December 11, 1978 - East Village - Journal Entry

Last week slipped out of existence without any resistance to the daily grind of waking past noon, Alice embracing me until three, Her going to Irving Plaza, while I wandered the East Village until six, having a drink in a Polish dive, then return to 256 East Street to watch TV, sleep and repeat. An unhealthy rut, but tonight was the first meeting of the National Resurgence Party at the downstair bar in Irving Plaza. I was surprised by the turn-out; Kim and the Kyle, Lang, Joseph Curtin, Mombo, Grant, Alice, Mitchell, John Kemp, the British shoemaker, and Jim Fouratt, Who fought at Stonewall, who's more interest in having sex with me than my humorous take on American politics.

After Stanley, the manager brought us a round of drink, I announced that the NRP will officially launch in the New Year with a meeting on the Staten Island Ferry to propose the occupation of Greenland, whose premise is a joke since the USA has no interest in world domination after the Vietnam Debacle other than to capitalism in the USSR through the sale of Coca-Cola.

Yesterday Metro-Novelties went well at Irving Plaza, even though David McDermott narcissistic madman routine of a Stock Broker losing his mind after the Stock Market crash of 1929. Not that he was a jumper. David heroically had helped rescue Patti Astors's husband after he fell of Tom Sculley's roof, but he has been replaced as emcee by the Mumps Kristin Hoffman, who is so funny and musically talented.

Klaus Nomi was the headliner and his popularity has spread beyond the gay demi-monde. We remain friends, but one day and one day soon he will be a star and stars have little time to space of light bulbs like myself. "Lady Bug' Hickman performed he erotic acrobatic routine and I wondered what it would be like to have sex with such a flexible female. Alice and I haven't touched each other in weeks.

Her rat-thin witchy friend Susan glares at me as if I were fucking her cat. She really is a cunt, but thankfully I have nothing to do with such a soul ugly harridan. Lance Loud lovingly covered the Sex Pistols'ANARCHY IN THE UK, then anonymous yet profane version of THE NUN Story followed by the ever popular Businessmen in Space. They are so Devo.

Kim Davis shared the stage with her partner ripping off grafitti tee-shirt after tee shirt, who looking like the illegitimate Jewish son of General MacArthur, complete with sweep-over. Traci Sherman deep-throated fire, accompanied by scantily dressed go-go girls in punk leather. Some egomaniac declared himself THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE. I wanted to throw him off state and suggest so to Alice. Her girlfriend Susan sighed with man-hating ennui, so I shouted the Center of the Universe, "Fuck you.You suck. Someone should have killed with at birth."

Susan gasped and I realized she was fucking this loser unbeknownst to her boyfriend, Tom, but then she's not the only one who hates me. Donna Destri still holds a grudge as my fight with with Blondie and I say to John Kemp, "Fuck her. She has legs like horse and tits as flat as pancakes. Alice and Susan walked away from he and John said, "Don't worry about them. All Susan thinks about if fucking Alice."

"Thanks for the comforting works."

In truth I was a little jealous, as the trio of Alice, Tom Scully and fucking Susan have successfully introduced vaudeville to the East Village and the modern world. They are stars of now, but I never wanted to be them and in truth I'm happy not to be them either. I remain faithfully a no one.

November 3, 1978 - East Village - Journal Entry

Last night at THE NEW WAVE VAUDEVILLE SHOW at Irving Plaza was a great success, but a debacle for me. Klaus Nomi was the headliner along with a horde of starry-eyed rockers and artists. I was asked to be the security with my friends. None of us were paid, but we guaranteed free drinks .

The night of the show started slow, but by midnight the auditorium on Irving Place was packed with new wave affecionados. Klaus killed the crowd. He was a star. At the end of his performance the stage lights came up, signaling time to go home. I went from table to table telling the guests that they didn't have to go home, but they couldn't stay here. The rest of the security was guzzling liquor at the back bar.

