About ten minutes ago the pipes gurgled and the battle cry “FLUSH – NOW” echoed between the Aqua luxury condos. As a result of over-enthusiastic flushing the water is off again, unable to instantly flood, what? 2000, 3000? 4000? toilets.
How many toilets between 51st and 63rd Street one wonders, how many dishwashers? How many sinks, showers and washing machines?
We just showered at our friend’s house. She’s away skiing. We fought over who’d get in first. I lost. I got last but longest. While waiting I remembered going camping, I did this a lot when I was a teen, and being everso grateful to be home as if the only satisfaction of being one with nature for days on end was the ensuing luxury of standing under warm running water until the hot ran out.
Yesterday, while I was having a swim ( yes there was still clean water in the Aqua pool), a women hunched by my side, and, while avoiding eye contact , filled two gallon-flasks. Stealing water from the pool! Really, how third world is that? That’s one tea party I do not want to be invited to (actually I can name a few others).
“Soon,” they tell us. “We’re working on it,” they say. “Divers have been in the water since four this morning,” they assure me. Divers? How? Really? Where there are divers there is water! Aqua super heros!
Mommy, I hear a diver in the pipe! Aaaahh, good sweetie, things will soon back to normal…
Turns out our water pipes run under water, like along Indian Creek. Thats why, this morning on my way to get bottled water at Publix, I saw that confused crew of guys in fluorescent gear and flippers poring over a map, while leaning against a small shabby boat on a City of Miami Beach trailer.
Eventually all becomes clear.
Meanwhile they’ve promised us Porta-potties. Whooppee!
as per e-mail:
” In the interim, we are working on providing portable toilet services for the community.”
See?
This means that, I, Barbi, get to stand on line with the CEO of Mattress World and also mega property developers, drug dealers, porn kings and stars, famous DJ’s, bratty cokehead children of Russian billionaires, a gaggle of trophy wives with implants (Brazilian butt and breast), that MOSSAD lieutenant who flies the Israeli flag, droves of gay interior designers holding their noses, real estate agents, etc etc. Think about it, what a perfect networking opportunity !
Meanwhile one learns from these “trying” situations. First off: I learned that Iona has a nervous breakdown when she’s unable to shower for 24 hours, and will refuse to leave the house. I also learned that the twins couldn’t care less. I learned that my hair is best hidden after 36 hours, but that husband, when I wear head scarf, will let me know that he doesn’t dig my “chemo” look.
Fuck off! I said and also learned that my sense of humor, like the water, has run dry.
Every For Sale sign becomes a For Rent sign, everywhere I drive I imagine living. I ponder the beach versus the mainland, Sobe versus Brickell, the Grove, Downtown, North Beach, Normandy Isle. I weigh ocean-front condo against a home with a yard against a community townhouse. Then I’m sure again that Aqua, where we now live is perfect, and that I should find a more affordable place here. I’m turning into a real estate catalog. Every Miami for rent three-plus bedroom now has a place in my mind. 95% is unaffordable and other the 5% is too small for our five enormous personalities. If its true that you become what’s on your mind then I’ll be a condo soon ( a gorgeous large but cheap one).
Yes, yes, yes Iona got into DASH and our nine month escape from the winter has turned into something very different. Oh its life-changing, our friends say. Hell yes. Like how the fuck do I patch this one together. Didn’t we just built a huge beautiful house that I love back in Milford? Wasn’t it the perfect place for us? Didn’t we create a balance between living, kids and work, lots of lovely friends, in a picture perfect village? Didn’t I say, when we moved in three years ago, it was great to know that we’d never have to move again?
sweet home
But no, we had to go and fall in love.
Suddenly Miami is the perfect place for us. We ALL fell in love with the palm trees, the beach, the bays and canals and swimming pools, the gardens and parks on every corner. Miami is crazy cosmopolitan, its not a white American city. Its Cuban and Italian and Jewish and Venezuelan and Chilean and its loud and a tad dangerous and hot and sweaty and gritty and romantic and we want it. We don’t want to flirt with it anymore, we want to get married and have babies. Well, maybe no more babies. But we want to look after our three baby girls, do whats best for them. And Iona is in love with DASH and Kiki and Leila are like Miami, wild and intense and engaging and a tad dangerous.
