1979 1 of 5
JOURNAL OF 1979
My journal from 1979 contains many "see DIARY XXXX" references. These will be filled in later; I just want to get the BASIC journal pages on the website. Since there is no journal from January 1 through March 21, I've put LIFELIST entries for those dates at the end of this year.
THURSDAY, 3/22/79: The Bejart "Amor di Poeta" was good and sexy, and some of the cast is TRULY edible, like Yann Le Gac as the motorcyclist and Bertrand Pie as the cat and a golden Jean-Marie Limon as Dionysius, Alex and Andre and I follow my suggestion and eat at Iroha, pretty authentic Japanese food at a reasonable price right in Times Square area.
FRIDAY, 3/23/79: Amy's over and I finish her cards 11-12:30, then finish the Mechanisms of Pain index and take it in at 4:45 to find Larry gone, but get new computer information from Virginia Martin, find that Laura's leaving, get a Raven catalog from Laura, find that Terry's working there on a freelance basis, Virginia needs people to work for her, and Berta's thinking of giving me a steady "Neurophysiology" journal to index! Xerox a few things and leave HAPPY to have been there. Burger King on W. 8th for dinner, a circus, pasty Whalers, and meet Arnie and Andre and John Gessner and Alex and a friend for Sheikh Musaffer and the Jerrahi Dervishes of Istanbul, who turn in ring-around-the-rosy circles rather than spin, and I get VERY annoyed by cameras clicking and flashing, and like Krishnamurti's remembering my "Man and man or woman and woman" HE remembers my question, after his anomalous "Thank you" and asks "Can I take a question from a photographer?" To Dennis's for something to eat and bring down my steak for his Lacotta and sex.
SATURDAY, 3/24/79: Wash half the dishes, get to Arnie's at 3 for good ice skating, a melodramatic "Vanessa" that's another silly opera (though Anatole and she DO get married and go to Paris, but Erika now waits for someone to return), then to Pope's for his exciting astrological reading (things will be happening this summer --- you BET!) until 9:15, then back to Arnie's for his tape of Balanchine #4, with pretty Robert Weiss in "Ballo de Regina," Baryshnikov another Nutcracker in "Steadfast Tin Solder," a wispy "Elegie," a lost Swan Lake PDD, and "Allegro Brillante" with Martins and Farrell that was very forgettable. Back to Pope's to trounce him in two Scrabble games, then back to watch the first of "Glittering Prizes," just EXCELLENT on a number of counts, with a BEAUTIFUL David Robb as Don, and Arnie enters at 2:15 and feeds me dumplings and egg-curry-vegetable soup, then I get the Times at 3 and do a puzzle and bed at 4 am!
SUNDAY, 3/25/79: Wake with a dream of polluted rivers (see DIARY 14208), do the other puzzle and read the Times, then watch "Hey-Day of Europe" 2-3 that gives me all SORTS of ideas that I write up in LOOKING AT HISTORY (see DIARY 14202-14207), and part of the problem of my OLD filing system is: where would I FILE that so I knew where the information was? Had started sorting out receipts when Springer sent a LAST check before a PREVIOUS one, and decided to start preparing for tax-report filling out, but trundled them back and forth for a couple days, putting some of them into the receipt drawer, other into new stacks, making new lists of expenses. Called Dennis at 11:45 and he invited me to brunch, then gets a call from a trick so I wait till he calls back at 4, not having eaten, then down about 5 with Times for food and finish reading the paper, catch up with his New Yorkers, listen to his music and his complaints about Tree, shower, and we get to bed to talk and not do much else, enjoying the warmth of his new comforter.
MONDAY, 3/26/79: Get groceries and one last (?) request for a complete JOYI report, finish putting receipts away and look at Canadian map AGAIN, since Dennis and I are AGAIN talking of going there, and he's up at 9:30 to eat and watch "City of Gold," about Dawson City, by coincidence, and he says he likes old things but isn't sure about traveling 10 days just to GET there. I've drunk lots and talk about how everyone seems to be BEHIND me: people in indexing, Rolf in programming, Dennis in travels, and I have to keep PUSHING for FORGING ahead, with is getting TIRING. Lay stoned-drunk and think to finish DIARY and go to NOTEBOOK (see DIARY 14209-14210). Also DID feel virtuous about practicing singing yesterday and today.
TUESDAY, 3/27/79: We're both awake at 6:30, bright light outside, and he's got time to go downstairs even at 8:45. I make up NOTEBOOK tabs and type up the decision to switch on the LAST DIARY PAGE 14210, and type these 2 pages by 10:05, seemingly happy to get an early start on THIS bright day. Lots of phone calls, I jerk off during the day, take the laundry out and mail JOYI and get a card for Arnie's birthday, have lunch, then Sherryl's over at 4 after I shower, and she stays until 5:15, which gives me time to pick up mattress pad in case I want to sleep in my bed tonight or tomorrow, and then get to Jo's to explain indexing 6:15-7:15, but she goes out of town on weekends and can't get to the Heights, though Dennis is willing to teach her. Then to "On Golden Pond" in the refurbished Apollo Theater, and both are parallel: pleasant, modern, adequate, amusing yet nothing to stand out or talk about. Out at 10:30 hungry, Dennis has dynamite chicken and broth from before when I was at Andre's, and we buy Praline which isn't so great alone but is FABULOUS on his vanilla ice cream. Cuddle at 12:30 and tired to bed.
WEDNESDAY, 3/28/79: We come. Eggs and prunes for breakfast, inspiring the exchange: Dennis (eating prunes): "It is not NICE to be SNIDE to others" at which point I laugh and say "Or others will throw PRUNES at you!" Have a great discussion about THE PSYCHOANALYTIC VERSUS EST VIEWPOINTS (see ESSAYS 1, below) and he leaves for work at 9:45 and the REST of the morning I'm on the phone to Jane Hodi for Sherryl's index, Sherryl, Barbara Toniolo on Barbara's index, Rolf on the car and PLEASE get the computer, Andre and Arnie for Friday's dance program, and Everett about my index, and Jeff Robbins and Jo and Dennis about EARTH-MOON index, and I haven't STARTED on the Solar Heating and it's 2 pm already (having decided to say "pages typed" ONLY when it's NOT in the NOTEBOOK 1979). Work on Solar Heating #5 and eat JUST before class, which I KNOW to be a mistake, so lesson is pretty bad and we chat about her MS until 5:10, when I find the library's closed, so I go to Avi's to work and finish all I can do on Solar Heating until class time (see ACTUALISM 1), then home to find a note from Dennis saying "Come on down," and he has chicken from the deli, rice, and a banana split and shows off his Volume 8 of collectibles and we're into bed cuddling, he's SWEET, at 1 am.
ESSAYS 1
3/28/79
THE PSYCHOANALYTIC VERSUS EST VIEWPOINTS
Dennis says (per "On Golden Pond") that when people KNOW each other through ALL the changes in their lives, they have a RICHER relationship, as I should "respect" him more because he moved from financial dependence on his parents to independence when I knew him. I say that I adhere more firmly to est's viewpoint that it's not what's BEHIND the action or the time or the circumstances that counts, but the ACTUAL circumstances and the ACTUAL response. He insists my mother is still with me, and I agree that I'm not ALL the way to the est side because I'm a great believer in CHANGE and PROGRESS, which admits of a KNOWLEDGE of the past, if only the present can be compared with it and the direction of the future determined. He says that the problems of childhood and the adjustments of adolescence and the trauma of adulthood are all things which have to be understood, and I say that's a way of abnegating responsibility: you are who you are REGARDLESS of how you got there: if you can comb your hair (short or long obviously based on the past, with equipment BOUGHT in the past) TIED to the idea that you ALWAYS have to get the pocket mirror from the cabinet, you may NEVER put a NEW mirror on the WALL, and FREEDOM from that habit, predilection, or taste could let you look at it ANEW. I've progressed along this line of viewpoint, and I hope to go FARTHER along it, while he seems a bit too stuck in the PSYCHOANALYTIC view that there's always something to talk about as forming a background for action. There's little SURPRISE there, I think to myself now, whereas someone acting FRESHLY, from a CLEAR view of what's so NOW, is much more apt to SURPRISE you, ENDEAR you, and make life more INTERESTING than someone who's rather predictable because he's frozen into his views, which IN FACT create his reactions to today's events, and even as he SAYS he can't change, or can't free himself from the past, he's binding himself to the past ever more tightly, while I, recklessly, throwing myself FREELY into the future, can have greater possibilities for pleasure (and pain) and unpredictability, yet hope to get far MORE of the RANGE of life than he might expect espousing the psychoanalytic viewpoint.
THURSDAY, 3/29/79: I hand him off for GREAT sex, then throw myself into indexing, take in SH5 despite fact Helen Ferguson is taken away to a sick mother, pick up Ethology for Sherryl, get to Andre's to find he's doing as HE thinks on Adenosine index, which is OK enough, gives me a pen wrapped in so many Tiffany's wrappings it's almost obviously NOT Tiffany's, and then I get a decent Mamma Mia pizza (they don't deliver) and a so-so caramel-fudge ice cream cone and get LOTS of indexes in mail, another one from Angie, and Sherryl's in at 1:10, we talk until 2, she starts and I put indexes away and figure I have to WORK these next few days! This at 3:20. We work together until 5, when I shower, she types cards and sees her errors, leaves at 5:45, and I get out at 6 to be late at 6:40 but we're around to Famous Restaurant for my GREAT liver and pork chop and bacon for $4, and then to an AWFUL "Zoot Suit" that Paul Bosten's afraid might rouse the Spanish rabble and cause riots in the streets. Dana thinks he's a snob for not liking it or the audience, and I assure him he is, but I agree with him too, which doesn't make it more or less right or wrong. To Howard Johnson's for their favorite coconut chocolate cake and my GREAT butter crunch hot fudge sundae, and home to Dennis's meeting Paul Steiga on the subway (as I met Joe1 going out this morning), and down to Dennis's to chat and get to bed.
