Entries 1 through 10 - A Submarine Circus

Entry 1

At this moment in time, Garvan looked out his little submarine’s periscope from under the sea.

‘Well hell, I wish I was able to permanently live under the sea - hiding from the insanity I see through the periscope in my face - shooting through to my mind – upside down nonetheless,’ Garvan thought as he turned his periscope towards the beach. “Pelicans fly along the shores looking for food to scoop out from the sea, but they fly down the coast starving. Sharks frolic up and down the coast searching, as well as hoping, that one day they’ll catch the pelican under the water. The pickings are slim, and so is it in the world we have created,” Garvan muttered under his breath as he looked at the scene.

Garvan wasn’t quite sure why he was able to walk on this rock floating through space. Not sure why he was given the privilege. Maybe it was to finally see there is more than what exists in this four dimensional world. Space and time are only but a finite concept of what is really happening beyond what people’s periscopes can see.

Society has – Garvan believed – lost its last and final marble. The thoughts that brought him on this underwater journey in the first place began to invade his mind and bother his senses.

‘The liberal and the conservative need to compensate and really concentrate on what is important at this juncture of time and space. Gays wanting to raise children – so be it. If they are good human beings, let ‘em do it - it is better than a child growing up in a crack house or a home with abuse.’ And Garvan knew abuse from experience.

His thoughts rattled on into a mind-numbing tirade of emotions and snapping synapses, ‘It doesn’t make sense, yet we are fools to believe it really matters in the long run. If god is the being we say he is, praying for his saving, believing in his teachings, reading from all of the books proclaimed in their names – ‘tis all the same – a human understanding – be a good human being. Yet we don’t. And the Garden of Eden never existed. Humans created hell, and it’s right here on Earth in the good ole year 2006.’

‘Fire drills and a possible duck and cover drill was all Garvan remembered doing in school. Now it’s lock downs, swat teams, and crazies trying to shoot other crazies but hitting the innocent in between. It doesn’t really make sense – the test. Teach a test cry the lawmakers of the world. Teach a test – we can measure what is going on with statistics on who passes, who doesn’t, and who needs remediation. Hell, we all need remediation. Not of our intelligences, but our basic beliefs – a human understanding. Our parents are lost. The world is being bombed. We’ve lost our minds. While the pelicans keep searching for food, and the sharks look awaiting from beneath.’

Garvan slammed the periscope shut and began to pace. ‘Bombs blow up people’s windows, but not in his country as of yet. He felt sorry for the ears who have to be reminded daily of life and death. For it’s there – the one true thing that happens – life then death. If it’s born it has to die. No choice.’ And outside, on the beach, the pelican swooped down, but the shark missed.

In between the tirade and the sharks’ utter incompetence, Garvan asked a simple question to himself and wished everyone would ask it to themselves. If he were to die right now, at this very instant, would all of the things that he had control over in his life, justify himself – in a human sense – to realize a little more of why we are all here in the first place? We don’t die. Our energy moves on – for energy is never created nor destroyed. It just changes forms.

Garvan hoped he was good enough on his karmic scale, or god’s good favor, or Allah’s acceptance, or whatever you choose to call it – him – or her. He hoped he didn’t come back a fly on shit, or the toilet seat of a fat, hairy man. He couldn’t deal with that, and he’d rather get swooped up by a pelican being a fish, or be caught as a pelican by a shark. It doesn’t really matter. People don’t have much choice. If he had his choice, however, he’d rather get off this rock entirely and head out somewhere else to learn some other way of living.

Sitting down in his captain’s chair, Garvan finally stopped pacing. He began talking to himself softly, “Everybody’s dead. That’s what it seems half the world wants. Infighting. Outfighting. Left fighting. Right fighting. Dogma fighting. Cock fighting. It should all be illegal.” Garvan knew he was just a human being, sitting under the beach, escaping the world, watching the pelican dive, and the sharks try to score.

