Tuesday, April 12, 2005

Dark Days at Mayham

Some of you may be thinking, that Tara is always trying to be so cheerful about stuff, it's so annoying, blah blah blah. But I will tell you I wasn't always like this. Here is a story of dark days.

The summer after high school, my friends Whtiney and Bryce got an apartment in a very questionable complex on Mayham Road at LBJ and Central. It is shocking that their mothers let them live in this place. But they did, so we all had a place to hang out. It was a bad summer for me. I was transitioning away from heavy metal and into the unknown. I was getting ready to go off to UNT in the fall to study - get this - business. I had no ambition. I was 17. I think what I probably thought I wanted to do at the time was work my way up the Sound Warehouse ladder of success, and maybe if I was lucky I could weasle my way into a job at a record company as the girl who goes around to the Sound Warehouses to put up posters. Everyone wanted this job. Those people got a lot of free stuff like CDs and tickets to big rock shows and backstage passes.
Anyway, every night, a bunch of people would gather at the Mayham apartment, because it was the only place to go. At any given time, there could be 15 or 20 people over there. There would always be a couple hours of doing hair and make-up. This was the guys. I can hear Bryce now..."It wasn't make-up...it was European Theatrical Grease-Paint." I stand corrected. Before grease-paint was applied, mohawks had to be achieved. Those guys kept Aqua-net in business through the late 1980's. I don't know what the primping was all about, because I don't actually remember ever going anywhere except for Denny's.
One night this guy Dino came over. I don't know which cat dragged him in. I think Bryce or somebody met him at the mall and thought he was cool or something. Dino was all bedraggled and punk, with a 12 inch mohawk and the most horrific B.O. you have ever smelled. Dino had a posse of two or three semi-normal guys whose names all started with "J". Once Dino found out about the apartment, he was there ALL the time. One night, Dino and the J's went to the mall and returned with a Ouija Board and a giant machete. Nobody in their right mind would sell any sharp object much less a machete to someone who looked like Dino, so that tells you about the kind of people who worked in the knife store at the mall. During play with the Ouija Board (such utter nonsense) Dino mentioned to someone that he often had homicidal thoughts. It was about that time that someone, I think Bryce, told Dino he was no longer welcome at the apartment. Mayham became slightly less interesting, but smelled a lot better.
Several video tapes were big players at Mayham. The ones I remember most were "Another State of Mind" which was the story of the first Social Distortion tour. It had lots of curse words. Most of my friends had the thing memorized. Another was "The Great Rock and Roll Swindle" which featured Malcolm McClaren and his tiny friend, and a song whose only lyric was "Who killed Bambi" which was repeated over and over in increasingly annoying silly voices. I am pretty sure that both of these films are terrible, and not worth watching, even for nostalgia.
Most of the time, I would get to the apartment early and find a spot on the couch, and watch the goings-on until it was time to go to Denny's.
I was not cheerful then. I complained a lot. If you would have told me I'd eventually like puppies and birds and little children, I would have thought you were nuts.
At least I learned about some good music during that time.
And in case you are wondering, everyone turned out OK. They all have jobs and families and normal hair now.

8 comments:

john clarke said...

john_clarke, for one, loves Tara tales of yore. I think I met you a couple of years after the Mayham experience (that name makes me giggle-happy) at an equally crappy apartment across from Restland on Greenville Avenue. If memory serves, Carla and revolving mix of your friends lived there, but I can't remember if you lived there too. But I do remember that somebody had painted "Jot Is Cool" and "Grease is the Word" above the fireplace. I remember listening to Japan there. I remember Bryce yelling at some girl named Jennifer on the phone. I remember Dave Howard talking about keyboards in excruciating detail. And I remember being introduced to James Henderson, who did an incredible immitation of the Rerun dance and could play various T.V. ad jingles on the guitar. And lastly, I remember going to Denny's.

Robert_M said...

I love these stories, and I had forgotten about the Carla apt.

The Dino Ouija night was creepy, I was there and it was bad. More fun to read about now.

I lived at Mayham for a few weeks until my roomate grew tired of lying on my behalf, and Bryce grew tired of my living in his place while contributing nothing.

I drive past Mayham every day, and I'd swear it's actually less shady now.

ahhh yesssss

Robert_M said...

Dangit now I'm flooded with Dino memories. Didn't he wear a Morrissey shirt and insist it be pronounced More-a-say.

Tara said...

Somewhere there is a picture of Dino holding the machete up to Whitney's throat. I have searched high and low, but can't find it. I did find some other funny pictures from back in the day, though. Perhaps I will scan them in and post them eventually.

I never lived at the Greenville Carla apartment. I eventually had an apartment down the street from there, on Walnut, but I never had many visitors because I wouldn't let anyone smoke.

glad you fellas enjoyed that little trip down memory lane.

Tara said...

I don't remember about the Morrissey thing, but wouldn't be surprised if it was true. And I completely left out the Hippie Witch.

whitneydonkey said...

i lived at maham and at the fireplace apartment. i have a picture of myself with dino sans machete, and I also painted the fireplace. i enjoyed those days, we had "good coffee" sang the blues alot and listened to the Cult on the record player really loud. i can only hope my daughters get to have as much fun as I did! viva soundwarehouse!
I wish we could have a reunion in Hawaii paid for by a reality television show. I still like the Cult a little.

Robert_M said...

I'm so happy Whitney is blogging. Where are the rest of the groovers?


All must blog, it's theonly way I can communicate in these the otts.

whitneydonkey said...

do you think the reality show would just pay for all the groovers to meet at denny's?
remember, we never had enough for the bill, because SOME PEOPLE didn't pay. no one on here of course.