Husband and I? Don’t know. I’ve always been a sucker for moving. I left home in Amsterdam when I was seventeen. But my bag had been packed since I was ten. Not because I hated my life. I’ve never moved because I hate my life. Paris, Sydney, Melbourne, London, New York, Princeton, Milford, Miami, I always moved because those places nurtered me enough to turn another corner and experience more, learn more, challenge myself more and expand. Its never personal. Its just who I am.
And husband? We’ll let him speak for himself. He loves to swim and his goal is to swim in every pool in Miami and write about it. I’ll say no more I’ll just send you links, after all he’s the seasoned writer in this house.
Meanwhile.
I’m sitting in front of this giant puzzle and all the pieces are still strewn in front of me. School, home, kids, husband, dog, renters, friends, work and money. Money. Money. Money. Money. Money. Money. And Health Insurance.
If every principal was like Stacey Mancuso the world would be a better place.
I’m writing this from the courtyard of DASH, the Design & Architecture Senior High School. Its awesome. Like really awesome. Like I wanna go here when I grow up. I now know that I never appreciated school, never, not even college in London, St Martins, Harrow, The Royal College of Art. But I’d really appreciate it now. Especially DASH. Iona is auditioning as I write this. And I’m having Couvade ( that’s when men get contraction pains when their wife is in labor) I’m having I wanna get into this school contractions, and like Iona I’m everso nervous for the audition. Poor Iona. Am I projecting? Bad mother!
So back to Stacey, and I’m not sucking up (yes, she’s funny and glamorous too) she just gets it. She gets kids, teenagers, what they need, how they’ll be their best when super motivated, super engaged, super challenged.
Never bored!
Iona’s Middle School teachers do NOT get it. They are angry. They punish. They fail to engage. Kids sleep in class. They text, listen to their I-pods. Like the gym teacher, who releases the entire class into the sports-field without any directions. She then disappears, sits around lazily, and the kids hang around in the grass, chat and listen to music. Then she suddenly stalks and punishes them by taking their music/ Ipod away. For a week, and if your parents complain she threatens, I’ll keep it for the rest of the school-year.
I want to complain but then they’ll be punished by doing one hundred push-ups without any sense that what they’re doing is for any other reason than breeding resentment.
So thats why I want Iona to go to a highs school like DASH. A place that sees teenagers as an endless source of creative posibility and not as juvenile delinquents. So wish her luck, fingers crossed and even send a little prayer if its not too much to ask.
OK. so. I havent blogged. Lamely I blamed it on the weather. And you must’ve been thinking that I was having such a fabulous party time that I just forgot about it. Of course you weren’t thinking anything at all. Confession: I was getting into a daily drudge already, here on the beach, after four months. Maybe my lack of inspired blogging is evidence that after four months in a new city the baggage catches up. Like lost luggage it was delivered at my Aqua front door, I signed for it, and there it it sat. Or maybe it was Santa who brought it. Christmas has a tendency to bring my old shit no matter where I am. So. I was stupid enough to open the old bags and take a rummage. See if there was anything I’d missed. I got hooked in. I did my thing. I lost my improved Miami self to an older more familiar me, one I truly thought I could leave behind. One part victim. One part bossy bitch. One part I’m getting the fuck out of here…
Not much humor in that baggage. Not much blogging inspiration.
So lets forget about January 2010. Relapse month.
Hey. Hi. How’ve you been? How was your January? Shitty too? Or do you, like a Hallmark card, get positive energy and inspiration from that brand-new- year thing? I wish I did. The downside of expectation gets me every time, just about around the fifth or sixth. but I wasn’t gonna talk about January…
Bye bye January. Hello February.
Top five good news things:
1.My mother is here. My own sweet, beautiful, eighty-two year old mom from Amsterdam arrived a few days ago. She flew from Schiphol to London, where she changed to Virgin, sat cramped for nine hours next to a man with halitosis and B.O., and like a hero, arrived here, in my new paradise home. It makes me happy. She completes me. Now I can show her all the things I told her about in my mind over the past four months, for real.
