Simply put, and things must be simply put these days in the heat of mob-think and leftist power-grab mentality, the answer to racism whether real or perceived is not more racism. The answer to injustice is not more injustice.
Is that not what we are seeing? What we’ve been seeing?
Are we not in the throes of emotionalism? What does emotionalism get us?
Did the owner of the Wendy’s in Atlanta deserve to have his/her place burned down for calling police to move someone who had “fallen asleep” at the wheel in their drive-thru?
So we need to think things through. We need to all of us take a deep breath, take a pause, and think about what’s going on.
We need to ask ourselves many questions.
First question: is the answer to racism more racism?
Second question: is the answer to injustice more injustice?
Third question: when our politicians say no one is above the law, do they mean that or do they only mean when it suits their political needs?
Fourth question (at least for now): can we really believe anything we’re told by the media?
And a final statement: it behooves us all to think for ourselves and to check out what we’re being told by our elected officials and especially by our openly-biased media.
By Peter Weiss
The second week went quietly and quickly. Bill worked a lot of hours and managed to spend most of his time away from the distractions of the women there on the job. He saw Millie regularly and Millie was ever Millie. She took to wearing different colored nail polish and lipstick each day and she managed to know, pretty much, when Bill would be having breaks. Two times she took him back to her private hidden space and two times she used him to please herself with him. During the second time, she promised him an uninhibited lap dance and she used the moment to preview what would be upcoming for him.
Bill asked about her boss and how it was that her boss always knew things about him and what was going on in the kitchen. While she sat on his lap facing him, Millie told him that her boss hung with the big boys sometimes even up in the chef’s room upstairs when they held their management meetings. Millie told Bill her boss also played cards with the big boys when they had their regular card games.
Millie was coy. She told Bill that she had a secret to tell him about her boss but he’d have to earn it.
“Earn to learn and learn to earn,” Millie had said. “Cute right?”
“Cute,” Bill said. “But I don’t want to play games.”
“No games.”
“Good.”
And that was it. That was how they’d left it, as that he’d have to earn Millie divulging whatever the secret was, but Millie gave him no clue as to how.
He knew. Bill knew exactly what Millie wanted and he wasn’t overjoyed by it but he wasn’t dismayed either. It was the same thing Beverly wanted, except with Beverly it was a spiteful thing, paybacks for her cheating husband.
Bill knew about being used that way. He had been used that way two times already in his short life, once with his college live-in’s cousin whose boyfriend had come on to Bill’s girlfriend. That one was a wild, raunchy time driven by blackmail, or the threat of it at any rate. Jenny. She was wild.
Bill, for better or worse, had now known some wild women.
The second was Alfreda. She was paying Henry Lee, her husband, back for his messing with the salad girl, Marie. Alfreda threatened blackmail too, threatened to make up some wild stuff about Bill and pass it on to Henry Lee.
For his part, Henry Lee pushed Marie on Bill. Bill had held her off long as he could, but there came the point when it was easier to get it done with than fight it all the time.
This was how it was with Millie. In her mind their being intimate, or being partners, or being whatever it was they were being, was — he didn’t know what she had in her mind — something he knew he should be staying away from but something he didn’t stay away from, maybe didn’t really want to stay away from.
Maybe that was true of Beverly too. She was another getting-even girl. The only non-getting-even girls were Millie, Rosie and Edelgarde. They were just the fun ones.
Norma was a fun one. Drenovis had told him she was a put-it-anywhere girl, and she was just that.
Still, but for the two times with Millie and some quick clandestine meets with Rosie and Edelgarde, Bill had a hard-working, long-hour week, one where he worked from mid-morning through The Falstaff Room hours. This would be, although he didn’t quite know it yet, his new norm, his regular work week, somewhere between ten and twelve or thirteen hours a day, sometimes even more, mostly seven days a week although he got Sundays off when he could.
Millie’s secret about her boss was out there somewhere. The Falstaff Room, after a slow start on the Monday, had another great week. Maybe, Bill thought, it was that the holiday season was coming up quickly.
By Peter Weiss
I have a bridge to sell. If you don’t buy it, you’re racist.
If you watch Fox News you’re racist.
If you hire a white person over a black person, you’re racist. But… If you hire a black person over a white person, you’re not.
Black lives matter. Yes, they do.
But…
Shouldn’t it be: All lives matter?
If the implication of Black Lives Matter is that white lives, or brown lives, or olive lives don’t, isn’t that racist?
