Loose Ends

Why I Support Occupy Wall Street

2011-11-10T15:26:00.001-05:00

I took these photos at Occupy Wall Street a few weeks ago. As I've tried to articulate why I support OWS, my slow brain hasn't been able to keep pace with the changes in events. Like a lot of people (see Paul Krugman, for example) I wonder if Bloomberg's heavy-handed raid may have been a blessing in disguise, keeping the occupation from fading away as winter approached, and galvanizing many of us to greater enthusiasm for the movement. Counter to my usual thinking, I believe the lack of specific demands was a strength of the occupation, but wonder if now we've reached the next stage in the process, and will begin working on particular goals.

It probably doesn't surprise anyone who knows me that I support OWS, and the vast majority of my friends and family probably agree with me. But I know some of my friends don't agree, and are rather disgusted with me for my support. It's you I hope to reach with this post. Let me explain my view of things.

Study after study has revealed stark economic discrepancies in our country now. The richest 1 percent of the population holds more net worth than the entire lower 90 percent. The richest 400 people in this country have more money than the poorest 150 million. These claims don't seem to be in dispute. Everyone appears to agree they're accurate. Where we disagree is how we explain this discrepancy. Friends of mine truly believe most of those wealthy folks got that way from sheer hard work and sacrifice. They earned their fortunes, every penny of it, fair and square.

I simply can't agree. And I believe events in the last few years back me up. We now know hedge fund investors and mortgage lenders made fortunes on bundled investments they knew were bad, often earning money by betting they would fail. Multinational corporations ran the economy off a cliff through incompetence and greed. Thanks to years of deregulation their actions may not, in fact, have broken any laws, but a child could see that those actions were irresponsible and unethical. Bailouts were granted by the government in an attempt to save the economy, specifically the millions of workers who were in danger of losing jobs, homes, and pensions. A lot has been made about the fact that most of those (interest-free) loans have been paid back. Many of those companies have gone on to have record-breaking profits. The fact that thousands of their workers still got laid off, or lost their pensions, that's where I get stuck. Even CEOs who were forced to resign nonetheless often still walked away with generous retirement packages even as their company workforce was gutted. I can't see that, and not see blatant economic injustice. It seems undeniable to me that people got rich unethically if not illegally, have not been held responsible for their actions, have in many cases been allowed to keep their ill-gotten wealth, and, to add insult to injury, are now working hard to shift the blame to unions (especially government employee unions, like teachers, fire fighters and police officers) and the working poor.

What is being exposed now is what many of us had suspected all along, that a tiny minority of wealthy people have manage to buy our government, and insure the laws and policies enacted protected them to the detriment of the larger society. It became increasingly clear that there was one set of laws (tax and criminal) for the 1 percent, a different set for the rest of us. That tiny minority managed to put its finger on the scale, allowing it to amass and protect great wealth, while the income of the majority froze, shrank, at best rose more modestly.

A specific example getting lots of play right now is Wal-mart. When you have a CEO worth billions running a business where the vast majority of the workers are earning so little that they're eligible for food stamps, then I think you have a business model that is broken. The people who helped build that fortune (here and abroad) are not benefiting from their labor adequately. No, I don't think everyone should earn the same flat wage, but it's ludicrous to think the rich guy at the top did it all by himself.

Are there people out there looking for a handout, wanting to get something for nothing? Oh, I suppose such people exist. And if they can be bothered to do anything, I guess some of them might be willing to camp out in a city park for weeks at a time. But the idea that they're running this movement, and are in danger of taking over the country is laughable. The shiftless layabout is merely the most frightening bogeyman detractors claim dominates the occupation. Whenever a movement is as big and sprawling as this is, many of us feel the need to say "I support the movement BUT I'm not a..." trust-fund kid, dirty hippy, lazy whiner, anti-American, terrorist lover, druggie bongo player, etc. etc. If you're determined to find such people at the rallies and actions, you'll probably be in luck. (Hell, I've been accused all those things at some point.)

For what it's worth, when I was at Liberty Park I always saw plenty of people representing unions, medical associations, religious groups and various other groups. If you wanted to find the guy dressed as a viking, spouting nonsense, you could. If you wanted to talk to a nurse about the health care industry, you could find her too.

A popular movement will always have a wide range of opinions and viewpoints. Democracy is a messy, inefficient, infuriating endeavor. It just is. Much to my surprise and delight, this ragtag, sprawling mess of a movement has managed to keep our attention on important questions far longer than I would have ever imagined. Kardashian marriages and Republican front-runners have come and gone and our media, normally blessed with the attention span of a fruit-fly, has been forced to keep coming back to this story, these issues. Maybe they come back still wanting to know what do these people want, maybe Fox News comes back looking for ways to be outraged, but they keep coming back.

As I said, I think we may be moving into the next phase, when actions become more focused, demands more clear. When that happens, it will inevitably cause strife inside and outside the movement. Some ideologies that have managed to share space will find it impossible not to clash in the future. I would happily throw my support behind a major overhaul of the medical industry, for example, transforming it from one where pharmaceutical and health insurance profits are protected to one where people actually receive adequate healthcare; on the other hand I will not be signing any petitions demanding an end to private property. If we can keep the energy and momentum this movement has set off, however, I think we could be on the cusp of real reform in this country.

Have You Ever Seen Something Amazing?

2011-08-17T13:32:00.000-04:00

That line above comes from a TV commercial running presently. I couldn't tell you what the product is, I want to say a car, but I can't remember. That will no doubt disappoint the writer of said commercial. (Actually, I may not even be remembering the wording correctly; it's really not an effective ad.)

Normally a question like that would make me roll my eyes. How much more banal can you get? It's right up there with 'have you ever eaten something tasty? Heard something beautiful? Felt excited? Do you like fun?' The first time I heard it though, instead of snorting derisively, I found myself vividly recalling one such amazing sight.

I was ten years old, sitting in the back seat of a car my family had rented in Ireland. We were driving along the west coast, in view of the ocean. It might come as a surprise to know it was raining. As a kid I loved being in the car during big downpours. I loved watching the raindrops stream up along the windows, the sound of water on the roof, tires on the wet road. Watching storms from a house window was fun too, but it was so much better doing it inside a car, a moving 360 degree view, especially if the landscape was stunning and spacious by itself. I have many fond memories of rainy car trips in Ireland and the UK. Only recently did it occur to me how nerve-wracking those experiences must have been for my parents. Driving an unfamiliar car, on unfamiliar, narrow, poorly maintained country roads, frequently around blind mountain passes, on the left, during a torrential downpour? And let's not forget having to keep alert for flocks of sheep. I doubt my parents were having much fun. It says a lot that they didn't prevent me from enjoying it.

This particular day we came around a hill to the sight of great sheets of rain marching in from the Atlantic, coming up onto shore and across some cliffs. And 'march' is the only way to describe it. The rain looked like it had been carefully arranged in rows, evenly spaced, all moving at a brisk yet controlled pace. At that distance, the storm seemed planned, at least organized. Whether I thought it consciously or not, I suspect I was also awed by the scale. This storm was probably several miles long, at least a few miles tall, but from where we were it was a single entity, one enormous, awe-inspiring battalion. I may not have had the good sense to be frightened, but I was definitely awed by the size and power of it. .

I'm not sure why the commercial copy triggered this particular memory, but I'm grateful that it did. It has me wanting to compile a list of personal experiences that I would consider amazing. Rough categories are already forming in my head; there are all the ones involving weather and landscapes, ones involving animals, and the ones involving works of art or performance, just for starters. Not really sure what will be gained by recording these memories, but I plan on finding out.

How about you? Does this question trigger a specific memory for you, or does it just make you roll your eyes? What is the most awe-inspiring thing you've seen or experienced? Care to share? Feel free to do it in the comments section, or share a link if you do it on your own blog.

Happy Bloomsday!

2011-08-01T13:36:00.000-04:00

(For various reasons this didn't get published on the actual day, so here it is two months later.)

Tain Mural, Dublin

No, I haven't read Ulysses. But when I spent a semester studying in Dublin in the Fall of 1986, I lived with a lovely family a block from James Joyce's Tower, in Sandycove, County Dublin. So I figured today was as good an excuse as any for me to revisit my photos from last year's trip, specifically the Dublin portion. That's as much of a connection I'll be making to Joyce, however. So if you're here hoping for an illustrated tour of Bloomsday, my apologies, and good luck with your google search.

Saint Stephen's Green

It probably won't surprise anyone that when you have a country as small and as saturated with writers as Ireland, you're going to come across literary landmarks quite often. I was tickled a few years ago, when I was reading At Swim Two Boys, to discover that much of the action is set at the Gentlemen's Bathing Area, which is situated not far from Joyce's Tower. I never went swimming there; as much as I love cold water, the Irish Sea in Autumn is too frigid even for me. Word was the area was still 'men only, bathing suits optional' at certain hours of the day, though.

Saint Stephen's Green

The country is small; I think the population is hovering around five million now, and in 1986 it was closer to four million. I was to discover that this meant Dublin was both a cosmopolitan city (complete with international celebrities) and a small village (everyone knew each other, including the famous people). The founder/registrar of the school I attended was an old chum of Paddy Maloney, the founder and leader of the Chieftains. Because of their friendship, the group gave a concert in the lounge of our school, for about thirty of us. This was something they did each year, apparently, and even relished, since it was one of the few opportunities they still had to play without amplification.

Memorial to Constance, Countess Markevicz, Saint Stephen's Green

Seamus Heaney gave a reading for us in that same room. David Norris, who I came to learn was credited with starting the LGBT movement in Ireland, was on the faculty (teaching Joyce, by the way, oh look there's another connection). My host mother was an old school chum of U2's manager. Had I been staying in town one day longer, I might have been able to see their hometown concert. For FREE. Sigh.

Saint Stephen's Green

Given all this, it didn't surprise Mary and me to discover that we'd be spending the flight to Shannon sitting next to Malachi McCourt. He was every bit as charming in person as he had always seemed on TV. Like us, he was travelling in part to honor a brother who had died recently, in his case his brother Frank. A school in Limerick was endowing a chair in Frank's honor the following day.

Ha'Penny Bridge, Dublin

Thanks to the volcano in Iceland, we were looping to the north, which added at least two hours to the flight, but with a gifted storyteller as company, the time flew by.

River Liffey, Dublin

He asked us what we planned on seeing, and we mentioned one of our first stops would be at Kenny's Bookshop, in Galway.
"Oh, I'm afraid it's closed," he said. We were crushed. Kenny's has been around for decades, and has supported many great writers. Dad came across it sometime in the sixties, I believe, and it's been a regular pilgrimage stop for all of us ever since.

The Foggy Dew, Dublin

Of course bookstores are dying out all over the world, thanks in large part to the internet, and with Ireland's economic troubles, it didn't surprise us at all that Kenny's might have succumbed. Once we arrived in Galway though we were delighted to discover that shop hadn't closed, it had simply moved. In fact the move had been due to a needed expansion of the bookstore, art framing department, and art gallery. It was a bit of a walk to the new location (we had elected not to rent a car), but we found the shop spacious and well-stocked. Browsing was still encouraged, even to the point of the store providing free tea and coffee and comfy couches. Mary and I spent two happy hours there.

Dublin near the Center of Town.

When we went up to make our purchases, we told Rosemary, the lovely woman working the cash register, how glad we were to find the place, especially after we'd had our scare courtesy of Mr. McCourt.

"Malachi said that?" she exclaimed. She shook her head, tsked a bit. "We have to call him!" It was like she was talking about a rascally-yet-beloved uncle. Off she went to inform the owner of the store of the situation. I have no doubt that he immediately called Mr. McCourt, and teasingly scolded him for spreading false information. The Irish are big ones for teasing. Sorry if we got you in trouble, Mr. McCourt! I'm sure you're as delighted as we were to find the place thriving.

Near the River

Lo Siento, No Hablo.

2011-05-18T17:57:00.004-04:00

On the day of the royal wedding, I went to my local laundromat. There are two TVs in the place; the one closest to the desk is sometimes tuned to an Asian language channel (for the owners), but the other is always tuned to a Spanish language station. I was a bit surprised to hear the words "el palacio de Buckingham" as I walked in, but apparently this obsession was more international than I realized. That's cool, I guess.  Kate and Wills, they seem like nice kids. I like a big show as much as the next guy, but this one hadn't really captured me for some reason. I didn't get too worked up about it, one way or the other.

Others in the room, however, had much stronger opinions. The older woman seated next to me was watching the coverage intently. Suddenly she piped up, "why is this important?"

I replied without thinking, "Yeah, it does seem a bit silly, doesn't it?"

This would all be fine, if it weren't for the fact that we had this interchange--short simple words, short simple concepts, present tense only--in Spanish.

Yes, I took Spanish in school. Hell, I got straight As in Spanish, in my midwestern schools, studying for six years under fellow midwesterners with names like Hollingsworth, McKnight, Schneider and Terkoski. My last class was in the Winter of 1985, but I've retained some vocabulary. Many folks in my neighborhood here, including the cashiers at my grocery store, don't speak a lot of English, so I've gotten in the habit of exchanging short, almost reflexive phrases of a very practical nature with them.  None of this should be construed as indicating that I speak Spanish, however. Unfortunately I had, of course, just given this nice lady that impression. And having provided the opening she was looking for, she was off on a long, passionate, very fast diatribe of disapproval of this whole event. At least I think she disapproved; her tone and expression did not indicate sentimentality or celebration, but that was all I was going on. Because she spoke so quickly, and with such energy, I felt like the moment when I could have admitted my inadequacies had come and gone before I knew what was happening. So, I tried to ride it out. Because, you know, that seemed like the best solution.

I stared intently at her, trying desperately to catch something, anything of what she was saying, but in addition to my poor language skills we now added an internal monologue that went something like this:

"Okay, I think she just said hambre, she's probably talking about starving people. Are you smiling at her? You are, aren't you. Stop it, that's weird, she'll think you're not taking her seriously. Hey, that phrase, was that 'lots of money'?   I think so but damn, it's gone now, let it go, bye-bye, stay with her. Are you smiling again? Quit it. Nodding your head is probably a bad idea too. It gives the impression you understand her. Wow she is especially worked up now, go with a frowny face, furrow your brow, that's probably safe. Trabajos, jobs, pretty sure she's working an economic argument here, I respect that, QUIT NODDING, YOU MORON, was that regina? I think so, for god's sake stop smiling!"

I can only assume expressions came and went on my face like a wheat field on a windy day. By sheer force of will I did NOT tilt my head like a confused dog. I started to relax when I heard her conclusion coming. She came to a rousing finish, and looked at me.

Oh. Right. Damn. Not out of the woods yet.

" Did she just ask a question? It didn't sound like a question. I didn't hear an uplift on any of her sentences, certainly not that last one. Is she expecting a response? Hell."

Of course I could have, should have admitted my ignorance at this point. But my embarrassment was so complete by now, I figured, in for a penny, in for a pound. So I nodded one last time, grimaced sympathetically and shrugged my shoulders in a general gesture of summing up. This seemed to satisfy her. The gods of laundry smiled on me at that point, ringing the bell that told me to move my clothes to the drier. She never tried to engage me in conversation again. Maybe she figured out the problem. Maybe she just had nothing more to say. I haven't a clue.

Her English is probably excellent.

I may have to change laundromats.

Kiss Me, I'm Irish

2011-03-17T14:57:00.004-04:00

On top Knocknarea, Ben Bulben in the background.

In honor of the day, here's a story from my travels in Ireland with Mary last May.

Strangers tend to take a shine to my sister quickly. You'd think I would have remembered this fact, having seen it in action several times in the course of a weekend the previous November in Philly, but somehow it had slipped my mind. Add in the fact that many Irish, especially in the west, are very quick to chat up a stranger, and you have a recipe for some interesting encounters. People of all shapes and sizes are drawn to her, but probably the greatest percentage are men who give the impression they would propose if given the slightest encouragement. There were at least three such encounters during this trip. My presence occasionally inspired a certain wariness, but rarely any actual deterence, and finding out that I was her brother rather than her husband usually brought the twinkle back to their eyes. As it so happens, in two cases the men mentioned early in the conversation that they were themselves (happily) married; the flirting, if that is what it was, was just play, though I wouldn't say that meant it was insincere. They were by turns cheerful, teasing (the Irish are big teasers) and charming but never offensive.

On the Burren

This is not to say that none of them were persistent. One fellow especially sticks in my mind.

Galway, First Day

Mary and I were at the Ennis transport hub waiting for a bus to take us to our next destination, the town of Clifden. The small crowd waiting was soon expanded by a school van dropping off a group of students. It was immediately clear that this was a school for people with developmental disabilities. With them was an older, lean gentleman whose age, smile and posture said "teacher" to us initially. He greeted an older woman in the bus shelter with great warmth and seeming recognition. Then he saw Mary.

Cliffs of Moher

There was an audible pop of the sound barrier being broken, and suddenly he was at her side. Smiling radiantly. His speech was clotted and soft, suggesting that learning it had not come easily. His ability to communicate, however, was uncompromised. He grabbed Mary's hand, kissed it, slid their clasped hands into her coat pocket, and kissed her on the cheek. In the telling this might sound worriesome, but Mary clearly wasn't worried (it probably wasn't her first time, after all) so neither was I. It was broad daylight, we were surrounded by people, and frankly if he had been any kind of problem, Mary could have kicked his ass herself, even without my help. No, he was harmless, just smitten.

Hiking to Clifden Castle

There were more kisses on hand and cheek, then he announced that she would be sitting next to him on the bus. "No, I'm going to sit with my brother," she replied, indicating me on her other side. We were, neither of us, convinced this had registered. I wasn't entirely sure my existence had been. When the bus arrived he quickly got on ahead of us, while we loaded our luggage below, and gave him a chance to roost somewhere. When we boarded he gestured vigorously for Mary to come join him in back, but we filed into an empty pair of seats near the front, with me sitting on the aisle to act as a bit more of a barrier.

Coming down Knocknarea

We had under-estimated this fellow's determination, however. He moved up to sit across the aisle from us, reached across my body, grabbed both of Mary's hands with both of his, and rested them on my belly. I had a human seatbelt for the duration of the trip. We probably could have dissuaded him at this point, but neither of us felt the need; we knew he'd have to go home eventually. When other passengers boarded or left the bus, his plan was for them to play London Bridge, and crawl under his arms, but we did insist he let go at least on those occasions. One of his classmates, a young man with Downs Syndrome, was seated a few rows ahead, looking through a date book filled with workshops and job interviews (I got a good impression of this school). He looked back at one point, shook his head and rolled his eyes, obviously thinking, "ah, Séamus has found another one."

The Sky Road outside Clifden

Any time I caught the eye of Mary's swain, he beamed joyfully, completely free of embarrassment or self-consciousness. It was impossible to be annoyed with him.

When we got up to leave (our stop coming before his) there didn't seem to be any regret on his part, no downcast looks, no objections, no demands she stay put. Something tells me he had been in this situation before, and was wise enough to know there were plenty more fish in the sea.

Hiking up Knocknarea

Happy Saint Patrick's Day.

Sunset in Midtown, March 12th

2011-03-16T19:04:00.001-04:00

These images may benefit from enlarging (and viewing separately) more than most. Just click on each image, as usual.

