Way back in the late '70s, in my pre-Pope days, long before the All John All The Time World Church was established, I was a married guy with a family (me, the -ex and my beautiful daughter, Hezakiah, who we called Fred), working as an apprentice meat-cutter in a local grocery store in the suburbs of Chicago. (I'm not going to say where exactly, or use the name of the store, although the business is no longer there, because the family of the people who owned the store is still around, and discretion is the better part of pickle relish.) I was a young guy making my way through the world, taking care of my family and trying to get it right, and succeeding at least some of the time.
Now the company I worked for as an apprentice meat-guy (this was OJT, orange juice taster, err, on the job training) was an independent grocer, renowned for their fresh produce and meats. The store was probably 30,000 square feet, medium-sized by today's chain-store standards, and fully 30% of that was the produce department, and our produce brought people in from literally all over the county. Every morning around 3:00am, one the owners would take the store truck up to the "Market" in Chicago and come back with a load of fresh, just off the farm, fruits and vegetables, and this was WAY before the whole all-natural, organic thing that is all the vogue these days. In fact, the store had been started by the father of the then owners, as a farm-stand to sell produce his family grew right there on a 10 acre plot of land on which they eventually built the store. That was the good thing about the place, among a few others. The bad thing was that the people that owned it were a bunch of assholes to work for, but I was in the union, the pay was decent, the raises determined by our contract and it could have been worse. And I didn't have the great Pope gig I have today back then.
Besides the outstanding produce department, the other feature of the market was an old-fashioned, full-service meat counter. Remember those; you walked up to the counter, which was fully 50 feet in length, pulled a number out of the dispenser, (you know, the gizmo that looks like its sticking it's tongue out at you) checked out the clock-looking thingies on the wall that showed what number was being waited on at that moment, and then stepped up and told the "butcher" what you wanted when he called out "26", or whatever number you had. (Think Whole Foods meat counters, but a lot earthier somehow; and FYI, if your number was, say, "14" and we called "26", you couldn't walk up to the counter and order; it was kind of a rule we had.) The official union designation was "meat-cutter", but the older guys, the "journeymen", were butchers.
I was the only apprentice, and I got the gig by virtue of playing in a rock n' roll band with two of the sons of the owners, who apparently felt sorry enough for me to let me work there. The sons were good guys, just fair musicians, but we were friends and we had a lot of fun together. Their fathers...not so much. As the only apprentice, I mostly waited on trade, and did little actual meat-cutting; however, I still managed, over the four years I worked there, to, at various times, put six stitches in back of my left index finger, almost sliced off the end of the ring-finger of my left hand (can you tell I'm right-handed?) on a bandsaw, requiring another six stitches, as well as inflict any number of minor cuts to myself as well, including one on my right thigh with a boxcutter, opening a box of canned hams. (This is also the job I was working at when I had my vasectomy; all of above events were lessons that taught me a healthy respect for sharp instruments.)
One of my co-workers in the department was a guy my age named Jack, who had worked at a chain store in the area previously and had gotten his journeyman card there; Jack was ostensibly in charge of my training, being the youngest journeyman in the department. (Jack's favorite comment to me, when he'd see me standing in one spot, confused, was "John, do something, even if it's wrong.") Like most professions, I imagine, we had our own group of "inside jokes"; I remember hearing one of the older guys tell a lady one day that butchers ground their mistakes and doctors buried theirs. (I came up with a good one myself when I broke my finger playing softball and had to work wearing a small cast; when a lady asked me how I had injured myself, I replied, "Well, I really can't tell you, but don't buy the ground chuck today.") The worst of all was the day I heard one of the owner's sons, (not one of my friends) who helped out behind the counter occasionally, tell a young lady, who had enquired as to how someone would prepare beef kidneys, which really aren't meant for human consumption but are usually used as pet food, that "you take them and boil the piss out of them". The fathers weren't the only assholes in the families.
