by David Raffin
“You Little…”
“See ya, Middle! Like in the middle of the street!”
The newsboy runs down the street whooping.
“It’s one thing to be presented with fake news, but rather another to be expected to pay for it in the end,” says Middle, as the audience laughs. This fulfills the social education portion of the show.
“You, sir, stuck in the street!” comes a strong female voice.
“Me?” says Middle.
“Do you see another man stuck in the street?”
“Well, I can’t turn around…”
“I represent the rescue association. I am prepared to offer you escape. Yes, sweet escape. Freedom. Like the cola.”
“Ah,” says Middle, “Freedom Cola.”
“Exactly,” said the rescue woman. “But the cola is extra. Freedom Sweet Freedom. Its value is unmeasurable.”
“Yes,” says Middle. “How could one put a price on Freedom.”
“Oh, Mister Middle. You've been stuck in the street a long time, poor man. You can put a price on anything.”
“Are you intending to charge me for rescue?”
“Not at ALL, Mister Middle. The rescue is free. That’s a humanitarian service. It’s immoral to charge for that.”
“It is a Christian Nation.”
“Oh, yes, Mister Middle. We charge only for the method of rescue. I suggest we pull you out of there. Get you on your feet again. Eight thousand pounds.”
“I DON’T HAVE THAT!”
“We are a modern rescue association. We do extend credit.”
“FINE. I’ll pay you. You, the newsboy, the cola stand girl, the policeman’s blasted ticket… No matter how long…”
“OH, Mister Middle. I can’t extend credit to you if you’re overextended.”
“But…”
“No, sir! This is an era of fiscal responsibility. You pay all those older debts and then we’ll talk.”
“Why you…”
“I don’t deal with bums! Good day!” She leaves.
“I am so angry. URRRGG. MMMMPH. AAARRGH.” Heavy breathing. “I’ve pulled myself free with the last of my strength. I think the Freedom Cola weakened the concrete as it was setting. I’ve made my own rescue in the end. With Freedom Cola, of course.”
“Mister Middle!” The audience cheers as the policeman reenters. “That is a nasty hole you left in the street.”
“That is a nasty hole I escaped from.”
“You can explain that to the judge. Property destruction. Anarchism. Bet you don’t even pay your bills.”
Thomas Middle says, “Oh, Dear, Oh, Dear, Oh, Dear.” The audience erupts again as a light comedic jingle signifies the end of the program.
The policeman turns to the camera and says, “Stay tuned for The Last Unicorn. Professor Johnstone found the last unicorn in a small wood, taped off for clearing. She knew no one would believe her. That is how the series of deplorable events which followed began. There are laws against it now, as usual, too late. And tune in again tomorrow as Thomas Middle has adventures in the private debt prison system.
Rain flicked the television set off.
“It was a true exposé of the evils of the economic system on the average person just trying to get by in a system where the dollar takes precedence over human worth,” said Richard. “Disgusting. Low level economic exploitation. Happens all the time. The system is built on it.”
“I love it,” said Sunny. “Tell me, is there a Mrs. distinguished scientist waiting next door?”
“Sunny!” said Rain.
“Just curious.”
Richard looked downhearted. “Sadly my wife passed on a number of years ago. It was an accident. An experimental sex accident involving an Orgone energy machine and a reading from Aleister Crowley. It… went all wrong I’m afraid. Perpetual orgasm. A time travel incident, accidental. She was hurtled backwards in time. I still await a sign.”
“It is so sad,” said Rain. “But I’m here for you.”
“We all are,” said Sunny.
“Good people always come together in times of trouble,” said the clown.
“Now that’s the truth,” said Frankie. “Trouble defines who is your true friend. When I was a younger person I was on the run. I was wanted everywhere I went. But who were they to objectify me in a way I didn’t agree to? So I became another person. My true self. But sometimes you have to let your spirit free, damnit. I gotta fly like a bird. Free. I gotta be me.”
