Hard Shopping
March 5, 1989
I'm making progress with Sonja. Yesterday, we picked up some wine and a rose to put by the phone (replacing the one from which she had torn the petals). Things were quiet at my house since Lolo took the cassette player when she moved out. We had a bottle of Iron Horse Chardonnay. Sonja selected it because, once when her mother sent her some wine from California, she accidentally included a bottle of Iron Horse which she'd planned on drinking to celebrate her divorce. Sonja mailed the wine back to California.
Sonja and I are making progress. She is interested in games so I lent her Biblical Games by Steven J. Brams. This book uses games theory to examine some old testament stories. Although this book offers some peculiar insights into the Bible, the main thing I expect her to get from reading it is a better understanding of strategy.
Sonja asked me how I would feel if she found someone else. She said that she felt lucky to know me and thinks she could get a lot from knowing me but there are no love rockets going off. I gave her keys to the studio. She asked me to tell her about the pruning of my family tree.
March 6, 1989
This morning the phone rang. It was Lisa.
She asked, "Are you on this planet?"
"Sure. We going to breakfast?"
"If you aren't busy."
"I'll meet you in an hour. What time is it?"
"Eleven o'clock."
"Yikes!"
I can't remember the last time I slept this late. We awoke at six, but must have fallen asleep again. We were groggy this morning. Sonja forgot to take the coffee she bought at the Coffee Connection yesterday. It's in my freezer. I gave her a cassette by Television.
I met Lisa at Thayer Street. Jane was there. She's having a difficult time. Jane decided to move to New York. She made arrangements with some friends to move into their loft in Brooklyn and these plans fell through at the last moment. Her business partners are not very businesslike and there has been some activity in the ouster department. Meanwhile, she's been working on a backdrop. Something went wrong with it and now Jane is losing money rather than making money on it. The money she lost is the money she needs to move to New York. Because she was planning to be gone by now, Jane gave up her space on Thayer Street and now has no place to work. She is sleeping in her ex roommate's room this week while Laurie is out of town. On top of all this, Jane's grandmother has been having strokes and is dying. Jane is feeling sad.
As we walked down the stairs, I told Lisa, "I feel a little funny about Jane. Things aren't easy for her and I feel like I should be there for her, but that isn't what she chose.
"Jane is always making plans that collapse and require improvisation. She does well, but when she's improvising, it is stressful for her."
Walking through Chinatown, Lisa said, "I've finished the introduction to The Education of the Senses and I'm poised to begin the book itself. I know that doesn't sound like much, but that's one long introduction, isn't it?"
Lisa is planning on taking her hats around this week and making some sales. I thought she should meet my friend, Mimi, and get some questions answered soon. Lisa asked me to set something up for Thursday after breakfast. I think Mimi will be out of town then.
There was a line at the Blue Diner (we've got to stop arriving so late). We walked to the Stage Deli. I asked Lisa why she waited till eleven to call me. She figured that I was with Sonja and didn't want to disturb me. I told Lisa that the reason Sonja wasn't with us was similar. Sonja said that she felt that my Sunday morning breakfast with Lisa was our time alone. Just the two of us. She didn't want to intrude. I would have preferred breakfast with Lisa and Sonja at ten, when the diner opened.
Anyway, we decided on breakfast instead of lunch. This was a poor choice. The breakfast at the Stage Deli is even worse than the lunch. My matzo brie wasn't crisp. Lisa made a comment about "all the white people" in the room, loudly eating. She said that they all looked so much more successful than she is.
I said, "Look again. Think about the way that people like this spend their time. You get to do what you want. You are better off than almost everybody."
Lisa replied, "You're right. And I am grateful, but sometimes I feel guilty. I'm thirty-three. I live in a disaster area. Shouldn't I have done something by now?"
"Lisa, you know that life is a forked, crooked path. It serves no purpose to compare your progress along one branch to somebody else's progress along another branch.
"We should print some flyers and put them up in Harvard Square to start a support group for people who don't want to need to feel secure."
Lisa looks good. Not working agrees with her. Lisa had to go to Downtown Crossing, to the Woolworths to get an extension cord. I went to Central Square, to Barsamian's, to meet Jim, Cindy and Peter. (I also went to get a brownie to refresh my palette after a disappointing breakfast).
There is a man in Park Street Station almost every Sunday morning. He plays a tape of Christian background music, dances like a Hari Krishna and raptly rambles along with the music. His message is the good news message. Adoration style. What he says about Jesus is all joy and sweetness. His God is in such a good mood that it is almost a sin to worry. Sometimes he quotes from the new testament, other times he sounds like a television commercial with that heavenly choir. Selling the ultimate product.
People are challenged by his presence. They mock him or they defend him. There are often amusing exchanges. Almost nobody ignores him.
At Barsamian's there were no brownies. "No brownies on Sundays." I wondered if it was a blue law.
