February 15, 2023 • 50 mins
Ruby is coming home for Christmas, and Danelle has a plan to try to get her to stay — before she has to move out of her apartment. Danelle meets Cary Westcott, who walked through hell trying to find his daughter on the rails, and managed to bring her back home, to mixed results. The holidays are bumpy but hopeful, and Danelle discovers the Barn. Then, it's off to Texas.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Only one time. I had a kid pressed up into
the lockers. Security came and it didn't go well, and
he spelled his beans Cababa's. But as before, the p
guys got there. And when Carrie Westcott's daughter ran off,
he was desperate to find her in the halls of
her high school. He questioned her friends until he found
one who knew where she had gone. The score did
you off the property? Well to the office, then off
(00:31):
the property, And they knew who I was. I coached it,
and I want to high school for four years. They
knew who I was. But I'm looking for my daughter.
I'll walk through the fires at hell. Carrie was looking
for his daughter like I was. Like Carry as a
railroad engineer, after twenty years driving the train, he knows
all the dangers of the rails. That poor kid Carrie
(00:53):
pressed up against the locker told him Starla was in Hollywood.
Carry's route ended at eleven PM, not far away. Night
after night, he leave the train yard and searched the
streets for Starla. Was getting my car and drive up
to Hollywood. I had her picture and I was just
walking the streets up there, asking people that look like
locals if they've seen that girl. Finally, one of those
(01:16):
guys said, yeah, he was at that chick she she
panhals in front of the grounds Chinese Theater. Carry went
to the Grand Old Movie Theater on Hollywood's main drag
that he didn't find Starla in fun of graumans as
the days were in. Two weeks without finding her, Carrie
walked deeper into gang territory. I had people at work
cause I tell him they going back up there. And
then I said, yeah, I'm looking for my kid. Man,
(01:38):
They're not after me. You know, I'm not a hoodle one.
I'm just a guy looking for his kid. And finally
Carry's persistence paid off. He showed Starlet picture to a
gang member who said his boss might help Carry. So
he took me to his boss, and this guy knew her.
Was this guy he was one of the elders in
(01:59):
that eighteen Street gang. The Street Gang was one of
the most powerful in Los Angeles. He says, come back
here tomorrow night and I'll have her here. That's what
you said. Kerry would do whatever it took to find Starla,
even meeting up with a gang boss. My search for
Ruby had led me to do some pretty nutty things too.
(02:20):
But it was almost Christmas and Ruby was on the
Greyhound on your way home. This is my best shot
at keeping her here a few weeks. When we'd have
time to talk, I could find out more about why
she chose to leave and how she had been living
a few days before, I'd gotten bills in the mail
for Ruby from a hospital in Florida. What had happened
to her? No matter what, this was my chance to
(02:43):
remind her that home wasn't that bad. She didn't have
to flee. So of course I was excited, but I
had my daska. Anything I said or did could entice her.
How much had the rails changed her? But I recognized
the person coming off the Greyhound, and how can I
get that person to stay? I'm Deel Morton and this
is City of the Rails. The days before Ruby arrived,
(03:37):
I was racing around, buying her favorite muffins, splurging on
great coffee, the whole time imagining what it would be
like to have her back in the house. I had
a dozen scenarios, including one where we'd embraced at the
bus station and Ruby would announce she was home for good. Yeah,
that's not going to happen. Could we even have an
honest conversation. I know I'd be hiding a lot of
(03:59):
my thoughts, and she definitely had some secrets. Once my
overthinking exhausted me, I relaxed into the idea of hugging her,
holding her, even if it was just for a minute,
and feeling that she was safe. I needed to figure
out what could get her to stay, or even stay
a little longer. I made a plan, one that I
(04:19):
called the comfort Offensive. Ruby was staying in a bathroom
in Austin with her boyfriend and a pregnant pit bull
named Junks. I could beat that home. Under the comfort offensive.
Ruby would have clean sheets, I'd buy her flannel pjs,
a old navy and new slippers. I'd stock the fridge
reminders of the life we lead, but better carry. The
(04:42):
dad who chased his daughter through the dark streets of
Hollywood told me he tried a lot of things to
get Starlett to come home. What would he think about
the comfort offensive? We did the same exact thing. Remember
a new new comforter on the bed, and sheets and
clothes and food. Well that's weird. Do exact same thing.
Kill the fatted calf, give him the robe, but Carrie
(05:04):
and Starla weren't Ruby and Me and Starla was home now.
She had been living with Carrie and his wife Ginger
for the last six months in her childhood bedroom. At
the age of forty three, Carrie invited me over to
meet the family on an early morning in December. I
arrived at their house on a hill overlooking the desert.
I was eatre for any inside he could offer. Here's
(05:26):
like quite a set up here. There's a swimming pool,
there's like a water fall. There's two horses, greene horses,
and huge corral basketball court. So what are the names
of your horses? This is Baby, this is Dallas. The
(05:48):
place was immaculate, with the shrubbery, neatly trimmed pathway swept clean,
and a pristine pool. It was clear that this backyard
was Carrie's domain when he built over time with his
own two hands. An inside was his wife, Ginger's realm.
In the dining room, where Carrie and I spoke, she
had a collection of dozens of hurricane lamps and heaps
of nineteen seventies California pottery. Though it was beautiful, there
(06:12):
was something a little overwhelming about this house. Well, we spoke.
Carrie's grandson. Starler's teenage boy was in the kitchen making
the world's slowest breakfast as he eavesdropped on the interview.
Carrie and I talked for more than an hour. The
grandson was there for at least forty five minutes, frying
one strip of bacon at a time at different times
(06:33):
in our interview. There were three generations of Westcott's in
the room. So even though Starla was off the rails,
she was still Carrie's responsibility. Her whole family was, including
her nine year old daughter, who Carrie and Ginger were raising.
How did this come to be? Would Starlet's story give
me any insight into Ruby's? Once we settled in, Carrie
started right off. She ran away from home and she
(06:56):
was junior in high school. They just couldn't. I couldn't
keep her home, and it pretty sure got to point
where I didn't try. But before that, Carrie and Starla
had been very close. They spent all their afternoons together
as Carrie coach Starla, who was a phenomenal softball pitcher.
He was a standout blue chip athletes. She was. Did
you have a natural gift? She did? She was thrown
(07:17):
in the low sixties by the time she was in
high school, and there's kids that are way faster than
that now. But her big road to success was she
had eleven different pitches and even though there were well
there aren't for most people. Carrie hired private coaches and
sent her to special summer camps. Every night they practiced
in the backyard. We video her because I was real
(07:40):
serious about it. I would watch just watch her, you know,
and I could feel it. I could feel the ball.
And then you take the softball and I would get
magic marker and put red and blue so I could
see the rotation of the ball, which way it's traveling,
so I could tell if she was putting snap on
the ball. Those knights in the backyard paid off. Starler
(08:04):
started competing in state tournaments, but at the same time,
Starla was developing a rebellious streak. When she turned fourteen,
Starla dyed her hair neon pink and started wearing tattered
fishness under her shorts, but she was still doing great
on the mound at first. Carry loved it. When Starla
brought the punk attitude to a tournament. We went to
(08:25):
the Women's Nationals in Wisconsin, dyed her hair purple, and
she bought a cheese hat at the airport. You've seen
those cheese hats. Starle cut holes in her hat to
thread her hair through. She had purple Liberty spikes sticking
up through a cheese at, which they took magic marker,
and she put tattoos on the inside of her arms.
And she's already six ft tall, and she had these
(08:47):
Nike cleats that went halfway up her calf. Were Madison,
Wisconsin girls still have their pigtails intwear in pinafores. And
then you got Zeene to the Warrior princess from California.
You know, trash talking Starla was on her way. But
around age fifteen, she lost interest in softball and started
(09:09):
getting into punk music. Her graves fell and she was
blasting music at all hours. There was more and more
conflict with her dad, and the day she was scheduled
to meet with college softball scouts, she ran away. So, hey, dad,
you you wanted it. I didn't. I never felt threatened,
(09:31):
but you just feel Oh yo, the eighteen Street gang.
I'm not a hoodle, I'm not dealing drugs, I'm not
on your turb I'm looking for my kid. The longer
she was gone, the further Carry walked from the swanky
parts of the Sunset Strip until finally he found the
gang leader who knew where Starla was living an abandoned
warehouse over here, and they wouldn't tell me where. The
(09:52):
next night, the bus told his deputy to escort Carry
to the squad where Starlett and the others were staying.
I was thrilled. I was nervous because last time I started,
we're not getting along, but I'm going to get her home.
Carry stood outside the warehouse, yelling Starla's name, refusing the
budge until she came out. But a random woman walked
(10:13):
out instead. And she came out because you know what,
starl has a new family now and it's us. And
I said, bullshit, She's got a family at home and
she needs to get home, and that's why i'm here.
Carry stood his ground, and finally Starla walked out of
the warehouse. Carry grabbed her getting the car, getting the car,
and then she gave me ship right then, and I
(10:36):
was afraid that she's going to get out of the car.
She didn't, and we went home and we didn't get
in a fight because threatening and fighting with her was
not going to ever win because she'd take off again.
So she lasted a month. I don't remember exactly, not long.
(10:56):
So how does this leave you? Yeah, I just gotta
get on. I got I you know, I got my son,
I gotta raise and dangerous to be preoccupied. I really
had to distend myself from that. Hearing that Carrie was
(11:16):
only able to keep Starla home for a month was brutal.
He didn't say it out right, but the advice was clear.
Don't get your hopes up. Would a comfort offensive work?
