Brownstonelit's Blog

It is New years Eve…
Hold onto your hats because after today, this thing begins to fly! The clock has begun to tick. Can you hear it? Tick… tick… tick…
Tomorrow is the first day of another nine year cycle for me. As Betty Davis says, “Hold on… it’s going to be a bumpy ride!”
When I stop to think about the real players in this thing, it just wants to make me say…
Bumpy ride? Wow, is that an understatement!!!! It will be more like the roller coaster from hell.

Happy New years to you and yours… be well. Why? Because you’re not going to want to miss what happens next!!!

Tick… tick… tick… tick… tick…tick…tick…tick…tick…

12/30/10

When thinking about the long arms of those involved in Charley’s murder and the amount of lies necessary to keep this cover-up afloat for 44 years, I am remanded that caution may the better steward of truth till all are squarely on board and ready to move this thing forward. Numb with anticipation on how this will eventually play out, my heart has raced at a staggering rate since the epiphany of two days past. In an effort to distract, I rummage through real estate in far away places-dismantle Christmas stockings and holiday cheer. I ponder the patterns in the clouds, chart the weather and dabble at opening paragraphs while plotting my outline. Still nothing breaks the adrenaline… the rushing of blood coursing through my brain feels like a thoroughbred, heady with fright and daft with wind in its ears as the enormity of what is about to ensue nips at its hocks, spurring it on..

Numbers collide in my field of vision. I carefully try to reap the benefits of their wisdom and absorb their message of calm. But nothing dissuades the angst I am drowning in, till my phone rings and for a moment I am held captive by an educating anecdote…. a chanced warning from a cherished colleague. Even in humor… there is benign wisdom.

I paraphrase…

“…A man went out for a drive in the country. As he passed in front of an insane asylum, one of his tires went flat. With uneven keel, he pulled the limping vehicle to the side of the road and set about to fix it. First he removed the deflated tire, careful to place all the lug nuts safely inside the hubcap at the edge of the road. Next, he went to the trunk- removed the spare and came back to the front by way of the shoulder. As he neared the front of the car, his foot faltered on the edge of the asphalt. Suddenly he pitched backward, stepping on the inverted pan and watched as the ruptured hubcap spat its contents into the air, with all landing in the grassy landscape beside him. After a frantic search and unable to find them, he sat- scratching his head-perplexed as to how he would be able to manage the repair.

A small snicker carried across the lawn and garnered his attention. Dressed in pajamas, a man who had been silently watching his endeavors from behind the bars of an upper room hollered, asking if he could be of some assistance. Humored by the irony, the man with the ailing tire responded; asking just how the hell he could attempt such a feat from inside his cage?

“Simple”, said the man from behind the bars. “Just remove one lug nut from each of the other remaining three tires on your car and that should be enough to hold you until you can get yourself to a gas station where you can buy some new ones to replace the ones you’ve lost!”

“Remarkable!” said the driver and slapped at his knee. “I should have been able to think of that myself!” The man in the pajamas nodded in agreement, much to the chagrin of the man in the street.

“How on earth did you ever think of that… all things considered of course?” chortles the driver, making public mockery of the man’s obvious assumed deficiency and current residency.

Not appreciating the driver’s condescending attitude, the man behind the bars puffed up his nightshirt collar, looked down at him… smiled an impish smile and replied…

“I might be crazy… but at least, I’m not stupid!”

Here in lies my lesson for the day:

They did what they did 44 years ago.
They might have been crazy at the time… but they weren’t necessarily stupid, so perhaps it would be wise for me to be very careful.

Lesson for them…
It is 44 years later and I am neither crazy, nor stupid… so perhaps it is they who should be very careful!

(Thanks for the joke and the reminder, L.)

So riddle me this…
Who loans out the house? The house in the woods? And who orders sex like pizza and gets it delivered by the man that belongs to the red sports car? The one who runs errands… who picks up… and drops off? The one who delivers secrets and carries the package from here to there? Shhhhhhhhhhhhh… keep it quiet! They will see, they will hear.

Bed springs that squeak, but do not sigh live in the  house whose walls are riddled with guilt and blood.

Riddle me this…
Is this the house with the shingle roof? The hut… tucked away? Hmmmmm…
Long drive… long walk… long legs and long nights.
Do you  know?
Can you see?

Google Earth this __________________________.

Getting nervous, Grim?

Squeak…squeak…squeak…squeak…squeak…sigh! 

The walls will talk- they have much to say. They have much to show… maybe even who really owned the lighter?

