Valerie's Research

Two years ago Valerie surprised me with a copy of my first LP “Distances” as a Christmas present. She found it on Ebay. The seller, who lived in L.A., wanted to know more about the buyer and why she even wanted it. They exchanged personal info about me in their correspondence. The seller was Dan Holt, my old buddy from Wuxtry Records.

When I opened the present I didn’t have the heart to tell her I still had a thousand copies of it in Steve Martin’s basement.

Dan sent extra stuff with the record including a DVD of the film “Docta Ignarantia.” I played a small part in it.

The movie starred a friend of ours named Mark Secunda. Mark was schizophrenic and committed suicide 20 years ago. A lot of people misinterpreted his behavior as comical. He was even beginning to enjoy success at the Funny Bone comedy club.

I remember one evening in the 80s when I was bartending at the Oyster Bar he came to visit. We were both interested in juggling at he’d just progressed to 7 objects. We stood at opposite ends of the dining room juggling across the customers as he attempted to teach me how to do it. He terrified everyone when he started throwing knives.

Video was relatively new in the late 70s when I worked at Wuxtry. Mark, Dan and I would videotape shows adding our own sound track. They were hysterical and I think Dan still has them.

Dan turned me on the great sound track composers. I still listen to Ennio Morricone, Bernard Hermann and John Barry. When Alfred Hitchcock made “Torn Curtain” he started with a Bernard Hermann sound track. Studio heads thought it was too intense and it was replaced. Dan found a recording of Hermann’s version and edited it back in. He was always a purist.

It just goes to show how easily my mind wanders. This entry is really about Valerie’s luck with research.

She was searching YouTube for St. Louis music and came across a TV show my band Delay Tactics did circa 1980-1982. The show was called “Sound Waves” and this one featured us.

I had totally forgotten about it. The music is pretty chopped up but you can still get a sense of how young we were in the interview. I believe I was 22 and already had it all figured out. One day I’ll collect all the old TV and film footage for a YouTube page.

While I’m at it, my friend Red sent me a poster advertising the 20^th anniversary of The Venice Cafe. Jeff Lockheed and Paul Cuba are in the photo. It’s the weekend of August 29. It’s the pic I’m using for this post.

Check out these links-----

Sound Waves with Delay tactics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNIFHzbZRb8&feature

Docta Ignarantia

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig_lFieseG0&feature=related

Blog List

I've started a blog list of my dear friends. 2 more have come to my attention. Sharon's is "Dreaming Aloud Allowed". It features her art and thoughts. Dominic's is "Elsewhere"-- melancholy and nostalgic-- right up my alley. Check 'em out.

Everyone's First Car

My first car was an old, black Pontiac station wagon with a red interior. I was 16 when I bought it for $200.00. I lived in that car, finally freed from the constraints of hitch hiking.

If you ever drive by the intersection of Tucker and Gravois in Soulard you’ll see an old service station that someone has turned into a beautiful garden. It used to be a used car lot.

Gas was .29 a gallon at Bob Riegle’s Texas Discount gas. Cigarettes were .35 a pack. I sound like an old fart don’t I? “Why, when I was your age!”

We did a lot of drugs and cruised up and down Gravois. We found all the secret ways past the flood walls where we could party ‘til sunrise on the riverfront. I never really started drinking until I was well into my 20s.

There was one major exception. My best friend Lora and I would occasionally buy a bottle of Annie Green Springs Apple or Boone's Farm Strawberry wine. We'd have a marathon session in front of a blasting stereo. I've never had a drunk as good as that since. I guess that's the high I keep trying to relive.

We’d have to drive to the East Side where drinking laws were a little more lax to get it.

Lora and I were lovers off and on for years. In our hearts we were always best friends. She taught me a lot. Maybe I should say we learned a lot together. She was surprised when I told her I was marrying Kim because we were lovers at that moment. She came to the wedding though.

When I was 16 we had no idea you were supposed to change your oil every now and then. It was unnecessary anyway. My car burned so much you just added a quart every other day.

One of my hitch hiking trips to the East Coast with Dominic I lent the car to my brother. I don’t think he was legally old enough to drive it. I gave him explicit instructions to check the oil every day. He didn’t and it threw a rod. Some junk yard gave me $20.00 to tow it away. I watched a chapter of my life being towed away.

Tony Patti and I bought a car together after that. I remember what it looked like but I can’t remember where we found it.

