When I first met the Stones (there is a polaroid on my site of the first time we got together), I was living with a roommate in a studio apartment next to Weequahic Park in New Jersey. It was close to the Newark Airport and all the ‘stewardesses’ stayed there. Keith came out to visit with his girlfriend (I think it was Linda Keith) and swam at the apartment swimming pool (he had the longest hair that anyone there had ever seen) and came up to the top of the building to hang out and watch the sunset. Keith was and I would assume, very cool. I had many great, exciting, scary, funny, etc. experiences with him.. He was someone that you want on your side.
When we were in Dallas, he said that he wanted to go horseback riding.. We had this image of just going up the road a bit and going riding.. well, we had to drive quite awhile out of Dallas before we got to a real ranch and spent the day riding..when we arrived for a date in Phoenix, we went horseback riding there as well. It was great to go from the grassy fields, to the desert with the cactus and then up mountains that seemed to be made from black sharp rocks. The stable insisted that we go with a guide and sent a girl with us..:-) We only wanted to gallop and race each other, which she did not like. At one point she insisted that we ‘stay put’ as she had to go to the bathroom, she rode a distance from us, got off her horse and squatted in the desert. When we saw her disappear, that seemed to be the starter’s pistol we needed to charge our horses in her direction. Scared the piss out of her or boy was she pissed.. She made us walk our horses to cool them down when we got back to the stable and was glad to see us go.. which leads me to
.After the last date in California, our pilot said that he was dead heading the plane back to the east coast and if we wanted a ‘lift’ he would take us and drop us off anywhere along the return route. Keith said he had made some calls and he wanted to go to Scottsdale, Arizona where he had set up an overnight ride and he invited me and Gered Mankowitz (our photographer for that tour). There are a lot of pics of this on my site..from a bobcat stealing bacon at the camp, waking up to him being shot at, my horse deciding to roll over in the water while I was on him, us wearing chaps, having Winchester rifles, I think Keith had a custom made 45 revolver that Lou Adler loaned him to play with, shooting our hats, wearing these outfits with the rifles to the airport..they kept the guns outside the pilots cabin…and did I mention that the cowboy in the pics that went with us was John Wayne’s guide for his westerns…I believe he also worked with John Ford..
That was the kind of guy the Keith I knew was..also..he loved and collected derringers and once shot one that came thru my motel room wall, as he said …ron, it was floor lever by the base board, sorry didn’t think it would go thru…
Yikes, where are my guns?
