US BY GREYHOUND TRIP 1963 7 of 10
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24. While he walked into a place for breakfast, I rolled down Clark to the Y. [Chicago telephone directory lists Zzyzzyxy Zyzzy 7904 S. Palina TR 4-9451.] [Sort of amazing, but the eatery in the bottom of the Y, though it certainly has good food to recommend it, seems to have more female customers than male.] [Dream last night is rather odd, probably taking off from my complete lack of interesting faces to gawk at. Get all hot over a doll, and a third party comes into the picture and takes over while I'm willing to sit back and watch. Gosh.] [That old one about the West being better than the East for looks might certainly prove true of Chicago --- which has really lousy people. More than getting used to the changes in climate is the job of getting used to changes of sexual appeal. As I go east, the appeal lessens, as I go west, it increases --- almost like the temperature. Which is low in Chicago. As I recall, the last time I was here it was HOT and since Chicago is known as the windy city, I guess I'm getting a taste of the REAL Chicago.] [Part of that taste includes the subway, I guess, and WHY does Chicago have such better ones than NYC? Not only are they less crowded, with few standees (Chicago still doesn't have the concentration of tall offices that NYC has), but the cars themselves are more comfortable, seating about twice as many, and they are NOISELESS. It seems that anything as simple as a car on a pair of rails, if it can be made silent in one place, could be made silent in another. Why must NY's always squeal so as they go around corners. Another surprising thing is the number of stations under the loop which are connected by walks. Now with a city map in my possession, the routes themselves are easy, but the transfer details will probably remain a mystery for my stay. This makes the third time I've trotted out my three layers since Philadelphia: Yosemite, Grand Canyon, and now Chicago --- hardly the altitudes, as in the former two, but the latitude.] [I must be getting stage fright --- feel actually guilty about writing in a crowd. I'm more aware of how I must look --- glancing up at the people, bending to write, looking back up and writing some more. And some of these old men in the lobby look at me with such --- what? --- hate that they don't even bother to TRY to think I'm not writing about them. They KNOW I'm writing about them and hate me for it, and that's the end. So now I'm upstairs.] [What a remarkable smell exudes from old shorts: fresh urine, old semen, whiffs of excrement, a touch of sweat, the smell of that strange scale which forms in the creases of the crotch, and a damp smoky smell that combines them all but is none of them.] The morning was bright and my eyeballs felt covered with suede --- red suede. Passed a park with the bums sitting around with greasy faces on benches, hot and tired even at the start of the day. I went to room and washed and shaved and ate and decided that day was for the Art Institute. Walk down Michigan Avenue after stupidly buying one pair of sunglasses the wrong color for $1 and the right color (Polaroid) later on for $2. I didn't bother to even call the Conservatory to see if they'd been turned in. Identified what remained of Chicago's skyscrapers, and the Tribune Tower is certainly quite a carved beauty. Got looked at because the day was cloudy, yet I still wore the sunglasses. But the right sort stared at me --- neatly suited businessmen, girls looking like fashion models, butch guys in jeans. I felt incognito. Down to the Art Institute and am again shocked that they don't have a floor plan. They do, fortunately, have a place to check coats, so I'm off through the print and etching collection, the Chinese and Japanese and then the truly magnificent mastery, artistry, and imagination of the James Ward Thorne rooms [Chicago Art Institute: Jean Drevet: The King Pursued by the Unicorns, Clarence Buckingham Collection, is QUITE. Rodolphe Bresdin, French, 1822-85, has lithographs and etchings much like Doré, but with not as much skill in the figures. The goodness of Durer the Engraver summed in "Knight, Death, and the Devil" 1513. The understatement of the Chinese: a painter's color box, in porcelain, from Ching Dynasty, with THREE colors.] [THORNE ROOMS are amazing for their completeness. Lit in many cases from open windows over gardens and ponds and far vistas, the light illumens carved wood paneling on the walls, perfect wood pegs in the period floor boards, properly sculptured stucco ceilings, even such things as books which open and appear to be printed in, flowers in vases and vanity sets on bedroom tables, needlepoint tapestry on chair backs and stools, beautiful rugs on the floor and velvets on the tables, though the bearskin rugs are rather fabulous since the hairs, relation-wise, would be two feet long. One wonders whether the many familiar paintings are good lithographs, photos, or possibly hand-done duplicates, scaled to the size of the room: Rembrandts, van Dykes, Gainsboroughs, etc. The mirrors are not true, and the porcelain dog is grotesque before a magnificent fireplace, complete with ashes. I wonder how my little people who spun webs from the altar to parts of church during the long morning masses at St. John's would like to inhabit these rooms. Suits of armor, tapestries and altar screens complete the perfect effect in the Late Tudor Great Hall. Candlesticks are present in sconces, chandeliers or table lights, and here's a quill pen in a gold holder. Small reliquaries and needlepoint framed and hung in the Stuart Withdrawing Room. The Stuart Reception Room has a sword on the bench and huge ceiling frescos, and white lilies are gently reflected in a checkerboard marble floor. The Late Stuart Salon looks down a tree-lined lane to the coach house. Splendid matching inlaid chest and clock, and the dish drawer appears to pull out. English 18th century cottage contains dozens of tiny hardware items and minute Meissien figurines. English 18th century library amazes with literally hundreds of books, box hedges outside and Chinese blue and white porcelains. The early Georgia drawing room contains a painting in process, easel, brushes, pallets, an incredibly tiny chess set, and a beautiful black lacquer Chinese screen, to match the Buddhas displayed in the next room through the door. A white pawn and castle are missing. Cherry size globe here as there were two in the previous room. Tea is set with tiny spoons, but there is no sugar or cream in the silver containers. The double-tier brass chandelier contains 18 candles. The Chinese Chippendale bedroom contains the typical scrolled figurine display, but without mirrors to back them. The Partridge in a Pear Tree wallpaper is pleasant. One of the marigolds has died, but there are no dead petals on the table. The Hepplewhite salon is long, to a six section, 5 shelf per section, 10 books per shelf breakfront, and the bank barrel-vault roof recedes in the distance. A representation on the table is too small to make out. The Georgian dining room has simulated Wedgwood paneling, painted circles in the ceiling and a lovely bowl of fruit on the dining stand. Tiny glasses and tinier utensils set two places at the long table. The Georgian entrance hall and stairway has marvelously delicate Wedgwood plaques and cherry stain balustrades, and makes the plastic-like Cupid statues awfully coarse. The wall panels have cracked, an added note of accidental (?) realism. The Sheraton drawing room has the "turnsit" chair on the lamp sconces (?), and the violin in a case looks playable to the unplayable sheet music (no MELODY). An elaborate bell cord is half hidden by a door with a porcelain knob held open by a silver doorstop. The Regency rotunda has circular marble blocks in the floor, and the library beyond has a beautifully polished desk and Empire side tables. The Victorian drawing room lacks only a white rook in the set, but does have the wedding photo of Victoria and Albert, a copy of the Daily Mail, a fan, a painting of the Crystal Palace, and flowers under glass and a paperweight and rather grossly patterned lace curtains. Looks like real coal in the scuttle and fireplace. The English contemporary drawing room STILL has the Victoria and Albert wedding picture, STILL gets the Daily Mail, but a portrait of King Edward and whisky bottles bring it up to date. The white carpet needs cleaning. Cigarettes and pipes and dice and cards show a busy family. The "Our Lady Queen of Angels" is too big for comfort, but the inlaid colored marble floor is good and the stained glass is ultra-modern. No sanctuary light, though "it is designed in accordance with the requirements of the Roman Catholic ritual." The 1761 Philadelphia dining room has a thicket of evergreen and twigs outside, it's a second floor dining room, as the top banister is through the door. The grate glows. The 1752 Miller House great hall has Dutch door, Dutch shoes and a Dutch spinning wheel, but American rifle, utensils, knitting, and hex signs. The Shaker living room in Community House has an unfinished desk complete with paper in the compartments and letters on the desk. The bed in the next room is neatly made and the hook rugs curl up properly at the edges. The 1770 Maryland dining room has mushy grapes, terrible copies of terrible US paintings, but a beautiful cabinet with wood inlay and polished brass drawer pulls and hinges. The 1758 Virginia dining room is again Chinese, with wooden Buddhas above doors, Chinese Chippendale mirrors, and jades and crystals in the next room. And stylized Chinese bird wallpaper. The harpsichord in the Mount Vernon West parlor has 67 keys (full size?), and the pink flowered draperies are perfect in the off-pink room. The Fredericksburg dining room has a bird in a cage and large white columns outside on the porch. For some reason, the chandelier sways. The Virginia drawing room 1754 has three birds and a crystal-clear mirror that looks out across the road. The next room has elaborate dim-with-age wallpaper. The Virginia entrance hall contains riding horn, caps and crop, and the open door looks out to oversize cherry blossoms and sheds light on a high-relief rug of luxuriant pile. The doorstop looks like a gold pepper shaker. The wood, as kids point out, even has its scale-size "knots." The Virginia drawing room has needlepoint