Something just HAD...
to be done!
First...
this is me...
tommy mondello
and my doorsmobile
1980 / 1981
USS Nimitz CVN-68 Diaries...
In Search of Jim Morrison
May 4, 1983
In Search of Jim Morrison
May 4, 1983
This is a cool story and truly, my greatest accomplishment while serving in the military.
Imagine that shit. What kind of whacky military career did I have anyways?????
And yes, this is even greater than
my performance as The Fourth Floor Leader,
back in Millington, Tennessee.
This is the story of how my friend
Billy Scire...
... and I traveled through Europe
in search of Jim Morrison’s gravesite.
You know, the lead singer from The Doors.
He died in 1971 while living in Paris, which would also be his final resting-place.
Let me start from the beginning.
This amazing adventure came to life during my one and only Mediterranean cruise,
while aboard the Nimitz.
A "Med" cruise consisted of six or so months of floating around the Mediterranean Sea,
and pretty much intimidating anyone
that got in our muthafucking way.
Kinda neat right!
Our home port while in the Med,
was Naples, Italy.
But we also stopped at a few other places along the way, such as Florence Italy, Monte Carlo Monaco, Palma Spain, and Alexandria Egypt.
But it was in Naples,
where the grand plan was first conceived.
Billy and I had often talked about goin’ to the grave. But we really never did any planning or gave it any serious thought. It was still just conversation at this point.
Although at the start of the cruise we did promise ourselves, that if we ever landed at a port
within striking distance of Paris France,
that we would definitely try for the grave.
The schedule for port landings was never written in stone, so we really didn’t know
where we would end up.
But while in port Naples,
strange things began to happen.
It all began on a beautiful, sunny day.
We had a Frisbee in our left hand and not a worry in the world in our right. There was only one item missing at this point to complete the scene, and that was of course, the ice-cold beer.
So, we found a store, bought a few six packs, then headed over to the park. And this is where the first of 3 signs, the first omen if you will, occurred.
Now, this was no ordinary park. We were standing in the remnants of a burnt out volcano. It was really cool.
Anyway, we were drinkin’ and tossin’, tossin’ and drinkin’, and then it happened. The Frisbee came to a landing on the soft green Mediterranean grass. And when we went over to pick it up...
... bang!
There it was, sign number 1.
A mutha F'ing lizard.
A little green guy about five inches long jumped right onto the Frisbee and stared us both the fuck down. It freaked us out to say the least!
I shit you not!
Now, I hear you guys out there saying...
So big deal, a fuckin’ lizard.
Stomp on the little bastard
and get on with the tossing
you two chicken shit a-holes!
Man, and I thought I cursed a lot.
But you guys are ruthless!
But wait!
Lemme tell ya the significance
of that little green fuck.
In the world of rock-n-roll, Jim Morrison
had proclaimed himself...
The Lizard King.
Just as Howard Stern proclaims himself The King Of All Media, or even Babe Ruth was considered to be The Sultan Of Swat.
Morrison had become The Lizard King.
With snake-like movements while on the stage, and the shaman-like mystery surrounding him, he truly was... The Lizard King!
And there he was,
standing on our muthafucking frisbee.
Taunting us.
Or maybe communicating with us.
We were freakin’ out. Really, we were!
We couldn’t believe what was happening. It was a sure sign telling us to take a trip and seek out the aura of our hero! Our dead... rock 'n roll hero!
And then, as quickly as he appeared,
our little green friend had vanished.
And wow!
How cool was that?
Right then and there, we both began to talk about the idea of actually going
to the grave for real.
At this point though, distance and time were working against us. We couldn’t get enough time off for the distance that we would have to travel, to get to Paris, France.
But little did we know that the wheels of destiny had already begun to turn behind the scenes. And unbeknownst to us,
they were turning in our favor!
Once we regained our composure, we then resumed our drinking and tossing, along with some more talk of the possibilities of making the trip a reality. We were pumped!
I’m thinking back now, and man, sometimes life gives you some really cool moments in time.
Just think about it for a second.
We had Italy, volcanoes,
a beautiful day, frisbee, and beer.
This was probably a once in a lifetime combination. It sure beats driving home from work in rush hour traffic every day, huh?
How come we never really appreciate the cool things that happen to us, while they’re actually happening? It’s always years later that it hits us, just how cool life could be!
Anyways, at this point, I still don’t think that we were really serious about going. Even with all of our alcohol-driven pumped up talk. But soon, a second, and then third sign would show up, practically daring us to take up the quest.
And then the wheels of destiny would click just one more notch, giving us the opportunity that we were waiting for. And it would be at that point, that we made some concrete plans to search out the wordman from the nether worlds.
Later on that same day, after doing
some sightseeing, we ended up
at the Number one piano bar.
This was a real shit hole, located about fourteen steps from fleet landing.
(This is where all of the ferries unloaded us
not yet drunken sailors from the ship)
So, this was pretty much the very first thing that we saw when leaving the ship.
Can you say, Heineken please!
