2.23.98

The plane landed at LAX with a thud. No sooner had I stepped out of the tunnel ("And now, at 6'4", weighing in at 235 lbs, the Star Running Back for the San Francisco 49-ers, A-man-da Erickson!" The crowd goes wild.) when I was whisked into the arms of my lovely T. If you've never been whisked you really should try it - it's heavenly.

With a dash we headed to baggage claim.

Can I just say, "Nightmare"? LAX is a cacophony of people and machines and children screaming and porters porting. It was crazy.

So, we get out of there and step into the blazing sun and heat of L.A. I think it was some sort of record that day, pushing 100 degrees. Which is nothing, I scoff. I've lived in San Antonio where it gets to be over 300 degrees in the shade; I've lived in Mississippi where the humidity gets to be over 175% and you'd think that would mean flood but no, it just means frizzy hair and limp clothing and road-rage like you've never seen before. But, 100 degrees is a 100 degrees so I sweated.

We headed into the parking garage and were greeted with the...

~ Warning: if you are of the faint of heart or the nervous of stomach then maybe you should head over to one of my more timid stories. I'm trying to be honest here and maybe it's just me but this really grossed me out and maybe it's only because it's so vivid in my mind but I don't want you to get so grossed out that you leave and never come back. So, you've been warned. ~

...overwhelming stench of feces. I've smelled some bad smells in my time, and much of it in parking garages, but this was intolerable. The smell permeated everything. It hung in the air. As we came around a corner towards T.'s car we were face to face with a very strung-out looking family. A little boy, no older than five, was missing his pants and was being led by the hand by who I can only assume was his father to a beat-up pick-up. In the passenger seat I could see someone leaning against the door with big, greasy hair making a pattern of swirls against the window.

Along with the smell I felt like I was privy to something really awful, something that ought to be private but was being played here in the open. I can only assume that in the heat of the garage and in the heat of family dysfunction that this poor child had been forced to take a dump in the corner.

We were parked two spaces down from this stomach-churning scene and the car was parked in a suspicious puddle. I managed to jump from the dry area into the passenger seat. Nausea can make you do amazing things.

It ended up being several days before I could get that smell out of my mind. It kept coming back in waves. While this incident could have happened anywhere, I suppose, it is now indelibly one of my first impressions of L.A. That can't be good.

When I was arranging with The Company to fly down for this interview it had not been brought up yet about where I was going to stay. So, finally, I asked.

"Well, aren't you going to stay with your boyfriend?"
"Noooooo. Not only are we not familiar enough with L.A. to know whether he is living close to your place of business or not, he is staying with friends and sleeping on the floor. There is no room for me at his place."
"Oh."

Hel-LO! What is going on here? I mean, first of all, it really wasn't feasible for me to stay with T. but second of all, they're flying me down for a job interview. How unprofessional is it to ask me to stay with my boyfriend?

We eventually show up at the hotel which is in, I guess, the business district of Los Angles. I was told by my contact at The Company that even though it was a nice area that I shouldn't go out after dark. It's a really strange part of town. There is almost no street parking because all of the buildings have their own underground parking garages. There are very few on-street businesses.

I needed to go to a Kinko's we saw in the area to make copies of my resume and some of my clips. It took us ten minutes to find a place we could put the car. Went in and made the copies and then we decided to take a walk around. There were two sort-of mall-like structures but almost everything was closed inside. I can see why I was warned about going out after dark. If I was out I'd be the only entertainment for the various bums and shufflers we saw roaming around.

The hotel staff was your basic bored, rude, I'd-don't-want-to-be-here kind of people. I was told that if I planned to make any phone calls that I would need to leave a credit card at the desk and local calls were $.60 each. I balked. I explained that I was there on business and was told that The Company had made no extra arrangements for me. How nice.

Needless to say, I didn't give up my credit card.

For dinner I went down to the desk clerk to make the proper arrangements for pizza delivery.

"Here," she said, "I'll find a phone number for you."
"That would be great but I would like you to make the call."
"Well, you have a phone in your room."
"Yes, I know, but you're not doing anything and I'm not paying sixty cents for a phone call to order pizza. I would like you to do it for me."
"But..."
"That's okay - I'll wait."

So, T. and I got our sad little pizza and watched Spanish television (Dando! y Dando!) until the late hours of the night.

- to be continued -