steal this car

Today I learned from the Los Angeles Times that a young mexican immigrant was killed by a thirtysomething white male driving an SUV too fast in Laguna Canyon the other night. This horrific story more than proved my point: SUV's should be outlawed. That, or close off Kansas and make it SUV-only, so the idiots who drive them will finally have ample space in which to navigate their tin beasts.

The sickest ticket of all: Witnesses told police that the driver stopped TWICE a mile from the accident to inspect the front of the vehicle for damage. It was early evening. It was not dark.

Anyone else want blood?

Life in Gotham is doing its bit: White, Chevy S-10 Blazer, right front-end damage, license plate contains letters JM. Reading this in Orange County? Any information?

Call the Laguna Beach pigs on 949-497-0701. Let justice roll down.

LOS ANGELES -- At the corner of Lookout Mountain Road where there’s a school and playing field of some sort, I come to a stop, as per the red hexagonal instruction sign on my left, while at the same time, a gargantuan suburban attack vehicle looking very leased and brand new and silver, pulls at the opposing corner.

I stop, she doesn’t. Cutting right in front of me, she stares me down, with an evil look, this pint-sized bleached blonde and no doubt surgically altered creature, so tiny she must be sitting on the Los Angeles County yellow pages to see over the dash of the late model SUV.

Peeling tires, she heads off towards Laurel Canyon. I shoot her a disapproving look, and she quickly turns away, giving me that classic, unspoken fuck-you I’ve grown so accustomed to while driving in Southern California.

That’s it!

I’m going to pull this car over, this nonsensical two-door sports car glaring white, hurl the keys at the windshield of the next SUV that blows me off the road, and walk. Train out of service, and kiss my ass.

Funny, how in this town, everyone is such a rebel when they’re behind the wheel, which says a great deal about the personality of the Angeleno. So sticky-sweet, faux-friendly and don’t-rock-the-boat standing next to you in line at the Coffee Bean, yet so very demon-spawn from behind the protective tin and glass barrier of their vehicles.

I resort to yelling from the car, much like I would at home in New York, if i had to drive -- ‘get out of the car and say it to my face asshole’, ‘yeah, you’re a big man behind the wheel, mother fucker,’ et al and ad nauseum.

Finally on a recent visit to town, I grow so weary of the lousy game, of these beastly idiots, who are so easily aggressive, so big and so bad riding high in their Ford Explorers and Chevy Suburbans. Not to be the New York Asshole, but I miss home, where you say what you mean to people’s faces, on sidewalk and out of window alike.

This time around, I stop complaining and get rid of the car.

Talk about your sea-changes – possibly the most stress-free day I’ve ever spent in LA was when I drove into the park and lock on Las Palmas early one Thursday morning, not looking back until nightfall.

I had meetings on Hollywood Boulevard, at which I arrived on time and relaxed.

I had lunch at the newly refurbished Pig n’ Whistle with a colleague. I did not valet.

I walked down to the El Capitan building for another appointment, then for coffee at the Roosevelt where a certain homeless man likes to sit in the corner with his balls hanging out.

I had business to attend to downtown, and I wanted to make it to the Grand Central Market before the evening traffic thinned out on the streets. I strolled unmolested down the boulevard toward Vine, where I boarded the Red Line, for what was one of the most relaxed subway rides ever.

Looking like a NYC subway car at two in the morning (about, say, ten people per car) instead of Los Angeles at evening rush, I crossed my legs and read the paper, as the soothing voice of the conductor announced the various stops.

Pershing Square. I rose out of the station on the silent escalator, crossing Hill Street and into the Market, I notice car-clogged avenues, but pain-free sidewalks – instead of jostling for my square inch of personal space at home or fighting pussy drivers on the 101, the moment was considerably relaxed.

I poked at fruit in the market, smelled the heavenly scent of pupusas de queso frying up on the griddle and looked for David Brancaccio, who apparently thinks the market is the swellest place in Los Angeles. And there I thought it was my little secret.

Emerging at the other end, one comes face to face with the Bradbury Building, a wonder of architecture, and always fun to look at – especially considering that the infamous Ross Cutlery remains open in the corner, where one of the most famous knives in history was sold to OJ once upon a fateful day.

Piped in organ music blasts ‘Here Comes The Bride’ out of the wedding chapel, all decked out in lace and silk flowers. DIVORCIOS, reads the sign planted out on the sidewalk. INCOME TAX. One stop shopping.

