Monument to Carlos
Carlos Guerrero was my best man, and my best friend. We would get into the most ridiculous shenanigans in our youth. In addition to fun, Carlos was ferociously loyal, determined, and generous to a fault.
Below are my recollections. Other friends contributed theirs, and helped fact check my own. I am honored by their help. Where the word “I” or “my” is used, it’s from the voice of many people who knew Carlos.
This is my monument to Carlos. A written collection of his stories, that they may be remembered.
Dr. Carlos Gabriel Guerrero Jr
September 3, 1981 — July 25, 2020
Lifehacks And General Life Advice from Carlos
Tell Your Friends You Love Them. Tell them A Lot. Make It Really Weird
Carlos would always tell you how he felt. And he would always tell people he loved them. Profusely and shamelessly. And he would pull you into this game of making it progressively weirder and weirder for the people around you who weren’t in on the joke.
Two grown men need to loudly scream things like “HEY BIG SEXY” from across a parking lot. or “I NEED YOUR MANLY LOVE!” They also need to be weird when they introduce new groups of friends to each other, such as a bar or restaurant. Say things like “I LOVE YOU HOOCHIE MAMA!” right as the food comes out.
Privately he would send you random texts or memes for no reason other than to say I love you.
Now Carlo’s protocol did have exceptions to it. When you do this, you can’t convey any sign of weakness or fear.
Towards the end of high school, Carlos, Scott and I watched the movie American Pie at a theater. The movie’s about high school ending and friends going their separate ways. We sat towards the front, and the exit was out the front. We walk out of the theater first into the parking lot, and there are about 50 people right behind us.
And Carlos starts to tear up and lose it. “I’m gonna miss you. This is so sad. I love you guys!”
Scott and I start telling him. “Yo man, not right now”
Carlos, bursting into tears. “DON’T TELL ME TO BE QUIET. I LOVE YOU. THIS HOW I FEEL MAN”
Scott and I glance back. There are about 50 people right behind us listening to all this. And they’re watching big ole’ Carlos blubbering in the parking lot.
In that moment Carlos regained his situational awareness, glanced back at everyone. He realized what was happening. His eyes then snapped forward, started walking faster and blurted out “Get in the car guys!”
24 Hour Wal-Mart:
Sometimes at the end of a night of partying, you find yourself given charge of an obscenely drunk human being you just met. You’re trying to get home, but before you can go, you have to get this drunk guy home. The problem: he’s too drunk to tell you his address, or give you any intelligent directions where to take him.
The best answer to this question I’ve ever heard came from Carlos: 24 hour Wal-Mart. Take the person in with you. Take him to the candy aisle, tell him you’ll be right back and leave. Don’t worry, he’ll be ok.
Fedex Truck Delivery
I was dating a girl once in high school and had the idea of having myself shipped in a gift box to her house. These ideas start as totally preposterous. But with Carlos, anything was possible. Once he heard this idea, we went to work on it.
First, can we get our hands on a pallet? Check!
Now a pallet fork? Check!
Now an oversized appliance box? Check!
Now enter Carlos with the game winning shot. Carlos figured out a way to get ahold of a Fedex truck. How you ask? Never mind the details.
Now before you get all weird on me with “Are you telling me that you and Carlos stole a Fedex truck?!?!”…
First, we didn’t steal it. We borrowed it for an afternoon. We returned it back where we found it in the same condition. Second, we were minors at the time. So anything arising from those activities would have been expunged. Third, we acted alone, and the statute of limitations has long since expired. Fourth, in addition to no harm befalling the Fedex truck, no humans or animals were harmed in this caper.
So, one afternoon we acquired the truck, made a human sized gift box that could be moved on a pallet, threw me inside and gift wrapped it. And Carlos helped make one special delivery. Stunt completed. To complete the circle, the girl was solidly unimpressed with our heroic achievement and we broke up soon thereafter.
Raiding the Frito Lay
There was a Frito Lay distribution facility in our town. They had a dumpster in the back where expired product would be disposed of. For a few dumb teenagers this was a gold mine. Bags of Frito Lay products were still edible, still sealed closed, but free for the taking on the account of an expiration date.
