LOST ANGELES PART 3

THE THROW of the dice this week falls on part three of adventures in moving.  Marietta Hayes and I were just seated in a booth at the far end of the Grill, “ We won’t disturb anyone here. Let’s order and then we’ll talk.”

I’m not at all hungry.” I said.

“ Neither am I,” she declared. ”I’ll order an English Muffin; that way they won’t make us leave.” 

We had only to look at one another; and the friendship blossomed. She’d discovered a likeness to my mother, and I recognized in her, a woman associated with the era of gangsters, glamour, and subtlety. Her poise was what struck me; today we’re not refined and self contained. Today we are=2 0still admonishing the residue of restrictive behavior and thought.  

We started talking about the kinds of things that have changed in Los Angeles, like Laurel Canyon.”

“Oh those homes used to be so beautiful. It’s such a shame they are not maintained any longer.”  She said.

“It must have been really different in the thirties.”

“Oh it was! I don’t want to sound conceited. No–it’s not even that.  I was fortunate to have lived during the most glamorous of times in Los Angeles.”

“You definitely were. The whole city seemed to be night-clubbing.”

0We had our tragedies too. My husband was a musical lyricist, and worked for the studios. He was black listed because he associated with some of the questionable characters. After that he couldn’t get any work, and we left the country.”

“For how long?”

“Several years. I think I was with Fox Studios then.”

Much later, I thought, what would a woman thirty years younger want to know about me. She might ask if I was a hippie, a feminist, or a protester. What could I impart about my twenties that would stand the test of time?

Marietta didn’t ask what I used to be, she wanted to know who I was now, and how I ended up in Santa Fe. All I could think about, was what she knew about my mother.

“ I knew your father too.” She interjected.

“ You did? Tell me about it.”   

“ Well, I was dancing at Earl Carroll’s Night Club. Your dad used to come in quite a bit; he was in the movie business at the time. One night he asked me to introduce him to a girlfriend that he liked. So I introduced them, and they went out. A little while later, he came up to me and said,” I want to return the favor, and introduce you to a friend of mine.”

She paused. I asked who it was.

“It was Bugsy.” She giggled.   

“ Did you go out with him?”

“ Yes. He had impeccable manners, you couldn’t help liking him. I didn’t know what he did, that hadn’t come out yet. We all thought he was a businessman. I went to his house, I think it was the one on Linden Drive, and I noticed there were guns all over the place. She leaned ov er and whispered. “It was exciting, I was so young, only nineteen or twenty. Well, we went together for awhile. Until I told my father.” 

“What did your father say?”

“Oh he was furious. He had information about Ben I didn’t. Oh, he went into a rage. He was a policeman.”

“Then what happened?”   

“I think Ben left town, and we just drifted apart. It wasn’t serious or anything.” 

 “ Dad used to mention Earl Carroll’s. He loved to watch but I never saw him dance. Was Johnny Roselli there too?”

“Oh yes. I remember him. He went with a gal at Fox, and she got paid three times the rest of us!“

“ You had a great time of it didn’t you?”  Earl’s later became the Moulin Rouge, where I used to go with Uncle Doc’s daughter and see musicals.  Then it was renamed the Hullabaloo, and the Doors played there.   

“ Earl had a great sense of style and perfection. He made us practice all day. It was a beautiful dinner club, and we performed all night. I was too tired to tell you what happened in the club. All the stars went there.”

“ Did you know Clark Gable?”

“ Yes, like all of us knew him. Not very close, but we crossed paths a lot. He was so easy to like.”

“ I could watch him act all day.” I added.

“ Oh he wasn’t acting. He was just himself. He used to say, if he acted or tried to act, he wouldn’t be any good. He was just na tural.”

“ Dad went out with Carole Lombard before she met Clark.”

“ I’m sure he did. He was tremendously good looking. I can see why your mother fell for him.”

“ How did you meet her?”  

“ Norma. She was a very good friend of your mothers. She introduced us.”

I remembered Norma. Mom talked about her so often.

“ Where did Norma live.”

“ Chicago. But she moved to Los Angeles later. ”

“ My mother was in Chicago when she toured with a Broadway show, I think it called High-Kickers. May be that’s where they met. ”

“ It could have been. Norma danced in the Latin Quarter.  Well, Norma was very close to your mother. I wish you had a chance to meet her. She could have told you so much more. She was a lovely generous woman.  She ended up with millions from one of her husbands.”

