Audio Interview, Mike, 1974
- MIKE: At that time, early in my life or earlier than now,
- I'll say ten years ago, like then I was I
- felt like I tried to identify with these super violent men.
- With Hell's Angels, with, you know,
- Wyatt Earp er Wyatt Earp Jesse James, and, you know,
- the outlaw image, the very masculine men.
- And then up until a little, short time ago maybe a year,
- maybe even then, I was still like really intense into that.
- And now, the way I feel about it was, you know,
- I was looking for a man image because like I
- felt that I had none.
- I grew up, you know I was always mommy.
- I grew up like with all women, consistently
- around me like that, you know?
- And so, you know, this was like the most masculine thing
- there was out.
- It's this real virile, hard guy, fighter, (unintelligible).
- INTERVIEWER TWO: You got this image
- like after your father left?
- MIKE: No, that was like you know,
- I grew up my early years, until I was like four years
- old on, like I lived me, my mother,
- it was my grandmother, and my grandfather, and my aunt,
- and my cousin both female.
- My cousin is a girl, too.
- I was consistently surrounded with women in the house,
- at all times, like that, you know?
- My grandfather was older like that.
- And he was a rummy, at that time.
- He drank a lot like then, you know.
- So what I figure is what happened like then myself
- is that when I started coming to realize these things,
- that I was looking for like a man image, or a father image,
- or something like that to copy, this is what I went for.
- It was the most, you know, outspoken, violent thing
- that I could get a hold of.
- And at that time, in the late sixties and middle sixties,
- the Hell's Angels were in full swing.
- Everybody was denim, leather, you know, swastika.
- At least that's the way I saw it, you know?
- And that's what I went after.
- I could never reach that point.
- It's really so bizarre, you know?
- I had all the trappings.
- I had this iron cross around my neck
- and I had the cut off denim, you know.
- And I had the gang's name on the back: Rogues, you know,
- Incorporated, Lovejoy, Buffalo, New York.
- And that was my it was a big suit.
- I used to love wearing that, man, you know?
- Just the way people would look at me.
- Look, there goes a man.
- You know?
- And it was really true.
- That's the way it really was, you know?
- Because like I could like go in any place, you know?
- I knew what was going on inside me
- and I wasn't what was portrayed.
- And yeah.
- I could go into a place like that
- and I could give off enough show that people wouldn't bother.
- You say,"Uh oh."
- You know?
- It was a mutual agreement that other rough guys do not
- hassle this rough guy, too.
- And it was mutually like that, you know?
- Just don't mess with that guy, you know?
- And I was never these people started picking up this,
- you know.
- Other people started seeing the ads that mask.
- And it was so bizarre.
- And then like a legend grew up, you know?
- Like I don't remember.
- Like I was in a fight in, I think, seventh grade.
- And I wasn't in another fight for like maybe four years
- like that.
- But when I was big and running around like that, you know,
- a lot of strange people would say like, you know,
- outside they didn't know me like that.
- They would really think that was really a hard, you know,
- nasty thing.
- You know, here's these guys street corner guys, you know?
- And I was never really that.
- After I got out of high school, it even got more intense,
- for some reason.
- I really went nuts, you know?
- I didn't wear shoes for a year, I wore consistent cowboy boots
- for like eighteen months.
- I didn't even own a pair of shoes,
- it was always boots, boots, boots, you know?
- And always black denim pants, always a black t-shirt.
- I had a big trucker's wallet hanging out
- with the chain on it, the belt. And I
- used to wear the skull the cat skull all the time, you know?
- And it was just, you know, it was just a big joke. (Laughs)
- And what happened, I think, is I started to believe the image.
- And that's where I really got into trouble
- because I couldn't keep up with what I thought I was,
- or what I wanted to be, or identify with.
- And that was a big hassle.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: What was it again that you definitely
- wanted to identify with?
- MIKE: I think I wanted to identify with a masculine image
- of what a man is.
- And I felt like
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Did you try it like in all ways?
- MIKE: No.
- I don't think so.
- I don't know.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: Okay well, you were
- talking about being really masculine,
- so did that also go into like what was your relationships
- in high school?