in progress, untied colors draped down the front. The convex mirror, over the fireplace, brings back the scale with an immense reflection of the viewers FACE huger than the room. The Jeffersonian 1800 dining room has neatly ironed curtains looking over a too-sponge-like bush. Glass in sash, and the glass doors shake, the balls under sconces tremble and the chandelier shakes with the kids running and shaking the handrails. The Governor's palace kitchen in Virginia has a lovely brick floor, a straw mat, an odd doll, a new pie, and shadowed red lights like fires under pots in the fireplace. The kitchen garden has cabbage, cauliflower, carrots, and flowers. A jug appears to have vinegar in it. A pitcher of milk stands by a sharp-looking knife and a plate loaded with "vegetables." Three sizes of hourglasses line the shelf. The Charlestown drawing room, 1775, has an out-of-place Chinese screen, a marble fireplace, and a grandfather clock that looks like it WOULD work. The mirror in the second room is odd, because it reflects off a mirror FACING it. There, in mirror, seen through two rooms, you see a mirror seen through two rooms. And in the reflected mirror you see you. The book's title "The English Bijou." Ballroom in Charlestown has a huge veranda and garden looking over to the willowed house across the street. This oil, for me, because of the light, is PAINTED. A harp, with colored strings, stands before beautiful yellow drapes and an old piano with La Mexicana on it. The 1850 Georgia double parlor has a stereopticon on a red-velvet-covered carved table. The fireplace screen is metal and ornate. The Hermitage entrance hall has beautiful Egyptian scene wallpaper around the gracefully curving staircase. The New Orleans bedroom has wrought-iron balcony, shutters, floor-length windows, a parrot and a huge rose on the lounge. A tiny key pokes from a chest of drawers. The Chicago parlor, 1875, has three wonderful chandeliers, in entrance, parlor, and dining room. The doll has gold arms, and the sewing basket looks complete. Huge shells adorn the whatnot shelf. Mexican dining room has adobe walls and staircases, and a straw broom, and Indian huts lie beyond. Beautiful Indian rugs. George Washington Smith living room in Santa Barbara has a copy of Colliers, a huge wood arch roof, baked tile floors and a cactus and calla garden. Eyeglasses, bellows, vignettes and huge pinecones complete the scene, with an orangewood Buddha I've seen somewhere in England, previous. Monterey, California 1850 living room has a thimble, smaller than which only pawns were before. The Boardman Gray and Company piano has only two pedals. The SF penthouse has an original Leger and a view of the lights of the midnight SF. The Massachusetts living room and kitchen, 1675, has a wonderful ship model and the candles look hand dipped, rather than "ready made." Portsmouth parlor, 1710, has a chair which folds into a table. Practical. Tiny glasses would do NOTHING for wine, but yarn looks useable. The Salem dining room, 18th century, has some finely grained furniture, this time with rush seats. The Connecticut tavern parlor, 1750, has one of the lovely vistas through the park, into dim hall, through bright kitchen to scene outside. Marblehead drawing room, 1768, has perfect Chinese vases and a desk that would be anyone's envy. Portsmouth dining room, 1760, has quantities of old silver and china, and the mirror is even scratched and losing its backing: antiqued. The Portsmouth entrance hall, 1799, is austere, but the bright sun streaming in makes it warm and clean. American eagles everywhere. Bedroom in Peabody 1800 mansion is so good I even pass it quickly by. Truly representational. The 1818 Massachusetts parlor is snowbound, and you can even see the GE sun in the mirror --- in all three mirrors. The Boston 1795 dining room has some rather unlikely purple fruit, but the wood vases and highlights and highboys and china chests are wonderful. The 1820 Rhode Island parlor has dusty hollyhocks outside, but the carving, hardware and usefulness of the desk is fantastic. The Cape Cod cottage, 1750-1850, is idyllic --- bow window, trellised porch, winding stairway, ship in bottle on mantel, and prints of Philadelphia and Boston are precious. The New England bedroom is prim, the quilt is quilted and the H-hinges looks useable. The hope chest is properly brass-bound. The Pennsylvania drawing room is ugly, but the backgammon and dice game look fun, and there are two concave mirrors. Parlor at 28 East 20th Street is properly red plush and dark carved walnut (?) wood. Let's CHECK. (Birthplace of Theodore Roosevelt.) French halls have beautiful set pieces --- choir stalls, lacquered tables, fireplaces. French Valois bedroom, 1580s, had magnificent painted timbered ceiling and a papal-tiara-type chandelier. The Louis XIV salon was over-gold and elegant, and the tapestry in the next room was properly faded. The Louis XIV dining room had a great cupboard, and the damask chairs were red and white and the drapes were gold-trimmed. The Louis XV library had a rug I'd like to have, and lovely SETS of books. The Louis XV boudoir had six paintings, one each tapestry, bell pull, rug, chandelier, window (no door) clock. Two vases with flowers, three vases without, a fine tray set, a display case with ten items, a ten-piece tea service for two, eight shelves of books, five candelabra, ten-piece vanity set, a miniature and two items, two figurines, two pieces of sculpture, three occasional chairs, one sectional sofa, one sofa, a fire bench, screen and andirons, carpet, wood paneling, parquetry floor, carved marble fireplace, a Chinese vase, draperies and curtains, shutters with bronze fixtures, an iron railing and a view of woods and a lake beyond. That was a DULL room. Normandy bedroom of 18th century had Crucifixion and Sacred Heart of Virgin among nonreligious knick-knacks. French Louis dining room, French salon of Louis XVI were much the same, and I'm getting tired. French Bath of the Revolution was sunken tan marble, and all the furniture linear graceful Empire. Napoleon everywhere. French Empire salon was too crusty for my taste, but the bronze nude Ephebe was good and better than the busty Sphinx. 1930 French library was modern and Art Nouveau and Eiffel Tower. Carpet was flat velvet. Open and airy and Oriental. The Biedermeier boudoir was more Empire than I'd expected; the mountain alps through the windows were lovely, even though the center one looked on a lake and the right one down into a valley from a great height. The Chinese interior I hadn't seen before, was large, with much carved and lacquered wood. Five complete rooms here, if you count the farthest altar chamber. Must be real jade pieces. The traditional Japanese interior and EXTERIOR too, with a watery rocky treey garden. The Thorne rooms, Chinese art, Japanese prints, contemporary art, medieval sculpture, prints, paper cutting, fabrics; a museum has everything.] [Phuck you.] [What's that about "Foolish love of parents" in Proverbs 13:24?] [I remember Chuck's telling me about the Temptation of St. Anthony. Here, by Ivan Le Lorraine Albright, American 1897- , is "That which I should have done I did not do" 1931-41. Intricate, frightening, detailed and grotesque. Simply an old hand reaching for a door on which stands a funeral wreath. Alfred Jensen does Bobby to shame --- The Nine Cauldrons in Five paintings (?) is the absurdest. Head of Philosopher, Greek marble, late 4th century BC, A.A. Sprague Fund Purchase, is PRECISELY Jerry Weinburg. Zubaran did quite a pictorial Crucifixion. Saint Lucy had her eyes put out, so her eyes are on a plate. What happened to St. Agatha that the plate contains two breasts?] [And the angels lit the CANDLES. And the cat peed on the MATCHES.] [Amazing in 1450 the Master of the Dido Panels was NOT painting religious in Italy, but the "Adventures of Ulysses."], a great entire wing of Modern Art which I can't recall seeing before, and a collection of glass and medieval relics that I HAD seen. Through the early French and Italian Renaissance, and by the modern art and the awful current exhibit of "Chicago, 1963," and the Seurat back in place and that was that, and I left at 5 after looking to see if I could find anything, but couldn't, in the gift shop. Quite a good museum, just about perfect for a full day. Walk back to Y and windowshop on way and cross still another bridge. Eat and read a bit of the Aenied until I'm tired (had only 3 hours sleep last night) and write a lot and get to bed early. [Two monks set up a fish and chips stand. "Are you the fish friar?" "No, I'm the chip monk." Thanks to Saturday Review.] ["I love to kiss your ass. I love to play with your asshole. I love to stick my tongue up your asshole. Call me Shit. That's my nickname." Graffito in 19th floor john at Chicago Lawson Y.] At least I start to, but look down the back and see an old fat man lying on his bed feeling himself. Though he's old and far away, this free kick thrills me. Then directly across from me a fellow in pajamas gets ready for bed, and I wait for him to start sex before he shuts the light off. Next to him a fellow's lying in bed propped up on pillows at his windows, and he has a shaving mirror out the window, in which I can catch glimpses of bare arm. And now next to the nude who's playing without getting excited, another fellow enters and I watch to see if HE undresses. Look out other window and see young kid leaning out window, smoking, looking down. After a bit a fellow across from him raises the window and leans out. It gets darker as this goes on, and I jump from window to window and every so often to the door grating, where I can see people who have rung for the elevator looking out the window at the kid. If he's smart, he can see me run to the door, then look at the same fellow I'm looking at. There's some sort of Philippine Pentecostal meeting on the 3rd floor, and Latin voices filter up through the night. The pajama fellow's light is off, the mirror hasn't moved, the trousers haven't come off, and the limp prick is gone from the bed (so is the man). Think there might be two at the lower window, but can't be sure. Finally I just get sick and tired, after debating to call the cute kid on 16, and get to bed around 10. Tiring watching out windows --- KNEW I should have taken my binoculars --- they would have been a good trade for my bathing suit, which I haven't used once yet.
