Literacy and Longing in L. A. (6 page)

Stray Dogs and Other Companions

“Classic. A book which people praise and don’t read.”

~
Mark Twain (1835–1910)
~

I
drive back to Brentwood in a brooding funk. For the first few miles or so, I work myself into a hyped-up, articulate rant in which my imaginary retorts to Miss Piggy are so blunt and uncomplimentary that I end up getting into terrible trouble. Daggers start flying across her office and, well, you get the picture. Some things are better left unsaid. Then again, some things aren’t. Why IS it that I always think of the perfect thing to say when it’s too late? Like with Fred. There I go again. I’ve got to stop massaging to death that pathetic scenario in the bookstore.

I cruise down the street just beyond Chinatown and
turn on the radio. It’s daylight but the streets have a deserted, menacing quality about them that prompts me to lock my doors. If I could navigate the freeways, this wouldn’t be an issue. When I was a reporter, I’d drive around the neighborhood with a brazen, no-problem attitude, filing stories in an urban sprawl where whites, Latinos, blacks, Middle Easterners, and Asians all live in separate neighborhoods. The melting pot doesn’t exist in this town—people stay in their cars, shielded by metal and tinted glass.

I decide to call Darlene. I don’t feel like going home and dwelling on my failures. Or, for that matter, having to give Virginia an upbeat, bullshit report.

Darlene is happy to hear from me, the way she always is, and my mood starts to brighten.

“Hey, you,” she croons. “Where are you?”

“I’m in our old stomping grounds, near the
Times
.”

“Oh god. Don’t remind me. How did the interview go?”

“Terrific. You want to have lunch?”

“I’d love to. I knew you’d do great. You’re so amazing. Good for you.”

“Great.”

Darlene doesn’t fit in with my other friends, nor would she want to. They think she’s low-rent and bonkers and she thinks they’re shallow and spoiled. They’re both right. My time with her is a welcome respite from the insular life in West Los Angeles. She is the only one of my friends who doesn’t have any credit cards and still doesn’t own a cell phone. Also, Darlene rarely buys books. She goes to the Malibu library to check out her
trashy sci-fi fantasies and romances, which she’s always trying to get me to read.

We normally spend most of our time discussing her newest failed romance or her latest harebrained scheme to make money. This afternoon, it’s a do-it-yourself prefab “Charming Swiss Chalet” kit, which she’s ordered sight unseen from a catalog and which she’s going to build in Big Bear, a mountain resort ninety miles from L.A.—the white trash version of Arrowhead. Darlene has vacationed in Big Bear for as long as I can remember, and the first and last time I accompanied her there we stayed in her friend’s ramshackle, dingy A-frame house by the lake. It was dark and dank, furnished in early kitsch mountain resort with seventies fake wood paneling, a thick, mustard-yellow multicolored shag rug that smelled faintly of mildew, and enough water damage to lead me to believe this was not a good place to be in a rainstorm. The walls were covered with homey sayings in needlepoint, like “There’s no place like fucking home” and “Hello, where’s the beer?” and there was a cramped, cluttered kitchen with ancient windows that spewed shards of paint flakes when you tried to open them.

The house was located in the kind of bedraggled mountain neighborhood where there were no sidewalks and people’s lawns were cluttered with rusted swing sets, mattresses with springs poking through, Big Wheels, firewood, tires, and other junk that usually is hidden away in garages. Her next-door neighbor had an enormous RV parked on the lawn that was painted an alarming shade of teal and had blotches of seascapes and seals
camouflaging a fading paint job. Our morning walks along weed-lined streets ended up on the main drag where we’d get breakfast at a diner connected to a Gas-and-Shop and watch the kids in the back make gray slushy snowballs. The area had its share of beer-bellied bikers and scuzzy, scratch-assed locals who were still lit at nine a.m. when we’d order our eggs and juice. There is something depressing about a place where life just doesn’t shape up.

I meet her on the beach outside her apartment building, which is advertised as ocean view, but can only be called ocean view if you stand in a corner and look over her neighbor’s garage. Her unit is a one bedroom that faces the street, and whenever I duck in there to use the bathroom, it’s always cluttered with catalogs and paraphernalia from her latest project. Right now the apartment contains sample light fixtures and synthetic rug swatches, not to mention undecipherable blueprints that apparently came with the chalet-building kit.

