Confessions of a Transylvanian (2 page)

Summer, 1979. Uncle Mike was home from college and we were in Colorado Springs for three months. At 14 and 12, my brother and I were starting to look at the world in an entirely new way. The hormones were practically bursting out of our eyeballs and, personally speaking, I could get a boner if a properly timed breeze shot through the window. To this pubescent mix, my uncle—for good or ill—deemed it appropriate for David and me to learn about Frank-N-Furter and his friends.

The Rocky experience was a phenomenon that, by the late
'
70s, was already in full swing. Someone (Mike could not say who) had discovered that if you ran this strange rock and roll movie late at night in a movie theater and yelled properly timed smartass comments at the screen as the story unfolded, it would be an enjoyable experience for the audience.

Merge that idea with the fact that some people (their origins were similarly vague) were actually willing to dress up as the characters in the movie and act out the plot in real time as the movie rolled on the screen above their heads.

Now, to that simmering brew of oddness, add the further participation of regular audience members who, at prearranged moments in the show, would throw items into the air (toast, cards, toilet paper, etc.) as the movie continues down the merry path of sexual ridiculousness. Mix these three ingredients together and, ladies and gentlemen, yo
u’
ve got yourself a cult film.

Mike explained all of this to David and me, who sat open-mouthed at this news. People brought
props
to the showings? And threw them in the air on cue? They yelled at the screen and nobody
cared
? Girls dressed up in little trashy outfits with fishnet stockings? And the
boys
did, too?

Amazing.

Then Mike said, “
I’
ve got the album. You want to hear it?”

We were, as you may imagine, mildly interested. He gave it a spin.

Now, for the record, listening to the Rocky soundtrack out of context wo
n’
t help you with the story one little bit. I do
n’
t even think Mike bothered explaining the plot to us beyond, “These kids named Brad and Janet wander into a castle and things get weird.”

We did
n’
t care. The music was cool even without a corresponding storyline.

“Dammit Janet.” “Over at the Frankenstein Place.” “The Time Warp.” It did
n’
t get much better than that. And a sweet
what
? Did he say “transvestite”? Really? Plus a girl who begged you to touch-a, touch-a, touch her? Seriously?

It was unlike anything w
e’
d ever heard before. In dropping that needle and exposing us to this truly bizarre series of songs, Mike had inadvertently kicked wide the door leading out of childhood and into the vast, steamy, whacked-out world of adolescence.

Listening to that soundtrack, we tasted blood and we wanted more.

Sadly, Mike had nothing more to give. He let us play the grooves off the album (you could do that in those days) but, tragically, there was no local Rocky show in Colorado Springs and, even if there were, my grandmother never would have let us go near one.

So, beyond the songs on the album, our Rocky initiation would have to wait.

But not, as the song says, for very much longer.

Flash forward three years. Well, do
n’
t
flash
forward. Le
t’
s fill in a few blanks before we take off on our all-Rocky adventure.

David and I are back in Florida and w
e’
re knee-deep in, respectively, our sophomore and junior years of high school.

And w
e’
re miserable. For different reasons and to different degrees, yes. But the truth was that life in Florida, to put it succinctly, sucked
balls
.

I do
n’
t know if yo
u’
ve spent any significant time in Florida. And if you have
n’
t, what
I’
m about to describe might sound a little harsh. I assure you, from the bottom of my heart: It is
n’
t harsh enough.

First and foremost, what you need to know about the state of Florida (and South Florida in particular) is that it is a swamp.

Exaggeration, right? “Swamp.”
C’
mon now. How can it be a
swamp
? The
y’
ve got highways and houses and luxury hotels and all that stuff. Ca
n’
t build that on swamp, can you?

Well, if you truck in enough cement, buddy-boy, you bet your ass you can. Hell, with enough asphalt, concrete, rebar, plumbing fixtures and electricity, you can build just about anything anywhere.

And if i
t’
s located near a beach? You can charge top dollar for it. And
get
it, too.

But you do
n’
t want to
waste
that beachfront property. No, no. So when yo
u’
re looking to build something, make sure i
t’
s a multi-story, thousand-unit condo complex. Or a clubhouse at a golf course. Or a bank. Or a strip club.

Not a museum. Jesus, whatever you do, do
n’
t build a
museum
. I
t’
s not like anyone will go to it anyway.

A theater? Puh-leeze. Tell you what: Put an auditorium out by the airport or something so that “Cats” or “Phantom” or whatever can stop off and do a few weeks of its tour there. People will like that. But do
n’
t build any actual
playhouses
or anything ridiculous like that. You do
n’
t want to throw your money away.

A library? Good God, fine.
I'
ll tell you what: Build one library for every ten churches. How about that? Work for you? No?

Look, how about a pier? You can fish off that. Or just stand on it and get drunk. Sound good? And her
e’
s a marina for your enormous boat! And
I’
ll throw in about a billion liquor stores, bars and nightclubs. Happy yet?

Boy, ther
e’
s no pleasing some people.

