FLASHBACK: Coupling @ 47 Pianos (1978 - 1984)

Dave and I found a one-bedroom apartment on the parlor floor of a converted brownstone on West 88th Street.  A piano has the same number of keys, so Dave called our new place 47 Pianos.  We split the rent, which we managed to get reduced when we learned we lived in a rent-stabilized building.

Not having to open a sofa bed every night made a huge difference.

Smokey had twice as many places to sleep.  

We celebrated our first Christmas not long after moving in.

In 1979, we could enter Central Park at the end of the block, very convenient for walking Smokey. And cruising the Ramble--oops, I mean jogging.

Dave didn't much care for monogamy, a source of tension between us.  Fortunately we had similar taste in men.  David, an Italian guy we brought home, worked in construction.  He helped us attach an L-shaped butcher block counter in our kitchen.

It needed all the help it could get.  

We invited our hot construction worker over for Easter dinner to say thanks.  I'm not sure we ever saw him again.  

But maybe that's the pot calling the kettle black.  Dave didn't go out in public as the Easter bunny.  I did, however, sport this New Wave outfit.  Too bad you can't see the color of the glasses and matching jacket (picked up at a John Karl, sample sale):  cherry red. Everything else was black or white.

Tom and Audrey never suffered from a lack of glamor.  A pro took this photo of them at Hurrah.  Tres chic, no?

Sire Records hired Audrey to publicize their artists, including the Ramones and Talking Heads.  

Upper West Side (1979)

Audrey used her connection in the music business to score VIP standing room for a free Simon & Garfunkel concert in Central Park.

1.5 million people attended, including David and I.  

Central Park's Great Lawn (September 1981)

Tom and Audrey left the city for good around this time.  They bought a row house in Hoboken.

Not long after, they stopped by the library to tell me they'd gotten married at City Hall. Dave and I went to their wedding brunch at Windows on the World.  They began their family a few years later.

June 1982

Dave and I made friends with Paul and Ed, a fast-lane gay couple who lived on upper Park Avenue, owned a Jeep and belonged to the Saint. They introduced us to the Pines in the off-season, long before we could afford to rent the TV House, at the left edge of the photo. 

Ed, Paul & Dave

My First October Plunge (1981)

Michael, a competitive figure skater, was a carry over from West 70th Street.  You would have carried him over, too.  We called him Alabaster Buns.  He eventually joined the Ice Capades.

I gave Dad $1500 to restore a 64 VW, a labor of love that he completed in 1982.  Dave and I called it Herr Cucaracha.  After he finished a summer-stock gig, I picked him up in Beverly, Massachusetts, we drove it to Maine for a camping trip.  I forgot the tent.  We never vacationed together again.

Acadia National Park

I wasn't above trying to make Dave--who by this time had instructed me to call him David--jealous with other guys.  Like William, who eventually danced with Ballet Hispanico and Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo.

Columbus Avenue began to gentrify.

Harriet, my first work friend--she wrote copy for Crown Publishers and I scheduled publicity tours for their authors--bore the brunt of my relationship woes.  

Harriet also taught me more about gay culture, particularly movies, than anyone else in my life.  She and her husband Jake were avowed Marxists and lived in Park Slope.

David and I ended our co-habitation shortly before I fled to Australia.  He moved to Florida not long after I returned to 47 Pianos in 1984.