Richie’s turning 30 in 2 months and has been on the run for the past 7 years. He’s hid out in the mountains of Nepal, escaped South Korea’s powerful police force, trekked through the Peruvian highlands and paddled the thick, chocolaty, Amazon on a little wooden canoe, dodging Caymans, with nothing but an oar and a flashlight. I was with him the day he got bit on the nipple by a piranha, he wouldn’t stop talking about it- it hurt him so much that even his sun-faded dress shirt was too sensitive. Richie always wore collared shirts no matter the heat, always a collar.
His grandmother always told him “put on a collared shirt, you might meet a nice Jewish girl”. Neither Richie, nor his grandmother were Jewish, and this always questioned him about his grandmother. But, growing up he always wore collared shirts, even when going to the supermarket to pick up a french baguette, he would spend at least 30 minutes trying to find the right shirt for the day.
The reason he always likes to look nice, is because he believes that each and every time he walks past his front door, he is throwing himself into a life altering decision.
Hoped he met a nice Jewish girl.
Richie and Art became great friends and spent 2 years of their lives together travelling the globe getting into the craziest of stories, that one could only dream, or to have dreamed up. In their time together they both had women in and out of their lives
And were both really living with the concept that they were always on the move and with that comes the sacrifice of never letting yourself time to get to know someone. This bothered them both greatly and had many discussions weighing the toll it takes on ones soul vs. the pleasure of having complete and total freedom- obviously you know by know which lifestyle got hit out of the park each time: Homerun freedom 11 times out of 10:
That’s what he thought and at least believed that he loved for said time now.
Richie bid me farewell and left the same day by boat from the Galapogos Islands preparing to arrive home in time for his parent’s anniversary. His parents were celebrating their 30 anniversary in style, making reservations at an upscale sushi house- word has it, that the chef flew to China to learn new, fresh techniques in the art of sushi. Before bringing it back to my homeland.
Now this would be all well and good, the only quip being that, Richie’s parents haven’t been together in the past 22 years- not even a smidgen, in fact Richie's father remarried and divorced a second time, while his mother dated a little but every guy turned out to be gay, talk about a happy ending.
Richie meets a girl on the plane
Richie meets a girl at the bagel deli
Richie meets a girl taking his parents dog for a walk in the woods, while he is home
Only for a short time before returning to Asia to pursue his career in photography, he has
to decide whether she’s worth “settling down” for or if he’ll keep on running. And the worst part of it is, who to settle down with- Richie fell in love easy and had met a lovely girl traveling abroad that he was also interested in- what to do?
I try to convince Richie to stay, because he is a great friend and I need him, we have been on some amazing journeys and we got along so well. Richie needs me, he is too indecisive and when he asks me what to do, I am going to lure him back to Asia, and away from this girl. Meanwhile, Richie had gone out with woman a handful more times and each time they ended up sleeping at one another’s house, but only drenched themselves in the art of conversation- they had amazing discussions on life, and what it holds, they shared the same taste in music, and even held their own stock of independence. Richie drove to her house one morning and they spent the day taking a tour of ginger’s home town- Richie finally had some good time to get to know ginger, and they talked and shopped all day. They went back to the house after a long day, and ginger left to go for a run, Richie knowing ginger was a free spirit thought nothing of this, and used this time to make a checklist of things that he needed to take responsibility about in his life. Richie really liked this girl ginger and on a list of 9 things he needs in his life he was going to put ginger down as number 10- making reference to gingers note on the fridge of things that she had to do today, where Richie was number 10. Richie thought this would be an exciting way to start a relationship, anyways, they flirted enough, and he wanted to know her intentions. Richie nervous of the decision, and knowing that this is a life altering decision, gets scared out of writing it. Just then ginger comes running into the house, making her way to the kitchen, she comes and hugs Richie. Richie laughed, jokingly pushing ginger away “ awww your dripping, get away from me”.
