1958 2 of 3
FRIDAY, MAY 1. Up too early to shower and pack lunch and over to meet Walt, since Gene and Joe took off on a pass. To work and lunch veritably alone, and then wait from 4:15 to 4:30 for a Walt who never shows up. Walk to mailbox and Chesapeake and talk to Jerry and back to pack and talk Walt into taking me to Philly. Leave at 7 and take scenic 202 and City Line Road entrance to town, getting off at 30th Street Station at 9:30. Call Ray and Laird and get no answer, so I'm down to Allegro by 10 to watch the fight and fight off two horrid ones. Greet Jim and Jack and Bill and Jim as they come in and get introduced to Dick and Stan and Don and someone else and we all talk, but they all leave and Dave Hunt grins at my predicament of having no place to go, and I figure I'll see him later. Long-haired butch number comes close and talks and invites me to his place, which I go to and find that twenty-year-old John West is really tremendous in bed and knows music and plays piano and trumpet and sings bass and has great aspirations, in which I wish him good luck. Move the bed into kitchen and go to it nicely, he coming thrice and me not taking it at all, damn it.
SATURDAY, MAY 2. Up at 11 for a shower and to breakfast and he leaves without giving address or phone number. I call Roy and talk for an hour and arrange to meet him at 8 for the Stables and read a paper to find absolutely nothing doing in town, so I'm into Rittenhouse Park to get cruised and finally Flat-top comes along and asks time and we look for coffee and end up at his place. We tussle and with great patience he brings me off. Great body on this Bill Tucker. Call Laird and say I'll be over, arrange to meet Bill for dinner at 6, and to Laird's to get a call from Don, to meet in the park at 2 Sunday, and talk to Laird and get keys and go meet Bill at 6 after shaving and washing. We drink Vodka-tinis and have leg of lamb at Coach and Four to jazzy organ and I leave him to meet Ray, which I finally do at 9:15, after standing so long while he talked 1½ hours to Detroit. Subway to 69th and Red Arrow out to Country Line and dark, rolling road to middle of hill past bridge for the Stables. Drink one glass of beer for $3 and first I don't dance or like place, so walk back on road, catch 12:06, and look at sleepy sailors and drunk soldier until 15th Street, and I go up to Bill's for a set-to and sleep from 2:30 to 11.
SUNDAY, MAY 3. Cuddle some more and talk and then to Hamburger for breakfast and to Town Hall for great view of city after spectacular elevator ride to top. Leave him to tennis and run to meet Don at 2:15, getting into Bob's truck and drive out to Red Hill Inn, after having second breakfast in the first Hamburger. Chorus of drunks swoops into song at 4:30, and Don and I have long involved talk, in which I harangue about confidence and selling oneself. Back through Fairmount Park and Mayfair and such and stop to eat at Lintory and then up to Don's for a hideous get-together I'd rather forget. Bus down to 19th and Walnut and meet John going through Park. Call Bill and say I'll be seeing you and call Jerry to say meet at 5 am and talk to Laird and Ron until 11:45, when I collapse into bed.
MONDAY, MAY 4. Alarm burrs at 3:55 and I'm up and dressed and out in the cold to catch the 4:10 bus and the 4:25 subway, getting out to bridge at 4:55. Stand and shiver in the cold until 5:25, when Jerry drives casually up. Talky ride back and get in at 7:25, too late for work, so I'm over to Chesapeake for breakfast and back to throw everything on floor and crawl into bed at 8. Up at 12:30 and take much-needed shower and read papers and settle down with books until 5:45, having dinner between, and then dress and off to "It Happened to Jane," funny comedy with Doris Day, Jack Lemmon, and Ernie Kovacs. Back at 8 to talk with Bill for a good long time about how good an engineer he is, and then write a few letters and make a new "Who I've had sex with and how many times" supplement and finish up to date on this, getting through at 10:30, completely fatigued. Get laundry ready and toss it into the hopper and fiddle around with uniforms and by that time it's 11:15, and high time I got to bed.
TUESDAY, MAY 5. Up early to polish brass and put it on khaki uniforms which are much too long, and get to breakfast late and work to hear the awful tale about Anderson shooting himself and dying with a .22. HORRIBLE. Goof around with the code-checker and leave work for mailroom, which blesses me with four day's papers, TW's, a chocolate cake from Cesira, six or seven letters, a bill, my income tax return. Loaded with stuff I stagger back to treat benefactors with goodly hunks of chocolate cake. To supper late and back to converse with a completely fascinating Speidel until 8, when I finally tear myself away from Anderson and card tricks, and start a long letter to Bill at 8. Get pulled out to watch Gene Kelly and Patrice Munsel and leave all junk in awful heap as I rip out EB tickets and pay it all off in one big swoop. More letters and start of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" at 10:45 and I'm to bed amid mess at 11:45.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 6. Up shortly after 6 to take a rapid shower and stuff everything into drawers. To work for more checks of x' and the almost complete finish of work on the program. Wander about a lunchtime in idyllic summer weather and back and wrack machine with code-checking. To pay bills and supper and spend two whole hours catching up on the Times. Write this and then concentrate on letters until 10:30, when I tackle closet. Get through with that and get wearily to bed at 11:00.
THURSDAY, MAY 7. Up to pack breakfast, get to work to mess around, with obsolete unpredictable code checker, hot walk to mailbox after lunch, and then to PX for good Bermudas and back to read papers and see "Some Like It Hot," with Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon, and Tony Curtis---ladies, all three. Pack bag for weekend and write letter for a bit and get into bed by 11, leaving time to sleep and space for writing about the NYC weekend coming up.
FRIDAY, MAY 8. However, I don't go to sleep, but run from window to window in the dark, jerking quietly to watch four or five nudies get ready for bed. Get exhausted at 12 and lie down to toss for a bit and fall asleep. Up at 6:15, shower and pack lunch with much cake, and off to work. Lunch like picnic and struggle through Friday afternoon and leave grabbing paper, and get to BOQ to change clothes and pack for another relief of closet. Talk to Walt and find he's reluctant to take me, and finding no busses handy, I phone a cab and ride out to the North end of Aberdeen for $2.20. Have a shake and stand by road to get picked up in ten minutes by an affable middle-aged, ringless chap who immediately turned the subject to sex in general and homosex in particular. We talk and I almost persuade him to NYC, but he leaves me off this side of Delaware Memorial Bridge, and I'm out on my own. After half-hour the cops swoop down and warn me to walk to town. I start but get back to thumb some more and finally get ride with Marylander who's going to Staten Island. Very pleasant conversation concludes at 10 pm, when I catch a bus to the ferry, a ferry to the subway, and a subway to 61st and a bus to Bill's at 11 pm. Have an osterized omelet for supper and walk in park for a bit and then back to bedroom for a pleasant tussle, with a six and a nine in style. We finally get to sleep about 3:15.
SATURDAY, MAY 9. Wake up about 9, loaf until 11, then start chumming, but decide not to be "logy" during the day and I call E. 61st to find I should get there by noon. Dash out to be there first in time to join Tom in apartment and the janitor in the basement. Get suit and jacket and hunt for rest of stuff, but to no avail. Talk with Tom and call Bill and meet him at 1:30 to take subway to Coney Island, where I satisfy my hunger with all sorts of junk and sandwiches and stuffs, and then indulge in rides on roller coasters (Cyclone three times) and Ferris wheels and Wild Mouses and spend the rest of the time wandering about looking at the delightful youngsters and wading out on the rocks, looking at the kelp and jellyfish and skin-divers off the windy beach. Get back to beach and to subway and back to town talking lightly. Call to find Circle in the Square full for weekend and get up to Bill's for supper and then fuss around until it's much too late and we bus down to 60th and take a cab to the Artist's Repertory Theater to give $2 to see "Cradle Song" with a beautiful Inga someone by a couple Spaniards named Swain. Middling good. Wander around to Horn and Hardart for a snack, then find the new Regent's Row at 140 40th. Subway up to Bill's about 1 am and get to bed fairly early. Talk quite a bit and have nice tussle and fall asleep.
SUNDAY, MAY 10. Up to quibble about money and eat breakfast and then bus down to CPW, where we wander through Ramble, talking only occasionally and looking at all the sights. Cross and re-cross paths and then down to hear the last few notes of the music at 72nd Street Mall, and then continue on down to Zoo, where the sea lions are certainly having a complete ball. Through rest of park to Tom's and pick up suitcase and out again finally to bus and pleasant ride to 122nd and supper, then bid adieu and catch subway down to Port Authority to get reservations and mail card off to Bill Tucker. Look at pleasant sights and get on bus to the company of "Giovanni's Room," which Tom said was good and it most certainly was. Six Jewish women make life a bit miserable with their really ear-splitting chatter as I finish that book and get to work on "Anatomy of a Murder," the pocketbook of the long-time best-seller. Ride from 7:30 to 11:30 for $5.75, enough reason for not getting back to NYC before July. Off bus and into cab and back to BOQ to put most of stuff away and get to bed just seconds before midnight.
MONDAY, MAY 11. Up at 6:15 and put brass on long uniform, and by the time the hot, sultry afternoon is over I've wished a dozen times I'd worn my shorts. Test a couple times and chew fingers to shreds as mistakes by the dozen crop up. Will the problem ever resolve itself? Stagger off to mailbox and get TW's over to fitter, who assured me they fit, though it's obvious I'll never be the belle of the ball in such loose stuff. Supper and back to read papers and then out (out of sheer looniness) to "Woman Eater," a completely horrid English grade D film. Back to jerk off four times wetly and once dryly and then get to work on papers and shoes and this and suddenly it's after 10. Finish shoes and get laundry out and finally flop into a rather moist bed at 11:30 pm.
