Hard+Feet+and+an+Old+Guitar

Hard Feet and an Old Guitar

The town's name was Hippocrates, though most folks pronounce it Hippo Crates. It was a scav town made good, transformed into a proper piece of post Fall civilization. Hippo Crates started when a group of scavengers stumbled upon a fully intact teaching hospital in the ruins of Morgantown. They staked a claim, began searching for any medical tech they could make use of or at least trade for. That first bunch didn't last long though, didn't even finish exploring the place before another, better armed and more ambitious crew kicked them out. The new settlers realized exactly what they had, a wellspring of medical knowledge and technology. They set themselves up, with good defenses and a deal with the trade caravans, and then proceeded to go to school. Before long, other folks moved in, and soon a town had sprung around the old hospital. Ever since then, Hippo Crates had provided medical services to the surrounding settlements through docs trained at the university. It was not a bad place to live, especially given the times. It was also not a bad place to find work if you're willing to make the journey. I wasn't lucky enough or rich enough to own a horse, so all I had to take me are my feet. Walking the wasteland is never easy, but if you stuck to the highway you could at least expect a boring journey, which was much better than the alternative. Vigilante groups patrolled the highways, keeping them free of bandits and slavers in exchange for regular gifts of supplies and ammunition from the towns who rely on the highways for survival. Most towns weren't lucky enough to have both a good water supply and earth to farm, so they relied on the caravans to provide what they can't produce. I'm not a trader, though I've traveled with the caravans sometimes. No, I'm a player. Players are actors, writers, or musicians, traveling between towns and performing for bread, board, and anything else we can barter for. I do music mostly, though I sometimes read from old books. My father taught me everything I know, more than just how to entertain an audience. He was a history professor before the Fall. Music was just a private passion, at least until he had to use it to survive. Because of him, I'm a fair bit more educated than most people born after the world crumbled. He died a couple years ago though, just got too old and sick to keep going. Ever since then I've been a one man act. It had been two weeks since I hit what could even be jokingly referred to as a town. I had started down in Georgia, where my father and I wandered for most of my childhood. Ever since his death I'd been working my way slowly North. I'd been wandering what was once West Virginia for a while, taking the long road up from Charleston, the old state capital. My plan was to stop and resupply in Hippo Crates, then move on up into Pennsylvania. Hippo Crates was getting closer ever day. I figured that if I walked on through the night, I could make town right around dawn. With any luck, they'd let me in, and give me what I needed for the journey ahead in exchange for a day or two's worth of music and reading. While I walked, I listened to one of my mp3 players, memorizing songs in preparation for the upcoming show. It was new one I'd gotten from a trader in Charleston in exchange for a private show for his family. I'd hit jackpot with the little gadget, it had on it songs from some of my favorite Pre Fall musicians, songs I didn't have. I had plenty of material, more than enough to get me through any show. I could even do a month long show without having to repeat myself much. The pockets of my duster were stuffed with sheet music and the little books full of lyrics you could pull out of the front of CD albums. The real treasured though were the mp3 players. I had sixteen of them tucked into a bandolier I'd made, each one with a couple hundred songs I could listen to over and over again, memorize. I also had four books stashed away in my backpack. I had the Phantom Tollbooth for kids, whose parents would trade me quite a bit for just a couple chapters. For folks wanting a mystery, I had the Maltese Falcon. For those looking for either nostalgia or just a good time, I would read bits from a the Fellowship of the Ring. My personal favorite was a ratty old copy of the Stand, but I never did readings for it. People didn't like hearing stories like that anymore. Too much like real life. As for instruments, I had two. The first was an acoustic guitar that my father left me. It was an old, beaten up piece of junk to look at, but it played a sound that was sweet and sad. I also had a harmonica, which I'd gotten down in North Carolina. I hadn't quite gotten the hang of it yet, so I didn't pull it out except for very simple numbers. The long walk gives you a lot of time to think about things, even if you've got mp3 players with a full charge. I spend a lot of time thinking about my father, reminiscing on my childhood and how he raised me. I also think a lot about music, both the way it was and the way it is now. So many names, lost to the Fall. Cash, Waits, Dylan, Presley, Sinatra, a thousand and one musicians who so few still remember. Not as many folks these days can recall the music of Bad Religion, the Beatles, or Amon Amarth. My father dedicated himself to preserving music, keeping it alive the only way he could, by playing it. Even that wasn't enough for him though, he always wished he could show an entire crowd a song as it used to be played. Sure, you could have people listen to the mp3s, but you can't give that to an entire audience, not the without the kind of setup that just doesn't exist nowadays. I've spent nights staring up at the skies, wondering what music was truly lost when civilization fell. Bands whose songs weren't found by a player, and are now forgotten completely. As the generation that witnessed the Fall die off, taking with them the last memories of a time before the world crumbled, so much is