One of the best things about my high school years (aside from the 
identical-twin girlfriend who eventually became my sister-in-law) 
was stage crew. In my sophomore year, I got involved with Warren 
Central's theater department. I ended up running a follow spot for 
South Pacific, and spent the next three years crewing practically 
every event Warren Central put on.

Even better was that Warren's brand new multi-million dollar 
performing arts center opened the next year. Ah, the adventures, 
the shenanigans we enjoyed in that place! Not to mention the 
shows...

Wait, I will mention the shows.  It wasn't all high school drama. 
The Warren Performing Arts Center was a state-of-the art facility, 
and hosted its share of notable billing. It was a particular, 
peculiar one-man show which I so fondly remember, involving a 
portrayal of Albert Einstein. But it wouldn't have been peculiar 
at all, were it not for the event that directly preceded it.  
Only days before, the Indiana Thespians society held its annual 
conference at the WPAC.

Some brilliant mind decided that the aspiring young acolytes of Thespis
should enjoy a smashing big banquet, and directed that it should be held on the theater's 
mainstage. Furthermore, it was decided that what was really needed 
was an abundance of helium balloons, liberally distributed among 
celebrants. Our tech director was furious.

Creative minds being what they will be, it didn't take long before 
the main amusement became releasing the balloons up into the 
fly space, and watching them vanish into the rows of curtains 
above. And there they remained, trapped by the static charge that 
developed as they rolled across the heavy velour.

We spent the rest of the week trying to get those blasted balloons 
out of the fly space.

Fast forward to Einstein. A wonderful performance. At the end, as 
Albert listened to classical music on the radio, the broadcast was 
interupted to announce the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
He staggered, nearly collapsing as he slumped into his easy chair. 
It was then that the first balloon, its buoyancy depleted and 
static cling neutralized, descended from the fly space. It was 
caught by a strong draft and swept across the stage behind, and 
entirely unbeknownst to Einstein.

We, the stagehands, were sitting in the back-row, slack-jawed and 
wide eyed as the moment of dawning comprehension simultaneously 
robbed us of breath and yet compelled us toward uncontrollable 
laughter. Einstein began a somber monologue as another balloon 
came down behind him and rushed away across the boards. Then 
another, and another. 

We dashed out to the lobby and completely lost it. There would be
hell to pay, but at that moment, it was worth every penny. 

We regained our composure and returned to our seats. Einstein was 
speaking gravely about the grim inevitabilities of a nuclear 
future, when another balloon -- pink and still possessing enough 
helium to float, came down, dragging its string along. Somehow, it 
escaped the river of air that had carried its comrades off so 
swiftly, and it stopped center stage. My future sister-in-law 
clutched my hand as the diabolic latex sphere reversed direction 
and drifted toward the dispirited genius in the wingback chair.

We held our collective breath as it stopped next to him and 
slowly, inexorably, impossibly,  impiously turned around to reveal 
-- I kid you not -- a one-eyed smiley face, bearing the slogan 
"Happy Mutants for Nuclear Power!" Einstein never noticed. His 
monologue ended, he rose and shuffled off stage as the lights went 
down.

When the house lights came up, a small group of people clustered at 
the edge of the stage, staring in wonder and murmuring 
speculation on how we had managed to make the balloon do that. I 
fetched the wayward mutant telling them it was a trade-secret. I 
dare say that those lofty musings on the balloon metaphor haunt 
them to this day. I kept that little pink memento until it was 
nothing more than a shriveled latex blob in my cabinet of 
curiosities. To my knowledge, Einstein was never the wiser...

I met Duane Wesley "Bud" Thompson in late 1984, during a visit to The Tinder Box  -- which is appropriate, considering the incendiary nature of these two tales and the ashen state of his final repose. I was procuring a pipe and some tobacco from Bud when I mentioned having just quit Target, and He immediately set about getting me hired for the Christmas season. He was thin and haggard, a very humble gentleman of 55 who had paid his dues in spades.  I was almost nineteen, spoiled, and knew everything. It made getting along with Bud very interesting. He didn't have car at the time, so I frequently drove him home.  It was through Bud's domestic situation that I began to appreciate the simple things in life;  like heat, a toilet, place to cook, and running water.

Home is a relative term where Bud's lodgings were concerned. Abominable hovel is probably a 
better descriptor. His fortunes had diminished considerably in the previous decade. But, 
shockingly shabby as it was, his rooming-house apartment was a step up -- he'd spent the 
previous winter under a bridge in Broadripple. Things would eventually Improve for him, but 
over the next decade he would go through a string of dilapidated digs at which even vermin 
chittered in contempt; except for cockroaches, who seemed to have a special affinity for Bud. 
And so begins our first story.

Once upon a time, Bud gave shelter to a young Mormon woman of eighteen, on the outs with her 
monstrously restrictive, controlling, unreasonable family. In exchange for light cleaning 
she was afforded a spacious room on the creaking second floor, lessons in film processing 
and darkroom basics -- whether she wanted them or not, as well as rides to work and back.  

