Straight Life - Art Pepper [189]
As for Diane, well, at one time Diane was a beautiful girl. I've seen pictures of her. When I met her, she was a dog. She looked like she was a hundred years old and had lived every one of `em on her face. All her teeth were gone: completely false uppers and lowers. Haggard, tired, worn. She'd put herself in the gutter and wallered in it long enough to where she couldn't ever get back. It sounds kind of cold, but her dying wasn't any loss to anybody in the known universe. In my opinion she wasn't nothin'. She was a tramp. And that wasn't Art's fault.
Art's very dependent, and in my opinion Art's relationship with women is one basically of dependence. Because of that, I could never accept the idea of Art being responsible for anything Diane did. I'd have to look at it to the contrary. I think that any man-woman relationship Art's gonna be involved in, the woman is going to have more influence with Art than Art's gonna have with her.
Art doesn't have an evil bone in his body, and he's-I don't mean this in a demeaning manner because on Art it's totally acceptable, you have to know him-but Art is a pathological physical coward. I guess it's the way he was raised and he's been in music all of his life, moving with that element of people. He's never been called upon to get violent or be violent. I remember an instance in the joint. I can't remember if it was Big Woody Woodward or Tubby Whitman. It was one of the notorious hogs that had some words with Art. They got into a hassle, and the guy told Art, "Man, I'll tear your head off and shit in your neck!" Somethin' to that effect. He had no intention whatsoever of doin' it; he wouldn't have laid a hand on him. But Art took it seriously, and he came to me and a half a dozen other people, and he was just in a panic: "Oh, God, what am I gonna do? That animal's just gonna ruin me, man! That guy's gonna break my spine, gonna tear my arms off!" I can't remember who it was, but I went and talked to him: "Man, what is this shit with you and Art?" The guy said "What?" I ran it down, and the guy cracked up. He said, "Man, you know me better'n that, Jer. I wouldn't put my hands on that guy." I said, "I didn't think so but Art goddamnsure believes it." Art was panic-stricken; "Oh my God, it's all over. I know it's all over. Fuck it, this is it!"
I WAS released in June of '66 with another guy that got out on the same day, a friend of mine, Richard Fortier. They gave us each a package and a suit-a cheap, single-breasted, black suit, but at least it fit well. I paid the guy some cigarettes to have it fixed. I put a white shirt on and a tie. We went through the gate and they gave us our ticket home and a little money. Richard had been there a long time. This was his second time, too, so we both knew all the guards. They said, "Well, good luck, man, hope we don't see you back here again."
We walked out into the little town of San Quentin and got a ride to San Rafael, and when we got there we stopped at a bar immediately and we both got brandy. Everybody could tell we had just gotten out of the joint. The bartender said, "It must be a great day." We had a few drinks and got a nice buzz and rode into San Francisco. I didn't have to be back in L.A. till Monday to report to the parole department, so we decided to goof around in San Francisco for a while.
We got off the bus on North Broadway, right in North Beach. They'd given me a package with some extra stuff in it-a couple of khaki shirts, khaki trousers, work boots, sport shirt, "dress" slacks, and assorted underwear and socks. I just took it and threw it in the trash can. It was a beautiful day, sunny and warm, and we were wandering around, and we heard music. We walked toward the sound of the music and saw a little, narrow