October 12, 2004

• The Cop and the Hippy

  
  

  I dreamed about Bob Manlove last night.  (What a wonderful name for  gay guy, but Bob was a straight arrow.  But I digress.)  Bob and I worked together at the James Lett Company, oldest photo store in the country–Matthew Brady purchased his wet plates there for his civil war pictures.  He was a tall rangy guy, absurdly good looking–like a cross between Robert Urich and Tom Cruise, blue eyes to die for.  And he was real easy going,  customers trusted him on sight.  Anyway, he wanted to be a cop.  The troopers wanted him to do undercover work on college campuses, befirend dopers and then bust them.  He was above  this heinous crap, and ended up working as a patrolman for the Camp Hill PD.

  
  

  He’s working there maybe a week, heading home at end of shift, and he gets a call–burglary in progress.  Instead of ignoring it, like any smart off-duty cop would, he heads for the scene, sirens and lights blazing. Protect and serve and all that.  Until he gets hit, head-on, by a drunk driver.  He was all smashed to shit, was hospitalized with many broken bones and internal injuries.

  
  

  I decided to cheer him up, visit him in the hospital.  Now at this point, you need to realize the mind-set of the times–early 70′s.  Cops hated hippies–we tended to disrespect lawn order, wore the flag on our butt, and pelted the fuckers with bottles and rocks when they tried to break up our anti-war demonstrations.  We in turn, hated the cops–”Off the pigs,” as a popular chant of the time had it. And many of us had the living shit beat out of us with nightsticks for no good reason.  Okay, I was more  a freak than a hippy, but we’ll save that distinction for a later blog.  But I looked the part,  had hair half-way down my back, plus a fu manchu mustache and a goatee.

  
  

  Anyway, I decided to don my most outrageous regalia, maybe give him a laugh.  So I go bopping into his hospital room in this purple shirt, and hot-pink corduroy bell-bottoms (with aqua and canary-yellow patch pockets), and sing out “Peace and love, brother!”

  
  

  His room was full of cops.  Big cops, little cops, cops with hidden guns.  State troopers in bullet-proof vests, dripping with riot gear.  County sheriffs  wearing cowboy hats and fucking pearl-handled Colt 45s.  Barney Fife-clone deputies, but still armed and dangerous.  They stared coldly at me. They hated me on sight.  Every  last one of them wanted to kill me.

  
  

  I gulped, said “Um, hi.  Um, hope you’re feeling  okay.”

  
  

  Bob almost fell out of his body cast laughing.   The other cops gave him this “Do you know this guy?” look.

  
  

  My mission complete, I got the hell out of Dodge, went home and smoked a LOT of dope.

  • 3:10 pm
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