Nov21

Obama Traffic

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Unable to reach for the hand sanitizer in my purse, I sat motionless on the crowded bus, pinned between arms and thighs, staring at the sharp teeth of a Russian man’s zipper.  The 6 train stopped running.  Obama was stumping in midtown.  The fury of delayed travelers ascended 86th street, pushing against crowded busses, willing doors to open and bodies to crush onward.  Miraculously, I got a seat.  With the bus draped over us, we drove on, stronger than gasoline.

Jeffrey sat next to me.  He was one of the guys on the street pushing people and yelling and swearing, a mess of tweaky anger.  I wondered what would happen if I started talking to this guy.  When I introduced myself to him, Jeffrey brightened.  It’s been nearly four months since I talked to Jeffrey and then Jasmarie, and as I sink into that July afternoon, I sit in my apartment after a day inside a burgundy sweater, contextualizing those four months in between that bus ride and now with what has passed – the election, illusory love, the hurricane, a successful new project, an accordion player, rocking chairs, cable, a farm wedding, electric blue leggings, and love expanded. 

Back in July, Jeffrey was just leaving work, and was on his way home.  He works for a company called CEO – Center for Employment Opportunities. 

“The 6 train let me down,” Jeffrey said.

“Me, too – I’m running late,” I said.

“Yeah, where you going?”

“Therapy,” I said.

“Back therapy?”

“No, head.”

“Oh, head therapy.  That’s cool.  Everyone needs someone to talk to,” Jeffrey said.

Jeffrey is going home to Jamiaca, Queens.  He’s been there all his life.  I ask him about his neighborhood. 

“What’s it like in the hood?  It’s definitely different from anywhere else. It’s ongoing struggle in the neighborhood.  It’s kind of rough.  People can’t find jobs.  You got to survive so you’re going to do whatever it takes to survive.  I don’t regret anything.  I don’t regret my upbringing.  It was good.  It’s just the outside influences.  The streets.  The neighborhood.  Your friends.  Your neighbors.”

Jeffrey has an empty wine glass in his hands.  I ask, “Are you drinking some wine?” 

“It’s for my Hennesey later.” 

I have no idea what Hennesey is – “What is that?” I asked.

“It’s cognac.  Liquor.”

I told him that I don’t drink.

“That’s good.  But in my neighborhood you would.”  

A woman beside him laughs.  People are listening to us.  We are sitting on a bus. 

He says, “This is my nice little cup that someone gave me at the job.”

 “Oh, who gave it to you?” I asked.

“A friend,” he tells me.

“What’s your friend’s name?” I ask.

 “Rob.”

“Was that a gift?” I asked.

“He gave it to me.”

“That’s really nice of him.” I said.

“I guess you’re right.”

“Have you ever given him a gift?”

“I give him cigarettes,” he says.

“Are you ok that this bus is crowded because Obama’s in town?  How do you feel about Obama?” I asked.

“Obama’s cool with me and I’m cool with him.  I’ll give him my vote again.”

“What do you think about the state of the country?”

“Ain’t nothing happening that they don’t want to happen.  I’ll put it like that.  Everything for a reason.   It’s already been written.”

“What, if anything, would you like to see changed?” I asked.

“In America?  I’d like to see politicians keep their promises so when they say something they do it instead of just telling us.”

“How about you, do you make promises?”

“Only if I can keep it.  I don’t want to promise something I may not be able to give.”

“Yeah, it’s integrity.  Say you’re going to do something and then do it.” I offer.  “Can you tell me about when you were a kid?”

“You psychoanalyzing me?”

Jeffrey told me about his two brothers and one sister.  They all live in New York.  He sees his sister at least once a week.  She’s in the Bronx.  He sees his brother every day.

 “What does family mean to you?” I asked.

“Family’s everything. Family first.”

“When you were a little boy, where did you hang out, what did you do?”

“What stop is this?  60th?  Alright.  Right around the corner from my block they had a play street where they blocked the streets off and you could play skully.”

“Skully?”  I ask, perplexed.  I don’t think he’s referring to The X-Files.

“You put numbers on the square and you pluck numbers into the square.  First box, second box.  Thirteen boxes.  Hopscotch.  For about two blocks.  There was a lot of kids.”

“You must have met a woman eventually.” I probe.

“Melanie.”

“Where’d you meet Melanie?”

“I met Melanie in a Chinese restaurant.  I was standing there.  She was ordering.  I liked what I saw.  She had a baby with her.  I asked her if there was a husband to go with that family, and she said – no. I took her out for her birthday our first date.  Her birthday was March 7th.”

Jeffrey had two kids with Melanie. 

“I’m single now, by choice.  For me, it’s good to be single because I’m not ready for a commitment.  How is this interview going?” he asked.

“It’s going great.  Thank you.”

“At least you got something.”

“I did.”

“She’s got a story to tell.”  He looks playfully at the woman who sat down at the other side of me – I think we both could tell that she’d been listening in..

“No I don’t actually,” she says.

“Everyone’s got a story to tell,” Jeffrey says.

“I do have stories to tell,” she says

I asked her if we could talk, and she says – “Sure.”

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“Jasmarie”

“I never heard that – it’s a beautiful name.” says Jeffrey

“That’s Jeffrey, and I’m Jessica,” I tell her.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To the end of the world,” she says.  Jeffrey laughs.  “I don’t know – wherever I can catch a train.  I’m supposed to be headed to Brooklyn.”

“What are you going to do there?” I asked.

“Just chill,” she says.

She looks at me.  “You’re funny.  I’ve been watching the questions you’ve been asking.  Have you taken psychology classes?”

“Yes.”

“I can tell.”

“Have you taken psychology classes?” I asked her.

“Yeah,” she says.

“What are you interested in?”

“Medical examining, poetry, and music,” she says.

I love this combination.  I ask Jasmarie what she writes. 

“I’m a revolutionary writer.” Jasmarie said.

Jeffrey runs out at 59th street.  As he runs out the door we yell back and forth how cool this was and where he can find my blog, and then he’s gone.

“When did you start writing poetry?” I asked Jasmarie.

“Long time ago.”

“How old are you?” I asked.

“19.”

“I was going to college but I dropped out because it was boring.”

“What was boring about it?”

“I don’t think they ever gave me the real liberty to think for myself.  They actually just trained me to think what they wanted me to think.  I don’t like that.  That’s not my kind of party.  Prior to you teaching me what you want me to know, I’ve already drawn a thousand conclusions.  I’m an observer.  I was listening to you and the way you asked questions was hilarious.  You entertain and then you break apart.”

I’m not used to people observing me.  I entertain?  Then I break apart?  I explain myself a little: “I want to get somewhere real with someone, and you can’t always get there with a stranger on the street or on a bus.  We’re all human, but we can block ourselves off in public spaces.  We can make people objects.” I said. 

Today I struggled on my subway ride home.  I didn’t like it when a woman who shared a pole with me let her leather jacket brush my arm from Fulton Street to 42nd Street.  I couldn’t move.  I vacillated between feeling angry at being treated like an expendable arm in someone’s way and thinking that we are beautiful spirits wearing jackets that sometimes touch each other.

Jasmarie says, “That’s funny that you say that because if you asked me a question about that, that’s what my answer would sound like.  I find these days that as I block myself from the world, the little interaction I do have with people is at a soul level, which is very strange.  When you open your eyes, you’ll be amazed by what you can hear and see.  When you get the facts of the conversation it’s better than listening to the bullshit all the time.  That’s what I’m reaching to.  I’ll tell you, all my friends – I don’t talk to them.  There’s nothing in common anymore.  When you start purifying yourself from the inside out, what they’re saying doesn’t make sense.”

“How are you purifying yourself?” I asked.

“Getting rid of the thoughts that used to plague me that added no value to my spirit.”