FRIDAY, 3/30/79: He wishes me happy birthday and leaves bed and I jerk off alone, then up for soup with rice and toast and upstairs to read some of Sturgeon, fabulous, and talk to Amy and Arnie and Pope (see ESSAY 2, below) on post-destination, make list of indexers and indexes (I have 6 by 4/20!) and freeze and boil tap water to see air-retention of both, and Arnie picks up tickets to Capoiera on Friday and I debate Bill Kirkpatrick tonight and type the essay and finish this at 1:35, hungry! Called Arnie and he'd recorded the "Glittering Prizes," and Amy said she might want a break, so I mark pages in the Ethological Method book from 1:50-2:15, then talk to Sylvan Levy for 15 minutes and HE wants to start, and continue marking from 3:20-3:00 and then 3:15-3:30 and phone Amy, who has a body session at 6, so we're over at 4:15 and out at 5:45, the second not as good as the first, though Malcolm Stoddard was handsome as Dan. Home and eat and get out at 7:30 to get Bill Kirkpatrick's tickets at 8:10, and he's QUITE GOOD, his missing ear and bandages and earnest face making ME, at least, go out to him, and he serves coffee and wine during the intermission which stones me a bit and I LIKE him, admiring the work he's done on his body to become quite sexy, though there's a fiery red spot alongside his ass where the dance-belt rubs which is a bit of a turnoff. Out at 10:15 and still stoned decide to see when "The Warriors" is playing. It started at 10:05 and they're jammed, but I say "You surely have ONE more seat," so he lets me in and it's jammed and loud, but "The Warriors" at least has nice bodies, though LOTS of violence, and it's interesting to see the audience GO ALONG with it, going "Ohhhh!" when the black gang confronts them at the end (are they sympathetic to the Warriors and fear the blacks might beat them up?), and then the blacks attack the Cyrus killer and the Warriors go free. (Funny what the black audience DOESN'T laugh at in WWIU: "I'm responsible for ANYTHING they stick in their mouths; knock the little man right out of the boat," and FEW know THAT simile!) "Which Way Is Up?" is MORE violent with fucking and dirty words and slappings upside the head, and I stay to see the start of "The Warriors" by 2:30, maybe getting a contact high on the grass being smoked despite the usher insisting "No reefer" and get out and home very tired, though happy that I've done things that I wanted to do. Note on the door "Come on down" from Dennis, so I DO, at 2:45, and we chat and sleep.
ESSAYS 2
3/30/79
POST-DESTINATION AND PRE-DESTINATION
Pope and I have a lovely talk, and he can't seem to understand my point: that the past IS there all the time and the PRESENT is all the time there and the FUTURE is all the time there, but that's not really PREDESTINATION. If X died last year, you wouldn't say it was PREDETERMINED, but it can be called POST-DETERMINED, since you can determine when he died after it happened. But PREdetermining it wouldn't be the same as PREDESTINING it, since the individual possessed freewill all the way along---if a person PRE-SEES his death, he would ALSO be able to see HIMSELF pre-seeing his death and going through all the antics to die at that time, INCLUDING the apathy that would come over him and the FEELING of predestination, yet it's only predetermined. The old analogy of a teacher watching a student adding a column of figures and getting a wrong units-column sum. The final sum WILL be wrong, though the teacher hardly MADE it wrong by SEEING that it was wrong. As far as "fate" or "destiny" is concerned, that's only a CONCEPT which has no determining possibilities at ALL, just as even GOD IN THIS SENSE, is only a concept, so God can't MAKE a person die or not, it's something which the current road, NO MATTER HOW MUCH IT TURNS, will lead to at that date at that place. Which leads me to mention to Pope my thought of "You die wearing a certain shirt, having eaten a certain last meal, having said a last word, but these "lasts" don't CAUSE the death, though they MUST BE there, and there's no consideration of IF or MAYBE, any more than you "doubt" the intersection of Amsterdam and 123rd Street, even though you may never have been there (hm, or does Amsterdam change to something like Lenox at 110th?) Nothing happens to the FLOW OF TIME so that 1980 would CHANGE anything, so why should a death in 1984 that is KNOWN differ from a death in 1974 that is KNOWN. Why should one be PREDESTINED and the other POST-DESTINED. They're both DESTINED, though that wouldn't affect what the person who died did. Read him Wheeler's quote of the "sacredness of the mile and the secularity of the foot" and then the religious machinations to "prove" the magic number of 5280, as we try to "prove" or "say why" for 3.1010 cm/sec. Good talk.
SATURDAY, 3/31/79: Up at 9 to fix HIS bathroom rug until 10:30, then phone Paul and he's coming with Barbara so he can find the way, then talk about 2 hours with Bruce about the "paradox" of mortality and immortality, which is REALLY a question of dimensions, it seems (see ESSAYS 3) until Sylvan enters at 12, and I vacuum between checking him and getting him started, and then he leaves at 4, and I'd talked to Dennis about how to rescue his prune-stuffed dish and find Rolf's not coming, then finish cleaning up the place in case Paul wants to stay HERE overnight, and then Amy phones at 5:30 and says she's finished, so I coax her over THEN, and she comes, checking everything out by 7 pm, and I'm glad I'd showered BEFORE, in preparation for fixing Dennis's washers in the sink. Down at 7 and try to fix them, but they're rusted on, so put stuff away and help him with a few items and people start coming in, interestingly Susan McMahon and Pope, and the party begins. Barbara talks with Dick McLean most of the evening, Don and Ernie seem rather lost, Susan says she drinks so much she's stoned, talking to Amy and Adam mostly, and poor Adam's sick so he doesn't stay long, trusting Amy to stay with us. Pope and Amy enjoy each other, Barbara leaves early, and Joan, Guy, Art and Bob, Dana and Jody, and Catherine Ellis doesn't come, but Lyn does, and Dennis gets off on him. So we were about 16: me, Dennis, Don and Ernie, Susan and Bill, Amy and Adam, Susan and Pope, John Casarino charming everyone and bedding Paul, Paul and Dick, Barbara, Paul Bosten late but pleasant, Lyn latest, Arnie, who gives me "As They Were," Susan "Birdy," Don and Ernie a shirt, a puzzle, and a phallic dump truck that Susan blushes over, and John a Snoopy-basketball-bank, and then John Vinton comes in about 1:30 when Dennis and Amy and I are rubbing heads, rather stoned, and he chats until about 2:30, and they leave and we're to bed.
SUNDAY, 4/1/79: Wake about 10 and have sex (no, we DON'T) and his folks call and we're out at 12:20 to meet Dick and Paul at the Bar at Windows on the World, and Dick pays, we enjoy talking, they want brunch, the buffet is full until 2:30, the Hors D'Oeurverie available at 1:25 when he said we'd have to wait until 1:30, but our $50+ brunch is meager and rather disappointing, particularly a too-brandy-y Tintoretto with acrid pear brandy, and Paul's eggs Sardou on artichoke hearts, but we talk of travel and money and they leave at 3:30, Dennis with them, and I subway home stoned and pull down the shades and jerk off from 4-4:30, then had gotten the Times, do the puzzles, which are difficult, Dennis calls and I say I'm having fun, watch "Lion, Witch and Wardrobe" from 8-9, reading papers, decide I MUST stop singing lessons, read bit of "Birdy" and "As They Were" in bed after coming a SECOND time, having had popcorn during Monty Python and GREAT Tanka-short and Eduardo-healer.
MONDAY, 4/2/79: Dream of travel to Ireland (from Paul going to Wales?) and valleys flooded at other times --- and bus driving, going off to a play, dealing with guides --- notes all I remember) Up late, slightly hung over, try phoning Dennis but he's gone by 9:30, then phone Arnie at 11:45 for "Richard II," which he has, and go over at 12:45 for him to be in at 1, watch it until just before 5, but it's not the best (see ESSAYS 4, after WEDNESDAY, 4/4/79), home disgusted, reading mail, starting on the jigsaw puzzle after Sherryl's over 5:55 (I'd gotten out of the shower and was just finishing the dishes) until 7:40, then watch second "Witch" animation while enjoying puzzle, and STILL there's no suspense: if you KILL the lion and he comes back to life, what can you FEAR? Put on ham, Dennis is in at 9:30, we eat lots, look over writeup and I give him new indexing guides, and then we look at Jo's book and discuss it, and then it's 11:30 and we're to bed. (Dream of one-week travel to Italy and I'm debating staying another, feeling FRUSTRATED)
TUESDAY, 4/3/79: No sex this morning either, I cut up ham for a filing omelet with onions and he's out early at 8:45. I finish puzzle by 11:30, then shower after phoning Paul for tickets for tonight, washed dishes, trying to do lightwork, then to surgery (see ACTUALISM 1) on generative, good, no JOYI, groceries to 3:25, then typed some pages before Susan came over at 3:50, and she talked about how it was PROVEN to her that her bosses in the real estate office cheated, as she thought, and I said that regretfully I decided not to follow up the TRAVEL business because it was so lousy. She's sorry the Cat index was cancelled, wants another if it comes in, and I get on the table at 4:45 for a welcome session and off at 6. She leaves, I put on hamburger for a quick snack, Amy's over at 7:05, returns home for binoculars, and we're to "Faith Healer," a very cerebral play with a small-unamplified-voice James Mason, an effective actressy Clarissa Kaye, his wife, whose father Dennis chatted with; and a funny Donal Donnelly, who's very PLEASANT in his parts, but I didn't grok till they TOLD me that Francis has been KILLED, THEY didn't get the significance of the poster's: Faith Healer, One Night Only, and Amy says it WAS a good representation of psychicism, but VERY low frequency. She doesn't want to eat, Dennis does, so we're to the Hunan in the Heights for a decent meal until 12, walk Amy home, then into bed to play hard for a few minutes then he says he's tired and we'll do it in the morning, I lay and sleep.
ESSAYS 3
4/3/79
"PARADOX" OF REALITY AND IMMORTALITY
Bruce and I are talking (see NOTEBOOK 5) about how Actualism seems to help the practical and gives some idea of the immortal, and I mention my typical statement that these two are paradoxical: one is finite, the other infinite; one is here-now, the other is everywhere-everytime; one is pragmatic and physical and testable, the other is mystical and spiritual and untestable. Then he uses the word DIMENSIONS and I immediately conceive that these do not need to be any MORE incompatible than HEIGHT is to LENGTH. They're quite independent, measured in different "directions," and from the point of view of light sources and shadows, a fruitful analogy, may be quite INVISIBLE one from the other. Project light from ABOVE and you get a PERFECT representation of the length and width but NO representation of height. Project light from the SIDE and you get a PERFECT representation of height and width but NO representation of length. So Actualism could be LOOKED at as a way of MOVING the light from above to the side (probably better to say moving the light from ONE SIDEDNESS to ABOVE the object---OUT OF THE PLANE of the physical and UP INTO the spiritual). Just as the shadow from INTERMEDIATE points may be confusing and unclear, so you have to REACH the "top," if only for a moment, to get a "picture" of the TRUE length, so that you can then JUDGE whether some particular view is "more from the top than from the side" or whatever. GREAT analogy, part of the article!! OUR view of OURSELVES is like looking through a TIME SLICE of a railroad track: the familiar I-beam shape. But if we can get OUT of the familiar, look ALONG time, we can see that the track goes on AS FAR AS WE CAN SEE, maybe taking courses including ups and downs that THE TRACK ITSELF CAN'T SEE---and maybe the tracks JOINED TOGETHER after great distances are different LIVES, just as the track may be under different jurisdictions as it moves from state to state. From the point of view INSIDE the track, there's a STOPPING AND A STARTING, from a point of view ABOVE the track, it's just CONTINUOUS, and what affects ONE section affects them ALL. This can be tied in with predestination and post-destination (ESSAY 2, above), too, since the tracks DO have stops and starts. ALL FROM A CHAT WITH BRUCE.
