Mishka
Zakharin: Biography
I was born at a very young age, in a part of
Europe that might best be described as the lower-Northerly, middle-central,
Eastern region—or perhaps just a bit Southwest of that—a little over
fifteen-hundred years ago. (I would
feel adverse, however, if I failed to point out, as young as I was at the time
of my birth, I’m not nearly so old as that now…)
Anyway, after being born just a whole hell of
a lot of stuff happened—I won’t bore you with all the sordid details… just the
typical growing-up sorts of things, the general fare that each of us has gone
through—toilet training, learning to ride a horse to escape Mongol invasions,
killing my first bear, the Dark Ages, school ‘daze’ mayhem, sibling rivalry,
adolescence, my first sweetheart—and, of course, the first heartbreak, which
quickly followed—learning to drive (though at the time, you understand, it
was a cart pulled by oxen…), losing my virginity to that whore in Gaul
early in the Sixth Century (I was really a bit of a late bloomer in that
regard, I have to confess—remember, it was the Dark Ages; it’s hard to find a
girl when you’re stumbling around in the dark like that… even if you manage to
find one who’s willing, you’re still a bit uneasy, as there’s no telling what you’ve
really found…), and then the usual rapid succession of Renaissance, Age of
Exploration, and Industrial Revolution (now days condensed greatly and
referred to as “College”), and blah, blah, blah—what have you…
I passed a number of centuries in a stupor of
relentless malaise, drifting through the mountains of southwestern Germany and
eating cheese… (ugh! Yuck! Can’t hardly stand the stuff anymore!) More recently, along about 30 years ago, I
was captured by pirates and served on board ship in the South Caribbean. It was an easy life, but it made me lazy and
slovenly and prone to long siestas in the late afternoons, so it was
okay. Mostly we drank a lot of touristy
drinks, with a lot of fruit in, to stave off the scurvy. Perhaps the thing I miss most about being a
pirate is the really wonderful tan I had…
My years as a pirate served me in good stead for my naval career back
in the 1980’s, in which—aside from that incident while on shore-leave in Guam,
with the drugs and the whore and that guy who ended up all dead and
everything—I was an officer of exemplary status… regardless of that, when I was
finally released from prison, I decided to lay low for awhile, turning my
sights toward education. Through the
course of my academic odyssey I attended nine universities, even going so far
as to enroll in classes at three of them.
I did, somehow, end up with a couple of degrees, and, deciding to move
on, I joined the Peace Corps. It was
there, sadly, that I met my first wife….
Oh, it’s true, I’m fully aware, after so very
many centuries of not having to answer to anyone, I’m sure I wasn’t an easy
person to live with—and in some ways I blame myself for the marriage lasting so
short a time, what with how intolerant I can be sometimes…. At any rate, it was like this—my Peace Corps
work took me to Wales where I met the lovely Celeste Avocado (—though, of
course, that wasn’t her real name; her real name was Delilah Ambrosia
Crapplecornia… ). I was working at
the Jonathan Swift Home for Unwed Mothers and my darling Celeste was a chef
there. At first—as one might expect, in
so romantic a setting—it was a whirlwind affair, spiraling rapidly ever higher
and brighter, burning with passion and ardor, with dancing and singing and
laughter all the time… (and sometimes, when there should have been passion
and ardor, there was just her laughing—and pointing, which made me uneasy—and I
really don’t like talking about it so much…). It only lasted about eight months—but by then she had just became so very bothersome… the way she
ran away with that other guy, and hadn’t been home for almost three months… no
calls, no letters… finally I’d just had enough, and, for my own sanity and
well-being, I had to leave her….
Since my failed marriage, I have found solace
in writing. (Vodka really rather
helps things along as well…) I also
spend a great deal of time in prayer and meditation—though on Wednesday
evenings I like to go a little crazy, and, so, as a kind of release from the
stress of all that sitting there trying not to think of anything, I get really
drunk, turn on some country music, and download Eighteenth Century Russian
literature…. I currently live in the
South of France with a retired stripper named Bunny (though, of course, her
real name is Arabella—and, I suppose, she wasn’t really, actually, technically
a stripper, so much as she was a kind of a woman who would take her clothes off
for money and then dance around quite a little bit…); we have a dog, a
monkey, two horses, three cats, four goats, five piggies, and six wonderful,
little cows, and we enjoy making bread.
Copyright:
2003 Mishka Zakharin