Posts
The
story you are about to read is Part Two of a memoir from a Road Trip From Hell
that took place in 2002. It's full of psychic phenomena, odd
coincidences, and unexplained paranormal weirdness...Enjoy!
All the hair on my body stood on end. I
shuddered in utter disbelief, chills running up my spine. I felt like I was drowning, like my brain was
being sucked slowly and loudly out of my skull. In the midst of it all, my
thoughts came thick and fast.
How was
this even possible…especially after the episode with My Electrical Disturbance?
Why the hell hadn’t I paid attention to
that damn gas pump? More importantly,
how come my apparent clairvoyance had
shown me “Chinatown”, and not the part
about the police pulling us over? What the fuck?
I started crying hysterically again, and at
some point, still in my clothing, fell into a deep, fitful sleep. I awoke
suddenly to blinding desert sunlight and the tinny sounds of ranchera music on
a cheap radio, floating above the roar of
the maid’s vacuum cleaner in the room next door. I took a shower and
tried to apply make-up over my tear-swollen eyes. I was gonna need every bit of
what was left of my feminine wiles to
figure out storing the truck, not to mention getting out of Seligman,
considering the fact that I was twelve bucks away from being flat broke.
Grabbing
a paper cup full of the brown crayon water that was masquerading as coffee in
the lobby, I began trying think coherently about negotiating vehicle storage at
the tow yard, not to mention financing my trip back home.
The Chuck Norris guy greeted me brusquely with
a grunt as I entered his garage. He rolled out from beneath the chassis,
dressed in worn, grease-stained coveralls. Lighting a Marlboro, he repeated his
terms, and then asked if my boyfriend had gotten out of jail. I started weeping
again, snot dribbling out of my nostrils as I recounted the previous nights
events…leaving out the crazy paranormal shit so I wouldn’t sound completely
insane.
“Oh, man…please
don’t cry!” he begged, his demeanor changing unexpectedly,
“ I just cannot handle seeing a woman crying!”
He pulled out a plastic orange crate,
gesturing for me to sit down as he handed me a clean red chamois cloth to wipe
my eyes with and a glass of water.
“You seem like a nice person, “ he said
earnestly, “ I know you’re really upset…and I’m not sure why your boyfriend is
in jail…”
“I’m
not either!” I wailed, lips quivering, snot bubbling out of my nostrils like a
child, “They wouldn’t tell me!”
He
looked me straight in the eyes and told me he would store the truck until James
got out of jail, and only charge me five buck a day instead twenty five, but
that I had to promise to mail him the
cash as soon as I got home. Gratefully
agreeing to his terms, I offered to leave my license as collateral, but waved
his hand in dismissal. Writing me up a receipt, he said a Greyhound bus came
through the town, and let me use the shop phone to make a reservation. The
automated voice stated that the bus only came through Seligman every three
days; apparently, I’d just missed one. Seligman, known as “The Birthplace of Route 66” is located in
Northern Arizona’s Upland Mountains,
“conveniently located” exactly 180 miles away from both Phoenix and The
Grand Canyon…which was a euphemism for “in the middle of nowhere”.
As I hung up in despair, the tow driver told me
I could get a flight from Flagstaff to Phoenix, so I could then fly to LA. I
reached my sister, told her the predicament, and she called back after she’d
booked the flights for me. Wolfing down
the Snickers bar the guy offered me after he called the taxi service, I thanked
him gratefully and profusely for his kindness. Things were actually starting to
look up!
The
“cab” which turned out to be a black 1980’s Cadillac Seville with a burgundy
velvet interior, arrived an hour and change later. The sunburned driver was
portly in a plaid shirt, Polyester pants and a shocking white comb-over.
Holding the door open for me, he told me that the journey to Flagstaff would
take roughly two hours. Shaking Chuck Norris’ hand, I stepped into the car’s
front seat and we took off.
