The Day Before Tomorrow

It’s almost a real spring morning. The northern tip of Central Park is wild and wooly. Over-grown and under-manicured. My punk dog romps through the meadow with her ball as a gaggle of canines and humans do what canines and humans do, sitting in the grace of a gentle, pre-caffeine sunshine in New York City, surrounded by joy and the lightness of being.

The way my dog throws herself into the grass and abandons her ornery ways, tickled, cooled, and comforted, makes me so happy.

Though we are standing on the precipice of spring, perfect days are hard to catch.

***

Now, I’m napping on my sofa. The dog sleeps, curled into my stomach. I can feel her short breaths juxtaposed with my long ones and the cotton comforter brushes my cheek. It’s a luxury to nap in the middle of the day, especially when I should be using my precious free time to write, to create, to do, but my over-used, aged, crumpling mass of dented cushion and bunched up blanket covers mind and its wanderings. I know there will be a time, hopefully many, many years from now, when my dog is no longer here. Her paw presses into the palm of my hand. These moments are precious.

I’ve written my resume. Spurred on by curiosity and fantasy and a job that sounds intriguing. In my imagination, it comes with the potential of noble overtures and innovative creativity. In reality, it’s a glorified advertising position. And ultimately, the screen with my name and resume on it has as much of a chance of being read as a New York City rat being plucked from obscurity to star in the next remake of Willard. But still, it’s fun to dream.

I’ve only applied to one other job in the last couple of years. That was a month ago, when I saw the listing for a reality television show. I sent them an email, inviting them to consider me. It was to take place off the grid, in the prairies and hills the under-developed midwest. It’s called Pioneer Family. They advertised for single people as well as families, but, they lied. They want children addicted to video games and husbands addicted to porn. They don’t want a cheese-making, ordained, haircutting, travel and dating blogging single woman caught up in the swirl of her life-long mid-life crisis, who laughs more than she cries.

I should have sent them a picture of my dog.

I haven’t written a resume in fifteen years, maybe longer. I haven’t had to. I’ve moved from job to job within my industry with surprising ease. I don’t know if I want to change that. Or if I can change it. I’m murky on where destiny ends and free-will begins. Or if either even exists.

But, it’s given me opportunity to pause and stand in front of the warped mirror of my life as I see it, and wonder if freedom of movement trumps freedom of expression. If I’d gladly give up the ease of my life to tell my stories on an international, easy-bake platform.

Would I rather move through the world whispering my work like a ghost, or tear through others’ consciousness like a glamour who wants to enchant, seduce, hypnotize, and mesmerize everyone she meets.

I don’t think it’s my choice to make, honestly. Life unfolds at its own pace and ever-present change babbles with promises it cannot keep while working its magic while no one’s looking, right here, in plain sight.

***

And now, It’s a rainy day, and the dog is sitting by my chair, chewing her bone. I’m four days late with writing this blog and sending it out into the world. But the deadline is of my own making. I doubt anyone, besides me, is concerned.

One of my windows is broken and won’t stay open. City birds are engaged in a heated conversation. I’ve finished my first cup of coffee and am considering a second. And it looks like the sun might come out. Maybe. For a minute.

Though nowhere near silent, things are quiet. Somehow, the city air smells sweet, and I’m imagining what it would it be like to know that this day, the day before tomorrow is the last day of my old life. What if I knew that tomorrow, everything would be different. I’m not talking about a switch that I’ve been lumbering towards, nor a traumatic change I’ve been rocketed into, but a shift into another life. Neither good nor bad. Nothing to fear. An easy slide – the sweet moment before I dive into something I never considered, haven’t prepared for, and trust implicitly. No time to pack my bags, but I know there’ll be a toothbrush for me on the other side.

I’ve typed a version of my story through the nerve-endings of my finger-tips and squeezed it through the invisible wires in our atmosphere to the great proof-reader in the sky. Now it’s her turn.

One thing I know. I’m still a beginner on this sleepy, almost spring morning.

We are all beginners. All of us. Every single day.

It’s a rainy Thursday morning. Nikki’s on my couch, deeply immersed in the colored lines of a New York City bike route map. The dog’s on her back, waiting for someone to scratch her belly.