“Bar fights are grand things to see - provided I’m not the one being fought. I’m a lover not a fighter,” Garvan said out loud and laughed. He never was a fighter, but his love life could use some improvement. He continued talking, “I probably ‘Shoulda been a contender,’ because love hurts even worse at times. Right now, at this moment in time – out in the world - hearts pound, chests heave, and others cry. Where were you when the door opened and your eyes actually saw what the periscope showed?”

Garvan knew why he was out in his little sub, alone, trying to get away. He knew he had lost my mind trying to forget he lived in this world. He always thought he was born in the wrong time.

“But Shakespeare was crazy, and Kerouac was a god!” he shouted, hearing his voice echo within the submarine. “So who am I? Who are you? What do we do? Why do we lie? But I lie. I lay in wait for the sun to set and the moon to rise – so the stars can shine in my periscope!”

One last time before settling down for the night, Garvan got up from the chair and again looked through the periscope. He looked through and watched the sun fall and the creatures creep out in the unlit night. His final thoughts began to invade his brain: ‘People worry about raccoons foraging through their trash cans – well, they used to. Now they worry more about rat faced humans, scouring through their information, trying to find a way for a buck besides working for a living- or keeping a file on us somewhere, for some reason, for some time they don’t even know exists - yet possibly could.’

Garvan knew he could turn them all in to show the world that it is really the clowns behind the scene running the show – and the fish jump out of the water because someone turned on the frying pan. It’s not fair, and he knew he didn’t make the rules. So he had no power to enforce them. Yet the government does, and they hide secrets from our submarines, as they lay cloaked in the dark, saying they are patriots - when they are nothing but spies spying on their own constituents.

Setting out to somewhere he didn’t even know existed; Garvan understood he had lost his mind on this day. Yet, he supposed, there couldn’t be a better day than today to begin his sojourn into the deep blue. He would escape the world – escape humanity. Escape what he couldn’t take any longer and write a journal as he hoped to help. Help himself? Help yourself? Not sure which one is the other – because everyone is one in the same. People are of an essence that can’t be undone no matter whether it got there from evolution or intelligent design. The sub has launched, and Garvan’s periscope is flying - making sure he keeps away from the pelican and the sharks.

Entry 2

Waking up, Garvan couldn’t tell if he felt like a fish or a clown at this moment in time. A fish would be nice until he got chased by the bigger fish. Unless of course, he was the biggest fish, then he’d be afraid of the humans trying to scoop him up and fry his brains into a frenzy. But he thought, ‘If I were a clown, all those people looking at me, laughing at me, but really they are scared of me – laughing at why I do the things I do. Painted face and all. I could hide behind baggy clothes and fall down whenever I wanted – not just when I’d had too many one late evening.’

He chuckled at that thought. He remembered those late nights with the bottle trying to find sanity at the bottom. Usually he just found a bad headache and the inability to think the next day. Either way, he figured he’d be a fish or a clown any day rather than listen to the !@#$ he has to deal with every day. Garvan didn’t create any of it – he just wades through it wondering when the trodden trail ends – will it be a lake or will it be a circus?

Arising out of his tiny bed, getting ready for the day, he pondered – ‘If I were a little fish and got swallowed by a bigger fish and then got swallowed by an even bigger fish – and so on and so on – would I not really be part of that bigger fish since he used my energy for his own? Or am I once again stumbling when I’m trying to juggle and hitting myself on the head with the bowling pin one more time? Some of this has to be right, or is everything just wrong? Maybe I’m a clown fish inside a grouper who just got swallowed by a shark.’

Entry 3

Garvan saw a midget yesterday walking an iguana on the beach. Not just any old midget either. As he later learned, it was Dandy Dan – the Wandering Circus’ lizard trainer. It’s an amazing sight to see when he’s drunk on scotch and screaming at the moon. Sometimes he will let out his komodo dragon and try to ride the thing in the moonlight like a dwarf of yore riding on the back of a swaying dragon. If it hadn’t been for his vertical challenge on life, Dandy Dan probably would have been a clown for the circus – or maybe even a minnow running from the bass.

