I asked if he had ever ridden a horse.
“Once,” he answered, “a pony, when I was three. I didn’t know how to do any of that. I was hoping to meet a woman who knew how to grow things.” Also under consideration was life as a circus carny. “I figured I could meet a lot of characters that way,” he said seriously.
But everything changed one night at the Golden Nugget when he heard Waylon Jennings crooning “Only Daddy That’ll Walk the Line.” Dressed in dark clothes and cowboy boots with slicked-back hair, Jennings personified cool. His music was rugged honky-tonk with a rock-and-roll bottom beat, influenced by his late mentor, Buddy Holly.
“Waylon was a totally new sound,” recalls Raven. “The only guy doing that besides him was maybe Johnny Cash, and Waylon’s voice was less talky, more my style.”
That night, at the Golden Nugget, Robert made one goal: to write songs for Waylon Jennings.
* * *
A FEW MONTHS LATER he was back in South Beach doing day labor jobs and playing stickball, but in February 1970 he bought a Greyhound bus ticket to Nashville, where The Johnny Cash Show was filming its second season. Robert waited around back at the Ryman Auditorium to shake Cash’s hand and slip him a lyrics sheet. “Security back then wasn’t as tight,” Raven recalls. “You could actually talk to people.”
For songwriting inspiration, Robert visited the post office to study Most Wanted posters. “Fugitive on the Run” was one of the songs he penned in Music City. But the pressures of self-promotion in such a bustling industry town ate at Robert’s soul, and he missed South Beach. “I had to be someone I wasn’t,” he remembers. “My stomach was always growling and churning. I think I had ulcers. I didn’t feel right.”
In one last effort, Robert pressed a new song into Cash’s palm after another broadcast at the Ryman. Cash told Robert, “I’m writing all my own stuff now, buddy, but maybe this guy can help you out. He’s a songwriter.” Cash nodded to the man on his left, who Robert already knew. “I’ll never forget it,” he says. “Johnny turned and gave him my lyrics sheet. The guy seemed a little high or stoned or something. But he didn’t say a word. He just took my song and stuck it in his right pocket.” The lyrics sheet was untitled and without a copyright. “I just figured if he liked it, he would call me. I didn’t know anything. I was so naïve.”
* * *
SIX MONTHS LATER, back in South Beach, Robert was listening to his transistor radio when, from out of its speaker, came a brand-new Waylon Jennings song. It took Robert two lines before he recognized the words. Wait a minute, he thought. I know those lyrics. I wrote those lyrics.
He sprinted back to his mother’s apartment and, fingers shaking, dialed the radio station, thinking, This is it. I’ve finally made it. The radio DJ picked up and before he could even say hello, Robert interrupted him. “Who wrote that Waylon Jennings song you just played?” he asked. “Who’s the songwriter?”
The DJ told him the name, and it was not Robert Kraft.
Without proof except the carbon copy of the lyrics sheet, Robert had no recourse—and his downward spiral began. “I became very angry, with a hair-trigger temper,” he recalls. “I felt like everybody was against me. My father had left, my mom married the Eagle, my song was stolen—everything. Life was against me. I couldn’t trust anybody.” As Robert tumbled into depression, his song climbed higher and higher on the Country Music charts. (On the record, Raven won’t name the songwriter who was standing next to Johnny Cash, and I’ve honored this request.)
His outlet had become his torment. Someone else was going to get credit for the best thing he had ever done. That afternoon, a cloud as dark as his Levi’s jacket settled overhead.
Suffering, some artists will tell you, can be an effective writing tool. But first you have to get past anger, and Robert couldn’t do that. Rage isn’t a useful emotion in country ballads. One of his songs from the era was titled, “I Hate You,” and the chorus went, “I hate you, you’re bad. You’re evil, you make me sad.”
“It wasn’t my best work,” concedes Raven. “But I was scared it was going to happen again, that someone would steal another song or even rip an idea from my head.”
Mary, his mother, offered little sympathy. “Are you sure he stole your song?” she asked. She told him the same thing she always told him when he didn’t feel well. “Well just don’t think about it.” Or, “Why don’t you write a better one?”
Apathy, he decided, must be a healthier alternative to pain, and his 21st birthday presented him with legal anesthesia in the form of Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill.
