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ANTHONY'S ARCHIVES

January - February 2008

-  February 27, 2008 - 

"The Best of Times"

“The Best of Times” occurred at a fantastic party on Sunday February 17, 2008 as Gary and I celebrated our 25th anniversary. Sixty of our dearest friends and family trekked to the Bronx for a gala afternoon.

The guests gathered at Trattoria Zero Otto Nove on Arthur Avenue for home made Pizza Margarita baked in an authentic brick pizza oven by a pizzaiolo direct from Naples. All this was washed down by a very special red sparkling wine called Gragnano from Salenero.  Forty-five minutes into cocktails, a eight-piece band from the Feast of the Giglio in Brooklyn marched into the restaurant and invited the group to parade down Arthur Avenue to Roberto’s Restaurant for dinner.

CLICK HERE FOR A VIDEO CLIP

What a sight this was! An Italian street band leading our family and friends laded down with gifts laughing and clapping in a festive mood all the way around the corner. Pedestrians gawked, patrons stuck their heads out of various ristorante, and cars honked their horns as we strolled down the mean streets of Belmont. My cousin, an avid movie buff, commented that it reminded him of the Sicilian wedding scene from “The Godfather.” He guessed one of my inspirations; the other was the final scene from Fellini’s “8 ½.”

Roberto’s, one of the best restaurants in New York City, was the scene for nine-course Sunday supper and very special presentation. My second inspiration for this part of the evening was the Broadway Revues of the 1950’s that commented on the social scene of the day.  Gary and I welcomed our intimate gathering explaining that the evening program of music of Broadway Show Tunes would reflect aspects of our relationship and comment on our lives together for the past twenty-five years.  The surprise hit of the evening was our opening rendition wish custom lyrics of I Remember It Well from the movie, “Gigi.” There was not a dry eye in the house. 

CLICK HERE FOR A VIDEO CLIP

Four song segments punctuated the many course Italian dinner of hot/cold appetizers, two pastas, risotto, veal and lamb, and desserts. Three Broadway performers sang music by the great composers of Broadway: e.g. Rodger’s Some Enchanted Evening; Styne’s Just in Time; Porter’s Always True to You Darlin' in My Fashion; Gershwin’s They All Laughed and Kern's Don't Ever Leave Me..

The finale ended in a toast to us with a sing-along to the Jerry Herman tune, The Best of Times from “La Cage aux Folles”. This erupted into dancing to the Disco Classics from the 1970’s.  Prosecco and Limoncello and “La Comedia e finita”.  All of our guests received a CD of the Show Tunes perfomed along with traditional Italian Wedding "Confetti."

The warmth and love from our family and friends still fills our hearts.

Gary:      We met at nine

Tony:      We met at eight

Gary:      I was on time

Tony:      No, you were late

Gary:      Ah, yes, I remember it well

               You cruised me dear

Tony:      No you cruised me

Gary:      I sat alone

Tony:      You sat next to me

Gary:      Ah, yes, I remember it well

That dazzling April moon!

Tony:      There was none that night

And the month was June

Gary:      That's right. That's right.

Tony:      It warms my heart to know that you

Remember still the way you do

Gary:      Ah, yes, I remember it well

How often I've thought of that Friday-

Tony:              Monday

Gary:      Night when we had our first rendezvous

And somehow I foolishly wondered if you might

By some chance be thinking of it too?

That taxi ride

Tony:      I walked you home

Gary:      We went upstairs

Tony:      No, you sent me home

Gary:      Ah, yes, I remember it well

We had some rain

Tony:      No, it was fair

Gary:      Those Donna Summer songs!

Tony:      Sung by Cher?

Gary:      Ah, yes I remember it well.

You wore Jeans of Levi blue

Tony:      Chino’s LL Bean

Gary:      Am I getting old?

Tony:      Oh, no, not you

How cute you were

How young and gay

A disco queen

In every way

Gary:   Ah, yes, I remember it well.

