Andy said nothing at first but frowned at my smiling.
“That will sure enhance your credibility with the administration,” he quipped, before breaking a smile of his own.
“I considered it a ‘teachable moment’,” I defended.
We relaxed after that and moved on to other matters.
Andy said, “I had another meeting with Gerard Mach today and one of the things we discussed was you. Mach has agreed to you working with his group of sprinters and coaches this summer. It’s up to you. But if you want to continue to coach at this level, then this is the next step.”
“I know it’s a great chance to learn more about sprinting and bring that back to the club,” I said. “But that’s a commitment of time I’m not sure I can afford. Which is why, I guess, I should try and not wipe out with the teaching. I have to find ways of paying for grad school.”
Andy put his coffee cup down.
“This could be a once in a lifetime chance to work with a master athletics’ coach. Think about that for a moment. And by bringing that back to the team you’d be taking a step forward to becoming a specialist in the fine art of sprinting.”
“That’s not exactly a part-time job,” I said.
“It’s what you make it.”
Now there was a thought.
Gerard Mach had been an Olympic sprinter prior to becoming Poland’s national coach. He became the first “professional” track coach in Canada in 1972 and, by 1976, had coached all four of our national relay teams to the Olympic finals in Montreal. All of that was a plus. One reason I held back my enthusiasm for what Andy was suggesting had to do with the fact that he had me working with other legendary coaches before. In those days, we called it the generation gap, but that phrase didn’t quite capture the deep divide between me and Mr. Fred Foot, another of Andy’s mentors.
Andy and I talked some more about teaching and coaching as complementary professions. Rather than treat them both as separate endeavors, he suggested I think of more creative ways of putting them both together. Since it was nearly quarter past four and soon it would be time for us to head up to the gym to workout a dozen athletes, I decided on another coffee for myself. Andy shook his head ‘no thanks’ just as someone he knew stopped over to have a chat. I got up and ordered myself a double shot of espresso.
While standing in line at the counter, I was surprised by who walked up from behind.
“Hey Peter,” he said.
I turned around and smiled broadly, sincerely happy to see Jean Cousineau again the same day we had met.
“Small world,” I said.
“No, not really. It’s a big world, Pierre. It’s a small café. The odds were good I’d run into you someplace like this.”
“I see what you mean,” I said glancing around, only I wasn’t so sure.
When I thought more about it, I wondered if maybe I’d seen him in here before. In those days, you needed an initiation (almost) to find your way to the Diablos Café. Many thought the place wasn’t as real as the metaphor.
“I’m having one more shot for the road, then heading off to workout at the gym...Faculty of Ed. building...at Huron and Washington Park.”
“That’s a coincidence,” Jean said. “I’m going that way myself. I’m late for a meeting with my advisor.”
“Can you wait a few minutes? We can jog up together.”
“Not unless you can leave this very second. I was just running out the door when I saw you,” he said.
“Why not hang around and meet up with me later? If you want, we can take a pizza back to my place. I live up the street on Madison. How does that sound? You can tell me more about Charles Manson and Leslie Van Houten.”
“Pizza sounds cool. See you past seven then...at the gym? Which one?” Jean asked, walking backwards.
“Northwest corner, ground floor!” I called back as Jean disappeared through the archway.
* * *
Mid-winter gymnasium workouts for this group of athletes involved a lot of ten-pound medicine balls. I always took part in these sessions. Our drills were mostly hopping off padded mats and bounding over hurdles and boxes. It was a kind of joyful, muscular agony you usually engage in as part of a group. It’s hard to imagine anyone doing this alone. That would simply be self-flagellation. In my view, physical madness of this sort tends to be more of a team sport. Despite what we choose to think about “lone nuts” that run amok, it’s really tribal life that makes most of us crazy.
