1985 Cadillac El Dorado on Broadway in front of St. Peter's Church, formerly Little Italy

 Courtesy Honks

 This is a story about driving in LA.  First up, it is a ‘recognized the world over’ rule that SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEPS RIGHT and the LEFT LANE IS THE PASSING LANE, but you wouldn't know it driving in LA.  If you wanna move through LA traffic with alacrity you must drive in the right lane and snake around the seniors and out-of-towners. 

Bret Easton begins his landmark first novel Less Than Zero with a line about LA drivers not knowing how to MERGE.   Last week, I watched the second half of the film version of Less Than Zero starring Andrew McCarthy and Jami Gertz on the USA network, edited for content.  There is a scene in Less Than Zero where Jami Gertz and 3 other LA fashionably dressed college-aged girls, looking entirely 1980’s with big hair and all, are snorting cocaine in this posh night club’s restroom, and one chick's nose starts bleeding.  “Rusty pipes!”  She says. 

I realized that I'd never scene the movie Less Than Zero before in my life; and I read the book just once, the year it came out mid 80’s.  My sister bought the first edition hardcover, read it, passed it to me, I read it, and then all my close high school friends read the same copy over the next few months. Shellee, my LA friend circa 1983/84 told me that she ‘cried’ while she read Less Than Zero.

I immediately recognized that line, "Rusty Pipes!"  A coke snorting college chick in the film, Rules of Engagement says that same line; and Rules of Engagement is based on another Easton novel.  All my friends and family are fans of Easton's books and films based on his books.  Rules of Engagement, the film by Roger Avery (co-writer of Pulp Fiction), is a BRILLIANT film, not like any other film I've ever scene.  Great acting and camera work -- the backward rolls and split screens are awesome.  It’s a very landmark and under-appreciated film, by the director of Killing Zoe, another stellar flick, like Marty Feldman’s 1980’s film, IN GOD WE TRUST with Richard Pryor as God, and Andy Kaufman as the President.  Actually, that film was not too good, as Bubbleboy might say.

Just last week, my good friend and Bravofold member GB commented to me in an email, "I just re-read Less Than Zero,” he wrote, “and you reminded me of one of the characters."  ‘Which one?’  I immediately thought.  GB didn't specify.  I spoke to my friend Jo, also a Bravo-fold member, currently living on Cheju Island in SKorea, and told her what GB wrote.  "Which one?"  Jo asked me.  "I don't know!"  I replied.  If it's the Robert Downey Jr. character, then that worries me.  This summer, while visiting a Walmart in Chatsworth with my buddy St. Tommy, another Bravo-fold member, some homeless dude called me Robert Downey Jr.  And he called St. Tommy, ‘Owen Wilson’, which was funny, cuz I'd never seen it, but Saint does look like the blondish Wilson bros.  Which made me think, "Do I LOOK REALLY LIKE a DRUG ADDICT?"

I lived in Asia for nearly 14 years zigzagging my way in and out of oriental madness, only to return to the US of A and the drivers here are no better.  When I drive in right lanes, during non-peak hours when the right lane is not parking spaces, during rush hour when they are open lanes, I speed through, giving 'warning honks' along the way.

It's not rude.  It's merely in keeping with me openly communicating with drivers on the road, signaling people with a slight honk that I'm approaching, waving people in and signaling lane changes with my arm out the window, making eye contact and smiling with as many drivers as I can daily. 

The Bravo Family, my family, in their/our entire 51 year history of living in America -- following their 1959 arrival in Miami, to my entry into the mix 9 years later and ending with us in the present day of 2010, still living in LA since the 60’s --  we Bravos have only ever owned a NEW CAR once; and that 1987 Silver Mercury Grand Marquis V8 sedan, we won in 1988, part of a promotional giveaway; pure luck! Or gift from the Almighty, depending on your POV. 

All my life, other than that Gift Merc, besides the Ford Torino station wagon my father drove in the 70’s; the only other Make/Model of cars that my father ever owned, until the Merc we won, was Fords. We drove a Ford Pinto Runabout, the famous ‘exploding model’ for several years, as well as another Pinto Squire, until my dad bought a used Ford Fairmont. That’s the Ford we owned when the Bravo’s won the Merc at that hotel in Santa Barbara, that weekend I visited LA from college in 1988, during the tail end of my first year in Berkeley. We drove home from Santa Barbara in a BRAND NEW CAR, the likes of which, the Bravos had never seen before!   

Personally, I’ve never bought or sold a single car from any Dealer or shop or non-family private party, in my entire life, new or used.  Yet, I’ve driven a car steadily since first getting my first drivers license in 1983.  Pure luck, or gift from the Almighty.

The only car I ever purchased in my life with my own money was a 1968 Sky Blue Ford Galaxie Coupe in 1992; and I bought that beauty from my Godmother’s husband for $275 dollars. 

4 years later, in 1996, Shaquille Oneal first came to the LA Lakers and Shaq also purchased a convertible 1968 Ford Galaxie Coupe upon arrival. 

Because Shaq was a semi media hound, out in LA from FLA, just like the early Bravo’s Maria and Jose, had come out to LA from Miami back in 1959.  Perhaps, had my parents stayed in Miami, I’d be ME now, but with a full on Dade County sense and OKAY with humidity. 

Shaq began his star studded NBA career in Orlando, FLA in 1992, had gone to the NBA finals in both 94&95, lost to The Dream and Spaceman and Will Smith and Mario Elly in Houston.  NOW, Shaq was in LA, like me, and driving the same Make/Model/Year car, only he had the convertible. 

Shaq in his convertible Galaxie coupe was highly visible. The fact that Shaq drove a COUPE, a two door, as opposed to the SEDAN or four door model; made the 1968 Ford Galaxie coupe a very popular car.  I not only drove that same car, but 1968 is also the year I was born; and I like to attach meaning to otherwise meaningless coincidence. That’s what culture is all about.  Culture and superstition, and a whole lot of other things.

Cut the 2000’s. The Mercury died after 10 years faithful service. My mother bought, from her friend, a used 1985 metallic green Cadillac El Dorado, or Avocado El Dorado, as I sometimes call, er, called it. 

For the first decade of the 2000's, whenever I visited LA, I drove the Avocado El Dorado, pictured above in duplicate.   Avocado died in August.

Now I drive a newer Cadillac, a 1999 SRS with only 85,000 miles

1999 Cadillac SRS in front of the original Zankou Chicken Rest, which always makes me think of that song by Beck, Deborah -- I wouldn't do you like that.  Zankou Chicken

 

Part Deux to Follow