I was baffled that this was the guy my Mom had been dating for months and that it had become serious enough for her to invite him to our house. Since she had gone back on the market (her words not mine) she had her dating life separate from our homelife. The closest the two worlds intermingled was when she had a bad date and would tell me about the inappropriate behavior of some man she met at line dancing. It seemed weird to me as a kid that she would share with me about some guys prying to get her to bed but she didn’t have anyone else to vent about such issues.

Before I knew it, Joe was coming around on weekends, for family functions and holidays. Joe didn’t fit in with my family and he often sat quietly, rarely adding to the conversation. If Joe did participate in the group conversation he’d pipe in on the conversation offering some unbelievable factoid about science, politics or life that drew skepticism from my brothers. When pressed on the validity of his statement Joe would fidget, drart his eyes back and forth and say, , “Oh yeah, I saw it on PBS Prgam”, or “I read it in Popular Science.”

During the OJ trials Joe said, “OJ is huge in Europe. They love ‘em. He’s like the Beatles over there.” This didn’t draw the usual skeptical probing from my brothers but garnered looks of bewilderment and calls of bullshit. Cornered Joe gave his pat reply, “Oh PBS did a whole thing on it.” Joe did his usual fidgeting as worked his way out of the room like a frightened animal.

I don’t blame him for being quiet around my brothers. I rarely jumped into conversations with my family. My brothers were a boisterous bunch with a penchant for crass humor. Often their banter could turn hostile and quickly escalate to someone blurting out, “You wanna take it outside,” or, “I ain’t afraid of you.” Very rarely did any of this macho posturing result in fist-a-cuffs, but the frenetic energy would hang in the air for the rest of the night.

Around eighteen I moved to Chicago. Shortly after Joe moved in. Being a good Christian, my Mom made sure to let me know Joe slept in the guest room. Not that I think Joe was capable of being a tomcat. Anytime I visited he’d be laying on the couch, smoking Pall Mall 100s as he watched endless hours of golf. He only got up to get a beverage or eat. After a meal he’d head straight for the couch. If I engaged him in any sort of conversation he’d respond in an exhausted tone as if there was weight to the air that carried his words.

Mom and Joe’s wedding was forgetful. A vague, colorless event with the charms of traffic court. Mom was not a beaming joyous bride. She smiled, but sort of as one does when getting a portrait taken for their work ID. Marital bliss didn’t change Joe. He stayed on the couch while Mom did the bulk of the chores around the house or went to events held by her church. Joe didn’t even help out around the house when she had a bout with breast cancer and was taking radium pills. This sent my brothers into a fury and I was shocked Joe’s body wasn’t never found in the nearby marsh. Mom was unhappy in the marriage and we all knew it. When I pressed her on why she didn’t get a divorce her eyes went blank and in a rehearsed manner she said, “I made a vow to God and I must honor that.”

No one was surprised when Joe was diagnosed with congenital heart disease. One can’t chain smoke with an exercise routine that was limited to reaching for the remote and not expect some consequences. Needless to say, Joe’s decline was fast and there seemed to be a collective sigh of relief when he passed.

His memorial was a monotone event with no grief or sorrow. No one spoke other than my mother and a minister and both struggled to find interesting things to share about Joe so they stuck to the basics of, he loved his kids and was polite. Mom seemed preoccupied most of the day and knowing her it was less about the loss of Joe and more about her obsession with organizing and getting rid of Joe’s things.

She didn’t wait long to take on this task. Clothes were put in bags and left out for a veterans organization, some things were given to his kids while others were put in the garbage. While in the middle of this chore, Mom discovered an old shoe box tucked hidden under some items in the corner of Joe’s closet. Inside was a long blonde flowing wig. She froze when she discovered it. Her mind spun and searched for answers of what this could mean but she was never good at accepting realities. Mom was a product of the Catholic church and denial was her forte. My brothers however, had no hesitation with speculating, joking and claiming that Joe’s wig was because he was a crossdresser.

Maybe Joe’s activities with the wig were salacious, or maybe it was something simple. Perhaps when Mom went to church on Sunday mornings, Joe developed catlike reflexes and leapt off the couch, darted to the closet, slapped on the wig, cranked some Motley Crue and pranced about like Vince Neal. Maybe he pretended to be hunk-model Fabio, Garth from WAYNE’S WORLD, or anyone other than himself.

A few years ago when my brother made a joke about Joe’s wig and it all came into perspective for me. It wasn’t something I understood in my twenties. I had to live a life in big cities where I mingled with marginalized people, dwelled in various underground scenes, worked in seedy dive bars frequented by sex workers of all genders, and observed the milieu of people seeking refuge in the dirty walls of this bar. Some were hiding from the world, others were hiding from themselves. I know what it was like to hide. I hid from my short-tempered father who could turn on a dime, I “toughened up” so as not to feel the sting of his knuckles. I hide from the football jocks who called me faggot and who humiliated me and kicked my ass for fun. I hid from myself and presented various versions of myself to blend in to avoid violence and judgment.

Joe was hiding. Hiding on the couch pretending to be engrossed with golf because Joe was trans. It’s why he moved slowly and in a contained manner. He was fighting to not let his real self to be seen. He had to. He came from 1950s macho Chicago. Men were supposed to be tough, fight, and be loud. There were no road maps for being queer, Trans or anything marginalized. Those communities were tucked away in dark corners and hard to find, so Joe hid. He kept hiding.

When Joe got sick he had plenty of opportunities to dispose of his wig. My mom worked, went to church and outings. He had plenty of opportunities to toss it in the garbage allowing him to die with his secret. Maybe by not doing so he was finally letting everyone know who he truly was.

It’s around 2007 on Saturday afternoon and I’m tending bar in a dive bar that’s just a stone's throw from LA’s skid row. The clientele is a mix of artists, transient hotel residents, and crackheads. While I’m working it’s not uncommon for a rat to run across my feet as I pour $3 well cocktails. Rarely does anyone care. They are there to drink or pretend they are Bukowski - calloused by life. When critters aren’t scurrying the floors they are dead from poison and decaying in the walls. The owners try to hide the aroma by burning cheap incense. This mix of odors smells as if your Aunt Chelsea who wears too much perfume died on the toilet and was left there

It’s a particularly slow shift. The bright LA sun streams through the windows as two friends and a newish regular who I don’t know well but like, hide from the light at the far corner of the bar. We are talking as we eye the TV mounted on the wall. This is why I dislike TVs in bars. No matter how hard you try not to, your eyes end up glued to the screen. It keeps everyone from fully connecting while we slowly disconnect with the drink. On the TV Tina Fey appears in an American Express commercial. One of my friends asks me something about Tina which leads to more conversation about other famous people I used to work with and how I had auditioned for “Saturday Night Live.”

I’ve made it a rule to avoid this sort of conversation in mixed company especially when working at the bar. If people knew I was a comedian and worked with famous people this often led to uncomfortable situations where people pitch me jokes, or look at me after they’ve said something funny to see if I am laughing. Often they suggest we should write together as if I wish to spend my afternoon with a junkie barber who will soon lose his leg to his addiction. Anyway, the newish regular guy hears how I once was swinging with these biggies, looks at me like I’ve just shit in the air and says, “What happened to you?”

My soul contracts like a spider that has just been hit with a drop of water. My breath becomes short and as, “I still do stuff,” stumbles out of my mouth like a lie. The guy realizes he may have said something wrong and returns a weak, “Yeah.”

The truth is, I was doing things. I wrote daily. I performed stand up around LA, opened on the road for David Koechner whose live act I’ve helped develop. I use my comedy connections to curate charity events to raise money for various causes like Jail Guitar Doors which was founded by MC5 guitar god Wayne Kramer. This is all cool and exciting shit to me. It’s fulfilling. Regardless, I feel it doesn’t count because I’m not rich and famous, and I too often ask myself, why do I not have the career my friends have?

Fame always seemed accessible to me. I had been around it since I was a teenager while washing dishes at the famed The Second City theater. I was there the night Tracey Ullman plucked Dan Castaleneta (the voice of Homer Simpson) for her sketch show, and the numerous times Lorne Micheals came to check out Mike Myers, Tim Meadows and Chris Farley. Famous people dropped by the theater all the time to see the shows or play in the improv sets: Robin Williams, Arnold Schwartznegger, Tom Hanks, various members of Monty Python, John Candy, Jackson Brown, and Johnny Lydon aka Johnny Rotten. I was standing feet away from Mr. Rotten when he was asked to join the improv set. He sneered in his very Johnny Rotten sneer and said, “Nah, you’ll fuck wit me.”

At the age of twenty-one I was hired for the Second City National Touring Company. I was one of the youngest people hired as an actor at the theater. Right up there with my hero John Belushi. It seemed to me I was following the path of all the other folks who had graced the stages of the esteemed theater. While I toured, actors from the resident stages would book big money making commercials or get parts in the films shooting in Chicago. Work, success and fame just seemed as easy as waiting for your turn.

I got it in my head at a very young age that I would be on Saturday Night Live and quickly become, not just a star - but a superstar like Belushi. This notion entered my undeveloped twelve-year-old brain shortly after my Dad’s death. Belushi had died six months before him. I was a big fan of Belushi’s, but after my Dad died this fandom became an obsession. I wanted to be like Belushi and I began to believe that my life would follow a similar path. Now, I ain’t no educated psychological doc or nothin’ but I don’t think it takes a genius to piece together that the loss of security I experienced when I witnessed Dad’s accident was transferred into believing fame would heal my wounds.

I was twenty-five when Lorne Micheals saw me perform at Second City. I found out the following day that I would be flying to NYC to audition for the show. Hearing this news gave me a surrealistic jolt excitement mixed with anxiety that vibrated on my being as if Charles Mingus was using my innards for his bass strings. This feeling didn’t leave me the entire two weeks until I flew to New York where it amped up to almost disorienting levels. The Big Apple is a fine place to visit unless you are there to face your dreams; then it’s like having a panic attack at a rave party while you're peaking on LSD.

Once I was secure in my room at the Paramount Hotel I didn’t leave. I ordered room service and ran my audition pieces so many times I could recite the lines while being waterboarded. When I wasn’t running my audition I was pacing around the room or watching NYC public access. I was baffled and curious that most of the programming was boardline pornography. Oddly the nudity of average looking people rubbing their crotches in Central Park comforted me somehow. It wasn’t titillating, just a needed distraction from the surreal existence I was experiencing in my tiny Manhattan hotel room.

The next morning I walked to 30 Rockefeller Center, signed in and was taken to my dressing room where I waited for my audition time. I’d been told that they will make you wait hours after your scheduled time to put pressure on you. Knowing this didn’t make it any easier. With nothing to do I smoked, pacing around the small room where the buzz of fluorescent bulbs was more noticeable in my heightened state of nervousness. My friend Pat Finn was in a dressing room next to mine and we talked, joked around and laughed. He was abnormally calm and confident while I was aware of every muscle tensing up in my body.

Come the late afternoon a stagehand came to my room and told me it’s time. I’ve never seen the above call sheet until recently when my good friend Bill Ham discovered it and sent it to me. The call time on the sheet is for the afternoon. I was told to be there in the morning - proof that they indeed, do fuck with you. Either way, I’ve waited so long my body couldn’t create anymore adrenaline.

I followed the stagehand down the hallway we’ve all seen a million times on the show, which is lined with pictures of former cast members. The stagehand opened a door and there, before me, is the stage where the guest does the opening monologue. For someone who grew up watching the show and worshiping comedy this is holy ground, like the tree where the Buddha found enlightenment or beholding the Arc of the Covenant. It’s almost impossible not to feel intimidated.

I was directed to get onto the stage and as I did Lorne Micheal appeared from the dark and said, “Hello, I’m Lorne Michaels.” I say, “Hi. I’m Matt Dwyer.” To which he coldly responds, “I know,” and then vanished back into the darkness.

The stage manager tells me to get on the stage, he hooks a small mic to my shirt, and as he disappears in the darkness Lorne Michaels appears. “Hello, I’m Lorne,” he says to me without extending his hand. “Hello, Lorne,” I say nervously, “I’m Matt.” To which Lorne responds with a condescending, “I know.” Even in my stupefied audition state I think, Yeah, I know. I’m being cordial ya dick.”

