One of the first things I learned about Larry was actually about his motorcycle: Larry drove a black 1970 Electra Glide. It was a shovelhead.
What this meant is that everywhere we went, people nodded at Larry and said, “Nice bike.” This happened everywhere: gas stations, parking lots, inside and outside of bars, convenience stores, grocery stores, beer stores and at stoplights.
Sometimes people would roll down their windows at the stoplight and yell, over the roar of the engine, “What year?”
And Larry would say, cigarette hanging from his mouth and with the lowest possible growl, “Seventy.” But it sounded like “seb-endy” because of the cigarette, and that was always okay with Larry. It was also okay with the person who asked the question.
Nobody held long conversations at the stoplight.
Having a 1970 Electra Glide shovelhead meant that people walked around the bike slowly wherever it was parked, staring at it. Sometimes they would mumble, “huh, shovelhead,” as if this explained everything.
In the world of Harley Davidsons, Larry’s bike was some kind of royalty. And that, of course, meant that Larry was royalty, too. There was a respect given – completely unearned – simply because he rode around on this particular motorcycle.
At that point in my life, motorcycles all looked the same to me.
Because his bike was 15 years old, it was “classic.” It was unique and special and wonderful to every single pair of eyes that noticed it.
To me, it was just old. It was very, very loud. And it was also very uncomfortable.
The bike had one long seat, like a widened version of my banana seat bicycle, and I had to squeeze onto the back of that one long seat. It wasn’t comfortable having two people on a banana seat, either.
Not only that, but once I got situated, it was very hard for me to stay on the seat – meaning, I was in constant danger of falling off the back. There was no backrest. So there was no way for me to continue moving forward with the motorcycle as it roared down the highway unless I had my arms wrapped tightly around Larry’s waist.
This seemed fine with Larry. I felt wobbly and loose, like dice rolling around in a can.
But this seemed to be a small price to pay for having an incredibly fun mode of transportation.
The Harley leaked oil – so I assumed all Harleys did – and Larry did all his own work on the motorcycle. He spent a couple of days working on the oil leak without much success, all the while driving me back and forth to various bars for burgers and beers.
One day, Larry came home with a new Harley.
“I got it for you!” he smiled. “See the backrest?”
It was the tiniest backrest I had ever seen – but it kept me from falling off backwards. I no longer had to hold my arms around Larry’s waist, which meant I could wave my arms around in the wind, fix my hair when it slapped me in the face, and light cigarettes (a story for another day) while I rode.
“Cool,” I said about the new bike, which looked like all the other bikes I’d ever seen. But I had learned from listening diligently that you can’t just say “cool” and not ask any questions. So I asked, “What is it?”
I don’t remember when or how I discovered Larry’s age. I only know that I tried very hard to ignore the number after I heard it.
Larry was 36 – and more than 16 years older than me.
When we were alone, it was fine. In spite of the wrinkles around his eyes (“so cute!”) and the male-pattern baldness he attributed to his helmet, I lusted wildly after this craggy, guitar-playing, motorcycle-riding outlaw.
But outside the walls of our apartment, it was hard.
And the most sickening, gut-twisting realization was that my own parents were only four years older than Larry.
Larry’s sister was my mom’s age. Larry’s mother was born before the Great Depression.
And Larry’s “baby” …? Larry’s daughter was 17 years old, only three years younger than me.
My boyfriend was old enough to be my dad.
I know: age is just a number. But as a college student, living with a balding man who was never carded by bartenders felt just … wrong. I believed 30-somethings ate jello and walked with canes; Larry may as well have been my grandfather.
So internally I cringed every time my youthful world collided with … him.
I lived with someone old enough to be my father, who grew up listening to my parents’ music, who went to school during segregation. Larry believed that men were in charge and women were arm candy.
To make matters more interesting, Larry came from a culture I’d never known existed. He worked with his hands. He read magazines instead of books. He didn’t own a tie.
