“

“I absolutely believe no university professor should condone homosexuality,” he said, “and I would do everything in my power to see that those professors are fired.” I told him I am a Broward Community College teacher and I condone homosexuality.

“

I got a letter from George. His last paragraph: “Never say that I told you this, but I’m not happy in marriage. There seems no way to talk about it. I feel sort of out of it now.” Poor George – and his poor wife. Maybe they rushed into things too fast.

“

I’d feel a lot better if I knew that Richard Simmons gets depressed, too.

“

Last night, while driving to Tamarac in a thunderstorm, I saw my first shooting star, one of the annual Perseid meteor showers. If you’re supposed to wish on a shooting star, I didn’t – because all the wishes that I wanted to come true have come true.

“

I just realized that today’s entry closes a dozen years of this diary. A week ago I was flying from Washington to Fort Lauderdale; just about this time we were landing at our stopover in Tampa. Now, unlike then, I know where I’m going – or rather, staying

“

I feel I’m surrounded by supportive, loving friends here and that I’m returning to a hostile or indifferent world. . . Looking back, I know how much I’ve experienced here in Virginia and I see the last four weeks as a very special time in my life.

“

I took a long walk down Highway 29, which goes north to Charlottesville and the Virginia suburbs of Washington. Back at my studio, I wrote five pages of a story called “If Abortions Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Abortions” in the voice of a 16-year-old boy.

“

He was slim, tanned, dressed in a t-shirt, straight-leg Levis and moccasins with no socks. I was attracted by his gentleness, his shy smile, the resiliency I could sense within him that I see in guys that are a bit effeminate.

“

We drank a liter of Tab and became nostalgic. At one point Ronna said to me something like, “But you don’t have any scars,” and I said, “Only –” and I stopped and then we both laughed because she knew what I was going to say and I knew that she knew and she knew that I knew that she knew.

“

I called Gary to say goodbye, and then Teresa phoned to say how sorry she was that I wouldn’t be staying with her. “You’d get sick of me anyway,” I said, and turning to the digital clock radio, I noticed it was midnight and that my twenties were over.