2.My agent sent back my last edit.Line edit and notes. And I finished the final draft of my novel. The BlackBerry Diet. More about that in future entries. Do you have any idea how long it takes to write a book? And the waiting for people to read it? Its teaching me about patience. Slowly, which I hate. Anyway keep your fingers crossed.
3. I am working with OCEANA, the largest international Ocean Environmental advocacy group dedicated to protecting and restoring the world’s oceans, to introduce them to Miami and establish a fundraiser for them. I’m putting together, curating, a show which incorporates aspects of the ocean, then, now and in the future, through the work of photographers, artists who use pollution and repurposed garbage in their work, and local art students. It gets me connected with people here, brainstorm and be inspired.
4. Iona is applying to two local magnet art schools. DASH and New World. She’s worked on her sketchbook, portfolio and ten art pieces. Five paintings and five photographs. She is good. Seriously good and into it. I’m proud of her. If she gets accepted we may have to stay here. I think I like the idea…
Sorry for the lag but I couldn’t blog over Christmas. I had to let go. Suspend. Lose control and be cool with that. Aye, the crowds, the action, the emotions and experiences. All too layered and intense to let me sit, be still and write. What is this different mind-space? The spirits of Christmasses past? The family isolation ward? The expectation of perfection? In gifts, food, love, friends, giving and receiving with equal grace while ingesting too much alcohol, too much sugar, too much fat? Kids spinnng out of control on candy highs, disappointment and greed, while husband and I fight because on some cellular level we remember our own parents fighting, getting drunk, leaving (forever) and coming back and ex wives and step brothers and sisters suddenly demanding equal opportunities in our perceived second-family-fun?
Family, they fuck you up, they say, but I dont want to have the kind of family that fucks anyone up. I take this mission seriously. Especially over Christmas. So what happens? I fuck mysef up. I twist myself into a pretzel of perfection. I will have the best food, the best decorations, the best gifts, the best dressed kids, the heirloom decorated tree, the funnest boxing day party, you get my drift. You probably drift in that same direction yourself. Nothing new here you are thinking. Well, this year with our change of scenery, palmtrees instead of evergreens, weather : sun @80 degrees instead of ice and snow @15 degrees, the impersonal designer bachelor candyland pad as our new home rather than my 200 year old farmhouse with beams and fireplaces, I thought it would be different. I went into denial, no, I actually believed that if I closed my eyes and wore a swimsuit Christmas would pass me by.
WRONG!
I have kids. Kids with friends. I have a husband who is a romantic.
They were gonna get the tree without me. Let them, I thought, I won’t be a control freak. A tree appeared, three days before the actual event, and the last strings of lights gathered from a variety of Walgreens, CVesses and Target. One pink, one green, one that blinked (!) and two white, and the last few boxes of leftover multicolored balls and silver streamers. I planned cinnamon salt cookies, but fuckit nothing could save this tree, which looked remarably like the one in the lobby of the Wachovia bank on 41st.
finnan haddie
Christmas eve we went to Vicki, our warm embracing super-hostess friend, who served the seven fishes. So bring a fish dish. But in my newfound, I’m-not-a-control-freak personality, I did not cook. Husband did! He made the most delicious Finnan Haddie. We feasted in the pre-Christmas gift chaos of our friend’s dining room by a tall tree which was obstructed by more gifts than my kids had ever seen, while another stack of presents lay as yet bare in the wrapping corner of the room.
Just before we left Vicki (mother of two young girls) whispered to us: “We’re off to get the kittens.”
That did it.
“This is our worst Christmas,” the twins wailed in the back of the car. “Why do Rebecca and Suzy always get everything? We never get what we want. WE WANT KITTENS!”
Fuck Christmas.
