Old

by Stan Charnofsky

  On a stormy night in February, when I was twenty-nine and living in an apartment in the Mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles, I decided to go out to dinner at Mr. G’s Steak House on Eighth Street near Vermont Avenue. They had super steaks at the lowest prices in town, and it was before the days when nutritionists began to spread the word that beef wasn’t all that good for you.

  I parked on Vermont and walked a short distance to the restaurant with an umbrella sheltering me, and saw in the window the char-flamed steaks cooking on a grill. Looked scrumptious. Though the aroma of scorching beef didn’t quite reach my outside and very soggy location, I began to salivate with anticipation. The hostess seated me at a small table and I ordered a New York cut steak (the cost was $6.95), and waited, sipping patiently on some good Cabernet Sauvignon ($2.00 a glass).

  Just as the waiter delivered my still simmering steak on a metal platter and began to set it on my table, the sound of a horrific crash out on Vermont Avenue penetrated the windows and door of the café. All heads jerked toward the outside, and I jumped to my feet and headed to the door. It’s not that I was a gawker—I hated looky-loos—but in my psychology training, I had learned some basic first aid, and thought I might be helpful.

  One of those old-time Volkswagen Beetles was crushed against a light pole on the sidewalk, while a Chevy station-wagon, which no longer is being made, had its front fender bashed in and was smoking like a recently drenched campfire.

  Others had beaten me to the scene, and one man was trying to pull a woman from the VW, who seemed awake but trapped, and flailing as if trying to swim her way out. I lent a hand and we got the woman away from her vehicle and under the awning that fronted Mr. G’s. She seemed to be in one piece, but frenetic, as she kept repeating, “It’s not my car, it’s not my car!”

  I noticed an angry gray spot on her forehead and realized she had likely received a bruise, though she seemed unaware of it. “If you can stand up okay, I’d like to walk you into the café to get some ice for that bruise. We ought to stop the swelling.” I turned to a couple of the others nearby and said, “When the police and medics get here, tell them she’s inside getting first aid.”

  Mr. G’s people were eager to help, especially since there were some fifty people, gathered outside in the rain, able to see with no problem the flaming steaks grilling in the window. Surely a few would be tempted to come in and partake.

  “Tell me your name,” I said to the woman, who seemed a bit more relaxed. She was, as far as I could tell under the stressful conditions, rather young, maybe twenty-five or so, had straight black hair and dark eyes that were red with insult and frustration. She wore a beige jacket over what seemed like a yellow blouse, though I could only see the collar protruding up over the neckline. There was a tear in the shoulder of the jacket with white cotton stuffing puffed out.

  “Annie,” she mumbled, and looked up at me, brows creased, seeing me for the first time. Going from anonymous rescuer to person, changed my demeanor as well as hers. She was no longer ‘victim,’ but was now ‘woman,’ with all the attending tensions.

  “Well,” I said tentatively, “you are going to be okay, Annie. Aside from the bump on the head, I don’t see any other wounds. Do you feel pain anywhere?”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t feel pain on my head either. Shock, I think. I’m too excited to feel anything.”

  “You kept saying something about it not being your car.”

  “It’s not. A friend loaned it to me for the evening. He’s going to kill me.”

  “I doubt it. Anything can happen on Los Angeles streets in the rain.”

  I hesitated, and said, “From the damage to the two cars, I’d say the other driver hit you.”

  “I didn’t see him. Next thing I knew he was slamming into me.”

  A voice from the front of the café called out, “The cops are here, looking for the other driver.”

  “We need to go outside. The police will try to unravel the crash.”

  She stood, holding the ice pack to her forehead, and with me guiding her by the elbow, made her way slowly back to the street.

  I felt an odd sense of connection with Annie. She seemed so vulnerable and genuine. With all my tenuousness around females, I realized I was feeling pretty comfortable talking with her.

  The police took over, one asking me, in fact, what I had seen, which was nothing, and I decided to get back to my now cold steak. I handed Annie my psychologist’s card, and said, “Call me if I can help.”

