Thanksgivikkahs and To-Do Lists

The alarm went off at 4:30am. She had gone to bed at 1am. She couldn't figure out if she felt sick from a lack of sleep or the dehydration caused by the acne drug she was taking. She gulped down a glass of water. Smee meowed incessantly. "Quiet, Smee, you'll thank me later when I feed you later." Adventures in cat sitting. She hated cats. Smee was no exception. How could anyone love an animal who would rather sit in a cardboard box than cuddle you?

As she stepped out onto 42nd Street at 5am, she remembered a time, years ago, when she was up at a similar time on a long ago Thanksgiving day, to walk the parade as a clown. To her 11 year old self, NYC was the city where stories happened the way they happened in the movies; where Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks meet atop the Empire State Building and live happily ever after. As she walked the deserted streets of the city all those years ago, she felt a pang if what might be and what the years could bring. NYC was a symbol dreams to be chased and goals to be met. At that age, she wasn't sure exactly what those goals and dreams were, but she knew how that life felt. It felt like this: to be walking the city at 5am 2 decades later, on the way to the Shubert Theatre. She was not about to meet a young Tom Hanks atop the Empire State Building, she was about to do something even better.

It was Thanksgivikkah 2013, a year when Thanksgiving and Chanukah collided for the first and last time for thousands of years. A once in a lifetime celebration. How appropriate that she was starting the day performing on the Macy*s Thanksgiving Day Parade. She had thought that nothing could be more exciting than sitting on the stage of the Radio City Music Hall waiting to perform in 2013 Tony Awards. As she stood outside Macy*s at 7am and saw the cameras set up for their dress rehearsal, she decided that this moment was possibly more exciting. She was choked up from cold and when her emotions started to get the better of her, she felt a feeling in her chest; a physical manifestation of "thankfulness." It felt achy and full. She wanted to bottle it up so that she could forever remember it. It's a curious thing about feelings; no matter how full they are in the present, they are altered by time and memory. This "thankfulness" was something she really rather not be altered.

It was really really cold. She sat on the set with the kids, wondering how long they would be pre-set there before the broadcast began and they could dance. Anything to bring feeling back to their hands. Without warning, the parade hosts started talking about MATILDA THE MUSICAL. "Here we go," she thought. "Don't fuck up." As she danced, mucus started to run down her nose. Every inhale she took was icy cold. Her hands refused to warm up. But, the crowd cheered and clapped and she loved every second of it. When it was over, she felt exhilarated, despite the pain in her chest from the cold air. That was so much cooler than walking the parade as a clown.

When she got back to her cat sitting adventures, Smee didn't care that she had just performed live on TV for all of America, or that the first thing she needed to do was make herself a cup of Lady Grey. Her stared her down until she finally fed him. "That's cats for you," she thought. And then she sat with her cup of tea and thought some more. About how it's possible to dream something all the years of your life and then suddenly be living it. "I can do anything," she thought. And not with arrogance, but with hope and determination. She pulled out her notepad and wrote. She still preferred writing the old fashioned way, no matter how advanced technology was becoming. She wrote herself a to-do list for the next decade. A woman who does not make promises that she does not intend to keep, she then folded it up and promised herself to fulfill her list. It was then and there that the next chapter of her story was determined. 

That evening, she was treated to the lighting of the menorah and a homemade feast of all the traditional Thanksgiving fare, with latkes and apple sauce to appease the Gods of Jewishness. As she sat and watched her cousin carve the turkey, she felt that none of these exciting endeavors of hers would mean anything were it not for the people in her life to share it with. Dancing on the parade was cool; watching the turkey being expertly carved in a warm home surrounded by family was just as cool.

