I Shall Show Thee the Best Springs

"Aw man...there's naked old men." I said sadly.

Mason looked towards me apologetically. "Sorry." She said.

She had promised me that there wasn't going to be any naked old men at the hot springs. My buddy Dale had warned me about such things. He had been right after all.

"Oh well." I said. I took off my backpack and reached for the high proofed rum. I took a swig and grimaced as the awful stuff burned my stomach. I was already kind of drunk despite the long drive through the mountains. We had taken the wrong turn at Cougar Lake and ended up at something called a powerhouse which over looked the reservoir, but had finally made it to the summit where we hiked a half mile into the Oregonian forest and reached the sulfur springs.

Despite Mason's assurances, the first thing I noticed as I gazed downward towards the hot water pool was a floating, 50 something year old hippy penis drifting like a piece of sea weed.

"I'm not gonna get naked." Mason told me and began to pull off her clothes revealing her white bikini underneath. I shrugged and pulled off my clothes to my boxers and took another swig of the rum, deciding that I wouldn't get naked either. Mason pulled out a marijuana pipe and began stuffing it with high powered marijuana.

"Hey guys, welcome!" I turned and a naked girl climbed up from the rocks towards us on the bank. She had long hair and national geographic boobs which hung scarily down her body. She had a crystal tied into the widow's peak of her dreadlocks which reflected the slowly setting sun which was drifting downwards in shafts through the green moss covered branches. I would later ask her the significance of the crystal, but she just smiled at me and said, "It keeps me fresh."

"Oh, hey Almana!" Mason said. Apparently they knew each other. The naked girl joined us on the bank and casually handed me a joint. Mason introduced me to her friend and we shook hands. I handed her the bottle of rum and she took a swig and coughed. We talked casually for a while as I tried to avoid looking at the naked old men until we finally decided to go into the spring.

I climbed into the hot water and almost fell drunkenly on the slippery rocks. I caught myself before I ate a mouthful of sulfur water and splashed towards the bottom. A large hole in the rocks above us formed a cavern which spouted smelly steam and hot water down into the pool bellow where I floated casually.

An older guy sitting fully clothed was speaking to a naked man sitting on the bank. "Yeah man," he said in a slow, drawn out way which LSD victims usually sport, "Janis, Morrison, Hendrix, Jerry Garcia...they all died for our sins. All of them."

I snorted with laughter. Son of a goose, I thought, if this is what years of heavy drug use did to one, I was glad that I no longer participated. The old guy heard my laughter and nodded at me, as though I understood. The naked guy he was talking to just starred blankly into the dusky sky above, slightly cross eyed. I was beginning to feel uneasy.

I swam to the other side of the hot pool, and climbed out onto the slippery rocks, careful not to fall and crack my skull. The heat was making me thirsty, and a flowing river ran adjacent to the hot spring. I climbed into the icy water of the river, and my body began convulsing from the contrast of the 104 degree hot spring. I had heard that this was good for the body, going from extreme heat to extreme cold. It was just stress. Like lifting weights.

"Can we drink this water?" I asked Almana. She smiled. "I wouldn't. They do," she said pointing to the naked men, "but I wouldn't. Here, have some of this." And she handed me a large plastic jug of water. I took a long swig, my body submerged in icy water splashing over me like melting snow on my winter skin, somewhere deep in the Oregonian wilderness surrounded with space cased, yet well meaning people who were talking about subjects they knew nothing about.

"And that's the universal mass constant." The clothed man said from the bank. "Does anyone mind cigarette smoke?" He asked to no one in particular, and no one answered him so he lit a cigarette. I climbed out of the icy river and went back into the hot spring with out cracking my skull. My body relaxed. A naked old man slowly lowers himself into the water as Almana smiles, her national geographic titties swaying slightly as she leans forward in the hot water. Mason stands and declares that she is getting out and going back to the bank to get high.

I decide that I have enough, so I climb out and join her on the bank. She is talking to two old men who are thankfully clothed. Mason excuses herself to go urinate in the woods, leaving me alone with the two old hippies. The older guy from the spring, the one who believes that the pop stars from the 60's and 70's died as martyrs for our sins climbs up and sits next to me. He introduces himself as Captain Beyond.

"I got that name in the fourth dimension," he explains to me. "When you reach that place, you'll get a name too."

"Can I be an admiral?" I ask him.

