DJing Stories: The Veteran with the Red Lamborghini

So it was about 2007 and I was playing a weak night at the bar. I had just finished this Power Hour set (pretty much, you play a different song every minute of the hour and the people have to drink when the song changes. 60 shots of beer in 60 minutes = ReallyDrunk People) and was getting ready to pull out some actual songs that weren’t Power Rangers Theme songs and hits from the movie Grease.

The 30 or so people there were good and drunk and happy (again, 60 drinks in an hour). Unluckily, it was June-ish so all the college chil’ren were home pretending that they didn’t have a drinking problem. I was playing Christmas music and a little top 40 cause no one was there (yeah, I’m about that life), and people weren’t really paying attention.

The point is everyone was in a good mood . . . except for this one dude.

So, I put on one of those long-ass, white-people-love-it, bar songs that last like 15 minutes “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer” (aka, my DJ has gone to the bathroom  song).I usually jump off the stage to chat with whoever is closest to me. This guy, who just happened to be in my vicinity, was at the bar, by himself, with a fresh scar on his head.

I ask him, in my “I’m a friendly, personal DJ that cares but seriously tip me or get me a drink” voice, how his night was going. He said well. And then leisurely explains how he is looking for a girl to take him home.

It turns out this guy is fresh from the Afghanistan war, thanks to our President at the time, and had survived a very serious bomb explosion.

I said something along the lines of “wow, it’s amazing you are alive.”

Then, he takes a moment to stare into his drink. He swivels it around and proceeds to explain how his surgery went. He says he was very fortunate that the doctors were able to remove the scrap medal from his head.  But while they were there, they found a malignant tumor in his brain. They gave him an estimated life expectancy of 8 to 12 months and sent him back to the US with six figures and hella veteran benefits.

I stared at him, shocked, as he sat there content. I told him how sorry I was to hear the news.

He goes on to tell me that he’s not sorry. He recognizes the fact that this will be his last 4^th of July, his last Thanksgiving, his last Christmas, his last everything with everyone. He doesn’t see a point in being regretful or maintaining poisonous friendships or focusing too hard on anything that causes stress. Apparently, when you only have so much time left in this world, you worry only about the things that matter.

Being the daughter of a veteran, my heart went out to this man. All he wanted to do was serve his country and prepare a better life for himself. In his effort to pursue happyness, all he received was the prediction of his untimely death.

I got on the mic and professed to the crowd that we had a veteran at the bar who just got back from 

Afghanistan who had NO BITCHES and a PARCHED MOUTH. He looks up at me and smiles as I point him out to the patrons of the bar.

In a few hours, the place gets packed and he ends up having a fantastic evening. (Noted, he didn’t get too much attention from the ladies. But he did enjoy talking to our busty bartenders. Smiling from ear-to-ear as only a man in lust can.)

At around midnight, when it was really starting to get crazy, he leaves surprisingly. He pays his tab, tips his busty beaut, and walks out to his car (with no woman on his arm, mind you). He jumps in this bright red Lamborghini, that is COMPLETELY uncharacteristic of College Park, and drives off into DC.

I tell this story to a lot and people always ask me “how do you know he wasn’t lying? Maybe he was just trying to get in your pants.” To them, I respond with it doesn’t matter if he were lying or not. Because at some point throughout this ridiculous war, we had lost men and women. Some of them never got the chance to finish their year with family. And regardless of whether his story was true or false, unbeknownst to him, he was telling an account of SOMEONE’s life.

So that was one of the most interesting nights at the bar. And plus, I got to see a lambo. And those joints are SHWEET!