The Franklin Files

     I apparently went into some kind of black-out. I remember that vividly as many alcoholics have described them in A.A. meetings that I have attended over the years.

     Often times they can remember the exact moment when the black-out began and the exact moment when they regained conscious memory "coming out of it" as they often say, which is not to be confused with waking up out of a sleep, but literally "coming to awareness" in the middle of being awake.

     Only thing is is I didn't start drinking until I was eighteen years old (not counting a beer or two with my dad once or twice when I was thirteen and fifteen)

     I also was not doing any kind of drugs at the time. At least none that I was aware of.

     I "came to" in my bath-tub at home. I was naked and inside the warm water of the tub. I had no idea how I got home, or how I got into the bath or how much time had passed by.

     The first thing that I did was grab my foot and try to bend it around so I could see the wound. The Band Aid was still on.

     I had wondered if my mother had seen the Band Aid on my foot and questioned me about it. What did I say? I had no idea? I had no memory.

     How was this even possible?

     It was like I experienced teleportation or alien abduction or something. My young mind really did not understand what had happened.

     Last thing I remember I was at the recreation center, walking towards the door to meet back up with Scott, and now here I am naked in warm water. What the hell?

     I tried real hard to remember anything else that had happened between that moment and this and I was able to remember about three very cloudy, very short image sequences.

     Now, what I am about to tell you, did not come from hypnosis. what I am about to tell you did not come from a PTSD flashback.

     What I am about to tell you are actual memories. I remembered them while I was laying in my bathtub having come out of that black out.

     They are hazy; dream-like memories and they do not have the same continuity as normal memories and their completely dissociated.

     Kind of how you remember your stay in the recovering room after major surgery coming off of general anesthesia-- you can remember a few things but their funny, dream-like and dissociated. It was kind of like that.

     First of all, I remember being at the pool and asking one of the people that worked their if it was OK if I went swimming even though I had a Band Aid on my foot.

     She told me as long as it wasn't bleeding any more it was OK.

     The memory is like a dream though and it only accounts for maybe thirty seconds.

     I have another memory of being in the locker room with Scott and the strange man we had met. He was there too, and he was pulling my wet swim trunks down, leaving me completely naked.

     That's all I remember about that. Again, maybe a thirty second memory, very dream-like, and disconnected.

     And I remember standing alone with Scott in a large deserted parking lot. I have no idea where this parking lot was. There were no cars in it and it seemed quite abandoned.

     I remember Scott and I just standing there doing nothing.

     I remember that the August sun was hostile, beating down on us with a fury; there was no shade anywhere and I remember I wasn't supposed to be in direct sunlight for more than twenty minutes.

     But I also remember that it felt good. It felt really good.

     Scott was just kind of standing there doing nothing, looking at the ground, and I was just wondering around aimlessly with no apparent intention.

     I remember picking up a cigarette butt off the ground. I had some matches in my pocket. (I collected matches for some damn reason, mostly from Smith's Food King, and also from The Shakey's Pizza Parlor) and I remember lighting the cigarette over a trash can. The same kind of trash can that was in Centinela Park. The same color. A City trash can.

     I remember Scott coming over next to me and asking me, "What are you doing?"

     And I said, "I'm going to try and smoke it." Which I did. I lit it and took a couple of puffs, and that was all there was to smoke.

     I don't remember every trying to smoke before or after that (not until I was an adult)

     I had the distinct impression in the memory that we were waiting for somebody. Somebody was supposed to meet us there in that parking lot. Someone in a car.

     And that's it. That's all I remember

     Not counting the flashbacks that started when I was seventeen, so, don't worry, more will be revealed.