When I was living at home and still in my ORANGE ROOM, I often thought about women. I guess most boys do around the age of 17 or 18. One thing was sure, I never wanted to get married!!! Well, at least not for many years anyway. My Dad got married at 20 years old, but always said that a man shouldn't get married until he was at least 35. Perhaps I should have taken his advise.
In the mid 80's I was finishing ISU. I had no job and only occasionally played music with the Peacock Family Band. I was broke and almost 26 years old. Confidence was at an all time low. I really didn't have a plan what I was going to do with my College degree or experience. I was a Communications major with a broadcasting background, so I was geared for television news which was basically second shift work 7 days a week with little pay. Plus, I didn't want to give up my weekends. I enjoyed playing music on too much on weekends.
It was during this period, that I met my future first wife. The band was playing at a late night club called DJ's and this attractive woman was dancing and looking at me with her finger in her mouth. It was a flirting gesture that I'd never seen before or since. Well, being a guy, I fell for it and soon we were dating. She was a couple years older than me and had been married before. Twice. She had moved here from Missouri and was friends with another local musician's wife. That musician ended up being Danny Newby and co founded the Flying D'Rito Brothers with myself and Daryl Klusendorf.
Fast forward a few more months, and I was having a hard time looking my Dad in the eye while living at home free. I felt that I had worn out my welcome. Truth be told, it was probably just my own insecurities and I could have stayed at home longer until I had finished school and found a proper career. My future first wife had been asked to stay with the Newby's in their partially finished basement. She asked me if I'd like to move in with her to split the rent of $100.00 per month. The timing was right since even I could afford $50.00 a month...although even that was challenging on occasion. So I moved out of my parents house and became a roommate with this woman.
The "apartment" was really just a basement that was partially underground. The walk in part of the dwelling was our kitchen AND OUR BEDROOM!!! To the left of the room was a door that led to the underground basement area. This was our living room with a couch, chair and a small bar. Through another small door was a very tiny bathroom with a toilet, sink and shower. Our clothes we hung on pipes in a crawl space to the right of the bathroom. So for several months, that's where we lived.......until one day she and I both were offered jobs at a new Retail store coming to the Northwoods Mall called FAMOUS BARR. We finally had steady income and could now look for a better place to live. It couldn't have come at a better time One day, as I was washing shampoo out of my long black hair, I noticed what looked like dirt that had coagulated against the cinder block shower wall. When I touched the foreign object, it slowly slithered into a hole in the wall!!!! It was a RAT TAIL or some kind of rodent!!!! That was the last time I showered there.
A few months prior to the rat tail incident, my roommate said we should get married!!!! Normally I would have just said no, but again, she caught me at a crossroads in my life. Had I declined, I often wonder how different my life would have been. However.....in my mind...I thought it over ...I'm broke, she's attractive, she seemed fine with a simple life and she was a HELL OF A GOOD COOK!!! She had beed married before , so she kind of seemed like a mature influence on me. Now, it's true that we did enjoy some great times together but looking back on our relationship, we were more like intimate partying buddies than a married couple.
Eventually, we moved into a real house next to the Sky Harbor and began our lives as a married couple. On one weekend, my wife to be ( I don't think we had married yet ) wanted to visit her parents in Missouri. I stayed behind that weekend. Maybe I couldn't get off work that weekend or I had a gig next door at the Sky Harbor. She must have driven what ever car I was driving then and she left me her bright orange Volkswagen Karmann Ghia to drive. About 10:00 on the Saturday night, I was getting restless alone in our home. My old habits were calling and I decided I'd drive her bright orange Ghia downtown and see if I would run into anyone that I knew. It was probably the last time that I ever did that. Time had moved on and it was a whole new and younger generation in the clubs.
I wondered around the old Times Square which by now was called something completely different. I may have hit another bar but I was bored and figured I'd have more fun by myself at home. So I found the bright orange Ghia and began my journey back up Main Street hill. Just as I had reached the top of the hill and about to proceed further on main, I saw a red light in my mirror!!!! OH SHIT!!!! This was probably Spring of 1986 and MADD had begun it's rampage throughout Central Illinois. I was definitely going to get a DUI!!!! I pulled the orange Volks over to the curb and waited for the officer to come to my window and begin the DUI proceedings. But....as he began his walk to my car....I had an Idea!!!! I had nothing to lose!!!!
I decided I was going to give this DUI stop an OSCAR PERFORMANCE!!! As he asked for my drivers licenses, I began to roll down my window, but I remembered that that window was a bitch to roll down so I just really exaggerated it's difficulty!!!! While I was trying to comply with the officer's request, I began to.....quietly at first.... cuss about the fact that I was left the PIECE OF SHIT CAR of my finance and how nothing worked in this orange pile of CRAP!!!! He kind of smiled as I finally got it down an inch or so. I managed to find the registration in the glove box but kept repeating my dissatisfaction with being left with an ORANGE VOLKSWAGEN!!!.
He asked me where I'd been and again, I expressed my dissatisfaction that my finance had to go out of town leaving me with this piece of shit car, but I had been downtown but was on my way home. He then asked if I knew why I was being pulled over....and I said probably because this death trap of a car doesn't have a WORKING SPEEDOMETER!!!! I was only estimating my speed. Then he asked me to get out of the Car!!!!! Oh NO!!!! Now, I was going to have to do the stupid human tricks!!!!! I kicked my act into full swing!!!! It just so happened that the drivers door handle was sometimes an little hard to get to work so I acted like the door was JAMMED and began CUSSING LIKE A SALIOR " See what I mean"...I can't even GET OUT of this SON OF A BITCH DEATH TRAP!!!!. Then I began acting like I was going to have to crawl over the stick shift and get out of the GHIA through the passenger side. I just began cursing even more at my fiancee and her stupid car. "NOW I'M GOING TO GET A SPEEDING TICKET!!!!! WAIT TILL I SEE HER!!!!"
To my amazement, the police officer realized my displeasure and figured I was having a bad enough evening and a ticket wasn't going to help anything. HE FELT SORRY FOR ME!!!!! He handed back my license and told me to go RIGHT HOME. I let the choke out a little to fast, and stalled the car briefly before putting an exclamation point on my situation. DAMMIT !!! See what I mean????
I pulled off the curb and slowly eased up Main Street and onto Farmington before I saw the cop car's lights disappear down another road. I did it!!! I talked my way out of the ticket and a DUI!!! That would never happen today.
When I finally got home, I pulled a beer out of the refrigerator, and my knees were still shaking!!! How the hell did I do that????
Just another foggy tale from the ORANGE ROOM.
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