Tag: Books / Literature

Posted on

Annual Trek to Brooklyn's Finest Stretch of Sand!

Every summer I must go out at least once to Brighton Beach / Coney Island. I don’t know why, really; I just feel like it’s not a proper summer without it! I usually take a day off of work around mid-May, before it gets too crowded and humid, but this year I must have been too busy because I never made it. Now that our fiscal year’s over at work and I have a couple of vacation days I must take before Labor Day, I looked up on weather.com to see which day this week would be most ideal weather-wise, only to find that it’s going to be rainy and cloudy and fall-like temperatures all week — Saturday was the only day with a little sun icon 🙁 So, I decided to brave the weekend crowds and went out yesterday. It’s kind of more fun that way anyway!

Here’s a little photo essay:

Fun in the sun! And relatively nice blue water.


Beside sunbathing, I love the town. Brighton Beach is very Russian; many people are new immigrants and hardly speak English. I love shopping in these stores, flipping through the Russian romance novels, the Russian videos and CDs, seeing if I can understand anything. I must have a very slavic-looking face; have actually been told several times that I look Eastern European, which is funny because I think I’m more Spanish-looking with my olive skin and dark hair… Anyway, everyone here assumes I’m Russian and begins conversations with me in Russian. Gives me a decent chance to practice my Russian — although, who’m I kidding; I haven’t had any classes since college, I barely remember the Cyrillic alphabet… Most of them don’t know any English anyway, so it makes no difference once they realize I have no idea what they’re saying and then I massacre their language with my hideous American accent. We end up gesticulating wildly with each other — just like in St. Petersberg, the one time I went to Russia, several years ago now — best foreign travel experience of my life!

I remember trying to impress Pasha once by telling him I came out here regularly and he just made this goofy smirk and rolled his eyes. I said, “What?!” and asked him why he didn’t come out here to get a taste of his homeland, be with people with whom he had so much in common. He said that just because someone’s Russian doesn’t mean they’re going to be your friend. I asked him why not; he mumbled something about generation gaps, culture clashes, judgments… It’s kind of sad, but I remember seeing that documentary Ballets Russes about that early 20th Century ballet company (a great movie by the way), and I remember one of the Russian ballerinas laughing and saying that Russians don’t like each other very much. They love us, they love everyone else, but it does seem like they don’t get along with each other very well for some reason.

Anyway, after I finished with the Dom Kniga (bookstore; or literally, house of books), I walked along the boardwalk down to Coney Island.


where they have the huge amusement park. I’ve only been on one ride — the giant ferris wheel, when my roommate from law school, Chris, and I came out here years ago. I was so terrified; that thing is so high off the ground. Chris, who normally had a very tough exterior, admitted as soon as we were safely on the ground that, when we were at full height, she was a bit worried too, though her way of so indicating was to say that she realized, if we were killed on the ride, our estates wouldn’t be able to sue because we’d assumed the risk… typical law students 🙂

And here’s the famous Cyclone, which I think they are supposed to be taking down at some point in the future (?), but apparently not yet, behind this cute froggie ride.

Haha, one of the many lovely eateries aligning the boardwalk on the Coney Island part. This one caught my attention because the name reminded me of dance 🙂 Do you think they misspelled “hole” on purpose??

This kind of freaked me out. They had this guy running around behind some garbage cans with a helmet and shield and people paid to shoot him with what I think was a BB gun?…


Can’t ever go to the beach without a little stop at the aquarium!

Where I saw all manner of wonderful sea creatures. If I was an animal, I’d either want to be a cute little primate denizen of the warm gooey rainforest or some kind of marine animal who inhabits warm waters…

Big, fattypants walrus entertained the crowd greatly 🙂

As did this saucer-eyed giant turtle. I love the woman with the camera. Everyone has digitals these days. No wonder you never see postcards anymore.

Ooh, scary shark, my biggest animal fear. This little girl was adorable though.

They have a couple of seals in this tank that used to be inhabited by the adorably cherubic white beluga whale. He died a couple of years ago and I think he’s too expensive for them to replace, but I always loved coming to see that little whale and his cute little “smiley face.”


Walking back along the boardwalk to Brighton, so I could dine at my favorite Russian restaurant, Tatiana’s (!), I passed this volleyball tournament. Must have been a big deal because they had bleachers set up and there was a big crowd.

The boardwalk kind of scared me. Some of those planks were quite loose, and the street was far below!


If you want to make lots of money off of a food or drink item, just call it “Naked”!

