The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy

THE TIP OF THE CONSORTIUM stayed for my reading, and they insisted that Lana stay with them, so I had an audience of twenty for my reading of “Enough Is Enough,” the twenty-seventh episode of Dead Air. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

ANOTHER OF THE REALTORS, Lana, brought a group of potential buyers to the island. They came in their own boat, one of those long, powerful speedboats modeled on offshore racers, the kind that my friend Mark Dorset, the unaffiliated psychosociologist, calls a penis boat. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscri...

BALDY THE DUMMY ended his program that night with a story that began with a question, his favorite kind of question. “Have you ever wondered what evil looks like, boys and girls?” He waited a moment, gave his listening audience a moment of dead air, so that we could answer, “Yeah.” . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.su...

I READ “Filling Time,” the twenty-sixth episode of Dead Air, to a good crowd, but as I looked out over their faces I couldn’t help seeing them as agents of destruction, people who were going to make messes and break things and cost us money. . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

I’VE SAID IT BEFORE: imagination can be a curse. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

AFTER THE READING, and after some discussion of the reading, I made my way to the bar, where I ordered a drink from Lou. When he handed it to me, I leaned across the bar and said, “We have to talk.” . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

THAT EVENING, I read “Testing, Testing,” episode twenty-five of Dead Air, to an audience of thirty-four — Albertine, Suki, Lou, Elaine, Clark and Alice, Artie and Nancy, Otto and Esther, Louise and Miranda, Tony T and Cutie, and twenty daytrippers. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

WHEN I WENT DOWN to the dock to pump the launch dry, I found that someone was already there. From a distance, he looked like a hood from my school days. (If you were not around during my school days, reader, you may not know that hoods were bad boys, or boys who wanted to be mistaken for bad boys. . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy...

“THERE ACTUALLY IS a drink called a hurricane,” said Lou, filling a line of glasses along the bar, “but I tried it and I didn’t like it, so this is my version of it, the Hurricane Lou.” Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

THE WIND was still roaring in the evening, the tide was still high, the basement was completely flooded, the cabins were partly submerged, and our island was only a fraction of its usual size, . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

THE WORST of the hurricane struck us in the night. The winds roared, the shutters banged, the doors shook in their frames. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

LYING IN BED, waiting for the storm to strike, I was struck again by the astonishing discovery that there really is no fool like an old fool, and by the more astonishing discovery that I had become one — not so much because I was willing to sell without making a profit, but because I had bought something that I couldn’t even sell at a loss. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Expe...

THE CISTERN was empty. There had to be a leak somewhere. It would have to be fixed, but that would have to wait until the storm had passed. . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

I STOOD AT THE WINDOW of my workroom, looking down into the courtyard behind the hotel. It faces southeast, so it catches the sun in the morning, preserving an isolated bit of summer well into fall. Louise and Miranda were out there, taking a break from their kitchen work, sunning themselves, naked. . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Lero...

ESTHER SAID, “I loved that bit about ‘I’m pregnant and it didn’t even wake me up.’ “Uh-oh,” said Otto, “I think the conversation is going to take one of those anti-male turns.” . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

I SPENT the rest of the day doing the hundred little chores that consume an assistant innkeeper’s day at a failing hotel, chores that leave no visible sign of their having been done, but which if left undone scream, “Look at me, look at me! Fix me, clean me, mend me!” In the evening, I read the twenty-second episode of Dead Air, “No Sale.” Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Exper...

HAVING IMAGINED Rockwell Kingman, I seemed to be stuck with him, and he was becoming annoying. He wouldn’t dance to my tune. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

WHEN I CAME TO BED, Albertine was reading, quite openly, the latest issue of Manhattan magazine. “Listen to this,” she said. “It’s my horoscope: . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

I USED TO ENJOY Mondays on the island. The weekend guests would be gone, and everyone who remained — guests, staff, owners — would feel liberated by their departure, enough to be lazy all day, figuring that there were four more before the next weekend arrived. That was in the days before the dredging, of course, and in the days when I still expected the hotel to succeed eventually. Get full access...

I EXPECTED the dredge to be gone when I walked out onto the porch. It wasn’t. I think I was relieved, but I was also disappointed, and although I am not quite certain about my being relieved, I am quite certain about my being disappointed. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

“HOW OLD would Mrs. Jerrold be now?” asked Louise. I glanced at Albertine before answering. She smiled; neither of us winked. “Well,” I said, “she was about seventeen years older than I am, . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

MY AUDIENCE for the reading of the twentieth episode of Dead Air, “Gratitude,” consisted of the inmates of Small’s Hotel (Albertine, Lou, Elaine, Clark and Alice, Artie and Nancy, Otto and Esther, Louise and Miranda), Suki and her boyfriend Daryl, and a quartet of Babbingtonians who stayed on after Sunday dinner. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Pe...

LIZA THE REALTOR brought another flock of mixed nuts to the island. Like the earlier shoppers who had come to kick the tires, these people were not interested in running a hotel. . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

“LET’S SEE what interesting things are happening outside the cave, boys and girls. Hand me the paper, will you, Bob?” . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

“I CAN’T COUNT the number of times I have calculated money that I haven’t earned yet!” said Artie. “You, too, right, Lou?” He pointed at Lou and said to the rest of us, “Of course, my buddy Hamlet usually ends up actually making the money, isn’t that right, Lou?” “Yeah,” said Lou. . . . Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.sub...