I met Gary and Eleni when my wife and I first moved to New York City. Gary was in Ashley's medical-school class. His wife Eleni was Greek. She came from Thessaloniki.
Gary and Eleni also lived in married-student housing, but in a different building, one farther north from the hospital, across from J Hood Wright Park.
Gary and I liked to get together and drink and bullshit, and Eleni, who didn't feel a big connection to the women among Gary's classmates, usually hung out with us.
Gary was more of a dope-smoker than a drinker, but he could drink pretty well too. After I broke up with my wife, my friendship with Gary and Eleni remained strong. They were good friends while I lived in New York. Eventually my drinking would ruin our relationship. Alcoholics have a knack for blowing things up.
The partial transcript below of a conversation between Gary, Eleni and I recorded one cold, dark Saturday night was my attempt (which was intended to be a much more robust effort) to get a handle on writing dialogue as it is actually spoken. I was motivated in this by having recently read Visions of Cody (1972), part of which is Kerouac's transcription of conversations he taped between him, Neal Cassady and Carolyn Cassady while he stayed with the couple in their San Francisco home.
Typing taped conversations is hard work. Never a skilled typist, more a quick practitioner of the hunt and peck, the goal of creating a transcript of an entire evening's free-flowing drunk discussion was far too ambitious. I'm sure the idea was to send it off to my buddies on the West Coast once the entire tape was transcribed. That letter was never sent.
I have zero memory of who Urgeen the Turk was and why Gary, Eleni and I are badmouthing him. Our conversation is mostly gibberish with a sizable dose of immaturity.
Spring 1989
G. This is going to be--this is going be a test, just to see if it's working. Okay? --
M. Okay! Excellent. Excellent.
E. Okay. One-two-three. One-two-three --
G. Okay, wait. . . Tes-- Testes, testes. I have one, two (Mike laughs). Testes, testes. I've got--
M. Genius, already!
G. -- I've got (laughs), I've got one, two.
E. What is this . . . (voice drops to a whisper; you can't hear the rest of what she says, something about disgusting")
G. Ha ha!
E. Huh?
TAPE STOPS
G. Alright.
M. Isn't it horrible (Pixies playing on the stereo; "Boxcar Waaay-tin" can be heard in the background) when you, when, when you --
E. It's nice when a person . . . (peels off into a chuckle; Mike joins in)
G. Alright, so what were we talking about?
M. Urgeen . . . (nobody says anything; Pixies wail, "Wait so-oooh laaaw-ong") What I found so amazing --
E. I don't know, I think you, ah, you really, though, you, I mean, you over . . . you know, like, you misjudge the guy, you --
M. Yeah! I was, I was --
G. He's not that bad.
M. No, I know. I think he was --
E. Like, I not, I mean, he doesn't have, like, of course, like manners because --
G. Because he's a Turk!
E. Yeah. (Gary laughs) Yeah, a Turk, and --
M. But, but you know what I felt kinda bad about though is it there was -- he was so, being so obviously flirtatious . . . with you, and his wife was, you know --
E. Right next to him --
M. -- Right, right there.
G. Yeah.
E. -- with the children.
M. Well , sa-- I mean, I mean --
G. Take-- Taking care of Lily. Ha ha!
No comments:
Post a Comment