The Second Coming of Broken Fingers Malone!!

This morning promptly at 9 am I started my rounds. This is Bullhead City, AZ and nothing changes. Life here fits me like a favorite pair of shoes. Well worn, in need of a shine and the heels at a severe slant just inviting a turned ankle but who cares. Certainly not me!!

My first stop was the Senior Center where I have a couple of cups of coffee and a stale donut. Ahh, life is good. Bullhead City is the the classic example of life in the U. S. There is practically no middle class. Your either very poor or your well off. The poor live in small carton like apartments and the well off live in gated communities. The best part living here is cheap so it fits us all just fine.

I walked in and sat down to enjoy my snack. There was a small Hispanic man over in the next table reading the Las Vegas paper. I mentioned last nights ball game between the Golden State Warriors and the Cleveland Cavaliers. His response was that he didn't like sports. Then he looked at me and said, "Were you ever in baseball with the Dodgers?" and I replied "Yes". He said, "Your Eddie Campos". I looked harder at the man completely surprised with his on the money remarks and I recognized the man. It was Broken Fingers Malone!!!

Broken Fingers was a young man I once knew. He played an electric Gibson acoustical guitar just like his favorite local musician, Arthur K. Adams. But that's another story. Broken Fingers stood up and we hugged like a video of 2 monkey siblings on FB when they were finally reunited. And the moniker Broken Fingers was tagged on him because he really played the guitar real good. And I mean real good.

It was great to see a person that I once liked as my friend and pal at one time in our young life. He bought a new Mercury Cougar that he called "El Coco". Broken Fingers real name was Danny Berumen and Danny and I used to cruise all over to jam with all the local musicians or just check out bands in other clubs. As we sat there we recounted the many stories in our ventures. The humorous ones that only could have happened spontaneously. We laughed and laughed like the 2 young dudes we once were.

Because they were gems I want to share a couple of these escapades with you. There was the story about this club we played at in a town called El Monte. The club owner had run out of money and when we showed up for our pay he informed us that he couldn't pay us. At that moment another guy walks in and he wants to be all friendly with the owner. The owners reaction was to pull a gun out of his desk and threaten this guy. It seems like the intruder was once a partner in the bar business and he backed out causing a severe financial burden for the guy we knew as the owner. We all recoiled but things turned out well when the intruder made a quick escape without a shot being fired.

Then there was another time we played in this bar that was owned by 2 brothers. They were a case. These guys thought they could hit on all the young sweetie pies that came in. One night this young lady started screaming for one of the brothers to get away from her. The girl jumps and screams, "Get away from me. Your old enough to be my father". The brother stood there for a couple of seconds and asked her, "What's your Mom's name. I may be"!! The whole bar was quiet and everyone was staring. When the brother finished his retort it brought the whole bar down!

And on and on. We talked about so many things that when we were finally finished we must have hugged about 5 more times. Ahhh! The delights of a young man and his pals. It was good to see Danny. He was one of those people that it seems like you could always see years later and things would still be the same. Friendly and full of happiness. We marveled at the fact we were back as pals again 40 years later and 300 miles away from our origins! We exchanged phone numbers and we will meet soon again!!