What it is, is life

10/6

A full day begins with Mark. He’s got sound equipment in several places, wants to bring it all to West-Park. Can fix us up with a good system. He’d like to be the in house sound guy, free for us and non-profits who are our partners. He’d charge straight rentals to others, split the fee swith us . He could also work out recording and even has a projector he could let us have. Sounds like a good deal. He also borrows a hammer, looks for some nails to repair one of our sign boards. 

Teddy is sitting in the sanctuary. The load out continues. Watching it all come down is depressing after the excitement of watching the Tenant spaces take shape over the weeks and living here all these months. Mark comes back in, sign repaired. 

Mim, Ted, Hope, Sarah and Danielle all come togther in the office to meet with Lisa  and begin to put together a strategy to raise the money necessary to get a new boiler. We need to get the final dollar figures firm so we can know what we need. 

Danielle goes with Sarah up to Mc Alpin to work on preparing the space for the gallery opening that will happen tonight.

Hope and I talk about Occupy Wall Street. The sense that something global is happening. We’re saddened by the silence of the church in the face of what feels to be a significant moment. The church seems to be caught up in its own self absorbed concerns whether it’s Louisville or New York City. Like somewhere along the line, it bought into the idea, with resignation or even cynicsm that one has to understand the way things are and make the best of it. That survival means acquiescing to where money and power seems to be. Making a prioiri acquiescence to the powers of domination which doesn’t really work anyhow. It’s causing her to raise theological questions. There has to be another, a prophetic word somewhere. The rest of it all is already over. But then we’ve known that. Presence. Relationship. Authenticity. That’s what counts. 

Derek from Grace Church comes by, wants to know if we’ve read his letter. If they could even rent for Christmas. Jocelyn stops by, she was the disabled girl in the Tenant. Also a  member of the Collective. Helped do casting. She’s opening in a new avant garde play by Mac Wellman tomorrow night. on Dixon Place downtown . Mr. Martin, the slightly eccentric paino tuner who shows up at random times at our home to tune the piano has come in. Begins to check out our popup baby grand. Tells me it’s a Selmer and that he used to work for them on 57th across from Carnegie Hall. Where he learned his trade. 

Someone comes in with the idea for a dramatic production that coud be punctuated with organ music. I explain that the Austin is presently out of service but Mark says with amplicifaction our classic Hammond could sound (almost) like a pipe organ. Sarah has returned with James, the little guy she nannies.  Boxer Mike is back form Sweden with stories. And just tell him how he can help. Maybe clean out the front where stuff is all in a jumble? We’ll figure that out when Woodshed is finally all out. 

Hope has observed all this. Thinks it’s great. This is her church. What it is, is life. And that’s enough.

We just have to find a way to get enouhg money to keep it going.

I return shortly after six to see the gallery opening. It’s a show called Telling the Truth. Simple installations by Joe Sturm, Ben Valentine and David Vu curated by Vincent Tiley. The cafe left over from the Tenant is  now our reception area. We’re using some of RL’s wine.  I tell Ben that his mylar works remind me of the mylar blankets we used to use for homeless people in cold weather.  He likes that.

Our gala committee meets. We talk about how it’s all got to be coordinated with the fundraising for the boiler. Ted has some doubts about the whole boiler/fundraising process. Do we need a plan B? A plan C? We have to  find a way to include music. And wonder. And yes, the questions raised by Occupy Wall Street. I see Leila and Berik leaving from  visiting the opening. 

Our meeting has  ended. The opening is over. Cardboard beds are being made outside. In the doorways. Above the steps. 

Arab spring, european summer, American autumn

          

     10/5/11

So I'll break my rule. Leave the steps. And go into the streets.....

Getting off the subway at Park Place, the first person I  recognize is long time cultural worker Paul Stein, an archivist and performer of labor songs stretching back to the yiddishkeit era, armed with his accordion. All right then, today’s march is linked to history.

Down Broadway, I see Cynthia Doty, a Democratic politican and colleague with the Interfaith Assembly.  She’s waiting to meet friends. They’ll join the march as it passes this way.  So mainline politicians are joining in too.  

