By Sol.: Fuckin’ Drunks….

It’s three in the morning and I’m exhausted. I’m on my third of four 12-hour night shifts.

The Emergency Room is empty except for a drunk, who’s writhing in pain from a self-inflicted wound.

“I’m fucking dying here, man,” he screams. “Somebody help me.”

He’s not really dying. He stabbed his chest with a fork.

I approach the cops who dropped him off.

“What’s this guy’s deal?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” one of the cops replies. “Found him wondering the streets. Fork was lodged in his chest….”

“You fucking with me, Tom? He was just walking the streets with a fork in his chest?”

“Straight truth. He smells like booze, too….”

“JESUS CHRIST, this is supposed to be an emergency room,” the drunk bellows. “Somebody treat me….”

“Bullshit, fucker,” I mumble. “You’re not dying.”

Tom laughs.

“Have a good night, asshole,” Tom tells me.

“Thanks, jack ass,” I reply as he walks out of the ED and returns to the night.

You’re not dying — you’re drunk….

I really don’t have the patience to deal with this guy tonight. I’m tired as hell. I’m afraid I might snap.

I walk into his room.

“What’s your name, buddy?” I ask.

“Mike,” he says weakly, lips quivering, tears in his eyes.

His eyes are blood shot. He has long black hair. He’s probably in his sixties.  He’s wearing blue jeans, a black shirt and boots with high heels. He has gold rings on every finger. His black Prada purse is sitting next to his bed. He has a French-tip manicure.

“What the fuck is this?” I think to myself.

“Mike, we have to do some things,” I tell him. “We’ll start with getting you undressed and into a gown,” I say.

“I’m fucking dying, man.”

“You’re not dying, Mike. You just stuck a fork in your chest. You’ll live.”

He moans and grabs at his chest, looking at me for sympathy.

He gets none.

“Tell us what’s going on tonight, Mike,” a nurse says.

“I was drinking at a friend’s house when we got in an argument and he kicked me out because I stepped on his cat…”

“No, Mike,” I snap. “Tell us why you stuck a fork in your chest — tell us why the cops found you on the street….”

He looks up at me, unsure of what I just asked. He is drunk out of his mind. He can’t focus on what we’re asking him. He doesn’t respond.

My patience is wearing thin. I always have problems dealing with drunks.

“Mike,” I scream, “Why did you do this to yourself?”

He looks up at me, unable to meet my gaze. His hair has fallen into his face and he looks helpless and frustrated. He takes a deep breath.

“I…I… I… I’m a fucking alcoholic, man. I just want to die, man. That’s why,” he says as he busts into tears and sobs.

Everyone in the room looks at each other, and then looks away….

Editor’s Note:  Sol.‘s last dispatch from the Emergency Room for The Third City was Freaks….

Benny Jay: Bike Helmet Man

My long and not-so-happy history with bike helmets begins sometime in the 1970s when I realize I have to wear one.

Before that I’d blissfully biked for ten to fifteen years without realizing my head was dangerously unprotected.

My mother made me wear a helmet. Or maybe it was Ralph Nader. Who can remember? Just know I didn’t like how geeky I looked in them. Like I was afraid of getting hurt. Girls don’t like guys who are afraid of getting hurt.

Steve McQueen never wore a bike helmet. And girls loved Steve McQueen.

So I went through this oh-I-forgot phase. Someone would say, “Hey, you’re not wearing a helmet.” And I’d say, “Oh, I forgot….”

Then one time in the late 80s or early 90s, I had an head on collision with another cyclist. I didn’t see her coming until it was too late. I applied the breaks and the momentum carried my head into her bike with a bam. Well, not a bam. More like a tap. But it was enough to scare me straight. I was too old to care about looking like a geek and girls aren’t looking at me more anymore anyway – as if they ever did.

I had a helmet that looked like this….

So back came the helmet. It was one of those racing helmets, looked like I had a football on my head. Felt like an insect. I hated that helmet!

Then one day in the `00s, I see this guy in a new kind of helmet. Like a army helmet. And I was like – oh, my God, I want a helmet just like that!

But I wanted one that looked like this (the white one)….

So I tell my wife – and she says: Why do you need a new helmet, the old one is working fine….

And I tell my kids and they say – Mom’s right….

How do I explain that it’s greater than the helmet. It’s all about the larvae leaving the cocoon to become a butterfly. Or whatever….