12/28/10

If you go back to 1/15/10 at the very beginning of this adventure you will read about a dream I had concerning my parents and a train…
In the beginning, I did not understand. But now, I know what it was that I was being shown. It was the night of their honeymoon. They had been given train tickets and a night’s stay at a fancy hotel in Minneapolis as a wedding gift from her folks. The reason why she didn’t… or perhaps…couldn’t recognize me in the crowd of onlookers as she boarded the train with my father, was because I was as of that moment… at least in heaven… not born to them yet.

I often think of that dream. It reminds me of this case and how, as always it has worked itself backwards to me. Odd, isn’t it? That at 52, I should be shown my parents leaving for the beginning of their wedded bliss and me- standing in the crowd watching- not even a twinkle in their eye yet? In fact… there were six other twinkles before they ever got down to me. I am number 7 out of 10. Still… it was appropriate that they take me back to the beginning of their story- that I might appreciate the beginning of my own. Dead, they can take me there. Alive… they could not. Fitting prologue, as this is the way I write as well. I start at the end and work my way backwards to the beginning.

I love the fact that Charley understands this about me and so that is how he has allowed his story to unfold. From his ending… to my beginning… of his story.

“Chapter One…

It was getting late. The rain had danced around the clock from early that morning, till well after supper and while her cigarette lay dying in the ashtray- he eyed the second hand as it swept past the top of the hour and calculated his departure for the ride outside of town. She stood rigid at the sink and offered him a cup of coffee for the road. With even timbre he agreed. She wrung her hands on the damp kitchen towel clinging to her waist, while he plopped his Fedora atop the fridge before sliding into the chair opposite her. They had been fighting all day, but here finally… caffeine proposed a treaty and she took advantage of the moment to quietly reinstate her sovereignty and gauge his resistance to recommit…”

And so it begins Charley… your story… your night… your murder… your revenge!

12/28/10

My dear Charley,
Here on the cusp of a new year, I stand at a crossroads as to which direction I should take. If what I discovered yesterday is the tragic impetus why all this took place, then I am duty bound to keep silent and wait for those whose ears are ripe and skill sets vetted for such information. But is that what you want me to do? Keep under lock and key what has not seen the light of days in 44 years?

You, my dear man… for want of another’s ego and reputation… you and your remaining life was sacrificed? My heart, infantile as it is in my current evolution bleeds from generations not my own for your fathomless loss. Not with vengeance, but cognizant with compassion for the collateral damages suffered by your family do I walk headlong into the fires before me- certain to be burnt in the process by those who will deny and brutally call my reason into question. As your loyal second, I shall continue to pursue this causation and carefully chronicle each step in an effort to be most effective on your behalf. As you have always backed me with the steely strength burgeoning behind those gray eyes, I shall with token likeness push forward into the unknown.

With steady determination guide this hand across each page and follow with blithe spirit all mental escapades that I might wander until I reach the ultimate destination of justice you desire. Oh Charley… why you chose to wait for me to tell this tale confounds me and yet perhaps no other vessel was both willing and emotionally disposed to take such a protracted journey. I think about all the people whose lives were altered by your birth. I think about all the people whose lives you could have graced after the fact and am humbled by your decision to rest such a weighty proposition upon such feeble shoulders as my own to serve as prompt for destiny.

It is with both honor and humility that I shall act as courier and scribe for your voice. Lead now with tempered judgment where it is you need for me to follow further and place my own as guardrail to give heavenly margin to all I am about to do. Could you have found a better Michael to fight your battle on this plane, would such a platform do better in their gilded hands? If so, then I beg that you allow them intercession so as to do better justice to your cause than such a fledgling as I. As another lamb patiently wandering in the Garden of Gethsemane, I ask not that you consider a more noble warrior to carry your shield, but rather that you bolster what tenacity you see in me to weather what will surely become the perfect storm upon publication of this intent.

My dear reader… for those of you whose fidelity has been great, know this – that if I could tell you now what all this had led to… you could no more be as shocked and saddened at the lowest common denominator of such lecherous and vile folly as I.

It is sometimes difficult to understand the shorthand of the dead and so my delays while they have been many… have also educated greatly. I have proposed my supposition and now wait for confirmation as to the governed direction of my confidences…

God help those who will litter this path with their lies.

