MY DAD'S STORE #4 "BEACH WALKS"
Dad further frustrated and pissed off gramps by giving stuff away free. Gramps was so furious his stumps waggled when dad went to the shoe finders convention with mother in Las Vegas and charmed a Hungarian man named Mike Magid, who had recently invented aerosol spray (“Magic Spray”) cans to dye women's leather and plastic high heels, and managed somehow to buy his entire load with a huge down payment, so that none of his competitors could secure one single can, and then set up a table between the front window and long counter, stocked it with all colors of the new invention, and invited all shoemakers from all over the county to come in mornings and spray-dye their shoes free of charge, no longer having to indulge in the tedious, time-consuming labor of using daubers from bottles.
Now, when we pulled up at 7:15, there was an army of shoemakers holding paper bags of shoes preparing to storm in and get first shot at the spray cans. To these shoemakers, all old country and tight-fisted, the fact that they no longer had to dye shoes by hand and could get it free, was like a shot of euphoria. Meanwhile Dad, scurrying about, in a state of near euphoria himself, introduced himself to the new influx of customers, all of whom felt obligated to buy a little something beside spray cans, and schmoozed them, so that they felt obligated to buy even more, so that the next time they came in for free dye jobs their orders were bigger, and soon they became regulars, culled from the major suppliers as dad promised them free delivery and discounts that cut the throats of his major competition that had ruled for decades and presenting himself as a scourge of the leather and shoe findings business in the LA basin.
He was already hinting at looking for and buying a bigger building so he no longer had to pay rent.
When school started, and I only worked on Saturdays, and Tuesday evenings, I walked down the same street the store was on on the way to Compton High with my three neighborhood pals, and when we passed the store it seemed the busiest hive in captivity, with people milling everywhere. Often I'd halt and rub my nose against the front window until a shoemaker pointed at me and my dad discovered my face, and I'd back up and put up my fists like a menacing boxer and exhort him to come out and fight me. I'd dance around and snort and throw a flurry of punches in an imitation of Sugar Ray Robinson.
Immediately dad put on a face so mean that all my friends were terrified of him, and he'd come to the front door and yell, “Come on, bird boy, let's fight!”
“You can't whip me, old man, I'm too fast,” I'd cry, “You're over the hill, dad.”
“That'll be the day!” he'd shout, stepping out from the doorway, all his shoemakers behind him. “When I'm 80, and you're 50, God willing, I'll whip your ass, bird-boy. You're a mollycoddle, a moma's boy.”
I had a mean face of my own, copied from dad, and I'd put it on, while throwing flurries and dancing. By this time Dad was out on the sidewalk and his shoemakers were with him, really enjoying the spectacle, sometimes twenty of them, and dad challenged me to see who had the “quickest hands,” which he claimed he had, and it was common knowledge in Compton that dad's hands were so quick he could balance 4 pennies on his knuckles and catch all four before they hit the ground. So could I. So we faced each other in a hand-slapping contest. Now kids in cars driving to school stopped, pulled over. The father and son who owned the Richfield gas station across the street ceased working and came to their sidewalk. Kids straggling along behind us stopped. It was ON!
We squared off, standing before each other. I always let him start first, cupping my hands before me, waist-high, while dad held his at his sides like a gun fighter. He always got me first, smashing my knuckles with his heavy brutal hands, a resounding splat! But I usually got away after a few hard slaps and then got him several times, and the more I nailed him the angrier he got, until I felt he might punch me, because no human living hated to lose more than my dad, who was so merciless he cheated my mother in cards and would cheat me at anything if I was stupid enough to get cheated. He talked to me as I repeatedly slapped him: “Ah, the mosquitoes are biting early, ey, bird-boy. You could hit me a hundred times with those pansy shots, and never draw blood, cuz you're a weak willy, a bird-boy...”
But, in front of his shoemakers, his idolaters, his gorge rose and his face flushed into a terrifying agate-eyed purple mask, lip quivering, unnerving me, and when I missed he retaliated and often hit me so hard my knuckles bled, and even though I out hit him, the sign of blood had him gloating insufferably and my friends cringing as traffic tied up with honks galore, his shoemakers patting his back, and when at last we were both worn out and he had to get back to business and I had to get to school, I resumed dancing and throwing flurries and insisting I won, and dad lifted a fist and invited me to “bring it on, punk,” and when we finally turned and crossed the street, I glanced back and discovered him standing at the door grinning proudly, probably bragging that I'd made first string varsity shortstop at a huge high school like Compton, beating out two seniors.
Mother said, “He can't stop bragging about you.”
Meanwhile, dad had also charmed a Japanese man who had created the first rubber flip-flops or beach-walks, simple thongs. Dad had also met him at a convention and managed to buy HIS entire inventory of merchandise, so that our store was packed to the rafters, the aisles so crowded we had to climb over boxes and crates, but now everybody in town was wearing flip-flops, and shoemakers from as far out as the San Fernando Valley and San Bernodino and Orange County came in to buy these thongs; they became so popular that kids were coming into our store and paying retail prices for them.
Dad bought an El Dorado Cadillac convertible, a black beauty, winked at me, and said, “Those beach walks bought this car, Dell.”
