Her name was Brenda Holmes

This is not Brenda Holmes. The Brenda Holmes I’m talking about looked nothing like the Mona Lisa. The problem is, I don’t have a picture of Brenda Holmes. This is because I don’t keep pictures. I’ve never cared about pictures the way most people do. I have no pictures of any of the woman in my life. I have no pictures period. This is why I’m offering you a picture of the Mona Lisa. So you can at least have something to look at. I was thinking of Gina Lollobrigida but I already put up the Mona Lisa….wait a minute. Here:

This is better. Brenda Holmes actually looked a bit like Gina Lollobrigida. Gina was a fiery hot sex bomb while the Mona Lisa looks like an Italian Grandmother. Though she is “enigmatic.” They keep saying that. Who’s they? People in the know. Artists, Critics, Art Historians…all those people who tell us what we need to know. The Know-it-alls. You ask me, I say Leonardo just told Mona to sit still and she’s thinking what a fussy old Fag he is. That’s what she’s thinking. But you can call the look “enigmatic” if you like. Gina looks like she could drive you stark raving mad after a night of chasing her ass all over Naples.

I suddenly find it highly “enigmatic” that I don’t have any personal pictures. I have zero pictures of any friends or relatives. Maybe only winners keep pictures…

My love life

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”
Winston Churchill

The above quote is pretty much the story of my love life. I’ve been with Joan, my current girlfriend, for almost six years. This is a record for me. We get along pretty damned well. I believe part of it is the fact that I’m 69 years old and she’s 66. When you reach a certain age, if you happen to be with someone you don’t despise and who’s company you find more or less agreeable, you “settle”.

Settling for what you got is way easier when you’re over the hill.

If Joan heard me saying this she’d be less than enthused.

She might even show me the door. Wait a minute! I do have a picture. I have a picture of Joan! Here she is about to show me the door.

They all deserved better than me

It wasn’t like Brenda Holmes was the love of my life. She was one of the loves of my life. They were all the love of my life. If they weren’t they should’ve been.

Because they all deserved better than me.

This is the mood I was in last night. I’m laying in my double bunk with the rain coming down and the tarps doing their thing to keep the rain out and my stomach pretty full from a half dozen Chinese pork buns and a half bottle of wine and I’m just laying there with the electric heater blasting away the bitter cold…and I’m thinking how the hell I got to this stage of my life aboard Scruffy like its a movie staring young beautiful people and I’m the eccentric old dude living on a boat. Maybe I’m the guy these beautiful kids turn to for comfort and solace because I’ve been through it all. Or I could be the guy who torches their parent’s beach house…maybe not. I’m a genial old duffer.

I rarely think of Brenda Holmes. The thing we had only lasted a year. A little more maybe. But it was a time and place. I was part of the young and beautiful crowd. I was turning thirty. Sounds like nothing today but then it felt like the end of youth. It was the end of something. And for myself and Brenda It ended badly. I have regrets. One thing I like to say, I have no regrets. Do I say that? No. Somebody I know maybe said that. Maybe Frank Sinatra said that in a song. He did it his way. Me, I don’t have a way…

I have regrets.

San Diego

La Jolla to be specific. I ended up down there in “79” I think it was. I’d just graduated from good old Chico State and moved down to San Diego to go to grad school. I needed to reaffirm my professional student status and why not do it at a campus near a nice warm beach. A lot of nice warm beaches.

I got there on the tail end of the Mac Meda crowd’s heyday. This was the gang that hung out on wind-an-sea beach. The Pump House crowd. They’re still there, maybe. A few of them. Old farts lingering on the beach. Guys like Donnie Thompson. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was still there. Last time I was down there, it had to be 94 or 95, he was there, playing beach paddle ball. Tanned to hell. Good old Donnie.

And this guy, Monte Stratton. A tough bird. Made and sold Mac Meda beer holders from wet suit material…I guess you could say he invented those.

And this guy:

And a couple dozen others, maybe more.

More than I need to mention here. Maybe later. It was a time and place and I just more or less stumbled into it and because I had this free house in the heart of La Jolla, the wagon house, people just came around.

