There's a Tear In My Beer [Echo RP, WC: 794]
Jul 26, 2016 10:35:37 GMT -5
Post by AshCandor on Jul 26, 2016 10:35:37 GMT -5
Echo Rigby sat in the back of an old honkytonk style tavern. Like any old good gunslinger from the days of old she sat with her back to the corner to survey the whole room. She wasn’t playing poker or expecting to get shot in the back like an old Western, but the imagery crossed her mind and she chuckled to herself. Her dusty boots were propped up on the table and she sipped from a longneck while whittling a small corner of the already scarred tabletop with a pocket knife. She’d loaded up the jukebox for an afternoon of reflection, and its words caught up to her ears from time to time:
She tapped her fingers in time for a moment and then began to speak.
“Seems to get in the right mindset of a match you got to get in the head of your opponent at times and try and recreate a bit of things; let your own senses experience what they do most commonly to fully understand them. For me, I’ve let a lifetime of music color my perception some. Now my listenin’ tastes today are a bit different but not foreign by any means. This feller I’m wrestling on Pride, well he’s old enough to be my dad and he’s a big ol’ boy; Hank Simmons, a country boy intent on surviving. Got a taste of the wrestlin’ bug as a young pup and then got struck down far too early. Fast forward a quarter century give or take of hard livin’, boozin’, womanizin’ I figure. You know the type of vacant soul who got not much to live for but slowly killin’ himself by degrees on a long slow crawl?”
She took another sip of her beer, as the jukebox called out again:
She adjusted the old dusty cowboy hat on her head and wiped her mouth.
“Seems to me Hank you got some other fellers with your namesake crooning out an autobiography of sorts set to a country twang. It’s kinda funny to call you a veteran of the ring, I don’t think that fits really. You had a year or so in ya before you got hurt or something? Guess we’re calling this Hank Simmons: Year Two after an extended break? Now look, I know you got training and whatnot, but wrestling today is not the same as wrasslin’ back in 1988 or whatever. Ain’t knocking what came before, it just ain’t all meat and potatoes brawling slugfests between two big slow guys anymore. I respect ya giving it another go, I really do. I mean, I’m an old soul at heart even if I’m less than half your age or whatever, Pops. “
She waved and the waitress brought her another beer and she took a long swig as the Hanks played on:
Echo twirled her hat off and hooked it on the nearby chair, mussing her hair a bit as she squinted and looked outside.
“I ain’t one to tell anybody else how to live but I wonder if you’re happy with yourself at all? It is a damn shame I guess you’ve been walking around saddled with this pain and desperation and longing for stuff that was taken from you far too young and somehow you’re trying to claw for a piece of now on the downslope of whatever passed for your prime. You’re a big ol’ cuss and I hope you do find some peace that ain’t at the bottom of a whiskey bottle or some truck stop tail. The little vices just carry us on through the days until there ain’t no more days, the human condition. All I can offer you is some good competition in that ring, and I hope you find some peace in knowing that I got empathy in my soul for you that all the Hanks in the world couldn’t fully express in song.”
She tipped her beer in tribute to Hank Simmons and downed it as the scene faded.
‘I'm a rollin’ stone all alone and lost
For a life of sin I have paid the cost
When I pass by all the people say
Just another guy on the lost highway’
She tapped her fingers in time for a moment and then began to speak.
“Seems to get in the right mindset of a match you got to get in the head of your opponent at times and try and recreate a bit of things; let your own senses experience what they do most commonly to fully understand them. For me, I’ve let a lifetime of music color my perception some. Now my listenin’ tastes today are a bit different but not foreign by any means. This feller I’m wrestling on Pride, well he’s old enough to be my dad and he’s a big ol’ boy; Hank Simmons, a country boy intent on surviving. Got a taste of the wrestlin’ bug as a young pup and then got struck down far too early. Fast forward a quarter century give or take of hard livin’, boozin’, womanizin’ I figure. You know the type of vacant soul who got not much to live for but slowly killin’ himself by degrees on a long slow crawl?”
She took another sip of her beer, as the jukebox called out again:
‘Play me some songs about a ramblin' man, put a cold one in my hand
'Cause you know I love to hear those guitar sounds
Don't you play 'I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry'
'Cause I'll get all balled up inside
And I'll get whiskey bent and hell bound’
She adjusted the old dusty cowboy hat on her head and wiped her mouth.
“Seems to me Hank you got some other fellers with your namesake crooning out an autobiography of sorts set to a country twang. It’s kinda funny to call you a veteran of the ring, I don’t think that fits really. You had a year or so in ya before you got hurt or something? Guess we’re calling this Hank Simmons: Year Two after an extended break? Now look, I know you got training and whatnot, but wrestling today is not the same as wrasslin’ back in 1988 or whatever. Ain’t knocking what came before, it just ain’t all meat and potatoes brawling slugfests between two big slow guys anymore. I respect ya giving it another go, I really do. I mean, I’m an old soul at heart even if I’m less than half your age or whatever, Pops. “
She waved and the waitress brought her another beer and she took a long swig as the Hanks played on:
'Cause I've been drunk for 30 days
and I don't care if I die
and I’m livin' fast and hard
and that's the way I spend my time
and I don't need no one tryin' to tell me
how to live my own no-good life.’
Echo twirled her hat off and hooked it on the nearby chair, mussing her hair a bit as she squinted and looked outside.
“I ain’t one to tell anybody else how to live but I wonder if you’re happy with yourself at all? It is a damn shame I guess you’ve been walking around saddled with this pain and desperation and longing for stuff that was taken from you far too young and somehow you’re trying to claw for a piece of now on the downslope of whatever passed for your prime. You’re a big ol’ cuss and I hope you do find some peace that ain’t at the bottom of a whiskey bottle or some truck stop tail. The little vices just carry us on through the days until there ain’t no more days, the human condition. All I can offer you is some good competition in that ring, and I hope you find some peace in knowing that I got empathy in my soul for you that all the Hanks in the world couldn’t fully express in song.”
She tipped her beer in tribute to Hank Simmons and downed it as the scene faded.