Somebody to Love?

by Grace Slick

  You and your dog pause under a carved wooden sign, hanging by wrought-iron hooks from a seven-foot-high horizontal post, that says bake shoppe. The smell of warm biscuits circles through the air, beckoning two or three people to join you for breakfast and to listen to the town crier. He literally sings the morning news, and accompanying him are two musicians in Robin Hood-like attire—one playing the lute, the other playing a pennywhistle—hoping to catch a few nickels for their impromptu performance. When the old church clock chimes nine times, everyone moves on to the business of making something by hand, from scratch, so they can trade it or sell it in the marketplace for something else they need.

  The day ends with a late dinner by candlelight and congenial conversation with friends over a couple of mugs of mulled wine. While you and the dog enjoy the warmth of the big stone fireplace, you read a few pages of an essay on freedom by Thomas Jefferson. Then you both climb the Dutch-tiled stairs. The distant sound of the grandfather clock in the hallway—eleven chimes—confirms it's time to retire. The last thing you see before you drop off to sleep is the view through the bedroom window: bright stars shining through a clear atmosphere, unclouded by smog or artificial lights of any kind.

  OR

  The year is 1998.

  It's 8:00 A.M. Again, you're lying on your back in bed, waking up. Everything you see has been mass-produced; not one human being touched anything in the room before it hit the retail store or the construction company warehouse. The ceiling is wall-to-wall twenty-year-old, white, asbestos-insulated cardboard tiles. The dresser amounts to four plywood drawers you were forced to assemble from twenty-seven separate pieces that came in a box marked ikea, which spits Styrofoam balls. You can switch the seventy-five-watt track floodlights on and off by pushing a button on a plastic panel on your metal headboard, which features rows of electronic remote units. They've been specially designed to keep you either immobile or comatose after your rigorous workout in a fluorescent-lit room filled with fake bicycles, digital readouts of your progress, gym instructors lurking behind overdeveloped muscles that look like tumors, people in eye-blinding synthetic glow-in-the-dark spinning suits, and seventy-five-year-old pensioners who've been ordered by doctors to engage in repetitive contortions because of heart problems caused by eating gigantic amounts of animal fat. Young girls are working out there, too, with fake lips, boobs, hair, and noses, talking about liposuction, and there are mirrors everywhere to remind you of your imperfections. In the corner is an isolation booth full of dry heat and infrared light bulbs to ease your pain and send your aching and tortured body back through streets redolent of carbon monoxide.

  The sounds of screaming ambulance sirens accompany you to your fourth-floor apartment in a twenty-story block of cement. There, you've installed a bunch of big black plastic boxes with knobs all over them that are capable of playing 130 decibels of music written by an angry fifteen-year-old with a third-grade education (who makes more money in four minutes than you make all year, and who gets paid to yell at you through speakers loud enough to break glass). It's comforting to know that you won't miss a note of the three-chord drivel that you paid seventeen dollars per CD to enjoy with your hearing-impaired dog who eats from his plastic bowl with cutesy paw prints on it stamped by a machine that has cranked out eighty million of the exact same doggy bowl worldwide.

  When Fido finishes eating the suspicious ingredients in Barkos, he goes over to the solid metal door, which is secured with seven dead bolts to keep everyone out who might want your stereo or your life, and he barks. He's letting you know it's time for a walk—a stroll that will include his taking a shit on a street populated with more dogs attached by leashes to more humans wearing fanny packs full of credit cards. You and your fellow dog walkers will sweep the shit into bags, tie the dogs to parking meters, and enter stores in search of even more plastic life accessories. Before you're through, you'll purchase one of those gizmos that makes fake ocean noises, hoping to soothe enough of your stress-riddled, buffed-out body to make it through the rest of the day and start your wonderful waking life all over again in twenty-four hours.

  Let's get real now: plumbing differences aside, which of those two settings seems the most conducive to a life of abject inanity?

