The weather on my phone said no rain. So I grabbed my bike and headed out. The fog was touching the pavement. It looked like rain, but I trusted my phone. I mounted and rode to work. Beating the thunderstorms by hairs and minutes. Housing other cyclists on the Manhattan Bridge as always. The weather on my phone is a liar.
I had an appointment in Greenpoint with Jesse that day and was not unconcerned about getting drenched. Jesse's a friend of a friend who I'd previously met a few times socially. [Thanks for the connection, Gillian! Gillian's also really rad. She works for the Audubon Center in the park and plays the cello and travels around the country working in gardens and meeting young musicians who she then goes touring with.]
We exchanged frantic (well, on my part, I think he must've wondered why a bike commuter was scared of the fog) emails, gchats and text messages for hours, examining the position of clouds, weighing their mass and estimating the potential energy of yet another downpour. The one that looked like a cartoon lesbian on a Schwinn (I don't ride a schwinn and I may be taking creative liberties here. I may actually take creative liberties all over and up and down this blog site) holding an umbrella loomed threateningly in the sky.
I took the chance and the Williamsburg Bridge and found my way to Grumpy's Cafe on Meserole past McGuinness Blvd. It is an area where Brooklyn begins to feel like Queens. The clouds held the rain and squinted down with mocking glares of sun rays.
I drink coffee. With milk. Or an americano when I'm tired. Or a latte when I'm feeling luxurious. Or a cappuccino, rarely. Or a double espresso once in a while. Jesse got an iced americano. Black.
He opened a black and white composition notebook. I'm gonna say wide-ruled, but must admit my abilities of observation were not so acute. I was nervous. Serious Zahra. Meeting with people I know, or kind of know, is practice for when I have to talk to strangers, doers, older, stronger women and men who have seen so much and created so much before me. I'm not an orator, I've always claimed. Well, it's high nigh time to get talking.
He used a blue pen and wrote and doodled and designed while we talked. Words without context in a child's notebook surrounded by sketched faces and squiggled creatures.
He's a writer, musician, activist and traveler. He dreams of sending teaching artists to English language schools abroad. Sign me up for that. Imagine. Five weeks in Seoul. A fully furnished studio. Korean soap operas. A decent stipend. Jesse, do it.
The first time I met Jesse was in 2009. He and Gillian were in a band at that time. He was the lead singer. Shirtless. Skinny and muscular. Would one say sinewy? Tattoos. On and off the stage. This guy is energy.
He's worked with children at the Community Word Project.
CWP believes that all children have the right to a learning environment that teaches them not what to think, but how to think. They achieve their goal through multi-disciplinary arts residencies, a comprehensive teaching artist training program, and professional development for classroom teachers and afterschool leaders.
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