Author: John Dowling

I am a fine artist focusing on abstract art. I was a fine art & photojournalist for 35 years. My art is extremely valuable often obtaining prices above $85,000 for each original piece. Currently I am offering the entire lifetime collection for $30,000,000.

Chapter 11 – Matt and Rosanne

Chapter 11, “Matt and Rosanne,” recalls working security at the Directors Guild Awards — turning away Matt Dillon at the ropes, partying inside, and a bleacher romance with a blonde bombshell from a famous acting family.

The Directors Guild of America Awards at the Palladium is an ultra-exclusive party and awards ceremony. I was completely unaware of what the Directors Guild was, but was told that it was one of the most exclusive invites anyone could get in the entertainment business. In the early eighties, The DGA chose the Palladium as a venue for its annual party and awards ceremony. The top directors from around the world and their guests would come to the Palladium to participate and celebrate after the ceremony. This party was different than other celebrity events, as the most powerful directors in the world were in attendance. Most every SAG actor and pretty much every A-list celebrity and actor wanted in. But this was for directors and their guests only. The security was, by far, the tightest of any event I worked prior.

I was given the task of keeping unwanted fans and party crashers from getting in. I had the list and was told no one gets in who isn’t on that list. When I started to qualify the security level they expected me to enforce, I was told, if they were not on the list, no entry. Period! As the date approached, the manager came over to me to have a private conversation. He did not want the head of security to hear. He said, “If someone really famous comes to the door, make them wait and call me.” It was obvious that he liked to hook-up celebrities in return for favors, both for the club and personally. While I was committed to security, I knew that it was my manager who determined if I did or did not have a job. I had to be politically strategic in those situations.

This was a huge deal for me. I was still considering acting if the opportunity came along. My father always told me, “It’s not what you know, it is who you know.” I intended on knowing the right people. This was a huge opportunity for me to expand my options. Once people started arriving, I realized just how exclusive the event was. There were Bentleys and Ferrari’s, stretch limos and all kinds of incredible cars dropping older people off. The funny part of it was that I did not know any director by face or name, other than Stephen Spielberg or Ron Howard. They were the two directors that did not attend, or at least I did not see them arrive. So, I did not recognize anyone who came to the ropes without first checking the list. When the escort or publicist would tell me who they were, I was like, holy shit, I know that name. It was very exciting. People were taking photographs of the stars. I must have been in many of them.

Everyone was prompt. I learned that many of the guests were there early for an even more exclusive invite. As such, after the first half hour or so, the ropes were not too difficult to manage. It was almost boring. I would have preferred to be inside. Then, all of a sudden, a guy walks up to me and starts to chat. After a bit of bullshitting he said, “well aren’t you going to let me in?” I was very nervous. He was a huge star who had just headlined in the Outsiders, a hugely successful film. It was Matt Dillon, but I could not remember his name. I was that nervous. So, when he asked, I looked at my guest list and asked him whose guest he was. It was humiliating. At least I knew he wasn’t a director, even if I couldn’t remember his name.

Well it just so happened that Matt Dillon was not on the list. What the FUCK was I going to do now? How could anyone turn away a movie star like Matt Dillon? When he finally told me his name he said, “I am not on that list. Do I have to be?” He said it with an aggressive, ballsy attitude and smirk on his face. He was even somewhat threatening. I stayed calm even though I wanted to punch him in his face. I thought about letting him in and risking my job. I didn’t know if the manger would protect me or if security would fire me. There was no way to reach them on the radios. They were too busy inside, so I was forced to make a judgment call.

We were about the same height. He came up to the ropes as if he were getting final instructions from a referee at a boxing match, before we were going to touch gloves and go at it. He was staring directly into my eyes. So, I did what any badass Irish kid would do, I stared right back at him, put my clipboard down and moved right up to the ropes. I was going to intimidate him into either going at it right there, or changing his tone. After all there are worse things for a career than knocking out Matt Dillon, or getting knocked out by a movie star. I was not into fighting at all. I swore it off after having hundreds of fistfights during my childhood. I was a typical Irish wise-ass who never backed down to most anyone. These days I would run for the hills, screaming like a little girl, begging for help. Well maybe not, but there was no fucking way he was getting in without going through me. At that point he started to realize he was fucking with the wrong guy.

I made him wait at the ropes for over fifteen minutes before I even tried to call management and security. After he stopped staring at me and trying to intimidate me, he switched strategies. He smiled and asked me to please call the manager. It became obvious that he was the guy the manger was talking about earlier. So, what the heck was I going to do now? Call Management or Security? I played it cool. When I heard the head of security was coming to the front for another issue, I called my manager. I figured if they got there at the same time and saw Matt Dillon and I standing toe-to-toe, they would come over. My manager did. As soon as Matt saw my manager, his tone completely changed again. He said, “don’t you know who the fuck I am?” I respectfully replied yes I do and I would love a photograph and your autograph, if you do not mind. He was livid and could not believe my audacity.

As my manger signaled me to let him in, he said, “You have a big set of balls dude.” My reply was “if you only knew, you never would have fucked with me to begin with.” I let him know I was willing to go anytime, even inside. He really got to me. I was only too ready to go at it, but I started to think that it would be far better to hang out with him and pick up some chicks together. So, I thanked him for being patient and asked him to wait for the head of security to leave. I told him that his manager friend was not the guy with the guest list. The only way he was getting in was if my boss said it was ok. I left him at the ropes and went over to Steve and asked him if I could let a friend in. He looked up at the ropes and saw who it was and nodded his head yes. I went back to the ropes. As I did, Matt put his hand on my shoulder like were old buddies. I flinched a bit, thinking we was going to take a cheap shot at me. But as he did, he winked at my boss and said, “Do you mind if I take this guy in with me?“ Much to my surprise the head of security said go ahead They all laughed as we went in together.

At that moment, I was feeling beyond cool. So, Matt and I walked in together. Once we got in, he went to mingle with some directors. I went to the dance floor, where two super-hot actresses were dancing together. There was no one else on the dance floor. Once inside, I realized that it was a very low-key event. Everyone was in a tux or gown. Most were much older than we were. I started hanging on the same side of the dance floor as the two hot girls. As soon as I got close to them the music changed. The DJ started playing faster, more current, music. As the next song came on, a smoking hot blonde actress grabbed me and pulled me onto the dance floor. I figured she must have thought I was someone famous. She was way too hot to be pulling me onto the dance floor. I had no idea who she was, but she was a great dancer.

We were dancing everywhere including on the speakers. It was old school, pretty much the couple’s dances that my mom taught me when I was learning to dance as a teenager. It was not how I would typically dance in a nightclub. We were getting the attention of the directors and guests. That was exactly what she wanted. She really knew how to dance. As each new song would start, she would change her dancing style to match. Almost every song had a music video. And, every music video had dance moves. She was emulating every dance move from most every song that was playing. I thought that she was a professional dancer as opposed to an actress.

By the end of the night we were making out in remote sections of the bleachers. Since it was a VIP event, every bar was open, but the place was relatively empty. We made our way up to the Michael Todd room and went behind some white curtains. We were hot and sweaty. She took off my bow tie and unbuttoned my shirt and started fanning us with some napkins. Well that is what I thought she was doing. Before I knew it, she was unbuttoning the rest of my shirt and taking my belt off. She pulled my pants off me without even unzipping them. She leaned back over a cocktail table to reveal that she wasn’t wearing any underwear and we started to go at it. I was young and she had been teasing me all night, so I came jackrabbit fast. As soon as I did, I heard my manager’s voice saying “John there are cameras everywhere. You and your guest better get back down to the party.” She was freaking out. I didn’t realize it, but she was an extremely popular actress.

The last thing she wanted was a videotape of me fucking her on a cocktail table. My manager assured her when she started freaking out that the video cameras were off in the Michael Todd room because the organizers insisted on no videos or photographs. They even turned off the security video that night. He showed us no tapes were in the VCR’s and she was relieved. Talk about a buzz kill though! He confided in me later that I would never have been given the opportunity to work another party if security found out I was banging a guest. So, he really did have my back, just like I had his, at the front door.

I never saw that blonde bombshell again. Later, Matt told me that she was from a family of famous actors and actresses. I had no idea who she was. I figured that he was just fucking with me, for fucking with him earlier. I didn’t know who she was, but even if it was Rosanne, I would never confirm or deny it. Regardless of who she was, it was a great night. And, not just because I hooked up with a future movie star. It was the night I danced in front of hundreds of directors with the hottest girl at the DGA, but also became friends with Matt Dillon and his brothers. His brothers came later in the evening, when they opened the place to the general public. They all came to my first NYC nightclub photo exhibition, weeks later, at Heartbreak. As a side note, from that point on, I always worried about what was captured on those Palladium cameras. I did aa lot of crazy shit there before I found out about them.

 

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Chapter 12 – The Girl In The Red Dress: Next Chapter →

Chapter 12 – The Girl In The Red Dress

Chapter 12, “The Girl In The Red Dress,” recalls a wild night with a woman in a red dress at the bar — a lady’s-room encounter, a limo ride home, and a sunrise scare that ended the romance before it began.

I’d never been in the lady’s bathroom before. This was no way to get my feet wet, but she was making it impossible to refuse. When we agreed to meet by the bathrooms I had no idea that she was going to drag me into one, lock me inside a stall and rip my clothes off. I was working the bar and I would never just leave it, except to use the rest room. Certainly, not for this purpose. She was hot. She wore a tight red dress that hugged her body perfectly. She had an amazing body. She was all-American looking with brown hair and bright blue eyes. She was not my usual type. I was taken with her. I knew I had to get back to the bar, but with every thrust I also knew that this was a once-in-a lifetime opportunity. I didn’t want to get caught away from my bar for an extended period of time, certainly not with my pants down, in the lady’s room, I just could not resist.

She had been coming up to the bar every fifteen minutes asking for water. Each time she gave me a huge tip. No one tipped for water back then, even when it was fancy mineral water. It was about the time in the hospitality business when bottled water became popular for the first time. Clientele pretty much felt obligated to buy it, but they were not going to tip you for it, at least not more than a buck or two. So, when this amazingly beautiful girl, in a red dress, started flipping twenties at me and telling me to keep the change, I knew something was up.

We started kissing. After a few minutes, she dropped her dress off her shoulders. She was completely naked underneath. She was tall and slim with a professional swimsuit or lingerie model’s body. I had never seen her before. I recognized most of the models who came to the Palladium from Elle or Vogue, or from their headshots the agencies sent me. I was shooting every day when I was not bartending, so I knew many of the working New York City models by their images, but not this one.

I could not hear her very well at the bar or outside the bathroom. I just kept following her and willingly following her directions. Originally, I thought she just wanted to get my number so we could shoot, but she never asked me for it. Once we were in front of the lady’s room she started kissing me and dragged me inside. There were a few men in there. As a guy, if you went into the lady’s room you were going for a bump, or you were gay. Straight guys rarely went into the lady’s room back then, so I was a trendsetter. As we entered, she put some lipstick on and then took my hand and dragged me into a stall. No one was paying much attention.

It was tight with the two of us inside, but the bathrooms were new, so they were clean. The lady’s room seemed to be much nicer than the men’s room. I never compared them before. They seemed luxurious. She went inside first, turned towards me, put her arms around my neck and pulled me towards her. She was kissing me quite passionately and I was of course loving every second of it. After only a few minutes, or so, she lifted her arms over her head, folded them together and her shoulder straps fell off both shoulders. She pulled me close to her and pushed her pelvis into mine. I rarely wore underwear behind the bar, so I could feel the curve of her pelvis grind against mine. Almost immediately she was unbuckling my belt and ripping my clothes off.

I lifted her legs, as she supported herself with both arms around my neck and I swung her hips towards me and away. She was a tall woman so it was an awkward position. She was supporting herself by bracing her arms on the walls of the bathroom stall. I thrust as deeply as I could but she was slipping from my grasp. There just wasn’t much room. As she slid out of my arms, I spun her around and re-inserted myself inside of her from behind. She braced herself against the back wall of the stall, but still there was not enough pumping room. Eventually, as I was thrusting fairly hard, her hands slipped down the wall until she grabbed the stainless-steel top to the toilet with her right hand and the flusher with her left. By now she was moaning loudly. Between my ass banging against the bathroom door and her moaning, we were starting to attract attention, although we weren’t aware of it.

It became dead quite in the lady’s room. People knew exactly what we were doing, but we were oblivious. At times, we stopped and listened to see if anyone was saying anything, but we heard nothing. I was nervous that someone would catch us. While it was undeniably exciting, I was nervous and self-conscious. Soon she not only was moaning to the rhythm of my ass banging against the stall door, but she started to orgasm, screaming and flushing the toilet over and over. It was moan moan, flush, scream, moan moan, flush, scream. At this point I was pumping so hard it must have sounded like a bull was trying to break out of the stall. Finally, we came together and we started kissing again. As fast as her red dress came off, she put it back on. Then, she sat down on the toilet and started peeing.