WEDNESDAY, 4/4/79: (Dream of climbing ROCKS, which roll down into valley, and HUGE rock DESTROYS village) Alarm rings, he shuts it off, I ask "What time is it?" and he says "Seven something," which infuriates me but I swallow it. He goes back to sleep and I doze until 8:10, then get upstairs without eating to wash socks and get to these pages after clearing up MESSY desk, going to index at 10:45 after getting a call from Jo, me telling her to phone for index, and from Alice Duskey, sending me stuff about computerized indexing. More phone calls and I never DO get to index, showering and eating and getting out at 12:15 to meet Amy on the subway and at Actualism Alice suggests we work on the urinary system, which isn't bad (see ACTUALISM 2) and out at 2:40 to buy groceries and check no JOYI and get hung up on GREAT jeans and crotch and thermal sweater on a "Show Business" reader on the subway, and back at 3:25 to put things away and Susan gets in at 3:50 and has Dennis's old coffee and we chat about real estate business (HA!!!, see now that I'd MISTAKENLY typed "today" as TUESDAY again, but I TYPED this already on NOTEBOOK 7!!), DO get to ethology index at 11:45 and have lunch between 2:10 and 2:35, then at 4 ROLF calls and says he has a BLOCK on the index, and I work from 4:30-4:40 when he comes over, and I try to push him through marking page ranges, working 5-5:30, but he says he's getting more and more frustrated and anxious, so we're into the living room and I give him a downpour and spinning and he says his back is sore and MAYBE it has something to do with emotional problems. I say I HAVE to leave at 7:15, and he finally asks "Where are you going?" and I say to Actualism and he seems contented. Worry about the report as we do the personality recognition in center 6, but though I blabber around, Michael says it's very good and Alice says we've all come a step forward (see ACTUALISM 2). Out early and home (Andre HAD wanted me to come to his place tonight, but then he said he had to work with his tax man in Brooklyn on Avenue N tomorrow, so he'd be over about 11, which was later changed to 8:30!) to put on the last of the ham and watch Patricia Birch on "Skyline" from 11:30-12, and then jerk off with rapidity and some liquor, Rolf NOT having called for more talk. Listen to RECORDS till 2, first time in LONG time, and I LIKED it.
ESSAYS 4
4/4/79
ON WATCHING SHAKESPEARE'S "KIND RICHARD II"
Amazing how we know so much MORE about Britain's history, how we so much assume SHAKESPEARE is a great playwright (though there's no doubting this, since EACH speech, though boring in CONTEXT, is marvelously wrought, finely honed in rhythm and rhyme, and complexly thoughtful and so freighted with simile and metaphor that each speech is a seed that fruits in the mind), and how much we assume we should "be interested" in him and his plays. Which shows how ENGLISH we are still, how influenced by old-age thoughts we are, how willing we are to subject ourselves to the past. But there are hardly KINGS anymore, let alone people who use words so wisely. Yet with people seeing such POMP, they just feel THEY should have more; or alternatively know that POWER and WEALTH isn't an automatic solution to happiness, good living, and survival. And again I question my list-keeping: WHY should it be so important to me that I see all these (though certainly it's so far between that I DO see some of them that they're discoveries all over again), since it's not this century, this country, nor these morals, so it's quite NOT here-now-it. ACTORS as much as anything keep them going: if HE did Richard II and HE was historically famous, I want to do Richard II and keep my performance alive FOREVER on cassette tape, as I'd debated vaguely, but then how often would you PLAY it, you'd have an excuse not to see a NEW one, and it would be EVEN MORE a freezing of the past rather than an absorption for CURRENT enjoyment, to reflect CURRENT values, to evaluate from where I am at this moment, which is probably different from where I was when I enjoyed it the LAST time. What NEW connections can I make now that I've made these connections so far in my life? They're a MODEL against which thoughts on love, faithfulness, service, honesty, loyalty, humor, beauty, truth, will, and other ETERNAL emotions and values can be judged against FORMER values: just as seeing a MOVIE again can show you how much you've changed since you were a kid. So the SEEING is fine, the FREEZING OF ONE PERFORMANCE would lead to the stagnation, the repetition for the sake of repetition and list-making, the holding to the past at the expense of investigating the future.
THURSDAY, 4/5/79: Rolf doesn't call early, as he'd said, and I have breakfast and water plants and talk on phone until 10:20, when I work 20 minutes on the index, Rolf's line is busy, so I call Amy AGAIN and talk with her about what to do, and she just talks about "the flag of mental illness that he waves" like "she waves the flag of what a horrible family she had and a sister who committed suicide." Then get Rolf and he HAS drunk a lot, now has a hangover, and will call later this afternoon. I call Larry Meyer and say it might be Monday, then work 11:05-12:40, maybe get the mail, then work 1-3:35, THEN going for mail, talking to Pope about the Cheeselovers package that I paid NOTHING for (and look AGAIN at my $2/month certificate and it MIGHT be special!, should USE it more often!!), then back to work 4:25-5:50, finishing it all up a day ahead of time, then Amy comes over to see if she wants to finish Rolf's index, which she doesn't, though she says she'll take the Hutchinson's disease one, and she and I climb to the roof, me taking down NEW Watson birdfeeder on way, but there was a LOVELY iridescent red-capped bird outside, and in the meantime Rolf calls and says Veneroso is going to Maine to look at property to buy, Rolf TOLD him, the first friend he's done it to, that he's gay (Did he react? Not at all; he'd had a gay relationship in college, lots of his friends are gay, but he didn't say he'd expected the news from me), and that his friend Jorge is performing his LAST performance with Senta Driver IN MAINE 20 miles from where Veneroso's going, so he drops by at 7:30 to deliver the dictionary, having said before he wasn't going to finish the index, and COULD he have known this before to SIMULATE a block so that he could go without finishing it?? Everyone's saying he's just not to be TRUSTED anymore! Clear up some stuff, maybe even taking a few minutes for lightwork, SO relieved that I don't have the voice lessons hanging over me at this time, and then Andre's over at 8:30 and we work till 10, when I watch "Glittering Prizes" (oh, had made steak for dinner quickly before he arrived) with Dennis eating more of the steak he'd fried for himself in my old pan(!), and they say it's great but Andre has to meet a client tomorrow morning, and he'll deliver the index to Garland and I insist he take $10, which he does, and Dennis offers more ice cream so I work with Andre 11:15-12:30, then we're down for another banana split, tales from Dennis, and he's horny so Andre takes my keys up and Dennis gets into cock and he comes spraying on my chest, which I use on mine and get all wet from come and we drift off to sleep happily about 1:30.
FRIDAY, 4/6/79: Yesterday or today I had the strange dream of wandering through an abandoned VERY large manor house, finding a LARGE leaf-shaped "Flexible Flyer" sled in the back, then telling someone about it on a train and he'd lived there and it was HIS sled. Arresting detail to dream. He puts on coffee and I take up a hot 2 cupfuls to Andre at 7:30, also taking up John's salad bowl from the party Saturday, and we work through his stuff from 7:30-11, takes my index to Garland, more are phoned in, and I managed to mark pages 1-102 from 8:55-10, then work solid 10:50-1:35, taking off a bit for lunch of hamburger, then work 1:55-3:50 finishing marking the pre-algebra book, phone Everett with questions and assurances I'll get it to him personally on Monday, and Sherryl called at 3:30 to come early, comes in and lies on the floor at 3:45, I wash face and teeth and we get started at 4:10, and she's overreacted to my digging out more items and has the pages ALL marked up, too many cards, and MANY too many involuted details to handle. I mark some pages for her, she seems to be clearer, and will call me next week, and she leaves at 6:10 after Dennis calls and I agree to make tuna casserole for dinner before Capoieras, Amy doesn't want to come because relatives are coming over, Sherryl's going to picket Con Ed about nuclear power plants (was surprised to read Sunday's Times to find how dangerous the accident at the Three Mile Island plant WAS!), and I don't have time to shower and had NO lightwork today when Dennis enters at 6:40, me working on the final typing 6:10-6:40, we eat, meet Arnie at Love and Henry at 7:20, meet Dennis's cute Chris, friend of pocked Margaret from Tree, and Dennis said that he'd been greeted at work with the resignation of his Time-Life nemesis Frank Osborne. Doors open about 8 and it starts at 8:30, and the Candomble is lots of jerky dancing but SEXY guys, SEXY bodies and faces and smiles and a HUGE sculptured black chest on the bongoist James Cherry, since Joe Sircus in the Soho article appears to be white, and it's probably Loremil Machado, the choreographer, who's the fabulous white body in all the dances. Out at 10:30, facing a disappointed Arnie who thought my invitation to dinner was AFTER the performance, not before, and Dennis and I go down to his place and I succeed with a bit of buttermilk, half and half, and Praline, and have TWO of his oranges and rum and get to bed to play with cocks but he turns on TV and we watch end of "High Sierra" where he pops out to (Humphrey Bogart, that is) greet his dog and a sniper who's even HIGHER in the Sierras than HE shoots him for Ida Lupino to smile bitterly at the end that he's now "Free, he's FREE!" Try two minutes of lightwork and sleep about 1:30.
SATURDAY, 4/7/79: Wake at 9:10 and so have time for lightwork before Dennis wakes about 9:40 and we jerk off fairly quickly: I on him and then he on himself, and up at 10 to shower, read New Yorker while he fries eggs and we have toast and I get upstairs at 11 while he goes for a haircut, and I water plants and put things away and Sylvan rings at 11:35 and isn't doing badly, though he's got a LOT to learn in EDITING CARDS, and he leaves at 1:20 because he has another appointment and I get to typing pages for the day, finishing about 2:50 and eager to finish Pre-algebra and get to Rolf's index. Edit Pre-algebra from 2:55-3:30, and then Andre enters with Adenosine stuff to be checked from 3:40-4:30, saying he has to leave then for something else, talking on the phone in a way that wouldn't convince ME that he was blameless in the handling of people coming in by bus from the airport. Continue on Pre-algebra from 4:40-5:20, when I probably eat, then from 5:45-9:10, then put things away and work on his cards for the Nutrition and the Brain volume #3 from 9:20-10, when I watch "Scarlet Letter" from 10-1:15, stopping in the middle to have popcorn, and maybe this is the evening I decide to listen to music after jerking off, having good fantasies like always.
