The Philadelphia Story (pt. 4 - Lephretta)

Even though it is Saturday and most of you are out wassailing or whatever it is you do this time of year, I am posting the current installment of this thing, because it is finished and I'm ready to move on to part 5 (in which I describe, monotonously, picking up a tuxedo from the rental place). Until then, please enjoy this. Now.
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As long as I have known of it, I have always hated Philadelphia. It is, on most levels, an irrational thing; I suspect it stems back from 1983, when the Phillies played the Orioles in the World Series. My family had just moved from Baltimore to Harrisburg the year before. I was nine, and still an Orioles fan. Most of the kids on the bus rooted heavily for Philadelphia. One of them, a kid named something-or-other Weiner (and whose younger brother, in fact, was perhaps the whiniest person I've ever met, to the extent that his catchphrase of sorts was, "My dad's gonna sue you!" I'm honestly not making that up. There was also a kid on the bus we called Ben-day O-tay, because he had a terrible speech impediment and Buckwheat was quite popular then. I remember Ben-day most for once writing "I WANT A ROCK" on the window with his finger, in loving tribute the similarly titled Twisted Sister hit. There was also a kid named Orville who ate paste or anything else anyone wanted to watch him eat) bet me a dollar that the Phillies would win.

Now, mind you, a dollar was a lot in them days (them days not being so much 1982 as much as being eight years old), and there was some gum and some scratch-n-sniff stickers I'd had my eye on for some time. So, when the Orioles took the Series four games to one and Young Master Weiner first refused to pay, then changed his gambit the next day, swearing that I was the one who'd bet on the Phillies, a seed was planted. A seed that, over time, grew into a majestic hate-tree, the twisted branches of which still clutch and scrape madly at my very soul, seeking only to snag it and tear it, and infect my bloodstream with its vile sap. It's a nuisance.

Still, I persevere, and while probably 90% of all Philadelphians I've met (and I've met quite a few, let me assure you) are, to some degree, awfully unpleasant, I'm learning to be accepting. But, Jesus, there's just this… there's a certain shared false bravado, a kind of cockiness that just seems to have little weight behind it. To put it bluntly, I think Philadelphia wishes it were New York, and there's some real resentment there.

Which is all to say that I wasn't surprised, when Tony and I returned to Pat's, to find Jamie and Andy involved in a heated exchange with the same young people (two boys, two girls, I think) I'd seen Jamie talking to some five minutes earlier. I never found out just what it was about, but what matters is that one of the young people (one of the boys, needless to say) seemed pretty pissed off at Jamie, who seemed unfazed, trying to charm his way out of the situation in a kind of drunken, amiable, Bertie Wooster way. Andy, meanwhile, kept reassuring the angry lad, "Don't worry about it—everything's really okay," until well after the guy had calmed down and such soothing was unnecessary. I did little but make the occasional "Ah, what are you gonna do?" face at the three other young people, secretly thinking, "Any y'all step up, we beefin', nigga!" Nonetheless, we soon parted as non-combative strangers and got a cab back to the hotel.

I had a good chat with the cabby, a middle-aged black man from Alabama, eager to tell me his story. "I only made two mistakes in my life," he told me: "Marrying a northern girl, and staying married to her. Still, I'm just glad I didn't marry Lephretta. Lephretta got so big, when I came down to Alabama to visit, I had to hug her twice." About the southern food so heralded in various racial stereotypes, he told me, "Naw, I don't miss it; down there, they'll eat a pig."

"You don't like pork?" I asked him.

"I like pork, but I ain't gonna eat a whole pig!"

"They do eat just about every part, huh?"

"Damn, down there, they bottle the 'oink'."

I should point out that while this was going on, I could hear Jamie in the backseat, trying to repeat everything the driver said, presumably for his own amusement. By then, it no longer mattered. It was late, we were drunk, and we all had shit to do in the morning. All I remember about the rest of the night was watching TV briefly, even more briefly discussing with Andy the ramifications of Arafat's passing, and a nice, warm, hotel bed.