Tiffany bracelets and Laurel Canyon: First days in LA

In 1991, I rolled into LA from Ohio, piloting my trusty old Toyota Corolla to my new gig in TV ad sales. My first sales assistant was straight out of a glossy magazine—literally. She was the daughter of music industry royalty, a model, and her wardrobe operated on a budget NASA could admire. She drove a pearl white Mercedes and once hit me with, “Why didn’t you buy that girl you dated twice a Tiffany tennis bracelet?” Twice. Tiffany. Bracelet. I was still paying off my Corolla’s muffler.

My second sales assistant? The daughter of a high-powered LA lawyer. She zipped around in a pristine BMW and carried an unshakable confidence that I lacked the proper map for Los Angeles. When I told her I’d spent a Saturday driving aimlessly to get my bearings—looping from Beverly Hills to downtown and up the 5 to the Valley—she practically clutched her pearls. “Why didn’t you just take Laurel Canyon?” she gasped, before broadcasting my navigational faux pas to the entire office. Apparently, I’d committed a crime against LA geography.

One day, the team went to lunch at Mezzaluna on Brighton Way in Beverly Hills. I wedged my Corolla into a parking spot flanked by a blue Ferrari on one side and a red Ferrari on the other. As I slid out of the driver’s seat, I made a note to myself: Get a nicer car.