Reading the Signs

2011-02-24T21:57:00.000-05:00

Another gull story:

During my first year living in Seattle I was walking one day through the main quad of the University of Washington. A huge flock of gulls and pigeons were on the ground and circling in the air, squabbling, squawking, making a lot of racket. Believe it or not, I didn't see gulls that often, especially not that far inland. Seattle is on Puget Sound, which is salt water that flows directly into the Pacific, but people were very firm with me that didn't mean it was the same thing as the ocean, and consequently Seattle was not on the coast.

Don't ask me, I still don't get it.

Whatever the nuances are of ocean topography, it was true that in the University District, where I lived and worked, gulls were a rare sight. Seeing this many of them was noteworthy, even without all the noise and activity. I watched for a while, trying to figure out what was going on. The obvious explanation --food-- didn't seem to be true. There was no visible foodstuff nor did the birds seem to be fighting or eating. The next most likely cause for excitement in the animal kingdom--sex--also didn't seem to be involved. I speculated that maybe there was some big storm out at sea that had driven the birds further inland. I never did guess what had brought them there, and gotten them so riled. As I continued my walk home, I was struck by the thought that I didn't know how to read the natural signs of my new environment. Culturally I may have been on familiar territory, but ecologically, maybe not so much.

I found this remarkably disconcerting.

I'm not making any great claims to woodcraft or weather-sense; I was never a boy scout, I didn't grow up on a farm, my ability to read the signs on my home turf are nothing special. If you dropped me into the middle of a local wilderness, the Appalachian Mountains say, I would die of starvation or exposure as quickly as the next tenderfoot. But in my home environment I at least knew what things meant. I expected to understand the flora and fauna around me. Morning walks with my dog were as much about gauging the weather as they were about exercise. I'd look to the west (where the prevailing winds typically originate) to see what the clouds were doing, getting an idea of what weather was coming. I knew what it smelled like before rainfall, or a snowstorm. New fronts, with accompanying changes in temperature or humidity, registered on my skin. The sensation of a cold front breaking an extended heatwave often triggered a powerful giddiness. A pet food factory lies east of my parents' home; eastern winds usually brought unsettled weather, and powerful storms. To this day I still associate freakish weather with an ambient scent of dog food.

As haphazard and unschooled as my weather sense was, I wasn't even truly aware of having it until that day in Seattle. The time I'd spent living in London (ages 10 and 14) and Dublin (age 20) I was probably so overwhelmed by all the new stimuli that any weather sense, or lack of same, was just part of the whole discombobulation. London's size and noise also triggered what I came to see as my urban claustrophobia; I didn't feel at home there, but attributed it to all the concrete and crowding. Besides, all three stays came with expiration dates. I knew eventually I'd be returning to Indiana, to home. Seattle, however, was supposed to be my new home. I'd gone there to live. Suddenly it seemed alien in ways I would have never predicted. Over the next seven years I did get to know the lingo better, but it never ceased feeling foreign.

Moving to New York mostly meant coming back to familiar territory. I was happy to have four distinct, readable seasons again, especially cold, snowy Winters and colorful Autumns. Once again I had thunderstorms, fireflies and violets, to name a few. But NYC jams my antennae in the same ways London did. I don't know how to see past all the cement and concrete most of the time. To find out what the weather is doing, I turn on the TV. My main tool for tracking the seasons is a calender. I plan trips out of town, or at least to the park, when I think it's time for the leaves to turn or the violets to show up. Here in my urban landscape, the seasonal changes aren't waiting to surprise me the minute I walk outside. I have to seek them out. I have to schedule appointments with them.

There have been years where I missed some of my seasonal markers. More than once I missed all of them. It's even a bit distressing to realize that something has already passed its peak. I grew up watching things go through their full cycles, from the first crocus peaking through to the last scarlet maple leaf falling. Now my seasonal experiences feel more like trips to the zoo.

Changes in temperature are almost the only signs that catch my attention by themselves here. Heavy precipitation does it too, of course, though my sturdy pre-War building keeps me from hearing it indoors. Storms have to be torrential--and southerly--to be audible in my fifth floor apartment. (I'm grateful for the good roof on my place, of course.) Occasionally I'll walk out the door of my building and be hit with the sexy, fishy stench of salt water off the Hudson, but that is rare. Most of the time I can't smell the river even when I'm right next to it.

I wouldn't say my minimal weather sense has completely turned off, though. I think it's just found other things to track. Given how much time I spend on the subway, it makes sense that I'd start reading its nuances and arcana. The slightest movement in the air will let me know when a train is approaching long before I see or hear any evidence. A certain clackety clack on the tracks will tell me that a local train is approaching; if the sound lacks a stutter, it means an express train will be blasting through without stopping. Unless we are at the Lincoln Center station, where for reasons I've yet to identify, the meaning of the sounds is reversed.

I also notice signals when it comes to groups. If a crowd at a station feels unusually swollen and hot, like a boil, it probably means there's been a delay in train service, with people piling up and waiting longer than they think they should. I may be kidding myself, but I believe if you played me audiotapes of such a crowd, I'd be able to tell you if the group was waiting during morning rush hour, evening rush hour, or in the middle of the day. Big talk, I know. It's like people who swear their arthritis can predict rain. But I do kind of believe it.

I guess we always strive to orient ourselves to our surroundings. But as I get older, I wonder if the place we grew up never quite relinquishes its grip on us. Does the first landscape inevitably establish the archetype? Is there a place that still lives in you, no matter where you are? Even if you hated where you grew up, and fled it as soon as you could, does it still always get compared and contrasted to your present surroundings?

Harlem Sun & Moon

2011-01-30T18:48:00.000-05:00

Rats

2011-01-27T20:57:00.004-05:00

Gulls in Riverside Park

I love gulls.

It's not that surprising that I would have found them exotic at one point. My first memory of them is from a trip we took to Ireland and the UK when I was seven; the sight and sound of them is tied up with some exciting places. Not just the ocean, which would have been good enough, but castles and weird foods and funny accents and all sorts of fairy tale wonderment.

Riverside Park, same day.

Terns in Morro Bay, CA

You'd think though, after more than twenty years in coastal cities that I'd be over them by now, especially when I've been hearing them called flying rats for much of that time. In fact I've often felt a little guilty for appreciating gulls, or at least like it was something best kept to myself. I have a similar fondness --and accompanying guilt-- for pigeons. On that same trip we (naturally) went to Trafalgar Square. Back then the place was absolutely swamped with pigeons, probably because there was a vigorous cottage industry of birdseed sellers all over the place. Mom and Dad bought some for us to toss. At one point a girl not much older than me was standing in place, head and out-stretched arms covered in birds, a huge smile on her face. I wanted to do that so bad, but was held back by one thing. Before our trip we'd had to get some vaccinations. One of them consisted of many little needles at once, pricking out a shape about the size of a dime. I had been proud of the fact that I didn't cry and I was equally proud of the impressive scab that formed on it. At Trafalgar Square though, the idea of those little claws accidentally scraping off my scab before it had healed was unnerving. I kept the seeds and birds away from my body... and regretted it for days afterwards. I campaigned hard to go back for another chance, but our schedule never allowed for that. When we went back in '76, the birdseed sellers were still there, but I was no longer interested in having birds all over me. Feeding them was still fun though. Mary and I went to Trafalgar this past May, and it will probably surprise no one that the seed sellers and the birds are long gone. There are in fact signs telling you not to feed them, but I'm not sure I even saw any. The place was spotless and sparkling. The whole city is getting ready for the Olympics, of course, and some very impressive public toilets have been added to that area. Even without health concerns, they do not want bird shit all over everything.

I have a vague sense that the pigeon's reputation for spreading disease is not entirely unearned. I believe they are especially hazardous to people with HIV. I don't mean to make light of potential health hazards. I don't feed them, unlike some people in my neighborhood. But I still love them. I love their iridescent heads, their coral eyes, and their little cooing sounds (I'm specifically talking about Rock Doves, which are one of the breeds lumped under 'pigeon'). I love the patterns they make in the sky, especially at sunrise or sunset, when their silver under-wings catch the light like mirrors. There's a big flock of them that hang out by my subway stop, near the grocery store. The shows they put on in the late afternoon have helped me decompress more than once.

Swans in Galway Bay

The birds I really fell in love with back in '72 though, were swans. They charmed me in all the ways they've charmed people for centuries. They were the things I would draw obsessively for the next few years. (I never spent any time drawing gulls up close, but no seascape was complete without a few M shapes flying in the sky.)

Swans seemed magical. I've never heard them referred to as rats with wings. They're so big and graceful, and that white plumage looks so clean. Maybe they don't intrude on human spaces quite as aggressively. But I bet it's mostly that long neck and sparkling feathers that gets them a free pass.

Galway Bay

I've actually heard a lot of animals equated with rats. Crows, starlings, sparrows, basically any plentiful bird (especially if it's noisy) gets the label. Squirrels are rats with fluffy tails. In the Methow Valley gardeners are forced to surround their plots with ten foot fences to have any hope of eating some of their own produce, and drivers are divided into two categories --those who have hit a deer, and those who have not yet hit a deer (I narrowly missed one; scared me out of a year's growth). So, deer are, understandably, rats with hooves.

Riverside by the Hudson

I found myself thinking about all this last week as I walked by the Hudson. The flock of Canada Geese in residence here had, for some reason, tripled in size. You may recall it was a Canada Goose at LaGuardia airport that brought down that airplane about two years ago. The plane landed in the river not too far from here. Some of these Geese might even have witnessed it. Maybe they learned a valuable lesson.

Evening Commute

I have no specific memory of my first Canada Goose. Perhaps the event just wasn't that charged. The sound of them honking overhead as they flew by in big V's was always a stirring part of my Autumn, but I don't remember seeing them on the ground much.

My first experience dealing with them in big numbers was in Seattle. One encountered them by Lake Washington. I thought they were beautiful, but was less enamoured of the guano-covered lawns one had to navigate to get to the beach. Naturally they've been designated rats with wings too. (I read something recently that claims the population exploded in the 60s, when hunters began breeding them so as to have more things to shoot at. If this is true, I have a lot less sympathy for the complaints that there are too many of them.)

Perhaps simply because of their greater numbers, I found their behavior intriguing. For a while they paddled back and forth in the water, seemingly with great purpose but no destination. Then they began flying up onto the shore, again giving the impression of maintaining a schedule ('and team Bravo...mooooove out!') or observing some kind of protocol. Eventually they were all on land, looking for any space where the snow had been blown off the grass. I love the sumi-ink look of their heads, the hues of walnut in their wings, and the way their white breasts seem to glow against the snow. Seeing hundreds of them all together, with their funny bow-legged strut, taking turns standing guard, I realized that I was feeling a sense of bounty. I felt wealthy, for lack of a better word. In addition to whatever romantic memories they trigger, the sheer number of them, whether gulls, pigeons, swans, or geese appeals to me. I feel the same thing looking at a field of violets. I love single violets, but how much better is it to have them by the hundreds? Part of what makes these animals rats is their ubiquity, of course. So, instead of denigrating them for being ratlike, I began to think maybe I should give rats another look-in.

I do not care for rats especially. I know they spread disease. They don't quite inspire the revulsion in me that they do in others, but I'd rather they stayed out of sight and out of my space. Their pink naked tails do gross me out. I doubt that's going to change. But maybe they deserve some credit for, I don't know, tenacity maybe? Neil Gaiman does something fun with them in his book Neverwhere. In the complicated society of London Below, rats are an aristocratic race that humans are proud to serve. It's mostly played for comedy of course (the main character, coming from our world of London Above, never learns their language, and takes his sweet time getting over his disgust) but it still made me think warm, fuzzy thoughts about rats for a brief time.

Tramping down this path started to make me rethink all sorts of things. I love bees, butterflies, praying mantises, lady bugs, crickets and fireflies, but the sight of just one lumbering, prehistoric water bug in my apartment inspires such an atavistic rage, I can't rest until I've reduced the thing to its component molecules. It's more than just "I don't want that in my house." Crickets and lady bugs have ended up in my house and I still find them charming. No rage is triggered, there's no lunging for a shoe to pound them into oblivion.

I kept wandering down this line of reasoning. I don't eat a lot of meat any longer (poulty and seafood only), but the thought of eating cow or pig doesn't disgust me. I've never tried horse, or deer, but those thoughts don't disgust me either. So why is the thought of eating dog or cat horrifying? I ate rabbit in the past quite happily, so it isn't just the pet thing. Besides, I've actually gotten to know some cows, pigs and chickens, and they often have rather nice personalities too.

I wouldn't say I have any earthshaking conclusions to draw here. I'm a product of my culture as much as the next person. But I felt like I'd made some kind of discovery that day. Perhaps it's as simple as noticing the mundane, truly seeing--and appreciating-- something I see every day. Gulls could be rats with wings, or they could be the magical evocation of castles by the sea they were when I was seven. Canada Geese could be enormous poop machines or they could be a whisper of wilderness in my urban landscape. Is this just taking a glass-half-full approach? Works for me.

Christmas Visit

2011-01-07T14:55:00.002-05:00

Christmas was a wonderful retreat for me this year, as it usually is. Bill came along for the whole time, allowing himself to be dropped in the deep end of the Laceyland pool for almost two weeks. He seemed to handle it okay, claims he even enjoyed himself. He says I only drove him crazy in 'good ways'. That works. I think crazy is a unavoidable part of life with me; one might as well enjoy it.

This holiday also gave me a sense that the Year of Firsts, IE the first year after James' death, was truly over. It's not that we didn't miss him, a lot, but speaking just for myself, I felt like there weren't as many emotional ambushes this time. His appearances were rarely surprising; the heartache still hit, but didn't hit unexpectedly. And yes, there is some comfort in that. I think I'm starting to know what the new normal looks and feels like.

For the first time in maybe thirty years I made an Advent calendar, using photos instead of drawings for the windows, and consciously included several pictures of James, looking cheerful and festive. They helped me, I hope they didn't pain anyone else. We also made Christmas cookies this year. That had been a ritual for the siblings in the past, but last year Mary and I just didn't have it in us. This year we felt up to it though, and had a good time. Bill's involvement was also a nice addition.

This is not to say that James didn't put in any surprise appearances. If you've been following his story, you know about his habit of adding to Mary's (hotly denied) cork collection. It started out simply with him handing her the cork of every bottle of wine they shared ("this is for thy collection"), progressed to hiding corks throughout her home (I found one in the bottle of ibuprofen the day of his memorial) and reached full expression in elaborate cork sculptures (including entire villages of people welcoming her back from a semester abroad) left prominently displayed in her home any time he cat-sat. Tony got into the act soon after he and Mary started dating; when they still lived separately they hid corks in each other's homes.

It was reasonable to assume that all corks had, by this point, been found. But not so fast. For Christmas dinner, which this year was at held at Hazelthorne, I was sitting in my usual seat at the dining table, when I noticed something above window lintel. See below.

See it? No, probably not. From this angle I can't really see it either. That is part of the genius. From most angles, sitting or standing, it's usually hidden by a shadow, the curtain rod, or both. This is even more true if you're 5'10" or taller, as both Mary and Tony are. Here, let me get a bit closer.

There we go. See that? Below the curtain rod, on top the lintel, left of the support bar? This is the angle from my seat at the table. When I pointed it out, Mary and Tony looked at each other.
"Did you do that?"
"No, did you?"
"Nope."

We're pretty sure it was James. And it's just been sitting there, maybe for years, waiting for someone to notice it. It really is a clever place to put one. The closer one is to the window, the less likely it is one will see it. Mary had put up that ornament and string of stars just a few days before, but standing at the window, the cork is virtually invisible. Anyone sitting on that side of the table is facing the wrong way. From Mary's seat the curtain rod blocks it completely. It's pretty much hidden if one is sitting at either end of the table too. My seat is really the easiest place to see it, and that chair only gets used if there are five or more people at the meal. During daylight hours, if one isn't just blinded by the light from the window, one is probably watching the birds and squirrels in the back yard, or watching the cat watch them. At night that part of the wall is usually in shadow. I'd sat at this seat at least twice before during this visit alone, and never saw the damn cork.

No, I think it was James. Putting in an appearance at Christmas dinner.

Okay, yes, maybe a friend of Mary's or Tony's started playing the game, and put it there recently. The story of James and corks is well-known by this point among our circle. But even if that proves to be true*, I don't really care. Whether it was him or not, it still brought James into the holiday meal in a funny, loving, which is to say characteristic, way. In response, Mary told me a story I'd never heard before, about picking up pennies. According to one superstition, pennies found at random are gifts sent to us by deceased loved ones. This is where the phrase 'pennies from heaven' comes from. I don't know how I'd missed this story previously, since I've been picking up lucky pennies for my own reasons for about sixteen years. This may not sell me on the idea of heaven, but it may have deepened my relationship with corks. They periodically made me think of him in the past sixteen months obviously, but from now on I suspect they will always feel like something more, a hug and kiss out of the blue perhaps, from my goof of brother.

*If you did it, or know who did, don't be afraid to 'fess up. We can handle it.

Two Rivers

2010-11-23T12:48:00.002-05:00

This is another video shot with my little Palm Pre phone, hence the vaguely impressionist look. I'm standing in Riverbank State Park, overlooking the Hudson, New Jersey, Riverside Park, the George Washington Bridge, Harlem and Washington Heights, and finally, the Westside Highway.

Riverbank sits atop a sewage treatment plant, and the smell was quite strong that day. I think that's why I had both Riverbank and Riverside largely to myself, despite the fact that it was a beautiful Saturday afternoon.

Remembering Stachio

2010-11-07T20:06:00.004-05:00

I met Stachio in the fall of '85, when I was his hall convenor. Wow, right there in that first sentence there's so much to explain. I'll start with the simple stuff; at my college, the dorms had a system of peer counselors. Each hall would have a hall convenor or a resident counselor who had received training in active-listening techniques and was charged with being the first point of contact between students (in particular first years) and the Student Development Office. Our purpose was to be safe people for students to talk to about any problems they might be having: annoying roommates, homesickness, the pressures of school, anything. We'd listen, help if we could, or direct them to more qualified people if that was warranted. We also kept an eye out for red flags of any kind. Student Development stressed we were not RAs like other schools had; we were not expected to be police officers, writing people up for rule infractions. We were encouraged to do all we could to create a sense of community, but mostly we were just supposed to be available to listen if anyone needed to talk.

So, that was my job, along with my roommate Peter. Before the first years arrived, we were asked to write them letters, introducing ourselves and explaining our role. When I got the list of names, I noticed something odd. One room had only one name, Sharon Kimery. Singles were a coveted commodity at my school, as they no doubt are at most schools. Generally only seniors got them. Juniors might get one if they had a really great number in the housing lottery. Sophomores never got one. And a first year student? An incoming first year? Absolutely unprecedented.

But to be honest I didn't think too much about it. I figured a student had changed her mind at the last minute, and Sharon would get a roommate eventually, like all the other first years. When we gathered to prepare for New Student Week however, I learned a bit more from an unofficial (but convincing) source. Sharon was a woman who wanted to be a man. At his boarding school he had had a lot of conflicts as long as he was forced to have female roommates, but the minute he was given a single, he calmed down. So, Student Development and housing had decided to maintain this approach.