- I mean, besides like with the guys,
- did the other image like go into with your relationships
- with women that you met?
- MIKE: Yeah.
- It did.
- And it always consistently followed me up, too.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: I want you to explain it.
- Like, what happened?
- MIKE: Well, say, how could the immortal, masculine, mucho
- macho man, how could he like lower himself to like,
- you know, to love a woman, you know?
- Because women were always sex objects in our group.
- They were nothing else.
- They had no minds.
- Nothing.
- It was always like, you know, broads.
- It was never women, or girls, or anything,
- it always broads like that.
- And it's really hard.
- If you're trying to portray something you're not,
- how are you going to portray it that way?
- And I got really messed up all through those
- through hangups like that.
- I just couldn't come out.
- It was another I was suppressed in all
- these ways these social pressures
- and pressures from home like that.
- It really messed with I can't explain it yet myself.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Well, why don't you give like, you know,
- a particular example of like a relationship?
- And then like, you know, how did the conflict come in you?
- I mean, you tried to love a particular, you know, woman,
- and then it'd get involved, it would get tangled up because
- MIKE: Yeah.
- Because of, you know, having to play
- the role, of having to act like something I wasn't like that.
- And I think I chose, also, people
- who I would have want to have relationships with.
- I would choose like people who, like maybe,
- supposedly jive with that and yet, didn't.
- I'm gonna see if I can put that better.
- I felt I chose people who I felt were, say, the ideal person
- for the ultra masculine man, you know, like the chick
- with the cut off jacket, right?
- Like that.
- And it turns out that these people are playing roles, too.
- You got two people playing roles, you know? (Laughs)
- And it's really hard for me to, you know,
- carry on and have a serious relationship, a long term one.
- I still don't have long term relationships.
- It's always hit and run, you know?
- (Unintelligible) I can't get over that.
- I blew so many beautiful women with beautiful heads
- like that by playing a game.
- I don't know.
- It was just a lot of pressure, too,
- from like I don't want to put too much pressure from home
- like that, but I think that's got a lot to do with it.
- I really do.
- Because like I was telling Paul before, like,
- there was a total matriarchal society there, in my house.
- Grandma was boss, mama listened to grandma,
- grandpa had nothing to say, and then it was Mikey, you know?
- And auntie came over with little girl, you know,
- cousin and here it is, you know?
- You know, you'reI think I thought that I was being
- feminized like that, so I took hold of the most masculine
- thing I could find.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: You had to.
- MIKE: I had to, right?
- Or did I have to?
- I don't know.
- I don't think so.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: Well, you had to have some identity.
- MIKE: Yeah.
- So this is what I tried to identify with.
- And yet, it fell through like that.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: Well, it might have
- been the best thing you could have done at the time.
- MIKE: Yeah.
- But I shouldn't have had to go through all those, right.
- You know, I blew so many things, you know?
- So many good things.
- I could really enjoyed myself doing by,
- you know, hanging out, you know, putting on the big show.
- Let's see what I get into.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: But how do you feel about yourself now?
- I mean, do you think you're playing any games now?
- MIKE: In a way, I'm still caught up in that not as much
- as before.
- And I recognize it now and I kick it
- down trying to identify with other people
- and doing what other people will do in order to like
- get their acceptance, you know?
- I find myself still doing that on certain occasions like that.
- But I don't think it's it's not as intense as it
- was at one time, like, you know, I couldn't like go
- any place, just myself, I always went like the other person,
- you know?
- Like I was saying before the tape,
- you know, I had all these social pressures on me.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Why don't you explain that once again?
- With the points of how you had a girlfriend.
- MIKE: Oh, yeah.
- I was talking before about when I was playing
- my role as hard guy like that.
- And the guys I'd hang around with,
- I don't know if they were playing the role, too.
- I got a feeling that they probably were, to some extent,
- too, but I don't know if they had such an intensity about it
- or not.
- I can remember, for instance, like Carl and Artie coming
- to my house "Come on, come on, like, you know,
- there's a fight down at Walden and Bailey tonight, right?"
- I went, "Yeah?