I know it would have worked on the old Ruby,
but the new one, the one coming home on a
Greyhound after eight months on the rails, I didn't have
a clue that carries. I also got to sit down
(11:39):
with Styla to hear what coming home for Christmas was
like for her. He tracks you down in Hollywood. Do
you feel embarrassed or at the time? Yeah, yeah, at
the time, but no other parents are doing that, And
I really should have been like golf at somebody cares
about me, you know, kind of uncomfortable being home? Did
(12:01):
you feel that very uncomfortable? I slept in the backyard
with the dogs. Why was that. I don't know, I
just like being inside. I felt claustrophobic because I was
staying squats, you know, and or I would stay outside
and so being yeah, it was just claustrophobic, and you know,
and I'm pleased. They were like, oh, don't you want
(12:21):
to take a shower? And I was like, no, I'm good.
It had to be hard going from the freedom of
the road to a home crammed with parental expectations. A
lot of writers described the struggle to rejoin society after
leaving the rails. Sometimes they tried it, hated it, and
ended right back out there with eight months of living
(12:43):
in squats and sleeping under the stars. Make Ruby feel
claustrophobic at home too, And we're getting here to take
a shower be a battle. Those kids they come home.
We'd pick them up at the truck stop because they
would come home and trump whatever I sprang with the hose.
I thought, take your clothes off outside, just filthy, filthy dirty.
(13:04):
You know. I was used to take a bird bath
and you know, like not full on showers, and now
I looked so different when I did actually take a shower, though,
I always swear because I would wear, you know, chains
around my neck and and they would get filthy dirty
and like just the trains period, just like you know,
like you smell train? What does that smell like? Like
(13:26):
dirty steel? Starlet didn't just slide right back into family life.
I remember coming home for the holidays as a teenager
and feeling the same way. The unmet expectations behind every
maternal gesture made me want a bolt, and my mother
approved of what I was doing. I appreciated when Starla
(13:47):
said it plainly, God, I just wanted to drink. Nonetheless,
I slept home every night. Styler showed me maybe I
couldn't expect that, like I had a hard time, you know,
trying to adjust to it. So I wouldn't stay there
long a week or two, you know, and but I
slept outside with the dogs. Would we be also get
(14:07):
restless after just a week. Starla might see the love
and carry's actions now, but it's been years. Back then
she was piste off. She ran away many more times.
Starla was on the road from more than a decade,
and in all that time, Carrie never gave up on
trying to get her home. And now he had his wish.
So despite all of this. Despite the pain that you've
(14:32):
been through, the disappointment, you were still going to find
your daughter. I just, what's your motivation there? I don't know.
I just I don't give up on anything. I never
have on anything, And sometimes it's just it's just manifests
itself and a lot of times it's foolish. Yeah, maybe
(14:55):
it is foolish, but I bet it would feel worse
to stop. You have to do something. So it sounded
like my comfort offensive could backfire. All this bothering might
make Ruby claustrophobic. But what other tools that I have?
Someone else I asked for a new perspective was my
friend Dave Crowe. He's a tennis lawyer who used to
work with the unhoused in day's experience, What was the
(15:19):
best way to get someone off the streets? Unconditional love?
The real difference between the kids who get in the
day or trouble. Did they experience that? My guess is
not as much or maybe never. That's how I felt
from before she was born. But did she feel loved unconditionally?
(15:42):
That's not for me to decide. So I also asked
Dave what warning signs would show me that the road
had its hooks and Ruby. When you are in sort
of dire straits, when you are unable to kind of
take care of yourself on a healthy level, teeth start
to go. And that was true of homeless folks who
(16:04):
were mentally disambled, but it was also true of folks
who had just been out on the road a long time,
who had neglected some of that healthcare. So, yeah, the
first thing that goes or your teeth, and you're in trouble.
You're in trouble because you have nelected yourself in some way.
Maybe you're not care enough about yourself. With what Dave
(16:32):
said and Carrie's experience plus my own theories, my body
was electric with anxiety. I had so much to watch
out for when Ruby came home, and I still hadn't
asked her about those hospital bills. Ruby and her brother
Ben were both set to arrive home Christmas Eve. I
had a week to pull it all together. The day
she got home, we'd have a family dinner to welcome her.
(16:54):
They leave on Christmas Day to be with their dad
and step mom, and then I was throwing a big
Boxing Day party on the after that. Who knew how
long Ruby would stay and who knew how long I'd
be able to pretend like everything was normal. I was
penniless now after Simon and Schuster rejected my book. Not
(17:15):
just penniless, I was a dred dollars in debt. So
all of my party planning and Christmas shopping was going
on credit cards. So there I was making my shopping
list for the Christmas Eve dinner and the Boxing Day party,
sitting with my laptop at the dining room table with
a sinking feeling about how much more this would add
to my debt. When all of a sudden, my inbox pings.
(17:38):
It was Bank of America offering me a twenty dollar
unsecured loan. I smiled slightly, like a criminal about to
pull off a heist and raise my morning coffee and
a toast to the b of A. If Simon and
Schus who didn't believe in me, God damnit Bank of
America did. I was almost ready for the big day.
(17:59):
Ruby bus was arriving early Christmas Eve morning. I decided
not to say anything about my book or about how
I needed to move out of our beautiful apartment. I
wanted Ruby's Christmas at home to be cozy, warm, stable,
let's not let the truth get in the way of
that story. I was up at four am Christmas Eve,
(18:20):
not knowing what to do with myself, so I jumped
in the car and headed to the bus station early,
eager to see my daughter again. The comfort offensive was
about to begin. Six I am Christmas Eve. I parked
(18:44):
at the entrance to the Greyhound station, examining everyone who
walked by. Everyone coming off the bus looked weary, trying
to juggle their luggage and Christmas packages. The bus station
was a dump with a lot of sketchy characters hanging
around the benches. I stayed in my car. Someone with
a loose swagger wearing tattered clothes made a bee line
(19:05):
for my car, mace hanging from one belt loop and
a pocket knife from the other. I tent sed up
when they reached for the car door and opened it.
Who was this guy? It was Ruby. She had a
loose camouflage pants with ragged purple shorts over them, layers
of tattered sweaters, and a jean jacket with a huge
Johnny Cash panel across the back. She grinned at me
(19:31):
and cocked her head towards the back of the car.
I popped the trunk so she could toss in her path.
She hopped into the passenger seat. My dread that the
rails had changed my daughter beyond recognition went away. At
the sight of her, I had only one feeling. I
love her. We hugged and held it for a while. Wow,
(19:54):
she really smelled like cigarettes. When we broke apart, I
got a closer look at her. She was dirty, and
your skin seemed tired. I pulled away from the curb
and started towards home. Her voice was raspy and deeper
as she told funny stories about the cook she'd met
on the gray hat sprawled out in the passenger's seat,
(20:14):
legs wide. Ruby looked tough, and I noticed that, just
like Morgan's friend had advised, she dressed like a man.
But I didn't want to scrutinize her too much. I'd
spent so much of the last month's pouring over every
little bit of information I got from her. There, with
her here, at last, I just wanted to love her
and feel that connection, remind myself it was still there.
(20:41):
So here she was. What could I say? A lot
of times, it's best to say nothing. I just focused
on how much I loved having her here in my
car soon in our home. Seon to be making her breakfast.
The normal pieces of our life before she fled didn't
need any words. But what did she want? It was
(21:06):
dark in the house after we arrived, not quite the
sunny homecoming i'd pictured. As we walked up to the door,
I was a few steps ahead of Ruby. I fumbled
with my keys, trying to get in as quickly as possible.
I was chattering, running into her bedroom to turn down
the bed, pointing to the clean sheets, the stack of towels,
the pajamas, and the slippers atop the new comforter, and
(21:28):
then dragging her into the kitchen to show her the food,
holding out the special coffee, and even pulling out the
bacon from the fridge for her approval. Oh my god,
thinking about it now, it sounds like an addition weby
kind of didn't notice though it was six thirty a m.
She was tired. What she wanted to do first was
to take a shower. That gave me hope maybe the
(21:51):
comfort offensive had a chance. After her shower, we'd be
dressed in her new pjs and fuzzy slippers. X. We
needed to do her laundry. Family would be arriving to
welcome her home with a holiday dinner. I brought her
a big towel to bundle up the laundry. It was
a sad little pile, and boy did it stink. She
(22:12):
needed something aware, so we agreed she could open some
of her Christmas presents, early new socks, gray sweats, and
a striped long sleeved t shirt. I could see the
relief on her face as she relaxed into these clothes.
She looked great. By the time I got breakfast on
the table, the sun was up. Ruby sat in her
usual spot across from me at the widest part of
(22:34):
the table and propped her foot up on one of
the spare chairs. I commented on how much I liked
her cheerful red sox, but I was also thinking about
those hospital bills. But part of her got infected, and
how infected I stuffled That thought wasn't going to ruin
this relaxed breakfast with an interrogation. Carrie told me about
how that would play out On one of Starla's first
(22:57):
visits home for the holidays, when she was still writing.
Harry's own father was furious with her as soon as
the family gathered, he went off on Starla. What did
he say? Well, I just you know what you're You're
a West Scott and you you walked away from an
education and you've offended the family and the family name,
and just my dad's just that. I remember I look
(23:18):
at the top of the stairs since she was in
her bedroom and he's just hammering her. Next morning she
was gone. And do I blame my dad? I do
a little bit, just but my dad just wouldn't back off.
There would be no Grandpa like lectures coming from me
or from any of my family members if I could
help it. Ruby's brother Ben was coming in from New
(23:40):
York in a few hours, and I had warned him
and everyone else in the family not to press Ruby
to answer questions or to criticize her. Christmas is a
season of love for the refugee, for the people who
don't have homes. Remember that and bathe her in love.
Fingers crossed her dad and Grandpa would remember that. At
the dinner and all my running around downtown spending Bank
(24:04):
of America's money, I bought Christmas presents, planned some expensive meals,
and made some impulse purchases in the back aisle of
the toy store on sale. I bought two pairs of
Hulk hands for Ben and Ruby. They hadn't seen each
other in a while, and I thought this might be
a fun way to ease the tension. Ben was only
home an hour when I presented the hands to him
(24:25):
and Ruby. In case you don't know about the magic
of Hulk hands, here's Ben. They are big green foam
gloves with a speaker in them that would make Hulk
noises when you hit somebody or you banged the other.
