December 27, 1964
Bob’s off to Westwood for 6 days. And I’m free to do my English project. I think I’ll do it in the natural color of the balsa wood, shading it in black and white. The important thing is to get it done. Speaking of done, Bob’s vest is almost done except for the buttons and buttonholes. Tonight I saw Rudolf Nareyev dance. He’s a 26-year-old Russian ballet dancer and is he good! Next week Jean Paul Vignon is on Ed Sullivan. I think he’s wonderful!!!
December 27, 2022
Oh, boy, the hormones were kicking in with a vengeance. For the next couple of years, I was crushing on dozens of male celebrities and classmates at a time. And yet I also wondered if I was queer. This reveals a lot about my (mis)understanding of sexual attraction and my complete lack of self-awareness. Here was my reasoning:
1. I was not a girly girl.
2. I really enjoyed gym class.
3. My name was Jo (maybe my parents really wanted a boy).
4. . Boys were not interested in me.
This is not the first time I had applied my reasoning skills to self-assessment. In sixth grade, I decided that I must be developmentally delayed (in 60s vernacular, “retarded”), despite being in the accelerated class. The evidence? My classmates teased me, while the teachers were super nice. Also, I sometimes made really stupid mistakes. Finally, I believed that if I were really different, I probably wouldn’t know, and would think I was normal. My very own Catch-22!