So these days there’s no point in even talking about what’s going on. These days in mob heat and mob mentality you can get fired, beat up, even killed and they (whoever they are and it’s not the Republican right) justify it as part of the movement. Either you’re woke or you’re the enemy to be suppressed, squelched and obliterated. That’s their justice. That’s their mob-rule-think.
So think what you think. Say what you say. Do what you do. This is America, at least for the moment. (It won’t be for much longer if we keep on as we are going in the mob heat.)
Two things are very clear.
First, group think/mob think brings us to the worst of what mankind can do. (Oh God, please don’t let me get fired for saying mankind.) (Oh God, please don’t let me get fired/beat up/killed for believing in God and for invoking You here.)
Second, our government is failing us. Our government was meant to be run by representatives who left their personal lives for a term in office and then went back to their personal lives having served their country. It wasn’t meant to be run by career politicians hell-bent on staying in power and enriching themselves. So long as we fail to institute term limits and get rid of the rubbish we have – that American Politburo – we are destined to be subjugated and ruled rather than represented.
By Peter Weiss
They had talked about these things. Bill, the chef and the banquet chef had pretty much set the parameters for Bill. They had told him clearly what he could and couldn’t do. He wasn’t supposed to fraternize on company time, but in the scope of things, since cooks like Bill never actually got their union-recognized breaks, the chef didn’t hassle them much for resting when they could. Bill and Jimmy G were responsible for a service so it was assumed they’d take breaks and deal with personal matters as they could. How they did it was left up to them.
The banquet cooks working only banquets did get a lunch break. Most of them ate in the kitchen. Few of them actually took their scheduled time. Instead, and this was strictly decided by Jimmy Banquet Chef who had okayed it with the executive chef, they left when the work was done, all the work, and often this was earlier than the end of their designated shifts. They ate while they worked or when they were in a lull. Lulls happened all the time, those moments when there wasn’t anything to do, when they could run to the bathroom or smoke a cigarette.
Kitchens were a small, tight world. Even a big kitchen like this one was a small, tight world. Things went well in kitchens like this one when they went well. Things were tough when they weren’t going well. Jealousy and envy threatened harmony from time to time, why, as Bill had learned, the cook he’d replaced had quit. He didn’t like that Jimmy G got over all the time.
R&R got in the way of harmony too. Big time. At least a half-dozen of the banquet cooks and even more than a half-dozen waiters were dying to get into Millie’s or Beverly’s pants, and everyone was hot for the two Falstaff Girls, Rosie and Edelgarde. Overall, this did not bode particularly well for Bill. He was brand-spanking new and he been there/done that with all three. It was only a matter of time until the word spread.
Insecurity was another threat to kitchen harmony. Room service cooks didn’t want Bill to know their jobs for fear he might one day replace one of them. Same thing for some of the banquet cooks. They were afraid and resentful at the same time and a few of them were jealous too since Bill had risen up as he did.
Bill was not thinking about these things. On his way home after speaking with the chef ever-so-briefly, Bill was thinking about what the chef had said about Caesar, how the chef was using him as a pawn in a game of power. “Suck it up,” the chef had said, which meant basically that Bill had to play his part in the game. Doing so and playing it well meant that he’d be protected, and his protection was from the top.
Bill was thinking that he didn’t want to be part of the palace intrigue. Bill was thinking, more than anything else, that all he wanted was to work. He didn’t want the girls. He didn’t want intrigue. He didn’t want the power games. He simply wanted to go to work, to earn his pay and to come home.
Working at Suburban had taught him that although it should be, it was never that simple. He had been learning from all different angles that the human condition almost always got in the way of simplicity. The human condition almost always messed things up.
By Peter Weiss
The chef kept a room in the hotel. It was no big deal really, just a relatively small corner room that was his. Bill would find out that they had poker games up there and sometimes they had some small parties that were kept among the top personnel in the hotel. The chef, the GM, the Food and Beverage Director, Millie’s boss, the head housekeeper, and a few corporate executives were generally the ones who attended. They were not illicit affairs and they were nothing that had to be hidden. Sometimes the top management just met there to make executive decisions.
Millie’s boss was a youngish woman. She was not American by birth, as the chef was not. She was French-born and had been working in the corporation since she was a kid. She had graduated the university supporting herself working as a maid and upon her graduation she had been promoted to a supervisor. She had accepted and was pleased with several promotions that were conditioned upon transfers within Europe, all of which were favorable to her, and finally they had asked her to come to the States. New York or somewhere out on one of the coasts might have been more desirable for her, but hey, here she was living in America with a good job and lots of perks.
