Reunion Weekend

This weekend is my 25th college reunion, a fact which should make me feel really old. But it doesn't. I've already dealt with a child going off to college, with my students being as old as my son, and a few years ago a student figured out that his dad and I graduated high school together. So this milestone comes as no shock. Since I have so far this weekend only attended my husband's reunion (I'm heading to mine this afternoon) I will only make a few short observations:

This is Princeton, and in case you needed to be reminded, you need only look at the breakfast table next to yours to see grown men who usually wouldn't leave the house in anything but a white shirt and a blue blazer, wearing orange and black jackets with tiger heads swimming in patterns that will make the most avid trick or treater's head spin. If you can walk, and that means even with two people assisting you, you show up here for your 60th and even 70th reunion.The parties are open to all classes, therefore you will be waiting in a long, long line for beer along with the current crop of Princeton seniors. Oh, and don't try to make a left turn on Route 1 in South Brunswick, New Jersey, because a cop who definitely did not attend Princeton will not be particularly sympathetic of the fact that you don't know your way around here and have never heard of a "jug handle."

I am off to my alma mater this afternoon, along with my best friend from college who happens to have also married a Princetonian, so I will definitely be more sentimental on Monday.

"The Thing Around Your Neck"

One of the perks of being a former book reviewer for a Gannett newspaper is that the publicists for various publishing houses continue to send you copies of books that they are hoping you will, in one form or another, write about (who knows, perhaps even blog about).

Although I no longer write about books professionally, I still talk about them a lot in my classroom at NYU, particularly the ones that are well written and that, in one way or another, relate to topics that fall under the obscure heading of "American Cultural Mythology," the subject matter of my second semester writing course.

So, how does a book of short stories about the struggles of Nigerians immigrating to the United States, or living in current day Nigeria, fit in? "The Thing Around Your Neck," by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, fits in because the "thing" is not a thing at all, it is a feeling of loneliness and isolation that happens when you are a stranger anywhere, at any time, in your own country. A line like, "You wanted to write that rich Americans were thin and poor Americans were fat," says more about our culture, and more about writing, than ten introductions to ten different text books.

And if you want to appreciate just how different our lives are, yet how utterly the same, from most of the rest of the world's population then I recommend reading this book, that came to me through the strange workings of the publishing universe.

Frank McCourt, my much beloved high school writing teacher used to say, referring to our student pieces, " A piece of writing should nourish you. With this writing I will die of malnourishment of the soul." This book will keep you well fed.

Home from College

I have to say one thing about having my son, my first born, home from college for a day and a half: I love it and his room is already a mess. That's two things.

It's not that I am constantly unhappy when he is away at school. I know that he loves college and he is utterly enthusiastic every time I speak with him, or rather text with him, which he claims is every day. Or at least it feels that way to him. But the only way I can describe what it is like to be without him, after eighteen years of having him in my home and in my heart, is to refer to what it must be like to lose a limb. Sorry to be rather gross, but it's the best analogy I can come up with.

When he first went to school last fall, I was constantly aware of his absence. Like a phantom presence, I set the dinner table for four even though we were only three. I referred to South Park way more times than would be normal for a woman my age. I thought of jokes that he would make, especially when I did something that deserved to be laughed at. As time went by, I started to get used to it, as if having only one child at home was the norm. But sometimes I would feel despondent, without really having a reason to be.

Now that he is home, it seems so obvious to me what was missing. I can almost guarantee that within a week I'll be getting on his nerves. He has, after all, not been told to do his own dishes since Christmas break. And within a week his habit of leaving his dirty laundry, mixed with the clean, on the floor of his room will be driving me crazy. But his uncanny ability to make me laugh, his ever evolving intellect, his "chill" attitude and his capacity for watching four straight hours of ESPN Sports Center make me feel whole again. At least until he leaves for a summer job in California in three weeks, I have all my limbs in place.

Sunday in the City With Otto

I have lived in the city full time for over a year now, but I still get a thrill from the fact that I live ten minutes from some of the planet's greatest works of art. Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer" (1907) was one half of the focus of a private tour I took today, along with my daughter and another family, at the Neue Galerie on 86th street and Fifth Avenue. My friend won the tour as part of a fundraiser for her synagogue, which has an irony all its own, given the provenance of the painting.

The painting was left behind by its original Viennese owner (and widow of Adele), Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, whose townhouse was annexed by the Nazis and turned into a rail station for transporting Jews to concentration camps. The painting (surprise surprise) wound up the property of the Austrian government and was displayed in the Belvedere museum in Vienna until 2006 when the 86 year-old niece of the Bloch-Bauers won her groundbreaking lawsuit to return the stolen art to its rightful, surviving heir. The story ends with the heroic (and very rich) Ronald Lauder, who helped finance the lawsuit, buying the painting for a record $135 million and placing it, like the Mona Lisa, at the heart of his own townhouse museum dedicated to Austrian and German art.

