Cracks In Sidewalks

Thursday is Thanksgiving.  It was also my mother’s birthday and is my friend Rhonda’s birthday as well as my friend Joy’s, so it is definitely a day of celebration and a day full of memories.

When I was a kid there would be 25 to 30 people gathered around our table for the holiday dinner.  My mother would buy a 27 lb. turkey, which became the centerpiece of our feast, and I would spend the day basting the turkey for my mother.  We all knew that I took the job so I could nibble on the stuffing before anyone else.  My mother had pilgrim and turkey candles on the table every year that we never lit, and Thanksgiving napkins and other decorations.  My sister threatened to pull them out last Thanksgiving as neither of us could ever throw them away.  They represented our parents and happy funny times together as a family.

I think Thanksgiving was our favorite holiday at least for us kids. Growing up Jewish in the Midwest, this was a holiday everyone celebrated and so did we.  At Christmas time no matter how my father decorated our house for Chanukah, all my girlfriends felt sorry for me that I didn’t get to have a Christmas tree and that Santa skipped over our house.   So Thanksgiving was a big deal in our house and our family did it up big.  Our holiday dinner was a feast and a tradition that has continued with us kids, now the adults.  Of course we have added a few of our own favorite dishes, and my nephew is a great vegan chef so along with the turkey there is now tempe and lots of other wonderful cooked vegetables.  My sister has added a macaroni and four cheese platter to the already carbohydrate fat heavy dinner and my specialty is a mashed yam dish with lots of butter, pure maple syrup, chopped pecans or walnuts, a hint of cinnamon and a hint of cayenne, and on at least half the casserole there has to be melted marsh-mellows for my one niece.

Unfortunately this year for the first time we will all be scattered among NYC, Ohio, and Oregon.  Parts of our family will be together but this is the most physically scattered we have ever been.  We will really be stretched out among the three states.  Some of it is because new families have begun and there are other obligations, part of it is because of these economically challenged times.  But as happy as we will all be, there will also be a sadness in not being together, not sharing our one big holiday together.  I know it will be a good day, but there will be something missing, first off my parents.  I have no doubt they will be looking down upon each of us hoping that we’ll save them some leftovers but most of all they’ll be happy knowing they created a family that loves each other.  We’ll all be on the phone to each other probably multiple times, and that will be nice.  It is not the same but this year it will have to do.  I will miss them all especially my youngest niece and nephew Kaya and Sky.  They are so funny!

Thanksgiving is a day to show our gratitude, to be grateful for all our blessings big and small and if we’re lucky there is food on our table, we are safe, and surrounded by loved ones.  Just those three things are not small accomplishments, so I for one will express my thanks and gratitude for having in my life those important ingredients, and I wish to you all the same and a wonderful holiday weekend and a Happy Thanksgiving Thursday!

Warmest regards,
Audrey

Who says we don’t get along!

This time of year becomes my own little film festival, well actually for me and every other member of one of the theatrical guilds.  They used to start a little later as did most of the award shows and I preferred that.  It was a good way to pass the winter in NYC.  It also used to be easier to see any movie you wanted to see as all the theaters would just accept your membership card, but then the guilds got too big and it became an economical decision to tighten the ropes.  But the film companies still needed us to see their movies as they needed our votes for the awards so they started to go out of their way to set up more private screenings then in previous years, and with those screenings came Q&A’s with the actors, writers, and directors and for me this has become the best part of it all.  The only downside is when friends later in the year want to go see a movie or rent one, my response to most their selections is that I’ve seen it.

Last night I went to my first screening of the season.  I was very excited.  I can also bring one guest so that adds to the fun.  The screenings have been going on for several weeks but none until yesterday fit into my schedule.  I went and saw “Last Chance Harvey” with Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson, who both participated along with writer director Joel Hopkins and a young actress I had not seen before, Liane Balaban, who plays Dustin Hoffman’s daughter in the movie, in a Q&A after the screening.

The Q&A portion of the evening began with Emma Thompson who was hoarse, imitating DeNiro “gangster” lines that Hoffman jokingly fed to her.  She was very funny!  What’s great about these Q&A’s is that they are very loose.  There is a moderator who leads the session and gets it started and then it is open to the room and their fellow actors and writers, etc.  Besides the moderator no press attends and no one is allowed to tape.  The nature of the screenings bring about an honesty that you won’t find elsewhere and you get to know the actors and their process a little better and in each Q&A I’ve attended over the years there are always special unexpected moments that appear like magic.  Two new things I learned last night about the actors were that Emma Thompson started by doing stand up and Dustin Hoffman wanted to be a jazz pianist and used to write music.

