Brokenhearted in Bakersfield
13 - STARDUST ACRES IS THE PLACE TO BE
“Think they saw us?” my
ex-business partner worried.
“You’d better hope not,” I tossed Chet a beer.
“You’re ‘bout two strikes into an enforced vacation now, ain’t you? Don’t worry,” I tried to sound reassuring as
much for me as for him, “if they’d seen us we’d be cuffed right now and sitting
in the back of the Sheriff’s cruiser and headed downtown.”
I cracked opened a beer for myself. “We
just better lay low here until all the excitement has passed.”
As we lounged inside my mobile home and enjoyed a couple more beers, we was
feeling pretty bummed out since our dreams of an agribusiness empire had been rudely
snuffed. On top of that, neither one of
us could figure what the hell Owen was up to, crashing into the gravel by our
hemp plants like that. “It proved to be
an unfortunately busy night out where the septic tank drains,” I sighed.
Chet switched on my television. In the
glowing light this older gentleman in a suit and bow tie bounced up and down on
a tractor seat and sang his heart out:
“Stardust Acres is the place to be!
Country livin’ near the big cit-ee!
Lots spreadin’ out so far and wide,
We got a pool,
And it’s dug deep down inside…
The ground!”
Chet pointed at the television, “Who’s that old guy on the tractor? Wasn’t he on TV a long time ago?”
I vaguely recognized that old guy, too, smiling bright, his teeth as white as
his hair, and his hair as white as his suit, sitting on a tractor while looking
down at Sonny Smite. (We both recognized
Sonny Smite as the proprietor of The Stardust Lounge.) The old guy smiled:
“Hello friends, this is Arnold Edwards.”
I slapped Chet’s broad shoulder, “Damn, I almost had it.”
“It was on the tip of my tongue, too” Chet bragged. “But ain’t he looking old and wrinkly now?”
While Chet and me conversed, Mr. Edwards was delivering his pitch:
“And I’m standing here with Sonny Smite, inviting you to come on down and
see the manufactured mansions at Stardust Acres! Come on down and see the next wave in
prefabricated living on these luxurious lots!
There’s lots and lots to see and do here, right Sonny?”
Sonny Smite grinned into the camera. (I
knew that grin. That’s the grin he uses when he tells you that you can’t run a
tab, or you been 86’d.)
“Sonny, how did you ever come up with this marvelous place?”
“Well, Arnold, I looked around at the condition of most trailer parks and
mobile home communities, and it didn’t take me long to realize what was
missing, and seeing what was missing, I set myself to creating the dream
community for transient living, Stardust Acres.
And I dreamed of building it right here in Bakersfield, next to my
fabulous adult entertainment complex, The Stardust Lounge!”
Sonny Smite pumped his fists while flashing a huge smile into the camera, with
Arnold Edwards beaming right behind him.
Sonny Smite then pointed to a big neon sign blinking over a lovely
grass-like green lawn:
“Friends, Stardust Acres is all new and shiny. And we have got premium picnic grounds with
cinderblock cookout pits for our residential guests, and we provide a
convenient coin-operated launderette for our discerning residents. Cleanliness is next to godliness, right
Arnold?”
“You bet, Sonny!”
“And best of all, we’ll have a real, dug-deep-down-inside-the-ground
swimming pool!”
Sonny Smite proudly held up an artist’s drawing of a kidney-shaped swimming
pool as he winked into the camera:
“And remember, friends, Stardust Acres is situated right next door to The
Stardust Lounge, where dreams are entertained!
Nightly! Yesss, you knowwww it!”
Sonny Smite kept winking into the camera as a bunch of smiling showgirls
sashayed into view wearing skimpy sparkled and spangled costumes, and they
proceeded to gyrate their way up onto the tractor next to Arnold Edwards.
I looked real close for a dancer in an Indian Princess getup to see if Lorleen
Littlesum’s act had made it to the big-time of local TV broadcasting, but she
was nowhere to be seen.
Arnold Edwards and the smiling showgirls kept on bouncing up and down as he
began singing that happy song again:
“Stardust Acres is the place to be!
Country livin’ near the big cit-ee!
Lots spreadin’ out so far and wide,
We got a pool,
And it’s dug deep down inside…
The ground!”
But I wasn’t persuaded to move on out to Stardust Acres. (Although, I will confess, a more convenient
locale for regularly patronizing The Stardust Lounge had a certain
appeal.) Nope, I love Broken Heart Park
too much to fall victim to the electronic spin of subliminal advertising. And all the star power of Arnold Edwards
would not budge my mind one bit.