Ben Stein's Diary / Trixie
Stein, Benjamin J.
BEN STEIN'S DIARY tie/ 4.0\39`rTrixie Saturday A gigantic wrestling match at the gymnasium of the junior high school here in Sandpoint, Idaho. I'm here with little Gorgeous George because his...
...I'm here with little Gorgeous George because his pal, 9-year-old Alex, and Alex's sister Rachel, age 12, are here...
...By battery-powered flashlight, I read the latest alumni magazine from my law school...
...Trixie, by herself, could throw that mantle of peace over me...
...I ate my roast beef and listened to Akiva go on...
...The Union forces were winning the battle, see, and then the forces of Stonewall Jackson came out of the trees, withstood the Union assault, and then turned the battle around...
...Oh, Trixie, who will soon be in heaven...
...This morning, we loaded Trixie into the car, carrying her on her bed, wrapped in a blanket, and took her to Dr...
...Dogra on Laurel Canyon Boulevard...
...How do hydrogen bombs work...
...She would say she was hungry or she was tired or she needed to go out or she was lonely...
...The plaque says that something amazing happened here in 1861...
...E very day, we considered whether it was time to "When I was a lad, and Shep was a pup . . ." played over and over in my head...
...My house is up a narrow canyon, about forty miles from Hollywood...
...I don't want to scam this•town," I said...
...Amazingly, UCLA acceded to his wish...
...Trixie Stein...
...I was asked a few days ago to go to Michael Milken's "class" at UCLA and write about it for Los Angeles magazine...
...I lay down in bed with her and held her paw...
...In the examining room, she did not even look afraid...
...One of my classmates was an incredibly famous, controversial professor at Harvard Law School, the toast of Cambridge...
...The slaves would not have been touched by all of that blood, could have gone on with their lives, and that would have been that...
...I answered them as best I could, as we roared north toward Coolin, a town just south of Priest Lake...
...The commanding officer, though, had poor vision and thought Jackson's men were on the Union side and refused to fire...
...In a word, I was trapped...
...He thinks that's hard...
...She's largely blind, totally unable to stand, virtually deaf, .and prey to a host of infections that attack her because she's on so much cortisone...
...Tommy's been running around with Rachel, keyed up like mad waiting for Alex to wrestle, and I've been noticing a few things...
...I wanted to run...
...He asked me how a jet engine worked, how a car worked, and why a submarine didn't sink...
...I'm telling you, it makes sense...
...Spend time with Trixie before she dies...
...While answering, I decided to turn around without seeing Coolin...
...Good-bye and good-bye and goodbye, and hello to a much lonelier life without my Trix...
...The canyon itself was closed above me...
...Trixie Stein...
...We got back into the car and headed north, ever north, towards Coolin...
...Didn't it bother you, Dotty, that you were basically being a prostitute...
...Your pal Barron sells airplanes," he said...
...Really...
...Hell, no," she said...
...By yesterday she was clearly in extremis in several different ways...
...Saturday y sister, Rachel the M Writer, has a number of witty apercus...
...There is a certain concern about the kids, but basically these are calm faces...
...You can feel the wind...
...I was scared...
...Yale degree, all that stuff...
...You need any help with your car...
...Tommy began to ask me questions...
...Tuesday A really typical L.A...
...Alex is wrestling in a tournament for all of North Idaho, and Tommy is watching fixedly...
...Then he slowly backed up and headed towards us...
...Now there was not only a good-sized flurry, but also a fog...
...And then all of that horrible loss of life would have never happened...
...There is nothing more we can do," Dr...
...I didn't want to skid into a ditch on Highway 30 to Coolin...
...I did T a very short radio commercial this morning, and then went to hold Trixie...
...We passed a steaming, hissing sawmill at Laclede, and then saw snow flurries when we got near Priest River, on the powerful Pend Oreille River...
...With my selling skills, and what you know about finance, we should be able to do a scam that takes apart this whole town...
...Monday rixie, Trixie, Trixie...
...Trixie ran in circles around them until they were gone, then she came back to me and licked my hand...
...It does...
...That guy's gonna inherit billions," he said...
...Oh, my boy, we were so happy when I was scared and you sang to me about your cartoon world...
...No one is afraid that if his son wins a match, the other boy's homies are going to be waiting for him outside with a gun...
...They also look extremely calm...
...What are you going to do about it...
...Thank you very, very much for asking...
...Little Fearless, however, was not at all fazed...
...Crying is largely a tool to manipulate others, not to express sorrow...
...I would say, "You beautiful angel, come here and kiss me," and she would kiss me with her big wet dog tongue...