* * *
RAVEN HASN’T TOUCHED ALCOHOL since 1990, and I wondered how long this drinking binge in his early 20s lasted. “Oh, let me tell you the worst,” began Raven one night when we were sitting in his living room, sometime in the fall of 2012. As usual, he was on his couch in black jeans with a shoelace belt and no shirt. (He prefers to wear less than pay more for air-conditioning.)
One night in 1972, he drank three bottles of Boone’s Farm and passed out in the gutter. When he came to, a tall man was standing over him. “I can picture him in my mind right now,” said Raven. “Black hair, slicked back. New Jersey accent—one of those gambler mafia, Italian rough-talking guys. Straight out of The Sopranos.” They would pass each other in the streets and sometimes waved as the man went between the dog track and the Playhouse bar. That night, standing over 21-year-old Raven in the gutter, the man spoke like he had a throat full of sawdust. “He says, ‘You know, I’ve been watching you, and you’re better than this. It’s about time you straightened up,’ ” recalled Raven. “And I listened. I was like, Hey thanks! I said [to myself], by the end of the year I’m going to do everything I can not to get drunk.”
“Let me get this straight,” I said. “You quit drinking because an Italian mafia boss saw potential and told you to shape up.”
“His name was Sal,” said Raven, brushing the top of his thighs with his hands. “He was just one of the gamblers, probably knew the guys in the mafia, but he wasn’t in that group.” Raven doesn’t know why, of all the drunken messed-up people in the neighborhood, Sal targeted him. “I guess he thought I was a good kid,” explained Raven. “It made an impact. Sal never saw me drunk again.”
Raven can’t recall if he ever saw Sal again, period. While other people might have thought, Look who’s talking, Raven just listened. Raven likes to keep it simple. He accepted that Sal had a valid point, and he didn’t look for reasons to discount the wisdom. When it comes to the truth, Raven doesn’t judge the vessel. “I saw I did foolish things when I drank, and I didn’t feel good,” he said. “And I saw other people making fools of themselves when they drank. I decided I didn’t want to be a fool in that way.” So he left it, just like that, because of a stranger named Sal.
From the gutter, a person has a lot of avenues for reform—God, rehab, school, or a career has set many a wayward persons on a straighter path—but Raven’s redemption would come through two boxers named Bulldog and Killer, and it would take over twelve million steps.
II
AUTHENTICITY
Raven is unique in a world of domesticated clones and people who struggle to fit in everywhere.
—Creve Coeur, 408 runs
I wouldn’t want to join any club that would have me as a member.
—Lobotomy, who was quoting Groucho Marx, 250 runs
You always meet interesting people with Raven.
You never meet, like, a consultant.
—Green Thumb, 460 runs
If someone was raggedy, I knew he had better stories. A guy picking up garbage in an alley is always going to have something more interesting to say than a guy going back and forth from work. Someone wearing a suit and tie was the last person I wanted to talk to.
—Raven
THREE
THE WORLD’S VERSION OF SOMEBODY
When I first moved to Miami Beach in February 2011, a friend broke down the city to me like this: “If you are
somebody, you go to New York. If you want to be somebody, you go to Los Angeles. If you want to be somebody else, you go to Miami.”
Four years in this town have taught me that Maseratis can be rented, bodies contain fake parts, and plans are optional. It’s a town to reinvent yourself. Most everyone is from another place. Nobody can tell you who you’re supposed to be, because nobody knows you well enough to make the determination. To this stereotype, Raven is an anomaly. He arrives on time. He doesn’t have a car, a driver’s license, a passport, or a cell phone. In a city of jet-setters, Raven has never ridden in an airplane. He does what he says he’ll do, and he hates it when people don’t. He speaks only English. While electronic music thumps out of every souvenir shop, Raven idolizes the Man in Black, Johnny Cash. With Raven, you don’t meet the club promoter who can get you into Liv, Set, Mynt, or Story. He would rather know a genuine asshole than a fake yuppie. Raven is, unabashedly, nobody but himself, and he likes to attract people who are similarly at ease in their own skin.