Santa, for lack of a chimney or anything else that resembled such in our candy-land-bachelor-pad, left our stockings in the elevator. In our astroturf, daisy covered mini elevator. Clever Santa. It was lovely. Husband, the romantic, had discovered the Aventura Mall and had shopped like a true trophy wife. He got me Gilly Hicks underwear, Jo Malone glorious smelling body stuff, and my own Ipod (finally).
click to see a full size Gordon
Everyone in our consumer household was content while at the same time contributing to the health of our economy by spending 60% on clothes, 20% on lifestyle, 15% on electronics and 5% on other. Kiki and Leila got twin bikes and learned to ride them, like good little Dutch daughters, within 30 minutes. Looking heartbreaking in their too-large helmets, long skinny legs and wobbling handlebars. I cooked Christmas lunch while they went to the beach testing the new boogy boards. I decided to serve the feast by our communal Aqua pool. Eat out in our bathing suits, our wet hair dripping in the cranberry sauce, I fantasized, but instead we had our first RussianChristmas, because, out of 120 deck chairs on all four sides of the pool a group of super wealthy Russians descended by our dining table with several bottles of champagne, caviar, choice drugs and proceeded to show us what a MERRY Christmas really sounds like (without a nod of recognition or toast in our direction). Fuckem. I had to leave anyway. Pick up Natalie, Iona’s best friend, from Fort Lauderdale Airport.
aftermath
“PLEASE LEAVE MY NAME IN MERRY CHRISTMAS,” – Jesus.
The first billboard on our trip to Sarasota, taking a break from Miami Beach on Siesta Key Beach, started with this quote by Jesus Christ himself, at the start of the Everglades National Park, aka Alligator Alley. How unlike the holy one, I thought. How un-Jesus to bitch about his credit in Christmas like it was some reality TV show. I mean we all know who he is, like isn’t he the biggest brand in history? Don’t get me wrong, I too think Merry Christmas sounds nicer than Happy Holidays, and personally I leave his name in.
As we exited Alligator Alley there was another enormous billboard: Mommy take my hand, please don’t take my life. A tiny newborn hand reached over the edge of the sign. What about Daddy ? I wondered. Is Mommy all alone in this unwanted pregnancy? What would Jesus think of that? But wait, wasn’t his mommy Mary said to have done pregnancy all by herself..?
A few miles along my question about Joseph’s/Daddy’s participation was answered. Vasectomy signs, like rows of Dutch windmills, sprung up alongside the highway. No Scalpel, No Laser, they boasted. Pro-Vas.com and Vasnow.com. Alternative birth control in retirement alley, where Grandpa, hard on Viagra, can now have endless happy holidays without sperm.
SO.
Those were ten days of Saturdays. One blur without structure. Tomorrow is Monday. First day of school in 2010 and I can finally resume being a control freak.
And you know what?
I like it. Being a control freak actually works for me…
OK. So. I know that some of you might be coming down this Christmas vacation. To escape the snow/20 degree weather. See Mom and Pop. See Grandma. See those silly friends who moved down telling you that Miami is like the next cool city. Or if you’re just dreaming of a blue Christmas.
After my first three intense months here I dare to share :
EAT:
My, by far, favorite restaurant, and OK so I’m biased because the owners are Dutch, and Ineke and I used to model together in Amsterdam in the seventies, is IndoMania, the only really good Indonesian restaurant outside Amsterdam (I never went to Indonesia), where they serve a full Rice Table, or great Indonesian inspired dishes that compete with any high class fusion restaurant.
Next fave, for lunch or a very early dinner (close at 7pm) and for those of you who like hole-in-the-wall style Japanese sushi, is at the Japanese Market @ North Bay Village. The deck at the Standard Hotel has great views of Biscayne Bay and also of superstar guests like Naomi, Nars, Weber and Calvin. More celebs and a great spot for brunch is, of course, under the trees at the Raleigh Hotel, if you’re cool enough to be given a table… Sardinia on Purdy Street is a fancy Sardinian restaurant where the food is excellent, the waiters real Italians and real cute, and I felt like I was back being spoiled on the Costa Smeralda. The Buena Vista Bistro is in the design district, the mainland, just over the Julia Tuttle Causeway. Cafe´ style home cooking like great grouper/mashed potatoes. Other restaurants in the design district are Michael’s with draft beer and macho fayre (bacon, burnt sprouts and lots of meat) and FratelliLyon. The Red Light, (305) 757-7773, has a fabulous owner chef, a cool quirky crowd and is hidden away in the fifties style Motel Blu , with only a handwritten sign that says Red Light . Upstairs interior is funky Caribbean diner and downstairs there’s a narrow terrace on Little River where manatees have been known to lounge around. Lincoln Road is fun, but most restaurants suck in a get them in and out fast kinda way, so we have our own three destinations: Books and Books for great salads, superb fish sandwich, magazines from all over the world, and cool well-read waiters. At Sostas the pizza is good and affordable, its where we take the kids. After seeing a movie at the Lincoln Theater next door I like the Venezuelan Baire where I have the poached pear and gorgonzola salad and hope that the super sexy group at the next table (straight from a Almodovar cast) invites me to join them.
