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Oh, Phyllis is my girl. Phyllis is my wife. Sylvia was a wild adventure, a dream--something that should happen to everybody once in his lifetime, and thank God it happened to me because it was a wonderful episode. The only bad part of being married to a girl like Sylvia and having it end is you can't forget it very quickly.
Nobody lets you.
It isn't only that. I'd temporarily forget her; then I'd turn a corner and see a flag in front of the Paramount Theater three stories high, “Sylvia Sidney,” or open the paper and see a great big picture of her looking absolutely beautiful in some new picture she was doing, or I'd read any item about myself--for three years after the marriage it was always “Bennett Cerf, ex-husband of Sylvia Sidney,” which used to drive me absolutely crazy. To round up this episode, gradually the tag disappeared and my memory of her disappeared, too-- the poignant memories, the ones that hurt. And I think a person can tell when they're over this kind of affair: for a long while these thoughts come unbidden into your head to haunt you--places you've been together, holidays you've shared.... But then there comes a moment when you are cured but don't want to admit it to yourself and you deliberately dredge up these memories. They no longer come unbidden, but you say, “I guess I'll suffer a little bit.” It's like putting a record on the victrola. Now it's no longer involuntary; it's something that
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