Taking Manhattan

If you were to ask me, I am not a birthday person. The last time I celebrated a birthday in any big way was in September 2002 when I hosted a fundraiser for three of my favorite non-profits by inviting 200 people to my San Francisco flat. Anal, over programmed person that I am, people were invited in shifts, but there was a point when a likely 90 people were in various parts of the flat and garden at one point It was a great event, but within weeks, many aspects of my life cam unraveling, with both of my parents, a difficult aunt that I was nonetheless very close two, both of my cats, and my significant other disappearing from my life.

Two years ago, when I refused to mark my 50th birthday, I was certain that my life was the embodiment of the Cavafy poem "Candles" in which there are many extinguished candles behind me and few leading me forward. In fact, it was hard to see any light.

This year I decided to visit Manhattan to celebrate year 52 and my 20th year of working for World Neighbors. Neatly, a blogger meet up emerged organically, and it was an amazing, touching four day weekend.

Nasty weather, humidity and an hour delay did not manage to dampen my spirits when I arrived Friday night and headed up to the East side Friday night Joy's place (she embodies the lyric from 42nd Street of "sexy ladies, from the 80s...) where she, Mark and Gary buzzed me in and were serenading me with a birthday greeting at the top of the stairs with handsome four-legged Basil peeking through their legs to smile at me and flash his potato chip loving tongue.

Afterwards, Joy took me to see a friend of hers named Robert at the Rodeo Bar and I videotaped it and you can see on my previous post. Late as the night may have gone on, I kept reminding myself that it was not even midnight yet in San Francisco.

After a breakfast with Nicole in Little Italy, I went to the Tenement Museum in the morning and then saw Boeing, Boeing that Gary and Mark treated me to see. It was a wonderful show, hilarious and perfectly staged.

That evening our blogger group had the meet up at the Soho Grand. Steve, Jill, Husein, Ched, Kim, Brice, and Ed were all there. After a few drinks, we had greasy food in Chinatown.

Sunday I saw the Van Gogh exhibit at the MOMA and then saw the amazing production of August, Osage County. Spoiler alert: In the third act, when one character said "He's not your cousin, he's your brother!" a man behind me, in a thick Okie accent, belted out "Yep, that's Osage County." Seated in the third row, I was oblivious to the fact that the show went on for more than three and a half hours. I could have watched another five. And what a thrill to see Estelle Parson on stage for the first, and likely last, time in my life. At 80, she was a ball of energy, charging up and down the stairs, struggling with a daughter trying to strangle her, and nearly chewing up scenery in this amazing play.

That night I headed over the bridge to Park Slope to have dinner with W______ and had a few moments of icky nostalgia in what used to be the flat we shared on Garfield. .

Monday, I took a quick stroll through Central Park and then visited Gary’s school on 23^rd Street. His kids were very sweet and smart and had many questions. I spoke a bit about my work with World Neighbors, and I was amazed that I was able to hold the attention of five-year-olds with some heavy global issues. Gary is an amazing teacher in action, and his co-teacher Lauren is just as gorgeous and graceful in action as she is in their videos. I spoke a bit about the issues of inequity between boys and girls in the Global South, and I was greatly impressed by the questions of the girls in the class. I hope it doesn't take that long, but when there is a woman in the White House, I wouldn't be surprised if it's one of Gary's former students.

Finally, I strolled through Wall Street which has an odd pall on the day the market took its biggest drop ever. Ironically, I was on CNN for an 18th of a second while strolling before the cameras.

The whole trip was way, way to short. The high point was truly the blogger meet up. We're not sure how we all came together, but we think it was likley the handsome and charming WAT in southern Cal.