I want to go all the way to Foley Square.  I’m seeing Union signs all the way, there are teachers, along with Public School Adovcates. Electrical workers, auto workers, service workers, and the heroic Transit Union Workers who refuse to allow their buses to be turned into police transports to the jails. 

I realize that I received e-mails from the Living Wage Campaign,the Religion Labor Coalition, from Moveon.org, the Coalition for the Homeless and at least two or three other groups announcing this event.

It’s a steady stream of people all the way to Foley Square. Courthouse steps filled with people.  Having to pass all the way down one street and funneled back up another to reach the square. Edges lined with fringe leftist groups, 9-11 truthers, La Rouchites, and folks with the blueprint for the New Socialist Republic in North America. Speeches going on, I can’t hear a word. But I hear the drum circle and it draws me nearer. 

Signs with typical humor. People against fracking. Sluts against rape. (Origin: the reported statement from Toronto police that women who want to avoid rape shouldn’t dress like sluts). Weed not greed. Lots of Make out not war stickers. (back in my day, it was make love, not war.)Banners. Bikers. Babies. Tatoos. Troy Davis t-shirts. And thousands and thousands and thousands of everyday people. As far as the eye can see. We are the 99 ... and so are you. The people united will never be defeated. El pueblo unido jamaz sera vencido. Familiar all. 

Two four six eight, fuck wall street. (Doesn’t rhyme, but then...) We’re not afraid, we don’t scare, we’re gonna occupy everywhere. 

After two hours, the people are getting restive. Let us march, let us march. The police have barricaded off all but part of one lane and the sidewalk. Going is slow. The spirit is positive, almost festive. Like enough is enough. And so the march winds its way from Foley Square back past City Hall and on to Broadway. Down what the city calls the Canyon of Heroes.A young man with an ancient camera has spotted my  batik shirt with clerical collar and wants a picture. I agree. He asks me to take off my hat. I agree, he snaps. It’s a college project he says.

The red t-shirted marshalls from UNITE, a union/community activist coalition seems to be serving as marshalls, keeping the paths straight and clear. 

Bob and Ric

Marching down Broadway, I see my next door neighbor Ric, his brother, and their friend Moishe. Like me, Ric is a movement veteran. Was part of a lawyers mission that helped draft a new Nicaraguan legal code after the Sandinista victory. He’s wearing a button promoting the 10 point plan developed by Moveon.org. Ric feels this is the fastest grass roots movement he’s ever seen get together. And more significantly, it’s the first such a public manifestation with class issues at the center. (Well since Martin Luther King tried to move  beyond race analysis to class analysis with the Poor People’s campaign, another vicitm of his assassination.)  The 99% image really hits home. Of course, somebody’s got to be drafting plans. Remember, he says, How I wore my Obama hat for so long? For so many months? It was because I knew it wouldn’t last long, just wouldn’t last long...He wonders what kind of staying power is here. I remind him that the homeless protestors occupied City Hall Park for 200 days. Kochville, they called it in honor of then Mayor Ed Koch. (See John Jiler’s Sleeping With the Mayor.) Thus was born the Interfaith Assembly. 

Guitars and banjos, people singing This land is your land, this is land is my land..., singing if I had a hammer....

As we approach Chambers Street, oldbodies are starigj to give out. Ric and friends drop out. I thinka minute, contnue on.On to  Liberty Street and Zucotti Park. Liberty Street has been opened up. Most marchers rerach the end, circle then head home. But the Park is filled  with people. In the park, I see Paul Stein again. We shake hands and he remembers singing at West-Park the Sunday before 9-11.

Paul Stein

A large US Mail truck pulls by and blows its diesel horn in support. The driver leans out alternatively flashing a peace sign and the raised fist of solidarity. U-S- Mail, U-S-Mail the chants go up in response. 

The People’s PA system is hard at work. Sentences, phrases being passed back. 

I want to make this clear, especially to the media. I am not the leader of any movement. I just want my money back. (Cheers)  Everyone here has a story. Everyone. Whether you’re a student saddled with unpayable debt. Or someone who lost a house. Or someone who can’t find work. Or a worker without health insurance, we’ve all got our stories. Hear them and we shall set ourselves free. 

