We went back to Oregon for the Fourth of July holiday and Damian happily went back to visit with my brother and his wife, Gina. Oregon in the summer was just as idyllic as at Christmas. This time it was warm enough to skinny-dip in the waters of Lake Shasta. At his family’s farm we all played softball in the endless green fields, and drifted down a balmy river in the same rubber tubes we had sledded with in December. To help a neighboring farm we picked bushels and baskets of sweet ripe raspberries before they spoiled. With the extra berries, Joseph’s mother taught me how to bake a stunning fruit cobbler, and make my very own homemade jam, which I was quite proud of. After the holiday we boarded a train, the Coast Starlight, back to California, and splurged on a private sleeping compartment. It was in this glorious wee room where Joseph with his Gary Cooper charm spoke the words, “I was thinkin’ we should get married.”
Marry him? I would have followed this man through eternal hellfire. He said, “Yep, sometimes those Hollywood marriages just don’t work out. We might have to move back to Oregon.”
I was afraid to shut my eyes in case it was a dream. We didn’t sleep a wink but made glorious love the whole twenty-two-hour ride home.
Three months later we were married by a lake on the coast of Oregon. Moments before our wedding a ladybug landed on Joseph’s sleeve. What was so amazing about this little bug, and I swear this is true, is that instead of the usual little black dots on its wings, this one had two perfectly shaped hearts, one on each wing. As we walked toward the lake for the communion, Joseph handed me a small folded note that read “I’ve seen the beauty on the earth and in the skies but it doesn’t match the beauty of what I see in your eyes.”
I was almost unconscious with sweet euphoria.
We honeymooned at a country inn on an ancient Indian reservation. The land was surrounded by natural hot springs and dotted with authentic tepees. It was the first and only time I ever got Joseph to stay in a hotel with grand room service and all. If he’d had his druthers, we would have camped under the moonlight and stars.
We drove home via the coast, winding through Big Sur and Monterey, stopping to visit all the quaint roadside antique shops and rustic inns. The whole heavenly drive I couldn’t stop staring at my wedding ring finger. My arm hurt from holding my hand out so long, admiring the luminous golden band with glorious delight. We were really married. I had finally found my prince; would it be like this forever?
We didn’t get back to Hollywood till two in the morning, and were too tired to even unpack. We dragged our bags and wedding booty into the sitting room and went directly to blissful slumber.
At 5:00 A.M., we were awoken by a startling ring. It was Joseph’s dad on the telephone. Their conversation lasted less than a minute, then Joseph put his face to the pillow and sobbed deep, inconsolable tears. His beloved older brother, James, had been hit by a drunk driver on his motorcycle, and had died in a field by the side of the road in Oregon.
We’d been married just five little days ago, and now we were on our way back to Oregon for a funeral. It was almost unbearable to see Joseph in such despair. Even worse, he refused to be comforted and only wanted to be left alone. It was exactly like someone had died. With a blink of an eye, the joy was gone.
After a while the clouds began to clear, but it was never the same. We hardly spoke and rarely made love anymore. I’d fix his breakfast in the morning and bake his favorite desserts. I’d iron his shirts and stick little Post-it notes on the collar saying how handsome he looked in them, but I couldn’t get his attention. I was trying to remind him of the girl he had fallen in love with, but he only got more distant. I held in my sadness, still trying to be the perfect, loving wife, but it all seemed to be in vain.
About the same time, something strange began to happen. I t started off when I was making a batch of tomato sauce. The can of crushed tomatoes tasted slightly off, so I checked the date, and found it had long expired. I remembered reading something about botulism and canned tomatoes, and went into a panic. I quickly called the poison control hotline and inquired, “How much tainted tomato sauce would one have to eat to get botulism?”
In a calm, pleasant voice the woman on the phone said, “Oh, just a taste could kill you, dear.”
