Big Mike: Black Comedy Excerpt No. 31 — She Knows Chet Is There
August, 1968. The Democratic Party’s “Convention of Death” (as the Yippies have dubbed it) is about to begin. Anna’s on the verge of giving life. Chet is half-responsible for that life but he prefers to be near the Convention of Death. Enjoy the latest installment of Black Comedy. — Big Mike
Anna’s got her TV and she’s got eyes. She knows things are going on in the world even though now and again it feels as if all the world is nothing more than the medicine ball protruding from her abdomen.
She knows, for instance, that the Vietnam War this month has become the longest in American history. She knows Tricky Dick Nixon has been nominated by the Republicans to be their nominee for president. She knows Paris is only now getting back to normal after tens of thousands of French university students have battled police on the streets. She knows Russian tanks right now are rolling through the streets of Prague. She knows that the Chicago police have shot and killed a South Dakota Sioux teenager in town early for the protests.
The World Anna’s Baby Will Come Into
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Here’s what she doesn’t know: in a couple of little straw hut villages in South Vietnam called My Lai and My Khe, U.S. Army soldiers have burned down every single structure and for good measure, they’ve lined up all the unlucky villagers who hadn’t run away before the troops came in, shot them all in the head, good and Nazi-style, and let their lifeless bodies tumble into mass graves. She doesn’t know that some five hundred people have in this way been murdered but not before many of them were gang raped, tortured, and mutilated. She doesn’t know that many of the bodies had the words “C Company” carved into their chests. She wouldn’t know that one of those American soldiers would later tell investigators, “I would say that most people in our company didn’t consider the Vietnamese human.” She wouldn’t learn about any of these things at least until November.
Villagers Saved From The Horrors Of Communism
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She also doesn’t know that the Army would stand on its head to cover up the massacre, that facts would be ignored, that the number of women and teenagers and little children killed would be falsified, that the investigation into it would be tightly controlled. She wouldn’t know that The Man has other things, more important things, to investigate. She wouldn’t know for years that J. Edgar Hoover thinks it of utmost importance to run a secret program to spy on, sabotage, and plant agents provocateurs in anti-war groups and civil rights organizations. Had she known any of this she would have felt even worse than she did already about bringing a baby into this world.
As it is, Anna often rubs her bulging belly and feels progressively more pessimistic about the future. “I hate this place,” Anna says time and again. At these times, she wishes the little living person could stay safe inside her forever. Then again, on other occasions, she rubs her belly and whispers, “You’re gonna be beautiful. You’re gonna change the world.” At these times, she wishes her beautiful little world-changer would decide to emerge at this very moment, especially when her back throbs and her bladder can hardly hold a teaspoon of water.
Anna is now a war widow. Chet hasn’t been home since since Monday, almost a week ago. She can use a little help around the house. The vacuuming hasn’t been done in weeks. No one’s scrubbed the bathtub and toilet since July. She gets to the pile of dishes in the sink every two or three days. Thank goodness for Daddy and his secret back alley visits. He brings salamis and cheeses, bread and tomatoes, along with his customary spare tens and twenties. Not that she has anyplace to spend the cash; Anna hasn’t left the house in fourteen days. She’s going feel like an ass when she tells Daddy this tonight — she’s running out of toilet paper.
Anna Can Use A Little Help
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Guaranteed, Daddy’s going to say for the dozenth time, “Where the hell is that husband of yours?” The truth is, Anna couldn’t care less where he is, only that he’s not here. Daddy’s been getting a look in his eye as if he’s sure Chet’s out having an affair. Anna thinks, What’s the difference? In fact, maybe it’d be better if Chet was having an affair. Then maybe he’d come home late at night and sweep the kitchen or throw some Comet into the tub. Or, dream of dreams, he could whip up something on the stove, some rice, say, or even put a chicken into the oven. Anna’s sick to death of salami sandwiches.
It’s Sunday night, August 27th. That’s good. The Smothers Brothers are on. They’re funny, Anna thinks as she points the clicker at the Admiral and switches it to Channel 2. She wants to see Pat Paulsen. Can you believe it? He’s running for president and he might be serious! It’s gonna feel good to laugh for a change. Anna picks up a months-old TV Guide and fans herself with it. It’s already 9:05. The show has started. I hope, Anna thinks, I haven’t missed Pat Paulsen.