“I know,” Lorne says in a snobby condescending tone.” and then he vanishes. I look around and see the point of view of the stage that I have watched thousands of times. The stage manager counts down as if we are about to start a live broadcast and I begin my audition.

For the audition I had been asked to perform one celebrity, one political impression and one original character. I did a half-assed Bono that I thought was good at the time. For my political impression I picked Ralph Reed who was the head of the Christian Coalition. He was in the news a lot at the time, but not on TV. I figured if I didn’t know what he sounded like neither would they. However, if they did they probably witnessed the worst impression they had seen in twenty-something years of the show. For my character I did a Chicago toll-booth attendant who wouldn’t let the gate up so he could hit on women. He would invite them to see his Yes cover band called No, and then brag that he played the Moog.

I’m going to cut to the chase here, my audition stunk.

In my defense, I never did anything to ready myself for a job on “Saturday Night Live”. I wasn’t a fan of impressions and never worked on them in my life. I found most impressions cheap and rarely did anyone bring something that was unique. Phil Hartman, Darrell Hammond and James Austin Johnson are exceptions to this. They brought it angles of humor that didn’t/don’t rely on the impression for laughs. I was also never a character guy. I created them in improvisations, but I didn’t spend hours creating a character. I was never going to be a Peter Sellers or Mike Myers.

My fellow castmates David Koechner and Nancy Walls got hired as performers and my pals Adam McKay and Tom Gianas were hired as writers. I don’t know if there is a word to describe the state of mind you experience when your peers achieve their dreams as yours curdles like milk in the sun. It’s an emotional recipe of feeling stunned, depressed, rejected, hurt, baffled, insecure, disoriented, disbelief and a level of existential loss that only the French seem to be able to fully comprehend.

When you and your friends rise together in a comedy scene you think that this is how it will always be. You’d all continuously graduate to the next level and then the next. When I didn’t move up with them I felt there was a status shift. They are the chosen ones and I wasn’t. I was stuck in Chicago. Maybe I was especially aware of this with Koechner who was my close friend. When we would talk on the phone I would feel smaller, as if my life happenings were trivial. I was now the Fredo to his Micheal.

To add to the pain of being left behind, the Second City theater I was working at in the suburbs closed. Shortly after that my girlfriend and I broke up. The breakup was my fault. Before I went to NYC to audition she asked, “If you get hired will I be moving to New York with you?” To which I replied, “No.” I justified this by saying that a lot of cast members don’t last beyond the first half of the season or get asked back for a second season. However, in my idiot brain of twenty-five I was already partying with Pearl Jam and dating Fiona Apple. Hi! I was an idiotic shitbird of a human.

So here I was, unemployed, post a breakup, and now living in an apartment at Irving and Damen, which for a guy who spent the bulk of his Chicago life in and around the Old Town neighborhood, this was like moving to Utah. My roommate, Matt Walsh (not the right wing jackass but the UCB/VEEP actor), shortly after I moved in, packed up and moved out to NYC with his fellow Upright Citizens Brigade cohorts. My new roommate was a hippy fellow who didn’t bathe and who attempted to hide his stank with natural oils. Both odors permeated all aspects of the apartment.

To top off all this joy I was forced to find work. Since I had no marketable skills in the real world I found a job waiting tables at a corporate Italian restaurant located in the Sears Tower. At night I could see the Sears Tower out my front window. It shimmered in the distance as if it were mocking me saying, You will be here tomorrow morning. This is your life now. You are no longer a fancy-pants actor.”

I was broke and sustained myself on Carl Buddig lunch meats that I bought at a corner liquor store on the way home from work. I’d also grab a pint of Popov vodka to numb the pain. If you have never experienced the joy of Popov vodka let me tell you this: it’s best saved for the darker moments of your life to give life that Hubert Selby, Last Exit To Brooklyn vibe. It’s pretty much the same as drinking rubbing alcohol. In fact, if you are at this low point in your life, save yourself a few bucks and just buy rubbing alcohol. Even if you mix Popov with something it burns going down and I’m fairly certain I’m still missing a layer of membrane in my innards from drinking it in my younger years. The pain that is eased returns ten-fold the following morning as you wake up feeling like Gregor Samsa pinned to a dissecting table.

I kept performing at this time. I joined a sort of all-star Harold team who had the top slot of Saturday nights at iO. I also regularly played in the hit long form show The Armando Diaz Theatrical Movement and Hootenanny. I had a lot of fun playing in the shows, but I couldn’t help but wonder if this was it for me. Had I peaked? Was I going to be one of those old Second City guys who never moved on, who taught improv classes and hung around the neighborhood bars drinking with their students, regaling them with tales of the glorious past?

A rumor started going around that there was a list of people who would be hired midseason for SNL. I didn’t think I was a shoe-in, but it gave me hope, albeit with much desperation and a burning in my stomach, that something would release me from my hell of waiting tables, and dining on processed lunch meat. This hope crashed to the floor like a full tray of glassware from a drunken waiter when Chris Kattan was hired. Deepin in my mind I knew I wasn’t going to get the gig, but felt somehow my dream would win.

The only hope I felt I had of getting my career on track was to get back on stage at Second City which thankfully happened. Director Mick Napier, who I had been improvising with around the iO for the past few months and who had become my friend, cast me in the next Second City ETC show. The ETC is the side stage at the Second City. It’s a more intimate theater and was where I saw my first Second City show. It was the exact place I wanted to be and it seemed to me that my life was once again headed in the direction that I had envisioned.

I moved to LA with my high school Improv buddy and winner of the Funniest Teen In Chicago Hal Sparks. Hal had a few things I didn't have for a life in Hollywood: A job in TV hosting a kid’s game show, an agent, a car, actual confidence, and a dad with money so he didn’t have to have a job.

 I had $3000 and knew absolutely no one. 

Hal’s dad co-signed for an apartment and we moved into a nice two bedroom place with a pool near Pass avenue and the 134 in Burbank. Hal quickly got busy going on auditions, having meetings and hitting the open mics. I didn’t join Hal at the open mics because I was “reworking my act.” Though the idea of performing put a pit in my gut the size armored truck was leaking hot oil. When Hal was home we’d work on a screenplay which was the same concept as Chevy Chase’s Fletch, but with two Fletches (Hal and me). I’m sure if I read this script today it’d cause me to repeatedly cringe that by the end I’d have permanent crease marks on my face. 

I spent my days wandering around my neighborhood as the sounds of the 134 scored my existential nausea as I blew my dough at nearby diners, the Crown Books or on cassette tapes until my savings ran out and I had to find a job. Due to my lack of marketable skills and not having a car I landed a job at a small shop a few blocks from my apartment called Flipper's Frozen Yogurt. 

I didn’t mind the job. The owners were a nice married couple and the customers were friendly, many of whom were celebrities on their way to the studios. Steve Perry of Journey came in once. My co-worker became so excited she began to shake and squeal so fervently that I thought she was having an orgasm. Ken Berry, Katy Segal, and Khyrsten Haje were regulars. Ken Berry was a thrill for me because as a kid I watched “F Troop” reruns daily. Katy Segall would park in disabled spot, saunter in as if she was on a Versace runway, order her yogurt and would sashay away without paying. I wouldn’t have minded if she tipped, but she didn’t. I naively mistook Khyrsten Haje’s friendliness as flirting. Everytime she came in I debated with myself if I should ask her out. Not that I had any money for a proper date. But hey, why wouldn’t a young beautiful star of “Head of the Class” making  twenty-grand an episode not want to date the minimum wage yogurt worker who overestimated his charm?

One afternoon as I had time to lean and didn’t clean, a middle-aged man shuffled in as if he was half asleep and made his way to the counter. “Hello,” he said in a voice and presence that was reminiscent of Droopy the Dog. “Did you replace Jonathon? Jonathan was my favorite so you have some big shoes to fill.” He rested his elbow on the counter and plopped his chin into the palm of his hand as he continued. “I’m Larry. I get the same thing everyday, a medium strawberry with almonds on top, so if you see me coming you can start making it and I’ll always leave a nice tip.” 

I gave Larry his yogurt and he shuffled to a nearby table. He took a bite and shuffled back to the counter. “I didn’t catch your name,” he asked. I told him my name and he repeated it to himself as if to lock it into his memory. “Where’d you come from Matt?” I gave him the brief summary of my arrival and my pursuits to be an actor, writer and comedian. His face lit up, “That’s a lot of ambition packed into that statement. I like it.” Larry paused and proudly proclaimed, “I’m a writer and an actor too. Have you ever seen the “Courtship of Eddie’s Father?” Larry continued on without my response, “I played Bill Bixby’s boss.” 

I told Larry that I often watched the show in reruns as a kid. Larry lit up as he proceeded to tell me what a wonderful person Bill Bixby was and how much he loved the boy who played Eddie on the show. Larry abruptly stopped speaking and he became forlorn as he fiddled with the paper wrapper from a straw. “I’m a homosexual, Matt,” he sighed, “Does that bother you?”

I was surprised by the sudden shift in topic, but I told Larry that I didn’t care. “Good,” he said as he perked up, “I just wanted to be upfront with that. A lot of people hate homosexuals and friendships have ended once they find out I’m gay. I’d rather you know now than down the road and hurt my feelings.” Larry reached out his hand and I shook his very soft hand. “We are now friends,” he said with a smile. 

Larry came in almost everyday and when I saw him approaching the shop I’d start making his medium strawberry yogurt with almonds. He’d smile as I put it on the counter when he walked through the door and he’d plop a dollar into the tip jar. Larry would hover around the counter and we’d talk about old movies, theater, Chicago, our painful childhoods and failed love. His attempts at love, not mine. My only understanding about relationships and love I had copped from movies and stories about John and Yoko. Nevertheless, I had plenty to say on the subject. 

On occasion Larry would point out an elderly person in the shop and inform me who they were.  “That’s Edith Head,” he whispered, “She designed the costumes for Roman Holiday and All About Eve.” One time Larry nodded towards an old man with a cap sitting in the corner, “That’s Billy Wilder.”  I was stunned that such an iconic LA figure was sitting alone in the corner of a Burbank yogurt shop. 

I stood there staring at Billy Wilder astounded that a true Hollywood legend was in my midst. Larry broke my gaze on Billy Wilder by breaking the silence by asking “Do you like pie, Matt?” He paused but long enough for me to respond but  continued before I could, “Would you like to get pie with me tonight? I’d like to buy you some pie.” I agreed and Larry said, “We’ll meet at the Copper Penny tonight at six.”

The Copper Penny was the perfect diner. It was an old joint and most of the waitresses appeared as if they had been there since the day it opened. It served mostly eggs, burgers, grilled cheese and your mug of coffee was refilled before it ever got close to half empty. It needs to be noted that I once saw Jack Lemmon at the Copper Penny happily enjoying a cup of coffee. I know this isn’t pertinent to the story. Nevertheless, I saw motherfucking Jack Lemmon smiling as if the cup held all the secrets to eternal happiness. Also not pertinent to the story: Watching Eddie Money in a red Puma sweatsuit arguing with his wife over a can of Campbell’s soup at the Vons, and seeing Vince Neil driving down the Sunset Strip in a Lamborgini with a porn star in the passenger seat. In all fairness I’m not sure if she was a porn star, but I’m fairly certain she wasn’t his accountant or mother. 

NOTE: Accountants can look like pornstars and pornstars can be accountants. This is not a judgment. It’s just  an assumption based on what is in public about Vince Neil’s dating habits. 

“I want you to order whatever you like, Matt,” Larry said as he perused the menu, "Don't worry about it. Eat and then we can enjoy some pie.” I was starving. Most of my diet at this time consisted of boxed mac ‘n’ cheese mixed with canned tuna for protein or Bisquick pancakes sans the syrup. I was so poor, syrup was a luxury item. I’d choke down the pancakes and hurry to drink water to flush them down my gullet. After this time in my life it took almost a decade for me to be able to enjoy pancakes again. 