- Jeez, I don't know."
- And I had all these things going in my head:
- I don't want to go fight, I might beat up.
- I might lose, you know?
- We might lose, you know?
- That would be terrible, if we lost, right?
- You know, but yeah, you know, then
- I said, you know, "If I don't go,
- like, who am I going to hang out with?"
- Right?
- Because there was nobody else.
- Like, all my friends were in the same thing,
- we were in the same boats, right?
- So like I was under that pressure
- of like having no friends, or being
- called a cop out, or a chicken, or, you know,
- a pigeon, or weasel.
- And weasels are worse than anything, you know.
- If you're a weasel, you know, what good are you?
- Where can you go?
- There was like no one else for me to hang out
- with because all my friends were in the same boat like that,
- you know?
- All the guys that I was hanging around with at that time.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: So you always went?
- MIKE: So I went.
- Right.
- This is exact (unintelligible) I can remember like that,
- you know?
- And I can remember like walking down
- Walden with Carl and Artie, you know, going down there,
- you know, giving ourselves the boost,
- the talk like that, you know.
- And I can remember like the things
- like running through my head, like, you know,
- which is the best way for me to escape?
- How could I get out of this?
- You know?
- I got to go to school.
- And I think, that they got to go to school, too, you know?
- And all that garbage, you know?
- You know, forget about the homework, right?
- And I just couldn't get out of it,
- so I was there, going with them.
- Then we used to meet at [INAUDIBLE] on Walden
- and Bailey, right there.
- And everybody's all over there with the jackets
- and everybody's getting geared for the fight like that.
- We were fighting on Genesee that night, Lost Souls on Genesee.
- So there's like fifty guys from Walden.
- They're all around there and everything.
- So I was nervous.
- I was really nervous like that.
- And then it was like, if I left well, at that time,
- I wasn't hanging around with Walden.
- We were hanging out in Lovejoy, in a gang in Lovejoy.
- And Artie was likehe was a real high member.
- He was like vice president, I think,
- at that time of the gang in Lovejoy like that.
- So like this was our little part of Lovejoy helping Walden out,
- in case we needed help some other time, you know.
- That was just a lie no one ever helps you out.
- (Laughs) So I can remember like going out in [INAUDIBLE]
- and meeting behind, I think, Victor's Store.
- And we were all standing around.
- All the other guys who are running around, getting ready,
- and hiding the pipes, and chains, and things like that.
- And I was likeI tried kind of like everybody was grouping,
- I can remember standing away from the group like that
- with the group, but not in the mass, say like that, you know?
- And then we started like walking through the back
- streets over to Genesee, through Walden, through Rapin Street,
- and Hazel Street over there.
- And I can remember like everybody"Hoo, hoo!"
- making noises and everything like that.
- And I remember like walking towards the back of the group,
- right?
- And there was Artie.
- Carl was up in the front, you know?
- I didn't even know where the hell he was.
- And I can remember.
- And there's this one guy walking next to me.
- And it was the first time I met him.
- His name is Lonnie.
- I remember his name and everything.
- This is like I'm still in high school.
- Like I was seventeen or sixteen years old.
- And I can remember walking over there.
- And I said, "Yeah, I came down to fight."
- And he goes, "Yeah, me too.
- I live in this neighborhood, you know."
- He says to me, I can remember, "Yeah, I
- got to come to the fight.
- I live in this neighborhood.
- There's no place else for me to go."
- And I said, "Yeah, these are all my friends, too.
- I got to help them out like that."
- And I could remember like we were just
- like walking up to Genesee and I hear all this noise and stuff.
- So everybody's moving up there.
- By the time we got up to the street there,
- everybody was coming back across the street, right.
- And everybody's running all over the place.
- We see this one guy, Nature Boy, running up to the tracks.
- We go, "Nature Boy, where are you going?"
- He goes, "I'm getting my hammer.
- I'm going to pound a few heads in," like that.
- And everybody just dispersed and then like they
- all came together like in the same spot like that.
- And a couple guys got beat up on the other side of the street.
- And they were like seven guys against fifty.
- Fortunately, we had the fifty guys that time, you know?
