That Good Night (15 page)

“What do I look like, that I'm in my nineties? Korea, goddammit! Nobody remembers the Korean War anymore, but if you fought at Chosin Reservoir, you do remember it! Did you fight in Korea?” he demanded.

“Not directly. But my company made gun sight parts and other stuff. I lost a cousin to it.” I said.

“Pardon me, gentlemen,” Commodore broke in, “But you must move that boat.”

“George,” Ernest said in no uncertain terms, “blow it out your ass.” I noticed the young helmsman snicker with
I wish I
could say that
written all over his face. “Why not go back to your mahogany-paneled suite and let me and this gentleman figure it out.” The Portuguese Water Dog barked approval.

“I'll write you up for this, Ernest. Expect a reprimand.” Commodore turned to the helmsman, who at this point was eating his fist trying to still a deep seated urge to burst a gut, “Take me back to the club. And, you will sign a witness statement.”

“Yes sir,” the young man replied, and then sped off back to the yacht club.

It appeared to me that Ernest was enjoying his waning years being a curmudgeon. Rather than have me subjected to the yacht club's quasi-military establishment, he invited me to tie-up
That Good Night
at his dock, offering me a shower, dinner, drinks, and an evening of, as he said, “Bullshitting.”

“Thanks, Ernest,” I said, “I'll follow you in.”

“Ernest! Jesus god, call me Ernie. That half-wit Commodore's as formal as a goddamned Beefeater. And,” he continued pointing to the bow, “the dog is known as First Mate,” to which the dog barked,
affirmative, sir
. I weighed anchor and followed Ernie to a pier that spoke of care and pride. After tying up, we walked up a few stone steps to a large deck overlooking the harbor. Greeting us there was Mildred, Ernie's live-in housekeeper, cook, and companion.

After introductions, she asked, “A nice glass of sherry, perhaps?”

I nodded while Ernie said, “Yes, and the carafe, too, please.” Mildred walked into the house as Ernie and I made ourselves comfortable on two well padded teak chairs. “Without Mildred, I'd be lost,” Ernie offered.

I acknowledged his comment with a smile just as Mildred returned with two cut crystal glasses and a a carafe of dark, amber sherry. “Would some nice strip steaks do well for dinner?” she asked.

Ernie looked to me for an answer. “Medium rare,” I said, tipping my glass to Mildred.

She asked me, “Will anyone else be joining us?”

I answered, “I'm sailing alone.”

“Oh my,” Mildred said. “Then steak will be just the ticket.”

I laughed, “Certainly beats frozen dinners.” Mildred answered with a cute shrug and pursed lips.

“The usual, Mildred,” Ernie chimed in, giving Mildred a warm and generous smile.

Sipping sherry, Ernie and I chatted about sailing, exchanging where we've been, boats we owned, close calls, and the joys of wind and water.

After a dinner of steak and fixings accompanied by a bottle of cabernet sauvignon, Ernie and I returned to his deck, cradling snifters of Courvoisier while Mildred remained behind to clean up.

As much as I wanted to boast about my escape from Sunset, I left it out, instead simply telling Ernie that after Lori died, I sold out and headed to sea. “I expect to die out there,” I heard myself say. Since leaving Sunset, I hadn't given much thought about dying, so I guess that consciousness finally caught up with something that had been brewing in my mind for a while. At Sunset, death pervaded my thinking, especially right before sleep. I'd hear wheezing and coughing, dreading that those would be the last sounds I'd ever hear. Once out of that place, it was all about future. So I was a bit taken aback at hearing
myself utter the word
die
.

“What are you gonna do?” Ernie asked. “Sail into the sunset, until somebody rams into your boat, all stinking with what's left of your rotting corpse?”

This was not a discussion I preferred to have. “I'll have to give it some thought,” I told him abruptly.

“Listen, Charlie,” said Ernie, “I didn't mean to be so crude. The fact is I envy you. My days are numbered and I gave some serious thought to taking my Alerion, heading out to the middle of the Sound, and calling it a day. But, that would be suicide and, quite frankly, I'm not into murdering myself.” We sat silent for a bit, sipping our brandy, casting our eyes out into the cove. I broke the silence.

“If you were going to commit suicide, how would you do it?”