Not wanting to break Larry I ordered a grilled cheese with a side of fries. As we ate Larry he informed me that soon he would be going out of town to perform his one man show as Mark Twain which he toured around the country at old folks homes. He patted his mouth with a paper napkin and said, “It’s not Shakespeare, but it keeps the lights on.” 

Larry sat upright, breaking out of his usual slouching demeanor and placed a book the size of the bible on the table. “Okay,” he said as he rested his hand on the book like he was about to take an oath. “I brought you something very special to me. This is my life story told through poetry. I would be flattered if you read it.”

Larry handed the book to me and as I opened it  he snapped, “Don’t flip through it here. I don’t want you to get french fry grease on the pages.” Larry giggled. “Read it in the safety of your home with clean hands.” 

After Larry and I parted for the evening I went home and began reading his book which was about his struggles of being a homosexual and finding a place to belong. Though I wasn’t gay I related to his being an outsider as a teen who was beaten by bullies and having a disconnected relationship with his father. As I lay in my bed reading my phone rang. It was Larry who was sobbing. “It was horrible Matt. Horrible. They punched me and threw me to the ground. I think they were going  to kill me, but somehow I managed to escape. Some people just hate homosexuals. That hate us.” 

I did my best to console Larry. When he had calmed down I joked that to make him feel better I’d put extra almonds on his yogurt tomorrow. He laughed and thanked me for being there for him. When we hung up I realized how lonely Larry must be that in a time of crisis the only person he could call was the kid who worked at the yogurt shop. 

The next day Larry limped into the yogurt shop wearing a pair of sunglasses to hide the ripe shiner on his right eye. As he tried to hold back from crying he said, “they threw me to the pavement, Matt. My knees are a mess.” The pain in Larry’s voice was heavy from a lifetime of pain. 

As I prepared his yogurt I said, “I’m putting on the extra almonds as I promised. You better say when,” as I poured a cartoonish amount of almonds on top. Larry laughed. “Thank you for talking to me last night,” he said, followed by a deep sigh. “I felt so alone.”

As the holidays approached my Mom offered me a roundtrip ticket to Chicago so I could come home. I leapt at the opportunity to get out of LA, see my friends in Chicago and raid my mom’s abundantly stocked fridge. . I hopped a train to Chicago so I could hit the Second City Christmas party. It was comforting to be around so many familiar faces and in a place I truly loved. When people asked me how LA was going my stomach would clench up and my mouth would go dry. I’d give vague answers and try to make it sound as if things were beginning to happen, but it was probably obvious I was floundering in Hollywood. When I had a chat with Second City producer Cherly Sloane she saw right through my bullshit and didn’t mince words, “You’re not ready for LA. Stay in Chicago. We’ll get you back on the staff and into classes. LA will be there when you’re ready. You. Are. Not. Ready.”

This was exactly what I needed to hear and was relieved to stay in Chicago. I called Hal and told him I wasn’t returning. This meant I abandoned all of my belongings in LA which was probably a dick thing to do to Hal, but I was a know-nothing-kid who was lost in every aspect of my life. I needed to be in classes, doing shows in the back of bars with sticky floors where the audience were people there to drink not see bad comedy. I needed to pay my dues.

I quickly lost touch with Hal which didn’t bother me too much, but I was sad I never spoke to Larry again. Over the years I’d wonder about Larry and what became of him. I’d searched for him on the internet, but I found next to nothing. He wrote a couple of B movies about hunky young men in prison. I could almost hear him saying, “It’s not Shakespeare, but it keeps the lights on.” Oddly, nowhere online is there any mention of him as a cast member of the “Courtship of Eddie’s Father.” Perhaps it’s an error by IMDB. If it was a lie, it’s a peculiar fabrication. I don’t begrudge Larry for it. LA is a strange place that pummels one’s self-esteem and can feed your insecurity and neediness. I know, because I returned to LA fifteen years later and spent two decades banging around that city fighting to keep my sanity. 

While living in LA I’d sometimes find myself in my old Burbank neighborhood. I’d pull into the strip mall where Flipper’s once lived in hopes I’d find Larry lazily shuffling around. Alas, I never did. I didn’t see it as a young man but as I looked back on my time in Burbank  Larry and were two lonely souls lost  in the vastness of LA who found some comfort in one another’s company. 

Even when I returned to LA  there with more life experience and had an abundant amount of friends I could feel isolated and alone. Often when I lived there I would think of Larry and hope that one day I’d bump into him. I never did. It’s too bad. I'd have bought him some pie.

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Downtown was more to our liking after the office dwellers had scurried back to the safety of their suburban homes and the tourists were tucked away in their hotels. The city’s solemn streets were ours for drifting as our chatter and laughter echoed down empty alleys. There was no destination. This was an open exploration. An improvisation with our feet only stopping to pay homage to the Picasso, Calder’s Flamingo, or Buckingham Fountain as we stood under ominous dark skyscrapers.

The conversation was as free and meandering as our walking: art and cinema, who we wished we were sleeping with, who we wished we could sleep with. We’d compete to see who could make the longest pun, “Your mom is a Ho Chi Minh trail mix-ed up in the head and shoulders above the rest In a piece of pie in the skyway to heaven seven eleven.” We’d also play a game where you took a famous movie title and substituted one of the titles words with vagina: Vagina Wars, Vagina Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, It’s a Wonderful Vagina. Our Man In Vagina. 

I know, not the brainiest of games. What do you expect? It was four or five in the morning and we were riding high on cigarettes and adrenaline. Does it help that I learned about Eastern philosophy Eastern philosophy, Sartre, SJ Perelman, Philip Roth, Bukowski, Dorothy Parker and a long list of others during these walks? I’d read some of the books by these astute individuals or at least gathered enough knowledge from the talks so that I could sound like I knew a thing or two during bar room blabberings.

It was during the very first late night stroll that I learned that Chicago’s loop was filled with the aroma of chocolate. Warm baking chocolate. As if some celestial mother hovered in the heavens baking chocolate chip cookies for all of the city to wake up to. None of us pointed out the confectionate fragrance. We let it hover in the night air stirring our sense memories as we were in the midst of creating new subconscious souvenirs. 

The Blommer Chocolate Company was responsible for this aromatic gift. It opened in 1939 and quickly became one of the largest chocolate processing plants in North America. That’s almost 80 years of permeating Chicago’s night sky with the aroma of cocoa. It’s not inconceivable that some people took their first and last breaths of life with the smell of chocolate filling their senses.

Late night chocolate became an elemental odor of my early twenties. If the air was right and the breeze headed a certain direction the scent would waft through the window of my first real apartment and mingle with the smells of nicotine, mildew and burnt coffee. It was as much of my early twenties as the music I was listening to and the clothes that I believed gave me identity. It hung in the air as I made love to my first serious girlfriend, had my first one night stand, watched Hitchcock films on a broken television set, ate cheap spaghetti with jarred sauce procured from drugs stores, listened to my neighbor yell at his mother, lamented my youthful errors and dreamed of fame. Often the smell of warm chocolate would hover in my room when I came home from these long walks with my legs twitching as I crawled under sheets that were too small for my bed. 

It was an already rarefied time made more so magical by the warmth of cocoa in the air. As these moments unfolded I knew that life wouldn’t always be spontaneous, open and free, that these friends would move on to different cities, and life would become more regular.  I’m grateful I was aware of this. It allowed me to hold the moments closer and let them become a part of my being. 

I usually could scrounge together something to eat. I would sneak into the backbar of Second City and scarf down some crackers and pub cheese. Catered charity events were often held at the theater which meant leftover mostaccioli or some sort of dry chicken dish with lemon slices on top. I’d load up styrofoam containers and pack every inch of my mini-fridge so I could eat for the next couple of days.

The producer of Second City Joyce Sloane would bring a huge bag of bagels and cream cheese for morning meetings. I knew that when the meeting ended and there would be bagels remaining I could help myself. I’d wait in the lower lobby with a growling belly like a stray dog awaiting someone to toss me some scraps. When I heard the meeting had adjourned, I’d walk up the stairs as if I had happened to stop by and help myself to some bagels. I’d eat an untoasted one to quell my hunger pangs as my second one warmed in the toaster. If there were a few remaining bagels I’d wrap them in cocktail napkins and take them home so I could sustain myself on stale bread for a day or two. 

One morning I strolled over to Second City to have my free cup of morning coffee. To my disappointment there were no bagels or food scraps for me to scrounge. As I headed to the back bar to grab some crackers and cheese the coffee shifted things in my  intestines. My belly rumbled as the cheap tap beer I had consumed the night before began to rush forth towards my bunghole. Time was of the essence. I hurried to the Second City ETC restrooms and rushed to get my pants down. By the sweet grace of God my lily-white butt hit the cold plastic toilet seat just in time.

As I sat there, humbled by the stench that one can create after an evening of Old Style on tap I noticed something on the floor to the right of my foot; a brown leather wallet and a fairly new looking one at that. I picked it up and immediately went to the billfold where I found six dollars. A fortune to a man who had zero dollars to his name. My mind raced with the possibilities of what I could do with the money.  I could go to the local cafe Savories and get a decent cup of coffee, and a muffin with a little money left to buy a pack of cigarettes. Perhaps, I could go to my favorite diner Nookies and have a bowl of soup. I quickly discarded this idea because that wouldn’t leave any cash for cigarettes. I then had the epiphany; I could get a chicken sandwich meal at Arby’s with curly fries and lemonade and still have cigarette money. 

Another feeling moved around in my empty belly that had nothing to do with the coffee and tap beer. It was my moral compass informing me that this money wasn’t mine. Keeping it would be stealing. What if the owner of the wallet was as broke as me? I decided I’d look at the owner's ID and if they lived nearby I’d deliver the wallet to their home.  If not I’d toss the wallet into a mailbox for I had heard  the US Postal Service would return the wallet free of charge. 

I pulled out the driver’s license out of the wallet and discovered the picture of a very handsome blonde-haired, blue-eyed male who was about the same age as me. He had a game show host smile and an ease in his eyes that let me know life was going his way. His address was in Kenilworth which happened to be one of the  richest suburbs in all of the United States. “Fuck this guy,” I mumbled to myself. 

I finished my business and I headed down Piper’s Alley to the corner mailbox and tossed Smiley McBlondie’s driver’s license inside. I stuffed the six bucks into my front pocket, emptied the contents from my ratty wallet, and placed them inside my new wallet. As I headed  to Walgreens to buy my smokes I flippantly discarded my old wallet into a city trash can.

The Arby’s at the of North and Wells circa 1989 was not pretty.  It was a place where forgotten Nelson Algren characters lived in a fast food purgatory as they smoked borrowed cigarettes and conversed with dead relatives. I once saw a man there whose nose looked as if it had been chewed off by a rat. He didn’t seem to mind though. He was all smiles as he carried his tray to a table. However, the visual of this man’s nose turned my stomach and I wasn’t able to eat for the rest of the day.

However on this day Arby’s may as well have been the Champs-Élyées. I ordered my chicken meal and quickly headed to the front steps of Second City so I could enjoy my meal on the beautiful Chicago spring day. I placed my lemonade and curly fries next to me and pulled my sandwich from the bag. It had been a while  since I had enjoyed warm food. As I brought it to my mouth, the entire contents of the sandwich fell from the back of the bun and plopped onto the dirty sidewalk. 

I was shocked. I stared at the pieces of chicken as they glistened in the sun next to a cigarette butt, some street grime and a piece of gum that was black and had been pounded into the pavement. I negotiated with myself if I could rescue all or some of the chicken. I finally had to face reality, the chicken was lost. I made an attempt to eat the bun, but it felt like the gesture of a lost soul like a widower dancing with the wedding dress of his deceased bride. Defeated, I ate my curly fries and as I sipped my pink lemonade and wondered, is what I get for stealing the blue-eyed kid’s wallet?

I’d spend a couple weeks every summer with my Elmer and thus began my indoctrination into bar life. We’d head out for a day of fishing, which also included multiple visits to the lakeside taverns. As we would exit the bright humid summer air and into the cool dark dampness of a musty bar I felt as if I was entering a secret society where only privileged humans were allowed to dwell. The bartender would place a bowl of shelled roasted peanuts in front of us as Elmer would order a boilermaker himself and a kiddie cocktail for me. 

