WEBVTT - The Girlfriends S1/E3: Bubbly, Bouncy and Very Alive 0:00:06.519 --> 0:00:16.520 Novel, Hey listener. In this episode, there's mention of suicide, attempts, depression, 0:00:17.040 --> 0:00:20.760 violence and control. There's also the story of Gail's life 0:00:21.040 --> 0:00:24.920 full of friendship, curly hair, and the romance of youth. 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.880 Probably a few swears too, so, as they say in 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:30.560 the South, Sorry, y'all. 0:00:31.360 --> 0:00:31.920 If you do. 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:35.680 Listen and are impacted by any of our themes, you 0:00:35.720 --> 0:00:39.879 can reach out to No More, a domestic violence charity 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:44.600 we've partnered with. They have lots of great resources to help. 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:45.600 You or your loved ones. 0:00:46.159 --> 0:00:49.760 You can find them at no More dot org. That's 0:00:50.120 --> 0:00:53.960 no More dot org. 0:01:02.440 --> 0:01:04.440 A baby photos. 0:01:07.280 --> 0:01:17.000 That you that's us too, and Gail No, and Gail 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:19.920 And I was with her when we took this one. 0:01:19.959 --> 0:01:21.560 You know you get from J. C. Penny these like 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:23.679 little things come here for a free photo. And she 0:01:23.760 --> 0:01:25.520 made me gun with her and we took the photo. 0:01:26.959 --> 0:01:31.480 And that's her beloved cat. Here's more care free Gails 0:01:31.560 --> 0:01:38.360 before she met and married Bob. And here's Bob. And 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:48.920 here's Gail and Bob. Does she look happy? No, I'm 0:01:48.920 --> 0:01:52.080 Alaine Katz, I'm Gail's sister. 0:01:57.440 --> 0:01:58.520 I'm Carol Fisher. 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:01.880 And from the teams that and our Heart Radio you're 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:07.160 listening to The Girlfriends episode three, Bubbly, Bouncy and Very 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:42.560 Alive You. A few days before Christmas in twenty twenty two, 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:47.600 my producer Anna visited Elaine in Westchester County, New York. 0:02:48.560 --> 0:02:51.960 Lane had just moved houses the day before, this beautiful 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:55.679 wood paneled home which looked out over the Hudson River. 0:02:56.320 --> 0:02:59.440 They sat around the kitchen table for two days, drinking 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:03.880 wine out of plastic cups pulled from cardboard boxes. I 0:03:03.919 --> 0:03:06.840 wish I could have been there, though I'll admit I 0:03:06.880 --> 0:03:10.079 would have been nervous. I worried a lot about how 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:12.680 Elaine would perceive me as a member of a lady 0:03:12.840 --> 0:03:16.880 social club that had turned her sister's disappearance into gossip. 0:03:17.919 --> 0:03:19.919 I would hate for her to think we made light 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:23.400 of the hardest moment of her life. But I'm really 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:26.320 ready to learn about Gail and to show all of 0:03:26.400 --> 0:03:29.680 you who she was, because I never got that chance 0:03:29.720 --> 0:03:35.440 when I first stumbled into this story. If you look 0:03:35.480 --> 0:03:38.240 at some of those old photos of their family, it's 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:42.280 clear how similar Elaine and Gail look. They weren't even 0:03:42.320 --> 0:03:43.760 two years apart. 0:03:44.800 --> 0:03:47.400 One of our favorite sayings is Gail and I were 0:03:47.840 --> 0:03:52.160 the opposite side of the same coin. We were very different, 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:56.000 but it was because we were responding to the same 0:03:56.080 --> 0:04:00.400 stimuli in an opposite way, so we were very close. 