6 posts tagged “new york city”

Vong

"...thus this story has no pictures, but this is not important. it is the experiences, the memories, and the triumphant joy of living to the fullest extent in which real meaning is found. god it is great to be alive. thank you. thank you."
- christopher mccandless

* I had to make sure my gifts would arrive in California (my brother) and Michigan before Christmas. The last day for guaranteed delivery is Friday, today. I tried to make it happen for yesterday just to be safe and to preserve some sanity while the whole world is rushing. I rushed around yesterday evening buying the standing tools for wrapping, including boxes, wrapped gifts and wrote snazzy messages at work, loitered at FedEx (nicest people, f'real. Even during this insane part of the season)  to get boxed and tape (you have to purchase tape, too, did you know that?) to make the last pickup deadline. Made it... Sweet. Wake up this morning to hear that a FedEx truck, just last night, just after the last pickup deadline, got held up by gunpoint and totally is PoofPowGone. Nothing like an early morning panic to get the blood going. I did a quick tracking search. My packages not swiped. In fact they're already in Memphis. Life is good again.

* At about 6:30 this morning on the uptown Q train, between Canal and Union Square, a young lady who was sitting and talking with her friend suddenly gets up from sitting, holds on to the pole in front of her, wrenches her feet up above her head to nearly touch the car's ceiling, and then partially upside down legs in the air stripper slide down with a partial twist down the pole. Me and another random girl across from her smile approvingly. lolNY.

* This accompanying comment thread amuses me greatly so.

* Oh and taking the whole market thing in stride with morning Trading Places references? Always good times.

* I'm a pretty happy heifer, lately. Someone out there has been trying to take better care of me than I do myself. It's an odd feeling, but I'm starting to get used to it... if only I learn to relax some, eh?

* Because I have no debit card (lost it this week), I must do a physical withdrawal at the bank. I walk east on 53rd. The light changes and I am stuck at the sidewalk bisecting Park Avenue. My ipod is pumping with some Mexican music from one of the Kill Bill movies. I feel like I should be riding a horse in slo mo. Across the street is a motor home with a giant sign saying "Mitzvah Bus" which makes me chuckle. What a great word: "Mitzvah". I always read it as "good works" though I'm almost positive it doesn't exactly. I could always pronounce Hebrew/Yiddish words better than I can understand them for obvious reasons; being accustomed to being around Jews, not being one.

  I suddenly sense someone veryclose behind me. I turn to see a woman, perhaps in her late forties. Dark Grey frizzy hair spilling from under her knit cap. Slightly unkept but bundled. One glove off, her other hand holding a cellphone to her ear. I see her looking at me, but that could be because i'm looking at her and how very much up behind me she is. There's room on the sidewalk so there's no reason except for the fact that I'm standing up against the lawn and her bag is up on it, so I turn again figuring she just wanted to place her stuff on something a half a foot higher than the sidewalk. Whatever.

  After a couple more seconds of idly watching traffic, I suddenly see her hand raised beside me. I turn and she's pointing to the Mitzvah Bus, her other black glove dangling. I pull out a headphone to hear what she's saying.

  "They don't know nothing about Jesus," she states matter of factly. The phone is still at her ear.

  I shrug, "Well, they're Jews," and I turn back to the street ready to ignore her.

  "Yes, but they know nothing about Jesus and all they believe in is money and penis envy..." she continues more but I've fully drowned her out by now.

  "Well, that's just not a very nice thing to say," I retort reproachfully. The light has changed, the taxis have slowed to a stop, I begin walking across the street again, Mexican horns blaring in both ears again. I continue to walk. She's waddling behind me, still carrying on, looking foolish. I roll my eyes and make my way to Lexington.

