Open Marriage

My first job after college was in Lancaster, PA. I worked at channel 15. I was originally hired to create TV media for a new mall. The mall wasn’t built yet so I worked in the TV station doing anything and everything I could. I learned what it was like to play in television in a small market and it was a blast. I got to direct the news, make commercials and shoot sports… I mean everything. Three weeks in I got married. 

After about a year I made a commercial for the manager of a clothing store called Double Image. He loved the commercials and we became friends. The commercial started with a close-up of a clown’s face and then slowly pulled back to reveal the clown dressed in the clothes from the store.

Off handedly I mentioned that if he wanted to really get people into his store he should get me a radio show. In 1971 you could not get good music in Lancaster. If the stars were properly aligned and the weather was clear and cold and you had an antenna at 90 degrees from your naval, you might be able to get WMMR out of Philadelphia (for about five minutes). I wanted to play the music of my generation.

The next day he called me and told me I better be ready with a presentation as I had an appointment the next day at 1. I went in and bullshitted my way onto the radio. I had three hours from 10PM to 1AM and would sign off the air. My main intention was to do a different commercial for each sponsor every time we did a commercial. I would do characters and news and play the music I loved.

One of the sponsors was a man named John who owned Ye Olde Book Shoppe. They sold used and new paperbacks. In the back of the store were all kinds of erotica… gadgets and paraphernalia and movies… you know the kind where you go into a little room and close the door, put in a quarter and the porn film would show on the back of the door for two minutes.

After two months of doing the show, I went in one day to find out what John wanted me to cover in his commercials for that week. While we were talking he said, “You should have been with me this weekend.”

“Why?”

“We had an orgy. Have you ever been to one?”

Now, I was from the city of Philadelphia. He was living in the Hicksville town of Lancaster. So I said, “Of course I’ve been to an orgy.”

He then proceeded to tell me all about the orgy he attended and I kept on bullshitting about my experiences. He then invited my wife and I to go with he and his wife the next time.

I went home that night and said to my wife of little over a year, “I had an interesting conversation with John at the bookstore…” and then I proceeded to tell her about the orgy and all the rest of it. I told her I was embarrassed about lying and didn’t know what to do. And then I said, “What do you think about the whole orgy situation?”

She said, “Remember our first date when I stood you up and left the bagels on your motorcycle?”

“Yeh…” Of course I remembered that. I had never been so angry and hurt with someone I didn’t even know.

“Well… that’s where I was!”

“Hold on. You were at an orgy?”

“Yes.”

I then proceeded to ask her every question imaginable. Where was it? What did you do get to the door and when it opened just throw your clothes off and f*** anyone who was there? Was there food?

She answered all the questions and I was impressed. I could totally understand why she didn’t show up for a goofy picnic with me. I mean, she was up all night and she was exhausted!

I had forgiven her before and now I really forgave her for standing me up.

There was still the matter of my conversation and how I had been a bragging assh*** with John. I was a newlywed. How could I possibly do something like an orgy with my wife?

I decided I would come clean, call John and tell him I was talking out of my ass when I spoke of my big city prowess. I was nervous and I dialed the phone. He picked up and before I could say anything he said, “Jerry, I have to say I’m sorry for bragging so much about the orgy. I think I came off a bit snobbish or something.”

I couldn’t believe it. He was apologizing to me.

Then he came up with a proposal. “Why don’t you and your wife come over for dinner one time. Not for sex or anything like that but to meet us and spend some time and eat and get high. If we decide after spending time together we would all like to do the sex thing… that will be for a later time”

Thus started the open marriage. John gave me a couple of books about open marriages and man, did I ever buy into that philosophy. It was sex with no cheating or guilt because you were doing it at the same time.

And let me say this in closing. Sex was always wonderful. Sex for just sex sake with various different women was great but afterwards when I was with my wife, that physical part of our relationship was beyond phenomenal! Once love entered the picture it took on a whole new level of intensity and depth.

Whew… I’m glad I got that out… the memories were flooding back.

Why The Y

You know I go to the Y to work out. If I do a full workout it takes me about an hour and twenty minutes.

Yesterday I do my full workout and when I go back to the locker room to change I turn the corner and ALL OF MY STUFF FROM INSIDE THE LOCKER IS THROWN ALL OVER THE FLOOR!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF?!!!!!

