The Forlorn Elephant of Broadway

My tragic looking new friend standing watch outside of a shabby little midtown shop.

There is a small diagonal stretch of Broadway in Manhattan between Koreatown and the Flatiron which is home to a street bazaar of peculiar wholesale establishments. Most contain bins full of unnecessary plastic knick-knacks that can only be purchased in minimum quantities of one hundred. The adjacent Fifth and Sixth Avenues are a tourist wonderland full of souvenir shops, hot dog stands and a legion of salesmen offering  "lowest price" guarantees to get to the top of the Empire State Building. This little stretch of road, however; is strictly for folks in the business of doing business.

Sometimes unsuspecting tourists will wander in to one of these shops and bring a single item to the salesperson only to be directed to read the "Wholesale Only" signs hanging rather unnoticeably in yellowed plastic coverings above the door. Some will try to plead their cases to uninterested store clerks for several minutes before giving up and continuing on their way without their coveted treasures. This anomalous zone feels like a relic of dead epoch that will surely be discovered by savvy real estate developers before the decade is over. Until then, the streets are still buzzing with merchants chattering away in a melange of Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew, North-African French and a peppering of languages my dull American ears are not yet tuned to pick out.

Recently I've been enjoying the summer weather and taking long walks during my lunch breaks. This helps restore remnants of sanity that my day job holds captive during business hours. I usually buy something along the way, and eat on a bench in Madison Square Park under the shade of stately old trees that have seen many generations of the midtown workforce before me enjoy a moment of daily respite, just as I do now. I like to sit and enjoy an over-priced sandwich while watching the traffic dance around the delicate intersection below the Flatiron, and enjoy being un-tethered from my desk for a few short minutes.

By the time I've finished, and I'm compelled to return, I say hello to Seward's statue perched above the flower beds, and pay my respects to General Worth resting beneath his forgotten obelisk before continuing back up Broadway. Each time I navigate my way through the narrow traffic crossings and construction zones that define this part of town, I try to keep my eye out for details that stand out among the swirling crowds going about their weekday business.

Recently I came across a rather worn out looking figure of a baby elephant made of papier-mâché chained outside of a chintzy looking shop that sells plastic costume jewelry. The poor little character looks as if he's seen a heavy share of life's injustices. He once had a dark vinyl skin which has peeled away around his face and trunk, revealing untreated wounds. Innumerable seasons of hot and cold have made their mark in the materials exposed. One of his font legs was broken and crudely taped back together causing him to lean unevenly on the gum-speckled pavement. Children with ice cream stained fingers assault him with regularity. Tourists use his back as a resting spot for their bags as they rummage to recover misplaced guidebooks and cigarettes. Mostly, he is overlooked.

In my sentimental mind, this little elephant represents so many of the pieces of old New York that have been cast aside and allowed to crumble, even though I know that I am probably over-reaching a bit. I don't know the real history of this object or how it came to be placed outside of a shop in this odd section of the city. I don't know how it received its many scars, but I do know that it has become an enchanting detail that I look forward to seeing. There is something behind the layers of decay that conveys a simple and sweet sentiment given freely to anyone who stops long enough to notice. Part of me wants to rescue the little elephant and take him home to be repaired, but there is something more genuine and powerful about his presence on the street. Who knew that bits of paper and glue molded into an animal would provoke such a reaction in me. Perhaps he has that effect on others as well. I hope so.

A Daily Reminder

The other day, I got off the subway at Herald Square, as I now do each morning. I was consciously ignoring my inappropriate weekday hangover, which is not necessarily an unusual occurrence. Wobbling through the obstacle course of stairways and turnstiles that leads to the exit of the “Manhattan Mall” building, I finally made it to the street after being poked, pushed and stepped on by the groggy mob around me. I’m fundamentally confused by the attempt to have a condensed version of a suburban shopping mall in the middle of Manhattan. I have decided that it makes the commuters feel more comfortable once they show up in the city for work. Sure, you may have JCPenney out on Long Island or in New Jersey, but the feeling of superiority that can be earned by waiting in much longer lines and paying higher sales tax in the city makes all the difference. There are certain cultural activities that unite the bridge and tunnel crowd, which I am unable to comprehend, and this is definitely one of them. At 8:30 in the morning though, nobody is shopping yet. Everyone is in a mad dash to find a source of caffeine before beginning the daily self-betrayal of long-term employment.

