Women - Charles Bukowski [98]
So there I was in the air again, drinking a double vodka-7. I was in with the salesmen and businessmen. I had my small suitcase with extra shirts, underwear, stockings, 3 or 4 books of poems, plus typescripts of ten or twelve new poems. And a toothbrush and toothpaste. It was ridiculous to be going off somewhere to get paid for reading poetry. I didn’t like it and I could never get over how silly it seemed. To work like a mule until you were fifty at meaningless, low jobs, and then suddenly to be flitting about the country, a gadfly with drink in hand.
McIntosh was waiting at Seattle and we got in his car. It was a nice drive because neither us said too much. The reading was privately sponsored, which I preferred to university-sponsored readings. The universities were frightened; among other things, they were frightened of low-life poets, but on the other hand they were too curious to pass one up.
There was a long wait at the border, with a hundred cars backed up. The border guards simply took their time. Now and then they pulled an old car out of line, but usually they only asked one or two questions and waved the people on. I couldn’t understand McIntosh’s panic over the whole procedure.
“Man,” he said, “we got through!”
Vancouver wasn’t far. McIntosh pulled up in front of the hotel. It looked good. It was right on the water. We got the key and went up. It was a pleasant room with a refrigerator and thanks to some good soul the refrigerator had beer in it.
“Have one,” I told him.
We sat down and sucked at the beer.
“Creeley was here last year,” he said.
“Is that so?”
“It’s kind of a co-op Art Center, self-sufficient. They have a big paid membership, rent space, so forth. Your show is already sold out. Silvers said he could have made a lot of money if he’d jacked the ticket prices up.”
“Who’s Silvers?”
“Myron Silvers. He’s one of the Directors.”
We were getting to the dull part now.
“I can show you around town,” said McIntosh.
“That’s all right. I can walk around.”
“How about dinner? On the house.”
“Just a sandwich. I’m not all that hungry.”
I figured if I got him outside I could leave him when we were finished eating. Not that he was a bad sort, but most people just didn’t interest me.
We found a place 3 or 4 blocks away. Vancouver was a very clean town and the people didn’t have that hard city look. I liked the restaurant. But when I looked at the menu I noticed that the prices were about 40 percent higher than in my part of L. A. I had a roast beef sandwich and another beer.
It felt good to be out of the U.S.A. There was a real difference. The women looked better, things felt calmer, less false. I finished the sandwich, then McIntosh drove me back to the hotel. I left him at the car and took the elevator up. I took a shower, left my clothes off. I stood at the window and looked down at the water. Tomorrow night it would all be over, I’d have their money and at noon I’d be back in the air. Too bad. I drank 3 or 4 more bottles of beer, then went to bed and slept.
They took me to the reading an hour early. A young boy was up there singing. They talked right through his act. Bottles clanked; laughter; a good drunken crowd; my kind of folks. We drank backstage, McIntosh, Silvers, myself and a couple of others.
“You’re the first male poet we’ve had here in a long time,” said Silvers.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, we’ve had a long run of fags. This is a nice change.”
“Thanks.”
I really read it to them. By the end I was drunk and they were too. We bickered, we snarled at each other a bit, but mostly it was all right. I had been given my check before the reading and it helped my delivery some.
There was a party afterwards in a large house. After an hour or two I found myself between two women. One was a blonde, she looked as if she was carved out of ivory, with