John Joseph - The Evolution of a Cro-Magnon

the evolution of a cro-ma gnon

Loudspeaker Entertainment

10 Jay Street

Suite 208

Brooklyn, NY 11201

2014 Loudspeaker, LLC

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Originally distributed by Punkhouse Publishing Company.

ISBN-13: 978-0-9800657-0-1

Dedicated to Srila Prabhupada

and all his sincere followers

He who wrestles with us strenghtens our nerves and

sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper

Edmund Burke

Nineteen seventy-seven was the year that serial killer, Son of Sam wreaked havoc in New York City, Elvis died, and the lights went out in New York. Disco battled punk as the Sex Pistols Never Mind the Bollocks and the Bee Gees disco soundtrack, Saturday Night Fever, dropped simultaneously. It was also my first year on the streets and what I learned that year not only taught me the skills to make money to survive, but how to survive in the face of life and death situations. Call me a freak, but I thrived on it. The danger of who would try to rob you, stab you, shoot you, hustle you; or who you were going to hustle or have to throw down on. All 130 pounds of me thought I was invincible and you had to think like that back then, because New York City was a different place. It was a jungle and just as an animal living in the wild has to fight for its survival, risking life and limb to eat or sleep, the city was no different.

The 42nd Street Disneyland shit you see today didnt exist; it was simply known as, The Deuce. I spent many cold winter nights there listening to the oohs and ahhs and, Yes baby, fuck me harders! coming from the screen in some 24-hour, buck and a half porno theatre, as I slept with one eye open and a blade in my pocket.

There was no East Village in Manhattan with its trendy little cafes, bars, and shops. It was called Alphabet City, the LES or Loisaida, a drug addicts heaven, filled with junkies, musicians and your hybrid junkie-musicians. Death lurked around the corner with gangs like the Hitmen and the Allen Street Boys who let you know very quickly that if you were an outsider of the Caucasian persuasion you dared not venture down to those parts without an escort, day or night.

Maxs Kansas City, The Mudd Club, CBGBs, Studio 54, Hurrahs, Berlin Club, and The Fun House were just a few of the popular clubs back in 77 and to say they were out of control is an understatement. The citys parks were hunting grounds where dead bodies turned up regularly. Places like Union Square Park, Forrest Park, and Grover Cleveland Park (nicknamed The Carbines) were open-air drug markets where you could get anything you needed to expand your mental horizons.

When most kids my age were just hitting puberty, I was on my own, a seventh grade dropout running wild. I earned my degree from The University of the Streets, where my teachers were a bizarre cast of characters including the likes of Junior Nuts, Demented Dougie, Bobby K., Crazy Dave, Disco, Bobbie Bird, Buckles, Computer, AWOL Airborne Paratrooper J.K. and my favorite, a low-life hustling junkie named Mikey Debris.

It was a magical time in the city and I wouldnt trade my experiences for all the money in the world. There was never a dull moment and plenty of, Holy fuckin shits! Nowadays people spend big money on extreme sports to get that ultimate adrenaline rush. I didnt need to travel far and wide in search of danger and adventure. All I had to do was step out of the burnt-out building I lived in, or wander into certain neighborhoods, and I had all the danger, adventure and adrenaline I could handle.

Ill get back to describing all the insane shit that went down back then, but first things first. In any story there needs to be an inciting incident; an event that throws the central characters life out of balance, sending him on a quest to restore that balance in some way, as he struggles through life and death decisions which put him at greater and greater amounts of risk.

My writing teacher, Robert McKee, (without whose knowledge and inspiration this book would never have been written) says that to live meaningfully, is to be at perpetual risk.

Well, from the moment of my conception, risk and I were on a first name basis. Shortly after coming into this world, at the age of five, would come my inciting incident. Most of the details about that night I dont remember, so I had to get them from my mom, but it would be the event that would change my flight plan forever and send me on a new course a course under the radar.

The year was 1967. Vietnam was raging and the hippies were having their love-ins. But my mom (Marie) my two brothers (Eugene and Frank), and I had our own little guerilla war going down right here in the states. See, we were dodging my pops, a southpaw welterweight who was a violent prick to my mom the entire time they were married. He basically used her as a human punching bag. She, in turn, lived as a prisoner of her own fear, flinching every time he lifted his hand, or jumping at the slightest sound in the middle of the night. I remember telling her a while back that Id picked up boxing as a hobby. She got this spooked look on her face and told me that when I was little, I hugged her and said, Dont worry Mommy, Im gonna be a fighter one day and Im gonna beat him up for all the times hes hit you.

When we were kids, my mom always made us sleep close to her, just in case we had to make a quick getaway, like we had so many times before. Not that it did us any good, because my dad knew everyone in the neighborhood and it was only a matter of time before someone told him where we were hiding. Inevitably he would find us and convince my mom that things were fine using one of his famous clich lines like, Things are gonna be different this time baby, Im a changed man or Marie, Id die if I ever lost you. Sure enough, she would go back to him and within days the beatings would start again. Well, this time things were different. He beat her so badly that she finally wised-up and decided to leave his ass for good.

We were living in a tiny, one-room dump on the ground floor of a building in Queens. It was a rainy night. Mom took a few Valium and a handful of other mysterious narcotics shed been prescribed for her recent nervous breakdown. I still remember the thunder, the flashes of lightning and the surreal moment of dead silence just before the front door came crashing in and my world along with it. I huddled with my two brothers, frozen with fear, staring at my father. He looked like a rabid animal as he stood there soaking wet and sopping drunk. Mom was clearly woozy from the pills, but she managed to scream at us to run away. My pops mumbled something then he charged at her and began beating her around the apartment like a rag doll. I still remember the sound of a lamp being smashed to pieces a sound that scared the shit out of me because it told me what was happening wasnt a nightmare. It was all too real, and we were helpless to stop him. We watched in horror as he beat her, until a policeman finally burst in and gave my father a shot with his billy club. Luckily, the old landlady upstairs had called the police when she heard the commotion. If she hadnt, Im sure my father would have killed my mother or come damn close.

The last memory I have of that night is being in the back seat of a police car and looking out the rear window at the flashing lights. There was a very eerie silence that was only broken by the sound of the windshield wipers slapping back and forth and my two brothers sniffling and wiping at their tears. I remember keeping my eyes locked on those bright, pulsing lights, as we were driven away. We were all crying and the cop turned around and said, Hey little guys, dont worry, everythings gonna be okay. Somehow, I knew better. I knew it was just the beginning of a long, bleak journey. I had no idea when, or if, I would ever see my mother again. I just kept staring out that window until the lights faded and my view was consumed by total darkness.