And Larry was a biker. I’m not saying he owned a motorcycle; lots of people own motorcycles. I’m saying the motorcycle was the solid base for his entire world. A whole biker culture emerged in front of my eyes as I rode around on the back of that bike.
Everyone Larry knew owned a motorcycle. They hung out in groups and they all grew bushy gray-speckled beards and spat on floors of garages and always had oil under their fingernails.
Yet the cry of the biker – “Live to Ride, Ride to Live” – was a real world motto. This culture believed riding was the essence of life. Getting on a motorcycle and roaring into the sunset – or home from the bar, or off to the local 7-11 – was literallythe only thing that mattered.
And the only real motorcycle was a Harley Davidson. The occasional Indian – a rare treasure – and/or a BMW or Triumph were tolerated, but there was no tolerance for anything made in Asia.
Larry and his friends believed in freedom above all else. They trotted around proclaiming rights for all Americans as they raged against anyone who had the audacity to purchase a Suzuki or Honda motorcycle, aka “Jap shit.” Larry considered anyone who didn’t speak English as a first language to be sub-human and simultaneously in line for his machinist job.
So here I was, an incoming college senior, learning that my middle-class existence wasn’t the only way to live. And I had been desperately yearning for a new way to live since before I picked up my first drink at age 15.
When Larry was 31.
It is important to note – in case it wasn’t obvious – that I’d inadvertently adopted a pseudo-parent. I would likely not have survived my alcoholism without Larry. He worked hard and he tried very hard to meet my basic needs.
Unfortunately, my “basic needs” were impossible to meet. I was insatiable.
During our ride to “my new home” I learned that Larry had moved out from the junkie’s apartment when his former roommate tried to sell Larry’s guitar for heroin.
The new apartment, like the old one, had a sunken loveseat and a single mattress on the floor and a grand entrance. (I stopped by last week for this picture.)
Larry would sit on the loveseat and play the guitar for me while I lounged on the mattress and listened to him sing. That gravelly voice translated beautifully into song and convinced me instantly that I was falling in love.
So when I moved in quite spontaneously on the day my parents threw me out, my new lifestyle immediately became awesome: a summer dream-come-true.
We’d buy a 12-pack of Miller Lite – always Miller Lite, when Larry was drinking – and we’d sit in that tiny apartment. He’d play guitar and I’d listen and drink. And when the beer ran out, sometimes we’d go to the bar and sometimes we’d just pass out on that mattress on the floor.
I called this “freedom.”
One night, someone knocked on the door while we were sleeping on that tiny mattress.
Larry leapt from the bed, scream-whispering at me: “SHHHHHHH!” Larry grabbed a six-foot steel chain from the corner and wrapped it around his right hand up to his elbow.
Fist above his head and ready to pummel the intruder, Larry whipped open the door.
An old hippie who lived upstairs, Marley, stood outside.
“Whoa!” said Marley, gaping at the chain and sounding like Spicoli. “Just wanted to see if ya wanted a beer!”
Larry exhaled. “Ya can’t fuckin’ do that, Man,” he said.
He unraveled the chain and invited Marley inside. Apparently we did want a beer at 3 a.m.
My macho protector deserved something in return: my body, no holds barred. It’s all I had to give.
But I’d been holding back. “I really don’t want to have sex unless we’re using some form of birth control.”
Larry said, “I had a vasectomy.”
“You did not!” I almost laughed, knowing this was a ploy.
“I did,” he said. “I had a baby with my first wife, and then I had a vasectomy.”
“You had a baby?” I choked.
“Yep!” he smiled. “Karen Marie! She’s beautiful!”
“Okay…” I thought: He’s got a BABY?!?
“I thought my wife was cheating on me so I had a vasectomy. If she got pregnant again, I would know the baby wasn’t mine.”
This seemed … logical. Really stupid, but logical.
Still, the actual operation is what mattered to me. “So you really had a vasectomy?”
“I really did,” he said. “Wanna see the scar?”
