Single

Here’s a bit more about what I mentioned yesterday -- being single.

In a nutshell: I’m all for it!

It’s taken me a long time to realize this, and lots of awkward attempts at relationships. I’ve always expected to meet a partner, and I lived many of my younger years anticipating his arrival -- thinking, I suppose, that's when my life would really begin.

Yet when I met someone and began dating him, I often found myself chafing against the time and effort it demanded. Things felt forced. My friends say that’s simply because I hadn’t met the right person, and maybe that’s true.

But deep down, I suspect that I’m just meant to be on my own. I’ve always been very self-contained. I do things by myself all the time -- traveling, going to movies, exploring the city -- and I enjoy it. My motto is, if you want to do it, do it. Don't wait around for someone to join you.

I’m a social person, and I enjoy hanging out with friends and being involved. It’s not that I’m a loner. But I live a lot of my life in my head, and I find that I am often my own best companion.

So I don't rule out a relationship, but realistically, it seems unlikely. I mean, I'm 41 years old, and I've never had one that's lasted longer than 9 months. My life pattern seems pretty established.

(Photo: Harlem, July 2008)

Boat

Last night I went on a three-hour boat cruise around lower Manhattan with my friends David and Mark. We chugged up the East River around Ward’s Island and then back down again and around to Jersey City and the Statue of Liberty. It was fun!

The event was billed as a singles cruise for gay men, but I went just for fun. I didn’t try very hard to mingle, I must admit. (At this point in my life I’ve pretty much decided that I am better off single -- I’ll write more about that sometime soon.)

The cruise gave us a chance to see Olafur Eliasson’s waterfalls close-up. As we paused nearby, I asked one of the bartenders, who happened to be standing near me, if she’d ever been to Niagara Falls. She said, “No! In fact, I was just in Las Vegas last year, and I didn’t go. But I’m going back to Vegas this year and I won’t miss it this time.” I thought, holy cow. They say Americans have a terrible sense of geography, but that was a shocker.

(Photo: Morning glories on Edgecombe Avenue, Harlem, July 2008)

Tears

When I went wandering in Harlem on Saturday, I found this beauty salon on Frederick Douglass Blvd. at 139th Street. Tell me this isn't the best beauty salon name EVER?!


I'm not sure what it means -- maybe when you leave, you're so elegant you burst into tears?

Yesterday I took the afternoon off work and walked around Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with Lettuce and Chedwick. We found lots of street art, ate free pizza and plundered a Salvation Army thrift store, where for 99 cents I bought a t-shirt that pledges my love for Henry. (I was actually unaware of Henry's existence until I saw the shirt, but never mind.)

Philosophy

Have you ever heard of a book called “Sophie’s World”? It was an incredibly popular novel in Europe in the 1990s, and while I was in South Africa back then I picked up a copy. Its plot is built around the teachings of the great Western philosophers, so that while you’re reading about the characters you’re also learning about Kant and Hegel and Kierkegaard.

I found it an incredibly BORING book. I got about 1/3 through it and stopped. And that’s very rare for me -- once I start reading a book, I almost never give up.

The problem, I think, is that I just don’t get philosophy. At the risk of sounding shallow, I think it’s possible to think too much about things. To try to identify rules that order our lives and the universe, or our reason for being, is an exercise in futility. (As I tell my friends, I am not a “big question” person.)

After all, who says there are any rules at all? Who says there’s a reason for life or our existence? All those discussions involve human constructs that have very little to do with what’s actually happening around us.

Maybe if I’d studied philosophy in school I wouldn’t feel this way. I’d have some foundation for comparing the various schools of thought. As it stands now, philosophy just annoys me. If I met Nietzsche in the street, I would say, “Oh, get over yourself already! Go to the beach! Pet your cat!”

This is one reason Zen appeals to me. It’s not about talking or arguing or trying to work things out. It’s just about being present to what is. In fact, in Zen, you want to release your ideas about existence and self, recognizing that they’re only ideas. To do this, you sit. You let all the thoughts come and go, and see that they’re only thoughts. The wisest thing you can say in Zen is, “I don’t know.”

(Which, of course, is a philosophy all its own, I suppose!)

(Photo: Playground in Hamilton Heights, July 2008)

Queen Anne's Lace

I was wandering in Harlem yesterday when I found this doorway to an industrial building, surrounded by Queen Anne's Lace. I love it when I find wildflowers in an unexpected corner of New York. Happy summer, everyone!

Kabluey

I went to see a very strange movie last night: "Kabluey," with Lisa Kudrow. I'd like to say I liked it, but I'm not sure I did. It's about a loserish guy who agrees to help his sister-in-law while her husband serves as a soldier in Iraq. She clearly doesn't want him there and treats him terribly -- in fact, everyone treats him terribly -- and he winds up dressed in an absurd costume, promoting office space in a stripped-down corporate park owned by a failed Internet company. Even with performances by Conchata Ferrell and Terri Garr, several laugh-out-loud moments, and a relatively positive ending, the film seems to take a dim view of humanity. I left the theater depressed!

(And this was after I schlepped out to Brooklyn to see it, because it's no longer showing in Manhattan.)

As for today, it looks like we'll have nice weather for wandering and photography, so that's on my agenda -- even though I probably should be painting my apartment.

(Photo: Doorknob near Ninth Avenue, July 2008)

Man on Wire

Last night I went to see a screening of “Man on Wire,” a documentary about Philippe Petit and his daring, unauthorized 1974 tightrope performance between the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Afterwards, Dick Cavett interviewed Petit and the film’s director, James Marsh, on stage.

As unbelievable as it sounds, Petit managed to sneak into the World Trade Center with a crew of accomplices, rig a cable that stretched across the two buildings at the roofline (1350 feet in the air!) and walk across it not once, but several times. He didn’t just walk it, he performed on it, kneeling and lying down.

I was surprised at how moving Petit’s performance, and Marsh’s film, were. I expected a mischievous movie about a daring stunt, but there was also an exceptional beauty in Petit’s goal and its achievement. It was a kind of performance art that blew apart people’s notions of fear and possibility.

When Petit spoke afterwards, he said he never “tries” to do anything. He just does. You’ve got to admire that kind of certainty and direction!

(Photo: Tarpon Springs, Fla.)