May 19, 2007--Saturday Story: "Found On Staten Island"--Final Part

Part Seven brought us to the last evening of the college’s Italian Culture Festival. Lloyd had managed to secure the services of just the sort of tenor Italian Club president Al Moroni had requested—one who specialized in the arias of his mother’s favorite composer, Gaetano Donizetti. But the highlight of the evening was the raffle—all in the vast crowd tensely awaited the drawing of the ticket that would determine the lucky person who would drive home in a new Fiat convertible. But before President Teitelbaum could do that, Al Moroni seized the microphone and spoke passionately to his constituency about not allowing anyone, especially someone the likes of Dr. Teitelbaum, to make them feel inferior to anyone else here in America. It was time to stand up and be proud of their heritage. As might be imagined, President Moroni’s public criticism of the college’s president, right there in his very own quadrangle, required Teitelbaum to respond. Which he did in an entirely surprising way: when he took the microphone, he spoke seemingly from his heart, telling all assembled that they were like him and he was like them—all victims of bias; and that if they were to succeed in the world, they needed to do so as allies. Some in the crowd seemed to respond to his plea but most chanted, “Raf-fle, Raf-fle, Raf-fle”; and so Teitelbaum promptly drew the ticket and announced that the winner was one of the college’s two African exchange students, who was immediately advised by Ed Paradise, chief of campus security, to get into the car and drive off the island as fast as he could. Otherwise, he couldn’t be responsible for his safety.

Part Eight at long last brings us to the conclusion of “Found On Staten Island,” and we learn that. . .

Teitelbaum had asked me to meet him for lunch the day after the raffle. I suspected he wanted to debrief, perhaps get my impressions of that astonishing evening. It turned out to be our last lunch.

As usual he was down at the end of the bar, smoking and already well into his Scotch. Before I fully made my way to him, unable to contain myself, I blurted out, “That was remarkable. I mean, what you did, particularly what you said was remarkable.” He didn’t move. He sat there seemingly ignoring me, perhaps not hearing me, the TV was blasting away, as if lost in troubling thought, sipping his drink and puffing away on his Lucky Strike. I settled on my stool and took the liberty to lean close to him, seeking to pull him out of his sullen mood. “It was amazing. After what Moroni said about you. In public in front of thousands of people. On your campus. Virtually mocking you. But you found a way to be so transcendent, to not take it personally, and to find a way to reach out to connect with that part of the community from which you had appeared to be estranged. And I think it worked.” He shrugged. “They were moved. Really! You found common ground. It’s exactly what you wrote about in your book. It was living proof of how a college, embodied or symbolized by your example, can connect to the community it is endowed to serve.”

Since what I was saying did not appear to be reaching him, I stopped blabbering and nodded to Andy to get me a Scotch of my own. After a moment, Teitelbaum snubbed out his cigarette, pivoted slowly in his seat, and turned to face me full on. I could hear him clicking his tongue. Coldly, he said, “You are so naïve.” Instantly deflated, I dropped my eyes to my drink and began to roll the icy glass in my hands. “And here I thought I had hired a mature operative. One who understood the world. And what do I find? Someone who is still clinging frantically to innocence. What is charming in a child is an embarrassment in an adult.” I did not attempt to respond. “Have you learned nothing from the world, much less from the experience of you own life? Listen to you, gushing like a girl. Look at you, all puffed up with self-satisfaction.” I allowed myself to imperceptibly shrink on my stool.