I found it very hard to believe that Larry’d had a vasectomy in order to catch a cheating wife, but that was before I knew Larry well.
“Yes, I want to see it,” I said.
He showed me something that may or may not have been a scar.
“Okay,” I said, as convinced as I needed to be.
Then I thought about the convenience of a vasectomy. Suddenly I felt almost giddy.
“So let me ask you something.”
“Yeah Baby, ask me anything.”
“So in this relationship … I get unlimited sex, unlimited beer, and unlimited music. What do you get?”
Larry didn’t blink. “Someone to share it with,” he said.
At the time, this was so romantic and sweet, I nearly cried.
Now I realize it didn’t matter to Larry who I was, as long as he had a warm female body on the back of his bike.
After staying out all night with Larry, my parents wanted to talk.
At 20, anything my parents said to me was irrelevant. I knew everything and they knew nothing. I am not sure how they even got me as a daughter, since we were so completely different in our core values.
Health and safety, for example, were completely unnecessary in real life.
Still, they tried. They calmly sat me down and said: “You are our daughter, and we love you. We would do anything for you. But we need you to follow the rules we’ve set, and you haven’t been doing that. Your curfew is midnight; we think that is reasonable while you’re home for the summer. If you need to stay out a little later, we can discuss that. But there are other people living in this house who need to get some sleep and you are not setting a good example for your sisters.”
“Okay,” I said with an eye roll and an imaginary “whatever.”
“We are very serious,” they said. “If you can’t follow the rules and be home by midnight, you will need to move out.”
“Okay,” I said. “Is that it?”
They sighed and leaned back. “Sure,” they said. “But the next time you don’t follow the rules, you are out.”
“OKAY!” I said, and stomped up to my room.
A few days passed and I went out with Larry again. I came home sometime well after sunrise.
My mom came to talk to me. “Where were you?”
“Out.”
“We thought you were dead.”
“Well I’m not.” I was throwing stuff around in my room.
“Kirsten, this has to be the last time. You can’t keep breaking our rules. We told you if you broke the rules again, you would need to move out.”
“Fine, I’ll move out!” I screamed. My immediate follow-up thought: If I’m moving out now anyway, I should have just gone to Massachusetts with The Firm!
My mom was still trying to keep me home: “You can’t just come home when we ask?”
“I guess not!” I bellowed.
“Then I guess you’ve made your choice.”
“Fine!” I started throwing stuff into a bag.
My mother, suddenly quiet, watched. She knew this was real. I did not.
“I didn’t think it would be like this,” she said.
“Oh really?” I snapped. “How did you think it would be?”
“I don’t know,” she said, errant tears appearing as she spoke. “I thought we might have a party or something.”
A party, I thought. Why would I want a stupid party?
I’ve thought about my mom’s comment a million times since that day: she wanted to have a party. She wanted to celebrate my independence, help me to move forward in my life, reward me for becoming a successful adult and set a festive tone for my transition to a new residence.
I just wanted to get out.
“Well I guess you’ll have to have a party without me,” I said. “I’m outta here.”
And I took my stuff – whatever I had shoved into my purple duffel – and walked out the door.
I had absolutely nowhere to go, no money, and no plan. So I walked to the nearest pay phone, next to Sweet William a mile away.
“Can you come get me?” I asked, without a “hello.”
“Sure!” Larry said. He didn’t even ask why.
He just showed up, tied down my purple bag, and roared off with me and my bag on the back of the bike.
Being at home with my parents meant that I didn’t drink nearly as often. Occasional parties and time with complete strangers aside, since I was underaged in Pennsylvania, my drinking time was severely shortened.
My parents also didn’t approve of my smoking – which was a full-blown addiction already. They didn’t allow me to smoke “out my window” – which meant I had to go outside. And I didn’t feel comfortable smoking in front of them at all. So I felt a bit imprisoned by my summer housing.
