The Greatest Ride Ever Told

Not quite a hitchhiking story, but related because it all started with me hitchhiking. A long time ago, I was a teenaged runaway—and I ended up spending several months away from home. I can't say why I did it—maybe I was just sensing that I needed adventure. I don't remember all of the names of the people and places, but I still remember who they were in relation to me.

Hitchhiking is often the mode of transport for the desperate. Fellow hitchhikers I met were a sullen, broody crew that had little prospect in life. I saw some desperate people on the road—bums, mostly, con men, or just general drifters. The people that picked me up often weren't too far off themselves—it was almost always the crappy cars filled with crap that stopped. Women alone almost never picked me up, but I had many families and couples give me rides.

My story begins a few days after I left home. I was seventeen.

I had spent the night in a national forest campground. The next day, I hitchhiked north to Albuquerque, and headed west. My ride out of Albuquerque was quirky in the fact that it was a woman with three kids in the car—all under the age of five or so. It had been a hot afternoon, and rush hour had started. I was glad to just be sitting and moving. I looked down, and noticed that there was a pipe and a rolled up baggie. “Want to get high?” She asked.

She dropped me off somewhere west of Albuquerque in the typical starkness of that part of New Mexico. I stuck my thumb out, but was already looking about to see if there was any place I could camp. It didn't look good, but then hitchhiking at night was not a pleasant alternative.

Finally, a red Lincoln stopped, and behind it a yellow van. I went up to the Lincoln, and a young woman opened the window and told me to get into the van. It was a customized van, with a refrigerator and small couch in back. There were two men in the front seat—whom I knew later to be Rob, the owner and driver of the van, and Jim, the passenger.

We didn't talk much. After introductions, I wasn't a party to the casual conversation between Ron and Jim. We finally came to Gallup, New Mexico. Rob made a comment about how Rick wasn't going to want to pass up a city with so many lights. We pulled into a McDonald's, and I ordered coffee with cram and sugar to stretch my money.

The girl from the Lincoln was named Maryanne, and her boyfriend was Rick. Rick was in charge of the crew of of two—Ron and Jim. Rick talked to me briefly, and offered to put me to work selling cleaner door to door. Not having any viable alternative, I accepted. We then went to spend the night in a cheap motel.

The next morning, I went out with Rob as he went to sell product. After I joined them, both Rob and Jim discussed their sales prowess in detail, and claimed to have made a lot of money in the New Orleans area. I never really found out where either of them were from, but New Orleans seemed to be as good of place as any. When Rob finally got someone's attention in a hair salon, he introduced me to her as part of his sales pitch. When the woman shook my hand she said, “Ooh, cold hands, warm heart.” I had never before heard that phrase.

A day or so later, we went to Flagstaff. After another night at a cheap hotel, I was sent on my first solo drop. I worked a series of strip malls, going into places of business and initiating sales calls. I had done door to door sales before, and was perfectly comfortable approaching people. I had a spray bottle of the cleaner with me, and a towel tucked away in a pocket. Much to my amazement, the cleaner worked—I would routinely take out carpet stains and clean glass with it in a matter of seconds. Between that and my presentation, I was able to convince several people to agree to buy bottles. Several hours later I had collected cash and checks—about $150 or so.

I calmly watched from the back seat in the van as Rob converted a check made to the company into his name, and took it to the bank it was drawn upon. When we met up with Rick and Maryanne that evening, there were two young men with them. They also joined the crew, and Rob and Jim spent several days training them while I went out on my own drops.

The two guys were Pete and Doug. Both had the look of running from something and appeared to be a year or two older then me. They weren't very good salesmen—i had to do some training of them when we went to Phoenix, and found they were pretty disinterested in the whole process. Our first motel in Phoenix was in a crappy part of town, and both of the new guys were exited about the fact that there were numerous prostitutes in the area. I couldn't care less—and was watching TV in the next room when they tried their best to rip a pair of them off. One of the prostitutes actually searched me for money while I watched football. The TV didn't have any knobs on it. Rob befriended a waitress in a nearby coffee shop, and shortly she left her job to join us. Her name was Beth. We changed motels several times after that, though we didn't stay in any one longer then a night or two.

