NEW YEAR'S EVE ALL RIGHT

In the Spring of 1969 my teenage sweetheart's mother was dating a Chilean pianist. One Friday evening the two adults left the brunette cheerleader in charge of the house and after she put her younger brother to bed, I came over for a study session. An hour at the books was our passport to a heavy petting session, while listening to WBCN, Boston's hip FM station playing the Ultimate Spinach, Grateful Dead, Ike and Tina Turner, and anything considered unplayable by the AM channels.

Janet and I were into the Jefferson Airplane, although she was more SURREALISTIC PILLOW, while I loved the uncommercialism of AFTER BATHING AT BAXTER'S, whihc was the only rock LP in our town library.

She turned off the lights. The couch was draped with the folds of vaarying darkness and we explored the mysteries of the human body to Jack Cassady's bass on SPARE CHAYNGE. Janet fought off my hands's roaming below her waist and we surrendered our bodies to the ancient tradition of dry humping to presserve our virginities. While we might not have had sex in its purest form, on several occasions we had come close enough to have achieved the Second Immaculate Conception.

Lying on her couch in the afterglow of our ardor, we lay tight in a loving embrace. Janet planned on a career in nursing. My father was pushing for me to be a doctor like his father, but I had my doubts. I told them to nobody. In truth I just wanted to lay with Janet and listen to rock and roll.

JJ Johnson was spinning records on the pre-midnight shift.

Teenagers around Boston depended on the black DJ's taste to determine our cool and JJ Johnson cued up Velvet Underground's ROCK AND ROLL with an intro monologue, "Here's BEGINNING TO SEE THE LIGHT by Andy Warhol's darlings, the Velvet Underground, and nothing says New York City like them."

The song opened with a strumming guitar riff and Lou Reed singing the title twice. I stiffened with delight, because the Velvet's lead singer was addressing my questions on life.

"Well I'm beginning to see the light.
Well I'm beginning to see the light.
Some people work very hard,
But still they never get it right.
Well I'm beginning to see the light.
Well I'm beginning to see the light.
Now I'm beginning to see the light."

I had no idea what the light was.

"What's wrong?" Janet nuzzled my neck

"Nothing." It was a lie.

Just like saying I was going to be a doctor. I wanted more and that more was to live in New York. and a year later I broke up with Janet right before her senior prom. That song echoed in my ears every day.

"Beginning to see the light."

My move to New York took until 1976 and I spent my first years at CBGBs, Max's, Hurrah, Studio 54, the Mudd Club, and the Jefferson, an afterhour club on East 14th Street. I had run into Lou Reed, who was in hiding as were the other members of the Velvet Underground, for they had abandoned fame for anonymity and I gave up on ever meeting them, then New Year's Eve 1987 I was drinking industrial strength cough syrup with a bunch of friends on West 10th Street. THe small Christmas tree was burning in the fireplace. It was 14 degrees outside. The blaze wasn't much worked to stave off the draughts from the windows.

The TV was tuned to Dick Clark in Times Square.

1987 had ten minutes left on the clock.

David Russell, Vickie, Barney and I were having a lovely time. We weren't expecting any other guests, since only the wicked can handle the deepest of night, which was blacker than a teenage girl's living room an hour. Everyone was where they were supposed to be on New Year's Eve, but not everyone.

Two minutes before the door opened for a familiar face. John Cale, the Velvet Underground's exiled organist entered the apartment fucked up as only a demi-rock god can be fucked up. The legendary musician said nothing, as he walked across the room to pick up the codeine bottle. In one go he chugged half the cough syrup and then puked into a trash can.

"And it was alright." The line came from SWEET JANE. I liked it even better than BEGINNING TO SEE THE LIGHT. I missed Janet. She was married with two kids. Her husband was a town cop. They made a nice couple.

The pianist wiped his mouth and gave us each a monster line of cocaine.

Real cocaine.

"Merry New Year." John Cale walked to the fireplace and pissed on the ashes of a Christmas fire before leaving without saying goodbye.

Once the blow burned out, the cough syrup took over us.

We nodded out to the aroma of Cale's pee.

It smelled like rock and roll, which was why first I had come to New York.

"And it was all right."

And I hope it was all right with Janet too.

