27 October 2010
 
Gales of November (Come Early)

(Official portrait of Speaker of the House Carl Albert, a Big Pink Resident)

I stopped by Willow last night with no agenda. It was refreshing. I had forgotten my phones in the morning- the Blackberry was charging peacefully by the coffee pot and the Droid was in the cradle by the toaster oven.
 
I don’t know what part of the morning ritual had failed. I had the belt holster on my hip, but no phone within it. I did have my leash around my neck, the one with the company logo and the plastic container that holds the sundry badges that give me access to the garage and the office and the Pentagon and the Agency, when I have to go there.  I had not forgotten to put that on for years, at least until Monday, breaking a three-year streak.
 
When a behavioral trait that has gone on without interruption that long is broken, it makes me question every routine event in the day.
 
I wandered into the kitchen to start the coffee this morning to discover that my sister was still awake in Alaska as I was negotiating the beginning of the new day in the Eastern Time Zone. Apparently the gales of November were coming early, like when they sank the Lakes freighter Edmund Fitzgerald.

Or like what is about to happen in the election in a week.
 
Anook had sent some messages about the strong winds and rain that are pummeling the nation’s midsection. She was worried about the house in Petoskey, and the potential for a tree to crash into the roof and crack it open to the gale. I checked the weather reports, and read about the low-pressure front that is blowing from the Dakotas to the eastern Great Lakes, and south toward us.
 
I had an idea about what was coming. Two guys in business dress were occupying Old Jim’s usual seat at apex of the “L” of the bar. He came in a couple minutes after I did, his routine intact, and glared at them until they finally cleared out after one beer.
 
Amateurs, I thought. Apparently they had come out of Chicago early that afternoon, ahead of what I heard them say was something like 500 cancelled flights at the United hub at O’Hare.
 
I slid up the bar to take the first seat to his right as Jim slid to his left to take the high ground.  
 
“NOAA claims the storm is among the lowest ever in a non-tropical storm in the mainland,” said Jim.
 
“I heard there was snow in it when it came across the Pac Northwest,” I said. “The jet stream that is about a third stronger than normal for this time of year.”
 
Jim said he was cautiously impressed. “Supposed to be the equivalent of the central pressure of a Cat-3 hurricane,” he said, as John-with-an-H stood up from his usual place midway down the bar and approached to remind Jim of their bet about Harry Reid’s Senate seat in Nevada. John claims the outraged electorate will throw the diffident Senate Majority Leader out on his butt.
 
“Not going to happen,” said Jim. I grew up there. I have been watching Harry for a long time and he always squeaks by.”
 
John knows everything, just ask him, and he snorted and offered to double down. Jim dismissed him with a wave. “I don’t want to take your money.”
 
“I agree,” I said, taking a sip of happy hour white. “When the people in Nevada get in the voting booth they are going to realize what they are giving up if they send a freshman to replace him.”
 
“This is historic,” said John, flush with his happy hour load. “Second part of a revolution.” He wobbled back toward his seat. He is always at the bar when I arrive, never fails, and always leaves early with a full load.
 
Jim polished off his Budweiser, which he drinks from the bottle in direct counterpoint to the wine-bar ambiance. He tended bar in the District as a younger man and knows all the old places.
 
“The leaders always go out with a scandal,” I said. “It takes something to make them go. Like Speaker Foley and that book deal Gingrich nailed him on.”
 
Jim snorted. “That was Jim Wright. Foley got nailed in a massive shift in the electorate. He was clean as a whistle.”
 
I stared into space, mildly embarrassed that I had lost track of my Speakers. “Well, Pelosi is gone for sure, and aside from not being able to remember what the CIA told her, she doesn’t have anything obvious on her except gender.”
 
Jim smiled and signaled the other Jim behind the bar for another Bud. “I remember when even scandal didn’t matter. Everyone knew about JFK in the day, but no one breathed a word.”
 
“Different times,” I said. “Speaker Carl Albert used to live at Big Pink where my place is. I have been trying to get a historic marker to commemorate it.”
 
Jim looked at the frosty long neck with satisfaction. “I was at the Zebra Room one time with Carl. Well, not with him, per se, but that was a place he used to hang out. Do you remember the place?”
 
“Yeah, I said. I know my bars better than my Speakers. “It was a dive in Northwest that had great pizza and cheap beer.”
 
“Well, back in the eary ‘70s,” said Jim with authority “it had a smoky interior and a nice terrace on Macomb Street when the weather was good. A guy named Hal was the owner, good guy, and I worked for him sometimes. He laminated some of the pies he baked and hung them on the wall. The toppings dripped down under the plastic. He had a crazy staff.”
 
“If you worked there, I can believe it.”
 
Jim snorted. “Some of the Redskins hung out there, the old school guys, and this one afternoon, I saw Speaker Albert getting shit-faced at the bar. It was just at the start of winter, and the weather was coming in from west, just like it is today. Carl got up and went out to the terrace where he had parked his car. The snow was coming down pretty good, and he slid in behind the wheel, fired up the engine and accelerated across McComb toward Wisconsin.”
 
“So?”
 
“Well, he only made it diagonally across the street and slammed into two cars.”
 
“Ouch. “ I said, thinking of Wilbur Mills, the Ohio Titan of the Ways-and-Means Committee in the house and his famous plunge in the Tidal Basin with Fannie Fox, The Argentine Firecracker.


(Wilbur and Fannie. AP photo.)

“No, that was the thing about it. Wilbur went for his swim in 1973, when Watergate changed everything. When the DC cops showed up, they drove the Speaker home, and then came back and moved his car.”
 
“That is service,” I said.
 
Jim nodded. “Nothing in the Post the next day. That is when being Speaker of the House meant something.”
 
Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra
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