“You see the end of things right from the beginning,” says his therapist.
He’s jolted. “My previous therapist said that,” he says. “Not the one before you, but the one before the one before you. She said I was always prepared for loss. That I always expected the teat to go dry. That I’d just suck away for all I could get because I felt sure it would go dry.”
“Your writing comes first for you,” says his therapist.
“Yes,” he says. “It’s number one. That makes decision-making easy. Everything else in my life, everyone else in my life, is subordinate to my writing. It doesn’t matter if I am lying in the gutter or davening at shul or standing on a porn set. They are all opportunities to write. Each perspective is but raw material in my artistic hand.
“I’m all about the work. I’m ready to sacrifice everything for my art.”
“That sounds very lonely,” says his therapist.
“Yeah, it can be,” he says. “It’s good to have your priorities.