...She's so pitifully sick that it breaks my heart to look at her...
...There's a defining moment in every relationship...
...Saturday T rixie...
...On that theory, I'm in my rented Ford, on Interstate 66, heading west from Foggy Bottom towards The Plains, Virginia, a major hunt club area about forty-five miles from D.C...
...This man is a scout from The Aryan Resistance and he's seen me intruding on their Magic Kingdom and now he's going to kill me...
...And on one little knob, very near a grove of pines or oaks, there's a small battery and a plaque...
...She came with me to my office when I wrote...
...Mail had come earlier in the day...
...I have always loathed Abraham Lincoln...
...To paraphrase Bob Dylan, we both could have died there and then...
...He looked viciously towards Ron Perelman...
...I was very scared...
...What is mass...
...My wife and I got her to make up for the loss of a beloved Weimaraner, Mary Margaret, and to keep company with a new, far more neurotic Weimaraner, Martha...
...Daddy, I want to look, too," little Ansel Adams said...
...In Trixie's and mine, it came about two years ago, in the basement of my house in the unfashionable northern end of Malibu...
...I really appreciate it...
...Then it got back under control, and then swerved again...
...Good-bye, my Trix," I said as she fell asleep from the barbiturates...
...I could feel her warm, fuzzy fur next to me, feel,the perfect rhythm of her breathing, and I felt as if I were in paradise...
...Dogra...
...They were obviously not hurt physically, but they cry perhaps to ward off imagined criticism...
...That's my theory, anyway...
...With the fog, the flurry, and the big trees, the sun was largely blocked...
...Lover dog...
...Hmmm...
...Then, when the rest of the Politburo found out about it a year or so later, they were horrified by Khrushchev's recklessness and so they forced him out of power...
...When I got back to Little P., he was asleep...
...Anyway, on to The Plains...
...He looked out at the Virginia countryside and said, "This is beautiful country...
...Half a million died...
...My glorious white-and-brown-haired angel sprang effortlessly onto the bed, turned in circles a few times, and then lay down next to me...
...70 The American Spectator February 1994 As if sensing my mood, Little Freud said to me, "Daddy, let's sing `Ren and Stimpy' songs...
...When I was with Trixie, I was where I was supposed to be, not demeaning myself or anyone else...
...The kids are all suited up, trying to look brave, and then hurling themselves at their opponents like mad, wrestling very, very hard for a few minutes, and then stopping...
...This is it...
...Trixie-rama...
...Even far out in Malibu, far from the Sheriff, far from anything but a Chevron station, even writing criticism of powerful financial figures, I never felt afraid with Trixie by my side...
...Okay," I agreed, and we sang that song over and over again, disgusting lyrics and all, until we got to Priest River, where the highway was dry, and we raced through the night back to town...
...The man instead rolled down his window, smiled a snaggle-toothed grin, and asked, "Are you all right...
...I'd better hide my son...
...But the main thing I notice is that even I, a novice at wrestling, can tell who's going to win each match just by the looks on the kids' faces...
...It's fabulous here...
...The power went out at about five in the afternoon and the phones went right after that...
...Then he was hanged, but on the other hand he didn't have a mortgage...
...What would a society be like in which there were an official religion that worshipped money...
...The Pacific Coast Highway was closed both north and south of my canyon...
...It's amazing how predictive that is...
...I kept thinking about the last words that John Brown said as he was about to be hanged in Harper's Ferry for inciting a slave rebellion...
...Not airplanes...
...My roof was dripping in my bedroomupstairs, in the kitchen, the living room, and the guest bedroom...
...Oh, boy, I thought...
...You can imagine the fighting...
...A college teacher of mine used to say that Lincoln did not care about death, and was he ever right...
...As I thought that, Tommy opened his eyes and looked at me and said, in his sleep, "Daddy, when can I meet Ren and Stimpy...
...We shared Trixie, not knowing which of us, wife or hubby, really owned her, until one day Trixie bit my wife so badly that wife wound up in 72 The American Spectator February 1994 hospital for a week and I wound up at home alone with Trixie...
...And so we began, with Tommy, who knew all the words, serving as choirmaster: "On the first day of Yaksmas, Cousin Sven he sent to me, a nose goblin stuck to a chair...
...First, there isn't one yuppie in the crowd...
...What is energy...
...If that officer had fired, the South might have reconciled and the war might have been over...
...You know how hard that is to do...
...She figures that if she's always around rich people, she must be rich, too...
...Probably a lot like what we have right here and now in Los Angeles...
...Together, through the KGB, they arranged to get Kennedy...
