Diary of Marie Stanley: November

About | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec | Photos

Thursday, November 1st

That song ‘Angie’ by the Rolling Stones is everywhere:
Angie

I still love you baby

Everywhere I look I see your eyes

There ain’t a woman that comes

close to you

Come on baby, dry your eyes…

Stayed home from work because it was on the radio. What other excuse did I need.

Went back to sleep, woke up and made love again, went out to a late lunch, my girl 
Angie so tender and sweet. Walked down Bleecker Street holding hands, tourists
sneered at us, made me wish I had a gun –

I’ve got a gun

My finger’s twitching’

I’m gonna kill

Another Christian.

She works as a hairdresser at a tacky little salon above Walgreen’s,
 on the corner of 6th Avenue and 8th Street.
 She said she would cut my hair for free.


Sunday, November 4th

Gorgeous weekend with my girl … can’t even write about it, too perfect … or rather I could fill up pages and pages … with her little ways, how she giggles, the childish form of her torso, the scent of her hair. I love her.


Thursday, November 8th

Did not go to the office yesterday. Spent half the afternoon sitting in the luncheonette at the end of Jones Street waiting for Angie to call me back. Was somewhat consoled by the forties’ mood of the place, the wood panelling and blue glass mirrors, the enclosed phone-booth for maximum privacy. Unrequited love inside an old movie set.

I left message after message at her Salon, that it was urgent, I had to hear from her. It’s eating at me to realize I had never had her home phone number. She called me at work and always showed up. I never had to call her before.

Drank coffee after coffee, had a grilled cheese, got on the waitress’ nerves. ‘Angie’ came on the radio to torture me again –

all those dreams we held so close

seem to all go up in smoke

I hate that sadness in your eyes

It was playing that first morning she woke up with me, then so strangely poignant. Now it’s only searingly prophetic. And of course only now I remember Mick fucking Jagger is singing about David Bowie’s wife whom he slept with. Fuck all the betraying bitches.

Friday, November 9th

Spoke to Angie’s nice boss at the salon again. He told me she had actually quit,
 because she was moving to England. I don’t know why I believe him. 
All day felt like I was about to throw up … I can’t bear this transient life.

Now alone again in this apartment which I am beginning to hate, so often has
 it
been the theatre for some betrayal. But rather than die, my reaction is to begin 
to dress for the evening. Once again I prepare myself to storm the maddest, most
 decadent boite of the moment darling! Where boy meets boy and girl meets girl,
 this time uptown.

What once was called “L’Oubliette” that is, a little dungeon
 where they drop you down and forget you, now they call it “Le Jardin…” First a fetid 
pit full of corpses now grows the flowers – yeah right.

So why CAN’T I just blow my brains out – figuratively speaking – there’s a lovely
 new full bottle of Valium awaiting upon the shelf.


Poem to Angie

For Next Summer

Two Girls walking backs bared

bared backs in the heat

the frail skirts unfurled hair

one faintly sweating arm hung

in the crook of the other’s, heat

of a New York night, inconclusive talk, a prowler

from the shadows stalks

two girls strolling thin fingers,

fingers long to meet

her frail skirt the tall shoes

one foot mincing a step

a wobbly brick makes falter her step

and her lover grasps her under

one faintly sweating arm, heat

of a New York dusk, lingering humid light

on the street dimming, nearly mists’ dewing

feathry lashes tasting feathry hair

trailing drops like weeping

upon the placid faces later to be tear’d, a prowler

in the shadow crouches

and her lover grasps her under

one faintly sweating thigh hung

in the crook of the other’s, heat

in this New York night, inconclusive talk, a prowler

from the shadow lunges

but Two Girls go coursing

barebacked in their paler night

11 PM November 16th

After work called Georgy for the first time in ages it seems. He invited me over,
 seemed in a good mood. But when I arrived the hideous Miss Pla was ensconced.

She and Georgy kept giggling and acting inane. I told them I had been rejected by Barnard, and they just went on talking about some new movie. All at once I saw it 
was a replay of the cruelty he and David had foisted on me last spring. I had only been invited over because I do not exist. I was the audience beyond their footlights. I finished my cocktail, got up and walked out the door without saying Goodbye.
 It really felt like the Final Analysis and as I write this now I just wonder why 
it took this long.

Wednesday, November 21st

Gloria arrived on the train at four, came to the office to schmooze and stick her nose in everywhere. She was very impressed with the premises: the ‘Stuyvesant-Fish House’, a Federalist masterpiece, historically registered, built in 1803. All done up in the period furnishings — Phillip’s pride and joy/fetish.

Phillip’s roommate Bradley found Mother snooping around in the downstairs dining hall, totally embarrassing to me. He gently asked me to come fetch her. Had to force her to sit in a chair next to me until 5:30. Pray she didn’t take anything! She would stoop to snatching a napkin which, if I know Phillip, would be some original piece of linen from Colonial times worthy of being either in a museum or upon his exquisite lap.

Went uptown with her to the Americana Hotel near Times Square. Its blandness is having a soothing effect. After a BLT from room service watching TV
[sic]

Friday, November 23rd

Gloria re-appeared at the hideous hour of 10 AM. I had planned to refuse to go out into public with her after the horrific Thanksgiving. So I told her I did not want to go to lunch, went out to get deli sandwiches. While I was out I had the distinct impression she was stealing something… Got back, ate the sandwiches, then I took her out to a cab and kissed her goodbye. She was snivelling, the hypocrite… because when I went back and checked around my desk I realized SHE STOLE MY FILE OF SUICIDE LETTERS!

Her response? When I phoned her tonight to scream and rage, she goes, “You never talk to me – “You never tell me anything!”

Well no fucking wonder! When I insisted she mail the file back to me, IMMEDIATELY, her actual response: “I want to XEROX them… and show your writings to my friends!” I forbade her to do so. “THEY ARE SUICIDE LETTERS AND NOT MEANT TO BE READ BY ANYONE!!!”

She does not give a damn. Went into conniptions all night long. Almost called the wicked Dr. Alexander, that is proof that I have been driven almost insane.

Wednesday, November 28th

Indeed, received XEROXES of the Suicide Letters! I called Gloria to scream and she was righteous, “I wanted to show them to the girls at the office… what a good writer you are!” Diabolical lunatic! What she actually wants is proof that I am crazy, and should be committed. Daddy had told me she started planning on that, when I was sixteen and doing acid. Fortunately my psychiatrist then the sublime Dr. Lofft saved me from her depredations.

So all that she’s proved to her alleged “girlfriends at the office” is that she is UTTERLY SHAMELESS. I mean can you imagine, FLAUNTING such texts as:

“Today I am disgusted by the entire world. Razor blades, knives, anything to end this misery. I wish a car would just run me over quickly.” Unembarrassed to let everyone think her daughter is “insane.” So they’ll feel sorry for HER! God what a psychopath.

Well I have brooded and obsessed myself now into exhaustion, I have to stop thinking about it and just start the series over.

4 AM Saturday

Tearing out my hair in horror, Gloria did not send me back ALL the letters! Which ones are missing? I never xeroxed them, they were never meant to be read by anyone! I had written one every day throughout the whole month of September. And there are only about twenty of them here. Fucking sloppy secretary! She has destroyed the whole concept for me now.

Tried to start over, worthless endeavour. Must be because I know I am going to Paris. So I don’t really want to die.

————————————————————————–

TO READ THE BOOK IN ITS ENTIREITY, WE INVITE YOU TO DOWNLOAD IT
ONTO YOUR iPAD, iPHONE OR KINDLE DEVICE.
As of September 21, 2014 –
Thank you

About | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec | Photos