After we broke up, I saw Naomi once or twice when she and Christina came to sing at our studio. She still looked ravishing and she was sporting around in a red and white Chevy convertible. Several years passed. I left the little leasing company and went to work for a magazine, run by some friends of mine who were also involved in our recording studio. The magazine, "The Mix" was about the professional recording studio business. One night, one of my cohorts from the magazine calls me up. "Mike, you ought to turn your TV to TBS, your old girlfriend and her daughter are accepting an award as best new singing group on the Country Western Annual Awards Show. In the next several years I got similar calls from my friends. The Judds racked up an impressive bunch of awards including six grammy awards which is for all music, not just country. Later, I heard that they sang at the White House and eventually, they were the featured act at half time of a super bowl. If you've played the White House and the Super Bowl, you really haven't got much more to prove in the music biz...
So I read Naomi's book. She had told me a lot of this stuff when we were together. For instance the two daughters had two different fathers. Something I don't believe they knew back then. As Naomi related it to me. She got knocked up by the high school quarterback on her first sexual encounter. When he heard she was pregnant he wanted nothing more to do with her. There was another fellow who was besotted with her charms and Naomi married him so she'd have a father for her child. She explained that back then, being a single high school girl and pregnant didn't sit too well with her people in Kentucky. I can only imagine...So she married the second guy gave birth to her kid from the first guy then had the second guys kid a few years later. I wasn't sure keeping this fact from her kids was such a good idea. They were bound to find out sometime, then they'd resent her for having withheld that information from them.
When I got to the part of the book where she was living in Marin County and coming to our little studio I started reading her version of our time together. Whoa, honey! I knew you smoked a lot of dope in them thar days but really? This is how you mis-remembered our time together? I was stunned at the "sins of commission and the sins of omission" in the book. She never mentioned the smoking, of course and, strangely, she didn't mention that WE HAD HAD AN ABORTION TOGETHER!!! She may have blithely let it slide but I will never forget that day. She came to me one morning at her house and informed me that she was pregnant with my baby. I asked her what she wanted to do. I was pretty "green" at this stuff. I had never been married or, as far as I knew, gotten a girl pregnant. She had been married twice by this time and was a single mother already saddled with raising two, sometimes rambunctious, daughters. With an angry, exasperated stare, Naomi said to me, "What do you think I'm going to do? I don't want your baby! I've got more than I can handle right now." Although I was somewhat taken aback by her tone I agreed. Hell, I didn't want to have my baby either!
We drove out to the little Women's Health Clinic in the village of Point Reyes Station in West Marin. Naomi had me wait in the car while she went in and took care of business. As I sat there waiting for her I thought about what was transpiring inside and I got very emotional. I admit I cried a few tears for my unborn child. Forty-five minutes later a very unemotional, even cold, Naomi came out and didn't say a word about what had happened. Hmm, this is some steel magnolia I got here... I don't believe the situation was ever mentioned again. Still, I marveled at how a woman could terminate a pregnancy and not show any emotion about it. I wondered what the good God fearing, bible thumping folks back in Kentucky would have thought...
It was becoming clear to me that part of my attraction for Naomi had been my studio connections. Why not shack up with the owner of a recording studio? Couldn't hurt, right? She was bound to scare up a few gigs singing harmony on other musicians recordings. Naomi knew my involvement with the studio was not like my other partners. I had a regular job in the world of finance and the studio was just a hobby; as much a clubhouse to play music with the gang and party in, as it was a "going concern" which it rarely was. As far as me being a partner in "Tres Virgos Studio" with my other two virgo general partners, it was like Sunday brunch. I was the chicken and they were the pigs. The chicken is involved, but the pig is committed... Despite really digging their singing together, I was uncomfortable with Naomi passing off her thirteen year old daughter as old enough to be singing in bars. While her classmates are home in their "jammies" doing their homework, Christina is singing backup for some bar band in San Francisco. Hank Williams may have gotten his start that way but I didn't think it was an appropriate way to raise a young girl in "modern times".
As she started making more connections in the contemporary music scene in the bay area, she probably saw me less as a boyfriend and more like a speed bump on the road to a successful music career. About this time, I got a call one day at work. It was a former co-worker of mine at the leasing company in Sausalito where I worked. I had always liked Colleen, she was a Phi Beta Kappa from Indiana University and in addition to being very intelligent, she was a lot of fun. She started bombarding me with a run of silly, off color jokes, and soon had me in stitches. I agreed to have dinner with her at her condo in Tiburon that night. One thing led to another and I never made it home. The next day, I was talking to one of my studio partners on the phone, when the operator broke in and said she had received an emergency request to break into our phone conversation. Fearing the worst I quickly acquiesced and the next thing I hear is Naomi's voice, "I know you were unfaithful to me last night!" That sure got the little hairs standing up on my neck. "Listen, Naomi, honey, it was totally innocent. An old work colleague of mine called me up and I went over to her place for dinner. I had bit too much to drink and I didn't want to drive so she put me up for the night." I didn't mention that she "put me up" in her bed but we were too far gone to consummate anything. I'm thinking to myself, "How the hell did Naomi know where I was last night?" It was kind of freaky...
