An Embarrassing Moment

I’ve had my share of embarrassing moments. When one has a tendency to live life on the edge, jump in head-first without thinking, a faux pas or two is inevitable.

There was the time when I was 17 and my senior class took a trip to Vienna, Austria. I attended a school for army dependents in Baumholder, Germany so this wasn’t much of a stretch. One night a group of us were sitting late in the lobby of the Prince Eugene Hotel awaiting a few of our more daring classmates who’d gone out on the town. Mind you, this was a formal place, ornate and quiet and staffed with good haughty men. The front doors were locked and when we saw our classmates outside I jumped up and headed to the door to let them in. Impulse. One of the formally-attired men came up, looked down at me with his most disapproving sneer, and said “You are the doorman?” Oops. That was pretty embarrassing, but I think it’s safe to say that the most embarrassing moment came in the spring of 1976.

I often say that 1976 was a big year for me, and it was. I had a mad, passionate relationship with the assistant conductor of the San Francisco Symphony; I went on my first backpacking trip – 10 wonderful days in the backcountry of Yosemite and Kings Canyon; I spent almost three incredible months temping as vacation replacement for the catering manager at the 5-star Clift Hotel; I moved to Reno and became a Ferrari salesperson and I jumped head first into the California presidential primary campaign for Jimmy Carter. Quite a year.

When I called to volunteer for the Carter Campaign they offered me my choice of two paid positions: office manager, or executive assistant to the campaign chairmen for California and the western states. Not surprisingly, I chose the latter. I always like to be right in the middle of where things are happening. The job was unspecified. We made it up as we went along and dealt with crises that arose. Among other duties I handled the money, fielded phone calls nobody else wanted to deal with and whatever else came along at any given time. I can safely say there was never a dull moment. Eventually, the two campaign managers and I closeted ourselves in a large corner office with three desks and a closed door, simply so we could escape the mayhem of the rest of the place.

Because of our enforced isolation, I rarely went into the bullpen area where the volunteers and office staff hung out, and I couldn’t even tell you which office handled the press or other necessary functions. I recognized faces, perhaps knew some names, but rarely did my path cross that of most others on a daily basis. We all had our jobs to do and little time for pleasantries. I always knew what was going on, who was traveling through town on what date, but I had no hand in setting any of it up and the dignitaries rarely visited the campaign office. They flew in for a speech or fundraiser and flew out.

One of our full-time volunteers was an extraordinary African-American woman, a graduate of Bryn Mawr married to the first African-American to receive dual degrees in law and medicine. Both of them were beautiful human beings. She always knew more about what was going on in the rest of the office than I did, because she answered phones, worked with the volunteers, happily accepted whatever menial chore might be asked of her. We became fast friends, always stopping to chat at some point of our long, crazy days. I think her name was Betty and I hope she’ll forgive me if my memory 33 years later is faulty. Other than Betty and the office manager, I really didn’t know any of the others very well and the volunteers came and went. I offer all this as an excuse.

One of the dignitaries who came through was Andrew Young, the prominent civil rights leader, activist and humanitarian who’d marched with Martin Luther King, been mayor of Atlanta and would later go on to even greater things. I knew he was coming, and because of Betty I knew that he would be staying overnight at her home. She told me that even in that day and age African-Americans often preferred to avoid hotels when possible. I filed all this information away and forgot about it, as I did with all the other dignitaries.

My usual tendency was to arrive at the office early and retire directly to my office, usually with one of the campaign managers. Rarely was anyone else around at that hour but since campaign headquarters were in Atlanta, our west coast hours left us way behind the beginning of every day. On the morning in question I followed routine, but found myself in need of staples, or some other mundane bit of office supply, so I wandered down the dark hallway and into the dark bullpen area in search. Nobody else was there and the lights hadn’t been turned on and I didn’t bother because the big, old double-hung windows gave enough ambient light that I could see what I needed to see. Normally, I’d have asked the office manager for supplies so I didn’t know where they were and had to poke and pry into cabinets, totally focused and needing to get back into my office. At some point I was vaguely aware that another person was in the shadows of the room, but in my focused frenzy and because I was used to strangers milling about, I didn’t pay any attention to them. Until I heard a voice behind me say, “Hi, I’m Andy Young”.

