I was 15 years old the first time the work of a ‘real artist’ had a profound effect on me. Interestingly, this experience had nothing to do with the visual arts, but instead was brought about by my introduction to a work of literature. Still, the lessons learned from one art form can easily carry over to another. Art is Art, after all.
The reason this book had such a dramatic effect on me was because reading it changed not only the way I thought about the written word, but how I felt about all forms of art and enforced within me my own desire to become a professional artist. This encounter with destiny occurred at, of all places, The Bowl America in Falls Church, Virginia- my very first place of employment.
I loved my job at the Bowling Alley. I loved everything about it; sweeping the lanes between games, busing tables on league nights, assisting at the snack bar. Hell, I even loved running the dishes through the washer and taking out the trash. Now, to be honest, cleaning the bathrooms I could have done without, but I truly enjoyed every other aspect of my job. Assisting at the snack bar was probably my favorite, because it was easy to sneak a plate of fries or slice of pizza while performing my ‘duties’ and I could fill up on free coke all night. Also, I got to know the ‘regulars’ while working the snack bar. These were the customers who came in week after week, some night after night, to bowl and drink beer and just hang out. At my tender age I was more than intrigued by the way adults lived their lives, the stories they had to tell and how funny some could get after a few beers. On slow nights I would hang out at the snack bar counter, listening to red-faced Phil banter on about how lousy his job was, sitting at a desk all day and taking shit from his boss. Phil came in to the Bowling Alley straight from work every single night, not even bothering to stop off at home and change out of his suit and tie. He belonged to a league that bowled on Saturday nights, but except for that he would just sit at the counter and drink endless amounts of beer. Some nights he would stumble out at closing time in a drunken haze to drive himself home, but most nights he could control his drink just fine and would sit on his stool, face growing redder with each beer. I used to think that maybe if he wouldn’t spend every night at the Bowling Alley he could find the time to look for a better job. In the course of the 2 years I worked at Bowl America, I came to realize that Phil was the type who would complain no matter what job he had. He hated the job because it got in the way of his drinking and his hanging out at the Alley, which he loved doing. We were the only friends he had; maybe the only family – Phil wasn’t married and I don’t remember him saying anything about family or relatives. And what a dysfunctional but interesting ‘family’ we were! The immediate members of our Bowl America family included the big boss Dave, Yvette the snack bar manager, April, the ditzy but sweet hippy who assisted Yvette and my best friend Craig, who shared the same job as me. Craig and I didn’t really have job titles. Our responsibilities were too varied. We were simply known as part-time ‘workers’ and we were basically assistants to all other employees.
Other ‘family’ members included the front desk cashiers who assigned lanes to the bowlers, passed out rental shoes and collected money, the mechanics who took care of any problems with the pin sorters or ball returns and Willy, the janitor.
Yvette was the unofficial head of the family. The single Mother of teen-age daughter Marcine, she had moved to America from France years earlier to escape an abusive husband. Yvette was a fiery redhead who took bull from no one and watched over Craig and I like a protective Mother. Marcine had an apparent crush on me, and Yvette was always reminding me, (in a more joking than serious tone), to stay away from her daughter. She claimed that she didn’t want me ‘corrupting’ her little Marcy. Truth is, if the daughter were anything like her Mother, it would probably have been me being the one corrupted.
Yvette was no great beauty, (she looked much older than her age- late 30’s was my guess), yet lots of male patrons and workers at Bowl America were enamored with her. On most Friday and Saturday nights the snack bar stools were filled with men, smoking and drinking and chatting her up. I was convinced that Yvette was one of the reasons Phil hung out at the snack bar every night. Yvette’s ballsy attitude, twisted sense of humor and deep French accent lent her a certain degree of sexiness. She constantly smoked, letting each cigarette linger between her lips until the butt was stained bright red from her heavy lipstick. Yvette had seen and done it all and was weary with life and men. Through vision obscured by the naiveté of my youth and my poet’s heart, I envisioned her as some exiled princess or disillusioned, has-been movie star whose cynical, almost fatalistic demeanor gave her fading beauty a forlorn attraction. The obvious attention from all the guys meant nothing to Yvette – taking care of her daughter was all that she cared about and, I believe, all that kept her going.