  As a child, with few responsibilities compelling me to accept the twentieth century's plasticized, cookie-cutter lifestyle, I chose the 1798 spin on reality. Aided by an imagination that was always ready to shift centuries, I simply ignored most of the mediocrity that prevailed. The persistent rejection of anything modern is usually only found in elderly people—you know, the type who begin every sentence with, “In the good old days …” My entire life, though, has been an exercise in counterprogramming. You say “White,” I say “Black.” It's only recently that I've started to bend a little. I'm more accepting of non-biodegradable packing-crate decor and polysynth sweatpants now, in my “old fart” years, than when I was seven years old.

  5

  Grouser

  Aside from my lack of appreciation for synthetic materials and assembly-line furniture, as a kid I was pretty easy to please. I was only an average student, but I liked school. My favorite subjects were English, ancient history, art, geometry, composition, and Latin. I slid through algebra with a D (the only reason I didn't get an F was because I had perfect attendance). I slept through American history and science. And I considered economics useless. Boy, was that a mistake: only later did I realize that “artists” need to know business games and numbers. It's unfair, really, because business types never have to learn to draw, sing, dance, or write lyrics.

  I played war games with the boys and jump rope with the girls, I went to Western movies with my father and shopped for clothes with my mother. Whatever anyone wanted to do sounded interesting to me. I didn't develop the “Fuck you, I do what I want” attitude until I was long gone from my parents' control. As a kid, the only time I balked was when I was told not to do something.

  WHY NOT.

  One evening, I was sitting in the living room, sort of absentmindedly fiddling with the ashtray on the coffee table. My father, who was sitting across the room, said, “Don't touch the ashtray.”

  “Why not? There's nothing in it,” I said.

  “Because it's not a toy,” he answered.

  I placed my index finger about a quarter of an inch away from the inside of the ashtray so he'd have to stand up and come over to my side of the room to determine whether I was contradicting his order. Since I wasn't, he simply gave me a disgusted look and returned to his chair. But after I got him out of his chair again, he said, “That's not funny.” And he proceeded to challenge me in a contest of wills. I was sitting in a rocking chair, so the following exchange had a rhythm all its own.

  My father said, “Are you going to do that again?” And he pushed my forehead with the tips of his fingers.

  I said, “Yup.”

  He said, “Are you going to do that again?”

  I said, “Yup.”

  Each time I spoke, he pushed my forehead so that the rocker, with me in it, went backward. This went on for about fifteen minutes, until my mother broke the seriousness of the game by laughing out loud at both of us. “Boy, you guys are stubborn.”

  Truce.

  Most people who write autobiographies have some crucial whining to do about parental aberrations, but not me. When I got punished, it didn't surprise me a bit. Usually I was sent to my room as a penalty for misbehavior, but it happened so rarely that I don't recall any specific incidents that were horrible enough to mar my outlook on life. What can I say? I simply knew when I'd done something wrong. When you're a kid, you don't break rules and then sit around wondering why you're being reprimanded.

  If you can't do the time, don't do the crime.

  I understood that, so I almost never complained. What was there to complain about? I was either too stupid or too happy (or some of both) to recognize opportunities for grumbling, so my parents sarcastically nicknamed me Grouser, which means “
one who complains.” I didn't know what the word meant at the time, but since they always said it in a friendly fashion, I just accepted it. I called my father Lid because he always wore a hat. My uncle called my aunt Slats because of her long, skinny legs. I called my daughter the Goon because of the funny expressions she'd get on her face as a baby. The whole family is saddled with silly nicknames.

  Occasionally, my parents wanted to go to a party or just be alone for a while, so they'd hire a young, quiet schoolgirl, Elva, to baby-sit. With her brown hair in a bun and wearing glasses, she'd show up with an armful of homework and several novels. I amused myself by doing the usual Jekyll and Hyde routine with costumes, or I annoyed her by drawing her face. Being watched is uncomfortable for someone who's shy (which she was), so in order to get the angles and colors right, I had to keep looking at her—up close. She suffered in silence, and, ever the polite girl, she always complimented me on the finished portrait.

