Wally

Elmer, "Walt" was a friend I knew when I lived in California. Despite being a throwback from the 1960's and a reject from society's public eye, Walt still lived with a smile on his face and a story in his heart. Walt loved to tell stories and he loved the place where he told them. Walt also loved to drink and toward the end of an evening the bottle had met his lips way too many times. Old hippy ways faded to history for everyone else but Walt.

Elmer didn't like his real name. He liked being called by his middle name, Walter, because of the relentless teasing that went on in his childhood. Elmer shared the same name as the famous Warner Brothers cartoon character, Elmer Fudd. The small circle of friends which Wally and myself were a part of gave him several nicknames. Two stood out the most. Walt Walter Wally Wallester, all one nickname but kind of long and the other Sir Walter Wally. He liked to be called the latter of the two. I would call him Wallester, which he disliked vehemently, to get a reaction from him.

When Walt entered a room, he'd get noticed. It wasn't his stature. His normal five foot ten inch medium frame didn't give him away. It was his demeanor and the clothes he wore that would make heads turn. His shoulder length kinked hair and long untrimmed beard surrounding leathery skin would be the focal point for his audience. Walt almost always wore a smile. His facial expression was one of comfort, not hatred. People did not fear him. He chose to wear clothes reminiscent of the late sixties. His brown fringed sued vest would wrap around layers of unmatched colored tee-shirts. His oversized Budweiser belt buckle would rest on his hips holding up striped bellbottom pants that partially coved white on black high top tennis shoes. He'd wear his belt buckle not in the center of his torso but way off to the side almost on his left hip. "Because I'm cool." he'd reply when asked about his fashion choice.

Sir Walter Wally lived about twenty miles south of Berkeley, California in the small town of Castro Valley. His tiny second story apartment was just outside the downtown area. The complex was old and out of code. The walls had been painted so many times before due to past tenants that it was hard to tell what was wall and what was trim, for the two had blended together creating a single texture. The constant abuse from smoke and nicotine stained the walls from their original off white to the color of dull beige. This was Sir Walter Wally's Palace of Fine Arts. The Palace, with its stench of stale beer and cigarette butts was almost void of light. Its only source of sunlight came from a grease smudged bare window that hung in the kitchen overlooking the brightly lit Arco Gas Station. Even in the brightest of the afternoon daylight hours could you still not see clearly the bizarre artifacts the Palace proudly displayed. There was an untouched slice of