Entering the house by surprise with my brother, as our mother laughed, “I didn’t know I raised such good liars,” and the family assembled for the surprise 86th birthday party laughed, I saw my three-year old grandson look up from his matchbox cars and scamper to his mother. After hugging the women and shaking hands with the men, I approached The Mother of the Race, flanked by two teenagers, including the 15-year old who is now my size. My oldest daughter-in-law said to him, “Lukey, that’s Pap, go say high.”
He buzzed past me into the side room and invited me to sit next to him and pet the old collie. Cake was announced and he disappeared to the appointed place. His other than came to sit next to me, “I have to tell you I was down in your neck of the woods, from Harford County to Harford Road, Baltimore City. With work, kids, family—I needed a break, Just a couple of drinks and a smoke. I called Dawn and she said we couldn’t go to Dead Freddies—all black, or Brennens. Only the Harford House, Racers and Shamrock. So, we go to to the Shamrock. I know Terry, still sleeps on the bar like Frankenstein. After 10 they have the crazy heavy metal bands and mosh pit. So we’re going to be out by then. We’re in our mid forties, right. I had no idea that Dawn and Brian still partied like they were in their twenties. We’re having a nice time, shooting the shit with Tom and Fred, the two old regulars and Terry. We go up to Racers, which is really nice, but two expensive to do shots. So back down to the Shamrock, literally half the price of Racers.
“These kids come in, early thirties. Dawn is coming back from the women’s room and says high to the young people, two couples. Then Brian gets upset Dawn is talking to them and walks over, ‘Why you talkin’ to my wife,’ swinging his dick around. Dawn gets pissed and comes to me, so I have to squash it. I cut in front of Brian, ‘Hey, buy us shots, dude,’ and yuk it up with the kids, ‘Oh, you’re so cute, nice to see you, you all want to play music, I’m putting twenty in the juke box and we can all pick songs.’ Done, good, stupid time averted. I’m too old to be getting in fights with men, and it never was that much fun beating up girls—you know, its just beating up a girl, you hit them and the’re crying about their nose… and all you are doing is entertaining men anyhow. I’m a nice drinker—just want to relax.
“So, to keep from drinking too much, I go smoke outside. I’m an adult now, right. Now, the whole time there is a cop posted across the street at Dollar Deals. There is also a back car with tinted out windows parked between Christopher and the side lot. The second time I go out, its in front of the bar. They roll up and roll down the windows. There are two black women—itty bitty, wam bam, but they could have knives—a big black man smoking a blunt, and an older black woman, his mother, I guess. The old woman—fucking my age, right—says girl, ‘Are you smoking weed or smoke?’
I show her the vape in one hand and the cig in the other and say, ‘Both, the vape is weed.’
The man says, ‘Wanta hit of my blunt?’
I say, ‘No thanks,’ I’m not taking drugs from strangers, right. And he says, ‘It’s my birthday, can we come in there?’
I said, ‘Well, I’m not from around here. You can give it a shot.’
Then Brian comes out, grabs the blunt, and is toking, and Dawn is behind him—they’re getting out of the car right now, and she’s, ‘Bah, bah, bah,’ at Brian. So I push her inside and I’m saying, ‘Be cool,’ and she’s like, ‘Damn niցցers,’ and I didn’t know she knew the little girl in the driver’s seat from some other bar.
They come in, and Brian is shooting pool with the dude, and they are okay. Mamma is nice enough. But you have the two skinny-minnie black hotties, right—that shit never goes smooth. I’m between Tom and the other old dude, on the short run by the window and the front door, and Dawn is popping off at the black dude, ‘He don’t owe you shit!’
Woah, woah, got the kids calmed down, find out they’re neighbors and all, and now this shit. The black chick, little—but I don’t knock bitches out anymore—I’m an adult, so I say, ‘what’s the problem.’
‘Oh, it’s my man’s birthday and he beat your man in pool, so your man owes him a beer.’
And Dawn is, ‘Mah, mah, mah,’ so I shove her and Brian into the doorway and tell the girl, ‘This is about a beer? Oh, I got you—how about I ball you all a round—right.’
They were all cool with it, except for her. She wanted a piece of Dawn. So I say to the others, start ordering, I’m paying. I’m outside at the truck telling Brian, ‘Stuff her the fuck in the truck and we’re rolling.’
And this Robin Givens bitch is behind me begging for a beating and her man is like, ‘Awe, Baby,’ but she’s jumping in her car to block us in. Brian’s got a brand new truck. I hop in and she blocks him in and I told him, ‘Fucking roll, Bro,’ and he’s driving over those stupid plastic parking things for bicycle people. He’s about to turn on Christopher but the fucking cop is over there. We are stuck at the red light, a car for, you know—hey Lukey, telling grandpa a story, sit on my knee—and this bitch is out of the car banging on the window wanting to fight—just so stupid, over a two dollar beer.
We get the red light and I say, ‘Don’t go home, you can’t let this bitch now where you live! We get up to Northern Parkway, Brian turns right, then pulls a hard short Uey at the cut in the median there at the Pharmacy, and we are facing west across Harford, but the bitch is behind us. We have a red light and this bitch is pounding on the truck and screaming—just stupid, right, and a cop pulls up behind her. That’s when I find out this bitch knows Dawn from the Firehouse, and I’m like, ‘Girl, that bitch is catching a charge over this—stay out of the bars,’ and Brian hit it and we were off to their place, screaming like we were teenagers. It’s like going into the city is a time machine—never again. No more Harford Road for me.’
