The sun was going down by the time we finally caught a ride from the Mississippi Welcome Station, where we’d been stranded most of the day. The young redhead who picked us up was named Kevin, and when he mentioned that he played third base for the Mets farm team in Jackson I told him he was doing a solid for a long-time Mets fan. I’d been following the team since their inaugural season in 1962, and Kevin got a kick out of the stories I told him about the team’s hapless early days when the ‘Loveable Losers’ were the National League’s perennial cellar-dwellers. When he dropped us off at the D’Iberville exit a half-hour later, Kevin thanked me for the history lesson and advised us to hike a couple miles further up the road to the D’Iberville rest area, where he said we’d have a better chance of catching a ride. It was pitch dark, and we were deep in bayou country now, on a desolate stretch of unlit causeway flanked by gloomy swamps and creepy cypress trees draped with Spanish moss.
‘Looks like a great place to dump a body,’ I said to Kalvin, putting up a brave front. I could sense he was as spooked as I was.
‘Or two bodies,’ Kalvin observed grimly. He was right about that. I couldn’t wait to get to the rest area Kevin had told us about. Even if it was deserted, at least there’d be streetlights.
A mile into our hike, to our surprise, a car pulled over to the shoulder thirty yards ahead of us. Thinking no one would stop for us on the narrow causeway, we hadn’t even tried to flag it down. ‘Come on, Kalvin, we just got lucky!’ I said, sprinting toward the tail-lights. But as soon as we got close the car peeled out, spraying gravel in our faces.
‘Eat dirt, faggots!’ a teenage voice yelled out the window, as laughter erupted inside the car. Faulkner’s yokels of Yoknapatawpha, amusing themselves at our expense. Sunday night fun in the Magnolia State. Get me out of here!
‘Assholes!’ Kalvin shouted, but only after the car was safely out of range. Smart move. The last thing we needed was a bunch of rednecks backing up and breaking out the Louisville sluggers.
‘I’m getting a bad vibe from this place, Kalvin.’ I said. ‘We’re easy targets out here in the dark. I think we’d better just make camp for the night when we get to the rest area.’
Kalvin agreed, but when we reached the rest area parking lot the road had another surprise in store for us. The lone car in the lot was a beat-up old Ford Falcon, and behind the wheel sat a stocky guy with a wispy black moustache who was squinting at a road map in the feeble glow of the car’s dome light. As we walked past, he rolled down his window and waved us over.
‘Heading to New Orleans, are you?’ he smiled, nodding at the sign in Kalvin’s hand. ‘Hop in if you want a lift. My name’s Bear. Don’t worry, I’m no psycho. Just a wayward Inuit, on my way to work an oil rig in Texas. Be passing right through New Orleans in a couple of hours, so long as this beater holds together.’
I grinned at Kalvin, and he grinned right back. Decision made. Neither of us was looking forward to camping in a swamp overnight. Now we had a shot at making it to New Orleans in time to score a bed at a Rescue Mission. Which was hard to believe, considering it had taken us the entire day to make it sixty miles down the road from Mobile.
‘Sounds mighty good to us, Bear,’ I said. ‘I’m Pete, and that’s Kalvin.’
I climbed in beside Bear, and Kalvin squeezed into the back, shifting some of Bear’s toolboxes to make room. ‘You boys like Red Hots? Help yourself,’ Bear said, nodding at a five-pound jumbo bag of hard candies on the seat between us – a bag that was already half-empty. ‘I been suckin’ on Red Hots all the way down here from my sister’s place in Boston. They keep me awake better than coffee.’
Which explained the rustling sound I kept hearing whenever I shifted my feet. I glanced down between my knees and, sure enough, the floorboard was carpeted with cast-off candy wrappers.
I grabbed a handful and passed some back to Kalvin. We’d gone hungry all day. Any food was welcome. Even if it set our mouths on fire.
I told Bear he was the first Inuit I’d ever met, though I’d been curious about Inuit culture ever since my parents took us to see Nicholas Ray’s The Savage Innocents at the Commack Drive-In when I was twelve. Bear let out a derisive hoot and said, ‘Yeah, I caught that movie on late-night TV at a motel up in Anchorage years ago and laughed my ass off. Anthony Quinn as an Inuit. Only in Hollywood.’