“ When did you meet my mother?” 

“ She was already sick. I didn’t know it. Norma told me. We all went out to lunch and your mother never said a word about it. I remember thinking how beautiful she was; I couldn’t believe she had cancer. You were living in Westwood at the time.”

“ Yes.”

“ She died shortly after.”

“ I’m happy you came to see her.”

We sat for a minute like you do when you remember someone whose gone, and you can’t quite harmonize with reality. We were still sipping coffee three hours later. I’d found out Marietta lives a few blocks from where my grandmother lived, she has some family in Los Angeles, she prefers night to day, rents movies, and watches the Academy Awards.

She was sixteen years old the first time she went to the Awards ceremony. She went with Alfred Newman; a legendary composer and music director in Hollywood.

“He kept winning awards, and he handed them to me. They were plastic records. I had to carry that load around all night.” She laughed, and her eyes glistened into the memory.  

I left Marietta with promises of another trip to Los Angeles, and an invitation to our place in Santa Fe. I believe she will take me up on it. Afterward we drove through

Rueben, who’s been the Matri D’ since they opened in 1966 was fast–footing his way across the room, shooting praise and adulation in every direction.  I waited until he stopped to take a breath, and told him I was Al Smiley’s daughter. He nodded hurriedly and bowed. “I have a plaque upstairs with your Dad’s name on it. All the big shots; Johnny Roselli, Frank Sinatra.” He went on name dropping. I didn’t remember the plaques.

I looked over the menu.

Rudy! I had no idea it was this expensive.”

He put his glasses on, “The appetizers are twenty-two dollars. How much are the entrees?”

“Forty–five. Don’t worry; we’ll share something.”

 When the waiter returned, we ordered.

“The split fee is twenty-five dollars. You might as well order an entrée.”  We discussed the matter, and then Rueben returned.

“May I suggest something?” He said in indignation.     

“Well, I’m not sure I want an entire entrée.” I uttered.

“You must have one. It’s Valentine’s Day.”

=0 D

“Okay.” I acquiesced. The food was sensational; if you don’t mind spending that much on one meal. I really went to feast on the memories, and those were free.

On the last day; I stopped at Nate n’ Al’s for a dozen bagels. I stood at the deli counter and noshed on all the times I’d been there, and all the hours spent waiting for Dad to stop telling jokes, so we could get on with the day. Nate’s is a sort of Jewish sanctuary, where every Jew is as good as the next, unless you happen to have more money. 

I took one look at Los Angeles before getting on the 405 freeway.  The city is like an old dresser drawer filled with garments I’ve outgrown, but I just can’t throw them away. When I returned to Santa Fe, I brought home a caption from these encounters; approach the next move with a big welcome sign. Whether it be Los Angeles or New York, make it a story I’ll want to tell one day.    

GALLERY LOULOU
WILD WILD WEST VACATION RENTAL
343 E. Palace Avenue
Santa Fe, NM 87501
Ph : 505-989-3426
Cell: 518-859-7828
www.galleryloulou.com

Laurel Canyon to watch the sun squatting down on a metallic horizon. It seemed strange to go to a hotel and not my own apartment. By now the Parrot and I were bobbing hello, and the little room by the pool felt familiar. We dressed and drove to Beverly Hills where I’d made a reservation at La Dolca Vita. It was another childhood landmark. Like a child from the country has a favorite place by the river, or tree, my places were ocean bluff parks, canyon roads and restaurants. I hadn’t been to La Dolca Vita since the seventies. Like so many early memories, it was not as sensational; until I looked at the menu.

LOST ANGELES PART 2

The throw of the dice this week lands on the continuation of last weeks, adventures in moving again.

I’d just walked into Jack Taylor’s haberdashery. Jack was looking at me from behind his big signature black eye-glass frames; one of the largest frames I’ve ever seen.  He didn’t recognize me right off.

“Jack–it’s Luellen.”  I kissed him on the lips and he smiled.

“How are you?” he said softly.

“I’m good. I was just driving by, and saw your sign. What a place you got here, it’s beautiful.”

“What? I can’t hear you. Speak up.”

“I SAID IT’S A BEAUTIFUL SPACE YOU HAVE HERE!”

“You know how many customers come in off the street?” he     asked.     

“How many?”

“One.In a whole year, one customer.”

“Oh Jack, that’s awful.”

“What? I can’t hear?”

“IT’S AWFUL TO HEAR THAT.”  

