Sunscreen, Dramamine, Various Clowns

Or "My Summer: An Epitaph"

IPhones, bitches...

Last Monday was Labor Day.  Ugh.



A labor of what, pray tell.  Nostalgia for a good summer?  Regret for a misspent one?   A mad dash to hit every barbecue and make that last weekend really count? Begrudged acceptance of the year's impending death?  Whatever.  Even speaking as someone who had the last seven summers off (sort of), I still feel like the season is as overrated as birthdays are.  You find yourself psyched up by the potential, and are so worried about it being great that you fill the whole thing with expectation and anxiety and then once it's over - BAM - disappointment over what could have been.

Who the hell thought it was a good idea to call it "Labor Day" anyway?  Nobody who'd expect to be surprised at a lack of enthusiasm for it, that's who.  That'd be like plunking a holiday in the depths of the depressing winter months, calling it "Crapfest" and then acting shocked at the terrible greeting card sales numbers.  "HEY!  How come nobody is celebrating Crapfest?!?   Where's your Crapfest spirit?  I tell you, there's a war on Crapfest in this country."

"I am shocked! Shocked to find that Crapfest isn't catching on in here!"

(Huh.  Now that I think about it, Valentine's day is like this fictional Crapfest.  I guess by being an actual crapfest... eh, never mind.)

I prefer autumn and always have, so I'm sweetly anticipating a decline in temperature and an uptick in foliage color.  

But my summer had some interesting moments.  A few day trips to some new places, a week in Montauk, a whale-less whale watch, and some surprise clown sightings to name a few.

It took a few weeks to get to the beach, but in late July, Kris and Jenn and I made it out to Jones in spite of the threatening rain.  We spent a few grey hours lounging on the beach when the sun finally came out and we popped up immediately to take advantage of the beach weather.  So everyone got up ready to swim, and the ladies on the adjacent blanket started slathering on sunblock and struck up the standard small talk topic of  "Hey, can you believe this weather?!"  We all co-celebrated the emergence of the sun and they talked about finally having a reason to put on sunblock. I revealed that I had already coated myself that morning in spite of the cloud cover and was just reapplying, to which the ostensible matriarch replied, "Well, you have to when you look like you!"

I get it, world.  I'm freaking pale, ok.  I have two words that apply to my relationship with the sun: constant vigilance.  I grew up with this skin, so I'm aware that it occasionally glows like the strips on a Tron uniform.  The kicker is, everyone acts like it's a revelation when they remark on it (by the way, it's almost always other white people, but specifically the kind of white people who enjoy tanning who are clearly implying that I need to correct my unfortunate situation.  Except Jenn's fiance.  He just does it to get my goat because he cares and knows I'm jealous of his lovely Puerto Rican complexion.)  I decided then and there that whenever someone remarked about my ability to stay pale past high summer, I'd tell them that I had secret method passed down by my fore-mothers.  Then, after a beat, I'd look left, then right, then lean in conspiratorially and whisper, "Bleach."

To which they'd naturally ask why I'd rub bleach all over myself.  And then I'd respond like my favorite (fictional) drummer.

Speaking of my skin, in spite of having gone through a metric ton of sunblock this season, I actually did approach something NOT in the living-dead-girl-palette by the end of August.   But I also became horrified by how much more freckly I've suddenly become.  My skin is a lot like my dad's so I asked him about it.  And he nonchalantly dropped this on me.

"Maybe they're age spots.  Y'know, liver spots?"

Cue the proverbial record scratch noise.  Excuse me, what?  Age spots?  Liver spots?  LIVER SPOTS!?  That's even worse than "Labor Day" for crying out loud.

Anyway.  Lots of sunscreen this summer.  Even though a lot of my fun-in-the-sun-ventures were punctuated by rainstorms.  Like my trip upstate with co-blogger KO and our homegirl Joan to Joan's family country house in the Hudson valley.  On the way back, we stopped at the Delaware water gap overlook for a pic and had to bolt back into the car before we got drenched.

Searching for George Washington...

The summer was not without its moments of complete disorientation, however.  At one point I had a bout of insomnia that was probably the reason for a series of full-on-hallucinations I had one day.  Tactile, auditory, and maybe visual.  It was weird.  Really freaking weird, but I guess not wholly unexpected after going for almost 3 days without any substantial sleep.  And it's worth nothing that I began said hallucinations having dinner at Johnnie's Reef on City Island with Erika and my mom.  Now if you've never eaten there, I must explain that Johnny's Reef has its own version of reality where seagulls will hold you up at knifepoint for your french fries and you'll hear bachata music and Nino Rota scores coming out of adjacent parked cars.  So if you can tell hallucinations from reality-dressed-up-as hallucinations, you know it's bad.  And later in the day I took this pic of the sky.

