Continued from part 1 & 2 of My "Night" with Gala Dali

The gig was in some large venue, I'd say a few thousand people and the cigarette lighter thing at the end. Impressive. No Gala before the gig, none after. Well, when I invited her, I thought she wouldn't show, so I wasn't surprised.  When you play music in front of thousands of people who make a huge light show of tiny flames at the end, you don't think about some middle-aged lady you'd invited on a lark to stop by, anyway. Several of us went to hang out with some people we had met at the concert, and here's where things got foggy. A lot of drinking went on, no drugs, not that alcohol isn't a drug, but my recollection of how things happened is gone. Some of the highlights have stayed with me all these years.

First we somehow found ourselves at the seaside and got on a small fishing boat. I recall a lot of rapid Spanish and suddenly we were headed out in the harbor. A while later, as charming as this was, everyone was getting like "ok, we better go back" because it kinda looked like we were gonna go fishing seriously and we did have other cities to play in! While I don't know what the fishermen made of all this, they did bring us back to the shore.

We then somehow got to a bar. Funny how it always gets back to a bar. So this bar, and it was now maybe 3 AM, is filled with the kind of people you'd see in a 40's movie set: sailors in striped long sleeve T-shirts, huge brawls starting and ending with no one watching or caring. We had a bunch of drinks, and left, passing in an alley, by a bakery where someone went in and brought out a bunch of fresh rolls. Christ, this should have been a credit card ad: trip to Spain: $800. "Fresh-baked bread in a dark alley near the sea, priceless."

It was 8 AM when we returned to the hotel. I went up to my room and its unmussed bed for my guitar. On the way down I stopped at Gala's room and knocked. Gala opened the door in a nightgown and bade me come in with an arm whose palm went in an arc from me towards the inside of her room.

"So, you couldn't come and see us play last night?" I said, trying to be cool.
She said "Oh, I was there and after, I see Dali and tell him of your great success." Then she took some hotel stationary and wrote several lines on it. She pointed to the paper and said, "You come for lunch sometime. You take a train to here" indicating the name of the place they lived on the Costa Brava "and then you take taxi here. I pay for taxi."

The note she signed, an invitation to come and visit Gala and Salvador Dali in Cadaquès, a note that for all I know could have been sold at auction for the price of a very fine bottle of wine, was stolen out of my car in the late 70's.

The unforgettable closing line though, the one that has rung throughout the decades since the  incident, and the last words to me from the 80 year-old Gala Dali were: "But if you rich... I no pay taxi!"

I remember this story as one in a collection of things I've lived that  are a little out of the ordinary, but I'll bet Gala herself had a  million of these interludes with men half her age if Wikipedia is to  be believed.

 

Photo: Mundo Desconcertante (Jorge Louzao Penalva)

Salvador Dali Museum, which I would have had a private visit to had I gone. Damn!

35 years ago on the road

We pulled into the city of Barcelona after a dry and dusty bus ride,
but we expected comfort. The expression, "it isn't the Ritz" was not
appropriate as this actually was The Ritz we were booked into. We
crossed the vast lobby, "we" being three black men and three white,
three bearded men and three clean-shaven, but still totaling six
musicians altogether, plus two great roadies there to schlep things,
check us in and pay. This group of 8 males ranged in age from early
twenties to late forties. A fairly wide sample of humanity with, as a
bonus, one of us wearing a turban. He was also carrying a bag with 12
bottles of Louisiana Hot Sauce.
 

The moment we had entered what must have been a wondrous place 40
years earlier, a svelte Russian-looking woman in what would be called
stretch-slacks had been following our sauntering gait across to the
desk, and when I sat on my road case, her eyes settled on me. (Why?) I
was tired, and as I gazed over I was thinking of a middle class
suburban housewife on vacation, but it didn't seem right. As I
reflected on the anomalies, she rose and walked directly over to me.
She was at least twice my age, perhaps more but she was not bashful
when she said, "You are artists? My husband is an artist." The accent
was there, fairly strong but unrecognizable to my then inexperienced
ear. Not Spanish, though, at any rate. Coming from Los Angeles, I
naively believed I'd have recognized that. As we moved through Spain I
realized this too was an illusion.

