NOW, forty-five years after the production of The Skin of Our Teeth and my adventures with it, perhaps I see who and what I was—and am—more clearly. For instance, now I can freely acknowledge that I’ve always wanted a secure domestic life and, at the same time, the freedom of the bachelor’s existence. But it never works. Somebody gets hurt. The curse of my life has been the illusion that I could have both. Still I’ve wanted it all, and in a way, gentled by the passing years, I still do. You know what I’m talking about. You’re not altogether different, are you?

I’m not making reference to my sex life. I’m trying to deal with the whole thing.

For instance: I’ve preferred to believe that I’m an adventurous man, yet I remain bourgeois, even a bit stuffy, am now the head of a large, traditional family with nineteenth-century comforts in bed, bath, study, and at the dining table. My car is a Mercedes, not what I’ve sometimes envied, an Alfa Romeo.

I’ve dreamed of living, unencumbered by children, possessions, and pets, in a small apartment where I’d have only the essentials: my books, records, tapes, research, typewriter, paper in reams, razor-point pens by the box, and a full fridge. There, absolutely alone, I’d work every morning undisturbed by the emotional needs of others. At night I’d enjoy a flow of guests, never the same, no repeats.

But as I write this, I live happily and faithfully in a kind of zoo with an excellent young wife, her two children, a perfect secretary-assistant who runs my life, a devoted housekeeper, plus two dogs, two cats, and, at the other end of the phone line, five grown children and five grandchildren. Did I say unencumbered?