much moved....

by reports on WNYC's The Takeaway about the brutally inhuman treatment given the children who have crossed the border and are being detained. What is one to do? Very sad. One can only hope that the courts or maybe even Congress will try to stop this horrible behavior. Not much else to say.
 Yesterday: a slow day---did not leave Manhattan (odd) did not even take the subway. For much of hte day I was fatigued. Finally, by around 7:30, some life seemed to come back to me, and I left the apartment. But where to go? At one point, thought that I might go to the bar-coffee place that is attached to the Quad cinema, but instead, opted for the coffee place on 2nd avenue between 81st and 82nd street. It is open until midnight (one of the few New York coffee places that does not turn into a bar that stays open)  which meant getting there around 9 would not make me feel isolated. And so that is what I did---taking the 79th street crosstown to 3rd avenue and walking the rest of the way. Always interesting to visit the upper east side, a world that once was so important to me (I dated a lot of women who lived in the area back in the seventies) but also just to chart the differences between the two sides. Of course, the upper east side is strangled by high rises, but strangely enough, the old tenements seem to stick out, demanding that their history be understood.
  Coffee place was open and lively---had my coffee and read the novel that I had just taken out of the library (a little pulpy) and enjoyed not being rushed. So much energy had returned to me that instead of simply going back to 79th and jumping on the bus, I walked north to 96th street---past the bars and restaurants and small apartment houses and pizza places (many) that line the street. Lots of people out, moving around. At 96th and third, walked a block north (remember when one would not dare to go any further than 96th) to look at the new high rises on the west side of the street. Of course, a NYCHA project sits on the other side. So what? It makes no difference how close a new luxury apartment is built to a NYCHA project, if you build it, "they" will come. The 96th street crosstown came pretty quickly, and soon I found myself on Broadway and 94th--it took about 20 minutes for a 104 to come, but I was in no hurry to get back (I now had new found strength)  and just watched while I waited patiently for the bus. That is all.
   Today, there is supposed to be a big anti gentrification meeting in Bushwick that begins at 6:30, and that is where I am planning to be. Should take up the whole evening---with the L running slowly, if at all, should be interesting to see what strategy I use to return to the city. DeKalb bus to the J, or just to downtown Brooklyn. We will see.