There is a certain peacefulness that exists in the act of being carried along in the current of human beings rushing down the sidewalks of Midtown like a steady stream of water. At this time of the day, everyone is determined and united with a common purpose. This enervated singular mindset prevents much of the unpleasantness that is possible after several cups of coffee and a street-cart danish. Unlike the chaos that comes at other times of the day when everyone has energy, the pre-9:00 rush is a sacred time reserved for the workforce of the city in which a universal objective unites us. The key to a peaceful coexistence is chronic fatigue and the hope that no matter how late we left our apartments, we will somehow make it to work on time and perpetuate the illusion that we are, indeed, responsible adults for at least one more day.

I started a new job recently, which means the creation of a new routine. For the past three years, I had my set path from the train to work. There were the familiar strangers I not only expected to see, but looked for in the mornings. There was the donut cart on the corner outside of Penn Station, the one that always charged me a different price for the same Boston creme donut depending on who was shut in behind the glass. There was the window full of fancy cupcakes on 8th Avenue that I always meant to try, but never did. There was the old man that stood barefoot smoking his cigarette in the same doorway every day who I named Fred. There was also the smiling green-eyed Halal meat seller who would sing cheerful songs in Arabic while chopping vegetables and heating his burners for another day’s crop of gyros. I’m sure they’re all still there, carrying on as before, but I am not. I wonder if anyone misses me as part of their own little morning inventory of strangers. Was I part of someone’s tally, or did I just blend into the clockwork mechanism of the Manhattan mornings without making a mark? I wonder.

When I was younger, I never thought of myself as a person who could be comfortable establishing such predictable morning rituals. I used to fancy myself an unapologetic “non-conformist” who would rather die than get caught get trapped in a pattern. Such arrogant thoughts are common in your early twenties. Although I’m not too much further along in my own timeline, now that I look back on it, I’m not quite sure what I was so afraid of. I’ve learned that it’s never wise to spend too much time considering the logic of post-adolescence. Now, I have come to enjoy discovering the patterns that will repeat and form the memories that will become my nostalgia that is cherished later on in life. All of these little things in our routines become part of the stories that we tell, and the stories that we tell become the larger parts of us that extend further beyond our own limited existence, and perhaps for some of us, they will outlive us when we’re gone. A story always becomes richer with repetition, and so does the experience of seeing the same series of things again and again over time. They somehow become more “your own” that way, and I’ve learned to value that phenomenon.  

Now, each morning, as I march into Herald Square with the legions of Midtown, I’m greeted with a view of the Empire State Building reaching far up into the sky, sometimes even gobbled up by low-hanging clouds near the spire. After living in the city for a few years, some of the magic of things which express the canned technicolor ideal of New York-ness have faded a bit for me, but I still get butterflies in my stomach when I walk in the shadow of that building. To me, it’s a firm reminder that no matter what discouragement may befall me, I’ve already come this far, and that alone is reason enough to keep moving upward. You can see the building’s silhouette poking out of the horizon from almost anywhere in Manhattan, watching over everything, keeping it all together. All the the pieces of my routine; the anecdotes, the high notes, the minor disasters and the rhythm that comes with the repetition, they all revolve around this glistening tower, watching over me like God. Sometimes, we all need a reminder of our purpose, and I am lucky to see mine every morning as I trudge forward in the mundanity of my little office job that allows my self-delusions of being a starving “artist” to move onward, and my own New York story to continue ... at least for another pay period.

A Year in New York City...

Self Portrait; One year in New York City and still going...