We would commonly go back there at night and raid the dumpster, filling our cars with all the booty it could carry. It was a well known thing among a few of us.
Now the people in the warehouse became concerned with the constant late night raids of their dumpster for obvious reasons. Eventually they put a pad lock on the dumpster to keep ̶r̶a̶c̶c̶o̶o̶n̶s̶ annoying high school kids out of the dumpster at night.
Nothing a set of boltcutters couldn’t fix.
So one night, three of us went around back to the dumpster, cut the pad lock and filled the back seat of the car. Driver, Passenger and Carlos in the back. Carlos in the back up to his chest in bags of Frito Lay product.
As we drive down the street we get pulled over. Why? Because we were 16 years old and couldn’t drive worth a shit.
The cop looks at me, looks at the passenger. Then he looks at Carlos in the back, buried up to his chest like he fell into a quicksand trap of refined corn products. Now Carlos can usually keep it cool under most circumstances, but at his core he was an emotional guy. If you knew him could always tell how he was feeling just by looking at him…
So I looked at him through the rear view mirror…
Carlos starts sweating profusely. ..
By some miracle, the cop simply wrote me a ticket and sent us on our way. I think the bolt cutters were down around Carlo’s ankles in the back seat.
One Time Carlos Was Innocent
Carlos moved to Kansas City during Chiropractic School. Shortly after he moved there he was pulled over. The cop took his license plate and ran a check. He came back to the car, had Carlos get out, and handcuffed him.
“There’s a warrant out for your arrest”
How? I just moved here? There’s no warrant for me!
“Are you Carlos G Guerrero?”
“Yes”
Are you Carlos G Guerrero born September 3, 1981?
“Yes”
“There’s a warrant for your arrest.”
So he sat Carlos down in handcuffs off the side of the road. Apparently there was another Carlos G Guerrero born on the exact same day, who was terrorizing Kansas City. It took a few hours to get it all sorted out. But eventually the innocent Carlos was set free..
The UPS Strike of 1997
Things you think are a good idea but quickly backfire. The year was 1997 and a huge amount of UPS workers went on strike.
In Grand Island there happened to be a large UPS warehouse facility that now was being picketed most of the day.
What good idea could two dumb teenagers make of this? How about we go down and yell things at the picket line and cheer for Fedex?
That sounds like a great idea.
So we drove by, rolled the windows down and yelled out the finest political discourse we could think of.
We made a few passes and the workers on the line largely ignored us.
But never underestimate the power of teenagers to be obnoxious. After a few more passes, a few of the workers did something we had never contemplated. They got into their trucks and started chasing after us to kick our asses.
Now at the time Carlos drove a 1989 Pontiac Grand AM 2 door. It looked kind of like this but had a black leather bra on it, nice rims, nicer stereo and was referred to as the “89 pimp mobile”
And that pimp mobile suddenly went from hunter to the hunted. A long chase ensued through the town. Fortunately we started this episode with a full tank of gas. After the better part of an hour of juking and jiving, the Teamsters appreciated just how young and stupid we were and decided to go back to the picket line..
McDonald’s Big Mac, In-and-Out Double Double?
This one we got Carlos. Las Vegas, around new year’s, mid to late 2000s. It’s a group of us. Carlos can’t shut up about In-n-Out burger. It’s so amazing. So much better than any other burger, etc.. We decide to go, but Carlos is slow as shit. He’s been dragging ass all morning after a night of partying. So we left the hotel without him and said we’d pick up In-n-Out on the way back. We piled into the van, went to In-n-Out, got ourselves burgers. Then we kept one of the In-n-Out wrappers and went over to McDonalds. We ordered a big mac, and put the big mac into the In-n-Out wrapper. Then we went back to the hotel to pick up Carlos.
We picked up Carlos at the hotel and started driving to our next event that day. Once he was in the car we gave him the In-N-Out wrapper.
He started chowing down on that big mac.
Isn’t this In-N-Out Burger so much better than McDonald’s Carlos?
And he starts going on and on about how this burger is so much better than all the other burgers. Hes sitting in the middle of the van while all of us are trying to stifle our laughter.