“Gramps and mom said you had to borrow money and go in debt to buy the beach walks and the spray cans, dad. They said you risked losing everything.”
“Yeh, well, they're both penny wise and dollar foolish. What'd I tell you?”
“You're not an ordinary man.”
“You gotta take risks to get anywhere, Dell. We made all that money back and then some, and we cornered the market for the future.”
Now, when we pulled up at 7:15, there was an army of shoemakers holding paper bags of shoes preparing to storm in and get first shot at the spray cans. To these shoemakers, all old country and tight-fisted, the fact that they no longer had to dye shoes by hand and could get it free, was like a shot of euphoria. Meanwhile Dad, scurrying about, in a state of near euphoria himself, introduced himself to the new influx of customers, all of whom felt obligated to buy a little something beside spray cans, and schmoozed them, so that they felt obligated to buy even more, so that the next time they came in for free dye jobs their orders were bigger, and soon they became regulars, culled from the major suppliers as dad promised them free delivery and discounts that cut the throats of his major competition that had ruled for decades and presenting himself as a scourge of the leather and shoe findings business in the LA basin.
He was already hinting at looking for and buying a bigger building so he no longer had to pay rent.
When school started, and I only worked on Saturdays, and Tuesday evenings, I walked down the same street the store was on on the way to Compton High with my three neighborhood pals, and when we passed the store it seemed the busiest hive in captivity, with people milling everywhere. Often I'd halt and rub my nose against the front window until a shoemaker pointed at me and my dad discovered my face, and I'd back up and put up my fists like a menacing boxer and exhort him to come out and fight me. I'd dance around and snort and throw a flurry of punches in an imitation of Sugar Ray Robinson.
Immediately dad put on a face so mean that all my friends were terrified of him, and he'd come to the front door and yell, “Come on, bird boy, let's fight!”
“You can't whip me, old man, I'm too fast,” I'd cry, “You're over the hill, dad.”
“That'll be the day!” he'd shout, stepping out from the doorway, all his shoemakers behind him. “When I'm 80, and you're 50, God willing, I'll whip your ass, bird-boy. You're a mollycoddle, a moma's boy.”
I had a mean face of my own, copied from dad, and I'd put it on, while throwing flurries and dancing. By this time Dad was out on the sidewalk and his shoemakers were with him, really enjoying the spectacle, sometimes twenty of them, and dad challenged me to see who had the “quickest hands,” which he claimed he had, and it was common knowledge in Compton that dad's hands were so quick he could balance 4 pennies on his knuckles and catch all four before they hit the ground. So could I. So we faced each other in a hand-slapping contest. Now kids in cars driving to school stopped, pulled over. The father and son who owned the Richfield gas station across the street ceased working and came to their sidewalk. Kids straggling along behind us stopped. It was ON!
We squared off, standing before each other. I always let him start first, cupping my hands before me, waist-high, while dad held his at his sides like a gun fighter. He always got me first, smashing my knuckles with his heavy brutal hands, a resounding splat! But I usually got away after a few hard slaps and then got him several times, and the more I nailed him the angrier he got, until I felt he might punch me, because no human living hated to lose more than my dad, who was so merciless he cheated my mother in cards and would cheat me at anything if I was stupid enough to get cheated. He talked to me as I repeatedly slapped him: “Ah, the mosquitoes are biting early, ey, bird-boy. You could hit me a hundred times with those pansy shots, and never draw blood, cuz you're a weak willy, a bird-boy...”
But, in front of his shoemakers, his idolaters, his gorge rose and his face flushed into a terrifying agate-eyed purple mask, lip quivering, unnerving me, and when I missed he retaliated and often hit me so hard my knuckles bled, and even though I out hit him, the sign of blood had him gloating insufferably and my friends cringing as traffic tied up with honks galore, his shoemakers patting his back, and when at last we were both worn out and he had to get back to business and I had to get to school, I resumed dancing and throwing flurries and insisting I won, and dad lifted a fist and invited me to “bring it on, punk,” and when we finally turned and crossed the street, I glanced back and discovered him standing at the door grinning proudly, probably bragging that I'd made first string varsity shortstop at a huge high school like Compton, beating out two seniors.
Mother said, “He can't stop bragging about you.”
Meanwhile, dad had also charmed a Japanese man who had created the first rubber flip-flops or beach-walks, simple thongs. Dad had also met him at a convention and managed to buy HIS entire inventory of merchandise, so that our store was packed to the rafters, the aisles so crowded we had to climb over boxes and crates, but now everybody in town was wearing flip-flops, and shoemakers from as far out as the San Fernando Valley and San Bernodino and Orange County came in to buy these thongs; they became so popular that kids were coming into our store and paying retail prices for them.
Dad bought an El Dorado Cadillac convertible, a black beauty, winked at me, and said, “Those beach walks bought this car, Dell.”
“Gramps and mom said you had to borrow money and go in debt to buy the beach walks and the spray cans, dad. They said you risked losing everything.”
“Yeh, well, they're both penny wise and dollar foolish. What'd I tell you?”
“You're not an ordinary man.”
“You gotta take risks to get anywhere, Dell. We made all that money back and then some, and we cornered the market for the future.”