At the end of my street there is a little café on the corner complete with warm red-bricked walls, canvas awnings, a lovely wooden patio and windows that look in on candle-lit tables dressed with warm meals and cool drinks all year 'round. I walk by this little café nearly every day on my way to and from the train. It's one of the first sings I see in the morning, and one of the last things I see at night. This little corner establishment at the bottom of my little hill tells the story of each season. In the summer, the long narrow windows open wide, the tables are set out neatly on the patio with umbrellas and the patrons sip on drinks with lemon garnishes. In the fall, they decorate the exterior with pumpkins, gourds and straw bails while the windows slowly close and the tables eventually disappear from the outside, leaving a warm cozy scene behind the glass to be viewed in passing. In the winter the patio is covered with snow and ice while warm light glows from the within the frosty windows as guests hold tightly glasses of mulled cider and hot buttered rum, toasting the the year's end and the new beginnings ahead. Then, finally, the spring comes and the windows begin to open again, flowers begin to appear in the window boxes and a hopefulness fills the air as the tables and chairs return outdoors on evenings when the rain decides to take a short rest. I have witnessed the passage of each season on my street corner as I hurry from place to place. A year has come and gone, and like this rather insignificant genre scene that I have grown to love in my daily life, I am still here, a tiny little piece of the big city, with no sign of eminent departure...

A year in New York City, and what a year it's been. Although it's been a difficult year in many respects, I never knew I could love a place so much. From my humble beginnings in the rural mountainous American-West, to my now even humbler lifestyle in the heights of upper Manhattan, I have learned that even a year in the Big City can't change the fact that on the inside, I'll always be a just a scrawny little ne're-do-well from the sticks, and happily so...

In my first year as a New Yorker, I really feel like I've packed in a great deal of that good "character-building" life experience that teachers in high school always warned me about. My search for steady employment, having no skills or useful education to offer, lead me to a number of rather peculiar occupational adventures throughout the city. I managed to be both hired and fired in the same month by a pair of narcissistic old queens living in Liberace's meth-addicted playland (a.k.a. their lovely home) where I had the distinct task of recording the quantity, frequency and consistency of their dog's bowel movements, and helping them reorganize their collections of sequined fabrics and other bedazzled costume accessories. I learned that one can survive on little more than hot dogs and water for extended lengths of time, and still look like a million bucks. After working for several months as a receptionist for very wealthy clients in a very "zen" environment, I was able to appreciate my mother's old saying that "money don't buy class" is shamefully very accurate. Through my stint in holiday retail on Fifth Avenue, I learned that just because one comes from Europe, doesn't necessarily mean they have any more taste, manners or good breeding than trailer park housewives in rural Florida (in which case specimens from both locales were available for empirical observation). I learned that working 75 hours per week for three months in a row between multiple jobs can easily make any person lose their grip on reality. Most importantly, I learned that any ruts one may fall into in terms of career or any other facet of life can easily be transplanted to a new situation, and even after promising oneself never to work in a certain field again or repeat any other sort of habitual behavior, sometimes it's easy enough to creep back into old familiar places, temporarily of course, just to find oneself there 9 months later with no end in sight... (strictly hypothetically speaking of course).

Even with all of my apparent character flaws and personality defects, I feel like the city has been good to me. Even on my worst days here, there is always some moment when the clouds seem to part and something wonderful is illuminated, reminding me why I came here and why I love it. There is an energy to the city that is so easy to become wrapped up in like a warm blanket, and there is a comfort in knowing that you never really can be very lonesome with 8 million other people all around you (many of whom are much more miserable than you will ever be, so really, just get over yourself and enjoy life!). I love that if there is anything you could possibly want to experience in the world, there is at least some little piece of it available in New York. After my first year here, I feel like I've only just begun to see and know all of the things I want in this place, and I still have so much before me that is just waiting to be discovered.

I am very grateful to be in a city that I find so inspiring. Although I do miss my mountains and my big blue skies of Colorado, and the rustic and bizarre way I grew up with my hippie parents out in the middle of nowhere, I'm learning that many analogous rules can be applied in both the wilderness and in the city. Learning to make something from nothing really has proven to be useful as I'm poorer now than I can ever remember being, and so I'm grateful to my parents for raising me so uniquely. I now feel it is appropriate to raise my glass and toast to my first year in the city, and to as many more as life sees fit to give me...

