Ch. 17 (A COOKIE for PUPPY GIRL) – Down at the Edge of the World!^[1]

I was ready to take the next step forward in my career, seeking opportunities to not only manage studies but also to oversee entire programs and participate in the strategic development of a drug culminating in FDA-approval. In fact, I pictured myself running a biotech company one day so now the challenge was to identify a pathway to get there. Of course, I was savvy enough to know not to quit my job until I found another job. As a result, I began researching the myriad of biotech companies that were thriving in the Bay area and further investigating what skills would best suit my ability to advance. Once again, I sought the expert advice of my insightful work colleague, Brad, who had been so valuable to me when I worked at Triton a couple of years earlier. We met for lunch and I was surprised to learn that he had left Triton months earlier and was now working on his own as an independent contractor, providing services directly to local biotech companies. I realized that if I took a similar career path as Brad, I wouldn’t have to choose one company to seek employment from, but rather work for several at once. After all, I was already accustomed to working with multiple sponsors at IBRD so I decided to resign, working as an independent contractor. However, I did want to resign in person at our upcoming company retreat at our corporate headquarters in Newport Beach.

When I arrived for the meeting on the evening prior, our clinical group was whisked away to a ‘team-building’ dinner at a comedy club across town (Los Angeles). Designated drivers were assigned to our group, with the managers encouraging us to socialize so, of course, the drinks were really flowing. Finally, as the evening wound down, I was riding in the car with my assigned driver on the thirty-minute drive across the L.A. basin, back to the hotel when my driver became ill. We were high-up in the air on a freeway exchange ramp when she began vomiting, so I had to grab the steering wheel to keep the car from crashing. There was a very narrow shoulder on the road so her car was hanging precariously into the nearby right lane as cars screamed by at 60-70 mph in the dark. We couldn’t exit the car because it was at least a 50-foot drop over the side of the exchange ramp, so we were stuck. However, after a few minutes I could see that a police car had pulled up about 50 yards behind us with a large spotlight focused on our stranded car. I motioned for them to advance but they did not.

Finally, after several near collisions with cars passing-by, I had no choice but to move my driver to the back seat so I could crawl across the transmission console and take control of the car. Huge mistake because, within seconds of pulling out onto the road, the police lit up their flashing lights and sirens and came rushing towards us. I stopped the car, but they came upon us with their guns drawn and yanked me out of the car. I tried to explain what had happened but my head was slammed into the hood of our car, I was handcuffed very roughly, and thrown in the backseat of the squad car. I couldn’t even believe what was happening but I became even more concerned when the second (male) officer got in to the car with my designated driver, a young female, and drove her away (without a female chaperone).

At no time did they have any interest in our circumstance and I understand that their actions of ignoring stranded motorists, are now considered illegal in California state law, but not so in 1989. I was taken to the Anaheim Detention Facility on South Harbor Blvd, not far from Disneyland, where they fingerprinted and photographed me and then threw me in a packed holding cell for the next eight hours, alongside members from rival gangs. Finally, I was released, complete with a summons to appear in Orange County court on DUI charges.

I had just enough time to taxi back to our hotel, sneak in a side entrance, shower and participate in the opening ‘meet-and-greet’ session at 8 am. I was bruised, exhausted and really pissed off, but when I saw my designated driver walk into the atrium, looking a little disheveled but acknowledging me with a thumbs up ‘OK’, I knew an even more dire situation had been averted.

In reflection, I have no idea, to this day, what the motivation was for treating us in that manner other than, perhaps, a quota for making arrests, but it was deplorable (DISGUST). We had done nothing illegal, as no one could have predicted that my designated driver would become ill at that point in time, likely from food poisoning. However, I don’t regret my actions in taking the wheel while intoxicated, because we easily could have died high up on that exchange ramp, although I do regret having to hire an attorney and spend thousands of dollars defending myself. Of note, I finished the meeting, tendered my resignation, and never told anyone at work about that terrifying night. One rather inauspicious note from that time period is that many spiritual leaders kept hyping an event called the ‘Harmonic Convergence’ in which the number sequence ‘1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9’ was supposed to represent ‘a new age in universal peace’. Apparently, this translated to mean that at 1:23 am (or pm) and 45 seconds on 6/7/89 (June 7^th, 1989) important changes would occur in the world. All I know is that at that exact time, I was in a holding cell in Anaheim, hoping that someone didn’t stab me or beat the holy Hell out of me and I also know that if I have to go to jail in Anaheim, California again, I prefer Disneyland’s version of jail.

In retrospect, I cannot even find the words to express my indignation for the area PoliceDepartment. I am not surprised that this incompetent bunch screwed up the handling of the O.J. Simpson case and have consistently incited racial riots for the past thirty years. Forget the Turd in the Pickle Jar Award, overhaul the department and regain some respect for our great country.

As well, part of the purpose of my memoirs is to find the truth, good or bad, and I learned quite a lot more from my trial attorney, who came highly recommended and considered to be excellent and respected in the industry. In point of fact, he had me write an honest, heartfelt letter to the judge explaining my circumstances and the judge unceremoniously ignored my explanation. Then my attorney attempted to speak with the judge’s support staff and was informed that unless we were prepared to bring official charges against the Police Department, we should kindly ‘Go to Hell’! In other words, no acknowledgement of wrongdoing, or for that matter, even ‘an unfortunate set of circumstances’, NO, just basic indifference all the way to the judges, enough said.

