There Was a Little Girl: The Real Story of My Mother and Me (30 page)

Even though being with Dean felt so right, I couldn’t completely give myself to him—in any way—without my mother’s approval. Her approval opened my world for me. I remember calling her to ask if I
could drive up to Sierra Summit with Dean to go ski after I had graduated. She granted me permission and therefore I felt liberated.

First of all, I was twenty-one and still calling home for permission! But the second point, and the bigger one, is that I would have gone even if she had said no. But my enjoyment would have been dampened. I would have felt distanced from the ability to be free and have fun. But in this case, since Mom said I could go and have fun, I was liberated and free to enjoy myself.

It is fascinating how my mom’s laugh could make me smile on the inside or how her being joyous could ease my mind and relax my hesitance immediately. And not just in person. Even from afar, I needed her to be accepting and condoning to let myself feel the same way.

•   •   •

When I was twenty-two, I finally lost my virginity. Dean and I had been together for what seemed like a lifetime. He was incredibly tolerant and admittedly long-suffering. I confess that I wish I had not made him wait as long as he did—for his sake and mine. I did not need him to prove anything to me, but I was still so bound and guilt-ridden by my mother. In retrospect, it was not fair to any of us, and all of this is still a regret of mine. Dean’s and my relationship was exactly the kind that any parent would hope for. It was based on love and respect and should have been allowed the freedom to unfold.

Mom was unjustly judgmental of our romantic relationship and she feared it on a deeper level. I don’t know if she would ever admit to it but this threat went beyond Catholicism. I believe she wanted me to stay hers alone. She believed in an absolute hold she had on me. And she prayed that I would never ever want to breach that bond in any way. And growing up, and having sex, would mean that I was leaving her. If I loved (and gave of myself to) another, I was no longer in her control. To her, losing control meant I did not love her.

When it finally happened, we were in Sun Valley, Idaho. Dean and
I were in a bedroom upstairs and my mother was downstairs, drunk. In a strange way, it was her being drunk that freed me up. If she had not been drinking, I would have found it more difficult to follow through. But even though I knew she was totally out of it, the potential threat that she would hear us or walk in and shame me was crippling to me. Her drunkenness emboldened me, but it wasn’t an act of rebellion as much as it was one of my own temporary autonomy.

The whole experience was beautiful. It was what you would wish for your daughter. It should have been what I had wished for myself, but in an instant, guilt slapped me in the face. Instead of giving in to what was a loving, and emotionally safe, relationship, and escaping into the most intimate and deserved moment, I began to cry deeply and silently. I didn’t regret sharing this with Dean and felt so secure with him. But I deeply regretted being preoccupied and fearful and not allowing myself to enjoy how much we loved one another and how long we had been together.

I got so overwhelmed that I jumped out of my bed, which was a handmade pale-wood bed made from local trees and faced a window and a fireplace. It was very high and I actually kind of tumbled off it and started running. Out the window the moon and the stars burned so bright that you could practically read a book, but I saw none of the beauty. Instead I ran from the room and down a long hall as if I were being chased. I have no idea where I was going but it was probably to go sleep in another bed so my mother wouldn’t find out.

I was buck naked, streaking down a hallway and running as if I had just stolen someone’s wallet. What a sight! Dean leapt up and ran after me with the comforter in his arms. He threw it around me, grabbed me around my shoulders, and stopped me from running. He hugged me tight and quietly asked me where I was going. He then said the most amazing thing. He said, “Hey, stop running. Why are you running? Where are you going? I am not going anywhere. I am not going to leave you.”

I was the one running and he was the one trying to take the responsibility. I was worried that once I slept with him I would become too vulnerable and would no longer own myself. I was afraid I was leaving my mother. As long as I kept that part of me untapped, I could remain emotionally closed. Being that exposed would destroy my escape route. I had always seen myself as alone, but with Mom. This meant I was possibly not alone. This meant I was attached to Dean and I feared that responsibility.

Even though I knew I had taken such a big step in committing to stay at Princeton, I remained entangled with my mother and our life. I didn’t know where I began and where my mother ended, and that meant I didn’t know how to fit Dean in.

I wish I had been more in touch with my own feelings about all of it, but I had my mother’s voice in my head, the public’s voice all around me in the press, and the shame of Catholicism in my heart. It wasn’t so much about being a good Catholic as it was a promise I had made. I couldn’t become a liar. And because the whole world knew I was a virgin, the whole world would know when I was not.

What should have been the beginning of a wonderful phase in my relationship with Dean turned out to be the beginning of the end. I regret the way I handled it. Without school and without virginity, I really was floating in a strange limbo. I suddenly did not know who or how to be around him. It all generated from a twisted sense of self. Dean never put pressure on me for anything, and he respected me in every way. I panicked. I was much better at arm’s-length relationships. I was better with an exit-route strategy. I could not handle loving somebody more than my mom.

My fears had much more to do with my mother than they did with religion or public opinion. I knew Mom felt that if she protected my virginity, I could still remain her baby. She probably didn’t have the confidence to not be threatened by someone I loved.

