A Night at Fischman’s
The Dreamer is outside, at night, at Fischman’s Liquors.
There’s a police investigation. A Thief has stolen something. The Thief also keeps changing the color of the Dreamer’s car from red to blue, blue to red, red to blue. The Dreamer is working with an investigator. They are out back in the parking lot. The Dreamer shows the investigator that there are two basement areas under the parking lot where the liquor is stored. Then the Dreamer realizes something, and looks into a parking spot. A medical bed is parked there. Underneath the bed are fruits spray painted white. The Dreamer picks up a fruit and it’s soft, soggy, overripe.
The Dreamer goes inside Fischman’s and his Mother is there. The Dreamer asks “isn’t there a (surveillance) video tape in the high room?” Mother refuses to access the tapes. The Dreamer switches gears and says “I’m going to have to run this business.” Mother rejects. “You’re going to need help,” says the Dreamer. “You’re not a business person,” he gaslights. Mother replies, “You should run for President, like Trump.” The Dreamer responds, “You have to get more aggressive.” Mother says, “Relax, life is short.” Dreamer says “Yes, that’s why you have to attack!”
Context: Fischman’s Liquors is a bar in Chicago that was owned by my Step-father Peter, where my Mother Marie worked as a bartender, where I also worked as a bar-back, cleaning crew, and cash register operator during college from approximately 2000-2003. I abandoned Chicago and that work environment in order to start a new life, first in Iowa then in Virginia. Fischman Liquors has long since shut down. Peter is deceased (2024); he spent his last years in a memory home. My Mother Marie is deceased (2020); she passed in a violent death from recurrence of breast cancer.
Associations: Fischman’s is a dirty, shadowy place: somewhere that I considered at that time to be beneath me: I didn’t want to work there, but I had to support myself, I had trouble finding another job to support myself, and Mother overpaid me to do the job. In retrospect, it was special to be able to spend that time with my Mother, even if I hated it there and I hated seeing her work there, as a bartender, often drinking to the point of intoxication. Mother was impatient, always on the go, not often able to relax. She was a business person, but not a good one. She supported me to become a good business person, to become a healthy person in general, by showing me the inside of that business and seeing the regular patrons there. I saw that life as a dead end.
Feelings: curiosity, guilt, anger