To listen to ROCK AND ROLL

JUST ANOTHER NIGHT 2014

Last night was New Year's Eve.

A redheaded poetess phoned to invite me to a 20-something party in Bushwick.

"You'll be the oldest man there." Irene was going solo.

"Almost three times older." We were just friends.

"I think of you as 16." She had seen me being silly on more than one occasion.

"I like to think of myself as 15." I was really immature when it came to watching sports in a New York City.

I hated Jets fans and Ranger fans were no bargain.

"You're much older than that, plus most of the 'boys' at this party act like ten year-olds." Irene liked older men. She was 26, but still more than two times younger than me in actual years.

"I know." Even thirty year-old men were more like teenagers. Nothing had ever happened in their lives. It wasn't their fault, however the lack of life experience angered them upon hearing my monologues of 'back then'. "I'll think about coming."

"It's just another night and you've had plenty of those." Irene was wiser than her years. She was only foolish in love.

Same as me.

I hung up and returned to watching ZATOICHI THE BLIND SWORDSMAN. I was episode 23 of the TV series. The blind masseur gambled with cheats. He scammed them one by one. They paid with their honor. The sun was setting over Brooklyn. Two bottles of wine were in my fridge. I could take one to the party. It didn't start until 9.

After the end of episode 26 TRAVELING ALONE I decided to go out. I hadn't left the house on South Oxford for over a day. The night wasn't as cold and I walked down to Mullanes. Will was behind the bar. The bearded bartender had gone out on a date with Irene. They had had a good time.

"What will you drink?" asked the Islander fan.

"A Six Point Lager." It was made in Red Hook. "And put on the Bruins-Fishmen hockey game."

"Sure thing."

Will left at 7. The face-off was at 7:05. The Bruins had a 1-0 lead by the end of the 1st period. I know no one in the bar. Most everyone was stuffing their faces. The two young men beside me spoke with Valley Girl accents. They drank Chablis. I texted Irene that I was staying home.

"Love."

She liked an economy of words.

I went home and cooked a pasta of bacon, mushrooms, and gruyere with a butter-garlic-olive oil sauce.

At 8 I called Thailand.

My daughter was having her 10th birthday. Her mother sounded happy. Angie never speaks with me on the phone.

"Tell her I love her."

"She knows that."

Next I phoned Fenway's mom. Our kids were having a good time with fireworks in Ban Nok. None of them wanted to speak with Pa-Pa. I was on the other side of the world.

"Love you," I told Mam.

"I love you too." We haven't seen each in a year.

2013 was a tough one.

I hung up and poured myself a glass of wine.

ZATOICHI drank sake. He killed yakuza by the hundreds. 9-8-3 made up the word 'yakuza'. It added up to a losing hand in hana-fuda. 2013 was 6. Six or Liù meant wealth in Chinese. Its Cantonese annunciation 'lok' signifies a drop.

2013 was certainly a drop in wealth in my life.

I had another glass of wine, then Wikipedia solicited a donation.

I use that website everyday. It saves me a trip to the Main Library on 5th Avenue. I wasn't hitting the bars tonight. Frank's Lounge was asking $20. I gave Wikipedia a little more.

At midnight I heard the fireworks from the river.

I ate a chocolate and finished my wine.

It was the end of my second glass.

ZATOICHI killed some more yakuza. They were bad men.

I felt good about giving money.

2014 added up to 7.

7 was good luck in every language.

ZATOICHI knows that.

To see Zatoichi, Flashing Sword Cut, please got to the following URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0m09S48JSK4

Kicking Off The New Year 2007

After New Year's Day of 2008 my 'wife' packed the car with Angie, Champoo, and her fat sister for the return drive to Chai-nat. Her week stay for Xmas had been torture. My every word was ignored with visible disdain. She told my daughter that I was a worthless drunk. My young daughter and I celebrated her birthday together. Angie refused to choose sides and cried getting in the car.

I hugged my daughter and said, "I'll see you soon."

Chai-nat was a five-hour bus ride from Pattaya. My online site for selling fake F1 merchandise required daily attention, but I had come to Thailand to be with Angie and not flog second-grade copies to brainless racing fanatics in the Occident.

