My father
had some kind of disagreement with my grandfather in January 1964 the details
of which we never knew other than the fact that it was something very trivial
relating to paintings of a friend of his he was trying to promote. Years passed
without communication of any kind between them and it became apparent to me
that the incident, whatever the particulars, was in my father’s mind a sort of
“last straw” in a series of conflicts with his stepmother, who had been my his
father’s mistress and, therefore, in his mind, to blame for the dissolution of
his parents’ marriage.
Although
we, his grandchildren, did try to maintain a relationship with my grandfather,
thanks in part to my aunt, my father’s sister Mary Ellen, it was never close
and always a bit strained. I remember at the end of every visit with them, my
grandmother—my step-grandmother—without asking me anything about how my life
was going, would pull out a checkbook, write a check for a couple hundred
dollars and hand it to me while telling how much they appreciated the visit. I
always wondered if I appeared impoverished to her in some way.
My aunt,
the only person that could have effected a reconciliation between her father
and her brother, told us often that our grandfather wanted no part in making
that happen. My grandfather was never told that his son had died in early 1995,
having predeceased him by seven months.
During the six weeks I spent at my
mother’s in Los Angeles before I moved up to Seattle, I was miserable. In my
mother’s eyes I was still the teenager I was when I first left L.A. for college
in Santa Barbara nine years before—and she treated me accordingly. I was broke—and
thus dependent on her for support. And
she was none too happy that my marriage was falling apart, because of my own
infidelities which she saw as rank immaturity and a criminal shirking of responsibilities!
I was obliged to account for all my time and money spent, I had to ask to
borrow the car, in short, I had to explain or justify all my actions. I felt I
was a prisoner on Alverstone Avenue. I couldn’t wait to get to Seattle.
My conversations with Mary Ann
resulted in her willingness to come to Seattle and try once again to put our
family back together. We would have a big family house for the year and it
seemed to provide an opportunity to mend things. It also enabled me to save
considerable face in my new location. After all, I was a young, green academic
anyway, and in good old “family-values” middle America Seattle, being divorced
at 26 with two kids would definitely not
be a social plus.
All was going well with us at this
time; the University of Washington History department had decided to keep me
on, and offered me a 3-year contract despite the fact that Tom Hankins was arriving
to fill the History of Science slot. But, I was
happy and content, my dissertation manuscript had been submitted to the UW
Press, and I looked to be well on my way. Nevertheless, I decided to hedge my
bets by presenting a research paper on the work I was doing at the annual
History of Science Society meeting to be held in Philadelphia just after Christmas.
This had the additional advantage of seeing my father in New York—and also my
former roommate on the trip to America, Claus Seligmann.
I contacted Claus, with whom I had
been in regular correspondence since he stopped in New York, and arranged to
see him there when I came out to attend the conference in Philadelphia. He
invited me to come back up to New York and stay with him over the New Year’s
holiday—the Conference was to be the December 27-30—I happily accepted.
I stayed with my father and his
family in Manhattan for one night before I left for Philadelphia. Nothing
unusual; my stepmother was as difficult as ever. She had been going on as if
she were some important patron of the arts. They had some decent paintings on the wall, called the artist Leroy Neiman
by his first name, and talked incessantly about discovering some young artist.
Since I had seen a number of Claus’
own paintings, I mentioned that I had a friend who was an artist, a good
artist, and who was looking to be discovered. She and my father said to bring
him over to the house—together with some of his works—one evening. I was happy;
partly because I knew that Claus was a good artist, better than the one they
had discovered, perhaps I could
thereby do him a favor.
Philadelphia was somewhat of a success.
I remember that my father decided to come down on the day I was to give my
paper. That was some day! It was to be like an audition and I had heard that
Yale and Johns Hopkins were both looking for an Assistant Professor on their
tenure track. I was quite nervous, under the circumstances. But so was the
young chap, Fred Churchill, who preceded me to the podium. I was sitting with
my father in one of the back rows when Fred began. I wasn’t really listening
when my father, hearing Fred slurring some of his words and swaying slightly,
announced that something was wrong. He told me that he thought the speaker was
about to faint; my father began to move out of his chair, towards the front. Sure
enough, Fred continued for a few more words, then collapsed right in front of
the audience. My father was one of the first to reach him where he was lying,
already surrounded by people. My father urged people to stand back and give him
some air and began to loosen Fred’s collar and tie. Meantime, former physician
and Hopkins professor Oswei Temkin was also taking it upon himself to minister
to Fred. He asked for a chair for Fred to sit in and was starting to help the
bewildered young man into it, when my father intervened. He said that he should
continue to lie still for a few moments and not
stand or sit up! At this point, an argument ensued between Temkin and my
father with Temkin demanding to know “Who
is this man?” and declaring that he, Temkin, was a physician, and knew best,
under the circumstances, what to do. My father countered that any first-year
med student would know not to have a fainter be put in an upright position. Temkin
demanded to know my father’s credentials. When he was told Chief of Medicine at
Beth Israel Hospital in New York, Temkin mumbled and stalked off! Considering
that Temkin had a say in the Johns Hopkins appointment only made me more
nervous—and I was up next!