This is what democracy look like, this is what democracy looks like....

I move closer. Look in. it’s Michael Moore, back again. In an orange Tigers hat. I wonder if he’s staying for the playoff game. 

Michael is making his way through. I follow in his wake to make my way out. This is a delicate time. It felt good to share our frustation togsether. To just enjoy our public presence together. It’s the largest demonstration I’ve seen in the city since we’ve been back.(1995) The Times had no figures. The Daily News would report around 15,000. We all know this isn’t working. And no one knows what’s happens next. 

These are our streets, these are our streets.

Apparently arrests were made later. Provacateurs, I think. Provacateurs. 

Stand! Defy! Occupy!

10/4

The mystery of the disappearing posters is solved. Turms out that kids waiting for the afterschool bus are tearing them down and playing with them. Danielle tells me she used her best mean old lady voice to get them to stop. 

The coolness of fall is starting to seep into the building. All too easily forgotten memories of winter come back. We’re not going back there. Not again.

Later, after a Presbytery Socai Witness meeting, I come to the steps of the church. Good to see people coming in for our Forgiveness film. I sit down next to Sarah. She asks about my yellow button, so I tell her about my time with the Occupy Wall Street encampment.

How  I went down to the Winter Garden to hear our friend Jed Distler open a special Theolinius Monk commemorative concert. I always find that part of Manhattan, Ground Zero, the World Financial Center, etc., confusing, befuddling  and frustrating. I never know where I am. So it”s no surprise that after Jed’s set while looking for my way to the subway I found myself in Zuccotti Park at Occupy Wall Street.

What did I see? First, leaving aside for the moment  any poitical analysis, the level of social organization was amazing. The park neatly divided into zones: a kitchen/dining area including vegetarian, vegan and gluten free offerings, a wifi zone, a press area, clearly marked recycling areas, arts areas, sleeping areas. Clearly anarchy does not equal chaos.  Well ordered, disciplined and clean. And a mini mall of food carts has set up along the park’s edges, capitalism never sleeps. And I see medical volunteers with  red crosses and badges from as far away as California.

News media folks wandered in and out throughout the park looking for colorful interviews. I experienced the people’s microphone, ie, since amplification is not allowed, speakers speak slowly and others repeat their words until it reaches the back. I saw Hyde Park debates like I hadn’t seen since, well, Union Square in the days following 9-11. EG, debates all over the park. EG, a shirt sleeved kind of crew cut red faced guy goes one on one against an old school African-American Obama loyalist. The Obamaite accuses red face of being a tea party guy and he says so what. The Obamaite defends O and appeals to the crowd and red face says aren’t you sick of governmen too? And the crowd roars. Then Obamaite says you have to back Obama or you’ll get the tea party. And a thin guy with a goatee steps forward and says you guys just don’t get it. You think its Obama vs. tea party, democrat vs. republican as if that’s all there is. You don’t get it. That’s over, that’s all  over. And the crowd cheers. 

In another part of the park, a very serious disussion is going on. Media, cameras, recording, is banned. It’s about organizing vs. organic. Old school lefties trying to push the anarchists and the young ones resisting. They are moving towards establishing a code of conduct for the resident community, a pledge of behavior. They want standards to define themselves as opposed to others. (They are perhaps too naive to realize that there are probably already among them undercover provacatuers ready to push them towards more radical behavior. I lived through the sixties. That’s what they do.)

Look, some of this I don’t quite get. Like the slutwalk, marching to Union Square dressed hot chanting hey hey, ho ho, rape culture’s got to go...On second thought, maybe I do get it. There’s a certain humor, irony, absurdity in all this I appreciate. 

