Good Morning Florida Keys

This came in last night from a Birmingham correspondent I’ve never met, who started writing to me after I started writing about my brother Major going missing.

Sloan, Thank you for sharing the eulogy. I appreciate your thoughts on many levels, but most importantly that you tell the truth as you see it. Truth hurts sometimes, but it never hurts as much as the confusion of lies. Your writing is NOT like a child who wants attention, but like a wise man who has been processing the life you have and are living. “Simplify, simplify, simplify… Give me that poverty that knows true wealth” ~H.D. Thoreau . . . I sense that you have gained more than you have lost. TMAG

This below fell out of me last night before I heard from TMAG. After I finished the second draft, I told the Board of Directors it should not be published. And I told Major maybe I was coming to join him soon, as I’d had quite enough of living on this world. My dreams last night left me feeling I had no alternative but to publish it and to keep on trucking.

———————————

After World War II, Leo Bashinsky and his former brother-in-law, Cyrus Case, purchased Magic City Foods in Birmingham from a couple who had run it for years under the Golden Flake Brand. A small company by today’s standards, it manufactured and distributed 5-cents packages of potato chips, peanuts, peanut butter and cheese crackers, and related packaged snack products.
 
I remember the day my father drove the family out to the plant on Lomb Avenue, not far from the turn over to Rickwood Field, where the Birmingham Barons played baseball in the Class AA league. I remember looking at the brick building and adjacent steel-gray quonset hut. It was a gray, dreary winter day. I did not feel elated, although my parents told me driving out there it was a big moment for our family.
 
I would work there in the summers after I entered high school, and at the new plant near the City Jail on South 6th Street, after it was built when I attended Ramsay High School situated above Five Points South. During college I worked there in the summers. Mostly I worked in the warehouse, and sometimes I worked in the manufacturing areas, all entry-level jobs, which I roundly did not like and watched the clock, waiting for the work day to be over.
 
After graduating from law school at the University of Alabama, I clerked for a federal judge. Then, unable to make up my mind what to do, I decided to go to work for Golden Flake. I did a lot of different jobs over the next four years, and learned the company pretty well, inside and outside. Manufacturing, purchasing, sales, marketing and advertising. But it didn’t suit me, nor did I seem to suit it, so I left the company and joined a small Birmingham law firm and started practicing law.
 
Before I left the company, a number of long-time employees came to me and we wept together. They didn’t want me to leave, I was the future and hope of the company, they told me. But I knew I had to leave, if I wanted to stay alive. My health was destroyed, my marriage in shambles. So I moved on, even though I left a big part of me in the company. A part of me that kept up with the company for decades. Even today, when I go into grocery stores in areas where Golden Flake does business, I find the potato chip section and view the racks, at which company has the best position and the most facings, and what the new products are.
 
Let’s go back to the beginning of what I wrote to start this story. Let’s go back to why my grandfather and his former brother-in-law purchased Magic City Foods. Former brother-in-law due to the early death of my grandfather’s younger sister, Helen, whose untimely passing caused by galloping tuberculosis or a rapid pneumonia shook the family to the core. So devoted was he to his sister that my grandfather forbade Cyrus to remarry and, because it would dishonor his departed sister’s name. Cyrus remained a bachelor until his death.
 
My grandfather and Cryus bought Magic City Foods because of me. I was the reason, but I didn’t know this when they bought it, nor when I went with my family that dreary winter day to look at it. I didn’t know it when I worked at Golden Flake in the summers, or later after I had clerked for the federal judge. I only learned of it when the story started coming to me in bits and pieces, mostly through my first and second wives, who heard it from my black mammy and the wife of my father’s brother.
 
Not long after America entered World War II, my father enlisted in the Army Air Corps. Trained as a pilot, he was so good with mathematics that after he got his wings they converted him to a navigator/bombardier. The family stayed with him during the training period, at the air base in Boca Raton, and then at an air base somewhere in Iowa.
 
Just before my father was shipped out for Guam, where a B-29 base had been built, my mother went to California to see him off to war. She left me and my beloved black mammy, whom I called “Cha,” because I could not pronounce Charlotte, with my father’s mother and father.

My grandmother did not like the way I ate, that is, what I ate, so she set out to change my diet. When I didn’t eat the food she had her servants prepare for me, she took me to a doctor to get him to make me eat what she wanted me to eat. When the doctor told her she was so much as crazy, she took my dear Cha away from me and banished her to the servants’ quarters in the basement, to force me to eat what she wanted me to eat.
 
When my mother returned from California, she noticed my ribs sticking out prominently and Cha told her what had happened. My moher was enraged and old her in-laws they would never have a relationship with any of her children. I suppose news of this was in the first letter she wrote to my father after she returned from California to Birmingham. He went off to war to protect his family, and shortly after he arriving on Guam he received a letter describing a war declared in his own family.
 
As months passed, my parents, probably at my mother’s urging, as she didn’t care for her parents either, decided not to live in Birmingham after the war ended. Because of his aviation training and high aptitude in mathematics, mechanics and electronics, my father was offered a post-war job by an aircraft manufacturer in Cleveland, Ohio. That was where we would move and live after the war.
 
I remember shortly after I finished law school, when my grandfather showed me a letter my father had written from Guam, saying as things now stood, he and his family would not be living in Birmingham after the war. I was shown the letter to persuade me not to accept a fabulous association with a well-respected country lawyer I had been offered, but to return to Birmingham from law school. My grandfther did not explain the background for the letter.
 
The background was what he let his wife do to me, and to try to make up for it, my grandfather wrote back to my father and promised him that if he came back to Birmingham to live, he, my grandfather, would purchase a company and my father would become a junior partner and eventually it would all be his. This was what induced my father and mother, probably mostly my father, not to move to Cleveland and to stay in Birmingham after the war. The company purchased was Magic City Foods — Golden Flake.
 
I learned just today (Monday) that my grandfather and Cyrus paid $1,000,000 for the company, which was a lot of money in those days. I also learned today that Cyrus was homosexual, although I seriously doubt my grandfather knew it. The person who told me this worked during high school for Magic City Foods when it was sold to my grandfather and Cyrus. He worked for the company until he retired maybe twenty years ago. He knew the company as well as anyone, but he did not know the company was purchased because of me, and I told him I might write about that.
 
Not only was my father made a junior partner, his brother Leo was also. When my father finally decided to purchase the business from his father and Cyrus, my mother insisted he buy out Leo’s interest, because she knew my father was going to make something of the company and she didn’t like the idea of him making his brother rich if he wasn’t working in the company. Leo was a pediatrician, perhaps as great a baby doctor to ever walk on this world.

So my father bought out his father, Cyrus and Leo, and then he built the plant on South 6th Street, near the city jail. Then,  with the help of Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant, the company took off, and my father indeed made a lot of money. As did top management make a lot of money through stock ownership, and later via stock options when the company went public. A lot of private investors also made a lot of money off the company stock. And yet no one in the company today, nor any stockholder, knows why my family came to own Golden Flake: my grandfather didn’t want my parents to move to Cleveland over what he had let his wife do to me.
 
I dunno. Maybe if my family wasn’t so prominent in Birmingham, maybe if Golden Flake wasn’t a household word in Alabama, maybe if Bear Bryant had never advertised Golden Flake potato chips on his Sunday afternoon post-game show, maybe if my father had not given so much money to the University of Alabama, Auburn University and Samford University in Birmingham, there would be neither interest nor point in my explaining anything about my family to the public. Maybe,though, having a high public profile carries a higher standard of openness and disclosure.
 
Maybe it’s even more simple than that. My father’s business creed was the Golden Rule. There used to be, perhaps still are, gold rulers over doorways in the company headquarters, saying “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” And there used to be a hobo clown on all Golden Flake packaging. A mosaic of the clown still welcomes visitors into the South 6th Street offices.
 
Maybe it’s time the company went back to the Golden Rule in earnest. Maybe it’s time to put the rank-and-file employees first, for a change. But for the rank and file employees, there would be no Golden Flake, now would there?
 
