Bruce
My first boyfriend in London was Alain Katzeflis. He was half Greek and half Egyptian. He lived with his mother in Chelsea. I really adored him but his father who lived in Paris decided that we should no longer see each other when his grades plummeted at the London School of Economics. He turned out to be gay in the long run. He would go on to pursue a career in journalism and became an excellent journalist apparently for the Manchester Guardian.
Meantime this poverty thing was really getting to Bruce and me. He was just as frustrated. He worked for a diamond merchant in Hatton Garden. He would have glamerous trips to Thailand and the Far East but his boss treated him poorly and he earned very little. His parents had had a rubber plantation in Penangoff the coast of Malaysia and it was the Far East he longed to return to. He was very indecisive, ruled over by his stentorian Scottish father and his dominant mother. He was never sure which to do. I was working in yet another ad agency and had given in my notice because we thought we were going to Bangkok. At the last moment they changed it to Frankfurt.
We went through with our wedding plans. We were married in St. Jude’s Church, Kensington on September 22, 1967. Our reception was at the Basil Street Hotel behind Harrods in Knightsbridge. Neither of our parents attended. His because they didn’t approve and mine because they were too far away and why would they anyway as we were more or less not speaking. Clive organized the entire wedding and Howard paid for everything. Clive gave me away. We had our wedding dinner at the Paglio di Sienna in Earl’s Court and we flew out at some unGodly hour on a charter to Pisa. We took a train to Piombino and a boat to Elba. Elba was lovely. Our relationship was somewhat strained. We did find two women from WHO in Geneva and became friends with them.
After returning from our honeymoon we started to prepare for move to Frankfurt. We moved in the winter, November I think. Frankfurt was cold, grey and unwelcoming although over time I would get to know it well and actually wish I had taken more advantage of it than I did. We went to the zoo, the Palmengaten, walks along the Main, museums etc. We had a little blue VW and we used to travel all over Germany on weekends.
At first I worked for the US Army, for Major Weimer in the IG Hochaus, the largest building in Europe and then I worked for an automobile insurance company. It was during this time that I had my appendix out and during my week stay at the Krankenhaus, Bruce never came to visit me and I later found out that he spent every waking moment with Douglas, his old flatmate and schoolmate. Things did not go well, I guess, as he broke down in tears one night never fully explaining the problem but the gyst as I understood it was that Douglas was getting married and whatever transpired between them, if anything, was finally and truly over. But I still did not understand it to be a gay relationship. I thought he meant as friends they had drifted apart.
After two years and a bit in Frankfurt we headed out. First to Geneva for some orientation and then onto London for leave and shots, etc. Next stop: Bangkok. We were practically on the brink of separation at this point but we tried. We honestly wanted to make a go of it and I honestly wanted out of London. I did not want to go back to living the way I had before I was married. So to Bangkok it was only while waiting for visas there was a little hitch. The quota for British visas was full so another change of plans: Tokyo. That was OK with me. I was hungry for all experiences to live everywhere by the time I was fifty. Almost achieved that!
Bruce and I eventually became engaged. Our whole goal was to leave England. We were very anti-England; for young people the hangover of WWII was very depressing. Constantly having no money was very depressing.
His parents were Scottish and had been rubber planters in Malaysia and he wanted to return to the Far East. He was working for a Hatton Garden diamond merchant as a buyer which afforded him great trips to Thailand etc. for buying precious stones but he really wanted a posting. He had a degree in German from Edinburgh University plus his Far Eastern expertise in general. Finally, he did get a job with Societe Generale de Surveillance, a Swiss shipping company that specialized in the storage of American material from WWII.
Our first posting was in Frankfurt, Germany. In those days, international companies would only send married men. For two reasons: they didn’t want their single men fraternizing with the indigenous population and the second reason is that a single man might be thought to be gay and could leave himself vulnerable to blackmail. So very quickly we got married.
Even though we were already engaged and living together, Bruce’s parents (Scottish, Presbyterians) were not happy about his choice of bride: me. American, no parents, to speak of. No money. Who was I sort of thing. So we invited his mother to come to London and meet my family: Clive and Howard. Mrs. Kennedy arrived and we took her up to their flat. Howard was making stiff gin and tonics as he was wont to do. Clive was pirouetting around.
He reminded me of Nathan Lane in the American version of Cage Au Folle, you know, mother of the bride. We took her in Howard’s Bentley to a very expensive restaurant for dinner. I can’t remember now where but I know it was top of the line - might even have been the Dorchester. Lots of wine was imbibed.
Anyway, I thought they had done a pretty good job of presenting themselves. As the Bentley pulled up at Barkston Gardens, Howard said “All get out and I will put the car in the garage and meet you upstairs.” Eve opened the passenger door, not waiting for Clive, to offer her an arm and I hear this “kerplumph” like a sack of potatoes collapsing in the street. Sure enough, she was in her cups and had fallen.
We were married on September 22, 1967 at St. Jude’s Church, Kensington. Clive gave a wedding breakfast in their flat (Howard was not there). He made scrambled eggs and served red wine, ‘breathing’ by a wonderful fire in the fireplace. My bridesmaids attended and remember it to this day as a wonderful experience. He basically organized my entire wedding and did a marvelous job.
My parents did not attend. And so Clive gave me away and Howard fronted for a beautiful reception at the Basil Street Hotel behind Harrods in Knightsbridge.
That night we and our wedding party had dinner at Il Paglio, a wonderful Italian restaurant of the day on Earl’s Court Road and at 4AM we headed to Gatwick to get a flight to Elba which is where we honeymooned for two weeks. To get to Elba you have to go to Pisa and there was the old Leaning Tower and both of us so hung-over we could do no more than lie on the grass and look up and then close our eyes.