9/11/23
Newsletter #455
The Crack of Dawn
After Harry Truman retired from the presidency in 1953, he moved back to his hometown of Independence, Missouri, and back into his mother-in-law’s house. Harry woke up at dawn, dressed immaculately (he was a former haberdasher), then took a walk with a local minister whose church he did not attend. After Truman died, the minister was asked what they talked about every morning? He said that they didn’t converse very much, but that Harry talked to the biggest trees. The minister was asked what Truman said to the trees, and the minister replied, “He said, ‘Keep up the good work.’”
When we made Evil Dead, Thou Shalt Not Kill…Except, Crimewave, and Evil Dead 2 – then everybody moved to L.A. – we had a bunch of offices in an old office building in Ferndale, Michigan. It was from the late 1920s, or early ‘30s. The Pioneer Building, it’s still there. The reason we were in that building was because Romig the Magician was located there. All of us had frequented the establishment of Romig the Magician over the years, ever since we were all young. Beyond everything else, he sold smoke bombs, which we often needed for movies. But when we were young, Sam Raimi was a magician. He and I were at the same bus stop since he was in 3rd grade, and I was in 4th. Sam would often test his magic tricks on me in the morning, particularly since I am gullible. His ability to roll coins over his knuckles always impressed me. Sam played Bar Mitzvahs. Anyway, Sam being a magician is how we ended up in that building for six years, 1980-1986. It was perfect for our purposes.
Me, Sam and Bruce all came from the suburbs on the west side of Detroit. Rob came from the east side, Grosse Pointe, which is a really cool, old suburb of Detroit, and very upscale in parts. But just like Beverly Hills with its surrounding “flats,” where the plain houses and apartment buildings are located – I am put in mind of a really good Alan Arkin movie, The Slums of Beverly Hills (1998) – Grosse Pointe has its normal neighborhoods as well – that are still gorgeous – and Rob lived on one of these more normal streets, which was a block from Lake St. Clair. Rob had a 16-foot aluminum boat with a little gas engine. Many, many evenings after work, I would follow Rob home, then he and I would go fishing for Walleye. We had a deal – I never had to touch a fish. God forbid I should catch one, Rob would remove the hook and bonk it on the head with the piece of wood he wound his line around. At some point I saw that he had a real, aluminum fish bat and asked, “Why don’t you use it?” Rob said, “On a really cold winter day when my hands were frozen, I went to hit the fish, missed and hit my own knuckles.” I said, “Yeah?” Rob pointed at the offensive bat and said, “Now it doesn’t get to go.”
I just read that nostalgia is “heroin to baby-boomers.” I’m personally not nostalgic at all. I wouldn’t want to be back there under any circumstances. Since I have specific markers, called movies, in my life, I can still remember very clearly how tense and aggravated I was. Combined with how inexperienced I was. No thanks. I’m glad we got the films made, but doing it once was plenty. However, fishing with Rob was great. We’d go trolling in lazy circles between St. Clair Shores and Windsor, Ontario, with the Tiger game on the transistor radio. We always smoked weed, and as I said, I never had to touch a fish. Also, and perhaps this is what’s interesting – or not – is that I didn’t care if I caught a fish, so I didn’t catch many fish. Rob really cared if he caught fish, so he caught lots of fish. The fished sensed it. He wanted them, so he got them.
When trolling you had a spool of metal line attached to a lead weight, connected to two fishing lines with lures on the end. The idea was to follow the contour of the bottom of the lake with the lead weight, without touching the bottom and alerting the fish you were there. There is equipment that would show you that, but we didn’t have it. Rob and I would go into a hushed, Zen-like state, the Tiger game coming in, then fizzling away, as we visualized the bottom of Lake St. Clair, or at least he was, I was probably thinking about a movie. He’s the one who caught the fish.
One time Rob and I were in this lazy, circular, put-putting path, with our lines in the water, the radio announcing, “Gibby gets to first . . .”, a warm, humid wind blowing, the Canadian Club factory going past on the Windsor shore, when we looked up and an iron ore tanker was right on top of us. These motherfucking things are 50 feet tall – five stories of rusty iron – coming right at us. It had not seen us, so we were now dead. Except Rob yelled, “Oh, fuck!” turned the engine and floored it. The Empire State Building on its side went silently past, missing us by inches.
But generally, it was exceptionally peaceful. I guess that I am nostalgic for the peaceful, easy feeling, not for being 25 years old.
So, we all moved to L.A. Rob didn’t have his boat anymore. He began sport fishing for Tuna and Marlin. I made a documentary for him about tuna fishing. Anyway, Rob needed to go fishing between fishing trips. He found that you could fish for Sand Bass off the coast of Marina del Rey, just south of my apartment in Santa Monica. Rob was in the valley, but he didn’t care where he had to drive to go fishing. So, we went Sand Bass fishing on a big old boat with a dozen people. On deck there was a swirling tub of live minnows that were about three inches long. You grabbed a minnow, stuck a hook through its head, tossed it out into the ocean and maybe you’d catch a fish, which I don’t recall ever doing. A week later Rob called and said, “Wanna go Sand Bass fishing?” I immediately said, “No.” Rob seemed slightly taken aback and asked, “Why?” I said, “I don’t like sticking hooks through minnows’ heads.” Without hesitation, Rob said, “No. They like it. Really.” From Rob’s point of view, it was part of the process of fishing, how could they not like it? Anyway, I didn’t go.
Puttering around Lake St. Clair though was fun.
It’s just before the dawn.
Why do I do this? Write this thing? Because it seems like the thing to do.
Thank you
"Keep Up The Good Work" nice stories.