Did I mention that on a clear day you can see the Hollywood sign from the front of my apartment!? I'm seriously in LA folks! I didn't notice this until just last week :)
Anyhow...I'm including below a summary (written by Ben, one of the guys in the group) of a Thursday night out a little over a week ago. It was an interesting night!
Charity, Danielle, Kristin, Anna, Ben, Monte....
Hollywood, interesting place.
We started our evening by meeting at Danielle's
Starbucks where we were treated to some caffine to
jump start our systems. It seems by this point there
was already some crossfire action going on as
automotive trouble, realigning of groups, and Anna's
health were a testiment of. So, as we started down
Sunset Blvd. Anna laid down in Charity's car to mend
and cover us from the base.
We strolled westward on Sunset from Gower commenting
on how random the Gower Gulch is (a 'ol Western style
strip mall meets Hollywood) and then decided to make
our way down to see the location of Danielle's future
"space" of barista-ing, ministry, and creative stuff.
On the way passing a smattering of restaurants, and
bars here and there.
Some blocks are vacant, somehave some life, some things are open,
many businesses are closed down. Fairly uneventful and we all are
struck by how quiet it really is. No one wandering
the streets really. We look at buildings and see
things we may not have noticed before such as the
Scientology funded "Psychology is Evil" building that
has a banner with photo of a concentration camp and
under it a Bible with a dagger through it...so anyway,
after that we walk on and make our way to Danielle's
spot. Cool building with amazing possibilities. We
take it in and after this meander around, down a side
street to see a small theatre space, then cross to the
other side of Sunset to return on the other side of
the road. This side is a bit more busy with tourists,
food places, and a few teenieboppers wandering
around.
As we are walking we are overtaken by two
gentelmen, one clearly homeless (Fats) and a taller
gentelmen who could or may not have been. They stop
and have a short exchange before us and as we walk by
them the the taller man says something about "No, I
don't" or something and goes in a different direction
and Fats walks with us. Literally with us. We walk
for about 15 seconds like this and then a cop car
drives by and I wonder if this is why is hanging so
close to us. But it passes and he continues to be
intentionally walking in our pack. Kristen engages
him and gives him the window to express how his pure
joy over the fact that there is one guy to three
women...which brings back a memory for him which he
shared in thankfully vague terms. So we walk with
Fats for blocks while he talks about women, and every
other word is an "sh" or "f" bomb. He is eyes are
blood red and he weaves back and forth bumping into me
now and again and I find I have to weave with him to
try to both stay in conversation and avoid collision.
He says he is 50 and asks if he looks 50, we say no
because he doesn't, and then he confesses that he is
actually 47. It is not everyday that people say they
are older than they actually are...that after the age
of 21 that is. I ask him where he is from and
immediately puts on a shifting Southern drawl which I
thought was a nice touch and made it difficult to
guess but I gave it a whack. After moving through
state by state of the entire Southern US, he says he
is from Texas and New Orleans. I didn't know New
Orleans was in Texas actually, but he is from some
sort of combination of the two which is where he got
his name, "Fats", after Fats Domino.
We walk to Wilcox, I think, and he says a couple of
times that he wants to show us something and waves to
us and we are down so we follow him and he starts to
say that he is taking us to see Cynthia who is
pregnant. He doesn't say it his child out right, but
this becomes clear over the next half an hour. As it
turns out the food he is carrying that was given to
him, is for Cynthia who is about a month and a half
pregnant. He speaks of her with affection and a care
that so closely resembles how Jerry cares for his
peeps in Silver Lake. When we reach Cynthia laying on
the concrete in a nook of a building covered with a
blanket, the reality of the situation hits like a
brick. What will become of Cynthia, Fats, and this
helpless little baby. Fats wakes her up as if he
brought her a gift, the gift not being the food but
that he brought her some interesting people. She
awakes with a lovely friendly smile and greets us all.
She eats and we all continue to chat a bit. Fats
says a few times that he is going to kill the baby.
This goes unresponded to by Cynthia or any of us.
Again, the air has changed for many of us as sit in
this very real space. Fats has now mellowed. No more
"sh" or "f" bombs and is normalizing.
