Take Another Little Piece of My Heart: A Groupie Grows Up (23 page)

I was reveling in my fabulous new friendships. I’d spent the years since Nicky’s birth as the do-it-all hausfrau for the mad menage. Even though we had various capable rock-and-roll roommates, someone had to shop, clean, schlep, and baby tend—and that was me. But with my newfound club-a-dub, bonhomie attitude, I felt like the tiger scratching out of the bag, like the social creature I used to be had returned from an arid, isolated mountaintop overlooking K Mart. It had been the right thing to put so much love energy into Michael and Nicky, I knew that for sure, but now Nicky was older, and I realized my own life had been neglected (by
me)
. Writing a little about who I had been, remembering that effervescent, ever-loving, hope-filled flower child made me realize that lack of self-trust and self-love had begun to set in like hardening cement. Before the concrete dried, I needed the balancing encouraging energy of my own friends and my own fun.

I remained close with Melanie and Donnie, who had stayed sticky, itchy friends. Though they never really reconciled their destroyed, bedraggled marriage vows, a truce had been silently declared since they had both fallen in love with other people. They got along with a shot of sideways bitter humor, but at least they got along, and I thought the effort was grand. Patti and I became inseparable even though it seemed we were from two different planets, and I suppose we were; she from the kick-ass streets of Manhattan, barely raised by a wild bohemian mother, and I from the coddled, clean sidewalks of the San Fernando Valley. Three wholesome meals a day, drivein movies, flannel PJs, getting tucked in every night. I found it fascinating how she spoke (yelled) her mind and took nobody’s bull
manure. If some fool dared to flip her the bird in traffic, she had no qualms about getting right out of her car and pounding on his windshield, demanding an instant retraction. She didn’t back down and never backed off; she stood up for herself defiantly, and I watched her like a newly hatched hawk.

One of our greatest forms of jovial kicks was Trivial Pursuit. The game was really just like a deck of fifties playing cards, the bridge or poker of the eighties; a perfect setup for the festive, high-old-time social intercourse that I hadn’t even realized how much I missed. After a few outrageous bashes Don, Patti, Melanie, Rocky, Michael, and I started calling ourselves “the Face Pack,” after the newly coined Hollywood upstarts “the Brat Pack.” We were so clever and cute, weren’t we? Corralling a mess of smarty-pants people at least once a week, the games took on a private clublike atmosphere, each unhinged session lasting many hours. Eddie and Ingrid Begley, Steve Jones (who cracked up everyone when he read the questions in his full-tilt Cockney accent), old friend Elliot Mintz (personal publicist for only the grandest of stars), newly sober (for the first time) Ozzy Osbourne with his new wife (and our old friend) Sharon, Gene Simmons and sometimes Paul Stanley from KISS, Sparkie GTO, Malcolm McDowell and his cutie-wife, Mary Steenburgen, Tatum O’Neal, Bud Cort, along with lots of interesting fly-by-nights, wouldbe could-bes, and various up-and-comers who would drop in and out of the games, but the nucleus was always the Face Pack. Everyone brought some sort of food or drink and the festivities would last well into the jam-packed, fun-filled, brain-teasing night. Sometimes the guests would find questions about themselves or, in Melanie’s case, her mother. “Which actress was presented a doll version of herself in a coffin, by Alfred Hitchcock?”

One by one, amazing stuff started happening for each of the fabulous Face Pack. Things were heating up madly for the Bauers. Rocky’s film
Scarface
, directed by Brian De Palma, was ready for release, and once in a while the seemingly oafish chubby Brian would arrive at the game with some sort of big pie, wearing the usual baggy khaki hunting jacket, take his place at the table and whip our butts with his vast razor-brain. The night
Scarface
opened the Face Pack sat with Rocky in the theater and watched his magnificent performance as white-powder Al’s goofy, sweet-faced best pal, and we all held onto each other and sobbed when he got blasted into smithereens. By then Melanie was filming
Body Double
, also with Brian, playing the platinum-blond hooker with the long, lean gams, which
would start her climb onto the covers of many, many magazines along with a big fat Oscar nomination.

