Five Things

First, here’s a compilation of 9/11-related observations, written by various witnesses and non-witnesses. Anna’s culled a whole bunch of damn good prose there.

Second, I was tempted to write Mr. September 11 and ask him what he meant by stating that he escaped from the World Trade Center that day, but I don’t want to be drawn into his web of lies. (Ooooh, sounds dramatic, don’t it?) Who knows what else he might lie about? So I think I’ll just let it be, and let September 11 remain September 11. (It was damn good sex though.)

Third, I had a really nice date tonight with someone who responded to my personal ad last week. We talked on the phone last night and seemed to hit it off well enough, so tonight we met up for dinner. He’s intelligent, and bookish, and a Tolkien fanatic, and he was a history and English major (I was a history major), and he writes, and although he lives in Manhattan, he grew up in New Jersey, and he has this slight East-Villagey edge to him. Handsome guy, and Italian. We plan to get together again this weekend.

Fourth, my ear is finally unclogged! I woke up this morning and everything had just completely drained out or something. (Ew.) It took seven days of antibiotics. Today was the eighth day. Only two days left, and then I can drink again.

Fifth, I only have 244 pages left of the Robert Moses book. In other words, another novel’s worth of words to go.

Sixth — well, there’s no sixth. That’s it.

Epilogue

So here’s an odd follow-up.

Remember the guy from September 11? Remember how he and I walked around the city together? How romantic and cinematic it was? We hardly knew each other, and yet here we were, keeping each other company, roaming lower Manhattan together on this awful day of death and destruction, spending the entire day together (and some of the evening) before finally parting at night.

Well, the following weekend, I called him and left a message. I got no response. A couple of weeks later I called and left another message. No response. So I figured I was never going to hear from him again, that it was one of those gay things, a one-time deal only. Our magical day would just remain an isolated mythic moment. “And I never saw him again.”

But then, a few weeks later, I got an e-mail from him.

Just figured I’d write and say hey, got your voicemail :-P just give me a call at your leisure :-) would love to see you again :-)

I thought it strange that after several weeks, he was finally writing me. By that point I’d moved on. I was also pissed that after telling me he hoped to see me again, he’d ignored me for a month.

So after reading his e-mail, I never wrote back.

But I still kept the message. And because yesterday was the three-month anniversary of the attacks, I was thinking about him again. I thought it would be nice to get back in touch and see what he’s been up to these three long months.

So today I opened up his e-mail again, and now I noticed that his signature line contained a URL. I hadn’t noticed it the first time.

I decided to check it out.

I started to surf around his site, and then I read a sentence that caught my eye. No, that couldn’t be right. So I read it again. And then again. Was I reading this correctly?

I had been in NYC one week when the WTC disaster happened, but I feel very connected to New York City now, and I feel very fortunate to have escaped, thank whatever I was on the lower floors when the plane hit.

Huh?

I checked out the “photos” section of his page. The photos were photos of him. So it’s definitely his page.

So: excuse me?

You weren’t in the World Trade Center on September 11. You weren’t even anywhere near it. You were in bed with me in your apartment on West 10th Street, and we lay there completely oblivious to Armageddon outside. In fact, at around 10:30 in the morning, the world was falling apart, and you were giving me a blowjob.

Is this guy a pathological liar or something?

I remember him telling me that he has no thyroid. He had thyroid cancer, so his thyroid was removed, and now he takes hormones.

Does the thyroid perform some lie-preventing function that nobody knows about?

This is really weird.

Does he mean that he’s glad he was on the lower floors of his apartment building, so he didn’t have to worry about another plane flying along and crashing into his building?

That’s the only weird sentence on the site. There are no other sensational phrases, nothing that’s so exciting that it might be a lie. So why would he do something like this?

Perhaps I should have left it alone.

Perhaps I should have let myself be satisfied with the memories of a romantic, scary, strange and surreal day.

