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The Story Of My Life, Such As It Is - Or The True Horror Story I Could Never Tell!

Part 2 - The Early Girls

I can't remember all my girl friends' names - not that there were all that many of them. My first little girl friend was Dawn Dubrowski - that was back in Detroit. Then there was Karen Love, and when I was 12 I liked Melanie Mapes. She was gorgeous - she used to be a child model, and then I liked another girl named Leslie Emmons, who was Melanie's best friend.

I never really went on dates. Being the son of a minister, my whole social life was based around the church and the people who were connected with it. On Weednesdays, Fridays and Sundays there were church-related events, and that was my entire social life for years and years.

Let's see, then there was Judy Jones, a church friend, whom I still keep in touch with. But to tell you the truth, I didn't care much about girls at that point - I was much more interested in model airplanes, and the little league, and things like that.

The Debby Days

My first real girl friend was when I was in high school in Phoenix. Her name was Debby Hickey. Now we're into the Debby Hickey-esque period. Our families lived in the same housing project, Country Gables, and we belonged to the same swimming pool association. That's where I first saw Debby, at the pool one day, and I was zapped right off my feet.

Debby was really, really a great girl, and I was decidedly in love with her. We went steady for three years. The big problem, though, was that her mother hated be because my hair was too long. Now it really wasn't that long at all - today if you had hair that long people would laugh at you because it was so short, but back then - at least as far as Mrs. Hickey just kept making it more and more difficult for Debby and me to see each other. What a miserable woman. she just hated my hair.

Well, we had started the band then - we called ourselves the Spiders - and we had a local hit on the radio. I kept telling Debby's mother, "Belive me, I'm going to be big - don't blow it for Debby," but she couldn't care less. All she could see was my hair. Eventually, I just couldn't take the pressure any more. The band went on the road, and I just moved away, and Debby got married and I got big, and I don't know where she is now.

It was difficuly having to leave Debby behind, but I wasn't really discouraged. I'm too competitive for that. After that the band went to California, and I had lots of different girl friends there. And that's where it finally happened.

I was very naive when I arrived in California. I was like a lamb going into the slaughter. Coming from that church background I dind't have any idea about sex at all. We lived right there in Hollywood in the heart of the Evil Hill, the area between Sunset and Santa Monica Boulevards, just below the Whisky. I didn't even know what a homosexual was - I just thought everyone in the neighborhood was fond of poodles. Finally, I caught on - you get an education living in California.

How I Lost My Virginity

Well, one night (I was 20 at the time), we were at a party in Venice, which is sort of a hippy neighborhood near the beach, and everyone was drinking a lot and I was drinking too. It was the first time I ever got drunk, and I found myself along in this room with a girl I had never met before. We started making out, and one thing led to another, and then we had our clothes off. This was much further than I'd ever gone, and I really didn't know what I was supposed to do. I was wondering how I was going to be cool with the whole hting, when suddenly she said to me, "You know, I've never done this before." And I said, "Me too!" and it was like Love American Style. There we were, on the verge of the Biggest Experience In Our Lives, and neither of us know what we were doing.

Actually, it was kind of disappointing. I had always thought it would be like skyscrapers and thunderstorms and rainbows and all that, but then it was over and there had been no skyscrapers. It wasn't awful, but it wasn't fabulous either. So I thought, "Boy, is that all there is to it? I don't know if I'm going to bother with this stuff any more - it's pretty boring."

When I told my friends what had happened, and how disappointing it was, they said not to worry, that the first time is always like that. You think it's going to be a big deal, and it's trivial. Especially if the girl is inexperienced too. Then it's all just fumbling and gropoing and poking. I was advised to find a girl who knew what she was doing. "Well," I thought, "I'll give it another shot. There must be something more to this."

So I did. There was this girl hanging around, and she was really beautiful, and she liked me, and she was reputed to be quite skillful at these things. One night she came over, and there was no one else home, and nature just took its course. "I've only done this once before," I said. "Don't worry about a thing," she said, and I let her take over. This time it was fantastic, completely fantastic. I had acquired a whole new outlook on life.

I'll continue the story of my life in the December issue of Spec, and I'll tell you all about Cindy Lang and how I met her, and how we've managed to stay together, through thick and thin, for all these years. See you later!