Brief Encounters

by Dick Cavett

  Yes, my temple quota had been reached. And exceeded.

  I opt to strike off on my own. I can step into nearby China and enjoy being unrecognized. I get the name of a picturesque small town not too far away and am taxied there, past miles of fairly dreary landscape and endless telephone poles.

  I’m enjoying that strong, fun sensation you can exult in when in a foreign country: nobody, at this moment, has any idea where I am. Including me.

  (The scene shifts now. Chinese restaurant. Interior.)

  Now I’m at a restaurant table trying to find a bite or two of edible substance in a bowl of some kind of alleged salad featuring sharp, broken hunks of chicken bone so undercooked that they exude pure raw blood.

  The waitress sees my displeasure. She has no English and I waste upon her, “This isn’t food, it’s attempted homicide.”

  Departing through the beaded curtain, I flash back to Saturday afternoon serial days, wondering if, behind me, a dark, pigtailed figure will fling a dirk drawn from the back of his collar across the room, expertly implanting it between my shoulder blades.

  As I step outside and look around the alien landscape, the thought that was no doubt unconsciously accumulating bursts into consciousness and hits me between the eyes.

  I have let my cabdriver go! I don’t know how we got here. There are dozens of roads. I don’t know where the ship is docked! I don’t know the ship’s name. There may be dozens of piers. And dozens of ships, one with my wife on it. And all of them without me. Oh, God!

  (Typing and reliving that moment just caused a noticeable increase in pulse rate.)

  Have I been fooling you a little up to this point by seeming, perhaps, to be describing a dream? Alas, dear reader, this was stark reality. This bloody well happened. And, worse, not to someone else.

  To have no language available to you is an awful thing.

  Japanese is sort of a hobby of mine and I can get around Japan with ease. But there is no Japanese in Chinese. And little English in the part of China I had chosen to strand myself in with a ship leaving.

  (Oh, and the cell phone, young people, wasn’t yet ubiquitous at the time of this particular adventure. There were a few so-called mobiles around, but they were more the size of a phone booth than a phone.)

  And what kind of brains? Really!

  Is this the same person who, as someone surprisingly wrote in an article about me, had “the highest IQ of anyone ever to go through Prescott School in Lincoln, Nebraska”? If true, would that person be dumb enough to get himself hopelessly lost in China? And what else might he be dumb enough to do?

  We’ll soon find out.

  Desperate for communication, and sweating, I clumsily tried to convey my plight to a couple of (other) cabdrivers—when, suddenly, a glimpse of salvation.

  There was Larry King.

  Three feet away, on a store window TV screen, was Larry, from the good old U.S.A. I was saved. Larry’s live. I’ll call him somehow and he can tell the Chinese where I am and … The irrational brain paused there, and subsided. Temporarily.

  Back to the two drivers. Through a combination of clumsy charades and a crude drawing of a ship, hope glimmered. One man said the Chinese equivalent of “Aha!” (That may be exactly what he said. Is it universal?)

  Although hope had glimmered earlier as well, when I pulled from my pocket something that might have the ship’s name on it. Yes, it was ship stationery. But the top, with the printing, was torn off.

  The gods were toying with me ruthlessly.

  But the one driver seemed confident. Some words had been recognized, it seemed. Maybe “cruise ship.” As I hurtled along in his cab, the telephone poles looked familiar. But then, don’t most telephone poles? I saw no land that supported a body of water.

  And I had no idea how much time we had. I’ll forgive you for failing to believe that, on top of everything, my watch had stopped. Not that it mattered. It seemed nothing did. Life was pretty much over.

  Honestly. The absurdity of it.

  I have—or should it be had?—a lovely cabin on a lovely ship on a lovely vacation and I’ve gotten myself lost in an antique land, without a clue about how to get rescued.

  What if the ship’s gone? Where do I go? People recognize me almost anywhere, but not here. I think of the line “My face is my passport.” Now, only my passport is my passport. My face has expired.

