A BRIEF HISTORY OF AN AMERICAN TORY

Arthur came by the Mercedes when he was twenty-nine years old. The car was massive and already of a certain age. He had first heard of the splendid machine at some official function or another of the Turkish Consulate in Tampa. Honorary consul Willie Ferguson faced criminal charges over some phony business regarding the Hurlugolu Charitable Trust Fund. The unfortunate man had retained Arthur as his lawyer and offered him the vintage vehicle in exchange for his services. He also had squashed Arthur’s hat, which sat on a chair as the lawyer he must have been anxious to consult with was preparing to leave. The Turkish diplomat caught Arthur’s shoulder, making him turn slightly while he said, "So soon! Please stay a moment longer."

These words left him out of breath and he dropped his massive frame onto the chair. Getting up, he threw a startled look at the ruined couvre-chef and said, "Clumsy me. Not valuable or anything, was it?"

"As a matter of fact, it was."

"Sorry and all that, old chap."

"Just forget about it. I sure will."

"If you’d care to give me a bit of your time, I may have a proposition for you."

Arthur allowed himself to be conducted in the direction of the buffet and the consul had put into his reluctant left hand a plate of food. "It's my wife's car," he confided to Arthur over dubious Turkish delicacies drowned in a whitish glob of jelly-like matter that the barrister had yet to find the nerve to bring near his mouth.

Willie, who had no such qualms, was gobbling the stuff like mad. He explained himself. "She has no use for it."

Still, Arthur, always the lawyer, protested, “It’s your wife's car.”

“Oh no, it is mine all right. Moreover, she can't stand the damn thing. Hates the Huns if you want to know.”

“Well, I am not sure...”

Willie affected a British countenance, dressed in tweed, and talked with a fancy accent. He added as if they were old friends from Cambridge University, “I am a little short of cash right now. Please, you have to take a look. The old lady is a real beauty. Built-in 1965 and not yet 10,000 miles on it. Time to get rid of that Toyota of yours. This would be the perfect vehicle for a young lawyer on the make.”

. . .

So, Arthur took a look and they made the transaction. Had he refused it, he would have lost the client altogether. And, in those years, still early in his career, who was he to pass up a Turkish Consul accused of misappropriation of exotic investments when most of his usual clients were content to occupy themselves with pedestrian misdemeanors? Also, the Toyota Corolla 64 he had bought used in 1969 had been emitting strange noises lately, which had helped a lot to rationalize the capricious impulse. Besides, it was not much of a deal, if one wanted to look into it, because Willie went into receivership one month or so later. And he had promised not to do that. But the guy was a crook, wasn't he?

Thanks to Arthur, the Turks were defeated on some technicality. However, the consul, because Arthur made him put back in the sums he appropriated by mistake in the Hurlugolu account, in the end, did find himself with not much money left. This calamity left the consul with no job while he, Arthur, as a suspected beneficiary of one unmerited Mercedes, had to go through a ton of red tape just to keep his justified fees and the vehicle that paid them.

The German magnificence had a three-liter, six-cylinder propulsion engine that packed 132 horsepower. It could easily have accommodated five passengers in royal comfort but never did. Or not quite. Once, early in his ownership, he had driven to Sarasota with the girl he was seeing at the time and two of her friends seat in the back. Veggie and Fruitie were what they called themselves and they were both smokers. Damn, they were rolling their cigarettes and God knows what they were putting in there. The sickening pair sat on the smooth, golden leather of his newfound marvel, windows fully opened, expelling fumes like locomotives, throwing ashes all over while babbling all sorts of nonsense.

“The crazy son of a bitch pardoned Nixon.” Fruitie had a high-pitched voice made worse as she screamed to be heard over the wind that engulfed the habitacle and stirred everything around in a maelstrom of nauseous dirt and dust.

Like an echo, Veggie added, "Yes, the bastard did it, didn't he?"

Arthur had voted for the destitute president both in ‘68 and ‘72 and would have done it again, given half the chance. True, he had started it all, criticizing Jimmy Carter over the Iran hostage crisis and now, those fools were attacking Ford on the rebound. He would not argue with them, and as far as his date was concerned that finished her. He didn’t like the way she dressed, going half-naked all the time, and he did not like her crowd much either. People who were always frothing at the mouth over one issue or another and seemed to believe that one could settle humanity's problems with absurd sit-ins or attaching oneself to lampposts, ending up with not much result save for blocking traffic and making police officers’ lives miserable.

. . .

He still had the car twenty years later when he met Jenny. She was a full four years younger than the Mercedes but it did not show much. While the car, without a doubt, looked better. Still, he kind of liked her when he had a mind for feminine companionship. That first night, he made a show of opening the door for her, really, on his part, a grand gesture, which had more to do with protecting the door from being slammed shut than being the perfect gentleman. "They don't build cars like these anymore," he said.

