Rolando: I Finally Got My Nod

Growing up I was always surrounded by music and musicians. All my best friends are musicians. I played drums and timbales when I was younger. And the group of us always spent most of our free time working on our chops or jamming together.

Now, of course, as we all got a little older, some of us got a lot better than the others at our craft.

I wasn’t one of them.

Some of my other friends began to show signs of being real bad boys on their instruments at a fairly young age.

But in Chicago, at least at that time, there was one place in particular you’d go to prove yourself if you were a Latin Jazz musician: Cafe Bolero.

Cafe Bolero is still open and cats are still jamming…

This tiny little Cuban restaurant/bar served as the meeting point for all of the bad ass Latin Jazz cats in the city. It’s located on Western Ave just south of Fullerton Ave.

Some real nasty dudes played there, and if you wanted any respect as a musician, you sat in with these guys and gave it your best.

So we’d go every Tuesday night to check out some music, maybe sneak a drink in or three. We were all under the age of 18, but the bartender knew us and served us anyway.

The bar, where the music was played, is a room no bigger than 30 x 30 feet. And that is including the full-service bar tucked into the corner. It has exposed brick walls and the lighting  is always dimmed down low.

This was back when smoking in doors was allowed, so there would always be a smokey haze filling the room from all the cigar smoke.

The place would always be packed to capacity; standing room only. But we squirmed and wiggled our way up to the front so we could get a better view.

We always wanted to study the Chicago legends up front. Guys like the congero, who we referred to as The Ogie. There was Mike, a trumpet player who could blow the hell out of his horn.

The Ogie is the freaking man. Beastly on the congas. Hands like steel…

But then there was Richie, the band leader and bassist. A real son of a bitch. The guy didn’t smile. He didn’t like new kids coming in and trying to prove themselves–unless they really proved themselves–and he sure as hell didn’t like kids that came up to sit in with a false sense of confidence.

But to us, back then, he was the man. He ran the show, and if you could impress him, you were set.

When guys would sit in, Richie had this way of testing them. If you sucked, he just wrapped up the song and got you off of your instrument.

If a guy was somewhat good, he’d stop the music and let him go off on a solo. He’d give a slight nod to the rest of the band, and with the wave of a hand, the guy would be all alone.

“Go ahead,” he’d say.

And it was the guy, his instrument and the crowd, watching, seeing if he had the skill to impress.

The shit was terrifying, because that meant a guy had nothing to hide behind. Any mix up, any mistake or lack of skill, and he’d be exposed.

But if he pulled something through, and really impressed, he’d get a slight nod from Richie. That’s it. But it was enough to know that he hadn’t made a fool of himself.

I was always too terrified to go up. Some of my friends did, some tanked, some got the nod. But I couldn’t manage enough courage to sit in with these guys. I was 16 and hadn’t felt brave or comfortable enough to try.

More than a decade has passed and the place is still holding its Tuesday night Latin Jazz sessions.

Only the legends are gone and replaced by some of my friends who spent their teenage years there trying to make a name for themselves. Richie is still there leading it up from the bass.

I don’t play anymore, but on a recent Tuesday night, it was an old reunion of a sort. It was Richie’s birthday and all the old cats showed up.

The Ogie was there and a lot of older familiar faces.

The shit was jamming like it used to. Song after song, the boys kept the energy high and different musicians were switching out and sitting in. The old legends would sit in and the new cats would sit out and vice versa.

Then on one song, my childhood buddy, a real bad ass on timbales, handed me a pair of sticks and told me to jump in on a round of solos that different timbaleros were having.

Dennis Calito, the second half of the renowned percussionist duo, The Calito Brothers, handed me some sticks and said stop being a punk. 

Now it was probably the drinks that I had on board, or maybe I just didn’t care, but I jumped in and let loose.

Greatest solo in the world? Probably not. But it wasn’t horrible. And it was fun. And a couple of weeks later when I was back at Bolero sitting at the bar Richie gave me his trademark nod.

He said, “Not bad bro, for not having touched percussion in years.”

