The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis 3 In God We Trust
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The Many Loves Of Dobie Gillis 6: What's Wrong With This Picture? free porn video
["Herbert T. Gillis" was played by Frank Faylen. He is probably
best known as being the sadistic male nurse in "The Lost Weekend"
(1945). He was also in 30 movies, (e.g., "The Grapes of Wrath"
('40), "Road to Rio" ('47), "Gunfight at the O.K. Coral" ('57),
and "Funny Girl" ('68)).]
The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis 6: What's Wrong with This Picture?
By Ron Dow75
The sun was getting low as Dobie Gillis, blond, crew cut, average
early 1960's Working-Middle Class Dobie Gillis sat sideways (as
he usually did) at his usual marble bench in the park, bent over
with his chin on his fist just like Rodin's statue, "The
Thinker", a copy of which was just behind him.
He looked up and across the park path. "This is the third time
I've sat here, today. While three times in one day is not a
record, the reasons I why I've sat here have got to be. Somebody
should publish a book of superlatives ('Superlatives', that's one
of those words you need to know in English class, but can find
very little use for outside it), so I could be in it. The first
time I sat here today would be listed under the heading 'Greatest
Opportunity for an Underachiever Who Wasn't Born into Money, and
Who Doesn't Have the Luck to Gamble'. I can get hundreds of
thousands of dollars (and even accounting for way the inflation
is in 1960, that's a lot of money), if I can marry somebody both
of my parents, the girl's parents, and Chatsworth Osborne, Jr.
can agree on... Er, maybe that 'Greatest Opportunity' should be
re-edited; perhaps it should read 'Greatest Long Shot'."
"The second time would be listed under 'Most Unnatural Change in
Girls' Attitudes'! (I do not say 'Unnatural' in the sense of the
occult or supernatural. This being 1960, and the middle of a
space race that the good ol' United States is losing at the
moment, I think what is happening to me and the people of the
town would be best be thought of as science fiction.) And Why?
Just because of some simple syllables. The 'simple syllables' I
refer to are names. Just names, mind you! Because the girl who
was once 'Maynard G. Krebs' is now a Gaspar, Milton Armitage III
is reduced to being just a Milton! Because they are on a first
name basis, the playing field has been leveled as much as it
possibly can when you're dealing with the second richest boy in
the Tri-State-and-Beyond Area. (The richest being the
aforementioned Chatsworth Osborne, Jr.)"
"Which brings me to this third time. Gaspar's and Milton's
impending duel of courtship over the most desirable of girls
could only be listed under 'The Most Preposterous Thing Anyone's
Ever Heard of'!!
"Zelda!?!! Zelda Gilroy, the Most Desirable of girls?!! She's
5'2" and weighs 120 pounds; her measurements are 33B, 27, and 36!
She has no lips to speak of, a squashed-in nose, piggy eyes
(which are brown, not blue, despite what that song says about a
'five-foot-two' gal), and a low forehead (which she covers with
stiff, stringy bangs). You would think that a genius would at
least have a high forehead! Then she'd have something cute about
her!"
"And it's not just the forehead. The top of her head slopes
forward -How can she have room for the superior frontal lobes! It
presents more of the dull, lifeless brown hair she has parted in
the middle and pulled back into a ponytail. And that ponytail! It
merely emphasizes that she has a head that's too small for the
width of her body. Again: How can she be a genius with a pint-
sized head?!! If they were going to cast somebody in the role of
genius who was the opposite of the stereotype, it would be Zelda!
(Did you know Hedy Lamarr, and most of the most glamorous of the
old screen goddesses were geniuses?)"
Dobie got up, shaking his head, "No!! I refuse to believe it! I
cannot be lucky enough to have two boys fighting over Zelda, and
taking her away from me. With my luck, it's all got to be an
elaborate deception to win over the one girl I have a chance
with, and leave me the loser. Again. I have got to find May!" And
Dobie headed off into the night, vowing, "I will not be entered
in the Book of Records."
