Excitement

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 17 of 182 · 20 per page

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  “Except when I get slaughtered.” Alan laughed. “I should put it into my development fund,” he continued good-naturedly as if we were all old friends, “but this is play money. I’ll buy my wife a present.” “How thoughtful of you. What will you get her?” I was impressed by Renate’s flirtatiousness. “She’s been hawking me to send her to a fat farm so she can lose fifteen pounds. I think she looks great, but it’s her thing.” Anaïs asked, “Is your wife here?” “No, she’s decorating our ranch in Arizona. She’s not into the Hollywood scene.” “No, we aren’t ordinarily, either,” Anaïs said. “What are y’ doin’ here?” Alan asked. “I’m a neighbor,” Renate said. “I live up the road. Jimmy Bridges invited us. Anaïs is a famous novelist.” We three introduced ourselves. “I’ve heard of your work,” Alan commented to Anaïs. “You have any novels that would make good movies?” This was falling into our lap! Jimmy Bridges must have prepped Alan Miller. I said, “She has lots of novels,” complying with Anaïs’s request that I talk up her work. “The book we think is a natural for a movie is A Spy in the House of Love. It’s the story of a woman who loves her husband but feels compelled to have secret affairs with other men. She’s followed by a detective who is in some ways her own conscience.” Anaïs and Renate looked at me, impressed, and Alan brightened. “A Spy in the House of Love,” he repeated. “Great title. It sounds like James Bond meets The Naked Kiss.” “Who directed The Naked Kiss?” Renate asked. “I haven’t heard of it.” “Sam Fuller,” Alan said, pulling a cigar out of the flat side of his jacket. The other side, with all the cash in it, protruded like a breast. “Anyone mind if I smoke?” I think we all minded, but no one said so. And when Alan blew out his cigar smoke, it didn’t smell bad to me. “I have this development fund,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “Bunch of dentists and lawyers in Arizona want to get into the movie game. Buy some books. Develop some scripts. I have an open invitation at Paramount to give ’em first look.” He turned to Anaïs. “If you want to get copies of your novels to me, I’ll give ’em a read.” Anaïs jumped up. “I have copies in my car!” Alan followed us out to Malibu Colony Road where I’d parked the T-bird. Anaïs opened the trunk and loaded Alan’s arms with her novels. “How do we reach you?” Anaïs dug in her purse for a purple card to write on. “Alan Rosen.” He gave her his phone number. “Alan Rosen? You aren’t Alan Miller, the producer?” “Naw, I’m the kind of producer Alan Miller comes to for money.” “So we’re going to the horse’s mouth?” Renate said. “That or the horse’s ass.” Alan Rosen roared and carried the books to his Mercedes.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  ‘Some of them are bigger and others smaller, but they are all very nearly black in colour.’ Having made a mental note of all that he had heard, Calandrino pretended that he had other things to attend to and took his leave of Maso, determined to go and look for one of these stones; but he decided that before doing so, he would have to inform Bruno and Buffalmacco, who were his bosom friends. He therefore went to look for them, so that they could all set forth at once in search of the stone before anyone else should come to hear about it, and he spent the whole of the rest of the morning trying to trace them. Finally, in mid-afternoon, he suddenly remembered that they were working at the nunnery a little beyond the city gate on the road to Faenza, so he abandoned everything he was doing and proceeded to the nunnery, running nearly all the way in spite of the tremendous heat. And having called them away from their painting, he said to them: ‘Pay attention to me, my friends, and we can become the richest men in Florence, for I have heard on good authority that along the Mugnone there’s a certain kind of stone, and when you pick it up you become invisible. I reckon we ought to go there right away, before anyone else does. We’ll find it without a doubt, because I know what it looks like; and once we’ve found it, all we have to do is to put it in our purses and go to the money-changers, whose counters, as you know, are always loaded with groats and florins, and help ourselves to as much as we want. No one will see us; and so we’ll be able to get rich quick, without being forced to daub walls all the time like a lot of snails.’ When Bruno and Buffalmacco heard this, they had a good laugh to themselves, stared one another in the face pretending to be greatly astonished, and told Calandrino that they thought it a splendid idea. Then Buffalmacco asked him what the stone was called, but Calandrino, being rather dense, had already forgotten its name, and so he replied: ‘Why should we bother about the name, when we know about its special powers? Let’s not waste any more time, but go and look for it now.’ ‘Very well,’ said Bruno, ‘but what do these stones look like?’ ‘They come in various shapes and sizes,’ said Calandrino, ‘but they’re all the same colour, which is very nearly black. So what we have to do is to collect all the black stones we happen to see, until we come across the right one. Come on, let’s get going.’ ‘Wait a minute,’ said Bruno.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  “You read my books so soon?” Anaïs trilled when I finally reached her. She invited me for tea, and I was so excited that when I hung up, I blurted to Lenore, who was covering up her work for the day, “I’m going to have tea with Anaïs Nin tomorrow!” Lenore set her round gray eyes on me with interest. “It’s good that you get to know her. Did you have a chance to talk when you went to her apartment?” “A little.” Wishing to divert our conversation from the previous evening, I asked, “How did you learn that Anaïs keeps a diary?” “She tells everyone.” Lenore shrugged. “Though I don’t know anyone who’s actually read it. It’s part of the mythology she spins about herself. She claims she knew all the surrealists, that Antonin Artaud had a thing for her, and that she was responsible for Henry Miller getting published.” “I thought Caresse Crosby published Henry Miller.” Lenore’s owl eyes expanded. “You’ve read Henry Miller?” “No, but I met Caresse at Anaïs’s apartment.” Lenore, who loved artists’ gossip, descended effortlessly into one of the miniature chairs that surrounded her small coffee table. At fifty-three, she was limber as a child gymnast from daily yoga. I sat on a low Japanese stool next to her and answered her questions about Caresse before finally getting in one of my own. “How did you meet Anaïs?” “I went to a gallery show of an engraver I like, and Anaïs