There was only one house rule at Bud's: Thou shalt NOT touch the loose wains-coat panel 
behind the kitchen table! I don't have to tell you what happened next but I will, anyway.  
She was brooming the grungy kitchen one day when the panel, perhaps by its slight bow, its 
imperceptible skew, vexed her sense of cosmic order and drew her inexorably to straighten it. 
It popped off the wall, and five thousand cucarachas cascaded onto the floor in a skittering 
brown deluge and rushed of in all directions.She called her wonderful, gracious parents in a 
shrieking frenzy, and we never saw her again. The bugs stayed.

Necessity is the Mother of invention, and Bud was the father of Dr. Thompson's World Famous 
One Part Roach Killer.  Aside from apple-cider vinegar and honey, there was no other 
concoction on which Bud relied more heavily.  I'm talking straight K1 Kerosene, folks. 
Sprayed liberally on bone-dry base boards in a big, old, two-story duplex. Regularly. For 
two years.

There is a lovely grassy lot there, now.  It also covers the ground where the neighboring 
house stood. Bud learned some years later from his former landlord that the old place was 
vacant when it went up, and was completely incinerated along with the neighboring house.  He 
mentioned that arson was suspected, because the whole place smelled like kerosene.  Bud 
could barely feign an air of surprize to cover his deep satisfaction and amusement. It was a 
rough, crime-ridden neighborhood and he had hated it, and the roaches.

Another one of Bud's K1 tales vaguely inspired an event in Uncle Arctica. The story goes: 
that one chilly, rainy, San Francisco evening back in the '60's, Bud returned to the 
spacious Victorian rooming house he shared with several friends, only to find it empty, and 
the conical, metal fireplace in the living room cold. He gathered several logs from the 
porch and loaded them into the freestanding grate. They were too wet to light, so he doused 
them with a cup of--you guessed it--Dr. Thompson's World Famous One-Part Formula. He went 
upstairs to give it time to soak in.The next roomer returned and, seeing the glistening wood 
Un-ignited in the cold fireplace, also decided to add a cup of K1 marinade. The third man 
returned --cold, wet, and anxious for a roaring fire (and apparently completely devoid of 
any sense of smell) added his cup and went to his room.  Bud finally returned to the 
fireplace and, splashing on a cup for the road, lit a match and tossed it in.

The blast knocked him flat on his kiester, and brought the other men running downstairs. 
Miraculously, Bud was only lightly toasted. As they were getting him to his feet and 
checking for damage, there came an excited rapping at the door.  They opened to greet a 
middle-aged woman who asked for the owner and stated emphatically that she wanted to buy the 
house!  The men explained that it wasn't on the market, but the woman insisted that the 
owner would sell, because while she was walking through the neighborhood looking for a house 
to buy, she began praying and asked God for a sign. No sooner than the words had left her 
lips than a thirty-foot pillar of fire erupted from their chimney and fanned out in five fingers.  "just like a hand."  she pantomimed.  They put her in touch with the landlord and...he sold her the house!
Impossible: yes;  but true.

However entertaining or maddening his eccentricities were -- however tragic his circumstances, Bud Thompson was a decent, humble, kind, and humane man; a thoroughly human individual whose aspirations were frustrated by the cards life had dealt him, and further complicated by the way he himself played them. Bud readily admitted this.

It was a hard, snowy winter the year Bud died. I trekked through the white and drifted 
boondocks of Owen County to find the Trustee, who doled out $600 to cremate my old friend. I 
was out of work, again. Even had the ground not been frozen, I wasn't able afford to return 
to his cabin to inter his earthly remains. So, the small, cubical, cardboard box of powdered 
Bud sat on my basement workbench for nine months. Eventually, the accumulation of 
clutter,tools, and such obscured and finally inundated him to the degree that I could truly 
say that Bud was buried somewhere in my basement. Finally, in the autumn in of 2012, I was 
back to work.  I had a dream: I was in a rustic hotel lobby in the desert -- White Sands New 
Mexico, I think. I was packing some things into a cardboard box when I spotted Bud coming up 
the walk. He was wearing new jeans, a wonderful plaid shirt of rust orange and deep blues, 
and of course, one of his homespun leather vests. I rushed out to meet him. We hugged, and I 
took his hands in my own. He smiled and said with humble excitement "I'm glad you could make 
it. I'm so glad you could make it!"

And that is all I remember. I knew it was time. I fetched a shovel, retrieved his box from 
the workbench, and headed back to Poland, Indiana.  I buried him in a beautiful spot by 
lake, covering his small grave with large chunks of white limestone.

Of all of the memories I have of Bud, the one that I hold most dear, now, is that dream.
Bud so happy and healthy.  I am so glad that he could make it.  So glad.