Later this week I am also attending a screening of the film “Milk” and Gus Van Saint, Emile Hirsch, and Josh Brolin will attend the Q&A that will follow.  Then soon thereafter is “Vicky Christina Barcelona” with Penelope Cruz, and a few days later “Revolutionary Road” with Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Sam Mendes, and it goes on like this for the next month or two.  It is a definite perk and for me a very special experience.   During this time I appreciate even more the roads in my life that I have chosen because they also led to this place and these adventurers.

I finally joined Facebook this past Friday.  After numerous invitations from friends over many months I began to feel like one of the last holdouts of this social networking phenomenon.  Since Friday I’ve had so many people from different aspects of my life reach out to me.  It’s been great and a little weird at the same time.  All of the sudden I’m seeing unrecognizable faces from High School and hearing from people who I have not thought about in years.  I’m reconnecting with old friends from San Francisco, musician friends from both coasts, and people who saw me on other friend’s homepages and invited me to be their friend too.  I’ve also heard from friends of my nieces and have gotten a few Aunt Audrey letters.  I’m truly honored by those.

I still don’t really know how this all works and I need to look at other people’s home pages and see how they’ve used this tool.  How much information do most people share and what do they keep private?  Where to put things and how?  Kind of like this blog, it can be so much more if I only understood the process and knew how to truly facilitate it.

Besides reconnecting with old friends and friends of friends I’m also hoping it will help promote this site as this is a big part of what I’m doing right now and of course it would be nice to know that what I’m writing is actually being read and of interest and value to some folks.

The history of Facebook, is well-known to most, so what I will do instead of sharing that history is from time to time share with you my experience of participating in its process and ask you for your feedback.

If you haven’t already joined and are interested in doing so, go to: www.facebook.com

For years in my neighborhood whenever I got the craving for pancakes there was always the Bright Food Shop, a little southwestern diner in Chelsea with high quality food and the best cornmeal pecan pancakes I or anyone else I know had ever eaten.  When you got that craving your mouth could water but you knew soon you could be satisfied with the thickest tastiest pancakes on the planet served with organic maple syrup.  Every one in my family was addicted and when they would visit from out of town they would be requesting Bright Food Shop for brunch before their arrival.

When I walked into the restaurant the waiter would know my order before I sat down, because rarely although every thing on their menu was good, did I order anything else.  I always assumed they would be there.  The restaurant had been a neighborhood fixture for many years.  I never dreamed I would need to get their recipe and think of fixing them on my own, they were so successful it didn’t enter my consciousness that they could disappear.  Then one day I was walking by and they were closed, they and their sister restaurant the Mexican take out place called Kitchen, also a neighborhood favorite.  I can’t begin to tell you my disappointment and shock.   To this day probably a year or so later I feel the pain.

I was in Vermont in October enjoying the fall foliage, but one can’t think of Vermont or go there without indulging in pure maple syrup.  This morning I was thinking of that weekend away and woke up knowing I had to have something with pure maple syrup.  I wanted to go to Bright, for it to still be there and for me to be able to taste my beloved pancakes once again. I wanted the opportunity to turn new friends on to their pancakes and see their faces after that first bite, when they would be transfixed and in heaven.  Ultimately I went to the Half King and had a delicious waffle with pure maple syrup.  It was very good and I love Half King, but still it was not the Bright Food Shop.

It is my understanding that they lost their lease or decided not to renew their lease as the landlord was asking for a ridiculous increase in rent.  I don’t know if it is true but that’s the rumor that’s been floating around and given the transformation and high costs of everything now in Chelsea, it would not surprise me.  So I’m asking all of you out there, does anyone know the pancake recipe they used?  Did anyone get it before they closed?  Does anyone who worked at Bright want to share it with us or does anyone have a pancake recipe they think could rival the cornmeal pecan cakes from Bright Food Shop?  I’m calling out to all of you.  You can help.  If anyone knows the true story of what happened to this neighborhood favorite and it’s sister next door, or if you know and are willing to divulge their wonderful pancake recipe you would be doing a community service and I’m certain it would assure you a good place in heaven and most definitely in this life.  The maple syrup gods and all your new friends would look upon you most kindly and I’m certain you would be highly rewarded.

Trust me when I say this is a puzzle worth solving.  Has Bright opened some place else, and more importantly where can we get their cornmeal pecan pancakes or ones of equivalent taste and quality?  If you have an answer, please respond with your recipes and thoughts for myself and other readers of this blog.  All of our Saturday and Sunday mornings could then be truly Bright.

There’s nothing like your own bed.  Mine is an old cat carrier turned upside down.  It’s my favorite spot!