The Wagon House

Anyway, Mac Meda was just a goof ball name they gave themselves. It wasn’t a club but a declaration. Like, you want to join, buy a sticker and you’re in. Long as you’re not a dork. I got to know a pack of these people from living in the wagon house and driving for the La Jolla cab company when Vergil Vance owned it. He was a con man from Dallas who showed up with a pile of used car sales money and bought the cab company and stuck a constoga wagon on the roof of a house on the corner of Pearl and Gerrard streets right in plain sight of everybody. He hoped to open an indian jewelry shop aka the Wagon but the city council put the kabosh on that idea. They told him to get rid of the wagon. He refused and rented the place to me then promptly sold the property to Citizens Bank. I discovered the sale and stopped paying him rent, much to his chagrin. I tried to work a deal with the bank for the rent but they had no system for dealing with a tenant so I lived there for free for three years until the bank finally got their shit together and tore down the building and built a la Jolla branch of their bank. I don’t know what happened to the wagon.

Maybe some historical society got ahold of it. Or it got busted up for beach bonfire wood.

Brenda had class

And I met her in class. I think it was English Literature part one or something. I forget. She was only 18 but close to graduating. She had class without needing to show it. Meaning she was hip. She had some boyfriend in his late thirties fighting for Polish Independence. I remember she talked about him. I never met him. Anyway, that was a thing she was getting over. She was friends with Bukowski’s girlfriend, meaning she knew Bukowski. She wrote this paper on D.H.Lawrence that was well received by all the professors. She owned a condo she bought with money she’d saved up herself. She didn’t have specific plans but she didn’t need them. She was moving in a direction that always seemed to benefit her in some way. And for some odd reason she decided she wanted me. I barely talked to her in class. She was kind of loud especially her laugh. She’d laugh like hell and everybody in class would stare at her in an admiring way. She put down the professors that deserved to be put down. She was smarter than the professors. She understood the great writers as well or better than they did. She was a sculptress of real talent. That’s how she befriended Bukowski’s girlfriend, also a sculptress.

One night I was walking the beach and there she was, looking hot in a black swim suite. She gave me a sly grin and we were hooked up. It just happened. Because she wanted it to happen. She got used to the Wagon House real quick.

Glom Ons

By now I had a crew living at the Wagon House. This old Mac Meda dude named Fleet. His pal Nate. Fleet lived on the Livingroom sofa while Nate crashed in his camper van in the driveway. Then Wild Nick my high school pal showed up. He’d landed a job as a Physical Therapist at Scripts Clinic. He arrived at just the right moment because apparently Fleet had barged in on Brenda while she was taking a shower which scared the hell out of her and forced me to give Fleet the boot. He was headed down to Mexico anyway. Him and Nate. So now Nick’s got the sofa. But I got the big veranda bedroom in the back of the house. And Brenda loves being there with me and near the beach. But in the end, I think, if I remember correctly, Wild Nick ended up with the entire house.

Nick always made out.

Somehow Brenda and I ended up living together in a sub-letted pad just up the street from Wind-an-Sea beach.

She really loved my ass

And this is the thing. She really loved my worthless ass. We lived together for the better part of a year. First in a little cabin behind the tennis racket stringing workshop, a business owned and run by some Sri Chinmoy devotees. Then in the sub-let up from wind-an-sea. I got her a part time job doing books at the Sacks 5th Avenue in downtown La Jolla, where I worked part time as a security guard. We did everything together. And she would often ask me did I love her…I mean did I really love her. Of course I told her I did. But for some reason she didn’t believe me. She felt I was only pretending to love her.

The Ski Trip

The ski trip was her idea. She loved to ski and she joined a group that went to bear mountain or maybe even Tahoe for skiing. She wanted me to go. I had no desire to go skiing. I was trying to write this great American novel and it was just another distraction, this ski trip. Now I’m remembering the novel. I had this manuscript I was typing in the kitchen and it got bigger and bigger. One day I dumped the fucker in the trash and she fished it out. Said I needed to believe in myself. Okay, so she believe in me. But there was this ski trip she wanted to go on and I didn’t want to go. And I didn’t want to live in the sub-let anymore, either. I’d purchased this old panel truck from one of the mac meda dudes and I made up my mind to live in it and save money. She had no opinion of that. At least I don’t remember her having an opinion.

