The Last Woman

Rod Amis - Unbound

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Baltimore - 23 September, 2000 - Turn the music up. I have. Once again in the Blue Moon season, I'm writing this column before going on to edit the rest of the magazine. It's been a tough week for Yours Unruly.

Shit happens.

I can turn back the hands of Time
You better believe I can!
I can make the season change
Just with a wave of my hand --- "Can't Get Next to You" The Temptations

My e-mail correspondent's second question/suggestion ran this way:

"... How and why you think you could make things work with 'the last woman in your life;' i.e. what would you try to do different?"

" 'Differently,' Dude," I thought to myself, being in constant editorial mode.

But I also faced that this was one of the most difficult questions anyone reading my exhibitionism has presented me.

Firstly, there is the explaining of how that phrase, "the last woman," has everything to do with where I find myself today.

Listening to a comedian one night, I heard the notion, "Look at your wife. Tell me that you really believe she is the LAST WOMAN you will ever have..." That notion blew me away. I was changed forever. I was too young to die!

So the scary part, for me, is that The Last Woman, will have seen all you have seen here. Me as Rat Bastard, as Sensitive Soul, as Victim of the Black Dog.

Now let's say that, in spite of all that, she decides to choose me as her man. Then what?

She THEN has to deal with me sending every spare dime I have to WRITERS on five continents. She has to deal with my obsessive writing disease. My Literary Priesthood...

I'm tore down
Almost level to the ground --- Eric Clapton

I've said before that this Web site is a jazz band, with me as the trumpet soloist, Miles, usually turning my back to the audience. But I have been "cryptic" about my life.

Baby, take off your shoes
I'll take your shoes.
Take off your coat --- real slow
Take off your dress
Yes, yes, yes!
You can leave your hat on
You can leave your hat on ---- Randy Newman

And you say: "GET TO THE POINT, PUBMAN! WHAT ABOUT THE LAST WOMAN?"

If there is a Last Woman, now that I am mature enough to accept her, this is what she can expect:

1. I shall dance like nobody is watching.
2. I shall be as steady in my loyalty as Gibraltar.
3. I won't fear love.
4. I shall never be a public embarassment and nothing that happens between us will be an item of public comment.
5. I shall surprise you with flowers and gifts for no reason whatsoever. Just because...
6. I shall expect that you know that I can't stop myself from taking care of other people, even --- and more usually --- people we have never met. Mostly writers. That is what is my life is all about.
7. Like a Huron, I believe that dreams are more "real" than what we see every day in our waking life. The universe in my head will always compete with the world most other people believe is "the real." Dreamer? Wait until I'm King!
8. I shall never expect you to agree with my bizarre opinions.
9. My friends opinions about you, and us, don't mean a damned thing.
10. Yeah, my past is sketchy. I won't ask about yours. This is a new page. If, after all this, you accept me as your Last Man, get ready for some wild nights, some crazy days... You can leave your hat on...

WIN ROD AMIS'S MONEY!!! IS THERE ANYTHING BETTER THAN FREE BENJAMINS IN YOUR POCKET? You tell us. With the holiday spending season looming big-time, wouldn't it be nice if you could spend our publisher's money instead of your own? Well, just click-through to our special Sweepstakes Page and find out how easy that can be, Dreamer. Do it now.

Try a little tenderness...

ONE OF MY OTHER E-MAIL CORRESPONDENTS suggested that we take this dialogue to "Oprah" and let her pick my next woman, The Last Woman, from the national audience that show has collected.

Yeah. Right.

Rolling On The Floor Laughing My Ass Off (ROTFLAO).

Has it come that?

I think it's bad enough that you people come here every week to see how screwed my life is compared to yours!!!

I slip on a banana peel and bust my ass and everybody goes "Har-har-har." Comedy is not pretty. And you let me be your Big Joke week after week.. You're welcome!

Nobody listens to modern jazz
And I'll never have what those guys have
And he said, "I do what I can
I work for a living and that's who I am..." --- Sheryl Crowe

It's been a very quiet weekend here. You see, along with 25% of the former employees of my former Day Job at Andover.net (now attempting to become known as osdn.com,) I received a telephone call this weekend informing me that I was being "riffed," as they say in the dot.com economy these days. I tell you everything else here, so I see no reason not to tell you that, too.

For over a month the name Andover.net was being buried. VA Linux, our new owners, were jazzed about promoting the new name of OSDN (Open Source Developers Network,) though very few readers seemed as enthusiastic.

A week ago Friday we'd been informed that most of the former senior managers of our company had resigned, so it was obvious that the "house-cleaning" subsequent to most acquisitions was now taking place. The only question that remainded was how much of the house our new owners felt needed to be cleaned. Now we know.

The terms of my severance package, clumsily explained on the telephone, were supposed to have arrived via FedEx today. Like most promises made in recent months, this one proved untrue, as well. I suspect I shall receive the package by Tuesday, in true VA Linux style. (There seems to be penchant for acting in "geological time" in the new organization.)

This, of course, makes my being in Baltimore all the more meaningless. I'd only moved here to be closer to my colleagues in "Andover South," you may recall.

So this week, rather than responding to queries, I shall be sending out new queries of my own. How odd. One would suspect that I would be good at it...

THINGS THAT BOTHER ME THIS WEEK

1. Wondering where the next Adventure will take me.

2. Coming to terms with going back to being a freelance writer again.

3. Wanting just one day when I feel pampered instead of pushed.

4. Budgetting out some time to resolve my healthcare issues.

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Thanks for coming back this week.

"Work like you don't need the money,
"Love like you've never been hurt,
"Dance like no one is watching..."
Rod

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This is another Web site made on a Macintosh.

ROD AMIS has published this magazine since 1990. It first appeared as a hardcopy 'Zine. In March, 1996, he launched it here on the Web. Rod was a Contributing Editor at Suite101.com, where he wrote the " 'Net Publishing" feature. His work has been featured in the San Francisco Bay Guardian Online, NRV8, and at WebLab's Reality Check site. Rod was also a contributing writer on technology for Faulkner Information Services.

Rod was a columnist for the Andover News Network, where he wrote over two hundred articles on web design and development issues. He was also principal writer and Editor for IT Manager's Journal, where he reviewed technology issues weekly. He became the Managing Editor for Electronic Mail/Newsletter Publications at Andover.net at the end of February, 2000. He is now a contributing writer for ACCESS magazine.

He lives in Baltimore, MD, at the moment (though it seems to most people he *actually* lives on the Web,) edits the writing of people from four continents for The World's Magazine, and wonders who The Last Woman will be in his "spare time."

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