Snapshots

— A cold and blindingly sunny day.

— I head into Manhattan in the morning to meet up with my dear old friend Betsy (she is my oldest friend – we met in the 5th grade – we were Phys Wrecks together – we have never not been friends, never not been in touch – amazing) who had come into town with her family to see Wicked. Her daughter is a dancer, and her dance school took a field trip – very exciting: they all got to take a dance class with an actual cast member from Wicked – and then would go to see the matinee – with their “dance teacher” performing!! Oh my God. If I had been able to do that when I was 14? I would have never recovered emotionally. hahahaha So I was going to meet Betsy and her family in front of the dance studio. Go have lunch while her daughter danced up a storm. I walked along 47th Street, looking at every address – and then saw a happy waving figure in a BRIGHT RED coat. My dear friend Betsy. Yay!!! Her two beautiful sons were there, all bundled up and serious and cute, and her parents – who I have not seen in YEARS. It was so so wonderful to see them. These people have known me since I was 10. Betsy and I would have epic sleep-overs at her house, where we would act out scenes from Oliver, and tape-record skits in her room, and talk anxiously and excitedly about getting our periods some day. Her parents were there, wonderful, warm, funny, welcoming. Betsy’s mother is a nurse, her father is an Episcopal minister – they lived beside the church where he worked – and their house was always warm and open. It was SO GOOD to see them, their beaming happy faces. Man!!! It’s like I look at them and see my whole life!!!

— I had a big plan to take them all to McHale’s – a great burger joint in the theatre district – kind of notorious for being an actor hang-out. If you eat there, you always see someone famous. It’s just the way it goes. But … as I walked by there to meet Betsy … I noticed that the place was boarded up. No!!!!! I feel … TERRIBLE. I don’t know if it closed for good – or if it’s remodeling … It has this old old signage – which I have always hoped they would never change … They have big cushy booths inside, and great great burgers. Sad that it’s closed!! So McHale’s was out. We set out to find another place to eat.

— We ended up going to Roxy Delicatessen – a famous tourist hang-out and New York joint right smack in the middle of Times Square. Across the street, the lines at TKTS were already out of control. We had a great lunch. I haven’t spent that much extended time with Betsy’s children, so it was really nice to just be able to talk with her two sons, and find out what they think about … oh … the most recent movie releases, for example. It was great – lots of conversation – Betsy’s parents were raving to me about the Hamlet being done at Trinity Rep right now, and telling me that if I could see it, I really should. I asked questions about – how they did it, what spin they put on it … Betsy’s father was telling me about how the actor did the “to be or not to be” speech, and how amazing it was, and different … Big conversation. At one point during all of this, Betsy’s youngest son whispered something in his mother’s ear. Betsy interrupted and said, “He’s afraid that my parents are giving too much away.” !!!!!!!! So cute!!! He was concerned that if I did go see it, they would be ruining the surprise of it for me! Adorable!!!

— Betsy’s oldest son was EXTREMELY impressed with our waiter. Our waiter would breeze by, deal with us, breeze away, and Betsy’s son would say, “Man. He is so cool.”

— I was EXTREMELY impressed with the manners on display. Both her sons when they ordered: “May I please have …” “Thank you very much.” etc. Very very formal table manners. Adorable. Well done, Betsy and Jean. It’s not easy to have good manners. It takes lots of practice, and both of these little boys have it all down pat. It was so cute.

— It was just so good to see everyone. I haven’t seen Betsy in a while either, so the whole thing was really really special.

— Then – very exciting – we headed back to the dance studio on 46th Street to watch the end of the dance class. Up the 6 flights of stairs. Then crowding at the door of the studio where a beautiful spectacle greeted us. All of these kids – ranging from age 7 to age 15 – doing a dance routine they had just learned – with Robb Sapp, who plays Boq in Wicked – taking them through it, dancing it with them, calling out instructions. “And 5, 6, 7, 8 … to the left … and to the right … ” I just got a big lump in my throat watching all of this. It was so so beautiful. Watching these little kids – boys and girls – wearing leotards, or sweat pants, or just regular clothes – bounding around the floor with this BROADWAY DANCER leading them. Robb Sapp was beyond generous with them. Beautiful. He was supportive, encouraging, and inspirational. He had choreographed dances – to different songs from Wicked – and he taught them to the kids. We watched them all going over the dances, again and again. Robb then saw us all watching and told us we all could come in. So we moved into the studio – and then just watched. It was so beautiful. I can’t really describe it. Betsy’s daughter was dancing up a storm – she was wonderful. She was wearing green glittery eyeshadow. She is 14. After the dances, Robb had a talk-back with all of them – taking questions: how did he get started, what was it like to be in the show, what did he do during the day … He was absolutely LOVELY. Just so giving and wonderful with these kids. Robb Sapp: you’re great!!! How fun, too – all of the kids were going to see him ON BROADWAY in just 2 hours … so they would get to see this amazing show but ALSO to see their new friend perform. Awesome.

