yustyoking

Eric, Campaign Mgr.

            Lest I forget, please start here:

Hola! Elect Anna Bola

Maryland Attorney General! 

A paid political announcement by

“The Friends of Anna Committee.” 

                                                               *

            It’s a Thursday. A volunteer, I’m in Anna Bola’s kitchen drinking coffee. The front doorbell rings. Eric, campaign manager, answers the door. I see him talking to a young dude of indeterminate origin—Latino? Oriental? Mulatto?—whose decorative T–shirt says

SAVE THE OYSTERS! 

            God help me, I’ve been following the federally mandated oyster project, it’s been a favorite subject in The National Herald. A source of great color photos of oystermen dredging the seabed (“drudging,” they call it), it looks like they are freezing butt 365 days a year. Besides, I’ve been on some of those boats! “Don’t make me an oysterman, mama, I don’ wanna be cold and wet all my life!” we sang as schoolboys, walking home from school. When I was growing up, there were oyster bars, crab shacks and lobster joints—places in strip malls lining commercial highways that we defined by the solitary fare on the menu.

            This kid wants a contribution. The natural oyster beds have died out, overfished and hopelessly polluted, like everything else in the bay. Enthusiasts are planting and harvesting imported oysters in creeks dousing into the bay. Less polluted, these waters give young oysters a better chance of survival.

            Eric surprises me, acting genuinely simpatico and giving the kid a check. Sweet moment: “You want a contribution now?” he asks affably. (I’ve crept into the front parlor to hear better.)

            “Yes, please,” the young man says.

            “How much?”

            “Well-l-l, you can join up and pay a monthly subscription or do a one-time-only payment. I’m required by law to say that your contribution may be used for political purposes, even supporting select candidates for public office.”

            “Well, I certainly hope so!” Eric replies. “How much is a one-time-only payment?” he continues, fancy fountain pen and checkbook in hand.

            “Well,” the kid gulps, “usually we ask for, uh, $80.”

            Lon-n-ng pause. “I’ll give ya $25,” Eric drawls.

            Another lon-n-ng pause. “Okay,” says the kid.

           “You’ve done yourself a service today,” Eric assures him absent-mindedly, busy writing the check. “Linking up with the Anna Bola campaign will give your project a nice bounce. I want you to call this number and we’ll tell you when Anna’s home. Then you can come by and meet the candidate!”

            Once he’s back at work crunching numbers and making arcane phone calls, Eric catches my eye and says, “Lots of precincts to visit, Kevin. Trips to the Eastern Shore, Ocean City, all those newbie suburbs west of Balto.”

            This is supposed to be my dog whistle, he expects me to start salivating and come panting, raring to go.

             I don’t say “I work three days a week.” I don’t say “No thank you!” I don’t say anything. I shake my head sagely and go back upstairs to finish a stack of voter surveys, entering the raw data onto a spreadsheet on the Mac.

             In order to win this election, Anna has brought in this—bought this—professional, 42-year-old campaign manager named Eric Brown. The Lee Atwater of Maryland, he is a man whom everybody in politics knows. It’s not that he’s a dirty-trickster, far from it, but his thought processes are hopelessly mathematical. One time, I walk in on Eric coaching a bevy of summer interns—all women—each perched before a laptop, six of them sitting around the dining room table with its dainty tablecloth and polished oak leaves. I cannot understand a word they are saying. “Number crunching… derivatives… algorithms… applied decimals,” I can’t even quote Eric correctly, math is not my suit, I have no idea what they are talking about.

             If he gets a sampling of 2% of the registered voters in any one precinct, Eric can extrapolate the data and tell you whether the district is going to break Democratic, Republican, Tea Party or Latino. That’s his specialty, defining the electorate. “It shows you where you have to hit your ping pong balls,” he says, making me wonder whether he plays table tennis. I can never get him to admit it.

             He runs what he calls “Octo-“ campaigns. An octogeneric campaign in an octomegalopolis. Success is coined “Octopussy.” Octopus campaigns, tentacles reaching into every precinct all over the state. Eric knows the power brokers in Democratic politics and most of the players on the Republican side, as well. He doesn’t even have to brag, he’s simply on the phone morning, noon and night, his laptop and WiFi modem glowing brightly, endlessly making connections. “We run a 24/7 campaign,” I hear him explain over the phone to a potential intern. I’ve never seen him sleep or even appear tired. Of course, I arrive at 10 a.m. and leave at 6 p.m., but all I see is Eric in an endless succession of baggy pants and wrinkled designer T’s, padding non-stop around the house in tennis shoes, leading his pack of female number crunchers. All the interns are math majors, that goes without saying. “It’s happening!” he shouts at me happily one afternoon. “This campaign is starting to simmer!”

           Eric is the second campaign manager, taking over from a raven-haired, buxom beauty named Amy. Where she had heart, Eric has everything else. One morning, he marches up to me, all excited. “We got in three new submarine turnarounds,” he announces.

          “That’s impressive,” I remark. “What do we use submarines for?”

          “What? Oh. Three new summer interns. Not submarines. Three new interns.”

           “A harem.”

           “Uh, no, Kevin. We don’t use that expression anymore. That’s considered sexist. You know, not politically correct.”

           The people on the campaign find me a colorful character. They love the colloquial phrases I utter:

           “His nose was out of joint…”

           “Put another log on the fire!”

           “Nothing beats success.”

           “We’ll knock them for a loop.”

          “We’ve got the data, we’ve got the base.”

           “That and $4 will get you coffee at Starbucks.”

           “… Available in many colors as long as it’s black.”

           “I’m not questioning where he was born, I’m worried he was hatched from an egg.”

          “Hit one out of the ballpark.”

          “Forget who wrote the Book of Love, who published it?”

           In an interesting case of symbiosis, I wouldn’t be laying these eggs of wisdom if they weren’t my audience. They bring out the weird in me; I find myself cracking wise in ways I never do at any other location. My normal modus operandi is mucho differente: Shy, angry and discreet, I go my own way, spouting platitudes and “being nice” to people by expressing concern for their welfare. “How are you?!” I ask. That deflects the question of how I am, which, usually, is pretty unhappy with life.

            If I’m a time-waster, it’s because Eric is so easy to talk to. That’s one of his gifts, his seeming interest. “Big issue, Kevin, the environment,” he’ll say. “Gotta fight industrial pollution.  Anna’s big on fighting industrial pollution. She may not know it yet, but she is!”

            And I’m off and running, babbling away about the wildlife you once encountered in Maryland, beavers, opossum, skunks, enormous horned turtles, foxes, frogs of every description, newts, lizards, praying mantises and butterflies, stingrays and skate in the bay, eels…

            My God, the eels we used to catch! We’d be fishing for “spot,” a local delicacy, with a fiberglass rod and light tackle. Suddenly, the rod is bent double and the monofilament blue line is singing off the reel, the reel lock grinding like an old tractor. “It’s an eel,” our dad would announce lugubriously from astride the heavy wooden rowboat. We boys would whoop and holler as whoever had it on his line eventually reeled it in and brought it, long, black and squirming, over the side and into the boat. “Watch the teeth,” our dad would warn nervously. “They are razor sharp!”

            Born in the Sargasso Sea, they migrate to the Chesapeake Bay and only return home to mate.

            I think they always swallowed the hook. I remember cutting the monofilament with a fish knife, but can’t remember ever pulling a hook from the mouth of an eel. Rockfish, trout and spot, you could rescue your hook. Skate didn’t nibble earthworms, so the rare occasion you brought one into the boat, your hook had simply, accidentally, snagged him. My mom wouldn’t cook skate, she complained it stunk up the entire cabin.

