teetotaling

It is Spring, moonless night…starless and bible-black…The boys are dreaming wicked or of the bucking ranches of the night and the jollyrogered sea…You can hear the dew falling, and the hushed town breathing…Only your eyes are unclosed to see the black and folded town fast, and slow, asleep…And you alone can hear the invisible starfall, the darkest-before- dawn minutely dewgrazed stir of the black, dab-filled sea…Time passes. Listen. Time passes…Only you can hear the houses sleeping in the streets in the slow deep salt and silent black, bandaged night….From where you are, you can hear their dreams.
(Dylan Thomas, Under Milk Wood)

brashly TRASHLY (image: courtesy Modern Drunkard Magazine)

Oh, the Good ‘Ole Nights of nihilism, liquor and lingerie. Oh…LAST NIGHT(!?)…UM. So maybe “after hours” NYC isn’t as Milk Wood-quaint. But srsly people, boozin’ isn’t ALL THERE IS late, LATE at night. And “after hours” memories are crisper, the drier they are.

Late night, Scrumpyless scenesters can peruse at Bleecker Bob’s Golden Oldies Record Shop (open till 3am weekends), bowl at The Gutter (open till 4am), gormandize at various evening establishments, or consider the aforementioned Wifi cafes–including Cake Shop’s new and IMPROVED upstairs.

And while it might be unwise to stroll alone at 4am, in-group it might be The Best Time to “get scenic.” Meander unhindered across Brooklyn Bridge, hitch a pre-dawn ride on the Staten Island Ferry or watch the sunrise along the Brooklyn Promenade.

But wherever you wander, remember, night is the world lit by itself, and yet for some, it is often more alive and more richly colored than the day.

(image: courtesy Daring Rocket)

Scrivenista? L Magazine wants your pocket fiction. BLOWING UP on Flickr? Click! Onomastically inclined? Submit a zoonym to Prospect Park Zoo’s kangaroo naming contest. Paralegalizing your pretty face away in a black tower in Money City? Take an actor/dominatrix gig. Musician could-be? Well.

(image: courtesy Fred Lantz @ Second Fret)

Producing under-the-gun for competitions, exhibitions and left-field “gigs” leads to new experiences/people/ideas. It may be best to “cross the river where it’s narrowest,” but in the absence of fragmentary-blackouts, or a robotrip…

we still need excitement, and to occasionally go out on that limb.

Fitness - If it came in a bottle, we’d all have a beautiful body.
(Cher)

It’s time to put the bottles down. It’s time to strut that gut.

I’ve belonged to several Brooklyn gyms, including The Metropolitan Pool and Recreation Center and Slope Health and Fitness, but my taste [somehow] aligns with Gawker’s: The Greenpoint YMCA was The Best.

WHY? I’m an Asocial Gym-goer.

(image: courtesy Franco’s Individualized Training)

An Asocial Gym-goer’s “WHAT TO LOOK FOR IN A GYM” criteria:
1. near home to a) allow for the shortest period of visibility on The Streets in tacky, not quite meant for the gym, default-attire; b) minimize locker room time
2. CHEAP
3. high machine/user ratio
4. almost barren of gym-talk intelligible to English-speaking monolinguists

Had I realized Gawker was at the Y in ‘06, well…

In any case, the shift from mingling in bars and drug dens, to socializing outside of them, means rethinking asocial tendencies.

pole dancing battle scars (image: courtesy Aradia Addicts)

With yesterday’s beer goggles busted off, exercising in mass can be re-seen as “an opportunity for conversation,” so query a directory for gyms that host classes (i.e. Crunch’s nationally-notorious pole dancing), or find standalone classes at a studio (i.e. pilates, martial arts, etc.).

If you’re more into sports than exercise-in-itself, your company/union/neighborhood organization might sponsor a “league.” Otherwise, check the general listings for Amateur and Recreational Sports Leagues in New York City and get in The Game.

When you sit right down in the middle of yourself
You’re gonna wanna have a comfortable chair
So renovate your soul before you get too old cuz you’re gonna be housebound there…

You’d better put some beauty back, while you got the energy

(Ani DiFranco)

Cynicism is almost insurmountable. But, in addition to acting commonly decent, we can IMPROVE THE WORLD, by evaluating what would make it “a better place,” and participating in the execution.

(video: courtesy Giant Elephants Roam, a friend’s not-for-profit formed to bring animation education to prisons and animated films out)

Maybe formal “volunteering” sounds awful, because common youthful “volunteering” experiences are actually INvoluntary, and “philanthropy” is a disillusioning term.

But, in our autonomous NYC adulthoods, we have the freedom to choose to contribute to causes we care about, to work with museums, bike groups, grassroots media, wildlife & domestic animals, the fight against hunger, etc. Or to start something ourselves.

Even for the most friendless, co-dependent serial monogamists among us, the “existential crisis” of being alone need not entail the next horizon of intoxication.

(image: courtesy Not Mr. Right’s blog)

Besides, drugs can affect your appearance, infringing on the quest for the next commitment-phob, or new old friends.

So if you need to escape, but lack an entourage, just take to NYC’s ever-evolving Scenic Sidewalk.

(photo: courtesy The Scenic Sidewalk of art by Swoon)

And make The Best of it; by bike or by foot.

“…so you want to be a rock n’ roll star… then listen now to what I say, just get an electric guitar…take some time and learn how to play…”
(The Byrds)

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
(Aristotle)

Don’t toss yourself out!

Consider enrichment. Consider the amassing of “mad skillz.” NYC’s overrun with experts. Let ‘em school you, in [special interest] NIGHT CLASS. For, “…the educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.”

Try increasing your literacy in foreign languages, your international awareness and your hire-ability [aka "higher abilities"] in this economic storm; bone up on digital photography techniques for upcoming opportunities like Brooklyn Museum’s crowd-curated exhibition Click!; learn to cook and eat better, experiment with life drawing, practice acting and meet charismatics [not the religious kind, though maybe those too].

The Gist: The better-honed your crafts under expert tutelage, the greater number of opportunities for putting your abilities to use, and your increased capacity for satisfaction.

PLAN: TONIGHT [the politically agnostic aspiring teetotalers among us] will cease the bad faith of The Alcoholically Apolitical Act (i.e. puking on SUV tires v. campaigning). TONIGHT we will [re]consider the upcoming election, etc.

(image: courtesy Roger J. Wendell)

As for involvement with the ever-climatic democratic primaries, there’s still time to participate. An [Obama] NYC-to-Rhode Island caravan leaves tomorrow (310 West 43rd Street between 8th and 9th at 7am; and Tuesday 6am), and you can zip-code query for events in your neighborhood on Obama’s and/or Hillary’s websites.

Those seeking other kinds of political affiliation can support or attend activities hosted by

• The Independent Movement
• The New York Metro Alliance of Anarchists
• John McCain
• Ralph Nader
• Briane Moore (and the Socialist Party of New York City)
• The Loyalist Party

et. al.

But it’s time to consider political INVOLVEMENT as-an-activity, because “politics is the art of controlling your environment.”