Just after seven, we were completing our final set of cool downs and stretches that evening, when I spotted Jean Cousineau peeking into the gym. I introduced him quickly to Buck and a few of the guys just as we were leaving. We stopped into Poppa’s Pizza on Spadina and ordered an extra-large Italian with anchovies to go. We sat on stools while we waited, watching the traffic and sidewalk passersby trudging their way through the slush. That gave me a chance to explain my involvement with track and field coaching. I told him some of what Andy Higgins and I had been discussing.
Before we got too stoned back at my place, I called Ms. Cynthia Kressler on her home phone. The call was cordial. In fact, to my relief, it was over inside of ten minutes. I apologized for my rudeness and made excuses for leaving early. She said she’d spoken with some of the students, who told her that Donna Reed and the others may have “overreacted.” But that didn’t let me off the hook. Kressler was stern about one or two things in particular—the outcome of which was my promise to discuss my lesson plans in advance from now on. It was an accommodation—meaning more to her and next to nothing to me so why not let her have it?
After the phone call to Ms. Kressler, Jean and I talked more about school and compromising experiences with practice teaching. After side one of the Plastic Ono Band, I put T-Rex’s Electric Warrior on the turntable and rolled a couple more joints from the ounce I had left in a Jamaican cigar box. I had nothing on hand to drink except milk, water, and coffee. That seemed to surprise and disappoint Monsieur Cousineau.
As I picked my book up off the chest that I used for a table, Jean said, “Still reading Helter Skelter, I see. And taking notes. Preparing another letter for Ms. Van Houten?”
I didn’t mind him flipping through pages of Helter Skelter, but I picked up my notebook and closed it. Jean put the book down and told me about sources he’d come across in Rolling Stone and other magazines I’d never heard of. One of the things we discussed was how we might have reacted, ourselves, if these crimes had happened to our friends or family. Jean said something about twisting and tearing Manson’s balls off with a pair of sizzling hot pliers. This image seemed to amuse him.
Combining what facts we knew from things we’d read, Jean and I reviewed the ghastly scene the LaBianca children first encountered—the day after news of the slaying of Hollywood actress Sharon Tate Polanski and four others.
* * *
August 9th, 1969. The LaBianca children, Frank and Susan, together with Susan’s boyfriend, Joe Dorgan, were the first to discover the crime scene. They called the police to their parents’ moneyed home at 3301 Waverly Drive, near the famous observatory in Griffith Park. Upon entering the house, what the LAPD officers saw in the living room caused them to call for immediate backup. There were splashes of blood on the walls and the floor.
In addition to the pillowcase wrapped over Mr. LaBianca’s head, there was a cord attached to a heavy lamp knotted around his neck, and his hands were tied behind his back with leather thongs. There was an ivory-handled, twin-tined carving fork embedded in his stomach, and, on his abdomen near several deep stab wounds, the letters ‘WAR’ were engraved into his flesh. Worst of all, a small but sharp kitchen knife had been thrust into his throat and just left there.
A sergeant from the backup unit was the first to discover Rosemary LaBianca’s body in the master bedroom—but only after the f
irst responders had already taken her husband away in a body bag. Mrs. LaBianca was found lying face down on the bedroom floor in a pool of blood. Like her husband, she had a pillowcase wrapped over her head which was secured around her neck with a lamp cord.
Leno LaBianca had been the forty-four-year old president and chief stockholder of the State Wholesale Grocery Company, which operated Gateway Markets. Mr. LaBianca also had horse racing and property interests in California and Nevada, just like Sinatra and some of his friends from Chicago. He died as a result of twelve knife wounds and fourteen punctures made by the carving fork that was left protruding from his stomach. In the living room beside the front door there was writing—“Death To Pigs” and “RISE”—in the victim’s blood. As well, on the refrigerator door, one of the intruders had misprinted the phrase, “HEALTER SKELTER.”