Just imagine being out to sea for sixty days, working twelve on, and twelve off. Us muthafuckers were ready to drink.
But before we went in, we came across a guy out front selling T-shirts. Well, we both walked up to this guy, and he began his onslaught.
“Hey Joe, you buy, you buy?”
He was holding up a T-shirt in our direction that ran chills down both our spins. Can you guess?
That’s right.
It was a T-shirt of the man himself.
It was the fucking Lizard King, Jim Morrison. Sign number 2.
After experiencing our little green friend earlier in the day, this normally innocent happening,
had transformed into an event
that was just too weird.
Go ahead, play that Twilight Zone music in your head now, because that’s how we both felt. Pretty cool stuff.
And no,
we didn’t buy the damn shirt, okay.
We needed all our monies for beer, you fool!
Well, we then turned away from our hero’s image, walked through the front door of the bar, and promptly ordered up
a couple of well-deserved beers.
The beer over there has a much higher alcohol content then over here for some reason.
Too bad we didn’t find this out
until many beers down the road!
Life in the Navy was one
learning experience after another.
But anyway, this place was strictly a rock-n-roll, drink ‘til you puke dungeon. And by the way, there wasn’t a fucking piano in sight dude!
All I remember seeing was a bar, a couple of stools, and two of the biggest muthafucking speakers I have ever seen.
Beautiful!
We were rockin’ pretty good to AC/DC, Aerosmith, Zeppelin, all kinds of great stuff. When all of the sudden the sound began to break up. And within seconds, had completely been silenced, as the machine decided
to eat the tape for lunch.
Enter, sign number 3.
The hot woman behind the bar reached in, pulled the broken tape from the machine, and tossed it aside. She then picked up another one that had no label. Slide that next victim into the hungry machine, and closed the door.
Then,
with one push of the play button,
blew both our minds the fuck away.
Guess what fuckin’ song came roaring out of those two incredibly beautiful speakers?
When The Music’s Over,
by The Doors!
It was one of their greatest hits.
Man!
We just freaked out again,
and made a pact right then and there,
to party on Jim’s grave.
But only this time, we really meant it.
We just couldn’t believe that this song came on. How could we look away from these three signs?
We couldn’t!
Lizard's... shirt's... and songs oh my!
We were destined to drink with The Lizard King! If we could only get that chance.
Well soon, this leave was over, and we were back on the floating city. But then, only two days later, we heard the greatest news
that we could ever possibly hear.
Now, if you listen really closely, you could actually hear the wheel of destiny click onto that very next notch. The notch that would open up the doors, and allow us to step into our dreams.
No, the ship wasn’t being taken over by Playboy centerfolds. That would’ve been even better than drinking with our deceased hero. Sorry Jim!
But, the word was passed down from the captain that our next port of call was going to be
Monte Carlo, Monaco!
Fuckin’ A.
Can’t get much closer to Paris then that, huh? Beautiful!
Well, as soon as we heard the news, Billy and I finalized our Morrison plans, and submitted our requests for time off while in port Monte Carlo. And within only a few short days,
we were right off the coast of Monaco!
We had the necessary time off,
and some half-assed directions,
that might just get us to our destination.
We hoped!
But the first day in port was spent sightseeing in the city of Monte Carlo itself. We wanted to get our feet wet, before our headstrong ways were unleashed on the countryside.
This was an incredible place. At the time we were there, the city was preparing for the Grand Prix to be run. Everyone was all hyped up for the race. We spent a good amount of time
at this one open-aired bar/restaurant.
We became friends with the owner, who actually offered us both jobs as kitchen help, if we wanted to stay in his country! Pretty cool, huh? I bet I wouldn’t find any animal heads
in this guy’s dishwasher!
Anyway, I remember sitting at one of the outside tables with a bunch of other drunks, cheering on all of the fancy sports cars and high end auto's as they drove by. When you're young, drunk and stupid, even the simplest of things
are fucking... awesome! LoL
We actually walked into the street and stopped a few of them to snap a photo! And believe it or not, most if not all of the people were into it. Some of them would rev their engines and give us a little show. One guy went a bit overboard and blew out his engine... Too funny.
Unbelievable!
We were carrying on like typical sailors, when I spotted a girl across the restaurant that had, well, a rather large honker.
In fact, it rivaled my petite beauty.
You know I mean nose right, you knuckleheads!
Now, remember the state that we were all in. Boozing sailors in another country, far from home. Now this combo didn't exactly lend itself well with a cultured people.
As I proved, when I walked up to that girl across the way and went nose to nose, face to face, ugly American to uglier Frenchie with her.
I measured my nose first between thumb and forefinger, and then moved the shaped fingers over to hers. It was about a tie.
We all had a great big laugh. Even the girl was laughing, I think. But hey, fuck it! I was out there floating around, protecting that nose from the tyrants of the world. So, if anyone had the right to hawk that honker, it would be me!
But getting back on track here.
That day soon ended, and the next morning, we were up bright and early. We each packed some extra clothes, a Walkman with dual earphone holes, and two cassette tapes.
