Denial Doesn’t Work

After two weeks, three plane rides, a multitude of airport personnel, numerous lines, rental cars, and one really very nice Northridge, Calif., hotel, Meredith and I arrived in Lismore, NSW, Australia.

I’m dripping with sweat from the humidity, which I’ll take over the snow of Brooklyn any day, actually. I was geared up to write a long-ass post, but why try to take care of it all at once, I say. I’m minutes away from heading outside to go do something Australian with my new sunglasses on (apparently the sun is more intense down here). But before that, I’d like to tell a little story.

Operation Book Purge

Dave tells me Box of Books No. 2 has arrived in California for safe keeping. And I finally shed the two or so boxes of books I had left. They’re gone. All of them. My most treasured are in Australia, followed by the second-tier (read: ones I could live without looking at so I wouldn’t have to pay upwards of $500 to have them shipped), which are with Dave. And it’s all good.

People strolling past my apartment on a recent sunny Park Slope day had the opportunity to stop and browse. And take if they were so moved. And I received one of the highest compliments I’ve ever received: “You have a good collection here.” Nice.

In 24 hours I’ll be typing away on my first NaNoWriMo page. I just checked and my goal is to write six-and-a-half double-spaced pages a day, so I can finish by the time Meredith gets here on the 26th. Jesus Christ.

Graffiti Uprising in the Slope

One night a couple of weeks ago, I was working out in my living room to an episode of House. I was in a relatively good mood, too, minding my own business, when a knock interrupted my sweat session. I don’t get visitors, let alone unannounced ones. My control issues take care of that for me. So, confused, I walked to the door and looked through my lame excuse for a peep hole.

I opened the door to see a bespectacled woman on the tall side who, it seemed, needed to visit her hair stylist because of the sun-damaged blond mop that sat atop her head. I don’t think she knew she needed this visit, because this was a Park Slope woman. Not sure if she was a mom, although if she were, I have no doubt that she would be pushing her baby in a stroller.

She took me in, adorned in my sweaty white t-shirt and Spurs shorts along with weight-lifting gloves, and prepared to deliver her speech. You see, there is graffiti on the side of our apartment building. When I first noticed it, I will admit I made a mental note to call the super and ask him to paint over it. But I simply forgot.

Back to the Theatre

I headed into Times Square today on this seemingly first day of winter for a play. But before I get to that, I must write a bit about this over-constructed theme park of a collection of streets united by one thing only. Commerce. The lights, the tourists, the fast food, the souvenir shops, the theme restaurants — all vying for the dollars of tourists whose cameras are poised upward at this sign or that.

I bought into it once. I’ll admit it. And it is a little overwhelming, but it is overwhelming not for its present but for its past. The numbers of names who have walked the streets is what fascinates me. The directors, writers and actors who have made Broadway and its various “off” shoots possible are, for me, what fuel this area’s glow.

Today I saw a friend in an “off-off” show called “The Servant of Two Masters.” It’s a commedia dell’arte story of arranged marriages, gender bending, class distinctions and, well, as this genre of theatre goes, farce.  Gray, one of my three first-year NYC roommates who went to the Actors Studio, played one of the servants. And she can act her ass off. I’ll never get to see her performance in her thesis piece, which blew me away. And I can’t wait to see her in more.

Just like I can’t wait to see Erin in more. Both of them, having landed in New York four and a half years ago, are members of the Actor’s Equity something or other and they are both currently involved in plays with theatre companies. Sweet.

But back to Times Square. One thing I will give it is that there are few strollers that jet and amble throughout the middle of the sidewalk. Perhaps this is because tourists understand that, have baby, will not travel to New York. This differs madly from the near-subdivision mentality of the sidewalks of Park Slope. Where parents, privileged in their minds, take up space with double-wide strollers and the belief that theirs is the best as the eye can see. Ah, Park Slope. It needs a kick. But so does Times Square.