lost. Entire genres of music lost to river Lethe, lost to the fickle hand of history. There were bands my father used to talk about but who's music he could never find, names that meant nothing to me. My father went to his death regretting that his son would never hear "Bohemian Rhapsody", the Ramones, Radiohead, and so many other things. My thoughts aren't always pessimistic though. While we've lost music, we've always gained music. As I've walked the East I've come across town's that have made their own music. In Virginia I encountered a group of players who did original work, three chord acoustic rock combined with angry lyrics aimed at the Old World. There was also a settlement back in Georgia called Lazarus, that was based entirely around its gospel choir, holding to their faith despite the state of the world. But the best example of Post Fall music is the Halls. The Halls are a group of towns and settlements built around old music Halls of Fame. Towns where they both preserve the old music, but also create new songs in that same genre. I've only been to one, a place called Crossroads in what used to be Memphis, where they keep the Blues alive. Most of the Halls are tiny hamlets, just little preservationist societies. There's supposed to be a big one up in Ohio in the old Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I'll probably head there someday, just to see what the place is like and whether their songs are any good. The last leg of the journey to Hippo Crates went by peacefully enough. The local vigilante group, the 79ers kept a clean interstate so I didn't have to use my gun. Good thing, cause all I had was half a clip of ammo. Not good for much except giving me a clean exit from the mortal coil if I run into any raiders. They'd do things to you that shouldn't be even thinkable for a human being. But then again, that's the thing with raiders. Before I even realized it, I was standing at the gates of Hippo Crates. Any settlement that plans on surviving longer than half a year ends up building walls, and this one wasn't any different. A tough but ramshackle barricade around the town made mostly from old cars. The gate was an old truck trailer. It wasn't locked, but there were holes carved into the top which gave the guards more than enough space to fill the entire thing with lead. Any uninvited guests would find themselves walking into a massacre with their name on it. I knocked. The two guards stationed on top of the gate looked down and saw me. One of them turned and shouted for the town Sheriff, who a couple minutes later appeared beside them. "Hello, Stranger." He said. The Sheriff was a thin, tough looking, old fellow. He wore a scavenged Kevlar vest over top a button down shirt and jeans. He was bald, and had one of those hawkish, pinched in faces. He smelled strongly of drink, most likely the cheap gin folks drank these days, made from whatever could find and put in a still. A hunting rifle was holstered to his back, and a knife strapped to his hip. I took it as a good sign that neither weapon was in his hands. "Hello Sheriff. You going to let me in?" I gave him a disarming smile, or at least what I hoped was a disarming smile. "Depends. What are your intentions?" He returned my smile with his own weary, shadow of one. He shifted his shoulders slightly, moving the rifle into a position more accessible to his hands. Without even thinking about it, I placed my hand on my snub nose revolver, not that it would do me any good. The Sheriff pretended not to notice. "I'm a player looking for some work. You got any?" "Maybe. What would you be looking for in regards to compensation?" "Depends on how long you want me here, and how much of a show you want." "What can you play?" "Guitar, harmonica, and I've got enough songs to last two, maybe three weeks. Plus, I do reading. Tolkien." That last bit caught his ear. His eyes went unfocused for a second, lost in the mists of the past. He was old enough to have been a kid during the fall, old enough to have read the books and watched the movies, to have loved them like only a child can. That's how a player worked his trade, tapping into people's memories of the past or their yearning for a world they'd never known. "Three weeks. You'll be fed and housed, and when you leave we'll give you enough supplies to get you to where you're going." "In exchange?" "You'll do two shows a day around lunch and dinner time. Most of us eat together so you'll be playing for a fair portion the town. Along with that, you'll also do daily readings from whatever books an hour after lunch. That'll give you some time to eat and get yourself together. And I expect you'll be reading Tolkien. Do we have a deal?" It was a better deal than I'd expected. Most of the time, the best I could hope for was a week, two tops. And more often than not, I had to pay for my own meals from whatever tips I got. These were charitable folks it seemed, though given their good fortunes they had much reason to be. "Deal." The Sheriff nodded at my affirmation and gave me something resembling a genuine smile. The two guards on either side of him relaxed in response, their own faces breaking out into grins. The Sheriff began to turn, but stopped halfway and looked back at me. He was still smiling. "You're show starts in an hour and a half. I'm looking forward to it Stranger." "You can call me..." But he'd already left my sight. Ah well. With a sigh, I started for the gate. I was about to hoist up the trailer door when I heard a noise above me. I looked up to see one of the guards looking down at me, pointing to something to my left. I turned to see what he was gesturing at. **NO GUNS IN HIPPOCRATES** **ALL GUNS MUST BE CONFECONFISK** **HANDED OVER TO THE LAW** I chuckled to myself as I handed over my gun. Standards of education had gone down hill since the Fall. Most towns relied on wandering teachers, a profession that was slowly going extinct. There were a couple settlements that provided education to people, places