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.840 Early in our lives, we lived in Brooklyn and there 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:11.360 was a school at the end of our block, and 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:15.480 the kids would get out, and I'd find this impossible 0:04:15.480 --> 0:04:17.760 when I think back on it. They would go wild 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:26.480 and they would like sometimes start fights with us. Gail 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:32.600 was a protector then, but then she became fragile. She 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:36.960 had psychosomatic asthma, like when she got anxious, she couldn't breathe. 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:40.039 And I remember we would be in school and you know, 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:43.120 they had those public announcements, you know, Laine cats come 0:04:43.160 --> 0:04:46.160 to the nurse's office, and there my sister would be 0:04:46.279 --> 0:04:48.280 breathing with you know, a bag over her nose, and 0:04:48.320 --> 0:04:50.440 I would be called down there to hold her hand 0:04:50.480 --> 0:04:55.320 and calm her down. So there was like a role reversal. 0:04:55.800 --> 0:04:59.600 Although she was older than me, she had become highly 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:01.279 emotion and fragile. 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:09.799 Elaine, Gail, their younger brother Stephen, and their parents, Sylvia 0:05:09.920 --> 0:05:14.040 and Manny, moved to belmore Long Island in nineteen sixty four. 0:05:14.680 --> 0:05:17.719 It's where the girls lived out their teenage years. 0:05:18.480 --> 0:05:21.520 There was a lot of noise in our families. When 0:05:21.560 --> 0:05:24.560 we got together. It was always lots of loud discussions. 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:28.280 I think partly the Jewish families. Lots of debating always 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:28.719 went on. 0:05:29.040 --> 0:05:31.760 This is Abby Bruce, Gail and Elaine's cousin. 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:37.679 We were having a passover or Thanksgiving or something all together, 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:41.880 and there was a lot of tension going on between 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:45.080 my mother and my uncle. I forget what was going on, 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:47.960 but I remember it being tense, and Gail went over 0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:52.440 and sat down at the piano and started playing the piano. 0:05:55.120 --> 0:06:01.440 It completely diffused the situation. She was young, we were probably, 0:06:01.480 --> 0:06:05.080 you know, fourteen or fifteen at the time. I remember 0:06:05.200 --> 0:06:07.680 watching her hands on the piano and thinking she has 0:06:07.760 --> 0:06:09.320 such beautiful hands. 0:06:17.120 --> 0:06:20.280 I would say I was into boys. Gail was into love. 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:25.480 There's a difference. I'm not saying that Gail was boy crazy. 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:30.120 I was boy crazy. Gail was love crazy. Gail was 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:39.520 engaged like twice before she graduated high school and Saturday. 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:43.280 Gail had a way about her that she would attract 0:06:43.320 --> 0:06:48.080 a lot of attention. We were very popular in school, 0:06:48.400 --> 0:06:50.760 and we were in the popular crowd. 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:58.200 This is Gail's best friend from high school Denise Cassenbaum. 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:01.960 If you look through gail high school yearbook, you'll find 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:05.320 Denise and Gail on the same page. They look like 0:07:05.360 --> 0:07:08.839 they could have been plucked right out of woodstock. Denise 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:12.480 has an air of a young barbistreisam with long, straight 0:07:12.680 --> 0:07:16.360 Joni Mitchell hair, while Gail's rocking more of a young 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:20.200 share look with their curly dark hair, flat iron long 0:07:20.320 --> 0:07:25.440 and cut to one length, pure flower power. They met 0:07:25.440 --> 0:07:28.280 when Gail was bumped up a year after excelling at 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:31.840 her studies. While they weren't at school, they were having 0:07:31.960 --> 0:07:35.040 lots of fun doing all the things us girls did 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:36.240 back in the seventies. 