When Marie dragged me away I sold my half to Tony. He gave me a carton of cigarettes for it. He couldn’t even drive yet. He lent it to my mother. It exploded and the engine caught on fire in the local supermarket parking lot.

I almost forgot to mention I named the Pontiac "Wild Life" after the Captain Beefheart song.

Negative Mohican

In the 70s my friends and I hitch hiked everywhere. When we were 14 or 15 Dom, Kent and I decided we’d go on a camping trip. We had no idea how to prepare for such a trip. We didn’t care.

Very early one morning we threw a little food and blankets into a back pack, ate a hit of STP, and left my Soulard apartment. We didn’t have a cent on us. Dom and I actually hitched to New York like this.

I’m not sure where we got the STP but it had been described as a “Businessman’s hallucinogen.” You tripped for 4 hours, then back to business. I remember a mild speedy effect but it didn’t matter we were tripping on youth.

Jethro Tull’s “Passion Play” had been out less than a week but we already knew it by heart. Every experience along the way was a scene from the album. Our first stop was Washington State Park and its main dirt road was the “Fulham Road.”

From the top of a hill we could see a perfectly cut path through trees. I think they were going to put up poles for some king of wires. We called it the negative Mohican. We laugh about it to this day. I guess you had to be there.

Our first night we found a sand bar in the middle of the river and slept under the stars. In the middle of the night we awoke to strange noises all around us. In silhouette, against the backdrop of glowing embers from our fire, we could make out a raccoon. One of us shined a flashlight into the dark. We were surrounded by hundreds of them. One of them was carrying our backpack. We ran up to it and it dropped our food only to grab it again. We threw rocks but the raccoons weren’t intimidated by anything. In desperation we lit rolls of toilet paper on fire and lobbed it at them. The next morning we inspected the damage and took inventory. We had a can opener and one can of peas left. We hit the road.

We made it to Elephant Rock Park and then the Johnson Shut Ins. I’m not sure how long we were there but at some point we decided we were starving. The three of us shared the can of peas.

I’ve been trying to remember for years where it was that we were picked up by a moon shiner from Arkansas. Dom says he wasn’t with me but I think it was our return from this trip. I think Dom was sleeping.

I had to throw this post together quickly because my son Dylan and I are leaving for a camping trip of our own. I didn’t tell him we were retracing the steps of that previous trip. Now I have all the latest gear and lots of camping trips under my belt. I wonder if he’ll ever suffer through his own learning experiences without the impediment of adult supervision

Photos are a very young Dominic and a camping trip with my kids.

Teacher Of The Year

I was thinking about a skydiving buddy of mine the other day named Steve . It occurred to me I’d better not use his full name. He made teacher of the year where he lives last year. This post probably wouldn’t help his career.

When I first met him he was president of the oldest skydiving facility in the St. Louis area.

I got my instructor rating out there. I was also on a 4 way team with Steve. It was really a study group because I could never afford to drop everything to compete in the Nationals.

The club was pretty wild. After jumping all day we’d get drunk and party around a bonfire. We’d throw cans of an aerosol hair product called Vavoom into it. It would actually produce a mushroom cloud. We’d dive behind anything we could find to avoid the shrapnel.

There was a straight stretch of highway running along the airport. Sometimes people would surf on the roof of a van as they raced on it doing 50mph.

The club paid for their airplanes by doing demo jumps at the VP fair, the Forest Park Balloon Race, and other local air shows.

Our base of operations for the VP fair was Parks College in East St. Louis. I remember setting off fireworks in the grass at it entrance. The grass caught fire and we almost couldn’t put it out.

I’ll never forget standing on the burned grass when everyone in the club burst into laughter. My fiancée Kim walked toward the group with her mother. Kim was standing beside her older self. It was eerie.

This was the year my friend, and attorney, Kim Tucker spiraled around the north leg of the Arch twice as he landed his canopy. This was the only time anyone had ever done it. He’s the guy I mentioned in an earlier entry that jumped into Busch Stadium as Fredbird.

I drove a beer truck as a casual driver for our local Budweiser distributor back then. One morning I was making a delivery to a drug store. Steve was there looking for medicine for his wife. He looked at me in the truck filled with beer, dropped to his knees with outstretched arms and yelled, “It’s every skydiver’s dream!”

I found this photo at Steve’s school website. It’s another point of view of the Missouri POPS record we broke a few years ago. Steve is in the middle in a black jump suit. I’m at the top in another black jump suit with a gray rig.