So 'The Blue Unconconscious' by Jackson Pollock that I slept under all through Cherry Lawn (where Mike Nichols went) and Bryn Mawr, is proof, hopefully, for the nice people who are trying to validate an untitled painting they own of Pollock's. They don't want me to name them, as they fear being annoyed by fraudulent attention seekers, or, maybe worse, real ones who might claim ownership or that they don't.
It is hard being here back East (not sure if you capitalize it when it's general, and having written about Bryn Mawr recently, I want to be correct.) Almost everybody I know here is gone or away(in both senses,) and the new people I meet seem unsure about me, except for the brilliant young lady doctor who almost immediately invited me to her coming soon wedding to a Japanese-in-origin financier who looks very handsome in his picture. I am excited to be going to it, as I of course loved her for being so trusting, since I know she's right: I'm not going to hurt anybody, and I am fun.
But cities are strange: I have lived for a fairly long time in Beverly Hills, the wrong side of Wilshire and have made very few friends outside of my beauty salon, where labors the gifted, long-time buddy Dusty, and the wonderful sister of my best friend who dropped me, she doesn't remember why. Life gets stranger as you get older, lucky to be alive, especially when you are used to being the youngest one, as I was on Melwood Street in Pittsburgh, where I said The Gettysburg Address when I was two years and three months old (WHAT?) and Bryn Mawr College where I wrote most of the songs in Junior Show at eighteen, and had the comedy lead. You get used to having the youngest mindset in your crowd, a diminishing blessing as your crowd gets smaller. Hardly anyone remembers as much as I do, a gift which, like your gang, gets smaller.
Marilyn Muir Pfaltz, the one in my class who remembers more, has instructed me to write these things somewhere I don't lose them, and my new dazzlingly kind friend, Mike Brown, from the Apple store who is also a first-class bass player, has told me to do them in Word, which I am unused to, so if you like them, kindly look for them there, as I will try to remember to do that. It was hard losing the first one I did, as I can think of no more glittering name to drop even now than Marlon Brando when he was thin. Well, maybe not thin, but at least spare and muscular. And God knows he was sexy, though not so much when his joint fell out of his pants when they were making that movie in Paris.
I passed an Andy Warhol store either in my dream or on a nearby street where I am now(Manhattan, 57th Street) and saw Elizabeth Taylor at the great height or maybe fairly short of her beauty, and remembered when she wanted to be my friend, so she could do THE MOTHERLAND as a movie, though it was already too late in her game. Richard Burton was on the phone, borrowing money while schtupping Princess Elizabeth of Yugoslavia, and Henry I think it was What's His Name, that second-hand car salesman, was in the bedroom. Max Lerner, the great political writer, too liberal to stay employed, was in love with her, as were most men of any or too little sense. She was not very bright, but read more than anybody, something for which I, certainly, was grateful, as I wrote as much or probably more than possible. She also ate more than was good for her and her future, and I was tempted to spit on her food as I loved her, in the right way for a woman, and wanted her to have a future, probably including my work, which never happened. But she did invite me to her parties, where she always came late, was overdressed and over-made-up. And it was at one of those that I saw Liza Minnelli whom I knew only slightly but immediately on entering came straight over to me and invited me to Guaymas in Mexico, where she was about to make Lucky Lady, that everyone thought would be the great hit of its day. Wrong. George Segal, who'd been at Haverford, with whom I'd been infatuated when I was at Bryn Mawr, and seemed about to be the great star of his day, was supposed to co-star, but dropped out because of drugs and was replaced by Gene Hackman who didn't intend to become a star but was too talented not to. Stanley Donen, allegedly a great director, failed completely and was a jerk, but married Elaine Nichols anyway, so nobody loses all the time.
I see where I have once again written this in the wrong place, will try not to lose it, and next time will do it in Word, in the beginning where there was one of. Go in Peace. The Russians are Coming.
