Alysse Aallyn

Category: #Fate

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

         24 Dec 77 – midnight – Plush Palace

                              The Big Day. Go home, sleep, wake up, do laundry, take dogs for shots, buy snow tires.  In a haze of infatuation – Jervaze was in for 5 hours tonight watching me dance with a sense of unmistakable pride.  

    He asked for my phone number so he could call me on Christmas Day – I gave him all of them.

        New York City Dec 25 77 – Fri night.

                                Life is so interesting, Wouldn’t miss it for the world.  

    Lovely intimate family talks – just what family should be doing for perspective on past and future. In two days Avril and I drive out to Michigan to see Merrill – 11 hour drive – tonight’s a dinner in the Village then an early night. 

    Heard of a studio apt on the island – winterized – going for $200/month. 

                          Of course I will have enough royalties for that…or won’t I?  Harcourt royalty dept uncooperative, editor Lauren very cagey.  But won’t the island kill my already comatose sex life?  Whenever I’m away from dancing I miss it. 

     It’s a great substitute for sex but not a complete one alas.   Physical activity vital to my peace of mind.

                              96th St off the Park- New York City –   26  Dec 77

                              Genevieve’s apartment is triggering horrible flashbacks to how sick I was over Ryder at the beginning of last summer. Scary that a man could do this to me. Don’t ever want to get that sick again.  

    Makes me sorry this diary exists – my trusty friend – because it gives misery an actual corporeal reality.

     Burn these sickening wails before I die.  The Victorians always did.

                              Well I’m raring to get back. Not only do I miss the dancing, I miss the bar.  Ah, the nightlife. Always a party atmosphere but I could feel superior for not drinking (or getting high).   I like our status and protections – I like getting paid for exercising, being admired and having fun. This pleasure just cannot be shared – Mom’s face crimps closed – and I am lost in the unredeemable beastliness and ugliness she feels certain it must be. 

                           The fact that I am a feminist and consider myself spiritually in tune with the universe also is incomprehensible to her. (Wives can get into big spiritual trouble too, but I am too tactful to bring that up.) Unfortunately there is no way to defend myself except by attacking back – her  “safe”, closed, restricted world of handmaiden to Dad, feeding and burnishing him like a racehorse, talking him “up” as if she were his sports coach, does not seem to me more inherently saintly. 

                              But to Mom self-loss is what “sainthood” is – you totally do not regard yourself in your care for someone else. The fact that you are puffing them up like a grampus, encouraging them to be completely selfish, is I guess too shockingly cruel to mention. So: I’m stuck in Patient Griselda mode with undeserved imprecations heaped on my innocent head. 

     I wonder if it would be too nasty to talk about how I am sacrificing myself for those poor lonely men who need to look upon a perfect feminine ideal while they swill beer?  Guess I better not. 

                              Mom is fond of saying that love doesn’t work unless 

    you open your heart to the other but you can’t do it without marriage!  

    I say Jervaze and I are “courting” which is a very different thing.  I don’t think I will ever open my heart again. I think perhaps it opens by itself –

     naturally. One might as well tear a flower open and complain about the quality of the bloom.

                              Interesting being here with Brett and Genevieve and 

    watching someone else’s marriage from the outside.  Does not look too enviable. Reading “Eclipse of the Hero in Victorian Fiction.”  He’s in eclipse everywhere else, too, I may add.

        Mon 27th Dec 77 11:00 AM

                              See Dracula on Broadway – pure pleasure with some 

    honest scares.  Frank Langella very sexy.  At Italian dinner Mom and Dad push the idea of the island hard, but I know the old people would never leave me alone.  They’d be worse than Ryder. Still, there’s something magical about being protected from the real world by the ferry – places you can’t get to easily are wonderful just for that reason. 

                              Mom and Dad say further I can’t be serious about my writing or I’d have a job in publishing or magazines!  I’m so rocked back on my heels its hard to even argue. It sounds so sane. But why won’t it result, really, in another “hostage taking” of my soul, which, so, so regrettably, appears to be so damn fragile? Becoming one’s self  is life’s greatest challenge – and so far it does seem necessary to abjure group (gang? Team?) endeavors. Writing doesn’t satisfy unless it comes out of the wild side of me – my secret side. There’s always the temptation to rip open the spider and get the silk out faster. Dad rolls his eyes – it’s the old “I’m an artist so I can do what I want” argument again. How to tell him yes, he’s right. Yes –

    I’m taking advantage of my education, my family, my “privileges”; it’s who they made me.  No going back to some invented Dust Bowl life of drudgery just so THEY can “feel superior & good”. They insist they don’t WANT to “feel good!” It’s about what’s “right!”  My turn to roll my eyes.

        Detroit, 11:05 PM, Thursday 29 Dec 77

                              At the adorably, impossibly 20’s Tudoresque manse my sister 

    Merrill is restoring – it’s lovely here. Merrill and her husband say dancing is “sex work” and “sex work” is “OK” if its “regulated so “sex workers aren’t exploited.”  I get annoyed that nobody can tell the difference between dancing and prostitution!  Lots of things cause “erotic titillation” – breathing for example. Still, I find I’m inclining toward taking a two-month break in March 

    and going to the island to write. Is this family management?  But one of the reasons I like dancing is because you can “pick it up and put it down.” 

    Well, we’ll see.

        Thurs night 29 Dec 77 9:30 PM

                              I find as I distance from Ryder I remember some good things and that makes me happy. He was so unique.  It was fun knowing him, watching him perform impromptu magic for street children and restaurant patrons. More extraordinary really than poor old Jervaze who in spite of his glamorous looks drinks way too much and hates his job. Also Ryder knew me as a “not dancer” which J doesn’t – maybe that persona obscures who I really am. I remember the excitement of watching Ryder make his television show – unexpectedly sweaty physical labor in choosing camera angles and shots –

    timing, music, close-ups – building the tape as the excitement was happening 

     – more in common with sports than some couch potato activity like editing.

                                        Greek Town for dinner after the Renaissance Center, so the night ended in a wild bouzouki.  Day occupied with antiquing – especially fun since I am reading Rumer Godden’s  China Court, which is basically a love song to things. It made me worry that there are not enough details in Demon – what should I add? Perhaps buy a Vogue to see.  

                                        Dreamed about Devon last night.  Wonder  what 

    he’s up to.  Maybe I’m being psychic again. Getting some peace of mind about him as well. Merrill’s daughter comes to read over my shoulder, then when I move to hide the diary says, “Don’t worry, I can’t read cursive. “

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

                     4:20 PM Fri Oct 14 – 77

                              Blessed book!  The joy, the solidity, the security this diary has afforded me all my life can’t be measured.  Bizarre letter from my dentist thanking me for referring “Mr. Arlen” to them!  Apparently Ryder is stalking me. Now I have to wear makeup to the dentist!  Hope I don’t run into Ryder while wacked out on Novocain.  Usual day of quotidian pursuits, washing lingerie & hair, filing, letters.  Avril writes that Mason is moving in with a friend! He thinks it will be “better” for her. Bet the “friend” is female! Sure sounds like death knell to me – he dragged her all the way out there, ran busily through her money & lost his spark.  Still other’s relationships are always so much clearer!  Now we can be glad she’s not going to school – she needs to get out NOW. 

                              Plush Palace – Mon – 11:40 PM 17 Oct 77

                              4 Dancers on tonight but Cindy and Linda walked out, ticked about my raise (I didn’t tell them.) So more dancing (and $$).  Plus coffee machine broken and we need to order out so I treated myself to 2 Krispy Kremes. Ah, the simple joys.  Five-year plan guy is back.  His fave play? “Love is Alive” – unfortunately.

                              The most gorgeous autumn weather tonight driving here – my heart soared. ONE MORE SET! Then fling on fake fur “Shakespearean” coat, jump into El Diablo, off into the night. Bar deserted, tips unspeakable. Asked if I could cash a check with Randy he just handed me a $20 bill, so there’s gas. Kiki says she’s getting married, worked the whole evening on her guest list for Big Event in Fredericksburg. Reading Hardwick’s Seduction & Betrayal and appreciating it although something’s “off” about her. Why won’t the ventriloquist put down the dummy and just talk?  And she’s just flat wrong about Woolf and Plath.

                              I brood about letting R. know where I work. Brave or stupid?  Stupid, I think.  Better class him with “dead end relationships”. I have plenty of people I’d never want to see again – Bruce and Kyro springs to mind.  Other people I feel good about like Toss Sheffield. He’d be fun to see again. Could he handle my dancing? He had a fun “hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy” attitude in general towards effort & enterprise.

    Insomniac

    I can’t sleep

    Because you’re gone

    My muscles wake

    My mind goes spinning on

    And where your fingers

    Plied and pruned my face

    Night air is cold and

    Caustic in its place

    And where we turned and woke

    In complex rhyme, I’m left

    To face the music frayed by time

    A waltz which once we won

    Losing battle choreographed for one.

    None to explore or

    Appreciate my line though now at last

    It’s incontestably mine.

                              12:10 PM- Plush Palace – Wed 19 Oct 77

                              Dance night, then dance the next day kind of rough. And tips are bad when the weather’s good – no one comes in.  I seem to have a lot of bills – just turned on the heat – but I’m meeting them. Making some inroads today on Thomson’s Life of Frost. Randy fired Robin –

    Yvonne needs $300 immediately because she just bought a piano. Well good luck getting it out of this crowd is all I can say. Paz’s “on call” because she left her husband and moved into the motel across the street.  Let’s hope she shows up.  Last time I saw her she was pretty depressed; said she gave him “the best four years” of her life. I have to get this all down in case I need it someday.  Ryder used to be especially pissed when I got nostalgic for dancing.  But dancing is its own little world. 

                              7:30 PM- Plush Palace – Thu 20 Oct 77

                              This afternoon I was getting ready for work phone rang, I say hello and Ryder’s tight little voice says: (very meaningfully) Hello.  

    I turned the radio down (Lakmé) and said casually as I could, “How are you?”

                              He said he should enroll in FBI school after all the 

    trouble he’d had tracking me down. 

                              (It couldn’t have been that hard since Mom and Dad’s 

    house sitter has been giving my # to all and sundry.)  Said he was punished now for being a non-communicative procrastinator who should fling himself off the 14th St Bridge.  

    I told him I lived in Beltsville and danced in Virginia, refused to give further details. I didn’t let him get away with any of his garbage.  He said I’d been in town since Sept 8 without contacting him. I said he’d made it pretty plain he didn’t like what I had to offer. Then why did I come back?  I said, I like it here. Creep!  

    Like he owns the world!  

                              He said, will you eat with me?  Hmmm.  Something

    rattling in Pandora’s box. While I hesitated, he said don’t make me disguise myself 

    as a girl scout cookie salesman (he could get away with it, too.) He said he hasn’t gone out to dinner since our last night at Alfio’s!!! (I guess the Emmys don’t count but I said nothing.) Said he’s having to give back his furniture and sleep on an air mattress because he can’t make the payments. Aww.  

    This is the idiocy of buying furniture on time, but I still say nothing. So we’re meeting Babe’s Sun at 3:30.Sunday.  Seems fairly safe… Rushed to library and took out every true murder book I could find.  Just in case.