Both:      Ah, yes, we remember it well

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-  February 14, 2008 - 

My Funny Valentines

1979

(one of the last pictures taken with my mom)

I guess a boy’s first Valentine is his mother.  In second grade our teacher announced we were going to make Valentine Day cards. Mrs. Morris was one of the few lay teachers at our Catholic grammar school of St. Thomas Aquinas in Brooklyn. She handed out multi-color sheets of construction paper, white paste glue, pipe cleaners, glitter and those funny stubby scissors that couldn’t really cut anything.

I constructed a glittery Valentine for my mom. I was proud of this crude hand-made arts & crafts token of my love for her. I carefully brought it home; pressed flat in one of my schoolbooks. When she wasn’t looking, I placed it on the kitchen table; the 1950's kind of table with chrome legs, flamingo colored Formica top and matching vinyl covered chairs. I sat down at the table and pretended to do my homework.

My mother came back in with a frilly apron on, getting ready to cook our supper, which we promptly ate every night at 5:30 pm. It seemed hours before she noticed the big read heart I had laid out before her. She picked it up and held it at a distance. “What is this? Why, thank you.” She gave me a demure Mona Lisa like smile of disappointment. It took me a few years to figure out that hand made gifts were not as appreciated as store bought ones.

As I grew older, Valentine’s Day found me at the local drugstore. I would go to the card section and pick the biggest flowery card I could find. At that time in the card section, you picked up a sample card sort of sealed on cardboard with a code number on it. You then handed the druggist the sample and he would open the drawer below and hand you the card out of a file with the same number on it. When I got bolder I would go to the drawer myself and select the Valentine. They got more lacey as the years went on, one of them even had a little silk tuft of sachet. Next stop was the candy aisle for a large red, satin heart-shaped box of Russell Stover or Whitman’s candy.  Over at the next aisle was the toiletry section for a bottle of Jean Nate Bath Oil or a round canister of "Evening in Paris" talcum powder. Like the gifts of the Magi, I made these three offerings to my mother from her adoring son. She smiled.

1982

The next serious Valentine is usually your husband or wife. Mine was for my boy friend, Gary. Having learned my lessons, I bought him a Hallmark Peanuts card with Snoopy on the front cover, Teuscher chocolates flown daily from Switzerland and a bottle of Lagerfeld eau de cologne.  I had them displayed on my dresser in my bedroom alcove in my West 83rd Street walk up in Manhattan.  He would be sure to see them as we arrived back after dinner at Forest & Sea Restaurant. We tipsily climbed up the creaky stairs to my fourth floor studio. I unlocked the Police Lock bar of the #4A apartment door and Gary went straight to the bathroom to brush his teeth. I lay coyly on my pink chenille bedspread like a Burt Reynolds Playgirl centerfold. Gary came over kissed me lightly and saw his gifts. He opened them gingerly making sure he folded up the ribbons for future re-wrapping.  I was given that same La Giaconda smile that I remembered from long ago. Hmmm? So I went back to the drawing board. I am a quick learner.

The following year, I wrote Gary a hand written poem that I took a long time to compose.  I dropped it in the post and it arrived as planned on February 14th. I handed him the daily mail and as he went through it, he noticed one was addressed to him. I tried to disguise my scrawl so he wouldn't know it came from me. He opened it and read the missive. He gave me a big Dustin Hoffman - “The Graduate” like grin from ear to ear - this time more Cheshire Cat than Mona Lisa.

I got nothing back that day but his generous smile. That smile funnily enough would stay with me for 25 years ... each day being Valentines Day.

My Funny Valentine

Click

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-  February 4, 2008 - 

Pistachio Nuts!

As you might have guessed, I intend to gather all of these Blog segments into book form. Actually I had the intention to write my life story way back in college. How pretentious! So here is what I wrote in 1972. It was meant to be the first chapter. It is pretty much the way I wrote it with just some minor tweaks.

*****

Pistachio Nuts! Yes, Pistachio Nuts, the red ones, the kind that the color gets all over your hands and mouth.  That’s where it all began – those blasted nuts, a glass milk bottle and a boy.

It happened in Brooklyn, a long time ago. I guess I was ten years old or so, fourth grade; bright and bitchy. Bill was possibly an eight-grader, tall, lean and blonde (the landlady’s son), an eight-grader - practically an adult - someone to look up to. I was called cute with short brown hair, slight widow’s peak and a tiny nose (little knowing it would bloom five years later to a classic Roman schnoz!).

