Thu, Nov 26 2009
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A few hours after Captain Tony asked me to zip up to Miami and get him a pack a cigarettes, he sat down next to me to talk about Eric Clapton. The song “Tears in Heaven” was playing. The song is about Eric’s young son who was killed in a tragic accident. Captain Tony knew Eric Clapton. He told me that Eric called him after the death of his son.
I listened while Captain Tony talked. Later, he told me a story about Tennessee Williams. I listened while he talked. I asked him if he had met Ernest Hemingway. He had. He told me that contrary to popular legend, Hemingway hated cats. “If he saw one, he would grab it by its neck and throw it over the fence,” he said. Later, I asked him about a couple of my favorite writers: Jim Harrison and Tom McGuane, who hung out in Key West in the 1970s. Captain Tony said he knew them and liked their books. “But back then they all did too many drugs,” he said. I listened to Captain Tony talk until almost 3 in the morning. The next night, my wife and I went back to Captain Tony’s. He offered me 10 bucks to go to Miami and get him a pack of Lucky Strikes. And then later, he sat down next to me and told me some more stories. Again, we sat at that bar until almost 3 in the morning. We saw a lot of Captain Tony that week we were in Key West. He invited us to his birthday party, where I met (and this is true) a professional sword swallower. Guess what we talked about. Duh! Sword swallowing. When we returned to Key West the next year, my wife and I walked into Captain Tony’s. Later, when Captain Tony walked in, I thought he might recognize me, but he didn’t. But he did seem to recognize my wife because when he saw her sitting next to me, he walked over and said: “Here, kid, here’s 10 bucks. Why don’t you run up to Miami and get me a pack of Lucky Strikes?” 
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