It’s always fun to attempt to accurately describe a town in 900 words or less.
As a psychoanalyst each hour I’m faced with a similar challenge of discovering and the describing the state of each of my patients. And at the sessions outset neither they nor I can predict what the discovery will be.
It lies hidden within their unconscious and it takes intuition and a relaxed sort of focus in order to catch the discovery as it rises to the surface.
As a journalist whose column is entitled Our Town, I am assigned the daunting task of accurately describing the true nature of a town.
This week the task is to discern the character of the town of Port Washington. So let us begin.
Port Washington is a community on the Gold Coast of Long Island with rolling hills, golf courses, yacht clubs and parks.
It was the home of Perry Como, William Randolph Hearst and John Cassavettes.
The median house sale is over $1,000,000. If that doesn’t impress you it should.
To discover the true nature of Port Washington I planned to spend the day wandering its streets.
I reserved a table at Louie’s Oyster Bar and Grille at noon on Sunday.
This waterside restaurant is quintessential Port Washington. It has a feel of history with all that burnished wood, brown leather and vintage photos and it has wonderful views of Manhasset Bay.
The biscuits were warm , my salad was delicious and the coffee was perfect.
After brunch I walked down the street heading north and sat for a while on a bench overlooking the bay.
My plan was to drive up to Soundview Cinema and watch the documentary film “The Founders,” which was about the 13 women golfers who started the LPGA back in the 1950s.
This film was part of the annual Gold Coast International Film Festival.
“The Founders” was directed by Charlene Fisk and Carrie Schrader and featured Louise Suggs, Babe Zaharias and Patty Berg, all legends of the game.
The film was a touching glimpse into the very humble beginnings of professional golf for women and also featured Karrie Webb, Anika Sorenstam and Stacey Lewis.
It described how women’s professional golf led the way to Title IX and the explosion of women’s sport in America.
During the film there was a moment when the documentary lost its sound which led to some grumbling in the audience.
After the film ended the two directors talked to the audience via skype.
Afterwards I ran into Caroline Sorokoff who was the festival director who offered me a brief history of the festival and off I went.
If I was to summarize the day in town as if it was an analytic session and then try to describe what I learned it would be very easy to do.
I would tell my patient “Miss Port Washington” that she was lucky indeed to be located fast upon the bay and lucky to have fine restaurants, golf courses and an international film festival at your feet.
But the symptom expressed in this ‘session’ was the grumbling by the audience just because they missed out on five seconds of dialogue.
In other words we are all very spoiled to live on the Gold Coast and in fact have nothing at all to be sad or angry about.
Life in Port Washington can’t be better.
The human flaw in all towns and all people is that irrepressible need to achieve perfection.
We are all looking for that perfect meal, that perfect day, that perfect film.
The diagnosis would be what we refer to as obsessive compulsive personality which is a long way of saying we are never satisfied with anything at all.
I’m that way; you’re that way and so is just about everyone else here on the gold coast.
The cure for this malady is easy enough as well.
Just walk around Port Washington, breathe in the fresh breeze blowing off the bay, look up in the sky and thank the Lord above for being alive on Long Island in the good year 2016.
And thank you Charlene Fisk and Carrie Schrader for reminding us just how great women’s golf is.
Golf, film festivals and sailing are just a few of the many things to do in Port Washington.
” />