Through panes of glass...

One of the many windows in the city from the old Custom House, now the Smithsonian's NYC Branch of the National Museum of the American Indian.

My oldest sister, Sariah, had a fascination with windows and the world outside of them. From the time she was a baby, she was attracted to the things on the other side. There is a yellowed photograph from an old battered album documenting the brief history of the (remarkably dull) events that occurred in my family during the few years before I was born (a remarkable event which illuminated their drab little lives). The image in the photo was Sariah as a baby, climbing up to the window in a shanty farm house my parents lived in for a brief time, and she was staring ever so majestically into the sunlight, looking as wise and as noble as an 18 month old can. She began her existence already enamored by life on the other side of the glass, and she never quite grew out of it. While she was always looking at the world outside of the windows, I often found myself taking the alternate approach from the outside looking in...

In the City of New York, there is no shortage of windows. On sunny days, much of the city shines as if tiny jewels have been embedded into the masses of stone that aim toward the sky, full of busy hives of people all trying to stay one step ahead of impending poverty. In this way, the city can be reminiscent of a really colossal ant farm, if all the ants had smart phones and caffeine addictions. Most of the people milling about in the buildings of midtown are so busy trying to get through the tasks of their day, they hardly have a chance to look up or follow Sariah's lead and peek out a window every now and again. I make it a point to look out of windows every chance I get, but generally, I just find myself looking into other windows as a result.

My office is situated in a very "no-frills" district of midtown Manhattan, just below Pennsylvania Station. Although there are several windows in the room, they all have a fantastic views of the rear-facing brick walls of the surrounding buildings. There is enough of a view to at least clearly see four or five floors of the buildings to the side and the back of my own, and during the moments I need to avoid the insanity of my job the most, I escape into the views of the other offices around us. Directly across from me there is an office full of clean looking thirty-somethings, sharply dressed in smart business casuals, and different members of the group meet at least once a day, sitting around a table facing a large flatscreen, where I assume they either do video conferencing or else they just really like to actively talk back to television programs for sport. Their workspace is brightly, but not TOO brightly, colored in a sort of "retro-mod" motif and there are always bagels (I wish my office had bagels). There are certain members of the group I have singled out as my favorites, and I periodically look out my window to see if they've entered the meeting. There is one man, tall-ish and balding with a cocky face - always wearing some sort of tasseled footwear, and I've decided I don't care for him. He's probably one of those people with a name like "Preston" or "Dayton" who drinks brandy out of a gold-rimmed snifter discussing his salary with members of his prep school alumni association while making jovial guffaws about his subordinates. When I get to the point where I begin fancying him to be a womanizer who has broken the hearts of all the female members of my office window soap opera, I know it is time to stop and get back to whatever task I've been avoiding by spying on my neighbors.

In the floors above and below the office full of young active people are two very dull views that rarely provide more than a momentary distraction. One window, the office above, peers into a room piled high with disorganized books on sagging shelves, where a very uninteresting old man sits in front of a computer all day, occasionally visited by a secretary of some sort who brings in beige folders full of what appear to be multi-colored forms (I like to call her "Helen"). He often eats his lunch out of a brown bag, prepared by some wife called "Marge" or "Barb," no doubt, and then he leaves every day, promptly at 4:30. In the office below, there sits a middle aged man with bushy peppered hair who seems to do little more than read magazines or the New York Post all day with his feet up on the desk. One time I saw him take a swig from a flask. I always try to see if I can catch him do it again. The only other point of interest in the views I have available to me is into a building directly behind mine. There is an office occupied by two uptight women who do not seem to get along. The sit, all day long at their computers, not speaking, one often pulling her hair back tighter and tighter as the day progresses. At least once a week, the tight-haired lady has to sit and listen to a paunchy older man, who has nose hairs that are visible from a building away, angrily talk at her for fifteen to thirty minutes while making severe hand gestures. I imagine he has bad breath. She then tightens her hair some more and furiously pecks at her keyboard until she leaves.