Maybe duking it out like this could help them break
(24:45):
the ice. They've never been very close, and that distance
grew when Ruby ditched us at graduation. I see her sporadically,
as through sheer willpower on your part. She's compelled to
finish high school, and then she's gone. And then she
sort of appeared, and during that time she became someone
(25:07):
that I didn't know anymore. Even though they'd always been
different since she had left, that contrast seemed greater. You know,
she wants to be free and not have to work,
and and she kind of wants to say funck it
to everything. And I was trying as hard as I
could to buy into the system at that time. You know,
(25:28):
if I could just find a way to get a
job that made me feel good about myself, and so
I never I just felt like I would never knew
how to connect with her at that time in her life.
It was clear they were in very different places in
life enterns. I remember being in the living rooms and
(25:55):
it was winter, so it was dark, and I remember,
are the squaring off? You know, We're both looking and
I have a photo of this somewhere. We're both looking
at each other with with our muscles flax ready to
goof off, trying to beat the ship out of each
other with these hull hands. And I remember this sort
(26:20):
of split experience of a family and pracess in that moment,
because we were having fun in a way that felt
very familiar, and we have this feeling of this is
how our family should be. And then just below the
surface was the the agony of are we safe? Are
(26:42):
we okay? What do we do for her? So I
was puttering around, fussing, setting out food, listening to the
laughter from the living room and the hull hands smashing together.
Who knew what the outcome of this visit would be?
(27:03):
This night felt like a victory. I had both of
my children under my roof again, and we were happy.
Ruby was clean, fed and would be sleeping safely tonight,
and she was only ten ft from me. I was
going to get the best sleep of the year. The
(27:30):
next morning, Christmas morning, I got up and made coffee
and started soaking the bread for Ruby's favorite French toast.
Ben got up and was hungry. I wanted to open presence.
I knocked on Ruby's door and knocked again. I opened
it and saw she was gone. I called her, but
(27:52):
no answer. I went back to making breakfast. I was anxious,
searching my memory for something I said that could have
given Ruby a reason to leave. And then, of course
there were no guarantees. CARRY had tried new betting and everything,
and still Starlotte told me how she shunned the new
comforter and went to sleep with the dogs. Then my
(28:14):
mood switched to fury. All the effort I had gone
through to get her here, all the money to make
this a special holiday, and the way I zipped my
lips and not said any of the things that came
to me late at night when I couldn't sleep all
this time, I disciplined myself not to offend Ruby, and
still she was gone. But I had to remind myself
(28:35):
the most important thing was to keep her here as
long as I could manage it. So when Ruby did
show up an hour later for Christmas breakfast, I was
happy to see her, no questions asked. After breakfast, we
opened presents with lots of laughter, and then Ruby and
Ben got ready for Christmas Day with their dad. They
(28:56):
came back that evening, but minutes after returning home, Ruby
left again, this time not even sneaking out. She just
grabbed her stuff and said see you, and walked out
the door. I shrugged. Asking her about where she was going,
or trying to guilt her about Christmas might just kiss
her off. Harry warned me about how a lecture would
go when he told me about dragging Style at home
(29:17):
from that warehouse in Hollywood. I still remember thinking to myself,
I'm not gonna deal with this. I'm not gonna throw
out admonishments, no, no restrict nothing. So I got in
a car took her to school, and she gets out
of the car and we didn't talk at all. I said,
Glad you're safe, Glad your home. She looks at me
and says, all I need to know is my restriction.
(29:39):
I said, well, let's do the math here. You stole
your mom's car, you went out all night, you're seventeen
years old, you got a ticket for reckless driving doing
eighty five. What do you think, Because that's all I
need to know, slammed the door. I didnt see her
for eight months, just when falling out and Styler was gone.
So I didn't say anything and Ruby left Christmas night anyway,
(30:02):
I knew i'd see her the next day. I was
throwing a big Boxing Day party with her friends, Ben's
and mine. This party was a big deal for me.
I wanted to celebrate Ruby being home. I also knew
it would be one last time to bring everyone together
in my beautiful apartment. All my leftist friends for my
years at Berkeley were coming. Musicians and journalists would be
(30:23):
intermixed with my son's academic crowd and all the squat
house punks. What a combination. I got one of those
sweet spiral cut hams and made biscuits. I made my
mom's Swedish meatballs. When people asked what they could bring,
I said beer. Boomer men loved to spend money on beer.
I knew the Hoboes would be impressed. The guest started
(30:46):
to arrive, and suddenly there were fifty people in my apartment.
I love seeing Ruby's friends. They were happy to see
me too, every one of them greeting me with open arms.
I'd look over my shoulder to see if Ruby was
noticing this. The ice was packed with half a dozen
punks on their front steps, smoking with some of my
formerly delinquent pals, intergenerational discussions about anarchy next to the
(31:08):
spiral ham with my political friends. I warned my friends
the same way I'd warned my family, no interrogations of Ruby.
They kind of heard me, kind of not. I kept
hearing them ask Ruby, with voices dripping and condescending concern,
how are you? I could see from the expression on
Ruby's face this was getting really old, really fast. The
(31:31):
party lasted till two am, but when it was over,
Ruby left with her friends. I didn't see Ruby for
days after that party. So far, she hadn't spent a
single night at home, but I knew i'd see her again.
We had business to conduct. She needed a new I
d she couldn't get on the plane without one. We
(31:52):
had an appointment for her at the d m V
a few days after Christmas, but I hadn't heard anything
from her. I didn't care if she missed this spot,
she'd have to be here longer. But Ruby knew that too.
She showed up at home an hour before her appointment,
and we jumped in the car and they crowded d
(32:13):
m V waiting room. Ruby pulled the number from the dispenser.
There were twenty numbers ahead of her, so we'd be
waiting at least an hour. We settled into our seats
and waited in silence. Sitting in the plastic cease, I
realized I had her captured. Asked her about the hospital bills.
Asked her about the hospital bills kept shouting in my head.
But then I also didn't want to ask her. In
(32:35):
some ways, I didn't want to know the answer or
learn why she'd been hospitalized. Finally, I worked up the
courage to say something. It was my Grandpa moment. I
turned to Ruby and mentioned the bills from the Gainesville.
I was anxious, but Ruby seemed unfazed. I told her
my nurse friends said the doctors had prescribed antibiotics only
(32:57):
used for the most serious infections. What happened Moruby was
a matter of fact. She said, her foot got infected
living on the streets in Florida in the summer. My
friend made an herbal poultice, but it just made the
infection worse. Then they applied calamine lotion and it got
a lot worse. So they went to the emergency room.
A nurse admitted her to the hospital and they kept
(33:17):
her there for three days. Three days. I was in shock,
I said. The staff must have feared for your life.
Ruby rolled her eyes a little at my retroactive anxiety. No,
she said. They told her if they didn't treat her
foot infection aggressively, they'd have to amputate, amputate. I was
about to jump out of my seat. Didn't this frighten her?
(33:39):
It's a pretty big sign it's time to get off
the rails. She shrugged her shoulders and fine, she said,
my foot's fine. It's not like I see my foot
as a symbol of life on the road. Stuff happens.
She was sorry, she told me, Anticipating I was about
to lecture her about needing to come home. There in
the d m VS harsh lighting, Ruby told me, I
(34:00):
love this, and I'm not coming home until I'm done.
I guess I had my answer about the comfort offensive.
We didn't say another word until her number was called.
On the way home for the d m V. The
mood in the car was hot. I had a dozen
more things I wanted to say to her, but as
(34:22):
Carrie knew, delivering them would be more for me than
they would be for her. The radical freedom Ruby embraced
made a prisoner out of me, as it had of carry.
I didn't know what to say, how to behave, and
so against my impulses, I said nothing. I was afraid
I'd lose it and push her away. Maybe she'd made
the right choice by not staying home. My plan hadn't worked.
(34:48):
Should Ruby like to drop in for a meal, to
have a mom willing to drive her anywhere and buy
her whatever she needed? But she didn't really need any
of that. She had no malice towards me, but it
wasn't about up me, And honestly, I had my own
crisis underway. Dollars from Bank of America was going fast.
I needed to cut my overhead. I'd given notice to
(35:11):
my landlady that I was leaving at the end of January,
and I still didn't know where I was going. M
(35:31):
The holidays were over, and I still wasn't seeing much
of Ruby while we waited for her license to arrive.
One reason was that she'd fallen right back into the
local music scene. She had gigs at clubs and house
shows just like before a New Year's Eve. Her band
brought down the house and a local record producer approached
her about recording an album. Maybe I couldn't keep Ruby here,
(35:52):
but music might. That was my low level of hope
as I trudged up the stairs and collected the mail.
A week or so into the new year, when I
saw an envelope from the d m V, my stomach dropped.
I had been relying on the sluggish bureaucracy to keep
her home for at least three weeks, but her new
I D came after only two. I called Ruby and
(36:15):
she let out a yelp of joy. The timing was perfect.
The album was done, the record release party was in
a few days, and she could leave right after that.
Plus her pregnant pit bull Junks had just given birth
to ten puppies, and her boyfriend was waiting. She got
off the phone to call her dad so he could
book her flight back to Austin. So much for the
(36:35):
comfort offensive. The album release party was in an art
gallery and it went on till one o'clock in the morning,
and the next day Ruby's plane was leaving. She showed
up at home two hours before her flight. We packed
her up in a frenzy and raced to the airport.
She'd stayed for nearly a month, longer than Carry had
managed to hold onto Starler that first time, and even
(36:57):
though the comfort offensive didn't keep her home, Ruby was softer,
happier than the young woman I had collected at the
bus station, not thanks to me alone. It was clear
how love she was by her family, friends and her fans.
We met her father at the airport. As we got
(37:18):
her things out of the car, it was hugs all around.
We said our goodbyes, feigning cheerfulness, telling Mauby how much
we loved her and we minded her. All she had
to do was say the word and we'd get her home.