Hotness

All right so it’s not hot necessarily. But let the record show that I, along with many others I walked alongside today, wore shorts and a t-shirt. Though I did allow the fact that it’s January to keep me in socks and Nikes. I’m not that out of control.

Global warming or El Nino, one can never be sure. The experts differ on the answer. (Correction: They DON’T differ. Thanks for the meteorology lesson, C.) In trying to find a good one for myself, I figured I’d watch the Weather Channel. When extreme temps occur, I tend to become obsessed with monitoring the weather. I have three weather widgets on my Tiger desktop, though one is for Australia. But back to the Weather Channel. I was watching this woman today whose name I cannot remember, and she was discussing the high temps for today. She said something to the effect of the following: “Tomorrow’s temperatures will be much lower than today’s, though they will still be well above normal. If that makes sense.” And she chuckled a bit, as though she had just made it through an excruciating point that she felt was going to give her some difficulty and, therefore, would be difficult for her viewers to understand.

If that makes sense? What? It makes perfectly ridiculous sense, so much so that she didn’t have to ask. This is an example of the dumbing down of society. The apparent need for media — yes, weather people count — to over explain and make plain the most simple of ideas. To put things in sound bite size pieces, so the people can get back to their respective social networks and hope to god someone commented on their page. I don’t watch much of the news media, preferring to get it from various online sources. Even then I’m not sure how much exactly is bullshit. But at least the people who write what I read don’t think I’m stupid. Not such a big point, but a point nevertheless.

After I turned her off, I put my aforementioned shorts and t-shirt on and began traipsing around the immediate blocks around my Park Slope apartment. This neighborhood is becoming more and more foreign to me. The staring eyes I catch have become a little more inquisitive rather than aggressive, though inquisition based on ignorance is a bit too passive aggressive for my liking. I can usually shame them into putting their eyes back on the double strollers containing their twins. It’s amusing most times. Or maybe it was just the fact that we were all seeing skin in January. Who can know? But I took care of some stuff, most important of which was checking with one of the three nearby liquor stores to see if it carried mint Bailey’s. How ingenious. It didn’t, so I settled on the good ol’ original. I also took some passport photos. Next is the passport application, which I will try to take care of soon so I don’t stress about getting it in time for my June trip to Oz. Fuck, I can’t wait.

A friend reminded me tonight about that essay I wrote last year. Still no word, so an e-mail from me is due. Mr. editor of gender book, what’s up with this shit? Either publish the damn book already or give me my essay back so I can make it better and shop it elsewhere. Because that’s what I need. A distraction from my book. Page 103 ain’t a bad place to be, though.

Favorite Moment Ever at Staples

I walked in there today during a rare break from work, clad in a black shirt and pants, intending to stay only as long as I needed to. Perusing shiny gadgets was going to have to wait for another day.

After assessing GHz, style, and price differential on phones, I had questions, because I didn’t give myself enough time on the various technology review sites for research — an important step when making such decisions.

So I went off searching for a person in a red polo who looked like they wanted to impart knowledge. On my way up to the counter, I passed a woman pushing a kid in a stroller and a man who trailed her by about two feet. Let’s assume they were married, but for the purposes of this tale, it is not important. Approaching the family, I took note of the kid in the stroller. He was too big for it. Way too big for it. He was sleeping, legs hanging out the front, arms hanging to the side. Let’s make the kids walk, shall we?

With my task still at hand, I prepared to walk by them. But it wasn’t without an exchange.

“Excuse me, do you have–”

“I don’t work here.”

“You look like you do.”

“Ok.”

That was it. I could have given her a lesson in color. Red polo. Black shirt. Stupid woman who can’t make her kid walk.

Speaking of children. Now I like them. I really do. I’ve known some pretty great kids. But I have a kid anecdote that I will relish for a long time, because my part in it allowed me to let off some steam that had been brewing. It happened last week.