Oh my God, I’d already ingested two large spoonsful, and was sure I was doomed. With my stomach beginning to ache, I dumped the whole pot down the drain and jumped into bed, waiting to succumb. After that trauma, any kind of fish became the culprits, then canned goods, then dairy products, and finally any meat became the enemy. I even stopped taking vitamins for fear they’d been tampered with. I eventually found the vomitorium more pleasurable than fine dining, and kept this little secret all to myself. I didn’t know what was happening to me, but I’d convinced myself, even with all my precautions, that I would end up being accidentally poisoned.
When Joseph was finally ready to talk, it was to say he needed some time to himself, maybe he should move out for a few months, until he felt better. I had a suspicion there was more to this story; when someone moves out, it’s rare that they move back in. I asked Joseph the age-old question, “Is it another woman?”
He looked at me like I was depraved for even having such absurd thoughts. “How could you be so ridiculous and insecure?” he huffed.
This was the man I had just married, the man I loved and trusted. I was bewildered but, wanting to believe him, assured him he was free to go, whatever it took for us to be happy again.
Shortly after that conversation, I was headed to Santa Monica in my Triumph convertible when a street peddler approached my car with bags of tempting fat cherries for sale. I’d finished half the bag before the voice of insanity loomed, “How could you have bought fruit from a stranger?”
The cherries were surely contaminated. I pulled my car to the curb and started carefully inspecting each one for puncture marks. Sadly, it looked as if every single one was adulterated with some kind of suspect spot, but it was too late to heave. Surely the poisonous toxins would have already begun to take effect. In the midst of my hysteria, I had a moment of clarity. There I was parked on a side street in terrified tears, picking through cherries like some kind of lunatic. I realized it wasn’t the cherries, it was me. I needed help.
I lucked out and found Dr. Thomas Deshler, an insightful therapist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. I thought it would be a casual visit, like a checkup, but I was in for a surprise.
I could usually charm the pants off any stranger, but this doctor wasn’t there to be enchanted. He gently suggested, “Why don’t we start from the very beginning.”
The beginning didn’t seem that important; my problem was now. I was afraid to eat anything, and if I did, I got so paranoid I’d have to throw it up before the assumed toxins reached my bloodstream. I knew that it sounded ridiculous, but the fear was real and overwhelming. I was starving to death. I casually spoke of my childhood, revealing a few tidbits about my mother. I glossed over how she used to keep me locked in the closet or bound tight in a chair. How she disciplined her little girl by forcing her to eat Ivory soap bars and swigs of Tabasco. By the time I got to her abandoning me at the train yard in the night, I had big salty teardrops running down my cheeks. Hearing my own words was heartbreaking, like I was talking about someone else, then realized it was me. I’d never really spoken about the frightful early years, and apologized for my unexpected outburst. He handed me a box of tissues and I wept like that long lost baby girl. After blowing my stuffed-up nose several times, and thankfully regaining my composure, I said, “Actually, I’m just here for the food poisoning problem.”
• • •
Joseph rented a garage apartment in Studio City and we began dating. We still made love, but instead of being joyous, it was heartbreaking, like each time was going to be the last. He swore there was no one else, but I could feel it in my soul; his heart no longer belonged to me.
Finally, someone came to my emotional rescue and offered me the lowdown on my bewildered marriage. Oddly
enough it was a friend of Joseph’s, a girl that I’d met in Oregon when we first started going out. I was spilling out my dazed heart to her when she stopped me, and asked, “Do you really want to know what’s going on?”
My heart started to race. Yes, more than anything I wanted to know. She told me my husband was having an affair with a girl he’d met at a commercial audition. She was an actress. In a strange way it took me out of my confused misery. At least I knew what I was up against. I looked her up in the Screen Actors Guild directory and called her agent, posing as a television producer. Her agent sent me a package of headshots and a resume, which I studied like a private eye. Who was this immoral witch? It certainly couldn’t have been her physical beauty that had captivated my husband. She was a freckle-faced redhead. I’d lie awake at night and imagine myself going to her house with a gun. Of course, I didn’t own a gun, nor would I ever shoot anyone, but the visual of her opening the front door and me standing there, pointing a threatening pistol at her heart, gave mine a twisted momentary feeling of empowerment. Homicide was a bit excessive, but I wasn’t going down easy. I sent her a poignant letter appealing to her decency, or lack of it. I honestly thought if she knew I had a name, a human heartbeat, she might see the evil of her immoral ways and relent, give my husband back.
