The Pilgrims Arrive, But They Have No Limestone

When the pilgrims arrived in New York City, there was no Empire State Building. "How the hell are we going to raise tourist revenue?" was the question on every city father's mind. There was another problem. To build the Empire State Building, they were going to need limestone, and lots of it. Where to get it?

Bloomington, Indiana. Well, not exactly. About twenty-five miles south of there. Or maybe north. One of the directions. Still, a long journey from New York City, and this was before all the tracks had been laid for the subway.

They had to hoof it. In other words, walk. And ride on horseback and canoe, when the opportunity to trade with the locals arose. Took them a long time to get there, but they did, and now all they had to do was dig a quarry, using shovels and dynamite and whatever else they could lay their hands on. A practically forever task, but these are pilgrims. Not easily daunted. They dug and blasted and before you could say "ouch, I just blew my hand off!" they had 600,000 pounds or tons or however much limestone they needed. Now they just had to figure out how to haul all that limestone back to New York City without getting taxed to death, or beaten to a pulp by the locals. Unfortunately for the pilgrims, they did get beaten to a pulp by the locals, who stole John Day's shiny tin pouch with the papers meant for John Jacob Astor, letting him know all about the network of trading posts they were building out west, where the fur was.

Still, they persisted, and when they got back to New York City with the limestone, somebody said, "aren't we going to need some steel?" Everybody looked at each other and said "sh*t, why didn't I think of that?"

And that's how come the Empire State Building wasn't built in a day.

The Quitter

As I crank up my subscriber generating machine, which is just a fancy way of describing the one-by-one emails, text messages, LinkedIn messages, and Facebook messages I’m sending to get me 10,000 (eek!) subscribers by July 23, I’m contemplating the advice of speaker agent extraordinaire, Christa Haberstock, Creator of The Obvious Advantage™. I’ve been grappling with that damnable Obvious Advantage™ since I first heard about it, unable to figure out what the hell mine is. And then it struck me, as it has before, only this time maybe I’ve got it. You see, ever since I was very young, my dad had me pegged as a Quitter™. Which, in his book, was really bad. That’s why he made me join the swim team at the age of 7, which I’m sure I’ve talked about before and will talk about again. The point of this particular story is that it dawned on me just now that my Obvious Advantage™ is that, yes, I am a Quitter™. Always have been. Always will be. Here’s a list of things I’ve quit, in no particular order:

Preschool, the day I refused to get on the bus in spite of my mom trying to drag me onto it. No more tuna fish sandwiches and tomato juice for me! Swim team, after several years of them not letting me quit because they didn’t want me staying home watching Speed Racer. The clarinet, because it made me burp. Boy Scouts, because all the boys in my troop were mean and called me names like “spaz” and “pussy.” Hebrew High, even though it was my idea to go in the first place. Smoking pot, because it was incompatible with running cross country and track. College, so I could be a rich and famous harmonica player and novelist. Harmonica playing and novel writing then going back to college, because I needed to give up childish dreams and get a real job someday. My job at Woolworth after less than a month, for killing the plants. My job at Music Plus after two weeks, so I could ride a bicycle from Los Angeles to Palo Alto, only making it as far as Santa Cruz before my back went out. My job at Domino’s the second or third time, because now I was lost in Tucson and my car broke down in the rain, and the boss didn’t care what my excuse was.

You get the idea. Oh wait, there’s more. Eating meat and dairy so I could live on what I thought was the ideal human diet of fruit and nuts because Mahatma Gandhi, Viktoras Kulvinskas, and Dick Gregory said so. Fruit and nuts, five years later, because one day after Farmer’s Market, I was standing outside the Pollo Norteño and was really hungry. Plus I felt like eating nothing but fruit and nuts was going to kill me, even though it was the ideal human diet.

