Honeymooners A Cautionary Tale (54 page)

Love you. Dreamed about you last night, that
we were making love, I don’t know where, moonlight falling on us,
it wss very sweet and we were happy and relaxed, but passionate,
too. Hated to wake up.

All love little fish

R.

Dearest L –

Here we go again. I won’t be coming up next
weekend, and that looks definite. So sorry I seem to be bouncing
back and forth like this. Forgive me if I’m creating emotional and
logistical problems for you up there. Please go ahead with your
plans for your trip for Thanksgiving. And then come down to
Berkeley as soon as you can. I’ll hopefully have a little money
soon, so we’ll be able to manage, as long as you can get the time
off.

Everything seems to hit the fan around here
on Sundays. (Began a story last night called “Sundays” – going to
deal with some of this.) Long, hard days, those, it seems. Started
off with my announcing that I intended to move in with you next
summer, yes, I was very much in love with you, no, I wasn’t going
to give you up under any circumstances. I wanted you and a new
life. Unequivocal statements, and, I suppose, about as clear and
straight as I’ve ever made my position and outlined my plans.
Pretty stormy reactions, of course, and then after an afternoon’s
and evening’s drinking we decided it would be better if I simply
got out of the house now. So I told Alice Ann to just color me
gone. That I was going to hop in my old heap and drive day and
night until I got back where I belonged, which was by your side. So
amid an insane scene of tears and screams and wails, I gathered up
some of my sorry possessions and threw them into the car about one
in the a.m. and got behind the wheel fully prepared to getaway from
this craziness forever. But the car wouldn’t start. Dead as a
doornail. I tried everything. Pushed every knob, even the radio’s,
even got out of the car at one point and kicked the tires before it
dawned on me – dead battery! I trudged up to the phonebooth on the
corner by the gas station to call you (where were you that late?)
(not that I really consider it my business) (I mean I don’t doubt
you – or your love, at all, really, I’m just curious, that’s all!)
Anyway, walked back to the house, and we drank some more, really
hit the bottle then, drank and talked, wept, and then ran out of
booze and started on coffee. Around six or six-thirty in the
morning Alice Ann asked me to stay through X-mas. I’ll have the
apartment in Berkeley to myself, probably, by then, and I can just
move up there for good, or at least before the big move to Montana
and our new life next summer. She’s right of course. That that kind
of transition will be much easier on everyone involved down here,
X-mas trees business, X-mas shopping, etc., etc. She knows, though,
that you’ll be coming down here to Berkeley when you can and what I
plan for the future. Said she will “give me my freedom” if that’s
what I want. So that’s where it is, and I will stay for now, feel I
must, in many respects. As much as anything in all this I’ve hated
and been sensitive to hurting Alice Ann’s feelings, her pride.
Breaking up is not an easy thing to do, as the song goes. Going to
survive this though, no question. Hope I don’t sound too callous,
shallow, or analytical. Overwhelming thing now is my feeling of
love and caring for you and wanting to make a life with you. Trust
the gods that look after these matters will take that fact into
consideration when they’re weighing and measuring these things in
the years to come. They’ll have to and if they don’t or won’t, I’ll
stand against them too.

So we have a lot of living to do, and to
make up for, Yes? And we will, you’ll see. I love you, it is as
simple as that and as complicated. We’ll make it together and will
make it with a minimum of fuss – all the fuss has gone on these
last weeks. Things are going to get better, no question. As long as
our love is a constant, and I know that in my bones, the other
business will take care of itself and we will be together.

All love, always

R.

