We talked about all kinds of crap on the way from Indianapolis over to Circus City for the big car show. It was great to see my brother again, with a lot of water under the bridge and some significant changes in our various relationships and physical conditions.
He had run in four of the last five Boston Marathons, and I had been very proud of him, and happy that the one he missed was the one that the Tsarnaev Brothers decided to bomb in 2013.
“If you had run in that one, would your time have put you at the finish line around the time of the detonation?” I asked. My brother nodded.
“Crap,” I said. He nodded again.
As men of a certain age do, we talked about the latest crop of aches and pains, and the fact that his marathon days are probably over, as mine were long ago. We both have problems negotiating stairs these days, and we talked a lot about options for the next place to live, centering on that fact that whatever it would be, it would not include staircases.
He looked out at the gently rolling green fields that whizzed by the windows of the Hertz rented Toyota Rav4 SUV. It was quite a step up from the usual piece-of-crap Camry. It was peppy and fun and big enough on the inside to hold a bunch of stuff; downscale from the Panzer, to be sure, but perfectly fine to roll across the Midwest. There are a lot more Toyota dealers out here than Mercedes, and a lot cheaper.
It was good to be on the road in a place that made sense. The people were uniformly pleasant and nice. The DaysInn the night before had proven to be an old-school horror show, so we were pleased to be away from it and headed for the Grissom Aeroplex where the show was going to be held. The weather on what would have been Dad’s 93rd birthday was fine. I never had a doubt about that.
There were supposed to be over forty classic American Motors cars, Hudsons and Nashes and Ramblers of all sorts. I told my brother he was going to have a speaking part, after I introduced him, and he would present the Award for Best In Show and the trophy named for Dad. Then we talked about the Ramblers we had known growing up, and the tricks and trouble we got in with the ’68 Javelin with the 343 cu in high-compression four-barrel carb.
He claimed he got it to 123 MPH on that empty interstate Congressman Jerry Ford pork-barreled into his district in West Michigan, while I had only got to about 120. I maintain to this day that it was speedometer cable-wear that accounted for the difference, but he still has the bragging rights for the land speed record in Mom’s car.
It was sultry and humid as the heartland can be in August, but pleasant enough that jeans were tolerable. At least while we had the air conditioning blasting.
As we rolled toward Circus City, we talked about the kids and what they were all up to. We hit most of the events in the news, too, with me voicing astonishment at the astonishing news of the last few weeks, unusual for what is usually the dog days of summer when people ought to be going to car shows and reading thrillers with tall cool drinks by the lake.
Being a known attorney of long standing, my brother gave me some free billable hours of experience and points to consider in the intricate legal maneuvering one of the prominent presidential candidates without orange hair is conducting, and a lot of it makes sense.
My train of thought got derailed as I looked at the tanker truck that seemed determined to pull out into the single lane bounded by the Jersey barriers in the extended construction zone, and floored the SUV to pass before the lane narrowed to make it impossible. It got my blood going, but I didn’t want to follow an 18-wheeler for the next six miles.
“From a legal and procedural perspective, it does have a certain strategic consistency,” my brother said. “You need to understand the law doesn’t necessarily follow common sense. Nice lane change.”
I said that even if they wiggle out of it (again) I wasn’t sure that the ongoing spectacle was going to play to normal people in Peoria, deftly swerving in ahead of the tanker as the orange cones narrowed two lanes to one.
Since we were actually near Peoria at the time, we slipped into a chorus of an old family song we used to sing Up North that was ancient even when we learned it as kids:
“ S. O. S., S. O. S., Captain we are lost,
Our ship is wallowing in the sea, by wind and wave we’re tossed,
Lifeboats here, lifeboats there, Hear the shrieks and groans,
The captain calls “All hands on deck!” and says in trembling tones:
“Oh, how I wish’t I was in Peoria, Peoria tonight.
Oh how I miss the “goils” in Peoria, Peoria, tonight.
Oh you can pick a morning gloria right off the sidewalks of Peoria.
Oh, how I wish’t I was in Peoria, Peoria tonight.”
We couldn’t remember any more of the lyrics and my brother looked out the window at the agricultural tableau as it slipped by.
The bounty of the soybean fields in long undulating fields of green made it all seem sort of plausible. Out in the middle of America, there are certain things that you know are true just by looking at them.
That is not the case back home in Washington, DC, but it is only to be expected. It isn’t really anywhere anyone calls home anyway. Peru, IN, the Circus City, is.
Copyright 2015 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303
“How I Wish’t I was in Peoria,” Words by Billy Rose and Mort Dixon.
Music by Harry Woods
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