2005-10-04 - 10:32 p.m.
IDYLL...Not So IDEAL
Fall is here and, in addition to finally getting my apartment organized after moving my office here�THREE YEARS AGO...I thought I�d share with you some tidbits from Summer �05.Despite my protestations of last winter, I found myself spending my 23rd consecutive summer at the little cottage in Quogue. Hard to believe, I know. But it�s true�and I have pictures of Elizabeth celebrating her 2nd birthday out there to prove it. Oh, so cute.
However, anticipating a certain restlessness with 20+ weekends of Jitney jaunts out to Quogue�s solitary confinement, I happily agreed to sub-rent the cottage to the Sheehan/Mahedy conglomerate for June and September�the perfect solution.
The little cottage is like a charming time capsule with lots of quirks and history. In the late 1800�s, it was the local village blacksmith shop. Rooms were added on over the years�in a haphazard fashion�so that none of the ceilings match�and there are no real closets. The hot water heater sits right in the middle of the kitchen. The water table is very high out there so close to the ocean, so when you flush the toilet, it sometimes backs up into the sink. Like I said...charming!
In the 1950�s, actress Tallulah Bankhead spent a few summers in this very cottage. It was her gay decorator friend who fashioned the curtained off closets behind the bedroom doors.
Anyway, let me back up a bit. I say 23rd consecutive summer�because there were actually two random �group share� summers in Quogue (1975 and 1976) that were, for me at least, basically nightmares best forgotten. However, since my memory has always been a steel trap (and my personal prison..!!), those two summers are still as vivid as ever.
Random summer #1�1975. In June of �75, I was shockingly DUMPED by my boyfriend of 18 months, who said he �owed me no explanation� about the break-up�even though we had once actually talked about getting married..!! That sorta killed the summer for me. What I thought was gonna be this romantic summer-by-the-sea�turned out to be the �summer of the Barbarians� instead. I shared this three-bedroom , ONE-BATHROOM Quogue cottage with seven guys; I was the only woman. Don�t get me wrong�these guys were hilarious, raucous, raunchy and fun�and, in earlier years, I�d actually slept with three or four of them�but this 24/7 live-in situation was pretty unbearable..!! Happily, I had my own room, which the boys labeled �the Princess Progresso Suite,� by literally taping the label from a can of Italian tomatoes to my door. (In those days, I guess I was a bit of an Italian tomato..!!) Anyway, this testosterone-fueled environment was damn depressing in my fragile state, and I remember listening to the barbarians comparing their �chick-scoring strategies� while crying myself to sleep every night. Brian McAleer would punctuate every sentence with the world�s loudest and longest belch�which just made me cry even harder. (One of the guys once offered McAleer $30 if he would drink an entire bottle of Worcestershire sauce in one gulp; McAleer won the bet..!)The only good part of the Summer of �75 was that I lost 25 pounds on a �heartbreak diet� of tears, beers, and sleeping too much. I don�t recommend it.
Random summer #2�1976. A year later, I was still obsessing over the old boyfriend but had moved on to my post-break-up slut phase, banging every guy in sight. I took a �nervous breakdown� leave of absence from my job, rented out my apartment on 18th Street, signed up for unemployment, and decided to spend the entire summer in Quogue partying and screwing around. I had begun a little �fling-let� with one of the well-known A. twins out there�so I thought, well, surely this will be better than the summer of �75, and I could use a change of scene.
Some of the same barbarians were back at the cottage�but seemed not quite as hideous as the previous summer. There was Montreal Olympics excitement in the air, there was my fling with JA, I was making dough by gouging my summer tenant in Manhattan, and collecting unemployment to boot�and, of course, there were free �happy hour� drinks at the Potato because Chris was the bartender. Life was okay�for FIVE MINUTES. I�d bike to the beach, come home and shower, bike to the Potato at 4-ish�for the first of many Pina Coladas or Daiquiris, then bike home, have dinner with the barbarians�then go out drinking again. After three or four weeks of beaching, balling, drinking, and staying out all night, I was getting restless and depressed. This was not my style. What was I doing with my life?
The JA fling fizzled out b/c he had met SS, a life-of-the-party type who was better suited to his party ways. He told me that I was �too intellectual for him�..that I "made him feel stupid." So, now my summer fling was over�and all I had left was happy hour, random rolls in the hay, and feeling like a total outcast.
That was the summer of the �Magic Christian,� this super sleaze-ball who introduced cocaine to our na�ve little crowd and everyone ADORED him�except me�because drugs were totally NOT my thing. I felt TRAPPED. I couldn�t go back to the city b/c my apartment was rented out, I had no main squeeze, it was just me and the barbarians and an impending hurricane (Belle, I think). We boarded up the windows, got trashed, and I made lasagna for 20�which Chris swears is the last time I�ve ever cooked. (Not true.) I remember making a drunken phone call to the old boyfriend (never a good idea), whose Village apartment had burned down earlier that summer.
Soon it was back to the job�back to my apartment�and back to the gym because that summer I had GAINED 25 pounds from boredom, too many tropical drinks, social humiliation, not enough sex, and my continued pining for the old boyfriend over pints of mint-chip ice cream.
PHEW..!! Talk about a digression. SO�enough meandering. Here�s a round-up of the Summer of �05�
� Planted my little tree-stump garden�and watched the rabbits and chipmunks eat the heads off all the marigolds.