Final desination: Tatiana’s, on the boardwalk, getting my annual fill of caviar (red not black, I can’t afford $120 for lunch!), with sour cream and red wine. Mmmm, so good…

but so filling. Even though it always looks so small, I can never finish it all and I always feel badly for wasting such good food! Summer reading, by the way, New York Magazine restaurant critic Gael Greene’s memoir “Insatiable.” This woman cracks me up: when she was a fledgling journalist, she slept with Elvis after getting herself admitted to his suite following one of his shows by playing up her press credentials. She was in such shock the whole time that all she could remember about the entire thing was that he asked her to call room service for him and order him a fried egg sandwich. She said she knew she was destined to be a food writer after that 🙂

Posted on

Help help please please

Help help please please

Originally uploaded by swan lake samba girl via mobile.


I was sitting on my couch contently reading my new saira rao book when for the first time ever something darted across my floor. I have never ever had a mouse problem ever — ever! Likely because i used to have a cat (who passed away not long ago) what to do what to do what to do! I absolutely cannot kill anyone — how do i nicely entice him or her out??? How do i even find it?

Posted on

Is Pasha a Nureyev or a Baryshnikov: What's In a Dancer's Sexuality Anyway?

Okay, I’m probably going to get attacked right and left for this post, but I’ve been receiving a lot of emails asking me if my former dance instructor, the extremely personable and talented (not to mention sexy 🙂 ) Pasha Kovalev, who is now a serious contestant on SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE, is gay or straight. My first thought was, argh, why does it even matter! But then I thought about it and realized, homophobia is totally passe and no one is asking because they want to judge anyone and, although of course it is completely irrelevant to the actual dancing, it does inform your crush on the guy (if you’re a straight female dance fan, which a good number of us are). I mean, you have a different kind of crush depending on whether he’s straight or gay, right?! (mine are usually far worse on the gay ones, but go figure…)

When I first fell big time for this one, my favorite dancer in the world (besides Pasha of course!), I did what everyone living in the 21st Century would do, an internet search of course. And how did my heart drop when I saw this, his cover story in The Advocate! NOOOOOOOO, I must have let out the most horrid cry. We’re never getting married now! (Because of course otherwise we were, since he’s not a big huge famous ballet dancer or anything…) But I have to say, it was far worse finding out this one, my second favorite, was married, and that this one is engaged to be married. After all, I’m never going to have to be jealous of any of Marcelo’s partners (you can’t envy a man; it just doesn’t make any sense).

And reading the Marcelo article of course made me fall in love with him all the more, and realize why he is, as Dance Magazine called him, the guy all the girls want to dance with. He is a big strong warm Brazilian guy, a kind of teddy bear, albeit a gorgeous one — in whose arms could you feel safer or more comfortable and secure?! Of course the actual story of the dance performance that unfolds onstage or TV is not real anyway, but dramatic narrative aside, to me Marcelo and Julie Kent, his frequent partner, are the greatest partnership around today, and that’s precisely because of the way you can tell they feel about each other: it’s obvious they truly love each other as friends and partners, and that’s everything in making a performance come to life!

I’ve never had the opportunity to dance with Marcelo of course 🙁 but in my own experiences, gay men are crazy fun as partners. Straight men are too, but, I dunno, there’s just something about gay men, that IMO, takes some pressure off and just lets you be you. If something gets touched, you know it was an accident, or if something stupid happens like this, or this, it’s not THAT embarrassing! And back to Marcelo briefly (I know, I can never stop talking about him; it’s an illness really…), big warm swoony stage door kisses like this could never happen if the dancer was straight, right — I mean, that might be looked on … just… a little perverted or something.

But, I also think that a dancer’s sexuality, as with all aspects of his or her personal life, though completely irrelevant to the dancing, do, rightly or wrongly, come into play in constructing the dancer’s persona or mystique, should he or she ever become really famous. Joan Acocella, in reading from her latest book at Barnes & Noble recently, said that she thought part of Baryshnikov‘s fame stemmed from his reputation for being a skirt-chaser. The press, she said, just went on a field day with a straight male dancer. I personally think it was more the political situation at the time (he defected from a country we were obsessed with hating after all), because, how does that explain the fame of Nureyev? To me personally, it is Nureyev who is the more intriguing: in addition to dealing with the shock of fame and wealth after having grown up in abject poverty, the horribly difficult decision to defect and leave his family forever behind (his mother was very ill), he also had to deal with societal and political oppression based on his sexuality. And the attacks that he had to endure, of leading a life of “debauchery” in the West while those left behind in his homeland starved, were criticisms I’m sure Baryshnikov never got. And, as for partnerships, please — that between Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn was the stuff legends are made of. For a very good, rather poetic book on this most fascinating of all dancers (IMO) please go here.

