With the Bentleys, the Hummers, the Benz
Escalade twenty-three-inch rims
Jumpin' out the Jaguar with the tims; keep your bread up
And live good, East Coast West Coast Worldwide
All my playas in the hood stay fly
And if you're ballin' let me here you say Righ. (Right)
Li'l Kim feat. Mr. Cheeks, "The Jump Off"
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I've been gone for a minute; now I'm back at the jump off. It's been far too long since I've emailed you all, and I think that there's a sufficient amount of news combined with a sufficient lack of readership of my weblog for me to warrant a massive email to blind-carbon-copy-land. But news and the lack of relaying it shouldn't be the sole reason why I'm reaching out to you today. In truth, I don't feel like I do enough to keep you all close and connected, not necessarily to my daily goings-on, but more perhaps as a mere show or gesture of my esteem. And, in return, I feel like I'm a pretty good guy to keep around. If you're not having fun with me, you should probably get out of the Having Fun business.
That was a Sports Night reference, for those of you keeping track at home.
Currently, I'm involved in really important and weighty issues: I can't seem to figure out who does the background music to Nike's new Lance Armstrong commercial, a wonderful spot entitled, "Magnet." Not that I've looked very hard; I spent more time trying to think of an appropriate song lyric with which I would open this email. I spent more time trying to figure out what to do with a small box of melted Ghirardelli English toffee chocolates that were inadvertantly left in my car in the hot Calabasas morning. I spent more time hitting snooze.
In all, it would be wrong of me to try and place particular emphasis on the daily trappings of misguided youth, particularly if I'm the pilot of this soul plane. So I'm not trying to deflect blame or receive credit for anything; I'm not trying to draw pity or comfort. I'll walk unafraid, and be clumsy instead. I've made a lot of poor decisions during my time, but I've made a lot of good ones, too, many of which include getting to know each and everyone one of you in my bcc: field. I'm not looking for a pat on the back. I'm not looking for a hand up. I'm looking for judgment and opinion, because only through possession of aversion or admiration for my actions can I truly know that you listened and listened well.
But as you know, telling a story in any sort of straightforward fashion isn't my modus operandi. Let's begin at the ending. Or at least, where it has left off so far:
I got off the phone with Ventura County probation department, telling me that I had to attend my scheduled court date at the end of the month. The judge will issue a contiuance for my sentencing hearing, after which I have to report to the probation department to schedule an interview. I hung up the cell phone, got out of the parked car and headed into the office.
I had just gotten back from the upper panhandle of West Virginia, getting the great opportunity to meet Heather's family and friends. I finally recovered from a sinus allergy, and I took great amusement in watching Heather nurse a Jagermeister and Sangria-induced hangover on Memorial day at a barbecue. I've found that the best way to have a good time with a new group of people is to eat & hang out with them. Never pass up the opportunity to accept the generosity of someone else's kitchen. The Dalai Lama is clearly a vegan, and though he sees eating a cheeseburger as bad karma, he knows that refusing a host who offers him one is even worse karma. I think that the sense of hospitality is lost among most Americans; we as a people are taught to be independent lone cowboys taming the wild on our own. I expect to walk through Iran and enjoy talking politics, soccer, and drinking a very very strong cup of coffee. Perhaps that's my naivete at play, seeing the world for what it should be. I find no fault in that.
Heather played tourguide as she took me through the Ohio River valley area. There was some cultural endeavors, but for the most part, either I was fighting exhaustion from the flight or she was fighting exhaustion from Jack Daniels. We did manage to swing by an ice cream parlor where we saw a guy eating ice cream out of a styrofoam box. I'm talking full-on cafeteria to-go-order-sized box. Ice cream. This guy must be following it up with about fifty liters of insulin.