You could say I have waited my whole life to have this painting in my backyard. As a child spending every other summer visiting my mother's friends and relatives in Vienna, I first fell in love with the shiny work of Klimt, particularly "The Kiss," in its original, but not proper, home. So having this spectacular portrait, with all of its intricate gold inlay and the delicate, painted white skin and black hair of Adele practically to myself today, I felt inordinately lucky and grateful. Adele looked pretty satisfied with the situation herself, but that may be because she was, according to our docent, having an affair with the artist.

The second half of the tour was devoted to the current show of work by the German artist Otto Dix (1891-1969). In terms of aesthetics, the two could not be further apart. The Dix exhibit is the reason the museum has an ongoing, strict "no children under 12" policy. His gruesome etchings of World War I scenes and graphic depictions of the depravity of German society during the Weimar Republic are grotesque and utterly compelling at the same time. He was a master watercolorist, and we are not talking your Impressionist watercolors here. As my good friend so eloquently put it, "What's with all the prostitutes?"

And of course, the final and real reason most people visit the museum: Cafe Sabarsky. Forget the opportunity to expand the cultural knowledge of German Expressionism, and relish the opportunity to expand the waistband by ordering the Hungarian goulash with spaetzle, a glass of red wine and the Topfentorte or the Sacher torte mit schlag for dessert.

God Bless You, Ronald Lauder.

Time and Desire

I have been thinking lately about how quickly time passes and how little we do to take that fact seriously and go after our heart's desire while there is still time.

When I was living in the suburbs, I kept thinking that some external factor would come along that would force us to move back to the city. A terrorist attack in the White Plains Mall? A pandemic of mosquito driven bird fever that was only transmitted by suburban mosquitos? I remember reading an article about a family from Pennsylvania whose daughter was an aspiring actress and the whole family had to move to the city to allow her to pursue her ambition to attend a child's acting academy. My daughter played the flute, but she had a great music program at her local middle school (darn it)., and she wasn't quite Julliard material...yet.

So, when I finally did make it clear that I wanted to move back to the city and was no longer willing to wait until my street got hit by a twister, all hell broke loose. My husband, daughter and son joined forces against me. This was their home town, this was where their friends lived (as if no other friends were possible anywhere else) and the city was a dirty, noisy place that is nice to visit but not for more than three or four hours at a time.

But the truth is that by the time I actually expressed what I wanted I was strong enough to meet any opposition head on. I even threatened to buy an apartment no matter what. I had lived in the 'burbs for sixteen years and it wasn't working for me anymore. I knew what I wanted and I wasn't willing to compromise. I felt as though I had done my compromising for the previous sixteen years. And so often mothers (and fathers, too) feel like they are bad people when they express their desires for change. To quote the LIon King (Disney at its most Shakespearian), "oh yes, change is difficult" ( as Rafiki hits Simba over the head to knock some sense into him).

In the end, I got my wish, but only because I refused to give in to the guilt and the pressure to change my mind. And the hardest part was suffering through my daughter's utter unhappiness (which lasted a year). All of this I bore, and not easily,in order to be surrounded by the noise and the traffic and the bustle and the people that make me feel alive. Even my daughter now likes the freedom of going to see a Broadway show with her friend, and not needing a ride there or back.

I was never one to speak up about my own desires, because as a wife and a mother it is seemed selfish. And maybe it was selfish. But it was a step in fighting for my own happiness. Just one step at a time.

Mother's Day at the New York Botanical Gardens

So here is the odd thing about this year's Mother's Day. I didn't spend it in the city , even though or perhaps because I live here now. When I lived in the suburbs, Mother's Day was the one day per year that it was absolutely guaranteed that I would spend the day in the city. Since it was my day, and I got to choose what we were going to do, no child or spouse was allowed to whine and complain about how he or she didn't want to go to the museum, or go to a play or go for brunch in the city. All other weekends Sunday could be up for debate (too much to do in the house, kids want to go to the playground, kids have too much homework (later), kids have plans with their friends and need a ride(even later), kids want to drive to rock band practice (much later)). But not on Mother's Day.

So, imagine my surprise at the fact that I spent Mother's Day this year at the New York Botanical Gardens in the Bronx (www.nybg.org) and actually enjoyed it. When my children were small we would go to the Botanical Gardens several times per year, usually at the urging of my husband who needs long walks the way I need to see at least some buildings over ten stories to feel fully alive. My reaction was usually the same: this is nice but aren't we surrounded by enough nature in Westchester? Also, the kids were mainly interested in running through the shrubbery maze that now resides in the Everett Children's garden, and they had to be forcibly removed after twenty minutes of making themselves dizzy.

But the Botanical Gardens happen to be a very special place, and the current exhibit of "Emily Dickinson's Garden:The Poetry of Flowers" (through June 13)is a unique and spectacular recreation of flowers that Dickinson both cultivated in nature and in her poetry. The colors alone could rival any retrospective of the Fauves at the Modern Museum of Art. And now that my daughter has grown up sized legs,the distances don't seem quite so large to get back to the parking lot.

I had no regrets, however, returning to a sushi dinner in Manhattan save for one: that we had no reason to visit the maze in the children's garden.

