John Coltrane John Coltrane Pt3

Before I return to the drug addled, angst ridden hero of my story, here's the results of my etymological study of "debauch." The word comes from French. The prefix, de, means away from and the root,bauch, means beam as in roofbeam. In French it referred to a rough handhewn beam, the wood being roughly hewed away from the original log to form the beam. From there it arrived at "a period of dissipation." So there I was wallowing in self pity and hopelessness, occasionally walking down to the neighborhood bar to eat a hamburger, drink beer, and watch football or basketball games with the locals, who would now and then harass me due to the full Italian 'fro I was now sporting. I avoided any escalation by telling them my mother was Irish and singing along with the Clancy Brothers songs on the jukebox.  New Year's Eve was approaching, and all of my roommates had decided to celebrate in their hometowns, apparently forgetting our sworn pledge to blow the top off this Ivy League burg together. There were two girls who lived on the ground floor apartment of our house, neither of whom had ever talked to any of us and seemed to go out of their way (probably wisely) to avoid us. On the way back from the tavern(hardly a tavern), I would look for signs of life. I  decided I would fall in love with one of them and that New Year's Eve would be a propitious time to make my amorous declaration. No signs of life. They were probably skiing in Switzerland with the rich boys. So as Steve Earle sings, "What's a poor boy to do?"     Gotta go to work. Ciao.