  Whatever “hoping against hope” can possibly mean, that’s what I was doing. But on what evidence? Maybe the driver had totally misunderstood. More telephone poles. He might be speeding me farther inland. To a Chinese rodeo.

  And then, wonder of wonders. Coming down a hill, I can see first the tops of some masts ahead. And then—the ship. About half a mile away. And not moving.

  An odd quirk occurs in my half-ruined brain. I now see my thoughts in block letters. In that short, blunt, constipated style that the Hemingway typewriter produced so readily:

  “It is a ship. It is a good ship. It is a good ship for it is my ship.” (Sorry, Ernie.)

  We pulled into a parking lot as close as possible. About twenty yards from dockside. The ship sounded its whistle.

  It began to move.

  I hurled all the paper money I had at the driver—possibly a year’s salary for him—and ran for it.

  The rational brain said not to do anything foolish. Then the irrational one took the controls:

  You were a champion gymnast once. You can leap for that railed deck at the back end (stern?).

  Thoughts, thick and fast and jumbled. “If I miss and land in the drink surely somebody will—” What? Take off his (or her) shoes and what? And there isn’t anybody.

  I don’t want to overdramatize this heroic feat. The ship was not speeding along. It was lumbering. But there’s no getting around the fact that the correct phrase for what I was dealing with would be, let’s face it, a moving ship. I would have preferred stillness.

  Channeling Errol Flynn, I took to the air and landed easily enough, hanging there on the outside of the ship’s rail like a kid hooked by his armpits over a baseball field fence.

  I scrambled fully aboard. And here’s the sad part. There was not a single witness. No cheering spectators, no videocam, no applauding and adoring females. Nothing.

  Now I was to learn what had happened. My wife, napping, had been awakened by an announcement. “We are leaving in ten minutes. Will passenger Cavett please identify himself.” She assumed I had.

  Did they also assume so?

  I didn’t blame them for not holding everybody up for one fool.

  Yet a friend of mine, not unfamiliar with the law, said, “You should have sued them. Knowingly leaving a prominent passenger, or any passenger, stranded and abandoned? No way.”

  Hmm. Is it too late?

  Advise.

  Finally, what can we learn from this, boys and girls?

  Two things: (a) don’t ever, ever get lost in foreign lands, and (b) leap for boats only when it’s wise and sensible.

  DECEMBER 14, 2012

  Acknowledgments

  George Kalogerakis, my editor at The New York Times, for invaluable help rendering my offerings into presentable reading form and, when necessary, for keeping me from going over the top. (And on occasion, too far under it.)

  Paul Golob, formidable presence at Henry Holt, for his sharp, sharp eye and his skill in shepherding these columns from the digital world onto the printed page.

  Lisa Troland, whom I’m urging to get rich writing “How to Be the World’s Greatest Assistant.”

  And, lest I forget, my wife, Martha, whose talents and virtues, listed, would fill the rest of this page. (Even in small print.)

  Index

  The index that appeared in the print version of this title does not match the pages in your e-book. Please use the search function on your e-reading device to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below.

  ABC

  abstinence
<
br />   Acosta, Mercedes de

  actorproof shows

  Adnopoz, David

  advertising

  Apple

  Ballantine

  Godfrey and

  Agnew, Spiro

  airport security

  air travel

  Albee, Edward

  Alcoholics Anonymous (AA)

  alcoholism

  Ali, Lonnie

  Ali, Muhammad

  Ali, Veronica

  Allen, Fred

  Allen, Steve

  Allen, Woody

  Alvarez, Luis

  Alvarez, Walter

  American Bandstand (TV show)

  American Prince (Curtis)

  Amis, Kingsley

  ancestors

  Andrews, Dana

  Andrews, Dickie

  Animal Crackers (film)

  anti-Semitism

  anxiety dreams

  Apple computer

  Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer (Rembrandt)

  Armstrong, Louis

  Arthur Godfrey (Singer)

  Assad, Bashar al–

  Astaire, Fred

  Astor, Nancy

  atom bomb

  “Aubade” (Larkin)

  Automat

  aviation

  Bader, Robert

  Balanchine, George

  Baldwin, Alec

  Ballantine Beer

  Bancroft, Anne

  Barron, James

  Barrymore family

  “Battle Hymn of the Republic” (Howe)

  Baudelaire, Charles

  BBC radio

  Beans, Charles

  Beauty Myth, The (Wolf)

  Begley, Ed, Sr.

