New York, New York and Open Mics

Well, I flew into JFK Airport just before Valentine's Day ended and met my girlfriend at the train station just after. Ah well. She still loved the chocolates I got her. The next day, we went to an open mic at a very cool place called The Vagabond Cafe in West Village, where she accompanied Griffin, an organist friend of hers, on violin. Griffin, of course, was on piano. They played Roxanne in D minor. It was actually really good. I got it on video.

After that, we... Went to another bar or something? I don't know. That was, like, two weeks ago. Time keeps moving, man. Memories can be insubstantial things. I don't even drink, and I can't remember.

For those of you who haven't figured it out yet, Rachel, my girlfriend, is a violin major at Juilliard. She's pretty impressive to me. So dedicated to her craft, and so talented in its execution. I have to say, aside form all of the obvious things, like her stunning beauty, razor-sharp intellect, and enchanting natural charms, one of the great things about dating her that one wouldn't immediately think of is that I hang out with all these Juilliard kids and get the inside dirt on how they carry on over there. Some moments are especially great, like when I'm hanging out in my friend Josh's dorm room with a bunch of drunk classical musicians, and he puts on one of his favorite composers, telling everyone in the room, "Shut up, shut up! All of you, shut up! The first movement of Mahler 9 is fucking epic!" Then he gets out his conductor's baton as the music fills his room. Around guys like these, low-brow moments feel positively enlightening. I hardly know the first

"This movement makes me jizz every-
where, man." --A drunken classical pianist in
Josh's room.

thing about classical music, but I'm learning, one Juilliard visit at a time.

Later, Rachel took me to a ballet showing of Romeo and Juliet at the Lincoln Center. She had to go for some class of hers, but I must say, I really enjoyed it. Even though no one said any dialogue, I was pretty much immediately able to tell who was playing what character by their dancing alone. Whoever played Mercutio was brilliant. Do you know how difficult that must be? A grown man wearing purple tights and prancing around stage managed to come off as tough, clever, and masculine, without a single line of dialogue. He made me laugh continuously throughout the show. I was very impressed.

Let's see... Then it was the weekend, we probably hung out around campus... Josh and I played a lot of Smash Bros Melee. He's very good at that game, always beats me. In fact, he's impressively good at most games. I have a theory that, due to his early introduction to violin, he has trained himself from a young age to be good at making precise, rapid movements with his fingers, and that early training has enhanced his ability to kick the crap out of me most of the time. The one game in which we're evenly matched is Soul Calibur, and those rounds can be intense.

Wait, why am I talking about video games?

Now I remember what happened: Friday, Rachel and I had dinner with a friend of hers named Michael; another organist. He told us the story of how he almost accidentally fed weed cookies to the pastor of the church for which he plays. Michael's a really nice guy, really likable. He and I hit it off pretty quickly and got to chatting while Rachel took a phone call from her dad. It turns out that you can make a lot of money playing organ for churches. Who knew?

After that, Rachel and I went to a bar called Russian Samovar. Sadly, there was no live music, which, apparently, there usually is. Rachel ordered in Russian, then introduced me to this older woman whose name I forget. She asked if I was athletic, if I played sports, and Rachel said, "Yes." That isn't really true. Apparently, she was going to make some sex joke, but then balked at the punchline. However, I used to do a bit of climbing, so I backed her up by saying, "I'm a rock climber." Then the woman held out her hand and asked to test my grip. She must've been 50, so I thought it'd be cute to humor her. I figured I'd go light. Instead, she clamped her death grip around my hand. I guessed she could take it, so I upped my pressure a little, and she did the same in turn. We kept doing this until I was squeezing as hard as I could, my face was probably beet red, and I realized that she was still squeezing harder than me. The slight, disappointed grin on her face told me that I'd been found out, that she knew I wasn't a rock climber. Not really.

Eventually, we stopped. My knuckles were sore. I asked her if her hand was alright. She laughed. "My hand? No, no dear, my hand is fine. How is your hand?" "'Sfine," I mumbled. She raised one eyebrow and nodded, then turned back to her companion at the bar. I was a little embarrassed. I massaged my knuckles, deciding I didn't care if she noticed. She did. It bugged me anyway. It's fine. I was starting to get bored of The Russian Samovar. None of our friends were able to meet us like we thought they might. "Hey, Rachel, let's get out of here," I said. She'd been texting as the drama unfolded, trying to find a place for us to go next, and apparently had found something. "Okay, yeah, there's a party on the upper west side, in the low 80s. Let's go!" As we left, I waved bye to the mysterious death grip woman, and then we were gone.

To be continued!