David Crosby and his "Dr. Detox"

 

Every time a celebrity dies, there's a flurry of social media posts and blogs and newspaper remembrances about the writer's encounter the the celebrity, which of course usually comes off as more about the writer than the recently deceased. 

This might be one of those. But it's really not about David Crosby, who died today, but the guy who'd introduced me to Crosby -- Bob Timmins, who Crosby credited with helping keep him sober. 

Timmins with Crosby in Timmins' office, by Max Aguilera-Hellweg

"If you look in Timmins's eyes," Crosby told me, "you can see he's been through it. He understands screwups. He doesn't stand in judgment of you-but he doesn't lie to you about what's going on."

Mars, Sixx, Neil, Lee shot by EJ Camp

I had met Bob in 1987, when I was on the road with Motley Crue for Rolling Stone. He had been hired  by management as a kind of sober minder for Vince Neil, who in 1984 had killed his passenger, the drummer from the band Hanoi Rocks Nicholas "Razzle" Dingley, and severely injured two women, in a DUI car crash. 

Neil had been charged with vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence. He served only half of a 30-day jail sentence, paid $2.6m in restitution, had to perform 200 hours of community service, and received 5 year's probation.

Vince's deadly car 

Timmins was part of this probation, kind of an unofficial gutter guard. Walking around backstage with an inocuous "Security" pass, he was instantly interesting to me -- indeed, more interesting than the band I was there to interview. 

His eyes were haunted, his arms were fully tattooed, he looked like a biker, but he was as gentle and calm as the Dalai Lama. He had clearly seen it all - and his experience gave him power with rockers who normally wouldn't listen to someone. 

Turned out, he had grown up in El Monte, California, the son of a law enforcement agent. At 9, he witnessed his mother kill and mutilate a neighbor, after which she was institutionalized. At 12, he started drinking, and by ninth grade, he had dropped out of school. He picked up a heroin habit, began stealing to buy drugs, and eventually did time in San Quentin and other prisons. 

I knew Bob's story was worth telling, but for whatever reason, I couldn't get Rolling Stone editor Jann Wenner interested. So after I went freelance in 1990, it was one of the first stories I pitched, and my GQ editor signed on. 

Remember - this was years before "Intervention" was a popular cable TV show, before Twitter confessionals. Drug use was still very much not talked about. 

Yet Aerosmith's Steven Tyler was among many who surprised me by agreeing to talk for the story. "Bob Timmins" Tyler told me, "is directly responsible for a lot of my friends' being alive today." 

Among others quoted in the article: Harry Nillson - who Timmins had only recerntly helped get sober after 20 years, and who called his 12-step meetings "the highlight of my life" -- Doug Fieger of the Knack, actor Corey Feldman, CSNY drummer Dallas Taylor. Among others he helped: Nikki Sixx, Anthony Kiedis, Sly Stone (hey, nobody bats 1.000). 

Tyler, Feldman, Fieger, Nillson, Taylor, Kiedis

Timmins was not intimidated by star power, partly because, as he told me, “I’m not, like, a rocker guy. I listen to jazz. A lot of times the first time I hear of a group is when I’m called in to meet with them.” 

He helped start two recovery centers in 1969 and 1971 while he was still using. Finally in October 1975 he was arrested again, and the judge let him check into one of his own facilities. He had not yet turned 30. "It was a little humbling," he told me, "but it saved my life." 

And, after a couple months' sobriety and clarity, he decided to dedicate his life to helping others. Quoting from my piece: 

Since then he has lived a workaholic existence, constantly on beeper call [!], out at meetings and clubs until 1:30am, then back in his closet-sized Santa Monica office by 8:30. A widower, he is often out of town - as he was for nine months this past year - and when he returns his desk is piled high with phone messages from such supporters as Paul Newman, Conrad Hilton and Ozzy Osbourne. 

He often didn't take money up front, because he didn't want the musicians to mistrust him as being in it for the cash.

Motley Crue's manager Doug Thaler told me, "For a long time, Bob was the ugly demon that came to the door when you were high. The last thing you wanted to see was him coming up the stairs, this Christ figure coming to save you, and you didn't want your soul saved. But I've never seen a more patient man. Even if you cry wolf five times, Bob's still there at the door, ready to pick up the pieces." 