SUNDAY, 4/8/79: Wake and do lightwork at 9 until 10:30, then phone Dennis who's still in bed because he'd been with someone who left at 3 am, and read the Times as he chats with his folks, doing the puzzle when it takes a long time for him to make his Scottish oatmeal, and I'm glad I'd told him AHEAD that I wanted to be upstairs at 1:30 to watch "Giselle" because I JUST make it after tearing MANY articles on travel and scrapbook quality out of it, piling them onto a growing pile in the bedroom, and watch Lavrovsky in pure black all the time so there's no crotch showing, though he's tall and elegant (and relatively earthbound) and Bessmertnova, who has the great advantage of being VERY tiny but who dances not at ALL during the mad scene, and Kozlova, not bad as Myrta lit from the back, but the quality of the FILM is poor: people going out of focus, and it's GREATLY cut, and the ads fall right into the middle, and there's no peasant dance in the first act. Finish the puzzle while watching acrobatic skiing and "The Fittest of Them All" swimming in white water on NBC Sportsworld from 3-4:30, then maybe have something to eat and get back to the index from 5:40-7, at which time I check the calendar for something for tomorrow and find I have an OPERA TONIGHT, and make scrambled eggs and wash my face and put on jeans and leave at 7:15 to meet Anthony and Cookie Gray going into the subscription seats, so I tell them about my indexing plight and he gives me his card: HE'S a consultant on minis and micros! "Aroldo" by Verdi is pretty, but not spectacular, but the chorus (of 240!) has some nice things in their pillowy-mushy diction, and Caballe is impressive in her hollers, but I won't subscribe to this again, even it's a kick that it's being taped for Columbia this evening, live, with all the rustles from the page-turners. Back to edit from 11:40-1:05 and then from 1:30-3:30 (can't IMAGINE what I did in the MIDDLE --- Did DENNIS call?), and bed.
MONDAY, 4/9/79: Up at 9:15 to get right to the index, typing 38 pages by 11:35, proofreading until 11:50 when Andre arrives, work with him until 1:55 when (oops, almost forgot dream note from this morning: Dictator rules though slot machine-like computers: put in coin and ask question and get answers on little chits from bottom. Lots of us take a COURSE in this and I get a high score, and since I'd gotten highest score in physics last year, I get cards for "sales" saying I can enter 2 of my ideas and get PAID for them. Wait for some helpers to input ahead of me, and he takes his ID and two quarters, and then I put in my ideas while others wait behind me.) he HAS to meet someone at 2:30 so he leaves and I call phone Sherryl who READS cards to me so I can check them, and she's doing well, and I leave in the rain at 4 after talking to Arnie about the movies at Lincoln Center and take a fast shower and deliver Pre-algebra to a pudgy Everett Draper who says I'll be getting more basic texts to index, and leave about 5 to walk to subway and get up to Bruno Walter Auditorium at 5:15 to find it full, so stand in line with a CUTE dancer with NICE legs in faded jeans pressing up against me, and Marcia Siegel doesn't want the apartment next to Paul's 4 rooms for $160 in Cobble Hill, and I get a ticket at 5:55 and talk to John Wilson, and watch cutesy Dale Harris introduce films from the Leonide Massine Collection: Bell Telephone 1961 9 minutes of Fonteyn and Somes (sic) in a "Firebird," and a TERRIBLY filmed "just a record" 1964 "Prince Igor" with Nureyev leaping, and Hugh Laing in "Afternoon of a Faun" stilted but with that "erection-upping" of the scarf, and Harris has a good anecdote: This reduced it to ONE nymph, and Serge Lifar did it with NO nymphs, TRULY autoerotic," and Diana Adams, Laing's wife, appeared briefly and amusingly. Then an interesting "Les Biches" with Nemchinova on someone's patio in color, pieces of Massine in "Three-Cornered Hat" from a great distance in 1937, the year before he left to form deBasil Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, and then 2 minutes of a too-speedy "Boutique Fantasque" with Danilova and Massine, and I left about 7:30 after one piece of "Good Humoured Ladies" showed it to be a costume-farce, so I left in the rain to grab a cab and have him wait while I bought a bottle of booze and got up to Virginia Martin's apartment on W. 84 (15, apt 2-C?) to meet a sexy Jerry who turns out to be a supplier, Charlotte Fahn who's drunk and chatty about computers and journals, Janet Isgreen who's dying to do indexes to support her kids, Allan the President who says he'll publish my indexing book!!!!, Berta who (probably again) says that John Cernusca used to be a priest, Laura who's pleased I'm there, and others I chat with, trying to call Dennis at 9:30 and 10:30 to say I won't be home for the Academy Awards, but then the party simmers down after I've had lots of wine and Berta's chocolate cake and peach pie for dessert after Virginia's strawberry shortcake and chocolate cheesecake, and I reel home, VERY pleased with the idea of the index book being published, find an angry Dennis downstairs, watch the awards, blown away as was Jon Voight with the marvelous understatement of Olivier's acceptance speech, and pleased with Voight and Fonda getting the acting Oscars but finding it strange that "Deer Hunter" got the award for best picture, getting 5 awards in all. Dennis stays downstairs and I get to sleep.
TUESDAY, 4/10/79: Again (or for the first time) do a long lightwork session, then get to Hematology index from 11:25-4:05, taking 10 minutes out to talk to Sherryl, then eat and shower and work on index from 4:40-5, when Amy comes in to chat, says she'll take "Huntington's Disease," and then gets on the table with the heater blazing away, and I don't feel that I'm doing very well (in fact I DIDN'T do a lightwork session, since I recall NOW I hadn't even formed HIERARCHY this morning), and I get rid of her at 7, mark and type and edit from 7-8:30, then watch Phillip Glass on Skyline from 8:30-9, then a portrait of the Library of Congress that I thought was only 9-10, but at 10:20 I put on the chicken, which finishes at 12, talk to Dennis who isn't coming up again, but he says Jo's doing well, and I watch "A Matter of Time" from 11:30-1:30, just AWFUL, with Vincent Minelli directing his daughter Lisa in a BADLY dubbed thing with Ingrid Bergman playing a dotty old lady who gets the unbelievable maid of Lisa to blossom (she was hardly dowdy enough for the maid and hardly glamorous enough for the star afterward), and a TERRIBLE screen test in which she tells about how Ingrid must live, while she's getting bumped off, literally, by a taxi. Even Venice didn't look good.
WEDNESDAY, 4/11/79: Up at 9:40 and work till 11:30 editing, talking for 25 minutes to Art, who's mailing my auto registration, and the story HE tells: His father died just before his Ballroom show, now they're moving and he won't be there until the fall; his brother-in-law died and the next day Joyce had her second 1-month miscarriage. Bob's sexless in his 90-meetings-in-90-days AA inauguration which might turn him around, and the SM guy in Art's Manhattan Plaza apartment is fucked up. WHEW!! Then tear down a SECOND platter of birdseed the crazy lady put down upstairs, talked to Andre, and typed 26 pages in the index on Experimental Hematology Today from 11:30-1:35, finishing it until 2:10, getting out a bill, getting another index from Larry Meyer, talking to Sherryl, get to Amy's at 3:15 for a quick body session that she's sick to her stomach before, farting during, and plowing up my backbone after. Leave at 4:10, get banking done, then dash for the BROOKLYN-bound subways, realize it at Dekalb, get off, get the RR back to Pacific and THEN dash across for the express to find that it's the D, which takes me slowly up to 34th Street, where I wait a long time for the just-missed RR to go back, and get there at 5:15 to find Angie gone and a message from Andre. But he's not home anymore after we'd talked for minutes trying to get me together with Keith, whom he insists I tell nothing about Andre. Look through the VERY expensive Springer catalog (no indication of index in IT!) leave at 5:45, then decide to phone Barbara, who's home, so I subway up to her (having a slice of pizza for eating --- Dennis called to invite me down tonight), she'll take "Mother and Newborn," hadn't done lightwork, so we did it together, me DETERMINED not to be allergic to her cat, and it GOES! Out at 7:30 to a cute upstairs neighbor who says "Every time I see you it rains" and we walk up to Actualism for the lifebelt (see ACTUALISM 2), and I get rid of lots of ill-will (talked to woman upstairs on phone today?) and out at 10:30 and home at 11 with a bottle of Frangelico, Dennis has smoked, is cooking chicken with DELICIOUS buttermilk basting that bakes black, we look through New Yorker waiting for it, and eat about 12:30 and fall into bed saying we'll play tomorrow morning, and I don't have enough wakefulness to light.
THURSDAY, 4/12/79: Alarm goes and he's up for sex, we both jerk off nicely, and he makes oatmeal and nuts and toast and I get upstairs at 9:30 to start on Coal Age, get message from Mary Lou, who's sick, and I say GOOD, let's CANCEL. Then do Coal Age January from 10:15-12:25, convinced I'll NEVER get it done on Monday, and phone Larry Meyer who says NB5 can come in ONE WEEK LATER and Joseph Wilkinson says it can be ANYTIME next week, so I say Wednesday, and I feel SO much better that I do February from 1:20-3:10 then decide to holler at the woman upstairs, get out for groceries and find no JOYI mail, Mrs. Cray wants to borrow CAR and HE looks at it and says NO! I chat with Pope on the way back, phone Dennis back to say I WILL have dinner for us, then do dishes for the first time in AGES, shower and start fixing up the bedroom floor which is SO awful that I'm not finished by 9, when I start watching "Icarus's Children" about man-powered flight, and I didn't know so MANY places had tried so MANY different versions before the Gossamer Condor, and Dennis comes in sick to his stomach and falls asleep at 9:30, so I make pork chops, slightly underdone, for myself, then enjoy the 4th episode of "Glittering Prizes," nicely interspersed with the "Joyce-having-baby, TV star won't marry, pretty-Dan marries, flashback to Dan fucking TV star's wife," with a lovely gunshot at the TV at the final scene, with some pretty little-boy peepees in the soccer-shower scene, and Dan undresses sexily but ties pajama tops INSIDE bottoms and SLAPS her a good one, which she DESERVED. Into bed at 11:45, having washed teeth, and we BOTH needed sleep, I guess.
FRIDAY, 4/13/79: He's up at 8 without a touch of sex, I make french toast with the last of the syrup, then finish up the last of the desk-work by the time Sylvan enters at 11:15, I'd not noted he WAS coming, but he called at 10:30 to say he'd be LATE! Leaving at 1:15 with editing going well enough so he only has to check back for final copy-checking, and phone Jane Hodi who flips when I say Sherryl's going to have the index on Friday, so phone her back and say ASAP, and she'll be over Sunday, she hopes. I type up the form letter for Alaskan Airlines, for the new JOYI mailing to get it here, both to be xeroxed when I'm next at Raven or Springer, and then get caught up with these pages for the first time in a week at 5:05, having had GOOD Scientific American reading session for about an hour when it came in, hamburger for lunch at 2, and trying AGAIN to plead with Judy to NOT have the birdseed on the fire escape. Write about Actualism and then get to typing the Coal Age cards from March through June from 5:30-10:35, pleased that it's not taking 2+ hours but 1 hour for months toward the end. Guess I have dinner then and maybe even jerk off, and then get to income tax from 12-2 am, finishing it off owing the government only a bit over $1100, not the $2000 of last year, GREAT!
