530. Been up two and a half hours, I think. I’m listening to Joan Armatrading. Again. Thoughts come back of Ayer . That was her name. I guess if she’s been dead 5 years and 4 months and 23 days, her anonymity doesn’t need protecting .

I don’t think I’m the only person who has fallen in love with the wrong person . I’m a repeat offender. Done it twice. At least twice, maybe more.

Joan Armatrading was part of the background music of all that newly ignited passion. I kick myself when I think of the pain I caused her. Oh well , she’s dead now and so are her parents and aunts and uncles and grandparents And that White Folks World she rebelled against and I aspired to .

Paradox is what you call it, I wanted to be in the John Cheever short stories she wanted out of, with the alcoholics and bisexuals, the suicidal relatives and the beach cottages of soulless beauty that trap the memories like a bell jar holds a specimen.

J is home now. The third time. She’s The Charm, so it is said. Who said it?

And there is nothing but the memories. And the child, now a man , that melding of us together .

I should say more, the longing demands more words, more Acts of Contrition, more penance. I was hoping, God, for another penance, besides celibacy without end. But I do get your well-taken point.