Cindy was there. Cindy was doing something with the tomatoes. She told me that, in Mexico, tomatoes are fertilized with human feces. For some reason this reduces the shelf life drastically. Cindy was going through piles of tomatoes, removing those which had gone bad. She said, "The best part of this is that I get to go in back and throw these into the sink and watch them splatter all over the place."
I said, "Tomato Surprise."
Jim arrived with Peter. Jim suggested that we save the bad tomatoes for pelting bad performers. Cindy said that there were too many bad tomatoes. I thought, "Cindy is an optimist."
The four of us piled into Peter's orange Volvo. Jim and I sat in the back. Cindy was pleased that she didn't have to fight for the death seat. I ate my not brownie thing that I'd settled for. It was good but I wasn't in the mood.
We went to a reception in a Newton church, for a painting exhibition called, "Diseases." I know the artist, Magnus. Whenever we get together someone is arrested. We don't get together much.
A group of people was in the gallery, milling, nibbling, chatting, looking at the paintings and the catalogue. Someone was spinning records. I should have expected that. Magnus is a disc-jockey. He's seriously into The Upsetters. I have to respect him for that.
I read the catalogue. It said some stuff about the relationship between parasites and hosts. It referred to the historical importance of plagues and mentioned something about inoculations and anti-biotics breeding more formidable infections. It reminded me of some of the ideas in Alan's grant proposal. I walked over to Magnus and asked him if he'd read Plagues and Peoples. He said he hadn't, although some guy'd left a message on his machine recommending the book. Magnus had read Rats, Lice and Men. I told him to read the McNeill book immediately. In addition to the micro parasite history, Plagues and Peoples describes macro parasites. I think that this relates directly to Magnus' painting.
I told him I liked his paintings. We talked a little about art and Magnus asked me what I think about formalism. He started to tell me about this woman, Lisa, who was standing by the table. He said that she'd just gotten out of art school or something and had her head full of all this academic junk about art history and art about art. "I can't stand all this self-referential bullshit. When I hear a song about being in a rock and roll band, I go the other way."
He had a point. The next thing I knew, I was embroiled in some outer limits conversation with the very Lisa that Magnus had been warning me about. She asked me what I thought of the art on display. Before I finished prefacing my answer, Lisa said that she'd had a conversation with Magnus yesterday, and that he seemed to think that the modern emphasis on form over content was not a good thing.
"Just imagine, for a moment, that Leonardo, Michelangelo, Rembrandt and Rilke were all at this party."
I thought, "Jesus, she's inviting the teenage mutant Ninja turtles? What next?"
"These men were all geniuses. They each had the ability to transcend time. Leonardo, for instance, his engineering designs reached into the future, his art recognized the past, and it spoke to the present. Any of the other geniuses on my list transcended time in the same way. If these men were alive today, they would imprint their personalities on these times just as deeply as they did in their own."
I said, "Formalism is a trap. So is the rejection of formalism."
She asked me what I did.
"If I told you, it would only mislead you." (At this juncture, I wasn't about to describe myself as an artist.)
"You're rich, aren't you."
Peter rescued me. We made our way to the door. We were discussing the pictures while we walked down the snowy slope. As we reached the car, a snowball whizzed by and landed in the parking lot. Looking upward in the direction of fire, we saw Jim and Cindy launch another barrage. They had the advantage of the terrain. Attacking from their elevated position, they were able to give their projectiles a deadlier force, while our returned fire fell short. My decision was to equalize the disadvantage by drawing them down from the hilltop. I withdrew behind the car, feigning loss of courage, and swiftly set about preparing an arsenal of snowballs to use in my ambush. Jim (with Cindy giving covering fire) attempted to outflank us on the right. As they came down the sidewalk, I struck from my hidden place and inflicted woeful disaster upon them.
March 7, 1989
After marching Jim and Cindy under the yoke, we declared them "allies" and got into the car. We drove back to Boston, to my place, "the moronic temple". Cindy, Jim and Peter had never been there before and were charmed by the bohemian/industrial atmosphere. Jim saw my Peters projection map of the world and mentioned that his had fallen down and is now neatly folded in storage. I showed him the blank space on the wall that had been occupied by my politically obsolete Pacific projection. (The first time I went to Jim and Cindy's, I was amazed to find the same two maps on their bedroom wall that were on mine.) I told them about the night that I came home and found Tricia at my door. She is a friend of Karin, my ex roommate (before Lolo). I hadn't heard from Tricia since Karin moved to California six months before. I let Tricia into my place and she popped a cassette into Lolo's blaster. "Arthur, you gotta hear this. This is my song. They are playing it on the radio."
Tricia's song was sort of folky and very Catholic. I thought it was pretty good but I wanted to hear it with a heavy metal arrangement. (I find that Catholic imagery combines perfectly with heavy metal music.) I played her a tape of some of my music. Tricia said, "I didn't know you were a musician."