So it happened in Brooklyn. If you blindfolded me and dropped me in any part of Brooklyn, I would instantly know it was Brooklyn. Like Tchaikovsky; I hear two notes of his and I know it’s his music. In this case it's Brooklyn. I don’t what it is – ladies in kerchiefs and pants, men in green work clothes, grubby kids or is it the church on every corner that makes Brooklyn, Brooklyn? I don’t know.

My first childhood memory – correction – my first sexual childhood memory occurred one fine spring day. My mother was pregnant, again. I already had a brother so what next? Bill and I were playing on the stoop in front of our Park Slope brownstone (stoop is Dutch term for the stairs leading up to the front door).

We were playing with our little green plastic toy soldiers (which taste great too if you nibble on them). I was “America” and he was “Japan”, the mysterious East. I would fling my spitballs at his troops and defend our honor. But he had a secret weapon – napalm. He would take out a book of matches and throw fireballs and burn my soldiers, searing them with his flame until they became an ugly blob of green melted plastic. How could America withstand the attack of Japan?

As I said, the time was spring and my pregnant mother, whose acute smell due to her late term, whiffed my burning soldiers from the open window up on the third parlor floor. She leaned out the window and screamed:

“Anthony what the hell are you two doing?

  What’s that awful smell? Playing with matches again?

  Do you want to burn the Goddamn house down?

  I have enough to worry about without having to worry about you!

  What are you doing?”

I yelled up. “We are just playing with our s-s-s-s…

“Shit, can’t you even talk” my mother announced to the entire neighborhood.

“Soldiers!” I cursed back.

But I had them all fooled. I stuttered on purpose. Well that’s how it began. Mommy and Daddy never noticed anything I did   - not my drawing, my homework, my writing, nothing.  But when I did something wrong – WOW I was the center of attention. They would yell, hit me and even fight over me. I did count or why all the bother and fuss. But, but, but my plan didn’t work out so well. Before I pretended to stutter, now it happened beyond my control. My mouth had gone Frankenstein on me. I couldn’t do anything right.

Meanwhile, Bill and I put our soldiers away. Japan was impotent without her flame. I was gonna go up and watch the Howdy Doody Show. It was time, 4:00pm. However Bill said he wanted to show me something. He gave me some more of his pistachio nuts and led me up the fourth floor landing under the roof.

We sat down. It was dark but some light came through the dirty skylight, enough to see what was around me – some empty milk and Coke bottles and Bill in his blue dungarees.  “What’s’ up?” I naively said. Bill smiled. He pulled down his zipper. Thee metallic rip sounded like the roar of a locomotive whizzing down the tracks.  He pulled out his thing and held it. I continued eating pistachio nuts. He reached to my mouth and took a wet, saliva covered empty shell. He placed it on the head of his penis. It looked like a little  soldier with a red helmet – “The House of the Rising Sun”.

He looked into my eyes and I knew what I had to do – the same. I don’t know why, like follow-the-leader. I fumbled with my dungaree buttons. I struggled to get mine out. I thought I lost it. As last it whimpered out. Bill placed a helmet on mine. We touched them. We dueled. My pistachio nut fell off in the heat of battle and it left a red stain on the tip. It looked like a little matchstick.

Bill then grabbed a milk bottle and stuck the head of penis in it  -“pheasant under glass”. The mouth of the bottle moved back and forth over his skin. It was pristine. He never took his eyes off of me as it glided in and out. All of a sudden he sighed and something happened which I couldn’t understand.  He motioned me to try. I tried to do the same; I picked up another milk bottle. I moved mine back and forth following Bill’s instructions. But I gasped in disgust when I saw a roach at the bottom of the bottle. It tried to get my thing out but it was stuck. I pulled hard till it finally came off. I stared down on my red stained penis. Now I was scarred for life I thought.

