A Carlin Home Companion (19 page)

He pulled out a gun from I-don't-know-where, pointed it at me, and said, “You can't walk out and leave me.”

I looked straight down that gun barrel, froze, and pissed myself.

When he realized what he'd done, he put the gun down. I collapsed onto the floor. My legs had given out. He ran to me and apologized profusely. I pushed him away.

*   *   *

I had been cut in two at that moment, even without a bullet.

I knew it was time to leave.

 

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

“Mother and Child Reunion”

F
OR THE SEVEN YEARS
I'd been with Andrew, I'd never been away from him overnight, or out of contact with him for more than three or four hours. Over the years he'd say things to me like, “I could never love another;” or “There will never be anyone who could love you as much as I do”; and let's not forget the always-popular, “I don't know what I would ever do if you left me.” This never made me feel loved. It just made me feel trapped. I was too afraid to leave him. Would he become one of those men who shot his wife, her family, and then himself? I knew that
if
I were ever going to leave, I'd have to do it cautiously. But I knew that I had to begin somewhere.

In the spring of 1988 I reapplied to UCLA, and got in. In January 1989, winter quarter, I'd become a full-time student. Knowing that I'd be reentering the world of reading, writing, and studying, I felt hope I hadn't felt in years.

*   *   *

I wasn't the only one. In 1988 my dad took an evolutionary step with his stand-up. In his sixth HBO special,
What Am I Doin' in New Jersey?
, Dad included plenty of the standard Carlin observational routines like “Keeping People Alert” and “More Stuff on Dogs and Driving,” but where he stepped into new territory was with “Reagan's Gang, Church People, and American Values” and “People I Can Do Without.” He'd always been a social commentator, but with these new bits, he'd found a new energy and intensity. Surviving two heart attacks and turning fifty gave him a new courage. Having endured the Reagan years of the 1980s gave him a focus for his outrage. When I watched the premiere of the show, I felt that something new and exciting was happening in his work. I was deeply proud and inspired.

*   *   *

On April 8, 1988, for Andrew's thirty-sixth birthday, he and I went out to dinner at a nearby German restaurant with a couple he'd been hanging out with lately. I think their names were Steve and Melinda. Andrew's newest toy was a Harley-Davidson, and he'd met them at some Harley event. They weren't hard-core bikers, but they certainly liked to party.

Andrew rarely drank alcohol (it wasn't his drug of choice), but on this night he ordered a schnapps, a gin martini, and a glass of white wine, all before dinner. By the entrée I was ready to walk out. At this point being with Andrew was difficult enough for me. Add a few too many ounces of alcohol, and it was as if his character flaws got turned up to eleven. He was intolerable—arrogant, pushy, and rude. The minute the check dropped on the table, I left and went to my mom and dad's house.

Around midnight Andrew called. He was in jail at the Santa Monica Police Department and wanted me to bail him out. He wasn't forthcoming about what had happened, and the turn of events didn't become clear until Steve called me to tell me the whole tale. He said that after dinner, while the three of them walked toward our house, Andrew went ballistic about my leaving early, and vandalized a street sign. Steve, wanting to calm him down, agreed to go with him to our automotive shop. He thought they'd hang out there and cool down. But when they got there, instead of Andrew opening up the gate, he pulled out a handgun and began shooting at the front of the business. After he'd emptied a clip of bullets into the garage door of the shop, Steve persuaded him to get back into the car. As they drove away, a Santa Monica police car, on its way to check out the “shots fired” call, drove toward them and made them stop. Andrew had gotten friendly with a few officers from SMPD over the last few years (gun nuts love gun nuts), and told them what he'd just done. A sergeant friend of Andrew's arrived and quickly took over. He arrested Andrew for drunk driving and discharging a firearm but was nice enough to throw away the cocaine he'd found on him.

When Steve was done, I hung up the phone and told my mom the whole story. We both agreed that we'd bail him out of jail only if he went straight to rehab. I called Andrew, told him the conditions, and he agreed.

