(Dedicated to the memory of Dino Murphone)
This Friday night, like hundreds before it consisted of the ritual bar hopping. The streets had dried out after a week of unrelenting rain. The bar was thick with smoke; civilians, want-a-be's and bikers looked much the same as any Valley bar somewhere west of home. Wearing his usual club night persona, Dino appraised the crowed as blues wailed in the background. Standing there a formidable figure, hot coffee filling one hand. Coffee had long ago replaced the booze. Stubbing out a smoke with the other. His booming voice and lightening quick wit, cracking wise at the expense of some poor fool that happened to be caught in his sights.
Yea you could say he stood out in a crowd. Maybe due to his ZZ Top like beard or maybe it was his long gray flecked hair that hung well past his granite shoulders, it’s hard to say. He was a big man and his appearance made him a fierce presence wrapped in denim and leather cautioning most to tread lightly. His steely eyes continued appraising the crowd in the smoky barroom.
Tough yea, he was tough ask anyone on the receiving end of his wrath, his fists or his gun. If they were still around to be asked. Few would ever know more about him than what they saw. They would never know or understand that he had lived his live on his own terms. Win or lose and he had done both. Most would never see past the image or the armor that he wore as proudly as his colors. There are some who got close enough to penetrate his thick outer shell. They would refer to him as a Teddy-bear, full of jokes, a man-child that loved to cook and wrote poetry for his own comfort.
Like always on cold nights, he wore his plaid flannel shirt over his club t-shirt under his leather jacket and his patch. He blew his hot breath onto his cold hand as he started his bike as the pack headed for the next stop. It was past midnight I was told, when a moment of madness, laced with liquor and rage, in the hands of a fool, violently and permanently changed the ebb and flow of life as we knew it forever….
Grown men held their breath as Pete held his hand. There wasn’t time for regrets or apologies, not even good-bye. Time moved as if in slow motion indelibly tattooed on the memories of those standing on the burnt stretch of asphalt known as Reseda Boulevard.
Seemingly without warning, the slowing Harleys were rammed from behind with such force. Sending one bike careening sideways across the blacktop. The other erupted into a fireball, rocketing threw the chilled night air. It’s engine crying out against the indignity. The shrill wail of twisting steel mixed with the pungent stench of burning gasoline. Smoke and panic filled the night. The two iron sleds lay silent, smoldering and lifeless.
That was the scene the rest of the pack rode up on, fear slapped cold and hard. Mortality up close and personal drives an icy chill into the hearts and souls of Brothers bound by trust. They all knew that it could have been any one of them, but it wasn’t…
It was Dino laying there, his life slipping away on the burnt asphalt. While his Brothers watched in stunned disbelief, as paramedics worked in vain. Dino lost his life that Friday night somewhere west of home.
It is said, “That the essence of life is in the living of it”. On February 25th, 2000. Dino was doing what he loved most.
By,
Six Shooter Sally
02/26/00