I’d listen to the men talk as I joyously tossed the peanut shells to the floor as my eyes wandered around the bar appreciating the various knick knacks and tchotchkes that collected dust behind the bar. Many of the bars had the same decorations: caricature statues of WC Fields or Groucho Marx, a plastic statue of a small boy who if you pulled his shorts down a stream of water would shoot out like he was urinating and signs that read, I work and I work and my wife gets all the money, or We serve wine not whiners. 

The most baffling item that I saw at some of the bars was a statue of two naked men wrestling and both had tight grips on the other guy’s genitalia. My young mind couldn’t understand what this was supposed to mean or why anyone thought this would be a great decoration for their business. I don’t know if I still fully understand.

As we sat in the bar Elmer would also advise me on proper bar etiquette and what made a good drinker. “Always tip and tip good,” and, “No one likes a sloppy drunk or one who cries. If that’s how you’re going to be when you drink, then stay home.  He also advised me that I shouldn’t do drugs. It was dirty business and drinking was good clean fun. 

I  don’t think I need to point out that Elmer would let me drink beer.  One time I was so drunk I was wobbling and slurring as we cleaned fish on his pier. My grandma Leona saw this and yelled,  “Jesus Christ Elmer, the kid is drunk.” To which he responded, “Aaah, it’s good for ‘em. It’ll make him a man.” 

Thanks to Elmer I knew how to properly conduct myself when I started hanging out in the neighborhood bars in Chicago at the ripe age of sixteen. I always had my money ready, knew what I was going to order when the bartender arrived and I did so quickly. When my drink arrived I left a healthy tip. By taking care of the bartender I was also taking care of myself because these actions ensured quick service the next time I was ready for another round.

I don’t know if I didn’t get carded or kicked out of these joints due to my perfect bar etiquette or because I often entered these establishments with the staff and actors of The Second City. Tossing around that we were from Second City came with privileges around Chicago. We never had to wait in lines and we got a lot of free drinks. 

Most of the time I bounced between the two bars directly across the street from Second City, The Last Act and The Old Town Ale House. These places were similar to the bars Elmer would take me to. They were filled with people from various walks of life, who were there to drink and talk. I felt at home in these places. As if it was some sort of rite of passage that Elmer would approve of.

The Exit was another bar my Second City pals and I would frequent. However, it wasn’t an old man bar but a  notorious Punk hangout. As soon as you entered the place you were hit in the face by clouds of smoke and a wall of blistering industrial or Punk music. You’d make through a multitude of dudes in mohawks and black leather jackets who made a point not to budge so you’d have to push past them hoping not to provoke a confrontation. Scantily clad women dressed in black tight clothing and  big clompy boots danced in cages which tantalized as well as intimidated my teen libido.  

One of the highlights of going to Exit was that you’d maybe get a glimpse of Old Town’s legendary Bra Guy. Bra Guy was a man who lived in the apartments above Exit would stand in the center window wearing nothing but a bra and a bathrobe. He’d sip on a bottle of beer while smoking a cigarette and fondling himself. If someone spotted him he'd slink off to the side and hide until he thought the coast was clear.

One time after spotting Bra Guy in full fondle mode as a long line of patrons waited to be let into the Exit. My friend Aaron said, “I wonder how many people in line at the Exit think the dripping on their head is from an air conditioner when it’s really Bra Guy jizzing out the window.” 

Occasionally we’d venture out of Old Town and into Chicago’s club scene to places like Crobar, Limelight, or The China Club.  As a young man I felt I should like these clubs. That this is where the young people should go to get fucked up and find one night stands. I never felt comfortable in a club. It seemed absurd to me that you’d spend the night in a place where conversations were held by yelling into one another’s ear and the prices of drinks could be best described as bullshit.

As I entered my twenties and started attempting to define myself I searched for bars to accompany my newly developing self image. Places where I could hear new music and perhaps find myself a hip girlfriend. I began frequenting places like The Holiday Club, The Blue Bird Lounge, Gold Star, Danny’s, Phyllis’ and on occasion Simon’s which was further north, but worth the trek for what easily was the best jukebox in all of Chicago.  

I decided that The Blue Bird Lounge was my favorite bar. This was probably because the first time I walked through the door Sonic Youth’s “Kool Thing,” was playing and that was all I needed to feel this was my spot.  It didn’t hurt that every bartender was a woman in crushed velvet dresses, Doc Marten boots, and hair that looked as if they just rolled out of bed. I also  found their I don’t give a fuck attitudes enticing, but didn’t nerve to make the conversation go past my drink order. 

Chicago has bars that are open until 2 AM and 4 AM. Once the two o’clock bars closed it was always a mad scramble to find the nearest four o’clock bar.  I’ve forgotten or never knew the names of most of these bars. I can recollect vague details like, it was near an underpass, or the walls were black with no artwork. Some of these places had bar tops made from plywood with bottles and cans in dirty buckets filled with ice and tables that hadn’t been cleaned all night, if not in many nights. It didn’t matter though, I was drinking. 

As my twenties began to wind down I found myself returning to the neighborhood taverns. I cared less about being cool. I was content simply being at a table where I could sit and talk with my friends. Often this meant the Old Town Ale House where my friends and I would empty pitchers of beer as we shared our ideas for sketches, plays, books and movie ideas.  I’m sure most of these ideas were terrible and thankfully the ideas left our memories shortly after they exited our mouths. I do recall one of my ideas and I shall share it with great reluctance.  I had learned that Punk legend and filth monger GG Allin used to visit serial killer John Wayne Gacy in prison. I drunkenly thought this would make a good one act play. My chubby friend would play Gacy and I would be GG. Thankfully, this idea never went past a couple drunken ramblings. 

It’s been twenty years since I’ve lived in Chicago. Most of the bars I frequented are gone or have been turned into places that serve craft cocktails or are micro-breweries. That’s fine. Cities change and evolve. Plus, I no longer hangout in taverns. I quit drinking three years ago and more importantly I became the father of two splendid girls.I’d rather be home with them than sitting next to a guy named Burt making small talk. 

I live in Saint Paul now where the old man corner joint still thrives. On occasion I’ll pass by a place called Gallahager’s, Skinner’s or Skarda’s and I’ll look it up on Yelp to see what it looks like on the inside. On a rare occasion I’ll step in to check it out. I’m instantly transported to the time I first stepped into a musty bar with Elmer. I’ll stay just long enough to feel nostalgic and miss my Grandpa. I never sit at the bar or even entertain the idea. I’ve lost more than enough hours of my life in bars.

My Mom’s boyfriend, who was a used car salesman, helped me find the car for three hundred bucks. The day he drove it into our driveway was the only day I was happy to see his mopish bald head that was punctuated with a bulbous nose. As soon as his nicotine stained fingers placed the keys into my hand I felt the surge of possibility vibrate the molecules in my being. 

My brother did a half-assed job of replacing the Delco radio with a Pioneer radio/cassette player. It simply filled the space where the radio had been. The speakers weren’t mounted, but placed behind the backseat so they would slide back and forth anytime I rounded a corner. 

I was in the throes of discovering new music and I was no longer interested in the repetitive cycle of Chicago FM radio. I was into Iggy Pop, The Clash, The Deadmilkmen, Suicidal Tendencies, The Dead Kennedys, Violent Femmes, Talking Heads, REM, U2, and The Waterboys. I bought several packages of blank cassettes and recorded my favorite albums and made mix tapes. In addition to new bands I was learning about the Blues and would record the local public Radio show “Blues Before Sunrise.”  

After my Mom was asleep I’d hop into the Impala, pop in a cassette and drive in any direction. Often I’d head north towards Illinois farmland as Muddy Waters moaned while the yellow moon followed  across cornfields, farmhouses and barns. If the moon wasn’t prevalent and the roads were dark I’d switch off the headlights and drive with the stars as my audience. 

One day as one of my high school teachers droned on about I-don’t-know-what because I never paid attention in school, I had an epiphany - I could be anywhere.  When the bell rang I walked straight to my car and left. Ditching class became my favorite pastime. The consequences for ditching school was a three day suspension. It made me laugh that the punishment was exactly what I wanted, not to be in school. 

Some days when I skipped class I’d make a frozen pizza, nap, or watch reruns on TV. Often I’d drive to I-90/94 and head east to Chicago. I’d exit onto North Avenue and head towards Old Town which was the only neighborhood I vaguely knew. I’d make a plethora of wrong turns trying to remember how to get onto Lake Shore Drive. I’d head north solely and turn around at Sheridan Road solely so I could have lake Michigan to the left of me and Chicago’s skyline before me. This view filled me with the illusion that life was perfect, that my nose was’t crooked, that one day a female would love me, money would always be plentiful and all dreams come true.

Any free night I had I’d drive to Chicago at night to see the free improv sets at Second City. I’d arrive in the city early so I could walk around Old Town. I preferred the city with the lights dimmed as my feet tapped on the pavement as if keeping time with the alluring chatter emanating from taverns. The air felt alive with possibility as if everyone who was out would find what they were searching for.  

When My Mom learned I started hanging around in Old Town she warned me to not go too far south on Wells, “That’s when it starts to get seedy.” Could there be more of a perfect invitation than your mother cautioning you not to do something? 

In the sixties Old Town was the hub for the counterculture and though the yuppies had begun to make their mark with nuvo-cuisine restaurants and overpriced boutiques, remnants of Old Town’s unscrupulous past remained. An adult bookstore let you know you had arrived at the less desirable side of the neighborhood. I didn’t have the courage to enter, but it sent my mind racing with what existed on the other side of the entrance. I did enjoy the show of men trying to enter the store unnoticed. Some would yawn, or pretend to tie their shoes, or act as if they were searching for an address before they made a quick dash through the door.

Further south was the Bijou Theater which showed gay porno films and held live cabaret shows. The theater piqued my curiosity. Other than kissing two girls I had no sexual experience. I had no concept of sex or sexuality. I knew who I was supposed to be, but didn’t know who I was.  All I knew was that the hormones in my body were twisting about and screaming at me adamantly to do something to ease the suffering. Perhaps, the answer was in this theater, or the Adult Bookstore, or perhaps the prostitutes who waved at me as I crossed the North Avenue bridge. I never attempted to satiate these curiosities. I was too scared to even entertain the idea. 

At the far end of Wells was Bizarre Bazaar, a store that sold a plethora of items with a strong emphasis on dildos, bongs and intricate wood or glass pipes for smoking marijuana. They also sold crack pipes which during the height of the crack epidemic seemed morally questionable.  For legal reasons the drug paraphernalia were displayed with a single Camel Light cigarette protruding from the bowl which was intended to hold an illegal substance. I found it laughable that anyone would wish to power hit a cigarette.

The name of my favorite shop to browse evades me, but I loved everything about it other than the overwhelming scent of cheap incense. As soon as I entered my sinuses and eyes began to itch. The store sold a variety of items none of which had a cohesive theme. There were novelty items like fake mustaches, magnets that read Fuck You It’s Friday, and 8x10 photos and pins of old time Hollywood stars. I’d buy pins of Harpo, Groucho Marx or Buster Keaton and stick them on the lapels of the green army trench coat I had started wearing to appear more urban. The lapels of this coat was where I decided to project to the world of who I was, or more accurately, who I was trying to be. Mixed in with pins of the Marx Brothers were my favorite bands and leftist political comments. I only had a vague concept of  what they meant. It didn’t matter, I was projecting the image of an angry self-righteous young man who was going to change the world. 

The store was run by a transwoman who resembled Divine. In the mid-eighties trans people weren’t as prevalent as they are today. I marveled at her in all her I-Don’t-Give-a-fuck glory. She was always wearing a colorful mumu as she sat on a beat up gold velvet loveseat behind the counter as she smoked a long thin cigarette. A male companion always sat next to her and they’d gossip and laughed. I wanted to be her friend and would try to think of something to say to her as I flip[ed through the photos of Humphrey Bogart or Greta Garbo. As I made my way to the counter an awkward,“How are you?” would fall from my mouth.  “Fine,” she’d reply as she was a prisoner responding to the warden. 

