B005S8O7YE EBOK (29 page)

Rick and I began the search for our dream place by driving northeast along the Boise River on Highway 21 toward Idaho City. The first property we looked at was about a half hour out of Boise in the highlands above Mores Creek, a tributary of the Boise River. The two brothers who owned the property could have been anywhere from forty to seventy-five. Each wore denim overalls that might have been blue at one time but had evolved to a nondescript slate color. They lived together in a one-room cabin roughly twice the size of a hot-dog stand. A table covered with bills, envelopes, and other papers stood beneath a wall covered with girlie calendars
from the 1940s. Unwashed dishes filled the sink, and there were black grease stains everywhere. The cabin reminded me of the back office of a filling station I’d walked through in rural Connecticut when I was a teenager.

To make conversation, I asked if either of them were married.

“Oh, no, ma’am,” one of the brothers drawled. “We find it’s cheaper to rent ’em.”

When Rick asked if we could view the property, the brother who had answered the “married” question led us out the back door to an old crew-cab pickup that would hold all four of us. Rick sat in the passenger seat. The other brother climbed in back with me. As we bumped along the two ruts that served as a road, Rick asked about water.

“Are there any hot or cold springs?”

The brother who had answered the “married” question replied, “Yep.” Evidently he was the more gregarious of the two.

We waited for him to continue. When he didn’t, Rick and I exchanged a look in the mirror as if to say, What do we have to do to get information out of these guys?

The gregarious brother stopped the pickup, pointed to a stand of red willows, and said, “Ya got a cold spring right there.”

“How can you tell?” I asked.

“Ma’am? D’ya see them willas?”

“Yes.”

“Wa-al,” he said, “where ya got willas, ya got water.”

“Sure,” I said, trying to sound as if I had already known that.

“Ya see,” he said. And he stopped as if that were his complete thought. Then, with the extra patience shown to a city slicker by a man raised in the country, he added, “That’s how it works.”

He shifted into first and started driving again. The taciturn brother decided it was time to end the discussion.

“No water, no willas.”

I had just received my first lesson in the lore of the land from a couple of locals. Other valuable lessons would come later, including that sewage flows downhill, payday’s on Friday, and the weather in Idaho changes every five minutes. In fact, right after “Idaho is what America was,” the phrase I would hear most often in my adopted state was, “If you don’t like the weather, wait a few minutes.”

The brothers’ land wasn’t suitable for our purposes, and neither were several other properties we viewed along Mores Creek. We wouldn’t find our dream place for nearly two years, but in the intervening months we had an unexpected encounter that led to an extraordinary evening in New York with a man who had changed the world.

W
hile living in Laurel Canyon I had traveled back and forth to New York frequently to visit friends, family, and other songwriters and musicians with whom I enjoyed working. After I met Rick I continued to travel to and from New York, but never without him. From the moment I saw Rick in his remarkable coat, he and I were virtually inseparable. More accurately, Rick was inseparable from me. That he insisted on going everywhere with me didn’t make me as uncomfortable in the beginning as it made my friends and family. Though they were glad I was happy, they thought Rick too possessive. That opinion was initially brought up by Rick, who had a keen sensitivity to anyone’s slightest possible dislike of him. He dismissed their judgment and said they were jealous of the love he and I shared. Caught in the middle (a place with which I was not unfamiliar), I tried to accommodate everyone. I allowed Rick to come everywhere with me, and I tried to assuage the fears of my friends and family by telling them it was my choice to have him with me. They didn’t believe me. Because they didn’t know what else to do, the people who loved me let me know that they were there if I needed them, and then
they gave me the space that Rick was building so industriously around the two of us. I could have set the concept to music had someone not already written it as a nursery rhyme: “Everywhere that Carole went, Rick Evers was sure to go.”

Early in our relationship Rick told me that he was a big fan of the Moody Blues.

“Anyone can be a fan of the Beatles,” he said, “but it takes a really tuned-in person to appreciate the Moody Blues.”