This got my attention. I spun around, looked up to a smiling face and a hand reaching out in friendship. All manner of thoughts raced through my mind, not the least of which was utter chagrin at having ignored his presence in the room. I was also a little star-struck and I believe some groveling was involved as we shook hands. He was kind and gracious and beautiful and we shared a few moments of private conversation there in that dark room.

My most embarrassing moment? No doubt. But at the same time one of the most incredibly special moments I ever experienced. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

The Ferrari Kid

I was born for Ferrari. I just didn’t know it until I was a teenager and I never saw a real one until I was 25 years old. It was lust at first sight.

Some of my earliest memories revolve around sitting on the front steps of the old house on Main Street in Cedartown, Georgia “counting cars” with my grandfather. I was very young – pre-school -- so the simplicity of the game matched the simplicity of my age and our lives. In a small town in the deep south in the late 1940s, we had to find our own diversions where we could. With the delight and glee that can only spring from a child’s purity, I would shout out “Ford!”, or “Pontiac!” or “DeSoto!”. As far as I can recall, no tallies were kept so I really can’t tell you where the term “counting cars” came from. That’s what we called the game, nonetheless. In the dark evenings we’d progress to guessing what make the car would be by the sound of its approach. I don’t recall what percentages of those guesses were correct, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was spending that time with my grandfather, who was the light of my young life.

I also can’t say if these evenings fostered the love of automobiles that was to permeate my life, or if the fascination with autos fostered my interest in the game. I do know that I continued a fascination (my mother would have called it an obsession, no doubt) with the American car that didn’t waver until I was 16 and uprooted once more to follow my career Army father to yet another new assignment. This one was particularly cruel because it presaged my senior year in high school, a time when most of us are unusually vulnerable. It was also particularly interesting because it was my first overseas assignment. We would be going to Germany where, although I didn't know it at the time, my father would be a key player in the first of many nuclear-armed Nike missile sites that would form a shield against the dreaded Soviet Union. In my first act of rebellion against the discipline imposed upon me by my southern birthright and also by my military existence, I tried to refuse to go. I tried to stay with family in south Alabama.

None of this worked, so in the summer of 1959 I found myself in the small town of Idar-Oberstein, Germany. My father was stationed in Baumholder, a very large military base in a very small German town. I’m quite sure I was still pouting and unhappy and refusing to even consider enjoying this new land that surrounded us. Fortunately, that didn’t last long. We would spend Sundays driving and exploring our new surroundings. Mostly, I remember long stretches of thick woods and narrow, twisting roads broken up by quaint taverns or villages. I do remember quite clearly seeing my first “sports car” parked along the side of one of these roads and feeling my heart go right up into my throat. Lust! This was a new experience. Up until now my love affair with autos had been limited to American behemoths, because that’s all I’d ever known. I suppose there were places in America where cars such as these were seen, but certainly not in my existence, which was limited to army bases and small southern towns, for the most part.

The car that started it all. Mine was black, but photo is not scanned. 190SL photo courtesy of automotivetraveler.com

When we passed this sleek little car I had no clue what it was, but I knew I wanted one. I don’t recall if it was that day or on a later sighting that I isolated a chrome circle with three prongs on the the car. Had I even heard of Mercedes then? I’m not sure. I know I didn't recognize the logo and I asked around until I discovered what manufacturer that mark belonged to. A little more research proved that this first love was a 190SL, a classic blend of sleek lines and rounded voluptuous curves in just the right balance. Many, many years later I would own one of these, but for now it was simply the beginning of a lifetime obsession with European sports cars that eventually led me to the conviction that the ultimate of the genre was the legendary Ferrari.

