WHEN I FIRST moved to New York City, at the tender age of 21 in 1997, I got a job as an assistant at an artist's studio about a block from City Hall. The artist was Sarah Schwartz, and she had been making black rubber bands with words stamped on them in silver. The rubber bands were spotted by a buyer from Barneys who persuaded Sarah that she could sell these to a mass audience (limited to New York, that is, not nationwide). Sarah started a mini factory in her studio producing these bracelets, along with a perfume line, and soaps. All of this was fascinating but that's not what I'm writing about today.

One of the other assistants in the studio, whose name was Eileen, became a friend. We were the same age, and it was through Eileen that I got my first taste of downtown New York. After getting off work, we walked north to Houston where there was cheap pizza and bars. But I am also not writing about Eileen.

What I am writing about is the Angelika Film Center on Houston, where Eileen's best friend (let's call her Jane; I don't remember her name) worked behind the food counter. They were both artists, and had met at SVA. We often went there to wait for her friend to get off work. Jane had incredible stories about the rats. The Angelika was subterranean—you went in, bought your tickets and got your popcorn, then descended a staircase to the movie theaters. The subway's rumbling was audible during screenings. It tunneled through Houston, right next to the theater. So it wasn't all that surprising that the Angelika had a rat problem. One movie goer believed she was petting a cat that had wandered into the theater until the lights came on, and she saw that the cat was a giant rat. Another time a couple came out of the theater well before the movie was over and requested a refund: the reason being that one of the ceiling panels had come loose and there was a rat hanging over their heads. Jane herself had encountered a rat in spectacular fashion: she was in the deep freeze getting something out and when she turned around she saw that there was an enormous rat in the final throes of life lying on the floor—right in front of the entrance to the freezer. She stood there, aghast and terrified and very, very cold, waiting for someone to come and take it away so she could leave.

So every time I went to the Angelika to see a movie I made sure to put my feet way up high on the seat in front of me. Because we could get in for free, I was not about to let a couple of gruesome rat tales deter me from free entertainment. I saw Boogie Nights, Henry Fool, and the criminally underrated Ulee's Gold starring Henry Fonda, which I only went to because Jane insisted on it. In the movie, Fonda plays a Vietnam vet who now raises bees as well as his two granddaughters. It is a very affecting movie that I still think about all the time, so thank you, Jane, wherever you are.

In addition to serving food, Jane was tasked with a unique job. The theater's ceiling was painted with gold and pink clouds, but the painting was badly chipped, and the clouds were full of, well, holes. Knowing that Jane was an artist, the Angelika's manager offered Jane a little money to do a Sistine Chapel job, repainting the clouds and filling in the holes. She had no idea what paint had been originally used to make the clouds, nor was she trained to do this kind of work, and her repairs were hilariously obvious. Years after I lost touch with Jane and Eileen, I would go to the Angelika and look up at the ceiling and smile at the roughly patched clouds.

I hadn't thought about any of this for years until I came across a guide to New York City in the new issue of The New York Review of Architecture, which includes an elegant write-up of the Angelika by A.S. Hamrah — who does admit it is "Manhattan's most disparaged movie theater." If they only knew.

Three Things Keeping Me Going This Week

1. Last weekend I went to CAKE, the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo, and there was a surplus of excellent comics, graphic novels, mini-comics, stickers, and more. I told myself I wouldn't spend too much money but ended up with an armful of books along with a super cute t-shirt. The vibe was excellent, too: friendly and collegial. I hesitate to call myself a cartoonist, or a comic artist, or whatever, but I felt welcome there. Some treasures I picked up: Adrift On a Painted Sea by Tim Bird published by Avery Hill: Forage Like a Bear by Chris Fink with drawings by John Porcellino; and You Are Not a Guest by Leela Corman published by Fieldmouse.
2. Lucia Berlin, A Manual for Cleaning Women: I had never read Berlin's stories before, and I tend to avoid short story anthologies because I only read one or two and then forget to read the rest, but Berlin's voice is so real and her characters are so beautifully flawed that I just go from one story to the next and never get sick of her voice.
3. Adopt a local NPR station!

This Week in Mushroom News

I hate sharing bad mushroom news, but unfortunately, not all mushrooms are good. The golden oyster mushroom has become a nearly unstoppable invasive fungus. It seems that the culprit are mushroom kits, which I have considered buying in the past, because they seem like fun! But apparently the spores are easily carried by the wind and have created a serious problem for native fungi. So, please, do not buy those cute little mushroom kits.

Popular edible mushroom species is invading U.S. forests and pushing native fungi out of the way

Golden oyster edible mushrooms is invading forests across the United States, displacing native species and disrupting the ecological balance.

Earth.comRaquel Brandao

That's it for me this week! Happy Mother's Day--and for those of you who might struggle with this particular holiday, you might like this lovely piece, Motherless Mother's Day, which I read this morning.

Love,

Claire