Those were words that make sure you will not be forgotten.

"You sound like my father, she responded."

She had a nice smile though. He gave her a second look. "You make your old man sound like an interesting fellow. I’d like to meet him."

"You’ll like him. You both think the same."

He didn’t know if she meant this as a compliment. "How so?"

"He’s always saying things were much better in his own day."

To that he had a ready answer. He jumped on it like a beggar on a ten-dollar bill.

"If you look at the mess we are in now, one might think that this is not such an unreasonable proposition."

"But it is so commonplace. Everybody his age engages in that sort of banality."

"Well, if they are all repeating the same thing, it may be that there is some truth in it, don't you think?”

. . .

There was a natural order in life, and when, hopefully, you had found what it was, you did not mess with it. Ever! That kind of summed up who he was. And it was all the philosophy he needed. The Mercie was part of that order and, at that time, so was Jenny. But during other periods, she was not. Like when, as a passenger in his car, she felt uncomfortable for one reason or another. Outside temperature and anything humid was a sure way to start her up, like traces of mist on the windshield interior surface. That usually got her on a destructive mission against the dashboard levers, dials, and other protuberances; all neutrally calibrated by him to ensure the best possible visual effect. Whatever comfort these devices had been conceived to provide, he had made a conscious decision not to use them, ensuring in that way that they would work forever. So it was real torture to hear Jenny complain over wetness, dampness, or moisture and watch her try to fix the nuisance with a maniacal assault on all that sprouted out of the instrument panel. Not to mention that she was always displeased with the outcome of her unrequited manipulations and worst of all, she’d end up blaming the car for it. Which hurt him a lot!

. . .

It was now six months that they had been seeing each other. The week before, the market had crashed 800 points in one day and lost a full 1000 over the whole week. They were traveling to Orlando and the weather outside was fair. Jenny was upset. They were talking about Wall Street. She was playing with the visor mirror, putting it down, then up, down, up, in an absent-minded fashion. The bulb incorporated in the mechanism sent flashes of light at every few second's intervals. This silly behavior drove him crazy. She said to him, "What a terrible thing to happen."

"Things happen,” he growled.

"How come they let that happen?"

"They? Who are they?"

She snapped at him, "Our government. Who else?"

"And what, if I may ask, would you have wanted the government to do?"

"Make laws, maybe? Protect the people from being hurt."

"What laws? There can be no laws that will protect people from being stupid and greedy."

"Oh no? There could be laws that protect us against systemic cupidity like abusive profits, abusive gains from speculation..."

He interrupted her. "Laws that would do more harm than good. What you are suggesting is control, control of the state over our lives. This may look good on paper but, in real life, every time that Congress votes a law that has some economic purpose, it ends up creating a mess worse than whatever the situation it wanted to correct was."

"So wonderful,” she hissed. “A world where women still wouldn't get to vote and children would still work in mines, wouldn't they? »

He looked at her, surprised by her vehemence. "That was uncalled for. What I mean is everything in life collapses that can't support itself or get some support from one means or another."

"So, what about them, those who need a little upholding?"

"I gave them equal rights, equal opportunities, and a free society to live in. That should be enough. The rest is up to them. Their responsibility. They should do as they please. Who cares? They should!"

"You have a cold heart, haven't you? You do care for nothing except that damn car of yours."

So he glared at her, a little startled, not much used to such dramatic display and emotional tantrums in discussions. Then, his sight fixed upon the sun visor light that was flashing madly on and off, on and off, with a distractingly orderly regularity. At last, he uttered, "Will you powder that nose or not?"

. . .

Marriage he did not put much stock into, after it no longer was restricted to man and wife. Arthur had not married. Once, he believed that it was something to be done when you were young. At an age where the setting of all things surrounding yourself, be they physical or philosophical, was yet to be made; all life turns, bends, and curves yet to be treaded; habits, dispositions, usages, and prejudices not yet crystallized. At a time when you could still look at a newspaper or listen to CNN without getting irritated, peeved, and rankled. Before the time arrived when you found solace in stability, steadiness, and being left alone within your comfort zone. Before the time when you felt free to emit shrewd pronouncements like "Routine is what protects oneself from chaos," and expected the silly cliché to have quotation quality.

Arthur could not have said when he had turned out the way he was. Or perhaps he had always carried that bent inside him; some inclination to see things as they really were and stay away from all Utopians, who wanted to turn the world over. Later, much later, in his now quite old Mercedes, he would ponder over this. Who was he? What was it that makes a human being what he found himself to be at fifty-one? How strange. So many people and so many views, so many attitudes, moods, postures, and feelings.

As for himself, anything could put him in a spell. The night before, Jenny had overcome his distaste for modern theater and they went to see that play from this gay playwright that everybody who counted in town was raving about. Arthur used to say that decent scene work was a thing of the past when one could be sure that the actors would keep their clothes on till the end of the performance.