Finally after he finishes the burger and yapping about the burger we hand him the big mac box and let him in on the joke.
Its gets worse though. The next morning Carlos was dragging ass again in the morning. We went out and brought him taco bell. I handed him a soft shell taco, playing it totally straight faced insisting it was In-n-Out burger. We all insisted with straight faces that it was In-n-Out burger like a scene out of a twisted psychological experiment.
“C’mon man. This is a tortilla.”
“I don’t see a tortilla there. I dont know what you’re talking about with that double double”
Drive By Water Guns
Some of the best water guns you could get back the day were the Super Soaker CPS 2000, 2500, or 3000. The CPS 2000 could hold almost a gallon of water, and discharge it all in 2 shots. We had 3 of them and 1 car.
What could you do with 4 obnoxious guys, 3 CPS 2000s and 1 car? Drive bys!
1 Driver, 3 shooters could roll down their windows, come up on an unsuspecting pedestrian walking on the sidewalk, hit them with approximately 1.5 gallons of liquid within about 1 second, and speed off before the newly soaked victim could identify the license plate. The rear seat of this car also folded down and allowed you to reach directly into the trunk. In the trunk we had gallon jugs of water and funnels. Shooters could reload multiple times on the fly.
We had a sense of honor about this. We would only soak people who appeared able to handle it. No children. No elderly. No people in walkers or wheelchairs.
We got away with this for months. Apparently the shock of being doused like this is so disorienting that nearly everyone fails to get your license plate… but then we got too greedy…
One summer evening we drove up the street and a couple was going for a walk. They were walking up the left side of the street, in the same direction we were driving. So the passenger seat shooter would have to shoot outside the drivers window. The two backseat shooters would shoot outside the left rear window.
We slowed down, prepared the shot. The man was walking closer to the street. He was closest to the car. His female companion was walking to his left, farther away from the car. They both were approximately the same height.
Right before the shots went, the man looked to his right, saw what was going to happen… and …he… ducked! Like a spooked deer, the 3 water bursts went right over his head.. and hit his female companion square in the right side of her head!
We sped away right after the shot. But then Carlos got to thinking… and then he got to talking… and he was awfully convincing… Who ducks? That guy ducked instead of covering his female companion! That guy has no honor! We need to get the guy too! Yeah we definitely need to get the guy!
So we drove back to get the guy… and he saw it coming, but we still got him.. As we drove away he yelled words that made our hearts sink: “LICENSE 8-C6…”
Well, my heart sank lowest.. it was my car!
The local police later made contact with us. The situation was subsequently resolved to the satisfaction of all parties…
Losing Our Ashland Nebraska Privileges
We did a new years party in Omaha one year. Omaha is highly recommended. You can do nearly everything you can in Las Vegas, but in Omaha, below freezing and for about 30% of Vegas prices.
Carlos loved fireworks. We would do big amateur fireworks displays for arbitrary things like someone’s birthday.
Anyway, Carlos shows up and opens up a big black bag. Inside are a bunch of bootleg fireworks, in size well in excess of what’s you’re allowed to buy off the street in the U.S.
Again you, the reader, might ask things like “Why would Carlos just happen to have a huge bag of bootleg fireworks that probably came from Mexico?”
The answer of course is “why wouldn’t Carlos have a stash of these?”
So we’re in Omaha and have some heavy artillery here. Where to go set these off? In the countryside outside Ashland Nebraska.
So we drive out in the dead of night. There’s country side, a few farm houses in the distance. In the countryside gunfire and fireworks are common throughout the year. So we should be in a good position.
Carlos lights one and throws it out the car window. And oh my gawd in heaven the boom was louder than any redneck firework we’ve shot off in the past. These are something special. We throw out a few more and they’re similarly loud. We shoot off a few of his artillery shells and they look commercial in size. They turn the night into day. It’s… spectacular…
Farmhouse windows start lighting up. You can tell this is way outside normal. So we relocate a few miles down the road and repeat the exercise.
Again, window lights in the distance start coming on, so we keep relocating.
And then the local police force finds us. This situation again was resolved to the satisfaction of all parties. But there is a group of us that have permanently lost our Ashland Nebraska privileges.