After they had put everything away and made sure the walk-ins were secure, Jimmy G and Kalista said good night to Bill and headed off to their respective locker rooms to change into civvies and head home. Bill stopped into the chef’s office, not particularly because he wanted to but because he thought it was the right thing to do. He didn’t have much to report and quickly told the chef they were done and everything had gone well. The chef thanked him for letting him know and told Bill that he had spoken with Caesar about the waitresses eating the fish. The chef surprised Bill by telling him he didn’t care what the waitresses ate since there were only three of them, but he reminded Bill that appearances counted and that word spread like wildfire. He also reminded Bill that food cost was a factor and that sooner or later the cost would go up if he gave away a lot of high-cost food.
Bill was not apologetic in his response. He told the chef they had had a fish special that sold out and that what he had fed the girls wasn’t going to make another day, not that it was old and bad, just that it had lived it’s time. So since he had the mushrooms and the inclination, he had given them what he wanted to not have left over, killed two birds with one stone as it were, made the girls happy and gotten rid of what he wanted to. If he’d had the day’s special left over, he would have given them that, he told the chef.
“I see everything,” the chef said. “It’s my job. I see everything and sooner or later I hear about everything. Caesar will fall into line, but he’s never going to be happy with you.”
“It’s nothing I did,” Bill said.
“I did it,” the chef said. “I did it and I’m doing it. And I’m glad about it. You’re just stuck in the middle, so suck it up and make sure you don’t get caught doing anything worse than you’ve already been doing with the girls you been doing it with.”
“You know about that?”
“Millie, Beverly and your two from The Falstaff Room? Yeah, what did I just say?”
Bill looked at the chef. The chef looked back at him.
“I was young once too,” the chef said. “I got married too young, before I’d finished what I should have done when I was single. Just don’t do anything really bad like drugs or stealing. Haven’t we said this already?” the chef asked.
By Peter Weiss
“Eddie’s fixed too,” Rosie said.
Bill was back in the kitchen and working at the cleanup. Jimmy G had stepped out to get the kitchen truck, or at least that’s what he had said. But he’d been gone longer than just going for the truck.
“That’s good to know.”
“She wanted me to tell you.”
“That’d be all I need.”
“Us too.”
Bill looked at Rosie as she stood on the opposite side of the serving window. “Not as busy,” he said.
“Not bad though,” Rosie said. “We all made money. And Caesar is happy. Well, except for that we ate fish and except for that he doesn’t like you and he certainly doesn’t like the position you’ve gotten into.”
“Too bad for him. All he had to do was be nice from the start. All I wanted was to work here. I didn’t ask the chef or the banquet chef for anything.”
“Sometimes it just works the way it works.”
“Ain’t that the truth?”
Jimmy G came back with espresso for him and Bill. They stood awhile and drank their coffee not bothering to do any work. Rosie stepped away and went back to her own work.
They had it down now. Jimmy G had fallen into doing certain things and Bill did others so that they coordinated and accomplished their work very quickly. It was more a matter of finding the inclination to do the work than anything else.
When they had everything in the kitchen either put away or packed away on the kitchen truck, it was almost midnight. Eddie had come to tell them there would be no more orders and Caesar had come snooping around a few times to see what they were doing. Before Bill had come to work there, as Jimmy G told it, Caesar would have stepped into the kitchen and helped himself to what he wanted to eat. But now, he would come to look, either from the server window or from the doorway, but when he was at the doorway he wouldn’t step in. This was a good thing.
“I don’t like anyone but us touching the food,” Bill said.
“Caesar won’t mess with you now,” Jimmy G said. “He’s not scared. It’s just not worth his while. You’ll see. Soon as he can, he’ll take it out on the waitresses.”
“He’s a pussy,” Bill said.
“He’s smart,” Jimmy G said. “He’s biding his time now and you need to watch your back.”
“I hear you,” Bill said.
Bill triple-checked to make sure everything was off in the kitchen and everything that should be was put away. Assured that all was in order, he and Jimmy G stepped out and took the kitchen truck down through the double doors and out to where Kalista was.
Kalista was all done. She’d been all done for awhile now and was even ready to walk with Bill and Jimmy G. Bill could see that she had her purse on her arm and she’d done her make-up a little, or, at the very least she’d put fresh lipstick on.
