by Sam Harris
The newspaper carried a large photo of Aretha getting the key to the city from the mayor with an article that mentioned “the show was opened by Star Search champion Sam Harris.” There was no account of what had happened and I could hardly believe it myself. But 3,500 Clevelanders had been there and I found solace in their anonymous witness.
Back in Los Angeles, I informed my management and record company that I would never again travel anywhere without someone at my side.
I was never paid for the concert, much less reimbursed for my hotel and taxi costs. I’d also thrown in a crisp fifty for the impromptu pothead bellboy shuttle. But the money was nothing compared to the loss of my hero, my idol, my innocence.
I didn’t want that to be the ending to my Aretha story.
One night, a couple of weeks later, I uncorked a bottle of wine and dimmed the lights and pulled out all of my old vinyl Aretha records and stacked them in front of me. I sat on the floor next to the turntable and played them, one by one, every song she ever recorded. And occasionally, I sang along.
Me and Aretha singing together.
7. Liver
I have a new fancy washer and dryer. They are front-loading, bacteria-killing, über-environmentally efficient, space-age works of uncommon art.
They have hundreds of options for every possible fabric in the world. You could wash and dry the Shroud of Turin in these things and it would be guaranteed safe. There are knobs and buttons and digital amber lights and delightful little bell tones that ping with each selection, like the sound of an idea, assuring that you have made a good and apparently very happy choice. They even have a “16-Hour Fresh Hold Option with Dynamic Venting Technology.” I don’t know what that is, but it is a good and happy choice.
When dirty clothes are placed in the washer, the door seals shut like a vault—no “Oops, I found another pair of underwear to toss in.” All decisions are final. There is serious work to be done and it begins with a sequence of scientific evaluations. The washer drum tumbles the clothes for a moment. Then back the other way. Then it weighs the contents to determine the exact, proper length of each upcoming cycle for this exact, particular collection of garments. Then it stops again and thinks. You can feel it thinking because it’s doing nothing, so it must be thinking. I imagine it analyzing the fabrics: cotton, wool, silk, Lycra, Lurex, nylon, rayon, velvet, mockado, crinoline, angora, chiffon, bombazine, spandex, chambray, crepe, duvetyn, rumchunder, tweed, twill, vicuña, grass, hemp, jute. Hundreds of options. I have no rumchunder and wouldn’t be caught dead in bombazine but I appreciate the technology.
After a few empirical, apprehensive moments, the washer has specified the most minuscule amount of water necessary to wash the clothes and save the planet at the same time. It spritzes a fine mist so as not to surprise or shock the clothes. Then it tumbles again. Then back the other way. Then it thinks again. Then it spritzes with a little more pressure. Then a sudden brisk spit. After half an hour of thinking and spritzing and spitting, the silent drum begins to turn with more frequency, slowly at first, so as not to make the clothes dizzy, and then it commits to actual water, or at least the sound of water, because you don’t actually ever see water and it could be another audio accessory like the idea pinging. But you can be sure that whatever water added has been heated or cooled to the exact, perfect temperature for this particular collection of these particular fabrics. It is so environmentally conscious that it can wash a large load of jeans with what appears to be little more than a tablespoon of water. Perfect and perfectly utilized water. As the washer turns, glowing lights fade up from within so that the proud owner can watch the entire hour-long exhibition from start to finish.
I have. With popcorn.
At the end of the final spin cycle, it plays a happy, larkish eight-bar song. It is a merry tune, which brings to mind images of Pan cavorting down a path in mountain wilds and glens, framed by moss-mounded chubby rocks and sprigs of violets and daisies as he toots his fluted pipes. He is followed by cheery cottontail bunnies and big-eyed frogs who smile and nod in rhythm. The internal lights dim. Act One is over.
The dryer is equally theatrical and scientific. Lots of important decisions are made. And it is so quiet that if you didn’t actually see the clothes occasionally plopping around between thoughts, you wouldn’t know it was on. Until the end, that is, when it offers its own ducky ditty in the same key as the washer. Once, in a miraculous moment of two-load timing, the washing cycle ended just before the drying cycle was completed. It was practically a concert and I nearly applauded.
