(part 259) JUST LIKE EASY RIDER

Me, Dj, and my brother Bill 1983...click photo to enlarge

In 1985, wherever I went on the central coast, I'd see little christian fish symbols plastered on car bumpers, windows, walls, everything. It was something that got my attention because I'd never seen so many little ads for christianity in my life. It was a form of shouting, "Hey, I'm a believer!" but in my world it did not mean that those broadcasting the message were peaceful, loving, or fair. To the contrary it was an alert to people like me to "stay on your toes."

Not too long after arriving here, I was sitting in a coffee shop in Arroyo Grande with a young girl friend of mine. A couple of tables away were three big guys eyeing me like a piece of rotten meat. I heard one of them say, "If I ever caught my daughter with someone like that I'd get my deer rifle and fix him!" I stared at them for a long time, making it clear I could hear what had been said and that I didn't give a shit about their opinion. It was like a scene out of "Easy Rider."

I found it necessary back then to stay alert at all times, wherever I went, knowing that this kind of thinking was aimed at me on a daily basis throughout the area. I had no allies or friends to speak of, except a few others I'd met at meetings who were looked down on the same way I was. To them it had become routine, almost normal, but to me it was cause to counter anyone who showed that kind of hostility toward me, and show it they did.

I was always ready to fight, both verbally and physically. I would not back down, fearing if I did it would bring even more of that crap my way. I had to take a stand or I could not have survived here. In most cases it was always a guy who'd grown accustomed to intimidating people with his size. The other versions were those who used their supposed standing in the community. In each case, it was guys who were used to people taking their shit and following their orders, something I refused to do even once.

More than a couple of times I went at it in public with these yahoos, turning the air black with verbal counter assaults. Unprepared by-standers watched in silence with their mouths open as I went after these jerks in grocery stores, coffee shops, or wherever the need presented itself. I never started it, other than to just show up, but I was perfectly suited to finish it.

The more they pushed on me, the more I stood up to them. Where once I had wanted to leave the area, I became determined not to be driven out. In 12 step meetings those who had once felt out of place and alone now began seeking me out as a refuge from the entrenched belittlers at large. I befriended the friendless and protected the unwanted. I made it clear that if you went after one of them I would publicly take your ass apart verbally, which in all reality was not that hard to do.

When you're wrong you're wrong, and these guys were dead wrong. They glorified themselves by demeaning the week and unwanted. Even though I could have spared myself a shit-load of trouble, it was impossible to sit by quietly and watch this garbage continue. The things that were said, and those who were saying them, were an affront to everything I'd read in the book Alcoholics Anonymous.

So this is the way it started for me in San Luis Obispo County and the Five Cities area back in 1985--a wake-up call for sure. An L.A. reject trying to find my place in the world, a world completely different from the one I'd left behind, a world where I was not welcomed or wanted.

(part 258) IF I WERE A CARPENTER

Don't know the exact date of this picture, but it is roughly what I looked like when I got to the central coast from L.A.

Back in 1985, if you looked like this you were pegged as a dope fiend and a criminal by those who were claiming the moral high ground. It was their way of enforcing a caste system for their own benefit.

As far as AA was concerned, I was a drug addict, and they didn't want drug addicts in their meetings, even though some of them had probably used drugs themselves, usually prescribed by doctors. It was the same phony bull-shit I'd run into early on in the program in Southern California, and it was rampant in this new setting.

Older alcoholics were telling dual addicted younger people that AA would not work for them because they were drug addicts.

It was this kind of nonsense that caused me, almost immediately, to break my own rule of, "Keep your mouth shut, Bob!" It was not only impossible for me to let this crap go unchallenged, but imperative, as I saw it, to speak up and defy it.

Something else I heard, and still do, was also hard for me to leave alone. People who said, "Hi, my name is so-in-so, and I'm an alcoholic, and I want to thank my higher power, who I call Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior, for my sobriety."

One of the great things about AA is it doesn't require anybody to believe in a specific God, philosophy, or religion. This was particularly important to me when I was a newcomer for obvious reasons.

These blatant references to Jesus that I heard from some, were not followed up with "This is just my personal belief, and not a requirement for sobriety or membership in AA." People who were new, and possibly scared to death, were hearing what sounded like a Christian message at meetings. I was unable to sit by quietly and let this stand without pointing out that AA was not a Christian organization, and that maybe God wasn't a Christian either...Again you can readily see that I was making friends all over.