Years go by. I  ride my bike downtown to meet my buddy Randy at the Art Institute. We see the exhibit by my new hero – Henri Cartier-Bresson.

By the way, you absolutely, positively have to see that show! The man went all over the world taking amazing pictures. Better hurry — it closes October 3rd….

Anyway, I’m on the bike path riding back from the Art Institute and I feel something grinding at head. When I get home, I look in the mirror and there’s a welt on my forehead. All raw and red. Think I’ve been attacked by those bedbugs my wife’s always talking about.

Then I realize – my helmet broke! The little cushion thing fell off. Oh, happy day! I can throw that piece of shit away and buy myself a new helmet!

On Saturday I head over to Easy Rider – world’s greatest bike store. Tell Mike, the owner, I want a new helmet. “Mazel Tov,” he says.

Actually, he doesn’t say Mazel Tov. He’s not Jewish. I think he’s Syrian. Not really sure.

I tell him I’ve been waiting to get a new helmet for years.

“Why didn’t you get one earlier?”

How can I answer that without looking like the lunatic that I am?

I buy the new kind. Which really isn’t new anymore. “Looks good on you,” says Mike.

I wear it on the way home – even though I’m not riding my bike.

I can tell women are eying me. Like – dang, who’s that good-looking guy in the bike helmet?

All in all, it’s been a great year for me and hats. Got that Kangol thing, like the one Samuel Jackson wore in Jackie Brown. And now this….

Pass the word — the butterfly has flown….

Big Mike: Black Comedy Excerpt No. 41 — Unsportsmanlike Conduct

Welcome to the latest installment of my serial novel, Black Comedy. — Big Mike

Julie Baby lives at the Drake Hotel at Michigan Avenue and East Lake Shore Drive. The historic Drake stands at the west end of Chicago’s most exclusive block, the centerpiece of the Gold Coast, Chicago’s most exclusive neighborhood. Ann Landers lives on this block, for gosh sakes. The block’s eight fussy old highrises face north, looking down at the skimpily-clad sun worshippers on Oak Street Beach the way a clutch of stately dowagers might look upon so many floozies and hooligans through their lorgnettes.

Of course, that’s in July when Chicago enjoys it’s all-too brief summer. It’s early October now. The street gutters are already dammed with fallen leaves. It’s jacket and heavy sweater weather. This morning, when Chet walked out of the house, he did what most Chicagoans do; he exhaled sharply — yep, he could see his breath.

In fact, no fewer than four neighbors checked to see their breath as they left their Natchez Avenue homes this morning. There were, in addition to Chet: Sidney Feldman, assistant corporation counsel in the city’s Law Department; Jerry Pergler, Northwestern journalism student, WBBM-TV intern, and — for today at least — freelance reporter; and finally, Sal Sanfillipo, one of Chicago’s Finest…, er,  a police officer, let’s leave it at that.

All four will wind up outside the Drake Hotel. Julie Baby’s place.

Julie Baby. That’s the name Abbie Hoffman has bestowed upon the Honorable Julius J. Hoffman, appointed judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois fifteen years earlier by President Eisenhower. Mayor Daley’s old law partner before the two of them became humble public servants. The Hoffmans share a surname but Abbie and Julie Baby are not related. Boy, are they not related.

Julie Baby has made it undeniably clear he doesn’t like Abbie and the rest of the Chicago Eight since their trial began in his courtroom in April. Doesn’t like, hah! Loathes, is more like it. Has already ordered Bobby Seale bound and gagged in court. Then again, Seale did yell out that the judge is a pig, a fascist, and a racist. Has called Abbie and Jerry Rubin obscene. But they have dropped the F-word a time or twenty. Abbie shot back that the judge was the only obscenity in the courtroom. That, and Julie Baby was a shande fur de Goyim (a disgrace in front of all the Gentiles.)

So, things aren’t exactly going swimmingly for Abbie and the boys. If the trial were a ball game, the officials might invoke the slaughter rule. The Weathermen have decided to take it directly to the head referee, the Honorable Julius J. Hoffman, right outside his front door. Oh, are they pissed! Almost as pissed as Julie Baby is that his old pal and law partner, Da Mare, was so humiliated by them and their kind last year. Julie Baby is gonna make somebody pay. But not before the Weathermen at least try to make him pay as well.

Somebody blew up the statue at Haymarket Square three days ago, on Sunday. The statue stood overlooking the Kennedy Expressway, depicting a turn-of-the-century cop holding his hand up, commemorating the Haymarket Massacre, another in the city’s long history of police nervous breakdowns. Now, nobody’s actually saying the Weathermen bombed the statue but…, you know.