“Whoa, Charlie, why are you asking me that? Go ask Dr. Kevorkian, not me.” He leaned in close with pursed brow, “Are you thinking of it?”

I hesitated before answering, “When I was sailing off the New Jersey coast, it did cross my mind. I had this thought of getting really ill while sailing. The thought of heading to shore, seeing a doc, winding up in some warehouse for the ill, letting
That Good Night
bob away at a dock…suicide sounded like a logical alternative. Do you understand?”

“I do, more than you know. I think all of us in our later years are scared as hell that we might wind up in a nursing home. I dread the thought. But suicide?”

“Why not?” I asked. “There is a reality at play here. I am an old man. I am sound of mind. I do know that I will never ever submit to spending my last days cooped up in some fluorescent lit, sanitized box. So, I ask a simple question, how would you do it?”

Palming his snifter, Ernie gave the glass a quiet twirl, inhaled its delicate aroma before taking a thoughtful swallow. He said, “I'd use morphine. That would do it. It's a painless, soft way to die.”

The subject of death was taboo at Sunset. Maybe that's because it was all around us. Beds became empty. The roster changed. It wasn't like people went on leave or some fancy vacation. No sir, it was death. Roommates changed—reminders that all of us were rapidly spiraling downward. Nurses and aides would change shifts, go home to families. We went to the grave. I thought of the gray boxes in the basement of Sunset. Neatly stacked.

“The name of your boat,” Ernie said, breaking the silence. He stood and walked over to the edge of the patio. I followed. Overlooking the cove and the sound beyond, he recited:

“Do not go gentle into that good night
,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light
.”

He turned and caught my eye. “Suicide? Is that how you're going to
rage against the dying light
?”

I stood, walked over to him, and pointed to my boat. “That's my rage, Ernie. That wonderful boat out there is my rage. The sea beyond, that's my rage. When death has me in its grip, I will submit. If I'm lucky, I'll just die. Slip off in my sleep. My boat might become a navigation hazard, I might stink it up with my rotting corpse as you suggested, but I will not demand suffering from myself. If I have to, I'll take death into my own hands.”

Returning to the deck, Ernie refilled our snifters. While pouring, he said, “Let's take a walk.”

Palming our snifters, we left the deck and ambled our way to a brick path that led to a small salt marsh. The tide was in. Bulrushes mixed with other tall grasses were a pleasing break from the manicured lawns that surrounded the marsh. Frogs croaked here. Dragonflies flitted for their catch. A neatly coiled black snake enjoyed the last heat of the day.

“So, you were in the machining business?” Ernie asked me.

I answered, “Precision stuff. After the Korean War, we stayed with the DOD, air force mostly. But we competed in the marketplace, too.”

In my heyday, when someone would ask me that question, I could expound for hours about the trials and tribulations of running a business, wooing clients, hiring workers, taking risks, carrying debt, sacrificing for the sake of business. But looking back, there really wasn't much to say. I worked hard, made a good living but I really didn't live much of an exciting life. We were talking about legacy here and I had little to offer. I thought about Lori's photo album, so many photos sans Daddy. One of the rare ones with me in it was of me, Lori and the boys standing in front of a hot dog stand on the boardwalk of Atlantic City. I piped up, “There was this time I took my family to Atlantic City. We had a great time just walking the boardwalk. The kids hit the beach like they'd never seen water before. My wife, Lori—she looked like a starlet in her bathing suit. It was a family day.” I choked up a little.

Where had
that
memory been? Were there more? Sure, there must be. Where the hell are they? I felt a strong urge to get back to my boat. Crawl into the cabin and shut out the world. Is that what I was doing, hiding, sailing nowhere? The Ancient Mariner? The Flying Dutchman? Charlie Lambert?

“Are you okay?” Ernie asked. “Hit a soft point, did ya?” He continued, “You know Charlie, the thing about the past is we have a lot of it. Live to be eighty and you have a hell of a lot of past to mull over. There's a lot of stuff in our wake and not a lot of future. But hell, there's always a tomorrow, at least there is for now. Here's to life,” he said, proffering his glass for a friendly clink. We toasted in silence to tomorrows.

“So Ernie, what about you—I'd guess medicine?”

