Liberation (104 page)

Last night, Don and I went to the movies and were much annoyed by a noisy baby in a party of four. Don went over to complain to them and one of the party, a young man, told him to “get lost.” So then I yelled “shut up” when next the baby cried. As we were leaving, the young man came up beside Don and glared at him, so Don glared right back. The young man told Don, “You're ugly.” Don said, “That's
my
problem.” The young man faded away. Actually, I think
you're ugly
was a backhanded compliment, in that the young man was unwillingly impressed by Don's readiness to be hostile, plus his muscular superiority. It was one of those situations which develop readily in the steamy hot weather we're having.

 

September 20.
Mike Van Horn has just arrived on holiday from New York. He came to supper last night, a bit fatter and with a bit less hair, but otherwise his usual sturdy, outwardly placid, deep-feeling, Dutch-obstinate self. He is very close to us emotionally and yet there isn't much sparkle in our encounters.

Beth Ann Krier
¹⁰⁷
(whom I do like) was also among the guests. She is studying female millionaires and how they got their money (marriage is cheating, they have to be self-made). Tried to interest her in making us into millionaires without our doing anything about it. Suggested that this would be interesting simply as an experiment. But she didn't see it that way. Later in the evening, I didn't see anything, got stupidly drunk, and I don't know why because I like everybody who was present—Penny, Billy Al, Jack Larson, and sympathetic silly-goose Sydney Cobb
¹⁰⁸
(who is still rather in love with Mike, after all these years).

On the steps below the house we found a plastic container made to hold liquids. The container was empty but arranged on it were some bits of plant which Mike and Don both thought might be pot. So we took them for future examination, leaving the container. That happened this afternoon as we were returning from the beach. It may all be very harmless, but I don't like the idea that this might be some sort of arranged “drop.” The police would probably descend on us and fuss and search the house.

 

September 21.
Played the tape of my talk in San Francisco, which shows me that I still say “er—er—,” which I thought I'd cured myself of and that I also have some nasty nasal tones in my voice when reading aloud. Also, it created a really bad impression, not knowing instantly who Dan White was.
¹⁰⁹
But I might have been a lot worse.

When Mike (who stayed the night in the studio) ran down to the beach with Don today, they found that the plastic container was still on the steps.

Yesterday evening, some unfortunate Mexican, drunk or zonked on something, wrecked a car[,] which was also (so we are told) stolen[,] and then fled. And now the helicopters came after him, with police-car support on the ground. The big rattling airborne insects, swinging their search beams like probing stings, seemed unspeakably futile. It seems impossible that they could ever catch anyone.

 

November 11.
During October, Don and I carried out the scheme which Don worked out with Jack Woody—Don to do a drawing or painting of someone every day, me to keep a daily diary throughout the month. Don got the whole of his share of the work done—not just thirty-one but forty-six pictures, four of which are black and white paintings. My daily diary is only a rough draft, however. Don is rereading it to make notes and suggestions.

Paul Wonner came down on November 1 for the opening of his show of paintings. On the 2nd, Don and I went to look at them—he had already seen them the day before, and had decided to buy one. When we got to the Corcoran Gallery we happened to meet Nick Wilder who took Don aside and confirmed that he is definitely giving up his own gallery. He also showed Don a letter from Jim Corcoran to Nick, telling him that he only wants to take over four of Nick's artists—Ron Davis, Sam Francis, David Hockney and Don. Which pleased us, needless to say.

On the 4th, we phoned Vera in New York, having just been told that she has had several small strokes. She seemed shaken and a bit vague, but still very much her usual self—greatly indignant because a specialist had come to examine her after her strokes—she referred to them as “illnesses”—and had shown her pictures of various animals, asking her to tell him what they were.

On the 8th, we gave a party—the first in quite some while, because of our involvement in our
October
project. We told Tony Richardson, whom we'd already invited, to bring a guest with him. He suggested Dean Skipworth
¹¹⁰
and Don said no, absolutely not; he wasn't to be allowed in the house, ever again. The reason is he came to us once before and dumped a great bag of garbage, which he produced from his car, into our garbage can. It contained something really rotten and stank up the whole area so much that Don had to drag it out again and dump it somewhere else. . . . I think Tony was sulking about this throughout the meal.

