I went to a theater production of “Paradise Lost,” based, it claimed, on the words of John Milton. I did not think much of the play’s quality, but the group putting on the play was a Christian group. On some level they succeeded with me. Eve was not initially naked as Biblical authenticity should have required but was clothed in a filmy fabric that moved and flowed and shaped over her body. She was lovely, and well before that consequential bite of the forbidden apple, all was foreshadowed because I was thinking about ripe, luscious fruit.

          Whenever the president speaks, I keep hoping in vain for more splendid flashes of silence.

          “Silence is the unbearable repartee.” G.K. Chesterton.

          At Madison Square Garden, Hammer of the Harlem Globetrotters got us in the audience to do a wave, then a reverse wave, and finally a slow motion wave. Even though this is all a hokey cliché, I hope you, like me, can still find pleasure in the wave.

          It’s such a surprise to hear people discussing cheating in American professional sports and find out that they are not talking about Boston.

          When I looked over to see who had sat next to me at the bar, I was surprised because he seemed close to my age, and few of the patrons of this place can remember Eisenhower, much less Truman, as president. He nursed his beer and was quiet for a few moments before he pointed to the book I had placed on the counter and asked what I was reading. It was clear that he was not really interested in that but that he wanted to talk. (Note. I did not say that he wanted to converse.)

          He told me that he was a retired real estate attorney from Atlanta and had been in a big firm. He was now living in Portland, Oregon, which he and his wife had picked after exploratory vacations.

          He was in Brooklyn to visit his son, who was a freelance cinematographer after graduating from Boston College. He has given his son, he told me more than once, advice about things the son should do to be a successful freelancer. I wondered what this big-firm real estate lawyer knew about either freelancing or cinematography.

          He was not staying with his son who lived in Bed-Stuy but at a downtown Brooklyn hotel. He said, “His apartment is even too squalid for me.” I wondered what he knew of squalid.

          I said that I was leaving soon. He was quick to tell me that he was meeting his son at the bar in a few minutes and said that I would enjoy meeting him. And then he said it again. I wondered if he was uncomfortable meeting his offspring. After a few more minutes, he looked at his phone and said that his son was not coming. He left three minutes later. And I wondered whether this was as sad as it seemed.

          “The opposite of talking isn’t listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.” Fran Lebowitz.