My friend and I were riding to a local tavern one night, in my car. I had the radio on.
I made the comment that, “God I’m sick of this Phil Collins co**-sucker.”
My friend just laughed.
“I mean,” I continued, “is he the richest man in the world? I swear to God I hear his songs every fu**ing day in work. It’s like my daily Phil Collins ration.”
“I’m sure he’s pretty rich,” said my friend Dwight.
It was that Su-su-sudia song or whatever. I changed the channel to some hillbilly talking about Jesus and turned the volume down. Dwight and I commenced talking about baseball until we got to the tavern.
The bar was pretty crowded so we had to stand, and yell, as it turned out, in order to hear each other. It was a Friday night at 8:30.
I’d been working and drinking a lot and so my hands were pretty shaky. I should have really gone to a strip club, I guess, but women made me nervous. Good ol’ Dwight-y did nothing of the sort. He was this kind of quiet black dude I’d known since high school, real into sports, and tended to keep his horny thoughts to himself. I was constantly in disbelief of him.
He always ordered these girly drinks though, like red bull and vodka and stuff. He got out his phone and started playing with it.
“What’cha doin’?” I asked.
“My boss texted me,” he said. “He’s being a real mealy-mouthed wooly-giggins.”
“Did he say something mind-bogglingly stupid?” I asked.
“Yup,” he replied, “and in sentence fragments, of course.”
“Tell him I said nice job,” I said.
“Will do.”
We sat there for a little while longer, kind of in the middle of the bar. A couple girls came up beside me, pressed their rears against me and smiled at me. I was all of a sudden very relaxed and my shaky hands were gone. I guess that was the purpose of this whole thing, you might say. Dwight didn’t care. He was cool like that. I think he was a member of Digable Planets in his past life.
Then somebody played “Throwing it all away” on the juke box. And I just lost it. I saw the punk who did it — kind of a hair stylist/rapist type looking dude, and decided to approach him.
“Hey,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder. “Was that you who played that song?”
“Yeah,” he said, defensive and full of machismo.
“What kind of creature are you?” I asked.
“Are you questioning my level of merit?” he replied.
“No,” I retorted, “I’m denouncing your level of merit.”
And he stared at me with this steely-eyed gaze.
“You, my friend,” he said, “are a sad, ignorant, misled slob. I’m surprised they let your type in here.”
“What,” I asked, “the type with any taste?”
“I bet you’re still stuck in the ’90s,” was his next volley. “You probably have a closet full of flannel shirts at home.”
I just kind of furrowed my brow and smirked.
“Seriously, dude,” I asked, “why the Phil Collins?”
He sat down and took a deep breath, maintaining eye contact with me the whole time.
“The journey into the soul, my friend,” he began, “is a long, arduous trek. It’s not for the faint of heart. You will be stretched to your limits, driven beyond yourself, driven outside of yourself, transformed into something that feels entirely foreign to you. There will be moments when you’re kissing the back of a woman’s neck and she completely becomes your ideal, saturates the entirety of your mind and existence with her beauty and charms. I actually played pool with Collins one night. He was kind of down and out but wielded this incredible, intense hatred of Manchester United. It was kind of beautiful, really. He didn’t talk much, but from the narrowness and intensity of his gaze, I could tell that everything he said was going to be pretty stalwart and true. At one point, he inadvertently crushed his glass with his hand, and started bleeding all over the table. I asked if he was ok. He didn’t seem angry, more like hurt, like a little boy who’s lost his puppy dog. He came out, and he seemed better, and he looked at me with the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen. And I said to myself, ‘This guy is destined to soundtrack grocery stores someday. He’s on a crash course with the produce department.’”
“Wow,” I replied. “That’s a pretty impressive story. I’ve never met a celebrity.
“Don’t,” replied the guy, and walked away.
I have to admit, I felt pretty dumbfounded, and went back to Dwight, who, as usually, was very bored with me and the rest of the world around him. He fit right in, I guess.
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