A Legacy for the Ages

Dubya's in lame duck mode right now, and in a couple months we'll all be contemplating his legacy. A lot has happened over the past seven and a half years, and I think we can all agree on his most successful act: the marriage of his daughter Jenna to a hand-picked up and coming Republican. Before 9/11, before we invaded Iraq and before gas was $4/gallon, Bush vacationed at his ranch non-stop, sharks were rampant on America's beaches, and the Bush twins were out of control...

At approximately 10:19 on Tuesday, May 29th, the Austin Police Department received a 9-1-1 call reporting minors attempting to purchase alcohol. The caller was the manager of Chuy's Restaurant located at 1728 Barton Springs Road.
APD patrol officers arrived and found that Jenna and Barbara Bush, 19, were alleged to have been involved in this incident. As no offense was witnessed by APD officers, following routine procedures, further investigation is required to determine if any charges will be filed. APD and the Texas Alcohol Beverage Commission are investigating this incident.
ABCNEWS.com, June 4, 2001

*The night of the "alleged incident" is clear in my mind. Barbara was visiting from Yale and I had promised her a good night on the town. It had been chilly and rainy the previous week, but Tuesday was beautiful and warm and everyone was ready to go out and pary. Barb is very sweet, but just doesn't know how to have a good time. This is off the record, but I generally think of myself as being the social butterfly. I mean, she goes to Yale where all they do is study! Anyway, the end of the semester was approaching and I had a few favors to call in. I borrowed Maggie's ID--she's 21 and I had lent her my favorite capris a few weeks earlier and she had spilled beer all over them, ruining them. She felt so bad about it that she was more than happy to lend me her ID. I gave my Secret Service guys, Joe and Nathan, twenty bucks each to leave us on our own for the night. I have them wrapped around my finger. My good friend Lisa assured me her roommate was tending bar at Chuy's and that if we asked for Sarah, we would have no problem getting served. Once there, I couldn't find Sarah, but calmly and cooly used Maggie's ID to order a round of margaritas. So when APD officers arrived at the restaurant at around, I guess, 10 o'clock, I had no idea what had gone wrong...

Of course she had no idea what went wrong! The girl was wrecked. I don't know what Jenna told you, but I knew the night was ill-fated from the beginning. First of all, she was still in the doghouse with mom for her possession of alcohol incident about a month ago. I told her we should lie low and maybe just take in a movie. My friend Ashley was with me and didn't have a fake ID and didn't want to risk getting in trouble. But there is no stopping Jenna when she puts her mind to something, even though she rarely thinks things through. We may be twins, but we are as different as night and day. To tell you the truth, I always consider myself to be the smarter one. But back to May 29th. Early in the evening Jenna snuck into this girl Maggie's room and searched through her desk until she found her driver's license. She mumbled something about capri pant, and when I asked her if she should really be searching through this girl's private stuff, she just said something about Maggie owing her. Then she broke out the Coronas. After about three beers, she said this girl Lisa's roommate, Sarah, worked at a restaurant in South Austin and that she had some stuff on her about cheating on a Biology exam first semester, so if she refused to serve us, Jenna would have only to make a call to the dean. Ditching our Secret Service guys was the hardest part of the evening. But by 8:30 Jenna had already downed the whole six-pack of beer, and was determined to get to that restaurant! Jenna tried to bribe Nathan and Joe with 40 bucks, but they just laughed at her. So we came up with something and ended up having to climb out of the second floor bathroom window and shimmy down the drain pipe.
Once at Chuy's, I was hoping to just sit down and order some food, but Jenna had to make a big production. You'd think, since she was using someone else's ID, she would keep a low profile and be subtle, but no. She was dancing and singing on the table! Before I knew it we all had drinks in front of us. Some guy bought us a round of shots. By then the manager had already called the police. Jenna was angry and kept yelling at the police, asking them if they knew who her father was. She said she would tell Daddy not to give them their tax rebates.
After we got home, I knew we were really going to be in for it. There were irate messages from Maggie, Lisa and Sarah. Nathan and Joe were not happy. They had already called Daddy and seemed pretty concerned about their jobs. I think I overheard them say something about Chelsea being an ideal charge.

I remember it being a great night--except for the police coming. I'm not sure why Barb is so grumpy. What's the big deal? She wanted a good time and I showed it to her. Nathan and Joe just laughed at us and joked about how much more fun we were than that goody-two-shoes, Chelsea. I'm really lucky they have such a great sense of humor. Appeasing Daddy is a piece of cake, but Mom's another story. I think she might still be mad about last month. The other week at Camp David I caught her in the kitchen taking some pills and mumbling something about Chelsea being a dream daughter.

Yeah, I'm pretty mad at Jenna right now. I'm going to have to smooth things over with Mom and Daddy, as usual, not to mention straightening things out with her friends. She just takes no responsibility! I don't know what she would do it she didn't have me.

Barb is so lucky she has me. I mean, who else is as much fun as me? She would be stuck at Yale, studying, studying, studying.

*This bit of fiction is reprinted, courtesy of myself, Andrea. I found it in a box, where it's been sitting since I took a summer creative writing class years ago.

On Being a Good Friend

If you happened to pass by the corner of Boylston and Clarendon around 6:30 the evening of Wednesday July 2, you might have seen two professional 30 year old women fishing around in the gutter. Had Rashmi and I fallen to drugs? Not exactly...the following is the series of events leading up the the gutter episode.
4:30 pm-- Decide to meet for dinner and drinks at the Globe. Contemplate The Cactus Club but decide that burgers and waffle fries would be better.
5:20 pm-- Arrive at the Globe and decide to drink iced tea and Roy Rogers, making it a "sober night". But I decide to subsitute the iced tea for a Rolling Rock.
5:45-6:15 pm-- chow down and sandwiches and waffle fries and comment on passers-by.
6:25 pm-- walk down Boylston deciding where to go next...and Rashmi gives her necklace a thoughtful tug, which causes the line to snap and a cascade of beads to fall into the gutter.
Since she still had a good handful, I said, "quick, just stuff those into your bag and you can restring them. It will be okay!" She looks unsure and says, "But it's my favorite necklace [later confirmed by her sister, who knew exactly which necklace it was without missing a beat]! It's from Target but..."
As I'm telling her it will be okay, that she still does have most of the beads, she starts picking loose beads up off the sidewalk...and then fishing them out of the gutter.
"Uh, do you need help?" I hesitate, but can't stand by while my friend dirties her hands, while balancing on her haunches. So down I go, and start fishing them out as well.
"Andrea, there's one over there."
"No, that's a cigarette butt."
When we had sufficiently gathered the beads into our hands, I looked at her and said, "You realize we need to beeline for the Filene's Basement bathroom stat." We hurried across the street with our hands in front of us and ran upstairs equally laughing and pushing bargain shoppers out of the way.
When we were washing the beads and our hands, Rashmi said, "thanks-- you are such a great friend!" Well, if all it takes is fishing around in a Boston gutter, I'll take it!