Fifty-two Stories, All the Same

A St. Louis Story of the 1970s

With stories as with love, I was brilliant at beginnings. The first lines, sometimes the first paragraphs, flowed like ink from Montblanc pens, in elegant cursive onto thick, expensive paper. Brilliant and beautiful.

But with my stories as with my loves, they all seemed to fall apart eventually. Sometimes after a hundred words, sometimes after a thousand, but somewhere well before the end, the cursive turned into a scratchy scrawl, the pen clogged and the  ink splotched. All too often the thick paper blotted up tears. It was ever thus.

And so, when I decided that to be a writer I must write, and set myself the task of writing a story a week for a year, I found, at the end, that I had written 52 stories, all the same: all tear-soaked tales of love longed for, initiated, fumbled, ended. For me it was the tale of life, and it seemed to be the only tale I had to tell. Write what you know? That was what I knew.

And so the first Monday in January, 1978, I sat down at my writing desk (at other times it was my kitchen table), rolled a blank sheet into my typewriter, and prepared to begin story 53.

“From an early age, he had thought he would be a writer. Then he encountered the unpleasant truth: to be a writer, one must write.”

Not such a brilliant beginning perhaps. Perhaps this time I was starting from the end, with the story as with the love, which had seemed so brilliant … well, until just the other day when it had splotched so dreadfully to an end. Once again I was looking at a blank page (except for that one line, already crossed out), wondering if sitting there, waiting, hoping, once again really made sense.

“From an early age, he had thought he would be a lover. Then he encountered the unpleasant truth: to be a lover, one must find someone to love.”

Of course, once again, I thought I had found someone to love, and someone to love me. He was the usual mix of pluses and minuses: handsome, smart, funny, sexy (at least some of the time); quirky, a little hung up about gayness, a little too fond of drugs and drink (but only some of the time).  It fell apart where it had begun – just off the dance floor at Bob Martin’s Bar, in St. Louis, on the last Saturday night of 1977. It happened to be New Year’s Eve, not that that made a big difference. It could have been any Saturday night (or any other night of the week either) for the month or more before. We’d been flirting with an end more than with each other for a while. But that Saturday night – that New Year’s Eve – he said, “I’ll be going home with him tonight,” as he pointed at a man across the room. “You’re welcome to join us if you’d like.” Not exactly the beautiful cursive I’d been hoping for; a painful echo of the night we’d met: “I’ll be going home with you tonight. You’re welcome to join me if you’d like.”

That first night, I’d liked. I’d been thrilled. It was the brilliant first line I’d been hoping to hear for an hour – ever since we’d nodded across the dance floor, moved toward each other, danced. The volume of the music had made first lines irrelevant that first hour. It was only when the music stopped for a moment so the bar could announce “LAST CALL” that he’d spoken. Though our bodies had already asked and answered the question – no, made the statement, since early on there had been no question – about spending the night together.

At the time I lived in a seamy, carved-out apartment up under the rafters of an old house on West Pine, near the park. It had never been a grand house – just large and middle class back in its day. But its day had passed and the neighborhood had changed, so now it had been chopped up to maximize low rents. I was embarrassed having anyone back there; it was NOT the place I envisioned for myself, or my lovers. But that first night with him, where we were didn’t matter a bit – wouldn’t have mattered if we’d been at the Ritz – because we were so consumed with each other (and so often) that nothing else mattered at all. It had been one of those fabled first nights when being together, with this particular man, transformed the world and everything in it into a fairy tale. I woke up in the morning almost certain that magic mushrooms must have been nibbled – how else could it have seemed so perfect.

If only it could have stayed that way. But “if onlys” don’t count for much in the long run. If only I were handsomer; if only he opened up more; if only I were better equipped; if only he didn’t cheat. If only, if only, if only doesn’t pay the emotional rent. And just now I felt almost as chopped up as my rooming house.

I looked out the attic window (dirty, of course, unwashed for years, decades) and saw only the attic window of the house next door. But at least I wasn’t looking at the blank page. Story 53 HAD to be different, HAD to have a different ending than the preceding 52, even if I had to imagine it instead of, this time, writing what I knew. Could I do it? Could I make anyone believe it if I did? Could I believe it myself? Or should I just change the title of this one at the start: 53 Stories All the Same?

He'd said all the right things for longer than most, but in the end even he had stopped saying them with fire. Toward the end it was a peck on the cheek, instead of the hot, wet kisses on the lips of the beginning. But that was natural. Passion can’t burn furnace-hot forever without burning people up. And as long as it still flared sometimes, maybe that was as much as one could hope for. My passion still burned often, and his seemed to also, once in a while. Often enough that I kept hoping.

I looked at the slips of paper piled on the night stand beside my bed. Twelve of them; I’d counted them yesterday. Each with a first name (Tim, Rod, Isaac, Charlie, Karl, Stan …) and a telephone number. Some with last names too. Tricks over the last months had left them – or given them, if we’d gone to their place instead of mine. Like the last step in a ritual, we exchanged the names and numbers which neither expected the other to call.

He wasn’t the only one who’d dabbled in infidelity. But I hadn’t really wanted to; I wouldn’t have if he’d been there to fill my bed – and my soul and all the other emptinesses that needed filling. I took out my wallet, removed another slip, last night’s. Thirteen, a neglected lover’s dozen. I dropped it on the pile - lost among the others like a found penny dropped into my change pocket, bringing no luck.

It had started to rain – a cold winter rain that would turn the streets to sheets of ice overnight. The raindrops pelted the gutter outside the window in not quite distinguishable thuds. Now that I’d noticed the sound it would stay in my mind all day, if the rain continued.

How much easier life would be if he could just not notice some of the things that didn’t have to be noticed. It wasn’t necessary to notice everything to get by – maybe not even much of anything. Certainly not the fading away of love.

No, those lines couldn’t stay. Because it was necessary to notice the fading away of love – when I had no choice. And he gave me no choice.  Sure, I knew I shouldn’t let love – its presence, its absence – suck up all the oxygen of life, but it wasn’t a matter of letting – it just did – I didn’t know why. I might as well not even ask “Why.” I’d asked it already and found no answer. Freud, perhaps, could have found one, but not me. It was a function as natural as, well, any function, and ultimately as uncontrollable.

They say that one of the worst things about getting really old is the loss of control. But perhaps all along all we really have is just the illusion of it.

Two hours at the typewriter, and what did I have? Just two lines – two lines about love. And if I sat there two more hours, or two more days, or two more years? Would I still only have a beginning (brilliant or otherwise) for yet another story about love, its presence or absence? Would it be 53 stories, or 54 or 55, all the same? Probably. Probably.

Or perhaps I’d shuffle the stack of slips, and draw one, and call the number – even though in the real world one almost never did. Perhaps that would be the first plot point in a story with a different ending. Probably not. Probably not. But you could never know for sure, not at the beautiful, brilliant Montblanc cursive beginning.

1978/2024