New Year's Eve: The Tale of 'Socks' Suzuki

The New Year had started with the same routine as the previous year that had ended.  A half cup of coffee to start with, a sliced bagel (sliced unevenly) that sat lopsided in the toaster and opening the lid of the computer.   It is OK though, it suits the grey skies outside.

There was no evidence of crowds this morning.  The streets were quiet and the park almost empty except for a few joggers doing their laps.  I smiled to myself admiring their dedication…setting a stellar example to those who make New Year’s resolutions.  Rather than make myself great promises and boast to loved ones all the great feats to be achieved this year, I plan on just enjoying the day for what it is and hopefully catching up on a few things I would like to and perhaps file through some vinyl and play some records.  Actually, that would be a great resolution for this year, take time to play more records and listen to music.

This whole New Year’s celebrating has never been a big deal for me.  The thing I was looking most forward to was a nice dinner with some newfound ‘friends’ and then watching the fireworks from the roof.  We even bought a few bottles of wine to be paired up nicely with the steaks we were to have.  Yes, the thought of grilled steak and nice wine was in fact more thrilling to me than the city full of revelers all around me.  I was also curious as to how the chimichurri sauce would be, since the cook had just bragged about how she made a truly excellent concoction.

As one would imagine, a call came late afternoon.  Dinner has been called off because the cook isn’t feeling well.  We are invited to still go over and have a drink with them though.  As Tonya relays the news I roll my eyes, “Yes, I would love to go have drinks with someone coming down with the flu so we all get a great gift to start the new year with”.  More importantly, I pose the question; what will we do now for dinner?  A quick discussion is had and the quickest, easiest solution is agreed upon.  Gone is the idea steak and wine scenario, in is the chicken tacos solution.  Not too thrilling, hamburgers would have been more ‘fun’, but it will do. 

We carry on with our afternoon in spite of our dinner plans being cancelled, doing a bit of this and that and watching clouds roll in.  For some reason, it is all adding up to simply snuff out any fun or enthusiasm any of us may have had.  On top of the mounting discouragements, I lament the fact that that I gave up going to the last bullfight of the year too. For what?

As 7pm nears, we are all cleaned up, donning sweaters and ready to go have a few drinks at our friend’s house.  As we drive over to our destination, Tonya asks what we will do for an escape plan.  I tell her there is no need for an escape plan, we’ll just tell him like it is, ‘We’re hungry, we’re going home and eating our chicken tacos, putting our PJs on and watching this French film, watch the fireworks form the roof and go to bed.”

Tonya is the first out of the car and she reaches up and rings the doorbell.  We stand quietly surveying the neighborhood and making a few faces at one another.  We hear footsteps approaching and the strange yapping of their minute little Chihuahua.  The door opens and our guest welcomes us in. “Oh my.  You look dreadful. Are you depressed?” he asks.  I tell him I am fine.  “Why are you wearing that sweater, its makes you look so serious?”   He greets each of us, I shake his hand and he ushers us through to their patio.  A nice fire is going.  Music is floating by thanks to his clunky old laptop in the study.  He is playing is 1920s playlist again.

“Sit. Please.  What would you like to drink?”  I point to the bottle of tequila we just put on his table. He looks and asks, “Well, what is that?” I tell him it is tequila and he then asks me if I didn’t like the tequila he has.  I don’t. It is that dreadful El Jimador stuff, rotgut.  I must apologize, we have no extra glasses. We don’t have any of those special little glasses you use for drinking tequila…what are they called, yes, shot glasses.  You know, we only have two spoons as well.  One big one and one teeny tiny one that you use for teas or coffees.”  Richard is starting to peer into cabinets and is opening and closing doors trying to find some extra glasses, “Please, go and sit”.  We all grab a chair and sit.  It is nice to be out by the fire.

Richard reappears giggling in his half snorting, half sneering manner.  He has three different glasses, one of which is actually a very small shot glass.  He is laughing as he sets them down.  He makes a sweeping gesture with his hand and stands by his chair as if he is about to make a grand proclamation, “I went to dinner the other night and had the most fabulous wine.  I asked what it was and sent my wife out to buy a case of it immediately.  After purchasing it and opening a bottle, I decided that it actually may be too sweet.  It is this Italian stuff, some Lambrusco…do you know it?” he asks the table.  Before anyone can actually say anything he is pulling out his chair and he plops down and continues with his monologue, “I don’t know.  I suppose it is fine if you are sitting outside in a nice breeze and are drinking this nice light wine, perhaps out in the countryside or something”.  This is not out of the ordinary, this is simply Richard.  He interrupts at will, does these semi-monologues and no matter where you are or what you are doing he will eventually turn his venom on Americans and anything of Latin origin.  He is English. He is very dramatic and brash, and yes, sometimes quite entertaining.

After only a few sips of his lovely Lambrusco, he stops and opts for a juice version of Sangria, thinking it is really the real thing.  Pleasantries are exchanged and everyone comments on how nice it is to be sitting with friends in front of the fire out on the patio. 

Richard seems a bit down, and he is.  He says he has been having a rough week…a rough couple of weeks as a matter of fact.  He is curious about some sea side spots on the Mexican coast.  He keeps asking questions about certain spots and asking if they have been Americanized.  He tells a brief tale of how the last time he was spontaneous in Mexico he ended up doing a 4 hour road trip, which he is quick to point out his Mexican friend told him it was only 15 minutes up the road.  After a completely boring journey they arrive to concrete blocks on the beach.  After all the talk he was let down to see this supposed get away on the coast had been “Americanized” and they had built boxy concrete buildings all along the beach. 