Even Big Boss Dave, or simply ‘Boss’, as we all called him, was at the mercy of Yvette’s whim. Even though he was the Bowling Alley Manager, Yvette had worked there longer and so Dave would often go to her for advice on any problems that might arise concerning employees or customers. Dave would call Yvette into his office for long meetings with the door shut and Craig and I used to ponder that perhaps more was taking place than just talk. After all, Dave did have a bit of the scoundrel about him; with his pencil thin mustache, fast talk and expensive looking suits. He was genuinely nice to Craig and I though, and hooked us up with our jobs despite our being too young to be employed according to Virginia State Laws. Craig’s Mom was a Captain on one of the League teams and one of the Alley’s ‘regulars’. She had talked Dave into giving both of us a chance. Dave broke the laws more by allowing us to work long hours that often had us leaving the Bowling Alley well past midnight on some school nights. Craig and I didn’t care. We were happy to be making good money, (mostly in tips), and doing something much more fun than sitting at home watching TV or doing homework. Sometimes, while working those late shifts, we would sneak canned beers out of the cooler in the back of the kitchen area and hide them in the woods outside the back door. After our shift ended we would hang out in the back catching a good buzz before either taking the long walk home, riding our bikes, or catching a ride with Craig’s Mom. Sometimes, if it was really late and Craig’s Mom wasn’t available, we would call a cab. My Mom, with her extraordinarily keen sense of smell, would always complain about my clothes smelling of cigarettes and beer. I could always blame the smells on the hazards of the job. It was, after all, 1975, years before the bans on public smoking would come to pass. My nights were spent working in a haze of stagnant smoke wiping spilt beer and soda off sticky tables and delivering full pitchers to thirsty patrons. Even if I weren’t sneaking the occasional drink in the back of the Alley, my clothes would have been ensconced with the smell. Nevertheless, Mom always held her suspicions. She would have been happy to know that I really had no interest in smoking cigarettes, even though my lungs were getting their fill each night with second-hand smoke.
The most interesting character in that group of cast off’s and rapscallions was, without a doubt, Willy the janitor. Willy was a Vietnam Vet left somewhat addled by the war. He was a black man with a wiry, athletic build, confident stride and a penchant for wearing button front shirts and trousers of matching, drab colors. With his monotone clothes and little round glasses Willy resembled a member of the American Communist group of the 1950’s. Behind the glasses were bright, soulful eyes that projected both distance and intelligence. Willy seemed way too smart to be a guy whose job consisted primarily of scrubbing latrines and mopping floors. In fact, I don’t remember him ever being without a book; usually a worn paperback that he kept tucked in the back pocket of his trousers for reading whenever he had a break.
For everyone else at Bowl America Willy was quiet, almost introverted, but always polite. Most thought he was weird. I liked him. He was more open with me, talking about many things, including books, music and his strange philosophies on life. Once, he held up to the light an almost empty glass of coke that he was drinking. “See how all that’s left is just that little bit of crushed ice and swallow of coke? That’s the perfect ratio. That’s heaven. I wouldn’t trade that for a million dollars.” He then drank it down, chewing on the ice, enjoying every last bit. I truly believed that he wouldn’t have traded it for the million dollars. Money didn’t seem to mean much to Willy. Once he spent his entire weeks pay on a fancy bicycle as a birthday present for his daughter, Louise. He didn’t even allow himself to keep enough money for food and relied on his one free meal at the Bowling Alley to stave off hunger until his next payday. I snuck him baskets of fries, hushpuppies and whatever other goodies from the snack bar that my quick fingers could nab.
Like Yvette, Willy was divorced with one child who meant the world to him. The difference between Yvette and Willy in this was that while Yvette had custody of her daughter, Willy’s ex-wife had custody of Louise. Willy never smiled more than when talking about his little girl. Of course, given his penchant for privacy, he never really talked that much about her, and not at all about any other aspects of his personal life. All I knew about him, aside from him having a daughter, was that he lived alone in an apartment in Arlington, took the bus to work and was on no easy terms with his ex-wife. I also knew that he loved to spend his time off scouring flea markets for used paperbacks, clothes and jazz records. It was Boss Man Dave who leaked that Willy had served a tour in Vietnam. He also told us that Willy had a brief stay in a mental institution after he was discharged. Hard to know exactly how the war had changed him since I didn’t know him before, but Willy did have a habit of talking to himself. He could also be a little too quiet sometimes and a bit intense. I always felt that under his Zen-like demeanor was a volcano of rage waiting blow. I suspected he liked working as a janitor because it was a job without real pressure, that didn’t require much thought or was too demanding. This enabled him to keep it together, to maintain his cool. Either that or, given his history, the only job he could get at the time.