...She was young and vigorous...
...When I was a recurring character on "The Wonder Years" for three years, she would often come and wait for me in my dressing room...
...I hugged my Trixie and kissed her paws...
...I once read that the North American Indians had over fifty words for horse because horses were both indispensable and beloved beyond any other creatures...
...Miss Trix...
...After lunch, a visit from a woman in my building...
...From that point Trixie was officially my dog...
...Now, I have to get a job, plus the state of California is going to be on my case because I've been getting disability payments and someone told them that I've been working out all day in Gold's Gym...
...Didn't he know it was just business...
...I had quarreled with my estranged wife, and my father had told me that he was not feeling well, a worrisome communiqué when your father is 75...
...Because the Union lost that battle, the South was emboldened to think it could win the war...
...Now I see in the newspapers that he's actually invited Garry Trudeau, who's been making fun of him in Doonesbury, to come to the class...
...You're a smart guy," he said...
...Two scary boys approached us...
...Another was being named head of Tenneco...
...He did not need to fight the Civil War...
...Several others were partners at huge law firms...
...As Tommy and I hurtled along the road, a cold wind began to whip through the trees...
...Frankly, I'm excited...
...They are from towns I've never heard of in the forests east of Coeur d'Alene, like Post Falls, Rathdrum, and St...
...I was connected with some force of peace so strong that it simply took me out of the dismal moment into a realm of pure security...
...The money was great...
...By that standard, Trixie was, again, perfection...
...He's just jealous that I've been dating a friend of his," she said...
...There's also no fear in the room...
...When I pick her up and hold her, she's just skin and bones...
...Not only that, but it was almost dark, virtually instantaneously...
...I'm fine," I said...
...Trixie and I had conversations...
...When the Federal Express man came, or the plumber or the electrician, she stood between me and the visitor and often gave him a warning nip, just to get the idea across that Benjy was a made guy in dog circles...
...I made a fire in the basement fireplace, got into a small bed in front of it, and said, "Trixie, come here...
...Trixie growled at them and they ran away...
...Alex's observation that kids cry when their mothers are volunteering at school, but not otherwise...
...That was the defining moment, as I say...
...He looked around Morton's at Steve Tisch...
...She would respond by wagging her tail and offering me her paw...
...When I awoke, Trixie was drooling onto my shirt...
...On the second day of Yaksmas, Cousin Sven he sent to me, two jars of spit, and a nose goblin stuck to a chair...
...I want to see this new, large lake...
...I watched the fish in his aquarium swimming around their pink castle...
...Slavery was doomed anyway, and obviously would have been illegal soon...
...Take care," he said with a wave of his callused hand, and then moved on down the road...
...We stood by the side of the road and watched the beauty of North Idaho, with nary a human in sight...
...Akiva went on as if he hadn't heard a word...
...I sat in the dark with him for a long time...
...So was Castro...
...I wish they would shoot me instead...
...Good-bye...
...On the way back, we kept slipping ever so slightly on the road...
...Also from Priest River, which I have heard of...
...Still, when I picked her up to bathe her, she felt like Trixie, warm and fuzzy and soft and reassuring...
...This was where one of the major battles of all time was fought, and hardly anyone's here...
...But . . . that little battery was in a position to deliver a devastating volley against Stonewall and his men and keep them hors de combat, so to speak...
...I've chosen The Plains because a friend lives there, and also because it's where my close personal friend Jack and his wife Jackie were building a house in 1963 before he was murdered by the KGB in Dallas, Texas...
...Marie's...
...had Trixie for about eleven years...
...Anyway, I'm on my way here to the Hunt Country, and what do I spy out of my car window but a sign for the Manassas Battlefield Memorial Park...
...Why can't we two guys think of a way to scam this whole town...
...There was no such thing as being lonely with Trixie...
...I wished they would shoot me instead...
...Some rat...
...Dinner tonight with my Russian immigrant pal Akiva, who's selling shares over the phone in a potash business in Chile that doesn't even exist...
...But I do it and I make a good living at it...
...Suddenly, as we entered a downhill curve, the car swerved out of control toward a ditch...
...I could see that the road, a two-lane blacktop, was getting very shiny...
...Oh, Trixie...
...There was no such thing as hearing about other men from Trixie, no such thing as having her order expensive champagne just to shock me...
...These people look like every one of them could fix a flat tire, change the oil, and skin a mule in the dark...
...Alex and I cried...
...I'm selling air," he said...
...There are about 500 boys competing, and, as far as I can tell, each and every child has at least two parents and several brothers and sisters...