Within a relatively short time, many in the area became aware that I was here, and that I was not a newcomer, but had nine years of sobriety. They also found out that I had a mouth and was not afraid to use it against the established point of view.

Those who had had to endure the purist's iron-clad grip on local meetings for years, were surprised by my knowledge of the book Alcoholics Anonymous, as well as amused by my verbal assaults on the arrogant self-appointed local leaders.

Along with my mouth, I had the added problem of drawing the specific attention of women in meetings, many of whom were married, which proved to be troublesome. The fact that I stood out like a sore thumb appearance-wise, and had little or no fear of who I pissed off once I got rolling, was what I referred to earlier when I said, "It's a nice place to look at, but a hard place to live, if your name is Bobby Jameson."

This was absolutely true in my case. If I'd been a plumber or carpenter, and had stayed in my place, it would have been just dandy, but being me, and coming from where I'd come from, my own history put an end to any chance of that. There was no way, short of tying me up and gagging me, to have made this transition smoothly. I went from totally unknown to infamous in less than two months.

When I got to the central coast, I believed in my mind that I had left L.A. a failure, with one exception, I had stayed clean and sober for nine years. Not the "everything is wonderful" kind, but the rock bottom "don't get loaded no matter what happens" kind.

My one self-perceived non-failure was what I carried with me like a six-gun into every single twelve-step meeting in the area. A no-holds-barred attitude of "this really works, even for a lowlife like me." That was what I had to offer anyone who wanted it. That was the foundation for starting life over in the five cities area of the central coast of California.

(part 257) GET A LOAD OF THIS GUY

This picture, with "Jesus is coming back" in the window, is representative of this area...click to enlarge

Although San Luis Obispo County is rather a nice area to look at, it is a whole different thing to try living there when your name is Bobby Jameson.

It is, in fact, an old ranching community, for the most part, made up of a lot of people who migrated from the central valley of California, from places like Fresno and Bakersfield.

A lot of stout Christianity, agriculture, and military people, just to mention a few of its attractions. Trying to fit me into this backdrop from hell, is exactly what I was faced with the moment I arrived in 1985.

My mother lived in a place called Grover City, if you can believe it, which sounded to me like East Of Eden starring James Dean. It is a small community in between a number of other small towns, known as the Five Cities.

Pismo Beach, Shell Beach, Grover City, Arroyo Grande, and Oceano, a mish-mosh of agriculture, beach towns, and Christian zealot good-ol boys. I fit in about as well as a black guy moving into a Ku Klux Klan stronghold.

I looked like I came from Hollywood. I did not look like I belonged in the Five Cities area. As soon as I hit the street, I was eye-balled to death by the locals, who did not try whatsoever to hide their disenchantment with me.

It was, "Watch your ass, Jameson," from the moment I arrived. Every street fighting instinct I had went on red alert from the first day. You know, like finding yourself in the bad part of town all of a sudden.

I felt like I was in hell as I drove around the area trying to get my bearings. Whereas L.A. offered endless opportunities for everything, this place offered nothing but the evil eye. The vibrations felt like concrete, a thick heavy feeling of, "We got our eye on you, boy!"

I knew I had to establish myself as a member of AA, and find the local meetings, but Jesus Christ, this place was scary. I truly didn't believe I could take it, but knew I had nowhere else to go, so I stayed, "a day at a time," literally.

For a long while, I would go out and sit in my car in the evening, because I felt so out of place and lost. I would try and coax myself into going back to L.A., but in the end would stay for one more day, and then one more, and one more...

My sense of longing for something familiar dogged me for a long time, and the feeling of being a fish out of water would rule my life for years to come. But in the meantime, I would have to make do with my new surroundings and seek out what good I could find.

I drove by a few of the local AA meeting places and sat in my car afraid to go in. From outside I could see a lot of cowboy hats and big bodies, indicating to me that I was gonna fit in here like a fart in a diving helmet.

Finally after a week or so, I made myself go into a meeting in Arroyo Grande called the Firehouse group, because it was held in the fire station. It was bigger than the others so I thought I could lose myself in the back of the room.

"Now don't say anything, Bob, just keep your mouth shut and sit down and shut up," I said to myself, "don't do anything to draw any attention."

