Victoria to California: Odyssey -1951

....by D. Grant DeMan

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For some, it remains the bar mitzvah, big football game or lion hunt, for others, the junior prom...for yours truly it was the California Journey...the first rite of passage..

There was a rapping as Claudette and I were changing into our street clothes. "Who's there," I cried, jumping into my khakis.

"Uncle Sim. Open up, will you?"

Ohmygawd! With a forefinger to my lips I waved her toward the tiny bath adjoining room 269 of the Figueroa Hotel, whispering: "It's my uncle. He picked a fine time to show up!" Every bodily expression of that moment betrayed my utter dismay and disappointment. I was an impatient fifteen-going-on-twenty-one in the middle of my manhood initiation and Simpson had unconsciously, but ungraciously rained on my Los Angeles parade. Ohboy!

My odyssey began months before in our tiny Chambers Street store across from George Jay School in Victoria. Mom took me aside: "You're going to be fifteen. It's time you got a part-time job to prepare you for a real one and save for college. I appreciate you work here in the store making deliveries and all, but we can't keep you for that. Maybe we'll take a trip to California this summer, and you'll need to pay your own way."

So I worked after school and Saturdays at Scott and Peden's seed-potato warehouse where my ability to lift two hundred pounds was appreciated, and during the summer in the Old English Bottling Works sorting Cokes from other bottles, while dancing evenings with the Lodge sisters to Hank Snow's Rhumba Boogie on their front lawn, because my sometimes girlfriend May liked only Frank Sinatra. I needed a break real bad.

August was well on the way when I asked Mom about California. "What trip?" A long pause. "Oh, I'm so sorry son, we wont be able to make it."

Miraculously I was able to convince my folks to let me go alone. And what a journey it was! The most beautiful girl I ever saw lay curled up, eyes closed, in a center seat of the southbound Greyhound I boarded in Seattle. I was numb with delight, but had the presence to sit behind her next to a woman of about forty who turned out to be her chaperone, a brand-new word in my lexicon. When Emily, a beauty pageant contestant returning to California, finally opened those blue limpid eyes, I melted, though the older woman was quick to show me a picture of her own daughter, for whom she claimed even more loveliness: "And only eighteen....."

"Never you mind her! I was first runner-up in the Port Angeles Miss Big Fir Tree Pageant." Emily chimed in, her breasts rising and falling, surging like the surf rolling over the big rocks up at Renfrew.

"Somebody's gotta tell you that Canada grows bigger trees than you have down here." I bragged.

"And so what do you Canadians do with your big home-grown trees?"

"Why we saw them into big big logs."

"And so what do you do with your huge big logs, Johnny Canuck?"

"We float 'em and truck 'em and run 'em into the mill."

"And so somebody's gotta tell ya that we have much livelier mills to put your logs in."

"Why I'd say you'd have to show me your mill."

"The mill works best after sundown."

"So I reckon the log can hold back a spell."

Thus I found the gorgeous Emily the veritable essence of femantasyland, from the sweet alluring scent of mimosa to the touch of her fine blonde coiffeur, the glistening sensuous lips and perky turned up nose. "I'm also nineteen," I lied like a big man on campus, and as night fell we also fell into the rear bench seat and spent an evening in Oregonian heaven with Chaperonia dozing peacefully up front. And all the while we sang Hank Williams' latest hits. Settin' the Woods on Fire!

Next day as I stood to disembark at Modesto it was like we'd barely met: "Oh yeah. You live here don't you? Keep your log dry, Sweety." I didn't reply. Our hallowed moments of sharing forgotten so soon? Like those Long Gone Lonesome Blues? Hank. Eat your heart out! I didn't have time.

Aunt Lola, wearing a sassy flowered kimono, met me at their Modesto cottage door that morning, "Oh you're Roy's nephew. Gosh, we knew you were coming, but not when. Golly, you had breakfast?" Then referring to my cousin, "Walter's sleeping. He works nights at the packing plant, and I do days. We're all in such a rush around here. Roberta!"

My voluptuous new step-cousin appeared, and over the next week we shared experiences as can only two fifteen-year-olds. She loved the idea of Canadian Hockey, always wanted to see a game. "What is that little gizmo they bat around the field? It's not a ball is it?"

