a little red hen

QUEENS: the personal and the global

Yes, it's Roxie!  Last week we passsed the test:  baby-sat for 2 hours while her parents took in an afternoon movie.  It was easy and reassured all of us that we are up to the challenge.

The hat is another of the basic baby models in Cascade Fixation, a cotton yarn with a  tiny bit of elastic that helps to keep it on her head.  Knit on #6 needles.  She's set for a fashionable Spring in Queens, a mellower borough than Manhattan.

Two activities have kept me from blogging lately.  Responding to my concern about more focus on Emergency Preparedness, the board of our 1,000-apartment development set up a committee about it.  Luckily for me, a recent retiree in my building, Mike Davidson, shared my concern.  The challenge is how to get New Yorkers to work on both individual and collaborative plans.  More later.

Writing Outside the Blog has been a category on this blog for but not addressed.  Last year I wrote a three-act play about older women in New York.  Finding a playwriting class had eluded me till this semester.  Over the past couple of months, I've worked on a one-act play with Jennifer Camp, a young playwright, and four other students.  Learned a lot.

Another of Nick Bloom's productions for Winter 2007 was GLOBAL NEW YORK, a one-day, interdisciplinary conference at New York Institute of Technology where he teaches.  Judith Adler Hellman, York University (Toronto), presented a fascinating paper based on recent research for a forthcoming book, "Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The 'Competitive Advantages' of Undocumented Mexicans in NYC."  Basically, her thesis is that employers and realtors particularly abuse Mexicans because they are considered both reliable and long-suffering. 

Before the afternoon presentations, a multi-media performance, illuminated changes emerging in Queens, the neighborhood favored by many Mexicans and numerous other recent immigrants.  Judith Sloan and Warren Lehrer livened the post-lunch time with slides, music commentary, their melange, Crossing the BLVD: strangers, neighbors, aliens in a new America.  Visiting their colorful website gives an almost-there experience of the work.  Documentary artists, they're also married, and have put together research and art in an immediately accessible way.  The hardcover version of their book (above) has a soundscape of "Crossing..." with appearances by several people profiled in the larger work. 

Make a reservation at The Tenement Museum on the lower east side for an April 19 performance.  I'd like to know your response to what the New York Times calls, "An offbeat ethicnic tour" of the City's most diverse borough. 

Monet's Garden, Giverny, Fall 2002

        

BILL W. and Dr. BOB

Trying to explain the power of "Bill W. and Dr. Bob" to friends the other night, I knew my enthusiasm was not coming across.  We were at the end of a long talky dinner; what needed to be said required more time.  Or was it that the idea of a play about AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) either piques your interest right away or does not.  The moment I saw the ad for previews, mentioned it to Ron, it was on our calendar.

But will you care?  The acting is very powerful--particularly by the two men playing the founders of AA.  Alcoholism has surrounded my own adult life.  If it has not come into yours, I'm surprised.  So many of us drank too much in 1950s and 60s in New York City.  Me too.  That it never took over probably has more to do with luck than anything else.  Golden-Daze Ginnie is an elderblog where I found a woman my age who lived in the same time in the City.  She wrote about her struggles and her recovery in a way that touched me deeply.  Perhaps she will tell readers of this blog where those posts can be found in her 2006 archives. 

In the mid-seventies, I did not learn much in a one-credit class on substance abuse in my graduate studies in social work.  Too bad: I was living in Baltimore, a very wet town. In my psychotherapy practice women and men often arrived with the struggle of living with an alcoholic parent  or spouse.  Or their own unacknowledged substance abuse. 

By chance again, my consciousenss was raised when Ron connected with two men who were starting a therapy group for "impaired" physicians.  Translation:  alcoholic and drug abusing doctors.  The three of them led the first group organized by Maryland medical society's to require these doctors  to attend.  Finally, through their work and further education, I began to learn what I had missed.  My work with clients took on greater depth.

Chance is how Bill W., trying to stay sober, and Dr. Bob, a falling-down drunk, met.   The playwrights are a married couple--Stephen Bergman, a psychiatrist, Janet Surrey, psychologist, who had worked with many alcoholics.  We were fortunate to attend one of the "talk-back" previews.  Dr. Bergman, after audience questions, said he wanted to know if the work had resonance for those with no connection to substance abuse.  Behind me, a woman immediately spoke up, "Did for me.  I came here tonight knowing nothing about this and really got drawn in."

At the play's website, billwanddrbob.com, there's more about the play, video interviews.  This is an open run which seems to mean that everyone involved is waiting to see how the public responds.  It sold out in Boston; I hope it runs a very long time in New York.

Yesterday a very positive review  appeared in the New York Time.  In her review, Gina Bellafante, points out how successfully the playwrights reveal the struggle that went into the bonding between Bill W and Dr. Bob, and how this interpretation demystifies the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous. 

...perhaps even in an unintentional way, [the play] releases Wilson from the trap of hagiography that the culture has kept him in...He is all showman all the time--a very unlikely savior.  But that, perhaps, is the point.

Two notes I'll add.  The live piano often playing in the background works well with the all the set changes.  With few props, the sense of bar, upper class home, hotel--many scene changes-- worked well.   The wives of Bob and Bill come across as both long-suffering and sturdy; these two actresses deserve more notice in reviews along with Marc Carver, an actor who morphs through twelve supporting roles--from hospital doctor to reluctant alcoholic--with ease. 

WIND-UP TOYS FOR GRANDMA

He saw this box sitting on the small shelf above my monitor.  "Look at that!"  Would I scan it for him; how come I had a wind-up toy?  No, I bought it before becoming a grandmother to the adorable Roxie, his daughter. 

We were halfway through a long day in the City.  Nick, our son, had presented  at Columbia University on the highly controversial "master builder" of the 20th century, Robert Moses.  Museum exhibitions and this two-day symposium, "Remaking the Metropolis," have been part of a major reassessment of his impact on the shape of New York-- parks, highways, bridges, neighborhoods.

Just before his Roxie was born in January, Nick completed his latest book, a history of public housing in New York City.  At 9 a.m. Saturday morning, seeming not at all sleep-deprived by fatherhood, he spoke of Moses' impact on the City's public housing.  Turns out this was an area in which the controversial "power broker" had less influence and interest than people assume.  This postcard announcement features two of the buildings in the six-building complex where I live.  Around it are the larger public housing buildings across the street from us.  Both projects were the result of massive land clearance in the 1950s--directed by Robert Moses. 

Last year I saw "Heddatron," a play based on "Hedda Gabler," updated and with robots.  Called "dopey and strangely moving" by the New York Times' reviewer, I found it hilarious.  Though I'm not quite sure about the connection to Ibsen.  Loved the robots...not quite sure about this either.  I have yet to try my own wind-up Roxy Robot.  Will take her to Portland visit with grandson Zach who has lost the key to his robot toy purchased at the same time. 

Described on the box (make in China) as a "domestic robot," my curiousity is stirred by her pinkness and ruffled apron.  Something evocative of the 1930s in tin toys, robots, knit teddy bears.  Maybe I'm regressing.

From Grannies to You...