I gave her a wet kiss and told her I would meet her at the bar. I opened the bar stall door slowly. She said she would wait a few minutes before she came out, to be discreet. Nice plan, but as soon as I took a step out of that bathroom stall about a hundred women started to clap, whistle and scream all kinds of things at me. They knew what was happening. I was shocked! I figured maybe one or two girls would hear the noise, but this was insane. We had an audience the entire time. I ran out of there, back to the bar, hoping no one would know it was me. It didn’t take long before I was getting tons of phone numbers slipped to me at the bar.

She waited for me to get off. I frequently used a limo service, so I called one of them and we took a ride uptown to my penthouse. We fooled around in the limo the entire way home. I always kept chilled champagne at the bar, so we were drinking Dom before we even got there. When we arrived, we went right to my second-floor bedroom and I went down on her for the longest time. Eventually after several sweaty orgasms we both fell to sleep.

The sun would always stream through the French doors to my bedroom. At sunrise, she was in a deep sleep, but I wanted more. We drank a lot of champagne, so she was probably hung-over. She must have thought we were going to sleep-in, but I had a shoot at the beach with other models that morning. Despite how great the night was, I knew the models would be terribly disappointed if I didn’t keep the booking. I figured that I would wake her up with a “bang”. Then, I would make a graceful exit. I had a great time, but I figured any woman who bangs a guy she doesn’t know and goes home with him, was probably not the kind of woman I wanted to bring home to meet my family. I often laugh at myself because of that now.

So, I started to position myself closer to her and used my fingers to lightly tickle the inside of her thighs until the moaning started again. I slid down and started to use my tongue until she was humping the bed slightly and rolling her hips higher and higher, arching her back to provide me with more access. Once her hips were high enough and she was dripping wet, I kneeled behind her and inserted myself inside her slowly. She was very wet, so before long we were going at it with a much greater degree of thrust and momentum. I remembered from the bathroom stall that she liked it that way. She was using her arms to support herself doggy style as she pushed back into me with every stroke. Even though she started to participate more in the thrusting, something told me that she was new to intimacy. That made it even more of a turn on.

I came so many times I did not think I could cum again. I wanted to give her a parting favor so she would come back. I slid one leg off the bed and then managed to pull her towards me as I put both my feet onto the floor. She was moaning louder and louder. As I was cuming, she started to cum with me. Her entire body started to quiver uncontrollably. As she quivered and moaned louder, her vagina started to tighten around me. It was much tighter than I had ever experienced. She became, what seemed to be, twice as tight. I thought she was orgasming particularly hard, I know I was.

I was in pure ecstasy. Not only from the amazing physical feeling but also from hearing and feeling her intense orgasm. It was one hell of an orgasm. It lasted so much longer than usual. Soon, she turned to me and the quivering started to intensify, so much so, that she started to scream as she came. In the midst of her climax I looked up at her and saw the whites of her eyes. Her entire body tightened. Her hands were ripping the blanket off the bed and she started quivering violently. She looked possessed. It was scary, so scary that I wanted out. But, there was no way I was getting out unless she let me out; and she was not letting go. Finally, she passed out. I thought I had “fucked her to death” and was terrified! I thought she might have taken drugs. I was I shocked at what was happening.

When the quivering stopped, she was out cold. I could not wake her! I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t detect a pulse or a heartbeat. My heart was beating so hard I thought I was going to pass out. Did I kill her? Was she really dead? I ran for the phone and called the emergency room at the hospital, which was only blocks away. She was only out for minutes but it felt as if time stood still. I finally got a doctor on the phone. He calmed me down and told me that she probably had a seizure. He said that most of the time they were not dangerous. He instructed me to make sure she didn’t swallow her tongue, bite it off, or damage her eyes. I held her hands away from her eyes and put a washcloth inside of her mouth to keep her teeth from touching her tongue. It seemed the worst was over, but she was still unconscious.

The doctor said to wait ten minutes and If she didn’t wake up to call 911. He told me to get her ID and to try to call someone who knew her. He also wanted me to try to find out what medications she was taking. She didn’t have medication in her purse, but she did have a learners permit. To my amazement, she was only seventeen. I was terrified. I had no idea how she could get into the Palladium without proper ID was beyond me. They were extremely diligent about ID. No one could get in without a legitimate age verification and I worked the door so I saw how strict they were. I was only a few years older, but never would think of being with someone under eighteen. I never even met anyone under eighteen at the bar. Finally, she woke up. The first thing she said was, “what are you doing in my pocket book?” My response was, how old are you? She didn’t remember we were together. In fact, she didn’t even know who I was or what happened. At that point I was like, holy shit, did she take drugs last night? I started to ask her questions. The doctor said when she woke up she might need some time to understand what happened to her. Meanwhile she was dripping with my cum. She started to become more coherent and told she was seventeen. She was afraid I would not have slept with her if she told me her real age. She was going to be eighteen shortly, but still.

About thirty minutes later she started to remember the events of the previous evening. She would ask, “did we have sex in the bathroom last night? Did we take a limo back here? Is your name John?” Everything was coming back to her. She told me she could not call her family as she told them she was sleeping at her girlfriend’s house. Her father was old school. He ran a sanitation company and would kill me if he found out. Not only was she on the border of illegal, she was the daughter of a mobster. I was now even more nervous. Not for her, but for me! I knew I couldn’t ask her to leave, or take the chance she would have an unattended seizure, so I came to the conclusion that I would have to find a way to get her home. I was completely overreacting, but I didn’t know what to do. She was so unsteady. She wanted to go home, so I put her in a limo.

I never did go out with the girl in the red dress again. She did call to thank me for the evening. She wanted to date, but I told her she had to wait until she was eighteen. She was embarrassed that she had an epileptic seizure during our relations. I told her not to sweat it. Still, she felt I was blowing her off because of it. I did not want her to feel any less a woman, so despite my fear of becoming fish food, courtesy of her father, I continued to speak to her until she finally stopped calling. The moral to this chapter is, the next time you are taking a woman from the reverse side and she starts to get tighter and tighter, tap her on the shoulder and check her eyes. While that chapter only lasted twenty-four hours, it was one of my most memorable and certainly one of the kinkiest. I did shoot the following day with another model and we did go at it all day. But, that is another chapter. It really did take me so long to really understand the meaning of true love, live and learn.

 

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Chapter 13 – Ménage A trios’: Next Chapter →

Chapter 13 – Ménage A trios’

Chapter 13, “Ménage A Trios,” recalls a sunrise beach photo shoot that spiraled into a day of drinking, passion, and an anything-goes ménage à trois.

The sun had barely risen. It was a golden haze partially hidden by the morning fog. As we walked through the sea grass, the morning dew was cold and wet against our ankles. We were approaching the shoreline. The waves were lightly rolling in. They were large enough to create the beautiful white and blue highlights that compliment my swimsuit and body shots. The seagulls were flying low across the horizon. It was a typical, tranquil, sunrise on Jones Beach. I was quite young and would often shoot at the fields I grew up on, field 3 and 4, sometimes the West End and Robert Moses. She was a native Long Islander. Despite the fact I was now living in New York City, I continued filming on the beaches, as I have most of my life.

I was not making a lot of money as a photographer, but I was making a living and meeting women from all over the world. It was unusual that this model was from Long Island. She was gorgeous, very sculptured and European looking. She was a tall blonde. For a model, she was exceptionally well endowed. When she took off her top, it became evident as to how curvaceous she truly was.. She was a teen model who just turned eighteen. I was only a few years older. I had shot hundreds of models, but I had never photographed anyone with breasts of that size. Most models were considerably less well endowed.

I never understood why models loved to get naked when we shot. Later, I learned that they are just as free spirited as I am. For them, it made the shoot more fun and fulfilling. Despite what people might think, every one of my chapters of love was a beautiful experience, even the ones that began quickly after meeting. I never judged any of the women I was with, at least I tried not to. My father once told me, “For every willing guy there is always a willing girl. What makes you think women are any different than us?” He was right, but I was still very naïve when it came to women, what they wanted and what they were willing to do to get it. This was despite my obsessive sexual appetite.

As the sun rose higher and higher, we started to get tired. It was about an hour or two after sunrise. We had been shooting for hours. We were near a lifeguard stand. I liked to use them as props and it also allowed me to shoot from the God point of view, almost directly above a subject. As usual, I brought a bottle of champagne. Champagne was a great prop that would never go to waste.

We started drinking directly from the bottle before it was even eight in the morning. We laughed and said it was noon somewhere. Soon those tiny beach flies materialized out of nowhere, millions of them and they were biting us. They have a nasty bite. It was getting worse and worse, so we took a sheet and covered ourselves. After the champagne, she attacked me. I thought she was an innocent young lady. Maybe, she was. She told me she was with her boyfriend for almost seven years and never had an orgasm. And now, she wanted one.

We started going at it and she had plenty of orgasms. In fact, I would go so far as to say that she may have been the most orgasmic partner I have ever been with. After about an hour of non-stop pumping and cuming, I suggested that we take a nap. I was dead tired. She agreed. She lay in my arms and we fell asleep with the sheet still covering us. I woke with my penis inside her mouth. She was trying to get me going again, but I was so tired. After a while I was ready. She rolled on top of me, inserted me inside her and started to grind. We were both sweating and came together. This time she really came. She started to scream. She grinded and milked every ounce of cum out of me she could.

She was dripping sweat onto my chest. It was hot, so she threw the sheet off us to get some air, bugs or no bugs. As she did, we realized that we had fallen asleep for several hours and there were thousands of people around us. Everyone saw the entire event, even the lifeguards who were only a few feet away. They were watching us while we were under the sheets. When she threw the sheet off we were completely naked. We couldn’t believe that we didn’t hear the crowd around us, but we were in our own world. While it excited her, she wanted to leave the beach immediately. She was so embarrassed. We drove to a local bar and had raw oysters and a few beers. The drinking age was eighteen back then and it seemed like the thing to do. Neither of us was of a mindset to continue the shoot, plus the sun was too strong and the angle too high. I figured we would have lunch and shoot at sunset. She had a different plan. Of this, I was unaware.

She dropped her swimsuit bottoms at the bar without me seeing and suggested that we play a game of pool. When the bartender was busy stocking the bar, she bent over the pool table to show me show me what was, or in this case, wasn’t under her short skirt. Before I knew it, we were at it again, this time at the side of a pool table in a bar. It was dark for a bar. There were no windows, just faint light emanating from the entrance and a dirty bulb over the pool table. She started to scream. The bartender came up from the basement to see what was going on. As he got to the top he saw my gestures to get lost. You should have seen the look in his face when he spotted her amazing breasts. He was very cool about the whole thing. He knew me, as I had been to this bar many times before. When we were done, she wanted more but I couldn’t perform. I was raw and tired. Every muscle in my body ached. She had worked me all morning and rode me all afternoon. I was shot. The shy innocent girl who showed up for the shoot was, in reality, a firecracker, maybe much more. When I refused to do it again she took off her shirt and sat at the bar. We were the only two people in the bar except for the bartender. He was loving it. I didn’t really know her, but I was getting jealous. I had already assumed that we were going to become boyfriend and girlfriend, or at least something more than how we started out.

She was trying to coerce me into doing it again. She said she was going to screw the bartender if I didn’t. I refused and shortly afterwards we left, but she was angry. We went to shoot at the relatively new EAB plaza in Uniondale. Fifteen minutes later she was going down on me. When I again refused, she got upset. I asked her how many times did she think I could do it. Her feeling was, she waited years for the right guy. When they did it, it was lousy. I was going to be fortunate enough to get it. But, she was insatiable.

I wanted it as often as possible as well. But, a man can only do so much before he can’t go any more. Her break-up was just a day or two before, so she wanted it again and again. She decided before the shoot that she was going to have me. I didn’t know what to do, so I took her back to my apartment. On the way, I left messages for two of my friends to call me after they got off from work. I invited them over to meet my new friend. It seemed as if they got to my apartment before we even hung up the phone. One of my friends put on a suit and tie. It was hilarious. By this time, I knew she was a nymphomaniac. I was never going to be able to keep up with her so I invited them to help. My message was “I’m with a super-hot model. I can’t handle her. Please take a shower and meet me at my apartment.”