Last year, Darlene supposedly made a bundle selling porno vampire-themed movie posters over the Internet. She mentioned it a few times, but I always changed the subject. Too weird. In addition, there’s her dog, Brawley, an overweight Rottweiler, who always rushes me for attention or a walk. Darlene only walks him at dawn or at dusk because the dog regularly pees on people instead of the usual lampposts or hydrants.

A few years ago, Darlene underwent a life crisis. Her husband, Mel, got hit by the proverbial lightning bolt one day at the precinct when he first spotted Detective
Maria Gonzales, a member of the Bicycle Co-ordination Unit (BCU) of the Venice Beach Patrol. She was raven-haired, perky, and ambitious, with killer calves. She had an AA degree from Antelope Valley College in Lancaster, north of L.A., and was in line for a promotion to the central bureau. She had her eye on Mel from the moment she met him as he was racing down the stairs to assist her with a homeless drunk perp who was feeling her up as she was taking him down. She was sweet and bubbly to Mel and a bitch to everyone else.

Mel and Darlene were about to celebrate their tenth wedding anniversary when he announced he’d fallen for someone else. “I felt as if my body was taking a punch,” she told me. She begged him to stay, told him she’d change. All to no avail. There was a period of emotional wrangling, but he was out of there by Christmas.

Darlene went into a funk, which lasted six months. Classifieds gave her too much empty time to think, so she quit her job at the
Times
and through a friend of a friend got into the Teamsters, where she is now a driver for the studios. During this period, she met me for a drink a couple of times a week and cried in her beer. The Teamster job is great for her. She went from “Please come back” to “Drop dead.” The pay is terrific and she gets to drive the stars around. But both of us know that, deep down, she’d return it all to have Mel back again.

On her last job, she drove a famous male action star, and Darlene was flattered instead of insulted when he greeted her every morning with “nice tits.” She’s one of the few people who knows My Big Freeway Secret.
Sometimes when I’m desperate and she’s not working, she’ll offer to be my driver. She’s given me several freeway lessons, which have all ended disastrously. The last one we just said “Fuck it,” and ended up in some bar off the 405 swilling beer and laughing uproariously.

That’s the thing about Darlene. She thinks the best of everyone. In fact, I’ve never heard her say a bad word about anyone. She’s still best friends with Mel and I hear that Detective Gonzales is long gone—maybe at some point she and Mel will get back together. At the moment, she likes cute, young guys she meets at Hollywood clubs who are totally inappropriate for her. I’m hoping it’s a passing phase, because inevitably she gets jilted, not to mention the danger factor. Currently, she’s still mooning over her latest disaster.

“He was so gorgeous and awesome Saturday night. He loved my outfit—you know, that yellow miniskirt. But he hasn’t called since he left Sunday morning. I just can’t believe he hasn’t called me.”

“You pick him up in a bar. You bring him home. He hasn’t called? You’re lucky you’re alive.”

“Oh, Dora. You don’t understand. He really liked me.”

I always try to be kind when we get to this point in the conversation, and there is just no good way to say it. She’s almost forty. They’re twenty-five. They like her in the nightclub lights and they come to their senses in the morning. But why bother trying to tell her this. “Darlene, maybe he has a girlfriend and thought better of it the next day. Why can’t you just give someone your own age a chance?”

“You know I don’t like older men, Dora. I don’t find them attractive. They’re so uncool. I’d rather just have moments with someone I’m into than a long, drawn-out relationship with someone who leaves me cold. Anyway, I don’t need a man to support me. I’m just fine the way I am.”

“That’s not the point. It’s nice to have someone to come home to.”

“I could say the same thing to you, Dora.”

“Okay. Forget it.”

We decide to drive back into town, stopping by McKenzie’s first because Darlene wants to get another one of her dumb fantasies that the library doesn’t carry.

I debate whether to tell her anything about Fred. She’d be too enthusiastic, too encouraging, the exact opposite of everyone else in my life. So I say nothing. Really, there is nothing to say anyway.

As soon as we walk into the place, Darlene starts bitching about how expensive all the books are and that anyone knows you can go to Costco and get the same books a lot cheaper. I immediately look around to see if Fred is nearby and if anyone has overheard. Fred is, in fact, across the room helping a flirtatious woman with a book club selection.