                               2 Nov – Plush Palace – 6:05 PM.

                              Ryder called this morning to “report in!” Just to chat about his day!  No more of that, I said.  I’m busy. Slam. I don’t chat and I’m not sorry and it’s too late to learn.  Actually, feeling amazingly happy.  Kiki showed me how to cut off my corn with an exacto knife.  Instantly better!  Still in Vol I of Life of Frost.  He was a repulsive human being, all right.  Nowhere near as fun as Agatha.  Precious equilibrium recovered. 

                              8:30 PM  8 Nov 77

                                I gave him the full treatment, poor guy. Red Italian boots, glittery eyeshadow, tight, tight jeans. Ho ho ho. Deliberately drove Connecticut Ave but no markers from the past reached out their claws.  Felt strong and blissful. 

    I was first there (of course) so could order carafe of wine and think. Thinking,

     I’ll just explain to him that my idea of friendship and intimacy requires a 

    degree of truth telling that appears to freak him out.

                              He wore his high heels, too. His hair is blonder, longer 

    and messier than I remembered and it suits him.  Off to the Bahamas next weekend, he says for a “dive”. He wore the pinky ring I gave him (he says he can’t get it off.) But that holy glow, that shine he used to have is gone for me. I get it that he doesn’t know the pain he caused – 

    shallow people can’t.  And that’s pitiable, really. He’s not just deaf in one ear, he’s deaf in his soul. 

                              He has a carefully worked out a “barstool rationale” for what happened to us; we became lovers before we became friends.

     I have no comment. Postponing sex would not have helped – and it might have made things worse dumping all the responsibility for timing on me. I think when he saw how easy it was to draw blood he couldn’t help doing it, and I was a fool and an idiot.  I ordered the fruit and cheese plate but left before it arrived. Realize how much I want all this to be in the past. No future of any kind exists for us.  Not even in fantasy. The future is what matters. Told him to give my regards to the folks at the Shalimar. He said he’d give me a buzz. 

                              Bet I can finish Demon by Thanksgiving. Avril coming. 

     Lucky I have a second bedroom.  Furnish it with Kliban posters, a 

    thrift shop bureau and a mattress on the floor.

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

    Plush Palace – 11:20 AM Sun 24 Sept – wrote a fourteen page letter to Avril tonight. There’s a very pretty blond here who looks just like Ryder – they could be mistaken for each other – but it’s not him. 

                              9:40 PM  – walls dry so I  could hang paintings. What a difference.  Reading Redinger’s bio of George Eliot, The Emergent Self. Like it very much. Turns out I love driving to work – 5Pm is rush hour on the Beltway – everyone’s coming home but I’m going out for the night!  Makes me feel weirdly close to all those people.  And apparently they feel close to me – though they could just be reacting to my bumper sticker (Colette was a Nudie Dancer). They don’t seem to get the literary reference.

        Mon 3 Oct 1977

                                I hear only from my sister Merrill who declares my book a “brilliant satire”.  She wants to know why I work?  Shouldn’t I tour with book? Sigh. Give me the money and leave me alone I say.

                              Spent the AM phoning around trying to find my book in all the stores. Only found it one place. Dropped note to publisher. 

                              Out for Courvoisier with Erika who lectured me on my book. I ended up defending the Victorians saying everyone now thinks “honesty and openness” are going to save them but we don’t know enough about ourselves for real honesty and our lives are still based on “smothered panic” as far as I can see.  (See Janet Case’s strictures to V. Woolf.) Well off to my double life. When I pull into the Plush Palace parking lot I have such a good feeling.  Everything coming together. Down the old runway.  

                              Bought the most wonderful gold stripper shoes that tie with ribbons and have clear Lucite six-inch heels. I finally have enough costumes to feel really professional – every set should be good. Randy always compliments me. I am slowly phasing my hair from red to blonde – seems to help with the tips. I can live on fruit and cream of wheat –  only buy groceries with tip money. Little man down front muttering “fuck me-fuck me-fuck me” over and over but not loud enough to be evicted. Randy said I am the best dancer in Washington area.

        Sat 8 Oct 1977

                              Giving a dinner party. Bought 8 old-fashioned glasses for 50 cents apiece, five floor pillows, peacock chairs and a glass dining table. Now I’m looking for a silk eiderdown (for my bed) in some violent color. Bought beautiful rose-lilac fabric for curtains. Randy gave me another raise without my even asking for one.  I love my body again!  After the long estrangement caused by Ryder…he deliberately tried to undermine my faith in my body. He would prefer bad sex with a slave as long as he can be boss. Wait – isn’t that the marriage he just got out of? Guess we all repeat ourselves.

                              7:30 PM Tues 11 Oct 77

                              I’m too fucking fragile.  All my problems come from pretending I’m not.  I look forward to old age when presumably throbbing metabolism, soaring hormones and plunging brain waves will have smoothed out. How to describe this scrambled day?  I’ve been vibrating like a cilia ever since I got up this morning.  Made dentist, gyno appts, shots for dogs, dog licenses, took angel puppies on an hour’s walk. Divorce lawyer on the 26th: “John Love”: seems appropriate. Clear the decks for writing.

                              My area of Beltsville very rural. Poetry in all directions. Reading Mildred Savage’s A Great Fall and getting lots of ideas. Vacuum cleaner to repair shop they say they can fix for under $15.  I hate errands, a disgusting dribble of irreplaceable time.  Rewarded myself by getting Sleeping Murder at the library. Already know Dr Kennedy is the murderer.

                              2PM Wed 12 Oct 77 – Plush Palace

                              Some men seem to interpret the fact that I’m a dancer as some sort of personal challenge to them.  You can feel the spike of hostility. “You’re making me think about sex again!”  Is it fear of rejection?  Any aura of professionalism bothers them also.  I always curtsy especially low to the hostile tables – they can never figure out whether I am mocking them or not AND THEY THINK I PROBABLY AM!  I save them a lot of money by getting them thrown out early.  One guy asked me how long it would take to get in bed with me. His erection was so obvious I almost asked, “And what is your little friend drinking?” but instead I said, “5 years.”  He showed up next night, saying, “Day one of the five year plan!”  I like those guys much better. 

                              Final R conclusion: What a JERK!  Jerk’s absolutely the right word – in instinctual reflex – no brain activity involved.  Will I ever find a gorgeous man (blond, please) whose soul is connected to his brain?  

                              9:20 PM Thurs 13 Oct 77

                              Shopping Loehmann’s yesterday with Maeve. 3 sweaters, silk jumpsuit with jacket & scarf, lime-colored silk jersey blouse, socks, boots, shoes, gloves – $140 cash. Nice. Saw a wonderful fake fur coat I’d like to come back for. It has a priceless air of Ken Russell camp. Buy it with my Folger money – Shakespeare would understand.  

                              Maeve bought nothing.  Couldn’t find one thing she liked, reading labels with the expression of Queen Victoria viewing a slum.  And the free-for all dressing rooms full of naked people just astonished her.  (Stuff I see every day.)  

                              She wants to know exactly why Wealthier People rejected this clothing at its first price?  They must know something we don’t.  (Wondrous rhinestone earrings to dance in, too.  M. expressed pious horror.)  People like this amaze me.  Why is your own taste of so little importance? Then went out to dinner at a Middle Eastern restaurant – my choice – heavenly lamb shish kebab and a belly dancer! I loved it but Maeve had to rush out before dessert. But as it seems I can never be with ANYONE – even lovers – longer than 3 hrs it was just as well.

                              Folger morning started badly, hair looked mangy, face requires immediate skin graft. Dog hair even on NEW clothing (How is this possible?)  Running an hour behind schedule (compulsively early me).  May Miller gave me worst intro I ever hope to have, misquoted my poems and said I was a grad of the U of Minn. I thought I would sob with emotion 52 times during reading.  My “woodcunt” poem did not go down well (even though it is definitely my most Shakespearean). 

                              Damn.  Then I could have strangled Erika Gelbfisz  (at the after party) who is so scornful and cynical about everything you can’t even have an ordinary conversation with her. I felt like throwing my wine in her face saying, “Suppose you actually succeed in making us all feel rotten, what then?  Fighting in the streets?”                                            

    Nothing’s worth anything in her opinion, so why is she alive exactly? This is what gets my hostility going but because I am at a party I DON’T WANT TO GET INTO IT.  So I just growl and stew. I don’t care for Cocktail Party Standing Around – my right boot was trying to extinguish my left toe, a toe already threatened with extermination from dancing.  This is real Italian leather so SHOULD ultimately fit my feet – I can see each boot slowly outlining my toes – if I don’t come down with gangrene first. Will try Wet Washcloth Stuffing tonight. (Still, I looked ravishing, my dear, in a blue gaucho three-piece suit and my red, red, high-heeled boots.) Poet Usher Glayne seemed impressed with me – but he’s an old man. 

                              To bed with my main squeeze, Agatha Christie.  Thank God for that woman.  She has pulled me single handedly through the last three months. 

                              I was just drifting off when Marc Kramer called. We talked ½ hr.  He bought a sailboat and a BMW and wanted to be sure to let me know. I like the sailboat and the car but the desire to “impress” me diminishes him in my eyes.  Sad to say.  He’s presently at risk of being filed under “has no conversation”.   Well, he did talk about work.  They wanted to fire him from The Washington Project, then admitted he had been right all along. He’d love to have dinner sometime, “see how I live”.   Uh oh. Can I keep this relationship out of the sexual? I don’t want to go to bed, even experimentally with someone Lacking the Necessary Spark.  Could they make up for it by enthusiasm or step-by-step instructions?  I hesitate.  Is it ever possible to just date?  It was AWFUL with Keith.  Marc, however, has a gift of humor. And my parents like him.  “No expectations?” I finally say.   And he promises. 

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

        Chevy Chase, MD – 10:15 PM Thurs 8 Sept.

                              At Shoulder’s house. Not a bad drive down – (washing the dogs right before the ferry (I had to – they stank) put some time pressure on me – but I made the ferry anyway. Shoulders looks different – has a moustache. Talks about needing a roommate – does he mean me?  He doesn’t know where yet and I don’t want to live with him. His constant string of ignorant pickups would eventually get me down. 

                             He doesn’t mention Ryder and I don’t look up his TV show. 

    Promising stuff in the classifieds – a garden apt in Landover, a townhouse in Dale City, sharing a house in Kensington. Took the dogs on the old walk – they remembered the route. Huge construction at my old house. 

     L’Escargot closed.

        5 PM Sept 9

                              Kensington House hopeless. You have to join some

     kind of food co-op that’s like a cult religion and there’s a huge emphasis on kitchen and cooking duties. They all eat together. Seems like the worst of college and boarding school to me. I’m now sitting in a real estate office which is really a garage waiting for a guy who’s already an hour late. He’ll be here in 10 mins they say, then he’s going away for 2 weeks so I hope he will want to close the deal tonight, It’s described as an old apartment, high ceilings, fireplace. $210 a month. So I’m just praying  the neighborhood’s not too bad. 