Leaving Bill sitting Indian-style in the dark hallway, I jumped up and ran down two flights to my apartment. I ran past my mother to the bathroom and slammed the door. I scrubbed and scrubbed trying to get the red pistachio stain off. It was like a stigmata. I rubbed it so raw that it began to hurt so I put some of my mother’s Nivea cream on it. As I came out of the bathroom my mother crinkled her nose and said: “Anthony have you been playing with my lotions again?”   “No Ma!” as I stuck myself in front of our Philco television. Howdy Doody was over. I noticed my fingers were still stained red from the nuts as I sat down Indian-style. I folded my hands underneath my legs to hide them. The William Tell Overture rang out as my heart was beating in fear and delight as fast as those last galloping notes....

“Who was that masked man?”

A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust, and a hearty 'Hi-yo Silver!' The Lone Ranger!

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-  January 28, 2008 - 

Diary of a Country Priest

I discovered my diary written in 1970/71. It was retrieved this past summer from a box in my family’s attic. This was a crucial time in my life. I had been in the seminary for five years and was on the verge of taking vows. I was disenchanted and frustrated in using my talents of directing plays for preaching peace and good will. A big decision had to be made. I am sharing this with you. It is a window onto my soul at that time in my “sentimental education”.  

Note:

The following entries are eactly as written:

**********************************************

Friday, December 11, 1970 – 5pm

Sometimes I feel so very sad. I don’t know why. Wait – I really do but the thought of it makes me so sad – I seek compassion and so I forget it. I am scared of life. What will happen next year? Standing in the bathroom suddenly I shuddered  – “ I am going to die. Then what?”  At times like these all my wildest dreams seem wild, foolish, no longer pleasurable fantasy but a foolish venture. Where do I go? Do I stay? Do I go? I don’t know.

Saturday, December 12, 1970  - 5:30 pm

The joy of having accomplished something is overpowering. I feel like busting out and singing  – so I put on a record and make believe I’m Leonard Bernstein conducting my bookshelf with a Bic pen.  Yet when one does accomplish something we can feel two ways. We can either be so eager to do more or we can completely relax and not want to do a blessed thing until time forces its accomplishment. Right now I have finished a term paper, listing to some glorious Tchaikovsky and just enjoying every God damn minute of it!   

Monday, December 14, 1970 – 7pm    

Well, I’ve done it agai! For some unknowable reason (or some hidden reason which I can’t even acknowledge) I circle in like a hawk and tear my prey to shreds. At times I'm funny like Don Rickles but like Don Rickles the insulting goes just a bit too far - and a great deal beyond that. What really hurts me, beside the fact that I am truly sorry for this way of acting towards a person, is the insincerity in which my friends view my apologies.  I really do mean what I say  - not when I’m insulting though! I am truly sorry and I always resolve to keep watch over my tongue. But sometimes I get carried away and I don’t know how to reconcile myself to my friends, especially ones whom I love dearly and should never act it that manner at any time, for any reason.  I am a fool.

Wednesday, January 6, 1971  - 2pm

Funny today is the Epiphany, and I decided to leave the seminary. I’m scared, very scared; not about what I’ve chosen but how to execute the future. I know I want to enter drama, movies or TV. I think TV is a good, solid starting place. I’ll be leaving my friends and that is what scares me. I don’t want to be alone. I want people to love and people to care for me. Am I capable of living alone, out there? Why has God cursed me? If I didn’t have my friend Charley, I don’t know where I would be. At least I can be reasonably sure that I am loved. But can a girl love me, or more to the point, could I love her? I don’t want to be alone!  I have been hiding here for too long!  I know what I want and I must do it.  But oh God, what lies ahead in the darkness. If only I could see!

Wednesday, June 9, 1971 – Noon

Well, it’s been a long time; so much has happened as a matter of fact, a hell of a lot. Why the gap? I think I was so involved with Hadrian VII (a play that I directed as my swan song at the seminary) that nothing else mattered. Now everything matters. I have left the seminary. Actually, factually, I have closed the door on that span of my childhood. I am now a young man who must face up and grow. Everything is happening too very fast - Everything at once. I have left.  I face the world.

I love! Yes a new love, (I had met a man who did makeup on the production I just directed) but now the possibilities are open,. It is no longer a dead end street. At least I now have a chance to love and be loved.  This person is wonderful, beautiful, and plainly fantastic. As always however, I am scared of no response on the others part.