THURSDAY, APRIL 25. Up late to shower and pack, and when I'm ready to go, I find that the 18th john is being cleaned, so I go to the 19th. WHAT PLUSH. Only one throne and one showerhead, BUT the huge window faces south over the complete unobstructed view of the Chicago skyline. I sit and shit and see Chicago from the 19th floor. Check out and catch bus just on time [Two strokes of luck, each more incredible than another: See that the bus leaves at 1 pm and 1:30. AT ONE time, I noticed that the time is marked CDT, and we're still on CST. I debate calling, but it slips my mind until I'm in the cab bound for the terminal. However, because there's nothing else to do because the breakfast joint ends at 10:30, because I want to shower, and then have only to pack, I find myself checking out at 11:45, over one hour from indicated departure time, and in the cab I look at schedule again, and look at the front to see that it's effective April 28, which it ain't yet. Figure quickly that CST schedules should be one hour EARLIER, so there's a chance. I pay cab off (for a mere fare of 55, I decide to believe guide which says 10%, give him a dime tip. He says thank you and THEN wishes me a good trip), and enter station in time to hear an announced departure for Des Moines. Glance around, no schedules. Hurry! Run downstairs and ask first person I see, "Where's bus to Des Moines?" "Right here," he says, and takes my ticket and I smile dazedly on bus.] ["Sittin' on a railroad track --- I guess he was drunk --- train hit him (as an afterthought) --- killed him."] [Girl hollers down to two girls getting on --- "Hey, where you guys goin for three days?" "California." "Oh, I'm goin to Oregon."] [W. Brown and Son Cartage --- French? Or is his son's name Cartage?] [Mennen Speed Stick ad in True magazine, full page, with muscular (not sexy) arm flexed "Man-Size." But in the flesh at the inside of the elbow are two dimples, one on either side of the crease of the elbow, and they're light, almost as if powdered, and they resemble greatly (as far as a man of my limited experience can tell) a woman's CUNT. With a bit more difficulty the forearm can be considered one outstretched leg, but the bicep lends itself to a second leg with greater difficulty. Talk about torsos in shoulders in comic books! I wonder if the resemblance would be more or less apparent to the man of greater experience?] [One of the most beautiful farms I've ever seen: an Illinois SOD farm.] [Every so often you see a CLASSICAL sailor and you can see why some people are nuts about them. Tall, broad shoulders, with literally shiny blond hair that's so bright it looks like a wig. And the straight line of blue between hip and thigh just looks GOOD.] [The sewage entry in the center of the field was covered by a square of concrete raised off the ground by two concrete walls on parallel sides. Across the other two walls, where the water entered, were two bars each. Around these two bars were caught weeds, molded by the water to form the images of two hands grasping these bars for life.] [A large doll (I hope) had been tied into a swing under an Illinois farmhouse tree.] [Christ died for our sins; we live for them, and will die for them, too.] [Teitel's law of SECOND letter being pronounced is useful for names like Kleinschmidt; thus it's Klineshmit, not Cleanskmid, or variant.] [Cartoon: Workman nailing sign "Do not molest trees" to a tree.] [Cartoon series, a la Peanuts: Seeds: Peach and cherry are obvious, but SOME people eat grape seeds. "I don't WANNA eat tomato seeds." Long series with contorted face: olive pit. Does a banana have seeds?] [The Illinois countryside full of young: tiny pigs bobbled along the fields, young sheep chased their mothers, calves had liquid lunch on the hoof.] [Rock Island boasts a "Lounge Magnifique" the Horizon.] [Some US girls are simply irrepressible --- pulls in girls to sit beside her and jabbers away, then when they leave she takes to talking to the girl across the aisle, and sitting in the front seat as she is, her voice projects back from the sloping front windows and echoes way to the back. As might be expected, she's fat and unsightly, but absolutely pleasant. She's the type who makes up for physical deficiencies by vocal achievement, sheer cheerfulness, and quantities of nerve. They can't be kept down.] [Illinois has no "Number of miles to ---" only "Next exit is." Iowa has crazy "No Passing Zone."]. Ride bus through Illinois and Iowa [Why do plains, as in Iowa, always become HILLS when night draws on?] and get to Des Moines [Again the rational decision. Think to get into Des Moines at 8:30, but the arrival is CST and in at 9:20. That's too late to DO anything in Des Moines; I peek at two of the three main movies and see "The Birds" and "Come Fly with Me" (which I guess will replace "40 Pounds of Trouble" for awhile), the station doesn't have a schedule for Omaha, appears to have nothing to South Dakota, and doesn't even have a NEWSPAPER. I decide to continue on to Omaha, "only" three hours away. Even the red Y sign down the street doesn't help. Why should I spend the night here when I'll only get up for a quick trip into SD? Now I can get to Omaha, GET the schedule to SD, if any, and plan things past THEN.] [Wish I had known about the "Burning Bush" in Des Moines. Looked like fun.], and continue to Omaha. Walk around the County Court House and get to the Y, and am nicely impressed by huge cast concrete male caryatids holding up the second floor balcony. Wish one or two of the four would move inside. Cute desk clerk gives me the room and I'm up on the elevator to find a group chatting in the hall. Into room --- casket shaped with two beds and one dresser, laid end to end along one wall, and another dresser and a desk. Unpack and go to john to clean teeth. Shirtless fellow comes in and stares voraciously at me. His jeans are nice, but his torso is 30ish and his head is jaded at 25, and that stern stare puts me off. I look him over and check him off. We pass in the hall and again I get that glare. I'm out later for a drink and he pads up beside me, stands very close, and a hand reaches over to me. I finish, stand up, put my hand on his shoulder and laugh, "Oh, boy, no. I'm sorry." His stern look freezes as I move away. Get into bed, but people are laughing and coming and going in the hall, and I feel finally like having sex. Get up and open door and wrap towel around me and pretend to be sorting through my luggage, planning for Sioux Falls the next day. Short Syrian type passes in the hall and we say Hi, and he passes again and I invite him in. He says he's locked out of his room, his roommate's drinking in some bar, and he's got the key. I say shut the door. He does and sits on bed. "Why do you have the towel on?" "Oh, I have to wear something." "You have a nice form: slim; that's good." "Thanks." "Why don't you take the towel off?" His hair is nice and his eyes are very fetching, but he's effeminate and rather plump. "Oh, take that towel off." So I take the towel off. "That's good; come over here." I walk close and he grabs it, still sitting, and I reach for the soft form in his lap. I tell him to take his shirt off, but he says he has to wait for his roommate. He pulls and fondles me for a minute, then says, "Let me go see if I can find him --- I'll be back in a while." I wait and he doesn't come back. I open door again, wondering what'll happen NOW. Little time passes and thin blond, the type whose forehead is too big in proportion to his body, with brown paper bag in hand, passes. He's looking for someone, too, but he doesn't live there. They just had a going-away party. He's going to California, and the Armenian he's looking for is going to