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:40.840 I remember being at her house and we'd go up 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:46.600 to her room and we'd listen to Neil Young, Crosby 0:07:46.720 --> 0:07:50.560 Stills and Nish and Neil Young. That was our favorite. 0:07:51.600 --> 0:07:55.840 And she was the first person who I went to 0:07:55.960 --> 0:07:59.920 New York City with. We were only fourteen, and our 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:04.040 parents let us go into Manhattan on the train and 0:08:04.080 --> 0:08:08.440 we went down to Crenwich Village and we walked around. 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:11.760 We met boys we thought were so cool. 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:18.160 Gail graduated at seventeen and followed her high school boyfriend 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:22.240 David out to Albany in upstate New York. She was 0:08:22.360 --> 0:08:25.160 convinced he was the love of her life, but they 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:28.360 broke up within a year or so. A few more 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:32.960 unsuccessful relationships later, and Gail was single again, but this 0:08:33.120 --> 0:08:36.320 time she was stuck in Albany for no good reason. 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:39.480 She made a plan to enroll in the school in 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:43.080 Colorado in the fall, but decided to stick around for 0:08:43.200 --> 0:08:44.120 one more summer. 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:50.120 During that summer, she met John fell in love head 0:08:50.480 --> 0:09:04.720 over heels. They had this durable apartment facing the public square, 0:09:06.440 --> 0:09:10.200 decorated it completely like you new hippie style. She was 0:09:10.280 --> 0:09:13.800 completely vegetarian. She had, you know, a zillion cats in 0:09:13.840 --> 0:09:19.040 the apartment. He was a struggling artist, and every now 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:22.400 and then, because they really couldn't pay the rent, they 0:09:22.400 --> 0:09:26.800 would go. They would tell some local club that the 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:30.880 name of their band was rent. They would play a 0:09:30.880 --> 0:09:34.520 few gigs, they would cover whatever crap somebody wanted them 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:38.080 to cover. They would raise enough money for the rent, 0:09:39.480 --> 0:09:40.240 then they would stop. 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:49.040 When his band, called Odd spelt Ode, weren't trying to 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:52.600 pay the rent. They were writing and performing in avant 0:09:52.640 --> 0:09:56.920 garde rock opera. If you don't believe me, here it 0:09:57.000 --> 0:09:59.000 is John's on the. 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:06.480 Keys an escalator raising side. 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:18.080 The farm in heaven my land, I saw the heart 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:23.960 of man in the old order moved, touching hands as 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:30.480 they walked on all the treasure will share with love 0:10:30.640 --> 0:10:32.120 for every woman. 0:10:33.080 --> 0:10:35.800 Ah the seventies founder. 0:10:39.360 --> 0:10:44.760 Unfortunately, she was the daughter of professional, educated Jewish people 0:10:45.440 --> 0:10:49.240 and our tribe doesn't really believe in rock music as 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:52.720 a career, and she was getting a lot of flack 0:10:53.720 --> 0:10:54.440 from her parents. 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:58.560 Her mother was very overbearing as a mother. Here's Gail's 0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:02.600 cousin Abby again, and she had very high expectations of 0:11:02.640 --> 0:11:06.960 the kids. So Elaine did what Sylvia thought she should do, 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:09.840 and that was go be a lawyer, because you're really smart. 