CHAPTER THREE

The whole ride back to Eugene, I was psyched. Now that I’d finally taken control, I just knew that something important was going to happen. And sure enough, less than a month later that feeling was confirmed when I found my soulmate.

We were playing at a bar called “The Monastery” in Grants Pass, Oregon. and the place was packed. Not because of the band, but because it was Dimer Night – ten cents for a pitcher of beer until midnight.

Pamela came up to me after my first set. She was far and away the most beautiful woman I’d ever been approached by, including those that were headed for the guy behind me.
Then the band started up again, so we went outside to talk. We sat straddling a little half wall around the parking lot, not quite knee-to-knee. And just as she began to speak, she reached over and took both my hands.

She started off by telling me how she’d had this overpowering sensation during my performance that the two of us had been together in a previous life. Then she took off her necklace, describing how these were antique glass beads from the turn of the century that her grandmother’d given to her just before she died. And then, as she slipped it over my head, she gave me the most passionate, electric kiss of my life.

“Bliss to Houston – we have liftoff.”
First I discover my art, and now I have found my soulmate. Could the signs be any clearer?

Oh, sure, a more objective view might be that I’d dropped out of college to be a juggler, and been picked up by a crazy woman in a bar. On dimer night.

Either way, the central truth of my existence had come swung 180 degrees since the night of the moonwalk.
I’d gone from apocalyptic fatalism to delusional optomism – without ever touching down in reality.
But at least I was finally thinking more positively. And that’s always a good thing, right?

No. Positive thinking isn’t good at all when it has no basis in reality. Take the schitzophrenic who thinks he’s Jesus. Now there’s a positive thinker. The more positive he is, the crazier he becomes.

Within six months the band broke up. I should’ve seen it coming the night the flute player asked me to help tie him off. If the woodwinds are shooting smack, you can imagine the bass player’s problems.
As for Pamela, it would be several painful years before I recognized that much the same way some women glow during pregnancy, others take on a powerful and alluring beauty just before they plunge into madness.

It came to a head in Ft Lauderdale. We’d started moving around every few months, as the relationship got worse. Ft Lauderdale’d been a rare bright spot, at least as far as me getting work. Between the beach discos and some small concert clubs, I was actually juggling for a living. Not much of a living, but better than it had been..
One day Pamela came to me with an ad she’d circled in the paper. Forty miles up I-95 in West Palm Beach, a spaghetti restaurant was opening in a remodeled movie theatre, running classic films while people ate.
On Saturdays, they wanted to specialize in children’s parties. They were looking for someone to do a little magic for the kids. Sing some songs. Maybe juggle. In other words, they wanted a clown.

I’d seen myself play any number of loser roles in my young life. But I’d always managed to keep my head well above the Clown Line.

Then Pamela reached over and took both my hands. Uh-oh. She had a concept. A vision: Robin Rainbow.

Pastel face makeup – a blue star over one eye, a lavendar teardrop over the other. White spandex jumpsuit with a rhinestone rainbow across the chest, and a shiny satin rainbow cape. All topped off with a flourescent pink wig.

It’s Emmitt Kelly meets Elton John. Kiss does Captain Kangaroo. What did I think?

Honestly, I have no clue what I thought, except that she clearly thought this was a stroke of genius. Our golden opportunity to corner the emerging rock’n roll clown market.

Not to be out-delusioned, I concluded this was my big chance to save the relationship.

“Save it for what?” you might ask. Once you’ve reached the point where you’re willing to put on a clown suit for a woman, and it doesn’t directly involve a sexual act, exactly what is left to save?

Somehow I overlooked that question.

I drove up to Palm Beach to pitch the restaurant’s owner, armed with my face-saving catch phrase: “Robin Rainbow is not a clown. He’s a ‘contemporary children’s host’.”

The guy not only went for it, he ate it up like a plate of his shitty spaghetti. He issued a big press release about the restaurant’s new “contemporary children’s host”, complete with a color photo of my smiling pastel mug, which wound up running on the front page of the West Palm Beach Times the day of our gala grand opening, above the caption: “He’s No Bozo”.
At least that’s the way I read it. I hope they didn’t mean: “He’s no Bozo”

Pamela came with me to the gala that night, reveling in the glory of her creation. Just after midnight, the owner appeared with three glasses of champagne, told me we were a hit, and we toasted our success. Actually, Pamela was pretty toasted already. And by 2 am when we left, neither of us was feeling any pain.