It’s thrilling to be an insider in a group comprised of and led by outsiders. You want to congratulate people for being themselves in a world that’s asking them only to be young, rich, and sexy. In Miami Beach, where appearances dictate status, Raven shouldn’t be faring well. Many people who look weird in this city are weird. (Believe me, I’ve done a lot of research.) But Raven surprises everyone by being kind, intelligent, generous, and humble—and, yes, a little crazy, too. But aren’t we all?
Trying to put my finger on one quality that consistently makes me like people that I meet with Raven, it’s realness. While most everyone is telling you what they think you want to hear, Raven Runners speak their truth.
I’ve learned this many times, but one of my first lessons was on my second run with Raven in June 2011, when I met a lifeguard named Low Key. I asked him, in his eleven years on Beach Patrol, to tell me about his proudest save. I wanted a heroic story. He thought for a moment. “It was one of those weekends where the beach was just packed with bodies,” he began. “I saw a big crowd of people standing around in the water, and I thought it was a fight. Then I saw one man holding on to something that looked like a big blob of gel, carrying it to shore.”
Low Key paddled his board out to the man and realized the blob was an octopus, which he took from the man. “I paddled out to deeper waters,” he continued, “and it wasn’t moving the whole time. I thought it was dead. I put it under water and held it for a few seconds—still didn’t move—until all of a sudden it puffed up like a balloon, turned around, and sprayed purple ink all over me. I was watching as it swam away and felt pretty good about myself when it turned around again and swam right back up to my board, poking its big head out of the water until I could see his eye. He held it there for a second, then swam away again. I think it was grateful. I think he knew I saved his life.”
His proudest save was an octopus. His second-proudest save, he told me, was a pelican caught in a fishing line, which turned out to be a double-rescue because he also saved the fish. “I wasn’t expecting both of your proudest rescues to be animals,” I remarked.
“Yeah,” he said nodding. “A lot of times I like animals more than people. People can be such assholes, you know?”
* * *
IN 1972, AROUND THE SAME TIME as the gutter incident, Raven was leaning against the pier railing watching the parade of South Beach characters go by when Bulldog walked up to him. Bulldog was a fighter at the 5th Street Gym. He had curly reddish-brown hair and light Irish skin with cheeks that were always rosy from taking hits. His baby face was cherubic, but when he spoke his growl was anything but the voice of an angel. The tattoos on his arms, a bulldog and a shamrock, were symbols of his Marine Corps service in Vietnam, and he was always grunting, Hoo-rah! Semper Fi!
With no preface, Bulldog said to Robert, “Hey Johnny, you gettin’ any grinding?” Grinding, in Bulldog’s lingo, meant sex, and Johnny was an all-purpose nickname. You see, a conversation with Bulldog required a glossary: Men and women were things. Hair was moss. Eyes were globes. The nose was a snout. Mouth was jowls. Butt was ort. Legs were sticks or stumps. Teeth were jibs. Ears were “eee-s,” and a hearing aid was an ear cock. Glasses were shades or cheaters. Hands were paws. Going to the bathroom was dropping gold. Going out to eat was “putting it down.” Heart Attack was H-A. Elvis was E-P. Checking out the scene was a recon mission. Clothes were vines. Shoes were treads. Drunk was wasted or wine-soaked. Ugly was twisted. Drinking was sipping. The Marine Corps was the crotch. His home was a cage. “Yeah, I met this thing, she looks pretty good, her ort’s a little sloppy,” he would say about a date. “She didn’t want to go in the ocean for the routine, so we took a drive in my short, and I went back to my cage.”
“That thing you were talking to last week,” continued Bulldog, “You getting’ any grinding off her?” That “thing” was a young brunette called Little Bit who hung out at the pier. When Robert said no, Bulldog invited him to run. “Come on, Johnny,” he said. “I gotta do my roadwork. You’re with me.”
“Roadwork” was a boxer’s endurance training, running and shadowboxing for a few miles. It was more a command than an invitation. Barefoot and wearing jean cutoffs, Robert adjusted his spray-painted black cowboy hat and ran after Bulldog, who commenced his half-wave, nod, and “howyadoing” chant to everyone they passed—lifeguards, senior citizens, and pretty young tourists visiting grandparents.