Richard holds his cigarette a funny way when he smokes; I suppose many would say he looks like a fairy.  He puts on a little clear filter on each of his cigarettes too.  Many times he gets carried away and the ash envelops almost the whole cigarette before he taps it into an ashtray.  He is holding his hand up, quite fey, with his cig between his fingers, his legs crossed and he begins to spill his woes involving his brother.  He asks for opinions, and opinions are given.  He complains that he has not one single reliable friend in his life.  Basically, everything is an overblown drama with Richard.  This topic, as is a typical troublesome family issue, involves money.  He mentions a Russian friend of his who he says used to be quite close, “We had so many fantastic adventures together.  We never had an argument, never a single one…until I lent him, let me correct myself, until I gave him a considerable sum of money.  Not only did I lose my money”, he says counting on his fingers, “but I also lost my friendship”, then holds up a second finger.  He takes a drag on his cigarette and gets off on the tangent involving his Russian friend.  It is not in vain though, as the story soon spins wildly into unbelievable territory.  He is in full story telling mode as he starts with this tale involving himself and his Russian buddy.

The Russian had come across some sort of ‘business opportunity’ in Albania.  The two flew down to check it out but were kept at bay until they ponied up the full amount for an ‘initial investment’.  Richard adds, “It all smelled horribly wrong.  I knew something was amiss when they said we had to put all the money in before we even had all the details”.  He leans forward, ashes and continues on.  Peering over his glasses he says, “I was right.  It was a complete mess.  As soon as they had the money they would have nothing to do with us.  Here we are in Albania and these heavies are making it quite clear that we are not welcome at all.  I immediately called my Japanese gangster friend, Suzuki”.  Richard says Suzuki culled together a few other thugs and flew straight away to Albania.  They found the guy they were after.  They went to his place and shook him down, literally.  Suzuki and his Japanese roughs held the guy out of his 8 story window until he decided to pay back the money he had just scammed form Richard and the Russian.  “We got back 80% of our investment.  On the spot!  It was in his safe.  That is quite good I think” Richard says while throwing his boisterous laugh out at the table.  He stops the laughing to take a deep drag off his cigarette and continues in a solemn mode, “They dropped him anyway you know.  I was horrified and asked Suzuki why he dropped him out his window even after he paid. ‘He was a real bastard’ he said, I didn’t question him any further.  He obviously had his reasons and I didn’t want to know anymore”

Everyone is facing Richard as he is telling his tale.  The fire is putting a nice glow around the patio and the sound and smell of the burning wood is quite relaxing.  “You know, when Suzuki got his start, when he was much younger, they called him Socks Suzuki.”  Richard talks about Socks as if he was a real, no nonsense bad-ass that no one should ever cross.  I am not sure how far up on his gangster lore he is, but he swears that it is this one Japanese gangster who really put the idea of hanging people out of windows in the books.  He said that when he would encounter people who did not want to co-operate, he found that hanging them out of the windows usually got the result he was after. It worked on 80% of those he was out to shake down. ‘The real tough bastards didn’t fall for it” Richard says as he arches his eyebrows, getting deeper into the tale.  “Suzuki said that he would hang people out and the hardened bastards would still hold out.  One day, he decided to take off one unfortunate guy’s shoes and retry his original tactic.  It worked in a flash.  Apparently even the hardest bastards think twice when they are hanging out a window upside down with no shoes on…” his hardy laugh is rising in volume, “I suppose that the fear is just too great when someone is holding you only by your socks.  It must feel like they will slip right off!”  He throws himself back into his chair to enjoy his own story and laugh at full volume.  He glances frantically to everyone at the table to see if they are enjoying the story as much as he is.  We are.  It is smiles all around.  Richard rocks back and forth like a spastic kid as he laughs it out.

“You like that one?” he says as he is leaning forward and tapping his cigarette. “I do” I say without a second’s delay.  Being with Richard means being prepared to switch drastically from one topic to another, then back again, then sideways into something else.  Now he is talking about books.  “Americans don’t read do they?” he asks, but he doesn’t expect an answer, he gets on with it and answers the ways he wants it done, “Of course not.  They watch movies don’t they?   I dare not ask Americans if they have read this book or that because it is always the same reply, ‘No, but I saw the movie’. Dreadful.” He turns to me and says, “You are from the South, you should read the book ‘Stars and Bars’.  You would love it!”  Now Richard jumps back to scouting the Mexican coastline for a getaway.

We are not having dinner here now, though as he is on a roll, he insists we stay and eat anyway.  We tell him that after he cancelled, we bought chicken and were going to have tacos now. “How pathetic!  Eating tacos on New Years Eve.  What, and spending the night in watching a boooorrring French film as well?”  He shakes his head and taps his cigarette. “We have to eat you know, why don’t you stay and join us.  We will grill some nice steaks, it will be more fun than those wretched chicken tacos.”  I know it would be.  However, we keep our game face on and insist that we get back so that we can have some dinner too. “I am horrible at starting fires.  Can you start a fire for me before you leave?” he asks as he looks at each of us.  We all know how this will play out.  We all say that we are horrible at starting fires, and stand up to leave.

We all wish one another a happy new year and wish Richard’s wife to get feeling better.  He walks us to the door and as we are leaving he insist we call one another tomorrow and do something so we don’t have to be bored all day.  We say we will and get in the car and leave.

Later, back at home, as we are preparing our chicken tacos the phone rings.  I can hear Richards’s husky voice from where I am at in the kitchen.  Turns out that since we left he will not grill after all.  Maybe he is truly bad at grilling.  He is asking Tonya to recommend a good pizza place.  I laugh when Tonya asks the name of the one that serves as our go-to.  We are not alone having a rather drab New Years Eve dinner it seems.