Dearest Lindsey –

And how are you, love? Hope I didn’t ramble
on too much or sound too ghastly drunk – at your expense, too –
when I called you up last night. There’re always so many things to
say and, seemingly, so little time in which to say them that I
sometimes fear I’m talking only in sheer banalities or
generalities, esp. if I’m a bit in my cups, only letting fly with a
word or a phrase now and then about what’s really on my mind.
Anyway, forgive me if such seems the case. What is needed, I think,
is to talk to each other every day, and in person, in bed. That’s
what I’d like. Ours has been an unusual relationship, to say the
least. We have something together, we have a great deal, or it
simply wouldn’t, couldn’t, have gone on like it has. My life
underwent a profound sea-change when we met; I wouldn’t have it
otherwise. That meeting in Missoula last August will always have to
be one of the most extraordinary, and beautiful, events of my life,
past or future. And I know it has not ever been easy for you, given
my situation. In truth, I know it has been most difficult at best,
to put it mildly. I often feel edgy, afraid embarrassed, even, that
you might feel you have compromised yourself or your principles;
and I’m absolutely terrified that you might ever think that I or
“the world” might see you as simply The Other Woman. Believe me,
with all the belief your heart and head can muster, when I say that
I love you and love you deeply. You’ve become part of my life as I,
admittedly selfishly, hope I’ve become a part of yours. These
written words are all such poor substitutes still for what I really
feel and want to say. As you said in one of your letters, we must
promise each other to sit down and talk about whatever might be
bothering onr or the other. One of the things Buffalo Bill said the
other night when he called so drunk, and he was giving me the
run-down, low-down, and general gossip a la Bill, was that if I
ever made you a clear and determined offer, you’d accept. I’m
paraphrasing now, but it was something like that. He was doing a
bit of talking, true, really going on, drunkenly, and he did say
some unflattering things about you, about other men in your life,
lots of other men, that you are called in some quarters The Black
Widow, for preying on hapless fellows like some hobby! But I didn’t
listen to any of that. The only thing I heard was that I could be
the man who could make an honest woman of you, his words, not mine.
But is it true? Could I make you an offer you wouldn’t refuse?
That’s what I meant last night when I talked about trust. Damn, I’m
afraid this letter is or has become entirely too somber, rambly
too. Sorry. Just writing it line by line, rather slowly, not
looking back at what I’ve said nor looking ahead very far either.
Need to see you. Need to have some long slow quiet mornings. Need
to lie back at night and watch the stars in their courses, etc.
need to love you and to feel your love for me. And the sooner the
better. I feel a tiny bit hung over I’m afraid, a tiny bit spaced.
Can’t seem to get it together, get myself together, I mean. Vast,
empty spaces inside. Unidentified flying objects flapping around
inside my chest and my head. Meanwhile, a stack of letters that
needs answering go unanswered, poetry and fiction manuscripts go
unmailed, not to mention unwritten, is there such a word as that
last? Yes, there is. Maybe today is just a lousy day, but all these
days are without color and incredibly long. Opened one letter a
while ago which told me I was $180 overdrawn on my Master Charge
and would I please refrain from using it. Nothing but nothing in
life is easy; profound, huh, but I learned that a long time ago.
We, the two of us down here, Alice Ann and I, have had some very
bad nights and mornings – one of the worst when I called you the
other morning and she happened to pick up an extension – I’m
talking sleepless nights, no appetite either one of us; everything
sort of at a standstill. No guilt trips on your part either,
please, at the moment. I love you, you know, and that is a
constant. And I still can’t get over my amazement with it all. I’ll
call you later and probably wind up telling you much of what I’ve
just said. Hope your telephone bill can stand up to it for a while
longer. Much love.

R.

Dearest Lindsey –

Just off the telephone. Made another pot of
coffee. Had a good eight hours sleep last night, up at six this
morning, feeling good, feeling groovy, confident about everything.
This thing the other night cleared the air or something so that you
wouldn’t believe it. Maybe it was good it happened, but nothing
like that will ever happen again, for sure. Have been told that
love and hate are very similar, that is very close to each other,
but never really believed it, am not sure I do now, only thing I
know is there has been a great deal of intensity in this
relationship down here for a very long time, years. We’re both a
couple of extraordinary and complex people, and it has not been
easy on either one of us to make a new life, have a different life,
envision a life with someone else. Have told you I never thought I
could love anyone again, and that was and is true. Love you.
Terribly much. I know we can make it – soar, in fact. These have
just been hard times for everyone, you not least of all. At the
least I can imagine some of what you too must have gone through,
been put through, these past weeks, the separation, worry, doubts,
guilts, what-have-you, including all that shit coming down from
mutual friends and so forth up there. But look, we’ll ride all this
out, we will, as long as you don’t lose heart, and you won’t, and I
won’t, & we’re going to have something when it’s all over
because we’ve wanted it so badly, and had to wait for it for so
long, and, besides, it’s just there, baby, it has been there for me
since those days in Montana; I was hit and hit hard and I guess I
knew then that my life could never be the same again. We’re going
to be all right. The awful waiting is damn near killing, however,
but I’m determined to have you, as I said. And, yeah, all them
fellas, whoever, says we’re not going to make it, or whatever they
say, we’re going to show them we can come through.

