Elliot Doomes
6.8.2017
Unforgettable Characters
There’s a gentlemen in our neighborhood. We lived on a small street called Nardane.
Every morning, he would come out and his first words would be, "My name is Cotton, and business is rotten." Usually, he would be half-high or on the way to getting drunk. I used to laugh at him all the time. He was like the joke of the day. I prejudged Mr. Cotton until one day I heard him arguing with one of his drinking constituents. And the guy talked about his family, his sisters, his brothers. I even remember him making derogatory comments about his mother. And I asked him, I said, "He’s talking about your mother like that and you’re not getting angry or mad?"
And he looked me straight in the eye. He said, "In order for a man to make me mad, he has to be smarter than me. And a dumb S.O.B ain’t never made me mad."
Needless to say, my opinion of Mr. Cotton changed right then. I had pre-judged him as a drunken bum, and my whole opinion of him changed right there and then. Next week, I’ll have to tell you about Dr. Squeeze!
Curated by Caitlin Cieri