THURSDAY, JULY 17, 2008

(part 84) SHARON TATE AND DIANE LINKLETTER GONE


In the early part of August 1969, we all woke to the Murder of Sharon Tate, Jay Sebring and others. At that particular time, it was unknown who had committed this act, but it none the less ran through the Hollywood and surrounding area like ice water on a cold day. This slaughter was followed a short time later by another equally morbid multiple homicide of innocents. It was the mind set, in late 1969, of the town we lived in, as well as all of Southern California and for that matter most of the world. A totally negative view of Hollywood and L A in general. You couldn't escape it, it was just there, and it hung in the atmosphere for a long and persistent period of time.

In my mind, it summed up the way I felt about life itself. That at any moment, it could just fold up and die. I am not trying to be morbid or unnecessarily grim, I am just telling you exactly how it was at the time following both those killings. As I have stated earlier, I was already on my own downhill slide into a personal hell, so this occurrence, as you might imagine, just added fuel to the fire. I knew by then that everything in my life was caving in and I knew Nancy and I couldn't afford to live in the apartment On Horn Ave. any longer.

I wasn't getting paid and Nancy wasn't working, because up until then she didn't have to, but all of a sudden we were forced to scramble and that's what we did. We had about a month or so left to live at the apartment and then we didn't know. Being that we all were piss poor at dealing with reality on a day to day basis, our choice for coping with this mess, was to get extremely loaded and act as if everything was gonna be fine, which it wasn't. So that was how we dealt with the sinking ship, we moved the deck chairs to the upper deck and ordered cocktails. Unfortunately this process of refusing to take responsibility for my own life and that of those around me, who were affected by my self centered choice, led to an overwhelming sense of defeat within me that was lethal in the long run.

I couldn't find what I'd always used in the past, a sense of "fuck it" I'll just make another record and get on with it. This time was different! I just didn't care. I could not get it going, because the nagging sense of "what's the use" had for the first time in my life taken refuge in my thinking. It was the most debilitating sense of hopelessness I had ever encountered and was being magnified by current events and drugs and alcohol. The only relief at the time was more drugs and more alcohol to blot out reality, which of course made it that much worse.

I have no recollection whatsoever of Diane Linkletter being a big time loady, to the contrary, she would be around all of us at times when we were fucked up, but she was not fucked up. I am not saying she never got loaded what I am saying is that she was not excessive. We all admired her for that, because she kept her shit together, that's how I remember her, as dignified and together within a framework of utter distraction perpetrated by the rest of us. Nancy too was not chaotic, but indulged more than Diane. I knew Diane was prone to become depressed and forlorn over her problems with her father, but I never thought it was something to get overly concerned about.

Right before Nancy and I left the apartment on Horn Ave. for good I spoke with Diane privately for the last time. She had just inherited a quarter of a million dollars for her 21st birthday and told me it didn't mean shit to her and that she really didn't want to take it because it just made her feel more controlled by her father Art. I told her "fuck it, take the money Diane, and then go do what you wanna do." She agreed that that made sense to her and I believed she was ok when I left her, I had no idea of how wrong I was going to be.

Nancy and I moved into an apartment on Sweetzer in West Hollywood. I had agreed to be the gardener for the building which was managed by a guy named Joe Steck, who had written the screenplay for WATERHOLE #3 a movie with James Coburn. I don't remember how I met Joe or why I agreed to be the gardener but Nancy and I needed a place to go and that's where we ended up in late 1969. Joe and his wife Judy, who had once been a go go dancer at the Whiskey, said we could give out their phone # to a few people so they could contact us. I still remember the day I got the phone call from Timmy Rooney. "Hey Tim", I said, "How's it goin?" "Not so good", he answered, "I guess you didn't hear." "Hear what?" I asked, "Diane." "Diane what?" I asked, "Diane, she committed suicide." There was dead silence on the phone. I had no way to incorporate what I had just heard into my brain, it was stunned silence.