Timmins in March 1991 GQ by Max Aguilera-Hellweg

"I wanna be fair," Timmins told me. "Sly Stone was very creative on cocaine, but after a while, he lost his ability to do anything. What I try to reinforce is, maybe you did some great stuff on drugs, but see the work people have done since they got clean. Motley Crue never had a number-one record until they got clean, and both of Aerosmith's sober albums [i.e. their two most recent at the time] are they best stuff they've ever done." 

So, what became of Bob? I didn't stay in touch with him, though I know a couple of friends he actually counseled on the phone when they were seeking to get sober. I heard some stories over the years, some of them unsavory, that I can't factcheck on deadline (if you know anything with citations, put it in a comment).

What's in the official record is his obituary from the Los Angeles Times, dated March 8, 2008, that actually quotes a bunch from my piece. 

It said he died of respiratory failure at his home in Marina Del Rey at age 61 - my age as I write this -  having worked the last several years battling chronic obsstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

It quoted him from my piece as saying he saw all these celebrities "as human beings first. I see them in their pain and try to help them through."

Well, Bob didn't die of drugs, and neither did Nilsson (heart attack), Fieger (cancer), nor Dallas Taylor (complications of kidney disease and viral pneumonia). 

Nor did David Crosby, who died today at the ripe old age of 81, who had survived multiple heart attacks, diabetes, hepatitis C, and a liver transplant, in part thanks to the mostly quiet work of Bob Timmins. 

"Sometimes," Crosby told me, "it's just a matter of somebody having the right word at the right moment. It's not as if it's a science; it's an art."

Lincoln Center, August 11, 2019

2022 in the Rear-View

After realizing I had not blogged once in all of 2022, I planned over Christmas to write up a year-end piece on the year's events that should've motivated me to the keyboard. But then I got locked out of my apartment on Christmas Day night. 

Sorry for the delay. I may get around to telling that story, but first: 

Among the missing posts:  

- my frustration before the year even began - December 2021. After having carefully avoided Covid because I'm among the 3% of Americans considered immunocompromised, I risked seeing my now-remote CNN colleagues in-person for the first time in 21 months -- and tested positive the next day, rushing to the ER for Regeneron  - which turned out to be ineffective vs. Omicron.

- my misery in then having to spend my two-week Xmas break quarantining from my partner in our apartment, having to skip my uncle's funeral, and then, trying to make it to the family cemetery for the interment, having  the Uber driver get so lost on the way that we missed all but the last farewells. 

Finally arriving at Mount Hebron Cemetery

- my reflections on visiting the buildings at 2 Broadway and 14 Wall Street where my father had his law offices before moving them up to the burbs, memories of accompanying him to work on Saturdays to match the schedule of his workaholic father/boss - part of why my brothers and I never followed him into the family business.

14 Wall Street's pyramid roof/my brother Matt
 (who became a school superintendent)

- my disappointment at the ongoing suspension of the Central Park volunteer tour guide program, for which I had just been certified on a second tour, the Ramble, when the pandemic hit in mid March 2020. I attempted to stay informed by taking more tours from the staff guides...

The Block House, built for the war of 1812, North Woods

...being a "greeter" at Belvedere Castle, while also still...

...giving unofficial tours to friends. 

The Bow Bridge, Lake, & Dakota, 1890 & 2022
(photo: John Williams)

- my relief in finally getting an Evusheld shot in March, finally giving me measurable Covid antibodies because the vaccines hadn't worked on my immunosuppressed system (now moot because Evusheld doesn't work against the latest variants, and has been discontinued).

- my sneaky satisfaction in returning in February, masked, to nearly empty museums on weekdays before the city had fully gotten back to full throttle.

MoMA and the Met, February 2022

- the crazy coincidence discovery by my older daughter, while working for New Yorker writer John Seabrook, that my great-uncle (her great-great-uncle) had been involved in the reorganization of Seabrook's grandfather's company in 1925.

- the bittersweetness of finally getting to attend a memorial service for our friend, the legendary music genius Hal Willner, whose wife Sheila had been my pal since Rolling Stone days, and who tragically died in the first weeks of Covid - with tender tribute performances by many including Bono, Elvis Costello, and the normally reclusive Michael Stipe and Tom Waits. R.I.P. 

- my risible fury with the crazy Covid rental car/employee shortage -