One night after parking on a particularly dark sidestreet I returned to discover the back window of the Impala had been smashed and the speakers stolen. They didn’t notice that the stereo was also an easy grab.   I drove home to the suburbs as I blasted the heater to keep the Illinois winter cold from entering my car. I wasn’t bothered. It was a christening of sorts into the world of city life.

Eventually the Impala died and was replaced with a blue 1973 Chevy Nova  that was so rusted that the water from the street would splash into the car and puddle on the floor. The Nova didn’t last long. One rainy afternoon I hydroplaned through an intersection and went sideways over a curb destroying the suspension. I was now eighteen and without a car. It didn’t matter. I was about to start Columbia College in downtown Chicago. Public transportation was about to be my mode of transportation as my soundtrack played from a Sony Walkman. I was about to experience a new level of freedom.

I accepted Jesus Christ into my life the way most people lose their virginity, in the backseat of a car while not fully knowing what I was doing. After the deed was done I expected to filled with light and love or greeted with the light warm kisses of angels as they ran their fingers through my hair. None of this happened. In fact, I felt like the same fifteen year-old kid I did a minute ago. However, now I had a loophole for my flaws and could ask for forgiveness for my masturbation.

I was seeking my place in life and didn’t have much direction other than I knew I wanted to be creative. Perhaps a writer, a drummer, an actor, or maybe all three. I tried a variety of cliques. I briefly hung out with the stoners, but Speed Metal made me anxious and smoking pot from a graphic bong made my lungs feel like they were hit with buckshot followed by intense claustrophobia. 

I switched gears and met up with some kids at the library to play Dungeons and Dragons. I found it to be so tedious I made an excuse and left early. In a moment of absolute loneliness tried Boy Scouts and found it to be more painful  than D&D. Plus, I had no desire to wear a uniform of any kind.

The group I hung out with the longest was the Jocks which was lead by Brian Hill. Brian could have been a villain in an 80s teen-comedy with blonde hair, blue eyes and a smirk permanently fixed to his face. Brian’s Mom would buy us beer and let us have parties in the basement. Some of the parties were just a handful of us drinking shitty beer and listening to records. Once in awhile there would be full on keg parties with a hundred people packed into the Hill home as people danced in the basement to the Animal House soundtrack, made out or puked. During these parties Brian’s Mom would stay in her bedroom reading romance novels. I’m amazed she never got in trouble for hosting these parties. 

I very quickly became the whipping boy Brian and his gang. Once Brian and the other jocks were liquored up they'd grab me, carry me to the toilet and give me a swirly. If you don’t know what that is, it’s when they dunk your head into a toilet bowl and repeatedly flush it. I tried to play along as if I too was in on the joke. I figured if I pretended to be amused they’d stop hassling me. This approach didn’t work. Their antics escalated and grew more violent. Pulling down my pants or smacking me on the head or face. I continued to act unphased, but the pain I felt inside outweighed the sting on my face.

At one party, as I talked to a girl I had a crush on Brian and his crew came at me, picked me up, carried me to the staircase where they handcuffed me to the railing. Brian pulled my pants and underwear down exposing me to the party. I was a late bloomer so my smoothness was a point of amusement to all who watched. As I lay their on the stairs my soul shrank as I struggled to keep my composure, but  inside my head the screaming could have fractured my skull. 

After that moment I felt a shift within myself. I withdrew and spent more time with books, music and watching old movies late at night on the UHF channels. I began writing on my Smith-Corona typewriter searching for a voice and direction.

It was around this time my brother Marty began asking me to attend a youth group called Son City at the Willow Creek Community church.  The idea of hanging out with a bunch of Jesus freaks wasn’t the direction I had envisioned for myself. Plus, the name ‘Willow Creek’ conjured up imagery of a small, white church with peeling paint where women wore long floral dresses and the males dressed in slacks and white shirts buttoned to the collars. 

I only agreed to attend Son City so my brother would stop asking.

I was surprised to find that Willow Creek Community Church was not a country bumpkin establishment, but a  large auditorium with a huge glass window that overlooked a manmade lake. As soon as I stepped into the lobby I heard the chatter and laughter of  500 Punks, Preppies, Goth, Metal Head and Nerd teens chattering, laughing and hanging out together. To top it all off, there were cute girls. One in particular with a wide grin and a bouncy behind that dizzified my brain approached introduce herself to me. No girl had ever approached me in my life.  

When the festivities began there wasn’t praying, hollering Jesus’ name, or condemning people to hell for their sins. In fact, it was a multimedia presentation starting with a live band playing  “(Don’t You) Forget About Me,” by the Simple Minds as a slideshow played on three large screens highlighting the events of last week’s Son City. As faces popped onto the screens the crowd cheered. A stirring arose in my gut. I wanted my face on that screen. I wanted the crowd to cheer for me. 

When the music ended the minister Dan Webster came out and greeted everyone, followed by more music and a comedy sketch. As the actors delivered their lines I thought about how I’d say them and what I would do to get more laughs out of the moment. 

I returned to Son City the following week partly because it was something to do once a week other than sitting in the glow of my black and white TV, but also because I was interested in being a part of the sketch group. When I inquired about it I was I was told I had to be further involved with the church and have relationship Jesus.

I quickly began making friends. Two fellows in particular, Nick and Mark were  like characters from John Hughes movie dressed in paisley shirts, berets and vintage suit jackets. They were funny in an offbeat way. They also liked bands I hadI never heard; The Talking Heads, REM, Elvis Costello, The Dead Milkmen and U2.

They didn’t just listen to music they discussed it, noted who produced it, and dissected the production. This inspired me to listen approach music in a whole new way. In fact, Mark and Nic inspired me to approach the world in a different way. They weren’t content with living in Streamwood Illinois. They had plans to move to Chicago. Mark was already attending the Art Institute of Chicago and Nick was about attend theater school at Columbia College. 

Though I had given my life to Christ  I never l fully felt comfortable in the lifestyle. There were a lot of details about one's “walk with Christ,”  that made me uncomfortable. As a Christian you were expected to witness (telling your story of how you came to the lord) and convert people to Christianity. I didn’t agree with this. I felt my spirituality was my business and I didn’t need to go blabbing about it to random folks in hopes of a win for the team. I didn’t think most people wanted to hear about it anyway. If  someone wanted to find Christianity it’s not like it’s a hard thing to find in the US. It’s the McDonald’s of religion with locations everwhere. 

I was also bothered by the posturing of many Christians.  Some wore tee-shirts of a bloodied Christ on the cross, with bible verses and big bold red letters that read, JESUS DIED FOR YOU. I knew from personal experience that these shirts were more of a turn off than a means of inspiration. Also, I didn’t ask him to die for me. That’s something his dad did to him because his Daddy couldn’t grasp the concept of sin, which further perplexed me, because a five year-old knows the difference between right and wrong. Are five year-olds smarter than God?

I digress.

My growing hesitance about the Christian world was put on hold when I auditioned and got cast in the weekly sketches at Son City. My reluctance was further pushed down after I performed my first sketch. There is a strange convergence of chemicals in one's psyche when neediness and a modicum of talent receives unwarranted affirmation. Prior to stepping on the stage for my first performance I wanted to be a comedy god. After getting four laughs in the three minutes on stage my ego surged to David Lee Roth levels. My ego further expanded when various audience members came up to me and said, “good job,” and “you were funny.” 

I approached every script with this question, “How would Robin Williams or John Belushi play this sketch?”  Not exactly the Stanislavski approach to acting, but I was out for laughs. During performances I would often change my lines often to the confusion of the actor I was performing with. I told my fellow castmates it was something that happened in the moment. The truth was, I rewrote everything days before and passed it off as “inspiration of the moment.”

I began to map out my life to follow in the footsteps of my hero, John Belushi. Sans the overdose. The first step of this was to get to where Belushi started, The Second City theater in Chicago. I began harrassing Bob, the director of our sketch group that we should have a field trip to see a show there.  Bob was was reluctant. He wasn’t certain the experience would be suitable for a church group. I don’t know why I didn’t go to the theater with some friends, but I was determined to do so as a sketch group and I hassled Bob about it until he gave in.

I was almost in a state of disbelief when I approached the doors of the Second City. placed my hand on the handle of the door and thought, John Belushi opened this door. Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, John Candy and Gilda Radner opened this door. I am not opening this door. 

Bob called out to me, “Matt, we’re not seeing a show there. We’re going to the the sidestage.

My heart sank as I thought, side stage, what the fuck is a sidestage? 

I didn’t know it at the time, but The Second City ETC, was a recently new stage established inside Piper’s Alley so Second City could handle the overflow from the mainstage as well have a smaller theater that would be a little bit more edgy and experimental. Something that appealed more to what I was looking for. 

As the group headed down Piper’s Alley to get the tickets for the show I went inside the lobby of Second City to explore. I was instantly hit with the sound of chatter, clinking glasses from bartenders, nicotine, and the scent of brewing coffee, pistachio ice cream and stale booze. I was immediately felt the history and significance of the place as I looked at the myriad of cast photos of the theater’s thirty year history. by cast photos from the sixties with a myriad faces I had seen on countless TV and movies screens. 

I made my way to the bar and a guy washing dishes nodded at me. I envied his job. It didn’t matter to me that he was crouched over, scrubbing dishes by hand, he worked at Second City. He got to mingle with the actors and watch the shows whenever he pleased. 

The lights in the lobby flashed on and off signaling that the show would start soon. I grabbed some matchbooks with the Second City logo from the bar  I scurried out of the theater, through Piper’s Alley and into The Second City ETC. It was a small minimal black box theater, that seated maybe a hundred and fifty people with a stage that slightly jutted forth into the audience. A piano began to rumble  as the house lights went down. The piano crescendoed as the stage lights came up and a jolt of electricity coursed through my body. The show started with three fast and brief scenes and I felt that feeling I thought I would have after I prayed to accept Jesus into my life.  I felt the angels kiss my face and love fill my heart and I knew in that moment this was to be my church. This is where I belonged.

Burton Place was a small tavern with a square bar at the center of a small room giving it a slight resemblance to the famed TV bar “Cheers.” Unlike “Cheers,” it lacked the glib one liners and hope. Everyday the same patrons sat at the same spot, drinking the same drinks as “Love Shack” and “Right Place Wrong Time '' repeated so often on the jukebox that the songs became white noise. As evening approached the daytime regulars stumbled out and left their stools for the coked up big tipping Italian waiters from restaurants along Wells street, actors from Second City and various souls seeking meaning in the act of emptying bottles.  

I was hired at Burton Place shortly after I turned twenty-one though the only experience I had pouring drinks was mixing vodka/tonics for my parents when I was a kid. I had three shifts a week, one of which was on Monday nights where I bartended, waited tables and cooked. I don’t know how I pulled it off;  I’d take orders, mix drinks, run to to the kitchen to throw burgers onto the small grill as I dropped baskets fries and wings into the fryer, then back to the bar to serve more customers while having to run back in time to flip the burgers, pull the wings out of the fryer toss them in sauce, and run them out to the drunks who desperately needed to coat their bellies with grease so they could continue drinking. As far as my memory serves me, I didn’t fuck up too much. 

Business Burton Place was thriving so the owners rented the upstairs apartment and converted it into a bar. The new addition looked more like the bar your uncle would build in his home. The lighting was too bright, the street lights blared through the  windows, and on the sparse white walls hung a few neon beer signs to give it that “authentic” bar look. The regulars took one look at the new bar and continued to hide in the dark corners of downstairs.

I was given the Wednesday night shift in the upstairs bar. Most shifts were spent alone. Occasionally, actors from The Second City would stop by, mostly because I gave them free drinks. Chris Farely would linger longer than the other actors. He’d sit at the corner of the bar and we would discuss God, Catholicism, sin and the afterlife. Then, when the booze kicked in he’d venture downstairs to become the loud Chris Farely the world soon would know.

One Wednesday I was setting up the bar as the setting sun streamed through the windows when a man walked in with a portable electric piano and a suitcase. He looked as if a costume designer for a 70s sitcom read the description of “Hip Cool Guy.” He was dressed in a vest over a loosely fitting white shirt, a scarf, an earring in one ear and a paddy cap on top of his feathered blonde blonde hair. “Hello,” In an animated voice he said, “I’m Smilin’ Dave.” He punctuated the sentence with a big grin, “I’m going to be playing music here on Wednesday nights.”

