October 16, 2012

October 16, 2012, is the Tuesday offered for a dinner meeting in Santa Cruz, turning a precise date into a point of reconnection between former associates. The invitation places a personal reunion against the recipient’s family life on the West Coast and the political conversation that surfaces in their exchange.

Invitation and Setting

The date appears in a letter from a writer who expects to be in the recipient’s area for a company event in Santa Cruz. October 16 is described as a free day, and the writer proposes buying dinner, with the cost billed to the government. The invitation is warm but also playfully practical: the writer offers to ask Klaus Heller about a security deposit he still owes the recipient.

Personal and Political Context

The letter’s invitation follows news of the recipient’s life away from Vienna. The writer mentions hearing from Sarah that the recipient is busy on the West Coast, asks whether Drew Favreau has had a heart operation, and remarks on photographs of Evan Favreau and Ginny Favreau, noting Ginny’s resemblance to her mother. The date therefore carries the prospect of meeting not just an old associate but someone whose family circumstances have become part of the distance between them.

In the surrounding conversation, Celia Favreau describes the economy as still troubled and notes that people blame either George W. Bush for breaking it or Barack Obama for failing to repair it. She says Drew Favreau has always been libertarian and that his political course is set. The exchange shifts from domestic politics to foreign policy when Henry Pelham remarks that Drew’s preferred candidate seems to have none; Celia agrees softly, leaving open whether she means more than she says.

Significance of the Date

October 16 gives the planned dinner a clear place in the narrative’s present: the invitation converts an affectionate letter into a specific opportunity to meet, while its references to family and politics show how much can be carried into that meeting from lives lived apart. The date is also associated with a conversation in which apparently ordinary political talk may conceal an unspoken implication, though the exchange does not resolve what Celia means.