"Nah. It's called a "puck" and the field is a "rink" or just "the ice." I took care not to betray my absolute ignorance, having never myself witnessed a game.

Walter, it turned out, was immersed in nuptial preparation so Uncle Roy kindly took me on his usual rounds of super-markets where he drank beer in the back rooms while betting double-or-nothing for his grocery bills, and poker-bars where I met young Maria trying to drag her daddy home off his stool. Like a couple of white knights we assisted her in bedding the inebriated patron, and later took a drive around town. Roy escorted us on what he called a romantic tour of the ice plant. Chuckle, chuckle. It was forty below - those blocks were as big as a house - and two blue wannabe teen-lovers were happy to return to the hot dry night of Modesto.

Maria and I were in the back seat cuddling. "You are soooo big." She said.

"You are so little." I responded.

Later, Roy chastened me, deftly explaining my faux pas: "Never tell a lady she is 'little'. She is petite. How you going to be a lover, if you don't learn some finesse?" At least my vocabulary was improving.

Next day I visited Maria at her shanty. We took a stroll through a lime orchard lit by magic Modesto moonlight. "Your hands are so fine. So petite." I said.

"Yours are so big and strong."

Sorting bottles, loading trucks and swinging hundred-pound potato sacks, I thought. But didn't mention. There are moments of sweet silence that lend more to a mood more that any explanation. We mellowed out.

"I waited so long for you to show up tonight, I felt like you were gonna break my heart. Like I'd feel when that cowboy in the bar sang 'Walkin' the Floor over You' - know what I mean?"

"I reckon. But you forget, I'll soon be gone."

"In Canada, is it cold?"

"You bet, especially in the mountains."

"It gets cold sometimes here, you know."

"How high is Modesto above sea level?"

"You're joshing me. There's no sea in Modesto!"

Walter married into Sarah's family, a religious sect so severe that the chapel was unadorned, unpainted even, while followers wore black serge exclusively in defiance of the burning heat. Roy, always the cut-up, capsized the reception by sneaking vodka into the punch, an act not much appreciated by his son, who also berated him for leaving beer in the Honeymoon Motel room refrigerator.

I never saw Maria again. Nor even Roberta, though I hope she got to a hockey game. Bakersfield was to be the next geographic stop in my youthful quest for further adult-orientation.

"You're a young one aren't you?" The cabbie seemed also youthful and attractive, and the very first lady-driver I'd ever seen. This was to be my first taxi ride too as po' folks, especially at the age of fifteen, generally traveled by shanks-mare or bike in Victoria. But I was now in BAKErsfield - appropriately-named for the temperature was well above one hundred Fahrenheit - heading for the up-scale neighborhood of Uncle George and Aunt Irene, that summer of my awakening manhood.

"I'm nineteen." I lied.

"New to Bakersfield?"

"Yep."

"We can drive the scenic route if you like." Her hand squeezed my knee. "I' ll show you some marvelous sights, and it won't cost you. Or we can deliver on time and it will." Her smile would melt the icicles off a landlord's heart. "The choice is yours, dear."

Quite a proposal to put to an adventurous youngster. Such a quandary: the good moral and sensible path, or a chance of new geographic discovery? The answer of course remains locked in my heart, the ensuing time spent left to the reader's infallible imagination.

Traversing dun hills, we suddenly arrived in a blue-green paradise deluged with water shooting out of the ground in every direction.

"Oh, let me get your bag. Here, we have a room for you. How's the folks up there in Canada?" Chirped Aunt Irene while little Cousin Georgie smacked me across the shins with his baseball bat. A glorious welcome.

One day Uncle George, who owned a bus company, arranged a trip to the desert. I was to take a coach to a point half-way to the near-by town of Arvin, meeting the one going to Bakersfield. "Yer out here, guy!" Cried the driver. As I exited and begun to cross the narrow blacktop, the heat hit like a blast from hell. I nearly fainted though the crossing was a mere forty feet, and still feel woozy at the thought of it. No wonder onion pullers and cotton pickers work early mornings. Newspaper accounts of their periodic deaths from exhaustion were regarded quite casually. A black dipping-bird grotesquerie of oil pumps littered the tarry hillside creating an otherworldly moonscape in hades' fiery kitchen.