“Thoughts such as…”

“The media, the latest fashion, that kind of stuff.  I’ve been writing since I was really young.  Sometimes I didn’t understand the things that I wrote.  It was almost like I was a vessel for something greater and not until I got older did I start finding myself again within my own voice, which is crazy. I found that the truth that I was looking for – I knew it all along.”

“What are some of the things you write about?”

“The lies, deception, the mask that people put on.  Deficiencies that I see in other people.”

“Is it based on your personal experiences?”

“What I see, what I experience, what I learned, and mainly learning from what I used to be and now that I’ve let go of certain things.  I compare the two, and I find I’m more free when I don’t care what my hair looks like.  You know what I mean?  It’s little things.  You wake up and just be you.  If you is not good enough for the world – then so be it.  Even adults have to face that.  There’s so many people who want to keep up with the Jones’s.  It makes no sense to me.  I understand we live in a society where we have to work, but in my perfect world I would depend on barter and trade.  Because people use their talents and everybody’s happy.”

I like this idea of barter and trade.  I have thought hard about bartering pedicures with friends.

Jasmarie said, “If you give a child a coloring book, you teach him to conform.  If you give him a blank piece of paper, you give him endless possibilities.  That’s what I thought about.  My thing is – I love the medical field – but I still love art, all sorts of music, all sorts of art.  To be in a state of mind where you can produce things, do you know the value of that?  It makes me so happy.  I have a lot of friends who are poets and spoken word artists, and the formation of their words is just so amazing. How do they come up with things like this?  It just baffles me.”

“Do you feel like your family understands you?”

“Definitely.  You know there is always the black sheep.  The beauty of that is that you are the one who defies expectations.”

“Is that you?”

“All the time.  Ever since I can remember.  My aunt used to say – you know more than a pencil.  I don’t march to their beat at all.  Their beat is the same old sad song.  Conforming to the ways of people around them.  Trying to fit in.  Go along to get along.  I’m not like that.  They sit down and gossip.  They eat their lives away with unhealthy food.  I’m nothing like that.  It doesn’t feel good, it doesn’t feel right.  It doesn’t feel like it’s what I’m supposed to be doing.  I’m finding greater joy and peace in helping people.  I went to Florida.  I really went out there on a limb.  I had no family there. I took my suitcase, and I was like – I’m out, I don’t need to be here.  I received a call from a friend and they said I have family there and you can stay with them.  Cool. A week or two later I go to the beach, and I kinda took the wrong bus and ended up not in Miami Beach but elsewhere.  I go in front of McDonalds, and there’s this guy there, and you know how you get this feeling that you’re supposed to talk to someone – you have a message to give but you don’t know exactly what.  I started talking to him.  I knew he was homeless.  I hung out with him the whole day.  Hours prior when I did reach the beach, I was talking to God – I was like – I want a husband that’s good and all this other cute stuff that I was asking for.  So I was sitting in front of the McDonalds talking to this guy about  keeping his head up, and this Indian guy comes out of nowhere.  He’s like, ‘Eh, my friend.’  I was like, ‘Who are you?’  He’s like, ‘Do I know you?’  And I was like, ‘No.’  He says, ‘You’re from New York, right?’  I was like, ‘Yeah.’  And he just starts talking to me.  He says come here, I have something to tell you.  ‘Fortune teller, 20 dollars.’  I was like ‘I don’t have no money for you.’ So he says fine, he pulls me to the side and says, ‘You’re going to have a husband, and culture isn’t going to matter.  And one day you’re not going to work for anyone, someone is going to work for you.’  It’s funny because he almost answered all of the questions I had asked God earlier.  It served as confirmation that I was where I was supposed to be.  Now that I look back, I really honestly believe that the whole purpose for me going down there was just for that guy.  I bought him food. I spent the whole day with him.  When I left him in the nighttime, he looked at me with those don’t go eyes.  It was a lesson I learned to not only give without judgment, but to be open.  I could have told that Indian guy to go away.  It was almost as if he was looking for me. There’s no accidents.  You can’t tell me that certain things aren’t real.”

“What is your relationship with God?”

“God is everything that sounds, everything that is.  It is God, it is me, it is you, it’s all one thing.   We collectively as the people form the body of God.  That’s why it’s so important that we become one with each other as human beings, because once we create that body again, we would become an incredible force.  This society does the divide and conquer thing.  How can you divide something that is ultimately supposed to be together?  If you think of humans, they’re all DNA cells that multiply, rejuvenate, and die, and they come above again.  It’s really strange that we have to be so separate.  In my poems, I write that.  “I spend more time being you, speaking like him, and loving like her.”

“Can I take a picture of you?” I ask.

“Sure, let’s take a picture together.”

As we got up, eyes followed us out the door onto 14th Street.  We hugged.  I went to therapy.  Jasmarie sent me this, a piece she wrote:

This dedicated for the mentally medicated for those who abandoned the real meanin their hearts perpetrated this is for the faithful faithless for those whose hearts face is mutilated for those who ride on the back of hatred for those who forgot god consciousness and in the process defecated  on their soul with no redemption or feelings of disasterness,,, this is for spiritual strangulation for those whose mind lies in detention push down by this fake nation,,, for those whose  philosophy is such catastrophe wake up and see what u r doing to we.  the fumes you breathe hurt u emotionally so you become motionless full o stress to ur past u regress with many regrets. this is for those who buried their voice and instead synchronize with a technological demise that keeps them brain dead and doesn’t allow them to rise,,, this is for u, ur friend and that guy,,, please people open ur eyes….see you follow empty words or should I say killing swords that were only used by those who u crowned as lords…please people open your eyes sooner or later you will realize ur demise please my brother and my sister plse rise,, utilize the sacredness between ur brow it’s ur heaven to the truth open your books now,,, notes to take changes to make  the perfect ascension waiting at hand loose ends to mend can u over stand open ur eyes I’m sure you can I’m asking you to extend ur hand on behalf Of the fallen men

I love what Jasmarie shared with me.  We are writers.

 

 

 

 

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Jun19

Belgians and Punishment at the Met

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I move amongst daggers, pendants, golden calligraphy, amulets, candlesticks, jugs, bird pins, perfume sprinklers, jewels.  The fingers of another time offer these gifts.  I’d like to lay down my Marc Jacob’s bag and pink Gucci glasses onto Fifth Avenue, surrendering my eyes to a blurred and beautiful world.  I tell my emails to stand in line, and they bunch together, hands on hips, sending each other on pretzel runs to the corner bodega while I gaze at nudes.  Unfurled and alone at the Met, I imagine myself sitting on crimson cushions, sharing goblets of wine with ghosts whose indigo stained hands rest on my knee with love.  It feels holy to breathe space around these objects.  In the sculpture garden, I toss two wishes into a sea of shiny wishes, and the collective gasp of still stone creatures warms my shoulders.

 The museum closes, and I travel from Rome to Egypt to Syria to 82nd Street.  Europeans sprinkle the museum steps and sidewalk, and I walk towards a couple leafing a map. 

An and Kristof are in New York for the last two weeks of a six month long vacation.  They come from Belgium.  Their eyes sparkle and their skin crinkles.  I am amazed by their travels and ask for details.  They tell me that first they went to Asia – China, Vietnam, and Cambodia.  Then they went to Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, and then the west coast of North America.  Now they’re in New York, and they’re going to Guatemala last.  They stand close to each other.

An is a social worker who works with mentally disabled people.  She took a leave from her job to travel.  Kristof quit his job – he was a campaigner for an animal rights organization. 

Two years ago they went to Africa and last year they went to Peru, and they always dreamed of travelling for a longer time.  An’s wind band decided to go on tour to China last December.  An plays the clarinet, piano, and the trombone.  The couple knew that a friend was getting married in Tasmania in February, and they thought…let’s not fly back to Belgium from China and then leave again one month later for Australia.  So two months became three months and three months became six months, and they started to tour the world together.

