The Legend Of Tex And His Big Fucking Stick (Part One)
Two weeks after I graduated from high school I got my first tattoo. A tall, boney, alien-like figure in black ink holding a body-length stick that my friends would soon decide looked like something from a Tim Burton movie.
“Nah. That’s ‘Tex,’” I’d tell them.
“Tex. So it’s a man?”
“Nah. It’s not really a man or a woman. It’s just Tex.”
“Right. Well what IS Tex?“
“Tex is my buddy. Tex will fuck you up if you mess with me. That’s what the stick is for. The stick will fuck you up.”
The truth is, I didn’t know what Tex was nor had I known why its name was Tex. The truth is, I was eighteen and I wanted a tattoo.
He was the first of many and just as the tattoo artist who etched him on me said, “They’re addictive, man. This is the first. You’ll be back.”
I got it done at Shotsie’s, a landmark tattoo shop in Wayne, New Jersey on a sunny July Saturday. After it was finished I drove the two hours down the Garden State Parkway, the sweat beading beneath the Saran Wrap that protects a fresh tattoo and met my family at our town’s Fourth of July celebration in Tuckerton’s Tip Seaman Park.
My father was about to take the stage with his swing jazz band when I arrived. He played guitar in the twenty-member group and they all wore black with musical-note themed vests. I’d never felt cooler as I strolled though the park making sure the Saran Wrap was good and visible so that everyone could see that I was now among the etched. I knew then how cheesy it was but I really didn’t care.
The swing band was taking their position on the stage that sat at the edge of the lake and was just beneath where the fireworks would explode, lighting up the sky like the biggest fireflies you’d ever seen. I found my mother sitting near the end of the playground, about fifty yards from the stage in a very low folding chair, bullshitting with a coworker.
“Lemme see,” she said as she bit her fingernails in an exaggerated, almost cartoonish manner.
I rolled up the sleeve of my black t-shirt and peeled back the sticky wrap. The gauze that the wrap was holding in place over the new tattoo was dotted with dried, rust-colored blood. The tattoo itself looked almost fake. It was the darkest black and very greasy from the lotion the artist had spread over it when he’d finished. It shone in the moonlight. The only thing that gave away its authenticity was the feel. The lines were swollen and puffed up, raised from my skin. I urged my mother to feel my shoulder.
“Go ahead. Touch it. It’s weird.”
“Ohhh I don’t wanna hurt you,” she said.
“It can’t hurt worse that it did two hours ago.”
With that she ran her fingers over his skinny body, down his legs and over his big stick. She whispered something that I couldn’t hear over the band tuning up.
“What?” I said as I leaned in closer, bending myself so my ear was level with her mouth.
“I like it.” She paused. “I like it a lot.” She paused again, moving her head back a few inches as to get a more complete view. “Don’t tell daddy but I love it. He’s beautiful.”
“Isn’t he?” I said. “What do you think dad’s gonna say?”
“What can he say,” she asked. “It’s done.”
With that the band broke into their set. The trumpets blared, the trombones bellowed, the drums thundered and my father’s guitar glided underneath it all, audible only if you were listening for it, which is the beauty of jazz guitar. You only know it’s not there when it’s not there.
I wandered off to find my girlfriend with plans to sneak behind a tree and spend one of many nights that summer making out in the humid air of the Jersey Shore. The fireworks soon started and the little park in Tuckerton was lit up in reds, golds and silvers.
For a time my favorite band in the entire world was a group of jovial longhairs from Jersey City called Plugspark Sanjay. They were fast and loud and aggressive and beautiful and they sounded nothing like any other band with whom they ever shared a stage.
Their dual guitar attack danced around the small clubs they played while the pummeling bass rumbled through the walls, always being anchored by a drummer whose pinpoint accuracy and jazz inflections should have been sorely out of place in their brand of angular, insightful indie rock but were somehow the most refreshing part of this punishingly loud band.
They had a tendency to get lost in long and winding freakout jams, each member receding to his own world, playing to his own will. It always seemed as if their knowledge of one another’s presence on stage was null as they thrashed around, barely missing hitting one another with the barbed headstocks of their roadworn guitars. And precisely at the instant you were sure everything would fall apart, they’d stop on the edge of a matchstick and roar into another of that song’s movement.
They had a sixth sense of one another, as if their chakras all spun on the same axis. When they moved, they moved in congress. It was like watching a river — a hairy, cigarette smoking, beer-swilling river.
My high school buddies and I would follow them around, often driving up the Garden State Parkway to Hoboken or Asbury Park or New Brunswick catching as many shows as we could. Sometimes we’d make the trip into New York City, sneak into Brownie’s or Under Acme, drink some not-quite-legal beers and watch them. When they left for their first major U.S. tour there was a big going away party at Hoboken’s cornerstone rock club Maxwell’s and everyone was there.
By the time they came home I had made them a map that traced their entire two-month route. I knew then how cheesy it was but I didn’t really care.
We all sat around, poring over how many miles they’d covered, how many corners of the country they’d seen. I imagined that someday I might do the same.
They told me stories from the dusty American highway about women and parties and good shows and bad shows. They told me how great it was and how awful it was.
The band went on for a few more years, a few more tours and a few more records but eventually, and as it does to most bands, the Do It Yourself ethos had taken its toll and Plugspark Sanjay split up.