Willy had a keen interest in my wanting to be an Artist and also encouraged my fondness for poetry. I was constantly drawing on pads of paper I’d bring in when work was slow or, lacking those, the backs of bowling score sheets and even napkins. Willy was always watching me. He’d say that he could tell I was a real Artist because my drawings didn’t seem to take much thought- they just flowed out. I could usually render an idea in minutes in a very loose, sketchy style and Willy thought this showed me to be instinctive, born with my talent. Sometimes I would just practice drawing the human figure. Other times it would be weird, surrealistic scenes straight from my lively imagination. Often I would draw the barflies as they sat drinking at the snack bar. If Willy liked any particular drawings he’d ask me for them and I’d give them to him without qualm. Most I ended up tossing in the trash anyway. The other employees at Bowl America knew about my artistic inclinations and thought it was cool. Often they, or even regulars, would send their visiting children or nieces and nephews back to the kitchen area so that I could draw pictures for them. Once, during a particularly slow shift, Boss Man Dave’s little nephew hung out with me the entire time while I taught him to draw comic book superheroes.
If I wasn’t drawing during my down time I was writing bad poetry. These were more like lyrics, really, influence by the songs of singer songwriters like Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne. I did read poetry collections and enjoyed real poems, but was too young to really get what much of them were saying. The words of many of the songwriters of the day read like poetry to me but were more direct and obvious. Yvette’s assistant April, having been heavily influence by the 60’s, idolized Bob Dylan and tried to turn me on to his words. She even brought a big book of his collected song lyrics in for me to read, but I found much of his writing too cryptic. I recognized the artistry but nothing I read or heard of his touched me in any meaningful way. It wouldn’t be until I was in my mid-30s before I really listened and understood where Dylan was coming from. Now he remains one of my favorite Artists. Back then I was a young romantic looking for words I could identify with and Joni and Jackson’s tales of love, heartbreak, loss and travel drew me in.
Willy admired some of my writing but recognized that I really didn’t have much to say about life at that point. He loaned me a few of his poetry collections and turned me on to the other Dylan, Thomas. He also tried to get me to appreciate jazz music, but I was definitely not ready for that. My favorite thing to do after a shift at the bowling alley was to unwind by filling the jukebox with quarters and rocking out to Aerosmith and the Rolling Stones while playing the pinball machines.
One slow Saturday afternoon, as Willy and I sat in the kitchen, he pulled a wrinkled paperback out of his back pocket and handed it to me. “I want you to have this”, he said, “a gift. But you got to promise me you’ll read it. This book, my young friend, will blow your mind.” I took the book from Willy’s hands and stared at the bright yellow, ripped cover with an illustration of two cool looking dudes standing beside a big convertible car. I read the title and author- ‘On The Road’ by Jack Kerouac. Now, I was, (and still am), an avid reader who not only enjoyed reading books, but also liked reading about them. I especially liked reading the Washington Post Book section on Sundays and also book reviews in my two favorite publications of the day, ‘Rolling Stone’ and ‘Cream’. I knew of ‘On The Road’. I knew that it was considered an important literary work and spawned the ‘Beat Generation’. That was all I knew.
“What makes you think I’ll like this?” I asked Willy. “Because I know you”, Willy responded. He reared himself up and got animated, flailing his hands about while speaking in that way he would when something got him excited; “I’ll bet I know you more than you know yourself”. “This book is about a part of life you’ve never experienced. It’s about an America that you’ve yet to discover and it’s written in a voice that you need to hear. Reading Jack Kerouac is like listening to Miles Davis play the trumpet – it’s jazz put to paper, man! These words have rhythm and a flow and they don’t stop till you get to the end. Trust me when I say, this book will open your eyes!”
Okay then. I was sold. If Willy thought enough of me to pull this book out of his collection and give it to me, and then to sell the idea of it so eloquently, well, how could I not read it? I took the beat-up old paperback home and began reading it that very night.
Three days later I was finished. “What the hell was that”? I thought, as I read the last few lines and put the book down on my night table. The entire reading seemed like it went by in a blur and it took my brain a short time to unravel the knotted tangle of words and ideas. Willy was right- the words did flow. They flowed and flowed, one sentence into the next pausing only to catch a quick breath at each chapters end. My initial thought was that ‘On The Road’ was simply one long, rambling narrative about two guys out on the road, cruising up and down the highways of a changing America in search of something, but never sure what. On second and further thought it all began to take on deeper meanings. The sheer poetry and romance of it began to stick to me and I couldn’t let it go. I realized the book is about many things. It’s about the struggle to find a place in this world and the desire to live a life of meaning. It’s about one man’s quest for identity and his need to see and do it all along the way. It’s about cars and bars, booze and broads, smoky jazz clubs and late night parties.
The two main characters, Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty, are 20th century explorers, discovering post-world war II America. They are adventurers, rebels, and misbegotten youth. ‘On The Road’ chronicles their journey from one end of the country to the other and back again, including a fated detour down to Mexico. It’s about the deep bond of friendship between these two men and the women who come between them. Most of all it’s about the solitary, searching life of an Artist, as embodied by Jack Kerouac in the form of Sal Paradise. It is written like no other book I’d encountered in my young life. There seems to be little punctuation as each long sentence folds neatly into the next. The writing style itself represented a new art form to me and for the first time I realized that the act of writing could be about more than simply telling a story.
