Thirty Two

 

June 12-14, 1974

My plan was to start the return trip to Buffalo on June 15th.  This would give me three days to tour the sites of Los Angeles and rest my thumb and the rest of my body.   

If there was a positive about the motel embarrassment, it was that I was not far from places in Los Angeles that I’d been told to see.  CBS Television City and the Farmers Market Place, two such sites, were within walking distance of the motel.  

I was still miffed at Steve and, to a lesser extent, his old bohemian cousin.  There is nothing attractive about sensing that others consider you an unwelcome parasite-particularly when you’d been told you would be welcomed.  I’d shake the lingering resentment. I was, however, sufficiently annoyed in the morning to consider charging the breakfast in the motel affiliated diner to the already paid for room.  If I thought it would have been a good clean dig, I would have consumed the most expensive item on the menu, left a big tip, and signed the room number.  I didn’t do it -- not because I am a class act-- but because I thought if I had, it might contribute to any notion that I was a sponge.   I did feel just fine about letting the old bohemian pay for the long distance call I’d made the night before. “Just wanted to check in with Steve” I would have told him if we’d had another encounter. “Wanted to let him know how it all worked out.” 

There was no such encounter.  I took a long hot shower in the room and then made my way to the Farmer’s market, a mile or so away from the motel. Then literally less than five minutes from the Market was Television City.   The CBS tour was cool. I saw the sets of various shows and got a glimpse of the real Lucille Ball who was around the studio preparing for something.  There were gasps among the group on my tour when we saw the star. Very red hair on Lucy.  She smiled and waved at the oohing tourists.  When the group moved on from where she had been standing, I was surprised to hear the tour guide make comments that were thinly disguised jabs about Ball’s eccentricities and demands. 

After the tour I moved on to UCLA which would be home base for the next few days.  The school was only five miles from Television City.   It was finals time at the university and the student services staff had set up a comfort lounge in the campus center for students anxious about exams.  It was a large room where there were chairs, couches, counselors, free donuts and coffee.  In addition to being a refuge for frazzled students the space also welcomed travelers who needed comfort and, even a place to sleep.  Such a lounge would not exist in 2019, but in 1974 it was not unusual.  We had a similar room at the University of Buffalo that welcomed all who needed something approaching a home base.  

On one wall of the lounge was a large map of the United States tacked to a bulletin board.  On it travelers pinned notes indicating that they needed a ride or riders.  You could write your name and destination and whether you were looking for riders or a ride and leave contact information. There was no e-mail then, nor cell phones so you had to either have a local phone number or check the map periodically.  I looked to see if anyone was going to Buffalo or thereabouts. There were far more people looking for rides than there were drivers looking for riders. I didn’t see anything that would work for me and vacillated about whether I would follow-up if I did. Part of the adventure of hiking was to take your chances. Prearranging a ride seemed like a sort of cheating. The issue was moot, however, as no driver was going my way.

I sat in the lounge and took advantage of the coffee.  I met a few others who were passing through.  There was a fellow and his brother from Brooklyn who’d driven all the way from the east and were taking off in a day or two to go up to San Francisco and then Seattle.  These two were really scarfing up the donuts. They’d stopped in Las Vegas on the way west and, between chewing and swallowing, told me tales of their gambling prowess.  I was intrigued. They had a strategy for blackjack which I listened to with amusement. The brothers Brooklyn, as I started to think about them, told tales of the eccentric people they met on the strip.  They asked about my journey and were excited to hear about the characters I’d met. I pulled out the log I had been keeping and regaled them for an hour or so.  Eventually, they left for a motel room in Westwood. It was late by then, so I conked out on a couch among a cluster of other hikers similarly checking out for the night.

The next morning I met Morris the cat.  Morris was the feline star of a series of commercials for 9Lives cat food. I’d decided to take the Universal Studios tour, an attraction that was dubbed a must-see destination by my San Francisco relatives, Maurianne, and even one of the proselytizers in San Luis Obispo.   Meeting Morris was part of the tour. A trainer told several corny jokes while explaining how they did the cat food commercials. In person the cat was docile and cute.  In the commercials, Morris was a finicky cat who wouldn’t eat any other cat food but 9Lives. The real Morris seemed willing to eat almost anything the trainer fed him in order to get Morris to respond for the tourists.  Hmm. I wondered.  Is that how we behave? Get some tasty reward and then perform for whomever it is we encounter.  Respond positively to pleasant stimuli and then do tricks for the benefactors. Become finicky when we don’t get what we need.

