Fire Down In The Basement

One Who Won't Witness

In the past few weeks I’ve done much background research for NIHILISTIC, including recording extensive interviews with those who witnessed the Nihilistics on and off stage back in the day. One person I’d love to talk with is N., a good friend of Mike’s who lived not far from him in North Lindenhurst. N. and I alway had what I considered a contentious relationship, perhaps based in rivalry for Mike’s affection, manifesting in digs and insults directed toward me from N. Unfortunately, N. was going to lose, even if he did sing some Ramones songs with us before Ron and Troy came along, because Mike and I had the band and N. went off to college. I’m not sure if this explains why N. refused to speak with me when I reached out two weeks ago. I asked why and he said he’d rather not revisit the past. Holy crap. That’s all I’ve been doing for months now.

I’ll keep working on N. but for now, make do with these recently-unearthed circa 1979 Polaroids of Mike and N. in our frequent hangout, the basement of my mother’s house. On this particular day we decided to burn stuff. We douses a doll in lighter fluid, set it ablaze and cackled as it melted. Then we burned an “action figures” dressed up to look like Kurt, the Master Baker at Cieslak’s Modern Bakery, boss to Mike and I. We hated that Nazi fuck. So we put a GI Joe in a white shirt, white pants and white apron, set him in front of the broiler to our old basement stove and set him ablaze. Someday, I’ll find those Polaroids. For now, make do with these, which culminate with Mike’s famous vomit trick.