The Droll Files

3-13-01  Dodge Sean

Had another gig tonight at the Sail.  This time before Maruma went on.  I remember seeing Sean when we were setting up, on his stool at the corner of the bar, downing his beer by the pitcher.  Nothing unusual there.  Dumpster Rob was there as well, and I was unusually distracted by his sorry antics tonight.  I’m Ok with him wanting to be the unpaid roadie and all.  I’m even Ok with his unique smell and his ability to display nauseating nose bits and viscous runnings.  But tonight he was in rare form, fussing constantly with the gels on the light above my keyboard.  He had promoted himself to unpaid light man without my knowledge.  In this particular dank corner of the Sail Inn stage I was forced to share one completely out-of-code electric socket with this lumen demon.  During a chorus of Meet Me I was unplugged entirely by the Dumpster.  He didn’t even notice as he was burning his fingers on the hot metal light fixture while his cigarette, most likely salvaged from the parking lot, glowed dangerously close to his sun destroyed lips, mumbling and cursing about the unfairness of his boss, Slim I presume.  Smoke completely obscured what little vision he must have had remaining after 22 years of MD 20/20 and full-exposure-extreme-refuse “camping”.  No problem, for the most part nobody can hear me or the Sitar player in this band anyway, due to the chronic upward volume adjustments of our leader Slim.  His remedy for every audio issue is to crank his own amp higher.  A little like the grade school nurse who gives you 2 aspirin regardless of your complaint, Slim knew but one knob, and one direction for that knob, during the heat of battle.  But I digress….this night is about Sean.  Sean, the blur of tales, the converted railroad hobo, the greasy haired stickler for daily liver calisthenics. 

We finished the way we often do with the sparse but vocal crowd appreciative, spinning madly and hooting and hollering for another song.  There’s a lot of love in this house, I thought.  Where were the bastards during the first set and a half every night?  The break between bands is marginally more interesting than the final band tear down, when the lights come on like a K-Mart nightmare, instantly exposing the hyper reality of bar and patron alike.  The break between bands is a kinder, gentler time, marked by words of encouragement from shit faced onlookers and hangers on.  A time when the handful of interesting female inhabitants are at the top of their game and drinks are still being served.   Through this I passed with load after load of band crap, filling my deteriorating SUV with the stuff.  On one such pass, while I was toting the ridiculous 1960’s coffee table that Slim made the Sitar player perch in the lotus position, I took note of Sean slurring to a compatriot that he’d sure as shit be back as soon as he could. I didn’t think much of it right then, but I did remember it later when it came back to me rather abruptly. 

I guess I should mention if I haven’t already, that Sean is one of Slim’s roommates and that the House on Brown is just a few blocks from the Sail.  It is the house of Slim and the house of the Overtones.  It is the fortress of Julie and the sanctuary of Jimmy’s Room.  The perch of Mochu Peechu and the Den of Kara’s Pythons.  In the gathering slums of west central Tempe, this house, at least for a time, is the epicenter of the Tempe sound.  Whatever that may turn out to be.   

I recall now that Sean isn’t able to drive his truck any more, although I’m not sure if it’s due to court enforcement or a mechanical problem or a recent accident.  All are very real possibilities and it hasn’t a thing to do with the rest of tonight’s entry anyway.   I finally finished my packing responsibilities, albeit with some much needed one armed help from the affable Rob, who’d de-socketed a shoulder in a recent biking accident, and was sporting a grimy sling.  “I only need one arm to do my job better than any other man, Slim knows that! Christ!”.   The Sitar player was packing up his miniscule allotment of stuff and we stood in the parking lot for a little while chatting about how much bullshit there is in various cultural and political matters, before we departed for the 2 block, 2 vehicle trip to the house to unload. 

Here’s what I remember.  Heading out of the parking lot south, I looked both ways and made my turn to the right.  Immediately to the west of the Sail a very large condominium project is under construction with that temporary chain-link fence they throw up that crowds over sidewalks and gives rise to whole colonies of striped and blinking traffic barriers and warning standards.  I was admittedly fiddling with the radio knob and not paying as close attention as I should to traffic conditions when a voice inside my head screamed, “look up!”  Emerging from utter darkness into the low-beams of my car was the swelling silhouette of a terrified oncoming bike riding Sean.  Long hair flailing, legs in an inverted “V”, bobbing for purchase, I adjusted to the left, giving him room to sail past.  But it was too late.  As he passed me on my right, on his one gear girl’s Schwinn, I could see that Sean would lose the battle to the construction zone.  I almost felt the air rush from his lungs as he met a barrier chest on.  I saw out of the corner of my eye a cloud of dust rising from the incident and I pulled to a stop 20 or 30 yards beyond it.  Almost immediately the Sitar player pulled along beside me on my left, oblivious of the carnage, and rolled down his window.  Leaning across the bench seat he calmly questioned why I stopped.  “Ummm…I think I just killed Sean”  I glanced in my side mirror and I could see, as the dust was settling, the slumped form of the body and above it, spinning eerily in the orange blinking glow of the warning barricade, the front wheel of the ruined bike.  The Sitar player’s face creased slightly with an expression of utter irritation.  The experience of existing in this fringe world of marginality, where the absurd is commonplace and compassion is a black hole.  With only a moment’s hesitation he muttered under his breath, “well shit…. I guess we better go back there, huh?”  “I guess?” I replied, really only wanting to get unloaded and home to bed.

And then the miracle happened.  Lazarus rose from the dust, covered head to boot in chalky dirt, blood oozing from at least four places, and began pushing his newly pentagon wheeled bike, limping with all his remaining strength, straight to the Sail Inn.  I drove away relieved that he was alive and guilty for not offering to help.  I take comfort in knowing, as the Sitar player assures me, that Sean won’t remember why he hurts in the morning, much less who ran him off the road.  I’m told that Tempe and bike accidents are no strangers.  That once or twice a week some bike rider barrels drunkenly, headlong into a railroad crossing barrier.  But that’s better than barreling into the passing train, I suppose.