They arrived separately. As each knocked on the door she greeted them nude with a juicy kiss. Five seconds later they were all over her. She refused to do anything unless I was in bed also, so I joined them. One of my friends was going down on her. I thought to myself, if he only knew how many loads I dropped into her. Then one moved up to her breasts and was sort of motor boating with his lips. My other friend went down on her and was sucking on her vagina in the weirdest way. I could barely keep from laughing, even when she went down on me, as I was standing by the side of the bed.

It was just too funny for a young man like myself. They were going to have sex with her at the same time. It was too dirty for me. I had no interest in doing it again, especially not in the presence of two of my friends. I was raw and hurting from all the earlier sex. Even my tongue and mouth were sore, as I went down on her for hours over the course of the morning and afternoon. With that I burst out laughing and left the room. They were both with her all evening. They thought I was the man. Of course, I never had the heart to tell them what had transpired earlier that day. The next day, I bought each of them a bottle of strong mouthwash.

They looked at me strangely. I simply said, “don’t ask, just use it liberally.” I did see her many times over the years but she became markedly more conservative. Even when I saw her at Penn Station once or twice over the years I never said anything about that crazy day at the beach. I could tell she appreciated the confidential way I kept my chapters of love. I was only too happy to see that her modeling career was taking off and she was working consistently. For years I saw my photographs on her comp card. That short chapter of love was very satisfying in many ways, both creatively and passionately. Of course my two high school buddies always thought I was the man because of that one day they hooked up with a beautiful model because of me. It would not be the last time I introduced my friends, even my friends with benefits.

 

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Chapter 14 – Monkey Business: Next Chapter →

Chapter 14 – Monkey Business

Chapter 14, “Monkey Business,” recalls childhood games of Truth or Dare — a sixth-grade lakeside adventure that ended with poison ivy and a hospital visit, and a reconnection years later in high school.

I was in elementary school. After a sixth-grade graduation, I managed to convince the principal to let me have the flower arrangements at each end of the stage. I combined them into one nice bouquet and left them outside the classroom of a, very cute, girl who I was taken with. I included a note. It worked, for soon afterwards we were experimenting in my tent, playing Spin The Bottle, or Truth Or Dare. Each of those games was a popular way to tempt girls into fooling around, while at the same time being somewhat innocent. But, by this time, I was not sure how innocent I was.

I had already gone through communion class. I figured I was going straight to hell for having gone all the way with my babysitter. I believed it. The nuns at church solidified that belief when I hinted I was not a virgin. There was something about going to confession I could not stomach at that age. I was not about to ask for absolution from fucking, when I was ten. It just seemed a bit much. Since I was going to hell anyway, I said screw religion. I do not believe in a God that would condemn me to hell. But, all the same, it was always in the back of my mind. I went through communion, but as soon as it was over I never went back to church again. Well, at times I had to and I always sat in the back and never ever went for confession again. I had not real mentoring when it came to religion as my father rebelled against the catholic church for beating him while he was an alter boy in a Christian boys home.

We would mostly pick Truth Or Dare. We would play with other kids who knew we were fooling around. Word spread like wild fire.   Not only were we the first kids in the school to be dating, we were the youngest. None of the sixth graders were dating. Most were feeling the first throngs of sexual awakening, but had no concept of what to do about it. When we started to get nervous about fooling around in my backyard tent, we thought that we could use a secluded area of the park. At first, we were going to use that same tent for privacy, but tents were not allowed. So, we improvised and took our bicycles and a blanket to the park.

Because we were so young, we had to tell our parents exactly where we were going. Beyond that, we were worried that someone would see us under the blanket. We had decided to stop with the oral and hand experimentation and go for it. We searched for a private spot, but there weren’t any. People were playing tennis, basketball, football, running and jogging. It seemed that every single sport in the entire world was going on around us.

I was not particularly nervous about doing it again. In fact, I had a major case of blue balls. They were aching like crazy. In between the babysitter and my new love interest, my doctor told me, that I had to rub one out. Truth was, I was rubbing one out at least once a day anyway. I was using my gym socks as a repository. Unfortunately, I was running out of gym socks. Interestingly, they were never as soft afterwards. No matter how many times they were washed, they would always be crispy in places I came. I thought I had super sperm.

I was determined to start the sex games I played before I moved back to East Meadow, a year earlier. We found a few spots that had vegetation so we could crawl in between the plants. Although we could hear everyone and they could hear us, no one could see us. But time and time again, footballs were tossed close to us and joggers would almost be looking down at us as they ran by. If they were walking, they would have seen everything. So, we packed up our bicycles and went to the lake. The lake had many pine trees and hills. It was infamous as the “make-out lake” by most of my older friends who would talk about such things in front of me.

I decided to tell my friend that we were going to take a bike ride by the lake. He was tagging along waiting for his girlfriend to show up. He knew what we were up to and was acting as our look-out. For him, it was more like a spy game than romance. For us, a look-out as we were afraid of getting caught. So, we took our bicycles and rode to the lake. There were couples on blankets making out behind every bush, so there was nowhere for us to go. Eventually, we found a large group of cypress trees with branches that were low to the ground. We rested our bicycles up against the tree to block the view. But we knew we weren’t hidden enough, so without saying a word we looked at each other with a mischievous smile on both of our faces, and then we both started climbing.

The tree had large branches. They were all parallel to the ground, so it was an easy climb. The branches were almost like stairs to a tree house. As we climbed higher and higher, we realized that the foliage around us was so thick that we were well hidden. I was about half a body length above her. I dropped my shorts to my ankles. Without saying a word, she went down on me. I remember the tree was sticky with sap. Everything was sticking to everything. Her hand could not slide over me because it was so tacky. I think that was the only reason she agreed to use her mouth. Even though we kept half joking about going all the way, we were both very nervous.

Shortly after she finished going down on me, she climbed a bit higher and I started on her. She was either shaving or she was bare down there, so it was clean. I enjoyed it immensely. Then, she hung her pants on a tree branch and lowered herself onto me. We were going all the way. We did this for just a short while. My lookout friend was fixing his bicycle chain under our tree, probably sneaking a peak. As fate would have it, the wind started blowing. This was a scenario too inconceivable for anyone to write into a script. The wind was moving the branches so we could now see the ground. We also realized that anyone on the golf course could also see us. I called down to my friend. When he looked up, the wind blew and there was a perfect opening for him to see me still inside her. He was shocked that we were actually doing it, started laughing uncontrollably and then just took off on his bicycle. We dressed quickly and went after him. Don’t ask me why. It seemed like he was upset and the wind was getting stronger.

When we caught up to him she asked if he was upset that his girlfriend hadn’t shown up and if he wanted to go up the tree with her. I said that I didn’t mind. After we discussed it for a while, we decided against it. For me this was like a sport and had nothing really to do with love. There really was no love involved as I did not know her long enough to love her. Although any time you are intimate with another person, I think it is accompanied by a feeling of love.

She was a virgin and was pretty sore, so we walked our bicycles home. Although she did not bleed during, she did bleed a lot afterwards. I didn’t know to be gentle with her, as I too was so inexperienced. We just wanted to do it. She was a tomboy. We played lots of sports together. She was very taken with the time I gave her flowers. The entire school was gossiping about us. That made her happy. She wanted everyone to know that she was with me. I didn’t want her to tell anyone about our tryst in the tree. I thought we would be marked with a scarlet letter. You just knew that sex at that age was not supposed to be happening. We didn’t care enough to abstain though.

Later that evening she called and said that she was sticky and itching all over her vagina. She thought she caught a venereal disease. The next day the skin on my penis started to bubble up. In places, the skin was peeling off. We thought we were doomed, that the devil had given us venereal disease. I made her swear not to tell her mother or anyone. She agreed. The next day was really tough. I was afraid to even take a bath. The skin was bubbling up all over my body. She was suffering the same fate. We were convinced it was God’s wrath. What else could it be?

Finally, she told her mother. Her mom took her to the hospital. They found she was covered in a poison ivy rash. We both were. I found out that I was also allergic to sap, so I was in much worse shape. Her mother and father were livid. The next time I called she told me I was not allowed to call her anymore. We were not allowed to see each other. I cried privately for at least a week and was singing sad songs. I could not tell anyone my heart was broken for a second time. I thought she was just a friend but I really did get attached to that cute tomboy. I think if not for poison ivy, we would have been together for a very long time. Fate stepped in that same year as we both went off to different junior high schools.

Years later, in high school, she came back into my life again. We talked for the first time in years. There definitely was a connection. But, that connection was based only on our shared intimacy. She chose to be with women for the remainder of her junior high experience. By the time we reunited it was clear that she only wanted women. I was shocked. I never told anyone, as she asked me to keep it a secret. We formed a genuine friendship, but every time I saw her I could not forget making love to her in a tree, in broad daylight. At my sixteenths birthday party, my “lookout” and best friend, who was still a virgin, gave everyone at the party a silk-screened shirt that read “Do it in the TREE’S.” With the cat partially out of the bag, he told the story to all my friends, even my girlfriend at the time, who said she wanted to do it in a tree with me too. . So, we did. Only this time it was a much larger tree with no sap. It had fallen behind the school, next to the Wantagh Parkway. I usually rode the minibikes I built there, but this was considerably more fun.

 

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Chapter 15 – Cadet Training: Next Chapter →

Chapter 15 – Cadet Training

Chapter 15, “Cadet Training,” recalls a police-academy cadet who visited his bar every weekend — a cocaine-fueled romance he ended dramatically before moving to New York to pursue photography.

I was very naïve about love; despite the fact I was sleeping with more women than I could have ever imagined. I was bartending. It was the 80’s. Just about everyone was experimenting with fetishes. I was no different. This was a very strange chapter of my life. She was a police officer in training who really liked her handcuffs. I had no idea she was training to become a cop when we first met, at my bar, as she was in street clothing. I was still shy, so I occasionally tapped into the liquor supply to give myself a little extra boost of courage. I had worked in the hospitality business for a short time, but typically as a waiter. This was both my first full-time management and bartending gig. By the time I found out she was an actual cadet she had me in handcuffs. While in uniform, she started cutting up lines at the then infamous Bethpage Hotel on Hempstead Turnpike. I was ridiculously nervous because I couldn’t believe a future cop was doing blow.

There was no way for me to escape. Frankly, I did not want to. But, I never did blow and never wanted to. This was going to be my first time, except for one tiny bump when I was drunk with a cheerleader. She was not only hot, but also very persuasive. For those unfamiliar, blow is an extremely dangerous drug, especially to anyone who has obsessive or addictive personality. This was a very bad decision. It became a weekend ritual. She would handcuff me to the bed and go to town on me. She was the more active participant in the actual thrusting and pumping. I was kind of her sex slave of sorts. Our relationship was completely based on role-play and sex. I really didn’t know her. I did know that she was related to many different families of cops to much later on in our relationship. Almost every working adult in her family was a police officer, so the fact that she was bringing blow to the hotel freaked me out. As much as it terrified me, the sex was so different and so intense I couldn’t bring myself to end it.

For months, every Friday or Saturday night, she would come to my bar after she finished at the academy. We would leave my car at the bar and she would drive us to the hotel and check-in. She got some kind of a cop discount. Then it was off to the room, where we would party all night. We would sleep most of the next day. Then, she would drive me back to the bar for the next night’s shift, or home to shower first and then the bar. She was not a model, as I did not date models at that time. Most of the time I dated fun, tomboy, type girls. She was no different. Except for one key point, to say she was the dominant one in our relationship would be an understatement. She was soft and pretty. It seemed as if she had absolutely no fear, not even of getting caught with blow. She was like the tough female cops you see on television. I think the Bethpage Motel was making most of its revenue from weekend affairs. It was set-up as a kind of sex motel where you could book rooms for the night or even for a few hours. I never knew a hotel to have such an elaborate collection of headboards, especially brass ones. Then again, most of my corporate life I stayed in business or commercial hotel chains.

I was snorting blow off her breasts and teasing her. Not that I wanted to or liked it, I just did it to appease her. Most of the time I would blow it away first and then pretend to snort it. She loved it. It was a huge turn on for her. For me, not so much. It made my heart race and I was paranoid. I hated the stuff. All the same, she was an amazing lover. This was truly kinky sex for anyone, let alone a guy who preferred the standard missionary position. Other than when we were at the hotel, she was quite serious about her future as a police officer. But, at the hotel it was always the same. After meeting her parents, it was clear that her father wanted a son. He treated her more like a fellow cop than a daughter.

Eventually she proposed to me, she actually wanted to marry me. I wanted no part of it. I only stayed with her because she threatened me. She told me that if I ever left her she was going to shoot me. I thought she was just screwing around at first but eventually I knew that I had to end it. I didn’t want a cocaine-using cop as a life partner, no matter how intense the sex was. I felt trapped. If you ever hear a woman admit that she is too afraid to leave her boyfriend, or husband, believe her. I was terrified about breaking up with my cadet girlfriend. If not for a frightening event that gave me the opportunity to leave her, I believe she would have carried out that threat. She was obsessed with me and addicted to cocaine.