- And so and I remember going up to Artie
- and I said, "Well, Artie, I came to the fight."
- And I shook his hand and I said, "I got to go now."
- And I just took off right out of there
- because I was really paranoid about being busted, you know,
- being arrested for assault or something like that.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Did you take part in the fight?
- MIKE: No.
- It was like over like that.
- The first two guys who were across the street
- beat everybody up with the chains and everybody,
- you know, just came across like that.
- Like I remember saying to Artie, "See, Artie,
- I came to the fight, you know?"
- I shook his hand and I left.
- And those guys stayed there.
- And then like, what I would do then
- this is really terrifying for me inside so then,
- the next thing I know, I'd be over there, "Yeah,
- I was in the gang fight down with Lost Souls.
- Yeah.
- I was there man.
- I seen the whole thing."
- Like I was one of the first guys across the street.
- You see that guy that got smashed in the head
- with a chain?
- Ha, ha.
- I know the guy who did that.
- And I'd be playing the role then.
- And I didn't want to do it, and once I did it
- I didn't even do it, but I was just
- around the general vicinity not wanting to do it
- I'd be bragging about it.
- I would say, yeah, yeah, I was at that fight.
- We worked out the Lost Souls at Walden.
- And it just went on like that, you know?
- And then like you get those legends built up about.
- Well, I used to have the parties at my house.
- I mean, Denny used to say, like, "We had a fire in the summer,"
- and everybody is all like, "Oh, big fire.
- Wow."
- And then we start living up to that
- and it really becomes complicated.
- And then you become less and less, you know, your real self.
- And then it just like perpetuates itself.
- It keeps moving, you know?
- Then I think I started to believe
- what everybody's telling me.
- And I started to almost like forget about my real self
- and become the image.
- Just a like a little bit before the group started
- is like why I started to like fall away from that.
- Well, I started about, maybe, six or seven months
- after I started work, which would
- be about eighteen months ago.
- That's when I started just to break away from that.
- And that would put me somewhere.
- And I was almost twenty-one years old at that time.
- I was twenty-one at that time when I just
- started to fall away from not living up to this image.
- And like now I feel like, you know,
- I'm really away from living up to other people's, you
- know now I can like be more of myself, at this moment.
- Like I could never like do this.
- I could never admit this the first time
- I have ever admitted to anybody that I never
- wanted to go to those fights and be in those gangs like that.
- It was cool to say, "I'm in the gang,"
- but when you came down to defending the neighbors,
- I'm like, "Ah."
- I crumble.
- I fall apart like that.
- Like I said, that guy, Lonnie, who was walking next to me
- same thing, man.
- He was scared as I was, you know,
- but he was there for the same reason, you know?
- What can we do?
- You got to go.
- But you really don't have to.
- That's the amazing thing, you know?
- I think a lot of fear of it was like,
- you know, I can just see it now: "Mrs. (Unintelligible),
- this is your son Michael.
- We just brought him home.
- He was in a fight somewhere."
- "Oh, my boy.
- What's he been doing?"
- And that's a lot of pressure like that
- for, like, mom and home.
- It really is.
- That's why, I think, I started off on those things like that.
- I don't know.
- I feel, at this point, that I'm like blaming
- too many things on my home life, my early home life like that.
- But I don't know if it's true or
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Yeah.
- But when you're young, most of the influence you have
- is from your parents and your family.
- It has to shape you a real lot, no matter who you are.
- MIKE: Yeah.
- But I don't know.
- I'm trying not to believe that.
- I'm trying to think that I did a lot of reading it
- and read it wrong.
- And I think that's a lot of what happened there.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: What happened when you started work?
- You know, when you got into work, how did work change you?
- Just the idea of being in work, you couldn't keep up the image?
- Or
- MIKE: No.
- You see, what was happening was that I was getting older
- and I was becoming really frustrated with the image.
- I was really becoming really Like when I would go out,
- I couldn't have a good time because I
- had that thing saying, you know, I was doing nothing, you know?
- I had no money.
- Hardly.
- I had money, but, you know, I didn't have enough money to,
- you know, do a lot of things or things I could have done,
- if I had been working or something like that.