Photo: FirstRozic

"Yeah, I guess you could say that." I managed, in a neutral tone,
already losing interest. "Maybe you have heard of him," she intoned.
"Salvador Dali?" I looked at this woman for the first time, directly,
and my own Russian background from two generations back saw something
in those eyes that went deep and yet, I somehow didn't believe what
she had just said. It wasn't until I later asked the hotel concièrge
who this woman was and heard his incredulous answer, "But you didn't
know, Senior? that is Senora Dali."
 
Continued here: http://randulo.posterous.com/200911-second-meeting-with-gal

As you look back on your life, you realize how many branches are in
it. The choice of a job, of a mate, a place to live, a city, a
country... imagine all the possibilities.
 
When I got back to Los Angeles after my first gig in Paris, I
interviewed for and got hired for 3 jobs. I then made a decision to
take one of them, after trying Universal Studios for a couple of
weeks. I never did go work at KMEX, the Spanish-language television
station, but I did have a parking pass. What would have happened had I
taken the KMEX job? Would I be married to an Eva Longoria look-alike
and have five kids? My Spanish chops would surely be excellent by now?
Where would I be today in the job? Management? Still running the cart
player (which is now a computer program)?
 
In Fresno I had a woman friend I was very taken with. She was very
good looking, very bright and had class. What she saw in me, I can't
imagine. I had hair down way past my shoulders and a full red beard. I
liked being with her and she was probably someone I could have made a
life with. What if I had? Would I have continued playing music in bars
or gotten a "'real job"? Would we have had kids? Would we be living
near Stanford (where she moved) or stayed around Fresno. Or maybe gone
to New York? (She worked for a modeling agency.)
 
One night I came home very late to the place I lived and went to sleep
without removing my instruments from the car. I lived in a very
isolated area at that time, way off the street, with no passers-by to
ogle the equipment. Early the next morning, the phone started ringing
and I took it off the hook. What I learned later when someone came
knocking was that the call was the near neighbor to tell me my car was
being broken into. They stole not only all my instruments but a photo
album and an answering machine I had fixed for a friend. That machine
belonged to Hervé Villechaise ("Dee plane bosss, dee plane!") and it
had a very funny tape on it from a comedian buddy of his with a bunch
of great imitations. My photo album had a few irreplaceable things
like the note from Gala Dali and pictures of women I hung out with
while on tour in Europe. But what if I had gone out there to confront
two or more people robbing my car? What if they were armed? What if I
died or was injured?
 
Another time I was out on a highway in the middle of nowhere and Lou
and I stopped to relieve ourselves near a chain link fence. It was
pitch black and we suddenly saw a glint of steel and a light shined at
us. The guy holding the gun was more nervous than I was and I wasn't
exactly comfortable with a gun being waved at my face and body in
alternation. What if the nervous gun went off?
 
We all make decisions every day, but a few of them create branches of
life and death importance. We had often thought of going to Buenos
Aires to see friends. We could have been on the fatal Air France
flight, but that would have been pure chance had it happened.
 
On the other hand, someone else's decision can also change your life.
We were on a flight to Europe from Minneapolis once when the lighting
system went black, emergency lighting came on and the plane began
losing altitude with a change in the engine sound. The pilot announced
that it was nothing to worry about and things were normal within a
minute or so. About five minutes later, the incident repeated itself.
Then I recall the chilling announcement:

"Ladies and gentlemen, we just lost the second generator. The plane has three generators, so we still have one running, but only a maniac would cross the Atlantic with one generator."

We turned around although we were nearly to the point of no return.
Although the announcement was reassuring, the reason I say it was
chilling was the emphasis the pilot put on "only a maniac would cross
the Atlantic..". It sounded to me like the pilot and co-pilot had
argued about it. Would I be writing this today if the co-pilot had
prevailed?