I felt frantic Asruby hoisted her pack onto her back.
I didn't want her to go, but if she was
going to leave, I wanted it to be over. It
(37:38):
was too hard to say goodbye. She thanked us for
the good visit and all the Christmas presents. As she
gathered up the last of her stuff, she told me
it was a good thing she was leaving. She would
get back just in time for her appointment with the
dentist that served the unhoused in Austin. The dentist was
concerned about her back teeth and just might pull them.
I flashed back to what Dave Crow said about trouble
(38:00):
with teeth as a sign and someone was slipping into
permanent homelessness. I didn't want to believe that this was true,
and even after this visit, I didn't know. Ruby turned
around to walk into the airport. I watched her disappear
through the double doors. My final thought as the doors
closed behind her, I don't know when I'm going to
(38:23):
see her again. I got back into my car and
pulled away. I held my tears in until I got
to the freeway, and then I cried all the way home.
When I got home from the airport, I saw Ruby
CD sitting on the kitchen counter and grabbed it. I
(38:45):
put it in the CD player and sat on the
couch in the living room. I looked out onto the
Lake and the Oakland skyline beyond. As the first chords
of her ukulele music came from the speakers. I hadn't
heard that since she graduated, and for the first time
I could appreciate the lyrics. I recognized she was singing
(39:07):
about her suicide attempt. Yes, the lyrics described when it
all went wrong back when we lived in l A
came out with the brand new drugs and that sadded
a pull up plug. I remember that last passage from
(39:29):
when she sang it at graduation. And while I was
furious when she ditched us, after all I learned about
hoboes and what I just pulled off with the Bank
of America, I couldn't help but smile at how Ruby
had made her escape. What a differenced those eight months made.
But the lyrics had some brightness. When Moby looked ahead,
when she imagined the world beyond high school, she was optimistic.
(39:53):
And when that bropriate you places away from me. I
can't remember how many times I listened to Santa Monica,
and it had to be at least ten, with pauses
in between. After I opened a bottle of wine. Every
time I listened to it, I felt as though I
knew her better, she had been in such pain more
(40:13):
than I ever saw. Look what I've done made up.
Ruby was gone and only she would decide when to
come back. And I was supposed to move in a week.
(40:36):
I had a lot to do. The problem was most
of that ship wasn't getting done. Every time I started
the dining room table to figure out my life, I
just end up gazing out at the lake, and then
nothing would happen but memories, the joy of moving into
this beautiful place with the money from a book deal,
and the comfort of being back where I was born,
watching Ruby thrive in her new school, and then embracing
(40:59):
her fascinating eating friends that kept showing up for dinner.
All of that tinge with a golden light reflected from
the lake had come to this me. Hunting through Craigslist,
trying to find an apartment to share at the age
of fifty three, I scrolled to the very end of
the listings without finding anything suited to me. I hadn't
looked for a place in the Bay Area in five years,
(41:19):
not since two thousand and four, and the tech boom
had sent rental prices skyward. I couldn't afford to pay
three thousand, five hundred dollars for a one bedroom apartment,
and I didn't want to live next door to somebody
who could. Then I saw a room for rent at
a place called the Barn. The six d and fifty
dollars a month, I could get a big room on
(41:40):
the top floor of a former shipbuilding warehouse facing the
San Francisco Bay. I called them up and the landlord,
Michael Hammond, gave me perfect directions. Head south toward the
abandoned shipyard just below the housing projects, and turned left
at the Headless Horse. It was a steve drop down
a perilous road to the rough pay and of the
(42:00):
barn parking lot, where half a dozen people were going
about some unusual business. And as steep as it was,
this fall from Grace was turning out to be a
lot more interesting than I expected. There was a man
loading up a life sized version of the children's game
The Mouse Trap onto a truck, and a woman dressed
in full belly dancing attire entering her car. It felt
(42:21):
like I'd dropped down off the main road and into
a staging area for burning man, but I'd found the
Barn and Michael greeted me at the top of the
stairs and showed me around the kitchen and party space.
It had a dining room table that could easily seat sixteen,
all of it with an unobstructed view of the bay. Amazing.
I asked Michael about the mail, which was bulging out
(42:43):
of the box at the top of the hill next
to the headless horse statue. Who brought it down from
up there? Anybody can? He said, somebody goes to get
it whenever they're expecting a check, which is not very often.
What a stroke of luck. I'd found the barn, the
last place in San franc Cisco where money didn't seem
to matter. This was it. I didn't hesitate in saying
(43:05):
I'd take it, and Michael agreed. He said I'd fit
right in, and I took that as a compliment. So
I had a place, a place to hunker down to rebuild.
Hope has had it right. Sure, I wasn't going to
hop a train, but I'm happy to live with a
whole bunch of people and not spend much money. Now,
all I had to do was to get rid of
(43:26):
my stuff. I was under the illusion that because I
liked my stuff, it had value I was about to
get a rude shock about that. In the open market
of Craig's list, I put up the teak patio furniture
I bought for two thousand dollars. When I got hired
at people for the bargain price of five hundred, someone
offered me three hundred. I said, fuck you. Fuck you
(43:48):
is not a negotiating strategy. I was so emotional about
this practical transaction. It was as if they were commenting
on my value. After a few degrading days of this,
I decided I'd give it all away. I put up
an ad that said it's all free, and at nine
am the next day, they were a dozen people waiting
on the front steps. A studious Middle Eastern girl and
(44:10):
her family were delighted by Ruby's bedroom set. I was
thrilled when the girl opened the door to Ruby's room
and exclaimed, Mommy, I love that desk. A Mexican family
who had been burned out of their apartment took most
of my kitchen, including the stoneware dishes from my wedding.
But the best moment for me was when a young
single mom and her two kids, a boy and a girl,
were smitten with the beat up old oak dining room
(44:33):
table I was so attached to. They sat at it,
and the mom rubbed its edges, the divids, and the
and the scratches. Do the chairs come with it, the
chairs and the hatch, if you'll have it? I said,
thank you. She said, this is just what we need.
And while all these strangers cheerfully stripped my apartment bear,
I said a silent thank you to Ruby. In some way,
(44:55):
after this visit, I was set free. I was lighter
on the ground with most of my possessions gone, and
I was lighter by acknowledging how the comfort I offered
Ruby and my gin d up comfort offensive was something
she had no use for. And I had been a
big phony to Chicken to discuss how she was living
her life and acting like that was noble. I wasn't
(45:17):
telling her about my book getting canceled, and soon I
wouldn't be living in this apartment, And the fact that
she had not answered any of my questions showed there
was a lot about her life she didn't think I
should know. We both had secrets to protect. But I
had to let this go and release both of us
from my worries. It would be a process, though, and
in the nights after she left, I would sit on
(45:39):
the couch and listen to her music over and over.
There was another song on that CD that stuck with me,
one that I played almost as much as Santa Monica,
called windows sell Ip sitting on your window sill. The
daytime was getting colder, and a field sill night time windows.
(46:05):
So the lyrics reminded me that when I cleaned Ruby's
room before Christmas, I'd noticed the screen was off her window,
stashed in the corner of the closet, and they were
shoeprints on the window sill itself. Ruby had wanted to
go long before I realized it, and now am I
packed up empty apartment. My life was down to the
necessities my bed, my desk, and some boxes. In that void.
(46:26):
I wondered if maybe Ruby had been right to stay away,
to keep our interactions minimal and positive. No opportunities for
my questions or lectures, no temper tantrums, none of that
would bring her closer to me. She had lived with
me for eighteen years. She knew what I valued and expected.
A bit of me remained inside her, and that was
(46:47):
what I believed would bring her back. Yeah, I think
it's the right time. Only she could tell me when
whoa to be my so. I knew Ruby would come
home when it suited her, and I couldn't predict how
long she'd be away. The best I could do was
(47:08):
wait and keep making contacts, keep learning. One day they
might come in handy, because after all, I'm a journalist,
an independent of Ruby. This is one hell of a story,
a story that has never been fully told. Who really
runs the train yard? To answer this, I knew who
I had to talk to, the rail cops. I never
(47:30):
expected the city of the rails to have a private
police force. And the more I learned, the more shocked
I was. We're bulls, we do what we want. We're
in control. We can outdo anybody, FBI, anybody. The rail
police are not just rent a cops. They have full
police powers and national jurisdiction and state. We're FEDS to
(47:50):
being out bolt and there's no public scrutiny, thank you none.
So next time, going to El Paso, right up against Mexico.
It's a major fraid hub and the international border, which
makes it a crossroads for hobo smugglers and thieves and
the perfect place to see what rail cops are all about.
It's kind of like walking into another dimension, another world.
(48:13):
He just took off. You know, I need your ride
in the rail like you know what. These chicks were
as tough as nails. They knew the game, They had
the attitude, and they were not afraid say Montica Sica
(48:44):
fourteen as well be drinking gasol. Look what you've done.
City of the Rail is written and hosted by me
to L Morton and developed in partnership between Flip Turn
Studios and I Heeart Podcasts. Thank you to everyone who's
(49:07):
been calling us and giving us great tips and sharing memories.
We want more. Leave a message at seven oh seven, six, five,
three oh three nine. You just might end up on
the show. A lot of you been saying you love
the music. Well, I've got a treat for you. I'm
sharing my playlist of modern hobo music. The link will
be in the show notes. Our team is executive producer
(49:28):
and show runner Julian Weller and executive producer Mark Healey.
Senior producer and editing master A Booza far I miss
a Boo He's gone on to another show, but I
just wanted to say tip of the hat to you
for being the only person I've ever written with who
can replicate my sense of humor. And producers Emilie Maronough,
she no Ozaki, and Zoey Denkla. Shout out to My
(49:50):
Lady Squad with production support from Marcy to Pina. Original
music every episode by Aaron Kaufman. Our theme music is
Wayfaring Stranger, performed by pro Faint Sass thanks to Scott
Michaud at Flail Records. Our logo is by Lucy Kingdonia
and uses a photograph by Mike Brody and at I
Heart thanks to Nikki e Tor and Bethan Michaloso. We'll
(50:12):
be back next week in Texas on the City of
the Rails.
