DIALOGUE WITH MYSELF

Who do you think you are -- taking aspects of your life, putting them into books? Making a 32 page website for your books , taking pow-pow, ouch, eek, oh no, woe, dear God, help-help moments from your life and working them into 300, 400, 800 page tomes ...

Yep, that's what you did. And since YOU are writing this tirade as if you were a reader wandering into The Readery with all those books in a virtual library, you ought to include in your attack on Em, her wry, slanted, sometimes gnarled, knotted and twisted vision of life.

Hey, I tried to pull away from ME. Tried to write about Machiavelli and Savonarola, the Renaissance priest who burned books, made friends with up-and-coming artists, and had them arrested, tortured, burned at the stake. It didn't work. I couldn't find my voice -- couldn't find a place for myself in it at all.

And I tried to write about Clare Boothe Luce -- couldn't do it till I turned her into Cordelia/me. I had to invent a similar but different background for Cordelia, because Clare's reactionary politics made it impossible for me to BE her.

How dare you -- you, a high school graduate, valedictorian because you used your memory, your charm, your ability to work longer hours, harder, do things over and over -- you who walked out on college and hammered yourself into a dancer -- you're using your own little voice ... How dare you write?

I dare. It comes naturally to me. It's thinking and talking and listening and laughing and whispers, and innermost secrets, all balled up, compacted, and yet, easily accessible.

And so much easier for me than dancing ever was ...

'The only other thing I've done that was easy, was teaching children, telling them stories, enacting all the characters while inventing true imaginary tales.

What do you mean -- you mean true and also imaginary?

Yep. The oppositional aspects of real and unreal, are why I do it so well. When things don't fit, my imagination and warrior self (the cook, painter, dancer-improviser who is bored by steps), can mix it together and make it taste/look/feel right, and flow.

If you wandered onto a website like the one you've got, thanks to Fran and Sue and JD, would you read those books? Would you want to download all those pages about invented heroines who are all bits of her, the writer, the one who calls herself EM?

Mmm. I'd be curious. Critical, picky. Curious ... I'd give it a try ....

INDEPENDENCE DAY YAY

Watching a television program on Jimmy Hendrix, waiting for him to smash his guitar, we switched to New York City's fireworks.

We're in walking distance from the Hudson River. The explosions made it seem as if our home was surrounded by the enemy attacking in the area. Bombs rattling the windows in New York ... that is a terror to which you cannot reconcile yourself.

We switched to a view of the explosions, immediately aware of more colors, more glittering, cascading flowers, in the sky. The orchestra was playing loud lyrical music when we tuned in, tunes that didn't seem to fit the fireworks, though we knew that the explosions were computerized.

Back to Hendrix, playing left-handed with his instrument behind him, over his head, under a leg, guitar upside down, or flipped over on the floor -- one hand plucking, teeth plucking. His pounding, louder and louder climatic, full-out sounds got us contagiously nodding, toe tapping and thinking "this is sort of tiresome." As were the fireworks --impressing us, not thrilling us.

I found myself thinking Macy's spent too much money on this. And Hendrix madly inventing new, crazy, wild positions for plucking away, singing while chewing gum, seemed to be wowing us, not with his music, but with his tour de force technique ...

The orchestra went into its final medley of "America the Beautiful," "Stars and Stripes," "Glory Hallelujah," with views of amazed youngsters, views of blandly pleased adults. With me thinking, "Enough already," glad it was going to be over in a minute, clicking back to Hendrix out of control, burning, bashing, and destroying his guitar.

We watched the Chuck Berry segment that came next, restlessly waiting, and peeved -- we wanted to hear him play his guitar and perform, and all we heard was experts and Chuck himself explaining his importance to Rock & Roll. Finally, a minute before the show ended, we saw a film clip -- Chuck playing four bars of his "Maybelline" hit song, and three seconds of his duck walk.

It brought us back to news, about the moon-walking Jackson's funeral. Over and over the tale is being told, making much of the sadness talk dreary and unreal.

