The Boop-Boop-Boop . . . Wheeee! Of A Dream Deferred

The New York Press attempts to learn just what the fuck it is dudes with metal detectors are doing:

James is mad as hell about something or other involving money — I don’t ask — and we’re tromping through the streets of Brooklyn in giant strides. He’s got a farmhand’s build, autumn-wheat hair and a scar that extends to the right side of his frown. In his hand is a metal detector as big as a bazooka.

Every morning James wakes up believing he might strike it rich on that very date. “One attic, one backyard or behind one door,” he trails off as we head out to dig up whatever fortune is buried in Prospect Park.

“You take a ring and throw it as hard as you want at the grass, and you ain’t gonna hear it make a sound,” he explains. “The dog walkers, that’s another thing. Tissues they use to clean up with, they put in the same pocket as their change. They pull out the tissues and where do you think the change goes?”

. . .

Dark clouds had followed us to the park and now thunder is rumbling in the distance. The headphones on James’ ears buzz a mosquito-like sound, which grows louder and fainter as he pans his detector side to side. The wind picks up and scatters leaves, and I see James on his knees carving a circular wound in the ground with a painter’s spatula. He flips over a hangnail of sod and reaches into the earth. A nightcrawler squirms across his knuckles. He plucks out a dime that looks like it was found on the Titanic.

Within an hour we have 65 cents in a baggy and are nearly swimming in the downpour.