TUESDAY, MAY 12. From the viewpoint of the rest of the week, I am surprised by the fact that I wrote no letters all week, except a scribbled note to Laird to tell him I'd be coming to Philly this weekend, and a letter written from work to Bill. That is all, and I still puzzle as to where the week went. On Tuesday, I know, I went to see "Gigantis, the Fire Monster," a continuation of "Godzilla," with acting that was perfectly horrible, but with scenes of destruction that were incomparable. Much of the week seemed to be taken up with messing around doing almost nothing; about this time I discovered I was infested with crab lice, and for hours in the evening before I went to bed and in the morning immediately after I got up, along with short periods in between, say after supper when I undressed to change clothes and almost invariably stripped down entirely to look over myself and investigate new ways of coming. The days were awfully boring and fraught with nausea. Though everyone was away at LogEx, and I had a perfect chance to type, I didn't touch the typewriter all week, just to show what a marvel of inconsistency I can be: when I'm working and studying, I'm dying to get at the typewriter and dash out my brains on paper---when I have the time, I ditherly find "other" things to do---completely worthless things like come or work crossword puzzles. Reason might here be mentioned why May 12-20 is so exceptionally difficult to read: I left my pen in Pa on the 17th, and am writing this with a jotter refill---at least I didn't let THAT stop me from doing this---the thought of having to catch up with all this later was much too much.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 13. Wednesday I sat down all evening with "Anatomy of a Murder," hating first part.
THURSDAY, MAY 14. After returning from the library where I looked up Encyclopedia and books on Chicago and read "How to do Nothing all by Yourself with Nobody," not bad, if you like spool tanks and mumbley peg, I finished 1OPM, reading straight through till 2 am, after getting interested in the trial. Got to bed, kerplunk, and got up at 6.
FRIDAY, MAY 15. It was a good thing I got to bed very early (9:30) Wednesday, I needed it for the weekend. Up at 6 to try to pack, but just search myself, take a bath, pack lunch, and that's about all I have time for. About this time in my job I finished (at long last) debugging my program up to the point where I start to compute x's. Out of work and back to supper after packing my weekend bag and getting dolled up in my summer suit for the first time in ages. Then cab into Aberdeen (35 cents against $2.25 before) and buy bus ticket, only to be accosted by blond turtle neck sweater who asks if I'm going to NYC. No. Haw. He'll take me part way into Philly, and gets two others for Philly. Talky ride and he leaves me off at City Hall at 8 pm. Grab a subway and shoot out to 56th and grab a cab to the Ambassador for an appealing Gerald Phillipe as Dostoevsky's "Idiot" and a fumbling "Closed Vision" by Cocteau. Out at 11:30 to call Laird and take bus down to Allegro at 12. Have quite a lonely time standing around, no Jack to break the monotony and then Wyman monopolizes me from 2 to 4, as I stay to watch the closing and he tries all in vain to get me to coffee in his apartment, which I steadfastly refuse, blushing chocolate. Wander into Laird's at 4:30 and collapse.
SATURDAY, MAY 16. Talk and hear music with Laird and get again to City Hall tower, making a production of it from 12 to 2. I wander through lower Harlem to get to a closed Poe house, am embittered by commercialism of Betsy Ross's place and the tawdriness of Elfreth's Alley and then take long, rambling tour of graves, historic buildings and private homes, from Old Custom House to nonexistent Moylan House. Finish last of map and eat supper and get into park to sit on wrong side, cruised by clods, until I get out to middle and DON'T get cruised by cuties. Ramble down to Allegro for cocktails and then get to Academy for Savoy Company's presentation of Gilbert and Sullivan's "Yeoman of the Guard," pleasant all around, out at 11:20 and to Allegro for a frustrating evening, getting out, alone, at 1. Again to bed at 2.
SUNDAY, MAY 17. Up at 8 for call from David, who comes right over. Get in bed and talk with Laird and Dave and Archie, then shower and have toast and see the giggly Archie off at 12. Get down to the Christ Church tour of fifteen mansions at 1, get a map and start touring. Glorious day and houses and time by all, including the four bell ringers at St. Peter's steeple. Finish in a flurry at 5 and then walk all the way back to a steak supper and back to Laird's to call Walt. Dave goes off at 7 and I pack and trundle off at 8:45, getting San Francisco book from trash can and get to City Line at 9:45. Read and wait till 10:20 and Walk picks me up, and we're off from Philly. Get into Aberdeen PG about 11:15 and I dump stuff away and flop into bed, having had nothing (but still no sleep) all weekend.
MONDAY, MAY 18. Up to rush through pushing breakfast and get to breakfast, preparing deck for final test at work. At supper Zimmerman suggests we go to the show, and it turns out to be "Sign of the Pagan," which I've already seen. Back to peek in on about three minutes of TV, and then back to rapidly page through four days of newspapers. Finish about 9:30, toss things into corner and get to sleep at 9:30, to catch up on all the sleep I didn't get over the weekend: four hours Friday morning, four Saturday, and only 6½ on Sunday, and since I walked so much over the weekend, I really needed whatever sleep I could catch up on.
TUESDAY, MAY 19. Up at 6 to avoid a shower, since I didn't get a haircut, and go to work to smell slightly sour all day. Don Kohler joins the crew in the morning, and the rest of the day is taken up with one test case, and a savings bond drive officer's call that features a film of "Father Knows Best" that's part good and part bad. Back with rather good resolutions to do things, but finish reading some of the SF junk in the book I found Sunday, and when 9 rolls around, I'm ready for bed again. Find more bugs settling down in me, and pick them off and fall into bed with a prickly greasy head from the haircut I got after supper, and the room littered with stuff. Kept awake thinking of the things I should do, but I wasted two hours trying to find a 4x4 crossword square without duplicating any letters, no mean task. By leaving everything I get to bed at 9:45 pm.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 20. Shower in morning and suddenly, after getting at crabs, it's 7:15, with no time to pack lunch and no time to fix room up, so I smash everything into the closet and run for breakfast. Work day goes very hotly and very slowly and supper passes and I make out a list of everything. I should finish off papers quickly, and get coming (twice) over with and start disposing of all my sick pictures and drawings down the toilet. Clean closet and drawers and leave stuff to sell to next BOMOP class, polishing boots, etc. Work on this from 8:30 to 9:30 and then back to polishing brass on buckles and get things set for the laundry. Finish a puzzle and still don't get to needed letters, and finish this up to date finally at 10:45. Put brass on and fall into bed at a normal time. Tomorrow I MUST write letters. Bed at a normal time, hell! I looked at myself and picked thirty LIVE crabs off my scrotum---what a lovely way to spend an hour. Got to bed finally at 12.
THURSDAY, MAY 21. Up at 6 to bathe thoroughly and wince as I apply alcohol to my red crotch. To work to a non-effective day, except for a two hour orientation of the tour we're going to give the Seniors of the US Military Academy on Wednesday. Quite a show it promises to be. Work on a test and get back to loaf until supper, when I meet Gene and haul clothing and boots off to BOMOP, getting rid of much to the tune of $18. Good job, and I still have junk left. Get back out at 7 pm to write the first single day in this log in a long time. Then I dash off a little letter to Mom, just to show her I'm still alive, and then down to wait in a 1/2 hour long line to see Paul Newman's "The Young Philadelphian." Back about 11 to look at glorious full moon, and even lie on grass watching progress of red and green halo move about the clouds. Up to scratch myself into bed at 12.
FRIDAY, MAY 22. Up at 6 to shower and search and moan about lack of tee shirts. Get to work to do very little except write a letter to Bill, show Don the lay of the land, and talk a great deal and get out to PX to buy playing cards for lunchtime. Back to read DC paper and then leave to eat and call cab to bus line, which arrives much late, but I'm into DC (sitting only from Baltimore) at 8:15. Call everyone and get no one, so I'm off to the Theater Lobby for "Six Characters in Search of an Author" by Pirandello and quiz person next to me why he laughed all through what I thought was a serious play. We talk and exchange addresses and back to vanishing conclusion to a good play. No answer at Jim's, so I'm back down, bag in hand, to the Hut which is only nicely crowded, and look at pleasant people and get seat at bar by the bald muscleman. At 12:30 he asks me home with him, which I accept immediately. Off for hamburgers and to his place for a well-lit, much observed session of handiwork. To bed about 3 and up at 7 when he crawls in with me.
SATURDAY, MAY 23. We tussle some more, hardly paying any attention to love-making, but concentrating on the body, which is OK by me, anytime. Lie about till 8:30 and up to shower and pack and start on Wylie's "Opus 21," which isn't bad and we leave at 10, after a breakfast of two eggs brutalized in milk. He drives me to White House and I walk to the Museum of Natural History, getting there at 10:30. Read paper and settle on things to do, and then spend six straight hours wandering through Academy of Arts and Sciences looking at swords, boats, medals, fabrics, autos, planes, busses, models, herbs, diagrams, dioramas, uniforms, trophies, stamps, coins, gowns, glassware, pottery, jewelry, fruits, drugs, etcetcetc. Still haven't seen it all. Out to talk to Dave and arrange to meet him at Jerry's at 7. Eat lunch and read "Autobiography of Cellini," through downpour and sit in Lafayette Park, then to 20th and F to meet Dave and change clothing and to show for "Devil's General" and "The Captain from Koepenick," me so tired I can hardly keep my eyes open. Back to Dave's to accept key and refuse to cuddle, since I feel guilty with people I "love." Fall to sleep at 2.
SUNDAY, MAY 24. Up wonderfully refreshed at 10 and giggle with Archie for awhile, then thumb through Dave's cartoons, drawings, paintings, and clippings from Trim and Rim and Gym and Slim. Finish at 12:30 and off to get to Jim's empty apartment and then to Jerry's and back up to Washington Cathedral and magnificent stonework, and back to the Islamic Mosque and finally down to the Phillips Art Gallery, to moan through nice private rooms to look at one of last good private art collections. Finish about 4 and get down to Bob Warnow's and pick him up and get to Howard Theater for Pearl Bailey, Mr. Wagner, two good tap dancers, and the completely unbridled Louis Bellson at the thundering drums. Wander out chuckling at Bob's performance on the dancing stage at 7 and decide on supper at Bassins L'Esplanade basement, with filet and champagne and table squeeze boxes. Amble out at 9 to Carrol's for a very disappointing bar, and spend sparkling burgundy, but got looks from Ted (not a toupee!!) and L.F. Leave then and off at 10:30 to Bob's to talk for awhile, and then all out again at 11:15 for Greyhound station. Board bus next to boxy sailor at 11:30 and nudge and push and try to cajole him for two hours, without any luck at all. Stagger sleepily off bus at 1:30 and get to BOQ at 2. Fall asleep fairly quickly.
MONDAY, MAY 25. Hop up, yawning, at 6:10 to ignore shower, search me, and pack lunch. Yawn through morning and wake up only enough to play a loser's game of hearts with Joe and Don. Back to scratch my head and draw maps and make lists and plan for leave, doing absolutely nothing in the line of work. Back with a load of papers and meander over to unappetizing supper and appetizing mess boys. Back at 6 and flip through a week's papers, or what seems like it, and put laundry both out and into drawers. This takes till 7:45, when I catch up with four days (I'm getting better) of this until 8:10. Fix up a few of my uniforms and watch the Firestone Hour from the University of Akron. Write one or two letters and get to bed fairly early.