They still know me as Bash out there. Many people have told me I was the model for the hobo clown, but he was there all along. Even so, that’s how I sign off today, as the hobo clown they knew as Bash.
 
I sign off saying to my father’s widow, giving money from my father’s estate, over which you are totally in charge from what I hear, to the Golden Flake employees is far more important than giving it to Alabama, Auburn and Samford, and to any church. Far more important. Give it back to the employees and the company, Joann. My father is watching you. As is God.

Many times in my youth, my father told me in a lamenting tone, ”Son, I built this business for you!” Many times he told me that. It always made me feel terrible, for it looked to me that he had built the business for himself. That lament had a lot to do with why I didn’t take that country lawyer’s offer and why I went to  work for Golden Flake, even though everything inside and outside of me was screaming at me to practice law.

Only now, the day after I started writing this, do I see the linkage in my father’s lament back to when he agreed to return to Birmingham because his father was going to buy him a company because of me. Major told you to be generous with the company employees, Joann. Now I’m telling you.

But for me, there would be no Golden Fake. But for me, you never would have met my father at the aircraft hanger where you worked in Nashville; where he parked his airplane when he flew up there to see the Golden Flake operation he had purchased from Don’s Foods just before I attended Vanderbilt University in Nashville.

I was his best man, Joann. I carried the ring he gave to you. I know who and what you are. I know you are a Bashinsky in name only. And I know you are no different from my grandfather. It’s all about you, Joann. It always was. This is your chance to change that.  
 
Bash

I recieved from my website developer that there still seems to be a malware problem on goodmorningkeywest.com, so probably safer to visit goodmorningfloridakeys.com, if you wish to keep following the really strange adventures of moi.

Here’s a 3 a.m. blast from my Birmingham past this morning.
 
Hello From Plano, Tx, A native of B’ham & who understands the jive of the “Magic City” & you were my lawyer (re Permutt Friend etc ) with nerves of steel & compassion for me in Sam Pointers court, had your heart into the case when I lived in FL & then I went on to NY & then to TX. I have followed the coverage with Major & blah, blah. So has everyone in B’ham. None of this matters now, the beloved brother is your property, not the publics. BTW, many years ago, I was on my way from DFW & heard you on the car radio advising persons about legal affairs & the person who called for advice was Mike? who wrote”All My Ex’es Live In TX” & he was a friend of my husband’s. He had gotten out lawyered at the time. I would also like to tell you that my children have had a Father who loves them & that would be my husband, Ron Black, UAB Tuscaloosa 1966, SAE. We now have five TX Grands & one TX Great Grand, Elliott, pic attached. People reading this,take notice. Sloan is a man, a lawyer, an Alabamian, a son of the South. Love, Carolyn Abercrombie Johnson Black

As if to say there are no coincidences in life is this response from a Birmingham lawyer buddy to yesterday’s “Clothing Optional Post.” The same lawyer who once referred a young, inexperienced lawyer a client named Carolyn Johnson, whose husband had been killed in a private airplane crash.  Her husband was a passenger on the plane. I did not win the case, and it has haunted me ever since. Carolyn’s kind email, saying how well her life has gone,  made me feel a lot better.

Sloan,

Hadn’t noticed this:

Please come back to Birmingham and run for mayor.  You’d make a nice contrast to our last one, Larry Langford, who ran up a $50,000 bill at Sons & Harwell alone.  “I like to dress well,” he explained to the press.  The bill was paid by Bill Blount, one of his financial angels.  Both are in prison now.

With this for a campaign poster, you’d win in a walk.

My reply:

Hi, amigo. Here’s the T-shirt’s history. The lies that have to be invented to make me a politician.

Campaign Billboard–Ripley’s Believe It or Not version

This ad appeared in Key West the Newspaper, a weekly “blue” newspaper that principally concentrates on busting the chops of people who need their chops busting, unless they work for or are buddies of Key West the Newspaper. The ad is the imaginative handiwork of Sandy Downs, former sheriff candidate and chop-buster beyond beyond. Not close to my actual likeness, other than the face, which is close. Proof that, contrary to some local rumors, Sandy and I aren’t an item. Here’s her photo, just in case you still think I dreamed this up myself. She dreamt it up after I lamented that I might use a nude breach myself, if I was hung like a horse and still enjoyed the physique I had in law school. Called me out, she did. Busted my chops.

(Sandy)

Meanwhile, this wicked creation of Sandy’s became one side of a two-sided campaign billboard (T-shirt), the other side being the soul drawing found on the ”Campaign Billboard–Aphrodite version” page of this here  website.

The reason I promoted a nude beach for Key West was because the Board of Directors told me to promote it, and because I was convinced it would bring a flood of buffit-beachers to Key West and fix the city’s ailing economy pronto, at no cost to the city. The buffit (no kin to Jimmy Buffet) beach would advertise itself among the perhaps 50,000,000 free beach lovers around the world. 

Sandy, or somebody, will have to go some to match all of that, if I run for the county commission down here this summer, which, despite all sorts of stuff flying my way from up north (Alabama), still looks like it’s gonna to happen.
 
Sloan Bashinsky

p.s. The green fig leaf in the top Sloan for Mayor photo was given to me my County Mayor Sylvia Murphy, who lives on Key Largo, and who once said at a candidate forum that she used to go to the nude beach on Grassy Key when she was a spring chicken. The nude beach that isn’t on Grassy Key any longer.

Father and sons

A sample of the replies to yesterday’s “We Who Knew Major” post:
 
From a former money manager at Golden Flake (my father’s company):
 
Sloan, A well written eulogy for Major, and for those outside of the family who partially entered the Basinsky arena.  We all saw and, perhaps lived, parts of the eulogy.  We knew parts of the history and saw the probable future of the family and the company.  I mentoned to you a week or so ago that I felt  your part in all of this was yet to come.  In my opinion, your eulogy today was a beautiful entry into your future as the guide you were meant to be.  MM

From my old gay Birmingham girlfriend who is like a sister to me:
 
 . . . imagine the determined despair of anyone as he methodically goes about preparations to kill himself. The label in his mouth, the bound hands . . .
 
as if he’d gorged on Dan Brown and wanted to leave a mystery barnacled with signs and portents.
 
That was a lovely tribute to him you wrote. I think it was, anyhow. L.
 
From a Birmingham reader:
 
Beautiful note.
 
From my former brother-in-law by my first marriage, who became very close to Major:
 
Thank you Bash…I’ll always b there 4 u brother  Jim

From a Birmingham reader:
 
Did not know Major or anyone in his family although my daughter did know his wife.  You have my sincere sympathy. After reading your blogs, I am sure you loved your brother and are grieving for him.  A friend who grew up with Major said the death of your mother changed his life, and not for the better.  Hope

From a former Birmingham girlfriend of Major’s:
 
I attended the memorial service on Tuesday and was thankful that the coroner had not released the report then. Your cousins presented interesting and colorful remarks about both you and Major. Although I would prefer that you keep these remarks private, I did want to speak to comments made by former girlfriends about Major’s virility or whatever you choose to call it. I dated him in the late 80’s. Major never ever had any inadequacies in the bedroom, so I wonder what that was all about. He was tender and caring, but he was also quite “studly” and satisfying. Need I say more? Anyway, I will read about the malady that he was purported to have; but that was not a problem when I knew him.
 
My Reply:
 
Major indeed was deeply affected and altered by his mother’s death. Oddly, they had not seemed close; growing up, he often was in conflict with her. We talked a good bit about that around 1988, after his divorce from his first wife. That’s probably when Major and I were closest. He said he could not explain it. He was rough on our mother when he was a boy, but it really tore him up when she died, and he was very upset with our father over they way he had handled it. Her attending physician during her last illness, who was my own doctor, told me that he had come not to like my father at all.

