Saturday mornng....

No heat when I woke up---but luckily this was fixed soon. Yesterday evening---went to the public to see The Michaels by Richard Nelson. His best play yet---tremendous easy flow between the cast, dominated by a great performance by Brenda Whele as an older dancer-choreographer dying of cancer. Her performance was brutally honest---the rest of the cast congealed around her, and Nelson
's dialogue was incredibly truthful. The play went on a little too long, with one monologue for the choreographer's partner that seemed unnecessary to me, but for the most part, I was terribly moved. First time being at the Public in a long time---I got these tickets through TDF, which at this point is the only way I can afford to go there.  One other caveat---although the choreographer is a woman her choreography when performed in the play by her daughter and her niece was by a male---Dan Wagoner. The choreography seemed super masculine and I was put off by it---I wonder why the choice was made to use that choreography. The young actress playing the young dancer was amazing, but what I watched turned me off. Nevertheless a beautiful evening in the theater---tonight I am going to see The Underlying Chris by Will Eno at Second Stage---I wonder if I will feel the same way.
  Afterwards stopped off at Burp Castle to visit with my friend bartender Erin---had not seen her since Labor Day weekend---we had a nice conversation---she is a little fed up with Bushwick where she has been living for about ten years. Also talked about movies and movie theaters---it was good to touch base with her. The Burp Castle, part of two bars---the other is the sports bar Standings---very different---was extremely mellow last night---a really soft energy---a great place for a quiet conversation about anything.
 Got an e mail from the colorectal Cancer Alliance this morning. Made me feel perhaps I should consider re scheduling the colonoscopy I have put off for a while. Need a lot of support. Will I do it?
Will report soon.

Friday morning....

after an enormous meal at my cousin's. And a very good time as well. Conversation flowed easily and everyone seemed to be very sharp. Nice image, right before I left of the three sisters on the couch. Now, all in their sixties, they have been together for a long time. Kara, the oldest, has just bought a coop nearby (kind of expensive, but hey, that is the neighborhood), Annie lives in Massachusets and has taught karate successfully for many years, and Kayla, at whose house the party was works for one of the city advocacy programs. The first Thanksgiving I was invited to there was I think in 91, pre-Stan (her husband) and the children. The girls, believe it or not, are now 25 and 22---amazing that I have seen them at these parties all their lives. I used to play hide and seek with them when they were pre-5, now, of course the conversation in a little heavier. As usual, I ate a lot, but the stomach seems to be handling it decently. A good time.
    Wednesday, did visit my bartender friend Eric at the bar where he works called the Four Faced Liar. It is a small bar on the north side of west 4th as it approaches 6th avenue. He seemed happy to see me---we discussed plays, movies, etc...the bar itself is a very laid back place with young people but also many middle aged guys. Nice quiet, unforced energy---a good place to go to to watch a game, if I needed a beer. I will try it again at some point. After I left I decided to head to La Flaca, and there hung out with its owner Bob, a very good friend and was greeted nicely bar bartender Benjy. I had not been there for a while---sometimes I forget what a really warm and friendly place it is for me. In addition to eating, I can watch TV as long as I want. Bob and his girl friend Kelly were having  small Thanksgiving party at the restaurant and I was invited. Very touched by that, but ultimately with the cold dominating the day, I could not make it. But I will be back soon..
  Yesterday morning with a lot of time to kill before the party, I decided to see a movie. Some internal debate about which one---I ended up seeing Dark Waters, an extremely passionate indictment of Dupont and their brutal poisoning of the water in Parkersburg West Virginia. Mark Ruffalo, who also produced, plays an obsessive, crusading lawyer who, over the course of almost 2 decades, manages to bring justice for those destroyed by the pollution. Beautifully shot and directed by Todd Haynes, it also has an amazing performance by Bill Camp as the aggrieved farmer who starts things off. I was taken with it all the way, and it only cost $8.10, because it was an early show. Kind of makes me want to see more movies in the near future but already seeing two plays this weekend---need a little breathing room, and there are more plays that I need to see in the next couple of weeks. Yes, NYC is truly a wonderland of art and culure--total overload! Lots of choices---even as I try to keep my budgeting in control.
 Tonight the Richard Nelson play at the public. Several actors in it, whom I have known a bit over the years. Looking forward to it.

