Those were the days my friend
We thought they'd never end ...

Cruising Gulf Coast beaches in skimpy trunks.

A guy tows a canister, somewhat like an oxygen tank. For a few cents he sprays hot bodies with a mixture of baby oil and iodine to produce that perfect tan. Cover your eyes he says as he soaks me head to toes, front and back.

Days on the nude section of Jones Beach, roasting in the sun with only grapefruit juice to keep hydrated.

Endless Summers on Fire Island baking in the dunes.

Little did we know or care back then.

[Back then the fad was to mix baby oil and iodine together and smear it on. Research into Australian, U.S. and Swedish attitudes to tanning predicts people born between 1900-1960 will be at highest risk of dying from melanoma than any other generations.]

Not to alarm you, it's nothing that dire, just some skin growths, but here I am visiting my Dermatologist yet again. The receptionist behind the barricade directs me to a newfangled device, a pad, to sign in with. I enter my name, it knows who I am! Next item shows my Ethnicity: African-American. Well, that's not right. [Insert inappropriate quip about excessive tanning?] How about Congolese ... Ethiopian ... St. Vincentian?

I'm stymied. The receptionist comes out from behind her barricade to help this older guy who has no idea how to deal with computers, clicks some buttons and gets ASIAN ... Burmese ... Thai ... Vietnamese. BLACK. I'm African-American again.

She's lost as well.

I notice a small arrow bottom right and keep keep pressing it, reasoning there must be a W down there somewhere as it scrolls on forever ... NATIVE HAWAIIAN ... listing every tribe known to mankind and in galaxies beyond . . Cambodian ... Chinese ... Hmong .... what's a YAPESE and why? All those Spaniards ... Andalusian ... I like the sound of that ... or maybe Valencian, they have great oranges?

And there it is, all the way at the bottom! WHITE! So much for White Privilege. No mention of Aryan so WHITE will have to do.

A bit later in the Doctor's office after multiple zappings with his ray gun: You wouldn't do all that sun again, would you he says. No cancer. See you in a couple of months.

A PDF of Races and Ethnicity is attached below, seems it's standard for medical services. Future research project: what did the Nazi's chart looked like?

Aspen Santa Fe Ballet

It's the Aspen Santa Fe Ballet at the Joyce tonight, ArtiePasta is located conveniently half way between here and there on Greenwich and serves a decent basic Italian dinner, mussels in a white wine sauce with lemon and garlic, tender fried calamari with a spicy marinara dip, linguini with olive oil and garlic, and a thin slice of pork loin with mashed potatoes, anchovies, garlic, and capers, all washed down with a fruity and juicy bottle of Chianti. We are prepared to brave the cold for the few short blocks to the theater.

At the Joyce it's a pleasure to watch the women glide effortlessly across the stage, the men lack the same finesse. Sweet Fields choreographed by Twyla Tharp is the highlight, set to hymns and traditional Shaker songs, an haunting ethereal theme of life and death coming from Ms Tharp that I hadn't seen before.

It's impossible to forget the first time I saw Twyla Tharp years ago, probably the first time for most people. It was a dark and foggy night in September, Shakespeare in the Park, the open air theater in the middle of Central Park, had a special performance of up and coming dancers and choreographers, endless performances running late into the night at the end of the Summer, a few better than most. There was one more troupe, doing something called 100 Steps. Now I may be confused by the actual sequence but it must have been about 11pm with the fog settling in when Twyla comes out, solo, doing 100 odd movements on stage. Most of the audience has left by this time leaving just a few hundred aficionados and friends of performers, lots of empty seats. Twyla finishes her 100 movements when, as it becomes clear, 25 members of the audience get up and rush the stage: 25 dancers line up and on cue they each do four of the movements Twyla did earlier. 25 more join the crew on stage and do two steps ... you know where this is going. Only a handful of friends and lovers of dance are left in the audience when the last 50 of the troupe join to do just one step each. End of the program. The few remaining watchers head into the night under rustling trees, heading for the nearest exit of Central Park.

Back at the Joyce: We've been members since they opened twenty five years ago, and from the looks of it so has the rest of the mostly subscription crowd who know each other by now. The seats are filled with old fogies, there's only a sprinkle of young 'uns. I hear one man complain to his wife that he has to sit next to that snorer again.

We'll be doing it again in a month or so.

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