From an earlier Birminngham girlfriend of Major’s, who told me he had Peyroine’s disease and could not sexual intercourse:

I believe you have done a great deal of damage to the Golden Flake brand. And, if what you say is true about Joann and your father, it would seem that he trusted her more than he trusted you and Major as it relates to the trust. That was as public a rebuke as one will ever see between a father and his two lawyer sons. Your father had every right to live his life in the manner that he saw fit. And it is obvious that he didn’t care who liked or agreed with his choices and decisions. It is also obvious that he thought he had a right to inflict public injustices upon his sons as he saw fit. In that regard, he had a moral and ethical obligation to take good care of his sons and he failed in that regard. He could and should have done many things for you and Major via his will. Leaving you money was only one thing he could have done for you. He could have done much more for you that would have uplifted you. He should have appointed you and Major as trustees instead of Joann, and failing that, he should have appointed all three of you. He obviously was a very selfish, self centered, individual. Your having outed him as such was a good thing.

The only revenge against these injustices is for you to live well for the remainder of your life. Living well means having something to look forward to and to enjoy the warmth of those you choose to be around.

Find some warmth today. I appreciate you Sloan for all of your talents and your brilliance. I want you to be happy and find joy and have fun.

My reply:
 
Interesting, I put in at the last moment, and then took out of today’s post, that I once had emailed my father, through his and the company’s lawyer, that he could not trust his wife, his lawyer, his accountant or his board of directors to do what really was best for his estate and Golden Flake, and he should put Major in charge of all of it, with all the others having to answer to/be supervised by him. This was in late 2004. Whether or not my father ever received that email (it would have to have been printed out and hand-delivered, as he did not use computers himself), I don’t know. It might have made a huge difference for my father and for Major, if my father had done it. Alas, he had surrounded himself with people who were making fortunes off him, who were not going to be the impartial, cold, calculating decision-makers he needed after he was gone. I never knew anyone more cold and calculating than Major. That’s part of why his suicide didn’t surprise me. I took all of this out, though, because I still don’t think the company and my father’s estate affairs had anything to do with Major’s suicide. I still see it as his being outed by someone who could prove it. So maybe my advice to my father wasn’t good advice. Maybe Major would have been too vulnerable to threats of being outed, if he did what he was supposed to do for my father’s affairs. I remember, though, that in another email to my father during that time, I said Major was gay, to get it all on the table top. And I said his lawyer was gay, as well. Despite the ramifications this might have for the company and for my family, especially what I have written, it has been my father in my dreams who has been part of the consortium pushing me to tend to his unfinished business on the world, and to protect his company from Joann and its management and the board of directors. And Major’s affairs, too. I, the son my father had rejected completely. Ironic as hell, and I tell him that from time to time. And he keeps coming around from time to time with advice I need to hear in dreams, not related to any of this about Major and/or Golden Flake. He’s been doing that since our first real falling out in late 1995, which Joann had a large hand in instigating. I hope to God when I leave this world, I don’t have to look back and see what was really going on that I did not see, or did not want to see. I hope to God. The damage to Golden Fake is being done by Joann, and not just over the dividend policy. She is managing the company in ways that my father would never countenance. I hear plenty about it from people who used to work there and quit. It won’t surprise me if I am not moved back in that direction before it’s all over. How I feel about it won’t be given any weight by the Board of Directors. Maybe that’s where you should file your complaints.
 
From an old Birmingham lawyer buddy, who graduated from Princeton, where my father had attended before dropping out to marry my mother, who was threatening to marry any man who would save her from her Puritan parents (she told me this many times):

Rest in peace

A human being has so many skins inside, covering the depths of the heart. . ..  Why, thirty or forty skins or hides, as thick and hard as an ox’s or a bear’s, cover the soul. 

– Meister Eckhardt
 
Yesterday I learned a draft of the now infamous letter criticizing the Golden Flake dividend was found on a flash drive in Major’s abandoned car. Yesterday I was forwarded an Associated Press article in which Major’sfather-in-law spoke for the family, and said they are mystified why Major took his own life and wrote the now infamous letter criticizing Golden Flake’s dividend policy. The letter comparing the Bashinskys and other company owners (stockholders) to vampires sucking the life blood out of the company. I wrote back to the journalist, who once had interviewed me, and reminded him again that not all family members were mystified.

We who knew Major were not mystified. Like the Heathcliff he was, we knew he had deep secrets, which he told no one. We who knew him well knew this. We knew he was brittle. We knew he would break if enough pressure was put on him. We knew he might run.

We saw him run when his father married his second wife. He ran because he could not deal with knowing his father had been having an affair with the woman while our mother was still alive, and even during her last illness. We know he never got over it, and we know the letter was aimed at her, who ended up controlling nearly all of our father’s estate and getting most of its income for the rest of her life. Joann Bashinsky, we knew her then, and we know her now. She does not even have our blood coursing through her veins, yet our father turned almost everything over to her, a stranger, and he did it on purpose, to tell us how he really felt about his own flesh and blood. We who knew our father understood and accepted this, because we had gotten over trying to win his love. We who had not gotten over it, never accepted it, and we resented it. Major never got over it, and in his leaving, he pointed the finger right where it needed to be pointed, for those of us who would not be able to understand how tied he felt his hands were to do anything about what had tormented him since his father married Joann Linder of Nashville, Tennessee.

A marriage at which I was my father’s best man and carried the ring. A service that tagged me with being the one who called Joann out from that day forward, when she needed to be called out. A service I carried out faithfully, to the point I became the family black sheep whom not even my own siblings cared to have anything to do with. Yet in the end, it was our brother, it was Major, who made the statement heard around the Bashinsky world. It was Major who called Joann out, and may she ever remain called out, and her husband too. He simply was not a family man, and everyone who knew him, including his wife, our mother, knew it. May his soul rest in peace, even though his son Major’s soul does not.

We who knew Major and are tormented by what he did need to step outside of ourselves and start worrying about his soul’s plight. We need to stop being children and be adults. We need to face what has happened with our eyes wide open, for a change. We knew Major was a Heathcliff. We knew he had deep secrets. We knew he was brittle. We knew he would break if enough pressure was put on him. We knew he might run. We saw him run when his father married his second wife, because he could not deal with knowing his father had been having an affair with the woman while our mother was still alive, and even during her last illness. We knew Major never got over it, and we knew he never got over his father doing it.

And we know Major was Heathcliff and had deep secrets. We know it is in those secrets that lie why he did what he did. We know, because we know he could not stand to have those secrets aired out. Not in that prominent Southern Baptist family. Not in that prominent Alabama family company. Not in that Alabama Crimson Tide community. Not in that sports-driven little league society. Not in that exclusive country club. Not in that upscale social-climbing tiny Republican village. Not in that elder law practice for his father’s generation. Not in that staid by-the book Bar Association. Not in that conservative insular southern city. Not in that carefully sculpted portrait of a family man he had painted. We who knew Major knew he could not stand to have all of that dashed and shattered, and not run.

Major was bisexual. He had a horrible medical condition that prevented him from having conventional sexual intercourse for much, if not all of his life, which, along with his father’s philandering and lack of attention in his youth, might very well have driven him to be bisexual. He was vulnerable and exposed to every woman he was with intimately, and to every man. In San Francisco, in Key West, in St. Petersburg, where he had lived, he could be who he was and not have to worry much about being who he was. Not so in Birmingham, and especially not so in the tiny kingdom where he grew up and eventually chose to live out his Heathcliff life under the guise of being straight. Under the guise of being a family man. Under the guise of not being what deep, conflicting currents deep in him had created him to be. Currents we who knew him saw and felt many times, even if we did not see all of their nuances.

Major ran to where his effort to be straight started. He ran to Highland Park, where he played tennis after he moved back to Birmingham to attempt to be the son his father wanted him to be. Highland Raquet Club is where Major met his first wife, the tennis pro there. His first of two Alabama State Women’s Tennis Champion wives. Major ran to where it all started: his attempt to live what could only be an impossible dream. For the parts of himself he had to hide, to try to pull off that dream, simply would not state hidden. Nor could they stay hidden. They had to have their say, and when they spoke, it was dramatic. Like a Heathcliff, Major went away. Unlike a Heathcliff, we who knew him know why.