On the 9th, we were invited by Richard Burton's wife Susan to a birthday party at Chasen's—that is to say,
I
was invited. (I suppose Susan, who has only met Don once before, and was doing the organizing herself because this was a surprise party, couldn't be accused of actual rudeness in omitting him, she probably didn't realize what our relationship is and how long ago Richard knew both of us.) Anyhow, I quite easily got Don included. But then, what do I do? Sitting right next to Richard—who is now on the wagon—I drank and drank until I passed out and sat slumped in the chair and couldn't rise to take part in the birthday toast. It's a terrible situation, especially as I know Susan hardly at all, and it's to her I must write an apology. And I can't do that until tomorrow at the earliest because I don't have an address to send the letter to until the offices reopen after the weekend and I can make enquiries!

Yesterday, I drove to Vedanta Place to see Swami Ritajananda from Gretz—he had been sick while up at the Santa Barbara convent but seemed fairly all right. He is very impressive. I felt a lot of love in him and also a great shrewdness. I think he was being careful not to criticize Prema to me, he became a bit guarded when I asked about Prema's part in their life. Several times, he remarked—maybe to reassure
me
—that you could be a monk for a while and then stop being one—that wasn't so important. As for me, I was still feeling my hangover—had, indeed, been a bit scared while driving on the freeway because I kept getting cramps in my hands and slight attacks of dizziness. When Ritajananda and I sat alone in the living room of the old bungalow and I started talking about Swami and about Sister, they both seemed intensely present, and I shed tears, quite spontaneously but yet I felt like some overemotional fakey female devotee, and that was when I became aware of the sharpness of Ritajananda's glance. Still, I am very glad indeed that I saw him again—it may very possibly have been for the last time.

Afterwards, I talked to the boys, including Bob [Adjemian], who has now got several of the other monks to join him in long-distance runs. Bob, who is a real little fighting cock, is longing for the showdown which he anticipates over
My Guru and His Disciple
, when it appears. According to him, Swahananda's only fear is that my book should give the impression that Vedanta endorses homosexuality. Anandaprana anticipates big trouble with the congregation. And Bob is just praying for it!

 

November 14.
On the 12th, backing out of our driveway, I bumped a car which was standing on that fatal spot, exactly where a backing-out car from our driveway will hit, with only a tiny bit of bad luck. This time it was a brand-new Subaru Brat, belonging to the lady who lives opposite, a Mrs. Karlow, who was peevish about it but not venomous. Her son, also present, is named Jeff and is cuteish. Later I called their number to find out the extent of the damage and found myself talking to Jeff, who had been researching for a term paper on Aaron Copland and had discovered that I was mentioned as one of his friends. So I was on the map, and the temperature rose.

That evening, after we'd seen
Cabin in the Sky
and liked it—I with more reservations than Don, because it speaks, albeit with Yiddish and black accents, the language of the Southern Baptists— Don suggested we eat at El Adobe, and I agreed, only predicting that it would be full up as usual. It
was
nearly full, only one table, but then out rushed one of the owners, Patricia Casado, who always receives us as though we were royalty. And the next thing we knew, we were being introduced to Governor Brown, who just happened to be in there. He looked just “like” himself, very thin faced, with a bright burning in the eyes and an air of being obedient to an inner voice. We were both impressed by him, he seemed extremely ambitious, perfectly serious and quite worthy of our respect. It was easy to imagine him robed as a priest. He gave us a copy of his announcement of candidacy. When I asked him to autograph it, he wrote, “Chris and Don, Peace! Jerry Brown.” Somehow, we got into talking about our play and hence the tempta tion of Jesus in the wilderness and Swami's book,
The Sermon on the Mount According to Vedanta
. He seemed genuinely interested.
¹¹¹

 

December 16.
Am now in the midst of revising my
October Diary
. I still don't know what I think of it but at least it does represent an accomplished task.

