The Wake Up Call

You. know the old saying, Misery loves company?  Well, I believe I’ve met the company’s founding fathers.

They frequent a bar between my work and my apartment that’s not quite a hole-in-the-wall as much as it’s a crater.  Marlin’s Inn is the place’s name, to keep you caught up.

I was in a funk when I first stopped by, but that’s enough about me.  This is about a cadre of the smartest guys I ever met, or the dumbest to ever crawl upon their bellies on the planet.  All I know is that I don’t know what I would have done – where I would be at this exact moment – if I had not stumbled into Marlin’s when I did. 

My life was drying up faster than a turd on an Arizona Thursday, as Kilgore might say.  I had to relinquish the demons digesting the light of my soul, H.L. actually did say.  And stop being a pussy – I heard that one at least fifteen different ways from Hank before it started to sink in.

For a 21 year-old to sour up and bitch and moan is an insult to all the years I didn’t sour up and bitch and moan.

Following these words, Hank ordered me a shot of whiskey with only a nod.  Santiago obliged not missing a beat.

The old men at the bar sure don’t make my life any easier.  But it’d sure be harder without them.