It’s time we who knew Major step outside of ourselves and be concerned for his soul. It’s time we who knew him admit we were unable to help him, even though we tried to help him. It’s time we who knew him ask God to help him. We have enough troubles of our own, caused by much the same things that drove Major to do what he did. We know only God can heal what caused Major to be who he was and drove him do what he did. We knew he was brittle. We knew he would break. We knew he would run if it ever got out who he really was. We knew he felt his hands were tied and he was choking to death trying to live up to the Golden Flake legacy. We knew he wanted his father’s acceptance, approval and blessing more than anything else. We knew he was his father’s favorite. And we knew he deeply resented his father. We knew because of the way he talked with us about his father. We knew it was not Joann but his father he was at war with. The Golden Flake label found in taped in his mouth proved it.

Let the one among us who knew Major and has not sinned cast the first stone at him. Let the rest of us who knew him say there but for the grace of God go I.

Amen

Seven Mile Bridge, below Marathon, which I sometimes call the new Mason-Dixon Line.

After seeing comments on the Birmingham News blog (al.com) and receiving emails from people yesterday challenging the county coroner’s determination that my brother Major committed suicide, I realized this was something I needed to at least put to rest in my own mind. I told one of my correspondents the Board of Directors would tell me in my sleep last night, if they disagreed with the coroner’s report, and if they said nothing, that was their way of saying they agreed with it. I heard nothing about Major all night, so I’m sticking with the forensic pathologist’s finding.
 
Down to earth, one of Major’s and my mutual north Georgia redneck friends said yesterday that Major had never killed himself before; he had never gotten to practice it. He was only going to get one chance, and he didn’t do it perfectly. When I said, you don’t get a mulligan when you kill yourself, the north Georgia redneck said said no, you don’t get a mulligan. When I said Major was smart enough to do it in a way that would leave a lot of people wondering what had really happened, the north Georgia redneck did not disagree.
 
I dreamt before dawn today of building bridges. Then I woke up and went online, to find this criticism from a fellow down here in the Keys. His views are shared by others in the Keys, in Birmingham, and elsewhere.
 
/////////////
 

Been a long time….. Old Friend?

Mr. Bashinsky,

     First off, good morning sir!  Secondly, I am sorry to hear about your brothers recent passing.  Beyond that, there really isn’t a whole lot of “kind” things I have to say to you, so I’ll just get on with it if you don’t mind me forgoing some of the “proper formalities”?  No?  Good, I didn’t think you would.

     Its been a long while since we’ve exchanged but I don’t want you to think I’ve forgotten about my old buddy, on the contrary, I’ve been watching you and reading your posts a great deal.  You still sicken me to the point of nausea, and I think every day you inch closer and closer to the legal point of down syndrome.  I have firm belief that there is something that is deteriorating your mind Sloan, and I wish you would go get that big ol’ egotistical mind of yours checked out sometime soon.  Maybe that way they can get you diagnosed and committed before you really break free from reality and harm someone, or even yourself.  I was and am glad you were not elected mayor, as it would have been a very scary day for us all.  Although, entertaining nonetheless, with all your public nut scratchings, unwanted sexual advances towards women, crazy ridiculous rants and tirades, social belching and farting, foul mouthed ramblings, self righteous stories of how god has directed you, and your countless other hilarious antics, that only serve to prove how much of a child-like below average intelligence cave man you are. 

     Lets talk about your brothers death for a moment.  I think you have serious mental and emotional issues, involved with your brother, that have tormented you your whole life.  Maybe you always thought “Daddy loved him more,” or “Mommy always picks Major over me,” or even “How comes Major has a bigger penis than me?”  I can’t exactly figure on why you have so much resentment for your brother, but it is glaringly obvious that you do.  I can think of NO OTHER REASON, a brother would verbally tear apart his own flesh and blood after his death.  Bygones should be bygones at that point.  I can only come to the conclusion that you have always wanted to confront your brother about possibly being  ehh humm “more endowed” than you, or whatever your crazy cranium has taken issue with him for, but never had the guts to do so, because deep down your a scared shit less 6 year old boy crying out for attention, using any means necessary to get it.  Now with his death, Sloan Bashinsky can go ahead and pick his brother apart in front of the whole world, show them how bad Major really was and “Look everyone, Mommy, Daddy, I’m a good boy, MAJOR WAS VERY BAD, PLEASE LOVE ME MORE!”  without fear of rebuttal.  I believe you have always been scared and intimidated by your brother, full of hate and resentment, never having the balls to say anything to him about it.  Well, go ahead Sloan, do him in now, shit he’s dead he can’t defend himself, whatever you say now will forever be the story with no chance of refuting what you say about him.  Your not a fucking man Sloan.  Your a despicable human being.  Lower than a fucking sewer rat.  Belittling a dead man is a sick thing to do.  I don’t care what your problem with him is or was, maybe he used to touch you inappropriately as youngsters.  Doesn’t matter, you don’t say nothing about a dead man, that hasn’t already been said, that’s the law of MAN.  If you wanted to confront him and throw his dirty laundry around, you should have done it like a man would have, when he was alive.  If it wasn’t important enough to talk about while he had ears to hear and a mouth to respond, it definitely isn’t worth talking about it now that he doesn’t.  Honestly, there’s a part of me that feels bad for you…. a 6 year old spoiled little boy trapped in the body of an old ugly bitter man, screaming out for the spotlight before he dies.  Then there is another part of me that feels quite the opposite.  That part of me would love to knock you right in the mouth sometime, punishment for all the scrutenizing you do of other people, as if you are the almighty judge himself.  I just want to bust that fat old quivering lip of yours wide open to show you that you are just mere mortal, you bleed blood, red as the rest of us.  Im sure you have heard the old rule “You dont speak badly about someone when they aren’t there to defend themselves”.  And here you are, badgering, slandering, and talking down of the dead…. your own god damned flesh and blood to boot.  Your a sick person Sloan.  SICK, SICK, SICK.  Your just running your mouth to steal some limelight from your dead brother, flapping your gums to get some attention from your brothers demise.  How dare you.  How god damned dare you.  I only hope that when your eventual demise comes to be, people will huddle over you and instead of mourning whatever good you have in you, they only reminisce about all the skeletons in your closet.  God knows you have them, we all do.  And like the good lord says, “Whats done in the dark, will be brought to the light”.  I’d be willing to bet everything I have, you have a lot darker demons hiding in your closet than your brother had in his….  Water in a shotgun, shut the fuck up you old cry baby.  My brother shot me in the temple with a BB gun when we were kids…  damn near killed me.  I love him today just as much as I loved him then, because thats what you do.  You love your family, come hell or highwater.  You dont have to like them, but you damn sure have to love them.  And you dont talk bad about a dead person, especially if you love them. 

      Sloan you are an old heartless fool, whose only desire and motivation on this earth is attention. This can be interpreted by the fact that you squandered all the money your daddy left you in his passing, trying to publish books that are just plain terrible, ridiculous. crazy, and uncomprehendable.  I know, I have tried to read a few.  Trying to “buy” your way into the limelight. I doubt god has instructed you to leave Key West, and move to on up the keys to a trailer… more so, probably your bank account has given you that instruction.  That’s ok though, most people in Key West are probably thinking this but not saying it, so please allow me to be their voice and represent them for a moment….. “Goodbye and good fucking riddance!”

        In closing, you have the mind of a bratty little 6 year old child.  Your brother has died Sloan, show some real emotion, sorrow, disappointment, depression, and lastly some fucking respect for the departed.  Like my father always said……  There’s no need to run the dead into the ground, they’re already there.

        It’s been swell talking with you again Sloan, I look forward to your awkward and pointless defenses of your obvious child like masturbations over your brothers name and family in tomorrows post. I’m sure you will come up with something totally fucking mind-numbing.  Till next time….