I’m sitting the floor, wedged between the yellow chair, and the bookcase. I’m rearranging my books.

“I guess I have to get a bike,” she moans. “I’ve never met someone so hard to cyber-stalk.”

“Maybe because the only thing you know about him is his first name.”

“He’s bald.”

“There can’t be too many bald men named Bob in New York City.”

It sounds like she’s on the outs with her married boyfriend, so it’s imperative that she have a conversation with her married boyfriend’s wife’s boyfriend. Bob.

“I need to know if he was lying when he said he loved me.”

“What would Bob really know?”

“He’s the type of guy women open up to. Non-threatening.”

We’re drinking coffee. I wish it were wine. Or Bloody Mary’s. Brunch would be nice. But, currently, I am flat broke.

“It’ll take a lifetime to find him,” she pouts. “Even with a bike.”

“Don’t give up,” I say. “Bob is out there. Somewhere. Sleeping with your boyfriend’s wife.”

“At least someone’s getting laid.”

She shoves the map onto the floor where the dog promptly tears it to pieces.

“How old is this sofa?”

“Old.”

“It smells like dog.”

I open folder crammed with old letters, expecting to see the familiar scrawl of a friendship gone sour. Instead, on top there’s an envelope addressed to me with an uncertain hand. I don’t recognize the handwriting.

“Quite frankly,” Nikki chimes in, “I was disappointed in your blog on your Alaskan dates. Where are the burly mountain men? Where are the rugged individuals? Where are the stories?”

“My vacation was hijacked.” I admit. “The Hurricane wanted to come along and I told him could. And then he hijacked it.”

“I see.”

That was Fairbanks, where people wear their loneliness like it’s a badge of honor. “I was alone in Anchorage, but there was less facial hair and more savior-faire. And a few drag queens…”

“I think you should go back.”

“I think I will.”

“I wish it would stop raining,” she says.

I open the letter. It’s written in the blue ink of a cheap fountain pen. “Dear Amy,” it begins, “forests have died for the amount of half-written and unmailed letters I throw away…“

“… a rugged Alaskan man would be just the thing for you. When’s the last time you had sex, anyway?”

The letter’s dated 1991. I was in Berkeley, California, recovering from my first failed love attempt with a guy who stalked me after we broke up. Confusion swirled around me like a dark cloud and life was an operatic production.

“I’m not at college right now,” the letter continues. “I’m doing chemo at Sloan-Kettering, in New York City.”

It’s from a college friend, Alli. She was a year behind me at school and legally blind. She wore coke bottle glasses and walked with one of those white canes. Her winter coat was bright orange; you could see her tripping towards you from across campus. She’s someone I lost touch with and then forgot. But I can see her now, clear as day. I can hear her voice.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“You look like you’re going to cry.”

I fold the letter and set it aside. I’ll read it later, when the rain clears and the coffee’s cold and Nikki leaves.

“I think I might be reading too many self-help books. They are depressing the hell out of me.”

“Stop reading them.”

“I recently paid someone a lot of money to tell me to read them.”

“You’re paying someone to tell you to figure out how to help yourself?”

“In essence. Yes.”

“You know you could easily cut out the middle man and save yourself some money. Or you could take drugs.”

I shrug. “I have a lot of patterns.”

Obi’s dating a Russian dancer and is caught under her spell, Nikki will leave me soon to resume her mad summer search for Bob, I’ve lost my best friend and drinking buddy to pregnancy. Everyone’s changing but me.

“Smoke pot. Drink yourself into oblivion. Or get some Ritalin. You’ll be happier and more productive. And your apartment will be spotless.”

This is where I start to cry. I don’t like it when we talk about me. 

“I feel like – I’m -”

“But you’re not. You just think you are.”

She slides off the couch and sits in front of me. We’re face to face and I suppress a hiccup of a laugh. She’s not good at this at all.

“You have snot running down your -”

I pull my hand under my nose. “I don’t know what I’m doing. Ever.”

“No one does,” she says. She cranes her neck and looks out the window. The dog stops chewing on the map to watch her. “It looks like it stopped raining.” We smile sadly at one another for another moment. And then sweetly, she says, “well, I guess I should go.”

And then she goes.