Frankly, I’m not a huge fan of this whole phenomenon of book clubs, although the concept is appealing—deep and incisive conversations on the merits of a certain turn of a phrase or an unexpected plot twist. But nobody I know reads the same books I do. They read self-helps and thrillers and bios of movie stars. There’s no end to the crap that’s around. This same crap is made into
movies and pretty soon they won’t even read the crap anymore. So joining one of my friends’ book clubs is out.

I have this fantasy book club in my mind where other people feel as passionately as I do about reading. As if it were a really good kiss. The sheer pleasure and intimacy of having a relationship with a novelist and all the characters is transcendent—even sensual. Certain passages keep resonating in my head long after I’ve closed the book, and I often can’t wait to get back to the story, as if it were a secret lover.

When I tell Virginia this, she thinks it’s all too extreme. She reads, she tells me, to find out what happens. And she doesn’t get half as caught up with the language and the stories behind the stories.

But for me, reading is so much more. Books teach you how other people think, and what they’re feeling, and how they change from ordinary beings to extraordinary ones. Often they are so appealing and intelligent, you’d rather spend time reading about them than doing anything else.

And unlike life, if you don’t like what you’re reading, you can slam the book shut and then…peace. That friendly, cajoling voice is cut off until you decide to open the book again. Which is why I may not be the best candidate for book clubs. I like to read on my own terms, in my own time. And the same goes for in-depth discussions. I’m just too opinionated and outspoken. I’d alienate everyone in the room. No one would like me. They’d kick me out.

My least favorite time to discuss books is on vacation.
Why is it when you are lazing by a pool, in the middle of a tropical paradise, and enjoying your solitude with a great book, someone inevitably has the urge to break into your reverie with “Is that any good? What’s it about?” My inclination is to stalk off, but I give them an uninviting smile and tell them I just started it even if I’m halfway through.

It all reminds me of the time Palmer and I were lounging by the pool in Cabo and spied a couple on the other side reading, sort of, while they lunched and snoozed. When they left to go talk to another couple, Palmer casually walked over to the empty chairs and moved the man’s bookmark about fifty pages or so backward.

“Ha ha,” I whispered, “very funny.” But when they got back, the man settled happily in his chair and resumed reading as if it were right where he left off. Palmer kept nudging me and winking. I miss those things about him.

When Palmer and I first started dating we used to joke about the unspoken hierarchy of readers and the private way in which they tackle a book. At the top of the heap are the purists—people who read to soak up the elegantly constructed literary style and savor the brilliant metaphors, inventive characters, breathtaking imagery, and sparkling dialogue. The story is beside the point. I had a lit prof once who preached that one should always read the end of a novel first so the plot won’t be a distraction.

Not far behind are the academics—readers who never quite got over how they read a book in their freshman English class, underlining or highlighting, turning down
pages, looking up words they’re not familiar with, and scribbling pithy comments in the margins.

The book worshipers come next. They keep their books covered (and not because they’re romance novels), use bookmarks, and absolutely never let the book touch the floor. They look at the book as a sentient being, a living, breathing object of desire that needs to be treated with absolute respect. They read every word, even the footnotes.

Then there are the readers who just want a good old-fashioned story and make no bones about it. They skip over long descriptive passages, skim though digressions, and zero in on who, what, and where to the nth degree. A subcategory of this is people who read books for sex, violence, or any other particular proclivity, and speed-read passages that don’t interest them.

Or how about the multitask readers, those who read while cooking, cleaning, talking on the phone, or driving. Which is stupid—not that I haven’t done it.

The bottom-feeders come next and include the status readers, a group of wannabes who don’t really want to read the book at all but want to be seen with it, like arm candy, the proverbial young blonde on the arm of a tycoon. They skim the book for plot and carry it around like a designer bag. Even worse are the people who listen to audio books, the new version of condensed books, or read novelizations of current movies. These people consider themselves readers, but they’re not. What’s most annoying is when they join in a conversation and act as though they’ve actually read it. I group the narcoleptic
readers in this nonreader category. People who use books as Ambien and have had the same book sitting on their bedside table for the last six months. Also the bathroom readers—you know, the ones with the magazine racks near their toilets that hold old
New Yorker
s,
Chicken Soup for the Soul
books, and dog-eared collections of dirty jokes. I have never personally engaged in this activity because my mother insists that it gives you hemorrhoids. And who would want THAT?