Greetings from New York, everyone.
There's nothing like a many states spanning, regions spanning, ideologies spanning plane flight. In one day, hell, with jet plane technology, just a few hours, one can feel the palpable differences sharply bordered in this country. Well, lets just say Texas is not New York, and vice versa. Up here, global warming isn't a myth. Or is it???
I lifted off from San Antonio under a sunny sky and as I flew deeper into the gray winter my concerns over my time away from New York grew shapes, became things to reckon with. What will I do now, in New York, have I faded from the public eye, am I a has been? I know better than to entertain such thoughts for any notable length of time, and I know better than to believe I've been in the public eye. But I'm well acquainted with rabbit holes, and my need to doom the future, so I mindlessly stared into the gray rain coming down steady through an Atlanta International Airport window, a rain's rain, soaking everything and defying the winter and washing the stains of Antebellum away and out of the Deep South. But the South is really deep, and no matter how determined the rain, there's always a little Lost Cause Mythology left in the corners which becomes a sprawling vine in no time. Well, as you can tell, it got my mind off of my little worries about failed personal ambition. A little loitering outside of that wonderful Atlanta International accoutrement, the smoking lounge, helped, too. Oh, rabbit holes, just one harmless little step...
Yet I remained a non-smoker and with self righteousness intact, I got on my connecting flight with a renewed excitement and when I flew lower and lower over Queens toward LaGuardia's runway I was ready to touch down. I love New York and in my adult life it has been my home. And, I'm fortunate to call it home. I feel it has accepted me, and it has, because it accepts everyone. If one doesn't feel accepted here, they really aren't accepting themselves. Trust me, personal acceptance has been a battle for me, and at times I felt so far away from New York when I was deep in the canyons of Manhattan, but those were times of inner turmoil, lost in my own canyons. It wasn't New York's fault. I'm a little healthier now, in mind and body, I think, and well, just a little older, and I just like the way New York feels. And it feels differently for all, as it should. New York is at once, for all, and just for you. Remember all that talk about the "melting pot" this country's supposed to be? Its sad you hear very little about that nowadays - along with that whole "give us you tired, your weak, your poor, your huddled masses" - due to it being drowned out by all the "don't tread on me" and "come and take it" paranoia inducing anger indulging, well, madness that really makes a TV screen dance. The melting pot lives though, and it is New York. Of course there is racism, prejudice and, despite the high gloss Democratic Blue paint job, a LOT of resistance to change. But that's everywhere, fear I mean, no matter if its painted blue or red or that Independent Multi Party Primer that I so want more of if we just get even a slight bump in voter registration. Fear is the equation of Human + Thought of Future - Change. But the essence of the ideals of the country are represented in the subways and streets of New York. Co-Existence is alive and well and there's not a whole lot of room in between humans to develop differences between gods, color of skin and indulge in gun toting hate. Again, don't get me wrong, these things do exist up here, but I've been all over this country and I've seen the inflation of differences on far grander scales in far smaller habitats. New Yorkers are just too busy and work too hard to worry about something so small as differences, or at least to let those differences define there lives. The streets and subways do smell from time to time, but whats so bad about smelling other humans? Really?
So I get off the plain and hop into a cab and tell the turban sporting cabbie to take me to my friends house. I bitch him out thoroughly for not knowing how to get there, even though I didn't either, but "hey, its not my job!" I promptly apologize. He promptly accepts. I apologize again, "you know, I've been on a plane all day....its just soooo grueling." And I feel at home. I visit with my friends that night and next day, then I get ambushed, paralyzed, obliterated - and please fill in the rest with like words - by a stomach virus that would get Montezuma to thinking about turning onto a path of forgiveness. But I get better, which I knew I would - I know longer pray for death when those things happen - and vetnure forth in my cowboy boots. And I can do that, because the city doesn't mind. Hell, I can carry on through my day dressed in woman's clothes, and I'm not talkin' fabulous drag queen women's clothes, I'm talkin' Mama from Mama's Family women's clothes. I know I could, because I know men who do, but I would never call them a man to their face. I call them what they want to be called, a woman. I like to be called what I want to be called, too. And what's so wrong with that?