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.880 Gail didn't want to do any of that kind of thing. 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:15.760 She was a bit of a free spirit, and that 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:17.280 was really hard for her mother. 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:21.640 I think she started to feel like they had to succeed. 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:27.680 Gail moved down to New York City, where she enrolled 0:11:27.720 --> 0:11:31.000 in a dance therapy program and started fronting the band 0:11:31.080 --> 0:11:33.079 to music producers, and. 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:35.439 She even got a job as a cocktail waitress at 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:40.680 Tracts Trax, which was one of the hottest rock clubs 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:41.360 in the city. 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:45.160 I think Gail and I would have been fast friends. 0:11:45.480 --> 0:11:48.200 I swooned over my fair share of rock stars, too, 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:51.120 starting with The Monkeys as a young girl and. 0:11:51.120 --> 0:11:53.840 Later Eric Clapton and Mick Fleetwood. 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:59.079 Rock and roll musicians represented everything opposite from an overbearing. 0:11:58.520 --> 0:12:01.680 Jewish mother, and rushing on them felt like a certain 0:12:01.760 --> 0:12:02.520 kind of freedom. 0:12:02.880 --> 0:12:05.840 So I totally understand why Gail wanted it to work 0:12:05.840 --> 0:12:11.520 with John. I wanted a guy like him too. At tracks, 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:15.480 Gail met big name producers and record label and our guys. 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:17.600 She even got friendly with Cindy. 0:12:17.360 --> 0:12:21.440 Lauper, but no one was really biting at her rock 0:12:21.480 --> 0:12:22.440 opera offering. 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:24.199 It was pretty lonely. 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:29.719 Sitting in her Manhattan apartment, Gail would write John poems 0:12:29.720 --> 0:12:33.840 describing how much she missed him. Here's Elaine reading one 0:12:33.840 --> 0:12:34.440 of them. 0:12:35.200 --> 0:12:40.760 It is a poem of loneliness about which I write words, thoughts, 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:44.040 and images seemed to come best to me in the 0:12:44.080 --> 0:12:47.400 dead of the night. Alone, I am in my own 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:51.960 quiet room, hoping that this feeling will go away soon. 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:56.760 I close my eyes and wash Sure here to help 0:12:56.920 --> 0:13:00.880 and love me and calm my fears. But you and 0:13:00.920 --> 0:13:04.840 I have things we must do to grow and to learn, 0:13:05.320 --> 0:13:10.000 to make our dreams come true. I cannot touch you 0:13:10.400 --> 0:13:14.080 and hear you say all of the comforting words you 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:19.640 always know to help me up when I fall too low, 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:23.280 And so I'll sing my song of loneliness until you 0:13:23.360 --> 0:13:28.680 come to me with the internal kiss. 0:13:31.960 --> 0:13:35.480 In nineteen seventy nine, John moved to Manhattan to be 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:39.559 with Gail, but their free flowing upstate love didn't thrive 0:13:39.640 --> 0:13:42.960 for long in the big city. They split after a 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:47.000 year or so. Around the same time, Gail suffered from 0:13:47.000 --> 0:13:49.640 an elbow injury that pulled her out of her dance 0:13:49.720 --> 0:13:54.320 therapy program within just a few months. She felt lost 0:13:54.720 --> 0:13:55.880 and aimless. 