Jimmy G said something to her in Greek and Bill watched as she pointed to several items that were sitting out but covered with film. These were the things she wanted the boys to take back to the main kitchen on their truck.
Jimmy G jumped as it were and grabbed up the things. It wasn’t much, just some of her own home-made Greek pastry and some salad that had been brought over and not used but which could be used on banquets for the next day.
Jimmy G stacked Kalista’s things on top of theirs and when the truck was settled, the three of them headed off and away toward the main kitchen.
The main kitchen was sleeping for the most part. Room service was working from its own kitchen station, but nothing else. Only the chef’s office was brightly lit and the chef, they could see, was sitting behind his desk reading the newspaper.
By Peter Weiss
Bill did Caesar’s steak quickly and plainly. His instinct was to cook it more than Caesar liked it, but he didn’t do that. Not using the food to satisfy his negative personal feelings was one of his rules. The exception to this was for positive feelings, for making things extra special, which he did for his three Falstaff girls all the time.
He plated the steak medium rare, put vegetables and a baked potato to it. This was Caesar’s usual. Done, he told Jimmy G he was heading off to the bathroom.
Jimmy G had enjoyed plenty of time away from the kitchen. He didn’t particularly care that Bill went off. He was sitting reading a Greek magazine. So what else is new, Bill thought.
Rosie was out by Kalista getting coffee for one of her tables. Jo Ann had said good night and was gone. Caesar was sitting alone quietly eating his dinner. Kalista was finishing up what she could of her clean-up.
“She’s waiting for you,” Rosie said when Bill stopped by her. “She’s quite excited too.”
“Okay with you?” Bill asked.
“Why wouldn’t it be? I want you to. I want all of us to be together.”
Bill smiled at Rosie. He didn’t say anything but he wanted them all to be together too. Meantime he headed off to the distant bathrooms.
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” Rosie said mostly to his back as he headed off.
Edelgarde was leaning against the wall smoking a cigarette. She handed the cigarette to Bill without saying anything. He took a puff, stood by her.
“Took long enough,” she said.
“Came as soon as I could.”
“There’s no one inside.” Edelgarde winked at him and took his hand to lead him in.
As he did with Rosie, Bill locked the door behind them. Once that was done, Edelgarde did two things. First, she kissed him, not a gentle simple kiss but a long, full one. Second, as they kissed she took Bill’s hand and placed it on her bosom.
“I’ve been so waiting for this,” she said.
Bill didn’t say anything. He hadn’t been waiting for it and he hadn’t been avoiding. It simply was what it was. He concentrated on her taste, on her feel. She took the liberty of distracting him by concentrating on feeling him.
They stood a long moment not far from the entry door just kissing and fondling. But then Edelgarde led Bill inside a stall, as it happened, the same stall Bill and Rosie had been in.
“I want more than Rosie got,” she said.
“Rosie got plenty.”
“You sit down,” she said.
Bill sat on the closed toilet seat and motioned for Edelgarde to straddle him, but she didn’t. First, she undid his fly and let him loose. Then she kissed him, again long and hard and deep. Next she did a few other things after which she took down her own panties.
She straddled him facing him so they could kiss when she wanted. The moment she was on him she moaned. The moment his essence met her essence she uttered a long “mmmm” and whispered “Sweet Jesus” in his ear.
When Edelgarde was fully settled on him she put her arms around him. He put his around her waist and held her. They sat there, her straddling him, hugging each other and kissing all the while.
When they were done, Edelgarde stood up and straightened herself. Then she helped Bill up and she put him back together. She did this lovingly, carefully, taking care of him all the while as she chose to do it. When they were both all back to straightened up, she kissed him again then went to the mirror outside the stalls and fixed her lipstick.
“All my close friends call me Eddie,” she said on their way back. “I think that’s what you should call me now.”
By Peter Weiss
I wrote a rant for Friday and decided, well, another time.
In light of what seems to be a concerted effort to effect the destruction of America…
It is difficult to understand what we’ve all seen many, many times. First it is difficult to understand why that police officer did what he did. Second, it is difficult to understand why the others stood there and simply let him do what he did. Third, and more germane, it is difficult to understand why that policeman was there in the first place. He had double-digit complaints against him. Why was he allowed to be out on the street at all?
So, George Floyd, rest in peace. My heart goes out to your family and loved ones. Everyone I know, their hearts do too.
For the rest of us, those of us still alive, we need to do some real soul-searching and that starts with independent thinking and stepping out of group think.
