It’s
obvious we are all so damn sick of the news. I can barely endure looking at a
screen in fact for fear as to what catastrophe might pop up.
But
while many people occasionally now find themselves thinking about the horrible
mischance of being caught up in a random terrorist act- even as they ride the
bus, stand in a rumbling subway car, casually peruse a museum exhibit or shop a
favorite department store sale- I have yet been harboring another kind of
terrifying thought, an image that beseeches my sense of security daily with
recurring doubts. It is the absolute terror of being knocked off my feet, not
by something so wonderfully amazing that it fells me with awe, but literally.
You see, several individuals already have dropped to the ground within inches
of my toes and I have found this series of unhappy events to be increasingly
unnerving. They say New Yorkers are tough, but like everyone else, we have our
Achilles heel. In short, one does not wish to find oneself in an unsightly,
awkward position flat on the pavement for the world to see, particularly in Gotham .
The
first woman to have performed this most unseemly falling action within sight- a
happenstance that eventually would alter my view of the universe- seemed to
have tumbled onto the floor of the Metropolitan Opera a short time before I
found her. I was on my way to the ballet and she was reposing rather
uncomfortably right outside of box number eleven. My friend Garrett and I
had just been escorted to the third tier left by the usher, and as soon as we
stepped into the tiny hallway leading to the velvet chairs we discovered this
rather unfortunate dose of virtual reality lying there in a small, cashmere
heap. I have to be honest-- my first reaction was annoyance.
A month before, I had endured waiting on line
for forty-five minutes and then haggling politely with the box office for
another quarter of an hour in order to get these seats. I considered the
outcome of my tenacity a real coup; the tickets were under a hundred and I was
pleasantly looking forward to a wonderful afternoon of Sleeping
Beauty. The production had been written up as
"extraordinary," the dancers "exceptional." Both
Garrett and I each had made doubly sure to get to Lincoln Center
Having arrived
with some time to spare, we passed the minutes before curtain in the usual way,
sipping overpriced, watery coffee from styrofoam cups and complaining. I whined about how frustrating it was to
arrive five seconds late and find oneself exiled to Siberia
until the first intermission just because they took themselves so, so seriously
at the Met. Garrett derided the thin swill
passing itself off as authentic java. While we stood casually near the railing
chatting and trying to look flawlessly cool, ballet-lovers and tourists of
every kind and manner wafted through the lobby in various shades of black and
charcoal, trying extremely hard not to show their cultural and social
insecurities. All was basically as it
should be: clothing rustled, the women’s bathroom line was exceptionally long, children
felt and looked important and the house was packed. The last thing I expected
to find right before the show began was a reserved and dignified sixtiesh lady
in a Chanel suit dumped on her side like a crumpled Lord & Taylor bag- and just
as we were making our way to our seats. . . .
