And Both Shall Row (The Exact Time IP)

The exact time of death was 5:25 PM. Dead on the shitter. Public toilet. Grand Central Station.
New York, New York, a helluva town.

If you don’t drink and smoke yourself to death like he did.

Oh, and that diet didn’t help him either.

“Fried Bologna sandwich?” I asked him once.

“That’s nothing. you should have seen what I was eating yesterday. Cheese and sausage omelette on a loaf of Italian bread, topped with a heap of smoldering fried potatoes, extra crispy. Gives the sandwich that extra something we all look for.”

“Give you a heart attack, if that’s what you’re looking for.”

Hope I didn’t wish it on him. But there he was was. Calvin Klein’s around his ankles and a Camel dangling from his thin blue lips. Not pretty.
Sorry I was the one to find him. But I was concerned. We were waiting for the 5:31 PM train to Beacon, NY, and he was taking way too long on the crapper.

“John!” I yell. “Come on, man! We got to go! We’re gonna miss the train! I got some icy cold Bud’s here in the bag. Gonna feel good going down. But ain’t gonna taste too good all warm and pissy! But that’s what you’ll get if you don’t get your ass out of there!”

Nothing.

Then I see the hat hit the ground. And he ain’t picking it up.

Well, that ain’t like John. That’s his NY Mets baseball cap. And I know that if anyone ever messed with the hat they’d have one fierce cat on their hands.

I try the usual ‘whistling in the dark’ routine.

“Come on, John!” Quit your clowning and pick up the damn hat!”

Then I see his legs slacken a little to the left, and I hear this thumping sound. Found out later it was his shoulder hitting the partition. But I’ll be damned if he wouldn't let go of the cigarette. That’s a smoker for you. Not even till death do you part.

That was two weeks ago.

Today I stand on the banks of the Hudson river in Beacon, NY. Not too far from Pete Seeger’s house. Man, did John like him some Pete Seeger.

John wanted me to invite Pete to the official Dumping the Dude in the River ceremony. But Pete was off somewhere helping somebody that needed helping. Something we all should be doing, but don’t.

But poor John was beyond helping. So I just sang him the song he wanted Pete to sing. The Water is Wide.

The water is wide
I can’t cross over
And neither have
I wings to fly

Build me a boat
That can carry two . . .

I stop there and get a little teary. I was the number two. Me and John we were everything to each other. Laurel and Hardy, Everly Brothers, a little Sam and Dave (John didn’t think I was a black enough to be Dave with his Sam. But he let me sing anyway).

Then there was Lennon and McCartney. Boy, did we love Lennon and McCartney.

Back in 1964, as teenagers, we got our selves some musical instruments. John got himself a Gibson acoustic like the one John played on You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away in the Help! movie.

Me? What else? A Höfner bass like McCartney.

We worked our asses off that summer, shucking scallops on Martha’s Vineyard, to pay for those beauties.

Oh, we didn’t go to Martha’s Vineyard to work, though. We were nineteen and hitchhiked from New York to Massachusetts, bound for Cape Cod. But along the way we got waylaid hitching a ride on a Mr. Softee ice cream truck.

“You boys ever been to Martha’s Vineyard?” the driver said.

“No, we haven’t,” I said.

“Well, I’m on my way to Woods Hole. you boys can catch a ferry to the island from there,” he said.
“Plenty of young college pussy on the Vineyard this time of year. Hope you boys have some money. Entertaining those Massachusetts types don’t come cheap.”

As it turned out we didn’t have enough money. Squandered it all on beer and food the first three days. And not a pussy in sight.

But we were soon directed by some other down-on-there-luck types like us. And they hooked us up with a fella named Joseph. Turns out he’s the foreman at this warehouse where they shuck scallops. We explain our situation and Joseph hands us each a knife. No point, and dull as can be.

“What are we supposed to do with these?” John asks.

Then Joseph sits us at a long table and at each seat is a barrel of fresh scallops.

“You shuck, boys,” said Joseph, “is what you do.”

“Shuck?” I say.

“You take the damn scallop out of the shell!”

That’s city boys for you. Don’t know our asses from a shucking knife.

But, boy, did we have fun. Never did get any of that college pussy everyone was telling us about.

I’m sure smelling the way we did had a lot to do with that. That’s what eight hour days of shucking does for you.

We bathed in the ocean. Because that’s where we were living. At night we slept in the dunes and hid our gear in the heavy brush during the day. We didn’t want to waste all that good money on a room.

We wasted enough money on beer, cigarettes and the jukebox, though. Got ourselves thrown out of Lou’s Worry, a local tavern, for playing I Want to Hold your Hand one too many times.

The bartender wasn’t too fond of the British Invasion. Beatles or other wise. He was more the Pat Boone type. He’d play Love Letters in the Sand. Then we’d hit him back with the Beatles. We played that game one too many times before he decided to toss us out.

Never did get anywhere with our music.

After we got back to New York we bought our instruments and holed up in my bedroom trying to write tunes like John and Paul. But I suppose you can guess how that went?

There weren’t many like John and Paul. Their stars were aligned just so and there was that special spark in the air when they got together.

Not many sparks like that anymore.

No sparks in my room. That’s for sure. The best we ever come up with was:

Why do I love you?
Love you like I do
Why do I love you?
I love you ‘cause I do.

Pretty damn lousy. But, damn, we had some fun doing it. Singing, playing, smoking cigarettes and sharing quart bottles of Ballantine ale.

We thought we were something and we felt like something. And that was a pretty good feeling

Problem was we couldn’t get that feeling outside the bedroom. One night we were playing at a dive bar and folks thought we were so bad they started throwing darts at our instruments. And every time after, we’d look at our instruments and call them our war wounds. It was a matter of pride with us. And we kept keeping on till one night someone bounced a billiard ball off John’s head and nearly killed him.

It was all I could do to get him and our instruments out of there. Damn, I was scared. John was too stunned to feel anything.

After that we kind of mellowed and went the folk route. Singing If I Had A Hammer, Bottle of Wine and The Water is Wide and such at barbecues and Saturday night Hootenannys.

Now I stand here with these ashes doing the same. It's been a long time since I've sung that song, and I can't believe I still remembered the words. But I did.

God love you John.

The water is wide
I can’t cross over
And neither have
I wings to fly

Build me a boat
That can carry two
And both shall row
My love and I

And both shall row
My love and I