midfuckepiphany

ive never done any time in jail in my life, which amazes even me. (this is a good thing. hell, im no tough guy. id be somebodys bride before brunch time on day 1)

but there have been a couple of times when i really thought it was going to happen. one of those times occurred when i was managing a chain of adult video stores in florida. (ive had a billion jobs. i was just a kid at this particular time, but the guys that ran this operation borderline mafia types were so un-used to getting applications from a non-ex-convict who sounded vaguely educated, that they immediately hired me, and i rose through the ranks very quickly. ultimately, i managed three stores and pseudo-managed two others. we all carried guns, briefcases full of cash, had our own lawyers, bribed local officials. good times. i learned a lot on that job. so many stories. but this ones about my brush with the law, so back to it )

anyway, one of the things we would do is have porn stars come and make appearances at the store, as kind of a promotional thing. anyone who knows anything about the porn biz knows this is a pretty common thing. the girls show up, strip, customers take their photos with them naked and pay extraordinary amounts of money for the photos, the girls sign movies, etc.

when this would happen, it became my job to run the show. it was perfect for my personality because ive always been a show biz kind of guy. id be all like, alright gentlemen, the moment youve all been waiting for, the lovely miss [fill in the blank]. [guys: whoo hoo whistles, hands clap.] look at that gorgeous body gentlemen. and this is your chance to get up close and personal with this crazy nympho. get on the line forming right here and you can get your picture taken pressed right up against her for only ten dollars. [guys: whoo hoo whistles, hands clap, line a mile long forms in an instant.] haha. i was like a carnival barker. and i was good at it, if i do say so myself. i took what might have been an otherwise uncomfortable situation a bunch of horny, ugly guys waiting to rub their pathetic peckers up against a hot 18-year-old into a fun thing for everybody. (it always amazed me how these girls could be in a room, by themselves, with 60 horny guys, totally naked, and yet be in total control of the situation the whole time. you know?)

anyway, one time we had this particular porn star there. id rather not mention her name. but she was absolutely gorgeous. perfect real boobs, real hair color, firm bod she looked like a classic california beach babe. if you saw her on the street, youd never think she did porn in a million years. she got famous quickly because of her wild-ass performance in this one particular flick, which i'd love to describe, but she'd be idetifiable.

anyway, so shes at the store, and were putting on our show, and the store is like packed with dudes. and wed do the show for like 20 minutes, and then take a 10-minute break in the back office, and go back out, and so on. and during one of her first breaks, she says she wants some coke. and the guys who i worked for were very into coke. (i, myself, have always been pretty take-it-or-leave-it when it comes to coke, but if somebody cuts me a line for free, i dont think ive ever said no.) so we go back out to do a show, and by the next break the guys have an eight-ball. so for the next few rounds, wed do the show, take a break, wed all do some lines, and then do the next show. it was going really well. everyone was having a good time.

so were doing one of the shows, and I run out of film for the camera. so i quickly duck back into the office to get some more, and then im about to go back out again into the store, but one of the guys i worked for comes back and looks really nervous, and slaps the eight-ball into my hand and wraps my fist around it and goes, get rid of this. and im like, huh? and hes like, just get rid of it.

so im like, whats this guy going on about? so i take a look out into the store, and its PACKED WITH COPS. blue uniforms were everywhere. there were almost as many cops as there were customers. wed been raided. it wasnt an uncommon thing for us. often porn shops, depending on what jurisdiction theyre in, are operating in a grey area of the law, and crackdowns can happen depending on what way the political winds are blowing. so i guess somebody somewhere heard that this girl was going to appear, and decided to make a show of it. (I think the whole time I worked for these guys, we got raided, maybe a dozen times?)

but, yeah, this time i had this coke in my hand, so i was worried. and the cops were all like in SWAT mode, and had batons out and were like in fighting stance, and like saying, nobody move, nobody leaves the store! pretty funny. and the customers looked like they were shitting and thinking about how they were going to explain this to their wives.

so my immediate thought was, ive got to get rid of this blow. so i sneak back into the office, and my plan was to dispose of it out the back door. so i swing open the back door to find myself face to face with a line of cops. like they actually had the store surrounded by cop cars. like in a big ring. oh shit.

