Jealousy

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.

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• From Another Country (1962)

  I was drinking too much and running around whoring when I should have been—being serious, like you, and getting my novel finished.” “How’s it coming—your novel?” “Oh”—he looked down and sipped his drink—“slow. I’m really not a very good writer.” “Bullshit,” said Richard, cheerfully. He almost looked again like the English instructor Vivaldo had idolized, who had been the first person to tell him things he needed to hear, the first person to take Vivaldo seriously. “I’m very glad,” Vivaldo said, “seriously, very glad that you got the damn thing done and that it worked so well. And I hope you make a fortune.” Rufus thought of afternoons and evenings on the stand when people had come up to him to bawl their appreciation and to prophesy that he would do great things. They had bugged him then. Yet how he wished now to be back there, to have someone looking at him as Vivaldo now looked at Richard. And he looked at Vivaldo’s face, in which affection and something coldly speculative battled. He was happy for Richard’s triumph but perhaps he wished it were his own; and at the same time he wondered what order of triumph it was. And the way the people had looked at Rufus was not unlike this look. They wondered where it came from, this force that they admired. Dimly, they wondered how he stood it, wondered if perhaps it would not kill him soon. Vivaldo looked away, down into his drink, and lit a cigarette. Richard suddenly looked very tired. A tall girl, very pretty, carefully dressed—she looked like an uptown model—came into the room, looked about her, peered sharply at their table. She paused, then started out. “I wish you were looking for me?” Vivaldo called. She turned and laughed. “You’re lucky I’m not looking for you!” She had a very attractive laugh and a slight Southern accent. Rufus turned to watch her move daintily up the steps and disappear into the crowded bar. “Well, you scored, old buddy,” Rufus said, “go get her.” “No,” said Vivaldo, smiling, “better leave well enough alone.” He stared at the door where the girl had vanished. “She’s pretty, isn’t she?” he said partly to himself, partly to the table. He looked at the door again, shifting slightly in his seat, then threw down the last of his drink. Rufus wanted to say, Don’t let me stop you, man, but he said nothing. He felt black, filthy, foolish. He wished he were miles away, or dead. He kept thinking of Leona; it came in waves, like the pain of a toothache or a festering wound. Cass left her seat and came over and sat beside him. She stared at him and he was frightened by the sympathy on her face.

• From Another Country (1962)

  And she looked down again, as though the burden of confession were too great. Yet they were united in the knowledge that what she had begun she must now finish. “And you think he doesn’t love you any more?” She did not answer. She covered her forehead with her ringed left hand and stared into the dish of salted peanuts as though the answer to all riddles were hidden there. The tiny arrows on her wrist watch said it was twenty-five minutes to seven. Ida would have left Ellis hours ago and would have visited her singing teacher. She would now be in the restaurant, her station set up, and her uniform on, preparing for the dinner rush. He could see her closed, haughty face as she approached a table, manipulating her pad and pencil as though it were a sword and shield. She would not have stayed long with Ellis—he was a busy man. But how long did it take for those guys to bang off a quick one, in the middle of the afternoon, in their inviolable offices? He tried to concentrate on Cass and her trouble. Perhaps he had taken her out for a drink; perhaps he had persuaded her not to go to work, and had invited her for dinner; perhaps they were together now. (Where?) Perhaps Ellis had persuaded her to meet him at midnight in a theatrical bar, the kind of place where it would do her good to be seen with him. But no, not that; it would certainly not do Ellis any good to be seen with her. Ellis was far too smart for that—just as he was far too smart to make any verbal comparisons between his power and Vivaldo’s. But he would lose no opportunity to force Ida to make these comparisons for herself. He was making himself sick with his fears and his fantasies. If Ida loved him, then Ellis and the whole great glittering world did not matter. If she did not love him, there was nothing he could do about it and the sooner everything came to an end between them, the better. But he knew that it was not as simple as that, that he was not being honest. She might very well love him and yet—he shuddered and threw down his drink—be groaning on some leather couch under the weight of Ellis. Her love for him would in no way blunt the force of her determination to become a singer—to pursue the career which now seemed so easily within her grasp. He could even see the truth of her loving and vehement assertion that it was he, his love, which had given her the courage to begin. This did not cheer him, the assertion containing to his ears the suggestion that his role now was finished and he was fouling up everything by failing to deliver his exit lines.