I finally found a way to end it. One night, when I was going down on her, we heard sirens coming closer and closer, until they were outside the hotel. At first, it was a turn on for her, as it made things more realistic. She was enjoying the change of being in the submissive role. I enjoyed it quite a bit certainly more than being handcuffed. As the sirens got louder and louder, she was getting more and more turned on. I was wearing a police uniform she brought from the academy… guns and all.

I never felt comfortable doing it, but I would go along with most anything at that point. I was afraid she would use her connections to screw with me if I tried to end it. Even possibly getting me fired from my bartending job. She was even trying to get me to go to the academy to become a police officer. She said with her connections and my reputation I would get in easily. It was something I was considering seriously at the time. She was a virgin when I met her, despite her fetishes. Because of that I couldn’t have sex with her and then just dump her, so I stayed with her much longer than I would have otherwise, especially because she was a virgin. Well, it was that, but also the threats.

So, we were at the hotel and I was going down on her. I was wearing the cop outfit with the entire package. She was handcuffed and completely high. She was screaming quite loud. Mostly, “no no,” “please stop.” I was supposed to gag her but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. What we didn’t know was that someone in another room heard her screaming and called the police. Before we knew it, there was a knock at the door. They identified themselves as police. There was a female and a male cop. I was freaking out. She went to the door without any clothing on and showed her credentials. They left as soon as she said she was fine and they realized that she and her entire family was “on the job.” For a good ten minutes, I was sure we were going to be arrested for breaking what I thought were so many laws. I had idea which laws, but I was sure we were in deep trouble. I was so naïve that I thought I could be arrested for simply “impersonating and officer” never mind the blow she had.

When they left, she wanted to go back at it, but I was done. I called a taxi when she was sleeping and went back to the bar to get my car. After that, I didn’t return her calls or communicate with her again. It was cruel of me. I know she was heartbroken, but I wanted nothing to do with a blow-using cadet who was forcing me to indulge. Eventually, she stopped showing up at my bar and I stopped hiding from her. In time, she became a police officer. At that point she started coming to the bar with other cops. It was obvious they were the ones now going to the Bethpage Hotel with her. A few times I could swear I saw white powder on their noses. But, that was the eighties for you.

Eventually, I left that job and moved to New York City to pursue my photography career. Jobs were coming to me faster than I could shoot them. I was also going to school locally for both business and engineering, but I decided to take a semester off, to see how far I could take my photography. I never did go back for my degree. It is a decision I now regret. But I had to get as far away from her as possible. She was now a police officer. Who knows whom she was handcuffing?

Years later, I was involved in a massive street brawl with two gang members, on Long Island. I was defending my life against two of them, terrified as they attacked me just before I got into my car. I was tough, but these guys were ten years older and wasted. They were trying to steal my wallet and intimidate me into giving it to them by not allowing me into my car. When I refused, they took an entire pizza and wiped it across the front windshield of my car. Then they came at me. Somehow, I left them both face down and bloody in the puddles that accumulated in the mostly dirt parking lot. Finally, the police arrived. Four officers got out of their cars. The two gang members got up and started screaming, “that guy attacked us both. Arrest him.” I never had to defend myself against two people at the same time, let alone gang members. I simply fought for my life and in the end thought I was going to be arrested. I couldn’t believe what they looked like. They were bloody. I really hurt them, but had no choice.

I didn’t have that killer instinct when I boxed or wrestled, but it was better off getting arrested than being killed. Just when I thought I was going to be arrested, several of the store merchants who saw the event, told the officers that I was attacked. Moments later, a detective showed up. It was that same cadet. She spoke to the officers who then left. She followed me back to my parents’ house with her lights flashing. When I got home, she and another officer told my father that the gang members were going to kill me if they found me. She smiled at me as she was leaving. Clearly she kept any mention of our previous relationship from her partner. Later that night my father went to that bar and beat the shit out of every gang member in the place. He was not a violent man but would never allow anything to happen to me. I will never forget that night, or those nights, I spent with my cadet. She was one adrenaline filled chapter of love.

 

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Chapter 16 – My Ballerina: Next Chapter →

Chapter 16 – My Ballerina

Chapter 16, “My Ballerina,” recalls a petite ballerina he met while bartending at the Palladium — a passionate, obsessive romance that unraveled over drugs and an older rival.

Not long after I broke things off with the cadet, I moved to New York City. I was subletting a friend’s apartment on 45th street in Hell’s Kitchen. Once I moved to New York City, my career started to take off. I was photographing many more models and making a lot of money, most of which I spent on photography gear and going out with those same models. I was photographing hundreds of guys as well. I became friends with many of them. Often, we would go clubbing or should I say, hunting. I shared some of the funniest and best moment of my life with those guys. We hunted and partied from New York to LA. My social life was on fire. I was popular and felt appreciated as a person, as well as for my photography. I wanted to help artists advance their careers whether they could pay me or not. Often, I would take things in trade. Once, I even got a python. Often I would trade those items for things I did need. It was a surreal time in my life.

In addition to my wild ways, I had a reclusive side. This came out when I wrote or edited and almost always when I printed in the dark room. Occasionally, I had actual photo shoots in the darkroom, which were typically followed by sexual encounters under the red lights.

I was bartending at the Palladium when I met my ballerina. Getting a job at the Palladium was not easy. It was a hot spot and there was a lot of competition. My friend who was one of those professional models knew a dancer whose boyfriend was the head of security. She was a tremendous break-dancer. After I photographed her, she introduced me to her boyfriend who got me the job with Steve Rebel. I was very fortunate. It turned out to be a tremendous experience.

Like every young man, I had both wild sexual desire for a variety of women, as well as a need for real love and companionship. It seemed as if I couldn’t find both passion and an intellectual connection in the same person. So, I had many different chapters. That too I am grateful for. How boring would life be to only have had one lover and one soul mate. Boring, but perhaps fortunate. I honestly do believe that there is a novel of love waiting for me somewhere out there.

I was working at the Palladium for just a short time when I noticed a very petite and beautiful ballerina dancing near my bar. She was with a guy. We had the opportunity to speak when she came to the bar for water. I assumed she and the guy were not romantically involved. She was not a model, but she had such a beautiful face and was so graceful. She was a classical ballerina who was living at a world-famous school of dance in the city. Her parents lived upstate, in New York. Because the school was very strict with their curfews she had to sneak out of the dorm to see me. When she did, she was always sore from that day’s ultra-high-paced and demanding schedule. She was shy. I admired her beauty and talent. She was talented yet humble. Both those qualities drew me to her.

It was such a turn on. She would demonstrate the most beautiful dance moves. Our relationship centered on art and the creation of it. I wish I had those photographs now. She was one of the only subjects I gave my negatives to, thinking I would be able to get them back. But, I never did. Same thing happened when I photographed Andy Warhol. I lent the negatives to a model and never saw them again.

She would come to my apartment and dance for me. Eventually, I would lose it and interrupt her routine by kissing her softly and gently everywhere. She had such sad eyes and mannerisms to match. I think it was her inner sadness I fell in love with. Whenever she could get away from school, we dated. Unfortunately, that was not very often, so I dated others as well. As much as I loved her, she was dedicated initially to dance more than our relationship and her school was extremely demanding on her time.

I remember how she would call me from a pay phone at the school and ask me to let her come over. The answer was almost always yes. Even my Midwest, farmer’s daughter neighbor, would get the boot when she called. I would order Chinese food and we would get high together and create. She never considered it work, as she loved the photographs. They were always black and white. She was far too graceful for color. We dated for months, until I started to fall in love with my neighbor. But that was not what ended our relationship.

She started to come to the Palladium and just sit by the bar, watching me, for hours. She didn’t like the fact I was dating other women. So, she would stay late until I got off to make sure I didn’t go home with anyone. That, she was available for. However, she was always dancing when I was free during the day. I told her that if she were more available, I would see her exclusively. I was bartending six to seven nights a week and she could only get out one or maybe two times a month during the day. That was simply not enough, so I never made it exclusive. I wanted to. I loved her. But, she was more committed to her dancing than to love. I didn’t blame her. I was equally as dedicated to my photography career. Despite our loving relationship, we both knew what our priorities were.

She started to come to my apartment when I didn’t pick up the telephone. That became a problem. I told her that it was not fair and that I was dating other women. I did not lie to her. I certainly didn’t want to hurt her. I was always honest with her as I was with pretty much every girl I dated. She became overly jealous and unpredictable. She began to flirt with guys at the bar. Although I was jealous, I tried to ignore it until I saw her with a much older guy. At first, she was trying to get me jealous so I would agree to be exclusive with her. When that didn’t work, she started to show up at my apartment and beg me to see her.

It turned out she was doing blow with that older guy. That ended it for me. I didn’t want to see her anymore. That only made the begging more frequent. Oddly, it started to turn me on. Everyone in New York City seemed to be doing blow. She was no exception. At one point, she invited me to a party sponsored by a major corporation. There next to the crudités and dip, was a mound of cocaine laid out on a mirror topped table. People were snorting it in the open, like it was nothing. We got hammered. That was one of the first times I indulged. I not only liked it, I loved it. It was much different than the cut blow I had done a few times with my cadet. It was crazy. I was beyond stupid. Being influenced by the NYC in-crowd was no excuse.

From that point on, she would bring some over and we would create all night long and screw all morning. It was pretty much impossible to get it up with that much blow in me. So, we always did it in the morning. I did not even consider it a drug. I was so naïve. I considered it recreation. Eventually, I didn’t want to do it anymore. That angered her. She began to try to bribe me with immediate oral sex if I agreed to let her in, when she showed up unannounced.

It got to the point where she was showing up to service me and leaving, even when she knew I had another woman coming immediately afterwards. She would swallow as I jammed my package as deep down her throat as possible. I held my hand on the back of her head, so she had no choice. It became fetish-like. She enjoyed it when I was rough with her. I liked it too. It was not something I engaged in prior. It certainly did not fit my idea of love, but it definitely fit hers. This went on for months. I would look forward to the begging phone calls and immediate oral sex. For a young man it was just a short lived “power trip”.

This is a bit bizarre, but occasionally, she would spit my cum into my potted rubber tree. It had not been doing so well. Believe it or not, that rubber tree became huge. There had to have been a connection.

The older guy she was seeing was about thirty. She was getting the blow from him. He asked to come to my apartment with her. He wanted to free base. I wanted no part of it. He brought a duffle bag that held a machine gun and kilos of cocaine. That was the last time I hung out with her friend, the dealer, or her again. I was terrified. I told her that I would not see her again if she continued to use drugs. She chose blow over me.

The separation didn’t impact me greatly. I was heavily involved in my career, plus women were throwing themselves at me. My new neighbor became more of a factor in my life. That made my dancer even sadder. The last time I took her call, she told me she was totally dependent on blow to get her through her dance routines. At that point she left school to live with her parents.

Despite the drugs and the fetishes, I did love her. I did everything I could to talk her out of seeing the dealer. Time after time, I would tell her that she would find someone better than me to love. Eventually we lost touch. Her parents were very strict and wanted her to remove herself from her former life. They forbade her from using the telephone. So, we had no contact even though my intent was to help her start a new drug-free life. I never saw or heard from my ballerina again. But, I think of her often. I regret not keeping those negatives, as photographs are often the connection to my past chapters of love, long after they are over. I sincerely hope she is continued her dancing, as she was the most graceful dancer I ever saw personally or professionally. Looking back on it now I truly believe we would have had a very long chapter of love if she had avoided that dealer and stopped begging me to party with her.

 

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Chapter 17 – Honeymoon Affairs: Next Chapter →

Chapter 17 – Honeymoon Affairs

Chapter 17, “Honeymoon Affairs,” recalls a heart diagnosis that sent him to the gym and then to an island “honeymoon” — a wild vacation of photography and casual encounters before reality crashed back.

The same day I was diagnosed, I quit my job and started spending eight hours a day at the gym, or working out elsewhere. I would walk around the indoor track so many times I would lose count. When I couldn’t handle the gym anymore, I would ride my bicycle in the park, at least ten miles. I was up to a few hundred crunches a day and lost at least fifty pounds. Not that I was fat, but I could be as in my past, extremely skinny. Prior to my fitness commitment, I hadn’t been eating well, but I had been eating a lot. Money was plentiful and so were my restaurant visits. Salad was hardly an intimate acquaintance. In between the exercise sessions I would cry. In fact, I’d cry all the time. Why I cried, I did not know. I was never afraid of dying, at least not consciously, but I was concerned for my parents. They had suffered so many heartaches. I didn’t want to be the biggest one. That was what helped me through some of my toughest times.