I slipped in the door and stood there quietly for a moment, looking around for an empty chair, finding one a couple rows up. I made my way toward it, but as soon as I did, heads began to turn around and eye-ball me.

"Aw shit!" I thought, as I watched one head after another turn in my direction. Smiles crept over their faces as they nudged the person next to them, saying, "Get a load of this guy."

WALDEN POND

I walked on the water at Walden Pond
with Bob Dylan, Henry David Thoreau,
and Jesus Christ.
In the bright autumn sun
we crossed from one shore
to the other.
Looking up,
I saw the sky laced
with fragments of clouds
sewn into the splendor
of the day.
"Hey, Henry!" I yelled,
"Now I know why you
love this place so much!"
He turned to smile broadly
but said nothing.
"How come we couldn't
always do this?" I asked.
"You always could!" said Jesus,
"You just didn't believe it."
"Yeah, it took me awhile
to get the hang of it," said Dylan,
"but now it's easy."

Bobby Jameson September 10, 2011

(part 256) I WILL FIGHT YOU TILL THE DAY I DIE

There are those who will wonder why I give attention to people like Tom Weatherwood. It is simply this. People like Tom live in a world where they have learned to justify their version of acceptability through a twisted belief in Christian Fundamentalism, something this entire country is beginning to be forced into coping with. Tom lives no more than a few miles from me, and is a carbon copy of the kind of crap-head I have had to deal with since the first day I arrived in San Luis Obispo County in 1985.

This is not about me whining or my music being good or bad, this is about people like Tom, who think they are called by God to clean house. The United States Of America is faced with exactly the same twisted mentality exhibited by this moron in his email to me from out of the blue. It occurred to me that the depth of his distaste is centered on the fact that, in his mind, I am plainly not the kind of person he wants in his area, particularly if you draw public attention the way I do.

I can accept that I am not Jesus Christ or Bob Dylan, but it is telling that he refers to me in that way. His belief about what he thinks I think about myself reeks of something conjured up by so-called church elders from hell. His self-serving "holier than thou" take on me is his own creation adopted after, in his own words, a year of thinking, reading, listening, and discussing me with others. Why anyone would bother to invest so much time in someone they despise is mental illness at it's finest.

Tom is a successful central coast resident, and he exemplifies, unfortunately, what this area is like. He is part of the local "good ol boy" establishment and resents, in the deepest way possible, the presence of one Bobby Jameson, or anyone like me, scumming up his picture perfect God-like vision of San luis Obispo County, a place, which at times, acts like the deep south in the 50's and 60's. This area is crawling with Christian fundamentalists, pawning themselves off as solid citizens determined to cleanse and clarify life on the central coast and the "Garden Of Eden."

Tom Leatherwood and all those like him are on a crusade to determine what's right for everyone. They are the Rick Perry, Sarah Palin, Glen Beck pricks of the central coast. They are self-ordained assholes with a Bible in one hand and a gun in the other. They are called by their so-called ministries to do God's work wherever and whenever they decide it is appropriate. It would appear that currently I am on their hit list, but this is not the first time for me.

You, the reader, can decide for yourself whether what I say here is real or fanciful thinking, but I in my fortress of bad behavior and endless complaining already know the answer...which is, "I will fight you till the day I die!"

I have loosened up comments so more can get their opinion in....even if it is to say how much you hate me and my pathetic mega whining.....

IF JESUS IS YOUR SAVIOR

MY NAME IS
JESUS DYLAN
AND BOY I
MAKE YOU MAD
AND ALL THIS TIME
I THOUGHT
YOU WERE
THE FRIEND
I NEVER HAD
YOU SAY YOU KEEP
YOUR COUNCIL
AND ARE CHRISTIAN
IN YOUR MIND
BUT YOU KEEP
SPYIN ON ME AND
WASTIN ALL
YOUR TIME
I THINK YOU ARE
A STALKER
I THINK YOU
ARE CONFUSED
MY NAME IS REALLY
BOB CHRIST
AND MAN
AM I AMUSED
IF JESUS IS
YOUR SAVIOR
AND YOUR LIFE IS
WORKING WELL
THEN WHY ARE YOU
DOWN HERE WITH ME
BECAUSE I LIVE
IN HELL

Bobby Jameson September 7, 2011