Only one time. I had a kid pressed up into
the lockers. Security came and it didn't go well, and
he spelled his beans Cababa's. But as before, the p
guys got there. And when Carrie Westcott's daughter ran off,
he was desperate to find her in the halls of
her high school. He questioned her friends until he found
one who knew where she had gone. The score did
you off the property? Well to the office, then off
(00:31):
the property, And they knew who I was. I coached it,
and I want to high school for four years. They
knew who I was. But I'm looking for my daughter.
I'll walk through the fires at hell. Carrie was looking
for his daughter like I was. Like Carry as a
railroad engineer, after twenty years driving the train, he knows
all the dangers of the rails. That poor kid Carrie
(00:53):
pressed up against the locker told him Starla was in Hollywood.
Carry's route ended at eleven PM, not far away. Night
after night, he leave the train yard and searched the
streets for Starla. Was getting my car and drive up
to Hollywood. I had her picture and I was just
walking the streets up there, asking people that look like
locals if they've seen that girl. Finally, one of those
(01:16):
guys said, yeah, he was at that chick she she
panhals in front of the grounds Chinese Theater. Carry went
to the Grand Old Movie Theater on Hollywood's main drag
that he didn't find Starla in fun of graumans as
the days were in. Two weeks without finding her, Carrie
walked deeper into gang territory. I had people at work
cause I tell him they going back up there. And
then I said, yeah, I'm looking for my kid. Man,
(01:38):
They're not after me. You know, I'm not a hoodle one.
I'm just a guy looking for his kid. And finally
Carry's persistence paid off. He showed Starlet picture to a
gang member who said his boss might help Carry. So
he took me to his boss, and this guy knew her.
Was this guy he was one of the elders in
(01:59):
that eighteen Street gang. The Street Gang was one of
the most powerful in Los Angeles. He says, come back
here tomorrow night and I'll have her here. That's what
you said. Kerry would do whatever it took to find Starla,
even meeting up with a gang boss. My search for
Ruby had led me to do some pretty nutty things too.
(02:20):
But it was almost Christmas and Ruby was on the
Greyhound on your way home. This is my best shot
at keeping her here a few weeks. When we'd have
time to talk, I could find out more about why
she chose to leave and how she had been living
a few days before, I'd gotten bills in the mail
for Ruby from a hospital in Florida. What had happened
to her? No matter what, this was my chance to
(02:43):
remind her that home wasn't that bad. She didn't have
to flee. So of course I was excited, but I
had my daska. Anything I said or did could entice her.
How much had the rails changed her? But I recognized
the person coming off the Greyhound, and how can I
get that person to stay? I'm Deel Morton and this
is City of the Rails. The days before Ruby arrived,
(03:37):
I was racing around, buying her favorite muffins, splurging on
great coffee, the whole time imagining what it would be
like to have her back in the house. I had
a dozen scenarios, including one where we'd embraced at the
bus station and Ruby would announce she was home for good. Yeah,
that's not going to happen. Could we even have an
honest conversation. I know I'd be hiding a lot of
(03:59):
my thoughts, and she definitely had some secrets. Once my
overthinking exhausted me, I relaxed into the idea of hugging her,
holding her, even if it was just for a minute,
and feeling that she was safe. I needed to figure
out what could get her to stay, or even stay
a little longer. I made a plan, one that I
(04:19):
called the comfort Offensive. Ruby was staying in a bathroom
in Austin with her boyfriend and a pregnant pit bull
named Junks. I could beat that home. Under the comfort offensive.
Ruby would have clean sheets, I'd buy her flannel pjs,
a old navy and new slippers. I'd stock the fridge
reminders of the life we lead, but better carry. The
(04:42):
dad who chased his daughter through the dark streets of
Hollywood told me he tried a lot of things to
get Starlett to come home. What would he think about
the comfort offensive? We did the same exact thing. Remember
a new new comforter on the bed, and sheets and
clothes and food. Well that's weird. Do exact same thing.
Kill the fatted calf, give him the robe, but Carrie
(05:04):
and Starla weren't Ruby and Me and Starla was home now.
She had been living with Carrie and his wife Ginger
for the last six months in her childhood bedroom. At
the age of forty three, Carrie invited me over to
meet the family on an early morning in December. I
arrived at their house on a hill overlooking the desert.
I was eatre for any inside he could offer. Here's
(05:26):
like quite a set up here. There's a swimming pool,
there's like a water fall. There's two horses, greene horses,
and huge corral basketball court. So what are the names
of your horses? This is Baby, this is Dallas. The
(05:48):
place was immaculate, with the shrubbery, neatly trimmed pathway swept clean,
and a pristine pool. It was clear that this backyard
was Carrie's domain when he built over time with his
own two hands. An inside was his wife, Ginger's realm.
In the dining room, where Carrie and I spoke, she
had a collection of dozens of hurricane lamps and heaps
of nineteen seventies California pottery. Though it was beautiful, there
(06:12):
was something a little overwhelming about this house. Well, we spoke.
Carrie's grandson. Starler's teenage boy was in the kitchen making
the world's slowest breakfast as he eavesdropped on the interview.
Carrie and I talked for more than an hour. The
grandson was there for at least forty five minutes, frying
one strip of bacon at a time at different times
(06:33):
in our interview. There were three generations of Westcott's in
the room. So even though Starla was off the rails,
she was still Carrie's responsibility. Her whole family was, including
her nine year old daughter, who Carrie and Ginger were raising.
How did this come to be? Would Starlet's story give
me any insight into Ruby's? Once we settled in, Carrie
started right off. She ran away from home and she
(06:56):
was junior in high school. They just couldn't. I couldn't
keep her home, and it pretty sure got to point
where I didn't try. But before that, Carrie and Starla
had been very close. They spent all their afternoons together
as Carrie coach Starla, who was a phenomenal softball pitcher.
He was a standout blue chip athletes. She was. Did
you have a natural gift? She did? She was thrown
(07:17):
in the low sixties by the time she was in
high school, and there's kids that are way faster than
that now. But her big road to success was she
had eleven different pitches and even though there were well
there aren't for most people. Carrie hired private coaches and
sent her to special summer camps. Every night they practiced
in the backyard. We video her because I was real
(07:40):
serious about it. I would watch just watch her, you know,
and I could feel it. I could feel the ball.
And then you take the softball and I would get
magic marker and put red and blue so I could
see the rotation of the ball, which way it's traveling,
so I could tell if she was putting snap on
the ball. Those knights in the backyard paid off. Starler
(08:04):
started competing in state tournaments, but at the same time,
Starla was developing a rebellious streak. When she turned fourteen,
Starla dyed her hair neon pink and started wearing tattered
fishness under her shorts, but she was still doing great
on the mound at first. Carry loved it. When Starla
brought the punk attitude to a tournament. We went to
(08:25):
the Women's Nationals in Wisconsin, dyed her hair purple, and
she bought a cheese hat at the airport. You've seen
those cheese hats. Starle cut holes in her hat to
thread her hair through. She had purple Liberty spikes sticking
up through a cheese at, which they took magic marker,
and she put tattoos on the inside of her arms.
And she's already six ft tall, and she had these
(08:47):
Nike cleats that went halfway up her calf. Were Madison,
Wisconsin girls still have their pigtails intwear in pinafores. And
then you got Zeene to the Warrior princess from California.
You know, trash talking Starla was on her way. But
around age fifteen, she lost interest in softball and started
(09:09):
getting into punk music. Her graves fell and she was
blasting music at all hours. There was more and more
conflict with her dad, and the day she was scheduled
to meet with college softball scouts, she ran away. So, hey, dad,
you you wanted it. I didn't. I never felt threatened,
(09:31):
but you just feel Oh yo, the eighteen Street gang.
I'm not a hoodle, I'm not dealing drugs, I'm not
on your turb I'm looking for my kid. The longer
she was gone, the further Carry walked from the swanky
parts of the Sunset Strip until finally he found the
gang leader who knew where Starla was living an abandoned
warehouse over here, and they wouldn't tell me where. The
(09:52):
next night, the bus told his deputy to escort Carry
to the squad where Starlett and the others were staying.
I was thrilled. I was nervous because last time I started,
we're not getting along, but I'm going to get her home.
Carry stood outside the warehouse, yelling Starla's name, refusing the
budge until she came out. But a random woman walked
(10:13):
out instead. And she came out because you know what,
starl has a new family now and it's us. And
I said, bullshit, She's got a family at home and
she needs to get home, and that's why i'm here.
Carry stood his ground, and finally Starla walked out of
the warehouse. Carry grabbed her getting the car, getting the car,
and then she gave me ship right then, and I
(10:36):
was afraid that she's going to get out of the car.
She didn't, and we went home and we didn't get
in a fight because threatening and fighting with her was
not going to ever win because she'd take off again.
So she lasted a month. I don't remember exactly, not long.
(10:56):
So how does this leave you? Yeah, I just gotta
get on. I got I you know, I got my son,
I gotta raise and dangerous to be preoccupied. I really
had to distend myself from that. Hearing that Carrie was
(11:16):
only able to keep Starla home for a month was brutal.
He didn't say it out right, but the advice was clear.
Don't get your hopes up. Would a comfort offensive work?
I know it would have worked on the old Ruby,
but the new one, the one coming home on a
Greyhound after eight months on the rails, I didn't have
a clue that carries. I also got to sit down
(11:39):
with Styla to hear what coming home for Christmas was
like for her. He tracks you down in Hollywood. Do
you feel embarrassed or at the time? Yeah, yeah, at
the time, but no other parents are doing that, And
I really should have been like golf at somebody cares
about me, you know, kind of uncomfortable being home? Did
(12:01):
you feel that very uncomfortable? I slept in the backyard
with the dogs. Why was that. I don't know, I
just like being inside. I felt claustrophobic because I was
staying squats, you know, and or I would stay outside
and so being yeah, it was just claustrophobic, and you know,
and I'm pleased. They were like, oh, don't you want
(12:21):
to take a shower? And I was like, no, I'm good.
