"concubines"

At the end of 1996 going into 1997, my roommate Sharky was preparing to leave to Spain for a year. He had landed a job teaching conversational English at the university where his then-girlfriend was going to spend a year studying abroad.

Sharky and I were inseparable as friends, spending most of our time together partying and acting dumb. Between him and Purple Paulie, my former bandmate, my time was occupied and tied up constantly.

But around the end of '96 I wasn't talking to Paulie all that much, and when Sharky left there was an enormous gap in my personal schedule. I soon realized that all of my friends had gone off to other cities to attend college, and that for the first time in my life I was totally alone: no roomies, no co-horts, no hangers-on, and my family all lived miles and miles away from me.

Up until that point, I had never lived on my own. I shared a room with my older brother growing up; my first apartment was a share, as well as my second apartment. And now, here I was, all by myself-- I didn't even have my cats yet!

With all this free time and nothing to do (besides working at a 9 to 5), I eventually sat down and began to write the novel that I'd been trying to write for ten years, a novel that has taken almost ten additional years to edit and arrange in a way that won't make the average reader's head swoon.

And now, thanks to the efforts of my friend Laurie, the novel is closer to completion than it has ever been.

I warned Laurie about the task I wanted her to undertake. She accepted the challenge with natural aplomb. She saw the potential for the novel to be coherent and yet still retaining the lawless nature of my writing. She has been very helpful and gracious with her time and input.

Nobody else could've done what she has done, which is to get me engaged with the material again, to have me thinking about what I wrote, why I wrote it, and what is relevant.

I don't blame anyone else for not being as involved: the novel was enormous, with an incalculable number of pages and any number of possible paths it could take. I'd had close friends read it for feedback, and their notes were invaluable, but Laurie went one further and chopped the shit out of it, breaking it down to elemental set pieces and wresting from my head the themes and main concepts of the book.

It isn't nearly finished, but I see an end in sight, and it is exciting.


*/*


I bring this up as a way of tying my latest obsession to this post.

Lately I've been going on about my own nature, and why I seek inspiration from women whether as muses or as catalysts for my passions, and although I am not much closer to knowing the answer, I think I have a good idea why I am so inclined to present my ideas to women for approval.

Women like me.

Let me get one thing clear: I didn't say they love me, or adore me. I didn't say they worship me or mythologize me or romanticize me, although I've had my share of experiences along those lines.

Women in general like me, because... well, I don't really know the 'because'... I just know that they like me, and that I am happier when they like me.

I like women, in return. I like the way they smile, the way they listen, the way the go on and on and on when I am listening. I like the way they wear their hearts on their sleeves, and I like the way they are modest when their emotions are on display.

I like their words of support when they know I am heartbroken. I like the way they do things for me, not out of necessity but out of generosity.

Don't get me wrong: there's plenty of women out there that I dislike. They are narcissistic and closed-minded, cynical and greedy, loveless and artless. The ones I dislike are clingy and shrewish and paranoid and ungrateful and bitter.

That's not to say that the women I like are perfect. Far from putting them on pedestals, I simply appreciate their kindness and their willingness to embrace the open end of infinity. They are more than just women: they are mothers, daughters, sisters and lovers, confidants and debutantes, and no matter what kind of relationship I have with them-- carnal or platonic or simply indefinable --I am always rewarded.

Of course, sometimes these same women whom I entrust with my heart and ideals infuriate me. They make me mad with their insane decisions, their deep-rooted insecurities, their stubborn pride and unwillingness to see certain things my way. But that's part of their appeal, after all, and maybe therein lies a clue as to what they like about me: I can be frank and open with them in a way that I cannot be with my male friends.

They sense this, and it draws them to me.

How else to explain what has become an annual phenomenon, where I go for long stretches of isolation and introspection, only to emerge from my hermitage with a score of ladies at the end of the tunnel, wishing me well and urging me to trudge forward, despite the heartaches and pangs of searching for love in the Waste Land of modern life?

This past weekend, I received phone calls, e-mails, and messages from all sorts of women who just wanted to let me know they were alive and thinking of me. This has been reassuring to say the least, because I haven't felt loved or wanted as of late.

Even someone like Eve, who has moved on and is working on her own personal boy-toy, took the time to drop me a line. Granted, I don't really want to hear from her right now, but it's nice to know that I still have a place in her heart, albeit a marginalized, trivial spot that is a mere fraction of what I once occupied.

Ironically, Eve was not cool with the prospect of my having a bunch of "emotional concubines"-- it ate at her deepest fears and caused her grief. She told me recently that I would have to give them up if I ever wanted to have a serious relationship with anyone.

That's proof of her doubts, her lack of faith. Any woman who knows me well also knows that I am a one-woman man. It's not my fault if my past girlfriends were too insecure to notice the fact that, although I may have a lot of female friends, my heart can only devote 100% of its romantic faculties to one woman.

The woman for me will be strong enough to know where my heart's devotion lies. She will be loyal to me, and I to her.


*/*


I started writing the novel back in '96-'97, when Amy (the female lead in my novel) had given me the heave-ho: she told me that she hated me and that we could never be friends again, and instructed me to never call her again. And she meant it-- even when I sent her a Christmas card the following month, she called me back to bitch me out and maintain the distance between us.

