It was time to say good-bye to my beloved New York, my home of eight years...and it threw its best and worst at me, just to make sure I'd never forget it:-)
Sitting on the subway on my way to Zayed's, my brain didn't blink-- it submerged. In some blurry recesses, it absent-mindedly erased the past 6 months, and it was as though I never left. But little things, such as my disgust at the dirtiness, my fascination with the non-white-looking people, and the confident, sometimes superficial smirks, smiles, and stature of all around me, gave hints I'd been away. I knew where everything was, I knew how everything worked, it was all terribly, terribly familiar; but it was no longer home. And that was good to know.
I was able to refill the Michela hug-meter for Zayed, Mor, Amy, Kaiti, Aditi, Tania, Chelsea, Lindsay, the CUTTA gang (Daita, Claire, Radu, Quique, Antonio, Kira), Josh-- and even make it to an old flamenco class (though Vittorio had a substitute that day, my friend Ricky was there)!! And NYC is CRAZY: I went to a Broadway show, "Sweeney Todd", starring Patti LuPone and 6 other dark characters who could both sing AND play SONDHEIM on their various instruments (alla Robby Marshall's "Cabaret"). Very well done. I went to see Lindsay's band "Stutter" at Arlene's Grocery in the village as potential label signers looked on (they rocked), and a friend of hers who is a composer, asked me if I would record a demo for him for one of his songs. Well, that didn't work out with the time allocated, but the potential in this city is so full its steaming out of the sewers. Speaking of steaming, Amy managed to get into a fight with this horrible woman on an overcrowded subway, who actually grabbed Amy by the hair. I grabbed the woman by the arm, and told her "You do NOT act like that!" and she backed off. That's something I've never had to do in my eight years in NYC... I visited my old haunts, Tea & Sympathy, Serendipity, Cosi-Cosi, Columbia's Campus, Amir's (twice), Amsterdam Cafe, Max Cafe, and even made it to an all-night diner. Cafe Lalo will have to wait for next time. I saw "The Devil Wears Prada" twice, because Meryl Streep is amazing, and it is so New York...and on the way to see it the second time, I ran into Angel Corella (yes, the world-famous ABT dancer), who looked more than a little surprised at my "Oh my god, you're Angel Corella- I
love you." I quickly regained some dignity, took his halfway extended hand and said "Thank you for being a dancer." He said, "Thank you for watching!" as I ran off to let him continue his conversation.
Ah, New York. It won't be the same without you. I'll be healthy;-) And I'll have to stir up some excitement on my own. And I'll be back.
Raph and I performed in Prague on June 10th, with our flamenco school at Svandovo Divadlo...it sold out quickly, so none of our friends got to see it, but here is a picture of us doing "Sevillanas" at that performance:-)
