Today is the 4th anniversary of Bunny’s passing — she was such a sweet cat. I swear that I still miss her every day.
I went looking for some old photos of her to post to the blog, and I serendipitously (which I don’t think is actually a word) discovered a bunch of photos that I forgot I had.
So it’s Memory Day again, here in Marilyn’s Room!!
First of all, I found a wonderful photo of Paul at Christmas, 1996. Paul was my best friend who died, whom I blogged about yesterday.
He was already really sick here, but you can see that even while he was dying, he was just such a good-natured human being.
Here are two photos of Bunny right after I rescued her and her brother, Buster, from a NYC cat shelter in Times Square. They were a few months old already when I adopted them. Bunny is the larger cat, Buster, was the grey and white cat. I loved both of them so much, it was almost unbelievable.
Wayne was not happy that I adopted two cats to replace Kitty after she died. But the rescue place wanted me to have this brother & sister pair, even though I had gone in to adopt a different cat. They insisted that I have these two instead and they wound up being such a joy to me.
When Wayne and I thought we were having a baby, we decorated the nursery. But no babies came, so it eventually turned into my office. So my office on West End Avenue was half-nursery. This is right after Bunny & Buster were adopted.
I could not believe I found this photo!! This is the house my family lived in from 1964-1966, in Cleveland. I took the photo decades after we lived there, but this was our house! I have so many memories from this house. I could write an entire book just about that. I found out years later that both of my parents disliked this house, but my dad bought it because it was really close to the school — just down the block. And both me and my older brother started school when we lived here.
I did not even remember that I had this photo!! Mikey Rivera and I were going to buy this house in Easton, Pennsylvania. It was owned by a priest who rented it out. We were “renting to own” when my mom got sick and we wound up moving back to Ohio. We lived in it for 6 months.
This was my office in that house. The house was really old — well over 100 years old. I edited a couple of anthologies in this office and wrote a few short stories, but didn’t live there long enough to write much more than that.
This was my “office” in the apartment Mikey & I rented when we left NYC together, before we moved into that house above. We rented a small one-bedroom apartment in an old Victorian house that was on the Delaware River in Pennsylvania, in the foothills of the Pocono Mountains. We were less than 2 hours from NYC, so it was an ideal location. I could easily go back & forth to Manhattan to meet with publishers and other writers, etc., and Mikey could go visit his son, who was only about 6 years old (!!) at the time. (He’s now well out of college…).
My “office” was in a corner of the living room. He and I lived there for 3 years. I wrote 3 novels in that little corner — including Freak Parade, which I wrote about Mikey Rivera. I also wrote three novellas and many, many short stories in that little corner. I also edited 4 fiction anthologies. All in that little corner. I was extremely creative there.
Naturally, Mikey and I shared the tiny apartment with Buster & Bunny! And according to my lease, I was only allowed to have one cat. So we always had to hide Buster from the landlord. Luckily, the two cats looked enough alike, that if one would sit in the front window, you couldn’t really tell if it was a different cat. The only problem was to never let both cats sit in the front window at the same time. The landlord only lived a couple blocks away, so I was constantly worrying that he was going to see both cats at the same time. Luckily, my little desk was not far from the window, because I mean it was a constant chore to keep both of them out of that window at the same time. (It was a beautiful bay window, looking out over the river.)
Okay! That’s my little trip down Memory Lane for today.
Well, the podcast recording went very well yesterday, although I barely even mentioned The Guitar Hero Goes Home! We talked about a bunch of other stuff, instead. Mostly the state of the erotica publishing industry now compared with its heyday, when we all first met. (Me, M. Christian, and Ralph Greco, Jr.) I will let you know when you can listen to it on YouTube.
And today, I am feeling better all the way around. The bruise on my thigh is a hideous mass of vibrant colors now, but almost all the pain is completely gone. And this evening, I’m meeting Kevin, the director of my play, for dinner, so I’m really looking forward to a chance to get out and socialize again. Yay!! And we’ll be discussing all the things that are going on with my play, so I’m very eager to hear about all that.
Nick Cave’s official web site sent out an email this morning, announcing the screening dates for the extended film version of Idiot Prayer – Nick Cave Alone at Alexandra Palace. To purchase tickets, you can locate your area here. (I think. I might have just given you the link that says you can’t yet buy tickets to see the film in Crazeysburg, but I’ve been assured the film is coming here soon!) (Just kidding, of course. Nothing comes to Crazeysburg!!)
Okay, that’s it!! Have a terrific Friday, wherever you are in the world. Thanks for visiting, gang. I leave you with “Euthanasia,” the new song by Nick Cave, which is in that film mentioned above. Enjoy. I love you guys. See ya!
Marilyn's Room 