like Hippo Crates. But these were few and far between, and most folks were too isolated to really make the journey for their schooling. An hour and a half wasn't much time, so I just started setting myself up as soon as I located the common area. I sorted through my songs, picking the ones that would work best for this show. The first one always had to hit them hard, songs that would hook them in and keep them coming back for more. I settled on a couple good ones, primarily Bad Religion and Tom Waits songs with some Johnny Cash and Beatles thrown in for good measure. You can never go wrong with the Beatles and Cash. The Sheriff had apparently spread the news of my arrival through Hippo Crates, as by the time I was finished getting ready the entire common area was filled with people. About one hundred, maybe two hundred, faces watched me as I picked up my guitar and started playing. The first song I played was called Skyscraper, a Bad Religion song. It told the story of Babel from the perspective of the people who built it, a perspective anyone after the Fall can appreciate. My voice isn't spectacular, my father's was much better. It's not exactly pretty to listen to, but that didn't matter. Music isn't about being pretty, never has been. It's about emotion, making people //feel//something from the very core of their being. Music calls up memories, long gone shadows of the mind come back to haunt us. It taunts and teases us, bringing tears to our eyes or joy to our hearts. Skyscraper hit them hard, not a cheek was dry by the time the song finished. The older ones, including the Sheriff, were mourning the loss of a world only they still remembered. The people, the places, the music they loved. The younger ones wept for the world they would never see, a prosperous and beautiful world stolen from them by the idiocy of dead men. I let them cry it out, playing sad, mournful songs of remembrance. They needed it, needed to just cut loose and let themselves feel what survival wouldn't allow them to feel. Even in a relatively safe community settlement like this life was hard and didn't give people the luxury of just letting themselves break down and weep. It took them awhile, but eventually everyone had finished doing what they needed to. Their faces were drawn and tired, emotionally exhausted but somehow feeling halfway human for the first time in a long while. I nodded to myself, and finished up my last song, Hurt by Cash. I looked at them, giving them a reassuring smile, an I've been where you are kind of thing. "How are we doing, folks. Ready to call it a day, or do you want some more?" They looked up at me, and each one of them told me to keep going in their own way. Some returned my smile and nodded, others took deep breathes and collected themselves. A couple even shouted, informing me that they'll let me know when I'm done. "Very well. In that case, this next song's for you, all of you." The next song was I Won't Back Down by Johnny Cash. I've found the best way to transition from one mood to another is to try and use the same artist for it. Makes the shift from happy to sad or from sad to angry smoother gentler. For this show, I'd decided to make the shift from grief to hope, let them wring their sorrows out so that something shinier could move in. I played a lot more songs, so many I lost count. I'd spent the first half of the show dragging out their shames and sorrows, so I spent the second half making them feel good. I reminded them that they were still alive, still fighting, not backing down from the world's troubles. I made them feel proud, made them see how much they'd accomplished with so very little. I used the words of dead men to exorcise the specter of other, lesser corpses. Using the music of a dead past, I got the people of Hippo Crates to celebrate their present. Not because it was nice or pretty or easy, but because it was theirs. They'd made it with their own hands, paid for it with their own blood. By the time I called the show done, there wasn't a single head in that crowd not being held high, with a gleam of defiance in every eye. I watched everyone go back to their homes, sitting on my makeshift stage. The Sheriff was the last to leave, giving me a smile as he did, a smile that made his eyes shine, made him look like a kid for a half second. Once he was gone, I dragged myself off the stage and made my way towards the shack set aside for me. It was a small, corrugated steel lump off to the side of town. Only had enough room for a mattress that had been laid on the dirt floor. But that was fine, all I needed. I was too tired to eat, might as well just wait for breakfast. With a contented groan, I dumped my things on floor beside the mattress and let myself collapse on the bed. The shows always take a lot out of me, more than you'd expect. The songs I play have the same effect on me as they do on the crowd, maybe even more so given that I'm playing them. Sleep didn't come right away, so I spent a while just thinking. I thought about Dad, about what he'd taught me, the music and history. I thought about what I do to get by. There really wasn't much of a future in being a player. All you had was the sounds of the past and reality of the present. The closest thing to a future was the next destination, the next show. No. That wasn't quite true. I had more than just the past and the present. I had the road always their to guide my way. I had feet, beaten and hard inside ragged boots, to take me where I needed to go. I had my guitar and my harmonica, to keep me from being lonely on the long road. But most importantly, I had my audience. People whose lives I made just little bit more bearable for me having been here. A reason to keep on walking, to keep on playing. My eyes eventually drooped and my mind quieted down. An old Sinatra tune played in my head, lulling me even further to sleep. One last thought went through my head, just before I was lost to kingdom of dreams. I thought, I can live with that.