It all went well for the rest of the
meeting; my father returned to New York and I followed the next day to Claus’.
Claus had taken a relatively menial
architectural job in New York at modest wage in order to secure his visa, but
he was none too happy at the rather stinginess of the wage he’d been offered and
in his own ignorance of the wages necessary to live confortably in New York
City. He had met and taken up cohabitation with, a German nurse, Jutta Holzhueter,
whom he had met shortly after his arrival. She was an attractive, intelligent,
extremely outspoken, Germanic young woman with a good sense of humor—and we all
got along well. They invited me to a New Year’s Eve party, offering to find me
a date. Immediately there came to mind the most beautiful woman I had ever met,
who had been my birthday present the previous May in Cambridge. She was Dutch
and was a flight attendant for KLM out of New York. She had given me her phone
number when we parted in May and said if ever I was in New York to look her up.
It was a night I’ll never forget. I
told Claus and Jutta that I might be able to scare up my own date for the
party. I didn’t think, on but 24 hour notice, that I could get a date with one
of the city’s most beautiful women—who certainly would not be hurting for a
date on New Year’s Eve!
I was surprised to even get
Michaela on the phone! And further surprised and flattered that she remembered
who I was. I was stunned when she said that—as a matter of fact—she didn’t have a date for New Year’s Eve
and would love to go along with me and my friends to a party. She had only just
gotten in from one of her flights. She did mention, a bit offhandedly, that she
had, about a month before, said to a young Dutchman she knew, that she might
see him if he came to New York over New Year’s; but she’d not heard from him. By
this time, I was hearing nothing, literally clicking my heels with ecstasy and
glee at the thought of my incredible last-minute luck!
When queried by Claus and Jutta I
said that I called some old back-up slag I used to know who would “make do” for
a New Year’s date. Jutta was a little disappointed as she’d talked me up with
an English nurse friend as a possible date. Meanwhile, I was in seventh heaven
in anticipation of this gorgeous creature.
The party was to be a modest one,
consisting primarily of nurses and artists in Greenwich Village. We brought two
bottles of vodka and left early to pick up Michaela on the way.
When she opened the door, Mike was
even more beautiful than I had remembered. Her long blonde hair was up in a
French twist, showing off her flawless tanned face and flashing white smile. She
was wearing a dark blue pinafore top dress with a single gold brooch. She
seemed delighted to see me and invited me in for a quick drink while she got
her coat. Claus and Jutta were down in the car.
I must say that I felt like
King-of-the-World as I sipped my Scotch-rocks and surveyed her apartment. Who
knows? Wasn’t it odds-on that I would get lucky on New Year’s Eve? I was
definitely pre-orgasmic! This feeling was to last less than 30 seconds; for
next the doorbell rang. Mike asked me if I would answer it.
Standing in the doorway of the
apartment was the handsomest male human being I ever met. He was about 6'3"
dressed in a ship’s officer’s uniform replete with braid and brass. He had a lion’s
mane of blonde hair and a disgustingly charming white smile! I felt like a
zit-ridden, wart faced Quasimodo by contrast. My mouth must have drooped open
as he introduced himself. As he held out his hand, Mike came out of her bedroom
and crossed to us. The only thing I could think of was to place my scotch in
his proffered open hand and apologize for being in their way. I thanked her,
hiked up my hunch, and strode out the still-open door. What total humiliation! And
here I thought I would return to my waiting friends in triumphant pride and all
I could do was drag one foot like Quasimodo and haul my humiliated hunch back
into the car.
I was that close!
Jutta was great, insisting that she
call her friend Gillian, who was going to the party anyway, and have her make
up a foursome with us, which she did. Lower than whale dung at the bottom of
the ocean, as an old friend of mine would say, I would find Gillian, a slender
attractive English blonde, a more than sufficient substitute for my Dutch 10. But
there was an interesting end to 1963—and I never hear to that song “December
1963 (Oh, What a Night!)” with its line “Late December back in ’63 . . . what a
lady, what a night!” that I don’t think of Gillian.
