My Appetite For Destruction (2 page)

A
fter such banishment, what could possibly send Mom crawling back to my grandmother? It’s simple: she had no other choice. We were freezing and starving. We needed to eat, and we needed someone to clothe us and keep us warm.

Now, Grandma wasn’t totally heartless, but before she agreed to help my mom, she made it clear that certain conditions must be met. First, my brother and I had to change our names to adhere to the strict Jewish custom that I mentioned that allows no newborns to be named after living people. So to please Big Lilly, my mother renamed us. I was now Steven, and my brother was Kenny.

Grandma Lilly’s second condition was pretty radical: Mom had to give me up. I was to live with and be raised by Big Lilly and my grandpa “Stormin’ Norman.” I literally became their son and spent most of my childhood under their care. Mom couldn’t believe her son was being stolen away from her by
her parents.
I remember my mother’s constant sobbing during this time when she’d be allowed to visit me. With an innocent child’s perception I’d be thinking, “Ma, what’s wrong? Ain’t you happy to see me?”

My mom was completely crushed. It wasn’t that I was her favorite or anything like that, it was just that I was her darling towheaded son, and that was enough. Now, I don’t know about you, but that rates right up there for all-time fuck-yous. It was payback time, and Big Lilly wanted to show my mom that Italians aren’t the only masters of revenge.

A
t this point in my life, I was pretty much like the free spirit in that song by the Doors, “Wild Child.”

Not your mother’s or your father’s child

You’re our child, screamin’ wild . . .

I was one wild, crazy, fucked-up kid, a born contrarian. Anything, and I mean
anything,
I was told to do, I would instantly do the opposite or just completely reject it.

My earliest memories are of my getting into trouble. I was kicked out of school during the first week. I gathered up and threw wooden blocks as hard as I could at the window. I still remember the sound it made. At any moment the glass could have shattered. I kept laughing at the way the other kids would wince at the sound. Fuck ’em.

As soon as the teacher stopped me from doing that, I tricked some kid into helping me get something out of a closet filled with board games and toys. As soon as he stepped in front of me, I backed off and slammed the door, locking him in.

He immediately had some severe claustrophobic episode. He started screaming at the top of his lungs and pounding on the door. To compound things, the teacher couldn’t find the key to the door right away, and the whole class became freaked out listening to this kid lose his shit.

When the teacher tried to discipline me, I threw a temper tantrum and pushed her as hard as I could. It seemed like I was locked into this other world and every time teachers told me to do something, they threatened the universe I lived in, and I had to fight them with all my might to defend my world. How dare they be a menace to the galaxies I ruled?

To their credit, the school principal and the teachers believed I had a likable side but had some control issues. They put up with an awful lot for a little time, and then they expelled me from preschool.

R
egardless of my behavior, Big Lilly was determined to spoil me. She really did everything for her little bratty, impulsive grandson. But sometimes I’d go too far even for her and she would ship me downstairs to be with Kenny and Mom. This was when the whole family lived in the same claustrophobic complex in Cleveland. Of course it took only a day before I would get on Mom’s nerves and she would send me to my room. Now, that’s not going to work, Mom.

I would just open the window and scream out, “Grandma. Grandma!” We lived on the fifth floor and my grandma lived on the ninth. She’d come down, forgetting all about the terror I had been the previous day, and run to my defense. She always stuck up for me. She seemed to take pleasure in ordering my mom around and demanding I not be punished because I was “a very sweet boy.”

She delighted in seeing Mom squirm. Mom was livid with the way Grandma Lilly and I would gang up on her, and there was really nothing she could do about it. When I’d get back upstairs, I could do no wrong until I wore Big Lilly down again.

O
ne of my mom’s older sisters lived in California. They used to keep in touch over the phone at least twice a week. Whenever they talked, my aunt would always tell my mom how great it was to live in Southern California. She would excitedly brag about the weather, the beautiful beaches, the ocean, canyons, and mountains. You could do anything at any time, because it was always sunny and warm, even in the winter.

Eventually this got my mom thinking about busting a move out of Cleveland, where, in all honesty, things couldn’t have gotten much worse for her. One day, Mom started asking her sister about job openings, and my aunt was ready. She grabbed the paper and actually started to rattle off openings she had circled out of that day’s classified ads.

Mom would usually tell us all about their chats after she got off the phone. When she was on the phone with her sister her voice would actually get sweeter and go up about an octave. She’d even speak faster and we could tell she was getting more and more excited with each call.

Finally, the chance for a fresh start and a new life overcame any fear or reservations she had. Moving was something she had been mulling over for months, and one day, when I was having dinner at her place, she just sat us down.

I’ll never forget the look on her face. She took each of her boys by the hand and told us we were going on an adventure. We were going to visit her sister out in California, and maybe even stay out there if things went right.

The fact that she picked one of the coldest, windiest, wettest days of the winter to tell us certainly sealed our approval. Kenny and I were all for it. I never saw my mom so wired. She talked about our move nonstop. Maybe that was to hide how scared she was during this whole time. She would make lists, then make more lists, then tear them up, make some phone calls, and start a new list.

She read travel brochures on Southern California. Then she boxed up everything we owned, from her sewing kit to the salad bowl, and labeled it all with Magic Markers. The entire time she had this look in her eye, like a runaway train. God pity anyone who got in her way. That’s probably why I never heard Big Lilly put up a fight for me when the time came to head out.

I could feel the excitement as the date neared. This golden opportunity to get a bad start behind her and begin again with a new home gave her boundless energy. She could have sprinted to L.A. So, at the lucky age of seven, we drove to California to get a fresh shot at life.

Made up my mind to make a new start,

Going to California with an aching in my heart.

