John Waters’s memoir/travelogue Carsick is out this month. In it, the mustachioed writer/director crosses the country twice. First on a series of imaginary rides and then he actually hitchhikes from his house in Baltimore to his apartment in San Francisco. He waves various signs – one that reads, “I’m not a psycho”. He decided to do it again last week in NYC for New York Magazine and he set out with a sign reading “Frick Collection” — “because we’re in tony, historic Greenwich Village.” He explained his reasons for the cross country trip:
“I wanted an adventure. Because my life is so controlled and planned. I used to stand in front of the Holland Tunnel tollbooth in the ’60s, and no one would ever pick me up. It’s very different hitchhiking when you’re 16 and when you’re 66. I didn’t have any rabid gerontophiliacs pick me up.” And he imagines what could go most wrong on the trip uptown. “The worst case scenario would be someone that didn’t speak the language, so we couldn’t really tell what they were doing. But immediately the locks go down. And it smells. We ride one block, and they turn around and blow both our heads off.”
Me, I can’t wait to read it. He always makes me laugh and for all his successes, he seems to be the same subversive crackpot dreamer he always was. Did you watch the episode of RuPaul Drives where he picks John up? It’s a two-parter and worth a watch. Those two!
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