Bed Ride at The Edge
This is one where Carlos ended up getting me. We were at the bar in Grand Island. Carlos, me, a friend or two and a couple of Carlos’ cousins. We were having a fine time, but then I had to ruin it. Somehow the conversation turned to strip clubs. There was this place called “The Edge” with a terrible reputation over in Alda Nebraska. Alda is a town on highway 30, population about 600. The town is about 15 minutes away from Grand Island. For me it was this mysterious place. Anyone you ever asked about it said versions of “it’s terrible, never go there.” I asked the group about The Edge. They had all been there and said the same thing “Awful place, never go there.”
This only served to make me curious. The mix of curiousity and drinking caused me to not shut up about it. I kept asking and asking what it was like. They’d try to change the subject and I’d come right back to it.
Apparently I became obnoxious enough that Carlos’s cousin Sonny was pushed too far. “You wanna go to The Edge that bad? Fine! Load up! We’re going to The Edge!”
I should have suspected something because Carlo’s dad decided to join us for this expedition. For a guy who hated The Edge and kept telling me not to go, he was way too eager to come along and see this…
So we drove over to Alda, and they led me to The Edge.
Do you know that scene in Blue Brothers at the bar, where they have the stage surrounded by chicken wire? It was like that.
It was every bit as terrible as they described. Right after we stepped and I saw what it was, I wanted to leave. But no. I wouldn’t shut up about it, so we were going to order a round of beers at a minimum. I was going to sit down and drink a beer and be in this club after my hours of yapping.
I sit down, and this very large dancer named “Sparkle" comes up to me and says “Your friends back there at the bar just bought you a bed ride!” All the other random folk in the bar start cheering like mad.
What’s a bed ride you ask? Sadly no pictures of it survive. But it was basically this. They had a room in the back, with padded mats on the floor and a mechanical bull in the center. Except the saddle part of the mechanical bull had been sawed off. Instead, a bed had been welded to the mechanical bull. There were two big bull ropes at the top you were supposed to hold on too.
And a creepy looking hyped up operator sitting in the corner with the controls to the mechanical ̵b̵u̵l̵l̵ bed. He approximately looked like this guy here…
Here are some third party accounts of the “Bed Ride”
“Among the items to be sold is the mechanical bed ride that Davidson told law enforcement in 2010 was her idea as an entertainment addition to the nightclub. It was a gurney affixed to a mechanical bull riding machine.
A patron would pay to lie on the gurney and have an exotic dancer straddle him while the machine was activated. Patrons had the option of having their ride in a back room of the nightclub videotaped or played on the big screen up front for other bar patrons to watch.
Davidson said the mechanical bed will not be sold at the yard sale, but rather through a different venue such as “putting it on Craig’s list.”
https://nebraska.tv/archive/roadhouse-law-gives-police-foot-in-door-at-strip-club
A bar known for pushing the law to “The Edge” may have gone too far.
She said, “It’s a gurney that has been placed onto a mechanical bull base. Patrons are allowed to lay on that on their back, hold onto ropes, dancers then straddle them and someone in the corner operates the machine.
So they throw me up on this bed and have me grab the ropes. The dancer climbs on me and holds on to me. And the operator starts cranking the mechanical bed. Apparently this thing is streamed throughout the club so you can hear all the cowpokes in the other room hooping and hollering as this thing goes. The cowpokes in the bar are screaming. “Sparkle" is screaming. I’m screaming. Carlos are crew are yelling all kinds of crazy shit at me and cheering the ride operator on. This isn’t some gentle gimmick ride like at the county fair. These people are hardcore and in it to win. The dancer tries to stay on you for 3 rounds until she’s thrown off. After the last time, the operator then cranked it up a few gears until I was thrown off.
Ok, I’ve had enough. I’m ready to go. But Carlos and crew weren’t finished with me yet. I walked out to the front room and this large heavily muscled dancer came up to me, with a voice like a tuba.
“Take your pants off!”
What?
“I said take your fucking pants off right now!”
