Chapter 8: October 7, 2002 (part 2)

When I arrived, Shooby was in an ornery mood. He sat at the card table-cum-landfill, chain-smoking Now cigarettes, the Dave Brubeck Quartet with Jimmy Rushing percolating on the CD deck. He was in no hurry to return to the nursing home, and picked up the tirade where he'd left off on the phone. "The music is a gift. Whatta you want from me? What do these people want from me? I don't do the music anymore. I have my life. You have the music." One cigarette extinguished, another lit. "I'm the artist. You're the producer. The music's there. I don't do it anymore. I had a stroke. I got a lotta problems."

He recounted his medical travails -- the dialysis, the feet, the heart, the implant operation. He didn't have his wheelchair in the apartment; he'd gone home with only a wooden cane.

I asked if he had any photographs from his younger days. This provoked his ire anew. "I don't have any. That's not now. All you have is the music. There are no photographs." He attempted to elaborate, but his explanation -- which I don't recall -- was a non-sequitur. There were no photographs, he reiterated impatiently.

While I sat on the bed, listening, I glanced down at some wrinkled yellowed papers, and a color photograph of 1960s or '70s vintage. Two black men in pin-striped zoot suits and felt hats -- a burly bruiser with a playful headlock around a pint-sized pal. I didn't recognize Shooby as either. I flipped the photo, but the reverse was blank. Curious, I was, but didn't want to further agitate the Human Horn by asking him about this photo after he'd vehemently denied the existence of same. It wouldn't have been polite.

I gave him a shopping bag stuffed with birthday cards, letters and postcards from WFMU listeners, and returned a few of his cassettes. He was grateful.

I asked if he had the open reel tapes of his original sessions. He flared again: "Yes. But I'm not in a mood to look for them." I asked why he was giving me such a hard time, and he explained that it wasn't me, it wasn't Rick, it wasn't his fans. It was "the people who want so much of me." I have no idea who those folks are -- the social workers? The doctors? His neighbors in the apartment building? He wasn't specific. He's allowed to behave in an erratic manner. He's Shooby Taylor, the Human Horn. He's had a stroke, and the medical community is proposing all manner of indignities.

Looking through the clutter, I discovered a CDR dated 1984 -- presumably from one of the studios where he'd recorded. It contained titles without artists, but there were enough clues to provide missing information about some of the recordings we'd previously preserved on CDR. In particular, the Charles Earland ("Blues for Rudy") and Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis and Johnny Griffin ("Gigi") tracks were now ID'ed.

While I poked through the cassettes and CDs, he seemed annoyed.

"You come here for the music. You look through the CDs and the tapes. But you don't even say anything about my apartment."

"What should I say?"

"It's a mess. You can see that."

"Uh-huh. So?"

"Why don't you say something about it?"

"Like what -- 'Shooby, clean your room?"

"Yeah."

"Why? I'm not your mother. Maybe you like this mess. Maybe you're comfortable living this way. I wouldn't be, but I know some people who seem perfectly at home buried knee-deep in their own crap. It's not my job to tell you to clean it up. Do you want me to help you? If you want me to, I will."

He nodded, as if to say, let's drop it. Point made. He wasn't interested in rearranging the mess. He just felt like venting.

He insisted on listening to the Johnny Cash/Shooby tape, which he termed a "masterpiece." I inserted the tape and hit "Play." He preferred it LOUD. He listened and talked, but the music was so blaring I could scarcely hear a thing he said. Taylor pointed out that these had been hits for Cash, and referred to several songs as "classics." However, it was apparent that the "classic" designation applied more to Shooby's scat overdubs than to the Man in Black's vocals or the songs themselves. After Cash, on the same tape, he ID'ed Shirley Caeser's "No Charge" (which I had mistakenly guessed was early Tina Turner).