  Mr. G’s staff couldn’t have been nicer. My steak had been removed and in less than five minutes, a new one, hot and steaming, on a platinum platter, was set in front of me. I’ll never forget Mr. G’s steaks, and even more indelibly, that steak, that night, the night of the accident, the night of Annie.

  EIGHT

  She called me three days later. The up-front reason was to thank me for helping her. Clearly, she had calmed down, was aware of events, and was eager to put the accident evening into some acceptable memory slot.

  “Dr. Bronte, this is Annie Gault. I’m the VW person, remember, the borrowed car, the crash, the rain, the bump on my head? I’m calling to thank you for what you did. I owe you. Maybe a steak at Mr. G’s if you like. Here’s my number.” She dictated her phone number on my answer machine (they didn’t call it voice mail in those days), and an hour later, Annie Gault entered my life.

  Here I am, reminiscing about events of forty years ago. The memories of some things are as clear as if they happened yesterday, while others have faded into that historical wasteland where all uncritical events go, forever to perish. I think of people and events, like Eleanor Roosevelt or Winston Churchill, and Pearl Harbor or Hiroshima, and know they are everlasting historical memories. One way I like to say it is, for example, that Cary Grant is not dead. So long as his movies keep being replayed on TV, he lives. For most of us, our little journey, whether fifty, sixty or ninety years, ends, and after one generation or so, we are lost. Not so tragic, just the way of things. After all, ours is only a small planet, in one solar system, in a medium sized galaxy, among millions in the universe. So, who really cares?

  Anyway, Annie Gault was connected to me for a while, and that was important in my life. Each of us has that: a bond with someone else for a while, and isn’t it delightful!

  I called her back and we arranged a Mr. G’s dinner. At first, I thought it might be stressful for her to return to the scene of her accident so soon, but she seemed unfazed by that.

  I tried to understand why meeting with her did not scare me, as so many potential rendezvous with women did, and all I came up with was that it was a social event, a return for a favor, and not a man-woman encounter with a sexual agenda. I told myself that, but after seeing her again, cleaned up, made up, rosy-cheeked and energetic, the typical underlying drama kicked in. She was, I neglected to say earlier, quite a beautiful young woman.

  If anyone who reads my words is also old, you will understand my hopes that my life has meant something, that, in some way, the planet is richer because of my journey here, that my life has made a difference, and things are better off than when I appeared on the scene. Well, I can’t say that I feel that way.

  When Annie and I were percolating, there were wars in the world, civil rights dealing with ethnicity in America were still not where they should have been, our thirty-fifth president, John F. Kennedy, had recently been assassinated, women were not on equal footing with men financially (the concept of a glass ceiling had just been recognized), and cancer and heart disease were killing off huge numbers of middle-aged people.

  Now, there are still wars in the world, civil rights for minorities leaped forward for a time, then leveled off and still have a way to go, our leadership in Washington seems corrupt, too many women are victims of domestic violence, children continue to be abused (30,000 children die every day around the world, from treatable diseases) and the old-time major maladies are still epidemic in nature and have been supplemented by AIDS.
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br />   Makes me sick that I’m going to die without these human frailties being resolved.

  But, back to Annie.

  Yes, she was quite beautiful. She was also intelligent and witty. (Not sarcastic/witty the way Kacey was.) It was heady stuff to see this woman attack a big T-bone steak and devour the whole thing. I’m not saying that in any chauvinistic way, but just to point out that she had a healthy appetite and relished a good meal.

  Her repartee began with, “I wouldn’t have died, but your intervention helped me settle down. I have a tendency to be excitable, especially in crisis situations. So, thanks for being there.”

  I smiled because I didn’t really do very much, but was glad she appreciated whatever it was. “Looks as if the bump on the noggin is fading away.”