+++
When Dobie had entered Gillis' Market: "You're a little early,
aren't you?!" Dobie's Dad said when he saw the lad come in. "It's
ten minutes before closing time! Somebody could come in, and you
might have to do a little honest work. Like helping them with
their shopping! Maybe even making a delivery!"
"That reminds me; can I borrow the delivery van?"
"No! I try and shame you into making a little contribution, and
what do you do, but try and get something for nothing. Again!"
"But I need the van to look for May!"
"May? That beaten-down-nik girl whose got to be a friend of that
beaten-up-nik boy, Maynard G. Krebs?!"
"What happened to May as the way to easy street?"
"I've thought I found the directions to easy street once too
often to count my chickens before the eggs hatch."
"You're mixing your metaphors."
"Then, counting my gold pavement before I've pried it off the
street then!"
"Much better. Can I borrow the van?"
"I just said no! Weren't you listening? (Ask a silly question.) I
may need that van; even though we close at 6, our customers know
they can call us at any hour (except, of course, in the middle of
the night; pregnant women, excepted to that exception, of
course)."
"Can I make the next delivery, then?!"
"Dobie!!" his Dad was about to yell a string of expletives that,
though rough, would not need censoring, when the phone rang.
"I'll get it!" Dobie volunteered, reaching over the counter.
"Over your comatose body," he told the boy, reaching under the
counter himself, and picking up the receiver. "Hello?"
He handed the phone to Dobie, "It's for you."
"Hello?!!" Dobie smiled, hoping to hear the voice he most wanted
to hear. Instead he heard the voice he would have most wanted to
hear at any other time, "Thalia? You called me... Yes, I'm
surprised. You never call me. Or any other boy... Of course, how
silly of me. If there were money involved, you would call a deaf
shut-in and make him listen. Then you've found out where May is-"
"Give me that!" his Dad said, taking the phone out of his son's
hand.
"Dad!!"
"Thalia?" Herbert T. Gillis said into the receiver. "Yes, you
don't have to tell me. I know where that young woman is, too.
Don't bother coming over. Good-bye!" and he put the receiver back
under the counter.
The "Dad!!" in Dobie's cry this time had a different tone than
the previous one. "You knew?!!"
"I, uh, just discovered it this afternoon, while I was making
deliveries."
"'It'!?? May is more than just an it!"
"The it I was referring to was an a," and his voice became
unnaturally softer, "a poster."
"A poster!?!"
"Quiet!" he tried to quiet his loudmouth son with hand gestures.
"Do you want your dear mother to hear?"
"Why don't you want her to know!? Is it a wanted poster?!"
"Oh, would that it were. There would at least be a reward."
"Dad!!" Dobie's cry was more like the one he'd made before the
last "Dad!!"
"Listen, Dobie! For once in your life, listen to your old man! I
wasn't going to tell you, because you're better off not knowing.
Forget the girl! She's nothing but trouble. Her kind always is.
Especially, if you're the healthy, wholesome, All-American type
boy that your dear mother, my wonderful wife, wishes you were.
For her sake, your dear mother's, not that of the one-girl-too-
many, stay away from that stray. Find yourself a girl a mother
-your mother- can be proud to call-"
"Mom!!"
"What are you doing!!?! I told you not to let her know!!"
"What is it, Dobie, Dear?!" called Winnifred P. Gillis from
upstairs.
"Nothing, Dear!!" Herbert T. Gillis called back. "Our son just
wanted to know, uh, if dinner is almost ready?!"
"No, I don't," Dobie threatened, leaning over the counter, and
staring down his father.
"Dinner will be done fifteen minutes after closing, as always!"
And, as always, Mom had a weary smile in her voice.
Dobie's Dad leaned his elbow on the counter, and stared right
back at the boy, but called out, "Are we having liver and
onions?!"
"Yes! I'm using some of what we couldn't sell, despite the big
sale we had!"
