Bukowski, Charles - South Of No North

Stories culled from the Los Angeles Free Press and Doug Blazek’s “Ole.”
The narrator recollects growing up poor, living rough. Childhood, poignant, bleak, overlaid with an adult wonder of how everyone survived.
Companions drift in and out, fellow discards, clutching bent pipedreams.
Women stroll into the Life’s bar, give, take. When the gauge hits empty, they hit the breeze.
The sex stories are pretty funny. Sex itself can be funny, unless you’re one of those types who view the mortal coil oh so seriously.
Chinaski visits the doctor for various ailments. The doc, an ex-Nazi, treats him, yet wails about his own problems.
Chinaski sees a fellow starving poet. Only this guy is about climb out of the ditch. This story seems eerily prophetic.
Two honchos of a roller derby league take an over-eager achiever to task.
(The roller derby awakened an old memory. Years ago, for four months, in a period of sheer lunacy, I dated a jammer. That didn’t go so well.)
Sour luck, bad choices, narrow chances, liars, drunks, the crooked game.
These are timeless stories, always timeless.
Don’t believe it? Go on, be pleased with yourself. It won’t last. It never does.
Then, when you’re staring at your empty hands, these essays will resonate.