0:13:56.480 --> 0:13:59.959 Gail kicked around the city, you know, working a train, 0:14:01.480 --> 0:14:04.120 dating guys that she shouldn't have been dating in the 0:14:04.160 --> 0:14:12.640 music industry, and uh she unfortunately had a suicide attempt 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:18.720 and ended up in the hospital Saint Vincent's I don't 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:22.160 think it was a real suicide attempt. She picked the 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:24.640 night to try a suicide attempt when I was meeting 0:14:24.640 --> 0:14:27.440 her attracts, so she knew that I would get to 0:14:27.600 --> 0:14:31.160 tracks she wouldn't be there. Ultimately, she was in and 0:14:31.160 --> 0:14:34.520 out of the hospital, and I somehow convinced her to 0:14:34.560 --> 0:14:37.680 move into my apartment in eastern Long Island, and she 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:42.280 lived with me briefly out there, but not surprisingly, she 0:14:42.280 --> 0:14:47.600 didn't want to live out there, and I wangled out 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:51.000 of my graduate school an internship in the city, and 0:14:51.040 --> 0:14:52.920 the two of us moved into the city and we 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:59.640 lived together in the city. So, yes, my sister had 0:14:59.640 --> 0:15:04.640 a cry depression. I have chronic anxiety, and quite frankly, 0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:10.760 anxiety and depression are on a continuum spectrum. As I said, 0:15:11.200 --> 0:15:23.720 opposite sides of the same corn. 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:37.280 It's never easy hearing about someone reaching a point so 0:15:37.520 --> 0:15:40.680 low that they try to end their lives. I can't 0:15:40.680 --> 0:15:43.360 imagine what Gail must have felt to find herself there. 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:47.480 What I have learned from listening to Elaine is that 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:51.360 depression was a lifelong affliction for Gail. But by the 0:15:51.400 --> 0:15:55.760 summer in nineteen eighty, after Gail's hospitalization, she was doing 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:58.960 a lot better, well enough that she wanted to start 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:03.200 dating again, so her friend Diane invited her over for 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:07.400 a summer barbecue with the promise of vegetarian options and 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:08.760 a young man to meet. 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:15.600 Diane was living in New Jersey with her then doctor 0:16:15.760 --> 0:16:19.680 husband and invited Gail over with the intention of a 0:16:19.760 --> 0:16:23.840 sort of blind date. Fixed up with doctor Bob, and 0:16:23.920 --> 0:16:25.080 they really headed off. 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:30.560 She was enamored doctor surgeon Pilot. 0:16:30.840 --> 0:16:33.600 One night took her and I think it was Valentine's Day, 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:36.440 flying all over the bridges of Manhattan at night. 0:16:36.800 --> 0:16:40.520 She said it was very romantic. I mean, why wouldn't 0:16:40.520 --> 0:16:40.720 it be. 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:44.520 He whined and dined and. 0:16:44.480 --> 0:16:47.040 Took her up to his East Side high in the 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:52.760 sky apartment with beautiful views of the East River. And 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:57.240 he took her out to his idyllic family's home in 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:02.880 West Orange, New Jersey, where his doctor, sister, doctor brother 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:06.879 in law. We're visiting with their son. The mother, I 0:17:06.880 --> 0:17:09.920 think was a psychologist, something that Gail always had an 0:17:09.960 --> 0:17:13.640 interest in. It seemed perfect to her. 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:17.199 But in terms of the difference between those two guys, 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:22.000 completely opposite ends of the spectrum. 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:23.399 John was a musician. 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:27.439 He could sit around for hours and play his guitar 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:30.640 and it was calm, and. 