Post by Mansons2005 on Aug 15, 2015 15:30:14 GMT
Das GirlFace – where can I start?
I met my wife for the first time in the very early 1970s while helping a female friend move into a new apartment in Manhattan. Her new roommate walked in the door with her arms laden with clothing, and our eyes met over a 20 foot wasteland of boxes and jumbled furniture. She stopped dead, not even completely inside the door, and I dropped the box of books I was carrying. We stared into each other’s eyes for about 30 seconds and then she said, and I quote, “I don’t have time now, and I have a date later, but you and I ARE going to do IT.”
It was the 70s in New York – Sex, Drugs, and Rock n’ Roll held sway, in that order………promiscuity was in fashion, and if it had a pulse and was amenable, well…………so our physical attraction was not really that big a deal, or so we thought. And the city had an air of “Live for NOW, cause tomorrow will be worse” attitude about it. The city was bankrupt, they were turning off street lights because they couldn’t pay the bills, gas was rationed, water was about to be in short supply, crime was skyrocketing, the infrastructure was crumbling and you had a choice – despair or dance while the ship went down.
And a few days later we did get together and started a wild, totally depraved, mutually rewarding, intense and very stable relationship that lasted until her untimely death.
She was a self-styled JAP (Jewish American Princess) from Oceanside, Lawngeyeland. She was brought up with money, but no family tradition beyond some bastardized form of Reformed Judaism. She called her parents, and everyone else who drew breath by their first names. She was also the world’s greatest procrastinator and by many standards, the laziest person I ever knew! But the impetuous for her “laziness” and procrastination was a deep disinterest in most of the mechanics of daily living. She could make instant coffee and she could open a tin of tuna fish and mix it with mayonnaise (and nothing else), but that was the extant of her culinary talents and she had no desire to expand on her limited repertoire, thus she was well known at most of the food establishments in Chelsea. . She never cleaned her apartment but had people who needed the income do it for her. She took off her clothes and tossed them into huge and ever growing piles – one for the laundry service and one for the dry cleaner. She didn’t own an iron and never pressed a piece of clothing her life. Sleep seemed to be her major pastime, but that was deceptive as she was a major “night owl”. One of the few traits we shared was a total convection that one should see the sunrise, THEN go to bed………….
Oh, she did have interests – her dogs (plural!) were very important to her and she would set an alarm clock to see that they were fed, watered and walked and that they had “time with mommy”. And her career was important to her. She started out modeling (coats & dresses) in the garment district of New York, attended classes for acting (which is how we knew, shudder, Pia Zadora) and was reasonably successful at that as well. She understudied some major Broadway actresses and moved to television where she was very successful as a “double” on a programme with cousins that looked like twins – so, many people saw her without realizing it as she was shown mostly from the back! With the advent of dance clubs in NY she ventured into spinning music and that became her passion. She never looked back. When I met here she was just starting in the field and we got to know some of the best and most innovative DJs in dance club scene, most notably Larry Lavine from the Garage and David Mancuso from the Loft. But she also worked as a relief DJ at the Limelight, Regine’s, Studio 54, 12 West, Le Mouche, etc. She also freelanced for private parties, most of which were given by moneyed people in the fashion and media business, out in the Hamptons or on Fire Island (we got some NICE perks from those people!). But she would never take a steady or permanent gig, even though many were offered. She was self-aware enough to know that HAVING to perform and produce would spoil her enjoyment of the process, denigrating it to mere drudgery.
She was beautiful in a slightly brash way – petite, 5’4” tall with short curly strawberry blond hair and pale blue eyes with a darker blue ring on the outside. From the time she was sixteen years old until she died she had the same figure – 34 D bust, 24” waist, 36” hips………..I always said that in High School she must have looked like “The Girl Most Likely TO”……………….She had very animated facial expressions and when you caught her off guard it was easy to tell what she was thinking. She had two smiles – her public grin and laughter were fun and infectious – her private smile started as a sparkle in her eyes and transformed her, to the point that to some that have seen photos of her in that state have not recognized her. I loved her either way…………………
There were a few decades between our ages, but that never mattered. She was totally self possessed and sure of herself, and I was still an approaching middle age adolescent (still am). We had many differences – many more than similarities.
