Tuesday, July 16, 2013

HOW TO FULFILL YOUR DREAMS ...KEY WEST STYLE

 
 

 
 
 
 
     Hearken to the life of Michael Avery: surfer, sailor, street vendor, handyman, author, drug dealer, raconteur, convicted felon and dedicated gentleman.
      I’ve long struggled to capture Michael in a single phrase; but all I can say is he occupies a unique space between Peter Pan and Jack Kerouac. For example, he and a friend once tried to sail from Hawaii to Australia by following the contrails of passenger jets. They weren’t sure whether their first landfall would be Australia or Japan. It turned out to be New Zealand. On another occasion -- sailing alone in the South Pacific-- he was thrown from his boat and clung to a chartreuse toilet seat for two days until someone --no doubt drawn to the seat -- rescued him.
     But those were only waypoints on a journey that led to Key West in the late 1980s.. He was by then in his mid to late thirties, and was searching for a home; a place that not only tolerated eccentricity and individuality, but encouraged them; a community where you were rarely asked why you were there or what you did; and where most people lived hard in the present. Key West seemed to him a perfect fit.
     He also fell in love with a local girl who was blond, bright, attractive and gregarious. I’ll call her Charly to protect her privacy. She was at the time a bartender -- popular and well respected -- in a town whose bars were the principal venue for almost all serious intercourse; conversational, political, and otherwise. Michael fell so hard for her (and she for him) that on their first date, he trusted her with his longest-held and most-cherished dream which she promptly forgot until one afternoon twenty years later.
     In those days, it wasn’t easy to make a buck in Key West. The cruise ship boom was in its infancy, the real estate developers were exploiting the geriatrics up on the mainland, and the local bankers were sleepy. In fact, it was sometimes hard to tell the difference between the oddballs and iconoclasts who were ’down and out’ and the oddballs and iconoclasts who were ’up and coming’ (Come to think of it, it still is.).
     So for a number of years Michael --with Charly as a stabilizer -- lived a life of conventional unconventionality. He worked at a lot of things, including selling jewelry as a street vendor, writing short stories for a local newspaper, house-sitting for snowbirds and, when things were slow, dealing cocaine to a select group of friends. At the time, half the town seemed to be selling drugs to the other half. Even a Key West fire chief with the exquisite name of Bum Farto had been convicted of dealing. (Three days later he jumped bail, never to be heard from again.) Michael was also convicted, served time in prison, and came back to Charly in a less adventuresome frame of mind.

     Then, sometime in mid-1998, his life went permanently awry. He was diagnosed with liver disease and told by doctors that he wouldn’t survive without a transplant. Two years later (’two bumpy years later’ according to Charly) it became clear that no transplant would be forthcoming. And as predicted, Michael became more and more ill; his behavior sometimes normal, sometimes nearly irrational. He was drinking heavily, still hanging out with buddies at his favorite bar, and as always reading books about life and death. But he was slipping physically as well as mentally and, in Charly’s eyes, struggling to come to grips with the inevitable.

     On a November day in 2000 -- when the nation was riveted to Florida’s Bush/Gore election battle -- Charly asked Michael to go to the bank and make a payment on their car loan. He agreed to go that afternoon; so she gave him a check and the payment book and left for work.
At some point in the day, he did start out for the bank but stopped first at his favorite bar for a few drinks with cronies. When he left the bar, he said he’d be back shortly to pay his tab.
     He then drove to the bank -- the Key West Federal Credit Union -- and fulfilled the dream that he’d confided to Charly twenty years earlier. Instead of paying the car loan, he robbed the bank.
     After passing the teller a note demanding money, he politely told her he wouldn’t harm her and asked her not to include any coins because he wasn’t planning to travel through any toll booths. Frightened anyway, and following strict bank policy never to interfere, she complied. So carrying a sizeable bag stuffed with cash, he left the bank as quietly as he’d entered it. When he reached his car, he turned to see if anyone was following him. Surprised that no-one was, he started the car, took time to fasten his seat belt and drove away.
    
     And that’s the dream he’d had since early childhood; the fantasy he’d confided to Charly: he’d always wanted to rob a bank. And over the years that dream had been nurtured and sustained by the mythological lives of Jesse and Frank James, Butch Cassidy, the Dalton boys, and later by ‘Baby Face’ Nelson, Bonnie and Clyde, John Dillinger and Willie ‘The Actor’ Sutton. And now Michael Avery had done it!
 