TUESDAY, MAY 26. Up quite early to take shower and get into uniform and make lunch and over to breakfast. Work goes slowly since I'm just about to run the final test. Play hearts at noon and win my first game. The day passes and passes, and at last I eat supper and scribble off a letter to Bill. Walk off to see "The Mysterians," another Japanese horror film, but in color and Cinemascope and very blood and thundery, with great effects and magnificent music. Back to waste a whole hour putting my brass on my TW's for the tour tomorrow, then to the TV room to see "Billy Budd" with a blond Don Murray, and quite a gay show it was. To bed no earlier than 11:45, though I set my alarm for 5:30.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 27. Up at that accursed hour and suddenly decide that I've no time for a shower, so I throw my TW's on, gulp a few date-nut cookies for breakfast, and set off walking for the 4800 block. Even this early it's warm and humid, and as I'm being late, I'm sweating a storm. Lopez happens by in a cab and I'm saved the torturous last few blocks of walk. Show up to find no one there, but finally the busses come and into mine piles a bird, three silver leaves, six gold leaves and a passel of captains. I nervously make my spiel, and the day starts at 8. Get a talk and film and then off to first station, the Human Engineering Lab. Here I get a distinct impression of the sexy cut of the trousers of these fellows, but am relatively unimpressed with the goodness otherwise. General Teltoy, all two stars of him, joins my group and gives it it's only lieutenant, except me, his aide. Next Mulbery Point and some questions I can't answer, and displays of weapons. Then to the museum for donuts and a talk with Keogh. Wander through Museum looking for goodies and don't find any. Back to lunch and I get some food into me and I feel a bit better, though starting to feel my lack of sleep. Afternoon proceeds easily as we sit on a hill to see DS Company and a tank climb a 60 degree slope. Two hours of an automotive demonstration is hard on the bottom, and then to the front for a slam-bang firing demonstration. I take shuttle to Chesapeake, eat and collapse for a couple hours, getting rid of my overpowering smell. Back to 4800 and ride out for night demonstration, of sound, lights and fury, by far the most effective I've seen yet. 10 pm sees the bus hearing my farewell speech and I GET THANKED and I lumber quite blindly back to BOQ, where I throw everything off and fall into bed.
THURSDAY, MAY 28. Do very little at work the next day, but arrange to keep myself busy most of the time, feeling tired from the day before. Back to eat and read papers and send a few letters off. I finish "Dorian" and start some of Sienkiewicz's short stories, which are not bad, though very much out of fashion. Eyes close involuntarily at 10:30, so I get to bed almost early.
FRIDAY, MAY 29. Awake a bit late and get to breakfast at 7:30, much too late. Gulp it down and get to work to spend the entire day running tests with various values of e and recoding from my sloppy master sheets onto readable coding forms. Get information on Baltimore and California cities from Don, Freddie, and Information Please. Decide, because of the letters I have to write, my up and coming trip to Chicago, and the books I should read, that I'll stay home the weekend, since going anywhere would be forced and I'd certainly regret it on Monday, when I would have to write letters and plan and pack for Chicago all at once, as well as get up at 5:30. Back to read papers and I decide not to eat supper at the Chesapeake but finish the rest of Sienkiewicz's tales before making a list of authors to get and take off to the library at 8 pm. Look about and end up taking three books to the Patio to have supper of a Bullseye and shake. Back to read "HPL, a Memoir," by August Derleth, showing a bit of the influence that went into Lovecraft's odd tales. Rather interesting. Finish that at 9 and then launch into Arthur Machen's "Tales of Horror and the Supernatural." Don't like his type nearly as much, and my eyes close again at 12:15. Set no alarm for the first time in ages and feel very good about it.
SATURDAY, MAY 30. Wake at 8:15, a good time and come fetchingly and up right away to finish skimming Machen's tales and start on the remainder of Benvenuto's Autobiography. At 11:30 I suddenly dress in bathing suit and get out for an hour's sunbathing, which does me good, I think. Shower and pull more lice off and then make myself a liquid lunch and read on until 5, when I dress in baggy pants and go out for supper. Back to finish Celini's paean of praise for himself at 9. Write four days of this and finish that at 10. Get started into Henryk Sienkiewicz's "With Fire and Sword," determined to skim and get 200 pages by midnight and I get to bed.
SUNDAY, MAY 31. Up at 8:15, after coming, I again get absorbed in "Fire and Sword." Dress enough to get over to breakfast at 9:30 and back to read some more. At 12:15 I don trunks and lay out for 1½ hours, getting rather more red than I should have. Shower and back to the book, which isn't bad at all, except the 820 pages are just a mite too many. Finish and get over to supper and then back to read some more. Throw hands up, though, at 7, and get down to typing some very necessary letters, some of them almost four weeks late, tsk tsk. Through at 10:15 and do actually a single day of this until 10:25. Fiddle around some more and get to bed at 11, deciding to do brass tomorrow. Zowy!
Chicago, in general, lives up to its reputation of being a city which, not succeeding in being one of the very greatest in the world (namely, better than NYC), has slumped into a sort of quiet funk, slyly trying to be great, but morbidly realizing that it isn't. Its entertainments are of the worst, its theaters bordering on the honky-tonk, again, of which there is much of in this fairly evil town. All the brazenness of Baltimore streets is etched into its entertainment palaces huddled like a whore in heat, blazing out its bright lights under the scrape and roar of the elevateds. Jackson St, or wherever they are. The echoes in the Adler Planetarium are annoying, and the almost constant pressure of bright lights being the artificial galaxies. The Art Institute has its share of the masterpieces, but no more than a share. It can be seen in an afternoon, and this is one of the worst descriptions which can be placed on an institution, particularly one like the Museum of Natural History, with its miles of untenanted hallways giving off a few decent exhibits of bygone seas and narwhals and such, but still weak compared with such staggering collections as the Smithsonian or the NYC collections. One tremendous Museum it does have, thanks to the Exposition in '33. This is the Museum of Science and Industry, good for about three days of viewing. Along with this go people who are about the same, except that they are wilder in the bars, that is, most bars. Along with the screaming, there are the raids by the police, and the supposedly ever-present possibility of Mafia violence. Protection is a common topic, and no one wants to be raided, so they pay. Ugh. Most of the bars screamy, and the Lawson Y relatively sedate, but the meeting of a few nice (or so I think) people evens all that up. I can't say how the musical theater world is, since I didn't see the inferior version of the only Broadway play in town.
MONDAY, JUNE 1. Up and put brass on uniform and bundle off to work, all eager to get off to Chicago. Make last minute arrangements with Hansell and get set to go, but then get punctured a bit when I find that there's something wrong with my test cases. Fiddle around a bit very busily and get very little done. Work finally through and I wander back, checkless, after having withdrawn $100. Also find my laundry hasn't all returned, which makes my packing less than extremely pleasant. Pack and get haircut at noon, too, and take shower and mosey in to watch the Sea Show on TV until 11, gawking at the sprawled out Dutch Speidel. Wander in to bed at 11 and find a few more bugs, and get to sleep not before 12.
TUESDAY, JUNE 2. Alarm wakes me up at 5:15 and I freshen up and finish packing and get out to meet Bill at 6. Drive to airport, stopping on way to phone Walt to sign in for us, and get, after quick breakfast, in plane at 8. Out at Washington to buy insurance and land in Chicago 3½ hours later at 10:30. Confirm reservations and take off on tour, walking up and down streets and enter City Hall and climb elevator, stairs and finally getting up back stairs to an old center room, and up iron ladder to the top of the chimney. Quite a trip. Joe and I kick ourselves all the way down and get over to the Board of Trade Building to legally get up to the roof and look out over the city and gather up sightseeing materials. Dash down and grab a light lunch and get to the Hilton in time to sit and wait for 20 minutes before the combined North-South tour of the city began. Ride with the incomprehensible guide up through traffic jam at Oak St. Beach and up through Lake Shore Drive and the Gold Coast and then across and stop at the hugely gingerbread VFW and Elks Monument. Down the not so miraculous Miracle Mile on Michigan Avenue and finally back at the hotel for part the second. Down the Lake Shore to the University of Chicago, the Robie House, and out to the Museum of Science and Industry, where we got off for 35 minutes and actually RACED through the halls to see the highlights. Back to the bus, and the hotel, and we eat at the YMCA and take off to the airport. Short flight to Moline and catch a limousine for $11.75 to Davenport, where we check into tiny room. Out for a walk to see the town and get a milkshake to highlight the evening. To bed at 11:30.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3. Up at 6 to muscle each other in bath and take bus to post. Get there an hour early and walk in limpid AM to Confederate cemetery and back to Conference. It is comfortably dark with slides and way over my head, which is typical. I'm faintly miserable over the shop talk at lunch and feel worse so I nod my way through the PM session. Out to a bus back to the Blackhawk, and I perk up already. Cocktails with Bill and Joe and John (Hans) Synnesvedt, and then supper, talking and laughing very nicely, until about 8, when I'm up to change for the Midway Fair which got into town. Hans and I walk down and immediately get painfully taken (fleeced, robbed, cornered, blitzed) out of $26 between us on a phony ball game. I'm mortified and Hans is amazed. The three enter the sideshow and I gaped at droves of teenage, dungareed dolls in Davenport. I throw horrid prize of plastic wallet away, and after we get back to hotel at 11:30 I avoid Joe and give Hans back $20, which I say I talked out of them. Bed at 1.
THURSDAY, JUNE 4. Up at 7 and on bus to meeting, while bridge swings back for barge. Hans remarks that he's suspicious, but I seriously don't think he knows. Meetings drag on something awful, but then noon and lunch comes and after a rather tiring tour of Rock Island Arsenal Proving Grounds (with sand shells and Cobalt 60 sources), we're back to the airport, where Joe's flight is cancelled and I read Jung's "Unconscious" book, until plane takes off at 6:45. We get out of airport and into bus and into town at 9, after waiting before taxiing to let people out. We part and I grab a cab to Lawson Y, check in, check bar addresses for three hours, and take off for the Haig. Incredible old man wants me to "fuck him in the ass," so I pour his beer down the drain and leave for bed at 3, after having seen the Shoreline Seven and Sam's Place unpleasantly.
