Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

LIFE WITH VAL: THE PARTY

My late wife Val and I met when she was 14 and I was 16 years old. Her aunt worked at the 55th Street Medical Clinic in Los Angeles processing insurance documents, and my mother was head nurse and physician’s assistant. That year my mother hired Val to send Christmas cards to the patients. I met Val while I was on one of my routine missions to the clinic to bum money from either my mother or Dr. Atkins. It didn’t matter to me - whichever one I ran into first was cool.
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It was my routine to go to the front desk and have whoever was there buzz me into the inner sanctum. Once there I would lay in wait in the lunchroom for whoever came out of one of examining rooms first. I always hoped it was Dr. Atkins, because he was an easier touch. He didn’t have time to listen to my sad scenarios, so he’d just pull out his bankroll and start peeling off paper without even listening to me, with maybe a caustic remark like, "Eric, you need to get you a job." It was kinda embarrassing, because my younger brother, Fred (12 years old), used to work around the office to EARN his money. But, being the consummate little deadbeat that I was, a little embarrassment didn’t phase me a bit.
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But what I didn’t know was, on that particular day, when I walked through those doors it would change my life forever. When I walked up to the counter, Val was turned facing the files. I waited before I said anything, because even then she had the body of a full grown woman, so I just stood there and took in the view. But when she turned around, I was shocked to see that she was a young girl. I also saw that it was my lucky day, because when she looked at me I saw for the very first time that look in her eyes that made me feel special until the night she died.
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We were married on Christmas morning when she was 19 and I was 21, and she’s been an ongoing gift in my life every since - even today, now that she’s gone. When I originally wrote this, several years before her death, I pointed out that we have two kids - a daughter, Kai, who was 23 at the time, and a 21 year old son, Eric, Jr. They’d both graduated from college the previous month (Eric, on my birthday).
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I also pointed out . . . that I'm sort of a laid-back, ‘cerebral’ kind of guy who refuses to make a move without thinking it through. You know the type - the kind of guy who people aren't really sure about until they get to know him. Val, on the other hand, is a totally spontaneous, what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person that everyone loves on first sight. But she's *so* spontaneous that the kids and I have to keep an eye on her to keep her out of trouble.
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In both high school and college my son was the school basketball star, and before each game countless kids would congregate at my house waiting for Val. Others would go to the gym early to save seats in the bleachers, waiting for her to show up - and when she did, the party was on.
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The kids used to call the section where Val sat "The Dog Pound." More than once a player on the other team would miss free throws or plays because they were laughing so hard at something Val might have said about one of the referees or opposing players - and the funny thing was, in spite of that, the referees, and the kids on the other teams, loved her, and they all call her by her first name - some of the kids called her "Nani."
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Kids who were scheduled to play our team would come by the house and say, "Now Val, this is just a game. Don't be doggin' me on the court next week." And she'd say, "I ain’t gon have to, my son's gonna do it for me - and get out of my refrigerator; don't Ruth feed you?" Sometimes after a game my son would say, "Moma, you know you were a bad girl at the game today, don't you?" And she'd say, "What? His topee was on crooked!" Sometimes I seriously wonder was the Whoopie Goldberg movie, "Eddie," loosely based on Val's Antics.
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She is so out there. She lives in her very own universe. I tell her sometimes, "Val, if WWIII broke-out, you wouldn't even know it until you heard the blast. And it's true. Val is so oblivious to the things that the rest of us worry about that it verges on dangerous. In spite of the fact that she is well known as one of the top Property Administrators at Hughes Aircraft in El Segundo, Ca., she manages to leave all of her business acumen in her desk at work. One day, for example, she saw a very expensive household item that she wanted to buy. So she came to me and asked if it was alright for us to purchase it. At the time, we were sort of strapped, so I told her that we didn't have the money. She looked at me with deep disappointment, and said with total sincerity, "What do you mean we don't have the money? You have a box full of checks in your desk drawer." So, needless to say, I handle the money in the family.
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But her disarming personality has also helped us out of a number of uncomfortable situations. About ten years ago when we moved from Los Angeles to Covina, California, we were one of just a few Black families in the area. Not being use to that sort of situation, we - make that I -was more than just a little uncomfortable. And to make things worse, one of the neighbors had a huge Confederate flag spread across one entire inside wall of his garage - and the garage door was always open, so whenever we drove down the street his blazing Dixie flag hit us right in the face. I felt uncomfortable with it, but hey, that flag was draped across that wall long before we moved into the neighborhood, and besides, the man has every right to love Dixie. The only thing I hate more than a racist is a person who comes into a situation and thinks everyone else should rearrange their lives to accommodate them. So I just learned to ignore, as I THOUGHT Val had.
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About a month or so after we moved in, however, the lady from across the street invited us to a party that she was having. Again, being the laid-back kind of guy I am, I felt uncomfortable about the prospect. I don't like parties as a matter of course. You have to stand around laughing and smiling when you really don't feel it, and discussing issues that you really don't care about (How about those Dodgers?). It's not my thing - it makes me feel phony. I had the feeling that this party would be all that multiplied by a thousand - especially, not knowing anyone, and being the only Black couple there - "Hey, Bubba! Guess who’s comin’ to dinner?"
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But Val immediately lit-up. The lady had said the magic word--PAAAAAR-TAY! Before I could say a word, Val took the ball and ran with it. "I'd love to! Hey, can I be the bartender? I make the best...." The lady ended up at our house all afternoon laughing and talking with Val. By the time she floated back across the street, under the influence of a quart of Val's "sample" Margaritas, Val was up on all the neighborhood gossip, and the two women had forged an unshakable, Most Favorite Neighbor Treaty.