        7:00 PM

                              Bleak. Too bleak. Tried to imagine myself doing my 

    exercises on that floor, standing in that kitchen waiting for water  to boil, etc. Couldn’t manage. Feeling very stressed. Do I even want to live in this city? It’s just that I know I can easily make a living if the 

    book doesn’t take off. Went to the library and loaded up on Agatha Christies to help handle the strain. It works.  Maybe I need to get a shag haircut  and spend the winter in Spain.  Now why don’t I do that, other than the obvious reason I can’t afford it and have already missed my dogs as much as I ever want to. Another guy says he has half of a house I might want.  With a fenced in yard.

        8:15 AM Wed 14 September – Powder Mill Road

                              Drinking coffee in my own kitchen from the mug that 

    was my present to myself last morning on the island.  The guy is 

    selling this house as a rental property and was amazingly cavalier – 

    needed a tenant – didn’t look up my refs or demand cosigner.  

    Absolutely cool when I described myself as a ”writer” so “dancer” 

    remains beneath the radar.  (Dad would say that proves I know 

    dancing’s “bad”! I refuse to be unsafe just to convince my own father I’m respect-worthy.) 

                             Yesterday very full day.  Got up at 8 and moved

     the dogs to their fenced in yard. Fetched the truck, loaded and 

    unloaded with Shoulders’ help – bookcases, boxes, mattress, 

    desk, sofa – had truck back by 3. A thousand robins on the weed-grown lawn. I wonder how long I will be looking at this peaceful green view.

        8:30 AM Thurs Sept 15 1977

                              Up early spending the last of my money on necessaries – hardware, lampshades, contact paper.

        Fri 16 September 1977

                              My books arrived at Larry’s!  I spent the morning sending them out. Then drove to the Landover Mall, bought two g-strings and pasties and off to the Plush Palace. Steve was there – (Randy the bouncer just hired) thrilled to see me. 

                              Wanted to know where I’d been but I turned that easily away. Vacay! Who wouldn’t!  Told me to come to work Saturday night and they’d give me my schedule.  So that’s settled. I don’t like trying to live without money.  Took the landlord my paint color selection – he buys the paint and I do the work. Probably will take me the next week. Every now and then am attacked by that claustrophobic feeling of restlessness and purposelessness but I am able to keep it at philosophical bay. Working at my poem index made me feel strong and soothed. 

                              Called Chloe to see if I can get on the radio – she was excited to hear from me, but unfortunately gave Erika the Pest my number. Erika called – I was nervous that she wanted me to rewrite her manuscripts, but she just invited me to breakfast.  After that she has another appointment so she can’t swallow up my day. Letter from Avril saying she is coming end of Oct.

    10:15 PM Sat 17 Sept 77 – The Plush Palace, Alexandria Virginia

                                Ego lift.  Nothing’s changed. I’m still the best dancer in the place. Four dancers on and I know two of them. The gossip, the Costume exchange, the curling irons, the dope in the dressing room – it’s all coming back to me. They’ve introduced some weird rules, like customers get to play the music, but it’s still a fun and relaxed place to be.  Steve the floor manager says I can have all the work I want so I might be able to put money away.

         Sun 18 Sept 77

                              Opal comes to over to say “hi” but really to complain about her incipient divorce.  Not the best company. Not the best climate for me either – I found myself sobbing over Ryder (fortunately was alone by then). Why does it seem a lost paradise?  So I can still get into that sort of mood. 

                              Nice phone call with Mom and dad, not too pressured.  They are coming to a boatyard in Annapolis  to look at a boat – will see me then.  One of the best things about this house is the month-to month lease.  Feel I can leave any time but if I behave well they won’t kick me out. Gorgeous location but forty-five minute highway commute to The Plush Palace.  Still wish I could live in Virginia.

                              Wed AM 20 Sept  77                                    Sent out a ton of poems. Replied to a woman who wants pieces for an anthology. Got a beautiful love-letter from Devon!  His usual length – both sides of one page.  Talked about how much fun we had in August, dressing up and going out and “afterwards…!” Made me smile. I said to hell with money and called Avril because I wanted to share – Mason is not there during the day.   She is in a bad place. Providential I called. He has taken to staying out at night without explanation – she is frantic. Thank God she is coming here. I told Randy since I’m your best dancer, how about a raise. He gave me one! Only flaw to this house – they need to fix hot water. I had to heat water to wash my hair. Bought 2 more costumes bringing my total up to six  – the bare minimum I’d say

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

            2:30 PM Dunkin Donuts, Eelsboro, Maine Fri. 26 Aug 77

                              Here I am again verging on home: have I changed? I like myself better, 

    I think I can say that. Thurs night was a big success. Devon came in with an IMMENSE bottle of white wine – he either needs it for himself or he’s trying to turn me into an alcoholic (with my full cooperation.) The clam and noodle thing I invented was quite good but he wasn’t ready to eat till nine and we didn’t get to bed till midnight where he revealed a sexually savage side to his nature that has been previously unseen.  So maybe he was nerving himself. (I loved it).  We finished the housecleaning and were off to the airport by 11. 

                              Fairly silent in the car, though he was tender.  When I 

    mentioned he might come down to DC he said he didn’t think there was much of a possibility – so now I’m worrying that I’ve been pushed ontoBad Girl Island while he pines for Pure Young Innocent English girl with who he would NEVER do those enjoyably awful things.          (She’s 21!!!! He knew her 24 hrs!!!) I shouldn’t be silly.  I really can’t ever “lose” him. I think he loves me and everything else is just scar tissue. Devastating airport goodbye – he asked me to “write soon”. I’m probably lucky he loves me as much as he does. I was looking damn good if I do so say so myself in backless red halter top and tight, tight jeans. I do want him to remember me as beautiful. 

                              11:30 AM Sat 27 Aug 77

                              Gobsmacked! Mom & Dad are on Ryder’s side!!! They 

    HATE him!  In other words, they will defend anybody rather than me.  They say of course R “behaves badly” if I am having an “affair” (don’t you love the archaic term?) 

    with Devon!  I say he doesn’t even know about Devon, plus we weren’t exclusive BY HIS CHOICE plus we were BROKEN UP.  But everything still seems to be my fault. Incredibly, they think I am not SUFFERING ENOUGH.  Here are people who have lectured me all my life to find any excuse for other people’s bad behavior – life has surely injured them somehow. They didn’t have Advantages!  According to them I am the only human being alive who doesn’t get an excuse – I should just “be different”.  

                      How, asks mom, can I meet “suitable young men” while dancing?  

    Suitable young men! (They like Marc Kramer who’s a complete horndog and a political troglodyte. But at least he can afford me!) Am I living in a Trollope novel? I am so annoyed I don’t want to accept their hospitality but I really don’t want to rent a room in the House of the Damned aka 

    Burnside Inn. which doesn’t take dogs – who wept to see me again like children – then immediately got over it. 

                              Dad’s a very restless retiree I must say but don’t ask me what to advise.  I’m too ignorant. My advice to everyone is “write”;

    Naturalists say, “Be alone in nature” and religious people say “Find God.”

     Reading Vol I. V. Woolf’s diary (so different from A Writer’s Diary)

     Hitting the gin.  Mom thinks I’m taking “bad” advice from messed up writers – “modeling” myself on failures and suicides – (Dad calls them “degenerates”) – because it’s “cool”. That’s why I need the gin. I need the gin the first minute I wake up.  Must try not to be such a limp limpet. Told Mom if R calls at night not to come get me. 

                              Sun 9:30 AM 28 Aug 77

                              Mom washing windows.  God – I think I am supposed to offer help but I Refuse. I need to get the hell out of here.  Mom says I can’t add my laundry to hers 9she sends it out)but have to go to the laundromat in town.  

    So the Battle is On. I’ll just go around smelling bad so there. Mom and Dad are sailing down the Inland Waterway but not till Oct. Have a horrible feeling I’m not out of the woods on this Ryder thing.  Maybe I can get established in Washington without him knowing. If I go back to him I will despise myself. Keep Devon in secret as my lucky talisman.

                              9;45 PM

                              Drunk, fat and exhausted.  Parents had cocktail party 

    inviting Island Poet.  (Published in The New Yorker.) Tried to give her the rundown on my summer but it sounds a complete waste – “Wrote half of a no-good book, got my other book rejected”. Of course my summer doesn’t sound like anything with the sex & love left out!!!   Am I trapped at the end of a cul de sac?  No; there is something there. I just can’t

    find it yet. 

                              Dad said he’s sure my life provides a lot of stories, but 

    maybe what I need is a PhD in Eng Lit!  Mom’s reaction to that is rigid disapproval.  (He’ll never make that mistake again.)  To explore the boundaries of one’s soul is Selfish. One Lives to Serve (or to Claim one is Serving. So, if you’re too stupid to know  you’re selfish its win-win for the small-minded!) 

                        Tried to read The Clocks but its Agatha Christie’s 

    worst.  Absolutely meaningless. Poor Virginia Woolf going through a very bad, painful period. Obviously sick, recording only weather & food. 

    Now theorists act like she was “mental” not liking to look at herself but 

    Vita Sackville-West felt the same way. Couldn’t look in a mirror, wouldn’t buy evening dresses or go to parties! (And she was on the sexual prowl, unlike poor VW.)  I think their era was actually worse about beauty than we are – they gave it a “magic” “classical” quality so it was very much restricted.  We see more beauty – and in weird places. 

    Otherwise how explain Leslie Caron? Jeanne Moreau? Charlotte Rampling?  

    Hardly classic beauties but wonderfully, rightfully worshipped as goddesses. I see hope for all of us.

                              8:00 AM Mon 29 Aug 77

                              It’s real Agatha Christie weather – fog so dense you

     can’t see the water.  Nevertheless the ferry’s running – Mom took 

    Dad down. I’m feeling successful, sober and sane. I’m doing exactly what I want and will find my own way.  I’m determined to be happy and not develop some kind of “rejection phobia.” Not knock out the props of 

    my own happiness. Accept the fact that my pride has been hardest hit.

    PHANTOMS

    The ghost awaits his chance

    Inside us all

    Revenge de-bodies –

    Anticipates the dark

    Impatience ill-concealed to

    Grasp our foot

    Beneath the turning of the stair

    Reveal a face as blank as

    Nightmare whose

    Icy, seaweed coils entwine mistrust

    Around our throats

    Suppress our breath

    While we dead live.

                              4:20 PM  Letter from the Folger Shakespeare Library 

    inviting me to read Oct 13!   Mom was impressed. 20 mins pays

     $50!  I’ve hit the big time!  Wish I’d known this when Island Poet

    asking me why I don’t just kill myself and get it over with. M & D

    very flush with money right now.  Got their $$ back

     from NY State bankruptcy but Dad always in a panic that we’ll figure out how rich he is.) 

                              9:00 PM Called Shoulders. He said dogs will be all right for a couple of days but he’s being evicted at the end of Sept!  Too bad!

     Such a nice house. (And in Chevy Chase!)  So I’m spared kennel 

    fees for 2 days at least.  Ryder must be back at work (if he still has a job). 

    Reading old NY Times Book Reviews in front of a roaring fire.  

    Dishwashing break – I said I’d do them. Pick up Agatha Christie afterwards –

    – the preferred reading for “shock cases”.  (She was a shock case herself.  

    Absent in the Spring is very fine). 