FRIDAY, JUNE 5. Sleep soundly until 10 and I'm up and wash and get out at 11. Grab subway down to Museum of Science and Industry after the Schubert has no tickets decent for me. Wander though University of Chicago campus, eating cheeseburger for a meal, and wander through impressive Oriental Institute on campus. Get out at 1 and hurry east to the Museum of Science and Industry. Some of the things aren't free, such as the submarine, the coal mine, etc, but they are certainly worthwhile. The Museum has outstanding exhibitions in biology (hatching chicks), physics (in light demonstration) and a rare marvel in the Colleen Moore Doll Houses, truly spectacular. Out reluctantly at 5:30, closing time, and walk along Jackson Park to the subway, which I take to an eating place, buying a ticket anyway to "Music Man," and then walk across to the Adler Planetarium for the Star show. Out at 9:30 and cab to Sam's Place and back to Shoreline 7 and back to Sam's Place to talk to a fairly decent fellow and down to Rush St. and Kitty Sheehan's, where nothing happens since I'm not dressed for it and back to the Haig to flaunt the old man and the bartender and then back to the Y, to get to sleep at 4.
SATURDAY, JUNE 6. Wake up way late at 12:30 and decide to skip breakfast. Dress in suit and cab over to Shedd Aquarium which I whiz through in an hour and walk down to the Art Institute, which is quite cruisy, and not really bad at all, though in two hours I see it all. Out to grab a cab to the Museum of Natural History and take two hours for that, getting through precisely at their 6 pm closing time. Wander over to Town and Country at Palmer House for the gay cocktail hour and talk with Joe Baer, who persuades me to sell back my "Music Man" ticket and come to "dinner." We dress similarly at his place and get out at 8 to the "Desert Inn" for butt steak and cocktails and conversation until 11, when we trot up to the Century. Pianist does a marvelous take-off on Bette Davis and the place is pleasant, indeed, and I learn "all" from Joe. Down to Paul's later and finally at 2:30 we leave for Joe's place. We plump down on the bed in complete darkness which I could do without, and set to. I'm down more than up under his awesome kissing and he comes and falls asleep on me.
SUNDAY, JUNE 7. I do little and wake up at 10 to say I should meet him at 11:30 for a trip to Milwaukee. I take bus to Y and shower and change and get outside at 11:35. Wait 40 minutes, and no Joe, but many people pass and stare, including a torso twitcher who's not bad at all. I wait a bit more and go to breakfast at corner and get back to lobby to sit and cruise (wait for a phone call, I mean). Doll comes back and we talk from 1:30 to 2:15, and then he invites me to his room. After 45 minutes of awful (and nice) torture, we set to it, and very pleasantly indeed!!! Just before I pop completely someone is nasty enough to knock over a Hertz truck, metal, dirt, girl and gas all over. We go back to it, but figure to shower, wherein I come and practically collapse. Very nice in all and back to talk and check out and get to Figaro's for beer and he drives me to plane stop, and I get on at 6:15 and ride in back lounge to Baltimore at 10:30 after a pleasantly cloud-studded ride. Meet Hans there, thank goodness, or I'd have an awful time getting back, and the Captain, Joe, Hans and I get back here at 10:30. I push stuff into the closet and fall asleep about 1 am.
MONDAY, JUNE 8. Up at 6 to unpack just a bit and put brass on uniform and pack a rudimentary lunch and get off to the first breakfast of the second last stretch at Aberdeen Proving Grounds. Get to work and find I don't have to write a report, thank goodness, and I get in my application for fifteen days' leave. Find what I hope is the last mistake in my program and run a few tests on it. Right at the end I have drum trouble and I rush off having everything on desk for first time. Pick up six day's mail and papers and eat supper and jerk off over Bill's photography and read Times until 8 pm. Get to work on this and alternate on unpacking and putting everything where it belongs and sending laundry out. I do no show going and no TV watching, yet when I get to bed at 11 pm I have no letters finished, and this diary remains undone too. Can't figure where all the time goes, although I did a lot, including shining brass for the first time in ages. Take a bath and fall into bed at 11:45.
TUESDAY, JUNE 9. Up at 6:15, feeling fairly good after 7 hours sleep. Sort out paperwork and eat and get to work to fill out most of the paperwork. Get on the machine only once during the day and the rest of the time I am busy writing letters and working my first two crossword puzzles in a long time and paying bills and depositing my check. After work it's down to the PX for buying stuff, and then directly back to eat, and back here to jerk off twice under the influence of the Continental Photo's Artistry. Lay in misery for an hour, feeling like doing nothing, and finally get started on this and finish the letters I'd started. Watch TV, a scene from "Once Upon a Mattress," from the Phoenix on Garry Moore's show and get in to finally finish this up to date at 11:15. Get to bed at last at 11:30. WHEN will I type Bill's letter and catch up on my sleep?
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 10. Up at heaven knows what hour, since I'm writing from here on to the 21st ON the 21st, the longest lapse of writing in a long time. And it must be caught up with today or never, since tomorrow begins a flurry of movement and activity encompassing 2½ weeks on leave in Louisiana, Texas, and California, followed by a 1½ week ending stay here at APG, then, hopefully, 2 weeks in Florida, a week in Ohio, and then back to New York---how traveled can you get? It's good I didn't do much on the 10th or 11th, since I can recall nothing definite, so since I know I didn't go to the show, and didn't watch TV, I couldn't have done much.
THURSDAY, JUNE 11. I wrote letters, this is sure, including a long one to Bill, and I read, and since I've started taking notes on what I'm reading, I need hardly be so conscientious here about recording what I'm reading and when, though for some days I'd have nothing else to write. As is noticeable now, I'm also permitting myself the luxury of writing bad (and rambling on), since I haven't much to say. Felt vaguely uncomfortable all week, oppressed, maybe, as if the only thing I wanted was sex. I didn't feel excited, far from it, but I CRAVED something or someone, and it made life uncomfortable.
FRIDAY, JUNE 12. Friday went along slowly at work; since I HAD NOTHING TO DO I helped Freddie and Lee out. After work I packed, took a cab to town where I ate and read GQ and Playboy, and caught a bus to Pennsylvania, getting in at 8:30. To Laird's to get a key and then out to get in the rain and get a cab to Allegro. Talked with many former bed mates and finally got Bill to ask me home, for a completely unpleasant session in which I could do absolutely nothing with, to, or for him. Back at 2:30 to bar and extreme, shunned quiet, and I leave at 3 to flop into bed.
SATURDAY, JUNE 13. Wake up at 8 and talk for quite a while with Bud and Laird, and then I'm off to see the Philadelphia Art Alliance, with a magnificent set of men by John Fear, and down to the Academy of Natural Sciences (with Muzak), and the Franklin Institute (gripping). Get back to lunch at 1, and more palaver, and take off in rain again, to see the Commercial museum, with a good show on Philadelphia, and the University Museum, where Ben and Ron go over my head in general. Cab back to supper and Fred and Laird and I take off at 7:30 for New Hope, getting there only at 9:30. Get in Canal Inn and I made spectacular sight, tieless standing in the middle of the floor with Ann's Siamese cat in my arms. How fey! Wander down canal with Fred and almost get stomped on by donkey-drawn canal boat with jazz band aboard. Wander around town looking in shop windows and ride back to Philadelphia, stopping off for a sandwich snack and a peep at the Frank Lloyd Wright synagogue. Now I have truly seen all of Philadelphia. To bed at 2:30.
SUNDAY, JUNE 14. Up at 8 to hastily breakfast, pack, dress and get off to Atlantic City. Get there at 11 and wander about looking at men's shops and eating, and then we're down to the cool, very sandily windy beach. I lay out for two pleasant hours and get nicely red. We separate and from 4 on I wander all way down boardwalk to the Convention Hall, but see no one of great interest. Turn back and wander to the Steeplechase Pier, the Million Dollar Pier, and finally Steel Pier. Wander to all the exhibits and finally sit next to fellow for the stage show. We talk and take a ride in the diving bell and get seats for the divers, tumblers, the clown, the tight-wire motorcycle, the porpoise, and the diving horse. Good clean fun. Back to try to figure a way to get more friendly with my dancer friend, when Laird storms up and drags me off to the car, where Fred and he are mad. We ride back at midnight, when it's too late for me to catch the last bus. Sit around and talk for awhile, then get to bed at 2.
MONDAY, JUNE 15. Up to get addresses of bars from Laird and down to see "The Horrors of the Black Museum," not good, and cruise downtown and Rittenhouse. End up at Allegro at 4:30 to witness the painfully slow start of the evening in a bar. Leave at 6 to catch tail front of the Flag Day Parade and the tail end of Matt Moniepello, whom I say I'll call, but probably never will. Ride back to APG and loaf around and get to bed about 11.
TUESDAY, JUNE 16. Up for work and completely ignore Palmer's threats about me not being there. Get started on a wonderful program to write music, using the voice box already on EDVAC. This should keep me busy until it's time for me to go. Get notice that "Lolita" is in, so on Tuesday night I get down to library after supper, and read many, many days of the New York Times, made easy by my leaving work at 4:10. Find a couple books by Bradbury, too, and get back to read "Golden Apples of the Sun," which, I shudder to admit, I'd read before, but I hadn't remembered---and these were GOOD and IMPRESSIVE; I shudder to think what happens to the stuff I read that I'm NOT impressed with. Read half of "Lolita," and watch the really unsexy (though I can't tear my eyes away) nude gyrations across the way. Get to bed at 11:45.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 17. Up to shower and get to work and back to finish "Lolita" and get started on "Dandelion Wine," by Ray Bradbury afterward. Finally get last signature on my leave application and get everything ready for that. Inquire into correspondence courses, too, which takes a nice hunk out of the day. The end is so near, of my Army career, that I can almost taste it, and would do anything to taste it. Write a couple letters, too, and get to bed fairly early 11.