I realize at times that I may get a little too carried away with my imagination when escaping into the ambiguous scenes of the lives progressing around me through panes of glass, but I feel it's generally a way to connect with a much larger reality that is so easy to feel excluded from. Leading up to my apartment on Amsterdam Avenue, there are several little cafés that attract neighborhood residents and their visitors each night. Often when I'm walking home, and especially on cold nights, I like to look in the windows at the people sharing their evenings together over warm food and cool drinks and I like to pretend I know them and I can hear what they're saying. Often I'll see someone I recognize from the subway platform or the market or one of the apartment buildings on my block, and I feel glad, as though I've seen a friend (when in reality I rarely ever talk to my neighbors unless absolutely necessary). For a split second, in my glance, I've shared a moment in time with a familiar face, and in a city of eight million little ants running around behind glass, it is a comfort to feel human every now and again.

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How shaking my behind made me who I am today...

A small visual sampling of my awesome moves...

In retrospect, it seems that during the time of adolescence, there were at least three distinct genres of people: the people who were "cool," the people who were willing to do anything or die trying to "be cool" and those who had college to look forward to for any small hope of a social existence. I definitely fit into the latter of the categories. Unlike my mother who, by the age of 12, was tall, beautiful and charismatic with long, formerly-blonde hair (she still claims to be blonde, but it's just not the case), I was a scrawny four-eyed runt with a big mouth and an overly-active imagination. The fact that I survived junior high school was by divine providence for certain. Had I been born in a more primitive time, I would surely have been phased out quickly under the auspices of "survival of the fittest," that is unless dorky butt-shaking and high kicks to eclectic and out of style music would have been considered a survival skill. If that were the case, I would have at least been able to puzzle my predators before making a quick getaway...

For me, college was the time I finally blossomed into the amazingly wonderful person that I am today. In art school, nearly everyone was a little off-center, so having a few bizarre personality defects wasn't looked at in a negative light. I went to a large state university where the visual art department was sequestered safely in a forgotten and undesirable corner of the campus. Aside from required general education courses, I rarely left the little art bubble which was always engulfed in a cloud of cigarette smoke, the aroma of cheap coffee and fumes of paint-thinner. It was there I learned how the fantastic side effects of prolonged sleep deprivation and mental over-exertion could bring people together to form unlikely bonds over seemingly meaningless common experiences. I also learned the importance of letting loose every now and then to deal with sleepless nights in the painting studios finishing countless assignments that have since been forgotten completely. All that remains are the friends I've held on to, and the knowledge that we were all part of the common struggle that has lead us all on sordid paths of ruin and financial instability. Every Thursday night, a particularly special group of friends would all meet at bicycle shop/bar for $1 local microbrews (oh, how very Colorado) and old music on the jukebox. To the tunes of James Brown, Michael Jackson, Devo and other fabulous entertainers from the murky recesses of the available albums in the machine, I learned that although I may not have looked very smart or conventionally "cool," my bizarre and inventive dance moves made me quite popular among the well-libated college crowd of artists, hippies and other friendly drunks.

Although my undergraduate years, all 6 of them, were filled with many good times and happy booty-shakin' memories, I quickly learned that life after school became progressively less exciting. Slowly all of the bicycle bar buddies from Thursday nights of yore went our separate ways and, for the most part, we all found new adventures to pursue.  Upon finding myself eventually in New York City, far away from friendly faces and familiar beers I had grown so fond of, I realized just how precious those quirky experiences were. I've also realized that age is a funny thing, and although I still believe myself to be both "young and fun," youth and amusement are very relative terms...