SATURDAY, 4/14/79: Eddie wakes me about poppers about 10, and I do a bit of lightwork and get to July through October from 10:25-2:30, including 91 cards for headings. Talking to Arnie and people on the phone doesn't give me time to shower before I leave for Actualism for the O-V intro, so I'm rather exercised when Linda asks me to get on the table, but since I'm the only male who's had NSH before, I'm the logical choice, so I get her to put on the green goo and I'm not concerned about the smell. Letter from Carol Ann is rather activating (see ACTUALISM 3). Ken Miller wants to leave at 3, but I want to watch "Alaska and the Aleutians" on "Journey to Adventure," and they have good shots of the Kenai homesteaders, the breakup of the ice-dam across some river to the east of Anchorage, the White Russians on Unalaska, the fur seals on the Pribilofs, and the incredible spires of the what-seem-to-be-lava-flows like Gothic cathedrals eroded by the weather, though what looks to be an erupting volcano is shown with the comment that the cold Bering Sea air meeting the warm Pacific air causes almost constant fogs and mists. Ken rings at 3:05, we get there at 3:45, of course, and we're out at 7:20, riding home with Amy and Ken chatting nicely, and I invite them up but they're both busy, then I finish November and December from 8:05-9:40, then watch "Mr. Perrin (the old codger who doesn't like) and Mr. Trail" (who's rescued from his fall into the tidey ocean by Perrin, who's swept away) until 11:20, then put things away from dinner and do ALL the editing on the book from 11:55-4:25, making what turns out to be a 42:05 hour working-week, lots of money, lots of agitation, lots of indexing.
SUNDAY, 4/15/79: MOM phones at 10:30, but I wake and feel pretty good, getting schedules together for her possible visit in May, then go out to buy the Times and get down to Dennis's for lovely pepper omelets and we read the paper and I clip things out and get upstairs at 2 to watch a bit of TV before Sherryl comes in at 2:15, work with her until 3 editing the cards, then watch "Measure for Measure" from 3-5:30, a much more CONDENSED play than usual: VERY direct "plotting" to overthrow Angelo and too-strict replacement of the monk-duke, with a VERY suspenseful ending with everyone thought lost until everyone's won, the Duke getting HER hand ONLY at the very last lines. Keep working with her until Dennis calls to go for a walk and she's hungry, so she leaves at 6:45 but Dennis doesn't call until 7:10, cake baking in the oven, and we go down to the Promenade to see the CLEAR view of the GRAY-CLOUDED city and horizon, striking, though still QUITE cool, and then he thinks of the baby ducks in the BUG windows, so we go there, then he says dinner at HIS place at 10:30, so I have an ice cream cone and we're back late at 7:45, and Sherryl's just coming down the block. I'd done the puzzles, too, while waiting for her, and then 8-9 we watch Baryshnikov at the White House, and Heather Watts is good in "Rubies" but he doesn't do Villella's back-knee-breaking solos, the "Chopin Dances" are decent, but I can't tell what the "third NEW one" by Robbins is, and the "Tarantella" is fun and lively with tambourines, which he wields fairly well. Then she's back to work and I look through for LOTS of questions, but she's pooping out, I phone Dennis and he says the chicken can wait until 11:15, and she leaves then, me leaving lots of questions which she'll check through, and I'm downstairs to have Rumanian wine, good, and his cake, good and zappy with lemon icing and caraway seeds, and we get into bed QUITE horny and he just doesn't want to mess around, so HE comes quick and then I come quick, getting ourselves all nicely wet, and then crawl in to sleep about 1 am, tired.
MONDAY, 4/16/79: He's not going in to work, so he makes breakfast and I get upstairs to phone some people and get back to typing Coal Age pages from 10:05-12:50, then get out to a LONG line at the bank to get a check for the income tax for $1165 or so, find nothing in JOYI, get back at 1:45 to find that Beethoven's Ninth is JUST starting, but though George Shirley is CLARION as the tenor, Ezio Flagello is mushy as the bass and the women don't have much to do, and I'm not very impressed with Dorati and the Detroit Symphony. But it's a rousing total-volume climax anyway. Then call Amy and she's activated about the letter's RULES, not its fringy-ness, which gets me, and then JUST finish lunch of hamburger as Sherryl enters at 3:50 and I find she has LOTS of things done WRONG, so I have to RECHECK the cards again, and she starts typing, messing up on capitals and italics all OVER, and finally at 7:10 we decide she knows enough, so she's out, then I talk to Dennis about JO and tonight and put on pork chops and type 34 more pages from 7:30-9:50 and then at 10 they announce the RKO program is on TOMORROW night, so we eat and he goes downstairs and I put on the end of it at 11 and watch Benny Hill, who's pretty funny, and then proofread 77 pages from 11:40-1:40, and get into bed thinking to jerk off, but I really don't FEEL like it, so sleep.
TUESDAY, 4/17/79: Wake about 9:40 and think of doing lightwork, but have to get up and start typing, so type 22 pages from 10-11:40, taking 20 minutes off to talk to Arnie for a couple minutes, and then Barbara's over at 11:40 with a quart of milk, a glass of which she spills over the table, her cards, and a bit of me and the floor, and I put on the oven and we go through her cards and change her Respiratory disease/ treatment of/ ventilation-support/ CPAP/ sub/ sub --- her SUB-entry to the 5th indent --- to SEE Ventilation, under which are lots of see's to things like CPAP, and she goes well, types well and leaves at 5:55. I had a chance to proofread more pages from 4:40-5:10, and then get to type the rest and finish it off from 5:55-7:35, having called Joe during the afternoon and finding that he'll be out tomorrow but we have an appointment at 11 am on Thursday "Done and done" to quote him. Then I get to bringing the money and index lists up to date and Dennis calls at 8:30, starving, and I call him at 9 to tell him to come up, so I fry onions and make a good spaghetti sauce and we eat BEFORE 10, drinking wine and sangria and feeling good, and I get into talk about how people ALWAYS want something (see ESSAYS 5), and the RKO is fun with Ginger Rogers and Harriet Hilliard and Sam Jaffe talking about their mediocre movies, and we watch Benny Hill, but Dennis has been slightly sick the last few days, came up to take his temperature when John was here giving us Circus tickets for Saturday, when his niece and nephew have to leave earlier than planned, and Sherryl was leaving, and so at 11:30 we just get to bed and go to sleep, though I form hierarchy and get a BIT into a lifebelt, thinking I HAVE to catch up in practice.
WEDNESDAY, 4/18/79: Alarm goes at 7:30 and he sleeps till 8, so no sex again, though I'd thought of starting it. He showers and I make spaghetti sauce on a shingle (SSOS?) and we chat --- he asks "What's an enclave?" when I describe my dream) oh, yes, my dream: Andre had a party, and for some reason I shave off my beard with the SKIN under it, and when I put it back it's over a WHITE ruff of neck hairs, quite striking, and I have to fold up his ELEGANT tablecloth so that I can wash dishes, and then two kids are wanting to show me their car, which they had to park outside the enclave (sort of from Benny Hall's car skit in the woods last night), and then there's a tall SEXY blond that I'd had sex with before who CAN'T get enough of sex with me, and we have GREAT sucking and masturbating scene, and I answer) "A rich ghetto" and describe the LaRue's in Darien. Wash dishes for the second time in two days just to get forks (used 4 last night and 2 today), and he goes off at 9 and I start on diary and then shower and wash for today, out at 10, and again to diary until Sherryl rings at 10:10 and the typing isn't bad at all, only about 20 small marks I have to make and PERFECT alphabetization, so she leaves at 11:45, rather pleased with the whole thing, happy to give me my 15%, and then Barbara calls to say SHE'S getting hers in, and Kidney comes in two weeks EARLY, so I phone and say I'll be a WEEK late, maybe, then phone Allegra to come over tomorrow, finish these pages, and check with Allegheny that Flight 286 is on time at 2:13, and get route now at 1:35. Finish the ESSAY - 5 page, below, and the Actualism page and it's 1:50, so I dash out and Seymour and his helper have to move 4 cars to get me out, but it starts after I pump it and he directs me out and I'm off, just at 2, and to the Van Wyck (which I'd just begun to despair finding) at 2:30, so I'm sure it's MUCH faster than the Belt. Around to Allegheny, which is in the Pan Am Building, and park for $1 for 20 minutes while I'm in and find them in the basement, having left the booze with a Military Assistance office and Rita had left a message for me, and yet they say they've only been waiting a few minutes. They have no idea what to do, so I suggest Coney Island, and they agree, opening the bottles of Kahlua, Cointreau, and Irish Mist in the back seat and disliking most of them, and we left about 2:50, after I piss, and we're out "for a ride" with bright clouds and get off on the wrong road (as I think I'd done BEFORE) and then back on for the right one, and off (as Rita groans as we slide close to some cars alongside) and park on the street for 20 for an hour at 3:30 and across the street for the Cyclone for $1, which they like, then they see the Enterprise whirling AT THE BOTTOM and think that's all it does, and Rita has to close her eyes as she goes upside down, which she doesn't like, and that's another dollar, and then we're off to the boardwalk, Dennis says we have to start back, via the Wonder Wheel, and he sort of doesn't want to go on, but we do anyway, and it's 75 so we already spent about half the POP plan! They're intrigued by it, then race back to the car to find, with relief, the booze in the back, and then to Olympic Airlines in the American building, they take my picture with a screwdriver for the trunk, and they're off about 4:45 as I get into traffic on the Van Wyck and got off to the conduit road for the last 1/2 mile to Atlantic, which is quite free, so I'm home about 5:30, parking with relief and lugging back the booze to find lots of messages, phone Dennis gone at 6, make the last of the hamburger for lunch at 6:30, putting things away and reading the mail, then WHIZ through the Endocrinology index: mark pages 1-95 from 6:50-7:20, type 76 cards to 7:35, mark to 202 to 8:05, type 102 cards to 8:30, then ZOW through 203-303 from 10-10:20, merely at a rate of 300 pages/ hour, then watch a LOUD (and Kenneth Riegel is a piercing red-headed tenor, but the sopranos aren't great and the text runs out about 9:30) but unfortunately not simulcast Mahler's 8th in Vienna until 10, then work till 10:45 to phone Dennis and say I'm feeling sorry for myself, NOT horny, but he says to come down, I take Kahlua and watch a gymnast doing little on Cavett so HE can show off, STUPID!!, and we talk and have cake and booze and get into bed about 12:30, but we're both sleepy so we drop right off.