This went on for a little bit before talking about making dinner, they decided on greek salad with garlic bread- they soon began preparing it, but ginger had not showered, she loom the kitchen with a sticky glow, Richie backing away from making a comment.
They sat down to eat, while putting on a movie, and ate before Richie soon fell asleep.
Richie asks me for my opinion on his dilemma, giving me a slimy opportunity to tell him to dump the broad and come back to an amazing lifestyle abroad, where he can have any woman he wants: I often quote myself saying “ I love home, but what I love even more, is being abroad”- Everyone always laugh when I say that, I think it probably hits home for a lot of people. But what I mean is that, the world is so big and I just want to see every square inch of it, and doing that with Richie has been some of the most amazing times in my life that I don’t think I can lose it. I will do anything to get Richie to leave the girl and come travel with me, we’ve talked of so many plans- I get excited just thinking about it. We are going to start a business up one day in Colombia providing a tourism company, taking the edge off of the global fear of the unknown country. But this new girl is going to ruin everything, she will take my position and Richie will run off with her, leaving me literally high and dry, being the altitude and climate of my studio bachelor apartment. So I tell Richie, that I don’t think she is the one, if she’s not going to make the effort to be clean for you, just think of everything else she will try to get out of: doing the garbage, washing dishes, wearing sexy lingerie, foreplay- say goodbye to foreplay, straight to sex, now how does that sound. You know you are right Art, thanks for being there for me buddy-
This is a story about taking chances and that a new life awaits you every time you walk out your front door, and that “settling down” doesn’t always mean what you think it mean, while a two-timing friend wants nothing more to do but hoard his friends time to feel alive and energetic- Meet these mischievously spun characters in Stroud’s new wackadoo pharcyde “running scared”.
Richie is scared of love and the ever so coined “settling down”- he wants nothing to do with those words, and he has been on the run from them for the past seven. I have been travelling with Richie for the last 2 years and have gained an amazing new energy towards life from this spectacular- and now I feel like a better person, but only when has around.
I can’t live without Richie in my life, he is my best friend.
Art has problems with himself- he is dangerously optimistic to the point of naivety. He has to many interests and is a jack of all trades but a master in none, and his biggest problem is that he doesn’t know when to fight for what he loves or believes- passive to the extreme is another way to put it. He has a fear of commitment and uses any excuse to back out of a relationship. Art grew up with his father and took after his traits of excessive drinking and schmoozing rich folk, hoping for their inheritance one day. Art is a kidney failure away from his big first return- but is beginning to feel creepy about his lifestyle and he needs a drastic change. He won’t let anyone get close to him because he has decided to leave the country and wants to do so alone, so he pushes everyone away so that he doesn’t feel guilty leaving.
Characters-
Richie –
Art
Ginger
Richie’s grandmother
Richie’s parents
The story is about a Richie, a man whose been travelling for the past 7 years and is about to go home for his parents anniversary- he doesn’t want to settle down which is why has been on the run for the past 7 years, but while being home, he met a girl. Is she the one?
Art his friend who’s been travelling with him for the past 2 years, wants him to himself, and tries to talk Richie from getting into a relationship. All this plus the wackadoo antics from Richie’s family, make for a very twisted return home, but will it last?
Riches parents are very eccentric.
Riches mom Jennifer loves 2 things animals and food; she calls her son religiously and makes sure he’s eating well in Asia, and she stops to greet every dog on the street with a paw shake and a first name greeting. She made it her business to know every dog in the neighbourhood, they day her and her dog moved in, and makes routine visits to neighbours houses to check up on them.
Riches father Peter hasn’t had the easiest road either- he remarried 5 years after his divorce from Jennifer to a woman who ended up being a man, a divorce obviously ensued and she/he tried to take him for everything; house, cars, dogs, even his manhood- I guess hers wasn’t big enough. She was too greedy and ended up with nothing, rumour has it that she even slept with Peters lawyers wife, to shake things up outside of the courtroom.