Movie Night

This weekend I saw two movies, "Hot Tub Time Machine," and "Iron Man 2." Neither of these movies represents my general taste in cinema which leans towards romantic chic flicks and intense drama with the occasional foreign film thrown in. I've always been an avid follower of movie reviews (sometimes I like the reviews better than the movies) so I usually have an idea of what's playing that is actually good. When my children were small I would pass movie theaters and glance longingly at the marquee like a prison inmate dreaming of a chinese banquet. Movie night was restricted to the weekend evenings when and if we had a babysitter, and then there was the difficult choice of movie versus dinner out because the movie times never seemed to allow for both. The alternative, as the kids got older was movies appropriate for them which nine times out of ten turned out to be among the ten worst films ever made (who can forget "The Scooby Doo" movie or "The Pokemon" movie. I have tried, believe me.)

Well, after this weekend here is what I have concluded about being a parent of young children and movies: you don't have waste time feeling like you are missing something. There are so few really good movies being made, that it is barely worth the cost of a babysitter plus the movie tickets when staying home and watching "Love Actually" for the tenth time will feel like a more satisfying cinematic experience. Granted, there is one really good line in "Hot Tub Time Machine" about the way teenagers in the 80's actually connected (hint:not on Facebook) and John Cusack is so heartbreakingly sincere that you feel like he stepped into the wrong movie. But other than those two minor elements, the movie is a crude, less imaginative frat boy version of "Back to the Future."

As for "Iron Man 2" well, that's a movie whose action scenes brought back not so fond memories of my son's Power Rangers toys and if it wasn't so long and droll would capture the heart of every nine-year-old boy. Two of my friends fell asleep during the movie. Of course, there is Robert Downey, Jr. who is such a good actor that he is capable of making even a comic book hero into a psychologically complex, despicable yet irresistible character.

I see a lot more movies now that my kids are older and I live in the city, but I still don't see a lot of good movies. In that respect the suburbs and the city are the same.

Group Class and Dance Party

So tonight I attended the weekly Friday night dance party at the studio where I take lessons. Almost every dance studio has a party on Friday nights where you can go and try out some of the dances you are learning in lessons as if you were at a Bar Mitzvah or a wedding or, if you're very brave, a Latin dance club. Of course, there are teachers there to dance with the students, and to dance with one another (which really makes you feel like you are just not born of the same genetic material as these lithe creatures.)

What's nice is that you can go with your husband or significant other (if you want to have a built in partner), or you can go alone and you will still dance with a partner, whether it's a teacher or some random dude who just showed up to hold hands. Seriously though these are all people who want to dance and some even know how. The only problem I can see with these parties is that the only beverage served is water. This is not conducive to helping you let loose and feel less inhibited about shaking your booty in front of a bunch of complete strangers.

Information for Moms Who Want to Dance 1x per week

If you like the description of the dance lessons, or you just want to get out of the house once a week and wear a pair of heels for forty-five minutes, then try to take a free ballroom dancing lesson either in the suburbs, or even better, at a studio in the city. The studio I go to, "Dance With Me SoHo," is in a great location for shopping or going out to eat after the lesson, if you can make a whole afternoon of it.

The address is 466 Broome Street (corner of Greene) and you can get there from Grand Central by taking the 6 train to Spring Street, walking one block south to Broome and then a few blocks west to Greene.

When my kids were very little I took a continuing ed class at NYU once a week, and it made me feel like a real person again, just being among grown ups and having some writing assignments that required me to go to a movie and to see a play. It was a pain to get there and I had to hire a babysitter for that evening every week, but it was very worth the change in routine. The dancing could serve the same purpose, and you are exercising at the same time.

Shall We Dance?

You know all of those lists of things that you are supposed to do before you die? Well, I'll never do the majority of those things (or see the majority of those things that are listed under things to see before you die) but I am doing one thing that has always been on my list and i don't need to go to Egypt to do it (just SoHo): I'm taking ballroom dancing lessons. I started taking lessons in March, and I have progressed to the point where I can actually have a conversation with my instructor (my very, very young instructor) and do the rumba at the same time. A few weeks ago that would have been impossible as it's hard to talk when you are counting out loud and looking at your feet.

My instructor has infinite patience and the body of a ballet dancer, and for forty-five minutes a week he acts as if there is nowhere else he would rather be than across from a middle-aged mother of two who can recite most of Baby and Johnny's lines from "Dirty Dancing" by heart. During my lesson this week my instructor, N., informed me that "God gave you knees for a reason." Apparently I never learned the lesson so often repeated by my Austrian mother on the slopes of the Catskills: "bend zee knees!" Also, apparently breathing is helpful when dancing, as I am reminded by N to "breathe through the steps." The last time someone reminded me to breathe was during childbirth, and the cascade of four letter words ensured that he would not remind me again; I would have to remember on my own.

The best part of the lesson this week was practicing the "corte" in the Tango. The corte is when the man and the woman stop and "strike a pose" with the woman's body in the shape of an arc formed by extending one leg forward and lowering into the knees while bending the body backwards. The tango is all together the most sensually charged dance, since it is all about wanting and then being rebuked and then wanting again and being rebuked again, but continuing to dance nonetheless. And that's why an English teacher loves dancing. It's all about the metaphors.

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