She was an avowed Atheist who believed that ALL organized religion was just a group of cults full of the brainwashed, and I was a Book of Common Prayer carrying Episcopalian. BUT – she never disrespected or argued with another point of view, and went out of her way to observe the traditions and rites of others. I once asked her why, if she didn’t believe in Judaism, she lit a candle on the anniversary of her father’s death and left a rock on his tombstone when she visited the cemetery (which ironically my family owned). She explained that those little actions meant nothing to her but would have made her father happy.
I am afflicted with OCD, so we clashed on ALL of the following:
Getting her ANYPLACE on time was a trial. It could take her four to six hours to get showered, made up, dressed, bejeweled, and get her handbag packed to go out. It always required a weeks notice because she would have to dig through the piles o f “dirty” clothes to find exactly what she wanted to wear (down to particular underclothes) and have it cleaned and pressed – and once her mind was set, she would wear nothing else. She would rather cancel than wear something she didn’t want to.
She had remarkable taste in clothes, shoes, and jewelry – she could unerringly pick out the correct colours and styles that suited her, ignoring fashion trends that she knew would never look “just right” on her. She could look hot as a hooker, demure as a virgin, sedate as a matron depending on her mood and the occasion. But she had terrible taste in EVERYTHING else. She had no sense of harmony when it came to her surroundings – she always wanted to be able to see the clock at a glance – so this ugly “digital” (the click, click sort) was perched on the edge of an end table in the living room, with the cord draped over the side of the table. The dogs leads and her seasonal “walking clothes” such as a parka and hat with gloves were important, so the were placed over the back of a chair in the dining area as you walked into the apartment – and NEVER moved – either sit on them or stand. There was no order in her place, except for the over one-thousand LP records she eventually amassed. Piles of letter, cards, cheques, bills, and invitations piled up on the cocktail table until she got around to asking me go through them and read them to her. The dining table was piled with bags and boxes from the clothing she bought, with the receipts inside so she could find them if she needed them (so good was she at her style, in all the years I knew her, she returned ONE item of clothing to the place were she purchased it – and she beat herself up over that because she did not notice that the top had a pull when she purchased it). Dog food, the can opener, her “emergency” cans of tuna, and the one bowl and fork she used were stacked on the counter in her “kitchen”, though there were plenty of cabinets, some of them stocked with dishes and cooking implements her mother had installed when she moved into that apartment but that were never used. Decades later, when I had to clean out the apartment there they were, most still with original wrappings or tags.
She was a woman of strong convictions and we would argue and fight – sometimes to the point of tears (hers and mine) – but she had a remarkable facility to pass any argument with a sudden stop, leaving it at that point, with no apparent resolution, and move on. I wanted (what they now call) closure, but she wanted dinner, and there was no acrimony or pouting or reference to the argument. MADDENING!!!!!!
She had a marvelous sense of humor - she could see the lighter side of almost any situation and she and I could laugh for hours - laugh until the tears rolled down our cheeks and our sides ached. Even in those shared moments of teary emotion during a heart breaker film, she could sniffle and then ask, sotto voce, "How come Julia Roberts nose doesn't run when she cries? Bitch never needs a tissue!!!!"
She could be hard as nails when it came to some things. In the 80s we had a lot of friends and acquaintances who developed AIDS. She was devastated and we spent a lot of emotion, time, energy and money caring for those people. But anyone who developed the condition AFTER the means of contraction was known received nothing but scorn from her. Her “You were stupid, don’t cry to me” attitude was in total keeping with her pragmatic outlook on life. But she never passed a homeless person with out at least passing on cash – put mostly she would buy them ready to eat food. We had standing arrangements with the places we ordered in from, both at Her Place and at His Place, to have the delivery boy drop off a sandwich/calzone/pint of fried rice, etc. before delivering our food.