The Nothing approaches.

I've had better days, is all I'm saying.

Speaking of alternate realities, I also spent a lot of the summer catching up on the t.v. show Lost.  I never watched the last 2 seasons because of grad school.  (Grad school is the reason I missed out on pretty much everything for 3 years of my life.  Oh but I've got this awesome student loan debt and a broken academic career to show for it now.  Yay grad school.)  So thanks to Netflix, I spent a couple of weeks on a Lost bender that culminated in my turning into the grandpa from Moonstruck.

I'm still confused.  But it was so worth it.  That was a damn fine show and I had many chances to play one of my favorite t.v. games "Spot the Deadwood player" (also great for Justified).  And I never EVER got tired of watching Josh Holloway do pretty much anything.  (Matthew Fox's alleged penchant for punching women soured me a little on him, though.  Why so beautiful, yet so horrible, Fox?  Why?)

Dramamine-based disorientation happened on a half-day whale watch cruise I took during my trip to Montauk.  Fearing that a bout of seasickness would keep me from enjoying the elusive and beautiful spectacle of a breaching whale, I dosed myself with Dramamine beforehand and was a liiiiiiiiiiiiiiittle bit loopy for the subsequent 6 hours.  Actually, it was a lot like being back at Johnny's Reef.  There weren't any whales, sadly.  There were however about a billion dolphins.

Wheeeee!!!!

I was trying to stay awake and not fall into the water (who wants to be THAT girl?  I'd cause trouble for Captain Carl.  Yeah, that was our captain's name.)  But I never threw up! Not once!  I did have a conversation about my new camera and its myriad functions with a woman who was a seasoned photographer and very nice about giving me pointers.  But I was so groggy I barely remember it and I'm pretty sure she thought I was drunk.   Anyway.  Dophins: pretty.  So, so, so pretty.  Also, it had been raining up until that point (sensing a theme here, summer) and the dolphins brought a lot of sunshine and entertainment.  No whales there, though.  More on whale sightings later.

On the way back to the harbor, it started raining yet again and we passed this awesome, awesome sign.  Warning or Thrill-seeking-enthusiast-mantra?  You decide.

Lack of punctuation now necessitates clarification later.

That same Montauk trip, I spent about 5 days with my parents just bumming around the East end and doing our usual thing.  Earlier this year, however, the New York Times had the balls to publish a bunch of articles on Montauk in the Style, Arts, Metro, Whatever sections talking about hot spots to hit and coining the term "Hampsters," referring (obviously) to hipster types in the Hamptons.  We definitely encountered a bunch of these new-money yuppy types.  As annoying as their presence was - and they WERE present, and annoying it WAS - it was almost worth it to hear my parents -  my awesome, intellectual, sexagenarian parents - sneering derisively and muttering "hampsters..." whenever we had to squeeze past them on the sidewalk, road, or beach.  We still had fun, though, and managed to hit favorites old and new, including the Pollock-Krasner house in Springs, which was a very pleasantly disorienting day trip. 

My mom approaching the main house.

The studio (converted barn) of Jackson Pollock and Judith Krasner

Mom and Dad looking at art supplies in the studio

The famous floor.

We had to wear special slippers.  Foamy and fashionable.  Yes, my feet are that huge. 

There's a plastic guard covering Pollock's records,
probably because of my dad,
who flipped through them the last time he visited and got scolded.  

Mom's reminding him of it here.

It was a great outing.  I have literally nothing snarky to say about it.  It's a very special place and you can see how artists would want to be there to tune out the world and into their genius.  The location is peaceful and beautiful, and you should visit if you can.

KO and Sandy came out later in the week and I hung out on the beach with them for another couple of days while my parents came back to the Bronx.  We were pretty sure we saw a fin or minke whale swimming off the coast a couple of days in a row.  I tried to film it with my phone but that was a total waste of time because I pointed it in the wrong direction while I was scanning the horizon. (Duuuuuh...)  Great shot of KO running in front of my phone and out of frame really fast though.  But KO and I  (Sandy is the type of person who actually tans, KO and I are not, and she was sunbathing and getting all bronze and fabulous) went for a walk in the direction it was swimming and bumped into a couple with binoculars and we were like "Whale?" and they were like "Totally."  That was kinda awesome.