Coffee. I don’t even like coffee. I hate coffee. But if I don’t drink it, I get coffee FOMO. I lost count of how many times I quit drinking coffee, then went back to it. I should give up on quitting coffee, but it’s hard not to. I love it early in the day, but by noon, when my stomach goes sour, I wish I never drank it. By the following morning, I forget and start the cycle all over again. This can go on for years. I thought maybe if I just add Pepcid and Tums, that I could get away with it. But Pepcid and Tums don’t work, at least not for me, so I quit those, too.

Tea. Makes me irritable, gives me hang nails.

Oh! Almost forgot. I quit taking Montelukast for my allergies/asthma (undiagnosed, but not lung cancer, which I originally thought when they found a spot on my lung one time when my wife, Penny, was out of town. I was sure it wasn’t a heart problem, because I walked Mazie, the good dog, every day, so therefore it must be lung cancer. I don’t even smoke. To make things right with the world, I recorded a farewell video and posted it to YouTube, pissing the hell out of Penny, because even though I didn’t tell her so she wouldn’t worry, my friend Mike, who I’m friends with because he’s Penny’s friend Gretchen’s boyfriend, told Gretchen, then she told Penny, then five minutes later Penny calls and says “what the hell?!?” in a contemptuous, “Louis, you’re an idiot and cruel” kind of way. Anyway, it turned out NOT to be lung cancer, so yay) yesterday, at the direction of my allergy doctor, who said that Montelukast is a black box drug, which I had to look up to learn that you shouldn’t take black box drugs if you can at all help it. I decided to give up Flonase and Zyrtec, too, which is why my eyes hurt today.

Graphic design and production. Because of Andy. And Bob. Prima donna art directors.

Keynote speaking. I can’t solve your big, expensive problem, or maybe I just don’t want to. And what sort of value do I bring to the customer. Who cares? So I quit and became a storyteller, purely for the sake of the story, which is where I’m at now.

Oh yeah, I quit being an IT guy. Sold the business in what’s surely the biggest miracle in the history of selling a business. Why would anyone want my business?

Got a job at the credit union. Didn’t quit that. Got separated. For telling stories.

Standup comedy, temporarily. I’ve kind of merged it into storytelling.

I’m sure there’s more, but you get the idea. I’m a Quitter™. It’s my Obvious Advantage™.

And I’m thinking, once I get my 10,000 subscribers by July 23 and launch my 50-state storytelling tour, with a Grand Finale performance of my one-man show, A NIGHT YOU WON’T REMEMBER — AND NOT BECAUSE YOU CAN’T, to a sold-out crowd at Madison Square Garden, what better story topic than NONE DARE CALL IT QUITTING? ChatGPT thinks it’s commercially viable, and I agree.

Not only that. My entire career can center around the theme of quitting. I’ll go from town to town, inspiring Quitters™ everywhere I go. I’ll keep going till I get sick of touring, and then one last final tour: THIS IS IT. I QUIT.

This thing’s got legs.

Behind Every Great Man is an Even Greater Sparring Partner

Chapter One

Delilah was hot. Everybody knows that. Had she been a dog, she would have been a gorgeous mix of Pom and Chihuahua. A Pomehuahua, with long brown hair and blonde highlights. Samson would do anything for her, even take on the mighty world champion, Sonny Liston. His track record was impressive, so far. "I am the greatest," he said, and it wasn't a brag. Not everyone could tear a lion apart like he could.

When he boarded the tour bus that day, Delilah demurred. "I've got a headache," she said, pressing her fingers to her temples. "Miss me." And she blew him a kiss.

"C'mon, let's go!" yelled Cassius, his sparring partner. Everyone was already on the bus, restless and excited, laughing at what was yet to come. They were headed to Vegas, to Liston's house, to taunt him with a megaphone and convince him to fight the newcomer, Samson. "Any fighter worth his weight can shred a lion," according to Liston. He wasn't about to waste his time on an unknown showboat.

Samson's plan was simple. Show up at Liston's house with the megaphone and belittle the guy, mercilessly. Follow him around the country, show up everywhere he was pegged to fight, and wear him down till he agreed to meet in the ring. He waved at Delilah through the open window of the bus, then he closed his eyes to visualize what it must be like to knock out a reigning world heavyweight champion.