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:32.480 How was different. 0:17:33.480 --> 0:17:36.240 There was a lot of excitement, a lot of we 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:39.440 did this, we did that. He was bigger than life. 0:17:39.800 --> 0:17:44.359 I think she was just overwhelmed with Wow, this is amazing. 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:48.560 And you couldn't blame her. We all thought it was too. 0:17:51.119 --> 0:17:54.200 Everyone was hearing about the wonderful new man in Gail's life. 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:55.960 Even her hairdresser. 0:17:56.400 --> 0:17:58.920 My name is we Dodd. I am the curl experts 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.480 started the Curly Hair in the country back in nineteen 0:18:01.520 --> 0:18:04.800 eighty four of the first salon for curls. Gail Katz 0:18:04.960 --> 0:18:08.040 was a client, a regular client, regular basis. She was 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:10.720 ecstatic when she first saw what her hair can do 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:13.320 for her. Was bouncy, and she was having a good 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:18.440 time with her and it literally reflected her personality. Bubbly, bouncy, 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:26.080 very alive. That's the Gail that I knew. We were 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:28.840 all talking about boyfriends, and she had met this doctor 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:31.280 and she was very excited about it. And I remember 0:18:31.320 --> 0:18:35.440 it was around Thanksgiving and that she was dreading going Thanksgiving, 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:39.240 but she might be introducing Bob to her family. 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:42.399 At that time, I imagine Gail would have been excited 0:18:42.440 --> 0:18:45.679 about introducing her new bow to the family. He was 0:18:45.800 --> 0:18:49.520 exactly what her mother wanted for her. Boy do I 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:50.960 know that feeling. 0:18:51.400 --> 0:18:54.119 Sylvia was beside herself. He's a doctor. 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:54.600 He's a doctor. 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:57.240 That's all she talked about. And I don't think she 0:18:57.359 --> 0:19:00.439 meant it in a bad way. I really don't. A 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:02.040 typical Jewish. 0:19:01.680 --> 0:19:06.359 Mother from a long island stream for their child. I 0:19:06.400 --> 0:19:08.679 think she wanted Gail to be taken care of, and 0:19:08.760 --> 0:19:12.040 this was the answer to what she thought was the 0:19:12.040 --> 0:19:13.119 best thing that could happen. 0:19:14.480 --> 0:19:17.880 And Bob took care of literally everything. 0:19:21.520 --> 0:19:23.879 Gail would tell me she would go to turn on 0:19:23.960 --> 0:19:27.800 a light, and he would with one hand hold her 0:19:27.840 --> 0:19:32.360 hand and with the other hand turn the light on. Now, 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:35.080 it might have looked like he was helping her, but 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:38.880 who needs help turning on a light? He was controlling everything. 0:19:40.320 --> 0:19:43.880 One evening early on, Elaine and her boyfriend Larry went 0:19:43.920 --> 0:19:45.639 out for sushi with Gail and. 0:19:45.520 --> 0:19:49.119 Bob, and Bob was with his chopsticks picking up food 0:19:49.200 --> 0:19:52.280 and putting it in Gail's mouth. He was feeding her, 0:19:53.840 --> 0:20:00.760 and then he started feeding me. He was telling Larry 0:20:00.920 --> 0:20:09.159 I own both of them. It was so strange. 0:20:10.359 --> 0:20:13.880 From that moment on, Elane started noticing things about Bob 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:17.160 that made her uncomfortable. First it was just the way 0:20:17.200 --> 0:20:19.520 he stood out and his front beclothed when they went 0:20:19.640 --> 0:20:20.359 dancing at. 0:20:20.200 --> 0:20:21.359 Studio fifty four. 