Seattle. "Want a beer?" "No, thanks." "Take one." "No." "Com'on, have a beer." "OK." He opens it and one for himself and he shuts the door and he talks a bit and he complains about the light. "If this was my room, I'd shut the light off and open the blind. I'm sensitive to light -- I'd like to live in the dark." "Go ahead." He does. "Why don't you lay down?" I do so. "Move over so I can sit next to you." He sits down. "Do you wear a towel to bed?" I mumble something. "Take it off." Again I obey. "Move closer; I feel I'm crowding you off." "OK." Shut your eyes, I'm going to light a cigarette. You'll be blinded, shut your eyes." I did, but I was sure tempted to open them. He smoked a bit, then put it out. He reached over for my limp cock and began sucking it avidly --- this is hardly something to excite me. He moved from the cock to the balls, working over them like peach pits, then goes down between the legs and I grunt and gasp and loll my head around --- I don't want him to do it, yet, masochistically, I don't want to tell him that. But by damn up I come, mainly from his working around the leg and knee, and he pounces and slobbers, leaving quite a bit of saliva. Then he starts working up, flicking his tongue back and forth like a broom. It dries out and becomes hard and cold, like flicking me with a partly cooked wiener. This extra digit works around the navel, then to the chest, and at that point I feel his tie and white shirt wiping my cock. He's going to look a mess. He works his way up to the neck, still with that absurd, dry, back-and-forth sweeping motion of the hard tongue, and he comes across the chin and up to the lips, he CERTAINLY doesn't expect me to respond to something like that. I draw back coldly, the tongue pauses a second, goes up a minute to the nose and eyes, cleans out the ears, then back down. He sucks and his head bobs and he chokes and coughs and draws out hairs. I'm half erect, half mortified with embarrassment for him. He works up again and I swear his tie must be dripping with saliva. Back to the anus and the legs, and he works away with his hands. I figure he's doing what he wants and let him go, trying to keep from alternately laughing or screaming to stop. Then his rasping voice, "Can't you COME?" I reach down and flail myself. He insists his mouth must be there, and I can hardly get a good grip. Finally I take it away (let him go back to his thumb for a second), and beat away, sweating, and eventually I come and release it to him and he sucks it and I gasp dryly and he hardly finishes when he's up, tucking in his shirt, and I lie limply. He puts his jacket on, gets his paper sack, goes to the door and exits cheerily with "Have fun." I lie there completely floored until I dry off a bit, get out for a needed drink, and fall into bed for the THIRD time at 3 am, amazed with the WMCA in Omaha.
FRIDAY, APRIL 26. Up in time to dress and get to Greyhound for an argument with the clerk and he sends me up to his boss after telling me I certainly can't go up to Sioux Falls. I say an army friend of mine moved up there since I'd gotten the ticket and I wanted to see him. Hardly could I tell him the REAL reason I wanted to get to Sioux Falls, that that would enable me to complete my visits to each and every one of the 48 continental United States on the trip. That would hardly sound like a valid reason to anyone except myself and a few other nuts. He sends me down and telephones ahead to OK it. I eat in cheerful post house [They might have passed out cheer pills in the Omaha Post House that morning. The plump one cheerfully gave me double cream for the coffee, after ASKING what I wanted. The mess boy made snide remarks about some dime-sized marshmallows. "They're about four years old," said an older woman. "They look like what comes after a kidney operation." "Oh, shut up," the girl said, poking him. "Oh, that hurts so good, keep it up, it'll be just like back home." "Looks like someone's been hocking up clams," particularly apt. "Hock pooie," said the cute girl, who was bouncing around behind the counter, singing the local version of "Fight Fiercely Harvard," and moving her arms cheerleaderly. "I thought you were told to stay off your feet, stay out of school, and keep in bed. What are you doing at work?" The girl babbled nonsense, and the plump one shook her head wryly, "From the looks of you, you shouldda stayed in bed." But the girl launched into the Bunny Hop. Shirley, huge, came in in a fairly surly mood. "Hey, Shirley, you alone?" "Yeah." "Sit back here so we can talk." "We can talk while I sit here." The plump girl: "Didn't you used to work here?" "Yeah." "With a girl named --- Carol?" "Yeah." Unsmiling. "I usta come in and you were here." No answer. The cheer was even unbroken when the Frank Morgan type with a five o'clock silver shadow and mustache came in and ordered toast. "Jelly?" "Yeah." "Apple or grape?" "Apple, I'll just take anything that comes with it." "Here's your dry toast" from the fellow. Plump frowned and went for the toast, returned with it glistening damply. "Is there butter on it?" "Yes, there is, sir." He picked up a piece and turned it over. "I don't see any." "We have it melted and just put in on with a brush (a particularly barbaric habit they carried to an excess of grease in Chicago and seems common throughout the Central North). "Not much butter on here" a minute later. "What some more?" "Yeah." She gave it and he said, "Milked the cows with my own hands for my children, fed them milk and butter." The girl looked at him solemnly. "Don't see why I can't have some now." "You've got a point there," she said casually. During this time three other waitresses came up to be brusquely brushed off by the sleepy Shirley. But still the cheer pills bubbled.] and join sexy crew in station and get on bus for Sioux Falls. The trip is pleasant [The cheer continued onto the bus. "Hi, fellows" boomed echoingly across the bus docks, and a beaming face paling Santa's followed a cup of coffee toward the station. A reply lost in resounding echoes came back, and hearty, cheery, non-AM laughs ricocheted back and forth. Even the driver said, "Sioux Falls? You'll have to change at Sioux City," as cheerfully as he would say "You've just had twins, congratulations." After this background the rock-n-roll music from Omaha's station: the Heart of the Country, sounded OK.] [Omaha remarkably cruisy. Fellows in tight trousers, waiting to go on the streets. The lively promiscuity in the Y halls inspired me to take the room for another night, despite my poor showing last night.] [America is a great country. I figured this out last night. So many diverse areas: city, industrial, small farms, large farms, plains, hilly forests, desert, canyons, caves, seacoasts, lakes, rivers. In each of these areas you can stand and gaze around and know that the area continues for hours of driving in any direction. How many places there are to see; how many TYPES of each of the above list --- some touristed, some not.] [You'd forget the incredible sets of steps between street and stoop just outside Charlestown, West Virginia.] [Consistent, anyway: Nebraska's license proclaims "The Beef State" and Omaha is "The Livestock Capital of the World."] [Lilac joined the redbud in bloom, and bushes looked strange when they mixed the purple and the white into one parti-colored bush. Magnolias were not to be seen since some small buds struggling to open in the Chicago cold.] [Iowa seems like an old state --- the houses in the quiet residential areas are turn-of-the-century, main streets are 20s-ish, the roads which have been cut through hills show sides that have been eroded away in soft gullies, and the fence posts hang in mid-air