16 Paces and You Turn and Shoot- Nashville , TN

It's 3AM in Nashville Tennessee, 4Am in NYC, 5PM in Tokyo and who you think I am is not who I be. This is not Christian, this is Bob; the Bob of travels with Bob. I'm pitch hitting at the moment out of necessity as I am the only one coherent enough to scribe the days events. I am no poet nor a writer, I am a cold logician, and the days events will be told in that fashion which best suits my personality. So, all ye who has read of me shall now be able to glean the truth of the day's events and a tidbit of my soul from the next words which follow.
The day begun with sunshine pouring into my tent. It was about 9 and I knew I had to get up. everything hurt, the ground was hard, I was a fool to choose that place as a camp site. At the kitchen I made the first of 3 PB&J sandwiches I would eat for the day's meals. We met up with Jai and Christan had a tarot reading on camera. The conclusions were...inconclusive.
In the garden we spoke with Mr. Rose about permaculture and how Short Mtn. sustains itself. After a long and elusive conversation the interviewer and interviewee swapped places and Christian found himself answering questions of his life goals to a radical farrie in the wilderness of Tennessee. Conclusions were equally inconclusive as tarot readings.
For the first time Christian swung in a hammock, falling ut the first 2 attempts to his delight. Attempting to do his first hand stand on a rock, once again he decided to trick me into a tackling match, which ended in a very hurt knee for him. A few dart games later (P.S. Bob/Wander beat out X/War Path both games) we talked with Socket who apparently moved to Short Mtn. sanctuary for the goats. She was one of my favorite faries and the conversation took place on a slanted log as goats grazed in the background, mosquitoes stole my blood, and a cream colored tabby wandered about aimlessly.
We were both sad to leave and Neil Young soothed our woes through the majestic Tennessee hills. But, it was bye-bye farries, on to Nashville to find a real southern honky tonk. That is exactly what the sign read in big bold letters, "Show me a REAL honky tonk." Walmart and 15min had bought Christian a plaid shirt, cowboy hat, and boot-cut wranglers along with enough poster board to make 5 signs along the remainder of the journey.
At the hotel he suited up as I prepped the technology for what was going to be one of the most spectacular, frightening, and memorable (for one of us) nights of our brief existence.
Broadway, Nashville, Tennessee; one of the most pathetic an synthetic attempts of a tourist trap we had ever seen...perfect to stage our re-immersion onto the grid. Armed with a country get-up, a ridiculous sign, a who-the-fuck-cares attitude, and a few hundred in wireless equipment we hit the streets looking for a real honky tonk.
Christian managed the following with the sign: to alienate many tourists, make friends with a few street musicians, give $10 to a one legged hobo, and encourage a rickshaw driver to pity him. With a few shots and a $6 a pitcher joint the stage was set and Tom, a motorcycle rickshaw driver, had no clue what to think when a drunken urban cowboy and a kid in a pink bunny hat showed up yelling into the night about needing honky tonk authenticity in a plastic world of fake honky tonkys.
But wait, got ahead of myself and missed a part. Make this in bulleted part in points.
-Met 3 street musicians and gave them a ride to East Nashville
-Drinks at a great place where young people where playing the old songs of blue grass in a circle seemingly evolved from nothing, but sounding oh so sweet
-One beer and were out with a great story of how some Weasel stole 2 mens dreams
-2 party buses full of masters of business students are too good to pass up
-Sure, we're from a reality TV show
-An overcrowded bar, a fight between bloggers, yelling, humping, racial jokes, handshakes, and a gay remark that would taint the night
We left and Christian was devastated for "loosing" the talk he and the other blogger/business major/Jewish man had. He was so upset I knew the rest of the night was in trouble, and he himself said the night was ruined as we walked back onto plastic Broadway. Another $6 pitcher that Christian somberly stared down while he drank, looking lost in a deep depression, and we were back on the streets.
Then we meet the rickshaw driver and before we know it he is driving us to another part of town where the real, or as real as you can get in the tourist trap that is Nashville, honky tonks are. A little joint named something or other full of somebodys listening to something that sounded just right. Bought 2 hot dogs from a guy named Ricky and some beers from the stereotype of a country bartender. While I was diverted outside by a crazy man who recited 9/11 poetry to me, Christian was all alone in his cowboy hat at the the front of the stage listening to a few musicians pour out their country souls. I had to hug the crazy man and salute the American flag to get him to leave me be and I had no idea whether Christian would be where I left him. But he was, and his diligence listening as the sole audience member earned him a kiss from a waitress who wanted to be filmed.
Tom told me I was on my own and left, he had done us right and I hope got something from the experience. A hungry man beside me watched enviously, and commented often, as I ate my hot dog that would round out my complete and balanced diet for the the day (if jelly counts as fruit and sour crout as a vegi serving). Stumbling out into the night Christian confessed that he loved his girlfriend Nicole and also New York City, and Nashville. We were walking back to the car, with no real idea where we were after Tom's rickshaw ride had turned me around, and then Christian stopped at a business lobby.
