Not Safe For Work…

Not Safe For Work …

There’s a scene in a season finale of THE WIRE where McNulty is wandering around Stringer Bell’s apartment. He’s chased this drug kingpin round and ground the streets of Baltimore and as he scans his foe’s bookshelf and mementos, spotting books on management and economic theory, and he shakes his head in disbelief: “Who the fuck was I chasing?”

That’s how I’m feeling today. Who the guck am I chasing? Who am I? What am I running to… or from?

I just walked past a billboard for the Twin Peaks revival which I’m excited about. It was near the marquee for Sunset Boulevard, the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that’s been brought back to Broadway with Glenn Close reprising her role from … 22 years ago? I saw that production.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. I’m feeling like a lot of folks have moved on, progressed, evolved… and here I am just … revisiting the past?

Case in point – the standard issue toursist shots in Times Square.

I still haven’t made it out to that damn diorama I’ve been meaning to see for literally decades.

Part of this is poor form jealousy at Steve and Alexis mentioning at dinner last night that they both enjoyed a run on the streets of NYC. I’ve been avoiding the endorphin high out of concern for the lingering tightness in my leg from this past weekend’s exertions.  On the plus side, I think I’m at about 85-90% for the race on Sunday so skipping the running game appears to have been the right play.

Still, I’m feeling my age, no longer recovering as quickly as I used to. The aforeposted pics of me at Times Square show the lines and markings of time in my forty-ish face. I’m just feeling… old. Old and worn out.

Perhaps, despite the thrill of the staging, a musical based on a Russian novel might not have been the best way to rouse a funk…

And surely reading Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” left me feeling like I should curl into the fetal position and not move. An indictment as much of the very essence of love as it is social norms and evils, the book was something I’m perhaps glad to have read but I wouldn’t say it was a pleasant read or anything I ever hope to revisit. The prospect of a ten hour tv show, of seeing that fictional world played out against our real world that isn’t nearly far enough removed from it has no appeal… but maybe we all need to be reminded of it and awaken our inner hopes to fight such darkness.

I don’t know.

Who the fuck am I to say any of this?

Who the fuck am I chasing?