When he said he would die to meet John Lodge, Justin Hayward, or Graeme Edge, I assumed he meant it figuratively. Rick never met the Moody Blues, but he did meet a Beatle, and he didn’t have to die to do it. All he had to do was go to a movie with me on a winter night in New York in 1976 after a business meeting, at which he was of course present. We went to a cinema on the Upper East Side to see
Taxi Driver
, in which Robert De Niro delivered one of the best-known lines in twentieth-century movie history when he looked in the mirror (as Travis Bickle) and said to his reflection, “Are you talkin’ to
me
?”

Just about everyone who has seen the film remembers that moment. I remember it, too, but the rest of the movie was eclipsed by other events that night.

Soon after that scene I became aware of an insistent call of nature. I eased out of my seat, sidled past the people in my row, and found the ladies’ room. As I emerged from the stall, the face I saw reflected in a mirror was instantly recognizable as that of Yoko Ono. Yoko was at the sink washing her hands when she looked up, saw me in the mirror, and recognized me. I suppose one good thing about having a famous face is that you don’t have to introduce yourself.

Drying her hands, Yoko asked, “Do you live in New York?”

I pressed down on the soap dispenser and said, “No. I came for business meetings and to visit my family.”

While we completed our ablutions, Yoko confided that she and John were enjoying their night out at the movies very much. “This is the first time we’ve gone out together since the birth of our son.” From news reports that had provided a waiting world with the announcement of Sean Ono Lennon’s arrival on October 9, 1975, I knew that their son had been born several months earlier.

“Oh, you must be so happy. Congratulations!”

Yoko moved toward the exit ahead of me. Just before she pushed the door open, she turned and volunteered that they would be leaving the theater soon. “Would you like to visit us at our apartment?”

“Sure,” I said. “Er… I’m here with my boyfriend. Is that okay?”

“Of course. You must bring him, too.”

As we entered the darkened theater together Yoko pointed to where John was sitting and whispered that they would be leaving before the movie was over. When I saw them get up, my boyfriend and I were to do the same and meet them at the back of the theater.

Incredulous, I whispered, “You’re not going to stay for the end of the movie?”

“No. We never do.”

As I made my way back to my seat I pondered the concept of never seeing the end of a movie. Rick glanced up when I arrived, then immediately turned his attention back to the screen. I tugged his sleeve to get his attention and whispered that I was going to get up again before the end of the movie, and when I did, he should follow me. It must have sounded very mysterious to him, but he nodded and returned to the movie.

I could no longer concentrate on Travis Bickle. I couldn’t stop thinking about Yoko’s invitation, and I was intrigued by her exit plan. Not wanting to miss Yoko’s cue, I kept looking in their direction. When at last Yoko and John stood up, so did two men
behind them. I, too, stood up. Rick followed, keeping an eye on the screen all the way out. We trailed Yoko and John to the back of the theater and slipped out the door after them into the brightly lit, nearly empty lobby. One of the two men with them escorted us to the exit doors, where an old-fashioned woody station wagon was waiting.

To my surprise, neither the vehicle nor the Ono-Lennons seemed to attract anyone’s notice. The whole operation took less than a minute. One man helped Yoko into the back seat and instructed Rick and me to scoot in on either side of her. The second man quickly helped John into the back of the station wagon, where John immediately assumed a prone position. The man who had helped Yoko climbed into the front passenger seat while the second man closed the tailgate and raised his hand to hail a taxi.

As the woody sped away I asked the driver, “Do you do this all the time?”

“Yes,” he said. “We have to.”

Of course, I thought. Security would be a major concern for anyone charged with protecting a Beatle. And if you happened to be responsible for the Beatle who lived with Yoko Ono, the need for security would be even higher because, among millions of fans who mourned the Beatles’ breakup, many blamed Yoko.

Thinking about security, I remembered a frightening experience of my own. After my free concert in Central Park in 1973, a crowd of overenthusiastic fans had broken through the fence and surrounded a limo with Charlie and me inside. As I tried to get the terrified driver to inch forward slowly, the fans, who had worked themselves into a frenzy, began to rock the limo. These were ostensibly people who
liked
me. Fortunately, three of New York’s Finest showed up before anyone was hurt and persuaded the crowd to disperse.

