If I Could Speak Chinese

If I could speak Chinese, I would talk to the women who give me massages in the basement shop for a dollar a minute on Eighty-fourth Street off Columbus. I know I go there to relax, to relieve the tension from all the stress of the blah blah blah, and not to make small talk with strangers, but for me it wouldn’t be small. The girls are Chinese, after all, and so is my daughter, Lily, and it would be lovely to let them know that I am very nearly one of them. Aren’t I part Chinese if my daughter is 100 percent? I don’t see why not, in a spiritual sense, though I keep my mouth shut about spiritual anythings in New York these days.