“Speaking of ‘looking at you,’ what do you think I was up to last night when that Yahoo Moroni,” he snickered at that reference, “when he had the audacity, the gall to do that to me. Me! After all I have done for this ridiculous and undeserving island. Bigots are what you find here. And bigots I know all about. That was the one thing from last night about which I spoke the truth. The rest was theatrics. And cheap theatrics at that. But it was all that was required there to turn things in my direction—cheap tricks”

He snorted with obvious contempt and, reaching out with his thick finger, stabbed me in the chest. “For them it was more than enough, as you witnessed; but it apparently was enough to take you in as well. Well I never . . . ”

Enraged by his mocking, perhaps as a way to avoid the truth of what he had said about me, I smacked at his hand as he attempted to poke me again. With the back of my hand I brushed my drink off the bar and it crashed to the floor. I did the same to his. Andy moved toward us but then thought better of it. “I came to this island, to your college,” I screamed with a pounding heart, “because of what you wrote. I believed in your ideas. I still do. But from everyone I met I heard that you were full of shit. That you were using the college and your presidency as a means to promote yourself. I attempted to defend you. Actually, in truth, maybe not defend you but to indicate that they could use you as they thought you were using them. To quote you, there were many quid pro quo opportunities out there. They came to understand that and we do, did make some new deals with them. Through these deals that I made we would be able to deliver, another favorite idea of yours—delivery--the kinds of services you have made a career of advocating. To bring thought to action. Sound familiar?” I was so angry and on such a roll that I allowed myself to mock him. I even found myself imitating his cadences.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw that he was studying me carefully. “I have one more thing to say and then I’m finished. Really finished. You knew when you came here to be president that the college was not in and of the city. More of your rhetoric. Look at this place—it’s more like where you grew up in Nebraska than the South Bronx. But you needed it to be of the city—to put your ideas into action. So you hired me to help you create a narrative for the college. In effect a fiction. You had to import a few minorities, even two from as far away as Africa like that Kwame,” I saw him smile at that, “You had to create a mechanism to reach out to the local community—especially to your favorite part where the few dozen blacks on this island live. And by doing that you could claim to the larger world that you had torn down the walls that separate gown from town. Well, on a clear day, if you go up to the top of that hill over there, and stand on your toes, if its winter and there are no leaves on the trees, if you’re lucky you’ll be able to catch a glimpse of the buildings on Wall Street. That’s your city. All the way out there. And you know what?” I couldn’t stop myself from concluding, “If you were the president of a college in a real city I suspect you’d spend the whole day hiding behind your desk curled up with your bottle of Scotch.” I was through.

After a few seconds of silence, Teitelbaum signaled to Andy that it was all right to approach us and to be sure to bring him a double. When he did, Teitelbaum turned to me. He reached out to me again; and as I begin to cringe, wondering what he would do to me, he took hold of my chin and forced me to face him. “Are you through? Do you feel good about yourself?” He held me so firmly that even if I were inclined I would have not been able to do more than grunt a response. “Let’s assume you do.” He squeezed my face even harder and it brought tears to my eyes. “And let’s assume that I do as well.” He saw my puzzled look so he added to clarify, “That I do as well feel good about you. For the first time. At last. Because everything you said is true. Don’t look so surprised. You think I too am naïve? Don’t underestimate me. I know exactly, exactly what I’ve been and what I’m doing. You think it’s by accident that I am who I am? It’s time for you to understand that. It’s not important what you think about me, but it is essential that you never misperceive the truth in all its splendor and contradictions. This may not set you free but it will set you in motion. And once you are thus mobilized, who knows, maybe you too will have you own university in the city.” He was grinning.

He let go of my face. My cheeks were throbbing. Then he reached out toward me again, this time to place his hands on my shoulders. “And so when I leave in a month to become president of San Francisco State University, you will be fine.”

“You . . . what? I will be . . . what?”

“Just fine. I assume you may need to begin looking for a new position,” he said casually, “because you will be vulnerable when they name a replacement for me. He will undoubtedly want his own representative to the community. And I assume he will be from that community. Don’t think your becoming an Honorary Italian will protect you.” He was reading my mind yet again. “That was too much, wasn’t it? I never saw anything funnier in my life.”

In truth I hadn’t thought about it that way, but in any case I got up off my stool and took Teitelbaum, who remained seated, in my arms.