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  Jealousy because Michael was marrying someone other than me. But pride because I was one of “us” and could count myself as one of God’s warriors, working for the Light. The fallout from this evening would last for years. Both couples would eventually legally marry and then divorce. This was a harbinger of the multitudinous couplings and uncouplings that many of the faithful would experience in Limori’s group. Although I was not the woman marrying Michael on this night, my life would eventually become intertwined with his and Jessica's marriage in ways I could not possibly imagine at the time. The workshop closed the following day with congratulations from Limori about what we’d accomplished and how proud God was of us for the spiritual work we’d done. She was moved to tears as she channelled Azeen, saying that battles in the universe were being won by the Light and angels were weeping with joy and gratitude. She described the throng of angels she was seeing as being bathed in “God light,” reaching their arms out to us in thanks for our work and for our commitment to God. Many of us, me included, were moved to tears as well. My tears were caused by the relief that came with feeling that I was a significant and valuable member of such a special community. I felt intensely proud of myself, in a way I had never felt in any other part of my life, as well as determined to never let God down. I felt like a warrior with a sacred mission, and let me tell you, that’s a pretty powerful feeling. It gave purpose and meaning to every part of my life, and that’s not something to sneeze at. To my dismay and grave disappointment, however, I had begun to notice in the previous few months that my stomach often had a serious case of butterflies whenever I was around Limori, and being here at the lodge with her for a week had worsened that feeling. I was concerned for two reasons. First, the group culture told me that if I was afraid or nervous, it meant I had something to hide. I didn’t believe that I was consciously hiding anything, but I understood that there could be something amiss with my energy that Limori would point out to me. I was loath to disappoint her and continued to long for her approval, so it tormented me that there could be something wrong with me that she and God would have to take me to task about. My second reason for concern was rooted in another piece of group dogma: fear allowed “negative energy” to proliferate, and this energy could potentially “hit” Limori. She would often wince and gasp with the pain she said she experienced in her body because of the energy of the people around her.

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  Michael and Jessica continued to visit his parents periodically at their home on Vancouver Island, and went to family weddings and on golf holidays with Michael’s friends and to other events, without revealing that there was anything untoward going on in their marriage. I, too, kept the information from my family, co-workers and the two friends I had outside the group, although the hypocrisy in this troubled me. I would wonder to myself, “I thought we were supposed to tell The Truth at all times. Why then are we keeping secrets?” Later, an even more uncomfortable thought crossed my mind: “If this (the Mistress Period) is truly God’s will, then why does it have to be secret? Shouldn’t we share it with others if it’s a good thing?” I was practiced at pushing thoughts like these away. Michael must have felt like he was slowly being pulled in half. Either Jessica or I, or both of us, was pretty much continuously upset or jealous about something, such as how much of his attention or time the other person was receiving or what our respective importance was to him. It was agony for me when they spent Christmas with his parents and other family members and I went alone to my mother and stepfather’s. And it was equally agonizing for Jessica when Michael and I went away on weekends or holidays. Imagine having your husband go away on holiday with another woman and not only knowing about it but feeling you have to agree with the situation because it’s God’s will. My mind reels at the audacity of it all. For Limori, the situation served its purpose. I have to assume that it proved to her once again that Michael, Jessica and I would do almost anything that God asked of us. Michael needed time to consider these types of outrageous requests, but his actions had shown that he would eventually come around to her way of thinking, even if it meant hurting someone he loved. The Mistress Period also served Limori by keeping all three of us on seriously unstable ground for a year. I was so focused for that year on stifling, suppressing, working through, working out and mulling over my feelings of jealousy, confusion and inadequacy that I had very little time or energy for anything else. Remember, we were completely convinced that all our feelings and ego positions had to be battled and overthrown for the good of the universe. So putting two women in a situation where jealousy, possessiveness, feelings of inferiority or superiority and myriad other emotions are naturally going to occur was ideal for keeping us under Limori’s control. Every time any sort of feeling would come up, which was practically every moment of every day, Jessica and I would point out to ourselves and each other how we were failing God and try harder to not feel these feelings. Which, as any human being knows, is an impossible task.

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  The “us versus them” strategy was also used within the group, as part of its hierarchical structure. At the bottom of the hierarchy was everyone who attended the Wednesday night meditation meetings. Everyone who came to Wednesday night was “special” in God’s eyes and was treated as such, but they weren’t as special as they could be. The next rung up the ladder contained those who had been asked by Limori to join the invitation-only Thursday night circle. This group was smaller than the Wednesday night group, and included only those who were deemed by Spirit to be worthy of this honour. The Thursday night meeting was similar in structure to Wednesday night, with a mix of meditation, discussion and confession. Those in the Thursday group, however, were looked upon by those in the Wednesday group as having additional spiritual merit. I envied my friends Michael, Lisa and Karen, who had been invited to breathe the rarified air of Thursday night. Belonging to this group meant special access to Limori, it seemed to me, because the group was smaller and there seemed to be greater intimacy between her and its members. Needless to say, it became my life’s ambition to be invited to the Thursday night group; I wanted to “belong” at a higher level and I suppose I expected that joining this elite crowd would be the final solution to the self-esteem issues that continued to plague me despite my dedication to meditating. When I finally was invited, I did feel a greater sense of belonging and remember feeling superior to those in the Wednesday night group who had not received the call. The final rungs above the Thursday group in the hierarchy were those who lived at Wolf’s Den, and above them was just Limori herself. Within these broad categories there were also mini-hierarchical steps; those who travelled with Limori when she spent months in Hawaii or Arizona were slightly elevated from those who lived full time at Wolf’s Den. Those in the Thursday night group who were invited to private events at Limori’s home were slightly elevated from those who were not, etc. Kramer and Alstad, in The Guru Papers , describe the hierarchical structure of a cult as providing security, and that was certainly my experience. The further I moved up the ladder, the more secure I felt about my purpose for God and the better I felt about my value as a human being because I belonged to a group that I believed were God’s chosen people. “Since spiritual hierarchies contain ready-made steps for advancement they offer quick access to feeling better through improving. . . Moving up the rungs brings power and respect,” Kramer and Alstad say. “The organization’s hierarchical structure neatly fits the disciples’ psychological need to make progress, and to be able to evaluate themselves (measure their progress) with regard to others.