But he was quick to add: “Not great either.”

Fuck it. I’ll take it as a compliment. Richie was always hard to please.

 

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Rolando: Hector’s Bar–Part II

Months had passed since I first stepped into Hector’s bar, and things had progressed to the point where he look forward to my company.

He’d open the bar on more nights than he had before I first walked in. And whenever I brought a guest, he’d treat us like we were royalty.

One night, after sitting in my apartment with nothing to do, I decided to take a walk down to Hector’s bar, see what was going on with old man.

I walked in and he greeted me as he always did.

“Oye, Boriqua, que tal?”

I responded as I usually did, “Todo bien, Che, todo bien.”

He poured me a beer and we began to talk about Malaga’s soccer team and how they were doomed to be relegated down to the second division because of their poor performance during that year’s La Liga season.

The old man was passionate about his soccer, and aside from his country’s national team, Malaga was his second love. But they sucked.

Being from the north side of Chicago and knowing how it felt to know your hometown team sucked horribly, I could feel the old man’s pain.

I was trying to relate how my own experiences with the Cubs matched his with the Malaga Futbol Club when two thug looking dudes  walked into the bar.

“Dos cervesas,” one of them said.

Hector, looking visibly shaken, hurried to pour them their two beers.

For a few minutes, we all sat silent, Hector, pretending to read his paper, the two guys, drinking their beers and watching Hector, and me, trying to process what the hell was going on.

One of the guys, he looked to be the younger of the two, walked up to me and offered me a cigarette.

Trying to ease the tension, I accepted. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a pack and handed me one.

I turned to Hector and asked him for a light.

“Che, tienes fuego?”

He grabbed a book of matches and lit my cigarette.

I inhaled deeply, thanked the man for the cigarette and introduced myself to the them. They both shook my hand but didn’t give me their names.

They offered to buy a round of shots and beers and we began talking.

They were brothers. The taller, older one did most of the talking, while the younger one–the one who had offered me the cigarette–just sat and listened.

We talked about everything. They wanted to know where I was from. I told them Chicago and they were immediately intrigued. That wanted to know about  gangsters and the mob. They asked if it was like the movie, “The Untouchables” or if Italian mobsters still ran the city.

I told them no, that it wasn’t like that. But that it was kind of like that. I couldn’t get them to understand the complexity of our political machine system.

We kept drinking, them buying rounds in exchange for my information on Chicago.

The younger brother offered me a cigarette again, and not to be rude, I accepted.

It was a fucking Chesterfield, I didn’t know I’d get high…

Only this time, the shit got real weird after I smoked it. I began to hallucinate, and I couldn’t focus on what they were saying. I saw double and the pitch of their voices began to stretch and bend.

After about five minutes of them asking me questions and me being unable to answer, the older brother caught on.

He turned to his younger brother and asked if he had given me one of the special cigarettes.

The younger brother, scared, looked down into his cigarette box and said yes.

The fuckers had inadvertently drugged me with whatever they had been getting high on, and it wasn’t your typical Spanish cigarette laced with hash. The shit was way heavier.

Fearing that I would freak out on whatever they were smoking, and run to the police station that was a quarter of a mile away, the older brother grabbed me by my shoulder and began to walk me out of the bar.

Hector pleaded with me not to go with them. He said that they were bad guys, connected with the local crime scene.

I was too fucked to even fully comprehend what he was saying.

I ended up on the back of the younger brother’s motorbike. We were flying down the strip called Calle Bolivia, and he was saying we were going to a safe place. I was so out of it I didn’t care.

A stretch of Calle Bolivia…

All I could focus on was the sensation of the wind, combined with the smell of the saltiness of the sea, blowing on my face as we raced down the street.

When we got where we were going, the younger brother told me to jump off, and we all began walking down this darkened alley.

I started freaking out. I repeatedly asked them where the hell we were going. In my altered mind state, I couldn’t help but feel that death was near. And that these two thugs, rather than deal with a high foreigner and having to explain to the police how they inadvertently drugged me, would prefer to just kill me in that dark alley and avoid all the questions.

