Re-Discovery Tour – Days 1-3

This past weekend, I was readying myself for a jaunt to my 45th reunion. I’m meandering from NY through Connecticut, then to Somerville, MA, before arriving in New Hampshire on Thursday. In between La Guardia and Concord, I’ll see three dear souls who are important to my life passage. If I’ve learned nothing else in the last few weeks it is that life’s precious and we must never take for granted that we’re shaped by every encounter, some more than others; I’m more than excited to engage with folks during an extended road trip.

Sunday I took a walk with my brother, newly returned from his travels to the east coast to visit our Dad. I heard about their trip to the 70th reunion and through his capture, we were all able to see his speech to his class, which was so gratifying. Sunday afternoon I attended with a group of colleagues IAMA’s production of The Bottoming Process at the LGBT Center. It is a truly powerful play, beautifully directed by our colleague Rodney To. Playing until June 12th.

Sunday evening brought a spontaneous dinner at a new restaurant in our neighborhood. It’s about time we had really good Indian Food in the area. It’s called Baar-Baar. I urge you to check it out. My friend Rob and I had a wonderful meal there.

Monday, I flew to LaGuardia via Denver. I had on the plane my colleague Rena Heinrich’s new book Race and Role: The Mixed-Race Asian Experience in American Drama to read and found it so insightful. Had a fun text session with my son about the “double liminality” (Dr. Heinrich’s term) of his mixed race heritage and how he’d become expert especially while traveling in Europe to shape shift effectively given his environments. I love the ideas expressed in Heinrich’s book about mixed-race Asian actors not being two halves, but two self-identified wholes. A methodical re-framing of identity in an empowering narrative. I’m so grateful for her research and the elegant book. You can get her book at the link above.

Once my plan touched touched down at LaGuardia, I grabbed my rental car and swooped up to Bridgeport to see my friend Ando for a brief night with her before continuing on the next morning to New Milford to visit with der Daves, as a mutual friend calls him. We lunched atop a beautiful hill overlooking Lake Waramaug (Pano shot at the top of this post.) In the course of one day, I attended his evening rehearsal of Pippin, providing some SM tips to his young team of stage managers, and enjoying watching the choreographers work at staging “Glory.” We’ll be doing Pippin this fall at SDA, so it was fun to see a rehearsal happen that I had no responsibilities for. 🥰

After rehearsal we searched the town for a bite to eat, stumbling upon O’Connor’s Public House, where there was some sort of Motley Crue Karaoke Night happening. We sat at the bar and threatened each other with going to sing, but didn’t think they would have “It’s the Little Things We Do Together” in the book of songs. At least it sure didn’t sound like it. Fortunately (most likely because we weren’t drinking) walked out after a heart clogging dinner and some diet Pepsis. I love David most because he makes me laugh. We have so much history (read blood under the bridge) in our lives together that it doesn’t take long to find a topic that starts us giggling. David did NOT want me to take this picture so don’t tell him you read this or saw this picture. Shhhhh. It will be our little secret.

Home again, two dyspeptic souls (God, what did we just eat at 10PM?) I climbed the stairs to “my” beautiful aerie bedroom and crawled under the covers on the antique sleigh bed, in the dead silence of the country. No screaming people outside my window, or traffic, or turbo car engines showing off for each other down in the street. I think I had one of the best nights of sleep I’ve had in years.

Today’s task was to renew der Dave’s passport, which we were able to do with only three trips to the post office, a trip to the Town Hall Mayor’s office where the folks were very very very helpful, breakfast at Johanna’s, off to CVS to take the requisite photos, house for final check and completing the application. London, here he comes!

Next stop for me is Somerville, MA, to visit my dear friend/nephew-in-law, Elliott.

Stay tuned for more reporting on my self-discovery tour! Here’s what I’ve discovered so far:

• I have made very arbitrary and not scientific decisions about when I will wear a mask. Don’t wear it in the airport terminal, but do wear it on the plane, peeling it off as soon as I get on the jetway after the flight.
• I am comfortable letting my GPS tell me how to navigate through New York City when the last time I’ve driven through New York City was thirty plus years ago. I’ll take an alternative route that the GPS suggests will save me 15 minutes even thought I have no idea what these alternative parkways are, and though the speed limits on most of them are 45 or below with no passing. And I’m behind a truck hauling sand at 10PM.
• There is nothing like being with friends to remind you of the quality of life you have lived to date and to give you the freedom to determine the direction(s) you want to go in the future. As if on cue, my Monday horoscope below.