Today’s Dating Game Update is brought to you by the Number 4, and the Number 8.
#4 came over for dinner on Thursday, and Busby Berkeley Night. I played Ruby Keeler to his Dick Powell–that is, Ruby at the beginning of Footlight Parade, before she got the haircut and took off the goofy glasses and gave in to Dick Powell’s delicate woo-pitching. He gave me a sweet peck as he left, then pulled me in harder for another, which I deflected demurely, channeling Ruby’s you’re-going-to-have-to-work-a-little-harder-to-get-in-these-stockings attitude. I don’t want to lose sight of his brain this early on, which is the part that I’m lusting after most urgently.
Meanwhile, #8 had significantly less in between his pitching and my catching the following night. I picked him up at work, and after a swift, but elegant dinner, took the ferry to Larskpur and eventually to his bubbling cauldron of chlorine. He makes these wonderful sounds that drive me crazy. Wild. Instead of “uh-huh,” he says, “uh-yeah.” Not as two syllables, though, really fast, like a cough, only excited. “Uh-yeah.”
BC and I checked out the Calder show at SFMoMA this afternoon, and the surrealist photography show. One piece in particular of Calder’s stood out, called “Tightrope,” of a wire strung between two abstract conical forms, with little loops and squiggles of wire balancing delicately across the span. It was him at his best–spare, with just a suggestion of form. The wires on the span seemed like they’d blow right off if anyone walked by too quickly, and created a circus-like tension of imminent collapse. The photo show had many fabulous iconic Man Ray photos, but way too many of everybody else. Edit, girl. Please.
Philip and I joined up later for dinner at Dosa, and bumped into Philip Kaufman. The director. “Phil, this is Chris. Chris, Phil,” blah blah blah, “Enjoy your dinner.” “Wait… that was The Right Stuff Henry and June Unbearable Lightness of Being Kaufman Phil?!!” “Yes,” Philip said matter-of-factly. Philip hides his glamour well, but I’m happy to be around when it slips out. After dinner we watched the thoroughly enjoyable Match Point at the Coco Monoplex, interrupted briefly by the fireworks outside. Woody Allen makes me squirm these days. The critics all seem to want to examine his work independent of his personal life, but really, doesn’t it seem like his last few films have been so much about latent Soon Yi guilt?
I work and I play and think I’m enjoying being in the world by myself, engaging with people and ideas, but really, I just want a plump furry man in my bed. Who worships me. And moves. Without me having to flip him over all the time. And has a place in Rome. And reads. And cries. And sends me little notes. And…