The song “North of Wasteland” from the Eleventh Dream Day
record Lived to Tell, was based on a true story that took place in South
Central Florida in 1980 shortly after my college graduation. I have
realized years later that the song tells just a fraction of the story and
fortunately, I have lived to tell the rest.
The Song:
North of Wasteland
There was a tree that grew outside my window
Amid the fields of cane and unanswered questions
It held a fruit of fatal mystery
And it soothed me to think that it grew so close to me
In the morning
There’s never any warning
Except the neighbor’s rooster
Rooster crowing
And the church bells ring
From north of the wasteland
I think back to the time
I lived in a trailer
Amid the fields of cane
And unanswered questions
It still seems so absurd
One night outside my door
A wild boar that seemed so lost
We both knew we were caught
In a wasteland
There was no time or place where we belonged
I was wrong
And I knew it from that night on
The Story:
Part One:
There’s
that moment when waking up in a strange bed where you have absolutely no idea
where you are; where your world is a late night test pattern of confusion. The
crowing of a nearby rooster offered no clues. It was still dark and I couldn’t
see a thing. But in the dank heavy air, I knew the space was small. A darting
tickle on my leg startled me into full consciousness, and I saw the tiny
cockroach scurry away as I lifted the sheet.
“Oh
yeah,” I thought, and as quick as a dart thrown at a map, I realized where I
was.
The drive in from the West Palm
Beach airport the night before with Sherri in her old Karman Ghia was the start
of a new life, a post-collegiate adult life, and now with the girl of my
dreams.
As we dieseled past lit highways
into the black pitch of a sticky Florida night, I looked at Sherri’s profile
and couldn’t quite believe I was sitting next to her. With her green-tinted
almond eyes and the start of a deep tan, she had the kind of exotic look that I
thought was out of my league. And she had been well out of my league for some
time now; hard-to-get couldn’t describe the last year and a half of my
frustration at trying to win her over. I still wasn’t used to this new haircut
though, a Hamillish bob, the result of a stormy spring when she took scissors
to the hair that had never been cut. But the feeling in this verdant place
where vines draped the trees was that love and hair would grow and keep
growing.
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The curtains began to color with
the pastels of morning and I took stock of what brought me here. I thought back
to the phone call that urged me to quit my job in Chicago, the voice on the
other end as seductive as waves lapping gently on a tropical beach. But now I
was on my back in an R.V. trailer, the kind that hitched to the back of a
pick-up. From where I lay I could see the tiny kitchen sink, and beyond that a
toilet visible behind a half-open accordion door. Sherri was close, though not
with me; she was in the double wide trailer that sat on concrete blocks just
twenty yards away. After whispered good nights following our late arrival we
had kissed one last time, and she had shown me to my lodging—“The Rogue”
decaled on its aluminum side.
I wondered when it would be appropriate to
rise and make my way to the door of the big trailer, Sherri’s parent’s
retirement abode. I noticed from the corner of my eye a couple more cockroaches
scurrying on the faucet then into the cabinet. Their night shift was over, and
I closed my eyes . Church bells tolled from some place unfamiliar, and I fell back asleep.
Part Two:
Two
knocks and then too much light poured through the door as Sherri entered The
Rogue with a steaming cup of Nescafe.
“Were
you going to sleep all day?” she asked. “My parents will think you’re lazy!
C’mon. Get dressed and say hi.”
I was
slightly nervous as I clumsily navigated the too steep metal steps out of the
trailer, but as I stepped into this novel space, the sun had an instantly
welcoming embrace.
“Mister
Rick Rizzo!”
A fifty
something stocky athletic man with his hand extended emerged from the double
wide with a greeting that was at the same time welcoming yet impersonal. His
handshake pushed my knuckles together.
“How’d
The Rogue treat you last night?” he half grinned.
“Just
glad to be here sir,” I replied, partly a reflection on my well- mannered
upbringing, but even more seeming like a private reporting to duty. Sherri’s
dad was a retired army sergeant, my preconceptions of which were informed
somewhere between Combat!and Gomer Pyle.
