Chapter 15 – Roadhouse Blues

“There’s going to be some lucky guy who will marry Sissy and be so happy with her cooking. There’s always a delicious abundance of food. She makes the best meals I’ve ever had.”

Constantly eating out was expensive and not good for us, so if we wanted a real meal, we’d have to go to a friend’s house. Diane rarely sparred in the kitchen but Sissy was a great cook. She would make all kinds of food: shepherd’s pie, broiled fish, stuffed chicken, and this really neat dessert she called “Boolah Boolah.” It was sort of like a rice pudding. Great stuff! Jenny really ate it up, which was nice to see. I worried about her health, weight fluctuations, and at times felt like her father (not Gilbert specifically), making sure she did all the right things. Because she ate so well at Jerry and Sissy’s, and was being treated like a little sister, I wondered if she missed home. Her mom spent a lot of time preparing for dinner even when it became just the two of them.

Jenny didn’t know how to cook so Sissy would give her pointers while the boys lazily camped in the living room smoking and drinking. Sissy had an old recipe book with yellowed pages and a ton of bookmarked places. To her, it was her bible. And in a way it was like one because parts of it had been translated into English. She’d turn to the page she needed, give Jenny the ingredients, and tell her to follow the instructions very carefully.

“Now, you want to use this when it asks for tablespoons. Do not use this one, that’s for teaspoons.”

“So, what’s the difference?”

“My dear, if you put too much baking powder in this, it’s going to taste bitter.”

Jokingly, “Then you’d add more chocolate, right?”

My girl was not very domesticated.

All the other times when we were on our own we were snacking, grabbing bites here and there. It’s not a healthy existence, nor is it always cheap either. Half of my meal intake was burgers, fries, and other greasy bar food. But I had been doing that since Anderson’s back in school. Not to be confused with Andersen’s in Buellton, CA which has great pea soup.

When Jenny did round up an appetite, she didn’t share with me that it was mostly pot-induced hunger. Doctors refer to pot as the “gateway” drug, but really it’s only for the people who were looking to start slow to begin with. Like everything else I was once oblivious to, I for a long time didn’t know what grass was. Even when some guys on the team were smoking it, I shied away.

“Hey Eric, wanna try some of this shit?”

“What is it?” Its aroma socked me as I took a whiff of the air.

“Marijuana, man. Take a hit.”

The air smelled like body odor and not because the players hadn’t showered, “No thanks. I’ll stick with Pall Mall.”

“But this shit is better than any smokes.”

A week or so after that (the summer before our senior year), I talked to Jenny about it.

“You know, some of the guys were smoking marijuana.”

“Where at?” her eyebrows raised rather inquisitively.

“Down by abandoned silo.”

She eagerly queried, “Did you try some?”

“Why are you asking me like that? What’s the big deal about it?”

“Come on, Eric. It’s pot.” That the word confused me. “Don’t you know what pot is?”

“A smelly cigarette?” I really didn’t know.

“Man, sometimes you’re too straight, Eric.” I could tell Jenny thought of the best way to word her next statement but in the most direct way possible, she said, “It’s a drug you get high from. Simple as that.”

Now as my eyebrows raised, “A drug?”

“Yeah!”

“God-damn-it!”

Smiling back at me, “What?”

“I can’t believe the guys were doing drugs. What if Coach finds out?”

“Come on, Eric. It’s not that bad. It’s just pot. A lot of people have done it.” Smirking still, “So, did you try it or not?”

“NO!” I belted out.

What Jenny didn’t tell me ‘til 1974 was she had already tried some at parties. Not much, but she was familiar with its “playful and platonic silliness” as she put it.

Jenny was not a huge advocate for legalizing any drug, but would argue that alcohol too was a type of drug. According to her, if we can buy liquor, why not weed, right?

She’d tell me, “It’s a chemical stimulant that gets you high. Grass does the same thing. And when do you hear that someone killed somebody else while driving stoned?” Her argument is still a common topic with those who want the legalization of marijuana.

“I don’t know, Jenny. I just know what I hear about drugs.”

“Eric, you don’t hear anything about drugs. You don’t even know what most of them are, what they look like, and what they do.” Well, she had a point. “Do you remember that senior girl when we were in tenth grade? What was her name…oh yeah, Sylvia Moyer. She got hit by a drunk driver while walking home from school. Remember her?”

