Freque Factory
Alabama Interlude, Part 2
As I've said, when I returned to Alabama it was because I was "in love." My young man arranged for me to live with his parents when I first got there. With my own family so broken it was healing to be around a functional family. The father was a brilliant, scientific minded man with his own company. The mother really ran things. She was intelligent, strong willed, caring, and determined to keep her family safe and healthy-and happy, if possible. I always thought of her as an example of an iron fist in a velvet glove. My lover's first sister seemed like a younger version of the mother. While she loved her brother, he exasperated her a lot. The second sister was about 5 years old-smart, inquisitive, and cute as a bug. My only complaint was that my lover was being more and more distant.
Looking back, I know now that I was not a good guest. Since I wasn't going to school and working, I had time to start to deal with my parents divorce emotionally. I suspect I was a bit of a wreck.
After a few weeks I suspect my lover's mother had a few words with him-like when was I moving out? Before I really knew what was going on my lover had found me a studio apartment on the east side of town. And a job interview that he took me to. I got the job. He helped me move into the largely furnished apartment, then vanished.
I didn't understand at first why my lover wasn't around. Didn't return my phone calls. I eventually figured out that I had been dumped. First love, first heartbreak. Damn that hurt! But I am a resilient sort of person. I couldn't cry forever. Besides, I had that (really cool) job to go to.
My first job in Huntsville was at the snack bar at the Alabama Space and Rocket Center. This was before Space Camp. In fact, the location we had out snack bar in is no longer accessible. It was a fun time to work there. I've always been a space geek and this had exhibits that had me drooling on a daily basis. The job itself was fun-making and selling sandwiches and hamburgers. The crew was all female and around my age.
Our boss hired us because we were all young and cute. We all wore white space girl looking jump suits-that were hot pants length. And white knee high boots. I wish I had a photo.
I didn't have a car and the only public transport in town was only used by the local blacks. So I hitchhiked. I was very, very lucky. If I could, I walked. And I discovered that I was not all that far from where my lover had moved to-a house on a street that was home to many of us hippies. I had found friends and a place to hang out! Robert and I sort of ignored each other.
Those days in Huntsville were some of the most free in my life. I had my brother who lived near town, but his wife was still angry with me, so they had little to do with me. I was really on my own, living in a strange place. I had new friends that I liked and that liked me. And I was having fun.
One day I was sitting in the sun in front of my little place. I liked that apartment. It was tiny and had giant roaches, but it was all mine. Anyway, there I was sitting and a hippie couple I knew was driving by and recognized me. They stopped and invited me to join them for the day. I wasn't working, so off I went just over the border to the small Tennessee town where the mom lived. It was like a scene in a hick movie. But they were all nice people and I had a good time. It all seemed so far away from California.
After a couple of months I got laid off my job. No real explanation. My boss turned out to be a real sleaze. He owned a couple of strip joint on the edge of town. I had driven by them and hadn't recognized them as such-very different from LA. He offered me a job working as a dancer there. And if I wanted to make real money he could set me up as a prostitute. And he told me all this while he was giving me a ride home. I was furious! The only thing that kept me from screaming at him or causing him real physical harm was that he still had my final pay check. And I was a girl from California-I would have wound up in jail.
Things were different in Alabama. I didn't qualify for their version of unemployment and I was not able to find another job. What to do? While I was deciding I had more adventures.
One of my former lover's good friends came visiting one day when I was over at Lincoln Street visiting friends. I'll call her Marie. We began what was, for a time, a very close friendship. Marie's dad really was a rocket scientist. We were at her place one time and she showed me a book. It was the proposed flight plan of one of the Apollo spaceships. It had pages and pages of math, followed by a graph showing a flight correction. And this book was full of those course corrections-Amazing!
Marie's family came from a small Southern town nearby. We visited one time. It was one of those towns that was owned by three families. As we drove to her Grandmother's house she pointed out the businesses owned by family members-including the gas station where her Uncle sold moonshine out the back.
While we driving back Marie decided she needed her favorite hamburger, found only at the shack out in the middle of nowhere (as near as I could figure). We went inside and I realized two things. One, there were only whites inside. Blacks were being served from a window from the outside. Two, there was a larger than life sized photo of Governor Wallace with a shot gun. This was the famous picture from when that man promised to not integrate Alabama schools (he lost that one). I was so uncomfortable that I asked Marie to order for me and that I'd meet her back at the car. Scary.
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