My Brother and Mr. Caruso's Cuban Cigars-Twilight Conversations in the Summer-A Liberal Arts Education

Photo Credit: Atlantic Monthly

It is, at last, warm in Maine. The back garden is lovely, cool-ish if I do not do too much weeding...fine by me. It is quiet in that late afternoon way. "All in the golden afternoon
Full leisurely we glide..." thank you, Lewis Carroll.

Dave is working his way through the Atlantic Monthlies from 2022. He runs across a sublime article that I have to share with you. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/05/philip-shribman-liberal-arts-wwii/677836/ and sends it on to me for discussion. It is a beautiful letter written by Phillip Shribman to his father during WWII. He is thanking him for his education at Dartmouth. He is thanking him for a Liberal Arts education. It is incredibly moving. He did not make it through the war but the letter has inspired several generations of his family as they trod off to college. The small, close, loving circle who read my stuff will love it. Happy July 4th weekend. It is just for you.

The article reminded me of a framed letter I saw at a friend's house in Thomaston recently. My pal, Benie, an Emery grad who married a Bowdoin boy, lives in Thomaston in the summer and wanders back to Griffin, GA. for the winter. She is in her mid-80's at this writing, can turn out a dinner party for 8 that astounds me. She serves it all in a dining room that has been hosting dinner parties since 1808 when James Madison, with the full support of Thomas Jefferson, became President. think of the conversations that have gone on in that room. For the most part, the entire history of this country has been played out in the candle lit dinner discussions held in this room. Benie and Bill bought the house on a whim 50 summers ago so that would be one fifth of the 250 years this social experiment has existed.

Bill passed away two summers ago. His library/ studio are filled with Bowdoin paraphernalia, his life and career, his treasured books. Framed on his desk is a letter, written in pencil to his father. He was in Korea in another confrontation and feeling mortal on the 38 parallel. He wrote with deepest gratitude to thank his father for a liberal arts education. He said it was sustaining him in crisis and that he never appreciated it as much as he did at this moment of conflict, far from home and his beloved family. This very special friend, this house, this library, this letter, this 4th of July in the golden afternoon remind me of what I value, what we all value.

What does this have to do with a cigar? Oh, well, that is another story, dredged up from my ancient past, far away from the Atlantic coast line with it s 18th century homes and candle lit dinner parties. This story comes from the little memory bank where I found Walter Dannhauser's rabbit.

Getty Images-A Cigar and a Cognac

Dennis Caruso and my brother were great friends from elementary up to 9th grade when my mother moved him to another high school because she was concerned that he was on his way to the dark side. Think Juvie. Dennis was a darling and my brother was a sweetheart but together there was a combustion that rivaled, The Lord of the Flies. Even today, they only call each other by their last names. You may think this was the 'hood but this was the most squeeky clean 'burb in the post war suburb history, appallingly ordinary and excessively boring. it was just ripe for two rascals to make mischief...

"Hey, Caruso!"

"What do you want, DeFazio?"

Like that....not thugs really... just in a constant state of being grounded for something, always in the dog house. They were agitators, rebels, smart asses.

My brother liked to take the family car, a 1960 Chevy Impala, out for a spin which seems innocuous enough except that he was 12 when he started doing this. He was a terrific driver but his head barely broke the top of the steering wheel and he was too stupid to sit on a phone book, so the semi-friendly Burbank/Glendale cops would bring him back home. It was like a parade. One police car would be in the front, John would be in the middle and another car would follow behind like a car rally. Dennis did not get involved in these forays that I recall. He had other plans for my brother.

Photo Credit: Cigar Guys

Mr. Caruso did business in Cuba until January of 1960, when things got tricky. I have no idea what that was about because we did not live in a neighborhood where folks buzzed off to Cuba for a holiday, let alone to make business...fare affari. His fare affari was his business but whatever it was, he bought a new Cadillac every year and put in a family pool, big doings in those days. He also kept a cache of Cuban cigars in the freezer. This was big doings. This was sacred. The 'gars had their own corner away from the frozen meatballs and eggplant parm and ice cream. They were wrapped with a thin sheeting that separated them from everything else. These cigars were meant to last him for the duration of Castro's regime. They were meant to last for years. They were sacro-sanct...but the boys knew where they were sleeping.

After the Bay of Pigs, Mr. Caruso was fairly sure that this supply of Cuba's finest was finite. If he smoked three a year, Christmas, Easter and the 4th of July, and had two more boxes left, of 20 cigars each, 40 divided by 3 would take him to 1976...a thought problem for boys in 5th-grade math. The two boys in question, in their haute wisdom, figured by 1976, we'd all be flying around Mars as the rate of space travel was moving so fast that Mr. Caruso would never miss a few cigars, say four, two each, give or take...to start.

The smell of a lit Cuban Cigar has a sensory range of a city block so this had to be a carefully crafted plan. The boys decided that if they went into the foothills at the top of Bel Aire Drive and situated themselves behind the dry brush and the Smoky the Bear sign. It was perfect. They had a view, a summer breeze, and a couple of smokes. You are thinking this was a one-shot deal...but, no...it went on all summer. you are also wondering if a Cuban cigar as thick as Tony Soprano's ring finger would make them cough or sputter or stop smoking. Au Contraire , they developed a taste for them. It all came to a head in late August, when the cops patrolled the area. The boys were caught by our friendly community helpers, two gun-toting gents from LA's finest. I only remember the crescendo in theory-the screeching, the gnashing of teeth, the rending of garments...like an opera, like Euripides, Trojan Women....alot of carrying on, the threat of boarding school. Mr. Caruso cried, swearing that the boys would be grounded until they were 30, which would be about 1985. The boys cried with feigned remorse....and my mother started looking at real estate beyond my brother's driving capacities. In the end, my brother attended UCLA and UCSB. He is a writer who became a businessman. He owns his own business in the heart of Los Angeles. He and his long-suffering wife raised three beautiful, funny boys, who were raised like hot house orchards. He saw them through liberal arts colleges. Now, they are raising their children. He also sponsored and ran a soup kitchen for the homeless for 20 years, which lies just off of Third St. He is sustained by his education and is still a good driver and a pain in the neck. My brother was born five years after the death of our grandfather, who could neither read nor write but had a dream. This story is for Terry Walker, to make him laugh...and cry. He knows my brother.