The Kennedy Family in Poland

     Excerpt from On the Job Training:  Berlin to Vladivostok

     Events in the world at the time of my week with the Kennedy’s included the demise of Colorado, US senator Gary Hart's campaign for President of the United States in 1987. After Hart challenged the press to provide evidence of his infidelities, reporters for the Miami Herald, in a controversial move, staked out Hart's townhouse around the clock, and finally spotted the Senator with Miami model Donna Rice. The ensuing report sent the media into frenzy, and within days photos of Hart and Rice on the opulent yacht, Monkey Business, were flooding international media. Consequently, his shot at the presidency had sunk. Teddy was going through Time and Newsweek articles on the train and among them included those famous photos of Gary Hart on the yacht "Monkey Business".

     “This really pisses me off!” he suddenly blurts out in the compartment. “See what the press is doing to him! This is going to destroy Hart. And why…for no other reason than they are challenged and now they go in for the kill. This really drives me insane!”

     “Please don’t go down this path again, Teddy. Please don’t. We argue about it every time. And besides, Billy is with us and this dirty laundry of ours needn’t come out right now.” Counters Kerry sitting next to the window.

     Teddy goes on in the same direction, “Look at this. Regardless of what it may look like, what he is doing isn’t any different than what most elected officials are doing and he will go down since the media have somehow targeted him for the kill.”

     Kerry takes a deep breath and hits the sour note that causes the rest of the group to cringe, “You always say these things and you forget that this family is still functioning despite common knowledge that both Bobby and John were fucking Marilyn Monroe and probably all three together in bed many times! Don’t go attacking the press too viciously with all they have on us. You need to be thankful, in fact, that things are the way they are in the wake of our legacy and recent history.”

“GEEEEZ!  Sorry Billy. Subject dropped” Teddy conceded.


     ...Teddy didn’t sleep very long and nudged William, “You ready for another hit? Billy! Let’s do another round!”

     William took a long shot and asked Teddy if he was up for messing around in Warsaw when the train arrived. He looked at me and said, “Surely there are few good night clubs or jazz bars in Warsaw we could hit?!” I assured him that there were and I would be happy to arrange things.

     Cousin Kerry spoke up after a long silence following the Marilyn Monroe comment and seemed pretty upset, again,

     “Let’s just get to the hotel and decide from there what we are going to do. There are people there waiting for us and they will be worried if we come traipsing in late. Worse yet will be if we wind up having the Marines scouring the city. Remember, we are in a communist country that is unfriendly to our being here, at all. They’d love the negative press.”


     With the group re-invigorated from another three of four shots of vodka, the train pulled into Warsaw around 8 pm. The Akwarium Jazz Club was a short couple of blocks from the train station. Teddy seemed “jazzed” for going out and wanted to walk. It had been raining for some time and was wet, slick, muddy, but the night air was fresh and we strolled over to the Akwarium that was in full tilt for the evening and very loud.