            Eric listens to, like, 180 seconds of this trip down memory lane, sighs in disbelief, and gets back to work. He never says so, but I castigate myself for being a chatterbox. There’s a wealth of information I bring to the campaign, a lifetime of deep understanding of Maryland issues. “Maryland tobacco? Tell me about it! I began smoking at age 9!” All this connectedness delights Anna. It bores poor Eric to distraction. What does he care how many whelps get sired by foxes to make up a litter? “I’m trying to get Anna elected,” he grunts, and I shut up. Forget hunting rifles, fishing tackle, tobacco sheds and backroom politics, in this campaign, I am surrounded by mathematical nerd bots.

            “The suburbs around Washington, D.C. have nothing to do with the Great State of Maryland,” Eric instructs me. “They are elitist, parochial and Washingtonian. Sitting here in Oxburg is worse than a backwater. It’s a contrivance. You don’t have one half of one percent of the vote! This township is irrelevant!”

            It occurs to me I’ve never explained the history of Oxburg. Built by developer Julius Lapidus in 1927, he felt he couldn’t very well name it Lapidusville. Originally, he wanted to, but his wife said “no.” Julius’ vision was a bedroom community for people working in Rockville, Chevy Chase and Bethesda, but also a location with direct access to Washington, D.C. The Blue Line ran local buses to and from the city, giant Studebakers with 6 cylinder,   40-horsepower engines and plate glass windshields. They provided a 1½ hour commute each way. Rockville Pike at the time was what its name implies, a thoroughfare linking several separate areas of habitation. A visionary, as I say, Julius left substantial lawns around each dwelling. “How I’d like to live,” was his favorite expression. Black and white photos of the area show his first billboards advertising “Cottage living in a rural paradise, accessible by car with urban centers.” Pure Julius.

            When we ask contractors to do brickwork in the development, they laugh incredulously. “Nine inch brick! No kiln in America manufactures nine inch brick. These houses must have been built in the 1920’s,” they guffaw. “Today, the industry standard is 7½ inches.”

            Hailing from Philadelphia, Julius named the place for Maryland historical figure John Ox (1617 – 1671) who was said to have owned property in the area. A developer, not a scholar, it never dawned on Julius to check out the bona fides of the man for whom the development was being named. A trip to the Library of Congress would have unearthed the trenchant facts: A Puritan from Boston, John Ox was at constant loggerheads with his Anglican Episcopalian neighbors. Basically a pain in the butt, after a few years, John Ox got run out of Maryland. No matter. Julius named it “Oxburg,” and Oxburg it remains.

            The town became incorporated in 1931, at the height of the Depression, for tax purposes. As a rural community, there simply wasn’t sufficient revenue to provide roads, parks and, above all, schools! That was the big issue, the one-room clapboard schoolhouse would not do for a rising bedroom community. The cinder roads weren’t much fun either, I’m told.

            “No good will come of this day!” announced the first mayor, Mr. Baldur Dash, at the incorporation ceremony. His words have stuck. The town motto resounds:

No good will come of this! 

           Poor Julius never found out, busy building military housing in Panama. Those moss-covered abodes are still standing, also, despite the humid climate.

            By the time my parents bought our place in 1951, my mom could write her folks that they’d left their apartment downtown and bought “a 24-year-old, $18,000 mansion with no closet space.”

            It was the same intrepid Mayor Dash who named the greenery abutting Riverdale Creek after his favorite daughter. “Natalie Woods” stands as testament to his obtuseness. However, it is not his fault that the official name of the sunken road leading into town is “The 1812 HWY.” The county decided that one. 

             Eric’s vehement dislike of my hometown always cracks me up. We still campaign locally, but Eric treats my neighbors as an afterthought.

                                                                 *

Game Plan

 

            One of our supporters sends us Hiram Whiplash’s campaign brochure. Hiram is running in the Democratic primary against our candidate, Anna Bola. Each wants to win the primary, so he or she can compete against the Republicans in the general election, for the position of State Attorney General.  Hiram’s brochure is a 4-inch by 6-inch full-color foldout. It has photos of Hiram with his kids, smiley close-ups and emphasizes his years of public service. While I spent my Army career fighting insurgents, rescuing refugees, pulling my pud and negotiating peace accords, Hiram worked 15 years as a JAG officer. The Judge Advocate General’s office is a good background in paralegal for someone running for A.G. Not a perfect fit, mind you, but at least something judicial. He also brags about serving on a minority rights committee by direct appointment of the president.

            “This sounds very impressive,” I tell Eric, campaign manager honcho extraordinary. “On paper, Hiram sounds like a formidable opponent. I’ve served in the military. Hiram’s JAG experience may be nothing but a desk job, for all anyone knows.”

            “It doesn’t matter,” Eric tells me. “If we run the campaign we want to have, nothing can compete. The oppo will be swamped. It’ll be a rout. Of course, we can’t always fulfill all the details of an ideal campaign.

            “Ideally, every household in the Great State of Maryland will get a mailer or a personal visit from someone affiliated with our campaign. They’ll participate in a meet-and-greet with Anna, see her at a campaign event or receive a welcoming telephone call. If nothing else, we can do the mailers and phone calls. The point is, we need to contact every single voter in one form or another. This requires manpower. You have no doubt noticed me interviewing in person and by phone several dozen interns from the University of Maryland. My A Team, they in turn will recruit more summer interns until we reach my stated goal of 300 campaign interns. Using their own personal cell phones at carefully scripted telemarketing marathons, they should blanket the state. Anna can sign that many letters of recommendation before these kids return to college.

            “Since I see that you are worrying, Kevin, rest assured that the people who do my TV commercials will make Anna sound like the biggest thing since the Coming of Christ. Warm and fuzzy, tough on crime and resilient in the face of adversity, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, even I will begin to believe Anna has super powers. The TV ads will require an enormous campaign chest loaded with gold doubloons, which, unfortunately, we do not at this time have.

            “So stop worrying and drive these yard signs to the addresses on the lists I’m giving you.”

            Not a local resident, Eric doesn’t seem to realize that his predecessor Amy has had me carting yard signs for weeks before he arrived. “There’s a technique to it,” I tell him.

            “Oh?” Eric says, turning his pale eyes in my direction. Anything having to do with technique interests him.

            “You hold the sign out in front of you like this. When people open the door, they laugh. The effect is that you’re naked and hiding behind the sign.”

            “Streakers for Anna,” Eric mumbles, intrigued.

            Driving around the local neighborhoods, my street map ever ready, I cover Oxburg, Chevy Chase, Silver Spring and Rockville. Everything from residential to strip mall, high end to suburban sprawl, winding country road to major artery. These signs aren’t destined for grass islands in the center of the street. Each sign has been requested by a supporter answering Anna’s election appeal. There are little red boxes on the contribution envelope for volunteering, hosting an event or receiving a yard sign. These people have put a check mark in the latter.

            The house I like best is a modern Frank Lloyd Wright knock-off with a gold plaque by the door. It states

                                               On this site

                                                  In 1864

                                         Nothing happened

                                                 

            That takes balls. One thing all of the addresses have in common is their peculiarity. Driving past a line of houses, Anna’s supporter invariably lives in the funky abode with the clay pots on the doorstep, the park bench situated on the lawn, the wind chime, the dogs baying in the window, the Christmas lights lining the gutter in June, the lawn trolls, glazed pavers and a driveway littered with junk.

             Those houses.

            If the homeowner is present, they are no less funky. Sometimes I think half of Anna’s supporters are Jewish. A mezuzah on the door post sends me into lyrical recitations in Hebrew. 

            “Oh, I don’t speak Hebrew,” the person at the door stammers, embarrassed.

            “Hi,” I’ll say, “I’m Kevin Feingold, a volunteer delivering yard signs for the Anna Bola campaign.”

            “O-o-okay-y-y,” people respond, apparently expecting me to ask for money.