I ask what the homeless community is like in this area. Silence and
I wonder if I asked the wrong question in this neck of
the woods...but Cynthia is looking at me with a
quesiton on her face so I thought I would just throw
it out there again and see what happens. Fats thinks
about this and asks if we really want to see the
homeless, or know where they are, or what they do, and
this line of questioning keeps going as he starts to
lead us off in a new direction. Leading us in a way
to infer that he is going to shock us. And I don't
know about what others are thinking, but I am like,
"What did I get us into?! Is he going to lead us down
some sewage drain that will lead to an alternate
Escape from New York universe?" He doesn't in fact,
he instead leads us to a Church, and I am thinking
that I don't find Churches overly shocking. But it is
ironic that we are now in the behind the scenes side
of a beautiful and massive Catholic Church that we all
took note of an hour ago as we were walking to
Danielle's wondering what goes on in there. As if God
was saying, "Oh, don't you remember? You asked earlier
what goes on here in Hollywood and at this
Church...didn't you actually want to know?"
So he explains what happens here and what services
they give here. We are met with skeptisism by the
security but Fats hooks us up by dropping some names,
which he was very proud of. But the best was yet to
come, after singing the first line of "Blueberry Hill"
he continued on without missing a beat! Which
continued into a funky chicken dance and singing and
telling stories about his singing and his musical
family and him not wanted to play any instruments,
just sing. This comes to an end as we are walking
back when he reveals his mother is dead, and I didn't
hear the rest of what he was saying. All we knew
prior to this is that he has three children in their
twenties and early thirties. He says he doesn't care
that his parents are dead and what is he supposed to
do about it.
Fats is absolutely loving being our tour
guide by this point and has mentioned a few times that
he wouldn't mind a little help. He takes up to the
Gay and Lesbian Center. This big building and I think
the thought crossed our minds...what actually goes on
here and what is the need for such a big building?
When asked he said "They do everything imaginable in
there. They do everything. Anything you could
imagine is in there." I don't exactly know what he
meant but that was enough and we started walking back
which Fats wasnt' quite sure how to take so he kept
walking along. He then offered to take us down the
strip and we said ok but we were heading back. So we
do that and then, enter stage left field: Monte.
As we are walking down Hollywood there is a pecularly
wirey and wired man on a public phone acting very
flustered and erratic. Somehow as Fats is telling me
about the fact that he is a Christian and went to a
Church of Christ and even taught, we have picked up
Monte! How did that happen, well I guess i don't even
need to ask. But he is just going off back there with
the girls and now and again I hear about making movies
and what projects he is working on right now. But I
am focussing on Fats who Monte takes note of now and
again in passing and like to two different species of
animals they go up to each other cautiously, testing
the waters, almost circling each other sniffing. But
then Monte wants the focus again so he starts asking
again for a cellphone and for someone to call his
assistant and get her laptop out. So we are all about
to go our seperate ways and we are trying to feel out
how to end it with Fats. We ask if they are usually
in this area and Danielle wants to know if they will
be around if she was to look in on them at work or
what not. Before an offer could be made, Fats asks
for money, and we instead treat him and Cynthia to a
Popeye's feast. The ordering was heartbreaking. I
couldn't get Fats to come close to the register. So
as I was ordering for him I had to keep calling over
to him to ask him what he wanted. We really wanted to
know what he wanted and we would get it for him. And
he was so bashful and ashamed in there. A life of
being turned down and kicked out of establishments and
igonored was clear in a moment. But we got his food
after about 15 minutes of negotiations and returned to
the outside, aka the world of Monte. And Fats was
confronted by Monte when he exited. Lots of nervous
questions including where he was from. As Fats said
Texas and New Orleans they had a very instense
exchange that looked like a boxing match. Fats was
the solid, slow moving, steady heavy weight boxer who
stood his ground and was saying "what are you going to
do about it?" and Monte who was the nervous
featherweight bobbing in and out trying to both get a
sucker punch in and miss a crushing blow from Fats.
