By 1976 when this picture was taken at The Reston Times, I had
already graduated college with a BA in English, been divorced, and served four
years in the Air Force. Much to the
dismay of my parents though, I still refused to grow up and get a “real job.” So
I took a job as the circulation manager for the local newspaper because it was
a five-minute bike ride from home. a bachelor pad where I lived with three
other guys in a four story townhouse. Party central. Aside from planning the
volume and distribution of our paper, I worked with kids. Mostly boys, ages 10
to 15. Dirty, sweaty, loud. Gangs of them, over 120. Paperboys. They would swarm in
like locust after school let out to crowd around my desk dumping piles of
crumpled bills and socks full of coins onto my desk. It was their job to
collect from their customers and turn it all in to me. I would count it, roll
the change, and head down to the bank across the plaza at Lake Anne center to
make a lengthy deposit.
Five pm was “quiten time”, a quick bike ride back to the
party palace.
One of our housemates was a banquet chef for Marriott Hotels
in downtown D.C., spending his days serving large rooms of politicians and
special interest groups. None of us knew Paul himself to eat anything other
than malted milk balls though. He carried around one of those paper milk cartons
of them, rolling them out into his left palm and making a loud popping sound as
he threw them into his open mouth. He wasn’t around much, working long
days. Before he left for work at 6am every morning, you could hear an
intermittent hissing sound coming from the attached garage. Paul got his chef
whites, whiter, by spray painting himself from the knees down. Quick drying
white enamel covered the kitchen splashes from the day before. The floor of our
garage looked like a lunar landscape, the outline of footprints all around the
door to the house. Paul would come back home very late most nights, often
carrying gourmet leftovers from one of his banquets. Of course in those days it
seems like none of us ever went to bed before 3 or 4 am so when the doorbell
rang furiously at 1am, it was no big deal. There stood Paul, a case of live
lobsters dripping saltwater and seaweed under his right arm, a case of fresh
Chinook Salmon under his left. He was hitting the doorbell with a paint
hardened shoe.
We decided that a dinner party was in order and rallied our
friends in the immediate area for a 3am feast. Bring your dogs. Paul prepared
the food, fueled on malted milk balls and the joints that were in constant
rotation. That was my job, rolling joints. We had too much of everything, 20 of
us doing our best to eat one more piece of warm lobster or cold salmon. One
more joint, another beer. Two dogs wore kerchiefs around their necks and sat up
at the table with the rest of us, doing their part to finish off the lobster
and salmon while The Eagles sang of the “warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air”.
I wanted it to last forever.
