Ballet class, Newburgh Performing Arts Academy

Many people whom I speak to in Newburgh say that there is a need for more after school programs. The only ones I know of are those run by the redoubtable couple Kim Turner and Kevin White who direct the Newburgh Performing Arts Academy and The Boys and Girls Club. One afternoon I recently attended a pre-teen ballet class. It is well known that ballet is a rigorous discipline and the class I attended bore this out. But the children plainly loved it.

Flippers

All summer we looked for the flippers whom Caroline had first seen a year ago in the park surrounding Washington's Headquarters in Newburgh. Whenever we were in Newburgh we looked out for them.  Never a sign―just people saying they saw them yesterday or last week. One Saturday they actually came up to us on their bikes to say hello while we were standing talking to a friend on Liberty Street. But we were on our way to film somewhere else and there was no time to do anything.

A month later I was driving down DuBois Street and there they were. I leaped from the car and asked if I could film them there, where they stood, on that nice wide stretch of sidewalk. Thinking they might want softer ground I was prepared for them to say no. But they agreed without hesitation and giving not the slightest heed to the hard surface, and without one fall or collision with a passerby, they cartwheeled up and down. One of the group was a girl whom we had not seen before. Last semester she had won a prize for gymnastics at school .

Waiting

Police were investigating a shooting just yards from here on South Williams Street in Newburgh, NY. People waited for something to happen. Nothing did. At last, the police, shouldering their rifles, climbed into their cars and drove away. Nobody had been hurt but somebody had been arrested. The girl above was there to see the fun with her mother, her sister and a friend, none of whom had any connection with the arrest. They talked and smoked and drank soda and asked me questions about where I came from and how long I had been working on my film.

Suddenly their friend looked at me and said, "Are you psychic?" I said no but things did pop into my head from time to time, mostly somebody's death. I discovered it to be true when I read about the death a few hours or days later.

I asked if she were psychic and she said she was.