I decided to skip the Chinese theater and Hollywood and Vine.  By the time the bus from Universal studios returned to UCLA I was not up for any more touring. I went to the Pauley Pavilion where the great UCLA basketball teams played and got into several pick up basketball games.  It was a thrill to make baskets at the same hoop that Lew Alcindor, by then Kareem Abdul Jabbar, had scored.    One of my teammates was a student named Josh Becker. We got to chatting after our games and I learned he was leaving school the next day for his home north of San Francisco. He said I was welcome to stay in his dorm room that night as opposed to the homeless lounge.  His roommate had already left for home. Josh told me the room was bare as he was all packed up, but at least I would have some privacy and a mattress.  I was a bit skeptical of whether this was an offer without any quid pro quo, but there were none. He took me up to the room which was indeed bare. He said that not only could I sleep in his roommates’ bed, but I’d have the whole room to myself, since he himself would not even be there that night. Becker had a girlfriend and intended to stay with her.   I took him up on the kind offer.  He also said I could stay the next night when it was completely vacant and I did that as well.

I woke up in Josh’s room the morning of the 14th and started my final preparation for hiking east.  I did a wash in the dorm laundry room and my duds were grateful.  I checked my map and identified the most desirable and likely hiking route to Buffalo.  I spent time on the log I’d discussed with the brothers Brooklyn.  I put big stars on the map to indicate where I had stayed up until then. June 14th was day 16 of the journey.  I figured I’d be back at the earliest by June 21st and made notes about mileage goals for each day’s hiking. I reaffirmed my commitment never to hike at night because I thought a different breed of cat picks up riders at night than those who pick up in the daytime.  By one in the afternoon I was all mapped and packed up.

I had some time so I finagled my way into a gated outdoor pool for students.  I’d gotten a hold of the novel, The Andromeda Strain and started reading it by the pool. A scary book that.   There were few people by the pool and I began to think of Morris the cat. I was feeling crabby, finicky and lonely. Lonely comes with the territory of hiking by yourself. The prospect of the looming 3000 miles between the pool and Buffalo, fueled a composite of “what am I doing here and why did I do this."  Like Morris, I needed some stimulus to get me moving and stop being crabby.

 

Becca and I had made a pact that there would be no phone calls while I was gone.  She said, and it made sense, that she did not want to be waiting to hear from me because that could ratchet up her anxiety if she did not hear from me.  By agreeing not to call she would never anticipate a call.  But this sudden surge of disconnect surfaced and I thought she would not mind if I broke our agreement.  I walked toward the homeless lounge where I’d noticed a number of pay phones. 

Becca didn’t mind the call. She oozed warmth and love and said she was relieved to hear from me and anxious to know where I was and if I was alright.  I told her I was fine, but was lonely. She said she missed me. She asked when I would be back and I told her that I was leaving the next day and my best guess was that I could be back as early as the 21st but could be the 22nd or 23rd.  We agreed somewhat reluctantly not to call each other again until I returned, but both said it was good that I had called when I did. It was a gooey conversation. We said we loved each other and I felt better.  Like Morris. I was ready for tricks.  

I almost decided to forego the homeless lounge, but it was right there a few steps from the phone booth. Maybe the brothers Brooklyn would be there eating donuts.   They were not. Nobody except a couple of attendants were. A man and a woman watching the area.  For the heck of it I walked up to the map to see if any drivers were going my way. None were. But I saw a note that made me take a step back. A woman was seeking a ride to Oklahoma City.  With the same pin she’d used to attach her note to the bulletin board, she’d pinned a photo.  I had met this person. I emitted a startled laugh and looked again.   

I went up to the attendants and inquired.

“She got a ride.” Said a young man behind a desk.

“She did?”

“That surprise you?”  

“I guess not.” I said.

“She posted that picture on the bulletin board sometime this morning and sat here for an hour or two.  Then a guy came up to her. They talked. She picked up her pack and left with him. She had a few copies of the picture. Gave me one in case someone asked about riders.”

"Craig here likes to take it out and look at it now and again." said the woman attendant.

Craig snorted. I returned to the bulletin board and stared at the photo.  It was absolutely she. The young woman in the photo was wearing a revealing low cut top.  You could clearly make out the moon and the star tattoo on her right breast.  I removed the pin that was holding the note and photo. I took the picture and flipped it over. There was a phone number and name written on the back. 

I put the photo in my wallet, returned to the dorm room, finished The Andromeda Strain and was spooked. I slept fitfully until I got up about 5. By 530 I was out on the highway with my thumb out.