Thanksgiving Day Unscathed!!

Well folks. It happened. We had a great Thanksgiving Dinner with my relatives (my parents and half my siblings). The turkey was perfect and all the side dishes were out of sight. Lots of bright beautiful colors on my plate.
Even the wine was lovely. At some point I'll have to figure out what led to this comet like occurence. But right now I just want to enjoy it.
Ben is not partial towards Thanksgiving fare. His plate consisted of turkey, stringbeans and a piece of Italian bread I brought out from the kitchen. No stuffing, no mash potatoes, no cranberry anything, no brussel sprouts, no gravy, no pies of ANY kind. One day he'll change his mind. Brian had a nice time too - which makes me very happy. I wouldn't say that the only way to his heart is through his stomach - but it certainly is among the express routes!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Fly Boy

Brian is on the west coast presenting at a conference. Ben and I are flying solo for four days.

Appropriately enough, it's been raining since Brian left. Ben misses him terribly and carries his dad's baseball mitt around with him as soon as he gets home. He sleeps with it wrapped up in his blanky.

This evening, after dinner, we walked Saki around Tompkins Square Park. We ended up on the black top where there's a baseball diamond painted on the ground along with painted bases. Ben is obsessed with baseball and the Red Sox. He expects that his future will include a few years in the major leagues before he starts his train company.

Ben is tall and big for his age. He's a slow runner and frequently trips over his feet. He plays kickball at recess where he's usually the last one chosen and the last one to up to kick.

As the rain came down he asked that I watch him run around the bases as fast as he could. He was doing everything he could to go fast. Without realizing it, he lifted his arms up like Superman in the hopes of picking up speed.

So I stood there with my dog. Watching my son running bases in the pouring rain with his arms outstretched. Each stumbling step was filled with hope and determination. Just a few minutes more and he'd take flight.

Ben. My greatest teacher and my greatest blessing.

Thank you Jesus!

I stayed up until midnight watching the campaign results on Tuesday. By then it appeared that the Democrats had won the House. It looks like they've won the Senate too. Unbelievable.

I've been so busy with my impossible daily routine that I didn't see this extraordinary news as even a possibility. What a relief to be pulling back from the edge of insanity.

Randy Balmer is an evangelical Christian and noted scholar who teaches at Barnard and Columbia. His most recent book, "Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religous Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America" has received great reviews and is very thoughtfully written. He has a bumper sticker on his door. I pass it everyday en route to my office.

"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in a flag and a carrying a cross."
-- Sinclair Lewis

VOTE!!!!!!

Please VOTE!

VOTE like your life depended on it.

Because it does!!

And vote for cool people who don't want to make the earth explode or control women's bodies, or take away our civil rights or shed blood for oil.

Party On!

Yesterday was the last day of the Muslim holiday Ramadan. I'm pretty sure yesterday marked the last day of month long fasting and praying. In the morning I heard the call to prayer outside my window. The sun was rising and Muslim men were coming into the Tompkins Square Park to celebrate/pray. On the black top, long rolls of brown paper were unfurled in rows. Men would find a space and kneel down to pray aloud. There were about ten rows formed before I got on the bus to go to work. I've only seen this gathering at the park a few times since I've lived here. It's really a beautiful ritual. They were pointed east towards Mecca. It made me feel proud to be in a country and a city where people could worship and express themselves freely - let's keep it that way.

Remembrance of Things Past

CBGB's closed at the beginning of the week. Sad. Very sad.

My husband Brian estimated that he and his band - the Cavedogs played at least 50 gigs there. As a partner of a rock musician, I put in my own time at a zillion CMJ showcases in the 80's and early 90's. It was hard to get too excited about venturing inside the club after Ben was born - unless it was an early accoustic show. But I guess I always thought it would be there. Like the Statue of Liberty.

