Tags:
Humor,
United States,
General,
Personal Memoirs,
Biography & Autobiography,
20th Century,
Entertainment & Performing Arts,
Biography,
Authors; American,
Women,
Rich & Famous,
Motion Picture Actors and Actresses
failure to achieve long-term sobriety is just thatmy failurenot the failure of the program.) I first started going to meetings when I was twenty-eight, but it was at this particular three-hour meeting that I heard someone say that I didnt have to like meetings, I just had to go to them. Well this was a revelation to me! I thought I had to like everything I did. And for me to like everything I did meantwell, among other things, that I needed to take a boat load of dope. Which I did for many, many years. But if what this person told me were true, then I didnt have to actually be comfortable all the time. If I could, in fact, learn to experience a quota of discomfort, it would be awesome news. And if I could consistently go to that three-hour meeting, I could also exercise, and I could write. In short, I could actually be responsible.
But I didnt learn this until after three of my three-and-a-half problems had occurredthe overdose, the bipolar diagnosis, and the man that got the man that got away.
It seemed like a lot of my trouble showed up in sex, it being the alleged road to love and all. In almostwell, I wont say every other situation, but in a lot of situations, you can hardly tell that there is anything really wrong with meI just have basically too much personality for one person and not quite enough for two. But in the area of romance, Boom!you know right away.
When I was littleabout seven, I guessI remember getting in the car with my mother when she picked me up from school and telling her that Id seen the word fuck written on the handball court at the playground and I wanted to know what it meant.
And she said, Ill have to tell you later, dearwhen I can draw you diagrams. Well, needless to say later never came and neither didIm sorry to reportthose promised diagrams. Which is a shame, really, because I think they wouldve come in pretty handy from time to time. Armed with my mothers diagrams I mightve moved through the world of dating in smooth easy motions, like a queen, with that straight-backed certainty that comes with being entitled, cared for, and wearing crowns. But without those diagramsI shuffle around like some street person, clumsy and stooped with the car riage of someone who picks through the trash, shopping for dinner.
But lets face it, the world of sex is weird no matter how you look at it. I meanfourteen hours after youve had your face smashed into someones genitals, youre walking down the street with the boy as though that were all just fine, thank you, how are you!
The first crush I ever had was on a boy called Willie Breton. For some reason, my friends and I used to try to say his name without using our tongues, which for whatever reason, was highly enjoyable. I cant recommend it as an activity highly enough. Feel free to try it when youre really bored.
Anyway, as it happens, Willie is now an orthodox rabbi living in Israel with his wife and ten children.
How often have I wistfully thought to myself, Ahhh, if I played my carnal cards right that couldve been me
Actually, never.
Many years later, when I was in Jerusalem on my honeymoon with Paul, we met up with Willie (now-Rabbi Willie) and his wife for lunch. Willie and Paul fought ceaselesslylargely about the deportation of the Arabs from the West Bank (Rabbi Willie for; Rabbi Paul against). I never realized how fun it could be to get a current partner and a past partner together and then pit them against each other. I mean, if you cant find a good book to read.
Ultimately Paul and I went our separate ways. He went on to marry someone much younger than he was (twenty-five years) and from the south (Edie Brickell), and so, not to be outdone, I found myself a mate younger than myself (four years) and also from the south. The only difference between our two choices
well, was that his was a girl and mine was a boy, but my choice forgot to tell me he
Glenn Stout
Stephanie Bolster
F. Leonora Solomon
Phil Rossi
Eric Schlosser
Melissa West
Meg Harris
D. L. Harrison
Dawn Halliday
Jayne Ann Krentz