Cousin Bob had just graduated high school while Jim was a college man. They took me to the public pool, where lean and handsome Bob became immersed in bounteous beauties, satisfying the mean demands of his ardent duties as lifeguard. Though I felt rather foolish, being so white among all those bronzed bodies, I soon fit in with introductions all around. Out to my very first drive-in picture show riding in the back of Bob's pickup, my warm vivacious companion: cheerleader Tammy was destined for the University of California. "Oh, if I can ever make the Trojan cheer team!" Later she gave me a gymnastic demonstration of her talents, and was proficient even at whirlwind baton-twirling. Wow! Tammy, a torrid tempest of that Bakersfield sun-bowl.

But best of all, she drove an air-conditioned chartreuse Packard, the coolness of which I enjoyed nearly as much as her athletic company and glowing cupid-bow indelible-pink lips. We spent starry evenings in the park singing Lefty Frizzell songs, wondering about the world, worrying about her brother fighting communists in Korea, and the atomic bomb. "I'd hate never to grow old." She mused. "What would it be like if the Russians or the Chinese or someone blew up the world?"

"Come up to Canada, where I can protect you." Adolescents say dumb things sometimes. Well, most times.

"Would you really!" She squealed, "Can I come up next summer?"

Ohboy! What am I letting myself in for here? "Sure, Tammy. I'll write you."

Somehow, I never did.

Tammy's probably a surgeon in Palmona now, following in her mother's career. I left Bakersfield a new person, but not yet a sensitive one.

Los Angeles and Hollywood were next on the itinerary, and the Long Beach - Figueroa adventure.

Aunt Bertha and Uncle Jimmy, and son Pat, met me north of Los Angeles. Jimmy, much like his brother Roy, was a joker, for we went immediately to a Mexican restaurant where he made sure my enchilada was abundantly laced with hot sauce. I bit in, downed my ice water, Coke and ran for the water-cooler, tears streaming from my eyes. Wow!

Seems funny now, because I've acquired a real taste for hot chilies and burning foods. Bertha immediately chastened him: "He's jus' a young chile, Jimmy. I declare, he don' know what you-all are up to. Y' big oaf!" She chided in her rural Georgian drawl.

We visited one of the big studios, probably MGM, and the Hollywood Farmer's Market where I picked up a few souvenirs for my family in Victoria, glorying in the Mexican music: El Rancho Grande - and joy of the people as they flogged their wares. Especially I was impressed with the Mexican jumping beans, and head-turning smiling peasant-dressed young senoritas, their ample breasts straining against laced white blouses, and dark shiny curls done up in ribbons and flowers. El Rancho Grande! I danced my fool head off while Jimmy nervously checked the time on his Rolex.

"Gotta explain something to you nephew. You see we can't take you out to our trailer in San Diego. For one thing there isn't enough room there. For another, it's a big navy base and you could get into all kinds of jeopardy. So best we go to Sim's.

Now Uncle Simpson and Aunt Agnes lived elegantly in a select area of Los Angeles. Since he was advertising manager for the Seven-up Company they could afford the finest. I was certainly impressed at the group they were entertaining as we came in, but mildly annoyed at being relegated to the end of the line in importance. Some rather discordant conversation took place between the brothers, after which we left.

"They claim not to have room for you. I don't know what to do."

"Don't worry, just let me out downtown. I'll find a hotel." I was eager to do some lone-wolfing in that city of blazing spotlights and neon.

"Oh no. But if you'll watch out for yourself, well take you to the Figueroa. I know it's a fine place." They checked me in, said their good-byes, and almost immediately I returned to the street, where I trekked to the finest bars and restaurants and enjoyed two movies in the most magnificent theaters I had ever seen.

Next day it was off to Long Beach on huge trolley called The Red Car, where having exhausted the entertainment pier, I swam in blue water and lay on white sand. I was just dozing off when I heard a tiny bell-like voice: "Mister. Mister, do you have the time?"

I had all the time in the world. Her name was Claudette, a true eighteen-year-old-version of Claudette Colbert. Her mom and dad were bon vivants probably off enjoying some party or other. In those days most people were not as concerned with danger and crime as they now are, and so we were left quite alone. "You ride the rollercoaster?" She asked.