The moment I slept with Dean was the moment I left my mother. I
chose him. I felt this and I am sure she did as well. I couldn’t handle having made this symbolic decision. There really is no such thing as choosing between a parent and a love—but there kind of
is
. In a moment this intimate, you are choosing your partner over anybody else. It is a rite of passage, and this molting is terrifying and uncomfortable. It needs desire and commitment. I had buried my desire and I had misdirected my commitment.

Yes, Mom would always be my mother, and yes, it was natural and right. But this was a severing of a cord that had become brittle. I would exert efforts at trying to reattach said cord for many years to come.

I feel sad for these two young lovers. I feel sad for myself, and for him, and for us. I wish I had had the strength to revel in our relationship more, even from the very start. I gave it what I could, but I remained tethered. The leap was too much for me to handle.

Going to college was, in a way, an ending to the first major era of my career, and it was a closure to the first and longest chapter of my mom’s and my relationship.

Chapter Twelve

I Wish I Only Knew You in the Mornings, Mama

E
ven before my relationship with Dean became intimate—and before the life-changing trip to our mountain home—Mom remained in the swing of excessive drinking. By the beginning of my senior year she had progressively increased the amount she was drinking and began to mix the vodka, wine, and the rum and Diet Cokes. I was home less, and when I was, I was buried in homework and my thesis work. That and having fun with my now best friends as well as Dean. I loved him.

I begged her to stop. I’d say things such as “Can you at least try not getting drunk on the day of graduation?”

“I promise.”

She had gotten so used to lying to me and to believing her own lies that the pattern just kept being repeated. I gave her one last request not to drink at my graduation. I should have specified
all day and also at the party
.

She managed to not drink before the actual ceremony. She was sober as I was walking up to the podium to accept my diploma: “cum laude, for French literature.”

The honors were a nice surprise and might have been higher if I had gotten an A instead of an A-minus on part of my junior paper. Anyway, I walked up and hoped Mom was proud. I knew my dad was. I believe he just felt I earned and deserved it because of all my hard work. Dad left after lunch.

By the end of the day Mom had managed to smuggle alcohol in and either surreptitiously or openly drink it—I can’t remember which. At the big graduation dinner Mom wanted to dance and I wanted to be as far away from her as I could be. I left her with Lila and my gay “godparents,” Hank and Richard, who were my mom’s
friends from way back. They were the ones with the Fire Island house and the poodle who exposed the fact my mother wasn’t wearing any underwear. At the dinner she had not done anything majorly embarrassing, but when she was drunk she cursed more and flirted more. I wanted out.

After I left the dinner, I went to Dean’s room and found him drunk after having just been punched in the lip. He had actually demanded a friend of his punch him. I have no idea why. I instantly felt as if I were surrounded by immaturity. I took my leave from him, too. I actually remember thinking at that moment that I was alone in a different way. I felt sad and disappointed in both my mom and Dean. Both of them felt out of my reach, and even though Dean did not have a problem with alcohol, alcohol had interfered with my enjoyment of this special day. But I forgave Dean.

•   •   •

College, which had been the focus of my life for four years, was over. I was about to start on a very scary, very unchartered path, and I would somehow have to navigate it.

After college, I basically moved more permanently into our townhouse on Sixty-Second Street. Up until then Haworth and Princeton had been where I lived. We had had the townhouse for a few years but only stayed there when necessary. But I wanted to live back in the city full-time, and I wanted to live alone. Mom stayed in New Jersey but would come and go as she wanted. But even though I liked living alone in the townhouse, I was constantly worried about my mother, just as I had been when I was at school. If we had lived in New York City only, I might have been less worried about Mom’s drinking, because driving would have been less of an issue. Every time the phone rang later at night I was sure it was going to be the police. It was so strange because I did not want to be near her. But being away from her and not being able to monitor her was even more torturous. Dick,
the driver, was only part-time by then because my work had diminished, and Mom always assumed she was OK to drive.

I did not have a movie lined up—or anything else professionally for that matter—but I was not yet concerned. I was enjoying being a graduate from Princeton University and I already had my vocation. Little did I know that it was all about to go horribly awry.

At this point in my career I did not have the luxury of not working and not earning. We had so much overhead. We had an office staff of five women, a handyman, a cleaning lady, and a part-time driver. We had four homes with mortgages and bills seemingly everywhere. We needed to make money, and much of the endorsements from the past—the doll, the hair dryers, the book, even the Brooke Jeans line—had all gone away. Great, I had a clean slate. What a luxury. Despite the financial pressures, I decided I had a degree and time and therefore would hone my craft.

I wanted to focus on myself as an artist. I started taking acting and dancing classes two and three times a day. I was still under the assumption that the jobs were going to keep flowing in. I was just going to be better in them because I was actually working on my acting ability. I was in an intense acting class that lasted for weeks and was six to eight hours long, including various exercises and scene work and two to four hours of meditation. We would spend the meditation portion lying on our back looking for a green light. People were crying all over the place and I felt incredibly alone. Basically this class was brainwashing and was incredibly unproductive for somebody like me. I needed to learn how to act, not how to get in touch with my “shadow side” while seeing the “green light” in my “mind’s eye.” It was a disaster because I became so stripped of any defenses during these exhausting, torturous techniques that I was mugged for the first time in my life. I had also basically stopped eating food, existing on fumes.