It bears noting that she did this at a time when she had found the man of her dreams, the one she was going to marry and have children with, and I knew it, and it made me so angry and I felt so defeated, like she was winning some sort of battle that had always been waged between us. She used the comfort of her newfound love to kick me in the groin, when I needed her the most.

My soul crushed, I used the pain as the impetus for the novel. I thought it was going to end up being one of those revenge-type of novels, where I get even with her for all the bullshit she put me through.

Friends who read excerpts of my novel at the time knew the score: they always wondered why I spent so much time trying to make Amy like me, when it was obvious that she treated me like dirt and made me sad. Out of respect for me, they often held their tongues when it came to how they honestly felt about her, so when I started venting about it they were all too eager to let me know what they felt.

Years passed. The novel grew. I'd made a whole new set of friends. I'd traveled on my own, had new adventures and met all sorts of beautiful women. I was making good money at a respectable job, lived in a comfortable apartment in Sherman Oaks, and began to play music again.

I came home one day, and there was a letter from Amy Coates in my mailbox. By that time, she'd been in her relationship for about three years and was well on her way to domestic oblivion, which is what she had always wanted (even when she used to claim to be a feminist, I always knew she would settle for marriage and motherhood at the drop of a dime).

The letter was typical Amy: she turned the situation around to make it seem like I was the one who stopped calling. She tried to maneuver it in a way to where I was the one who needed to apologize, and that I was the one who ruined this great bond we supposedly had.

To add insult to injury, she offered an olive branch to me in the most condescending manner possible: "If you don't want to be my friend anymore, then don't respond. I'll take your silence to mean we are done, and that will be the end of one of the most rewarding yet disappointing friendships I have ever had."

Normally, this kind of thing from Amy would've caused steam to rapidly escape from my ears. But time had passed, and I had some perspective on the whole thing. And I realized that I had wasted a lot of time on a woman who would never accept me for who I am.

I was also struggling to find an ending for my novel, and when the letter came I instantly knew that this was the way to end it.

So I wrote her back, and in my lengthy letter I put forth to her my realization that even as she claimed to love me, her actions belied different motivations. I told her that she never made me feel like she even liked me, and that was far more important than whether or not we were 'soul mates' or what have you.

It put the ball in her court, but it also forced her to recognize what she'd done to me over the years. She panicked, and called me up on the phone immediately. We talked for hours, and although we made up as friends, I never saw her again.

Shortly after that conversation, she and her man set a wedding date. They were married the week after 9/11.


*/*


Around the time that I forgave my father, I decided to write an e-mail to Amy Coates.

As documented in this blog, she and I were supposed to meet earlier this year. I flaked on her, partly because Eve showed up at my office minutes before I was supposed to see her, and partly because I was afraid to see Amy again.

Amy was not amused. For a moment, I was thrilled at the idea of standing her up. It served her right, no? All those years of keeping me at arm's length, making me feel like I had to earn her love...

But when I forgave my father, I also decided to apologize to her for leaving her hanging in front of P.F. Chang's, in the freezing cold. So I e-mailed her and said what I had to say. And she wrote me back and wondered why I just didn't come out and say it. And I replied that I just had 'cold feet' and couldn't face her knowing that she was married with a kid.

And that was it.

As far as I am concerned, even though she lives on in my novel, she and I are finally through. It is over. It has been over for almost ten years. And with it go the doubts and fears she instilled in me. I never have to feel like I have something to prove to her ever again.

It is liberating, especially when coupled with the affection bestowed upon me by women who actually do like me, who think I am a nice person and want to hear what I have to say, even if I am wrong or obstinate or closed-minded.

They have faith in me, and I don't want to let them down.

Amy never had faith in me. If I had somehow struck it rich or became successful overnight, then she would've wanted to be with me. But I would've known the truth, because for all of her talents Amy Coates was also as transparent as a panel of glass, and maybe that's what she resented about me. She could never fool me the way she could fool other men, who were too stupid or self-involved to see what she was really doing to them.

I feel sorry for her husband. He is a good man, and I guarantee you that, though he may love her, she will hurt him far worse than she ever hurt me. Out of all her past suitors, I'm the only one who actually has stories about making Amy Coates pay for her numerous sins. I was the only one who ever called her on her bullshit.

Who knows? Maybe she has changed. I think she has mellowed out some, with the birth of her baby and all. But she remains the same to me, mainly because she is immortalized in my novel, set in stone, unwilling to conform to the changes and ravages of time.

I will always remember her as that fucking bitch that I was so madly in love with, and it serves as a reminder to me, to never fall prey to that kind of abuse again.

As I finish up the novel and reflect upon these things, I know that I will probably make the same mistakes again. But at least I know how to deal with them, and I know now that all I have to do is weather the initial storm and I'll find a way out of it. And when I do, there will be people waiting for me on the other side, people who care and understand and sympathize.

I guess it's called "growing up" and I'm doing it at an accelerated pace, to make up for all the time I lost, all the time wasted on people less deserving than Amy Coates.

I'm beginning to see the light, and it is so bright that I have to close my eyes and visualize inside of my head.

And I'm cool with that.