“C’mon
in, let me show you around.”
As I
stepped into this much larger trailer, I noticed it was tethered in four
corners by steel cables, an attempt to keep it from flying away in the
occasional hurricane winds that swept through these parts.
“Check
it out,” he beamed; gesturing at what I had to admit was more space than I
could have imagined. It was certainly bigger than any apartment I’d lived
in—two bedrooms down the hall from a spacious kitchen, dining room and family
room complete with working fireplace.
“You
must be Rick,” Sherri’s mom entered cheerfully.
A
retired high school English teacher, she reminded me of my own mother with her
bright smile and short brown hair.
Nice to
meet you. Formalities. I wanted to make a good impression. I realized that I
had a weak reason for being there. A recent college graduate, but no ambition
other than being with their daughter.
As the
small talk began to sound even more forced, and Sherri’s parents moved on to
their daily routines, I noticed the morning paper on the breakfast table. The
West Palm local paper was typically thin, but I knew what I needed and went
straight to the classifieds. The clock was ticking on my dead beat status and I
needed to see what was out there.
My
bachelor’s degree was in business administration with a focus on marketing. A
number of my college friends already had found jobs, mostly through family
connections, but this was 1980, a year of double digit unemployment, hostages,
and high inflation. The meager list of job opportunities was worse than I
anticipated. Drive a truck. Telemarketing.
The best I could do was to call an employment agency and they setup an
appointment for me the following morning. It was a start.
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Walking out of the air-conditioned
double wide into the stifling mid-morning heat, I surveyed the flat horizon of
trailers and palm trees. A wasteland. A
few miles to the west, the sugar cane factory let loose the by-product of its
enterprise—a sickeningly beyond ripe rotting and somewhat burnt smell that
quickly coated my nostrils.
That
night after an all-you-can-eat pizza dinner at a franchise Sherri’s father had
an investing interest in, I had trouble falling asleep knowing how the
micro-fauna would soon be bustling around my restless torso. I must have dozed
off at some point into the Floridian night
Minutes or hours later I was aware of the
presence of a much larger creature and bolted upright. No matter how much I
wanted it to not be true there was no denying that something was snorting and
making guttural grunts just outside the thin aluminum of my walls. A
choice—either lie on my back petrified and wait for death or face it and get it
over with.
I slowly opened the screen door.
Somewhat darker than the shadows
stood a beast. The tusks that stuck wildly from the sides of what looked like a
head with legs told me this was some sort of wild pig or boar.
It looked at me and snorted.
I said nothing. It would have been
weird.
What I thought though, and what the
boar seemed to be thinking as well was clear. One of us doesn’t belong here.
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What
was invisible that first night driving in was now unveiled in the orange glow
of morning as I drove to my first interview in Del Ray Beach. Route 441 was a
single lane highway connecting Belle Glade to my future. Driving Sherrie’s VW,
I passed horses in pastures, county fairgrounds, migrant workers stooped over
baskets, and a turn off for Lion Country Safari. Pick-up trucks with gun racks
and dogs with tongues lolling in their flat beds kicked up dust pulling onto
the road. It all smelled green. When I hit the interstate though, time seemed
to reset as I joined the rush of the morning commute of BMWs and Audis. As I
pulled into Porter Paints on A1A, I checked my tie in the mirror poised to join
the working world.
The
interview went well enough, I got the job. I was now the assistant manager of a
business I had no experience in, but I was willing if not able. The money was
crap, but I knew the prospects were slim, and the feeling of going back to
Sherri’s parents with a job was worth it. Work was work, and this was work in
Florida! The beach was across the street; the Atlantic Ocean visible, a literal
sea of possibility. I crossed the road, dress shoes sinking into the sand,
unknotted my tie, and squinted into the morning sun.