Spur of the moment we tuned in "1776"' to see JC playing the South Carolina senator, and our personal friends -- Bill Daniels (Adams), Virginia Vestoff ( his wife), Howard DaSilva, Ken Howard , Billy Duell -- the list goes on -- we haven't seen the film and these friends in a very long time. JC was in the Broadway show "1776" when my back was broken in a car crash. Members of the cast chipped in, and bought us four flights of a gliding stairway, so that I could get physical therapy at the hospital.

The movie -- that's a trip -- to see the young spectacularly masculine, sexy, commanding Senator, hear John Cullum singing "Molasses to Rum."

That was a thrill -- the lump in one's throat one gets as we are pulling for the senators to sign the Declaration of Independence -- the final freeze bring tears to our eyes as the Liberty Bell clangs.

Fireworks, Hendrix, Berry didn't say much to me -- but "1776" -- our friends, the music, the songs, the vision was deeply moving.

COUNT THE FEATHERS

Wow. When I heard Sarah Palin was resigning as governor I was thrilled. With her pep, bounce, her bubbly feminine ways, this gal could wheedle her way into ... I don't want to say it out loud, I'll say it in a whisper ... into winning an election. She could construct, connive, instinctively find a bridge, a route to the next group of up-and-coming conservatives who want to back-space/erase/ eradicate what's new, and revive all the old ideas of what Americans want to be and do.

Oh please ... I pray ... to you, to the Gods in Heaven, to anyone who'll listen ... give SP another venue ... She is a NAME and that's hard to get, it doesn't happen easily but she's a NAME and a NAME has power.

We know who she is. So give her a TV show. Offer her a double big fat advance on a book. Please, SP, make your name even bigger -- get your vigorous down-to- earth, easy-talking self into galvanizing all the other gals who want to turn back the clock -- make 'em happy. Have talk fests, protest porn or prostitution, promote daily workouts building better bodies and souls, but keep out of government and politics and what our President is doing.

(Yes.. I keep coming back to that. I don't understand all the issues that he is handling right now but the man we so joyously elected because of what he is, what he says, his bearing, his ideas ... I trust. If he's making a mistake he'll rectify it.)

I wrote a post "Green Olives" about the Count the Feathers in a Turkey contest I won.

Count the jackets ... how many? Twenty plus? Does that include the different shades in red, white and blue? I'm not a fashion nut. I just observe. I know one picks the clothes one wears because one wants to make the impression the color, the style conveys.

What about counting Hillary Clinton's pantsuits? Only once did I note the same suit worn twice, and that's because it was an elegant black velvet with a ivory trim around the high collar -- handsome and flattering. She looks sad, tight these days. Is it the state of the world -- Korea, Afghanistan, Pakistan..Iran -- how to handle whom, where, and do what? Or is it the state of her life? Hillary taught us by her demeanor, not to peer, wonder and imagine. But with the smiling, laughing and the loving exchange between her and Bill, charade or not, it was perfectly, believably played. They are a good couple, they interact, So I go along with what she/they/the Clintons want us to believe.

Not Palin. Write a book, SP! Travel! Be a celebrity. It's not what you wore, it's your ideas. Please don't be a leader.

If in fact Sarah Palin resurrects herself from the mess she made when she presented us with an improvised explanation of why she's resigning her post as governor -- oh my -- when she gives her next speech let's give her a ton of love, and applaud till we drown her out and shut her up.

DAY OFF IS ON

The sun is out ...

Our hats are on ...

We're heading ...

For the park ...

The fountain ...

The zoo ...

Say hello to some favorite statues ...

Maybe picnic.

Have a busy Saturday ...

Doing nothing ... Just walking, talking ...

FINGERNAIL PHASES

I bit them. I wore scarlet red nail polish,. I peeled off the polish. I bit them.

I resolved not to bite them, and bit them. I bought a fancy nail file, and cuticle scissors, and shaped them. I bought myself a pale pink nail polish. I applied it. The next day, I peeled it off.

