My Parents Visited.

I would really be remiss if I didnt mention that my family came to visit. Thats right. The whole crew (Mom, Ariel, Dad, Stepmom) all flew (Mom flew seperately!) to the big apple and stayed with me for a week. Mom was only here for four days, which wasnt nearly long enough. We had a GREAT time. My parents fled NYC with me in my infancy after breathing 500ppm cockroach bits for six plus years in "Morningside Heights" in the seventies after my Dad gave Columbia the bird. They'd never come back, until October 23rd 2006. They all stayed with me in the apartment, in Brooklyn. It was so much better than a hotel cause we could just hang out and eat at home and not feel all touristy and hotelly. We went to the opera and saw those two short italian operas that always play together. I stayed awake for the first half between my mom and rick who were sawing logs, and slept through the second half which everyone agreed was stellar. They have these amazing little subtitle readers on the dividers between rows that give you the english translation of the lyrics. Im fairly sure I was kept awake throughout the first half by the greif that I felt due to everyones little reader being broken except for mine. After I was disabused of that notion during intermission when rick (ol smarty) informed me that actually the plastic was tinted from an angle so you werent distracted by thousands of red subtitles all around you, so you could only see your own, I slept like an accountant on april sixteenth.

Of course there was a certain amount of food tourism that had to take place, although I must say it was far less than I expected. We ate lunch at Katz's Famous Delicatessen on the Lower East SIde. I had never eaten there. It is an experience. The pickles are amazing. On second try, and the Kasha kind, I still think Knishes are like eating a bowling ball stuffed with mashed potatoes. Sorry Rick! I take great pleasure in seeing my dad enjoying his favorite "combination" sandwich which is a pastrami with chopped liver on rye bread. Even though its probably responsible for more fatalities a year than e. Coli, theres just something about something that makes you that happy and has that much nostalgia that has to be good for you. Food just doesnt taste like that in Spokane. We also went to the 92nd street Y and saw a rabbi who used to preside over a congregation that Rick attended in Boston, speak about the Kabbalah and read from his recent book on the topic. With Rick and his cousin (whose hair i now do :)) we took up a whole row, and i loved watching my parents soak up all the jewishness and intellectual presence in the room. Washington is so essentially gentile (even when youre in supposedly jewish places) that its an exhilerating feeling culturally to be around your own, regardless of religious commitment. They really enjoyed it and my dad asked some really salient question that impressed the rabbi and I remembered how I was always proud when I would get to hear my dad speak in public at school meetings and other stuff we went to, even when he took excessively long pauses which were embarrassing. I asked what he thought of the whole Madonna Kabbalah thing and the hipness factor. I wish I remembered exactly what he said but it was something to the effect that whatever brought people to it was fine with him. We stuck around afterward for shabbat prayer, wine, some obscenely sweet and delicious meltaway babka and the best Challah ive ever had. Usually challah is gross, I always eat a shred of it just for symbolisms sake but this stuff was amazing. ive got to (not) find out where they got it. We also ate dinner at the UWS's most reasonable restaurant, Ottomanelli's. Its cheap plentiful italian food with zero attitude and no reservations necessary. They went back later in the week too! Very cute.

Everyone came by the Salon and met Chaim and Judah and the gang. Some of the stylists were totally blown away by how beautiful mom is despite the fact that her hair is greying and she allows her skin to be wrinkled instead of botoxing and lifting. They were mesmerized by her energy and life force, daresay just happiness?? Mommy and I stayed and I blowdried, Cut then rewashed and let air dry her hair. it was really fun. We walked around the upper east side, laughing at hot n' crusty bakery, oohing and aahing at all the swanky stores and glitzy jewelery, bought me some shoes, and just hung out together in New York for the first time.

