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The clouds moving in over the city early this morning. 12:10 AM. Photo: JH. |
July 8, 2009. Yesterday was another beautiful sunny summer day in New York, with some dark clouds hovering in the distance to the north and to the east and to the west, but never quite making it to the big town until about midnight when it came as a deluge.
Down at Michael’s over the Gazpacho and the Shrimp Tortellini we watched the passing parade and discussed several little known facts about the players in the current courthouse drama.
Charlie Rose came in late (1:30-ish) wearing a bright yellow polo and a blue double-breasted blazer. A yachting cap would have assured the onlooker that there was a yacht awaiting his command. My lunch date dated Mr. Rose when they were in college when it was suggested that they’d make a “dynamite couple.” My lunch date’s father, a fine old Southern gentleman, hearing the suggestion, said to his daughter: “you are the worst picker when it comes to men.” Of course, she never “picked” Charlie although there were others to fill the bill. She still has the man’s letters – and no doubt the letters of many others -- from way back when.
Vernon Jordan was lunching at Table One with a lady who was listening and laughing. When Mr. Jordan entertains the ladies at his table, there is always laughter. He is one of the most remarkable men on the New York/Washington scene. The word power comes to mind. He’s a big man, tall and imposing but with an almost diffident bearing. When he speaks, and it is with certainty and aplomb but not arrogance, people listen.
At the table next to us Joan Tisch was lunching with Marie-Josee Kravis. These are two of the most influential philanthropists in New York. Putting their heads together; what will they come up with? On the other side of us Andrew Lack formerly of NBC, currently of Bloomberg; around the room, Jeff Wald, Frank Gifford; Lyor Cohen in a business confab, literary entrepreneur Luke Janklow with a very pretty lady (not flame-tressed) who was quite taken with her host and you could guess vice versa; next door to them, Alice Mayhew with a gentleman who might be one of her stable of esteemed authors.
The death of Michael Jackson cornered the national media and evidently a large segment of the population. I was never a big Michael Jackson fan although his great talent was still obvious and impossible to ignore.
Mainly my interest in him was in the personality. He always reminded me of the main character in Timothy Findley’s now classic “The Butterfly Plague” which is the best novel I’ve ever read about Hollywood, besides “The Day of the Locust.” The drama around Jackson’s death reminded me also of a statement Sir Laurence Olivier made to the press at the time of the alleged suicide of Marilyn Monroe: “She was a complete victim of Hollywood ballyhoo.”
To us civilians, always ready to dream the dream, that doesn’t sound so bad, considering the perks. However, Hollywood characters, stars, former stars especially, know exactly what Sir Laurence was talking about. It is the land of the American dream, set in that luxo-toxic climate of jasmine and clacking palm fronds. And it is a breeding ground for human oddity and personality dislocation when the ego has landed.
Someone told me that Brooke Shields gave a wonderful eulogy for Mr. Jackson, pointing out that they grew up together as two children whom the world was always looking at. An oddity, believe it or not. Ask Susan Boyle. Michael Jackson could have told her what she found out in a millisecond: it’s a weird life, and a hard one. And not for everyone, despite the reality TV shows. A grand funeral for Michael Jackson is scant reward for having made it to fifty.
At the same time, someone remarked on my Facebook page that this funeral/ memorial which required so much municipal and state security and organizing, is being done in a state which is now paying its bills with IOUs. California is the sixth largest economy in the world! And it’s broke. The IOU’s are now being traded on eBay. There is the threat that the major banks won’t accept them in lieu of cash. This is enlightening, considering that all of these institutions are recipients of Federal bailout money, i.e, taxpayers’ dollars.
Oh yes, and they were rioting in China where police and security killed more than 160 rioters and sealed off the city of more than 1 million. This is the same China who hosted the Olympics, who dominates the thinking of American bankers and politicians and businessmen. Conundrum/confusing/confounding.
And what of the social life in New York, you might ask? More later ... |
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| The dummy citydweller's no brainer terrace garden, all four by eight with alot of light but only an hour or so of direct sunlight (western exposure impaired by the apartment house across the avenue). Water supplied in re-cycled Volvic water bottles. |
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