I loved the idea of it- Sal Paradise hitting the road in search of meaning and reality and truth for the sole purpose of fueling his art, giving himself something to write about. Knowing that the story was mostly autobiographical and that in real life Kerouac risked everything to get to a destination that was more spiritual than physical only added to my admiration.
Reading ‘On The Road’ gave me the realization that in order to be a true artist, for my art to come from an honest place, I needed life experiences. I needed to get out on my own and see the world, meet interesting people, grasp opportunities. I needed to fill my heart and soul and imagination with the whole shebang and then spill it all out onto canvas or paper or whatever medium I chose to express myself with. Then and only then could I create Art that matters, Art that has a purpose, Art of relevance and importance.
That was it. That was why Willy gave me the book, wanted me to read it. He knew that I needed to see what it took to be a real artist, what was required to take the next step.
‘On The Road’ fueled in me a desire to strike out, get on my own road and blaze my path to glory. It left me with the itch to learn, see, feel, hear and do. There was a whole wide world out there beyond Falls Church and I needed to see it and experience it before I could even begin to think of myself as an Artist. Of course, I still had three more years of High School left so all of this would have to wait, but it was in me now, festering, and it would not go away.
In those remaining three years I would continue to do my little sketches. I would continue to write bad poetry/lyrics and keep on drawing comic book characters. But the difference then was that I knew it was all just superficial; I knew what was waiting. I knew that life would happen and as I experienced it my art would change. I was preparing myself for that moment when I could hit the road and absorb everything in my path, allowing myself to evolve and my art along with it. ‘On The Road’ provided me with a blueprint to being a better Artist and I would lock that precious information away until the moment came when I could put it to use.
‘On The Road’ also opened the door to literature for me. Now that I had discovered the power of individual style in writing and realized that good books truly were works of art, I was eager to read more. I leapt from Kerouac to William Burroughs to Hemingway. From there I went on to read Hunter S. Thompson, Steinbeck and even Dickens. I read and was transfixed by Allen Ginsberg’s epic poem, ‘Howl’. They were all revelations for me, these wondrous works of writing. Of course I was still a teenager and read comic books and continued to collect ‘Doc Savage’ and ‘Conan’ paperbacks, but my mind was more open now; I wanted to know about everything. I craved it all, high brow and low, fine and pop art.
I gave Willy a more sincere thank you for the book when next I saw him after finishing it. I tried to explain what it meant to me but struggled to find the right words. There was no need. He understood. Willy may have been a bit addled but he was also wise beyond his years and did, indeed, know me better than I knew myself.
Willy quit Bowl America a few months later. He had managed to save enough money to buy a used car and, no longer reliant on the bus line, was able to find a better paying job. I missed Willy and our talks, his insight on my art and recommendations on books I should read. He was a cool guy with a perspective on life different from anyone I’d met and knowing him left an indelible impression on me. At some point, as I moved on through life, I lost that beat up, old paperback copy of ‘On The Road’. Of course I replaced it with a newer version, and then another after that, but wished that I’d managed to hold on to the original. It was, after all, a gift- in more ways than one.
Later, during the summer of that same year, I heard Bruce Springsteen for the first time and the desire to get out on the road was again ignited within me. As I lay in bed late one night with my clock radio resting on my chest and the sound low so as not to wake the rest of the house, I listened intently while a local station played in its entirety the just released album, ‘Born To Run’. To my ears, this was everything Rock n’ Roll should be about. This was what was missing from the radio. This was ‘On The Road’ put to music. Bruce Springsteen would replace all of my musical idols and become something of a folk hero for me. He represented the blue-collar side of life, which my family definitely was a part of. He was all about being an artist as opposed to manufacturing singles for the top 40. He was an everyman doing what he loved and his music was the polar opposite of the sterile disco and tired heavy metal that perpetuated the airwaves during those years. To me, Bruce Springsteen’s music felt alive and vital. 1975 became a milestone year for me as I was awakened both culturally and spiritually. I was eager for adulthood, for it’s struggles and triumphs. I was ready to become an Artist.
I stayed at Bowl America long enough to buy my own car, a ’72 Ford Fairlane, then quit for a job in the kitchen at the local Nursing Home where a bunch of my High School buddies worked. The pay and hours were a little better but I did miss the excitement of the Bowling Alley. I missed the frenzy of league nights, joking with the ‘regulars’, getting Yvette all riled up, and working with Craig. It was an unexpectedly special place for a young man to work and learn about life and a wondrous time for me. One small irony of my working at and enjoying the Bowling alley was that, as much as I loved the job, I never really liked to Bowl.