They assured me that everything was alright. I would be fine. They just needed to get me to this safe place.

We walked up to this large steel door. The older brother knocked on it, and it screeched open. This bad ass guy looked at him, looked at the younger brother, then looked at me, my eyes all dilated, my body covered in sweat, with the stink of fear emanating from me, and gave us the nod to come in.

Once in, I realized what they were talking about. It was a tiny bar, a club house, really, where they and their associates hung out. It was completely off the map.

We were greeted by their friends. I was introduced as, “El chico de Chicago.” And the questions about the gangs and the mob began flooding in from all directions.

The older brother saved me. He told them that his idiot younger brother had mistakenly  given me the wrong cigarette, and that I was to hang out with them until I came off it.

It wasn’t until 6 a.m. that morning that I felt some what normal, we walked out of what they affectionaly called The Smoking Bar and the older brother gave me a ride home. The sweet, salty smell of the sea again invigorated my senses as we cruised back down Calle Bolivia towards my apartment.

The older brother dropped me off at my place, shook my hand and apologized. He told me his name was Osvaldo. And for the rest of my time in Malaga, I never saw him or his brother again, but I never had a problem with any of the local thugs.

Editor’s Note: This is the second part of a two part series. 

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Rolando: The Toughest and Best Thing I’ve Ever Done

A close and trusted friend recently told me something that made me stop and think about some recent life choices I’ve made.

“You’re a sick, sadist idiot,” she told me.

I thought about that for a few seconds and realized she was right.

She was talking about my decision to run one of the toughest races out there this last Saturday.

The name of the  race: Tough Mudder.

It is 12 miles of pure hell, just a lot colder. The race was designed by British Special Forces.

It has 22 obstacles that generally include running up in down muddy hills, fully submerging yourself in freezing cold water, climbing over 12-foot walls, trudging through muddy and swampy paths and sprinting or crawling through electrically charged wires.

We literally signed a death waiver…

The obstacles were designed to push you to your limits.

One of the obstacles, called Chernobyl Bath, was a jump into what amounted to a huge ice bath. Then a swim under a barrier to the other side of the container.

It was no more than 50 degrees out, by the way.

Another was a jump off a 20-foot platform into a ice cold lake and swim to shore.

The last obstacle was a real son-of-a bitch. After 12 miles of hell, we had to run through roughly 15 feet of live electrical wire, with up to 10,000 volts of electricity. I got zapped twice and it literally made me want to stop in my tracks.

Nothing like 10,000 volts after 12 miles of misery…

During the race we were cold, tired, our hands and feet were numb and we were covered from head to toe in mud.

I know, I know, it sounds sadistic and painful. And god was it painful. But it was fun, too.

We had a team of 9 men and women running this thing. And despite the pain, despite being freezing cold and miserable, it brought something out of us, something that I know we all will remember for the rest of our lives.

It showed that 9 individuals working together could dig deep, and through all the cold and misery and suffering, could accomplish this feat together.

When we crossed the finish line, we all shook hands and hugged, a great sense of relief and accomplishment spread through our team. We had spent the better part of 3 hours together, suffering through that course.

We supported each other. Helped each other over walls and through mud and freezing cold lakes and ponds, never leaving  anyone behind.

It was a damn good day in the end. And it was the toughest and best thing I’ve ever done.

 

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Rolando: Hector’s Bar–Part I

About six years ago I spent some time living  in Southern Spain.

I moved there to study at this institute that was located in the mountains of a small Mediterranean city called Malaga.

It was great–beautiful weather, good people, great food. I spent most of my time there really enjoying the better things life has to offer.

The apartment where I was staying was a block away from the beach. At night, in my bedroom, I’d fall asleep to the sounds of waves crashing against the shore.

I’d wake up–usually sometime in the afternoon–throw on a pair of shorts and walk down to the beach and have a swim in the Mediterranean.  Then I’d have lunch at a beach side restaurant, usually some type of seafood washed down by cold beer.

It was truly good living every single day, and I could fill a book with the wild and amazing adventures I had during that time.