What has happened since I last wrote? [The gardener's helper] has had hepatitis, contracted erotically, but is nearly well now. I have had an attack of dizziness—that was quite recently, on the 12th of this month. It was embarrassing, because it took place while I was being visited by a terribly square-dull psychologist named Tony Joseph,
¹¹²
and I feel sure he believed that I invented the attack in order to get rid of him. Elsie prescribed a seasick medicine, so Don got Merezine, because it suggested the word “mare,” and it was effective, apparently. I've had no more symptoms. It was rather unpleasant, as though my head had become so heavy that it kept making me lose my balance. We've been to a vast number of parties—about which I can at least say that I never once fell asleep or otherwise misbehaved. We went to Merle Oberon's memorial service on the 28th, chiefly because George Cukor had asked me to write a few words for him to say and so I was obligated to go and hear him say them, which he didn't do very well, poor old thing. The Downer remains a presence in the background—his absence is a lasting reproach to Dobbin's meanness. But time will heal, or make things worse in some quite new way. Meanwhile Kitty is Kitty, the one without a second.

 

December 21.
Solstice blues. It has rained today and is gloomy and Dobbin is gloomy because of bulging gassy bowels and pains around the hips and groin. Elsie, on the phone, recommended charcoal tablets and now his tongue is black as the tongue of a devil horse. However, I have made various assertions of the will—written a blurb for Warhol's Pop memoirs,
¹¹³
which I have just finished and found so wonderfully good-humored and so wise; sent off the publisher's copy of my British contract, duly signed; told the Black Sparrow Press that I will not sign the copies of the special edition of Stephen Spender's letters to me during the thirties—I still don't know if it was Stephen who put them up to asking me to do this. It seems to me an indecent idea, a kind of built-in blurb. If Stephen is publishing all of the letters, that means several quite vicious ones are included, and, knowing Stephen, it probably also means that he has added bitchy footnotes which I am not about to endorse. There'll probably be a fuss. Let there be.

I should mention that Susan Burton has never replied to my letter of apology for getting drunk on Richard's birthday. That proves, says Don, that she isn't a lady.

 

December 24.
Last night I had a dream about Kathleen. I was wandering around somewhere and suddenly came face to face with her. I recognized her—that is to say, she had changed a bit, for an instant I wasn't quite certain, then I knew it was she. The
shock
of meeting her was really the chief experience of the dream. She seemed sad and rather vague. I felt that she was
astray
, didn't quite know where she was going. I asked her, knowing from the first that she was “dead,” if she had come to tell me that I would soon die, myself. But no, she didn't seem to know that; she didn't seem sure of anything.

As soon as I woke, it struck me, self-reproachfully, that I hadn't asked her about herself, or about Frank, or about Richard. I think I was kind and more or less protective in my manner toward her. But she couldn't stay with me, it seemed, or didn't want to. She drifted away.

When I spoke about my dream to Don, I began to feel that this hadn't actually been Kathleen but something disguised in her appearance. She wasn't quite convincing. She was a sort of clone, I said to Don.

The feel of this dream was pessimistic, disconcerting, something was wrong.

 

1980

 

January 24.
A rolling 5.5 earthquake up north at Livermore. Went to see poor miserable old Jo who has to go into hospital, suffering from diverticulitis. What really upsets her is that they want to put a tube into her with a bag to drain off the shit—at least for several months. She shed tears, exclaiming that she wouldn't be able to go in the ocean for all that time: “I couldn't possibly wear it with a bikini.”

At last, the galley proofs have been corrected, after long sessions with Michael di Capua. Today for the first time in over two weeks, I restarted work on the revision of our
October Diary
project.

 

February 2.
A dreary crisis period, with Carter “leading” the U.S. against Russia for all-too-evident election-year reasons. Suddenly, an act of atomic idiocy seems possible.
¹¹⁴
Meanwhile I try to plod along with our
October Diary
project and fail, and blame it on pains in my back. Well, at least I'll try to keep this diary for a while.