Neil Diamond was playing softly on the radio
as we drove through the barren desert. Thinking of Pa in jail, I felt tears
welling up again. Staring out the window at the scrubby landscape, I tried to
be as silent as possible, just for the sake of being polite.
An
hour or so went by before the cabbie, in a timid voice, ventured,
“Miss?
I know this isn’t any of my business, and I don’t know what happened to you,
but I hope you’ll be all right… I don’t want to pry… but…”
Taking
a measured breath, he continued,
“ I
wanted to let you know that… you’re… the most beautiful woman I’ve ever had in
my cab. I’m a married man, so I don’t… mean anything by this…but, uh, I want to
help, so… this ride is on me”.
I looked over at his sincere face, and burst
into tears again, loudly and for real.
“Thank
you so much!” I sobbed.
We
drove the rest of the way in silence. When he let me out at the Flagstaff
Airport he wouldn’t take a tip, just patted me on the arm in a fatherly way and
wished me luck. Even though the airport
was the size of a postage stamp with only one runway, because the September 11th tragedy had
was still a brand new open wound, the security line was a bitch.
As it happened, I had a Starred Ticket, which meant I was singled
out for “secondary search”. The
extremely thorough agents succeeded in knocking six keys off my brand new
laptop. Then they confiscated all the vintage diaper pins inside my bag. Like,
sure, I was totally planning to hi-jack the plane by brandishing a diaper pin
decorated with a yellow plastic ducky! As they did this, a woman breezed
through the line wearing one of those giant American Flag pins made of beads- and
twenty or thirty safety pins.
“What about her? “ I asked indignantly. “She’s got tons of safety pins on!”
“Oh,
“ the security agent said, “That’s just
jewelry!”
With all the security procedures, I barely
made my plane, which turned out to be a single-engine eight seater. Five
passengers were men, ranging from executives to desert rats, and there was a
pair of newly weds who’d obviously been honeymooning at the Grand Canyon. Their
affection made me lonely for Pa and their clean-cut appearance made me envious.
It was clear that neither of them had never jumped on the hood of a police car
like a lunatic, experienced psychic issues involving popular films, or gotten stranded in a surreal one-horse town
with no money. I felt immensely sorry
for myself and during the bumpy take off, and the crying kicked in again.
I didn’t even notice the incredible turbulence
until the flight attendant started doling out barf bags to everyone- handing me
my bag along with small package of Kleenex. As we flew directly into a vicious
thunderstorm, the plane hurdled up and shot down hundreds of feet like a thrill
ride. Shell shocked, I watched with a detached fascination as huge,
fake-looking white bolts of lightning practically bounced off the wings. Passengers were heaving loudly and the entire
cabin reeked of vomit. The new bride clutched her husband’s hand praying out
loud and the pilot yelled frantically into his headset as the flight attendant
white-knuckled her seat.
After what seemed like forever, the plane
burst out of the storm and into glaring sunlight, making an abrupt descent into
Phoenix. Everyone filed off the plane and onto the tarmac like zombies.
Since I had an hour to kill- and had almost
died- I found the closest bar right away. Gulping down two shots of vodka in
quick succession, I noticed the woman on the stool next to me staring…I’m a fucking wreck. She looked like a Casino Trash Bingo Lady from Laughlin who’d
been a stripper in her youth, with her fried blonde hair and sun–damaged skin
covered in harsh, cheap make up.
“Been
there, done that, got the T-shirt”, she said with a kind, knowing expression
crossing her weathered face.
“Your drinks are on me!” she stated firmly,
ordering me another shot.
I don’t remember the flight back to LA, or
getting home. Immediately I called I called Prescott and learned that Pa had
been transferred to The Yavapai County Detention Facility. I Googled the number and called, waiting
through a series of automated prompts and recordings before I got a human
being. At first, the CO wouldn’t let me talk to him or leave a message,
explaining that inmates couldn’t receive messages unless there was a Verified
Emergency Situation. After I called back six or seven times in quick succession
pretending to be a pregnant spouse, in exasperation the guy finally said he’d
give Pa the message and allow him to place a collect call to me.
