The Real Story

When I wrote my last blog I was just having some fun, or so I thought. Several friends took it to be true and in a strange way that made me realize I was reliving an actual event from forty-one years ago which I had consigned to a locked chamber.

In 1980 I opened a pharmacy in a medical building. I liked telling people my mother named me after the store, Norm’s Pharmacy. It is still there in Tarzana. The new owners from Odessa, in 1997, choose to keep the name even though it has become a Russian-speaking pharmacy.

One afternoon I was held up by a rather crazed gunman who ordered me on the floor with his weapon at my head. He wanted cocaine and all the opiates.

At this point my deaf daughter, Janice, walked in. First, she thought I was searching for my contact lenses. The man with gun told her to get down. I had to explain that she could not hear him as he grabbed her and threw her to the floor next to me.

She started crying in panic. The gunman had a wild look in his eye so my job was to assure my daughter and calm the bad guy. I had no inclination to challenge him. I'd rather be remembered for longevity than bravado on the police blotter. I gave him everything he wanted and he left happily, I suppose.

About six weeks later he returned calling me by name as if we were old chums. This time my other daughter Lauren happened to be there. Again, he wanted cocaine and I had to convince him I did not reorder it but I’d give him the narcotics so it shouldn’t be a wasted trip. When police showed up the following week, Lauren and I identified him from dozens of photos. She then went off to college up north.

Two months later I was called to the police station to pick him out of a lineup. He had held up about ten pharmacies so there were many witnesses like me. Three of us picked the wrong guy. I knew him as a white man with an abundant afro. However, this was apparently a wig. In fact, he was practically bald. He was also shorter than I had remembered; the gun added six inches to his height. Fortunately, there were enough eyes to arrest him. I’ve always wondered if I had picked the desk sergeant.  

He was convicted at court and sent away to Folsom. Two years later Lauren noticed our man’s photo in the Sacramento Bee. He was petitioning for early release so he wouldn’t die in prison from AIDS. Lauren wrote a letter saying he was still a menace as a drug addict.

All this felt like a B-movie script. Life sinks to that level sometimes. His name was Corlan Keller. He died in Folsom. I had many reasons to retire from pharmacy. This was one of them.

Life lesson: There are times when traumatic truth lies embedded in wit.