Billy The jack and the Modern Throwbacks
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12/3/2009 10:06:27 PM
---- Updated 12/3/2009 10:10:27 PM
My Brush With Fame
[This is a true story, as best as I can embellish it. It did happen. The names have been changed because I don't remember any of them! This is a reprint from my non-musical website. Enjoy for what it's worth.]
The "North Side" is Minneapolis' ghetto, and the school I attended was called "North High", located right in the middle of that area. It must have been about 1985, and my occasional accomplice Sherman and I decided to skip, take the bus across town to his home, and get stoned on his mother's weed.
It was a fine summer-like day; the sun was shining and our youthful zeal for chicanery got the best of us. We skulked across the school grounds on that fine morning, climbed over the fence (put there by well meaning bureaucrats, to protect our innocence, to keep us wild children in our proper cages, and to offer us no means of escape from the school yard hoodlums — and The Nazi, our truant seeking Vice Principal), escaped with not a scratch and walked the three long blocks to the bus-stop, which was a rumpled, soot encrusted steel and Plexiglas shelter on a barren street corner, plopped upon a goodly sized trash littered plot next to a boarded up apartment complex. Our beautiful city in all its glory!
Sherman was a very likable fellow, a mixture of the best genetic qualities of his mixed race heritage—the "Future Face of America," as he would say. He had that intelligence and curiosity which the teachers found both endearing and infuriating at the same time. And he got along with everybody.
As we got closer to the bus-stop, we saw a seemingly dejected old man sitting on the plastic-planked bench inside the shelter. Sherman, being the gregarious that fellow he was, started talking with that old soul, whom I'll call Stan.
Stan pulled out a bottle and we all shared it around — a pull of sweet citrus wine for each of us. Sherman gave Stan his last dollar in return for the bump, and we had a fine time discussing the salient points of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, along with Stan's struggles to discover any of those ideals in this cruel and evil world.
All the while, a large, mangy, scraggly German Sheppard circled the desolation around us. Stan lovingly gazed at that dog with an intense despair in his lined face. "I don't know what to do with her," he said in a choked voice. "I just can't keep her, but I can't just let her go without a good loving home."
I couldn't take her home with me; my mother was sick in the hospital and our "Guardian" at the time had issues with the Canine Species. But Sherman could — and did. Stan was sad to see the dog go, but he seemed happy just the same that Sherman was taking her; he could tell that Sherman would love her like she deserved. Sherman and that dog hit it off right away, and she willingly followed his commands, seemingly glad to go with us to her new home.
The dog had a collar but no leash, so Sherman found a ratty rope which would do the trick. But we knew that we couldn't take her on the bus, so we had to walk to Sherman's house, which was just about three miles on the other side of Downtown. It was a fine day so we didn't mind too much.
From North High into Downtown Minneapolis: a few twists and turns, and you're on a broad diagonal road. You can see through to the skyline a mile away.
On this glorious path, we were strolling along, talking about finding a place to get a can of food for Lucy (the name coming from an ex-girlfriend of his). She loped ahead of us, seeming to know the way to her new home, the rope taught in Sherman's hands as she pulled us to her new destiny.
Ahead of us, all along the broad avenue, we could see a long row of several trailers, some trucks — and two shiny yellow Cadillacs in the foreground. We couldn't see that much activity, and we had no idea what this sight was all about.
Both Sherman and I admired the long, yellow saloons as the trailers ahead of us shone brightly, throwing off reflections from the bright blue sky, an occasional lightning strike-like glowing from the sun and sparkling in our eyes. However, Lucy seemed more enthralled with the skinny tree growing out from the boulevard, and she could tell that it was dry because she gave it her water.
After gaping at the cars, we could see some human activity start by the trailers, people coming and going about in incomprehensible tasks. We passed the first set of trailers, heading for the second row.
It was like a tranquil scene from out of an S.E. Hinton novel: two boys laughing and playing, walking on the clean streets in a fairy tale world where magic happens to good little children; a playful pup at the head of us, tugging her leash, happy as the day is young with her tongue lolling out like a smile from heaven and her tail wagging back and forth in a happy rhythm — the rhythm of life —
—interrupted!—
— the door to the side of us, just a hand's breath away, banged open with intense force — a crash of spike boots on the metal stairs — Lucy jumping back from the heels of a short sprinting man in purple — "Hey mother-fucker! You scared the shit out of me!" she exclaimed at the little purple blur — "GROWL!" is all we heard, along with a snap of jaws on empty air — shit! that little purple man could move when properly motivated! — Lucy barking like there was no tomorrow — three burly, beefy muscle heads from out of nowhere surrounding us as the purple man retreated back into his manufactured sanctuary!
Those big guys said nary a word to us, but their manners told us all we needed to know, and we were out of the area just as quick as lightning.
"Holy Fucking Shit!" cried Sherman hours later, exclaiming between puffs from his disreputable bong, the smoke curling around his words. "We just met Prince!"
Lucy enjoyed her new home as far as I know, and I had this wonderful tale to tell about how me, a friend and his dog who tried to castrate a little purple man.
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