She Can Also Use A Good Laugh
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But what’s this? Cronkite? What’s he doing on now? Oh shit, don’t tell me it’s more bad news.
No, it’s only CBS’s pre-convention coverage. Blah, blah, blah, delegates, marchers, McCarthy, McGovern, Hubert Humphrey, aw shit, it’s hot. Anna fans herself more vigorously with the old TV Guide, the exertion only making her feel more sweaty. Damn, damn, damn, come baby! Come out now! Let’s go!
Cronkite says some live footage is just coming in from this afternoon’s events at Grant Park, across Michigan Avenue from the Conrad Hilton. The delegates are staying at the Hilton. The MOBE staged a “Meet the Delgates” march, those rascals. And — wouldn’t you know it? — some of the delegates indeed did come down from their hotel rooms and mingle with the thousand or so protesters. Anna scans the screen carefully — There! Isn’t that Chet? I think so…, no. No, it isn’t.
Wait, there’s more film from Lincoln Park, taken later in the afternoon. Five thousand protesters there — That should make Chet happy. The police blocked a flatbed truck from coming into the park. Apparently it was going to be used as a stage for the speakers and the music. There was a fight. The cops started swinging their billy clubs. Lots of blood. Oh God! Is that Chet? No, it isn’t. Good…, I mean, I’m sorry for the person with the gash in his forehead, but I’d hate for it to be Chet.
Protesters Practice Self-Defense Moves Sunday Afternoon In Lincoln Park
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Anna clicks the TV off for a moment. She realizes she needs a break from it because she found herself thinking she’d rather club Chet on the head than have some fat cop do it. At least she has a valid reason.
Now she clicks the Admiral back on. Cronkite says there’s hundreds of protesters in the park, just north of North Avenue, just north of the St. Gaudens’ Lincoln statue where she and Chet first made out a million years ago, last September. More film. The cops are lined up, shoulder to shoulder, their billy clubs at the ready. Wait, is that that jerk cop, Sal, from down the block? Yeah! Yeah, I think it is!
Cronkite says the cops have announced that the park must be cleared out by eleven. Behind the cops’ advance skirmish line is a row of them holding shotguns and tear gas launchers. Then there are squad cars with barbed-wire riot cages affixed to their front ends. And finally, the meat wagons. Please, please, just leave. Come home. They’ve got shotguns, you fool!
The cops look antsy. The protesters are huddled together in a clearing, a row of trees and Lake Shore Drive behind them, a fat blue line in front. Anna begins to cry. It’s too dark now for her to make out individual faces among the crowd. But she knows Chet is there.
Join us Wednesday for the next installment of Black Comedy.
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Sofia: The Cubicle — A True Story
As an administrative assistant in a corporate office, I have seen my fair share of cubicle walls. And after spending a significant chunk of each day locked up in these prisons of metal and fabric, I have to ask: Who thought that was a good idea?
It’s become obvious to me that something so needlessly awful could only have been thought up by a select team of evil masterminds. I’m thinking a dark dingy room and a round table discussion between Ed Rooney, Bill Lumbergh and Dr. Evil. Because only Ferris Bueller’s fun-squashing principal, the passive-aggressive boss from Office Space and Austin Powers’ arch enemy could have thought of something so uninspiring.
I think the conversation went a little like this:
Ed: Well, you all know why we’re here today. It’s been brought to our attention that productivity levels in the workplace are sub par and as experts of evil and efficiency we have been assigned the ultimate task of whipping the office dwellers of this world into shape. So what have you come up with? Yes, Bill?
Bill: I’m thinking we’re gonna need to go ahead and put up walls. You know, just to separate them and avoid interaction.
Dr. Evil was there for the creation of the cubicle….
Dr. Evil: Yes, I like that; claustrophobic chambers of solitude. And we’ll surround them with shark tanks!
Bill: Ah, you know I hadn’t envisioned sharks but we could probably go ahead and talk about that later.