That didn’t last long. As soon as I got on the interstate, Pamela broke down and started sobbing hysterically . Going on and on about about how, in her whole life, no one ever tried to help her, and how nobody’d ever done anything just for her, and how the only man who had ever really cared about her was …
Gary.

I snapped “Gary!? Who the fuck is Gary? Was that in a past life, because so far every guy you’ve told me about from this life was an asshole.”

She spit back that I hadn’t done a single thing to prove my love to her. Then, like a drunken Dr. Frankenstein, she shreiked: “Without me, you’d be nothing!”

I shot back that from where I sat – Honk – Honk – nothing was big step up.
And as for all those things Gary’d done for her, “I bet he never wore a pink wig”.
She doubled over with laughter. Evil, maniacal, laughter.

I’d never been so angry in my entire life. I jerked the car over to the shoulder of the road and with a lame: “I don’t have to listen to this.” followed by an even lamer: “you owe me an apology”. I got out.

As I walked away, I felt pretty good about my position. She had no choice now but to see how unfair she was being, and come to ask her soulmate’s forgiveness.

As I watched the tailights of my car accelerate into the distance and disappear, I experienced a moment of utter … clarity. Just as Neil had to know that he’d reached his peak, I’d clearly reached my valley. A personal worst.

I was alone on the shoulder of the interstate at 2:30 in the morning. Seven miles from the nearest exit. No wallet, no money – legally drunk. Wearing a white rhinestone-studded jumpsuit and face paint. And clutching the goddamn pink wig, which for some reason, I’d grabbed like my hat on my way out of the car.

Best case, I get to sober up a little before a state trooper cruises by to make my humiliation a matter of public record.

Worst case, a big rig pulls over and I hop in, only to notice too late that the trucker’s wearing a clown suit, too.
“TOOT TOOT”
I could see the item in the B section of tomorrow’s paper: “The unidentified body of a man … … pink wig obstructing his colon … police are asking the public for help.”

I stuck out my thumb, and waited for Fate to decide.

Fifteen minutes later, the unthinkable happened. The actual best-case scenario. Literally the second car to come along headed southbound pulled over. The driver was a young woman who, no questions asked, offered to take me right to my door in Ft. Lauderdale.

I couldn’t believe it. Not only was Fate refusing to crush me, it seemed to be saying “let’s pretend this never happened”. For the first time in my life, I really believed something I’d always doubted. That like it or not, I was going to survive.

I arrived home triumphantly, five minutes after Pamela’d gotten there. I wish I could tell you that I walked in, packed up, and walked out of her, Gary, and Robin Rainbow’s lives forever. But no. I’d experienced enough clarity for one night.

Instead, I chalked up Pamela’s actions to the booze talking – a cry for help. And as for my miraculous rescue, why that was just more evidence of our ultimate oneness.
How’s that for positive thinking?

I continued to believe this when a few months later, Pamela set off to find herself. I was convinced her search would bring her back to me. How convinced? Well, even though I’ve never been to Aspen, I have wired money there.

When she called to tell me she was moving to San Francisco, I knew I’d been right. I’d just booked my first couple gigs out there. If we weren’t destined to be together, then why was her search taking her to the same city as mine? Of course I could wire more. We’re soulmates, aren’t we?
Three weeks later I arrived in SF . . . only to discover that I’d just made her fiancee’s house payment while he was finishing drug rehab.

Honk, Honk!

I never saw Pamela again. I thought I saw her once, years later, rummaging through a dumpster in the parking lot of a fine restaurant where I’d just dined. But it turned out to be a positive thinking flashback.

I have to give her some credit, though.
In a sense she was right, that whatever I’d become I owed it to her. With family ties frayed, friendships obliterated, and bank accounts zeroed, I’d certainly been liberated.

The only part of the whole ride not based in delusion was, of all things, my juggling. It turned out I’d stumbled onto a concert promoter’s dream opening act. No set-up or sound check, and if they threw things at the stage, I’d catch them.

I worked with Kenny Loggins, Duran Duran a couple times. I opened for Clapton once. I did an arena tour with the so-called supergroup Asia.
I was even on the Midnight Special on NBC – remember that show, with Wolfman Jack? I still remember the Wolfman’s intro – “Whoever said a picture was worth a thousand words was talking about Chris y’know”
And then in 1984, unbelievably, I was asked to be the opening act for Michael Jackson and his brothers on the Victory Tour, the most hyped tour of the decade.
Between me and Michael, we sold over 3 million tickets. And when it was over, I’d actually become the world’s most famous juggler.

This was at the Orange Bowl in Miami, in front of 63,000