FRIDAY, JUNE 19. Up very reluctantly for this last day of work for a long time. Get the processing part of the program finished and then try for the loops, which turn out to be harder than I suspected. Fiddle around with those all afternoon and leave to get back and pack and get out at 5:30 for 6 pm bus to Baltimore. Check in at Y and get notes for music program at Pratt Library. Wander over to see Lexington Market and Poe's grave, and lured by young cuties in front of Thompson's, I have supper there, watching brawl, and ask him to Y, which he leads me to by VERY round route. Talk awkwardly and I grope him and he "allows" himself to be sucked off. Out to wander down "the Block" and stop in at Pepper Hill. Attract much attention and Paul is very attentive. Talk and talk and look and ignore and cruise and he asks me to go to Checkmate Coffee shop. OK. Have coffee and he asks me to a party. OK. We go and dance and drink at artists' loft and I leave at 3, getting to sleep quick and up at 9.
SATURDAY, JUNE 20. Wash and grab cab too early to enter Peale museum, eat breakfast, tour that and walk up to the Walter's Art Gallery, very good indeed. Quickly see Maryland Historical Society and wander through Gallery One, catching bus up to Baltimore Museum of Art and wander through John's neighborhood and Druid Park, getting to the Zoo, and take bus to the show "He Who Must Die," really tremendous. Walk down to Peabody Book Shop for wine and then down to find Inter-County busses rooked me. Buy "Passionella" and read it and ride back to APG at 10:30. Cab here and fall into bed, after coming most juicily, at 11.
SUNDAY, JUNE 21. Up at 9, very relaxed, and over to breakfast. Peruse Feiffer's book again and figure Baltimore expenses (losing $1) and put stuff away from the weekend. Burn up photos and sort stuff out of drawers and get up to date with this and plan California vacation. That takes till 5, and then I get started in on packing and shining brass on cruddy TW's and putting everything in order for trip. To bed at last at 11:30, setting alarm for 4:30, when it obligingly goes off.
MONDAY, JUNE 22. By the time I dress and finish packing, it's time to call the cab and sign out and get down to Aberdeen bus stop. Wait, and 5:30 and 5:45 pass and ticket office not open. At 6 am, Air Force fellow stops and asks if I want a ride, which I accept. He says that Bolling is dying, I should go to Andrews AFB, where he takes me. OK. Sign in at 8 am and settle down with "Charterhouse of Parma." Eat breakfast at 11:30, when hunger pangs get too harsh. Eat lunch at 4:30, when there seems to be no hope of getting out. Sit through to 8:30 pm, talking only occasionally with my fellow waiters, looking at the quality of some of the Operations personnel, and getting quite disgusted. Try to call Dave, but get no results. Just about to get on bus to DC when they announce a station wagon to the BOQ's. I hop on, grab a rather nice room, and get to bed at 10.
TUESDAY, JUNE 23. Up at 7 and wash and dress and call transportation to get over to the hated waiting room again. "Nothing in sight; no, sir, just sit and wait." So I wait. Breakfast at 11:30 and I finish "Circus in the Attic," by Robert Penn Warren. Lunch at 3 and finally get news of a flight, which makes the wait till 4:30 bearable. Take off in a heavy plane toward Brookley AFB, in Alabama. Flying is glorious, going from clear to cloudy to the dark tossing of a storm to clouds and a sunset and darkness of the twisting rivers and the gnarled farmlands. Land at 7:30 and grab a cab to the bus lines and ride to the Greyhound depot in Mobile. Buy a ticket to New Orleans at 11:15, and wander around the rustic town for the next two hours, supping on waffles and iced tea. Changed from uniform to casual clothes, which feel good in hot night. Ride four hours to New Orleans, next to a tossing Negro that I ousted an astonished, indignant white to seat. See the Gulf and the Mississippi go by and get to the station at 3:30. Cab to the Y, which is filled, and get a room at the Seaman's Town House for $3 a night. Get to bed.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 24. Wake up to sun and dirt and noise and heat. Look through a musty Confederate museum and eat breakfast through the greater part of the AM shower. Out at 11:30 to wander to Canal Street in shower and take the trolley out to the 4000 block and back, looking at great funeral homes and tombs all above ground and the absinthed old ladies and the white porched houses with the green trim. Out to walk through black sections worse than NYC and stop at French Coffee Shop for donuts and milk and tour St. Peter's Cathedral (oldest) and wander through Louisiana State Museum looking at the river and the absolutely fantastic costumes of the Krewes of Comus. By this time it's 2 and I get down to the ship for a tour of the docks and wharves and the ships in the port of New Orleans. See the packing houses and the bridges and the seasides in a long, hot, rather worthless tour of the Mississippi River where it's only a half-mile across. Off at 5 and walk to Walgreens for supper and get to Chaplin's "Gold Rush." Back to wash and change for the evening and wander down Royal Street for a truly stunning look at the Vieux Carre. Into and out of a few of the bars, but not really worth anything. Down Bourbon Street, of strippers and joints, and pay $2.55 and $1.75 for two seven and seven's to see three strippers and dancers, and Lili St. Cyr, who had both age and style. Talked to two very talkable fellows---what a chance to make friends! Out and wander some more and get back to Seaman's at 1, after talking with a very unpleasant person on the street.
THURSDAY, JUNE 25. Up at 6:30 and wash and pack and dress in civvies and cab to the bus station to get a ticket to Biloxi and Kessler AFB. Wait and wait and leave at 9:45 on an 8:45 scheduled bus. Watch Gulf Coast pass luxuriously by and learn all about the bees and the bees and get into Biloxi at 12. Catch a cheeseburger and a milkshake for the first (and only) food of the day. Cab out to the base and take an hour to find operations. Nothing, but nothing goes out and I wait till 4:30 to get schedule for next day: nothing. Maxwell is 7½ hours by bus and nothing in prospect. Disgusted, my spirits hit a new low before a lieutenant says he's going to Rucker and so I get walked to parachute and climb into 1-20 Beaver for a two hour flight to Rucker. Major Jones schedules up and hops me to Maxwell from 7:30 to 9, and what with time changes and all, I get to a nice BOQ at 11, after being told I've got good chances.
FRIDAY, JUNE 26. Up at 4:30, 5 and 6 and shower and uniform and sign in at 7. Breakfast very heartily and back to start on Moravia's "Two Women." Wait till 10:30 when I hear of a definite flight at 9:35 tomorrow to Travis in SF. Wait some more until at 11 am Colonel Savage wants to start to Denver, and I and three others decide to go with him. He coaxes us up to the front where we literally drip sweat for thirty minutes until we take off at 12. Eat the box lunch and observe the pilots and then rebel and go to the back for a fantastic cloud-bound, sliding flight over Arkansas and Oklahoma. Stop at Tulsa and go on to Colorado Springs, as terrain changes from green rivers to flat farms and just plain scrub land. See Pike's Peak in distance and fly on to Denver, getting there at 9:30. Lug bag to BOQ office but because of a Reserve convention, there's no room there or at the guest house. Start walking to bus and get a ride to Peterson Hospital, which is also full to the brim. They get me a room at a $4.50 hotel and I start walking, but bag gets heavy and I stop at rather nice SOS motel for $5. Tear off clothes and plunk into bed at 11.
SATURDAY, JUNE 27. Up at 6:30 to baby cry, cough, and cat and take a $1.70 cab to the field. Wait in visitor's lounge, reading magazines, meet the stupid clerk who is persuaded to make a manifest for Long Beach. Wait for 45 minutes for transportation which never comes and we lug bags over to Base Operations. At 11:30 we find there's ALREADY a manifest for the flight, so for the rest of the afternoon, interrupted by two sandwiches and a milkshake at 1:30, I read "Two Women" and talk to people and look glumly at Dispatcher. Wait until 5:30, and just ready to leave, when they announce a flight at 9 to Ogden, Utah. I go walking to the Officer's Club for steak and salad and wine, etc, for $3 and wander to read magazines and over at 8 to wait for plane. Take off on jump seat of C119 and enjoy a great sight of jeweled Denver and then fly over absolutely bleak Rockies, can't see a thing, darn it. Flight bumpy and thrilling anyway, and go to Held AFB at 12:30. Sign in and ride to BOQ and get room and flop into bed at 1.
SUNDAY, JUNE 28. Up at 6, but hearing no flights out, I lay until 8 and get over to office at 9. Give up a flight for a Private and read along until 11. Read papers and write letters and write junk in notebook until 1:30, when I'm over to snack bar for two sandwiches and a malted and buy "Hidden Persuaders" by Vance Packard, which I find interesting enough to read until 5:30, when I find there's a flight at 10 the next AM to McClellan AFB. Say OK and get over to the BOQ again to find I'm too late for the Officer's mess, so I undress and get into bed at 7. Toss and turn and hear someone playing decent radio, so I listen to all-Tchaikovsky program of "Romeo and Juliet Overture," Symphony #4, "Overture 1812." This ends at 8 pm and I fall asleep soon after.
MONDAY, JUNE 29. Roused by knocks at 5:15, there's a flight and I have fifteen minutes to make it. Jump into clothes, unwashed and unshaved, and sign out in a flurry. Grab cab to Air Freight and get referred to a plane on field. Dash out in time and catch crew going in and strap in with many West Point cadets. Talk quite a bit with Bill Danforth next to me and take off at 6:15. Clouds at first, and then the Cascades and Sierras make very interesting viewing of the trees, pines, clear pools and snowy crags and dim smoky canyons. Get outside of Sacramento at 9 and find we missed a bus, so we're over to breakfast at 9:30 and back to a cab to the gate. Make a motley crew waiting in hot sun for the bus, and get on and ride to Sacramento, where I walk three blocks and stand in line fifteen minutes to get a ticket to SF on Greyhound. Up to john to change clothes, with great relief and down to stand in line talking with Bill until 12:15 but through rather typical California scenery: green and brown hills. Note two girls: one pretty and smart, other dull and stupid. Into SF at 2:30, enjoying view of city from Oakland Bridge. Grab a cab three blocks to YMCA hotel and am pleasantly surprised at $2 per night rate. Unpack and get everything in a proper place at 4 and get out to shave and shower, meeting sunbather who looks and feels, etc. and asks to see my room. He sits and talks and strokes and finally we get on bed and he does me rather pleasantly, and then gets himself, too, almost perfect, except that he wasn't very sexy. Dress in suit at 5 and walk down Market to Grant and shop, buying stuff too, in Chinatown. Pass a movie at 6 and go in on impulse, then rather odd production. Out at 8:30 and eat poorly at Lotus Bowl. Try to find Dan Timbo to no avail, and walk down---and I mean DOWN Broadway, to Finnochio's for two hours of womanly men and funny too, and then to Gordon's at 1, which is completely dead. Stay till 2 and walk all way back Market to Y, picking up Vogue on way and get to bed at 3, after reading Vogue and eating popcorn.
