If you know me and you are reading this, you have either been in a bar fight with me, or have seen me get into one.
Here’s the thing. I started the fights. I’m good at that. But I wasn’t great at ending the fight. Carlos was amazing at ending it.
Carlos Wilson passed away this week. I’ll forgive you if you didn’t know him. But if you knew me, you definitely knew him. He was the indelible etching that grooved the hallowed halls of Moe Joes. He spared me a fair number of ass kickings. He was the shaman like prognosticator of all things local.
Carlos was the unofficial Mayor of Plainfield.
I say all that to say this: Carlos mattered. He mattered to us, but more importantly, he mattered to everyone he let into his life. That number was heroically spare. It’s not that Carlos didn’t care about people….actually, it is. Carlos disliked 99.9999999999% of the people he met and interacted with.
If you were apart of that vast majority, this isn’t for you. In fact, if you even question whether you were apart of that fraction, you definitely were in the majority. He didn’t like you. Its not your fault. Actually, it probably was.
The easiest way to describe Carlos is to say he was a cat.
Dogs crave attention and love the satisfaction of being acknowledged. Cats though, you have to earn it. If you wanted Carlos to be cool with you, you had to earn it. He was a deeply layered dude, but literally only to the people he let in.
I have a deeply personal relationship with Carlos because, after doing a series of story retellings at Moe Joes tonight, he pulled me out of SEVEN different fights.
I distinctly remember one where a guy tried massaging my wife’s feet. I threw him down and cocked back to punch him, only for Carlos to catch my arm on the back swing. He said “Id do the same thing, but this cant hapoen.”
If you were there, you definitely remember the St. Patrick’s Day melee, where Mongo and I fought an entire family of hillbillies. Carlos always laughed about that one.
Carlos was responsible for exactly zero of those fights. He was just the enforcer. The hard headed defender of peace and sanctity at Moe Joes, a bar that used to be known as a hot zone for a good bar brawl (100 percent my fault). Carlos had a steely cool demeanor and a size that demanded respect without ever saying he needed help.
Carlos didn’t need to be my friend, and didn’t want to for a long time. Again, Carlos was a cat. Respect wasn’t given. It was earned. Carlos put everyone through the ringer. Those that came out the other side in one piece were the ones deemed good enough to be an associate of him.
I’m not even sure I can say friend. That said, I can confidently say he was my friend. He hated a lot of things. Two of those things were having your picture taken with him, and the other was having his phone number. The number of people who had both was exceedingly rare.
I earned his phone number by doing one of my favorite things: droning on endlessly about the Bears. Carlos was always just kind of cool with me going on a ten minute rant about what was wrong with the team. He always had a pointed comment to add to my endlessly unhinged musings. He decided he needed to hear my thoughts in real time.
Getting his number wasn’t as unicorn-ish as getting a picture with him, though. Somehow, in a world where everything is instantly online, there are very few actual pictures of Carlos, where he isn’t actively trying to escape them. Hell, the only full on picture I have with him looks like he would rather be anywhere else.
The picture is more than meets the eye, though. The picture was at the ten year anniversary show of the Moe Joes open mic. I don’t think i’ve ever laughed harder at a comedy show, ever. I distinctly remember Jack Baker and Aly Sky having great sets. I remember Ian Ellis, the founder of the show, giving off an incredibly well timed and beautiful diatribe about the importance of comedy in these times. I remember how sweet and amazing of an intro Gabe gave me. I remember having a pretty okay set.
But I definitely remember Carlos being there, 10 feet to my right, judging every single word I said.
And when I finished, he dapped me up and said I did the show proud.
That was the Carlos equivalent of a deep, thorough love making session.
Again, because Carlos was a cat. His love wasn’t a given. It was earned. I remember finishing that set and being so happy with myself for getting up after that long of a layoff (7 years) and doing well. But Carlos acknowledging my spot meant everything to me. Because at that point, i’d known Carlos long enough to know that if I had sucked, he would have let me know.
Its easy to say you take someone for granted, but I genuinely believed that Carlos would always just bail me out of any fist fight or bad set I got into.
I say all that to acknowledge that I’m an asshole. But one of those endearing ones that people love.
So was Carlos. He was an asshole. But those who know him thought he was the best dude ever.
And he was. For all of his surliness, Carlos was the dude. He was someone that we all loved but were smart enough to know not to shit talk, lest we end up in his crosshairs.
A million things go wrong in life everyday. It comes for everyone. It came for Carlos. It will inevitably come for all of us. One day you wake up, ready to take on the world. The next, you are a memory people hang onto.
It’s always a shame to say in retrospect, but it bares speaking it out.
Carlos wasn’t a good dude. He was a great dude I am going to miss talking football and life with him.
I’m gonna miss nights like the Sunday before Labor Day. This was our night. This was the night we talked shit about the 20 somethings ambling into the bar, desperately trying to get laid before heading back to whatever directional school they are trying to get a Poly Sci degree from.
I’m gonna miss the sly smile on his face whenever he was about to make a cutting remark about my appearance compared to my wife.
I’m gonna miss having someone to banter about Bears cornerbacks with.
I’m gonna miss how much you hated young people in the bar.
I actively hate how much I ugly cry when I think about you.
But mostly, I just miss the fact that i’m never gonna see my buddy again.
Rest easy big guy. I promised to fight some hillbillies in your honor.