My response was to dive headfirst into the only addiction that wasn’t trying to kill me: music. I woke up and turned on the radio. I had a stereo in my room, and I lived with my boombox beside me as a crutch to get me through those long, alcohol-free days.
I would sleep, too, as long as was humanly possible, to avoid my family. I would stay awake after everyone else slept, listening to music until I couldn’t keep my eyes open, then sleep until well past noon.
My parents worked so I fed myself. I would get up and make myself a bowl of cereal and then, a few hours later, I would make myself a “salad.” Because I wasn’t a huge fan of lettuce, my salads consisted of croutons with French dressing and Kraft parmesan cheese shaken on top. For a fancy meal, I would make myself a slice of Havarti toast, melting the cheese over bread in the broiler. I never enjoyed cooking so using the oven was “fancy.”
When my parents came home, I would get out of the house as quickly as possible – taking my boombox with me to the backyard, no electricity required.
In 1985, I was obsessed with Yaz, Prefab Sprout and the Violent Femmes, as though they were mentors. I’d lie in the grass on my back, staring at the sky as it turned from dusk to midnight, wailing about my woes. Singing at the top of my lungs and sobbing, I’d replay songs over and over and over and over, daring the sky to come down and swallow me whole.
Sometimes I actually expected it to happen, the angst was so great. And my music choices enhanced my pain. I believed I’d always felt this way, I was always going to feel this way; I would never recover, and the songs I loved echoed those sentiments.
My problem was always the world – my parents or society and its rules (the same thing) – never me or my use of alcohol and drugs. I was lost and alone in a sea of blame.
So I attached myself to songs the way others attach to people, and the Violent Femmes sang one of those songs. I listened to it over and over and over, but I didn’t connect any dots.
The song could have been a warning about addiction. It was Violent Femmes’ Good Feeling – enveloping me and spitting me out with every listen:
Good feeling, won’t you stay with me just a little longer? It always seems like you’re leaving when I need you here just a little longer… Dear lady, there’s so many things that I have come to fear; Little voice says I’m going crazy to see all my worlds disappear…
Vague sketch of a fantasy laughing at the sunrise like he’s been up all night… Ooh, slipping and sliding, what a good time but now I have to find a bed that can take this weight….
Larry came to pick me up on his motorcycle (hereinafter often referred to as “bike”). The motorcycle was so loud that we couldn’t possibly have held a conversation over its roar.
I remember thinking that it was nice that we didn’t have to talk. I didn’t have anything to say to him.
Eventually he pulled into the parking lot of a bar. We got off, took off our helmets, and started toward the door. I cringed a little.
“I’m not 21 yet,” I said.
“Fuck that,” he said. “Nobody’s gonna bother you if you’re with me.”
Larry grabbed my hand and we walked inside. No one even looked at us. We sat down in a booth.
This bar was fancy – first, there were booths. At college we were lucky to have a place to sit. And there was an actual band playing – or at least, whining. It wasn’t the kind of band I would normally enjoy.
A monstrous dance floor stood empty between the bar and where we sat. I watched Larry walk all the way across that empty floor. His hair was stringy and brown – stringy like thread, with a bald area in front that wasn’t quite combed over, and long enough in the back that it bounced when he walked. What he lacked on his head grew on his face – a bushy beard and mustache which, I recalled, scratched when he kissed me.
He wore blue jeans with a chain hanging out of his pocket on one side; it jangled with every step. His boots were black and bulky – “motorcycle boots” he called them – and they clunked loudly on the dance floor.
I was appalled. He made noise when he walked. I’d spent my entire life trying to go unnoticed.
Larry didn’t notice the clunks or the jangling. He had absolutely no inhibitions. As he walked across the floor he seemed to remember I was there. He held up two drafts in a sort of salute, and smiled that goofy smile. His teeth were yellow and crooked but he didn’t notice that, either.
“Here ya go, Baby,” he said, sliding into the booth across from me, the chain impetuously rattling against the wood as he slid the beer to me. He’d called me “Baby” a sickening amount of times in just a few hours.
