The Lost Weekend

PART 3 THE LOST WEEKEND

In 1972 ,the night McGovern lost the election, John and I were invited
to a party at Jerry Rubin's apartment in the Village. It was a gathering
of New York liberal intellectuals, some artists, musicians and many
journalists. John became totally drunk and pulled a woman into the next
room and started to make love. Nobody could leave the party because all
the coats were in that room. We were all sitting there trying to ignore
what was happening. The wall was paper thin and you could hear the
noise, which was incredibly loud. A considerate musician put a Dylan
record on to offset the sound. But that did not drown out the sound
coming from "the room." In the middle of all this, a New York celeb
woman chose to make conversation with me. "I don't know how you feel
about him... but we love him. He and his friends... what they did...
but especially John... we all respect him tremendously. He's a great
man... he is a wonderful man..." It was something like that she kept
repeating to me, with an angry look as if to blame me for not rejoicing
for what was happening in that room. Then there was a long silence.
Some woman quietly went into the room to retrieve her coat. Others
followed. When John finally came out of the room, he said, later, that
he had never seen me looking so pale. "I could never forget that face,"
he used to say for a long while.

Something was lost that night for me. Living with John was a very trying
situation. But I thought I would endure all that for our love. I used to
think that our love was a secret thing between us, so it didn't matter
what people said... let them. Our love was higher than the highest sky,
and deeper than the deepest water. But was it? Now it seemed that there
were some clouds I hand 't noticed and the water looked murky after the
splash. Jerry thought it was terrible that I couldn't "forgive" John.
McGovern lost. All of us were totally devastated. You can imagine how
John felt about it. It was a real blow to us. So he was drunk, for
heaven's sake!" "It's not a matter of forgiving him or not forgiving him.
I would not use that word. It's more like I can't 'forget' what happened.
Call me a prude, but it just hit me in the wrong way." Inside, I felt
like a shattered raggedy doll.

This was the prelude to the famous "Lost Weekend". The United States
Government was trying to kick us out of the country because of our
political stand. John and I had pretty much burned our bridge to
England, with John marrying an oriental, returning the MBE to the Queen,
and being arrested for possession of drugs, though the drug had been
planted. My daughter had been kidnapped by my ex-husband, I became a
dragon lady in the eyes of the public, and I lost my platform to express
myself as an artist. The tension was compounded by nets of intrigues
spun around us by sources which were sometimes not too clear. Yet. we
thought nothing was more important than how we felt about each other. We
can make it. We're making it. Yes, it's alright! But that night made me
think. It took almost another whole year for me to decide on what to do,
and I did. Extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary solutions.

There was no fight or anything. We were having a warm conversation in
the afternoon in our bed. I told John that I thought a trial separation
would be a good idea. "We're both still young and attractive, it's crazy
to stay together just because we're married. I would hate that. That's
not what we were about, was it? We should see what happens..."
I tried to make light of it. "What about L.A.? I remember you telling me
how you had fun on a Beatle tour..." - that sort of thing. "Okay,
but I don't want to lose you", John said. "We'd probably lose each other
if we stayed", I said. I didn't tell this to John, but I thought I would
lose him. Hey, it's John Lennon. It was obvious to everybody, except to
John, that I was the loser. Every man and woman of our generation was
going to be happy that finally I was not around their hero.

John was incredibly ecstatic for four days. He called me to thank me.
"Yoko, you're incredible. This is great! Thank you!" There was no
sarcasm there. I was glad that he was happy. After four days he called
me with a totally different voice, "I've had enough. I want to come home."
I laughed it off. It was too soon.

Alone, I started to do my work again. Charlotte Moorman greeted me by
saying, "Welcome home, genius!" That made me feel good. I knew her from
way back. But in 1974, she was already a very famous figure in the
avant-garde music scene. "Why are you wasting your talent, Yoko? Just
forget about those horrible people. You must immediately start working.
I want to put your new work in this year's Avant-Garde Festival...
This year, it's going to be in Shea Stadium... Oh, dear, what am I
saying?" We laughed. My old friends, Andy Warhol, Allen Ginsburg and
Ornette Coleman took me around a lot. I met William Burroughs through
Allen. It was very different from the Rock Scene. I was a person again,
not a dragon lady. A young gallery owner told me that he wanted to
include me in his Contemporary Art Show. I thought it was nice that he
asked, and I put a piece in the show. One day the gallery owner came to
me and asked if I was going to the Madison Square Garden show that
night. "What show?" "You don't know? I thought you would be going, and
if you were I was hoping that you would take me with you." It turned
out that Elton John and John Lennon were doing the show. "Oh, I don't
know..." Obviously, l wasn't too keen on going. "Let me think about it."
I asked my secretary to simply send a gardenia each to Elton and John
with a note saying congrats or whatever. But the gallery owner did
not let go of the idea of going to the show. "Oh, come on, Yoko. please
go." So at the last minute, I decided to go as a favour to this guy.
It was Elton's show. and John came out at the end as a surprise guest.
People were so excited that the whole Garden was shaking. I looked at
him and tears ran down my cheek. He was looking lonely. He was looking
scared. He bowed once too often. This was not the John I knew. When he
was with me, he wasn't afraid of anything. I couldn't stop crying.
Everybody else was ecstatic. After the show, the gallery owner said,
"Aren't you going to take me backstage?" I thought, "Oh, give me a
break!" But I took him. John couldn't believe his eyes. We looked at
each other for the longest time. We were saying nothings to each other,
but we knew what it was. We couldn't take our eyes off each other.
It was terrible. Oh, God. please don't do this to me. again. I said to
myself. I want a life, remember? "You're looking very good." John said,
trying to sound cool. That's how we came back together again.

In hindsight. I'm glad that John had his "boys room" stuff - before he
passed away. Who was to know that he didn't have very much time left to
enjoy life? I remember John's happy voice "Thank you. Yoko...", even if
it was for four days... and I'm sure it wasn't.

Yoko Ono Lennon
NYC 1998

Illustration "The Hole Of My Life" by John Lennon, colored by Yoko Ono Lennon.

from John Lennon Anthology CD box set booklet.