Which brings us to the second thing in that first sentence that needs some explaining. I consciously chose to use the male pronoun in writing about Stachio. Doing so is, shall we say, a bit revisionist. I did NOT think of Stachio as a man when I met him. In telling this story, I debated which was better; respect his self-identity--as I would now--or admit my own ignorance at the time, when I saw him as a troubled and confused woman? To honor his memory, I decided to go with the former path. I'll be addressing my own ignorance plenty.

I can't remember when I learned that he preferred to be called Stachio, but I thought it an intriguing choice. I wondered if choosing something unfamiliar to most Midwesterners (Stachio was from Michigan) was a way of taking a boy's name, but not being too obvious about it. Whatever the motivation, we all called him Stachio. I don't think anyone ever called him Sharon, at least not in my hearing. Another student (also a woman, but not, as far as I know, transgender) went by the name Voltaire: this was, after all, college. We'll call you whatever you want us to call you. What the hell.

Stachio had gone on a Wilderness program the college offered before the start of each school year, so he came into school having already made some friends. He was sturdily built, squat and strong-looking, with a low-affect voice and a no-nonsense attitude. He seemed a bit stand-offish at first, but not lacking in humor. As a fellow Midwesterner, I recognized the template of manhood Stachio was working with.

Student Development had still given me no reason to think there was anything noteworthy going on here. But whatever my intentions or motivations, I decided to try to draw him out. The easiest way to do this, of course, was to ask him to split a Dominoe's Pizza with me.
It didn't really take much to get him talking about himself, though he never, then or at any other point, addressed any gender issues with me. But he told me about his vision of a good life. Stachio thought a life of pure reason and logic was the way to go. He didn't see the point of emotions and friendships. Star Trek's Mr. Spock was his ideal. He didn't believe he'd be completely without human contact, however. He said in high school he had been friends with a guy who shared his non-emotion approach to life. They could hang out, or not, without fanfare or explanation. The connection was clearly important to him, but there wasn't any fussiness around it. Stachio hated fussiness. He was particularly disdainful of women as a group, mainly because of their messy emotionalism (that was as near as he got to telling me he was NOT female). He was sure that there was another friend like that out there for him, waiting to be found. The way he talked about this future friend was almost mystical. He knew they would simply recognize one another when they met for the first time. (He told me a few weeks later that he had met the mystical Mr Spock friend--a guy working in admissions--but a few weeks after that he lamented that he must have been wrong; there had been no corresponding reaction from the other guy, no recognition of their special bond.)

I should explain who I was at this point. I was still very much in the closet. I had never used the word 'gay' to describe myself to another person. A life free of messy human emotions and contacts such as Stachio described was, in fact, rather close to the vision I'd had in my head for the past six years. Unlike him, however, I was just beginning to question it. I had been willing, in high school, to act friendly with people, allow them to think of me as their friend, but I always felt my enormous secret stood in the way of us ever truly being close, and it always would. My last year in high school and first year of college, however, I began forming bonds that shook up my plan. I wanted to be close to these people, and if that required exposing my deep dark secret, well, we might want to give it some thought. I was, in short, considering joining the human race. Hearing Stachio describe an even more extreme version of my hermit plan was illuminating, and frankly, horrifying.

Stachio and I never had any more heart-to-hearts, assuming that's even a fair description of this conversation. The static in my own head continued to grow, until I finally did come out to four of my closest friends near the end of that term. I came out to my family over the Christmas break, told a handful of other close friends at the beginning of second term, then began living as if it was common knowledge. Actually I had sort of banked on it being juicy fodder for the school rumor-mill, but apparently that never happened. Whatever. In any case, coming out was a quiet, modest, and singularly-lacking-in-drama event for me. Being out would continue to have its complications--hell, it does still--but coming out, that went pretty smoothly.

So, with this experience under my belt, I looked at Stachio with some well-meaning but misguided ideas. For one thing, my process of self-acceptance had involved examining my own gender non-conformity. Any guy who has ever been identified as a sissy, regardless of his sexual orientation, has probably wondered about his manliness. Hell, probably every guy at some point has had some serious worries about his manliness. It's a remarkably fragile thing, when you think about it. You can lose it by crossing your legs the wrong way, by letting your voice go too high, by carrying your books the wrong way, looking at your fingernails the wrong way, etc. I'm not going to get into a discussion of the distinction between sex and gender, but suffice it to say, I had come to recognize that while I didn't conform to my society's construction of masculinity, I was, in fact, a man, and comfortable saying so, no matter how many bracelets I might wear. (That was my big statement of androgyny back then: lots of bangles. Ooh, daring! Also real jingly.)

One of the biggest reasons I finally came out was simply because I was finally meeting some openly gay and lesbian folks, many of whom were quite cool. (There were, of course, no out kids in my high school, and one kid who was almost certainly gay also happened to be a bit of a sociopath. That was a wee bit of a deterrent.) In particular there was a thriving lesbian scene, with many women tipping pretty far on the dyke scale, who seemed happy and comfortable in their skins. To my casual observation, they looked and sounded a lot like Stachio. So while I never said as much to him, in my head I kept thinking "Oh honey, just be a dyke!"

I was glad to see though that he seemed to be collecting friends, including some women. Clearly he had begun to reexamine his disdain. I was especially pleased when I saw him hanging out with a woman I suspected was lesbian (she confirmed my suspicion a few years later). Stachio even helped me mediate a conflict between the two guys living in the room next to him. Not only did this require he get involved in messy emotions, he told me he was friends with them both and didn't see why they couldn't get along. There was no self-consciousness about using the word 'friend', no awareness that it might appear to contradict his policy as previously reported. That made me happy too, though of course I didn't draw any attention to it.

As the year progressed, Stachio's friendships appeared to grow in number and depth, though again, we never discussed them. I have no idea what his thoughts were. Was he beginning to reconsider the Mr. Spock path? Did he see these friendships as real and valuable? And how did this affect his view of himself? Oh, I'd almost forgotten another aspect of Staccio's self-creation. He let it be known that he was the bastard child of a British noble and an Australian peasant. The noble family, disdaining his plebian breeding and bastardy, had initially denied him, but had recently made contact because he was their sole heir. Stachio came back from Christmas break with a picture of the castle and estate; his Australian accent, faint but noticeable before, had gotten a booster shot. So this story, mostly hinted at but widely disseminated, became, I think, another way to keep people both intrigued and at arm's length. I don't know how many of us bought it (seriously? British nobility?), but it probably added another layer of protection between us and his gender issues.

I knew Stachio was in therapy with a psychologist I also suspected (again, correctly) was lesbian. I can only hope that she was more enlightened than I was, and wasn't trying to convince Staccio "just to be a dyke." But I doubt I was the only well-meaning person in his life who thought that. And who knows how much he picked up on and internalized that message? To the best of my knowledge he was never bullied or called names at Earlham. But who knows better than I how powerful an internalized message can be?

That summer Stachio, like many students, stayed in town to work on campus. I have no idea what that Summer was like for him. I was caught up in my own summer jobs, and was getting ready to spend a semester in Ireland. Besides, he and I weren't close. I wasn't someone he confided in, assuming he confided in anyone. So I don't know what led him to buy a gun and shoot himself fatally in the head. I don't know if anything could have been done to prevent him from making that choice. How far back would we have to go?

There was a suicide note, but the only thing I can remember learning was that it included an apology for lying about his ancestry. He was not, of course, British nobility. He was adopted and had lived all his life in Michigan. He said something about lies being dreams of what could be.

Stachio's picture was included in the next yearbook, as an 'in memorium.' He was identified as Sharon (Staccio) Kimery. It was still a few more years before I learned enough to be saddened by that, to see it as misguided, however innocently. I don't know, presumably never will, exactly how Stachio saw himself. Did he consider himself a man, end of story? Did he feel some step needed to be taken before his true self could emerge? Had he and his therapist been working towards that? Or had they been trying to make him accept himself as a woman? That's what I assumed at the time. What other answer was there? It was two more years before I met a transgendered adult, by coincidence also female-to-male. I wish Stachio had gotten to meet Jason.

It Gets Better: Why Saying this Matters

2010-11-04T15:35:00.002-04:00

The recent spate of suicides by LGBT youth struck a deep chord with me, as it did with so many. It stirred up memories of my own adolescence when suicide seemed like a reasonable 'solution' to being gay. The sense of isolation, even for someone with as many privileges and good luck as I had, was easy to tap back into. Maybe in my case it was mostly in my head (the actual incidents of violence were rare), but that didn't make it any less toxic. Looking back I'm flabbergasted at how fully I had internalized the message I, like every other kid, was immersed in. The thoughts in my head were evil; the attractions I felt were disgusting. The urges had to be killed and if that weren't possible, maybe I needed to be.  Had I been brave enough to talk to my parents, I probably would have gotten help and support sooner (I repeat, I was luckier than most), but the idea of discussing this with them at the time seemed about as reasonable as growing a pair of wings.

So I was heartened when Dan Savage and his husband Terry started the YouTube channel called It Gets Better. I thought it had some very clever things going for it. One of the saddest things affecting LGBT youth is the fact that very often the adults in their lives believe that they are protecting their kids if they deny them access to information, resources, and positive adult role models. They believe being LGBT is a choice, a bad one, and the best way to protect their kids from choosing it is to talk about our lives and us only in terms of disgust, fear and yes, hate. That's if they talk about it at all. Any attempt to present our lives to children in a positive manner will almost certainly garner the accusation of 'indoctrination' sooner or later. Way too many people still believe that 'homosexual' is synonymous with 'pedophile', so naturally we can't be allowed direct contact with children. Even if parents don't take the misinformation to this degree, many of them feel that challenging their opinions on this matter doesn't just challenge their politics or religion, it commits the worst crime of all: questioning their parenting.

But this brings up one of the reasons I found Dan and Terry's plan so clever. They're not contacting any kids. They didn't get anywhere near any of them. They simply left a message in a bottle to be found by any kid who might be interested, and encouraged the rest of us to leave our own messages. They didn't say "your parents are wrong," though they did both mention that their families came around after initial disapproval. And while acknowledging how terrifying or overwhelming life can feel for LGBT kids, they made a point of stressing just how wonderful their adults lives have been.

Okay, I knew there were would be some objections even from supportive folks and they came right on schedule. Many of the earliest videos I saw suggested that all one had to do was get through high school, for example. The implication seemed to be that high school was the only problem, college was in every kid's future, and that would inevitably involve an escape into a place of greater tolerance. I do think things tend to improve for people once they reach majority; if you're an adult, you simply have more say in your life. But not every kid is going to college. Not every kid can escape her parents' grip the minute she turns 18. Not every kid can afford to run away to the big city, especially when the job market is as bad as it is these days.

But that revealed another hidden strength of this approach.  Anyone who felt the videos were misleading, or coming from a place of privilege could respond by making his or her own video.  For now anyway the Internet is not a zero-sum game. If you feel like your story isn't being told, you can tell it yourself. Sure Dan and Terry reserve the right to recommend certain videos, and that may shape which ones get more attention, but chances are good any reasonably computer-literate kid will be able to find videos that speak closely to her experience.

Okay, there are still some privileges involved. We're assuming (or hoping) that the intended audience will have unsupervised access to the Internet, or supportive adults who will allow or encourage access.  This is likely to exclude the group of LGBT kids most at risk. Many studies find that self-identified LGBT kids account for 40% of all homeless kids. Most studies of the general population figure LGBT folks make up somewhere between 5 and 10%. Even if this seems low, or impossible to measure (the closet is an obvious challenge to accurate reporting), it still indicates a significant disproportion. If you want to see some statistics regarding the experiences of LGBT kids, homeless or no, you can go here. Yes, it's been compiled by PFLAG (of Phoenix), which most certainly has a viewpoint and an agenda (as do I), but their statistics are scrupulously footnoted, and include documents from such radical Queer organizations as the US Department of Health and Human Services.  This page also does a good job of explaining how many kids face things far worse than just 'teasing and name-calling,' as so many opponents want to claim.

Recent brutal attacks on gay men in New York have reminded us locally that no community is truly safe, that bigotry and hatred don't disappear when one becomes an adult. I know some people have been tempted to say this gives the lie to the It Gets Better project. But the channel has a very specific agenda: ending the suicides of kids. We need to address bigotry, hate and violence in all its forms. We need to protect all potential victims. But there's something so obscene about kids beating the bigots to the punch and doing the job themselves. When we talk to kids, we always try to instill hope about their futures. Women are still raped and killed, people of color and other minorities are still murdered as well. They are still marginalized, brutalized, and in sundry ways relegated to second-class citizenship. We don't want to sugarcoat or deny those facts, but when we talk to girls and children of color, we don't just warn them about the dangers of the world, we also encourage them. Doing so isn't lying to them, it's part of the process of making their lives better, creating the world we want them to have. Telling LGBT kids that it will get better is the same process. It's valid.

I still may make a video. To be honest, I felt for a while like the middle-class, college-educated gay white guy contingent was pretty well represented, but then I remember that part of the point of things like this is numbers. The more people challenging the hatred and isolation, the better. Again, posting a video of my experience doesn't prevent anyone else with a different experience from doing it too.  And in a weird way, the privileges I had that made coming out easier for me may come with an obligation to speak up when others feel they can't.  It was out folks who paved the way for me, after all.

In the meantime I'm making a donation to the Trevor Project, the suicide hotline most often mentioned in the videos. Friend Kate mentions too that studies have revealed that arts programs in schools have a variety of beneficial effects including a lessening of bullying and violence. I don't know the specifics of that, am still going to research it, but as an arts-loving homo I am thrilled to hear it. It certainly fits with my experience. Art class, orchestra class, creative writing and drama club all were huge havens for me in high school, places where I felt accepted, even celebrated. Kate encourages us all to write our congress members asking them to bring back or protect arts programs in schools.* So that's another great step.

*Kate posted this info on Facebook, so you won't necessarily find mention of it on the blog. But you should follow the link anyway; she's a good read.

A Top Bound Notebook and a Good Pen

2010-10-10T16:36:00.000-04:00

My inner Luddite has been making an appearance lately. Oh, he's usually pretty close to the surface, I would say. I love email, certainly, and large portions of the interwebz, and while I wouldn't say I love my cell phone particularly, I find it useful more often than not. But the Luddite (what shall we call him? Don't you think he needs a name? Something Quakerly and/or Biblical, I think. Maybe Jeremiah? That's a bit grand though, and more foaming-at-the-mouth than I typically am when in Luddite mode, so how about Jerry? Yeah, let's go with that), excuse me, but Jerry has been piping up more often of late. Some of this is tied up with another message/voice I've been hearing (I don't think it's Jerry, exactly), which has been telling me to SLOW DOWN. At first I found that message perplexing. I've been gallivanting around the country and globe in the past year, it's true, but I wouldn't say I've been excessively busy, really. Yes there was work to be done in Twisp, and we did it, but there was also plenty of time for hiking, inter-tubing on the river, and having good long talks with friends over meals and wine. And Ireland? Maine? Morro Bay? The three visits I made to Indiana throughout the year? Those were vacations, clear and simple, no ifs ands or buts. So, um, I haven't been feeling overworked, exactly. So naturally I asked for clarification on the 'slow down' message, at which point the voice sighed, rolled its eyes (shut up and just go with it) and said very slowly, like I was some kind of moron or something, 'if it has an off switch, turn it off.'

Ah. That was much clearer. See, one of the side-effects of all my gallivanting was a bit of a technology diet. My email/Internet access was limited, TV even more so. As a result, I think a certain level of static in my head was allowed to dissipate. That information overload thingy that frownie-faced experts periodically feel the need to pontificate on? There might be something to it, at least in my case.

There have been two effects of this that I'm aware of so far. One is I'm being a bit more careful about my television watching even now when I'm no longer gallivanting. Actually for a ten year period (1984-94) I was rarely around a TV. There are big swaths of pop culture that someone of my generation is supposed to know, that I just, well, missed. The Golden Girls, for example. I knew of its existence, sure, but I don't think I'd ever seen an episode until my present roommate--who is something of a GG addict--moved in, and reruns became regular visitors in the apartment. Northern Exposure is another one, and that is even weirder because I was living in Seattle at the time, some of my friends guest-starred on it and I still mostly missed out on it.

Okay, before anyone gets his or her knickers in a twist, I'm not saying this like it's something to be proud of. My abstaining from television wasn't any kind of moral stance, it just kind of happened. Okay, so there was probably a point in Seattle when I and my roommates decided not to buy a TV, but it wasn't a big decision as I recall. Mostly it was just something we didn't think about. In fact during that period if I ever was around a TV, I found myself sucked into it completely, with the commercials just as captivating--if not more so--as the programming. I'd sit there, slack-jawed and drooling, watching the pretty colors, listening to the swirling sounds, and lose hours. Patrick like.

But this summer, when I once again inadvertently just didn't watch any television, I was a bit more surprised to find that I didn't miss it, didn't even notice for quite some time that it wasn't there. It's been a bigger part of my life the past twelve years, in large part because I moved into an apartment where a TV was already in residence, and I was given complete and sole control over it. So, if I'd thought about it in advance, I would have expected a hiatus to be a bit of a trial.

Probably a lot of the reason it wasn't is simply due to being in unfamiliar (spectacularly beautiful) surroundings, with other things to do. Now that I'm back in my own apartment, prone to routines that drop me in front of the boob tube, I'm trying to be a bit less of a boob, and actually choose when to be there. There are shows I like. There are things I look forward to, would prefer not to miss. My career means I could claim that I'm doing research, keeping an eye on stuff that might be sources of employment (there was a stretch of time where I only watched shows shot in NYC), but, um... that's a total crock. At least for me. And the static in my head gets substantially worse in NYC anyway, just from the sheer crackling, frantic, (neurotic) hum of the place. Making myself do other things with my evenings has been a good idea.

The other thing Jerry has me waxing nostalgic over is writing longhand. Okay, that leaves out some key steps. I've been recognizing how rare it is for me to write or receive longhand letters any longer. My mailbox here ceased being a source of joy many years ago, since its output is almost exclusively bills, catalogues I didn't request and don't want, bulk mailings from politicians, and lots of random stuff for people who haven't lived here for over twelve years, if ever. And I can't really complain, because I'm not writing letters any longer either. I did for a long time after college. I was still a pretty good letter writer even after I moved to New York. Then email took over, and the instant gratification, coupled with the luxury of the word processing feature made it a much more attractive option.

That would be okay too, if that were still the case. I've had some very satisfying email correspondances over the years. But for reasons I can't quite explain, most people have stopped writing emails now too. And I'm not so good at them any longer either. Maybe Facebook and Twitter are to blame in some way I can't quite comprehend (I'm a FB addict, but have so far avoided Twitter, precisely because I'm sure it would take over my life). So I'm missing epistolary relationships.

But unlike most other people I know, I still write longhand regularly. Every day in fact. Each morning I start off the day with three pages longhand. I've been doing it since 1992, when I read Julia Cameron's book The Artist's Way. At this point I may not buy the whole philosophy behind it, but I keep doing it because it's the closest thing I have to a meditation practice, and is pretty much the only thing I've done consistently for such a long time.