Rick was amazing and took lots of time to hang with us. Of course my family loved him immediately and would probably trade me for him if push came to shove. I had this whole driving tour of brooklyn day planned (about the only thing I had planned) but when the time came, everyone was too neurotic and busy asking what everyone else wanted to do, and Sherry was fixated on spending every day in museums and dad wanted to meet sherry and so on that no one could commit to doing it. By virtue of the F not running normally Rick took us to the L and therefore drove from my house to Williamsburg, which they LOVED and wished they had more time to tour. HELLO!?!?!? Thats why I wanted to do it, I knew you guys would get a kick out of it. So yeah, the family still has the potential to irritate. But I just let everyone do what they wanted to do. Which was get to the met on a Sat, check our coats, stand in HUGE lines to get in and then decide we're hungry only to leave and go to a deli on sixth ave for sandwiches and salad and only have an hour left til the museum closes. So glad we flew solo on that venture. He took us on a little more tour when we drove down coney island avenue to this fabulous, huge turkish restraunt that Mahdis introduced me to called Sahara. Delicious and so unlike any experience you could have at home that it was the perfect place to go. Plus you can see the crazy ebbs and flows of ethnic enclaves from russian to hasidic to indian/pakistani to bukharian jewish and all the crazy shops along Coney. thank god for that honda. which smells like burning toast above 35 mph. donations accepted.

Mom got her garage/thrift fix in with Mahdis up the block at "Larry's" where a guy named larry (who mahdis has called george for the past five years because he insisted on calling her roxana...I also (also thanks to the great miss M,) got an AWESOME salon chair from the sixties from him for fifty bucks. works like a charm!) sets out a bunch of old furniature and decor stuff on the street and in his garage every weekend. The morning of the day she had to leave, Mom bought a large, heavy and extremely fragile ceramic basket of ceramic flowers that had to be packed and brought home on the plane.


On the night before they all left Ariel Dad and sherry met me at work and we all took the F down to Dumbo and walked to the fulton ferry dock along the water where you can see the entire unobstructed manhattan skyline from just across the water. From the chelsea peirs and up all the way to the statue of liberty. Dad and sherry bought (really exceptional) ice cream from the little shop on the dock and ariel and I sat on the giant rope tie thingys and watched dad and sherry's backs outlined against the bright night of the manhattan sky. Even though it was halloween it was unseasonably warm and a totally clear and beautiful night. Rick came and picked us up and drove us home. Oh yeah, I was wearing a giant white afro wig and glittery makeup the whole time...forgot about that! We then came home and he and I left to go stand in line for some exteremely crowded and hip halloween party where we waited to get in about five times longer than we stayed. I came home and went to bed. Woke up the next day and went to work a little late. The cab i called to take everyone to the airport never came, they called another one and when I got home the house was quiet and empty, with a note for my roomate from my dad and some cash that he had absentmindedly accepted from her for some takeout thai food we all shared.

All in all , it was a wonderful visit. I cried a lot (sorry rick;)), cause it sucks being far from my family and seeing my parents so little as they get older and i get older. Also cause I dont have any kids, or any desire to ever live in seattle again. Its just emotional, this living. And especially when you are lucky enough to really love and enjoy your family. I see why so many Americans choose to estrange themselves from their families. Its far less painful to be a free standing unit, especially when individuality is the goal, than it is to love four or five people as much as you love yourself. Something will have to become clear sometime fairly soon that will illuminate a way for us to see each other more freqently. Im sure the fact that Ariel is moving here in January to pursue graphic design at Parsons will secure more frequent visits. I think it hasnt really sunk in that she is coming for me yet. Amazing. Were like mexicans in LA, one person comes and sets up shop then calls for backup.

Here I am tired and writing again, at nearly one. Time to hit the sheets, make sure the ol plantar tendons get some ice and a good nights rest. Gotta tend the feet as you get up in age dontcha know.

Will she take Svetlana up on the Russian Mafia Medicare Health Insurance??? Stay tuned!!

Quarterly?

