ONE MAN ARMY - Part One: Garage For Sale

“Don’t ever grow up Aaron. Your heart can’t take it.”

Growing up I had a neighbor named Jackie and he was crazier than a sack of kittens. I loved him. He was loyal and generous and funny and creative. He was whip-smart. I recognized in him a constant frustration with the world because things didn’t add up right. For a long time, I worried I would end up like him.

Jackie was the fourth youngest of fourteen children. On their driveway, all fourteen kids wrote their name in the cement. I often stared at the list. Jackie’s name was the biggest with long jagged lines. The letters were funny to me, but I didn’t know why.

He looked like John Lennon. He had long light brown hair and he wore the infamous round-rimmed glasses. He carried around an acoustic guitar. The standard outfit he wore was cut-off jean shorts with a white t-shirt and a black leather vest. He was usually barefoot.

He lived with his mother. He was the only one who stayed. It was his job to take care of her. His mother was confined to a wheelchair. She suffered from severe arthritis. Each finger was a dead man’s curve, twisted licorice that caused her great pain. Her legs were two straws connected by an orange for a knee joint. She was frail and gaunt and half deaf. She smoked Pall Malls fiendishly and requited oxygen.

Jackie’s mom, Mrs. Quinn, used to send me to the corner store for cigarettes. I was seven. She would write a note. I saw the pain on her face. I would watch as her hand shook. It was difficult for her to even hold the pen. Her knuckles were swollen and her fingers bent the wrong way. But I got to keep the change.

The man at the corner store was almost totally blind. He used a magnifying glass to read dollar bills. But he knew me and Mrs. Quinn. Later, when I was in fifth grade, I worked for him. Everyday, I worked two hours in the evening. I was paid fourteen dollars a week. I stocked the shelves and watched the older kids rob the place by filling their pockets.

Jackie and his mother constantly fought. She continually scolded Jackie like a twelve year old boy and not the thirty of forty something man that he was. Not that this anger was unfounded. Jackie was always doing something, and it swayed between utter nonsense to federal conspiracy. Once when Mrs. Quinn kicked Jackie out of the house, he moved into the old, slightly slanted garage. He draped a huge American flag on the wooden door. He sold pot from it to the neighborhood. And when he was low on cash, he put the garage up for sale.

A simple white piece of paper tacked to the door that said in bold black hand-written lettering: for sale.

I passed the driveway on my bike. Jackie waved me down.

“Hey Aaron, you want to buy a garage?”

“No thanks Jackie.”

“You sure, it’s a nice garage. It can be your bachelor pad.”

“Um, no, that’s okay. Why are you selling it anyway?”

“I’m tired of it. I want a new one.”