And no, we could never compromise. We couldn’t STAND the way each of us preferred to live, so we each kept our apartments, even when legally married. For a time we actually had FOUR addresses – Her Place, His Place, the Alphabet City Place (a third floor walk-up slum down the street from the Hell’s Angels, but very convenient for stumbling to after a 24 hour dance club marathon), and the Park Avenue Place (Ma’s co-op, she had more or less permanently decamped to Florida by then) ……………….
She kept her records and dogs and mess at Her Place, I kept my well ordered books and inherited furniture/silver/china/glassware at my place, we kept little more than a king-sized mattress and a table & chairs in Alphabet City so that the space was an oasis for both after a period of hedonism, and in the 80s/90s we used Park Avenue as a fourteen room entertaining space………though I was technically living there as a caretaker (something about the CO-OP bylaws)
Our joy in being together made the annoyances of our differences “a little thing” – something we each gladly suffered so we could be together. The thought of either of us changing our habits or of not being together were on an even par – one could not be without the other………………………
We lead a very decadent and depraved lifestyle in the 70s – one most people would not approve of. Mutual promiscuity, heavy “substance” abuse, daring adventures - all had a place in our life together. In the 80s when promiscuity and the use of substances that might lead to promiscuity went out of fashion we became part of the Elegant Set, entertaining on a lavish scale and being entertained on a lavish scale (though we still dabbled in a few vices). We had money, good looks, Old New York social connections and Café Society social connections. We were worldly, adventurous, well traveled, charming, witty, well known (and photographed!), I was classically educated, she was “street” educated, and we were sought after as guests. And we could be just as happy if we ordered food in and rented a stack of old classic black & white movies and stayed in for days at a time.
We were happy. We couldn’t wait to see and hold and communicate with each other at every opportunity. We lived for each other. We didn't fulfill each other, we were each other. Our existence was one – not two becoming one, but one from the day we met.
And then one very early morning when she ran out to the Korean Market on the corner of Seventh Avenue, she walked into a robbery in progress and someone ended it. I doubt she even realized what was happening, and I believe deep within me that her last thought was “Holy shit – ANOTHER new experience…………………remember I love you”………………………………..
And I love you DasGirl face…………and I shall eternally……………………..
I met my wife for the first time in the very early 1970s while helping a female friend move into a new apartment in Manhattan. Her new roommate walked in the door with her arms laden with clothing, and our eyes met over a 20 foot wasteland of boxes and jumbled furniture. She stopped dead, not even completely inside the door, and I dropped the box of books I was carrying. We stared into each other’s eyes for about 30 seconds and then she said, and I quote, “I don’t have time now, and I have a date later, but you and I ARE going to do IT.”
It was the 70s in New York – Sex, Drugs, and Rock n’ Roll held sway, in that order………promiscuity was in fashion, and if it had a pulse and was amenable, well…………so our physical attraction was not really that big a deal, or so we thought. And the city had an air of “Live for NOW, cause tomorrow will be worse” attitude about it. The city was bankrupt, they were turning off street lights because they couldn’t pay the bills, gas was rationed, water was about to be in short supply, crime was skyrocketing, the infrastructure was crumbling and you had a choice – despair or dance while the ship went down.
And a few days later we did get together and started a wild, totally depraved, mutually rewarding, intense and very stable relationship that lasted until her untimely death.
She was a self-styled JAP (Jewish American Princess) from Oceanside, Lawngeyeland. She was brought up with money, but no family tradition beyond some bastardized form of Reformed Judaism. She called her parents, and everyone else who drew breath by their first names. She was also the world’s greatest procrastinator and by many standards, the laziest person I ever knew! But the impetuous for her “laziness” and procrastination was a deep disinterest in most of the mechanics of daily living. She could make instant coffee and she could open a tin of tuna fish and mix it with mayonnaise (and nothing else), but that was the extant of her culinary talents and she had no desire to expand on her limited repertoire, thus she was well known at most of the food establishments in Chelsea. . She never cleaned her apartment but had people who needed the income do it for her. She took off her clothes and tossed them into huge and ever growing piles – one for the laundry service and one for the dry cleaner. She didn’t own an iron and never pressed a piece of clothing her life. Sleep seemed to be her major pastime, but that was deceptive as she was a major “night owl”. One of the few traits we shared was a total convection that one should see the sunrise, THEN go to bed………….
