January 6th, 1981

January, my annual messiah. January is always like some bright new morning rising over the gloom and despair of December. This year may have been the worst. Broke and hopeless with all my walls caving in with exhaustion from that job at Gimbels. Starting to feel shabby and tattered from my daily exposure to the broken spirits that staff the advertising department. And nights, whoring on Christopher and drinking myself into a hangover that lasted the entire month of December. Gaining weight and losing what shreds of self respect I can say are mine. My mother’s face pressed against my window, begging me to come home. And my grandmother dying of pneumonia and cancer in a hospital in Missouri. Facing the days like a zombie with stomach pains and hives that swelled my welted legs to huge masses. Stealing dog food from the deli and cursing god for being such a bad scriptwriter.

And now, January. I am on vacation this week and am holed up in my apartment shedding skin. The phone woke me up this morning: it was Allen R. from the agency who wants me to come in tomorrow to meet Jimmy M., the art director. This is it– new job! Escape from Gimbels. More money, what seems to be a good position with a great future. Gloria, my surrogate mother, has had her hand in this all along and she urges me to take the job. I trust her with that kind of faith I have always wanted to feel for my parents. And, my Grandfather called yesterday. Grandma is doing much better and may get to go home tomorrow. Hallelujah! I have survived the death and decay of another December and this new year gleams before me like a shining gem.