The Sullivanians:Through a Blue Window ((c) 2019 shelley feinerman's Podcast
CULT! This podcast chronicles the rise and fall of the Sullivanian Institute and its members. The psycho-sexual therapy] and institute existed on Manhattan's Upper West Side from the 1970s through the 1990s. Directed to abandon family and friends, as we all were, after five years my life was inextricably altered. The podcast begins with my childhood, then goes on to my time in the Sullivanians, and 20 years later, its self-destruction when it was characterized as a cult. It is entitled Through a Blue Window: The Sullivanians and is dedicated to mother, Ruth.
The Sullivanians:Through a Blue Window ((c) 2019 shelley feinerman's Podcast
(After the group )Jonestown and the Three Mile Island Fallout
]As this episode unfolds the eerie news bulletins of Jonestown bring with it the realization that the Sullivanians were a cult and I was part of it. Hoping, one last time to make a go of my relationship with Chris we move to the East Village,
Still cleaning for two Sullianian apartments, a few months later the events of near nuclear meltdown at Three Mile Island nuclear plant unfolds. Caught in the crossfire I learned of the treacherous events, marked by unprecedented actions and some shocking discoveries. These events are true. I experienced them. Thank you for listening and please pass along
The complete documentary Through a BlueWindow can be seen on my youtube channel shellfein1. I would love to hear your thoughts.
Thank you
It was dark outside and I hadn't noticed how cold or how hungry I was until I turned off the typewriter. I'd been in the apartment writing for most of the day and turned the radio on. As I dressed, I was meeting Chris at the cafe for dinner and I was going to be late. As I rushed around, van Morrison's Brown Eyed Girl was playing in the background when suddenly the song was interrupted by a news bulletin. After the first startling words, I sat down on the edge of the bed, one leg in one leg out of a pair of jeans, listening to the reporters, obviously shaking voice. I repeat Congressman Leo Ryan of California and several of his party have been shot on the airfield in Guiana. Ryan, after urging by his constituents, many of whom had relatives in the People's Temple, chartered an airplane to take him to Guiana to investigate allegations that Jim Jones, the charismatic leader of the temple, extorted money and encouraged sexual promiscuity among his followers and that the People's Temple was a dangerous religious cult. Early this morning, ryan was driven to the airport in a van and, while he was awaiting airlift off the island, open fire ensued. Reports have his gun-riddled body lying on the airfield, shivering, unable to catch my breath and then gulping for airs while breaking the water service.
Speaker 1:After a deep dive, and with no memory of dressing in what seemed like hours but in reality was barely 20 minutes, I headed downtown. The deafening noise of the? A train couldn't quiet the high-scoring pinball game that was going on inside my head, nor could it stop the silver ball from pinging repeatedly. As I made the connection between the group and Jonestown, chris was waiting for me at the Cafe Borgia newspaper strewn haphazardly across the table, their headlines screaming up at me. I approached the table with tears in my eyes. After the Jonestown incident, chris had been very supportive and I thought perhaps we had a chance. After all, we needed to get out of Inwood and I found a fifth story walk up on 6th street off of Avenue A in the East Village, and though the apartment was too small, the location was just a couple of blocks west on 2nd Avenue where black, leathered and blue haired Billy Idol and Madonna wannabes transformed restaurants after midnight into raucous punkadelic scene. An exotic mix of frankincense swefted up from downstairs neighbor and curry drifted down the block from the Indian restaurants that proliferated the neighborhood, filling the apartment, and in the months after the move I spent curled on the window ledge taking in the brilliant sun. After several months in our new apartment, it came to pass that Chris began spending nights at Mary Sheldon's Bronx apartment. The bespecaled Open Union member I knew at last was time for me to get my apartment. But then Three Mile Island happened, bringing Chris and I together for one more round.