                               Island 10 PM Monday night, 5 Sept 77

                              In bed in the Barnacle drinking coffee, eating bread 

    with honey. Delicious solitude. Can’t go to the Main House because Genevieve’s friends from Boston are there – they no sooner arrived for this Fantasy vacation than they decided they need a divorce. Fortunately, they are quiet about it. The one thing they can’t deal with is their dog –

     tomorrow I have to drive him to the ferry. Oh well.  I’ve been enraptured by this delicious solitude – beachcombing is very healing.  I guess I am just a solitary sort – don’t really care for people at all, I fear. Last night a bad dream about Ryder – treating me cruelly and me, paralyzed. In the daytime – in my conscious mode – I remember everything good about him, his lips mouth and fingers – his constant air of playfulness. 

    The way we fit perfectly together like interlocking puzzle pieces  

    – nice that he was short – my mirror opposite, only male. My lost twin. 

    But nature abhors a balance, apparently. 

                              Must remind myself how he had to try to turn it to his 

    advantage, throwing the whole system off and spinning my world into 

    frozen space.  Now he doesn’t know where I am (although he might suspect.)  No phone in this building thank God. 

                              Tomorrow goodbye Maine – back to DC to house-hunt.  

    M & D have been good about not dragging me to things – enjoyed the Smythes sculpture show – parties not so much. Parties seem like 

    “consensus building events” where I’m fated to be perennially on the outs.  Ford Madox Ford made some kind of statement about how 

    people have to achieve a level of “ordinariness” to be “successful” –

     I can’t remember the exact quote. Plus I lack the patience to look it up.

                              Ryder felt I despised him intellectually, which of course, I did. 

    I don’t think of myself as stratified, but he is and when you’re with a stratified person, you become so.  Sometimes I am in mourning for the part of me that died. I wish I could get my letters back – but they were only love-letters.  Must seem now like the ravings of an insane person. 

    Well, there’s no reason to see him again. I think the casual relationship is beyond me.  I hope in the future I’ll be careful of men going mach one across the sexual barrier. I’ve got to stop looking at sex as a vitamin requiring periodic intravenous doses.  

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

                              2PM Sun 14 Aug 77

                              Sitting on the deck even though it’s just about to rain – 

    back from long bike ride watching family barbecues.  Will I ever have children? I feel so exactly balanced between Ryder and Devon like a ball in the air 

    – but could fall at any moment.  Finished The Edwardians – made me long to read Trollope.  Vita Sackville-West’s work is like a death wish. 

    Maybe Pevensey Library can rise to some Trollope. Downy woodpecker 

    2 ft away.

                              Finished The Dark Island! An outrageous howl of 

    self-pity!  Mom & Dad called all worried about Avril. She & Mason had to borrow money after selling $4500 worth of stock in June! Dad wants to deal financially with Mason instead of his own daughter!  I was cool and stayed out of it.  

    I don’t even want to imagine what they say to the others about me. I sent Avril a letter that said I would buy her a round trip plane ticket any time she wanted – even for just a short visit. Talk about work and suffering!  I’m sure she feels stuck in every way with this guy. Down to a dinner of bouillon & smoked oysters. 

                              Tues 16 Aug 77

                              D’s & my relationship “plateaus.”  Each of us may have 

    given all we can spare. At least there’s no Mutual Punishment.  

    Womantried to get me into conversation at mailboxes – she’s an accountant whose boyfriend works on missiles.  God they both sounded like the dullest people imaginable.  Tried not to blanche.

                              6:00 PM  Couldn’t resist $10 phone call to Avril. She’s 

    hanging in there but doesn’t like Calif so far. She’s not going to school because Mason thinks he ought to be able to pay for it!  So, so sick after using her money to live on.  She’s looking for some clerk job. Still thinks 

    this guy might be The One, even though sex is once a week and she’s not satisfied.  After that I called Devon who should be back from psychomotor class but he wasn’t in. 

                              Midnight – Could get psychotic about D not returning my call – however I refuse. Let the poor man live. He lacks time for an ACTUAL other girl (although I know there are plenty of letters & phone calls with girls he cultivates.) 

                              10AM – Wed 17 Aug 77

                              Devon woke me up in the middle of the night, wondering if I was “psychic”.  He’d had a horrible day –  had to take a “pregnant friend” to the clinic for abortion (not his kid.) This is a new one. Can’t imagine him lying about something so bizarre – I didn’t ask for details –

    just told him it was a “sudden impulse” (true).  Called the bank – my money was in but only $987 (it’s never  as much as you expect.) From shit comes flowers, as they say. Called Marc Kramer and left message whether I can hitch a ride to Maine with him (he goes almost every weekend). 

    Finished Life of Waugh.  Cramps.

                              Sat 20 Aug 77 

                              Poor Devon!  He brought pizza and a very good brandy –

    (too good –  drinking it woke me up in the middle of the night) suggested a movie.  I said I wanted to Talk.  Told him all about my week; everything – 

    novel, phone call with Avril, breaking up (mentally) with Ryder because I “realized there’s another way”. Felt it was time to share. He asked if it had anything to do with him I said it did but he shouldn’t panic – it’s a good thing. He asked did I want to know about other girls? I said yes. Would I be jealous? 

    Maybe – but it wouldn’t impact on him.  He talked about his friend who had the abortion – she’s ready to take him on but his feelings for her are “clinical”.

     (Uh oh. She’s in trouble. He could be lying to me about Who’s the Daddy or lying to himself, most like.) She’s 2 yrs older than him.  

                              Then there’s a girl he met on the train – they’re just friends so far so he doesn’t know her well – but he’s curious.  Then there’s the English girl – he definitely wants to bring her over but neither of them can afford it so far. He seems to have a sex/romance dichotomy going so 

    I’m not jealous exactly – it would be like being jealous of someone’s fantasies. However, it doesn’t make me respect him more.  And he instinctively knows that – he can’t be the daring demon lover or swaggering ski coach 

    with me when I know too much about him. Fortunately, I suggested we bring the mattress up to the deck – we had a big, hilarious struggle through the house but it was worth it. Wonderful making love in the fresh night.  

    Gave him the full treatment making him yelp like a coyote. 

                              Cold in the AM like Maine – hard to get out of bed but he was worried someone would see us so we had to push mattress through 

    sliding doors to dining room floor at 6 AM.  Layers of secret lives!  He is SO DIFFERENT from the way he seems but aren’t we all!  Drove to the Idyllwild Mkt for breakfast – got lost as least six times but who cares it’s a glorious day – bought peaches, blueberries and mocha java beans.

     Then we went swimming – stopping after at the mailbox.  Rejection of Secaire from HBJ!  What a blow and in front of Devon of all people!  

    Worst of all was editor’s comment – I had fallen between 2 stools – “straight” and “gothic.”  Ugh.  Lowers my opinion of myself in my own eyes. 

    Fortunately, I didn’t cry.  

                              Devon did his best to comfort me. He compares it to 

    skiing which is 4,000 failures to one success. Said it’s ridiculous to consider myself a failure. I thanked him said he really cheered me up –

     he said it made him look forward to ministry!!!  (He can’t wait to get his hands on some “troubled young women”.) He’s going to a 3 day 

    retreat at Peterborough.  Period coming on. It doesn’t faze Devon. Reading Harold Nicolson’s diaries which are quite a treat.  I was afraid he would 

    be all Churchillian. 

                               2;30 PM Mon 22 Aug 77

                              Can’t write, so ready to return to Maine.  So desperate I 

    watched TV (Rhoda: Apotheosis of the Career Girl). Feeling crushed about Secaire and Demon is not far behind. When your mind is divided it’s hard to go on.  I always feel genre works actually have the potential for highest dramatic quality – mystery, discovery, transformation, revelation – telling the complete truth about everything but I just don’t know how to convey that. Also, I’m kind of worried that Devon will see my departure as  “because” we punctured the fantasy with honesty ; ie I’m “punishing” him –

    (that’s what Ryder would think, plus he would howl “I deserve it” then behave even worse) and of course it sort of is true . “New data” does affect everything.  But I miss the dogs & worry about them.  Dad has yet to figure out their gender (calls them both “boy”). 

                              Went clothes shopping got GOREGOUS skinny jeans! 

    Look so good.  Called Devon but had to leave an awkward message with Random Guy (ugh I hate that.) Thank God for diaries!   Best therapy 

    possible. So much cheaper than a shrink. Diagnosis? Sheer greed.   I always want everything.

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

        7PM – Sat 23 July 77

                              Devon and I went for a long walk today, had a great 

    talk.  He told me all about his passionate relationship with

    English girl – asking “Do you really want to know?” I did – I managed to 

    be very hands off.  Said he’d written her “lyrical love-letters” and 

    she is saving money to come to US at Christmas.

                                Bit of a downer to find other people have split 

    minds like me. I told him a little about Ryder and even more about my husband. I had to hope he wouldn’t see it “retaliation” for what he’d told me.  (R would have.) Fantasies can be ugly if they prevent you from experiencing reality.

                                We hugged – he left – I know he thinks I’m too 

    “intense”.  I was stupid enough to read him my peach poem.  On 

    the other hand, if a guy can’t handle my poetry where am I? R only likes poems he knows are about him.

                                Wrote a whiny letter to Avril (who usually can handle 

    whiny letters).  Good today – bike, swimming, plus my walk with D. Long letter to Mom and Dad.

                                Reading Stella Gibbons’ Cold Comfort Farm – 

    can’t stay grumpy – laughing too hard.  Settling into my spaceship – 

    my own body – first day of the rest of my life. Listening to wonderfully crazy modern opera on the radio.

        Sun 24 July 77

        4PM

                                 Wrote 4 pages of A Demon Roused. Horribly

    dissatisfied. Patricia Highsmith on the suspense novel no damn 

    help at all. Everything I’ve ever written pure dunder written by a 

    dunderhead. Restrained myself from calling Ryder to yell at him.

                                Face facts.  Left DC June 4. This coming 

    month has to be gotten through. Feel I my “breakdown” I suffered last spring was a crisis of identity.  Attacked by the writing thing 

    (no money, no approval, no relationships) attacked by the relationship thing (R too critical, wanting to “change” me.)  Starving myself. Long mad midnight walks rampaging thru Chevy Chase with dogs. The ENDLESS  Devon situation only  explicable when seen in this light. 

    (He’s TOO good looking – too much fantasy.)

                              Now about my book. New beginning ALL wrong and

     I couldn’t figure out why. The characters seem alive.

    1. First Person Difficult. My husband always said 
    2. omniscient narrator no longer possible, making 
    3. me want to do it. However, I have to admit you 
    4. need to be somebody – an extra character and that’s a
    5.  bigger pain in the neck.

                                      2)    Scene Problematic. I’ve GOT to get these people out of England.  

            It’s artificial.  How about if I don’t say where it is?  Will the specificity cops come after me?

                                       3)    Format (Suspense novel) rough because I have to be

     the one who knows what’s going on and I want to write my first draft in a narcoleptic state. Means I have to be happy making a huge ness with a million 

    false starts and then write the thing ALL OVER when I know what’s going on. 

    But I feel time running out on me. Goddam it.

