Pan-Handling

Seasonally we all think about giving... about gratitude, generosity... we count our blessings and try to remember the less-fortunate. Generosity, I have always told my son, is judged not by the quantity you give but the percentage of what you have left.  This puts the billionaires' annual charitable rosters in another light.  They give what they are able to deduct; they keep plenty on hand.  

The holiday was a little spoiled this year by the sudden passing of a downstairs neighbor.  He was an economist of sorts... we were fellow alumni of the same college, so he gave a sort of hall-pass for my financial eccentricity, as he referred to my personal life choices.  I live on food stamps; he regularly ate a modest meal at the local diner. I'm sure he left behind a small fortune... like my father he hoarded papers and financial documents and statements.  But his death was sudden and a little shocking.  He was stern and smart and short with people, but kind to me.  He reminded of my father.  His daughter and her family came quickly; they sorted out some possessions, and they left... just like that... his home of so many years will be professionally cleaned and quickly sold, renovated... and just like that another family will begin an urban dynasty.  

It made me feel disposable, temporary... I survey the landscape of my home and mourn the dispensing or discarding of possessions which will come. Time is relentless.  

Tonight I went on craigslist, as I often do, when I need something that feels easily surplussed-- like a partial can of paint, or copy paper... things that are shared or given away by the thoughtful... But there was a posting from some person who offered to grant a wish, soliciting applicants.  I replied, expressing my gratitude that such a person exists.  Besides the open can of paint which will come my way somehow, I need nothing.  But the woman with the two overweight children tonight, standing on my corner-- she needs things.  Her daughter who cannot be more than 10--  brazenly asked me for money.  I'm sure I don't look wealthy but I apparently look weak, or sensitive or generous, perhaps.  Today alone, walking all the way from Union Square, I was solicited by an astounding number of people-- with stories, with pleading, with a little theatricality.  Since I carry no cash, I generally offer to buy some groceries; it's rare that anyone responds.  This is not what they need.

My very successful friends-- with money, with positions of power-- spend an inordinate amount of time trying to solve problems.  They organize events and fundraisers.  The billions of dollars that are given toward cancer alone-- well, it's staggering.  And yet... my friends who have died over the last few years-- at home, in hospice-- suffering... received little.  Personally, I used to fundraise... then I began to just allot whatever small amounts I could muster to brighten their lives--- to hire a cleaner, to take them for a wig fitting, a manicure.  Most of them craved company-- someone to acknowledge their suffering, to empty trashcans and gather Christmas trinkets for them to give others-- things like that.  

I guess what I really notice, in this city of mostly good and somewhat generous people, is that we give and yet the receivers do not seem to get what they need.  Those who decide on the allotment of funds and the administration of charities (yes, fictional sums go to institutions and research... dinners and entertainment functions) succeed in eliciting so much from the party-attenders and diners... and yet the individuals-- the sick and suffering-- the poor and overwhelmed-- they do not seem to get relief.

How can we fix this?  To assign, like Secret Santas, one person for each of us?  A match, a recipient for whom we are responsible?  The city is filled with single-occupant homes and aging populations.  Who will really care for them?  The New Yorker today had a feature on the private equity acquisition of profitable hospice platforms... one of the most repulsive pieces of investigative journalism.  The whole system, the way medical groups and hospitals are run by massive insurance for-profit companies and hedge funds.  It's a disgrace,  it's anodyne for the rich who delude themselves into thinking they are doing some kind of good when the waterfall of benevolence becomes a mere trickle as it reaches or does not reach the bottom.  

The massive amount of money spent on our elections seems grotesque; these commercials in which one person mostly maligns their opponent in a way that is counter-exemplary for children... and then the ubiquitous drug advertisements.  When I was young there was Bayer aspirin and Alka Seltzer.  Now there are myriads of back-to-back creepy medication commercials-- like brainwashing-- the drug of the month club, with endless caveats and disclaimers accompanying the happy, calm, lovely people on-screen.  We all know the advertisements alone add many zeroes to the cost of these things which also do not seem to cure but to palliate and generate profit by giving some kind of trade-off or hope. 

I know that by allying myself with the educated poor I am not making a contribution.  I can't give these people on the street what they want; nor does a successful day of panhandling solve their long-term problem.  On Thanksgiving, a close friend of mine revealed that he was participating in a Go Fund Me campaign... he was tired of living hand to mouth, felt entitled to more.  He was tired; I argued with him, about which I feel badly, but I also cannot expect everyone to feel satisfied with the what-I-have scenario.  It is not human nature to be content.  Capitalism is not driven by people like me.  Art and ambition are not always bedfellows in my version of biography.  

What bothers me is the bitterness-- the climate of subliminal anger and dissatisfaction... the culture of money generates unhappiness... the obscene display of wealth among celebrities... who yes, fuel and fund charities with fervor... and also leave the world a huge mess of inequality.  What drives us to become the best version of ourselves seems competitive and joyless.  There is success and there is Success. It goes on... until, like my neighbor, it does not.  