• From Talk Dirty to Me: An Intimate Philosophy of Sex (1994)

  The move toward orgasm is a move toward preoccupation with one’s genitals. Whatever the stimulus, sooner or later the conscious self gets shoved down into the crotch, nose to nose with desire. Premature ejaculation can be seen as nothing more than a sudden, unplanned relocation. But for all the similarities in muscles and sphincters, the male and female experience of orgasm is markedly different. And who really cares about rectal sphincter spasms when it’s a rip-roaring throat-splitting orgasm we want? The felt experience is what matters, and I know the felt experience of men is not much like my own, and that to understand them even a little I have to see the differences as having no aesthetic, no moral, meaning. Men tell me of boyhood ejaculation contests in back of the barn; gay men I know casually describe the casserole they took to the last potluck jack-off party they attended. Many straight men find prostitution the most pragmatic sexual outlet. I was astonished when a friend of mine described a five-minute orgasmic sexual encounter in an alley simply because it could never be so easy for me, never so free of psychological consequence. Gay men can join themselves to an ancient system of anonymous sex, signified by the hole in the bathroom wall. Male sexuality seems different from mine fundamentally because nothing need be involved but the head and shaft of the penis, no other part of the body need be troubled, touched, undressed, or soiled, no relationship of any kind need exist. Even conversation can be eliminated. Most important, orgasm is usually guaranteed. In fact, men often seem to like the environments in which such sex takes place specifically for all the reasons I would find it unimaginably difficult to climax in: the danger of being caught, the unexpected opening salvo, the sudden arousal, its sudden end. Such sex takes place literally within one’s ordinary life—in, out, it’s over, back to work. I can be snide and point out the castration fantasy involved in putting your prick in a hole in the wall. But there’s a bit of jealousy there.

• From Talk Dirty to Me: An Intimate Philosophy of Sex (1994)

  I was flipping around the television channels late one night, and for the first time saw a condom being demonstrated on this most proletarian of media. I had happened across a Spanish-language program. A handsome, middle-aged woman sat comfortably in front of a large audience of attentive young women. She was talking in a rapid, maternal, lecturer’s voice of which I could catch only a few words here and there. All the while she spoke, glancing quickly up and down at the audience, making small jokes, she was very slowly rolling a lubricated, shiny condom down over a long, wide, green cucumber. She held the reservoir tip out, explaining its purpose, slid the condom down a little way, talking all the while, until it suddenly slipped into place. She made another little joke, cool, relaxed, and I felt intensely jealous. I couldn’t follow the speedy Spanish well enough to get the jokes, but my jealousy was deeper than that. I envied her matter-of-fact ease. I am bombarded by insinuation and entendre, by seductive skin and promises. I am bombarded by recrimination for my sexuality, reprimanded, as are we all, all our lives. We seduce and reprimand each other. We can’t make up our minds. To pretend one has no sex life (no sexual desires, or no difficulty in controlling them) is strange. Moreover, the pretense leads quite directly to neurosis, just as our universal cultural denial of death has led to neurotic and excessive efforts to conquer death. To deny that part of the human condition is sexual desire is like denying we were each born; the denial has about it the sense of something bizarre and incongruous, because it goes directly against almost everyone’s daily experience. Sexual denial is dysfunctional in the deepest, most psychological sense of the word. Who is crazy, me or you? Because there is no fit between my quotidian and lifelong erotic feelings and your repeated declarations that those feelings and ideas do not exist (or are wrong, wrong in nature, twisted). Only slightly less disturbing than your declaration that my feelings are wrong is your declaration that you have no similar experience, that what seems constant and obvious to me is strange to you. Even in 1994 there is almost no place and time where this is easy to discuss. The 1990s, in fact, may be one of the hardest times in history to talk lucidly about sex at all. I have, perhaps, three absolutes about sexual expression. The first, the most obvious and infinitely arguable one, is that we should avoid harming each other whenever possible. Second is my belief in the importance of self-determination—the right of every mature individual to make decisions for herself, for himself. Last is my unquenchable belief (in spite of sometimes quaking neuroses and plenty of evidence to the contrary) in the final goodness of humans—of human life, the human journey, and the human body.

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  I couldn’t hear much of what they were saying because they were speaking quietly, and I was trying to appear as though I wasn’t listening because the conversation appeared to be private, although, as with anything that went on in Limori’s orbit, I desperately wanted to know every detail. Finally, I heard her say to Michael, “You know what you have to do,” and she glanced at Jessica again. Michael seemed to gather himself up inside, and then stood up and went over to where Jessica was sitting and pulled her up to stand with him. The two of them stood in front of the fireplace at the end of the room and Michael asked Jessica to marry him. Everyone in the room had grown quiet as they turned to watch; we all sensed that something significant was going on, and when Jessica accepted we all clapped and cheered. I felt shocked and saddened, of course. In the last few months I had become more in touch with my feelings for Michael so it was painful, naturally, to watch him propose to Jessica. But I tried as best I could to stifle what I felt and pretend at least to be happy for the betrothed couple. Limori immediately began talking about the spiritual significance of this union and about how much it mattered to God and all his angels. She began planning for a spiritual wedding to be held the next night, our final night at the workshop. The following day was mainly spent preparing for the wedding. In the early evening, we all gathered in the lodge, wearing the best clothes we had brought with us. I had not brought very much in the way of fancy dress clothes with me – not many of us had. Jessica borrowed her bridal outfit - a blouse and skirt - from Alice. A huge table was laid along the length of the living room and Gayle had painted and calligraphed beautiful name cards for each one of us at our place setting. As we gathered in the room for the ceremony and dinner, Limori announced that we were to witness a double wedding this evening, as Gary and Karen had decided to get married as well. Each couple stood on either side of Limori, at one end of the table. The couples held hands and Limori held the hands of the grooms, who were closest to her. The rest of us stood at our places around the table and listened while Limori channelled and officiated this spiritual wedding between the two couples. After the ceremony, we enjoyed a feast that Alice had prepared and spent the evening in celebration of this event. Naturally, Limori painted this double wedding as having enormous spiritual significance and importance to the forces of good in the universe that we were working for. During the celebration and the evening that followed I felt a mix of jealousy and pride.