She went skiing with this group. And when she returned I was living in my panel truck and she was hooked up with one of ski group. A banker.

I tried to get her back. I begged her to take me back. I wrote her mean letters. I mean, really pathetic mean letters. The kind of crap you oughta be charged a fat misdemeanor for writing. But she never took me back. Instead, she went to Europe. She went to Europe because that’s what you do when you graduate from college. You do the european tour. You spend the summer in Europe then you come home and marry your banker boyfriend.

Did she marry her Banker Boyfriend?

I don’t think she did. How do I know? Well, I went off to Europe just like she did. I never had any plans to go to Europe. What the hell do I care about Europe? Let the Euro trash have Europe. But I went to Europe. I cashed my student loan check and I went to Europe. I went because she did. I figured if she could do it I could do it. I was tore up really bad by the break-up and somehow I figured if I ran into her over in Europe we might rekindle our true love. I never ran into her over there. She did the three month tour. I stayed a year. Married a German. Brought my German wife back to the states. And one evening, out on the town, we ran into Brenda.

But that’s another story.

The one that got away

Do I think of Brenda Holmes as the one that got away? Most all of them were, from first to last. They all got away because they had no choice. I’ve always been more or less impossible. I just don’t know how to love them the way they need to be loved. Yes, I’m somehow lacking. Well, what can I say? I’m too old now to change. But for some damned reason, Brenda Holmes remains the one I think about the most. As the one that slipped away. Slipped away and left me with the most regret.

Maybe it’s because I never saw her again. Except that one time. Well, here’s the story:

Brenda came back from Europe and started a business selling roses in night clubs. She owned the business and hired pretty people to sell long stem roses to bar clientele. She did well, selling the roses for ten bucks a pop. And it just so happened that the night my German wife and I were hanging at this club, watching the old band, Spirit, play, Brenda was filling in for one of her employees that called in sick.

I don’t remember much of Spirit. I remember seeing Brenda.

There she was at the table. Standing there with a a bunch of Long Stem Roses. Offering them for ten bucks a pop. She gave a look when she saw it was me. When I explained my German wife. A look of shock and disappointment. At least that’s what I want to believe. Then she did what I expected her to do. She did what a person with real class would do.

She offered my German wife a rose.

I never saw her again.

Three years later my German wife was gone, too.

Every now and then

It’s been years maybe twenty years since I last tried to look her up. I never have any luck at it. It was the same last night. I googled around for at least an hour seeking her whereabouts. Then, like always, I gave up and crashed out. I awoke this morning with a bright idea.

I’ll ask my new friend, the Robot. Maybe he can help me locate Brenda Holmes.

GLOOMER

I’m trying to locate an old friend. Can you help me?

ROBOT

Sure, I can try to help you locate your old friend. What information do you have about them? Can you provide their name, last known location, age, or any other details that could be helpful in the search?

GLOOMER

Her name was Brenda Holmes. She attended San Diego State university in 1977-78. She published a paper on D.H.Lawrence that was well received. She was born in 1961, I believe.

ROBOT

Based on the information you provided, here are some steps you can take to try to locate your friend Brenda Holmes:

Use social media: Try searching for Brenda Holmes on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, or Twitter. You can also try joining SDSU alumni groups or English literature groups to see if anyone knows her or has any information.

Check online directories: There are several online directories that can help you locate people. You can try websites like Whitepages or Spokeo to see if they have any contact information for Brenda Holmes.

Contact SDSU: You can try contacting San Diego State University’s alumni association or English literature department to see if they have any information on Brenda Holmes. They may be able to provide you with contact information or forward a message to her.

Use a people search website: There are several websites like PeopleFinder or Intelius that can help you locate people. These websites may require a fee, but they can provide more in-depth information like phone numbers and email addresses.

I hope these suggestions help you in your search for Brenda Holmes. Good luck!

GLOOMER

I was hoping maybe you could do all those things for me.

ROBOT

As an AI language model, I don’t have the capability to perform tasks like a private investigator or search public records, but I can certainly guide you through the process and offer suggestions. Please let me know if there’s anything else I can assist you with.

What the hell are these Robots good for, anyway?

I think I’m done with them.

Maybe I’ll listen to Spirit. What the hell…