...UCLA readily agreed for me to come...
...One of them is that she doesn't feel bad that she has so many rich friends...
...I hugged her once more and could still feel that perfect Trixie feel coming from her fur and her paws, and then out into the smoggy morning and good-bye...
...I asked...
...We both fell asleep and I dreamed that we were on Capitol Hill...
...So much for my crazed fantasies...
...On the third day of Yaksmas, Cousin Sven he sent to me, three used bandages, two jars of spit, and a nose goblin stuck to a chair...
...It had been a difficult day...
...I've decided to buy a suitable property for me and my fantasies...
...Dogra said...
...A friend who's a psychologist likes 'to say that the test of a relationship is whether you actually feel happy when you're with the other...
...She was deeply upset that the older man who had been keeping her had cut off the flow of funds...
...That decision, tout seule, changed history...
...This is a moment I have been dreading," said Dr...
...It told me that I was being audited by the federal government, which could not believe that anyone with so small an income as mine could have spent so much on meals and entertainment...
...I pulled off, and there was sprawling hilly country, statuary, a modest visitor center, and a few tourists...
...I would say, "Trixie, you fool, don't you know you're my lover dog and that no man but me can ever love you...
...True, this was not a particularly detailed conversation, but I also never had to hear Trixie tell me why she didn't like my tie or why she thought George Bush would win a second term or why the riots in Los Angeles were justified or why she liked Hillary Clinton...
...I drove along Interstate 66 and looked at the rolling hills, the magnificent horsies, thehouses, the bucolic scene, and then came to Middleburg...
...The war dragged on for four horrible years...
...Nothing," I said...
...I just The American Spectator February 1994 73...
...I want to drive around the Okanagan Valley in Canada with Little Perfect...
...On the gym floor, there are dozens of mats, and about twelve matches are going on at once...
...As our housekeeper used to say in hushed tones, "Trixie's Mister's favorite...
...Now I might have to pay back that money and I've spent it...
...I walked its cute streets, picked out my house in a real estate office, and then drove back...
...I wanted to be somewhere warm and safe...
...Centuries-long bitterness was created...
...Oh, Trixie, Trixie, Trixie...
...Love surrounded by the halo of eternity . . ." The yearning of the soul for the realm of the divine...
...I slowed down to a crawl, but we still were skidding...
...Trixie was a devoted mistress...
...But some infinitely familiar something still seeps from her fur into my fingers...
...I'll never stop thinking about you...
...Then, when Milken found out Iwas coming, he said that there couldn't be any more visitors because it would disturb him...
...A point brilliantly made by Edward Jay Epstein in a book entitled Legend, the only book about the assassination that makes any sense: The American Spectator February 1994 71 Khrushchev was humiliated about being faced down in Cuba...
...A fter lunch, little Hulk Hogan and I set out to find Priest Lake, supposedly a beautiful town forty miles north of the now legendary Priest River north and east of Sandpoint...
...On the other hand, the sensitive-looking ones can become,editors and lawyers and doctors—then we'll see who wins the matches...
...We were on ice...
...I'm Stimpy and you're Ren, so you sing this part and I sing the next part...
...I wanted to get back to The Edgewater Inn, and fast...
...Tommy began to sing songs from "Ren and Stimpy," our absolutely favorite cartoon, about a dog and cat who live together in a trailer...
...The tough, mean-looking ones almost always beat the ones with any trace of sensitivity...
...I stopped the car to take picby Benjamin J. Stein tures...
...No, Daddy," Tommy said...
...There was also no such thing as feeling scared...
...We passed by a beautiful ruined barn in a meadow with snow flurries and fog around it...
...Also, I notice that when boys lose their matches, they often cry, at least at the younger ages...
...On the day that Trixie made into the Platonic dog-man day, rain had been falling hard for about a week...
...I'm dead meat...
...In fact, I never heard anything, by word, look, or gesture, from Trixie that wasn't the truth.couldn't do it," sang young Elvis about putting down his old dog...
...I was trying to figure out if my house was about to slide down the hill into the Pacific Ocean, taking me and my troubles with it...
...Trixie never took advantage, never made me feel used or abused, never left me with a bad feeling about who I was...
...She came with me and waited in the car when I had auditions...
...Out of nowhere, a battered red pickup came up from the south...
...I had, for the same reasons, about a dozen names for my German short-haired pointer who died this morning...
...A grizzled-looking driver with two mutts slowed down, looked at us, and drove on a hundred yards...
...How do atom bombs work...
...It's like my wife Benjamin J. Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Malibu, California...
Vol. 27 • February 1994 • No. 2
