The autumnal equinox brought a crystal clear day in the low 70s. People were out in coats and sweaters; I was back in long pants. Center stage was mine.

After a few songs, a toddler came up to me and indicated he wanted to dance. I tried to put a lei over his head, but he would have none of it. Standing stiffly by my side, the child smiled for the camera. His father and older brother took pictures, while mother and sister sat on a bench. Mother was totally covered in brown, only her eyes exposed. She had a large red pocketbook in her lap. Father gave me a fiver and I asked him where he was from.

“You are my first Qatari,” I told him, and shook his hand.

“It is a very small country,” he said in unaccented English.

“In a very difficult part of the world,” I added.

Taking in the scene around him – boats on the lake, splashing fountain, giant bubbles from the bubble man, children dancing, the sweep of the twin stone staircases leading the eye to the sky – he said, “How lovely here. The children are happy.”

Next came 3 women, one of whom, Janice, was having a birthday. That was good for $2. The 40-something man in Bermuda shorts was good for a handful of silver. A girl in her 20s put on a lei and did some kind of interpretive hula that had her cavorting all around the fountain, balancing on the walls, leaping like a gazelle. That was good for another $2.

A pear-shaped man in a panama hat wanted to take my picture while I sang “Honolulu Baby.” As he held the camera steady, he waggled his butt. “Sons of the Desert,” he said, naming the title of one of the Laurel and Hardy movies in which the song had been performed. I sang on; his graceful waggle was vintage Oliver Hardy. As he walked off, he told me he was from Germany, where they love the old films.

A man walked up with money in his hand. “My group over there has been listening to you, and we want you to have this. It’s $100.” He put the c-note in my hand; I put it in my pocket. “Give them a little acknowledgement.” I tipped my hat.

They were 3 couples from Nantucket who had done well and had no problem spreading it around. At the end of the day, I counted $16.86 in my case. My previous one day record of several years standing was $51, $40 of which I got from film crews who had paid me to shut up. This was better.