I have loved Shel Silverstein’s poetry all of my adult life especially his poetry book ‘Where the Sidewalk Ends’, as many of his poems really speak to me. But it wasn’t until I wrote this chapter that I fully understand what he was saying in this poem, ‘Edge of the World’ (Silverstein, 1974):

Columbus said the world is round?
Don’t you believe a world of that.
For I’ve been down to the edge of the world,
Sat on the edge where the wild wind whilrled
Peaked over the edge where the blue smoke curls,
And I can tell you, boys and girls,
The world is FLAT!

That night in Los Angeles, the world was flat, ignorance was in control, and there was nothing I could do to find reason in a chaotic world. Somehow, we have to do better going forward, Kindness Has to Matter!

__________

Silverstein, S. (1974). “Edge of the World” [Poem]. Where the Sidewalk Ends. New York: Harper & Row.

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^[1]Disclaimer: This excerpt and corresponding writing sample display some color but the actual book is in black and white.

Ch. 20 (A TURD in THE PICKLE JAR) – Let Me Take the Garbage Out!^[1]

When I arrived back in Roseburg from my work in Arizona, little did any of us know that my dad’s sister, Aunt Sally and her cat, Florence, had driven out from the East Coast for a visit, showing up without any advanced notice, and then, inexplicably deciding to take up residence at our family’s home. Sally and Dad had never been particularly close as siblings growing up as Dad was many years older than his little sister. She had always been a free-spirit, never staying in one location for very long before moving on, always looking for a fresh new situation. Well, I guess she figured she had found it here when Mom discovered that Sally had gotten a job at a local thrift store but had not bothered to let anyone know. She was staying in a bedroom that my older sisters, Paula and Heather had grown up in and now our little sister Pamela was fixing it up and excited to move in when Sally and Florence arrived in town. Over the next two months, Sally kept Florence shuttered in that room, using a litter box rather than giving the cat access to the outside, and then ignoring her obvious clean-up duties. In addition, Sally would cook her own meals, choosing to eat alone in her bedroom and then abandoning her dirty dishes until Mom snuck in to retrieve them. It wasn’t long before the room had a distinct odor that eventually consumed the entire home, and could literally take one’s breath away! I offered to encourage Sally to be more of a team player but Mom was such a kind soul that she totally nixed that idea, until one day, Sally got into a disagreement with her supervisor at work, was dismissed, packed her belongings, including Florence, and moved out of town in the blink-of-an-eye. Needless to say, the room was a total disaster, requiring everything in the room, including carpets, drapes, mattresses and bedding to be discarded before the wood floors were redone and the walls were steamed and repainted. When Pamela finally was able to move into her bedroom, we all laughed, uneasily, and Paula reminded us of Shel Siverstein’s silly poem,Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout (Silverstein, 1974), WHO WOULD NOT TAKE THE GARBAGE OUT! to perfectly capture the moment:

Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout
Would not take the garbage out.
She’d scour the pots and scrape the pans
Candy the yams and spice the hams.
And though her Daddy would scream and shout
She simply would not take the garbage out.
And so, it piled up to the ceilings:
Coffee grounds, potato peelings,
Brown bananas, rotten peas,
Chunks of sour cottage cheese.
It filled the can, it covered the floor,
It cracked the window and blocked the door
With bacon rinds and chicken bones,
Drippy ends of ice cream cones.
Prune pits, peach pits, orange peels
Gloppy glumps of cold oatmeal.
Pizza crusts and withered greens,
Soggy beans and tangerines.
Crusts of black burned buttered toast
Gristly bits of beefy roast.
The garbage rolled on down the hall
It raised the roof it broke the wall with . . .
Greasy napkins, cookie crumbs
Gobs of gooey bubble gum
Cellophane from green baloney
Rubbery blubbery macaroni
Peanut butter caked and dry,
Curdled milk and crusts of pie,
Moldy melons, dried-up mustard
Eggshells mixed with lemon custard,
Cold French fries and rancid meat
Yellow lumps of Cream of Wheat.
At last, the garbage reached so high
That finally it touched the sky.
And all the neighbors moved away,
And none of her friends would come to play.
And finally, Sarah Cynthia Stout said,
“OK, I’ll take the garbage out!”
But then, of course, it was too late
The garbage reached across the state,
From New York to the Golden Gate.
And there in the garbage she did hate,
Poor Sarah met an awful fate
That I cannot right now relate
Because the hour is much too late.
But children remember Sarah Stout
And always take the garbage out!

In reflection, I am saddened by our family’s disappointing experience with Aunt Sally, because no matter what course of action we would have chosen, it was aways going to end badly. None of us had spent much time with her and she really did tend to prefer being on her own and in the spirit of ‘live and let live’ we had tried to support her lifestyle. However, when we learned that she euthanized Florence upon returning to the East Coast because the cat was too much effort, I was further disappointed (DISGUSTED) and really had no choice but to provide her with a Turd in the Pickle Jar Award^[2].

__________

Silverstein, S. (1974). “Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout” [Poem]. Where the Sidewalk Ends. New York: Harper & Row.

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^[1]Disclaimer: This excerpt and corresponding writing sample display some color but the actual book is in black and white.

^[2] Inspired by and awarded to those toxic individuals who seem to disrupt the vibe for everyone else at a gathering, after all, it only takes one to ruin it for all! Note that this image uses color whereas the actual memoir is in black and white.