And here they are today, about 400 strong along with another 400 supporters, funneling through the narrow pedestrian underpass beneath Lake Shore Drive, gathering at the Michigan Avenue intersection. Bad vibes all around, baby. The lefties and the peaceniks and the little old ladies in tennis shoes who just want this stupid war to end are tut-tutting the Weathermen not only for, as they believe, blowing up the Haymarket statue, but for wearing motorcycle and football helmets as if they’re ready for war themselves, for surreptitiously clutching stones and bricks, for the rage that burns in their eyes.

Bad vibes. The cops already have strategized what to do about all these commie bastards wearing helmets, robbing them (the cops) of the sheer joy brought about by the muffled clunk of wood hitting skull. The word is passed — hit ‘em on the back of the neck, hit ‘em in the small of the back, in the kidneys, whack ‘em on the backs of their knees, go for their balls.

Bad vibes. The sound of broken glass. Car windows are being smashed. Store windows being shattered. The Weathermen had said “The Power’s In the Street!” in the weeks before these Days of Rage. No one needed to be a Weatherman to know which way that wind was blowing.

Bad vibes. Lots of teargas.

Bad vibes. Some of the cops have unholstered their service revolvers.

Bad vibes. The thousand-person-strong knot of marauding protesters has broken up into smaller groups. The cops are trying to break even those up by driving squad cars directly into them. Somebody’s gonna get killed, man!

Bad vibes. Chet is scared. This isn’t just a case of out-of-control cops swinging their nightsticks at anything that moves. This is the real thing now.

Chet thinks, Maybe I oughta get the hell outta here. His reverie is interrupted by the deafening thud of a lead-gloved fist hitting him flush in the eyeteeth. Chet tumbles to the Oak Street pavement, lucky that whoever had cold-cocked him had hit him with the square of his knuckles, diffusing a bit of the blow.

Bad vibes. Chet struggles to his feet, blood gushing out of his nose. He hears a gunshot. Then another. And a third. This, Chet concludes belatedly, is not a game.

Bad vibes. A guy bumps into Chet, almost knocking him again to the pavement. The guy has a fist-sized jagged rock in his hand. To the guy’s right, about fifty feet away, a familiar figure raises his revolver and aims. Sal Sanfillipo does not want to see one more store window broken, goddamn it. To the guy’s left, also about fifty feet away, Jerry Pergler stares wide-eyed at the tableau before him. The guy looks into the triad of hollow black depths, Sal’s two blank eyes and the barrel of his gun. “Fuck you, pig,” the guy screams. “Kill me, motherfucker!” Sal thinks, With pleasure, you piece of shit.

Chet actually pees — not too much, a tablespoonful, probably — in his pants.

Now a human battering ram blurs into Chet’s filed of vision, driven by piston-like legs hardened by four years of Coach Ara Parseghian’s two-a-day drills. This battering ram, this missile, this A-bomb in wingtip shoes propels itself into the body of the guy in Sal’s gunsite with the force of a Volkswagen Beetle. The poor sap with the jagged rock in his hand expels simultaneous bursts of air and intestinal gas that might have made Chet titter had he not feared the poor son of a bitch might be killed by the tackle. The guy’s Raggedy Andy body whomps into Chet’s, nearly knocking him again to the pavement. The guy, still clutching the jagged rock, hits the sidewalk on his backside, the momentum of the blow sending his feet back over his head, the start of a triple backward somersault. Oddly, the man who has tackled him, assistant corporation counsel Sidney Feldman, lies inert in the gutter.

Chet and Sal rush to the guy with the jagged rock in his hand and Sidney, respectively. “You okay, man?” Chet asks the guy. The guy nods woozily. “You okay, buddy?” Sal asks Sidney, but Sidney does not respond for a piece of his fourth cervical vertebra has punctured his spinal cord. “Oh my fucking God,” Sal hollers, “he’s paralyzed!” Another nearby cop hollers back, “That guy kicked him in the head!” A third hollers, “He hit ‘im wit’ sumpin’!” Yet another hollers, “It was a lead pipe!” A fifth hollers, “Naw, it was a rock, get it outta his fuckin’ hand!”

Now Chet is shoved out of the way as the five cops cuff the guy, a process which entails the use of three nightsticks, a blackjack, a pair of brass knuckles, and Sal’s special little trick, the five-fingered ball-sack twist which causes the guy to squeal like a frightened piglet.

