One Final Note

Here it is. The final installment of the chronicle of the New York trip. I hope you've enjoyed reading so far, and I promise to get the pictures up soon.

Day Five: Monday.
Monday morning it was raining, but I didn't realize how much it was raining until I started leaving the apartment. I went down the stairs but when I got to the landing I saw rain pouring down outside the building, and so I went back into the apartment to grab the umbrella that luckily Blaine pointed out to me a few days before (only because it has this cool telescopic plastic cover that you can unfold when you go inside so it doesn't drip everywhere). It was really raining. Like, torrentially. (Broadstairs, anyone?) I shared the umbrella with a woman and her small daughter walking across the street to the train station where I took the train to Chelsea to get onto the High Line.

This is the High Line: http://www.thehighline.org/. It's absolutely beautiful, and because it was still raining when I got there there was nobody around. I got a couple of really good pictures in before others started showing up. It stopped raining about ten minutes after I got there, and it warmed up pretty quickly, but I still didn't see a huge number of people (probably because it was Monday). I walked the whole thing, and I just thought about how beautiful it was and how much Mom would like it. I stopped for a while to read and then continued on to the end of the Line, which ends up in the Village.

I wandered around the Village for a while, looking for a present for my roommate Lorayne. I was unsuccessful, but I did stop in a pet shop to get something for Stanley. I chatted with the owner, and he thought I was a local, which was extremely satisfactory, but he also wanted me to come back and tell him how Stanley liked the food I bought him. I felt bad not telling him I was from out of town, but I enjoy the feeling of belonging, so I didn't mention it. I then walked around until I found Stonewall Inn, the site of the beginning of the gay and lesbian rights. There had been police raids at gay bars all around New York in the past, but one night the people fought back and made history with the Stonewall Riots. Now gay and lesbian history is really divided between Before and After Stonewall. It was really quiet because it was about 2pm on a Monday afternoon, but I ordered myself a cranberry juice and just sat within the bar for a while, thinking, writing, and feeling the rich history of the place. It was smaller than I imagined, and I could just picture it full of people. For some reason the bartender reminded me of someone (she was very nice and she looked familiar), and we were watching music videos on TV (and after a while I thought "can't we get some sports on in here?"). There were a few older men there, and I wondered how long they had been coming. How many years had they been going to the bar? Before the riots? After? Were they involved? It was just a really cool experience to be there.

That evening Blaine and I met up and went to the 9/11 memorial, which was absolutely lovely. It was a beautiful time of day (around 6pm) and the fountains and gardens they built in the place of the two towers is a lovely tribute to the people who lost their lives. The fountains are set in the footprints of the fallen Towers and have all the names of those on the planes, in the emergency service crews, and working in the Towers. The water flowing down into the lower square has an amazing pleated effect, and it's a very appropriate and touching memorial.

That night we did not go out, but spent the night at home, eating leftovers and playing Whirly Word on my iPad. It was another enjoyable, relaxing day, though a bit sad because I knew I had only one day left. But what a day that last day was.

Day Six: Tuesday.
Early in the morning I couldn't sleep, so I composed a poem then fell back asleep until late morning. It was my last day, and I had a few places I wanted to go, but it was all pretty low key. I made my way to the New York Public Library (the Schwarzman building), which is an amazingly beautiful building. I was getting pretty tired of all the noise and smoke and people, so it was nice to be somewhere cool and quiet. They had a really interesting exhibit downstairs about the history of hot lunches, from the first restaurants to automats to fast food. Then I went upstairs to the reading room where I just sat and read "War and Peace" in the beautiful, book-filled, dark wood room. It was incredible.

Then I walked to Grand Central Station where there is absolutely nowhere to sit in the main concourse, so I went down to the dining concourse and got myself a wildberry rhubarb sorbet (which was ridiculously delicious) and thought back on the week: how people have been really nice, no one has been rude or crabby to me. How my attitude has been that people are just people, and that no one is out there trying to deliberately hurt me so I've never felt unsafe. I had a wonderful time and talked with some really interesting people, saw some lovely and fascinating things, and had my fill of adventures.

After going to the Station I finally, finally found a post office to buy some postcard stamps, then walked around Midtown up Lexington and Madison to the edge of Central Park South. There I sat and read for a while and met another squirrel. It jumped onto the bench I was sitting on, but I was all "uh uh, no way, not again" and it jumped off and ran away.

I then made my way down to Times Square and the Brooks Atkinson Theatre to enter the lottery to try and get a ticket to see "Peter and the Starcatcher." There were quite a few people there to try and get tickets, but I found a nice older woman named Ruth who I convinced to put in her name for two tickets instead of just one, and I did the same. It turned out to be a really good idea, because her name was called, and not mine, so we both got a ticket, and good tickets at that. They were several rows back on the house right section and we had a great view. Before the show and during intermission we talked, and she teaches a Tai Chi class down in Florida where she lives, so we talked about that for a while, and my interest and plans in theatre. It was nice. The lottery was a couple hours before the show, so I called Blaine and we met up to have dinner before the show. He had a meeting that night so he couldn't join me for the play, but we shared a delicious felafel sandwich thing and talked about our days. While I was waiting for him I was sitting outside the Marriot lobby and saw two couples walking by: the women were wearing dress suits and hats, and the men were in full dress kilt. I approved.

"Peter and the Starcatcher" was incredible. I've never read the book the play is based on, being a bit of a Peter Pan purist, but I loved the play. It was a fun, creative prequel to the Peter Pan story without taking away from the original. It does not match up with J.M. Barrie's prequel stories, but it didn't need to. It didn't try to be the definitive story but just one story, and it was very imaginative script. It was a little predictable toward the end, but it was a wonderful show with a great cast. The guy who played the Black Stache was hilarious, and the girl who played Molly was incredible. The guy who played the Boy (Peter) was good, but there wasn't a lot of opportunity for him to really shine. The character is written as a pretty sullen, isolated boy for much of the play, so it wasn't until the end you really got to see his talent. But the ensemble was amazing (especially Ted) and the whole show was beautiful. One of my favourite lines from the play was, "He may have wished to be alone, but he didn't really mean it." It was a wonderful experience, and I am so glad I was able to see it.

After the show I was so happy and full of life I wanted to do something fun and, probably because of the whole Peter Pan flying thing, I wanted to be up high. So Blaine came and met me and we wandered around for a while, talking about what we should do. We didn't have a clue, but we did find a restaurant that served cheesecake, and since I hadn't had any cheesecake in New York, we stopped and got some. It was not very good at all, and the waiters kept ignoring us so it took us forever to get out of there. I was seriously considering leaving without paying, but we waited and found someone and paid our check. We then walked into a Sheraton Inn and went right into the elevator and rode it to the top, but the hotel wasn't very tall and it didn't have a very good view, so we just went back to Blaine's apartment. We went up onto the roof of his building, where it was warm and bright, and just talked for a long time about secrets and dreams. It was a wonderful last night of an unforgettable trip, and it was marvelous to see Blaine and spend time with him.

Overall it was a fabulous vacation, taking time away from work and spending time with a good friend. I don't know if I could ever live in the city; it's a little too noisy and crowded, though there are plenty of parks. Blaine thinks I could live in Brooklyn, and maybe I will someday, but right now it's just not for me. I did have a wonderful time visiting, and I would love to go again in the future, but for now I'm glad to be home. Thanks for taking time to read about my New York adventures! Shalom!