After the show, he and Jenny were forced to wait in the packed parking lot while more than a few very suspicious-looking couples joined the crowd of exiting motorists. Arthur could not stop himself. Tonight, they did it again. One oldish performer that exposed his genitals in full public view when there was no need to do that. After all, someone could always wear a pajama bottom.

"Look at them,” he said.

"What is it, dear?"

"They took over the art scene."

Jenny's tone changed. "What on earth are you talking about?"

"Can't you see? They are all over the place. I guess they will not be satisfied until they get De Niro or Pacino to show their asses in some stupid play of theirs."

Jenny glanced at him and must have guessed the community he was referring to because she did not ask. At last, she said, "You can't be serious, can you?"

"There is an agenda, I am telling you! It is so obvious. They want us to believe that everybody has some queerness hidden inside of him. That all it takes is the right set of circumstances. Like this straight guy in that dumb play that falls for Allen in the end. What garbage."

"So you are serious after all."

Oh yes, he was and Jenny would have to put up with it, or else...

. . .

His father's sister died a celibate, a year before, and left Arthur her condo. She was 82. When it happened, he had a house that looked over a golf course in the right section of Tampa. It was big with too many rooms that he had no use for, never had. In the last five years, his back had been giving him trouble and he no longer played golf. His Aunt Laura's place was in St. Petersburg, a gated community called Pt. Brittany, for people fifty and older. He was sixty-four at the time. He vaguely remembered the location from a visit he had made to his aunt ten or fifteen years back when his father was still living. It was nice. There were six buildings and Laura's was on the water off the Pinellas Bayway, near the Gulf, the Don Cesar and Pass a Grille at St. Pete beach.

But this he learned later because at the time of his being there, all that Pt. Brittany consisted of was old Aunt Laura's place, which was not much to its credit. But now that he had the site for himself, he took a second look. And liked what he saw. The locale was gorgeous. She had a one-bedroom apartment that was right on the waterway, quite a piece of water in that area and the Gulf not far at all, just one island away or so. The flat was a mess but that was to be expected with all those worn-out relics that made up the furniture. And what about the pitifully useless junk piled up everywhere? Just looking in the living room was enough to give him a headache. He got rid of all of that was his old aunt's possessions, except some pictures and paintings that might have kept some value and then, he got the condo rebuilt from scratch. A new kitchen, a new bathroom, new floors made out of ceramic tiles, new electrical and plumbing; everything new for day one of his new life. It was a new departure for him to do all the things he always wanted to do and had promised himself that when the moment came, he would do because then, he would have all the time in the world to do them.

It was the twilight of his life, a moment of mutation, a period when one's old world vanished to be replaced by a new one full of promises. Formerly, he had had youth, hope, and reveries, plus enough of the required innocence to believe in their ultimate realization. Soon enough, however, little by little, without being aware of it, he must have exchanged those dreams for more down-to-earth accomplishments. The kind that materialized in a home, money, and wise investments. These were things that you later made your life about protecting, wishing for more, and always finding yourself in a state of want for bigger everything and anything. Just for the sake of it. Because it was there to have. And hating all man-made interruptions in that process of creating wealth. Ergo, he had worked hard. He had worked long hours. He had done it without thinking. After all, it was what men did. He had been trained for that. His father had done it. You do what you have to do to make an existence. That was life! And you put the dreams in its backseat. There would always be time enough later to do what you once longed for when you were still a kid. Like giving a chance to those skills at drawing that needed to get developed. Had he not found in his Aunt Laura's flat one painting of his she was kind enough to show some interest in, some forty-five years ago? He gave her the watercolor of some musicians in the street. It was colorful and lively. One could see that the artist had much left to learn in dexterity and craft but Arthur liked the piece. At that instant, he found in himself some long-forgotten affection for the deceased, remembering her when he was eight or nine and her, young and pretty, and how she had always loved him. She must have been thinking of him every time she looked at those Dixies jamming on the wall of her living room. He hoped he would do others. Who knows? Or he might end up writing a bio on some heroes of his or a real-life story based on a case he had tried. At least, those were the notions he had entertained when he decided to redo the condo and live in it.

. . .

The Mercedes had made it to Pt. Brittany. It was forty-five years of age and yet, looked as great and impressive as ever, but in a fragile kind of way. He was fond of the old extravagance. It was one object from his past that he could rely upon. And which had the power to bring back memories. Like the fun of driving around and feeling, because of it, as if he was some royalty traveling incognito. True, the car, early in the new century, was more and more of the kind the Chinese would construct if it was to become their fancy to get into that business. The vintage vehicle had, without a doubt, an old-style aspect with its excess of lustrous, shining chrome that reflected light in a gem-like fashion.