We all need to make repairs-- to fix the most broken things first... but we also tend to dwell so much on what we are missing.  So much of our assessment is based on what our neighbors have, rather than what they don't.  It's a function of this culture, too... seeing everyone's instagram and how much they spend on their underwear and face creams.  It's astounding.  We are all entitled to our priorities.  I've been accused of excessive moralism.  Yes, without blaming people, there is a price to pay for smoking multiple packs of cigarettes every day... this is a choice, and some people are unwilling to make better choices. I used to spend my childhood allowance on a book; it lasted much longer than a milkshake and I still have many of them.  I also saved for college while my own son did not.  At my age now I realize debt is more or less buried with our dead bodies. My son found his own version of life; the apple of him fell very far from his mother-tree.  I will always revel in his successes.  I will listen to my friends and try not to moralize.  I will not covet my neighbor's possessions, but I will dispute their distribution.  Isn't that in the end the global challenge? 

Don't Cry for Me, Minnesota

When I first arrived in New York, I dated a printmaker.  Not an artist, but a master printer who worked at a fantastic place where Jasper Johns, Rauschenberg, Warhol made things.  It was hard work-- physical and artistic.  He was from Minnesota; I met him at a dinner. In those days there were these funky 'salons'-- people from Pratt or Parsons or Cooper Union-- they'd gather on weekend nights in small apartments-- walk-ups, or lofts which were under-occupied and commercially zoned.  Music generally came from a portable stereo-- or some people had guitars... but mostly it was artists, all dressed like paraders in thrift-shop wear, eating on boxes and cushions, smoking pot, drinking cheap alcohol.  They rarely shared work at these dinners-- it was about conversation and ideas. Some of them were to become famous... we all knew every single gallery show and the more promising among students stood out. It was like a mixer-- all this talent in a room, with smoke and quiet ambition and melting of ego. No photographs-- only the ones tacked on walls for inspiration.

Anyway, the Printer was out of place here.  He was shy, with his blonde ponytail-- half Irish, half Scandinavian.  He was sober and serious.  We went on a date or two; he had trouble speaking to me... he lived, fortunately, in a fantastic huge loft on the Bowery... which in those days was super affordable and of course he was well paid for his skill.  When I visited the studio to witness his work, I was overcome.  His technique was precise and masterly... the artists trusted and respected him enormously.  He spoke little and executed with brilliance. No, he had absolutely no ambition to create his own; still, he was a kind of maker. I was swept.  

The prints were pulled from these enormous presses of different varieties... laid out and then stacked when dry-- sometimes they were hand colored by the artist, but mostly they were piled up, waiting for the artist to sign, which they did, beginning with the one on top, so the last one pulled would often be numbered one of whatever.  Irony.  Of course they were virtually identical, but people are often seduced by the number '1', while the printer knows the last is first. 

Going through an old drawer of keepsakes last night, I found a handmade 'book'.  It was this lovely card from the shy printer, inviting me to come out with him.  Each page offered a different activity, with these charming illustrations and collages... like a children's book he'd created because it was so difficult for him to look me in the eye, or even touch me.  Last night, maybe 45 years later, it touched me. The smell of the paper and the inks in that studio, the phantom colors embedded in his rough hands... his sweater-- I remembered he insisted I wear it one damp early morning walking me home from one of those all-night soirees. It had a scent.  

My doorman told me last week that Low had cancelled their dates. Mimi Parker the singer and fulcrum of this band was ill and dying.  I remember so well their first album-- I played it over and over, went to an early concert where the breathtaking restraint of the music silenced the audience like nothing I'd experienced.  It was a small-ish club-- Brownie's?  I can't recall... but it was riveting and we went home without speaking.  I had a young boyfriend then-- it was romantic and the 90's in New York now seem so innocently grungy and real.  Night after night we'd put the cd on and it would provide the soundtrack to long hours of some kind of passion.  The music embedded in us-- it created a sort of Cathedral vibe, in my old converted-factory place with the sleep-loft.  Especially for musicians, whatever is on the turntable affects us-- paints a landscape. 

I'm sure thousands and millions of Low fans are mourning the loss of Mimi.  She was the epitome of unpretentious-- her voice true and crystalline-- soft and strong at the same time.  Minimal.  A worker and  musical angel. You'd trust her.  Apparently as a person she was the same.  Her life was perfect although she was a Mormon, but maybe that was part of her solidity.  At the funeral service in Duluth, everyone received a profiterole... and a recipe card. The message here to me-- is go on, be light and make something.  Each family also got a piece of her hand-sewn marriage quilt.  I'm sure the music was amazing... and by request, Tim Rutili performed his exquisite composition: 'All my friends are weeds and rain/All my friends are half-gone birds/Are magnets, all my friends are words/All my friends are funeral singers.'  

All my friends are funeral singers.  It seems not just cruel but wrong that a Mimi Parker is taken-- as though her number came up on the top of the pile, like a mistake.  Nothing is a mistake, Tyrone on 114th Street in Harlem announced last night.  There are regrets, there are omissions... there are secrets and lies, missteps and accidents.  But no mistakes. 

Tim's song is especially haunting for me as it goes on to say, at the end, 'All my friends are keeping time/ All my friends have just quit trying.'  If that is not a mistake, then it must be a kind of sin.  You may take time off to be a mother-- to love someone, to care for someone-- to fight a war, embrace some random person in an elevator.. but you must not drop your own narrative.  You must go on singing-- while you work, while you print-- in the back of your head... to accompany silently a Low melody or a lullaby, or the traffic noise. And at this point-- yes, to sadly recognize that we are all indeed funeral singers.