                                                                                                                   Adeu Old Friend,

                                                                                                                          Greg Greggerson

 //////////////////

My thoughts:

I don’t remember ever seeing Major naked after he reached puberty, so I have no idea what his endowment looked like. The only thing Major ever did that I envied was master snow skiing, at which I remained a klutz until my interest in it faded away. Like my interest in a whole lot of sports hobbies faded away, until they had all faded away. As for my coming on to women, I confess some women do turn my head. Sometimes I say to a woman that she’s causing me to wonder where my digitalis is, and that seems to get a laugh. But I don’t chase women, I don’t pressure them, and I know even if a woman chased me, unless it was okay’d by the Board of Directors, it would be embarrassing for both the woman and me. I haven’t been with a woman in over five years. I miss that, but I don’t miss the hell the Board of Directors put her and me (and her predecessors, one at a time) through. In some ways, being a monk has been easier, even as the deep longing for a mate pines unabated in my body and soul. Alas, she’d have to be a lot like me for it to work, and she’d have to be prepared to be beaten with a stick and lured by a carrot that she sometimes almost but never quite catches. Not a strong sales pitch, I’m not left wanting to hold my breath for her to come along and go for it. People who know me well, know I never wanted to have anything to do with Major’s disappearance. I knew generally what would happen if I was put into it. I wanted a pass, but I wasn’t give one. Nor did I expect to be given one. Major’s soul is in serious trouble. If someone doesn’t help, there could be hell to pay. Because I understand this, because I have a deep bond with Major, because I know the terrain, it falls on me to do what I knew from the beginning would upset many people. The details I did not know going in. I never know the details ahead of time. I do what I’m told to do and the details start falling into place. One step at a time, it goes. Steps arranged by the Board of Directors, who see the big picture and know what step needs to come next. I seldom know what to do next. I know I am blind and need to be led. I know I will screw everything up, if I start acting as if I’m the Board of Directors. I also know I will screw everything up if I let other people replace the Board of Directors. I listen to what other people say, then I ask the Board of Directors to comment. If they agree with what I have been told by a person, they tell me they argree. If they disagree, they tell me they disagree. If they argee in part and disagree in part, they tell me where they agree and where they disagree. As for my foul  mouth, cussing is the one thing the Board of Directors have not made me give up. They made me give up drinking. They made me give up being in charge. They made me give up trying to make things happen to suit me. But they did not make me give up cussing, although sometimes they get onto me when I cuss in situations they feel it isn’t okay. I cuss all the time when I talk to them. I bet anyone would cuss all the time, too, who had the Board of Directors on his/her case 24-7, 365. I’m not cussing in this moment, because I don’t feel like cussing. If I felt like it, you would be reading cuss words right now. God hears everything I think, even if I don’t say it. Before God I’m naked as the moment I was born. What a huge amount of engery it takes to hold everything in, trying to hide it. What problems that creates. What a mess living in that way made of me. What a mess it made of Major, who contrived his own death to look like something else. As for my moving back to Little Torch Key, I dreaded it and I wrote about that a great deal. However, now that I’m back up here, in the woods with Miss Kitty and Ranger, two cats I adopted from the animal shelter in Key West, I’m glad I’m back. I don’t miss Key West. I don’t have the urge to get in my car and drive down there, which is very different from when I lived up here four years ago. The Board of Directors were wise to humor my resistance and nudge me back up here. They didn’t beat me with a stick over it, because they knew it had been really rough for me when I lived up here before. Rough in a human way, rough in spirit ways. I’m feeling better in body and soul since the move back than I have felt in a very long time. When I drove down US 1 a few miles last night to hear some great Thursday night music at Mangrove Mamas and have dinner, a fellow walked over and said, “Welcome back to the Lower Keys, Sloan.” It feels better each day to be back. I hope that trend continues.

Sloan Bashinsky

Scout Carr’s photo on Facebook

Received this comment on goodmorningfloridakeys.com, in response to yesterday’s “The Dog That Didn’t Bark” post:
 
“Harper Lee tells us it’s wrong to kill a mockingbird . . . “
 
Once upon a time I had a poem about a mockingbird burst out of me as fast as I could write it. I’ll save it for desert today. I wrote most of today’s post last night, and it is rough and can stand some sweetening. The part written yesterday is set off in ///// marks.
 
/////
 

I received an email correction to yesterday’s post, in which I said I had been told by someone that my brother Major had done securities transactions for his clients without a securities license, and perhaps that had something to do with my having heard he was talking with the FBI before he went missing.

Good morning,

I have been following your blog since the whole story broke and I have enjoyed reading your past blogs.

I did want to comment on your blog today (3/24). Major did have all securities licenses needed to sell any kind of investment he wanted. Even though he was an attorney, his main business was an investment advisor practice thru First Protective, a subsidiary of Protective Life. Although I do not know for sure, his business seemed to be legit, so I would lean more towards his personal life for the reasons behind his suicide. I just thought you should know.

I hope you find closure and peace.

I wrote back that I was glad this had been cleared up. Not long after that, I received an email containing a Birmingham News online update saying the county coroner had ruled Major’s death was suicide, accompanied by comments that he faked it to make it look like someone else had killed him.

Horrible as Major’s death was, my next thought was, if the coroner had ruled it was homicide, my father’s side of the Bashinsky family would have lived out their days wondering when they would be next.

For my family’s sake, I thought and said to a few friends, Major could not be allowed to get away with it. Nor for his sake. For whatever he did in his life that harmed others, he took with him and must reckon with in spirit.

It then came to me that Major’s soul had agreed to this airing out, to be cleard of some of this horrible thing Major did. By serving as a public role model, Major is a caution to all who might be tempted to take matters into their own hands, even to the extent of making it look like something it is not.

As the day went on, yet another thought came to me: I still don’t know what set Major off. I still don’t know who leaned on him, which drove him to do what he did. I’m convinced someone did lean on him in some way he could not defeat, over something he felt he could not live with being made public.

The more I thought about it today, the more I felt I was going to be taken into it, to get to the bottom of it. Then I found myself thinking someone or someones will end up getting real uncomfortable; like nobody might want to be in their shoes when I am shown who it was, and what this person was threatening to expose about Major, which pushed him over the edge.

This is in no way meant to defend what Major did. I wonder if he realized the terror he would strike into the hearts of every Bashinsky on my father’s side of the family, except probably me. I hope Major never even thought of that effect, for if he did think of it and went ahead anyway, then woe indeed be unto his soul. For his soul’s sake, therefore, and for my father’s side of the family’s sake, we all should give thanks Major did not get away with it.

Now is it time to learn who drove Major to do what he did. Who was it that hung something so heavy and, for him, so horrible, mean-spirited and unbearable over his head, that he killed himself to avoid it? I now am convinced it was something personal and not of a business nature. Something so embarrassing he felt he could not live through its exposure.

/////

Just before dawn, I had a dream that, on waking, would turn me toward a Birmingham couple I have known most of my life. But just before I came out of the dream, I heard a person’s name. A woman’s name. The same name mentioned by Major’s old girlfriend, who told me about him having a severe case of Peyroine’s disease, which prevented him from having sexual intercourse with her. The name of an even earlier girlfriend of Major, according to the woman who told me about the Peyroine’s disease. The name of woman I had known only on sight and by reputation, but I had known people pretty well who knew and ran with her.

Before I turned in last night, the woman in the couple my dream would turn me toward forwarded a news update on Major’s suicide and his attempt to disguise it as murder. This was the first email I’d ever gotten from her. We have not seen each other in years. Even longer since we had any kind of conversation. I wrote back saying I felt it was time for me to find out who pushed Major over the edge, and over what.