For a very long time I had to do all my creative writing by hand first. I couldn't type and think at the same time, basically I created with a pen, then became a stenographer. The one-act I wrote in 2004, Ariadne's Thread, was the first creative project I composed entirely on the keyboard. Probably it became possible because by that point I had about six years under my belt of composing emails on the keyboard. I still think my brain works differently when I write with a pen as opposed to a keyboard, but my addiction to the delete button means I'm less likely to handwrite letters any longer.

The thing I've been rediscovering recently though, is the sensual pleasures there are to writing by hand. The slow down voice and Jerry's ranting have been making me pay closer attention to it, but it was actually triggered some months back by a discovery that changed my life. The G2 Pilot bold point* black ink was the pen I didn't realize I'd been looking for all my life. The line was satisfyingly dark, the ink flowed evenly and consistently without pooling, splotching or failing to write when hitting places my fingers had rested. Apparently I'm such a greaseball that most pens can't write on any surface I have touched. But the G2, baby, it never even hesitated, sweat, oils, it rolled over them without a hitch. And miraculously, this lovely dark ink didn't end up getting smeared on the side of my hand. If you don't know what I'm talking about, ask a leftie.

Years ago I discovered legal pads with ring binders at the top (again, ask a leftie), but that didn't increase the pleasure of writing so much as lessen the annoyance. Glass half full, half empty, I suppose, and at the time I was pleased at the discovery. But these pens, whoo boy, they are a treat. Combine them with one of the notebooks and it's heaven, so much so that my stream of consciousness (or 'bilge pumping' which is what my dad calls this kind of writing) can sometimes spend a little too much time writing about how fun it is to be writing. How much I love the pen, the notebook, the way it makes my handwriting look, etc. OH, that's another funny thing: in case you're thinking I have beautiful handwriting, let me hasten to correct that misconception. Most people find it virtually illegible. I have, on more than one occasion, been accused of writing with my foot. It's probably for the best that my handwritten documents are usually for my eyes only. That said, I do like my handwriting more when I'm using the G2. Somehow the letters are just rounder, more even, more elegantly shaped. I don't know how a pen would affect that, but it does. My handwriting changes dramatically, at least to my eye, depending on what pen I'm using. I think another aspect of the G2's ink is that it flows quickly too. It keeps up with the speed of my hand more than any pen I've come across before. It just feels good.

No, Pilot is not paying me for this testimonial. If the folks in charge (the pilots of Pilot, as it were) were inclined to send me free pens, a lifetime supply say, I certainly wouldn't take that amiss. But no, this rave review is unsolicited, heartfelt and sincere. I love these babies.

These sorts of things are quite personal of course. this summer, after seeing a cool drawing my friend Kathleen did with a pen, I showed her the G2 and raved a bit, but she had already used one and didn't care for it. Drawing with a pen is different than writing with one I suppose, but she probably also just has different wants and needs from her tools. Other things work better for her hand.

So you may not find the G2 to be anything special, assuming you're even the type of person to get excited about this sort of thing. But that's part of the fun in all this for me too, the personal, idiosyncratic opinions we develop. We all may have different needs and wants from our keyboards too, how hard we want to hit, how far apart we want the keys, what we want the tilt of the board to be, that probably affects us all in very personal ways, whether we notice it or not. But at least for me, it just doesn't give me the same satisfaction as a good pen. I can't help but wonder if key neural pathways, maybe some very old, important ones, get activated for me when I'm enjoying the act of writing itself. Whatever else is at play, anytime I get this much pleasure from an item that costs less than $2 and can fit in my pocket, I feel pretty lucky.

*The medium point is nice too.

It's the Audience, Stupid

2010-09-27T21:57:00.001-04:00

Yes, the audience. That was one of the most satisfying aspects of Tuesdays with Morrie, we kept clearly in mind who we were doing this play for. That probably sounds silly, doesn't it. Who else does one do a play for? Let me explain.

Sunset during a forest fire, as seen from the patio.

We were the only professional theatre in the whole valley, population (I believe) approximately 3000. This was definitely an advantage, but does not mean we could take the audience for granted. The Playhouse worked very hard at publicity: posters, newspaper articles, a radio ad, and word-of-mouth. We knew we couldn't assume anything. Our opening weekend we were competing with a very impressive local chamber music festival. A local gastropub hosts live music at least four nights a week with bands both local and regional. Sure, the closest cinemas were forty-five minutes away, but people out there are used to driving long distances. A weekend in Seattle (three hours away) was not unheard of. And netflix is everywhere. We had competition.

Goat's Peak

That said, we were still the only theatre in town, and that definitely worked in our favor. There's something to be said for novelty. The play itself also generated attention; people knew the book, or movie, possibly had even seen the play when it ran in Seattle, so a buzz had started even before any of us arrived. That gave us all a bit of an unexpected lift right at the start.

The hike to Blue Lake

We (specifically the out-of-towners, namely the actors and me) also began getting to know people in town, most of whom made clear they were looking forward to seeing what we accomplished. My favorite example: at one point Isaiah (Mitch) got pulled over because of a burned-out headlight. Once their business was completed, the sheriff asked what brought him to the area and when he learned about the play, he got rather excited. He loved the book, apparently, and promised he come see the show (I'll have to ask if he showed up).

One of my outdoor offices.

Because of this the potential audience began to collect specific faces and specific biographies for us. We knew who had lost loved ones in the last year or two, who was worried about aging parents, who was questioning her career path, who simply loved theatre. One of the dominant themes in the play is the importance of giving to others. Perhaps any work of art ought to keep this in mind, but when it was right there in the writing, when it was, in fact one of the themes I chose to emphasize, it made keeping the audience in mind that much easier.

Another sunset viewed from the patio. Yes, there's a plastic lawn goose in the sage.

We knew we were dealing with a sophisticated audience-base. Any temptation we might have felt to condescend to this crowd as a bunch of credulous yokels was quickly quashed. These were people who knew good art, good theatre, and they'd know if we gave them something sub-par. But they were also coming prepared to enjoy the work. They were giving us the benefit of the doubt. They were NOT coming to prove their artistic bona fides by --as John (Morrie) put it-- "disagreeing with choices."

On the way to 30 mile (?)

I can't tell you how freeing that is. I wouldn't say I've played for a lot of cynical, overly-judgemental audiences. Usually my only complaint is that they're too small. But New York audiences can be rather jaded. Going to work each day with the sense that we were building something many people were looking forward to, were assuming would be at least worthy, was a pleasure I haven't had in a while.

Still Another Sunset as seen from the patio. This became a ritual for me. In case you hadn't noticed.

I think I can humbly say that we fulfilled their hopes. I haven't found out what the final numbers were, (and it's a simple financial fact the Playhouse needed to sell as many tickets as possible), but it was gratifying to sense the energy in the room each of the four shows I attended. I wasn't just pleased at the reaction the play got, it was a joy being in a theatre that felt rooted in a community. People came expecting to have a good night out, and the play was only part of it. Intermission --which typically run for ten minutes, fifteen at the most, in most theatres-- was twenty minutes at the Merc, not because the space was so huge, not because it was so hard for people to get in and out of their seats or the building, not for any logistical reasons at all but because audience members knew one another and wanted time to socialize. This was a night out, an event, in a way that felt (here's one of those words I love) archetypal.

Approaching Storm, same viewpoint.

This experience reaffirmed some of the fundamental joys of live performance for me. In some ways I haven't had this experience since I was in college. Being connected to a community, having that community's issues, questions, struggles and tendencies (good or bad) in mind while plays were chosen and produced, that felt relevant. Maybe I'm simply describing the pleasures of being a big fish in a small pond, but I think that's not the whole story. In a place as huge and saturated with live performance as New York City, it's hard to keep such things in mind. In NYC it's also easy to let business or career concerns overwhelm or waylay one. Instead of thinking about connecting with an audience, giving them a gift, one obsesses over whether the right people, important people are in the audience, people who might be able to give one other, more ambitious (satisfying, lucrative, wider-reaching, more stable, longer running...) work. I have a lot to say about work as-career-stepping-stone, but I think I'll save that for later. For now, I'm focusing on the gratitude I feel for lessons relearned, and possibly inspiration rekindled.

My house and the town of Twisp

For another artist's thoughts on some of these same issues, stop by friend Jeff's blog right here, if you haven't already.

Priming the Pump: My Director's Notes

2010-09-26T14:59:00.003-04:00

Friend Marta was here for a few days of writing, and it was the first chance we'd had in several months to catch up face-to-face. Both of us had fairly eventful summers, so we had a lot to talk about. I got closer to articulating some of the satisfactions of the job in Twisp, but much of it is still clogged in my brain. My talking is only slightly better than my writing these days. There are a number of reasons for this, I know, but at this point simple atrophy from disuse is probably the biggest culprit.

(The Merc Playhouse on Glover St, Twisp, WA.)

So, I'm still plugging away, trying to crystallize the experience at least for my own edification (can't make it happen again if I don't know what 'it' was), and I expect explaining myself here will prove to be the useful tool it's been in the past. In the meantime, in the hopes of priming the pump, I'm posting my director's notes from the play's program. Facebook friends will recognize these photos, taken with my shmancy new phone; I'm posting them here for non-FB users (hi Dad!) to see.

June 2009, two days after his 41st birthday, my brother James was killed in a car accident. In the days that followed, I realized that running through my grief was a sense that such an obvious mistake had to come with an option to appeal. Something so drastic, so permanent had to include at least one do-over.

(Alfalfa in Twisp Park.)

It's odd, but undeniable, that something as central to the human experience as death is still terrifying and mystifying, still taboo even to discuss for most of us. Many, if faced with it before we're ready, may choose the path Mitch Albom takes with his Uncle Mike, which is to run away. It's his good fortune --and ours-- that he reconnects with his beloved teacher just as Morrie begins a close and personal study of death. It doesn't take long before they both realize that looming behind the question of how one prepares for death is another, perhaps more daunting question; am I living a good life? Naturally this triggers a storm of related (and equally daunting) questions. Do I want the things I'm chasing? Do I even know what they are? What place does ambition hold in my life? Is my work fulfilling or diminishing me? Who are my loved ones? When did I last show them what they mean to me?

Just to name a few.

(Twisp River, as seen from the Town Park.)

If you're like Mitch (or me) you may find that as you set off in pursuit of your goals, you got a bit off track. The demands of daily life can overwhelm and distract us, but a more insidious force may also be at play; when we deny death, it becomes that much easier to deny life.

Kind soul that he is, Morrie doesn't abandon us with these questions, he shares the answers he lived his way into. Most of those answers will sound familiar; wise and compassionate people have said the same things in every culture for centuries. Unfortunately so have many movies-of-the-week and Hallmark cards. This makes them easy for Mitch, me, and possibly you to dismiss. But Morrie finds his way past the sentimentality to the core of the answers, reclaiming their deeper resonance. Few of us know when we'll die, but we all have the ability to build the lives we want, with humility, humor and --this is key-- the help of others.

That brings up another unfortunate aspect of death; it can easily tempt us to isolate ourselves. The real solutions, however, lie in community. And few places lend themselves better to such explorations (or adventures) than does a theatre.

So, that's where I was six weeks ago. Having a place to work, good people to work with and something worth saying was incredibly satisfying. Having an audience to connect with was even more so. That's the topic I've been circling fruitlessly around for days now, but I think I'll be able to make some sense of things soon.

(Forest Fire sunset, as seen from the house where I stayed.)

Burren: The Close View

2010-09-06T20:35:00.002-04:00

Here, as promised, are some of the closer details I caught during our walks on the Burren. I learned the names of the unfamiliar flowers while I was there, but in the intervening two months I've forgotten most of them. Help, as always, is much appreciated.

The Ireland trip is already feeling like it was a dream. Hell, the month I just spent working in Eastern Washington feels like it happened a gazillion years ago, to some other lucky bastard. With all the globe-trotting I've been doing recently (and this past year broke all personal records for plane travel alone), it's a little disconcerting how quickly places start to seem unreal. I discussed this with my friend Mark while I was in Twisp, since at that point, New York seemed like an impossibility. I seriously thought I had lived there? For like, fifteen freakin' years? Me? Gimme a break.

Here I am though, back in Manhattan. Like, in my apartment, and everything. Whacky.

I'm not sure what this tendency towards amnesia says about me. Maybe it's a zen thing, a recognition that only this place and time, the one I'm in right now, is real.

Yeah, why don't we go with that? What the hell.

Not sure what these photos are in aid of then, though. Or this blog. Hm.

Words still aren't coming easily for me. I'm still having to take it slowly. Still not sure what all this gallivanting adds up to. But damn it has been a lot of fun. I'm off to Maine this week, for a few days. More walking. More looking. More conversations and glasses of wine with loved ones. I may not know what all this adds up to, but I do know I'm one lucky bastard.

(Re)gaining Perspective: Burren, the Long View

2010-08-21T14:28:00.003-04:00

What an overwhelming four months I've had. I've been some amazingly beautiful places, met some wonderful people, got to do some satisfying work.

And I've walked. And looked. Lots of looking. There's been so much to see. There have been some wonderful, important conversations as well, often combined with the walking and looking, but I'm having a hard enough time synthesizing stuff as it is, so for now I'm going to stick just with the walking and looking.

In case it wasn't clear, these images are picking up where I left off in Ireland. Mary and I spent four days on or near the Burren, in Co. Clare. Its name comes from the Irish for 'rocky place'. One might expect a culture as poetic as the Irish to come up with a more lyrical term, but I hope these images show you just how the name really couldn't be anything else.

There's a guy who believes he has strong evidence that J.R.R Tolkien based his image of Morder on this place, and true or not, it's a believable claim. Big shelves of limestone have been eroding for millennia, resulting in a lunar landscape of natural roads, spirals, and shallow lakes that feels endless. Mary and I wonder if our mid-western upbringing means we have an easier time than some appreciating the austere beauty of places like this, but fact is lots of people gravitate towards the Burren. More than one writer mentions a sense of great age and magic about the place. There just seems to be a special energy.

A later post will show you some of what we saw when looking close up; we were lucky to hit right at the height of wildflower season, which this area is known for. That eroded limestone soaks up sun, resulting in millions of protected microclimates. This the only place in the world where one can find alpine, arctic and Mediterranean plants growing side by side. It meant I got a second season of dog violets, for one thing.

Dividing this time up into long view and short view has everything to do with the fact that I was on foot. In contrast, the train Mary and I took from Hollyhead to London was one of the Virgin Atlantic highspeed trains; after three weeks spent mostly walking, I found myself annoyed at how fast we were going. I couldn't SEE. Mostly what that meant was, I couldn't get any decent photographs, but I also simply felt like there was too much going by for me to take it in. I was missing out on stuff.

I know there is a chance all this images will look alike. One of the risks of digital cameras I now realize is, that freedom to take endless shots means one often does just that. When you're walking, things look different every twenty feet or so, or at least that's how it feels. The Norman tower I showed you in the last Ireland post was looming intriguingly on the horizon for a least an hour. We eventually decided to walk to it because it drew our gazes. One can take a lot of photos of a single image in an hour. (Its presence behind a herd of cows for much of the walk didn't hurt; Mary and I can't quite explain our penchant for photographing every cow we saw. Every. Single. Cow. Like cows are so hard to find in this country. But photograph them we did.) Being able to see things far away, then walk to them, it's hard to put my finger on why that is so satisfying. Mary and I both felt we got a glimpse of a freeing concept, namely, that if one allows enough time, one can walk almost anywhere.

My present frustration is tied up with that idea somehow too. I'm filled with experiences, and I feel overwhelmed. I need time, and quiet, to make sense of it all. I spent the last four months on a high speed train, and now I need to walk back through the memories, slowly, to see what I find. What I learned. This blog has been helpful with that process in the past, I hope it will be this time too. Thanks for stopping by, and helping me out.

Falls Creek With Dana

2010-08-12T18:17:00.001-04:00

I'm back in New York, getting reacquainted with my life here, after a fantastic month in the Methow Valley, direcing a production of Tuesdays with Morrie at the Merc Playhouse in Twisp, WA. Not even a cracked tooth could mar the joy of the experience, the beauty of the surroundings, or the loveliness of the friends old and new I encountered.

So far the weather here isn't too bad, but it promises to get nasty again in the next day or two. So here's a mini-heat break, at least for your imagination. My new friend Dana showed me this waterfall as part of a lovely day we had two Sundays ago. I wish you could feel the air (negative ions bouncing everywhere) and smell the cedar trees. Why does the scent of cedar immediately cool me off? Sigh.

I don't know why the sound cuts out before the end. The quality is not great, unless you take into account that I shot this on my Palm Pre phone. Then I think it's pretty damn impressive.

London Video

2010-07-03T12:46:00.003-04:00

This is out of sequence, coming as it does towards the end of the trip, but it's the only decent video I shot, and I felt like posting it now. Mary and I were crossing the Thames when Big Ben began striking noon. Three bells had rung before I got the camera running, but trust me, it was noon. I was pleasantly surprised by how well the mic on my little camera picked up the sound.

Review Link

2010-07-03T12:29:00.001-04:00

Bill, our friend Jeff S. and I got to see a sneak preview of The Kids are All Right on Tuesday. I have a review of it up at my other 'blog home, Queer New York. Go check it out, and if you get a chance, check out the movie. It's worth it.

The Burren: The Walk Before the Hike

2010-07-01T12:01:00.001-04:00

Visiting the Burren, Co. Clare was perhaps the most ambitious part of our trip. Ireland has a decent public transportation system (beats the doors off this country's, not that it would take much) but now we were leaving the settled areas and heading someplace that is known for its barren, rocky solitude. It's a national park with hikes threading throughout its 300km, so we wanted a town that would get us closest to the greatest number of options.

We settled on Corofin, then booked two nights in a nearby B&B. The guidebooks are all clear that a car is the easiest way to get around in the west of Ireland, but this is where we first learned how much they're written with that assumption in mind. It turned out that the 'nearby' B&B was actually in the next town over. Our landlady warned us that the house was actually about two miles from Corofin, but Mary and I decided that was an acceptable distance to walk.

Of course if you're used to driving a particular road, you estimate distances a bit differently than if you had walked it. We never did figure out how long the trip actually was, but two miles was probably low-balling it a bit, and of course that was measuring from the edge of town. Corofin is hardly a metropolis, but it still took us a little while to get from the bus stop to the city limits, when we could start the actual count.

We got directions to the B&B from the local grocery, but since there was only one road, it was just a question of asking 'do we go right or left?' It was a beautiful country road, but that also meant there were long stretches of time without any signs of any kind, and my imagination occasionally got away from me. What if the grocer meant HER left, not OUR left? Walking for two (we think it may have been closer to four) miles with unwieldy luggage is a whole lot less fun if it turns out to have been in ENTIRELY the wrong direction.

Eventually we did see signs for the town of Kilnaboy. We also saw at least three different spellings of that name on maps and signs, which is pretty typical for Anglicized versions of Irish names. When we ran into some workmen we asked for confirmation that we were on the right track. In true country fashion they didn't recognize the name of the B&B itself, but fortunately Mary remembered the family name, and that did the trick. Not too much farther down the road, one of them pulled up in his truck and offered us a lift to the place, politely refusing our offer to buy him a drink ('ah, you're all right').