was there.” “Was the engraver Ian Hugo?” “Yes, did she tell you?” “No, I guessed because he illustrated the novels she gave you.” Lenore said, “Oh, I didn’t realize that. Let me see those books.” I brought them over, and my godmother paged through the illustrations, repeating, “I like his work.” When I asked her to tell me more about Ian Hugo, Lenore said, “He’s tall. Reserved. Very old world manners.” “That sounds like her husband!” “No, no, Anaïs isn’t married to Ian Hugo. Ian is just an artist. She’s married to some wealthy man.” “I met her husband! He has the same name, Hugo, but it’s his first name. Hugo Guiler. He said he’s an international investor, and he is wealthy but he’s nice.” Lenore picked up some pieces of lint and thread from the floor and rolled them into a tiny ball in her palm. I asked her, “Does your friend Ian Hugo usually live in Los Angeles?” “No, what would make you think that?” “Something Caresse said about Anaïs going to Los Angeles a lot.” “As far as I know, Ian lives in New York.” Lenore sounded impatient. “He’s represented by a SoHo gallery, and we have mutual friends here. I think that Anaïs tries to make people think she’s attached to Ian. At his opening, I invited him to come visit my loft, and she was standing next to him and just invited herself along.”

• From Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997)

  2. Distinguish between fear, terror, and excitement. Experiencing fear or terror for more than a brief moment during traumatic play will not help the child move through the trauma. Most children will take action to avoid it. Let them. At the same time, be certain that you can discern whether it is avoidance or escape. When Sammy ran down the creek, he was demonstrating avoidance behavior. In order to resolve his traumatic reaction, Sammy had to feel that he was in control of his actions rather than driven to act by his emotions. Avoidance behavior occurs when fear and terror threaten to overwhelm the child. This behavior is usually accompanied by some sign of emotional distress (crying, frightened eyes, screaming). Active escape, on the other hand, is exhilarating. Children will become excited by their small triumphs and often show pleasure by glowing with smiles, clapping their hands, or laughing heartily. Overall, the response is much different from avoidance behavior. Excitement is evidence of the child’s successful discharge of emotions that accompanied the original experience. This is positive, desirable, and necessary. Trauma is transformed by changing intolerable feelings and sensations into palatable ones. This can only happen at a level of activation that is similar to the activation that led to the traumatic reaction. If the child appears excited, it is OK to offer encouragement, and continue as we did when we clapped and danced with Sammy. If the child appears frightened or cowed, on the other hand, give reassurance but don’t encourage any further movement at this time. Be present with your full attention, support, and reassurance; wait patiently while the fear subsides. 3. Take one small step at a time. You can never move too slowly in renegotiating a traumatic event. Traumatic play is repetitious almost by definition. Make use of this cyclical characteristic. The key difference between renegotiation and traumatic play is that in renegotiation there are small incremental differences in the child’s responses and behaviors. When Sammy ran into the bedroom instead of out the door, he was responding with a different behavio r, this is a sign of progress. No matter how many repetitions it takes, if the child is responding differently, even slightl y, with more excitement, with more speech, with more spontaneous movements-the child is moving through the trauma. If the child’s responses appear to be moving in the direction of constriction or repetition instead of expansion and variety, you may be attempting to renegotiate the event with scenarios that involve too much progress for your child to make at once. Slow down the rate of change and if that doesn’t seem to help, re-read this chapter and look more closely at the role you are playing and how the child is responding; perhaps there are some signals you are missing.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  What distinguishes Boccaccio’s version from the others is the advantage he takes of one further permutation of the story’s basic elements: three beds and a cot in a darkened room, where at different times during the night a husband and wife, their nubile daughter, and two young male lodgers all share their bed by accident or design with more than one of the others. In Chaucer’s version, the tale ends chaotically with the beating and humiliation of the host, a crooked miller, and his awareness that his daughter has been seduced. Boccaccio on the other hand resolves the story to everyone’s satisfaction by having the wife move swiftly into her daughter’s bed, from which she declares that the girl’s honour has remained unimpaired, being supported in her claim by the second lodger’s pretence that his companion has been dreaming. A classic instance of Boccaccio’s delight in telling a complicated, vivid and dramatic narrative is the story of Pietro Boccamazza and Agnolella (V, 3), which incidentally mirrors and documents the lawlessness and factional strife prevalent in the Roman countryside during the ‘Babylonian Captivity’ of the papacy in Avignon. From the initial description of the runaway lovers departing from Rome on horseback to the final account of their marriage and return to the city, the story proceeds via a series of exciting episodes in a manner that foreshadows in rudimentary form the technique adopted by the outstanding narrative poet of the Italian Renaissance, Ludovico Ariosto, in the Orlando furioso . Ariosto so arranges the several strands of the narrative as to lead the reader to a climax in one episode, then switching to another, likewise taking that to a moment of crisis, and so on before he eventually returns to an earlier episode to describe what happened next. In the same way, Boccaccio’s story proceeds alternately from crisis to crisis in the fortunes of the two main characters. When the lovers take a wrong turning, leading to their being set upon by an armed band, Agnolella escapes into a forest, whilst Pietro is seized and about to be hanged from a tree when his captors are in turn attacked by a second armed band. Pietro flees into the forest, where he spends the whole day in a fruitless search for his beloved before tethering his horse to an oak tree and climbing into its upper branches to preserve himself from being attacked by wild beasts and to await the dawn. The scene switches to the cottage of an elderly couple where Agnolella has taken refuge, but the cottage is invaded by yet another armed band. She hides under a pile of straw, narrowly avoiding death from a spear thrown carelessly into the straw by one of the brigands. Once they have left, she is led to safety in a nearby castle.