Mark and Jonathan -
Burlingame 1987
I found a neat unfurnished 2 bed apartment on El Camino Real
in San Mateo, about 2 miles from Shirley’s place, close to a Supermarket and
not far from The Crosby Commons Mall. We
moved in with the basics and I mean basics, 2 plates, 2 knives, 2 forks, 2
mugs, you can guess the rest of the twosomes.
We had a TV, a small table and a couch.
In the bedroom we had sleeping bags on the carpet. It was not the most elegant of apartments to bring
girls to, but it would do for now.
Mark was keen to carry on with his Karate. He was a 2nd Dan in Shotokan
Karate and knew his stuff. Every time we
went to work with Paul in a new town in the Bay Area, Mark would be looking for
Karate Studios (Dojo’s), Paul would be spotting Liquor Stores and I would be
eyeing up the local talent, so everyone was happy. We would work as far north (toward San
Francisco) as San Bruno and as far south (toward San Jose) as Stanford/Palo
Alto. So I had a wide range in which to
cast my gaze, as did Mark and Paul for that matter. As Paul and my reputation grew for good work,
we picked up more work, on higher profile and more expensive homes.
Some of these homes were in Hillsborough and others along
the ridge of hills that form a backdrop to the bay looking west. These homes were set back into the hillside,
discreet entrances, usually gated and single storey in design; they would have
pools overlooking the bay, with views on clear days of the Sky Scrapers in San
Francisco and across the bay towards San Leandro and Oakland. On Monday 19th October 1987, we
were working (Paul and I) on just such a property, high in the hills directly
behind and overlooking Redwood City and Menlo Park. The area below us was known as Silicon Valley
and at that time was home to Apple Inc’, and various other burgeoning Computer
companies and software providers.
The guy whose home we were decorating did not appear that
morning. We’d been there a week already,
cleaning the cobwebs and dust off the eaves running around the property prior
to painting them. In America, Gloss
Paint is called Enamel and Emulsion is called Latex and we would be applying
Latex. We had laid out our drop cloths
and were prepped and ready to go. Noting
that he had not come out is pertinent as every morning he’d bring out pastries
and coffee, seat himself at a table and look across the valley reading the
“Pink” Financial Newspapers.
We knew he was home, as we could hear him shouting and
hollering into a phone at someone.
Mid-afternoon, after Paul had demolished the 6-pack and was debating a
run to the store for “more paint”, the guy emerged and sat on the grassy
lawn. He was crying his eyes out, trying
to light a cigarette, but with tears and snot all over his hands and
cigarette, it was a non-starter. I
walked over and asked him if I could help, did he want some water and offered
him a Marlboro, which he took after I had lit it for him.
All he could say was “I am fucked man, fucked, fucked,
fucked” (sic). I went to find Paul and
we walked around the house to the guy, who was still sat on the lawn. “He says he’s fucked Paul” I said, as if that
helped explain the problem, at which point the guy said something like “I lost
most of my money, my shares are worthless”.
Paul walked off, got in his car and went to the store, I sat on the
grass, lit a smoke and we sat in silence, save for the odd sob and shudder
coming from him. Paul came back with a
six pack of Bud’s and we all had one, not saying much, staring across the bay,
savouring the last of the Autumn sunshine and deep in thought.
This turned out to be Black Monday; the day when the Dow
Jones stock market crashed 22%, (by October month end, nearly 23% had been
wiped off the Dow Jones value. The UK
lost 26%, Spain 31%, Australia 42% and Hong Kong 45%). The guy paid us when we had finished and
thanked us for our concern, the beers, smokes and comfort. I wonder today whether he recouped or failed to
ever get back his money.
Mark and I were enjoying our life in the Bay Area but had
never really explored San Francisco beyond a trip to the tourist haunts of Pier
39 and Fishermans Wharf. My mum had given
me one of my father’s watches just before I travelled. It is a watch by Montine of Switzerland and
whilst not worth a great deal, has sentimental value. It needed an overhaul and a new strap, so
Mark and I went along to a Jewellers and watch repairer on Burlingame Avenue. He looked at the watch and recommended a few
parts he needed and it would take a few weeks before it would be ready. Mark was browsing the window outside when I
came out of the shop and told him the news.