(Remember, this was 1982/83 my friends.
The i... fucking whatever pod/pad thing wasn't even a thought in Steve Jobs' mind!)
And the tapes, well, they were two of the dumbest tapes that you could ever imagine, for the trip that we were about to embark on.
The first tape had Heart on one side, and a mixture of some other crap on side two. The second tape was The Wall, from Pink Floyd.
Now how ridiculous was this?
Where the fuck were all the Doors tapes?
Fuck if I know.
I can’t really remember why we only took those two. And I can’t tell you how much we both hated Heart by the end of the trip. LoL
Well, we took a short ferry ride from the ship to the mainland, and headed over to the train station where we boarded a train. Which if I’m not mistaken, took us to the nearby city of Nice.
It was here that we boarded
the world famous Bullet Train.
And believe me; it lived up to its name.
That sum-bitch was like a bat outta hell.
Pretty fuckin' fast!
We just sat back and listened to the sweet and depressing sounds of Heart and Pink Floyd, for the length of the ride. Wondering if we were really going to find the grave or not.
Shit, the hell with the grave.
Let’s find the damn city of Paris first!
Then, we can concentrate on the dead guy.
Eventually, the train pulled into Paris France,
the city of light.
And where just a few short years ago really, a madman by the name of Adolf Hitler and the third Reich, marched through the Arch of Triumph. (Arc de Triomphe)
Fuckin’ incredible man!
You could just smell the history there.
It was so very exciting.
Really, it was!
You could definitely tell by the machine guns the police had strapped to their sides that we weren’t in America anymore, Dorothy.
Nowhere even close. That was pretty scary!
Cops wearing machine guns
right out in the open.
Sounds like fun, huh?
(Once again, 1982/83. We have this here in America now, but back then you very rarely saw law enforcement carrying around assult rifles
as standard equipment!)
This day was spent on sightseeing, and getting ourselves checked into a hotel which was only a block or two away from The Bastille.
We ventured over to the Eiffel Tower for a peek, but there was some kind of school trip there that day. We hadn’t the will, nor patience, to wait for the elevators to take us up. So we
snapped a few photos, and moved on.
The day ended at a small pizzeria type restaurant, not far from our hotel. That was where we met a waiter named Valerie.
Go figure!
But this guy was cool. He gave us directions to the cemetery, and hungout with us a bit
during our meal.
The next day was it.
The day that we would meet our hero,
face to face!
And we were ready, so we thought.
We were up really early in the morning, got dressed, and started on the final leg of our quest.
The hotel was about a 30 minute walk to the cemetery, Pere-Lachaise.
A very famous burial ground. Other such notables as the great writer/poet Oscar Wilde
composer Frederic Chopin
and the early nineteen hundreds actress,
Sarah Bernhardt...
... were amongst the celebrated.
But it wasn’t them we were there for.
It was for The Lizard King,
The Shaman,
the mythical figure himself ……
James Douglas Morrison!
We were still in the process of waking up while walking the streets of Paris, checking the map along the way. And soon, the gates
of the Pere-Lachaise Cemetery
were right there, before us.
It was a really weird feeling.
As we approached the main gates, two ridiculously over zealous security guards prevented our entrance. They took one look at us, and in broken English, said that they could not allow us to enter, because I was wearing shorts! I don't know if they were just fucking with us in particular, or if they were hassling everyone.
Could you fuckin' believe these assholes?
We were walking into a cemetery, not the mutha F'ing Russian Tea Room, for goodness sake.
We put up a small fight, but caved in pretty fast. We still had visions of those machine guns.
No telling what these two nutjobs
would whip out and point our way.
So, back we went towards the hotel.
I changed into some long pants, and we started the final leg of our quest all over again. Only this time, we made a few stops along the way.
We picked up some fresh flowers, and a little breakfast. Consisting of several bottles of off the shelf red wine, and some napoleon pastries. Hey, I know it was only about six or seven in the morning, but why not? Jim wouldn’t have it any other way, man! And you know that's true!!
Again we made it to the pearly gates. And again, the guards gave us the once over, only this time allowed us entrance.
We asked them for some kind of directions to the gravesite, being that this was such a vast cemetery. But they just pointed out into the never ending array of tombstones,
and mumbled something.
Billy and I just looked at one another,
and said “OH, okay”, and walked on.
We headed in the general direction of the point, but were really just guessing.
We were both feeling kinda weird, walking around an old Gothic cemetery, looking for a dead hero to eat breakfast with. And, I kinda forgot that normal people come to these places to mourn their dead, and not to party with them.
Enter the nice young woman,
obviously distraught, on her way
to mourn a missed loved one.
I yelled out in a most jocular manner,
“Hey, where ya goin’?
Why dont'cha come with us,
and hangout on Jim Morrison's grave?”
Oh man, I was such a dick.
But I wasn’t trying to be one. It just came naturally I guess! I was just in a very nutty mood, and I forgot where the hell we were,
kind of.