The reason this book had such a dramatic effect on me was because reading it changed not only the way I thought about the written word, but how I felt about all forms of art and enforced within me my own desire to become a professional artist. This encounter with destiny occurred at, of all places, The Bowl America in Falls Church, Virginia- my very first place of employment.
I loved my job at the Bowling Alley. I loved everything about it; sweeping the lanes between games, busing tables on league nights, assisting at the snack bar. Hell, I even loved running the dishes through the washer and taking out the trash. Now, to be honest, cleaning the bathrooms I could have done without, but I truly enjoyed every other aspect of my job. Assisting at the snack bar was probably my favorite, because it was easy to sneak a plate of fries or slice of pizza while performing my ‘duties’ and I could fill up on free coke all night. Also, I got to know the ‘regulars’ while working the snack bar. These were the customers who came in week after week, some night after night, to bowl and drink beer and just hang out. At my tender age I was more than intrigued by the way adults lived their lives, the stories they had to tell and how funny some could get after a few beers. On slow nights I would hang out at the snack bar counter, listening to red-faced Phil banter on about how lousy his job was, sitting at a desk all day and taking shit from his boss. Phil came in to the Bowling Alley straight from work every single night, not even bothering to stop off at home and change out of his suit and tie. He belonged to a league that bowled on Saturday nights, but except for that he would just sit at the counter and drink endless amounts of beer. Some nights he would stumble out at closing time in a drunken haze to drive himself home, but most nights he could control his drink just fine and would sit on his stool, face growing redder with each beer. I used to think that maybe if he wouldn’t spend every night at the Bowling Alley he could find the time to look for a better job. In the course of the 2 years I worked at Bowl America, I came to realize that Phil was the type who would complain no matter what job he had. He hated the job because it got in the way of his drinking and his hanging out at the Alley, which he loved doing. We were the only friends he had; maybe the only family – Phil wasn’t married and I don’t remember him saying anything about family or relatives. And what a dysfunctional but interesting ‘family’ we were! The immediate members of our Bowl America family included the big boss Dave, Yvette the snack bar manager, April, the ditzy but sweet hippy who assisted Yvette and my best friend Craig, who shared the same job as me. Craig and I didn’t really have job titles. Our responsibilities were too varied. We were simply known as part-time ‘workers’ and we were basically assistants to all other employees.
Other ‘family’ members included the front desk cashiers who assigned lanes to the bowlers, passed out rental shoes and collected money, the mechanics who took care of any problems with the pin sorters or ball returns and Willy, the janitor.
Yvette was the unofficial head of the family. The single Mother of teen-age daughter Marcine, she had moved to America from France years earlier to escape an abusive husband. Yvette was a fiery redhead who took bull from no one and watched over Craig and I like a protective Mother. Marcine had an apparent crush on me, and Yvette was always reminding me, (in a more joking than serious tone), to stay away from her daughter. She claimed that she didn’t want me ‘corrupting’ her little Marcy. Truth is, if the daughter were anything like her Mother, it would probably have been me being the one corrupted.
Yvette was no great beauty, (she looked much older than her age- late 30’s was my guess), yet lots of male patrons and workers at Bowl America were enamored with her. On most Friday and Saturday nights the snack bar stools were filled with men, smoking and drinking and chatting her up. I was convinced that Yvette was one of the reasons Phil hung out at the snack bar every night. Yvette’s ballsy attitude, twisted sense of humor and deep French accent lent her a certain degree of sexiness. She constantly smoked, letting each cigarette linger between her lips until the butt was stained bright red from her heavy lipstick. Yvette had seen and done it all and was weary with life and men. Through vision obscured by the naiveté of my youth and my poet’s heart, I envisioned her as some exiled princess or disillusioned, has-been movie star whose cynical, almost fatalistic demeanor gave her fading beauty a forlorn attraction. The obvious attention from all the guys meant nothing to Yvette – taking care of her daughter was all that she cared about and, I believe, all that kept her going.