Ed: Yeah, Dr. Evil I’m not sure about shark tanks….
Dr. Evil: Sharks work!
Ed: I’m sure they do, but…
Dr. Evil: Freakin’ idiots.
Ed: Moving on. As far as the atmosphere of the workplace I was thinking something very neutral and bland. We want to avoid the possible distraction that bold colors or any individuality could cause. Uniformity is the key to productivity.
And so was principal Rooney….
Bill: And while we’re at it, we should go ahead and create light fixtures to replace natural sunlight. We can’t have people craving the outdoors when they should be inside working.
Ed: Good point, Bill. Yes, Dr. Evil?
Dr. Evil: Gentleman, I have a plan that would create a great sense of foreboding.
Ed: I like that, can you be a little more specific?
Dr. Evil: We find a way to make them feel like prey, like they’re constantly being hunted.
Ed: How so?
Dr. Evil: We can surround their desks with a pool of water filled with large man eating fish.
Bill: You mean like a shark?
Dr. Evil: No… I was thinking more like a giant piranha.
Ed: Dr. Evil, I’m going to have to ask you to stop suggesting anything involving a pool of water and large aquatic creatures. But you are on to something. I like the foreboding. We can strategically place each person so that their superior can pop in unexpectedly. Keep them on their toes.
Dr. Evil: Ooo, and Nothing keeps people on their toes like a laser! We should give one of those to every supervisor. Then they can pop in unexpectedly with a freakin’ laser!
Ed: I’m afraid I haven’t made our mission clear. We’re not trying to kill these people. We’re just trying to bore them into a state of advanced productivity.
Dr. Evil: That’s something that could have been brought to my attention before I spent hours creating this list.
Ed: Sorry Dr. Evil. Let’s hear the rest of it. We might be able to tweak a few of the ideas.
Dr. Evil: The rest of it?
And this, my friends, is how the cubicle came to be. Okay, so maybe it’s not 100 percent historically accurate, but I’m pretty sure it’s close.
By Sofia
Editor’s Note: Sofia‘s last piece for The Third City was Judge Judy….
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Benny Jay: Blago To Blog For The Third City!
Hold the presses. Breaking news. This just in….
Former Governor Rod Blagojevich will be blogging for The Third City!
Yes, yes, it’s true. I got the deal started myself. Part of my effort to build readership by bringing in celebrity bloggers and become the world’s richest man by blogging. Gonna buy a red Mustang convertible and everything.
Here’s how it went down….
I see Blago jogging on Western near Berteau and I call out: “Hey, Governor, I’m behind you one-hundred percent. Had I been on that jury I’d have voted for acquittal on all twenty-four counts…”
“Thanks, man,” he says.
Having buttered him up, I go for the kill. “I know you’ve been thinking about media deals. How about blogging for The Third City? It could be fuckin’ golden, sir – if I may be so bold….”
“Hmm….”
“You could blog about politics….”
“Fuck politics — I’m bigger than politics….”
“Right — yeah. That’s what I meant….”
“I’m bigger than Donald Trump. Bigger than Oprah….”
“Bigger than the Beatles….”
“Fuck the Beatles! They were never as good as Elvis….”
“It’s funny — I was just telling my wife the same thing the other day….”
“God blessed me. I prayed to him and he blessed me. I said — God, the big people hate me. But the little people love me. Cause I let their mother-fucking grandparents ride the trains for free….”
“Yes…..”
“Did Daley do that?”
“No…..”
“Did Obama?”
“No….”
“Fuck them — it was me, me, me….”
“That’s right, man — you, you, you….”
“Twenty-three down and one to go!”
“Gov — is it just me or is there a blog bit here?”
He voice drops. “But I ain’t writing it….”
“Huh?”
“Writing’s for losers. You gotta hire some fuckin’ hack to do the as-told-to shit….”
It all started when I saw Blago jogging on Berteau….
“No problem – you don’t even have to read it….”
“How much you fuckin’ payin’ me?”
“Pay?”
“Listen, pal, I don’t give this shit away….”