If this were not enough, the design of the machines is stunningly architectural. So much so that I considered putting the washer and dryer in the dining room just to show them off and also use them as a buffet. I imagined warm napkins plucked from tableside. It seemed shameful to hide these beauties away in a bedroom closet, but I knew I would give tours and demonstrations, inviting friends to come for dinner and bring their dirty laundry.
There is one downside to the new washer and dryer.
They suck.
Our clothes are not clean.
And no matter how small the dryer load, everything comes out wrinkled.
And somehow wet.
A bit of research revealed that the drying-sensor option was made in Korea and the Korean idea of “dry” is somewhat damper than that of Americans. Its detectors are set for a different, clammier culture. Who knew? I always thought dry meant “without moisture.” Apparently dry can be damp—at least in Korea. But I have not noticed any dampness or the smell of mildew on any Koreans I know or have happened to encounter.
I’ve been duped. I don’t care how fancy my washer and dryer are or how many stars they got on Bestbuy.com. The fact is: it is not possible to properly wash a load of laundry with a tablespoon of water. Any idiot knows this.
Well, I do now.
And furthermore, periodical tossing does not make for dry or smooth clothing. Not even with the 16-Hour Fresh Hold Option with Dynamic Venting Technology, which is still a mystery to me, and probably comprehensible only by reading the twelve-hundred-page operator’s manual. The guide is offered in English, French, Spanish, and German, but not Korean, presumably because all the presets are already perfect for their version of dry.
Our ten-year-old top-loading Whirlpool combo contraptions had worked perfectly fine. The wash cycle was appropriately known as “agitating.” It didn’t pussyfoot around. It was agitated. It shook and banged, and the final spin cycle ended not with a song, but a ratchety, mechanical clanking that grinded to a halt with a final, constipated grunt. “I’M DONE!” it bellowed in no uncertain terms. “AND YOUR CLOTHES ARE FUCKING CLEAN!”
Nothing was wrong with the Whirlpools. They were old and noisy and cantankerous and produced beautiful results. Kind of like me and Danny. But I needed a change, so I decided to keep Danny and get a new washer and dryer instead. It has taken me too long to get through his operator’s manual to ever consider a different model.
The new dynamos are fool’s gold. But alas, they remain. I can’t get rid of them just yet. They were hauled through a treacherous and life-threatening walkway and up a spiny, crumbling-rock back staircase into the bottom floor of our hillside house by a trio of shirtless, sweaty men who were tipped well but may never walk again. For the time being, the sting of my disappointment is quelled by my enjoyment of the happy final spin cycle song. And aesthetically, which is almost everything to me, the machines are emphatically beautiful and modern and perfect in every way but actual purpose. I have photographed them.
It’s frustrating and confusing. The elements seem right: bells and whistles, knobs and buttons and amber lights. Ecstatic reviews from Amazon.com housewives with soiled construction worker husbands and five filthy children. The package is perfectly put together and impressively marketed. But the machines are charlatans. Imposters. The Frank Abagnale of appliances. And yet I hang on, convincing myself that this load came out a little cleaner, brighter, drier. That everythi
ng will be better.
And then I recognize that there is a familiar pattern here.
I have often found myself blinded by what could be—should be—rather than seeing what is. I hear the happy song at the end of the spin cycle and block out the encroaching death march, whether from an appliance, a relationship, an agent, a manager, a project, a business opportunity, a pair of skinny jeans. And my indefatigable tenacity, which has proved winning in so many cases, argues for stick-to-itiveness for things I really care about—despite truth. If success is defined as one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration, I rank among the most successful, albeit sweatiest, people I know.
I have always believed that the light at the end of the tunnel is not an illusion; the illusion is the tunnel itself. But then there’s the old saying that the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train. Both are possible, I suppose. For this reason, I have been forced to come up with a checkpoint for my life. A simple barometer of sorts. Something I call “The Liver Law.”