We ended up getting to know that stretch of road very well. All the restaurants, pubs and grocery stores are in Corofin, so except for our hearty breakfasts, meals required a trip into town. We ended up walking between Corofin and Kilnaboy five, maybe six times. Often the trip was part of a longer hike out onto the Burren proper, so my count is a little vague.

One of nice things about walks is the way they will seem completely different from one day to the next. Even just changing direction, or the side of the road will reveal new sights. These photos are culled from the various times we walked this stretch of road. Soon I'll post photos from the 'proper' hikes.

2010-06-23T13:35:00.001-04:00

Still planning to get back to the travelogue, but if you're just dying to see some of my photos, head over to Queer New York for a visual diary of one of my Riverside Park walks.

New York Pride This Sunday

2010-06-22T12:21:00.004-04:00

Hey Fellow New Yorkers, or anyone who will be in town this coming weekend: Father Tony, the man who never seems to sleep (I don't know how else to explain his dauntingly high level of activity) is once again organizing a group to march in the Pride Parade. Bill and I will be there, and we'd love to see you. See below for the notice Tony sent out.

You are invited to march with the queer New York bloggers, writers and digital activists in the 2010 NYC Pride March on Sunday June 27.

Let me know if you'd like to join us. I'm assembling an email list for last minute info.

Our group has been assigned an advantageous assembly point and a start time near the front of the march (also we are right behind the Gotham Knights Rugby team!):

We are Group #15 in Section Two, assembling on 40th Street between Madison Avenue and Park Avenue. We step off at 11AM. If you'd like to march with us, you'll have to meet us at the assembly point before 11AM.

Last year, in front of Stonewall

Hi, it's Patrick again. Anyone, regardless of blog ownership or sexual orientation, is welcome. Well, you should be fun to be around, but I think that's the sole criterion. It should be a blast, and I promise not to complain about the heat. Well, not too much. Bill has been instructed to keep the tranquilizer dart gun primed and loaded, so at least I won't be your problem.

Day Four: The Burren

2010-06-18T19:00:00.005-04:00

Blogger is being EXTRA annoying today. Recalcitrant, arbitrary, moody and just plain bitchy. There, I said it. You're being bitchy, Blogger. What is your dang deal, anyway? Put the photos where I tell you to put them. It doesn't matter to ME if you want to load them top to bottom or bottom to top, all I ask is that you be consistent. I don't think that's a lot to ask of a computer program, or online software, or whatever the hell it is you call yourself, Blogger. It seems to me consistency is the least I should expect.

Okay, I haven't gotten back to the travelogue just yet, I'm trying to take some uncharacteristically pro-active steps to enjoying a city in warm weather. Even the fact that I just used the term 'pro-active' should tell you something. I pretty much hate that term. Not quite as much as I hate hearing 'impact' used as a verb, but it's a close deal. Anyway, I'm getting out and about, doing things, being all citified and cool and like that there, so I'm not home as much, and when I am, there is work I actually should be doing, so, well, I've been doing it. So, doing summer city stuff and work. That's my deal.

Can you tell I've been wrestling a wee bit too long with this stupid freakin' page? Oh, and while we're at it, Blogger, don't underline "freakin'" with a bright red line. I KNOW it's not a word. But I don't think you're really in a position to be worrying about my spelling, when you're not getting the basic tasks of your own work done sufficiently. How about you worry about things like loading the stupid photos in a consistent manner, and publishing text as text, not all one imaginary link, 'kay? AND YES I KNOW 'KAY ISN'T A WORD EITHER.

Okay, already written more than I intended to. There's that work I should be doing (this was supposed to be a brief mental break, and while it's been quite mental, it's hardly been brief), and the thing about freelance work is, there's no boss breathing down your neck. I think that may be the definition of 'free-lance' actually. So no one knows if you're not working until you crash and burn spectacularly, thus assuring that no one ever wants to hire you again.

I think that's part of the definition too.

Okay, this post is breaking all sorts of record for lame, but I was feeling the need to have something up on the bloggerino (yes, Blogger, not a word, thank you) that didn't involve terms like 'STD' or 'syphilis'.

Dammit.

I hope to get back here soon to write more about the trip. Days three, four and five in the Burren (YES THAT IS SO A WORD, JESUS CHRIST ON A BICYCLE), county Clare, were some of the best parts of the trip. For now I'll leave you with my little rant and some photos.

Stupid Blogger. (I gave up months ago trying to control the size of the type-face.)

The Romance of Travel: Collecting Viruses

2010-06-11T09:53:00.009-04:00

I'll be getting back to the travelogue very soon, but first, a brief sketch of my first week back.

With the exception of one very hot day, hot even for here let alone there, Ireland and London were blissfully cool. It felt like mid-Spring most of the time, mostly because it was. I only needed my sweater once, but most days I had to wear my over-shirt, and long pants were always in order. In other words it was my ideal weather, sunny and warm but not too warm during the days, at night cool enough to warrant a blanket or duvet on the bed. Bliss.

I came back to New York experiencing one of its baking periods. It wasn't strictly a heat wave, per se, I believe those require temperatures in the 90s to fit the definition, but it was hot, muggy and thoroughly unpleasant, unless you are a lizard or some kind of tropical houseplant. I am neither. I believe I am part penguin, actually. Naturally since it's five floors up and topped by a tar roof, the temperature was worse in my apartment. This time I had Bill and Mary to corroborate the rise in temperature one experiences climbing the stairs in my building. I think there could be as much as ten degree difference between the relatively cave-like lobby and my hotbox apartment.

It probably comes as no surprise to those who know me that I did not greet this change in season equably.

It came to a head last Wednesday when I went to a celebratory picnic for my friend Kate, who has graduated with a doctorate in Physical Therapy. Let's pause for a(nother) moment to congratulate her for completing what was a grueling and challenging three year period of her life. Like virtually every person I know who has received a higher degree, Kate is now convinced she knows nothing about her field, and is devoting a lot of time to compiling a list of classmates she can refer potential clients to. I think she still deserves major kudos for tackling the degree, and wrestling it into submission. I also suspect she will, in fact, be an excellent physical therapist. But don't tell her that; she's not buying it.

But back to heat. Last Wednesday things had been hot for a few days, so the tar and cement in the city had been baking for a while, with not enough time at night to cool off sufficiently. I assumed this was why I felt so miserably hot, and why my brain had turned to tapioca, rendering me unable to perform simple math, read subway maps, or make decisions of any kind, really. Once I found some air conditioning however, I became quickly chilled, chilled in a way I NEVER get, so that's when I realized I had a fever.

It was kind of a relief to discover I was actually ill, and I hunkered down to ride the flu out. Thirty-six hours later I felt pretty good, not counting the weather which was still miserable and hateful and steamy and just generally horrendously awful. At least energy and appetite had returned and I was no longer inexplicably hot, merely explicably.

Then Friday afternoon, I came down with a weird rash. Itchy, burning bumps showed up on my hands first, mostly my palms, but just as I was wondering if they were an allergic reaction of some kind (I have yet to discover any allergies, but that doesn't mean I don't have some) I realized I had the rash on my feet, mostly the soles, as well.

So, add 'itchy' to the list of things making Patrick cranky as of Friday night. Sweet wonderful Bill had gone out and found a collection of Mystery Science Theater 3000 dvds, and suggested we watch one that night in memory of James. I agreed, as long as he understood no part of my body could come in contact with any part of his body or indeed any substance that might hold or generate heat in any way (if I could levitate, and thus avoid touching the couch, I would have). I also took an antihistamine, in case this was some kind of allergic reaction, and while it did virtually nothing for the itching, it did turn me into throw pillow. I actually enjoyed the movie we watched (Santa Claus) very much, and was touched at Bill's thoughtfulness in seeking it out, but you wouldn't have known it from watching me. I lay there like a lump, a sweaty, grumpy, slightly itchy bag of hair. Lucky Bill.

The itching had decreased the next morning, and the rash didn't seem to have spread any, so I waited one more day before consulting a professional. Of course for poor Bill this meant another day of me distracted and short tempered. I was still uncomfortable (oh and the weather still sucked) but even worse, I didn't know WHY I was uncomfortable, and neither antihistamines nor hydrocortizone seemed to have any effect. This even managed to distract me from thinking about James a little bit, which I suppose could be seen as a blessing, but it wasn't, it really really wasn't.

So, bright and early Sunday morning I headed off to a drop-in clinic at 50th and Broadway. I had a sinus infection treated here once and found the whole proceeding civilized and pleasant. This visit was, if anything, even MORE civilized and pleasant. I was in and out in maybe fifteen minutes and the doctor made a confident diagnosis immediately.

"I think you have hand, foot and mouth disease." She proceeded to show me pictures on her laptop of hands that looked exactly like mine (I managed to avoid bumps on or in my mouth). My recent travel, and exposure to crowds of people (especially children), not to mention the recirculated air on the air plane, all supported this diagnosis. Turns out the flu-like symptoms the previous Wednesday had been a part of it too.

I think my skin is on a quest to collect random viruses. Two years ago it gave shingles a whirl, decided that wasn't obscure enough, so this time it went for something a bit more esoteric. Well, I had never heard of it before at any rate. Apparently it's more common for kids to get it; adults can, but more often they just spread it without actually getting symptoms. It's scary how crafty viruses can be. This, by the way, is NOT the disease cows get. That is hoof and mouth disease. In case you were wondering. I had. (Addendum: I've since had TWO people ask me "isn't that the thing cows get?" So I'm no longer feeling so dumb.)

Of course I had to ask about contagion. Remember that celebratory picnic? There were lots of wonderful people there, many of whom I hadn't seen in two to six years, so there had been much hugging and kissing. I had made a particular point of hugging and kissing my friend Dessida, who is six months pregnant with her first child. When I came down with the shingles the Nurse Practitioner had warned me to steer clear of pregnant women (and people on chemo, which was distressingly relevant at the time). I had then proceeded to fly from Indiana to New York on what appeared to be a flight chartered by a convention of Expectant Mothers. Back in NYC as I took care of chores that simply could not wait, pregnant women kept jumping out at me Ninja-like from around corners, or standing up from tables to reveal their states after we had been conducting our business for HOURS. Consequently I was a wee bit anxious this time. Dessida reacted to my news calmly though, as she does to most things in my experience, saying she sometimes thought she should just stay in a glass bubble for nine months.

Anyway, it was nice to know what I had, and since the itching had stopped that morning, all physical and mental distress was alleviated. There's no cure for it, one simply has to let it run its course, which usually takes about seven to ten days. Then Monday morning came with a significant break in the heat and I was a very happy camper. This was probably one of the most straight-forward, uncomplicated encounters with the medical industry that I had ever experienced. That was nice too. I've had lots of medical wild goose chases, where people give me their best frowny faces, make lots of vaguely worrying innuendo, suggest a fair number of expensive tests, then after I've spent money I don't have they suddenly say "nope, there's no problem, and in fact there never was, we're really not sure what this was all about." I'm more than a little distrustful of the medical industry. This experience had been refreshing from beginning to end.

Then the doctor from the clinic called, mostly just wanting to check to see how I was, but also to ask a follow-up question about the rash. See, if it was anywhere else besides the hands and feet, then there was another possibility.

"It might be syphilis."

Sigh. For some reason doctors are constantly suggesting I might have syphilis. And they never, ever believe me when I explain that most of the time it simply isn't possible. They assume I'm so embarrassed at the suggestion I might have an STD, or horrified at the thought that maybe my partner (the one they erroneously assume I have) isn't QUITE as faithful as he claims to be, that I refuse even to entertain the notion.

"Are you sure you couldn't have come in contact with it?" they always ask.

(Well, is there any way other than sexual contact? I mean, I haven't seen another person naked, let alone touched one, in months or in some cases, years. Is it possible to get it from toilet seats or, I don't know, poorly washed sheets from the Drawing Resource Center?) "Yes, I'm really pretty sure," I'll respond.

They never believe me. I don't know why they bother to ask, frankly.

"Well, let's do the test, just in case."

It's hard to argue with "just in case," -- even when it's a test I KNOW is unnecessary, and is going to cost me $50 to $75, money that in the past wasn't always that easy to come by -- so I usually end up doing the stupid test. Occasionally somewhere in there I might even start to wonder, well, IS it possible? CAN you get it from toilet seats? Am I forgetting some fun hot night somewhere along the line? I don't know how that could happen, believe me, if there had been some fun, I think I'd remember it, at the very least I'd notice suspicious black-outs in my recent past, but well, who knows? Or maybe that encounter six months/five years ago DID expose me, and we're only just now seeing evidence, okay sure, 'just in case', what the hell.

I have had this experience at least five different times. The test always confirms what I knew all along, and it's SWELL and all to get good news of any kind, but unfortunately in many cases that has also meant that the doctor feels his/her job is done. The actual problem I came in with, however, often hasn't yet been addressed other than yay-not-syphilis and I'm forced to remind them of that fact. Usually the problem, whatever it was, clears up on its own, but occasionally I've had to be quite aggressive with these people, refuse to let them dismiss me as a hypochondriac, or someone insufficiently grateful for the gratuitous yay-not-syphilis 'diagnosis', and kick up a fuss until we ascertain the actual problem.

Fortunately this didn't have to happen this time. I had none of the additional symptoms that STD requires and while I no longer can claim to be living like a monk, my recent travels and accompanying virtuous living (and believe me, even if I were a cheating bastard, there is nothing like traveling with one's sister, especially a sister who has met and liked one's boyfriend, to encourage good behavior) had put a big hole in the most likely window of infection (which granted, is nine to NINETY days, but still). The doctor won even greater appreciation from me by accepting this. No "are you sures," no "just in cases," she accepted my analysis of the situation. On a side note, should I be flattered that most medical professionals assume I'm more of a stud-dog than I am? They seem to ascribe a much more exciting sex life to me than has ever been the case.

Okay, after I've had some fun at the expense of some medical professionals, and vented just a wee bit, let's acknowledge that a "no it's not possible" reaction to a suggested STD is text book. I know that. I understand that doctors have to assume you're just not being quite honest with yourself or them. I just don't know why syphilis consistently is the one I get accused of, and why the accusation usually comes after an extended period of celibacy.

I'm sure you're all delighted to know that the rash is almost gone today. And anyone who may have come in contact with me before I sequestered myself, if within a week of our contact you haven't gotten sick, you probably won't. So says my lovely drop-in clinic doctor.

And the weather this week has been wonderful.

Back to travel photos very soon.

James: One Year Later

2010-06-04T08:30:00.036-04:00

(Photo courtesy of Jennie Isbell.)

Today would have been James Lacey's 42nd birthday. Sunday will be the first anniversary of his death. People who know more about this sort of thing than I do assure me that once the Year of Firsts is over, things will change. The grief won't disappear, nor would I want it to, but it will change. We'll see. There have been many emotional ambushes lately, probably because of the impending anniversaries, but also, as I mentioned earlier, because of the trip. Before I left there was also a very weird week where about five plays or TV shows I saw had dead sons/brothers as surprise plot points. Man did that get old. Finally, after one too many times sniffling and snorking excessively until intermission, I learned to have tissues handy at all times. So, there's that.

My friend Ellen, who is also grieving the loss of a younger brother, did something a few months back that I really liked. On her brother Mark's birthday, she asked her friends to have an Entemann's double chocolate donut -his favorite - in his memory. Our mutual friend Marta happened to be visiting at the time, so I bought a dozen (or was it two?) donuts for she, Bill, and I to share. DAMN they are some good donuts, but I don't recommend having more than one at a sitting, or even in a single twenty-four hour period. I think my heart palpitations only stopped a couple of days ago.

So, I want to suggest something like that in memory of James. There's nothing quite as clear-cut in the way of favorites with him, at least I'd be hard pressed to pick a single food he really loved. Actually, he'd probably have loved those same donuts, but the one food I can remember him getting really excited about was, well, salad. The man loved his salad. He always complained after devouring one in a restaurant that "it was too small." And I use the word 'devour' advisedly. Mary always said, seeing James eat a salad wasn't pretty. It was a bit like watching a lion take down a gazelle. And I'm not talking the quiet aftermath when the lion munches contentedly on the slightly-quivering-but-mostly-still corpse, I'm talking the heart-pounding terrifying scene of the lion literally taking down the gazelle. Lotta gusto. He got in the habit of having salads as his afternoon snack. Mom and Mary nearly strangled him when they learned that. It's just unnatural, is what it is. Snacks aren't supposed to be good for you. He was as much of a foodie as the rest of us, and always enjoyed big feasts, but seemed to be constitutionally unable to over-do in most cases. He never had more than a single glass of wine, for example. A second one always gave him a headache. Maybe the Quaker genes were just a bit stronger in him than they are in the rest of us. Little weirdo.

So, like, if you want to have a James Lacey commemorative salad, well, that's swell, I guess (ya little weirdo). But here are a few other suggestions for things you might do over the next three days, if you've a mind, whether you knew him or not.

Snoogle a big dog. Extra credit if you take it for a long walk.

Take a housebound (or merely carless) friend grocery shopping.

Call, visit, or invite over for tea anyone you suspect is hiding from the world, due to a divorce, job loss, or any other psychic wound. Risk being a bit relentless about it, a pain in the ass, even.

Go bowling with friends.

The man loved Tweety-bird. I have no idea what to do with that, but if that inspires you, more power to ya.

Invite friends over for board or role-playing games. Snacks, if they are provided (and why the hell wouldn't they be?), should be served in bowls. And don't worry, he always served good snacks (no salads).

Get friends (and snacks) together for a Mystery Science Theater 3000 Marathon. Star Trek, any of them (well, maybe not Deep Space Nine) works too.

Amendment 6/5/10:  PIE! I can't believe I forgot about pie! James loved it, especially blueberry, but he'd pretty much take his pie any way he could get it. Maybe I had blocked it out, since 'pie' was one of his stock responses to virtually any question, whether food was involved or not. Basically he just felt any situation could be improved by pie, I guess. It's an argument worth examining, I suppose. Thanks to friend AJB (see comments) who learned this fact from visiting Mom yesterday, while she was baking a blueberry one in James' memory. So, that's another fine food you can have in celebration.

Hug and kiss everyone you love, in greeting and parting. No need to go overboard with this one; I don't think James did it with many people outside the family circle (which of course includes the dog and cat), his bowling or gaming buddies for example. But don't miss any opportunity to say good bye to anyone.

We miss thee, James.

Days One and Two: Galway

2010-06-03T19:37:00.009-04:00

Mary and I took a bus from Shannon airport to Galway, arriving in the station just next to Eyre Square. The nice lady at the tourist board office in the airport had said she was perfectly willing to book rooms for us if we liked, but it would cost us a commission plus VAT (value added tax), so she recommended that we just look around for rooms once we got there. It wasn't high season yet, she said, and she was certain we'd have no trouble finding something easily and cheaply. This was only the first of many times people went out of their way to make sure we didn't over-pay for things. In Galway we perused the couple of guide books Mary had brought along. We chose a hostel that wasn't too far away, and after booking in there, we went looking for food.

