In 2016, I went to Los Angeles to find my daughter.
Don’t worry. She wasn’t abducted. Nor was she a runaway. Nothing nefarious.
Let me explain.
During most of her adolescence, rarely was there a day that Delaney and I didn’t coexist under the same roof. Still, I seldom saw her. She stayed in her bedroom, for which the secret password to enter was … well … a secret not shared with Dad. If music played from her side of the closed door, that meant she was home, safe. I lived for her muffled music.
She grew up quickly, and while I’d like to report that she grew up before my very eyes, in reality she grew up behind the very bedroom door between us.
During those years, my daughter chose not to hang out with her old man. She had friends. She was a teen. I got it. But I didn’t like it. Worried we might never do anything together again before leaving the nest, I bribed her with travel. “Anywhere in the world you want to go,” I said. “That’s where we will go.”
Months passed. No answer.
Then she texted me from her bedroom: LA.
But only if her best friend Britt could join us. I agreed. After all, both girls were only 16 and neither possessed a driver’s license. A dependency on Dad was inevitable. Delaney would have to involve me in their plans. In essence, they would be my hostages.
I was texted an extensive itinerary, requiring me to be their chauffeur, tour guide, and bodyguard. In other words, I had become their hostage, not the other way around.
The recent reports of wildfires in LA in 2025 got me thinking about our trip nine years earlier.
(TOP LEFT) The three of us at Chateau Marmont. (TOP RIGHT) Delaney poses with the Pacific. (ABOVE LEFT) Delaney and best friend Britt drive Dad to bankruptcy over breakfast at Chateau Marmont Hotel. (ABOVE RIGHT) Scott tries to seduce Dustin Hoffman at Madame Tussauds. (Photos provided by Scott Saalman)
Here are some highlights:
- Breakfast at the iconic Chateau Marmont Hotel in West Hollywood. Fitzgerald wrote there. Jim Morrison stayed here. Belushi overdosed there. Scott Saalman paid $130 for breakfast there. Excuse me, waiter, is that syrup on my pancake?—or molten gold? A $4.99 Denny’s Grand Slam would’ve tasted the same – but we were there for the unique experience. Highlight: To the girls’ shock, I asked the front-desk clerk if we could tour the famous grounds meant for the hotel’s star-powered guests. He put his forefinger to his lips as if to shush us and secretly presented a brass key for the inner jungle-like sanctum of the posh property’s cottages, bungalows and swimming pool. He gave us star-struck Midwesterners the star treatment. Maybe he thought I was Woody Harrelson – I get that a lot, though I don’t see it. Suddenly, I was the king of all dads! Thanks, Woody.
- Murder and mayhem at the morbid Museum of Death on Hollywood Boulevard. My traveling companions were into serial killers: Manson, Ramirez, Dahmer. The John Wayne Gacy room contained his actual “Pogo the Clown” shoes, self-portraits, and unsettling details of the 33 murders that led to his execution. But nothing seemed more ghastly (and timely) than a questionnaire Gacy filled out in prison. When asked to list his heroes, he wrote, “Donald Trump.” I kid you not.
- We visited Westwood Village Memorial Park and found burial plots for dozens of famous people, including Roy Orbison, Farrah Fawcett, Dean Martin, Don Knotts, Truman Capote, and Natalie Wood. Marilyn Monroe’s crypt was marked by the lipstick kisses of past visitors. The most memorable headstone belonged to Rodney Dangerfield, with the words, “There Goes the Neighborhood.”
- As the girls indulged in surprise facials at our hotel spa (the king of dads strikes again), I treated myself to a deep body massage. An LA freeway had left me knotted. My masseuse, Kim, narrated with a whispery chant over and over: “Muscle knots don’t like Kim. Knots hide from Kim. But Kim find knots!” Eventually, I felt the bottoms of her bare feet walking up and down my backside, from ankles to neck, my spine a tightrope. Many women have walked all over me, but Kim was the first to literally do it. This time, it actually made me feel good.
- We playfully posed with wax figures at Madame Tussauds. I pretended to dine with Audrey Hepburn at Tiffany’s while Delaney swooned over Elvis.
- We saw the iconic Hollywood Sign. Not much to it, really.
- We heard the pound of Pacific surf from atop Palace Verdes’ breathtaking coastal cliffs.
- We were bedazzled by the Friday night lights of LA way below us from our high perch at the Griffith Observatory. We were happy to see a bust of fellow Hoosier James Dean erected there.
- We saw the famous Santa Monica sunset.
- A slime ball at Venice Beach invited my jailbait daughter to his “beach house,” making me imagine a future room dedicated to me at the Museum of Death.
- In Long Beach, Delaney hugged me as Britt took our picture by the Queen Mary, the first time I could recall her arms being around me since she was a toddler. For this alone, I will always love LA.
When we returned to Indiana, Delaney disappeared into her bedroom, but that did not rob me of my newfound contentment. I smiled when I heard the sweet birdsong of Joni Mitchell play behind the bedroom door: “California I’m coming home.”
I had done what I had set out to do: I found my daughter in LA before it was too late.
Email Scott at scottsaalman@gmail.com.