the waste land

I sometimes say that I cannot wait for summer, imagine how will I sit in parks for hours in warm weather and relax outdoors, and then there are other moments, this evening around 10pm for instance, when I think how much I love this cold weather, how there is something really stimulating about such cold weather, and I will decide to take a long walk crosstown from Chelsea back to my apartment in the East Village. The weather makes me emotional and allows me to think about things a bit less distractedly than in warmer weather, the cold weather keeping most people off the street.

I am thinking about friendships still and about how I have been spending my time these past few years and who I have been spending it with, wondering what the future holds, whether I will be friends with these same people that I spend long walks thinking about, thinking whether they harm me or do me good.

Circuit City is going out of business, the one in Union Square where I once jerked off with a stranger in the bathroom. The crappy convenience store on 3rd and 14th has just closed and I fear it will be replaced with a neat, clean chain convenience store, another Rite Aid probably. The city changes constantly and I wonder how this economic downturn will affect that, whether stupid shit will go away or whether this will be its chance to make a bigger foothold.

I went to rehearsal this evening for a performance I am doing on Saturday. Rehearsal was quite fun. I met some new people, met a cute boy, a Micah, who I have a gigantic crush on, and who I fear has a boyfriend who I also met this evening, a Barrak. It is really lovely to meet new people in these days especially when I am feeling generally down and sour on the idea of human relations, that these sparks of newness make me forget all that, and make me realize that things can be nice and exciting.

A friend the other day, after I had detailed my troubles to him, told me that life is hard, that it's not easy, that am I for real, that friendships are like relationships and end, that I am young and have it easy, that I need to imagine what shit and what heartbreak 80 year olds have seen and gone through in their lives. Looking at old people lately I have really been taking his advice to heart and it somehow makes me feel so much better to look at them and know that they have probably also experienced so much heartache in their lives and yet are still going, still walking down the street, doing errands, buying groceries, whatever it is we all do with our feet, our hands, our time.

Anyways, that digression aside, rehearsal was really stimulating for numerous reasons, among them the company of strangers, some cute boys, having to perform, and hearing this poetry read in new ways. The performance is a theatrical reading of The Waste Land, followed by a reading of the months and days of the year, followed by a dance and me dancing with pom-poms, followed by an Elizabeth Bishop poem. I really like the director a lot and am inspired by his visions, but more importantly by his bringing them into being, by his staging this odd reading of poetry because he wants to. I think it will be a beautiful thing. It is this Saturday at 7 if you want to see it.