Fast-forward about 10 years and I was walking down Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco one Saturday, on a break from a part-time ‘job’ at British Motors. That, perhaps, is a story for another day. Parked on the curb in front of the Porsche dealer was a sleek bit of gold that stopped me in my tracks. Until this day, I had never seen a real, live Ferrari and I stood on the sidewalk with my mouth gaping and eyes wide as I drank in the sight and bent over to take a peek inside. I jumped like a scalded cat when a voice behind me said “Like that, do you?” I turned to see an attractive older man, who turned out to be the owner of the gold beauty, a 330 GTB. His name was Al and he sold Porsche. Right away, we had things to talk about aside from the Ferrari and soon became friends. I can’t recall with any detail my first ride in the car, but I do remember walking from the bus stop to my ‘day job’ in San Francisco one morning early and hearing a high-toned car horn blowing insistently behind me. Since my southern mother had tried to teach me to be a lady, I ignored the insistent and continuing sound until I saw the car and realized Al had come by looking for me to say good morning. And I do remember the first and perhaps only time I was allowed to drive the car. I remember much more about this car and Al, but their purpose in this story is that they introduced me to the world of Ferrari for real, rather than fantasy.

Fast forward another few years to around 1973, when I was living in Newport Beach, California. Those were the days of the gas crisis, long lines, fuel shortages and theft by siphoning. I had spent a weekend in San Francisco and that Monday morning was driving to work with a close eye on the dwindling gas gauge of my red Datsun 240Z. I’d intentionally left it low while I was out of town, and because of the lines thought I’d take a chance on getting to work then fill up later, when I had time to wait in line. The car had other ideas and sputtered to a slow halt along a stretch of lightly traveled four-lane road that was, naturally, the only portion of my commute that took me outside a densely populated area. I steered off to the side of the road and sat there deflated, wondering what the hell to do now, when in the distance I spotted a car stopped and backing towards me. I watched its approach with some combination of incredulity that somebody was actually stopping to help and a dawning bit of disbelieving astonishment as the car neared enough for me to see the Ferrari logo on its rear.

I couldn’t move. I was dumbfounded and speechless and seriously wondering if I’d moved into some fantasy world where things like this might happen. They sure didn’t happen to me aside from fantasies and dreams. But there it was right in front of my car, big as life, prancing horse and all staring me right in the face. Then a tall man who I later characterized as a cross between Burt Reynolds and Clark Gable unfolded himself from the Ferrari and started walking back to where I sat trying to take it all in. All I could think was "holy shit, this can't be happening." But he was here, he was real and he was outside my window wondering if maybe I was afraid he was an ax murderer.

I forced my body to move, rolled down my window and after a bit of conversation he piled me into the Ferrari and off we went in search of a gas station, where he filled up a gas can and returned me to my car, primed the carburetor and made sure the Z was running well before he left. If all that wasn’t enough, in the course of our search for gasoline our conversation had shown the unlikely coincidence that he and I lived in the same apartment building in a huge singles complex in Newport Beach. We dated and became friends and he had many wonderful Ferrari stories to tell. I never drove his car, which I believe was a 365 GTC, but we had some wild rides in it. I remember going out for ice cream and flying down a stretch of Newport Highway at about 130 mph.

My Ferrari of San Francisco Auto Sales License

By 1976 I was living in San Francisco once more and it was quite a year in my life, for many reasons. One day in late summer I presented myself to the owner of Ferrari of San Francisco and told him I’d like to sell Ferrari. He was fine with that, since he didn’t have to pay me anything, but I’d have to scare up my own contacts because anyone walking in the front door belonged to his existing salesperson. I didn’t care – I just wanted to be there, to hang out with these cars. I got my first auto sales license and thought I’d reached big-time. One day I offered to wax the cars in the showroom – there must have been 4 or 5 used classics that he thought needed help, and I took the paste wax he gave me and began applying it to each in its turn, which worked out quite well. I really didn’t know what I was getting into or how difficult it would be to take all that dried wax film off the cars. I found out soon enough and in fact think the realization set in about half way through the first car. Leaving the stuff on the cars wasn't an option, so with the thrill of rubbing those fabulous cars dwindling rapidly, I struggled for hours, as the men stood around watching and laughing at their little joke before finally stepping in to help. I was exhausted!

This opening led to me working with them setting up and staffing the Ferrari booth at the San Francisco International Automobile Show that fall and from there to becoming a real Ferrari salesperson at Modern Classic Motors in Reno, NV, the legendary holy grail of Ferrari on the west coast. MCM was owned by Bill Harrah and had imported and distributed Ferrari west of the Mississippi for many years. In December of 1976 they were opening a new showroom and I opened it with them. I also latched onto a gig delivering Ferrari and Rolls Royce in and out of California and a few multi-day trips with brand new Ferraris to places like Denver and Phoenix. If you’ve never been turned loose with a brand new Ferrari, unlimited expenses and no time schedule, you haven’t lived.