Anyway, back to Pasha, and THE QUESTION! Sorry for the long-windedness, I just wanted to make everyone read about all my favorite dancers 🙂 Okay, well, I don’t want to be gossipy, but I feel there is nothing wrong with pointing you all toward something he said on TV on either the first or second episode of the show! Remember! Remember what he said about why he wanted to become a ballroom dancer, what led him to dance in the first place! That’s a pretty good indication 🙂 If you can’t find it anywhere on the show’s website, I’ll give you a hint — it’s the same thing said by this other dance hearthrob on what drew him to ballet in the very fun documentary, “Born to Be Wild,” which if you haven’t seen, you can read his words on that issue here.

Posted on

Ashley Bouder's Absolute Gem of a "Ruby"

Okay, this has to be short and sweet because I have about five briefs to write before I go to bed tonight, but I just got back from seeing my second production of “Jewels” at NYCBallet— go here for my post on seeing this wonderful ballet for the first time. (By the way, I just started flipping through Terry Teachout‘s book on Balanchine and noticed he signed it and wrote, “To Tonya, in honor of her first Jewels.” Aw!!) This was my first time seeing ballerina Ashley Bouder in the main role in “Rubies,” as her debut in the part took place just last night (which explains what Alastair Macaulay was doing sprinting back and forth across Lincoln Plaza last night — if you don’t know what I’m talking about, go here, for my post on last night. Hehe, I hope I’m not revealing anything I shouldn’t be 🙂 — Arlene Croce said she used to do the same thing… and it does show how happening the NY dance scene is right now if the critics are running all around like mad people trying to see everything at once.) Anyway, as I said, Macaulay did not seem to have been successful in getting into Jewels last night, so I do hope he went back today because Ashley Bouder IS NOT TO BE MISSED IN THIS ROLE!!!! Oh my gosh, she completely knocked me out! She is such a powerhouse, just wizzing around stage in those turns this way and that, traveling at lightning speed and changing directions like there’s nothing to it. But she is not just an athletic, virtuostic marvel — she is known for that after all — artistically she was brilliant as well; she really brought to this role exactly what Balanchine must have had in mind when he created it. She perfectly exemplified the sexy, jazzy, sassy, flirty American with showgirly flair. She really brought Rubies to life for me, in other words. I can’t help but still love Diamonds best — just watching all of that beautiful partnering, the stage filled with couples at the end, the gorgeous pas de deux and the Tschiakovsky music… it just makes me nearly cry — but Ashley’s performance today almost made me reconsider my favorite “jewel.” It’s really too bad that today marked the end of the NYCB season (a lot of endings this weekend), but when they bring it back, you MUST go see this one in Rubies! You must!

I loved Emeralds just the same — it’s probably my least favorite of the “stones” but I think it’s slowly growing on me. And I’m loving Rachel Rutherford — last time I went on and on about her beautifully expressive wrists, this time I couldn’t get over her lovely en pointe tiny-stepped pas de bouree couru turns. Is she dancing the role that Balanchine originally choreographed on Violette Verdy I wonder? I’d love to see what Verdy looked like, not to compare, but just because the former history grad student in me wants to know. Philip, who accompanied me today, handed me his binoculars when Robert Fairchild took the stage! (He knows how much I like him 🙂 ) We were sitting near the front of the orchestra!! I said, I don’t think I need them to see him that close up! And Maria Kowroski was stunning again in Diamonds, as was her very leading-manly partner Charles Askegard (who I forgot to mention last time). Oh dear, I almost called him Charles Bushnell… Speaking of which, Candace Bushnell (his wife, and “Sex and the City” lady), was right when she told him he was tall for a ballet dancer. I usually sit in the fourth ring, where everyone looks a lot shorter, but sitting up front, as I have been lately, you can really see people’s real sizes!

Oh, also, Philip and I met up with some of his friends, Monica Wellington and her beautiful daughter Lydia (who is currently a student at the School of American Ballet, run by NYCB), and, at intermission, they took us to the patron club, called The Green Room. This was the first time I’ve been in there and it’s really lovely. It looks just The Green Room at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, so called after 19th Century artist / designer / writer / philosopher William Morris. It looked like it was perhaps decorated with his wallpaper designs… Beautiful!