"You take care?" Angie's mom spoke little to no English. The former factory worker considered farangs 'so-kapok' and only one step above Arabs. Thais have a very high opinion of themselves and their country. Their chauvinism was not misplaced, for the Thailand was the France of the Far East.

"I'll be fine." I kissed my daughter good-bye. Her mother and I had not been intimate since before her birth. Our sole connection was our daughter and she had said on more than one occasion that Angie wasn't mine. Murder constantly paced the corridors of my mind and her slightest touch could lead to a stranglehold. Accordingly we maintained a defensive distance whenever we were close.

The Toyota backed out of the driveway. Angie waved from the backseat. She had my mother's smile, crooked teeth and all. I swallowed a lump and went inside my rented house to open a can of beer. It was twenty-three minutes short of noon.

I thought about calling Angie's mom to come back, but my words had lost their magic.

They had a full tank of gas and 2500 baht. More than enough to last two days, but if I've learned one thing in Thailand, "It's never enough."

The beer tasted of irony on an empty stomach. I was once more being deserted to my own devices in Pattaya. Nu's ex-boyfriend had disappeared from Pattaya weeks ago. Pi-et was no magician and the main prop for his vanishing act had been a bus north. Chai-nat lay in the same direction.

I turned the TV onto Fox News. Bill O'Reilly was praising GW Bush for saving America after 9/11. I finished the beer and threw the empty at the TV. The cheap aluminum didn't even scratch the screen.

As I got up for another beer, my mobile phone vibrated on the coffee table. The volume of the ringing was turned down to avoid unwanted phone calls during Nu's stay. My wife suspected the worst and a woman was never wrong about a man. I answered the phone

It was Mint. 22 years old, thin as a runway model, and convinced that I could never love her.

"Is she gone?"

"Back to Chai-nat."

"And her 'feend'."

The Thai word for lover sounded very much like friend.

"Yes."

"We have to talk," she said in English. She didn't watch farang movies, so that statement must be universal in every language. The topic had few options.

"About what?" Mint and I had been lovers for over a year, but we had never spent a night in bed together. We were pure afternoon or early evening.

"I tell you when I see you." She shared an apartment on Jomtien Beach with a gay friend. Glai was very jealous of our relationship. The hustler liked it better when I had been a customer. Mint felt the opposite.

"Can't you tell me now?"

I pondered the subject of our conversation.

If Mint wanted to leave me. No problem. She was young. I was ancient. Her old 'friends' called at all times of the day. She never picked up the phone, while we making love.

"No. Not now. I see you. I tell you."

If you can't say it over the phone, then it wasn't about money, although Mint wasn't greedy, despite having two kids. They cost money. I gave what I gave. It also was never enough. I could see #2 leading right to #1.

Mint probably had another boyfriend to bankroll her life. She was an ace at pretending desire. Her faithful clientele from her years on Soi 6 and the Mona Lisa Massage in Bangkok were legion. She juggled her time with us like a crap shooter hoping for the best roll, however she had been slinging snake-eyes for the past few months.

We were more than lovers.

I drove my scooter down the back roads to Jomtien. The vanishing wetlands behind Jomtien Beach put a good distance between my house and Mint's apartment, diminishing the possibility of my wife and Mint running into each other. I hated confrontations.

Pattaya was attracting thousands of long-timers. Coconut plantations were giving way to holiday villas.

By the time I reached Thraprassit Road, the sun had burnt through the morning haze. The cold front had sputniked down from Siberia. Thai beach-goers were reveling in the sea. Russians waddled out of 7/11 with ice creams. It was a too nice a day to hear goodbye twice.

I turned off the Beach Road and rolled up to her semi-abandoned apartment building hearing the start of the Doors' 'THE END' like this scene was the beginning of APOCALYPSE II. Mint sat on a stool. She was wearing a loose dress. A bottle of beer was on the table.

The two glasses had ice in them.

"You want drink?" She averted looking in my eyes.

"Yes." Beer protected me from everything.

She poured beer into the two glasses. Neither of us took a sip. Mint had her hands folded on her lap. I sat down and asked, "What is it?"

"I'm pregnant." She lifted do-it-yourself pregnancy test. Two red lines indicated mint was carrying another life. I had thought her recent extra weight coming from beer.

"Pregnant?" I was old enough to be Mint's father, who's actually two years younger than me.

