Only a few minutes ago, I, thegrowlingwolf, was lyin' flat on my back square-dab in the middle of Broadway, yep, that Broadway, right at the tip of Horace Greeley Park, just after a pourin' rain, flat on my back and lookin' up into the grey boiling sky into the stainless steel eyes of the west side of the Empire State Building, judgmentally looking down at me, looking to me like it was scolding me, meanly telling me to haul my ass up off the damn street and stand up like a real tough man and do a couple'a hundred jumping jacks (named for Jack LaLanne) to show my vim and vigor.
Why was I lyin' flat on my back in the middle of Broadway, on one of the busiest corners in mighty old gridlocked NYC? No, I wasn't sloppy drunk--like I'd rather be sometimes--"I'd rather be sloppy drunk and driftin' in the sand..." than to be lyin' on my back in the middle of Broadway.
About six months ago, maybe longer now, an old pal o'mine I've known a couple'a decades now, once a drummer of astute drive and now a crack med-ed in the advertising racket--know his wife, know his kid--and he emailed me one bright day and said that one bright and early morning he was crossing a Queens street to catch his Queens Surface bus to come into Manhattan when suddenly he was propelled high up into the air and came smashing down, body slammed down, into a car windshield. Next he remembered he said was waking up in a hospital emergency room, his head bandaged up and not much feeling in his lower body. Groggy as hell, too; head spinning like a top; hurting like Francesca di Remini in the lowest pits of Dante's poetic Hell.
He was crossing the street with the light; he had looked both ways; he had learned safety in grade school. Of course, as a New Yorker of many moons now, he knows the most unsafe place to cross a New York City street is at the corner, at the light, in the crosswalk. "Screw the law, play it safe, jay walk"--that's a given little safety tip for crossing a street here in NYC. Here's a little article about pedestrian fatalities in NYC from the Dept. of Transportation:
Tucked away inside a routine October 2nd press release from the Department of Transportation was the startling announcement that, according to preliminary figures, motorists killed 102 pedestrians in New York City during the first nine months of this year.
Although it is unquestionably a grievous loss of human life, the fatality figure is significantly lower than ever before and far lower than a decade ago.
In 1993, motorists killed 214 pedestrians during the same period. If this year's trend continues, New York City will finish 2003 with fewer than 140 pedestrian fatalities. The previous historic low was in 1998, when police reported 183 pedestrians killed.
Pedestrian fatalities have declined steadily since about 1990, when motorists killed 365 pedestrians. Since then, the Department of Transportation has improved safety at the 100 most dangerous pedestrian crossings.
My old friend was hit by a small compact car drivin' by a sweet little old lady--"Careful, dearie, or you'll hit that nice man...ohhh, now look what you've done?"
He was fortunate, he said, that the car's bumper was low to the ground and as such clipped him at his lower legs and flipped him up onto the windshield--a higher bumper and he'd'a been clobbered down and thrown under the car and then...BUMP, BUMP..."Oh, dearie, I think you just ran over that nice man...oh dear."
Well, anyway, last I heard from the dude, he was beginning get a grip on his balance though he still trouble walking and still suffered some pain, which the doctors tell him to hang on it's a pain'at's gonna be with him for many a moon to come.
Well--OK, I didn't wake up in an emergency room with my head bandaged and no feelings in my lower body. Nope; I never went out. Not me. That's a sign of weakness--which is a joke my old pal who's still trying to get his balance and is in pain and therapy understands, having heard me utter it in healthy brag so many a time when people were sneezing, phlegm-hawking, and nose blasting into already snotty tissues all around me--"I never get a cold," yowled I, "that's a sign of weakness." And I have not had a cold in at least 5 years; so long since I had a cold, I can't pinpoint it in any recent or distant past, it's been that long since I've even had the sniffles.
Suffering in my family--oh yes; tragic suffering; yes; suffering like no one wants to endure--and my best friends in life have died long ago--my God, I've outlived my mother, father, brother, first wife, my favorite writers...but for one brief, quick-as-lightning moment today, I almost gave in to my family tradition and suffered--perhaps a fate worse than death, except I'm a "Live and Let Live" survivor. I carry a built-in rabbit's foot; it's that pioneer white woman stock I come from. Western White Women--leather skinned, slim, long multistroked-combed hair--beautiful like Georgia O'Keefe was beautiful when she was old; my grandmother looked like Georgia O'Keefe when she was old, slim, pretty of face, long of multistroked-combed hair; beautiful but old tough women--like female eagles.
Here's what happened. Around 2 pm, it stopped raining cats and dogs and got even sunny, sweet enough I decided it would be an opportune moment to boogie out and buy some god-damn ink for my printer--I gotta have that printer--I hate them; they are so foreignly shoddily made and they run out of ink more rapidly than a mad squid--and they go out of style and worth the minute you buy them and hook them up--same with software; car designs; packaging; logos...I'm driftin' off into the winter snows of a wolf's growling territory--and I've been so domesticated since this afternoon, too.