Fame was closing in on all of us, I just knew it! I was about to find a buyer for my book, Chequered Past would soon be a million-selling household name, Rocky was already at work on another movie, Patti had regained her svelte shape and was knocking them dead at her acting auditions, and Donnie would grab the world with his charm any minute now. He had always had a ton of self-confidence, and I didn’t see any sign of it letting up. He certainly had mellowed since he became a dad and stopped inhaling and imbibing, but his faith in his talent never wavered. I adored them all—my stew of talented, quixotic, slightly damaged yet brilliantly
alive
friends.

Even our dog Nellie had gotten a new lease on life, becoming queen of the canines on Wonderland Avenue, romping all day and night through her own private Canyon paradise, so it was a cruel blow when our creepy, owl-eyed landlord sold the house out from under us with very short notice.

The next pad I found was on Gardner Street, right off Hollywood Boulevard, an old-fashioned beauty with a great big front porch and a sundeck in the back that we turned into Nick’s room. I hoped the cheery brightness might help him see the cheery, bright side of things. He still had a penchant for cars, so I found a pair of vivid red drapes full of Corvettes and got him a bed in the shape of a nondescript, flashy race car. I think it was supposed to be a Trans Am.

The move wasn’t so bad, because Stevie and Michael gathered the rest of Chequered Past and a big load of AA helpers, and our latest mess of bamboo furniture didn’t weigh very much. It was a glorious sunny summer day when I placed my typewriter on the funky yard-sale desk in my cute, new, little office/den and swore to complete my book in that very room. Ron Bernstein, an agent friend of Danny Goldberg’s, had loved the first chapter of my book and was shopping it around. Rejection slips started coming in, but since I was used to rebuffs from my acting days, I wasn’t all
that
mortified. One of those rejection letters from a giant publishing house said, “This is a well-written document but would
never
sell as an entire book, maybe an article for
Rolling Stone.”
A couple years later, when I got my first batch of hardbacks, I sent this oh-so-wrong fellow his very own
autographed copy, but I never got even a thank-you note. Some people.

So every day I hunkered down to work, summoning the right words to appear. After writing a couple pages, I would pore over my self-help, Science of Mind, spiritual, and religious tomes, attempting to get a handle on that seemingly elusive concept: Peace of Mind. It was terrible to grapple with the constant self-doubt and its stranglehold on the soul. Certain truths worked for me: the fact that we are in fear or in love, that fear is what people call the devil, and love is God. And as I got more creative—working on the book, opening that channel—I saw very clearly that imagination is the Holy Ghost; bright sparks appearing straight out of the vast and empty stratosphere onto the page, like heavenly magic. But, of course, if I took
too
much notice, the flash of splendor would disappear and turn into a crumpling pumpkin. My jittery chatterbox brain got in my way even as I kept repeating, “Be still and know that I am God.”

Gardner Street School had no idea what to do with Nick, so skipped him into the next grade way before he could handle it emotionally. I was in and out of ugly, beige public school offices, listening to underpaid, bored officials tell me my son needed help. He came in second in a citywide art contest, but it wasn’t first place, and in his mind it wasn’t enough. I started taking him to the Self-Realization Lake Shrine out in Pacific Palisades, praying a big dose of Paramahansa Yogananda would infuse him with some much-needed self-love. We sat feeding little chunks of bread to the swans, gazing at a beckoning statue of Jesus, discussing why we were alive. Shouldn’t he have been watching after-school cartoons, laughing his small ass off instead of contemplating the afterlife? I encouraged soul study because it seemed to give him solace when nothing else could. His perfectionism had reached the place where nothing he did could satisfy him, so he began to lose himself in all kinds of books, which, thankfully, gave him temporary escape from his ever-intruding inner battle.

Fending for Nick and filling the empty pages with my past weren’t filling the empty spaces in my life. I had divine friends, a brilliant son, and a husband who could never seem to relinquish his infernal devil-may-care ways. When he wasn’t on the road or rehearsing with his band, he was out with the boys or at an AA meeting. Our sex life continued to diminish, and I was pricked with frightful hints of his philandering. The sad thing was when we did take the time to spend some alonemoments, it was always a rekindling of mutual adoration. I knew he loved me and I certainly loved him, so what was going wrong?