There was a late night when Alli and I were leaving the college theater. She was telling me about her cancer, when it was discovered, where it lived. For no reason, I changed the subject to dinner, or something equally mundane. Alli was as excited to talk about the dining hall as she was about describing the tumors growing behind her eyes. I’ve often wondered at that organically abrupt non sequitur. I don’t know why I remember the moment.

Conversation is rarely a one-way or even a two-way street. It’s a labyrinth inside a playground in the middle of an obstacle course littered with flowers and land mines.

I’m not going to share her whole letter. But, here’s a small bit:

“My life has not been so hard. Even if it has been tough, I would never change it. Once I played a very old woman in Master’s Spoon River Anthology, or rather, her ghost floating around the graveyard. She talks about how she went to dances as a young woman, how she met her husband, her twelve children, how they died… She turns to the other souls in the graveyard and says, ‘irreverent sons and daughters, how silly you are. Life is too strong for you. It takes life to love life.’“

I think Alli died a year or two after she wrote that letter to me. I was off on my first adventures, kissing strangers, working odd jobs, learning how to be a friend. I didn’t think much about anyone those years, except myself. I heard she died well after the fact, when I ran into one of our professors on the subway. And, honestly, after a few days, she slipped from my mind again. But today, I see her everywhere.

Magic vs. Make-believe

“Everything’s fake in Orlando,” he says as we drive. The day has evolved from hazy with a wet chill to clear skies with a heavy blanket of humidity. “You are in the land of make-believe.”

I see how right he is. I just snorkeled in a swimming pool.

“Do you know what the back of an amusement park looks like?”

“…”

“Like the back of a strip mall. People are the puppets. You keep the people looking in one direction. If they turn their heads, they’ll see how everything works. The illusion will crumble.”

“Maybe that’s where the magic is.”

“Always look where you’ve just been.”

***

A hush falls over the arena. The air is electric as Magic and Make-believe square off. They circle each other and meet in the middle of the ring for a boxer’s handshake.

Back to their corners. Make-believe looks shrewd, eyes sharp. Magic is relaxed. Calm. Excellent form as he warms up his punch.

The bell rings. And they’re off!

***

“This used to be the Explorer’s Club,” he points to a huge warehouse of a building.

“There’s an Explorer’s Club in New York. They serve bugs.”

“Actors dressed like famous explorers and wandered through the club. The potrait on the wall talked to you. You were in the middle of a puppet show.”

“The one in New York has real explorers. Someone who found Atlantis. Again.”

“And that building used to be a dance club. A friend of mine got all the mannequins from an S & M club in New York and hung them upside down from the ceiling. Because it was Orlando, families figured it was good clean fun. It closed, too.” He pulls open the heavy door to a palatial restaurant. “Irish pub. Clog dancers.”

Small platforms hover above hundreds of empty tables. Clog dancers dance while patrons eat their Irish-themed dinners.

We sit.

***

Make-believe throws the first punch – a one-two. Magic bobs and weaves. Effortless. But not a single punch. Not yet, anyway. 

Magic remains elusive despite Make-believe’s athletic attack You can feel the tension building. Lots of history between these two.

***

“As I was, you know, scuba-diving in the swimming pool,” I report, “I was thinking. Magic is – magic. You have to want to see it to see it, but it’s everywhere. Make-believe is a tacit agreement between the parties involved where rules are discussed and agreed on. And a game is played, a world created, based on those rules.”

“Such as -”

“For example – the nice people at the sting-ray swimming pool. We agreed that they will pretend to be happy to see me, and I will pretend to believe that they are happy to see me.”

“You might be on to something.”

“You will pretend to be an Irish clog dancer -”

“I’m not going dance,”

“But let’s pretend you are.”

“Okay.”

“And I will pretend to believe that you are an Irish clog dancer, as opposed to a, say, a North American dancer who got a gig as a clog dancer in Orlando since you studied Irish accents and dance as a minor during your undergraduate education.”

“I see.”

“Furthermore, I will also agree to pretend that I’m not afraid that you will be stepping off this platform and into my mushy peas.”

***

Magic rounds up for his first punch and there it goes – straight into the ethers. What a wallop for Make-believe.

Make-believe does a double flip fight jump and flies straight into a cloud. Who knew Make-believe had such agility!