This couple used to live across the street from me in Mt. Brook. The husband has been receiving my posts for years. I’m pretty sure, no, I’m more than pretty sure this couple know this even older of Major’s girlfriends. That’s why I am asking them to go have a talk with this woman. In the spirit of friendship and respect for the dead and the living, I ask then to talk with Scout Carr, and then report back to me how she handled being told that Sloan Bashinsky said there is a special place in hell reserved for her, for threatening Major with public exposure of his Peyroine’s disease.

Someone indeed did kill Major – Scout Carr. His attempt to make it look like someone else killed him was based in fact. No way could Major have coped with the effect such a disclosure, accompanied by likely further disclosure that he was bisexual, would have on him, and on his two wives and on his and their children. No way could Major have coped with that. No way.  

His brother

I happened upon a mockingbird

singing its fool head off.

I asked it how and why it sang,

But all it did was look ahead,

All it did was sing.

It never turned to see if I was watching,

Or listened for money jingling in my pockets,

Or asked if I liked its music,

Or expected a recording contract –

It was too busy singing

to pay any attention to me.

Thus did I learn

The greatest sin of all

It to kill a mockingbird.

Major Bashinsky

Here’s the link for my taped interview a few days ago by Shanisty Myers of Channel 42 Television in Birmingham. Wait on the whole page to appear, and you will see the link for the interview on the top right side of the page. It is about the Major I knew growing up and later, before he and I were estranged. Also something toward the end about my father and Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant’s relationship.

http://www.cbs42.com/content/mediacenter/default.aspx?videoId=17845@wiat.dayport.com&navCatId=179 

Then, an email reply to yesterday’s “Memorial - Major Bashinsky” post from an Alabama lawyer amigo with whom I used to paddle white water rivers, including the one featured in “Deliverance.” Back in those days, Hawkman was the lead trial lawyer in his city’s Public Defender program. He was assigned and tried the very worst cases, including capital cases. He all along has felt Major took his own life, as have I.

Sloan,

I think you are exactly correct about Major’s Soul decision to leave the body, likely for the reasons you state.

The Soul removal for the Higher Good was made manifest to me when my mother developed cancer quite suddenly and was gone in a matter of weeks.  She was seven years younger than my father and had always enjoyed good health.   During my father’s health decline over half a year before his transition, I realized mother had decided to leave(at the Soul level)  so she would not be there to take care of Daddy during his waning months and my two brothers and I would have a lot of one on one time with him.  That time was wonderful in terms of my older brother and Daddy resolving some issues and for all three of his sons to see him evolve into a warm, humble, thankful, example of a Soul shift in who he was for the better.   It became clear to me Mama took her leave so that all this might transpire, as Major left so that those left behind might experience a higher good.

I think you are the anchor for your family during this “tragedy” because you are the one who understands the Spirit work that is going on.  Though they don’t appreciate your understanding, may disagree with it, be angry with you and continue their view of you as the “black sheep,”  at some point they or some of them will understand.   

Hawkman

And an email yesterday from an “intuitive,” who recently contacted me by email after learning of me in the Birmingham media. We have been corresponding for a few days, and she is “picking up things” that seem to agree with what I have been sensing has happened to Major. She also picked up something that indicated my sense that Major wrote the letter criticizing Golden Flake’s dividends, which was found in his car after he went missing, and also in his and my sister’s home mailboxes the day he went missing.

 Hi Sloan, 

I hope you have had a decent day – seems a lot of information for you to deal with, not knowing the answer.  This must be very frustrating for you!  I hope you are getting enough rest and all.  I feel that people are beginning to pay attention to you and to what you have to say, your popularity is growing.  You make a lot of sense even though some people try to block it out.

The sun finally came out today!

And a comment logged on goodmorningfloridakeys.com to yesterday’s “Memorial – Major Bashinsky” post.
After reading the news on 42, I found your blog and decided to see what the lure was to this totally complex story. It was not what I was expecting. It was much more.
As I thought about sending a note of condolence, I found I had feelings of awkwardness. Words are not enough, although it is all most of us have to offer those we don’t know. I am sorry for your loss. I am touched by the things I’ve heard and read over the last few weeks and even tho I am certain you have friends and family who care about you and your family, I am not one of those people you know. I do not know you or your family. I am not an acquaintance.
I do know Golden Flake. This is reminding me of the scene in “One Flew Over the Coocoo’s Nest.” The scene is with the Indian man in the story Jack Nicholson refers to as “Chief” and the offer of a piece of chewing gum. The “Chief” has not spoken throughout the entire movie until this moment and he simply says, “Um. Juicy Fruit.”

I have thoroughly enjoyed your writing and can hardly wait to read Heavy Wait. That one is first. Then, later, the others.

This is rather odd, I know, I am sorry to have learned of you from the bad news about your brother. I am glad to have found your blog and it’s so enlightening, encouraging and entertaining.
 

So I must tell you -Thank you.

Louise

And this web link forwarded to me yesterday, excerpts from which are reproduced below: http://legalschnauzer.blogspot.com/2010/03/major-bashinsky-and-curious-actions-of.html

While conducting research for a post, I checked the Bar’s online directory last Thursday evening for information about Major Bashinsky. This was about 48 hours after his body had been positively identified and roughly three days before an obituary would appear in the local newspaper. But Major Bashinsky’s record on the Alabama State Bar Web site already had been wiped clean.It’s possible that an official death certificate had not even been prepared at that point. But it was already as if Major Bashinsky never existed for the Alabama State Bar.

The coroner’s report has yet to come out, which suggests to me this not a clear-cut death in law enforcement’s eyes. I told someone yesterday, which I’d stated to other people, that even if the coroner’s report says it was homicide, I won’t believe it until the Board of Directors tells me to believe it. Based on what I’ve been receiving in dreams and other spirit ways, including dreams other people have had, and what the intuitive is picking up, Major was a deeply tormented man. He was desperate and felt trapped, and all signs point toward suicide. I was contacted by one of Major’s former girlfriends, who dated him a short while, before he met his first wife to be. She said he was unable to penetrate and have intercourse sex because of a physical deformity (Peyroine’s disease) that severely affected his erection. She was reluctant to reveal this and does not want to be dragged into it. I looked up Peyroine’s disease online. In severe cases, which this woman described Major having had when she dated him, it has no good medical outcome. I found myself seeing how that could have pushed Major to be bisexual. I saw how someone could hang the condition and/or Major being bisexual over his head, and how, faced with public disclosure and humiliation, he could have killed himself and perhaps done it in a way to make it look like someone else may have done it. I was told law enforcement had wondered if Major was left-handed (he was not), which immediately caused me to think law enforcement was trying to determine if he had shot himself. Major’s oldest daughter told a friend of mine he was shot in the left temple. A right-handed person bent on shooting himself in the head would normally shoot right-handed at a part of his head the pistol muzzle could reach. Unless maybe that right-handed person was trying to make it look like someone else did it. I also heard Major’s body was found with his hands tied behind his back, which, if true would seem to have ruled out suicide immediately and there would have been no public talk by law enforcement of suicide. Yet law enforce twice was reported in the news after the body was found, as saying it did not know if it was homicide or suicide. I have heard it was reported in the news that Major was talking with the FBI about something before he disappeared. Perhaps he was under investigation and it was about to become public. I was told by someone who ought to know, of Major having charged commissions for security transactions he made for one of his clients. He had no securities license and could not charge commissions. Perhaps the FBI was involved in that. If you knew Major as I knew him, as others knew him, you would have no qualms thinking something happened he could not handle and he killed himself. What still puzzles me is why the FBI never contacted Major’s first wife or me, to develop a profile? I can only imagine the FBI knew something all along that caused them to feel they didn’t need to canvass people beyond Major’s immediate family, and all they did not know was where he was. Either that, or they are not very good FBI agents.

In deference to Sherlock Holmes, what dog did not bark? There was no contact from a kidnapper. No ransom demand. There was only silence until Major’s body was noticed by golfers on a Monday, 12 days after he disappeared, in a shallow pond at Highland Golf Course. The course had been heavily used by golfers and a tournament crowd the Saturday before. Ergo, the body got into the pond after the golf tournament ended on Saturday. 10 days ago, the body was found. Yet still nothing from the coronor’s office when I checked al.com this morning. Why hasn’t that dog barked? Was it waiting on the Memorial service to be held, out of respect to the family? Or is that dog still scratching its head?

