Tony D’Wonderful met Lotta Gue when she was working the streets. He lived in the neighborhood, and fell in love with her. Snookie Lumps wasn’t around to give her that comfort she needed.

Tony was a lonely fuck, with a lot of heart and sincerity. His rooming house was in the middle of the Zone, 231 Appleton Street. He lived on the third floor. He had no sink, and roof outside his only window where he sat out to view the action below. He saw the cars driving around, and the women working the streets.

He was twenty-eight, and still had not experienced any sexual contact of any kind. After he was twenty-one, he wasn’t going to waste it on just anyone. Maybe Fate was telling him that one of these girls would be an unlikely but likely first sexual experience.

He started to sit on his front steps and hang out with the girls working the street. He would let them use the bathroom in the hallway to pee, but they were really shooting up coke, or heroin in Lotta’s case. But Lotta was doing coke and heroin—the coke reminded her of Snookie Lumps, who she would write to at least four times a week.

Lotta gave Tony that look, that look that said, "You’re a part of this fucking human race." Or, "Maybe I can get some mileage out of him." Tony felt as if he was a friend of Lotta’s. They had never gone out on a "date" or even spent any time together. Tony saw the hungry feeling that Lotta had inside. Maybe that hungry feeling was for him.

Tony saw the goodness, sincerity, and genuineness in Lotta Gue. He was looking into her Human Factor. Tony had this ability, it seemed, to take away a person’s human sufferings and take them onto himself. He ended up doing this with Lotta. She had too much pain even for Tony to endure, but her suffering was somewhat relieved.

It was a Sunday night. Tony was out on the front steps again. He hadn’t seen Lotta in over a week. One thing about street walkers, every time you saw them, you never knew if you would see them again. This made Tony cram a lifetime into a moment whenever he saw Lotta.

Lotta came around. Tony was in heaven, but couldn’t show it. She would go to the corner, a car would stop, and she would get in. Tony would see it, and wait for her to come back around. She went in and used the bathroom a lot that night. She was thinking about Snookie and the pain the life had inflicted on her. Lotta saw Tony as a good guy, a guy who didn’t take drugs and who didn’t appear to go out with the girls. Couldn’t hurt to have another friend…

It was two o’clock in the morning. Lotta Gue came by one more time. Tony was rambling a mile a minute, trying to keep Lotta’s attention. Lotta said, "I hate to cut you short, but I gotta crash." Tony said, "You can crash at my place." Lotta said, "I have a place in Lawrence to crash. It’s better to crash there, because I have errands to do there in the morning." Tony had an empty feeling inside. Would he ever get a chance to spend time with Lotta? Was she the woman who would relieve him of his virginity once and for all?

Tony had that ugly feeling in his gut, that feeling that he got when he took on other people’s woes, making him feel even more empty than before. Lotta saw this, and felt bad for Tony and said to him, "I’ll be around next week—maybe we can go out and do something." A care came up, and Lotta got in. Tony went back to his room.

A week later Tony found out that Lotta was in jail. He had to be friendly with some of the rather unsavory street walkers. He finally got her full name and where to write her in Framingham.

It felt that Tony had already taken on the majority of Lotta’s suffering. He wrote her a letter telling her of the goodness and genuineness that he saw in her. He never knew if he would get a reply. But he did after a week. It was the most wonderful letter with the most graceful handwriting. They would write each other and tell about their lives, their hopes and dreams, the agony that life had issued them. But Tony would never have sex with Lotta. They wrote back and forth for a year.

Here are some of the poems Lotta wrote to Tony during her time in jail:

Thoughts of You

Thinking of the friend you were…

And how you become, so much more

The letters, the poems, the smiles you sent…

Somehow to my heart they all went

And when I’m sad and feeling low…

I think of you, and my heart will glow.

Burning like a candle bright…

With you I feel I’ve won the fight

I found it all.. when I found you,

You make me feel like someone new

My Depression

Slipping away, away from me… Someplace in my memory

To a place that’s oh so sad.. Everything there’s oh so bad

I’m somewhere else inside my mind…

I’ve left the world far behind

All alone, scared to death… I start to take deep deep breaths

I try to run, I try to hide… from the nightmare I live inside

I call out, but no one hears… sometimes I think no one cares

I reach for you, please grasp my hand…

Take me from never, never land.

Bring me back where I want to be… to you and I in reality.

My Body

My body is listening,

My soul searching for the

Presence of you, like antennas

Reaching cut grasping for you,

To take in your essence, your emotions your thoughts

You are speaking, my body is listening

Testing My Heart

It’s easy enough to be pleasant

When life flows on like a song

But the one worthwhile, is the one who will smile

When everything goes dead wrong…

For the test of the heart is trouble

And it always comes with years

And the smile that is worth the praise of the earth

Is the smile that comes through tears.

The Essence of Me

We’ve enjoyed our love so long

Our soulds have come so close

That I keep the essence of you

As you keep mine.

If you deny my presence in your life,

It would be enough to embrace you and talk

I give you so much life, that now you must possess

The essence of me.

I make no attempt to be your master

I’m nothing, there’s no vanity in me

I give you only what’s good in me

I’m so poor, what else can I give?

Dreams of Sand

Here in my room, all by myself…

Wishing I were somewhere else…

Thoughts are drifting like clouds afloat…

to a deep blue ocean on a dreamy boat

Seeing faces come and go, of people and places

I just don’t know…

Listening for laughter that isn’t there…

Make believe visions that disappear…

I open my eyes, I’m forced to land, and I’m all alone

With my dreams of sand

Suspended

Suspended in time and space

My love it seems goes to waste

My smiles, my tears, my joy, my pain, all let out, but all in vain

I call to you, you do not hear, my state of mine you cannot share

I’m all alone with what I feel, in this tiny room, it’s a big deal

My emotions are here, alive and real, the strength from within will help me deal

Do You?

Do you lie awake and think of me, as I think of you?

Do you ever really wonder exactly what I do?

Do you call my name and reach for me deep in the night?

Do you long to hold me close and make it feel so right?

Do you weep silent tears, as I do for you?

Do you think of me as often as I think of you?

Tony had purchased a car to drive to Framingham to visit Lotta. Tony was occasionally sending her money, even clothing.

One day Lotta was finally to get out of the big house. Tony went to pick her up. He was told she got out the day before. He had no way of finding her. Tony drove all the way home empty and alone. He felt rejected. He felt used. He raged inside like he had never raged before. He was about to explode by the time he got home. He had told his friends and family about Lotta, and now he looked like a fool. It would be years before he would be able to live this down.

Tony survived and would eventually lose his virginity a few years later with a person who really wanted to be with him.

Tony wears his heart on his sleeve. Tony is an easy touch. Tony is centered in his emotions. He’s up, he’s down, he’s over there, sometimes he doesn’t know where he is. Don’t get him when he’s feeling sad, he’ll talk your ear off.

He wanted to be a lounge singer, but that era was over, for him anyway. He was no Robert Goulet or Wayne Newton. He was just Tony D’Wonderful.

Lotta Gue would go on to transform herself into a Mussolini-style feminist unrecognizable even to Tony.