Quinn had played an Inuit named Inuk, who welcomes a visiting missionary priest into his igloo and offers him the traditional tokens of hospitality – a meal of whale blubber and a tumble in the bearskin rugs with Inuk’s wife. The priest turns his nose up at the offered food, and scoffs at the idea of having sex with Inuk’s wife. Insulted by the priest’s refusal, Inuk flies into a rage and kills him, and spends the rest of the film on the run from a Canadian Mountie played by Peter O’Toole. It wasn’t one of Nick Ray’s more successful films at the box office, but in its own way it pursued the same theme that he’d explored to greater acclaim in Rebel Without a Cause – society’s intolerance for those who won’t abide by its repressive rules.
As luck would have it, a dozen years later, I had the pleasure of meeting Nick Ray one evening at the Lion’s Head and he had a good laugh when I told him my parents had made me and my kid brothers cover our eyes during the scene in The Savage Innocents where Inuk’s wife goes into labour and gives birth to a wailing infant on the igloo floor. Ray said my parents weren’t the only ones squeamish about the childbirth scene. The studio had urged him to tone down its unflinching realism, but Ray had flatly refused. Back then he had enough clout in Hollywood to get away with it. Those days were long gone, however. When I met him in 1973, Ray was in his early sixties and had fallen on hard times.
Drinking and drug use had cost Nick Ray his last teaching position, leaving him without access to the equipment he needed to complete the editing of his work-in-progress, a film called We Can’t Go Home Again. When I heard about his predicament, I thought maybe I could help. One of the authors I was working with at Harcourt Brace during those days was a documentary filmmaker named Lee Bobker, whose filmmaking textbook The Elements of Film was in the process of being updated for release in a second edition. Lee Bobker had a state-of-the-art film studio in midtown, with the latest word in editing equipment – a Steenbeck digital editing console. When I mentioned to Nick Ray that I might be able to get him access to a Steenbeck, his bleary eyes lit up with interest. But then he ruefully admitted he couldn’t afford to pay for studio time. I told him to let me see what I could do. When I made a call to Lee Bobker and explained the situation, he graciously offered Ray free after-hours access to his editing room. Ray was delighted, of course, and I was so proud of myself for brokering the deal I’m surprised my big head didn’t split my hat. Unfortunately, I never crossed paths with Nick Ray again. But six years later, when I read the sad news that he had died of lung cancer, I flashed back on our brief encounter and was glad I’d done what little I could to help him when I had the chance.
Thirty miles outside New Orleans, Bear announced that he had to stop and make a call to his union’s shape-up office to find out when he was scheduled to report to his new job in Texas. He turned off the highway at Slidell, Louisiana, and pulled into a truck stop to use a pay phone. ‘Sit tight, boys, I’ll be right back,’ he told us. Ten minutes later, he returned bearing gifts – coffee and snack cakes for both of us. But he also brought bad news. The union had switched his job assignment, and he’d been told to turn around and report to Mobile instead of Brownsville, Texas. Which meant Slidell was the end of the line for Kalvin and me.
It turned out Kalvin had once lived in Slidell, so he took the lead as we set off from the truck stop to find a campsite – New Orleans would have to wait until morning. Meanwhile, both of us were still hungry. Bear’s handout had only whetted our appetites. Kalvin had an idea where to score some free food and he led the way to a Dunkin’ Donuts shop about a mile down the road from the truck stop. ‘The dumpster in back should have plenty of stale doughnuts we can scavenge,�
�� Kalvin predicted. He was right, too, but as soon as we popped the dumpster’s lid we nearly gagged. Some righteous Dunkin’ Donuts asshole had bum-proofed the trash with a jug of Clorox. The smell of bleach was so strong it made our eyes water. Slamming the lid in disgust, we walked away cursing. Two human vermin, successfully repulsed. Then, as if that wasn’t discouraging enough, the sky opened up and suddenly began pelting us with chilly rain.
