The pool is open, the flowers are in bloom, the boat has been cleaned and the bicycle riders are clogging the lanes along the road. Summer is here. As I drive, I watch for the bicycle riders, sometimes riding solo, sometimes in pairs and sometimes in full tour group mode. I remember a biking trip to Martha’s Vineyard, 18 years ago, meeting up with a friend from Colorado.
Super Shuttle picked me up. The driver’s Russian accent was charming; he was from the Ukraine. He had been working for SS for only a couple of weeks, ergo the constant reference to maps. Apparently when he first came to the USA two years prior he worked for a Russian limo service. Since he chauffeured only Russians, it didn’t matter that he spoke no English. Spoke no English? When I asked how he read the signs, he responded that he would call in to the central desk and read the letters to them. More urgent, to my mind, was the question of a drivers license. How did he get a drivers license if he couldn’t read. “Ah well” he said “a license was not important to the Russians”. He went to night school to learn English, then left the Russians. The long line of waiting passengers snaking out to the sidewalk sank my heart. Russians saw lines as an ordinary part of life. It was just a line, “no big deal” as he slapped my back.
I met up with my Colorado friend. We had an hour to wait so we grabbed a bite to eat. We asked a young guy, who was seated at a table for four, alone, whether we could join him. He said his wife was in line for food, but grinned and said he could dump her. While eating, we discussed current events. Throughout lunch, the young man opined that it was time to take the country back from all these foreigners. Hell, in Florida everyone spoke Cuban, and California had all these Mexicans. Something had to be done about the foreigners. His wife nodded in agreement. At the end of lunch I HAD to ask: was he a member of the Apache tribe or the Ojibways; to which original tribe did he belong, precisely.
Finally reaching Martha’s Vineyard, after planes, trains and boat rides, we met up with a few members from our group, then proceeded to drinks and dinner to get to know each other. One young man, a nice Jewish boy from Jersey, was honeymooning with his bride, a nice Catholic Italian girl from across the bridge. When my eyebrow shot up, he shrugged and said he needed some balance in his life. Later, we wandered aimlessly around town, admiring the scenery, the cobblestones, the fresh air and stars, until someone asked “does anyone know where we are, and how to get back to the inn?”
We gathered the next morning, ready to enjoy the sun and ocean breezes. Instead we were met with cold rain and a strong nor’easter, or a sou’wester, or a nor’wester; I was never quite sure about the direction of origin but it was a very strong howling wind. However, we were tough and single minded in our pursuit of healthy bicycle riding. Off we went, pedaling against the wind, pedaling, pedaling; I was in the zone, until I looked down and realized that I wasn’t moving. The wind was keeping me in the same spot. Rocks in my pocket would not have helped so we decided to tour the shops. The next day was sunny and clear. We bicycled out to Chappaquidick “don’t worry, Mary Jo, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
There must have been a muni code that specified grey shingles with white trim because every home was painted exactly alike. The inn keeper said one of the local jokes was to direct a lost tourist to walk down the road a couple of blocks, then turn right at the grey house with the white trim. The people all looked alike too. They were all white, longish faces, aquiline noses, the men all looked like James Taylor while the women all sported pageboys. Even the hired help was all white. It got a little creepy there in Stepfordland. I started paying attention to the names on the mailboxes: Harrison, James, Sargent, Potter, MacKenzie, and then I found one — Cohen. Yes! No pizza parlors though.
The creepiness was offset by the fact that Bluto was buried at the local graveyard. Yes, John Belushi is buried on Martha’s Vineyard. I easily found his headstone. The grave was marked with empty beer cans. I noticed that he was buried next to Lilian Hellman. Apparently I was the only one in the group who appreciated the irony. I rambled on about her works for a bit, until I noticed that I had lost the audience. First we kill the playwrights.
We boarded the ferry. The captain was a three generation local, so I asked why there were so many bits and pieces of sea shells on the Atlantic shore sands, but none on the Pacific shores. He was stumped too. If anyone has an answer, please advise.
I grabbed a cab at LAX and once again found myself with a Russian driver. He remarked that he loved this country; people could do anything. He was living in a room at his uncle’s house. Apparently his parent’s pension was not enough to feed him. Gorbachov stopped further pensions so he was on his own. His problem, by his own admission, was that he was lazy. He didn’t like to work. He was perfectly content to drive a cab. Ambition was not in his DNA. We pulled up to the house, which he openly admired, and asked how many people lived there. When I told him I lived alone, he asked for my hand in marriage. Who says Russians weren’t romantic.
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