  Belcher, Jovan

  Benchley, Robert

  Benny, Jack

  Berle, Milton

  Bible

  bin Laden, Osama

  Bitter End

  Blake, William

  Bloomberg, Michael

  Bloomingdale, Alfred

  Blue Angel, The (film)

  Bogart, Humphrey

  Book of Mormon, The (musical)

  book tours

  Borden, Lizzie

  boxing

  brain

  Brando, Marlon

  Breed, Robin

  Brennan, Walter

  Breslow, Marvin

  “Bright College Years” (song)

  Britten, Barbara

  Broadway musicals

  Brooks, Mel

  Brown University

  Bruce, Lenny

  Bryan, William Jennings

  whitewashing statue of

  Buckley, William F., Jr.

  Burns, George

  Burr, Raymond

  Burton, Richard

  Buscemi, Steve

  Bush, George W.

  By George (Kaufman)

  Caesar, Sid

  Call Me Madam (musical)

  Candid Camera (TV show)

  car accidents

  Caro, Robert

  Carsey, John

  Carson, Johnny

  first hosts Tonight Show

  Johnny Winters and

  nightclub act

  Stan Laurel and

  Tonight Show in L.A. and

  Carter, Jack

  Carter, Jimmy

  Cassidy, Hopalong

  Catholic Church

  Cavett, A. B.

  Cavett, Martha Rogers

  Cavett (Cavett and Porterfield)

  CBS

  Cerf, Bennett

  Chaplin, Charlie

  Chase, David

  Cheers (TV show)

  Cheever, John

  Cheney, Dick

  Chesterfield cigarettes

  Chianese, Dominic

  Chiat, Jay

  Chicago Seven

  China, lost in

  Chiricahua Apache

  Christianity

  Christie, Chris

  Christmas

  Chump at Oxford, A (film)

  Churchill, Winston

  Ciannelli, Eduardo

  Clark, Dick

  class reunions

  Clinton, Hillary

  “closure”

  CNN

  cocaine

  Cohn, Sam

  Colbert, Stephen

  Colbert Report, The

  College Humor magazine

  college. See also specific institutions

  sex and

  Columbus, Christopher

  Comedy Central

  comedy writing

  advantages of

  for B-level comedians

  conception

  Congreve, William

  Conrad, Joseph

  consciousness

  contraception

  Cooper, James Fenimore

  Costas, Bob

  Coward, Noël

  Crawford, Joan

  creationism

  Crime and Punishment (Dostoyevsky)

  “Cross of Gold” (Bryan)

  Crow Indians

  Cummings, Robert

  Curatola, Vince

  Curtis, Tony

  Dantine, Helmut

  Darrow, Clarence

  Darwin, Charles

  Davis, Bette

  “Dead, The” (Joyce)

  De Carlo, Yvonne

  Defiant Ones (film)

  Democrats

  Dennis, Sandy

  Detroit Metro Airport

  Dick Cavett Show

  ABC and

  on alcoholism

  Ephron on

  first network

  Nixon and

  PBS and

  taping first

  Dick Cavett Show DVDs

  Dickens, Charles

  Dietrich, Marlene

  Divorce His, Divorce Hers (film)

  Donne, John

  Downs, Hugh

  dreams

  Actor’s Dream

  anxiety

  author vs. viewer of

  escape attempts

  Exam Dream

  madness and

  readers on

  sleep-protection

  driving

  drunks and drunkenness

  driving and

  families and

  first experience of

  showbiz and

  Dyson, Freeman

  Ecclesiates

  ecology

  Edwards, Ralph

  EG (Entertainment Gathering)

  Einstein, Albert

  Eisenhower, Dwight

  Eliot, T. S.

