Part Three, Chapter Five continued

Well it was getting to be early autumn and Melody was still talking about marriage, in fact her best friend Porchia was helping her to plan it. The guest list they were putting together was something out of a Hollywood scene, some of the people were celebrities from the movie studios, others from the social scene, but wait a minute who was paying for all this I wondered. I would soon find out much to my dismay.

Well October came it was the day before the wedding, my brother George and I went out to a bachelor party that would end up taking in six Lounges and Bars, from Santa Monica to Hollywood. Everyone got way to drunk, my boss Lonny Martin was really smashed, my brother walked into the restroom to find Lonny hugging a toilet barfing his insides out. I was really smashed along with George, all the guys wanted to do one more round before I fled the scene which we did. I evidently got behind the steering wheel with George in the passenger seat and I drove from Santa Monica up Santa Monica Blvd. to where ever I decided to turn left all the way back to Argyle Street how I did this is still a mystery today. Melody was spending the night before the wedding at Porchia’s place, so she wasn’t home to put me to bed. I woke up the next morning still dressed and in bed, I had no idea how I got there from the bars the night before, George was waking up from where he feel asleep on the coach in the living room. He had this puzzled look on his face, he asked, “How did we get home last night”? I told him that I had no idea, all I could remember was getting into the car at the bar, everything from that moment on was a mystery. George said, “Oh shit where is the car”? We went down stairs and out to the garage area; where I had to park the Nova was on the end parking spot where you had a solid stucco wall on one side and your neighbor’s car on the other. Now on a normal day and sober it was a challenge to get your car into this spot which was a very tight fit, George and I came around the corner expecting to see a car with damage on either side. Oh my, there sat the Nova perfectly parked no damage anywhere on the car, couldn’t believe what I was seeing, all I know for sure is that my guardian angel was with me the night before. beach wedding dresses cheap

Well now that the car was okay, George and I needed to get dressed in our tuxedos and head for the church, but first we had to watch the rest of the Purdue and Ohio State game which was one of the Buckeyes most memorable games of the past. The Buckeyes upset the Boiler Makers 10 to 7 and then would head for Ann Arbor and the end of the season showdown with Michigan. George wrote the score of the game on the souls of my shoes so when I kneeled down for the wedding ceremonies people setting in the cheap seats could see the score on the bottom of my shoes, why we did this I don’t know most of the people at the wedding could give a shit whether Ohio State won or not.

Melody looked absolutely beautiful, Porchia her maid of honor was lavishing also, two very beautiful women, the question was what the hell was I doing here? The wedding ceremony went with out a hitch, Melody and I now are Husband and Wife, Mr. and Mrs. “What the hell did I just do”, or I should say, “What the hell did Melody just do”. At any rate we were married for better or worse, the reception was full of people from Melody’s office and people from my office, with exception of Lorie, and Kathy, gee wonder why they didn’t show up? The Linkletter’s were there, also Bob Linkletter stopped by to congratulate both Melody and I, and invite us to dinner some night in the future. Melody was really happy smiling at everyone, I thought she may be a little sad that her parents hadn’t shown up, guess they were unable to get the time off work to come for just a couple days.

Well now that we were a married couple we decided to up grade our abode, we rented an apartment on 3rd Street in Santa Monica, it was a brand new building two story surrounding a swimming pool in the center. Melody and I had a second floor two bedroom unit, really nice interior and most important only three blocks from the ocean, and mile from the Dungeon, (Muscle Beach Gym), on 4th and Broadway. My first visitors were my Uncle Jack and Art Zeller who stopped by to invite me along for a photo shoot, Art was photographing a few body builders on the beach there in Santa Monica. Reggie Parks from South Africa and few other local boys were going to be there, which included Dave Draper, at that time he was doing a television show entitled “Dave the Gladiator” that he hosted. We ended up after the photo session at Zucky’s Restaurant for lunch and after lunch we really splurged by crossing the street to the “House of Pies” for dessert.

Christmas was around the corner and this year Melody and I were going to spend it together at home in Santa Monica, no traveling planned this year. We both decided to have a Christmas party, the guest list went like this Art Zeller his wife, Uncle Jack, Aunt Carol, the Linkletters, another photographer Martin S Martin his wife Bebe, who’s father was one of the developers who invented the cubic zirconium diamonds in Switzerland, also another side note about BeBe she had been married five previous times prior to Martin but she wore all five diamond wedding rings on her hand, she had more money than Liz Taylor and more diamonds, at that time.