“Oh fuck,” was the best my internal voice could do to articulate how I felt. I’d been to enough piano bars to know that this meant cheesy songs, bad jokes and the clientele of newly divorced lonely people who were relearning how to have fun. Plus, like all  twenty one year-old males I believed I was the only one on earth who knew good music and for me that was anything, Punk, Post-Punk and Grunge. An evening of listening to covers of “My Way,” was going to be a violent assault on my identity.  

I helped Smilin’ Dave figure out where to set up his equipment. When he finished he opened up the suitcase which was filled with various handheld percussion instruments like tambourines, maracas, tiny drums and other things you shake, rattle and hit with a stick. He picked one of them up, gave it a shake and said, “So my fans can play along.”

“Oh cool,” I said while wondering, fans? What kind of fans would a guy who plays in dive bars possibly have?

At 7:00 PM sharp, Smilin’ Dave was behind the piano playing to an audience that solely consisted of me. He’d occasionally glance my way to see if I approved as I forced an approving smile. By 7:30 people started to rapidly flow into the bar. I didn’t know where they came from, and they surely weren’t the usual Burton Place crowd. They were office dwellers, corporate yuppie types with power ties and pantsuits who demanded drinks like pirates on shore leave. As they got drunk they hollered, whistled and sang along as if Smilin’ Dave was Elton John playing Dodger’s Stadium. 

I watched in perplexed awe as they jumped around banging on instruments like they were the apes from 2001 A Space Odyssey.  I couldn’t help but think, is this what working in corporate America does to people? Is the life of cubicle dwelling, abiding office etiquette and pretending to give two holy fucks about stats, profit margins and the Johnson & Johnson report so oppressive that one must release their frustration like they were speaking in tongues at a snake handler tent revival and the songs of Billy Joel were the hymns? 

Smilin’ Dave sang a lot with Billy Joel. Every other song was motherfucking Billy Joel. I’m not judging Billy Joel. Honestly, I have no opinions about Billy Joel’s body of work and admittedly have enjoyed some of his songs. However, twenty-one year old me couldn’t stand Billy Joel. I was into edgy music, remember? 

To make Billy Joel matters worse, Smilin’ Dave played “Piano Man” at least five times that night, which is one of Billy Joel’s songs I surely hated. Smilin’ Dave cleverly changed some of the lyrics to adapt to his surroundings, “Now Matt at the bar is an actor and he gives me my drinks for free,” he’d sing with glee as he lifted his glass to toast me. I didn’t know how to respond the first or fifth time he did this, so I just went about my business. 

Smilin’ Dave mixed in a couple ballads and the corporate cave dwellers would slow dance and sing along and then he’d bring back the energy with “Uptown Girl,” or “We Didn’t Start The Fire,” and the Yuppies would spasticity dance and shake their toys.  Even twenty-one year old me with all my pretensions and judgments had to admit,  Smilin’ Dave knew how to work a crowd. 

At the end of the night my ears rang and my brain was exhausted from sensory overload. I had hoped Smilin’ Dave’s evening would have failed so I could go back to my quiet Wednesday nights, but the $300 dollars in nontaxable income informed me otherwise. 

“You did pretty well, tonight, huh?” Smilin’ Dave said with an air of pride. 

“Yeah,”  I agreed.

“Hey,” Smilin’ Dave said with a serious tone, "You know when I sing “Piano Man,” and I toast you?” He picked at the label of his beer as he continued, “Do you think you could return the toast? I think the people would like that” 

“Yeah,”  I said. To which Dave grinned and excitedly replied, “Awesome!”

So five times every Wednesday Smilin’ Dave sang, “Matt behind the bar is an actor he gives me my drinks for free,” then he would raise his glass to me and I returned the toast. Every time the crowd would look over to me and cheer. Smilin’ Dave would grin and then wink at me as if to say, “see, they love it.”

One Wednesday night the upstairs bar was booked for a private Christmas party for a floral company called, Rose’s Roses. Smilin’ Dave came in a little more chipper than usual and rhetorically asked, “You know what this is tonight, don’t you?” Before I could answer he said, “Rose’s Roses is a front for a high end escort service and their clients.” 

For some reason I thought Smilin’ Dave was bullshitting me. 

When the guest for the party began to arrive one woman with very large breasts in a small tight dress gave me twenty dollars to keep her purse behind the bar, as did another woman who also had her abundant cleavage on full display.  I thought, oh shit, Dave was right. When the male clients began to show up they could be best described as the cast of Goodfellas. They had thick Chicago accents, nice suits, heavy amounts of cologne and they tipped like, well, mob guys. Tens and twenties landed on the bar as I made sure to keep the drinks coming as the scene from Goodfellas where Pesci shoots at the floor and yells at Spider, “Dance the drink back here,” played on a loop in my head. 

It was a strange sight to see these hardened men, who hours ago may have been tossing a body into Lake Michigan dancing around and singing to Billy Joel. Maybe like the pent up corporate workers they, too, had some steam to blow off.

At the end of the night when I fetched the ladies purses they again tipped me twenty dollars. Some of the mob guys also tossed money on the bar and said, “You did good tonight.” 

After I tipped out the barback and cooked, I walked away with $600. In 2023 $600 in one night bartending would be a killing. 1991 Matt I felt like he had just pulled off the Lufthansa Heist. 

Smilin’ Dave sat down at the bar and said, “You didn’t believe me, did you?”

“No I didn’t,” I said with a chuckle. 

“Smilin’ Dave wouldn’t steer you wrong my friend,” he said with a huge smile. I cracked open a beer for Smilin’ Dave and as I handed it to him I noticed sitting in his left nostril an Indiana Jones sized boulder of cocaine. I now knew how Smilin’ Dave was able to spend hours passionately singing Billy Joel tunes.

Smilin’ Dave sat in the quiet of the room as I tidied up the bar. After ten minutes I grabbed him another beer and handed it to him. For the first time since I had met Smilin’ Dave, he wasn’t so smiley. “One of these days I’m going to sneak one of my own songs into a set.” 

“Oh yeah,” I said as my curiosity peaked?

“I did once,” Dave said quietly, “But people like to hear what they know, ya know? He looked at his beer then smiled, “At least I make my living playing music. Not many can say that, that’s for sure.” 

I had a few more Wednesday nights with Smilin’ Dave and then without explanation he was gone. For years I thought of Smilin’ Dave as some sort of hack with a monkey grinder act. However, as a middle-aged man who’s had a life of creative ups, working shit jobs to pay the bills, including being a corporate office dweller, I began to see the entire Smilin’ Dave differently. He was a man providing much needed relief and fun to people who needed it. He was also an artist, struggling between survival and creating. Smilin’ Dave may not have been doing one hundred percent of what he wanted to with music, but as he said, “At least I make my living playing music.” I just hope he slipped one of his own songs into one of his sets and got the reaction he was hoping for.

I was surprised to discover that the horse was in the house with its head sticking out a front window as the owner of the horse fed it apples. Though I was a small boy, and who had dreamt of having a pet horse I kept in my room, this still didn’t feel right to me. Horses are meant to be in open fields and where would the horses poop? I looked around to check with the other kids were hesitant about this. They smiled and petted the horse’s head. Maybe my feeling about this man living with a horse were wrong. Everyone else seemed to be fine with it, maybe I should be too. 

This was an example how a many moments went down for me in Streamwood Illinois. Something would begging to unfold before me, a signal would go off in my head informing me something wasn’t right, my young mind would work to figure out, only to grow confused because the people around me were fine it. 

Jokes are a good example of this. A group of people would be in a circle and one would say, “So, a racial slur, a stereotype and a marginalized individual are on an airplane…”  except that wasn’t the wording. Unfortunately, I heard racial slurs and derogatory statements often as a young boy. I didn’t know what the words meant, but they sounded harsh like a slap to the ear.  When the punchline came and everyone laughed. I’d laugh too. Not because it was funny. I just didn’t want to be the outsider.

The first and only time I expressed confusion over what was being said I got the harsh rebuke of, “What are you fucking stupid?” I didn’t understand why not knowing something resulted in being “fucking stupid,” but I did know I don’t want to be an outsider in Streamwood. I’d seen how outsiders were treated. They were called faggots, and bullied.I didn’t know what that word meant either, but I knew it wasn’t good. It sounded like knuckles hitting flesh.

Amy was a girl who I had a crush on. She wore velour shorts, halter tops and had long straight brown hair and  big eyes like a Margaret Keane painting. She sent another signal to my brain. One that caused my Fruit of the Loom whitie-tighties to protrude. An occurrence I fully couldn’t comprehend but knew it was a feeling that had a pull stronger than gravity.

Amy invited me to her home while her parents were at work. As she unlocked the front door I wondered if I was about to embark on my first makeout session. I grew nervous, that is until we stepped into her living room which had the qualities of a VFW Hall after closing on a Saturday night. Empty beer bottles and overflowing ashtrays were scattered about the room as were pizza boxes. The odor went above and beyond. 

“Don’t mind that smell,” she said casually, “Daddy hasn’t paid the garbage bill, so he’s been putting the bags in the attic.”

The signal was sent to my head. Garbage in the attic doesn’t seem like a good idea, but her Dad did made this choice. Dads don’t make bad decisions. They are wise like Mike Brady on “The Brady Bunch.” Plus, if you can’t pay the bill, what else are you going to do?  It’s like stashing toys under the bed because you want Mom to think you cleaned up. 

Amy and I didn’t find out what happens after the music begins to swell. I don’t even know what we ended up doing in the lingering smell of garbage. I do know that one day Amy and her family suddenly left town and no one knew why. 

Dale was another person who sent the signal to my head, but it wasn’t just one. He was about ten years-old and everyday wore the same clothes that appeared as if they never made it into the wash. More often than not he was smoking a Marlboro Red. “My Mom would rather know I’m smoking than me sneaking around behind her back, so I guess she’s cool with it,” He’d say as his fingers with filthy nails placed the cigarette to his lips. He sucked from on the cigarette long and hard as if he needed it for sustenance.

I attempted to understand the logic of his Mom letting him smoke. She wants to know what he’s up to. She’s accepting and isn’t punishing him for smoking. In fact, she’s actively watching over the situation by purchasing him cigarettes. It was like the other parents I knew who let boys have girls in their room with the door closed. Perhaps this approach to parenting was wiser than other Moms and Dads. By allowing their kids to do as they wished the parents could keep a closer watch on them.

The signal didn’t stop there. There was also that matter of Dale’s teeth. They appeared as if he had just eaten a bag of Oreos and the cookies stuck to every tooth. When he spoke his teeth were all I could focus on while I wondered: Doesn't his teeth hurt? He’s going to be toothless by the age of fifteen. What sort of job are you going to get with teeth like that? Surely nothing at a in food service.

What perplexed me the most is why no one else took alarm over Dale’s teeth. Didn’t his mother take him to the dentist? Didn't his teachers feel alarmed by his overall appearance? This is assuming Dale went to school. I’m not sure that he did.

There were many incidents where the signal fired off in my head. Somewhere I didn’t need to have an internal debate. I knew it was wrong. Like the time the son of the town dentist pulled out a pistol at a keg party. He waved it around and fired the gun into the air. Everyone thought this was cool. I hightailed it out of there. There was also the time a complete stranger and his girlfriend invited my friend Brian and I into his home. He let us drink his beers, and smoke his pot as he played us Frampton Comes Alive! I got so wasted I could barely  move.  Later as the weed cleared from my head I realized that this guy could have been like John Wayne Gacy. The next time he invited me in for beers and records I kept walking and pretended I didn’t hear him.