ESSAYS 5
4/18/79
YOU'LL NEVER HAVE EVERYTHING YOU WANT
Tell Dennis: when I was rich at IBM I felt badly about Joan and Joe wanting ONLY $250 or $500 to do something, and it was NOTHING to me, but then I had to want IBM, their stock, and the worth of the US dollar to KEEP GOING, and became quite a CONSERVATIVE because I'd INVESTED in the future of the nation. Then when I QUIT, I wanted the nation to go UNDER, since I'd invested in the dollar NOT being worth anything, and I'd look rather silly if it SURVIVED and I'd bailed out because I thought it would FAIL. But now I don't feel RICH anymore, so I want DIFFERENT things. We looked at the RKO films with that in mind: did Astaire feel content with the tap dance number in "Follow the Fleet," was "Citizen Kane" a happy person, since he still wanted Rosebud when he had everything. When he paid a bill he thought he'd be happy, but he just wanted to buy something NEW. I'd wanted to be happy "just" indexing, then it got BORING and TOO CONTROLLABLE, so I had to open it up to training, missing deadlines, taking on too much, and generally expanding to keep the element of CHALLENGE. When I exhausted opera I went into ballet, and then into modern dance, and possibly theater, and then I keep lists of things that I want to keep lists of. Wanted to go to the Caribbean, and now I want to go BACK to the Caribbean. Went to 49 states, so that just makes the pressure to get to ALASKA that much greater, REGARDLESS of the intrinsic worth of a trip to Alaska, both cost-wise OR money-wise. Then I want est, then Actualism, then OUT of Actualism. If I get the computer indexing system, I'll probably want something ELSE on computers; I'd wanted the publisher of the indexing book to come to me, and he DID, at the Raven party, and now I have to get that out and want something MORE to happen with MORE of the books. When I publish 5 I'll want 10 more out, and then I'll start regretting that I didn't spend more time when I was ENJOYING myself writing, just as I regretted NOT writing after I took the LSD, when "not writing and recording" was one of the great DISCOVERIES of the LSD trip. So there's ALWAYS the need for the challenge, the surprise, that which is just around the corner, something new and different and exciting: ALWAYS!
THURSDAY, 4/19/79: Upstairs after Dennis gets out of bed at 8:15, and mark 305-398 from 8:25-8:50, then to 516 to 9:25, then type 85 and 153 respectively until 9:45 and 10:15, and then dress in a jacket and subway to Joseph Wilkinson at JUST 11, but given to Paul Marriott for checking, and we chat until 12:30, and I'm to do a study for a new format at $12/hour, and he'll give my indexing name to EJD (or whatever) and Metals Weekly, and I get home feeling good to buy booze, meat, and groceries, home at 1:40, messages from Sylvan and Allegra, have hamburger and read Soho and rest of mail, then get to marking 517-629, the last, from 2:50-3:15 and type 123 cards to 3:40, and then leave work with Arnie to record "Glittering Prizes" and call Sylvan to tell him not to be late, and type these pages to date at 4 pm. Edit from 4-4:50, then decide I have to write things out for Allegra, which I do from 4:50-5:25, when Sylvan comes in, and I look at his fairly-well done stuff (except for putting commas before AND after "and") until 6, when Allegra enters with Stephan AND the kid, so there's a screamy half-hour when he finally takes her downstairs and we finish at 6:30, and then I get back to Sylvan until 7:05, when we both leave, me telling him the story of my IBM and moneymaking life. Meet Dennis at 7:40 at Loeb Auditorium at NYU, and the program finally starts at 8:25 with a GREAT combo with a fluttery guitarist (Gene Bertoncini), a LOVELY riff from the piano (John Bunch) for "Over the Rainbow," played solo on a mellowphone (Don Elliot), and then Jackie and Roy are "pastel" as Dennis describes them. Surprise guest George Shearing plays two numbers, Barbara Lea is introduced and said she's going to be here, and then Maxine Sullivan comes out for 4 songs and it's over at 10:50 and we have to wait a LONG time to get out from firetrap auditorium, and Dennis had passed a place called "The French Peasant" and we went back there to be the last customers in the cloth-papered room upstairs with classical music and burnt-out candles and I go to Sheridan Square for fruity German wine, and his pot au feu is rather tasteless but my pork is tasty and cabbage is good in salad AND stew, and the starting paté was good too. Out about 12 and home very tired, decided to go to our own places, and I was SO horny that I got out the porno and gazed through it, then to prolong the ecstasy got out the baby lotion and slicked up my cock and kept working at it and kept working at it until it got VERY tense and sensitive, and then I KEPT at it as I came, thrashing about on the bed, enjoying it to the frenzied utmost, loving the constant sensations as I grabbed and squeezed and refused to let that post-orgasm tickle stop me from pushing at it, and then almost dozed off before washing the stuff off with soap and getting to sleep about 1:30, drained.
FRIDAY, 4/20/79: Wake about 8:45, surprised it's so early, and form hierarchy but don't feel like lightworking, feel like work-working, so I'm to the editing from 8:55-10:15, type 37 pages of the Endocrinology index from 10:15-12:45, not bothered at ALL by telephone calls, then proofread from 12:45-1:20 while hamburger is cooking, eat from 1:20-1:40, finish the index from 1:40-2:05, make a detailed plan for the day since it's so complicated, and change and leave at 2:30. To Springer at 3 and talk to 1) Jenet, giving Endocrinology, 2) Al Steine, saying I'll get my $319 next week because Jenet only SIGNED the bill on 4/12!, 3) Debra Makay to say hello and that Dennis is doing "The Injured Hand," 4) Linda Hering who takes me to Gaby and find that Saralasin will be SEPARATE indexes in the NEW format on CARDS, and I xerox the pages that I need, then down to 5) Angie Milo who said that Hsu added organisms to the Cytology index, that the author liked the Hematology index, and that Barbara's Clinical index was sent to the author, and finally 6) Jeff Robbins, who said that Physics might be delayed 2 weeks IF the author doesn't do it, and that Jo had talked to him already with the Earth and Moon index. Only 9 discussed, that's all. And waved at Ute and Catherine MacKay. All this took only 45 minutes, and then I walked in the bright cool (60) day down to "Men Among Themselves" by Arthur Tress, but though I liked some of the bodies, the cruelty and the ugliness of some of them turned me off, and then I subwayed to Brooklyn on a train that bypassed the Hoyt station, so I had to return from Nevins to A&S and up to the Legoland, rather tacky, but the 254,000-block 420-hour globe was spectacular, the palaces overblown, the people fun, the elephants too slab-sided, and the amount out for the kids too paltry. Decide to get a haircut, which I do INSTANTLY because the guy is sitting jobless, from 5:25-5:40 for $2.75, find no JOYI stuff, buy more wine, get a number to phone to see if I can get a box refund, and home for mail to find Mom's coming when John has the car! Phone her for about 15 minutes and she's coming then anyway, May 24-28, and put stuff away and start working on the diary when Dennis buzzes about 7:30, saying we neither feel like cooking, so we're out about 8 to Dar Lebnan, buying poor Zazie wine for $3.25 and paying $14.50 for mediocre but flavorful meal (though my cutlet du chef was more Germanic, as was the décor, than Lebanese), ending with a 95 single-scoop hot fudge sundae, for a total of $9.85 for me that wasn't quite worth it. Decide at 9:55 that we'll be home alone, he to "work on an index" and I get up to decide to watch movies, but they don't work: 1) "Amateur Photographer" doesn't even have anyone touching their semi-soft cocks, 2) "Foaming Over" is a plumpish young kid with a mustache who doesn't seem to ENJOY it, being soft and flutter-fingered most of the time, 3) "Gary," sort of young Spock-like, is cute enough but he doesn't seem to come at ALL, and except for some exceptional angles doesn't even seem well-built, 4) "Black and White" is so SAD because the EXTENT of the black's spectacular shot isn't shown, but there are GREAT CLEAR STILLS of his fabulous geysers, 5) "Rockhard" may be that, but he sure has soft BALLS much of the time, though the hardness and the redness of his uncircumcised cockhead is exciting, and then 6) "Joe Angelo" has his first giant come CUT for the photo, but he DOES hit 8-9 shots, depending on how many of the intermediate dribbles one counts, and I manage NOT to come then, so get out the porno and get off about 12:30 (after having played for 2.5 hours!) almost soft, but just as a relief, and wipe off and put things away and get to sleep about 12:45, exhausted.
SATURDAY, 4/21/79: Wake at 9 to make bed and put things away and get to Nutrition and the Brain volume 5 index, marking pages 1-108 from 9:25-10:55, then get to these pages, only 2, until 11:25, then get to typing cards. Type 234 from 11:25-12:05, then talk to Dennis about tonight and get the mail and then mark pages 109-200 from 12:35-2, taking 20 minutes off to talk to Jack Seelye, who seems to want a piece of the indexing business, getting told to phone Dennis for his friend to start indexing as a student, and I say I'll call him next week after I'm finished with the overhanging indexes. Type 214 from 2-2:35, put on hamburger and mark for 10 minutes, then eat lunch, then from 3:30-4:35 finish marking 201-304, type 186 to 5:25, and figure that 5:55 today is good enough to finish on time by Monday. Shower and meet everyone downstairs at 6:30, and we get to Madison Square Garden at 7 to find everything closed: John runs up a down-moving escalator and gets chewed out by a security guard, and there IS no menagerie this year, and at 7:40 the clowns come out and I've gone through my $2.50 program and was surprised to find they advertise old ones as collector's items (and I sent $22 for all the ones they offered that I didn't already have), and then it started at 8 with Gunther Gebel-Williams and his lions, went on to a SEXY Armon troupe with LOVELY chest and arms that I'd noticed in the first parade-around, and then it kept coming with Superman flying over elephants, sexy tumblers, boring clowns, women who were ignored for the men, animals who did tacky things, and Dennis bought John beer and then John bought Dennis beer and with what he did last night (he never DID say!) Dennis started dozing off, we enjoyed chatting with the former circus-seller behind us with his girl, liked some of the crowd, but found the acrobats VERY disappointing and chill-free, though the guy leaping over another guy on the wire was quite a deal, even if it DID seem that he planned to fall off, but maybe he didn't, since it would seem to be the most dangerous part ANYWAY. Wong on his swinging pole was a kick too, and they had only a few acts in all three rings (long-gone the 5 rings of the past), and Gebel-Williams LOOKED somewhat older, the MC was somewhat sexy, some of the clowns could have been cute, the dazzle was there and more dazzly than ever, and when it was over at 11 they both decided to go home, so I took my Times to Lenny's Clam Bar and had crisp fried sole with lots of tartar sauce, a $3 half-bottle of wine, and some of their softish cheesecake, reading and looking at some of the sexy crowd, and then home about 1:30 to try the puzzles, taking until about 3, then bed.