The other woman had been a soap actress. She had appeared on Days of Our Lives, but now had a recurring role on a popular television show. Masochistically, I never missed a Tuesday night episode. I even paid to see a dreary play she was appearing in just to get a closer look at her face in person. I took solace in despising her, ripping apart her mediocre acting, but the grim truth was that she had bewitched my husband, and there was not a thing I could do about it. In my missive I wrote a modest reference to karmic justice, action and reaction. I was absolutely cheerful when two weeks after I sent her my letter, her show was mysteriously cancelled and she was out of a job.
It was coming on Christmas, the time when Joseph and I usually headed for Oregon. We were still dating, even making love, but when he announced he was taking the actress instead of me, it was more that I could bear. We had just gotten married there—three months ago. It was actually less agonizing when my boyfriend Paul died of the drug overdose; at least there was finality, a clear-cut closure. Joseph, my husband, was alive and making love with another woman just a few miles down the road. I refused to believe he just ceased being in love with me. The cosmos was calling, it was time to move on, but it was so painful to let go.
I found myself pursuing the liquor stores again. The truth was, I hated the taste of alcohol. I’d buy cheap sweet port or a bottle of sickly-sweet Frangelico and swig down the whole bottle, anything to deaden the rip-roaring sorrow. I daydreamed of going to a hypnotist and having Joseph’s memory eradicated from my aching heart.
In the following three months I lost fifteen pounds in grief, and my modeling jobs were few and far between. Wilhelmina still sent me on interviews, but there was a whole new crop of young beauties, all ten years younger than I and vying for the same handful of print jobs. My desire to compete for my husband and a livelihood was waning. I needed a change of venue, a stress-free situation.
I’d always been fond of fresh flowers and had a talent for artful arrangements. I applied for a position at the chic LaCienega flower shop on Melrose Avenue. They had the most extensive array of exotic blossoms, and I thought the environment might cheer me up a bit. I remembered how I used to feel receiving a romantic bouquet, and took great pleasure in fashioning grand arrangements for would-be beaus and hopeful suitors. It seemed just about every handsome man in Hollywood frequented the flower shop, but unfortunately most of them were already taken.
During my flower stint, an amazing thing happened. Remember my fantasy TV romance in Connecticut? Dr. Dan Stewart, the soap star doctor from As the World Turns? When Dr. Dan breezed into the shop for a dozen roses, I felt like a deer in the headlights. Seeing him in person, away from Oakdale Memorial, smack dab on the middle of Melrose Avenue, was completely out of context. He hadn’t a clue of the comforting role he’d played in my mixed-up life in Connecticut, or our imaginary romantic history. John Reilly was true to his soap opera character, warm and friendly, even a little flirtatious, which made my day. I tied an extra-special bow around his wreath of roses, and he left the shop completely unaware of our prior relationship. I never did get the courage to mail my letter to him. It’s probably still hidden somewhere in the lining of my winter coat, which I donated years ago.
My new employment and extended psychoanalysis took the edge off my dining drama. I continued my sessions with Dr. Deshler, but instead of our usual office visits, as part of my food-anxiety therapy we began meeting at a little café across from Cedars-Sinai hospital. At one of our afternoon luncheons I was devouring my burger and fries like a ravenous piglet when Dr. Deshler asked, “How do you know the food isn’t poisoned here?”
I had to think for a minute. It hadn’t even occurred to me to check for contaminants. I suppose I felt safe with him. Nothing bad was going to happen while I was with Dr. Tom. My terror of being poisoned seemed to be a bizarre manifestation of panic. My fear of loss, losing my husband and myself. My inner voice was clamoring, “You’re consuming too much crap!” Like the kindly woman at poison control had warned, “Just a taste could kill you, dear.”