“Get out of here,” he snapped. And I did.

* * *

Thus anointed, I left the bar and Teitelbaum to get to my appointment with Sunny Russell. We had agreed that I would come to the Jersey Street Community Center where we would debrief and divide the cash.

“Did you ever see one of those African dudes move so fast?” He was again ensconced behind his desk and tipped all the way back roaring with laughter. “I always thought that those robes were not built for speed. But they didn’t hold him back! He sure was flyin’.” He was so amused, smacking his thighs and pitching back and forth, that I feared he would tumble over backwards.

“So what have you brought for me, my man? I see you have a nice size bag with you. I assume we are still talking about cash?”

I was exhausted from the past few days’ events, particularly what I had just learned from Teitelbaum, that I wanted to make this quick. I was hoping that he was right, that I would be fine. But though I felt that I would be I needed time on my own to sort things through. So, deciding that I wouldn’t tell him about Dr. T’s departure, I merely said, “Yes, it’s all here and, as we agreed, it’s cash. You can count it, but your share, the center’s cut is a little more than fourteen-seven.”

With a wave he dismissed my suggestion, but I knew that once I left he would be certain to count every dollar. Twice. “So tell me, what else is going on?” He rocked gently in his chair, grinning at me like we had just pulled off the Brinks robbery.

“Nothing much. To tell you the truth I need to get some rest. I’m beat. We can talk about the other parts of our deal later this week or next.”

“Come, come my friend. Partners don’t hold things back from each other. Especially if it’s important. We have a lot to accomplish together during the next month.” His grin widened even further, if that were possible.

“As I said I got to get out of here and catch up on my sleep. I’ll be good for nothing if I don’t do that soon.”

“OK, I hear you. So I won’t play with you.” He stopped his rocking and shifted forward so that his stomach was pressed right up against the desk. “Your man Dr. T, that’s what you call him right? I don’t know if he told you, but him and me we go back a bit together. I see that he did. Good. So I can cut out the preliminaries. He called me last night after he got home from the festival and told me about San Francisco. Ain’t that a trip—Dr. T finally in the place where he belongs all the way out there.” He laughed to himself at that. “That shouldn’t surprise you that I’d be the next to know after he told his wife. You’ve still got a few things to learn Lloyd.” So he too was going to pass along some lessons in life. Go on, I thought, I can handle it.

“Did he tell you about what happened when we met? I’ll bet he did—it’s one of his favorite stories. About me trying to hustle him in One-On-One and how he conned me into wrestling with him? He tells everyone that story. He even told Len Trout from the Advance! And he’s the definition of ‘everyone.’ I’m surprised they haven’t printed it yet in the paper. In any case I’m sure Bill told you about how I laid my butts and brains spiel on him? Ah, I can see from your expression that he did that too. Perfect. And did he tell you that he and I have a so-called secret pact not to tell anyone what happened when we wrestled?”

At that I nodded, and in spite of my tiredness leaned forward to get closer to him. “We’ll I’ll tell you what—again since I said before that partners should tell each other everything, I’ll tell you what happened.” I must admit I was curious.

“This nobody else but Bill and I know.” I believed him. “He took me over to the wrestling room and had me put on a wrestling outfit that he kept in his locker—tights, jock, headgear. He had quite a few in there, all sizes, so I assumed he tried to pull this trick with everyone. Anyway, as you know he’s an old drunk not more than five-five, and you can see from when we played that I’m big and still in pretty good shape. So when he said it would be two-of-of-three falls I thought I’d be back in my car in fifteen minutes. At the most.” He paused and swiveled in his chair to look, away from me, out the window.

“So what happened? I need to get going.”

Not turning back to me, snapping his fingers, he said, “Well it was over in much less than fifteen minutes.”

“And?” I asked.

“That fucker pinned me twice in a row.” Then he turned to look at me again and said, shrugging and grinning in a manner similar to Teitelbaum, “No big deal.”

The END