The night drew to a close as the house emptied of guests. "I'm going to hell for gluttony," she said, as she stuffed her bag with a leftover caveman turkey leg and a kosher chocolate lollipop with a menorah on it. She stood on the train platform and felt, as Thanksgivikkah wouldn't come round again for thousands of years, that she had played her part in celebrating it aptly, for today was one for the books. "We are lucky," she thought, as she stepped out of the cold into the warmth of the heated train, "to have so much to be thankful for." As she walked the streets of NYC upon her return, she saw the familiar sight of homeless people trying to take shelter from the cold along with the unfamiliar sight of blocks of people lined up for Black Friday sales, and the lightness in her step became heavy.

When Smee pressed her for his evening meal, she fed him distractedly. It didn't feel right, having so much when others had nothing; to give thanks then go out for more before the day was even over. She added something to her to-do list. Then she went to sleep, thankful for the heat, the turkey leg in her fridge, and the comforter under which she lay with her full belly. 

Family Matters

CHAPTER 1: Prelude to the Journey



Family comes first. And yet, my immediate family, within which the family core and values are as strong as the Trunchbull's hammer throw, have somehow managed to end up in 3 different countries on two different continents. I blame my dad's wanderlust; whatever genetic predisposition inside of him that possessed him to leave Long Island and eventually meet and marry a Malaysian native girl in a town of Malaysia that is not Kuala Lumpur (were there Long Islanders from his hometown of Merrick who were even aware that other towns existed in Malaysia?) seems to have been instilled in me. And let's not forget my mom's singular ambition to get out of her hometown, Miri. She often says that my dad had to travel halfway around the world to find her and take her out. But enough about them; they'll wring my neck for writing an entire paragraph about them, as it is.



So, back to my initial point: I live in NYC, and between my sister and parents, there are Rubin representatives in England, Spain, and France throughout the year. Lucky ducks. The one downfall of our international family is that we only get to talk via Skype once a week, and that once-a-week Skype date can, in some cases, be challenging to plan, or may not even happen during a busier week. Time difference is a bitch. So forget about actual, physical, face-to-face time (FaceTime on iPhone doesn't count, but thanks, Apple). The last time I saw my family was in July of 2012. The last time I saw my family Stateside was summer 2009. Ergo, my number one priority once I booked MATILDA was to figure out when an appropriate time would be for them to come to NYC so that: A. We could hang out, and B. They could (finally) see me on Broadway.



Their plane was due to arrive in the afternoon on a Monday, which is my day off from work. I told them I'd wait for them in my cousins' apartment with my cousins who would be joining us for dinner. As I knew I wouldn't have much time to spend with my family during a work week, any free time I had was reserved for one thing: EATING. I couldn't wait to introduce them to my favourite restaurants. Before committing acts of gluttony, they had to arrive, and I took myself to JFK to surprise them at arrivals. They were super duper surprised!!! It was such a joy to see their excited and non-expectant faces, and I burst into tears and couldn't stop, to which my dad asked, "what is wrong with you?!" It had been an overwhelming time as it was: proof being on my body where I had red bumps on my torso, which I of course promptly showed them while waiting in the taxi queue. Nerves of having many people booked to see me in the show that week mixed with Accutane side-effects mixed with having worked non-stop since December were showing up physically and by the end of the week, the bumps on my torso were joined by a very itchy rash on my thighs, and what felt like chemical burns on my arms, and two styes in my right eye. The impish Vacation Gods were taunting me, and I was ready to submit to them. I just had to get through one more week because the Working Gods are far stronger than their impish brothers and sisters.



In the week that followed, we ate a Schezuan meal, congee in Chinatown, ramen, Japanese BBQ, and sipped tea at both Harney & Sons and Radiance Tea House. In a normal week, my free time is spent either taking dance class or working out with my personal trainer, but this week, those acts of well-being were substituted with eating. So much eating. So, really, even though I had been on in the show all week, it had been a relatively relaxing week and I felt less tired than I usually do at the end of the week. After 4 hours of sleep on Saturday night, I woke at 5:30am on Sunday, alert and ready to run the Color Run, the world's happiest 5k! I'm so glad that my dad had decided to join me and my colleagues for our morning of color running in Brooklyn because we had a blast! The weather was perfect, and these sorts of events are a great substitute for socializing to your average night out at a bar. I've discovered that I'm an adventurer at heart (I'm starting to realise that it was perhaps the desire for adventure more than the desire to be on Broadway that urged me to move from London to NYC) and I think my goal is to do something like the Color Run every 3 months or so. But let me take this opportunity to say that anyone who lives in Brooklyn who gives me grief for living in West New York, NJ is CRAZY. Crazy! The commute was soooooooo loooooooong.