Malaga, Spain…

I have nothing but good memories about that time and place. But there is this one memory that’s been replaying itself in my head a lot lately.

I was making my way back to my apartment after a long night of hanging out with friends in the city’s center when I noticed some lights on in this bar  located just around the corner from my apartment building. In the months sinced I first moved in, I had never seen it open for business before.

It was early by Spanish standards–about 2 a.m.–so I decided to stop in and have a night cap and check out the neighborhood bar.

I walked in and there was this little old man sitting behind the bar reading a newspaper. The place was empty. Not a sound.

“Buenas,” he said to me without looking up from the paper.

“Buenas,” I replied. ”Una cervesa, por favor.”

He poured me a beer and went back to reading his paper.

I sat at the bar and tried to start a conversation with the old man. Nothing. He’d either ignore my questions or give me one-word answers, all the while never looking up from his newspaper.

He looked like he was in his eighties. He was short and thin and he had white hair that he wore combed back. He had a pair of neatly pressed dress slacks and a button down shirt that he tucked into them.  He wore gold-rimmed glasses that sat at the very tip of his nose. And as he read, the only movements that he made were to push his glasses up a bit with his index finger every time he turned the page.

I continued trying to get the old man to speak, but he seemed more interested in his paper than talking with foreigner.

After a while, I grew tired of essentially talking to a wall. I drank half my beer, threw two euros on the bar and walked out.

The next night I came home and the bar was closed. The same thing over the next week. Every night I walked past, it was closed.

Every time I walked by, the doors would be shuttered…

Then the following week, I noticed it was opened. So I decided to go in again. Maybe the old man was having a bad night that last time and I could get him talking this time around.

I walked in and it was a repeat of our first encounter. I sat at the bar asking questions. He read his paper, and ignored me.

But this time I tried something a little different; I offered to buy him a beer.

“Quieres una cervesa? Yo invito,” I said, offering to buy him a beer.

For the first time he put his paper down and looked up at me. He removed his glasses, placed them on the bar and poured himself a beer.

“Gracias,” he said as he lifted his glass to me. He took a long pull from it and held the glass out in front of him, examining its contents. He looked pleased, and for the first time, he asked me a question.

I told him I was from Chicago, but that I was of Puerto Rican descent. He said he could tell by my accent.

I learned that his name was Hector. He was from Argentina. He moved to Malaga in the early 80s and eventually purchased the bar. He didn’t need the money, so he opened it when he wanted, mainly when he was bored at night and couldn’t sleep.

We spent the night talking about the details of our lives and drinking a lot of beer and whiskey.  Hector loved Johnny Walker Black Label and I think between the two of us, we finished off a bottle.

As the sun rose that next morning, I helped Hector close up and we both stumbled out of his bar and went our separate ways.

Over the next several months, I had a lot of good times at that bar. In fact, being at that bar led me to one of my more crazier experiences of that trip.

Editor’s note: Stay tuned for part two of this series…

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Rolando: The Monk

Thelonious Monk is by far my favorite jazz musician. I listen to his records all the time — when I’m reading, when I’m writing, when I’m driving my car. Monk has been a constant companion of mine ever since I was a kid.

There’s something about his style of play, the way he made notes fit into spaces that no one else had thought to try.

For some of the jazz critics of his time, Monk’s style of play didn’t sit right with them. It sounded as if he were hitting wrong notes.

But for Monk, who was determined to do it his way regardless of what  was in fashion at the time or what critics said: “Wrong was right.”

Monk was with out doubt ahead of his time. And I’m pretty sure he recognized it, too.

“I say, play your own way. Don’t play what the public want — you play what you want and let the public pick up on what you doing — even if it does take them fifteen, twenty years,” he once said.

Then there was his personality and behavior. He was seemingly unpredictable. He’d jump up from his piano,mid song, and start stomping his feet and spinning around to the rhythmn.

He never kept regular sleeping hours. His approach was to sleep when he was tired. That’s it.

Then there was his hats. Monk loved to wear varying styles of hats during his performances, none of them really made any sense, but the man loved to wear a new one every time.