  Usually, though, I went out with my mother and father because their idea of a night on the town was to go to dinner at a five-star restaurant. One evening in December 1948, I can remember the three of us riding in our old 1938 black Buick on the way to the Tonga Room in the Fairmont Hotel, when my father said, “We have something special to tell you, but we'll wait until we get there.”

  Suspense.

  When we arrived, my parents asked me to sit at a table with them instead of whirling around by myself on the carousel that was in one of the lounges. “We have good news,” they said. “You're going to have a little sister or brother pretty soon.” My parents hadn't planned the pregnancy, but it sounded all right to me. As it turned out, I didn't hear the phrase “sibling rivalry” until years later, when I was too old to be affected by it, so the usual inherent jealousies didn't get much of a workout.

  My brother, Chris, was born the following September, 1949, at Saint Mary's Hospital in San Francisco. All I knew was that Mom and her big stomach and her small suitcase went off to the hospital, and a couple of days later, she came home with a tiny, crying boy. Newborns are usually kind of funny-looking, and Chris was no exception. His skin was dark pink and he had a shock of bright red hair that stood straight up in a point at the top of his head. In those months after he arrived, I'd watch my mother tend to him; I'd observe the constant feeding, lifting, rocking, covering, singing, and diapering. It looked like a lot of work for an indiscernible reward, and it was clear to me right then that occupations such as nurse or schoolteacher wouldn't be high on my list, nor would having lots of children.

  The nine-year age difference between Chris and me made the business of hanging out together a bit problematic. He usually didn't want to do what I wanted to do and vice versa. I baby-sat for him once in a while, but by the time he was eight, I was already away at college in New York. Today, I see him once in a while, but since I live in L.A. and he lives in Palo Alto, our relationship is sporadic.

  Blood doesn't necessarily bind.

  Maybe it was because my parents hadn't expected another child, that I wasn't raised like most girls. It's not that they gave me knee pads and a football helmet, but they were unusually open concerning guidance for a female child. Considering their conservative upbringing, I would say they were lenient about my obvious disinterest in the homemaking arts. If I seemed to have an affinity for something, they encouraged me. But that comes later.

  When I watched my mother cook, the routine consisted of chopping, turning stoves and ovens off and on, shuffling pans around, cleaning up messes, setting the table, and washing dishes. Not terribly exciting. When I asked her if she actually liked cooking, she said, “It's something that needs to be done, like brushing your teeth.”

  Ballet, on the other hand, was enchanting, beautiful, graceful, and people clapped when you finished, so I did ask for ballet lessons. Stretch, point, turn and bend, memorize positions, plié at the practice bar, costume fittings, and at long last, the day of the performance. We were performing The Nutcracker Suite, and I had my part down at the dress rehearsal. But when it came time to step onstage, it occurred to me that there were more interesting moves that could be executed in the Sugar Plum Fairy's role, so I proceeded to do my own version of the piece. When the show was over, the instructor approached my mother. “Maybe Grace has talents in other areas,” she suggested. Not only was I too short and fat to be a ballet dancer, it was also becoming apparent that taking direction was not my forte.

  6

  Toodles

  My initial training in the sexual arts left a lot to be desired. Literally. Since my parents never wandered around without clothes, I had no idea what their bodies looked like, much less anyone else's. They usually went to sleep a couple of hours after me, and my father always turned off all the lights in the house.

  I was lying in bed at about 3:00 A.M. one night, thinking about nothing in particular, when my father got up to go to the bathroom. He had to pass by my room to get there, and since my door was open and he was wearing only his pajama top, I got a shadowy glimpse of his privates. I wasn't aware of the one penis/two balls setup, and it looked to me like he had a crotch full of swaying thumbs. I suppose the darkness added to the genital mystery.

  I told one of my older girlfriends—she was nine—about it the next day, and she looked at me as if I had the brains of a matzo ball. “Oh, of course. Those are ‘toodles,’” she said. She wore that condescending look, as if it was one of those Latin medical terms only doctors use.

