December 17, 2014
Being separated from my true love, is a harsh existence. I came upon a passage by the Goncourt brothers that put it in perspective: “Today I begin to understand what love must be, if it exists. When we are parted, we each feel the lack of the other half of ourselves. We are incomplete like a book in two volumes of which the first has been lost. That is what I imagine love to be: incompleteness in absence.” After reading this passage by the brothers, I read a touch more about them. Not only did they write books together, but they also didn’t spend more than a day apart from each other. Even in death, the brothers are buried together, and in the same grave in Montmartre Cemetery.
My wish is intended to be buried with my wife. I have no desire to be separated from her, either in life or death. As of now, I’m facing a house that is full of items, but lacking the presence of her, and I go to bed in an empty right side, where I sort of made a pillow to resemble a human form. I wake up realizing that I’m still alone, and I face every room in the house, and just count the echo of my steps I hear when I walk down the hallway. The only way I can work around this is to make it into a theater piece. At first, I wanted it to fill the void that I’m feeling now, but alas, it will expose the void, and as its author, I want the audience to be aware that they are watching the play. I want to make something so I can watch it as well.
To project myself onto a wall, or on a piece of paper - to go out and explore … to avoid the void. When I was a younger man I had a job as a model for the artist Paul Cadmus. He would have me naked, and I remember the feeling of his eyes approaching me. It wasn’t instant, but more in a series of moments as I can feel his eyes looking from my toes to my knees, to my genitals, and eventually my face. I had a good body, and I even had a job as a lifeguard at the beach. That is where Paul first saw me, and approached me to be his model. Although the drawings and paintings were quite sexual, I never felt he was trying to seduce me personally. Then again, like the theater up above, when I took my clothes off in front of him, I felt like my soul or consciousness was somewhere in that room. I was watching him watching me, as he focused on the piece of canvas or drawing paper in front of him.
I think back to those times, because it was before I fell in love, and eventually becoming a husband. I took my marriage vowels seriously, and the fact that I never wanted to stand apart from her. Before she recently left, I gave my wife a print by Paul, that he drew of me. I just wanted to show her that I had another life before I met and married her. We are often shocked that we had a “life” before we met. We are shocked that there was even a “life.” Alas, therefore a theater of loneliness. I will write it, perform in it, and of course, watch it.
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