            “May I give you the sign?” I ask, handing it over.

            “Oh!… Yes, certainly,” everyone says, relieved that I’m not asking for money.

*

            At Saigon Terrace, where I’m delivering a yard sign to a man named Ky, I pass a Vietnamese woman wearing a bright white T-shirt. In bold black letters, the text reads

                                                      SO FAR

                                                   HE SUCKS  

where the “O” in “SO” has been replaced by Obama’s Sun Rising Over the Road to Hope campaign symbol.

*

            One of the names on my list is Andersson. You can’t get any more Swedish than that. The house is a faux Colonial mansion, just the kind of place an over-extended Swedish immigrant would rent or buy. I make up my mind to take a chance. Ringing the doorbell, I’m confronted by a black maid. “D-Do you speak Swedish?” I ask doubtfully.

            “Ah, honey,” she drawls, “y’all wait a minute! Lars! There’s somebody here about Sweden.”

            “Yes?” a brutish, very tall young college boy with startling blue eyes, asks me.

            “Svenska,” I say stupidly. “Förlåt, Anna Bola kampagnen har skickat hit mig att tilldela skyltar.” (Swedish… I’m sorry, the Anna Bola campaign has sent me here to deliver signs.)

            “What about it?” he asks.

            “Här har ni skylten.” (Here’s your sign.)

            “What are we supposed to do with it?” he asks suspiciously, “Put it on the lawn?”

            “Y-Yes!”

            “Okay! We will!”

            “Hej på er! Vi hörs och syns!” (Best wishes! See you later!)

            “Yeah, yeah, goodbye!” he says, closing the door in my face.

             It felt neat to get to speak Swedish again!  

            Chugging water bottles, studying the map, the heat and humidity are awesome.

            I also get a kick out of seeing some of the signs I previously delivered, particularly in Oxburg, where there’s a tradition of tweaking the message. There’s a sign that states “Simon Cowell Loves Anna Bola For Attorney General.”

Another says

                                                      I 2 AM 4      

                                                    Anna Bola 

 

Or the one telling us 

                                    Anna Bola For Attorney General

                                      –     –     –     –     –     –     –     –    –    –

                                              Beware of Dog                                         

                                                             *

            I knock on Dr. Isaac Sack’s screen door.

            “You just got paint on your knuckle,” he informs me genially, carefully opening the door from within. Sure enough, my finger has a smudge of dark green paint, the same color as the door. “I haven’t had time to put up the wet paint sign,” Dr. Sacks explains. Inviting me in, he hands me a paper towel and says, “Both my dad and my aunt are elderly and have medical issues. I’ve invited 60 people to the event, but I’m afraid it’s going to be a bust.”

            “A meet-and-greet at your home?” I guess. “These things aren’t meant to be straightjackets. If you need to cancel—“

            “Is Anna canceling?” Dr. Sacks asks, horrified.

            “No, no, no!” I flounder. (I don’t even know when it’s scheduled for!) “What can we do? To help?”

            “I’ve sent out 60 invitations, but only a handful have responded. I need someone to telephone people on my list and get a commitment. That they’ll come.”

            “We can do that at the campaign,” I suggest. “Our summer interns will make the calls.”

            “Only, my mailing list lacks phone numbers, and God only knows when I’ll have time to track them down.”

            “We have a Democratic voter data base. E-mail us the names and addresses. We’ll punch up the phone numbers. Not a problem!” I assure him.

            A very worried Dr. Sacks begins to look relieved.

            “Who are you?!” asks his wife, coming into the living room. Tough lady.

            “I’m delivering a yard sign—“

            “Oh! Of course. The Anna Banana campaign… Well… hello!” she says, friendly as chestnuts by an open fire.

            Later, exhausted, I telephone Eric from home and tell him to have someone call Dr. Sacks immediately, if not sooner. We have to help him contact his guest list by telephone. Naturally, I’m leaving Eric a message. I know better than to expect him to answer his phone.

            Once, in a similar fix, Amy had me address 150 anonymous white envelopes. We wanted them to appear as if they came from Mrs. Franklin, who was hosting the event, not from the campaign. With Amy gone and the campaign in the hands of mathematicians, it’s definitely a colder experience. On the plus side, Eric is the one who said, “You have to service your voter base and make the choir sing!”

            While Amy said, “We concentrate on convincing the undecideds. Basically, once someone is an Anna supporter, we ignore them.”

            Two very different philosophies.

            Now, Eric’s will be put to the test.

            He and his assistant Judith are cold fish. “How’d you like the parade?” Judith asks me. Apparently, she was there, although I never noticed.

            “I liked Jackson Jones,” I tell her. “Great speech!”

            “Oh, I didn’t like it,” she replies. “I prefer reasoned argument. Jackson is too much fire and brimstone.”

            Fuck! Here we go again. Math geniuses!

            “I need that fire to heat up my coals,” I say, mock apologetic. That makes Eric laugh.

            “Kevin needs a fiery speech to get hot,” he chuckles.

            Lacking warmth, I don’t know how helpful this campaign is going to be to someone like Dr. Sacks.

*

            Employing public sources and creative use of the telephone, I locate the JAG office of the National Guard Reserve where Hiram Whiplash so patriotically serves. JAG is accessible to the general public since some cases impinge on civilians. When I tell the clerk I’m ex-military, he puts me through to Hiram’s commanding officer.

            “What seems to be the problem?” this gentleman asks me. “Do you wish to file a complaint?”

            “No. As a voter, I simply want to fathom the extent of Hiram Whiplash’s duties, to judge his qualifications for holding elective office in the State of Maryland.”

            “Well, I certainly cannot comment on that,” Hiram’s commander says, weighing his options. “Captain Whiplash is a meaningful addition to this office. We fight a constant backlog of cases. Captain Whiplash isn’t afraid to put in the long hours.”

            “Is it a desk job?”

            “It is most assuredly a desk job.”

            I thank the man.

            “Are you a movie buff?” he asks me.

            I begin to laugh. “Deep into my second career, I am a screenwriter. Yes, I am definitely a movie buff.”

            “I only ask because I’d say our office is a lot closer to A Few Good Men than Top Gun.”

            “I understand.”

            Anna is on the campaign trail, shaking down corporations for the big money needed to finance TV advertising. I wonder: What is she promising them in return?

            I’m delighted that Eric trusts me enough to hand me an assignment and leave me to run my own show. I enjoy the work, but never in my wildest dreams, had I expected to be lonely out on the campaign trail. Driving around delivering yard signs, I do become desperate for ever more human contact.

*

            No one home, I prop a yard sign against the stucco wall of a suburban dwelling. Sometimes, I’ll actually plant the sign in the front yard. This time, I can’t figure out where they’d like to put it. As I return to my car, I see her.

            She is sitting across the street in a beige compact. Watching her through the windshield of her car, two features strike me, setting my heart a-flutter. She is wearing ridiculous heart-shaped sunglasses. And she is laughing. Not talking-on-the-phone laughing, not listening-to-the-radio laughing, just sitting by herself, convulsed in mirth.

            THAT IS A VERY NEUROTIC LADY WHO IS NOT GOING TO BE ANY FUN.

            My immediate reaction. If I get involved with her, she is going to be high-maintenance, lead me a wild chase, turn me on and break my heart, but (1) it doesn’t lead anywhere and (2) it won’t be much fun.

            I’m totally devastated.

            She’s everything that’s wrong in a friend, my polar opposite. All I do is work, all she does is play. It’s obvious that’s what she’s doing now. Having fun. Her way. Something is going on, I have no idea what.

             SHE’S LAUGHING. SHE’S SO BEAUTIFUL.

             I’m captivated. She owns me.