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That
evening I enjoyed a cold beer with Sherri’s dad as we both watched the sun set
over the trailer park. I sensed he was
sizing me up, and I did my best to survey the landscape with authority.
“That’s
an interesting apple tree,” I pointed toward a spiny looking tree with ripening
fruit.
“That’s
no apple tree, that’s a manctineel--the Spanish call it manzinilla de la muerta—little apple of death.”
He
explained how Columbus had noticed that just a few drops from a leaf onto the
skin would instantly blister.
“You
know if you took a bite of one of those “apples’ you would drop dead within ten
minutes. The interesting thing is that an autopsy wouldn’t turn up a thing.”
I fell
asleep that night wondering why he added that last tidbit.
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Part Three:
The
next morning in Del Ray Beach at the paint store I was primed to start a new
career. A clean cut preppy looking kid not much older than me would be training
me before moving on to manage the Boca Raton store.
I got
trained how to mix paint using a variety of pigments squirted into a can of
white base. It was easy, and I enjoyed it. I knew I could do this job:
Keep the books. Check.
Receipts, register, check, check.
The first paint contractor came in.
Bloodshot eyes. Painters are notorious alcoholics I would come to know, with
gruff hung-over demeanors. I was intimidated which I’m sure was the intended
outcome. The shift ended. I would survive to work another day.
My third day on the job, things
weren’t quite so good. A rich lady with a brand new Lincoln Continental had me
load a five gallon container of primer into the trunk. The trunk was deep
though, and the container was heavy and awkward, and it tipped out of my grip.
Five gallons of milk white paint burst out and coated the fuzzy black interior
of her luxury car. I hadn’t put the lid on tightly enough in the store.
She was as nice as could be
considering the mess, and didn’t get upset, although she asked me to stop
trying to clean it up since I was only making it worse.
The days passed. It was a job. I
was working poor, but now I had an apartment in Del Ray Beach and my girlfriend
would soon be moving in with me.
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Sherri moved in. Her parents didn’t
know, so if the phone rang only she could answer it. The apartment was basically
a studio converted from a coach house broken into two units. The owner was a
widow who turned a blind eye to our sinful cohabitation and the immigration
status of the two young Cuban fellows who lived behind us. There was a relief
that the tiny cockroaches were out of my life, but here, gigantic Palmetto
bugs, cockroaches on steroids, apparently thought the space was theirs.
Life was peaceful though and a
routine developed. Work at the store, home for lunch, a downpour of rain at
12:30 which evaporated by 12:45, back home for dinner with Sherri, and an
occasional walk to the beach past the Intercoastal waterway with its funky houseboats.
The neighbors across the alley (not the friendly Cubans) blasted Eric Clapton’s
Cocaine live version at regular
intervals punctuating the day. Some nights we took a late night dip in the
ocean which might have been romantic save for my crippling fear of man-o-war
stings and shark attacks. It was worth the buoyant embraces and salt water
kisses though and life seemed good. But then came the day Sherri announced she
wanted to be an actress.
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Part Four:
Yes, Sherri wanted to be an
actress. This in itself should have been great news. I should have been happy
for her. The thing is, in the last few months she also had wanted to be a
nurse, a teacher, and a merchant marine. This last one was particularly
troubling. Sherri’s ex-boyfriend was a merchant marine. I had noticed one day
on her dresser a letter from this guy, Richard. I asked her about it. They had
been high school sweethearts and she swore she was long over him, but there
were little things I couldn’t let go. For one, Sherri’s favorite record was
Joni Mitchell’s Blue. There’s a song The Last Time I Saw Richard on that
record. Her eyes seemed to go somewhere when it came on.
The
last time I saw Richard was Detroit in ‘68
And
he told me all romantics meet the same fate someday
My name Rick seemed so
unsophisticated. Richard was a merchant marine. Traveling to distant ports.
Tattooing girls ‘names on his biceps. A salty spray of ocean as he stood on the
deck of a ship.
I was assistant manager at a paint
store.