Looking out through the morning mist of the sea, Garvan swore he heard bombs outside. Not big nuclear bombs, just bombs of people yelling, screaming, and killing – chaos taking its material form.

Watching the midget dance yesterday on the beach, Garvan knew Dandy Dan had no chaos besides his scotch-brain-drowning-habit. He also knew Dandy Dan would not be the same little midget, wishing he was a clown, had it not been for his finding of scotch. Dandy Dan probably would have, and he admits this fully when he actually gets a ride on the komodo’s back, that he would have been a miserable little man. A miserable short fool who probably would have taken a shotgun to his upper palette had it not been for his scotch and his fondness of reptiles.

That night, as the drunk little man danced his dance under the sea, Garvan pulled in closer to the shore and turned on his microphone amplifier receiver contraption he installed for such occasions. He put on the headphones and listened to the little man rant.

Dandy Dan was dancing in circles as if possessed hollering at the top of his little lungs, “It seems energy has created gigantic monsters dropping bombs every single day in every single country. Look at the news. Look at CNN. Look at all the wars going on all of the time for all of the wrong reasons. Which God stood on almighty asking one being to kill another for the sake of his own piety?”

Whichever God it is, Garvan hoped he finds Dandy Dan - frolicking among the clowns screaming high on scotch - and gets whipped by the komodo’s tail into oblivion, where that God would belong for letting so much hatred flow through his creation solely to provide free will.

He took of the headphones, but continued to watch Dandy Dan ride the komodo dragon. He laughed at the sight, but couldn’t help but thinking how religions alike cry out for their patrons, screaming their bells through the skies, hoping to get one more conversion before the perversion sets in from the pulpit - blaming others who don’t think the same for the chaos at hand.

‘Hell,’ he thought, ‘we all had a hand in it all – letting it happen. Letting the politicians run the material world the way they want to run it – with one hand in the piggy bank and another on the automatic weapon pointed at our heads.’

With that depressing thought, Garvan decided to retire for the day. He had already seen a midget riding a komodo dragon under the moonlight. What more could a man hiding from the world ask to see in one day. He undressed, and lay down in his bed.

Falling to sleep, he wondered back to an old friend he knew – ‘What happened to humanity? What happened to the world? What happened to all of the peaceful solutions? Did they all get shot down in cold blood like Frank the Freak from Philadelphia? Frank got his name because he was freaky and his name started with an f. Frank was only freaky because he didn’t think like everyone else. He had his own drum, and he beat it to his own rhythm. He had gone well passed following the beat of a different drummer. For he was his own drummer, and no one could make him think differently. So, when one day Frank stood up for what he believed in – saving a poor child from a man who had dirtier deeds in mind. He was shot down in cold blood by an even sicker individual who wanted to see what it would be like to shoot another human being. Frank was a martyr for the world we live in. The sick get sicker and the pure get dead.

Peace might just lose out to chaos. The sharks might just catch the pelican. The bass might just fill up on all the minnows he can find - only in turn to get eaten by one of us, when the end of the fishing line becomes the end of the line. Dandy Dan just might grow five feet and become the funniest clown a midget has ever become. And Frank the Freak might just come back as another spirit and spirit away all the chaos.’

Unfortunately, here in his sub, looking out the periscope at the world – one man can’t do it all, and it might just take a revolution to make it happen. A revolution where people are human and animals are treated like animals – shot dead when their utility has ended. This is definitely a concept Running Fast, a rambling racehorse, can appreciate from his grave. He broke his leg, and the vet said he’d never race again. We all end up six feet under no matter how we live. Everything born must die – And energy is never created nor born – It just changes form.

