Lush Life

They say alcoholism is a disease. I say, as far as diseases go, it's a lot more fun than cancer. This blog chronicles countless nights spent in pursuit of the perfect social buzz - for better and worse. All names are changed to protect the less-than-innocent.

9.06.2005

"You let your mom read your journal?"

DATE: Wednesday, August 3, 2005
PLACE: Old Hilltop
CAST OF CHARACTERS: Me, Jason, Emma, Willie, Nasty Nancy


Up at Hilltop again, playing shuffleboard with Jason, Emma and an omnipresent regular named Willie who turns out to be really fucking good. He's down on my end of the board, knocking off every halfway decent shot I toss down. I'm on Jason's team, and we're way behind, but I loudly promise to mount a "wicked comeback that will make the devil himself seem holy by comparison." We end up losing 15-6.

Willie's energy level seems dangerously low, even for a game that requires as little physical dexterity and exertion as shuffleboard. I ask him what's up. It turns out a close friend of his, a carpenter, was paralyzed in an accident this afternoon while on the job. A tress fell from above, landing squarely on the carpenter friend's neck. News from the hospital has not been promising.

"There's five of us. We've known each other since kindergarten," Willie tells me while Jason and Emma are shooting. "We did big wheels, bikes, cars and women together."

I laugh. It's a serious moment and obviously a line that's come out of Willie's mouth numerous times in that same pre-rehearsed form, but I laugh.

"And this guy was always the sober one, the one who stayed away from drugs and got himself the successful job and family," Willie continues. "And he gets crippled in an accident. I keep thinking why not me, you know?"

"Yeah, it's kinda sick," I agree. "Bad things can happen to good people, and fate can mow you down just as bad as drugs and alcohol. There's nothing you can count on."

I think about our friend, Schnucks liquor manager Rick Williams. He's one of the nicest guys I've ever met, and he's probably spent the week comforting his mother in a hospital waiting room while his dad inches closer and closer to death. Meanwhile, I've been drinking, swimming in the middle of the night, talking to kitchen brothers about taking dates to McDonald's and playing shuffleboard in a hoosier bar.

I decide to write a couple of these thoughts down. While I'm writing "carpenter - tress - paralyzed - strait-laced one - life unfair," I overhear the regulars sitting up at the bar delve into one of their most frequent topics of conversation.

This is one we've all fantasized about - what would you do if you hit the Missouri Lottery's Powerball jackpot? A regular who prefers to go by the name Nasty Nancy volunteers this quotable tidbit: "If I hit the jackpot, I'm buyin' Maryland Heights, and I'm tearin' it down!" She doesn't want to destroy one particular building or block; she wants the entire county torn down.

Willie sees me writing and tells me he keeps a journal. We both agree writing our thoughts down is the only way we can organize or apply any meaning to them. I say I have a feeling he'll be writing a lot tonight, and he nods, saying, "I can't wait for my mom to read this one."

"You let your mom read your journal?"

"Let?" He snorts. "She sneaks into my room and reads my journal, and she corrects my grammar in red pen. Mom says I have problems with tenses."

Once again, it's a serious moment, and once again I still can't help but laugh.

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