I never managed to own one – or to like one of the owners well enough to marry them – but my memories will last a lifetime and my heart still goes right into my throat when I hear that unmistakable growl of a V-12 or the tight whine of the newer mid-engine V-8s. I'm a Ferrari Kid for life.

Naked Wood Nymph

I’ve never been one to see ghosts, find fear much of anywhere. Had I been that kind of person, I would never have attempted this lengthy bicycle journey alone in the first place. But there are times…..

On the morning after my Cave Woman trip to Grand Lakes, I traveled back down the hill a short distance to some kind of National Park Service recreational facility, planning to do some hiking and exploring. I spoke with a ranger, who pointed out some trails, offered suggestions.

Leaving the bike safely locked, I headed uphill for several miles through the forest and past some rusting, abandoned corrugated metal mining shacks, over a series of switchbacks that eventually brought me into the sunshine at a narrow dirt road that had been cut into the side of the mountain. The plan was to follow that road for awhile until I reached an intersection with a trail going back downhill, forming a loop that would take me back to my bike. You know what they say about the best laid plans!

Still feeling the exhilaration of the previous day, hot and sweaty from the hike and the sun, I walked along the road gazing with great longing at the tiny stream that flowed alongside. I don’t think it was natural – memory says it was no more than a shallow trench dug into the mountain beside the road with a mere trickle of water. I’d gained a lot of elevation by now. The road formed a steep cliff along the mountainside beyond which there was nothing but endless trees and mountains as far as the eye could see. Finally, I stopped for lunch then stripped off my damp clothing and gave in to the urge to cool off in the stream, take a bath in the cold water, dry off naturally in the warm sunshine.

Lying naked in the sun on top of the world. What a feeling of freedom!

Refreshed, I dressed and continued walking down the road for about a half mile when I realized I’d left my sunglasses on a rock, returned to find them. Everything that happened after that was a little crazed.

After finding my glasses I returned to where I’d left my pack and continued along the flat, exposed trail until I reached a site where a huge rockslide – seemingly recent – had pushed boulders and trees thousands of feet down the cliff. The road looked recently bulldozed, and with great trepidation I walked on, hoping to pass that section quickly. It looked as though the earth could move again at any moment and bury me under a new pile of boulders down the hill. A storm was approaching and I was anxious to get off the mountain before rain and lightning came along.

Finally, the threat of impending lightning, thunder, rain and rockslides got to me and I turned around and ran back beyond the threatening cliffs, and further. I must have run a mile, at that altitude. Then I hurried along the road, anxious to reach the trail downward so I could have more protection. It seemed an eternity, but finally I started downhill, cutting through the woods across switchbacks whenever I could see the trail below me. That’s a real no-no, and I knew better but was too panicked to care.

It really was quite ominous. I could hear the thunder, clouds darkened the sun, and the forest was totally silent. Each time I stepped off the trail for a shortcut, I felt as if I had stepped into some enchanted forest out of the hobbit world. I kept waiting for trees to move and attack me, or for some vile creature to give chase. I never saw another living creature the whole time, nor heard anything except the thunder and the rushing of waterfalls down the mountainside. It was eerie, strange. I was a bundle of jitters.

It took me almost two hours to reach the valley. My moments of fantasy, seeing myself as a naked wood nymph dancing in the sunshine, were short-lived. No ghosts or landslides appeared.

During this two-month solo bike tour of the Colorado Rockies I kept a detailed journal chronicling the experience. I wrote a few new introductory paragraphs for this story, but the portion of the story that continues from "after I found my sunglasses" was lifted verbatim from the journal entry written that same day.

Cave Woman

The road was rough and I was going fairly fast and looking at the scenery. Suddenly, I looked ahead and saw a rounded asphalt depression about two feet in diameter, with a rough knob of asphalt at the far end. There was no time to avoid it, all I could do was grip the handlebars tightly, raise up off the saddle, and ride it out. The bike literally left the ground – both wheels, just like a skier coming off a jump. It landed with shimmys, all the weight bounced, but it didn’t go out of control as it might have. Scary. Funny. All at the same time.