“ Look out the window.”  He said. I turned to look, and a young man was passing by. He was hunched over, plugged into an Ipod,  dressed in crotch hugging jeans, a sweatshirt, and lace-up shoes.

“Look at that-no one dresses. They all look like that,” he said.  

“ Jack, they look like that everywhere.”

“Call Bonnie,(his wife)and ask her to come down to the shop.”

I wondered why he didn’t have a hearing aid; knowing Jack, it wasn’t stylish enough. Bonnie got on the phone with me, while Jack sat, staring into his memory through floor to ceiling glass windows.  What separates Jack from all the others is that Jack’s continental suits are custom fit to the customer by Jack, and no one else. His tailors hand stitch each item; with custom lining, handmade bottom holes, and your name woven into the pinstripes.

I remembered back to the summer of 94, when Jack used to fancy-foot around the shop on Camden Drive; calling out orders, answering phones, greeting customers, and yelling at me,

” Luellen, don’t just stand there. For crying out loud, count the suits or something!”  Whenever I went to do something, he shouted, “For crying out loud Luellen, don’t do it like that!” He repeated the same script to me every day for three months. He had a similar script for everyone in the shop. His tailors, some of whom have been there thirty years, shake their heads in frustration and sew. Behind all that shouting and hollering is one of the good guys, a guy who would give you the shirt off his back, a guy from Brooklyn. 

Bonnie, his wife for some fifty years, speaks with a flare born from the genes of an actress. She’s theatrical without being in the business. “Oh Luellen darling–it’s so good to hear your voice. How are you? Did Jack recognize you?”

“Oh yes, right away.” I fibbed.

“I’m surprised. He can’t hear, his eyes are bad, but he won’t leave the shop.”

“Bonny, he said he has no customers. Is that true?”

“Unfortunately, it is. We both thought new customers would come from the second generation, but it didn’t happen, so what can you do? All the old ones are failing or dead. Tell me about you. Are you married?”

Bonnie and I chatted while Jack talked with Soaring Crow. I was looking at Jack the whole time I was on the phone. I noticed the way he raised his brows, and shut-tight smile that resonates a New York edgy resignation. His expressions were so familiar to me from working with him that summer.

“How’s your daughter?” I asked Bonnie.

“She died four years ago.”

I was watching Jack, “Oh Bonnie, I’m so sorry.” Jack’s eyes darted back to me. I promised Bonnie I’d come back and we’d all have dinner. I told her about the memoir and she remarked, “I have lots of stories about your father. He was a character.”   

After I hung up the phone, Jack yelled, “Is Bonnie coming down?”

“No. She’s not up to it right now,” I answered. He pressed his lips into a thin disappointedly accepting line. For twenty years Bonnie worked side by side with Jack. She knew every customer, and made them feel like family. As a young teenager dad used to bring us in the shop. Bonnie always made an effort to be our friend.     

“Look out the window, there’s another one. See what I mean?” Jack said.

“Yes Jack. I do. Listen, I want to thank you for giving me a job that summer. I never had a chance to thank you. It really meant a lot to me.”

He smiled. “I can’t sit here all day and count the birds. What am I gonna do?”

“What do you want to do?” I answered.

 He shrugged his shoulders.

“Do you have any hobbies, anything else you like besides suits?”

“I love to paint.”

“Paint?” Well that’s what you should do.”

“Look over there,” he gestured with a heavy arm. On the wall behind me, half a dozen oil paintings were hanging. I noticed one of a young sailor standing next to his ship.

“I really like that one Jack. I think you should paint.”

 “What?”

 “I said, RETIRE AND PAINT.”

He shrugged his shoulders. I kissed him again and he didn’t move from the chair. He needed me to raise him up, close the shop, and lock the door. I would have done it if he was all alone. I wanted to take him back to Santa Fe and place him at the Audubon, and let him paint the swallows.

 I walked out and looked back once. He was staring out the window. I thought about the stories he used to tell, like the time Mickey Cohen came rushing through the shop and dropped a suitcase at Jack’s feet, “Hold onto this until I get back.” Mickey had commanded.

“What was in it Jack?”

“Whatta ya think? Stolen loot. They all used to come through the shop on the way out of Ducker’s Barber Shop.  I couldn’t stop them–they did what they did–I don’t even know what they did, but use my phone all day.”  

