YOU should have been there—it was great. How come you missed it? I’d get up earlier if I were you. I can’t believe you missed it. Maybe you have a discipline problem.
You got here slightly too late. A moment ago we had crab cakes. Marie cooked them up. Did you see the sunset when you came in? No? I can’t believe you didn’t see it. The sky was huge and dark; curved; with wisps of light, just the way you like it. After the sun finally went down, Marie and I sat on the porch and watched an electric, vital blue just over the western horizon. You hardly ever get to see a blue like that. Marie, me, Billy—did I tell you he was there?—watched it together. Billy took me by the legs and tumbled me over and over until I burst out laughing; then he took Marie and placed her on top of me, and I laughed and laughed until I thought I would burst; and then—get this—Billy piled on top and rolled over the two of us like a steamroller. We couldn’t stop laughing.
Are you comfortable? Can I get you something? Sure? Can I ask you a question? How come you weren’t there? Were you taking some kind of examination or something? So anyway, we got up. I don’t know if you’ve seen the way Marie looks in the new dress I bought her. It hangs on her so nicely. She stood up, and I watched the dress hang. I don’t know if we missed you or not. Later on we thought, “He missed us,” but that is different. Then the little boys and girls of the neighborhood came by. We wanted to remember to tell you about that. The oldest, the cute one who is called Shiloh, brought a lizard to Marie. That’s what made her think to cook up the crab cakes. When she brought out the steaming mess of crab cakes, she put her hands on her hips and let the steam make her perspire—little drops running down her neck and even onto her breasts. “I wouldn’t care to know anyone who isn’t here with us,” she said defiantly. You should have been there. But I’ve said that.
In my opinion, you’re the kind of guy who missed Hell Week, railroads sending clouds of steam into the station, singing just to hear the sound of your own voice, and operetta. How could you have done it? With all your potential? How could you have been so stupid and lazy? You weren’t here when we had the intelligent debate about Vietnam. You skipped; you missed the moment, and don’t pretend you didn’t.
But I’m ahead of myself. Where was I? Well, after having such a wonderful time on the porch, we walked down Water Street. The lights were just beginning to come on. Suddenly we heard “The Gal from Joe’s”—the Ellington tune. It was Joe’s. An acre of pleasure spread out before our hungry eyes—room after room! Range-fed chicken, fish you can’t get anymore, delicious beers, and turkeys from Tidewater farms like “Acrewood,” “King’s Forty,” “Underlea,” “Scrivesden,” and “Rose Hall”—the last miraculously raised from its ashes. The best part was that jazz was being reborn in the back room. Maybe you heard about that—how suddenly a little white boy added a note to “A Night in Tunisia” at Joe’s in such a way that the audience was reduced to utter respectful silence, at which point black and white men and women, each one an expert in the development of bebop and other modern jazz idioms, clasped hands while tears streamed down their faces. You had to see it. Why didn’t you see it? Were you in detention or what?
Then Billy brought the novel out of its doldrums of postmodern irrelevancy. Somehow, with that wonderful natural spontaneity of his, he was able to capture what I was saying and cast it in novelistic terms. I was so enthralled with the rebirth of jazz that I must have communicated to him some quintessential American energy, which, together with his work in linguistics and his deep sympathy for Hispanics and women, came together to produce an American free-form prose that promises to enrich all our work. Whew. It took my breath away to hear it.
Then we walked out along the causeway. The little fisherfolk who go out in their boats just as they have for centuries raised a cheer: “Hurrah for the creators of a new American civilization!” they cried. The head man or person of the fisherfolk came out and explained that it is the custom—indeed, the stated purpose and goal—of the fisherfolk to be willing to die for the right to save the best fish for their sweethearts. Then in a very tender way they explained that we were their sweethearts, and they gave us all the fish. I erected an impromptu brazier, and Marie grilled them up. I gave Marie a little kiss, and Marie gave Billy a big hearty sloppy one, and we all three settled down to eat this corn tortilla of incomparable delicacy, which Marie had in her pocket.
Then we told stories about you. How you didn’t get a National Merit Scholarship. (Remember how easy they were to get?) And how you missed seeing the Tall Ships. I mean, everybody saw the Tall Ships. I know people who were sick beyond endurance with seeing the Tall Ships by accident—just running into the sight of them out a window or something—and apparently you never saw them once. And how about all those things you said you saw when we weren’t with you, like the Liberation of Paris, and the ’51 National League pennant race, and Elvis when he was under contract to Sam Phillips at Sun in Memphis?
Marie said she likes you anyway. She told a long story about taking a bicycle trip with you in France and stopping in an out-of-the-way restaurant that looked just perfect and all they had was toast. “How do you make it?” you asked. The man said nothing. “How much is it?” you asked. By the way, the man turned out to be a great artist, and the sketches Marie bought that day are worth a small fortune now. I wonder why you had to ask that. You made the man so sad. Marie liked him right away and made friends, or so she says.
Could I borrow about one hundred dollars? Your parts are on order. We had some corned beef, but that guy over there got the last serving.
1988