The last motel in Phoenix was different. It was much larger, and was a former Holiday Inn,. The pool was closed off, but it was much larger then the other places. And it also had another sales crew that was selling cleaner. Rick apparently knew the guy who ran that crew, and they spent a lot of time partying together. That crew was about 20 people—almost all black, and was a lot more organized and rambunctious then we were. They held nightly sales meetings, which could be avoided only by selling above one's quota. Rick quickly assigned the new people to these meetings, including myself.

Rick appeared to be about thirty. He had red hair and a thin red beard that made him look distinguished. Maryanne, his girlfriend was a short blond woman, who appeared to be about twenty. Rick appeared to be the ultimate scammer/conman, and was very glib. He also apparently had a background in hustling pool, and once demonstrated a trick shot that was pretty amazing. On several occasions during our morning meetings, Rick would start off by reading text from ads in various porno mags, and had the eloquence and timing to make them damn funny. Maryanne seemed to be bright—I had several long conversations where she demonstrated a wit that was uncommon.

We would have breakfast in a nearby coffee shop in the mornings. Rob would then drive us to our first drops for the day. I would work my up whatever street I was assigned, making contact with just about anyone that might have money. If a place had carpeting, I would start my pitch by saying that I could remove any stain, and would promptly remove half of the largest ugly stain I could find. The product, an orange liquid called “Sun Sations” had no odor, and was sold as a concentrate. The bottle made absurd claims of using 1 capful per quart, but after some experimentation, I used a formula of about 30 percent cleaner. I had a small receipt that had the name of the operation. I don't fully remember it now, but it was a name that was chosen so that Rick would be able to easily write over it.

We spent some time there, and I began to avoid the sales meetings by reaching my quota. After a day of sales, I came back one evening, bought some pot from a member of the other crew, and began to relax, only to discover that we were heading to Los Angeles that night. I smoked all my weed in the van as we crossed the desert into southern California.

I woke up to find the van parked on a city street in a urban center. Rob explained that we were to wait here until Rick came, which could be a while, seeing that he saw Rick's car pulled over in the desert. It was Rick's birthday, and he had been partying pretty hard. I walked around, and found that we were near the bus station. We had no money for food or tobacco in the van. I went out to see if I could steal something to eat, but there wasn't anything I could get without getting caught. We spent all day there, and didn't leave until 9 or so that night. We ended up in Venice, at a motel on the beach.

So I spent some time on Venice beach. It was my first time seeing the Pacific, and I spent time walking along the beach. The sales meetings continued, and the boxes of cleaner in the back of the van were sold off, and we started selling the product that the other crew sold, called Viva. A rumor among the salespeople from the other group indicated that our late night leaving of Phoenix was due to a dispute between the boss of that company and a member that was threating going to the police. 

Rick decided to send me and others out on drops with the other crew. At first I was at odds with the new driver. He wanted me to work residential areas, and wouldn't let me work the commercial areas where I was traditionally successful. He'd drop me off in these upper middle class neighborhoods where I'd knock on door after door of empty houses. Finally tired of my bitching for a couple of days, , he dropped me off in what he thought was the worse place possible: Rodeo Drive. It was a miserable place to do what I did for a living, and I was treated pretty badly, but I still made sales. One of my sales was tough, and I ended up spending extra time when I dropped off the product, which pissed the driver off even more. For my night drop, he left me at some subdivision that was on the side of a mountain. I had long walks between houses, but people were home and I made sales.

In the next morning's sales meeting, the driver gave me a reward for coming through. After that, he dropped me off where I asked him to, and I no longer had to attend the nightly sales meetings. Once time after that he dropped me off in the gay district, which I didn't realize until I was fondled by a shopkeeper who was clearly more interested in something other then cleaner.

We switched motels a couple of times, and then ended up in a place in Santa Ana. This one was considerably crappier, with a pool filled with algae. It was across the street from a factory, and was in that scrub desert that' all over southern California. There I would take walks down the streets at night, where I would pass row upon row of southern California homes that I had grown to hate. There was a vacant lot next to the motel, and I played football with members of the crew there. 

The cross training ended, and I was going out with Rob as the driver of our original small crew. Beth wasn't sleeping with Rob anymore, but was getting friendly with a white guy in the other crew.

One morning, I was told that we were going to Las Vegas. Rick sent Rob out with the crew to do a quick half day because he needed money. When we took off, I told Rob where to drop me because I had seen some promising retail at the end of yesterday's drop. I went on to have my best day selling cleaner. Everyone was interested. At one point, it was near lunchtime, and after making some sales, I stopped in a restaurant just to use the bathroom. The manager asked me what I was doing with the spray bottle, so I ended up even selling to him.