Special Agent Molder reporting

Today is my brother Major’s memorial service in Birmingham.
 
Shanisty Myers of Channel 42 Television in Birmingham did another phone interview about Major with me last night. She said she was going to try to get her and my previous interview, taped at my request, online in its entirety today. She seemed to agree it would be fitting for it to be available on the day of the memorial service. Lots of stories and memories I imagine many people will never hear otherwise, and would like to know. Also some tales about Major’s and my father and Bear Bryant perhaps not generally known and/or forgotten. I told Shanisty it was arranged by God for us to have our talks, and I was glad for it.

Received this next below by email later last night from my maternal first cousin, Charles “Bubba” Major, the family golf champion, and more. At age 16, Bubba blew away the entire field at the Alabama State (Men’s) Amateur Golf Championship, played that year at the Selma Country Club, as I recall the location:

“Bash, hope all is well–have been following your blogs, and want you to know i have been thinking about you and the tragedy the familyhas been going thru, sorry you will not be here tomorrow for the service but do understand somewhat, brother Jim will not be attending either, but thats ok too. You probably did not know that I ran Highland Golf Course for 15 yrs 83-98 and thought it was ironic that they found Major’s body at Highland Golf Course, still have not heard the cause of death, but guess it will come out soon. For the record there is no way the body could have been there several days, without being seen because Hooters had golf tourney there Sat and had over 120 people going by that pond every 3 minutes. I saw Major every day at bcc for past year in 19th hole at 5.30 am every morning, he would be reading paper and drinking coffee and we would chat and talk about golf and his son holt, and how proud he was about his golf. Sissy and I see each other at church often and when i saw her this past sunday we both got quite emotional. She asked me to sit with the family tomorrow but have decided to pass for reasons that hard to explain.  Big Jim would be very upset with this tragedy, he always thought the world of you, major, and sissy. I know we have not been that close over the years, but wanted to take this time to let you know I was thinking about you and the old days, will never forget the time you and martin williams took me bone fishing at the fish house years ago.

your cousin charles bubba major”
 

Background note: Major’s body was spotted by golfers Monday following the Hooters tournament. He went missing 12 days before his body was found. He was alive most of that time. There was no ransom demand. There was no note to law enforcement or the family or the media. There was only silence. And there was the dream the Birmingham woman had two days after Major went missing; the Birmingham woman who never remembered her dreams. She saw Major pacing the side of the swimming pool at the Birmingham County Club. She did not see but felt Holt’s presence in the swimming pool. I felt then, and published it, that I took that dream to mean Major was still alive and was in a deep soul struggle. Otherwise, why would this woman I didn’t even know have the dream? And why did she then look up my website and write to me? It was arranged by God, that’s why.   

And this comment last night to goodmorningfloridakeys.com from someone I don’t know personally:
 
“I am sorry for your brother even though I do not know him nor do I know you.

“I am mostly sorry for the pain that families inflict upon their children, scars stay with us while we live on this earth.
 
“also, I enjoy your poems of life.

“Truth is good, I believe what you have written.

“Sheila P.
 
And this on Facebook yesterday, from someone I don’t know personally:

“Hi Sloan,

“Thanks for being my friend on Facebook. Let me know if I can do anything to help your family. We are so sad about Major and send our love, prayers and assistance if needed. I haven’t seen Elizabeth in a while but would love to. I am in real estate as a broker and would love to work with your family if needed.

“Blessings!

“Lynn

My reply back to Lynn:

“The family black sheep, I have no influence that I know of in my side, or in any side, of the Bashinsky family. I don’t even know what anyone is up to, other than I know Major is dead and I read some online interviews with Leslie.

“I’m trying to get to the real bottom of what is going on, what led up to this. The work in the spirit is rough and seems to be going deeper and might well be getting rougher, maybe a lot rougher.

“I suppose I will continue writing about it for a while, in different ways, and posting it to the Today’s FlaKey Drivel file in the home page menu of goodmorningfloridakeys.com. Some get virus/trojan horse alerts when they go to the sister website: goodmorningkeywest.com. The fellow who built both websites cannot find anything in goodmorningkeywest.com, and it never shows up when I open it. But to be safe, the other website should be used.

“The work I do today is a far cry from the work I did as a lawyer that let to my writing HOME BUYERS: Lambs to the Slaughter?, in 1983. Curiously, the woman who did the cute illustrations in that book recently contacted me by email after hearing of Major’s trouble and finding my website. Lots of stuff seems to be coming back around for me as I go through this. Horrible for Major’s young children by Leslie. How do children that age cope with something like this? I don’t see how they can cope.

“Major and I were not close. I found myself feeling recently that in some ways I maybe have grieved his and my relationship many years ago.

“Sloan

Did you notice how I dealt with Lynn’s totally out-of-bounds attempt to solicit real estate business from my family, under a thinly-disguised cover of a condolence post to Facebook? Some things, real estate brokers/agents, for example, never change.

My dreams last night left me feeling on waking that this truly terrible situation is going to be used to initiate an attempt by the Board of Directors (Jesus, Michael, Melchizedek and the Holy Spirit) to explain God’s ways a little differently than were explained to me when I was growing up. A time frame of one-year was given. Can’t say I’m looking foward to it, but I suppose we should get started.

If Major was the family man he is being touted to be, how come he was in 19th Hole at the Birmingham County Club at 5:30 every morning, bragging about Holt’s golf achievements, instead of at home with Leslie and Holt and his younger sister, helping them get ready to start the day, having breakfast together, talking about this and that? I published that Major was taken out because he could not be allowed to repeat with Holt what he had done with his first son, Brooks. He made Brooks an extension of himself, through sports. It destroyed Brooks. It could not be allowed to happen again. At the level of soul, Major came to terms with this and took himself out. At the human level, something happened that triggered the soul response. I now may know what it was, but I’m not ready to publish it.

All who decide to stick with this coming through me have my sincere condolences. Those who don’t stick with it, I understand, but know this: it will come back around again, and it will keep coming back around until you stick with it. This course in mirrors is not elective; only the time you choose to take it is open to some degree of flexibility.

As I have told a few people lately, I’m just a donkey on which the Board of Directors ride and beat me with a stick and dangle a carrot in front of my nose, which I sometimes almost catch.

Sloan Bashinsky

Tomorrow is my brother Major’s memorial service in Birmingham, of which I learned yesterday afternoon. For a variety of reasons, including being told by the Board of Directors to stay down here in the Keys, I will not be there.
 
Here are very recent email comments from people with Birmingham ties: 
 
1) Just had an hour talk with your name-sake, Sloan Bashinsky. [Major's first child]. Ran into her working my job at the Summit. She thinks suicide. Gunshot to the left temple.

I have known this man since 2005.
 
2) And I would bet that the “cause” of Major’s death is at the service; now go sleep on that.
 
I have known this man since grammar school. He is the old friend who took me to task, described in yesterday’s “Love & Freedom” post. 
 
3) Sloan, for what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re a nut; a little unconventional, but not a nut.  Something about having the alone time, not being bombarded with daily crap, etc allows a person to get in touch with a higher level of … well whatever you want to call it. 

Well hell!!  The post [she put yesterday's "Love & Freedom" post on the Birmingham News blog] didn’t last long, it’s already been removed.  Geesh Sloan, they REALLY don’t  like you do they?  I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have laughed, but I couldn’t help it – people in the south are as slow and backward thinking as it gets.  Sometimes I hate admitting where I’m from.

This woman emailed me out of the blue a few days ago and introduced herself. The Birmingham News had blocked me out of its blog, and at my invitation she started putting the text of my posts up there.

