By the Dumpster drinking

In the city, the sun sets over the buildings at 3:30 pm because of the hatred the high risers have toward the natural order of things. The heat from sewer drains and greasy vents pour into the alley where Bill and I sat, appreciating the nights heat with a couple of 40’s waiting to be snapped open. This is when Hollywood came alive for the two of us.
“Good night for a brew there youngster, ain’t it?” said Bill, snapping open the green hornet bottle and drawing back a deep glug. His chest rose to the occasion of deep satisfaction.
“Ah hell Bill, it’s always a good time for a brew,” I said, watching the bubbles percolate to the mouth of the bottle as I snapped mine open.
On nights like these, I liked to pretend that I was 20 years older with a wealth of experience behind me. But that was where my feelings of wishing I were someone else in the presence of the great man Bill ended. His audacity to continue living in the soulless city came from his tenaciously serene nature.
Being born in the late 50’s, Bill came out of the womb with ‘a bottle and a cigar to his lips,’ he always liked to say. His face carried a long white beard bespeckled with the acutrimon one collects from a nights slept on cardboard boxes in dingy alleyways and bus stops. A blood shot red face and nose colored his bulbous head. Razor thin white hair streamed along the top of his eyebrows, underneath a wax coated irish boonie hat. He wore a 35 year old Carhart jacket with stains too soaked in to ever be washed out. Blue jeans stretched themselves along his emaciated legs with combat boots he received from his last tour of service. They were so old that the treaded soles were as smooth as the bottoms of sandals. He shook from tremens that came whenever he didn’t get enough to drink. But he never thought once to go into rehab to combat his problem. “Why would I turn my back on the thing that has saved me from myself for the last 50 years. It’s the only thing that will keep me sane.”
Bills experience shone through not in his physical characteristics. He sat strong in the alley that he called home, peacefully watchful of the people walking by with a smirk tucked into the corner of his mouth and left eye. He never spoke ill of anyone and only described to me the great times that we lived in.
“Let me tell you youngster. The place and time that we live in is unparalleled to any other time I have lived in before. You see that over there?” he pointed with his left arm strong across the street to a lesbian couple holding hands laughing together amid the evenings bustling cars driving down overland avenue. “Thirty years ago they would have been persecuted by everyone that walked by. But look...everyone around them continues without contention or argument,” he said smiling with another glug from his bottle.
“I guess I will just have to take your word for it Bill. The only experience I have with life is running away from home from the tutelage of my parents.” “Well son, one day you’ll realize how great you really have it. But for now, just take another swig with me, and light up this joint.”
We both sat in the alley below Sunset Blvd., a quarter of the way drunk and smoothed out feelings washed over well. Bill let out a chuckle after I had drank my 2nd brew, and I vomited the access onto a pile of old newspapers staked next to the side of dumpster.
The alley was where Bill slept every night since he was 43 years old. He finagled an old mattress from a buddy that he’d done two tours with. Cardboard boxes disassembled, acted as bottom sheets to keep Bill from getting sick from the mold growing on the box spring. He kept a small gas lantern to the left, to stay up reading. Mostly Whitman, Thoreau, Hemingway, Steinbeck, Burgess and Hamsen. He was well versed in a breadth of literature and would often implore me to read. But I was too caught up in the fizzy liftings that provided me with great enthusiasm to live on the streets.
Most days and nights I spent my time with Bill in contentment that I was gaining drinkable wisdom from a homeless alcoholic. I never had any money, but Bill cashed in a 2,000 dollar check from the VA once a month, and we both drank hearty. Our meals usually consisted of begged for leftovers that I would attain from the yuppies walking out of upscale restaurants. He never wanted to spend any money he’d earned fighting in wars he didn’t want to be in in the first place. Only on things that he knew he couldn’t get otherwise.
During his service overseas, Bill procured himself many position which ended him in a career to one day become a general. That was until his alcoholism took over. In the span of a month, he drank away his career, his family, and his home. The two kids he’d raised until they were in their teens still wouldn’t speak to him. Shattered and alone, Bill went back to the only thing that he knew how to do; be a soldier. But the military couldn’t risk him being back in the service. They also couldn’t risk him describing certain events to the general public. So they bought him off with monthly checks, just to shut him up. His commanding officers granted him honorable discharge, and he never bothered them again.
“I’ll tell yah boy, some of the buddies I have down at the VA talk about the good old days of suburban housing that had kids content in sitting on street corners, and playing pick-up games of baseball and building forts. Listening to their parents and staying out of trouble so they could attend church on sundays with a clean soul. ‘Those were the days,’ they’d say as though these days that we have now mean nothing.” Bill took a hard swig of the 40 in his right hand. His eyes shut to let his balls roll to the back. “But the way I see it youngster, comes from the life that I am in now. There is a lot of peace spread around this world, but people care too much about where they could be, rather than where they are. In the moment. Contentment can come from sharing with laughter. Thats the stuff that lets people know there is a cadence that loves them...” I could never really hear him during these rants. It was a struggle to keep comfortable in the alley, on top of cardboard, with the hard concrete pressing into my back as Bill continued on with his rants. At the ends of these talks, he’d stretch his back against the dingy alley wall, right ankle brought over to the left in cross legged position and chant a deep ‘OM’ for about twenty minutes.
