Jerusalem Syndrome - Marc Maron [51]
The last day I was home I took the rental car up old 14 behind the Sandia Mountains. As I drove north toward Santa Fe past Madrid I rolled the window down halfway and let the cold, brisk, February air come into the car. I smelled the piñ on trees and the damp earth. The Gray came over me. My life flashed through my heart in one deep rush of feeling. When I made the turn around the mountain to the west, the mesas and valleys spread out before me under the orange and gold horizon. The sun hit me like a wave that flooded out the past and dissolved any idea of the future, and I felt okay and whole for about twenty minutes.
Acknowledgments
THANK YOU, GERALD HOWARD, FOR GIVING me the opportunity to write this book and actually believing I could. Thank you, Kimberly Reiss, for being with me and loving me through most of the worst of it and some of the best of it. Thank you, Kirsten Ames, for codeveloping and directing the stage show that this book is based on and being with me through all that happened with that. Thank you, Sam Lipsyte, for being a true friend and guiding me through the process of writing like a writer writes. Thank you, Jack Boulware, for being the best running buddy I ever had. Thank you, Jim Loftus, for being Jim. Thank you, Craig Maron, for being my brother. Thank you, Devon Jackson, for being my oldest friend. Thank you, Mishna Wolff, for holding my hand when everything that I thought was true and real went away. Thank you, Jason Spiro, for the technical support that aided greatly in the creation of the stage show. Thank you, Roy Trejo, for illuminating me during the stage production of Jerusalem Syndrome. Thank you, Arnold Engelman, and the staff of the Westbeth Theatre Center for keeping me full of cigarettes, soda, and love. Thank you, Dave Becky and Michael O’Brien, for keeping the dream alive when I was a nightmare.
About the Author
MARC MARON IS A LEADING FIGURE IN THE “alternative” stand-up comedy movement. A founder of the fabled Luna Lounge evenings in New York City, he has been featured in his own HBO “Comedy Half-Hour” and “Comedy Central Presents” special and has had regular guest appearances on the Conan O’Brien and David Letterman shows. He has performed his one-man show, “The Jerusalem Syndrome,” at the prestigious U.S. Comedy and Arts Festival in Aspen and at an extended sold-out off-Broadway run at the Westbeth Theatre Center. He lives in Queens, New York.
THE JERUSALEM SYNDROME: MY LIFE AS A RELUCTANT MESSIAH
Copyright © 2001 by Marc Maron. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information, address Broadway Books, a division of Random House, Inc., 1540 Broadway, New York, NY 10036.
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Maron, Marc.
The Jerusalem syndrome: my life as a reluctant messiah / Marc Maron.
p. cm.
1. Maron, Marc. 2. Jewish comedians—United States—Biography. 3. Maron, Marc—Religion. I. Title
PN2287.M515 A3 2001
792.7'028'092—dc21
[B] 2001025989
eISBN: 978-0-7679-1094-1
v3.0