Magic looks perturbed for a split second. What is Make-believe doing? Where is he?

Oh my god. He’s just emerged from a thunder-cloud. And he’s wearing a cape. Make-believe is making believe he’s a super hero! 

But – what’s this? Magic has Make-believe by the cape and is swinging him over his head. A one, two, three, and Make-believe is launched back into the clouds, out of the atmosphere, into the starry universe.

Imagination looks fraught, holding Make-believe’s water bottle in the corner. Wonder mops Magic’s forehead.

How will Make-believe ever recover?

***

Outside the hotel, idling in his car. A family of four, all wearing mouse ears, walks past us, bickering.

“When I was at the dolphin place, they were piping birds sounds and music throughout the park. And everyone was wearing pith hats. It was like Las Vegas without the alcohol. You couldn’t find a moment of quiet.”

“I have theories about that.”

“It’s as if they want to fill us up with white n. Distract us. Keep us from finding… something.”

“Exactly.”

“I don’t know what.”

“The truth, maybe.”

“The magical truth.”

“You are in the land of make-believe.”

***

There’s silence in the arena. Magic turns slowly. You can hear his breath. You can feel his heartbeat. 

Make-believe is nowhere to be seen.

Has the battle been decided?

Has it been won?

***

“Thank you for the date.”

“Thank you for the conversation.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t bring the sock puppets. It’s a real hassle trying to pry them from the sweater drawer.”

“I understand.”

“Especially when they’re drunk.”

I exit the car and walk from the heavy humidity to the clammy coldness of the hotel lobby. He drives away, through the land of make-believe, back to his puppet theater.

Orlando.

***

We wait…

And wait…

And wait… until -

Holy cow!

Make-believe is making believe he’s Magic! Folks! There’s more glitter here than the Gay Day Parade! And what a display of fireworks! What gymnastics! Even Magic is impressed! Wonder looks giddy. Imagination is positively over the moon!  What a come back!

What a day!

***

Two weeks later, I’m sitting in the projection booth at Lincoln Center, visiting a friend at work.

I tell him my theory on make-believe.

“You’re right about the agreement. Last night, my daughter left her imaginary angel wings on the kitchen counter for me wear so that I could fly in my dreams.”

“Did you wear them?”

“I forgot. She knew it, too.” We’re eating girl scout cookies, drinking tea. ”I feel so old.”

An hour later, he walks me out of the booth. I’m on my way to work, a fragile place made of facades and gestures, where a game of make-believe, a tacit agreement between story-tellers and audience, becomes magic every night.

“Tonight, when you get home you should do it.”

“What?”

“Check out the angel wings.”

***

There’s been a major turn of events, for the folks reading this at home… 

Magic has – become fascinated with a blade of grass that Make-believe is pretending is the home of a lady-bug.

And they are -

Am I really seeing this?

They are… wow…

They have decided to stop fighting and are playing in the sandbox instead. 

daybreak, the cove

2 a.m. Orlando, Florida.

Is it late night or early morning, that I find myself wandering through the labyrinthine passageways of the Sun Spree Inn of Orlando., I turn down one hallway, then the next, two more rights bring me full circle, back to the courtyard, desperate to find my lodging. Around the moonlit pool, through a different entranceway, I learn the language of the Inn. I double back and trip through a corridor. Directions are hard enough to follow during the light of day. Excitement has led to sleep deprivation. And leaving a state where spring drags her heals to traverse a state of perpetual summer has worn thin the fabric of my already fragile sense of reality.

I find my room and drop into the bed and off to sleep.

I dream I am at the Explorer’s Club. I am smoking a pipe and picking at scorpion and cream-cheese stuffed endive hors d’oeurves. A fire rages in the stone fireplace and I recline casually in a wing back chair, sharing my tales and travels, my hard won pearls of wisdom and unusual adventures… all that I learned from the dolphins at Discovery Cove.

The discoveries have already been made, I readily admit, but none of them by me.

I have heard of this magical place with birds and marmosets, where stingrays flirt and dolphins share their stories with their human brethren. A winding river with sublime waterfalls and tropical forests. And the food. I’m told the food, lovingly prepared by locals, is memorable, satisfying, clean. The palm-shade beaches and the loving sun kiss all who enter.