Even Big Boss Dave, or simply ‘Boss’, as we all called him, was at the mercy of Yvette’s whim. Even though he was the Bowling Alley Manager, Yvette had worked there longer and so Dave would often go to her for advice on any problems that might arise concerning employees or customers. Dave would call Yvette into his office for long meetings with the door shut and Craig and I used to ponder that perhaps more was taking place than just talk. After all, Dave did have a bit of the scoundrel about him; with his pencil thin mustache, fast talk and expensive looking suits. He was genuinely nice to Craig and I though, and hooked us up with our jobs despite our being too young to be employed according to Virginia State Laws. Craig’s Mom was a Captain on one of the League teams and one of the Alley’s ‘regulars’. She had talked Dave into giving both of us a chance. Dave broke the laws more by allowing us to work long hours that often had us leaving the Bowling Alley well past midnight on some school nights. Craig and I didn’t care. We were happy to be making good money, (mostly in tips), and doing something much more fun than sitting at home watching TV or doing homework. Sometimes, while working those late shifts, we would sneak canned beers out of the cooler in the back of the kitchen area and hide them in the woods outside the back door. After our shift ended we would hang out in the back catching a good buzz before either taking the long walk home, riding our bikes, or catching a ride with Craig’s Mom. Sometimes, if it was really late and Craig’s Mom wasn’t available, we would call a cab. My Mom, with her extraordinarily keen sense of smell, would always complain about my clothes smelling of cigarettes and beer. I could always blame the smells on the hazards of the job. It was, after all, 1975, years before the bans on public smoking would come to pass. My nights were spent working in a haze of stagnant smoke wiping spilt beer and soda off sticky tables and delivering full pitchers to thirsty patrons. Even if I weren’t sneaking the occasional drink in the back of the Alley, my clothes would have been ensconced with the smell. Nevertheless, Mom always held her suspicions. She would have been happy to know that I really had no interest in smoking cigarettes, even though my lungs were getting their fill each night with second-hand smoke.
The most interesting character in that group of cast off’s and rapscallions was, without a doubt, Willy the janitor. Willy was a Vietnam Vet left somewhat addled by the war. He was a black man with a wiry, athletic build, confident stride and a penchant for wearing button front shirts and trousers of matching, drab colors. With his monotone clothes and little round glasses Willy resembled a member of the American Communist group of the 1950’s. Behind the glasses were bright, soulful eyes that projected both distance and intelligence. Willy seemed way too smart to be a guy whose job consisted primarily of scrubbing latrines and mopping floors. In fact, I don’t remember him ever being without a book; usually a worn paperback that he kept tucked in the back pocket of his trousers for reading whenever he had a break.
For everyone else at Bowl America Willy was quiet, almost introverted, but always polite. Most thought he was weird. I liked him. He was more open with me, talking about many things, including books, music and his strange philosophies on life. Once, he held up to the light an almost empty glass of coke that he was drinking. “See how all that’s left is just that little bit of crushed ice and swallow of coke? That’s the perfect ratio. That’s heaven. I wouldn’t trade that for a million dollars.” He then drank it down, chewing on the ice, enjoying every last bit. I truly believed that he wouldn’t have traded it for the million dollars. Money didn’t seem to mean much to Willy. Once he spent his entire weeks pay on a fancy bicycle as a birthday present for his daughter, Louise. He didn’t even allow himself to keep enough money for food and relied on his one free meal at the Bowling Alley to stave off hunger until his next payday. I snuck him baskets of fries, hushpuppies and whatever other goodies from the snack bar that my quick fingers could nab.
Like Yvette, Willy was divorced with one child who meant the world to him. The difference between Yvette and Willy in this was that while Yvette had custody of her daughter, Willy’s ex-wife had custody of Louise. Willy never smiled more than when talking about his little girl. Of course, given his penchant for privacy, he never really talked that much about her, and not at all about any other aspects of his personal life. All I knew about him, aside from him having a daughter, was that he lived alone in an apartment in Arlington, took the bus to work and was on no easy terms with his ex-wife. I also knew that he loved to spend his time off scouring flea markets for used paperbacks, clothes and jazz records. It was Boss Man Dave who leaked that Willy had served a tour in Vietnam. He also told us that Willy had a brief stay in a mental institution after he was discharged. Hard to know exactly how the war had changed him since I didn’t know him before, but Willy did have a habit of talking to himself. He could also be a little too quiet sometimes and a bit intense. I always felt that under his Zen-like demeanor was a volcano of rage waiting blow. I suspected he liked working as a janitor because it was a job without real pressure, that didn’t require much thought or was too demanding. This enabled him to keep it together, to maintain his cool. Either that or, given his history, the only job he could get at the time.
Willy had a keen interest in my wanting to be an Artist and also encouraged my fondness for poetry. I was constantly drawing on pads of paper I’d bring in when work was slow or, lacking those, the backs of bowling score sheets and even napkins. Willy was always watching me. He’d say that he could tell I was a real Artist because my drawings didn’t seem to take much thought- they just flowed out. I could usually render an idea in minutes in a very loose, sketchy style and Willy thought this showed me to be instinctive, born with my talent. Sometimes I would just practice drawing the human figure. Other times it would be weird, surrealistic scenes straight from my lively imagination. Often I would draw the barflies as they sat drinking at the snack bar. If Willy liked any particular drawings he’d ask me for them and I’d give them to him without qualm. Most I ended up tossing in the trash anyway. The other employees at Bowl America knew about my artistic inclinations and thought it was cool. Often they, or even regulars, would send their visiting children or nieces and nephews back to the kitchen area so that I could draw pictures for them. Once, during a particularly slow shift, Boss Man Dave’s little nephew hung out with me the entire time while I taught him to draw comic book superheroes.
