HAUNTING IN THE CHURCH OF ZOOKS , by Suzanne Farkas

Check out the etiology of zooks
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/146125.html

Ever notice how the halls of a place carry the echoes of voices gone by? We all pray we are leaving a footprint, or at least a psychic fingernail so gross perhaps that someone will notice it lying there and pick it up to see what it is before going yuuk ! and throw it out uncerimoniously with the trash.

Losses are hard, not being seen is even harder and post traumatic stress PTD for those in the know, can really make it hard to move on.

Here we all are pushing and pulling and staying alive, while our band’s bleating out sounds designed to make us all better people. We need a break. fame is elusive even if you are praying in the church of zooks and death was stalking me like a bad movie- - hey I’m sarah polley in the sequel to Night of the Living Dead. Trapped in an endless shopping mall ain’t the half of it. Being the only girl in the band, a bass player with no pretensions but good intentions and a lot of secret hope, aint easy when the rest of the gang let their id’s do all the talking while super ego’s gone out for lunch . somewhere along the way my house got voted band house for the never ending band on the run and I sometimes forget that -guess what kiddies ?– I was around and more than a glimmer in my dad’s eye when Glen took man’s giant step – n fact I was milking it to try to get my cute boy next door to come over and share the big moment of my own- you know how guys love shinny things – I figured I could get him all excited and I would get a giant step of my own – my first kiss- praise the lord! Bless his heart the guy was a genuine born again ( pretty hard when you’re hardly even in puberty yet) bible thumping fire and brimstone have your own dunkpool in the front of the pulpit (I kid you not- I saw it with my very own eyes ,even thought of converting for him-I was in the beginning stages of rebel then ) southern white but envies BlackBaptist and he was almost as hard a nut to crack as being the bandhouse mothersistersecretarywhore bass player in the band. We don’t play Leonard Cohen for nothing and my name is Suzanne
http://www.noolmusic.com/videos/so_long_marianne_-_leonard_cohen.php

But I digress. So we take a break and one chat leads to another and soon Steve, our drummer says- how’s your house holding up and I for some reason start telling a tale about the house being built before Canada was even Canada and how I figured it was in a fire- the big fire of 1927.

Did I tell that I had just gone to 3, my Dad’s being the first of them, shocking funerals in 6 weeks- I mean it was so crazy that I now have wash and wear funeral duds- so history has been a bit of a thing for me lately – anyway...

All of sudden Greg- the high priest of the church says hey where’s that sound coming from? Yup I hear it too and really weird- it’s coming from my standing alone in the corner as I always put it for break Bass. What’s up with that? Its not only humming as might be expected- no its actually playing a note- plucking it really, and then for fun picks another string and plucks it. Yikes- Steve asks it if it was around in the fire and did the player know he was dead (silence from the bass) or hadn’t figured it out yet another pluck (don’t ask me why we all thought it was a he but I guess sexism is one motherf** so expect to find it on the otherside too?!) The hair is standing up on my neck – I figure wit all the demons visiting my neighbourhood I must of left a window open somewhere. I run off to check the back door tears flowing freely while the macho guys continue to play a game of truth or dare with my bass loving visitor.

After watching my bass answer Steve’s probing I can feel the afterlife listening in on the conversation and I’m not s sure that it is all that innocent. At some point later my nerves are shot and zombie girl takes over- don’t believe automatic states improves your playing folks. My ghost seemed to be deliberately sabotaging me so we decided to call it a night. Greg tried to reassure me that even if the ghost turned out to play better than me he would find some band job for me to keep me going – I figure I can always go back to my flute-van Morris and zeppelin here we come- or take up the fiddle again.

The guys think its funny to stir the shit and leave me holding the bag-Greg throws me a bone as he leaves- hey don’t worry but if you have problems being alone just call me on the phone! Fat chance virtual help will trump a visit from hell.

Later at the next practice, we get knocking on my walls just about break time- remember the ghosts smell life like a dog in heat- I run next door thinking it’s the neighbours complaining- but no= no one is there, its pitch black and no one but us pigeons. I tell the guys the ghost boy from the fire is back and we all figure he wants to get a chance to play out his unfulfilled fantasy- I’m just the medium. So when my bass starts resonating in ghost harmonic frequencies during a gig I figure its time to let him have his way-, as little boys are wont to. Lorne insists it’s a visit from his famous bass playing uncle wanting a last kick at the can and me.

I just figure if I don’t get a chance to leave my mark on some damn rock soon or is that rocknroll, I’ll probably explode my head like dawn of the dead or was that the body snatchers and what a way to find the key to the parallel universe. Praise the lord Zooks has come.

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