            As I approach, she keeps fooling around with the car door. She opens it. She closes it. She opens it again. Finally, one shapely leg arches out. A sandaled foot touches the pavement. And what a sandal! One of those Roman toga numbers with tight leather thongs crawling up the calf. Turning sideways in her seat, she crosses her right leg over her left and starts bouncing her foot.

            “I saw you eyeballing me! What are you looking at, snarky?! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” she calls out, wrinkling her nose.

            I am going ballistic!!!

            A comparison shopper, this is what I’ve been looking for! Ever since my high school sweetheart and long-term nemesis Peggy Sue Cockburn died, I have sought a replacement pitcher who will tease me, drive me crazy, treat me like an idiot and give me a hard-on. Someone young and non-threatening who will make me feel like a tongue-tied teenager again.  

            “What are you, a mime?” she taunts me. “Can’t you talk? Cat got your tongue? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

            “Hi!” I say walking up to her in my khaki cargo shorts, white T-shirt and sneakers. “You’re so great. You’re amazing. I mean, I saw you sitting here laughing and I thought, ‘Oh my god, she’s wonderful!’ I-I’m sorry.”

            “You’re mad!” she lisps. Looking down at her red painted fingernails, she lifts her arms and waves her hands in my face. “You’re so wired! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! You ought to close your mouth before a fly buzzes in there and sticks in your throat!”

            That’s when I realize that my jaw aches. I’ve been staring at her with my mouth hanging open. Up close, I see she is much younger than I anticipated. She has a tiny, round face with outsized features. I can’t see her eyes, but her nose, her lips and her apple cheeks are squarely in evidence.

             Me like!

            “I-I’m sorry! I, I love it when you laugh,” I tell her, feeling myself blush.

            I love more than her laughter. I love her legs, her arms, her hands, her face, her blond hair, every part of her compact little body. Sitting sideways in the driver’s seat, she’s wearing a white, frilly, cotton summer frock.

            “I drove over here,” she explains with a wave of her hand. “Ricky Williams has been my boyfriend for the last three weeks, but he won’t commit! He says his mom will kill him if I come around. She’s such a bitch! So this morning, after class, I told him, ‘Ricky, Ticky-poo, if you won’t give me your home address, I’m leaving for California, like, tomorrow. Right after school lets out. I’m not waiting around here when I can drive to California!’ That’s when he gave me this address! See the sign? He lives here! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

            Intelligence isn’t handed out like door prizes, where everyone gets one. Besides, she’s “funny”: A lady with an agenda, she uses laughter as an aphrodisiac.

            Definitely my kind of girl. “Gosh, you’re so neat!” I tell her. “What, what’s your name?”

            “I’m Carrie!” she smiles.

            “Hi! I’m Kevin.”

            “Kerim?”

            “Kevin.”

            “Oh, okay!”

            I look over at the house across the street and see the trad mushroom-shaped sign with the family name painted in black. “Williams.” Well, well… little Ricky Williams doesn’t want Carrie showing up at his house. Gad! I wouldn’t want her showing up at my house, either! My mother would have a heart attack. Carrie is every mother’s worst nightmare.

             “You’re great,” I tell her. I sit down at her feet, right in the middle of the street. The pavement is hot and sticky under my shorts. Fortunately, it’s dead quiet, not a breath of traffic.

              LOOKING AT SOMEBODY WEARING HEART-SHAPED SUNGLASSES DOES PUSH MY BUTTONS.

              “Do you carry a wallet?” she asks me. “Not everybody carries a wallet. I was just wondering if you do, ‘cause… Huh? Do ya? Can I see it?”

            I fish out my wallet.

            “How much money do you carry around? ‘Cause different people carry around different amounts, and I was just wondering how much you carry around, Kevy…”

            “Well, it’s, I…”

            “Show me! Take out your money!” she says, her foot bobbing inches from my face, her hands making violent circles in the air, her mouth constantly breaking into a triumphant smile.

            “Please!” Desperate, panting, I pull out my bills.

            With a flip of the wrist, she shoves her left hand in my face, palm up. Flexing her fingers, she waits, laughing at me behind her crazy sunglasses.

            “H-Here!” I say helplessly, handing over my money. “It’s a… a twenty and a ten and a five and some… ones,” I choke, barely able to speak, my mouth is so dry.

            “This is so weird!” she assures me. “You’re such a go-go! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

            If Carrie is young and dumb, what does that make me? A masochist?

            “I-I’ve got to go,” I say, gazing up at her.

            “I’m gonna go ring the doorbell and visit Ricky, Ticky-poo! Then, when I finish with that, I’m gonna come visit you! Go straight home and wait for me!” she instructs, pulling off the heart-shaped sunglasses and staring deep into my eyes.

            Gulp!

            Her eyes are sky-blue. My kind of loser, I feel like I never want to leave. I never want to stop staring into her baby blues. My penis is hard as a rock. I feel dizzy with so much blood in an unaccustomed place! Lord help me! Eureka!!!

            (She’s still human. Yes, she’s wearing blue eyeliner, but late nights, booze, drugs or hay fever have left her with bags under her eyes and puffy lids. I find these flaws endearing.)

            “D’you have money in the bank?”

            “I have money in the bank,” I tell her, swatting away gnats. The humidity’s a killer.

            “Because people always say they have money in the bank,” she enumerates, punctuating each phrase with an emphatic up-and-down motion of her hand. “But when I go to borrow $1,000, they never have any money!”

            “I have money in the bank!” I insist. She’s driving me batty with this line of questioning.

            “How much money do you have in the bank?” she demands. Now she sounds like an auditor from the IRS.

            “I have money in the bank! I have $20,000 in the bank.”

            “No, you don’t,” she joshes me incredulously. Her foot stops bobbing. Leaning forward, she slaps me playfully upside the head. “You’re as bad a liar as everybody else!”

            “Carrie! You’re driving me nuts!”

            “O-o-o-oh??? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

            “I have $21,560 in the bank as of last Wednesday,” I shout, exasperated.

            She tweaks me on the nose. “Liar, liar, house on fire!”

            “I will take you to the bank and show you.”

            “But it won’t be in cash! It won’t be in cash,” she chants, giving me a noogie.

              It feels like my cock is going to explode.

            “I want cash!” she sings, drumming on the door frame.

             “I will give you whatever you want!!!”

            “If I want to go to Europe this summer…” she asks me in a scratchy,

sing-song voice, “will you pay my way?”

            “If.. you want to… go to… Europe this summer,” I recite, nailed to the spot by her iron gaze, “I will… pay your way!”

            “Oh,” she opines, “I thought you might want to!”

            Kirk to Picard: Resistance is futile.

            “My god, Carrie! I just met you ten minutes ago and you’ve got me paying for your trip to Europe. I love you! I love everything about you!”

            “Well, gooo-o-o-ood,” she chortles. “What’s your home address and phone number?”

              Now I know how Ricky must feel!

             “Here’s my cell number,” I tell her. “I live with my mom. She’s not an easy lady to get along with…”

             “They never are, Kevy-poo!” Carrie assures me. “I understand, honey pot! Is there a Starbucks where you live?”

             “Well… yes!”

              “I’ll meet you at Starbucks. We need to talk about my trip to Europe. I’ll help you with the details!”

             “Are you serious? Oh, Carrie! Thank you,” I babble, finally getting up from the street. “I’ll do anything for you!”

            “That’s not my fault,” she drawls. I realize she has a soft South Carolina accent.

           “Oh, no! I mean, yes! Please! Of course! I’m just glad for any time we… can spend … together. Carrie.”

           I love the way she twists me around her little finger. She’s putting real time and effort into this new-found relationship. I’m impressed, this lady has both the technique and the panache down pat!

          Waltzing up to me, she runs her left hand down the side of my face. Reaching over my shoulder, she massages the bump on the back of my head. “I like hanging out with you!” she announces. Breaking away, she approaches the Williams residence, giving me an admirable view of her gorgeous little butt swinging left and right under her cotton dress.