* Before hitting Lexington, there's a construction site, scaffolding serving as pedestrian archways. There's a gap in the plastic sheeting, it reveals a large hole in the building they are demolitioning. A man in a red windbreaker, youthful but with grey hair and grey beard, like a friendly English teacher, stands at the hole with hands in his pants pockets watching the work before him. I stop too fascinated. It's like an open chasm. No roof, light is streaming in. The large brick building once about 6 floors now reduced to 3 floors of carefully contained rubble and girders. A construction guy in bundled Carthardt gear standing a storey and a half up on top of rubble trying to light a welding torch. Behind him a digging machine. The man looks at me when he discovers a companion. I smile. He smiles. And we continue looking at the sight. I make a gasping noise.

  "I used to go here," I start. He looks at me with a slight smile and open eyes. "When this was a YWCA many years ago."

  "This must be very strange for you to see this then. You used to be up on those floors, now gone..."

  I grin sideways and shrug, "Yes it is, a little." And I look up to the open air past the exposed girders. Summer Day Camp. I was, what?, 8 maybe 10? The pool was up there and I would try the back flips. On the lobby floor was the auditorium with a stage. We performed to Prince around the time of Purple Rain so when we danced to "Let's Go Crazy" and did that one part when we simulated sex complete with the "Sss AHH!" sounds, the adults clutched at their chests. Our teacher was always so annoyed at how when we had to change for PE in the same locker room as the regular YWCA members the grown women would walk around naked. I used to go there as a child and now it was being torn down...

  "New York, it is always changing, never stays the same," I say as I continue walking east, waving goodbye.

* The transaction at the bank went smoothly enough. Amazingly no lines. As I was walking out the door, a woman asks loudly to the room, "Excuse me, did anyone leave this here?" I turn and she's by one of the tables we use to fill out the deposit/withdrawal slips. Her hand slowly goes up like she's uncertain of the outcome and you can clearly see some checks of different colors and large denomination bills... cash. I mutter a surprised Oh Dear LORD and the woman sitting not far from me on the phone is looking at her with wide eyes and gives a startled chuckle. Then a man who was on line with an extremely pale face now utters, "Oh my goodness. That's mine." And there's a collective exhalation of air and some more chuckles. The man thanks her but has that look on his face that he dodged a bullet and is amazed that he's still alive. We all smile at him and each other. I'm still chuckling as I go out the door.

* I cross Lexington again. I pass the hole in the demo'ed building. There are three men inside drilling and welding and what have you. The man in the red jacket is no longer there. I look to the right and I see two construction men over a BBQ grill with ribs and steaks piled high. A table full of food for the guys. The guy manning the grill is wearing a red Santa hat. The other guy overseeing. I smile. Crossing Park I pass the Mitzvah Bus again. I see two Hassidim and a young boy with them passing out pamphlets, their music blaring from the motor home. I trot across but I still get caught at the bisecting sidewalk and I wait again for the traffic light to change.

"I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York's skyline. Particularly when one can't see the details. Just the shapes. The shapes and the thought that made them. The sky over New York and the will of man made visible. What other religion do we need? And then people tell me about pilgrimages to some dank pesthole in a jungle where they go to do homage to a crumbling temple, to a leering stone monster with a pot belly, created by some leprous savage. Is it beauty and genius they want to see? Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window - no, I don't feel how small I am - but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body."

-Ayn Rand, "The Fountainhead"

Share a photo of something written on the sidewalk or written in concrete.

Free Chalk!

Ziggy and I, for some reason, were wandering around Lower Manhattan. In Washington Square Park, we came across a lone box of sidewalk chalk with "FREE CHALK" written on the floor beside it. We looked around puzzled as did everyone else who stepped around it like it was some form of entrapment. True to our adventurous forms, we opened the box and went to town!

We started drawing competing fishies. I tried my hand at an interpretation of the famous Washington arch. Went to town!

Soon, as if we were some sort of guinea pigs, people started to watch us curiously to make sure we weren't part of some sort of performance art. Then they started to join in. As we soon left, bored with our newest conquest, that whole section of the park was filled with people crouching over drawing madly on the floor. It was good times. :)

Genius!