About 45 minutes and seven cigarettes later, we prepared to leave the apartment. Before driving back to the nursing home, he wanted to buy me dinner at a seafood eatery down the block. I declined the offer, but said we could stop in to get him a meal. I tied up a plastic sack of garbage, and he threw some belongings in a bag. After locking up, he shuffled s l o w l y down the hallway, holding onto the corridor rail. A female neighbor came along heading the opposite way. "How are you, my dear?," he exclaimed, flashing a smile. She smiled back. "Never stop praying," he bellowed as she passed. After we took the elevator, I left him to walk slowly towards the front entrance while I went around back to fetch the Toyota. I drove around to Broad Street, and helped him into the passenger seat. He paused before sitting down, and said, "Irwin, I apologize for the way I was upstairs. I hope nothing I said hurt you." I assured him that I understood his frustration, and that everything was OK.

Two blocks down was the Newark Seafood House at 1011 Broad. Bright fluorescent lights, and too much empty space -- Shooby said the place used to be a grocery store, but opened as a restaurant a year ago. The premises were filled with an odd array of juxtaposed merchandise. Seafood -- cooked dishes, and fresh and frozen take-home -- along with display cases of stuffed animals, dime candy, Du-Rags, scarves, vials of ginseng extract, cheap jewelry and baseball caps. Anything to pay the lease, I guess.

Shooby ordered a "fish sandwich" -- a vague request which meant something specific to the fry cook. Into the deep fryer sank some generic piece of breaded ex-marine life. The cook plopped the golden fried filet on two slices of bread, tossed it on a tray and passed it across the counter. Shooby slathered it with ketchup.

We walked over to an empty booth and sat for ten minutes while he ate. We chatted, I snapped pictures, and he was in a far better mood.

When I took him up to his room at the nursing home, he seemed "at home." He commented that he felt comfortable here, because the people treated him better.

I hadn't eaten for hours. He offered me a miniature Mounds candy bar from his windowsill, which I accepted. Only after unwrapping it did I realize it had melted one afternoon in direct sunlight, and re-solidified at evening into a mushy latke.

Shooby expressed gratitude for everything -- the ride, the friendship, the birthday cards, for Rick discovering him, for Jesus. As I left, he had a huge smile on his face.

Chapter 8: October 7, 2002 (part 1)

[Shooby had been discharged from the nursing home during the final week of September. I was in Minneapolis visiting my girlfriend, when he left a message on my machine. Said he'd requested the discharge, and it was granted. I was surprised at this development. He was back at his apartment on Broad Street. We spoke on the phone, and I promised to visit him upon my return.]

Over the past few days, I'd left two messages on Shooby's answering machine. Although he can no longer sing or scat, his outgoing message concluded with: "shooba-looba-looba-looba." (He later explained that this message was recorded ten years ago, before the stroke.)

Today I finally succeeded in reaching Shooby. He was agitated, rambled his way through a conversation, doing most of the talking, often raising his voice for emphasis.

Said that he and his son agreed that he needs to return to the nursing home for a while longer. The dialysis-related operation (to implant a shunt in his arm to facilitate the procedure) that had been postponed last month is being re-scheduled. However, before surgery the VA hospital needs to re-administer tests they conducted several months ago -- chest X-Ray, EKG, etc. -- because it's been too long since the last round. Shooby said he also might need a hernia operation, and has an appointment with the foot clinic. He was very anxious about these circumstances.

"I've got a very busy month," he explained, several times. Then he launched into a defiant diatribe: "Hey listen, I got a gift to give to the world -- my music. Not to you, but to the world! That's why I call myself 'Shooby Taylor, the Human Horn'! Because I got feelings like everyone else! I'm talking about the nursing home, the people where I live. They expect a lot from me. They expect me to laugh all the time? Sometimes I don't speak, because I already spoke when I came in. I got a personal life! I'm not yelling at you or Rick or my fans at the radio station -- but at people who don't think I'm human. I'm the Human Horn!"

I had no idea what he was driving at, but didn't take it personally, and don't think he intended it as such.

He was expected back at the nursing home later that afternoon, so I offered to drive him. Said I had another load of mail and birthday cards, and some tapes to return. He agreed, and sounded grateful. Then he resumed his diatribe.