SUNDAY, 4/22/79: Continued to read the paper and work the puzzles until 11:30, when I felt depressed, so I phoned Dennis, who was working on breakfast, and went down to eat --- no, I guess I didn't, just worked on the puzzles and read the paper and marked 305-378 from 1-1:55 then put on hamburger and watched "World War I" on "The Mighty Continent" and for the first time saw the difference between an ARMISTICE and a PEACE, and ate, and then marked up to the end, page 446, from 3:05-3:45, typed 277 cards from 3:45-4:35, which made only 911 cards, then edited from 4:35-7:05, sorting the first-letter 900 in 15 minutes, but still about half through. Then decided (took me a LONG time to remember what happened then, but noticed the program!) I had done enough for the evening, Dennis was still working on HIS index, so I'd phoned for reservations for DANCEMOVES/Irene Feigenheimer and Company, and got there at 7:45 and "Piano Solo" was pleasant by her, "Weave" introduced a manly, nicely-built, faintly Supermanish Art Bridgman, but "Parts;Particles" with repetitive music by Harry Partch was TOO repetitive in motion to be liked, though she finished the first half in 30 minutes. Then "Yours, Mine, Ours" had Feigenheimer and Bridgman in moderne pants, and I don't like them because they're TRULY unisexual: broad hips, no sexy crotch, thick thighed and narrow ankled and showing nothing. Then "Visitors" was vaguely disturbing when the masked people ripped off each other's clothes, then took off the masks, then clung to others' clothing, then plastered soft clay onto their faces to make a NEW set of masks. Jude Bartlett was unpleasantly thin as Magician/ Death, Jim May voted best abdominals for Prophet/ Thief, and Ric Rease looked like a KID until it turned out he sported a mustache as Old Wise Man/ Child, and Art Bridgman showed a LOVELY titless-chest as Laborer/ Politician, so it was an interesting evening, though smallish of audience. Out at 10 and up for wine and had bought ice cream, and he'd made a chocolate-topped cream-praline-filled butter-gingersnap-crusted concoction that didn't hold together but sure TASTED good. The wine wasn't bad for $1.99, his chicken with hot sauce that didn't taste of hot sauce was FABULOUS, and we drank and got into bed for sex that took place quickly and we slept about 11:45 (probably not, since I worked on the index down there from 10:35-11:05, so we probably finished eating about 12 and finished sex more like 12:45).
MONDAY, 4/23/79: Woke with alarm and he started making breakfast, so I said I was going upstairs --- NO, I finished down THERE from 8:25-8:35, glad to be done, then had eggs and toast and orange juice for breakfast and talked about maybe going to Great Adventure sometime this week, (which was later changed when I recalled that it looked great under the TREES, and since the trees didn't even START coming out here until about Thursday (and then it rained), I decided that I could wait for the beginning of MAY to see it), and got upstairs at 9:45 (maybe after watering plants) to finish typing the 44 pages from 9:45-1, talking to Arnie, who DID record "Glittering Prizes" for me, having taken care of a QE2 transfer on Sunday and been impressed by the facilities of the wooden-interior ship that looked like a Grand Hotel, from 12:15-12:35, and then I proofread from 1-2:05, finished up, then had lunch and showered and got out about 3:30 to chat with Larry Meyer, have a chance to talk with Tom LaMuta who's busy on the mailing lists, find that Rita Scheman is taking over many of Laura's books, get reminded of a book that I xeroxed from Terry and maybe loaned to Jim Connolly (and when I called Arthur at work he said that the staff was cut to 4, Jim was now working on some sort of vidicomp editing system and had moved out of his apartment, as Arthur had done to get away from drug-crazies who threatened him from next door), get an RPG-2 manual to see if sorts can be done on that, and chat with Virginia Martin who says I can't even TALK of using the machine until Tom implements the mailings in about 3 months. Charlotte Fohn is very busy and begs off talking, and Maria is wandering around looking happy and I hardly remembered who she WAS. Leave at 5:30, full of information, and subway home, still reading "Public Burning" with shocked pleasure, and home to put lots of things away, then start reading the article on Bermuda that I clipped from Dennis's New Yorkers that I cleared through this morning before and after breakfast, and then Bruce came over about 8 to get a body session (see ACTUALISM 4), flaking out on the table until 10, when Dennis comes up in response to my cooking the beef roast at last (and I'd done the dishes, too), and we eat that somewhat overdone thing, drink and smoke and have nice sex and sleep about 12.
TUESDAY, 4/24/79: Dennis is up and I'm putting more things away and listen to some of Bill's tape, doing SOME lightwork, and then Arnie calls at 10:20 and I'd typed up the envelopes for the Alaska Airlines mailings and the JOYI "out of the closet" mailing to 10 people, so I took out two laundries, dropping them off, mailing the letters at the PO and taking an ad out of the box, then dropped two copies of the Astrology spoof from Bruce at Tree with Pope, gave one to Arnie, along with a lend of the Michelin guide to NYC, and settled down to watch the missed "Glittering Prizes" and AGAIN you start out with disgust at the drunk, sympathy for his wisdom, and even sorrow for everyone when it turns out he doesn't even have SEX with his women, a typical turn-about-again-about script by Frederic Raphael, a master, and I'll have to see "Two for the Road" next time on TV. Watch the start of "Drive-In" until 1:30, it's cute, then get home (having given Arnie Dennis's pie, which he likes, and he in turn serves me lunch of hamburger and cheese on a hard roll, NICE) to change and write checks out for Actualism and go for the surgery on the testes with Alice (see ACTUALISM 7), then out at 4:30 and to Allegra's from 5-5:40 checking her well-done cards and giving her the new chapters and taking the old numbers of the book to index myself, and then get home to listen to more tape and Bruce comes in to do ME from 7:30-9 (see ACTUALISM 5), then throw in the beef roast for reheating and Dennis comes up for that and peas and carrots, we drink lots more, and where last night DENNIS came so nicely I went down, listening to Bette Midler so that we could hear Bogie during breakfast this morning, tonight I came first so HE could get kicks, which he did, and we got to bed early again, both TIRED.
WEDNESDAY, 4/25/79: Just as I worried what I was going to serve him for breakfast he announced he was going downstairs to make his lunch, so I lay there until 8:25, feeling more and more horny, then decided he probably wouldn't come back for his left wristwatch, so I got out the porno and jerked off nicely, feeling good to do it, and it only took 10 minutes because I was so eager. Decided to repot the pot, so I opened the closet and there was lots of junk, so I got out the pots and earth and then got sidetracked into the books of matches and cleaning up the top drawer, putting grass away and trying to give the seeds to John, who didn't want them, and he got the stems he DID want, and then phoned Amy, who didn't want to pick up the index because it was just before the new moon, so she said she'd come over at 2:30 for a body session to even us out, and I planted the pot any way I could, not very effectively, and tried hunting for the xeroxed index book, Andre called to say that Helen Ferguson wanted the index done ON time, so he couldn't do it, but he wanted a piece of the indexing action, so I was so annoyed with him and his opportunism that I decided to phone Rolf and he was busy with Asbestos, hanging at $3 Canadian until tomorrow afternoon, so I said he should come over then, and I sorted out some more things and Amy came over at 2:30, complaining about the fertilizer smell I'd just put out, and we chat about travel and I do her nicely (see ACTUALISM 5), and she has to leave about 4, so I sort out more things and finish listening to the tape about 6 while potting and cleaning up and having lunch, and then I shower about 6:10 and the light goes out, to come back on, so I fix THAT, after having fixed the shower head earlier in the day, and I'd gone out with her to buy wine and meat and groceries, too, picking up the mail and looking through that, and again getting depressed at all there is to DO, feeling better when I have an INDEX to concentrate on. Barbara called yesterday and said she wouldn't be in class tonight so I wouldn't have to bring a box of cards with me, and I hadn't REMEMBERED that I was to bring a box of cards! Finally got in touch with Doris and made the dinner Sunday earlier, and will be glad when the time changes, since we're both waking up about 6:30 with the increasing brightness outside. Larry called with another index, but it's still few for me, and I'd asked Helen Ferguson for the probable date for the next Solar Heating for my vacation, and told her Adam didn't want to do the legal indexing. Hamburger just before 7, then out to class, and it's very effective today (see ACTUALISM 5) and get out at 10:15 and have a heart throb that tells me I'm horny (see ESSAYS 6), and wander to the foggy Promenade and the people are AWFUL, so I'm back upstairs to phone Dennis, who's making spaghetti, so I'm down and there's no wine and I take down his watch and we eat until 12:30 then fall into bed without sex, feeling pleasant.
THURSDAY, 4/26/79: (Dream of 4/14 note: The ABSOLUTE worthless/idealized paradox: I'm too BAD to be IN Actualism (if it works), and if it DOES work, it's only because I was GOOD enough to DO it, being better than it all along.) (Dream of 4/26: I'm traveling with a woman (who's like Sharon Askew, but obviously based on the idea of Amy and Susan and me going to the Bahamas and Bimini) and we have to use our watches to sight along in place of compasses to get through woods to other side, and then we're sharing a one-room cabin with many others and there are so many coats on the sofa they spill over to the john, so the coats have to be piled OFF before we can use the john.) Wake in the light and don't manage to do lightwork before Dennis's oatmeal is finished at 8:20, and then I'm upstairs at 8:45 and sort things around and make a list of things to think about when Rolf comes over (and phone Lindisfarne to find out about New Age Alchemy but they're disconnected), and talk to Amy about Dennis not going square dancing because he has to finish his index Friday night, and refuse Barbara a body session because I don't know when Rolf's coming over, and sit and do lightwork from 10-10:35, but then VERY horny so I get out the porno and jerk off in the chair, to the lovely sound of rain outside, and then get started on the typing for catching up, write a note to Mom and order TDF seats, then put on hamburger about 2 and eat and read Omni and had read the mail from 1-2 (Soho) and finish typing at 4:10, LATE, and Rolf hasn't called yet and so MUCH happens that days go OVER a page, but there are surely fewer SEPARATE pages, and it'd be MUCH easier to SORT later on! Finally get down to the Kidney International index at 4:20, and whiz through all the subject permutations of the tables of contents and finish at 8:15 with 426 cards and the staggering realization that there's nothing more that can be done on indexes!! It's such a ludicrous feeling of having run headfirst into a brick wall that I LITERALLY sit stunned for a few minutes, too shocked to feel pleasure. Then tiny tingles of glee hit and I decide that the only thing left to do is to skim the books for the indexing book. Phone Allegra who says she's coming to Brooklyn at 7 am tomorrow morning and will drop off the other two books that I need, and then from 8:30-9:55 go through the books, and then watch the last part of "Glittering Prizes" where all the people don't QUITE come together, and I DIDN'T remember who Barbara had been, or who the now-drunk-alcoholic Anne was. Susan calls and I put her off because I'm watching TV, and I finish the last of the roast beef, and then Dennis calls and says he's coming over from Jo's, and I have the last of the Grand Marnier and finish off the Framboise mixed half-and-half with Maraschino while Dennis has some sangria and we chat for about an hour about Jo's progress and problems, and he reminds me again that I hadn't phoned Bill Drischler about her character-count-per-line. Then it's about 12:15, he seems tired, so I just put off lights and get into bed where we cuddle for a bit, talking about how he MIGHT be quitting his job and would I loan him money through the interim, and then we sleep.
