New York, Yup It’s Still Home

Battery Park

I walked around Manhattan during September. It’s true. It happened. I was there. Never made above midtown. I did go the the Hudson Yards a lot though. 

Because the Armory Show was being held there. 

Armory Show booth installation
That’s an immigrant coal miner’s name on the wall

It also happened to be NY Fashion Week. That meant I all at once found myself as close as 50 feet away from Very Famous People (trade mark)

I chuckled at the palpable glow of their fame and wealth. I barked a laugh as I could actually recognize one of them glittering blondely in the light rain. The distance between me there unkempt and outfitted in clothing bought at the US | Mexico border and these million dollar Very Famous People (trade mark) was purely comical. What else could I do but laugh? I am a witness to ridiculous times. 

 Proenza Schouler fashion show rehearsal on Little Island
No context shot from Proenza Schouler fashion show rehearsal on Little Island

Walking the streets of Manhattan during fashion week made me feel physically small, and shabby. Being in Mexico I forget what it’s like to feel short!

I did have an excuse to visit my old home base of Williamsburg. For those who don’t know, I used to live on those street before it got big money cool. I visited the Pierogi Gallery space and CAVE again.

I did my best not to cry seeing Domino Park. Mini Golf?! And how can there be so many people of wealth and probably status pushing strollers on Kent Ave? I remember when you could get run over by big rigs going both ways up and down that street. Now it’s one way and half parking lot!

Me in Williamsburg with all my memories and no mask because I was vaccine carded at the door. Like an adult.

The legalization of marijuana has made the city a more curious experience. The lingering pot smoke in the air sometimes hits you like a hammer even through a double layer of masking. I’m sure I got a contact high a few times.

Chinatown

For all of the changes and the pandemic weirdness, it still felt like home. I would move back in a tick if I could. 

At the end of my trip I went down to see  the 9/11 um… memorial site for the fist time. 

I cannot recommend that place. I would not. Especially if you are psy-sensitive in any way.

The place is horrific on so many levels, but what I could not handle the most was the… screaming. If you can call it screaming. I had felt an uneasiness when passing through that part of town before, but getting  up close actually made a huge difference. 

Thousands of soft, terrified, confused souls died very, very badly in that place. 

And it was like I could feel all that sudden transition rattling my guts.

I didn’t stand there thinking about what happened. I didn’t imagine or remember anything.. I was just trying to see the giant water feature squares in the ground and trying to understand the hideous ‘artistic’ mural section of the memorial grounds. It looked like corporate street art from the 90s that did not make any sense to me. Even with that confusing eye sore assaulting my sense of taste, I was overwhelmed with- I could feel  these rushes of something hitting me in irregular waves. I could have burst into tears and and thrown up all at once if I stayed there too long. I had the chills in the heat of late summer. It was like someone had told a ghost story, but no one spoke a word to me. 

And the blasé mood of the people around me didn’t make me think I was channeling their feelings… Though I could have been… I won’t rule that out. But I have felt things in places where there are no people hanging around remembering so… 

My advice is to never go to the 9/11 memorial as it is now. More construction needs to be done. There is a church and a performing art center than need to be finished. Without those things especially, it is an ugly, unhealed place. 

With a shopping center. 

Because nothing says New York Strong / Never Forget more than a new Lacoste polo shirt.

Mexico City Happened, New York City Will Happen

people getting limpias near templo mayor in Mexico City

I went off to and came back from Mexico City without much of any fanfare. 
You didn’t notice, did you?

I thought I could just tag along on for a music event. Just slip away for a bit. Because what urgent things rest on my aching neck?

More than I thought… 

It was supposed to be a little vacation for me; a little time away. But when I came back from wandering through the green and previously earthquake shaken streets of Mexico City, I was hit with a suddenly urgent to-do list. After a month of suspended animation I was called into all this action. So the supposed rest and relaxation I accrued went straight out the window. 

Between the things I am trying to do for myself, preparation for a big show coming up, and actual paying work- oh and my health issues, I am no blissful, carefree specimen over here.

