Brokenhearted in Bakersfield

 

10 - ANOTHER MEETIN’ TO GO TO

The hot sun of a brand new day beat down on me where I’d been felled the night before, and I woke up sprawled out on the worn-out EZ-Boy lounger dumped outside Owen Purty’s little camper.

“Here amigo, try some of this,” Owen was up already and offering me a steamin’ cup of coffee in two outstretched, greasy hands.  Surprisingly my fingers was steady as I grabbed for the hot java.  I slurped the dark brown liquid with my coffee cooler lips while Owen waved a sheet of bright pink paper.  “Look,” he shook it in my face, “the annual Tenants Meeting is tomorrow.”

I just grunted.

“You opinionating about the Tenants Meeting or my coffee?”

“Bit of both,” I grumbled.

I then took the paper from Owen’s hand and scanned its contents announcing another Tenants Meeting in Broken Heart Park.  It said Ferris and Rosa Twain would be formally installed as our new Park Managers, and there was a lot of positive spin on what Broken Heart Park, Inc. had provided us over the past year, like supplying gas hookups, electrical power hookups, and colorful sunsets at affordable prices.  (But it did not say a word about Ol’ Jack or the fiscal condition of the Broken Heart Park improvement funds.)  The big agenda item would be voting on whether we get a real potted geranium for every trailer hitch or whether we have the septic tank cleaned out and repaired.  It mentioned two “special guests” was promised to be showing up, which I knew was not some F-list celebrities but most likely Sheriff Al and Deputy Perro, just to keep an eye on the proceedings.  Then it caught my eye.  Free beer and hotdogs for attendees!  Sounded like someone was making a major effort to promote a little goodwill here.  Free weenies and beer will do that.

Anyhow, you don’t have to go to too many of these productions to get the idea.  The 200-proof truth is that as rundown and badly run as things are, our votes won’t count for nothin’.  Your ballot will be disqualified or discounted because the reality was a group of anonymous guys behind Broken Heart Park, Inc. controlled everything.  The Twains was just the latest face of corporate control.

“Going?” I asked.

“Well, I’m sort of new and all,” Owen answered between gulps of coffee.  “Don’t wanna start out being pushy or nothin’.”

“Don’t worry,” I assured, “every last mother’s son-of-a-tenant gets to have his say and vote, for what it’s worth.”  I took another sip of coffee.  “Of course, the septic tank was an issue near to the hearts of many at the last Tenants Meeting and we voted almost unanimously to have it fixed and emptied out, but it lost.”  I registered my disgust with deliberate loud slurps.

“Yeah,” Owen commented, “but if the improvement funds was pocketed by Ol’ Jack Philpot, I don’t see why they’re giving us the option of voting for it again or voting for geraniums.  Something here ain’t right.”

We looked at each other and shouted: “Free beer!”

Free beer would almost certainly guarantee a good turnout.  Why, most folks in Broken Heart Park would rush into a burning building just to toast a free marshmallow.

“You sure you’re going?” Owen asked.

“Yup.”  I knew I would, and not just to get my rightful share of weenies and beer.  I’d go and give the appearance of supporting the new management team, especially if Sheriff Al and Deputy Perro was present and monitoring events at the occasion.  But I wasn’t born yesterday.  I knew that Broken Heart Park, Inc. (whoever or whatever they was) would make all the real decisions affecting our trailer community in Broken Heart Park, and us residents was powerless to change any of that.  The Broken Heart Park Tenants Meeting was all a spectacle, and a corporate show of force at that.

Then a most amazing thing happened.  I swear, a truck fully loaded with beer pulled up near where Owen and I was sitting.  We shot each other a look, and we was up on our feet and flapping our arms.  The truck’s gears grinded as it sparked and sputtered to a halt.

Sprinting up to the cab of the beer truck, and exhibiting a speed I did not know he possessed, Owen hollered at the driver, “That the beer intended for the Tenants Meeting?”

The driver looked him over real suspicious.  “Yeah.  You Twain?”

Owen broke out in a double-wide grin.  “Why, yes.  Yes I am.  I’m Ferris Twain, and this is….”  Owen pointed directly at me, and I swear to God I was poised to sock him in the jaw if he called me Rosa.  But Owen smartly left it right there, and changed the subject.  “You need some help unloading?  How many cases was that again?”

The driver picked up his clipboard.  “Kegs, three kegs and a tap.  Says you ordered ‘em.”  The driver eyed Owen again with suspicion.  “You sure you’re Ferris Twain?”

“Last time I looked in the mirror I was,” Owen reassured the trucker.

I backed up my neighbor.  “Oh, definitely.  He’s Ferris Twain all right.  He’s got them eyes.  Yeah, you can bet the Buick on it.”

Owen gesticulated with his arm and cut me off.  “Well, yes, I ordered three kegs, but how much beer is that measured in cases?  I’m a teetotaler myself and not real familiar how the liquor industry operates.”

The redheaded feller opened his door, hopped out and responded, “Three kegs ought to be enough to float this tin tenement.”

“That’ll do fine,” Owen nodded.  “Just put ‘em over in the shade.”

The driver muttered something as he handed Owen the clipboard, then he ran around and unlocked the truck’s sliding door while shouting out, “Sign the papers, I’ll unload.”

I looked out in hopeful search of a premature hotdog mobile while Owen scribbled something unidentifiable on the papers.  The deal was signed and sealed.  The beer was delivered a whole day ahead of the scheduled Tenants Meeting, and we was its entrusted caretakers.  What was Ferris thinking?  But enough on that, I was too occupied opening a keg to care what the hell Ferris was thinking.

Before you could yell free beer a group of neighbors gathered around to sample our bounty.  Being consummate connoisseurs, we consumed the beer under varying circumstances, such as standing, sitting and laying down.  Someone produced bottles of Nyquil, and we was off to the races with poor man’s boilermakers.

We proceeded to toast our health, good fortune and whatever else we could think of, with round after round after round, knowing that we was never too drunk as long as we could still hold on to the ground.