As I hit my teens it became more and more apparent to me that I didn’t fit  in with my surroundings. I began to hide in my room taking refuge in my books, records TV and the radio. I’d sit in front of my compact stereo system looking for clues in lyrics or flipping through the radio dial getting glimpses of worlds outside my town. Jazz, Country, Ranchero and Classical music stations made me realize that there was more out there than Aerosmith, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Led Zeppelin and The Doors. I was particularly fond of the warmth I found in a radio show called, “Blues Before Sunrise,” which was on WBEZ the public radio station. The popping and scratches of mono records signaled to me of other worlds, with low lighting, and warm autumn colored bricked buildings awaited me. 

I began reading the Chicago Tribune regularly. Articles about underground theater, political groups, concerts and festivals signaled of life outside suburbia. Worlds that made my heart and mind pulse with anticipation of what may await me. Mike Royko’s column showed me it was okay to be angry and dissatisfied with the world around you. In fact, you could use your anger  to be funny and pointed. I hassled my mom to get me a typewriter and folding card table to use as a desk. I couldn’t write in the Billy Goat Tavern like Royko did so a card table seemed like the proper substitute for thirteen year-old me. 

One Sunday as I sat on the living room couch in a blanket of the Sunday Tribune I read an article about the Second City theater in the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago.  John Belushi, Bill Murray, John Candy and many other of the comedic voices I had looked started there. I had never heard the word improvisation before but realized it was what I had been doing my entire life. In the lunch room for laughs or to get out of tough situations with my brother or bullies. When I learned it was an artform and something you could make a living from a light went off in my head.  

Without ever stepping foot into the place, without ever even being near the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago I knew this is where I belonged. It was a feeling unlike anything I had ever had before. It grew from my gut and pulled at me as if I should get up and walk to Chicago in that very moment. The signal that had for so many years informed me that life wasn’t as it should be was now telling me -  I needed to be in Chicago. Chicago is where I could find freedom. Chicago is where my true self awaited me. 

I was having a really bad day. I felt lonely, my heart ached. I was having anxiety. Overall, the world seemed to pulsate with the meaninglessness of it all. One could say I was having an existential crisis. Standing mid-hill on a walk home, breathing heavily, I thought, I wish Life could take the form of a man, so one afternoon I could bump into him in a dark empty tavern. He’d be sitting at one end of the bar, toiling through whatever thoughts Life would toil through. I’d give him a nod and say, “Barkeep, send that man a whiskey.” He’d thank me and we’d share some inane conversation about baseball, the weather, and how there is no good TV news anymore. Life would even make the joke about how there are so many Starbucks opening up that a Starbucks opened inside of a Starbucks. Though I wouldn’t find it funny, I’d smile. Then out of nowhere I’d say, “I know who you are.” Life would play coy, shrug, and try to make it not a big deal. I’d say, “Guess what? I’m going to take you out back and kick your ass.” I’d mean it too. I’d take Life right out back and beat the living shit out of the mother fucker so badly his front teeth would hit the pavement like the sound of dice, and every punch would be delivered with a verbalized reason: “This is for heartbreak” (Punch). “This for that cancer scare you gave me this year” (Punch). “This is for the girl who made 1998 hell” (Punch-punch).

“This is for utility bills. My lack of being able to connect with my family, being born poor, not being able to pay my rent, born-again Christians and the various other assholes who harass me on the corner. This is for the threat of nuclear devastation, starvation, hatred, racism, AIDS, the Chicago Cubs sucking for my entire life, wet shoelaces, the death of John Lennon, my father’s breath, homelessness, the girls who I can’t get to love me and the girls who do love me, fear, high school, my inability to truly understand The Brothers Karamazov, the day I have to hear Martin Scorsese died, the lack of health care, the depletion of the ozone, the price of gas, my social awkwardness, cars breaking down on the 405, the general overall pain we feel, jobs, Republicans, Joan Rivers, spider bites, bad tacos, my sudden inability to digest cheese, and the goddamn daily struggle of it all!”

 Finally, when Life was beat and tired and lying on the pavement, I’d extend my hand and help him up. He’d struggle to get his footing, weave, and then stumble into me so he wouldn’t fall back down to the pavement. I’d grab him and hold him close to me, with my hand cradling the back of his greasy head. I’d whisper to him, “Hey, thanks for Miles Davis, Chicago in November, and that girl who smiled at me in the lobby of that theater. Thanks for The Marx Brothers, Guinness, Jameson, and those flowers I smell when I stumble home drunk. Thanks for girls with dainty tattoos. Thanks for Camus, even though I have never finished one of his books. Thanks for breakfast at outdoor cafes, the city of Dublin, and that guy at the subway stop in New York who plays that old metal bucket with a string and a broomstick attached to it. Thanks for the sound trains make and Cole Porter. Thanks for the paintings of Gris. The words of James Joyce and ee cummings. Thanks for road trips to Portland and Mad Magazine when I was eight. Thanks for the love I do have and my friends, no matter how fucked up they can be. Thanks, you old shit bag, thanks.” Then I’d throw my arm around Life, and we’d shuffle back into the bar where we’d proceed to get drunk and laugh like fools, for that’s what we both are – fools.

It didn’t matter when we went to sleep (or when we woke)

We sat in the kitchen 

smoking cigarettes flicking our ashes into saucers 

You doodled inside matchbooks and I struggled to define myself

Until the caffeine forfeited to tiredness.  

And we retired to our beds with thrift store sheets and flat pillows. 

Did we know how free we were back then?

I do now

That is why I sit here wishing I could make a pot of coffee at night.

I continued with my conversation with Gillian when I heard someone yelling, “Hey you stupid motherfucker, you almost hit me you fucking asshole.” I looked to my left and noticed the driver of the SUV flipping me off. I wanted to return the gesture, but I was thrown off by his familiar face. I knew he was famous and from a band I couldn’t think of, but was certain they sucked. A few years ago his mug and blonde highlights were omnipresent on MTV, billboards and his insipid music filled the airwaves.

“Are you still there, Dwyer,” Gillian asked. “Yeah,” I said, "It's just that guy from some shitty band is yelling at me but I can’t recall which shitty band he’s in,” to which Gillian responded, “The Goo Goo Dolls.” 

She was right. It was John Rzeznik of the Goo Goo Dolls, and at that moment all my feelings about Rzeznik and the Goo Goo Doll were justified. 

This concludes my tale of a hostile and strange celebrity sighting.

“Look what I found,” he said with joy as he waved the canvas bank bag used to deliver large sums of money.” I sat up from my bland dinner in anticipation. “I was walking down a side street in Chicago when I saw this bag,” Dad reached into the bag, “At first I thought I found money, but instead it was this.” He pulled out a tiny angular .22 caliber pistol with a clip for bullets. It was the color of dirty gold but other than that it resembled a tinier version of the pistol James Bond used. It was the perfect size for my hand. 

“Can I hold it,” I asked. Dad handed me the gun as he informed me it wasn't loaded. The steel was cold and it felt heavier than it looked. I had seen enough movies where a man commits a crime and quickly tosses a gun aside as he quickly walks away. “Don’t you think maybe you should call the police,” I asked. The smile left Dad’s face as he took the gun from me. “The cops have bigger things to think about. Besides, they'd probably keep it for themselves.” 

Dad stashed the .22 in his sock drawer next to his .38 revolver. My brothers and I were instructed to never touch the guns unless an intruder had broken into our low crime suburb of Chicago. None of us listened. When my parents left I’d take the rifles from the gun rack that hung over the couch and pretend I was John Wayne in True Grit.  I’d sit at the foot of my parent’s bed with the heavy .38 thinking about the things the pistol could do like blowing a hole in a wall, and the fear they could bring.

While showing my friend Chris my Dad’s pistols I pointed the .22 at him and said with Humphrey Bogart seriousness, “Sorry Chris, but you’re no use to me anymore.” I pulled the trigger and as the hammer clicked the clip fell from the gun. It was full of bullets. 

I often think of what my life would have been if that clip was securely in place.

My Dad took the pistols with us on vacations. As we drove from Illinois to Texas he’d keep the .38 under the driver's seat.  I guess the busy highways of America were ripe for ambush or pirates hid behind the vending machines at the  KAOs. While on vacation we’d drive out to the desert and Dad would set up targets for us to shoot. I remember him being irritated that the .22 didn’t shoot straight. 

The only time he ever used one of the guns with the purpose it was intended was when a wounded animal found its way into our backyard. Dad put the poor creature out of its misery.  It was one of two times I saw my Dad weep. The other being when John Wayne died. 

Dad was very much a product of the 1950s. He drank too much, smoked cigarettes, got into bar fights and rode his Harley Davidson year round even in the harsh Chicago winters. He dressed like Maron Brando in the Wild One. In pictures from this era, he was Paul Newman cool with a charming smile, but his eyes tell his truth. 

There was a deep sadness in my father. When he was six his mother died. She doted on and loved my father. She was also his sole protector from his angry and violent father. After she passed his Dad would like him in a motel while he went to work.  His only visits were from a woman he’d never met before. She’d bring him sandwiches and comic books. Later my Dad would learn that she was his father’s mistress. 

The only ambition my Dad had in life was to be a photographer. When his Dad offered to get him a job at the Chicago Tribune as a staff photographer, my dad turned it down. Dad was intent on making it in life on his own. What followed was a career of being laid off from seasonal construction jobs, frustration and struggling to make ends meet. 

I often have wondered if he regretted not taking the staff job at the Tribune and who my Dad could have been if his camera would have been the tool for him to express his pain. Instead, his children became the avenue in which he expressed his ill emotion. When Dad would yell it would hit the center of my being like a sonic boom of rage. A white flash of fear would blind me, releasing the urine from my bladder that rushed to the edges of my penis. Often my muscles would react in time so I wouldn’t wet myself, but not always. There were times when a splotch of urine would stain my white Fruit of the Looms. Being in his path at the wrong time could mean a slap that sent me off benches to land on a cool linoleum floor, face stinging, hip throbbing wondering how you did to end up there. 

My favorite outburst of Dad’s was at the kitchen table. One of my brothers said something that set dad off. He stood up from his chair and yelled, “Goddamnitt, you motherfuckers can’t just be fucking quiet and let me enjoy a meal in peace.” He crumpled up his plate of frozen waffles like pieces of paper and threw them at us. I wonder if he was pissed off because he worked his ass off in the summer heat laying hot asphalt and with all this labor and hard work all he had were frozen waffles. 

Dad did his best to make me into a man like he was. He’d encourage me to not cry, make me do pushups if I hurt my hand to “toughen me up.” He’d impart wisdom on me with saying things like,“nice guys finish last.” Even as a kid I found this incredibly ignorant. My Dad wasn’t nice and eating frozen waffles for dinner wasn’t exactly winning.

On a September night in 1982 my Dad sat at the foot of his bed discussing a camping trip we were going to take the following weekend. I was in the next room drifting off to sleep under a collage of Kiss and Led Zeppelin posters when I was woken up by a loud POP followed by the anguished pleading of my Mom. I got out of bed and ran to stop whatever was upsetting my mother. I don't remember what I saw. I do recall the loud rasping that came from his chest. 

The .22 misfired and the bullet struck my father in the head. 

I didn’t realize until I was into writing this piece how many similarities my father and I share: we both traumatized from angry violent fathers, lost a parent at a crucial age, and have both struggled most of our lives due to these situations. The great difference between my Dad and I is,  I pursued art when he abandoned it. This has allowed me to not lash out at those I love. 

Not to that it was that simple. I still have moments where I am overwhelmed by life. Yelling, intense emotion, and pressure situations can return the white flash of fear that sends me into survival mode. Gratefully I have found refuge in writing and the works of others. Coleman Hawkins, John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, Billie Holiday, Hoagy Carmichal, Hopper, Gris, Picasso, Bukowski, ee cummings, Dylan Thomas, Nelson Algren and Mike Royko. They can help me find the beauty in life by holding on to the abstract swirling blues of art, as opposed to being consumed by my past. 

I am married. My partner has her own story. She’s also an artist. It’s hard not to think we came together to help one another heal. We work hard not to pass our trauma onto our joyous, smiling daughters whose lungs are pink, and whose hearts burst with joy. They dream as wide as Minnesota skies filling in the blank clouds with whatever they imagine. Their dreams have become my dreams, their heart is my heart and my heart is full. 

My heart is so very full.