Well, as you could imagine, the girl just broke out into a full-teared waterfall, and ran away.
As fast as she could, might I add!
Oooo, sorry ‘bout that my dear.
Well, after I destroyed her world, I caught up with Billy, and we resumed the search. It lasted for another twenty minutes or so, and then we began to see signs that we were getting closer.
No, not psychic, omen-type signs, like the lizard on the Frisbee. Real signs. I mean people actually wrote directions and arrows on other peoples’ gravestones and tombs, pointing the way to Jim. So, you see, we weren’t the only nutjobs who had this idea.
We both sensed that we were getting close,
as the writings on the walls
were coming with more regularity.
So, at this point, we both split up.
Billy went to the left, and I went to the right.
We were like the U.S. Marines
on a reconnaissance mission.
Then, I heard it.
It was soft, sullen, and barely audible.
Billy calmly spoke the words...
“I found it.”
It was like a wall of reality hit him, when he actually saw the stone for the first time. I quickly rushed over to him, and there it was.
A two-foot high bust of the Lizard King himself standing atop a two foot high block
bearing our hero's name.
We were in awe of it for the first couple minutes. We really didn’t know how to react.
We both just stood there in disbelief.
It was like, holy shit, there really was a Jim Morrison. He wasn’t just some pictures we saw on album covers, and in magazines.
And he really was dead!
We then sat down on the gravestone next to his and cracked open some more wine. It took us some time to loosen up. I felt the same way when I went to Dallas Texas with
my ex-wife Lynn, and we stood
where President Kennedy was shot.
A strange heaviness came over us.
History is such an incredibly powerful force.
At this point in the day, we were the only ones there at the grave. So, it gave us a good chance to hangout with Jim, before we had to share him with anyone else.
We placed a couple poems that I had written, and the flowers down in front of the bust.
It was amazing.
Well, soon the napoleons came out, and the wine continued to flow. Then before long,
other people began to show up.
Doors music began to play from someone’s tape player. We were meeting people from all over the globe, who just like us, journeyed
to hangout with history.
The rest of the day was filled with ups and downs. It was really an emotional roller coaster. One minute, everyone was talking to one another about their favorite Doors album, and the next, everyone was feeling all glum and down.
The whole scene was just so weird.
It was like we knew these people our whole life.
Imagine that shit. What kind of whacky military career did I have anyways?????
And yes, this is even greater than
my performance as The Fourth Floor Leader,
back in Millington, Tennessee.
This is the story of how my friend
Billy Scire...
 |
| Well you already know that I'm a knucklehead... but Billy Scire, my partner in crime, was way more funny & nutty then I could ever be... LoL That first pick I'm guessing is right before we were about to leave the ship. The other pics are when Billy came down from the flight deck one day to the Calibration shop where I worked and we took these stupid photo's. Aren't they fuckin' classic!! LoL It's the return of the fake long armed guy!!! Hey, when you're floating around in the middle of the fucking ocean for days on end, shit like this makes all the difference. And is the key to keeping your sanity! |
... and I traveled through Europe
in search of Jim Morrison’s gravesite.
You know, the lead singer from The Doors.
He died in 1971 while living in Paris, which would also be his final resting-place.
Let me start from the beginning.
This amazing adventure came to life during my one and only Mediterranean cruise,
while aboard the Nimitz.
A "Med" cruise consisted of six or so months of floating around the Mediterranean Sea,
and pretty much intimidating anyone
that got in our muthafucking way.
Kinda neat right!
Our home port while in the Med,
was Naples, Italy.
 |
| That's Billy Scire in our very first port of call, and Mediterranean home, Naples, Italy back in 1983. How funny is this photo... LoL |
But we also stopped at a few other places along the way, such as Florence Italy, Monte Carlo Monaco, Palma Spain, and Alexandria Egypt.
But it was in Naples,
where the grand plan was first conceived.
Billy and I had often talked about goin’ to the grave. But we really never did any planning or gave it any serious thought. It was still just conversation at this point.
Although at the start of the cruise we did promise ourselves, that if we ever landed at a port
within striking distance of Paris France,
that we would definitely try for the grave.
The schedule for port landings was never written in stone, so we really didn’t know
where we would end up.
But while in port Naples,
strange things began to happen.
It all began on a beautiful, sunny day.
We had a Frisbee in our left hand and not a worry in the world in our right. There was only one item missing at this point to complete the scene, and that was of course, the ice-cold beer.
So, we found a store, bought a few six packs, then headed over to the park. And this is where the first of 3 signs, the first omen if you will, occurred.
Now, this was no ordinary park. We were standing in the remnants of a burnt out volcano. It was really cool.
 |
| That's me playing human water fountain with some of that high octane beer in the burnt out volcano park in Italy 1983. This was the day when that first sign gave us a visit. |
Anyway, we were drinkin’ and tossin’, tossin’ and drinkin’, and then it happened. The Frisbee came to a landing on the soft green Mediterranean grass. And when we went over to pick it up...