“Ugh, I think you better talk to the boss…”
So I turn the deal over to Big Mike – the Barn Boss of this outfit – who tells me to shut the fuck up before I screw everything up. Says I’m too stupid to negotiate a complicated deal like this. Only he can get it done.
They meet in the banquet room of the Diplomat Motel over on Lincoln Avenue. We keep it a big secret. No one else at the Third City knows about it. Not even Milo.
As part of his hardball negotiations, Blago insisted I post this picture….
Negotiations go like this.
Blago: I want ten fuckin’ thousand a month….”
Big Mike: “Blow me….”
Blago: “Fuck you – I’m goin’ to the Huffington Post….”
Big Mike: “They don’t pay either….”
Blago: “Fuck it. Who gives a shit about you losers? Write whatever you want — just spell my name right!”
Wait — hold it. This just in….
Oh, no! Milo’s on the warpath. Says he wants nothing to do with Blago. Claims there’s an ancient family feud between the Samardzija and Blagojevich clans going back to the old country when Blago’s great- great grandfather stole a pig and two gallons of Slivovitz from the Samardzija family farm.
Apparently, Milo’s consulted his battery of attorneys and discovered a little-known clause in his contract that says The Third City can employ no more than one Serb at a time.
It’s similar to the clause that says we can only employ one native of Gary, Indiana, which is why you never see Monroe Anderson or Joe Stiglitz writing here.
Who knows how this will play out. At the moment, Big Mike, Milo and Blago are back at the Diplomat, trying to cut a deal. I’m in the hallway listening through the keyhole. Doesn’t sound good. Milo and Blago are cursing each other in Serbian. Something about their grandmothers and barn animals. Can’t say for certain cause my Serbian’s kind of rusty.
Uh oh, bottles are smashing. Looks like this may take awhile….
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Letter From Milo: The Old Bastard in the Shiny Suit
A couple of weeks ago I was sharing a few bottles of wine with a very good friend, who I’ll call Bruce Diksas, to spare him any embarrassment. We were mildly intoxicated, sitting in my back yard, enjoying the fading sunshine and the early evening breezes.
Later, there were steaks to be grilled, potatoes to be baked, a salad to be tossed and more bottles to be opened. There may have even been a little something to smoke, too.
It should have been a wonderful evening – except that it wasn’t.
You see, there was a phone call we were going to make and neither of us was looking forward to it.
“Should we give him a call now?”
“Let’s wait a while. Have another glass of wine. We’ll call in a few minutes.”
“Good idea.”
“Man, I hate this shit.”
“I’m not too fucking happy about it, either.”
The call we were fearful of making was to our old and dear friend, Wayne Gray, who was dying of lung cancer in Venice Beach, California. We had made the same call the week before and it was heartbreaking. His ex-wife, Mila, who had taken Wayne in when he needed help most, was in tears when she answered. She was so choked up that it was difficult to understand her, but she managed to convey the information that Wayne was too weak to use the phone. Besides, he had lost the use of his voice. He had also lost the use of his arms and legs.
“Tell Wayne we love him!” I shouted into the phone before losing the connection.
That was not a good day. When I told Bruce what Mila had told me, he sadly shook his head. Neither of us spoke for a while. There was nothing to say.
My intuition told me this was not going to be a good day, either. I had a hunch Bruce felt the same way. Between the two of us there were a lot of long silences, plenty of sighs, much head scratching and a fair amount of gazing off into the distance. Finally, Bruce broke the silence. “Hey, did I ever tell you the story about the time this mean-looking biker caught Wayne giving his girl a back rub in Oxford’s?”
“About 100 times. But I’d like to hear it again.”
“It was about three in the morning. We had been drinking most of the day and were having a nightcap at Oxford’s. Wayne spots this chick and…”
Wayne was one of the first people I met in Chicago. And, for a time, he was my roommate. In the early ‘70s, Wayne, Bruce and I shared a coach house on Burling, just south of Armitage. The rent was $80 a month, roughly $27 each. Some months we had trouble coming up with the money. Those were not our peak earning years.