now it is Wednesday...

feeling up, since I just finished a phone conversation in which I described my experience with NYC Well in late April. There I was at 4 in the morning---the whole world telling me to take my scheduled colonoscopy. Except i could not. With no one to talk to at that time, I dialed 311, and amazingly enough the connected me with a real live and very sensitive therapist, and we talked for about 45 minutes. It was just what I needed. I got some feeling out and passed the time. Of course, I did not take the colonoscopy---but this made me feel a lot better. The conversation with an organization hired by the city to evaluate the program was brief and fun.
  Thanksgiving day tomorrow---I have my regular dinner with cousins Kayla and Stan and their two children and assorted relatives tomorrow.This has been going on with only one exception for about 28 years. Sometimes I get a little "antsy" if I feel not enough is happening---other times there is some good conversation. Still, I am very glad that they have it. In the morning, perhaps I will see a movie---I better see The Irishman soon, or I probably won't see it at all.
  Tonight--might go down to a bar in the village where a favorite bartender of mine is supposed to be taking care of happy hour---then improvise from there. Yesterday, after two sessions was just too tired to do anything, so i went home. Will report, probably on Friday.

Tuesday morning....

off again today--no work until next week. Yesterday's blog was interrupted by time running out on the computer. I wanted to say that in the beginning of the session I went to my high school year book. All the pictures of my classmates (only one of whom I feel close to now) had their addresses. Of course, at least half of those addresses were in the Bronx in what we now call the Concourse area---an area that was mostly Jewish until about 67 when it changed radically into a mostly black and Hispanic area. Why? Like the Park Heights section of Baltimore, which, in the years I was at Hopkins, seemed to be completely Jewish, the children of that time were groomed to do better---were strong academically and so on leaving college had so many more opportunities then their parents. But when I read the addresses the picture of the "old days" comes quickly into my mind. What do you do with a memory like that? What were the last moments of the Jewish environment like in those neighborhoods. Sometimes I fantasize an older man, living in one of those apartments, listening to a string quartet by Beethoven or Schubert. When was the last time that quartet was played in that apartment?  How was the change effected? Why, when there are reunions of people who lived in that area (there is one coming up this summer)  do people never talk about what those streets are like today?
   All of this was on my mind, and I wanted to include it in the blog yesterday, but could not. Plenty of time to write today, so there it is.
  Theater plans for the weekend include The Underlying Chris at Second Stage, a play by Will Eno, and the Michaels, a play that I really wanted to see at the Public on Friday. Tomorrow is still opened. I promised myself a "theater orgy" this week---we will see if it comes to pass. Tomorrow night there is also a good basketball game between the Nets and the Celtics on tv; might be a good idea just to "hang out" and watch the game. Well, choices, choices.
 Yesterday evening was free, and I had several ideas of where to be. Made the decision by instinct to hang out at the bar at Gotham Market. A bartender with whom I had become friendly with was leaving for another job, and I wanted to see her before she left. I had not seen her since early October. It turned out to be a good choice; this was her next to last day, and she was happy to see me. We had a nice conversation, while I watched the Ravens decimate (that is not an exaggeration) the Rams. Left early and returned to the apartment, kind of tired, probably from the marathon walk between 79th street and 110th street I had taken that morning.
  So here we are---not sure what I will do this evening---will report soon.

first free day...