Then two of her cronies each grabbed an arm, the lead dancer undid my belt and pulled it out. One other crony pulled down my pants and exposed my bare ass in the middle of the bar in front of everyone. The lead then whipped the bejesus out of me with the cowpoke customers all cheering like mad. Again, this isn’t some gentle county fair thing. These people were brutes.
And then Carlos allowed us to finally go home. For the next 5 years or so, Sonny and company referred to me as “8 Seconds.”
Three Tuxedos and a Pontiac Aztec
I’d like to introduce you to someone. Not by name, but by description:
- There’s no forgiving that face
- Bravery and stupidity in equal measure
- An example of design by committee gone wrong
- Quite ugly
- Horrible and deplorable in the early 2000’s
I think you know who I’m talk about. I’m sure of it.
The Pontiac Aztec.
An automotive engineering failure not seen since the Gremlin…or whatever the hell it was that Steve Urkel drove.
Now I’d like to tell you about how Carlos helped me rescue a Pontiac Aztec, and possibly my career.
Let’s go back to 2006…Erie, Pennsylvania…winter…white everywhere…and it even snowed. Well, not white everywhere, a motley smattering of diversity invaded this frigid hamlet in order to celebrate the Hemmingsen-Morley, Morley-Hemmingsen nuptials.
I knew nothing of driving in the snow but I knew I needed all wheel drive and I knew that I was on a budget. One of the travel perqs of my job at the time discounted car rentals and VIP…Ha! Sorry, human treatment, treatment from certain vendors. Taken together, we have the entrance of the co-star of the this story, the Pontiac Aztec. In red. Because cool guys drive red cars.
The car performed admirably during the first few days of my visit to Erie. It’s all wheel drive capabilities even helped me shave a whole 45 seconds from the route from my hotel to an adjacent McDonalds by driving through a small grassy field. I know what you’re thinking, 45 seconds is not trivial at the end of a night on the town when McDonalds is selling 2 large fries and 2 20-piece chicken McNuggets for $10.
And they say youth is wasted on the young.
As is tradition…nay, the obligation, of every 20 something wedding attendee, we went out on the town after the wedding ceremony. A brief aside about drink pricing in Erie, PA: if they don’t intend for you to buy shots by the dozen, they shouldn’t price a dozen shots like a carton of organic eggs. Maybe it was a discount because the entire wedding party was still in their tuxedoes and gowns. Or maybe it was just a form of local hospitality, but I digress. In the venue for the evening was a stage, a pizza joint, and dancing revelers. One of whom was far too eager to display her Steeler’s tattoo that would have remained covered in the swimwear round of the Miss Erie Pennsylvania Pageant.
After a night of celebration and a safe drive back to the hotel, upon entering the driveway we realize that we should get one more round of the Massive McDonald’s Meal. With full bellies and doggy heads, the seven people going for food pile into the Aztec for one last trip across our northwest passage though the grassy field on our way back to the hotel. In a burst of enthusiasm and hubris I pushed the little Aztec that could through that field with enough speed that we could get up until now adequate all wheel drive to let the car slide sideways. And just when I decided to try driving reasonably again…the Aztec got stuck.
We tried driving slowly and rocking it back and forth from drive to reverse and nothing worked. At that point we knew we had to get out and push. Carlos was the first to jump behind the car, in a rented tuxedo and shoes and start shoving. Sadly his, and then our, efforts were for naught. My car was stuck. My car was stuck, high-centered in mud, rented using my corporate card, and rented using a corporate discount program. And then the snow started.
We scrounged for materials to push under the cars tires to drive out. A friend found a metal sign but it was too slick. Carlos found a wood pallet that we took apart to use as a ramp, but it also failed. Then I remembered, I had OnStar. I had to call for a tow truck. When the truck arrived he saw our situation: five men clearly from out of town, wearing muddy tuxedos with a car stuck in the mud. He looked at us and said “I can’t tow you out. That’s private property and technically…you’re trespassing.”
My heart sank. I was in a far away land with a serious problem and no way to fix it.
