The Ooze is a place. Simply stated, but necessarily so. Depending who you are, the Ooze could be the place or absolutely nowhere. Regardless of the individual perspective, the fact remains that if you are there, then you are there and only those who are or have been can understand. The building is a character as old as the dusty stagnant town on whose shoulders it rests its immutable girth. It had once been the local hotel, moonlighting as a mortuary. Transition after transition it moved from stagecoach inn to public house to western bar all the way to the its contemporary status as the local haven for drunks and lost souls, performing weekend functions as a rock and roll venue at which whomever should be passing through can play a comfortable small crowd gig and get drunk on the owner's dollar.
But the character of the Ooze goes further than simply its social standing. It was written on the walls, literally. The bathroom graffiti is like that of no other venue, and it appears in the comments of innumerable visiting musicians and transitory patrons. The character is carved into the floor with the blood of the fights and the accidents and the suicide attempts. It seeps through the walls with the echoes of time passed and the dripping residual smoke which, in its unchallenged thickness, poisons the lungs of all those who enter and brings with it the most intolerable headaches and hangovers in the booze serving trade. It lies in the pool tables and the fooseball table and the inescapable video lottery terminals. It is in the liquor and sweat and laughter and tears that soak the building from the faded brick exterior to the very core of the building. The place in itself is extraordinary, that is to speak in the true meaning of the word; extra-ordinary thereby stating it to be beyond the mediocre regularity of the world. In the ethereal drunken dreams, promises, threats that float through its rooftop like so much burned tobacco there lays a soul; a soul fueled by want of drink and companionship.
The companionship. The company the Ooze keeps bears as much of the character as its other elements. Not nearby buildings: the bar forces distance from all the surrounding buildings through roads and parking lots on all sides. Rather the company provided by the occupants. Those who dwell within are the heroes and villains of the world. They are the brass tacks, to the core, meat-hook realities of the liars, truth-tellers, and word changers. The character as provided by the characters. These individuals are so large and low and abjectly beautiful as to be nearly unreal, inhuman. Defenders of the faith, the regulars maintain true commitment to the drink. So true in fact, that were one to enter and spend enough time thereabouts said individual would undoubtedly encounter friend after friend after friend, if for no other reason than that of the alcoholic primacy. But it goes further than simply a want for booze. Were it that simple there would be no need for a story being told. Yes, the threat of the standard drunkard's one drink, two, a dozen and more still stands, but it goes far deeper than base alcoholism. There is a spirit of the place. A will. Be it a result of the hauntings from the stale death in the basement or all those who've died in the rooms or the complete camaraderie that results in recognizing one's self in the face of everyone in the room, the truth stands that they are not just drunks.
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