The Liver Law is basic: Liver is liver. You can throw on a little bacon. Add some onions. But it’s still liver.
When Danny senses that I am sugarcoating something so far off its original trajectory—affixing myself to the tiniest, most remote glimmer of positivity when everything around the situation spells “run”—he blithely mutters “liver” and walks out of the room. Sometimes his insight slaps me into actuality, but not always. I have been known to stick with certain liver for years after the project or the person has proved rancid. I add a little more bacon. A few more onions. And the acrid smell of sizzling, iron-packed organ meats is perfumed and averted. Temporarily.
I have a long history of liver:
The alcoholic, abusive boyfriend who was not really my boyfriend, who said there should be a “wide load” sign on my ass, while he sat, propped up in bed, devouring mounds of steak tartare between prank calls to televangelists. But he had introduced me to obscure Patti LaBelle songs, which was tantamount to a mountain of applewood-smoked and dry-cured sizzling pork.
The abysmally disastrous mini-tour that I’d suspected would be an abysmally disastrous minitour, but for which I had diced enough onions to sufficiently tear my eyes to a blinding blur. It began in the town of Parole, Maryland, where the sign at the border read: WELCOME TO PAROLE—BETTER THAN YOU REMEMBER IT! It might as well have read: WELCOME TO PAROLE—LIVER!
Then there was the other boyfriend who was studying for the bar, mostly at the bar, in keeping with my malignant attraction to functioning, bipolar alcoholics. He was so sweet when not drinking—like a Vidalia. And I remained besotted, despite evidence suggesting he was a serial cheater. Little things: secret phone calls, sudden changes of plans, other people’s underwear at his apartment. When I casually offered my suspicions, the tables were always turned, ending with an apology from me accompanied by a gift of some sort.
One late night, I was delivering a large bouquet of flowers to his doorstep with a note saying I was sorry that I’d upset him to the point that he had to slam on his brakes, nearly smashing my head through the windshield, and throw me out of his car blocks from my home. As I crept away from his front porch, I saw him drive up, so naturally, I hid in the bushes. Through thorny branches, I watched him emerge with a young blond club-type and stagger, drunk and laughing, to his apartment. He noticed the flowers and foggily read the attached card, then stepped over the arrangement to open the door for his companion. I crawled behind the bushes to my car in tears.
The next day I confronted him and, without the slightest hesitation, he yelled, “That was my cousin! He was visiting from Kansas!”
“My cousins are from Kansas, not yours,” I reminded him.
“Now you’re an expert on my family geography? You have some real trust issues and I don’t know if this relationship is going to work.”
He was convincing. I knew he’d make a great lawyer. I sent more flowers.
My experiences of career-liver qualify me as a card-carrying member of the North American Meat Processors Association.
Take the legendary record company mogul who told me I was one of the best singers in the world and that he wanted to take me under his tutelage and give me the record career he knew I could have.
Within the industry, he was known as somewhat of a genius. Within the human race he was known as somewhat disgusting. His pudgy frame was ever stuffed into a disheveled five-thousand-dollar suit with his bloated, scarlet face popping above a sweated-out, unbuttoned shirt, offering eye bags so large they wouldn’t qualify as carry-on. His balding head rose like a spotted dune from wiry white tufts forever in need of a trim. He reeked of careless money and expensive red wine. He told me I was fat. I starved myself and lost fifteen pounds in a month and was deemed “able to be seen in public.” There were many late-night dinners and limos and platinum carrots dangling in my face but no actual contract or music or any work whatsoever.
Just when it was clear that I should get out of the kitchen, he took me to San Francisco, where Madonna was playing her Blond Ambition Tour, with the intention that she and I would meet and write together. He said we each had qualities the other lacked and we would elevate each other. Real promise. No need for bacon or onions.