           Give the lady an A+ in seduction.

           Grrrowlll !!!

            I’m in love!

*

 

CONFESSION

 

            Since so many of you have been asking (well, three), I wish to state my agitation over the endless search for biographical truth on the Internet.

            Enough, I say. Mea culpa. My bad. Tearfully, I admit it, I am a female lesbian activist living in Beirut, Lebanon. All other identities are temporarily put on hold.

            You may have seen my glam shot on Facebook, sweeties! That’s Clearasil on my chin. Lady Clairol does my hair. Nails by Tina. The nefarious machinations of the manipulative puppet masters at the IMF and World Bank are depriving we Third World youngsters of our future and our birthright.

            As we all know, Beirut is hot in summer and the Babylonian antiquities are kept on the second floor of the National Historical Museum, next to the gift shop. Scenic postcards still cost only 3 livres 50 piastres, despite the inflation. Henri Matisse, to my knowledge, painted only landscapes in Lebanon.

            Speak truth to power! Richard Nixon created Lipitor.

            I bought that mauve oneset at a small tailor shop just off the souk. I have inherited an agate ring from my Grandma, darling, but I only wear it on special occasions. So, help overthrow the repressive autocracies of the Arab world! This is a revolution! As we said in college, there’s no wishy-washy, mealy-mouthed Mickey Mouse about it!

Workers of the world, unite! All you have to lose are your personal information, your credit rating and, like, maybe, your freedom.

            I have yet to find an Arab prison with really fresh potato chips or a decent ATM machine!

            I dare to speak out! I am currently incarcerated in a Scottish gaol on drug charges and for allegedly passing bad checks. Those checks weren’t bad! Money wants to be free!

            Help get Pamela out of prison! Send cash!

            If and when I ever get back to America—I went to school in Ann Arbor, Michigan—I intend to continue our battle as a member of Pretty Girls For Obama.

            Long live the proletariat!

                                       –         A Female Lesbian Activist in Beirut, Lebanon

P.S. For security reasons, I am using a proxy Web server that only makes it APPEAR that I am writing from the International Space Station. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Everybody Likes A Parade

 

            Some traditions demand loyalty. I’m trying to work up enthusiasm for the Mason-Dixon Line Parade. What is it with Oxburg, Maryland and parades? This one starts at the Oxburg Regal Hotel. A cultural landmark, it’s a converted, two-story clapboard farmhouse from the 1840’s. Ever since 1933, a local dignitary has spoken from the second story balcony, followed by a Long March to Natalie Woods where a mock Civil War battle is enacted. By torchlight. In the old days, the re-enactment preceded a mighty bonfire at which people consumed unidentified beverages concealed in brown paper bags, only the neck of the bottle nestling visibly in the creased brown paper. I remember those wondrous conflagrations of my youth, the sparks spiraling upwards into a 1950’s sky filled with stars. Many a pagan dance lent pageantry to the evening, one of the few times of the year when the adults acted childishly and we youngsters stood in awe of them.

            Open fires have been banned for years and night glare blots out the sky, but in 2011, I get an invitation to attend this rite of passage from my candidate herself. Anna Bola all but begs me to come.

            “The Mason-Dixon Line Parade?” I ask, staring at her over her kitchen table.

            “Please! I need you there!”

            “Uh…”

            You’ll remember, I promised myself no more outdoor barbecue campaign events for this puppy!

            As soon as I say yes, Anna and campaign manager extraordinaire Eric are off to the Eastern Shore. They are on a veritable crusade. We have the same problem there as the Obama presidential campaign struggled with in rural Pennsylvania. The locals love their guns and their Bibles. No sweet-talkin’ jive cat from the ‘burbs can possibly fathom the rights and obligations of a waterman, a tobacky grower, a Southern Maryland cornhusker or a ‘coon hunter. At least, that’s the opinion of the locals.

            I keep waiting for Anna and Eric to call me. I’ve spent summers in my youth drudging for “arsters” on skipjacks. I know more about the Eastern Shore than they do. In this instance, they fall victim to the old adage: You only value help in direct proportion to what you pay for it. I work for free, I cannot be a valuable commodity. Busy, they don’t call.

            “It’s my smartphone,” Eric insists every time I complain about his not returning my calls. “You call, I’m gonna answer.”

            Unbelievable! He never answers. I get so alarmed, sitting at home, unable to even book my next day of work, I telephone Amy. Maybe she knows where the campaign is sequestered.

            I get her on her cell phone. “I haven’t worked on the campaign in three weeks!” she rages. “Why call me?!”

            Yikes! “Hey! I’m sorry. I didn’t—“

            “Just keep calling Eric. Eventually, you’ll get him,” she advises me.

            This is the first indication that Eric has pushed Amy aside. Not an amicable divorce.

            So I call the Oxburg Regal Hotel. “The Mason-Dixon Line Parade. What time does the… official speak from the, uh, balcony?”

            “The Lieutenant Governor,” the prim Events Coordinator says. I can barely hear her.

            “Right. The Lieutenant Governor of the Great State of Maryland. When does he speak? I’m supposed to attend—“

            “Out of privacy concerns for the organization hosting the event, we refrain from giving out any details,” she tells me.

            “Wait. What? The Lieutenant Governor is speaking from the hotel balcony and you won’t tell me the time?” I marvel, laughing incredulously. “Are you serious?”

            “Check your invitation,” she tells me, annoyed. “Get in touch with the organizer!”

            “Okay-y-y,” I say. “Who is the official organizer?”

            “Out of privacy concerns for the organization hosting the event, we don’t give out that information.”

            “Thank you!” I guffaw and hang up. This is why hotels have such a bad rep!!!

            I google the parade and find the info online in, like, three minutes.

            On my way to the parade, I am hyper nervous. I hate crowds. I feel totally out of my element. Luckily, none of this seems to show. Apparently, I look just as much like a party animal as everyone else.

            Maryland in June, it’s a steamy night, muggy as a sauna. People drain their plastic water bottles in one gulp and begin beating one another over the head with the empty containers. Bonk!… Bonk! Bonk! Bonk!

            “If one more hooligan hits me over the head,” Eric growls ominously, “that person’s in trouble.” But I’m laughing hysterically. Having found Eric in the crowd, the “hooligans” attacking us are all young girls. Slow-eyed schoolgirls, they keep giving us “come hither” looks and beaning us in the head.

            “You’ve got a hat,” I remind him.

            Incongruously, Eric is dressed like Marlon Brando in The Wild One: Leather jacket, black leather cap, jeans, black leather boots. “These young ladies on the cusp of womanhood need a good spanking,” he opines, “preferably with the flat of the hand on their round, little heinies.”

            I smell alcohol on his breath. Opening a bottle of champagne, he drenches me. In the old days, I would have raised a fuss. In campaign volunteer mode, Mr. Cool, I roll with it, wiping off what I can with Kleenex. “See,” I imply, “no worries!”

            Eric’s still babbling away: “I believe the actions of these young maidens constitute an existential threat. They are channeling repressed sexuality. Long live Dr. Kinsey!” He seems serious. “I’m a number cruncher. The number of girls waiting to be crunched is insurmountable…”

            It never occurred to me that Eric cannot hold his liquor. A finely-tuned machine, even a few drops make him a wild man, spouting gibberish.

            “A hot-blooded pedofile like yourself must be going mad in this heat,” he tells me.

            Accurate gibberish, but never-the-less, the guy is out of control.

            “Too much!” I mutter, bemused. I duck into a green Porta-Potty, both to take a leak and to escape his verbal assault.

            Hiram Whiplash, Anna’s opponent in the upcoming Democratic primary, is there with his supporters. It’s hard to criticize them. Everybody likes a parade. They think their candidate is best.