“Yeah…and?” And what about Gilbert?

“I know you drove home drunk before.”

“Yeah…and? You were drunk, too. And I was the more sober of the two of us. Were you going to call your mom and tell her to come pick you up? No! So I took us back and you made it in one piece.”

“Man, forget it.”

Sarcastically, “Don’t you ever talk bad about alcohol again. It’s a man’s drink. It puts hairs on your chest. See?” I pulled down the front of her shirt. “See? Even on chicks. There’s three right there!”

“Fucker!” She started giggling as I tickled and played with her. “Stop it, Eric!”

That was the first time we ever discussed it and the conversation ended in me goofing off. It’s how I got out of the dreadful communication.

In the beginning, Jenny’s drug use started out slow. They were easily dismissed despite my reservations. I had nothing to go by. Her friends had been users for a long time and still seemed healthy enough. To use her deceased idols as examples led to no clues either. Brian Jones died in a swimming pool. Jim Morrison, they said heart failure. Jimi Hendrix, choked on his vomit in his sleep. Janis Joplin, alcohol and heroin (which I knew Jenny wasn’t using). Mama Cass succumbed to a heart attack. Blind Al Wilson killed himself. And Gram Parsons…he did overdose. And what I wasn’t aware of back then was all of these performers’ deaths were linked to drugs. And they pretty much died alone.

It would take years later for anti-drug campaigns and untold celebrity deaths to really make us aware of the dangers. All I really knew was they were “bad” but people weren’t stopping each other, saying, “That stuff will kill you, man.” That just didn’t happen. No one was cramming the shit down your throat and apathetically no one was stopping you from doing it yourself.

At Jenny’s worst moments, she wouldn’t eat, bathe, communicate, or comprehend. Her appearance alone scared the hell out of me. Not being a doctor or having experience in these situations, I wasn’t sure if this would pass or continue on. As clueless and completely uneducated as this sounds, I didn’t know that her drug habit was causing this. I really just thought she was sick or extremely fatigued. All I knew was she’d be okay when I was around, and in dire straits when I wasn’t. It got to a point I hated to leave her alone.

           Guys I hung around who knew Jenny made side comments about her drug use and that her main supplier was Jerry. He was the only person she really knew and trusted to get her high. Everyone else was just a name. I didn’t appreciate the words said about Jenny, so much so, I drew my fists afire one night. I stood up for her but the jokes were true. Jenny had a drug problem. I was also concerned that seeing Jerry so much would lead to more than a friendship between them. When I went to confront him, he wasn’t around and I had control myself, not to explode on his sister.

“Sissy, what does Jenny do when she sees your brother?”

She turned over the omelet in the skillet, “Hang about.”

“About what?”

“They talk about making music and all the people they’ve met and where everyone has gone.”

My eyes raised, anticipating the worst still, “And?”

“And…she really likes listening to him.”

I cut right to it, “Does he supply her shit, or what?”

Sighing, “Yes, he does…but he doesn’t give her coke as much as he used to. It really overpowers her.”

“Why is he giving Jenny drugs, anyway?”

“It’s not that bad, Eric. Everyone in the scene does them…everyone except you. But, you’re more of a bar kinda guy. Most jock guys are.”

“What’s that’s supposed to mean?”

“Look…nothing, sorry.” She looks down, “Damn. I burnt the poor thing.” I looked down at my green and yellow football shirt and then to her embroidered, flowery blouse and white scarf tied over her hair. I was reminded of how I didn’t fit in and it sunk in hard. Perhaps she saw the expression on my tired face. “Look Eric, I’m sorry.”

“I’m really worried about her. She’s been getting sick.” I stared out the window to a landscape I suddenly blamed, “I want this all to stop.”

“I’ll talk to Jerry and let him know.”

During these times, Jenny slowed her writing pace. Her rare words never directly alluded to pain or symptoms attributed to her use, but the feelings were certainly evident.

“In a far away city like L.A. with a far away feel. Yeah, Gram, I know how it does feel. Even in the big city you can be deserted on an island as people pass by your distress signals. They are involved only with themselves in some selfishly horrid love affair. We’ve shed the skin of love and harmony and bare the armor of greed and indulgence. Once we were concerned about others, but now it’s only about “me.” In the future, I think people will be sheltered, isolated from reality. They’ll find some hobby to close their eyes from the truth of real horror.”