Entry 4

Garvan watched the moon cry tonight as water wept onto his periscope - blinding him from perusing the heavens. He had to turn the little windshield washer he specifically put on the lens for such a reason. Originally, he thought it would be more from hurricanes and storms that he’d need such a contraption. He never thought he’d see the moon cry. And because the moon was crying, Garvan was able to find out why from the Gliding Gorilla who flies through the midnight skies on his banana surfboard - looking for a restful place to lay his Rasta head.

The only reason Garvan met this magnificent gorilla (all dressed up in green, yellow, black and red - wearing dreadlocks only a god could fathom) was because he was lost from the blinding tears of the midnight moon. He thought it was a storm that had come unsuspected - from a battle or a clash between men on the land. However, as he tried to glide higher and higher over the clouds, he realized the rain never stopped. He finally got to the moon, and he found where the torrents came from.

“The moon,” the Gliding Gorilla said in a deep and reggae voice, “has been told that when there is nothing more on the planet for him to reflect down on, the sun will let all its gasses fly and blow himself and everyone else up.” Garvan wasn’t quite sure why the moon would be so upset if nothing was left and it all ended, but the Gliding Gorilla sang on with the story.

“See,” the gorilla rang out, “to you or me it doesn’t seem like anything, because if there is nothing left on this rock called Earth hurling through space, then we are for surely gone and need not worry about it anyway. However, the moon is ancient – has seen many things we can not even fathom. So when the sun decides to blow itself up, the moon will still be around orbiting a barren Earth. Such a shame for a glorious entity as the moon, who rats think is made of cheese, to lose its mind all at once. I am lost, and must get going again. I have a gig to get to. Good luck in your sub.” And the Gliding Gorilla glided away, without another word, on his banana surfboard - dodging the tears along the way.

The moon is crying. The world is dying. The sun is fed up. Garvan was just surprised the Earth hasn’t gotten rid of humans altogether anyway – helping to speed up this self-destructive process humanity has chosen to venture down.

Garvan shouted out to the gorilla as he sped away, “If people polluted me and stole resources from my veins, I surely wouldn’t be so giving as this planet is. I would send all my lava up into the skies, watch the world burn away into the water, and melt into a landscape void of life. All the while, hoping evolution would kick in again leaving humanity out this time, so the moon can continue to orbit, and the sun can continue to glow!”

Entry 5

“Dam the man. Save the empire!” Garvan read on a sign the record company had placed precariously above the human heads along the beach. He thought about it for a while – the empire – the world. It’s just not right. The man is the empire for without him or her there would be no empire. There would only be a concept that is dead, because there is no one to carry it out.

Garvan knew it’s just a slogan, and he was being irrational. However, while looking down pondering, he didn’t realize his sub had wandered directly into a reef. He wasn’t stuck, but he saw the largest moray eel he had ever seen. The moray was swallowing something carefully. Garvan edged himself away on a more direct course, put it on auto pilot, and sat down to think some more.

‘The prices of cigarettes go up, the price of gas goes up, but the price of beer goes down. It’s just a ruse to get everyone drunk so they don’t care about what is happening. It’s not our fault. It’s those who are supposed to look out for our best interests. Yet where are they? They are on vacation soaking in the Texas sun that does nothing good for the body other than make it wrinkle and die young – cancer – well, that’s just a different story altogether.

Hookers need gas and cigarettes to work. So their prices go up too, but then drop when the drunk get drunker on their cheap beer – drowning out the truth that the world is falling to shambles right in front of their eyes. Yet Big Brother lets it beat us down rather than protecting us like a caring brother would. That’s what Dandy Dan thinks. That’s what a lot of folks think, but the sharks swim faster and the world gets smaller!’

Entry 6

There was a man Garvan met once named Bucktooth Willie who owned a farm in some town in this country. He is a farmer, and as his name states, he is bucktooth. They didn’t believe in dentists when he was a child. He doesn’t care much for pain, so it was a win win situation.

Bucktooth Willie, like previously stated, owns a farm. He has a pig named Lou. A horse named Marty. A cow named Betsy. And a dog named Howie.

