My dearest, putting my arms around you to kiss you hello. I hope all is well with you this evening. I'm back from a jaunt downriver, to Rhinebeck, where I purchased sumptuous loaves of fresh organic bread with a discount certificate, and with the savings stepped into a high-end shop with the express purpose of finding lovely soap for B'klyn, which I did, two small pure, fragrant lemongrass bars milled in France, one for the sink, one for the tub. The main purpose of my excursion was to catch Biutiful, starring Javier Bardem and nominated for the Best Foreign Film Oscar.

Have you noticed that I enjoy going to the cinema? I really do. I love film, but find that with most I need to be committed to sitting in a darkened theatre, with others, in order to become wholly absorbed. Biutiful was wonderful, but I could never have watched it on the small TV at the kitchen table, or even on my home computer now that I know how to work the DVD. It was a very good movie, Bardem of course excellent, and it dealt in a very palpable, realistic way, in an interwoven dramatic narrative, of mass immigration, involuntary diasporas, forced or slave labor, and their harsh impacts on individual families and lives.

Snow and ice still cover the landscape but when I left the theatre the sun was shining, everything was melting, there was a feeling of spring in the air, and I had a spring in my step as I thought of you. Somewhere near church carillons pealed, light traffic moved through the village intersection, and I put on dark glasses against the sun. I jumped over enormous puddles in low heels and made my way to the car where first thing I did (after turning on the radio) was to open up one of the breads - "organic country peasant" - and eat an end along with a bit of cheddar I had tucked in my purse. Then I drove along country roads back home, only I took a wrong turn at first and wound up in Rhinecliff, which is right on the river, and has an Amtrak station and a really lovely looking inn that advertises on my favorite radio station, that (as I could tell looking up at its cheerful yellow clapboard edifice that faces the still-ice-covered river) has beautiful individual balconies with river views, like a river steamer or cruise ship, and I thought, oh my dear Dmitri, you and I would enjoy spending a night or weekend in this place, we really would, it looked utterly romantic, and there's a restaurant and bar downstairs - I should have stopped the car and peeped in the windows - plus, I should think, room service. Ah, anyway, that was just the most delightful fantasy I had of you and me, my darling, as I maneuvered the car from the tight riverfront, and made my way back north.

The whole time in the cinema I thought of you too, as I sat in the darkened theatre, watching the images, becoming absorbed in the story. But I'm not very Zen at all, I always have an alternate scenario going in my mind, or wishes, and my wish or constant abiding comforting fantasy was to hold you in my mind, to never let you go, I mean - well, really, I never let you go, you're always on my mind, we're always holding hands. Are we angels? Maybe. Another thought I have is how over a year ago I had drinks with some people at (p.m.) bar and one of the fellows in our little peripatetic company (we went up and down Warren Street that cold, snowy evening during Winter Walk) was at the bar and at the end of the evening gave us a ride "home" in his mini-Cooper. What a vivid memory that is, three of us piling after midnight into his tiny car parked on the street (amazing that we all fit but it was surprisingly roomy). And he was perfectly sober and whizzed up not the main gridded streets towards North Fifth, but rather - and he could because his car was so tiny - flew along the narrow back alleys behind the streets, whisking us to safety. It felt enchanted. I had encountered him a couple of times in the course of that evening, once at a party at a gallery where earlier that day had transpired a huge collectibles auction. He was seated at a table talking to another woman and I stood with my glass of wine nearby and overheard him saying something about the Cate Blanchett production of Hedda Gabler, which I'd actually seen. Or maybe he was saying that he works in theatre production, at BAM. Then there he was again a few hours later, at (p.m.), a Slavic, really handsome guy.

Where I'm going with this is that even at the time (or near to it) I haphazardly blogged about how this guy reminded me of you, the same types of looks, something about him that I felt so --- I hesitate to put words to it now. Recognition, just a feeling of recognition - is how I described it at the time. And then I went glancing off into something else.

And that's it, so that night, very very late he deposited us in safety via his mini-Cooper, and here I was today flying north along snowbanked country roads thinking of you, you by my side as far as I was concerned or could possibly wish. Only had you been with me then I suppose you would have been doing the driving, or perhaps one day we can take the train up or down river and either way you can have the scenic river view seat and maybe we'll stop in Rhinecliff, and into the Rhinecliff (inn that is) for a drink, a meal, a night, and the next day, after a walk along the river, a snap -

very many kisses darling