The party was packed with people, a
convivial, casual group of urban existentialists. Much booze, and delicious
boiled calamari which went splendidly
with ice-cold vodka; all contributing to the normal boy-girl vibes which, at
our age and general inclinations, didn’t really need any stimulating.
Our first stop after the party was
Gillian’s. I went up with her, telling Claus and Jutta that I would walk back
to their apartment afterwards. We were feeling no pain at that point, but
neither were we feeling any unmistakable signs of forthcoming intimacy either. Offered
a choice of either coffee or another drink, I chose neither. A few minutes of
small talk and Gillian excused herself—it was getting late. She asked for my
help in moving the coffee table away from the couch that would become her bed. I
obliged and the bed appeared, already made. I was getting tense. Although 26, I
had little or no bachelor experience—and I knew that the moment of truth was
quickly approaching.
All I could think of was asking to
use her bathroom.
As I stood there nervously emptying
my bladder, my mind asked the perennial question whenever I got into tight
spots like this: “What would Herb do in a situation like this?” My full-blooded
Blackfoot Indian roommate from college, mentor, guardian, role model came in
handy during moments like these. As I turned towards the door I saw, still
swinging from its hook, an empty clothes hanger in the batroom. I knew what
Herb would do. I took off all my clothes and was about to open the door when I
paused, feeling utterly naked—which, of course, I was. I got this mental
picture of myself walking out, buck naked, into the apartment of a young woman
whom I had only just met some five hours before and having her look me up and down
saying “What in hell do you think you’re up to?” All parts of me shriveled at
this thought. I reached into my jacket pocket and, thinking of the English
cigarette ad with the line “You’re never alone with a Capstan”, I took out a
cigarette and lit it. I thought proudly of my mentor Herb as I turned the knob
and sauntered into the livingroom.
Gillian had turned all the lights
out except a small one on the bedside table, had gotten into bed, and skootched
herself over into the middle, not only leaving enough for me next to her, but
turning down the bedclothes invitingly. Although I must have looked a proper
fool, coming out of the john without a stitch on, cigarette dangling coolly
from my mouth, I maintained my composure, stubbed the cigarette out in the
ashtray on the bedstand, turned out the light, and moved in to enjoy Gill’s delights
for the opening of 1964!
When I returned to my father’s
apartment, I tried to convince him to accept one of Claus’ offered paintings
for his wall. He actually had a choice of three, from which he picked one. It
was a largish colorful abstract which I found striking. I pointed out that it
would be very helpful if my father could help promote Claus—as he was not only
talented but much in need these days. I gave them a packet of Claus’ cards just
in case anyone struck with the exhibited sample might be further interested. I
also gave them what would be the price of the one they had on the wall, as an
example of the kind of figure Claus was expecting. Before I could finish my
promotion, my father jumped all over me, ranting about my expecting to turn his
apartment into a gallery, expecting him to hawk Claus’ paintings right off his
walls—to vend to his house guests! I hardly had a chance to remind him that
offering a business card to an interested party would be sufficient; but he and
Hellie went on haranguing me for my presumption and audacity—and soon the
diatribe veered into the area of long-simmering grievances they felt towards
me, my mother, etc.
I backed off apologetically, but
that had the opposite effect, they pushed forward, my father working himself
into a real tantrum, at one point looking as if he were going to strike me. Again
I apologized, saying that I would take the painting back to Claus—and again
they pushed. Wasn’t it Claus’ gift? What was my role here? Was I some sort of
agent or middleman for Claus? Was I using them? And off they went on some
tangent that nothing to do with the painting and everything to do with the
history of our relationship, and how my mother was telling me how rich my
father was, was always putting me up to something.
As they joined forces in the browbeating,
two things came into my mind. First, I felt that Claus’ beautiful painting was
about to become the permanent property—a presumed gift—of my father and
stepmother and, second, that I was being treated like a teenager, being forced
to listen to years-old grievances of guilt-sodden immoralists. Slowly, I grew
angry. My loyalties to my recent friend, I began to realize, were stronger than
to these unreasonable adults. The phrase about the best defense being a good offensive
also came to mind. If I was seen as standing in for my mother, I would defend
her. I found a way out of that room—and the apartment—in which I could avoid
being struck by my father and left. As of this writing, the incident was now more
than thirty years ago; and I’ve not
seen my father since.