• From Another Country (1962)

  They looked at each other and smiled. Then, “I hope you get along with Ida better than I did with Rufus,” Eric said. Vivaldo felt chilled. He looked away from Eric, toward the window; the dark, lonely streets seemed to come flooding in on them. “ How ,” he asked, “did you get along with Rufus?” “It was terrible, it drove me crazy.” “I figured that.” He watched Eric. “Is that all over now? I mean—is Cass kind of the wave of your future?” “I don’t know. I thought I could make myself fall in love with Cass, but—but, no. I love her very much, we get on beautifully together. But she’s not all tangled up in my guts the way—the way I guess Ida is all tangled up in yours.” “Maybe you’re just not in love with her . You haven’t got to be in love every time you go to bed. You haven’t got to be in love to have a good affair.” Eric was silent. Then, “No. But once you have been—I” And he stared into his drink. “Yes,” Vivaldo said at last, “yes, I know.” “I think,” said Eric, “that I’ve really got to accept—or decide—some very strange things. Right away.” He walked into the dark kitchen, returned with ice, and spiked his drink, and Vivaldo’s. He sat down again in his straight chair. “I’ve spent years now, it seems to me, thinking that one fine day I’d wake up and all my torment would be over, and all my indecision would end—and that no man, no boy, no male —would ever have power over me again.” Vivaldo blushed and lit a cigarette. “ I can’t be sure,” he said, “that one fine day, I won’t get all hung up on some boy—like that cat in Death In Venice . So you can’t be sure that there isn’t a woman waiting for you, just for you, somewhere up the road.” “Indeed,” said Eric, “I can’t be sure. And yet I must decide.” “ What must you decide?” Eric lit a cigarette, drew one foot up, and hugged one knee. “I mean, I think you’ve got to be truthful about the life you have . Otherwise, there’s no possibility of achieving the life you want .” He paused. “Or think you want.” “Or,” said Vivaldo, after a moment, “the life you think you should want.” “The life you think you should want,” said Eric, “is always the life that looks safest.” He looked toward the window.

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  Lisa glowed in Limori’s presence and began dressing similarly to those women like Alice who lived with Limori full time; they wore dresses, never pants, and all sported an uber-short haircut that the group had begun referring to, jokingly, as the “cult cut.” In short, Lisa could do no wrong, and at the time I was jealous of her special relationship with Limori and felt threatened by it. Limori praised her often for being such a good spiritual student, and there developed a joking familiarity between them, similar to that of people who are falling in love. They shared jokes and private references in front of the group, giggling intimately. So, in the summer of 1994, Lisa packed up her life and her three children and moved up to Wolf’s Den. Coincidentally, in September of that same year I fell and broke some ribs and had to take some time off work to heal. I called Limori at Wolf’s Den to talk to her about what had happened and see if she could give me the spiritual answer as to why this had happened to me. She invited me up to Wolf’s Den for a few days to convalesce. I flew up to the lodge, moving agonizingly slowly and carefully, and Matthew picked me up at the tiny airport. It was immediately and painfully apparent to me that Lisa’s honeymoon phase with Limori was over. Lisa’s children had already been banished back to the city to be raised by their father and grandparents. Limori was not calling her by her new name, Numi, but was referring to her as “Scum” and, on my first day there, the others who lived at the lodge were instructed to do the same. And she was clearly, even to my mind-controlled eyes, being ostracized, while still moving among her peers. I had seen this happen a number of times before at workshops, but the ferocity with which Lisa was being treated was stunning even to me, even though I had become slightly immune to these type of techniques that Limori called spiritual. As we sat outside at two picnic benches for lunch on the first day, Limori was at one bench with Alice and Matthew and the rest of us were at another. Limori would call over from her bench and ridicule and berate Lisa, all without speaking to her in the first person. “Look at her eat! She eats like a pig. Here, piggy, piggy.” This was followed by oinking noises. “Would you like some more food, piggy?” Limori proceeded to pelt Lisa with whatever food items were handy at her table. Lisa ducked slightly to avoid receiving a pickle to the side of her head and Limori mocked her for that: “Don’t you want it, piggy, piggy?” There was a small pause as Limori turned away and continued to eat her lunch, but it didn’t last long. She hurled a cherry tomato at Lisa and then said, “Here!