I was not sure if I was going to live long enough to go on what was supposed to be my honeymoon. However, as the months passed, I began to realize that I might live long enough to do so. At the time, I was being paid ongoing commissions despite the fact I left my job. I was also working part-time as an analyst, after I resigned from AT&T. I think I was having a nervous breakdown. I told my sales manager that I would be dead in mere months. A more empathetic company might have put me on a trauma-based leave of absence or on disability. Instead, they just accepted my resignation.

I was experiencing major chest pain when I exercised. For some reason my hips hurt as well. I thought from riding my bicycle and walking so much, but as it turned out it was related to poor circulation. I went from out of shape and just a bit overweight, to a rock-hard cardio machine. But, I knew something was very wrong. My second set of blood tests showed my numbers were off the charts. What made it even worse, was no one could even tell me what I had. It would take a very expensive blood test and genetic mapping to make that determination. That technology did not exist commercially at the time. One doctor concluded I had asthma and another said I had asthma and eczema on my elbows. They could not have been more wrong. Another doctor told me it was my inner ear that was causing the issue and put me on steroids. The doctors were literally just guessing and the plethora of diagnoses made a dire situation even worse. My hands were turning orange and xanthomas, growths of rock hard cholesterol, were growing all over my body and inside it as well. It was disgusting to say the least.

Eventually, a doctor found a match for my condition in a medical textbook. But he only got half of the story. The reality of the situation was that I had two genetic mutations. The growths on my elbows, knees, and other joints were similar to the growths on the “Elephant Man.” They were growing even faster in my arteries and organs. Although this is a form of uncontrolled cell growth, it is not cancer. My body simply has a hard time processing any lipid, no matter if it was plant or animal fat based. The resulting, rock-hard, plaque growing in my body, was going to kill me. According to Nassau County Medical Center it would happen within months. When I left the hospital, I called my boss and quit. I never shared the diagnosis with my rock star fiancé. I just scared her away and she ended our engagement. I was not only going to die. I was going to die heart broken, as I loved her with all my heart. Depression set in and then, I think, shock. I was not even twenty-five and my life was ending.

There was no such thing as statins back then. Even stenting was uncommon. All four arteries in my heart were over ninety-five percent blocked. The walking and the exercise was keeping my arteries from getting worse, but barely keeping me alive. The true miracle was that my body somehow managed to grow new arteries. But at this point no one knew that I was one of the small percentage of people who could. My diagnosis stood as a death sentence.

At the time, my fiancé thought I had lost it. I experienced frequent episodes where my eyes would tear. I couldn’t control it. It happened most often when we were together physically. I couldn’t make love to her without thinking that she was about to be a widow, before we were even married. I lost it. I couldn’t maintain any sense of normalcy during those moments. Oddly enough, she never did ask me what was wrong. For me it was just too emotional. I was planning a way to end the relationship so she would not be going to my funeral in her wedding dress.

She became more and more distant, as did I. I did all I could do to reverse the damage and grow arteries but no one knew what I was going through. I was trying to exercise myself into Olympic physical condition. I loved her, but I tried hard not to think about her. If she had agreed to have children immediately after we were married, I firmly believe I would have married her. I was torn. I didn’t want to leave this world with my bloodline ended. At the same time, I didn’t want her pregnant at my deathbed. I also could not tell her. If I had, I knew she would not leave me. Eventually, I came up with a plan to chase her away. All the same, I was hyper-focused on having a child before I died. My plan was to have a child and leave a note for my father to take my place after I passed. My father lost his father to a train accident when he was only eight. He never recovered. I was determined to give him a grandchild before I died.

Before our relationship ended, we actually had a date for the wedding and the venue selected. We even had our engagement party. I had to get away, so I planned to go on what was supposed to be my honeymoon with a friend. In Saint Maarten, I played my wedding date on a roulette table in a local casino. I wanted verification from above that I had made the right choice in ending our relationship without telling her I was dying. Starting with only fifty bucks I won thousands of dollars! People started to put their chips on top of mine and the place started going crazy. It was the first and only time I every gambled in a casino. I won a small fortune. Almost immediately, I was upgraded to fine champagne and gorgeous women were hanging all over me.

I started spending like there was no tomorrow, as I thought there would not be. I brought a few of the casino women, as well as other willing women I collected along the way, back to the hotel. Several bottles of champagne later, I wound up in my room with one very pretty, intelligent, college girl. I came inside her without protection at least three times. I was trying to get her pregnant. I was a bit drunk and totally obsessed with making a child. After I planted my seed in her, I found another willing participant downstairs by the pool.

My entire stay, I was photographing everything while walking and sleeping with one woman after another. I used no protection. I must have slept with six or seven women between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five. Not a single one asked me to use protection. This went on all week. I would switch back and forth from one to another. I didn’t even know their names. We would just meet, drink, have hot sex and then I would leave. It was a blur of photo shoots, sex, snorkeling, walking and popping nitros.

Nitroglycerine is one of the drugs the doctors gave me to keep me alive, during cardiac events, when my capillaries were pushed past their limits. I would frequently suffer from severe angina attacks. Despite my workout routine, I had still not grown enough arteries to manage wild, hot, sex. I was putting my life in grave danger. I was also potentially fathering more babies than any man should, especially a dying man. I gave every one of them my contact information. I was hoping at least one of them would tell me she was pregnant.

I was hoping it was the girl I went sailing with. We took a sixty-foot catamaran to a small island, where we all snorkeled in the nude. Most of the girls on the boat sunbathed nude as well. I joined the party. I was snorkeling for hours. The coral reef was so beautiful. As I floated on the surface of the water I forgot my troubles. I didn’t even feel the angina. It was an extremely peaceful experience. The beauty of the reef below me, the sun beating down on my back and the warm water caressing my body took me to a different place. A place of comfort, I had long since forgotten. She would swim alongside and under me. She was very overt in her flirting. Eventually, we floated to the shoreline. She laid on her back, partially hidden under the water. I mounted her partially submerged. We made love with our genitals under the water. Since I was partially suspended in the water, it was not as grueling a physical effort. I wound up with quite a sunburn on my back, but it was worth it. The cannabis I was indulging in helped with the pain and for some reason, my breathing as well.

As my time on the island vacation my planned honeymoon was ending, my reality came crashing back to me. I was likely not going to be around much longer. And, she, amongst other women might be carrying my baby. Yes, I was completely heartbroken after losing my rock star fiancé and of course about my diagnosis, but I was obsessed with trying to get all, or any, of these women pregnant.

Having, wild, unprotected sex with virtual strangers was the most insane thing I have ever done. However, I was at peace with the fact that after I was gone, my mother and father would have part of me still…. a child…a grandchild to love. Quite possibly several.

 

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Chapter 18 – Natasha: Next Chapter →

Chapter 18 – Natasha

Chapter 18, “Natasha,” recalls meeting an elegant Eastern European woman over beluga caviar and Cristal at Maxim’s — and a daring beach photo shoot in a black gown, immortalized on a lost roll of film.

When I met her, I didn’t know she was involved with someone, nor did I want to ask. I just wanted to get to know her. She was the embodiment of fashion and beauty, white gloves and all. I was bartending at Pierre Cardin’s extravagantly expensive Maxim’s, one of the world’s most famous French restaurants, located in the Helmsley Carlton House on 61st and Madison Ave. in New York. It was an outpost of the famous Parisian belle époque cafe founded in the 1890’s. It was a weekend and she was alone. I had never seen a woman of that beauty, dressed so formally, alone at a bar. I was waiting for the plethora of men who would soon line-up to capture her attention. I was trying to play it cool, although I could not take my eyes off her. I was pathetically shy. She had such an effect on me that I became clumsy behind the bar. I was ogling her and she liked it. I am sure she was taking a good look at me in my tuxedo as well.

The patrons were extremely wealthy. Most dressed as if they had just come from the opera. Many had. Occasionally, mere mortals, from the middle class would come in. This was generally for special events such as engagement parties or anniversaries. While I was bartending I had the opportunity to expand my knowledge in the culinary arts. I would skip my lunch and dinner breaks to take lessons from the French chefs in the kitchen. I had often thought I would open a restaurant, so whenever I wasn’t bartending, I volunteered to work with chefs, for free on my lunch an dinner breaks. I probably have more kitchen hours logged than many chefs. I have mastered numerous cuisines. I can really cook!

But this chapter is not about cooking. It is about this incredible woman. I wasn’t even thinking about sex when I first met her. I just wanted her to agree to pose for me. I couldn’t wait to get her into my studio, which at this point in my career were primarily the South shore beaches of Long Island. She was a work of walking art from head to toe. As I learned shortly after meeting her, she was a model, designer and also, a fine artist.

The food and atmosphere at Maxim’s was always refined and world class. A string quartet would often play on a mini cabaret style stage. We all wore tuxedoes. Patrons would come similarly dressed. Some even wore top hats. Other than in the movies, I had never seen anything like it. I had never even been to a black-tie event prior to working there. As for the food, the duck was incredible, as was the chateaubriand in a demi-glaze. I would eat there most nights when I bartended, right in the kitchen with the chefs who were training me. I spent very little time with the head chef. Usually, I trained with one of my friends, who was the fourth or fifth chef. He was the one who introduced me to the restaurant management. He was also instrumental in helping me get the bartending gig there. In all, I was taught by about four of their top chefs who appreciated my interest in learning French cuisine. When I was bartending I would make them cocktails and sneak them into the kitchen. That was totally against the house rules, but I paid for them out of my own pocket so I didn’t see the harm in it. They weren’t supposed to be drinking on the job, but they also weren’t supposed to be teaching me how to cook the entire menu either. My manager knew. As long as I kept ringing up more sales than any other bartender, he looked the other way.

After a quick dirty martini, she ordered beluga caviar and Cristal. This was far too expensive for me to comp or buy for her. She asked for two glasses and two plates, so I assumed she was waiting for a guest. She seemed to be as enchanted with me as I was with her. I have never been particularly fond of any body type or figure other than totally fit and she was as fit as any fitness model I had ever seen. Her accent was intriguing, different than anything I ever heard. It was the glamorous way in which she presented herself that made her so irresistible and alluring. This was amplified by the fact that she did not stop staring at me.

Her accent was Eastern European, but I don’t recall where she was from, other than I don’t believe it exists anymore. As she was waiting for her champagne and caviar she perused my portfolio and told me that she was also an artist. She wanted to paint self-portraits from photographs I would take of her. She loved the way I used natural light and the reflections from water to create glowing, golden, bodies with dynamic highlights. This was my style of shooting for both headshots and body shots. I was starting to gain a reputation for showing the human figure in this way, in contrast to so many photographers in the eighties who were using the new Speedetron studio lights. I always brought my print portfolio to work with me. I never knew when I was going to meet someone who was interested in shooting with me. I always recruited none agency models and actors to shoot with me, even if they were not pursuing careers any longer or never had. Often I would use photography as an icebreaker and very often because I loved the human figure. She was mesmerized by my work. She couldn’t believe that with such talent, I was a bartender. It was obvious that she came from money. If not, someone was paying for all that beluga and Cristal. Someone with lots of money!

Although I was more than willing to photograph her without any fee, as I often did for others, she offered me an enormous retainer. As I served her the Cristal and the waiter brought the beluga, I realized that she ordered the champagne and caviar for the two of us. I immediately asked for the rest of the night off. It was the only time I ever asked and the manger agreed to let me off early. He knew what was going on. Despite the fact we were not allowed to socialize with the patrons, he looked the other way. We shared several bottles of Cristal. The caviar was new to me. The champagne was delicious, as was the caviar. To me it tasted like a woman, so I thought that must be why it was so expensive. I didn’t understand why a woman would like it. I wondered if it was a universal aphrodisiac. It definitely was to me!

This would be my last bartending job. My life as photojournalist, portrait and event photographer had begun. It was not until later in life that I became educated in software development methodologies, telecommunications, data mining and analysis. Careers I became very accomplished at for a short period of time.

She would top tiny, crispy crackers with caviar, chives, and other accompaniments. She would feed me one, eat one herself and then we would both toast with Cristal. We went through several bottles. I knew the tab would be over a thousand dollars. Later, she asked me if I needed a ride home. At this point, I was living at my parent’s apartment, while I was looking for an apartment in the city. She thought I was living in the city when she offered. I told her I had to go to Long Island to get my equipment out of storage. She suggested that we take her car. I was taking trains and commuting, so this was all new to me. Before we left, she ordered more caviar and Cristal to take with us in the limo. At that point I shouldn’t have been surprised that she also purchased the silver crystal caviar plate and mother of pearl spoons as well. But, I was.