“When I was eighteen it was the World Fair in Seattle, 1962,” said Rain. “And the pavilions were filled with the goods and services of the future, though now, in that future, it is easy to see that those promises were broken. Everyone was there to gawk. And I got my first job after high school. I worked on the adult section of the boardwalk in a stage show called Peep. It was constructed so that patrons would peep in through holes in the walls and watch us gals as we went about our day for them. Reading magazines, curling our hair, taking showers. So many showers a day I felt like a silly mermaid. Mermaids are silly because they spend all their time wishing they were humans, though they know the risks, while humans wish they were mer-folk, for a grass is greener urge, all very silly. But I worked there all through the fair. Six months. But I tell you, it beat being in the secretarial pool. And boy do people like to watch a lady read! There was no theater showing men lounging through the day which I thought was odd. But it didn’t keep me from cashing the checks. It’s also better than working the tourist traps where ladies dress up in mermaid costumes and swim in a tank for tips. What can I say, wage labor stinks. Like dead fish at low tide at an off season beach resort.”
“You know what I think,” said Sunny. “I think I’ve been naked the last two hours and the rest of you ought to join me and let’s get down. No more pussy footing, unless that’s your thing. And the odds are, it isn’t. But no one will judge.”
“Well,” said Richard, “I do have some research waiting…”
“Damn your research,” said Rain. “It all means nothing without the human element. Skin to skin contact is important for physical and mental health. That’s the human element. The problem sometimes is people think too damned much.”
The clown was already rubbing his body against Frankie and Sunny started rubbing her bare feet through his wavy clown hair, a plush red carpet of lust untamed, driving him wild.
Richard took off his coat and pants, which he was folding neatly.
There was a knock at the door.
Rain walked to the door, saying, “Better be good!” and whipped it open. Outside was a man in a black suit and hat. He held up a badge in a leather case. “FBI agent Danger. Mitch Danger. I need to talk to you.”
“Buzz off, I hate cops,” Rain said.
Danger pulled a gun. Rain stepped back and let him in, walking in front of him, hands up. She looked angry.
They entered a living room filled with three naked people and a clown.
“I can explain this,” said Richard. “Logically.”
“Hi,” said Sunny. “My name is Sunny. I love role-play.”
“Every one of us plays his or her role,” said Danger, “Good or ill.”
“Oh, goodie!” Sunny said.
“No. No goodies, ma’am,” said Danger.
“Mitch,” said Richard. “How you’ve changed. You are literally a black hat. A villain.”
“I am the best of both worlds my dear old chum,” said Danger, “A double agent. Always was. Traveling in both worlds. It gives me the freedom to be the man I wish to be at any given opportunity.”
“Opportunist,” Rain said.
“I’ve been tailing you for years. I was infiltrating you and the AI department at the college years ago. I know your work. Your accident where you lost your wife Heather. I am sorry about that. But you are to blame.”
“Whatever happened to your girlfriend Mimi?” asked Richard.
“Making plates at Leavenworth,” said Danger. “The traitor. Wouldn’t
name names. Prison. Prison, were she belongs.”
“The Gulag,” said Richard. “She wasn’t even a member of the party. She was trying to get close to you. Misplaced love.”
“And that is not an endeavor without its share of risk,” said Danger. “My name is Danger. I hide nothing I don’t mean to.”
Danger pulled a magazine from the inside of his jacket and threw it at the couch. “Look at it. A scientist. In a dirty magazine.”
“Cool,” said Sunny. “An old style nudist magazine. I want to read the cartoons.”
“Cartoons always add a certain something to a publication,” said Frankie. “People like them.”
“Smut!” said Danger. “Challenging the prevailing mores regarding decorum! Already embarrassing your country by fraternizing and spreading communist ideology, but casual nudity? You go too far. This is beyond communism. This is Free Communism.”
“Yes,” said Richard, “It is.”
“There are things you’ve heard about the FBI,” said Danger. “They are all true. Cointelpro. Surveillance society. Vote rigging. Assassination. Propaganda. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a liberal. A classic liberal. I supported the war in Vietnam, I support Business, Manifest Destiny. I’m a true American. A Democrat. Just look at that smut. Just look.”