The pedestrian streets around the hostel had an abundance of options, so we more or less chose the Front Room arbitrarily, thinking it looked nice. We were not disappointed. Galway, especially the town center, is a city dominated by medieval architecture. Row houses and shops are no more than two or three stories tall, and built sharing walls on both sides. This often creates a coziness that is especially nice during the bleak, dank Atlantic-lashed winters. We could have chosen to eat outdoors, taking advantage of the long sunny days spring brings (the sun set around 9pm), but were more in the mood for cozy. Good hearty food, including a salmon sandwich, seafood chowder, beer, cider and tea all helped restore the inner person.

I hadn't really taken in how light it was where we were sitting, despite the fact that we were in an inner room far away from windows. It was only as I gazed lovingly into my teacup that I realized we were directly under a skylight.

Still broad daylight outside, as you see.

I've always loved the free use of color I've seen in Irish houses. I imagine this is another way of combating the harsh bleakness of Winters. Some Seattle houses experiment with color too, but it's usually just one or two, never whole neighborhoods as one sees here.

Food taken, Mary and I were now ready to stretch our legs, having been sitting for hours at a time since getting to Kennedy the night before. We stumbled across a walk that follows along the river Corrib, running through the city out into Galway Bay. It was here that our two week discussion of which houses we wanted began. There were a certain number of new structures cheek-by-jowl with medieval ones still in use, as well as a handful of abandoned shells we weren't ruling out as fixer-uppers. Someplace with a view of the river and the bay would be nice. We also saw our first swans here, a single mating couple (look where the bridge meets the walkway; above you can see Mary too. Hi Mary!). I have a soft spot for swans, in part because I first saw them in Ireland and the UK when I was seven years old, so they still have an air of romance for me, being associated with castles, fairy tales and picturesque scenery. And keep in mind, I grew up in landlocked Indiana, so even the ocean was a revelation, and my first views of that were also here. Anyway, I took a gazillion shots of these two swans, only to find later that in the bay there were more than thirty of them, receiving handouts.

This is a big hot spot for eels too, apparently. That's nice.

Another view of one of the walking streets. Pura Vida, the cafe in lower right, was a favorite spot, which is to say we went there twice, the second time when we were just in Galway for a couple of hours between buses.

I love the fact that I don't know if that little face next to the sign was scratched into the stone last week, last year, five years ago, or five hundred. Frankly I assume it's a fairly recent addition, but I don't know. Ard Bia translates as 'high food' but I haven't the slightest idea what that phrase means. Does it refer to high tea, or is it a claim that this place is really fancy-shmancy? Anyone?

"To get to my place, just keep walking up Tuam Road until you hit the yellow door. If you see a red door, you've gone too far."

I love this horseshoe house.

I took a gazillion photos of this house too.

Lest we forget, this is Catholic Ireland.

Claddagh and flying swans.

See what I mean? And this is only part of the flock.

My suspicions about this monument rock turned out to be accurate. Conversations and memorials about An Górta Mór, the Great Hunger - the famine that devastated Ireland during the 1840s - are fairly recent developments. A paralyzing shame and silence covered the country for years afterwards, and many people believe (myself included) that this horrific time fundamentally changed the Irish psyche. I think I've mentioned an amazing book I came across a few years ago called Irish Hunger; Personal Reflections on the Legacy of the Famine. (Note: the link takes you to a title that isn't quite the same as my copy. I assume this means it's a more recent addition, or maybe there was a change of title for the American version, as there often is.) It's edited by Tom Hayden (yes, that Tom Hayden), and I found it fascinating, moving, and more than a little enraging. Here in Galway Bay a simple standing stone and plaque commemorates the thousands of people who left Ireland from this harbor, most of them forever, to escape the potato blight, famine, various plagues, and what some might call the genocidal response the people in power brought to the disaster. Simple gestures like this may not seem like much, but for many people, this is helping to bring great anger, pain and ugliness out into the light for the first time. You should be able to enlarge the photo, if you want to read the text.

Irish Postcards: West Coast

2010-06-02T11:43:00.001-04:00

Here are just a few shots I took, to get the ball rolling on documenting the trip. The top two are from Yeats Country, specifically Rosse's Point. The third is Galway Bay; I believe that row of houses is the Claddagh of ring fame. You may be seeing a lot of that. I loved the look and the colors, and since it was our first part of the trip, I may have gone a wee bit ape-shit with the photographs. Later I didn't feel it quite so necessary to take 492 shots of every place (varying for angle and light) that appealed. (Observant readers may notice that the Rosse's Point photos are both of the same location, however.) This was aided too by the discovery that the extra memory card I thought I had packed with the camera was in fact just an empty case (no, I don't know what I was thinking, shut up), so my plans to switch cards when the first one became full (somewhere around day ten) had to be amended to erasing redundancies while we went. That became a useful process though. Meditative, almost.

It's fairly easy to get shots that look like something the Tourist Board would have put out. I acknowledge that without shame. We never saw any rainbows, however. I think October is really the best time of year for them. When I was there in the Fall of '86, I saw at least two rainbows a day while travelling in the west. Seriously. We just had to make due with sunny days broken occasionally by unimposing cloud cover. Fortunately we're both survivors, Mary and me.

There will be stories and musings too, don't worry, but today I need to get reacquainted with my New York life in various ways.

Day 14? London

2010-05-28T05:52:00.004-04:00

I came to realize that I had to treat London like a brand-new-to-me city; my memories of the place were so few and tended to center around places we weren't likely to get back to (the homes we lived in, the school I went to, the part of the Heath I walked every day). This is probably for the best, since I didn't really enjoy London as a kid or teenager. My fondest memories from back then tend to be of the trips we took OUT of the city, to greener, more open spaces: Scotland, Ireland, the Lake District. We probably won't get to see any theatre here this trip, sadly. Shows are largely sold out, since it's a bank holiday weekend. Wandering about Trafalgar, in St. James Park, and along the Thames was quite fun yesterday. We finished up at a Greek restaurant that was the scene of a wonderful last night in town back in '81. We missed Mom and James, of course, and we didn't recreate the drunken stroll through a dark Heath afterwards, but that was probably a good thing too.

Dad's lecture is Saturday night, at Friends House, just around the corner from our hotel. I may find my memory triggered there by some of the rooms. But all in all, the claustrophobia I feel in cities, I first discovered in this one. Fifteen years in New York, seven in Seattle, and about six months in Dublin in '86 have all taught me skills for managing it (and those daily walks on Hampstead Heath back in '81 were undertaken for therapeutic purposes at the time), and I think I'd have quite a good time here, if our stay was longer. Cities are great to visit, but I wouldn't want to live in one. Oh. Huh.

London and New York feel similar in size and energy. There are different visual effects of course, but the first thing I noticed was distinctly different smells. Dublin's is different as well, and I can more readily attribute that to the greater influence the Irish Sea has on the place. It's simply not as big, there are fewer buildings over five stories, and the air just smells saltier.

More thoughts, and OH so many pictures, when I get home and have a moment to synthesize the experience.

Day 12 Dublin

2010-05-25T11:53:00.006-04:00

Our last full day in Dublin, and in Ireland. Tomorrow Mary and I go much against the grain to get up an some ungodly hour so we can be on a ferry to Wales, then a train to London. Dad will be flying, content to substitute quickness for scenery. Today we had breakfast with a good friend of Mary's from grad school; Eileen and her family live in England now, as she's teaching at the University of Warwick. Her perspective as an American citizen making a life in England was pretty interesting; she has a stake in the local politics and economics but still views things as an outsider at times.

I'd forgotten how often the Irish will ask if you've family connections here; the reasonable assumption is most Americans who choose to come here do so at least in part because of ancestral connections. Mary and I have discussed more than once the funny way she, James and I all identify with being Irish in particular ways, even though we know nothing of the specifics other than our last name and the fact that everywhere we turn here we see relatives. By contrast we have a fairly extensive genealogical map of Mom's side of the family, some lines traced back to tenth century Wales. The vast majority of the names are Welsh, Cornish, Scots and probably Irish, so I like to pretend sometimes that we're basically Celts, but the fact is we're probably mixed-biscuits like most Americans, a mish-mash of western Europe, with one legendary great-grandfather who was American Indian. (Lots of Americans believe they have such an ancestor, however, and it rarely turns out to be true.) We know we romanticize Ireland big-time; maybe no one does it more than Irish-Americans. Americans can be fond of tracing 'their roots'. We crave a sense of cultural tradition and belonging that other cultures take for granted. We feel like our country is too young to have much of an identity yet, and the more honest of us recognize that it was always a big messy gumbo anyway.

On this trip though I became more aware of the way eastern Irish (mostly urban Dubliners) can romanticize the west themselves. (Well, what they do is romanticise, but it's much the same process.) Many people there and elsewhere still see it as the repository of Irishness at its most authentic. The language is most vigorous out there (both B&Bs Mary and I stayed at were run by bilingual households), the rural ties are still strongly evident, and of course there are ruins and abandoned villages all over the place to stand as stark reminders of the various invasions and devastations the country has experienced. The stage Irishman that came into being during the Irish Renaissance was intended in part to counter the previous version, that of a drunken, lazy, slovenly braggart always ready for a fight. Reams of pages have been written about the fact that the Irish Renaissance and the Independence Movement in general was dominated by members of the Anglo-Irish Protestant Aristocracy. On more than one occasion we were told that we couldn't truly claim Irish heritage since our name was not Irish, but Norman. No one went so far this time, but more than one person did make sure to mention the fact. So even our sole tenuous claim --Dad knows nothing of his family history beyond the names of his parents, and it took the Freedom of Information act for him to learn the date of his father's birth-- is seen by some as dubious at best. We nod solemnly, accept our pretender status, then smile as we hear laughs and see faces that could easily belong to close relatives, I mean, like siblings. Culture is more than genetics and bloodlines, of course, but whenever we've spent time in Ireland, we can't help but wonder if genetics plays a part in more aspects of our personalities than is presently understood. Our family sense of humor, for example, seems to fit into the collective understanding in Galway or County Clare in ways it doesn't always in Indiana.

I said we romanticize the place, didn't I? Shush.

We saw a new play, still in previews, at the Abbey Theatre (The national) last night. By Bernard Farrell, it's titled Bookworms, and all four of us (Dad, Mary, her friend Eileen and I) loved it. A nice mix of farce and political commentary, I'll be curious to see if it plays outside the country. I've a collection of other plays of his that was given to me years ago, but haven't read it. That will be added to the list when I get home. Tonight we hope to see Stoppard's Arcadia at the Gate theatre. Oh, the show last night cost us 18 Euros, Dad got a senior discount at 13. Sure it was a preview still, but did I mention it was at the NATIONAL THEATRE, written by a well-established and -loved playwright? Picture seeing a new work by Tony Kushner for about $25, and buying the ticket an hour before the show. Maybe the tickets tonight will be unavailable, but they won't be substantially more expensive. Yes, this is largely due to the size of the country; Dublin is about 1million strong, and post-Celtic Tiger the country as a whole is around 5 million. That is less than half the size of New York City, I believe. But there's also just a different attitude towards theatre there, as there is in England. People go. They think it's fun. They can afford to go, especially if they're students and can avail themselves of some fantastic deals. In this country, if you're spending nearly (or in some cases more than) one hundred dollars on a ticket, you understandably expect it to be SPEC-FUCKIN-TACULAR. Oh, the things I have to say about theatre in this country. Sigh.

Today we went to the national art museum, in particular to see the Jack B. Yeats collection, but we took in some of the new collection as well. Then Mary and Dad headed back to the hotel for 'restorative naps' and I decided to take a stroll along Grafton street, to see if memory was triggered more fully than it has been thus far. It was loads of fun, I do love walking streets, and things are looking very spruced up since the last time I was here in 1993. That was pre-Celtic Tiger, so even though the country is in a recession now, there are still plenty of signs of improved infrastructure and such. Most notably there are new-to-me trams running through the city and they seem very popular. I do love public transportation when it's done well. I have lots to say on that topic too.

Feeling a bit bashful, I nonetheless stepped into a woolens store to see about sweaters, hats and scarves. I always figure those things are mostly for tourists, and maybe they are, but on this occasion I was heartened to see Gabriel Byrne in the store looking at jackets and vests. He was wearing clothes that may very well have come from the same place.

I've come to realize I have almost no recollections of London; the last time I was there was in 1981. A favorite restaurant, some spots on the Heath, and big tourist spots like Trafalgar are the only memories I'm conjuring at this point. But Mary and Dad have tons of fond memories and favorite spots between them (each has been back several times since then, usually for several months while they led foreign study groups), so I'm looking forward to seeing the place with them, and starting to collect new memories of my own.

Day 11-12, Dublin

2010-05-23T16:58:00.004-04:00

So much for my plan for regular updates, even just ten minutes ones. Mary and I have been having a fabulous time. We probably could have sought out more internet cafes than we did, but there always seemed to be something else to do. We spent two days in Galway, soaking up the sun (yes, sun) on the sli na slainte, which I think translates as walk of health, a walking path that takes one along the bay. Many photos will be shared at a later date with anyone foolish enough to click on this blog, or sit still in my presence for any length of time. Mary and I travel well together; we want to go to the same places, usually because we share the fond memories, and we're pretty much in tune about how much to plan and how much to play by ear. Having seen how much I love my new camera, Tony decided Mary needed one for her trip, so we've been madly snapping away, both of us, flowers, mountains, donkeys, cows, pigs, more flowers, greenery EVERYWHERE, scenery galore, cottages we intend to own (still haven't narrowed down WHERE we want to be exactly). After Galway we spent three nights in Co. Clare, hiking about the Burren. A woman at one of our favorite bookstores (back in Galway) gave me an article about a guy who theorizes J.R.R Tolkien based his vision of Mordor on the Burren. It seems plausible; once you see my photos, you'll see why I think it bears examining.

Trying to sum up over a week's worth of travel while still sticking to my ten minute rule is a wee bit tricky. Add in the fact that we just had some really great Italian food and a fair amount of wine, and you'll have to forgive me if I'm not painting the detailed picture I want to. There have been characters along the way, as all good travel will entail. I'd forgotten, for example, the men frequently like to chat up my sister, and smooch her if given half a chance. Okay, so far there have been only two, but they were both pretty smitten, and we're not out of Ireland yet. City people are more reserved no matter where you go though.

We've been doing a lot of hiking, sometimes more than we had actually planned. A hike up Knocknarea, for example, ended up being a hike from Strandhill to the mountain, up the mountain, down the mountain, then back into Sligo. We still haven't figured out exactly how long that was (either in miles or kilometers, which sound so much more impressive), but anyone who knows the area has been very impressed with us. We're pretty pleased with ourselves as well. On top the mountain we had another little moment to say goodbye to James (he loved the place too). Naturally we're constantly reminded of things he would have loved doing, seeing, eating or enjoying with us, but that's mostly been nice.

I haven't said a word yet about how wonderful Clifden in Connemara was, but the internet cafe closes in five minutes. Maybe now that we'll be in cities for the rest of the trip (here, then London) I'll get to write more... but there is so much to see...

Day One: Galway

2010-05-23T16:34:00.003-04:00

I've got about ten minutes to write a quick post before the time runs out; that's perfect though, since I told myself if I posted at all during this trip, it would be no more than ten minutes at a time. When I get going, I can lose hours, but I don't want to spend more time reporting on the trip than I do enjoying it.

Our flight out of Kennedy was delayed by a plane switch, then the trip was lengthened by two hours so we could fly north of the Iceland volcano ash; seven hours on a plane, in the middle seat, is a looooong time. It was mitigated by having my sister on one side of me, and the actor/writer/activist Malachy McCourt sitting on the other. We had seen him and one of his brothers in the waiting area, and were pretty sure we knew who he was, but didn't have it confirmed until we realized we'd be spending the next seven hours together. He's every bit as charming and funny as one would expect after seeing him in interviews. He, like us, was coming over in part to honor a brother who had died in the last year. His brother Frank is being honored today by a school in Limerick with a bust and an endowed chair.

Shannon is one of the quietest international airports in the world. We caught a bus into Galway, hitting several towns along the way that brought back fond memories of family trips. After checking into a hostel, we wandered the gorgeous walking streets, and an equally gorgeous river walk. The thing one has to keep remembering is, the things here aren't trying to look charming. That building just looks like that. Those horses and swans aren't trying to be picturesque, they're just doing their thing, being swans and horses. (Between you and me though, I think some of the animals are paid by the Tourist Board. More than once I've had one of them seem to pose, finding just the right position to make a shot work best.)

Several Days Later: So it turns out this didn't get published when I thought it did, the computer cut out on me sooner than I realized. Now I'm sitting in an internet cafe in Dublin, on the 23rd. Mary, Dad and I all met up yesterday in the city and have spent today bopping about the place. I'll post this one, then try to jot down some notes about the last week.

Mr Blue Sky: Ambushed by ELO

2010-05-06T12:47:00.007-04:00

I was a teary kid, a crybaby, until age twelve when I resolved never to cry again. It wasn't that I thought it was unmanly; Dad has always been easily moved to tears for causes both sad and joyful. I think I've seen him cry more than Mom. In my case it just seemed silly to hand other kids such easy ammunition, especially when I had so many other things to live down.

My resolve worked surprisingly well. I was in college before I shed any more tears, and even then I rarely did it in front of other people. I never had the experience of catharsis others claim to have. Giving way to tears, like giving way to rage, doesn't leave me feeling purged or relieved. I don't strive to bottle either one any longer; when they come, they come. But giving them expression doesn't seem to help much.

James' death was the first occasion in a long time I can remember feeling like I had no say in whether or not I cried. Have I told you the story about when I learned of his death? I had been at a friend's surprise birthday party, in a cheese cave (seriously) so the phone call went to voicemail. Above ground again, I listened to Dad's message on a street in Midtown.

"Patrick, make sure to sit down before thee listens to this. James was killed today in a car accident."

Then he dissolved into sobs, and had to hang up the phone.

I suppose it was shock that made me unsure I had heard the message correctly, so naturally I had to replay it. But remember, I was in the concrete canyon of Midtown.

"Patrick, make sure to sit down before thee mumble mumble...mumble cell phone cut out, mumble mumble mumble."

Dammit.

I moved to a new location, got more bars on my phone and hit replay again. But I'm still in Midtown, remember? Suddenly a parade of Falun Gong followers marched past me on the Avenue. There were gongs, drums, cymbals, some species of caterwauling horn. It was like Chinese freakin' New Year.

What. the. fucking. HELL. (In other circumstances I would have found this hilarious.)

Fourth time was a charm, though by this point the shock had worn off enough that probably my brain was simply catching what my ear had heard perfectly the first time. Not knowing what to do with myself, I went on autopilot and headed off to my appointment. It wasn't until I met with my acupuncturist that I realized that trying to talk meant unleashing the torrent I had been holding back, just out of habit. It took at least three tries before I could explain why I was sobbing. She wisely sent me home. Next on the agenda was calling Brian, to explain that I wouldn't be much use to him at the rehearsal that day for the staged reading we were working on. Having said it out loud once already, thus removing any chance I had of magically rendering it not so, I was able to choke out my message after just two tries.