where the ground has been washed out from under: where once the posts held the wires, the wires now hold the posts. Weather was mostly cloudy, which helped give the impression of quiet age.] [Would there be any money in a "portable" car crusher? Buy wrecks in fields for $5, crush them, ship them, sell them for $40? Sort of a countrywide garbage collection of cars? Charge admission, too, to see it work.] [The Omaha, Nebraska, to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, highway, in Iowa, was odd. Left of road was typical Midwest plain, to right of road was typical Midwest hilly woody area. Could the river (Missouri) have once covered all this TO the road? Cannot recall what was paradoxical about "self-describing" words in the Scientific American article. Check it. "Is a phrase which cannot follow itself" is a phrase which cannot follow itself is a TRUE sentence, because "IAPWCFI" is NOT IAPWCFI, precisely because of the quotation marks. We may TRY to omit consideration of quotes, but we really can't. "Red" is black may be OK ("Red" may be a Negro's nickname.) But Red is black is not OK. Or black is white. Words have to be distinguished from LABELS.] [Still bet the Dekalb process of hybridization was found by fellow named Blake.] [When women urinate, does their hair get wet? Do they have to wipe themselves? Or when they sit is the orifice free and clean?] [What's a Coke Whip or a 7-Up whip? Adv in drive-in in Onawa, Iowa.] [Havilland: oyster had sex with an octopus --- a sucker here; my pearl's gone.] [As partner to missing C in Sinclair, we have what might be the owner's name in Sergeant Bluff, with a missing N.] [Maximum speed 75 in Iowa, was that it, or was it 70 in Maine? Also 75 in Missouri?] [Sioux City, Iowa; South Sioux City, Nebraska; North Sioux City, South Dakota. Boy.] [Bessie ordered a Pear and a Beach and broke the place up --- Copper Kettle menus served from a purse-like copper kettle. I might LIKE this area. A tall slim cowboy with winged hat, gaunt blond face, oversize jacket and undersized jeans sauntered in, and poor Bessie just happened to be going toward the first counter. "Bessie, you stay here." "My, look at her head for the first counter." "Where did he come from?" "I don't know. What I want to know is, where did he leave his horse." This laughing dialogue occupied two women, one, the one next to me, tailored and fit, had earlier remarked about the number of strange faces. Many of them were surprisingly interesting: the man with the clear complexion and shining nose and overactive eyebrows, the girl across from me, one of the few genuinely pretty girls so far, with only a trace of complexion trouble around the chin, weeded but not pruned(?).] ["Now look" said the matron, "everyone sits in seats like that," and she picks up her other grandson who'd never seen inside a bus and showed the seat she'll sit in.] [A breathless silence took over the bus waiting to leave Sioux City, and every so often it seems people moved just to hear some sound. Everyone was alone, and there were few in mid-life. Many very old (some, in the case of the tottering lady in black, too old to travel without being led), a few young. The other younger old lady showed her age by removing her clip earrings, large coral-orange disks, and clipping them incongruously around the cords around a large brown-paper package.] [Instead of "Run it up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes it," why not "Stroke it and see if it comes?"] [Many wild pheasant in fields in Iowa, and one in South Dakota.] [South Dakota trees are more gnarled, old-looking, windblown, fewer than Iowa. Though here we are in silly generalities. I can certainly get you a photo of a twisted grove and say "This is South Dakota" and a fine straight young grove and say "This is Iowa," but I suppose you could do the vice versa. Roads poorer up north, and in South Dakota it seems no matter where you are, you can see a great distance over an intervening depression.] [Coyote Seeds --- crazy trade name.] [Boos for Sheriff???] [There's hope: there's an IBM office in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.] ["Didn't rain too much." "No, not very much." "No, sprinkle." Exchange between South Dakotan and me on street.] and we stop in Sioux City for lunch. Out into South Dakota in fairly hard rains, but weather clears up and lets me see Pettigrew Museum [In the Pettigrew Museum: "He showed me fossilized bones of a mastodon with the point of a spear driven into it. (Dr. Oyarzum from South America). These were found in formation of rocks two million years old, indicating man's presence before Adam."] [Sioux Falls has lights "Don't Leave Curb" and "Leave Curb." As soon as I could, I left the curb.] [How could any town having "Ethel's All-Girl Bar" be all bad? On Main Avenue I saws the 49er bar, with little red sign: Formerly Ethel's All-Girl Bar.] [First time: a flatcar following the caboose on a train going over the Cascades, on a bridge.] [To the tune of Ernie Kovac's (Mozart) theme, with tone of Zsa Zsa Gabor: Leetle boy, leetle boy, leetle boy, want your --- cock sucked? And to the tune of "Drink, Drink" --- "Suck, Suck."] [I may not have been the first one to do what I did with Sioux Falls, but I may be the first fellow at 27 to break his neck doing it.] [Last call for bus out to Omaha is made by the one-man station to an empty room.], a really cluttered place, then down to main street to see if they have any good movies. Get some "air-popped" popcorn for lunch and wander all streets and find nothing. Walk back the other way to the green spot marked "City Park" and it has a water tower and a view of Sioux Falls Park across the tracks and down the hill. Run down and along road to Park. The falls really MIGHT fall 220 feet in the town. Five or six drops of about ten feet, and many rapids and cascades and smaller drops. Rock is an odd sandstone which falls into layers like shale, only perpendicular. Jump from layer to layer and watch rust-colored water foaming up into pinkish foam against the rocks. Reach to pick a leaf from sharp dead grass and ram a tiny shoot up my finger-foreskin (above the nail). Chew on it to get it out. Grass is green, but trees are bare, and place is empty but for kid and his son, and kid on a bike who asks if I saw any fish (mackerel?). I said no. He mopes about pools and goes off. I jump from level to level, pass under trestle, hop across sewage ducts, wade through mud and trodden grass, listening to rushing water. Climb onto concrete wall by means of a tree, and scamper along it, brushing the branches as I go by. Feel not too much like a kid again, rather stupid, but enjoy it because I get the FEEL of Sioux Falls Park, South Dakota. Past the train switching yards and dumps and a manufacturing plant whose yard I walk through with the sneaky boldness I have used so many times before. Find a side street that looks back to Main Street and I'm there just as it's getting dark, about 5:30. Into the terminal, empty but for the kid behind the counter who hums, whistles, adjusts the radio, adds figures, handles baggage, sells tickets, announces trips, goes to the john, and buys candy and steals newspapers to read. And one old woman who's busy sewing the seam of her coat. I write for two good hours, then go to dinner for a lousy steak, and back and write until the bus comes to go south. On and leave at 8:45, and it rains again on the way back. I doze and think about the wonders of the US and try to cruise cute kid in front, and fail. Out at 1 and into Y, expecting a holiday though I'm tired. No one's around though I piss and drink and drink some more. Give it up as well enough and flop tired and happy into bed at 1:30.
