Me taken in 1974 in Los Angeles 

I moved to Los Angeles in 1975 to write, pure and simple.  I loved living in Colorado, while beautiful and providing me with opportunities, I was convinced I needed to be in LA to publish a book. I had the opportunity to visit on many occasions over the past year, mostly due to the fact a movie I was co-starring in was being shopped around for consideration of a Golden Globe.  I made some friends on these visits; writers, filmmakers and press, all of whom had promised to help me get settled if I did.  So I moved.

 I was working on a book in collaboration with Bill Cardozo, who had been a previous editor for The Globe Magazine part of the Boston Globe Newspaper.   Currently he was a contributing writer for Rolling Stone Magazine.  He and I were working together writing a book tentatively titled “Desert Flower”.  In truth it was going to be a biography, mine. 

He conducted interviews with me over many hours.  I still have those cassette tapes (as well as his writing, which I may share one day) before we moved on to other things, mainly me deciding to write it myself when his marital problems interfered. 

Bill was quite fascinated with me, so it was no surprise when he asked me to accompany him to a Rolling Stone’s party.  In fact I was thrilled to be included.  Jann Werner was the publisher and I was so curious about this whole magazine.  I also figured there would be many successful writers there, and I was excited to be included. 

The evening of the party I opened my door when Bill knocked.  I was very surprised to find him standing there with another much taller man wearing a hat and sunglasses and smoking.  I noticed he smoked with the cigarette held between his second and third fingers.

“Hi Bill, come on in.”  I let them into my modest bachelor apartment. 

“Buffy, this is my friend Hunter Thompson.  Hunter, this is Buffy...the gal I told you about.”  He stood in the doorway, looking around, over my head and into the scarcely furnished place I called home. 

“Please come in Hunter, nice to finally get meet you.”  He stepped inside, not removing his sunglasses or hat.  Oh well, I was used to being around some characters since moving here.

Of course I had heard of Hunter since Bill was his friend and both wrote for the magazine.  Hunter already had quite the reputation, after his books, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas as well as his legendary tales of the Hell’s Angels’.  I admit I was a bit star-struck.  Bill coined the term, “Gonzo Journalism”, to describe his friend Hunter’s writing style.  It was something Hunter had embraced, and some would say, built on.

Hunter acknowledged the introduction to me with a dazed nod. Once they came inside I closed door, trying to think if I had anything but a half full bottle of red wine to offer.  Immediately Hunter rolled up a hundred dollar bill and snorted the white powder he had lined up on a table.  He offered some to both of us.  We each did a line, it seemed to be expected.  I had never indulged before.  (This was the first experience I ever had with the drug, cocaine.  I experimented with some different drugs over the years, but this was my first exposure to this particular drug, and immediately I regretted it as my heart raced.) 

Once we had all snorted he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the biggest, fattest joint I had ever seen.  He fired it up, and offered to us. He  asked me if I had any Chivas Regal.  I didn’t, it was too expensive for my meager budget.  I passed saliva moistened joint along to Bill.  I had barely taken a hit; not because I did not like it, but because I had no idea how the cocaine would react with it.  I wanted to maintain some kind of control, and so far it worked.  Other than feeling my heart racing I was remarkably clear headed.  (Of course I understand only too well this is why so many people became addicted to it; the false sense of well-being.)

Bill drove us in his battered BMW to the downtown hotel where the party would be.  I have to say the magazine had taken a suite of rooms in the luxury hotel, so this was quite unusual, I was expecting a private banquet room, which points up my naiveté of the scene during this time. 

Hunter searched his pockets to find scrap of paper the room number he had written.  The three of us were likely an odd sight walking through this downtown hotel.   The balding Hunter wore a funny hat, green corduroy blazer and his omnipresent sunglasses.  Bill was shorter with his wiry, curly hair and glasses and an ill-fitting blue blazer.  He looked almost square in comparison to Hunter.  Yours truly had heard “party” and dressed up in a bright red dress and platform heels. Once we located the right room number Hunter banged loudly on the door.  I looked around to see if anyone was disturbed, but the hallway was quiet.

I was unable to keep up with the steady stream of seemingly incoherent things he had spoken about in the car on the way over and continued as we walked.  I do remember he would have few coherent moments.  He and I were surprised to discover we both had been at both Lackland Air Force Base and Scott Air Force Base during the same time frame, though he was eleven years older and I was just a military brat to his enlisted status.

Bill seemed to speak his language enough to keep Hunter’s stream of conscious style conversation going.  I got a sentence or two, but usually by the time I got out comment, he had already moved along in his thought process. Just as well, I hated to think I sounded stupid to him.

We stood there in the hall for what seemed an eternity.  Finally when the door opened I was astounded at the density of smoke and number of people moving about in the room.  We were let in immediately, the door was slammed shut behind us and I soon was wandering around, alone, as Hunter and Bill were pulled into different groups of friends’ conversations.  I was left alone, so I explored.

There were at least three rooms all opening into each other.  On banquet style tables, in each room, I saw something I would never, ever witness again; big silver bowls filled with the white powder.  I now understood the bowls contained the drug of people’s choice.  My jaw hit the floor in utter amazement; the drug use was more flagrant than any I had ever seen before, or since. People were drinking, doing drugs, dancing, and milling from room to room.  In general it was a kind of orderly chaos.  Some people seemed to be especially out of it when they came out of the bathrooms in various states of disarray. No telling what was available in there...I was not going to find out though.

I couldn’t tell you the names of anyone else there or even how long we was there, but the contact high from the pot makes me unsure.  I wandered around paranoid about the open use of the drugs, and was afraid of a police raid.  Things were deteriorating quickly and I wanted no part of any of it.  Apparently neither did my two dates...they found me and Bill said, “Let’s get outta here.”  

On our way back to my place we stopped at a liquor store in Hollywood.  I was given some money to buy some Chivas Regal for Hunter, which I did, looking completely out of place as I stepped over passed out (I hoped) bodies lining the entrance.  It smelled of alcohol and urine, which clearly did nothing to enhance my experience.   The man behind the counter was a slightly overweight, middle-aged man with greasy hair who perked up some upon seeing me enter his shop.  His smarmy smile was creepy.  I hoped he had Chivas so I would not have to do repeat this scenario somewhere even  worse.  He did, I paid and hurried back out to the waiting black car.  “Thanks Buf....” Hunter took the brown bag from my hands. 

By the time we got the apartment Hunter had already opened the bottle and was taking swigs directly.  He turned toward the back seat and offered it to me.  I took a sip, wondering what we would do now.  “You guys want to come up?”

Bill seemed agitated with the situation.  I don’t know what they talked about when I was out of the car buying the booze, but clearly they had some plan cooked up for the rest of the evening. 

“We’ll come up for a minute, then we need to be going.”  The three of us again went to my place where the boys used my bathroom, took time to snort another few lines and smoke another huge joint.  I refused the cocaine this time, instead taking a few hits of pot, by now mellowing out some.  I really was happy to be home, no telling what was going down next.

I was grateful to be home, safe-and-sound.  Although I never saw Hunter again, I did hear of further exploits in the following years and finally in 2005 his suicide.

Bill died only a year later, in 2006, from a heart attack.  I opened the LA Times one Sunday and saw the obituary. It inspired me to dig out all of those tapes.  Only now can I appreciate how important they are.  These two men left their indelible marks on both the times and in my personal memory.