Tuesday, January 03, 2006
Ahhhhhhhh....
...the ever present, evergreen, always open , always welcoming PARIS HEALTH CLUB!!!!
I have been a member of this neighborhood health club for so long that when i first came to NYC, shortly after joining it, as all the Upper West Side actors seemed to do, I actually shared 20 minutes or so in the hot tub with CLIVE BARNES!!! The drama critic for everything at that time...I mean there we were sweating together in our bathing suits, being extremely human (and dare I say humid?) as we whirlpooled the aches away! I'll never forget that....one of those pivotal NY moments...when I really got that I was living here at last!
And it has been ever thus...I have been a member of this sturdy spa for three decades now, on and off...depending on my willingness and location of work....and now I find, as I grow old along with my love (the Paris), I need it more than it needs me!Though it never fails to make me feel wonderfully and warmly welcome...oh that sauna room in the dead of winter....God bless it indeed!
And i have gone to strenuously workout every single day since Christmas, it seems, because the holiday festivities so did me in with food and alcohol that if i did not go work out I felt like I would simply sit, grow fatter and die with no effort to do otherwise...so the club, the club, the club...whew! And I can hardly wait to go again tomorrow...now this is extremely unusual for me..so i can only figure taht I am getting wiser in my old age and I am finally listening to my body as it tells me what to wisely do to keep IT happy...and functioning in any way well.
I hail the wonderful and determined PARIS HEALTH CLUB...why it is named that I will never know, though it is next doot to the Paris Apartments...but why are they named that? No clue....it certainly seems Parisian in no way whatsoever...not an accordian or beret to be seen, nothing faintly atmospheric and artistic in either the apartment building or the club...but, ah well...a badge of honor nonetheless: I belong to the Paris Health Club,,,,,so there! You silly New York Health and Raquet people you! Feh Who needs chrome and shiny steel machines when you have the crumbling tiles and historic stretch rooms of the actorly Paris....ah! if those walls could talk! I am so glad it is only 6 blocks from my home!
I will go to the Alabama Shakespeare Theater for a few days at the end of this month to help dramaturg Elyzabeth Wilder's new commissioned play for their Southern Playwrights Conference...title: SOULS GROWN DEEP....i feared my NYU teaching schedule would keep me away from the necessary week's committment to do this, but both Elyzabeth and the director Janet Cleveland are fine with my tardy arrival in the process, and Elyzabeth and I will work here at home anyway before then....I so like this play she has written about the quilting ladies of Gees Bend...she has found a core for the story that I admire.
More on that as it develops...
I have been a member of this neighborhood health club for so long that when i first came to NYC, shortly after joining it, as all the Upper West Side actors seemed to do, I actually shared 20 minutes or so in the hot tub with CLIVE BARNES!!! The drama critic for everything at that time...I mean there we were sweating together in our bathing suits, being extremely human (and dare I say humid?) as we whirlpooled the aches away! I'll never forget that....one of those pivotal NY moments...when I really got that I was living here at last!
And it has been ever thus...I have been a member of this sturdy spa for three decades now, on and off...depending on my willingness and location of work....and now I find, as I grow old along with my love (the Paris), I need it more than it needs me!Though it never fails to make me feel wonderfully and warmly welcome...oh that sauna room in the dead of winter....God bless it indeed!
And i have gone to strenuously workout every single day since Christmas, it seems, because the holiday festivities so did me in with food and alcohol that if i did not go work out I felt like I would simply sit, grow fatter and die with no effort to do otherwise...so the club, the club, the club...whew! And I can hardly wait to go again tomorrow...now this is extremely unusual for me..so i can only figure taht I am getting wiser in my old age and I am finally listening to my body as it tells me what to wisely do to keep IT happy...and functioning in any way well.
I hail the wonderful and determined PARIS HEALTH CLUB...why it is named that I will never know, though it is next doot to the Paris Apartments...but why are they named that? No clue....it certainly seems Parisian in no way whatsoever...not an accordian or beret to be seen, nothing faintly atmospheric and artistic in either the apartment building or the club...but, ah well...a badge of honor nonetheless: I belong to the Paris Health Club,,,,,so there! You silly New York Health and Raquet people you! Feh Who needs chrome and shiny steel machines when you have the crumbling tiles and historic stretch rooms of the actorly Paris....ah! if those walls could talk! I am so glad it is only 6 blocks from my home!
I will go to the Alabama Shakespeare Theater for a few days at the end of this month to help dramaturg Elyzabeth Wilder's new commissioned play for their Southern Playwrights Conference...title: SOULS GROWN DEEP....i feared my NYU teaching schedule would keep me away from the necessary week's committment to do this, but both Elyzabeth and the director Janet Cleveland are fine with my tardy arrival in the process, and Elyzabeth and I will work here at home anyway before then....I so like this play she has written about the quilting ladies of Gees Bend...she has found a core for the story that I admire.
More on that as it develops...
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