I am in Florida for only a day and have much to see. The cove. A date in downtown Orlando with the puppet-master, and a wedding celebration at a sister cove aptly named “Paradise.”

Some days I look in the mirror and wonder whose life I’m living.

***

***

Despite my late night, I awaken at 7 a.m. With sleep in my eyes, I prepare for my day’s first adventure.

I am giddy like a child. The dolphins await.

I am undeterred by the topiary dolphins at the entranceway and the smiling greeters in pith helmets. Blinded by my conviction that the dolphins will lead me on a life-changing adventure, I barrel through the gates and grab my gear.

I force down half a coffee that tastes of bitter water and choke down half a banana, for I will need my strength. A seasoned trainer meets me at the pavilion. My fellow adventurers, mostly the young, are beside themselves with wonder.

For a moment, I think I can hear my grey hair growing.

Our group sets out to the shallow lagoon, where the dolphin, Kayle, greets us.

A little girl smiles at me as my heart settles into stark reality. We pet the dolphin. Pose for a picture. Kiss the dolphin. Pose for a picture. Ogle the dolphin. Pose for a picture. There will be no swimming with dolphins today. Unless you consider swimming standing in the water, smiling at a dolphin.

No mind, though. I learn all that there is to know about dolphins in the twenty minutes we spend in the lagoon. Afterwards, I peruse the photos. There’s one in which I look as if I think Kayle will eat me, and I am tempted to purchase a hard copy as evidence to my trials. However, I am frightened off by a man who wishes to pursue the sale in a most unsavory way.

I collect myself and wander to the Great Reef, where one can snorkel amongst schools of fish and friendly stingrays. The reef is warm, tropical, and active with fellow adventurers. I don my mask and submerge my face in the water. Once the water clears from kicking on small feet. I am able to see the coral.

It is fake.

I am snorkeling in a swimming pool.

My undertaking is far from over. I venture first to the aviary, where one can view two beautiful peacocks sitting in a tree, a pea hen, and two toucans who preen each other in their luxury quarters while humans tempt them with bird seed, and then to the fabled winding river, where, surely, I’ll be able to find some solace and peace in nature.

Imagine my dismay when I discover that all rivers, lagoons, and reefs in this strange land of Florida are artificial! The winding river, is, in essence, also an elaborate swimming pool, the waterfalls, high pressure hoses attached to spreaders. I move slowly along the watery path, sometimes walking, sometimes swimming; I laugh at cruel fate and curse my vivid imagination. It’s all a ruse.

As I console myself over a plate of french fries from the commissary, I see the reflection of my true-self winking at me. I am a child, despite my advanced years. A child who doesn’t fake things. Like ketchup.

When asked about my experience, I tell the truth. My good intentions mis-led me and I imagined real forests, a movement in conservation of land and animal. Music, noise, animal sounds were piped in at every interval, so that no one would ever have to suffer the gift of silence.

I pray that the young ones, and their caretakers, will have the opportunity to explore what was alluded to at the cove – out there, far away from the safety of life-guards and pith-helmeted overseers who keep their audience from learning anything about themselves.

“Orlando’s in central Florida,” Mark points out after listening to my tale. “You have to drive to the beach. For a long time.”

“It would’ve been nice if someone told that before I went,” is all I can muster.

When I am old and fully grey, sitting by the fire at the explorer’s club, telling my stories, I will be sure to recount the day spent at Discovery Cove, where I discovered that magic and make-believe are two very different things.

Heroes

Exercise caution in your business affairs: for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism

– Desiderata, Max Erman, 1927

I was thinking about Superman last night as I was falling asleep. Christopher Reeve was on my mind as the doe-eyed, innocent alien; I remembered the moment in the movie when he flies backwards around the earth, either spinning the globe or himself, I’m not sure which, into the recent past so he can save his one true love’s life.

He only takes time back a minute. No earthling is aware of his transgression. When I was eight and deeply hopeful about the love between Lois and Superman, I didn’t consider the billions of other lives affected first, by the rumblings of the earth and second, by a burp in time as they lurched backwards, re-living a moment of their lives.

What of those fictional off-screen characters? Were any of them saved, or doomed? Or did they repeat the moment as if it never happened with no possible salvation? Was Superman the only humanoid with the free-will and power to change the outcome of events? Or was there some other open-mined master who understood the potential of his or her unusual opportunity?