4) My dear Sloan– You’re so totally together and peaceful and, I think, wise. I’m amazed at what people will say, and of what they’ll accuse you. There was, I’m sure you know, an article about his family in the paper this morning, complete with photographs. I thought Major’s toothy smile looked a bit forced– but what a pretty family! What else can anybody do but wait to see what may have happened? At least Major’s out of it, and I hope he’s finally at peace.

And now I’m sayin’ what I believe: You’re tormented because you see things most folks can’t see, and you have to interpret them to philistines and boneheads. You know enough not to get bent out of shape when people get angry with you or say stupid things. Just keep me posted, and I will send any puny prayers I can muster — “puny” because my understanding is dim–to keep you robed about with Spirit and Safety. You know what kind of safety I mean.

To make sure nobody misunderstands, the last writer meant spiritual, not physical, safety. She has known me since 1974. She is a deacon and sings in the choir at Independent Presbyterian Church on Highland Avenue in Birmingham. That church lies about a block and a half from where Major’s body was found last Monday in a golf course pond lying a short distance from Highland Avenue.

Sloan Bashinsky

 Today is Sunday. Three days ago, I received a lovely email from my old gay Birmingham girlfriend, who became and remains like a sister to me. She ended by saying she was going to pray for me to have a peaceful night’s sleep. Then, she caught herself and said she would not do that. because my nights had gone very rough in the past after such prayers were made for me. Then, she caught herself again and said she was going to do it anyway.
 
Around 6 p.m. that evening, I received an email from Shannisty Myers, a journalist at Channel 42 TV, in Birmingham. She already had interviewed me, and this time she wanted to know if I could tell her anything about Major’s earlier years. She was doing a piece on Major Bashinsky, the person. She provided her phone number. When I left Key West that evening, to spend the first night back in my trailer, with all of the rats in it, on Little Torch Key, about 30 miles up US 1 from Key West, I called Shanisty. I asked her to tape the interview, and she said she would call me back after she had it set up for taping.
 
When she called back, I said she could keep me company during my drive up to my new home. I had lived there in 2006-07. Then I was moved by the Board of Directors to Key West. Now I was being moved back. We talked about twenty minutes. It came from the heart. It was very different from anything I had published so far about Major and his disappearance. I told Shanistry I had grieved Major’s passing many years before, but perhaps after this hard work I was doing passed, I would grieve again. I said I felt some emotion coming up.
 
I said I had told some people earlier in the day that I had yet to have any dreams about how Major was doing. I was surprised by that, because just a few days after my father died, I heard in a dream, “Chips going to heaven.” Potato chips were my father’s trade, so I knew Chips was my father. I told Shanisty what I’d told the other people earlier in day: now that I had voiced it, maybe I would dream like that about Major.
 
I did not tell Shanisty that I then started feeling really sick, like I had been poisoned. I was cold all night. My sleep was very rough. I dreamt of my mother, sister and second wife, and the rat I reached up and grasped in the air above me, which I described in yesterday’s post. All of which caused me to feel I had been rebuked by the Board of Directors for giving the interview with Shanisty.
 
After reading my ensuing post (yesterday’s), one of my oldest, dearest Birmingham amigos emailed a truly severe rebuke. He’d been with me all through this. He’d acted as if he was mostly in line with me about what I had written about about Major’s disappearance itself. He said he was very upset over the effect my recent writings, especially yesterday’s post, would have on Major’s wife and her children.
 
I sent a personal reply, which I thought I might be asked to publish today. However, my old friend came to me in a dream last night, as a General, and gave me a song he had found about love and the heart, which a young woman, perhaps it was Shanisty, started singing. I added to the song, when I tried to sing it, that it was about the heart and the soul. The heart becomes the soul when we die; and it was about freedom, I said in the dream. My friend the General started to object, then he said he was okay with my addition to the song.
 
In my email yesterday, I told my friend, the General in dream time, that it is possible for us to help a soul who has passed over, by doing something on this world to help that soul finish up its work here, so it can move on to something else in spirit. I compared it to my father coming to me after he died and asking me to try to get his estate in better order, which I attempted to do, albeit not successfully it seemed. Following Major’s disappearance, I wrote some about that, and it now seemed I was making another pass at it for my father, even as I felt it again wasn’t causing anything to change on this world. I wondered if what I was writing about Major was indeed an attempt to help him leave this world behind and began the next part of his existence? I have told a number of people that I hope Major is in a better place now, as have a number of people told me they hoped Major is now in a better place.
 
I said I wondered, because I do not know even now if it was about that. Or, if it was about that, I do not know if it helped Major’s soul. People often pray for departed souls. Perhaps this was my given way of praying for Major. I simply do not know. I do know I dreaded what I knew would come when I learned of Major’s disappearance. I wanted nothing to do with it. I wanted to be left alone. And, I knew I would not be left alone. I knew I would be put into the heart of it, and I knew it would upset people. I knew, because it had always gone that way before, when I was put into the heart of something. Hundreds of times, it had gone that way. There never had been a happy ending, nor a sense of any good coming from it. Yet, I was told over and over again, by the Board of Directors, the attempt has to be made. So I keep making the attempt, even as I keep wishing I am not involved, or even on this world.
 
About three months ago, my father came to me in a dream and said he would meet me on the ship on March 20. Yesterday was March 20. Yesterday, I finished moving all of my stuff from my little rented flat in Key West back to my trailer on Little Torch Key. Yesterday, I posted what so upset my old amigo in Birmingham. A post I knew would upset him, and many people. A post that upset me to put up. A post I have no doubt I was told to put up. The words were mine, but the subject matter was given to me by the Board of Directors, even as the Board gave me the subject matter of this post today. Every day with the Board is different. The tone, flavor, depth and subject changes daily.
 
I get up each day and go to work. I deal with what is in front of me. It is my life. Sometimes something happens that I enjoy. Sometimes I laugh. Sometimes I cut up with friends. But the work never stops, and it is true: when people prayed for me to have it easier, or that I get a good night’s rest, the very opposite occurred. I ask my friends not to pray for me in that way. I ask them simply to pray that God’s will be done for Sloan, and that he sees what he needs to see. I don’t remember ever hearing anyone tell me about making that prayer for me. I can understand people wanting God to ease up on me, but my experience continues to tell me they are wasting their breath praying in that way. If God eases up on me, I will not have the experiences I need to leave this world free of it. I will leave this world with a great deal of baggage, which I will have to deal with in spirit.
 
I know this because I was told it by the Board of Directors. Many times I was told it. I also was told many times that love is not what I think it is, or what other people think it is. Love is something I’m still learning. Maybe it is something I will be learning for the rest of my existence as a soul. A poem, probably the defining poem of my life with God came to me in April 1994. It laid out my life ahead, without giving any details. I have posted it quite a few times before. Here is again.
 
Earth,
The sacred prism through which
souls are refracted into their elemental parts,
Purified in Holy Fire,
Then one-forged and sent on their way
to not even God knows where,
simply because they are all
unique emanations of God,
Evolving . . .

 
I much prefer that “theology” to the cold-hearted heaven-or-hell option offered by Christianity. The poem was given to me by Jesus, Michael, Melchizedek, and the Holy Spirit.
 
Another poem they gave to me, in 2000, was:
 
Paradise:
All fig leaves burn,
All ugly seen,
All truth beauty,
All pain loved,
All time now,
All people one.
 
Another poem they gave, in 1993, was:
 
God’s gifts are not for sale,
But are freely given to
angels, saints, sinners, devils and fools alike,
For all are God’s children.
 
Another poem, in 1993, was:
Black is white,
White is black,
When they fuse,
Rainbows bloom.
 
Another poem, in 1995 was:
 
Love and Truth,
Two sides of the same coin,
They live together,
Or die.
 
Freedom is just another word for nothing left to loose . . . Janise Joplin killed herself, but left behind her soul’s song we shall never forget . . .
 
Maybe Channel 42 TV will publish online Shanisty’s and my interview about Major Bashinsky, unedited.
 
Amen.
 
Sloan Bashinsky