I was, however, lucky enough to have them play a private party for me and my friends. I emailed the band asking if they’d like to play at my high school graduation party, again realizing and not really caring how lame that made me seem. As it were, the band said absolutely, piled into their big green tour van, trucked two hours south on the Parkway and played for me and my South Jersey classmates.
We set the band up on the far end of my parents’ deck and let everyone fill in the space in front of them. My high school cover band opened for them, playing for about an hour while the sun was setting.
Plugspark followed into the night with a very intoxicating, very sweaty and very loud set. After playing for over an hour — and my parents fielding many concerned phone calls from the neighbors — the band wrapped up and invited the party into our pool for a game of Marco Polo.
We partied late into the night. Some kids snuck to the woods to smoke reefer, some ducked into shadows for makeout sessions. I just hung out in the pool with the band’s dueling guitarists, while they regaled us with jokes and stories from their unordinary lives.
After the party had fully wound down we helped the band load their gear so they could start their long journey home to Jersey City. It was getting late and we were sure they wouldn’t get home until at least two in the morning.
Once the gear was loaded and we’d said our goodbyes, one of the members jumped into the van and hit the ignition.
Click.
It was dead. Thousand upon thousands of miles of stress had taken their toll on the big green machine and he’d finally gone to sleep.
“Fuck,” was the general consensus. Luckily a good friend of the band’s had driven down in her car with them that day. It was decided that she, along with Mike the bass player and Ernie the drummer, would take her car back up to Jersey City while guitarists John and Joe would stay with us and get to a mechanic in the morning. I acted concerned. I couldn’t have been more excited.
We stayed up much later than usual after Susie, Mike and Ernie had left. The band was accustomed to late nights. We were not. We hunkered down in my living room playing video games and watching movies until the sun came up. We woke up late, had breakfast and took another swim. Eventually, my mother took the guys to the mechanic to see if they could get someone over to have a look at the van.
I had tickets to see Tom Petty that night and my friends would soon arrive to pick me up. Again I said goodbye to John and Joe, not sure when I’d see them next.
“See ya soon dude. Maybe we’ll play in Philly soon!” Joe told me, alluding to my impending move to college.
“Can’t wait!”
“Go run down that dream, dude.” I didn’t realize until I was in the car, headed up the Parkway that Joe was quoting Tom Petty.
Petty killed that night and it was the start of a summer tradition that my friends and I wouldn’t break for years. They played all the hits and even though I was never his biggest fan I had a very drunken blast.
By the time we left the parking lot it was almost midnight and we were in Holmdel, an hour’s drive from my house. I found a pay phone and called my mom to tell her I’d be home soon.
“Ok drive safe,” she said half asleep.
“Ok ma. See ya soon. Love ya.”
“Love yiz. Oh hey no luck with the mechanic. John and Joe are staying here again. I’m sure they’ll be up when you get home.”
I lied to my friends, telling them that I couldn’t go to the diner because my mom was pissed that I didn’t call her when we got to the venue. I had to get home.
By the time I got in, the guitarists were posted up on my couch, each occupying a side with their legs curled in, feet nearly touching one another at the couch’s center.
“Hurry up, dude. It’s about to start,” Johnny said.
“What’s about to start?” I asked.
“Beat Street,” John said.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“A masterpiece of American cinema,” Joe added. “You’ve never seen Beat Street?” he asked.
“Boy,” said Johnny, half referring to my age, half stating disbelief. I changed out of my sweaty, beer soaked clothes and pulled up a spot on the floor below the couch.
“Any news on the van?” I asked.
“Yea. The guy can come out here the day after tomorrow. We’re stuck till then,” John said.
When the band was on the road, John had supplemented their income by using his background as a visual artist to make amazing little refrigerator magnets that sold at their merch table for $5. People at the shows loved them and the band sold a ton. Each one was its own, one-of-a-kind piece. John said he’d had some that he needed to finish before their tour that summer so we spent some time in the afternoon hot gluing old action figures onto tiny magnet-backed scraps of wood and making a brand new round of art.
John was looking through his sketchbook when I had mentioned to him that I really wanted a tattoo soon. I was eighteen and though my father despised tattoos, he told me that I was officially an adult and my body was mine to do with it what I wished. He didn’t approve and he made that fact very well known but he bit his tongue and let me grow up.
“What are you thinking about getting?” John asked.
“I’m not sure. I’ve had some ideas but I’m sure they’re all stupid.”
“Yea. Fuck it. Do it man.”
I looked down at one of the hand drawn magnets and held it up to him.
“What about something like this?”
“Like a face?”
“Nah man. Like one of your drawings,” I said.
“You mean LIKE one of my drawings or one of my drawings?”
“Well, if you wanna draw one and it looks cool…” I trailed off.
“Just ask, dude.”
“Ok. Draw me something cool. Somebody cool. Scary. But not gross scary. Just kind of gnarly looking.”
“Why don’t you look through this,” he handed me his sketchbook, “and point out something similar to what you’re after.”
I peeled the pages back one at a time, marveling at John’s talent. Finally I came across a sketch of a man that reminded me of a hurricane.
“This one,” I said. “Yea. That’s the one.”
If you enjoyed reading, please click the little heart so that others can read it too and stay tuned for the rousing conclusion… um… Part Two.