If I wasn’t drawing during my down time I was writing bad poetry. These were more like lyrics, really, influence by the songs of singer songwriters like Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne. I did read poetry collections and enjoyed real poems, but was too young to really get what much of them were saying. The words of many of the songwriters of the day read like poetry to me but were more direct and obvious. Yvette’s assistant April, having been heavily influence by the 60’s, idolized Bob Dylan and tried to turn me on to his words. She even brought a big book of his collected song lyrics in for me to read, but I found much of his writing too cryptic. I recognized the artistry but nothing I read or heard of his touched me in any meaningful way. It wouldn’t be until I was in my mid-30s before I really listened and understood where Dylan was coming from. Now he remains one of my favorite Artists. Back then I was a young romantic looking for words I could identify with and Joni and Jackson’s tales of love, heartbreak, loss and travel drew me in.
Willy admired some of my writing but recognized that I really didn’t have much to say about life at that point. He loaned me a few of his poetry collections and turned me on to the other Dylan, Thomas. He also tried to get me to appreciate jazz music, but I was definitely not ready for that. My favorite thing to do after a shift at the bowling alley was to unwind by filling the jukebox with quarters and rocking out to Aerosmith and the Rolling Stones while playing the pinball machines.
One slow Saturday afternoon, as Willy and I sat in the kitchen, he pulled a wrinkled paperback out of his back pocket and handed it to me. “I want you to have this”, he said, “a gift. But you got to promise me you’ll read it. This book, my young friend, will blow your mind.” I took the book from Willy’s hands and stared at the bright yellow, ripped cover with an illustration of two cool looking dudes standing beside a big convertible car. I read the title and author- ‘On The Road’ by Jack Kerouac. Now, I was, (and still am), an avid reader who not only enjoyed reading books, but also liked reading about them. I especially liked reading the Washington Post Book section on Sundays and also book reviews in my two favorite publications of the day, ‘Rolling Stone’ and ‘Cream’. I knew of ‘On The Road’. I knew that it was considered an important literary work and spawned the ‘Beat Generation’. That was all I knew.
“What makes you think I’ll like this?” I asked Willy. “Because I know you”, Willy responded. He reared himself up and got animated, flailing his hands about while speaking in that way he would when something got him excited; “I’ll bet I know you more than you know yourself”. “This book is about a part of life you’ve never experienced. It’s about an America that you’ve yet to discover and it’s written in a voice that you need to hear. Reading Jack Kerouac is like listening to Miles Davis play the trumpet – it’s jazz put to paper, man! These words have rhythm and a flow and they don’t stop till you get to the end. Trust me when I say, this book will open your eyes!”
Okay then. I was sold. If Willy thought enough of me to pull this book out of his collection and give it to me, and then to sell the idea of it so eloquently, well, how could I not read it? I took the beat-up old paperback home and began reading it that very night.
Three days later I was finished. “What the hell was that”? I thought, as I read the last few lines and put the book down on my night table. The entire reading seemed like it went by in a blur and it took my brain a short time to unravel the knotted tangle of words and ideas. Willy was right- the words did flow. They flowed and flowed, one sentence into the next pausing only to catch a quick breath at each chapters end. My initial thought was that ‘On The Road’ was simply one long, rambling narrative about two guys out on the road, cruising up and down the highways of a changing America in search of something, but never sure what. On second and further thought it all began to take on deeper meanings. The sheer poetry and romance of it began to stick to me and I couldn’t let it go. I realized the book is about many things. It’s about the struggle to find a place in this world and the desire to live a life of meaning. It’s about one man’s quest for identity and his need to see and do it all along the way. It’s about cars and bars, booze and broads, smoky jazz clubs and late night parties.
The two main characters, Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty, are 20th century explorers, discovering post-world war II America. They are adventurers, rebels, and misbegotten youth. ‘On The Road’ chronicles their journey from one end of the country to the other and back again, including a fated detour down to Mexico. It’s about the deep bond of friendship between these two men and the women who come between them. Most of all it’s about the solitary, searching life of an Artist, as embodied by Jack Kerouac in the form of Sal Paradise. It is written like no other book I’d encountered in my young life. There seems to be little punctuation as each long sentence folds neatly into the next. The writing style itself represented a new art form to me and for the first time I realized that the act of writing could be about more than simply telling a story.