Alice and her friends were flush with of achieving glory for an evening and tomorrow promised more with the B-52s headlining the show. Only one table remained and I approached the four rockers, telling the same thing as everyone else. They didn't like what they heard and a thin-haired guy in glasses asked, "Do you know who I am?"

I had seen him someplace, but said, "No."

"We're Blondie and we're not going anywhere."

"Blondie? I had seen them several times at CBGBs. I liked them and said, "It's been a long night. Just do me a favor and finish your drinks."

I turned to walk away, but he grabbed my shoulder. I shucked off his grip and slapped the beer out of his hand.

"Just leave, you cunts. You guys suck."

I was no music critic and they attacked me as if one of them had said, "One two three four."

I seized the forelock of the rocker in the glasses and whacked him in the face. He backed away and I found myself with a shank of hair in my hand. After that I was buried underneath them and their roadies. Not a fair fight. I was used to those.

Alice wasn't there when I got to my feet. I had trouble breathing. Two of my ribs were broken. I returned to our apartment on East 10th Street and lay on the futon wheezing. I coughed a little blood. Nothing serious.

Alice show up at dawn.

She sat in the kitchen.

"A good night."

"Yes, but you had to ruin it all. Blondie wants to play, but both them and the B-52s won't perform if you're there."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Well, the show must go on."

That morning we slept in separate beds.

Alice left for the show before sunset without saying a word. I wandered north to Irving Plaza and drank in the Polish Bar beneath Irving Plaza. The Poles toasted me. I toasted them back.

"Na Zdrowie!" I coughed with pain

I spit up blood for the next two days. I should have sued the band for a hundred-thousand. Sadly I wasn't that type of guy.

Fighters never are. We win. We lose. We never cry.

Never.

Dec 2, 1978 - East Village - Journal Entry

I had been serious sick from food poisoning this week. Puking and shitting non-stop.Two days of retching in the WC toilet. I slept in the living room to keep it close. Pus getting out of the loft bed was dangerous in my condition. I felt like Doc Holiday in Tombstone. Always ready to die.

Alice was a great nurse.

I do love her.

What's an evening without a fight?

After the Klaus Nomi closed the show for the Vaudeville Show, I had a few drinks and then cleared the crowd from Irving Plaza. A table of rockers ignored my several polite requests. They looked familiar and I let them slide. Finally I said, "It's time to go. Please finish your drinks. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."

I had heard Merv from CBGB's say that many times without any trouble, then again he was 6-4.

A musician with glasses stood up.

"Do you know who I am?"

"Not a clue. I just want to go home."

"I'm not stopping you. Fuck off."

I turned my head. Debbie Harry from Blondie glared at me and I recognized the big mouth as their guitarist.

"I'm just doing my job."

"Then why don't you fuck off."

He bumped into my chest. I did not move.

"You're no one to me." I shoved him away hard and he fell into the table. This band rose to their feet as a gang. Five on one. I looked for help. Anthony and Anthony were drinking at the bar. Completely useless as they had been all night. I was on my own. The band flanked me and one of them Japped me. Not a hard punch, but then hands grabbed my arms. I snatched the pianist by the hair. The rest of the band pigpiled atop me and we went to the ground together with the pianist was under me and got a stomping. Boots struck my ribs. One practically hard, knocking out my breath. Staying under the assault was a death wish. Somehow I rose to my feet. Pianist in hand. I punch him hard and was stunned to see his hair in my hand. The beating continued unabated. I saw an opening and clocked the guitarist, breaking his glasses, but there wasn't much fight in me. Them neither. We stood apart. Anthony and Andy came to my sides.

"Let's get the fuck out of here," Debbie spat with venom.

As I regained my breath. Not easy. At least two of my ribs were broken. It hurt to breathe. I got a drink at the bar. Alex. the manager of Irving Plaza, served me a double whiskey.

"On the house."

Polish drinkers from the downstairs bar came up to the concert hall.

"I heard the band say you started it." Chris the publicist said, as if believed them over me. "And they said they beat the shit out of you."

There was no blood, but my body had been thrashed and I looked at my friend Anthony. "It was five on one. Pussies. I had no help."