  Ephron, Nora

  equal time requirement

  Erin Fleming v. Bank of America

  ERPI classroom films

  eugenics

  “Everyone Says I Love You” (song)

  evolution

  Faerie Queene, The (Spenser)

  Falco, Edie

  Fallon, Jimmy

  Fatal Vision (McGinniss)

  “Father’s Day” (song)

  Faulkner, William

  Fear Factor (TV show)

  Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

  Fields, W. C.

  Fischer, Bobby

  Fisher, Eddie

  Fitzgerald, F. Scott

  Fleming, Erin

  Fonda, Henry

  Fonda, Jane

  Fourth of July

  Frasier (TV show)

  Frazier, Joe

  freezing rain

  Freud, Sigmund

  Fried, Ron

  Funt, Allen

  Furious Love (Kashner and Schoenberger)

  Gabin, Jean

  Gabor sisters

  Gad, Josh

  Gandolfini, James

  Garbo, Greta

  Garson, Greer

  Gastineau, Mark

  Gaylin, Willard

  Genesis

  Genghis Khan

  Geronimo

  Gertner, Jared

  Gilbert, Billy

  Gilbert and Sullivan

  Gilroy, John

  Gingrich, New
t

  Giuliani, Rudy

  Gleason, Jackie

  Gloye, Mrs.

  Gobel, George

  Godfrey, Arthur

  God of Carnage (Reza)

  Goldwater, Barry

  Gormé, Eydie

  Graham, Sheilah

  Grant, Cary

  Greenway, Dave

  Griffin, Merv

  Groucho Marx and Other Short Stories and Tall Tales (Bader)

  Grunwald, Henry

  Guinness, Alec

  gun lovers

  Hair (musical)

  Haldeman, H. R.

  Halsey, William, Jr. “Bull”

  Hamlisch, Marvin

  Hammond, Darrell

  hangovers

  Hardy, Oliver

  Harvard University

  Hats Off! (film)

  Hayden, Steve

  Hayworth, Rita

  hecklers

  Hellman, Lillian

  Hemingway, Ernest

  Henkle, Roger

  Hersey, George

  Hitchcock, Alfred

  Hitler, Adolf

  Hodgman, John

  Holmes, Sherlock (character)

  homeschooling

  “hooking up”

  Hooton, E. A.

  Hope, Bob

  Houdini

  Houdini (film)

  Howard, Curly

  Howard, Trevor

  Howe, Julia Ward

  Huckleberry Finn (Twain)

  Imaginary Friends (Ephron)

  impact theory

  Imperioli, Michael

  Imus, Don

  Indians

  Ingraham, Laura

  Inherit the Wind (Lawrence and Lee)

  Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)

  Islamic cultural center

  It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (film)

  Ivy League

  Iwo Jima

  Japanese Americans, internment of

  Jebreal, Rula

  Jerry Lewis Show (ABC)

  Jesus

  Jews

  Joan of Arc

  Jobs, Steve

  John Birch Society

  Johnnie Walker Black Label

  Johnson, Lyndon B.

  Johnson, Samuel

  Jonathan Winters Shows

  Jones, Berwyn

  Joyce, James

  Julia (Hellman)

  Karamazov Brothers

  Kashner, Sam

  Kaufman, Ann

  Kaufman, George S.

  Keaton, Buster

  Keaton, Diane

  Keefe, Patrick Radden

  Keene, Tom

  Keillor, Garrison

  Kelley, Peter

  Kennedy, John F.

  Kennedy, Joseph P.

  Kent State shootings

  Kerry, John

  Kimmel, Jimmy

  King, Larry

  Kissinger, Henry

  Koppel, Ted

  Koran burning

  Kraft Music Hall (TV show)

  Kraft Television Theatre (TV show)

  Kramer, Stanley

  Ku Klux Klan

  Lachman, Mort

  LaGuardia Airport