Engage Your Brain Before You Open Your Mouth

Many years ago, 1975 to be exact, I was an 18 year old Biker wanna be. I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up and I began by hanging around every Biker I met. I quickly learned the art of engaging my brain before opening my mouth, and I learned that lesson the hard way.

As a kid growing up in the Washington, DC suburb of Arlington, Va I saw a lot of neat things. I was within miles of the hub of the universe as far as I was concerned. Along the way I learned many little tricks to get by in life and one of the most important was taught to me by a Biker named Squirrel. Squirrel demonstrated to me the possible result of running your mouth at the most inopportune of occasions.

I was living with my fellow Biker wanna be buddy, Truckin' George. Among the many associates and visitors at the pad were members of the Pagans Motorcycle Club. Perhaps they were "ex" members at that particular moment, but suffice to say these were some bad Muthas. One day I was sitting around chillin' and I made a rather stupid offhand remark.

One of the neatest things I'd ever seen was a guy who rode a Full Dresser and had a monkey riding on his shoulder. It was one of those little Organ Grinder monkeys. I saw this dude and his monkey dozens of times in the late '60's and early '70's. This individual and his monkey were well known in the area at the time. One day when Squirrel was at my apartment I made the stupidly ill advised remark "That dude with the monkey is the baddest thing I ever seen," or something to that effect. I was merely expressing my admiration for the dude, his motorsickle and his riding around with the monkey on his shoulder or sitting on his gas tank. A poorer choice of words could hardly have been chosen by my big mouth.

Sometime later that day came a knock on the door. I answered it and lo and behold my acquittance Squirrel was there. I opened the door and he walked in. No sooner than I closed the door behind him he reached under his long winter coat and out popped a .410 double-barrel shotgun, the barrels sawed off so that they were no more than 10 or so inches long. The back of the stock had been sawed off and the whole gun was no more than 16 inches long, thus easily concealable.

The sawed off .410 then found its way under my chin, both barrels pushing on the fleshy part beneath my jawbone. At this point Squirrel asked "So who is the baddest thing you ever seen?" To which my reply was "You and the Pagans are the baddest SOB's around man," or some such. I was then informed that another such disrespectful remark would result in my imminent demise. I had learned a lesson for life. That lesson has served me well. In spite of what some around the AC community may believe about me and my rhetoric I, more than most, am keenly aware that words do have consequences.

A year or two later I was again the victim of some idiots' words, but this time the idiot wasn't me. There was a whole group of us reprobates that hung out together and one of the members of this clan decided he needed to join the Marines. While he was at boot camp me and some pals were at his folks house as his sister Rosemary, was dating one of the above mentioned reprobates, and we were all chillin' and doing what reprobates did at that time - 'nuff said! Anyway, one day Rosemary's Mom was asking me about gun values. She showed me an old .32 semi-auto pistol and asked if it was worth anything, as she wanted to sell it. I told her I'd let her know if I found out what the gun was worth, and basically forgot about the matter.

I forgot until about a week later when there was a knock at my door. I answered the door and Rosemary burst in screaming "Give it back you f-'ing thief! Give it back. Nick is home from the Marines and he's gonna kill you! You know you stole my Mom's gun!" and so on. I protested my innocence to no avail. Rosemary left and I quickly dressed and hopped in my car. I was gonna get this shit straight.

I went to Nick and Rosemary's house and there was the former Marine, Nick. He had been kicked out of the Marines about 2 or 3 weeks into his odyssey. As I entered the living room Nick started calling me a thief, etc. He was sitting there with 2 or 3 dudes I didn't know. He started threatening me with all grades of violence including him and his friends killing me. No matter how much I protested, it was to no good purpose. He was sure I had taken his piece of crap Saturday Night Special. After a few tension filled moments I left and went home. There was no purpose in trying to convince the idiots that they were wrong. That and I didn't wanna have to take the Smith & Wesson Airweight .38 out of my pocket and kill Nick and his two friends, so I booked home. I was pissed for two days until the other shoe dropped, then I really got mad.

Turns out a girl we all knew, a little gutter snipe hanger on named Robin had stolen the gun. She was staying at Nick & Rosemary's house and knew about the gun, knew their Mom had shown it to me, and figured she could pull a fast one and leave me swinging in the breeze. She was wrong. What really chapped my ass was that I was accused, convicted and threatened with death on no evidence whatsoever. None! And the best part is when they found out who had actually stolen the gun, not only did they never apologize for their hateful accusations against me, but when I asked who had actually stolen the gun I was told it was none of my business. That's when I got mad!

I politely and under my breath informed Nick and Rosemary that if they ever threatened me again I would kill them both. I showed Nick the .38 in my pocket, told him I had it on me the 2 days previous when we had our encounter, and that if he or his two friends would have made a move toward me I would have capped 'em right there. Nick looked like he didn't believe me so I added, "and if you think I'm f-ing kidding, you try it again!" and I walked out. Needless to say Nick suddenly saw the light and wanted to be my friend again. But still no apology.

And to prove karma does exist, in 1978 when I was living at Va. Beach old Nick and Rosemary and her boyfriend Dave showed up for a visit. Nick and Dave were sporting new identical tattoos that had some sort of a picture with the words Necessary Evil MC tattooed beneath the artwork. I asked were they now patch holders in this Motorcycle Club, to which they replied "not yet, but we wanna be." I laughed and said "cool," knowing full well what their futures held for them.

Sure enough I went back to Arlington for a visit a few weeks later and I saw all the old reprobates, Nick and Dave included. But now they were sans their new tattoos. "What the Hell?" I asked.

I was informed how the tattoos resulted from a night of drunken foolishness whereby these two idiots had hooked up with some former Necessary Evil patch holder and they liked his tatt, and he was blowin' smoke telling them he could get them into the club. Turns out he was just taking advantage of the two idiots who were buying the beer and supplying the smoke, so he told then whatever they wanted to hear so he could party on their dime as it were.

The beauty and the karma of it all was that to remove the tattoos required bleach and a wire brush and a large quantity of Wild Turkey. The left forearms of both these idiots were scabbed and bloody. I got quite a kick outta that.

So, how does this last story equate to my thesis about not running your mouth unless you know what you're talking about? Simple! In addition to not saying stupid and ill informed things it might be wise as well not to do stupid and ill informed things, like tattooing the name of a hardcore Motorcycle Club onto your body if you are not a member. As I recall, Nick and Dave had to remove the tatts or the Necessary Evil patch holders would remove the tatts for them by removing their left arms. Six of one, half dozen of another.

To add more emphasis to the karma part, Nick died of Lymphoma the next year. it was the kind that could be treated with chemo but every time he had a chemo appointment he would have some friend take him to the hospital. Along the way he would often opt for going drinking and blowing off his chemo treatment. Turns out stupidity can indeed be fatal! And so can running your mouth when you don't know what you're talking about, or at the very least, you're not careful about what you say in front of certain individuals. I learned my lesson many years ago.

Think before you speak or act. Like Lincoln said, "It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak up [or act] and remove all doubt."