A knowledgeable reader has informed me that the plants I cannot identify are the annuals gomphrena and celosia.\u00a0 Except for a single golden stella and 2 pink dog roses, gomphrena and celosia provided the only color behind the benches on Friday, the fourth day in a row of beautiful busking weather in Central Park.<\/p>\n
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The Imagine Mosaic guitarist was singing \u201cEight Days a Week.\u201d\u00a0 A yellow-vested workman on break shouted to his buddy, \u201cOne of me favorites.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Leaving Strawberry Fields, I noticed the wood anemone had emerged from the scrub along the path.\u00a0 It was already 5 feet high, with large buds visible in a nest of leaves at the end of the long stems.<\/p>\n
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At Bethesda Fountain, the cowboy was finishing up \u201cSong Sung Blue\u201d (Neil Diamond, 1972). \u00a0He motioned to me to sit down for his last number, \u201cQuando, Quando, Quando\u201d (Engelbert Humperdinck, 1968), accompanied by prerecorded strings.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
My first hula dancer was a teen-aged Australian boy.\u00a0 At the end of \u201cThe Hukilau Song,\u201d he rejoined his parents and walked away.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Obnoxiously loud music started blaring to my right.\u00a0 Something was going on near the big bubble man.\u00a0 A young man had spread roses on the ground in front of a young woman. \u00a0He dropped to one knee. \u00a0It was a marriage proposal, complete with an amplified soundtrack.\u00a0 There was nothing to be done but stand quietly and wait for the scene to play itself out.\u00a0 She said yes, they kissed, the crowd applauded.\u00a0 A friend, who had been taking pictures, finally bent down and turned the music off.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A group of young men wanted a picture. \u00a0One of them gave me a dollar.\u00a0 When I asked where he was from, he answered, \u201cVerona,\u201d as if answering \u201cItaly\u201d would have done an injustice to his heritage.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A cheerful mom from Hagerstown, MD, offered up her son and daughter to the hula.\u00a0 The kids did a credible dance; mom gave me a fiver.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
An Asian mom unbuckled her baby from the stroller and gave her a little push toward me.\u00a0 She swayed to the music of \u201cGet Out and Get Under the Moon.\u201d\u00a0 Mom was delighted and handed the baby a dollar to give to me.\u00a0 The child ran off, the mother gave chase and came back with my gratuity.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Another baby girl, named Tenzing, from Tibet, was unleashed by her mother.\u00a0 She walked to within a few feet of me and looked up, locking eyes.\u00a0 When I finished my song, she started to cry.\u00a0 Mom picked her up with one arm, as she dropped a dollar in my case with the other.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A prosperous-looking man in a straw hat and Bermuda shorts put a fiver in my case.\u00a0 As he walked by he said, \u201cGood luck to you in your life.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A group of Dutchmen walked by.\u00a0 A teenaged boy fell behind to do a hula.\u00a0 I threw a lei over his head and he danced to a quick rendering of the first verse of \u201cThe Hukilau Song,\u201d sans intro.\u00a0 Handing back the lei, he said, \u201cYou make people happy,\u201d before running off to rejoin his group.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A boy and girl, both under 20, straggled by.\u00a0 \u201cHave you got time for a hula today?\u201d\u00a0 They were hesitant, embarrassed.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re homeless,\u201d the boy said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cAll right, then, this hula’s for the homeless.\u201d\u00a0 I asked them to imagine they were in Hawaii, blue sky, warm sand, the ocean waves lapping at the shore.\u00a0 They smiled, swaying as I sang to them like palm trees in the breeze.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, I feel pretty good,\u201d the boy said, returning his lei. \u00a0We shook hands.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, that was fun,\u201d said the girl.\u00a0 Together, they turned and blended back into the crowd.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A mom, dad and 2 kids sat at the edge of the fountain.\u00a0 The kids had watched the homeless hula.\u00a0 I motioned for them to step up and dance next, but they quickly turned away.\u00a0 When they got up to leave, however, each kid had been provided a dollar for me.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"