The knowledge of Sandra's passing from this earth has made me feel "old" for the very first time. (Before, in my 50s, I'd only been thinking I was "middle aged.")
For one thing, I knew the whole history of this woman's life, which she was very free in sharing. I don't think I've ever known more about any person on this earth. She was utterly raw emotionally, and didn't hide any of her struggles---every childhood trauma, every adult obsession, every poem, every insane thought about helicopters following her and tracking devices planted in her home.
I first fell in love with her in person in a poetry class in 1985 at UT Austin; aside from seeing her twice a week in class, hung around her only a few times for 2 years, then lost track of her completely, until she out-of-the-blue contacted me in 2008 when I was living in NYC and she'd come upon an online blog post I'd written about her and our poetry classes.
Right at that time (2008), her youngest daughter had just turned 18, and so Sandra's child support was ending. (She'd been married to a rich Houston lawyer from around 1987 to 1992; upon the divorce, she had child support that allowed her a nice apartment until the 2nd/last daughter turned 18.)
From 2008 on was a series of constant wanderings and address changes.
A man that Sandra considered to be the Love of Her Life died in 2010.
He'd had a sexual relationship with her mother back in the '70s before the mother's death, and then a
3-month sexual relationship with Sandra in the early 2000s. Sandra had constantly counted on her psychological connection with him to see her through, although he actually took out a restraining order against her.
After her unsuccessful legal battles with her first husband for alimony, she then relied on another rich Houston lawyer for her upkeep; he paid for another nice apartment for a few years, until he---in his late '70s---was too sick with cancer, and his family then put him in hospice care and cut off Sandra from contact with him. (Before he was sick, he offered to marry her, but she didn't love him and so she didn't... She was true to herself, I told her... But she and I both wondered later if she shouldn't have just married him for financial security...)
After this older man died, and she had absolutely no source of income (other than maybe $200 a month from her father's ongoing oil income continuing from the 1970s), Sandra basically couch-surfed at the homes of multiple friends in Houston. At one point, the local church once associated with her family paid for an apartment for a month or two (not a long-term lease). The last actual address I had for her was in 2014. After that, no real address. The last time I saw her in person was in 2015, when I spent the night with her at a relative's nice house in West Austin. (She was driving a car lent to her by a male friend in Houston.) We didn't get along on this weekend, but continued to keep in touch (and argue) constantly until about 2018.
I then didn't hear much from her until May 2020, when she called and told me she'd had a stroke. We had sporadic contact from then until January 2021, when I got my last e-mail from her. She died February 21, 2024; I didn't find out until I did an Internet search in May 2024 and came across the death notice from the Houston paper (when her last addresses were given as Aaryn Hospice and Braeswood Estates assisted living).
All of this misery I relate here because it's utterly tragic and horrible. An example of how, despite our innermost dreams, it's quite possible that nothing at all will work out as we'd hoped and dreamed. When I first "re-met" Sandra in 2008, I'd thought she needed some actual concrete help re finances and a job. While I was looking for work myself (both in NYC and then later in Austin), I'd always do a simultaneous job-search in Houston for things that she might possibly be willing/able to do: A part-time job in an art gallery, a week-long gig as a personal shopper... When she was afraid that she'd have nowhere to stay, I told her that she, if desperate, could always stay with me. Which was a bit ridiculous when I had only my one-room apartment from 2010 to 2014. And slightly more plausible with my small 2-bed apartment from 2014 to 2017. My new (and current) apartment after 2017 was truly big and roomy, with a potential separate bed and bath for her, but by this time, we were barely in touch---at one point in 2018, she said she was coming to Austin and needed my place to stay, but she never showed up.
And then she died.
So, yeah, I feel old. After a lot of wasted energy. Emotional energy listening to her anger and impossible efforts at either winning over or defeating various men in her life. Emotional energy trying to navigate around how "helicoptors" and "random devices" were following her. And then energy trying to actually fix some concrete problems like where she might stay and where she might work to get money to support herself. About 10 years of this. (I consider my latter-day "relationship" with her as lasting from 2008 to 2018. After 2018, I'd kind of given up. Though my empathetic sorrow was renewed upon learning of her stroke in 2020, and then her death in 2024.)
I feel old because I now recognize that it's an utter myth that one's hopes and dreams will come true. Sandra is the perfect example of this. Utterly beautiful, utterly talented, utterly sexually attractive. Utterly unsatisfactory love life. Dismissed those who truly loved her, and drove herself mad over Jim (literally, she was institutionalized because of this obsession), who did not.
Even so, she had the support of various art/poetry mentors. When on the outs, she had the constant support of various friends/lovers to get back on her feet. She completely disregarded all of the help she was offered. Once she had her stroke in 2020, it was too late for her to ask for help, because all of her rich former lovers were dead, and she was physically incapable of asking for help. Her two last truncated messages to me in early 2021: "I had to" and "OK." I tried to contact her a few times after this, but the messages were returned as undeliverable. I guess that in her hospital settings, her old phone had been taken away from her... A true nightmare---to be completely incommunicado.
If there is such a thing as reincarnation because one did not do it right the first multiple times: Sandra will definitely be reincarnated to a much LESSER state. She spent most of her time complaining about those who did her wrong and yearning for those who had rejected her. I had always hoped for, and expected a better end for, her: At least a small apartment, with a space where she could paint. And ultimate recognition for her actually brilliant work. The Fates proved otherwise, at least for the time being.
As for me: I've done pretty well with my lower-middle-class upbringing. As for Joan Crawford, while I'm thinking about it: The Ultimate in overcoming past psychological traumas.
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