Sunny leafed through the old magazine, Modern Nudist, as the others gathered ‘round.
Modern Nudist Publisher’s Note:
By Heather Dumbrowski
It has been a whirlwind 1964! What a great year at the Bare Valley Club. Dr. John Thomas has supervised a security system around the perimeter which is designed to keep out the lookey-loos. The only way in or out of the club is via the front or the back gate. He designed the sub-atomic death ray we’ve all heard so much about now that the Soviets have their own model filling the death ray gap. Dr. Thomas doesn’t like to talk about that— he still thinks the death ray is best used to open letters cleanly. And the security at the club is not so deadly, but it is effective all the same. Let them stand for membership as the rest of us do if they are interested in what goes on here on the inside.
In the future all will be free to enjoy fun in the sun, as we do in this artificial paradise. I would like to inform you that we are now carrying Moxie soda in the clubhouse. After a hard afternoon of sun and fun, archery, tennis, swimming, it is nice to enjoy a refreshing drink and conversation, naturally. Next month we will host our annual strawberry shortcake event and how sweet that will be. We expect to have record attendance. Also a great time to meet new members and catch up with old ones as well.
We are pleased in this issue to share the usual personal stories about our growing and vibrant movement, for we are nothing without each other. Plus, an interview with our resident cartoonist, Harry Tukus. Here’s to a great 1965!
Free as JayBirds
As you all know, I met my husband while doing research at a university. We bonded over slices of pizza and the freedom of the naturist lifestyle. And, of course, love for the sciences, social and physical. We started the club here at Bear Valley, just one of the clubs in this great country spreading the ideology of health and freedom to the masses.
I thought it would be interesting to take a look back at the founding from his perspective, thus, Richard’s story:
“When I was invited to the other shore, the shore further out from the mainstream shore most people visit, I was not sure what I was getting into. I had spent my life up until that point in the pursuit of knowledge for its own pleasure, though that is somewhat isolating. But in the university setting I was surrounded by social opportunity. Once I met Dr. Einstein and he told me the same. He was not much for decorum. But it was through him that I first became mindfully aware of social inequality, its causes and potential cures. Very rudimentary, he was a scientist of intuition and imagination, but that was my first exposure to the science of socialism27.
My work is human betterment. I work in the theoretical field of artificial intelligence with which I hope to someday cure human loneliness. Alienation is a killer. Every Marxist knows.
So when I was invited to the beach that day I went with reluctance, for I was leaving behind my great work for humankind, but Heather told me I had to have a fresh mind in order to achieve a breakthrough. I was going through a rough patch. For one thing, and I know it is petty, but, it seemed that every ballpoint pen was destined to destroy every unstained shirt I own. Something about the workmanship, or lack thereof, it is as if under capitalism things are being produced with a limited life-span forcing one to make a re-purchase on a massively sped-up time-line in order to ensure profits to the few who rest at the top of the system. I was as exhausted as I was unfulfilled. I was alienated, as are we all, by modern society.
My most secure pen was an old model. An under the counter model, with the picture of a lady in a bikini on it. But, turned upside-down-right, the suit disappeared. A nice use of chemical engineering. It didn’t leak.
So I was ready to go to the beach. My protest aside, I was more than ready. It is strange that she took me out to a shore where we had to walk much further than the more popular beach. We had to trek through the brambles. But it was worth it. For the area was remote, and private. The view was wonderful. And the quiet! Nothing but the Sea lapping gently and repeatedly against the shore and the birds cooing to their lovers.
Heather sat down the picnic basket and I dug through it with the curiosity and gusto of a famished man. When I looked up the sun was in my eyes. But as I adjusted my vision, and slid my glasses up my nose, I saw that Miss Dumbrowski had removed all of her clothes.
“Miss Dumbrowski!” I said.
“Call me Heather.”
I was stunned. Time paused. Academics had not prepared me. I was embarking on a new field, an exploration of uncharted territories. It was then that I saw the inherent flaws within the American academic system. Not enough hands-on experience. Everything is theoretical. Which in itself is also very important.
