The CCC

By R. A. Daly

In the midst of these covers lies a natural hesitant of validity, inviting you to decide the authors claim that a desperate Human Being is capable of crossing the barrier into impossible, while exposing the visual surrounding truth of the last six decades of change that has drawn more people into the realization of the missing love they needed at birth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 19, 2016
• ISBN: 9781682891117

Book preview

The CCC

R.A. Daly

Copyright © 2016 Rick Daly

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc. 2016

ISBN 978-1-68289-110-0 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-68289-111-7 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

The CCC

Rich Dolario and Jon Barrett La Fortune

Chapter 1

Born

Chapter 2

A Friend

Chapter 3

The Hangout

Chapter 4

Shaky Days

Chapter 5

Hopeless Hoping

Chapter 6

Yes, Yes

Chapter 7

1975

Chapter 8

Settling Down

Chapter 9

Holy Cow, Jon!

Chapter 10

Our Tenet Command Post

Chapter 11

Dead or Alive

Chapter 12

Sault Sainte Marie

Chapter 13

Ascending

Chapter 14

The Last Song

About the Author

The CCC

Rich Dolario and Jon Barrett La Fortune

•

This is the story of a man with constant shattered dreams, a long time of planning and bombing out, decades of haste and hard work, only to drag along at the bottom of the American middle class with only that instilled spark of hope, which most lotto players or devout worshipping folks rely on, the hope of someday landing on an instinctive peace of self-worth, to annihilate that internal craving that comes with the battle of life.

My name is Rich Dolario, and I’ve been a close and longtime friend, actually since childhood, of the man whose journey we are about to embark on. This is a fascinating tale of borderline insanity, humor, as well as an outcome of outright stupidity guided by blind bravery. People come and people go, but this particular individual is exceptionally worthy of recognition, not only as my close friend but also as the only man I’ve ever known or heard of to perform such a self-grueling punishment for the only purpose of finding one’s identity.

Chapter 1

Born

Jon Barrett La Fortune at the Glendale Sanitarium and Hospital in California in1952

Jon’s mother left his name and the hospital a couple hours after his birth, never to be seen again. It was rumored that she had traveled back to Quebec, and the name she had left her newborn could never be traced through any records since.

Glendale in the forties and fifties was a happening place, packed bars, hamburger joint hangouts, and beautiful hot rods. So from the cats and the drunks in the alleyways behind the bars, having coitus over garbage cans, it was a noisy and illegitimate lifestyle for many. But Jon started life in a loss and gain mode, and he would continue with that for what would seem to be the rest of his life.

After a month or two in the newborn ward of the sanitarium, an elderly lady that worked as the night nurse grew rather fond of little Jon. She just loved his big lips. Southern California in 1952 was still beginning to experience post-war growth. Subdivisions of small bungalows on inexpensive lots with two bedroom and flat-roof starter homes dotted Los Angeles County and the San Fernando Valley. In exchange for vast agriculture, orchards and grain fields left from the early days before William Mulholland’s water. Jon, however, would always refer to those days as the start of the human breeding grounds. I would agree, yet also argue, that we would not be here if it were not for those days!

Now, in Jon’s own words:

A train arrived in Los Angeles in 1928, and stepping off in downtown Glendale City Depot, was a young lady from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, by the name of Hanora Rita Hanson, a discharged war nurse veteran who left everything behind to start a new life in California. Along with the hundreds that were piling in to the Sunny State every day in pursuit of the good life.

A few years went by, and Nora finally landed a somewhat living-wage job at the Glendale Sanitarium/Hospital. Nora had also been fortunate enough to rent a small apartment a few blocks away from her new job at the hospital. She was also thrilled at the opportunity to be placed in the pediatric ward in a new wing at the old hospital, certainly a deliverance from the gruesome days of past war and waste! One aspect of Jon’s recollection of Nora’s history is that she never had any of her own children. So it had been Jon’s belief, later in life, that Nora had a vision from the Lord. At the age of forty-nine, little Jon had been placed there for her to take home, to cuddle, and call her own. So after working at her job in Glendale Sanitarium/Hospital for over two decades, and due to her outstanding work for the hospital, only minimal paperwork was required and adoption permission by the State of California was granted. And low and behold, Nora was a mother! And baby Jon finally had a home.

As the months turned into years, Nora had become aware of Jon’s traits and genetic character that had been passed on by his birth mother. One particular annoyance, and little Jon seemed to have many, was his overwhelming desire to smell things, anything! He had picked up a chunk of dog feces on his way to school one day and sniffed it throughout the day until a teacher discovered it and slapped it out of his hands. When Nora came to pick Jon up, in her 1948 Plymouth from school, Jon unusually decided to sit in the back seat. Jon sneakily pushed in the cigarette lighter and greedily shoved the hot stick to his nose. You can only imagine the howling that followed that action, which was quickly followed by a slapping from Nora while she attempted to drive with only one elbow.

