The Knife Man

…come closer little boy

In a previous posting I talked about Mike, The Ice Cream Man ( https://medium.com/@charleywarady/ode-to-mike-c97e05b327f9 ). Mike was the nice guy. Mike was the man with a permanent smile on his face and lived to make kids like me happy.

The Knife Man wasn’t like Mike. I don’t think The Knife Man had a name. I think that’s why he became a Knife Man. A man can become bitter growing not having been given a name. I’m not kidding. Ask anyone who grew up on Chappel on the South Side of Chicago in the 50s and 60s and I guarantee they will not know the name of The Knife Man.

Every Tuesday, there he was (I’m really not sure it was Tuesday…I’m an alcoholic…I can’t believe I remember this much), rolling down the sidewalk, sitting and pedalling his machine of murder, shouting out “Knives sharpened! Bring out your knives to be sharpened!”

I hid.

I hid in the house because I knew damn well that my mother was not going to be the one to take out the knives. Now that I sit here and think about it as I write, knife sharpening was a damn stupid profession, anyway. I can not think of one time as an adult that I regretted not having a Knife Sharpener come rolling down my street. Why did my mother need such sharp knives?

It didn’t matter where in the house I hid. My mother’s voice penetrated every crevice of 8111 S. Chappel. She screamed my name and I had to come out of hiding. If I heard the sentence, “Don’t make me come look for you,” I knew the sentence after that was going to be, “Wait until your father comes home,” and then I didn’t need The Knife Man; I could slit my own throat. It amazes me that all that kids have to worry about today is being threatened with a ‘time out’. What kind of bullshit is that? That’s no threat. A threat is something your parent tells you that makes you contemplate committing suicide as being a preferable option.

Ahhhhh…the good ol’ days.

Always standing at no closer than arm’s length (which still wasn’t that much…I was a little kid), I handed the bag of knives to The Knife Man. He took the bag from me, grimaced, and raised an eyebrow. The Knife Man never spoke. He wasn’t there for conversation. He was there to kill me.

His legs shifted onto the second set of pedals and began to rotate. The enormous grinding wheel spun, waiting for its next victim. The Knife Man took one of my mom’s knives and touched it to the wheel. Sparks flew and I jumped back.

Every goddammed time.

I don’t know how much he charged. I don’t remember if I ever paid him or if I even had any money. I know that he handed the bag back to me and I raced back into the house, dropped the bag on the kitchen table, and dove onto my bed.

Every goddammed time.

Please leave a comment below. Thanks! And share, and recommend, and everything else.