I hope Lois Lane, having been grabbed from the jaws of fate and given a second chance of life on this earth, helped more people than she hurt.

Love’s been on my mind since my friend Arlene asked me to officiate her wedding. When she called, I reminded her of my failed marriage and awkward relationships, my fatuous affection for my dog, and my tendency to speak slowly and in half-sentences when over or under-caffeinated and when drinking wine.

“Lee’s an atheist,” is all she said.

So, I said yes.

Five days later, I find myself an ordained minister preaching from my pulpit to one dog who likes to sleep while I talk. I have a parking permit, bumper stickers, and a certificate with my name on it. If you’re looking for someone to marry you, I’m happy to help you out.

It’s been a hard week in the continental U.S., and elsewhere. An oil spill in Arkansas that no one outside of the perpetrators is allowed to assess, earthquakes in Oklahoma, an attack on the civilians and guests of our beloved city of Boston, and a lethal explosion at a fertilizer plant in Texas. A gun control proposal was filibustered out of the Senate, with the Senate Minority leader, Mitch McConnell, amongst other over-paid, under-performing civil servants, cruelly mocking their fellow, concerned citizens who supported the bills, many of whom are direct victims of gun violence.

This week, it seems to me that humanity is divided into two groups. Those who practice their humanity, and those who conclude that simply because they walk on two legs, they are human.

I started playing cello around the same time that Superman movie came out. I am told that the moment I picked up the instrument, it was clear that I born to play. My fingers knew where to go and the bow fit my grip. When I breathed, my cello breathed with me. For a while, every time I played, I got better, whether I practiced or not. But, as I got older and the music got harder, my advantage leveled out. “If you’re not moving forward, you’re moving backwards,” my teacher warned me. And then she told me to work on my scales.

During those foggy days of adolescence, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. It didn’t really matter. It was destined that I’d grow taller, stronger, practice more, and lose myself into a swirl of circumstances I was not old enough to understand.

What makes sense to me now is that it is a human responsibility to learn and to grow. We’re here to experience, process, and teach. Evolve. Understand. Give what we can and take what we need. To do so, we need to practice, to keep up the strength in our fingers. And our souls.

It is plain to see that there are people who want to stop moving forward. They want to stand still or retreat into an illusory place of emotional comfort… hide behind their thick wall of righteousness. They want to slam on the brakes, stop the car, and watch everyone pass them by, simply because they don’t know where the road will lead, or because they like the view, or they’ve gone as far as they want to go.

Here’s the problem with standing still: no one is safe in a non-moving vehicle in the middle of speeding traffic.

And driving backwards is dangerous.

I can say things like that because I’m an ordained minister on a bully pulpit with a congregation currently consisting of one bone chewing canine.

If Superman were alive today, on this earth, and decided to spin time backwards a week or so, would the administrative powers at Exxon decide against running their crude oil through Mayflower? Would the Boston marathoners choose not to run? Would Mitch McConnell decide against mocking his fellow citizens who are in pain? Would the owners of the fertilizer plant in Texas take to heart the safety violations they declined to address?

I think not.

I don’t know much, but I read that the earth only rotates in one direction and blue tights, or no, there is no Superman protecting our city out of a sense of love or duty. Time, widely believed to be an illusion, feels really real. And the moon’s magnetic pull affects the ocean inside each and every one of us. There’s more than meets the eye. If you’re not moving forward, you’re moving backwards. If you’re not expanding, you’re contracting. And if you’re afraid of change, you’ll never, ever be at peace.

And, if you don’t want to drive a metaphorical car, you can always take the bus.

Alaska

Anchorage. Friday night.

I am in a bar. I have come to test the 7:1 ratio theory. I want to experience, first hand, the legendary prowess, the outrageous displays, the bright feathers of the Alaskan mating ritual.

I see men. Lots of men. Most of them are wearing sensible heels and dresses.

Of the women, many, but not all, are dressed like men.

As the disco ball slowly spins, a gaggle of girls screaming girls gets plastered on jello-shots. I am on the edge of the middle of an orgy of equality. People are happy tonight. Alaska, it seems, is a come-as-you-are state.