Okay, final offer: the creation of not one, not two, but 5,000 old folk
s’
homes. And not little ones, either! Whole
communities
, filled with millions and millions of little, tiny old people who have moved here from all over the country to live out their final days in alternating states of futility and rage.

I’
m sorry, you had a question? You want to know why these old people would choose to live in this festering cesspool during the final few years of their lives?

Because they could
n’
t afford to retire to San Diego, why do you think?

To make things interesting, each of these old codgers will be supplied with keys to their own bright, shiny, two-ton killing machines called
automobiles
. Thus armed, these barely coherent octogenarians will head out on the road and zip around aimlessly all afternoon looking for early-bird specials at their favorite eateries. Because, really, what beats wolfing down a half-price three-course Chinese dinner at 3:30 in the afternoon? Nothing!

But wait! You can hardly be expected to live in this 150-degrees-in-the-shade paradise with just a bunch of old people, right? So before you call our toll-free number, w
e’
ll throw in a special bonus!

Snowbirds
!

Yes, these lovely Northern wilting flowers will come pouring down into South Florida every year by the busload. The
y’
ll snatch up those newly constructed concrete houses, the little two- and three-bedroom monstrosities sequestered away in little private communities with clever little names like “The Glades of Emerald Cove” or “The Palms of Grann
y’
s Crotch” and the
y’
ll put down roots, change their party affiliation to Republican, learn how to make Mai Tais and slowly, but inevitably, turn into slovenly piles of goo.

Think of it—what type of person feels compelled to move into a humid, fetid sinkhole like this? Simple: They are the folks who can no longer stomach shoveling snow four months a year up in Brooklyn or Chicago or Denver. People whose balls retract up into their bodies if the temperature dips below 50. The kind of people who will leave behind their friends and family—the loved ones who have surrounded them all their lives—just to live in a state where the mean temperature is 85 degrees and the humidity hovers at about 90 percent year-round.

They are the weak. The thin-blooded. The lowest rung on the evolutionary scale.

Want to know why survival of the fittest is a thing of the past? Because people do
n’
t simply keel over into a snowbank and die at age 50 anymore the way they should. They move to
Florida
.

Exercise ceases. Air conditioning is the new religion. Their gathering places become these enormous indoor shopping malls where no one looks at you twice when you show up in a pink jogging suit that shows off your man-boobs. Why would they? Hell, everyon
e’
s wearing
‘
em!

They undergo complete transformations. They cultivate tans, learn how to smoke weed, snort coke, bang one anothe
r’
s spouses, tack on fifty pounds of ass fat and puff a few packs of smokes a day. Then, for kicks, they dial up the Weather Channel in mid-February, prop up their flip-flop clad feet and, when they see a blizzard clobbering Buffalo, they laugh their asses off at how much better the
y’
ve got it.

And when they finally do shuffle off this mortal coil, their kids fly down to Florida, throw each and every item they ever owned into a dumpster, sell the condo (at a loss) to the next fresh-from-Minnesota retiree and...the circle of life continues.

This is where I grew up.

This is what I fled, the minute I had the chance.

This, my friends, is where our story begins.

It was
n’
t always thus. Nope, David and I began life up in Chicago, of all places. One of the coldest places on Earth most of the year. But since my folks decided to split up when my brother and I were young tadpoles, it was Mom who called the shots.

Here was the shot she called: When I was 8 and my brother was 6, she obeyed her thin-blooded genetic makeup and shipped us all down to the Sunshine State.

Zoom
. Freeze-dried culture shock, delivered fresh to your door.

We woke up one day and we were in South Florida. Land of the dead, dying and constitutionally spineless.

And there we stayed. And there we festered.

Oh, sure—we got out of our humid prison for the occasional reprieve.

Summers in Colorado with Uncle Mike. (Nature! Fresh air! Actual snow!)

Christmases in New York City with Dad and his new wife. (Broadway! Times Square!
Zabars
!)

Wonderful, memorable escapes.

But as suddenly as it began...it was over. The vacation would end and we would be banished back to the Swamp. To that citrus misery that was life in our little town of Deerfield Beach.

Cute name, is
n’
t it? “Deerfield Beach.” Do you know it? I
t’
s ideally situated, right between the world-famous retirement community of Boca Raton and the beloved tropical oasis known as Pompano Beach. Plus, i
t’
s only a few short miles north of Ft. Lauderdale itself and just an hou
r’
s drive away from beautiful, world-famous Miami Beach!

In other words:

It was a complete and utter shithole.

Deerfield Beach had a beach, all right. And it was
n’
t a bad one, if yo
u’
re into that kind of thing.

I was
n’
t. Dirty, messy, appallingly hot places, beaches. You can have
‘
em. Besides, we did
n’
t live
on
or even
near
the beach. We lived inland, a good five miles or so. So for me, going to the beach was a tremendous effort to get somewhere I did
n’
t particularly want to be anyway. A few natives go all the time, but most do
n’
t. Too touristy anyway.