— After that, we all went to the big Hershey store on Broadway. Kid heaven. Willy Wonka incarnate. You walk in and you are overwhelmed by the smell of chocolate. Betsy’s parents walked around with their grandsons, and Betsy and I stood off to the side and talked. The words “Diary Friday” did come up a couple of times, I must admit. I also got to hear about Betsy’s job – and catch up on how all of that is going.

— Then … sadly!! … we parted ways. They went off to find Rockefeller Center and then to go see the show … and I headed downtown to go to Pier 1 and to meet up with Allison.

— I had seen a lamp at Pier 1 a couple of weeks ago that I, let’s face it, COVETED. And when I showed up at Pier 1 yesterday, I found that it was on sale! 10 bucks off. It was 20 dollars. It’s similar to this one – only it has a bright red shade. I ADORE it. I have wanted a red lamp for my bedroom (shut up) for a while … and I saw this one and fell in love with it. Allison met me at Pier 1, and she was so cute – she had hoped that she would beat me there so that she could guess, ahead of time, which lamp I would pick out. hahahahaha

— I bought my lamp and then Allison and I headed back to her place, to drop off my lamp, and then go out and have lunch. Well, I had just eaten … so Allison would have lunch and I would watch her eat. heh heh As we walked through the sunny busy streets of the West Village talking a mile a minute. It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other. We talked about LA, my trip there … she, of course, had been following my adventures online. Allison’s from LA.

— We get to her apartment – it’s warm, cozy, sweet … I love it. It has such a good vibe. She shares her studio apartment with two gentlemen. Oscar and Charlie. Ahem. A dog and a cat. Allison is Dr. Doolittle. I love these animals. Oscar has tremendously rancid gas which tempers my love for him … slightly … but still … the way he cocks his little head when Allison says certain things to him is enough to just slay my heart forever.

— We grabbed a Scrabble board and went over to 7th Avenue to Dublin 6 – her “local”. When Allison and I went to Ireland, we stayed in an AMAZING garret room in a B&B in Ranelagh – the B&B was run by the mother of Dublin 6’s owner. So there’s this whole connection there. It’s like home over there. We sat at a big table, and were about to start Scrabble – but as so happens with Allison and I, we got sidetracked by our fabulous conversation. We talked about cults (Emily – where were you?? Have you read Under the Banner of Heaven??? Read it!!) – and somehow – we followed wherever the conversation took us – and it ended up with Allison telling me about this wonderful movie she had seen recently called In Good Company – a film I had never heard of, despite my deep admiration for Dennis Quaid. In Good Company? Nevah hoid of it.

— So of course we decided to scrap our Scrabble plans, go and rent In Good Company, and watch it at her apartment. I love Allison because we can freely trash our itinerary in this way. We were all a-flutter with excitement. Allison has that thing, too, that I have: if you love something, then you want to BE THERE when you introduce it to your friend. She will always have my eternal gratitude because she basically FORCED me to watch The Office – it was a similar situation: I had never even heard of it – she said, “Okay. That’s it. We have to go watch it right now.” And … I was hooked, within one episode.

— We got the movie and then set ourselves up to watch. Her DVD player is on the fritz right now so we had to watch it on her laptop. This was not bad … we had a nice set-up … only the VOLUME of the movie was a little too low for us, and we had the volume up as high as possible. Bummer. Our eventual solution was this: (and it was so ABSURD – but within an hour we were completely used to it, and were very blase about it) take little ear-phones like you would plug into your walkman – plug it into her laptop – and she would get ONE of the “ears” and I would get the other. This meant that we had to sit basically on top of each other, and could never really be parted. We had to become Siamese twins in order to watch In Good Company. I swear, if anyone had peeked in at us – they would have thought we were batshit insane.

— In Good Company is WELL worth it. I can’t believe this movie didn’t get more of a buzz. It’s Dennis Quaid, the wonderful and complex Topher Grace, and the luminous Scarlett Johannsen. I thought I knew where the movie would go (so used to cliches we all become!!) and then it went totally another way. It was lovely. A lovely film. And it’s really ABOUT something. It packed rather a large punch … and just from looking at the cover of the video, you would never guess that. VERY good movie.

— A discussion ensues about Dennis Quaid. The wonderfulness of Quaid, how he’s grown into middle-age so well, how great he is … I bring up The Rookie – one of my favorite movies – only to find that Allison has never seen it. It is only 7 pm. So what the hell. We bundle up, put Oscar on his leash, and go back to the video store to get The Rookie. hahahahaha

— On the way there we have a great talk about James Frey. SO MUCH TO DISCUSS.

