Three Men Named Tom

by Tom Peters

11/25/2021

After a Thanksgiving feast, the three friends all named Tom sit down with martinis in hand. They all toast the hosts Tom and his wife Barb, from their hilltop home in Orange, CA. They all take a sip. Tom from Laguna Beach packs a pipe full of his homegrown weed and passes it around, as the wives start packing leftovers. Tom from Santa Monica says.

“I had my liberal ethics challenged yesterday while driving up Pico Blvd. A crazed unhoused man walked right in our path, I stop quickly. The man throws a black plastic bag that bounces off my hood and into the next lane. All cars stop as he retrieves his bag near my driver side door, and continues ranting incoherently as he walks through traffic.”

Tom from Laguna, a former Marine* coughs after taking too big of a hit.

“You should’ve hit the asshole!”

Our host Tom giggled.

“What did you do?”

“Nothing”

”Nothing!” Is the chorus from the other two Toms.

“He was having a bad day and I wasn’t”

“Jesus, I read just yesterday that you have 66,000 homeless in LA ….what’s that like?”

“Like I said – a challenge… it’s not like I’m confronted very often, actually it’s quite rare. You guys have homeless in Orange County too.”

Our former Marine*-turned-wealthy-contractor Tom says.

“Yeah less than 7000 and they’re all in Santa Ana, and I never go there or LA…ever! I bet you’re still doing volunteer work for them."

“No, the volunteer work I do is limited to our unhoused and hungry students at SMC.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet they drive up in their Ferraris and you hand them free food!”

The wives, Bev, Barb and JoAn interrupt….

“Time out! We need help in the kitchen boys.”

*Sorry Tom, I know...'Once a Marine always a Marine'