“Being in Love” is only half of my romantic dream.  I have been in love – many times but here is another half – their loving me. All the past loves were petty and flirt. This one, only 1-½ months old, is mature and warm and sincere. It’s just that will the person love me? Can I “win” their love?

Love, Love, Love. How I hate that word.  How I love it. Without it would be banality, with it - storm, exciting spring rain. Pour on me - Pour!   Pour!  Pour!

             *********

“Years from now when you talk about this - and you will - be kind. ...”

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-  January 21, 2008 - 

"I Had a Dream "

In January 1969, I was in my second semester as a junior at St. Joseph’s Seminary. Located in Yonkers, Dunwoodie as it was also known, was the university to study at if you wanted to be a priest for the Archdiocese of New York.  It was also known as the West Point of seminaries for its strict rules, classic curriculum and educational regimen.  If you drive across the Cross County Parkway in Westchester from east to west, the castle like turrets spring up over a hill as you approach the Thruway. I used to sing “Camelot!’ as I sped up the hill in my Fiat 500.

I entered the seminary for humanistic reasons more than theological or deistic ones. I was going to change the world and help my fellow mankind – this is in the nascent days of the Vietnam protest and the era of peace and love. I thought I could use my great love of theatre and talent as a director in my ministry - harking back to the days when Mystery Plays were performed to teach the faithful.  In time I discovered that the church did not see this as a viable teaching tool.  I did get to direct plays at the seminary though and produce a children news show on ITV, the station of the Archdiocese.  RCA had donated to St. Joseph’s the color television studio they had at the 1964 World’s Fair.  Maybe the C in RCA stood for Catholic!

For my public speaking class, I prepared a short speech on the poetry of TS Eliot.  The date set for my delivery was January 15, 1969.  There was a movement afoot to make that date a Federal holiday in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. who had been assassinated the year before. A few miles away in North Tarrytown, 1,500 employees of the Ford Motor Plant were planning to take the day off in protest if their factory did not close in King’s honor. 

A few of us seminarians approached the Dean of Discipline to ask if we could suspend classes for the day and commemorate Dr. King with readings and meditations. . A flat NO was the response.  We were very angry at this response but as powerless as the plebes at West Point.

But I had a plan and it would also get me out of having to give a speech, which I was dread to give due to my stuttering. So far my speech impediment was undiscovered but I was fully aware that it was against Canon Law to ordain a priest with this handicap. This sword of Damocles would hang over my head to the very end of my seminary days.

January 15th arrived. I went to class and sat through fellow classmate speeches on the “Influence of St. Helen’s mother-love on her son, Constantine the Emperor”;  “Jesus: the message was the medium” and the “Song and Second Vatican Council.” (which gave us “kumbaya”). The countdown to shame came up to my number.  I walked up the lectern to deliver mine: “The use of time in the poetry of TS Eliot.” I gave the class and my professor a hard stare. I dramatically threw down a copy of my speech to the floor. I said in a very loud voice (this helps in not stuttering) - “I am not giving my speech today in honor of Martin Luther King Jr.!” I walked quietly out of the class. My professor was as speechless as I was.

The next day I was called into the Rector’s office and given a scolding on not conforming and being a radical. As a further example, he pointed out I was wearing brown penny loafers (bought on 8th St. in Greenwich Village) and not the regulation black ones to match my black pants and shirt with Roman collar.  I was silent. I was sent to the chapel to pray and meditate on my transgressions. I went to my room instead and read “Soul on Ice” by black author, Eldridge Cleaver. Meanwhile sixty autoworkers were suspended that day and so was my dream of becoming a priest.

It is a cold and frigid, Monday January 21, 2008 - Martin Luther King Day. I am sitting at my desk at work over looking Times Square, typing this. As I look down at my Allan Edmonds brown penny loafers, I laugh ironically - the Briggs Office is open for business...

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Langston Hughes

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-  January 14, 2008 - 

The June Briggs Awards at Sardi's

January 8, 2008 was a grand night for singing at the 6th Annual June Briggs Awards for Excellence for Destination Management Services in New York City.  I re-wrote the lyrics to Stephen Sondeim's "I'm Still Here" from his Broadway musical, Follies. They reflect the changes that have occured in our city over the past 35 years.

We're Still Here!

Good times and bum times,

We’ve seen them all, and my dear,

We’re still here.