An and Kristof outside the Met

I ask them how the trip has affected their relationship.  An says, “Oh, people said – six months together?  You’ll have a lot of fights and you won’t know what to say to each other any more.”  Kristof laughs, and says that their travel was a confirmation of their relationship, that it’s been an unbelievable six months.

They met at a student’s home in Belgium eight years ago. 

In the museum, An and Kristof saw statues from Greece, Egypt, and Europe.  Kristof says, “Auguste Rodin is one of An’s favorites.  We saw the Burghers of Calais, which we saw in Paris, too.  I think it’s a replica here.  I really love masks – African masks.  We saw things here that we also saw in Australia and New Zealand.  I was a little bit refusing to come to America.  The image of America is totally different than what we experienced here.  It’s unbelievable.  The west coast, the four corners, and now New York- it’s unbelievable.  The image of America is not always that great in Europe.  But together with Vietnam, it’s the best part of the trip.”

Luckily, for An and Kristof, the United States and Vietnam are no longer engaged in active combat.  I ask them what their personal impression of America was before coming here.  An thought of America as a country perpetually at war.

Kristof says, “The image of America is old, conservative, Republican.  It’s totally not the case.  Everyone helps you in the subway.  We had the totally wrong image, I confess.”

I ask them to tell me about their travels. 

Kristof shares, “Once we were making some mistakes about booking a hotel.  We realized at 9 at night we would have to sleep in the car.  We were between Yosemite and San Francisco.  We couldn’t find a motel with any vacancies.” 

An says, “First we saw an RV camp but we couldn’t find anyone who was responsible for the RV camp.  So next door was a church and there was a big parking lot, so we thought it would be ok to stay there.  There was one camper in the parking lot and the woman came out of it and started looking at our car.  I got out of the car and explained the situation.  She said, ‘This is actually the minister’s house.  The minister and his wife live here.  It’s a home.  You just have to ask if it’s ok to sleep here, and probably it will be ok, but just ask their permission.’  So we went to the house.  I was thinking – can we just leave?  We have to ask a minister?  We’re not Christian people!” 

“A woman opened the door and I explained our situation, and she said – it’s ok for me, and the minister will probably think it’s ok, too, so just park here.  So in the evening, we were taking our sleeping bags and organizing the car because it was full of stuff.”

Kristof interjects, “We were really changing clothes.”

An admits, “Yah, we were changing clothes.  It was really hot.  We were putting on shorts.  A car came, and I was like – oh shit. I put on my shorts.  There were flashing lights.  It was the police.”

“The sheriff came and said, ‘What’s going on out here.  And we explained the situation.  I said, the minister’s wife said it’s ok, and he said ‘I’m the minister.’”

“He was the sheriff and the minister.  In Belgium, that’s really something that we always thought could happen in America – that the officer of law is also the minister.  If you get a ticket, suddenly you have to go to the preacher.  We laughed a lot about that.”

Oh holy America, where in some states, the job requirements for the sheriff match the job requirements for God’s emissary.  Do we judge and punish as a country?  Then I think about guillotines and the Crusades.  Judgement and punishment does not belong only to the United States.  What about Dostoyevsky?  What about ethnic cleansing?  Just a couple of hours earlier I stood before a Roman sarcophagus from the 300s with the inscription: “If anyone shall dare to bury another person along with this one, he shall pay to the treasury three times two thousand. This is what he shall pay to the city of Portus, but he himself will endure the eternal punishment of the violator of graves.”

My parents would never speak to me like that.  Eternal punishment strikes me as harsh.  Authority?  Blech.   What is the point of Roman magistrates paroling the Elysian Fields? 

An and Kristof smile easily.  They talk easily.  I like what they wear – An wears a poofy white skirt.  I like the lines in their faces.  I like that they only planned to come to the Met for 20 minutes.  My European friend once said that Manhattan is an island off the coast of Europe.  Well, we certainly don’t wear cowboy hats in the city, and I have no desire to hang an American flag out of my 3rd floor walk up window.  But…how European are we?  Do we take naps?  Can we pick figs from trees in central park or fall in love by the Jersey Shore?   

I want to be still, yet from time to time, that preacher-sheriff appears on my liberal Jewish free to be you and me shoulder admonishing me through missing teeth that my hair is too long and my heart is beating too softly, and there is a litany of things I should to be doing – anything but what I am doing in this moment.  Surrendering to the romance and spirit of life sometimes feels like medieval Texas torture. 

On a trip to Jerusalem fifteen years ago I met a friend sitting on a couch and drinking beer from a communal refrigerator.  We spoke of love (and sex) in the ancient city.  When I left An and Kristof, this out of touch friend’s name appeared in my head.  She is from Belgium.  We haven’t been in touch in over ten years.  I emailed her when I got home, and the next day she wrote back.  These ghosts are  alive, making pottery, playing music, getting married.  My friend from Belgium spells October Oktober and has a cat named Sjimmie.

May11

Visiting Morris

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In 1914 my great-grandfather, Morris, lived on Henry Street.  Today, I stand on his steps under the awning, avoiding the wind.  I see the Manhattan Bridge looming above, and if I were to knock down the Meyer London Public School, I could see the Williamsburg Bridge.  An old tree sits across the street.  A shop next store sells rice cookers and mops wrapped in disintegrating cellophane.  A man wearing a suit and neon green sneakers shuffles past me.  Little girls hold umbrellas, following their mothers.  One block away hipsters eat oysters and celery root pot pie.  This is Chinatown. 

Looking up at 105 Henry Street

A building permit sign is posted on the brown door of 105 Henry Street, and I worry that the building is in disrepair.  Earlier, as I walked along Allen Street towards this old building, I considered that this building could be an empty lot, an elevator building, a condemned building.  The old is so easily replaced.  As I stand before a solid brick 105, I feel relief and elation.  I move aside as a woman with a bowl cut walks out the door wearing a pale pink blouse and pleated pants. 

I tell her “My great-grandfather lived here in 1914!”  She shakes her head, not understanding.  I start to pantomime my family’s immigration story to her, and she  walks away.                              

I stand for several minutes by the building, in the rain.  At last, a redhead walks by.  He looks about my age, and wears a hat that signals coolness.  Still excited, I tell him that in 1914, my great-grandfather lived in the building where we stood.  Morris walked along this sidewalk, the dust of Lithuania still on his shoulders.  I ask the redhead to tell me about his great-grandfather.  He tells me he doesn’t know anything about his great-grandfather, and that he is in a rush.  He ambles away.  I don’t like him. 

A few minutes later, a guy walks out of the building.  I talk to him, and he talks back in fluent native English.  He hauls an orange covered laundry cart behind him.  I tell him that my great-grandfather lived in this building in 1914.  He stops.  We chat.  I ask him if he knows anything about his great-grandfathers.  He tells me no.  He has to get going, but he suggests that I wait by the door for an hour – a woman named Thea, his upstairs neighbor, will walk out of the building to stretch her legs, eventually.  Thea, he promises, is a talker.  She is old, he says.  Like 90.  She has lived in the building for over 35 years, when this used to be a Jewish neighborhood.  As he walks away, his gaggle of laundry follows behind.  We wave goodbye, and I ask him what he does.  He runs a nightclub. He just woke up. It’s 3:42 p.m.

I imagine my great-grandfather – who in 1914, worked in a factory that made trusses for male hernias – walking up the stairs to his apartment, passing the gay nightclub owner with his delicates.

This morning, I decided to come to Henry Street because I wanted to see what my great-grandfather saw when he first came to this country, back when he worked in the truss factory, before he met my great-grandmother Lena at her father’s grocer and moved to Brooklyn with her, before he moved with Lena to Ohio where he had a used furniture store and three daughters  Here, he saw the tree before me.  Here, he saw the Manhattan Bridge, probably when there was no subway rattling through the lower level.  Here, he saw wide boulevards with signs in Hebrew instead of Chinese.  On this step, he stood on a different layer of brown paint beneath my feet.  I wonder if he ever sat on the big cement arm of this porch peeling a banana he bought on Hester Street.

