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October 4, 2001
An invitation to a book party. The author, a friend unseen for years from college who resides in Ireland, has written a children’s book being published in the US. When I first lived here, in a self-made Irish ghetto on Flatbush Avenue Extension, she came to stay in what we referred to as nightmare dormitory. Whether it was a long standing thing or something that developed in the close quarters of the walk through apartment I don’t know, but she developed a passion for one of the permanent occupants, another friend from college. She would get up very early, before the staggered stagger to the bathroom, and boil potatoes. The potatoes were intended for the loved one’s breakfast. They would sit dry and floury in a pot waiting for him to arise and for her to fry them to perfection. Her attentions, particularly the potato boiling, irritated him. Living six to an apartment, boiling potatoes, drinking whisky. It would be a play to avoid on, even off, Broadway. Somebody I had developed a similarly misguided crush on once made a remark about the potato boiling authoress. It must have been spring or summer as she wore a series of slightly anachronistic cotton dresses that all featured a cut out triangle on the upper part of her back. He asked, “Where does she keep all of the triangles?” It endeared him to me even further. These things and her good skin came to mind when the invitation arrived.
October 3, 2001
I’ve been wondering what the nation has been dreaming of late. It’s probably not the time to commence taking a medication with the documented side-effect of “vivid dreams and nightmares.” But a visit to Dr. Sleaze, who I really think I have to fire, resulted in just this. Ever the pessimist, I have been going to bed expecting to be churned through the subconscious mill with a vengeance. I had heard from fellow patients that Sustiva® rendered horror more colorful and apparently three dimensional than any DVD player. I had even heard that it was being sold as a street drug. Perhaps my lifelong inability to endure a movie with anything stronger than a gremlin in it is paying off. The dreams are vivid but thankfully the horror is absent. They appear to be art directed by Gianni Versace and display a tackiness of subject, costume and color that is more reminiscent of pornography than horror. Last night I was part of a female burglary team. We infiltrated the parties of the rich and famous and in between making inane conversation about oil free moisturizers, sipping champagne, and adjusting our Yves Saint Laurent sandals strapped high on our tanned and well muscled calves, we discreetly pocketed the jewelry and personal effects of the household. All of this was blissfully without guilt or the fear of being apprehended. I awoke with the distinct feeling of a job well done, of finally having found a métier that I relished, and only vague misgivings about my own shallow, not to mention immoral, nature.
September 28, 2001
Today I set out to achieve two things. I failed at both. I had planned to avoid two things. Two situations where I had determined to utilize all my upper body strength to pry the collar of my coat off the smooth bronze nub of the proverbial hook. I had resolved to use deception, pleading and in one instance—if it felt appropriate at the time—a little half earnest bribery. One involved a doctor, the other a friend attempting to herd me into gainful employment. The particulars are not relevant. What is relevant is the failure of my intent and my subsequent relief at that failure. We may not be up to the job, stoic enough for the prescribed poison, but we can be shored up, bullied, and hoisted back up onto our hook. It might even leave us grateful. Permission, once again, to be sentries to ourselves.
September 27, 2001
My favorite part of the day is later than it used to be.
By ten p.m. I am almost convinced of a life.
As if the functions misfire all day and then hit their stride as bed looms.
Don’t get me wrong; I love bed.
My encouragement to myself daily, to leave that place, rests on the logic that if you don’t leave it you can’t get back into it.
But there is peace, or a sense of it now, here at the desk: no phone, the vehicle soundtrack muffled.
Scanning an article on James Baldwin by Colm Tóibín I read:
“He found odd jobs and then lost them, washing dishes, working as an elevator boy. He drank, he had casual affairs, he suffered a number of nervous crises.”
What reassurance biography becomes.
Today, I saw a completely naked man in Soho.
Neanderthal in Soho. Between two cars.
So in place.
September 23, 2001
Yesterday, hot but beautiful, found me eating Mexican food at a sidewalk table on 8th street, thinking that I really might be in Los Angeles. A glass of beer lulls me into survivor’s gloat; here we are again, alive, enjoying the day. Again it is remarkable to be alive. The people at the tables around me seem oblivious to the light, the trees, the birds. A niece is being irritated by her aunt who is critical of her eyebrow do: “too fluffy...too bleached...I used to shave mine off...do you wax or pluck?” A foursome of tourists is being bullied by the alpha male of the expedition who has apparently lived, albeit briefly, in the city and insists on guiding them to Midtown on the subway for their Broadway musical. The other male of the foursome makes a dive for a cab as they leave the restaurant. Alpha Male explains the “off duty” sign to Nervous Male and they head for the subway at Astor Place, their wives uninvolved in the primordial struggle. The women discuss how age has sapped their faces, particularly the lips, of all color. They apply red lipstick, a little too orange in hue, and submit to their guide. Nervous Male follows a few paces behind the trio.
That brief moment of community that appeared after the disaster seems diminished, replaced by irritation. My own irritation seems to have gone. I feel a strange calm and a renewed vigor for life. I meet Gabrielle, the chef of Prune, at the Farmer’s Market. She is eating a raw green bean: “These are really over.” She says that the days following the disaster, before 14th street was re-opened, were glorious days. The customers delighted and delightful. By Friday they were saying: “I don’t like any of these white wines.” She had resolved to work less.