     Immediately after that, however, his train went off the tracks. Here’s what we know and have pieced together, partially from what Michael remembered and from what followed:
    He went home and burned all the dollar bills he’d been given because, as he later explained. ‘they were too bulky.’ When Charly got home that night, not having any idea what was going on, she found a small mound of ashes on the patio stones with a few charred scraps and a piece of George Washington’s face.
    Then, for reasons Michael could never explain, he hid a bundle of money in a Kleenex box at a neighbor’s empty house; and another stash of money in a friend’s outdoor garbage can which was due for pickup the next day!. And finally, he returned to the bar, got drunk, paid his tab and distributed fistfuls of money to everyone in the bar; cronies, strangers, a few tourists and the staff. He left behind a happy gaggle of people and disappeared into the night.

    At five o’clock the next morning, a convenience store clerk called 911 to report that a injured man had entered his store. When the police arrived, they found the man slumped in a corner with a serious gash across his forehead. He was conscious but seemed groggy and confused.
“I think I got robbed.” he told them, then added. “No, that’s not right. I robbed a bank .. and I feel awful about it.’
    Thus was Michael Avery, bank robber, apprehended by the constabulary. The cops quickly recovered the stashed money, but seemed disinterested in how their captive was hurt. And to this day, no-one knows what happened.

    For Charly, the following month passed in a fog of confusion.. Michael was held at first by the Key West police, then transferred to the Monroe County jail and put into its infirmary. Since bank robbery is a federal crime, the FBI asserted control of the case and transferred him to the Florida Keys Hospital. Charly was permitted visitation when he was under local control; but finally -- as his condition became more and more serious -- she was denied the right to visit him in the hospital for reasons only a federal bureaucrat could think of. In fact, A 24/7 guard was posted outside his door. She kept trying, however, and on one occasion -- and one only -- a compassionate guard swore her to secrecy and let her in.

    Then, on the evening of December 15, 2000 she got a terse phone call from a Justice Department prosecutor. Without explanation, he told her that Michael would be released without conditions the next day. If she wanted to, she could come and get him. Which of course she did.
     Two days later, on December 18, comfortably ensconced at home and after having said goodbye to his closest friends, Michael died. He was fifty-nine years old
    Only a month had passed since he’d fulfilled his dream.

     I have no idea what he was thinking when he faced death. But I like to think the Peter Pan side of him thought he was off on another wonderful adventure. And if not, then I hope the Jack Kerouac side approached it as just another waypoint on the road. Whatever it was, God bless.
 
 
 
 
                                                      AFTER DINNER MINTS
 
 
A few days after the robbery, the Key West Police Department issued a public plea for the return of the money Michael gave out at the bar. As far as I know, they never recovered a penny. What a surprise!

The arresting officer in Key West doesn’t remember the case. Neither do the detective in charge or the then-chief of detectives who is now the city’s chief of police. The reporter for The Key West Citizen who wrote two stories about the robbery doesn’t remember it either. He’s now a Monroe County deputy sheriff. The FBI said I could file a request under the Freedom of Information Act if I wanted to see their records, but didn’t tell me how long it would take or even whether it would be approved. And finally, a nice lady at the Key West police department’s records office found Michael’s case file and promised to call me back once she’d gotten permission to show it to me. I never heard from her again. Hmmm.

After distributing Michael’s ashes to several of his friends, Charly spread some on the lawn of the Key West Federal Credit Union. Whether the grass became greener is unknown.

Many days later, she found several hand-written notes hidden in a way that she’d eventually find them. They said, in effect, not to worry .. he’d be okay .. and she should get on with her life.

She did move away from Key West and returned to the island only recently. Although now married, she always smiles nostalgically when talking about Michael and readily describes him as the love of her life. And why not!
     Even bank robbers can be lovable.
 
 
 
 
Please feel free to share this blog with friends. Just have them Google keywestwind and click on the header or go to
http://keywestwind.blogspot.com. Many thanks. And all comments are welcome. 
 
 
 

3 comments:

  1. Well Frank ,...Thanks for the memories, they are good ones.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Interesting to read on this sad day. I wonder if you thought of Peter Pan or the waypoint???

    ReplyDelete