This little incident took only seconds – takes longer to describe it – and thus began my first day of travel. I’d left the top of Trail Ridge Road headed for Grand Lakes 22 miles below, coasting down the steep hill at a good clip not paying much attention to where I was going, distracted by the incredibly beautiful, vast environment of snow-covered granite peaks and deep green forests. It’s astonishing just how much can go through one’s head in such a short time when faced with an urgent situation, how the brain can evaluate and make a decision in mere seconds and the body will follow. Over 200 pounds flying through the air with nothing to land on but two skinny bicycle tires is quite a sensation, I’m here to tell you. Terrifying for a few seconds, a huge relief when I realized I was in one piece. When I pulled to a stop to check things out, the only damage was that a pannier had come unhooked on one edge and was hanging a bit crooked. Everything – including me – could easily have gone flying in all directions and that would have been the end of the trip. Fortunately, it’s merely a humorous memory.

My bike at the top of Trail Ridge Road, 12,183 above sea level, the highest pass in the state.  This is the kind of scenery that detracted from my cycling!

I’d begun the day in Estes Park and while my original plan had been to ride the bike up and over Trail Ridge, I realized the day before that I simply was not ready for this yet. Not physically, not mentally, not emotionally. So I’d caught a shuttle bus to the top and started off on my planned adventure.

Timber Ridge Campground lies just over 12 miles and 3,283 feet below the 12,183 foot summit. I knew it was there, had every intention of passing by and continuing down the hill, but curiosity pulled me in to investigate and I felt captivated immediately. This was what I’d been looking for in a campground but hadn’t found in Estes Park: level, wooded with spacious private campsites nestled among the trees. Because of the late snow melt that year, this campground had just been opened for the season and was virtually empty. Totally peaceful and serene. I decided to stay, fully realizing I had no food and would need to ride on down to Grand Lakes to do some shopping. I didn’t care. My energy was high, my legs strong.

I chose an isolated site among huge trees, set up my tent, unpacked the panniers and left them inside the tent, then headed downhill with a small, lightweight daypack I’d brought along for hiking. Although essentially all downhill (about 450 feet elevation drop) the road was nonetheless a series of ups and downs over rolling hills through 10 miles of deep forests.

I was flying! For the first time since I’d arrived in Colorado over a week earlier I was really, really riding the bike with deep pleasure, my heart soaring, my legs pedaling furiously with the sheer joy of it all. No pain, no weight, no struggling. Just me and my bike doing what we did best and rejoicing in every moment. Filled with energy, bursting with an overwhelming sense of ‘I can do this,’ I wanted to sing and shout to the world. But I didn’t – nobody would have heard me anyway.

After 45 minutes of flying down the mountain I found a supermarket in Grand Lakes, bought food for a couple of days and, with 10 pounds on my back – another new sensation that required a bit of balance adjustment – I flew back up that mountain almost as fast as I’d flown down. An hour of pedaling fast and easy in mid-range gears and I was back at the tent. Exhilarated. Stimulated. Joyous.

All that stayed with me through the evening. My body felt great from the exercise, my mind felt great from the accomplishment of getting over Trail Ridge and getting to Grand Lake for food. I felt remarkably self-sufficient, in a pioneer sort of way, that I could choose an isolated campsite and still supply myself with food from a hilly source 10 miles away. The caveman syndrome, I guess – or in this case, the cave woman.

Magic

There was magic in the air that night.  You might say it was merely a gathering of friends and neighbors in a pretty room to taste some very nice wines, and you would be right.  But it was more than that.  The friends and neighbors were the finest vintners in the Napa Valley; the pretty room was the elegant grand hall at the Far Niente Winery; the very nice wines were a dazzling selection of rare and precious burgundies from the remarkable cellars of the House of Leroy.  Oh, yes.  Madame Lalou Bize-Leroy, her husband Marcel and her daughter Perrine were also included in the friends and neighbors, for although their home is France, they are friends tied by a common bond of winemaking.

There was a murmur of quiet anticipation in the Hall as the guests arrived and joined the crowd.  Madame Leroy was in the cellars, with her wines.  The treasures.  She had brought with her 25 red and white burgundies, from a youthful 1978 Meursault to the last flight -- a 1949 Musigny and a 1949 Richebourg.