We limo’d directly from the airport to the venue and were escorted to Madonna’s dressing room only minutes before the show. We found her sprawled across a leather couch in her opening costume—a black tailored men’s suit with slits cut to expose giant golden cone-shaped pointy breasts that could blind an unsuspecting midget at ten paces. She was glorious. There was only the sofa, no chairs, and she sat up to receive us but outstretched her arms on the cushions to occupy the entire couch, so we had to remain standing.
She was friendly but glib. Low energy, possibly reserved for her minions. She looked me over like I was a concubine and spoke to the record giant in a condescending tone, reducing him to a cocktail of anxiety and indignity that he seemed to enjoy, like a masochist begging for one more flick of the cattail. When introduced to me, she managed a monotonic compliment, but it meant acknowledging she might have watched Star Search and that was trickily beneath her.
Her show was amazing. Smart. A collection of historical iconic images from the Metropolis set to the Monroe, Dietrich, and Fosse influences that no one in her frenzied audience had ever seen—all reborn with decadence and a modern dirty defiance. It didn’t matter that she couldn’t sing. I had been smug about her vocal abilities but this production convinced me that she was a true artist. A hardworking, hard-thinking trouper. She loved show business.
I couldn’t wait to collaborate with her.
After the concert, the mogul and I went backstage for a quick congratulations and then were off to the hotel he’d arranged for the night. At check-in, I learned only one room had been booked for us both. He claimed it was a mistake, but unfortunately, there were no more available rooms in the entire hotel. The smell of liver burned my eyes and I couldn’t help but wonder if the fumfering receptionist had been bribed to confirm the news. All cards had been exquisitely played. In return I played dumb, claimed exhaustion, and slept fully clothed under a high pile of covers on the precipice of the king bed, facing away from him.
I was swimming in a vat of slimy, bruise-colored liver.
But at this point I’d been presented and exhibited and was set up to work with the biggest music star of my generation. A quick trip to the fridge for a slab of fatback and all would be well.
For the next entire year, the game continued. Lots of talk, no music, no contract, no Madonna collaboration. I rummaged the pantry for an onion—yellow, green, red, pearl. Onion powder. A soy bacon bit. Finally, one night at a schmancy Italian restaurant in Brentwood, I gave an impassioned and well-rehearsed speech.
“I want to believe in all of your plans for me, but I need something concrete. I need to make the record.”
I punctuated the appeal with a sharp and convincing exhale of my Salem and stubbed it out as an exclam
ation point.
He leaned forward, as red as the wine and with equal alcohol content, and slurrily said, “Sam, if you’d just followed my lead back in San Francisco, you’d already have a CD out with two top ten hits and a Grammy nomination. I have a way of doing things.”
Having driven full speed ahead, hypnotized by the white dashed lines down the middle of the desert road with the oasis ever just around the bend, I had burned out the clutch and run out of gas. A slow, blunt rage rose through me, scraping my throat like a carpenter’s plane, and I took a liberal gulp of wine to swallow it down. Then I stood, coolly pushing my chair under the table to signal I would not return. I found a sidewalk pay phone and called a friend to pick me up.
I had been proud that I’d never had to do the Hollywood Boy-Toy Shuffle. My talent had always been enough. As I waited on the curb in the crushing, fleeting strobe of headlights, I finally broke, not knowing which was worse—the mogul saying what he said, or my knowing it long before he said it.
If it looks like liver and it smells like liver . . . blah blah blah . . .
Sometimes my bacon and onions have come in a form unrelated to the actual liver at hand but are meant to distract, nonetheless. This tactic often reveals itself through my hair, with the thought that a dramatic change in style will alter the rest of my life. However, photographs through the years expose me as severely disturbed and probably schizophrenic with a multiple personality disorder. My hair has been spiked, mulleted, banged, crew cut, Mohawked, shaved, shoulder length, curly, poofed, ponytailed, page-boyed, pompadoured, weaved, and even cornrowed—the last requiring sleeping in a do-rag and not washing my hair for weeks at a time.