Speaker 1:Though the first reports downplayed the seriousness of the accident, as the afternoon wore on and the truth was revealed a macabre hush blanketed the streets of the usually Polini-esque, like Lower East Side. The Governor of Pennsylvania had ordered the evacuation of all pregnant women and school-age children within a five-mile radius of TMI. Chris had come home early that day and uncharacteristically took the initiative. After a quick run to the supermarket, he announced we were all to stay in the apartment. I was to call my two cleaning jobs I was still cleaning for the group and say I wasn't coming, but it was a non-issue. No one answered my calls.
Speaker 1:I left several messages, but ten days passed without contact. On the eleventh day I decided to use the key and let myself into one of the apartments. The combined odor of sour milk and urine hit me in the gut like a fist. In the kitchen, coagulated bowls of cereal sat on the table and two containers of milk, now rancid, stood open on the counter and looked as though everyone had been vaporized zapped right in the middle of eating breakfast. You could almost hear the spoons dropping to the floor where they lay on the soiled newspapers. Several glassy-eyed dogs appeared from hiding, with tails in the air, and began to sniff at my feet, obviously starving for human contact. Hoveredly, I poured out some dry food and refilled several pots with water. There was no note and no money, and I left spooked by what I'd seen.
Speaker 1:Two days later, I was finally contacted by both of my jobs and what they said sounded scripted and no doubt was. They claimed to have left a message with that quote. That man I was living with, unquote, refusing to be intimidated, I confronted the lie. We were home and there was no call, and that man is my boyfriend and I trust him. In the end, tony's apartment agreed to pay me for the lost time and would leave a check with the doorman in exchange for the key, but the men's brownstone told me to come there the following morning to collect my pay. Manny Weiss, one of the trainees who lived there, met me at the door and escorted me upstairs to the kitchen. I'm surprised I wasn't blindfolded, because I couldn't help but notice the strange goings on taking place.
Speaker 1:The monitors had been installed in the pantry, one for each major city LA, chicago, florida, san Francisco and New York and the screens were flashing barometer wind and precipitation readings repeatedly. The common room, on the other hand, looked like a save the group telethon. In place of the couch chairs and tables, there were three eight foot long conference tables set one behind the other, with five people to each table answering phones. I was thanked for my service and told I would no longer be needed. He paid me in cash for three weeks of work and I handed him the keys. Serena, my pipeline into all group happenings, eventually learned the truth and passed the information on to me.
Speaker 1:When the news first broke about TMI, seth decided the members of the Institute, therapists and trainees, pregnant women, children and their babysitters should leave the city and though not one group apartment was officially notified, a chain of calls alerted the apartments to the exodus. Days later, more than 300 members of the group followed, flying down to Orlando, florida, where they set up a stronghold at the Howard-Johnson's and conducted house meetings, therapy and strategies sessions around the swimming pool. Members were instructed to call their jobs and lie to their employees, saying their employers saying they had to help a sick relative who had just happened to live in Florida. How else could they have accounted for the tan? Back in New York Lewin's laws went into effect.
Speaker 1:What happened in Florida and what I saw at the Men's Brownstone and the group's response overall was to be kept strictly within the group. Most members were able to adapt, but there was one notable exception Alex Bergen, a tall milk-coast guy, milk-toast guy with a patchy blonde mustache, who joined the group as I was getting out. It seemed TMI and its aftermath were too much for Alex and he swallowed a handful of valium. Alex's roommate, marv Halpern, older than the average college-bound Arlettian with a well-established accounting practice, found Alex in a drug-induced sleep and when he couldn't wake him up, marv carried him to the street and into a taxi. Alex's stomach was pumped at the Mount Sinai emergency room and when he was questioned by the psychiatrist he did the unthinkable. He broke group security, beginning with the secret phone calls, the whispered voices and the mass exodus.
Speaker 1:Alex broke security and related the events of the past 11 days. He told them about the panic, rushed to the airport with his roommates about the institute, about the therapists, house meetings and sessions around the pool, and he named names and gave details. The doctor wanted to commit him for observation until Marv cooperated his story and assumed responsibility. It was three in the morning when Alex and Mary got home from the hospital. Ten minutes later the phone rang. It was Lewin himself and because they had endangered the continued existence of the group and the institute, they had one hour to pack and leave the premises. Thank you, you, okay, good.