While I believed that she had her own car parked in a lot nearby I found out shortly she had a limousine with a driver. She directed the driver to take us to my Long Island apartment. The entire trip she flirted and poured glass after glass of Cristal. I ran in, retrieved my equipment and we went right to the beach. It was as if I was dreaming. This was not what a woman of her stature was supposed to be doing with a middle-class bartender who was driving a Plymouth Duster. We didn’t need any clothing for what was going to be an abstract and implied nude shoot, although she had an entire wardrobe in the trunk of the limo. She had it converted into what appeared to be an upscale portable closet, so she must have owned the limo. So, no clothes were needed. All she needed was a towel, which she did not have, so I took two from my parent’s house. Her only requirement was that I give her all the negatives. She offered me five grand for the shoot so I didn’t care if she took the negatives and a pint of my blood. But, as we became more and more flirtatious she became just as important as the money and the shoot itself.

She had her driver drop us at the beach. We were going to shoot and then sleep on the beach. It was late fall, but it was unseasonably warm. There was no one on the beach that morning. The sun was rising over the horizon and the first bits of sunlight were peeking through the clouds that were low in the sky. The gulls were scarce, yet somewhat audible with their chirping. The tall tufts of dried sea grass were gently rolling in the breeze, on the dunes, beside us. The rest of the sky was golden. Her skin was glistening in the orange glow of the morning light. The wind was gentle and soft. It cooled our skin as the sun warmed it. It was a beautiful day to be at the beach. Truly, a beautiful day to be alive. I felt as if I was living in a fairy tale. It was all so surreal. The water had turned from a green tone to a cool reflective blue, as the sun rose higher in the sky. It wasn’t the mild chill in the air that gave me goose bumps. It was the sheer magnitude of her beauty, as she slowly undressed. She did not rip her clothing off and change behind a towel, as many models did. She turned it into an art form. She took her sweet time, knowing that she was seducing me.

She was wearing a long black gown. There were many buttons on the side of the dress. She slowly was undoing them, one at a time, as she looked over her shoulder at me. I was in a black turtleneck with my black photographer’s vest and black jeans. I always wore black when I was shooting. She had a confident smile on her face, mixed with a look of satisfaction. As she laid her dress on the sand I could see that her body was even more sculptured than I imagined. My heart started to race. Under that gown, she was wearing black garters and lace lingerie.

She removed the garters very slowly. Every few seconds she would look back at me and smile. Each time she did, I became more and more entranced by her seductive striptease. She took off the garters and gently laid them on top of her dress. Then she took off her bra and put it on top of the garters, while carefully covering her nipples with one arm and hand. She was staring at me each time she turned and was intentionally keeping enough to my imagination. I was hypnotized by her grace. Then, she sat down onto the sand, facing away from me and slipped off her panties, using her feet to kick them away. She was on her side facing away from me, acting very modest. That combination of grace and pure animal sexuality totally stunned me. I couldn’t bring myself to start shooting. I stood there gazing at her for what seemed like an eternity.

She rolled onto her stomach with her arms still covering her breasts. I could see her back and the curve where it met her buttocks. Her dimples were as perfect as were her curves. She was lightly covered in a thin layer of sand. I fell to my knees and started shooting. Back then we used motor drives to advance the film. We were engulfed in silence, broken by only the occasional high-pitched screeches of the gulls, the surf, the sound of the shutter and the camera’s motor drive advancing the film. I was shooting faster than I had ever shot in my life. It was instinctual with her. I didn’t have to pose her. She would turn gracefully while covering her nipples and vagina with her hands. The sand would stick to her body and fall off as she moved. It was getting much warmer as the sun rose higher above the horizon and I began to sweat, so I took my vest and shirt off.

I switched to a telephoto lens, to blow out the background and put the 300 2.8 on my camera body, so I had to move far away from her. Before I did, I walked over to her and dropped to my knees, as she was lying on her back. I moved the few strands of hair that were in front of her eyes. She reached up to me and pulled me towards her to kiss. It seemed as if that kiss lasted for minutes. I felt as if I was floating. It was a gentle but passionate kiss. I was the modest one, but I hadn’t expected it. I starting to mount her, but she pushed me away, covered her breasts again and with a nod of her head let me know the kiss was as far as it was going. She was shy despite her courageous posing. It might have been the Cristal, or the moment. I have no idea what prompted the kiss, but the goosebumps were again moving up and down my body. I was rock hard. I knew she was checking, as I caught her staring as I was getting up. First it was my groin and then directly into my eyes.

I put the camera on my tripod, to keep it steady, as my hands were shaking. I was about thirty yards from her. As I continued shooting and directing her, she took her arms off her breasts and vagina. The distance and the kiss had emboldened her. I was lying with my head practically in the sand to get a low angle. I could feel my erection against the cool sand, which made it even harder. I thought I was going to cum right there. She waved at me to come to her. This was it. She wanted me

I closed my eyes and lowered my head. My heart started beating even faster. Before I got up I took one last look through my lens. All I saw were legs… hundreds of legs. There were hundreds, maybe thousands, of marines in full battle gear, running between us. There were so many I lost sight of her for a few seconds. Then as gaps between them opened, I saw her rolling into the water, trying to hide herself. We both were so focused on each other; we never saw them coming, until they were directly between us.

It seemed to take forever for them to pass. When they did, I ran over to her and gave her my vest and shirt. She was freezing. The water was cold. Her mouth was wide open the entire time, as if she was in shock. As our eyes met, I wrapped my body around her to warm her. She did not put her dress on. It was far too expensive to come in contact with wet sand and salt water. It didn’t belong at the beach. Once she stopped shivering, she looked into my eyes and we both burst out laughing uncontrollably. She asked if I took any photographs of it. Of course, I had. That excited her. Her body was amazing. She had a look almost identical to Natasha Kinski in Richard Avedon’s famous snake photo. That shot inspired me. When I saw the actual photo, it was startling how much she looked like her.

We walked back to the parking lot quickly, as she was freezing. It was empty, as the beaches were not open that time of year. Not even a single marine was anywhere to be seen, as they disappeared into the distance. To their credit, not a single one broke formation, said anything, or stopped running. Within thirty minutes her limo was back at the beach. She dried off and cleaned herself up in the car. I called a friend to have him bring my reflector, which I had forgotten. The sun was now too high above the horizon to shoot without it.

We shot in the sea grass with him reflecting light for us. At this point she was not willing to do nudes. She was too rattled by the sudden appearance of the marines. Utilizing her wardrobe, we shot all day, through sunset. My friend swore she was the real Natasha and always told that to people. I never could confirm or deny that it was, despite the similarity. Just before sunset, we asked my friend to leave, as we were done shooting. We made love on the beach until it was dark and so cold we were both shivering.

We cleaned up so her driver wouldn’t suspect anything and went back to the limo. She asked her chauffeur to drive me home, but on the way, we were feeling so close we didn’t want the day to end. She didn’t want to go back to the city, so we handed him the film to take to the lab and she gave him the rest of the night off. I was embarrassed, but I drove her to a hotel, yes the infamous Bethpage Hotel, in my Plymouth Duster. It was the same place I had gone with the cadet. It was the only hotel I could afford, especially since the processing of the film was going to cost almost as much as the Cristal. At this point I had decided not to accept her offer of the five-thousand-dollar fee. I checked us in and as soon as I set up my strobe lights we were going at it again and taking photographs as well. She was getting so turned on, she coaxed me over to the bed with my camera in hand. She was rolling around in the white sheets and alternately hiding and exposing different parts of her body. Later, after we slept a bit, she went into the shower and posed erotically behind the shower curtain, to seduce me to join her. I couldn’t resist, even though I was exhausted.

The next morning, we went to the Empress Diner for breakfast and then to the NYC lab to pick up the film. I mostly shot black and white, as per her request. To say she loved the photos was an understatement. Back in the limo, she kept hugging and kissing me. Suddenly, her mood changed and she started to get upset. I asked her what was wrong and she admitted that she was involved. Her driver met us at the lab and handed her an envelope when he first arrived. She hugged me and gave it to me. As she left, I could see tears in her eyes. I teared-up as well. I knew I would never learn her name or anything more about her. I would never see her again. I knew it and of course I was correct.

About a month later, I found a roll of film with a frame or two shot from my “Natasha” shoot. I cherish those two shots, as it is all I have to remember her by. She was my Natasha and I will never forget the day a thousand marines crossed our path in the middle of a shoot. For weeks, I was heartbroken and shed a few tears every time I thought of how connected we were. She was committed to someone else. That someone else was the one who paid for the caviar, limo, dinner and my $5000 fee. It was painful, but gave me hope that I would find my true love one day. Even if she was not my soul mate, we did have an amazing chapter of love.

 

← Previous Chapter: Chapter 17 – Honeymoon Affairs
Chapter 19 The Kiss That Broke My Ribs: Next Chapter →

Chapter 19 The Kiss That Broke My Ribs

Chapter 19, “The Kiss That Broke My Ribs,” recalls testing his heart in the Swiss Alps — walking miles in freezing cold, photographing a recovering addict and a Miss Switzerland runner-up, and breaking his ribs for a kiss and a camera.

I went to Switzerland to test my heart while it was still freezing in the Swiss Alps. At the time, I was living in Southern Florida. I had to leave New York, despite my life-long love for the city and the beaches of Long Island. It was one of the hardest decisions of my life. I was depressed, lonely and lost, as I knew no one and nothing about Florida. I did know it was over eighty degrees, year round- It was the perfect climate for walking, but it was the most boring place I have ever lived. It was like being stuck in a perma-vaction nightmare. Granted, if you were on vacation for a week or even three months and living as a snowbird, it was paradise. But to give up everything and everyone I knew; friends, clients, family, to live in Naples, was nothing short of waiting to die in paradise. I was deathly homesick.

I left New York knowing that the cold winters would kill me if I stayed. I cheated death so many times, despite the fact the surgeons couldn’t fix my heart completely for almost fifteen years. I was walking a marathon (26.2 miles) every two days, seven days a week, for almost six months. I recently learned, when one has stents inside failed stents, the arteries become less flexible. When it gets cold, there is more pressure. You can feel it because the walls of your arteries do not give as much as they normally would. It could cause a heart attack. So, when I left Florida for Switzerland, I did not know if I would survive. A heart attack was a distinct possibility. Yet, this was a rare opportunity to live on a farm in the countryside, so I packed my three hundred pounds of production gear and computers and was on my way. At the very least I would know if I could move back to New York, or if I had stay and try to build some kind of life for myself in Naples. Or even more concerning, If I could survive in the cold again at all.

I was going to stay with one of my best friends. I photographed her for years. On her birthday, she would always fly to NY, without her husband, to shoot with me. She did this for eight years. She extended an invitation to stay with her while we looked for backing for a feature film we started in Florida, months earlier. It was definitely an experiment. My friend was a world-class model, but I didn’t know if she would to be able to develop her acting skills fast enough to pull this off. I cared about her and we were very close, but we never crossed that line. She was married. I thought that there might be something between us, but I would never lure a married woman away from her husband, no matter how beautiful she was, or how close we had become. I had been in love, with creating with her, for at least five of those eight years.

When I went to Switzerland to meet with potential financiers and investors, I knew it was a long shot, but I needed something to believe in. I was lonely and depressed. Traveling with her, dancing with her and creating with her, gave me hope. She even walked with me. Even dreaming that our friendship might turn into something more was a dream to hold onto. This trip was different, as I could tell that she was no longer in love with her husband. She was dropping hints and suggested that I should move to Switzerland and continue to create with her full time.

Florida was not anything like I expected it to be. Not that I had a choice. I needed someplace warm to live while I was recovering from numerous surgeries. I had a multi- foot bypass surgery on my right leg that not only saved it, but also relieved the agonizing pain of intermittent claudication and from the gigantic aneurism that went undetected for so long the main artery in my leg was 100% blocked from my hip to below my knee. I was in agony for over ten years before they diagnosed it. That damaged artery was causing intermittent blood clots in my calf, so walking was extremely painful. At times, I could barely walk. Before I left for Naples, the surgeons finally fixed my heart, both of my legs and removed a golf ball sized blockage in my abdomen. The surgeries were so painful I was traumatized. I was not only in Florida to avoid the cold and lose weight; I was there because my brain was as fried as my body. I needed to get my body back and I needed to be out of pain. If I continued to suffer, even my children wouldn’t be enough motivation for me to continue to fight. I would have thrown in the towel. I just had enough.

