Last night I drank a lot of bourbon waiting for Ro to show and accompany me to my friend’s art opening. Thankfully Mike Selbach was there with his wife. Cheryl kept ribbing me, as if she wanted to see my cruel side. Mike had enough of this at hime and went o get beers at the bar. The lanky blonde leaned over and said, “I bet that you can’t say anything they will hurt me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” She smiled, hiding her crooked bottom teeth, but everyone has a flaw, even Cheryl so confident of her beauty. Model thin, emerald green eyes. The teeth were her only flaw, but I said, “You’re as flat as an altar boy.”
She laughed once. I had hit the nail on the head. I could have gone on. It was obvious she was a masochist. Silent, she smirked and said, “You’re all talk.”
She joined Mike at the bar.
I know Michael a couple of years. He had worked with Ro at David’s Potbelly on Christopher Street. A late-night gay eaterie. Mike had been the cook. I sat in the alley eating omelettes. He was a good man and I like his dog, a mutt called Merlin. Mike saw me and tapped his watch. I shrugged. Ro was late. So were we. At David Mills on Bleecker Street I decided I like Mike’s sculpture. I couldn’t see anyone else in them. Cheryl brushed against me as a tease. I left without saying goodbye.
When I returned to CBGBs, the Sic Fucks were on stage, playing ‘Take Me To The Bridge. Russell Wollinsky singing with Snooky and Tish as slutty back-ups. I can’t understand a single word outside the chorus, but I love them. 100% punk, unlike the uncool Talking Heads.
Gerard Pas was playing Pinball with Roxy. She hasn’t been here for months. I heard she was a groupie for some stadium band. She looked healthy and not on drugs. She asked for astrological love advice with a Scorpio. I had no idea how to help her and said, “Do what you think is best.”
Home Alone no man
Later
Yesterday I went up to the Upper East Side what a shithole. Rich clean, luxury. I never want to go up there again and I told Anthony Scibelli how Tim Dunleavy accused me a stealing from him.
“I haven’t been in your apartment, since the blackout.”
“It was probably Andy Reese. He has a drug problem. So does Frank.”
The two ex-ballet dancers tricked out of Cowboys on East 53rd. I liked them. They had introduced me to Alice., but this information meant keeping my distance. Leaving I stopped into Serendipity 3. Big Bird, William Lively, and all the other boys cooed hellos. Mr. Bruce the owner, said, “You are so rough trade.”
A flaming queen. I so love him. He protects the boys. Jancy Stephenson wasn’t in the upstairs store. I left at her birthday party with Alice adn her lesbo girlfriend. That must have hurt.
I was a bad man
I ran into Andy Reese outside the Subway Inn. He didn’t look like a coke fiend. Glancing across the street he said, “You are always talking about destroying the Upper East Side. Sure, great idea. Two months later there’ll be a Bloomingdale’s in Union Square. Bigger and taller and blocking out the Ed Watchtower and then it would be the Chic Lower East Side. I’ll keep the Slime up here. We’ll keep the village for ourselves.”
I went to a disco party at Les Mouches. Marc Stevens was wearing only a jock strap. He wanted coke. “Two truckloads to get me hard.”
Mr 10 and a half was never hard. Too much coke.
Kim wanted to get him some coke. She want to see his cock hard. Everyone does. It’s his best talent, otherwise it’s kind of dumb, But he’s famous and with good reason I would hate to see what would happen to him it wasn’t big
Who else can I slam?
Ro finally showed at CBGBs. She had been at work. I escorted her to the party but I didn’t stay as they had been fairly lame and they were too many lesbians who clocked me for not being queer. Lesbians have the worst time of it, because straight men keep on saying oh I want to watch two chicks and I want to be with two chicks or I’m a lesbian too. I don’t want to say I want to see two guys fucking my ass, because they really don’t like macho.
Later
Alice’s grandmother died last night. Off for West Virginia for the funeral. My Nana dead since 1968. My grandmother Edith 1972. I never met any either of my grandfathers, except as photos. Both dead in their their late fifties or sixties. I hope my father lives forever. My great-aunt Bert lived to be 103 and sailed around the world with her father hunting whales off Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. I can deal with the idea of dying
Although most male egos can’t deal with a threat of death, of not having achieved anything. They want to die in a blaze of glory or in a car crash. Live fast die fast, I want to piss off everybody by never dying. I’ll settle into the old age, although it might be hard to take the loss of memory, I’ll always have my soul
Later
Alice is leaving for Charleston with a heavy heart. “I’ve cried all morning and I’m crying now. It could have been worse, but I’ve been working so hard.”
She has been crying in her sleep, when she doesn’t have nightmares.
Gerard Pas invited me to a party and he explained that his leg was fucked up because of polio. It doesn’t bother me, but I knew a girl in Boston. Peggy had a withered leg. Polio as a child. She went to an all-girls high school. One afternoon I saw her crying on Dot Avenue. I asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Nobody will take me to the prom.”
“I will why didn’t you invite me.”
“I didn’t think you’d accept but take me.
“Hell yeah. Let’s go.” She was so happy and we had a good time. Peggy was a good dancer.
.
Death death death rips through relatives and friends. I never go to the doctor. The only time I’ve been to the hospital was birth. I feel like I can live forever, but I’m delusional. Fine one second. The next a piano drops on your head. Flash life gone. Flash lying on the sidewalk. Flash blood breaking through a pavement to drowned the land
.
Mort death tote.
Our final destination
We are not Jesus
We are not Lazarus
We do not rise from the dead
And the dead
Do not dream
But before dead
We can go to Spain Mexico Hawaii Cuba France England Asia
When we live we live
When we die we still live
But not in this now
And death chooses everyone
The Good the Bad and the in-between. Okay