The Sky Through the Hole in the Bone

Set In The Last Days Of A Still Bohemian Greenwich Village This Memoir Is The Story Of A Young Girls Awakening And Growth Told Through Letters And Journal Entries. Her Adventures Lead To A Summer Working With Georgia Okeeffe Encounters With Several Atists Before Their Fame--Wilhelm And Elaine Dekooning Franz Kline Joachim Probst Writer Maxwell Bodenheim And Later Joseph Heller. . The Year Is 1942 The Time Of The Second World War And The Beginning Of Recovery From The Great Depression. Defense Plants Are Booming; Meat Sugar And Butter Are Rationed As Well As Gasoline. Government Ration Books Are A Must The Draft Is On And Young Men Are Being Conscripted Into The Service. For The First Time Women Are Allowed To Work At Mens Jobs. . Marjorie Not Yet Twenty-One Uncomfortable With Men Decides To Become A Lesbian And Devote Her Life To Writing. She Considers Herself A Poet And Escapes Much Of The Influence Of The War By Moving To Greenwich Village. But When She Becomes Involved With A Group Of Artists And Loses Her Virginity To Joachim (Jack) Probst A Member Of The Group Her Lesbian Dreams Fade. Probst Renames Her Carol Her Middle Name And They Live Together For Two Years.. Wickie Her Best Friend And Recipient Of Most Of The Early Letters Is The Opposite Of Marjorie Now Carol. Raised In Europe The Daughter Of An Ambassador Wickie Is Sophisticated Worldly Secure In Her Self-Image.. Carol Is Curious Adventurous Uncertain Insecure. She Met Wickie While She Was Selling Magazines Cross-Country And They Became . Instant Friends. She Expects Someday To Be Transformed To Automatically Become Very Wise. The Magic Age Is Thirty. Her Life With Probst Has Many Twists And Turns: Infidelities Separations Money Problems. In A Get-Away To San Francisco She Becomes An Artists Model A Hat Check Girl Rides The Cable Cars Discovers French Poets And North Beach. Her Adventures There With A Friend Babs Yield A Sense Of Joy Which She Had Not Had In New York.. But When Babs Becomes Ill Its Back To New York To Probst And Inner Turmoil. She Becomes Pregnant And Probst Leaves Her.. As A Mother Carol Continues Her Bohemian Life Boarding Her Daughter Whom Shes Named Lilith (The Goddess In George Bernard Shaws Play Back To Methuselah.) . After A Failed Romance Which Nets Her An Apartment She Falls In Love With Arthur Gunn A Painter Exactly Her Fathers Age Who Plays Pygmalion To Her Eliza Doolittle. He Is Committed To Transforming Her-- To Making Her Into A Lady And She Is Completely Open To It. She Sees Him As Very Wise. It Is Through Him That She First Learns About Okeeffes Work In A Retrospective At The Whitney.. Arthur Gives Up On Her Transformation And Carol Betrays Him With Ernest Guteman A Sculptor She Is Posing For. There Is A Terrifying Night When She Is In Bed And Hears Arthur Sharpening Knives. . After That Incident She Moves In With Guteman And They Bring Lilith Now Three Years Old To Live With Them. It Is Through Ernest That She Meets Georgia Okeeffe And Spends A Summer Working With Her. A Very Important Time For Carol The Okeeffe Influence Is Felt For The Rest Of Her Life. . At Liliths Nursery School Carol Becomes Friends With One Of The Teachers And Through Her Is Introduced To Richard A Young Writer-Painter Who Is Working On His Phd At Nyu And Teaching English At Penn State. They Fall In Love And Eventually Marry Making Their Home In State College Pennsylvania. Lilith Begins First Grade. . Marriage Creates Many Problems Much Adjusting As They Learn To Be A Family. Carol Keeps Busy With Writing Taking Jewelry-Making At The College And Learning To Cook. . After Four Years In Pennsylvania Living Next To An Abandoned Apple Orchard Getting Used To Being In The Country Richard Applies For And Is Hired At Long Beach State Co