A little Christmas tradition... Evening tea in bed... And memories of the Ansonia...

Did I ever tell you how I love keeping little pieces of my world with me along my journey?... things that may not mean much to other folks, but when I've found them (sometimes tossed aside, or even away in the trash!) I keep them and find a use for them in life.

Here's one; it's the bronze wall thermometer from the notorious Continental Baths in the Ansonia Hotel!... yes, THAT Continental Baths where a young, loud, and over-the-top, funny-looking Jewish comedienne with a brassy voice and a zaftig figure sang to Park Avenue socialites and gay boys in bath towels. Her name of course, was Bette Midler and her goofy little pianist was Barry Manilow... both of them destined in a very short time to become icons of the 1970s, and beyond. Well, as we all know, NYC has almost no sentimentality for anyone or anything... not even for itself. And, as times (and tastes!) changed, the city could devour parts of itself one night and awaken the next morning with something shiny and new. The Continental Baths was one of those "things"... it ran its course (even in its later incarnation as "Plato's Retreat"; a forlorn, short-lived, and shabby hand-me-down for heterosexual hipsters of the 1980s and finally was sentenced to the wrecking ball and dumpsters of Giuliani's "gentrification" schemes.

One night, as I roamed the dimly lit labyrinth of the Ansonia's sub-basements, I came across rooms full of the Continental/Plato's wreckage. All that was recognizable of the place was the Olympic-sized swimming pool with its three terra-cotta lion face water spouts, its brass railings and stair bannisters, and the brass stencil-sheet for "5 FT" still splashed with red enamel where the attendants had painted the water depth along the walls of the pool... it was lying on a pile of smashed marble; the dividing partitions of the maze of the infamous steam rooms where New York's, and indeed America's gay men had gone for magic, mystery, and other men!

As I dug through the rubble looking for some piece of terrazzo or tile, mosaic, or memorabilia, I stumbled over this, half-buried in crushed plaster and yet, miraculously undamaged. I had to wipe the front clean of dirt to realize that it wasn't an automobile wheel housing; it was the face of a thermometer, weighing almost 40 pounds. And when I scratched the underside with a discarded nail from the floor, the familiar rosy glow of solid bronze showed itself in the dimness of the work lights strung on the overhead beams.

I lugged it back up to my apartment, and I mean LUGGED it... 40 POUNDS, at least! I scrubbed it in my double-sized cast-iron bathtub; the type that grand old hotels like the Ansonia were known for. And as I polished it, the slivery-green of the verdi-gris began to wash away, and that gleaming, warm, coppery-gold came into view. It was far too heavy to mount on the wall of my splendid bathroom although I thought it would be wickedly witty there, but by the next morning, looking at it sitting on the sofa, I knew instantly what it would be perfect for. I thought of all those breakfasts-in-bed that great ladies of film liked to have in the classic movies, and I remembered how often I myself had turned around in bed to grab a phone call and scattered my plate all over the floor! Not anymore! With this glorious bronze steam-punk objet weighing down the covers, nary a drop of my morning cappu would ever be spilt.

And that's how it's lived in all my homes, even after my long adventure in the Ansonia... a turn-of-the-century thermometer, originally installed in 1904 on the wall of the elegant gentleman's spa of a great metropolitan hotel, before the San Francisco earthquake, the Titanic, World Wars, the Roaring 20s, the Stock Market Crash, the Depression, World Wars, assassinations, moon landings, booms and busts, and blow-jobs... oh yes, and Bette & Barry!

That's how it is for me. Things; things you can hold in your hand, and behold in your eye; things that most folks walk by and don't even notice... Things hold a meaning for me, a depth and expanse that is... spiritual... oh, beyond spiritual. And when I "save" them, when I keep them from being disposed of, discarded, or destroyed, they become... what?... my children?... Certainly they become a part of me. Truly a part of me... whatever…

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