I had a manicure at a beauty salon. I didn't enjoy trying to make conversation with the manicurist. The way she filed my nails hurt. Nevertheless, I made a second appointment. The next day, my finger was fevered and painful. I canceled my appointment, and never went back.

I bought fake nails and glued them on. Hated them.

I went with D an actress friend to a fingernails place. We each paid $60.00 for a set of fake nails. Mine were lovely for about a week. When D broke a nail, I went back with her to the salon, and watched very carefully as a new nail was created.

Afterwards we had cocktails. The chic things we chatted about made me uneasy. D's elegant expensive exclusive look, made me feel put together in my Filene's bargain wardrobe.

(Fingernails went with gadding about, and I was maybe 30% committed to gadding about. I didn't know what my next project was, and while JC was coming up up up in the world, I had a feeling I was teetering down down.)

At a beauty supply shop I bought fake nails powder, the two liquids that are needed to harden the powder, a roll of nail shaper papers, and a small electric nail filer (like a tiny power drill). Also application brushes and tweezers for removing the shapers.

Then, slowly, carefully, I created a thumbnail. And practiced, and practiced, till I could make ten professional looking nails.

They looked good. But within a week my fake nails began to develop greenish moons at the cuticles. By the middle of the following week, the whole nail was green.

Even so, though it was time consuming, I kept my unnatural nails perfectly manicured.

A filmmaker phoned. He'd seen me dance my "Four Seasons" solo and said he loved it. He suggested a lunch meeting, saying,"There's something important I want to discuss with you."

I wore my ankle-length black jeans skirt, a studded black jeans jacket, and a purple (for good luck) shirt. With my three favorite Liz T rings, (see my post "Elizabeth Taylor Socks Syndrome"), and freshly fake nails, I felt glamorous. Entering the crowded chic restaurant, I was delighted to notice people noticing me.

After we ordered, he asked what I was doing. Though I was in the doldrums, between projects, between forkfuls of salad, hoping he'd interrupt and tell me what the important something was, I described "Zinnia," a two character play I'd been writing.

Finally, he put down his fork, and said, "The head of PBS and I would like you to be the fund-raiser for our new dance film foundation ..." and mentioned yearly salary, my own office, my own secretary ...

The conversation became ah ... oh ... yes ... mm ... How I got home, what I said escapes me. Did I turn him down gracefully? Probably not. I've never heard from him again.

What I do remember is ... removing the fake fingernails, dumping the powder, the liquids, roll of shapers, and hanging the black jean skirt and jacket in my closet where I keep clothes I'll probably never wear again.

Was it the next day, or two days later that I was back in my studio ...no rings, on my fingers, no bells on my toes. I had music -- Mahler's Tenth. I had "Zinnia," I was me again, unadorned, self propelled -- with a project I loved working on.

WHO IS EPLEY

Why is this guy becoming someone I have to contend with every day? Along with MJ being turned into the media's new Anna Nicole Toy, And the health care war, the Ask Don't Tell issues mixed into a pudding with the S. Carolina Gov's guilty-boy ramblings.

He's Japanese specialist, Nakayama M. Epley. A medical person who had made a series of simple exercises you do if you "BPPV." (A benign inner ear problem that creates light-headedness, which comes and goes.)

Yes it's "Vertigo." But I'm not using medical terms today. I'm trying to untie the knots that I seem to have been tying around myself.

A million years ago this past March, I wrote a post 'GOING TO THE DOC" and mentioned the 125 physical therapy exercises I had to do in order to re-learn how to walk.

I stated loudly -- I don't want anyone telling me what I can do, should do. Shouldn't do. Or give me permission about anything.

Whoops -- (I didn't realize till I re-read the post myself just now). I refer to "water" in my left ear. But a note I made for myself in April of 2008, clearly refers to water in my right ear. So it's moved, from ear to ear.

