VIENI VIENI - LUCKY SPOT


It was 10:45 on a slow-ass Sunday night, and I was up $87. I say "up" because you can actually lose money driving a cab and be "down", what with $85 gates, and $17 gas bills. I started my shift at 4:30p.m., approximately 100 bucks in the hole, so I was pretty much thrilled with $87. I figured I’d make one more pass through North Beach and call it a night. Jump on the freeway, gas up, and turn in the cab. I had a 26-year-old Amerasian girl waiting for me at home.

I cruised down Columbus, turned right on Stockton, and was flagged by a woman holding onto a man. They were both drunk. The woman was a bartender, and the man was a bar patron who’d been in a fight. She explained to me that the man had gotten mouthy with some biker type, and was beaten to the floor, then kicked in the jaw. She wanted me to take him to the ER, the last thing I wanted to do on a slow-ass Sunday, up $87. There was no way around it.

The man had taken a savage beating. The left side of his face was blown up like a balloon, and his left eye was completely shut. He had specks of blood all over his face and clothes. It looked like someone had dipped a brush in red paint, and flicked it at him repeatedly. Incidentally, the name of the bar was Vieni Vieni - Lucky Spot.

Lucky for some, I guess.

The man got his big head into the cab, and told me to take him to the Hotel St. Paul, so he could get his Blue Cross card. Apparently everyone had medical coverage, except me. He had me wait, then directed me to St. Luke’s Hospital. On the way we stopped at a liquor store for a 16 oz. Budweiser. Mid-journey he started laughing then announced, "My jaw is numb. Wanna Vicodin?"

"Sure." I took it for later.

"I’ve been in that bar since one o’clock this afternoon. I’m a merchant seaman, 22 years. What do you do?"

"I drive a cab."

"I got hit HARD in that bar back there. Where you from?"

"South Jersey, near Philly."

"No shit, I’m from Philly!"

There was a lull in the conversation, so I told him that my mother grew up in Philadelphia, and went to Overbrook High School around the same time as Wilt Chamberlain."

"No shit, ‘Wilt the Stilt’. I read his book. Said he slept with 10,000 women in his life."

"Yeah, I read his book, too."

"So wadda you think? Your mom was like number 7 or 8?"

"I can see why you got hit in that bar."

"Man, I got hit HARD. Who was your favorite Philly in 1964?"

"That’s a tie between Johnny Callison, and Richie Allen."

"Richie Allen was a nigger with a big mouth."

"You’re a nigger with a big mouth, and you can’t hit your weight."

"My face feels funny. Does it look bad?"

""Pretty bad, but you’ll live. You should avoid bars for awhile, and/or try being nicer to people that you meet."

"I know, I know. I’m a real dick when I’m drinking. Wasn’t Johnny Callison ‘Rookie of the Year’ in 1963?"

"No, but Richie Allen was in ‘64."

"Richie Allen was what?"

"‘Rookie of the Year’, 1964."

"No shit."

I pulled into the ER entrance and the guy couldn’t get out. I went and got an orderly with a wheel chair, and we both maneuvered him out of the cab. He gave me a fifty, and called the orderly a nigger. I wheeled him into the waiting room and all conversation stopped. His face was now so swollen that his head was lopsided. A big, cartoon head with various shadings of green, yellow, and purple. He was the "Star of the Night", and even the admitting nurse stared. As I was leaving, he grabbed my hand and said,

"Bro, my face don’t feel right."

"Don’t worry, the docs will fix you up."

"Allright. Thanks for puttin’ up with my bullshit. I’ll buy you a drink sometime."

Then he palmed me a Vicodin. I took it for later.

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