• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1393 0

guy, a nice guy; I'd known him in jail. He was a real dopefiend and a criminal, so I respected his opinion. He'd been in Synanon for about four years. He said, "Oh, Art, I was looking for you. I want to talk to you." We walked out by the pool. He said, "I don't know how to say this. This girl was talking to me today. She knew I was a friend of yours. Laurie." Paul said, "She wanted me to explain things to you. She doesn't ... She's a nice girl. They come in here, and they don't want to be treated ... They want you to act like a gentleman and not come on coarse. You've got to cool it. You've got to go through the formalities. That's the routine here. To make it different from the streets. She wanted me to talk to you. You can't move so fast." I said, "It doesn't matter. I blew that anyway." He said, "Do you like her?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "Well, I don't think you blew it. Just act like a gentleman." I said, "Well, I thought that was a gentleman. It always was a gentleman where I come from."

After I talked to Paul I got some insight as to what was happening in Synanon. A lot of the girls that were into the dope thing-they weren't treated as ladies. Some cat just took 'em out, and if he wanted to ball he'd say, "Let's make it." And so the idea was to change that and to treat them as nice girls and also for the man to do something he'd maybe never done. To make it as much like the American way as possible, courting and getting used to living in society. I saw Laurie and apologized and asked her if she would forgive me. I said, "I still really have eyes for you and I'd like to get to know you. Is that okay?" She said, "We'll get to know each other and see what happens."

I would meet her after games and at different times when she was free, and we'd go into the club and have coffee and peanut butter sandwiches. I got to the point where all I thought about was her. During this period of time you weren't allowed to touch. There's no contact. Finally I asked my tribe leader, "What's supposed to happen now? What am I supposed to do? I want to keep everything on the up-and-up so it'll work out right." He said, "Well, I don't have anything against her. She's a lot more together, Synanon-wise, than you are. Now you get in a courtship. I give you my permission." I said, "Great! That's it then!" He said, "No, that isn't it. You have to go to her tribe leader and tell her you'd like to be in a courtship with Laurie."

Her tribe leader was Betty "Greek." Betty had been around a long time and was married to a guy named Jimmy the Greek, Jimmy Georgelos, who'd been around longer than anyone just about, ten years at least, and was really a legend around Synanon. He was a wild character. He was around sixty. Betty was a very together chick in her mid-thirties, very attractive. I said to Bob, "Wow, it's really going to be embarrassing going to her and asking her something like that." He said, "No, man, she's a great chick. It's just something you have to do, a formality. You'll grow behind it."

We were now on the "cubic day." We worked ten hours a day every day for fourteen straight days, no time off, and we really worked-two coffee breaks and a meal-but at the end of that time you had fourteen days off. The cubic day had a lot of good qualities because when you worked you really got into it. You excluded all else and were so tired by the time you finished your day's work and played a game you just fell out on your bed. If you didn't have a game you had to do your laundry, your dorm assignment. I found that I worked well on this system, and when I was off it was really great. "Motion" was your working period. I was in my "vacuum." It was still summertime so I could just go lay on the beach.

I was out on the beach with Laurie the next day, and I saw Betty. I realized that the longer I put it off, the harder it would be to talk to her. I got up and walked over. Betty was getting a suntan; she had her straps down; she had kinda large breasts. She was lying there and I was thinking, "My God, this is the most ridiculous thing I've ever done