It didn’t take long for Chris to prove that he belonged there and soon he was everyone’s favorite actor onstage and off. He never assumed because he was on actor at the Second City that he was better than anyone. He was always friendly and genuinely cared about how everyone was doing. However, if he approached me I would become nervous and struggle for things to say. I was a young man figuring out my voice as a comedian and to me there was no one funnier than Chris. 

I’d take long breaks from washing dishes to watch him perform or come to the shows and improv sets on my nights off. It felt special to see him perform like catching Miles Davis in a small club before his genius was recognized. I particularly loved watching Chris play with fellow castmate Joe Liss. Together they were the ideal comedy team. Joe was short, thin and subtle which was the perfect balance to Chris’s overall largeness. They’d fall into Laurel and Hardy scenarios or improvise entire episodes of “The Honeymooners,” where Ralph’s quick money scheme was dealing black tar heroin or harvesting organs for the black market. 

On a hot summer Monday afternoon I was hanging out on the front steps of Second City when Chris came walking towards me. I grew nervous as I always did around him.  “Hey Dwyer,” he said in an antsy whisper, “Do you have any unicorns?” 

Unicorns were a type of blotter acid floating around Chicago that summer  with purple and pink unicorns printed on each tab. I usually had four wrapped in the cellophane from a cigarette carton stashed in my wallet and a few more at home. I was twenty and in the throes of a mind expansion complete with performing exercises I had read in Carlos Castaneda books. Everyone around Second City knew that I had acid. Not wanting to be thought of as a dealer, I never charged people. My hippyish logic found it morally wrong to take money from someone who wanted to expand their mind. Not a sound philosophy for a guy who was sustaining himself on Arby’s and fried rice. However I believed karma would return the favor and it usually did in the form of free beer.

I gave Chris two  tabs which he plopped on his tongue and said, “Thanks Dwyer. See you soon,” and then he walked off into the Chicago summer day.  

A week later Chris called me, “Hey, do you think I could get some more unicorns,” he whispered as if the Feds were listening in on my small time non-for-profit LSD enterprise. I walked the five blocks to Chris’s apartment which was above the Las Pinatas Mexican restaurant on Wells Street. There wasn’t a buzzer so I yelled for Chirs and his head immediately popped out of the window as if doing a cameo on “Laugh-In.” 

“Come on up, Dwyer,” he hollered as tossed his keys down which bounced off my hand and landed on the sidewalk. As I opened the door I saw an excessively steep staircase and I wondered, how in the fuck does Chris negotiate these stairs when he’s drunk?

I climbed the stairs to Chris’s door and lightly knocked. He opened the door revealing his apartment that looked as if he had just thrown fifteen simultaneous frat parties. Chris noticed my eyes scanning the colossal mess and said, “The maid has the week off.” 

I laughed as  Chris ushered me in and cleared a spot for me on a chair.  “Get ya a brewski,” he asked in a performative manner, “I got a Mexican one and an American one. Which side of the border do you want?” I asked for the Mexican beer and Chris ran off to his tiny kitchen. As waited I attempted to label the mingling of odors that filled the air; cheese and grease from the Mexican restaurant, extinguished cigarettes, stale beer, decaying food and an indistinguishable odor that was a medley of dirty laundry, a bar urinal and mildew. None of this mattered because I was stoked to be hanging out with Chris. 

Chris returned as he struggled to carry my bottle of beer, a 711 Big Gulp tumbler, packed it with ice, a bottle of vodka and Minute Maid lemonade. I took the beer from Chris, as he sat down and proceeded to fill the tumbler with ninety percent vodka and a splash of lemonade.  “That oughta do it,” he said and then he clinked his tumbler to my bottle.  I took out the three tabs of unicorns and handed them to Chris which he plopped on his tongue and then an awkward silence fell between us.

“Dwyer,” Chris said, searching for something to say, “You Irish?” 

“Yeah,” I said, taking from my beer. “It was originally O’Dwyer, but the O got dropped somewhere along the way.”

“We Irish need to stick together, ya know?”

“My dad used to say that.” I said to keep the conversation going.

“That's because your Dad’s a good Irishman,” Chris paused, “You said, ‘used to,’ is your Dad no longer with us?” 

“He died when I was a kid. 

“I’m sorry to hear that. How’s your mom - you still got your mom?”

“She’s fine. She remarried a few years ago.” 

“Do you like the guy?” He said as he took an abnormally large sip of his drink.

“No really. He lies about weird things like, No one knows who the Beatles are in Africa,” I said, putting on a thick Chicago accent. 

Chris laughed, “Really?” 

“Yeah,” Feeling encouraged by Chris’s laugh, “and if you press him on it he darts eyes around and says, “Yeah, I read it in Omni.” 

Chris cracked up and repeated, “Read it in Omni, that’s great.”

Chris pulled a bowl out of his pocket, packed it with marijuana, lit it and inhaled it as if he was about to dive deeply underwater. He passed me the bowl I didn’t want to smoke pot because I had to go work in the Second City box office to work off my scholarship for improv classes. However, not wanting to seem square in front of Chris so I took a small hit which hit my lungs like pine tar.

“Your dad was Catholic, right?” Chris asked as he released a factory sized plume of smoke from his lungs. 

“We were, but we didn't go to Church much.  I was the fifth kid and my folks were over church by the time I came around.”

“He was  baptized, though, right?” Chris asked with urgency.

“Yeah.” 

“So, then you know he’s in heaven. That’s good.” Seeming relieved. Chris paused and then looked me in the eyes, “Do you believe in God, Matt?” 

“Not really,” I said. Chris’s face grew distraught. “Matt, you’re Irish. You have to believe in God.” He milled it over for a moment, “I mean, you’re Catholic, right? You were baptized?

“Yeah,” I said, panicking as if I just blew my budding friendship with Chris.

“You have to believe in God,” he continued, “How can you not? Don’t you fear going to hell?”

My stoned brain had a moment of clarity and I realized that the LSD, pot and vodka may have begun the festivities in Chris’s consciousness. Not wanting Chris to kick off his trip on bad footing I began to back peddle. 

“I believe in God. I just have my doubts sometimes, but I do believe.” 

Chris’s face relaxed. “We all have our doubts Matt, but it’s important you believe.” He took another large gulp of his drink, “You have to believe, Matt. You’re Irish.” 

Sensing the need to keep away from heavier subjects I pointed to a Blues Brothers poster on Chris’s wall,  “I used to have that exact poster,” I said as Chris jerked his head to look at the poster. “Oh yeah, I love Belushi.”

“Belushi is what led me to Second City.” I said. 

“Me too, Matt, He was the greatest.” 

“When I was in High School I spent hours in front of the mirror training my eyebrows to raise like Belushi’s did so I could be funnier.” 

“I did that too,” Chris laughed as he got up and walked over to the poster. He stood in front of it gazing at it as if the picture held the intricacies of a Dali painting. “I really want to be like him.” Chris continued with his eyes locked on the poster. “Sometimes when I get high enough Belushi comes off of the poster and talks to me,” Chris chuckled, “Do you think that’s crazy?”

“Not at all. I used to have conversations with him too.” 

“Do you think Belushi is in hell, Matt?” Chris said quietly.

“I don't know Chris.” I replied fearing we were returning to dangerous territory. “He brought a lot of joy into the world. I can’t see God not smiling upon him for that.” 

“I think you’re right, Matt. That’s all I want to do. I want to make people laugh so God laughs.” Chris paused for a moment as the distraught look returned to his face. “I’m a sinner, Matt. Sometimes I don’t know if I’m going to go to heaven.”

“You were baptized, right Chris,”

“I was Matt.” Chris said as some of the strain left his face.

“And you pray and ask forgiveness?”

“I go to mass every Sunday,” Chris said as if was telling God not me. 

“Then I think you’re going to be alright Chris.” 

Once I sensed Chris was on better track for an acid trip I excused myself so I could go to the box office where I repeatedly gave out the wrong change because I was stoned.

From that point on when I saw Chris he always greeted me with a boisterous “Dwyer!” Often he’d ask, “Hey Dwyer, how’s your step-dad,” encouraging me to do my impression of him. Chris would always laugh and repeat, “I read it in Omni, I love that.”

When I began bartending at the bar down the street from Chris’s place he’d visit me on slow Wednesday nights. I’d give him free pints of beer or whatever else he was drinking and we’d talk for hours. Inevitably the conversation would turn to God, hell, sin as Chris worried if he’d go to hell.  

I never told Chris what I really thought. That heaven didn’t exist and if the god in the bible is real he was a spiteful needy motherfucker and I wanted nothing to do with him. I simply did my best to reassure Chris that he was a good hearted man with the best intentions. 

One night Chris and I were at a bar and pretty drunk. Chris was trying to make some pretty women laugh by doing bits for them like dropping to the floor and doing pushups. I attempted to join in more so for Chris’s enjoyment than the highly uninterested women. Due to the drunkenness I don’t recall what I did exactly, but do remember I ended up with me tearing my shirt off of my body like I was a scrawny pale version of the Incredible Hulk. Rightfully the women walked away as Chris howled with laughter and bellowed, “That’s my boy,” as I stood in the bar shirtless.

“Alright,” I said, realizing that I wouldn’t be allowed to stay in the bar without a shirt, “I guess I have to go home now.” 

“No you don’t,” Chris said as he took off his blue oxford and wrapped it around me leaving him in a stained v-neck tee-shirt. 

The next day I washed the shirt and I tried to return it to Chris. He insisted I keep it. Even though I swam in it like a kid playing Grownup. I constantly wore that shirt. It was trophy that I was friends with the funniest man to ever live. 

When I got the news that Chris had been hired for “Saturday Night Live,” I was obviously happy for him, but also saddened. I had seen others leave Second City for the big time and when they returned there was inevitably a shift in the relationship. Fame has a funny way of altering the reality on both sides of friendships. 

It was a tradition at Second City on last nighof an actort to fill the improv set with the their favorite sketches, improvisational games as guests joined in. The night would crescendo the parting actor getting a pie in the face followed by a speech. I couldn’t bring myself to go to Chris’s last night. I wasn’t good with goodbyes and this one was especially sad for me. 

The next time I saw Chris I was understudying Paul Dinello on the mainstage. Chris was in town and dropped in to do the improv set. Fame didn’t alter him at all. He was exactly the same, only his clothes were slightly nicer. He was fresh out of rehab, healthy and happy. I don’t remember anything Chris and I did in the set together, but I did make him laugh a few times which made me feel as if I had just won an Oscar. It was surreal to be sharing a stage with my hero. I took it as a sign that maybe I too was on my way to bigger and better things. 

I’d see him one more time a couple years later in December of 1997. It was at the Second City’s Christmas party. I was crossing the lobby when I heard him bellow, “Dwyer! Get your ass over here.” I turned and Chris was smiling like a Poppa who had returned from a long trip. I ran over and he gave me a bear hug, “How the hell are ya,” he asked. I proudly told him that I was on a resident stage at the Second City and invited him to join us for an improv set while he was in town. He told me he’d try but was going to see his parents soon for Christmas.  We talked briefly and as he always did, he asked me how my mother was doing. 

When I got the news of Chris’s death I was at my girlfriend’s apartment. Second City producer Kelly Leonard called and informed me that there would be a lot of press in front of the theater and I shouldn’t speak to anyone. I was stunned yet not fully surprised. I just hoped it was anything but drugs.

At the end of the show that night I was chosen by my cast to say a few words. Due to my emotional state I don’t remember what I said. The main point I wanted to make was that a lot of things would be said about Chris in the coming days, but it’s not how Chris should be remembered. What should be remembered is that he was a  kind generous man who loved everyone around him and gave every bit of himself to make others laugh.

I will end this piece with a story that sums up the integrity, honesty and care Chris had for the people and the work that he did. When Chris was twenty-four and newly placed on the mainstage by legendary improv guru Del Close, Del wanted to hold secret rehearsals with only the male cast members. Del, like the asshole that he was, believed women weren’t funny. Chris, who owed everything to Del risked losing his job and being ostracized by the male actors, protested. Chris remained true to the philosophy of ensemble improvisation and more importantly did the morally correct thing. If God is real I’m sure they smiled upon this.