PLAY:
Like shop?
For loitering outside, people watching and groovy stores like Diesel and Miss Sixty (dotted between the same old same old Gap, Victoria Secret and Pottery Barn) there is of course Lincoln Road, which becomes more interesting every other Sunday when a street fair/fleamarket is part of the streetscape.
While being So Be-ward, even if you cant afford or fit into ultra expensive, gorgeous, top of the line, best pick designer clothes, you have to visit the Webster, a newly opened lifestyle of the rich and famous store run by former YSL execs, Milan, Laure and Frederic, all chic as poodles, and incidently there’s a Kaspia, the Paris caviar joint ,in the lobby. But in general modern shopping is best in the design district, a small neighborhood of about four blocks square with furniture/lifestyle, Luminaire, Avanti, Kartell and fashion/accesories stores like Marni, Fendi, Quinn, Tomas Maier and the recently opened Moore building with several young designers boutiques. A few blocks down is the Wynwood area with lots of little galleries and cool shops like Las Tias , a consignment furniture store (and more) choc full of Lapidus and Miami Vice-style cast offs and owned by my fabulous Miami friend Esther Percal. A must!
More PLAY:
Like beaches and pools? We like to walk to the public beach entry on 62nd street where the water is turquoise, the beach is wide and very quiet. But for the complete Miami Beach experience rent a bike and take the boardwalk all the up or way down and pick a spot. Like South Pointe Park which was recently opened and extends along the port waterway where cruise ships like giant UFO’s glide by you on your tiny towel. For a grand feet-out-of-the-sand experience the beach at the Raleigh is wide and buff boys settle you into their comfy sun chairs for a substantial fee. The Raleigh pool is fabulous dahling, models, male and female, are encouraged to hang by the pool (in their spare time) for sex appeal but it made me want to diet, do the gym, botox, tummy tuck, and spray-on tan before ever coming back . The Fontainebleau has a “poolscape” meaning three, or is it four, pools with connecting terraces that are dotted with sun chairs and VIP cabanas which include flat screen TV’s and girls who rub sunscreen into the oily backs of sunburned Soprano types. Its kitsch but if you’re doing Miami you gotta do the Fontainebleau, even if its only for an hour. My favorite pool ever, anywhere, is the lake sized pool at the Biltmore Hotel in the Gables, nowhere near the beach, but go for a drink at the poolside bar, bring a costume, and float around (preferably at night when the hotel is lit up and feels like the Alhambra.)
