The French Quarter. Ken JD Mask
dead-beats, deadheads, whores, prostitutes, and pirates had landed there early in the 16th century and their offspring had the same sensibility: an expected carryover due to the ‘natural evolution.’
What amazed him was his father’s ability to hide his sadness. How he held his head high and mighty—in spite of. Around 5’10”, Luke was somewhat smaller than his father, with a light-brown complexion from his mother’s Indian side. Luke was similarly forthright in public, and reserved around family and close friends.
He was keen-featured, and attractive to the opposite sex. Without shunning the numerous advances of young women, young Jacobs delved into his studies in high school, college and law school. While enjoying women’s company, he still managed to keep his thinking clear. He glided through college studying Political Science as do most pre-law students, and later went on to Tulane’s Law School. Thereafter, he took a pos-ition as a New Orleans public defense attorney. Soon he became an assistant D.A.
He despised the position, the mundane routine of putting away individuals who he knew were young and foolish, not quite knowing what they had gotten themselves into at the time. This conflict which Luke would experience throughout his career as an Assistant D.A., troubled him.
His love for wood re-manifested itself in his early thirties. He began hunting and fishing again. He even flirted with carving: he still loved the smell of fresh-cut cypress wood and often carved figures for friends and family members.
* * *
One of the things the boy admired about his father, particularly after their hunting expeditions, was the care and dedication his father demon-strated during their “carving” years. They both learned to carve together, and his father took his time, patiently learning to whittle the wood into objects that were quite different from their origin. Luke loved how a piece of wood would transform itself into a life-like thing.
His father always looked in his eyes when he spoke. “Son, the main thing in life, and the one thing you need to carry with you as far as you go, is a certain level of discipline. No matter what you do, no matter where you are, demonstrating a certain level of discipline is important. Being able to demonstrate to someone that you’ve had the wherewithal and the presence of mind to sit down and to concentrate for a certain period of time is something no one can take from you and is always admired.”
His father would sit there, fumbling, in his initial attempts to carve the wood, his efforts crude at first. Yet, as time passed, they both learned to find in each other the delicate nature of wood carving. It was something his father took great pride in and passed on to Luke. For some reason, Frank never took to the practice. He was off doing other things most Saturday afternoons. Even after poor days of game hunting, Luke and the ole man would sit there in the backyard in their New Orleans Seventh Ward duplex and carve, hours upon hours.
Roy Winston enjoyed being a police officer and it provided him with a living; however, the time spent with his sons during the weekends, and particularly the time spent on carving with Luke, seemed to provide him with the greatest pride.
After 10 years, the boy still missed his father. He couldn’t quite understand why God had taken him away from him at the age of 50, but he’d resigned himself to believe in a certain man’s destiny, that is that the separation of spirit from the physical world was necessary and that one day he would be with his father in some capacity.
A solid individual who learned discipline at an early age, though seemingly carefree in his mannerisms, he was disciplined. But even more than that, he was intuitive, like his father.
Just as he was loading his shotgun, a dark feeling rippled through him making bumps at the base of the hairs on his forearm stand up in formation. Sniffing the air, looking for clues, he saw none. Whatever it was, was happening in his spirit. “Something’s wrong,” he said out loud to the silent woods. He remembered how his father used to say: “A dog can tell the difference between being kicked and being stumbled over…” whenever he had this sensation. He didn’t know quite what it was, but he knew it was something.
Chapter 3
Dr. Malaki Burgos couldn’t believe the in-tensity with which this patient felt she needed psychotherapy. She seemed to be well put to-gether. Having just moved to the area and establishing his practice from the Midwest, he was taking all comers and didn’t quite know how to tell her she didn’t need his assistance.
Looking down at the Dictaphone to make sure that the red recording light remained strongly supplied and that the tape rolled undisturbed, he began his dictation.
Prodded by this text case, he turned the recorder off and looked down at a novel, he had recently picked up on Decatur Street, at Beckham’s bookstore just across from the House of Blues’ Foundation Room. The bookstore which boasted new and used books was, solidly bucking the big mega-book-store chains. There he found a yellow, almost forgotten read: an obscure work from a very important literary figure.
This time he found JD Salinger’s Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters. Dr. Burgos immediately jumped on the place he had carefully marked; he never bent the edges down feeling that it was disrespectful.
Having read a few chapters, he decided to interrupt his dictation for the day’s last case and to continue reading. Salinger mentions a Taoist story in the first chapter. It reminded him of his patient.
He read:
Duke Du of Chin said to Po Lo: “You are now advanced in years. Is there any member of your family whom I could employ to look for horses in your stead?” Po Lo replied: “A good horse can be picked out by its general build and appearance, but the superlative horse, the one that raises no dust and leaves no tracks is something fleeting, elusive as thin air. The talents of my sons lie on a lower plane all together. They can tell a good horse when they see one, but they cannot tell a superlative horse. I have a friend, however, one whose name is Chiu Fang Kao, a hawker of fuel and vegetables whom in things pertaining to horses is no wise my inferior. Pray see him.”
Duke Du did so and subsequently dispatched him on a quest for a steed. Three months later he returned with the news that he had found one. “It is now in Shachi,” he added. “What kind of horse is it?” asked the Duke. “Oh, I think it is a dun-colored mare,” was his reply. However someone being sent to fetch it, the animal turned out to be a cold black stallion. Much displeased, the Duke sent for Polo. “That friend of yours,” he said, “whom I commissioned to look for a horse has made a fine mess of it. Why he cannot even distinguish the beast’s color or sex. What on earth can he know about horses?” Po Lo heaved a sigh of satisfaction. “Has he really gotten as far as that?” he cried. “Ah, then he is worth ten thousand of me put together. There is no comparison between us. What Kao keeps in view is the spiritual mechanism. In making sure of the essential, he forgets the details. Intent on the inward quality, he loses sight of the external. He sees what he wants to see. He looks at things he ought to see and neglects those things that should be so. He has it in him to judge something quite better than horses.” When the horse arrived, it indeed was a superlative animal.
As this story resonated within his conscious-ness, Dr. Burgos imagines a young lad, round-faced with deep penetrating, gently slanted brown dough eyes. He is clothed in a dark black collar-less and mid-calf high-fitting jump suit contrast with a clean, brilliant white rope, knotted buttons, and hip tie strings, barefooted and crouched along with others listening, folding his legs perhaps, opening his mouth and then closing it each time he heard the man continue the story.
And thus, yet, another prodding impetus to finally reflect on his encounter with this new patient. Dr. Burgos had been made richer by his encounter with this dynamic lady.
Given the great things that must have happened in her life, she was set on learning and growing and helping others. However, she had a greedy streak.
Dr. Burgos looked down at his Dictaphone, which had been turned off while he read the Salinger novel. He couldn’t quite bring himself to