Standing about in the freezing wind, collecting snow, we try to look for options. One of the group thought this was the time to flee and he left us to our problem, but Carlos stayed in support, like a true friend. Just as we give up on finding a way to get the car out, a stranger drives up and asks “Are ya’ll stuck?” After stifling a sarcastic response, I explained that we needed to get the car out after going to a wedding. He says that he has chains in his Jeep and tow hooks and would be happy to pull out our once capable Aztec. We were saved. A stranger with spare time to the rescue. Let’s hook up these chains, get out of this mud and go to sleep.
Oh that we could. The top rate design and construction of the Aztec featured plastic molding as most of its bodywork. Plastic molding that deformed under the pressure of a tow hook when we tried to pull the car out of the mud. Undeterred our white knight happened to own a heavy duty towing company and said he’d drive to his shop, get nylon tow cables used for big rigs, and tie them to the car. After a nervous 20 minutes, he returned with the cables, tied up the Aztec, and towed the car free.
Amazing.
Now we just needed to get our car to an all-night car wash to get rid of the evidence that we had been driving ruts through private property for the past five nights and recently towed our car from the scene of the crime. We made our way back to a convenience store that we saw was still open with Carlos helping to guide us through the falling snow. We rushed in to ask for directions to a car wash. We, minorities, in Erie PA wearing muddy tuxes at 3am, looking like we just buried a body. Carlos, never being one to shy from a conversation asked the clerk if she could help us find a car wash. After some inquisitive looks she gave us directions to an automatic car wash.
Among the car wash’ options, I didn’t see one named “crime scene clean up” so I went with the ultra wash. $30 worth of car wash, 20 minutes of nervous driving, and many collective sighs later we made it back to the hotel.
The moral of this story is don’t drive like a moron. And if you’re going to rent a tux, Men’s Warehouse is your best choice because they don’t care in what condition you return them.
Car + Sled + Homestead Act
One winter evening we had the idea of taking an old metal toboggan, a rope, a borrowed Chevy blazer and taking a field trip to a defunct cement plant.
Tie the rope to the Blazer, sit on the toboggan, hold on to the rope and tow each other around. This worked OK, but Carlos always had grander plans. There are 640 acres to a square mile. The homestead act granted settlers 160 acres. Why does this matter? This led the countryside roads of Nebraska to be laid out in neat orderly 1 mile grids.
These roads are gravel, never plowed in the winter, and virtually free of traffic. Over the course of a Nebraska winter, the traffic of occasional farm trucks packs down the snow. It leads these roads to become endless straight line roads of packed ice.
These make the perfect long road to tow a sled behind a car. And your speed could approach 50 MPH + if you had a good run.
By the time we figured this out, that old toboggan was battered like the surface of the moon. We needed a better sled.
Carlos had a sense of style. At the time we named all of our fun devices variants of “Bad Mo-Fo”
The sled became Bad Mo-Fo III
Carlos was a Steelers fan and took some inspiration here. Gold rails, black seating, and a proper name in gold stencil paint. Even a little bit of glitter in there. This was our chariot. And this chariot flew through the Nebraska country side.
(This story was updated December 19 2020 with a few pictures below)
I had a 4 seat car, and Carlos drove a two door ’89 pimp mobile as described above. My car could fit 2 passengers, and this sled in the back. Carlos and I could take a friend or two along if we took both my car, and the pimp mobile. We did this a few times. Word got around school. We’d go out over and over again taking a couple of friends. Each time we’d come back miraculously alive and unharmed. After a while, we had a waiting list of people who wanted to go out and do this nonsense. A friend recently discovered old pictures of a trip we did together. She was kind enough to scan these.
Carlos on a sled, date: some time in the late 1990s. Perhaps 1998 or 1998.
Note the Steelers jacket and cheap as shit eye goggles.
My car and the pimp mobile. Snowpacked roads straight as an arrow
Al on the sled.
Safety tips
Note the goggles. You have to be safe doing this. God forbid a piece of gravel hits you in the eye.
Now this was the late 90s after all. So helmets were never used.
The padded clothing helps. Coveralls were great. You’re actually sitting so low to the ground that when you inevitably fall off at 50 MPH, you just roll down the road. So tuck your arms, and just roll with it until your body comes to a stop.
