1) “If you don’t like the weather, wait five minutes,” blah blah blah. With thunderstorms in the forecast, it seemed clear that the beach would not be possible . . . and yet the weather could be deceptively clear.
2) Breakfast al fresco at Liz’s Café — formerly Tippy Toppy of beloved memory — where the parking lot has been commandeered for outdoor seating. Excellent coffee and a smoked salmon and cream cheese omelette.
3) Having missed my usual Wednesday column because of traveling, I knew I would have to spend the morning writing and publishing a column. But I really had to wrestle it to the ground before I felt comfortable publishing, and even then it was too wordy.
4) After that, with a wee bitty of a headache, I knew I needed a change of scene. So I ankled down Bradford Street to a place I’d never really visited in Provincetown: the cemetery.
4a) Walking from Bradford to the cemetery, down — oh, I don’t remember the street names, Alden, Standish? — reinforced for me that I really know only a very small part of P’town (even after 25 years) and ought to get out a bit more. What I know is mostly Comical Street from the P’town Inn to the PAAM, the crescent formed by Pleasant and Franklin, and Herring Cove.
5) Well, what a contrast from Forest Hills! Windswept, almost no tree cover but the occasional cypress or something, and yesterday bleached and blasted by the heat. Many tall rectangular slabs of white marble from the 19th century were flush with the ground — either through misadventure or malevolence — and indeed I noted that this cemetery included quite a few modest ground-level markers. From a distance it made the place look even emptier.
6) All the Provincetown communities were there: the Yankees (mostly 19th-century), the Portuguese fishing community, the artists, and the gay/lesbian community. For the first time I felt I was seeing the graves of non-celebrity same-sex couples — beautiful, poignant, and ordinary. For several of them, it appeared that one member of the couple was still living. One stone included the date of their first date and the day of their marriage.
7) One child’s grave from a century or more before had been decorated with beads and a plastic flamingo. Dahlings, when my time comes, I don’t want you bringing plastic to my grave! Bring whiskey, champagne, and the good crystal, and have yourself a little party. And if security or anybody gives you a hard time, tell ‘em I’m gonna come back and haunt ‘em. And I will.
8) But it was hot. I had to adjourn to Ben and Jerry’s for a hot fudge sundae. And then, home.
8a) Mercy goodness people, if you’re in a hurry, take Bradford.
9) I spent the afternoon crunching some numbers (again, the weather), and then figured out how to work my new airpods all by myself without asking anyone. 😇
10) After cocktails, during which I was introduced to Rick and Morty 😱, the household dined in. Since I’d done none of the cooking, I happily washed up. This time this meant witnessing a debate about how to clean a cast-iron skillet, after which I was handed a tiny piece of chain mail. “And what is this? A fetishkini?” I asked. Turns out there is such a thing as a chainmail dishcloth!
10a) The secret ingredient is violet syrup. But . . . to what?
11) So as if discovering a new, unexpected use for chain mail didn’t blow my mind enough, we then switched on the new movie version of In the Heights. Deeply moving on more levels than I expected, and able to go places the stage version couldn’t because movies are magic in a different way. See it.