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I was reading Whose Body?, the first of Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey novels. Its publication in the U. S. preceded that in England, and I owned the true first. I quoted Lord Peter: "Sex is every man's loco spot." Three for Lord Peter. Harper and Row. P. 110. I was disinclined to deny it, thought my own behavior a case in point and that I was probably misjudging Throck imagining him sexually sensible. Throck was a boy-man who, like Faith, had been misused when younger. Loco man using as toy little girl and little boy? Be careful, Arthur, careful.
"I didn't tell you," I said to Faith as she was setting me up, "that Brian walked in on me last time."
She gleefully wailed, "He did?"
"We just acted normal."
"That must have been a little embarrassing. I have to tell Throck. Can I?"
My penis, both of us unaware of it, stiffened? I wanted Throck to know and accept what I was doing to whatever extent Faith chose.
"No problem. It's probably too funny to keep secret."
_____
Naked in front of my mirror I listened—without transcribing--to the first half-hour of Tape 3; after Brian had left its clarity had diminished, but it remained understandable, and I imagined offering it to Faith and Throck (typically, I never did). I rewound and transcribed nearly to Brian's exit. Would I write enough before Faith, Throck, and I left for Godwin to have something for them to read? I hoped so. I'd thought when it had been decided that Throck would be here from mid-June until mid-August that he and I would talk, even become intimates; we hadn't, knew each other now no better than we had in Tucson.
_____
This year’s flea infestation was bumper and Faith was being bitten daily. A little before 1 P.M. Faith and Throck set off insecticide bombs all over the house; she, he, and I then walked the three miles to Storris'. It was very hot and we put off returning to avoid both the heat and the lingering gas, rode home in the back of Storris' pick-up at sunset.
Angus and Hettie greeted us and they and I did a few lines before they helped me to bed; they left before Faith put up the mirror. When Faith left me alone I lay back to feel, but I soon forced myself up, wrote a while, then lay back again. I heard someone, I thought probably Brian, come into the kitchen, and reflected that he was surely now forewarned not to barge in. If he did, I thought, it would be knowingly; I did not interrupt myself, remained with my legs spread wide, my hand resting on my small penis, my glasses on, my eyes closed.
“Good night Art,” he said through the door.
“Good night Brian,” I said, my eyes closed.
I heard the door open. “Have fun today?” said Brian.
I opened my eyes, looked at him, and laughed as though he had rhetorically asked if I were having fun tonight, my laughter my answer.
“Yeah,” I said; I moved my hand, not to expose myself but to diminish my position's sexual implications. “I had fun." I noticed that his entrance stirred no sexual response in me.
“It was a hot one today,” he said.
When he'd come in on the 30th I’d not thought he looked embarrassed or surprised. Tonight I wasn’t so sure. “It was awful,” I said.
“Purt near a hundred.”
“Too damn hot.”
“Well, good night.”
“Good night.”
Alone again I transcribed July 30 through Brian's exit and then put in a blank tape. My bookworm, buckshot sewn into navy-blue felt with which I usually held open whatever book I was reading, lay next to me, and I tried putting it to a new use.
Not easily,
I work the bookworm under my balls like a necklace,
Leave its ends in the creases where my belly meets my thighs
For Faith's eyes,
Then lie back, silently wait to feel.
Ten seconds later I was in love with Anne and in less than a minute hard. I said her name and was singing before the syllable was done, softly sang as though across the years. Anne, Anne; Anne, suck me as you never did and would have loved to do; suck me as you never did and would have loved to do. I sang again after a 60-second silence. I would have my nose surrounded by your slippery labia, would rhythmically dip in and out of you so as to taste and smell you as I never did. We lacked a language. We'd been 21 when she died, 18 and 19 when we fell in love, Throck's and Faith's age. At 18, 19, and 21, you are not young. At 46, you know you were. I thought of Faith and Throck, Anne and me.
Spot, Brian's younger dog, was barking in the front yard. Was someone coming by the house on foot? Would they see my light on? I felt in silence for a while longer and then spoke. The fantasy with Brian had never occurred, simply wasn't there. I paused again, then softly sang: And I imagine, if Brian yet again looks in, saying to him: "You don't seem to avoid seeing me like this; even seem to seek it. I'm surprised." I closed my eyes, lay still. I silently reviewed my situation, then talked about the story that I hoped I'd write. I was again silent; the feeling built as my penis grew and stiffened in my hand. I exhaled once, coming. Brian! See! I gasped. Good night, and thanks for looking in! I laughed, then moaned, then spoke: Trust. Magic. Danger. Help! And coming overcame me one more time.
