I don't have a movie tonight; I watched episodes of "Tales From The Darkside" and "Tales Of Tomorrow" instead, so rather than do a review of the shows, which are short (30 min), I think I am gonna start work on my Rappaport Kidnapping story. As reported a few weeks back, when I completed my "Dear Ann" blogs, I meant to keep going at some point and write about my experience with Jared Rappaport. I guess tonight is a good time to start, and it needs to be done, just as "Dear Ann" did. I'm gonna be 60 next year, and I know no one is gonna help me tell this story, so it's up to me. I wouldn't want to come to the end of my life - hopefully at 120 - and have the regret of not doing everything I could to bring the truth to light.
Please keep in mind that I'm not relating this story for anyone's entertainment. I'm only writing about it again in order to extract as much microscopic detail as possible, just as I tried to do in the "Dear Ann" blogs. I originally wrote about the Rappaport Incident on Myspace in 2006, when I was working on my book, which I still hope to publish one day, even as a self-published work. Since then, I have never re-explored the subject matter, except for a short blog I wrote here at Blogger around 2013 or so, that had to do with what my experience felt like from an emotional standpoint.
This time I am inspired by my recent reading of "The Rendlesham Enigma", which in the course of it's 700 pages examines Jim Penniston's landmark UFO experience in forensic detail. Every last step is looked into and cross examined, and that's what I want to do with my overall experience of the twelve day event that took place in September 1989.
I can't say that it will be a cohesive read. I might write some of it this evening and then do a week's worth of movie reviews before continuing the story, or I might write it straight through on consecutive nights, or I might try to do both things. It will come out in whatever way the mood moves me. The problem with the Rappaport Incident is that I don't have the same amount of recall as I did with the initial event that took place at the Concord Square Apartments on the night of September 1st, 1989. That was the situation I described in detail in my ten "Dear Ann" blogs. My memory of that first night is mostly intact. It gets a little foggier the next morning, on September 2nd, but I still had enough recall to take me all the way back to my house at 9032 Rathburn Avenue in Northridge, and I know that it was Ann - Lillian's older sister - who drove me there. My memory with Ann ends in the living room of that house, where my family and I had lived since 1970. Go back and read the "Dear Ann" blogs for context. She drove me home from Concord Square sometime in the afternoon of Saturday September 2nd, 1989. She helped me to lie down on the couch. Read the blogs to know what I went through the night before. I was in shock and thoroughly exhausted. I'd come close to dying. Ann was a nurse. She was in a tough position that day, but she got me home and got me situated on the couch in the living room at 9032, and I must have fallen asleep very shortly thereafter. This would've been at about 2pm.
Here is what I remember happening next, and now we will try to get forensic. Please keep in mind that the narrative may be broken into at any time to examine the evidence at hand.
The date is September 2, 1989, the time approximately 9 to 9:30 at night. In my memory there has been a knock at the door. The knock is not visceral in memory (and again, read the "Dear Ann" blogs to understand what I mean about "visceral" memories), but the next part is. I am opening the front door and a man is standing on our porch. The porch light is on, so I can see him clearly. He is tall, or at least taller than me, probably 6'1" or so. He looks about 40, solidly built and in good shape but a little dweeby, black hair slightly receding, small round glasses perched on a sloping nose. He is wearing a light jacket over a button up shirt. I don't think I have ever seen him before.
"Hello", I say.
He says, and I paraphrase "Hi, I am your neighbor and my dog got out. I'm wondering if you have seen her at all tonight"?
That was the ruse he used to engage me in conversation. It had to do with his supposedly "missing dog". This part of the memory is entirely visceral. I don't recall what he said next, but it must have been something designed to get me to come out of the house, past the porch and down our front walkway. He might've said "I think I saw her around here a few minutes ago". That would've gotten me to come out, because I love dogs. I had two of my own at the time.
So all of this happened very quickly. I answered the door, he asked about his dog, and within ten more seconds I was down the walkway and to the sidewalk, about 20 feet from my porch at the corner of Rathburn and Sunburst Avenues. I am standing there with this man, turning my head to look for his dog, when all of a sudden he reaches into his jacket and pulls out a handgun. At this point, only a minute after I'd answered the door, his demeanor changed entirely. He grabbed me by my upper arm, standing close to me to hide the gun he was pointing at my ribs.
"Start walking and don't make a sound", he told me, nudging me in the direction of Etiwanda Street, one block to the east of Rathburn.
My mind was going at 1000 miles an hour as I tried to take in what was happening. When someone pulls a gun on you suddenly - and in this case it was someone I would never have been suspicious of - you have trouble in registering what is going on. I could see that the gun was real, it sure didn't look like a toy, but I thought we were supposed to be looking for this guy's dog? He says he's my neighbor. Have I ever seen him before? I don't think I have.
I was wondering if this was a joke of some kind, but that notion only lasted for a moment as he then increased his grip on my arm and pushed me to move faster. It was now maybe 25 seconds since I'd answered the door, and I realized I was being kidnapped. The gravity of the situation had not yet hit me because I was still too confused. Here I will interject to say that I do not recall if I was aware, at that moment, of what I had been through the previous night. Amnesia works in very strange ways, which would take a series of blogs all it's own to explain. I am guessing that I had no memory of the night of September 1st, for if I had, there is little chance I'd have answered the door to an unknown man, and zero chance I'd have come out of my house for him. Also, if I'd been in a normal state of mind, chances are that I would've run or backed away instinctively the second I saw his gun. At the very least I would've yelled. I say this because I know how I would react in different contexts. For instance, if I was in an already threatening situation, let's say my car broke down in a bad neighborhood, I'd be mentally prepared for someone very dangerous to possibly pull a gun on me, and in that case I'd be extremely cooperative, because of the expected personality type of the gunman. But this man, though physically imposing (at least compared to me) was a mild-mannered nerd. He looked like a college professor, which in fact he turned out to be. I am an Aries, which means I am very quick to react, and what I am saying with all of this, is that - had I not been in a state of shock already - my natural reaction to this nerdy man pulling a gun, this man who did not seem threatening, would have been to run or scream immediately. "What the fuck are you doing!! Get away from me"!! And I would've run down the street, just on automatic pilot alone, without even taking time to think. A gangbanger, I'm gonna do what he says. I middle-aged nerd? Chances are I would've run away on instinct.
But that would've been if I were in a normal state of mind. Unfortunately, I was not in a normal state, and so I walked with this man, slightly ahead of him with my arm in his grasp, his other hand holding a gun to my side, and I wondered, my mind spinning wildly : "Is this for real"?
The night was pitch black and, it being Labor Day weekend, the street was quiet. Still, the man kept turning his head, scanning the neighborhood to make sure no one was watching. "Don't make a sound or I'll shoot you", he said under his breath. The next thing I knew, we were at his side gate. It was only about 50 or 60 steps from my corner. "Looks like he was telling the truth about being my neighbor", I thought.
Very quickly he shoved me through the gate. We walked a few more steps to his back door, which he opened. He pushed me inside his darkened house, turned around to lock the door, then turned on a stove light, casting a bluish tint around his kitchen. He opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.
"Put your hands behind your back, Adam", he demanded.
That's when I knew that this was all very real indeed. /////
To be continued.
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