Plush Lutece sometimes,

Sometimes a McSoreley’s beer,

But we’re here.

Luchows and Lundys,

No Sunday booze..

Rainbow and Stars

No more blues,

Seen all Yorkville disappear,

But we’re here.

(Marta Cooper)

Slept at the Plaza,

Now where does Eloise play?

But we’re here.

Barbizon Plaza,

One hundred dollars a day,

But we’re here.

Played for the Dodgers

Brooklyn’s best,

Urban Renewal

Did the rest.

In the 70’s were we depressed?

Nowhere near!

Now Brooklyn’s got the Nets

So let’s cheer!

We’ve gotten through Aids, the so-called gay plague.

Wow we’ve been through Crown Heights.

Or better yet, Al and Tawana’s

Charades,

Black outs, riots and fights.

We've been through Lindsay,

Nelson Rockefellers affair,

And we’re here.

Fun City one day,

Needle Park and Tomkins Square,

And we’re here.

The Bronx is Burning,

New York Drop Dead!

Carter on Charlotte,

The middle class fled.

Beame should ‘ve gone to accounting school

That’s seems clear.

Now Mike Bloomberg may run,

So we hear!

Chorus Line one day

Twenty-five years, now it’s back.

Grease is here!

Phantom ‘ll close one day,

Lloyd Webber will get the sack

Cats not here.

We got through Abe’s

Fiscal woes,

Rudy’s wives,

Dinkins Bro’s.

Had smear and lox

With Koch’s

Rheingold beer.

We’ve lived though Bess Myerson

And we’re here.

We’ve gotten though Queen Leona and

Ivana,

Harry and Donald’s better halfs.

When you’ve been through Queen Leona and Ivana,

Anything else is a laugh.

Good Times, Bush times

We’ve seen em all, and my dear,

We’re still here.

Flush room rates sometimes,

Sometimes 9/11 and fear,

But we’re here.

We’ve run the gamut.

NYC!

Three Bronx cheers, dammit

C’est la vie.

We got through Tony’s Blog last year

And we’re here.

Lord knows, at least we’ve been there!

And we’re here!

Look who’s here!

We’re still here!

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-  January 7, 2008 - 

The Phantom of the Opera

or

Standing Room Only

It was a cold, late afternoon on January 7, 1976 as I headed out in my heavy dark blue Navy Pea Coat to the D Train from Park Slope, Brooklyn to get standing room only tickets for that evening’s performance of "Fidelio" at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center.

As I walked onto the Lincoln Center Plaza, the fountain sprayed a frosty glow and the Chagall’s looked like Marc had just finished them with his box of Crayolas.   The usual bunch was already on queue for the standing room tickets: opera queens, Juilliard boys (and girls), Saul Bellow Upper West Side characters, senior citizens, and me.  This night was my lucky night since they still had student seats left.  I got to sit in a real seat in the orchestra; House Left at the extreme end the row -

Seat R35.

After I got my ticket I strolled next door to the Library of the Performing Arts to hang out till the 8pm curtain. I had come here many times since 1967 when I was a student at Cathedral College on West 87th Street and West End Avenue. If I sat at a certain LP listening station, I could watch who went in and out of the Men’s Room while I listened to the latest original cast recordings – how perfect!  

At 7:45pm I went to my seat so I could read my program. The great Boris Aronson had designed the sets and the young John Mauceri of later Hollywood Bowl fame was conducting.  Of course, I knew the plot of Beethoven’s "Fidelio" - about Leonore, loving wife disguised as a prison guard named "Fidelio"”(the Faithful One), who rescues her husband Florestan from death in a political prison.

I settled in with my coat folded neatly over my lap. I could never understand people who put their coats on the back of their seats and then sit on them! - so uncomfortable and lumpy and wrinkling. Then the magic moment came that never failed to excite me. The Swarovski Crystal Chandeliers, a gift from Austria, rose slowly up, up and up to the golden ceiling of the Met.  The house darkened.

It was then I noticed I was seated next to an attractive older gentlemen dressed in suit and ascot with his coat folded on his lap too. I tried to glance discreetly sideways but he caught me looking.

