A Drinking Problem & Pill Problem..First Chapter

Naked as a jay bird, Joan screamed at me "Don't you dare hang up on me and then take the telephone off the hook."

Joan (not her real name) was somewhere between being a hard drinking genius, nympho and a fucking maniac. I met her in AA which, sadly, never worked for her. She was a spectacular dresser, wearing a hat all the time, and very, very bright (when sober and not 'doped up'). In addition to her drinking problem, it turned out, Joan had a pain killer problem. Her Mother was sick and on pain pills which Joan took and loved.

As with most people with a serious drinking problem her weapon of choice, when in the bag, was the telephone.

Joan lived in Atherton in one of the world's ugliest houses, unless you liked houses that looked like hotels, and Joan often voiced that opinion of her adobe hacienda. The family room had an old fashioned soda fountain and a pool table. The family room was as big, if not bigger, than my one bedroom apartment of some 800 square feet.

Joan's husband, when I was taking her out, was looking up at the grass. In Yiddish he was in 'Yenna veldt'. He had been grossly overweight and died while playing tennis. According to Joan he would come home, drink a few martinis while in their home sauna. He then would have dinner and eat everything that wasn't nailed down. He topped off the dinner with an ice cream sundae or ice cream soda that he made in his private soda fountain. All the goodies that he made had over the top quantities of ice cream and whipped cream. Hardly a wonder that he keeled over on a tennis court playing varicose veins doubles.

One time on a trip to the Big Apple I was staying, in act of penance, at the not lamented long gone, Downtown Athletic Club. It was convenient to Wall Street and my appointments. The rooms were just one step removed from being jail cell duplicates. The bars were missing but the rooms were stark.

The lone telephone operator was a tired old man. Joan got in the bag early California time that night but it was midnight in NY. She started calling repeatedly and driving that poor old man and me crazy. People with drinking problems tend to have a list, in their heads, of people to call when in the bag. So by two in the morning, NY time, Joan moved on to the next poor son of a bitch.

After getting back to the Land of Milk and Honey and Fruits and Nuts I avoided even calling Joan. After a few days she called at about 1:00 AM, drunk as a sailor on leave. I hung up on her but she wouldn't give up and kept calling back. So I took the phone off the hook. About 30 minutes later the front door bell starts insistently ringing and I buzzed her in. Up the elevator she came and I let her into my apartment. She was wearing a long hair lynx fur coat. She screamed at me 'Don't you dare hang up on me and then take the phone off the hook.' And off came the lynx coat with Joan just wearing her skin.

Joan's drinks of choice were Drambuie or Champagne, sometimes both in a night of spirited drinking. That night, she told me, it was a full bottle of Drambuie. I could puke at the thought of consuming a bottle of that shit.

Joan was all for spending that night with me but having sex with someone blind drunk was too disgusting for me. So after some 'discussion' she left, having put that insane lynx coat back on while leaving. Owning, much less wearing, a lynx coat in Atherton is like a Bedouin wearing a snow suit in the desert.

Naturally after she got home she started with those fucking phone calls again. The next day I called an attorney (One if the three most dangerous people in the world is a Jew with a lawyer). He talked me out of filing a harassment complaint against Joan and suggested a heart to heart talk with her.

A few days later not so sweet Joan and I met for lunch at a place in Palo Alto called Stickney's. After ordering lunch, we went through the usual 'amenities' which included a few strong Jewish American Princess (Joanie's genre) strong insults of me. After one of her fucking nasty insults, I leaned over the table and said "Joan, if you ever call me again, day or night, I'll slap that tight little ass of yours in jail.” Laid a $100 bill on the table for the lunch and tip and walked out. Never, thank God, ever heard from Joan again.

More to come on Joan's idiosyncrasies and acts of insanity. 'One man's nightingale is another man's owl' and Joan was not my nightingale. Sadly, she died a horrible death a year later in a style befitting someone dedicated to booze and pills. She, under the influence, jumped out of a tow truck and was run over by the wheels of her own car that was being towed to a repair shop in S.F.

The whole story for another time.