                             I should be happy to explore. Why all this pressure?  Two novels unaccepted, why write a fourth?  Am I deliberately trying to drive myself to the 

    brink of insanity? Also I HATE Sunday because the pool is packed, no stores are open, and there’s no mail.

                              Devon and his roommates Blair & Brian drop by and I 

    struggle to appear sane. Hard for me. 

        6PM

                              Called R.  to yell at him. He wasn’t there – thank GOD. 

    Maybe I just want to punish him.  He certainly deserves it. 

                                 1:30 PM Mon 25 July 77

                              Dark night of the soul finally over. Very athletic today – 

    feel deliciously tired. Decide I should go back to Washington no 

    matter what.  My choices are my choices. My happiness can’t be dependent on how people treat me. I plan to use my time to become powerful – to be the person I’m supposed to be.  In the drugstore line I was reading up on the showbiz personalities – nobody interesting before 30 and I have a few years yet.

                              Forget about weight – just follow & learn to love 

    “virtuous routine”. (I’m a size seven – that’s pretty good.) Today it 

    POURED rain –  night baseball Devon wanted to attend out of the 

    question.  He suggested we switch to a movie when he called this am. 

    Still feel stilted with him unfortunately.

                              Assault on library. Planning to ransack the place. 

    Leafed through Helen Hayes (poor woman); enjoying Thurber’s 

    My World and Welcome To It .

        Tues. 26 July 77 9:40 AM

                                Sitting on stonewall in full sunlight in my black bikini 

    waiting for pool to open. Swim and sunbathe till ll:30 when mail comes. 

    After 7 pm I can return – that way I miss the crowds.

                              Exercise, coffee, 3 glasses water. The Regime.

                              I’m down to $4. Embarrassing to be taken out last night 

    by Devon & his roommates. (We saw Star Wars. Childish, but they were into it.) Sent letter to Mom & D asking for stock certificates. They 

    won’t like it.

                              Dinner should have been nice but barbecue very messy. 

    Wore my tightest jeans and my pink French “Trés chic” t-shirt.         Devon surprised me by talking on and on about how beautiful I am.  Started to get stoked  – in fact I was horny as hell. I would have taken the three seminary students on if I could have avoided the interpersonal madness that would result. They all have beautifully athletic bodies. But I’m starting to get a feeling that if I just sit in my deer blind a bit longer Devon will come to me.

                              Every now and then I get a bad “Ryder – flashback”, like some synaptic slipup. What will I think of this years from now? Mirror images ache, then fade.

                                Cold Comfort Farm exactly 100 pages too long (but I 

    think most books are).  Take a long hot Jean Nate bubble bath and read The Thornbirds.

        2:30 PM Wed July 27 – 77

                                Masturbation is the better part of valor. Don’t make 

    decisions ruled by sex. Bike ride combined with cold shower doesn’t work.

    Must husband my wattage (joke). Too bad  sex is 

    such a fast way to get to know someone.

                              First draft of Demon so far bony and spare. Neatly 

    boxed “components” = “write your own novel”.  Trying to exterminate “dead” patches.  Wish I had done this with The Mass at St. Secaire – 

    but in those days I was in the “throw in everything you think of and 

    take it out later” school.  I like constructing this awkward armature better. Lean and mean superior to flagellate and winnow.

                              Will I ever let Ryder see my new body, my new confidence?  

    He will hang on for dear life and I don’t want that.  I want to go back to dancing but Ryder prefers I have neither security NOR money.)  Think I’ll look for a sublet – easier to impress a private owner than a credit union.

    I prefer living alone. Painstaking cultivation of intense privacy in the midst of a crowd has always been my forte.

                                Mom and Dad called – acting all worried. Apologizing

     for giving Ryder my number. I put on a good show of being completely ”over” him but I can see they don’t want me moving back to Washington and prefer Mrs. Duvall’s ski chalet option.  (My cynical side tells me it’s just cheaper.)  I act like I have connections to the literary life in DC and they don’t know any better.

                              Thornbirds is teaching me the great unpleasantness of 

    what publishers define as “a good read”. Contrary to my previous belief unfortunately the Victorian period has not ended. Forced to skip the war, potted history and scenery descriptions just to keep  going. 

                              7:30 PM Finished Thornbirds.  Neither Dane’s death nor Justine’s love affair rang true for me. Uh oh.  Danger signs.  My taste thoroughly out of kilter with the market.

                              Couldn’t swim – 3,000 spectators at some sort of race 

    in the pool. So went to library – checked out twelve books – bio, history murder mysteries. Alec Waugh, Somerset Maugham, Vyvyan Holland, –

    Hugh Walpole. Evelyn Waugh, of course. At this very moment R is 

    doing his very last show of 7:30 Live. Will they have a party or wake? 

     Probably go out drinking at the Shalimar, try to pick up dancers he can hector and assault. Time for me to go walking and see how the other (99%) live.

    HOT PROWL

    Don’t wake up.

    I surveil by night

    Your chiseled torso

    Slacken with exhaustion.

    Touching things that once

    You touched,

    Listing to your apnea –

    I turn away before you turn.

    Making peace with all my choices.

    It’s worth everything;

    Winning in divorce a

    Hard-won superpower:

    Invisibility

        2:45 PM Thurs 28 July 77

                              Loving myself today. I am very tan.  Hair strawberry 

    blond and my stretchmarks look like silk moiré. Any sense of inadequacy must be pounced upon and shored up – work like a beaver at his dam. 

    No worries, few fears. Daddy sent $ which I deposit in my acct. Since I can’t cash a check anywhere I eat what’s here; pickled beets and plain grits. Gallons of water to even it all out. Shake the old body out after 26 years.

                              Decide two people create love – I refuse to do it alone.  

    Reading Ford Madox Ford and grooving on his Violet versus Elsie 

    problems.  Schadenfreude. Years later poor Elsie says,  “I should have ignored everybody and divorced him.”  Alas, Ford is a self-centered fool.  

    Not a simpatico character.  However the period is a favorite with me. Mail hideously dull.  Nothing from Harcourt. Will my “Westerns” editor have thenerve to turn down an author they’ve got 105,000 copies of?  Yes. They’re all a bunch of weenies, frankly. Bike ride.

                              8:45 PM Finished article for the McManus mag about 

    Shadowe – “Island in Common” – 750 words – sent it off with letter.  

    Mission accomplished. Thinking of substituting a night ride for my walk.  

    Triggers fewer yearnings.

                             Ford’s moved to the US and I’m at the end of my tether with him. Tried 

    reading Jane Novak’s Razor Edge of Balance on V. Woolf – but she’s no threat –

    – Lingo Academico virtually impenetrable.

                              Loved reading Fowles on the Fr Lt’s Woman – even though he has a “tin ear” about the Victorians – their “failure” to depict “a man and woman in bed together” ! (How about My Secret Life!!!) He’s the real thing all right even though he launched 1st draft without any research. (It shows.) 

    I’m going to stop freaking out about how little I know London.

                                Full of joy & life & strength & immortality & pep.  Now thinking fondly of DC.  Resist the impulse to call myself a turkey for even MENTIONING living together to R. (I said in my phone message I had to have a house for dogs.)  

    I can see him crying over his beer at the strip club. Insisting his wussdom is independence. I feel and look mighty thin – but refuse the temptation to weigh 

    myself. Size seven is good enough. Took my walk looking indulgently at couples with children thinking, “This too is within my reach.”

                                Mail full of dull rejections NO interest or acceptances. But the UNITY MITFORD I’d ordered came which I’m reading now.  Must write about  sisters someday. It’s a trip.

      11:12 AM Sat 30 Jul 77

                                Going out tonight with Devon to see Annie Hall, that laff riot he hasn’t seen.  This is one of the things I love about life – it’s so unpredictable!  Give these guys space to stew they will eventually DO something. We had a nice phone conversation. I can tell he has “traumatized” himself by thinking he “lured” me fruitlessly here.  I tell him hardly, I’m writing 8 p. a day (of course it will all have to be thrown out) getting a tan and reading piles of books.  (All true.) Too cold & overcast today for pool though and now its raining.

                              Starting to get a feeling D and I will end up in bed. 

    It’s inevitable. How I crave that tight young flesh…Bet you $5. Will 

    wear my faded cerise linen jumpsuit, high heels and Nefertiti necklace. 

    Stoking! 

        4:15 PM Sun 31 July 77 Deck

                                Devon found Annie Hall so painful it took awhile for him to speak.  I was surprised but patient.   I couldn’t have dreamed up a movie more likely to focus all our reservations.  The scene where Annie tells Alvy she misses him made me think of poor Ryder – the separate fragile uniqueness of each human soul – and I could tell Devon was “feeling” his memories too.

                              We sneaked a pizza (a whole pizza) into the theatre 

    so we could come right back here for wine and coffee and more wine – 

    took three hours to get to the point of making love. 

                              In a fairly daring move D opened the buttons of my jumpsuit and stroked my stomach pulling down first one shoulder and then another to play with my breasts. Lovely feeling our bodies surge together. He’s good with his hands and has the most sensitive nipples of any man I’ve been with. At last I suggested we go to bed – the couch was really too uncomfortable. D went down on me – his body is the most gorgeous since the history of time – mountains, valleys, crevasses 

    – it’s like rock climbing making love to this man. He insisted on coming outside me which startled me somewhat, but after asking about my “protection” (IUD) fortunately abandoned this technique the second time.

                              He looks at me in a funny way like he wants to say 

    something but he doesn’t say it. I tried to tell him I’ve learned so much from our 5 year friendship – he seemed unable to take it in. He obviously fears the future and his memory is so bad – after the terrors of his childhood he thinks the whole past is all bad news.  It’s like he’s afraid to remember ANYTHING.  That would be the worst thing for a writer. 

    You dare not fear the past. Rhythms can’t evolve from longing alone.

                              We woke up, grapenuts & coffee, went swimming, sat on deck, watched tennis on TV.  Every time I changed clothes he said “the sight of you naked turns me on” and we made love again.

                              Tomorrow is the first of August – whole new beginning. 

    Try to see myself at 33, with a lawn and a bra and a trash compactor. 

    Freedom is key. No mail. Reading Geo Woodcock’s critical study of Orwell.

                              6:45 PM  Dark as night and pouring rain. Obsessing 

    about  D’s body – can’t get it out of my mind and our 22 hours together.  

    Welcome obsessions; R’s slate cleared. Did I use him? Is he “Brand X?”

     Thinking of all the things I wish I’d said to Devon.  He’s so intellectual yet so impermeable.   Strange delicate kisses – as impossible to get inside his mouth as his mind.  Loud thunder, lightning. 

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

    1 July 77

                       Today I should start my new novel – always the worst 

    part.  Lauren called to APOLOGIZE for our dinner.  I said nothing

     to apologize for I had a wonderful time.  She said she had an

     “off” night and they are upping my print run from 100,000 to 

    110,000.. So I guess I’m “on” again in case I write another Eng 

    gothic historical paperback they like (don’t hold your breath).  

    Threw aside Berckman’s Crown Estate suddenly can’t stand 

    other people’s writing. 

