On frosted fields of juniper and lamplight

“I am not going to sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I’m going to take a stand. I’m going to defend it. Right or wrong, I’m going to defend it.”

“She played a lot of Artie Shaw records, I remember that, and that was a bit of a pain in the ass to hear all the time. I guess she had just busted up with him—I had met Artie when I was dating Tommy Dorsey, and Tommy didn’t like him at all. And I remember her place was filled with yellow roses. Somebody was always sending her all these fresh yellow roses.

“We’d borrow a cup of sugar from each other now and then. And she knew some of the men I was dating, and I knew some of the men she was dating. But we were neighbors, not best friends, and I did not know any of her inner thoughts. She seemed content when I knew her, and I never sensed any great unhappiness about her. She was a very free person, it seemed to me, and she was not embarrassed about anything. If a man stayed overnight with her she didn’t try to hide it; she would just say, Oh, he stayed overnight.’

“She was very free, I mean, nothing embarrassed her. She was very comfortable with her body, I know. I remember going up to her apartment one day, she was getting ready to go out, and she wanted to borrow a pair of earrings. Her door was open, I don’t know if she was expecting somebody. And, I mean, things weren’t as crazy as they are today, but her front door was open and I tapped and she yelled, ‘Come on in.’ And she was in front of the mirror putting some makeup on, and she was standing there nude. It was rather shocking for me. And she had the most gorgeous body, and the complexion and the hair, I mean, she was just beautiful. And she was quite comfortable being like that…and it made me very uncomfortable because I felt quite ugly next to her.”