Classic NYC Story

I wrote this sometime last month on the E train on the way to the grad center… and I’m not certain which of my friends it’s about.

And since I think so much of you, ladies and gentlemen, I plead your advice on this decision. On the one hand I want to avoid the situation of having people whom I see on a semi-regular basis making the connection between me and some of the frighteningly candid details I include in my writing. I want to avoid having discussions (or having to dodge discussions) about my private life, my ex husband, my bellevue stay, etc. I want to avoid having people look at me once and already feel like they know me in and out. That’s dangerous in New York. And so perhaps I should delete this blog while I’m still semi-anonymous…

It’s one of the concepts the instructors push in yoga class (wow… I haven’t been there in waaay to long)… can you find the childlike breath in an uncomfortable pose? Can you find the… pleasure? Can you enjoy it? Can there be a moment like this one, where everything is all right even though your limbs and torso are twisted into shapes you didn’t know were possible?

…I got up and paced around that little room singing over and over again “It’s a happy day and I thank God for the weather…” and then I changed the tune. And then I changed the lyrics. And then I changed them back. And I kept singing. I sang until I got tired, but I couldn’t stop, because I knew instinctively that I was keeping the demons away by singing. So I sang. And I paced. And I sang…

…these things that dared not
show their faces while you were around
but these who now claim me as a sister
or perhaps a lover…

I came uptown because I wanted tequila. I wanted to drown myself in something sweet and alcoholic. I forewent my yoga lesson. I walked into the building, then changed my mind and walked out of it. I wanted to go home, but I haven’t been home since 2008. I wanted food, and could have stopped by the pizza place on st mark’s, but it almost seemed pointless to eat. I wanted to drink until I passed out.

My adorable cousin is a year and a half younger than I am and is absolutely not a New Yorker. Certain things that I take as inevitability are absolutely shocking to her… like the fact that the elevators in Penn Station smell like urine.

“You should have told the monkey to make a quick stop in Queens and bring your father back his railroad pass!”
“Okay, mother. Okay.”

… in the same way that the Christians claim that demons tremble at the name of Jesus, I feel a slight trepidation every time I hear his name called, even if it’s in reference to someone who isn’t him: an actor, a ball player, a famous movie character… it doesn’t matter if I know the reference or not. His name was called. I tremble… briefly. My breath quickens… briefly…

I sing because I don’t know how to pray
and laugh because I don’t know how to sing…