It was Monday, October 17th, 1988.

I was leaving for New York in the morning. 

Who could sleep?

Well, not just from excitement.  Nosirreebob.  I had to work – the trip was going to pretty well clean me out.  I spent a dreary Monday night out at City Limits, spinning records to almost nobody.  By 10PM, it was just me, the bartender, the “bouncer” (a guy who was all of 5’5 and 130 pounds and who’d never actually stopped a fight in all the nights I’d worked with him) and the waitress, who spent most of her time over in the bowling alley, schlepping beers to the few duffers rolling desultory balls down the lanes. 

And that was OK; my mind was all focused on the next day anyway; picturing the city; visualizing my way between stops on subway routes and intersections I’d long memorized; most of all, visualizing myself getting one of the jobs on my slate over the next week.  I pictured the studios; I envisioned myself behind the mike, taking my first caller (“Gino from Bensonhurst”, I figured), finding a place to live, grabbing a bagel in the morning on my way to, or from, work; the lights at night; Broadway; the Hudson, the WTC, CBGB; hopping the train to Asbury Park to hobnob with Bruce and Steve and Joe at the Stone Pony; meeting a neurotic Italian girl from Brooklyn named Angela with big Jersey-Girl hair and a black leather skirt and an accent that’d set your teeth on edge and who could probably beat me up, but wouldn’t want to…

…well, the daydreaming was always the same.

The bartender decided to close up early that night.  I drove home, the long, lonely, dark, winding path up Highway Three back to Saint Paul, across the Lafayette Bridge, looking at the riot of lights on downtown’s seemier side, practicing my delivery.

“Yehuda in the Village – you’re up”. 

In my mind, Yehuda was completely batspittle crazy.

“Yehuda, take your medication and call me next week.  Maria in Jersey City, you’re on…”

I came off the bridge and drove past the Savoy, up Tedesco street and around the corner to the tumbledown house on the narrow Swede Hollow street lined with houses that had seen their salad days when Coolidge was president.  I parked, and walked up the sidewalk. 

I heard music as I walked in the door.  There were half a dozen people in the living room; Wyatt, Shane, two guys I’d never met who had the shifty eyes and puffy demeanor of  bar-room drug dealers, and a couple of young women. 

“Miiiitch”, said Wyatt, sloshed and smelling like pot smoke.  “This is Amanda and Carol!  Have some pizza!” he yelled too enthusiastically, pointing toward three Dominos boxes on the table.   

“Hey”, said Ashley, a strikingly attractive, petite blonde with a pixie hairdo, wearing a short black skirt and strappy FM pumps.  Her friend Carol – ruddy-faced, with long, straight hair, dressed in a bright maroon blouse and a gray skirt, like a legal secretary except for a garish necklace – was lolling on the couch, seemingly oblivious. 

“Hi”.  I was hungry.  I grabbed a slice.  “So…how do you know Wyatt?”

Ashley smiled.  “Wyatt lets me into the bar”.

“Ah.  So you’re…”

“I’m a senior at Cretin!” she said, laughing. 

“And her fake ID wouldn’t fool anyone!” Wyatt chortled with gusto, like…well, like a drunk. 

“Huh”, I said. 

Hard to follow up on that.  I stood there, holding the slice of pizza, nodding my head at the conversation around me…

…until I felt something tugging at my slice of pizza.

Carol had crawled over to me on her hands and knees, and was chewing on the pointy end of my slice of pizza. 

“Er…would you like…” I started, and noticed she probably wasn’t getting a word I was saying.  Hammered, high, whatever.  I guided her back to the couch, gave her the slice, and retired to my room.

I had packed everything I needed earlier in the day.  I was ready to go.

Boy, was I.

This entry was posted by by Mitch Berg on Friday, October 17th, 2008 at 1:05 pm and is filed under Twenty Years Ago Today. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.