Being on massive amounts of painkillers was not an option. It was an absolute necessity and a recommendation that ultimately saved my life. The surgeries were done at a time that I was in so much pain I stopped eating. I would rather have died of starvation than be in pain any longer. I was either going to lose the weight and make it through the surgeries, or die trying. I quit working, other than writing my memoirs. I quit everything. I gave up medical coverage, my home, everything and just started walking. I had walked for many years prior, but nothing like a marathon every two days. It was a pace I didn’t think anyone could sustain, let alone a guy with 27 stents and a three-foot bypass in his right leg. Not to mention, complication from the other surgeries that caused me to bleed profusely, on and off, for years. I was walking every day post-surgery. I even walked home from the hospital after my heart surgery. I walked everywhere and even gave up my car to make sure I had no choice but to walk. The painkillers did their job, or there is no way I would have survived. I hated the feeling of being on heavy pain meds. It affected my memory and caused me to constantly repeat things. The greatest side effect was that it acted as a truth serum. I started writing emails to everyone I knew. I said and shared things that were best left unsaid. And for the first and only time in my life, I became angry that I was suffering so much, not grateful for more life. I believe it was a side effect from the prolonged pain, as MRI studies have proven that pain over long periods of time will change the way your brain functions.

Tramelan, Switzerland would be the place I either got back my life, or died. I had to put some space between myself and my children and everyone else I loved. I had been an athlete in my youth. Years of disease had ravaged my body and I wanted it back. Even at the expense of going bankrupt, losing everything and temporarily leaving my children. I truly owe my life to my children. They were the only reason I could endure the years of pain and push on. Everyone wants to live. I decided life was not worth living if I was disabled and useless to my family. It was time to kick the painkillers before I moved back to Long Island. If the cold was going to kill me, it was not going to be while I was with my children. I wouldn’t allow them to see me suffer or die in front of them. I didn’t want them to be traumatized, so Switzerland would become my test.

So, with that, I flew to Geneva. There, I walked to the train station and took a several hour train ride to the country farm I was to live on for the next three months. I had three one hundred pound rolling suit cases with me, so it was a small miracle that I managed to traverse my way around, pulling all that weight.

I was walking every day in the Alps, often alongside my friend and her children. It was reminiscent of The Sound of Music. Beautiful snow-covered mountains complete with the smell of cow manure in the fields. They were adorable black and white cows. They would run to greet you, carefully avoiding the electric fences. And yes, I did get shocked once while photographing a model. As I tried to duck under the fence, my arm hit a wire and I was knocked on my butt. It shocked the hell out of me, but acted as sort of stress relief. It reset my “fear factor”. It was a hell of a jolt. The cows knew not to greet me when I was too close to the electric wires. They also had natural stone barriers to keep the cows corralled. They were much like giant dogs, very affectionate and so much more intelligent than you would think. Keep that in mind the next time you eat a hamburger a.k.a. a cow burger. It was at that time I decided to become a vegetarian. For the most part I have maintained that diet ever since. I do eat burgers and steaks occasionally, but I always think of those beautiful cows and feel guilty about it. So, on those rare occasions, I only eat grass-fed, humanely handled, animal products.

I would walk for miles in the freezing cold. I couldn’t believe I was surviving. Not only was I surviving, I was doing well. I still had to deal with the effects of withdrawals from three plus years of taking strong painkillers. I did not take a single pain killer with me. In fact, as soon as I called my primary care physician and told him I was now walking a marathon every two days he said to throw the painkillers out and get ready for all hell to break loose. AS is evident from all the data out there, getting off pain killers after that prolonged a period was going to have side effects. Going cold turkey was going to complicate it even further. Before leaving for Switzerland I threw them in the toilet, took a photo and sent it to my doctor. He was very supportive and literally put his medical license on the line for me knowing that it was my only hope. With that, I was prepared to go through everything I had seen in the movies about going cold turkey and the horrendous withdrawals that came with it. They were horrendous, so I will spare you the details. After living through it I understand why even the strongest willed individuals become heroin addicts when they can no longer get pain killers. I was never going to be one of them. I went through withdrawals over the next year, while I was in Switzerland and couldn’t get more pain killers anyway. Well, not easily. As you will read, I could have gotten them for my two broken ribs, but I chose to suffer without them rather than extend my addiction to them.

I made a great deal of progress. It was also apparent that my life would no longer be the same in winter. The arteries in my heart would forever be somewhat stiff. Still, it was better than being three hundred and fifty pounds and alone, basically in solitary confinement. Apparently, I could tolerate the cold, even though it did slow me down. The next challenge was to see if I could shoot in the cold. Would my heart hold up? Did all the walking and resistance exercises grow enough new arteries? If so, could I start over with nothing but my health? The only way I would know was to try. I had tried for decades and it was not possible. I was always limited, even disabled. I prayed for better results and the opportunity to rebuild my life so I could leave something to my children. During this period, I wrote my memoirs. Often I would post excerpts on social networks and man did I piss a lot of people off. When I was on painkillers, even my emails were six pages long. The first draft of Chapters of Love was a mess. It was over nine hundred pages long, most of it written on my smartphone while I was walking. I was seriously lost.

I vomited daily as my body went through withdrawals. In retrospect my doctor really should have put me in rehab as we both knew I would become addicted taking pain medication for over three years. But back then the pharmaceutical companies campaigned heavily that Oxycodone was safe, but that was a joke. I managed to keep it a secret, but it was ugly. I started to shoot and promote my production company as if I was already in New York. I was again walking and shooting for free to build a reputation in Switzerland and test my heart. My friend was a huge help. To return the favor, I made her the focal point of my photography. Years earlier she was hit by a truck and had to go through a tremendous amount of rehab to get her life back. I always did what I could to help her. Love is not always about sex. It is often about unconditional compassion, loyalty and giving. She was the object of my “paying it forward” when I had nothing to give but my photography. I was hoping to somehow help her build her career to the point she could live her dream of acting in a movie. Soon after arriving and reviewing her screen tests, it was obvious that she had made little progress. She could speak five languages, but she could not remember her lines or express herself in a role. I didn’t know how I could help her. It was then I decided I would dedicate the rest of my life to paying it forward, with my camera, to everyone I could, as I had done so many years prior while walking the country and living in an RV; even for hundreds of charity events.

I came up with what I believed to be a brilliant Idea. I was going to shoot, write, edit, and do the layout for an international magazine that recognized model citizens. I bought the domain ModelCitizensMagazine.com and was on my way to becoming an international publisher. Within days of sharing the first layouts on Facebook I had hundreds of models contacting me about being in the magazine. Since this was about my friend, I put her on the cover and made her the focus of the entire 110-page issue. I included her family, friends and clients. When I saw how hopelessly in love her husband was with her, I knew that despite our chemistry and her assurances that she wouldn’t be with her husband for long, we were never going to be a couple. Neither one of us wanted to cross that line even though at times I was tempted. I am sure she was as well. After all, she lived with me every time we shot, no matter where I was living. She even came to stay with me in Florida, all the way from Switzerland.

I was proud of myself. I again turned downtime into something productive. After a while, many of the top models in Europe were coming to shoot with me. I was humbled by the experience. I also loved the Swiss people and their culture. I was fortunate to see how the farmers lived, while at the same time working with some of the most attractive and charismatic models and actors in Europe. Most importantly, I realized although limited, I could manage my life in cold weather again. Life was by no means perfect, but I was no longer disabled, even though I was still quite handicapped. I could no longer carry my own equipment. Nor could I shoot every day. Photography was no longer going to be my career. It was going to become a compliment to my writing. I had been writing most of my life. Most people seemed to think I was pretty good, so it was natural to blog and to write copy for social networking and web sites. Model Citizens Magazine was a way to help her and of course test myself. What it became was an artist’s dream. I have so much gratitude to the incredible models and people who came together to participate in the very first issues. I was writing about them, showing them love and was sharing their stories with everyone back home. I was honored.

One of the shoots was with a young lady who had not always had it so easy. She was a recovering heroin addict. I wasn’t aware of her past when I agreed to photograph her. After she modeled nude, on the train tracks and in the forest, she told me how much the photographs meant to her and how much it meant for her to be featured in the magazine. It touched my heart. We shot together many more times. Once she brought me some medicinal herbs and wax to help when I fell down a mountain and broke two ribs. Yes, I fell while filming on the side of a mountain. That fall would set my health back years, as nothing can be done to fix broken ribs. They heal, but slowly. I refused to take narcotics of any kind, as fate had it, I was literally still going through massive pain killer withdrawal at the same time.

I was only in Switzerland a month or so. My plan was to stay the legal limit before I had to apply for a work visa. I had approximately three months. When I took that bad fall, I was not photographing the model with the past heroin issue. It was another model who excited me even more. She was the reason I fell. Not only did I fall down the mountain, I fell for her. I had met her online. She was coming to shoot with me in Tramelan. She was gorgeous. She didn’t look Swiss at all. In fact, she looked Italian. She spoke Italian quite well and seemed to have an Italian accent. However, I was no expert in accents.

We shot, after my friend did her hair and makeup in her downtown Tramelan salon. Then she drove me to a lake. On the way, we stopped for bread, cheese and wine. The bread was fresh baked. And, everyone knows the Swiss reputation for great cheese. We drank both bottles of wine in about an hour as we shot on stone stairs that were on the side of a mountain, overlooking a beautiful lake that in the valley below. The stairs that went up to that hill were very steep. They were carved right into the stone hillside. The scene was straight out of a French magazine or postcard. It was there she took her shirt off and posed. I had thousands of watts of portable strobe lights on her. The shots were magical. She was magical. After a while I realized that she was not just posing, she was flirting. When we finished shooting by the lake, we went to another mountain, which was much rockier and steeper. We drove around until we found a perfect view. I could photograph her with a majestic view of the snow-covered peaks of the Swiss Alps in the distance. It was a winter wonderland paradise.

We were now finishing yet another bottle of wine and I think we even had some champagne. She was so European. Her accent was driving me crazy. When she spoke, she was very expressive with her hand gestures. She would gently touch me. I liked it. My body was responding to her touch. The more she touched me the more I wanted to see if it was just flirting or she had something more in mind. Out of nowhere I had a rather impulsive thought. What if I asked her play the role in the film I wanted to produce with my friend? Maybe she could be the lead and my friend who was not doing particularly well as the lead, could play a supporting role? Maybe that would get us funding?

I asked her if she had a monologue and she said no. That burst my bubble because I realized that she was a model, not an actress. If she couldn’t improv a monologue I doubted she could carry a film. So, with that I said, “You’re not an actress, we’ll never pull this off” and went back to our photo session. What happened next was quite unbelievable. I was photographing her. She was in lingerie and out of nowhere she walked directly over to me and kissed me with the most passionate kiss I ever had. It warmed my entire body as if I had been injected with passion. I kissed her back and we kissed again until we were enthusiastically making out. Then she put her finger to her mouth and made the shhhhhh sign, literally communicating that the kiss was just between us. With a wink of her eye we were back to shooting. My heart was beating so fast; I could barely focus. The adrenaline was rushing through my body. I was so dizzy I literally fainted and fell to the ground like a shy teenager and knocked her down the side of that mountain. She fell right on top of me.

I didn’t pass out, but I did go down hard. To protect my camera, I did what any red-blooded photographer would do; I held it up and sacrificed my body. I broke two ribs. Her elbow was bleeding; despite the fact she fell on top of me. That didn’t help my cracked ribs. If I wasn’t buzzed I would not have been able to continue shooting. I was in so much pain. To top it off, I was still in the middle of going through pain killer withdrawals. All I could think about was that amazing kiss. For a brief moment, I believe the cracks in my heart started healing and love flowed throughout my body. Endorphins were washing into my brain. Was this love? Was this somewhat famous, younger, gorgeous model my soul mate? Or was I just dreaming, or even worse, did I have a cardiac event or a stroke?

It was going to take much more than two broken ribs to stop me, so I continued to shoot the rest of the day. The following morning, after she spent the night in the country house with us, we drove to a smaller more intimate lake that had a winding path around it. It was cold and foggy that morning. We were going to shoot video to see if she could act. That one passionate kiss motivated me to see if she could pick it up quickly. I had already started writing Chapters Of Love and thought it would make a great screen play. I used a working title, “Chasing Sunrise,” but never let anyone see the story. I didn’t want anyone to steal it. I also didn’t know if I had the health or the courage to ever share it, so I used that working title while I tried to recruit both investors and actors.

She was a model by profession, not an actress. But, the Italian looking Miss Switzerland runner- up was a natural. All it took was that one kiss and she touched my heart. I thought to myself, maybe I could start my life over in Switzerland, publish a magazine and produce another film. If I had to, I’d shoot in Switzerland, where I was becoming more and more popular. The people in town were treating me like a movie star. That kiss was making me think of all kinds of ways to try to co-mingle our lives. I had very little money left. In fact, I had practically nothing. I had just enough to fly back to New York and with some luck get a place in in the city. I was simply not thinking straight. Her kiss had totally taken over my heart.