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:25.960 Then the fact he'd make up bizarre lies, like saying 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:28.240 he went to a trendy pizza place all the time, 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:30.800 and then not knowing which neighborhood. 0:20:30.320 --> 0:20:30.760 It was in. 0:20:31.760 --> 0:20:34.600 It was such an innocuous and dumb lie, like, no, 0:20:34.760 --> 0:20:39.360 Pebby's pizza isn't there. And you know, he's so bright 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:42.480 that you had to be really smart to catch him 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:45.840 in all his lies. But that wasn't so hard for Larry. 0:20:45.920 --> 0:20:48.880 Larry was yell undergrad, Harvard Grad. Larry was smarter than Bob. 0:20:49.359 --> 0:20:52.440 And Bob would say something, Larry would turn his head 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:54.800 and look at me and roll his eyes, and I 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:58.600 knew that was, you know, code for not true. 0:20:58.920 --> 0:21:02.000 Worst of all was how Bob was trying to change Gail. 0:21:02.880 --> 0:21:05.840 Gail couldn't change two things that Bob required of her. 0:21:05.920 --> 0:21:09.399 He wanted her to be taller, and he claimed that 0:21:09.440 --> 0:21:12.239 she had a Brooklyn accent. She was five two, she 0:21:12.320 --> 0:21:15.680 wasn't tall, So there was this constant You're not good 0:21:15.760 --> 0:21:20.639 enough for me, Get thinner, get taller, don't wear you know, 0:21:21.320 --> 0:21:26.199 sexy clothes. I'll never forget seeing her. And she was 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:32.000 dressed so dowdy. She looked like she was from some 0:21:32.160 --> 0:21:37.359 religious sect. We very quickly began to realize Larry and 0:21:37.400 --> 0:21:40.040 I what a sick fuck Bob was. 0:21:45.280 --> 0:21:47.760 The Fact is Gail was in love and she wanted 0:21:47.760 --> 0:21:50.480 it to work out with Bob, just like I had 0:21:51.320 --> 0:21:53.600 no amount of side eye from Elaine was going to 0:21:53.640 --> 0:21:57.879 convince her otherwise. After around a year of dating, Gail 0:21:57.880 --> 0:22:01.520 and Bob got engaged, and with Elaine liked it or not, 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:04.600 she was plunged into the role of maid of honor. 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:11.760 They started planning the wedding, picking out food, scouring wedding 0:22:11.880 --> 0:22:16.080 dress shops, visiting venues, combing through Bloomingdale's. 0:22:16.440 --> 0:22:19.080 Hated Bloomingdales is way too big. I have no idea 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:22.800 where anything is in Bloomingdale's. But we went to Bloomingdale's 0:22:22.840 --> 0:22:26.080 looking at dishes and linens and towels and doing the 0:22:26.080 --> 0:22:27.520 whole gift registry thing. 0:22:28.240 --> 0:22:30.639 During a haircut, she told we did the news and 0:22:30.760 --> 0:22:32.800 asked if she'd come up to Long Island to do 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:37.000 everyone's hair and makeup before the ceremony. No expense is spared. 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:39.600 Gail seems so excited. 0:22:40.160 --> 0:22:42.399 You know, I'm in New York with a lot of clients, 0:22:42.480 --> 0:22:44.960 So for me to have a Jewish girl marrying a 0:22:45.040 --> 0:22:48.880 doctor's perfect. That's what they all want. Another Jewish girl 0:22:48.960 --> 0:22:51.719 marrying a doctor. How happy, how fabulous. 0:22:54.800 --> 0:22:58.280 Then one night, about a month before the wedding, Elaine 0:22:58.280 --> 0:22:59.520 got a frantic call. 0:23:01.440 --> 0:23:04.439 My sister calls me hysterical, and she said, you have 0:23:04.560 --> 0:23:07.640 to come get me in the morning. And like, I 0:23:07.680 --> 0:23:10.520 wasn't so happy about this marriage, and this sounds good 0:23:10.520 --> 0:23:12.840 to me. I'll come get you in the morning. I 0:23:12.880 --> 0:23:14.760 go into the city and I drive up to her 0:23:14.800 --> 0:23:19.040 apartment and she comes out holding her cat, no luggage, 0:23:19.240 --> 0:23:23.359 no nothing, just the cat, and she's weeping, and I'm like, 0:23:23.720 --> 0:23:26.760 what's up. And she said, Bob tried to kill the cat. 