“The Mini – Solve in seconds”

That’s the promise, or more probably, the challenge of the daily five-by-five crossword puzzle on the New York Times games page.

Monday’s second row, down, challenge was “Rockefeller Center statue depicting a Greek Titan.” Five letters.

Obviously not Prometheus – the golden, cast-bronze statue in the lower end of Rockefeller Plaza – since it busts the five-letter wall. But that’s the one everyone knows, even if they have never been to New York, because it is always in the frame with the Rockefeller Christmas tree.

Of course, the answer is ATLAS.

But far from solving in seconds, the crossword took me 2 minutes, 25 seconds. Just under two minutes is a good time for me these days. Rarely do I solve it in less.  Not like the old days, the younger days. The days of surplus and unused brain cells.

That’s OK, I’m good with 2:25 especially when some of the clues included “It’s measured in kilograms” (MASS), “River that Achilles was (mostly!) dipped in” (STYX), and “Tree-dwelling animal whose fur gets tinted green with algae” (SLOTH).

I could picture the statue, the darkly muscular 15-foot-tall god holding up a lighter-than-air, minimalist, three-band, armillary sphere. His stature is erect, his head upright, tall, suggesting too much pride for the effort required.

The ball-o-heavens astride his shoulders certainly had grown lighter, in appearance at least, since the 2nd century Roman Empire-era Farnese Atlas was carved from marble. Now that Atlas looks like the bidding of Zeus to “hold up the heavens” was a seriously weighty sentence.

The Rockefeller Atlas looks like it’s a day job or a hobby. You might recognize it from Ayan Rand book covers and “30 Rock” on TV.

Above left, the Farnese Atlas. Right, Rockefeller Atlas facing St. Patrick’s.

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I just couldn’t think of the name while doing the puzzle.

Then, that afternoon, while in the home stretch of Amor Towles’ novel “Rules of Civility,” there was this passage:

“He stopped tapping his feet and directed his attention across Fifth Avenue toward the deco-era statue of Atlas that holds up the heavens in front of Rockefeller Center.”

What were the chances?

Two references to Atlas in one day?

What do you suppose that portends?

In the novel, this statue would be barely two years old, having been cast in bronze by sculptor Lee Lawrie in 1937. The narrator, Kate, happens to be sitting on the steps of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, directly across Fifth.

She’s about to deliver some bad news to her ersatz boyfriend, Dicky.

During an awkward lull in the conversation, Kate observes that Atlas is “the very personification of hubris and brute endurance,” that it faces the entrance to St. Patrick’s where “back in the shadows … was the statue’s physical and spiritual antithesis, the Pietà  – in which our Savior, having already sacrificed himself to God’s will, is represented broken, emaciated, laid out in Mary’s lap.

“Here they resided, two worldviews separated only by Fifth Avenue, facing off until the end of time or the end of Manhattan, whichever came first.”

Just a nice coincidence, I suppose. But these days, I’m inclined to find meanings in patterns and symbols and warnings in uncommon juxtapositions. I don’t believe in mere coincidences anymore.

Maybe that is part of trying to make sense of this increasingly senseless world.

I crave connections among all of life’s broken pieces. Connections that will ground me in rationality.

Because right now, we’re awfully short on rationality.

If someone or something is pulling the strings, it has a weird and cruel sense of humor.

Two Atlases in one day?

Maybe I am to assume a heavier burden.

For all eternity?

Dear Gods above, I hope not. I’m neither the Atlas nor the Sisyphus sort.

Atlas. World Atlas? Am I to travel soon?

I’d go for that.

____________               ___________            ___________

For you rabbit hole lovers, here is an excellent discussion of the juxtaposition of Atlas directly across Fifth Avenue from St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Was there a sinister intent behind it? 

To the author of this post, Atlas is not starring-down the broken Jesus of the Pietà but the tiny Christ Child statue on the main altar – the one also holding the balled universe but in the palm of his tiny hand.

Who’s the tougher guy now, Atlas?