Thursday, August 8, 2013

Train Wreck Survival

I am working without the fancy editor (good old fashioned HTML which I could have made $$ doing, back in 1999; before the fancy editors came around, if I didn't have me head up my ass and wasn't driving a taxi in Phoenix, Arizona, In fact some of my passengers, who were in their early 20's and who had wads of cash, told me to study a book like "Learn Java In 30 Days" and mess around with it for 30 days and then apply for a job making 50 bucks per hour...just like them...)
  • A Ride To Atlanta
  • A 3 Dollar Night

Yes, you read right.
The night after being tossed off the train; trying to get to Atlanta, I had a 3 dollar night playing on deserted Bourbon Street.
However, as I began to play, a truck pulled up with a husband and wife in it and asked if it was OK to park in front of Barnabys condo.
I told them that I had never even seen a meter maid there.
They walked over and asked me some of the usual questions, like "Do you live here, or are you just passing through?"
I gave them a brief history, mentioning that I had just tried to hop a train to Atlanta, the previous night.
"We're from Atlanta," they said, almost in unison.
We exchanged phone numbers, and they offered to give me a ride to that city on Saturday.
They had been on their way to Dallas and had seen the sign for New Orleans and decided to stop.
The wife had been here before.
They wanted to walk Bourbon Street for a couple hours.
I went to Rouses Market and bought a girl two candy bars in exchange of a dollar and then ran to Uniques.
I Retured along Bourbon, in the direction of my spot.
"Daniel!" called out the wife (who had apparently remembered my name) from the doorway of The Crazy Pirate.
"Come on in; we'll buy you a drink."
We sat and drank Coors Light and talked.
Judi (as that was her name) was in the real estate business and managed 1,800 apartments in Atlanta.
She was on her way to Dallas to see about a job because Atlanta was "disgusting," as she described it.
"The blacks run the city. We (white people) have no rights there. After Katrina hit New Orleans and all those people evacuated, we had to lower the rents and now all my units are occupied by black people.
When I call them to tell them they are on the verge of being evicted, they say things like: 'I'm gonna come down there and [shoot you].' Why would you leave here to go to Atlanta?!?"
I told her that I just wanted to get moving in the direction of Massachusetts and that I wanted to try to find my girlfriend Karrie while there. I joked that I would flash her picture at all the liquor stores
Judi advised me to think really hard about my decision to go there.
"Black people rob you there. If you think the French Quarter is bad; it's nothing like it!"
I went back to playing and made the dismal amount of 3 dollars; all the while thinking very hard about my decision to leave here.
They returned for their truck and dropped me off some snacks and a bottle of water (they used only plastic money).
I went to the sign spot, where I was attacked by ants.
I walked almost a mile to the "pick pocket" spot, thinking very hard all the way about my decision to leave here.
I slept until almost noon with my stuff tied to the bushes and my pockets (already) empty of money, and thinking hard about my decision to leave here...

I will be busking the next couple of days in order to get money to have with me when I get to Atlanta.
Perhaps after getting to know me better along the 8 hour drive, my new friends will toss me some money when they drop me off.
I just hope that my conversation is not construed as panhandling, as I relate the horrors of street life; fraught with uncomfortable pauses.
Some readers (Alex in California in particular) have contested that this blog is merely a way for me to panhandle...

1 comment:

  1. Sadly, what they say about blacks is true. In fact, here in California, we've gotta a bit of a reprieve - Mexicans loooooove shooting blacks. In fact, they've been doing what can only be called "ethnic cleansing" in a bunch of places, shooting blacks at random until they either run of out blacks, or (so far how it's gone) the blacks get the memo and move out.

    I think it's going to be another generation before these matters can be honestly discussed and dealt with.

    In the meantime, all the much-vaunted hostility I've been told about from Hispanics towards whites is just about nonexistent. Aside from blacks, who seem to think *everyone* owes them a living and a good one at that, everyone gets along really well out here in Cali.

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