There in the front line is my friend Rabbi Michael. If it’s real, he’s there. (Or for rather, if he’s there, it’s real.) I talk to him. The unions are getting on board. Verizon workers are there in force. The Transit Workers have gone to court to protect their right not to be commandeered by the police into using MTA buses and drivers to transport arrestees. Rabbi Michael only regrets that the faith commuity has been resisting showing up. We seem to have bought into the New York Times strategy of subtly demeaning and discrediting everything that happens here. The narrative of childish folly that can so easily be looked down upon. Just as old time organizers critique the lack of a specific demand or a program.

But I get it That’s part of the point. Lunch hour visitors are yelling what’s your plan? And the protestors respond, no, what’s yours?  And even more profound, there is no plan, we have to make one together.

This is not an ideological protest because for most of them, ideology is over. All they know is that we have handed them a world that doesn’t work, a world without hope. A world wthout a real future for them to participate in. And they are angry. (Not a few bought into the whole Obama Hope thing and feel profoundly betrayed at the deepst level, in ways he may not even understand. Reublican/democrat doesn’t mean a thing anymore, it’s way beyond that.)

They claim identity with Egyptians, Syrians, Libyans,Israelis,  Spainsh, Greeks....a global generation shut out....In some ways it would be easier if we had a dictator. Get rid of Mubarak, Khaddafy, claim victory, it’s over. Here it’s more complicated. No dictator. But a very real oligarchy . Gated communities and baseball stadia with moats to keep the rich separated from the rest of us, not only at Yankee Stadium but in Pittsburgh as well . Those who literally live in a separate world from the rest of us. That is more complicated. In my work I may need the help of that 1 % to survive, but I live, I am, part of the 99. 

So there’s a march tomorrow. A solidarity march. At 4:30 PM.  From City Hall to Wall Street. I wanted to see my kids’ old high school soccer team play but screw it. Many of these young people are asking profoundly spiritual questions.Questions about right and wrong and meaning.  We can’t leave it to the unions. We need the collars and kippahs to get out there. I’m joining Rabbi Michael. 

Look, I have no illusions. These, forgive me, kids, have no idea what they’re up against. Rumors have it that the park is private property and the owners are being pressured to ask the police to clear it. What then? Does it all go away? Is there violence? More mass arrests? Who knows?  

More important than answers is the questions. These questions have been my life for over 40 years. I can’t criticize the asking. They need to know we think asking is important. And that collectively seeking new answers is not to be riduculed but comes somewhere near what we used to think was the American dream. 

The buttons, with a cute little yellow face, almost South Parkesque, say :

STAND!

DEFY!

OCCUPY!

I’ll be there tomorrow.

Sarah tells me she has to go there. That her generatioh has to care about something. Get passionate about something. She is part of the duo of Marc and Sarah handling our marketing.She is professional in every way from dress to demeanor to her way of speaking. Yet there is a deep anger underneath all that. She was one of those who were  brought out of a premature youthful cynicism and into politcal involvement by Obama. Who feel not only let down but betrayed. I’ll say it again, I don’t believe he has any idea how he failed to understand and use the moment he had created. 

More and more people are coming. We’re having short conversations about the beginning of the Center. There’s a sense of excitement about what we’re up to.

I welcome people to West-Park. Eleanor, who is leading this series, introuces the film from her perspective. Next week the  film maker herself, Helen Whitney will join us. Katherine has introduced the Center and reminded everyone of its tag line:

Dream. Real. Hard.

Today that seems more appropriate than ever. 

Deconstructing the world they had created

10/3

When I get to the church, Sarah and Danielle are in the sanctuary running the Forgiveness film and making sure that everything is set for tomorrow night’s screening. The rest of the church is filled with a beehive of activity by Woodshed, only this time it is deconstructing the world they had created.   Bathroom sinks, bedoom dressers and kitchen appiances fill the sanctuary.

Already, the small platform in the basement I had wanted for a cabaret stage was gone before Danielle even arrived this mirning. The courtyard in Mc Alpin is being dismantled, though we’re keeping the cafe  bar. 