"Yes. Two months. It is yours."

"Mine." Two months ago had been Loy Krathong. I distinctly recalled a long afternoon in bed. The math worked out to 1+1=3.

"I not go with other man."

"I know." I wasn't brought up to accuse a woman of entrapment. It wasn't like I was the pick of the crop. "A baby."

"Chai." Her morning sickness and expanding belly should have been signs of impending fatherhood. I was too absorbed in my problems to notice the obvious.

"A baby."

Walking was easy in Thailand. Marriages dissolved like sugar in the rain. Men were free to come and go as the wind. Women were glad to see them go too. Mint was well aware of her position. The father of her two children had left her penniless at 18. Her beauty had saved them from starvation. I lifted her head with two fingers. Tears dotted the corners. She had been here before, but not with me.

"Two months."

"Chai." She was expecting a repeat of bad luck. Men ran from a woman in her situation. Thai and farang. Pattaya was the Last Babylon. It was every man for himself.

"What you want to do?"

"I want have baby." Mint wanted to make me happier. She was too crazy to do that all the time, but she had heard the sadness in my voice, as I told her about Angie. Her mother had signed the name of the father to Pi-et. The Thai authorities would never reverse that signature.

Mint wanted to have the baby. She wanted it to be mine.

"She be cute."

"That's the truth." Looks were the least of our problems.

"How do you know it's a girl?" She certainly had not done an ultra-sound.

"Old lady see my neck and say if blood move up and down sure to be girl." Mint indicated a pulsing vein on her neck. "Old lady say maybe I have two."

"Twins?" 30 seconds was not enough time to digest the first news let alone the second.

"Not sure. What you want do?"

Abortion was out of the question. It was illegal in Thailand and while I accepted the freedom of choice for a woman, I was old-fashioned enough to regard every life as sacred.

"If it's a boy, can I chose the name?" I was a 55 year-old American living in Thailand. Going back to the States was not in the books.

"Yes. What about your wife?"

"We were never married." Her numerous betrayals had cancelled that wedding.

"I not want be mia noi." Her smile was half-hearted. The second wife or mia noi usually ends up standing in the rain outside the house of her child's father. Thai TV soaps loved that scene.

"You won't be a mia noi." I couldn't guarantee how her countrymen would view her, but Angie and her mother were living up-country. They weren't coming back. My cash flow was threatened by the global slow-down. The big house in Pattaya was an unnecessary expense. Two families were an obligation for a real man. Jomtien had the beach. Mint and I could live small.

"You and me will be one."

"I not want much." Not much sounded good today. Much would be spoken later, because kids cost money.

"Only me." I felt good saying it. Believing it was not as easy, but Mint held my hand and said, "Only you, me, and babies."

And I wouldn't have it any other way.

You never do when there's only one choice.

For better.

Never worst.

I wasn't going anywhere, if I could help it.

Seven months later we had a child.

My son Fenway.

He's no girl.

Journal Entry - December 31 1977

The last day of 1977.

365 days.

The most important; moving from Boston, Libbie's rejecting me, Ro's leaving for hours before I arrived in New York in a semi-stolen car, and staying her no matter what. I was never going back to the Selma of the North.

On the 7th Avenue Line

I hit bed in the SRO early. The radio was on. The announcer said it was twenty to five. I had missed the stroke of twelve. New Year's at CBGBs. Five vodkas fucked me up....I lay on my whirling bed, wishing the mattress had handles.

New Year's Eve 2007 Pattaya

On the afternoon of December 31, 2007 heavy lorries, pick-up trucks and 125cc motorcycles with sidecars exited from the distributor at the end of my soi with thousands of beers every minute. Thousands of Thai and farang tourists were flocking into the city for the year's final drunk in the beach resort's countless bars, go-gos, hotels, and brothels from Jomtien to Naklua.

"What are you doing tonight?" Sam Royalle asked on my porch in the shade of a Norfolk pine. He had been out the previous night with our friends and couldn't remember coming home. His skin exuded a sheen of excess alcohol.

"Nothing." I planned on avoiding the debauch in the Last Babylon and falling asleep before the TV during a Star Trek ENTERPRISE marathon. The mozzies from the swamp in the backyard will party with my feet during my unconscious state.

