I have my books prepared with the flashlights, the phones are charged, the tanks are full in both the minivan and my charger. We went to church this morning and there was the sense to replace the fear with the love of God. But there was a foreboding feeling of doom as I looked outside and saw the wind spray over the plants. It’s coming. It is bad. We are ready. Why all the gas in the vehicles? It’s not as if we are going to escape. We have enough water to put Poland Springs over this quarter, the investors have a savory smile on their lips, they can see the images - the survivors from this Frankenstorm, a Perfect Storm scenario which will strike land, will enjoy the tepid spring water from their plastic bottles. I am ready. The backyard has been cleared of any furniture, so has the deck – it is all clear. The projects I completed today should have been completed weeks ago, but with each passing weekend there have been events. Life led me to Atlanta and Plains with my mother. Last weekend up to Boston to visit Amanda at Simmons. This weekend with the threat of a storm, hurricane, blizzard and tornadoes - we are making the responsible choices to seal up the place. At least for today, yesterday was another story. The air conditioners are now pulled from the windows and stored inside. They have not been used for weeks, so the storm was a great opportunity to get them in. I even cleaned the bathrooms, swept the halls, took care of that spider’s web on top of the stairs - I made enough mental notes to fill my brain. Clean off the web. We are ready. We have food, gas – yes – even for the grill outside - so we can cook the thawing slabs of meet since the power is expected to be out for days. And yes the sheets are clean as we try to rest our stressed thoughts.
Yesterday was a break from all of this. Ali bought tickets for my birthday to see GlennGary Glenn Ross on Broadway at the Schoenfeld theatre. It stars Al Pacino, Bobby Cannavale, David Harbour and Richard Schiff. It was the first time for Ali to see Pacino, early this year I saw him in Shakesphere’s Merchant of Venice. GlennGary is a man’s play and Pacino was excellent. He plays, Shelly Levene, and older salesman who is going through a bad streak until he closes on a big sale. If you saw the movie, you know the story, in the play - Pacino plays the part that Jack Lemon played. There is the scene in the play when Pacino is describing in detail how he made his big sell and closed the deal. But he does it by looking into the first two rows of the audience, drawing them into his story. Reaching, his pen out - as if he dared anyone to get up to take it. It was a master at work. I never heard of Bobby Cannavale, but was impressed with his adaption of Roma which Pacino played in the movie. Bobby had the part to a T – from his clothes to his mannerisms, to his booming voice which filled the theater
. I loved the movie and now have fallen for the play. Ali and I made our way outside and were crushed by the crowd. We saw Richard Schiff, in fact I reached out to get his autograph he took the playbill and signed it and asked if I was in the balcony as well. Yes sir we were in the last row. He was very gracious and took his time signing and taking some pictures. Pacino came out and the place went nuts, he had a smile on his face and signed some Playbills I reached over and got him to sign the back of an advertisement and then looked at the squiggle. It looks like a child’s attempt to write an e in script. But he did make an effort to sign as many as possible and even posed for a picture with a fan. Afterwards we had some cheese cake at Juniors and made our way back to the car. Traffic in the city was packed as we tried to cut up some blocks and Avenues and over and down to the Ed Koch Bridge. On the way home it inspired me to try to write a play. I tried a radio play this year, but was a little discouraged since I felt it was becoming conventional and contrived. The play I’m thinking about is far from contrived or simple. The sky is getting darker. Before anyone woke up I went for a run. On my route I made mental notes of places which will be impacted by this furious storm…God is good…all the time…thank you for reading this.
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