Chance = Change

...has officially begun!! The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade sort of kicks it off, I guess you'd say, with Santa Claus always being the last float in the Parade ... he symbolizes the entrance of the Christmas Spirit into this city so full of other sorts of spirit... like someone enormous sprinkles a thick layer of powedered sugar over a roiling mass of beef stew...somehow it all gets sweeter, even if it is not in the City's nature to be sweet.

But a palpable change comes over it all, no doubt about it. And I have always enjoyed that shift. The seismic shift from selfishness to an imperative sort of kindness: people actually smile more than they usually do. Perhaps it is the anticipation of the gifts they hope to receive around the tree on the Morning. Maybe all those extravagant windows at Saks Fifth Avenue actually do work some magic on the passers-by. Or it could be that childhood memories, insistant and strong, come back into even the most miserable of minds, and even if nothing is in the oven, we smell cinnamon and sugar everywhere we go...I dunno...but the City does begin to change into something nicer and funner at about this time every year. It all becomes like an enormous Yankee Candle Shoppe, and no matter how much it may give you a headache , you are forced to enter it and smile anyway!

The more Buddhism I read (I am reading a most amazing book right now by a Vietnamese Nun who has worked all her life with Thich Naht Han to help the people of her country...I am sharply aware of how my heart is opened by such selflessness)...anyway, the more I read, the less I need. And this simple fact is difficult to reconcile with how I have always lived. So, mountains of gifts under a festive sparkling tree, or sitting next to a glowing menorah...well...I do love prettiness, but I have learned that things are simply...well...things. There are these deeper and realler gifts I am uncovering lately. And the digging sometimes gets messy. I have, however, always liked to garden in the mud and rain, (easier to pull out old roots) ,so, I must remain patient and keep studying. And letting the earth of my being do what it will do.

I am having tea with Alex T. this morning before my afternoon class. A valued friend, Alex is also a private student of mine, and a gifted fine actor who can sing. More than that, he is a fine spirited man, and recently finished a run in HISTORY BOYS as the general understudy. I saw him in one of his five roles and he was wonderful...and he and his friend (who has also become mine) Caitlin F. have just returned from a good trip to London, and he has much to tell me. So we shall tea at a place new to me: Podunk, on 5th Street and 2nd Avenue....both Alex and Cait adore it, so to Podunk we shall go! I am looking forward to spending that time with Alex.

Over the Holiday, Peter and I got cught back up again in watching the 2nd Season of SLINGS AND ARROWS on the Sundance Channel...or is it Bravo?...in any event, wherever or whoever plays it, we will be watching! And we have learned that a 3rd season of it will be out sometime...can hardly wait. The show is about a fabulous and typically dysfunctional repertory theatre , this one in Canada, modeled on Stratford Festival no doubt, and it is so filled with inside theatrical references and personalities and dilemmas, it is irresistible!! We laugh and cry along with them , since we totally understand so much about what the people are going through. And the fact that the show is filled with genuinely fine Canadian actors, spouting off immortal Shakespeare lines as part of their "sit-com" journey,totally in story context as they rehearse and perform their regular season, is just the most wonderful icing on an already substantial cake! We adore this show. And appreciate that it even exists! Thank you Canada!

Labels: Holidays and Slings and Arrows