from the early summer, read in a park in Middle Village, Queens

"One night I was at this dude Grater’s apartment. He was a hardcore biker. He had nasty prison tattoos all over his neck. He sold speed and guns. There were four or five gang members hanging out at his pad. One came up with the idea of ripping off a liquor store. One guy would go in and make a distraction, then the other two would run in and steal cases of beer. I got pressured into going to steal the beer. I was so scared. I could hear my mom’s voice inside my head begging me to just please come home. Through sheer luck, we ran into some punks at a stoplight on the drive to the liquor store. They had acid so we went back to their house, tripped, and listened to The Misfits all night. I still get chills when I think about what could have happened, because a week later the driver of the car shot a convenience store clerk in the face. I could have been part of the commission of first-degree murder and armed robbery; had I been a few years older, I might have even gotten the death penalty. That I could have been strapped to a lethal injection machine is a realization that does not diminish over a couple cocktails."

http://brooklynrail.org/2007/05/express/walking-new-orleans