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:34.280 And she tells me that she was in the bedroom 0:23:34.400 --> 0:23:38.840 she heard the cat making a funny noise. She goes 0:23:38.920 --> 0:23:43.040 into the bathroom and there Bob is with the cat's 0:23:43.040 --> 0:23:50.399 head in the toilet, drowning the cat, and she of 0:23:50.440 --> 0:23:55.360 course saves the cat. And she says he was jealous 0:23:55.520 --> 0:23:59.680 of the cat. He thinks I love the cat more 0:23:59.720 --> 0:24:04.159 than I love him. So I'm going to prove to 0:24:04.240 --> 0:24:07.359 him how much I love him. I'm going to get 0:24:07.440 --> 0:24:12.000 rid of the cat. And I of course responded, I 0:24:12.080 --> 0:24:15.040 have a good idea. Let's keep the cat and get 0:24:15.119 --> 0:24:15.639 rid of Bob. 0:24:17.720 --> 0:24:21.160 While this alleged drowning was never reported to the police, 0:24:21.520 --> 0:24:24.480 it raised alarm bells among Gail's family. 0:24:25.160 --> 0:24:29.200 I remember thinking this is so weird. Why would anybody 0:24:29.240 --> 0:24:34.240 do something like that. Here's Gail's cousin Abby again, and I. 0:24:34.200 --> 0:24:37.400 Think I remember having a conversation with my mother about it, 0:24:38.359 --> 0:24:43.560 and my mother saying, you know, maybe it's not exactly 0:24:43.600 --> 0:24:45.560 the way we hear it went. You know, it was 0:24:45.560 --> 0:24:47.960 the typical deny that it could really be as bad 0:24:47.960 --> 0:24:50.560 as it was. So I remember thinking, Okay, maybe it wasn't. 0:24:51.000 --> 0:24:55.200 We were planning a wedding, so why were we planning 0:24:55.200 --> 0:24:59.200 a wedding if this was so terrible. When I think 0:24:59.320 --> 0:25:02.159 back now, I'm like, oh my god, what planet was 0:25:02.200 --> 0:25:02.560 I on? 0:25:06.720 --> 0:25:10.640 Sorry? 0:25:10.800 --> 0:25:19.800 I didn't think it would made me cry. 0:25:29.800 --> 0:25:32.680 Gail did get rid of the cat astray she rescued 0:25:32.680 --> 0:25:35.840 from Caldwood Airport after she found it roaming the strip. 0:25:36.480 --> 0:25:41.760 It was named Amelia. A month later, on the morning 0:25:41.840 --> 0:25:45.359 of August twenty ninth, nineteen eighty two, Gail and Bob 0:25:45.440 --> 0:25:49.120 woke up in separate beds, Gail at her parents' house 0:25:49.160 --> 0:25:51.919 in Long Island and Bob in their apartment. 0:25:53.440 --> 0:25:57.600 They're getting married, the poem. 0:25:57.320 --> 0:26:01.080 By Gail dats today. I feel like pleasing you more 0:26:01.119 --> 0:26:03.800 than before. To be living for you is all I 0:26:03.840 --> 0:26:08.320 want to do. To be loving you. It will all 0:26:08.320 --> 0:26:13.040 be there. Everything you want. I swear it all will 0:26:13.080 --> 0:26:17.960 come true. Today I can't use words. They don't say enough. 0:26:18.760 --> 0:26:22.520 Please please listen to me. It's taken so long to 0:26:22.560 --> 0:26:27.439 come true, so long for you, all for you. 0:26:30.200 --> 0:26:32.639 There are so many reasons we choose to get married. 0:26:33.080 --> 0:26:36.680 It sounds unromantic, but it's not always just about love. 0:26:37.720 --> 0:26:42.119 We get married for security, both financial and physical. We 0:26:42.200 --> 0:26:46.160 get married because of family pressure. We get married because 0:26:46.160 --> 0:26:49.920 our friends are doing it too. I can't say why 0:26:49.960 --> 0:26:54.000 Gail decided to marry Bob. I suspect she recognized in 0:26:54.080 --> 0:26:57.919 him a life she wanted, financial security and a husband 0:26:57.960 --> 0:27:04.440 her parents would be proud of. But for her sister Elaine, 0:27:04.680 --> 0:27:09.480 it felt wrong. She'd been dragged around every wedding dress 0:27:09.480 --> 0:27:13.080 shop in Manhattan, only to find that Gail had decided 0:27:13.119 --> 0:27:14.720 to wear Bob's mother's dress. 0:27:15.560 --> 0:27:17.960 I can tell you for a fact it was not 0:27:18.119 --> 0:27:21.800 at all like what I thought she was going to buy. 0:27:22.200 --> 0:27:24.800 And again, I think this was about pleasing Bob. 0:27:25.520 --> 0:27:28.920 It was the most obvious start to a marriage of compromise. 0:27:30.280 --> 0:27:32.720 Early in the morning on the wedding day, we DoD 0:27:32.760 --> 0:27:35.840 and her husband Peter, arrived at Gil's parents' home to 0:27:35.920 --> 0:27:38.320 start fixing everybody's hair and makeup. 0:27:40.240 --> 0:27:42.720 The door was open. I just dragged the belt, I said, 0:27:42.720 --> 0:27:44.840