By the end of the afternoon, Sidney Feldman learns he will probably never walk again. By the end of the afternoon, Chet Michalski learns the guy with the jagged rock in his hand will be charged with attempted murder. By the end of the afternoon, Jerry Pergler has gone to the WBBM-TV news editor and the city editors of Chicago’s four dailies, hoping to sell his eyewitness account of the incident. Each of the media gatekeepers dismisses Jerry with some variation of this message: “Beat it, kid. Who’s fuckin’ side are you on?”

It is now dark. Chet, riding the Lake Street el home, stares out the train window at the West Side slums of Humboldt Park and Garfield Park and the east end of Austin. Lots of empty lots, the burned-out shells of three- and four-flats having been razed months ago, the lots now owned by smart speculators like Jackey Pontone and Rocco Bianco and, yep, Al Dudek. The brothers put the torch to their ratholes after Martin Luther King was killed but that didn’t get them any better homes to live in. Chet thinks back to August, 1968, when he and his cohorts made The Whole World Watch. Lotta good that did; the war’s still going on. Chet flashes to the day’s events on East Lake Shore Drive and Oak Street. But Bobby Seale’s still bound and gagged.

Chet thinks, This isn’t working, man. None of it. Chet realizes he’s a lot more pissed off right now than he was when he decided to go to the street outside Julie Baby’s home this morning. Days of Rage, hah! This is Chester Michalski’s Moment of Rage. He wants to pound on the windows of the el train but it pulls into the Ridgeland Avenue stop in Oak Park. Chet is so filled with hot energy that he decides to walk home from the station. The two and a half mile walk takes him a little less than an hour. Chet feels as though he wants to climb out of his own skin.

Bad vibes, man. Anna’s home. Sitting at the kitchen table, wearing one of her dad’s oversized old dress shirts, the top three buttons undone, her newly pendulous mom-breasts clearly visible, her thighs calling out to be squeezed. Anna says, “What happened now? There’s blood on your shirt.” Chet does not answer. Instead, he grasps Anna’s ponytail and pulls her close to him for the first time in…, months, is it? Maybe a year or more? Chet smashes his mouth against Anna’s. She pushes him away, “C’mon now, Chet. Whaddya doin’?” Chet pulls Anna by the hair down to the floor and rips open her old man’s oversized shirt, three buttons clinking off the kitchen walls. Anna says, “No!” Chet says nothing as he unzips his blue jeans. Anna feels as though she’s going to hork. Then again, this man is her husband and doesn’t she have a duty to give herself to him? She resists the twin urges to hork and to claw his eyes out as he puts himself inside her.

Join us Tuesday for the next installment of Black Comedy.

Lynn Collins: Dogs and Their People

Editor’s Note: Lynn Collins last photo shoot for The Third City was Dogs of New York City….

Randolph Street: Lake Atitlan

Lake Atitlan–Panajachel, Guatemala

Fisherman–Lake Atitlan

Church–San Pedro

Christening–Panajachel

Couple–San Pedro

Soccer Ball–San Pedro

Carnival Ride–San Pedro

Benny Jay: Evanston Library

I’m driving into Evanston and listening to the radio and the lady on NPR is talking about how the digital age has made books obsolete.

Just my luck — I’m on my way to the public library. As always my timing sucks….

I used to get books from the local library in Chicago. But the city’s so broke they can’t afford to buy new books. And they can’t employ enough book checkers to make sure the books they have are properly returned to the shelves.

So I gave up on Chicago and head off to suburban Evanston, which has reciprocity with Chicago when it comes to checking out books. There must be a million books in the Evanston library. I’ll never come close to reading them all….

I try to stay up on the hot new reads, but it’s hard – especially in Evanston. As soon as a book gets a big write-up in the New York Times everyone wants to read it. That happened this year with Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad. You can forget about checking out that book anytime soon.

The most popular book in the Evanston public library….

The librarians suggest I reserve Egan’s book by putting my name on a list. But, nah, I figure it just wasn’t meant to be.

Sometimes I’ll track down an author after reading his or her obituary in the paper. Happened earlier this year with Barry Hannah. The Times called him a master of black humor.

I found his masterpiece – Geronimo Rex – on the shelf in Evanston. Looked like it had been sitting there for years.

Great book — really glad I checked it out. Librarians tell me that if a book doesn’t get checked out a certain number of times over a period of years they throw it out. I hate to think that would happen to Geronimo Rex.