The overtures began.  Leonore, disguised as a gentleman, began to sing in the beautiful quartet  - Mir ist so wunderbar ("A wondrous feeling fills me").  It was then I felt the pants leg of the ascoted gentleman brush up against mine. I stared straight ahead and concentrated on the music. As he shifted in his seat, his shoe slid up along mine and then withdrew. I stirred in my seat. Since the electrical gap was now broken I decided to close it and move my leg close to his. Contact was made as a surge of electricity pulsed, almost in complicity with the surging quartet.   The current ebbed and flowed to the end of Act One.

I swiftly flew up the aisle at intermission for a breath of fresh air on the Grand Tier Balcony. Mein herz was pounding.  I didn't know what to do, but knew I had to do something. As I walked back downstairs I saw my gentleman standing up against the Enzo Pinza Water Fountain holding one of those silly white cone cups people pretentiously use to drink from the fountain to prevent their lips from touching the spigot. I jauntily walked up and bent over and took a mouthful direct from the bubbler. He was standing next to me now. As I wiped a bit of water dripping down my mouth, I stammered out  “Tony” to his slightly British cadenced response of  “Alfred.” He surreptitiously gave me torn piece of his program with a phone number that I guess he had hastily written.

Suddenly a woman approached. He said to me “This is my wife Lynn” and to her “This is my friend Tony.”  Like a grand dame she said “Good Evening Antony” and stared right through my mask of embarrassment. I was saved by the bell so to speak, as the usher struck the end of intermission chimes. I quickly excused myself as I waited for them to go back to their seats first.  I took my seat at the last moment as house lights were almost dark.  I looked furtively over - funny I didn't notice whom he was sitting next to during Act One.

The young  John Mauceri climbed onto the podium and started Act Two. Florestan is alone in his cell, deep inside the dungeons. He sings first of his trust in God, then has a vision of Leonore coming to save him:

Gott! Welch Dunkel hier!

God! What darkness here!

 In our darkness the switch was pulled once again and the current flowed. Our ritual continued till the famous off-stage trumpet call announced the arrival of the minister. The horn stirringly rang out as a hand moved under his cashmere coat and across my overlapping dark blue one. His palm ever so slowly and gently moved over my thigh to its desired end.

O Gott, o welch ein Augenblick!
O unaussprechlich süßes Glück!

Oh God what joy at last!

Oh what a moment unsurpassed!

Mauceri was impassioned leading the orchestra in the interpolated Leonore Overture #3. My gentlemen caller was stirring as well. Then came the great chorale finale ultimo. The gates opened and the prisoners came up into the light in joyous exhalation of freedom and love. 

There was a standing ovation, torn program confetti streaming from the “heavens” and four curtain calls. Since I was on the aisle, I left before the last applause died out and the house lights came up. I grabbed a quick drink of water at the Pinza Fountain before I floated onto the plaza like Cher in “Moonstruck” but without Nicholas Cage on my arm.

The D Train came right away.  Seated in my orange plastic subway seat, I felt like Cinderella as my coach arched up over the city and across the Manhattan Bridge – A Lovely Night.  The walk from the subway station to my apartment on Garfield Place was exhilarating. I got into bed and read the entire "Fidelio" program from cover to cover. The night was long and cold.

The next day I woke up feeling like Scarlet O’Hara the morning after Rhett carried her up the dark blood red staircase. Having waited anxiously till 11 am, I finally got up the nerve to dial the number on the scrap of paper that I had looked at so many times during the night. It rang a few times till it connected. “Hi, this is T-t-t-t.”… I was stuck – T-t-t-ony.

Silence...

Then a female voice said sharply and knowingly  “Antony, don’t ever call this number again, ever.” 

Click...

I recoiled and dropped the phone, the scrap of program still in my hand. The winter sky darkened a bit and I felt like the other Christine pulling off the mask off the Phantom revealing the horror underneath – a hideous laughing grin. I sat down on my coat on the sofa which I had jauntily thrown there the night before. Reaching under into my coat breast pocket, I took out my ticket stub - Row R35 - and tore it up as the glittering Swarovski Chandeliers came crashing down around my head. I went to my window and stood there motionless like Garbo in Queen Christina, silently staring into the horizon.