Mad Myrna’s is a portal onto a level playing field. As these Alaskan drag kings and queens take the microphone, the joy in the room is palpable. Clear as the majestic mountains. Clean as the air weaving drunkenly down the streets. I feel giddy. My cocktail is in a pint glass. I suck it down through a straw.

This is the final frontier.

Or one of them.

***

I have learned an important lesson: even with the fabled seven to one ratio, there might not be one in the seven who will want me.

I collect myself in the refreshing night air. Not to be defeated, I walk down Fifth Avenue and slide into a restaurant and onto a bar stool. I hang my coat on knees, wriggle out of my sweater. Moments later, a man sitting caddy-corner glances past his drink and smiles.

“You just get into town?”

I am amazed. How does he know I’m not from there? Is it my city vibe? My shoes? The stupid smile plastered on my face? I trace the bar with my finger, looking down at the menu.

I am wearing my red ‘Arkansas’ shirt.

“Yesterday.” I answer, meeting his stare. I order a glass of wine.

He is a handsome man, rough around the edges, finely chiseled and tattooed, a bad boy type – straight out of the pages of a well-worn romance novel. He knows it, too.

In the next five seconds, a woman comes up to him. “You have such nice hair,” she says, giggling. She drops her business card and darts out the door. He handles the card, flips it over. Reads her name. Tosses it on the bar and sighs.

“I hate that shit.”

“Must happen to you all the time.”

“I don’t understand why people can’t just sit and talk. I just want someone to talk to.”

So we talk.

***

In the lower forty-eight, Alaskan men have a certain allure. They are exotic, mysterious, manly. Lonesome loners who have chosen a strange road. Rugged individuals. Strong, silent types.

Alaskan women, from what I’ve observed, have a different story.

It’s this: the odds are good, but the goods are odd.

***

Fairbanks.

Earlier in the week, when I step off the plane, I’m greeted by a polar bear, stuck at the airport in a saw-dust filled, snarling purgatory. My clothing doubled, tripled, and painfully stifling at O’Hare airport, smiles upon me as snow-covered Fairbanks lifts an eye-brow.

Another tourist from another one-horse-town touching down to look up at the night sky. Bears slumbering, humans barely out of hibernation, ice lining the streets, refusing to budge. My new-found obsession with hot springs, Santa Claus, and the Northern Lights distract me from my purpose, preventing me from venturing far off the beaten path.

I am very lucky, however, to witness a dating ritual at the coffee kiosk at the Fred Meyer’s on Airport Road.

He has unfortunate facial hair and a braided beard.

She’s a perky cashier with sensible shoes and an espresso habit.

He seductively pushes her coffee across the counter.

She shoots her espresso and sips her Frappucino back.

His hopeful innocence peers past his frizzled beard and gruff exterior, smiling.

She invites him to pop by her cash register sometime, ostensibly for a deep discount.

He watches her walk away. Maybe tomorrow, he thinks, maybe then I’ll ask her out.

***

Six things one should do when visiting Alaska:

Eat snow.

Shoot a gun.

Drive on ice.

See a moose.

Drink at a gay bar.

Watch the world from the top of a mountain.

***

***

Anchorage. Thursday night.

I sit across from a clear-faced, open-minded, world-traveled, born-and-bred, fresh-scrubbed Alaskan. White shirt, black tie, straight out of the pages of Susie’s Alaskan Man magazine. We’re sitting at the bar at the brewery.

He’s a successful entrepreneur with an acting habit who lives life, delighted by the gifts that come his way – the perfect balance of old soul and young spirit.

I am impressed.

He knew I wasn’t from Alaska, too.

***

A friend of mine has a theory that environment shapes culture. And I agree with her to a point. The people in Fairbanks seem frigid, fragile, and tired, as if they’re just coming out of a deep freeze. A blanket of white encroaches on their lives, almost always covering their houses, narrowing the roadways. It’s not an easy place to live. But, when the sun shines, it shines long and hard. Hope comes from above, and the magic of the Northern Lights, with its scientifically simple explanation, is a constant reminder of all that we do not understand.

In Anchorage, surrounded by mountains and clean air, there is a purity of spirit. It seems to be a city of happy secrets. Even the people who want to leave love it.