I resumed speaking after long minutes silent: After Brian left I imagined that he'd gone upstairs, returned with Ellen, motioned her to the door, and that she'd surreptitiously peeked in. I imagined them returning upstairs and talking about what they'd seen and what I was doing. I wished I were recording what they said.
_____
Faith had come and gone. She'd told me that she had three new flea bites. I picked up my pen and wrote two scenes between her and Throck to accompany the tape that I'd just made if I should give it to them:
1. Throck: "Too weird? Some people might think it's too weird. Some people think everything's too weird. I think it's a really cool subject. It's interesting!"
P.: "It's just the kind of thing I like to do. I don't mind at all."
2. Throck: "It's too weird."
P.: "Should I ask him to stop?"
Throck: "Do what you want. I don't care."
P.: "I'll ask him to stop."
Throck: "Don't do it for me."
_____
The next afternoon I finished Voyage in the Dark and began Rhys' first novel, Quartet, in which Marya is the name of the fictionalized Rhys. Heidler, Marya’s lover and protector, is based on Ford Maddox Ford, and Lois Heidler on Ford’s wife. Heidler sees no problem in his mistress Marya's joining his and Lois' household and seems to believe this means there is none, and Lois seems even to herself to welcome Marya. To make a fuss over her husband's women, she has decided long ago, would accomplish nothing, and letting his affairs run their course, his compulsions be acted out, keeps him faithful in his fashion. She is good to Marya and, Marya learns, has been good to other of her husband's lovers. Marya, writing, continues: "And in spite of all this, or because of it, she gave a definite impression of being insensitive to the point of stupidity--or was it insensitive to the point of cruelty? Which? That was the question. But that, of course, always is the question." Complete Novels. P. 154.
I wondered, thinking of how I yielded to my own compulsions, whether I was stupid or cruel? I hoped I was neither and assumed I didn't know. I wrote: Heidler seems to believe that others--Lois, Marya--are as he wishes them and, too, that they enjoy what he wishes them to--or, at least, would were they wiser. I thought it neither kind nor wise of the man to think he understood so much. I also suspected that Lois was neither stupid nor cruel. Heidler offended me, perhaps because, like me, he was so sexually self-indulgent.
Heidler to Marya: "'My darling child,' said Heidler with calmness, 'your whole point of view and your whole attitude to life is impossible and wrong and you've got to change it for everybody's sake.'" CN P. 188. Ugh. Heidler again: "I've never shared a woman in my life, not knowingly anyhow, and I'm not going to start now." CN P. 209. Yuck. I have never, with Lee or since, thought my or my lover's eschewing other lovers defined our fidelity to one another. All my lovers have made love to others while with me, as have I while with each of them. Doing so was not problem free, not emotionally always easy; it was, I thought (and hope Lee, Jane, and Marjorie thought), in our particular cases best.
Night had come and I felt as Violet, then paused again to write:
I think of being as I, a Being like the others, love to do.
We are being, like the others.
Each of us is Being,
Each of us an Other.
_____
It was now the night of August 4; both day and night for several days now I had been transcribing the July 30 tape, my taping, my notebook, and my work at the typewriter for the nonce one. Long softened, I kept on writing after I'd stopped listening to the tape.
Any life can be examined, but to examine a life is not to make it good. All truthful examinations, though, are good.
Arthur was a human who lived indoors in rooms with corners, encased in his chair or in his bed. Pine needles never underfoot, he still sought nymph, lay in the moonshine of imagination.
To become a healthy and responsible adult is not to leave childhood behind but to protect the childlike in being.
We do not know the limit of our limits, which is one of them.
He was relieved that since July 30 he was less regularly readying himself for P.'s entry; often, instead of lying back, legs spread, she now found him writing, and even when he was lying back he was doing nothing to assure he would greet her with as strong an erection as he could. In the beginning he had exposed her to his erection because he could; now he was letting it be or not because he could.
_____
To access the second half of LOVE NOTE Chapter 13 click here.
To go to the THE HEALING & LOVE NOTE DISCUSSION FORUM click here. I want to hear almost anything you are willing to say, including whether you have had similar or contradictory experiences. Criticism of my behavior and beliefs is also solicited and will be (more or less!) welcome.
Edited by Coach, 23 July 2006 - 08:00 PM.
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