“I didn’t bring a suit,” Heather said. “But why waste the day? And why go back?”
I have to admit I admired her calculating scientific mind. In order to make her feel more comfortable I also shed society’s skin and we had a wonderful day at the beach, frolicking in the sand and the waves together. And after a while that Mary Jane lady showed up with watermelon and cookies. It was the start of everything. And it was good.”
At the bottom of the page was an advertisement for a beach towel. The club sold its own Sun Fun Bare towel featuring a scene of bears at a picnic on it under a yellow sun. The Yellow Sun was the symbol of the greater movement and the bears need no explanation. The bear is the animal totem of the Soviet Union.
In the second world war there was a tame bear, liberated from a nazi circus, who fought with the red army. Why should bears not have a nice day at the beach? They have earned it.
Dare to Go Bare, for Science
“Our sister club, Bear Island Naturist Resort, has been working hard on various projects. They have a mushroom farm on site and they are doing a lot of work in the field of mycology. They are also working on robotics and human cloning. While most naturist resorts are filled with interesting people, artists, writers, and scientists, Bear Island takes the cake. They even might take a prize at the strawberry shortcake event upcoming. You never know what will come out of their labs. Wonderful people over there. Making every one of us all proud to be naturists. All hats off to them. Figuratively.”
Down the side of the page were some text ads. One, circled in red, said: “Trapped in the Past! Yes. Caution, Dick. Check the math. Twelve years behind. Temporal protective measures are being taken. Keep our faith. Avoid the clones and robots from the alternate future, as I do. Sort it out.
The Art of Harry Tukus
Harry Tukus is a well known illustrator of magazines. His Evie graces every issue of Modern Nudist providing us all with gentle naturist humor, proving nudity is more than just being naked. It is with great pride we interview him for o
ur Fall issue.
Q: How did you get started in cartooning?
HT: Same as anyone. I practiced drawing Betty and Veronica nude, as figure studies. I learned a lot that way. Most artists are schooled in the streets.
Q: The kid’s comic Archie?
HT: Sure. Those are standard cheesecake pin-up figures. Same as any other so-called risqué art in modern magazines. The same thing that interested artists thousands of years ago, the human figure rendered in two dimensions. Check it out, Betty and Veronica are no different than any other illustrative pin-up. No different than Hedy Lamarr28. Betty Boop. George of the Jungle. Betty was based on a real woman named Betty Jankovitch29. There were other comics of that type. Have been, still are. But Archie has staying power because of the allure of the perpetual love triangle. Good clean fun.
The comics page was instrumental. Popeye showed oddly sharped figures, fighting, squabbling amongst their own number. In poverty they fight over limited resources. Unlike Archie there is no pretense of a possible love triangle and few options. There is always the possibility that, like the comic foil Whimpy, they could be left behind by the social system. Unloved. In Blondie, Dagwood placates his powerlessness within the system by consuming sandwiches named for his plight. Ornate and impossible, he strives to fill the endless void with consumerist pleasures only sparking further misery. Who will one be: Whimpy or Dagwood? The binary choice of capital. This is exploitation, plain and simple. People motivated by fear whether by the carrot or the stick. They dream of being Richie Rich, but forget that his world is filled with lesser serfs. It is the dream being sold, social place. Fear. The Splendor of Majesty categorized as earned. Pity the rich man who cannot enter the kingdom of heaven and must make a pleasing hell on earth filled with consumerist pleasures, affordable or not. The underdog of the popular press.
Pin-ups were painted on the noses of warplanes. Incendiary bombs dropping from containers decorated with the hopes and dreams of the men who control both the flightpath and the Bomb bay doors. Their minds on their maps, their destinations. Their eyes on the horizon ever in the distance. Their hearts in limbo, neither here nor there. They are good men, following orders, dreaming of the good life after the war. But the war never ends. Who is the hero? The one who paints the desires of the heart. That is how one comes to art. Through struggle.