A formal white cloth had been laid the length of the great hall, each place carefully set with arcs of glasses.  When everyone was seated and the preliminaries finished, the first wines were poured while Madame Leroy presented a slide show of the vineyards and towns where the wines were grown.  She spoke in French, for she was nervous with this group and unsure of her English.  Her words were translated as she spoke, as she tasted each of the wines in their turn and offered her own opinions of them.

Magic is the only word for it.  The energy of the event spilled electrically through the room holding all in its spell.  The spell of being present at such a momentous affair, not really earthshaking on the surface yet momentous, nonetheless.

Around 1982. Written then.

David's Hat

It was a marvelous hat, and David was its destiny. It became a part of him the moment it landed upon his head. It was leather -- thick, supple brown leather, with a style which might have been a cross between the sophisticated black satin top hat of Fred Astaire and the exaggerated glory of the Mad Hatter. Its brim turned up at a rakish angle on the sides, and down in the front. It was tall, flaring outward at its crown and laced with the leather stitches of its craftsman.

I had a Halloween party at my house that year, and of course David would wear the hat, for it was new and thus inseparable from him. Their group staged a wonderful entrance, one at a time. David's wife, JoAn, wearing a white leotard and a fuzzy tail, ran up the stairs into the party shouting to all who would listen, and hid in the crowd. David was next, wearing the hat and wonderful, elegant, vested Mad Hatter costume, shouting for the rabbit. Where did that rabbit go? David's friend Tony charged up dressed as the King of Hearts and Tony's wife, with her long blond hair, finished the scene by chasing up the stairs behind the others dressed as a demure, bewildered Alice. Of course, by then everyone was in thrall and in hysterics. David played his part to the hilt all evening, sipping his wine from his china teacup and glowing under his hat.

Afterwards, the hat simply became a necessity for David. He wore it everywhere, and picked up a vibrancy from its presence which radiated to all who were around him. David now has a large collection of outrageous hats; they have become a trademark, an expected part of his personality. This old leather mad hatter holds its special place among the newcomers, however, for it was the first.

Iceberg Lake

We sat upon a ledge with our backs to a stone wall, our feet dangling above the rapids that sang over the rocks below.  The wind blew hard -- a frosty snowborne wind cutting through the rocks and canyons of this private place at the crest of the earth. We had picked our way from the trail to this narrow shelf, seeking some sliver of protection.  It was July, the sky sparkling blue, but we were many thousands of feet in the air in a wilderness which does not know true warmth.  To quench our thirst we captured an icy liquid which just moments before had been snow.  There is no finer water in the world.

We were at Iceberg Lake, a sparkling alpine lake at the base of a glacier and the Minarets: rocky stone outcroppings reaching into the sky and standing like sentinels guarding paradise.  The rapids below our narrow ledge ran from a still pool formed from a waterfall flowing from the lake. Despite the roar of the water falling and churning and echoing off the stone, all was peacefully serene, as on that day no other humans had hiked the rough mountain trail to reach this place, and it was ours.

The lake is small, as lakes in that region go, and dotted with two stone islands from which it takes its name.  But it is surrounded by steep stone slopes covered with wildflowers.  The glistening glacier and the Minarets reflect in the still blueness of the water, so it is more beautiful than many of its larger neighbors.  On one slope a goat-path of a trail runs through the loose rock.  It crosses the ridge at the far end of the lake to yet another lake, but we did not follow it to the crest.  At the point where the trail leaves the foot of the lake, where we are sitting, a carpet of small pink wildflowers covers an entire section of the rocky slope.  They are nowhere else.  Just here on this slope in this spot, and they are exquisite in their fullness of color and in the perfection of their tiny blossoms massed by the millions on this private stretch of the Sierra Nevada.

We had been 10 days in this wilderness, hiking from place to place. Tomorrow we would hike back to civilization, to hot showers and good food.  But as we sat on this rocky ledge and ate our cold lunch we did not want to leave.  We spoke of the beauties of this wilderness and the time we had shared with these wonders of nature, and it was with regret that we knew we must return to our homes. 

There was a sadness as we last looked upon Iceberg Lake and its glories, then turned for the hike back down the mountain to our camp many miles away.