"That was three weeks ago!" Dobie said.
"And every time she takes one thing out of the deep freeze, she
replaces it with something else we couldn't sell," his Dad
reminded his son.
"Dad?" Dobie asked.
Dad held up a hand, "Winnie! Is that lima beans I smell?!"
"Now, Herb, you know that at your age you need more vitamins and
minerals. This is one of the most nutritious..."
"Come on, son," he said, coming out of the counter isle.
Only to turn around again. "I forgot something," and he opened
the cash register with a tap of the "No Sale" key. "As long as
we're going to be out, we may as well get something to eat."
Dobie was about to remind him that they were in a store, with
plenty of things around they could eat off the shelves, when he
caught himself. When was the last time Dad had sprung for a meal?
"Mom! We have a delivery to make!"
"Close up for me, willya, Winnie?!" Herb said, exiting the
counter again.
"It takes both of you?!"
"It's an emergency delivery!" her husband lied, quickly heading
around the counter, and towards the backdoor, and the alley were
they van was parked. "I'm going to trust our son this time of the
evening with the van?!"
"Dobie's going to do some heavy lifting?" his Mom called back.
"That does make it sound unbelievable," Dobie told his Dad, as he
followed close on his heels.
+++
"We're eating in the van?" Dobie said, having expected a chance
to actually go inside a restaurant.
"It's the deal I made with Groenyitz," Herbert explained, handing
Dobie one of the doggie bags through the passenger side window.
"I don't bring down the tone of his fancy French/Hungarian place,
and I get the leftovers at half-price."
As Dobie looked at the bag suspiciously as he took it, "Something
he couldn't sell, hunh? Why do I get the feeling I would've been
better off with the liver and lima beans?"
"Eat it," he was told as his Dad went around the front of the van
to the driver's side. "At least the ingredients are good. Most of
it comes through the store." He got inside, "Groenyitz is still
old-fashioned enough to believe that a local merchant should do
business with a local merchant."
"Dad, if six restaurants, nearly half, and most of the people
around here eat our food, why are we nearly broke all of the
time?!"
"It's the middleman, my son."
"We're the middleman!"
"Then it's the volume! The middleman can afford to get most of
the profits, if he has enough customers that he can squeeze the
little man out of business!"
Dobie nodded, "We're definitely the little man middleman. But
still-"
"Look, if it'll keep you quiet on the subject, I'll drive by the
Big N Supermarket they're putting up. Now, can we drop it? Why
aren't you eating?"
"I'm not opening it until I see what you've got."
"I've got the same thing you're eating: Goulash!"
"Goulash?! The only time I hear about that is when they're making
jokes about it. No wonder they have leftovers."
"It's just stew!" his Dad insisted, taking out a container like
they gave you with Chinese take-out, and the plastic picnic
spoon. "How do you know you won't like it until you've tried
it?!"
"You try it, first!" Dobie challenged, looking straight at him.
"Remember; you have an ulcer."
"I've never had an ulcer!" Herbert T. Gillis told him, smelling
the container. "A backache, yes."
"So, are you going to take me to May? Can you at least tell me if
she's alright?!"
"I can't take you to her, Dobie," the man said, lowering the
container.
"Can't, or won't?!"
"I can't," he said, looking down at the goulash. "All I saw was
the poster outside."
"Outside? Outside where?!"
Herbert T. Gillis rolled his eyes up, "Why'd I have to further
clarify?" He, then, handed Dobie the container, and the bag with
the rest of the meal in it. "Thalia knows. And, knowing boys the
way I do, your friends are going to find out sooner or later.
(Maynard excepted; that's one thing in his favor.) I guess it's
best you hear it first from the man you expect bad news from,
anyway." And he turned the ignition key.
+++
Dobie was surprised to find himself in the "Less Than Reputable"
part of town. It had other names, but none that was repeated
around decent, churchgoing people while they were being decent,
churchgoing people. The original name was Little Bostown. The
local saying was, "If it was banned in Bostown, it had to be..."
