Several months later, James returned to
Aesthetic Realism and began dating another
woman. I wanted him. I was distraught. I
wrote a letter about my feelings to Siegel. He
told me my distress was not about this man at
all—it was shame because I was using Columbia
University to feel superior to Aesthetic Realism.
He said I had “architectural snobbishness,” that I
was using the impressive buildings at Columbia
against his small room in Greenwich Village.
I became terribly anxious and took to my bed. I
pulled the blanket over my head and cried for
hours. I would not talk to anyone. Only my
mother’s coaxing and finally a telephone call
from Siegel got me back in circulation. I went
to graduate school, but my grades fell I was ill
at ease on campus, and ultimately, although I
had earned a master’s degree and completed all
the exams for a PhD, I gave up academics to
teach Aesthetic Realism.
This increased attention on Aesthetic Realism all
came about as part of the new openness about
homosexuality following the historic 1969 riot at
the Stonewall Inn. For the first time, gay men
and women took to the streets to protest police
brutality. Two years later, students of Aesthetic
Realism appeared on prime-time TV, saying that
through studying with Siegel, they were no
longer homosexual. Hundreds of people called
the Terrain Gallery to learn more about
Aesthetic Realism. Siegel named three of the
men who said they had changed to teach as a trio
in what he called consultations. My parents
were in a trio teaching artists. I was in a trio
teaching professional women. We gave
individual consultations and public seminars
about how Siegel’s work had changed our lives,
and now was changing the lives of people
learning from us.
As Aesthetic Realism became marginally better
known, Siegel’s demand for confirmation grew.
We picketed in front of The New York Times
building and also Arthur Sulzberger’s home to
demand that the paper write about Siegel. We
wrote letters, visited critics, and jammed
telephone switchboards at popular magazines.
SoHo was now a cultural center, and my mother
told Siegel we should buy a building there for an
Aesthetic Realism school. Siegel said buying a
building was a substitute for gratitude, but
somehow my mother prevailed and in 1974,
when I was 30 years old, the Aesthetic Realism
Foundation in SoHo began.
My mother was director I was treasurer and
registrar. Consultants gave classes in marriage,
art, music—all showing the truth and beauty of
Aesthetic Realism. Along with others, I directed
public programs, wrote papers, helped others
write or wrote for them, and helped prepare the
application for the Foundation to become a
nonprofit organization. Siegel continued to
teach in his West Village studio. At the
Foundation, a new leadership formed, composed
of people Siegel had praised for their ethics and
honesty.
At Monday night “opinion meetings” of 30 or 40
students at the Foundation, we confessed our
failures and endured searing public criticism.
Leaders measured every aspect of life, every
activity, by the yardstick of gratitude. One
woman my age—mid-30s—wanted to start a
family. Wanting a baby, the leaders told her,
was a way of avoiding gratitude. One day I
arrived to give a seminar with my face swollen
from an abscessed tooth if I wanted to be
honest, I was told, my face would not be swollen
that way.
How I Chose to Leave
In the late 1970s, Siegel developed a prostate
condition. He refused to see doctors and
eventually, unable to walk, stopped giving
classes. When he finally submitted to surgery, it
was too late to restore the use of his feet, and he
could not use his hands to write. He entered a
profound depression that culminated in his
taking sleeping pills, once unsuccessfully and a
second time ending his life.
After the surgery and before his death, Siegel
stayed at the home of one of the new leaders. I
was among the students who helped her care for
him. We worked in shifts, two people at a time,
sleeping in a guest bedroom to be available at a
moment’s notice. One night, the first time
Siegel tried to take his life with sleeping pills
and was taken to the hospital, I heard his wife
talking with him over the telephone. He was
saying he wanted to die. She said, “What about
International Journal of Cultic Studies ■ Vol. 5, 2014 41
Aesthetic Realism and began dating another
woman. I wanted him. I was distraught. I
wrote a letter about my feelings to Siegel. He
told me my distress was not about this man at
all—it was shame because I was using Columbia
University to feel superior to Aesthetic Realism.
He said I had “architectural snobbishness,” that I
was using the impressive buildings at Columbia
against his small room in Greenwich Village.
I became terribly anxious and took to my bed. I
pulled the blanket over my head and cried for
hours. I would not talk to anyone. Only my
mother’s coaxing and finally a telephone call
from Siegel got me back in circulation. I went
to graduate school, but my grades fell I was ill
at ease on campus, and ultimately, although I
had earned a master’s degree and completed all
the exams for a PhD, I gave up academics to
teach Aesthetic Realism.
This increased attention on Aesthetic Realism all
came about as part of the new openness about
homosexuality following the historic 1969 riot at
the Stonewall Inn. For the first time, gay men
and women took to the streets to protest police
brutality. Two years later, students of Aesthetic
Realism appeared on prime-time TV, saying that
through studying with Siegel, they were no
longer homosexual. Hundreds of people called
the Terrain Gallery to learn more about
Aesthetic Realism. Siegel named three of the
men who said they had changed to teach as a trio
in what he called consultations. My parents
were in a trio teaching artists. I was in a trio
teaching professional women. We gave
individual consultations and public seminars
about how Siegel’s work had changed our lives,
and now was changing the lives of people
learning from us.
As Aesthetic Realism became marginally better
known, Siegel’s demand for confirmation grew.
We picketed in front of The New York Times
building and also Arthur Sulzberger’s home to
demand that the paper write about Siegel. We
wrote letters, visited critics, and jammed
telephone switchboards at popular magazines.
SoHo was now a cultural center, and my mother
told Siegel we should buy a building there for an
Aesthetic Realism school. Siegel said buying a
building was a substitute for gratitude, but
somehow my mother prevailed and in 1974,
when I was 30 years old, the Aesthetic Realism
Foundation in SoHo began.
My mother was director I was treasurer and
registrar. Consultants gave classes in marriage,
art, music—all showing the truth and beauty of
Aesthetic Realism. Along with others, I directed
public programs, wrote papers, helped others
write or wrote for them, and helped prepare the
application for the Foundation to become a
nonprofit organization. Siegel continued to
teach in his West Village studio. At the
Foundation, a new leadership formed, composed
of people Siegel had praised for their ethics and
honesty.
At Monday night “opinion meetings” of 30 or 40
students at the Foundation, we confessed our
failures and endured searing public criticism.
Leaders measured every aspect of life, every
activity, by the yardstick of gratitude. One
woman my age—mid-30s—wanted to start a
family. Wanting a baby, the leaders told her,
was a way of avoiding gratitude. One day I
arrived to give a seminar with my face swollen
from an abscessed tooth if I wanted to be
honest, I was told, my face would not be swollen
that way.
How I Chose to Leave
In the late 1970s, Siegel developed a prostate
condition. He refused to see doctors and
eventually, unable to walk, stopped giving
classes. When he finally submitted to surgery, it
was too late to restore the use of his feet, and he
could not use his hands to write. He entered a
profound depression that culminated in his
taking sleeping pills, once unsuccessfully and a
second time ending his life.
After the surgery and before his death, Siegel
stayed at the home of one of the new leaders. I
was among the students who helped her care for
him. We worked in shifts, two people at a time,
sleeping in a guest bedroom to be available at a
moment’s notice. One night, the first time
Siegel tried to take his life with sleeping pills
and was taken to the hospital, I heard his wife
talking with him over the telephone. He was
saying he wanted to die. She said, “What about
International Journal of Cultic Studies ■ Vol. 5, 2014 41