Meanwhile, Robert couldn’t breathe after a few steps. He felt weak from his diet of hot dogs and alcohol. He hadn’t run a mile since high school PE, and the only running he liked to do was around the bases. On its own, the exercise seemed pointless—even wasteful. But that afternoon, Robert was just trying to keep up with Bulldog in the soft sand. “Come on, Johnny!” Bulldog barked over his shoulder. “You can do it.” Robert decided that even if he dropped dead, he wasn’t going to walk. He wanted to accomplish something. He needed to accomplish something.
Two miles later, heaving but moving, Robert finished behind Bulldog. Endorphins pumped through his body. His legs felt alive and strong, and Bulldog praised him. That day something changed in Robert’s head. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt good.
He started joining Bulldog and Killer, Bulldog’s best friend, for roadwork once or twice a week, for two or three miles. Killer trained with Angelo Dundee at the 5th Street Gym. Among those who follow boxing, the 5th Street Gym is as legendary as Angelo, who is best known for training Muhammad Ali, though he has stood in the corner for fourteen world champions: Carmen Basilio, Willie Pastrano, Ralph Dupas, Luis Rodriguez, Sugar Ramos, Jimmy Ellis, José Napoles, Michael Nunn, Adilson Rodrigues, George Scott, Pinklon Thomas, Slobodan Kacar, Sugar Ray Leonard, and George Foreman.
Before boxing, Killer had gone to clown school in Sarasota but dropped out due to a personal conflict with his instructor. He then tried stand-up comedy in Las Vegas, in between driving a taxi. Before he perfected making people laugh, he was drafted for Vietnam, and the Marine Corps turned him into a boxer. Bulldog and Killer used roadwork to troll for women on the beach and hit on anything with breasts under 70.
In his female conquests, Killer was aggressive. “If a girl didn’t want to be with him, he’d walk away and say, ‘Eh, she’s a lesbian, ’ ” recalls Raven. Then he moved to the next prospect, who was usually within earshot of the first. “I’d think, She just saw you get shot down, you should go farther away. But no, he hit on everybody.” If Bulldog got shot down, he announced, “Who cares? I lost my pride years ago.”
Raven admired Killer and Bulldog; they were confident, entertaining, and self-deprecating. They were themselves and proud of it. Rejection was a joke. On the run, Bulldog pointed to the few young tourists and encouraged Robert. “You can get that, Johnny. You gotta try.” Slowly but less surely, he did start trying.
His fighter friends dubbed him the “Cowboy.” He didn’t particularly like the nickname, but he went along with it because it made him feel a par
t of something. “I learned from them,” said Raven.
* * *
I MET KILLER IN FALL 2012 at the 5th Street lifeguard stand before the run. Raven had told me to be a little skeptical of his stories because Killer had a tendency to exaggerate. “He took a lot of punches,” explained Raven.
The first thing Killer told me was: “The difference between me and Bulldog is that when I tell something, it’s true. With Bulldog, it’s about one percent truth, ninety-nine percent bullshit.”
“What about Raven?” I asked, leaning against the lifeguard stand to stretch. “Does he tell the truth?”
“Raven?” repeated Killer in his New York accent. “Eh, he’s too dumb to lie. He ain’t got enough education.”
Seaside Sparrow, a blond environmental lawyer in her 40s, laughed, catching Killer’s attention. “Now she’s gotta lie,” he said, pointing to Seaside Sparrow. “If she didn’t lie, she wouldn’t be making a living. I was a paralegal. I know it.”
“Environmental lawyers are usually on the right side,” she said.
Killer shook his head. “Nah, nah. It’s a misfortune of your profession.”
Killer had come with his 28-year-old son, Danny, the third born of four children. Earlier that day, they visited Bulldog in a nursing home in Hollywood, reporting sadly that he was basically a vegetable.
Killer is five-ten, in great shape—especially for a man of 70, but also for a 30-year-old. “Raven says you’re a writer, huh?” Killer asked me. “Well you need to read my books then.” After his career as a professional boxer, Killer tried out several professions—from car salesman to real estate agent—but he has determined that writing is his calling. “If I tell you a story, and it’s not in South of South Beach, it doesn’t exist.” That night he would give me a signed copy of South of South Beach, which is a self-published, 739-page tome, written under his real name, Keith Laufenberg.
Running with Raven Page 4
