Tell Me on a Friday #23: Don’t Look Back in Anger…Look Back in Cringe

Hi-ho readers,

From the twisted mind of Emily Bergmann comes the 23rd issue of Tell Me on a Friday… on a Saturday afternoon. I HAD outlined it yesterday afternoon but then had a wonderful evening with Zach and Adam at the Whitney Biennial, Cafe Cluny, a kiki on the Christopher Street pier, and Pieces (where I don’t think I’ve been since I worked at GLAAD a million years ago). I’m not sure if this qualifies as what Rachel Syme would call a “city fuckaround,” but I feel like most of my happiest evenings in the city result in aimlessly walking around the West Village on a hot night in June. As I was walking west on 14th Street in high 80s heat, I felt 21 again, sticky and young and dumb, sleeping on the floor at Adam’s mom’s place in Chelsea and learning what it was like to be a person in a city.

Speaking of out-and-about adventures, here are some recent ones:

• I sang with Downtown Voices at a compline (evensong) service by candlelight at St. Paul’s. The whole thing unexpectedly moved me. The professional choir did a bunch of plainchant/improvisation as the sun went down, and I felt like I was in a healing bath.
• I ran a 10K for the first time! The loosening of commitments that summer has provided has allowed me to start running a little more. I was fully anticipating spending the whole summer working up from the 5K to 10K distance. However, on a recent run, I started from my apartment instead of the head of the park, so by the time I emerged from the loop, I’d already run four miles. I thought, “what’s two more?” and did a tiny Tour de Prospect Heights until I had 6.2 miles under my belt.
• I went to the Museum Mile Festival with Charlotte and Patrick, but all of the lines to get into the actual museums were too long, so we happily walked up and down 5th Avenue and then watched the turtles near Bethesda Fountain. It’s just lovely to see people out. Although, once we emerged at the southeast corner of the park, we were hit by that classic midtown bouquet of kebab, piss, and horseshit, with top notes of hot garbage¹.
• Also, I went to a class recently and was plotting with the instructor about starting a queer knitting circle (for all skill levels). Are you interested in joining? Get in touch with me!
• The most exciting news is that my preferred bodega has a new cat. He is a little teen guy, and it was all over once he realized I was down to give him scritches.

And now, some reflections on the Great Indoors.

• I took two baths this past week, which is incredibly unlike me. I am NOT a bath-taker, but on a hot day, it occurred to me that a bath does not have to be scalding. It can be cool! So I took cool baths and felt luxurious. 
• Fruit flies have colonized my kitchen. This is slightly distressing, but more so when I have houseguests, which I have had more frequently as of late. I fully assumed none of the “natural” traps would work, but it turns out that apple cider vinegar with a spritz of dish soap is quite effective! Sorry, fruit flies. I will try to honor your life in some small way.
• So much tidying is just moving stuff from surface to surface. Clearing off the bed to make it. Clearing off the couch to put laundry on the bed to fold. Clearing off dining table to put dishes in the sink. Clearing out the sink to wash dishes. I need to cultivate a more meditative attitude about this, but I think the desire to have a tidy apartment works well enough.

I was lucky enough over the past two weeks to connect and reconnect with several old friends and a few new ones. A summary:

• Alex had her birthday party in McCarren Park a few weeks ago. I always love spending time with her, but this party felt weirdly transformative. I was with my dearest friends; the weather was perfect all day. We were outside for almost 12 hours of it; we ate cake; we played Jenga slightly stoned while blasting Björk and ceding our sweet skin to the mosquitoes; we danced barefoot to ABBA and Cher while eating cold pizza in the darkened park; I looked at Zach and teared up saying I felt like myself; I felt free. Also, Alex’s two-year-old niece kept eating half of a chip and gingerly placed the drooly remains back in the bag.
• Ryan, with whom I went on two dates five years ago but have stayed connected online, posted about making sourdough pretzels in their Park Slope apartment. I, a slut for mooching baked goods, offered to take some off their hands, and we lounged in the park and caught up on the intervening time since our last in-person encounter. It is nice to re-integrate someone you like into your life.
• Tim was in New York and came over to sit on my fire escape, eat Chinese takeout, and absolutely thrash me at cribbage. Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ. And Tim and I are certainly each other’s fools. Come back any time.
• I worked the reunion at Barnard, and despite the ungodly hours, it was nice to get face time with colleagues, some I had never talked to in my two years at my job. Julia, welcome to my newsletter; it was especially nice to talk to you for 10+ hours a day for three days running. The trauma of being raised Catholic is a bonding ritual almost immediately. Also, my reference to Steve Reich’s Clapping Music landed with someone almost immediately, which was borderline erotic.
• Madison and I have been friends online for God knows how long, probably because I slid into her DMs with some choir geek bullshit, but we finally had an extended hang in person at Guevara’s and Mike’s Coffee Shop², and God, isn’t it weird to find people that you’re so similar to but just different enough that you delight each other? What are we doing on Earth if not to delight each other? Isn’t that enough?
• Sophie and I spoke way too loudly about sex and love at Calexico and the playground on 5th Avenue in Park Slope until the rats got too cocky, and we felt endangered. As always, thank you for listening.
• After two years, I finally had dinner at Alexandra and Jessie’s and met their sweet dog son Bruegger³. Regardless of my situation, I always feel so safe in the presence and home of couples who you can tell really love each other and have built a life together. And also, when those couples make you an excellent tagine and watch King of the Hill.

My dance card has been quite full recently, which I am pleased about. I am happy alone, know things I like to do and feel whole that way, but it’s nice to have some of the negative space filled in. Speaking with good conversationalists sometimes feels like dancing. This entire shimmery summer thus far feels like an empty table of opportunity, and there’s some unfinished puzzle on it that I have the pleasure to work on with no pressure of completion. The people I know best and the things I like to do are the edge pieces that scaffold my ability and confidence in new tactics or people. I don’t want to finish it; I don’t think I ever will.

However – as someone prone to overcommitting (read: college years), I’ve taken this silly Da Share Zone meme as a Zen koan.