Restless, and in desperate need of adventure, I quit my job at an insurance company to travel west with a couple of guys I smoked pot with, scandalizing my family.

But some things are the same. My mother still owns the house I grew up in, on what would now be called a cul de sac, but which the sign on the corner called a dead end street.

The first things I did when I got out of school in '65 was to buy a pair of Levis and pierce my ears.

Children would only get in the way of our erotic lifestyle!

It was there that, through a mutual friend, I met John Waters - proving what I've always said: you meet the best people on field trips.

We've had the same set designer and the same crew in many cases since 1972.

Even then, our family was extraordinary, with ten kids.