— It’s nighttime now. Cold. Oscar must inspect EVERY car tire. He must inspect EVERY tree trunk. He is a small dog, but he must bark at EVERY dog he sees. Hilarious. He’s horrifically gassy, but so cute you want to fry him up and eat him. All with love, of course.

— Oh, funny moment at the video store – we cannot find The Rookie. We look in drama and comedy. No Rookie. Now Allison has declared the guys who work at this store “movie Nazis” – she called them that TO THEIR FACES – because they, oh – they refuse to watch movies made after 1921, or whatever. hahahaha So knowing this – I go up to the guy behind the desk and say, “Do you have The Rookie?” He looks it up. He sees two copies. We look for it. In drama. In comedy. No go. Hmmm. I say to him, “It’s rated G – do you think it might be in kids?” He says (with no snotty judgment, I must add): “It might be in kids …” Allison, meanwhile, basically shouts, “It’s rated G????? No sex or drugs? GREAT!!” Giggling with laughter, I go to the damn Kids section, and what do you know – there is The Rookie. It’s not even PG-13??? Not even that comforting 13 tacked on the end?? Nope. It’s straight G. I take The Rookie to the counter to check it out. Allison calls the guy behind the counter a “movie Nazi” yet again. I say, “Oh … you’re a movie Nazi? So you must LOVE that we’re renting THIS, huh???” (I say that as a movie Nazi myself. For example: I flat out think movies are BETTER if they were made before 1940 and I flat out think you’re an IDIOT if you don’t agree. That’s me. That’s my Nazism. However – I loves me some Dennis Quaid in The Rookie!!!) The guy behind the counter started laughing and said, “I’ve never seen The Rookie so I wouldn’t know …” I gushed at him, “It’s a wonderful movie!” Suddenly – as all of this is going on – we become aware of his co-worker standing next to him. He is filing pages into a 3-ring binder. The pages are all laminated, with three holes punched into them … and they are ALL pornographic images. I suppose it was some kind of directory of porn – to let their viewers know what XXX movies they had. Or something. But AS we are all bantering about rated G and movie Nazis and The Rookie – Allison and I become kind of distracted by the almost casual filing away of utter FILTH right in front of our eyes. The guy was literally putting this stuff into the binder as though they were pictures of window treatments or tea pots. Whatever. So bored. Gotta file this stuff away. Whatever. But we glanced at the porn pictures a little bit closer, glancing at each other – then the guy filing them away noticed us, and said – “Uhm … I guess I shouldn’t be doing this at the front desk, huh?” We just all BURST into laughter. It was so funny. He moved the binder away from us, and Allison was like, “No! Don’t take it away! I’m about to go watch a G movie!!!”

— We go back to Allison’s place, laughing about the entire scene in the movie store. They obviously all know Allison and love her. “You called us movie Nazis,” one staff member said to her. hahahaha We go to cross 7th Avenue and Oscar promptly has a nervous breakdown. He whimpers, and cringes, and pulls back on his leash … he is terrified of 7th Avenue. We finally figure it out. Steam is billowing out of one of the manhole covers. This is a normal thing in Manhattan, however creepy … it is like War of the Worlds, like something is alive beneath the earth … but we are all used to it. Oscar is NOT used to it. He was terrified of the steam. So cute!!! Allison scooped him up in her arms and we crossed the street. We were not annihilated in a fiery mesh by the steam coming out of the street. Oscar’s fears were unwarranted.

— We order a pizza. We get into pajamas. We set ourselves up in our Siamese Twin formation, and we watch The Rookie. It is GLORIOUS. I have seen that movie countless times but I still cry at the same moments (I don’t WEEP – but tears stream down my face – there is a difference): when he throws the ball past the speed-detecting device on the street, when all the kids come up to him and say, “It’s your turn, coach…”, when the manager of the minor league team tells him “cause you’re goin’, too …” OH! SO MOVING … and then Rachel Griffiths response when he tells her over the phone … And then I am pretty much Ms. Waterworks for the last 10 minutes of the movie. Fuggedaboutit. We had a great time watching it.

— Then we watched one of the special features – which was a little documentary about the real Jimmy Morris. Interesting – I did not know just how much of the real story they had used. I had known it was “true”, but I didn’t know how much was true. Looks like most of it was true – even down to the pouring rain at his “callback”. I just loved every second of it.

— Then … it was time for me to go home. It had been a long and beautiful day. I took my red lamp (SO EXCITED – Allison wanted to make sure I had a light bulb for when I got home … “Do you need a light bulb??”) and headed off for the PATH.

— I was home in half an hour. I set up my red lamp, and sat in my chair for a good 5 minutes, staring at its beautiful sensuous light … the red glow on the wall behind it … so happy in my purchase … and SO HAPPY because of the beautiful day I had had.

— Betsy, Betsy’s kids, Betsy’s parents … red lamp … Allison … Dennis Quaid … Pajamas .. Siamese twins … A perfect perfect day!!