in a week. Time moves so differently when I am out of Friends, then when I am there. Still, have accomplished a lot so far. A book for one of the students that I help was only available at a library on 110th between Lexington and Third Avenue---so I took the cross town bus to Madison and 79street, and then walked the rest of the way. Quite a walk. And yet Madison between 79th and 96th is not an area that I frequently go to, so observing what is there was important. In spite of all the building, there are still several small (three to five story) apartment houses on those blocks. They seem like odd ornaments, almost endangered species, if you compare them to the massive building going around the city. Emblems from a different time---if you were young and bohemian in the fifties or early sixties, you could have gotten an apartment there for a very cheap rate. Well, that was Manhattan then---continued the walk betweeen 96th and 110th---very different, almost all NYCHA projects on the east side of the streets on those blocks, while the other side belongs to Mount Sinai hospital.. Finally arrived at the library, found the book and one other, a book of essays by Emily Bernard, a black woman who teaches at the University of Vermont. That should keep me busy for a while. For my return, I took the 6 train which travels south on Lexington Avenue and got off on 86th street to find a gaggle of coffee places, restaurants, donut shops---almost within one full block radius. Do we really need so much? Around the library there is not much--though that neighborhood---once considered a poverty area has seen a decent amount of luxury (or at least) semi-luxury housing---there is even one right across the street from the library. So goes NYC now.
  Saturday, did go to see Brando-Capote at the Tank, a theater for emerging artists. The 'artists" who did this piece--a very nice couple that I have met a few times---created a rather self indulgent, not very clear performance piece. Depressing. Yesterday, traveled into Bushwick and hung out at Cobra in the morning---afternoon at Downtown Brooklyn, then went home because I was tired.
 Have to stop now because the computer is reserved for someone else. Still a lot to say, will report soon.

where have you been, cityboy...?

Five days in a row subbing at Friends. Quite a marathon. At the beginning of the week, I had two and a half days scheduled---but that quickly changed to 5. In addition, I attended the Fall upper school concert (very good) on Thursday evening. Wow! No wonder yesterday after work I was exhausted! Even now, sitting in the library, I can feel it. Two more sessions today, and in the evening, I am scheduled to see Brando-Capote---a kind of collage that brings these two icons together. The creators are two people I know--though not very well---I have seen some of their other work, so i wanted to show support for this one. Like so many other off and off off Broadway projects, they are closing this weekend. It starts early, at 7:30, so possibly some other "action" after the play. We will see. 
  Next week there are only two possible days of work at Friends---have not been hired for either yet---will try to use the rest of the week to catch up on Theater, movies, etc. Already I have a ticket for the Friday evening of Thanksgiving to see The Michaels, which is Richard Nelson's play about a family living in Rhinebeck. Kind of elegiac, from everything that I have heard. I will try to see at least two other plays as well--want to see how my schedule turns out for most of the days before I make another commitment.
  Last Saturday evening (seems like a long time ago) i did see Dr Ride's American Clumbhouse, an original play that my friend Kristen was appearing in. Very glad that I did--it is a very well written play, that the four actresses performed really well. Sunday I saw a documentary at BAM, The Hottest Summer--where the narrator-director goes around to different neighborhoods in the city, interviewing different people, mostly working class, no one percenters. I was always interested, though I thought that in certain interviews she avoided coming to terms with the problems her subjects were facing---also I would have liked her to identify the neighborhoods she was visiting. Still, it kept my interest, but I walked out of a question and answer period with the director and the programmer from BAM---a little too self congradulatory and "gooey" for me to deal with.
 So that is it for now---will report soon.

yesterday was one of my...

"best days ever"--walked all over Manhattan, saw a movie (horrible!) and a beautiful dance concert, and generally felt very strong. (A little tired today, probably from all that wear and tear on my body).
After the library, did walk north on 5th from 42nd to 58th---a hideous amount of foot traffic, particularly in the first 11 or 12 blocks--but finally reached my destination--the Paris Theater---to see Baumbach's Marriage Story. Well I hated it! In certain movies that he makes, about middle or upper class white people and their "problems", he doesn't resonate with me at all.The two leads play a husband and wife who are splitting---both are theater people, he a "genius" director and she an actress with a Hollywood background who has become the leading lady of the company. There the reality stops--both of them, once they are out of the theater, seem simply like "ordinary humans"---in their daily life they might as well be teachers, social workers, bankers, etc. Baumbach has no idea how people whose life is centered on the theater behave once the rehearsals are over. The second part of the movie (at least as much as I saw of it) is actually a picture of the high powered lawyers who work with the wealthy in Hollywood, the principles are all but forgotten. I left the theater, before the ending in a rage.
 The rest of the day was very pleasant, as I walked back to my apartment (I seem to have been able to walk endlessly without tiring yesterday) and waited for the Dance Concert at the State theater in Lincoln Center. Had a great (and cheap) seat and was really surprised at how beautiful the whole program was. Two dances by Paul Taylor (it is his company) that were upbeat and sensitive and had some amazing choreography, and a new piece by Pam Tanowitz that while a little muted, had some great steps and a lot of musicality. Company B, the last piece on the program was brilliantly danced and made me aware of how brilliant a choreographer Taylor could be (I am not sure I realized this before). I practically danced back to my apartment---really feeling great!
  Tonight, after some sessions, I am scheduled to see the play my friend Kristen is in. She told me at the TEAM party, that she is very happy in it, so it should be meaningful.
That is all for now---will report soon.

