Thurs 5 Aug 76
R dearer every day, in spite of the fact that he’s been checking up on me. Called and called last night – wondered where I was – I wasn’t too sure how to tell him A and I were over at Shoulders’ drinking, so I just said we were visiting the neighbors. Standing in their yard, which wasn’t true. He is jealous of Shoulders and I don’t blame him – such lush male beauty makes women helpless. A is a complete mess over him. He frequently wanders around the house in nothing but his boxers – we call them as his “huppa”. R. finally got an apt and can stop “crashing” with friends – one bedroom at the top of a Rockville skyscraper. Sounds crazy expensive to me. Wrote a good poem – capitol ghosts – today from the book R gave me. Trying to think where to send it. Tomorrow’s my day off – R coming over at 2. Shalimar 7 Aug 76 Sitting here in a stupor of exhaustion. We had an Al Green fan in here tonight – kept playing same song over and over. Presumably working through some kind of a relationship crisis. They don’t realize coming here and blowing their money kills any relationship – and I am not going to tell them. Anyway I hate Al Green. Missed my bus this AM so took the Fessenden bus and walked across. A better way to go – I like the walk – to hell with this transfer business. I have to admit R doesn’t seem to understand poetry. He’s very suspicious of all ease, elegance, lightness. Nature.! “Work” should make you grit your teeth, groan and bulge your forehead veins. The easier it comes, the less valuable it MUST be. (He would hate Picasso’s very best stuff!) I’ve tried getting him to understand by comparing art to athletics – it only looks easy – it’s the training beforehand that’s so hard. The trick is to render training invisible. But he seems to think modern poetry is a plot to make him look stupid. Really worried about money lately – everything at Unibank is bouncing. It doesn’t take much to set off a chain reaction. Guess I’ll have to borrow from A after all. How true it is that before you can love you must love yourself. My love for myself is wavering. Just finished Sean Stiles’ Occam’s Razor. I hate to see a good idea wasted. Mostly I am depressed by the poor quality of the stories in the Times Detective Story competition anthology. This is something I should aspire to? I’m on a wonderful streak of poetry – keep piling them up – got suicide street and haunted house this eve. Tomorrow R is taking me on a tour of the television station and out to lunch. This is a biggie – see where he works. So I had to buy a gorgeous black linen jumpsuit (size 5!) Should be worn with high red heels – but needless to say, can’t around R. So instead, flat sandals. Fortunately everything is on sale. A and I have decided to ask Maeve to move in with us – we can’t seem to manage alone and we do have three bedrooms, but she’ll have to hide from the landlord. I hate to do it. Letter from D today – he’s in love with the 18 yr old virgin daughter of his minister. Since I am too, it didn’t do a thing to me. God bless ‘em. Rick the gambler in tonight. He’s a friend of R’s – cheered me up by telling me I’ve done so much for R who was really “hurting” over his divorce. Ryder – I love you – but I don’t really know who you are. Hope you are who you pretend to be. 6:30 PM 9 Aug 76 – Shalimar Writing carefully so as not to mess up my fresh polish. Got here early –Fessenden bus much better. Rick Marl in tonight talking about R’s divorce. Said I should hear his wife’s side of the story. (He’s met her.) I don’t want to hear his wife’s side of the story – what would I do if I did know it. Sounds like they should get a divorce – she’s not resisting so obviously she had as many problems with him as he had with her. The fact that he spent so much time here is bad news for any marriage. I was very impressed by his job – a TV news director is a king – he sits in a the control booth with all the camera angles in front of him and tells everyone what to do. I said nothing, but I enjoyed the way they looked at me – very admiringly – where did SHE come from. Little do they know – R won’t tell them. If they dine at the Shalimar, they’ll find out. Fortunately they’re all good family men – eat lunch out of a cooler then rush home to fix the automatic garage door opener and read a bedtime story to the little ones. Reading Mortal Wounds and loving it. Fun to compare the George Sand period to the Notorious Woman TV series last year. Went on a picnic with R. then saw Robert Shaw in Swashbuckler. Ghastly flick. I wasn’t too rude because R liked it. Told him he should have seen Anne of the Thousand Days. Sent out 12 poems. But I’m trying to force myself to stop writing poetry and concentrate on novel. There’s no financial point to poetry – Alas. 11:35 am Thurs 12 Aug 76 I’d like to write but I must pack for the trip and it junks up my head. Mss, 2 ribbons (in case) correctype, The Romantic Egoists, Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald’s Scrapbooks, and the wonderful portrait by Julia Cameron of the two little girls clutching each other which I see as the cover of my book. Sad to see the way Fitzgerald tried to force his wishes on the universe – force it to see things – to be – his way. No wonder he admired the rich – they’re the only ones who sometimes – very infrequently - get away with that. But they are not enviable nevertheless – it’s always a naked emperor situation. Zelda’ s constant references to “not having a past” interest me exceedingly – that way madness most definitely lies. This is what happens to people who insist on “living in the present”; they become amnesiacs. Idea for a poem. I guess I’ll need clothes – so I must do laundry. I also should clean house for poor A – it’s only fair. No writing; circumstances militate. R working very hard to get to the point where he can take a vacation – didn’t get in till 2:45 AM.
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Alysse Aallyn
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