... bang!
There it was, sign number 1.
A mutha F'ing lizard.
A little green guy about five inches long jumped right onto the Frisbee and stared us both the fuck down. It freaked us out to say the least!
I shit you not!
Now, I hear you guys out there saying...
So big deal, a fuckin’ lizard.
Stomp on the little bastard
and get on with the tossing
you two chicken shit a-holes!
Man, and I thought I cursed a lot.
But you guys are ruthless!
But wait!
Lemme tell ya the significance
of that little green fuck.
In the world of rock-n-roll, Jim Morrison
had proclaimed himself...
The Lizard King.
Just as Howard Stern proclaims himself The King Of All Media, or even Babe Ruth was considered to be The Sultan Of Swat.
Morrison had become The Lizard King.
With snake-like movements while on the stage, and the shaman-like mystery surrounding him, he truly was... The Lizard King!
And there he was,
standing on our muthafucking frisbee.
Taunting us.
Or maybe communicating with us.
We were freakin’ out. Really, we were!
We couldn’t believe what was happening. It was a sure sign telling us to take a trip and seek out the aura of our hero! Our dead... rock 'n roll hero!
And then, as quickly as he appeared,
our little green friend had vanished.
And wow!
How cool was that?
Right then and there, we both began to talk about the idea of actually going
to the grave for real.
At this point though, distance and time were working against us. We couldn’t get enough time off for the distance that we would have to travel, to get to Paris, France.
But little did we know that the wheels of destiny had already begun to turn behind the scenes. And unbeknownst to us,
they were turning in our favor!
Once we regained our composure, we then resumed our drinking and tossing, along with some more talk of the possibilities of making the trip a reality. We were pumped!
I’m thinking back now, and man, sometimes life gives you some really cool moments in time.
Just think about it for a second.
We had Italy, volcanoes,
a beautiful day, frisbee, and beer.
This was probably a once in a lifetime combination. It sure beats driving home from work in rush hour traffic every day, huh?
How come we never really appreciate the cool things that happen to us, while they’re actually happening? It’s always years later that it hits us, just how cool life could be!
Anyways, at this point, I still don’t think that we were really serious about going. Even with all of our alcohol-driven pumped up talk. But soon, a second, and then third sign would show up, practically daring us to take up the quest.
And then the wheels of destiny would click just one more notch, giving us the opportunity that we were waiting for. And it would be at that point, that we made some concrete plans to search out the wordman from the nether worlds.
Later on that same day, after doing
some sightseeing, we ended up
at the Number one piano bar.
This was a real shit hole, located about fourteen steps from fleet landing.
(This is where all of the ferries unloaded us
not yet drunken sailors from the ship)
So, this was pretty much the very first thing that we saw when leaving the ship.
Can you say, Heineken please!
Just imagine being out to sea for sixty days, working twelve on, and twelve off. Us muthafuckers were ready to drink.
But before we went in, we came across a guy out front selling T-shirts. Well, we both walked up to this guy, and he began his onslaught.
“Hey Joe, you buy, you buy?”
He was holding up a T-shirt in our direction that ran chills down both our spins. Can you guess?
That’s right.
It was a T-shirt of the man himself.
It was the fucking Lizard King, Jim Morrison. Sign number 2.
After experiencing our little green friend earlier in the day, this normally innocent happening,
had transformed into an event
that was just too weird.
Go ahead, play that Twilight Zone music in your head now, because that’s how we both felt. Pretty cool stuff.
And no,
we didn’t buy the damn shirt, okay.
We needed all our monies for beer, you fool!
Well, we then turned away from our hero’s image, walked through the front door of the bar, and promptly ordered up
a couple of well-deserved beers.
The beer over there has a much higher alcohol content then over here for some reason.
Too bad we didn’t find this out
until many beers down the road!
Life in the Navy was one
learning experience after another.
But anyway, this place was strictly a rock-n-roll, drink ‘til you puke dungeon. And by the way, there wasn’t a fucking piano in sight dude!
All I remember seeing was a bar, a couple of stools, and two of the biggest muthafucking speakers I have ever seen.
Beautiful!
We were rockin’ pretty good to AC/DC, Aerosmith, Zeppelin, all kinds of great stuff. When all of the sudden the sound began to break up. And within seconds, had completely been silenced, as the machine decided
to eat the tape for lunch.
Enter, sign number 3.
The hot woman behind the bar reached in, pulled the broken tape from the machine, and tossed it aside. She then picked up another one that had no label. Slide that next victim into the hungry machine, and closed the door.
Then,
with one push of the play button,
blew both our minds the fuck away.
Guess what fuckin’ song came roaring out of those two incredibly beautiful speakers?
When The Music’s Over,
by The Doors!
It was one of their greatest hits.
Man!
We just freaked out again,
and made a pact right then and there,
to party on Jim’s grave.
But only this time, we really meant it.
We just couldn’t believe that this song came on. How could we look away from these three signs?
We couldn’t!
Lizard's... shirt's... and songs oh my!