• From Cult: A Love Story: Ten Years Inside a Canadian Cult and the Subsequent Long Road of Recovery (2013)

  Limori knew who among us could be brought along at this fast-track pace, and Lisa was the most rapidly accelerated disciple I would ever witness. I recognized in Lisa the same devotion that I felt for Limori. I could see in her face the love she felt for Limori and the space in her soul that Limori was filling up. I could see it because I felt the same way, and yet at times I was jealous of Lisa because she seemed less conflicted than I felt. For a couple of years Limori groomed Lisa by making her the treasurer of our meditation circle, by spending one-on-one time with her and (again, I can only see this in hindsight) by testing her devotion. There was the typical period of seduction and flattery, which involved, among other things, Limori declaring that Lisa was the incarnation of the Angel Gabriel. She presented Lisa with a ring that signified her spiritual purity and significance, and I never again saw Lisa’s right hand without the ring present. While Lisa’s devotion to Limori grew, she was also building a family, and gave birth to two more children, the last being born in the late spring of 1993. Lisa left her husband shortly thereafter, which, as I have explained, was an essential move in order for Limori to have more control over this follower of hers who was proving to be the ideal disciple. A few months later, Limori arranged a short-lived relationship between Lisa and group member Victor. Lisa was obviously willing to do whatever Limori asked of her and this relationship was an ideal test of that loyalty; at the time, even in my mind-controlled state, I could see that Lisa had no feelings whatsoever for the man she had been matched with. He was at least twenty-five years her senior and it was so obvious that no romantic feelings existed on Lisa’s part and she was only doing this because God asked her to, that to see them together in the circle was cringingly uncomfortable. Yet Lisa gave herself to the situation fully, proving to Limori that she was ready for the next temperature increase. Consequently, that relationship was over almost as soon as it began. In the meditation circle one night in mid-1994, Limori announced that Lisa’s name was being changed to Numi and she was moving to Wolf’s Den to work for God full time. While Lisa prepared for her departure, Limori encouraged her to tune in at every opportunity, took her shopping and generally spent as much time with Lisa as Lisa could spare away from her children.

• From Another Country (1962)

  And Dupree said, Betty, I’ll get you most any old thing. “My God,” muttered Vivaldo, “she’s been working.” His tone unconsciously implied that he had not been, and held an unconscious resentment. And this threw Eric in on himself. Neither had he been working—for a long time; he had merely been keeping his hand in. It had been because of Yves; so he had told himself; but was this true? He looked at Vivaldo’s white, passionate face and wondered if Vivaldo were now thinking that he had not been working because of Ida: who had not, however, allowed him to distract her. There she was, up on the stand, and unless all the signs were false, and no matter how hard or long the road might be, she was on her way. She had started. Give Mama my clothes, Give Betty my diamond ring. Tomorrow’s Friday, The day I got to swing. She and the musicians were beginning to enjoy each other and to egg each other on as they bounced through this ballad of cupidity, treachery, and death; and Ida had created in the room a new atmosphere and a new excitement. Even the heat seemed less intolerable. The musicians played for her as though she were an old friend come home and their pride in her restored their pride in themselves. The number ended and Ida stepped off the stand, wet and triumphant, the applause crashing about her ears like foam. She came to the table, looking at Vivaldo with a smile and a small, questioning frown, and, standing, took a sip of her drink. They called her back. The drummer reached down and lifted her, bodily, onto the stand, and the applause continued. Eric became aware of a shift in Vivaldo’s attention. He looked at Vivaldo’s face, which was stormier than ever, and followed his eyes. Vivaldo was looking at a short square man with curly hair and a boyish face who was standing at the end of the bar, looking up at Ida. He grinned and waved and Ida nodded and Vivaldo looked up at the stand again: with narrowed eyes and pursed lips, with an air of grim speculation. “Your girl friend’s got something,” Eric said. Vivaldo glanced over at him. “It runs in the family,” he said. His tone was not friendly; it was as though he suspected Eric of taunting him; and so referred, obliquely, to Rufus, with the intention of humbling Eric. Yet, in a moment he relented. “She’s going to be terrific,” he said, “and, Lord, I’m going to have to buy me a baseball bat to keep all the hungry cats away.” He grinned and looked again at the short man at the bar. Ida stepped up to the microphone. “This song is for my brother,” she said. She hesitated and looked over at Vivaldo. “He died just a little before Thanksgiving, last year.” There was a murmur in the room.

• From Another Country (1962)

