I WOULD NOW LIKE to continue my saga as a California State Police Officer and my assignment to Governor Reagan’s residence on San Onofre Avenue in the beautiful hills of Pacific Palisades. Now this was a few months prior to my previously written account about the shots fired, officer down at the same location.
I am sure that all of you good folks remember, I was working 12-hour shifts that would rotate weekly (no days off) from noon to midnight or vice-versa, midnight to noon since those kill-crazy-psycho-hippy-dope-smoking-commie-Mason family members were still a threat to the Governor and his family and they (not the Governor’s family) could storm the residence in their VW Buses (or Beetles) at any time!
This was during that time period when if nature called, we would have to take a rather long and busy drive down from the Palisades into Brentwood where we would frequent a Ronny McDonalds to make our bodily deposits and, on occasion, provide a food pick-up (plenty of happy meals) for our compadres.
Well, the Governor employed a live-in housemaid by the name of Consuela who was very cordial but she mainly kept to her household duties except when we (the officers) would walk by the house and she would always greet us with a luminous smile and a “Hola!”.
Consuela was a very kind soul who would allow us to use the guest bathroom of the residence. She would even provide us with a sandwich or two. She offered these kindnesses to us only when Nancy was not at the residence. The sad truth is that after several weeks, we came to notice the absence of our caretaker Consuela. We heard that Nancy had learned about Consuela’s gracious invite to the guest bathroom and Nancy had fired her!
Once the word got out (cops like to spread rumors and gossip with the best of them), and it was confirmed by several reliable sources (the CHP personal driver for Nancy), we had no choice but to resume our past routine of frequenting Ronny McDonald’s down in Brentwood.
Curiously however, Nancy could never figure out why her prized flower garden with her roses and such, suddenly appeared to be wilting and dying in her presence no matter how much attention she gave it (or instructions to the Hispanic gardener). What a mystery and a sense of bewilderment and frustration she must have had?
Well, we macho officers (there were no female officers on our detail) took it upon ourselves to personally make sure Nancy’s garden was always properly watered – day or night – whenever nature called!
This was in part for you Consuela . . . wherever you are . . . mystery solved.
Until next time kind readers, this is the Gumshoe signing-off. Be safe, be alert, people love you!
I actually loved Ronald Reagan, but even I would want to give a pay back of sorts to his wife who was totally able to allow graciousness and appreciation to others, but instead withheld it. That is just plain mean.