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  Bob looked at me kindly through his colorless eyelashes and said, almost apologetically, “We have voted, and it was decided that if Philip does not leave immediately, you have to move out.” I failed to mourn the loss of my commune family—probably because Philip provided me with so much mood-lifting weed. Using a ritual that Philip had learned from the Beatles’ own swami to find a rental, I drew in lipstick on my commune bedroom window a child’s stick figure picture of a house with wavy lines behind it. Sure enough, in the next day’s LA Times classifieds, we found a beach house for rent that we could just afford. With its steeple roof, it looked like my drawing. Originally built as a real estate office, it had no heat or insulation, and its whitewashed walls resembled a movie set, the paint peeling as if an art director’s crew had aged it. Tall, unscreened Dutch windows opened onto the Pacific Ocean, which was so near it appeared we were at sea. I fall in love with houses the way I fall in love with men, at first sight, and Philip and I rented the beach house before anyone else could. We furnished it with a king-sized waterbed, dangled crystals on threads from the window frames, and from the rafters we hung a clear round fishbowl in which swam a brilliant blue betta that my cat Jadu watched circle all day. Philip bought me a Victorian claw-footed tub and placed it under a window. It was hooked up to the kitchen faucet by a removable hose and emptied onto our patio downstairs, which was always buffeted by waves. So began our life of play magic, getting high, bikini beach days in our ocean backyard, making love in our heated waterbed, and taking moonbaths together in the tub with the Dutch windows flung open onto the sea, unfiltered moonlight falling on our slender, wet bodies. I was ecstatic. I was going to be like Anaïs—in tune with the rhythms of nature and my inner rhythms, as she was when she’d lived on her houseboat on the Seine. I was going to have it all: Philip to love me, a house on the water, shelves full of books, artistic friends, the fun of filmmaking, a life of laughter and play. One afternoon, Anaïs phoned. “Oh, I’m so glad I reached you. I was so worried!” she cried. “I called the commune, and they said you weren’t there anymore.” “Didn’t they give you my new phone number?” “No. Rupert finally got the idea to try information.” “I’m fine. I’m great. I didn’t know you were back yet. Can I come tomorrow?” [image file=image_rsrc3R3.jpg] The next day at her front door, Anaïs sang, “Tristine, you have to visit Bali! Every person you meet there is an artist! A whole country of artists!”

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  I was certain of my intentions and, having taken note how fast the European girls moved if they were interested in a man, I said, the words igniting sparklers in my mouth, “Yes, and I’d like you to make love to me after.” Gerardo recoiled for a moment, and instantly I regretted my bravado. But after a beat, he returned to the lyric pace of his practiced seduction. “I have a very special ristorante in mind. It is in the countryside.” After numerous courses and tiramisu, we lingered in the cafe’s courtyard, and I began to think he’d forgotten my request. Finally, Gerardo said, “Would you like to see my friend’s place in the mountains?” The gears of his little Fiat strained as we spiraled up the dark road. Halfway up the mountain that seemed to get higher with every round, I said, “I’m a virgin.” He didn’t say anything, just downshifted the straining gears. I expected after such a long drive we would reach a villa with a romantic view. So when he let us into the modest single apartment, I asked, “Where’s the view?” For the first time he appeared not to understand my English. What I did not understand was how difficult it was for a young man in those years to find a place for a rendezvous. He’d had to persuade the rare friend who didn’t live at home and didn’t have a roommate to vacate his precious apartment for us. It may not have had a view, but the tiny apartment was prepared for romance in every other way: a stereo, soft lighting, and a single bed in an alcove. Later, when Gerardo saw blood on the sheets, he said he hadn’t believed me when I’d claimed to be a virgin. Yet he could not have been more sensitive and gentle if he had. Even as he was kissing, touching, and preparing me, I mentally thanked Anaïs for her advice to choose a European man. Unlike the many women for whom the first time is disappointing, I triumphantly had an orgasm with Gerardo sometime before dawn. “Now I want you to teach me everything,” I told him. We began immediately, and in that glorious month, we made love at the beach with sand scratching our thighs, in his boxy Fiat, in my room in the hostel during siesta, and in courtyard apartments we had to vacate hurriedly at a specified hour.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  “Except when I get slaughtered.” Alan laughed. “I should put it into my development fund,” he continued good-naturedly as if we were all old friends, “but this is play money. I’ll buy my wife a present.” “How thoughtful of you. What will you get her?” I was impressed by Renate’s flirtatiousness. “She’s been hawking me to send her to a fat farm so she can lose fifteen pounds. I think she looks great, but it’s her thing.” Anaïs asked, “Is your wife here?” “No, she’s decorating our ranch in Arizona. She’s not into the Hollywood scene.” “No, we aren’t ordinarily, either,” Anaïs said. “What are y’ doin’ here?” Alan asked. “I’m a neighbor,” Renate said. “I live up the road. Jimmy Bridges invited us. Anaïs is a famous novelist.” We three introduced ourselves. “I’ve heard of your work,” Alan commented to Anaïs. “You have any novels that would make good movies?” This was falling into our lap! Jimmy Bridges must have prepped Alan Miller. I said, “She has lots of novels,” complying with Anaïs’s request that I talk up her work. “The book we think is a natural for a movie is A Spy in the House of Love. It’s the story of a woman who loves her husband but feels compelled to have secret affairs with other men. She’s followed by a detective who is in some ways her own conscience.” Anaïs and Renate looked at me, impressed, and Alan brightened. “A Spy in the House of Love,” he repeated. “Great title. It sounds like James Bond meets The Naked Kiss.” “Who directed The Naked Kiss?” Renate asked. “I haven’t heard of it.” “Sam Fuller,” Alan said, pulling a cigar out of the