A Dream of Escape

A dream of escape.

Here in the Northeast in America, we are under a cold snap.

Since Christmas, we have been suffering with below zero temperatures and into the predictable future (according to the iPhone).

And then, with or without a cold (which I have), we are essentially trapped indoors.

I've been lucky to have a writing project to take me out of myself.

The BEST vacation I can ever have. 

In Sparkly Love Just as NYC gets Cold

He mentioned how suddenly it had turned cold and windy, right on Park Avenue and 51st street.

It occurred to you that this was the New York you KNEW.  Always either too cold, or maybe too hot.  Just a few weeks ago you indulged in a diet coke like you were a sailor enjoying a beer.

He had a funny white knitted cap which made him look like a 6 ft tall 5 year old.  And he had a grand smile.

You tried not to read into it, tried to take it for the joy both of you felt in the moment.  Leave behind what you would learn later, all that he would tell you about the divorce, and the woman after.  And how you were not in the plan.

That is how you know New York.  Cold and beautiful.  Shining lights, the aura and illusion of warmth and beauty, but the wind gets in everywhere.

Even your dreams.

Take ALL the Pictures You Can

Yes, I realize that the world is taking far too many pictures.

Yes, I realize I will probably never match up all the photos I take of the same thing everyday.  The difference is imperceptible, yet I am riveted by the changes and the similarities.

Because everytime I DO go back to my previous pictures, I am happy. Whatever images made me happy that first time allow me to revisit the shapes again. Look again and again until they become familiar and part of my mental art gallery.

The Blue and the Red which pop when side by side, outside of a favorite theater. 

Sometimes the shapes or the colors no longer speak to me. But the ones that do, the ones which catch my attention may even be more glorious than the original, real life image.

Just this morning, the reflection of leaves on the pond, and the bottom still visible.  And Green leaves with Red stems, and blue in the background, not of the sky-but of the steel and glass building behind it.  Almost as good as the sky.

VINdication

When I first arrived in the city, as an overworked or out-of-work Stage Manager, I would often come home late at night and wide awake.

One of the first friends I had, to my mind, was an amazing DJ who was on the air from 10-2 (or longer) On WNEW (?) Vin Scelsa.

I found him the old fashioned way. I turned on the radio and turned the knob until I hit a song I liked.  When a song came on I didn't like, I'd change the channel.  i found that during his time slot, I was less likely to turn it off at all.  Even the songs I didn't like (or wasn't ready for) were worth sticking around for.

His archives now exist online in the form of https://vindication.neocities.org/test.html . 

This week at work, a millennial coworker asked how I access the radio.  I tried not to laugh when I said, "I simply turn on the knob"

Ghosts all Around

NYC is a vastly changing city.

The Riviera is closing.
http://gothamist.com/2017/08/04/rip_riviera_cafe.php

Lou is getting older and losing her memory.

Fringe is changing and becoming a block party.

Martin Denton is closing Indie Theater Now
http://www.indietheaternow.com/Playwright/tamara-rose
http://nytheatre.com/

Soon, it is only left to YOU to share the memories, like the Ancient Mariner, clinging to people's sleeves, trying to conjure up the good old days!

And life brings you back to someone's wants (your mother wanting you in Waltham), like gravity, like centrifugal force that you never fully expected to be able to escape.

Jeremiah's Vanishing New York

As if we came to the city at the same time.  It always starts the moment you enter, and then gets diminished, constantly taken away.

And replaced by the towers of steel and glass, very soon, there will be nothing left of the New york of legend.

Maybe there never was.

Dojo

Walking by Dojo, why did I remember it to be a crunchy-granola place?  It's Japanese, NOT specializing in Sushi!!

I ordered a madellaine, a fried tofu burger.  Suddenly I was transported back to my early days in the city, the first time.  When it was all I could afford, so I savored it.

The 2 gay guys next to me were being so precious about their conversation.  Preening about poetry, using all the super-meta words.  Exaggerating in front of each other, who is more gay, who is more smart.  NYU Grad students/teachers.

It took me back to those days....

Being Brave Against Trucks

The ground changes under our feet, daily.

Last week, it was all about me being brave.

And then a few people, beloved to me, have gotten hurt.  Jessica M was hit by a truck.  I was nearly hit by a car making a left turn at 30 miles an hour.  Stay out of the way of people and machines who seem determined to hit you. (And Times Square.  The girl from Michigan who came to her destiny.  And the man who was so angry he drove over 30 pedestrians.  And the one who blew up Manchester. And the stabbings in Portland.  And something today in Mississippi)

That should be lesson #1.  But I seem to keep needing to learn it, over and over again.

BE SAFE.

Owl Table

The Other Version of me is Jealous

Walking down 7th Ave, I was wondering & feeling a glimmer of that other girl, who actually envied my career in tech, even the bad days.

Theater is harder.

In so many ways.

Day to day, drama offstage, money money money. More so than in the private sector.

Love Boat and Other Suburbian Reruns

Reruns are easy to get lost in.

You can belong to the 1980's time, with everything except the youth and the commercials.  Lots of the actors look familiar.  Mostly because they haven't aged.

When "visiting" the house you grew up in, it's hard to tell the difference between now and then.

There are PLENTY of reasons to keep TV out of your grownup house.

You also thought that you'd be singing during every spare moment you had alone in the car.

But lately, in the suburban life, stuck in traffic on the way to a tech job, you are asleep at the wheel. Of Life.

You JUST put away the Xmas tree (just before March and Mardi Gras).  You JUST set up the "big" screen tv.  It took months and months of you worrying about how big and how to get it installed on the wall and finally you just walked in and bought the cheapest tvs that were bigger than your 19 inch color tv from 1980.  $70 each.  You were in and out in 20 minutes.

And you've almost stopped dancing.

Just in time for you to go back to the City.

Spontaneous Protests

It's good that we are practiced at flash mobs. All those pants less subway rides were mere practice for tonight, showing upninnBrooklyn, outside Cadman Plaza, protesting & then celebrating the overturning of the Muslim ban.

New Yorkers ride in the same subway cars as people from the rest of the world, who lives in a bubble? Maybe those who have no idea what it is to stand next to a stranger and understand.