Bucktooth Willie always was a wondering and wandering man. He had never really left the state he grew up in. He didn’t wander in that way. He wandered in his mind as he wondered. It was quite an amazing feat folks would tell you. All Bucktooth Willie had to do was drink a bottle of moonshine and sit back in a rocking chair holding his ears to keep in his brain. Then he’d start thinking – wondering really. Wondering what it was like to be somewhere else. It would happen folks would say. Bucktooth Willie would rock so fast and so long that it would make everyone dizzy and laugh hysterically. Yet the entire time, Bucktooth Willie would smile and laugh at all of the places he wandered to while he was wondering. If only all of our imaginations were so well tuned.

Entry 7

Night was setting in again so Garvan found a place to park his submarine for the night. Out a few miles, he was able to find a ledge sitting just above a large crevasse in the ocean floor. He didn’t let his mind wander too much on what might lie deep down below in the dark underground of neon fish and glowing worms. He had seen 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and he didn’t want a giant squid to take down his lovely sub - keeping him from peering in on the way the world is slowly being destroyed merely by a lack of effort and deep green pockets in business suits. The sharks are on the take and the pelican is blind.

As he lay dreaming that night hidden from the world, Garvan was visited by a stranger more stranger than strange can be. There was a fisherman – and his name was Captain Conan the Caretaker. The only thing Garvan remembers was the story of Captain Conan and how a simple fisherman got the title, Caretaker.

It all started when Capco – as Captain Conan liked to be called – was fighting a giant storm at sea with a cargo more precious than man would ever understand - a secret cargo Capco himself will never divulge. However, the seafaring man swore it was something that could destroy the entire planet Earth if it ended up in the sea.

So Capco decided to fight for what he believed in – nature herself – and guided his ship through gales and humongous waves. Every time the ship would be slammed by a wave or tilt on her side, he would hold on screaming out to the heavens that he would not let mother Earth be destroyed for something his fellow man created. There was no way he would let it happen.

He ended up getting through the storm, but not in his entirety. Capco lost his left arm in that battle. Lost it good and well when the anchor decided to come loose from its holster and flew into the water with such great force that the rope came up and around the seafarer’s left elbow ripping it right out of its socket.

Capco never cared for his left arm anyway. He was a righty after all. And anything he could do with two hands on a ship he could definitely do with one. So he smiled as he cauterized his wound in between the bounces of his ship. The entire time he kept screaming at the heavens that there was no way he was going to let the end of the world happen on his watch. He bled in between it all- bled a lot to be exact. Capco did end up stopping the bleeding, but in the end he passed out.

While he was unconscious his ship tossed and turned more rapidly and wildly than it had previously. It was a miracle Capco himself wasn’t torn from the ship and drowned in the crazy sea. The sharks were waiting safely below the waves for a meal all of their own.

Capco came to, but the storm was still going mad. He himself was shocked he hadn’t been tossed over - as if nature decided to have a mutiny and let his ship sail like all ghost ships do – around and around wherever the winds and currents take them until they sink to their watery grave.

There was only one thing to do. Keep the maiden afloat until the one armed captain could make it to land or out of the madness of nature’s wrath. He did just that – made it out of there alive and well. He even found his way to his favorite port. While in the pub, he told the bartender of his tale, and that is how he got the name Caretaker. For Captain Conan became the Caretaker of the Earth – and he became famous for his feat.

That is the dream Garvan remembers while slumbered on the ledge below the sea in his submarine. He knows of the story behind Captain Conan’s name, but not what the maniacal seaman looked like – other than he was missing his left arm at about elbow’s length. Garvan wished he remembered what Capco looked like. His outrageous portrait and garb would be a great addition to a famous museum somewhere. The sad part though is that the artist who paints the portrait would probably have to die until it was worth something and then displayed for all eyes to see. And of course, when it sold for millions, that poor artist would roll in his grave laughing that it took so long for it all to happen - while his soul flew through the colors his own brain couldn’t imagine while alive. The world is a canvas – somebody needs to start painting.