  How long is it?” “It’s over three hundred pages,” Richard said. “Come by tomorrow, you can look at it then.” He said to Cass, “It’s one way of getting him to the house.” Then: “You really don’t come to see us like you used to—is anything the matter? Because we still love you .” “No, nothing’s the matter,” Vivaldo said. He hesitated. “I had this thing with Jane and then we broke up—and—oh, I don’t know. Work wasn’t going well, and”—he looked at Rufus—“all kinds of things. I was drinking too much and running around whoring when I should have been—being serious, like you, and getting my novel finished.” “How’s it coming—your novel? ” “Oh”—he looked down and sipped his drink—“slow. I’m really not a very good writer.” “Bullshit,” said Richard, cheerfully. He almost looked again like the English instructor Vivaldo had idolized, who had been the first person to tell him things he needed to hear, the first person to take Vivaldo seriously. “I’m very glad,” Vivaldo said, “seriously, very glad that you got the damn thing done and that it worked so well. And I hope you make a fortune.” Rufus thought of afternoons and evenings on the stand when people had come up to him to bawl their appreciation and to prophesy that he would do great things. They had bugged him then. Yet how he wished now to be back there, to have someone looking at him as Vivaldo now looked at Richard. And he looked at Vivaldo’s face, in which affection and something coldly speculative battled. He was happy for Richard’s triumph but perhaps he wished it were his own; and at the same time he wondered what order of triumph it was. And the way the people had looked at Rufus was not unlike this look. They wondered where it came from, this force that they admired. Dimly, they wondered how he stood it, wondered if perhaps it would not kill him soon. Vivaldo looked away, down into his drink, and lit a cigarette. Richard suddenly looked very tired. A tall girl, very pretty, carefully dressed—she looked like an uptown model—came into the room, looked about her, peered sharply at their table. She paused, then started out. “I wish you were looking for me?” Vivaldo called. She turned and laughed. “You’re lucky I’m not looking for you!” She had a very attractive laugh and a slight Southern accent. Rufus turned to watch her move daintily up the steps and disappear into the crowded bar. “Well, you scored, old buddy,” Rufus said, “go get her.” “No,” said Vivaldo, smiling, “better leave well enough alone.” He stared at the door where the girl had vanished. “She’s pretty, isn’t she?” he said partly to himself, partly to the table. He looked at the door again, shifting slightly in his seat, then threw down the last of his drink.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  But these tuppenyha’ penny impersonators - Fannie Leslie, Fanny Robina, Bessie Bonehill, Millie Hylton - they look about as natural in their dinner-jackets as I would, clad in a crinoline or a bustle. It makes me rage’ - he was seated in our little parlour as he spoke, and here he slapped the arm of his chair, so that the ancient seams gave a fart of dust and hair - ‘it makes me rage to see girls with a tenth of your talent getting all the bookings that should be yours - and worse! all the fame.’ He stood, and placed his hands upon Kitty’s shoulders. ‘You are on the very edge of stardom,’ he said, giving her a little push so that she had to grasp his arms to stop herself from falling. ‘There must be something, something that we can do to just propel you over - something we can add to your act to set it apart from that of all those other prancing schoolgirls!’But, however hard we worked, we could not find it; and meanwhile Kitty continued at the lesser theatres, in the humbler districts - Islington, Marylebone, Battersea, Peckham, Hackney - circling Leicester Square, crossing the West End on her nightly trips from hall to hall, but never entering those palaces of her and Walter’s dreams: the Alhambra, and the Empire.To be honest, I didn’t much mind. I was sorry, for Kitty’s sake, that her great new London career was not quite so great as she had hoped for; but I was also, privately, relieved. I knew how clever and charming and lovely she was, and while a part of me wanted, like Walter, to share the knowledge with the world, a greater part longed only to hug it to myself, to keep it secret and secure. For I was sure that, were she truly famous, I would lose her. I didn’t like it when her fans sent flowers, or clamoured at the stage door for photographs and kisses; more fame would bring more flowers, more kisses - and I could not believe that she would go on laughing at the gentlemen’s invitations, could not believe that one day, amongst all those admiring girls, there wouldn’t be one she would like better then me ...If she were famous, too, then she would also be richer. She might buy a house - we should have to leave Ginevra Road and all our new friends in it; we should have to leave our little sitting-room; we should have to leave our bed, and take separate chambers. I could not bear the thought of it. I had grown used, at last, to sleeping with Kitty at my side. I no longer trembled, or grew stiff and awkward, when she touched me, but had learned to lean into her embraces, to accept her kisses, chastely, nonchalantly - and even, sometimes, to return them. I had grown used to the sight of her slumbering or undressed.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  In Bethlehem he presided over a monastery till his death, built a hospital for all strangers except heretics, prosecuted his literary studies without cessation, wrote several commentaries, and finished his improved Latin version of the Bible—the noblest monument of his life—but entangled himself in violent literary controversies, not only with opponents of the church orthodoxy like Helvidius (against whom he had appeared before, in 384), Jovinian, Vigilantius, and Pelagius, but also with his long-tried friend Rufinus, and even with Augustine.365 Palladius says, his jealousy could tolerate no saint beside himself, and drove many pious monks away from Bethlehem. He complained of the crowds of monks whom his fame attracted to Bethlehem.366 The remains of the Roman nobility, too, ruined by the sack of Rome, fled to him for food and shelter. At the last his repose was disturbed by incursions of the barbarian Huns and the heretical Pelagians. He died in 419 or 420, of fever, at a great age. His remains were afterward brought to the Roman basilica of Maria Maggiore, but were exhibited also and superstitiously venerated in several copies in Florence, Prague, Clugny, Paris, and the Escurial.367 The Roman church has long since assigned him one of the first places among her standard teachers and canonical saints. Yet even some impartial Catholic historians venture to admit and disapprove his glaring inconsistencies and violent passions. The Protestant love of truth inclines to the judgment, that Jerome was indeed an accomplished and most serviceable scholar and a zealous enthusiast for all which his age counted holy, but lacking in calm self- control and proper depth of mind and character, and that he reflected, with the virtues, the failings also of his age and of the monastic system. It must be said to his credit, however, that with all his enthusiastic zeal and admiration for monasticism, he saw with a keen eye and exposed with unsparing hand the false monks and nuns, and painted in lively colors the dangers of melancholy, hypochondria, the hypocrisy and spiritual pride, to which the institution was exposed.368 § 42. St. Paula. Hieronymus: Epitaphium Paulae matris, ad Eustochium virginem, Ep. cviii. (ed. Vallarsi, Opera, tom. i. p. 684 sqq.; ed. Bened. Ep. lxxxvi). Also the Acta Sanctorum, and Butler’s Lives of Saints, sub Jan. 26. Of Jerome’s many female disciples, the most distinguished is St. Paula, the model of a Roman Catholic nun. With his accustomed extravagance, he opens his eulogy after her death, in.