so im standing there, and these cops standing by their cars looking at me. and thats the point when i thought it was going to happen. i had that feeling in my gut: oh shit. this is it. youve pushed your luck too far. youre going to prison fucker. i was sure of it. i was just looking at them like, ok, youve got me. lets just get this over with.

now you would think that if you were a cop, and you were conducting this massive raid on a porn store, and your job was to guard the back door, and you saw some weird looking dude swing open the back door and start to step out, and then freeze and stare at you i mean, wouldnt you assume that dude was up to no good? wouldnt you like, question him or something?

instead, the cops and i just stood there staring at each other. it was like this incredibly awkward five or six seconds. nobody knew what to do.

so finally, im just like, ooooooookayyy and i slowly shut the door and went back into the store. hey, if they wanted to throw away an easy bust, that was more than fine with me.

so now even the office is full of cops. so for the next 30 minutes or so, i stood in a store surrounded by cops, perverts, gangsters, a naked chick, and all the while clutching an eight-ball of coke in my hand.

meanwhile, in the store, it was funny because the initial tension between cop and customer was kind of morphing into confusion, because nobody knew what to do. the cops were all like looking at each other like, um, i dont get it. what do we do? is there a law being broken here? do we arrest these guys? why are we here? do we still need to act all SWAT-like? but at the same time, they didnt want to completely drop the SWAT act out of sheer embarrassment. i think everyone felt awkward. so some of the cops were in semi-SWAT mode, and some were just bullshitting with each other, and some were even reading the porn boxes. a bit surreal. meanwhile, the customers were like, i dont get it, they told us not to leave. but can we leave? so the customers started slowly trickling out the front door unmolested.

so anyway, that was it. ultimately the cops arrested the girl on an unrelated marijuana possession charge in nevada that they discovered when they ran her license. our top boss got taken in on some bullshit public nudity charge that, as always, he got out of later through the usual channels. within an hour of the raid the store was completely empty except for me, so i did all the coke myself.

but yeah, thinking about that awkwardness between the cops and the customers ive always been fascinated by that point of human interaction that point at which nobody knows what the fuck to do. humans get lazy, they start to take things for granted. they get into such a routine that they start to just accept this idea that there is a system for everything and that everything moves along pre-determined grooves. but the reality is, that there are no systems, no pre-determined grooves. were all just in a state of chaos, and any assertion to the contrary is a fabrication. moments like that bring it all home. i like to find those moments, and even create them, when possible. and exploit them, while torturing the confused. its for their own good.

* * *

this is an unrelated story, i guess, but it feels kind of related (and im in a writing mood today).

one day i was working in a retail store in a strip mall, and i was by myself, no customers, no co-workers, nobody. and this cop comes barging in and hes got this totally pissed off look on his face. and he says, is that your yellow car outside? and im like, oh shit. yeah.

so he points his finger at me and orders me outside. so i follow him out the door, and we stand next to my car, and he points to the window and goes, do you think this is funny?

and i look through the window and i see that, like an idiot, i had left a half-smoked joint right out on the dashboard for anyone to see. and im thinking, fuck, im busted. so i say um, no. and he said, did you know there are anti-obscenity laws in this county? and im thinking, what the fuck does obscenity have to do with weed? and then i realize that this idiot wasnt talking about the joint, he was talking about the fact that i had a middle finger sticker on the window. haha. he was so pissed off about the sticker, that he completely ignored the fact that i had a car full of narcotics. dumb ass.

he said, how fast can you go into that store and get a razor and scrape that off of there? i said, um, very fast officer, ill do it right away. he said, good.

that was it. i came out a second later with a razor and he was gone. i scraped off the sticker and smoked the joint.

the lesson here? pissing off cops can work in your favor!

* * *

my sleep schedule still hasnt normalized from that last travel period. ive been trying to drink my way into a normal rhythm, but so far it has only gotten me drunk, not normal. yesterday, i began drinking at about 2pm, then, after about two and a half six packs of 16oz Buds, i passed out at 9pm. then i woke up at 4:30am. i sat on the edge of my bed in the dark and drank the remaining half a six pack. i sat there and i thought. and for a moment, i actually felt at peace. there was an owl solemnly howling outside my window. it was nice. how the fuck did an owl find its way to Georgetown?