Actually, what happened yesterday...

after the library and after my session up on 160th street and Saint Nicholas, was "nothing". (Well, "nothing will come of nothing")
By that I mean my body simply wanted to rest  after the session---that surprised me---after all it was only one, but I was tired. So I returned to the apartment and tried to rest. Today, this morning, feeling much better. No work today, as a matter of fact it is one of those rare occasions where my whole day is free---I did go to Friends to pick up my check---climbed the six flights to where the payroll department is---and after that had an incredibly good walk from 16th and 2nd, all the way to the library where I am at now, the one on 40th and 5th.  The walk was mostly on Park Avenue South, a street that I don't often travel on---wow! has that street changed (well for that matter, what street in this city hasn't?) New luxury buildings in the 20's, and so many coffee places on those streets---maybe two per street. Then a little north on Madison and finally to 5th. This session will end soon---I hope to do some book browsing after that, maybe find a viable book to take out (right now I am only reading a book of short stories) and probably head for the Paris theater.
   The plan is to use this time to see Marriage Story, the Noah Baumbach movie. On some level I would probably like to spend the time doing something else, or checking in on the hearings in DC, but time is precious---I am going to other projects tonight and tomorrow evening---so this might be the only time to experience it.
  Tonight--the Taylor Dance company---I picked up a  $24.00 ticket yesterday. I am interested in the second ballet, a new piece by a much praised choreographer---I actually met her husband at a party for my niece and her husband about a year ago. Close to home, which is go. Tomorrow, after some sessions will see the play my friend Kristen is in. So time is forced! At any rate, will report on all this soon.

feeling much better today....

more relaxed because I did not have to wait for a phone call from Friends this morning, and deal with the "readiness" of it, but more so, because I had a terrific time with my friend Joe, another teacher at Friends, when we met for a beer and some food last night. It had been a long day--two sessions, with an hour and a half in between (tough)  but we met at Grill on the Hill, an amiable place on 140th and Amsterdam, and talked for about a little over an hour. Conversation flowed really well---I felt relaxed and easy---just a very nice mix. Joe left around 7:30 to join some friends for a Trivia game downtown, I could have stayed around and see if I could have joined one of Grill's trivia teams (they were also having a trivia evening) or watched two or three interesting basketball games that were on the TV's. but very quickly after Joe left, I crashed, and decided it was best to head home. Did stop off at a Greek Diner for coffee and a muffin, but then returned home. It's interesting, I had tried Grill on the Hill shortly after it opened, about a year and a half ago, did not have a bad time, but felt they were a bit disorganized---things seemed to be much better yesterday, the bartenders were very easygoing, the place had a warm vibe about it--might return by myself sometime soon.
  One session today, so I should not be too fatigued afterwards---no excuse for not doing something tonight. Might try to see Marriage Story in Brooklyn---did not want to plan in the morning, so just means playing it by ear. Anything could happen, will report soon.