The ending depended on how moral you were being at the moment.
The mostly brownstone buildings were run down, and the streets
were dirty; a patina of unwholesomeness clung to everything. But
what really caught Dobie's attention were the scantily clad women
(some of them girls) out of the street together, but sometimes
alone, acting as if they were waiting for their dates to pick
them up. They would cheer up when they saw the some cars slow
down; but then go back to being bored when they passed by.
"Those can't be boys dressed like girls," Dobie said, unwilling
to believe his eyes.
Now that he'd noticed those three, he saw that there were a few
boys out on the street, too. His mind refused to make the
connection, and he turned away from the sordid scene outside.
"Dad! What were you doing here?!!"
"I told you: I was making deliveries!" the man said, his sweaty
palms gripping the steering wheel. "When it comes to making a
living, the Gillis Market's slogan is 'We Deliver Anywhere Within
a 26 and a Quarter Mile Radius'!"
"I could say, '26 and a quarter miles!' Where'd you get that
ridiculously un-round number from?!. But I've heard you repeat
that slogan of yours before. It's the length of a marathon, minus
873 feet."
"Correct. '26 and a quarter' will stick in a customers' mind
better than 25 miles. But not '26 and 385 yards'!"
"Considering the fact that just about all of our customers live
within walking distance of the store: Who would want you to make
deliveries out here? Is it even within 26 and a quarter miles?!"
"With a dime to spare. Here we are," he said, slowing down.
Dobie looked past his Dad and out the window. "It's a poster, all
right. But it's not of May. It's some woman named 'Belle Peppurr,
the Volcano Goddess'."
"You don't expect a newcomer (at least I would hope she's a
newcomer), like May, to get top billing, now, do you?! And her
name is not 'May'. It's 'Anne Ville'."
"'Anvil'!?" Dobie had to ask. "As in, what falls on you in
cartoons?" Then, he nodded, "How very appropriate. May is more
like a cartoon than a real person, most of the time."
"There's a 8 by 10 glossy of her in the mezzanine, along with
photos of the other 'attractions'." Herbert T. Gillis speeded up;
he was slowing down the already cruise-speed traffic.
"Dad! Stop! There's a parking spot over there!"
"No! I'll not have either of us out there at this time of-" Damn
gawkers!! Dobie had opened the door, and leaped out.
---
"Dobie!! Come back here, at once!! That's an order!!!" his Dad
yelled out the driver's window. He'd stopped the van in the
middle of traffic.
But, Dobie heard, the traffic was not pleased. His Dad would have
to start moving again, and find a parking space. Every one of
them had a meter. That would slow his miserly father down even
more as he wrestled with the thought of spending money to chase
after his worthless, but only child.
"Please, Lord: You're suppose to watch over the young, and the
foolish... and the idiots."
---
Dobie ignored the honking horns as he dashed for the sidewalk in
front of the 'Roxy-Palace Theatre'.
"Hey, baby! Nice set of legs you have there!" called one of the
women standing just outside the lights of the marquee. (Dobie
thought of a dragon lady with slits up both sides of her short,
black-with-flowers silk dress.)
"Leave the kid alone, Nanette," a bleached blond said to the
henna redhead. (Dobie thought of Marilyn Monroe in a very short
pink gown, and a white fur stole.)
"But maybe he's looking for more fun than just a burlesque!"
Nanette grinned.
"Don't listen to her, kid!" the one who was wearing a cheap black
wig. (Dobie thought of a mulatto apache dancer.) "You'll get more
time for your allowance inside."
"You can stay until you get bored!" Marilyn told him.
"If they could get bored, we'd be out on the street because we
were off it," Nanette sneered.
Dobie thought for a moment about asking them if they knew May-
or, rather, Anne, now Gaspar. As he dithered, he noticed that
these three women were actually girls. Maybe they weren't his
age, but they definitely looked older than they should. Not just
older, aged. It was as if the spirit of youth had just about been
drained from them.
