And he’d stop and look at me with that one clear eye, that cloudy one staring off dead in the distance, his ears jugged and cauliflowered, and pull me from what I was doing, on the speed bag or the heavy, and grab me by the thick of the forearm, so I could smell his coffee-tinged breath: Murphy, the gropers are those who want to learn. They are always grasping the means to find out ways of improving their lot.
When I came to the gym, I didn’t even own my own pair of gloves. I worked in the off-hours for my gear and training at the candy factory on the river and would emerge late at night smelling like burnt sugar and grease. I made my living with my fists in pickup bouts for the enjoyment of two-bit hustlers over the river in Phenix City – the same rings where they fought roosters and dogs – and soon in the legitimate ring, taking the Atlanta Golden Gloves in 1938. From there, I never thought it would end, boxing my way from New York to New Orleans and even down to Mexico City.
I bought new tailored suits and carried gobs of cash in a silver money clip, even being able to afford a nice little convertible that was a hell of a thing in the country on a spring day.
But then I met Joyce, and when we danced one night on my new nimble feet at a bandstand down on Moon Lake, the fighting didn’t seem as important. She worked as a beautician in Phenix City, was about the prettiest thing I’d ever seen. And unlike most of the girls you meet on the road who were with you until the booze and prize money ran out, she could’ve cared less about me being a fighter. In fact she hated it, and about the time the Japs bombed Pearl Harbor she asked me to please quit getting myself beat on, just like that, never acknowledging that the other fella was taking most of the beating.