All
good dreamers pass this way some day
That night I had a dream. I was back in The Rogue. Hurricane winds
started to rattle it back and forth. Cockroaches streamed upward from the sink
and toilet. The trailer walls ripped away and I was exposed to the storm. A
wild pig ran out from behind the big trailer as the steel cables groaned. Cane
snakes slithered beneath what was left of my trailer. The giant smoke stacks of
the sugar factory crumbled. I closed my
eyes and screamed silently into the gale.
When all had calmed, the sun was burning
through the clouds. The boar asked me why I was still there. Sherri’s dad stood
with a rake in his hands. Gathering the tiny apples of death.
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The small theater culture of South
Florida was vibrant in the early 80s, no doubt fueled by the presence of Burt
Reynolds in Jupiter Beach and a bevy of retirees to fill the seats. The Florida
Atlantic University Theater posted a notice for open auditions for a production
of Moliere’s The Miser and Sherri
figured it was a good place to start.
Auditions were held on a small
campus stage in Boca Raton, and each hopeful was instructed to improvise a
scene (unrelated to The Miser) based
on a suggestion from the director. I’m not sure if that was standard procedure to
try out for a play, but I was nervous for Sherri. I thought she nailed it though,
and I was impressed.
After the mostly female group of hopefuls
finished, Sherri and I were headed for the back of the theater, when I heard
the director’s voice.
“What about you young man? Aren’t
you trying out?”
I turned, not knowing it was me he
was talking to, but I did seem to fit the bill.
I saw that he was addressing me.
“I’m just here for moral support
for my girlfriend,” I replied somewhat sheepishly.
“We really have a shortage of males
for this play, and I think you should give it a try,” he peered over his
glasses.
Thankfully, he didn’t make me
improvise. I simply had to read a short scene from a paperback copy of the
play. I sensed he was lowering the bar. I did my thing, he said thanks to both
of us, and we headed back to Del Ray.
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The phone rang. It was late
afternoon, Sherri was out shopping. I picked it up forgetting as I often did
that I shouldn’t; I might have some ‘splaining to do to the Sergeant.
I was formulating an excuse for why
I was there and Sherri wasn’t as I said hello.
“Hi, this is Joe Conaway, I led the
auditions last week for The Miser.”
“Oh, hi” I replied. “Sherri is out
right now, can I take a message?”
“No, that’s okay. I want to talk to
you about being in the play.”
“But wait, what about Sherri?”
Nothing was registering for me, but
he would quickly give me the necessary pieces of the puzzle.
“We thought she was really good,
but we really have so few female parts for the play, and there were some more
experienced actresses I wanted to cast.”
“I’d like to offer you a role
though. I can actually see you as Cleante, Harpagon’s son.”
I don’t remember what I said, but
it wasn’t no.
After we hung up, I realized that I
had made a huge mistake. There was no way I could relay this news when Sherri
got home. I don’t remember what I said, but my reply didn’t have the words,
I’ll call him back, no, or sorry.
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The
Miser ran through the end of July. The rehearsals were a blast, and the
rest of the cast was so fun to be around. I didn’t get the hefty role of Harpagon's son, but I did
get a line as one of the lackeys.
“I seem to have torn me breeches”
delivered in a ripe Cockney got howls of laughter every night as Harpagon chased
me off the stage with his cane.
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By the time the play closed I knew
I was leaving for Chicago. I wanted to find a band to join. Sherri had applied to Nursing School at the
community college. We weren’t talking to each other much. We had one tearful
night when I told her I was going home. I think she was relieved.
Sherri and her father drove me to
the West Palm airport. There was a beautiful Florida sunset that night.
Sherri’s hair had grown much longer now and she brushed long strands from her
eyes. She kissed me on the cheek.
“Good luck, Rizzo. Don’t do
anything I wouldn’t do.” Sherri’s father gave me one last strong handshake.
“Yes sir.” I returned it in kind and started for the plane heading north of the wasteland.
thank you Mary for your editing and love
