DeAntoni was not a man whose life was complicated by an overactive imagination.
At a Mobil station, intersection of 951 and Rattlesnake Hammock Road, east of Naples, DeAntoni pulled me aside and whispered, “Jesus Christ, next time that weirdo takes off those John Lennon shades of his, check out the pupils. I think he might have been smoking marijuana. ”
“Really?” I replied. “Using drugs this early in the morning. Hum-m-m-m. I guess it’s possible. ”
“And wearing that crazy Hawaiian dress. I practically had to threaten him to make him change into shorts.”
Actually, Tomlinson had been wearing his black-and-orange sarong, swami-style, like a pair of baggy pants. He knew a couple of dozen ways to tie the things, depending on the occasion. I’d had to issue a threat or two myself. Nothing to do with his sarongs, which I’ve become used to. If he didn’t get rid of Karlita, though, he wasn’t going anywhere with me.
Which is why he informed Karlita that she couldn’t accompany us.
DeAntoni said, “What I don’t understand is, you two guys are pals. But you’re like exact opposites.”
I said, “I know, I know. It’s been worrying me for years.”
I think DeAntoni decided that the best way to keep Tomlinson quiet was to fill the silence by asking me lots of questions.
Speeding east on the Tamiami Trail, the remote two-lane that crosses Florida’s interior, all cypress swamp and grass savanna, I explained to Frank that the sawgrass growing out there, ten feet high, got its name from its three-edged, serrated blades.
“Sawgrass is deceptive,” Tomlinson added. “Looks like Kansas wheat, but it’ll cut you like a razor.”
Referring to the thatched huts along the road, and state road signs that read INDIAN VILLAGE AHEAD, I had to think back to the Florida history I’d learned in high school.
Trouble was, I wasn’t certain the information was still accurate.
I told DeAntoni that ’Glades Indians were derived from mixed bands of Creek and Muskogees, on the run in the late 1700s, who’d sought safe haven in Florida. The earliest group, Mikasuki-speaking Creeks, became known as the Miccosukee, then Trail Miccosukee, as in Tamiami Trail.
Another group, mostly farmers, were called the Cimar rons, which is Spanish slang for runaway or wild people-possibly because of the runaway slaves who sometimes lived among them. Cimarron became Simaloni in the Miccosukee language, then Seminole.
I told him, “I’m not sure if that information’s up to date. Tomlinson’s an expert on indigenous cultures, Native American history. He’s like an encyclopedia-literally. You should be asking him.”
DeAntoni shrugged, ignoring the suggestion, then changed the subject to wrestling.
I could see Tomlinson in the rearview mirror, chuckling, not the least bit offended, enjoying the man, his quirkiness.
We drove past Monroe Station and the dirt road turnoff to Pinecrest, then into the Big Cypress Preserve. At Fifty Mile Bend, in the shadows of tunneling cypress, we approached the cottage that is Clyde Butcher’s photo gallery. Tomlinson said why not stop in, say hello, take a look at some of the great man’s black-and-white masterpieces, Clyde was a hiking buddy of his.
DeAntoni replied sarcastically, “You got a swamp hermit buddy who’s an artsy-fartsy photographer? That’s a hell of a surprise,” and kept driving.
We didn’t slow again until we entered the Miccosukee Indian Reservation east of Forty Mile Bend-beige administrative buildings among pole huts, airboats, brown-on-white Ford Miccosukee Police cars-then the Florida deco tourist attractions, Frog City and Cooperstown.
At the intersection of the Tamiami Trail and 997, DeAntoni got his first look at the Miccosukee Hotel and Casino. It was in the middle of nowhere, elevated above the river of grass, fifteen or twenty stories high.
The casino was a massive stucco geometric on the Everglades plain, abrupt as a volcanic peak, painted beige, blue, Navajo red. It had a parking lot the size of a metropolitan airport. The lot was already half full at a little before noon on this Saturday. Lots of charter buses and pickup trucks.
“GAMING AND ENTERTAINMENT,” DeAntoni said, reading the marquee. “Now, that’s one place I wouldn’t mind stopping. Back in New York, I’d drive to Cornwall-the Mo hawks got a pretty nice casino there. Best one’s in Connecticut, though, a place called Foxwood Resort, run by the Pequots. You think this Miccosukee place is big? This place ain’t nothing compared to Foxwood. It’s the biggest casino in the world. They take in one billion dollars a year.”
Tomlinson whistled, then said, “Far out, man. A billion? You’ve got to be exaggerating.”
“Nope. I read it in the Times and the Post, too.”
“I knew it was big, but not that big.”
“Bigger than anything in Vegas. A clean one billion a year, and they’re proud of it-which I don’t blame ’em for. Man, they got three or four hotels, golf courses, more than twenty restaurants, everything open twenty-four hours a day, and the state doesn’t have a damn thing to do with it. No say at all. Not even taxes, ’cause they’re Indians. They even got their own police department.”
He glanced away from the steering wheel to speak to me. “Why is that? Why do Indians get to open casinos, but regular people can’t? I never checked into it.”
“I’m not sure myself.” I looked over my shoulder. “Let’s ask the expert.”
Still smiling, Tomlinson answered, “I’m allowed to speak? I don’t want to irritate our driver.”
DeAntoni said, “Your weird talk, that’s the only thing that drives me nuts. Gambling and casinos-that’s something I like. If you got something to say.”
Tomlinson told him, “I know something about it. I have lots of Skin friends-that’s what they call themselves. As in Redskins. The AIM people, man, I was really into their act, occupying Wounded Knee and Alcatraz. The American Indian Movement. The best of their warriors are still out there, fighting their asses off. The right to run gaming businesses, casinos, that’s all part of the movement.”
He said, “The Skins call it the New Buffalo-casinos, I mean. Tribes used to depend on the buffalo for survival. Get it? Gaming houses are what they depend on now. It’s become the same thing. A way for the tribes, their families and children, to live, stay healthy.”
I turned and gave Tomlinson a warning look-he tends to ramble and this was not a good time to ramble. But he’s also quick to catch on. So he straightened immediately and gave us the concise version. He explained that Indian reservations are on federal trust land, governed only by federal or tribal laws. States have no jurisdiction over Indian reservations, unless jurisdiction is specifically authorized by Congress.
In this way, reservations are actually sovereign nations. Unless prohibited by federal law, each Indian nation can decide for itself what gaming may be conducted. Gaming, not gambling, which is considered a dirty word by those involved.
Tomlinson said, “Back in the nineteen eighties, when the state of California tried to screw over the Cabazon tribe, that’s what really got the ball rolling. There were less than seventy people left in that little tribe, almost extinct. This little ghost band, out there on the rez, not bothering anybody.
“So what happens? State bureaucrats tell them they can’t play bingo on their own rez. Old ladies sitting around smoking, watching Ping-Pong balls fly up the chute. Their thrill for the week. But then the U.S. Supreme Court said, screw you, California, individual states have no say over Indian land. Which is when the idea for Indian casinos started booming.”
But that wasn’t the end of the controversy, Tomlinson added. Concerned about the Cabazon decision, Congress passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 (IGRA), attempting to balance the interest between the state and tribal sovereignty.