L
ast night Taylor and I walked from Rockefeller Center to 28th Street. We saw the Christmas tree, the light show on Sacs 5th Ave, Macy’s, and countless store windows and lights. Our destination for this walk was a restaurant called Oscar Wilde’s where we had dinner.
Wild(e) is an understatement for the decor. It felt like a Victorian drawing room, a New Orleans brothel, and an Las Vegas showroom somehow all materialized in the same space. Their were mismatched decorations on every inch of every wall. Couple this with the added Christmas decorations, and our senses were over stimulated while our palates were satisfied. The restaurant was the epitome of the Mick Jagger line, “Anything worth doing is worth overdoing.”
I acknowledge the irony of using a quotation from anyone but the man himself in describing the eponymous restaurant. Wilde is known for two things, the second of which is his aphorisms.
After I returned to my hotel after dinner (and a wonderful visit to a jazz club) I decided to read through a collection of Wilde quotations. A witty turn of phrase might be the most beautiful creation of the human being. Even if I disagree with a person, I can forgive anything for smart and funny.
After enjoying several hundred jabs and judgments (how did he have time to do anything else?) I decided on one to use in my post for the day.
“I am not young enough to know everything“
As I limp into my seventh decade and my sixty-first Christmas, I sometimes miss the young me. That person knew what was wrong with the world, with the country, with you, and could quickly articulate what needed to be done. Today, even when I know things are wrong, I have no idea what to do about anything. I know how I want to be and act, but I so quickly see contradictions in the world and in myself, that part of my wants to declare a separate peace and go live in a cabin by the lake. I once wanted to change the world, I wonder how much longer I’ll be able to change my socks without questioning my choices and motivations.
I watch the talking types on TV, and I wonder how anyone can hold any opinion so strongly as to express it on television. I’m pretty sure that things are bad, but I’m less certain about what if anything can be done…
I wonder what Oscar would have said