  A real sophisticate.

  So I started off with an inaccurate vision of men being all thumbs, in a manner of speaking, and the first name I heard for a man's apparatus would have been better suited to a breakfast cereal:

  TOODLES Breakfast of Sluts

  My second sexually explicit event—apart from those times when I benignly stared at the nude statues in the museum—was a watering-can tryst. Another girlfriend, Jessie—who was my age, seven—gave me a questionable lesson in copulation. She was either operating from a vague natural instinct of this-fits-in-here-nicely, or she'd seen some unusual behavior that she was mimicking. We were in her parents' basement, looking at the standard clutter that lives in such places, when she took a watering can down from a shelf and filled it with water. I thought we were going to spray the petunias, but she said, “Let's play doctor.” She pulled down her pants and said, “Now you put this [the slender nozzle on the watering can] in here.” She pointed to her crotch.

  I'd never really checked out even my own crotch thoroughly, so I didn't know there was a hole into which the spout would fit. After I aimed it in her general direction and squirted water all over her thighs, she said, “No-o-o-o, let me show you.” Now it was my turn to be the patient. Sure enough, the watering can not only found its mark, but a kind of pleasant, albeit messy, stream of water went in, then slowly turned around and came out of me—all over the cement floor.

  “Toodles” (Grace Slick)

  Thanks, Doc.

  My third childhood sexual encounter had more to do with not knowing when to shut up than with direct sexual activity. A boy called Frank Funk (I'm not making up the name) kissed my hand on a whim after we'd been playing with my next-door neighbor's rabbits. I was honored and said, “Oh, Frank, that's so sweet and old-fashioned. You kissed my hand!”

  He was obviously embarrassed that I'd made such a big thing out of it, so he said, “No, I didn't. I spit on it.” I looked at my hand and I didn't see any spit, so the conclusion seemed to be: Don't bring too much attention to a young boy's romantic behavior or he'll balk.

  Over my lifetime—for God knows what reason—I dated a number of guys who'd been with my girlfriend, Darlene Ermacoff. I was thirteen when I had my first taste of Darlene's leftovers. His name was Nelson Smith, and I suppose it still is. You reading this, Nellie? That's what his friends called him. Not only my family but my whole circle of friends seemed to be overly fond of silly nicknames. Like a bunch of rap stars, we wore them with pride.

  I invited Nelson over to watch TV on
e evening, and since the set was in the dining room, we had to sit in these two stiff-backed chairs. I was so preoccupied with him, I have no idea what we watched; it could have been Howdy Doody for all I cared. All I remember is that it took him a tantalizing two and a half hours to get from the position of simply having his arm around my shoulders to dropping his hand and lightly caressing my breast. We kissed a couple of times and since I hadn't yet heard of “hard-ons,” I didn't realize what kind of pain a two-and-a-half-hour erection was probably causing him.

  Teenagers' sexual advances—or lack thereof—are fraught with such intensity it's amazing they don't regularly culminate in a big blast of hormone-driven shrapnel.

  7

  Fat

  In the early fifties, my father got a pay raise, so we moved from our small, rented San Francisco house to a larger, two-story home in the suburbs. Palo Alto, home of Stanford University, was a college town that provided a safe and proper environment for bringing up well-adjusted (?) children. Suddenly, we were right in the middle of the WASP caricature of family life, complete with two children, a two-story house, a two-car garage, and the promise of many more “well-adjustments” on the horizon.

  I didn't mind our move as much as I minded my parents selling our old black 1938 Buick, my fat friend that lived in the garage. They just went and sold it—the car that had faithfully transported us since I was born. Although crying was something I rarely indulged in (I usually got either quietly annoyed or verbally abusive), tears flowed for my intimate four-tired friend. I was sure that cars had feelings. It just seemed such a betrayal that a 1949 two-tone gray Oldsmobile was now usurping the Buick's position as a member of the family.