Other PLAY:
Like renting a boat? Any size is available depending on your budget, from Indian Creek along Collins Avenue. Nightclubs must still be play for some, and the Wall at the W is one hot-spot, although it made me feel like my own granny. Debbie’s after hours club, called Private Residence @ 1427 West Ave is my Saturday night spot, its small and exclusive and reminds me of the old London clubs like Tramp and Annabel’s. Exploring funky neighborhoods is what I like to do best. Miami is a cosmopolitan experience and if you want to feel like you’ve left the USA go hang out in the South American strip by the beach between 63rd and 75th street. My favorite is the Buenos Aires Bakery where they sell pre-made mini sandwiches which I take to the beach. Or walk around little Havana for quirky shops, great Jazz and cigars if you’re so inclined. Along the railroad tracks on 4th North Court/79th street I found, behind a wall of highly designed shades of grey concrete panels, a commune of cool young fashion designers, artists, hairdressers, architects and Green developers. Its where I want to have my studio. If we stay next year that is…
Last Saturday morning I reached for clean knickers in the freshly done laundry basket and ping, my back went out. Dont do this to me I said to it, not now, (not ever actually) but it did anyway. It did it badly just to spite me. It doesn’t do it often, maybe two, three times a year, usually when i’ve been sitting in a bad chair, same position for a while, like writing and making jewelry are really bad for my back and they are the two things I really need to do (for my sanity) after making lunchboxes, driving to and from school twice a day, shopping for supplies for my family, that fucking dishwasher, homework, and cooking. But when I get fully into doing my two favorite things, which actually make me money, my back goes out. This is really unfair. Because, lets face it, the other stuff is boring. There are scales of boredom, like driving with the kids to and from school is not acually so boring because we usually have fun, but driving back alone, along the same streets twice a day is boring. Buying food is unbelievably boring, the same isles, the same shitty choices, the same rickety rusty carts, I mean the entire Publix aesthetic is just too upsetting and boring. I hate it. Making lunch boxes every morning has a certain creativity to it, its low on the scale of creative activities, but it rates in a pathetic way. Then there is cooking. Now I LIKE to cook. I’m a good cook, or so they say, I just dont like feeding, as in whats for lunch? Whats for dinner? Twice a day. Every day. I’m the kind person who likes surprises, challenges, sudden upsets, throw me a curveball and I’m there, ready to play, but the same thing every day, day in day out eventually makes me angry. Anyone can do this shit, in fact a robot would be better because it wouldn’t get annoyed. So WTF you say? Didn’t Barbi just party around Art Basel? Yes I did. And I took all those pictures. And I met interesting people who get to be creative all day long, like men with wives like me. Like my husband. I wish I had a wife like me. Someone who pathologically has to make it perfect for everyone else. So anyway my back goes out last saturday morning. I’d been making more beachplastic jewelry because there was an increased interest after Art Basel when I wore this new piece that everyone loved. I really need to create a full collection to start retailing. I want to find a retail partner. I want to be recognized for doing something creative, like all those Art Basel types. So I’m excited. And frustrated. Like I never have a enough time to actually do what I need to do to get to where I want to get. So, what usually happens at this point of frustration is that my back goes out. Make sense? Now I cant do anything at all. I cant sit. I can shuffle sideways like a crabby crab. But I cant write, I cant make jewelry. So I take a Vicodin. I like this stuff. Not only does it stop the pain, but it also stops my pissed-off ambition dead in its tracks. Now I’m mellow. I don’t give a shit. But not everyone else in my family is equally mellow. Its Sunday. The day to do things “as a family”. We haven’t been outside Miami since we arrived, my husband says. So he gets us invited to The Keys. They have a boat, he says, we can go fishing. I’m not sure about boating I say. But I take another Vicodin and now I don’t give a shit. So we go, over an hour in the car, sitting, then a long leisurely lunch, sitting, then we drive to the boat, sitting, and then in the boat sort of sitting (in a hopping kind of way) at 30 knots over big waves, woohoo, what fun cry the kids, bang bang bang goes my back.
What a lovely family outing. Only by the time I get home I can’t actually get out of the car and my husband says in a I-know-best kind of way: You really shouldn’t have gone on that boat. Really? It must’ve been the Vicodin that made me do it.
I wake up the next day and realize that someone has come along with superglue and glued my right eye shut. Its pink-eye mom, the girls say. Hurray, now I’m blind and crippled. I will just have to stay in bed. I take another pill and sleep till two. Then I get into the jacuzzi bath for the first time since we moved into this house. I do some gentle stretching. I take it easy while my husband notes how taking the kids to and from school really cuts into his time to work… HELLO!
Still I’m good for doing homework and making dinner. I go to bed at ten.