When we returned, Rick was pleased with my and Beth's efforts. He sent the rest of the crew, along with the Viva crew, to Las Vegas, while he kept Beth and I to do more sales. Rick never took us out, we ended up spending the rest of the day and night at the hotel while Rick took off some place. Beth had noticed that I had been writing, and asked me to read it to her. Rick then came the next afternoon, and we drove to Las Vegas. I wrote in my journal to the lights of the strip.

Las Vegas wasn't as easy of a town to sell in. The commercial areas were smaller, and ended up working more residential areas. Tensions between the crew members began to rise. One night, all of the white members of the Viva crew came into our room, and we ended up having a small party and talking for hours about various issues. It was then I learned that Rick and the leader of the other crew had assaulted one of the other crew members, and that they had left to avoid the cops. I also found out that there were people in the other crew that were using the sales front as a way of braking into homes.

Doug and Pete weren't selling very much at all, so they had little money. They pulled a dine and dash at the coffee shop across the street, which pissed Rob and Jim off. They came with me to a Montgomery Wards, where I bought a couple of things while they shoplifted. Upon returning, rob took some of their stuff away. When they complained to him about not taking my stuff, he told them that I had purchased them, so it was all mine. Actually I hadn't, but he didn't know that.

A few nights later I was talking with Doug and Pete, and found out they did have some vague criminal charges against them. I told them that I was a runaway. A few days later, while on the way to a drop, Jim pointed to a nearby mountain and said that he wished he could climb it. I remember staring out the van window wishing the same thing, and wondering when I would next get a day off to try it.

Tensions grew because of poor sales. A Viva crew member started making open crude passes at Beth, and her new boyfriend couldn't deal with that. After a night of partying with Doug and Pete in our motel room, Pete came after me with a knife that belonged to me. I subdued him and took my knife back, and  managed to get a couple of small cuts. The whole affair was surreal, and I thought he was joking.

Rob found out about the knife incident and bitched to me about it. He wanted me to kick Pete's ass, which I really wouldn't have minded. He was bitching to me about it when he dropped me off near a small commercial area. I worked the area, selling some product to a  dentist's office. I remember the shopping plaza because it had the Liberace museum in an outlot. No sale there. After I finished working the commercial area, I went into a residential neighborhood behind it. The homes were empty, but I decided that I wanted to come back there for my evening drop.

Ron picked me up, and then went to a nearby residential area where he had dropped Pete. He couldn't find Pete after driving around for a few blocks, so he went to the drop point and parked. I asked him for a cigarette, and he responded by telling me that there was a cop behind us.

We were ordered out of the van and spread eagled over the trunk of the cop car. The cop took our id's and went to his radio. Rob looked at me, and said “Do  you know what he's doing?”

“Yeah,” I said, “he's calling us in.”

“What's he going to find on you?” Rob asked

“Well, Rob, it's been nice knowing you. Take it easy.”

“I figured as much.” We were separated, and I was whisked away to the Las Vegas juvenile facility. It turned out to be some huge building in the desert that was quite large and prison like. I was processed in and spent the night there. Most of the time was in isolation; though I did get to talk to other kids at mealtimes.

Maryanne came as a visitor. She had my backpack, which was suspiciously light. I later found that my stuff had all been gone though, and that everything of value, including most of my clothes, had been replaced by dirty towels. Maryanne also handed me a folded twenty dollar bill. I wonder today why anyone even bothered to show up.

The next morning, I was escorted to the airport and flown back to Chicago. I spent the afternoon getting my hair cut and reviewing pamphlets for private schools at some counselor's office. After my parents went to bed, I climbed out my window and partied with my friends. The next morning, I flew with my mother to Boston, and then drove to Vershire, Vermont in a snowstorm. When we arrived, we were told that it was the first serious snow in quite a while. I met with school staff for a few minutes, and then my mother left to spend the night in a motel while I stayed in the dorms. I walked with a student guide up a hill, to the Lodge, which was the main building for the school.

I stepped into the dining hall and became a student at The Vershire School.

Comments

[Harold Hawken]

Hey, I've BEEN to the Liberace Museum, and to a restaurant in that same little strip mall.

[W]

I to became a student of the Vershire school....

[Trucking Factoring]

Cool. That was a great ride. :)