Going Green with Bob:
A year ago now since Bob passed on. That news hit me like a freight train and even though I knew it was coming, I stood firm and let the train do its work.
Time has started to cover the hurt like scars over deep cuts and I smile now when the Bob angel or devil on my shoulders shouts in my ear.
Like the time in Ocean City when rain drove us from the job into a bar, where, in smoky late morning light, we narrowly escaped the wrath of several louts from Philly that did not care for Bob’s dissertation on ex mayor, Frank Rizzo.
Bob had a girlfriend, a naval lieutenant, no less, that left him for Dr. John – the Dr. John, who sent his limo down from New York to pack her away to his lair. There was some crying in his beer after that one. Then it was on to Salsa dancing lessons in DC and notions of Latin love that surely would have meant bigger trouble had he succeeded in seducing those girls. There was wild dance party at Burney’s place, where the police were called twice by Fox newscaster, Chris Wallace. Bob screaming “Chris Wallace – COME ON DOWN”! The same night, retired marine, Wiley Pierson impressed us in with his own ‘dance in his pants’ – henceforth known as ‘pulling a wiley’.
Getting paid in the alley from Mr. Bo. Red, Bob and I ambushed him and his cronies in the smoking lounge of the Tidewater Inn. He was quite annoyed by our need for compensation. But he and his friends taught us the secret to success - like the ‘Plastics’ talk from the Graduate, instead it was “buy ocean front property, but make sure it is in a DEAD ZONE so the Fed’s will loan you the clean up money and cover your bond”. We nodded our heads, thinking, man this world is in big trouble…
Bob handing off a quick loan to Jerome, Peanut and Joe (rarely repaid) or sometimes the use of his car. Once, both the loan and the car never came back.
Working the rigs in North Dakota, hanging with the oilfield trash, everybody is ‘hon or darlin’. Kermit the Frog and the Bismarck Letterman jacket found in a single haul from the Salvation Army Store in Dickinson. Apply the homemade herb salve to cover the bruises from a tumble off the rig. The imprint of green Bob, fresh on his flop house bed sheets left behind.
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