It had to be hard going from the freedom of
the road to a home crammed with parental expectations. A
lot of writers described the struggle to rejoin society after
leaving the rails. Sometimes they tried it, hated it, and
ended right back out there with eight months of living
(12:43):
in squats and sleeping under the stars. Make Ruby feel
claustrophobic at home too, And we're getting here to take
a shower be a battle. Those kids they come home.
We'd pick them up at the truck stop because they
would come home and trump whatever I sprang with the hose.
I thought, take your clothes off outside, just filthy, filthy dirty.
(13:04):
You know. I was used to take a bird bath
and you know, like not full on showers, and now
I looked so different when I did actually take a shower, though,
I always swear because I would wear, you know, chains
around my neck and and they would get filthy dirty
and like just the trains period, just like you know,
like you smell train? What does that smell like? Like
(13:26):
dirty steel? Starlet didn't just slide right back into family life.
I remember coming home for the holidays as a teenager
and feeling the same way. The unmet expectations behind every
maternal gesture made me want a bolt, and my mother
approved of what I was doing. I appreciated when Starla
(13:47):
said it plainly, God, I just wanted to drink. Nonetheless,
I slept home every night. Styler showed me maybe I
couldn't expect that, like I had a hard time, you know,
trying to adjust to it. So I wouldn't stay there
long a week or two, you know, and but I
slept outside with the dogs. Would we be also get
(14:07):
restless after just a week. Starla might see the love
and carry's actions now, but it's been years. Back then
she was piste off. She ran away many more times.
Starla was on the road from more than a decade,
and in all that time, Carrie never gave up on
trying to get her home. And now he had his wish.
So despite all of this. Despite the pain that you've
(14:32):
been through, the disappointment, you were still going to find
your daughter. I just, what's your motivation there? I don't know.
I just I don't give up on anything. I never
have on anything, And sometimes it's just it's just manifests
itself and a lot of times it's foolish. Yeah, maybe
(14:55):
it is foolish, but I bet it would feel worse
to stop. You have to do something. So it sounded
like my comfort offensive could backfire. All this bothering might
make Ruby claustrophobic. But what other tools that I have?
Someone else I asked for a new perspective was my
friend Dave Crowe. He's a tennis lawyer who used to
work with the unhoused in day's experience, What was the
(15:19):
best way to get someone off the streets? Unconditional love?
The real difference between the kids who get in the
day or trouble. Did they experience that? My guess is
not as much or maybe never. That's how I felt
from before she was born. But did she feel loved unconditionally?
(15:42):
That's not for me to decide. So I also asked
Dave what warning signs would show me that the road
had its hooks and Ruby. When you are in sort
of dire straits, when you are unable to kind of
take care of yourself on a healthy level, teeth start
to go. And that was true of homeless folks who
(16:04):
were mentally disambled, but it was also true of folks
who had just been out on the road a long time,
who had neglected some of that healthcare. So, yeah, the
first thing that goes or your teeth, and you're in trouble.
You're in trouble because you have nelected yourself in some way.
Maybe you're not care enough about yourself. With what Dave
(16:32):
said and Carrie's experience plus my own theories, my body
was electric with anxiety. I had so much to watch
out for when Ruby came home, and I still hadn't
asked her about those hospital bills. Ruby and her brother
Ben were both set to arrive home Christmas Eve. I
had a week to pull it all together. The day
she got home, we'd have a family dinner to welcome her.
(16:54):
They leave on Christmas Day to be with their dad
and step mom, and then I was throwing a big
Boxing Day party on the after that. Who knew how
long Ruby would stay and who knew how long I'd
be able to pretend like everything was normal. I was
penniless now after Simon and Schuster rejected my book. Not
(17:15):
just penniless, I was a dred dollars in debt. So
all of my party planning and Christmas shopping was going
on credit cards. So there I was making my shopping
list for the Christmas Eve dinner and the Boxing Day party,
sitting with my laptop at the dining room table with
a sinking feeling about how much more this would add
to my debt. When all of a sudden, my inbox pings.
(17:38):
It was Bank of America offering me a twenty dollar
unsecured loan. I smiled slightly, like a criminal about to
pull off a heist and raise my morning coffee and
a toast to the b of A. If Simon and
Schus who didn't believe in me, God damnit Bank of
America did. I was almost ready for the big day.
(17:59):
Ruby bus was arriving early Christmas Eve morning. I decided
not to say anything about my book or about how
I needed to move out of our beautiful apartment. I
wanted Ruby's Christmas at home to be cozy, warm, stable,
let's not let the truth get in the way of
that story. I was up at four am Christmas Eve,
(18:20):
not knowing what to do with myself, so I jumped
in the car and headed to the bus station early,
eager to see my daughter again. The comfort offensive was
about to begin. Six I am Christmas Eve. I parked
(18:44):
at the entrance to the Greyhound station, examining everyone who
walked by. Everyone coming off the bus looked weary, trying
to juggle their luggage and Christmas packages. The bus station
was a dump with a lot of sketchy characters hanging
around the benches. I stayed in my car. Someone with
a loose swagger wearing tattered clothes made a bee line
(19:05):
for my car, mace hanging from one belt loop and
a pocket knife from the other. I tent sed up
when they reached for the car door and opened it.
Who was this guy? It was Ruby. She had a
loose camouflage pants with ragged purple shorts over them, layers
of tattered sweaters, and a jean jacket with a huge
Johnny Cash panel across the back. She grinned at me
(19:31):
and cocked her head towards the back of the car.
I popped the trunk so she could toss in her path.
She hopped into the passenger seat. My dread that the
rails had changed my daughter beyond recognition went away. At
the sight of her, I had only one feeling. I
love her. We hugged and held it for a while. Wow,
(19:54):
she really smelled like cigarettes. When we broke apart, I
got a closer look at her. She was dirty, and
your skin seemed tired. I pulled away from the curb
and started towards home. Her voice was raspy and deeper
as she told funny stories about the cook she'd met
on the gray hat sprawled out in the passenger's seat,
(20:14):
legs wide. Ruby looked tough, and I noticed that, just
like Morgan's friend had advised, she dressed like a man.
But I didn't want to scrutinize her too much. I'd
spent so much of the last month's pouring over every
little bit of information I got from her. There, with
her here, at last, I just wanted to love her
and feel that connection, remind myself it was still there.
(20:41):
So here she was. What could I say? A lot
of times, it's best to say nothing. I just focused
on how much I loved having her here in my
car soon in our home. Seon to be making her breakfast.
The normal pieces of our life before she fled didn't
need any words. But what did she want? It was
(21:06):
dark in the house after we arrived, not quite the
sunny homecoming i'd pictured. As we walked up to the door,
I was a few steps ahead of Ruby. I fumbled
with my keys, trying to get in as quickly as possible.
I was chattering, running into her bedroom to turn down
the bed, pointing to the clean sheets, the stack of towels,
the pajamas, and the slippers atop the new comforter, and
(21:28):
then dragging her into the kitchen to show her the food,
holding out the special coffee, and even pulling out the
bacon from the fridge for her approval. Oh my god,
thinking about it now, it sounds like an addition weby
kind of didn't notice though it was six thirty a m.
She was tired. What she wanted to do first was
to take a shower. That gave me hope maybe the
(21:51):
comfort offensive had a chance. After her shower, we'd be
dressed in her new pjs and fuzzy slippers. X. We
needed to do her laundry. Family would be arriving to
welcome her home with a holiday dinner. I brought her
a big towel to bundle up the laundry. It was
a sad little pile, and boy did it stink. She
(22:12):
needed something aware, so we agreed she could open some
of her Christmas presents, early new socks, gray sweats, and
a striped long sleeved t shirt. I could see the
relief on her face as she relaxed into these clothes.
She looked great. By the time I got breakfast on
the table, the sun was up. Ruby sat in her
usual spot across from me at the widest part of
(22:34):
the table and propped her foot up on one of
the spare chairs. I commented on how much I liked
her cheerful red sox, but I was also thinking about
those hospital bills. But part of her got infected, and
how infected I stuffled That thought wasn't going to ruin
this relaxed breakfast with an interrogation. Carrie told me about
how that would play out On one of Starla's first
(22:57):
visits home for the holidays, when she was still writing.
Harry's own father was furious with her as soon as
the family gathered, he went off on Starla. What did
he say? Well, I just you know what you're You're
a West Scott and you you walked away from an
education and you've offended the family and the family name,
and just my dad's just that. I remember I look
(23:18):
at the top of the stairs since she was in
her bedroom and he's just hammering her. Next morning she
was gone. And do I blame my dad? I do
a little bit, just but my dad just wouldn't back off.
There would be no Grandpa like lectures coming from me
or from any of my family members if I could
help it. Ruby's brother Ben was coming in from New
(23:40):
York in a few hours, and I had warned him
and everyone else in the family not to press Ruby
to answer questions or to criticize her. Christmas is a
season of love for the refugee, for the people who
don't have homes. Remember that and bathe her in love.
Fingers crossed her dad and Grandpa would remember that. At
the dinner and all my running around downtown spending Bank
(24:04):
of America's money, I bought Christmas presents, planned some expensive meals,
and made some impulse purchases in the back aisle of
the toy store on sale. I bought two pairs of
Hulk hands for Ben and Ruby. They hadn't seen each
other in a while, and I thought this might be
a fun way to ease the tension. Ben was only
home an hour when I presented the hands to him
(24:25):
and Ruby. In case you don't know about the magic
of Hulk hands, here's Ben. They are big green foam
gloves with a speaker in them that would make Hulk
noises when you hit somebody or you banged the other.
