karma

karma

How much karma does $10 buy?

The guy was sitting on a frayed black canvas suitcase. around the corner at Sansome and Pacific.

He was wearing a lumpy tweed coat and dirty jeans. Goatee, shaved head,

a bearded skull with blue gray eyes that searched for mine and locked on.

-Could I trouble you to buy a cigarette? Your make up looks as good as mine.

-I'm not wearing make up.

-oh? well you look pretty good for fifty four, can I tell you something? Do you believe in karma?

-Possibly, but I'm not sure about it as motivation.

-I've been keeping count and 109 people have passed me by without acknowledging my existence, so I asked the Boss to direct someone and that is you. You understand; so I'm going to tell you something fantastic. But first, but first, you know… there is evil in the world, been around since George the First.

- That's a pretty long time.

- George Bush Senior.

- oh

-Three words: New World Order. George and the, the Texaco cartel. And these philanthropists like Bill Gates. Well sure the foundations do good things but where are the politics? Just feeding into the politics that are. The richest man in the world could do something but he's feeding the politics. And Getty used to give away a million dollars every year to someone he chose by blindly running his finger through the phone book. I'm probably crazy, and people are afraid of this, but I can see you're not.......
....because I'm a philanthropist too. I come into town for two months and I make sandwiches and give them to the homeless, that's why I'm dressed like this and my hands you see this skin peeling off, it's because I was getting a manicure at the St Francis, I usually get one at the Sir Francis Drake but this time, they, they didn't sterilize all of the equipment and I got a fungus,

- Do you need a light?

-No i'm just holding it for now. If I was on stage doing my routine, then I could smoke, you know? But if I'm just talking to someone, I don't want the distraction. I work with big bands, I do impressions I work with Frank Sinatra, jr........

So I was getting ready to come into town, coming down the stairs at my house and I had my great dane on his leash and my bags and wallet and cell phone trying to hold them all and the phone upstairs starts ringing so I went back up and set my wallet and cell phone down on the table and then when I left I didn't grab them so after I paid five bucks to cross the bridge and parked in the garage I didn't realize that I only had six dollars left and I owe the garage thirty two, so could you loan me twenty four dollars?

-I don't have twenty four on me, but here's a ten.

-Thank you. now I'm going to tell you the fantastic thing I promised. I was baptized twice, once in Miami and once at the Wailing Wall, but I'm from Las Vegas now. Once there was this kid who saw a long-haired bearded guy standing beside the road out in the desert so he stopped to see if he needed help and it was Howard Hughes and and Hughes left him, -Melvin, remember? millions of dollars. You know people who give to charities, they get it off their taxes or they get their names on new hospital wings and it's all just ego and tax deductions. I like Las Vegas, that's where I'm from, my grandmother was married to Meyer Lansky, you know the guy who put up the money for the Flamingo Hotel and when he died, when he....this is hard, I asked the Boss, you know, the man upstairs, for a sign and ever since there have been 45 people and you're the 46th....., what would you say if I gave you a a cashiers check for ten million dollars? but you have to give one million of that to any organization that helps the homeless and it has to be anonymous and you can't take a deduction but you'll still have a lot left over even after taxes. what would you say to that?

- I'd say thank you very much.

- ok, ok, the Boss told me that, that, you know how you could be sitting in the bathroom with the door closed and it's quiet and you ask for a sign, some kind of sign? Well I asked the Boss to give me some kind of a, and then you stopped and actually saw me. Are you any relation to Johnny Carson? Because you could play him, you should go to Hollywood if they make the movie, you could be him, are you sure you aren't his brother or related? It would be like Johnny coming back to life. So. How are we going to work this?

- Work what?

- The ten million dollars, how are we going work out the... how am I going to get it to you?

- I work around the corner, you can give it to me tomorrow about this time.

-ok, I'll have to find a parking spot so let's say about 1:30 or quarter to two.