Having just turned eighteen at the height of hippiedom, I so much wanted to be part of that scene! But I was still a high school kid from the Bronx, college-bound and straighter than I wanted to admit. Sure, I smoked dope, but who did I know that didn't?
On weekends, I would take the subway downtown to the East Village and hang around St. Mark's Place. I loved the button and poster shop, Underground Uplift Unlimited. I would buy sandalwood incense at the Intergalactic Trading Post to burn in my candlelit room at home while listening to The Mothers of Invention. At the Gem Spa, I would have an egg cream, a classic drink from every New York boy's childhood, and pick up the latest issue of The East Village Other, the local alternative weekly.
The Other had a weekly feature called Slum Goddess, a photo of a real live East Village resident. No airbrushed bunnies, these were the girls I fantasized about. I imagined myself living with one of them in a tenement on Avenue B.
One Saturday I was browsing St. Mark's Books, the kind of store that stocked "The Anarchist Cookbook" and "Revolution for the Hell of It". I saw a woman walking the aisles who looked familiar. She was a prototypical hippie chick: long black hair parted in the middle, peasant blouse, well-worn jeans patched with embroidered ribbon from the Ukrainian store on Seventh Street, and leather sandals. I suddenly realized why I recognized her.
Although it seems impossible now, I was extremely shy at that age, which accounted for my limited dating experience. I had been out with a few girls, and even made out a couple of times, but had passed up many opportunities for fear of rejection. Yet something motivated me to step up and address her.
"Hey, I liked your picture in The Other."
She looked at me coldly. "Oh yeah?" she replied, "What did you like about it?"
I said she looked exactly like the kind of girl I dreamt about. This seemed to soften her, and she said, "That's sweet. So what kind of girls do you go out with?" With nothing to be gained by talking big, I told her the truth, that I had only been on a few dates, and with girls who were nothing like her. You could drive a truck between the lines and it would have had "virgin" painted on the side panels.
She looked me up and down, took my hand and said, "Let's go for a walk." I was incredulous, and if I hadn't been so nervous I would have sprouted wood right then.
As we walked, I learned her name was Suzy, she was 25 and had come to New York from Ohio four years earlier. She waitressed at Ratner's, serving blintzes to Jewish ladies before performances at the Yiddish theater, and cheesecake to rock stars and their fans after shows at the Fillmore East.
Eventually we were on Third Street between B and C. She stopped, dropped my hand and said, "This is my place." I thought our time together was over. But she started up the steps, turned and said, "C'mon!" As we hiked up to the sixth floor, I experienced an olfactory potpourri that included tomato sauce, cigarette smoke and cat piss.
Her apartment was bedroom, living room and kitchen together in one long room. It was what they used to call a railroad apartment, cut in half. The bedroom area had a full size mattress on the floor and a dresser strewn with candles in various stages of meltedness. The kitchen consisted of an ancient fridge, small gas range and deep sink in a row, across from which was a table and two chairs. The living area had a single easy chair, a milk crate full of records, and a stereo on the floor. There were bars on the windows that led to the fire escape.
Suzy pulled out a few albums and put them on the record changer. First up was Donovan's Gift From a Flower to a Garden. She told me to sit in the easy chair and climbed on, facing me, with her knees on either side of me. She bent down to kiss me. Her tongue entered my mouth and then pulled back, my tongue following into hers. My mind was racing and then went blank. The idea that I was making out with this beautiful older woman in her flat in the East Village was overwhelming. I heard Donovan sing, "Oh gosh, life is really too much."
My hands were on the arms of the chair. She sat upright and placed them on her breasts. It was my first such feel, and a braless one at that. She pushed back down and we resumed kissing, now with my hands squished against her softness. What seemed like a happy eternity later, she pulled up again and pulled her blouse off. This was my first in-person view of a woman's naked breasts, and I sat there dumbfounded. She smiled at the effect she had on me, then stood, unbuckled my belt and undid the buttons on my jeans. I lifted my butt and she pulled off my jeans and briefs. She motioned me to remove my t-shirt.