After all of Brian's touring he would make me laugh with his countdown of the worst men's rooms he'd encountered as a rock musician. CBGB's did have a solid place in the top ten. I smiled to see that the NYTimes included a shot of the club's graffitti filled, poster plastered, sinklesss bathroom. When I showed it to Brian he said "Are you kidding me? That's the women's room - - a virtual lap of luxury! For starters the men's room never had an actual toilet seat."

He liked CBGB's and was grateful for the exposure it gave his band (which was eventually signed to Capitol Records) and other emerging musicians just like him. You could be a beginner there.

Here is an exerpt from a recent web interview with Patti Smith. She played the last show at CBGB's on Sunday night.

Rolling Stone: Did you ever feel threatened (in CBGB's neighborhood or in the club during the 70's)?

Patti Smith: I never felt threatened. I feel more threatened now. I feel confined by the intense commercialism. The stores, the shopping, these people all night long in their limos, acting like they own our little streets. New York to me was the worker city, the artist city. It was a place to get your shit together. Now it's a place people come to with their shit together. They have a lot of money, and they want condos. They want high life. They come to film here and have fashion shows. You try to walk on your street, and they act like they own it.

Cities should be edgy. They are edgy parts of America. They are not suburbia. They are supposed to be a melting pot of struggles, a collective force of ideas and energy. I watched horrified recently -- NYU students coming in with truckloads of fancy stuff. Magic Chef stoves and boxes with new computers. I mean, these are not struggling college kids. Get a hot plate. Drink some Nescafé.....

You said it Patti. What they don't get is that what makes this city great is what they're destroying.

News flash: money isn't enough. it can't eclipse the art. smart people know that.

Once upon a time in America....

Last week my son Ben and his third grade class went to Ellis Island. It was his first trip there. I wish I was with him. There's so much we could have talked about before the ferry arrived on the other side.

He saw a movie about the immigrant experience and found the name of his maternal Italian great grandmother. I'm pretty sure my Irish great grandfather is listed there as well. You can also find his name in the index of Gangs of New York...a dubious achievement that explains a lot about my family's character.

Ben's gene pool combines almost every country in Europe with a stop in the Ukraine and Cypress. He is a true American mutt and I must say that the results are extraordinary.

Ben complained that on the ferry ride home his class was not allowed to sit up on the top deck with the rowdy public school kids. He was furious and said "Mom, it was hot and smelly down in the lower deck. All because we went to Ellis Island doesn't mean they have to send us back to Manhattan in steerage class!"

I went back to Ohio....

and my city was gone. Well. At least my part of the city.

A few nights ago I took a cab from the East Village across town. We cut across 13th street. I couldn't believe all the buildings that have been torn down and replaced with new construction. The new structures are at least 15 stories high. Probably more, but I'm not used to counting that high in my neighborhood.
First you see your community get fucked up by drugs and violence. Then finally it climbs out of that hell hole to be destroyed by the greedy real estate developers.

Seriously, will anything be left of the East Village in a few years from now? The artists are pretty much gone. The drag queens are pretty much gone. Regular people are being replaced with rich people each day. Now the buildings are gone. Maybe they'll leave a little piece of land where they can hire people to do East Village reenactments - like Colonial Williamsburg.

Sick Day

I'm feeling ugh today. Very ugh. 24 hour bug. Probably because I've been working/writing until midnight for the last two weeks.
You know how it is. All those balls in the air. Motherhood, a job, chairing the Halloween party at my son's school, serving as a trustee there and writing squeezed in somewhere in the cracks. My writing mentor just reassigned me to a group with three other people....who are PUBLISHED. The screws are turning. My apartment looks like we're moving. Must be wishful thinking on my part.

Bella Luna

Early Friday morning the new moon arrives.

New moons are the perfect time for beginnings. And this new moon has lots of power packed into it.

So start something.

It's not about doing it perfectly. It's just about doing it. Even if you trip, stumble and make a mess.

You won't be sorry.

Apology

Big Apple -

I'm sorry I said fuck you.