Maybe duking it out like this could help them break
(24:45):
the ice. They've never been very close, and that distance
grew when Ruby ditched us at graduation. I see her sporadically,
as through sheer willpower on your part. She's compelled to
finish high school, and then she's gone. And then she
sort of appeared, and during that time she became someone
(25:07):
that I didn't know anymore. Even though they'd always been
different since she had left, that contrast seemed greater. You know,
she wants to be free and not have to work,
and and she kind of wants to say funck it
to everything. And I was trying as hard as I
could to buy into the system at that time. You know,
(25:28):
if I could just find a way to get a
job that made me feel good about myself, and so
I never I just felt like I would never knew
how to connect with her at that time in her life.
It was clear they were in very different places in
life enterns. I remember being in the living rooms and
(25:55):
it was winter, so it was dark, and I remember,
are the squaring off? You know, We're both looking and
I have a photo of this somewhere. We're both looking
at each other with with our muscles flax ready to
goof off, trying to beat the ship out of each
other with these hull hands. And I remember this sort
(26:20):
of split experience of a family and pracess in that moment,
because we were having fun in a way that felt
very familiar, and we have this feeling of this is
how our family should be. And then just below the
surface was the the agony of are we safe? Are
(26:42):
we okay? What do we do for her? So I
was puttering around, fussing, setting out food, listening to the
laughter from the living room and the hull hands smashing together.
Who knew what the outcome of this visit would be?
(27:03):
This night felt like a victory. I had both of
my children under my roof again, and we were happy.
Ruby was clean, fed and would be sleeping safely tonight,
and she was only ten ft from me. I was
going to get the best sleep of the year. The
(27:30):
next morning, Christmas morning, I got up and made coffee
and started soaking the bread for Ruby's favorite French toast.
Ben got up and was hungry. I wanted to open presence.
I knocked on Ruby's door and knocked again. I opened
it and saw she was gone. I called her, but
(27:52):
no answer. I went back to making breakfast. I was anxious,
searching my memory for something I said that could have
given Ruby a reason to leave. And then, of course
there were no guarantees. CARRY had tried new betting and everything,
and still Starlotte told me how she shunned the new
comforter and went to sleep with the dogs. Then my
(28:14):
mood switched to fury. All the effort I had gone
through to get her here, all the money to make
this a special holiday, and the way I zipped my
lips and not said any of the things that came
to me late at night when I couldn't sleep all
this time, I disciplined myself not to offend Ruby, and
still she was gone. But I had to remind myself
(28:35):
the most important thing was to keep her here as
long as I could manage it. So when Ruby did
show up an hour later for Christmas breakfast, I was
happy to see her, no questions asked. After breakfast, we
opened presents with lots of laughter, and then Ruby and
Ben got ready for Christmas Day with their dad. They
(28:56):
came back that evening, but minutes after returning home, Ruby
left again, this time not even sneaking out. She just
grabbed her stuff and said see you, and walked out
the door. I shrugged. Asking her about where she was going,
or trying to guilt her about Christmas might just kiss
her off. Harry warned me about how a lecture would
go when he told me about dragging Style at home
(29:17):
from that warehouse in Hollywood. I still remember thinking to myself,
I'm not gonna deal with this. I'm not gonna throw
out admonishments, no, no restrict nothing. So I got in
a car took her to school, and she gets out
of the car and we didn't talk at all. I said,
Glad you're safe, Glad your home. She looks at me
and says, all I need to know is my restriction.
(29:39):
I said, well, let's do the math here. You stole
your mom's car, you went out all night, you're seventeen
years old, you got a ticket for reckless driving doing
eighty five. What do you think, Because that's all I
need to know, slammed the door. I didnt see her
for eight months, just when falling out and Styler was gone.
So I didn't say anything and Ruby left Christmas night anyway,
(30:02):
I knew i'd see her the next day. I was
throwing a big Boxing Day party with her friends, Ben's
and mine. This party was a big deal for me.
I wanted to celebrate Ruby being home. I also knew
it would be one last time to bring everyone together
in my beautiful apartment. All my leftist friends for my
years at Berkeley were coming. Musicians and journalists would be
(30:23):
intermixed with my son's academic crowd and all the squat
house punks. What a combination. I got one of those
sweet spiral cut hams and made biscuits. I made my
mom's Swedish meatballs. When people asked what they could bring,
I said beer. Boomer men loved to spend money on beer.
I knew the Hoboes would be impressed. The guest started
(30:46):
to arrive, and suddenly there were fifty people in my apartment.
I love seeing Ruby's friends. They were happy to see
me too, every one of them greeting me with open arms.
I'd look over my shoulder to see if Ruby was
noticing this. The ice was packed with half a dozen
punks on their front steps, smoking with some of my
formerly delinquent pals, intergenerational discussions about anarchy next to the
(31:08):
spiral ham with my political friends. I warned my friends
the same way I'd warned my family, no interrogations of Ruby.
They kind of heard me, kind of not. I kept
hearing them ask Ruby, with voices dripping and condescending concern,
how are you? I could see from the expression on
Ruby's face this was getting really old, really fast. The
(31:31):
party lasted till two am, but when it was over,
Ruby left with her friends. I didn't see Ruby for
days after that party. So far, she hadn't spent a
single night at home, but I knew i'd see her again.
We had business to conduct. She needed a new I
d she couldn't get on the plane without one. We
(31:52):
had an appointment for her at the d m V
a few days after Christmas, but I hadn't heard anything
from her. I didn't care if she missed this spot,
she'd have to be here longer. But Ruby knew that too.
She showed up at home an hour before her appointment,
and we jumped in the car and they crowded d
(32:13):
m V waiting room. Ruby pulled the number from the dispenser.
There were twenty numbers ahead of her, so we'd be
waiting at least an hour. We settled into our seats
and waited in silence. Sitting in the plastic cease, I
realized I had her captured. Asked her about the hospital bills.
Asked her about the hospital bills kept shouting in my head.
But then I also didn't want to ask her. In
(32:35):
some ways, I didn't want to know the answer or
learn why she'd been hospitalized. Finally, I worked up the
courage to say something. It was my Grandpa moment. I
turned to Ruby and mentioned the bills from the Gainesville.
I was anxious, but Ruby seemed unfazed. I told her
my nurse friends said the doctors had prescribed antibiotics only
(32:57):
used for the most serious infections. What happened Moruby was
a matter of fact. She said, her foot got infected
living on the streets in Florida in the summer. My
friend made an herbal poultice, but it just made the
infection worse. Then they applied calamine lotion and it got
a lot worse. So they went to the emergency room.
A nurse admitted her to the hospital and they kept
(33:17):
her there for three days. Three days. I was in shock,
I said. The staff must have feared for your life.
Ruby rolled her eyes a little at my retroactive anxiety. No,
she said. They told her if they didn't treat her
foot infection aggressively, they'd have to amputate, amputate. I was
about to jump out of my seat. Didn't this frighten her?
(33:39):
It's a pretty big sign it's time to get off
the rails. She shrugged her shoulders and fine, she said,
my foot's fine. It's not like I see my foot
as a symbol of life on the road. Stuff happens.
She was sorry, she told me, Anticipating I was about
to lecture her about needing to come home. There in
the d m VS harsh lighting, Ruby told me, I
(34:00):
love this, and I'm not coming home until I'm done.
I guess I had my answer about the comfort offensive.
We didn't say another word until her number was called.
On the way home for the d m V. The
mood in the car was hot. I had a dozen
more things I wanted to say to her, but as
(34:22):
Carrie knew, delivering them would be more for me than
they would be for her. The radical freedom Ruby embraced
made a prisoner out of me, as it had of carry.
I didn't know what to say, how to behave, and
so against my impulses, I said nothing. I was afraid
I'd lose it and push her away. Maybe she'd made
the right choice by not staying home. My plan hadn't worked.
(34:48):
Should Ruby like to drop in for a meal, to
have a mom willing to drive her anywhere and buy
her whatever she needed? But she didn't really need any
of that. She had no malice towards me, but it
wasn't about up me, And honestly, I had my own
crisis underway. Dollars from Bank of America was going fast.
I needed to cut my overhead. I'd given notice to
(35:11):
my landlady that I was leaving at the end of January,
and I still didn't know where I was going. M
(35:31):
The holidays were over, and I still wasn't seeing much
of Ruby while we waited for her license to arrive.
One reason was that she'd fallen right back into the
local music scene. She had gigs at clubs and house
shows just like before a New Year's Eve. Her band
brought down the house and a local record producer approached
her about recording an album. Maybe I couldn't keep Ruby here,
(35:52):
but music might. That was my low level of hope
as I trudged up the stairs and collected the mail.
A week or so into the new year, when I
saw an envelope from the d m V, my stomach dropped.
I had been relying on the sluggish bureaucracy to keep
her home for at least three weeks, but her new
I D came after only two. I called Ruby and
(36:15):
she let out a yelp of joy. The timing was perfect.
The album was done, the record release party was in
a few days, and she could leave right after that.
Plus her pregnant pit bull Junks had just given birth
to ten puppies, and her boyfriend was waiting. She got
off the phone to call her dad so he could
book her flight back to Austin. So much for the
(36:35):
comfort offensive. The album release party was in an art
gallery and it went on till one o'clock in the morning,
and the next day Ruby's plane was leaving. She showed
up at home two hours before her flight. We packed
her up in a frenzy and raced to the airport.
She'd stayed for nearly a month, longer than Carry had
managed to hold onto Starler that first time, and even
(36:57):
though the comfort offensive didn't keep her home, Ruby was softer,
happier than the young woman I had collected at the
bus station, not thanks to me alone. It was clear
how love she was by her family, friends and her fans.
We met her father at the airport. As we got
(37:18):
her things out of the car, it was hugs all around.
We said our goodbyes, feigning cheerfulness, telling Mauby how much
we loved her and we minded her. All she had
to do was say the word and we'd get her home.
I felt frantic Asruby hoisted her pack onto her back.