When I saw Andrew swagger out of the station, I knew it meant trouble. He got into the car.

“Take me home,” he demanded. No “Thank you” or “I'm sorry.”

“You're not going home. You're going to St. John's CDC,” my mom calmly replied.

“No I'm not. I need to think about it. I need to go home first,” he countered.

“I can't take it anymore,” I tried to explain. “You have to go. You are not going home. We're going to St. John's.”

“Stop the car,” Andrew demanded, as he opened the door while the car was still moving. He got out blocks away from the hospital and our house, and started walking. Mom and I sat there and watched him.

“He'll go,” Mom said as she pulled away and drove toward her house.

About an hour later Steve called.

“He's trashing the house. Throwing shit everywhere. I think you should come home.”

“You can tell him I'm not coming home. I'll only come home after he's gone to St. John's.” Of course, deep down inside, I hoped he wouldn't go so that I would never have to go home.

An hour later Andrew called, demanding I come home. I reiterated that I would not be coming home unless he went to rehab. He then said, “Well, if you don't come home now”—and then I heard the sound of a shotgun being cocked—“I'm going to shoot Jeremy.” Jeremy was my eight-year-old black Lab.

I said, “That's nice.” And hung up the phone.

A few hours later Steve called to say that Andrew had taken some Valium, calmed down, and was ready to go to rehab. Jeremy was sound asleep, too, oblivious to the drama that had unfolded all night.

*   *   *

Five days later, after Andrew's detox period, I found myself in my first group therapy session at St. John's Chemical Dependency Center, with the spouses and significant others of the rehab patients. We would undergo our own rehab program, learning about addiction, how to live with people in recovery, and of course, our own issues.

“You know you're more insane than he is,” the therapist, Berenice, said to me.

Excuse me? I had just poured my heart out to her and the group, sharing all the insanity, chaos, and emotional turmoil that Andrew had created in my life over the last seven years, and I was the insane one?

She continued, “You stayed with him. You enabled him. You ignored your own needs, and you expected him to change. That sounds pretty insane to me.”

I didn't want to hear a word of it. I didn't want to hear the truth. This “tough love” thing was a bit too tough for me. And yet, somewhere deep inside, I felt the love behind it, too. I was actually relieved. She was the first person in my life ever to talk to me like this. She was not afraid to confront me on my denial and bullshit. She became my therapist for the next ten years.

*   *   *

Once Andrew was out of rehab, our life together was amazing. We both went to meetings—Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous—and I to Al-Anon, where we made a bunch of new friends. We immersed ourselves in the twelve-step culture and learned how to live in a different way. I realized that my needs and feelings were separate from Andrew's, and that I had the right to ask for what I wanted and needed. Of course, having been expertly trained since the age of three to take care of everyone else's feelings before mine, I found that unlearning this habit was challenging. I felt intense pangs of guilt when I put myself first, but I soon learned that no one died when I abided by my needs instead of others'. Baby steps, yes. But even these baby steps created more space within me than I'd ever had.

Andrew became more honest, accountable, and productive. The house stayed cleaner longer. When he said he was going to do something, he actually did it. He became willing to listen to others and let go of the belief that he knew everything. (I even glimpsed a small sliver of humility one day!) We sold the auto business (too many bad memories and baggage), and he decided to open a new business—a small hobby store that sold radio-controlled helicopters. For him it was a transformation. There were moments when I felt we just might be able to live the life that I had always imagined we were capable of living.

*   *   *

In January 1989 at the age of twenty-five, and despite the fact that my panic attacks were still in full swing, I finally began school at UCLA. I was excited to fill myself up and move toward a real future. After seven years with Andrew, who had no interest in learning about anything because he felt he already knew it all, being in an environment that invited my curiosity, independent thinking, and creativity was like drinking at an oasis. I could actually dare to ask myself, What do I want to make of this one precious life?

