It's good to be wealthy

Taku, my husband, could have walked the two and a half blocks to the ATM machine on Telegraph and Russell, but he took the car. When he got his cash and went back to the car, it wouldn't start. He called Triple-A and they came after about thirty minutes. The driver told Taku that the problem was the alternator and that the car would have to be towed. I called our regular mechanic to see if he could work on the car and ask if it would be OK to tow the car to his garage on Telegraph and Parker. That's only four and a half blocks from the house. Convenient. Sparky (not his real name), the guy I talked to, said yes, and told me to make sure to bring the car to 2734 Telegraph instead, because they had moved. That is the garage location once owned by Tony and John's, our previous mechanics, and it's only one block and a half from our house. Taku then called Triple-A back and asked for a tow this time. The driver, when informed of the address, said he had to take the car to the address they had on record. I told Taku to insist on the new address, that Sparky had specifically told me they had moved and Triple-A had not updated their records. Taku insisted that Triple-A knew what they were doing and I twirled my Rolodex once again looking for a good divorce lawyer.

The (second) Triple-A truck arrived, and the Triple-A man, a different guy this time, tinkered with the engine, said there was no problem with the alternator, jiggled something and got the car started so that Taku could drive it himself and eliminate the need for a towing job. Taku asked the man to accompany him the three blocks to the garage in case the battery died while he was en route. I was at home all the while, so I never got to see the look on the driver's face, but enjoyed the image in my mind.

Taku realized once he got to 2734 Telegraph that the entrance was actually on Ward Street (which I could have told him if I were more forthcoming with information, but since we were in the throes of divorce when last we spoke, I didn't say anything.) He left the car and walked the one-block journey back to the house.

Sparky called after a few hours to say there was indeed a problem with the alternator, and that it had drained the juice out of the battery, and we would need both a new alternator and a new battery. That would come to $619. I gave the go-ahead. There are people who haggle with plumbers, electricians and car mechanics over fees. I'm not one of them. We are wealthy. So I just pay.

The car sat in the garage - we'll call it by its proper name, "Berkeley Auto Care" - which should be a warning right there, since I've learned over the years that any enterprise with "Berkeley" in its name is bound to charge Rockefeller prices - for almost a week. We don't drive the car except to the grocery store, also three blocks away, because rice and flour and sugar and milk by the gallon get heavy, so we were OK with that.

Finally, today, a week later, Sparky calls back to tell me that he had done as "that other man" had directed. He had given the car a thorough going over. I informed him "that other man" was actually my husband and thanked him for his kindness.  I made no mention of impending divorce, because I have lost my short term memory almost entirely and no longer had any recollection of any domestic kerfluffels. Did I have a minute to go down the list? I said I did.

Turns out the car is overdue for an oil change. And the rubber things on the metal thingie were wet indicating that the transmission fluid was leaking. And that other thingie needed replacing as well. As well as yet another thingie, and it would all come to about $1270 dollars and did I want them to go ahead.

As I said, we are wealthy, so I said yes. The car should be ready by Wednesday.

Isn't this pandemic wonderful? You can just sit tight in your room and write a check to the City of Berkeley to pay a fine for not renewing your dogs' licences on time, and another check to spruce up your 23-year-old Toyota Camry which you rarely drive, and never leave your desk except to get up and get a stamp. 

When I was 16 and got my driver's license for the first time, my father insisted I know how to fix a carburetor. He said nobody should drive a car who couldn't also fix it. That was in 1956 and when the battery went dead my father would buy a new one for $35 and install it himself.

But my father wasn't wealthy, so he had no choice. I am wealthy. I take in $500 every month in Social Security. It should be twice that, but the U.S. government, in their infinite wisdom, insists that since I also collect social security from Japan they need to cut my American social security in half. I tried to convince them that the Japanese government doesn't have social security, that it is a retirement plan, and that since I paid for 24 years into that plan, I am only getting what the Japanese law tells me I am entitled to. I am not profiteering. But the Americans insist it is social security and there is no way I am going to scam them out of good taxpayer money because God has informed them it isn't fair to collect social security from two countries simultaneously while there are children dying of hunger all over the planet. We all have to pay our fair share. Amazon does. Blackwell does. Raytheon does. The president does. Why shouldn't I?

My Japanese retirement income brings in about $1200 a month. Taku works as a translator for about $9.00 an hour, so when we put our incomes together, even with huge bills for dog kibble, we make enough to live on comfortably. Provided we can make that 23-year-old Toyota last another 23 years.

I saved money all those years when I was employed and I have money in savings and in the stock market. I really am well off when you consider that nearly 70% of Americans have less than $1000 put away for rainy days. And a $1200 bill for routine car repairs would not only wipe them out but put them in debt. 45% of Americans would not be able to give Sparky a go-head on a probably overpriced car repair.  I could, of course, haul the car around to other places, and maybe find somebody who would do it for fifty bucks less, but they would all be more than a block from my house and we are still, after all, in lockdown.

So I thank my father for shelling out over $10,000 to get me a decent undergraduate college education, which set me on the path to a good career, which enabled me to put enough money aside to be able to write a check for $1200 plus when my car needs a new rubber thingie on a metal part. Plus the money the city of Berkeley is fining me for failing to register my dogs on time this year. That's $10,000 for all four years at Middlebury, which today costs students an estimated $71,830 annually, or $287,320 for all four years. Something tells me that a kid from my circumstances back in 1958 facing that kind of cost, would not even take time to apply today.

This is my story of white privilege. I get to make jokes about being wealthy, knowing that when I give details those who know the story will recognize that I am not wealthy. Merely lucky to have been set on a path where I was able to save enough money to live comfortably in retirement.

And that's no small thing.

What percentage of young Americans from working class families - both my parents were factory workers - can look forward to a life on the path similar to the one that my life took, I wonder.

Maybe, as you look for an answer to that question, you'll understand why I identify no longer as a Democrat but as a Social Democrat, and I no longer see "socialism" as an ugly word, but as a word used by the greedy to frighten Americans into believing capitalism, even in its most rapacious form, is the American way. And why I wanted Bernie Sanders to get the nomination for president and not a man who represents the institutional (business-as-usual) democratic party.

I'll vote for Biden. And if he wins, I will let out a huge sigh of relief that my fellow Americans duped into seeing Trump as a Savior didn't get their way to four more years.

But I will also understand that the country will only have put itself out of the fire and back into the frying pan. And that the task of fixing what's wrong with this country, its racism, its inequity, its failed democracy, is still, effectively, only at the starting gate.

Maybe I will think a little harder about the advice Robin DiAngelo is giving white folks these days: check out her TED talk or any of her many talks and interviews available on YouTube. Maybe I will even stop making jokes about being wealthy.