It was through Wayne and Bruce that I met everyone of consequence on the North Side of Chicago. They introduced me to bartenders, drug dealers, bookies, gamblers, artists, writers, musicians, cab drivers, hot dog vendors, quite a few very attractive waitresses and a good criminal lawyer. Many of these fine folks are friends to this day.
“Should we make the call?”
“In a minute. Let’s have another glass of wine first.”
“Good idea.”
“Hey,” I said, “did I ever tell you about the time Crazy Angela tried to do Wayne in with a beer bottle?”
“About 100 times. But I wouldn’t mind hearing it again.”
“It must have been about five in the morning. I was asleep when these wild noises woke me up. They were coming from Wayne’s room. So I get up to check it out and there’s Crazy Angela sitting on top of Wayne and smacking him with a beer bottle. Wayne’s trying to reason with her but she keeps on trying…”
Wayne was an extremely intelligent man but he hid his intelligence behind an endearingly goofy exterior. As a young man he felt the call and spent a year or two in a Benedictine monastery before coming to his senses. He explained that he was concerned that his fondness for fucking women might interfere with his responsibilities at the priory.
Wayne went on to earn a Master’s Degree in mathematics and, for a time, made his living in the insurance business. His true calling, however, was massage. When he and his then-wife, Mila, relocated to California, in the early ‘80s, Wayne bought a first-class massage table and set himself up as an unlicensed, unbonded, independent, outdoor massage specialist on the Boardwalk at Venice Beach. Rumor had it that his favorite customers were women.
Bruce reached over with the wine bottle, filled our glasses, and said, “Fuck it, let’s make that call.”
“Might as well.”
When Mila answered the phone she said that Wayne had passed away a few days earlier. She told me that she hadn’t called me because she was still in shock. She had Wayne’s body cremated and planned to take his ashes back to her home in the Philippines. When she died she was going to have his ashes buried with her.
The Old Bastard in the Shiny Suit came for Wayne on the evening of August 5th, 2010. I wish I could have seen him once more before he died. His friendship was precious to me.
Well, I guess there’s no getting around it. Sooner or later, all of my friends are going to die. The Old Bastard in the Shiny Suit makes no exceptions, accepts no excuses and takes no rain checks. You come, you stay a while, you go, and you try to leave some good memories behind. Wayne Gray left some real good ones.
I believe it was W.C. Fields who said, “It’s a tough old world. You’re lucky to get out of it alive.” I doubt if luck has anything to do with it.
After I told Bruce what Mila had told me, neither of us spoke for a while. We were each sifting through our memory banks, calling up bits and pieces of Wayne’s life. Finally, I broke the silence.
“Hey, did I ever tell you about the weekend Wayne worked as a doorman at the Black Pussycat tavern on Clark Street.?”
“About a 100 times. But I’d like to hear it again.”
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Big Mike: Black Comedy Excerpt No. 30 — It’s Not A Pig, It’s A Principle
It’s Friday, August 23, 1968, the week before the Convention. Protesters already are arriving in Chicago. And trouble is beginning. Welcome to the latest installment of my new novel, Black Comedy. — Big Mike
It’s been an unusually cool summer in the Midwest. Some weeks the temperature has barely inched into the 70s. But now at the end of August, the heat takes over.
The gang’s all here: Abbie and his wife, Jerry and his girlfriend, Phil Ochs, Paul Krassner, Stew Albert and his girlfriend — the entire Yippie! establishment. They’re here in the shadow of City Hall on the Civic Center plaza, late in the afternoon, for the opening act of the Festival of Life. Abbie and Jerry, trying to hold on to a grunting, kicking pig, pose for photographers. They’re smiling — Abbie and Jerry, that is, not the pig. Hell, yesterday she was rolling around in the slop on some little farm up north toward the Wisconsin state line. Now she’s in the smoggy, raucous, traffic-snarled Chicago Loop in the clutches of a couple of grinning hippie political pitchmen.
Chet’s amazed at how Abbie and Jerry can put the face on for the press. For all Chicago’s news reporters and photographers know, Abbie and Jerry are brothers, baby, peas in a pod, tight as soldiers in a foxhole, thick as thieves. Chet knows better. He was with them last night when each came this close to wrapping his fingers around the neck of the other.