Half an hour later, I gladly accepted the
charges, rejoicing in hearing James’ voice. He sounded good in spite of
everything he’d been through: getting shackled with the “4-piece” – the cuffs
and chain arrangement usually reserved for serial killers- while sitting in the
back of a squad car and then on a bench in Prescott waiting to get processed.
He’d gone to jail in ancient, shredded jeans and a T-shirt emblazoned with a
ventriloquist dummy that had a bloody Manson X on its forehead and “Puppet
Terror” in drippy horror movie letters. He didn’t have a cent on him and was
barefoot, so he was booked as an “indigent”. He still hadn’t found out why he
was being held or when he’d be released, but he sounded good. I promised to
wire cash to be put into his commissary account and we phone-kissed. The call
ended far too quickly, but reassured that my lover wasn’t being mistreated; I
slept peacefully for just over twenty-four hours.
The next couple of days were filled with calls
to his mother (who, not surprisingly,
was cautious and suspicious each time we spoke) and cyber-stalking the Yavapai
County Detention Center, to the point that I knew how many employees the place
had and all about the new prison-wide plumbing system that was being installed.
In a couple more days, Pa finally found out
why he was being detained. It turned out that a court summons had erroneously
been sent to an address at which he hadn’t lived at for years. Eventually it turned
into a bench warrant, and the recent passing of the Patriot Act had qualified
any fugitives from justice to be extradited back to the state they’d fled for
trial and/or punishment. So Pa was held in custody in Arizona until New Mexico
sent for his transport, which would land him in the Metropolitan Detention
Center in Albuquerque, until his trail. We’d definitely need a criminal lawyer
to unravel this mess, even though it stemmed from a clerical error.
I was at an absolute loss at how to find a
competent attorney in another state. There were dozens of them listed, but
trying to actually reach one on the phone was impossible. Either the lawyers
would be “busy” and I’d be forced speak to a clueless paralegal who didn’t
understand the situation and apparently never left a message, or it was suggested
I come to New Mexico for a consultation- yeah, right! And then I remembered Mr. V.
I’d known Mr. V for years- he’d gone to
school with one of my sisters. Somehow during a boozy party at her place, Mr. V had pegged me as a libertine, and pulled me aside to confidentially ask me for sexual advice regarding his current girlfriend. Evidently, I counseled him quite well,
because he began calling me every few months to ask my take on getting a girl
to role-play or how to introduce light bondage into a relationship. These calls became regular... like, every time
he had a date (and he was dating a lot)
but they were clean and clinical as opposed to kinky, I didn’t feel creeped
out at all. I was starting to feel like an unpaid sex therapist though. When he called for the third time in one
week, wondering about coercing his latest fling into getting spanked, I joked
that he would have to repay me someday.
Since Mr. V was a former state senator who was currently a lawyer…that time was now.
As
luck would have it, Mr. V was happy to reciprocate, hooking me up with a man
who was supposed to be the best criminal defense attorney in the Southwest; he
even wrote a personal letter of recommendation. The lawyer took the case, but
the court date wouldn’t be set until Pa was extradited back to New Mexico.
Meantime,
James seemed to be having a fine time in the Detention Center, as detailed in
his many letters to me. Along with heartfelt passages about how much he missed
me, he wrote descriptions of day-to-day prison life. Apparently, because I was still calling the
prison constantly to check on his status, I’d become something of a celebrity
among the correctional officers. During the Lights Out rounds, while dragging
his baton along the metal bars, one of them had even taken to clandestinely
whispering out of the side of his mouth, “Hey! your wife called again!”
His
correspondence described all the various inmate cliques: the Mexicans who’d life weights by attaching
plastic trash bags full of water to each side of a broomstick, the trannies who
offered hair cuts to other inmates from their cell-salons, the Meth freaks and
the White Power guys. He wrote about the
shitty food- and the people who served it.