Got some good Cat Stevens playing on the FM.
Goddamn but I’m so lonely for you. Don’t worry about anything down
here. Thing are going to be all right and run smoothly until the
first of Jan. After that too, you know what I mean, no hostility.
It would have created a dreadfully difficult scene if I had tried
to come up that week. I told Alice Ann I had a long talk with you
on the phone and that I was leaving, as that was what I told her I
wanted more than anything else. As I’ve told you, that night we
talked for hours, about everything, you, me, she, the future. Also,
as I told you, she asked me to please stay here through the
holidays and then if we’re going to separate have an honorable
separation without any scars and bitterness. We’ve come through a
lot, and come through it together, for a long time, good times and
bad, and all that we’ve put in deserves more than an absolute
foundering replete with viciousness, hostility, and vindictive
bitterness. I do seem to be going on, don’t I? Anyway, no more
hostility down here and no more violence, just understanding from
here on in. And by the way, I’ve clipped Alice Ann just twice in my
life; once years ago in Arcata, and once this fall. This last time
I swore to myself never, never, never again, no matter what. And
she’s blasted me twice; once the other night, a roundhouse right,
plus a few other assorted jabs, I think anyway, and once also a
long time ago. This last Sunday took place in a cocktail lounge
where else, about one in the morning, some late night entertainment
for the other drinkers. Guess it sounds pretty low-life, huh?
Anyway, never again, as I said. Although, in some strange way, it
seems to turn Alice Ann on.

Felt a tiny bit nervous when I talked to you
this morning. Fear you’ll think I’m prevaricating, that’s not the
right word, fear you’ll think I can’t make a decision, or that I’ve
so many problems of one sort or another you might just decide to
throw in the towel and look around for a nice clean-cut guy who is
entirely unencumbered, or something. Anyway, I did feel a little
nervous, I have to admit, a little embarrassed about everything,
and a little worried too about your reactions to everything. Please
write me again as soon as you get this, will you, love? If I could
afford it I’d send this ir mail special so maybe you’d have it by
tomorrow night. I tried to borrow some money from my mother but she
claims I still owe her which isn’t true and makes me worry about
her mental state, that maybe her memory is going. I also tried to
borrow a couple of bucks from my pal Jim Stark, but he also claimed
I owed him. I should not have paid him back the last time when he
was half-drunk, because then he can make the claim that he doesn’t
remember it. Oh well. Missing you so much. Love you, you know that.
Close this up for now. Take care of yourself, little fish. I
promise to do the same. No nervous breakdowns or anything like that
down here. Never. Feet too firmly anchored in that peasant stock.
Wow, I wish I were nibbling on your toes right now, and then right
on up that shapely thigh, etc. etc. Yes. Yes. Yes. And, yes, thanks
for the loan. I’ll get it right back. Hope you can drop that money
order in tomorrow’s mail.

Love ever

R.

Dearest Ralph –

Just getting up. Luxuriating in Saturday
morning. Actually, it’s already 1 p.m. My crazy cat managed to
rouse me for the 8 a.m. chow session on the backporch. She let me
know she was quite annoyed, thank you, that I didn’t grace her dish
with sirloin – letting me know she is very bored with the Puss
& Boots bullshit. But then as I’m scooping out that horrible
stuff from the can she suddenly has no manners, that cat. And I
have to push and toss her here and there to fill her bowl. Must get
to Italy someday and see how all of those cats live. Doris Lessing
has a nice short story about that. I am quite convinced of the
cat’s place in the arcane. Cats always skulk around the corners of
our rational life. But then what do we, you and I, know about
rational life? We, I should have said, have to get to Italy
someday, my love.