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This was going to be more complicated than I thought - it had become serious. We had just moved to the area, and already, life as we were just coming to know it was about to come to a screachin' halt. I could just picture this nice, quiet neighborhood under the influence of Val and her notorious mixed drinks. Once the neighbors came down from their hangovers they'd never forgive us. I could just see the headline of the next day’s San Gabriel Tribune now - "BLACK CHICK CORRUPTS COVINA!" - and knowing my woman, there was no doubt in my mind that’s exactly what was about to happen.
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Val has a real knack for mixing drinks in a way that masked the liquor. She can blend various juices, fruits and crushed ice with more artistic flare than a Renaissance master. If she could pull-off the same thing with paint and canvas we'd be instant millionaires. She can mix these drinks so well, and make them so pleasing to the taste, that people generally forget about the gallon of liquor that's in them. We'd have parties where I'd here non-drinkers saying, "Ah Val, can I have another 'slush,' please?" I'd think, "slush, indeed. The only thing that's going to be slushed is you, in about five minutes." Val got a real kick out of it - and now she was about to do it to our new, unsuspecting, neighbors.
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The night of the party I wasn't as uneasy about it as I had been previously, because by then I'd had a week to get to know both Rose, who seemed to have made Val her closest friend on the block, and her husband, Al, who was really a nice guy. But I still wasn't passionate about the prospect of being paraded about as the new Black guy on the block to a lot of people that I didn't know. So I begged off with a cold that I had made it a point to cultivate three days prior to the event.
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The night of the party I kissed Val on the cheek and told her to have a good time. But as she was leaving I held on to her hand and reminded her, "but not too good of a time." She promised to be good, and she was off.
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I then got comfortable and settled into the bedroom to watch television for the night, but I kept the windows open and the blinds open so I could keep an eye - and ear - on the house.
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By 12:30 a.m. the party was going full blast. I could hear the laughter and the faint sound of music playing in the house, but by 2:00 a.m. I began to hear the sounds of Val working her magic. A couple of guys who I recognized as two of my more conservative neighbors were in front of the house arm-wrestling on the hood of a brand new Chyrsler, and another guy was calling out to a woman who was struggling down the street barefoot in an evening gown. So I decided I'd better drop in on the party.
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When I walked in it was clear that Val was in full control of the festivities. It was also clear that I didn't have to worry about uneasy small-talk - everybody in the house was about as loose as you can get. Val walked up and hugged me, saying, "Hi, honey! Hey everybody! This is my Nu-nu, Eric." I heard various drunken responses:
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"Hi, Eric"!
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"Hey, Nu-Nu!" 
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"What's his name?" "Nu-NU?" 
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"Big, ugly rascal, ain't he? Just kiddin', don't beat me up, brother!"
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Then this one guy walked up and said, "Hi, I'm Stewart. I live down the street. This is quite a lady you got here."
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"Yea, I know," I said. "I hope she's been behaving herself?"
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"Naw, I can't say that she has," the man said. "First, she done got everybody drunk - but I can't fault her for that, that's what I came here for - but then, she called me a Commie."
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I said, "what?"
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Then Stewart's wife chimed in. Between the booze and her laughter, she could barely get her words out. She introduced herself as Sue, and said, "No, she asked my husband, 'Are you a communist or something? And my husband said, 'No, I ain't no damned Commie. What made you say that?' Then Val said, 'Well, why you got that Communist flag in your garage?'" Sue went on, trying to talk through her laughter, "Then Stewart said, 'That ain't no damned communist flag! That's Old Dixie. We from Georgia.'"
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With that, someone else took up the story. "Then Val said, 'Same thing.'" Then everyone fell out laughing all over again (even me, because I knew Val was serious) as Stewart stood there pretending to be incensed. But everyone knew inside that while the joke was suppose to be on Stewart, we were actually laughing at the childlike way in which Val viewed what was suppose to be an uncomfortable subject.
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It seems that Stewart had been receiving a lot of ribbing over the flag for quite sometime, and Val's remark just put the icing on the cake. It turns out that he and Sue are both really nice people. Stewart is quite an intellectual, and - believe it or not - has turned out to be my closest friend in the neighborhood. We spend hours together debating everything. He says, "I admit, I’m a Southern bigot - I think we should lynch anyone who roots against Georgia Tech." 
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Stewart and I agreed on one thing - since the essence of our being is what we think, and physical attributes are purely superficial, it makes more sense to define ourselves according to the way we think, rather than the way we look - and if that is true, then our preoccupation with race is an exercise in stupidity. 
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I really like that guy, and if it weren’t for Val we probably never would have met. And she’s brought so many other things into my life. I discovered my love for writing as a direct result of finding that I didn’t write well enough to answer the love letters she used to send me while I was in the Marine Corps; she encouraged me to go to college, and she also talked me into buying my first Commodore 64 Computer when personal computers first hit the market. So, while living with Val can indeed be challenging, I can’t imagine life without her.
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I could go on and on about this woman, but I’ve got to go now--it’s time for me to mount a campaign for dinner.
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"Oh, Sugar Lips!"

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"Sugar Lips my ass. Hit the microwave, Buddy!"

Eric L. Wattree
http://wattree.blogspot.com/
[email protected]
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
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Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.