� Found a mouse nest in the air conditioning vents of my car, and, after cleaning it out, I was paranoid for weeks about contracting Hanta virus.
� The car, an �86 Subaru station wagon, basically sits in the driveway from October to May getting rustier and rustier in the salt air. The windows leak and are sealed up with electrical tape. The wheels are rusted out and the tires have dry rot. It�s a sight.
� My friend Bill Hoffmann of the New York Post (who's been dying to appear in this Diary) visited one weekend and got ready for the beach by donning a baby blue Speedo, which he got for free as a promotion for the movie, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou. It barely covered his twig-and-berries�and I said, �You can�t wear THAT in Quogue..!! Quogue-ees wear J. Crew swim trunks with dolphins or turtles on them. You just can�t wear a hug-me-baby ball-hammock on Quogue Village Beach. They�ll call the police..!!�
� Me and Hoffy had a blast drinking wine, eating popcorn, swatting mosquitoes, and sharing stories, on the back deck. We played our usual game of, �For a million dollars, would you�..?� Of course, we both realized that there were very few things we WOULDN�T do for a million in cash.
� The whole Quogue summer went by�and I still haven�t finished Peter Quinn�s new book, The Hour of the Cat. I feel terrible about this�and if I ever write a book, I give Peter full permission NOT to read it.
� Chris had a few splendiferous dinner parties and, happily, Betty Perazzo didn�t turn up at ANY of them.
� One weekend, the Quogue Library held its annual Art Show�and I stopped by after a long bike ride. I was sweaty and disheveled...wearing a pair of old Speedo lifeguard shorts and a T-shirt that said �King of the Ring� on it, which I had gotten from my friend Beau Williford who owns a boxing gym in Lafayette, Louisiana. Of course, I was surrounded by �Muffies� and �Binkys� in their pink-and-green Lilly Pulitzer shift dresses�and there were lots of �Thurston Howell III�-types in khakis and Lacoste shirts. A guy at the front gate stopped me and asked:
�Are you from around here?�
�Yes�I live right up the road at #67. Why?�
�Oh, um, it�s just that we like to know, um, how far visitors will travel to our, um, art show. You looked like you had come from far away.�
�NOPE�right up the street.�
�Oh, um, okay. So, you don�t live here year-round?�
�No way. I�d rather DIE. I live in Greenwich Village the rest of the year.�
�Oh, of course, of course.�The dude DEFINITELY took one look at my outfit and thought I was gonna walk off with Mrs. Otis�s decoupage plaques or whatever. It was hilarious. Clothes make the (Linda) Mann, once again..!!
� In other summer news, the cost of shrimp salad at the Quogue Market went up to $48.99 per pound.
� I got hooked on Pepperidge Farm's new �Whims� cookies. Deadly good.
� Merrill routinely brought me green beans, wax beans, strawberries and summer squash from his garden. Very sweet. But he had this habit of laying out the yellow squash on my table and asking me, �Do you like them BIG or small?� Um, I�m probably a total perv�but those big yellow squash�and Merill�s question�always made me uncomfortable. �I�ll take the small ones, thanks.� And, for a creepy minute, I thought, �Is he coming on to me?� Mind you, Merrill is 80+ years old!
� After being stopped by a Quogue cop for an expired inspection sticker, I brought my old heap into Otis Ford, where it finally FAILED inspection after all these years�and had to be ditched. I donated it to some charity listed in the back of the NY Post�where they�ll pick up your car the same day and give you a $500 charity receipt for tax purposes. The guy who picked it up said, �DAMN�this car�s got cancer..!!�
� So, now I was car-less. No more Tanger Shopping Mall outings for me. What�s a weekend without a trip to Saks Off Fifth?
� AND�my bicycle got a flat tire, which meant I had to walk it over to Mr. Beckwith�s shop, which always means listening to his endless war stories. I told him my brakes were sticking�and asked if he could loosen them�but he said, �Aw, no deah�dey don�t need loosenin��you just, UH, need some, UH, dat dere lubi-CA-tion. Ya gotta LUBE-i-cate dese tings�or dere�ll dry up on ya.� (Again�is it just ME�or does that sound suggestive?�)
� The garden grew wild-and-wonderful�with very tall Cosmos of all colors and bunches and bunches of enchanting Black-eyed Susans. Clara Mae routinely stopped over to admire the garden�and every time she bent over�she FARTED..!! Just farted�and kept on talking as if nothing had happened. In fact, during most of our conversations this summer, Clara talked (and farted) and talked (and farted). �So, my granddaughter is in Italy studying architecture (*fart*), and grandson Brett (*fart*) just got into law school (*fart*)�..� Bear in mind,she speaks VERY loud�so she�s probably a little too deaf to HEAR the farting�but, DAMN, can�t you sense those things slipping out�??? Very weird and embarrassing, I must say.
Well, now summer�s over�and I do still have to go back out there and pack everything up for next summer. NEXT SUMMER??? Hmmm�I�m guessing�YES�I will go back to Quogue for my 24th consecutive summer..!! (not counting the two �randoms�). But I�m hoping the Sheehan/Mahedy�s will want to take a few weekends off my hands�and that I can find a �new� old car to replace the now-dead rust-bucket.
Now, tell me how you spent YOUR summer..!
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