Words:

[Rosa Naparstek]

Hello, I am a little nervous, well, not nervous, just concerned that, well, I'm going public with "chatter" that may not matter. Oh, for those of you who know me a little, I am somewhat uncontrollable re: rhyming. If I had grown up in an other decade, or two, I know I'd be rapping.
I am right now here in Florida, if I were home, nyc, (the usual me) I probably would not feel justified in sending postcards from my room, but, now on Vacation, well, at least I can say the weather is sunny, cloudy, warm. I am right on the beach, the "Atlantic", my sister had the forsight to get a great place. And it feels like Bermuda, Pepto Bismo pink, yellow, baby blue, mustard yellow stucco....high risers, low risers, with many vacancies due to the high rollers who bought in order to flip and make their fortunes even greater, now stuck with the rest of America but of course, not bearing the same brunt of it.
I do have photos, but don't know how to get them from my camer to my sisters computer to you. HOWEVER,
what I really wanted to write about is how great I think this Idea of Peter F' re: ning thing is. Not only does this give me the opportunity to join in the 21st. Century, and tell my wonderful 18 year old neighbor Anna, that oh yes, I blog, but since I never could stand to write just to myself in a journal, and pretended I was writing letters, or actually made the mistake of writing letters and sending them in leiu of a journal, this will or should be good for me. And well, I think this will or should be great for Artists Unite.
When I first moved to NYC from San Fran, in 1996 to this Wash Hts/Inwood 'hood, all I did was run into artists/musicians at the grocery stores, cleaners, bank, park....but with no real or virtual place for us to meet/be. I collected names, phone numbers and emails. The pile in the little drawer grew. I wanted a directory of all of us....a wonderful little booklet ala the little yellow mini-neighborhod yellow pages (now made worthless by the internet). However...this would take time...and (is still not in existence, on line or off...but more about that another time). Meanwhile, I started a Sunday Salon at Capo Verde, which was a previous incarnation of the Monkey Room on Fort Washington Ave. and 187th. Street. Actully, it wasn't for artists, it was for discussion of "the news". We meet for perhaps almost a year, but most of the talk at the time was about Israel and Palestine, and well, after a while...enough was enough.
I am getting a little off the subject, but then again, isn't a blog just that? I am a little worried, but I am not going to censor myself...not yet anyway. Meanwhile...back to the artists directory! Hmmm. the clouds broke, the sun is out, the ocean is blue with white crests...and the sky is blue with white billows...oh my god, that really is bad. nonetheless, dare to struggle dare to be, let it all hang out? I am not really much of a sun person, or even beach person....but how can I be here, among the palms and beach and sand and actually say, I might actually prefer to be writing to myself, maybe you? It makes me anxious...there may never be this beautiful day again. And when I lived in Berkeley, CA, San Fran, CA, each sunny day forced me out into it...regardless of how much I preferred to stay home and glue this to that....till I finally realized, I was really living in California and it didn't snow and it mostly was mostly wonderful weather most of the time.
Now back to all the artists and musicians. One day at Fort Tryon Park I meet a dancer while I was handing out flyers for some Friends of Fort Tryon Park Event (I've been on their board for years,starting my career as 'hood activist by picking up litter), and she wanted to know what it would take to have a performance in the park. Another dayin the park, I met an artists
who had just moved here and she wanted to know how to have an art fair in the park. I told them it was easy. All you had to do was organize. We three met, and from that arose Artists Unite....with almost three hundred people at our first meeting (gathered via flyers in Wash Hts/Inwood). Here was our directory "live". That was January 2002.
However, despite getting a little $500 grant from the Blumberg Foundation to finally have the directory....(and when I spoke accepting that grant, I went on too long, much too long, about arts in our community and was almost dragged from the non-stage as I am going on much too long now...however, I will not censor myself, just yet....) we were never able to get it done. All my desire for a directory morphed into a major website project, that I worked on through a grant at the Y last year, but that still hasn't happened, and now MOMAA is working on it, and by the way, there will be a mini convention in May to bring all interested parties together to finally create both a website FOR ALL and that Directory of Artists/Musicans....Now this finally brings me to Peter F. Artists Unite president and his ning idea.
Here is the opportunity for Artists Unite to finally Unite. We can all join, meet and greet, have our space/place, our art, connect, cathect...blog/write....Unite All of Us.
Thank you peter, and I hope you all join in....and wish you were here. the water is just the right temperature.
rosa

[Peter Ferko]

Thank you, rosa. Wish I were there, too!

[Stephen]

Thanks Rosa

That's the worst thing about sunny days in California i felt like I ought to be going out and doing something. After a while It wore off and i was content but now it's sunny In nyc aaacckk!

i've become a human doing! guilt over being

I'm reading Eckhart Tolle's latest and his descriptions of the ego has stuck in my consciousness to a degree I'm quite pleased with. As unnerving as it is to notice my addiction to mentation I feel like I'm getting somewhere. Each time i notice it I'm, for that moment, no longer asleep to it.

look see what you started now you got me babbling