It had all begun after everybody had agreed that they should go out, buy a pig from some farmer, bring the swine into Chicago, and announce it was Yippie!’s candidate for president. Perfect, right? Straight out of “Animal Farm.” George Wallace and Tricky Dick Nixon and the porcine Mayor Daley, all of them, they said, are nothing more than hogs, at least in the metaphorical sense. Why not drop the pretense and just put up a real live porker for president?
Straight Out Of “Animal Farm”
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Even Chet had to laugh. The idea was born of the promotional genius of both Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin. The whole bunch was practically falling off their chairs howling about the pig idea. You could tell by Jerry’s eyes — flashing and darting — that his mind was chugging out ideas faster almost than he could articulate them. First, we’re gonna demand Secret Service protection for the pig, he said. Then we’re gonna get daily National Security briefings. Third, we’re gonna call for everybody in the world to vote in the November election because, well, America rules the world so, damn it, the world should be able to vote for its leader, right?
Oh, it was rich! Chet noticed, though, amid all the roaring laughter, that Jerry was serious. As the laughter died down, Abbie started talking about what kind of pig they should buy. He was of the opinion that the pig should be small so it’d be easy to carry as well as, well, cute.
“No, no, no, no,” Jerry said in a loud voice. The room got quiet. “The pig has to be huge and ugly, just like Daley,” he said. “It’s gotta be disgusting. It’s gotta smell like pig shit, man!”
“C’mon, man,” Abbie said. “Somebody’s gotta go get this pig. Somebody’s gotta carry it. It’s a pig, dig? Everybody’ll get the point.”
Jerry shook his head violently. “No, no, no, no! This isn’t a kid’s cartoon; we don’t want Porky Pig. The politicians are disgusting so the pig has to be.”
“Aw, man, lighten up! For Christ’s sake, the pig isn’t the star of the show, we are,” Abbie said.
“That’s your problem, man,” Jerry said, wagging his finger not six inches from Abbie’s face.
Abbie jumped up and got close to Jerry. “What’s my problem, man?”
“You,” Jerry yelled back. “You’re the problem! Everything’s you!”
“You! You’re The Problem!”
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“Fuck you, man!”
“Fuck you back! People are getting sick of you running this show — as you so aptly put it.”
“You mean you’re getting sick of it, right?”
“Yeah. I’m sick of it. You’re trying to turn this whole thing into your ego trip.”
“Come down off your high horse, dude,” Abbie said, turning away and waving dismissively.
“Uh uh. This has to be said: You’re an ego-tripper, man!”
“So what?”
“So this: the people coming to Chicago have to know who you are and what you’re all about. Y’know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna print up mimeos, man, I’m gonna pass them out at Lincoln Park. I’m gonna tell everybody just what you said, that you’re the star of the show. The people have a right to know.” Jerry raised his hands, palms out, and spread them wide like an advertising agency executive imagining a billboard. He said, “‘Abbie Hoffman — Ego Tripper.”
Abbie took a step toward Jerry. Krassner jumped up and stood between them. “Hey man, let’s settle down. What are we fighting about? It’s a pig!”
“It’s a principle,” Jerry shot back.
Jerry wasn’t going to back down. In fact, he clearly was ready to fight for his pig. “Fuck this,” Abbie said. He gestured to his wife. “C’mon, Anita, we’ve got work to do. We haven’t got time time for this bullshit.” And they left, along with Krassner.
“The Pig Isn’t The Star Of The Show….”
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So it was left to Jerry and the rest to go out to find the ugliest stinking pig in Illinois. That is, one who wasn’t otherwise occupied running the nation’s second largest city. They found one. They called it Pigasus.
And now Abbie and Jerry and Pigasus are standing amid the crowd on the Civic Center plaza, turning this way and that, smiling for photographers, telling reporters about Pigasus’ political platform. But now a phalanx of Chicago cops elbows through the crowd. They arrest Jerry and all the others who’d gone up to the farm to buy the pig. Abbie and Chet, too. Oh, and the pig. Abbie and Jerry are thrilled. This is precisely what they want. The cameras roll as the cops take Pigasus into custody. The quintessential Yippie! moment.
