The guy who plowed into a tree and broke his neck
They screwed a halo brace thing into his head
He kept drinking
He didn’t skip a beat
His kids were with him a lot. They were grown and still lived in the neighborhood
The son had to cut him off after three or four vodkas
The guy didn’t like it. He didn’t like how his kid was sneaky about it
Signaling to the server (usually Alan, remember Alan? Well, he’s still an idiot, he just is an idiot in Wisconsin now) for the check behind the guy’s back like that, treating his dad like that
His daughter wanted to be anywhere else, and we didn’t see her after a bit, she absconded
Then, a few weeks after that, he’d come out on his own, still with the halo, and he would make the bartender (Jason, who has been known to enjoy a frequent tipple himself) promise not to tell the son
Jason told the son as soon as he saw the son, which was usually the next night or so
The guy had a beard and by the end it was long and scraggly and looked as if it could use a good wash
He pissed his pants one of the last times he came in, but not like Stinkhead pissed his pants (“just a little!”), like a full-on pissing of the pants, full-on puddle …
He thought we were saying shit behind his back (we kinda were kinda weren’t) and he yelled at us all one night, said he’d never be back, and … he wasn’t
The single mom who brought in her high school age son
(Jason called her Scarfy cos she always wore a heavy scarf, even in summer)
The son drew portraits of everyone, staff, Jimmy, me, other customers if they didn’t mind
And his mom
The portraits were pretty good actually
Everyone kinda liked theirs
He got the head too big on mine but I got a big head so
He showed me the portrait of his mom and it was basically her leaning against the outside of the place, right outside the front door, under the POINT neon sign, with a cocktail shaker and martini glass spilled out all around her, shitfaced as shitfaced can be
I wasn’t sure what to say, so I said we wouldn’t let her walk out with the shaker and glass
She thought Jimmy was trying to rip off customers with an extra charge
Her son drew another portrait, with steam shooting out her ears and nostrils and booze splashing everywhere, her stomping up and down, and he called it “Hopping Mad”
The married guy whose drink was Sapphire martinis with bleu olives
He’d have … four or five on a weeknight and by that fourth or fifth, he had taken off his ring and was chatting up whichever gal he could
Jason said one night it worked and it worked with someone I knew, but he wouldn’t tell me who
He brought his wife and children in for a brunch one day, with his in-laws, and Jason and I just … couldn’t figure it out. (Don’t shit where you eat, basically … plus our brunch wasn’t any good in the first place, even if you weren’t fucking around)
Mainly, though, he was shitfaced by a little after noon, and his father-in-law said, “Here we go again”
The woman with several restraining orders against her, who said Chicago Public Schools abused children, and when I was (I thought reasonably) skeptical, she accused me of being a child abuser, and she called the police on me
She was probably legitimately hooked on Xanax and red wine
Within a couple weeks, I had gone from being a child abuser to a child molester, and on a trivia night, she took the microphone from the host and told the crowd what I do to little boys (and sometimes girls)
Jimmy banned her at that point (I was off that night) and later she made the news for allegations of police brutality
Anyway that was a bit of a sidetrack, but before we realized she was popping pills, she had two malbecs and barfed everywhere, like all over the bar and some stools and then yelled that Jason laced her drink and tried to rape her
Jason did neither of those things and yet
Her husband came and dragged her out of there and Rudy cleaned up the barf
(Rudy, by the way, is now back on the south side, down by Marquette Park)
The guy who brought his family in one Sunday afternoon to watch the Bears
They got the big six-top (table 17) and Gina and I tilted the TV so they would all have a good view
The mom ordered a vodka tonic and he ordered a pitcher of High Life
By the second quarter, he ordered another one
At halftime, he wanted a third, and Gina said no
His wife collected the kids, he nodded that yeah yeah maybe not having another pitcher’s a good idea
He came back before the third quarter started and tried to get served
Gina said no, I backed her up, he swore at both of us, then went down the street to this faux Irish weirdo place that people say is actually Irish, but it just seems so conspicuous about it, oh well who knows, anyway that’s where he went and I saw him stumble outta there like six hours later
And then there’s me
I took my son to the batting cages and mini golf
On the way home we stopped for pizza
While we looked at the menu, we ordered a Son of Juice and a Fanta
Then a second Son of Juice and another Fanta as long as she was here
Then a third of both when we ordered (pepperoni and black olives, with a basket of tots to start)
We had been there not even a half an hour
A fourth beer when the pizza came, and the server said I was going for the land speed record
I had to explain what that meant to my kid, who was in fifth grade, this was last year
She came back with the tots and the beer and my kid asked her if anyone has ever drank so many beers so fast
I didn’t know what to say so I just kinda shrugged and she said - Oh sure, lotsa times
And then beat a hasty retreat
She brought me a fifth one without me ordering it because she just assumed and I took it, of course, and then I asked for the check and a to-go box
We walked home and he was quiet and I didn’t know what to make of it
Once we got home, he turned on the Xbox and I snoozed in the hammock
Couple weeks later, when she was going over the bank statement, she asked how we spent 90 dollars at the pizza joint and I said that I, uh, had to pay for someone who forgot their wallet and I saw the guy later and he paid me back so it was all fine
The kid was at the dinner table for this, and he heard and he looked at me like he was trying to figure out if this was the time he thought it was
So
Blasts from the past
You honesty is devastating. xo
This one - completely unexpectedly - made me cry. Because the writing is that good. But that's not the only reason.