The month of June had many crying jags, and I realized that not only was I rarely in control of it, I was also not embarrassed by it. Certainly that must have been partly due to the fact that I was surrounded by lots of other watery messes, none of whom saw anything to be embarrassed by in their grief. It was comforting in its own weird way. (By the way, I have never been embarrassed by other people's tears, just my own.)

Then the memorial happened. For those of you unfamiliar with the silent Friends tradition, let me explain some key details. Because there is no predesignated minister, there is no pulpit, and the benches are usually set up in concentric rings, so everyone can see everyone else. One bench closest to the center is designated the 'Facing Bench'. Originally this would be where the elders sat, and today it's where the people charged with ending the worship sit. During special meetings, like for weddings or memorials, the families directly involved will sit here. The last time I sat there had been for Mary and Tony's wedding in 2006. That was nice.

I'm going to go on record here and say I'm not so sure having grieving families sitting on the Facing Bench is such a swell idea. At least in my case I didn't care for it. Suddenly I was aware of all these loving, sad, sympathetic people staring at me, wondering how I was doing, how I was going to react. The old ambivalence about tears resurfaced with a vengeance. Oh, they still came, I wasn't able to control them yet, but I felt vulnerable, exposed, above all embarrassed. I saw how this experience might be mitigated a bit in other Judeo-Christian memorials, where everyone faces in one direction. The only people who can see you crying are the ones at the lectern or pulpit, and maybe the folks sitting next to you.

Oh, except in those cases, the grieving family members are often expected to say a few words, right? So you're still visible to everyone, and you're expected to both stand and talk. Nope, that would have been worse. Scratch that paragraph above.

What brought all this on today? Well, in the past ten months, tears have come and gone according to some inner logic of their own. At times, sometimes for days, I'll feel them brewing under the surface, before they're triggered by the damnedest things. I mean Mercedes singing "You are Beautiful" in an episode of Glee was nice enough I suppose, but definitely one of that show's more treacly moments. The show hits pretty high on the treacle-meter actually. I still love it, but usually resist its more overt (read: cheap) plays for emotions. Was I really going to succumb this time? Apparently, yes. Not sure why, clearly it had something to do with James, don't ask me what, other than the general sentiment that yes, he too was beautiful, but for whatever reason that song (maybe because Mercedes was singing to all the fellow misfits at her high school and James had definitely been a misfit? I got nothin') set off the waterworks.

I had a similar experience this morning, with this song. I don't know how James felt about ELO, though I would suspect he liked them well enough. He probably even liked this tune, assuming he ever heard it. Maybe the lyrics make me think of him, especially the refrain:

Mr Blue Sky

Please tell us why

You had to hide away

For so long (so long)

Where did we go wrong?

Hey there Mr Blue

We're so pleased to be with you

Look around see what you do

Everybody smiles at you.

Yeah, there's some kind of trigger in there. I've mentioned James' relentless sunniness before, and how it often drove me crazy as a kid (maybe mostly when it took the form of teasing or hounding his older brother). I think James had some bleak periods, ones he rarely shared with me. Maybe he expressed them to Mary, or to close friends, but I fear he had the same tendency I did to hide away when things were really bad. I think it's a family trait, or maybe a cultural one. As a country we're still Puritan enough to think grief, misery, or simply low self-confidence are things to be ashamed of. Weaknesses of character. Sins to atone for, perhaps. Or maybe we don't know how to talk about them in a way that doesn't sound self-pitying.

So a peppy, upbeat song with deceptively melancholy lyrics threw me a curve ball today. Not the first time nor, I suspect, will it be the last. And more often than not now, I get embarrassed by it. Writing about it is almost as bad; woo boy, does that trigger the 'wallowing police' siren in my head (neener neener neener!). There's no denying this is all about me, after all. I think Mom, Dad, and Mary may be having similar experiences. In the days following James' death, grief tended to be a force bringing us together; at this stage, I think lately each of us feels the need to experience its greatest depths privately. I guess that's just part of the process. Funny how often that word--process--is the only answer I have for most of life's little struggles these days. It's a popular word among artists too. Getting to hate that fucking word.

Which undoubtedly is also part of the process.

Fuck.

Sigh.

Subway Snapshot

2010-05-05T11:11:00.013-04:00

Riding on the #1, three handsome young men of South Asian decent catch my ear and eye. I'm not drawn by what they're saying--they're discussing people I don't know, and a game I've never understood, even after playing it in gym class when we lived in London--but I love the music of it. One fellow speaks with a lilting South Asian accent (my ear isn't tuned enough to get more specific than that). Another speaks with a posh London dialect. The third tawks pure Bronx. And all three are dressed in white uniforms, the crisp blinding cloth only slightly rumpled and grass-stained at this point. They carry cricket bats and shin guards. They were just playing at Riverbank State Park, in Harlem.

Bread & Butter Issue: Comment Moderation

2010-05-02T11:37:00.001-04:00

For the last few posts one of my most faithful commenters has been someone posting a link to an Asian porn site. If that were all it was, I might be inclined to leave things be, and delete those comments as they come. I'm not convinced, however, that IS all the link does, and being just clueless enough about the ways of the interwebz, I've decided to change my comment policy. For now, I've switched over to the moderated setting, which means (for the two of you who aren't bloggers yourselves) that before a comment gets posted, I have to sign off on it. Frankly it's rather nice that I've been able to go this long (almost five years) without having to make this switch. It's also nice that the cause is a random spammer who seems to have figured out a way around the word verification function, rather than the irresponsible, over-heated ad hominem attacks I know have motivated the switch at other blogs. Of course the topics here at Loose Ends rarely inspire the kind of debate that usually leads to those ad hominem attacks. If my chirpy reports and photos of various green spaces enrage anyone, they haven't found me yet, or they haven't had it in them to post a scathing review. No one is more surprised than I am that my blog has become such a flowers/bunnies/hearts destination. As a pacifist socialist faggot with some rather heated positions of his own, I fully expected this venue to be a bit more controversial when I started it, but that's not where it's taken me. I think that's all to the good, frankly. It's been a good discipline for me to seek out positivity when I write here. To be honest, that's not my natural tendency.

Anyway, moderation, as opposed to Open ID (where you have to have signed on for some kind of online identity) will still allow anonymous users to post, since I have occasionally written about LGBT issues, and that has sometimes triggered anonymous comments from users who are not yet ready to come out. Then there are all those folks who, like me, get a bit tired of having to sign up for yet another online something-or-other in order to leave a comment, so they just don't bother. Honestly, how many different photo-sharing websites do we need, and why do no two of my friends seem to belong to the same ones?

Okay, got a little distracted there. So, comment moderation is now in place, I wish I didn't have to bother, but we'll see how it goes. If, at any time, someone wants to contact me directly, remember that you can find an email link under my photo there on the left.

Happy Beltáin

2010-05-01T13:30:00.002-04:00

It's a bit harder this year to muster enthusiasm for the beauty and abundance of Spring. But I'm trying. Soon my sister and I will take a trip that is sure to help the process; Ireland in May is something I haven't experienced since I was 10 years old. In the meantime, I make myself stop and pay attention to what (and who) is around me, making my life richer and more joyful.

Happy May Day.

More photos after the jump.

Heading North: Van Cortlandt Park

2010-04-25T12:01:00.003-04:00

Last Sunday I (and a game Bill) finally got up to Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. I've been meaning to check this out for years, but somehow it just never happened. It's not on any of my beaten paths for one thing, as numerous and varied as they are. Usually I fulfill my craving for green space by going to one of my old favorites. I don't get to see them enough, they change with every season, so new places don't get added to the rotation easily. I think I may also have had it in my head that visiting this park would be a major expedition, requiring nothing less than a free day. Then there's just the way routine carves itself into one's life. I'd been living in this apartment for about nine months before it occurred to me that, upon leaving my building, maybe this time, instead of turning right (heading towards the subway, the grocery store, all familiar territory) I might just get a little crazy and turn left. Just, you know, to see what was over there. Whacky, right? That's kind of shenanigans I get up to when I've a mind.

So, a conversation with friends on Saturday reminded me of the Park's existence, then Sunday came with gorgeous weather and an empty schedule. So off we went. I already knew my local subway (the #1) would deliver us right to the park. The final stop is called the Van Cortlandt Park stop, so I was confident a pair of savvy urban types like us wouldn't get lost. And once I had actually looked at the trip, I realized it just wasn't that far. The commute maybe took twenty minutes, and what's more, most of the ride was above ground. I always get excited when the subway leaves its hidey hole, especially since that almost always means it becomes an elevated train. Suddenly the windows actually look out on something, well, something besides stations, crowds and work lights. My general resentment of concrete lessens considerably when I can see great distances and plenty of sky.

As promised, the subway station fed us right into the park. We didn't have specific destinations in mind, so with Bill's permission I headed us towards the woodsy-looking parts. One of the first thing we both noticed was how small the crowds were. A gorgeous Sunday in Central Park means wall-to-wall people. That can be fun in it's own way, especially since the crowds are usually pretty cheerful (just watch for the kamikazi bike riders), but it was a surprising gift to have so much of the place to ourselves. On a related note, I can't remember the last time I came across so many considerate teenage bikers.

The park had evidence of former lives throughout. I always find it exciting, if a bit scary, to see how vigorously plant life can take over when it's allowed to. (You might need to click on the image above to make sense of it; there's a fence in there.)

We pretty quickly found a path that took us along side some large ponds, and a golf course. Bikers and pedestrians were able to share the path cordially, in part, again, because there weren't that many of either group.

Of course I was on the lookout for violets, and I wasn't disappointed. Much to my delight, I discovered that my new camera gets pretty damn close to capturing the correct color. The trick seems to be adequate sunlight. Violets like shade, so maybe I'd just never put that to the test before this trek. I hope you'll indulge me as I post several of those photos. It probably won't surprise any who know me well that this collection is just the tip of the iceberg. I've also made them all larger than the other photos, no doubt shortening the time before Blogger tells me I'm over my storage limit. Don't care.

These purple-throated white ones were also a fun discovery. I think that's part of the charm of violets for me, I feel like I've found hidden treasure. I love cherry trees and other extravagant blooms, for example, but they don't trigger quite the same sense of discovery. I mean, you rarely stumble across them accidentally, know what I mean. You see them coming for miles. That's nice too, don't get me wrong, it's just a different experience.

When I find big fields of violets, I want to lie down and roll around in them. Having enough sense to realize this wouldn't do them a lot of good, I make due with lying beside them. Having a camera gives one so much license. Bill made sure I didn't get run over by bikers.

Another surprise: we officially walked out of New York City. I hadn't realized Westchester was so close. The minute we left the park, the dirt path became a paved bike trail, and suburban houses (see below) sprouted up on one side. On the other we heard the constant roar of the Sawmill Parkway. I've been on that road several times, usually heading someplace fun and gorgeous, and getting to it previously involved an elaborate process of renting a car, maneuvering through Manhattan traffic to dive headfirst into Westside Highway traffic, etc. To have come across it unexpectedly while out for a Sunday stroll was funny, and oddly freeing.

Keeping my eyes peeled for violets meant I noticed these little darlings. I don't know what they are. Having had such good luck with the forsythia identification in the last post, I'm hoping my savvy readers can help me with this one too. Does anyone recognize it?

This might be a bit too Thomas Kincaide for some, but I'm pretending it's an homage to El Greco.

Shut up.

How about this flower? I don't this one either. Anyone?

Little reminders of the urban life surrounding my green oases used to bug me, but over the years I've come to like them. I'm not sure why; maybe it's just nice to be reminded that people created these parks on purpose, that I'm far from alone in needing this outlet.

We rounded out the day with a nice malbec, some Chinese take-out, and the first bunch of lilacs I'd seen on sale. They were half the price I'm used to paying, probably because I usually buy them farther south. That will stand as another good reminder to head north every once in a while.

April 4th: Fort Tryon Park

2010-04-07T14:10:00.001-04:00

This year I missed the season when the heather in Fort Tryon Park reigned alone in the garden. Last Saturday it may have no longer been alone, but it still held its own beautifully against the daffodils, pansies and flamboyant trees that were starting to bloom. In the rest of the park, where things are left to be more foresty and wild-looking, some unknown-to-me yellow bush was starting to explode all over the place, looking like it might set the bare trees on fire. Yellow was the dominant color throughout, and its effects as a mood elevator were pretty clear. Combine this with long vistas, open sky, and bird song that almost drowned out the hum of the Westside Highway, and you have a good antidote for my Urban Brain Frenzy (UBF). Is SO a disease. Well, you wouldn't want to be around me during an attack. Ask my local friends. Oh, the whinging, the snarling, the snapping.

I have a deep fondness for the George Washington Bridge, not only because it often is the escape route to some nice places (and yes, there are some very nice places in Jersey, you snobs), but I also just think the bridge itself is pretty. And when looking from Fort Tryon Park, I even find the South Bronx rather pretty. Amazing what trees and some distance can do to my outlook.

Can anyone tell me what this bush is? It's everywhere, and I love it.

Sorry if the image on the right stirs up a wee bit of vertigo, but I liked the composition better at a slight angle.

Linkedy Link-Link: Next Fall: A Review

2010-04-06T13:45:00.000-04:00

I have a review up of Next Fall, a great new play running right now on Broadway. Go here if you're interested.

Bette Bourne: A Life in Three Acts

2010-04-01T12:17:00.005-04:00

I was hesitant to write a review of the show I saw on Saturday at the St Ann's Warehouse in Brooklyn, since as far as I can tell, it ended an extensive tour (mostly in the UK) the following day. Writing about it seemed rude, maybe even cruel, especially since I intend to rave a bit. I saw something great, you don't get to. Sucks to be you. I'm writing about it though, because I think the person at its center deserves to be celebrated.

A Life in Three Acts is a shaped recreation of interviews the playwright Mark Ravenhill did with his new friend, the performer Bette Bourne, about her life. As thrilled as I was at subject matter, having been a fan of Bourne's since the early nineties, I was initially a bit leery of this format. It's not without problems, but Bourne is a gifted storyteller with some fantastic material, Ravenhill a friendly presence, and the connection between them created a warm, relaxed atmosphere.

The evening starts with Bourne's working class childhood in WWII London. We meet his frequently abusive father and his "gifted amateur" mum who helps kindle his love of theatre. Over his father's objections, Bourne pursues a career as an actor, first attending the prestigious Central School of Speech and Drama, then almost immediately landing a job at the Old Vic.

In 1969 he and fellow rising star Ian MacKellan toured the world with rep productions of Edward II and Richard II; a short exerpt of a recording is played; we hear Bourne speaking the role of Kent. His artist boyfriend Rex, upon seeing him perform, is less than impressed however; "there was nothing of you in it," he announces. This statement, as perplexing or painful as it must have been to hear at the time, strikes a nerve for Bourne.

Rex is also the man who encourages Bourne to attend a Gay Liberation Front Meeting. At first he goes for the cruising (Rex promises loads of gorgeous guys), but is quickly captivated by the ideas and discussions. This political awakening naturally triggers a self-exploration of identity, and being an actor, perhaps it's not surprising that Bourne's exploration includes costuming. We see a photo of him in what he calls his Che Guevara drag; he mentions, in one of his many seemingly tossed-off thoughts, "those boots didn't even fit me." An important discovery is on the way though. At one of the meetings, when another fellow denounces the proceedings as nothing but cruising, Bourne says "I felt the crown of this queen rising up in me." Perhaps no one is more surprised than he that when the queen chews the other fellow out, she does so in the voice of "a Cockney fishwife." It will surprise none of us who have ever been part of a political group that this Cockney fishwife is quickly offered a position on the steering committee.

By this point Bourne is working at a stall in a market (not, it would seem, acting) where, inspired by the queens at the meetings, he buys a dress he sees. With a friend's encouragement and company, he eventually wears it to a meeting, even braving the cobblestoned streets in heels. The experience is both freeing and revealing, as she recognizes just how vulnerable this clothing (and nascent new identity) makes her. Anyone who has worn heels on a completely flat floor, let alone cobblestones, can probably relate. Drag becomes an important new avenue to explore.

Soon she and other "working class queens" at the meetings notice that while they're the ones doing all the set-up, clean-up, tea preparation and such, university-educated members dominate the meetings, spouting off about the latest theories of liberation politics. Realizing that the theories rarely tell them anything they didn't already know from experience, a group of the working class queens separate from the group to form an anarchic drag commune.

We remember this is swinging Seventies London, right?

For six years Bourne, thirteen or so other queens, three women, two children, an older woman and her boyfriend share all money earned, two rooms of a London squat and what appears to have been an extensive and fabulous wardrobe. Pot, LSD and sex are part of the mix as well, of course. Some of the greatest stories, naturally, come out of this time. There's the early morning raid where the police find themselves face to face with fourteen beautiful naked young men--several of them "proud, as one often is first thing in the morning"--, and the flustered bobbies leave quickly with no arrests made. Bourne does find herself in court at least once, following a demonstration, but even her refusal to remove her hat ("it matches the shoes") doesn't appear to have earned her any jail time.

The arrival of harder drugs and their dealers eventually encourages her to leave the commune and despite a six year gap, she is able to land acting work immediately. The return to acting is welcome, in part because Bourne felt that part of herself wasn't taken seriously by other members of the commune, but she still hopes for a greater synthesis of her identities as actor, gender outlaw and gay activist.

Enter Hot Peaches. This flamboyant theatre company is before my time, I have to let the link do most of the heavy lifting regarding background, but for Bourne it was just the thing she'd been looking for. The costuming and make-up are outrageous and over-the-top yet anchored by writing and acting of the highest caliber. She eventually tours throughout Europe with them, and when they head off to America, she stays behind in England and forms her own company, Bloolips.

Bloolips was my introduction to Bette Bourne, and I'd be willing to bet that was probably true for most other members of Saturday's audience. How to describe a Bloolips show? Never having seen the Cockettes, the Angels of Light, Hot Peaches or The Ridiculous Theatre, I can't tell you where--or if--this company fits into the pantheon. I've also read that Bloolips drew on the traditions of English music hall, Pantos and American Vaudeville (interesting to note all three traditions had a place for drag). All that seems valid and worth mentioning, but the company was still like nothing I had ever seen. The production I saw in Seattle in the early 90s, titled Get-Hur, was a campy, deleriously silly look at the love affair between the Roman Emperor Hadrian and Antinous. The costumes and make-up were so outlandish they weren't drag so much as clown, the writing was farce at its best with silly songs, big tap dance numbers, rauchy humor such as a character whose ass lit up if anyone paid it compliments,("I've never seen it myself," he says) but on a dime the actors--most notably Bourne--could shift gears and take us into moments of rich emotional truth. This is the only Bloolips show I ever saw (the company has since disbanded), but I've been a fan ever since.

The company toured internationally and developed a substantial cult following. I wonder how many actors there are left who have managed to develop such a huge and passionate fan base almost solely from live theatre? And from flamboyant drag/clown/spectacle/political theatre at that? Probably not many since the days of Vaudeville.

At seventy Bourne is still working steadily, recently playing the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet at the New Globe, Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest, and portraying her friend Quentin Crisp in a solo show. In many ways it would appear the world has finally caught up with her, and she's able to move cheerfully back and forth between mainstream theatre and experimental projects. Like Crisp, she carved out space for an identity that felt most true to her inner being, and built a life that fit her like a glove.