You've been through a lot. Today reminds me of all we went through and how it made me realize in stark terms - how much I love you and that there is NO PLACE like you in the world. When other people ran out of town - we stayed - even though we were scared of what might happen - because we weren't going to abandon you.

Five years later and it still really hurts. God bless all of those souls and their families.

Fuck the Big Apple

When you go away from this place for three weeks, away to a place with no cell phone use, no long distance access and non stop media in your face, it changes you. If only temporarily.

I got back on Sunday. Still relaxed. Still peaceful.

Now I'm surrounded by urban overdrive. I am in complete contradiction to my environment. It feels like being stoned but without the paranoa. I walk down the street, but really I'm floating. Everything around me is going way way too fast to even consider engaging in.

This can't last. Can it?

Is this how it feels to live in Ohio?

It saddens me to realize the level of anxiety, stress and fear that I usually function on from day to day.

Needless Suffering.

Maybe I need to pack up.

Big Mama's Birthday

Yes folks, the rumors are true. Mommy is 44 years old today.

Woke up to a light rain falling on our summer cottage. I was in a cozy bed under warm quilts. Just me, my husband, my son and my dog. It was a tight fit but everyone wanted to get into the act of falling asleep with mom on Ellen-eve.

We all had a lovely breakfast and headed out to Provincetown where I finally got a chance to weave in and out of art galleries. If only I had the money to buy art...until then we'll just have to make it at home.

We ate at the Lobster Pot (see above pic). This restaurant is the height of culinary achievement in Benjamin's eyes. It is a very reliable place to eat (even Gourmet recommends it!) and it's customary to go there at least once during your stay out here. What makes us laugh is how very adament Ben is about us patronizing the place. Mama mia - the boy still eats off the kiddie menu!

Afterwards Ben and Brian presented me with my VERY OWN Boston Red Sox baseball cap. I also got a great book on meditiation written by Pema Chodron, the well known female Tibetan Buddist monk. I also gave myself the gift of joining up with my writing mentor/editor again after a long break filled with self doubt.

We went for a walk on a deserted bay beach with Saki, happy to be the only people in sight for miles. Afterwards we went home for a dinner made by yours truly. Clam chowder, a cold lobster salad and a nice white wine followed by an excellent Carvel ice cream cake! I made Ben a "crabby patty" a la Sponge Bob Square Pants. Basically, a crab cake topped with chopped pickle, tomato, mustard, ketchup and lettuce on a toasted sesame seed bun. According to Ben - it's the closest we'll ever get to cracking the secret recipe.

Brian just finished drilling us with Trivial Pursuit questions. Ben knew all the history answers. I knew all the ridiculous answers.

As I blew out the candles, I felt so grateful to be living in a safe environment with a healthy family, a job, a cool dog and a lot of laughter. People in Israel never have that sense of safety we take for granted every day, nor do people in Iraq, Gaza or Afghanistan...or parts of this country where people fight violence and poverty everytime they step out the door with their children.

In some small way, I know that what I do for a living helps move things forward - if only just a bit. My father always says that education is the great equalizer. I couldn't agree more.

Now help me blow out those candles and make a wish!

Close Encounters of the WASP Kind

So I'm standing at the deli counter at a grocery store in Provincetown silently waiting my turn.
The woman before me places her order. She is blond, ivory white, in a crisp summer outfit.
And then she spoke....

"Yes, could you please give me a half pound of the chicken breast or the turkey breast please. What's most important is that it should be extremely dry. That's how we like it. Which would you suggest to be the driest of the white meats?"

My jaw dropped. Having been raised by an Italian mother that request is tantamount to saying "please direct me to your most burned piece of toast, the more charred the better."

I knew that voice. She was the replica of my mother in law only forty years younger.