Go to page #32 of the journal…she whispers. Go there- there is more for you.
In deed there was. For how do you present a gun to a victim’s wife that should still be in Atlanta at the GBI State Crime Lab? How do you ask that same widow to identify a gun she has never seen before in her life? Why do you list the gun as a 38 Special on the Crime Lab Report and then demand information from the widow about a 38 snubnose?
Hmmmm….?
And then, how do you tell her it was issued by the government to her dead husband- when the government appears to have no record of that gun on file anywhere? How do you manage to gather evidence, bury a body,send said evidence to State Crime Lab 1/2 a state away, get the test done, get the results and get the weapon back in your posession to do all these things between Atlanta and Millen, Georgia all in less than 72 from the death of the victim?

How???
You don’t!
Not without help from the inside. But why would someone on the inside in Atlanta give a rat’s ass about a small time Treasury Agent in a litter box like Valdosta in 1966?

If what I think I have figured out is true…the New Year won’t be very happy for those still alive and know why too!

Remember earlier in October of this year they gave more clues? One had to do with ‘…a scarecrow that goes up at this corner every year about this time’? And another…’the man who stands at the fece near a hay bale has information for you’? ‘He is old… tanned, leatherered skin- wrinkled… he husks the corn.’

I beilve they are corroboration for this most recent one:
‘…the man who husks the corn knows it all… he has information for you– if he will talk…’

I know who this is. And they are right. He would know because I believe he was part of the cover up-helped stage witnesses. Charley talked about an association between him, LT and G. He showed the cheese cutter that lascerated his skin. I know who this is- now if I can only get him to talk. His son did… his wife did.

Now pray that he will!

A blessed day to all I love on both sides of the veil. Especially my parents whom I adore and whose deaths have both broken and remade me. And a special Christmas wish for Charley that he be able to be with his family through the power of a new light.

Silent night, holy night… all is calm…

Atleast until the Feds arrive!

Last night Charley had much to say. All night long my sleep was interupted with conversations about the lawyer… the agents… and the MOT.

Something about the evidence- one thing being removed after the fact and even more than that- they kept talking about the watch. The MOT and his watch. R had spoken of this watch before in tandem witht he MOT. We know he worked for Sears… but what does the watch signify? That he worked in the jewelry department… or that the MOT was running out of time? The watch is significant.

Talk to me Charley… I need more details. And by the way? Thank you for listening to my other request- I will wait to see how it plays out and gracefully accept whatever comes to fruition.

12/23/10

The history of the railways in Georgia is rather interesting… Moultrie for instance was a huge hub. So numbers Charley presents of 321 or 342 denote what? Contract numbers? Route numbers? Or rail car numbers? Should be an interesting history lesson, don’t you think… finding this out?

Now with all these people involved in this illegal railcar moonshine business- you would think that the rest of the illegal services these folks provided to the many patrons of Valdosta would have suffered… but they didn’t. The numbers running still ran strong- the porn still ran hot and the players all got cuddly on winter nights with their hookers and their guilt. The thing that just kills me is that in the midst of all this moonshine running, the federal and state agents (Alcohol, Tobacco and Tax Treasury Agents) were in the process of another wave of Operation Dry Up. In fact, Charley was on stand by that weekend with his partner as other state agents were already “sitting” on another still. So how the hell did the RR gang get away with it? Hmmmm… someone on the inside and lots more on the outside. The same fella who was at Charley’s house that night- blood rushing through his veins could scarcely keep up with the adrenaline rushing through his body and the fear rushing through his brain. He didn’t bargain for them murdering Charley- in the same way the other man with the badge and light brown uniform didn’t think they’d really go through with it. After all- it was Charley. They all knew him- how could they do this?

Self preservation my friend… in the end it was all that mattered. All that matters still 44 years after the fact.

I have decided… it is time to begin writing the book in earnest. Not that I haven’t been writing all along… it’s just that every time I commit to an outline… another body appears- or another name and then I am duty bound to follow where Charley will lead. Blogging is fine; it acts as benchmark for chapter contents and has been a great avenue for release and discovery. But there are things I cannot blog about that must go into the book. Secrets that could not be bandied about public airways and theories that are still- pardon the pun- fleshing them out. But as Harriett Austin says if you’re going to write a book- ‘don’t talk about what you’re going to write-write it’! So my darlings, I shall be busy for quite some time to come, but I will still post here every day or so to keep you in touch and spell out some of the more intriguing lines of thought I have. The New Year will be here in days and then- it’s off to the races for this case! Big things are just beyond the reach of my fingertips into the new calendar year. You can sense it in the air-that electricity that pulsates with promise and baits with sweet come hither whispers. I can feel it and I know that Charley will guide my metaphorical pen throughout my discoveries, because this is his story too and it will take us both places we never thought possible.

Stay close Charley. I need your guidance now more than ever….

Happy Birthday to my youngest!