We were destined to drink with The Lizard King! If we could only get that chance.
Well soon, this leave was over, and we were back on the floating city. But then, only two days later, we heard the greatest news
that we could ever possibly hear.
Now, if you listen really closely, you could actually hear the wheel of destiny click onto that very next notch. The notch that would open up the doors, and allow us to step into our dreams.
No, the ship wasn’t being taken over by Playboy centerfolds. That would’ve been even better than drinking with our deceased hero. Sorry Jim!
But, the word was passed down from the captain that our next port of call was going to be
Monte Carlo, Monaco!
Fuckin’ A.
Can’t get much closer to Paris then that, huh? Beautiful!
Well, as soon as we heard the news, Billy and I finalized our Morrison plans, and submitted our requests for time off while in port Monte Carlo. And within only a few short days,
we were right off the coast of Monaco!
We had the necessary time off,
and some half-assed directions,
that might just get us to our destination.
We hoped!
But the first day in port was spent sightseeing in the city of Monte Carlo itself. We wanted to get our feet wet, before our headstrong ways were unleashed on the countryside.
This was an incredible place. At the time we were there, the city was preparing for the Grand Prix to be run. Everyone was all hyped up for the race. We spent a good amount of time
at this one open-aired bar/restaurant.
We became friends with the owner, who actually offered us both jobs as kitchen help, if we wanted to stay in his country! Pretty cool, huh? I bet I wouldn’t find any animal heads
in this guy’s dishwasher!
Anyway, I remember sitting at one of the outside tables with a bunch of other drunks, cheering on all of the fancy sports cars and high end auto's as they drove by. When you're young, drunk and stupid, even the simplest of things
are fucking... awesome! LoL
We actually walked into the street and stopped a few of them to snap a photo! And believe it or not, most if not all of the people were into it. Some of them would rev their engines and give us a little show. One guy went a bit overboard and blew out his engine... Too funny.
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| Tommy Mondello & Billy Scire at their favorite outdoor cafe in Monte Carlo, Monaco 1983. Watching the fancy cars driving by. Do you see the blue bleacher stands in the upper left of the photo's? They were in the process of getting ready for the running of the world famous Grand Prix race which was just days away. Just great stuff! |
Unbelievable!
We were carrying on like typical sailors, when I spotted a girl across the restaurant that had, well, a rather large honker.
In fact, it rivaled my petite beauty.
You know I mean nose right, you knuckleheads!
Now, remember the state that we were all in. Boozing sailors in another country, far from home. Now this combo didn't exactly lend itself well with a cultured people.
As I proved, when I walked up to that girl across the way and went nose to nose, face to face, ugly American to uglier Frenchie with her.
I measured my nose first between thumb and forefinger, and then moved the shaped fingers over to hers. It was about a tie.
We all had a great big laugh. Even the girl was laughing, I think. But hey, fuck it! I was out there floating around, protecting that nose from the tyrants of the world. So, if anyone had the right to hawk that honker, it would be me!
But getting back on track here.
That day soon ended, and the next morning, we were up bright and early. We each packed some extra clothes, a Walkman with dual earphone holes, and two cassette tapes.
(Remember, this was 1982/83 my friends.
The i... fucking whatever pod/pad thing wasn't even a thought in Steve Jobs' mind!)
And the tapes, well, they were two of the dumbest tapes that you could ever imagine, for the trip that we were about to embark on.
The first tape had Heart on one side, and a mixture of some other crap on side two. The second tape was The Wall, from Pink Floyd.
Now how ridiculous was this?
Where the fuck were all the Doors tapes?
Fuck if I know.
I can’t really remember why we only took those two. And I can’t tell you how much we both hated Heart by the end of the trip. LoL
Well, we took a short ferry ride from the ship to the mainland, and headed over to the train station where we boarded a train. Which if I’m not mistaken, took us to the nearby city of Nice.
It was here that we boarded
the world famous Bullet Train.
And believe me; it lived up to its name.
That sum-bitch was like a bat outta hell.
Pretty fuckin' fast!
We just sat back and listened to the sweet and depressing sounds of Heart and Pink Floyd, for the length of the ride. Wondering if we were really going to find the grave or not.
Shit, the hell with the grave.
Let’s find the damn city of Paris first!
Then, we can concentrate on the dead guy.
Eventually, the train pulled into Paris France,
the city of light.
And where just a few short years ago really, a madman by the name of Adolf Hitler and the third Reich, marched through the Arch of Triumph. (Arc de Triomphe)
 |
| Me & Billy at the Arch of Triumph. Tons of history that just punches you right in the face. That second photo is of the armed military personnel standing guard at the tomb of the unknown soldier and it's eternal flame that lie directly beneath the Arch. |
Fuckin’ incredible man!
You could just smell the history there.
It was so very exciting.
Really, it was!
You could definitely tell by the machine guns the police had strapped to their sides that we weren’t in America anymore, Dorothy.
Nowhere even close. That was pretty scary!
Cops wearing machine guns
right out in the open.