I loved the idea of it- Sal Paradise hitting the road in search of meaning and reality and truth for the sole purpose of fueling his art, giving himself something to write about. Knowing that the story was mostly autobiographical and that in real life Kerouac risked everything to get to a destination that was more spiritual than physical only added to my admiration.
Reading ‘On The Road’ gave me the realization that in order to be a true artist, for my art to come from an honest place, I needed life experiences. I needed to get out on my own and see the world, meet interesting people, grasp opportunities. I needed to fill my heart and soul and imagination with the whole shebang and then spill it all out onto canvas or paper or whatever medium I chose to express myself with. Then and only then could I create Art that matters, Art that has a purpose, Art of relevance and importance.
That was it. That was why Willy gave me the book, wanted me to read it. He knew that I needed to see what it took to be a real artist, what was required to take the next step.
‘On The Road’ fueled in me a desire to strike out, get on my own road and blaze my path to glory. It left me with the itch to learn, see, feel, hear and do. There was a whole wide world out there beyond Falls Church and I needed to see it and experience it before I could even begin to think of myself as an Artist. Of course, I still had three more years of High School left so all of this would have to wait, but it was in me now, festering, and it would not go away.
In those remaining three years I would continue to do my little sketches. I would continue to write bad poetry/lyrics and keep on drawing comic book characters. But the difference then was that I knew it was all just superficial; I knew what was waiting. I knew that life would happen and as I experienced it my art would change. I was preparing myself for that moment when I could hit the road and absorb everything in my path, allowing myself to evolve and my art along with it. ‘On The Road’ provided me with a blueprint to being a better Artist and I would lock that precious information away until the moment came when I could put it to use.
‘On The Road’ also opened the door to literature for me. Now that I had discovered the power of individual style in writing and realized that good books truly were works of art, I was eager to read more. I leapt from Kerouac to William Burroughs to Hemingway. From there I went on to read Hunter S. Thompson, Steinbeck and even Dickens. I read and was transfixed by Allen Ginsberg’s epic poem, ‘Howl’. They were all revelations for me, these wondrous works of writing. Of course I was still a teenager and read comic books and continued to collect ‘Doc Savage’ and ‘Conan’ paperbacks, but my mind was more open now; I wanted to know about everything. I craved it all, high brow and low, fine and pop art.
I gave Willy a more sincere thank you for the book when next I saw him after finishing it. I tried to explain what it meant to me but struggled to find the right words. There was no need. He understood. Willy may have been a bit addled but he was also wise beyond his years and did, indeed, know me better than I knew myself.
Willy quit Bowl America a few months later. He had managed to save enough money to buy a used car and, no longer reliant on the bus line, was able to find a better paying job. I missed Willy and our talks, his insight on my art and recommendations on books I should read. He was a cool guy with a perspective on life different from anyone I’d met and knowing him left an indelible impression on me. At some point, as I moved on through life, I lost that beat up, old paperback copy of ‘On The Road’. Of course I replaced it with a newer version, and then another after that, but wished that I’d managed to hold on to the original. It was, after all, a gift- in more ways than one.
Later, during the summer of that same year, I heard Bruce Springsteen for the first time and the desire to get out on the road was again ignited within me. As I lay in bed late one night with my clock radio resting on my chest and the sound low so as not to wake the rest of the house, I listened intently while a local station played in its entirety the just released album, ‘Born To Run’. To my ears, this was everything Rock n’ Roll should be about. This was what was missing from the radio. This was ‘On The Road’ put to music. Bruce Springsteen would replace all of my musical idols and become something of a folk hero for me. He represented the blue-collar side of life, which my family definitely was a part of. He was all about being an artist as opposed to manufacturing singles for the top 40. He was an everyman doing what he loved and his music was the polar opposite of the sterile disco and tired heavy metal that perpetuated the airwaves during those years. To me, Bruce Springsteen’s music felt alive and vital. 1975 became a milestone year for me as I was awakened both culturally and spiritually. I was eager for adulthood, for it’s struggles and triumphs. I was ready to become an Artist.
I stayed at Bowl America long enough to buy my own car, a ’72 Ford Fairlane, then quit for a job in the kitchen at the local Nursing Home where a bunch of my High School buddies worked. The pay and hours were a little better but I did miss the excitement of the Bowling Alley. I missed the frenzy of league nights, joking with the ‘regulars’, getting Yvette all riled up, and working with Craig. It was an unexpectedly special place for a young man to work and learn about life and a wondrous time for me. One small irony of my working at and enjoying the Bowling alley was that, as much as I loved the job, I never really liked to Bowl.
©Jerry Kirk
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