"At least you can tell your grandchildren what wimps Blondie were. You're lucky it wasn't the Ramones."

"Yeah." It was small solace.

I had been in plenty of fights this year. This was my first loss. I blame drink and the odds. I wasn't looking for revenge. Not five against one. Alice was busy counting the take with her skinny stick pussy. She obviously hadn't heard about the fight and I went back to 256 East 10th Street adn watched TV until the National Anthem.

Alice came into the apartment. The TV was a snow storm.

"Where are the stamps."

"I forgot to get them."

"I need those stamps."

"At four in the morning."

We hadn't had sex in weeks. We did tonight. She felt so good. Being with her was good.

Later

Politically I have tested the ranks of the NRP. Some believe. Some don't, but there are loyalists even after last night. The enemy grow in strength. Alice always has my back. But I am a coward to be hiding behind a women's skirts. We are us.

OCTOBER 23, 1978 - JOURNAL ENTRY - EAST VILLAGE

QUITING MARK AMITIN

Tore up your phone number Written on a scrap of paper I never memorized it And I'm glad I hadn't I'm so happy to walk away from your shit The screaming The tantrum The lechery I tell you, "Fuck you." "You'll be back." "Fuck you in case I do." I walk out the door I don't turn around No second thoughts Glad to be gone I'd say it had been fun None of it was.

Today I quit ALBEE DIRECTS ALBEE. Edward is a good man, But Martin Amitin questioned my accounting. I did it once again and came up with the same numbers.

"I guess you're good at cooking numbers," said the acne-scarred producer.

"I was a math major in university. If I wanted to cheat, you'd never know and the only reason you're busting my chops is that you want me to have sex with you. I might, but you're dick is too small."

"What?"

"Small. It isn't ever two plus two." I burned him in effigy and wished he caught an incurable tropical disease, as he yelled at me.

"I quit."

If you quit, I'm not paying you."

"Then I'll pay myself." I took my wages from the petty cash. "$120. Can you count it?" I had not been brought up by my Yankee father to quit jobs Some how I would find another.

"That's theft."

"Call the cops." I left the office, as Edward entered with a press release.

"Going someplace?"

"Yeah, I quit. Good luck. It's been an honor working for you."

Outside I felt free, but then Mark screamed in a high whining voice from the 17th floor.

"Stop that man. He's a thief."

Not a single pedestrian paid attention.

I love a city where people know enough not to get involved in other people's bullshit.

I called Alice from 27th Street.

I quit."

About time. That old queen hated me."

"He hates all women."

"You want to meet me for breakfast at the Kiev."

"Sure, you feel bad?"

"No, I have enough for rent."

November's rent?"

"Sadly only October's rent, but don't worry, Mrs Golding love me."

"Everyone loves you." She was a little jealous of how I got into clubs and venues and ate for free.

"And I love you." I hadn't been seeing Alice at all as she devotes all her time to NEW WAVE VAUDEVILLE. I have gone to sleep alone veery night for the last month

"It's strange, but I feel married. and I don't know how to react to that. I've never lived with a man before." She was 22.

"I've never lived with a woman before." I was 26.

Are you crazy about me?"

Yes, you are my love, but lately you've been distant, because of the show, so I understand. You feel your freedom, so you can be creative. I haven't been seeing anyone.

"Yoy, the sexual adventurer?"

"Yes, the libertine has retired." I'm not concerned with my cheating. Alice??? I pray that she isn't sleeping with that horrible shrew, her co-conspirator in the show. Susan Hanneford. At least I'm happy to see that the witch hates me more than I hate her.

After Alice went to rehearsal at Irving Plaza I spoke with Michael Selbach. We drank Rhein wine and the sculptor bemoaned his wife's desertion. "She's gone and I don't know where. At least you know where Alice is.

With that stupid bitch.

We finished two bottles in record time.

And then decided to hit CBGB's for beers.

It was still daylight, but nothing said fuck your boss better than hitting a Bowery Bar early.