TUESDAY, JUNE 30. Up at 9:30 and write four days in here till 10:10. Dress too scantily and catch bus out to the Palace of the Legion of Honor, wandering through its galleries of inferior painting and Rodins until 1. Out of back and walk across gold course to sea, ignoring "No Trespassing" signs. Clamber up and down cliffs, and stand on rocks watching waves washing in. Clunk shin on rock and limp for day. Around at 4 to Sutro's Baths and pay way to get in and spend nothing inside, which made a rather worthless visit. Look at Cliff Tea House and Museum and scan ocean from Cliff House and Seal Rocks. Over to Playland by the Beach for a hot dog and French fries, first food of day. Look at everyone and everything and catch a bus back to Y, where I put on new clothes. Ride the Cable Car, inside, to Fisherman's Wharf, and scout about it, and wander into the tent theater. Out to grab a hamburger and back to talk with the usherette about Art and California, and then see quite a pleasant production (though awfully amateurish) of "The Tempest" with Jean Arnold. Out at 11 and wait in frightful cold for the trolley back to the Y, where I get to bed at 12 am, ready to tackle the new day afresh.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 1. Up at 9 and out at 10 to take bus down to Golden Gate Park, warmly dressed this time. See the Steinhart Aquarium, and the rather placid set of displays at the Museum of Natural History. Wander out to the de Young Museum, for early Americans, and then into the Japanese Tea Garden, to wander in the moist quietness for about an hour. Then to the conservatory for breathtaking beauty and smell of the florid California flowers. Bus again down to the Portals of the Past, of which only one is standing. Back to the bus and down to the Playland and walk up cliff streets to Sutro's Gardens. Marvel at his choice for a fortress and back down through the Playland again to the Swedish windmill, without the pinwheel. See the Bijou and then the VFW Beach Chalet. Walk down to the surf and watch the waves as I walk down to the Dutch windmill, truly huge. Catch a bus to the end and eat supper in mass-production restaurant, then walk to the ferry building and a positively enormous diorama of the entire state of California. Out at 6 and from 6 to 9 completely cover Telegraph Hill, mapping out the streets and cliffs and gawking at the picture-windowed apartments. Climb hills and down to also chart presence of bars. Finally end up at Gordon's and get to talking with kind fellow who gives me list of places to go. I leave at 10 and down to Purple Onion to comic singing and comedienne Phyllis Diller. Out at 12 and walk across to the Hideaway, where I see Don and listen to his adventures and look over rather pleasant crowd. Stay till 1:30 and decide nothing's going to happen, so I have a toasted English and get back to the Y at 2.
THURSDAY, JULY 2. Up at 11, feeling great, and after a breakfast of an omelet get down to the San Francisco Museum of Art, with a fairly good display of four modern artists. Stay there till 1 and then catch a bus down to Mission Delores, paying a donation of 25 cents to look around 1776 church and very nice cemetery (if cemeteries CAN be nice). On another bus trip down to the SF Zoological Park, a very large and variously populated place in the natural, huge rocked theme. Wander through eating peanuts and watching the monkeys jump and then down to Fleishhacker Pool, to see the 16-18 year old humans jump into what certainly must be the largest pool in the world. Down to the beach again, for a while, and then a bus back to the trolley and back to the beatnik jungle, stopping in at the Bagel to watch the begging and the dope-taking and the love attempts and the bootless talk and the wild looks of the conforming non-conformists. Up to the Paper Doll to wait for a table and talk with Bob, and after I eat we talk some more and I try to get with him and he says no, but finally we talk in his room and we get together from 11 to 2 for a very, very pleasant and peaceful and passionate session. We're both quite pleased and we doze off and wake up and snuggle a bit and doze off and wake up and finally get up in earnest at 9.
FRIDAY, JULY 3. Dress and talk and get down for donuts and he goes off for a short while. I'm back to the Y to shower and get uniform and eat breakfast and dress and meet him at the Fox, where we turn about and go back to the Paramount for a free "Hercules," a showoff if there ever was one, but no great shakes as a show. Out at 2 and I go to the bus and walk to the Palace of Fine Arts, getting into a truly magnificent ruined center court by a hole in the fence. Quite a spectacular set of ruins. Walk across the Marina and the yacht basin to the Marine Museum and look around there for a half hour and get onto a trolley which is promptly derailed. Walk to Bob's and we talk and get out to La Rinata for a dinner of Fritos, Refritos, Tacos, Enchiladas, Flauta, Arroz and Chile Relleno. Grab a cab, after paying $5 for meal, to the movies of George Broughton, some just plain stupid and others very good. Out at 10:30 and down to the Handlebar to meet Bob, meet Court instead and talk for a bit and up to his place, where he turns out to be rather pathetically nice, unfortunately too late. Back to Handlebar in his convertible and look about for Bob until 1. Out to Nob Hill, which is nothing, and then walk twenty blocks back to look for Bob and end up at Jean's, which is a coffee gay bar, and that's that. Out at 3:15 for toasted Danish and to bed.
SATURDAY, JULY 4. Up at 10 and wash and pack and check out at 12. Cab to bus and wait till 1:15 for bus to Hamilton, while I chatter with fairly knowing lady. Get to Hamilton AFB at 2:30 and get to Base Operations to find nothing scheduled (likewise for Moffett and Travis) and the next flight to San Antonio Monday AM. That's something, anyhow, but hope for tomorrow. Wander up to Cabana to eat at 3, but so bewildered with the multitude of swimmers that I go back to bedroom to peruse Virginia Woolf's "The Common Reader," a most uncommon authoress and book. Up the hill at 5:30 in suit to a baby beef en brochette supper with all the trimmings and a self-serve salad. Back at 7 to lounge about and finish with Miss Woolf. Feel very lazy so I rest between 8 and 10:30 and then go to bed officially, only getting awake at 8 and up at 9:30.
SUNDAY, JULY 5. Finish "Hidden Persuaders" right off the bat and get started on The Koran, by God via Mohammed and Daward. Dress in uniform at 12 to sign a half-full manifest for the flight tomorrow, after making sure there's nothing else east. Eat lunch of two cheeseburgers, milkshake and pie in the PX, drooling at the marvelous California custom that makes between the ages of 10 and 23 wear tight blue jeans all the time. Back to shift reading to Nietsche's "Thus Spoke Zarathustra." Read on till 6, when I again suit up and get up to the Officer's Club for a huge supper of ham and corn and salad and sundae and such. Back down full to the top at 7:30, and read steadily on to 9:30, when I finish with the tract of the Superman. Write this up to date until 9:45, and then take a shower and get to bed fairly early.
MONDAY, JULY 6. Get called at 6:30 and dress and pay bill and get over to base at 7. Wait around a bit and look at map and drink hot chocolate to pick up flight lunch and get on plane at 8, taking off for San Antonio soon after. Stare out window as we pass over Oakland and San Francisco and Salinas and on down coast over Sierras. This changes to rolling, dry desert on into Texas. Fly and fly and eat part of box lunch and feel just a bit ill, so I lay back and ignore rest of flight. Get in at 5 and see plane in and jump to find it going to Bolling tomorrow AM. Lug to lounge and find myself well down on list. Scheme with Navy lieutenant and make an ass of myself in front of Major Baxter by asking literally if we could sneak onto the plane. Eat supper and back to the decent lounge to talk some more, leaving at 8:30 for BOQ. I shower and get set for the morrow and go to bed at 9:30, and toss and turn and think about all sorts of things.
TUESDAY, JULY 7. Get up and in a sort of hot desperation jerk off, but even that doesn't lull me to sleep, with thought of missing the flight, Bell and Marshall, and my trip flying through my head. See 11:30 and 12:30, and finally doze off, to get up at 1:30 and 2:15. Phone buzzes at 5:30 and my sleepy arms almost can't get the strength to answer. Over to agonized hour's wait and turn up 12 on a list of 12. Get on the plane and sleep from takeoff at 8:45 until 11:30, and then eat a bit of lunch and start gabbing with the Naval Lieutenant about nothing much. Fly over Memphis and land for a half hour at Lexington and take off again and snooze and look out the window and talk and finally get into Bolling at 7:30. Call Dave and go there to change and call bus depot to find that best bus leaves at 8:30. Dave drives me and I say I'll see him Friday and off I go, reading the Koran. Get into Aberdeen at 10:30 and get a dish of ice cream to celebrate and catch a cab to sign in at 11 pm, only one hour to go. Back to the stuffy barracks and unpack absolutely everything, take a late shower, and get to bed at 12:15.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 8. Up at 6:45 and dress and to work for the first time in ages. Palmer's gone, and talk until 9 and work for a bit, then talk some more and loaf and get not too much done in general. Pick up mail and read it, and get haircut and stop in the Commissary to pick up food, taking 1½ hours for lunch. I guess I just don't care. Work a bit more and talk quite a lot more and leave at 4:10, loaded with junk. Read papers and change for supper, getting back at 6. Write long letters to Mom and Larry about my California and Florida trips, and at 9:30 start talking to Bill and keep talking to Bill, quite a nice guy, until 11:45, and then get to bed at 12:05, setting alarm for six, which I shut off and get up actually at 6:25.
THURSDAY, JULY 9. Shower and wash and get down for my physical exam at 7:30. Sit around and talk and loaf and read Rockets and Missiles Magazines until 8:30, when we start exam. All goes very slowly and very frustratingly until 11:45, when we're finally finished with our half-hour exam. Walk back to buy stamps, mail letters, and eat lunch, and then ride to QM with Bill to stock up on undershirts and towels and walk partway and ride partway to library where I bone up on what to see in the South, especially Florida. There till 4 and back to room to fix place up and pay BOQ bill and get set for my Washington weekend. Out to supper at 5:15 and back feeling quite tired of it all. Stand in hot booth 30 minutes to get call off to Larry who says we're not going to Florida. This sinks me and I get back to reread "Passionella" and slouch in disgust and write this until 7:45, and then I take off for the show "John Paul Jones," which won't be any good, but I've got the old escape urge again, and I just feel I HAVE to go, or I'll go nuts!! Rather staid movie, grand only by Bette Davis' presence. Get back at 11 and get to bed, fuming about missing underwear.
