Awash with theater.....

 theater in nyc is exploding! No doubt about it--options this weekend are many but nothing compared with what options the theater going "nerd" (is that how I define myself) will have in a few weeks. But as I contemplate my choices, I also have to ask myself "where am I in all this?" Somehow the pre pandemic person I was then---who wanted to see whatever he could---has become an illusion. I am on the outside now--the times I go to see a play that has a friend or more likely, an acqaintance, in it, seems like a visit to a world I once knew--but am not that much part of now, But is that me, or that world? Am I physically so different after working with the illness for 3 years, that somehow I feel that separates me from others. In truth, my life revolves around my tutoring schedule now---I find the work very fulfilling--it is where I want to be---the kind of committment I want to make---but I come home tired--only on weekends can I travel out. Today is cold--will that limit my options further? Tonight at Dixon Place I could see what I think might be a fantastic project with puppets---but of course I would be a "stranger" there. Trying to picutre myeslf at those different places---all of a sudden something stops, and it is not clear what I want to do.

Interesting options for tomorrow (Sunday). Last chance to see Nabucco at the Met---you know my interest in early Verdi is very strong. Could see that--get out at six, and then, nextdoor, at the Walter Reade theater at 7:15 is a movie, part of the Jewish Film Festival, that I promised myself I would see. Called Delegation, apparently it is about three students from Israel who accept a trip to Poland and part of the trip is a visit to one or two of the concentration camps the Nazis established there. How do they absorb that---how does it change them? That is what the movie promises. For some reason, I, a non-religious Jew, want very much to see this film. Can I do both in one day? Or should I? At the Film Forum there is a four hour movie about the Nazi occupation of Amsterdam from 1940 to 1945--a part of me also wants to see and experience that movie---but four hours...? And when? Is there something about being a Jew in those years, living under that occupation that I want to find out for myself. 

And then what? Out of the occupation and into the football playoffs? It's there if I want it. Should be an interesting weekend...

wild night in Queens....

A  friend was appearing in a dance piece at the Chocolate Factory---a performance space where Astoria meets downtown Queens. An odd neighborhood-contrasts galore- filled with new luxury high rises and older apartment buildings---some private homes as well. Cold, cold, cold. Train did not stop at the nearest station which menat a longer walk in an area I did not know. Quiet streets---after some fumbling reached my destination. Starving---found a deli near the space---then misdirected myself on the way back to the theater. Finally returned. My sense of direction has always been strong--yet twice I found myself on the wrong street. 

The performance itself baffled me. The creator-choreographer demonstrated a cold, inarticulate world for her five dancers---some of her choreography, particularly in the first part of the piece was stunning--fascinating to look at---very original---but as the piece progressed, seemed to go nowhere with its content. I don;t mind feeling "distanced" but by the end there seemed to be no point to what it was trying to say. All the touching between the five dancers was cold and a little aggressive, but one was left with just that. Waited afterwards to say hello to my friend Lucy, one of the dancers. She was happy to see me, and we had a good if brief discussion about our lives and the piece. Can't believe that this was the first time that I had seen her in five years---the last time, ironically, when she performed in another and more interesting performance piece by the same choreographer. The memory of that last encounter---January 2019-is so vivid in my mind---how can it be so long---the pandemic intruding and literally taking away time--a dream interfering with real life.

Trip back to the subway was also strange---ended up at the subway platform of the trains that were not running that weekend---can't believe that Queensboro Plaza and Queens Plaza, where the R goes, are so far apart  A dark, strange world last night---should go back some day during the day and figure things out--finally found a shuttle bus that returned me to the R, where i needed to go A real workout for my legs---sometimes the search for the right way to go seemed endless---lost in the dark in Astoria. But the good news is that my energy was able to go with it--I think the reduction in infusion matter during my last treatment is adding to my energy. Another infusion happens on Thursday---no plans for the weekend after because  that might be when the effects of the treatment keep my energy low. But maybe not...

So now it is over....

 A terrible sense of relief! But yesterday was full of "grapples". Wanted very much to go down to my friend's bar on Avenue C and ninth, but was tired most of the day. So if not that, maybe a movie? Shot down that one as well. By 7 I realized that my energy could not support a trip to the East Village, and with some (but not much) reservation, decided to just stay home. Watched some football; listened to some music; also slept a little. Seemed to have made it through, but still, after all these years. haunted by the "myth" of a successful New Years Eve. That would be "what"? A date, or atleast a party with some friends. But it did not happen. Now, the next morning, the anxiety has all but washed away---it's over and I am a free man again. 

As far as today goes....not sure. Maybe one of the many movies that are around---or possibly just a "jaunt" to  Brooklyn---remember those trips east on Lafayette Avenue, as the bus moved from BAM to Bushwick?  There and back-is it still possible? We will see.