I stand in the wind, pondering whether to wait for Thea for the next hour. I look at the names next to the buzzers.  I see Thea’s name.  I consider buzzing her apartment. 

I decide to wait.  My sister calls.  She’s driving to Starbucks with my nephew, who my sister tries to convince to spend an afternoon in the city with me, promising ice cream on my behalf. He says he’d rather I come to his house and push him on his swing.  I tell my sister where I am –105 Henry Street, where our great-grandfather once lived.  I tell her about the truss factory.  We are amused.  Years ago, when I was still living in California, my family did a dead person ancestor tour of New York.  They visited the graves of some of our relatives.  They went to the Brooklyn house where Morris and Lena eventually lived together.  It’s now a halfway house.  They went to the house where I first lived in 1978.  They told me the neighbors still lived there, and they still had caged rabbits in the backyard.   On their tour, they never made it to 105 Henry Street.  That was my discovery. 

I say goodbye to my sister, and right away my mother calls.  She tells me about her blood work – she had some genetic testing done.  She is out on a walk.  It’s 80 degrees in Ohio.  I hang up.  50 minutes have gone by, and I no longer want to wait for Thea.  If Thea is truly 90 years old, then I would hope she has the sense to stay indoors on a cold day.  I say goodbye to the young version my young great-grandfather, and step off his stoop, leaving Chinatown.

I walk along Orchard Street where things start to look like the Lower East Side.  I pass a man who spits French into his cell phone.  I pass two vintage clothing stores that double as bars.  I pass a zipper store.  I walk along Orchard and make a left on Houston.  At Bleeker, I get on the 6 train.  I wonder how far uptown Morris got.  Did he ever go to the Met?  I stop at my library to pick up some books on reserve, I walk home to snack on a banana, and I call a friend.  We talk.  I tell her about my trip to Henry Street.  I tell her about Morris, and how he worked at a hernia truss factory for men.  She explains the difference between a hernia and a hemorrhoid.  I had them confused all day.  I had been imagining my sweet little from-the-shtetl great-grandfather making Victorian style anal plugs made of leather and steel, when truly, he was making tight male underpants to bind male groin bulges.  He did this in a factory in New York, when just seconds before that, and in another country, he milked a goat while davening. 

I love my great-grandfather, Morris. 

My great-grandfather Morris came to Ellis Island in either 1906 or 1909.  He came from Gelvan, Lithuania.  As a teenager, he left his country, his synagogue, and his bed.  He left his father, his step-mother, and the Bubbe.  He left bare feet, skinny chickens, and half-built walls.  

From 1909 to 1925, Morris and his father wrote letters thick with God, the Torah, sisters, cousins, and counts of rubles and kopecks.  From 1909 to 1925, Morris became an American living in New York, a husband to an American girl from Brooklyn, a hernia truss factory worker, a furniture shop owner, and a father to my grandmother in 1922. 

Morris’s first daughter, my grandmother, born in Brooklyn in 1922.

Morris has 24 great-grandchildren.  My sister is his first; I am his second.  While Morris was building an American life, with his Yiddish accent and his earnest attempts to read Gone with the Wind, his family in Gelvan struggled to buy bread and meat.  They were murdered in 1925 by bandits who were looking for money after learning that a “rich” cousin from America had just visited.  Morris learned of his family’s murder and the three bandit’s death sentence from a newspaper clipping sent in the mail.  He never spoke of any of this.  My grandmother found sixteen years of letters when her father died.  The letters are part of our family’s blood.  We are a family that talks to strangers and wants to know about you, the people you love, and where you began.

A couple of weeks ago I went to Washington, DC with my sister and her family, and saw my sister become friends with our Afghani driver, a former engineer.  Ahmed spent the afternoon with us in the air and space museum pushing a stroller, explaining to us that the The Kite Runner was not real, showing us photos of his children, and holding my nephew, who incidentally, had the same number of teeth as Ahmed (4).  After we left Washington, DC, Ahmed and my sister exchanged texts and phone calls.  This is normal.  Last week, in a seven minute cab ride with friends we learned how our Ghanaian cab driver met his wife 17 years ago at a Madrasah. 

I appreciate Morris’s reinvention of himself.  He didn’t come to New York to become self-actualized, as opposed to me and my quest for the meaning of my life.  He came here for a better chance of survival, and to have a family.  I think Morris could relate to Ahmed and the Ghanaian.  It doesn’t matter what you do, it matters what is in your heart.  I don’t think Morris would be any more impressed to learn that his 24 great-grandchildren are well-educated lawyers, consultants, social workers, third graders, commercial bankers, and non-profit leaders, than if he were to learn that we were  denture manufacturers, telephone operators, or hemorrhoid cream chemists.  He would only care about the things his father impressed upon him:

Long life and peace to my dear son, loving as my soul, Moishe-Joisef, who should be well.  I pray that you do the will of our Eternal One who wrote in the holy Torah that you should be fruitful and multiply.  And about a livelihood, you shouldn’t worry.  Our dear Lord, who created you on this earth, prepared a livelihood for you before you were born.  If you, my dear sweet children, will observe God’s Torah, you will always have honor and income and success. Write to me, my dear son, if you have time, regularly, to study a page of Talmud every week and at least see to it, my dear son, to study daily a little of the code of Jewish Law, because the Holy Temple was destroyed, God has nothing left but four cubits of Religious Law and it is a commandment and a duty upon me to write to you, my loving children, that you should pay reverence to the law, to serve Him with all your heart.  And then you shall be successful.  I am also asking you, my loving son, to see to it that you fulfill the commandment of God that is written in the Torah; therefore a man should leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife, because it is no good for a man to be alone.  This is how King Solomon said: Find a woman – find goodness.  A lot of good luck, long life, and happiness I wish my wise son, Moishe-Joisef, who should always have the best of everything.

Long life to us all.  I believe that seeking a spiritual life and adhering to principles of honesty and kindness will continue to rain in love and livelihood.  I will now turn off this computer, sit on a pillow, and pray to cleave.  

Now, about you.  Who were your great-grandparents?  What are their names?  How did they make their livelihood?  Where did they came from?  What do you know about them?  What is your family’s immigration story?  Our ancestors stories and blood still flow inside us.  We see their trees grow.

Henry Street Tree across from Morris’s building

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Apr12

Bones

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I sit in a burgundy waiting room, defying my 30-somethingness, waiting for a purple scrubs lady to summon me for my bone density scan. I look at the women in their 60s, with their motionless hair and pantsuits. I want to think about the delicacy of my bones later.

When I am called to get the scan, I take off my metal belt holding up my jeans and I sit on a chair beside the x-ray machine. The technician asks me to put my left arm under the scanner, and to be still. I look at her wedding ring. I put my arm on the table, feeling my breath move my arm. My bones slowly appear on the computer screen. I lie on my back and she asks me to be still again. My leg twitches. She puts her hand on my left hip bone.

My bones are out from hiding. We are not designed to see our bones, and yet, that morning not only do I see my own bones, but I also hold the image of other people’s bones in my bag because someone mistakenly gave them to me. Inside a different burgundy waiting room on Park Avenue, I return the images and wonder about these people. Wrist. Tibia. Clavicle.

Later, I run along the Bridle Path around the Resevoir, where the familiar dodging of European tourists eases my mind. I think about seeing and being seen. It always feels different, depending on the onlooker.

My days are not all about tulips and running and doctors. I also read. By day, I read The Ten Faces of Innovation. (By night, I read The Discovery of Witches). Tom Kelley, the general manager of the design firm, IDEO wrote the daytime book. IDEO’s culture fosters openness, multi-disciplinary collaboration, and innovation. I get the sense that being part of IDEO would feel like being watched by someone who loves me as I am. My colleagues would look at my bones, see their intrinsic value, and encourage me to eat sardines.

