Tuesday, May 30
ZELDA FITZGERALD It’s true I hate the stories about the other women, but I love the description of their daily lives, like the scene with twelve raspberry cakes in a French café, or the drunkard asking for the way. A bottle of whiskey on a heavy walnut table, my husband’s hands on a glass. No one’s muses are believable, said the painter whom I loved for twelve weeks and who would rarely touch me. To him, the female body was a plant: it needed to be tended and spoken to, but too much warmth would spoil the matter. In his paintings that I like best, women wander through cities and notice objects. Lanterns. Hats they can’t afford. Little glasses of Pernod. I loved him to hurt the other one, whom I loved more. And so, most of my life, it passes like this: light touching my skin, lying on the floor among my diaries, writing of him–– What did Proust say, months before he passed away? I have great news. Last night, I wrote “The End,” so now I can die. Oh! Had I known the boredom that my talents had in store for me, I would still have asked for them. (Aria Aber)