flat side of his jacket. The other side, with all the cash in it, protruded like a breast. “Anyone mind if I smoke?” I think we all minded, but no one said so. And when Alan blew out his cigar smoke, it didn’t smell bad to me. “I have this development fund,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “Bunch of dentists and lawyers in Arizona want to get into the movie game. Buy some books. Develop some scripts. I have an open invitation at Paramount to give ’em first look.” He turned to Anaïs. “If you want to get copies of your novels to me, I’ll give ’em a read.” Anaïs jumped up. “I have copies in my car!” Alan followed us out to Malibu Colony Road where I’d parked the T-bird. Anaïs opened the trunk and loaded Alan’s arms with her novels. “How do we reach you?” Anaïs dug in her purse for a purple card to write on. “Alan Rosen.” He gave her his phone number. “Alan Rosen? You aren’t Alan Miller, the producer?” “Naw, I’m the kind of producer Alan Miller comes to for money.” “So we’re going to the horse’s mouth?” Renate said. “That or the horse’s ass.” Alan Rosen roared and carried the books to his Mercedes.

• From Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997)

  Most of us enjoy the “natural high” we get from wild arousal. Many of us seek out “near-death” experiences like bungee-jumping, skydiving, and paragliding because of the euphoric feeling that comes with extreme states of arousal. I have worked and talked with numerous war veterans who lament the fact that they have not felt fully alive since they were in the “heat of battle.” Human beings long to be challenged by life, and we need the arousal that energizes us to meet and overcome these challenges. Deep satisfaction is one of the fruits of a completed arousal cycle. The cycle looks like this: we are challenged or threatened, then aroused; the arousal peaks as we mobilize to face the challenge or threat; then, the arousal is actively brought down, leaving us relaxed and satisfied. Traumatized people have a deep distrust of the arousal cycle, usually for good reason. This is because to a trauma victim, arousal has become coupled with the overwhelming experience of being immobilized by fear. Because of this fear, the traumatized person will prevent or avoid completion of the arousal cycle, and remain stuck in a cycle of fear. The key for trauma victims is becoming reacquainted with a simple natural law. What goes up must come down. When we can trust the arousal cycle and are able to flow with it, the healing of trauma will begin. Following are some of the most common signs of arousal:  physica l— increase in heart rate, difficulty breathing (rapid, shallow, panting, etc.), cold sweats, tingling muscular tension  menta l— increase in thoughts, mind racing, worrying If we allow ourselves to acknowledge these thoughts and sensations using the felt sense and let them have their natural flow, they will peak, then begin to diminish and resolve. As this process occurs, we may experience trembling, shaking, vibration, waves of warmth, fullness of breath, slowed heart rate, warm sweating, relaxation of the muscles, and an overall feeling of relief, comfort and safety. Trauma Is Trauma, No Matter What Caused It Trauma occurs when an event creates an unresolved impact on an organism. Resolution is accomplished through working with this unresolved impact through the felt sense. Reliving the event in itself may seem valuable, but too often it is not. Traumatic symptoms sometimes mimic or recreate the event that caused them; however, healing requires an ability to get in touch with the process of the traumatic response. The following exercise will help you understand why the organism’s response to a threatening event is more important than the event that caused it. The exercise doesn’t deal with trauma itself, but with the physiological response that initiates the potential for trauma. The exercise will also help clarify what trauma feels like (which is similar from person to person), and tells how to identify it. Exercise

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  As the musicians began to play, slightly out of sync, I took it as my cue to get into character. The givens were that I was a highly cultured, ladylike coed, sitting knees together, ankles crossed, hands gracefully folded in my lap. I was so interested in chamber music that I really wanted to be invited again to listen to Rupert’s quintet. In my imagination I practiced the lines I would say to him before I left, so that he would invite me back in Anaïs’s absence, and I could do my surveillance. My life had gone from being that of a shy girl from the Valley in hand-me-downs to that of a future college professor, who was also a spy like Mata Hari inside a sophisticated, decadent world. I was doing espionage for the world’s only female bigamist. It was surreal, as I now understood surrealism from the woman who’d known the surrealists in Paris. I was living inside her dreamscape and flying with her past ordinary life as though lifted by a sudden wind, free from the grim realism of existentialism. Anaïs had quieted her breathing and adjusted the rhythm of her diary writing to Rupert’s strokes on the cello. The script from the fine point of her Montblanc slanted deeply forward, pulled by the future, her high loops reaching for the sky. I marveled at the serenity of her face, the face of Djuna, wise and centered, calm as the mirrored surface of a lake. How was it possible with the life she led? CHAPTER 18 Los Angeles, California, 1964 TRISTINE EVERYTHING WENT ACCORDING TO PLAN. When Anaïs left for New York, Rupert invited me to his chamber music evenings and accepted my offer to help at the construction site. The first Saturday I showed up and desultorily added some small rocks to a wheelbarrow, as Rupert hauled lumber around shirtless and went on about how much he missed Anaïs whenever she was gone. He didn’t express any suspicions about her, nor did I have to fight off any advances from him. At the next chamber music evening he complimented me on looking pretty, but he regularly complimented every woman there. However, the following Saturday, when I wore jeans to help him move rocks, he said, “You should wear skirts. I’ve seen your legs; you shouldn’t hide them.” Thereafter, I wore pants, even to listen to Mozart. I finished my semester-end exams and watched my fellow students cheerfully disperse for the winter holiday. I was already depressed at the thought of going to my mother’s house for Christmas. Rupert, too, was blue when I visited him at the building site. Anaïs wouldn’t be back until after the holidays. He took a swig from the beer I’d picked up and asked, “Do you want to go to a party with me tonight?” “You mean like a date? No.” “No, as Anaïs’s friend.”