SATURDAY, APRIL 27. Up at 8, shower and get shocked by a tall good-looking guy as I reach for my towel. I never see him again. Check out and put bag in locker and walk in cold rain to Joslyn, a good first museum for kids [Joslyn: Fragment of marble sarcophagus, Rome, 5th century, shows Adoration of Magi --- used drills for details (mouth, nose, eyes, curls, finger dimples). One of earliest Christian. More Spanish frescos. "Many Christian churches and monasteries were built in Spain following the end of the Moorish domination in 1031 AD (El Cid?). The present Cathedral of Siena was originally planned to be only the TRANSEPT of an enormous church. Beautiful flowers in "Madonna and Child with Two Angels" by Lorenzo di Credi (1482) "Mountain Landscape," 1877, Gustave Doré, oil --- glad he stayed with etchings. A magnificent first museum for children --- defines Renaissance and Dark Ages and Middle Ages and Baroque and Rococo and shows restorations. Cleaning of painting, basis of ceramics, glass, stained glass, sculpture, and later will add jewelry, mosaic, textiles, painting, graphic arts and photography. Excellent start in museuming. Even two or three Russian paintings and a couple Austrians. Lousy modern collection, after 1850. Is Bronco Buster by Frederic Remington in EVERY Midwest gallery? Guido Arezzo, Italy 990-1050: "Regularized shape of neumes and dropped unnecessary ones. He also used the first syllables of a hymn of St. John to indicate variation in pitch and so invented the syllables "re, mi, fa, so, la."]. Back to the bus station for lunch of pancakes and sexy crew [The quantity of fellows might be explained. It's Saturday now and what else might there be to do on a drizzly day but go down to the bus depot and see what's going on? But how to explain the quality? They're farmers and workers, which explains the exemplary form? They have good air and water and soap which explains the clear complexion? They get lots of sleep for clear eyes? They're happy, which explains the eye sparkle and walk bounce? They've not been praised and exploited, which explains the level look and the masculine movements? They masturbate frequently, which explains the frequent visible, slight but so fetching bulge on the left or right side of the already stuffed zipper area? Such a lovely area, the zipper area, sometimes so full that the zipper cover, if not smoothed over the zipper, remains folded to the side from belt to crotch, showing a slightly curved line of grained metal for the sun to reflect off as they go swaying down the street. But there's nothing to explain the clear line of the eyebrow, the length of the lashes, the sheer size of the eyes. Midwest witchcraft to fill a city with adolescent beauty (comparable to Siena) and then to have a Y that's huge fun! The sight of that tall big blond as I reached out of the shower stall for a towel was enough to make me sick. Pink hairless body straight and full above the tight, but fitting light-blue jeans, and the head, fully a head above mine, and level gaze and good skin --- almost enough to make me want to stay another day, but I must get off to Kansas City, and do so. Even though I won't SEE anything of Nebraska, Kansas or Missouri, through which we pass, because the window is foully muddied from the typical Midwest spring weather: Rain. In fact, after checking the evening Kansas City paper, to be sure, I'll probably keep to the bus for Denver --- I need laundry done, I want a place I can stay, I want clear dry air, and the Mile High City should have it. That or snow. Spring is usually the best time to see a place, but if you can avoid the rain in rainy areas, good for you. Where drought is typical, as in the Southwest, there's no trouble (except for the cloudburst in Tucson), but in the Midwest the order of the day is rain until the leaves are full blown (as they were hardly in South Dakota), and then it lapses fairly quickly into summer. Where there are no rains to cool, the earth dries, the sun streaks through the cloudless sky, dust forms, and THAT'S summer in the Midwest. Wonder if Florence gets rain --- it seemed hot and dustprone --- maybe the few days I was there were the peak of the lovely season. I'll have to try again and see.] and on bus for Kansas City. The rain that started coming back from Sioux Falls, SD, continues in Nebraska and down into Kansas City, Missouri. The bus windows are literally impossible to see out of and I give up my window seat to sit in front. Lady with cane and paper parcels comes on and shoves me to the window, saying she's getting off in couple stops. We start talking and her father had a ranch there, and her relatives lived there, and her large German family began there when she had no coat that wasn't handed down to her until she was 18. Not that they were poor, they had a house and had to sleep in the unheated attic between comforters, so it didn't matter that their breath froze during the night. She had to drive the horses to the grocers, and the flour grinders, and the woodchoppers and the other shops and by that time she had to hurry home to do her chores. "Things have changed a bit since then." "Yes, they have," and she talked of her brothers and sisters and the work they all had to do, and the times the family worked in the fields and no dances and no school and no play, but all work, but everyone was somehow happy anyway. She got off and gathered her parcels and said, "When the weather's nice, I usually get a ride; now that it's blowin', I'll probably have to walk." As the bus pulled away from the muddy dirt road, she poked her rubber-tipped cane into a pebbly puddle and moved slowly off, her old blue coat wrapped around her legs. Countryside was hilly, farmed and dismal. Seemed to get dark about 4 pm, and when we finally crossed the Missouri to the tall (18 floors) towers of Kansas City, it was dusk. Rolled up to the station and jumped out on the dismal city. The Y was across the street, but I suspected I wasn't going to stay. In at 5:45 and checked that the 6:45 left for Denver. Bought the paper and despite "Vanessa" decided to go on. Look through a copy of "Equestrian Quarterly" and wondered who sketched the ads for riding trousers, and marveled at the specialization of the book (you can get come from a prize-winner for from $100 to $300), and got on the bus for Denver. Marveled at the football players with cute heads and huge arms and shoulders and legs who got on, and found no postcards in Manhattan, only two crazy college kids in lipsticked tee shirts and sweatshirts and tight clamdiggers in the cool night air, staring in wonder at the people who stared in wonder. Slept possibly a bit and made notes a bit [ Good place for Nebraska State Teacher's College: Peru.] [Kansas has a Port of Entry where busses and trucks sign in --- what do they think they are, a country?] [Sarcastic sign: "Plan to retire? When? On what?"] [Even highway ads indicate location: in Kansas it's fuel, fertilizer, and farm equipment.] [Nothing like an express. Leave Kansas City, Missouri, on a bus due to stop in Kansas City, Kansas, Lawrence, Topeka, Rossville, St. Marys, Wamigo, Manhattan, Ft. Riley, Junction City, Abilene, Soloman, Salina, Ellsworth, Wilson, Dorrance, Russell, Gorham, Hays, Ellis, Wakeeny, Oakley, Winona, Shawn, Weskan, Cheyenne Wells, Kit Carson, Hugo (Colorado), Limon, Agate, Deertrail, Iyera, Strasburg, Bennett, Watkins, Aurora and Denver. From 6:30 pm to 8:30 am with a total of 1 hour and 30 minutes scheduled for rest stops and an hour taken away at Sharan because of change from CST to MST. Thus 14 hours travel time. This for a road map distance of miles and time of hours. And again, going west from Kansas City, there's another port of entry, and I presume, another blue sticker to paste on the window.] [Losses on the trip have been great, but little: 1) the copy of "Dead Souls" with 50-60 pages of notes; 2) the maps of Cincinnati left at Edward's; 3) sun glasses dropped in the Chicago Conservatory; 4) wash rag left in some shower (but got one back); 5) plastic bag for wet wash rag (plain stupidity). Come now, is that so BAD?] [Eastern Kansas, contrary to everything, is QUITE rolling --- sometimes looking almost Appalachiany. Out about Lawrence, things level out mostly. Sometimes rest stops seem to serve no purpose at all, except for the driver. Not to mention the lousy times NO rest stop is called and we sit in the terminal for fifteen minutes.] [Kansas seems to MOVE. The U of Kansas Players had "Vanessa" at the University playhouse, and the Topeka Civic Theater had "Toys in the Attic." Not bad.] ["Idiot! You don't say "Your head's small," you say "You have the heroic proportions of more head lengths per body length than average that the Greeks used in sculpture when portraying their deities.""] [Bus drivers almost make a game of it --- blinking their headlights, winking their turn signals.] [The surprised look on the face of the Indian girl. She kept rolling her head on her upright seat, and looked mystified at the woman across from her, reclining. Then the fellow behind, grasping the situation, seized the seat back and pulled sharply. It swung back; she fell back a bit, sat upright in surprise, then smiled and nodded back at the fellow and laid her pretty black braided hair back on the pillow.] [One of life's sorrows: Manhattan, Kansas, sold no postcards.] [Even the western part of Kansas is far from flat --- guess I got it confused with Nebraska. Every mile or so there's a dead tree, and every so often a riverbank produces hundreds of dead trees. There ARE houses, scattered, and windmills, small and weak-looking. In the early morning I saw a herd of perhaps 20 small deer between the bus and the nearest rise. Few herd of cattle grazed, and I don't see how they could live without supplement to the short spare dry grass-hay.] [Sign on Hays, Colorado, repair shop: "We fix everything from Daybreak to Heartbreak." They should get to work on the entire whole TOWN.] [Speaking of heartbreak, a cemetery sure looks grim in dust, rather than grass. And what was next to it, that area of hilly ground, very smooth, with packed dirt circles every so often, with a flag in the center? COULD it have been a golf course just west of Hugo? Maybe that repair shop did SOME fixing. The low sun cut the land in high relief with chisels of shadow, and small water trails became ravines, dark, deep, and bottomless. Everything ran parallel far to the right, possible high-tension wires on poles, then an intermittent line of snow-fence, then cattle-fence, then the road, another line of cattle-fence, telephone wires, the railroad, and the vaguely parallel course of a far-off river. Trees may be dead, or it may be that spring hasn't leafed them yet. What is spring here? Warm weather they have. Rain it appears they never have. What does it? Then the land appeared agitated, and it looked like we would sway and climb into Denver, but then it eased off again, and to the south first, and then to the west, could be seen snow-capped ranges. I was in the West again.] [Signs exhorting to "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ." Guess it IS a bit more practical than believing IN.] [America is losing its curiosity; no one in the bus bothered to try to read the Burmashave signs for the traffic going the OPPOSITE way.]