Last night---

found myself tired after two sessions (both of which I feel were incredibly productive and filled in some good spaces for the students whom I work with) so simply grabbed a slice of pizza, then a large fruit drink and finally some pound cake and returned home to the apartment. Before long I was asleep, waking only slightly until around 1 A.M. This happens often--and usually the next 4.5 hours (I usually start to get ready for the day around 5:30) are half waked---half sleep. This is the time that I have a constant dialogue with myself---taking things apart, letting my memory take me to the past,  trying to figure out what the next day will bring. When I leave the apartment, whether I am going to Friends or just to get my coffee from around the corner (and read the Times in the hotel next door) something changes---life becomes "real" again.
  Went to the Johns Hopkins Barnstormers page yesterday. This is the Hopkins theater group that, a long time ago, I was President of. It was my last year at the college. Their fall production was a play by John Patrick , called The Curious Savage. The playwright was popular in the forties and fifties---kind of a "one level above" Neil Simon. I saw one his really great successes called The Teahouse of the August Moon, when I was 11. A comedy that took place in post World War II Japan, David Wayne played Sakini, a charming Japanese interpreter for the Americans. Lots of fun, I had read a lot about the play, but not having seen that many non-musicals, was excited to be there. It was the first time I saw the actor Paul Ford, a marvelous comedian, great at playing the "flummoxed" middle aged man. He later played Colonel Hall on the tv show You'll Never Get Rich, which starred Phil Silvers. I know nothing about The Curious Savage, a strange choice, maybe it is a little more serious then the plays of Patrick that I know about. Certainly he was a good craftsman, perfect for that era.
  Tonight will meet a friend who is also a teacher at Friends for a beer after some session. Looking forward to that--tomorrow there are no classes at Friends, so I can wake up knowing I don't have to listen to the text machine ring. A kind of freedom, maybe I can actually do something in the evening. Will report soon.

two benefits, two movies, and....

some other things. But first, very odd  for me, that within the space of a week, that I should find myself at two benefits for two "indie" theater groups. One was for the TEAM, a company that I have followed and been friends with since 2007, and the other for Assembly, a company that I discovered summer of 2011 at the Collapsible Hole in Williamsburg via their remarkable production of Home/Sick. I remember when the TEAM was having parties at the theater space right by South Ferry, and Assembly's fund raiser was at a small space between third and fourth avenue in Brooklyn. Both groups have come a long way since them; these two benefits very definitely stressed the fact that both groups had attracted some "high rollers" and that the money of the wealthy was going to help them create their work. . Good or bad? Can't say, but I was struck by the dichotomy (especially at the TEAM benefit) between a theater group whose claim to existence is to "enhance social justice"  (my terms)  and large horde of wealthy people in attendance at their benefit whose income might have depended on working for companies that were exploiting the very people they seem to want their theater pieces to empower. A strange dichotomy indeed, but I suppose funding is necessary, and that is one way to get it. And at both parties I did have a good time, with some good theater conversations with many people. I am just an observer, watching how far things have come in this creative sphere in the last 20 years.
 As for the two movies, the first, Saturday evening was called Synonyms, a film mostly in french, conceived and directed by an Isreli. It was a New York Film Festival selection. An abrasive film, about an abrasive young man, who comes to France penniless to to escape completely his Isreli roots. In the course of the movie, he participates in a menage a trois, joins some Isreli terrorists hunting French neo nazis, disrupts a concert and does some other crazy things. His journey is somewhat sympathetic, but he is so abrasive---the film itself follows him at an intense pace. I admired it more then enjoyed it---the camera work and color are really excellent. Went because I was tired from the day's work and needed to see a movie close to my apartment, that being said, I had planned to see it.
The second movie, Sunday afternoon at BAM (could not bring myself to watch the Gaints-Jets game even for a minute, so I needed structure)  was Downtown 81, a shapeless piece filmed around Avenue C and D and east 14th street, when the area was a wasteland. It was valuable just for that, its story followed a young black artist played by Basquiat. He had a winning and affable personality as he moved from small apartment to small apartment, and encountered hoboes, bands, and other sleazy denizens of the lower east side. In spite of the poverty surrounding him, he sort of ambles through it---but nothing of real consequence happens to him--I guess that is the point, but it does leave on a little cold. Also, it ended kind of quickly---I was ready for another 20 minutes--the ending was abrupt and left me feeling a little cheated.
 So that is it---Tuesday evening unplanned yet, will see how I feel after two sessions, will report soon.

