Running Away to Austin - 1992-93ish

Austin, Texas 1992-3ish. I know it was summer Pete died. When you don't have to know what day it is, you don't. Friday's meant nothing to me because I was going out 7 days a week and had yet to look for work since arriving in the little big city, living in a rent-controlled apartment off I-35 and Riverside for $300/month. I went to Austin with dreams of doing hair for punk rockers and I found out very quickly that punk rockers do their own hair. Literally, with the cheapest product you have ever seen and most of the time they are happy when their hair has a chemical blowout and burns off in patches. That's punk.

Sharing the apartment with my high school friend Cindy after I got my cosmetology license we high-tailed it out of Brenham as fast as we could. Town Lake Apartments on the East Side was where we were, one exit away from downtown 6th Street.

We lived a few apartments down from 2 punk rock guys named Turtle and Dave that helped us load our boxes in with the help of a hefty tip handed over by John my friends' dad. Dave was a character, his hair was cherry red, he colored his teeth black with sharpies, and wore a band-aid on his face for no apparent reason. His clothes were torn and dirty. He smelled stale and musty most of the time so we kept him at arm's length. Looks can be deceiving because he was a very nice kid. So I introduced myself and wanted to know where he gets his hair done when he informed me he did his own and was able to see it first hand one day, as he poured Clorox in his already bleached hair, then when it was bleach yellow he put cherry kool-aid in it. Wow. Can you say, over-processed? Well, that is an understatement.

Having met several of his friends all of which didn't have a dime and all did their own hair, Elmer's glue for the mohawks, and most had a jar or two of manic panic for color. I could see I wasn't going to make a living in Austin trying to do punk rock hair.

My roommate on the other hand had a full-time job and was diligently working and being responsible. She was serious, she was here to live. The love of her life was here and she wasn't going to mess it up. I, on the other hand, had just lost the love of my life and didn't give a rat's ass about responsibility. I was here to party, and party I did. I never even made it out of the house to go out each night until around 11 pm. Months went by and I was not a contributor to our living environment in any way. Food stamps and checks from home were the only things that kept me above water.

My looks had changed dramatically, I was no longer the pretty girl that was engaged to be married that same year. I had cut my hair off, very very short in fact it at times was shaved in the back and sides leaving hair on top to prove I was a girl. I colored what hair I had in purple and wore the same thing over and over. No jewelry o