New York Doll

I’ve been downtown five days a week recently and thought that I was hallucinating for a sec when I saw a poster for a New York Dolls concert. Wow, man, groovy–David Johansson is not performing as Buster Poindexter. It was a name he used when under the spell of his big band persona.

Lucia and I still call him Dexter Coinbexter. We first called him that one night when we were very stoned on some very good pot, found it very funny and still do. Maybe it’s just us but we like to think that anybody who saw David Johannson perform as Buster…would.

Once Lucia and I actually paid to see him perform under that name. However our drinks at The Bottom Line were paid for. Later we were taken to One Fifth–our favorite hangout in 1982, our calamari was paid for as was our martinis and then champagne followed by desert, coffee and Sambuca–it was the decade of sambuca. At the end of the night, 4:00, we properly thanked the men who had been hanging onto our every word and went to our separate apartments. Lucia called me and we spoke until seven.

Lucia and I had known each other for five years and had been friends for four of them but she had lived in Atlanta for several years and it felt as though we were just really getting to know each other. I had been with the Bum for most of those years. Lucia and he had been friendly and she was just learning about the Bum’s dark side.

Lucia and I couldn’t stop talking. It was a never ending gush of words; one long phone conversation that went on for years, and another in person one. Lucia and I were enchanted with one another. Angie Ralph was Lucia’s best friend and Shelby was mine, but it was inevitable that Lucia and I became best friends also.

Though we worked long hours, we went out at least four nights a week. As we were both in recovery from good love gone bad, we really didn’t need men to complicate our lives, though at One Fifth one night Lucia met The Kangaroo Kid, an Australian TV star, and I met Derek, a Soho art dealer.

I had issues dating somebody named Derek; his pants while obviously expensive were too short, and he lacked a personality. The last was his saving grace. After the Bum I was in desperate need of somebody who could blend into the bar stool. Neither the Bum nor I had ever been able to blend in anywhere.

Derek was more than willing to double date with Lucia and The Kangaroo Kid, who would spend the evening explaining to anybody who listened that he was a big TV star down under. Lucia and I would then be free to talk to each other, as we had the evening’s dinner and drinks paid for, and we had dates so we didn’t have to flirt. When we felt the urge to flirt we would go out without them.

Though neither Lucia nor I owned a VCR, our mutual best friend, gay category, Patrick owned two, so were able to see The Kangaroo Kid on Australian TV. He was who he said he was.

It’s strange that seeing this poster brought back memories of David Johanssen, because I have much earlier memories of The Dolls which I will share tomorrow