An Artist in Hydra
Walking through the narrow streets of Hydra with Michael McGregor is an amusing experience. He stops to shake hands and cry out various greetings, to shopkeepers, restaurant owners, other artists and a few old bohemians who lounge in the cobbled squares, like sun-baked iguanas in bandanas and denim cut-off shorts. He’s been spending weeks at a time here over the last few years; a local fixture in a rumpled linen shirt and paint-splattered running shorts, a permanent glint in his eye.
Is This the Perfect New York Bar?
Joan Didion put it this way: “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” We’re doing it all the time. Storytelling, like dreaming, is a trick for enduring real life, especially when life falls short of our expectations. Sometimes a place — a restaurant, a bookshop, a bar — pulls us through the front door because it acts as a sort of cinematic backdrop for narrative therapy. You walk in, you sit down, you’re transported to a different sphere and a different self. For me, a great bar is the opposite of Cheers, the fictional ‘80s saloon where “everybody knows your name.” A great bar gives you life because it lets you pretend you’re someone else for a little while.