So, let's say, about 2:10 pm, I loped out of my building, whipped across my street and meandered over to Broadway where I tucked my head against a Fauvist wind and spread my wings north up Broadway, up to the next corner, up by the Martinique Hotel--I go that way all the time--it's a way to the 34th Street Subway Station entrance, but it's a risky street crossing, traffic coming at you from 3 directions, always jammed, no direction, cars jammed bumper to bumper, even when the pedestrian has the walk sign you have to be a pretty good dodger and hurdler to get a break through to the other kerb. When it rains, traffic thins out, and it had just been raining one of those mad-god special rains and had just stopped but had left a wavering of thin wetness all over the sidewalks and streets, and when I started across this risky corner, the street was clear of traffic, except for an SUV that barged his way in front of me; no big deal; I saw him in time and let him pass and started on across.
I saw the truck, a black SUV-like pickup, one of those monster-looking pickups, all fancy with a lot of chrome, and black like those black helicopters, but he surely wasn't coming on--you know, I had the right-of-way, so hell he would stop, but he didn't stop and he kept coming and then it suddenly hit me, this motherf-ing butt-F-ing asswipe is going to run my ass down. My life did not pass in front of my eyes. Nope. I was cool as hell. As the truck hit me, it popped my head up and I looked right in the eyes of the truck driver and just as I looked in his eyes they went wide as pies and he saw me and he saw he had hit me and he hit the brakes. That's what saved me--his hitting those truck brakes so fast. Just as the truck hit me, he stopped it in its tracks and the force threw me backwards on my back.
I lay on the street. I didn't move. I was thinking, Jesus, is this the gold mine I've been looking for? But when I moved I knew I was invincible; I was unscathed. Still I lay there. Suddenly I raised up on an elbow and yelled, "Are any of you lawyers?" I got no answer, only young women asking me if I were alright. I said, "Ah, to hell with acting; I'm too damn real and invincible to be an actor; I've gotta get up and show these bastards what a real wolfman's like--invincible, I tell you. I stood up. No pains. No torn pants. The back of my pants were wet; my US Army camou-jacket's back was wet, too, but I was frisky, peppy, happy, filled with joy--THE JOY OF BEING ALIVE. As I stood up and went to the kerb, suddenly two cops were there--they had seen the whole thing--they were right behind the truck, their lights flashing and a couple of wails from the siren and then there they were. "Do you want'a ambulance," the male cop asked me, "Are you OK? Are you sure? Are you sure you don't want an ambulance?" "Naw, man, I'm a human-animal hybrid; I'm invincible." The woman cop asked me if I were all right, too. "Did I want to file charges on this guy?" The guy was a Korean dude; a paint contractor; probably worth some bucks--papersacks of cash maybe. I mean, come on; didn't I have the perfect ambulance-chaser lawsuit and yet I forgave the poor bastard. He was all shook up and well he should be.
Finally, I told the cops to let it ride. You know, F filing on his poor ass. The male cop told me he had written the guy up with a citation--"failing to yield to a pedestrian in the crosswalk"--I said, "I'd rather just go over and punch the son of a bitch out...." And the woman cop said, "Well, I can't let you do that, but I know how you feel." She looked like Lynndie England; hell, I was getting growly for her.
Then, to hell with it, I had the story, and now it was time for me to move on into time and go on about my chores. In fact, the whole drama left me feeling happy as hell; chirpy, rather arrogant--"Hell, you bastards, you all just saw the Invincible Man take on a god-damn tank-like truck and kick ass.
My hip did hurt a bit as I started walking toward the office supply store to get my printer ink. Then somebody grabbed my sleeve. It was the guy who hit me. "Are you OK, sir." He looked like shit warmed over; he was scared to death almost--I yelled BOO right in his face, "You bastard, do you know what shit you'd be in if you'd'a killed me? You rat bastard. Do you know I could sue your ass for every penny you got?" "Let me take you to dinner." "Dinner! Bullshit on that." "Call me, please call me; I want you to call me." He gave me his business card.
I've been wanting to go out to California for a while; you know, bask in a little Santa Monica sun--or maybe wander up into the mountains up around Mojave--maybe I'll have dinner with this poor bastard and during dinner I'll say, "Hey, dude, my lawyer tells me I'm a fool for not suing your ass for at least half your business. So I'll tell ya what I'll do. I been thinkin' of maybe a month's vacation out in the vineyards of California, you know--I mean a cool vacation--the works, massages, a little golf, maybe some hanggliding with my nephew--hey, he studied hanggliding in Brazil...blah, blah, blah--so, what say to 20 grand or so say; I might even be able to go over to Vegas with that--you know, unjangle my nerves." OK, he was Korean so he wouldn't know what the hell I meant by "unjangle my nerves," though I'll bet he'll pick up the drift pretty quick. "Sir, I have a papersack full of twenty dollar bills--20 grand--how 'bout I kick in another 5 grand for sweetners, how 'bout that?"
So, hell, another day, another story, another post. If I keep going like this, I'll make a year-straight with this blog easy as pie.
As Pooh creator, AA Milne, said:
They're funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you're having them.
thegrowlingwolf
for The Daily Growler
No comments:
Post a Comment