Kalvin made a run for it, and I followed him through the dark streets of a ramshackle neighbourhood until he pulled up short in front of a sagging old Victorian house with boarded-up windows and a half-collapsed roof.
‘This might work,’ Kalvin said. ‘Looks abandoned. Let’s check it out.’
The front of the place was well secured with plywood, but when we circled round back the porch door was hanging open, half off its hinges. We crept up the porch steps and dug out our lighters to look inside. The house smelled of mildew and charred wood, and there was rainwater cascading into the kitchen through a jagged hole in the roof. Skirting the edge of the big puddle beneath the hole, we worked our way warily toward the front of the house, looking for a dry spot to crash. The floors were littered with crushed beer cans and crumpled cigarette packs and empty pint bottles of Thunderbird, so it was obvious we weren’t the first squatters to seek shelter there. I half-expected we’d turn a corner and scare the bejesus out of some poor wino in his bedroll, but it turned out we had the place to ourselves – at least for the moment.
The house’s carpeted bedrooms all reeked of mildew, so we bedded down on the parlour’s plank wood floor. I was warm enough in my overcoat, but our dash through the rain had left Kalvin shivering with cold. Luckily, the parlour’s windows were hung with heavy brocade drapes. We ripped down a pair and shook the dust out so Kalvin could use them as blankets. Then we turned in for the night and let the white noise from the kitchen waterfall lull us both to sleep.
I stayed dead to the world for hours, but at some point, deep in the night, I felt something strange going on. When I jerked awake, I was shocked to find a ferret-faced wino with sour breath kneeling over me in the shadows, rummaging through my coat pockets with his greedy little hands. ‘Get the fuck off me!’ I shouted, and shot an elbow to his throat. I caught him square in the windpipe, and when he tumbled backwards I heard him hit the wall. Next thing I knew, he was on his feet again, clutching his throat and croaking like a gigged bullfrog as he ran splashing through the kitchen and out the back door.
Amazingly, Kalvin snored on serenely, an arm’s length away, throughout the entire incident – just like my brother Steve had slept through my father’s performance the night he threatened to carve me up for sandwiches. I saw no point in waking him. One of us might as well get some rest and it surely wasn’t going to be me. I knew I’d be up the rest of the night, jacked on adrenaline, keeping watch in case the wino returned with a brick to collect some payback. I would just have to wait impatiently to share the blow-by-blow with my snoring sidekick. Hey, Kalvin, you slept through all the fun!
New Orleans, at last! After seven days on the road, there I was, standing in the noon rush on Canal Street, digging the sweet tropical air that Jack Kerouac said feels like soft bandanas, with a dopey stoner’s grin on my face and the scent of marijuana still clinging to my clothes – and Kalvin standing right beside me, equally wrecked.
It had been quite a trip from Slidell. We’d waited all morning to catch a ride out before finally hitting the jackpot with a young welder from Biloxi, who welcomed us into his smoke-filled Ford Galaxy and plied us with Dixie beers and Oaxacan sensimilla all the way across Lake Pontchartrain. By the time we got to the French Quarter, we were slit-eyed and wasted. And hungrier than ever.
‘Man, I wish we had some money,’ Kalvin said. ‘I could go for a big plate of rice and beans.’
‘I hear you, Kalvin,’ I nodded. ‘Right now, I’d give my left nut for a fried oyster po-boy. Maybe we should find a blood bank and raise some quick cash selling plasma.’
Neither of us had ever sold blood before, but Kalvin said he was game, so we set off through the French Quarter, heading for Jackson Square Park to consult the experts. I knew the park was a daytime hangout for the Quarter’s street people. A decade earlier, during our cross-country road trip, Kate and I had stayed at a bed-and-breakfast just blocks from Jackson Square and I still remember how relentlessly we’d been panhandled whenever we’d crossed through the park on our way to the Riverwalk. No doubt we’d find some tramp there who could give us the scoop on the local blood banks.