My front door is right on the sidewalk in the heart of Park Slope. I can hear everything that people say as they walk by. It will make a good book one day once I gather some comments and create a story out of them. Living where we do also made moving in a cinch. But we have to get our mail somehow, and to allow this, there is a mail slot that anyone can open right up and drop things in.

Jill has told me a few times of her experiences with unattended children who have opened the slot and peered in. One day she went out and had some words with one of the parents who was standing on the corner talking to a friend totally ignoring her cute little monster. The mother didn’t seem to take it very seriously. Jill told me of a few other times this has happened, but I still hadn’t experienced it.

Last week one morning, I was rushing to gather the necessary things to walk out the door because I had gotten up on the later side, like I always do by snoozing NPR for an hour. I heard an abnormal ruckus outside, so I investigated. I raced out of my room and that’s when I saw these little beady shithead eyes looking right back at me through my mail slot. I ran to the door, but ended up fumbling with the lock. Lock, unlock, lock. Shit. Finally, I opened the door and looked to my right. That’s when I saw a mini-monster playing monkey on the bars in front of the apartment building next door. I also saw his mother’s face, turned back around with a sort of embarrassed crack of a smile on her face. She was pushing a stroller. Something to tell Jill.

The next morning, I actually got up early to kick start my metabolism with some Kashi puffs, and I turned on the Today show. Then I heard some crack crack crackling behind me, so I turned to look and there was a little thing’s face, grubby hands on my mail slot. I put my puffs down in haste and ran over to the door. But on the way, I remembered my go-around with the lock the morning before. I didn’t want to repeat that. I needed closure on this situation, so I slowed down as I got to the door, his face still stuck in the slot, and bent down. One split second later, I moved to my left, met the shit face to face and AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!!!!!

He ran. I laughed. It felt fantastic. Haven’t seen him since.

In Transit

I decided to do something last weekend I haven’t done before, so I hopped the train and went to Brooklyn Heights to go to the Transit Museum.

I have a love-hate relationship for the subway, which is a feeling many people share. It makes you wait and wait and wait; it smells sometimes; it’s crowded sometimes; it goes slowly sometimes. But there are also its sounds, and speed, significance to the movement of the city. I’ve always been fascinated with the way it was constructed more than a hundred years ago. And I’ve long wanted to visit the museum.

So I walked the blocks to Schermerhorn St. and turned left, noting the smoke shop to my right as I headed to Boerum Place. When I got to the intersection, I noticed the sign for the museum. There was an arrow pointing at a downward angle. My view of the thing it was pointing to was obstructed by a scaffold and other miscellaneous construction material. Of course.

So as I crossed the street, I saw that it was pointing to a subway entrance. The museum is underground in an abandoned subway station! Brilliant. As I started down the stairs, my excitement grew. I wanted to whip out my camera and take a picture of the black-and-white cut out of an old (probably long-dead subway worker), but I forgot it, so forget that.

I paid the $5 and started at the beginning. I learned about the sandhogs and the tunnels they dug in danger. The levels of different land fills that comprised New York. The unions that supported the workers who experienced unfair labor practices. The ethnic groups that helped build the underground city.

A sandhog cut-out.

There’s a Triborough Bridge exhibit now, which I sort of sped through, not because it wasn’t interesting but because I don’t have much interest in it, rarely have been over it, and bridge construction blueprints sort of go over my head.

As I left the bridge exhibit, I noticed a woman walking down another set of stairs. There’s more? I followed her halfway down and that’s when I saw them. The old trains! I stopped dead on the steps wanting to hold off on what would be the most exciting part of the entire excursion.

