tookerntax

Never had a friend like that before or sinceNever laughed so hard in my life as I did with MannyManny was money in the bank for meNobody ever gave us any Jewboy shitA little back in boot camp, but that was itWhen Manny fought, the guys would bet their cigarettes on himBuddy Falcone and Manny Rabinowitz were always the two winners for us whenever we fought another baseAfter the fight with Manny the other guy would say that nobody had ever hit him as hard in his lifeManny ran the entertainment with me, the boxing smokersThe duo--the Jewish leathernecksManny got the wiseguy recruit who made all the trouble and weighed a chanel handbags on sale hundred and forty-five pounds to fight somebody a hundred and sixty pounds who he could be sure would beat the shit out of him"Always pick a redhead, Ee-oh," Manny said, "he'll give you the best fight in the worldRedhead'll never quitManny going up to Norfolk to fight a sailor, a middleweight contender before the war, and whipping himExercising the battalion before breakfastMarching the recruits down to the pool every night to teach them to swimWe practically threw them in--the old-fashioned way of teaching swimming, but you had to swim to be a marineAlways had to be ready to do ten more push-ups than any of the miu miu clutch recruitsThey'd challenge me, but I was in shapeGetting on the bus going to play ballThe long distances we flewBob Collins on the team, the big Stgot drunk for the first time in my life, talked for two hours nonstop about playing ball for Weequahic and then threw up all over the deckIrish guys, Italian guys, Slovaks, Poles, tough little bastards from Pennsylvania, kids who'd run away from fathers who worked in the mines and beat them with belt buckles and with their fists--these were the guys I lived with and ate with and slept alongsideEven an Indian guy, a Cherokee, a third basemanCalled him Piss Cutter, the same as the fendi spy zucca bag name for our capsNot all of them decent people but on the whole all rightLots of organized grabassPlayed against Fort BenningCherry Point, North Carolina, the marine air baseBeat Charleston Navy YardWe had a couple of boys who could throw that ballOne pitcher went on to the TigersWent down to Rome, Georgia, to play ball, over to Waycross, Georgia, to an army baseCalled the army guys doggiesSaw things I never sawSaw the life the Negroes liveMet every kind of Gentile you can think ofMet beautiful southern girlsSkinned 'er back and squeezed 'er downSat in a rundown slopchute in Mobile, Alabama, where I was damn glad the balenciaga bag black shore patrol was just outside the doorPlaying basketball and baseball with the Twenty-second Regiment Got to be a United States MarineGot to wear the emblem with the anchor and the globe"No pitcher in there, Ee-oh, poke it outta here, Ee-oh--" Got to be Ee-oh to guys from Maine, New Hampshire, Louisiana, Virginia, Mississippi, Ohio--guys without an education from all over America calling me Ee-oh and nothing moreJust plain Ee-oh to themDischarged June 2, 1947Got to marry a beautiful girl named DwyerGot to run a business my father built, a man whose own father couldn't speak EnglishGot to live in the prettiest spot in the big chanel w