SUNDAY, APRIL 28. Wake early in the hazy area between Kansas and Colorado, and stop for a sore-eyed breakfast of terribly greasy eggs and watch mother fuss with three small kids. Feel sorry for any mother who has to travel with ANY youngsters, and they certainly ALL travel by bus. Into Denver about 9 and pass the Y and sketch where the bus goes since I have no decent map. Walk to Y through streets running three, not two, directions, and get checked into old section (only $2.34) for room that's not fixed yet and read the paper and clip out what's germane for the city. Seems that the Sunday paper usually comes at the start of a big city: last Sunday in Chicago, today in Denver, next Sunday in Salt Lake City, and the next in Portland. Very good. Maid gets fussy about cleaning room at odd time and I shower luxuriously and change shirt which is beginning to get so dirty it irritates my neck. The last shows of the Ice Capades are at 2 and 6, so at 1, before breakfast, I begin walking. The blocks on the small-scale map are shorter than they really are, and a tremendous wind builds up, blowing dust and debris down the stormy slummy streets. Dark kids run for cover and I'm afraid the huge, fast-moving dark clouds will bring the rain that followed me from Omaha and Kansas. As rain starts, I step out to thumb and some young kid in a new Ford picks me up and we talk nicely and he goes out of his way to drive me precisely to the building, the marquee, the very door of the auditorium. I thank him and get maybe three drops of rain in all on me, while others are drenched walking from the parking lots. Ask the lady to give me whatever she wants, and she says, "Treat yourself, I have a good ringside seat (for $3.50)." OK. Buy two franks and a frozen malted (what made it different from ice cream, except for its great quantity, I don't know) and peanuts and get down to the second row, and center seat for breakfast. Lunch is at the intermission with popcorn --- I eat the peanuts the next day, and they're somehow salted inside the shell, with a powdery yellowish gritty salt that's better rubbed off than eaten. The show is better than I recall, since they deal more in the individual skaters and duos rather than on the ensemble, or worse, stage settings. The music is still lousy, but the choice of it is good, melodic and fast-paced. Many of the "special effects" took place right in front of me, to see they WERE faked: the clown kissing the girl, the fellow falling when they grabbed his camera, the guy with the spilled popcorn, but I know that the kid they took from the audience and the girl that the "elegant fellow" gave a gift to WERE real. The clowns were great and they finally got rid of the Old Smoothy's, and the spins were better than ever, and the boys in the ensemble were more girls than ever --- I get THAT's where you could get (or sell) a good list of gay bars across the country. Even the program turned out to be worth 50 and the show, from center, was VERY good. Out and hitchhike, holding the program so they can see I'm "one of them," but couples and families pass and a Mexican picks me up and when I praise him for his English he prattles on and I miss much of it. He messes up the streets, but I get off at the Capitol and walk to the Y. Fuss around the room and check for the show and get down to see a GOOD "Ugly American" and a BAD "Wacky Professor" [Ugly American: TRUE American was book's hospital founder. US SAID it would "aggress in order to get "Sarkor" to do what US wanted." WHY the road???? US always assumes whatever the OTHER does is WAR, thus the US always acts in WAR. Why is everyone who is un-American, Russian??? Fabulous ending: "If I had one appeal to make to Americans, it would be---" and man flicks off his TV set. Indifference, complacency and ignorance; my first impulse was to have fellow flick TV to another channel, but here he preferred NOTHING to the truth. "Giving a new country freedom is like giving a knife to a small child."] [End of Wacky Professor perfect, too --- he falls into the camera.] [Play written as a, say, three-voice fugue. No spoken words, all mental, then all declared. Two could, in unison, say, "I love him," or in unison, one "I love," the other "I hate," and the Third joins, thinking of one of the other "He loves him." Etc. Infinitely variable, a kind of dramatic reading. And maybe a narrator, a kind of "Our Town" fellow, to care for time and setting and background and comment unknown to either of the three.]. Out perfectly starved and stop in at Swift's Steak House for an excellent steak for $1.25, and wince at the old-maid schoolteachers in town for a convention. They wear their nametags and affiliations in the street (ugh), and act every inch the silly tourist. I pretend I'm a native and ignore them. Bed, very limp, at 1 am.
MONDAY, APRIL 29. Make sure and get laundry out at 8:30 and know price will be high (was $2.70 for six pairs of socks, three sets of underwear, two shirts and one pair trousers and one handkerchief and wash rag). Wait outside the Denver tour office at 8, eat cruisy breakfast [Why is it that cruising looks most interesting where it's most unfeasible. Want to take off on a Denver tour at 8:30, but sign in town office window says "Back in 45 minutes" so I go to the Russell Grant Restaurant for breakfast, and the counter's loaded. Down at the end is the "my type" business man, pleasant, kindly face, crew cut, good wit, nice hands, good suit, looks very understanding: and looks over from time to time with level gaze. No rings at all on his well-shaped, hairy (in the right places) fingers. But he's off on some sort of convention, obviously not staying at the Y, obviously not ready now, as I am not. Assimilate this when a Vince Edwards type come in, wonderful arms, good black hair, wedding ring, cute torso. Then sits next to me the outdoor type. Face almost burned reddish-brown by sun and wind, obviously a skier from his face, weather-beaten hands, and quilted drawstring jacket. His thumbs, my dear, are huge, and his wrists are thick and hairless, with that curious depilatorical look: the places where the hairs SHOULD be are clearly marked, but there are no hairs. His wraparound sunglasses hide his eyes and brow, but the skin is mountain-stream scrubbed clean, and his hair is blond-streaked and neatly combed, and his legs look sturdy in the starched cotton poplin.] [Another bad-good-luck train: Wait for office to open till 9 am, no open. See bus passing on street: Mountain Parks on the placard. Oh? Run across the street and knock on door and pay $4 for the standard Denver Mountain tour. He suggested that that office would not be open until June. (Course, if I'd waited, the bus went around and drove in FRONT of the building.)], and fall into Mountain Tours bus, driven by a slim-hipped crewcut from Boulder U. [Not Lafitte, La Petite.] [Into the commentary came an electric buzz, on and off, until finally it was only on and filled the bus. "Looks like we gotta have a water stop." He drives up and revs motor until finally it stops. Then gets out and helps lady "Can I help you?" put water in. What alarm would that be?] [Doves nesting in Creation Rock and Ship Rock cooed and echoed deeply, indicating the acoustics of Red Rock Amphitheater. Kids, ever enthusiastic, leapt up the seats from the bottom and sat, smiling and puffing, in the top row, looking down on their friends. Only seats 10-12,000 people. Made of Dakota sandstone. The hawthorn bush was in white bloom. Evergreens profuse above 6500 feet.] [Themes of songs seem to have changed from "I'm yours forever," to "I'm yours tonight."] [Ponderosa pine --- long needled, (?) limbs: Douglas Fir --- short, Christmas tree.] [Alas, a demon came; a Lacedaemon came.] [Forest fires hurt water conservation. If snow melts slowly off trees and UNDER trees, it can be conserved, but if it falls only on rock, and sun hits it, it melts quickly and can't be conserved.] We see Red Rocks (just before the shooting that killed two) and Buffalo Bill's tomb and his huge museum, where I buy quite pretty notepaper and postcards, and we wind down Lariat trail through Coors and Golden and scenes and sights of Denver in the cloudy distance. Back to the Y to write many postcards and letters, getting everyone off my mind, including sending Mom flowers for her birthday that morning through FTD. Then, with lack of anything ELSE of interest to do, I "invent" a new way of coming. Lean comfortably back on the base of my spine in a chair, legs out limply in front, thighs parallel to the floor. Preferably in a chair with arms, rest the arms and grasp the cock in the middle with only the thumb and one finger. Start with the left hand first, as this is apt to take quite a while, and you don't want to tire your good RIGHT hand. I had intended to simply refrain from coming, working all the while, for one hour, but then decided it would only be WITHOUT tensing my legs or flexing that penis muscle that always involuntarily flexes during the spasms of the orgasm. After a half hour of this I recalled what pleasure can be had by the lightest handling of that peculiar "intensed" cock. I found myself still drawing in and holding the breath while blood rushed to the head, and pulling in the stomach and getting tense in the upper leg with that breathless "It's getting closer, it's getting closer." Finally it got to the ineffable point where short pulls up or down produced prodigies of sensation, and the clear serum begins to drip out and flow over the glans. I wiped thrice, and then once went too far and ejaculated, but didn't have the orgasm. I kept it at peak, and wanted to ejaculate again without spasm, but got carried away, locked my knees together and my cock got to its extremity of hardness, so that I could even feel the cords of the veins in my clenched hand. I released only slightly enough so that the semen could spurt out, and hung on through throb after throb. I could feel the slight pain afterwards from the intense pressures at the testicles and at the base of the cock. It was undoubtedly worth the effort of the 40-45 minute buildup. Cleaned myself off and read a bit of the Aenied and walked back down, rather blustery night, almost like a huge storm brewing, but it never did break, to Swift's for a somewhat smaller steak, but this time I was captured by the fine-faced Greek who cooked the steaks. Roamed back, wishing I could find someone to share the bed with, read a bit of the Aenied to digest the food and got to bed about 11. Don't really feel like doing much, and would like very much to have someone to have sex with. I don't feel like seeing museums and can only just bring myself to take these tours. Would like to spend more time WITH someone, preferably in bed. Maybe this is only because I haven't really talked to anyone for more than a half hour since the beer-fellow in Omaha, and that was four days ago.