The prison had separate buildings for men and women in the same
compound, and the food-serving trustees worked both sides. For a price, they’d
smuggle foil-wrapped notes (hidden under the lid of the meal plastic
containers) back and forth between lovers who resided in different cellblocks. One letter of Pa's included pencil rubbings of
the tweaker graffiti carved into the metal benches, another was written from
the viewpoint of an ET who’d somehow been incarcerated.
Through
the grapevine, he learned that many of the inmates believed Yavapai County was
shaped like a Pentagram, and that the Sheriff’s office was the very tip of the star. Then there was The Truth Hurts Incident. The only channel the big
screen television in the common room ever played was MTV, all day and night. Pa
just happened to be watching when my video made its debut. All the convicts
were crowded around the TV, whistling
and catcalling at the hip-hop hotties shaking their booties. When I swirled
onto the screen in my sparkly blue and gold costume and veils, undulating in a
“private dance” for Dr. Dre, Pa proudly announced to everyone that I was his
girlfriend. Of course they all thought he
was joking!
He’d
also become the star of a true Big House rags-to-riches story. Because of his
artistic talent, he was now rolling in cigarettes, candy bars, Hostess Cakes,
postage stamps, and Swiss Miss drink packets…. all paid to him gladly by his
fellow inmates. He was doing a roaring business drawing birthday and greeting
cards to send to their mothers, wives and baby-mommas. His work was composed of
intricate pencil drawings decorated with cherubs, hearts and roses colored in
vivid yellows, and reds and greens, using un-cooked Jell-O mix as paint. He even designed a tattoo of a raging bull
for somebody, and then watched it get inked into the guy’s skin by hand. I
could practically see the headlines: Jailhouse
Indigent Makes Good!
On the last day it was possible to extradite
James from Yavapai County to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Albuquerque,
the New Mexico officers showed up. They’d flown over in a Cessna to bring James
back to wait for his trial. Green-faced,
one of the cops was so sick and terrified in the tiny plane that Pa wound up
holding his hand the entire way.
The
jail there was vastly different than in Arizona- Pa was put into General
Population, which was basically a huge cage full of crazy people. In comparison, the Yavapai Country Detention
center had been a cakewalk. He kept a low profile as he waited for another two
weeks for his day in court.
Apparently,
Mr. V had done an absolutely bang-up job of finding an attorney. Though the
lawyer was hideously expensive, he was, for real, the best criminal defense
attorney in the state. He was also the presiding judge’s golf buddy, and had
been a mentor to the prosecuting lawyer when he’d been in law school!
A few days after the trial, James returned to
Hollywood in his rattletrap pick up truck.
He hugged me long and tight and we kissed for eons.
“I
brought you a present from jail!”, he said jubilantly, handing me a grocery bag
and a tattered paper clipping.
Some guys learn how to crack safes or become
bookies when they’re on the inside; others kill their fellow inmates with
shanks made from a toothbrush. But Pa had been going through magazines in
Albuquerque, looking for recipes. The
one he handed me was for Southern Fried chicken, written by Martha Stewart…a
good two years before she herself was incarcerated.
“I’m
starving,” Pa said, getting out a frying pan.
“Let’s try this!”
As I handed him the contents of the grocery
bag, he squeezed me and sighed regretfully,
“ You know, when we were in Kingman, and the gas
pump said $9.11? I didn’t think that was a good sign, and I wanted to stay
there at the motel…but I didn’t tell you because I thought you’d think I was
crazy!”
#
This story
excerpt is from my memoir Showgirl
Confidential: My Life Onstage, Backstage And On The Road, published
September 2013 by Punk Hostage Press.
To get a Tarot card reading from me or to check out
what I do when I’m not dancing or on the
road, click here: http://www.pleasantgehman.com/
Find me on online:www.princessfarhana.com
www.pleasantgehman.com
www.pleasantgehman.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com/pleasant.gehman
www.facebook.com/princess.farhana
www.twitter.com/PrincessFarhana
www.twitter.com/PleasantGehman1
www.instagram.com/princessofhollywood
