She was the girlfriend/lover of the Radical Lesbian Feminist. Seventeen years old, bright, intense and primal. R was no blushing schoolgirl. She grew up in New York City where she lost her virginity at the age of twelve to her stepfather. It wasn't long after that she was on her own. Stocky and slightly hunched she had a face like a boxer moonlighting as a trucker (or vice-versa) and a rather hoarse raspy voice that spoke with the most intense urgency and speed. We liked each other on first impact.
She borrowed my book of the writings of Simone Weil, French-Jewish philosopher and Christian mystic. She admitted when she returned it a few weeks later that she was more intrigued by the portrait of the author on the dust jacket and she had trouble penetrating her writing. On the invitation of a friend we visited an ashram for a screening of Franco Zeffirelli's film of St. Francis of Assisi, Brother Son And Sister Moon. I don't think she was intending to become a Christian, neither had I an agenda of converting her, but I did sense that light in her: a tender, loving child trapped in her pain and struggling to triumph but on her terms. I wanted to summon that light forth in her.
R. joined an all-lesbian punk band and moved into a shared house near my workplace. I would sometimes visit her during my lunch break. We didn't stay in contact. Our circles and our worlds were very different. We often saw each other on the bus and the friendship was there if muted. I don't thing I've seen or heard of her in at least thirty-five years.
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