This isn't a part of my novel but a scene from my autobiography which I skipped over publishing months ago. But it came back to me a few days ago as I used the setting of Bohemian Grove in the novel and remembered visiting a restaurant just outside the complex thirty seven years ago, when I first heard about it and remembered it for my novel. At the time I wondered why all the waiters in the very posh restaurant were male. As I looked up information on the place two days ago I found the answer. Bohemian Grove is a males only retreat, always has been since it was built by some misogynistic millionaire from San Francisco over a century ago. Its history is fascinating. The first meeting for building the atomic bomb in 1942 was held there, (no women present). Check it out. The fact that my own question was answered thirty seven years after the fact should give hope to all of you with riddles on your mind. Give them time enough and they may be answered.
Dale returns
From love without money to money without love:
Dale had returned to the Bay Area in September and was living in S.F., renting a room from a woman her age (in her mid-forties). After a few phone calls, and my arm recovered, I visited her there and took her out several times for drinks and dinner. But a re-kindling of our old flame was not to be. She had aged over the last two years with her penchant for cocaine undiminished. Our first few dates were curious affairs. We ate, got high, slept together, sometimes even argued a bit as we talked over old times with fondness and sadness, caresses, kisses and brief, hateful glances commingled.
Now that I had money (the lack of which put such a strain on our first love), part of my desire to revisit her was to make amends. It’s ironic that ‘Brideshead Revisited’ was the show that joined us. We ate at nice restaurants, watched the sunset from the hilltops of Oakland and visited old friends with a fine bottle of wine in hand. One afternoon as we strolled through a mall, we entered Macy’s and I told her to pick out something nice for herself. She settled on the cashmere sweater. It was Fall and it fit her beautifully. She had the finest taste and discrimination in clothes of any woman I ever met. It was a joy to me to see her in it.
Our best date, in early November, was an all-nighter at the house of her old Australian boyfriend John, who now had a beautiful wife. I was glad to meet him again as we’d parted on indifferent terms when she spent the night with him before her train departure. I always thought she should have reserved that for me. We had dinner at their place in S.F. and I suggested we do some lines.
But they told use they rarely indulged anymore, hating the after-effects and wretched sleep. So I told them I also had a bagful of Quaaludes and Valiums. This turned the tide. So we had a party that night, two couples, talking away, with wine and music into the wee hours of the morning. When they showed signs of wanting privacy, Dale and I sped off in my Datsun, picked up some clothes at her place and headed up the coast on highway one, the sun just beginning to rise as we crossed the Golden Gate.
Just past Bodega Bay we found a bed and breakfast house on a cliff overlooking the ocean. As they had few guests that time of year, they were glad to rent us a room at 9 a.m. We ate, rested and spent most of the afternoon sleeping. Then to dinner and back to bed. The next morning, well rested and in the best of moods we directed our course back home through the most scenic, winding mountain roads we could find on the road map, through redwood forests, and ended up that evening in some park-like setting by a river, where one large, posh, A-frame restaurant, totally out of place, presented itself.
The entrees on the menu were near a hundred dollars apiece. But I was in the mood to splurge and the oddity of such an expensive restaurant in the middle of nowhere intrigued me. I mentioned this to Dale. She was equally curious. So arm in arm we went in.
One thing about Dale, with her radiant beauty and intelligence, her entrancing, almost mesmerizing southern voice and accent and her overflowing charm, I imagined there was no place in the world, however luxurious, that wouldn’t immediately open its doors to her and where she’d fit in perfectly. She was a princess in glass slippers, which anyone with eyes could see. And something happened during this dinner that fully validated my high opinion of her, and quite frankly amazed me.
It was still early and the place was almost empty, with only one other couple in a far away corner. All the waiters were young, handsome men. One very polite waiter seated us at the other end of the room (for privacy no doubt) near the kitchen. We ordered drinks and began chatting with him as he brought them out. He told us there was a ‘retreat’ nearby, used by the rich, mostly Republican politicians and their donors. He told us Ronald Reagan and other famous people had enjoyed this five star restaurant quite recently. We congratulated ourselves on our luck in finding this gem, after hours of driving winding roads without a clue, as long as they were in a southerly direction. We read the one page menu and ordered our meals.
After some appetizers and more wine the main dishes appeared. I’d ordered a steak and it was done to perfection but Dale had ordered a fancy plate of lamb and I could tell from the first bite that entered her mouth, and her expression, something was amiss. She told me, with my alarmed look, that it wasn’t anything gross, like being under cooked or cold but that there was something wrong with the sauce, which the chef should immediately be informed of.
In the most polite, soft-spoken manner she calls the waiter over. In a restaurant like that, when they have the time, they stand about twelve feet away, back straight, not looking at you but at your beck and call. I’m almost starting to sweat at this point because I hate a scene, to the point of downing the worst cooked meal with a fake smile on my face and leaving the place quietly, never to return. It’s a part of my timid nature. I hate any unnecessary fuss.
She asks to speak with the chef. He’s brought to our table, another young, handsome man and to the both of them she begins, in her most lilting, southern voice to explain at length and in precise culinary terms some faults in the balance of the sauce, naming several spices used to excess and another spice, not present, that would enhance it.
The chef begs to take a taste off her plate, is handed a fork by the waiter and to my astonishment, wholeheartedly agrees. Then begins an avalanche of apologies, ‘thank yous’, civilities and compliments lasting twenty minutes, the chef having that dish promptly removed and begging Dale to try his specialty of the night, on the house. He even asks her how she acquired such an epicure refinement of palate and she tells him (with the waiter standing there drinking up every word) of her rich, cultured, southern upbringing and her world travels to other fine restaurants, naming a few.
The new plate arrives, much to her liking. They retire to let us enjoy our meals, now at half-price, and as we get up to leave the chef again comes out to thank her again for her enlightened critique, overflowing with gratefulness and handshakes. I could tell as we left that this was not just the show of politeness which the rich are constantly caressed with, but a valuable tip to the chef which he would immediately adopt.
This is an example of civility at it’s best when a complaint, properly couched, turns into gratitude and profit on both sides. This was Dale at her most charming. Her charisma could turn complaint into compliment, as if she had a magic wand. Yet she did know food and had the most rare, refined tastes, equivalent to my refined knowledge and tastes in literature, which she saw long ago and which cemented our first relationship, but which I didn’t fully see in her until that evening.
When I moved into my apartment November 1st, and furnished it in the next days, I gave her a key to it. It was a place worthy of her. She could stay there anytime she wanted. She did stay a few nights with me and house-sat for a week in late November, another in early December when I was up North and then the two full weeks I was away in Mexico with Louie and Robin.
We slept together several nights but our love never rekindled. But we were dear friends, ready to do each other whatever favor we could. Some nights, sleeping with her, her warm arms around me, after hours of intelligent conversation, I almost felt like we were a couple, married and perfectly harmonious after years of trials and reconciliations. I supposed that this was as good as it gets in real marriages. Then my youth came back to mind, restless and unsatisfied, and that other picture just wasn’t me. I was no where near ‘middle-aged’ yet.
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