FRIDAY, JULY 10. Up to breakfast and to work, finally getting the clue on shift cycles to enable me to complete my coding of the musical problem. Lunch at work for the first time, working straight through to make up for some of the time that I had lost before. Out of work with Gene and get back to flip things around and not even plan for weekend. Over to supper and Walt says he's going quickly, so I rush back, slam things into bag and get to Aberdeen to wait for bus without a ticket, buying a round trip in Baltimore and getting to DC at 7:30. Dave picks me up and we investigate cancelled band concert and an organ concert that isn't there, and we drive way out to see a drive-in triple feature of "Great Houdini," "Shane," not at ALL bad, and "Giant Claw," about the La Cockomia that I had seen before. Out at 2:30 and back to sleep at 3 am.
SATURDAY, JULY 11. Dave gets up at 8 and we talk for two hours from 9 to 11. I tear apartment apart looking for his pictures, but not being able to find them, jerk off anyway and leave for town. Get his letters of Van Gogh from the library and walk down to the Peterson House and eat breakfast later almost forgetting the book. Across to spend a couple hours in the Corcoran, for good drawings by Sergeant and across to the Octagon House and the AIA exhibit. Down to the Washington Monument to a long line, so I walk up, sweating and seeing all the stones in the place. Gaze out top for ten minutes and elevator down, getting over to the National History Museum at 3. Find nothing new but in the basement and the Disney exhibit and leave at 4:10 for the National Gallery of Art, which I quickly scan and dwell on "The Last Supper," buying it and a reproduction of an El Greco that I find so nice. Find a good Chinese supper and dash off in a cab to see the start of "Room at the Top," a scorcher, and bus back to the Hut, book and paintings still in tow. See Jerry and groan and get stuck in booth for awhile, then get to center table and talk with Jack, who is writing to a deaf mute near him. At 12 we leave separately and take off to Corcoran Street for a pleasant patio and blue lights, where everyone camps like mad and I play with Jack. We drink two beers and leave $1.50 and he drives me to Dave's and I give my address and bid fond farewell. Get in at 2:30 and sleep till 11.
SUNDAY, JULY 12. Up to look at more of Dave's clippings and eat a rather tasteless, but good rib dinner and we pick up Suzy and drive down to the Titanic Monument, quiet, and then take off for the Taylor Model Basin in the driving rain. It's closed, and missing the Old Gold Mine, we come to Great Falls. Still in rain we wander along bridge and rocks over roaring water to see the falls of the river. Back to buzz flowers on the grassy banks, eat a snack, and get back to visit Caesar and an apartment full of music and goodies and then to the Paramount for filet and back to pick up bag and just make the 8:30 deadline for the bus back to Aberdeen. Drive myself nuts trying to make out with cutie next to me, but I get to APG at 10, untouched. Toss things around a bit and put only a little away and flop into bed at 12:30.
MONDAY, JULY 13. Up at 6:30 and pack lunch and get off to work, getting set for a series of tests on the EDVAC music box. Forget 1/4 of input and take off in cab for my interview, which gets me closer and closer to the day I'll leave APG. Cab to cash two checks and pick up papers and get back to work in time to eat lunch over the first Times puzzle in ages. More tests and I argue with Chester in front of a large glassed-out audience for about 45 minutes. He agrees it can be done. I work some more and leave with Don to pick up more mail and get to room. Skim quickly through all the papers and go see "Middle of the Night" with Kim Novak and Frederic March with Walt P. We talk there and back and I get in writing mood and whip out typewriter and sweat through eight pages from 8:30 to 11. Have a ball watching nudies shower above me, and come tenderly at 12. Won't these people ever learn to put their shades down, and how I wish I were living on the second floor now!
TUESDAY, JULY 14. Up for a moment at 4 to shut window in face of storm and back to bed until 6:30 alarm. Lounge till 6:45, listening to rain, and breakfast and pick up final clearance papers from APG. From 8 to 10:30 walk and I splash through puddles and showers to get signatures on that most valuable piece of paper. Back here for an hour to catch up on 4½ days of this, until 10:45, and write up lists to do until 11:30, when I get a ride to work and eat lunch and spend afternoon testing and punching cards and making a general nuisance of myself over the musical EDVAC program. Leave a bit early with Don and pick up letters by Larry and write him a long answer and write to a few more people, and right after supper I took off for the horrid movie "Holiday for Lovers," with spectacular South American scenery and lousy acting by Clifton Webb and Jane Wyman and good clowning by an obese Gary Crosby. Wring out my uniform and get it out to the cleaners and get into bed by 12:15, for seven hours sleep, though I surely didn't feel like getting up when the alarm rang at 6:15.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 15. Polished brass and got to work at 8:10. Tested and tested and punched song decks and get a call from Captain Schreck for duty at 1 pm. Try to get Palmer to get me out and he tries and gets nowhere. I run two tests for vast audiences and everyone gets great kick out of it. Talk to Hans about the S and P's and steel myself to borrow raincoat and take cab over to the Orderly Room. No one around to find, the troops are going to theater across camp by bus and they don't need an officer to hold their hand double timing across intersections. Talk to blue-eyed PFC and catch cab back to work. Produce many sounds, but no progress and persuade everyone to let me stay for an hour. Get on at 4 and Palmer leaves and Chester comes on and we diddle and fume and fuss and finally at 5:10 give up. We talk until 5:30 and I race for mail and get last meal at Chesapeake rush hour at 6:30 to work puzzles, come, read papers, and write many letters till 9, when I finish with this and an apple at the same time at 10:15. Take a shower and watch people lolling nude in front of their open windows next door, and get to bed at 11:15 pm.
THURSDAY, JULY 16. Up excitedly, feeling the last day at work, and get in, walking, at 8:10. Clean out desk and give everything of importance to Palmer. Get told about candy custom and take off at 10:30 to PX to find it closed. Pick up mail and a signature and get back to work. Out at noon to Chesapeake for lunch and out to Aberdeen, where I think I'm missing a $15.66 deposit, but after they hunt through records for an hour, they prove I cashed it. Out to shop at PX and back to office for last time to pass out candy and say goodbye to everyone, exchanging addresses with Hans. Through at 4 and cold cab to mail box and walk to room. Read paper and eat and get to "Scapegoat" with Alec Guinness in a double role, and Bette Davis in a singular one. Talk to Walt for a bit and in to pack, throwing things away and stuffing duffel bag full and getting kick out of doing both. To bed at least at 11:15.
FRIDAY, JULY 17. Up at 6:30 to shower for last time and breakfast and pick up my pay in cash and back to dump all into Walt's car and get set in VOQ until Larry comes. Walk to check out of PO and cab to Transfer Point to find I need hospital clearance, get it and get finished and sign out of the US Army at 11:25 today. Quite an occasion. Back to room to do absolutely nothing but think, finish this, and get down to lunch. Back to finish Jung's "Unconscious Mind," and, later on, "Great Essays," by 38 writers. Find much that I like in both. Finish in time for supper and get down to practically deserted dining room for steak and French fries and corn on the cob and strawberry shortcake. I think they're trying to persuade me to stay. Back up to read on into the Koran, and at about 9 pm I get too tired to hold my eyes open, so I go to bed.
SATURDAY, JULY 18. Get up at 7 to get over to breakfast. Time now starting to weigh heavily on my hands, as all I do is read and eat. Talk with Olivant and get a free suitcase from him. Back to read in the "Greek Reader" again by many authors, going strong until lunch. Get down to the mailbox to find it closed, with no mail anyway, and back to a lunch of spaghetti and meat balls. Assure myself that there's absolutely nothing of note on TV to watch, and get back to my books, "Fear and Trembling" by Kierkegaard taking up much of the time. Pack things into my new suitcase and read the day's Times and read on, until supper. All cold cuts sits good, and I'm over to read in the last three books until 7, when I come to make myself tired and fall into bed, exhausted with the heat, at 8.
SUNDAY, JULY 19. Up at 6 and loll about and up at 8:30 to eat breakfast. Read straight through until 2 and put on short sleeved shirt for the movies, only to run back and run over again in a sweat-stained long shirt and tie for "The Diary of Anne Frank," a long, impressive-in-parts movie. Run back in furiously driving rain to meet Larry at 4:30. Talk and talk and out through sometimes completely flooded streets to the snack shop for supper, and back to plan the trip's progress, making absurd puns and jokes and moues as before. Never laughed so much in the past six months. Get to bed, after packing, at 10.
MONDAY, JULY 20. My alarm rings at 7 for the start of our trip. Wash and pack car and eat breakfast and we're off, after signing out, at 8:15. Leave APG and drive up to NYC, jabbering cozily away all the way. Through Lincoln Tunnel and to surface to buy tickets to "Music Man," and up to apartment at 12:15, when we "luckily" find a parking spot right in front of 35 E. 61. Laboriously lug all my junk up the stairs, and unpack most of it, finding that Tom left some interesting stuff. Peruse mail and dash out for money orders to pay four bills. Then we subway to Times Square and walk across to Selective Service (Social Security?) Building and I get re-registered. Walk back uptown by way of Takashimaya and the Curio Shop at Madison and 62nd. It starts to rain, as we dash across to apartment and change clothes and take showers and at 4:30 we walk down Madison to the scientific double feature: both of which I'd seen before, "War of the Worlds" and "When Worlds Collide." Out at 8 and over to Hector's for a confectionery and fruit snack and walk over to the Majestic for "Music Man," a jovial, sassy, wonderfully BOOKED play about music and shysters and love (?). At 11:15 we walk back uptown and I have steak and Larry has only coffee on Lexington Avenue and back to apartment at 12:45 to spread bed roll and get to sleep.