Madness and genius wrapped into one package…

It was said that his wife and muse, Nellie, traveled everywhere he toured, handling the most mundane and simplest of tasks. She laid clothes out for him and dressed him before performances. She made sure he ate. It was almost as if Monk was incapable of executing normal, everyday tasks. He was a child that needed caring for.

But once on the piano, he was genius, decades beyond his peers.

Listen to his rendition of “‘Round Midnight.” It’s breathtaking. It’s all wrong, but right at the same time.

It’s sadness and joy all wrapped into one performance. Simply put, It’s Monk.

Monk also has a special place in my heart because he’s tied to so many of my travel memories.

That rainy day in Paris, sitting at a cafe in Amsterdam, that long train ride from the south of Spain to the north, traveling through the mountains of Morocco, Venice, Florence, Rome, the rain forest in Puerto Rico, the jungles of Belize.  I’d put my headphones on, que up some Monk, and soak it all in. So that now every time I hear “‘Round Midnight” or “Ruby, My Dear”  some of my most fondest memories come flooding back to my mind’s eye.

I was listening to “Ruby, My Dear” up in the mountains of PR…

Yeah, it’s safe to say that Thelonious Monk’s music has been one of the biggest artistic influences on my life.

Hell, I’m listening to Monk right now as I write this post.

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Rolando: My Nine Lives

I was hanging out with some old buddies of mine the other day and we got to reminiscing about our teenage years growing up in the city.

Now we weren’t the wildest bunch of kids, but we saw our fair share of craziness growing up.

So we got to talking about those crazy times. I’m not even sure how or why the subject came up, but we started talking about all the times we almost got shot together.

I know, crazy ass subject to be discussing over pizza and beer.

When I thought back I counted 9 times I had almost been shot. One time I had a gun pulled out and pointed right at my chest. Another time some dudes pulled out a gun and put it to one of my friend’s head as they robbed us.

One of my old buddies, we call him Blanco, took the record for the amount of times we had either been shot at or near together. We counted four times in total.

They happened when I was 19 and living in a studio apartment on Blackhawk and Bosworth just on the outskirts of Buctown. At that time the neighborhood hadn’t fully been gentrified and there were pockets that were heavily controlled and fought over by local gangs.

We were hanging out at my place one night when we decided to go to the local fast food joint to get some food.

“Let’s get some pizza puffs, bro,” Blanco said.

“Come on, let’s go.”

I grabbed my keys off a table and headed for the door. Blanco got up from my couch and followed me out, but turned around.

“I got to take a piss, bro.”

“What the hell, man?” I said. “Hurry it up.”

When he was done we got into my car, made our way onto Ashland Ave. and headed south to the fast food joint that was literally two blocks away.

Then we heard gun shots, at least six of them.

“You heard that, bro?” Blanco asked.

“Yeah.”

“Someone got there ass popped.”

“Yup.”

When we got to the fast food joint, it looked like a scene out of a crime movie. The windows were all shot up and there was blood everywhere.

Some dude was laying on the floor moaning in pain, and the Arabs that owned the joint were all cowered behind the bullet proof glass they had installed to protect them from such an incident.

Within minutes the place was swarming with cops. We got the hell out of there and headed back to my place.

Cops and paramedics swarmed the place…

It wasn’t until about a hour later that it dawned on me: If Blanco hadn’t gone back in to use the bathroom, we would’ve been in that fast food joint when that shit went down and we would’ve been dead.

There was another time that was a bit closer.

Same scenario. We’re at my place and about to head out to the gas station for some munchies. We jump in my car make our way to the gas station, stock up on a bunch of junk food and head back south on Ashland Ave. towards my place.

As we get two blocks from my street, I see this kid walk up to the street corner raise his arm and start letting off shots from what had to be a .45 magnum. The thing was like a cannon.

He had to been firing this thing…

Things is, he shooting across Ashland at some other dudes who start to run. And Blanco, myself and my car are right in his path. Now we’re moving in the car, but it felt like everything froze. I just remember looking past Blanco out of my passenger side window and seeing this kid fire this gun with a weird perveted smile on his face. There were these flashes of light coming out of the gun followed by thunderous blasts.

