May 27 — June 2
What a week! Part of my birthday package was going to Coney Island. All New Yorkers know that weekend travel on the subway is an adventure unto itself. Eventually, I met my pal at Stillwell Avenue, the last stop on the D. She had wanted to knock off some barbecue but I used birthday rights and so we stood in line for about three days to get Nathan hotdogs, fries. We then strolled them off (ha!) on the boardwalk, stopping for a restful merry-go-round ride. Lots of crowds, lots of families, lots of lovely sea air and sunshine.
On Tuesday, I went to Caveat, the nightclub/ speakeasy on Clinton, to watch and marvel at one of my friends talking about her alter ego. Her performance was part of a Generation Women program in which women between the ages of twenty and eighty plus tell their stories. Caveat is a gem. The atmosphere is one of happy expectation coupled with wine, Get It Girl White Blend, that supports Planned Parenthood.
I went to Invisible Julliard. We all know that every organization wants money, right? Some, like Juilliard, do it with class. Lovely champagne followed by an hour sample of classes: Drama Voice, Drama Movement, Ballroom Dance, Juilliard Dance, Basics of Singing -the selections seemed endless. I chose Drama Voice. It was held in an enormous black box and the instructor, Susan Finch, put about fourteen of us thorough our paces. Lots of movement and walking in circles while we trilled and buzzed our vocal cords. Afterwards, there was a buffet supper. A friend (Drama Movement) and I shared a table with some new friends from Drama Voice and Drama Movement including a Juilliard graduate who had majored in dance and who explained how daunting, thrilling, scary and life affirming it was to attend Juilliard. A delightful evening.
Graphic Lessons: NYPD Detective Steve Kulchek is assigned a murder case at the prestigious Windsor School. What’s bugging him? His partner being stabbed while Kulchek was buying cigarettes? Escaping an attempted car bombing? His hated boss, Captain Dick Holbrook, being a trustee of the Windsor School? Losing his girlfriend to Holbrook?
Graphic Lessons: Recent thirty-five-year-old widow Millie Fitzgerald applies for a private school teaching job, faints on a stabbed and dying man in the school kitchen, deals with the only witness to the stabbing – a troubled nine-year-old, develops a crush on a NYPD detective and her dog dies.
Graphic Lessons: Nine-year-old Dana is the only witness who overhears a person fighting with George Lopez, the soon to be stabbed Windsor School kitchen worker. Who can she tell? Her mother who never listens or accuses her of lying? Her father who’s started a new family in Singapore? She tells Millie.