He must’ve fallen asleep, because when he woke up, startled, the scenery was completely different and unsettling, as if to match the dream he had, in which Delilah stood over him, laughing. He was in chains, all his strength gone, and unseen voices mocking him. “What will you do now, great champion?” Samson shrugged. “Just a stupid dream.”

Several food and bathroom stops later, Samson and crew arrived in Vegas. Now, to find Sonny’s house. That part was easy, it was on one of those maps to the stars’ homes that you can buy at the gas station. But some of the boys on the bus wanted to go gamble first, and see a show, so that’s what they did, at the Tropicana, because they liked the name, and you could also park a bus there without too much trouble. “Cassius, go on ahead and see if they’ve got enough rooms for all of us tonight.”

Samson sat on the idling bus for a while before going in, savoring a moment’s solitude. “Enough of that,” he finally said, tempted by the thought of a ribeye steak you could get for a bargain just by joining The Players Club. As he entered the hotel, Cassius waved him over. Not only was Cassius his sparring partner, he was a wise friend who always had Samson’s back. “You can have two drinks max,” said Cassius. “And we spar at midnight.” Samson laughed and slapped him on the back, which you could do pretty hard with Cassius.

“Look at this place,” Samson said. Flashing lights and ringing bells, cigarette smoke, showgirls in feathers and wild costumes. Nothing like anything you’d see back home. “Maybe just one drink.”

They sat in the bar and had a drink. The waiter said “we’ll take care of you this evening, sirs.” A man walked up to Samson and said, “hey big fella, mind if I squeeze that arm?” He was a little man, with a big grin, and Samson could tell he meant no harm. People were always coming up and asking if they could squeeze his arm, just to make sure it was real. You don’t see muscles like that very often, so it’s natural to assume it must be some sort of trick. “You go right ahead,” he said, and the man reached out, stretching his hand as big as he could, and of course he couldn’t wrap his little hand around that massive arm.

“Holy Toledo!” the man exclaimed. “How is that even possible?” He sat down in the booth next to Cassius, not waiting for an invitation. “You look like you could tear this place apart. I’m surprised they let you in.” The three men swapped stories for a while, then the little man said, “come be my guests at the Copa, I’ll be playing later tonight.”

“Playing what?” asked Cassius, but the man was gone. “I swear I’ve seen that face somewhere.”

Samson nodded, but he didn’t know where. “Just one of those familiar faces. You hungry?”

“Heck yes,” said Cassius, and he called over the waiter. The waiter insisted “we’ll take care of you this evening, sirs” and refused to say why. “This town’s funny,” Cassius said, more of a thought than anything else. Samson agreed, without saying so. He was so used to everything being a setup for something else.

“Let’s go grab ourselves a ribeye.”

They left the bar and made their way through the cigarette haze to the Beau Rivage Room, suggested by the concierge who’d signed them up for The Players Club. “Best steaks in all of Vegas,” he said, whether he meant it or not. The maitre d’ seated them at one of the red booths, where the men ordered glasses of ice water to start.

“Ribeyes all around,” Samson said to the waiter. “Spinach and creamed corn on the side for me.”

“Same,” said Cassius. He was a calorie counter. He didn’t care how he got to his daily total, as long as he got there.

The men spent dinner talking strategy as it pertained to both drawing Liston into a fight and to the fight itself. When it was time to go, the waiter said, “we’ll take care of you this evening, sirs.” Samson raised his eyebrows and looked at Cassius. Cassius shrugged and said, “Players Club, I suppose.”

As they walked out of the restaurant, Samson said, “I forgot to ask about the rooms.”

“Yeah, plenty of rooms for everyone. ‘We’ll take care of you this evening, sir.’” He laughed. “Somebody wants us here.”

“Spar at midnight?” Samson asked. “You’ve got a gym arranged?”

“All set.”

“Cool. I’m going to go up to the room for a bit.”

Cassius tossed him the key to room 306. “11:45 in the lobby.”

Samson flashed him a thumbs up and made his way up to room 306.