Nora had been called many times to school’s parent-teacher conferences, and one included a psychological evaluation of the seven-year-old. The conference was called to further understand the reason why little Jon couldn’t stand up in class when called upon, (his erections). When his teacher would bend over to explain something to Jon, his gaze would fixate on her cleavage. Jon’s own recollection of these accounts, as well as the outcome of the school psychiatrist’s evaluations, was normal. An extremely imaginative young mind vigorous with curiosity and a natural free spirit.

When Jon was eight years old, Nora decided to relocate to another town in Los Angeles County. Jon was anxious to move but he choked with tears, at the thought of leaving his favorite place ever! It wasn’t the old apartment, or his grade school, the little candy store at the comer, or the Verdugo Hills, where he loved to hike the trails. No, it was a small rocky hillside at the beginning of a driveway at the end of Provincia Drive in Burbank.

Jon has explained to me that at the age of five, he had wandered away from the apartment and walked about five blocks in a Southern California rainstorm. He wound up holding on to some vegetation on the side of a small cliff. Jon said the sunrays and a light drizzling rain had exposed a presence of God right in front of him. Jon said he was at God’s feet! The cool, wet smell of dirt, plants, and coastal moisture along with the soft sunrays poking through the clouds spoke to him. Jon said it wasn’t a voice, but he was told, in a way, that he is loved and he will experience much! But mostly the sense of love and comfort was unforgettable. Jon has talked about this a few times and doesn’t remember how he was found that day.

I have visited this place in Burbank recently, and in the midst of the bustling streets, it is still there! Exactly the same as Jon described, the hillside of God.

Jon in Burbank, California

Retirements at Glendale Sanitarium were set for an extremely old age, but Nora found she could transfer her account to a broker and start another place of employment, so she did. It was at the Veterans Hospital in Northeast Los Angeles, in the small town of Sylmar, at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains and the San Fernando Valley. So Nora and Jon loaded up the Plymouth and set out for Sylmar to find a house for rent. Jon remembered when they rolled into town,

the air was thick with yellow, oily auto exhaust all the way there. But, when Nora and I started driving toward the big mountains, ascending a road from the little town called Sylmar, the air cleared and I could smell lots of things. When we got to the top of the road, Nora and I got out of the car and stood next to the roadside. A very strong smell of eucalyptus filled the air. Men were cutting down huge trees, dozens of them, and tractors were piling them up! I saw red! I took off running at the men with the chainsaws, Nora followed and tried to keep up, tripping over large branches and stumps. When I got to the first idiot, I picked up a rock and threw it at him, hitting the motor on the saw that was screaming through a large eucalyptus log stacked on top one another.

You stupid fucker! I yelled.

The man had stopped the saw and put it on a stump. Nora ran to me and grabbed me up, while the worker hiked his way over and stood there with his hands on his hips. His gloves were hanging out of his rear pocket. He wiped the sweat and chips off his face and said to Nora, What the hell is wrong with your son? How old is he?

Nora, catching her breath while holding onto my arm, said, He’s eight, and I am sorry he came at you. I don’t know what brought that on, we just drove here from Glendale, and I have to be at the VA hospital in a few minutes.

The man pointed to the gates at the hospital, just across the road. I was still pissed, but I honestly don’t know where those words came from. I just blew up!

After some help from the hospital staff, Nora and Jon looked at a few small houses around the hospital that were for sale or rent. In the 1960s, subdivisions in and around Sylmar were small. But developers were on the march, clearing the foothills for more. This part of the San Fernando Valley still had many small ranches, sand roads, olive and orange orchards, and natural streams. They were all located at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains. Jon has reminded me many times, that the destruction of this area should be put to a stop. He became extremely emotional and stone-cold serious when talking about the town’s residential growth. He told me that it makes him physically sick to watch the destruction.

Nora had decided to buy a small house just down the street from her new nursing career at the Veteran’s Hospital. Nora could take her car to and from her job, and Jon could walk to a small grade school a mile down the hill. It would come to be that this area of Southern California, from 1960s onward, would be the catalyst that would form this young boy’s mind about the world. After settling in, Jon really grew intrigued with the backyard of the little house in the foothills. He wanted to be a farmer when he grew up. He began to grow a small garden with no help from Nora or anyone else.

He was always a muddy mess, but he also managed to grow some vegetables and carted them around to various houses to sell. Five cents for a yellow squash! Jon would yell. Back then, you could buy DDT insecticide at the store, and Jon did so, covering his lettuce and spinach with it. Years later, he felt bad about selling it to old women around the area, because he might have ended their lives sooner. Nora would watch Jon through the window while he worked in his garden. Jon knew that, and it bothered him because now she had lots of time on her hands. She had even taken up drinking beer! Jon hated the smell that Nora would emit when she talked to him. And it seemed she was drinking more every weekend.

Jon really loved Saturday mornings up in the foothills of Sylmar. The mountains were huge and mysterious, and the different smells in the cool, quiet mornings offered a hint of sage, ocean, and citrus. There were some eucalyptus trees around the comer from the house that Jon would visit on his way up to the waterfalls behind the VA hospital. Nora didn’t want Jon to go off hiking by himself, but he would leave the house long before she would wake. Jon has explained later that the