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Therefore come quickly, come embrace me soon; I sing to think you may!’ All of her companions surmised from this song that Filomena was engrossed in some new and exciting love; and since the words seemed to imply that she had gone beyond the there exchange of amorous glances, some of those present, supposing her to have savoured the fruits of her love, were not a little envious. But when her song was finished, the queen, remembering that the following day was a Friday, graciously addressed the whole company as follows: ‘Noble ladies, young gentlemen, tomorrow as you know is the day that is consecrated to the Passion of Our Lord, and you will doubtless recall that when Neifile was our queen, 3 we observed it devoutly, abstaining from our agreeable discussions, not only on that day, but on the ensuing Saturday. Wherefore, being desirous to follow the good example which Neifile has set us, I feel that for the next two days it would be seemly for us to suspend our pleasant storytelling, as we did last week, and meditate upon the things that were done on those two days for the salvation of our souls.’ The queen’s devout words commanded general approval, and so, a goodly portion of the night being already spent, she dismissed the whole company and they all betook themselves to their rest. Here ends the Seventh Day of the Decameron

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  Rupert stood at her side, beaming his Hollywood smile. He put down their tiny poodle Piccolo, who’d been squirming in his arms, and handed me his snapshots from Bali, pointing out his favorite—of Anaïs in a swimsuit, up to her calves in the calm surf. “Look at what a great figure Anaïs still has,” he boasted. “Like a girl.” She was then sixty-nine. My jaw dropped at how lithe and youthful and happy she looked. It was just the reaction Rupert was looking for. Satisfied, he left to take Piccolo to the park. I was bursting to tell Anaïs that I’d found my own Rupert and fallen in love, but she lilted, “Before we have our talk, let me show you the diaries I brought back from Japan.” She had them spread out on the lid of the grand piano and gracefully unfolded each accordion diary for me, one with images of dragonflies on its cover, another with delicate flowers, another in which she’d begun to write, black with a dashing orange stripe. I compared her delicate handwriting and neat margins with the uneven scribbling in my own journals. My writing was irregular and runaway, and my books were big, heavy things that would endure all my ramblings. When Anaïs closed the accordion diary and glided toward the sliding glass doors, I erupted with my news about living with Philip at the beach house, the words gushing up like soda from a shaken bottle. I begged Anaïs, “Will you and Rupert come to dinner at the beach house to meet Philip? He’s a great cook.” “Of course.” She smiled. “I can’t wait to meet him. I know Rupert and I will love him if you do.” My heart leapt in gratitude. I threw my arms around her, thanking her, the two of us standing at the unopened sliding glass door, the sun streaming in on the cold, clear day. “I fell in love, too,” she said, “with the rock and sand gardens in Japan. Rupert took me to Ryoanji, and the garden was so tranquil I wished I could bring it home.” She pointed down to a white rectangle at our feet. “So Rupert made me a miniature sand garden here.” Rupert had removed some of the floor bricks to create the sand-filled hollow at our feet. Next to the rectangle of white sand lay some small rocks and a miniature rake. Anaïs kneeled Japanese-style, resting lightly on her ankles. I tried to imitate her, but my knees tottered on the way down. I attempted to balance on my heels, but they dug into my behind uncomfortably, so I sprawled, supporting myself on one arm. Still poised on her ankles, Anaïs leaned forward to pick up the miniature rake. She began to pull it slowly, carefully through the sand, creating a pattern of parallel rolling waves. I had the impulse to grab the rake from her hand, the movement looked so pleasurable.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  THREE WEEKS LATER, ANAÏS PHONED me, sounding breathless. “We’re going to a party in Malibu on Sunday where Renate’s director friend Jimmy Bridges and his producer, Alan Miller, are going to be. Have you heard of Alan Miller?” “No.” “Well, me neither, but he’s the producer on Apple Lose Her.” “Apple Loser?” “The Western with Brando.” “Appaloosa! Did James Bridges tell Renate he would be interested in directing Spy?” “No, Renate said that Bridges has gone commercial. He told her we should get a European director like Antonioni.” If James Bridges didn’t want to direct her novel, I could not understand why Anaïs was so thrilled. “How will you get to Antonioni?” “Jimmy said we need a big producer first, and that Alan Miller, this producer we are going to meet, is a very cultured man, and while he was not a good producer for Apple Loose Her, he could be right for our film, and Jimmy will introduce us at this party! And you’re coming!” “I won’t be any help.” “Of course you will. I need Renate to go, and Renate needs both of us.” I was uncomfortable with Anaïs’s fantasy that my youthful presence could supplant Peter’s absence. But I wanted to see a Malibu party. Besides, if I wasn’t home Sunday afternoon when Neal dragged in after his night out, he might not take me so much for granted. When I arrived at Anaïs’s apartment, she said that Rupert’s brother had picked him up to visit the construction site so that I could drive us to the party in the T-bird. She glanced at me in the driver’s seat. “You look good driving a Thunderbird, Tchrristine. Is that a new dress? It suits you.” I’d fretted over what to wear. I was able to live on my scholarship and loans by almost never buying new clothes. Now, though, I wanted to reflect Anaïs’s sense of costume, dressing creatively with an awareness of color and nuance. So, using my aunt’s employee discount at Bullocks, I’d bought a new dress—a flowered synthetic in a vintage 1930s bias cut, a dress I imagined Anaïs wearing in Paris when she was having her affair with Henry Miller. The repaired and repainted T-bird bounced so much on Renate’s dirt road that I feared we would end up in a ditch, but Anaïs didn’t notice. She was too preoccupied with her plan to present A Spy in the House of Love to Alan Miller. She would play hard to get, she said, so it would be my job to talk up her novels. “You’re studying English literature. That gives you the most credibility,” she assured me.