Passing through security at LAX, I was putting my cell phone and keys back in my pocket when the security guard behind me says, "Are you having a good night, Ron?" I turn around and smile at the middle-aged gentleman, and indeed I affirmed the aforementioned evening. "Where are you flying tonight, Ron?" After putting on my jacket and securing my carry-ons, I respond that I was headed to Pittsburgh, and that I was confused since I was wondering how this fellow knew me. He pointed to my name written on my chai latte.
I had never taken a red-eye flight before, but I left Thousand Oaks at about 9pm for my 11:30pm flight across the country. Guy Warrack once said, "You should make a point of trying everything once, except incest and folk-dancing." (This quote has also been misattributed to Sir Arnold Bax & Sir Thomas Beecham. My mass emails are also fonts of trivial knowledge!) I arrived in El Segundo with enough time to get a cup of tea to try and cure my sinus headache and to hit the Washington Mutual for some pocket cash. Traffic was surprisingly light for a Friday night, but sometimes there's no such thing as coincidence. Dale would happily point out that a case of beer has 24 cans and that there are 24 hours in a day. Not coincidence, but providence.
That was a Matrix reference, for those of you keeping track at home.
I really needed to get away for a while, and so when I heard that my early disposition conference would be held before Memorial Day, I booked a flight on United to get me away from California for as long as I could. Being in that courtroom is so weird at times. I've had three hearings so far, and I haven't really enjoyed any of them. It's been weird in a room full of thieves & liars in jumpsuits. And there I was, in my suit from Bachrach, looking forward to a day when this was just another story I could tell. In the meantime, I had to live with the consequences of my actions, and that meant going along for the ride named The Judicial Process. The district attorney just informed my lawyer, prior to me pleading guilty to charges of driving under the influence causing injury to another individual, that they would be upgrading it to say great bodily injury, which, while the charge is still a felony, now meant that I was pleading guilty to a felony that counted as a strike.
I remember meeting with my lawyer for the first time. She has a small office in Fullerton down a street that's weird in that it's as wide as most major thoroughfares, but it's bound on both sides by residential homes that have been converted into businesses. It's as if zoning laws didn't apply on this one stretch of road. Her office was one of them, where she practice criminal defense along with Lloyd Freeberg. This is a lawfirm whose clientele include wealthy hockey stars who tend to get in trouble. Now I'm a big believer in paying the consequences for your actions. I'm hiring the big guns because I will happily pay my dues, but I don't want to screwed by the system.
I got in touch with Lloyd's law office while I was in Oceanside recuperating the day after the accident. My brother had been working for a performance-tuning garage at the time, a business that attracts people who have a lot of money to spend on their automotive toys. It was rough spending that weekend in Oceanside; I didn't have the ability nor the willpower to see anybody, and I was immensely sore throughout my body.
The amazing thing was, though, that I had managed to walk away from the crash practically unscathed. In Oceanside, I was nursing linger neck, back, and leg pain, but there was no internal bleeding and no broken bones. Betty gave up her life to save mine, despite my worst efforts. A lot of people may have wondered whether spending $50k on a luxury car is worth it, and my perspective will be forever skewed by the fact that I might not be in one piece of I were still trucking around in my green Honda.
The morning after, I was struggling to do basic things like rolling out of bed and urinating, the former because of immense whiplash, and the latter because my bladder didn't so much like having the seat belt compressing it (nor did I appreciate the catheter used to see if I had any internal bleeding). My parents made the drive up after I called them at 4am from the hospital, and I'm lucky that I had my good friend David to taxi me home from the emergency room. That was a rough four hour ordeal, having to be lifted by orderlies to an MRI machine and so on. Meanwhile, the police officer who arrested and followed me with the ambulance eventually let me go of my own recognizance. I'm hoping that when I finally get my probation hearing scheduled, it can be made clear that I was sorry from moment zero.
Doctor: "So, do you feel anything?"
Me: "You mean like remorse and regret? Yeah, I have tons of that."
Doctor: "No, I mean like muscle pain in your shoulders or back."
Me: "Not really, I guess."
