Well, here 'tis. The man who became my second husband did not feel comfortable with my having a male roomie upstairs (he was not my lover), yet offered me no money, so I moved downstairs, thinking he'd man up and help me out later but no, and he didn't help me financially at all for a long time until I built up his career. Behind every successful man is a woman, they say. To my chagrin, I supported his parasitic butt for 12 years and built his career, helping him be a writer. I was his meal ticket. I went to college and worked day jobs, also sex industry jobs. My own family pimped on me hard, as did my first fiancé and various friends were always asking for financial aid, not caring its origins or my well being.
The apartment was all painted in turquoise and Sophie had apparently lived in a larger apartment in the building earlier and was an original tenant. The building went up in 1928 and was luxury, with a 24-hour concierge and a roof garden. I saw her things and looked at a photo album which showed her holding a baby -- the landlord, Slocum Realty, let me in a few times to inspect the place. I saw Jewish books and items in the place indicating he, her child, had been bar mitzvahed. Was the Man in the Hat we saw in 1994 her husband? I don't know, but her things were thrown in the trash, though I had offered to buy some, but there was no one to claim them, so I am glad I kept a few. Cleaning supplies and stuff. Everyone kept saying "She had an accident" and the lipstick scribbles in the bathroom were disturbing. My second husband spotted them right away and said they looked like messages from a dying person.
The second husband did not give me a penny toward the rent for about two years, then it was a mere hundred dollars after all that, and we did not get married even for about three years later and I had to pay for that and lost my Wall Street job for marrying a Jew.
That's how Wall Street was; you couldn't even have pierced ears.
Nor take a honeymoon or vacation. Nor get pregnant, which I found out later.
The photo by Irwin Cook is in its original frame I bought for it but the matting and glass have changed as the originals were badly damaged in the smashing fall for no reason. I don't think I heard it fall, but it was struck down by something right after I had it framed and hung in my Brooklyn kitchen. That was a huge, beautiful Art Déco apartment with a battleship inlay floor, Norwegian pine cupboards, a dumbwaiter out of use, fixtures in the ceiling for a washline in the eat in kitchen, and a cooler for the milk out by the window, with a small space for an icebox though not everyone had one. Apartments in the front of the building were enormous, with servant quarters.
About three weeks after we saw The Man in The Hat in the apartment in July, 1994, my current, third spouse had a near death experience, in the hotel I had rented for us before we expatriated. All my things had been packed up and were being shipped to France. I got to him in time and revived him with a shocked friend. There was no time even to call 911. He must have had too much to drink. I don't know.
New York was a terrifying place for me but I always felt safe in this apartment. My second spouse heard weird noises all day while I was away at work and he was writing and demanded I buy him another place nearby, so I did. The neighbor downstairs, who worked in the restaurant of the Statue of Liberty and was in a lesbian relationship apparently, complained I was walking around all day in high heeled shoes, when for that period my fiancé was not yet in the place (he'd just show up hours late for dinner occasionally) and I always worked day jobs in the city (and buying a thick rug with a pad did not help the problem). As I left the place, I discussed the haunting with Ricky, the handyman, and he said apartment A3 was haunted so badly he'd never work there and he wasn't too surprised my place, D3, had a problem also. I had been in F3 before with the only problem being mice, which smelled dreadful. He could not only hear the footsteps but see the parquet flooring move under them in A3. I really liked Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, and horseback riding in the park. There was a bowling alley, a skating rink, and Har-Tru tennis courts nearby. An absence of shops made it a little hard to arrange shopping, but I just chuckled when people called me a loser for moving to a borough. The F train was there and a taxi to Wall Street was always under ten dollars. Go figure!
copyright 2012 Lisa B. Falour, B.S., M.B.A. all rights reserved LISA, INC. (EURL) cutecatfaith.com
That is a stunning print.
julz35 1 week ago
@julz35 Glad you like it! Scratched up from the broken glass, but hey. Mr. Cook used transparencies. I was only lying on a small rock and the big rocks on the left were not there. I remember my skin was so dry, the makeup lady had to start over and give me a facial. She said, what do you put on your skin? I said, um, I only have a bar of Ivory soap for the bath and washing dishes in the sink, hee hee hee!
slobomotion 1 week ago