Entry 8

Today had to be the strangest day of all as Garvan met a magician named Marty the Magic Miraculous. Garvan didn’t actually meet Marty. Marty rather met Garvan. Garvan was perusing the coast, checking to see why the pelicans were hiding on the shore rather than flying through the sky. He found out the sharks were circling, but not in a feeding frenzy. Something, rather, someone had stirred up chaos, and the sharks were sniffing it out.

As Garvan watched the scene, he saw this loosely robed man waving his arms wildly while chanting crazy words out loud such as – “Alabaster, flabergaster, hocus, pocus, make these sharks turn into locusts.” It didn’t work of course. None of the sharks turned into flying insects. Instead, they became agitated. The more the man waved, flailed, and chanted – the worse the frenzy became.

Then the most unbelievable thing happened. Garvan watched this one shark rise up out of the water - as if answering this man’s curse - swell to immense proportions, then instantly shrink into a tiny locust and fly away looking for a crop to devour. Garvan thought his eyes were deceiving him, but as he wiped his brow in disbelief, the man on the shore noticed the periscope. Garvan decided to lower the sub out of sight, but before he could do so, he saw the man begin to wave his arms and chant furiously. Garvan watched intently as the last word fell from his lips. He shrunk into a poof of smoke on the shore, and instantaneously appeared next to Garvan and his periscope on the sub. Garvan fell down in shock as the periscope rose back into its resting position, and the sub began to dive.

Garvan got up quickly and stabilized the sub. Then he turned to his unexpected guest.

“Hello, my name is Marty the Magic Miraculous,” the robed man stated. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, Marty. My name is Garvan. Pleased to meet you,” Garvan responded.

“The same to you,” he said first before he asked me a series of questions all in a row. “You built this sub? Where you headed? Can I come along?”

“Yes. Not sure yet. If you would like. However, the space is limited,” Garvan answered back.

“The space is fine. And thank you. However, I know where you need to go. I can point you in the right direction.”

“Um, where is it I need to go?” Garvan asked.

“That’s not the right question you need to ask. When you can think of the right question, I will answer it. For now, head north please. That is the direction we need to go.”

“The right question? Where is it I need to go? Why do we need to go north? What are you doing here? How did you get here besides instantly coming from the shore to on my sub? What the hell is going on? Are any of those the right question?” Garvan asked in frustration.

“No, please head north.”

“Fine,” Garvan muttered as he directed the sub north. He turned back to Marty and asked, “Why do I need to go? I put it directed north as you asked. Can you please just answer me that question?”

“Surely,” Marty said with a smile as I watched befuddled. “For that was the right question. And you must go because you have to meet some people.”

“Meet some people? Who?”

“You will find out all in due time.”

“Why do I need to meet these people?”

“Because. They are waiting for you. The circus is starting, and you are the last participant. They are waiting.”

“The circus? What are you talking about?”

“Don’t bother yourself with the details, Garvan. You had already set out in your hand-made sub, looking for something other than what is provided. Why worry about the details?”

“Ok, I won’t worry. It’s late anyway. I’m tired. Let me show you the one spare bunk I have on this little sub.”

“Sounds good.”

They went to sleep. As Garvan lay awake before dozing into slumber land, he wondered whether this crazy man was going to be the end of him, or if he actually had a plan. Either way, Garvan was floundering in the sea of undecidedness. Maybe, he just needed a push in the right direction.

Entry 9

The sub headed north for a day or two. Marty kept to himself, wandering up and down the sub as if checking its every inch of make and design. Every once in a while he would bend down, take out a white piece of chalk, and mark and x on one of the walls near the floor. Garvan had no idea what Marty was doing, but would find out soon enough.