I check for my wallet... it's there with all the money inside.

I check for my phone... it's there

I check for my car keys... there

It's just all of my stuff is thrown all over the floor.

The lock is still on the locker door which is open and the lock is still locked.

I picked up all my stuff and walked to the front desk

"You're not gonna believe what has happened to me when I walked into the locker room. All of my stuff was on the floor."

"Would that be locker #25?"

"Yes, how did you know?"

"There was a guy out here who had that locker. He had left his jacket and hat in the locker and he came out here and was yelling that someone had taken his locker, put all their stuff in the locker and locked my locker!"

I said, "There wasn't anything in the locker except for a visor type hat which I put on top of the lockers. I thought somebody just forgot their hat.

"He also had his jacket with his keys in the jacket. He was here while we tried to find the owner of the lock. He was here for over an hour and he was very angry. I guess he went to the locker and banged on it somehow and the door opened. He shouldn't have thrown your stuff around."

How weird is that?

FIrst of all I can't believe I missed a jacket that was in the locker. When I open a locker door and see someone's stuff I just go to another locker.

Secondly... what are these people doing? Buy a f***ing lock and protect your stuff.

And that's the latest in what it's like to be Jerry DIner

Personals blues

I have been dating since I’m 13. That’s when I became a man. That’s 52 years of dating. OK, I was married for six years so I have actually been dating 50 years. I’ve never had a problem finding women to go out with… until now.

What is it with the dating sites and the personal ads? It’s all so crazy and it keeps on getting more and more insane by the hour.

I hope anyone who sees this blog, if you have had stranger experiences than mine, you’ll post a reply.

So here goes…

One woman I met on e-harmony. We finally got together over coffee. It was our first meeting and I was on my best behavior. I’m taking a sip and she blurts out, “I had sex with the angel Gabriel!”

I wanted to keep it clean so I said, “Oh… so you were touched by an angel?” She says, “WELL HE DIDN’T TOUCH ME!!!”

I said, “Check please…”

Every woman in her ad says she wants a guy with a sense of humor. What bulls***! One woman said she was beautiful and wanted a guy with a sense of humor. I have a sense of humor and I was looking for a beautiful woman. I wrote back and asked her to send me a picture. In the picture she was riding a horse. I typed, “I received your picture… You’re the one in the hat and the sunglasses, right?”

She was not looking for a sense of humor.

The crap she wrote back to me about how I was a stalking f*** and she hoped I died a and painful death… C’mon… my email was funny!

How about this one? In her emails another woman told me she was 37. I got to her door I found she must have been dyslexic. I asked her if her daughter was home.

But the kicker is this one. I finally found a woman who got my sense of humor.  When we spoke on the phone the first time it was one of those great three hour conversations. This was someone I really wanted to meet.  We ended up meeting at a jazz club on Santa Monica in Encino which was her favorite.

When she called me to tell me exactly where the place was, things started to change. She said, “I wanted to tell you… I don’t look like my picture.” “What do you mean?” I said. She told me here hair was really short and platinum blond. I told her that could be very artistic and don’t worry about it.

I got to the club and she looked good. Very cute and the platinum blond was actually a good look. We were sitting and listening to jazz and talking, talking, talking about anything and everything. She was laughing and things were going superbly.

Periodically she would go outside to have a smoke. I’m not a fan of smoking and thought I could put up with that one vice. I was taking into account the personality and all the rest of what it was like being with her. I figured she would just never come to my place as I didn’t want that lingering smell pervading my home.

When we left I walked her to her car and she was going to drive me to mine. As we sat in the car she said, “This is the first time I’ve gone out with anyone in a long time.” “Why,” I said. “Well, I had an operation and this is the first time I’ve gotten out since.” “What kind of operation?” I asked. “I had a double mastectomy a year or so ago and…”

Talk about a 180 from the moment before. What ever happened to keeping a couple of secrets until the second or third date. I asked many questions and she explained the whole thing to me. She also told me it was my loss… she used to be a 36 D. Yes, that was a big loss, I have always been a fan of the boobs.