It was one of those multi-story generic corporate buildings with a lot of glass and a blank single secretary desk set against a marble entrance. At first I thought he was staring himself in he mirror and confronting his inner daemons, but instead he turned to me and was ranting about a duel and how I didn't understand we had to fight. I thought he wanted to fight me, but was totally wrong as he told me. I was on his side, and we were to duel the corporate structure. 16 paces, turn and shoot!
Staring at me as if for validation he collapsed into a large amount of landscaping; only his white cowboy hat visible in the shrubbery. He than began to fight other forms of landscaping and running into the road unpredictably. After that it is hard to sum up what happened as it was hard just to keep up with him. For the next 20 min it was an ongoing poem about life, the chorus of which was "16 paces, turn and shoot!" From challenges to the system, comments on passerby's clothing, and surprisingly eloquent metaphors we stumbled through town, dancing with homeless men, screaming at limos, and offending a very large man in suspenders. Like an madman he poured through the streets unbridled and free from his conscious. I found it all rather moving to tell the truth, but people on the street did not share my sentiment and without the camera he would have surely been in a fight or arrested.
I had kept a green pepper from the Short Mtn. garden in my pocket and gave it to him to chew on as he waxed on about the state of the world and "turn and shoot" changed to "know the truth." A man moving to Miami seemed to agree that 16 paces was the right amount to know the truth and despite my urging we had to go into another bar, the worst looking trap of them all, to which Christian commented, "I want to experience the worst."
A gorgeous waitress gave him another beer and he sat amongst the dancing couples for about 30 seconds before storming out without drinking a drop of his purchase. By now tape was low, battery dying, and patients running thin so I steered towards the car in a zig-zag pattern that took a while to accomplish. Jeff Tweedy was one the radio and I knew roughly how to get back to the hotel but Christian was being controlled by another spirit (later identified as the evil spirit living in the white $5 cowboy hat) and the voice wanted to go somewhere to get out its angst. Well, I convinced the hat it wanted to go back to the hotel, but the hat thought I meant the hotel bar so within 1 min of being back in the room it ran out into the night again.
I found him in the courtyard as a drugged out hooker and a john walked by me commenting on how hot it was in the 40 degree Nashville night. Christian attempted to climb a relatively gentle slope on all fours and then hopped a large wooden fence to get to the bar. Of course, his doing so brought security, who found me dumbfounded on what to do about the whole situation. Thankful for my soberness I convinced the officer to let him be as we were filmmakers just back into society from a long stint in isolation and the culture shock had led to overindulgence, which was only human. The guy agreed to help me get him back to the room, but I found Christian in the bar waiting for me with 2 beers on the table. The officer told me just to keep him away from fences and wandered away to look for the other hotel residences who bore an eerie resemblance to our other Nashville hotel patrons.
After telling 2 middle 50's women singing Patsy Cline that he could not be more attracted to them, he noticed a Greenbay Packers foam square thingy sitting in a booth. Head down on the table clutching the square he began to sob momentarily before springing up and and excitedly stating to everyone he loved that team. That opened the gate to sports talk with the 3 remaining patrons of the bar. One was a 1/2 Mexican man in a soft yellow polo shirt. He had sold paint, put 3 kids through college, and has been a sprinter back some 30 years and 150 pounds ago. The other was a special forces vet who had never married or had kids. The last was a leathery faced bartenderess who would periodically wander over to the claw game to pluck at plush toys in exchange for quarters.

So we closed out the bar and we wandered back to the hotel. On top of me constantly calling him a writer, which made him happy, but it was the truth, he was full of mixed feelings. "Bob, I feel really bad right now, but I am having a good time." With that he stripped of the costume he had purchased and fell into bed asking me to do the blog tonight an promising I'd say it was me, Bob Geile, and not he, Christian Clarke.
But, through all the madness of the night no one was hurt and promises were made that may never be kept. In this cold Nashville night I miss Maiko deeply, and I wonder what she is dreaming of 1,000 miles away, all alone in NYC. I look at Christian and see a very exceptional person with very normal questions to ask of the world and am glad to know I too want to get married. When morning comes it may be only one of us still wants to, or even remembers the promise, but like a river time passes on and no amount of chasing will ever allow us to change what we said on a cold October night in Nashville Tennessee.

At 5:30AM I'm looking at his smiling face and I know he had the best night in Nashville of his life, and you know what, despite my other night in Nashville was full of drug dealers, cockroaches, and hookers, so did I.

-B.G.-