It was a weird scene, and I think I'm emotionally detached from that evening, enough so much that I can describe it. I was sitting on the bumper of the patrol car, staring off at the wreckage. I failed the breath test and they were writing me up, and I originally felt just fine, and I initially refused medical attention, but then I realized that it would do me no good to focus on my remorse and regret, and that the sensible thing to do is to take care of the situation at hand and determine if I had any internal damage. Technically, the police could have taken me into custody as soon as the hospital discharged me, but my tenure in the emergency room outlasted the officer's patience.
Do this day, I cringe at the smell of ozone in the air. Burnt oxygen. I remember waking up, pain shooting through my legs, and me repeating Fuck Me Fuck Me over and over as I opened my eyes. At that moment, I had no idea the extent of the damage. I was inside of a wrecked Lexus, deflating air bag in my lap, and I instantly had the wherewithal to reach for my registration and proof of insurance in my glove compartment. Betty was the name I gave my car the day I bought it. I personified a car that symbolized my arrogance. She was pride with perforated leather.
I haven't seen Betty since that evening. I didn't take pictures of that car, and I see other models of that car on the freeway and on the road, but they are all lifeless renditions of my soulful original vehicle. I bought that car with 12 miles on it. Insurance bought it from me with 19k. I had been to Vegas, to San Diego, to Ventura, to Oregon. How do you measure a year? But in the end, I see other GS300's on the road and I think fondly of the beauty, grace, and majesty of that which I threw away. I never took pictures of the car, and I always choose to remember her in my head, in my own way.
That was a Lost Highway reference. You guys aren't very good at this game, are you?
I held the registration and proof of insurance in my hand and stepped out of the car. Down the curb from me was a wrecked pickup truck and a crowd of people attending to the bleeding and moaning driver. I would later come to find out that it was some 22 year old kid with ADD living with his parents. His early 90's truck didn't come equipped with an air bag and our collision caused him to hit his forehead against his driver side window. Complex cuts around his eye, but as the medical reports would later state, no loss of vision. Seat probably didn't secure him properly; simple fracture of his collarbone also. As with most incidents involving chest trauma, he also suffered from a collapsed lung. He would later stabilize in the hospital, and was out after five days.
As you may remember, I was out in four hours with a few bruises, a sore neck, and lifetime of regret.
I was driving up the road, up a road I always drove, up a way I always knew. I was about two miles away from my driveway. I was almost home. Two lanes in each direction. Slow guy in front of me in the faster left lane. I swing over to the right lane to try and pass him, but the road was beginning to curve to the left. I hit the gas pedal to try and get the rear-wheel-drive to catch and propel me through the inside-out maneuver. But my tires slip and I'm now powersliding into the right lane. I apply the gas pedal harder, but I can't avoid nailing the curb on the side. It's at this point that my recollection of the actual event stops.
Based on analysis of the tracks the next day, my guess is that once I hit the curb, the car was going slow enough that tires finally did catch, and all my revving ultimately accelerated the car and its non-driving driver across the road. My trajectory was such that the car was headed straight for a gas main. Now enter a kid, driving at the wrong place and the wrong time. My car now was veering into oncoming traffic. He applies his brakes, they lock and he begins to try and swerve toward his curb, in attempt to dodge me. However, he ends up meeting me instead and we collide roughly head on. He alters my trajectory so that I hit the electrical box next to the gas main instead. The impact causes sparks in the power lines, attracting passersby to the scene.
I'm going to skip past the part where I'm at the bar and I tell the bartender that I'm okay to drive home. I'm going to skip past the part where I go to the bar in the first place. I instead am going to focus on me running errands earlier that day. I'm on an offramp near Agoura. The license plate frame in front of me reads, "Don't drive faster than your angel can fly." I turn in to get my car washed.
Car Wash Guy: "You want us to wash your tires, too? It'll make the rims really shiny."
Ron: "Yeah, sure. Why not."