In the book, Tom Kelley writes about ten roles that he has observed people playing at IDEO. Embodying these roles – such as the Anthropologist, who does field work to understand the natives, or the Director who galvanizes the players to create something powerful – stimulates new ideas, unearths possibilities, and fosters creative thinking.

I love that IDEO sees the many paths towards creating value for clients. I love reading about the culture at IDEO, not only because it brings me back to singing “ideo gloria in excelsis deo” down the halls of my all girls school every Christmas, but also because I feel inspired. As I read, I feel inspired to reach out to strangers.

I reach out to Tom Kelley. When he mentions going to Oberlin College on page 111, and then Jacobs Field on page 201, I get excited. I am from Cleveland, and I also went to Oberlin. Cleveland is not that strange, but Oberlin is a place where unexpected and quirky things happen. I had no expectation that Tom would respond to my note, but he did. He even sent me a copy of his book, which was quite open of him, considering I am a stranger. I like people and organizations open to the free flow of ideas.

Sending Tom the note takes me back to being a student at Oberlin. There, I felt freedom to learn about myself and the world as I encountered people and ideas that felt limitlessness. There, I contacted strangers I wrote papers about simply because I was curious. I emailed my first stranger while writing a paper on performance artists – Karen Finley, Annie Sprinkle, Carolee Schneeman, and Linda Montano. I contacted Annie Sprinkle because she was so bizarre, and yet, a nice Jewish girl like me. She responded to the questions in my email, and a few months later, she ended up cuddling with my best friend’s cat in my house on West College Street, performing to an overflowing college audience, and later, leading me to the craziest jobs I have ever had once I lived in San Francisco.

The next stranger I contacted in college was Sarah Schulman. It was still the 20th Century, and I dialed 411. She answered the phone, and we talked. She sounded stunned that I called her. She never did meet any of my friend’s pets, but she did inspire me. Her book, Stagestruck: Theater, AIDS, and the Marketing of Gay America, stunned me – she showed me how experiences that are widely loved and mainstream can be deceptively oppressive. Her politics felt exciting, and calling her – me, the 18 year old girl from Ohio talking to a New York City activist – made me feel like the world of deep thinking, angry politics, and sartorial coolness was as accessible as Sarah’s phone number.

So here I sit in New York City over fifteen years later, not quite the renegade bohemian of my 18 year old fantasies, but not too shabby, either, having learned to apply cats eyes while watching this morning’s Today Show. I sit and read The Ten Faces of Innovation. One of the ten faces is the Experience Architect, a person who creates sensory experiences for people who are interacting with products and services.

Monica Bonvicini's public toilet with one way glass sits across from London's Tate Britain.

Tom wrote about a public bathroom with a one way mirror. When you are inside the loo, you are having an intimate and private experience while seeing the world outside, and feeling like others are watching you. Imagine the performance anxiety. How does being watched transform us – the gaze of a lover, the gaze of a collaborator, the gaze of a boss, the gaze of a parent, the gaze of a stranger.

I want to dial 411 again. I want to talk to Monica Bonvicini, the artist who created the toilet with the one way mirror. I want to talk to Bjork and Isabella Rossellini. I realize this might be ridiculously improbable, but I’m willing to try. As I finish writing this, I get a call from my doctor. My bones are normal.

I think about Passover and opening the door for an imaginary Elijah to walk through and sip the wine at our table. I think about seeing and imagining. Elijah mystifies. I have been mystified into opening my door to strangers – not the kind who will give me candy with a razor blade in it – but the kind who will awe me. In Leviticus 19:34, it reads, “The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.”

Mar14

Love and Barneys

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I’m grateful for my unresponsive landlord, who has left me without light in my apartment for the past few days.  My bedroom lights blew out, my ceilings are high, and I am short.  I dress myself in the dark.  Caste out of my cave on the first spring-like day, I wander to the West Village to run some errands.  On my way to Chelsea Market from 13th Street and 7th Ave, I see Will Ferrell jog down 13th Street in a t-shirt.  In my head, I see myself running after him in my black trench coat and peep toe flats.  I play it cool.  I am amused because earlier that morning, I saw Will on the Today Show while sipping coffee in my pajamas.

At Chelsea Market, my brain comes alive as my salmon salad from Friedman’s Lunch swims inside my blood.  After lunch, I buy black cherry balsamic vinegar, and I walk up to the High Line to greet the sunshine.  When I overheat, I move to the shade and pull out my library book about nonviolent communications.  Two stylish women who look like they’re in their 50s sit at a table next to me.  They have shopping bags.  They chat. They sit quietly.  As Marshall Rosenberg leads me through how to listen to people empathically, the women kiss on the lips.  I watch as they stroll towards the stairs on 16th Street, holding hands. 

My iPhone battery is dying, so I cross the street to charge my phone at Starbucks.  The kissers walk into Starbucks a few minutes later.  I feel excited to see them again – just like Will Ferrell – twice in one day.  I want to talk to them.  I pack my bag and walk towards the door, stopping at their table.  I introduce myself.  I barely have to explain myself.  The chatty woman tells me that her name is Gail, and her girlfriend – let’s call her Gloria.  Gail moves her shopping bags from a seat and I join them at their little round table.  I tell them that I saw them on the High Line earlier, and ask what they were doing there.

Gail, on the left, lives in the neighborhood, and says it was a nice day to walk on the High Line. 

I ask if they’re a couple, and Gail tells me they’ve been a couple on and off for twenty years – more recently on for two years.  I ask how they met, and Gail tells me that twenty years ago Gail was promoting parties for women at different clubs.  One night in the middle of winter, she went to a friend’s party in Tribeca, which she mentions, was not the Tribeca of today.  There was a snow storm that night – a blizzard.  Gloria also came to that Tribeca party.  The following week, Gloria came to a party that Gail threw. 

I ask Gail what Gloria was wearing.  I think that is a quintessential question for people in love for so many years.  At the moment you recognize the person you will love, do you see the shade of her eyes or the shape of her dress?

Gail didn’t remember exactly what Gloria was wearing, but she did know what she was wearing: vintage black ski pants, a jacket with a lot of zippers, and a scarf.  They laugh.

Gail says, “I don’t know what she was wearing.  Gloria always had an amazing sense of style.  Her hair was red then. Maybe those were her Gigli days.”

Romeo Gigli is a designer.  I had to google that.  I ask Gail what they did together when they first started dating. 

“I was working as a hotel manager and I’d get off work at 3 o’clock and she would come by at 3 o’clock.  We would go to the old Barneys a lot.  Gloria was a favorite there.  Everyone knew Gloria at the old Barneys.  She was a stylist, a wardrobe stylist.  The old Barneys was the best.  Barneys and Charivari.  She had a country house and we’d go there.  We’d do what everyone does.  We went out to dinner.”

I ask them how old they were 20 years ago.  Gail is going to be 57, and Gloria is going to be 65.  That would make them 36 and 45 when they met.  Gail came out in San Francisco in 1974, when she was 19.  I asked Gail if she joined the Harvey Milk happenings.

“I was in high school from ‘71 to ‘73, and that’s when Roe v. Wade came around.  Abortion rights, gay rights, black civil rights.  I graduated in ‘73 and then moved to San Francisco.  At that time some of the gay boys who I met working in a coffeehouse were going to the Castro to protest Anita Bryant at Harvey Milk’s camera shop.  This is before he was in office.  Anita Bryant wanted to fire teachers for being gay.  My nephew is graduating high school and his principle is an out lesbian – that’s how much things have changed.”

Gail tells me that if I had approached Gloria and asked her for an interview, she would have said no.  Gail told me she would never say no, but Gloria would, because she’s so shy.