The only other "young guys" in the department, other than Jack and I, were two part-time college kids, Bruce and Chris, who worked a few nights a week and on Saturdays, our busiest day. (Personal note here: I haven't seen Jack, Bruce or Chris in over 30 years and I have no idea what became of any of them, but I hope they're all well and doing fine; good men all.) Since all of us were at the low end of the seniority ladder, it was this crew of guys that stayed late on Saturdays, after the store closed, to pull the meat case completely apart and clean it, with hoses and brushes, and other similar fun jobs. (The first time I pulled this duty, as I was leaning into the case as far as I could to clean the front glass, my butt sticking out and up, Bruce walked up behind me, stuck the nozzle of the hose in my back pocket and let'er rip. Fully initiated, and really wet, I was welcomed to the club.)
Since we had the Saturday evening clean-up duty, and worked later than the other guys, we took our lunch break after all the journeyman had returned from theirs, usually at 1:00pm, and we fell into a habit that, looking back on it now, had to be one the most stupid things I have ever done in my life. We'd all punch out, walk out to the car of whoever was driving that day, fire up a doobie and then go get something to eat.
Now a little background for those of you who have never "toked up"; this was the late '70s, and marijuana in those days, especially in the Midwest, so far from the source, could be wildly erratic in quality. Some was good, some was lousy, and some, like the stuff that Bruce brought the fateful day I'm going to tell you about, was killer. (I'm reminded of the scene in the movie "Up In Smoke", where the bass player for Cheech and Chong's band walked into the living room from the kitchen with a box of cereal in his hand, after they had all partaken, and remarked, laughing, "I'm annihilated.") On this particular Saturday afternoon in question, we got "annihilated".
The other piece of background info I'm going to share is this; the stories you hear about how marijuana makes you laugh uncontrollably (although nothing like in the movie "Reefer Madness") and gives you a case of the "munchies" are completely...true.
So we passed a joint around as we pulled out of the parking lot of the store, Bruce behind the wheel of his VW Bug, headed for a hotdog place just down the street about four blocks. To give you an indication of the "quality" of what we were smoking, although I can't speak for the others, by the time we got there, I was baked. Four blocks.
Deciding that we weren't likely to get service sitting in the car, we entered the hotdog establishment and sauntered up to the counter. Now some people are able to "maintain" when they're stoned; I, unfortunately, am not one of them. Chris and I went to one line, and Jack and Bruce another. Chris ordered, got his food, paid and then waited for me; I ordered, no mean feat by this juncture, got my food and proceeded to a table. Sadly, there was the small detail of paying for my order, which I had neglected to do. When the older lady behind the counter loudly pointed out this fact, I returned, giggling, and gave her what I owed her. Although she didn't say as much, the look on her face said that she was sure I was the supreme asshole of the universe. That, of course, only made me laugh harder.
We sat at a picnic table-like setting, with Jack and Bruce inside by the wall and Chris and I opposite each other on the end by the aisle. As we were eating, and still laughing foolishly, a young man approached our table and, clapping me on the back, said hello and asked how I was doing. He obviously knew me, for he mentioned something about a mutual friend. Unfortunately, I hadn't the slightest who he was, but I didn't care to admit it to him, in my diminished state, nor to be rude, so I just played along, nodding at what I hoped were the right places and answering in monosyllables, still giggling quietly (I think) to myself. After a few moments of one-sided conversation, with my side batting zero, the young man told me to take it easy and left. I thought he had walked out of the shop, but no, he merely took a table directly behind me, and of course couldn't help but hear when I loudly announced to Chris that I had absolutely no idea who he was. Jack and Bruce thought this hysterical, but Chris was still had sufficient wits about him to furrow his brow and motion with his hotdog behind me, so, surprisingly, I shut up; it wasn't until we were leaving however, that I figured out what he had been warning me about, when I stood up and noticed my still unidentified friend sitting at the next table, looking at me like he agreed with the counter lady that I was the supreme asshole of the universe. I slunk from the place, abject in my embarrassment, but only for a moment, because by the time we hit the lot, we were all laughing like proverbial hyenas again.
Tell you what: I've gone on long enough for today, but there's more to this story, so I'll pick up the thread in tomorrow's post.
I'd be ashamed of myself if I had the requisite smarts to do so.
Until tomorrow...
Love and rump roasts,
PJTT
copyright 2011 Krissongs, Inc.