Yeah so, my health remains questionable. I after all I have been through, I developed a ‘silent’ tooth infection. There was no pain because I had had a root canal done, but I was feeling terrible for weeks. And I didn’t know exactly why. How could I know when I’ve been feeling terrible for months?! I just thought it might have been something like a flare up of symptoms from my stomach infection.

The tooth was removed to get the infection out. 

The saga went on though.

August has had me knowingly exposed to COVID. I became worried when I started coming down with something. Something that thankfully turned out to be a cold. I got a hit of the germs from all the people coming back out of seclusion. And some COVID too. But hey, no fever, no linger cough for months- just a lot of snot stuck in my throat for weeks.

Because my vaccine shot worked for me. 

I look ahead to a week in New York through this veil of uncertain health. It is happening. I am going to go to New York. The plane tickets have been bought. There is a room reserved.

However, my travel plans haven’t been widely broadcast out because- *deep breath* –

I don’t want to visit anyone. 

I want to just hide away in the city. I am not ready for… people. COVID isn’t over and I’ve been sick for eight months straight with all manner of infections.

Please don’t think poorly of me for this seeming rudeness. It is a matter of mental health. 

a museum display of a sitting skeleton with it's head between it's knees


Wear your face panty!

The results of wearing the most uncomfortable bra I own.

July! The month were the house starts to kill me in the manner of a slow cook oven.My space is constantly stuffy. Even with the windows open and the fans going. Heat rashes adorn my hand and feet like awful henna designs.
It’s been hard to sleep. 
It’s been hard to not get depressed.
It’s been hard to concentrate. 
Fortunately, I won’t be stuck in here for the whole  summer! At the end of this month there is a trip to Mexico City lined up. It’s part work related, part mental health booster.
I am happy to get out. I would be thrilled to get out except there is as yet a pandemic drifting through the air. Still drifting through the air. Mutating as it goes.
Sure, sure I got my vaccine, but there is a little fact that keeps slipping people’s minds: VACCINES ARE NOT A CURE ALL. I can still get sick even if I have been vaccinated. My CHANCES of not getting sick are improved. 
It’s like that cancer that I had in 2017. (Remember that time when I had cancer?) The CHANCES of it not being something really nasty are very high, but I how would I know what my personal chances are? There is no test to make such a determination. That’s why I went through with putting a sizable hole my chest that resulted in a sizable scar. 
You don’t have to scar your body to increase your chances of not coming down with COVID-19. You don’t even need to take the vaccine (which is not being forced into your body by some scary doctor-man, by the way). Eat well, stay clean, stay away, and wear a mask. It doesn’t seem like that was ever a lot to ask. 
But from what I have seen… far too many people are so mindless and careless and so self-righteous… It was way to much to ask. If people can’t follow basic health and safety measures I don’t understand how the hell they are going to travel in space let colonize places with alien and quite hostile environments wherein you will have to wear protective gear a whole heck of a lot.
More complaint has been made about mask wearing than I’ve heard women complain about bra wearing! At the end of the day even the most comfortable bra I own annoys me. 
But I have to wear a bra, right? It’s not “proper” if I don’t, right? And I don’t wear bras for my sake. I don’t have large breasts. What need do I have to wear this garment?I wear bras for the sake of “society.” For the sake of my fellow “-men.” 
Which, as it turns out, is same reason anyone should wear a proper mask during times when an airborne disease is passing through multiple populations. So you don’t get all hot and bothered with a certain fever and become a useless burden to everyone around you with your sweaty moaning and groaning. 
AM I RIGHT?! {😏}
And you know what? I really don’t care if I can’t see your face- or if you can’t see mine. For me, mask wearing has been a such a mental relief. Wearing a mask mutes the smells of the street, it block some of the dust kicked up by the endless traffic; and it works as a sunscreen. What, oh what, is not to like?
If you wear sunglasses to protect your eyes from the sun’s invisible dangerous radiation that may or may not damage your optic nerves, then what is wrong with a mask to filter your airways when there may or may not be crap in the air? Do tell, do tell.
I didn’t exactly want to go off on a thing about “face panties”
– which you change and or wash daily- RIGHT?!  
Yet there I went talking about “face panties.”
 (Are you cringing yet? Should I say it again?)
But, wait, hey, I’m going to Mexico City! 
I need the change of scenery. 
Badly.