I ask them if they balance each other out, with Gail being more outgoing and Gloria being more reserved.  Gail laughs, and tells me that Gloria is not shy around her.  Gail says, “We’re best friends.  Twenty years later we’re best friends.  I love everything about her.  We broke up for a few years and I had another relationship.  I realized that I just missed how compatible we were.  So, I said let’s talk and work this out.  She was seeing somebody else for about a year, and I was seeing someone for about two and a half years.  I realized I wasn’t emotionally available because I still had feelings for Gloria. There was still something there.”

 I ask if they live together and have a country house together.

 “The country house is gone.  Gloria and I lived together for 10 years and now we don’t live together.  Eventually we’ll live together again, but it’s just not that big of an issue right now.  When we broke up Gloria bought an apartment, and then my apartment went co-op and I bought it.” 

I ask Gail what they love to do in the city.

“Walk on the High Line.  Walk around. We go to the movies all the time.  We walk around the neighborhood.  Bed Bath & Beyond is fun with Gloria.  Everything is great with her.  Whatever it is, it’s always good.”

I ask what they are doing tonight.

“We’re going out with a couple that Gloria fixed up – her second successful fix up in the past couple of years.  She’s very good at it.  The first one is lasting four years and counting, and this one looks like it might have legs.  They’ve been going out for a few months.  It’s very funny how they ended up together.  They went on a few dates fifteen years ago, and then they got distracted by other people. Fifteen years later, they both became available, and now they’re on fire.”

My bracelet falls off, and Gail catches it.  “Is this something that fell off you?” she asks.

Yes, my bracelet – I made it.

“Oh my god.  It’s your bracelet, it’s great.  But you almost lost it.  That’s not great.”

I tell her it’s ok – it’s just brass.  I ask her if she likes my S hook.

“It’s really good.  Totally,” Gail says.

Gloria tells me she loves my blouse.  I love my blouse, too. 

Gloria and I chat while Gail gets up from the table.  She is easy to talk to.  She tells me she likes the idea of my writing project, and says that in New York, there is a sense of isolation even though we’re all over each.  We’re on the train and nobody’s looking at each other.  There are millions of stories in New York.  We’re all just trying to navigate life.

This talking to strangers thing is my attempt to unearth some of the stories that live quietly inside this city.  I also want to live inside Mister Roger’s neighborhood, and I imagine myself waving to Gail and Gloria while walking down Greenwich Ave. on my way to Village Natural with my friends, who also smile and wave at Gail and Gloria.

Gail returns to the table.  They are getting ready to leave.  I tell them they’re both gorgeous, and I thank them.  They walk out the door and I follow behind after I throw out some napkins and my coffee cup.  I see them walking down 15th Street ahead of me, holding hands again.  I’m glad they put on their ski pants in that blizzard. 

 At some point, I lose them, then I nearly collide into Susan Sarandon as she walks out a big black door.  I hear her admiring a woman’s puppy.  I love Susan Sarandon, not only because she created Spin in Gramercy for Yoshi, but also because she gave a kickass Oscar speech in 1993 that affected me and my 7th grade relationships.

We are all navigating life, famous or not famous.  We jog.  We sit in the sunshine.  We love puppies.  We fall in love.  We wear dresses and scarves and bracelets.  We tell our stories.

Mar2

Cops In My Apartment

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In the morning I get a call from my landlord. He asks if I have seen my neighbor lately. My neighbor? As much as I would love to live in a building in which the neighbors drink tea together on the fire escape, use each other’s q-tips, and ruminate about our lovers, I do not live in such a building. The first time I actually spoke to any neighbor in the three years since I’ve been in this building was on the day before Hurricane Irene blew through. I wanted my neighbor, the 20ish year old nasal aspiring Broadway singer with a doormat that has words such as – “Merci,”, “No Regrets,” “OMG,” and a neon pink peace symbol – to know me in case I got scared. I might have needed her to comfort me and feed me canned tuna packed in olive oil.

An ex in college could recite the Robert Frost poem, “The Mending Wall”. The poem has a line, “Good fences make good neighbors.” That line makes cry. I think that good neighbors make good neighbors. I come from a family where it’s normal to show up in each other’s driveways on the way to pick up a jar of pickles or a little cousin. We sat on each other’s porches, gave impromptu foot rubs, and fed each other prunes and Muenster cheese. We examined our days together.

When the police knocked on my door in the afternoon, like a good citizen, I answered. I learned that my neighbor’s mother was concerned about my neighbor, and had called 911. I had a gargantuan pot of soup on the stove with another hour and a half left to simmer, and books spread all over my apartment. I was getting ready for a meeting. From my hallway, the cops ask me questions. Have I seen my neighbor lately? [I have not.] Have I seen anything unusual? [No.] Have I heard anything unusual? [No.] Could they come inside my apartment to break into my neighbor’s window from my fire escape? [Um, yeah.]

Two tall cops – a man and a woman – step inside my studio. They wear powerful looking raincoats. I’ll call the man Raul, and I’ll call the lady Jackie. I like cops.

I feel like hosting them. I wished my soup were ready. I wonder if they can smell the thyme. I tell them if I had known they were coming, I would have cleaned.

I have no fences. They see me in my pink pajamas. They step over my piles of library books. They see the knocked down vitamins beside my bed and my chair covered with jeans and unopened mail. Jackie peeks at sheets of music on my table – she reads Pat Benatar lyrics. “We Belong”.

Jackie opens my window. I tell her it’s broken. When you open it, it doesn’t stay inside the window frame, and it also doesn’t stay open. I’ve been aware that it’s been broken for the past three years, but every time I tell my now deceased landlord or the repair man that I need it fixed, they tell me that they will come tomorrow, and they never come.

Jackie puts her big stick in my window to prop it up. She climbs out the window and gets on the fire escape. While she is trying to open my neighbor’s window, Raul agrees that it’s hot in my apartment. Jackie climbs back into my apartment through the window and asks for a screwdriver, which I am fresh out of. She asks for a butter knife.

I don’t know why these cops mesmerize me. I’m a liberal. But they do. Jackie works on the window with the butter knife, facing danger. Raul turns off my heat by rotating my burning valve counterclockwise, saving my dehydrated skin.

While Jackie is on the fire escape, Raul calls my new landlord, who is from Manchester, England, to see if he has a spare key to my neighbor’s apartment. I think this phone call is called “back up” – in case Jackie can’t get the window open. I’m starting to think like a cop. My landlord is new because my old landlord died two weeks ago. She was a very sweet woman. Raul, not knowing that he is speaking with the new landlord, scolds him about my broken window. While Raul is on the phone, Jackie, back from my neighbor’s apartment, crouches in my window frame, noting that the broken window is a code violation. She would like that point to be noted on the telephone. She jumps back into my apartment, knocks my cream colored Thai silk curtains off the rod, and I waive it off like it’s no big deal.

Raul tells me that until my window is fixed, I should forget where my pen is when it’s time to write the rent check. That feels thrilling. I think Raul scared my new landlord. I think my window will be fixed soon.

I’m not accustomed to having big men fix my heat. I’m not accustomed to stirring my soup while having casual conversations with hot lady cops hanging out my third floor window. I don’t have a whole lot of risk in my life. Nobody has ever stalked me. Nobody has ever stolen my gold. I stand behind the yellow line on the subway platform. I talk to my mother regularly.

When Raul and Jackie leave, they thank me, and I am sad they are leaving. We had fun. I am glad they did not find anything bad in my neighbor’s apartment. Good fences do not make good neighbors. I hope my neighbor and her mother can find peace. I thank Raul and Jackie for their help with my window and the heat. I tell them if my window doesn’t get fixed, I’ll call 911. They smile. “Call us,” Jackie says.

Feb23

A Funny Sikh in Astoria

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Walking from the Q train, then along Ditmas Avenue, I notice that I am not on the Upper East Side.  I pass a window display of Jesus and his disciples, which is above a garage where you can get a perm and a dozen red carnations.  A locked parked locked car has an ersatz pug on the dashboard.  I nearly call animal control.

