Driving Ms. Johnson
"Can anyone volunteer
to pick up Joyce Johnson at her hotel tonight?" Paul Marion asks at
the Jack Kerouac Literary Festival last weekend. Without thinking, my hand shot up.Joyce Johnson is On The Road royalty. The talented writer of eight books, and one-time girlfriend of Jack Kerouac, was in town for the night and needed a lift. I wanted to be her chauffeur.
I've read Minor Characters and heard the stories about this independent streetwise Manhattan writer nurturing Keroauc's words, navigating his moods and soothing his sensitive side. Of all the women who entered Kerouac's up- and downbeat orbit, Johnson is the only one to emerge unscathed. Or so I am thinking as my Mini Cooper pulls in front of Johnson's hotel. What would Kerouac's still-living Maggie Cassidy be like?
I escort her into my car and we head to sushi bar Blue Taleh in downtown Lowell as instructed. She's in a talkative mood, so I pepper her with deep journalistic inquires."Was he as handsome in person as the photos suggest?" I ask as we cruise down the Lowell Connector.
"He was amazing," Johnson confirms. "Deep blue eyes, ruddy complexion, dark hair. He looked like someone who just walked out of the woods."
Johnson and Kerouac circa 1957
The woods of Centralville? I'm trying to imagine how a Franco-American kid from these gritty streets ends up looking like a wise woodman from Vermont. But there is no time to ponder. I only have Johnson for few more lights.
Submerged in a plush arm chair in the lobby is not an overly dolled-up 77 year-old, or aging beatnik chic, but a friendly, energetic woman with a wide smile "Are you here to pick me up?" Johnson asks, her face brightening.
I escort her into my car and we head to sushi bar Blue Taleh in downtown Lowell as instructed. She's in a talkative mood, so I pepper her with deep journalistic inquires."Was he as handsome in person as the photos suggest?" I ask as we cruise down the Lowell Connector.
"He was amazing," Johnson confirms. "Deep blue eyes, ruddy complexion, dark hair. He looked like someone who just walked out of the woods."
Johnson and Kerouac circa 1957
The woods of Centralville? I'm trying to imagine how a Franco-American kid from these gritty streets ends up looking like a wise woodman from Vermont. But there is no time to ponder. I only have Johnson for few more lights.
"How did you meet Jack?" I ask, pulling onto Central Street. "On a blind date set up by Allen Ginsberg," she says with vestiges of excitement about this fix up, 55 years ago, still lingering.
Picture it: Howard Johnson's, Greenwich Village, 1957. A struggling one-time author of the unacclaimed Town and the City calls her up and says "I'll take you out, but I have no money. Can you pay?"
Johnson, 13 years his junior, recalled how revolutionary this date was for many reason. "I had never paid for a man before," she says.
Johnson, 13 years his junior, recalled how revolutionary this date was for many reason. "I had never paid for a man before," she says.
Her early impressions of the writer confirm the gloom often found in Kerouac's prose. "He was drinking a lot when I met him." This was before On The Road came out. He was 34. His moods, says Johnson, were mercurial. "I had never met an alcoholic. No one in my family had drinking problems. I wasn't equipped to handle him."
What did she like most about him? "He was tender and supported my writing."
In promoting her newest biography: "The Voice is All: The Lonely Victory of Jack Kerouac," Johnson mentions the Kerouac questions that bother her the most.
Q: "Why are people still reading Kerouac?" ( A: "Because of the writing.")
Q. "What was it like to sleep with Jack Kerouac?" (A: "What's it like to sleep with your boyfriend?")
Out in the chilly October night with Jack Kerouac's one-time girlfriend, now walking with a collapsible cane, I'm caught up in the significance of the moment. "This was Jack's favorite time of year," I say to Joyce. "Yes, everyone comes home in October," she says, quoting the famous line from On The Road. "He got that from Thomas Wolfe."
Posted by Bistro Broad at 10/14/2012 2:55 PM 
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: kerouac joyce johnson lowell
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: kerouac joyce johnson lowell
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