ESSAYS 6
4/26/79
HOW HORNY I AM
Fascinated by the curving cock in the black leather pants leaning against a sign outside the St. George; mesmerized by the saggy crotch of the handsome actor reading Show Business with a fabulous profile and a somewhat debauched full-face; then totally captured by the full lump in the front of the faded jeans worn by a sharp-nosed blond who got off at Clark Street and was so good-looking that when he passed me on Hicks at a run I followed, only to see him sprint out into the street and look up at the house next to the house next to Love Lane to find someone was in (or out) and then sped up the steps two or three at a time and disappeared behind the black door. And I wanted, wanted, WANTED! Looked at people on 72nd and admired the time they had to wander at will and cruise at their pleasure. Still wanting to try the baths, the men in the advertising section of The Advocate, or even some of the JOYI people who might call now that they know my phone number. Sadly, Dennis doesn't seem to satisfy my horniness. I want something BIG to hold in my arms, some new sensation to thrill me with unexpectedness (though nothing so unexpected as fucking, however), some "conquest" so that I won't remain so hung up about my growing old. But still to take a lesson from Dennis: smile up at them like an eager dog, show pleasure in looking at their parts and happiness to be myself, and if that doesn't get them they're probably too constipated to enjoy me anyway. I may be a dirty old man, but I'm still a lot of fun in bed, and I don't want to end up the misogynistic Bill Hyde who refuses ANYTHING that comes toward him and pursues ANYTHING that retreats. Try some of my magnetics, exercise a bit to reduce my profile in jeans, and TRY something different from jerking off with the porno that's gotten so stale that I have to switch to different envelopes to provide the pleasant surprise of an unexpected cock, angle, smile, or body on a beautiful male. Probably spring has something to do with it, as does my long work-month of April and my eagerness for a vacation to ANYWHERE to get a change of venue. But I won't get anything talking about it; if I want it, I have to DO something about it---at least give me someone different to WRITE about!
FRIDAY, 4/27/79: AND WHAT A DAY IT IS!! Dennis is up at 7:15 and we lie closer and closer, then I start playing (though I figure I'll NEVER come up, and I have rather dark circles under my eyes when I get a drink in the bathroom) and I DO come up and he wants me to suck him, so I do (oh, I'd gotten a call from Mark Barton last night, too!), and then get to playing with myself and he gets close and I get close and I shoot off a load and he follows panting right along and we cling and gasp and catch our breaths and then smile and nuzzle and he's into the shower at 8:20 while I doze another bit. Then up at 8:40 and start sautéing onions and bologna for a super omelet which he tolerates for my benefit, and he leaves about 9:15 and I phone Bill Drischler then and get specs which I phone to Jo at 9:30 and leave word with Dennis that I've done at 9:45, and Rolf calls on the dot of 10 to say he's coming over in 45 minutes, so I put things away and go back to skimming books from 10:35-11:50, when he enters, saying he had phone calls to make, and I talk about it calmly, asking what's next, and HE CALMLY GIVES ALL THE STUFF OVER TO ME, with an evaluation that, of 5*, Cromemco is tops with 5*, Alpha great with 4.5*, Ohio Scientific with 4.1*, then Xitan with 4*, and various others. Folders on disks and printers and CRTs and systems and suppliers, and he leaves about 1:30 and that's the end of that! He'd blocked on the index, hated doing them, refused more, said he knew he wouldn't like the programming, was working on United Asbestos because he "controlled" 150,000 shares (see ESSAYS 7, below), and then left! Left work with Amy to phone me, then Larry Meyer called with another index which I phoned and had sent to Sylvan, then Rachel Davison phoned to send me an index by messenger that I phoned Sherryl to say SHE could have, and then Barbara called needing cards and she'll come over for a body session tomorrow to get some cards and tell me about her writeup corrections, and at 2 I gathered up checks and went to MHT to put in my Visa application which he said I should hear from in a few weeks, deposit my check in a slot that seems easier than waiting on lines, then deposit and withdraw from savings, then to the post office for more stamps and they're now selling SINGLE strips, I find as the man in front asks for one; nothing more in JOYI, and home at 3 to start studying RPG II for indexing, then decide to call Anthony Gray at 4:15 and make an appointment for Wednesday morning to talk about systems, with Marty Sokol for lunch at Wednesday noon, and then call Madge and talk to HER about information about time sharing, and she'll look around for me, and debate calling Jack Seelye but decide I have enough irons in the fire, and called and left work with Andre. Amy called at 6:30 and I was surprised Allegra wasn't here yet, but then watch TV with a rather actory Tom Conti with Cavett, then an interview with Harold Stassen, the perennial presidential candidate, on MacNeil-Lehrer Report, and then at 8:00 put dishes away, Allegra comes at 8, then I finish typing 101 cards from number 6 from 7:55-8:45, then type the 38 measly cards from Saralasin from 8:45-9:05, and then decide to catch up with these pages to keep typing until 9:30. Dennis calls and asks questions about his index, saying he has a headache, and I tell him about the day, then Amy calls and says she'll call in the morning to bring over the indexing writeup, and then I edit the big index from 10:20-12:25, and then "proofread" the cards from 12:25-1:10, but by that time I'm feeling VERY tired so I plop into a chilly bed and sleep alone, since Dennis had called about 10:30 and said he was just going to sleep alone.
ESSAYS 7
4/27/79
ROLF ON UNITED ASBESTOS
When I ask WHAT he's going to do with his time now that he's off the indexing project, he says, with me and Veneroso and friends and other holdings, he "controls" 150,000 shares of stock, so if it goes from 3-6 that's almost half a million dollars. Interesting, but he's not getting any of mine. He talks of the Asbestos Corporation wanting the company as well as ESARCO, and it might be UA can't get refinancing because people want to snap it up. Even the government of the province wants asbestos mines, and if they start a stock war (which entails ads in papers and stock scouts phoning and putting pressure on large shareholders to sell) one may bid 5, then the next 6, then 7, then 8, and everyone would really WANT to sell for fear of getting lost in the dust. "Most have invested around 1," he said, so if they sell at 6 and put their money into ANOTHER stock at 1 that's going to 6 ..." Yes, it DOES sound good. He doesn't want a job with the company, even the employment agencies have been after him but he waves them off with a bland hand. He's had dinner with stockbrokers, has been asked by the Maloufs if he wants to raise $20 million for their refinancing, and he says he might ask some investor fiends of his (that WAS meant to be friends) for the money and get a piece of the action. He said UA's sold this year's product at a 12% price increase, and another 12% increase's coming in June, that the debt has been lowered to $36 million from a high of $48 million and they're making $12 million a year, so for a debt that could be paid off in two or three years, they're in very good shape, but if the company's bought away from them, old Malouf would probably die in a year, being one of the millionth of one percent who thrives in business and will wilt without its stimulus because they'd find ordinary living too boring. Like Rolf? So I got whatever I could from him, had him say he'd bring over the SECOND shitload of material, along with lots of magazines, tomorrow or the next day, and suggested my next step would be to VISIT these people for demonstrations, though he said probably RPG could be got going on the Raven machine, and he didn't even seem to CARE what I'd be doing with the system next.
SATURDAY, 4/28/79: Lovely dream about traveling in Switzerland, trying to get back to a hillside hamlet but the driver says that it'll be impossible this late at night, and indeed ahead, even though it's spring, we can see the snows starting to blow in and the cars beginning to skid off the road. I figure there must be another way back, so I scan booklets of maps that give all the streets and buildings of tiny towns with names like Altheimer, Rotweiller, which have old buildings and churches, and resorts like Ski Bottom which are only slopes and lifts and after-ski chalets, and I look at a larger map for a bit, just thinking too much, so I'm up at 9:30 and sit in the CHAIR and think too much, finally getting lightwork in from 9:45-10:15, and then I get out the porno again and the rubber band and the popper and come very nicely, then put everything away, water the plants, listen to the 11 am news to find that it's going to be between 70 and 75 today, but it still feels chilly inside for Barbara's body, and Elaine Hyams calls in desperation for a body session and gulps when I say I'm in Brooklyn Heights. Phone Amy and say "I hope you didn't forget me," and then count cards and edit the small index and finish that from 11:05-12:05, making out the bill, and then finish typing THIS page up to date at 12:10, feeling good about the day. Shower, have lunch, then do more work on the indexing book from 12:45-1:15, when Sherryl enters, we laugh at the Criterion referenced testing book that had been mal-indexed, and Barbara rings precisely at 2, so Sherryl leaves, saying she wants to find out what goes on on that table one of these days, so I'll have to play her the intro sometime, and Barbara pays me two checks for the index and for the body work and the two boxes of cards that she buys. She wants to work in red, so she's quickly onto the table, and I'd put on the oven and the heater to warm up the room, which worked so well that in the middle of the good session (see ACTUALISM 9) she said I could put the heater off. She finished and moved out quickly at 3:25, so I got back to work on the book from 3:25-6:55, pleased with it, and maybe it's THEN that I take a shower, and work on the book from 7:10-8:10, for a total of 5 hours today, and then Dennis buzzes and I go through his "Hand Surgery" cards from 8:10-9:40, when I get impatient with his working with the steak and finish putting it on and having the rest of the sweet potatoes, and we eat and drink wine and settle in to watch "Le Bonheur" and it's another woman's film that looks like a MAN'S fantasy: wife with two loving children and he finds a mistress who doesn't mind the wife, as the wife seems not to mind the mistress until she drowns herself, and then the guy marries the mistress and lives happily. Cute guy, but WHY did the wife commit suicide? Bruce buzzes at 11, activated with our jokes about him (since he said he'd come before 10 to chat and then go to Capulet's), and he turns on "Saturday Night Live" and Dennis insists on "A New Leaf," which is good with a VERY rich Walter Matthau spending all his money and marrying rich Elaine May, who finds a new leaf and they both fall in love and live wealthily ever after. Dennis is actually wide awake until 1:45, then plunks into bed, and it's really 2:45 since this is the night the time changes, good for light!