I make it to the Waltz Astoria.  I sit.  The brick walls, rickety chairs, bizarre people, and microphone feel reminiscent of college, where weird people mingled as easily as the vats of improperly seasoned vegetables and tempeh that we ate.  Dreadlocked white boys gave dreadlocked white girls massages under windows.  Skinny New York appendages rested on skateboards while reading Marx.  Clusters of gay girls in black hoodies and nose rings drummed their clipped fingernails on smudged notebooks.  The air smelled of Egyptian musk, turpentine, and roasted tomatoes. 

New York is stranger and more fantastic than my weird college.  I like it that way.  When I shop at the market, I don’t look for bunches of asparagus neatly and uniformly tied together.  I look for ugly no spray apples.  When I’m out in the world, I look for ugly apple people – raw, untreated, unkempt, unmanicured, wild, unexpected, misshapen, and delicious to the core.

That is why I like Narinder when I first heard him.  He is an ugly apple.

At 7:26 p.m., I am four minutes early to meet my friend, who will be doing stand up.  There are just three of us in the room – a curly haired woman with a plunging neckline, Narinder, and me.  I ask Narinder what he is here to do.

“I’m gonna try some comedy.  And if that doesn’t work…it’s gonna be a poetry reading.”

I laugh.  I move to his table.  I start talking to him.  I ask him if I could interview him for my blog.  He asks if there was a big following.  I tell him no.  He wants to talk anyways.

His name is Narinder, and he has been doing stand up for four years.  I feel excited to talk to him, and at ease because I could see how his name was spelled in my head, having met another Narinder on a beach in Hawaii four years ago.  I asked Long Island Narinder what he likes to be funny about.

“The first thing I talked about was my high school.  And then I started talking about observational stuff, family stuff, relationships.  I think the ultimate goal of the comedian is to transcend your identity.  It’s an interesting experience.”

Considering his identity seems so obvious, that sounds pretty interesting, indeed.  I ask him why he started doing comedy, and he laughed.

“Right after 9/11 I started. I had some good material.  They say comedy is you in a struggle.”

I asked him how it feels to look like the enemy.

“It makes good comic material.  I was the emcee for an open mic.  I humanized the Sikh, because I showed that I had a sense of humor.  I only did it once or twice a year after that.  Then I was running a hedge fund.  Me and my friends started the hedge fund.  When the recession hit, it almost wiped me out.  It was the universe telling me to do stand up.”

I think of two things.  First, I am glad to have met my second person who has run a hedge fund, and I am grateful that this second person is not a white man in his 60s driving me in his Porsche SUV to a train station somewhere in the Hamptons after writing something about business on the MSNBC website while simultaneously admiring his sister’s painting in a Chelsea gallery.  It’s refreshing.  The second thing I think about is that it’s nice to feel a kinship with Narinder.  We both believe the universe talks.   

My friend, the comedian walks in. I show her my purple otter Iphone case.  We chat.  I ask Narinder what he wants to do with stand up.

“Make money.”

Are you making money?

“No, I’m loosing money.  Tonight I’m gonna lose 11 dollars.”

I lost 12 dollars, but on the up side, I had fun and I went home with 3 bottles of Perrier. 

I am glad that Narinder did not do clean corporate comedy to make more money.  I learned about corporate comedy last night.  It’s when you go to things like stockholder meetings and don’t say anything provocative, offensive, sexually charged, or profane.

The idea of censoring myself for corporate comedy aggrevates my dry skin.  I want to cure myself by listening to Prince, then Bjork while taking a hot shower and then putting on a pair of Ugg slippers with sheep fluff.  I like Narinder with his turban and hairy face.  To a lesser degree, I like flaming gay guys.  I also like foreigners and blind people.  They cannot hide their identities or their vulnerabilities.  Being around them, I feel free, like I don’t need to hide anything, either.  That’s why I love New York City still, even though you can’t see the stars.

Narinder Singh kills it on stage.  He is ridiculous.  He is the funniest guy there. 

Here’s a youtube link of Narinder that I found on the internet.  It’s not his performance from yesterday, but I still like it.  If you google him you’ll find more.  Check it out:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmAMjuPplAE

Feb1

23rd Street

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I stepped into Chelsea Guitars this afternoon to ask about a guitar strap. I had no intention of walking in, as I had just eaten tuna mixed with capers and kale, and was on my way to Chelsea Cinema to see the 2:15 p.m. showing of The Artist.

Earlier this week a friend asked if I wanted to go to an open mic in Astoria, which I interpreted as, “Do you want to have heart palpitations for nine days, and then on the tenth day, play at an open mic in Astoria while I watch stolidly?” I have been ruminating about guitar straps and amplification since.

Inside Chelsea Guitars, there were two guitar guys, both adorable. I told Guy #1 that I have never played live music for other people, and that I needed a guitar strap and a way to plug into an amp. He walked me to a guitar hanging on the wall and showed me the knobs on the butt and the neck of the guitar, where you attach the ends of the strap. Not all guitars have two knobs, and if mine did not have the neck knob, he told me I would need to buy a new guitar. Then he laughed, and told me that they could add a knob if I needed it. It is nice to have luthier options.

Guy #1 walked me to a wall of guitar straps, showing me a range of prices, thickness, and designs. He highlighted the chain metal strap, which would be nice counterpoint to my Joan-Baez-cover-vibe. He showed me where the straps would hang on me, and in the process, pulled my hair. I said, “You pulled my hair.” He laughed and told me that some people pay money to get their hair pulled, and I just got it for free. Being from Ohio, I was not sure if this was sexual innuendo or friendly guitar salesmanship. I told them that I had a blog about talking to strangers and asked them if I could interview them. Guy #2 behind the counter told me that none of us are strangers, which I agree with, philosophically. He suggested that I come back after 5 p.m. to talk to Dan.

I left Chelsea Guitars with some unanswered questions. I saw The Artist.

I walked out of the movie theater onto 23rd Street at 8th Avenue feeling charmed. I asked a couple if they would talk to me. The man, who wore a safety pin on his sweater, told me he did not want to talk to me.

I walked east on 23rd Street, now only slightly open to talking to strangers, as I had become slightly disillusioned and intent on going home to eat a banana. I listened to two girls behind me marvel at the sunlight.

I passed Home Depot, where I had been 5 months earlier to buy Klein canvas tool bags and eye the hand saws and levels. I thought of a woman in my jewelry class who married a man she met on Jdate.

I passed a corner where I used to walk when I was taking classes at Singers Forum five years ago, when New York was still new to me and I had just started grad school.

I walked past Spin! If, dear reader, you have read all of my blog postings, then you would know that Yoshi, the first stranger I officially wrote about, used to play ping pong at Spin. At that moment, Yoshi’s living spirit was with me, telling me to keep going, and to be open to serendipitous surprises in all forms. I took this picture.

I thought of a summer afternoon I spent on The High Line, watching the sky, watching people, not quite reading Rilke, and spotting the woman who used to be my FedEx lady in San Francisco seven years ago step inside an elevator and disappear from me again. In that five seconds of recognition, I was happy to know that her life, like mine, had changed. People and experiences disappear and reappear, like silent movies, hand saws, grad school, and music.

Jan26

Tantric Love

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This morning every time I was upside down or arching back, I saw a pair of golden legs that I had never seen before. They were golden smooth muscular legs that soothed my gaze and entreated me to hug them tight to me. As I moved into down dog, then bridge, then plow, I hoped to see his golden face, but I could only see his legs in shoulder stand, shavasana, then…gone.

Is he still a stranger to me, considering we had no recognition or acknowledgement of each other? I have been practicing Mysore for over a year, breathing and looking at many of the same people over time. We create the sounds of the ocean in a room that heats up with our collective warmth. That feels intimate to me.