The Thing With People

People are everywhere. This is nothing new. Everyone meanders in and out of everyone else, and it seems that there are unwritten rules to make this flow rather smoothly most days. I’m not quite sure what it is, but I go with it, as I am one out of everyone else. But there are some days when nothing goes right. When it seems the stars are out of whack and everyone gets hit with the dumb stick upon waking. This was one of those days. The R train to Brooklyn comes at 9 a.m. I try to catch it on mornings I’m at my house. Whether I get up at 7 (rare) or 8:30 (more often than not), I usually have luck. I caught it this morning in one of those perfect fashions when the door opens just as I swipe my metro card. But before the perfection, I had to contend with an idiot who just had to pick up the nickel or dime or penny or whatever it is he dropped just before the turnstile. The Union Street station gets crowded at this time and because of this, neither he nor I were the only ones around. Which meant that there was little space for me to pass him as he was bent over, ass in the air to retrieve a pointless to me coin. “What an idiot,” I thought as I decided to go to his right, which would leave me with just enough time to catch the train that had just arrived and that would definitely not wait for me unless I got my ass through. But then he moved. To his right. And at times like these, when it seems that common sense flies away, I take matters into my own hands. I teach little lessons in common sense by letting the stupid people know that their actions have interrupted the flow of someone else. I bump into them. And this is what I did with the coin dude. Just a quick nudge to let him know that he was an idiot and in my way. We both made the train. But I got on first. I take the R train one stop to Pacific with what seems like the rest of the world. And, like clockwork, the D train arrives. I look for a spot that might allow me to get on first, so I can try to sit in one of the few remaining seats. It worked that way for me this morning. And I spotted a seat just as I stepped on the train. With my head down, I went right for it. But I soon noticed that there was someone else, coming in the opposite direction with her head down bolting to my seat. And just as I pulled up next to it, she sat down. “All right then,” I said out loud over my music. With a sideways grin on my face, I stood in front of the doors and pulled out my book. But before I started reading, I made sure she saw me. We looked right at each other, her dumb brown eyes peering out from behind the glare of her stupid round lenses. She wasn’t much darker than I and she had a few years on me. I didn’t care though. I wanted to pull her up by her neck, give her one good knee to her potato, and step on her back as I took the seat that she stole. I shook my head with that grin still on my face. Had she not been so greedy, I would have let her take the damn seat. But it became a competition for a morning respite before work, and I lost. And all I could do was grin. And the madness didn’t stop there. People gather in groups in the worst places in this city. At the top or bottom of the only set of stairs; in front of a turnstile; on a corner; in front of subway doors. When I left the D train, there were two people standing in front of the open doors not caring about the people getting on or off. Common sense. I had to teach them a lesson. With a quick nudge to a back, I stepped off and shook my head. Sometimes this city annoys me. Or is it the people? Maybe the two don’t mix. And this was all before work. It warranted a break-time conversation over chai with Chris. He had a similar day yesterday. But we differ in one respect. He won’t nudge people. I don’t care who the hell it is; they need to know they’re stupid. It’s so annoying that it’s worth a blog post.

Gotta Love Park Slope

As seen on Union Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues.

Convos Outside My Bedroom Window

Here’s what I don’t get. People standing right the hell outside my bedroom window, which is right on the corner of (oh wait, I don’t need people knowing where I live) talking. I just heard the word “boogey.” Who says that?

Woman #1 is talking about some guy who is at her house with a bad leg. “I have to go home and deal with the “brute.” Do wives call their husbands “brutes”? I’m thinking so. A few seconds have now elapsed with Woman #1 talking to Woman #2 about the aforementioned “boogeying.” And now there were three. Three women gathered outside my bedroom window fawning over each other’s dogs.

“I’m done with my bag of poop.” You don’t say. Ok, it appears as though the Brute’s name is Peter. And I don’t think she’s Woman #1′s husband. “I was just telling her that he’s home. Staying through Thanksgiving. I went into the kitchen and he’s making toast. I have to go pee and he’s sitting on the fucking toilet.”

Here’s what needs to happen. Woman #1 needs to go home and deal with her Peter brute. Woman #2 needs to commence her yoga or boogeying or whatever the case may be. And Woman #3 needs to go take care of Bailey’s poop. And they all need to do it the hell away from my bedroom window. Next time, I will open my blinds with the fervor of a maniac about to climb the walls. We’ll see what happens with that.