Earlier today she went on a building heating systems tour with the man we’re tryign to close a deal with to do the boiler.  And she had to deal with one of those neighbors who think its awful that we be allowed to keep a building in such a state of disrepair, an eyesore to the community. That it should be given to someone who could take care of it. (Like what, a bank? A festival market place? A private school? A fundamentalist church? A giant nail salon? Like what, exactly?)So she now asks if it was fair to landmark the building and make it financially impossible for us to carry out the restoration plan we had created. And her complainer  admits that those who pushed so had for landmarking  should have contributed. And they still can, she said. But it gets tiring, wears the soul.

RL comes by. He’s looking  for a place to rehearse for his next cd. As soon as Woodshed has cleared out, we can see what would work for him. And we need to get back to his bathroom and basement ceiling project as well. But the boiler is first. 

Next to visit is Coach Nelson. He is young and well muscled. And wants space for his boxing program. ( What is it with this boxing?) Interestingly, many of his clients, trainees, are women. Wanting to learn self defense. I mention luta por la paz from the Brazilian favelas and he speaks of his familiarirty with and respect for capoeira in both its dance and competitive martial arts forms. Again, as soon as Woodshed has cleared out.....

It’s time for a late afternoon break. We go to Barney Greengrass for bagels and coffee.  Gary is swamped by his usual high holy days deluge of demands for sturgeon, white fish, nova...His workers slice with the careful precision of surgeons, of diamond cutters. There’s no rushihg it. The Yom Kippur Break Fast may be his busiest day of the year. We’ve stopped taking orders, he says, it can make you meshuggah, as the French say...We wish him well and back to work. 

Time for one more tour to see what of our furniture we may want to send out to Materials for the Arts when they come by. We look through drawers. There’s my old clerical collars. And there my business cards. Photos of Roberto Clemente. Things I haven’t seen in years. 

And it’s once again plain to see what had been so depressing for Andrea. The   chunks of plaster pulling away from window frames, the see through holes where as Danielle puts it, you can see daylight. As the Tenant’s Parisian aprtment building disappears, the old building reemerges in its nakedness, its woundedness. (Here we are in ruins, sang Amanda last December. People were upset, but....) Times like this I hate it. Wish we had torn it down. But then I have to remember it made this experience possible. And like the Eldridge Street Synagogue, it’s a long process. A long process. Maybe twenty years. And takes patience. More patience than recovering from spinal surgery. Patience. 

Ted has come. And is waiting for his son Jon. And Lia Ganitano of Partipant, Inc. gallery on East Houston Street. They’re looking  for a place for a major winter fundraiser for PI. We show them all our spaces.  Looks like it could be just right. The kind of work they do very much in line with our vision. 

Woodshed is moving out. What’s next?

World communion and a tag sale

10/2

It’s World Communion Sunday. I am excited to discover that for the first time in over a month I can climb up and unlock the door. I feel like something has been returmed to me.  I go out to the steps and pick up papers  and butts and other detritus  for the first time in weeks.  I’m not yet up to moving furniture around, however. Ana is first to arrive and I ask her to watch things while I go and pick up the bulletins.

I also pick up some grape juice and then go to Barney Greengrass for bread. No round challas left,  only a round pumpernickel. As I’m checking out, Gary says to me, Reverend, if you need anything,we’ll be open tomorrow. And even if you don’t need anything, we’ll still be open anyways. 

Back inside, our guest for today, Ryan Smith of the Presbyterian United Nations ministry  has arrived and under Ana’s direction is moving the table to the front. Candles are placed. We have to send out for mathces. John has arrived. I try not to get anxious as people slowly are gathering.  And there are guests. I’m glad that Andre and Amy are both here.

As we are gathering Hope brings word that yesterday, one of the Saigon Grill protestors was attacked by someone inside. We’re going to need to get a group to visit the precinct. And it seemsthat somehow police helped provoke the situation on the Brooklyn Bridge with the Occupy Wall Street protestors that led to the arrest of over 700 people, including press. Again, the Times is virtually silent while the Post splashes it all over the front cover with the headline The S*#t hits the Span with a full picture. 