Now, as we sped across Central Park toward John and Yoko’s home in the apartment building known as the Dakota, I realized that my scary fan experience was insignificant compared to what the Beatles had to deal with
all the time
. When it came to the Beatles, the fanaticism of some people knew no bounds. Hey, I knew what it meant to be a Beatles fan. I had been one when I first met them in 1965.

I’d been on my way to retrieve my car after a meeting with an A&R man when Al Aronowitz hailed me outside the Warwick Hotel. Seeing the crowd gathering behind stanchions off to one side of the entrance, I remembered having heard on the radio that the Beatles were in residence.

“Wanna meet the Beatles?” Al said, in the manner of a street guy offering to sell me a watch.

Unaware of the circumstances, I said, “Sure!”

Al said he was on his way up to see the Beatles. What he didn’t tell me was that he was trying to earn insider points by smuggling four young women up to their suite. It was a completely unsolicited enterprise by Aronowitz. After all, it wasn’t as if the Beatles needed his help in finding female companionship.

Whatever Al said (and, I’m guessing, gave) to the leader of the phalanx of security officers through whom all potential visitors needed to pass, it worked. The next thing I knew, I was in the service elevator with Aronowitz and four young women. When we arrived at the Beatles’ suite, whatever Al said (and, I’m guessing, gave) to the gatekeeper got us in the door.

Inside the Beatles’ suite, a huge party was going on with a lavish amount of food, drink, smoke, and a high probability of substances I wouldn’t have wanted to know about. I immediately separated myself from Al and the four women and set out to achieve my personal goal of meeting all four Beatles. I had arrived with an
advantage. Early in their career Paul and John reportedly had said that they hoped to become the Goffin and King of the United Kingdom. I had taken this to mean not that they hoped to marry each other and live in New Jersey but that they aspired to be successful songwriters. I was grateful for the compliment and hoped that my uninvited presence in their suite would do nothing to diminish their respect.

Making my way through the gaggle of groupies and hangers-on, I saw my first Beatle: Ringo Starr. I introduced myself and he responded with a look of recognition. This was good. I welcomed Ringo to America, and he thanked me in his distinctive Liverpudlian accent. Then someone waved him over and off he went.

I didn’t have to go very far to find George Harrison. He spoke kindly, quietly, and briefly. George was not the most extroverted Beatle, but my next Beatle, Paul McCartney, was outgoing and congenial. He welcomed me as if we were at a social gathering rather than a scene. He went on for several minutes about how much he and John had always enjoyed and respected Gerry’s and my songs, even going so far as to cite specific songs and artists. Then, in what seemed to be emerging as a pattern, someone actively engaged Paul’s attention and he turned to that person, though not before gripping both my hands and thanking me for coming.

My last Beatle sighting was John Lennon. Surrounded by several women, none of whom appeared to be his wife, he looked… how shall I put this?

High.

I barely had time to say, “Hi, John. I’m Carole King…” when he interrupted with a remark so disrespectful that I cannot remember what he said, but I do remember how I felt. I had proffered a face of friendship and he had responded with a figurative slap. Had I been mature enough to realize that pushing the edge of decorum was a
reflex for John at that stage of his life, I might not have taken it so personally. But I was very young, and I took it very personally.

There was no reason to stay after that. I left through the front door of the suite with no idea that I would have an opportunity to learn directly from John eleven years later why he had been so rude.

T
he woody’s sudden stop for a red light at Central Park West and 72nd Street returned me abruptly to 1976. When the light turned green the driver crossed Central Park West and pulled into the Dakota’s motor court, where the man who had taken a cab from the cinema was already waiting for us. (Where’s
that
taxi driver when you’re late for a meeting?) In a smooth series of motions, he opened the tailgate and helped John out while the fellow in the front seat opened the front passenger door and the rear door on my side, helped me out, and retrieved Yoko. By the time Rick stepped out the first man had already escorted the couple into the lobby. The second man told us to follow John and Yoko, but once Rick and I got inside there was no sign of them. We waited in the lobby while the second man told the driver of the woody where to park. Then he escorted us up to John and Yoko’s apartment. Make that John and Yoko’s
apartments
, plural. The Lennons had been systematically buying up apartments in the Dakota and as of that evening owned several floors. They didn’t own the entire building. Roberta Flack resided in the Dakota, and so did Lauren Bacall.