THE BLUE SUIT
Private conversations between the Blue Suit – the mayor’s blue suit, that is – and Josh Resnek.
I picked up the Blue Suit Tuesday morning in front of the Elm Street Market – that is – the brand new Elm Street Market which is looking pretty snazzy following a yearlong total gut and rehab of the store and the construction of living units above.
The property looks like $1 million and is worth much more than that at this point.
What did the Blue Suit buy inside the market?
He showed me a Milky Way! Then he ate the Milky Way in two bites.
“My God,” I said. “Can’t you eat like a normal human being?” I asked.
“I’m not a normal human being,” he replied.
“What are you?” I asked him.
“I’m a blue suit. I’m the mayor’s blue suit. I am the best known blue suit in all of Everett,” he said.
Sure enough, no sooner had the last syllable trailed off into the cold air when several shoppers caught sight of him.
“Look over there,” they shouted.
“It’s the Blue Suit!”
Several women shoppers from Abbott Avenue went right up to him and asked him for an autograph.
“Please, for my kids. They all love you,” she said to him as he wrote out his signature on the back of an envelope. “How’s the mayor doing?” one of the women asked. “Good, good,” the Blue Suit answered.
“He’s doing real good,” he added.
One of the women felt his lapel.
“You feel real nice,” she said to the Blue Suit. “You feel like soft cotton,” she added with a smile.
“Sorry, mam. I’m 100 per cent wool. Real wool,” the Blue Suit responded.
He blew kisses to a small crowd outside of the Elm Street Market.
Everyone waved back as we pulled away.
Inside my car, the Blue Suit turned the rear view mirror toward himself.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I’m looking at myself. It’s more than that, Josh. I’m looking into myself.”
Whoa! Yo. Bro. You’re looking into yourself. I like that. You’re a suit with an inner feeling about yourself. You’re a suit with a mind that is self critical. That is saying something my man. Believe me. I know.”
“Yeah, when I look at myself I think and therefor I am,” he commented as though he was a French philosopher.
As we drive down Elm Street he looks at everything passing by – the high school, the skating rink and pool, the police station. Glendale Park in the warmth of the brilliant sunlight. We drive past several people walking their dogs. He sees a homeless man. Then he turns his attention again to the mirror. He looks at his reflection.
“I look wrinkled,” he said. “ I look like someone wearing a mask. You know, kind of hiding out, pretending to be someone I’m not.”
Then he turns to me and says: “I wonder if my soul is literally burning out, if maybe I’ve seen enough and done enough with the mayor for two or three lifetimes. Maybe that’s why I always feel tired these days and look a bit shopworn,” he said.
“Turn into the mall. I need to get something at the liquor store, please.”
I parked my Lexus in front of the liquor store. I watched the Blue Suit exit the car. I thought he might have been in pain. In a moment he got back into the car. He had six Jim Beam nips with him. He downed two, one after the other. He was opening a third when I asked him, “How did the yoga go.”
He looked back at me like I was crazy.
“This ought to tell you how the yoga went. Yoga isn’t for me, “ he said. He downed another Jim Beam nip.
He ended up Ubering to yoga and Ubering back the day before Christmas.
“What about it wasn’t for you,” I asked.
“Everything – from the black suit I tried to stretch over my body, to the instructions, to the yoga moves themselves. I mean like I was in the wrong place!” he said. “People look so good in those black stretch suits. I look like a blimp.”
“How was your Christmas?” I asked the Blue Suit.
“Good. I was left alone and that was good. I didn’t want to be bothered by the boss and
thank God I wasn’t. Now I’m preparing to go away,” he said. “Where are you heading?” I asked.
“Are you serious, Josh.
You’re telling me you don’t know where I’m going? I’m heading to Aruba, Josh. I can’t wait. You’ll be up here freezing and I’ll be warm as toast in a lovely suite and left to myself for much of the time. Aruba isn’t exactly a place where you have to act like a suit and be all proper.”
“Do you have friends down there?” I asked.
“Hell yes,” he said.
“I cause a stir wherever I go on Aruba – especially at the casino.”
“Do you need any cash for the trip?” I asked him.
“No. Thanks for offering but I’ve got plenty of chips that people give me down there. So I can play table games for hours.”
“I’ll see you when I get back, Josh,” he said as he got out of my car.
“When are you leaving?” I asked.
“Whenever the boss says so. That’s how it is when you are me, Josh.”