After I left Jack, Soaring Crow drove me over Laurel Canyon to meet Marietta, my mother’s friend.  We had just passed Lookout Mountain when I recalled being there. It was painted right before my eyes. Lizzie, one of the wild ones in high school, and I used to drive up there in her British racing green Volvo. She loved going to mountain tops. We’d get high, and lean into the flickering spray of lights imagining all we were missing by beings so darn young. We didn’t know then we weren’t missing anything. We had it all; a big bubbling hot city filled with mysteries, puzzles, romance, and opportunities. Neither one of us had dreams of college and marriage. Lizzie wanted a baby, and I wanted to runaway to a distant splendor in the grass. As Soaring Crow descended the canyon and inched towards Studio city, I glanced over, and noticed a street sign, Sunshine Terrace.

“That’s where Kenny used to live with his parents. I bet his mother is still there.  I’m going to call her.” Kenny was an irreplaceable boyfriend at eighteen, who later became the man who guided me towards writing. He used to shout out loud about how f—g good my poetry was, and how I should be published. Who can let go of a guy like that.  

Kenny’s dad, Bernie the big shot, who everyone tolerated because he was a WWII Nazi military prosecutor, had died years before. You couldn’t butter your bread without Bernie finding something fishy about it. Soaring Crow met Kenny back in the nineties, when Kenny dropped by his house on his way to living in a campsite in Escondido. He stayed a month.      

“Kenny! What a case that one is. You gotta love him. I understand him now. I know why he bailed out of society. I thought he was weird back then.” Soaring Crow chuckled thinking about Ken. He always had a neatly organized backpack, a cigar in his mouth, and carried a little black book with all his notes and phone numbers. He was an herbal tea importer and an inventor of gadgets.    

We drove into the strip center on Ventura Boulevard fifteen minutes early. I called information and got the phone number for Ken’s mother, Anna Marie.

“Hello Anna Maria, it’s Luellen.”

 “Oh Luellen how are you? It’s been a long time.” That was an understatement. It had been thirty years or more.”  Her voice revealed so much. She spoke in long unwavering sentences, and it reminded me of how long-winded Ken could be when he got on his philosophical podium.  She was Austrian and her accent smoothed out the awkward moments.   

“I’ll be 84 this week.”

“Really? Well Happy Birthday.”

“ Oh thank you. I’ve been in this house fifty years.”

“ Wow, that’s amazing. It’s a beautiful house. I always admired your cooking and gardening.”

“ I don’t do much of that anymore.” 

“ How is Ken doing?” I asked.

“ He moved to Guatemala.”

“ Really? When was that?”

“ Five years ago.”

“ Have you seen him lately?”

“Five years ago was the last time.”

“Is he all right?”

“He says he is. But I don’t know. We email, and sometimes he’ll call. I wish he would visit.”

“He couldn’t stand living in Los Angeles, or anywhere in the US.”  I added.

“He lived in Ensenada for years; then he decided to go to Guatemala. It’s so far. He loves the Latin culture. It’s too hot for me. He should come back and visit. I need a little help.”

“What about the other brothers?”

“Rick has cancer.”  

I rolled the rental-car window down and looked through people as they walked by. I didn’t tell her I was around the corner; I couldn’t just stop in and leave five minutes later.   

“I’m so happy you called. I’ll tell Ken when I write to him next time. Are you married?”

“No.”

“Oh well. So nice to hear from you. Come and visit sometime.”

“I will, I promise you I will.” 

As I left the car and headed upstairs to meet Marietta I felt a peck of familiarity with my surroundings. I was standing in front of the Starbucks, where Ken used to call me from when he was in town.

“ I’m over here at Starbucks, what a nightmare, I can’t even find a set a teeth in the place, nobody smiles. I’m telling you Lou, this isn’t the way it’s supposed to me. I got a headache and nothing even happened yet.” I wished he was sitting there, he could bring hours of non-stop laughter.     

Soaring Crow opened the door to the Daily Grill. Seated on a high stool, next to the hostess, was a strikingly beautiful woman. Her hair was pulled back in a bandana, and fell to her shoulders. Her skin was snow white, with a frosty pink glow and her china blue eyes glistened when she smiled.

 

 

 

 

 

“Oh you must be Luellen.  I knew it right away; you look like your mother.”  To be continued next week.