We finish the reading of scriptures,  incuding the Exodus version of  the Ten Commandments and Jesus' strange parable of the ungrateful (to say the least) tenants. Definitley not one of the kingdom of heaven is like this parables.  Then I introuduce Ryan who talks of his work in promoting global discipleship through peacemaking. His job is interpreting and advocating for international policy as articulated by the PC(USA) General Assembly.( I find it  ironic that there is a PCUSA General Assembly, A UN General Assembly and the Wall Street Occupiers call their daily discenmnet and decision making meeting the General Assembly.)

Ryan works with Ecumenical Women and Israel-Palestine issues and recently anti-human trafficking. He also speaks of the slavery footprint website that has started to raise conscuousnees as to how things we use get produced.  We share with him our work with the coalition seeking to build a sweatshop free Upper Westside. Of the coalition between the Chinese and Mexican workers. (Take the  slavery survey at http://slaveryfootprint.org/ )

Ryan and Bob

During the offertory, Andre singing, He’s Got the WholeWorld in His Hands, people bring their breads to the table. There is  Puerto Rican, Cuban, Italian and best of all, Marsha’s homemade Texas cornbread muffins.  As we prepare to share communion, I talk about my week, the song smiths of P & G’s, the actors of Woodshed, the communities of mutual respect and apprecaition they created, the encouragement of each other to risk more, to grow, with your freinds beside and behind you. And I asked what it would take for our church to feel like that. That’s a big part of what sharing communion with each other is all about. As Zwingli said, it is not bread and wine that is transformed into  the Body of Chirst, but we oursleves, together. We become the body of the  Risen One. 

We sing our amens, make our greetings. P____ is still concerned about me, but also anxious to talk to Ryan. 

The  congregation meets with Sarah who has brought Ben Valentine, one of the artists of the upcoming Telling the Truth gallery installation scheduled for McAlpin Hall.  He wants to work with us, have an ongoing dialogue, not just install a show, have a party and leave.  

Sarah, Ben and Marsha 

The Session meets to work on our boiler strategy and other parish concerns. Sarah and Danielle want to come to clarity about what exactly do we want Woodshed to leave. Already, they are going room to room, marking and pricing things, preparing for the tag sale. I look to see what’s mine/ours. Then head to the Firehouse to watch part of the Steeler game with Andrea. 

We come back at 3 and join Katheirne for a walk through the building. She has been surprised to find things of hers she hadn’t seen in years which had become part of the set. Like the Buddhist meditation chair her mother had given her and a raised ceramic Eucharistic bread plate. They eye some deco furniture, and  a floor lamp tucked away in a corner. 

Some actors have come to claim part of their apartments. Jocelyn has brought her leg braces to sell, which go pretty quickly. Bought by teenage boys. I’m not going think about that for very long. Andrea says it’s overwhelming seeing the level of delapidation as the building begins to return to itself. It’s a bit painful seeing the Parisian apartment building that existed just last night beginning to disapper. People are walking around eying, buying, various   intriguing items. Actors wander around, look for awhile, perhaps share a hug, a see you soon, then one by one go off. Katherine has left her items with Teddy for John H to pick up tomorrow. Andrea has left.

I take today’s communion cups, one made by John H with the church on the outside and people on the inside, and one by Andrea’s mother Pat, downstairs to wash and clean before I leave.  

Closing night

10/1

Saturday morning I go to the church to open the door for Jeremy. He’s bringing his choir from the Sacred Center to West-Park for the day for a retreat. He has now become the official music director for Jane at the Center.   As I struggle to get all the lights on, his singers arrive with bagels and baked goods, fruit and juice. Jerermy plugs in the coffee  maker which of course breaka a circuit  and requires flipping switches until all the lights come on again. 

Outside, Amsterdam Avenue is being shut down. Latinos from many countries, all dressed in white, are gathering for the annual Marian parade. Floats are being prepared. Flags of various Latin American countries being unfurled. Women’s auxilaries in white dresses and accompanying little girls in white are getting ready. It’s an annual celebration not only of devotion to the Virgin Mary but also of national and cultural pride. They’ll march north from 86th for over a mile until they reach my friend Father Dufell’s church, Ascension, at 107th.

