Tag: sacred sexuality

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Lucy and The Epstein Files

Saint-Germain-des-Prés

I can write this now that these men are dead and cannot sue me for libel. Lucy Pilgrim would want me to, and would want you to know the despicable agents in her story and my first novel, Lucy, go see., were real-life characters whose names are in the Epstein Files. I used some of my own experiences in the modeling world in the novel, and Lucy would also like it that I ask you to scoundrel-hunt these characters in the pages of Lucy, go see.

I often remember when I heard the news that Jean-Luc Brunel had hung himself in his prison cell in Paris, and how strange it felt. I had been close to this man for some hours in the summer of 1988, a morning and an afternoon, a sort of overnight time, a lunch, a couple of dinners. It was and still is weird to remember the proximity and humanness of him, his elf-like expressions, agility, and hyperactivity, and then to imagine this slight, arrogant trickster preparing to hang himself, then prison guards finding his limp body dangling in dank darkness. It had been weird, too, over a year earlier, when I read he had been arrested in an airport. I imagined his knee-jerking movements and nonchalant expression as he was approached and taken away. I could see him nervously lying, smiling, twitching, his wounded-animal blood-shot eyes pleading. He was never a friend, yet I would call the time we spent together intimate, especially because he revealed a spark of his vulnerability to me during it. He was honestly despicable and that clarity was part of why I hung around for a while. I had a good hunch about what I was getting into when I agreed to go to his home, and I went as a curious writer gathering fodder because I wanted to see how far he would go. I think he sensed with me his usual shtick might require something more and maybe he was too tired for that and happy for the company. Maybe he hadn’t started slipping Mickies in drinks yet, or was out of them. It was August in Paris and perhaps it would never have happened if there had been more unoccupied teenaged models in town. Instead, he would get nowhere with me, other than at least avoiding what he proclaimed he loathed most–being alone. In the end, it was a shame-filled experience for both of us, for different reasons, or maybe the same, depending on how you look at it.

I hesitate to write more though there is so much I’d like to say about sexual abuse in our society. John Casablancas also comes to mind. Another agent, also deceased, also fictionalized in Lucy, go see., also unsurprisingly in those files. The one who said straight to my face when I was 19, “You are already old for this business. I like to get girls when they are fifteen, before they have a mind of their own.” It is also uncanny to think of the moments I spent with him and how his interest in me moved my life toward places I wanted to go, and how my subsequent disinterest in him moved it again, in yet other interesting directions.

And another, whose name I try to recall, who is possibly still alive, also in Lucy, go see., and whose name I also would be unsurprised to see in those files.

Oh, the trouble Lucy got into and out of!

Enough for now. This morning I went to see the film, Nuremberg, (go!) and am thinking about Dr. Douglas Kelley, the psychiatrist who interviewed the war criminals, and his disturbing revelations that they were not monsters, they were humans, shaped by extreme circumstances, and this line: “The only clue to what man can do is what man has done,” attributed to British philosopher R.G. Collingwood, 

I am thinking about it because of what I wrote in the first paragraph above, and how I was able to feel sad and sorry for someone even while knowing he has done despicable things which I in no way condone. I knew some of those things then, from what he told me, and what I could imagine, but later learned the extent of the network and the depravity.

I am following the news and praying for justice, for accountability. Over all, I’m praying for abuse to stop, praying for people to see it and call it what it is.

Thanks, as always, for reading.

Marianne

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mi amiga marianne

February 11, 2025. Barcelona, in the evening. A chime on my phone, I saw the link you see below and under it the words mi amiga marianne, then another chime: Hello Marianne. I listened to your rendition of the prelude, and first chapter of Lucy go see. It was a beautiful experience. Your writing is beautiful and powerful. You are a good writer… and a brave one! I shared the podcast with some friends…

I responded: Such good timing you have. I was writing when I heard your message come in. working on writing myself right, as I sometimes call it. Feeling down and writing, too, about writing, and all the time put into it and wondering if it mattered much–and then I saw this. Thank you very much. It means a lot and especially coming from you. Thank you so much too for sharing it. I’d so love to move this story further and wider into the world. A really big hug. I hope you are having a good start to your week.

As did she: The timing is not mine…probably🥰😅 Imagine….I read/listened to it early afternoon… and had to reflect a bit afterwards… powerful words… I shall buy the book. I thought you could try a public reading with your students…you do a superb job reading your novel… you are a good interpreter of “Lucy”… but personally I think they may not be ready for your honesty… and they may misuse the sacredness of it. I am afraid for you, but you know best… Am afraid of the superficial nature of some youth. On the other hand, you could help them tremendously… because of your experience and the healing over the years… you talk about it with great insight and wisdom.

The “it” my friend refers to is a sacred understanding of sexuality.

My friend is a sister of the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word of Houston, Texas, and a pediatrician. We met in a nearby café in Barcelona soon after I moved into this neighborhood in the fall of 2023, and we struck up a conversation. Within it, I learned she had returned to Barcelona after more than two decades in the USA, to care for her mother, who was in her early nineties. It was remarkable to me that I, after returning to Barcelona after my years in Iowa with my mother during her last years of life, was meeting a Barcelona woman who had returned to her hometown to do the same, after living decades in Texas, and who was talking of a future return there. We talked about that and many things including spirituality, sanctuary, sacredness, swimming, and the themes of wound, eros, and voice that are prevalent in my work. (We have continued this conversation ever since.)

You probably guessed I am a nun, she said.

No, I said. Why would I?

My collar, she said, lifting her shawl. To me a lace collar, nothing more. My cross, she said, holding the pendant around her neck.

It’s pretty, I said.

You probably already have many friends, she said.

Never too many, I said.

A few weeks later, she sent me an article she had written about vulnerability, wounds, and wisdom that I’d like to share with you:

https://issuu.com/joanofbark/docs/e_news_-nov_21_n_n_2

Our friendship continues to flourish, enrich, and reveal what can easily be seen as divine timing and connection.

I was grateful this week to be reminded through her that what means so much to me is worth doing, and it will continue to be surprising in its revelations. This is one of the stories of how it has moved and moves in the world.

Thanks for reading. May you marvel at your life, and this world.