            Hiram’s 12-year-old daughter sings the national anthem, holding a cordless mike, looking as serious as Ben Kingsley. She sounds uncannily like an ad for Pennsylvania Dutch Oatmeal. When I congratulate her on her performance, she turns to her dad for reassurance.

            “Who are you?” demands Hiram.

            “John Q. Public,” I say. I can’t very well tell him I volunteer on the campaign of his fiercest opponent.

            “What do you want?” Hiram inquires angrily.

              “Fewer speed humps. Better public transportation. Smart growth. Mixed use. An end to wasteful police procedurals on television.”

            “Move to Russia!” Hiram counsels me.

                                                                          *

            “Was fatty there?” my mom will later ask.

            Well, yes, Arthur is there. His lifestyle has left him overweight, but he is a precinct captain of some renown. His current claim to fame is an excelling daughter. Graduating top of her class in economics at Harvard, she now works in the West Wing of the White House. Heady stuff for a lady one year out of university. Since economic recovery is a major bone of contention between the voters and the current administration, I’m not entirely sure she is the right person for the job.

                                                                         *

            The Lieutenant Governor never arrives. Instead, the designated keynote speaker is Jackson Jones, one-time candidate for governor. The “keynote” is reserved for a rising star in our hierarchy. Jackson lost the Democratic primary in the last gubernatorial election by a landslide.

            “I know you didn’t vote for me!” he roars, smiling toothily. “I came to the campaign with bright, burning ideas, well outside the box. ‘If you like my ideas, vote for me! If you don’t, don’t!’ That’s what I told you. True to your convictions, you didn’t! I’m getting the message.

            “Maryland is an incremental state, we do things in small steps.

            “I tried to get a reputation as a sexist pig by twittering lewd comments to college girls. I must be doing it wrong. They keep texting me, ‘R U coming by or what?’

            “I’ve been dating a lady half my age. She keeps asking me, ‘When do we get to the fun part?’ I offered to take her hiking on the Appalachian Trail, but she opted for Venezuela.

            “Speaking of hidden engagements, I offered to work for the current administration in the White House. ‘Sure,” they said, ‘as long as you don’t tell anybody!’

            “You know someone is employed in the security sector when they cannot tell you what they do for a living. ‘Oh, I’m a chiropractor, but I can’t tell anybody. Top secret. Hush, hush. Highest security clearance. I’ve seen some X-rays in my time!’

            “I’ve been in Egypt working with members of the democracy movement. One of the women I worked with most said, ‘I don’t know how to ask this without seeming forward.’

            “I thought she was propositioning me. No such luck. ‘You keep telling us how to go door to door and how to man phone banks,’ she said. ‘But you lost!’

            “Ow, ow, ow! Not the most impressive entry on my résumé…”

            I look around at the audience. Using the applaud app on their smartphones apparently saves them wear and tear on their hands.

            Anna works the crowd as only she can. By the time she’s finished, everyone has left.

*

Summer In the Suburbs

 

            Where was I? The I.R.S. keeps sending me refund checks. I don’t want these refunds. I am working to attain 40 Social Security credits toward Medicare. I don’t want the I.R.S. reducing my earned income for the year and returning me money. Most people want the money. I just want to pay my taxes!

            I go to my bank to get a larger safe deposit box. My Senior Account gives me a free box, but it’s only 3” X 5”, although all the boxes are a glorious 18” deep. The only things I can imagine keeping in this rectangular metal box…

            “Oh, and no explosives,” Margaret, my personal banker, tells me wryly.

            “What?!” I complain, “I can’t store my collection of ammunition clips and hand grenades?!”

            She is such a mind reader.

            Since the box has been sitting empty for almost a year, I decide that here, finally, is a bank service I can really use. A really big box to store all my drug money! No, actually, my unpublished book manuscripts. If the neighbors burn down our house  (see below), I don’t want to lose my scribbling.

            Gunhilde, the icy blonde bank clerk from Iceland, looks through their inventory online. “How big?”

            “This stack of papers is 4” high, 8½ X 11 inches,” I tell her, pointing. A mix of spiral notebooks, CD-RW discs, printouts and old-fashioned hard leaf binders, it sits majestically on the corner of her desk in her cubbyhole of an office.

            This is a distractingly beautiful woman! “All I have is one box that is 5 inches by 10 inches. Maybe that will do,” she tells me, raising my hopes. “For some reason, it’s not available,” she adds, dashing my hopes. The girls of Iceland are such heartbreakers!

            It turns out the box is on the reserved list for internal use by the bank. Being an incredible bank, Gunhilde gets on the phone and has them make the box available to me.

            “Only problem is,” she explains, “it takes two days to complete the transfer. Can you come back in two days? I’ve got the keys. I won’t let anyone else rent the box!”

            Somehow I knew this process was not going to get done speedily. Margaret would have found a way to get me the box within the hour.

            This is a bad air day: Since early this a.m., my mom has been chasing around the house with her smelly vacuum cleaner. I go out back to cut branches and have to don my dust mask for the pollen. I drive down the street and an old geezer helpfully waves the nozzle of his weed killer canister at me. I go into the drugstore to buy a spiral notebook and a two-man crew is boring holes in the wall, raising pounds of concrete dust, in preparation for installing an ATM machine. Thanks, guys.

            Ms. Anna Bola, candidate for elective office, on whose state-wide campaign I labor as a volunteer, tells me, “You may also get called before the State Elections Board and grilled—I mean grilled—about my campaign. Please explain to them that there is nothing devilish or tricky about a campaign being run from the kitchen of my home.”

            In an effort to maintain love forever, my mom has me go to the local Post Office and purchase 20 of their “Love” stamps and 20 “Forever” stamps. This is a woman whose husband abused her and whose parents abused her. Guess if she argues with me night and day about anything and everything. Sulking, worried that her life is making too small an impact as she approaches “four score and ten,” she monopolizes the kitchen and washing machine. If I start to enter a room, she hurries there first, a defiant look on her face. Since I hate arguing, I ignore this erratic behavior. The silence is deafening!

           Mom and her bridge cronies, this coterie of little old ladies, keep congratulating each other on having air conditioning in their cars. Where are we living, Cuba?

            Our next door neighbor Tracie Sherer has left a message on the answering machine. “Hi! I’ve got a little something for your mom since it’s her 90^th birthday and all. Call me and tell me when to bring it over!”

            This has nothing to do with us. This is Tracie trying to feel good about Tracie. This Madwoman of Chaillot is demanding that the Town Council put in speed humps. Busy with her knitting, she wants speeders guillotined; she wants to watch. Not your friendliest of spirits. Since I oppose speed humps, she has chewed me out at public meetings. That neighbor. Single-handedly, she has destroyed our peace of mind, ruined our sense of community, and left us seething at our neighbors. Thanks to Tracie and her husband Skip, we are going to end up with speed humps, nubs and multi-colored crosswalks on our residential street. That Tracie.

            What do you mean you want to come by and give us another $8 plant?! I’m still watering the cactus you gave us on Christmas.

            Mom listens to Tracie’s message. She doesn’t say a thing. I see the “1” on the display and listen to the message. We don’t need to discuss this. You know where Tracie can shove her $8 plant, folks.

            So when Tracie comes knocking at our front door, keening “Kevin! Kevin!”, mom goes deaf. I ignore the brouhaha. Eventually, she goes away. Though she’s so peculiar, I can’t tell if she’s getting the message.

            It’s the ‘burbs, for God’s sake, walk around the side of the house and beard us on our back porch. Tracie no can do. Paranoid, she’s afraid we’d take her to court and sue her for trespassing. Even our least auspicious neighbors, to our chagrin, come around the back.  Not Tracie.

            I am delighted not to have another of her plants to water!