While thinking about these examples of the 'working girl', he
remembered May. Dobie felt a great relief. 'Anne' did not look
like she knew them. Not in the 'professional' sense, anyway.
But there was another profession she might belong to...
---
Okay; if his Dad had a good reason to be here, he would not have
seen much of anything. Not as far as Anne Ville was concerned.
She was part of a gallery of 8 x 10 photographs. Each had their
stage names under them (at least, Dobie assumed there were no one
really named Texass Starr, Randi Anne Ruff, or Peggy Suss); and,
besides where they were placed in the display window, a passerby
could guess how they stood in the billing by how much flesh they
had exposed (though nothing that was not strictly epidermis were
visible in the photographic exposures). The girl who looked like
May was not leaning forward so much in profile that you could see
all of her cleavage; her shoulder was raised, and he face was
caught from going from a frown to a smile. It was a pose that
Dobie could never have imagined May making.
That was what made it so, er... interesting.
"Of course, if May were really Anne, now..." Dobie said, putting
his hand in his back pocket. His back pocket was empty! "My
wallet!!" Luckily, he'd just put it in the other back pocket.
Unluckily, but typically, the wallet had no money in it. "Five
dollars is all that separates me from visions of domestic bliss."
"That, and a valid I.D. that says you're old enough to go into a
joint like that," a voice that sounded a lot like his Dad.
But who wasn't. "Oh, uh, heh, hello, officer!"
"Isn't it past your bedtime?" the large, if a bit overweight man
said, not asked.
"It's barely past seven! Uh, officer."
"Listen good, son. The new mayor has started a crack down
campaign. New police officers are to be hired. Those with a
little seniority under our belts are to be reassigned by how well
we do in our quotas. I mean to be promoted to the Vice Squad."
"No disrespect intended, officer, but why, then, warn me?"
"Do you have a mother?"
"Yes. She's at home freezing liver and lima beans."
"Then consider yourself warned. Next time I see you, I may just
use you to help my quota."
Dobie quailed. Being basically a coward at heart was what had
helped keep him on the healthy, wholesome, All-American path. On
either side, was a fall into the lava pits for the
nonconformists. (Well, those that meant to be nonconformists.
There was always grace for those with rightful intentions. Or so
Dobie wished to believe.)
"Excuse my stupid son, officer!" Dobie's Dad explained, coming in
past the nick of time. "You know how kids are at his age;
especially boys! I was trying to give my stupid son an object
lesson in what not to-"
"Herbert T. Gillis!?!" the policeman said.
"Rourke?" Herbert T. Gillis said.
"You know each other?" Dobie put into words the obvious.
"I'll say we do: We're lodge brothers!" Officer Rourke said.
"'Lodge brothers'?" Dobie started to smile with relief.
"But not at the same lodge," his Dad frowned at the policeman.
Dobie's smile fade along with his relief.
"Last year's intra-lodge bowling tournament," Rourke said to
Gillis.
"And theyYear before that," Gillis said to Rourke.
"And all those lodge picnics!"
"The three-Legged race was my favorite."
"That was him!!?!" Dobie cried, realizing what they'd been
talking about.
"I bet that was the only time your stupid son won anything!"
Rourke slandered.
"No contest!" Dobie said, reminding his Dad that it wasn't
slander.
"You shouldn't have tried to win with a girl!" Gillis told
Rourke.
"She was my daughter!"
"And he is my son! Come on, Dobie!" Herbert T. Gillis said,
dramatically slapping his hand around that son's shoulders, and
forcing him to lead the way.
"I'm sorry, again, about your daughter, What's-her-name!!" Dobie
called back to her father, the cop.
"I should run your kid in on the principal of the thing!!" Rourke
threatened.
"And I would have you before the complaints committee on conduct
unbecoming of a lodge member!" Gillis responded over his own
shoulder.
"I'm going to remember your name, Dopy!!"