Oh, she did have interests – her dogs (plural!) were very important to her and she would set an alarm clock to see that they were fed, watered and walked and that they had “time with mommy”. And her career was important to her. She started out modeling (coats & dresses) in the garment district of New York, attended classes for acting (which is how we knew, shudder, Pia Zadora) and was reasonably successful at that as well. She understudied some major Broadway actresses and moved to television where she was very successful as a “double” on a programme with cousins that looked like twins – so, many people saw her without realizing it as she was shown mostly from the back! With the advent of dance clubs in NY she ventured into spinning music and that became her passion. She never looked back. When I met here she was just starting in the field and we got to know some of the best and most innovative DJs in dance club scene, most notably Larry Lavine from the Garage and David Mancuso from the Loft. But she also worked as a relief DJ at the Limelight, Regine’s, Studio 54, 12 West, Le Mouche, etc. She also freelanced for private parties, most of which were given by moneyed people in the fashion and media business, out in the Hamptons or on Fire Island (we got some NICE perks from those people!). But she would never take a steady or permanent gig, even though many were offered. She was self-aware enough to know that HAVING to perform and produce would spoil her enjoyment of the process, denigrating it to mere drudgery.
She was beautiful in a slightly brash way – petite, 5’4” tall with short curly strawberry blond hair and pale blue eyes with a darker blue ring on the outside. From the time she was sixteen years old until she died she had the same figure – 34 D bust, 24” waist, 36” hips………..I always said that in High School she must have looked like “The Girl Most Likely TO”……………….She had very animated facial expressions and when you caught her off guard it was easy to tell what she was thinking. She had two smiles – her public grin and laughter were fun and infectious – her private smile started as a sparkle in her eyes and transformed her, to the point that to some that have seen photos of her in that state have not recognized her. I loved her either way…………………
There were a few decades between our ages, but that never mattered. She was totally self possessed and sure of herself, and I was still an approaching middle age adolescent (still am). We had many differences – many more than similarities.
She was an avowed Atheist who believed that ALL organized religion was just a group of cults full of the brainwashed, and I was a Book of Common Prayer carrying Episcopalian. BUT – she never disrespected or argued with another point of view, and went out of her way to observe the traditions and rites of others. I once asked her why, if she didn’t believe in Judaism, she lit a candle on the anniversary of her father’s death and left a rock on his tombstone when she visited the cemetery (which ironically my family owned). She explained that those little actions meant nothing to her but would have made her father happy.
I am afflicted with OCD, so we clashed on ALL of the following:
Getting her ANYPLACE on time was a trial. It could take her four to six hours to get showered, made up, dressed, bejeweled, and get her handbag packed to go out. It always required a weeks notice because she would have to dig through the piles o f “dirty” clothes to find exactly what she wanted to wear (down to particular underclothes) and have it cleaned and pressed – and once her mind was set, she would wear nothing else. She would rather cancel than wear something she didn’t want to.
She had remarkable taste in clothes, shoes, and jewelry – she could unerringly pick out the correct colours and styles that suited her, ignoring fashion trends that she knew would never look “just right” on her. She could look hot as a hooker, demure as a virgin, sedate as a matron depending on her mood and the occasion. But she had terrible taste in EVERYTHING else. She had no sense of harmony when it came to her surroundings – she always wanted to be able to see the clock at a glance – so this ugly “digital” (the click, click sort) was perched on the edge of an end table in the living room, with the cord draped over the side of the table. The dogs leads and her seasonal “walking clothes” such as a parka and hat with gloves were important, so the were placed over the back of a chair in the dining area as you walked into the apartment – and NEVER moved – either sit on them or stand. There was no order in her place, except for the over one-thousand LP records she eventually amassed. Piles of letter, cards, cheques, bills, and invitations piled up on the cocktail table until she got around to asking me go through them and read them to her. The dining table was piled with bags and boxes from the clothing she bought, with the receipts inside so she could find them if she needed them (so good was she at her style, in all the years I knew her, she returned ONE item of clothing to the place were she purchased it – and she beat herself up over that because she did not notice that the top had a pull when she purchased it). Dog food, the can opener, her “emergency” cans of tuna, and the one bowl and fork she used were stacked on the counter in her “kitchen”, though there were plenty of cabinets, some of them stocked with dishes and cooking implements her mother had installed when she moved into that apartment but that were never used. Decades later, when I had to clean out the apartment there they were, most still with original wrappings or tags.