Reminds me of the time my local Chicago library purged its collection of “unwanted” books.

A local book lover – his heart broken by the sight of hundreds of discarded books — told me about it. And I wrote it up in the paper, mentioning that they’d discarded a copy of Working by Studs Terkel.

Well, you wouldn’t believe what happened next — Studs called me up! He couldn’t have been friendlier. Asked if I would take him to see the library.

I told him that there really wasn’t much to see – since the books had already been carted away. But he said he wanted to see it anyway. And who am I to say no to the great Studs Terkel!

The great Studs Terkel!

So me and Studs and the book lover met at the library. Well, when the librarians saw that book lover show up with a camera around his neck, they called security. Apparently, they recognized him as a known troublemaker.

Next thing you know a security guard tell us we can’t take pictures in the library — not that anyone was taking pictures — and he asks us to leave. I told him he’d just kicked Studs Terkel – one of the great Chicago authors of the modern times – out of a public library.

Here’s the thing – the guard was an old friend. Great guy. Didn’t like playing the hard guy anymore than we liked putting up with his hard-guy act. He was just doing his job cause he needed to make a living. Would have made a great interview for a Studs Terkel book – say, Working.

To his credit, Studs held no grudge. After they kicked us out, we stood on the sidewalk and he told us how much he loved libraries and librarians. He said it was a librarian at a public library on Division Street who introduced him to poetry. Right there and then he quoted The Rime of the Ancient Mariner: “Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink….”

Just writing this makes me miss Studs Terkel, who died two years ago.  I think I’ll drive over to the library in Evanston and check out one of his books….

By Sol.: Freaks

Pain is all relative…

I work in a hospital emergency department and dealing with blood, guts and death are all part of my daily experiences. I accept this and deal with it as best I can.

It’s not a job for the weak.

But there are times when I can’t deal with what I see. It’s not what you think. I’m not talking about dead bodies or broken bones popping out of some dude’s skin.

These are the things you expect to see in an ED.

I’m talking about what we call “freaks.”

Before you ask what it is exactly I mean by freak, I’ll explain why we use the term.

Freaks are people who come in to the ED for a variety of reasons—none of them valid—seeking more attention than is needed for their particular problem.

I work in an Emergency Room….

The term freak came about as a means for staff in my ED to flag potential problem patients. It is a way for us to give each other a heads up.

We’ll say something like: “Boy, the lady in room ten is a real freak….”

Or: “Did you get a look at the freak in room twelve?”

Now, don’t misunderstand what I’m saying here. The majority of patients that make their way through our ED aren’t freaks. I’m not calling granny who has dementia a freak.

You’re not even a freak if you’re just a pain in the ass or an asshole. You’re just, well, a pain in the ass or an asshole….

No, freak is a special designation reserved for the extraordinary few who rise above the rest.

They usually come in with things like a cat scratch to their leg, or a splinter in their finger, or because they have a hangover from drinking beer and scotch the night before, or because they threw up once four hours ago.  And what’s worse, they usually call 911 and are brought in by ambulance.

Not this kind of freak….

Take for example this kid that came in the other day….

Twenty-year-old male calls 911 because he has a laceration to his hand. We get the call over the radio. Paramedics give an ETA of two minutes.

I go into a patient’s room and set up. I get gauze ready and some wraps just in case the kid’s pouring blood.

A couple minutes later our ED-bay doors slide open and in come the paramedics – looking disgusted – followed by this joker on his cell phone laughing and talking about how he got a ride in an ambulance.

“Where’s the patient?” I ask.

“He’s right here,” says a paramedic, nodding at the kid on the phone.

I stop dead in my tracks. Mind you, the medics gave us an ETA of two minutes. That means the kid could have walked to our ED in five.

Now, like I was saying, pain is relative. And like our administrators like to point out – what’s an emergency to one person may not be an emergency to someone else.

But this kid was not experiencing an emergency. He was just a freak — and a particularly stupid one at that.

I tell the kid to have seat on the cart. He does. I tell him I have to take his vital signs. He looks up at me, tells the person on the line to hold on, and looking annoyed for having been interrupted, says, “Jesus Christ is all this shit necessary? I just cut my hand.”

How I managed not to slap him is beyond me.

I take his vitals and move on to the next patient.

Another day, another freak….

By: Sol.

Editor’s Note: Let’s all welcome Sol. to The Third City!