We had beautiful weather and I even got to hang out and play with my new camera in one of my favorite spots on planet Earth - Kirk Park off Fort Pond.  (Below)

It wouldn't be summer without a street fair or a trip to an amusement park - I had three such occasions this year.  I hit up the St. Teresa feast with Sandy, Charlie, and Nin and bumped into about half a dozen former students in the process.  I visited Rye Playland with first-timers Hattie and Victoria and didn't even throw up ONCE.  I also hit up Coney Island with Ali to go to the free Joan Jett concert (I can almost hear my dad right now:  "Free Joan Jett?  Why's she in prison?"  ::rimshot::)  I freaking love all these places, and had a great time for all three excursions.  

The St. Teresa feast gets more and more crowded each year, and wading through the countless Bronx stereotypes takes a certain amount of dexterity.  But it's worth it for zeppolis and fresh lemonade, and also, I freaking love it.  (P.S. 2 cops were TOTALLY checking out Sandy while they stepped aside to let us get lemonade first.)  The feast is an anthropologist's dream and I hope to someday write a series on street fairs.  

And Rye Playland is always beautiful.  Hattie and V had a good time as well, and I was relieved because it's been one of my favorite spots since childhood and I was glad to see that it wasn't just nostalgia sustaining that love.  I didn't get any pics of the Joan Jett concert, but it was a gorgeous night at Coney Island when I met up with Ali there, and Joan Jett continues to be gorgeous and stunning and talented and lots of other very awesome adjectives.   

A few pics from the St. Teresa feast.

In the Bronx, you aren't legally married until your names are etched onto a colorful reflective keychain/ wall hanging/ frame.  I'll know it's for-realsies-for-keeps-love when a guy gives me one of those.  Like, "I understand that you come from a place that is at times ridiculous but you love it anyway and maybe because of that so here: street-fair-ware."

Like Susan and Mike here.  Love.

What year was it, Susan and Mike? Huh?

Spelling is for chumps.

Fried everything!

It was so magic, the booth disappeared.

I don't know why this prize was so popular...

Zeppolis pass the Dr. Nick test for acquiring obesity.

Some Rye Playland pics:

Gross.

ZOLTAR!  Like from BIG!

Victoria and Hattie!  (Hattie is imitating
the carousel horse's face.)

Hattie sampling ginormous cotton candy.

But unfortunately, you can't have theme park outings without CLOWNS.

 Among the MANY inherent to all three locations, there was this one...

 And this one...  At the entrance to Kiddieland, what the hell?

And who can forget seeing that iconic and terrifying Steeplechase Park logo at the Coney Island train station?  Not me.

Perhaps the worse clown encounter (clowncounter?) was not at a carnival setting, but rather in a text my brother sent my while I was upstate with KO and Joan in the middle of the woods.  Imagine being surrounded by dense foliage, away from most human contact when you're sharing a house with two friends (who happen to be smokin' hot babes, by the way) and you open a text message to be greeted by this:

Goddammit Charlie V.!

Yeah.  (God bless my sister-in-law Nin, who followed that up with her own message: "I'm so sorry.  I tried to stop him.")  And I shouldn't have been surprised by his text, either, even though I reacted by tossing my phone into my bag and shrieking and then rolling my eyes at the ridiculousness of it all.  After all, this is the same person who, a few years ago, spent a week texting me pictures of famous Stephen-King-creation, Pennywise.  FROM OTHER PEOPLE'S PHONES.  I'd get a random picture message from a random number and open it up to find a not-so-random Tim Curry's evil mug staring back at me.  "Beep Beep, Rosie.  Beep Beep..."   My brother got coworkers and friends of his in on this, all in a glorious attempt to prank his little sister, which was in itself all part of a larger life-long plan to get back at me for being born in the first place.  (The dent in my forehead and the scar over my left eye are earlier completed phases of this plan.  I'm sure if I ever get married, there will be another phase on my wedding day and if I ever have babies of my own, he'll teach them lots of Italian curses to shout during christenings and funerals to complete the whole plan.)

So now we've reached that post-Labor-day liminal phase of summer where we've come to the end of it recreationally, but not astronomically (that's the 22nd of September this year, right Earth Science kids!?) So it's still hot enough for summer fun, but most people no longer have the time or wherewithal to indulge in such activities, what with school opening and beaches closing.  Now, I love the idea of liminal states.  I have devoted most of my anthropological scholarship to it.  I just don't particularly like this one.  

But it's cooler today, and I'm about to indulge in a traditional season-closer with my folks and visit the art fair in Greenwich village.  Every year I can remember, it signaled the end of summer for me and the beginning of the school year.  When I was a little girl, when I was in high school, then college, then the ostensible grown up on the other side of the desk - the idea of summer was book-ended by the memorial day and labor day art fairs, and gave me a sense of completion and transition.   Feels a little different this year, though.  I wonder how not teaching anymore will make me feel about summer and the change of seasons from now on.  Guess it's time to find out.  

Anyway.  Sly -  play us out.