TUESDAY, JULY 21. Up at 8 and wash and Larry catches Mrs. McGeogh and I give her mailbox key and talk till 9:45. Out to get a $5 money order at Bloomingdales for the ticket Larry got yesterday for parking there, and get back to find another ticket. Fuss and fuss and curse and complain and send $10 to the NY Police. Take off at 10:30 and go up diverse parkways and bridges in Manhattan and Bronx and get on New England Thruway and Connecticut Turnpike and take off across Connecticut. Breakfast in NYC and have nothing to eat all through the 2-5 pm stop at Mystic, Connecticut, to see the reconstructed seaport with all its ships and shops and models and museums. Larry buys stuff and we look and laugh and wonder and then out esat again, going up and down roads and rivers and getting to Conniaut Island, outside Newport, where we eat supper and decide to spend the night. Look over place and travel to north of island to find bag place, but have to go into town and buy awful lotion and get back to first location, blow up air mattress, visit the bushes a bit, and the beach, and rub lotion on and try to get to sleep. The bags are hot and the bugs are busy and I wake up at 3 or 4 different times to spread rather ineffectual and eye-smarting lotion around.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 22. Up at 7 for a leering Larry that practically sends me into convulsions. Breakfast at same place and take ferry to Newport, gaping at huge houses. Drive all around Island on good maps and end up at point, where we roam through an old, deserted, though undeniably luxurious beach mansion. Drive around some more and get to the Breakers and pay $2 for a large tour. House is spectacularly sumptuous, looking all the smaller for being perfectly proportioned. A sight for sure. Wander along Beach walk and get back to car and drive into town for lunch and mosquito netting, and tour Hazard House and roam across town to the Harter House, seeing very much Newport furniture. Leave Newport at 5 and have supper in some little restaurant, Larry having clams and I ham and we drive off to find a place to sleep along Massachusetts shore. Find none and drive through Plymouth and after investigating numerous false leads, find an abandoned road and set up elaborate tenting, which doesn't work at all. Finally open windows of car, drape nets over them and sleep there, easy. Larry is ill most of the night from clams, and the nets prove quite effective.
THURSDAY, JULY 23. Up at sunrise and get into Plymouth at 8:30 to see the Mayflower and the Rock, while I eat breakfast and Larry eats oranges. Tour Plymouth Plantation and start off along interior roadway for Boston, getting there at 1:30. Catch the Adams House and lovely Library in Quincy and get to Boston to start at Museum of Fine Arts. Look at all stuff and meet at 5 after touring completely worthwhile, huge plant. Start driving through town and I continually spout directions to navigate the short, twisted one-way streets in the old town. See MIT and Harvard and then in quick succession the Athenaeum, the State House, many, many buildings, until finally we scream out and dash out of city, leaving coast, see "Old Ironsides" from a distance, and the Bunker Hill Memorial on Breeds Hill. Drive all along New Hampshire coast trying to find a place to stay, to no avail in the Coney Island atmosphere, and finally get into Portsmouth at 9. Try the closed Y and finally end up on the roof of the Rockingham, quite elegant and I get my first shower in three days, which feels GOOD. Come deliciously and get to bed at 11:30.
FRIDAY, JULY 24. Up at 8 and finish this up to date and take another shower, arrange clothes, and we leave for Maine at 10:30. Finally get into Bar Harbor after taking Maine turnpike at 70 all the way and ask for directions to Acadia. Look around at a few of the shops and an eager beaver offers me a 10x15 rug for $180. I debate and fume while walking and over a cheeseburger and a frappe, compare prices in stores, and end up buying the thing, to have it shipped later. This shocks my entire day and we drive around quite a bit of the park until fog sets in, and we find a nice campground, register, set up our netting, investigate the men's room nearby, and fall asleep.
SATURDAY, JULY 25. We explore town the next AM, and get lunch for our afternoon jaunt. Larry investigates all the jewelry shops in sight, and finally we get started on the glorious sights of the Maine coast. Start at Anemone Cave and look at waves dashing in and out among weeds and rocks. Then to Thunder Hole and sit for a couple hours simply watching the tide coming in over and through and among the rocks. Also in morning we looked at Soeur de Ments museum and spring and drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain, highest point on the coast. Down to the south tip to interrupt painter and look again at the tide pools and the waves of the out-going tides. Between 4 and 6 pm we hike up the Bubbles and surveyed the Island and the blueberries. Turn about to go down and we get into Bar Harbor for supper, and out again to low tide at Thunder Hole, with flashlights and solitude, busting clams and anemones and sea stars and crabs and myriad colors of the tide pools. Roar around island for last time and get to bed at 11.
SUNDAY, JULY 26. The dawn wakes us for Mass at 8:30, which we barely make. Quite an odd ceremony, with unknown Gospel, and we're out for waffles and the last of Maine. Drive for most of the day, talking about almost anything which comes to mind, including ideas of time before time, being before matter, a time machine, a Chemistry computer, etc. We just start getting on each other's nerves, and conversation and agreements get odd in times. Stop for fancy dinner and pay good price, and on we go, to get to New Hampshire and into the White Mountains in time to ride up the Wildcat, a pleasant little gondola car 2000 feet up the side of a blasted mountain. Look at the view and fly back down, to get to the car and start looking for a place to sleep, after we got supper and gas for what seems to be the umpteenth time. Find a spectacular overlook and spend quite a lot of time tossing and pushing and levering rocks over the cliff, to crash very satisfactorily into the trees below. Get to the next town to phone Larry's kin, one of whom has just died, and then get back to get to sleep.
MONDAY, JULY 27. Up to hear a train whooffing up the hill, and dress and get off the place and go down to Franconia Notch for Old Man of the Mountain, quite a prominent pile of rock. Drive down to the Flume and walk through and along many trails to see the glacial boulders, the natural bridges of felled trees, and huge falls, the green jade pool, the heavy up-hill climbs, and the wooden plank lined gorge of the flume itself. This in early afternoon, the morning being taken up by a 25 minute frolic on a next-to-dirt road to the Cog Railway up Mt. Washington, and we get the first seat in the first car after breakfast and postcards in the Lodge. Up and up and stop for photos and up Jacob's ladder and to the top to wander the highest point in NE US. Clamber about rocks and ride down, with interesting talk with a worker there. Then, in late PM, we get down to Polar Cave and roam the Museum and try all the ins and outs of the sandwich and the lean squeegee, the back breaker and the ankle breaker and the Lost River. Great fun and lovely garden near. Out of New Hampshire and get all across Vermont in evening, ending up in desperation just this side of Lake Champlain in a CEMETERY. Look at the stones and talk only a very little bit about spooks before we doze off at 10.
TUESDAY, JULY 28. Up and into town for the 7:20 ferry to New York, brushing my teeth in undrinkable water. Get into New York at 8:30 and eat breakfast before walking down into Ausable Chasm. Walk along gasping at all the sights and hop into a boat to scrape over rapids. Out to get back into car and journey down to Fort Ticonderoga. Look at the relics to be found at the site and the inferior paintings and the quantities of junk passed off as historic relics. Day very hot and we roam battlements and dungeons and then into the car and to the St. Lawrence and look at two ships going through the Eisenhower Locks, biggest anywhere. Go up to Messina and the Moses Power Dam and see the model of the valley project and the site of the huge dam. Try to drive around, but most of the roads closed. Eat and get flirted at by loose waitress in diner and take off along an abandoned road leading right down to the flooded river bank. Roam about the shore and get ready for the night.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 29. Up at dawn and proceed down Main Street and lather up in quite a good bath. Enjoy looking at roads venturing off under water and the fences going nowhere. Travel toward Alexandria Bay and just manage to hop aboard a tour of the 1000 Islands. Get a personable guide and stare at all the private homes and bays and boats on the placid islands. Stop at Heart Island and look at the two million buck castle in twenty minutes. Dash among tremendous ruins and brambles and leave, sweating, dream of what I may be one day not too far away. Back to dock and set out for Niagara, getting there and, ignoring a perfectly good Y for $1.75, we check into a $10 Red Coach Inn, where we bathe and get down for my sweetbread supper in first suit in ages. Walk partway across bridge, and then cross forbidden bridge to Goat Island to see the falls spray accented by the lights. Wander rapidly through sights and get back to room at 12 and sleep under air-conditioning.
THURSDAY, JULY 30. Up to listen to report on "Once Upon a Mattress" and breakfast on waffles. Out to look at the islands and drive across to Canada after I get thoroughly soaked and incidentally disgusted in the Cave of the Winds. Ride a terrifying incline car down to the Maid of the Mist and get a spectacular foam-flecked view of the Horseshoe Falls, magnificent in green and white. Out and buy Larry's gifts and then into boots and raincoat again to go into the caves under the Canadian falls, gasping and cleaning glasses and trying to see through the prevailing foam at the thunderous rush of water. Back to the car at 5:30 after Larry gets caught by the customs inspector. Through much of New York and a bit of Pennsylvania and finally we're into Ohio. Larry stops at 12 for coffee and I pack all things together and I finally get home at 1:30. We talk and I flop into first decent bed I've slept on for more than one night in two weeks.
FRIDAY, JULY 31. Up the next AM at 11 and do absolutely nothing all morning but read funny books until 2, when I have some eggs for breakfast. Mom phones and breaks things up a bit and I also use some very handy mirrors to come interestingly twice, just to prove my boredom. Read through dozens of funny books and look through house curiously. Supper is over and I call Dr. Dunlap and ask Mom and Rita to "Romeo and Juliet" at Stan Hywet. Mom argues and finally doesn't go, but Rita and I sit through long first act and meet Joan and Dave and talk and laugh and compare notes and I congratulate Dr. D. on his great set. The play is rather unintelligible, but cute in places, so it's fairly interesting. Afterwards we walk to coach house for phone, and back to home and get locked out of front door, and have to run after taillights of MG down old dark driveway to wait for cab on Portage Path. Home at midnight and finish watching "Mildred Pierce," with sobby Joan Crawford until 2. To bed quite tired and ready for a week of vacation.
Now in blank spot is a good chance to talk AGAINST vacationing in general. Sure, they're nice, and I certainly enjoyed San Francisco, but after a short span of time, really too short for comfort, I simply get tired of looking into old houses or museums of rows of souvenirs and mementoes, or galleries of pictures and paintings and sculpture, or miles of picturesque countryside. One museum is very like another if they're skimmed through without having TIME to appreciate individual strong points. Anyway, my taste for history is certainly lacking, and I couldn't care too much if the gates were locked about Old Ironsides. Things like "The Breakers," and the Castle on Heart Island certainly stand out, but then the stupidities of sightseeing in general also impress themselves onto the mind very heartily. The perpetual photographers who thinks he has exclusive rights to a sign or a sidewalk or a point of observation, and possibly even worse the one who insists on sticking a relative into the view---certainly to no good effect---make viewing rather disgusting. Why is it that people seem to be too loud and too quarrelsome on vacations, and certainly always dress horridly? They see for the sake of seeing, not for ABSORBING, and if I don't watch out I may be getting that way, too, through sheer surfeit of sightseeing. I feel almost glad of a chance to get back to NYC, where I can sightsee without being a tourist, which is perhaps the best combination of all.