“Toothpicks. Can you beat that? I manufactured toothpicks. Billions of goddamn toothpicks. My grandfather spent his life building the business. So help me, Charlie, the old man worked right up to the end. Damn, he even died sitting behind his desk. Anyway, you're right about the medicine part. Fresh out of my internship, I was drafted and served in a MASH unit. Remember that? The TV series?” I nodded. “From the frying pan of working like a dog in the hospital to the fire of wartime trauma. That was Korea. Now, how many people give that war a thought today? Hell, I bet it gets at most a sentence or two in the kids' history books and not a word more. We fought like bastards, Charlie, and for what? When the Korean conflict—they didn't even want to call it a war—ended, I wanted nothing to do with medicine—too much gore, Charlie, too much trying to do the impossible. I lost too many kids. It's the craziest damn thing. Why the hell do we fight like that? Anyway, war wiped out my idealistic view of medicine.

“When I got out, Grandpa had just died so I took over the company. It only took me three years to drive it into the ground. Obviously, I had no idea what the hell I was doing. Besides, old Grandpa had a ton of debt. That's when I returned to medicine. General surgery, you know tonsillectomies, appendectomies,
that kind of stuff. Pretty sure bet that patients would survive. There was a real push for me to jump into trauma medicine, but no way was I going to get back into that. Oh, now and then I was called in to the ER when the shit hits the fan, mostly having to do with gang warfare—don't get me started on that.”

After a slight pause, Ernie switched gears. “Any kids? Grandkids?”

“Two boys. Both married. No grandkids. You?”

“I had a son. Killed flying a Piper Cub into a bunch of trees. Can you believe that? It was the worst time in my life. I still think of Brad most everyday. He was a good kid. College degree, fiancée and all that. Anyway, my marriage died with it. So, no kids, no grandkids, no wife. It's just me, my housekeeper Mildred, and dog First Mate.” Ernie swallowed hard and shook his head as if to dislodge his demons. We walked quietly back to the deck where he pointed to his Alerion. I read the boat's name printed in neat dark blue block letters on the white stern: LAMEKUF. I read it aloud pronouncing it
Lame-cuff
.

“No, no,” Ernie said. “It's pronounced,
Lamb-eh-cuff
”

“What does it mean? Is it Swedish or something?”

“No, it's not Swedish. Pure American. Try reading it backwards,” Ernie instructed. “Take your time.”

I studied it for a bit then said out loud, “Fukemal.” I let it sink in. “Do you mean fuck ‘em all? Is that it, Ernie?”

Slapping my shoulder, Ernie laughed, “You got it, Charlie. Lima, Alpha, Mike, Echo, Kilo, Uniform, Foxtrot, that's what I named her. And believe me, it's worth every letter. That's the way I see it, Charlie. At our age it works for just about everything.” Leaving no time for me to respond, Ernie abruptly switched gears again. “So you're really going to die out there?”

“Die where out there? Jesus, Ernie, I'm still trying to figure out how you came up with naming your boat like that. I mean, why?”

“You know, Charlie, when you get old and all that was gold fades into a cloudy distance; there is a pervasive sense that life is a journey of aloneness. When I left my doctoring career, there was the tried and true retirement party with all the congratulations and tokens that come with it. Retirement is not commencement. It's the end of something except perhaps for a few lucky ones that keep a hand in their work or find some great reward. After retiring, I lost contact with my former colleagues. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't blame them for not calling or coming by; rather, I came to understand that going to the hospital every day had become my life instead of my job. When I left the job, I left my life behind. So when I say fuckemall, what I'm really saying is I prefer to just be me. I no longer want or need to be a part of a herd.”

“So there you go. Deal with it!” Abruptly changing the subject, Ernie swept his arm toward Long Island Sound, and asked again, “Are you going to die out there?”

“If you mean Long Island Sound, I sure hope not,” I replied. “Maybe on the Atlantic somewhere. What about you?”

Ernie laughed heartedly, “I'm going to die playing with myself. I decided that the other day when I had a rare erection and, of course, used it. My chest tightened a bit and that's when I concluded that I would die whacking my carrot. You still pound the meat, Charlie?”

“Jesus, Ernie, what are we, in junior high school?”