Another choice to make.  Last nght’s Yankee-Tiger suspended playoff game will be resumed tonight at 8:30 instead of tomorrow as had originally been announced. But it’s also closing night and party for Woodshed and the Tenant.  Not really a choice. I’ve been with them through this journey. Need to see it through. 

And so one last time I wait in the basement bar for the show to begin. Feeling sad that this is the end. The entends! (understandings!) flashing on the video screens in French with literal English translations, fractured and amusing. One last time. Tonight I see some of the few scenes I’ve missed,  Nan the Concierge’s soliloquies, the fight in the cafe, a game of Russian roulette,the final scene between Msgr. and Madame Z....filling in gaps.  

The party’s a time for final thanks and conversations. Where will different actors go next? Some have projects they’d like to pursue. One will be in the Public’s King Lear. There are at least two yoga teachers.Others beginning to want to exlore thier spirituality. I meet two actors and a friend from Pittsburgh and we talk about neighborhoods, schools, and of course the Steelers. I look up and see Jeremy and his wife have come in. He began and ended his day here. 

There is a deep sense of appreciation for what the church made possible for them.  That a church could be open and accepting not just as a consequence of  what has happened to it but as a statement of value, commitment and vision. I tell them that what they do remains part of the spirit of the building. Changing it by their presence.  And I point out the Center tag line on the scaffolding outside:  Dream. Real. Hard. I invite them, If you have a dream, bring it here, that’s what we’re here for. 

The company and friends continue to dance. Talk. Laugh. For me, it’s time to go home. Get ready for tomorrow.

They too are tenants

9/30

It’s been a hard week. Danielle has had to do a lot of sorting through options on the  boiler and it's never ever apples to apples. Also a very complicated financial sorting through with Woodshed to figure out who owes whom what.  Plus pressure to get out adeqaute publcity on the Forgiveness series. And she’s had to do a lot of this on her own. She  has learned, day by day, everything one needs to know about boilers. 

Late in the day I  meet my friend and colleague Pastor Elise Brown from Advent Lutheran at  Popovers. Our real focus is on the boiler situation and what it is going to take to raise the money necessary to get the boiler going. She continues to be completely with us on this issue.  We talk strategy, how to get the religious communty behind West-Park in getting the community to fulfill it’s promises.

Elise and I go into the church and I accompany her down to the bar and  prepare her for tonight’s performance of the Tenant. I feel very torn. I’d like  to stay with her, experience the show with her, hear her reactions, but it is also the first game of the American League Division Playoffs beteween the Detroit Tigers and the  New York Yankees. And I’ve got 5th row bleacher seats . So I tell her how best to enjoy the show and head to Yankee Stadium to meet my fellow Presbyterian, John, with whom I share tickets.

After one and a half inning, score tied at one, a steady rain is falling. After an hour, the game is suspended. I subway back to the church. Too late to catch Elise, but in time to catch tonight’s after show performances as the actors once again share their best scenes with each other. It’s pushing 2 am before they finish.  

Once again, I feel privileged to have been able to share in this experience.  And I’ve realized some things. One, in the six plaays that are going on simutaneously, occasionally intersecting, virtually every actor has at least one moment to shine, at lest one monlogue, aria that stretches them to their fullest capacity and beyond. These moments are matched by paired moments, duets in a way, two actors playing off each other. As they watch each other performing  these moments, there is nothing but admiration, respect and support. No sense of competition. Rare among actors, they have truly become a community. Fulfilled the vision of the Woodshed Collective. 

And there’s another realization. Within these stories, with the exception of Trelkovsky, the outsider, in spite of the madness, the crazy edge, there is a dramatic moment  in each of these realtionships where something approaching real love is shown and shared. In spite of, despite, all.  As Judith said to me, I want my character to be more than crazy. I want to show that she truly loves her daughter and that this love is real. And at the dramatic climax of their relationship, her daughter returns that love with intensity.  

And with that, even in this intense, dark play of midcentury French alienation, soemthing profoundly human is expressed. Something that leaps across the courtyard and touches the residents of Capital Hall who lean out their windows to catch the scenes in the courtyard below. They, too, are tenants.  A reality that many mainstream critics have missed.