INTERMISSION

The room quakes. I wake up. Short quake, the night sky is a fan of maroon rising to scarlet. The Northern wildfires storming across the Dawn. My bed is cornered along a wall so that I see the view through glass doors to the balcony. I sleep with several cushions. A cuddly polar bear stares out with a bit of a tilt against the navy blue velvet. Then near the foot of my bed is the cushion embroidered with the London Bridge. The Pinto Pony, perched on top, sees the vines and the macho palm tree, with its horny, naked, torso.

I’m allowing fear in the door. I step out onto the balcony. I touch the nasturtiums billowing, coiling, up the lattice on the wall. I sat in my rocking chair watching the ruddy swollen column of the palm tree standing guard by the balcony. Weed-like hula skirts sprout from his torso’s base, and his towering head is crowned by lively emerald palm leaves.

If you can find gratitude in spending moments of solitude, you will find names and images of who or what you have lost, and you will know you are capable of deep love. Pleasure will come by. Be patient. Accept Gifts of Hope, such as poems, or dancing to music. You will then reprise the strength of your soul. Always have books you've loved right on your bed. Choose the music you loved when you first began to make selections. I find myself smiling at this song, not that one, and I’m liking tapioca pudding I got from the fridge. Too early for strawberry ice cream.

“Good morning,” I tell myself. “Do not go back to bed.”

You don’t even have to be alone. Here in LA, melancholy is the co-star, the solemn “peddler” providing ideas, images, lifted from refuse, old letters, rejected storylines, and car wrecks. You can always find the way to feed the kids. There's always a story coming up—and, then, there are these woeful talks on the cell phone.

“You don't have to be by yourself.”

“Why aren’t you answering your phone?”

“I am not here.”

I don’t want to tell them I can’t figure out the Zoom thing again.

So I make the bed and lie on it, flicking through the Sunday Times. Armani has a new line. You can pig out and wear a herringbone tweed jacket: the new baggy look for the big eating season.

At 84 years old, I am learning how to live by myself. “I’m not needing a funeral,” I shout to this afternoon’s cell phone plea from the Neptune Society, hoping to earn a good commission on the celebration of my departure. “Not done yet.” I hang up. Then my friend Lucero comes in with several boxes of fresh plants for my balcony.

Every morning all my wake up dreams now end with me alone in a large space—a lawn, a canyon hillside, a cliff overlooking the sea.

I found Thanksgiving pleasant on my own. I watched Harry Potter. My friend Linda brought me gorgeous challah bread French toast with maple syrup. She had dropped off a remarkable feast featuring all the things the exhausting Dr. Gundry on TV says “you must never eat if you want a long life.”

“I am having a very long life and I am eating everything wrong on your list!” I shout at the TV.

I pick up a tomato and sit at my curvy desk. The stories appear. They are a heritage. It’s a very different process than you would imagine. To find the story, privacy must be total.

I could see my father’s privacy was even more closed. I’m guessing he appreciates that I take these early morning intermissions. I am also grateful for the pleasure and wonder of surreal meet-ups with him just after dawn.

So now I am wandering with an anxious feel over that wide, empty lawn. Far ahead of me, I see him, my father, his particular stance. Now he’s turning. He has on a storm dark coat. I run fast. I reach my arms high to embrace him, careful of his bad back. “You knew I’d find you,” I said. I keep my face away. I have not brushed my teeth this morning. He is never without a vial of mouthwash. He gives me a spray.

I can tell it’s not been easy for him. He endures the danger of being a creative legend. You’re no one without a deal, a deadline, a contract. With the covid thing, I see it clear. These days, we’re all in a semi-afterlife.

“I heard what happened to you,” he says to me.

“You mean my book got turned down.”

“I know that’s hard. I haven’t even written in so long,” he says.

“I know, but it’s coming up okay now,” I say. “Things will ease.”

“In truth,” he says, “the only thing that matters is that we remember the work we’ve done.”

“Thank you,” I say. “You know, Joe Biden reminds me of people in your best movies.” He smiles. “And he sounds like you.”

In heaven we long gone artists, actors, and writers keep fit by wandering over endless land, knowing there will be an occasional encounter.

“Books aren’t the thing today, Foxie,” I say.

He has a slight frown. “Does anyone teach literature on Zoom?”

“Always,” I say.

“You’re lying,” he says.

“And I talked about you last night to Jeb.”

“Oh Jebbo,” he smiled.

“He's fine. He's in Texas, with Zach.”

“Still a Blue State.” My father shakes his head. “You know I saw Studs Terkel on my way to Chicago last year.”

“Why would you go there?”

“To the Pump Room. I needed meat. Heaven’s vegan.”

“So you do eat, I mean how does that go?”

“I'm not sure. It has to do with a depth of faith.”

“Is Mommy around?”

“Miriam is somewhere in Paris. She was never delighted by America, you know that. But we meet on Sundays, for Belle’s chicken soup of course.” Belle was my grandmother.

“She’s here?” I ask.

“Yes. And after she leaves,” Dore says, “Gershwin comes and plays for us, and Miriam and I dance. The chicken soup’s still good,” he says.

“I know,” I say, “I served it in London.”

“I know that.” My father smiles. (My God I love his smile.) “You made it very well. A little too much salt.”

I ask a hard question: “Have you seen my Englishman—when you visit London? I was married to him for 31 years.”

“Yes, we play Scrabble; we had a croquet club, but we're distracted by the concerns over the planet's progress. What is coming along will be a challenge. But this time, there WILL be a permanent realm for the Arts.”

My father and I stroll to the edge of the cliff. Somewhere almost out there you faded away so slowly.

Now the light is turning up from firestorm crimson. I know his arms are around me, even though I cannot see or feel him now. I forgot to ask him if he’d seen Mank, the interesting movie about the family who engaged our time in Hollywood. We kind of envied their attention, even as we caught the despair, buoying up the most fascinating wit of that brilliant family. I also forgot to tell him about Armani’s new bulky jackets. Last time we met up here, Dore had on a new herringbone jacket, sharply tailored. That was when he told me I could write the book about him. And he smiled. He didn’t mention it now, because he knew I hadn’t started it yet. Dore didn’t want me to feel guilty. Just as well I didn’t mention Mank the movie.

Now I’m awake. Off the cliff. In front of the London Bridge cushion on my bed. Remembering some of the things he told me.

That life is an intermission.

The last time we’d met, he’d been so concerned about America’s character.

“I knew you were,” I had touched his jaw, and he smiled. “Isn’t there anything up here that can be done?” I said.

“How do you think Joe Biden won?” He raised his eyebrows.

“Prayers?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. “I thought of you everytime covid-19 was mentioned.”

I think that over with care. “Yes,” I say, “but you’ve already crossed over.”

“I know, but I worried about the ventilators on you.”

“Do you still feel pain? I have noticed that when I reach out to touch you, my hand feels nothing.”

“That’s probably true. It’s part of the arrangement.” He adds, “There has to be some challenge.”

“I see,” I say.

“You don’t.” He smiles and takes my hand.

We are together. There’s no sense but the vision of our smiles.