This morning I’m sore but I can move enough to resume the daily chores. And the bills. I need to do the bills. And the twins science project is due on Thursday. And the fridge is empty (again). And Christmas is coming. And all I wanna do is make more jewelry. I think I’ll take another painkiller instead. At least then I won’t give a shit and l may even be caught humming: … all I want for Christmas is more Vicodin, Vi-co-din, Vi-co-din…
beach plastic comes in every color of the spectrum, the new piece
It was fun and now its over. The last of the turkey was fed to the cats. and the raccoons, our guests have left, its quiet. Iona misses her friend Amanda and the twins are bummed, they love a full house, parties, action, and opportunities to dress up in glitzy gowns. Yes i said raccoons. And cats. Just up the street, at a large abandoned theater, there live a dozen homeless cats and four raccoons with their two raccundles. and every evening we collect our leftovers, get in the car, and park in the lot and i sneak out, weary of those either maternal or rabid raccons, and dump the food. Usually one tiger-striped cat with huge serious eyes walks out and sits right under our rolled down window. and stares. She stares us right down and we try to figure whether its a grateful stare, or a take-me- home-with-you stare, or a fuck-off-we-dont-need-your-food stare, or a I-remember-the-humans-who-abandoned-me-here-stare. or just a meditation stare before she tucks in. Then there’s the black alpha cat who always gets first dibs, and a ginger one who lingers until there’s the invisble sign that she too can join the feast. Tonight one raccoon was eager, it may have been the liver laced, wine soaked, cranberry dotted gravy smell, and tiptoed like she was drunk in high heels across the beam from my headlights, dove into the food, found a large turkey bone heavy with meat and carried it, head held high as if she was afraid to get her loot dirty, into the bushes where one youngster waited for her like a Tim Burton shadow against the white wall.
I have a hunch that this ritual of feeding cats and coons will be the sole reason my twins will finally fall in love with Miami.
Last night we held a small screening here, at our candy-land-bachelor-pad, of the movie that Roland, dear friend and godfather to all our kids, has made. This film follows three of his Bronx high school students over several years in their attempt to escape the ghetto through writing poetry. The movie is a powerful and touching piece of work, which will be shown by PBS sometime next year. As all twenty of us sat quietly and watched and listened to loud, intense rapping and slamming, another, even louder noise, seeped in through the open windows. Alastair and I looked at each other. WTF? A street fight? On our ultra secure Aqua island? A spousal argument? The new neighbors?
Rowdier shouting and hooting competed with the rap poetry that echoed from Tiesto’s Bose sound system.
Words like: You cant have sex!!! Bounced from the street walls. And no masturbation!!!
I peeked outside and through another open window across the street I saw ten young Hassidim men and their Rabbi sitting around the dinner table. The ten men cheered as if the Rabbi had just scored a goal.
As we finished Roland’s movie and ate a second Thanksgiving dinner, more loud and explicit sexual warnings about the pre-marital relationship were delivered across the way, whether we liked it or not, as we wondered what was going on, how long it would last, and where it would lead. (Any explanations? )
Tomorrow is the day before Art Basel Miami launches into its week of over-the-top art events. Alastair and I will be blogging it all. Both here and at his new blog, Alastair Gordon, Off the Wall, so stay tuned for more from rabid Miami….