And what do I want to be called? Hmm....that's a good one. I've called myself an actor, a writer, a musician, a horse wrangler, a baseball player, a lover (yes, i have), an alcoholic (yes, recovered), a traveler, wanderer, wonderer, a spiritualist, and fill in the rest with like words, or what you like. Because it doesn't matter what I call myself. Sure, I like to be called the above things, I've got an ego, after all, its alive and well, but it really what adjective I ascribe to myself. Its like in science, where nothing can be considered to truly exist unless it is observed, and like my old friend Don Luna says, that we are only the sum of the company we keep. I like that. And, no matter what I wear, do, or say, I will exist as long as I'm observed. I'm overwhelmed and fortunate beyond any measure to have the loved ones that I do in my life. They give my life shape, a form in and through which consciousness can do its thing. And, to top it off, I live in New York City, where I'm observed in so many ways and from so many angles that my life gains dimension that can never be imagined until experienced. And, at the same time, I can enjoy the fact that I am just one head in the heard. That smallness is truly beautiful to feel, and necessary if we are to understand, and embrace the "melting pot." But who am I? I don't know. As I walk through New York I am certain that the only thing that changes in New York is the scaffolding. The changes I see I see when I'm looking inward. So what can I be if I'm forever changing? Why does it matter? I'll be different tomorrow.
But New York will be here. Its funny, I didn't know how scared I was to leave the city until I left it. I was so married to it. Then I realized, when gone, that if I stayed burrowed down in the borough of Manhattan, holing up in an apartment writing plays I would soon only be able to write about a guy holing up in an apartment in Manhattan writing plays. Maybe people wanna see something like that, but I'm pretty certain they don't wanna see me do it. Trust me. If I'm holed up anywhere I am observed less. I fail to exist. I walk around and I feel something weird. I feel a disconnect to the city. Not in a bad way. I think what I'm feeling is the absence of the fear of getting booted out of the city and its gates being forever closed t me. Like my marriage to it is dead. Now, I think of the city as if she is a madame, and I her faithful customer. We come together and live vibrantly under the light of low lit lamps and strong perfume, have a few drinks (metaphorically, of course, always metaphorically), fool around in each other's comfortable arms that can only be called home, then say goodbye in the gray light before sunrise, with a wink to each other that is all the commitment we need. We have thrown away the false faith of monogamy that we don't even know how to question and want each other more now than we ever did. Or not, who knows, it is just a city after all. Its not human, its just a place to be human.
But, oh, the struggle for identity. During my morning, afternoon and night haunts around Gotham, I think about such adjectives as "driven", "ambitious", "determined", terms I used to have a high regard for, but terms that also almost put me in the ground. New York is THE city to be ambitious in, no doubt, but I had to let that go. I traded all those terms in for a sanity transplant. Now I just have a slogan: "I will do my best". Five words, five syllables. I consolidated all my debts of insecurity for one simple slogan. I got so caught up in my drive to succeed at all costs as an actor I lost touch and stopped living, stopped enjoying life. I couldn't see the city for the theaters. But I'm certain of something, as I learn to move through and embrace my own little role in humanity - to observe and to be observed - I'm stone certain on one thing, and it is the greatest realization a human being - and especially a caucasion male like me - can gain, and that is this:
I am an immigrant.
We all are. We have all traveled to where we are from somewhere else. Indigenous, imperialist, native or colonial, we have all simply "ended up" where we are to stay alive. The great wrong turn in humanity was the development of the concept of the ownership of land. Is it a wrong that can be righted, or, should we go extinct for the betterment of the universe, and allow for the coming about of a species that can appreciate the cosmos? I was talking to a lady who travels the world teaching empowerment to the down trodden all over the world and the importance of eradicating humiliation by embracing one's own humility (yep, it took me several visits to get her vibe) and she speaks of humanity as a species that is forever traveling and that movement is imperative to its survival. We stay still, we don't change. We don't change, we die. Change is good, go figure. There is freedom in embracing travel, physically and mentally. If we are just visitors, then we cling less and change happens to be less painful. That is as far as I go in that direction as I am not a Buddhist, although I think its a great idea. I think all the great religions are great ideas. I can do that in New York City. I can like everything, no matter how different things are. I can do that anywhere. We all can. There are no contradictions, just the refusal to change. "I am an immigrant"...it has a nice ring to it. I feel peaceful and light when I say it. Give it a shot, say it out loud. You don't have to tell anyone you said it. I gain perspective when I say it. It helps me see the immigrants for the city, for the world. It helps me see myself.
Well, identity, who cares? I can say one thing, I like the fact that I can be what I want to be. New Yorker, ramblin' man...etc. Like I said, I've been many things over the years, but I'm kinda likin' the now, the me that is now, and that is a traveler who feels right at home.
Take it easy or don't take it at all,
Todd
