Sunday, July 17, 2005

I wanna go back to visit New York

And a living example of contemporary beauty – a classic New York celebrity sighting – an imposingly tall, slim blonde with tied-back hair and rimless glasses and the straightest posture I’ve ever seen on a human being, who turns out to be Nicole Kidman, striding through the museum with a tall gray-haired man. She’s wearing a taupe jeans-style jacket, a knee-length white lace petticoat, and pearl gray Asics walking shoes with violet stripes. Her cheeks are rouged to a high pink and the rest of her face is china white, she looks prim and stiff like someone trying to appear comfortable. Is it really she? We take surreptitious glances – everyone in the place is taking surreptitious glances – as she walks through the rooms just slightly faster than we do. She passes very close; she sits on a courtyard bench just across from our courtyard bench, not making eye contact with anyone. Yes, it is. While obviously not wishing to be approached, she’s not making much of an effort to pass unnoticed: I’d imagined that people like her would sneak into ordinary life with sunglasses on, makeupless faces shadowed by hats, bodies concealed by unstylish anonymous clothes. NK’s wearing a couple of thousand dollars’ worth of fastidiously chosen and coordinated chic. She’s beautiful, yes, but if I hadn’t known who she was, I would have thought of her as an aristocratic young woman who knew how to make the most of her long lean lines and fine features. She looks like a first-year teacher at a school for royal children. She’s not, however, the hottest item in the room, for along with viewing paintings I’ve been glancing at fleshly works of art in these rooms, and some of them have been … well after all, this is Manhattan.
LINK

1 comment:

Richard Lawrence Cohen said...

Thanks for the link, Hoots!