This Old Clotheshorse likes the sweater, the turned up sleeves, the tall neck. Oh yeah the flowers in the gun barrels too. So I am wondering about the hipster in question and turn to The Keeper of the Graveyard since I know he knows these things.
Turns out the hipster is none other than Joel Tournabene.
"So who's Joel Tournabene, Tom?"
"He's in the concrete biz. Mob guy. He was the grandson of Sam Giancana from Chicago. He did some yard work for me, and I hung out with him most of the time. He died in Mexico about five years ago. He was a good friend of [producer/composer] Hal Wilner, and he was a good guy. He had an errant--I don't know how to put this--he used to go around, and when he saw something he liked in somebody's yard, he would go back that night with a shovel, dig it up and plant it in your yard. We used to get a kick out of that. So I stopped saying, 'I really like that rosebush, I really like that banana tree, I really like that palm.' Because I knew what it meant. He came over once with twelve chickens as a gift. My wife said, 'Joel, don't even turn the car off. Turn that car around and take those chickens back where you found them.' He was a good friend, one of the wildest guys I've ever known."
"How's It Gonna End?"
"...Drag your wagon and your plow
Over the bones of the dead
Out among the roses and the weeds
You can never go back
And the answer is no
And wishing for it only
Makes it bleed
Joel Tornabene was broken
On the wheel..."
1 comment:
Joel was my brother; he passed away in 1993. He was indeed a wild guy, however our family was not and is not mafia-connected. That, it seems was a story concocted by Joel himself, why?, I have no idea. But I miss him terribly.
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