Towards the end of my sophomore year at St. John’s College, Blake*, my then-boyfriend and I were hanging around Peterson Student Center near the mailboxes chatting, waiting for the mail to arrive, as people did back in the days before email. It so happened that the student job bulletin board, a physical entity where people posted jobs for students, was also located there. A man in his fifties, balding, bearded, and over-weight, walked in the door, and pinned a note card to the board.
Blake’s eyes darted toward the man, and his face brightened as he leaned in close and whispered, “You see that guy?”
I looked and nodded affirmatively.
“I know him.” Blake said. “He was a neighbor of ours in Virginia.”
“Wow,” I exclaimed, “How weird. Are you going to say hi to him or something?”
“Nah” Blake said. “He wouldn’t even know me. I was just a kid.”
“Hmmm…is he somebody?” I asked. Blake grew up in the D.C. suburbs, had gone to Langley High School, an affluent high school attended by the children of Washington’s elite. His own family was tied into the political establishment in mysterious ways.
“Well, yeah, actually, that is John Ehrlichman.”
“No way!” I said. “Old Sneer Face?” My mother had forced me to watch the Watergate hearings when I was in sixth grade. History in the making, she had said, just as important as the first man to walk on the moon. I remembered being bored out of my skull, and not understanding what was going on. I had no idea what was at stake. To entertain myself, I had come up with nicknames for the various characters. Ehrlichman was “Old Sneer Face.” Haldeman was “Flat-Top.” John Dean was “The Rat.” I hated them, even though I didn’t understand what they had done wrong. They were the enemy.
“Yep,” Blake replied. “I am certain of it.”
By then the man had left and we had moved over to the job board. The contact name on the posting was “Christy Peacock” and it was a tutoring job for her 7 year-old son.
Blake looked at me with a shit-eating grin. “Trust me, you should apply for that job,” and so I did.
I called the number on the card, and a day later made my way to the house for my interview with Christy. When I got there, I was warmly greeted by a friendly golden retriever whose name escapes me. I was surprised to see how young Christy was. She appeared to be in her early 30’s, a petit redhead with a pixie-cut and smooth skin. Perhaps the man who posted the job was her father? I was still a bit skeptical about its being Ehrlichman. I got the job, and we agreed that I would start the next week. Christy said that her husband would pick me up and bring me over.
On the following Tuesday night at the appointed time, the man who had posted the job was waiting for me at the curb in a late-model manual transmission Toyota Celica. Definitely her husband and not her father. Hardly seemed like the kind of car John Ehrlichman would drive. I opened the door and poked my head in.
“Hi,” he said, “I assume you are Anne?”
“Yeah!” I said as I slid into the seat.
“I’m John. Nice to meet you. Christy has said very complimentary things about you!” His name is John. My heart pounded. I thought, well, John is a common name.
I studied his face, racking my brain to match this man to Old Sneer Face, but I couldn’t see it. This John seemed warm, friendly, charming, the complete opposite of the calloused and angry man I remembered from our black and white television screen. He had a nice smile, not a sneer, and he had a jolly beard.
We made small talk on the short trip to their house. He talked about their two sons, one seven, the other not quite three. The boy I would be tutoring was Christy’s son from a previous marriage. He had been diagnosed with dyslexia, and they didn’t want him to lose gains that he made during the year in his reading. He didn’t live with them full-time, so the tutoring job would last just through the summer.
For the next several weeks, John picked me up and drove me to their house. He asked me about my studies. We talked about philosophy, politics, and a variety of topics, but he never gave away his identity, and I was still uncertain that he was who Blake said he was. I was curious, but I didn’t dare ask. He told me that he was writing a novel. Over time, I found myself spending more and more time at John’s and Christy’s, first to babysit, and then to housesit when they traveled.
On my first night of babysitting, I went in to use a bathroom that I hadn’t used before. Upon entering it I saw a large framed Doonsbury cartoon. It was about Watergate, and specifically about John Ehrlichman. I wish that I could remember what it said. What I do remember is that Gary Trudeau had inscribed it to John with warm wishes, as if they were friends. I don’t remember the exact words of the inscription, but it implied affectionate familiarity. I knew then with certainty that Blake had been right.
I continued to interact with John on the same terms as we had been. I burned with curiosity though. Then one day, when he drove me back home after a babysitting gig, he asked me about my family. Among the things I told him were that I was the youngest of five—two girls and three boys, that my father was a career military man, and that my parents had divorced.
“Really? I have five children from my first marriage. Same distribution!”
“You do?” I asked. “How old are they? Where are they?”
“Grown,” he paused before saying, “I am a little estranged from most of them.”
I wasn’t sure what to do with such adult information. I was not quite twenty, and found myself feeling vaguely embarrassed at hearing a man who was my father’s age with so much emotion in his voice. I wondered if that is how my father thought about his own children.
“How so?” I asked uncertainly. “I mean, what happened?”
“I went to prison,” he said matter-of-factly. “I don’t think they will ever forgive me for what I put them through.”
Not knowing what to say, I offered, “People can be pretty forgiving. Maybe with time…”
We rode along in silence the rest of the way.
Note: This story is a recollection of events that took place nearly four decades ago. In creating this narrative, I have constructed dialogue that approximates real conversations that I might have had. Doing this exercise, reminds me of just how thin the line is between fact and fiction.
*Pseudonym
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