| Me and Big Joe by Michael Bloomfield page 5 |
| From forty years of hiking roads and riding rails he was wise to every highway and byway and road-bed in the country, and wise to every city and county and township that they led to. Joe was part of a rare and vanished breed�he was a wanderer and a hobo and a blues singer, and he was an awesome man.
It was nightfall when we got to St. Louis, and it was hot�lord, was it hot. The first place we stopped was the home of Joe�s sister, or sister-in-law, or step sister, or something. When we walked in, there were little kids sleeping on every available surface, so we all went into the kitchen and sat down. �Now you know I play the guitar,� Joe said to his relatives, �and this boy Michael do too, so we�ll play some while we visit.� He brought out his guitar, and with it a bottle of Schnapps. I took George aside and said, �Man, we better not let this guy start drinking. It�s a long weekend, and if he starts in now, his brains�ll fly right out the window�we�ll have a lunatic on our hands the whole time!� But Joe was set on drinking, and when he said. �Michael, why don�t you have a little taste?� I went ahead and put some down. I figured if Joe was going to get drunk and crazy, I was going to get drunk and be crazy right along with him. So I drank as much gin and Schnapps and beer and wine as I could get in me that night, and I sat with Joe and played the blues. And man, I got sick. For the first time in my life I got king-hill, shit-faced, tore-up drunk. I puked in the hall, I puked on the sofa and puked on the wail. I was just rolling in puke�I was sick. sick, sick. I woke up on a bed the next morning to find Joe standing over me. He had stayed up all night drinking and he was more that just drunk�he was on a bender. His nostrils were flared and his eyes were red and runny. A barbeque-fork was in his hand and on it was a pig nose, and hot grease from the nose was dripping on my chest. He opened his mouth and his Schnapps breath hit me in a wave. �Snoots, snoots!� he shouted, �I promised you barbeque, an� fine snoots is what we got!� Continued on page 6 |
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