  “Yes, and I had a bruise on my clavicle as well, tore my jacket when I must have slammed into the steering wheel. But I feel fine now.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I said, lamely, “You look fine too.”

  She smiled and I noticed (reminding me of Kacey) how straight and white her teeth were, with the eyeteeth prominent like on TV movies of Dracula and other vampires. For a fleeting moment, I had a compelling desire for her to bite me on the neck. Sick, I know, but, in my fantasy, it wouldn’t have hurt; it would have been a sexual event.

  Softly and a bit shyly she said, “You look fine, too.”

  Put off by that—personal remarks always made me turn inward and become guarded—I replied inanely, “I played tennis this morning.”

  She thought better on her feet than I did, and said, “Well that accounts for the ruddiness in your cheeks, but it doesn’t cause good looks.”

  I blushed and remained silent. What does one say when a woman compliments you on your looks?

  She caught my discomfort and said, “Sorry if I embarrass you. I tend to speak my mind.”

  “I tend not to know mine. Strange weakness for a psychologist.”

  “I’ll bet you can read other people pretty well, or you wouldn’t be a psychologist.”

  “That’s right,” I said, pleased to agree with something. “It took hard work to learn that skill, graduate school, internship, and all that. But unfortunately, those things don’t translate into me understanding myself any better.”

  “You don’t seem out of touch with yourself to me.”

  “Well, not with everyday routines. Only when it involves emotional things.”

  “So, talking with me is an emotional thing?”

  “It didn’t start out to be, but now it is.”

  “Oh? What changed it.”

  I knew she knew, but said, “You’re…attractive. You’re…appealing. I never know what to do with that.”

  “I suspect nobody really does. What I’ve learned to do is take a time out in my head, and then say what comes up. Like, right now, what comes up is that you are an appealing man, as well.”

  “See, now what do I do with that?”

  “Enjoy it. I know most people don’t get enough of those compliments.”

  God, but I liked her! Suddenly, I wanted to know more about her: what did she do? where did she live? was she alone?

  My mind went momentarily blank, and finally I said, dumbly, “Good steaks, don’t you think?”

  “Sure,” she said, “and good conversation, too.”

  I nodded. That was always safe for me. Nod agreement. Nothing new is added, no error made.

  Then, as with Kacey, I revved up some inner, mysterious courage, and blurted out, “Think we might get together again?”

  It took no more than two seconds and she replied. “You bet. My place or yours?”

  NINE

  I was rewarded in that Annie was a wholesome person who allowed my fragile ego lots of room to be itself, to become embarrassed, flustered, unsettled, and even frozen with uncertainty. She was patient and uncritical. With Annie, I truly believe I grew up and became self-confident.

  She had studied Environmental Science at UC Santa Barbara, at a time when it was a fairly young science, and her awareness of the trespasses of humankind on the ecology of the world was impressive. She would regale me with insights about global warming, holes in the ozone layer, disappearing animal species, less than ample potable water, and limits to the earth’s capacity to grow enough food for its burgeoning populations.

  “We, in America,” she told me, “tend not to give credence to these realities because we don’t experience their consequences. Africa, Asia and South America experience them big time. Millions die every year from shortages of food and water.”

  As part of her curriculum, she also studied Astronomy, and what a joy it was to listen to her hold forth on the origins of our planet and others in our solar system. I didn’t have any idea that Neptune and its moon, Triton, were discovered way back in 1846, and Pluto in 1930. Recently, scientists have named two new planetary-like bodies, Xena, in July, 2005, with a diameter 1.5 times as great as Pluto’s and Buffy in December, 2005, which orbits well beyond Pluto, on the fringes of our solar system. For a while, scientists informally called Xena the tenth planet, pending a final ruling by the International Astronomical Union, but then, in a drastic move, Pluto was voted out of the solar system as a planet. After all, if another body, or even two, are larger than Pluto, why should it enjoy planetary status?

  See, Annie’s influence, years ago, stimulated me so that I still get all worked up about recent astronomical discoveries!

