Every morning I would rise at 4 am to get dressed and get downtown by 5:45 am for my 6 am-Noon shift. Seven days a week. The building was in the middle of a bad district downtown. Plus, the fact I was parking in the dark and had to run across the street so as not to get hit by a bus. My favorite part of the ride to work was the Country music station on the radio.
At least something still worked on my truck. I haven’t paid the mortgage this month. And the truck, as always, was on empty and driving on fumes…like the song on my favorite Country Music station. ”Cause Mama’s hooked on Mary Kay. Brother’s hooked on Mary Jane. And Daddy’s hooked on Mary two doors down.”
My favorite was Toby Keiths, Red Solo Cup! Which kept me laughing and bouncing all the way to work. Isn’t that what Country Western music is all about. The losses in life and how some people never recover. They never get angry. They feel it is their fault. And then the cycle continues to the next generation and the next generation.
My new job was selling Magazines. We were all huddled in a tiny room of many cubicles with our desk telephones and our script and a list of contacts. We were all encouraged to read the Magazine’s so we could understand the Owners who bought them.
I was at a desk for two. Me and Alfonso during my first week. He had tattoos on every finger. A snakehead on the tip of his chin. He wore the same army outfit every day. His head was 1/2 shaved with long hair on the other side and safety pins in his ears. Some days he came in a sleeveless t-shirt with tattoos of skeletons, dog shit, swear words, and so forth.
Every time he couldn’t get a payment he would pound the desk and glare at me. The kind of glare that looked like it was my fault and he was going to scratch my eyes out any minute. Never once did he speak to me.
They rotated us ofen. Thank God.