As I mentioned, the format of a recreated interview had some drawbacks. There were moments of extreme emotion, for example, when I found myself wondering, is she feeling that, or is she recreating--playing-- an emotional moment from the original interview? This may seem like nitpicking, but it took me out of the performance. There were also occasions when Ravenhill would suddenly become a character in one of Bourne's stories. I'm not sure this gained them as much as they hoped, and it was occasionally jarring. One of the first times it happened I thought Ravenhill was interrupting a story with a rather abrupt and offensive change of subject ("have you ever been inside a woman?") until I realized he was playing the part of an older man offering a young Bourne his first blowjob. On the plus side, the set included an enormous screen that displayed images from throughout Bourne's life. This theatrical tool helped make the evening feel like a chat between friends, since photos would trigger other memories for Bourne, and Ravenhill usually let the digression run its course. I was grateful for that. Perhaps it's also a testament to the format that I frequently wished I were the one doing the interview; many times I wanted Ravenhill to follow up on a comment, ask for more information or clarification, but I had to let him follow his own line.

In the days since seeing this show, I've been mulling over the many ways identity is both discovered and constructed. We all have to do both, listen to inner promptings, and reconcile them with the expectations of the larger world. Most of us may feel perfectly comfortable adopting the costuming--the drag, if you will--our culture hands us, but that doesn't change the fact that we're wearing a costume, a mask even. One wonders if, having first challenged the boundaries of class in 1960s England, Bourne was able to see through the illusions of identity more clearly than most, and this prepared her to challenge boundaries of gender as well. Obviously she came to adulthood at a good time for such questions, and found some merry companions to ask them with; she was not alone. But that doesn't lessen the risks she took, or the things she achieved. In telling her story, she seemed quick to downplay how rough some times were: her mother made a game out of taking cover during the Blitz; running from mounted police after sex in the bushes was ''a big lark''; secondary school in the fifties seems to have been one long gay orgy (especially following Chapel). But she does not discount how rough it still is to go out in public wearing make-up or ambiguous clothing. Just that afternoon, she reports, a clerk at a convenience store refused to serve her because of her lipstick. (The recreated interview format made it unclear if this incident happened two years ago in London, or just that afternoon in DUMBO, but the emotional impact was clear.) Taking such risks must be a bit more daunting when one is seventy and a bit stiff in the knees, compared to when one was (judging from the photos) a vigorous, strong, and frankly, gorgeous young man, but she's clearly still willing to take them.

Bourne reports someone once said to Quentin Crisp, "you just want to be noticed." Crisp replied, "I want to be recognized." Obviously Bourne feels much the same. Some may consider my admiration excessive or misplaced. The creation of a personal identity, no matter how spectacular, may seem self-indulgent, not the work of an activist. Certainly Bourne does not claim to be a big gay hero, though she does at one point, jokingly, refer to herself as a gay icon. I think though that she and her cohorts opened up space that has benefitted the rest of us more than we know. And this is the work we ask of artists. Show us life. Show us other ways of being. Ask the questions, big and small. that we need to ask. Get the discussion started, at least. I'd say Bourne has done all that, and more. (For the record, I believe she's also been a staunch activist.)

Bourne also showed a host of performers (including me) that finding their own way outside the mainstream was possible and appealing. It was a nice coincidence, for example, that Justin Bond (of Kiki and Herb fame) sat in front of me on Saturday. I don't know if Bond considers himself one of Bourne's spiritual daughters, but a case could be made. Then there's my friend Kevin Kent, who I have to thank for introducing me to Bloolips; you can see Kevin in action regularly at the Teatro Zinzanni in Seattle. I think Bourne would approve.

Midwestern Spring: The Long View

2010-03-27T14:13:00.001-04:00

I stopped to take several photos of this fellow as I walked from Laceyland to Hazelthorne. Judging from the chattering and tail-twitching, I think he (?) found me to be a bit of an intrusion. This impression was strengthened when I turned my back to leave and was hit on the shoulder by the walnut shell you see in his mouth. Little bastard.

Facebook friends will have already seen this image, but I just love the colors. Purply-red-orange-brown, that's one of my favorite categories. Autumnal and Winter landscapes tend to have it a lot. Those are black raspberry canes; once Springs shows up in earnest, they will disappear behind walls of bushes almost as formidible as they. Human beings won't be the ones eating those berries. My family knows of several other, more accessible patches though.

My first three years in New York, I lived in ten different locations. Fourth in the series was a four month sublet with classmates in West New York, NJ. Yes, that's the name of the town. And yes, it does have a view of New York City. I was initially disappointed to learn the only way to get there was by bus, either NJ transit or gypsy, both leaving from the Port Authority. I soon learned the buses were dependable and constant, and eventually I began to enjoy the trip, especially out bound. One of the principle pleasures of the home journey was the experience of coming out of the Lincoln Tunnel and heading up the ramp to Kennedy Boulevard, where one got a view of Manhattan. That was a fairly tumultuous time in my life, and there was something so soothing about being able to see the city as a whole OVER THERE, and realize I could leave the tension, questions, and undifferentiated frenzy of Manhattan life behind for the day. The literal change in perspective provided a nice metaphorical one. Things just weren't that big a deal. Even now, whenever I leave the city through Lincoln Tunnel, I can feel a nice drop in blood pressure upon exiting.

This trip back to Indiana, I finally realized this wasn't my first time using this technique. While attending Earlham, when things were feeling especially fraught, I would, far too rarely, take a walk back campus. More than once I would get to the view seen above, where the college was all easily contained in my sights, and think "wow. It's just NOT that big a deal." Whatever 'it' might have been at the time--and if you think I'm overly ruminative now, imagine what I was like between the ages of 18 and 22--this visual trick was always therapeutic. It was a lesson I had to relearn at regular intervals. As far as I can remember, I never walked back there to have this experience, I'd take the walk for some other reason (looking for violets, wanting some exercise, feeling a bit caged) and the view would hit me as if for the first time.

I don't get out to West New York much, and though I have started to collect parks in the city where I get some long vistas, I'm remembering now how good it is to get visual perspective on the city as a whole. I'm going to Dumbo later today, to see a show (Bette Bourne, of Bloolips fame is telling his life story!) but I'll be sure to make some time to look at the city, and shrink it back down to its proper size.

This tree has been rendered somewhat more accessible in the last few years by the construction of the new locker room at the football field. We've all admired it for a while, but this afternoon was the first time we took our inexact measurement of its circumference. When I took Mom's right hand, I was even able to see Dad's left one. We think this tree has a real chance of taking the crown for biggest tree on campus. The present title holder is behind one of the campus houses (Marmon, for those who know what that means). A friend in the biology department told us later this is a burr oak. Below is a view of the top.

I don't know what kind of tree this is, but it cracks me up. Actually, this is what I look like first thing in the morning, if I go to bed with wet hair. Maybe that's the appeal.

You'll have to enlarge this image to see the Canada geese pair. Almost as soon as this pond was constructed, back in the Spring of 1988, a pair of mating Canada geese began showing up and raising a brood. At some point my folks noticed that they showed up, like clockwork, on Saint Patrick's Day. This year on March 16th, we saw a pair of geese on the small pond, a short distance away from this one. We wondered if there was some change in routine; was this a new pair, were they changing their location, their schedule, what was the deal? We wondered if this indicated a greater sense of security, since not only is the small pond more accessible, it lacks the runway stretch of open water most waterfowl need to get their running start before take-off. Did you know they needed that? I hadn't either, until a biology professor explained it to me. Cool, huh?

Well, for whatever reason, the next day, right on schedule, the geese were in residence at the little island in the big pond. I assume they walked the short distance. I would love to know why they chose to show up a day early, but not take residence until the time was right. Canada geese were a much more rare sight here in 1988, but now there are flocks in residence year 'round. I assume this pair (presumably one of them is a descendant of that first pair) spends the winter somewhere else, but who knows?

Backyard at Hazelthorne, two views of the budding Magnolia.

No final thoughts to share, no conclusions to be drawn presently from this meander. It was a nice week, that's all.

Midwestern Spring: Close-ups

2010-03-24T13:58:00.003-04:00

A few weeks ago I realized a scheduled lull in work (read: spring break at Pratt) was coming up. A good freelancer would see that as a time to shake the trees a bit, make a little rain, seek out new revenue streams, or utilize a host of other nature-related images for 'do more work'. Instead I decided to treat it like a vacation, and take a quick trip to visit my family.

I couldn't be more pleased.

In my defense, the week happened to include my dad's birthday, so with Mary and Tony's help I arranged to fly back to Indiana, to surprise him and Mom. I could pretend it was a purely altruistic act, but that always made me think of that old story of the kid who gave his mom a baseball glove for her birthday, or, similarly, the Simpson's episode where Homer gives Marge a bowling ball--with the name 'Homer' on it--for hers. Much as this was a treat for me though, I think Dad was pleased too.

Mary had invited them over to join her and Tony for dessert Saturday night. Mom came in first, saw me, froze, then said "how did this happen?" A few minutes later Dad came in, saw me, and said "how did this happen?" (I suspect years of teaching and social activism means Dad is used to the unexpected, which is the reason he shortened the freezing part.) I got the impression they both initially wondered if I had developed the ability to materialize at will anywhere on the planet. Nice thought, and it's rather sweet that both my folks appeared ready to ascribe supernatural abilities to me so quickly, but they didn't seem too disappointed at the more mundane explanation.

We celebrated Dad's birthday a day early, on Sunday. Mom and Dad each said they'd had a sleepless night or two in the past week, and had figured out that it was due to anticipating yet another celebration without James. Birthdays have always been a family affair, so in this year of firsts, his absence was noteworthy. We toasted him as well as Dad. The occasion was understandably a bit muted, but still very nice.

I haven't been in Indiana in March for many years, so it had been a while since I experienced the first glimmers of Spring there. Whether due to the slight change in latitude or less cement (not an exhaustive list), Spring was just a bit further along in Richmond than NYC. Or maybe the signs were just easier to see. Mary and Tony were rejoicing in the crocuses sprouting up in their garden, and appreciating the bigger showing of snowdrops, even if it didn't match their hopes, given how many bulbs they had planted. They had the bigger field at Laceyland to reassure them, though; the garden at Hazelthorne will have its own blanket of white flowers soon. Tony claimed Mary didn't let him buy or plant as many bulbs as he had wanted, a claim she vigorously denied, so to keep the peace I offered to act as witness to the future plan 'to let Tony go nuts with snowdrops.' Marriage is a delicate negotiation.

Seasonal changes are always a good excuse to look at things closely. My eye kept switching back and forth from close study to drinking in the panorama. Today's post is mostly the close study. For those of you not on Facebook (be strong, she's a harsh bitch-goddess of an addiction!), I'll post some of the landscape photos soon. One of the many benefits of being able to return to one's hometown, hell, the actual home one grew up in, is the ways experiences can feel archetypal. I wasn't just witnessing the start of Spring, I was witnessing it in the place where I'd enjoyed it for most of my first twenty-two years. There have been plenty of changes to the place, of course, but many of those changes are for the better, which is always nice to see. Things are both brand-new and memory-laden.

James would have appreciated this combination of rainbows and

pretty rocks.

This, in case you aren't sure, is a crayfish hole. Or crawdad, if you prefer. Crawfish, even. Not, however, craydad. Unless someone wants to start a campaign. If so, good luck with that. For reasons I won't get into here, Dad has, for years, thought we should change the name of New York back to New Amsterdam. When I moved here, he assumed it would be so I could head up the home office. I've been dodging that agenda for fifteen years now, and it's pretty much a full time job, so I won't be joining any other whack-job campaigns.

Um, so, anyway, that there's a crawdad hole.

Mary and Tony are thrilled this pussywillow bush is thriving this year. In past years the branches have been broken by squirrels before any real growth could occur. I did see one squirrel climbing in it one day. I prepared to go out and scare it away, but before I did, I watched it crawl to the end of a branch, and delicately nibble only the blossum at the very tip. My theory is that one is the most tender, and the fuzzy nubbins on the rest of the bush are now safe by reason of unpalatability. Not sure why it was allowed to reach this stage this year; maybe the fussy gourmet squirrels had a surfeit of other goodies to draw on. Lord knows they're still looking sleek and tubby, though that doesn't impede their acrobatic games of tag.

Dad and Mom have insisted for years that they don't need any more things, so Mary has taken to giving them nice trees, flowers and plants--plus labor--for their garden. This year she gave Dad a couple of Peruvian daffodils and ten bulbs of freesia. On Saint Patrick's Day I helped her plant them. Two warm sunny days following torrential rain on the weekend meant the soil was close to perfect. It also meant we discovered some shoots and blooms we might have overlooked otherwise. Houseplants, much as I love them, rarely provide those kinds of surprises.

I also observed my Saint Day by building a tiny dolmen for James' memorial garden. Dolmens dot the landscape in Ireland and the UK, and their simple design, massive scale, and obvious age have always appealed to all the Laceys, but especially James. History, big rocks, they have it all. Mary and Tony had saved some of their border rocks for this purpose, and it was nice to be doing it on Saint Paddy's Day. This mini version makes me think of the Stonehenge number in This Is Spinal Tap, but I'm okay with that. Pretty sure I would have had to get a permit and some serious equipment if I'd tried to make a full-sized one. And besides, James loved that movie.

My return to NYC (NOT New Amsterdam) was softened by being greeted at the airport by my Prince Charming, then heading back to his place where I fell asleep to the sound of peepers. The following night Charming had his first experience of a warm night in my neighborhood. We had each actually managed to get to sleep, despite the revelry on the street, only to wake standing a few hours later when a fire fighter blasted his truck horn and siren repeatedly, then issued commands on the bullhorn for the partiers to clear the way for the truck, or risk arrest. It took several tries before people decided to move their moronic partying asses out of the path of a fire truck desperately trying to get to an accident scene.

City life comes with slightly different seasonal markers. Fortunately there are crocuses here too.

Window Box Update

2010-03-04T12:34:00.001-05:00

I'm starting to sense Spring a bit when I'm outdoors. The snow from the last big storm is almost gone, and more importantly, so is the nasty brown slush it becomes so quickly in urban settings. No doubt my feelings are shaped by my recent trip to Seattle, where the weather was warm, the sun was out, and blossoms were starting to show all over the city. But my living room window boxes have been approximating spring for several weeks now. Above you can see a close-up of some sweetpea blossoms. So far I've never had more than three at once, usually only one or two, but maybe this is a careful policy on the plant's part, sort of a limited edition approach, so my delight in each individual bloom stays nice and high. It's a clever policy, if so. My morning routine now includes a few moments of close study of both window boxes, to see if anything has changed or needs my help.

The morning glories have also lured me into a daily visit, with almost the opposite approach. While I'm still not getting the blanket of blossoms I keep hoping for, these babies are definitely blooming in greater profusion than the sweetpeas. Nowadays though, my daily visit is mostly to see if any of the gazillion seedpods are ready to burst. I was dozing on the couch recently and was wakened when a tiny shower of seeds hit the windowsill. Most of the time I catch the seeds before they burst out on their own. There's an odd satisfaction in squeezing a dry seedpod at just the right moment. For weeks now I've been soaking the new seeds and throwing them in the pot when they're ready. I think I have at least three different generations of sprouts growing. With any luck I'll have morning glories blooming indefinitely.

I have a vague recollection of planting two different kinds of morning glories, one purple variety and one red. So far only the purple, called Grandpa Ott, has shown any blossoms. Maybe the reds are taking longer, maybe Old Grandpa is a more vigorous type, and took over. If I'm only stuck with one kind though, he's not a bad way to go. When the blooms first open, they're often blue, but as the day progresses, they'll change to a deep violet, with red throats and stars. The vigor and speed of these guys might be a bit scary, if I were inclined to think that way. I think I've seen vines grow as much as an inch in a single day, and the number of seedpods is a bit overwhelming.

Funnily enough, the sweetpeas have only been purple so far as well, this despite the claim on the seedpacket that I'd be getting a profusion of "orange, lavender, scarlet and pink blooms." Let me just tell the universe at large that while I am quite fond of purple, it is by NO means the only color I like.

Something else my daily visits have shown me is just how much sunlight these east windows actually get. I think the white walls on the opposite side of the courtyard also mean the setting sun has more of an effect on the plants than I would have predicted. With the sun moving farther north as Spring approaches, the hours of daylight are lengthening in the living room, so I have hopes for moving all my herbs out there for the summer. It's nice having plants in my bedroom, sure, but it might be even nicer to have more of them in a room where I do more than sleep. So far the basil plant I've moved seems pretty content.

Below you can see a couple of morning glory vines creeping out of the window, on their way, it would appear, to meet up with the golden pothos. It too seems fairly enthusiastic about meeting up with the morning glories. I can't for the life of me imagine how that would benefit either of them, but what the hell. I would have expected the pothos to be content with the light in this area, but haven't a clue why the morning glories would choose to move away from the direct sunlight. It's a mystery unfolding in seasonal time; maybe I'll understand the agenda better in a few weeks. Further bulletins as events warrant.

Snow Day in Harlem

2010-02-26T16:37:00.003-05:00

Yesterday as the snow began to pile up, the only thing I really needed to do was go to the grocery store. Even that was somewhat optional, if I didn't mind making the poor food delivery guy slog through a whole lot of nastiness before climbing four flights to my apartment. (My roommate says it's somewhat comforting to realize he's not the only one out of breath by the time he gets to the front door.)

I tend to like snow though, so I decided to head off to buy some stamps, then if I was still having fun, I'd head down to Riverside Park.

It was late enough in the afternoon that anyone who was out (shoveling supers aside) were probably there, like me, by choice. A rather cheerful atmosphere permeated, at least amongst the pedestrians. I think the drivers were having less fun.

Of course part of our enjoyment no doubt comes from having more space to ourselves than usual. As you can imagine, this was even more true when I headed down the park. Even in good weather, this place isn't really on the way to anything. If you're here, it's because you chose to be.

At the water's edge I found creatures who were going me one better in the chilling department. Ducks and Canada Geese sat in the choppy waters. I didn't see any of them fishing; I think they just liked being in the water.

As my face began to hurt from the driving snow, these two bikers passed me. I was impressed by the progress they were making through the slush. One of them called out a cheery hello as she passed by. This never happens in more clement weather.

Snow falling on water has always seemed magical to me. Growing up in Indiana, I always associated large bodies of water with the Summer. Even if we were going to nearby Brookville Lake (an hour's drive, in my recollection) we only went in hot weather. Going to the east coast, usually Maine, also usually only happened during the Summer.

My first year of college coincided with a sabbatical year for my Dad, so my parents and brother spent it on Southport Island, in Boothbay Harbor, Me. That Christmas break was probably the first time I saw snow fall on the ocean. My seven years living in Seattle didn't give me many more opportunities. Snowfall isn't common in the city, at least it wasn't back then, and on the rare occasions when it happened, it usually shuts the place down. Getting down to the water's edge, let alone onto a ferry, would have been more trouble than it was worth. Being able to walk to the Hudson yesterday was nice, it even felt like a bit of a luxury.