The Cock Block Heard Round the World
So this story starts and ends in Las Vegas, and we’ve received special permission to retell it. Like most good stories this was an adventure of several men in their 20s trying to do things that are well beyond their actual abilities.
On the night this story starts, the group of guys was in a fancy hotel, we were well groomed and dressed to the nines. We didn’t know what “being dressed to the nines” means, but we knew it was probably good so we did it. We were looking to charm equally adventurous ladies into spending time with us. Obviously, we had no idea how to do this — just the vague notion that this would be time well spent.
To the shock of most (and to the horror of others) somehow Mike worked up the courage to sit himself down next to an absolutely stunning woman at a blackjack table. Her smile leveled small cities. Her hair glistened like sapphires. She was more than what was rightfully appropriate for a friend of ours. We watched as he proceeded to not embarrass himself. There was no accidental spitting, no weird body noises… in fact, he seemed to be successfully charming her. He joked; she laughed. He teased her; she tapped his shoulder in mock protest. Things. Were. Happening.
The table cooled down — winning hands started losing. Mike faced a choice: stay with her and lose his paycheck? Move tables and lose her magic? The young hero made the decision and moved. A hush fell upon the group… she moved with him. The group cheered (from a safe, non-interfering distance).
As minutes turned into tens of minutes, and as tens of minutes teetered on an hour, it became apparent that Mike was doing something that the group of guys would need to document and tell stories about. We were watching the stuff of legend.
And then Carlos came back from the bathroom.
Carlos, a man who sees clearly and speaks plainly, sized up the situation unfolding at the blackjack table. He understood the dynamics. He could see where things were heading. And he did the spectacular: he chose the shortest path.
Carlos sauntered over to the blackjack table. He sat himself down next to the beautiful woman. And he said in an all-too-powerful-voice: “HEY MIKE, what’s our room number? She’s hot. You should ask her to come party with us, bud!” And reached over and slapped Mike on the back.
And the guys had been right. This night was the stuff of legends: Carlos had executed the fastest, the highest-visibility, and the most brutal cockblock ever witnessed by a group of charming, highly-intoxicated young men dressed to the nines.
(The story from another person’s point of view)
Ok, lets be real here. Mike wasn’t getting anywhere… he was smitten, she was humoring him. This wasn’t going anywhere. If you’re winning hand after hand after hand at blackjack and some guy is sitting next to you hitting on you, are you going to get up and move? Of course not! You’re winning money! You’ll stay there and humor the guy. May-be he’s lucky!
But yes, Carlos did come into the scene and ask this woman if she wanted to come party with us. And he did it loudly at peak drunken Carlos. Those facts are not in dispute. But Mike wasn’t getting anywhere…
Carlos’ Dream
Carlos was nothing if not stubborn. He was creative, resourceful, and street smart, but academics were a challenge for him.
Carlo’s dream was to become a chiropractor. School was challenging, the exams were challenging. But Carlos would not be deterred. Stubborn…
Bit by bit, inch by inch, Carlos chased his dream. Nothing could stop him.
On October 23, 2015 he achieved his dream and opened his own practice. Redzone Chiropractic. I’m sure it was his proudest achievement.
Final Duty as Pallbearer
The reader will find many voices in the stories above.
This is Al talking now.
I didn’t have a brother. I considered Carlos my brother. His family described me as “family.” They asked me to serve as one of his pallbearers. This is a precious honor for me.
Carlos was a man. A gentleman. He was kind to children, generous to others. Hard-working, loyal and family oriented. A fine example of a man.
Pall bearing is an archaic tradition. Today we have hearses, and wheeled carts, and the duty is less physically demanding. And over time the world has become more compassionate, and inclusive. This is all for the good. A woman can do anything a man can do. But for Carlos, this was one final duty reserved for the men in his life.
We nine men, who are strong and able, serve the helpless dead. The demands of being men sound in our heads.
“Be a man”
“Stand up straight"
“Look forward toward the altar.”
“. . . and don’t cry.”
“At the moment of truth… STAND, LIFT, CARRY, WALK. Do it strongly, securely, but gently.”
The pallbearer carries the weight for the family. It’s a gesture of respect and love. And for me it was a sacred duty and an honor.
Fin