"Sure, no problem."

"I'm frightened, but I want to try it. I'd go if you take me."

"Sure, no problem." I was scared silly, but I put up a brave front though I nearly lost my lunch in the first switch-back.

Since her folks never returned, Claudette caught the Red Car back to Los Angeles with me, and even followed up to my room at the Figueroa, where we changed out of our swimsuits. Then came uncle Sim to ruin everything.

"What would your folks think if I let you stay in a hotel? Jimmy always was crazy! You're coming home with me. Here, let me help you pack." There was no denying this masterful executive. Like a cringing coward, I let him lead me out of the hotel and up to his highbrow mansion, leaving the gorgeous Claudette in the bathroom.

I sure hope she made it home okay. It must have been quite an adventure, I'm sure. But I reckon I'll never know for certain, except what a damn cad I turned out to be.

Following the Figueroa escapade, Uncle Sim and Aunt Agnes paid special mind to me. It was out for drives and scenic tours of everywhere: down to the Hollywood Bowl and Pasadena, Santa Monica and Pismo Beach. But somehow their progeny were busy doing other things as lawyers and designers, so I missed their close acquaintance. It was especially odd that Agnes never seemed to cook. In fact I cannot remember ever finding a kitchen in that wide expanse of house, though there seemed to be a fresh pot of coffee in every room. Caterers brought stuff in on silver dollies and trays, or we dined in elegant restaurants. "Don't tell your Mother about the hotel, and Jim. Just leave that alone, won't you?" Sim repeated daily."

He questioned me about my job with Coca-Cola, comparing my wages with those paid his employees, free in expressing his mildly conservative views: "When I hire a salesman, I figure he's going to be as good as the inverse ratio of the distance from his back-bone to his belly-button. If he's starving, he'll do good. Of course, we screen out the pinkos, they deserve to starve."

Agnes seemed absorbed in churches and Catholic schools of the community. She had a sparkling smile and bright wit: "There'll never be a dull moment on earth 'till the last Irishman leaves the planet, though many an Irish woman wish they would!" And then came the twinkle: "With Godspeed of course." Though seemingly paltry now, my biggest thrill lie in having a room to myself with...ta-da!...a real television set. No sharing. I could tune into any of a dozen channels. Hell, they must have had one in every room, while my family couldn't even think of owning a TV for a whole house in Victoria. In fact the closest we came was watching NBC on KING through Standard Furniture's big window, or sneaking into the Douglas Hotel lobby. Hard to imagine now the first thrill of watching a real moving picture of Jack Webb. Dragnet. Dum-da-dum-da...radio with pictures! In LA!

On the trip home I sat next a big black U.S. Marine Staff Sergeant hosting a plethora of fruit salad ribbons upon his expansive uniformed chest, the most decorated soldier I have ever met. His engrossing tales of the Solomons, Guam, Guadalcanal, Truk and Iwo Jima intensified my eagerness to join the Korean conflict, from which he was on furlough, and due to ship back through Seattle. We corresponded for years, even when I was in the Air Force, during which time he regularly sent gifts from foreign lands.

Dad met me in Seattle, and as we drove to Cousin Gene's house I gave a whoop-up wolf-whistle to a bobby-soxer riding a bicycle only to feel a surge of embarrassment a half-hour later when the same girl entered the home we were visiting. I can only surmise she was a second cousin; both girls who lived there at the time do not now remember. I must have been extremely forgettable.

But I recall. It was quite a monumental event to be taken for a long walk along the foot of the floating bridge by a voluptuous teenager who plied me with ice-cream and sang Happy Trails better than Dale Evans. She wrote me a letter, long forgotten in the wistful mists of time.

For a time May and I resumed strolling hand-in-hand to Victoria High, though time, distance and changing whims of chance shifted....as always they do. The old store and neighborhood lost us to a new business. A fresh horizon rising.

But no matter how much time elapses, how many people intervene, the ensuing clutter of lifetime episodes could never diminish the impact of my summer of fifty-one. The summer I began - as Hank Williams put it -: "Settin' the Woods on Fire."

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