LITMIR.BIZ

      NINTH GRADE WAS the worst year of my life. I missed my friends in Boise and the feel of the place, the light and the smell, and Virginia seemed very dark. I hated the nature in Alexandria—the forests were completely different from Boise—and I got in with some bad guys and sort of became a juvenile delinquent. One of these guys, kind of the ringleader, was way older than his years and was like an adult. A smoothie. He looked like a smaller Rock Hudson, and he’d steal his neighbor’s car and pick up different people, and we’d go into D.C. at two or three in the morning, a hundred and twenty miles an hour down Shirley Highway, and go to novelty shops or drinking or whatever. The thing that drew me to this guy was that I didn’t like my life, and I liked the idea of doing strange things, sort of. I liked it and I didn’t like it. This guy came up to the house once and he had a cigarette behind his ear and a pack of cigarettes rolled up in his T-shirt sleeve, and my parents met him. They weren’t real happy. They thought, Poor Dave, he’s into something. . . .

      This guy had lots of girlfriends and I think he quit school. I visited Boise during the summer after ninth grade, and when I got back to Alexandria he was gone. Then one day at lunch I was out in the parking lot, probably going over to the smoking section, and he drives up in this convertible with this girl and it was just perfect. All happy; Mr. Cool. I don’t know what became of him.

      My bedroom opened onto a patio on the second floor and I could climb down and sneak out; then the next day I’d have to go to school. One time I got home and the minute my head hit the pillow I heard the alarm go off. It was crazy, and my parents knew I snuck out, but they didn’t know what I was doing. I wasn’t that wild, but I did get really drunk a few times, and one time it was on gin. I was drinking gin and telling these girls it was water and I ended up in Russell Kefauver’s front yard. I woke up and saw this wooden post with a number on it, and I kept looking at this number, then I realized I was in a yard on my back and that I was at Russell’s house. I don’t know how I got home.

      My parents worried about me when I was in the ninth grade. Magazines then had these contests that said, “Draw me,” and just to see if I could do it, I drew this thing and sent it in. Then one night this man came to the house and told my parents that my drawing was so good that I’d won some kind of fake scholarship. I was upstairs, and my parents were downstairs meeting with this man in the living room and it was so sweet. They were trying to help me find a better direction to go in.

      I guess I believed in God in my own way when I was growing up. I didn’t really think about it, but I knew there was something kind of running the thing. Then one Sunday morning when I was fourteen I thought to myself, I’m not getting anything out of going to church. I knew I wasn’t getting the real thing, and looking back, I can see I was headed for Maharishi. When I was working on Eraserhead, I’d see photographs of Indian masters and think, This face knows something that I don’t know. Could it be that there’s such a thing as enlightenment? Is that real or is it just some Indian thing? Now I know it’s real. Anyhow, I stopped going to church.

      Like in every school, the jocks at Hammond High were the most popular. Then there were fraternities, and they weren’t exactly the bad boys, but they didn’t give a shit about sports and were into other things. I was in a fraternity and Lester Grossman was our president and Lester was a supreme character. After school Lester worked in a shoe store and every night he stole a metal shoehorn, and when he got home he’d throw it on the floor in his bedroom, and there was a big pile of shoehorns in there. A relative of Lester’s got us a bunch of light bulbs for super cheap and we sold them door-to-door. We were selling them like hotcakes and we made a truckload of money, then we threw a giant party. It wasn’t just for our high school. It was for Washington, D.C.–area high schools, and it was huge. We hired this band called the Hot Nuts, and there was an admission fee and we made a lot of money. We had so much money that we all spent a week in Virginia Beach, and the fraternity paid for little bungalows and dinner every night and maybe even some spending money. I went my junior and senior year and was in a fraternity the whole way through high school. People had slow-dance parties in basements, too, and I’d also go to those. Movies didn’t mean anything to me when I was a teenager. The only time I went to movies was when I’d go to the drive-in, and I’d go there for making out. I went to movie theaters a few times, but why go to the theater? It’s cold and dark and the day is going by outside. You could be doing so many things.

      I dress the same way now that I dressed then, and I wasn’t aware in high school that I had my own style. I got my clothes at Penney’s. I loved khaki pants and I liked wearing a coat and tie—it was just something I felt comfortable with. I wore three ties for a long time, two bow ties and a regular tie, but I wouldn’t tie the bow ties—they’d just be knotted at the top. I’ve always buttoned the top button of my shirt because I don’t like air on my collarbone and I don’t like anyone touching my collarbone. It makes me crazy and I don’t know why. It might’ve been one of the reasons for the ties, to protect my neck.

      I met Jack Fisk at school and we became friends because we were both interested in art, but the thing I really liked about Jack is that he’s a dedicated worker. When you see the seriousness of him working and building stuff, it’s a beautiful thing. I have tremendous respect for Jack, and because I met him when we were young, those are friends that you keep longer. I probably haven’t talked to him in months, but Jack is my best friend. I remember meeting his sister Mary very well, too. She was a fox and I was always attracted to her. We dated a little bit and I made out with her and I think Jack got really upset.

      Linda Styles was my girlfriend during my freshman year. Linda was petite and real dramatic and we used to make out in her basement. Her parents were nice—her father was in the navy and her mom was real sweet, and they let me smoke there. Most people didn’t mind smoking in those days. Later on Linda ended up going with this ringleader guy, and I think he was screwing her. See, I didn’t get there until I was eighteen, the summer after high school. Maybe I was slow, but I think I was pretty normal for those days. It was a different time. After Linda Styles I saw some other girls. If I had a type, I guess you could say I liked brunettes the best, and I kind of liked librarian types, you know, their outer appearance hiding smoldering heat inside. . . .

      Judy Westerman was my main high school girlfriend, and I loved her so much. She sort of looked like Paula Prentiss. Was I faithful to her? No. I mean, I was and I wasn’t. I was seeing some different girls and getting further with them because Judy was a Catholic. We probably did more on the early dates than later, because she kept going to catechism and finding out more things she wasn’t allowed to do. Only one girl broke my heart and her name was Nancy Briggs. She was the girlfriend of my friend Charlie Smith, and I don’t know if he knew I loved his girlfriend. She didn’t love me, though. I was nuts for her all during the first half of my year at college in Boston, and I was just brokenhearted.

      During Christmas break when I was going to college in Boston, I went down to Virginia and I was pining away, and David Keeler said, “Why don’t you just take her to lunch and see what’s going on?” So I called Nancy and we went to McDonald’s. We took our food to the car and I asked

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