This was how I’d spend most days with Bill. People walked by that alley mostly oblivious to what we were doing. On occasion, a little kid would poke it’s head in to give Bill and I a glance of disgust. I’d always laugh, but I could tell it got to Bill. He had a real weakness when it came to little kids. He told me about his daughter and how much he missed her. It had been decades since the last time that he saw her, that he even questioned whether she changed her name. “She’d be about 30 now,” saying while a tear trickled down his right cheek, temporarily cleaning the dinge off his face.
On Sunday mornings, I’d get to the alley early if I wasn’t too hung over from the night before, to go to church with Bill. He liked going to church on Olympic and Hauser, in the Miracle mile. They always had good coffee there and while Bill mixed his whiskey into the drip, we’d listen to the minister preaching the gospel. Bill explained his reason for being there every sunday: “You see this youngster, this is integration at it’s finest. We are sitting in an area that is mostly Jewish. But here sits a Christian church. Say what you will about organized religion. I happen to disagree with the majority of it, but here are two world views giving a howdy-do.”
Whether he was talking out of his ass or not, Bill sat there with not even a blinking eye to anyone of the ministers speeches those mornings. Thats just how Bill was. He had an uncanny respect for what people had to say. Whether it was disrespectful or not, he listened. Something a lot of my other street crowd couldn’t exude to save there own face. Or me for that matter.
Sitting on the drainage grime of society with booze and drugs teaming through our bodies, begging for change from the same people we hated so much. The differences between us and them were not very large. The conquests were the same. They may have been sitting in the building of high finance with their high balls, laughing at the joes slaving away just get by. We sat on the streets, covered in grit and grime, laughing at them for being part of a higher echelon rat race. But we all sat in comparison to one another, one and all unhappy with our situations, forever needing to get to the next plateau or the next squat. The next financial endeavor, or the next city or town to beg from that we hadn’t burned yet by being there too long.
I sat with Bill to break from the norms I was sucked in by. He separated himself from the confused many, and sat with what he had always wanted. Even though he was a flagrant alcoholic, he sat with the quiet composure of a monk.

Coming to on the morning of September the 4th with a hangover that would turn a grizzly bear into a weak cub, I turned off the digital watch I’d had since I was twelve, beeping me awake. It was Bills birthday and I had made a promise to visit him. My friends were strewn out all about the underpass off of Cauhenga, some with vomit laden on their chests, others curled up into the fetal position form the nights chill that was still melting off. I got up to wipe the pre-goo from my eyes and the sides of my mouth, reached into my left sock and pulled out the twenty I’d saved for Bills bottle of Jack. The bills were crumpled almost to the point of a fine powder, but would suffice at the liquor store. I took a toot of meth from a little bindle Roach had kicked me down from last night.
Hopping over the fence and onto the sidewalk, I walked down the street, my pants barely held on by a moldy belt and walked into the liquor store. I knew the clerk never asked me for my ID. It might have been from fear that if he didn’t, my friends and I would smash his stores supply to pieces and then run off. Which was true.
“Eighteen-fifty,” said the clerk. I had been there a lot, but I was too high and hungover to remember his name.
“Here yah go, man.” My lines of sarcasm never phased him. As long as he got the buck he was owed, it never mattered who he sold to. He scratched his beard as I walked out the door, feeling his eyes burning holes into my back. He would definitely call the cops, I was convinced. Taking speed first thing in the morning probably wasn’t a good idea.
My feet slapped against the concrete blacktop on Overland Ave in the nine to five morning for everyone off to work. Line after line cars, packed in between red lights and the foul stench of Starbucks coffee mixed with dunkin donuts teamed through the air. Brakes screeching to a stop short, and white collars with sweat dripping down temples with an un-differentiated thought between them all: ‘I’m going to be late.’ My stained jeans too long for my body and too wide for my emaciated heroin legs dragged under grime ridden shoes. The bottle was snug next to my leather jacket, inside my faded Jansport some Christian missionaries had given me, and all I could think of was the home in the alley; Bill and I fully inebriated and content in sitting together of unabashed souls who were just interested in simpler things. Getting drunk and staying out of the lime light completely. Watching the day to dayers walk by without noticing our stares and observations.
The morning hadn’t even reached 10:00 a.m. and the sun had risen the sweat from near by storm drains, and out of my two month unbathed skin. The burnt calluses on my fingertips dripped in rain drop meditative sweat, and I think about the heroin I’ll need by the end of the day. Getting sick was not on my agenda. But that could wait will until after I got nice and drunk with Bill.
When I got to the alley, the walls were emanating a stench from the calcium deposits stained onto the left inner wall by the adjacent restaurants grease fans. I could see some movement from the left side of the dumpster. It was Bills rising and falling belly. There were liquor bottles scattered around the floor from last nights drunk.
Bill suddenly rose from his mattress with a loud scream. “AHHHHHH!, he belted, underneath a scraggy morning voice. “Youngster? Is that you?”