Do you know how much time I spent in therapy discussing the "food issues" around WASP family gatherings during the holidays? I'll never forget when my mother in law put a three pound roasted chicken down on the table to feed five people. My husband could have eaten the whole thing! At first I thought she was angry at us but then I came to understand that what she hated was the need to eat food. I took my wonderful therapist's advice -eat before you get there and there won't be any more tears of confusion or hunger.

Of course if I wanted a martini, they would gladly hand me a Methuselah sized bottle of gin and send me on my way - - no questions asked.

Go figure.

Summertime

I'm having such a wonderful vacation.

This is the first time since childhood that I've ever gone to the cape for three straight weeks. Every morning I go for a walk at around 6.45 am. It's a magical hour. Very few cars, just the fisherman types driving by in their trucks and a few high powered bike riders.

During this walk I thank God for all that I have and for this beautiful world we live in. I ask for guidance on how to be an instrument for good and how I can somehow alleviate suffering in other people's lives.

If there was a class for remedial praying - I would be in it, including remedial praying summer school. Most of the time God must be reacting to my prayers by thinking "Jesus, Mary and Joseph, what the hell is she actually trying to say?"

Katrina

I heard that there will be a documentary on HBO in the next week or so made by Spike Lee titled The Day the Levees Broke. Wish I could catch that one but I'm far from the land of cable consciousness here in my sleepy sea village.

Maybe I still haven't gotten over reading Gone With the Wind but the more I think about it the more that the Federal response to Katrina seems like a mutation of the Reconstruction. It seems like people in New Orleans should be seething in anger at this country. That place is still a friggin hell hole. Is it because most of that city was poor and black?

And why hasn't the press stayed on it?

By the Sea

We spent four hours at Longnook Beach today. It's a wild beach. Huge dunes and untamed waves. Everywhere you turned there were seals, blue fish, minnows - - and they had no intention of leaving because of a few freckled nude and semi nude humans.

Ben asked us what animal we would be if we couldn't be human. We were mulling that one over when he said "there's no way I'd ever be a butterfly". I asked why and he said "because butterflies don't ever know their mommies". He has no idea what those words meant to me.

Brian spends most of his time in the ocean. Swimming out too far, weaving through the waves with the slickness of a seal. He is so happy in the water. Out there all by himself. He stays out so long that I finally got him to wear a thermal swim shirt and shorts. It's pretty clear that he's just visiting us here on dry land. His heart is lost somewhere in the Atlantic.

Unraveling

I'm up on the far end of the Cape with Ben and Brian.

Three weeks of ocean, bay, woods, cooking, hiking, reading, swimming, writing, biking, sleeping, music and I forget what else...

I'm slowly forgetting where I live and what I do for a living.

Red Alert

Liquid bombs.

What will people think of next? How do governments keep ahead of all these terrorist schemes? It's just too much.

What is motivating these rageful acts? Is it because thousands of people have died in Iraq and now one thousand in Lebanon - - and no one intervened? Is the message to these people that some lives are worth more than others? That a dead Lebanese child or Iraqi child means less than an American or an Israeli? And why are some of these Muslim sects determined to kill each other?

Why does Iran want to "wipe Israel off the face of the earth"? If I lived in Israel with my son -- how would I want my government to react to that statement with Hezbollah a stone's throw away from my door?

I wish I understood the history of the middleast better - so I could understand what motivates these actions - where the rage comes from and the desperation.

Branson, Missouri

I have a very sketchy idea of what Branson, MO is all about. But I'll tell you one thing. This country needs tons more with lots of variations on the theme!

First of all, it keeps entertainers employed long after they fall out of fashion. It helps me to sleep better knowing that Tony Orlando, Joey Heatherton and the entire cast of Hee Haw have gigs and health benefits.

I also like the idea that the performances are all hours of the DAY and EVENING. I wouldn't mind going to see Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Chrissy Hines or anybody else for that matter at 2pm instead of 11pm. Who gives a rat's ass as long as the music is good.

If only there could be a P.S.122 or spiegeltent in every state.

Someday.