- So it really got frustrating.
- And when I got a job like that, it
- started to ease off the frustration like that
- because I was there and I was doing something.
- And it just started to ease off.
- It seemed like it was tap into the frustration, the pressure.
- And it just started to like ease.
- And then I went back to school that fall, night school,
- and I was working like that.
- That was just like last fall.
- And that was even more.
- When I was in school before, I would like take up space
- and that was it.
- I was there.
- I just did enough work to get the seat and that's it.
- And now, I just sit around and I get good marks,
- good grades just by, you know, I don't even have to study,
- you know?
- It's not like being forced, it's because I want it now.
- Before like I went to college first
- because I didn't know what to do.
- I went in likeeverybody in their senior year of high school,
- September, everybody's writing applications and sending them
- out all over the place like that, you know?
- It was April, I think it's about time I do something, you know?
- So I did, you know?
- I got accepted out there, at Erie.
- So I went there for two years.
- And all I did there was get drunk and pass out.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Were you still into the image there?
- MIKE: Yeah.
- That's where it got intense.
- That's where it really got out of hand.
- That's where the outer dress really blossomed, you know?
- Always in black, always, in the cowboy boots with the chain,
- the big skull.
- That's where it really got intense there.
- And at that time, after my first year
- of college, that's when the outer signs of my body
- started to show the effects from drinking too much, and eating,
- and just continual partying like that, you know.
- And that's why I started putting on weight, got a huge beer gut.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: It's hard to picture you like that,
- without the black and the skull and the
- MIKE: I could show you a picture, if you want to see it.
- They're funny to look at.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: I remember.
- Yeah, I remember at through our class and everything.
- INTERVIEWER ONE: How long have you guys known each other?
- MIKE: Fifth grade?
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Yeah.
- Fifth grade.
- So a long time.
- MIKE: We lost track each of other for quite a few years.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: We'd come back here, once in awhile.
- MIKE: We came back once in awhile for a reunion.
- But that's where it got intense.
- And it was totally every day. (Unintelligible)
- Like I was telling Paul before, I never wore shoes,
- it was always boots.
- And at that time, bells were starting to come in.
- That was like, oh, I can't do that.
- And it was always black denim jeans
- right over the boots, no bell on them.
- Just cover the boots right off like that.
- That's what it was, you know?
- And that's where it really I don't know why.
- That's supposed to be a stimulating environment there
- or something like that.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Well you didn't have
- there wasn't any gangs there.
- You were just mostly by yourself there, right?
- Putting on the image?
- MIKE: Yeah.
- I mean, that it intensified.
- I don't know.
- It intensified the image more.
- I can't figure that out.
- Why would I do that?
- I don't But it just got intense then, you know.
- And then, like I said, at that time
- I was really capable of putting away
- great quantities of alcohol at that time, you know.
- And I had allocations like, I'd have blackouts,
- minor blackouts like that.
- When you drink a lot, you know, you get blackouts,
- where you still move, but you don't know what's happening.
- And then people tell you these things.
- And I was starting to get these things, you know?
- I got it a few times.
- And one time, I went after Jimmy Loose
- one night with a hot dog fork.
- I threatened his life.
- I was continuous.
- I was really abusing my body to no end.
- I guess it was just more frustration there,
- more trying to live up to the image.
- I was really going nuts inside.
- I was really neurotic at that time, you know?
- I couldn't carry on a relationship with a girl more
- than like one night, you know?
- And that was it for me.
- Like, hi, how are you?
- I didn't even want to have sex with anybody, you know?
- I just wanted to be drunk all the time.
- And like I couldn't function, socially, without drinking.
- And like I fell apart.
- I would get to a point, like, I would go out
- in order to break down the inhibition, I would get drunk.
- And then when I was drunk enough that the inhibitions were gone,
- I was too drunk to do what I had broken down
- the inhibitions to do.
- And, you know, it really got vicious.
- And I couldn't function.
- I couldn't remember.
- You know, everybody would be sitting around,
- having one or two beers.
- And I'd be over there and I'd really get drunk.