Its the first of december and the first cold day of the year. Hot winter manifested throughout november in that we had winter with summer symptoms instead of vice versae but basically the same weather. Today though, its crisp and cold. Almost all the yellowed leaves on the grape vine that obscures my balcony from the street all summer are gone. The hard welcome light of East coast winter makes the apartment bright and dusty looking.
I have begun having problems with my feet. The stringy tendon that attaches from the ball of your foot up to the back of your calf, as it turns out, can become very painful and they have a name for it. Plantar Faciitis. Lovely words. Conjures up thoughts of warty nazis. So, if you stand on hard surfaces for extended periods of time (like clogs, say) or do strenuous exercise on hard floors without supportive shoes, or any shoes (like west african dance, say) you can tear and bruise said tendon. The gift which your plantar tendon gives is that it doesnt really hurt while youre performing the above activities. It taketh away, however, when you get up from your first rest after the standing or dancing or whatever and THEN it really socks it to you. The heel of my foot after a post work Sopranos episode or after a nights sleep, no matter how short, is so tender and painful that my first hour of walking is limpy and excruciating. Especially on the left side where my foot turned in sharply as a child. So, having chronic pain for the first time is scary and makes me nervous, but I am never one to be bogged down by bodily discomfort, and wasnt about to go to the doctor, heaven forfend. They'd no doubt tell me I had heel cancer. I turned to Web MD and to family friend Krissi who once had to wear a cast due to extreme Facist Wartyness and found out that there are a lot of things you can do to lessen the effects. Ive been doing them (excercises, stretches and icing) along with a healthy dose of bemoaning how ones body betrays one in old age, mostly for effect, and it seems to be helping. I also went back to dance class last week because Im sure that stopping dance has brought on this disorder as well as a nasty recurrance of what I thought was childhood asthma but appears to be having a second coming. Dance class wasnt remotely fun but I am glad I went and I hope to be able to stay the course long enough to get into a routine of going. Rick instists that I should begin working out with those kettlebell contraptions, and I may try it out. I love the idea of not having to go to a freaking gym. I cant keep it up especially when I have to take the train there and back (sweaty) to do it. t
I took the written exam for my license. I ordered the test exam book from Milady (the main beauty school testing prep company, as if it werent embarrasing enough to go to beauty school you have to call your book My Lady, assholes.) I completed the entire book and did both the practice tests inthe back. I think I probably passed despite really poorly written questions that could have been answered correctly in a multitude of ways. Nonetheless you can miss thirty questions and still pass, so if I failed I will be concerned for myself on several levels. I also managed to get my hands on the prep materials that they give graduating beauty students in the NYC schools. Sweet. A new assistant at work gave them to me. We suddenly have (incl myself) four american born english speaking future stylist assistants at the salon. Its great, so much easier. Dakota is from Oklahoma, shes curvy and pretty, she has a beautiful smile and a sort of country girl sensibility. Her mom, when figuring out what to name her, closed her eyes and whatever key on the typewriter her finger hit, would begin her middle name. Fortuititously it landed on the *. Her middle name is *. Seriously. Dakota * Martinson. Brilliant. Anyway, she seemed to be the only one in the tri state area with those prep materials and she actually brought them in for me. So as soon as I prepare, get my stupid kit packed and get word that I passed the written I can take the practical and be done forever!!!

Thanksgiving came and went. It was fun. I went to connecticut with Rick's family. I made a celery root puree that went over well. It was good although Im not sure anyone would have eaten it if they had seen what celery root looks like pre preparation and cleaning. Yikes. And its not easy to clean Ill have you know.

A homeless man crapped his pants next to me and Mahdis on the train last week. I wont go into details (except that the stench cleared the car) but its the kind of moment that makes you wonder why on earth you live in a city that brings people to that kind of destruction.

I am in this sort of grey area between assistant and stylist at work. Judah has told me that I can take walk ins when the other stylists are busy and that I can book my own clients as well. He wants me, howver to work five days. Thats fifty plus hours. Four days assisting and one as a stylist to start. He refuses to do it otherwise and says that he can never build me up unless Im there five days. He may be right, I realize. I just cannot commit to being there more than I already am! I dont know if my feet can take another day, and I dont know if I can take another ten hours of upper east side per week. I am planning a month long trip to senegal in feb/mar which i know he wont be happy about. I realize about myself that I have trouble commiting to anything work wise. I can see that pattern. I want to break it, I want to be able to be somewhere and build something. But dont see anyone building anything in that salon exept chaim and judah! And thats not a good sign. I want to be somewhere where I can see that some greatness is possible and it will be an investment for me to be there a long time. When I get back from Africa, I am pretty certain i will be somewhere different. It WONT be fun telling the guys, Im dreading it.

I have more clientele every week and am coming to be a pretty good barber. I took three walk in mens cuts yesterday and thought of ms V as I gave a flawless fade using only shears and a comb. I thought I would NEVER be able to do that. I remember watching her beautiful hands fly up the head in perfect unison and the velvety strip of perfectly sheared hair that they left behind. My shears labored up the head crunching unevenly and left a line-y blotchy strip that needed several passes and always ended up too short.