Danger Old Man

In 2008 I left my family in Thailand and moved to Fort Greene. The neighborhood abutted the closed Brooklyn Navy Yard, which had employed 80,000 during the War Years. Bars, brothels, opium dens, and gambling rooms dotted the slope up to Fulton Street, serving as the inspiration for HUbert Selby Jr.s LAST EXIT TO BROOKLYN. After the Yard's closure in 1966 combined with the completion of the BQE or US 278 destroyed the neighborhood. Sin was replaced by danger and drinking by drugs. Only the toughest joints remained protected by loyal customers, but after Sellers shut its doors the only local bar left was Frank's Lounge.

I've drunk at hundreds of bars around the world. Only a few have been home; Concannon and Sennett's in Brighton Mass., tHe Gaslight Pub in Park Slope, CGGBs, le Pere Tranquille in Les Halles, the Soho House in London, and the Buffalo Bar in Pattaya.

Coming bck from the city I got off the C train and spotted a bar across Fulton Street. It looked old school. The second I entered the bar into Frank's Lounge, I know knew where I was. The ceiling was stucco whit4e. The TV was an old Trinatron. There were three people in the bar. Buddy Guy was on te stereo.

Hey white boy," a big man drawled with a lifelong Delta accent.

"Firstly while I ain't as old as you, I ain't no boy."

"I turned to young Chinesse-Mexican bartender.

"If you serve gin and tonics really strong, then I'm a happy man." I signaled the Chinese bartender." "You got the right place and Homer, stop harassing the customers, I'm trying to make money." "Please make mine a double..Put in a big glass. Twice the gin half the ice."

"And get 'Homer' a Heiniken." "I don't need a beer, Cracker." He stuck all his drawl in every word.

I had been a race traitor in Boston and said with a hard no-H South Shore, "I ain't no cracker."

"What you know about crackers?"

"The crack of the whip."

"Homer, shut your hole," said a nattily dressed man in his 70s. He stuck out his hand and said, "Old Bill. don't mind Homer, he's harmless."

"Excepting when I'm not." Homer said and shook my hand. "Sorry White Boy, but you all look the same to me." ,