Elan Mudrow
Smidgens
Been Leaving Ever Since
There used to be a couple. Bud, Miller. Pissy, yellow stuff with names of factory workers and truck drivers. Now, flavors flourish like house cats, calico, Siamese, tabby.
He loves tabs.
Drunk on credit. Purrrrrrr. That’s something to be proud of. More important than an IPA or a Kölsch, cheaper if you drink Oly and Pabst. Same shit, different tap.
The bar he goes to, the last dirty one… without video poker, old vacuum tube TV. Representing some cultural fabrication of what punk rockers call authenticity. And the patrons, busy pretending they’re stupid ‘til they arrive at not being bright, loud, speaking a type-o-talk, bar language with its own set of jokes.
But he thinks, alone. Dangerous. Liable to cause ideas. Thinking is a form of credit. Get now, pay later. No tabs on thinking. Different form of credit. Ties in to all shit….urges…..creative juices….one night stands, arguing with the neighbor upstairs with the low bass speakers, the barista who gave him decaf , the dentist about to pull out all his remaining teeth.
A ways back, he got kicked out of Olympia brewery, carrying around a malt liquor. Colt 45. Can’t call no beer Olympia. Shorten that shit. Oly, like your best drinking pal.
Revolutionary branding. For the cause. Sam Adams. Schlitz. Henry’s, and Lucky with a joke under each bottle cap.
He gulped the last of that lost Colt down, placed the empty on the ground. A group of white coats, beer scientists, glared at him from their office windows. Who needs scientists for rotgut?
He was asked to leave. Been leaving ever since.
17 Comments on “Been Leaving Ever Since”
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Elan Mudrow 
You nailed it. Great write.
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Nice
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Beautiful foggy cadence. *Raises glass*
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Powerful write. You’ve really captured the downside of alcohol.
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I keep rereading it as I find it captivating. Paints a picture that brings back memories.
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Great!
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Thanks
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Good one, I really liked this!
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Perhaps both. Thanks.
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Ah, the stench you portray in the beginning. Lived it for a while as a contract house sound engineer. I can still smell it. No bottles because everything was on semi-cold tap.
I like the end, too. Went a different way and been going that way since… for better or worse. But was he asked to leave, or was he leaving?
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It’s still out there, but has become a branding technique.
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I understand. Thanks, my friend!
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Makes me miss my beer~!
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I don’t understand it, but I can relate. I never played music in those bars. Mostly just rued reality. good work
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Thanks!
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Dilly! DIlly!
Well written. I really enjoyed!
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Paints a very unique and fuzzy picture of memories I think I had in my early twenties while playing music in the little town bars around the midwest.
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