, in which the male bends down a bit and leans back, holding the female's hand as she circles him almost flat to the ground.  He serves as a counterweight to her extreme pose, and their held hands support the other from falling.  Another, at the end of the swing of a baseball bat from his left to right, his face up to follow an imaginary baseball, is a unique vision of both sides of the back muscles - especially the paired latissimus dorsi.  The right side was relaxed, as it had been on the receiving side of the swing, but the left side was stretched to its utmost, as the left arm was stretched across the body.

Each plastinate had been carefully positioned to display specific parts of the body.  A ballet dancer was a singular complement to the figure skaters; her delicate balance and raised right leg forced patrons to consider the mind and body training we undergo in our youths to perform such acts.  Another, supporting himself on gymnastics rings, had some muscles splayed with forceps and surgical spreaders to show bones and prosthetic body parts.

Full plastinates are far from the only attraction in BodyWorlds.  There are dozens of individual body parts encased in glass with basic anatomical information - a healthy heart sits next to an enlarged heart, a healthy lung is shown next to a smoker's lung, etc.  The brain of an Alzheimer's patient is displayed at the midpoint of the exhibit, its recesses deeper and wider than that of a healthy brain.

Nancy Tait, the Science Museum of Virginia's Manager of Communications and Stories, met with me and gave me my Press Kit for BodyWorlds.  She was actually kind enough to stop by the museum on her day off to speak with me about the exhibit.  "It really is beautiful," Tait said.  "A friend of mine went through and said 'I know this sounds horrible, but the first word that comes to mind is exquisite,' and I said 'I don't think that's horrible at all.'"

Tait said that the Science Museum of Virginia is extending its hours for BodyWorlds' final week, including showtimes through midnight on Friday and Saturday.  A gift shop boasts several published books about the exhibit, a DVD, postcards and more.  Ticket and showtime information is available at SMV.org.  Information about BodyWorlds is available at the BodyWorlds website.