                       Very disllusioning dinner with Chuck Kornowitz. My 

    piece de resistance crab manicotti in Newburg sauce turned out 

    exquisitely but he only cared about the booze. When I mentioned The Great American novel he said it’s been written and offered to send it to me.   He edited it!  He only laughed at one thing I said – 

    he called Athenaeum a “very, very small publishing house” and I 

    said, “More of a hut, really”. He obviously thought I was going to 

    have sex with him so that he would read my book. I turned him 

    down but offered to make up a bed for him on sofa (he really seemed incapacitated by drink but he blamed it on jetlag.) He insisted on leaving, looking very cranky. He did wonder aloud who the hell I think I am?  What’s a little sex between “friends” (or supplicants & donors?) 

                       Letter from Devon (I needed it) cheered me up extraordinarily.  

    Just in the nick of time. I’m a loner, he’s a loner too – do two loners

     make a party? Having a hard time feeling beautiful when I am not 

    dancing and 50 situps a day and one filthy bike ride are no substitute.

     But this seminarian writes a mean letter. Loved  my novel. Looks 

    forward to servicing – er surveying Boston in my company.  Four

     hours on novel produces 8 bad pages. It’s a start. 

                       Ms. MacManus foisting her probate lawyer nephew 

    Henry on me. He came over to invite me to the beach 

    (and help me walk the dogs.)  He’s a pale,

     pale Ryder (he’d have to be Peter Frampton to arouse me at 

    this stage) and I feared he’d get sunstroke but I said yes. Saw 

    Jabberwocky – very Monty Python. 

                       Wrote a long wailing, complaining letter to Avril.  Try to 

    read Women & Madness but it’s too poorly written and repels 

    every attempt.  Norah Lofts White Hell of Pity – very depressing. 

    But you’re pretty much asking for it if you pick up a book with that title. 

                       11:00 AM Sun 3 July 77

                       Had to walk Genevieve’s dogs all the way to Columbus 

    & Ninth to find NY Times.  Henry cancelled – I didn’t know why till 

    Ms MacManus told me he found out I wasn’t Jewish!  Now she tells 

    me! (She’s not Jewish either.)  Reading First Person Singular – 

    actually some helpful dating advice.  Is it too crass to count on 

    having sex with Devon July 20? (That’s as long a wait as I think

     I can stand.) 

                       12:45 PM Mon 4 July 77

                       Almost strangled the dogs today. Sam rolled in horseshit 

    in the park. Had to wash them both.  Then they bothered me so much

     during my exercises I had to lock them up.  They howled.  Penance all around. Ms. McManus invited me to see New York, New York

    . We enjoyed Unsung Cole last night – and she is going to Martha’s Vineyard so won’t be around to make me her new chew toy. 

                       11:25 PM  Wish I could read the future. New York, 

    New York none too reassuring about male/female relationships. 

    Reading Leonard Woolf’s depressing Downhill All the Way.  

    His mind so different from Virginia’s you could call it “antithetical”. 

    Tomorrow’s excitement – double feature of Shame and The

     Passion of Anna.

                       12:25 AM 9 July 77 

                       Ryder’s divorce final. His relationship with me?  Still in 

    “separation” phase.  Trying to hate him but it’s not working. Pity 

    the petty man who revels in bondage. Feeling sorry for all his 

    future lovers is the best I can do. He would respect me more if I 

    was less sexually excitable, and that’s the ugly truth. Totally 

    resigned that Harcourt will reject Secaire. Went to Patti Smith 

    concert with Brett’s brother.  Kind of fun the way she barks out

     her poetry; but little too butch for me. He is an incipient pedophile 

    remarking on every thirteen-year old he saw (or possibly he was

     just trying to annoy me.) 

                       11:45 PM Sun 10 July 77

                       Loved  Rhoda Lerman’s The Girl That He Marries

     – never were reviews so misleading! 

                       July 14, 1977

                       Power out in the whole city! Living by candles. No 

    elevator doesn’t affect us readers. Doorman up and down the 

    stairs with flashlights looking for old people.  Dogs poop on 

    balcony. I seize any excuse not to write.

                       9 PM Fri 22 July 1977 – Mrs. McManus’ condo 

    Pevensey Old Farms

                     New deal: all I have to do for luxe pad is write an 

    article for Mrs. McManus’ real estate mag. I think rich people 

    are masters of bait and switch – I was supposed to be doing HER a favor – but of course I say yes.  Contemplate novel about homicidal house-sitter called Other 

    People’s Houses  but I see from Books In Print it’s been taken.

                       Lying here making new breakthroughs in the art of 

    writing sideways; disinfecting my ear from swimming. Wanted 

    to write about Monica Dickens’ Man Overboard or N Ephron’s 

    Crazy Salad or at the very least make a New Plan for My Novel 

    but find I can’t. Was very “good” today – swam, bicycled, some 

    writing. Allowed to eat anything here luckily her food is not too 

    outrageous – hamburger and zucchini salad.  Marinated artichoke 

    hearts.  

                     Refuse to shred my nerves further by hating myself.  

    My body’s not perfect but I do feel on the home stretch to self-control.  

     Give me six weeks and I’ll be flying.  Emotionally, I’m a mess.  

    Devon brought up marriage and I am smotheringly certain that I 

    can’t live up to either of our expectations as a parson’s wife. 

    Might be fun to try – but that’s not the point.  I fear the idiot side of me that just keeps coming out. Can’t seem self-assured, playfully 

    grave instead sexually voracious and maniacally ridiculous. 

                     Anyway Intuition told me he would call tonight between 

    8-10. 

                     He called at 8:30. I cracked too many jokes – conversation 

    painfully bizarre.  He seemed calm and unfreaked. He got a new

     job that gives him more “room” (he’s a waiter- he’s sick of teaching 

    people) asked when he could “show up” and suggested tomorrow.

                     Moving a lot faster than I expected from my memories of 

    Shy Boy. Do I want to have my fantasies played fast and loose with in this way? (Am I over Ryder?) Do I want to get over him?  Or are mismatches of Time & Desire my Fate?

                       I am certainly NOT turning down D’s offer to see what 

    there can be for us. Companion? Lover? Second self? Brother?

    Alas he is too blindingly handsome for me to be rational.

                     If he comes tomorrow there won’t be time for more than 

    necking (has to get to new job by 4.)

                       Forget “July 20”, entered on my calendar as S Day. 

    I WILL NOT MAKE LOVE TO A SCHEDULE. We have to have 

    a night alone to make things happen.  I can be patient – can he? 

    Well, I can be honest.  Best anyone can do.

                       10:45 PM  Back from a walk, reliving my years as teenage 

    prowler. And peeper.  These walks are very informational as I spy 

    couples hanging plants & merrimekkos, having fights and pouring wine. 

    Macramé is de rigueur. Try to imagine Devon & me in similar situations. 

    Maybe he won’t be a parson forever.

              Celebrate my freedom from R. Nice to know I can go to parties without fearing R’s paranoia & restrictions mixed up in his exhibitionism & flamboyance. Freeing me maybe to be those things. Fantasize 

    pleasurably about long drives with D – my hand on his thigh – separate but equal thoughts unfolding with the journey.  My emotions a difficult horse to ride.

        11:50 PM

                                Interrupted by phone call from R. 

    Offered to send me money. What is wrong with him? 

    He said, “You were right the way you always are.  When are you 

    coming back to me?”  Loves me, misses me, wants me back. He’s 

    been sick – Emmys a complete bust – his TV show cancelled – 2 

    directors actually fired (25 people in total.) Today’s the first day he’s 

    been back to work, amazed not to get a pink slip. He’s taking a two

     week unpaid leave to go to the Finger Lakes and find his soul. If 

    they fire him so what. He refuses to take out of town job.

                                He really worked me over – gave me a bird’s eye 

    view of what life with him would be like.  For example, said, “his 

    place is my place.”  If he means “move in” he knows I’ll say no 

    because his skyscraper doesn’t take dogs.  He asked, “When 

    do you come down to get your furniture?” I don’t like him having 

    all this information.  Thank God for D.  Six weeks to decide 

    whether I even want to return to Washington. I write a poem for Devon. 

    Angel Clothes

    You are like a ripe peach

    Swollen in the summer of your life

    And as the peach surrounds its stone

    Your skeleton enwombs your soul

    But thinly.

    I often see it shining

    Through the hollows in your cheeks.

    I need your body

    Need to know its shadows

    Sound its pleasures

    But as the stone

    Though small at first

    Must grow; feed off the dying peach

    So your spirit must transhume your flesh

    Disgorge it in

    A thousand peaches a thousand summers a

    Thousand eternities more beautiful than

    You or i

  • Inspired Pleasure – the Dance Diaries of Alysse Aallyn

    Shadowe Island 23 June 77 11 PM

          Walked around corner of my parents Cape Cod house to 

    The deck – there’s Devon sitting with his Mom and my Mom and Dad. 

    Waiting for me.  He is still dreamily beautiful; cut glass profile, 

    muscles shining through clothes;  a star. The understanding 

    between us electric as always – hope I did not gape too 

    obviously. 

             I felt a “reaching-out” from this shy man bubbling up 

    from the deep wells of his most secret personality. 

    Seemingly uncertain of his power and frightened by his own beauty, 

    Utterly obliterating poor hopeless, impossible Ryder, which is just what 

    The doctor recommended.  

              I must have babbled something as they gave 

    me a huge Tanqueray gin and tonic. Mom has that 

    wrinkle between her eyes whenever she looks at me 

    like there is no book I can publish, job I can take, no man

     I can marry to iron out that wrinkle. 

             We hear them talking about us as if we weren’t there:

     “1972 was such an important year for them, that Winter 

    Carnival;” “Why don’t they get together if they love each 

    other?” “Kids these days think marriage just a piece of 

    paper.”  Just a piece of paper?  You won’t get a rise out

    of me over that.  I pass my life in a blizzard of papers, 

    which may (or not) survive me. May (or not) bear any 

    ultimate meaning.

             His Mom offers me studio apt in their ski chalet – 

    $125 month utilities included.  Staking an early claim to 

    any progeny I may produce.  I say, No thank you,  I need 

    a city. Still, it gives one furiously to think.

             When Devon left he lifted up my chin to kiss 

    me – tight familiar “everyone’s watching” mouth and 

    prickly blond moustache. He says he’s going to England 

    for a week. Invited me to Boston after. I imagine us 

    unpeeling at the station, two nude souls confronting one 

    another. Rank terror. The body reacts first, hands trembling 

    violently.  All I could do to keep from just savaging him in 

    front of everybody. I could hardly hold my drink. 

             I am an easy catch, too.  He quoted from my poem

     “the one you wrote on the bus” when I visited him at Amherst –

     I had completely forgotten about that one. Quote to me from 

    my own work and I become your slave. 

            Poor Ryder! He never thought of that! I know he will “feel” 

    This moment, the moment I lose interest in him; he will lift his head – wherever he is and whatever he’s doing – and come after me.  Just when I don’t want him any more.

    (The quote: “memories like stones I’m free to choose and

     in life’s rivers, eventually lose”)

       Still true. 

     Barnacle Cabin – Sat June 25 – 77

                 I can tell it’s early by the light but can’t find out what time 

    it is without waking someone.  Health complete.  Walked the dogs all over Heath Island, ran into Paul Morris who just bought the Burnside Inn. He invited me back for coffee and brandy, to show me the changes he has made. He sneered when he asked me if I thought “exotic dancing” was “art”.  I said Sure, why not.? It can be. He read Boston Globe “exposé” on “strippers who are just little girls.  They were all molested by their fathers.” I told him they get better tips by calling people “Daddy”. 

