01 June 2008
Pizza Meltdown
Severe thunderstorms came through in the early afternoon and sharply demarcated the day. Mother Nature has an immediacy that is compelling when she sends rainwater flooding though the open windows.
There are hundreds without power, but not us. The storm only made the top two Big Pink events. The first was personal and immediate. We apparently succeeded in breaking Bennett, the handsome young American lifeguard.
His existential pool-deck journey at Big Pink lasted exactly one week. He apparently called Peter and left a note that he had a family emergency in North Carolina, his cell phone was inoperative since he inadvertently took it with in the pool and didn't know if or when he would be back.
It is a new record for existential burn-out. I could see him going downhill, day-by-day. He was clean-shaven when he arrived last week, and by Friday had a stubbly growth. The first day he read almost an entire book, something he seemed to view as an unusual and somewhat unsettling occurrence. I knew things were not going well when I noticed he had taken to ordering aBrick’s Classic American pizza pie each day, delivered to poolside. Brick's is a fine Arlington franchise, and their pies feature a generous amount of real mozzarella cheese lovingly melted down on a hand-thrown crust. I calculated that at $15 dollars for a medium pie, plus tip for poolside delivery, he was probably eating a third of his check each day.
Perhaps all the ideas had clogged up his mental process with extraneous facts. I withheld the urge to provide a reading list for the rest of the summer, though I counseled him on the existential nature of this job, and how, insh'allah, he could turn the interminable waiting for swimmers to his advantage.
He was not waiting for Godot, after all.
On Day Two we got him set up with power to his lap-top computer, which was the way that the other life-guards have been able to survive the solitude of the long week-days alone on the concrete by the sparkling blue water. With wireless internet access, he would not have to read any more books.
By the end of the week,though, Bennett was morose and withdrawn behind the check-in table. When last I saw him, a pepperoni pizza was half-eaten in a box laid cross-wise across the resident sign-in sheet.
Jozef was present when the storm clouds cleared. He is a tall and formal Czech who has been in America for a while. I realized he is probably the Minister of Recruitment for the Deep Blue Pool empire, the direct connection to the Czech Republic’s labor market for pool-Czar Peter.
Josef was apologetic for the schedule of higher examinations in Europe, which left us vulnerable to the vagaries of the native American labor market. He assured me that reliable help would be on the way in just a few days. He was appalled at the way Bennett handled things, but apparently did not think it unusual for the local hires.
Given the long domination of his homeland by the Red Army, a few months of enforced solitude at a quiet American pool was nothing for his people. His guards might complete an on-line master’s program.
He said a replacement Czech was flying in today, and they might bring him direct from Immigration to the check-in desk. I thanked him for his dedication, and thereafter there was a report of smoke on the seventh floor and the ensuing clarion call of the fire alarm. It was irritating enough that the sound drove most of the residents of Big Pink had out into the parking lot. It was a marvelous opportunity to catch up with the non-swimming population of the building, including a young woman who was just signing a lease as the Arlington Fire Brigade entered the formal lobby.
At long last, it was back into the pool under Jozef's studied gaze when the skies cleared and the Fire Department left the property. When the dusk came in, I watched an entire NFL hockey game- the current incarnation of the venerable Red Wings franchise of my youth serus the Penguins of Pittsburgh in the finals for the Stanley Cup.
The back and forth of quality hockey is quite remarkable, and when the Wings, leading by a single goal, withstood the onslaught of a 3-on-5 double penalty minute late in the third period I literally had to get up and pace. Astonishing.
The Wings will take the series back to the Joe Louis arena in Detroit tomorrow and will have the chance to take the Cup that night in the best of seven.
It is more than a little like politics, back and forth, sudden advantage and grinding persistence.
I was gong to talk about John McCain this morning, and how he found his calling in the Senate offices of the United States Navy, The Press doesn’t have it quite right, and they don’t know how to convey the ambiguity of the halls of power in sound-bites that meet the agenda.
The New York Times earlier this week One of the thinly-veiled accusations against Captain McCain was that he skated his own line on the Hill, I remember the first time I had to disobey a direct order, realizing the consequences of what would happen if news of what I had done got back to the Pentagon.
Unfortunately, I will have to get to it tomorrow. There is a break in the storms, and there is a chance to get outside and into the sun.
Copyright 2008 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com