SuperBad....
posted by jeremy on December 06, 2007
Bartending in this town... It requires interaction with the Fuzz now and again.... On a social and professional level. I even would say I'm friends with a couple of cops....
Considering my philosophies and prejudices and theories and prior personal experiences with that particular social group, that gang that is the biggest gang around.... Basically, considering the fact that I fucking hate cops.... It's a big thing for me to feel friendly towards a couple of 'em.
& I tell you, it pays in dividends just to hear the stories and watch the sociological weirdness of off-duty police interacting with the civilian populace.... Getting drunk, getting human. Some of the stories you hear from a good cop who has had a shit-day, they'll break your goddam heart.... And then, there are the strange good days for them, where your friend heard the bullet as it punched past him and he won that big big bustling motherfucking beautiful hot-rock of a prize: He got to keep right on breathing, goddam shit-fuck existing.
Then there are the funny nights... Nights where a cop friend brings in some friends and ask you in a slightly embarrassed murmur, if you know where to score some blow.... For his friends, of course.... And there are the other nights where he might bring in a crew of guys who you call as 5-O right away... And he pulls you aside and tells you, he generally doesn't like to mix his work and his fun.... but either way, make sure sure sure people know that these are COPS that are with me and a couple of them don't... won't.... turn blind eyes to anything that they see...... And thats cause they are Cops, ok? Get it?
So play it safe.
& there is this....
I remember a slow useless night at the bar.... Tuesday in New Orleans, murder capital of damn near the whole world.... Just sitting there, sipping coffee, waiting for patrons to show and watching a cop and coke dealer buy each other drinks, bullshit, tell war-stories from both sides of that sharp line.... They drank all the live-long night and got passionate eventually, got funny and furious, talking blood and farce and prison and mishap and pain... & they talked a lot of loss... I could see it in their eyes and the set of their faces..... The intensity of their gestures and whispers; The conveyance was clear.
It was crystal.
and I... I refused to eavesdrop that night.... cause some stories you just gotta earn.
It was enough just to see that Time-Out....
Two enemies forgetting to be enemies, if just for a moment.
Yeah, it was fine enough.... It was bloody beautiful.