Saturday morning...

a long week is coming to its end. As of this moment, I have two more sessions left---then FREEDOM!
But what does that mean? Not sure---think I will try to see a movie this afternoon or early evening---probably Marriage Story, the movie directed and written by Noah Baumbach. Have mixed feelings about his work---some like The Squid and the Whale very effective---two later movies that he made the "much praised" Frances Ha, and the one after that with Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts as a couple somewhat in turmoil, turned me off. Like so many other white liberal "New York" movie makers, his intelligent subjects seemed disinterested in people less fortunate then themselves, while glorying in their problems. The last movie, called, The Meyerowitz Stories (Real and Imagined) at least I think that is the title, was much better--dealt with some important issues in a strong way. Still, no interest in "others" but some telling problems for its protagonists. Yet even that movie, irritated me---Baumbach seems so in love with his own vision of things. In spite of these feelings, I am anxious to see this movie---it is about (at least in theory) theater people--or maybe I just want to see if he can really pull off a meaningful film. If that doesn't happen tonight, there are several other movies I could check out, not to mention a concert at the Philharmonic that is interesting. Well, we will see.
 Last night--in spite of a long day at Friends, went to see my friend Kim's performance in a revival of Sylvia, by A. R. Gurney. She and the rest of the cast did very well (this was presented by the New York theater for the Deaf, and was half spoken and half signed) though I could only stay for one act, because I was tired. I was surprised, this is play, considered one of Gurney's most sucessful, seemed kind of simplistic.But Kim was really good, I was happy for her.
  Tomorrow is the Assembly benefit party in the early evening---they want $40.00 for activists---some activists my find this a little steep, but......anyway, I always have a meaningful time with them. Before that, I usually spend my early Sundays in Bushwick at Cobra Club, but the only game on TV is so pathetic that I may opt for a change. What? Not sure, will report soon.

48 hours...

from Monday at 6 to Wednesday---with the exception of the TEAM party, all non stop work. So what is there to report? Nothing much.
 As I sit in the Lincoln Center library a gentleman is at the nearby tables---from what I can glean from
the conversation, he was an associate of the late Hal Prince, the library has an exhibition dedicated to him in its large exhibition center on the first floor. He is speaking about Prince's production of Candide, the Leonard Bernstein---Richard Wilbur musical that opened in 56 and closed soon afterwards, but that Prince revived or actually recreated successfully in 74 in Brooklyn (yes, there was a Brooklyn in 74) and which later moved to the Broadway theater in 75, and ran for quite a while.
The original production took the story seriously, this revised version saw the musical as a kind of hippie carnival---the floor of the Broadway theater, where the audience normally sat was used as the playing area--with the audience on all sides. It was a very spirited and inventive affair, even if it made
the hero's journey somewhat superficial--how I loved listening to the overture, when I saw it. Since then, every director seems to have wanted to get his(her) hands on it and revise it with their own vision---sort of like Merrily We Role Along---every"creative person" or entity seems to want a piece of it. I still have to find out who this gentleman talking is, perhaps I know of his work.
  Again, some options for the evening, assuming that I am not too "bushed" Will report soon.

tired today...