I scan my emotional radar for signs of homesickness. hm. there are a few pockets. I think of a fire in the fireplace, of picking Roland and Ian up from the train, preparing the turkey in my pajamas, and seeing the forest in the the fog through the glass wall of my kitchen, the bare wet trees beside me, the streams and falls swollen and roaring, a last yellow leaf falling reluctantly past, the sound of shooting far away because hunting season opens on monday, Roland at the kitchen table cracking nuts and catching up on the news of the year, the girls peacefully playing or watching a movie, the smells of the turkey mixed with smoke from the fire, the long walk to the waterfal before we eat, amber straining at her leash, setting the table with layers of plates and late or dried flowers and plants from the garden, Donna arriving with yet another evolution of Happy Feet, the dancing penguin who became a dancing turkey, and last year a dancing Obama, and Anouk with Zeb and Zoe, and then finally as its now dark, lighting the candles and sitting around the long table fifteen or more, kids and friends and family, and holding hands and saying a prayer of grace and thanks, and tucking in, and pouring the wine, and laughing and telling tales of Thanksgivings past…
But I’m here in Miami. Its ten thirty. I anticipate. I’ve already done thirty laps in the pool. I set the glass table for ten. Arranged the designer chairs alongside the ones from IKEA, I opened all doors and windows to let in the sun and air, so fresh after a night of rain. Roland is here, I’m thankful, it would not be Thanksgiving without him. Al is preparing the turkey. Evonne just called, her voice still raspy from sleep. Their flight to Miami was four hours delayed and they didn’t arrive at the Fontainebleau till two this morning. Iona is eager to see Amanda. Together they’ll make the sweet potatoes with marshmellows. And so it will be different, but I’m excited and thankful for all of it, the memories and the day that lies ahead. For my family and my friends, the ones who are here, the ones who are elsewhere on the planet…
my mother (on the phone from amsterdam) said last saturday when i told her i was cooking another dinnerparty for eight new miami friends, you cant stop can you!? this, coming from my mother, is funny. where do i get this urge to celebrate? whatya think? my mother at age forty something, after my stepfather had departed with one of her best friends, celebrated by starting a singing telegram business. this was the early eighties, when in amsterdam such a thing was considered another over the top american extravagance. SINGING TELEGRAM AMSTERDAM was the first, and really the one and only for years and my mom the go-to-madame of dutch celebrations. she planned at least ten bunnies leaping from cakes, singing clowns, whacky clumsy waiters, homeless women crashing parties and breaking into opera, dashing crooning valentinos, a week. my mother couldn’t stop and only retired a few years ago when requests for strippers and other seedy sexist telegrams (which she referred to the local escort service) exceeded the regular fun-o-grams. and this was only her day job! whenever there’s a friends with not only a birthday, but a wedding anniversary, a new grandchild, a first birthday grandchild, a retirement, an actor friend who’s been on the stage for fifty years, a new home, a new job, a graduation, an opening night, my mother is there with personalized gifts for everyone. for chrissake she even celebrated my, and my sister’s, first period with cake and fanfare and when my little brother felt left out she celebrated his first wet dream with same cake and pomp (he later admitted it wasn’t his first at all….). so when my mother says to me you cant stop can you? i blame her, in the nicest possible way, and say : mom i’cant help myself, i am still getting over that one birthday when all your good intentions became my nightmare…
for my fifth birthday she had a full carnival fairground designed by my stepfather (he was an architect) and built by his crew. i was the icecream vendor. this was supposed to be my dream come true birthday, since, every day in the summer, when the ice cream man began ringing his bell at the corner of our street, i went into convulsion of nervous anticipation. could i have one? would i have one? would i be able to convince my mother that i NEEDED one by the time he passed our house, would he even stop for me? my daily nervous breakdown, to some extent, ruined the short lived joy of dutch summer for my mother and so, for my fifth birthday , i would have all the ice cream i could imagine in my own rietvelt meets picasso plywood icecream cart. i wore black and white plaid bakers pants, a white shirt, a skinny tie and a slightly too large captain’s cap. i remember the start of the party. i hated birthday parties, all those kids i barely knew, making so much noise and pushing and yelling, but anyway there they were crowded around my cart, screaming and pushing and shouting: chocolate. i want chocolate, i want vanilla, i want strawberry, and grabbing and getting ice cream all over their face and coming back for seconds and thirds and fourths. BUT. i was a good girl, i lived up to expectation so i kept on scooping. i scooped and scooped and scooped and slowly before my very eyes the icecream went down, first the chocolate went, then the vanilla and the strawberry. Until there was nohing left. not a scoop, not a teaspoon. and i hadn’t had one cone, one lick, one crumble bit of wafer. it was all GONE! i was devastated. tears choking my throat, i looked for my mom, she was across the room holding my newborn little sister, laughing and throwing colored balls at colored cans in a red, blue, green, black and white wooky frame. i looked around me. all the kids had scattered, playing different games, ignoring me. again. cause i was out of icecream.
that night, when my mother tucked me into bed, she said. and? did you have fun?
reportedly i answered that next year i’d rather be a princess…
Barbi Does Miami 