Past the Times, across to Spring Street, I see the DASH stop, and rather than board, I inquire instead, which way to the Subway, the Red Line, the Civic Center station. A middle-aged latina peers out past her glasses, brow furrowed.

Subway?

Red Line?

Civic Center?

Yes, I want to go to Union Station.

Oh, is very, far – you take the DASH.

No, I’d rather walk to the nearest subway station, thanks.

Oh, I don’t know – where is, what, sub-way?

It is a foreign word, yes, but she does know what the DASH is, and all I can think of is well, who the hell expects people to ride the subway when they don’t even know where to find it?

She points me up Spring Street, which she says will will lead me toward Union Station. But she insists. DASH, not walk.

Is too far. Is too far.

I smile, and say, thanks, I’d rather walk, a little too loudly (the gaggle of DASH riders waiting at the post turns around to look), and cross 1st Street, up the hill to City Hall. She shakes her head, as if we were re-enacting the ‘son don’t go up that mountain’ scene from whichever movie that was.

I have opted to climb the mountain, through the horde of city employees waiting also for the DASH, and down to the 101 bypass. I stand on the bridge, watching eight lanes of traffic going nowhere, and hear the bells pealing from what seems to be a church a few blocks over.

It’s the famous mission, the Nuestra Senora del Reina de something-or-other, built in the early 1800’s. Soft sounds of spanish reverently sung float from the open doors, where the congregation prepares for communion. Mothers dressed in white blouses hold small children to their breasts, men in suits kneel behind the pews. The hushed atmosphere stands in stark contrast to the honking of horns on the 101.

I close my eyes, breathe deep, and stand. All thoughts are banished.

The service draws to a close, people pour into the courtyard and across the street, through the square into Olvera, where the authentic looking tourist district has been reclaimed as a gathering place for latinos, out for evening dinner at the charming little restaurants with vine-covered patios.

Through the stands of palm trees in the parking lots, Union Station looks lovely in late afternoon light. I stroll down the main corridor through the gorgeous structure, the transportation hub is oddly silent for six o’clock in the evening. I hear someone remarking to someone else – I’ve never been down here, it’s beautiful!

Right?

I board the train in the basement – this time, the car is full. I actually have to sit next to someone, and I think, this is the closest I’ll ever get to contact with strangers in this town, and it feels good – like home. To simply sit next to a complete stranger in this wholly private town, and read a magazine or people watch in a completely non-fabricated environment, at the end of a long day.

I could do this Los Angeles-without-a-car thing – I’d live in Hollywood, work downtown, take the Red-Blue-Green arrangement to the airport, take the Santa Monica bus to the beach, oh, I don’t know, maybe even walk to the Whitley Market from my gorgeous 1920’s worthy-of-Park-Avenue building on Franklin?

But what about the mountains – can’t live without them. The mountain, more specifically, Mount Hollywood, one of the best hiking trails in the United States. The one place in Los Angeles where you get to see the city, the real city, of all shapes, colors, styles and nationalities behaving well together, and in nature yet.

I ponder this as I hike down the trail next evening – perhaps I could drum up the energy to walk from Los Feliz Boulevard -- that’d even be better exercise.

I’d heard there was a statue of James Dean somewhere over by the observatory, and I’m banging the dust from my aging loafers as I pad across the parking lot past the mothers throwing soccer balls with their children on the lawn, young couples liplocked and draped over fences, old ladies swinging arms fiercely as they stride towards the trailhead in full jogging gear – and then I look up.

There’s a bus, on the hour, all day, from the Red Line station at Vermont and Sunset, up to the Observatory. It stops running at night, but I prefer mornings, anyway.

I can do it – of course I can.

Well, maybe at least for a while. With the headaches of parking and gas prices and insurance and actually driving the damn monster, well, I’ve discovered that the price of complete freedom is pretty steep. Sure, I can’t whisk off to Trader Joe’s on a whim, but I can get there when I have to.

Absolutely. I’ll let someone else do the driving. And his name doesn’t have to be James, either. But he will take me home – I might just have to hang out at the bus stop for a while.

I start thinking of good lines to get out of trouble when the cops pull over to ask what’s up -- apparently in this town, it’s hard for people to comprehend that young males hanging on Santa Monica Boulevard late evenings might simply be waiting for the bus.