Mrs. LaBianca, an attractive businesswoman who owned her own boutique, had been stabbed a total of forty-one times. Six of the punctures could have in and of themselves been fatal. Some of the wounds perforated her stomach and lung. She also had lacerations of the cervical spinal cord and spleen. The most murderous wound was to the posterior of the neck, just slightly left of the midline. This single wound in itself was savage enough to be fatal. In addition, more than a dozen “superficial” cuts had been inflicted post-mortem.
The coroner established there were perhaps as many as sixteen superficial, evidently postmortem, lacerations to Mrs. LaBianca’s lower back. These injuries, he said, were readily distinguishable from the others. The coroner’s report also stated these wounds to the lower back did not show any significant hemorrhage into any of the surrounding tissues. What explains this? Judging from crime scene photography, the prosecution would have us believe Leslie Van Houten must have acted like some wild animal—whom they imagine stabbed Rosemary LaBianca dozens of times—even after the woman was dead.
But is that really what happened? Somehow, I doubted it. What was it Marshall McLuhan taught us about the peculiar characteristics of photography? For one thing, it abolishes time. To say “the camera cannot lie,” said McLuhan “is merely to underline the multiple deceits that are now practiced in its name.”
* * *
“So what really went on here and why?” I asked Jean if he knew. He admitted he didn’t. “I wouldn’t believe anything the DA said—not about who, why, or wherefore. Only the people who were there know for certain.”
We kept talking until a quarter past one. Jean then called a cab to take him home to his flat near the corner of Bathurst and Bloor. He told me he lived on the same side of the block as Honest Ed’s Department Store. I thought it safe to say we had a good time indulging our morbid fascination with the Manson murders and the brutal events surrounding Leslie Van Houten. Despite his definitive portrait, Jean and I agreed there had to be more to the story than Bugliosi unveiled or uncovered. Perhaps Leslie’s retrial would clear up more of the mystery. What if Helter Skelter wasn’t the true motive? And to what degree were the codefendants equally guilty of murder?
I stayed up another hour or so scribbling more notes. Though my body was aching and begging for sleep, I had a hard time shutting my mind off. Finally dozed off for a spell—only to be startled awake by nightmarish cityscape scenes of people on fire and being chased by armored marauders. After scratching that down in my notebook, I returned to the very same dream I’d already come out of. And after tossing and turning and trying for hours to stay asleep, I finally dozed off until dawn. When I stopped dreaming and opened my eyes, I did not want to wake up.
4
Cupid Introduces
Leslie to Manson
The next morning in Ms. Kressler’s office, she wasn’t as calm as the night before on the phone. She clasped her hands and seemed to smile in a way I mistook as friendly.
“Last night I had a call from Mrs. Reed, Donna’s mother. I’d rather not have this go any further. So, to simplify matters, you must promise not to speak to Donna Reed if you see her. She won’t be coming to English class until after you’ve gone from the school. Is this all understood?”
“Perfectly. Is that all there is to it?”
“For now.” She paused. I turned around. Then she continued, “Oh, and one other thing. Please remember not to start class until you’ve taken the rolls. Report all absences to me or, if I’m not there, to the office. This is an important duty you have been lax about.”
The way I looked at the situation, conceding these points was a small price to pay in the service of suing for peace on the poetry front. If that was all there was to it, I was all for it. Ms. Kressler said she would “prefer it” if I presented Al Purdy that day instead of more Leonard Cohen. Fine by me. It just so happened I had plenty of Purdy’s Sex and Death poems ready on hand, but I didn’t tell her. I’d abandoned all tact, as always, and simply said I would dig something up.
Then, just as I’d begun to leave, I turned around again and said, “I’m sorry, Cynthia, I’ll take the rolls if you say so, but frankly I don’t see the point. Students are unprepared for the most part. That’s where we should start. Forcing ill-equipped kids to come and just sit there only inhibits those who are prepared to take part.”
“You aren’t making any sense, Peter. Are you high or something?”
Of course I was, but there was no way for her to be certain.