After two years of visits with Dr. Deshler, and with Joseph gone from my life, I could finally sit through a meal without knowing the precise route to the vomitorium.
15
After a lifetime of concealed boozing, my eccentric Aunt Claire finally succumbed to the swill. She died at sixty-five of cirrhosis of the liver. No one had thought to mention it to me at the time, but my grandmother Helen was also gone. Alzheimer’s disease finally got her. My poor defeated cousin was now left to haunt the halls of our decaying house all alone.
For Claire’s funeral, Blake dressed his domineering mother in one of her vintage white fox furs, and had her made up like an aging femme fatale. Instead of being laid out, had had her propped up in the casket and surrounded by her beauty pageant trophies and dramatic glamour portraits. It was a scene worthy of Hitchcock’s Psycho.
Blake was left with a huge house and plenty of cash, but not a clue about how to take care of himself or what to do with his inexperienced life. At thirty-three he’d still never been with a woman, and he started hanging out on Sunset Strip to make friends. He quickly became popular with the local drug hounds, who introduced him to the wonders of cocaine and crystal meth. The home above Sunset that had once been an oasis was now a ransacked flophouse, with drug addicts coming and going at all hours of the day and night. Blake took down his mother’s oil portraits and used the canvases to stub out his cigarette butts into the shape of massive pyramids. Besides being confused, I think someplace inside himself he knew she had cheated him of a life.
His final hurrah lasted just six months. He was in Santa Monica with a young woman, who was driving his Mercedes. She was too intoxicated to notice the stoplight, and slammed hard into a halted panel truck at sixty miles an hour. Ironically, it was Blake who saved the female driver’s life. With no seatbelt, he was hurled in front of the steering wheel. He had cushioned his companion, and took a fatal blow to his chest. The girl walked away unscathed, but my cousin died on impact; sadly, he had never really lived.
My dad had always wanted control of the house on Ozeta Terrace. Years earlier, Claire had been offered over a million dollars for the property, but his surly sister refused to sell. My dad wanted his share, and it was a long-standing issue between them. When Blake suddenly died, my dad kept it a secret. I didn’t find out until two months later.
In short time my father had managed to clear the house out, and he sold it to the first buyer.
Nobody in my family ever threw anything away. The last time I was there, my deceased grandmother’s stockings were still hanging on the towel rack in her bathroom. My dad brought in four gigantic construction-site Dumpsters and loa
ded them up with free-for-the-taking treasures. He said it was disgusting how all the neighbors went digging through the bins. He complained that they were there day and night; some even jumped right in. I didn’t say a word, but I would have been the first to take the plunge. I felt sick thinking about my grandmother’s beautiful Nouveau dishes and the elegant silver she kept wrapped away for special occasions. All the cupboards had been chock-full of amazing vintage textiles. And the pink satin fainting couch, I’d always wanted that fainting couch. I asked my dad, “What did you do with all of Claire’s wardrobe?”
The rooms of costumes, all her outrageous hats in their original boxes, the shoe collection from the thirties on. I used to play dress-up in those rooms and daydream of being glamorous. He waved his arm, like “good riddance,” and said, “I had the Salvation Army pick all that crap up: you didn’t want any of that old stuff, did you?”
I was in total shock. Everything was gone, my heritage dispersed all over Los Angeles. I sighed. “So who bought our house?”
He had to think for a minute. “Oh, some English actor, Julian something.”
It couldn’t be Julian Sands, could it? I adored him. I saw A Room with a View four times; I’d even had a lustful dream about him. I asked, “Was he blond? Is his last same Sands?”
“Yeah, that’s him, Julian Sands,” he said.
Somehow it made my wearied soul feel a little better. I liked the idea that Julian, my imaginary heartthrob, was living in the house I loved.
Dandelion; Memoir Of A Free Spirit Page 15