Any dice to throw: Email: folliesls@aol.com

 

LOST ANGELES

 

The throw of the dice this week lands on adventures in moving….again. What precipitated my even considering this next move an adventure is the weekend I spent in Los Angeles. I was going to meet two women; one who had known my mother, and one whose career paralleled hers. It was a meeting any daughter  who buried their mother before turning sixteen would wish for. A secondary and subconscious motive was to explore the idea of moving back to Los Angeles.

 

The day I arrived it was raining; a Saturday painted with big strokes of gray and patches of blue between a steady but non-threatening shower. The rain breaks Los Angeles down, and spreads an even glossy finish across the faded facades of buildings along Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood. This is where I lived with Dad, just north on Doheny Drive, and where almost anything could happen to a teenager walking her father’s poodle. I was invited to parties, met strangers, hitch-hiked and observed adults that didn’t want to be noticed. West Hollywood was a reclusive neighborhood in the late 1960s.

 

As I strolled south on Doheny forty years later, I discovered a jigsaw scenery.  It was a bizarre surrealistic shadow, between deteriorating shops, abandoned buildings, and modernized residential neighborhoods. I stopped into Bristol Market for a snack. The lofty concrete warehouse was filled with gourmet packages and imported delicacies. It’s a grotesque replacement of the former Chasen’s restaurant;where Lionel Barrymore and Errol Flynn sipped the off-camera hours, before heading upstairs to a private steam bath. It was where I first laid eyes on Paul Newman and my father scolded me for staring.” Dad everyone stares at Paul Newman!” 

  “Well, stop being everyone!”  Paul’s eyes were blue headlights that radiated in every direction. You had to be blind not to see him. Dad was right, Paul squirmed at the attention.

  

When I got back to the hotel, the lobby-house parrot was my first detour. I needed to settle my nerves, going home is unsettling.  You may find the whole city unrecognizable.  The longer I remain detached from Los Angeles, the more intensely attached I need to feel when I return. Doheny Drive is the street that distinguishes Beverly Hills from Hollywood. Dad lived on the Hollywood side. If you served time, you have to register with the local Beverly Hills police department as an ex-con. After dad was released from prison, they arrested him for not registering as an ex-convict. He swore he’d never live in Beverly Hills again. However, he made his presence very well known by spending the better part of each day and night meeting with associates, girlfriends, and shopping. Almost every day he walked from Doheny to Linden Drive; the street where his best friend lived and was murdered.

 

The next day I wandered around Melrose and watched the 90212 cliff-dwellers at work in the cafes.  Café Figueroa was the first real coffee house on Melrose; it was where I discovered lattes during high school, and how well they went with obscure magazines and classical music.

 

The first day in LA was an amusement ride. It was jostling, humorous and frightening, like riding my former self through a time capsule. The parrot made me laugh, and the staff at the Beverly Terrace was old school Los Angeles, even though they immigrated here very recently. They all seem to be Russian; in fact all the guests appear to be Russians, and my room overlooking the unused pool, was where I observed these Russians don’t sit by a pool.

 

The second and last day of the trip began with a sublime  umbrellas of Los Angeles walk up to Urth Caffe on Melrose. I stood in a chaotic line of young readymade bohemians; friendly and insincere, a remarkable warm up exercise for any dweller in LA. Everyone in the café was on the phone so I opened mine.  

   “Hi Marietta, it’s Luellen.”

   “Oh hi Luellen. Edna cannot make it today; she’s not feeling well enough.”

   “That’s too bad, I wish I could stay longer, I’m always rushing in and out of Los Angeles.”

    She laughed, “Well, I’m okay. Do you want to meet at one o’clock at the Daily Grill on Ventura; it’s very easy to find?”

    “Sure, that’s perfect. I’ll see you then.”

    “I’m an old lady with gray hair.” She laughed again. I decided to drive through downtown Beverly Hills. As I was about to turn onto Canon Drive, I noticed a big store-front sign ahead. I parked the car in front of Jack Taylors. Jack was Dad’s pal since the 1960’s when he opened his opulent men’s custom-suit salon. He had a pool table, green marble floors, and a bar in the lounge. In the back room a circle of tailors hand-cut suits for men who dressed for work. Dad was one of them.  I worked for Jack, one disjointed summer back in 1993, and I hadn’t seen him since. He was the man who made the Rat Pack look like rat royalty.

Jack was in the shop, seated at a big circular desk in a dark blue suit with a day old carnation in his breast pocket. I recognized the same smile of tolerance, the Jewish brand of tolerance that evokes historical overtones he’ll never speak about. Jack is 92 years old. To be continued next week.