Sounds like fun, huh?
(Once again, 1982/83. We have this here in America now, but back then you very rarely saw law enforcement carrying around assult rifles
as standard equipment!)
This day was spent on sightseeing, and getting ourselves checked into a hotel which was only a block or two away from The Bastille.
We ventured over to the Eiffel Tower for a peek, but there was some kind of school trip there that day. We hadn’t the will, nor patience, to wait for the elevators to take us up. So we
snapped a few photos, and moved on.
 |
| There it is... the Eiffel Tower. Pretty neat huh? Somehow I got ink on a lot of my pix from this trip... spaz! |
The day ended at a small pizzeria type restaurant, not far from our hotel. That was where we met a waiter named Valerie.
Go figure!
 |
| That's Val over to the right holding up the peace sign. |
But this guy was cool. He gave us directions to the cemetery, and hungout with us a bit
during our meal.
The next day was it.
The day that we would meet our hero,
face to face!
And we were ready, so we thought.
We were up really early in the morning, got dressed, and started on the final leg of our quest.
The hotel was about a 30 minute walk to the cemetery, Pere-Lachaise.
A very famous burial ground. Other such notables as the great writer/poet Oscar Wilde
composer Frederic Chopin
and the early nineteen hundreds actress,
Sarah Bernhardt...
... were amongst the celebrated.
But it wasn’t them we were there for.
It was for The Lizard King,
The Shaman,
the mythical figure himself ……
James Douglas Morrison!
We were still in the process of waking up while walking the streets of Paris, checking the map along the way. And soon, the gates
of the Pere-Lachaise Cemetery
were right there, before us.
It was a really weird feeling.
As we approached the main gates, two ridiculously over zealous security guards prevented our entrance. They took one look at us, and in broken English, said that they could not allow us to enter, because I was wearing shorts! I don't know if they were just fucking with us in particular, or if they were hassling everyone.
Could you fuckin' believe these assholes?
We were walking into a cemetery, not the mutha F'ing Russian Tea Room, for goodness sake.
We put up a small fight, but caved in pretty fast. We still had visions of those machine guns.
No telling what these two nutjobs
would whip out and point our way.
So, back we went towards the hotel.
I changed into some long pants, and we started the final leg of our quest all over again. Only this time, we made a few stops along the way.
We picked up some fresh flowers, and a little breakfast. Consisting of several bottles of off the shelf red wine, and some napoleon pastries. Hey, I know it was only about six or seven in the morning, but why not? Jim wouldn’t have it any other way, man! And you know that's true!!
Again we made it to the pearly gates. And again, the guards gave us the once over, only this time allowed us entrance.
We asked them for some kind of directions to the gravesite, being that this was such a vast cemetery. But they just pointed out into the never ending array of tombstones,
and mumbled something.
Billy and I just looked at one another,
and said “OH, okay”, and walked on.
We headed in the general direction of the point, but were really just guessing.
We were both feeling kinda weird, walking around an old Gothic cemetery, looking for a dead hero to eat breakfast with. And, I kinda forgot that normal people come to these places to mourn their dead, and not to party with them.
Enter the nice young woman,
obviously distraught, on her way
to mourn a missed loved one.
I yelled out in a most jocular manner,
“Hey, where ya goin’?
Why dont'cha come with us,
and hangout on Jim Morrison's grave?”
Oh man, I was such a dick.
But I wasn’t trying to be one. It just came naturally I guess! I was just in a very nutty mood, and I forgot where the hell we were,
kind of.
Well, as you could imagine, the girl just broke out into a full-teared waterfall, and ran away.
As fast as she could, might I add!
Oooo, sorry ‘bout that my dear.
Well, after I destroyed her world, I caught up with Billy, and we resumed the search. It lasted for another twenty minutes or so, and then we began to see signs that we were getting closer.
No, not psychic, omen-type signs, like the lizard on the Frisbee. Real signs. I mean people actually wrote directions and arrows on other peoples’ gravestones and tombs, pointing the way to Jim. So, you see, we weren’t the only nutjobs who had this idea.
We both sensed that we were getting close,
as the writings on the walls
were coming with more regularity.
So, at this point, we both split up.
Billy went to the left, and I went to the right.
We were like the U.S. Marines
on a reconnaissance mission.
Then, I heard it.
It was soft, sullen, and barely audible.
Billy calmly spoke the words...
“I found it.”
It was like a wall of reality hit him, when he actually saw the stone for the first time. I quickly rushed over to him, and there it was.
A two-foot high bust of the Lizard King himself standing atop a two foot high block
bearing our hero's name.
We were in awe of it for the first couple minutes. We really didn’t know how to react.
We both just stood there in disbelief.
It was like, holy shit, there really was a Jim Morrison. He wasn’t just some pictures we saw on album covers, and in magazines.
And he really was dead!
We then sat down on the gravestone next to his and cracked open some more wine. It took us some time to loosen up. I felt the same way when I went to Dallas Texas with
my ex-wife Lynn, and we stood
where President Kennedy was shot.