TUESDAY, APRIL 30. Have a quick breakfast in the Trailways Post House and they have fairly good wheat cakes except for the absurdity that you must pay 3 per pat of butter. Take off on the Mount Evans tour, but since that's closed with snow we go to Berthoud Pass (where the ski lift isn't running because they're replacing the cable, and THAT will take five days). There are six of us in a limousine and since I'm tall and the seats are tall and the windows are short this is rather inconvenient for me to see out of. I get paired up with a little old lady who loves to talk about Mexico, and we have another of those conversation that I love so much --- SHE wants to talk about HER topics and I want to talk about MY topics and we listen to each other ONLY to find a pause long enough to see where to fit one of OUR great remarks in. There are four fellows, in pairs, two from Boston and two from Chicago. The old fellow driving isn't bad, and it appears he was someone fairly interesting before he retired and became a driver for Checker tours. This is mostly a mining tour and I see Central City [Central City --- interesting to look UP through the outdoor part of "The Glory Hole," a tavern and see the Catholic church.] [Wind through long-needled pines making sound like distant waterfall. Ranges and roads and mines and trees and far-off snow-capped peaks.] [Moths and ants at 9000 feet.] [Fellow looks at beautifully landscaped pool, rocks, and plants and trees, and speckled trout swimming, and says "Gee, I'd like to look at the dates on those coins."] [Palisades Peaches from Grand Junction, Colorado --- the best.] [Glenwood Springs, Colorado, good place to retire, and this from a former salesman through the Northwest and a fellow who now guides tours in Denver area.] [Government gives a title, not a deed, to land in national forests --- lets you build, but if government says so, you must SELL.] [Boston: See three Volkswagens packed in the yad. Myassachusetts. Yes, the Luby has a hat (heart) too. The accent.] and the "Face on the Barroom Floor," repainted in 1923, and Joann Grillo's picture in the program, and wander through Lost Goldmine and buy three samples of rock for 70 --- a quartz crystal, a hunk of iron pyrites, and some fluorescent petrified wood. Later on the slopes pick up an old rusty nail from a narrow-gauge railroad mine-car and my trunk gains in weight. They seem to have dug holes anywhere, dumping the slag at the entrance. We stop for a look at the dozenth "Bridal Veil" falls (one in Yosemite, and one in Oregon) the driver's seen, and I decide I don't like TROUT at dinner. Off again in the afternoon for mountains and placer mines and talk of Leadville and Baby Doe and he tells of when he was a youngster and someone said, "See that poor old lady, why don't you give her some silver." "I did and that old lady knew more language than a mule skinner. She wouldn't take charity. People'd leave groceries out in front of her place, and they didn't know from one day to the next whether she'd ignore them, throw them away, or eat them." See Red Rocks again, and find I missed the trail UP INSIDE Creation Rock, but no Ship Rock --- he calls it Titanic. Next time. He says he'll call tomorrow if they have a Pike's Peak tour, and I get to room to read awhile and try the tenseless come again, but get carried away and jerk off plain and fast. Get to Denver University for "The Importance of Being Ernest" [Bang, bang, bang. Ask tour driver how to get to DU and he mumbles about Colfax, Broadway, 15th, and #8 bus. I get to Colfax as a bus is pulling up and he says Broadway. I dash for a 6, wait possibly three minutes for an 8. Ask driver where is Little Theater, he doesn't know, but "I'll let you off close to it." We get to campus, he sees two girls (mother and daughter) crossing the street. "You should be able to find out here." I ascertain that I catch the bus across the street, and prepare to draw a map of the intricacies of the campus. Ask the two women and they say "Right here." I follow them and it is. Up blindly to the box office and obviously all seats are reserved. A few strays decorate the ticket box. I ask for a single and get L11. I visualize the last seat in the last row --- and for $1.50. But it's 10th row, three from the rear, and there are 16 seats in the row, so 11 is fabulously close to center. Good.] [One sign on DU campus: "Religious activities / Office of the Chaplain / Basic Communications."] [It is very difficult to flick the lights three times for the end of intermission if the lights are fluorescent.] Play is perfectly set and costumed, the cast is good with their "Annunciation," and the house is full and appreciative, so the evening is good. Just miss the 10:35 bus and across to Rockybilt to wellbuilt fellows sprawled about in the chair and by damn they MUST be gay; they're so DAMN good-looking. ["'Christ,' he said to me, 'are you CUTE.' And I never SAW the guy before." "That was finky." "Then he offered me a cigar." "THAT was cool" "No," I said, "it depends on whether you TOOK it." "Yes, as a matter of fact, I DID accept it."] Tight and flushed and shiny faces and knowing eyes and tattered shirts and tossed hair. WHEW. The sauce on the cheeseburger is lousy, but it's food, and I wait for bus with nut who's knitting, getting read to from paper by his girlfriend. Back to town to check a bar, but times have changed and it looks closed. Bed at 12:30, discouraged.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 1. Up early, as usual, and fuss around, probably come quickly, and finish the Aenied. Out of room about noon to eat brunch in the cafeteria downstairs and out to the post office to mail a bulging packet. Find that the Ship's Tavern is in the Brown Palace Hotel (but I never get there), and the clouds look as if they might start raining a bit. Typical: I sit in my room in the morning when it's nice and decide to go OUT in the afternoon when it looks like rain. Buy book in dusty rack in musty cigar store, and that AFTER going into Woolworth's to cash check and buy "Guns of August" on Don's behest. Decide to walk the great circle route and end up at the Art Institute, passing nothing in particular, except a whole complex of parks and gardens and outdoor stages near the Capitol building. This Art Institute has a lovely set of maps, a Klee exhibit, good Chinese stuff [What's the bit about Kwan Yin? The man turning into a woman? Tiresias again. I wouldn't have suspected that Chinese painting from 600 AD would have a donor, as in early Christian paintings. How amazing to see the half-beast, half-human forms of Bosch in "Maro's Attack on Buddha" by Li Lungmein, artist of Sung Dynasty (1040-1106). Buddhist characters, but he borrowed from Taoist mythology and ancient Chinese folklore. They remark about Bosch. Chinese fans were sometimes used to trace out characters in the air when the spoken word is not understood.] [Nef, c. 1600 AD. Nefs were elaborately fashioned salt containers and table decorations in the form of ships. The Gabelle, a salt tax levied by the kings of France, made salt an expensive commodity and salt containers for the banquets of French nobility were usually costly ostentations. How's this for a loaded name: Michelangele Amerigi da Carravaggio (1560-1609).], hunks of the Kress Collection of Italian art, and rooms (and I can really see the advantage of the Thorne rooms) (it's hard to see the unity AND the details if you're "in the middle" of the room, while with miniatures you're a kind of God looking in and taking in all at a glance). Modern collection is nonexistent and walk back to the Y to devour "Out of the Silent Planet," start "Guns of August," down to the Swift steakhouse for another dinner, and bed relatively early at 10:30 --- there's nothing else to do.