"Listen, Mike, we need to talk about this. Me and the kids are going out of town, back to Kentucky to momma and poppa for a short family visit. I'll be back on Wednesday, you've got my car (mine was in the shop, Naomi had two, one of which she had loaned me, temporarily). You come pick us up Wednesday night at the Oakland Airport." I quickly agreed and we hung up. Then I started thinking to myself, "Emergency telephone break in? How the hell had she known what I'd been up to?" Then I remembered something that happened earlier in our relationship. I was on a volleyball team sponsored by The Olympic Club of San Francisco, a very old and august sporting club for "gentlemen of a certain persuasion". I didn't exactly agree with their admissions policy (no women, no blacks) but they were the best team in the Bay Area by far and I was honored when the coach "drafted" me. The initiation fee was waived and I just had to pay the monthly dues. The president of the company I worked for had been on the waiting list at the "O Club" for three years and when he found out I was a new member he was understandably miffed.
We had a tournament coming up that was local, so I took Naomi along with me. As we walked down the hall, outside the gymnasium, one of my teammates walked past us. When he was out of earshot, Naomi turned to me with this astonished look on her face and exclaimed, "That guy's name is Tom Krause! I've never seen him before in my life but his name just popped into my head!" Whoa, another "chicken skin" moment with Naomi. My partner, Tom Krause was a buttoned-down banker in SF who wore Brooks Brothers suits and serious, financial district shoes. He and his wife lived in a nice house on the Belvedere Marina. His social circles were about as far away from Naomi's as you could get. "Great..." I thought to myself, "my girlfriend is psychic." Coda to this episode. When I packed up Sunday evening to return to my place, I noticed that my volleyball shoes felt real heavy. "Hmm, looks like it's time for some new shoes." I bought new shoes and was about to toss my old ones in the back of the closet when I noticed that all the weight was in the toes. I reached in to the toe of each shoe and, much to my surprise, found two lovely polished and painted stone "eggs", one in each shoe. The girls had put them in there as a present for me. Awww. How cute is that? It only cost me the price of a new pair of shoes...
So now, Naomi knew that there was someone new in my life. During the time they were back in Kentucky wolfing down the hominy, grits and corn pone, I was quickly getting cozy with my new squeeze, Colleen. That fateful Wednesday night rolled around when I was to pick up the girls at the airport. Colleen was at my place, actually in my bed, when I left. "You go take them home and tell Naomi you have a new girlfriend. I'll be waiting here for you when you get back", said Colleen as she nestled into the pillows and gave me a big "come hither" smile. On the drive from the airport back to Naomi's place I gave her the news. I explained that although I loved our time together, it was obvious that she would soon be moving on to bigger and better things in the music world. She was very understanding and said I could even keep her second car till mine was fixed. I thanked her for her understanding and wished her the best of luck. We sat talking in the car for awhile but I was, understandably anxious to get back to my place where my new girlfriend was waiting for me in my bed. I told Naomi I should get going. With that she reached over and took the car keys out of the ignition. "I've changed my mind. I don't want you to leave!" Uh oh, now I'm officially in a jam. By this time, it was almost midnight and my ride had just been usurped. I thought for a second. My best bet is to scram from here and knock on a neighbor's door and use the telephone to get me a taxi, if I can pull of such a stunt in West Marin (a decidedly rural area...) at midnight.
So I took off running down the road to put my plan into action. Behind me I could hear Naomi start the car up and the sound of the gravel as she pulled out of the driveway. I quickly dove into some roadside bushes. I could see some houses on the other side. Then I heard Naomi's loud cries in the still night air, "Mike, Mike! Come back! Don't leave me! Where are you?" I managed to get to a phone and taxi home to my little apartment. Amazingly, Colleen was still in bed waiting for me. I explained what had happened and she reluctantly accepted my explanation. I jumped into my bed and into her arms and all was jiggy between us after that.
Naomi's version of our break-up.