  Over the next few months our relationship grew intimate, delicious, and as tender as Mr. G’s steaks. Annie knew how to give. Different from Kacey, she seemed not to have hidden skeletons. Seemed not to.

  One stunning event occurred three months after we met. Her parents, married for thirty-one years, separated. It didn’t catch Annie completely by surprise. She had told me of the friction between them, once even mentioning that she didn’t know why they stayed together.

  She had a sister, Julie, two years older, who, at twenty-eight, was married with one child. The separation hit Julie harder than Annie; she saw it as a sudden evaporation of the homestead, a cozy if unsettled place to bring her daughter, the classic “family home,” no longer available.

  In response to Julie’s concerns, Annie said, “Look, Sis, it’s better this way. They’ve been at each other’s throats for years. I can’t remember going over there without having to tolerate some sort of emotional explosion. Maybe now each of them will find some peace.”

  As a person who came from a dysfunctional family (my parents divorced when I was nine), I understood Annie’s and her sister’s angst. I grew up trading off living with Mom and then Dad, had to tolerate two completely different discipline styles, and most of all, had to tolerate their indelicate bad-mouthing of each other to me. They moved to Northern California, one to Alameda, the other to Marin County, so, thank goodness, I didn’t have to spend too much time with them in my adult years. My older brother, Gene, became a computer person and lives to this day in the Boston area. He never had much to do with our parents after their divorce. He’s eighty years old and lives in a retirement village.

  When Annie’s parents broke apart, I felt good that I could be there for her with some semblance of insightful support. She appreciated it too. Kept hugging me, and though I couldn’t be sure that was the reason, escalated our sexual celebrations to delirious proportions. Annie, I’d have to say, was a wild and uninhibited lover.

  The first time I kissed her, she held on for a long minute, then pulled away and said, softly, “I liked that.”

  “So did I,” I answered, and before I could take a breath, she grabbed my face in both hands and almost devoured my mouth.

  We didn’t go to bed that same night because it was late on a Sunday, we were in my car, and we both had early appointments. Practicality ruled.

  But, a week later, she invited me over to her apartment to watch a movie on television—still a pretty new form of entertainment—and when it was over, we were in her bed in less than two minutes. I
remember it was the old Cary Grant-Deborah Kerr movie where they were supposed to rendezvous at the Empire State Building and she got into an accident and didn’t show and he thought she didn’t care and mourned the loss.

  From that evening on, our romance was spiced with regular lovemaking, though I must say it always felt to me that Annie would go wild and then go away; in that sense, she was only partly there. It was a sadness that I was picking up, but did not understand. I hesitated to raise the issue for fear I’d lose whatever lovely closeness we did have.

  Now that I’m old and alone, it is obvious that Annie and I did not last, as they say at weddings, “for as long as you both shall live.” Pretty long, though. Nearly six years. That sadness I mentioned never disappeared.

  She was twenty-six when we met, an age which, normally speaking, is pretty young to harbor too many damaging historical events. And, as I said, she was healthy emotionally, seemingly forthright, had a good sense of humor, a woman with goals. The Volkswagon crash where we met had more to it than I knew at the time. She said it wasn’t her car and that her friend would “kill” her for wrecking it. Well, that friend was her ex boyfriend, or better said, an almost ex boyfriend.

  Here’s what she told me, finally, when I got the courage to say, “I can see something’s troubling you. Want to tell me about it?”

  “Douglas,” she said, “can be a real asshole. We had a two-year thing, and at one point I thought we were going to get married. He had this ring, which was his grandmother’s, and he told me it would be mine one day. Of course, one day never came. It wasn’t ever quite the right time. A big real-estate deal was waiting to be closed, after which he’d be financially set. Or, his employer was thinking of moving him to Dallas, so we’d better wait to see if that developed. Or, his sister in Montana, who was rearing two kids by herself, needed his help so he had to be available to commute back and forth. Always something. I finally told him to go screw himself.”