            Let her go to church if she wants absolution.

*     

Rolling Thunder

     How riding to the nation’s capital on a motorcycle honors our veterans, I don’t know. Different folks choose various symbolic acts. In the 1960’s, spilling beer on the bar, we’d tell people, “I don’t drink because I’m a slobbering drunk, I drink to protest the war in Vietnam!”

     I would think that a contribution to a veterans’ organization would be more to the point, but then you run aground on my mother’s complain that, according to the ratings agencies, veterans’ organizations are among the most corrupt, money-wasting charities. So you really cannot win.

     It’s always fun to ride a hog and it is certainly a visible presence wherever you go. Keep the faith. Semper Fi!

Gaga Performance

     For some of us, Lady Gaga’s appearance on Saturday Night Live was counterproductive. Finally getting to see and hear her, I found the stunts sophomoric, the costumes loony and the thick New Yawk accent unappealing. Of course, anyone whose fan base consists of 15-year-olds isn’t trying to earn a degree in astrophysics.

     Do I think she can win the Republican nomination in 2012? Well…

Campaigning

 

 

            Quote of the Day: “Freedom is not free, as we all know.”

            Even if you never believe anything else I write, you’ll believe this: Towne Day! A crowd of 3,000 in shorts, T-shirts and tennis shoes—families with children, weirdos and teens—fill Riverdale Park. It’s a gorgeous, sunny day.

            It’s also May 21, Armed Forces Day. I have other places I should be, even other countries. Instead, I’ve been bamboozled by the Anna Bola campaign into participating in this IMPORTANT CAMPAIGN EVENT.

            At the Democratic tent, ward bosses, precinct captains, donut eaters and enthusiastic middle-aged women vie for attention as the crowds swirl by in a euphoric daze. One of the ladies helpfully shows me the events program, pointing out the list of 30 GOV’T. AGENCIES & NGO’s and 60 corporate sponsors.

            Freebee City, every tent is handing out woven cloth shopping bags (Made In China) with the organization’s logo and insignia. Every one. Helium-filled balloons, corporate pens, pencils, crayons, train whistles, fans, people are going nuts gathering goodie bags.

            Taking a nice ballpoint pen from a local vendor, I make up my mind to skip all the rest, until I come to a bridge table on the grass that steals my heart: The C.I.A.

            No shit.

            The C.I.A. is there recruiting, situated right next to the little white tent housing the Army Proving Ground Ordinance Demolitions Program.

            “Hi!” I say, removing my sunglasses. I’m wearing an Anna Bola For Attorney General T, so it’s not like the carrot-topped young lady behind the card table has to guess my identity.

            “Hi!” she says, smiling. “Another campaign promoting law enforcement.”

            “Nice to see you guys out and about,” I tell her, blushing. “I’d kill for a C.I.A. tote bag and some of your gear.”

            “Start with a lanyard,” she says, opening a blue bag and popping one inside. She gives me a fancy ballpoint pen, a pad of C.I.A. stationery (size, small), a C.I.A. pencil (“Central Intelligence Agency, www.cia.gov”) and a strange plastic blue object. “It’s a CD cleaner. You know, for kids to clean their musical CD’s.”

            “Um, okay,” I smile. Each item embossed “C.I.A.,” this is very cool stuff!

            “How’s your campaign going?” she asks.

            “Great! Hey, uh, want to, uh, sign Anna’s petition to get on the ballot? She needs 500 signatures. Right now, we have 320.”

            The young lady laughs and shakes her head, “no.”

            “Aha! Right,” I blurt out. “Of course. No can sign. You’re C.I.A.”

            I take the stash back to our tent and carefully stow it with the Anna possessions: the bag of water bottles, the yard signs, the foldout map showing our state, Maryland, divided into voting districts.

            A pile of fliers in hand, I go back to the entrance to the park and start handing them out, chanting

                                        “Hola! Anna Bola,

                                         Democratic candidate.

                                         One of a kind for A.G.

                                         She’s herself alone!

                                         Take no substitutes,

                                         Get the real Attorney General.”

            My competition are school children: High school girls wearing next to nothing shorts and campaign T’s in a rainbow of colors. Grade school kids wearing enormous red T-shirts that go down to their knees, handing out cardboard fans on popsicle sticks, “VOTE CALLOWAY FOR A.G.” They are my opposition. Around us circle a dozen other people of various ages hawking the abilities of people running for Town Council, for Sheriff, for the State Senate.

            As the sun reaches its zenith, we all begin to melt.

            One hour, two hours, a high school lass channeling a sundrenched Kelly Ripa has the field covered, hands down, everybody loves her, the popsicle fans jump from her fingers. This is one sweet kid, even I want to jump her bones.

            Calloway hisself shows up, the only human in the park dressed in a business suit. Walking up the drive, surrounded by his staff, he spots me and pauses to take a mental snapshot, nods in recognition, and trudges on. Later, I hear him orating onstage: “Freedom is not free, as we all know…”

            One of Calloway’s henchmen comes marching back down the road, a passel of 6^th-graders in tow. The youngsters are lugging a 4 ft. by 5 ft. blue yard sign, proclaiming “Calloway for Attorney General.” They head for the main road. This is closely followed by the arrival of the same Pirates of the Caribbean hag (bandana, earrings, bangles) who so graciously showed me the list of corporate and non-corporate donors.

            “Look at them,” I say, pointing at the Calloway gang rapidly disappearing from view. “Pure, unadulterated penis envy. ‘My yard sign is bigger than your yard sign.’ Pitiful.”

            “I understand that Calloway has unlimited funds for his campaign,” she says.

            Huh? What do I know? Nothing. “Is Calloway independently wealthy?”

I ask.

            “No,” she replies. “What I hear, it’s mafia money, out of Baltimore.”

            “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” I say. “I don’t even want to hear that! Even if it’s true, that’s a matter for the authorities to take care of. This campaign isn’t going in for slanderous accusations and mudslinging. That just sullies the campaign for all contenders. Let’s keep our noses clean and take the high road.”

            “I’m just telling you what I heard.”

            “And I’m asking you not to say such things. For our benefit. For the good of the Anna Bola campaign. Let’s not go negative.”    

           She leaves, looking unhappy. I know, I know, all that juicy gossip and I’m no fun at all.

           Dogs everywhere, school kids, concession stands are selling doggie treats, bottled water, popcorn and Tex-Mex cuisine.

           After three hours, Anna comes by and orders me to accompany her to the taco stand for lunch. “I’m buying,” she insists, but only has a $20 bill and wants to get on line at the salad bar.

           “I’ll pay for myself.”

          “No, no, no. Take the $20 and give me a ten.”

          “Go get your salad! I have money!”

           The Latinos behind the counter look surprised that I’m only ordering a $4 taco, everyone else is going for the $7 fajitas, which is a more substantial plate of meat. When I stay with the taco, they heap the entire plate with chopped meat, tomato, cheese, guacamole, sour cream and lettuce. And a taco shell.

          “You no go hungry,” the burly Mexican smiles, revealing a fine, gold molar.

           I don’t mind paying, but I expected to eat my lunch with Anna and, you know, talk politics and bond a little.

            She gone.

            When I return to the tent, Eric, our campaign manager, sends me back to the front of the park.

             Yes, I attract the voters, but this is boring work. Boring. That’s why mostly school kids are doing it. Finally, at 2:15, Eric comes and tells me to pack it in. When I get back to the tent, my crew is already homeward-bound.

            This is why I don’t work as an extra in the movies. We have family friends who rave about it: “The work is a lark. Play-acting! They always make sure you’re comfortable and that you have enough to eat. Most of the time, you’re sitting around on your duff and, best of all, they pay you by the hour! What’s not to like?”

             I need more attention than that. I’ve paid my dues, I’ve been Mr. Nobody. I don’t do crowd scenes.

