I opened up the doors to the ballroom, which was now darkened, its banks of seats totally empty except for a woman’s bobbing head. It looked like one of the analysts I had seen at the conference was giving a blowjob to a colleague, and for a moment I experienced a shot of jealousy, thinking it might be China. In any case, the atmosphere in Rio was obviously infectious even for analysts, who generally tend to keep a professional demeanor. I was beginning to understand how Rio could liberate the unconscious desires of practically anyone, including the most intransigent mental health professional. What if it was China giving the blowjob? So what? She was a free agent and so was I. We had no commitments to each other, beyond that of doctor and patient. I had no right to make any demands of her at all. As painful as it all was, China was actually doing me a favor by keeping her distance. My unfulfilled love for her only fueled my lust.
I decided to head out to the Copacabana. It was early evening and I knew that I was at a turning point in the trip. I was no longer waltzing around Rio in my underpants, and in fact had progressed to the point where I was both desirable and plainly eager to make my desires known. Sometimes analytic patients have sessions over the phone, and as I proceeded out onto the Copa, I thought momentarily about calling China in order to air a few lingering anxieties. I just wanted to let China know I was still thinking about our work together, even as I made my way toward the crowds of whores at The Gringo. If I was still thinking about her even as I was dressed to kill and about to get my rocks off, then she must mean something to me. But just as I was about to reach into my jacket pocket for my rented cell phone, it occurred to me that if she was indeed the woman I had spotted in the darkened ballroom, she obviously wouldn’t be able to talk. So I returned the phone to my pocket.
Being a New Yorker, I always jaywalk. But with the tight pants I had trouble estimating the time it would take me to get from one side of the street to the other, and a taxicab swerved dramatically to avoid hitting me, nearly sideswiping another car. The driver pulled over, plainly annoyed and cursing loudly, but I couldn’t understand the Portuguese. When I screamed back, “Could you express your feelings in English? I’m an American,” he simply slammed his car door, gunned his engine, and sped off.
At that moment, standing in the island between two streams of traffic, I was reminded of the fragility of life. I knew that I had to give myself extra time to make it from the traffic island to the other side of the busy avenue. I was hyperventilating, and now that I had finally decided this was the night I would test the depths of human pleasure, I was eager to get to my destination. I would have run or at least picked up my pace if I could, but I had to wait until there was no traffic in sight to finally cross a street, encumbered as I was by my skin-tight jeans. I had never been bow-legged, but now I noticed I was walking around with my knees pointed outward, like a cowpuncher who spends the day in the saddle rustling up his herd.
Despite being an urban dweller, and more particularly a denizen of Manhattan’s Upper West Side, I have become totally dependent on Global Positioning Systems. All the car and cab services use them, and my car is equipped with one. As a result I have lost the ability to follow directions. One of the harbingers of modern life is an attrition of abilities in areas that have been taken over by technology. For instance, even though I’m an accountant by profession, I can barely add or subtract, and have totally lost the ability to multiply and divide. So, as I negotiated the warrens of Tiffany-filled streets that led to The Gringo, I was in a continual state of confusion, not knowing which way I was going. My body was trapped in the contemporary version of a medieval suit of armor, but I was driven on by images of a magnificent world filled with impossibly beautiful prostitutes, like a palace in one of those Disney animations I loved as a kid.
At the very least I can usually rely on my dick as the equivalent of an electronic device leading me toward a scent — specifically the pheromones given off by women whose bodies are for hire — but now I was in a state of total confusion, frequently finding myself turning in circles, growing dizzy and light-headed in the process.
I was actually reminded of the scenes in Vertigo when Jimmy Stewart’s character experiences the sensations of falling as he relives his traumatic memories. But what was the trauma I was responding to? Was I suffering from a totally experiential problem having to do with the loss of circulation to my genitalia, which could be addressed by an analyst of the so-called existential school, or was my vertigo the result of factors pertaining to depth psychology and the instinctual drives that it addresses? In addition to the constriction of my blood vessels, I was also sweating profusely, and I wanted to find a Tiffany as quickly as possible, if for no other reason than the fact that I needed to get my pants off. It might have been a superficial solution, but I was convinced that as soon as my dick was free to get as hard as it needed to, I would at least be able to retrieve some sense of direction. This is what is known by those seeking spiritual enlightenment as a “limited objective,” but I needed to do something before I fainted right in the middle of one of the many boulevards scattered around Rio.
I decided that I would find a fresh Tiffany even before I got to The Gringo and I promised myself to practice some form of coitus interruptus, which would whet my appetite for the pleasures that awaited me later in the night.
Memories flashed through my mind as I staved off another fainting spell. There had been an episode in high school, soon after the Beatles became famous, when I’d wanted to be like the other kids and had secretly gone out to buy a pair of tight white Levi’s, which fit much like the pants I was wearing now. My penis hadn’t grown to its full adult size, so the pants were not nearly as constrictive, and I was easily able to walk around with or without an erection. I was totally embarrassed when my mother discovered them hidden behind a pair of slacks in my closet, but when I asked her if she was mad, she just shrugged and said that she was disappointed in me. I would actually have preferred it if she had gotten angry, because the disconsolate look on her face made it seem as if I had inflicted a mortal wound in my attempt to look sexy and hip.
One of the things that can happen in an intense analysis like the one I was undertaking is that the patient introjects the analyst’s persona into his consciousness. So even though there was no China at the present moment, I felt her questioning presence in my mind. Consequently, I began to realize that the trouble I was having with my new pants was partially psychosomatic. The feelings of constriction, I began to understand, were largely in my head. And the faintness came from reliving the trauma of my mother’s discovery of my adolescent fashion transgression. It wasn’t the pants that were making me feel lightheaded; it was the guilt I felt toward my mother!
Whenever a therapist interviews me for the first time, I make a point of the fact that I’ve never had any transcendent experiences. I’ve never seen a great white light. Instead, I endorse a pragmatic spiritualism that is simply a reiteration of the Golden Rule. But now, for the first time, a genuine lightness came over me and I almost felt as if I was levitating. The tightness of the pants no longer seemed to matter. My crotch was no longer locked within the denim that encased it, and I knew I could have as many erections as I wanted regardless of the restricted circumstances in which my penis was operating. I realized at that moment that there are many people who have to make do with extremely meager resources. If whole families with eight or nine children lived in one solitary room, then my cock and balls could certainly survive a cramped walk to The Gringo.