A strange heaviness came over us.
History is such an incredibly powerful force.
At this point in the day, we were the only ones there at the grave. So, it gave us a good chance to hangout with Jim, before we had to share him with anyone else.
We placed a couple poems that I had written, and the flowers down in front of the bust.
It was amazing.
Well, soon the napoleons came out, and the wine continued to flow. Then before long,
other people began to show up.
Doors music began to play from someone’s tape player. We were meeting people from all over the globe, who just like us, journeyed
to hangout with history.
The rest of the day was filled with ups and downs. It was really an emotional roller coaster. One minute, everyone was talking to one another about their favorite Doors album, and the next, everyone was feeling all glum and down.
The whole scene was just so weird.
It was like we knew these people our whole life.
We spent about four or so hours at the site, taking pictures, and getting phone numbers.
 |
And PLEASE... save me from your disgust!
Do you think Jim would have had it any other way!
Being young, drunk & stupid only comes with a very
small window of opportunity. So... what better way to be
young, drunk & stupid
then at the graveside of one of your favorite rock 'n roll hero's!
I was only 21, and I think Billy was only like 19 at this point.
Fuckin' awesome!
|
Every so often we would pour some wine onto the grave to quench our hero’s thirst. Then, we both scribbled our names and a little note
to Jim in a few places right alongside some of the other writings on and around Jim's stone.
After hanging out for a couple more hours,
it was finally time to say our goodbyes.
We both felt emotionally drained.
I placed a hand written note to Jim on the grave, along with the last few drops of wine.
 |
| Give us an hour for magic... There will never be another one... like you. There will never be another one... who can... do the things you do! Goodbye Jim Cheers from Billy & Tommy! |
The walk back to the hotel
would be long, and quiet.
Pretty cool stuff, huh?
The hours spent at the gravesite were incredible, but nothing could ever compare
to those first few moments.
A wall of emotion just came crashing down upon us, like a ton of bricks. The finality of it all
was just so overwhelming.
We were completely unaware of what the headstone would look like. So just imagine how emotional it was when we first came in contact with it. Take whatever you're thinking,
and multiply it by 100.
Off the charts!
Seeing that bust of Jim caused the big screen
in my head to re-run every Doors memory
I’ve ever had.
That’s how weird it was!
It took us both a good ten minutes to loosen up, and actually begin to enjoy
the spoils of our journey.
The next day we packed up, said goodbye to Valerie the waiter, and boarded the train for Monte Carlo. Yes, back to our Heart, and Pink Floyd tapes. Why the fuck didn't we buy a few new one's for the ride back?
Who the fuck knows the answer to that
most poignant of questions!
The ride home was uneventful, except for this one minor glitch. We had our own compartment on the ride back, and Billy had fallen asleep. Then, I remember leaving the compartment
to go to the bathroom. I was gone
maybe five minutes, max.
I walked back into the compartment to find Billy, now wide-awake, sitting there with the look of fear in his eyes. And across from him, were two bloodied up, degenerate-looking derelicts. It was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.
Well, I asked Billy what the fuck was goin’ on, and who the hell were those two losers. He just shrugged his shoulders, and said he didn’t know. I then proceeded to calmly kick those two
a-holes out of our compartment.
And to my surprise, they fuckin’ left!
They were probably mass murderers on the run from the law. And they actually listened to ME,
of all people. The guy who cried
while getting a fuckin’ tiny tattoo!
Well, we made it back to Monte Carlo without any further incidents where we promptly picked up on our partying ways, right where we left off.
At our favorite outdoor café.
Then I unavoidably got into a drunken shouting match with a Navy officer, who then
ordered me back onto the boat.
Uummm, unavoidably??
I think not!
And, guess what my final words to the argument were. And probably the very last words I would ever speak, in the country of Monaco.
With a slight drunken slurrrrr, I clamored...
“Yooou neevveerrr
let us haavvve any fuunn!”
Get the fuck outta here will ya.
Am I a douche-head or what!!! LoL
I was the Foster Brooks of the USS Nimitz
for goodness sakes!
Oh man!
Are those the words of a drunken fool, or what?
Goodbye Pere-Lachaise Cemetery
Goodbye Paris
Goodbye Bullet train
Goodbye Monaco
Goodbye mean green lizard
Goodbye T-shirt
Goodbye broken tape
Goodbye... Jim
Elvis has left the building!
We want the world...
and we want it…………NOW!
J.D.M.
Oh yeah... thats me in the pic below back on the ship in my shop 670, the calibration lab, with the first bottle of wine we opened during our quest to find Jim. I filled it slightly with some dirt and small stones from Jim's grave. And yeah, I still had my porno mustache at this point... LoL
Oh yeah... thats me in the pic below back on the ship in my shop 670, the calibration lab, with the first bottle of wine we opened during our quest to find Jim. I filled it slightly with some dirt and small stones from Jim's grave. And yeah, I still had my porno mustache at this point... LoL
Too cool.
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