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  When my plane descended home, the Los Angeles basin looked unbearably flat and suffocating. Before I unfastened my seat belt, I had decided that I was going to become a college professor so that I’d have summers off and could go back to Italy for three months every year. My European trip had changed me. I’d learned about the US involvement in Vietnam, acquired a sympathy for socialism, and developed, as Anaïs had predicted, my own seductive Sabina persona. She descended the ramp with me at LAX, ready to take advantage of the “free love” ethos wending its way down the coast from San Francisco. My new sexual confidence and the new sexual freedom in the air worked handily with my new goal of becoming a professor. Since I would now have to spend inordinate hours cracking the books, I could no longer waste time with casual dating. If I met a guy I was attracted to, I intended to have sex with him right away to see if we were compatible, and then I could get right back to studying. No longer able to tolerate the restrictions of sorority life, I moved off Frat Row into my own apartment. Actually I moved considerably off campus, because the further one ventured into the surrounding ghetto, the cheaper the rent. My plans for devoted studying immediately went awry, though. I was just settling in for a full night of cramming for a morning essay test when a former sorority sister phoned to remind me that I’d agreed to a blind date she’d set up for that night. Despite my pleading, she would not let me out of it. When Harry Browne arrived at my apartment, my heart sank. He was old, at least thirty, with too short a haircut, and wearing a boxy business suit. He announced, “I made reservations for us at a restaurant in Malibu. The Holiday House.” Damn! It would take an hour and a half to drive to Malibu, three hours round trip. It would be midnight before we got back and I could start reading Cliff’s Notes on The Faerie Queene. My mood lifted, though, when we pulled into the parking lot and I heard the crashing surf, saw the glassed-in restaurant that hung over the Pacific in a graceful arc, and smelled butter and garlic infusing the salt air. When we entered, a brunette, chignoned hostess introduced herself as Renate Druks. Learning that this was our first time at Holiday House, she began her routine: “Our beautiful modernist building was designed by Richard Neutra in 1950—” “Is your accent German?” I asked, wanting to show off my travel experience. “Viennese,” she responded haughtily.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  ‘I could never describe to you the range and multiplicity of the dulcet sounds from countless instruments, and the melodious songs, that descend upon our ears at these gatherings. Nor could I tell you how many candles we burn at these banquets, or estimate the number of sweetmeats we consume, or the value of the wines that we drink. Neither would I want you to imagine, my dear wiseacre, that we attend these meetings in the clothes you normally see us wearing; even the most beggarly of the people present looks like an emperor, for we are decked out, one and all, in sumptuous robes and other finery. ‘But over and above all these other delights, there are the beautiful women who are brought to us there, the moment we ask for them, from every corner of the earth. Not only would you see the Begum of Barbanicky, the Queen of the Basques, and the Sultana of Egypt, but also the Empress of Uzbek, the Chitchatess of Norwake, the Semolina of Nomansland, and the Scalpedra of Narsia. But why bother to enumerate them all? You would see every queen in the world there, not even excluding the Skinkymurra of Prester John,7 who has horns sticking out of his anus: now there’s a pretty sight! And when they have wined and dined, these ladies trip the light fantastic for a little while, after which each of them retires to a bedroom with the man who asked for her to be brought. ‘Now these rooms, mark you, are so glorious to behold that you’d swear you were in Paradise itself. Moreover they’re as fragrant as the spice-jars in your dispensary when you’re pounding the cumin,8 and the beds on which we lie are every bit as splendid as the Doge’s bed in Venice. I leave you to imagine how busily these ladies work the treadle, and how nimbly they pull the shuttle through, to weave a fine close fabric. But the people who have the best time of all, in my opinion, are Buffalmacco and myself, because Buffalmacco invariably sends for the Queen of France, and I send for the Queen of England, who when all’s said and done are two of the handsomest women on God’s earth. So you can work it out for yourself whether we have good reason to be happier than other men, considering that we enjoy the love of two such queens as these, not to mention the fact that when we have need of a couple of thousand florins, they hand them over to us right away. And that’s what we mean when we talk about going the course, for just as the corsair takes away other people’s goods, we do the same; but whereas corsairs never restore their plunder, we give ours back as soon as we’ve put it to good use.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  ‘Now that you’ve discovered what is meant, my precious Master, by going the course, you will see for yourself how important it is that you should keep it a secret; so there’s no need for me to say any more on the subject.’ Master Simone, the extent of whose medical knowledge was sufficient, perhaps, to treat an infant for thrush, took everything Bruno had said as the gospel truth, and was inflamed with an intense longing to become a member of their society, as though this were the highest good to which any mortal being could possibly aspire. He accordingly told Bruno that he was no longer in the least surprised that they were always so cheerfully disposed; and it was with the greatest difficulty that he restrained himself from urging him to enrol him there and then, rather than waiting until he had plied him more generously with his hospitality, after which he could plead his cause with a better chance of success. Having therefore held himself in check, he assiduously began to court Bruno’s friendship, regularly inviting him to breakfast and supper, and displaying boundless affection towards him. And they spent so much time in one another’s company that it began to look as though the physician was unable to exist without him. Bruno counted his blessings, and in order not to appear ungrateful for the physician’s lavish hospitality, he painted a Lenten mural for him on the wall of his dining-room and an Agnus Dei at the entrance to his bedroom and a chamber-pot over his front door, 9 so that those people who needed to consult him could distinguish his house from the rest. Moreover, he decorated the loggia with a painting of the battle between the cats and the mice, which in the eyes of the physician was something of a masterpiece. One morning, after failing to turn up to supper the previous evening, Bruno said to the physician: ‘I was with the company last night, but as I’m tiring a little of the Queen of England, I got them to fetch me the Gumedra of the Great Khan of Altarisi.’ ‘Gumedra?’ said the physician. ‘What does that signify? I don’t understand these titles.’ ‘I’m not a bit surprised, my dear Master,’ said Bruno, ‘for I’ve heard that neither Watercress nor Avadinner say anything on the subject.’ ‘You mean Hippocras and Avicenna,’ 10 said the physician. ‘You may well be right,’ said Bruno, ‘for these names of yours mean about as much to me as mine do to you. However, the word Gumedra in the language of the Great Khan is equivalent to the word Empress in ours. And believe you me, she’s really delicious!

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  I thought about it. What would Anaïs want me to do? My instructions from her were to keep an eye on Rupert, so I agreed to meet him at their apartment and follow him in my car to the party at film director Curtis Harrington’s house. Later in my old Buick, I followed Rupert up a winding road, and when we arrived at Curtis’s driveway, valets ran into the street to take our cars. Rupert offered me his arm as I struggled up a steep incline in my high heels. A young woman wearing a minidress with pinwheel-patterned stockings passed us as she ran down the hill we’d just climbed, calling back, “Dennis Hopper just left! I’m on to another party! Merry Christmas!” “How do you know Curtis?” I asked Rupert. “Anaïs’s friend Renate Druks introduced us,” Rupert said. “They’re part of a Hollywood crowd we used to run with.” I wondered if Renate and her football star husband would be guests at the party and what she would think of my being there with Rupert. I had tried to phone her when I’d rushed home to change, to make sure that I was doing what Anaïs would want, but no one had answered. We entered the hall where a bust of Medusa, snakes sprouting from her head, glowed under a Tiffany lamp. As Rupert and I crossed into a high-ceilinged living room, I felt as if we were entering the House of Usher. There were thick velvet drapes over the windows, ornate Art Nouveau furnishings, porcelain masks, darkly erotic Aubrey Beardsley posters of Oscar Wilde’s Salome, and a stuffed, mounted raven sitting on an end table. I even saw a man dressed all in black and with a long cape like an Edwardian sorcerer. “Is that Curtis Harrington?” I whispered to Rupert. “No.” Rupert laughed. “That’s Samson de Brier. He’s at all these parties and always dresses like an aristocratic sorcerer. He was in Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome, along with Renate and Curtis and Anaïs and me.” “The film Kenneth Anger directed!” I hadn’t seen it yet but remembered Renate telling me to catch a screening. “Will he be at this party?” I asked Rupert excitedly. “No, Curtis and Kenneth had a falling out,” Rupert said, moving toward a man who had the wide face of a Persian cat and a feline’s padded step. “Merry Christmas, Curtis!” Rupert boomed. For a man who lived in such a Gothic house, Curtis Harrington appeared remarkably congenial. “I brought a guest,” Rupert said, putting his hand on my back. “I’m Anaïs’s friend,” I added to clarify I wasn’t Rupert’s date. “Oh, well if you’re Anaïs’s friend”—Curtis took my hands, turning his back on Rupert, and winked at me—“you are welcome any time.” He turned back to Rupert. “So Anaïs told me she has a job in New York with a new magazine.” “Yes. It’s named Cue,” Rupert said proudly.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  “You just gave your books to the wrong producer,” Renate said to Anaïs. “No,” Anaïs chirped. “My intuition tells me he’s the right producer. I liked the way he talked about his wife.” In the T-bird, on the way to drop Renate at her house, we laughed about the confusion caused by Alan Miller and Alan Rosen. We were convinced that everything had happened just the way it was supposed to. We agreed that I would call the number Alan Rosen had given us the next day to make sure he was legit and leave him my phone number and Renate’s, but not Anaïs’s. She would remain the slightly mysterious, elusive author. When I got home in my flirty, feminine new dress, Neal was waiting for me. The more evasive I was in answering how I’d been invited to a Malibu party where John Huston, director of The Maltese Falcon and The African Queen, was a guest, the more Neal wanted to know. He assumed I’d been with another guy, and with his mounting jealousy I felt Sabina’s power return to me. That night Neal’s lovemaking was sweetened with emotion and, for the first time, he whispered that he loved me; though afterward he