Friday morning....

feeling a little rushed---not sure about today's schedule. My friend Sibyl's performance celebrating the fall equinox at the Whitney is happening and I would like to go, but I need to be sure of a session that might happen later today in upper Harlem. Can I get them both in? Possibly, but the Whitney may be my next stop.
  So yesterday, after leaving the library, I headed to Brooklyn---there was a Save Our Streets vigil on Saint Marks avenue and Utica---a young man had been killed on that block a few days before. I have attended a few vigils for Save Our Streets, an organization dedicated to stopping violence in Crown Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant, by having former convicts from the neighborhood, now reformed, talking to the younger members of the community and trying to talk down any "beefs" that might spiral into violence. At these vigils, I am always a little bit on the outside, but I felt it was important to attend this one, since I had the time. From the A stop at Utica, a very interesting walk south on Rochester Avenue, mostly private houses but then projects on the east side of the block and what seems like a new building across the street. Very little signs of gentrification, though I am sure that it is happening there. The block that the vigil took place on is a quiet one---I arrived as one of the speakers was calling out for an end to violence. Several other speakers cried out on the same point---they also urged people living on the block who were home to come out and stand with them. Several residents sat on their stoops but did not join. One minister who was there, thanked me for coming, and during his speech said that he appreciated someone coming all the way from Manhattan to stand with them. I felt good for this, but I have to remember that these vigils are not there for my self esteem, but to make an important point about a world that has nothing to do with me. I liked being on that block, and appreciated that the gentleman who spoke had taken  time to talk with me briefly. I will try to go to more vigils, if my time allows it.
  As I left and walked south again on Rochester Avenue, towards Eastern Parkway, I felt helpless and sad, unable to really do anything to stop what was going on. That is how I continued, and of course, as I approached the parkway, and passed more and more apartment houses, I thought that yes, this is where I could have been raised sometime in the fifties, these houses and neighborhoods were similar to the one that I was raised in in the Bronx.
   Another vigil was scheduled for 6, at Franklin Avenue and Lincoln Road. I had planned to go to that one, but the time I hit the library at Grand Army Plaza I was too tired to attend it. This would have been interesting--the juxtaposition of the black church leaders with the more gentrified residents who now live on or near Franklin. So after stopping on the Parkway, I jumped into the subway at Utica and took it to Franklin, then headed to the museum for coffee and then to the library. Instead of going to the second vigil, I took a Flatbush bus back to Fulton and Bric Arts to use the bathroom and settle myself. The early evening had become cool---I walked to BAM, and sat outside on one of the stoops---felt a nice sense of calm as I watched people pass. Too tired to hang out, yet I definitely did not want to return to the Upper West Side just yet. So I remained at and around BAM, watching the people pass, wondering who they were and what was their destination, and simply enjoying the energy that was around me. Finally it was time to return home.
  Tomorrow I am off to Long Wharf where my friend Ben is playing in Small Mouth Sounds. Should be interesting---when I leave the library today, will probably head to the Whitney, getting an early read on Sibyl's project. God, how I miss those late night or early morning vigils that she creates. Will this one be a little more earth bound? Will report soon.