That afternoon, for my last performance of the week as The Acrobat (after I spent a panicked turn in the shower scrubbing color from my skin upon which the bluish tint so stubbornly sat) I was the lucky gal with sixteen family members in the audience. I had family come in from Europe, Long Island, and Westchester to watch me run around the stage as a glasses-wearing schoolgirl searching for Amanda Thripp, living the Broadway dream I have talked about at every Jewish holiday at the kosher hotel between bites of matzoh ball soup and flanken. It was cool, performing for them. I had emailed them exactly what to look out for so they'd know how to pick me out. What was even cooler was bringing them onstage afterwards. For me, the stage is my 2nd home, an extension of my office, if you will. For them, standing on a Broadway stage was VIP treatment to the max. We ate family style afterwards at an Italian restaurant, the adults at one table, the "kids" at the other, just like old times in the kosher hotel. It was lovely for us all to be together, and for me at least, the most important thing about that day was not that my family got to see me on Broadway, but that my being on Broadway brought the family together for the first time in four years.



Chapter 2: Roots



When my family and I found out that I would be on in MATILDA for a week and that they would make a trip Stateside to see it, we decided that I would take my week's vacation right off the back of that. As a visit to my aunt's (dad's sister) family in the Carolinas was overdue, it seemed that a road trip to the Carolinas would be a super fun way for us to spend time together and see other parts of the country. While I'm relatively well-traveled internationally, the same cannot be said for my domestic travels.



Our first stop was in Washington D.C. Along the way, we stopped at a rest stop for breakfast, which consisted of Cinnabons and Starbucks, neither of which my parents were accustomed to, obviously. Who drinks Starbucks in Europe?! My dad is always complaining that he can't get a good cup of coffee in the States. When the cashier asked for my dad's name to write on his cup, it seemed to take him by surprise! Anyway, my only reason for mentioning our rest stop is to mention our discussion over breakfast. We listened to my dad talk about his parents' generation and I learned new things about them and their lives and the types of people they were. As I write this now I wonder if these were things my grandparents would have ever spoken about to me if I had ever bothered to ask. I just knew them as Grandpa Morris, Grandma Edith, Aunt Fran, and so on, and was too young to contemplate that they were people with colored histories during which they built roots from which my family has grown.



We reached D.C. by early afternoon. There is a loveliness to D.C. which surprised me. The architecture, the cleanliness, the slower pace, everything about the city made me feel completely relaxed. The beautiful weather probably accounted for a lot of those feelings, but I daresay I fell in love with the city. Had it a theatre scene as vibrant as London or New York, I think I could even set up home there! We spent our first afternoon playing tourist and walking to the memorials via Georgetown. First though, we needed food, and I had come across Rasika in my research. It is rated #4 in the city and just happened to be a few minutes' walk away from the hotel. It was one of the best Indian meals we have ever had, and that is really high praise coming from the Rubin clan. It's the best Indian meal I've had since I left London 4 years ago. As much as NYC is a culinary delight, it lacks really great Indian curry, and y'all can stop recommending places to me because they never live up to my expectations! Rasika, on the other hand, is well worth a visit if you're in the area and love a good curry.



My sister and I started the next day catching up with an old camp friend at Lincoln's Waffle Shop, just opposite Ford's Theatre. I'm not a huge waffle fan, but how can you go to a waffle shop and not order a waffle? Much to my surprise, the waffle was not big and fat, which kills my appetite, but flat and crunchy. It was super delicious! I also ordered scrapple, which I'd never seen on a menu before. You know what? I know it's supposed to be really gross, and as I was googling it, I was scared that google was going to tell me that it was pigs' shit, but turns out it's all the trimmings that the butcher throws out. It was also delicious. All those trimmings are not good enough for other people? I'll take them! Gladly! Yum!



