September, Yucca Street, and Tree Living Punkers...

Sitting here sweltering at my computer transports me to 1985 Hollywood, Dire Straits - "Money For Nothing" came out, I'm seventeen years old, and my first studio apartment. It was hot like this, hovering around 100 degrees, my air-conditioning unit would ice up and I would have to chisel away the ice to get the cooled air out an into my 300 square foot room. In these "olden" times, Hollywood was much skankier on the strip. The day I moved in, there were all these women at my apartment complex. Lots of smiles and stare-downs headed my way like arrows at Little Bighorn, while I was unloading everything I owned in Chevy S-10 pickup. I thought to myself "Wow! I haven't even moved in yet and adventure is already swirling around me!" I started to talking to one girl, we were laughing and getting along pretty good, when more women came into the complex...then it hit me...internal dialogue-"Hookers!" Oh Hell...this isn't the adventure I thought it was. Embarrassed and feeling really dumb, young, and full of...I quickly unpacked my truck and stayed inside. Alone. You have to understand, that up to this point in my life, I stayed in my room playing guitar and never left but to eat, take out the garbage and mow the lawn. My social skills and worldly knowledge were of the pre-school age. *laughing*

Living in Hollywood at this time I grew up quickly, someone was mistakenly killed at my front door by a gang. It could have been me. My life threatened on two occasions by drugged out psychos, and someone else pulled a knife to take my candy apple red Gibson Flying V Heritage guitar from me. You know how many lawns I mowed to get that guitar? "Fuck you! You're gonna have to take it from me!" I pulled out my own knife that I always had cupped in my hand when walking the streets for this very occasion. Fortunately the guy found it to be too much work, so he just walked away cursing. Yes...I know...a Gibson Flying V...it was the 80's. I was in a metal band. I had just played the Rainbow Bar, I was underage, so when I to played, I had to wait outside most of the time except when and only when I was on stage. It was the time of Depeche Mode vs. Megadeth. You were on one side or the other. This is very funny to think about now. It was also when I saw the movie "This Is Spinal Tap" and when I seriously thought about jumping the metal ship and going to blues. Teenagers...

When you're seventeen, you think that because maybe you're smart, you know everything sans experience. It is in experience that life reminds you that you don't know shit no matter how many books you've read. I was humbled in Hollywood. Watching dumpster diving for food, drugs take over people's minds, whores puking up their job they just finished 5 minutes ago. Humbled.

One morning I went to my truck to go to the grocery store and my truck hood was all dented in and scratched up. There was a small group of punkers who practically lived in the tree above my parking spot. One of them apparently fell asleep and fell out of the tree and on to my truck. They were really sorry about it and they pooled their money together and bought me a case of Keystone beer. I was really mad, but I couldn't be mad for longer than a minute. I realised these guys had nothing. Not even a place to live. If you take the money they spent on the beer for me, it probably was 60% of what they had. Damn. That's a lot. In my mind that case of Keystone was one of the biggest offers of restitution and compensation from someone in my life.

I still think about those guys every time I see a parking lot and a big tree looming above the spaces. You never know what might drop out and change the way you look at things forever...