after a "marathon" yesterday both at Friends and after. Lets begin with Monday evening--at the benefit for the TEAM, theater group--glad i went, saw a lot of people I knew from the theater community, and even if our encounters were brief, it was heartening to be in touch with these people.
An actress friend of mine, Jill, someone whose on stage work I find extraordinary, introduced me to her new boyfriend. He  is a "baseball person" who writes for MLB (the baseball web site) about mino league ball. With my solid baseball knowledge, we seemed like a perfect fit (ironically, he does not go to theater that often) and it was decided that the three of us would get together for a beer sometime soon. It will be nice to talk to someone who really knows baseball (as I do, at least in my opnnion), and Jill seemed really eager for it to happen, but I must remember to include some theater talk as well. In a way, that was the highlight of the evening---the event was held in the Caroll Gardens-Gowanus section of Brooklyn, an upscale neighborhood filled with brownstones, now probably selling for at least two million, but the streets are incredibly quiet--an almost eerie feeling walking through them, especially on Smith Street, which in the last ten years has acquired many new bars and restaurants. Some of them were half filled---it was Monday night after all, but still, it leaves one a little creeped out.But the evening was important---glad that I went--the subway trip home was pretty efficient, considering the late hour.
  Yesterday, accepted a job at Friends that ended at 3--three classes---then took the subway north to Washington Heights to the library on 160th and Amsterdam to work with one of my students.When that was over, took the bus about fifteen blocks to another student--amazing that although by that time I was physically tired, it did not prevent me from focusing on the assignments of  both of the students. Naturally I was 'dead' afterwards---returned home and slept.
  Scores of movies and plays available for me to see in the city--today I think I will have three sessions--would love to 'chill" at a movie after that but I am tired today---let's see how much energy I have when all the sessions are over--will report soon.

There I was, sitting in the....

Lincoln Center Library, not far from posting for yesterday, when I received a text from Friends, asking me to take over two classes for a teacher who had gotten sick. The text arrived at 11:40; the first class was at 12:35. Could I get there in time? Of course--the subways run very quickly even with one change. I arrived about 12:15--enough time for a cup of coffee before the first class. Rather proud of that, though I think at the school, it was just seen as "normal". Anyway, that is what happened. A session in the late afternoon, meant that all I could do is go home and rest for the rest of the day.
  Today, just one session---I am debating with myself if I should buy a ticket for the Moby Dick project at ART. It could be amazing---I know the director, composer and one of the leads. They have some $50.00 seats left. It would mean spending the night at a hotel in Boston (or Cambridge), another expense---but it is obviously coming to NY, and it would be good to see it before it arrives. I would be the envy of all my theater friends. Well, we will see---its during the Christmas vacation so I would have the time. It is all instinct.
  Tomorrow a full day at Friends and then maybe a protest in Brooklyn against the aggressive policing of black youths that has gone on in the city for the past two weeks. Hope I won't be too tired to make it. No reminiscences today, as life seems to be existing only in the present. Will report soon.

This weekend...

Well, the highlight was seeing Will Arbury;s play, Heroes of the fourth Turning at Playwrights. Very well written, with a surprising climax that left me shattered. Wonderful acting from the five principals. The characters are all alumni or connected by family to an Evangelist Church, and they are there for a reunion. Lots of conversations--personal and political---finally an explosion at the end. Very glad that I went; I wonder if Regional Theaters around the country will pick up on it--with five characters and really one set, it would be very easy to produce. But since these characters are all Republicans (though questioning) some theaters might feel their audiences might not want to see it. It will be interesting to see how this evolves.

 Yesterday, a kind of'normal" Sunday, started off at Cobra---first time there in three weeks---nice to see my bartender friend Olivia--then over to Molasses, the bookstore to hang out with Matt Maggie, and Tuli, their month old son). After that took the DeKalb avenue bus to downtown, did stop off at a new used bookstore and coffee shop at Nostrand and Kosciosco---kind of nice--an interesting selection of used books. Ended up (of course) at Gotham Market and spent some time at the Fiction Center---thought I might go to a movie, but by 6 was tired---that hour that was "gained" did not help me at all. So I returned home.

 Most of my reading this weekend was of the Brent Easton Ellis memoir White---a very well written dialogue about his writing history, his younger days in New York when one could live in the city fairly cheaply, and finally his complaints about (I guess) "liberal righteousness" , or what he sees of it in LA, where he now lives. He makes some very telling points---would enjoy having a dialogue with him. He has a lot of Twitter followers---I don't do Twitter, so I will not be one of them. But it was a very good read. 

 Tonight, the party for the TEAM theater group that I have known for now about 13 years. It will be deep in Carroll Gardens---I don't have to be there until 8:30---since I am not working at Friends today, and as of now, have only one session, I should be in pretty good shape to go and party. Will report soon.