Why did I choose Los Angeles for my next Antioch Co-op job? Maybe it was because it was about psychology. The job was receptionist and only full-time person at the Graduate Psychology Clinic at the University of Southern California, where students getting master’s degrees of Ph.D.s could see clients, and then discuss with their advisers. Maybe I thought I might get some free therapy—I still thought I was extremely neurotic, which was how I explained my general unhappiness.
To get to L.A., I was going to fly for the first time. At that time, 1961, there was a ticket called “student standby”: if you were a student, you could show up at the airport, and if there were empty seats on the flight you wanted, you got to fly for cheap. I don’t remember how cheap; my parents must have paid for this.
I had met a very un-handsome man—short, stubby face, grayish buzz cut—who was stationed at nearby Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (the words “Peace is our profession” were huge on the fence banner surrounding the base)—men from nearby colleges and Wright-Pat hung out at Antioch because they’d heard there were open dorms and no house-mothers. When he heard I had to be at the Dayton Airport at 6 in the morning to have a chance of getting on the first flight, he offered to take. This meant I hung out at his apartment all evening and night. At first it was like a party—his friends, my friends who hadn’t left for their jobs yet—then it was night. We sat up talking, necked a bit. I had lost my virginity that summer, but wasn’t eager to continue; he had a wife somewhere. It was still dark when we set out for the airport.
Etta James’s “At Last” was the hit song of the summer, and we heard it dozens of times that evening, night, and on the drive to the airport. That song still evokes my apprehension and excitement, sends little thrills down my back. Was I going to be afraid of flying, as I heard some people were? There were only two other Antioch students going to jobs in the L.A. area; what would it be like to be totally on my own? Dawn brightened to our right as we neared the airport; it was the first time I had seen a sunrise. We kissed chastely as he dropped me near the entrance, and I carried my suitcase inside. (No wheelies yet.)
I was able to get on the first flight to L.A.; in those days, airlines were required to fly the number of flights in their schedule, no matter how few passengers. Flying turned out to be delicious; I didn’t feel detached from the ground, even when we were 30,000 feet up. I had the absurd feeling the plane was attached by an enormously long pole to a truck down below, so felt perfectly safe.
The Schecters met me in L.A., old friends of my parents I had never met. I was to stay with them for a few days until I found a place to live and started my job. Their house, near Beverly Hills, was very quiet. One day I had dinner with Robin, the Antioch student who was just leaving the job. She was friendly and warm, told me I would love the job, cued me in to the various professors and students. It was dark by the time I returned to the Schecters’, taking a bus that left me at Wilshire Boulevard and their street. Houses sat behind large lawns, but the quiet—no kids playing on the street, no people sitting outside—was so unnerving that the click-clack of my heels on the sidewalk felt like it was attracting some crazy person that a lone woman was out here. I took off my shoes to walk barefoot. When I arrived at the Schecters, I was told that NOBODY walked in Beverly Hills, and it wouldn’t have surprised her if I’d been stopped by the police and asked, what was I doing?
Apartment hunting was also a bit unnerving. L.A. seemed full of garden apartment complexes in U-shape around a swimming pool, looking like a motel, with rent way more than I could afford. I still hadn’t found anything by the Sunday before I was to report for work. So the Schecters dropped me at the YWCA in downtown, near a bus route that would take me to the university. There I shared a room with a woman maybe in her 40s, who suggested I try rooming houses near USC. I finally found a place on the third day of work, and Thursday morning, I carried my suitcase to my new home before setting off to work. After work, I took the bus to a shopping street where I could stock up on food for my new home, and was surprised to find one aisle entirely filled with beer and wine. In Pennsylvania, where I’d lived all through high school, all liquor was sold in “package stores”; was this a way to make it harder for minors to acquire it? I bought way too much food, three bags worth, and this is the days before grocery bags had handles. I had a hard time making my way off the bus and walking the two blocks and up the stairs to my room on the second floor. My room, which was utterly silent because I had no radio.
I put away the food in the tiny half refrigerator and sat down on the couch that would turn into my bed. It was quiet, too quiet. No sounds of passing cars or people walking under my window, as there had been in New York City. I had no radio, having left mine back at school—it didn’t fit in my suitcase. I had asked the Schecters whether they could help me find a radio, and they said they’d give me one. They hadn’t, yet. But the quiet was oppressive, frightening. I was used to the sounds of roommates, hallmates, and especially the radio, tuned to music.
There was a pay phone in the hall outside my room. I called the Schecters, asked about the radio, trying not to sound like I was begging. Mrs. Schecter was curt; her husband was very busy at the moment, they’d see what they could do when they had a chance. I went back to my room, disconsolate, sat on the couch, and started to cry. I sobbed, for what felt like forever, and wondered if I was going crazy. I couldn’t stay here—and by “here” I meant more than this room in this rooming house. I called my boss, who had given me his home number in case he was needed in the office on days he wasn’t scheduled to be there. “I can’t stay here,” I said, shakily, “I think I need to go home, but I don’t want to mess up the job for Antioch.” He said, “Don’t worry. Meet me at the clinic.”
I had decided I had to “go home,” though I didn’t really want to, but it was the only thing I could think of to get out of this situation. Once I’d made a decision, I began to feel better, more sturdy, that there was solid ground beneath my feet. My boss offered to let me spend the night at his home; his wife was used to students showing up. I called my parents; my mother asked, hesitating, “Are you all right?” How did I know she meant, “Are you pregnant?” I reassured her I was not.
The next day, Friday, I went to work for the last time. A very handsome graduate student took me out to lunch—we sat outside in the sun. He’d heard that I was leaving and tried to persuade me to stay. But now I felt stuck; I’d made a decision, and if I changed my mind, I’d seem flighty, unsure of myself, and uncertainty was exactly what I needed to escape. Grownups didn’t waffle. I was 19, but was sure I was a grownup.
The next day I was on a plane to New York, and on to Philadelphia, where this story continues...
No comments:
Post a Comment