             Paul has a mysterious live-in girlfriend who refers to herself as The Sinister Chambermaid. Helping him renovate the place, traveling with him from Boston where he is a university professor.  Since they are not married I wonder about their “financial deal”.  Let me guess, she invests her labor, you own title and cash?  But now I have a good excuse to stay at the Inn and I am considering it.  They have electricity for my typewriter and the Barnacle doesn’t.

                       New York City, 96th off the Park Sat June 25 77 ll PM

                       Suffered through my sister’s wedding – a day of hideous 

    rain forcing us out from the rooftop garden to huddle in the restaurant.  

    I wore a gray silk backless tuxedo pantsuit – halter-top and bare midriff 

    – Mom did NOT approve. (Looked ravishing if I do say so myself.) 

                  Someone asked Dad – about me – “How many of you are redheads? 

    And Dad answered, “Hardly any of us.” Bride tells me she chose Brett because he would make a good father.  Says she’s coming back pregnant from this honeymoon if it kills them both (they take temp, every morn, etc.) Mom all dewy eyed.  I feel like replaying a few “deleted” scenes from Genevieve’s past of which Mom is blissfully unaware but loyally refrain, thus retaining my title as Official Bad Daughter. Hey, it’s a pivotal job.

                       NYC 10:45 PM Sun26 June 77

                       Last night Avril came into my hotel room to stop my wailing and we talked till 2:30 AM. We both agree “fireplug sex” – you stand there while I spray you – is out of the question.  She says women 

    who expect nurturing from men are always disappointed because men lack the nurturing gene.  Hmm. This is not true of Ryder OR 

    Devon (it was true of Bruce.) If we’re going to talk about “nurturing” 

    we have to face the fact that plenty of mothers seem to lack the 

    gene too – they don’t care what you want or who you are they are just trying to smack you into “shape”.  That’s the kind Ryder is. 

    Devon?  Remains to be seen but the way he talked about my novel – 

    seeing me inside it – gives me hope. 

                       Went to see 3 Women tonight with Best Man (Brett’s 

    brother) on the Doobie Bros principle of “why you in such a hurry to be lonely one more night?” But he is still in college.  Immature frat 

    boy.  Any relationship speculative at best. There’s Genevieve’s bike to ride when the physical becomes overwhelming on my 3 wk housesit (while they are on their honeymoon & Devon is in Eng) will pass fast. 

    Hearing I was “house-sitting” in NYC parents’ friend at wedding offers me another outside Boston – perfect for seeing Devon whose theological 

    college is nearby. That’s a definite yes.

                       I REALLY miss dancing. Yet creativity heals all. Conquers 

    my fear of ultimate impotence.  The act of creation – even if others don’t agree – has a purifying effect. After all, we can’t live in other people’s heads

     (it’s dangerous to try). 

                       Tues. 28 Jun 77

                       Walk Genevieve’s miniature dogs, tend fish & plants, take bike

     ride, wash hair, see Swedish flick Man on a Roof (long Lincoln Mercury 

    ad). Bought huge-brimmed red sun hat with single rose in Greenwich Village. 

    Walked HUNDREDS of blocks to NY Pub Lib but they won’t let me take anything out. 

                   Planning next novel, A Demon Roused.  Need to give Jewell some past 

    crime. Infanticide?  But under sympathetic circumstances.  Or maybe murder

     of Stephen Ward-like pimp. Bad news at publisher: Harcourt acquires Pyramid and my editor dumped (lunch with her Thurs).  Could be good news for me (lunch with new editor tomorrow). Trying not to feel 

    dragged in to dumped editor’s hysteria.  

                       Out to dinner at Fiorello’s last night with Brett’s brother, 

    then Altman’s Images (which he knew I wanted to see.)  He is trying to figure “a way in”.  There is no way in.  Images  exquisite. Much better than 3 Women. Transitions so elegant they hardly existed. 

    Wish I could do that. Didn’t want to ruin it by talking about it.  Very 

    reminiscent of La Prisonniere. My previous all-time favorite.  Sent R. my Pevensey Old Farms address so he won’t harass M & D. That’s what I tell myself, anyway.                      

                       Listening to Vivaldi and reading Haskell’s From Reverence to Rape –anything I can find around here. Genevieve likes novels andI HATE other novelists writing (usually). New editor Lauren changed our Monk’s Inn lunch to dinner.

                       Chuck Kornowitz offered to read Secaire – I invited him to dinner here.

                       Wed 29 June 77

                       Disappointing meeting with “editor”.  I guess dinner went 

    as well as it could on the surface – but Lauren doesn’t like me and 

    eager to wash her hands of me.  Damned if I know why. Trying not to take it personally.  She is furious at being in “paperback division” (subtext: “throwaways” ) and says my new  novel being read by someone else – guy promoted over her who used to edit Westerns.  

    Think she enjoyed my panic at this news. 

                       Tried entertaining her with usually reliable Tales of Childhood but she was not amused.  Probably considered it all bragging.  She was what I expected, mousy bun, tortoise shell earrings, presumably raging hormones. Dinner with me was something she had to “go through”. 

     Work, not fun.  Said she is forced to read two novels a day but prefers memoirs!  That’s what she reads for pleasure. I ate snails with lots of garlic and I think she was a bit disgusted.

    I conjectured you could take out an eyeball with those special snail tongs.  Since she was not turned on by this idea I could see she is not the editor for me. 

    Snails were delicious, however. Anyone who loves mushrooms 

    would adore snails.

                       Lunch with on-the-way-out-editor Ruby a scary experience.  She made me meet her at a laundromat where her clothes were in drier!  Went to a Mexican restaurant around the corner, I ordered Sangria. She wore old jeans, ill-fitting shirt, had a price list in hand.  

    Trying to get me to hire her as freelance editor!  She showed me 

    her poetry collection (awful: title “Twitterings”.)  Says she has a 

    novel ¼ done. Praised me awkwardly by saying I am “a real writer”. 

    When I tell her I just want to find out what I need to write by patiently building house of cards in my head she tells me people like me are trampled underfoot by the thousand and I need her to make my novels acceptable.

    Her qualifications are that she has been fired by all the big publishers (they are “consolidating”!) But she also expresses disgust with them.  She is probably right on facts but she needs to work on her presentation. 

                       I was horrified.  Wanted to be friendly because she bought my book, but when I say why pay someone to rewrite your book in a way you might hate she say there are no guarantees in life.  You have to go with whatever “works”. That she is not working seems too rude to point out.  I agree the world’s a dark wood but I need to find my way out alone. She drank 3 bullshots, I order coffee frantically afraid I’ll have to drag her and her laundry home. We split the tab both probably thinking the other should have treated  (last time out was on Harcourt’s dime). I tried to act like I might be thinking about it but I don’t have a good face for hiding when I am absolutely appalled. 

                       Purged my mind at Visconti’s Conversation Piece.  

    Especially reveled in the beauty of our modern Dorian Gray 

    Helmut Berger and  the “footsteps of death” in apt. overhead. 

    Very Edith Wharton. Dinner at Old Ms. McManus’ Sutton Place apt. (whose Boston house I will sit next.) She shows off her latest antique acquisitions.

  • Inspired Pleasure – the dance diaries of Alysse Aallyn

        7:50 PM Sun 15 May 77 
    Justifiably proud –  paid ALL my bills and sent off my

    galleys. Nothing like money! (Stupid car needs a new clutch.
    It’s always something.) Able to refuse “help” from Mom and Dad
    who are dithering about whether I need to be institutionalized.

        Told them I was working at a “restaurant” (Let them

    assume waitressing. They know I can’t cook. PP does serve food;
    State of Virginia makes people who serve alcohol serve something to sop it up with. Good old Virginia. ) Sent M & D a DEVLYN cover.


    $57 left in my acct.; $100 in my purse. (Open a savings acct tomorrow).

        Ordered a beautiful Vietnamese print ($80) for Genevieve’s

    wedding gift (last time she got married I sent candy. Well, I wasn’t invited!) Horseback riding did make me horny however – Ryder & I made love like a pair of wild animals. He may be compact, but he’s beautiful.

    Cleaned the entire house. Now darkness falls .– it’s
    time to walk the dogs. How I love peering into people’s windows.
    When I get back, strong tea with milk and the “splendeurs et misères”of Monica Dickens. Or will I succumb to that modern master of the Grimm fairytale, Agatha Christie? No poetry, but plenty of trolls.

        10PM Mon 16 May 77
    Finally got a reaction from agent to Secaire.  I was

    physically sick when I opened it but she was full of praise. I could
    teach Poe, Verlaine and Mallarme a thing or two! She’s sending it
    to Harcourt but telling them it’s “too fine for a paperback”. Says it’s also readable, which is a thing more “precious than rubies”. I was really afraid of what she would say after our literary discussions and her poetry sneers.


    So elated! Hit the library today and hit it hard – Nancy
    Mitford’s novels, Hilaire Belloc’s Letters, life of Brontë. Delicious
    dreaming.

        5:35 Pm Broadcast Agency – 17 May 77 
    Enjoyed Helen Bevington’s The House was Quiet


    cuckoos and thrushes and loblolly pines.

        Bored to tears with this stupid switchboard job but you can’t say

    it’s “hard”. I’m the last happy dodo in a world of dinosaurs – all this
    equipment about to be ripped out. In 5 mins I get to disconnect
    phone, walk to Church St (parking’s free in Mafia territory). Drive
    to Arlington. Fish sandwich for dinner, read about Unquiet Haworth while wearing G-string & stockings. (So appropriate.)

    Expanding
    my house hunt to Rt 450. (Towards Annapolis; might need Dad to co-sign.) Obviously I can handle 45 min commute. (Don’t like rain, however.) Aware El Diablo is nothing but a hunk of junk. Future of American literature is fragile on some of these May nights.

        Broadcast Agency Thurs May 19, 77
    Only $134 in my saving acct and $7 in checking, curse that

    clutch. Crisis brewing with R. He is jealous and suspicious that I am out so much in the evening. He’s the one who wants to be non-exclusive so let him sweat. I have too many negative emotions about him – that he’s a coward, for example. Which would make him angrier – if I was dancing or screwing some other guy? (Which I have no desire to do and he should know me by now.) I think he sees my privacy and aloneness as infidelity. While he’s doubtless experimenting with “goofy chicks” who’ve “never been touched”; I’m only “unfaithful” with Shelley & Brontë.


    But that’s STILL too much for him.) After all this time if he still doesn’t realize I’m the best, the hell with him.

        Worry about the dangers of psychic scars. They can SEEM to heal,

    but sometimes they re-shape the life beneath. All I know, is, contempt is the ultimate relationship killer. To love is to be happy with! Boy scout methods won’t work with me, the sabre-toothed tiger. Our relationship may already be fatally spoiled by resentment and revenge.

        Last night audience bored and hostile, but who cares?