Nothing?"

"Sounds good to me." I had worked in nightclubs through the 70s, 80s, and 90s. My fellow workers referred to 12/31 as 'amateur's night' and the same stupid behavior of fights, accidents, and stupid conversations held as true for Pattaya as it did in New York, London, Paris, or LA. "I'm giving it a miss. My wife is going out with her friends though, so I get to care back of my daughter. We're going to watch the fireworks from my garden."

"Have a party." Sam was a family man and understood kids came first. He drove off my his scooter in the direction of home.

My wife left the house at 8:30 without any good-byes. Angie didn't care. She and I had KFC and played rodeo on the bed. We had a glass of Pepsi and watched some more Star Trek. It put both of us to sleep before 10. I was dead sober.

I heard the fireworks and tried to open my eyes.

Not a chance.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.

What has happened to my wickedness?

Children. Tonught was Angie's birthday. I was gratefull for her in my life.

They tend to rescue a bad man's soul.

Better them than the devil.

JUST ANOTHER NIGHT 2014

From 2014

Last night was New Year's Eve.

My redheaded poetess friend Irene phoned to invite me to a 20-something party in Bushwick.

"You'll be the oldest man there." Irene was going solo.

"Almost three times older." We were just friends.

"I think of you as 16." She had witnessed my silliness on more than one occasion.

"I like to think of myself as 15." I was really immature when it came to watching sports in a New York City. I hated Jets fans and Ranger fans were no bargain.

"You're much older than that, plus most of the 'boys' at this party act like ten year-olds." Irene liked older men. She was 26, but still more than two times younger than me in actual years.

"I know." Even thirty year-old men were more like teenagers. Nothing had ever happened in their lives. It wasn't their fault, however the lack of life experience angered them upon hearing my monologues of 'back then'. "I'll think about coming."

"It's just another night and you've had plenty of those." Irene was wiser than her years. She was only foolish in love.

Same as me.

I hung up and returned to watching ZATAOCHI THE BLIND SWORDSMAN, episode 23 of the TV series. The blind masseur gambled with cheats. He scammed them one by one. They paid with their honor. The sun was setting over Brooklyn. Two bottles of wine were in my fridge. I could take one to the party. It didn't start until 9.

After the end of episode 26 TRAVELING ALONE I decided to go out. I hadn't left the house on South Oxford for over a day. The night wasn't as cold and I walked down to Mullanes. Will was behind the bar. The bearded bartender had gone out on a date with Irene. They had had a good time.

"What will you drink?" asked the Islander fan.

"A Six Point Lager." It was made in Red Hook. "And put on the Bruins-Fishmen hockey game."

"Sure thing."

Will left at 7. The face-off was at 7:05. The Bruins had a 1-0 lead by the end of the 1st period. I know no one in the bar. Most everyone was stuffing their faces. The two young men beside me spoke with Valley Girl accents. They drank Chablis. I texted Irene that I was staying home.

"Love."

She liked an economy of words.

I went home and cooked a pasta of bacon, mushrooms, and gruyere with a butter-garlic-olive oil sauce.

At 8 I called Thailand.

My daughter was having her 10th birthday. Her mother sounded happy. Angie never speaks with me on the phone.

"Tell her I love her."

"She knows that."

Next I phoned Fenway's mom. Our kids were having a good time with fireworks in Ban Nok. None of them wanted to speak with Pa-Pa. I was on the other side of the world.

"Love you," I told Mam.

"I love you too." We haven't seen each in a year.

2013 was a tough one.

I hung up and poured myself a glass of wine.

ZATOICHI drank sake. He killed yakuza by the hundreds. 9-8-3 made up the word 'yakuza'. It added up to a losing hand in hana-fuda. 2013 was 6. Six or Li? meant wealth in Chinese. Its Cantonese annunciation 'lok' signifies a drop.

2013 was certainly a drop in wealth in my life.

I had another glass of wine, then Wikipedia solicited a donation.

I use that website everyday. It saves me a trip to the Main Library on 5th Avenue. I wasn't hitting the bars tonight. Frank's Lounge was asking $20. I gave Wikipedia a little more.

At midnight I heard the fireworks from the East River.

I ate a chocolate and finished my wine.

It was the end of my second glass.

