Waiting on the Moon: Artists, Poets, Drifters, Grifters, and Goddesses

When Peter Wolf was 10 years old, his sister Nancy was sick with rheumatic fever and was hospitalized in Manhattan. He and his parents traveled from the Bronx every week to visit her. After a particularly troubling visit, Peter’s parents took him to the cinema. It was a dull French movie. As Peter sat restlessly in his chair, a couple approached and sat down next to him. The woman wore only a nightgown under her coat, slippers, and an intoxicating perfume. During the movie, she fell asleep on Peter’s shoulder and was woken at the end by her husband jostling her. Only when the house lights came on did everyone realize that the couple was Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller.

Peter grew up in the Bronx in New York City. His mother came from a traditional family that expected women to be caregivers and nothing else, but she had bigger plans and became involved in the art scene. There she met Peter’s father, who was talented in arts and academics but lacked ambition. Peter’s mother became a teacher and the family’s primary provider, and the home was often in shambles. She was involved in left-wing protests and groups, and Peter often had to deal with the FBI when they came to the apartment to investigate his mother. In addition, Peter’s mother often couldn’t afford rent, and Peter was left to talk to the landlord.

Having a television was a big deal in the 1950s, and Peter’s mother bought one so that she could watch political broadcasts. One day, Peter was skipping school (as he often did) and had a chance to be on the news. He stood behind the reporter, jumping up and down and making faces into the camera. When he came home, his mother asked him about school, and he lied and said it was fine. She revealed that she saw him on TV, and Peter knew he was caught but continued to lie anyway. Just then, one of the family cats threw up, distracting Peter’s mother from scolding him further.

Peter’s father was an enigmatic man, but Peter loved and admired him deeply. He was skilled at learning languages and was a talented singer but in his youth passed up a scholarship to stay home and help his family during the Great Depression. In addition, Peter’s father was passionate about theater and knew the name of every Broadway actor.

When Peter was a child, his father received a call from his brother Bernie about an opportunity to sing on television. The Merv Griffin show required two imposter singers to pretend to be singing waiters and fool the audience as to who the real one was. Peter was thrilled at the idea, but his father was terribly anxious about it. He decided to do it anyway and practiced singing for weeks. When the day of the show finally arrived, Peter’s father started out well, singing beautiful notes and impressing the audience. Unfortunately, he had overlooked the waiter portion of the act and didn’t know how to set the table. Totally embarrassed, he froze. Peter recalls that his father stopped singing after that. The last time he heard his father sing was decades later, in a church choir just before his death.

In first grade, Peter announced that he was getting married. He fell in love with a girl in his class named Joyce and was determined to be with her forever. Peter’s father and uncle found it humorous and indulged Peter by buying him a cheap ring to give Joyce for their engagement. Peter gave Joyce the ring, and she took it but told him she wanted an ankle bracelet instead. Peter managed to get one, and Joyce took that, too, but never spoke to Peter again. Years later, Peter ran into her on the street. She was with her friends and proudly announced that she quit school. Out of nowhere, she gave Peter a kiss and told him it was a thank-you for the ring.

Peter’s mother admired Eleanor Roosevelt, and Peter had the chance to meet her when she came to his junior high school to speak at an assembly. Peter was in charge of setting up the microphone for the event. The principal, a harsh woman who displayed no faith in Peter, was certain that he would somehow mess things up. On the day of the assembly, Peter accidentally set up the microphone too low and had to run back on stage to adjust it after Eleanor Roosevelt arrived. A few minutes into her speech, the microphone started emitting feedback, so Peter had to run on stage to adjust it again. Eleanor Roosevelt smiled and thanked him, but his principal was angry and embarrassed. She banned him from ever helping with the microphones again and instructed him to put the equipment away. On his way out, Peter pulled a record out of his bag and set it up on the school’s record player so that it would play throughout the whole school. He locked the door to the equipment room, hid the key, and then left for home, where his mother was curious to hear all about Eleanor Roosevelt.

While working as a book and record store owner, Peter’s father managed to get two front row tickets to Louis Armstrong’s final performance at the Roxy Theatre from a ventriloquist who worked with his brother Bernie. Peter’s father was excited to give his son a chance to see one of the most legendary musicians of all time. At the show, the music was wonderful, but the stage was so high from the ground that Peter and his father couldn’t see anything. They concluded, “[N]ever trust a man who works with a dummy” (28).

Peter met Edie, his first love, in a summer program for skilled art students in 1959. She always sat by herself, and Peter was intrigued by her. They were accepted to the same high school, the High School of Music and Art, in Harlem, and both had to take the same long train ride to get there each day. On the second day, Peter saw Edie sitting across from him on the train and always looked for her after that. He finally worked up the courage to talk to her one day and found out that they had a great deal in common, including their mutual love of music.

Edie lived in the Edenwald housing project in a diverse neighborhood, and she had experience and a reputation among some of the area’s youth gangs. She used these connections to protect Peter on several occasions, negotiating and standing her ground at all times. Peter and Edie fell in love, and she declared “The Wind” by The Diablos their song. As Peter became increasingly involved in the J. Geils Band and Edie took up a career as a teacher, they spent more and more time apart but always came back together. One night while Peter was on tour, the band’s drummer Stephen told him that Edie died in a car wreck. Afterward, Peter immersed himself in his career, feeling empty. He received Edie’s ashes in the mail and took them out to sea. As a final goodbye, Peter played “The Wind.”

As Peter found his independence, he began spending most of his time in Greenwich Village, which was a major hub for arts and music in the early 1960s. Folk and jazz musicians, painters, actors, and other creative people constantly surrounded Peter. He often hung out at a record store called the Folklore Center, which was owned by a friend of his father’s named Izzy, and musicians regularly used the back room of the store for jam sessions. It was there that Peter heard Bob Dylan play for the first time, and the unique voice inspired him.

Wolf saw Dylan perform several times and often heard him playing in the back of the record shop. He managed to talk to Dylan on the phone once when he played a live radio show, and Dylan wanted to see Peter’s paintings. Peter eagerly took them to Dylan to show him, but Dylan was no longer interested and instead invited Peter to a party. At one club, Peter spent the evening standing near Dylan and sneaking sips of his drinks. On one particularly memorable occasion, Peter found Dylan sitting outside a café and asked him to explain what truth is. Dylan stared at Peter before giving a long spiel about the precarious nature of truth and Peter’s mistake in thinking Dylan was some sort of prophet. He then told Peter to find the truth for himself. Years later, in 1981, Peter was on tour with the J. Geils Band and the Rolling Stones. He encountered Dylan and complimented his leather pants. A year later, Peter received the pants in the mail as a gift from Dylan.