Eye on Everett – Everett Leader Herald

— Eye on Everett —

“What do you think? Can the mayor be beaten?.”
– Josh Resnek asking a question to the mayor’s Blue Suit

By JOSH RESNEK

In Everett political circles, there’s one major question about the upcoming September 21 primary and the following election November 7.

Can the mayor be beaten?

This is the major Everett political question until the evening of September 21.

For the sake of my sanity and to show I really want to

know what folks believe, I put the question to my buddy, the mayor’s Blue Suit on Monday morning.

I met him at the corner store in Everett Square where he was buying cigarettes and scratch tickets. I know. I know. How low can the Blue Suit go? But then, he does live with the mayor inside the polished marble mansion on Abbott Avenue. He can’t help but be a bit like his boss, the man who has enslaved him for years wearing him around and abusing him.

Inside my car, I put it to him.

“Can Carlo be beaten?”

“Jes… Josh, don’t you think about anything else? Is Carlo all that’s on your mind? Cause if he is, I can show you how to get to you to check in to a padded room and get you some medication to take the edge off your paranoid existence,” the Blue Suit answered.

We shared a laugh as we drove down Broadway past the Parlin Library, past Central Station.

— Eye on Everett —

“Nothing bores us as much as boredom.”
– Josh Resnek talking to the mayor’s Blue Suit

By JOSH RESNEK

I drove up Elm Street. I turned left onto Abbott Avenue. There he was. The Blue Suit smoking a cigarette waiting for me in the doorway of the mayor’s mansion. I’ve never been inside. Some say it’s all polished marble inside the mansion, just the same look and feel like the casino. The mayor, I am led to believe, loves white polished marble.

“Put it out before you step into my car,” I ordered the Blue Suit.

He hesitated for a moment. He took a long puff and a deep inhale, and he let it out as he fell into the passenger seat of my 2007, red and bruised, Honda Fit. He tossed the cigarette before closing the door.

“I can’t believe you won’t let me smoke a cigarette in your dump of a car, Josh. What’s up with that, Josh”

‘I turned to him.

“It’s my car. It’s old and ugly but it’s my car and it’s paid for, and it works, and what’s better, you’re sitting in it talking to me.”

“Wow! I guess I should be privileged.”

“I know it’s not like being inside the mansion. It must be difficult to go from the polished grandeur of the mayor’s Abbott Avenue mansion, to step outside and then to be inside my car. What a contrast for you. Are you going to be alright?” I asked the Blue Suit.

He smiled. He laughed just a bit.

“I’ll survive. But hey, why don’t you act like the mayor and get yourself a brand new white Mercedes. Come on, Josh. You can afford it. He drives a Mercedes to look rich. I don’t think he owns it outright. I know he feels a rush of power driving that Mercedes around the city. It makes him feel like someone,” the Blue Suit added.

— Eye on Everett —

“Carlo believes he can’t be beaten.”
– The mayor’s Blue Suit talking with Josh Resnek

By JOSH RESNEK

The Blue Suit was waxing eloquent to me as we ate a lovely meal at Abbondanza Ristorante on Main Street last weekend.

The Blue Suit started out with Rolatini di Melanzane – eggplant stuffed with ricotta and spinach, baked in plum tomato sauce, and topped with mozzarella.

I got the shrimp starter, Gamberi Grand Marnier – fresh jumbo shrimp sauteed in a francese batter, sweet soppressata, and assorted fried peppers.

I love soppressata.

While we devoured the starters, we talked.

“He and his supporters truly believe he cannot lose. They are convinced he cannot lose. In their minds, and I know many of them, they believe he has already won. The election isn’t really necessary,” the Blue Suit said to me.

“God, I love eggplant,” he said to me.

“Did you hear me?” he asked.

“Yes. I heard you,” I answered.

“What do you think of that?” he asked me.

His people should not be talking or thinking like that. It’s bad luck. That being said, I can tell you this, the mayor is a tough guy to beat. There are no illusions about this.”

“You know his polling shows him with a wide lead over Adrien and Capone,” the Blue Suit said to me.

“To hell with that. Let’s order dinner,” I said.

The Blue Suit ordered a double helping of Rigatoni all’ Amatriciana. That’s homemade rigatoni tossed with sautéed pancetta, onions, red peppers in a spicy cherry tomato sauce.

“You must be hungry,” I said.

“I’m always hungry,” he answered.

I felt like veal. I ordered a veal marsala – veal sautéed with mushrooms and ham in sweet marsala wine sauce served over pasta.

— Eye on Everett —

“The mayor has gone gray on me for a while”
– The Blue Suit talking to Josh Resnek

By JOSH RESNEK

There’s a famous story about Joe DiMaggio, the baseball great, the last professional baseball player to hit 56 consecutive games.

That’s the rough equivalent of hitting red or black each time you bet at the roulette table 56 times consecutively without missing.

Think about that.

“Joe, why do you hustle the way you do in each game, in each at-bat, like a maniac on the field,” a sportswriter asked DiMaggio who was well into his career as a Yankee.

DiMaggio thought about this for a moment.

“Because there might be one person in the stands watching my performance who has never seen me play. I want them to know how seriously I take the game. How I give my all on each play,” he replied.

It is the same with me and my buddy, the mayor’s Blue Suit. I never know how many new readers there are pouring over the secrets revealed in this column. I want them all to know that what they get from me talking with the mayor’s Blue Suit, we come away with a clearer view of exactly who Carlo DeMaria is as opposed to who he presents himself to be.

Many people can’t understand me striking up a relationship with the mayor’s Blue Suit, of having a relationship with a Blue Suit that tells me the mayor’s secrets.

It is, after all, difficult to explain except that the proof is what we learn about the mayor from a suit he has worn for many, many years.

— Eye on Everett —

“I’ve done bad things, but I’m not ashamed. I’m like Carlo.”
– The Blue Suit talking to Josh Resnek

By JOSH RESNEK

The Blue Suit got all uptight when we passed the police station on our way to Woodlawn Cemetery for a look at the several thousand American flags placed there for Memorial Day.

We were driving around the city in my little red car Tuesday afternoon. Just the Blue Suit and I, with the windows down, the FM radio playing progressive music, psychedelic stuff from the late 1960s and early 1970s.

‘What’s wrong?” I asked the Blue Suit.

“I’ve had run-ins with the police. Police stations make me very uptight,” he said to me.

“Are you talking about yourself or about Carlo?” I asked the Blue Suit.

“I’m talking about myself. I know Carlo feels the same way. We’ve both had our problems with the police.”

“Go on. What exactly are you talking about?” I asked.

The Blue Suit went quiet. He drew in a deep breath. He let it out slowly.

“I’ve been bad, Josh. I’ve done things no man is supposed to do. I’ve cheated people out of what is rightly theirs. I’ve stolen money. I’ve done things with the ladies that are way out of bounds. I’ve had to go to court…and I’ve been lucky so far that I haven’t gone to jail,” the Blue Suit blurted out.

“Does Carlo know what you’ve done?” I asked him.

“Are you serious? Of course, he knows. He wrote the book on these kinds of things. I’ve been with him when he had his own problems. It was scary, believe me. The terror never goes away remembering those times.”