Kansas City to Memphis town, Arkansas on down; Come on into Mary's kitchen if you want your sausage ground"
Old Crow Medicine Show, 'Mary's Kitchen'
The work crew have a tradition. In fact, they have many traditions. Some of these traditions could be somewhat more accurately termed as 'addictions', but this particular example, whilst accommodating to some of those addictions, is very much a tradition. On the evening of Gay Pride Sunday, they rustle up as many folk willing to part with $30 and buy tickets that allow them to join the masses clambering aboard a large floating vessel that circumvents the island of Manhattan, whilst the aforementioned masses extend on the celebration of the day of pride.
It's not a 'quaint' tradition. Not at all like how you all might gather on the anniversary of your Grandma's death to solemnly remember her life. Neither is it equitable to a more joyous annual event like the Jewish festival of Purim. However, it is a tradition and it is annual and they really give the whole thing a (here comes the obligatory Australian cliche) 'A red-hot go!'.
I happened to have the $30 spare, so i purchased my ticket. It wasn't that i was either so certain that i wanted to attend nor certain that i did not, but i am a man who likes to keep his options open. As the evening of truth rolled around, i was somewhat exhausted. Yes, it had been a long weekend at work. Yes it had been an even longer week with The Californian in town for it's duration. Yes, we had argued like demented, sun-stricken geriatrics on some beach in Miami. Yes, we had argued well into the wee hours of Sunday morning. And yes, i had just completed the dreaded Brunch Shift with it's head-numb, lemming-like, pimple-ridden, decaf-drinking, fuck -wit customers. However, it wasn't so much a physical exhaustion thing as apposed to a general apathetic lethargy to levity. But my friends, The Hipster Mexican and The Israeli Cowgirl, managed to led the way (in their matching canvas slippers)to the meeting point for all ticket holders - 6 floors up, on the Greenwich shoreline, overlooking the whole Gay Pride mess.
There was booze, there was drugs. There were men, there were women. There was someone's elderly(ish) parents in from Australia for the weekend. There was blaring dance music. There were aqua coloured trousers, there were white sailor hats. There was a overcrowded patio and there was even a tattooed woman who, rumour has it, enjoys the odd bit of public-display-sex. Basically, everything one needs to get a party started.
And then the Ukrainian whipped out her nipples. I believe the intention was to show the draggingly slow rate that her previously pierced nipples were returned to their unmutilated glory, now that she had chosen to remove the actual metal sitting in (through?) it. So, off came the boob-tube and out came those ample Chicken Kievs. Poor innocent Katie (so innocent that she does not deserve a 'Hersh in the City' nickname) fought every 'I'm disgusted but i can't look away' urge to peer down at them. But the temptation grew too strong and she allowed the most instant of glances at The Ukranian's glory and then shot her eyes away from Ground-Zero as fast as an illegal African vendor on Canal St. running from the cops.
Something told me it was now time to leave. It's not that i don't like drink and drugs, nor am i not impartial to sailor hats and blaring music. Hell, i even don't mind the odd bit of visiting-from-OZ-parent thing. But as i said earlier, i was just spent. There's no need to look deeper into it other than Hersh in the City wanted to be Hersh in Bed.
Now, here's what i wanted to say Miss Ukraine : I don't want to hear your 'so cliche it may have been scripted by a Housewives of New Jersey writer' guilt trips. They just don't work! So just let me fade off into the background and back behind that stage curtain into my private world of calm. It's not a slight on what you guys got going on, it's just that I'm old way before my time. and really feel like me time.
So, off home..............once i find my way out of this rainbow-flag festival, blocking off the next 25 odd blocks between me and my destination.
It's not a 'quaint' tradition. Not at all like how you all might gather on the anniversary of your Grandma's death to solemnly remember her life. Neither is it equitable to a more joyous annual event like the Jewish festival of Purim. However, it is a tradition and it is annual and they really give the whole thing a (here comes the obligatory Australian cliche) 'A red-hot go!'.
I happened to have the $30 spare, so i purchased my ticket. It wasn't that i was either so certain that i wanted to attend nor certain that i did not, but i am a man who likes to keep his options open. As the evening of truth rolled around, i was somewhat exhausted. Yes, it had been a long weekend at work. Yes it had been an even longer week with The Californian in town for it's duration. Yes, we had argued like demented, sun-stricken geriatrics on some beach in Miami. Yes, we had argued well into the wee hours of Sunday morning. And yes, i had just completed the dreaded Brunch Shift with it's head-numb, lemming-like, pimple-ridden, decaf-drinking, fuck -wit customers. However, it wasn't so much a physical exhaustion thing as apposed to a general apathetic lethargy to levity. But my friends, The Hipster Mexican and The Israeli Cowgirl, managed to led the way (in their matching canvas slippers)to the meeting point for all ticket holders - 6 floors up, on the Greenwich shoreline, overlooking the whole Gay Pride mess.
There was booze, there was drugs. There were men, there were women. There was someone's elderly(ish) parents in from Australia for the weekend. There was blaring dance music. There were aqua coloured trousers, there were white sailor hats. There was a overcrowded patio and there was even a tattooed woman who, rumour has it, enjoys the odd bit of public-display-sex. Basically, everything one needs to get a party started.
And then the Ukrainian whipped out her nipples. I believe the intention was to show the draggingly slow rate that her previously pierced nipples were returned to their unmutilated glory, now that she had chosen to remove the actual metal sitting in (through?) it. So, off came the boob-tube and out came those ample Chicken Kievs. Poor innocent Katie (so innocent that she does not deserve a 'Hersh in the City' nickname) fought every 'I'm disgusted but i can't look away' urge to peer down at them. But the temptation grew too strong and she allowed the most instant of glances at The Ukranian's glory and then shot her eyes away from Ground-Zero as fast as an illegal African vendor on Canal St. running from the cops.
Something told me it was now time to leave. It's not that i don't like drink and drugs, nor am i not impartial to sailor hats and blaring music. Hell, i even don't mind the odd bit of visiting-from-OZ-parent thing. But as i said earlier, i was just spent. There's no need to look deeper into it other than Hersh in the City wanted to be Hersh in Bed.
Now, here's what i wanted to say Miss Ukraine : I don't want to hear your 'so cliche it may have been scripted by a Housewives of New Jersey writer' guilt trips. They just don't work! So just let me fade off into the background and back behind that stage curtain into my private world of calm. It's not a slight on what you guys got going on, it's just that I'm old way before my time. and really feel like me time.
So, off home..............once i find my way out of this rainbow-flag festival, blocking off the next 25 odd blocks between me and my destination.
