The BMX movie Rad and the bicycle messenger movie Quicksilver both came out around the same time, 1986, as I recall. Even though I was a hardcore BMX freestyler then, I was really bummed out by Rad, because it was such a ridiculous story. At the time, I was much more stoked on Quicksilver, which had an actual freestyle jam circle scene in it, even if it was with road and fixed gear bikes. It did have Woody Itson and Martin Aparijo doing what they could on the big wheel bikes, along with veteran stunt rider Pat Romano.
Then there was this corny dance scene, which really sparked something in me. No, I wasn't dreaming of dating a ballet dancer. Well, not that often, anyhow. But I loved the idea of living in a huge open area in a warehouse, like this scene. I thought it would be so cool to be able to ride flatland in my living room. I didn't tell anyone, but I secretly wished I could someday live in a space like that.
That idea was actually sparked when I was a kid by the TV detective show Vegas. Dan Tanna, the private detective in the show, drove a red, '57 Ford T-Bird, and parked it in his living room, which was in a non-descript warehouse in Las Vegas. My dad always watched the show, and we both thought that was the coolest place to live... open the car door, get out of the car, grab a drink, and sit on the couch a few feet away.
Only months after Quicksilver came out, I got hired at Wizard Publications, home of BMX Action and FREESTYLIN' magazines, and started a new life in the BMX industry in Southern California. As expensive as SoCal real estate was, it was obvious the warehouse life wasn't going to happen. Like so many dreams we all have at one time or another, it faded into the deep recesses of my mind. I went on to live many different places, have well over a hundred roommates, and did many different types of work.
After an injury in 1999, I became a taxi driver, which was a tough way to make a living. I wound up living in my taxi for a few months, and taking showers at the gym as I learned the ropes. Once I did, things went pretty well, and I lived most of the year 2000 in Huntington Beach, California, able to support myself by working only weekends in the cab. Things were looking up. Then a accident at the DMV invalidated my driver's license by mistake. Things got sketchy quick, and I spent a couple years telemarketing and working at a restaurant while I got the mess worked out.
On Labor Day weekend, 2003, I went back to taxi driving. It took about a month to get back in the groove and figure out where the nightlife was, which was where I made my money giving rides. Just as I started making decent money, the taxi company took out our radios and replaced them with dispatching computers. The whole business changed literally overnight. I was living in the cab and working seven days a week, 14 to 18 hours most days. In the next two years I only took five full days off. I gained 100 pounds, lost all energy, and my focused on nothing but making money day after day. I had given up all creative pursuits and became a cranky taxi driver struggling to pay the taxi lease each week. Most people don't realize that taxi drivers have to pay about $600 a week to rent the cab, and pay out another $300 a week in gas. It's a tough gig.
Then, in late summer 2005, a taxi driver I knew named Richard offered me a different deal. In addition to driving a taxi, he owned an indie art gallery named AAA Electra 99. I rented wall space in the gallery to put up poems I'd written years before. By 2005, the gallery had moved to a small industrial unit in Anaheim. Richard's deal was this, I would rent his taxi on the weekends, work the bars and clubs like I always did, then I could live in the gallery during the week real cheap. I thought about it for a few days, then took him up on it. You can get a look at Electra here.
It took me about a day to actually realize that my dream of living in a warehouse not only came true, but it was a warehouse crammed full of art and kitsch, a creative environment if I ever saw one. The only downside was that I didn't have a freestyle bike, but I was too fat to ride one anyhow then.
On my second night at the empty gallery, I was sitting in the tiny bathroom taking a dump. The bathroom there was plastered with band flyers on all four walls and the ceiling. I didn't really have to take anything in to read, because it was cool to just check out the flyers. But for some reason, I'd taken a pencil and post-it note pad in with me. I think I was making a list of things I had to do that week as I adjusted to me new home. I sat there and drew a little drawing of Mickey Mouse (I was in Anaheim, after all) watching a concert and throwing the heavy metal sign with his three fingered hand. It felt so good just to draw again.
When I finished, I got some Scotch tape and taped the Mickey drawing on the bathroom wall. From then my creative juices just started pouring out. I slept about 14 hours a day the first couple of weeks, trying to make up for two years of sleeping 4 to 5 hours a day in a parking lot in the cab. I ordered pizza, and just started making posters of my poems. I played with different ways of coloring with markers. One day, my "scribble style" Sharpie drawing just happened. I liked the way it let me shade with markers, and I've been drawing in that way for the 11 years since. I never gave up on creativity again after my months living at Electra. When I did go back to driving a cab full time, I drew pictures while sitting in the cab on my downtime. It was my time living my dream in a warehouse art gallery, and drawing as P.A., the gallery momma cat and her six kittens roamed around my feet, that led to actually making a few bucks from my artwork over the past year. Here's my latest, my take on a classic photo of street rider Vic Murphy launching an incredible 1 footed tabletop off a curb. It's funny how things work out.
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