Out-of-towners
I had my cousin and his friend in town from California this past week. His perspective on the Midwest was typical: Cheese-eating, mullet-wearing, hand-job gving, blow-job receiving, beer drinking, yellow-teeth sporting, happy-cow having rednecks with blue collars and a farmer's wit. He may be correct on a lot of those things, but I was out to prove him wrong. I wanted him to know that we DO drink beer, that we DON'T like fat rolls and chocolate shakes, and that we CAN party like those pansies in Hollywood. I showed him what I could, may have drank myself stupid a couple times, but managed to succeed in my goals. On his first night, for example, was the night of all nights. I showed him what was up.
I took my visitors out in Chicago for a night. I knew that there was a lot of drinking to be done, so we started early. I was completely hammered drunk by 1am, and decided to stand outside and get some "fresh air" for the meantime. With drool down the side of my face and eyes burning, we finally met up. We stumbled to a place called the Weiner's Circle, which is known for it's outstanding char-driven food and extremely hostile service. People gather here for both reasons, and tonight was nothing different. A large crowd was waiting inside for their grease filled fat fixes while yelling obscenities and rude comments back and forth with the staff. All of a sudden, as I was waiting patiently in line, a man behind me screamed, "Hey! I want a chocolate shake!"
The black woman behind the counter replied, "That what you want, white boy? I got you."
She proceeded to lift her shirt up and dance around like a sumo wrestler in an earthquake. She was not thin AT ALL, and also had no bra on. Her fat rolls were flying everywhere like tires at Sam's Club and her boobs flopping up and down making a slapping sound with each contact of skin. I imagined it to be a dream, something that I wasn't really seeing and that I would wake up being relieved it wasn't real. The sight of saggy tits and a fast food busting gut wasn't my idea of a fond memory. To my unfortunate dismay, this was very real. It was so real that as it was happening, I couldn't stop staring. It was like seeing a three legged dog, a wheelchair with rims on it, a butt crack of a rather large man, a tampon string hanging out from a woman's swimsuit, a shoulder massage train consisting only of men, or a dildo hanging out of a grandmother's purse. I hated it, yet was uncontrollably drawn to it. It was so disgusting yet so fascinating. You know in the movies when people are in awe and their jaws are wide open? You know how you are thinking the whole time, "Dude, that jaw thing never happens." Let me tell you friend, when you see something as memorizing as a giant black woman shaking her fat tits and stomach rolls in the air screaming "you like that chocolate shake? huh?", it will happen to you. I don't like to admit it, but it's the damn truth.
As soon as we left, my cousin and his friend had a new perspective on the Midwest. What that perspective was exactly, I'm not sure. All I know is that whatever they thought before coming out here was different now. Not better or worse. Just different.
Fine with me.
F.I.B. You know what it means.
