I called Gary to say goodbye, and then Teresa phoned to say how sorry she was that I wouldn’t be staying with her. “You’d get sick of me anyway,” I said, and turning to the digital clock radio, I noticed it was midnight and that my twenties were over.
I decided to have breakfast in the Village, at the Greek Garden. Next to me was a psycho with shoulder-length blond hair, a headband and beads, who said things like “I should have beat her on Rosh Hashona” to no one in particular. “I’m drinking coffee and sitting here just like I was a normal human being,” he told me. I just stared at my paper.
Talking to Brad last night was so nice. He remarked, “From your stories, I can see I played a part in your formative years.” “As I recall, Brad,” I said, “they were your formative years, too.” “That’s what made it so sweet,” Brad said.
New York is really two cities. There’s the city of people who are educated, sophisticated, often young and single. They live in luxury (though they are always complaining). Side by side with them there’s a second city made up of the poor, the elderly, most blacks and Hispanics, and the middle class who haven’t fled to the Sun Belt.
She was wearing a one-piece bathing suit and had small, high breasts and wavy brown hair, and she moved with an effortless grace. It was a pleasure just to watch her to put her barrettes in her hair; I liked the way she held one in her mouth as she put on the other one.
The Moral Majority types seem to be taking control of America; they want to make it a Christian country and end pluralism and secularism. I don’t know if the 1980s will bring about repression and start us on the road to fascism, but I’m going to fight it with everything I’ve got.
There was a woman about my age at the pool, and she gave me the key to the sauna and shower room so I could wash off. She wasn’t pretty, but I couldn’t help noticing that she had a great body, and I kept staring at her. She was looking at me, too, and I knew she found me attractive.
My reaction to Fredo’s threats is not fear but rage. Let him try to do something to me. There’s only one way to deal with a criminal like Fredo, and that’s to fight back and show him he can’t frighten you. I’d rather die than let some subhuman scumbag have the best of me.
At Grandma Sylvia’s, Debbie Solomon’s interview took an unexpected turn as Grandma poured out her bitterness and frustration. It seemed depressing and tedious to me, but Debbie said it was great: “She’s sort of a punk grandma who could go on TV and just keep saying how bad life is.”
The Krewe of Thoth threw out multicolored beads and coins bearing their name and the Mardi Gras seal. I managed to catch or scoop up a handful of beads and four doubloons. Tom said this was a tame Uptown parade and that on Tuesday the Downtown parades are unspeakable madness.