But then the funniest thing happened. While I was taking all this in and trying to process exactly what it meant for my life and safety, I noticed that Blanco was sitting in the passenger seat oblivious to what was going on. He was tucking into a tub of ice scream he had bought at the gas station.

When I looked back up the kid was running in the other direction. The whole thing happened in a matter of seconds.

The two other times were similar scenarios; just us being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

Thankfully none of us were ever actually shot. And now that I’m older, I look back at those times and can now fully appreciate that none of us were ever hurt.

 

 

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Rolando: Parenting with Rolando, Jr.–Sports

My old man is an old school kind of guy. He grew up in Chicago in the 60′s and 70′s in different neighborhoods throughout the city.

So needless to say, he spent a lot of time on the streets playing sports. And truth be told, my old man can play them all.

So growing up, he always made sure me and my brother played sports. He’d take us out and play fast pitch with us. He’d take us to the park and play basketball with us. Hell, he’d wake us up every Saturday morning and challenge us to a wrestling match. He wanted his boys to be tough and active.

But my old man isn’t like most. He wouldn’t take it easy on us cause we were kids. He’d give us a real ass whipping, and he’d enjoy it.

“It will make you tough,” he’d say.

I remember for years we’d play basketball and he’d be ruthless. He would beat me up in the post, playing as physical as if he were playing and adult. He’d block my shots and talk smack.

No blood no foul was my old man’s saying…

His favorite saying after he would demolish me in a game would be: “One day, son. One day you will beat me, but not today.”

I was probably 11 or 12 when this was going on.

Like I said, my old man isn’t like most. He’s a competitive son of a gun. He doesn’t like to lose. Even if it’s to his own kids. And he was like that all through our childhood and teenage years.

A couple years back, my dad, my brother and I decided to start a round of weekly games of racquetball at our local YMCA.

My old man–in his 50′s now–thought it would be good for us as a family to get some regular sporting activities in together.

So one day we’re at our Y playing a game.

It’s the three of us, and we’re playing a round of cut throat.

My pops is all over the court, has the accuracy of a marksman when it comes to placing that little blue ball. He has me and my brother running all over the court, chasing his well-placed serves.

Then he and my brother get into an argument about a call. My brother says the ball hit off the floor before hitting off the front wall. My dad says it didn’t. They go back and forth for a while, both passionately arguing their cases.

Normally my dad would let it go. But my brother is arguing in a high-pitched falsetto voice for some reason. Has been talking like that the whole game. He does crazy stuff like that sometimes, just to throw us off.

“Nah, daddy, the ball hit the ground,” he said in a high-pitch voice.

“The ball did not hit the ground, boy,” my dad replied. “And why are you talking like that?”

“It hit the ground, daddy. I saw it, and you’re wrong,” my brother replied in that same high-pitched voice.

“Boy, I’m telling you it didn’t.”

“You’re wrong daddy, just wrong.”

My dad let it go. But I could see in his eyes that he was planning something.

On his next serve it become evident what he was planning on doing.

My brother was on the front line of the court, I was just behind him, and my dad behind me.

We all set up, ready for his serve. I looked over as my dad threw the ball in the air, reached back as far as he could with his racquet and with an evil grin on his face, proceeded to hit the ball as hard as he could right into the center of my brother’s back.

My brother let out a squeal, threw both his hands up and arched his back with his chest sticking out forward.

He dropped to his knees and then fell to the ground as if he had been shot.

“Oh, God,” he screamed.

My dad walked over to him with a smile on his face, laughing.

“What’s a matter, boy?”

My brother just rolled around on the ground in pain.

My old man is a vet of the racquetball courts. Blasting someone in the back was how you intimidated someone, or paid them back for something you were unhappy about.

He kicks ass and takes names later…

From that moment forward, my brother ditched the high-pitched voice, and we both cringed every time my pops served the ball.

We both lost that game.

 

 

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