The Art of the Pimp: One Man's Search for Love, Sex, and Money Read Free Page A

There were half a dozen other guys working there, all of them older than me and more experienced, and they were nice enough, but they didn’t work very hard. It seemed like they put most of their energy into selling customers all sorts of shit they didn’t need: “Your transmission’s shot.” “That noise you hear is your brakes rubbing up against the tire.” “I’m going to have to replace your battery.” I don’t claim to have been a saint, but I’d been brought up to be honest and to work hard, so that’s what I did.
    BEFORE LONG I DECIDED it was time to get a gas station of my own. It wasn’t rocket science: You buy gas, you sell gas, and if it’s your place, you’re the one that makes the lion’s share of the profits. So I talked to my boss about it and I talked to the company rep, this guy from Richfield Oil, and they let me lease an empty station on a highway in Phoenix. I had to borrow a thousand dollars from my father to replace some of the older equipment and I only had enough left over for half a load of gas, but as soon as I sold that first half-load I was in business and I didn’t look back.
    I was proud of my gas station. This was back in the old days, when the guys at the pumps wore uniforms and bow ties and wiped down your windows and made the glass squeak. I did such a good job that within a year I had a second gas station and the year after that I had a third one. I was racking up awards, too. I got the Cleanest Gas Station Award, or whatever the hell it was called. I sold more tires than any other gas station in Arizona, and the Goodyear people took me for a ride in their blimp — three years in a row. To be honest, I liked the recognition. I liked the fact that I’d show up at a business conference and people knew who I was. By 1971, I was running five gas stations and there was no stopping me. But insome ways I felt a little out of my league. Most of these guys were better educated and some of them came from families that knew which was the right fork to use at dinner, while I was just a working-class kid with very little knowledge of the larger world around me. It was great being recognized for my success, but I worried that my lack of education would hurt me in the years ahead.
    Then my father took early retirement and came to work for me, which was the best thing that ever happened: I was working with my best friend. I had someone to help me with the load, someone to talk to. Sometimes he’d urge me to cut out early, saying he’d cover for me, and I’d hire a sitter and take Shirley to a movie and a fancy restaurant. It was nice having money. We could order anything on the menu.
    Around this time, my maternal grandfather died. He’d been an electrician in Chicago, but a few years earlier he’d moved to Phoenix to live with my parents. I was very close to him and he loved me unconditionally, and after the funeral my mother told me I could go into his room and take a little memento, anything I liked. I found a book by Dale Carnegie, How To Stop Worrying and Start Living , and that’s what I took. I don’t know why I took it, frankly, because I didn’t even look at it, but a few months later I saw an ad for a self-improvement class based on the teachings of Dale Carnegie and I signed up. I had missed out on college, and in the back of my mind I was always trying to figure out how to educate myself, how to become a better-rounded human being, and this sounded like an opportunity.
    The class was at night, with maybe a dozen people attending, and one of the first things they asked us to do was to describe a happy moment. Some of the people had no problem getting up in front of the class and telling their stories, but I was a little tongue-tied.Still, I managed to talk about the time my mother took a job at a fancy summer camp in Prescott, Arizona, so I would have something fun to do for the month of August. We couldn’t have afforded it otherwise, and it was unlike anything