by Mac a'Bhaird

Created on: March 08, 2010

Yes, of course I had my sojourning in the world of petty theft. Every toe headed boy that picked his nose shoplifted.

Ah, it’s been a few years now, but I can still remember the first time; it was in Pasadena California, in the late 50’s. My buddy’s name was Rod Streeter, and, to prove that this brain of mine isn’t even closely affected with memory loss, the name of the store, on Colorado Blvd, was Cornet five and dime store. The booty we were after were the new Duncan plastic slider yo-yo’s. They were the craze at school and Rod convinced me that we could go in there and get our own. Now I don’t remember why I thought I had to steal one. Rod said he had the perfect plan; we would go in there, and he’d talk to me from another isle… they couldn’t watch both of us at the same time, he said, and we could help ourselves. First he did it, and then it was my turn. It was like picking something hot up. It was hot. But we walked out, and everything was cool. We did it!

Next day, we thought we’d do it again; the first time was so easy. What is it; they say that a criminal will always strike twice? Well, in my case it certainly was true. The first time was just too easy. Yet this second time, we got caught red handed; our parents were brought into the picture, and I got into a lot of trouble.

I never stole again, but I do admit a few years later, actually around ten years later, I witnessed probably the most adept shoplifter there ever was. It was now the late ‘60’s, my buddy and I were hitch hiking up to San Francisco and got a ride from an old man- well, I’ll say an ‘older’ man. I don’t really remember how old he was- but he was dressed like the dude- black cowboy hat, vest, big buckle, boots, denim pants and the whole nine yards. He was driving a station wagon.

He picked us up and after a while asked us if we were hungry. He said all he needed to do was find a store, and he’d get us whatever we wanted. He said he would shoplift it. My buddy and I were both so curious as to what he meant, and how he was going to do it! We pulled into a small town somewhere in the San Joaquin Valley. We stayed in the car, and he went into the store… a few minutes later, he walked out, got into the car, and pulled out few cartons of cigarettes, packages of ham and cheese. It was incredible. And to make it even more incredible, he drove to a gas station and sold the cartons of cigarettes.

He asked us what cigarettes we smoked. Then he went to another store, and repeated the process, bringing out our brand of cigarettes. Again, it was incredible.

We proceeded toward our destination, pulling off the road at every little city, and again over and over he repeated the process, lifting mainly cartons of cigarettes, then going to a gas station and selling them.

Finally we came to the place his destination parted from ours. He pulled off to the side of the road and he dropped us off. He pulled out a few $20’s and gave them to us, said ‘so long’, and drove into the sunset, making us wonder if we dreamed the whole thing. But we didn’t- we had a whole carton of cigarettes and a couple of $20's to prove it wasn’t a dream.

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