franny
bananafish

A
Thu Jan 17 2002

spent about 4 hours on the phone last night with a very dear friend. we went to college together. we were both in the Dance program. we talked about family, friends, dance, our bodies, choreography dreams, eating habits, and how our perspectives were now that we are in our mid-late 30's. she's mellowed. she's okay in her skin. she's a thoughtful woman. we talked about the Met. (metropolitan museum) how we loved that place. she once told me that she saw a man praying in the Egyptain exhibit...

she has mellowed and i've simply forgotten what it was like to live in tights and leotards and lock myself in the small studio to work out phrases in silence. my bare feet never stuck to the floor. my mouth barely said anything, but my body had lots to say. movement used to unfold itself like a long ago story. it just happened. i could always tell when my movement was bullshit and when it was real. dear Martha Graham once said, "Movement never lies"...

i forgot what it was like to lay the marley floor and hang the frennels and strip lights, climb 12ft ladders and wait in the wings for my entrance to the angry solo from ecclesiastes, my bare legs for all to see...

walking from 41st uptown, past the plaza and into the park...i loved the park and all its craziness. a perfect people watching place with a couple of frisky seals swimming for the city gawkers.

city center. i miss city center. i miss seeing the diaghilev program, afternoon of the faun...my favorite nijinsky piece, sacre du printemps...oh i need to hear and see it all again...

right side, left side. the sciences/the arts...


~~~~~
Ms. A left me with a hopeful story just when i was feeling low. she visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. she said she almost got through the entire exhibit without shedding a tear, the last section she visited was a wall of people, rescuers that risked/gave their lives to get Jewish children, families, men and women out of harms way...one story in particular set the tears rolling for her: it was about a Jesuit priest that hid a little jewish boy who had lost his family. out of honor to the boy's heritage, he raised the boy in jewish tradition. A called it, " the highest level of humanity", as she cried into the phone...

6 Comments
  • From:
    Salamander (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    "right side, left side. the sciences/the arts... " They're just sides. By themselves, they are simply fragments. Maybe useful, maybe pretty, maybe puzzles. Together, though, they are a yin/yang whole that has a perfect completion beyond words. That's what medicine is all about. You're right where you belong, franny.
  • From:
    Greensparkles (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    I saw a 'dead' guy in the Egyptian exhibit (mummy)...at the Wadsworth Museum in Hartford. Two ladies and myself were gazing @ him....The ladies wondered out loud how could his hair be blonde?? I told them he dyed it with 'henna' ...they asked how I knew this? I told them (pointing) that I read the engraved slab hangin on the wall.

    why I tell you this? I do not know

    Do you think you'll go back to NYC someday franny?

  • From:
    Franny (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    maybe to catch the joffrey dance rite of spring and afternoon of the faun...and visit the park.
  • From:
    DaffyDuck (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    I wish you had a video of your dances...would love to watch you.
  • From:
    Slipperman (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    thank you for making life utter poetry
  • From:
    Sezrah (Legacy)
    On:
    Thu Jan 17 2002
    great entry