“Happy Birthday you old fart!” I said pulling the bottle of Jack out of my pack and setting it onto a small nightstand made of cinderblocks and ply wood.
“Fuck youngin’! I though it was those young gangsters that came around here last night to hassle me.” He walked over, and grabbed the bottle, snapping it open in the hot summers air.
“I see yah brought some liquor,” he said, taking a deep swig. “Much obliged.” I could tell that he really needed it. His forearms were already shaking from tremens.
Bill seemed weaker than normal. He stood up without the same confidence he normally did, slumped down in his chair swigging the Jack quickly to his lips, and taking huge slugs.
“Thanks youngster. I really needed this one.”
We spent the entire morning drinking that bottle and smoking refer in Top rolling tobacco that Bill had stashed. After awhile, Bill got some of his exuberation for life back. He slumped up and toward the mid day sun with a quiet smile. His white and blond beard glistening in the suns radiance. He turned toward me and said “Son... If there’s ever a minute in the day that you can pause from the drunkness of you own life... what I mean is... try to treat each moment you have with a quiet respect...” His long pauses were only the result of physical tremens. We both sat back, like on a raft along a wide river, smoking grass out of corn cobs, and taking in all the smells.

The days heat and a belly tanked full with booze and pot, swung me into passing out. I woke up, worried that I might be getting sick soon from the lack of junk in my system, but I was fine. The unbalanced noise of cars driving to the clubs, people quickly hurrying to get somewhere, anywhere quick, while the thick evening smog settled on obtrusive neon lighting, blocking the stars who so desperately wanted to be seen. Bill sat next to me, looking out the alley with content amusement, with one arm akimbo on his right knee. Normally he hid back in the alley without even the slightest evening stare, but tonight was different. Tonight, Bill stuck his head out like a man-eating cat fish looking only to googgle at anyone and everyone. Angry scowls ladened on passers by faces, but occasionally someone would smile and hurriedly walk on. But four eyes kept locked on us like desperate men looking for something named fight.
“You got something to say old man!” a young gangster said. A switchblade hung out of his baggy jean jacket and a tight upper lip sat stoically underneath a dirt mustache.
“Me?... Yes I do. Good evening to you gentlemen. I hope that you enjoy yourselves this evening.” Bill was so drunk he could barley stand, let alone make any kind of decent conversation.
“Listen old man, don’t bother us just because you’re some old useless drunk.”
“But all I was saying was...”
“Shut up! You got any scratch old man!” his switchblade glistened in the halogen lights glare, twisting and turning, waiting to be used.
“Hey why don’t you get the fuck outta here punto!” I said with the arrogance I’d need to kick the shit out of him and his three buddies.
“This isn’t your business fuck head. Get back to your drinking unless you feel like dying tonight,” The head gangster said, turning his back to Bill. Might have been the last thing he’d ever do.
Bill stood up like the massive adonis he had convinced himself he was after all the days booze. He had the Gangster down on the ground slamming his face in with a brick grabbed from behind the dumpster. I jumped at the other three with a piece of metal piping, and it ricocheted two of them in the head. It knocked them all out, but as I was bashing their heads in, the third guy grabbed me and slammed his fist into my jaw. Bill had already knocked out the gangster, and stood up to fly his right knee cap into the guys back who was on top of me. The knocked out gangsters lay flat across the alley floor, but the one remaining got up to run. He yelled out “I am a veteran of two foreign wars, you’d better run before I...” He grabbed his chest and gurgled “Shit youngster... I think I’m having a heart attack. Get me another drink!”
I ran over to his bed side and pulled out a bottle of dry gin he always had in case of an emergency. ‘As long as I have my booze, I can get through anything.’ I turned around after grabbing the bottle of gin, snapping it open as I spun. Bill was lying on the floor, sweat proliferating from his skin, his body sunk into the cold concrete. He wasn’t moving and his eyes skalked open staring at the alley light looming it’s aura as the last twinkle in his eye. He was dead.
I couldn’t move. All I could see were people walking by his dead body. I put the bottle to my lips, and did not stop sucking until I felt the last vapors of alcohol dried out my tongue. I no movement. No crying. This was just a body now, no need for any emotion.
Reaching into Bills pockets and gear I found an assortment of different bills, equaling 900 dollars. I knew to take it, otherwise it would go to the paramedics that I would call. I’d need that money more than they. I had to think of Bill wanting me to have that money. I really couldn’t think of anything else.

The following morning I came to in my squat on Cahuenga blvd. My crew were nowhere to be found. I sat quietly with my hands tight around a bottle of southern comfort and though hard about my dead friend: Standing without judgement and anger. Teaching me more than my family ever could have. Giving me the only solution he knew. Bottle and Buzz.
I got onto the I-70 onramp, Bills rucksack snugged tight. I was done for awhile with this town. A town oblivious as nine to fivers. As homeless street drunks.
With my brain properly inebriated, and my thumb pointing North, I was ready for the ‘fuck LA, and goodbye’ slogan I had in my head, for fear that I might return back. Quitting dope cold turkey with a wild turkey, and hopes that I’d find serenity as I had only seen Bill have.