When we went to the lake the next morning, we filmed a great amount of video. All I had her say was, “I love you.” This was a directorial technique I used many times to judge the ability of an actor to make me believe what she was saying even though I knew she was just acting. By the end of that days filming I did not believe it was acting. I believed she loved me. She wanted me to believe and she wanted the part. I wanted her to have it, but I had to find out if she was going to be truly dedicated and if we could raise money with her in the lead role.

I thought that putting her on the cover of Model Citizens Magazine might give her the credibility we needed, but I would never take my friend off the cover. So, after thinking about it, I came up with the idea to publish another issue at the same time. It would be the Italian version of the magazine. She agreed and said she would help me write it and translate it into Italian, as my fifty-fifty partner. I agreed. A few weeks later, despite my broken ribs, the three of us flew to Venice to shoot “Model Citizens Magazine Italy” and give her a real screen test. She would start by hosting a travel style magazine, both for the issue and for a video version of it. We booked a tiny hotel room and started filming every day and drinking Prosecco every night. The hotel was giving us as much as we wanted gratis because they were thrilled with the publicity. Both models were pretty much becoming local celebrities as we shared the photographs with the merchants who supported our efforts. Within hours of our arrival, I was getting hit on by dozens of women. It would start almost as soon as I put my tripod out in the square and started shooting.

But something had changed with both models after our arrival in Venice. They were no longer competing for my attention, or even camera time. They started hooking-up with each other and were falling in love. They tried to keep it a secret, but it soon became obvious. Later, my Swiss friend’s husband told me it was the reason their marriage ended. It had nothing to do with her obsession with my photography any longer, or our almost ten year friendship, that extended a bit beyond. It was because she was expressing more love for a woman than for him. Venice was the most beautiful city I had ever seen. The people were so warm. I felt love from everyone; the shop owners who donated clothing for our shoot, to the restaurateurs who comped almost every meal. It was like being a celebrity, if even for a few months. We left Venice a few days later. We would never kiss again, nor would we make the film. My photographs put her on the map and her career skyrocketed within days. She was not supposed to use them before the issue came out, but did so against my wishes. She became quite the diva. It became rather apparent that the kiss was strategic and not the least bit authentic.

When we got back to the farm my dear friend was a mess. Her marriage was falling apart. She was miserable, no longer in love with her husband and totally obsessed with her new girlfriend, who was hooking-up with everyone, both men and women. Each of them were the object of so many admirers’ obsessions. It was not surprising they became the object of each other’s. My friend was building a small house in the country, on property given to her by her mom. For a moment, I thought, maybe I would stay. She wanted me to. They both did. They were both bi-sexual and thought we might live out a three’s company kind of arrangement. It was very tempting, but nothing was going to keep me from my children and my true home on Long Island. Not even the thought of building a publishing empire in a European paradise, while engaging in a modern family with two of the most beautiful women in Switzerland.

I left Switzerland with three issues of Model Citizens Magazine and very little money. But, I had proven to myself that I had my health back. I also was fortunate enough to go to Paris and Stockholm where women were much more sexual and free spirited than they were even in Switzerland. I knew my career as a full-time photographer was coming to an end, no matter how much I loved it. I also knew that my heart was healing in more ways than just physically. The crack in my heart was on the mend. That single kiss, gave me hope I could find my true soul mate and could love again. I had finally started to heal and was ready to look for true love. That passionate kiss that broke my ribs was one of the most romantic and passionate kisses I ever was blessed with. When I am asked, “was it worth it?” I always say yes. I was in Switzerland for only a few months, but I experienced some of the most creative and romantic experiences of my life. I am sure if I took them up on their invitation to stay that we might have all shared a very long and modern chapter of love. I just could not keep my heart from wanting to go home to my island, Long Island so I left as soon as I was healthy enough to fly back.

 

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Chapter 20 – The Coat Check Girl: Next Chapter →

Chapter 20 – The Coat Check Girl

Chapter 20, “The Coat Check Girl,” recalls working as a promoter at REDS nightclub — a steamy, secret romance with the shy, engaged coat check girl that ended when she quit.

I was working at REDS as a promoter. Each week I would recruit thousands of teenage girls to come to a REDS Teen Dance Party. I originated the idea, handled the marketing, business development and exclusively promoted it. The lines around the club on Sunday afternoons were longer than the lines at the movie theaters. They were not paying me the way they promised, so I said screw it, and started to work as a bartender and part time manager at the Salty Dog. There are so many stories from my time at the Salty Dog, I could probably write a book about those experiences alone. However, the one that stands out as the most memorable chapter of love, was with the coat check girl. She was not the coat check girl when I started bartending there. Over time, she hung out at the bar so often that the GM gave her the job just to keep her busy. She was very beautiful, petite, black hair and a body to die for. She was down to earth and smart. We talked all the time. She became a good friend.

There was a lot of sexual tension between us. But, she was shy and also, engaged. I don’t know why her engagement ended, but as soon as it did, the flirting became much more extreme. I started hanging out at the front door, with the bouncers, just because I wanted to spend more time with her. She started working just before the holidays. It was cold, that year, so there were always tons of coats. In fact, there were so many that they could barely fit in the coatroom. Often, coats would be tagged and brought to the second floor. That was the restaurant area. That area closed at about ten pm so all the booths became another spot to store the overflow of coats the de facto second floor coatroom so to speak.

I knew her at least six months prior to her starting to work the coatroom. Within a few weeks it was clear that there was a connection. Not just as friends. We wanted each other. But, we were both shy. Neither of us wanted to be the one to start something, fearing that the other person was not interested. Plus, as I said, in the beginning she was engaged. It was safe to flirt with humor. If it wasn’t met with a return flirt, you always had an out. When I finally worked up the courage to ask her on a date, we skipped the date and went immediately to sex. We started by making out in the front vestibule, where the coatroom was. It was isolated, so we felt safe enough. Everyone was busy inside, at the holiday party. No one was leaving anytime soon, as we had an open bar.

The soft first kisses and hugs turned into wet lip action and much deeper kisses, as we wrapped our bodies tightly around one another. We were both lost in those kisses and the grinding of our bodies against one another for at least an hour. We moved to the coatroom, which had barn style split doors. We were both rather intoxicated and once we felt safe inside the coatroom, our clothing started coming off. We were lost in the passion. We were standing up inside the coatroom, going at it like seasoned, passionate, lovers. But, soon enough, people did start to come to get their coats and we had to stop.

She would give coats to the exiting patrons and we would immediately go at it again. She decided to take her underwear off and have me take her from behind, as she stood at the opening of the coatroom, leaning on the bottom half of the barn doors. We moved a coat rack filled with coats parallel to the opening and arranged the coats close to her body so you mostly only saw her, even though I was inside of her, it looked like I was simply standing in the coatroom helping her. Of course, I had to pull out and reinsert more times than I cared to, almost cuming every time I went back in. I held off, as I wanted this to be as good for her as it was for me.

We were as intoxicated as the guests. I am sure that many of those people knew what was going on, but we didn’t care. Either did they, for that matter. We were so engaged in raw, physical pleasure, that we kept going even when we heard voices coming towards us. We waited until heads started to turn the corner to the entrance of the coatroom lobby. My head said pull out. But sometimes I just couldn’t stop. She was bouncing back and forth as patrons came up to her. I would pull out and pass her most of the coats. As the evening progressed, she was going to have to retrieve coats from the second level.

She had to get about a dozen coats so I came with her. Once we got upstairs our clothing came off and we started to passionately fool around on a pile of fur coats. We went at it for a few minutes but we knew we had to get the patron’s coats. She stayed up there locating them and I brought them down, sometimes as many as ten coats at a time. Many of the coats left that night with wet spots on them. We didn’t much think about that at the time. We were obsessed. As more and more people left, we were spending more time upstairs and less in the coatroom. As we ran out of coats, people started to hang-out on the stairs, so we couldn’t use the second-floor booths anymore. Instead, we went into the juice room that was under the stairs.

It was tight, but she was petite and I was determined. We stripped down to our shirts and went at it for about a half hour, until we both came together. The stairs were old and as people stood on them, the treads would bend and let thin streams of light shine down on us. We were nervous someone was going to see us naked and we would both be fired. The GM who was our boss had to walk down those stairs, right over us, to get from his office to the bar. He did this several times. We could even hear him ask people where we were. They were cool and said we were outside getting something from the car. They knew where we were, but they did not share it.

We knew we had to make an appearance quickly so we fixed ourselves up in the bathrooms. She went back to the, fairly empty, coatroom and I busied myself buying some of the VIP guest’s drinks, to make sure people saw me. Finally, she was out of coats and was allowed to leave. Neither of us wanted it to end there. I walked her to her car. We got in. I sat next to her and we started making out again. It was a small sports car. We managed to put the passenger’s side seat down and started at it again. It was fortunate she was so petite. It was freezing. The windows were coated with ice when we started. I loved going down on her. I kept at it for a good thirty minutes, before we realized the ice on the windows melted and the few stragglers leaving the club were getting a good look at her half naked body. By that time, I was mounting her and driving deep inside her. She was in an orgasmic state when I released inside her. She grabbed me fiercely and dug her nails so deeply into my back that I had eight or nine bloody scratches by the time we were done. It must have been about four in the morning. We held each other and fell asleep in each other’s arms with the heat on.

When we woke up, it was to a full-fledged brawl between two of the guests. I had to get out of the car and break it up. I was shocked to see it was the Editor of the Hofstra College Newspaper and his Assistant Editor. They were pissed at each other and it ended badly. I made sure the cops didn’t arrest them by hiding them in the, now closed, club. I told the officers that they already took off. Someone called them when the fight got bloody prior to me seeing what was going on. It may have been the neighbors who called the police. With all of this going on, I suggested that she go home. We would see each other at the Salty Dog the next evening anyway.

When I came back the next day, I found out that she quit. I didn’t have her phone number, or even know her last name. The GM would not give it to me. He said it wasn’t allowed. But, he gave her my number. Unfortunately, she never called. I had no way of finding her. Months went by. I thought about her almost every day and asked everyone if they knew her last name. No one did. I was so disappointed. I liked that coat check girl very much, so much so that I know that we would have spent a great deal of time together if she just showed up the next day and shared why she was quitting. Months later I was in a relationship with a cocktail waitress who worked there. Out of the blue, she showed up. I didn’t know what to do or say. I had been so disappointed that she bailed on me. Dating the cocktail waitress was convenient, but it was not turning into love or anything close. It was just an ongoing hook-up. She tried to explain that many of her friends saw us that night and was embarrassed even though she was falling in love with me.

She could tell I was disappointed, hurt and feeling rejected when I first saw her. I was trying to be cool about it. When I told her I could not see her again because I was involved with the cocktail waitress, she told me she had been grounded for months. Somehow, her parents found out what happened when she went home, apparently still intoxicated. They were incredibly strict. She was not allowed to use the phone, or car, until the very day she came to see me. When I told her we were done, she cried and started to leave. I got emotional as well and tried to stop her. I started to tell her I would end my relationship with the cocktail waitress. I realized that she would never want me again, knowing that I did not wait for her. It was a tough moment. My heart sank so low I thought it would stop beating. As is the case with so many of the girls I dated, in the hospitality industry, we shared a short chapter of love. For me it was meaningful. She was a great young woman, with a beautiful smile and laughter in her heart. She was also humble despite her great beauty. I did see her again years later, when I was visiting Long Island, after moving to the city. We shared a nice conversation but she was rather cold. As I found out shortly afterwards, she had gotten back together with her fiancé and he was there with her. When he excused himself to use the bathroom, she gave me an incredible kiss and said that she never got over me despite her return to her fiance.

I was not over her either, but I let it fade away, knowing I was now in the city and a reverse commute was not going to be my gig. Especially, since I was already involved with NYC women and bartending at the Palladium. To this day I can still visualize her ebony eyes and silky, long black, hair. Of course, the memories of making love to her in that coatroom with the door completely open, the juice room and her sports car, will stay with me forever. A few years later when I went for a stroll down memory lane, back to the Salty Dog, I stopped at the coatroom for an extended reflection of our short chapter of love.

As I was leaving, the GM said, “You better not do that at the Palladium, you two were going at it all night.” He was much older so I said something like, “that’s great advice. Thanks.” and left. I had no idea that he knew what was going on that night. I found out from some of the bartenders months later that they all knew, but thought it was cool that one of us was able to hook-up with her. I never did screw around in a juice room or coatroom again, but there was this one girl who grabbed me during a concert at the Nassau Coliseum and pulled me into a walk-in freezer, but that was just a quickie and another chapter all together.

 

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