Cutting through the lunchtime crowds, we hustled down cobblestone streets that echoed with the clip-clop of horse-drawn carriages and the come-on calls of the Lucky Dog vendors, whose comical, wiener-shaped food carts sat steaming on nearly every corner. Ten minutes later we were huddled up on a park bench beside a white-haired old black wino, who kindly tore a scrap from the brown bag that held his pint of port so that I could jot down his directions. He told us the closest blood bank was on Canal Street, just south of the Quarter – which wasn’t far. But hiking there was pure torture. We must have passed two dozen restaurants along the way and each one smelled more appetising than the last. By the time we got to the blood bank the antiseptic smell in the waiting room was actually a welcome relief. But the sour-puss receptionist promptly sent us packing when we couldn’t produce picture ID, and that was the end of that.
‘Let’s see if I can bum us a few smokes at least,’ Kalvin ventured, approaching two leather-faced tramps on the sidewalk outside the blood bank. They handed over a couple of cigarettes and we stood around bullshitting with them while we smoked.
‘Haven’t seen you boys around before,’ the bearded one said. ‘Just hit town?’
We admitted we had, and glumly told them how we’d just struck out in the plasma centre.
‘You boys should head over to the Traveller’s Aid office at the train station,’ the other tramp suggested. ‘Don’t need picture ID with those folks. Just tell ’em you’re broke and stranded. They’ll hook you up with food and lodging vouchers for five nights at the Oz. All-expenses paid,’ he chuckled.
‘The Oz?’ I asked. Had we reached the end of the Yellow Brick Road already?
‘Yup, that’s what everyone calls it. The real name’s somethin’ longer, don’t ask me what. But the first two letters are O and Z, so we call it the Oz. Catholics run it, but it ain’t a bad flop.’
The Amtrak station was out near the Superdome. We found our way to the Traveller’s Aid Society office on the concourse and told our stories to the sweet little woman at the counter, who bobbed her blue-rinsed head in sympathy and gave us some forms to fill out. Then she asked if we had any ID. I had nothing to show except the hitchhiking ticket I’d been issued in Florida, but she said that was good enough. Thank God I saved it, I thought to myself. Kalvin followed suit and dug out a desk appearance ticket he’d been issued for shoplifting in Miami. Easy as that, we collected two vouchers for the shelter and a mimeographed map to help us find our way there from the train station.
The Traveller’s Aid lady told us we were eligible for Greyhound tokens, too, if we could contact a friend or relative willing to reimburse the society for the cost of a ticket. She said we could use her desk phone to call anyone we thought might sponsor us. Kalvin’s face lit up when he heard her offer, and he immediately called his aunt in northern Louisiana, who gave the Traveller’s Aid lady the go-ahead to issue him a bus ticket to Winsboro. He could finally give his thumb a rest. I was happy for the kid. And a little envious, too.
When Kalvin got off the phone, I asked if I could make a call to San Francisco to let a friend know I’d been delayed on the road. I wasn’t planning to ask Tanner to spot me a bus ticket, but I figured he’d be wondering why I hadn’t turned up on his doorstep yet. The Traveller’s Aid lady said no problem, so I dialled information, got Tanner’s number and called to break the news that I was running behind schedule. Whereupon Tanner broke some news of his own, and it wa
sn’t good. His condo project had run into problems with the planning commission and his permits had been denied. His architect was preparing revised plans, but Tanner had no idea how long it would take to get them approved. Meanwhile, the job site was shut down and he had no work to offer me.
‘Sorry, Hat,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see this coming.’
That makes two of us, I thought, my brows knitting into a frown. But I swallowed my disappointment and told Tanner not to sweat it. I’d work something out once I got to California. This time, however, I knew better than to forecast my arrival. ‘I’ll see you when I see you,’ I said, no longer in any big hurry.
‘Bad news?’ Kalvin asked, reading my face as I hung up.
‘Bad enough,’ I said. ‘My job in Frisco just fell through.’
Kalvin shook his head. ‘That’s a bummer. What are you going to do now?’
‘Push on to California and take my chances, I guess. But I think I’ll kick back in New Orleans for a few days and rest up before I hit the road again. Anyway, don’t worry about me. Let’s get you on your way to Winsboro.’
At the bus station, Kalvin got lucky again – there was a Greyhound to Winsboro leaving within the hour. While we waited for his boarding call, I asked him what he planned to do once he got home.
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