Well-fed, we walked to the Holocaust Memorial Museum. I debated on whether to go into detail about our visit in this blog entry and decided that it's an experience that I would rather discuss with people privately. What I will say about it, is that my mom said, upon exiting, "it is every human being's duty to go." Also, there was a train carriage there which was used to transport Jews to a concentration camp, and when I walked inside, I swear I felt spirits there. Though a visit to the Smithsonian had been on our list, we were completely drained after spending a lot more time than anticipated at the Holocaust museum, so what did we decide to do next? Eat! Of course! We walked to Fish Wharf and after a day and a half of seeing people all suited up, we finally saw some of the other half of the city hanging out at an awesome outdoor fish market, which we would have loved to frequent if our feet weren't swollen from half a day of walking, so we went to a nearby seafood restaurant and indulged in some Americana seafood buffet. The food was less than mediocre, but we sat there at length, discussing our visit to the Holocaust museum and the Holocaust itself. I asked many questions, but there was one question that none of us were able to answer: if you were living during the Holocaust and were not a Jew, what would you have done? Would you have done nothing? Been a complier to the Nazis? Put your own life at risk to help the Jews? We all know what type of person we would want to be, but in reality, who are we really? A haunting, but important self-reflection.



I was actually sad to leave D.C. and would love to return again. Our next port of call was Williamsburg, VA. We spent the afternoon walking around colonial Williamsburg after which we made a unanimous decision to have Red Lobster for dinner, which was absolutely delicious, but let me tell you, I zonked out afterwards and when I woke up, felt dehydrated and lethargic. Eating like that all the time is a sin, and I really should be fasting on this Yom Kippur to atone for such sins, but I have never fasted and am not about to start after half a week of complete gluttony. That evening we took a ghost tour which was awful. I had taken one other ghost tour in Edinburgh which was far superior so was disappointed by the tour in Williamsburg. I feel that historic Williamsburg is a bit pricey on the whole, and was not sad to leave for the Carolinas the next day.



So, here I am in North Carolina. Ballantyne, Charlotte, to be exact. The weather today has taken a turn. After a week of scorching hot sunshine, it is cold and grey today, a metaphor for the Rubins coming to the end of this family road trip. Last night we ate Yom Kippur dinner with my aunt and cousins after a visit to my aunt's new home in York, SC. The adults never made it to temple and instead watched the little ones perform plays after dinner. We had brought two flamenco dresses for my two little cousins and the older one put hers on straight away while I showed the younger one how to open a fan. I look at them and see myself and my sister, for we were once putting on plays and dressing up. And so the world turns and things change but yet things are the same because it seems we all follow the blueprint of those who have come before us, back to the beginnings of our ancestry. Is that far too simple a way of thinking about it? I feel that, for all the complexities of the human race, we really are that simple. Like the trees, we plant roots and from those roots we grow and our families grow and everything is passed on and on, timeless and forever.



We have a couple more days left of our road trip. Unbelievably, this is the first time that I have been away from NYC that I do not miss it. This is not a reflection of my feelings for the city, but a reflection on the peace that I have felt to be with my family and discover new things and have new adventures. Traveling serves as a reminder that things are relative and that there are many experiences waiting to be had. I can't wait for the next Rubin road trip! I'm trying to convince them that next shall be the Grand Canyon. Until then, I'm due a vacation in Europe next year, so I had better start planning that. So many things to do and so many places to go! We are the lucky ones who can travel. While the majority of Americans probably don't hold passports, I count myself in the bracket of those lucky enough to have the choice to travel. Before any of that though, I must return to reality and work off these pancakes, waffles, BBQ ribs, etc etc etc. NYC, I'll see you in a couple of days. Get ready to whip my butt!