“Listen,” I said, “I truly believe in teaching poetry the same way it’s written...with passion...not the same lame routines repeated over and...”
“Peter, please! Leave your speeches for the classroom. Or wherever. We’re talking about taking attendance. Stay on track.”
“Fine,” I said, “it’s just that I hoped we might talk more about today’s classes besides taking the roll call.”
Cynthia held up her hand and said, “Let’s leave it at that, shall we?”
I disagreed but backed down, even though I considered absenteeism a fluent way of making a point about schooling.
After faking the roll as a concession to Kressler, who sat at the back of the class taking notes, I handed out mimeographed copies of Al Purdy’s “At the Quinte Hotel.” It was a slight gamble. But I thought, what the hell. My supervisor’s evaluation wasn’t likely to suffer much worse no matter what I did. Though I could have been wrong about that, but, if I was, it shouldn’t matter.
Even though Al Purdy wrote his poem in the first-person, when I asked for someone to read it aloud it was a girl, not a guy, who volunteered. Not surprising. Lucky for us, she was an actress and had the pluck to give the ‘Quinte Hotel’ a decent whirl. And, whoever she was, she put on a really good show. There may be reason for hope after all.
I asked the class, “What does the poet’s ‘lament of a sensitive man’ have to say about Canadian values, bar fights, and the meaning of Carling-O’Keefe in this woeful society?”
No one laughed. Nothing but baffled, uneasy quiet from everyone, not just my detractors. Even those who weighed in on my side remained silent. Wrong joke for this crowd, I thought.
During the debriefing with Ms. Kressler, she asked what I had been trying to prove.
I responded, “I’m asking students to prove things for themselves. For instance, I’m asking them how the art of poetry can help us enjoy or pull through the best and worst of times. Let them see, if they don’t already, how poetry can be a joyous, poignant occasion.”
No response.
I reconsidered and then added, “I enjoyed giving my performance even if no one else did.”
Actually, that last part was true. Ms. Kressler scored me “poor”—on a scale one-out-of-five—for such “peculiar ambitions.” It was the lowest mark I’d ever been given on any course or teaching evaluation. Serves me right since such nonsense as grading meant less than nothing to me or anyone else. Why all the hubbub?
Outside of school, track and regular pick-up gam
es of hockey in Varsity Arena, I spent one or two nights a week with my off- and on-again girlfriend Gabrielle Adler. I also made time to hang out on a regular basis with Jean Cousineau. The worst I could say about him was that he could be a mean drunk sometimes—more often with women than with me or other men. So I had to call him on that. But, most of the time when we got together to talk, we were high on Benzedrine and marijuana. I’d always tended more towards recreational stimulants and psychedelics. Mostly, I smoked pot when I was reading or writing. Jean was more into cigarettes, booze, and downers.
When we weren’t speculating idly or sharing facts about the cult of Charles Manson, Jean and I talked a lot about music, novels, film, and philosophy. Jean was fond of quoting ideas he lifted from Ortega, Malraux, Hesse, Camus, and Aleister Crowley. Together we also spoke at length about the “Tate-LaBianca” killings—admittedly, a cold way of referring to such frightful events. But neither he nor I had any ties to the case at that moment. I withheld talking too much at first about Leslie. For one thing, I was unsure of myself and wanted more time to think about her on my own before I tried expressing it to friends or strangers.
Among the filmmakers whose work Jean and I admired was Roman Polanski. Jean and I had both seen Repulsion and Macbeth, but hadn’t been to see Knife in the Water, Chinatown, or The Fearless Vampire Killers yet. In that one I’m told the director plays Alfred, the professor’s assistant, with Sharon Tate in the role of the innkeeper’s daughter. But of all Polanski’s films up until then, the one we talked about most often was Rosemary’s Baby.
No Journey's End: My Tragic Romance with Ex-Manson Girl, Leslie Van Houten Page 4