Or other past remembrances, like when his friend, Bill, had come to live with him for a few months in the early eighties. Bill was divorcing his first wife. It would have been a happy experience if not for the Mercedes. Arthur had a thing for neatness and tidiness that verged on compulsion if not freakiness. During a ride, he liked his passengers to stay quiet and motionless, touching nothing; just sitting there and enjoying the trip. Bill must have been hyperactive as a kid because as an adult, he tended to move a lot, jerking left and right, touching everything within his grasp, in a maniacal-like rhythm, quite the bull in the china shop. What about in a closed habitat? At times, Bill could reveal himself to be a real pest. So, it was a relief when Arthur saw the last of him, when Bill moved out to Susan's house, a saint of a girl, that one, who would become his friend’s second wife.

. . .

It had now been a year that he made the small condo at Pt. Brittany, his home. He was not doing much of anything, though. And suffering no anxiety for the idleness. He was reading a lot, seeing a lot of movies. He discovered TV shows that he did not know existed in his former active life and was getting through the lot of them like an avid teenager; series like Desperate Housewives, The Commish, N.Y.P.D. Blue, Seinfeld, The Shield, E.R., Brothers and sisters, Dallas, Six Feet Under, The Sopranos, and what else? He could not get enough of these old reruns. He would die before he found the time to see all of those, past and new, and that was a reassuring thought.

He was not meeting people much. Had no real mates. He disliked small talk and was bad at making friends. Traveling, he did not do much, since most of the world outside his country, he found hostile or unfriendly and would not visit even if invited. He was eating out two or three times a week, while the Publix at the corner of 34th and 54th Street S. ensured his subsistence otherwise. Nothing complex, however. Mostly frozen dishes or whatever meat he found cooked at their ready-to-eat counter. Thus was the way he spent his days, looking at the water and the Mercedes now his principal worry, as it found its way to the dealer more and more for checkups and repairs of all kinds, which were quite on the onerous side most of the time. It was like having an old dog. Killing the animal when it was sick would be considered unconscionable. Abandoning his vehicle to some scrap metal dealer would be, too.

. . .

The day before, he saw Bill at their regular poker game. Normally, they would have used Bill's Ford Fusion to get to Tom's luxurious villa, which had a beautiful view of the bay of Tampa. But on that occasion, the Ford was unavailable; having been impacted in some traffic incident. Now, Bill sat in the Mercedes, gesticulating in a very distracting way and worse, was trying to move his seat that was stuck. Seeing his friend exciting himself over the task was enough to put Arthur in peril of crashing into the traffic ahead.

Bill was a federal judge, one of the first to be appointed by the Bush administration in 2001. Everybody would have thought that he was quite well-off financially but what with three ex-wives and the kids he had either adopted or produced, he was paying alimony through the nose and lived like a miser. And being a lousy poker player, he was losing more than his share in the game, more than he could afford, anyway. That day, he was in a sorry mood, exploring with Arthur all that was wrong in his wretched existence. And Arthur who was not listening much obsessed that he was over the racket that was coming out from below Bill's seat.

Finally, after a long monologue, Bill asked dejectedly, “Have you been happy?”

“Well,” Arthur said, even if he was not at that instant, “yes, I have.”

“I wish I was.”

“I’m sure you are! Why you have everything. Kids, a great career, honor, pair recognition, the lot.”

“I envy you so much. Always did.”

“Aye, me who have had nothing of the sort.”

“You had it all.”

Arthur could not but react a little strongly to such a depressing discourse. “Now don't you go wishing your life away. It is a very unhealthy process.”

At last, they made it to Tom's chateau and the Mercedes passenger seat stayed put. Bill ended up lucky enough and finished the night even. Now, he was there in the car and mercifully, was sleeping like a baby. He would, till getting home at Isla del Sol, which was around the corner from Arthur.

Arthur knew at that moment that life for him and till the end of it would be quite what it was, then and there. He understood that he would not transform himself at this later age into a new Hemingway or Steinbeck. Or paint his way up to an exhibition of his dubious art. The drive to do all those things was not there. Whatever had looked fun from the perspective of a harassed attorney looking for some way out from the pressures of day-to-day lawyering was not that tempting or practical or believable when viewed at proximity. And what about that? Most of the people around have a ready-made plan to transform the world they live in but would find it impossible to change something that mattered in their character, even if they had the rest of their lives to achieve the task.

What silly nonsense. He was who he was. He liked himself. He did not feel the need to change anything in his life. As of this minute, he was driving his perfect car on the Skyway Bridge. The night was clear. There was water all around him. The engulfing wind was making his hair go wild. He was feeling fine. He recollected what Richard Nixon had written in his memoir WHEN YOU ARE THERE, THERE IS NO THERE.

It was so true.

Still, life was beautiful.

THE END