NEW YORK
The streets of the Big Apple were thick with tourists and the weather was sunny and warm. A pleasant change of pace from our quiet island life. We walked briskly down 6th Avenue, joined the High Line at 23rd Street, and then decamped to Chelsea Market, an adventure in food and eating we had not previously explored. Lunch at Cull and Pistol Oyster Bar was a savory salmon burger for me and a very large bowl of gumbo for my spouse—just perfect. We continued our walk through the angled tangled streets of the West Village ending up in Washington Square Park. On the way, we paused for some serious browsing, and of course a few purchases, at Three Lives, my current favorite NY bookstore. Have to qualify that since I have favorite bookstores here at home, in Maine and elsewhere!
Most of the weekend was spent on the green lawn of suburban Connecticut enjoying the bright sun and the crisp air and celebrating our granddaughter’s birthday. At three, she fully gets and embraces the concepts of birthday (“I’m not two, I’m not four, I’m three!”) and party. She and her young friends romped and ran and had a very lively time. It was an afternoon of balloons and bikes, of ice cream cake and candy, of bubbles and chalk. What could be better?
On Tuesday evening,back in New York, we had the extreme pleasure of seeing Helen Mirren in The Audience. She was marvelous, effortlessly capturing the novice queen in black with Churchill, her first prime minister, and then moving forward and back in time over the years and the prime ministers, aging to how the queen looks today and then reverting. I thought Churchill and Harold Wilson were particularly notable, although the scene with Tony Blair contains a wonderful moment of contemporary humor. The accents can make it hard to get all the dialogue, but the theater does display a transcription which, if you are seated close enough, is most helpful.
SARASOTA THEATER
Last week we immersed ourselves in the music of Frank Loesser at Asolo Rep’s production of the new musical, Luck Be a Lady. Loesser wrote words and music for more than 700 songs and a number of Broadway musicals including Guys and Dolls and How to Succeed in Business... Familiar favorite songs include: “Standing on the Corner” and “Once in Love with Amy.” This play does not have a standard plot, but rather follows two couples, one older and one young, as they re-visit an old ballroom. It was a most pleasant afternoon.
RECENT READING
I quickly read poet Elizabeth Alexander’s new memoir, The Light of the World, about the life and sudden death of her 50 year old husband, artist and chef, Ficre Ghebreyesus. Unlike some memoirs about the death of a spouse, the tone is not unrelieved sorrow, but rather the sadness is tempered by her account of his joy in living, his nurturing love for their two sons, and his experience as a child of war and an immigrant several times over. I learned much about his homeland Eritrea, his African roots and her African American heritage. As you might expect, her writing is lyrical, almost musical at times.
[Source of image: www.gtkp.com]