ZATOICHI killed some more yakuza. They were bad men.

I felt good about giving money.

2014 added up to 7.

7 was good luck in every language.

ZATOICHI knows that math.

ps Good night Irene.

I've always wanted to say that.

ops The Islanders beat the Bruins 5-3.

Go figure.

To see Zatoichi, Flashing Sword Cut, please got to the following URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0m09S48JSK4

Friends in Our City

After COVID struck, the city closed everything. Mazin and I wandered the shorelines of Manhattan and Brooklyn drinking wine in the desolation of uncertainty. Counting the stars. It was our city. One night we sat at a Williamsburg park on the East River. Across lived his sister and he called her to illuminate the Christmas lights on her top floor terrace. She did and we knew the city was destined to live

Last New Year's Day I met Mazin at PJ Clarkes

Chicken Pot pie

Hmmmm

Back From The Dead 2011

From 2011

My New Year's Eve for 2011 plans were simple and local. Watch the Celtics-New Orleans game at Mullane's followed up by an early beer at Frank's then home to my Fort Greene Penthouse to watch the final sunset of 2011 before getting attire in my evening suit. Nothing says New Year's Eve better than a tux. I polished off a bottle of Cote du Rhone and bid farewell to AP and his wife. They were expecting neighbors to see in 2011.

"Frank's?" AP asked knowing my answer.

"Until 11:30. I'll join you for the countdown. "Is Dick Clark still around?"

"They'll have to flash-defrost him to make it to Times Square." AP will be 50 this coming this month. Most of our new year's countdowns were with the eternal teenager, but not this year. "He's in retirement."

"Damn." Nothing stays the same. It was 10:15. "I'll see you in an hour."

Frank's is a five-minute walk from South Oxford. The bar is a Fort Greene fixture dating back to 1972. The owner was sitting at the first table. I greeted him with warmth.

"Thanks for having me this year." One of the regulars had recently named me 'the White Shaft' after I entered the bar in a long black-green leather coat. To misquote Frank Zappa, "I wasn't black, but sometimes at Frank's, I didn't feel white."

"Glad to have you."

I ordered a beer from Sandy, the bartender, and had a few more. My phone was silent. No one calling from Thailand, the Continent, or America. I was off the radar and commanded another beer. I tipped the bartender the change and drank the beer in the glow of another year of the new century sinking into the past. More than a half-century of last-minute preparation for the new year.

Larry and I toasted the Celtics and Lakers.

"Here's to another championship."

Both of us were predicting a rematch of 2009. My phone buzzed with a text message. Shannon was at his girlfriend's restaurant on DeKalb. I wrote that I'd see him after the countdown and bid good night to everyone at Franks'.

AP buzzed me into his house. We drank two bottles of champagne with his wife and two guests. My phone rang 10 minutes into 2011. My nephew was waiting at Oskars. Same rendezvous as Shannon. I tipped my hat to my landlord.

"See you in the afternoon."

"If not later." AP knew that I was hellbound for drink this evening.

Wine, whiskey, and song until 5am.

Yesterday was a blur in my bed. A burger at Mullane's for breakfast at 3pm and Chinese leftovers at home for dinner. No more booze. No drugs. Only water and it wasn't a cure for my ills. Sleep would help a little and I called Fenway's mother in Sriracha before crashing into my pillows.

"Mao?"

"Not mao." I had recovered from the staggering drunk. "Hang."

"Bad?"

"Bad enough. Love you and call you in the morning."

It was barely 9pm and I had had enough of 2010 to last a lifetime unless the clocks reverse their spin and I'll be ready to relive this New Year's Eve backwards. It's the only way to repair the holes in your soul.

Happy 2011

A Personal Ban On New Year's Eve

Rain pounded the Brooklyn streets in sheets on the last night of 2018. Shannon and Charlotta traveled to a Fellini soiree on Park Slope. I had planned to spend the evening with Doctor Nepola, except on Sunday I discovered my old college friend invitation was for Christmas Eve.

"Opps."

Geoffery invited me to a Lesbian party in Bushwick.

"There might be ten people there."

"Food?"

"Pizza."

"I like pizza, but the only pizza in that neighborhood in Dominos. Drink?"

"Shots of Bourbon."

