{"id":12817,"date":"2012-12-12T17:59:32","date_gmt":"2012-12-12T22:59:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/?p=12817"},"modified":"2024-12-07T18:58:12","modified_gmt":"2024-12-07T23:58:12","slug":"the-real-world-parts-i-and-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/2012\/12\/12\/the-real-world-parts-i-and-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"THE REAL WORLD (PARTS I and II)"},"content":{"rendered":"

PART I<\/span>
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I worked at a key warehouse as big as Home Depot. But just keys.\u00a0 The\u00a0 warehouse supervisor drove a golf cart.<\/p>\n

I packed car keys.\u00a0 This was a summer job.<\/p>\n

My dad worked in the front office.<\/p>\n

My shift was about seven hours too long.\u00a0 I rested on my cart for massive breaks. Sarge, the warehouse supervisor, threatened to fire me, but he had a problem — my dad (aka the front office).<\/em><\/p>\n

I told<\/strong><\/span> my father I wanted out of the job; I didn\u2019t want any more money; I didn’t want a car; I didn\u2019t want a UAW card. I had several thousand dollars from my bar mitzvah money.\u00a0 Let me go.\u00a0 I could be in Barcelona in a minute.<\/p>\n

But I was stuck in the warehouse.\u00a0 Big presses stamped out car keys.\u00a0 Kaboom.<\/p>\n

A band instrument factory was right next door.\u00a0 Why couldn’t my dad work there? King Musical Instruments.\u00a0\u00a0 King had an employee who stood at the end of the assembly line and blew saxes all day.<\/p>\n

Next time around, work at King, Dad.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

PART II<\/span>
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The taxicab supervisor, smoking a stogie, asked, \u201cWhere\u2019s Charity Hospital?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know, ” I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere’s the Federal Building?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNinth Street.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Pick-Carter<\/strong><\/span> Hotel?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Hollenden House?”<\/p>\n

“Downtown — St. Clair.”<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople want to know where their hotel is,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Fair enough.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

But hired me.\u00a0 Yellow Cab.<\/p>\n

I drove welfare recipients with vouchers to hospitals, and workers to Republic Steel Works #4.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t drive many rich people; I thought I was going to drive rich people, but it was poor people.<\/p>\n

I picked<\/span> up a fare downtown.\u00a0 The customer said, \u201cSeverance Hall.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAre you Claudio Abbado?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you know!\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

I knew because I had seen hi’s picture in the morning paper.<\/p>\n

I stopped at my neighbor, John, afterward, and told him I had just driven a famous person.\u00a0 I said, “He\u2019s a conductor from Italy.”<\/p>\n

“Why<\/strong> did<\/strong><\/span> he come here?\u201d John said. John’s favorite expression was “Cleveland is the armpit of the nation. ”\u00a0 Put that slogan on your cab door.\u00a0 This was 1970.<\/p>\n

Taxi driving ultimately didn’t agree with me. A cabbie told me to carry a bat.\u00a0 He said, \u201cA bat isn\u2019t a concealed weapon. It\u2019s legal.”\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

I had<\/span> a low batting average.<\/p>\n

My cab stalled at Fairmount<\/span> Circle.\u00a0 The engine smoked.\u00a0 I left the cab and hitched back to the Noble Road garage.<\/p>\n

The supervisor said, “You mean you left your cab, son?”<\/p>\n

“I knew<\/strong><\/span> I could get back here. ”<\/p>\n

“You mean you left your cab unattended?”<\/p>\n

“Yes.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Fairmount Circle, 1970<\/p><\/div>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PART I I worked at a key warehouse as big as Home Depot. But just keys.\u00a0 The\u00a0 warehouse supervisor drove a golf cart. I packed car keys.\u00a0 This was a summer job. My dad worked in the front office. My shift was about seven hours too long.\u00a0 I rested on my cart for massive breaks. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,11,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cleveland-full","category-coming-of-age","category-toby-stratton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12817"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32616,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12817\/revisions\/32616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}