Here’s the thing. I felt I was maturing even as we spoke. I put aside my physical desires to have things perfect. I was looking at the person in front of me and how much fun we were having and how bright she was and all the rest of what was going on.

During our verbal exchange, we were talking about games we liked to play and I mentioned that I loved to play cribbage. She invited me over to her house to play cribbage and I was thrilled because it’s rare to find people at my age who like to play my favorite game.

I arrived at her apartment and we started to play and the conversation was once again fantastic and filled with all kinds of jokes and laughter. A half hour in she excused herself to go into the kitchen and she brought out a two foot square tray. On the tray was an assortment of white lines. Now, I had not done coke in quite a while. I mean like a decade or so.

“What’s that,” I said.

“Meth.”

To say I was floored would be the most huge understatement ever made by any person on this earth. I didn’t know people even did Meth anymore. To me it was so 70’s. For the rest of the evening, she would do a couple of lines every half hour or so.

I could not wrap my mind around the fact that here was a woman who had cancer. Not only did she smoke (which was bad enough), now she added meth to her drug regime!

Here’s the funny part… she started complaining about the fact that meals on wheels would bring her food everyday and she was never hungry enough to eat it. She showed me her fridge which contained at least 20 containers worth of meals. Could it be a bi-product of the meth which doesn’t allow you to eat?

I left knowing I would never go on a dating site again.

Why is it so hard?

Inaugural Post

Inaugural Blog

I promised myself when I finally wrote about my life I would be completely honest and totally forth coming. So, folks, my truth will be coming at you with no holds barred.

I start this blog with my favorite quote by Lanford Wilson:

Life is hard

Death is mean

So get a little lovin’

In between!

Doesn’t that sum up everything?

For too many years I thought love was sex (and man, did I ever live up to that form of lovin’). I never believed in platonic love be it with men or women. I knew I loved certain people yet I guess I never thought myself worthy of more than a friendship.

And then came a brain tumor. I’ll talk more about the operations to remove the damn thing later, I need to write about how fortunate I am to have had love showered on me during the most stressful time in my life.

Having never had an operation before, I didn’t consider the care I’d need afterwards during my recuperation. The reason for this is the operation was not supposed to be too serious as they were going to pull the thing out through my nose. I was supposed to be up and out of the hospital within a day of the procedure.

When I awoke from the nose portion of things the doctor was there with his face inches from mine. He looked so serious and he said, “We could only get three eighths of the tumor so we’re going to have to cut.” That meant they were going to have to shave my head (my biggest fear), open my skull and go in under my brain to get out the tumor. This course of action required major recuperation for which I never planned.

Some of my friends were in the room with me and when the doctor said, “Do you have anyone to take care of you when you get home?” My friends John and Bernice Hayden said in unison, “He’s going home with us.”

That was the first of many tears of joy and relief shed by me for the love shown to me. I counted them as friends and until that moment never knew how much they cared.

After my two week stay with the Haydens my best friend in LA also stepped up and cared for me with the kind of caring and concern only love can bring. Through the fog of his ADHD (that’s ADD in High Definition) he handled my care as best he could as I was out of it. I was a problem patient. I refused to eat, I couldn’t get up, I had a nine inch tape pompadour in the shape of a question mark on my bald head covering the  incision. I was a mess. I am speaking of the very talented Scott LaRose.

He would come over every day and prepare food for me, which went untouched. And then one afternoon he did something I don’t think I could ever have done. You see, I was delirious and suffering. The only relief for me was to take a bath. While lying in the bath soaking in the calming heat, I inadvertently soiled the bath. I had no control over the pain of having to go. It literally scared the crap out of me. I am in the bath picking up turds and placing them on the edge of the tub as if I was lining them up to be counted. He walked in as I was crying, not knowing what to do. I was almost too weak to get out of the tub. He yelled, “I need rubber gloves and a gas mask!” and he cleaned that bathroom. I never had kids. I think changing diapers enabled him to do what he did after my embarrassing bodily function explosion.

That could only have been done out of love.

I am touched and thrilled to have witnessed those compassionate emotions coming at me.

My sister Robin and my best friend from college, Irwin Finger, came out to be with me and take care of me. When I think of them doing that, the tears flow again and I am filled with such overwhelming gratitude for the people on this planet who truly care for me.

Am I lucky, or what?