Oh, last note, happy Gay Pride day, everyone 🙂

Posted on

First Ever Reading Survived!!!

Hahahahhaha — I look SO intense!

Tonight I had my first ever public reading of my novel at the Cornelia Street Cafe. I read as part of the Writers Room Member Reading series, which takes place there every third Tuesday of the month from September through June.

Hehe, so much fun. I was so nervous, but once I got started, I was fine… at least that’s what my wonderful friend, Evangelina, told me 🙂

Here I am with Evangelina, my good old trustworthy friend from my writing class days. She’s known (main character) Sophie and all of her nutty problems since her inception so it was PERFECT to have her in the audience! I would have invited more people, but I was really nervous going into it and didn’t know how well I’d do, so I wanted to minimize the number of people to see me screw up!

But as it turned out, it went fine, and now of course I can’t wait to do it again. When I do, I promise to invite everyone I know in the NYC area 🙂

Here’s playwright and Writer’s Room Reading Series host, the hilarious Stan Richardson, about to introduce me.

Hehehe, I’m such a goof. I actually wrote out my intro to my piece that I was reading. I always do such silly things — whenever I give an oral argument in court, I absolutely MUST write at the top of my outline the words, “May it please the court. I am Tonya Plank and I represent (client’s name)” … my friends like to make fun of me — because what, am I going to forget my name?? — but I’m always so nervous approaching a podium, I just must have those words on my paper in order for me to get myself actually talking.

All in all it went really well. Like I said, I was very nervous and shaky-voiced at the beginning — which I felt and Evangelina confirmed — but after I got into it, it got much better. After I read, Stan said my reading made him think and there were a lot of things that he really wanted to talk about but there was no time — how sweet! And then later, he made a couple of jokes about Freud and everything in this post-Freudian universe being sexual, which was a riff on my first couple of lines 🙂

Then, after all readings were over, a writer, Jim Story, approached me and told me he thought I did well and my work sounded interesting but that I read way too fast and needed to slow down. Evangelina agreed, but said I only read how I talk (which is way too fast!). She also said that I need to learn proper comic timing — when I have a funny line, I need to PAUSE afterward to give the audience time to get it and respond. I know, I know, I know, but eeek, I just feel so weird doing that; I feel like I am begging for laughs, basically telling the audience I want them to think this is funny and to laugh by pausing in certain places — no??? I guess maybe just reading slower in general would do the trick…

Hehehe, also Stan asks everyone a question or two when introducing them. For mine, he asked me what I liked best about my website. I was thinking he was going to ask something like when did you join the Writers Room and / or why, what publishing house would you like to publish your book (questions he’s asked others), but instead I got this one and I couldn’t think quickly. I said the first thing that came to mind which was the graphic! I do really like the graphic designer my web builder, Gregory Tomlinson, hired, and those couple of little outlines he did of me and Pasha dancing in my first showcase, one on the main blog, and one on the home page. And then I started vomiting on (when I’m nervous I just start blabbing incessantly; it’s really just BAD), about how I used to take ballroom and, oh can you believe the guy in my graphic, my former dance teacher, is now on “So You Think You Can Dance” and woo-hoo a famous person on my blog, who knew Pasha would make it so big, and how awesome, and blah blah blah… have no idea what else I said; it’s just a blur now! Well, Stan had no idea what I was talking about — he’s like, So You Think You Can Dance, is that American!? I’m such a goof, I have to remember not everyone is as obsessed with dance as I am … And, hello, what kind of writer says their favorite thing about their website is the graphic!!!!!!!

Anyway, it was all so much fun and such a great experience and I so want to do it again. I could totally get used to this writer life 🙂 Thanks to Stan for being his humorous self and easing my nerves, along with my two co-readers tonight Dan Klein and Lauren Yaffe, and Evangelina, friend extraordinaire for her never-ending support :), and to Cornelia Street Cafe and the Writers Room (the most awesome of all urban writers colonies!) — as well as the Jerome Foundation, NYC Department of Culture, and National Endowment of the Arts for underwriting the WR Reading Series — all for giving new writers such a wonderful opportunity to be heard and to engage in the writing life in this way. Happy night!

Front of Cornelia Street Cafe, where Evangelina and I had dinner and caught up with each other after the reading. And, across the street, we noticed this very happening restaurant, Petra or something like that? Hmmm, will have to check it out someday…