I didn't want her to go, but if she was
going to leave, I wanted it to be over. It
(37:38):
was too hard to say goodbye. She thanked us for
the good visit and all the Christmas presents. As she
gathered up the last of her stuff, she told me
it was a good thing she was leaving. She would
get back just in time for her appointment with the
dentist that served the unhoused in Austin. The dentist was
concerned about her back teeth and just might pull them.
I flashed back to what Dave Crow said about trouble
(38:00):
with teeth as a sign and someone was slipping into
permanent homelessness. I didn't want to believe that this was true,
and even after this visit, I didn't know. Ruby turned
around to walk into the airport. I watched her disappear
through the double doors. My final thought as the doors
closed behind her, I don't know when I'm going to
(38:23):
see her again. I got back into my car and
pulled away. I held my tears in until I got
to the freeway, and then I cried all the way home.
When I got home from the airport, I saw Ruby
CD sitting on the kitchen counter and grabbed it. I
(38:45):
put it in the CD player and sat on the
couch in the living room. I looked out onto the
Lake and the Oakland skyline beyond. As the first chords
of her ukulele music came from the speakers. I hadn't
heard that since she graduated, and for the first time
I could appreciate the lyrics. I recognized she was singing
(39:07):
about her suicide attempt. Yes, the lyrics described when it
all went wrong back when we lived in l A
came out with the brand new drugs and that sadded
a pull up plug. I remember that last passage from
(39:29):
when she sang it at graduation. And while I was
furious when she ditched us, after all I learned about
hoboes and what I just pulled off with the Bank
of America, I couldn't help but smile at how Ruby
had made her escape. What a differenced those eight months made.
But the lyrics had some brightness. When Moby looked ahead,
when she imagined the world beyond high school, she was optimistic.
(39:53):
And when that bropriate you places away from me. I
can't remember how many times I listened to Santa Monica,
and it had to be at least ten, with pauses
in between. After I opened a bottle of wine. Every
time I listened to it, I felt as though I
knew her better, she had been in such pain more
(40:13):
than I ever saw. Look what I've done made up.
Ruby was gone and only she would decide when to
come back. And I was supposed to move in a week.
(40:36):
I had a lot to do. The problem was most
of that ship wasn't getting done. Every time I started
the dining room table to figure out my life, I
just end up gazing out at the lake, and then
nothing would happen but memories, the joy of moving into
this beautiful place with the money from a book deal,
and the comfort of being back where I was born,
watching Ruby thrive in her new school, and then embracing
(40:59):
her fascinating eating friends that kept showing up for dinner.
All of that tinge with a golden light reflected from
the lake had come to this me. Hunting through Craigslist,
trying to find an apartment to share at the age
of fifty three, I scrolled to the very end of
the listings without finding anything suited to me. I hadn't
looked for a place in the Bay Area in five years,
(41:19):
not since two thousand and four, and the tech boom
had sent rental prices skyward. I couldn't afford to pay
three thousand, five hundred dollars for a one bedroom apartment,
and I didn't want to live next door to somebody
who could. Then I saw a room for rent at
a place called the Barn. The six d and fifty
dollars a month, I could get a big room on
(41:40):
the top floor of a former shipbuilding warehouse facing the
San Francisco Bay. I called them up and the landlord,
Michael Hammond, gave me perfect directions. Head south toward the
abandoned shipyard just below the housing projects, and turned left
at the Headless Horse. It was a steve drop down
a perilous road to the rough pay and of the
(42:00):
barn parking lot, where half a dozen people were going
about some unusual business. And as steep as it was,
this fall from Grace was turning out to be a
lot more interesting than I expected. There was a man
loading up a life sized version of the children's game
The Mouse Trap onto a truck, and a woman dressed
in full belly dancing attire entering her car. It felt
(42:21):
like I'd dropped down off the main road and into
a staging area for burning man, but I'd found the
Barn and Michael greeted me at the top of the
stairs and showed me around the kitchen and party space.
It had a dining room table that could easily seat sixteen,
all of it with an unobstructed view of the bay. Amazing.
I asked Michael about the mail, which was bulging out
(42:43):
of the box at the top of the hill next
to the headless horse statue. Who brought it down from
up there? Anybody can? He said, somebody goes to get
it whenever they're expecting a check, which is not very often.
What a stroke of luck. I'd found the barn, the
last place in San franc Cisco where money didn't seem
to matter. This was it. I didn't hesitate in saying
(43:05):
I'd take it, and Michael agreed. He said I'd fit
right in, and I took that as a compliment. So
I had a place, a place to hunker down to rebuild.
Hope has had it right. Sure, I wasn't going to
hop a train, but I'm happy to live with a
whole bunch of people and not spend much money. Now,
all I had to do was to get rid of
(43:26):
my stuff. I was under the illusion that because I
liked my stuff, it had value I was about to
get a rude shock about that. In the open market
of Craig's list, I put up the teak patio furniture
I bought for two thousand dollars. When I got hired
at people for the bargain price of five hundred, someone
offered me three hundred. I said, fuck you. Fuck you
(43:48):
is not a negotiating strategy. I was so emotional about
this practical transaction. It was as if they were commenting
on my value. After a few degrading days of this,
I decided I'd give it all away. I put up
an ad that said it's all free, and at nine
am the next day, they were a dozen people waiting
on the front steps. A studious Middle Eastern girl and
(44:10):
her family were delighted by Ruby's bedroom set. I was
thrilled when the girl opened the door to Ruby's room
and exclaimed, Mommy, I love that desk. A Mexican family
who had been burned out of their apartment took most
of my kitchen, including the stoneware dishes from my wedding.
But the best moment for me was when a young
single mom and her two kids, a boy and a girl,
were smitten with the beat up old oak dining room
(44:33):
table I was so attached to. They sat at it,
and the mom rubbed its edges, the divids, and the
and the scratches. Do the chairs come with it, the
chairs and the hatch, if you'll have it? I said,
thank you. She said, this is just what we need.
And while all these strangers cheerfully stripped my apartment bear,
I said a silent thank you to Ruby. In some way,
(44:55):
after this visit, I was set free. I was lighter
on the ground with most of my possessions gone, and
I was lighter by acknowledging how the comfort I offered
Ruby and my gin d up comfort offensive was something
she had no use for. And I had been a
big phony to Chicken to discuss how she was living
her life and acting like that was noble. I wasn't
(45:17):
telling her about my book getting canceled, and soon I
wouldn't be living in this apartment, And the fact that
she had not answered any of my questions showed there
was a lot about her life she didn't think I
should know. We both had secrets to protect. But I
had to let this go and release both of us
from my worries. It would be a process, though, and
in the nights after she left, I would sit on
(45:39):
the couch and listen to her music over and over.
There was another song on that CD that stuck with me,
one that I played almost as much as Santa Monica,
called windows sell Ip sitting on your window sill. The
daytime was getting colder, and a field sill night time windows.
(46:05):
So the lyrics reminded me that when I cleaned Ruby's
room before Christmas, I'd noticed the screen was off her window,
stashed in the corner of the closet, and they were
shoeprints on the window sill itself. Ruby had wanted to
go long before I realized it, and now am I
packed up empty apartment. My life was down to the
necessities my bed, my desk, and some boxes. In that void.
(46:26):
I wondered if maybe Ruby had been right to stay away,
to keep our interactions minimal and positive. No opportunities for
my questions or lectures, no temper tantrums, none of that
would bring her closer to me. She had lived with
me for eighteen years. She knew what I valued and expected.
A bit of me remained inside her, and that was
(46:47):
what I believed would bring her back. Yeah, I think
it's the right time. Only she could tell me when
whoa to be my so. I knew Ruby would come
home when it suited her, and I couldn't predict how
long she'd be away. The best I could do was
(47:08):
wait and keep making contacts, keep learning. One day they
might come in handy, because after all, I'm a journalist,
an independent of Ruby. This is one hell of a story,
a story that has never been fully told. Who really
runs the train yard? To answer this, I knew who
I had to talk to, the rail cops. I never
(47:30):
expected the city of the rails to have a private
police force. And the more I learned, the more shocked
I was. We're bulls, we do what we want. We're
in control. We can outdo anybody, FBI, anybody. The rail
police are not just rent a cops. They have full
police powers and national jurisdiction and state. We're FEDS to
(47:50):
being out bolt and there's no public scrutiny, thank you none.
So next time, going to El Paso, right up against Mexico.
It's a major fraid hub and the international border, which
makes it a crossroads for hobo smugglers and thieves and
the perfect place to see what rail cops are all about.
It's kind of like walking into another dimension, another world.
(48:13):
He just took off. You know, I need your ride
in the rail like you know what. These chicks were
as tough as nails. They knew the game, They had
the attitude, and they were not afraid say Montica Sica
(48:44):
fourteen as well be drinking gasol. Look what you've done.
City of the Rail is written and hosted by me
to L Morton and developed in partnership between Flip Turn
Studios and I Heeart Podcasts. Thank you to everyone who's
(49:07):
been calling us and giving us great tips and sharing memories.
We want more. Leave a message at seven oh seven, six, five,
three oh three nine. You just might end up on
the show. A lot of you been saying you love
the music. Well, I've got a treat for you. I'm
sharing my playlist of modern hobo music. The link will
be in the show notes. Our team is executive producer
(49:28):
and show runner Julian Weller and executive producer Mark Healey.
Senior producer and editing master A Booza far I miss
a Boo He's gone on to another show, but I
just wanted to say tip of the hat to you
for being the only person I've ever written with who
can replicate my sense of humor. And producers Emilie Maronough,
she no Ozaki, and Zoey Denkla. Shout out to My
(49:50):
Lady Squad with production support from Marcy to Pina. Original
music every episode by Aaron Kaufman. Our theme music is
Wayfaring Stranger, performed by pro Faint Sass thanks to Scott
Michaud at Flail Records. Our logo is by Lucy Kingdonia
and uses a photograph by Mike Brody and at I
Heart thanks to Nikki e Tor and Bethan Michaloso. We'll
(50:12):
be back next week in Texas on the City of
the Rails.
Host
Danelle Morton
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