My date and I talk about the lights, the verdant spring, the long days, and the long nights.

“It’s no wonder that people here believe in God,” he says. “Go to the top of a mountain. You’ll see. Sometimes it’s nice to feel so small.”

***

To quote one fine, bearded bachelor featured in Susie’s Alaska Man Magazine, “what you see is what you get. That’s the Alaskan way.”

I submit that this is mostly true anywhere you go.

I suppose it depends on what you’re looking for.

Improvisation

Obi and I were chatting over coffee the week before last. The day before I left for Alaska. We were talking about the universe, as one does when one is half asleep and half awake, hopped up on caffeine in the company of a sleep-deprived, suddenly 40-year-old friend.

I was packing. Long johns, jeans, socks, skirt.

I told him my latest theory, which is that there is something beyond our infinite universe (which is only infinite to us because it’s impossible for us to comprehend its vastness). This thing beyond is even bigger, more magical, mysterious, and worthy of our awe.

When I was growing up, we had the back yard, where the grass was soft, and the way back, beyond the vegetable garden. It’s where my father tried to grow his dwarf apricot trees and we chipped mica off of rocks. Past the way back and over the stone fence was the way, way back, where a wild pumpkin patch grew. The way, way back had black-berry bushes, golf balls we’d bring back to my father so he could practice putting, and an occasional mattress.

It was forbidden territory, so we were always there. Lost for hours, picking wild flowers to bring back to our mother, who was invariably allergic to whatever gifts we presented.

The back yard was like the earth, the way back, the universe. And the way, way back, the whatever that is beyond our comprehension.

That morning, over coffee, it seemed to me that life is a third draft of a novel that needs another few rewrites. It’s written, but not well. Anything can change.

Obi disagreed.

“I think the universe is like us,” he said. “Tripping along, pressing buttons to see what happens. Moody. Hoping no one notices when it makes a mistake.”

“Riding the fine line between fate and free-will…”

“Drinking a beer. Learning as it goes…”

I take my coffee lightened with really good milk, and sweetened by beautiful, raw honey. I’m picky about my mugs.

Obi takes his coffee black, with a splash of water. He’ll drink anything out of anything.

By eleven, the coffee was cold, the conversation over, and I was surrounded by small piles of clothes.

“I hope I packed okay,” I said.

“It’s not like you’re going to the end of the universe.”

“Feels like it.”

“But you’ll be able to find a tooth-brush. If you need one.”

I’ve often considered life an improvisational, experimental piece of performance art. Sometimes the moments are eye-rollingly mundane, and other times, distilled, intense, and deeply moving.

First and foremost, I traveled to Alaska to get a date. I take my research very seriously. But, as a side project, I wanted to see something of such breath-taking beauty that it changed my entire paradigm.

Armed with a seven to one ratio and a mini-skirt, I figured my date would find me, so I focused on the more pressing challenge of finding breath-taking beauty in Alaska.

I expected a front row seat to the Northern Lights would suffice.

Here’s what I think now:

If we’re mirrored by the universe, and the universe is mirrored by us, quantum siblings tripping through life, I am honored to be related to the greatest artist known to man. There is, out there, a beauty that defies human language. It’s filled with a mystery I don’t want to solve. Broad strokes of colored light smeared across the sky, a forest covered just so with snow, the mountains cradling a fat, juicy slice of quiet. The attention to detail is heart breaking.

Like a slow, icy slide into a snow bank with 32 chattering Japanese tourists while colored curtains painted by an invisible hand consume the night, living is the moment between eyes open and eyes closed when you’re not sure if you’re dreaming or sitting at the airport at 4 a.m., wondering if you remembered to pack underwear. It all swirls together and blends into a rich stew of questionable ingredients.

I’ve been lucky to be mostly warm and rarely hungry all of my life. And even though I can demolish a three ingredient brownie mix and render the finished product inedible, lose my favorite pen and my favorite hat on the same day, and hurt a stranger’s feelings by accident, I can also walk five miles with a skinned knee, smiling.

I assume the universe can do all that, too. But better.

As for the great beyond. I don’t know. Maybe it looks like Hackensack. Or Detroit. Hard to tell.

I did have a date, by the way. I’ll tell you about it next week.