They’re all put in a holding cell at police headquarters at 11th and State. All except Pigasus, of course. No one knows what the cops will do with Pigasus, although they do have a giddy time posing with her for the photographers. It’s a little after dinner time. The turnkey brings a tray of bologna on Wonder Bread sandwiches into the cell. His keys and handcuffs and baton jingle and rattle with each step he takes. He’s pink and potbellied. Jerry and Chet exchange glances, neither has to say it: the cop looks like, well, a pig.
Pigasus In Custody
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But he’s a funny pig. “I got bad news for youse guys,” he says as he lays the tray down on the wooden bench. “The pig squealed.”
Meanwhile, in another police station some six miles to the northwest, Sal Sanfillipo stands in his boss’s office, enduring yet another chewing out, seething. This one is different, though. The Shakespeare District commander tells Sal the punk kid he roughed up on the corner of Armitage and California last night turns out to be the son of one of the ward’s top Puerto Rican precinct captains. “You screwed up,” the commander says. “This is bad. City Hall’s coming down hard on me. I got no choice now. My hands are tied. You’re going on suspension.”
“Aw, Commander, you gotta be kiddin’ me!” Sal says.
“Whoa, watch yourself, son. Remember your place. Remember who you’re talking to!”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry, Commander,” Sal says. “But with all due respect, we got the Convention next week. I’m all ready to do my duty. I gotta tell you, I’m lookin’ forward to it.”
The commander shakes his head. “I know. This isn’t what I want to do right now. I need every man on duty; twelve-hour shifts start Sunday at oh-three hundred. But there’s no way out, son. Go and sin no more.”
Sal salutes, spins on his heel, and exits his commander’s office. He walks directly to the Burglary room where he picks up a phone and dials a number handwritten on a slip of paper he’s carried in his pocket for a few weeks. A woman answers: “36th Ward.”
“Is the alderman there?”
“May I ask who’s calling?”
“Just tell ‘im it’s a friend.”
“I’m sorry, sir, the alderman is unavailable at this time. May I take a message?”
“Look honey,” Sal says, “tell ‘im his good pal from Ma Barker’s is calling, y’got it?”
“I’m sorry, sir….”
“Whoa! You tell ‘im just what I said. Believe me, sweetheart, he’ll wanna hear it.”
The receptionist emits an annoyed sigh. “Hold on,” she says icily.
Ten seconds later an agitated man’s voice comes on the line. “Who is this?” the man says.
“C’mon. You know. I’m your pal from Ma Barker’s.”
“What the hell is the matter with you?” the man hisses into the phone. “What the hell do you have to tell my secretary about Ma Barker’s for?”
“I didn’t tell her nothin’.”
“Officer, I know who you are. Listen to me. Do not mention Ma Barker’s to anybody anymore, cabeesh? That was a mistake, okay? I thank you for what you did for me that night. You did the right thing, okay?”
“Yeah, I know it was a mistake. And I know I did the right t’ing. That’s why I’m callin’ you. Now maybe you can do the right t’ing for me.”
So for the next two minutes, Alderman Rocco Bianco listens as Sal tells him about being suspended. The two men end their phone conversation cordially, two businessmen who’ve just concluded a deal to their mutual benefit. Sal hangs up and leans back in his chair. He thumbs through a Sun-Times he finds on the desk. Not five minutes after his call to Alderman Bianco, Sal hears the Shakespeare District commander’s voice come over the crackly PA system: “Patrolman Sanfillipo to the office immediately.” Sal closes the newspaper and places it back precisely where he’d found it. He has a smug smirk on his face for he knows his commander will soon inform him his suspension has been rescinded.
Join us Wednesday for the next installment of Black Comedy.
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Best of Benny Jay: Sammy Davis Jr.
While Benny Jay’s off with his family at some jet-set resort (where, by the way, he’s modeling the latest Speedo swim brief for men) we’ll be running some of his greatest hits. This post originally ran on March 28th, 2010. He’ll be back, leathery tanned, sun-streaked blond, and utterly relaxed, Tuesday. — The Eds.