“Thanks, Baby,” I mocked.
He blinked for a second and then regrouped. “Here ya go, Kris,” he said, trying to impress me.
I sipped my beer and considered this. Did I care that he didn’t know my name? No, I did not.
And yet: “It’s Kirsten,” I said, emphasizing the first syllable. “My name is actually Kirsten. I tell people ‘Kris’ because it’s easier.”
“Kristen?” he asked.
“No, it’s keer-stin.”
“Say it one more time,” he said.
“Keeeeer-stin,” I repeated.
Larry smiled. “Keer-stin!” he said, proud of his accomplishment. “That’s a pretty name! Pretty name for a pretty girl!”
“Thanks,” I mumbled. I was used to ridiculous, sexist comments like this, but I didn’t think my name was particularly pretty, so I just drank.
Larry got me a second beer, and a third, and then I lost count. I have no idea what we discussed.
When the bar closed, we rode back to his place – the place where the junkie had sold their stereo – and we screwed around on the floor until just before dawn.
“I’ve got to get back before my parents wake up,” I said.
Larry laughed. “Let’s go!”
When he revved up the motorcycle I realized: my parents would be awake the instant we roared into the neighborhood.
There was something inside me screaming to get out in the summer of ’85. I didn’t know what it was; I just knew that something was desperately, horribly uncomfortable.
My youth was one long recognition that I was different. I was weird and I was unliked and I was never going to fit into the world the way I saw it. Everyone else seemed to know what they were doing. Everyone else seemed to get along with each other. Everyone else seemed to have a ton of friends and an understanding of how the world worked. Everyone else seemed to fit societal ideals. Everyone else seemed to have a grasp on what they wanted and needed in life. Everyone else seemed to reach out and grab what they wanted while I floundered in a ditch, watching.
I always felt like I was on the outside looking in. My whole life. And for this, I blamed my parents.
I was almost 21 years old and I believed my parents were to blame for absolutely everything that was wrong with me. Nature, nurture – doesn’t matter. It was my parents’ fault.
I saw my parents the way I saw the world: they knew what they were doing, understood how the world worked. They fit societal ideals; they knew what they wanted and needed in life and were able to get it. They were the epitome of the way I saw society.
And I didn’t belong in their world. Something was desperately wrong with me; I never, ever fit.
But I didn’t know what was wrong. There was no label for it, no name to identify what was causing my problems. It never – not once – occurred to me that nothing was wrong with me.
If I didn’t fit into the world the way it was, then I had to be the problem.
And of course, people told me I was a problem – particularly my parents. I didn’t feel like this because of the alcohol. I drank because I felt like this my whole life. Alcohol was just an accelerant.
And the rage building up inside me inevitably sparked and spit every time I walked into my parents’ house.
My parents responded the only way they knew how: by buckling down, trying to allow me some independence while also trying to enforce rules so they didn’t lose their own sanity. And I responded by breaking every rule, as often as I could, trying to break free of societal expectations, all while trying to find a place for myself in a world I didn’t really understand.
One particularly bad evening, the phone rang and no one was around. Normally I would have let it ring and ignored it, but I was bored so I answered it.
“Hello?”
“Is Kris there?” The voice on the other end of the line was low and growly and I was really, really bored.
I knew exactly who it was. It had been a few days and I had given him the wrong name and number – or so I thought – but here was the guy from the gas station, somehow calling me.
Nobody named Kris lived at my house; I reserved that name specifically for people who were too stupid to learn my real name. Part of me really wanted to claim “wrong number” and hang up.
I don’t remember much about the ride from the gas station, or about the guy who drove the motorcycle on the night that I erroneously believed I would embrace my independence.
I remember that there was beer at his apartment, so we ended up there: a dirty room with a couch and table, no chairs and nowhere to sleep.
“Turn on the tunes!” I said enthusiastically, wired by the wind in my hair.