Seconds tick to seocnds A ragged man's death rattle on the Bowery. Not death, but something far from life. The bum had been hit by a car. Drunks live hard and die harder. Blood flows from his head. Seoncds tick to death A siren approaches fast. The man opens his eyes. Laughs Cries An asks "I never thought I would die here." He groaned and breathed again. "Maybe I ain't dead, but I can't call this living." Seconds tick back to his heart. The ambulance workers load him inside Life goes on.

OCTOBER 20, 1978 - JOURNAL ENTRY - EAST VILLAGE

NEW WAVE VAUDEVILLE has Alice and the other participants in a panic. I've seen a few rehearsals. Klaus is fantastic, David McDermott is the quintessential fey emcee. Stanley the Polish manager of Irving Place, tells everyone that the show will be a big success. Alice is giving it her all. We haven't been together in weeks. I wish I possessed her drive. I'm only capable of writing in this journal and scribbling bad poetry on blank paper. I throw most of it away without reciting the verses to friends or strangers or reading it myself.

Failure.

A twenty-six year-old failure at school, work, and love.

"I think I'm getting too fat," Alice said this morning before the mirror above the kitchen bathtub. "I can't make love to you until I'm skinny."

"You don't look fat to me. You look as beautiful as the first day I met you."

"That's because you're blind to anything other than your own narcissism."

"What?" I was prone to regarding my reflection in mirrors and windows, so there was truth to what the West Viriginan had said, but her to me revealed a cold side of her. Cold to me.

"You're always glancing at your reflection in mirrors and shop windows."

"True." I sat at the table, as she pulled on her jacket. "I also look in people's eyes, because people really see you for who you are."

"You're not Adonis." She slammed the door shut and I was alone.

No sex.

I've been celibate before.

When Alice directed OUT TO BRUNCH, the hillbilly beauty rejected my advances to the point where I slept on the living room couch. Some nights she would steal under the covers and huddle close, saying, "I'm cold."

The sex during the no-sex period was all for her. She came and went right back to the bedroom without a good-night kiss. After that I went on strike.

I'm working for Mark Amitin. I need the money more than I don't need the grief. His cat, Camus, sits on this journal. Mark wants to fuck me. He wants to fuck everyone. I leave after lunch, saying, "I have to go to the doctor for a clap test."

I walked south down Second Avenue. Women stare at me. Most I wouldn't touch. They exude no sexuality, which I prefer to beauty. Last year this time I was whoring my way through Brooklyn with Betty, a married bimbo with augmented breasts, Roz, a lesbian, who liked my cock sometimes more than licking pussy, Fran, a skinny Jewish pinball player, who begs me to cum on her baby-powdered breasts, and young Ellen, a scrawny teen runaway, who gets off one my fucking her ass in between subway cars the night Elvis died. Last year I told her about Alice and that we couldn't fuck anymore.

"What about blow-jobs on the D-Train?"

"Fellatio isn't really sex."

I said good-bye to her last Spring when Alice Graduated from her Midwestern liberal arts college. I can never remember its name. I arrive to East 10th Street without seeing a single women exuding sex.

I'm cursed with desire for one woman, who fears me, but not my cock.

OCTOBER 20, 2021 - BROOKLYN

I can do nothing right for Old Yellah.

Today I hadn't replaced the heater to the bathroom. I should have. She heats up the bathroom for yoga. Hot sauna's one of her great pleasures. Sh tells me that my apologies are fake. I don't respond to the valid accusation, since she is so absorbed in her efforts to save outdoor dining and a million other projects that my cancer hasn't registered with her.

I haven't mentioned the fatality rate of liver cancer to her or anyone else. 2-5 years. No one at NYU hospital have discussed my future other than to say that I'm a perfect candidate for a liver transplant. I thought about telling Alice about my ailment, but opted to spare everyone, since they are wrapped up in their cellphone existences

This afternoon the NYU team checked my heart condition. Everything was normal. It looks as if I'll live to the end of the year.

ps I am the world's # 1 failurologist.