I am often fanciful here. I will, just for the fun of it, suggest that Katy Perry bore Bruce Springsteen’s love child, or that Bruce Springsteen is one of South Africa’s most notable musical exports. But I am not being fanciful when I tell you that Annie Liebowitz, later America’s most famous photographer of celebrities, once implored me to pose naked for her. I decided not to in the end, for the same reason many fellows would not — I was worried that I might be seen as stingily endowed.
I discovered later in life that I am in fact very generously endowed, and cannot blame on the hardware that the post-coital remark I have heard most often in my life has been “Well, that was pretty disappointing”. It’s more a software problem. I may not be imaginative enough, or empathetic enough, or, as I’ve become fond of saying the past several weeks, enough enough. After all these years, it may be I have no idea what I’m doing.
But we’re getting distracted. It was my worry about being inadequately endowed that made my skinnydipping with W— and C— and W—’s fat, neurotic male roommate in Tuna Canyon all those years ago all the more remarkable.
You’ll need some background. W— was my pal, and C— his girlfriend. I lusted after C— in my heart, but knew I had no chance with her, as she preferred younger, very pretty men. (She and I were 22, and W— 21, and absurdly pretty.) A few months before, she and he and I had driven up to San Francisco together in my VW microbus, on LSD. Leave it to me to drop acid for the first time on Highway 1 north of San Simeon, where it gets twisty-turnier than any road anywhere in the world! While I concentrated hard on preventing our plunging into the frigid Pacific far below, C—, in the back, teased W—’s hair. For hours. For literal hours.
But back to Tuna Canyon. The four of us discovered a little waterfall, with a pool at its base. For the reasons outlined above, I wouldn’t normally have removed all my clothing and leapt in, but we’d all taken mescaline, and I didn’t want to appear unfree, uncool, or unhip. Splash! Wouldn’t you know it, though? Not two minutes after the three of us had begun cavorting naked in nature, we realised two grizzled outdoorsmen straight out of Deliverance were looming over us, leering at C—’s wonderful firm 22-year-old breasts. It occurred to me they might slash my, W—’s, and Roommate’s throats and rape C—, so I leapt out of the pool, yanked my clothes back on without even drying off first, and tried to strike up a conversation with our visitors, who were by now licking their lips.
But then a large wild, malevolent-looking rodent of some sort materialised at my feet, and I thought maybe The Lord Thy God had sent him to help me demonstrate to our prospective assailants that I, like them, was a nature-loving outdoorsperson. As our would-be assailants readied their crossbows, I gave Mr. Rodent an affectionate little pat on the head, which he reciprocated by taking a bite out of my finger. Our two prospective assailants looked at each other, apparently agreed without speaking that I was crazy, and disappeared quickly into the foliage, or whatever we rugged outdoors types call it. I went to the emergency hospital in Santa Monica and got my finger stitched up, and a tetanus shot. C—’s chasteness was uncompromised, as two were my, W—’s, and Roomate’s throats.
Years later, I attended the debut performance of Bob Marley & The Wailers at the Roxy Theatre. I was enchanted by the sight of a waitress with bleached blonde hair, and passed her a note suggesting we become an item. She turned out to be C–. We did indeed become an item, for around 24 hours, after which she reverted to favouring very young, very pretty men.
Some gratitude.
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