—”
GOING
TO
CALIFORNIA
,”
LED
ZEPPELIN

M
om found us a tiny apartment in North Hollywood. This began a second series of long phone conversations, but this time it was with her boyfriend from Cleveland, Melvin Adler. A month later Mel showed up with a huge suitcase and a big smile. Mel and the suitcase never left. Even though we were literally living on top of one another it somehow worked out so well that in 1973, Mom and Mel got hitched.

I
n 1975, Mel and my mom became the proud parents of a baby boy, Jamie. Just before mom had Jamie, Mel believed it was time for us to officially become one big happy family. He spoke with Mom, then asked Kenny and me if he could adopt us. We were thrilled and had our surname legally changed to Adler.

Jamie lit up our world. I loved my little brother so much I decided that I was going to protect him. Next to his crib was a small couch where I slept every night with a switchblade in my hand.

Nobody was going to bring any harm to my little brother ever. I’d kill them if they tried. I’ll never forget the flash of alarm in my mom’s eyes when she spotted the knife, but just as she was about to explode, she caught herself and leaned over to kiss me gently on the head.

Somehow my parents knew this was just a phase and they never freaked out about the knife. Long after I stopped guarding Jamie, I continued babysitting him and even changed his diapers (well, just a couple of times . . .).

With Mel and my mom both working we were able to move into a bigger house in Canoga Park. Mel got a steady job, one he held until he became very ill in 1991, as a chief clerk for the Southern Pacific Railroad. Mom worked as a waitress at a restaurant called Two Guys from Italy. (What the hell is it with Mom and Italians?) Since most of Mom’s family, her three sisters and a brother, had now settled in California, my grandparents soon followed suit and moved to Hollywood.

W
hile I couldn’t have been closer to Jamie, I had to share a bedroom with Kenny, and we could not get along. We really hated each other. We fought all the time. He was always taunting me. It may have just been a run-of-the-mill sibling rivalry but it soon got way out of hand. He would tease the hell out of me and push me to my limits. I’d put up with all I could take, then fight back as fiercely as possible.

He was a lot bigger than I was, so I often found myself on the losing end of our brawls. And it wasn’t always a physical battle; many times it was mental torture too.

Like when Kenny had this paper route. He saved up enough to buy a cheap used TV. At night, he would turn the volume way up and position the set where I couldn’t see it from my side of the room. He’d be laughing at
The Tonight Show
or whatever while I just lay awake unable to see the TV screen or get to sleep.

One time I got so furious with him that I smacked him with a tennis racket in the back of his head with all my might. He keeled forward in the bedroom like he had been shot. Good thing he collapsed on the bed. Kenny didn’t move for like five minutes. He suffered a concussion and I really caught hell from Mom, who screamed at me for an hour.

W
e were complete opposites in every way. Kenny resembled our dad, olive skinned, dark haired, and heavyset. I was thin and light like Mom. We never went to the same school at the same time. It always worked out that when I’d be entering junior high or whatever, he’d be graduating. In class he was shy and introverted. I, however, was very outgoing. I made the class laugh and made friends easily, usually hanging out with older kids who were almost my brother’s age. Kenny preferred to hide out in our room, reading comic books and watching TV. He was content to do that all the time.

Things hadn’t changed much from my kindergarten days. I would get in trouble nearly every day. I was still getting in fights and talking back to teachers. My mom received calls from the faculty. Teachers, coaches, classmates, the custodian—I didn’t take shit from anybody.

M
om and Mel were constantly trying to figure out ways my loner brother Kenny could make new friends. So one summer they sent my brother and me to one of those Hebrew summer camps. Clear Creek I think was its name. I got there and just went nuts. Poked around, made fast friends with everyone, then fast enemies. I was so bored by the end of the first week that I thought I was going to go insane. So I did.

I’ve always had an imagination that lets me visualize doing something or being something before even a hint of it happens. Sometimes it serves me well, like when I told Slash we were going to be huge rock stars, but most times it’s just the forecaster of doom. My doom. Big doom.

At the end of the second week, when they had “family day,” my parents proudly came to visit. They were expecting to hear fun stories about what a great time we were having. They were expecting the counselors to tell them what swell kids we were. They thought they were getting a lovely day out in nature.

They got something else. Mom and Mel sat there numbly as the counselors told them I had been running wild in the camp and had probably been the one who stole $300 from one of the camp counselors while she was in the shower.

Can you imagine the shock on my mom’s face? One moment she’s walking along this idyllic tree-shaded lane with Mel. She meets us at the lakefront, all adorable with little Sunfish sailboats bobbing in the background. She sits down to hear the camp counselor telling her that I’m a thief and a liar.

I had already denied it—they had nothing on me—and besides, I knew who did it.

They pulled a full-on search of the camp. Since I was the usual suspect when it came to evil and mayhem, they interrogated me about the missing cash. Three male teenage counselors held me down and forcibly searched me. Needless to say, a situation like that could easily provoke a lawsuit today. I was barely ten.

They didn’t find the cash, and I was tempted to act outraged and demand my parents seek some kind of restitution, but in the end, this little demon that nests in my head received a sharp pang of guilt. That girl counselor looked like walking death. It must have been her life savings.

Yeah, I knew who did it. I did it. But honestly, it was just for kicks. I was so fucking bored by the second week, I wanted to spice things up. So I bought a shitload of candy with some of the money I stole but then, instead of stashing it, I gave it out to everyone. I know, brilliant.

Just when they were getting a little shaky over their accusations, I confessed and gave it back of my own free will, minus what I had blown on candy. It was like as soon as I thought I might actually get away with it, then I felt free to confess. I was more into taking it for the sheer thrill of it anyway.