As they approached a cape along the coast, Marty mentioned that they had to go into the port and park the submarine at Dock #7. Marty said he needed to pick up a few supplies and that it would be good for the two of them to get out of the submarine one more time. Garvan refused to leave the sub, and Marty just laughed. However, he did state they still needed to dock and pick up some things. Garvan obliged and headed around the cape.

The harbor was not as big as Garvan thought it would be. Mercantilism and capitalism abounded, and he wondered what he had to do with any of this. They passed by docks fifteen to nine without any problem. As they approached Dock #8, Marty started to get excited.

“There it is!” he exclaimed, “Dock #7. And it seems that everything and everyone is here. Before you dock, do me a favor and take us down below the water for a second. There is something I have to do before we park the sub.”

Garvan was confused, but figured Marty had a plan. He did as he was asked and headed below the water. It wasn’t very deep in this channel they were in, but it seemed it was just deep enough for what needed to be done.

“Hocus, pocus, all in a row. The sub is too small, it needs to grow. The council is gathered, let’s not make them wait. This little yellow sub will grow up great.” Marty spoke over and over as he touched his wand to the x’s he had marked on the wall near the sub’s floor. As he tapped, each part of the sub would expand. Garvan couldn’t believe his eyes. When all was said and done, the little sub Garvan began his adventure in had become three times its size. And in the middle, was a circus tent precisely placed with three-rings and all – a circus with all the trimmings. It was aptly named – as the sign on the tent declared in neon lights – “The Submarine Circus.”

Entry 10

They came up from being submerged, and Garvan parked the sub alongside Dock #7. He opened the top hatch of the sub for Marty to get out and get the supplies he needed. However, Marty didn’t budge or move as if he was going to leave. Garvan soon found out why. Instead of him leaving, it seemed visitors were getting on board. And was Garvan surprised to see who boarded.

In succession, one by one, the motley crew came aboard. Garvan had to rub his eyes a few times to see if what was hitting his brain was real. Yet it was. One by one they boarded until all seven of them were standing in front of Marty and Garvan – equipped with their luggage and all. Garvan guessed they were coming along on the ride that was supposed to be his own sojourn into the truth. However, the truth, Garvan found out, was within him all already – and they were all here to show him such.

In front of Garvan stood: Dandy Dan, Frank the Freak, Gliding Gorilla, Bucktooth Willie, Captain Conan the Caretaker, Lady Lake of Lavender, and Platypus Pam. The first five Garvan knew. The last two women he had yet to meet.

Lady Lake of Lavender was beautiful to the eyes. She radiated an aura Garvan could actually see. He had never seen such an aura, but heard they exist. She was dressed in white with black shoes. She wore a black scarf around her neck, and a black shawl covered her shoulders. Next to her was Platypus Pam. She was an elderly woman with a flat nose and weird shaped body. She wore old maid’s clothes with stockings that hung down to her ankles. Her voice was gruff, but her eyes showed wisdom only age could know.

After the introductions, Marty suggested we all take our seats. No one seemed to find it strange that there was a circus tent in the submarine except Garvan. Everyone else just grabbed their things and headed towards the table under the tent in the middle circle of the three rings. Garvan looked around waiting to see an elephant come out from nowhere or dancing dogs – but he didn’t see such a sight. Instead, he saw faint images of clowns and cotton candy as he slumped into his chair. When the last person sat, bright lights shone down on all of them, and a voice rang out from above.

“Welcome to The Submarine Circus. A place where ideas run free and people are mesmerized. A place where anything can happen and will happen. A place where freaks of the world go to figure out the problems facing the individual. A place where only one can understand the consequences at hand. A place where humanity can watch one sort out the issues of the mind. A place - A Submarine Circus. Welcome – and enjoy”

With that being said, the lights went out above them all. At the same time, light shone around from the outskirts of the circus tent. Garvan couldn’t believe what he saw. For there were audience members looking in on them all – the nine of us. And the audience was eating popcorn or their cotton candy. Kids were laughing, parents were explaining, clowns were dancing – it was a crazy scene. The audience was watching them, and the show was about to start.