withdrew, as if his declaration had stolen something from him, something he wanted back. [image file=image_rsrc3R3.jpg] The next morning I phoned Alan Rosen’s number and got an answering service, but he called right back and asked to have a two-week exclusive so he could read through all the novels. He invited the three of us to lunch at the Old World on Sunset. The lunch with Alan got rescheduled a few times and when it was finally set, Anaïs couldn’t come because she was flying back to New York to prepare Hugo for her move to Paris. She’d instructed me: “You and Renate are my representatives. Tell Alan that you both should have some participation in the project.” She added invitingly, “So you’ll have money to join me in Paris. I’m counting on you, Tristine, to keep Renate engaged.” Keeping Renate engaged turned out to be easy, since both she and I were soon living alone and needed each other’s company. Renate had asked Ronnie to move out because she could now care for herself, and Neal had packed all his things, excited about an invitation to join up with other civil rights activists in Selma.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  TENTH STORY Friar Cipolla promises a crowd of country folk that he will show them a feather of the Angel Gabriel, and on finding that some bits of coal have been put in its place, he proclaims that these were left over from the roasting of Saint Lawrence . His nine companions having each told a story, Dioneo knew without waiting for any formal command that it was now his own turn to speak. He therefore silenced those of his companions who were praising Guido’s clever retort, and began: Charming ladies, although I have the privilege of speaking on any subject I may choose, I do not propose to depart from the topic on which all of you have spoken so appositely today. On the contrary, following in your footsteps, I intend to show you how one of the friars of Saint Anthony, 1 by a quick piece of thinking, neatly side-stepped a trap which had been laid for him by two young men. And if I speak at some length, so as to tell the whole story as it should be told, this ought not to disturb you unduly, for you will find, if you look up at the sun, that it is still in mid heaven. Certaldo, 2 as you may possibly have heard, is a fortified town situated in the Val d’Elsa, in Florentine territory, and although it is small, the people living there were at one time prosperous and well-to-do. Since it was a place where rich pickings were to be had, one of the friars of Saint Anthony used to visit the town once every year to collect the alms which people were foolish enough to donate to his Order. He was called Friar Cipolla, 3 and he always received a warm welcome there, though this was doubtless due as much to his name as to the piety of the inhabitants, for the soil in those parts produces onions that are famous throughout the whole of Tuscany. This Friar Cipolla was a little man, with red hair and a merry face, and he was the most sociable fellow in the world. He was quite illiterate, but he was such a lively and excellent speaker, that anyone hearing him for the first time would have concluded, not only that he was some great master of rhetoric, but that he was Cicero in person, or perhaps Quintilian. 4 And there was scarcely a single man or woman in the whole of the district who did not regard him as a friend, familiar or well-wisher.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  Things had been a little slow for years now, ever since Castro had nationalized the assets of Hugo’s wealthy Cuban clients. Bad as she was with numbers, Anaïs thought she was better than Hugo had proven to be with their money since leaving the bank. Every profit he made with his investing, he threw away on extravagant spending. She asked him gently, “Do you think you could ask the bank for your old job back?” She was afraid he might explode at this suggestion, but he said, “I already have.” “And?” “George Moore is going to take it to Rockefeller when he thinks the time is right. We have a dinner scheduled with Moore and his wife a week from Friday.” “What about your leg?” “I should be able to get around on the crutches by then. I’ll need your help, though. Cue has to let you go that night.” “You can count on me.” She smiled, feeling somehow … saintly. Thus began her frenetic daily swing back and forth across Washington Square Park from Hugo to Rupert, and Rupert to Hugo, a foreshortened trapeze at high speed. During the afternoon, while Hugo thought she was at Cue, she and Rupert—along with the other teacher families on winter break—visited the Met, MOMA, and the Natural History Museum. In the evening, she and Rupert made love in their hotel bed, enjoying a honeymoon they had never taken. But at 5 a.m. Anaïs had to wake herself, dress in her skirt and heels, and rush off to her supposed job that began before sunrise. Since crossing Washington Square Park in the dark didn’t feel safe, she would scurry along the park perimeter—Waverly to MacDougal, around the corner to Washington Square South and the entrance to the massive apartment complex where she and Hugo lived. She’d crawl under the sheets with Hugo, and when she heard him rattling his crutches to get up at ten she’d force herself awake to help him, make breakfast, shower, and put on a fresh dress for her supposed late-shift job. When Millie arrived to take over helping Hugo at noon, she’d dash from the Washington Square Park Apartments back to Rupert. At first, she found this frenzied marathon exhilarating. The same excitement she experienced 30,000 feet in the air on her transcontinental trapeze, she now discovered on her brisk walks just before dawn. Wearing her Sabina cape, street lamps glowing as in a de Chirico painting, she swept past the chess players, for whom commandeering their favorite table was worth arriving before dawn. A short Russian with a Lenin cap and a Trotsky goatee would bow to her and say, “Would her majesty care for a game?” She would laugh. “Not today, comrade. I’m already in a game.” That was when Sabina thrived. Sabina was back.