Call Me Lucky Page #7

silent as a newly dug tomb. "

- So I'm a little kid...

I'm a real little kid...

and I'm by all reports

a sweet little kid.

Curly haired...

I mean, I remember

everybody loving me.

I remember, you know,

strangers doting on me'

and I remember

trusting everyone'

and I remember delighting in,

figuring out what's going on.

What, you know,

day and night is,

and what, you know,

the sun is.

I was a good little kid,

you know?

And I deserved a break.

I was a sweetheart like

every little kid. You know?

I deserved a break.

And I didn't know

what was headed my way.

You know,

my parents who weren't...

they just went out sometimes

so they had a babysitter.

And, uh...

the babysitter

kind of set me up

and made me like her a lot.

And then this guy

started coming over

who was her mother's

boyfriend or something.

You know, something that was

an arrangement that wouldn't

have been formally

discussed in the late 50s.

Sometimes you know

who's not good.

And anyway this guy

was not good.

And,you know,

I can remember him, like,

touching my curly hair.

There was always, like,

an attraction, you know'?

Like, I generally

didn't mind but this guy...

there was something just wrong.

You know, I couldn't tell

you now how many times.

I mean, I could never...

how many times or whatever

but it was a number of times.

This guy would come over,

he would take me down in the

basement and... rape me.

- Barry felt that it was key

to interview you.

He actually said to me

that you're his hero.

And that's in regards to...

ms rape.

- It's scary for anybody

of any age to really see

someone who's gone,

who's the face of evil,

who's like this nothing.

There's no soul there.

There's nothing.

It's just so...

possessed by what they have,

what they feel like

they have to do,

what they can't not do.

And I would of course

scream and cry...

and... my face would get shoved

into these couch cushions...

to muffle the noise.

Well, this sewed to

suffocate me and I...

I would get asphyxiated

and pass out.

This is...

a lot to ask of me.

Anyway, so...

let's see...

So I was, like, five.

So I.. - even like a normal

five year old,

I sneaked in the house, right?

And nobody was upstairs.

So I thought that was

very strange, like,

you know, where's Barry?

Where's the babysitter?

So...

I went downstairs,

walked down the stairs and...

you know, I thought

Barry was dead.

Then the babysitter saw me

and yelled my name

and then Barry

looked up at me...

And I ran and just...

knew he needed help.

So I made it up

almost to the top stair

and she got my foot'

and I was screaming,

and I bit the babysitter.

Pretty hard.

- I read of this poor

little girl in India

who was raped to death.

I think she was 3 years old.

Imagine that. I mean,

I've been through some stuff'

but being raped to death...

Well, I mean, that's the

end of your whole life.

And I just felt

so badly for her,

felt so terrible for her.

And I was,

you know, relating to it,

and I was just thinking, yeah,

so, it could've been worse.

I had almost been raped

to death a number of times.

- But it's that glance

that gets you,

you know what I mean?

Life registers in, in... kind of

visually on people, you know?

It's a glance that lasts

a lifetime, you know?

Just like the glance from

my brother, you know?

And I had to, like, belt out of

there and run up some stairs

and what the hell'

and yet the whole world

was changed for both of us

from that point on,

you know?

- It was the most shocking thing

I think in my life that I heard,

when I heard the whole story.

I mean, it makes you

just revile humanity.

It makes you want to hug Barry

and just... or f***ing kill him,

you know,

put him out of his misery.

And it just took a long time for

me as his friend to get over it.

- To me it gave me

a little bit of resolve

knowing the man that I do.

'Cause there was, there

was always anger there.

There was always something.

- He's always seemed a little angry.

- There was always...

- he was always pissed off at something, and...

- And he'd show it on stage too.

- And it started to

kind of fit into place.

- I do remember the

headline in The Phoenix:

"Baby Rape. "

And it was,

you know, something

that I don't think

I understood,

fully comprehended at first.

It was like something

that I myself would go'

you know, "Why, why would you,

why are you talking about that?"

You know?

"That was a long time ago.

Why bring that up?"

You know?

And it wasn't until that I came

to terms with my own sexuality

and my own abuse

that I looked back

on that and said,

"Look at how courageous,

you know,

he was to admit that

and not be afraid. "

A lot of gay people

here tonight?

Just me. OK.

You know, Lenny

had called Crimmins

and told him that I was gay.

And then he called me

and it wasn't...

he didn't even ask me,

you know,

if I was or wasn't gay.

It was just, like,

this kindness that he had that,

it would be okay if I was.

And I just continued to

deny it, you know?

"No, I'm not, I'm not. "

Because that was my whole life,

you know?

That, you know,

you were just, like'

constantly hiding

that you are who you are'

you know,

so I couldn't admit it.

It took me a long time to,

you know, come to that,

come to those terms'

and when I did, you know,

I called Barry and it wasn't...

he didn't say, "I knew it,"

or anything like that.

It was just this kindness

that he had,

and if it was anything that,

you know,

if there was anything

that he could do to help me,

you know,

he would be there.

But you can be

a football player.

You can be a f***ing homo

and be a football player.

How about that?

You couldn't do that

years ago.

Now you can be

a football player.

And everybody's going,

"Oh my God, he's so brave.

He's so brave!

He plays football,

and he's gay.

He's brave.

That's brave. "

I'll tell you what's brave.

I told my wife I was gay.

That's brave, alright?

That is brave.

- So many people

said this to me:

"Well, are you talking

to anyone about it?"

Yeah, I thought I was

f***in' talking to you.

You know?

But what they're really saying

is go talk to the psychiatrist

who's then gonna...

and I did, and you know'

they said, "Well, there's

a variety of things... "

and basically they

were just telling me

what drugs

they could put me on

and for once in my life

I turned down drugs.

- I was sitting in the offices

of Moving Forward,

the news journal that

I published and edited,

and answering phones,

and I get this call

and it's Barry Crimmins.

So he told me a

little bit about himself,

but it was very humble,

you know?

He didn't get into,

you know,

all this stuff about

being a famous person

or, you know,

anything like that.

He really just wanted

someone to talk to.

He had been rejected repeatedly

by numerous organizations

who were out there

supposedly helping victims

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes