Last night I found myself at Smoke, a jazz club in Manhattan Valley, until something like 4 AM. I caught the late show which on Saturdays is an interesting mix dubbed “The Harlem Sessions” run by phenomenal pianist Marc Cary. The gig starts out with Cary and friends performing a set followed by an open jam… musicians, poets, singers are all welcome on stage. If you want to see the best the NYC jazz scene has to offer, look no further. Cary, bassist Barry Stephenson and drummer Cory Cox pretty much blew my mind last night with an emotive, rhythmic and at times almost ethereal set. Cox’s snappy and precise style was like a rifle bolt engaging each beat and provided a perfect juxtaposition to the more pensive melodies. If you are, or happen to be in NYC and are into Jazz, I would highly recommend a visit. Anyway, I digress. You must be wondering about the title to this week’s post. I am wondering myself.
Last night on the walk home I was thinking a lot about how the city has changed in the last decade or so and I became mournful, although I couldn’t lay an exact place to the emotion. Perhaps mournful for when I was younger or just for the familiarity of memory. Anyway, this eventually led around to a sense that we, as humans, seem to trample on the most precious things without even noticing. For some time now I have been noticing birds that are killed flying into glass buildings. If you keep your eyes open, they are everywhere. Almost everyday I see a new one, laying at the foot of some bland, enormous, often recently build, high rise. No one seems to notice the bird. No body seems to notice the building really, either.
Some time ago I made my living painting people’s bodies. It was an interesting thing. Often, I was hired to go to someone’s party and paint the guests. One year, I got a gig at an office Christmas party painting body art on the guests. It was a big party so I brought an art student, who worked with me part-time, along. We’ll call him James. James was a good-natured, if at times ill-tempered, art student. At the end of the party, the company owner asked if we could stay for an after party he was planning to have at his home in northern NJ for double the hourly rate. So, we went. It turned out to be an S&M orgy, but that’s a story for another time. The first thing painted was a bullseye zeroing in an the anus of the guy’s wife who, at the earlier party, had been quite proper and buttoned up. Later, the guy wanted Rolling Stone lips done on his genitalia, with his phallus as the protruding tongue. As a matter of coincidence, James had been the one to paint both of these requests.
After our pre-arranged two hours of body painting was complete, we were invited to stay and join in the party. We declined. Once safely back in the car James and I sat silently for a time, processing the evening. Eventually he fumbled for a cigarette, lit it and inhaled deeply. After a tremendous pause, James turned to me. “Dicks and assholes, Lauren,” he said rather angrily. “You made ME paint the dicks and assholes.”
Dicks and assholes indeed. Sorry about that James.