ROAD TRIPS, poems

 

SEX, LIES, AND DECADES LATER... THE INTERNET

These greeting cards are pieces of a bittersweet memory from 1970 to 1973, and the messages are quite romantic. I saved the cards to always remember a man I loved named: Lou. But, this was a dark and layered and mysterious "love" because Lou was not just a man... he was my therapist.

Lou looked like Al Pacino in "Serpico." And he was married with several children. I'll be brief...

I began seeing a therapist in about 1970. His office was in Greenwich Village and after just a few sessions I came under the seductive spell of "erotic transference." I grew attached and I was dependent. I fell in love, or thought I had fallen in love. The feelings were not yet mutual. There arrived the day when Lou told me he was moving his practice to Staten Island. I was not ready at all for the separation and I was emotionally devastated. So, I followed him to Staten Island and became a twice a week ferry regular.

The longing for him until my sessions each week was unbearable. I was vaguely aware back then that transference was a common feeling when in analysis. And I had fallen deeply in love with my therapist. Lou sent a real mixed bag of messages; by turns flirting with me and allowing me to believe the feelings were becoming mutual, and at the end of each session he drove me back to catch the ferry. But, in the sessions he would emotionally push me away. He pulled me in and gave me hope and played with my desire, and then confused me by pushing me away with his mercurial whim. He vaguely promised to soon meet me for lunch in Manhattan and then in the next session he told me to find another therapist. I returned home filled with longing and I was confused and desperately unhappy. I was in anguish. I wrote him long love letters in which I poured out my heart.

He sent me greeting cards for Valentine's Day and my birthday... copies hang at this blog (configured with folds to fit.) The saga continued for several years and well.. as it goes with time, the hypnotic spell eventually broke and I ended the "therapy." One day, just like that.

About eight years later, in 1981... I tried Lou's old number and I called. I needed closure. Lou was very excited and happy to hear from me. He was now divorced. He started calling me twice a day. I had to tell him to calm down. So, we had dinner at a Manhattan restaurant. He sat there all pompous and clueless. We went back to my apartment and well... anyway, when he left he hugged me and I knew it was a good-bye forever. He had not changed. He had told me over dinner his experience with me took him to a place where he made a decision to never allow physical contact with a patient in a session ever again. The man was a fast and quick study!

I look back on this episode of my life now and it is totally meaningless. I am not angry. I feel nothing. I know this goes on. I watched "In Treatment." Lou was verbally unprofessional, unethical, and his behavior was inconsistent. He did not know what to do about me and he could not handle and come to terms with his own feelings. Transference is serious and should be handled properly by those who have fallen under it's seductive spell. I think my experience with Lou exacerbated my condition of limerence and I actually never knew I had that until a viewer in my broadcast was listening to one of my many stories and gave it a name. 

I am happy I saved all of Lou's cards because I am reminded of a bittersweet chapter of my life. 

Added after the above: a few years ago, I saw online that Lou had passed away. I called a number I believed could have been his (to offer some form of condolences to whoever answered... I am not a grudge holder and shit happens). A woman answered who told me she was his wife, allowing me to conclude he remarried. After some quick back story to identify myself, I asked her if Lou ever mentioned me. She said no... and as my saga unfolded she was riveted to my story and listened intently. She actually seemed to enjoy hearing it. At the end, she told me her name was also Marjorie. Damn, I am so sad he is gone. I really would have liked to talk to him again. 

a found piece of a letter from long ago

 

Yetta... from Yesteryear

So yeah, I was a teacher for 35 years in NYC and I wrote several books as my real name: Marjorie Levine. Road Trips and Becoming Until (on Amazon) did well.

But, for decades, I tried to "make it" in comedy. But, I was never good enough, or remarkable enough, or lucky enough.

But when social media prospered and live broadcast sites became popular, I decided to try to do shows on the internet so I fired up my computer cam. I became "Yetta Telebenda" and "Cookie Lipschitz" and I was off and running!

A viewer with the nickname "TripCode" became my videographer and he faithfully recorded my shows and uploaded the videos to YouTube. But, I still remained mostly invisible except for a small group of loyal "fans" who I gathered along the way and they became my devoted "cult following." But, fame still eluded me and no casting agents ever called. However, I persisted and through the years found new and creative ways to reinvent myself and keep my content fresh.

I enjoyed developing my new life and making my shows as beautiful as a live memoir in an old silent movie. I fit the pieces of my unique puzzle into a new journey which took me straight to the streets of Broadway. And with pathos, I performed on The Great White Way and said jokes like nobody was listening and mimed like nobody was watching.

And the most bittersweet and sad part... nobody there was. I was all alone on that old and famous avenue and somehow it did not even matter. In my mind's eye, I was famous. For one night, I was a celebrity and as the strangers passed without even giving me a second glance, I hardly even noticed. 

And when my "performance" was over, as I walked home in the crisp night air there was one thought that remained with me. I knew that there could be fulfillment in small scale poignant ways because in that personal magical moment in time, I was shining in my own imagination like a sentimental Broadway star who would sparkle and twinkle on... forever.

watch here:

Yetta from Yesteryear

Voices from The Road

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bURAStSaJoE

My father made a series of "records" when he was in the Army during WW2. They were made as he crossed the country from New York to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska and they were for his family who were back in Brooklyn.

After he died in 1994, I had the records transferred to audiotapes. A copy of the tapes are now at THE NATIONAL WWII MUSEUM in New Orleans.