A very attractive blond haired girl (I kid you not), aged
early twenties was stood to one side and said my favourite line at the time
“Are you guys British?” “Why yes we are”
we answered together, “Oh, I just love your accent!” she giggled, we were
hooked! “Care to grab a coffee” we asked
again, like Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dee.
“I’d love to” she replied, so off we went to the cafe’ just down the
Avenue and proceeded to beguile her with our tales of Derring-do, our adventure
to America etc.
She lived on Market Street near 16th Street and
we told her (sneaky, sneaky ulterior motivey) that we had rarely been to the
“City”. “You can stay with me” she
offered. Mark and I exchanged what to us
seemed fleeting glances of agreement, but to the trained eye would have been a
blatant scream of “CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT, SHE FELL FOR IT, and SHE’S OFFERED TO
PUT US UP – ARE WE IN OR WHAT!!” One of
us replied, “Why thank you that is very kind, we would love to, do you have a
number?” in as refined a cut glass English accent as we could muster. “You’re just so cute” she said.
Not ones to shun an offer, we had agreed by the end of the
coffee to see her the forthcoming Friday and with address in hand set out after
work on the Caltrans (The Caltrans is a train system that runs between San
Francisco and San Jose) to the City.
Once there we grabbed a cab downtown to her address. She lived in a three storey town house; the
bottom floor was a shop, with an entrance door off the street and stairs to the
apartment.
During the train trip Mark and I had discussed which of us
she fancied more, whether a three-way would be on the cards and fantasised on the
number of other shagging scenarios that may occur over the next few hours. We turned up at the apartment and rang the
bell. She buzzed and asked who it was,
we told her and she let us in. Once in
the front room, she asked us if we needed a drink and said we could crash on
the floor in the front room. Mark and I
looked at each other, shrugged and said ok, perhaps she was playing hard to
get? Why?
A male voice called her from the back of the apartment, a
male “English” voice, (that was why!). She
left us and went towards the voice; we looked at each other again, our
pre-nuptial erections wilting rapidly!
Raised voices came from the back of the apartment and she came back
through to the front room. “My boyfriend
is not too happy that I asked you to stay” she said. “Should we leave then?” asked Mark, “oh no,
he says you can stay tonight” she said.
At that the boyfriend came through to the room. He was a decent enough bloke, he explained
that she was always asking Brits to stay and it was pissing him off. We explained our recent history as much as we
felt relevant and omitted the part about wanting to screw his girlfriend so
hard her eyes popped out.
He was ok
with us staying, gave us a key and said don’t steal anything! Mark said we couldn’t blame him as we were
two English blokes on the pull in California and he was the same, or had been,
so knew the score. We decided to make
ourselves scarce for the evening, and wandered out into the street. It was after 7pm and coming down the stairs
and out onto the street, the street lights were on and people were making their
way home, or out into town for the evening.
Mark was hungry and spotted a Hamburger joint across the
street, we crossed at the lights and walked down to the burger joint, which was
quite a large place. As we entered,
there were tables and chairs on either side with an archway through the right
hand wall into another room, from wherein the sounds of disco music could be
heard. I wandered towards the sound and
looked into the gloom, as there weren’t any lights on in there except for the
low wattage disco lights reflecting off the glitter ball on the ceiling. It took a few moments for my eyes to adjust
to the gloom.
Beneath the glitter ball four couples embraced each other
tightly, swaying to the music and occasionally staring into each other’s
eyes. The couples were all men and I
turned to Mark, trying to point this out, but he was looking up at the menu. I told Mark to look through the archway into
the other room and he referred me to the menu.
The menu featured some tasty delights such as; Feel My Meat Burger, Hot
and Meaty Burger, Chew My Meat Burger, (you get the idea). Mark came back over and we smiled and tried
not to laugh, but we were still hungry.
The guy behind the counter asked what we wanted, “FRIES!” we said.
We took our fries out onto the street and looked at each
other and started to smile. That was the
first time we had ever been in such a blatantly gay atmosphere and I suppose if
you are going to experience the gay world San Francisco is the place to
go! Waiting for a cab the sidewalks had
got busy, a couple walked past dressed in black leather and I looked at them
after they moved on up the street and noticed that one of them had no arse in
his trousers, his bare behind on show, we both lost it. The traffic was passing by now and Marks arm went up and he shouted “CAB!”
Our trip to the City was not finished yet, but that can wait
until the next blog.
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