             Someone has rifled my C.I.A. bag, leaving me the printed lit, the lanyard and the bag. All the other stuff, they’ve stolen. Oh, in compensation, they’ve left me a yellow plastic Frisbee from Palmtree Banking Corp. Even my red lanyard and wooden train whistle from the Metro Authority are gone. I go back to the Metro tent and get a new wood whistle and cloth lanyard. At the C.I.A. table, carrot top looks at me and says, “You’re back!”

         What a memory!

          C.I.A.

          They remember everything.

          “My friends… my coworkers… cleaned me out. They took all your wonderful gadgets. They left me the lanyard and the bag.”

           Of course, it’s late, all they have left are pencils and notepads. “Take as many as you want,” they say, but hey, I’m feeling abused and it ain’t the same, no how. I thank them and leave the goddam park. I manage to keep my cool, but I’m not doing this campaign event bullshit anymore. Let them find another volunteer. Even data entry, typing names, addresses and voter preferences into the office Mac, is more stimulating than this.

           At the office, grateful to have a volunteer, they thank me too much. Today, no one thanked me at all.

           Believe me.

*

 

 

 

NO MORE KISS KISS BANG BANG, BIN LADEN

The National Herald

Correspondent Mitch Daniels reports

 WASHINGTON, D.C. May 2, 2011 –  “Like flossing your teeth, eventually that nasty food particle will get dislodged,” a military source tonight likened the demise of America’s arch enemy Osama bin Laden.

            “We wanted him, we got him,” said another official familiar with the operation.

            Not only was bin Laden killed by U.S. Special Forces on the ground in Pakistan, his dead body was recovered, dispelling any question of his having survived this most recent attack. After ten years of persistent pursuit, America’s efforts have borne fruit.

            Sundays are traditionally a slow news day, which made our ears perk up when we heard that the President would be making a statement from the East Room of the White House sometime after 9 p.m. EST. Still, it was almost midnight before the President addressed the nation in a serious, nationally televised nine minute speech. He said U.S. Forces killed bin Laden in the Abbottabad Valley of Pakistan and “took custody of his body.” The city of Abbottabad lies about 100 miles north of Islamabad in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. A city of 100,000, it is the headquarters of a brigade from the Pakistani army’s 2^nd Division.

            Within an hour of the President’s speech, a spontaneous, enthusiastic demonstration of mostly young people in jeans, sweaters and sweatshirts lined the north fence surrounding the White House, cheering and waving American flags. Among them stood Amal Habeeb, waving a Palestinian flag.

            “This is a great moment for democracy and peace,” Amal proclaimed. “Muslim, Christian, Jew, Buddhist, Sikh, Hindu, Baha’i or Jain, all of us have reason to celebrate the victory of democracy over violent extremism. May today hasten regime change in the Arab world as well!”

            Perky and young, Ms. Habeeb seemed a personification of the sentiment permeating tonight’s triumphant vigil.

            Standing next to her, Orlov Kosygin declared this a great victory for the working class. “Workers of the world, unite!” said Orlov. “All you have to lose are your chains!”

            Stephen Harrington, visiting from Bristol in the U.K., expressed chagrin. “If only Prince Harry had led the charge, you see,” insisted Stephen. “What a gloriously great day for England that would have been. Rather!”

            Dos Lance kept trying to unfurl a Confederate flag, but his friends seemed determined he should keep it furled. “The South has a long and glorious military tradition,” he explained. “That’s my only point in coming here tonight.” The blonde next to him, sporting a button that said “Pretty Girls For Obama,” assured me that Dos was only carried away by the excitement of the moment. “He’s really not a racist,” she insisted earnestly. Looking at me longingly, she added, “I’m also available in orange flavor.” I think it was my press pass.

            Battling through the tightly packed crowd, I stumbled upon a goateed college person named Monty Pellier, wearing an Uncle Sam costume. “I’m Canadian, I have to emphasize my patriotism,” he said, “otherwise you might revoke my visa.” When I protested, he told me that he was joking. Regarding bin Laden, Mr. Pellier said: “I thought, like the Unabomber, Osama would be hiding in the hills, but apparently he preferred the suburbs. I’m from Calgary. You drive two miles, you are outside of town.” Monty claimed he was glad Osama was dead. “What did he ever do for Canada? Nothing!”

            At one in the morning on a balmy May 2, a veritable kaleidoscope of opinions

                                                                                                 [ more on page 10 ]

*

Forget Ayn Rand, Here’s Silvia

 

            I wish to give fair warning: Silvia de Plathelovich will be a recurring name. Not only did I go to school with Silvia—also known as Sydilvia—but we remained friends during that fruitless period of the late 1980’s when she was lead singer in the garage band The Brass Tacks. I knew her then! Silvia de Plathelovich, songstress, seamstress, seductress. You may watch her on the nightly news, trying to figure out what she’s saying, but remember, some of us wax nostalgic whenever we hear a Sarajevo accent. Long live Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kampuchea, Nagorno-Karabakh and any other historical construct that solves a knotty problem by creating a conundrum. If you can’t beat ‘em, give ‘em a country of their own! Look at Palestine, for God’s sake.

            But I digress.

            Did I ever have sex with that woman?

            Did I ever have sex with that woman!

            Alas, the answer is “no,” Silvia never invited me into her bed. With Silvia broadcasting on network television in New York, I would have to classify current opportunities as non-existent. It’s not for want of trying. Undergraduates at Moosegrave College, I drove up to her house in Scranton, Pennsylvania one Christmas and, sitting on the floor of her bedroom, spent a long afternoon listening to her daddy’s collection of 8-track cassettes on his mammoth, homemade tape deck. We called him “sir” and “Mr. D.” We tended to be respectful to former members of the Yugoslavian Armed Forces. That he escaped with his entire family in a Russian-built An-2 cropduster bi-plane added greatly to his rep. I never heard him speak anything but Serbo-Croatian. He had taken an 8-track deck out of the car, bought the right size transformer, linked them to an amp and speakers and shoehorned the entire contraption into a bulky pine box.

            Even I was impressed.

            That didn’t stop me from wanting to screw his daughter, but Silvia had, as they say, other plans: She romanced her way through a series of television producers, each time improving the quality of the show. Yes, there are tapes of Silvia on the daytime soap “Egalitarian Courtroom, “ where she played heroine Margaret Welch, paralegal to and romantic interest of hero lawyer Max Blair. They lasted three seasons, before they got muscled off the air by the excellent stagecraft and brilliant scripts of Law & Order, which, in addition, aired on prime time. Who could compete with a behemoth like that? A juggernaut.

            Next she appeared on “Yoo hoo, America!” That was the morning show that wasn’t Good Morning, America or The Today Show. A perennial also-ran, they never tried to be anything but the third morning show. To her credit, bringing the concept of the plunging neckline to ever greater depths, Silvia became a revolutionary influence on women in television. Network television is a somewhat timid medium—all those millions of dollars in ad revenue at stake if you goof—but that never stopped Silvia.

            I liked her best as pitchwoman for “Elastishirt,” her wide-eyed, busty profiles, with tons of backlighting, gelled perfectly with the company slogan, the only thing she ever uttered in those ads:

“What? Me busty?!” 

            Yes, dear, you busty.

            That income carried her through the 1990’s. About the time I left the Army, Silvia began to show up in news segments on the local New York stations. After all, we were both journalism majors at Moosegrave. And now, there she is on national TV, the same molto vivace, staccato delivery transforming t’s into d’s, f’s into v’s and v’s into w’s. A sulky voice, a smoldering glance, the medium is the message, but what is she saying???

            Damn if I know.

            To her credit, again, I never watch TV, but I’ll watch Silvia. She’s that good at what she does. Flirtation Television.