Last week I saw Mike (my doctor) and based on his exam, Dr. Em had herself diagnosed correctly . It's a temporary condition -- not serious, not anything to do with tumor, cancer, stroke or any other bad stuff. Mike said he'd heard there was a physical therapy treatment for it. Something new. Did I want him to check it out? I said no.

At home, having seen a reference to "new physical therapy treatment," and pictures of it, I printed out the Epley "maneuver" exercises. Look to the left -- don't they look simple? Probably these exercises help the inner ear repair itself.

Then I found a YouTube film that shows you what to do. IF you know which is the "affected" ear. Want to try it? Just click EPLEY MANEUVER.

What point am I making? Right now JC is in his office, laboring over making me a simplified copy of what's in the Merck Manual. There are 5 variations on YouTube. I'VE TRIED THEM. There's even a test you can do to figure out which of your ears is affected. I DID THE TEST. IT IS BOTH EARS.

I have 3 different ways of doing the Epley typed out. Plus the new version JC typed out making it sound ... Simpler? Slightly different? I don't know what to do, unless I compare all the versions.

Dr. Em is thinking right here as you read this -- S T O P. The shoe doesn't fit. The exercise DOES NOT work for you! Do your nightly dancing, and handle the dizzy feeling you get when you jump (there are jumps in the dance) by changing the jump. For the time being. that's what I'm going to do.

Leave it alone, says Dr. Em. And she's the one I obey.

NOSE PRESSED TO THE BAKERY WINDOW

I love the smell of fresh bread at the bakery. And the fragrance of fresh pretzels, on a street vendors wagon ... I've got to have one immediately!

I'll never recover -- you'll never recover echoes psychotherapist Em -- zoom --flashing back, remembering the bakery in Greenwich Village that I used to pass on the way to my temporary home.

My first summer in New York -- my allowance was TEENY. I'd been staying with Mrs. Graves in her Washington Square apartment. I was, lonely,and hungry.

Mrs.G was a wealthy widow. Her husband, Daddy's partner, had died a year ago. All Mrs. Graves ate, all she served me was soup. All she talked about was her husband, his cancer, how her dead husband's lung, eaten away by cancer, looked in the X-ray they showed her.

I phoned my parents and they arranged for me to stay in Sunnyside with an Aunt and Uncle on a cot in their dining room, where I could hear them whispering at night, saying my parents were cheapskate snobs. But there was plenty of food, subway fare, ten cents for emergencies, no money for snacks.

I remember how hungry I was. After beginners' ballet at the Metropolitan Opera house, I ate crackers with ketchup at the Horn & Hardart Automat, and chewed the ice cubes I got from the water and ice machine that was next to the pastry.
And desserts in glass compartments -- oh boy -- cookies on a doily, chocolate cake on a plate, breakfast rolls, pies -- I could smell them, see the poppy seeds, wavy patterns in the icing, the semi-sweet chocolate buds in the cookies ... so near, yet I couldn't have them in my hand or in my mouth.

(You'd think with all that in my mind, I'd be a big eater, definitely overweight, but I'm not -- my slenderness is great, just what a lot of women want. This 'nose' business -- my longing for things is a permanent quirk.)

After my divorce, walking in Washington Square Park, seeing couples holding hands, chatting, I felt like I was back in the Horn & Hardart Automat.

After I met JC, who'd mentioned dropping in so casually, there I was watching the street, counting ten taxis telling myself he won't show up ... maybe he will ... telling myself in ten minutes I'll stop waiting. But I kept waiting at the window counting cars, looking for him, longing for him to arrive.

He didn't that night. He did a week later.

That 'nose pressed' neurosis -- how many times, on the verge of success (his or mine), have I waited for the reviews, the goodies, the rewards on the other side of the window.

Just yesterday, working hard on a post, I found myself longing for more hits, more readers, more visitors. I checked the stats on my website and blog -- wow. I'm getting more readers!

So, ladies and gentlemen and fellow self-therapists, if my nose is still pressed to the window, and I'm on the outside looking in and longing for something -- hey -- all I need to do is go inside and look around at what I've got.