Try to Remember...

Quite by accident, browsing on facebook, I came across a tape of Jerry Orbach singing Try to Remember, from the Fantasticks. All of a sudden my mind shot back to the summer of 63; during that summer I listened to the recording constantly. I was home, working in a park near the Bronx Zoo, (watching the changes in the neighborhood) and preparing for my senior year at Hopkins. 

Two images immdiately came to mind---the first, of myself in my family's apartment on Thwaites Place, listening to the record, and the second, was of course of J. Who was J? A freshman at Goucher that year when I was a senior at Hopkins. She had come to Goucher to act--and since I was the President of the Hopkins undergraudate theater group, we had to interact. She was thrilled by what I was---incredibly empathetic and wanted to be close to me. Only one problem: she was comitted to a boy friend who was a sophmore at Hamilton. That would not stop her from spending a lot of time with me---but of course--no sex, or even simple hugs and kisses. So what could I do? Once I made up my mind to leave her alone---then she saw me after my performance in J.B. by Archibald MacCleish. "I have never seen you so happy", she said. That was it---I could not give her up---and so for the next six or so months---our relationship, based on this "compromise" continued. Did I believe that at some point she would change, that she would leave her Hamilton boy friend for me?  As I sit here now, all I remember is her ability to "absorb" me. It did not end well; you can understand that. There are moments when I remember another side to her---an ability to push away, to be harsh, if she felt threatened or imposed upon. There were rules to our game.  Yet Try to Remember only made me feel her warmth--the energy in her that I believed in. Perhaps I am "distanced" enough now (well it is only 57 years later)  to simply focus on the warm memories.

The phone rings---a friend unexpectedly is in the neighborhood; we meet for coffee, discuss the state of the city; the pressure on possible Mayor elect Adams to move to the left; black theater, etc. I return to the computer in a very different place; memories of closeness seem to have vanished. I am ready for the next moment in my life.

And what of J? She is now 76, living, I think, in New Jersey (she is not on facebook!).  My fantasy of her is that she lives with a  'boyfriend" around her age---close to retirement--you know the whole thing. Has she "blown out her candles"? I don't know---probably at some point, some other song or play will evoke more memories of our relationship. Oh how I longed to have a girl friend in my senior year at Hopkins--how envious I was of those boys who had them. But that was a long time ago--- in the present.....