- I was like getting drunk like five days a week, you know?
- And not just high drunk, but drunk where I was sick.
- I remember, like every night, I used to come home, you know,
- and go behind the garage and puke.
- And that's like day in and day out.
- And then I started like when I'd get drunk,
- I wouldn't get tired like that.
- It would speed me up like, and I'd
- be walking around, like I'd fall off things, and fall.
- I always had big, huge bruises on my arms and my legs
- from falling all the time like that.
- I was continuously drunk, you know?
- It was really sickening.
- And the thing was that, after a while like that,
- I wasn't having a good time, even in my own head,
- you know, doing that.
- Even when I got drunk, the inhibitions
- were still there, right?
- I still had the pressure, the social pressure,
- of not doing anything, but just laying around and being
- a drunk like that.
- And it really got super frustrating.
- INTERVIEWER TWO: What were the like inhibitions that you
- wanted to like break down?
- Like you said that you got so drunk
- that you couldn't do the things that you wanted to break down.
- What were those things?
- MIKE: One major thing is like well, I
- can remember my mother always like putting ladies up
- on a pedestal for me, like, you know.
- Women are something ultra special like that.
- You know, they're not people, they're above you, above men,
- males.
- You know.
- And there was always grandpa around who, supposedly, you
- know, never took care of the family very good.
- So she's got this man image from him.
- My father wasn't with us, you know.
- And so, like I said, it was super feminine like that.
- So I was getting pressured, like, you know, I can remember,
- like, I don't know, like, I can remember like arguing with her,
- saying, "I didn't mean it that way."
- Then she'd like embarrass me like in front of like relatives
- and friends who would come to the house
- like that her friends, you know, my family,
- my relatives like that.
- I can remember her saying, "He hates women, he hates women!
- You know.
- Look what he said, look what he said!
- And I said, "I didn't mean it like that!
- And she said, "Oh, yeah, yeah."
- You know.
- I was like driven away.
- And the whole thing of women being so idealistic
- is so, you know like, unapproachable, right?
- And that's one thing that always like
- on a social level say, out at a Binky Brown's or something
- like that is really hard for me now just
- to imagine that those people are just people and not,
- you know, off by themselves like that.
- And it's really hard for me to break down things like that.
- Where I am is like I have to know them ahead of time.
- I have to talk a few times.
- I can't just go up and say hi in a place like that because it's
- still too bizarre for me.
- When I'm sober, it was even harder then.
- Like I couldn't even do it at all, you know?
- I couldn't go, you know, in a strange place
- and say, "I like that chick, I think
- I'll go over there and start a conversation with her."
- INTERVIEWER TWO: Yeah.
- But then that's of pressures of the idea
- that hardly anybody goes through the same things about going
- into a bar and the bars, really, aren't set up for people
- to meet each other, in a way.
- I mean, it's like a pretty loud music,
- and it's pretty hard to go over, and say hello, and really get
- to know a person.
- It's almost a joke, the idea of setting up
- a bar on that aspect.
- MIKE: The first thing I do I won't even
- look at any anybody in there.
- The first place I would head to when I went any place
- was just to the bar.
- I was just sit there and pour four, or five,
- or six drinks down.
- And then I could get up to take a walk around,
- even to look what was there.
- It's really been difficult because then,
- I also had that extra thing of trying
- to live that image of being wild, and hard guy, and tough,
- and crazy.
- So you're acting bizarrely in order,
- you know, to attract attention, maybe.
- I think that was part of it too attract a lot of attention
- like that, you know?
- And like how could I be serious then and say,
- "Hi, how are you?" (Yells) Look at that one, a warthog.
- And that's what it was, you know?
- And then I just keep getting more and more frustration
- drunker and drunker.
- And like, you know, if I wanted to I was too drunk.
- You know, I was slobbering around.
- What would happen I don't think I can really express to anybody
- like the amount I used to drink, the great quantities,
- and how sick I used to get like every night, you know.
- It was like my days would go like, you know, I would get up
- and I wasn't in school.
- It was summer between my first year of college and the second.
- I didn't want to work.
- I could have worked if I wanted to.
- I didn't want to.