A Plague Upon Your Family

Everything seemed to slow down as he picked up a fist-sized rock. He raised it high over his head and was threatening Maureen. Terror showed in the whites of her eyes. If he brought that rock down it would be all over for her. Nobody moved. It seemed like the moment was frozen in time. I didn’t think, I reacted. In the four steps it took me to get to him I was going full speed. It’s amazing what adrenaline can do for you. I didn’t punch him, I didn’t tackle him, I didn’t try to swat the rock out of his hand, I just full on slammed into him, right into his back. Maureen scrambled out of the way as the both of us toppled like cut trees in a forest. Chris had brought his hands in to brace for the fall, unfortunately one of them was still clutching the rock. The force of me landing on him drove his face and chin into the stone. The horrifying crack that resounded from the rock shattering his teeth and jaw was ear splitting. When I got off of Chris and he rolled over I thought he was wearing a mask. What remained of his jaw line was two inches left of center. Seven teeth had been shattered and blood poured profusely through his nose and mouth. More than one person came up to help only to walk away retching. I stumbled away stunned. I hadn’t made it more than three steps before Chris’ mournful wailing began. If I thought the bones breaking was bad, this was horrible. An ambulance showed up within minutes, the cops a minute or two after that. They found me sitting in the living room, drinking a beer. They let me finish it before they arrested me. I was charged with attempted manslaughter. It was dropped down to assault after the police figured out that I had nothing to do with the initial near drowning.

Talbot 2 – Cops 3

TALBOTSODE #6

This final encounter with the police is what saved me and my family’s life. When I was a kid, nineteen, I used to work for a small Paving Company. We were working in downtown Boston and if you work on any street in Boston you have to have a police detail for traffic. So its high summer, it had to have been 90 degrees and 90% humidity. Crappy combination to begin with. Then you throw on top of that the 375 degrees of the material we are working with and you have a recipe, not so much for disaster but definitely for flaring tempers. My job that day was to operate the 10 ton street roller. As the paving spreader machine lays down roadway it is my job to follow behind and compact the material down.

Before the asphalt is rolled it is a very soft and pliable material so much so that a man walking across it can mar the new surface up to two inches deep, not to mention what a car can do to this new material. Well our traffic detail cop decided that he was going to let crossing traffic go across the new hot top. I asked him for just two minutes so that I could get the roadway rolled and at least reasonably ready to withstand traffic. He didn’t listen. What happens to cops that they get such an arrogant attitude about them? I know they deal daily with some of the scummiest people on the planet but to become so jaded to the rest of us doesn’t make any sense. You would think that they would want to cling to those people that are the reason they do the job in the first place. Somewhere along the way they must have lost their people GPS.

In a nutshell he basically tells me to ‘Go fuck myself’. No matter that this cop is the dick that lets the traffic cross over, I’m going to be the one blamed for letting the pavement get ruined. so I gunned the engine on the roller and was now traveling somewhere in the whopping 4 mph range. I was going to try to get at least one roll through before the cars started across. All the cop could see was this giant machine bearing down on him. So even though he could have made himself a sandwich and half finished it before I got to him I was charged with intent to commit harm with a deadly weapon. Are you kidding me? A toddler could have outdistanced me, but this fat, doughnut eating, cynical prick was just pissed off that I held up the traffic. The life I was living came to an abrupt halt as I stood in that court room.

The judge had my record in front of him and he wasn’t impressed.

“Mr. Talbot, I have thought long and hard about what I should do with you.” I kept silent, it seemed the better part of valor. “You have a decent high school record. You are in college. You work, which a lot of kids your age choose not to do. But you have this streak that runs through you, Mr. Talbot. Something which I feel if it is not reigned in will lead to an untimely demise for you. I am going to give you an option Mr. Talbot, it might not be the easy route, in fact, I’m hoping that it isn’t. But it just might be what you need. The court recommends 24 months of jail at the Dedham correctional facility followed by 36 months of probation.”

My heart dropped. Jail? That was my option?

“Or.”

I seized ‘Or’ like a drowning man seizes a life jacket.

“Five years active duty in the United States Marine Corps. Which is it Mr. Talbot.”

“Semper fi, your honor.”

“I had hoped so. Good luck young man.” The gavel crashed down. “Court is adjourned. The judge actually came down and shook my hand, I was in a mild state of shock, but it wasn’t jail.

Talbot - 2, Cops – 4, Marine Corps - 1

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