She was a woman of strong convictions and we would argue and fight – sometimes to the point of tears (hers and mine) – but she had a remarkable facility to pass any argument with a sudden stop, leaving it at that point, with no apparent resolution, and move on. I wanted (what they now call) closure, but she wanted dinner, and there was no acrimony or pouting or reference to the argument. MADDENING!!!!!!
She had a marvelous sense of humor - she could see the lighter side of almost any situation and she and I could laugh for hours - laugh until the tears rolled down our cheeks and our sides ached. Even in those shared moments of teary emotion during a heart breaker film, she could sniffle and then ask, sotto voce, "How come Julia Roberts nose doesn't run when she cries? Bitch never needs a tissue!!!!"
She could be hard as nails when it came to some things. In the 80s we had a lot of friends and acquaintances who developed AIDS. She was devastated and we spent a lot of emotion, time, energy and money caring for those people. But anyone who developed the condition AFTER the means of contraction was known received nothing but scorn from her. Her “You were stupid, don’t cry to me” attitude was in total keeping with her pragmatic outlook on life. But she never passed a homeless person with out at least passing on cash – put mostly she would buy them ready to eat food. We had standing arrangements with the places we ordered in from, both at Her Place and at His Place, to have the delivery boy drop off a sandwich/calzone/pint of fried rice, etc. before delivering our food.
And no, we could never compromise. We couldn’t STAND the way each of us preferred to live, so we each kept our apartments, even when legally married. For a time we actually had FOUR addresses – Her Place, His Place, the Alphabet City Place (a third floor walk-up slum down the street from the Hell’s Angels, but very convenient for stumbling to after a 24 hour dance club marathon), and the Park Avenue Place (Ma’s co-op, she had more or less permanently decamped to Florida by then) ……………….
She kept her records and dogs and mess at Her Place, I kept my well ordered books and inherited furniture/silver/china/glassware at my place, we kept little more than a king-sized mattress and a table & chairs in Alphabet City so that the space was an oasis for both after a period of hedonism, and in the 80s/90s we used Park Avenue as a fourteen room entertaining space………though I was technically living there as a caretaker (something about the CO-OP bylaws)
Our joy in being together made the annoyances of our differences “a little thing” – something we each gladly suffered so we could be together. The thought of either of us changing our habits or of not being together were on an even par – one could not be without the other………………………
We lead a very decadent and depraved lifestyle in the 70s – one most people would not approve of. Mutual promiscuity, heavy “substance” abuse, daring adventures - all had a place in our life together. In the 80s when promiscuity and the use of substances that might lead to promiscuity went out of fashion we became part of the Elegant Set, entertaining on a lavish scale and being entertained on a lavish scale (though we still dabbled in a few vices). We had money, good looks, Old New York social connections and Café Society social connections. We were worldly, adventurous, well traveled, charming, witty, well known (and photographed!), I was classically educated, she was “street” educated, and we were sought after as guests. And we could be just as happy if we ordered food in and rented a stack of old classic black & white movies and stayed in for days at a time.
We were happy. We couldn’t wait to see and hold and communicate with each other at every opportunity. We lived for each other. We didn't fulfill each other, we were each other. Our existence was one – not two becoming one, but one from the day we met.
And then one very early morning when she ran out to the Korean Market on the corner of Seventh Avenue, she walked into a robbery in progress and someone ended it. I doubt she even realized what was happening, and I believe deep within me that her last thought was “Holy shit – ANOTHER new experience…………………remember I love you”………………………………..
And I love you DasGirl face…………and I shall eternally……………………..