Heading north on Ashland, listening to the oldies station on the car radio, when on comes The Candyman by Sammy Davis, Jr.
Right away, I turn the station. There’s no one else in the car, but it’s like I’m embarrassed to be caught listening to the song.
I move the dial to hard rock, NPR, all-sports and then, sigh, back to The Candyman.
“Who can take a rainbow, wrap it in a sigh, soak it in the sun and make a groovy rainbow pie….”
I stop at a red light at Lawrence and turn it louder. Who am I kidding? I love Sammy Davis, Jr.
Way, way, way long ago — when I was a wee lad — I thought he was just about the world’s coolest guy. I loved the way he wore his clothes, his cool easy patter, the graceful ease with which he moved across a stage. He could sing and dance. Check this out, if you don’t believe me. He was Michael Jackson before there was Michael Jackson.
Plus he was Jewish. Not a whole lot of black guys being Jewish back then. It always pissed me off that Don Rickles wouldn’t respect the fact that Sammy was every bit as Jewish as he was. At the roasts, Rickles used to make fun of Sammy for being black — overlooking the Jewish part like it didn’t exist.
I bought his book — Yes, I Can. (He had the phrase long before President Obama.) I read it once, then I read it again. Read about how he lost his eye in a car accident and then some mobster threatened to take out the other eye cause he was dating white women. White women loved Sammy. Black women too. All the women loved Sammy — that just made him even cooler.
It didn’t bother me that he endorsed Richard Nixon for president. Well, it did a little. But I got over it. It was a crazy time — people were doing all sorts of nutty things. Besides, Sammy Davis was never ashamed of being black. Way back in the 1970s, he performed at the Black Expo Jesse Jackson put together in Gary, Indiana. For all I know, Milo and Monroe were there….
I used to love him in those Rat Pack movies. Pissed me off the way they treated him. Like he was a mascot. Probably cause they were jealous cause they knew he had more talent than all of them put together — yes, Sinatra too — though they’d never admit it….
Anyway, one time I was sitting at the nerds table in the Evanston High School cafeteria, must have been around 1972. And this boy — call him Greg — was going on and on about Elvis. He loved Elvis the way I loved Sammy Davis. Matter of fact, he’d just seen Elvis at the old Chicago Stadium and he was talking about about the white suit Elvis wore and the songs he sang and how he came on the stage to the sounds of the theme song from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. I said that as good as Elvis was — and I conceded that he was good — he wasn’t nearly as good as the great Sammy Davis Jr. Greg said are you kidding me? And we went at it — right there at the nerds table in the Evanston High School cafeteria.
I don’t want to brag, but — I was whooping Greg’s butt. I might not know how to put pictures on a computer, but no one can out talk me, that’s for sure.
But then, old Greg, played the ultimate trump card. He started singing The Candyman. Only he changed the lyrics to something along the lines of — who can give a blow job….
What could I say? The song was considered lame even then. All the guys at the nerd table were was cracking up. And let me tell you, it’s a rough day when the lames are laughing at you for being lame.
And now I’m sitting here almost forty years later, at the corner of Lawrence and Ashland waiting for the light to change, and the song doesn’t sound so bad. It carries a pretty little sadness, like Sammy knows life really isn’t so sweet.
“Who can take tomorrow, dip it in a dream, separate the sorrow and collect up all the cream….”
I’m singing along, got my head bopping to the melody, when I look to my right and see a woman in the car staring at me. I get all red. Try to cover it up, pretend to yawn, like I really wasn’t singing.
Then I figure — what the hell. Turn it up even louder. Who am I kidding? I love Sammy Davis, Jr. Always have, always will….
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Randolph Street: The Guatemalans
Streetkids–Guatemala City
Girl And Baby–Nebaj
Banana Man–Chajul
Girl On Ladder–Chjul
Family and Dry Corn–Nebaj
Boy Vendor–Bus Plaza, Guatemala City
All photos © JonRandolph
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Pull My Finger. Written by Milo. Read by Andy Orscheln, Lorenzo Toia, Joel Reitsma, Nels, Laura Korn and introducing Benny Jay as Rolando. Produced by King Conundrum.
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