“Can’t,” the guy said. “My roommate sold the stereo! Fuckin’ heroin. He sold everything that used to be in here. Sold my amp, too, but not my guitar. I’ve gotta get out of here before he gets my guitar.”
I took another sip of my beer. “Heroin?” I asked, a little afraid.
“Fuckin’ junkie,” he said. “I don’t do that shit. That shit’ll kill ya.”
He stared at me, smiling again.
This guy wasn’t the brightest bulb and I couldn’t imagine continuing to hold a conversation.
Somehow I found him oddly attractive. He was rough and gravelly and swore constantly, wearing Levi’s and leather – my kind of guy. So I decided it would be easier to kiss him than to talk. We messed around until eventually I passed out on the floor.
When I woke up, he was walking into the one-room apartment with two coffees and an already opened pack of Winston cigarettes.
“Thought you’d need this,” he rumbled, trying to hand me a coffee. This guy didn’t know me at all; I couldn’t stand coffee.
And in the light of day, oh my god he was unattractive.
And old. Really old. I needed to get out of there.
“No thanks,” I said, lighting a cigarette.
“Wanna get some breakfast?” he asked cheerily.
“No thanks,” I repeated. “Can you take me back to my car?”
“Only if you give me your phone number first,” he said, laughing that gravelly laugh again.
Dear Lord, I thought. I am not giving this guy my phone number. I don’t even know his name.
“Okay,” I said.
He found a napkin on the table and a pen near the ashtray, and handed them to me. Fully intending to write a fake number but too hungover to think of a good one, I scrawled down some digits.
I laughed nervously. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”
We walked outside directly into an ancient city block I’d never seen before. I could hear cars nearby; the sun was blazing. My head was pounding and I was dying of thirst. As usual.
I didn’t know how far away the car might be, but I realized that I’d have to ride – sober – on the motorcycle to get there. This wasn’t quite as free-feeling as the night before. The guy had to help me with my helmet again. I climbed on carefully and held onto him, although morning made this feel slimy.
“Ya ready?”
“Yep,” I said, lighting another cigarette. The motorcycle was so loud, we could have woken every sleeping person within a 12-block radius. But apparently he heard me, because he revved the engine and off we went.
We drove down a hill and stopped at a red light. We turned right, drove maybe a hundred yards, then turned left into the gas station where I’d left my car. I was thrilled to be back so quickly but also amazed that I’d had no idea where we were. I could have walked to my car.
I hopped off quickly and handed the helmet to the guy, who started tying it to the back of the bike.
At 3 o’clock in the morning, I pulled into a gas station and sat for a moment, staring at the guy in front of me. He was pumping gas into his motorcycle, facing away from me. All I could see was long, brown hair sticking out from under his helmet.
I almost stayed in the car, a little afraid that I wasn’t alone at the station at that ungodly hour. But I needed gas, the stereo was still blasting, and Van Halen made me feel brave. I clicked off the car but turned the key backwards, the “music only” gear.
Wearing my typical attire – cutoff jean shorts and a t-shirt that went well past the shorts – I hopped out in bare feet and went straight to the pump. I kept my head down and avoided eye contact, also typical.
This did not deter the motorcyclist. “Hey Baby,” he said, in a gruff, growly tone.
I looked up. He had bright green eyes, a very full beard, and a wide smile in spite of his truly awful tooth alignment.
“Hey,” I said, way too quiet for anyone to hear over Eddie Van Halen’s guitar riffs. I looked down again.
He took two steps closer, but didn’t quite reach my car. “What’s your name?”
After one look at his teeth, I decided he was too stupid to properly pronounce “Kirsten,” which is Keer-stin. It would have taken 10 minutes for me to give him the tutorial about my name.
“Kris,” I said, using my standard name for stupid people.
“Okay Kris,” he smiled again, his voice growly enough to be almost creepy. But it was happy-creepy. “Ya wanna go for a ride?”
I looked at him again. He could probably see the wheels turning in my brain.