• From Justine (Alexandria Quartet vol. 1) (1957)

  ‘She told me one night as we lay in that ugly great bed in a rented room — a gaunt rectangular room of a vaguely French-Levantine shape and flavour: a stucco ceiling covered with decomposing cherubs and posies of vine-leaves. She told me and left me raging with a jealousy I struggled to hide — but a jealousy of an entirely novel sort. Its object was a man who though still alive, no longer existed. It is perhaps what the Freudians would call a screen-memory of incidents in her earliest youth. She had (and there was no mistaking the force of this confession for it was accompanied by floods of tears, and I have never seen her weep like that before or since) — she had been raped by one of her relations. One cannot help smiling at the commonplaceness of the thought. It was impossible to judge at what age. Nevertheless — and here I thought I had penetrated to the heart of the Check: from this time forward she could obtain no satisfaction in love unless she mentally recreated these incidents and re-enacted them. For her we, her lovers, had become only mental substitutes for this first childish act — so that love, as a sort of masturbation, took on all the colours of neurasthenia; she was suffering from an imagination dying of anaemia, for she could possess no one thoroughly in the flesh. She could not appropriate to herself the love she felt she needed, for her satisfactions derived from the crepuscular corners of a life she was no longer living. This was passionately interesting. But what was even more amusing was that I felt this blow to my amour propre as a man exactly as if she had confessed to an act of deliberate unfaithfulness. What! Every time she lay in my arms she could find no satisfaction save through this memory? In a way, then, I could not possess her: had never done so. I was merely a dummy. Even now as I write I cannot help smiling to remember the strangled voice in which I asked who the man was, and where he was. (What did I hope to do? Challenge him to a duel?) Nevertheless there he was, standing squarely between Justine and I; between Justine and the light of the sun.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  But she did not try to hide her melancholy now, or to disguise its cause - letting me know, for example, that her trips were (as I might have guessed) to Lilian’s grave. In time she even began to speak of her dead friend, quite routinely. ‘How Lilian would have laughed to hear of that!’ she would say; or, ‘Now, if Lily were only here, we might ask her, and she’d be sure to know.’Her new, sweeter mood had an effect upon us all. The atmosphere of our little house - which I had always thought easy enough, before, but which I now saw to have been quite choked with the memory of Lilian, and with Ralph and Florence’s sorrow - seemed to clear and brighten: it was as if we were passing not into the fogs and frosts of winter, but into springtime, with all its mildnesses and balms. I would see Ralph gazing at his sister as she smiled or hummed or caught at Cyril and tickled him, and his gaze would be soft, and he would sometimes lean to kiss her cheek, in pleasure. Even Cyril himself seemed to feel the change, and to grow bonnier and more content.And I, in contrast, became ever more pinched and secretive and fretful.I could not help it. It was as if, in casting off her own old load, Florence had burdened me with a new one; my feelings - which had been stirred, on the night of her confession, into such a curious mixture - only seemed to grow queerer and more contradictory as the weeks went by. I had been sorry for her, and was as glad as her brother to see her rather lighter-hearted now; I was also pleased and touched that she had confided in me at last, and told me all. But oh, how I wished her story had been different! I could never learn to like the tragic Lilian, and had to bite back my crossness when she was spoken of so reverently. Perhaps I pictured her as Kitty - it was certainly Walter’s face I saw, whenever I thought of her cowardly man-friend; but it made me hot and giddy to think of her, commanding Florence’s passion, sleeping beside her night after night - and never so much as turning he face to her friend, to kiss her mouth. Why had Florence cared for her so much? I would gaze at the photograph of Eleanor Marx - I could never shake off the confused conviction that it was really Lilian’s features printed there - until the face began to swim before my eyes. She was so different from me - hadn’t Florence herself told me that? She said she had never been gladder of anything, than that I was so different from Lilian! She meant, I suppose, that Lilian was clever, and good; that she knew the meaning of words like cooperative, and so never had to ask. But I - what was I?