"That's Do.... That's been my problem all along!! My Name!"
+++
"Changing your name is your mother's department," his Dad said,
starting the delivery van. "If I had any say in it, do you think
you'd be named Dobie!?!"
"But she won't even talk about it! All she ever tells me is that
I was named after somebody very important, and I should be proud
to be called Dobie!"
"This from a woman who's happy to be a Winnifred." He drove.
"Don't tell your mother I said that last part. Winnie is a
wonderful woman. I'm sure she's made me more of a winner, than I
would've been without her. But once she's made up her mind..."
Dobie nodded, "The Rock of Gibraltar would roll, first."
"That's your dear mother, alright. She quotes some stupid
philosopher type, who says, 'It's called a given, because it must
be taken'."
"And if life gives you sour grapes?"
"You add sugar, I guess. At least, that's what your dear, sweet
mother tries to do every hour, of every day, of every... Well,
you get the idea.
"Some times, I actually look forward to the few minutes when she
takes her coffee black. To, uh, use a, a..."
"A metaphor, Dad."
"Thanks, son. As the brain ages..."
"We all must age, I guess." Age, age... something tickled the
back of mind of the boy who was named after no known relative,
male or otherwise.
Suddenly, Dobie thought of something that made his head turn
away, and back again. Dobie looked at his father, and turned his
head away again.
"Dad, you were in the war, weren't you?"
"The Big One, Double-U-Double-U Two! I was a sergeant fighting
Adolph and his nutzie Panzers! Why-"
"You fought in the Pacific!!" he turned his head back. "You were
never any where near Europe in your whole life!"
"I thought you wanted to hear my war stories?!"
"I want to hear where you were born the day I was born."
"I was fighting in the Pacific, like you said." His tone had
become more serious, as he stared out onto the road.
"Now... Where were you the day I was conceived?"
The End of this chapter
W.W.2, Europe vs. Pacific: At the moment, I can't remember in
which theater of operations Herbert T. Gillis fought (Army, I
believe). But in this alternate reality, there is a reason he
keeps saying it was Europe. The reason I say it was the Pacific
is because that's where my father fought (Marine). And there are
some old TV shows I liked where the characters served in the
Pacific. If the opportunity presents itself, I may have a
"reunion".
About Little Bostown: I may have been a little more graphic than
the times warranted. I'm not an expert on such areas. If there is
a call for it, I can provide an explanation for why conditions
are the way they are.
But know: The Little Bostown, burlesque, etc. story line will be
for a limited time only. I do not like writing dark.
---Warning: Beginning of Political Spiel---
Explanations: This is a time, 1960, and a place, the city before
white-flight, where there were not, as yet, many supermarkets,
nor corporate chains of any kind out in neighborhoods that were
still neighborhoods. The developers of cul-de-sac suburbs were
just beginning to make Kensington's predictions come true; and
the author of most of what's wrong with modern America (due to
the "Law of Unintended Consequences" brought on by the
inspiration he got from Hitler's Autobahn) was still President.
[Note: "Law of Unintended Consequences"! This same man warned of
the "Military-Industrial Complex" that slowly got transformed
into just the "Global Industrial Complex" thanks in no small part
to All subsequent Presidents. No one is nominated to the Supreme
Court that is not graded by the Chicago School of Economics.]
It was a time before the corporatization and destruction of the
family farm, when prices were relatively cheap, and a Mom-and-Pop
were nearly competitive enough to supply neighborhood
restaurants.
P.S., Milton and Chatsworth coming into regular contact with the
hoi polloi? As another of their kind would say, "It's a good
thing". There'll be more on that under a later chapter.
---End of political spiel---
Except for this: If you want to tell me I'm wrong (and nobody is
even close to be always correct), you're first going to have to
tell me how you're going to know when you're wrong. "The Angel of
En-Light-enment asks, "What is the truth"; the Angel of Un-Dark-
ening asks, "What is the lie"."
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