Peter and his ex-wife Jennifer get along better than ever, and are coincidentally celebrating their 30 anniversary, the same weekend Richie happens to be arriving home from Asia.
Richie is greeted at the airport by his parents, the usual tenderness is displayed being the duration of his trip, and they exchange “how are you? And whets new?”- before Richie has time to talk about his trip his mother cuts him and asks them what they want for dinner- “I was thinking of making a breakfast for dinner”, Jennifer enthusiastically states. “Jennifer, your son was about to tell us about his trip”, Peter retorts. “It’s alright pops, I am kind of tired anyways”, Richie dozily .
So Richie slept the whole drive home and well into the night, even through his mothers breakfast- good news was that when he woke up he had French toast, eggs, and hash browns, not as exciting as for dinner, but a good thing to wake up too.
He decided to take his dog Time out for a walk while his mother was at work. They walked to the swampy marshlands that laid deep in his backyard that he once used to trek when he was a child- much of it overgrown now, but still has the same warm feeling of home. Many paths intertwined throughout the woodlands, and bore home to many bike paths, wooden bridges and paw created paths. Richie sat down on a bridge to listen to the babbling brook, and reflect on his travels; where he has come, gone and been and what he wants to really do with his life, and who he would like to share it with- if any. His dog Time was playing in the creek when she took off downstream, Richie immediately jumping to his feet, yelling “Time, get back here” at the same time, to save time- being that it is his mother’s dog and he hasn’t even been home one day yet.
Richie new that Time must have seen another dog, because that’s the only time she doesn’t respond. So picking up speed Richie finally spotted time pouncing around the murky water with a brown lab, which simultaneously was being chased by what he believes to be a sporty young girl, mid twenties, with her blonde hair in a wrap, wearing a nostalgic Pink Floyd t-shirt.
Richie, always fast to fall for a girl, already has introduced himself to her and to his parents anniversary dinner- she surprisingly accepted knowing little of this man except that he liked her because she was sporty, loved animals, and dug pink Floyd.
Richie was never one to play games, and if he liked a girl he would tell her- it didn’t always lead to long lasting loving relationships, but he didn’t know any better. He was on the move so much, he felt he never had a lot of time to get to know someone before he could get a chance to ask them out, out of fear of never seeing them again. This all comes into play to why he was so quick to ask Ginger out. She happily replied.
Following their parents dinner, to which they had a comfortably lovely, ginger met Richie’s mother and father and they all hit it off. Richie had ginger come over to his parent’s house afterward and they stayed up all night drinking baileys and milk over ice, and talking about each other’s lives and dreams, before falling fast asleep in each other’s arms.
Richie woke to the site of ginger returning from a run- “ when did you get up?”, Richie wide-eyed clambered. “I’ve been up for a couple hours now, I picked some apples when I was out on my run, and I cut them up so you can put them in the granola I just bought”, Ginger open-heartedly replied.
Who is this girl, Richie questions in his head, she must be the one, and I can’t believe it I found the one. Excited Richie gets out of bed, gives Ginger a great big kiss, before washing up for breakfast.
“I’ve always wanted someone to wake up to who was energetic and got me excited about starting the day- I think the two of us are going to get along just great”, Richie manages to escape between bites of his cereal.
“What do you want to do today?”,Ginger asks.
“ Anything, as long as you are by my side, but I did hear about an art exhibit in the park”, Richie responds, “but first I am going to jump in the shower”.
“O.K, sounds lovely, I just have a few things to take care of”, ginger pouts.
Richie took a long hot shower, under a proportionately measured nozzle, in Asia all the spouts came up to his neck,- so things were beginning to look up.
He finished, changed into a nice dress shirt and came down from upstairs.
“Looking good big man”, Ginger giddily says, “is you ready to go?”
Sure… but….. Aren’t you….? Richie didn’t have the nerve to ask her if she was going to shower. All that sweat stuck to her body, stringy hair, wet socks- Richie was about to explode inside- and right then he had to call up his friend art in Asia who he always went to when he had something important on his mind.
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