i felt exhausted last night after going to cynthia's performance. it was at an elementary school in plymouth meeting with this really nice auditorium which strangely had plastic seats. a 'say no to drugs' campaign plastered all over the walls. school cafeteria with plastic lunch trays--'please have your money or lunch ticket ready'. after c's performance i hopped down the hall with luke like the colorful people painted on the walls, to the shiny chrome kitchen and had a few sweet cheesecakey cubes with some kind of brown bean in them that was really good, left over from the dinner which was much earlier in the evening. partway through the performance of this singer of classical north indian music i snuck out-- i was falling asleep and needed a drink of water. went out into the misty warm parkinglot, stretching my legs on my car. so tight in my shoulders, upper back. some towers of red lights i've never seen, lacy, more fragile then the towers i'm used to.
i got lost on the way there and drove along germantown pike way into chestnut hill, a very affluent neighborhood of philly. clean streets paved with stone, brightly lit restaurants, ice cream and coffee places, a spa offering $90 special on massage and facial, open saturday evening, furniture and clothing stores, evenly pruned healthy trees, lots of shiny slick(o: cars parked along the street.
things people say:
in the clay studio--"she eats breakfast like a horse."
bernadette and i talked to eight people this morning in the neighborhood of port richmond, where, guess what! there are several polish cukiernias/bakeries, a big grocery store and a couple skleps, a restaurant, two travel agencies, two catholic churches, a lithuanian cultural center, a polish ballroom...i was very excited to be surrounded by polish products, the same kind of bread, cheese, paczki, babka (actually i might have to go back after work and get some babka) it felt oddly like being in poland for a moment, polish signs, saying dzien dobry, dziekuje bardzo.
an older woman in port richmond, living in an apartment along richmond ave. she was born in philly and lived in kensington when she was young, then moved to alleny i think it was, went to saint ambrose school, her husband's family has owned a bakery on girard for several generations; she's lived in port richmond for seven years-- "the colored people were coming here from the south in droves. You know, most of em came just recently 30, 40, 50 years ago."
"those russians and polaks are kind of like the colored. (why's that?) (pause) they're rude, inconsiderate people. (looking up with her hand on her heart) God forgive me saying that. i shouldn't be saying that but (something under her breath) well the polaks and russians they mind their business. don't bother you."
posted by Liza 2.11.03