    Bouncers won’t let them show it! We are goddesses to be revered and if they won’t worship at the shrine they’re out. Compared to the Shalimar, Palace is sheer joy. We are never hassled. God forbid if they try to
    touch us! They are bounced on their heads in the parking lot.
    If I have plain grits when I wake up at 9:30 or 10 (also coffee and
    orange juice) I can last till 4. Hunger peaks at 5. Salad, then rush
    to work – when I get there I’m not hungry anymore. Would like to cut the burger habit.


    Need to sew my G-strings but Merribeth can see me
    through the glass and she won’t leave. Reading Robt Fish as an
    antidote for poor Charlotte Brontë’s pain.

        1:00 AM Plush Palace – 20 May 77
    Four dancers tonight. Less work, more intellect. (!) Fred,

    the cook, insists I try his potato pancakes and they are DAMN good.


    Can’t say no. Long wailing phone call from Maeve this afternoon. Why is it we can see other’s relationships so clearly? “Dump him”, I always say. Am I telling myself something? R & I make date tomorrow night.


    Now wearing black velvet, smoky eyeshadow, black stockings and glitter I look in the mirror and am astonished by my own beauty. Take that, Ryder, you poor bastard. Eight mins and I’m up – One more dance and home. Front table of impressionable navy cadets eminently shockable.

        11:30 AM – Sun 22 May 77
    It’s all over, baby blue.  Getting up my strength for our date

    tonight by sunbathing in back yard – literally cooking in coconut oil.
    R. complained on Fri he called me “all night long” and I wasn’t home.


    Aww. Could have told him I was writing but lying just postpones the inevitable (because next time he’ll come over.) So told him I would explain on our date. A poem came suddenly : In the Butterfly Pavilion.

    This evening you said you wished
    I was more conventional.
    I bowed my head. I did not speak.
    Outside the animals leaned together,
    Breathing lightly; waiting
    For my answer.
    Cats-tongue ferns
    Swelled up like swords, pushed out a stink
    Occluding fields of vision while
    The rabbit-bloodied lawn curled away. 
    Phlox flamed  
      Sows littered in the cyclamen
    Dwarf stars broke free as
    Frazzled molten ore raced across a sky
    Darkening to night.
    Summoning my power
    My hands stay folded in my sleeves.
    Nighttime is my kingdom.
    .

    Exhaustion from the violent motions of the pendulum.
    I made dinner, but he refused to eat. He said, “I think
    I know what you’re going to tell me. “
    I said, “I bet you don’t.”
    “It’s another man.”
    “No. I’m dancing again. I’m living here alone. I need the
    money.” (I should have said “it nourishes me UNLIKE
    SOME PEOPLE” but I’m a coward too.)
    He said very dismissively, ”Well, if that’s all you think you can
    do.”


    He who read my novel! Bastard! He said, “Well, the ball’s
    in my court.” So I guess, that means “Game on!” (Was it ever
    off?) And he left! Put his dinner carefully away in the freezer
    (I’m not made of money) and took the dogs on an hour’s walk.
    Now I lie here again in Paradise – baking, basting, trying to recall
    every detail of the last time we had sex. Because that’s all I’ll ever
    get from him.


    11:30 PM
    Session this aft with Chloe at Pacifica and a young PBS guy
    named John about writing a radio play for kids. I threw out some ideas.
    Then out for dinner with Chloe who complained that her husband has a mental illness given to him by the Army .

    And I think that I have problems. I reject “victim” AND “slut”. The
    poet alone in her lofty palace. Feels like an abscess has been lanced.
    Heard about a great apt in Takoma Pk that’s OK for dogs.

        Broadcast Agency – 4:20 PM – Mon 23 May 77
    Present tenant says do not mention dogs so I am out of

    love with Perfect Apt. Would rather have a house. Lots of calls today.


    I seem to be getting fat – but I look so good – much too good for 128. How I hate to starve but it’s the only way. Need to be a fine-honed racing machine.


    Considering entering Courtney in the Saxton fellowship.
    Can I get a readable copy? Lack of sex keeping me awake at night.


    Now I know why people take drugs. Devon writes to say he’ll be in
    Maine on the island but not at Genevieve’s wedding for “financial
    reasons”. I plan to do my best to seduce him. Reading Mitford’s
    Wigs on the Green – not as funny as it is sad. Pastiche, really –
    Wodehouse is better. But I feel that way about E Waugh’s humor
    too – that it is basically tragic – “this is all we can expect”.


    Asked me when I was moving, when going to wedding.
    He couldn’t be hinting for an invite – if I show up with him my family will have me institutionalized for sure. They never could figure out what I was doing with this hysterical little man.


    We’ve said our fond goodbyes. If the ball is in his court,
    it died there. Need to buy a dress for wedding. Macy’s? My mother criticizes me for:
    1) Making money
    2) Caring about making money
    3) Needing money AND
    4) Buying inexpensive clothes. AND fake jewelry. A lady
    never – etc.


    You figure it out. Finished Farber’s essays – very bad book.
    He seems to regard the female orgasm as some kind of personal insult –
    “Now I’ve got this to contend with!” We’re not doing it to annoy you.

    Hopelessness on the subject of sex a grave inadequacy in a philosopher I would say. Merribeth sent me to the bank today – I was thrilled to get outside – when I came back Keith called down to say he was having lunch at the Hyatt Regency and had seen me walking and wanted to say hi! Nothing to say after that. I thought of inviting him to the Palace but what would be the point? Everyone would think he’s my boyfriend and it’s a tips killer.

        12:50 AM Plush Palace – exhausted and bathed in sweat.

    Man tried to crawl onstage with me. He was in the mood to dance!


    Every dancer (except me and I guess him) is using Darla’s overdose death (suicide or accident? I say why not murder?) as an excuse to not dance. I like dancing. Passes the time faster and the tips are better. Steve managing tonight – he looks just like Dylan Thomas.


    I keep expecting a Welsh accent when he warns the old men with their balls hanging out. Great tales from new dancer Charmian –
    she has toured the entire country. Just dancing. (She has the body of a seven year old. Plasters pasties on her completely flat chest. )


    There’s a townhouse in New City I like the sound of but nobody
    EVER answers that phone. Tomorrow dinner with poor Avril and that awful Mason whom I loathe and despise. Couldn’t get through Babs Deals’ The Walls Came Tumbling Down – and Crystal Mouse was so good. Fortunately I have Steven Marcus’ The Other Victorians which is excellent. Pornotopia, indeed! Should have $1000 in savings by the 24th June.


    3PM Wed 25 May 77
    Weighed myself – I shouldn’t have. Lost two pounds but I
    can gain it back through thought alone. Reading Gore Vidal’s essays –like them better than his novels – unsettling man. Avril says Dad’s taken hotel rooms for everybody in NYC. New City townhouse a terrible shock – NOT to be thought of. R. called to invite me to the Emmys June 4. He had the nerve to say I’ll “always come back” to him. So I have to be careful not to, even when at night I howl like an animal.


    I can’t trust him to “take care” of me.


    7:45 PM Thurs May 26
    Who knew the worst was yet to come? I was talking to
    A at Broadcast Agency and a call came in and it was Ryder. “Hello
    Broadcast Agency”. I said, “You’re on the wrong line.” He said, “Your private line is busy and I’ve got to talk to you. Need to come clean and beg your forgiveness.” Uh oh.


    Yup. He invited another girl to the Emmys BEFORE me
    (that’s his story) she said she couldn’t afford to come, he invited me,then she contacted him to say she managed to get a plane ticket.

    So he’s disinviting me! I disconnected him immediately. He’ll be
    lucky if I ever speak to him again. I ought to be glad it happened –
    I was dithering. Needed a decision maker.


    I said to Charmian this evening, “Are you happy? I’m
    taking a poll.” She said, “Well, I feel all right. All that bothers me
    are asshole men.”


    So true! I think the pain is over if I decide it is. Struggling not
    to be feel ashamed of ever loving that man. Distance is required.
    Distance & discipline. Dancing makes me feel better. I kicked
    really high. Audience enjoyed it.


    3:10 AM
    Home dreading Ryder would be here – if so I was prepared
    to scream the place down. He wasn’t. Just a note – saying I was
    “right to get rid” of him. Calling himself a worthless shit! He said
    he’s “sinned” ever since he met me by refusing to admit how much I mean to him. The problem is it doesn’t matter. We are the wrong people for each other.


    8:30 PM Fri. Plush Palace May 27 1977
    The only place I can sleep is work, dozing off between
    sets. Not even masturbation knocks me out. Tempting to make
    Mon my last day but I should last out the week – I need the cash.
    Still have so much packing to do. Keith in my office the last day of
    Broadcast Agency work – I told him about the Emmys – he said it
    didn’t sound like a deathblow. Men! I had considered inviting
    him to the wedding – this decided me against it.


    3 weeks alone in NYC house-sitting for Genevieve
    while she’s on her honeymoon. Parents will take dogs. The Blessing is an awful book. Nancy Mitford not cut out to be a novelist; she’s really not interested in motivation. Only wants a forum for her retro opinions.


    4:30 PM Sat 28 May 77 – Plush Palace
    A girl left early so Laverne and I are splitting her sets.
    Courtly Jim of the hush puppy body and the Elvis Presley hair
    realizes he has to pay us more to keep someone onstage. Good tips –
    holidays make people feel richer. Only 3 days left.


    7:30 PM Sun 29 May 77
    Packed for six straight hours, ate yogurt and chicken,
    walked dogs now I’m lying on mattress more exhausted than
    I’ve ever been. Shoulders has agreed to store my furniture –
    we don’t need a van since his house is right across the street.
    Told him he can use whatever pieces he wants. Jim will be in
    to pay me Fri so I don’t need to trust the mails. Called phone,
    gas, water, elec people.

    Don’t think I like EM Forster
    (where Angels Fear To Tread) – Henry James without the
    Henry James. Edwardian didacticism makes me miss James’s
    scrupulous objectivity. Why did he write this book? Because
    he’s “The Literary Type”. Compare with Woolf’s Unwritten Novel.
    Stagger about forcing myself to gulp Yuban. So enjoying throwing things away.


    Wed. 1 June 77 – 8:30 PM Plush Palace
    $770 to take off with – not bad I think. Ryder tells me
    I am “fleeing.” Damn straight. Mom asked me what was going on –
    I said I proposed to Ryder and he turned me down. She was
    squeaking on the other end of the phone like a gerbil but I couldn’t help it. It’s almost true – I didn’t take her advice but showed him my true self! Too bad!

    Reading Forster’s Longest Journey. Still feeling another story
    trying to get through. Pretty sick of the glory that wasn’t Greece.
    Everyone in book sanctimonious prig.


    12:30PM
    Forster so foul I reread this diary. Deeply shaming.
    Maybe Forster is right: whatever you do, don’t write about what is actually going on – nobody may ever recover.


    Opal took me out to lunch at Apple Tree – painless. Crab
    quiche and 2 Brandy Alexanders. An elegant poem unspools in my head about the difference between hummingbirds and hawks.


    Will I go round in circles? Or will I fly high like a bird up in the sky?

    Like me the hummingbird
    Transcribes inner space
    Half wingtip pinwheel
    Leaving outer reaches
    To the ragged hawk that flies alone
    The hawk is:
    I am what shall be