Yesterday my yoga teacher spoke about tantra – not in the way people generally associate it with – not tantric sex. The way he described it, it was about being present with the energy and support of other people. Being together.

I have a lot to learn about this. I found myself moving away from people this week. On Tuesday, a stranger asked me to get a hamburger with him at Shake Shack on 86th Street. His name was Peter. He was a photographer. He wore a hat. We started talking on the Barnes and Noble escalator after attending a mildly contentious book discussion on “The Profitable Artist”, by the New York Foundation for the Arts. There were some angry artists in the room. Pete and I were not angry; it’s not our style. He told me about his work. I told him about my creative projects, but I did not want to get into the details. I declined the hamburger. I have never eaten a hamburger; they don’t intrigue me. Also, I did not have the energy to talk to him. Furthermore, buns are unmentionables to me – that morning I had been diagnosed with Celiac.

That brings me to another stranger – my gastroenterologist. He was referred to me by my sister, who was diagnosed with Celiac a month before I was diagnosed. He is my age. He has a pleasant, low key, demeanor. I don’t know if he’s Jewish – but he looks like a guy I could have gone to Hebrew School with – good guy, nice, diligent, smart, familiar. A few days after my endoscopy (anesthesia, tube down throat, biopsy of intestines) my sister asked if I felt comfortable with him. While I would prefer to sing the Shehecheyanu with him rather having him put a tube down my throat, in the grand scope of things, I did feel comfortable with him. Like golden legs, and like Pete, he had a low key, mellow, easy going demeanor and I felt like he was someone who pays attention and does not rush. On the other hand, I am not so comfortable with him that I would want him to biopsy me from the other end.

Three strangers: a pair of legs, a hamburger-eating photographer, and a gastroenterologist who I imagine to be Jewish. What are these three people teaching me about connecting to others – and to myself? I don’t want to project too far into the future, but I’m fairly certain I will never feel comfortable wrapping my arms tightly around someone’s legs without having seen their face. I’d also like to rule out cuddle parties. If I’m not willing to cuddle with strangers, how comfortable am I to hug a friend’s legs? When am I comfortable and energized enough to tell a stranger about myself, and to listen to them? Sometimes I don’t feel like it, and that’s ok. But will I ever be open and willing to have an impromptu meal with a stranger on 86th Street between 3rd and Lex? Will I ever allow a mellow doctor who I fantasize about going to Hebrew School with give me a colonoscopy?

I am aware that the answers to these hypothetical thinking questions do not actually matter. What matters is being loving and squeezable with people I already love today.

Dec30

Good Orderly Direction

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She wore a furry hat with ear flaps and stood still as her snack sized dogs sniffed 19th Street. I approached her.  I said – “I’m a writer, and I’m writing a blog about strangers – do you have time to talk?” 

It was 3:01pm on a Thursday afternoon.  She asked if I was a student. (No) She told me she was a writer – she had been a writer.  She was a journalist at People for 15 years, then Us Weekly, and before that she was a sportswriter. 

She left.  She got a dog.  She became a dog walker.  I like her instantly.  

She explained to me that when she started in her career, all she did was interview people, but as you go further up the ladder, other people do the interviews and you edit and write from their interviews. 

I wondered what an interviewer gets curious about.  I told her ”I was just walking around the East Village, and I thought – maybe I’ll run into Patti Smith.  What would I ask her?  The only thing that came to mind was – What kind of toothpaste does Patti Smith use?”

She said, “I often think, if I were to run into Lenny Kravitz or Keith Richards, what  would I say.  If Lenny Kravitz has to go to the 7-Eleven to buy some milk, does he have to put that whole getup on, because people expect him to look a certain way?  Or can he just go? Or does he have to get the boots, the earring, the beret?” 

I get it.  I think of a line from a Roethke poem – “Which I is I”?  Who are we when we are not creating ourselves for someone else?  Toothpaste is an equalizer. 

She says, “I don’t think I ever ran out of questions in interviews, although I would think about it before the interview.  I would spend 30-40 minutes before I talked to someone and think about it.  I’d ask about religion or their families.”

I ask her if she has a spiritual practice.

“I do.  I’m not sure about the God question, but for me, God stands for Good Orderly Direction.”

Kim is in AA.  ”My new thing is I really need to get down on my knees.   I just don’t do it.  I think it’s self will, but I find that so contrary to me.  Over this holiday, I thought, I should at least, even for a second, get down on my knees, just to acknowledge there’s something bigger than me.   The program for me – that’s an hour of checking in with myself and listening to other’s people’s voices instead of the ones in my head.”

I ask Kim how long she’s been in AA.

“I’ve been in AA off and on for 20 years, but actively for ten.  Maybe two and a half.  I’ve been at it for a while, and I don’t doubt that’s my place to be.  I was doing so well in my career, and it was easy for me to flip back into denial.  Then I would be fine until I wasn’t fine.”

I asked Kim if she has a sponsor.

“I’ve had like 5 sponsors, but the one I’m with now I got two and a half years ago.  I haven’t had a drink in ten or eleven years, but pills are hard for me.  I got this sponsor two and a half years ago – I’ve known her for ten years.  This time, I got a step person.   We work the steps.  I don’t need a best friend.  She does make me call her every day, which I kind of hate.  I don’t know if I’ll get to a meeting today.  I don’t know why I deprive myself because it really helps me.  I never not have a good time.”

She asks, “Do you want to walk to Petco with us?”  

I want to walk to Petco. 

I ask, “Before you found AA, what was your life like?”

It was successful and crazy busy.  I used booze in my 20s and 30s at night.  I used booze and sex to calm down at night.  If I didn’t drink I don’t think I would have made it through my 20s.  I was travelling, high flying, celebrityish.”

“I think I’m going to start another program.  I’ve lost 58 pounds but I’m not in the food program yet. I gave up sugar.  Over the holidays, I could not resist Christmas cookies.  I had a couple of slips in a row.  I had two boxes.  I ate a box both times.  I was at my mother’s house.  I don’t even try to control it because I know I’d eat it compulsively.  I talked to my sponsor about it.”

We are standing outside of Petco and a talk brunette with red lips stands by us as her dog checks out Kim C’s dogs.  We’re wrapping up the conversation, and I want her professional opinion of my interviewing skills, so I ask, “How was this interview?”

“I think you did fine.  The hardest part about interviewing is you have to sublimate yourself and not leap in.  But at the same time, you have to identify with the person, which you did.  You have an easy style.”

I told her I love to write.

“Keep doing it.”

I give her the address of my blog.

“The anonymity part, if you want to use everything in the interview, it’s fine. Just call me Kim C.  My whole life is an open book.”

She looks at the tall brunette with red lips and tells me, “This looks like someone you might want to interview.” She tells red lips, “She just interviewed me for her blog.  She’s a good interviewer.  She’s really nice. I’m going into Petco.  I’ll see you later, Jessica.”

I didn’t need to talk to red lips.  I got what I was looking for, and I believe it came from a power greater than me.  Today New York City rocked me like a porch swing.  Everywhere I went, I felt connected and alive.  I was humbled at my appointment on Varick Street. I felt human, and connected to the world.  I grazed Canal Street and some slow walking tourists.  I meandered through Soho and found purple knee high socks at Pearl River Mart.  At the Whole Foods on Houston I ate tomato soup, kale, and tofu, and sat near interesting looking mustaches and foreigners.  I played my future guitar and hummed along at Ludlow Guitars.  I walked down 1st Avenue and then made a left on 19th Street on my way to return a dress my sister gave me, and a woman ran after me imploring me to be careful, that my bag of purple socks fell on the sidewalk.  I ran into Kim C.  We connected.  After that, I watched the latest Twilight movie and had dinner with a friend.  Good Orderly Direction is all around us.  It is my job to notice it and be present to it.

Kim C. has a great idea for a book.