"Hell, you could be. I got this name because I'm so far beyond, and a captain gives out the orders. I am, like, the master."

"Well," I say carefully, "an admiral out ranks a captain."

He smiles, and tells me that there are plenty of titles in the fourth dimension for everyone. Even me. He attempts to introduce me to his friends, but he can't remember their names.

"Oh shit--Mike. That's right, I remember now." Cpt. Beyond tells me after a little assistance from his friends. "Mike here is the business guru hippy. I'm the spiritual LSD guru hippy. It's a nice balance." Cpt. Beyond asks me for some of the rum, and I oblige. He coughs heavily after sipping it, and seems impressed by the high quality of a common, cheap liquor.

Mason returns and joins me on the bank by the three old men. Cpt. Beyond asks me if I want any opium.

"Sure." I said, because I do enjoy opium.

"Here, check this out." He pulled out a stash of incense.

"What's this?" I ask the good Captain.

"This," he explains, "is pure, holy opium."

"No, it's not." I said. "That's incense. I thought you had opium?"

"This is opium." The Capt. argued.

"No it's not, that's just incense. You said you had opium. That means black tar stuff."

"Oh man," the Capt. said, "I wish I had some of that. Do you have any?"

"No," I laughed. "You said you had some." I sighed. Talking to these people was like dealing with children. I returned to my bottle of rum, hopeful to get drunk.

"Check this out." Captain beyond was over my shoulder again, reaching into his pack like his bag of tricks. He pulled out a knot of t-shirts and clothes. "You want to see my paintings? I'm a visionary artist." And I believe him, because all visionaries always tell you that they're visionaries.

He shows off some mediocre print screenings and acrylic paint splashed onto an assortment of t-shirts, and I fear that he'll ask me to buy some but thankfully he doesn't, because his art is awful and none of the pictures look right. Jesus Christ is a red and blue blob, Hendrix is yellow smeared on blue, and the holy flower of life is a mess of yellow spirals. I nod and act impressed. Mason and the others pull off the act much more convincing than me. Or more frightfully, they really are in impressed. This worries me very much.

The Captain has a final surprise for all of us gathered on the bank over looking the hot springs. By this time, the sun is starting to go down, and it is illegal to be up here past dark. Some young teenagers have made their way up to the springs, and none of them have national geographic titties and I am highly interested in them. Mason taps my shoulder and draws my attention to Captain Beyond's hands. They're filled with beads, necklaces, and bracelets.

Again, I assume that he is trying to sell them and make some quick cash. But I am surprised when he shoves them into the hands of the girls, and Almana and Mason start putting them around each other's necks and the Captain insists that they keep the handful of jewelry. The ladies started to tie bracelets around my wrists and ankles, as Almana tells me how each consecutive knot is a symbol of strength upon me. I don't believe in it, but I do like hemp jewelry so I bite my tongue and enjoy my free stuff.

Captain Beyond sighs and stands. He zips up his pack as his buddies whose names he could not remember start putting on their socks and tying their expensive looking Timberlands and Northface apparel. The Captain just has an old pair of Nike's, worn down and beaten with the souls coming off. I assume that they are leaving; they are very worried about the park rangers coming up and finding us up here in the dark. The old men claim that they helped build the paths leading to the springs, lugging stones up in wheel barrows over the steep hills. This justifies their extreme territorial habits.

In the impending dark, Captain Beyond looks sad and older. He does not look like a spiritual LSD guru. He does not look powerful or wise. Not that he did much in the light either, but in the darkness his vulnerability is almost comically exposed. He seems lost.
Someone asks him if he has a place to stay after all this. The Captain explains that he's sleeping down at the base of the mountain. He's being doing that for the past week. But he puffs his chest out and proudly states that he has found a home outside of the state park. He has a trailer in the front yard of someone's house which he can stay in during the day. And when the people inside the house aren't home, he can sleep on their couch. He's not sure how he knows the people who own the trailer and the house, but it seems as though he's fought for this for a long time.

These are the words of a man who claims to have experienced the esoteric secrets of the universe. Living the way that the pop star martyrs claimed everyone should and could has lead him to confused nudity at a hot spring deep in the Oregonian forest. For the last time that day, I am glad in a self righteous kind of way that I have moved beyond the notions of enlightenment through substance abuse. Because I can see what it has done to all these poor bastards.

Regards, Esortnom