While we were listening to Change of Life Orchestra 1984, Tricia started laughing. She said it was because she was having hallucinations while looking at the map. She said that she wanted to paint on it. I gave it to her. I haven't heard from her since.
When my guests had made themselves as comfortable as my furniture would allow, I showed them some of my jewelry chains and some gemstones I had lying around. I lent Jim my copy of Steven Hawkings' A Brief History of Time.
After they left, Alan dropped in. He brought me a Scientific American book on structures and materials. He read me an article about the role of the media that was very perceptive and very amusing. He told me about his adventures with the rent equity board. It seems that his bank had printed up a new batch of checks with the wrong account number. When this was discovered, new checks were made. Alan started getting notices that checks were bouncing, and when he called the bank they said, "There is plenty of money in your account. We can see no reason for your checks to bounce."
He kept getting notices, and when he pursued it, found out that the account number was correct but the bank routing number (in the upper right corner) was not. When the checks went to some bank in Worcester, they had no record of the account and stamped the checks, "insufficient funds" then returned them.
I started to tell him about Magnus' Diseases. I showed him the catalogue and the postcard Typhus. Alan said that he had known about Magnus' work and had tried to contact him. After a bit of telephone tag he left a message on Magnus' machine recommending Plagues and Peoples.
Alan is reading Mankind and the Natural World. We chatted about how good the "Natural World" book is. Alan said that he is up to the part about pets and that the timing is perfect because he is planning a series of photographs of people and pets. Some of the images will be taken at pet grooming salons.
After he left, Jane arrived. Her grandmother died. Jane wasn't feeling too good. She said that she had no place to stay. She could stay here.
March 9, 1989
Yesterday, Jane called me. She wanted to pick some things up at my place. When I arrived, she was writing in the snow. I called Amy and left a message on her machine. "Amy, this is Arthur. I don't remember if I was supposed to meet you at six or if you were going to call me. Call me." Amy and I were still trying to get together to discuss our dreams.
Jane was wearing a military jump suit. Although it had paint splattered all over it, it looked very good on her. She was telling me that she's been in a "daze" for the last few days. In Jane's world things are happening very fast.
The phone rang. Amy said, "Come on over."
I said, "O.K.." I hung up.
Jane and I left. We rode the red line. She got off at Park Street and I continued to Central Square. Amy and Ann were playing Scrabble again. The words on the board were; "duet, sex, filth, defer, need, boost, deity, tribe" and so forth. I pointed out the message and mentioned my previous observations about the vocabulary in their games.
Amy said, "I'm hungry. Is it cold out?"
I said, "OK, I'll go get something. What do you want?"
When I returned with the pizza, the game was over and Amy asked, "Did you get our invitation?" Amy and Anne are both turning thirty. They are having a party together. Debbie will be there. Ann's parents will be there. Ann wants me to meet her mother because her mother also reads history books. Ann's various ex-boyfriends will be there. So will John. Ann had a dream about John. "I dreamt that John was waving his dick in my face. He put it into my mouth and I bit it. He hit me. When I told John about it he said, 'Don't worry. It will never happen.'"
Amy said, "That isn't a good sign."
Ann said, "I hope he didn't mean it that way."
Amy removed the brownies from the oven.
Ann said, "Arthur, I've been thinking about what you said about how being responsible and making sure that things are taken care of is a kind of shirking. I get a kick out of how that fits in my life."
Ann talked some more about not getting any sex. She said, "I'm such an exhibitionist.
I said, "I know. I'm a voyeur. We should get together and not have sex sometime."
Amy asked me if I wanted to play a game. I suggested Ulysses and the Sirens.
Amy asked me what that was and I told her, "Tie me up and entice me to jump overboard."
Ann said, "We'd have to sing."
So much for that idea.
It's a good thing I didn't suggest Golden Apple of Discord.
Amy was asking me if I wanted to play Scrabble. We started to play but the words coming out were, "phobia, frozen, voice, demand" and I wasn't enjoying it. I asked if they would let me have some photographs taken of them.
"What kind of pictures?" Ann asked leadingly.
I tried to assure her that I didn't expect them to let me have "that kind of pictures" and Ann seemed disappointed. She asked me what I would want if we were taking dirty pictures. I awkwardly answered her. She seemed to be mostly concerned with making sure that she got copies.
By this time, Amy was standing behind me, rubbing her breasts on the back of my head. I got the message. We went to her room. As her clothes started coming off, I wondered if Ann could hear her moaning. I hoped it was bothering her.
"Arthur, this feels wrong."
"Does the wrong feeling heighten your experience, or does it prevent you from having a good time?"
"It mostly gets in the way. You're the only man I've slept with who I still like. But, I think I want to be in love. I feel selfish. It's been so long, and it feels so good just to have a man's body to lie on. I don't think this is a good idea."
"Is there anything I can do to make your rejection of me more satisfying?"