My dad loved that I was in school, not just because I'd be the first Carlin ever to graduate from college, but because he got to hear about everything that I was learning in classes like Astronomy, Oceanography, and Anthropology. He even intimated that he was a bit envious of my chance to soak in so much about the world. He wished he could join me.

It was so nice to be able to share my life with my dad again.

Because I'd been out of school for seven years, I was required to take a Remedial English class my first semester back. One day the instructor, a cool thirty-something guy, brought in what he called the perfect essay that reflected the “compare and contrast” style of writing that we would be expected to use in our future studies. He put a boom box on the desk, pressed
PLAY
, and my dad's voice came out of the speakers: “I'd like to talk a little bit about baseball and football. Starting with baseball; baseball is different from any other sport in a lot of different little ways. For instance, in most sports, you score points or you score goals. In baseball, you score runs.”

I guess Dad made it to class after all.

I swelled with excitement. After class I told the instructor who I was. He nearly fell off his chair. For a flash I felt that old flood of “specialness” that I used to feel backstage with my dad, but mostly I felt a rush of pride for the force my dad had become in the culture. He'd been doing comedy for almost thirty years, and he'd made a real mark. I could feel my own aspiration rise within me. I, too, wanted to make a dent.

But before I could make that dent, first I needed to make it to class. My anxiety and panic made getting to class a bit like an obstacle course. I feared walking up the big hill in the middle of campus because it raised my heart rate, and that always triggered a panic attack for me. My solution was to go into Ackerman Union (a huge building that housed the bookstore, auditorium, and food court), take the elevator to the third floor, and walk through the coffee shop. This would situate me nicely three-quarters up the hill.

On the outside I looked like any other student making my way through the building, but on the inside I was a secret agent searching for the earliest sign of racing heart, tingly hands, and spaced-out head. Once I'd get to class, I'd casually put my finger on my neck, checking my pulse every five minutes, making sure my heart was still beating.

I have no doubt this is what an insane person looks like.

And of course I still told no one. Why break with tradition at this point? I suffered silently. Eventually my mom, who had suffered from panic attacks in her twenties, too, figured it out. But instead of talking about it head on, she just asked, “What do you need? Would you like me to drive you to school today? Come onto the campus with you?”

Quietly I replied, “Yes.”

Sometimes she'd drop me off. Other days she'd bring a book and find a table or patch of grass and read while I went off to class. Every once in a while, when I had a big lecture, she'd join me and come to class and pretend that she was just another student. There I was, twenty-six years old, in American History 101 sitting next to my mommy. Life had worked itself out in such a way that I could finally be the “helpless child” and she the “nurturing mother” that neither one of us was able to be during her alcoholism. It's amazing how a simple gesture can heal so much.

*   *   *

About eighteen months after Andrew got sober, the magic spell of sobriety wore off, and he returned to his old Andrew ways. He wasn't using, but he became what they call a “dry drunk”—doing all the dishonest and manipulative behavior of an addict without the drugs or alcohol. It's kind of like memory foam—no matter how much you try and change its shape, it will always return to its original form. He was once again arrogant, controlling, and a liar. He went to fewer and fewer meetings and stopped calling his sponsor. Once again he believed he knew better than everyone else. All the patience and understanding that had been restored in me quickly dissolved. I knew for sure now that my future could not and would not include Andrew. For now, it was all about school.

*   *   *

Eventually every college student must face the question: What the fuck do I major in?

I myself dabbled with the idea of anthropology until I realized that every professor in the department was nine thousand years old. I thought maybe English would be a good fit, but English seemed like the default major for the completely lost—athletes and stoners. I didn't want to pick just anything. I wanted this time at UCLA to really count.

When I was eleven years old, my dad had taken me to the UCLA Mardi Gras, and we'd gone to a booth that played short films by UCLA film students. After watching them I turned to my dad and said, “I want to do that.” But now that I was at UCLA and faced with the opportunity to actually apply to that very same Film Department, I balked. I feared being rejected so much that I did it for them by not applying.