"Jack Daniels almost killed me in 1970." Foreign consprators had tried to the same to Cary Grant in NORTH BY NORTHWEST.

"It's a ten minute walk from my house. The B54 runs to my corner. That's your bus, right?"

"I'll think about it."

I hung up and popped the cork of a bottle of Frexenet sparkling wine. I liked how Spanish had Xs.

The dawn was breaking on Sri Racha and Wat Singh. I called my children in Thailand. I wished my wives 'Sawadee Pii Mai'.

My daughter was born on January 1. She was named after my mother.

I have loved her from the moment of conception.

Angie's fifteen.

I am lucky to have her in my life.

Same as my son Fenway.

Noy

Noy.

Flukster.

And crazy little Pen.

"You go out tonight?" asked Mem from the other side of the world.

Nu asked the same.

I told them the same thing.

"I'm staying home. Kin Khao Kundeo. Dim Kundeo. Mii Monsoon."

"I hated winter rain.

I phoned Ty Spaulding in Hawaii. We had met in the Himalayas in 1990. He was going to the movies in Honolulu.

I told him about the rain.

I wished it was snow.

I come from Maine.

When I was a young boy, winter was winter.

Not anymore, but no one now wants to hear about the then-before.

"Is it snowing." Ty wasn't a fan of snow.

"Not at all. Rain and lots of it. I'm not leaving the house."

""Harder than Oahu."

"Yes, and colder."

Ty loves his island.

So do I.

What was there not to love about Oahu?

It's New Year's Eve 2019.

The rain has let up.

A half million people awaited the dropping of the ball in Times Square.

I might have seen it once, maybe twice.

I remember being with the Prince of the Night.

Arthur Weinstein.

We were in the MTV control room two stories about Broadway.

A top executive sneered at the hoi polloi below him and Arthur said out the side of his mouth, "Without them you are nothing."

Only the executive and I heard those words.

The exec cringed with rejection.

Arthur's club THE WORLD was the best in the city. He knew cool better than anyone. The executive knew nothing but profit.

The rain stopped tonight.

Hundreds of thousands of people are stuck inside the police cordons.

There is no leaving for security reasons.

Drones float overhead. Cameras studied the crowd. No drinking allowed.

Yet at ten seconds to the new year and the masses count together.

"Five-four-three-two-one." The voices of the people.

Happy 2019.

One and all everywhere in the world.

And I am happy.

Because I am not wet.

Good night and sweet dreams."

New Year's Eve 2009

In 2009 my options for New Year's Eve were three; stay home and watch Dick Clark dribble on his tux, go over to Frank's Lounge, or head up north to bring in 2010 with Andrew Camp and his wife and daughter, a gay couple, and myself.

Being alone on New Year's Eve is dangerous. Drinking with strangers at a Brooklyn Bar could be considered fool-hardy, so I packed my bag and caught the 5.17 Metro-North train to Wassaic. I snorted a few lines in the bathroom to sharpen my anti-terrorist antennae. The few passengers heading north seemed harmless. No beards or turbans. The nearest traveler was reading Kurt Vonnegut's WELCOME TO THE MONKEY HOUSE. He was no threat.

Andrew was waiting at the station. We drove in a snowy darkness to his house south of Millbrook. His wife and daughter were happy to see us. Andrew cooked dinner for us and his gay friends. We drank and laughed at old stories. 2010 was a full moon night. The clouds shrouded the orbiting satellite in ghost drag. We went to bed at 3.

I called my wives in Thailand. 2010 was already fifteen hours old on the other side of the world. One I wished a good year and the other I told that I love her.

How you started off the New Year will determine how you will spend the rest of the year and I started mine by telling the truths, although only because I'm too lazy to lie.

For a related article click on this URL

http://www.mangozeen.com/2009/03/30/new-york/pierre-of-the-plaza-hotel-rip-2008-2009.htm

2015 Amok

Last New Year's Eve I stayed off the streets of New York. Many people call the celebration 'amateurs' night and Joel Goodman's photograph of Manchester's last night of 2015 holiday showed the veracity of that comment in spades.

Drunks everywhere.

The coppers battling drunks.

Drunks strewn across the street.

Ah, 2016 NYE I barely knew you, but I've known other years far too well.

Thank the stars for that.