• From How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety (2018)

  The next FOMO flavor is Other people are having a better time than me. This is essentially envy, which is a mix of inferiority and resentment. This type is closest to what the term “FOMO” actually implies: that you’ve been left out, either unthinkingly or deliberately by others, or because you weren’t in the know, didn’t have access, or couldn’t muster the guts to go. Regardless, this type links directly back to I’m not good enough. Finally, the last answer to the question “If I did miss out, what would that mean about me?” is I suck. Or, for Vivian’s version, They suck. You get the idea. This screams “perfectionism” and manifests as insecurity. So what’s the cost of FOMO, besides feeling anxious, envious, and insecure? It turns us inward, which also lies at the heart of social anxiety. But when we turn inward, like Diego at the hospital, we miss what’s going on around us. And that’s the biggest cost of FOMO: actually missing out. Hear me out on this one: Pretend you’re at home having a perfectly relaxing evening. But then you check your alerts and updates and find a party you’re not at, and your mind stops enjoying and starts comparing. Did I make the wrong decision? Are they having a better time than me? I suck. The result? We end up discounting and being distracted from the most important moment: the one we’re actually in. Our brains aren’t wired for multitasking, so when we toggle back and forth between the present moment and status updates we end up with a series of skips and interruptions—again, actually missing out. There are two ways for Vivian, or any of us, to resist the pull. First, remember that people put their best foot forward on social media, posting only the highlight reel of their lives. We tend to post when things are going well—vacations, accomplishments, kids doing cute things, photos in which we look hot. No one posts cleaning the cat litter, picking up tampons on sale, or a bad hair day. Everyone experiences these things just as often as you—it’s just that those moments aren’t on display. Resist comparing their filtered image to your everyday, unfiltered reality. Another remedy: JOMO, or the joy of missing out. JOMO is the deliberate choice to enjoy the moment one is actually in. Sometimes JOMO is celebrated as an escape—all sweatpants, unwashed hair, and Nutella with a spoon—but it’s more about intentionally focusing on wherever you actually are. A constant stream of technological connection makes people crave and value space, so a deliberate decision to stay home with a book, to cuddle with your sweetheart instead of painting the town, or to simply have a cup of tea and go to bed early can be a perfect antidote for the perfectionistic pull of constant social connection.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  “But this tranquil state, the power of conquering my preoccupation, all ended with the carriage drive. Scarcely had I entered the cars, when the other thing began. Those eight hours on the rail were so terrible to me that I shall never forget them in my life. Was it because on entering the car I had a vivid imagination of having already arrived, or because the railway acts upon people in such an exciting fashion? At any rate, after boarding the train I could no longer control my imagination, which incessantly, with extraordinary vivacity, drew pictures before my eyes, each more cynical than its predecessor, which kindled my jealousy. And always the same things about what was happening at home during my absence. I burned with indignation, with rage, and with a peculiar feeling which steeped me in humiliation, as I contemplated these pictures. And I could not tear myself out of this condition. I could not help looking at them, I could not efface them, I could not keep from evoking them. “The more I looked at these imaginary pictures, the more I believed in their reality, forgetting that they had no serious foundation. The vivacity of these images seemed to prove to me that my imaginations were a reality. One would have said that a demon, against my will, was inventing and breathing into me the most terrible fictions. A conversation which dated a long time back, with the brother of Troukhatchevsky, I remembered at that moment, in a sort of ecstasy, and it tore my heart as I connected it with the musician and my wife. Yes, it was very long ago. The brother of Troukhatchevsky, answering my questions as to whether he frequented disreputable houses, said that a respectable man does not go where he may contract a disease, in a low and unclean spot, when one can find an honest woman. And here he, his brother, the musician, had found the honest woman. ‘It is true that she is no longer in her early youth. She has lost a tooth on one side, and her face is slightly bloated,’ thought I for Troukhatchevsky. ‘But what is to be done? One must profit by what one has.’ “‘Yes, he is bound to take her for his mistress,’ said I to myself again; ‘and besides, she is not dangerous.’ “‘No, it is not possible’ I rejoined in fright. ‘Nothing, nothing of the kind has happened, and there is no reason to suppose there has. Did she not tell me that the very idea that I could be jealous of her because of him was humiliating to her?’ ‘Yes, but she lied,’ I cried, and all began over again.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  In all the evenings I had spent with her, she had had no visitors but the call-boy - who came to tell her when she was wanted in the wing - and Tony, who sometimes put his head around the door to wish us both good-night. She had no beau, as I have said; she had no other ‘fans’ - no friends at all, it seemed, but me; and I had always been rather glad of it. Now I watched her step to the door, and bit my lip. I should like to say I felt a thrill of foreboding, but I did not. I only felt piqued, that our time alone together - which I thought little enough! - should be made shorter.The visitor was a gentleman: a stranger, evidently, to Kitty, for she greeted him politely, but quite cautiously. He had a silk hat on his head which - seeing her, and then me lurking in the little room behind her - he removed, and held to his bosom. ‘Miss Butler, I believe,’ he said; and when she nodded, he gave a bow: ‘Walter Bliss, ma’am. Your servant.’ His voice was deep and pleasant and clear, like Tricky’s. As he spoke he produced a card from his pocket and held it out. In the second or so it took Kitty to gaze at it and give a little ‘Oh!’ of surprise, I studied him. He was very tall, even without his hat, and was dressed rather fashionably in chequered trousers and a fancy waistcoat. Across his stomach there was a golden watch-chain as thick as the tail of a rat; and more gold, I noticed, flashed from his fingers. His head was large, his hair a dull ginger; gingerish, too - and somehow at once both impressive and rather comical - were the whiskers that swept from his top lip to his ears, and his eyebrows, and the hair in his nose. His skin was as clear and shiny as a boy’s. His eyes were blue.When Kitty returned his card to him, he asked if he might speak with her a moment, and at once she stood aside to let him pass. With him in it, the little room seemed very full and hot.