Festival of Lights

Last night I went over to my aunt’s house for latkes. See, last night was the first night of Hanukkah (note: it doesn’t matter if you spell it Hanukkah, or Chanukah, or Hanuka, or whatever, because it’s a Hebrew word, so there’s no correct English spelling anyway). Latkes (pronounced LAHT-kis) are potato pancakes, really unhealthy because they’re fried in oil. They’re fried in oil in order to commemorate the Maccabees, who had only enough oil to light their lamps for one night; miraculously — so it is said — the oil wound up lasting eight nights. And so we have Hanukkah, really a minor Jewish holiday, one that’s not even Biblical but rather historical, one that nobody would even think about except that all the Jewish kids would get really jealous if all the Christian kids were getting presents and they weren’t getting any.

So last night we lit the menorah and had latkes and my three-and-a-half-year-old cousin opened lots of presents. My brother and I each got a check from our aunt, which is just fine by me… although I do kinda miss getting toys, ya know?

Okay, not really.

Okay, yes really.

I’m getting bogged down in The Power Broker. I still like it, but it’s getting a little repetitive, and I still have 400 pages to go. Yes, let’s say it again, Robert Moses has power and everyone’s in his pocket and he can ride roughshod over the little people and the city’s democratic system and build roads and bridges and housing projects wherever he wants and consequently can destroy old buildings wherever he wants. That’s the general theme. And Robert Caro’s sentences — well, they’re so crazy and long and meandering, filled with dependent clauses and lists of people or projects — and sometimes separated by dashes (and sometimes by parenthetical phrases) — and sometimes containing clauses that themselves are interrupted by other clauses — which, I suppose, he’s entitled to do, since his investigative reporting for the book is really first-rate, making up for his awkward writing style — that by the time he gets to completing the original clause that started the twisty, clumsy sentence, I can’t remember what it said.

Meanwhile, after a lull in my apartment organizing, I’m getting back into it again. I wound up staying over at my parents’ house last night, and on the living room table was this book. Rose Tarlow seems kinda pretentious. For instance, “if your bed doesn’t have a canopy, you should install a reading light,” and — my favorite — “few people can resist having at least one four-poster bed in their home.” Oh yeah, sure, I’ve got three of ’em.

The book is good, though. It’s rather slim and well-written, with pretty pictures throughout. Tarlow states some simple design principles, none of which I can remember now. But she got me motivated to rearrange some things in my apartment tonight and straighten up some things that I hadn’t yet gotten around to doing.

First off, as I was walking home from the PATH station after work, I found this pretty wicker chair sitting on the sidewalk, so I carried it home with me. It really adds a nice touch.

Then, when I got home, I got to work. I moved my bed into a more harmonious location so it makes better use of the space in my bedroom. I tucked away dangling wires or put things in front of them. I threw out old newspapers. I unpacked the rest of my CDs from their unsightly cardboard box. And then, in the evening, my parents came over. My mom had bought me these two little lamps at bargain-basement prices, and they brought them over along with a lasagna. (Wait, we’re Jewish, not Italian!) They also brought a carpet pad, so one of my rugs doesn’t slide around anymore.

I still need curtains for my bedroom windows, and blinds for my front windows, and some plants, and a small mirror, and some other things for my walls. Windows! I have seven windows in my apartment! There’s even a window over my kitchen sink. It’s like a little piece of the country. This is such a great place.

Oh, and if you don’t think I’ve been gay enough tonight, earlier I was watching “A Star is Born” with Judy Garland on Turner Classic Movies.

Meanwhile, I’m still taking antibiotics, and I can’t tell if they’re helping my ear or not. I don’t have a sore throat anymore, but my nasal passages feel slightly blocked still. At any rate, I’m only on Day 5 of a ten-day antibiotics regimen, so, as Rob suggested in his comment to my previous entry, I’m trying to be patient. (If that doesn’t work, maybe I’ll follow Tim’s advice and get a hypoallergenic mattress bag or something.)

Anyway, life is uneventful and good. Actually, someone replied to my PlanetOut personal ad recently — the first response I’ve had in months. He seems like a decent guy, so we’ll meet up soon, although to be honest, I don’t feel like I’m looking for anyone these days. Whatever happens, happens.
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