Bluestone's Blog

(Published in 1999)

PART TWO

Pink.

Except for the obligatory Green Bay Packers poster and a couple of beer signs, the whole place is pink. The top of the bar is mahogany or cherry wood—some nice stuff— with pink vinyl padding around the edges. Behind three rows of pink-lit liquor bottles is a mirror ringed in fluffy, padded, pink satin. The faded red walls have little pink dots and bows. A pink hue clings to the window trim, the pool table felt, and the vinyl tops of the chrome barstools.  Sugar sweet, like cotton candy.

I’m kind of overwhelmed at first, especially after I catch a gander of the aging, peroxide-silver, poof-haired blonde with Howdy Doody cheeks standing behind the bar in a shiny white pantsuit with pink powder puff wristlets. Her lips as big and red as her teeth are big and white.

I sit down and try not to look too fucking mind-blown, order a shot of Wild Turkey and a Budweiser. The Bud comes in a can, the Turkey in a two ounce shot glass about three-quarters full.  Mama’s perfume is strong and cheap.

I whack down the shot and shove the tin can to my lips for a wash. Goddamn. Son of a bitch. Those fuckers better answer that phone pretty goddamn soon.

Over to my left a couple of stools is an Indian guy wearing a wrinkled, blue, pin-striped dress shirt and jeans: swarthy, lightly pockmarked skin, heavy lidded eyes and some kind of Coca-Cola drink in a shorty glass sitting in front of him.  About five-ten and a middleweight, he’s checking out a fishing show on the wall tube behind my spinning head. His profile is exactly like the face on those old buffalo nickels. This guy’s grandfather must’ve been the model.

I move to the next stool on the right and turn around so I can see the TV. A blonde, bearded guy in a flannel shirt is hammering the walleyes on some Canadian lake. I always liked fishing; my old man used to take me fishing.  In fact, that’s the last time I ever saw the asshole—the time he took me fishing, years ago, when I was eleven….

When you go after catfish in the summertime, you go at night.  Build a fire by the river, boil a pot of coffee and throw out set lines with bells fastened to the rods so you can hear the fish take the bait—a glob of chicken livers on a big hook.

We bagged a couple of nice cats that night. Eventually, I fell asleep by the fire on an old canvas chaise lounge. At first light, I woke up and my daddy was gone and one of the rods was busted, the line broke.  At the time, I don’t remember what pissed me off the most, losing the rod or losing ol’ Bill.  Couldn’t say I’d miss the Saturday night slap arounds….

Ma was never the same afterwards, took to the pills.

So I’m sitting here watching the fishing show and trying to avoid looking at Mama. I mean, check out her white, fringy cowgirl boots, they’re too much.

After a while, I’m getting a crick in the neck, so I stretch and turn my head from side to side. I come eyeball to eyeball with the Indian guy and he’s smiling back at me.

“You like fishing?” he asks me, friendly.

“I never caught one of them walleyes before, like that guy,” I say, gesturing up at another ‘nice fish’ being netted.  “I haven’t fished in a long time.  One of those fly-in trips up to Canada would be a kick.”

“Shit, man,” the guy comes back. “You can catch fish like that right around here, if you know the right places. Too bad there’s not much going on now… maybe trout or salmon if you can get out on the big lake.  It’ll be better in a few weeks.”

“Nah, I won’t be around that long.  I’m just here in town waiting for my car to get fixed—over at Carlson’s.  I’m not staying around. That Lake Superior is something, though.”

Then we get to talking about fishing and sports and all that for a while and I kind of get to liking the Indian guy. Even Mama ain’t bad, with time.  She smiles too much and wears too much lipstick and makeup, but she’s all right. After a couple more shots and beers, we order-up hamburgers and fries that Mama cooks up to a delicious result.  I’m feeling so good and generous that I pay for the meal and order another round. Mama (by now she’s sipping pink wine from a champagne glass and insisting we call her Ethel) starts spinning yarns about her days as a stripper.  Even brings out some yellowed old newspaper clippings with stories about her “dancing” at places called the Saratoga and the Classy Lumberjack and the Silver Slipper, under the moniker Ethyl Flame—sometimes Ethyl Fire.  Her real name is Ethel Hawley.  But what’s in a name?

We carry on for a time like good-natured drunks.

At one point, Mama is down at the other end of the bar waiting on a couple of guys in blue coveralls, and the Indian guy asks me if I want to go outside and smoke a joint. He says it isn’t that great, some homegrown, but it tastes good, and it’s the least he can do after I bought dinner.  So I say yes, and after we finish our drinks, he puts on his jacket that he’s been sitting on, and we go out to the alley.

After we finish the jay, I pull a little chunk of black hash out of my pocket and inquire into the availability of a pipe, and he says: “Yeah, in my car but we better go inside and say good-bye to Mama first.”

I say, “Fuck Mama.”

He says, “I did once.”

I laugh; he winks.

“I can’t stand anymore pink,” I say.

“Just a quick in and out,” he says.  “I need a pack of smokes.”

I want a pack of Kools myself, so I go back in.

(To be continued. See May 2010 archives for Part Three.)