Since Michael was gone so much, I spent more time with my sweet mom, shopping, hanging out in her garden, reminiscing. One afternoon while we planted some rosebushes along the side of her triplex, I couldn’t help but notice that the young guy who lived in the front apartment with his mom had grown into quite a stunning hunk of stuff. He had gone out of state to see his father for a couple of years and had come back a few inches taller, loaded with muscles and newfound sexy charm. Since he was so much younger than me—the very married woman—I struck up a flirty chat with him that day, which turned into a horny platonic friendship that made me feel hot and gorgeous again. We went out for a drink, and he confessed that when he was fourteen I had been his fantasy doll and whenever I walked by in my spike heels to visit Mom, he would dash into his room and do what growing boys do best. He said it went on for a long time and that he still thought I was the best-looking hot dish around. I almost wept with pent-up female ego-relief. We had a drink now and then at a darkened Valley bar, and just the way he looked at me helped my womanly pride make a mighty return. I was thirty-six at the time, an unwieldy age when you can let it all slide or look to Jane Fonda for inspiration. I started working out even harder, I discovered the Tova face mask, got rid of all frumpy clothes, and vowed to keep my heart young by staying young at heart.

This inside vow-job was making it harder to accept that I was one half of a perfect marriage. I needed more from Michael but didn’t know how to ask for it, so picked up the trusty old journal once again and cut loose. My husband had been on the phone behind closed doors, out too late every night, and my new feminine trust told me there was somebody else on his mind.

October 9, 1984
—
In the throes of ending a long life cycle, I feel not quite on the verge of a very different life, but it’s looming. I didn’t realize the extent of the submerging of
my self
into Michael; the wifeness. Without Michael being obviously demanding, I allowed
my self
to take second place all the time. Writing the book and my friendship with mom’s neighbor have brought me out again. I’ve done a lot of growing
with
Michael but have been feeling very much alienated lately. I’ve decided not to accept our relationship the way it is. When
I
want to discuss a certain incident (major or minor) he squelches it, stomps down on it, making me the instigator, the villain. Or he says I’m paranoid like he said today. Luckily I have stayed centered (mostly) these last few months. I don’t want to feel so alienated from what our life together used to be, and I have changed so much that I’m not sure I would be satisfied with the relationship
before
he got so
unhappy and distant. I feel alone a lot of the time. I’m pretty sure he’s “seeing” a girl in AA, Janet. I’m feeling so mixed about it all, and so tired
.

Michael did something he hadn’t done since we first met: He read my journal. I think it’s because he felt me withdraw and it scared him. For the first time he was forced to think about his actions and how they were making me feel. And for the first time I was admitting to myself that he might be romantically involved with another woman. Not quite a complete admission, however. Since I couldn’t truly accept it all the way, my heart felt injected with morphine, and all Michael’s soothing, placating attempts to woo me back to the way I was fell on a numb love-thumper. Janet’s name was never mentioned even though it hung in the air above our heads, but Michael stayed home more, and family life resumed in a semi-content way until Nicky found a syringe along with one of his baby spoons, bent and blackened. “Look, Mommy. What happened to my spaceman spoon? What is this funny needle for?”

Stevie was at it again. Loving him like a brother couldn’t keep him away from his addiction—heroin. Since he had disappeared a few nights before, even missing a gig in Santa Barbara, Michael and I suspected the worst, and we had been so sadly right. It was doubly hard for Michael because he and Stevie stayed straight together, and Michael had invested so much time and energy attempting to keep his guitar player in a sane, safe state of mind. Steve had slipped a few times before, but only briefly and never at home. We waited days for him and finally had to clear out his room and drag his belongings onto the back porch in black plastic bags. The bags stayed there for two months, getting damp and moldy while Steve roamed the miserable, dark world of strung-out misery. They were still there when we left Gardner Street because we couldn’t afford the eleven-hundred-dollar rent without him. Awful stories surfaced about his bent and punishing purgatory on the streets, which made us angry and full of sorrow at the same time. I thought of Stevie holding Nellie in his lap, opening his first Christmas presents, so happy about a toothbrush and a pair of socks. When we packed our things one more time, Michael discovered that Stevie had taken two of his leather jackets, and it killed him. It was a brand-new year, 1985. There was no more Chequered Past, and we had no place to live.