"Ruby" later had had own story. 

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/276/434/1461257/

WHAT WAY TO GO TODAY

Here's my poem that won Rick Dale's Beat Poetry Contest on December 3, 2009.

WHAT WAY TO GO TODAY

Almost dusk:
Last summer on one Wednesday, in July,
I sat on a bench, a grey wooden tired
Bench on a boardwalk out at old Long Beach.
In the sky a lonely and lost grey kittiwake tipped
As the hot pink sun set in blazing technicolor over
Hot pinkish sand and the fading blue ocean water.

That morning:
I had thought about seeing great art...
Vermeer, or Courbet, or maybe Monet.
But, I drove to the beach instead to think
To think about everything creative that had been
Created before I got here, and when I was here,
And what will be created when I leave this place.
When one day I leave my place and all places in my
Consciousness that is now in this time and was
At a past time and will be in some next time;
Maybe all time exists at the same time.
The great minds of theoretical physicists search
For the "Theory of Everything" as they sit
In their cluttered rooms, their great thinking rooms.
In universities, they ponder the mathematical equations
And Schrodinger's cat and all those mysteries.

In the evening:
It is during the quiet and still and sad night when
I miss most the people I never met:
Edie Beale, and the Rat Pack, and even Rod Serling
Who made me want to time travel: to go back to simpler places
Like Nedick's, or the Belmore, or Bickford's, and Willoughby.
Then the longing, a longing when distant sounds and faraway
Foghorns drive thoughts to reflect on a life visible through some
Smoky cracked mirror, a haunted and haunting steamy mirror.
As I am sort of old now and getting older
There is a vague and odd feeling that I,
Like the kittiwake, somehow must have lost the way.

© Marjorie Levine 2009

THE LIGHTS AT DUSK GUIDE THE WAY HOME

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

THE CENTER BECOMES ART

A Rich and Rewarding Life

Here are some class photos of my long career as a proud teacher.

Jon Hamm, in Parade magazine: “I got into acting because my teachers kept nudging me into it,” says Hamm, who taught school himself for a few years after graduating from the University of Missouri with an English degree. “The power a teacher has to influence someone is so great. I can’t think of a profession I have more respect for.”
from: Parade magazine

I was a teacher in NYC for almost 35 years. I have close to 35 class pictures to help reflect on my long career. I had read in the UFT paper, "The New York Teacher," about the long career of Regina Sayres, who is now 100 years old. She was a teacher at PS 41M in 1968 during the time of that long teachers' strike. I was a teacher at PS 41M during that time when Ms. Sayres was there, and at a place when she was perhaps ending her career... mine was just beginning.
I looked through all the class photos in my collection, and I selected many for inclusion in this blog. They represent the four schools in which I taught... and the memories come flooding back. (please click on each photo to enlarge)







The year was 1973, and I was teaching grade 6 in a public school in the theater district of Manhattan. I entered my class in an essay contest sponsored by Bella Abzug and one of my students won. She went to Washington, DC to read her essay. I found this photo: Charity goes to Washington. And I also found the (now very wrinkled and faded) letter I received informing us that she won. That was over 35 years ago. It seems like so long ago. I guess it was.

This was my fourth grade class at PS 33 in 1986. The next year, when they were in the fifth grade, these students were chosen by Eugene M. Lang for his "I Have a Dream" college scholarship program. Over twenty years later... I am wondering: "Where are they now?"


And most bittersweet:


The year was 1974. I was teaching at a small school on West 45th Street. I had a wonderful 6th grade class. The students were bright, creative, and they had a real sense of humor. The school was on the same block as the Actor's Studio, the Manhattan Plaza had just been completed, and on nice days I could walk home. I loved going to work.
One day, a student named Christopher came to school a little bit late. I asked him the reason for his tardiness, and he told me that the night before he had attended an opening of a movie in which his father had a role. I asked him the name of the film, and he replied, "Godfather 2." "Oh," I said. I asked, "What part did your father have in the movie?" He replied, "Frankie Five Angels." I did know that Christopher's father was the playwright who had written "Hatful of Rain." But, I did not know that he was in the film, "Godfather II." So! Christopher's father was "Frankie Pentangeli;" interesting... Godfather II, was released and it opened at a Loew's theater on Broadway. It received phenomenal reviews and I couldn't wait to see it.
Soon thereafter were parent-teacher conferences. I am lucky Christopher was an excellent student. I do not think I would have had a comfort level sitting across from that father and giving a bad report. Mr. Gazzo had written a note to me during that school year asking permission for his son to be excused early on an October day and I saved the note. It was not just a signed note, it was an autograph.
A few months later, the Gazzo family moved to Los Angeles. Christopher kept in touch with all of us through letters he sent to the school addressed to me. In one letter, Christopher asked me if I was still singing because I was awful. I was a teacher who sang while she taught? He said he was going to a school 20 times better but he would rather be going to our school because he missed all of us.
I think about all of the students I had in so many classes over the years. Eddie, who died of a drug overdose. David, who fell off the roof of his building one hot summer day when he was up there with his brothers playing ball. Debbie, who was crossing 9th Avenue and was hit by a car. Brenda, whose mother we saved.
Larry David was asked why he still works. He clearly does not need to work. He said his mother had told him many years ago that we all need to always wake up in the morning and have a place to go. I had a place to go.

Didn't Mr. E's secretary leave out the 's' in comprehension in #4? He should have proofread that letter!