Do I want to go for a ride? YES I want to go for a ride! A motorcycle ride in the middle of the night? YES, YES, YES! But this guy is a moron.
I made this judgment after he’d spoken only 13 words.
Then I remembered: I have literally nothing to do and nowhere to go and a whole night to kill.
“I could do that.” The words came out of my mouth almost without my permission and certainly without any forethought about danger.
“I’ve gotta get another helmet,” he said. “Ya wanna wait here while I grab one? I only live right over there.”
“Okay,” I said.
And here’s the really, really stupid part: That’s what I did.
I finished filling up the car with gas, pulled over to the empty space by the tire pump, and sat there for 10 minutes while he went and got another helmet for me to wear.
He came back with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He smiled when he saw me sitting there. This guy smiled all the time. It was gross.
He pulled up next to my car. “Ya ready, Kris?”
“Yep,” I said, trying to be cool. I wanted the ride, but I did not want to be with this guy.
He helped me strap on my helmet, told me where to put my feet on his very old Harley, and pulled my arms around his waist.
“Ya don’t wanna fall off!” he said, and laughed a gravelly laugh.
I grabbed my left wrist with my right hand and hung on. I didn’t want to actually touch the guy.
I didn’t get back to my parents’ car until almost noon the next day.
When summer rolled around, I decided to have a party. My parents were out and all three “kids” were old enough to stay at home alone, so we had a bash. We stocked the fridge with a ton of beer and invited all of our – meaning my sisters’ – friends to a party. I don’t remember any of my own friends being there.
I was so happy sitting on my parents’ deck, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes. Music blasted, people laughed loudly; I felt like I was in a John Hughes movie.
But the party wasn’t pleasing to my parents.
Another long meeting ensued about how I needed to follow their rules, blah blah blah. There was some mention made about my younger sisters who, at this point, were 14 and 17 years old. Blah blah “role model” blah blah “rules” blah blah “set a good example” blah blah blah….
So many things I didn’t want to hear, so little space to do what I wanted to do.
A few days later, I told my parents I was going to my friend Cherie’s house to spend the night. I hadn’t yet been invited, but Cherie always offered me the opportunity to spend the night. I just didn’t want to be home anymore.
So I went to Cherie’s and we drank. Only on this particular night, for whatever reason, for the first time in many years, the words “you can spend the night” never came out of Cherie’s mouth. If I had asked, I could have stayed, but I didn’t ask.
It was 3 a.m. I had an opportunity to be alone, to do whatever I wanted to do, wherever I wanted to do it. I even had a car!
I felt … independent. I felt free.
I decided to drive around, sleep in the car, watch the sunrise in a park somewhere. I could do whatever I wanted because nobody was going to stop me.
I blasted the stereo at top volume, forging a solid path so that I didn’t get lost. There were no GPS trackers and no cell phones and I never know my way around, so I just drove up and down Route 30, the road that passed directly in front of my parents’ neighborhood. I figured if I just drove for a couple of hours one way, then drove back a couple of hours the other way, I would be home at a reasonable time.
Route 30 runs the entire width of Pennsylvania. I could have driven back and forth for a month without getting lost.
I spent a lot of my drinking career – before and after this moment – wishing desperately for this kind of freedom. I wanted the stability of shelter and transportation, but ultimately I just wanted to be left alone. I wanted to create my own fun alcoholic life.
I imagined myself as a hippie stuck in the wrong generation, flowing freely from place to place, following my dreams of freedom and the road.
In reality, because I had no money, I ended up immediately dependent on the first guy I saw, especially if he had an extra 50 cents to buy me a beer. But I didn’t recognize this pattern for decades.
So tonight was my chance. No friends, no family holding me back: middle of the night, stereo blasting in my parents’ car, I launched myself into the wild black yonder.
I made it as far as North Versailles, maybe 15 minutes from home, where I stopped for gas. And that’s where my plans for independence vanished into thin air.