Martin S Martin had a Salvador Dali mustache which he took great pride in, he would often sit studying a model while pinching and twisting the end of his mustache. Martin was Hungarian and a former pilot during the Second World War; he was captured by the Germans, because as he puts it the Hungarian Air Force gave him enough gas for the plane to drop its bombs but not enough to make it back. Martin photographed the movie stars of Hollywood, he worked for several magazines doing model layout photos for fashion and movie magazine ads, and of course a few of the major movie studios of Southern California doing their promo shoots.

The party was a total success people from Melody’s and my offices showed up, in all we had over a hundred people go through the apartment at different times that night. Bob Hummel from my office had to spend the night because he was to drunk to drive back to Hollywood. I was also thinking of taking Ron Wilson’s keys away but his wife to be drove home instead.

New Years Eve Melody and I went to a Hollywood party, put on by Martin and Bebe; they were having a huge party at their home which would be a who’s who in the film business. Martin’s photo studio was across the street from the famed Dino’s at 77 Sunset Strip, he would have people come in his studio and ask if he was related to Dean Martin which of course he wasn’t.

Melody and I arrived at the party greeted by BeBe and her flamboyant personality, she took us around introducing us to Army Archerd who was a gossip columnist for Variety Newspaper a audition listing and news rag for the movie industry. Murray Drucker editor for the California Girl Fashion Magazine a fashion magazine, Murray and I would become very good friends in the future. Dennis Hopper was there with his girlfriend Michelle Phillips from the Mama and Papas singing group, (they were married later that year). Truman Capote along with his friend were pretty fucked up by the time we got there, I never really liked the guy although BeBe loved him to death. Other people there through the night were Peter Fonda who Melody spent a lot of time talking to, and drinking with. Terry Southern was one of the writers of the movie Easy Rider along with Hopper, and Fonda who I had a couple JD’s on the rocks with him, was a very cool guy, I would meet him later in Malibu at a party at Jay Ingrid’s place who was a bodybuilder, and actor friend from the Dungeon. It was a great night had loads of fun and many great memories. One other partier was Roger McGuinn of the group the Byrds, I didn’t see him but Melody talked him. My drinking buddy Vic Marrow came stumbling through the door just as twelve o’clock hit, drunker than a skunk. When Vic was drunk a person needed to give him room, you never knew what mood he may be in when he was drinking.

A note about the party the reason that Hopper, Fonda, and Terry Southern were at the party was partly due to the fact that Martin shot some of their promo pictures for the movie Easy Rider.

Later in the week:

Nixon was still president and I was still doing shit for Peggy and who ever she was working for at the time. She summoned me to her office and told me she wanted me to get as much information as possible on Tom Hayden and David Dellinger these guys were part of the Chicago Seven investigation and all the bullshit that had gone on in August 1968. Tom Hayden would eventually marry Jane Fonda who was an activist herself against the war in Viet Nam, the scuttle butt on Fonda was she was actually working for the CIA and was a agent herself. Peggy is rambling on about my new mission so I said, “You can’t jail the revolution” which was a slogan I had heard at several protests, she just curled her lip then said, “I have someone I want you to meet soon his name is Sgt. Patrick Curry from the Marine Corp. he's just started with the NIS and the two of you will be working for me”, with that she went out of the room. I really was taking the revolutions side in all this, I was seeing and hearing that our government was lying to the people of the United States on just about every issue you could think of. I should have known that I couldn’t trust the government for a truthful answer especially the way I was lied to in school about the settling of the West and the authorization of slaughtering all the buffalo and the Indian nations which represented hundreds of thousands of deaths to the first Americans.

I had made more contact with some of the leaders of the movement and was getting accepted into circles of protestors who like me thought the only way to change things was to take Washington by force. I was a big reader and fan of Che Guevara one of the revolution members who along with Castro over threw Fulgencio Belista in Cuba in 1959. I had to consistently remind myself that I was supposed to be getting info and reporting it back to Peggy, and not being sucked into the movement, which I eventually would be. Its funny how you go through life believing one thing only to find out it was nothing short of a lie.

Melody was oblivious to all this spying shit she really didn’t care either way what was going on with the demonstrations and protests. Melody was absorbed in her job and friends at work and was far removed from what was happening in the world around her, looking back she was the smart one, besides who fucking cares anyway, humanity doesn’t learn from history but instead just repeats it.