In her book, she has our break-up happen in a whole different way that avoids the embarrassment of a slow speed car chase at midnight with her wailing for me out the window. Years later, I ran into someone who lived near there and I related my crazy experience that night. He said that he remembered hearing a women's voice one night around mid-night crying out the name Mike. Too weird! About the only things she remembered correctly about that time was that, yes I was a volleyball player. Yes I was a part owner of a recording studio and I did occasionally play the guitar in there. Everything else was fabricated to put her in a different light for her "Grand Ole Opry" type fans. In fact, at that time, I was a pretty good finger picker of the acoustic guitar. Naomi and Christina liked the way I could play lead lines above Chris's rhythm guitar work. In our little eight track garage studio, we had a section of wall that was just sheet rock. Musicians used to leave graffiti on it about their sessions. It was fun to see all the comments. One day, Robin, my partner and our main engineer, brought my attention to the latest message. After one of their sessions, Naomi had written: "FOR GOOD GUITAR CALL TWEEDS: 383-7982". That nice little comment stayed up on the wall long after the Judds became a household name.
After finishing the book, I wondered how much of the rest of her life had been fabricated. It kind of bothered me that she was portraying herself as this poor struggling, put-upon, single mother who managed through hard work and tenacity to overcome numerous obstacles to become fabulously famous and wealthy in the country music game. I realized that she was idolized by church moms of the South and didn't want to "tarnish" that angelic image she had fashioned for herself. I sympathized with her battle with hepatitis. Still, she was making millions on this book that, I knew, to be anything but "mercilessly candid" as the book cover maintained.
I mentioned this to a friend of mine and he had a novel idea. "Mike, if you want to get the real story out, I know a way you could do that and make some coin in the process. The Judds are huge right now; the autobiography just came out and I bet "The National Enquirer" would love to hear your story." Wow, "The National Enquirer", king of the sleazy tabloids? Do I really want to go that route? I had glanced at it while standing in the check out line at the local grocery a few times. It seemed like it was all two headed babies, alien abductions and the like. I remember one story that stuck in my head, and my craw. "Hippy Love Tryst Throws Self in Volcano!" The story went on to relate how a trio of hippies, high on acid, went up to the volcano in Hawaii. With no one else around, they "threw themselves" into the volcano. I thought, if there was no one else around, how is this story getting reported in your paper? I talked to a couple of other friends (all guys, I should point out...) about it and they didn't have a problem. They saw it the way I did. She was making out like a bandit telling mendacities that her fans wanted to hear---sins of omission, sins of commission...
I went ahead and contacted the Enquirer at their office in Florida. When I told the receptionist what I wanted to do she put me on hold for a moment. Then a British voice came on the line. Yes they were definitely interested in "my story". Over the phone, he conducted an interview with me and recorded everything. "Great work Mike", he enthused, "we'll be sending a photographer out to your place in Mill Valley. He's from our Sacramento bureau and he'll take pictures of you and any Judd memorabilia you may have lying about." Several days later there's was a knock at the door and the Enquirer photographer was there. All I had was a copy of their first album and a picture that Naomi had given me back in the day. It was a gorgeous professional portrait that she had had done when she was doing some modeling work during her time living in Hollywood. When we had been going together, I had it pinned up on my bedroom wall so I could admire my beautiful girlfriend. The photographer took a bunch of snaps including the portrait photo. "I'm going to have to take this picture and process it at the lab in Sacramento. I'll be sure to get it back to you. Sadly, I never did get it back. Now all I have is the photo on the cover of "The National Enquirer".
I'm sure my sainted mother, God rest her soul, was thrilled to read that "Pregnant Naomi refused to have our love child and tried to run me down when we broke up". I gotta say though I sure loved that picture of Naomi and I'm pissed that I never got it back!
So the story came out and I got paid $ 750 for setting the record straight---at least the part that concerned me. All my guy friends congratulated me for a deed well done. It was a different story with my lady friends. Their take in a nut shell: "How dare you! Stooping to publish your kiss-and-tell expose in "The National Enquirer" of all places. You should be ashamed!" It was right down the middle; my gender: for; the other gender: against. So be it. It's water under the bridge. Although I did cringe a little when I read how they sensationalized everything. But I guess that's what they do. Compared to the "Hippy Love Tryst Jumping into the Volcano" my story was pretty tame... One last little ripple from this whole thing, came to me from my mother. Back home in Hawaii where she lived, she ran with a pretty smart social set. Several of her friends mentioned that they'd seen an article in a tabloid in the check-out stand that mentioned my name and my hometown. "Jean. Don't you have a son named Mike who lives in Mill Valley? There's some kind of kiss-and-tell thing in there about Naomi Judd. Here. I brought you a copy." My mother, like all the other women I had talked to was mortified that I was being written up in "The National Enquirer". "Oh dear, how could you?" opined my mom, "Naomi wouldn't have my love child and tried to run me over in her car? It says it right hear in large type!" I apologized for any embarrassment it might have caused in her social set. What can I say? I'm sort of the black sheep of the family and anyway, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
"Momma he's crazy. Crazy over me." I leave you with a song in my heart (their first big single), Mickey da Mayor of Happy Acres.
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