This ended with Fats becoming very frustrated with
Monte's ramblings and turning away mumbling "What do
you know about New Orleans?! You don't know anything
about New Orleans! What do you know?! I know about
the 9th ward, I could tell you about..." Danielle and
I walked with Fats and noticed that Monte was really
holding the other ladies back, clearly talking about
his acting career, the oscars he's won, his 1.8
million dollars despite the fact people think he's
homeless and no doubt the tremendous need for SOMEONE
to call his assistant, true urgency if you ever saw
it. This however gave Danielle and I a chance to pray
for Fats. What to pray? So that was our prayer, for
healing, hope, and for God to deliver and be known for
both he and Cynthia. By the way, Fats has been
stabbed and has seizures...other tidbits that were
given.
So after a while we say goodnight to Fats and wish him
well and are walking back to our cars because it has
dawned on us how very late it is and that poor Anna is
probably at her wits end, oh! and there's Monte still
talking! He is SOO angry that despite have millions
of dollars, people think he is homeless! And on top
of that he has had with the kattyness of this
business, and that here he is with one oscar and
nominations and people just don't care. My favorite
part was when he asked me what I do and when I said I
act, he said I clearly suck and that he was the person
I should be kissing up to. He being a director now
could hook me up. I was taking notes by this point.
So...was Monte for real? Was he homeless? Was he an
actor trying to put us on? His appearance was fairly
put together, haircut, shaved less than a week ago,
wearing converses, jeans a little dirty. But he was
WIRED! I went from one moment to the next believing
he was really the Monte we saw to believing he was an
actor. He was just too funny! The things he said
were genius, you couldn't write comedy that good. His
comebacks, his statements. He was killing me! Half
of me wanted the night to go on forever and the other
half of me wanted to strangle Monte. He would not
leave us. That is a new thing for Tread. We spend
most of our time trying to engage the world and people
and here we could do nothing to lose him! I thought
we had our out when we walked past CBS and he said he
was being interviewed soon with Sean Penn and all
those guys. But alas, he didn't go into CBS but
instead followed us to our cars. We needed release so
we got together and wanted to end with a Monte cheer,
which Monte wasn't eager to put his hand in the
center, but with some urging he actually put two hands
in and on three we yelled Monte, all but Monte that
is. He just sort of shrugged and shook his head like
"whatever, that is sooo lame." This gave the ladies
an opportunity to sprint to their cars. I continued
to create a diversion for Monte as they left. When
they had he said he looked horrible and his tooth was
coming out and he covered his mouth with his hand.
This was felt like the most genuine moment, a perhaps
vulnerable moment for Monte. I responded by saying
that he didn't, because I actually thought he looked
like he was holding up pretty well. He asked if I
really meant that and seemed to really appreciate the
affirmation.
I got into my car and Monte stayed at
the window pleading for me to get out, or roll down
the window. I backed up slowly, the worst thing would
have been to after all that run over Monte. I
couldn't take it anymore and rolled down the
window...what a sucker. And then he asked "how was
the show? Was it a good show?" I thought to myself,
what is he referrring to??? Is what he just did a
show? That didn't seem quite right. So as I drove
off slowly and said goodbye about ten times he said
goodbye and how thankful he was to have nice people to
talk to. Usually people just say get away from them
but he really liked us and we were nice to talk to.
This intermingled with the question "Was it a good
show?" I drove off leaving Monte in the middle of
Gower. As I looked in my rearview mirror I saw his
outline and behind him the car that he had stopped
that was flashing him with his highbeams and I thought
to myself "...that's our Monte!" But as I drove off
the phrase "Was it a good show?" ran so powerfully
for me. That is what actors say. They say that to
their friends. Those insecure moments after a play,
where you want the feedback of a trusted friend. Was
it good, did you really like, are you just saying
that...etc. It felt like that. Not in the sense that
he was putting us on, wink, wink, but that there was
something, some metaphorical production or play in his
life or mind and he wanted desperately for affirmation
and love.
The monastery is about an hour and a half away, out towards the Palmdale desert. I arrived there Wednesday afternoon and stayed to Thursday afternoon. I was able to: be quiet, reflect, pray, enjoy nature, listen to God. It was really terriffic. I realized how much has gone on this past year! At this time last year I was in 'transition' preparing for an imminent move to Thailand...and now I'm in LA! I was also reading a really cool chapter in the Bible, Isaiah 55...which is just too good to pick a verse or two from, not wanting to post the entire chapter...it can be read at following link: Isaiah 55.
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