This winter I was thrust into a lively social situation during a seasonal job in holiday retail with Esprit on Fifth Avenue at Rockefeller Center. I worked there, folding sweaters and swiping credit cards during my evenings and weekends for three months, in which I decided to forgo sleep and/or sanity. The majority of the people I worked with were not born until after the ball dropped in 1990, and for the first time in my life, I was one of the "older people" in the group. This was a startling new experience for me. Given that even in my own age group I am quite a bit out of touch, to all of these people, I probably seemed like a space alien. I know very little of current TV, as I've not had cable since Friends was on the air, and I know even less of popular music. I should also mention that by the time I arrived at Esprit every evening, I had already worked 9 hour shifts at my "real job," and my mental clarity had been worn quite thin. In addition, I should also mention that when tired, my socially awkward tendencies burble to the surface and my concern over the rules of propriety wanes. As the environment was one of fashion retail in one of the most exclusive shopping districts in the world, a horrible mixture of utra-hip music was always pouring out of surround-sound speakers abundantly furnished around the store. To pass the time, I did what any frazzled idiot might do, and I would channel my youthful days of Thursday night splendor and make my own dance party on the sales floor of Esprit Rockefeller Center. Doing my own modifications of the mashed potato, the Charleston, strange references to high kicks by the Rockettes and variations of moves from Frankie and Annette films, I would blithely pass my time physically making fun of the Lady Gaga remixes and Rhianna songs I was subjected to as my coworkers stood by. After a while, I was accepted as the funny "older" nerdy guy who made people laugh by making an ass of myself. Some of the people would even join in and try to either match or out-do my awesome moves (which really isn't hard to do). Eventually, my willingness to be an idiot paid off and made me quite popular in a strange sort of way with the crowd of retail workers, mostly in their late teens.

From the experience, I learned that even in the unlikeliest of circumstances, a positive attitude and a lack of pride can go a long way in breaching certain social barriers. As time moves on and I slowly settle into being a "grown up," I know that I have a great deal of youthful "joi de vivre" to draw from in the form of moronic body movements. I am certain that even in the most taxing of circumstances, such as working the equivalent of two full time jobs at once, there is joy to be found when you can let go and dance like nobody's watching (even if you know people are staring and pointing and laughing)...

Autumn in New York...

A very picturesque scene of the Central Park Mall - It actually looks even more charming in person...

Perhaps it's due to the fact that I'm somewhat of a curmudgeon at heart, but the autumn is my very favorite time of the year. Ever since childhood, I would look forward to the leaves changing colors and flying through the air in dancelike patterns until falling into the community of their previously fallen compatriots, already stuck on the ground, which depending on how you look at it, can be either inspiring or really depressing. In New York, a city known for its fashion-savvy residents, it is safe to say that even the trees seem to be modeling some trendy sort of seasonal wares this time of year, competing with the other trees to be the most outstanding, not unlike their human counterparts turning the sidewalks of the city into runways and catwalks of extravagant outerwear...

My Stupid Hat

Recently my office moved to a neighborhood near Penn Station known as the fur district. It's a rather dingy little section of mid-Manhattan with an abundance of tired looking gray industrial buildings in need of sandblasting and lacking very many good places to eat (I am most affected by this aspect of the move). There are more fur suppliers, resellers and designer fur-clothing manufacturers concentrated in these few blocks than any other place on Earth. I am not surprised at how many of the fur merchants seem to be surly Russian mafia members, but I'm definitely surprised that the streets aren't overwhelmed with PETA protesters holding overburdened paint cans, ready to for action. Being neither an angry animal rights activist, nor a person of wealth, I recently purchased the most ridiculous giant faux-fur winter hat I could find. Aside from looking like a reject from the Sonny and Cher collection, it keeps me warm in the oppressive New York winds that blow through the narrow streets between the buildings. My bargain-priced fall fashion decision earns me disdainful glares from the beady-eyed shop keepers surrounded by their menagerie of animal carcasses. They can notice from a mile away that my hat is both fake AND stupid-looking, as I blithely make my way down the sidewalk in search of lunchtime burritos (ah, Chipotle barbacoa), enjoying their squirms and malignant disgust.

Coming up on "the holidays," I have taken an extra seasonal job in retail working at a clothing store on 5th Avenue at Rockefeller Center. As glamorous as that may sound, retail is retail no matter the setting. The store can best be described as a more drab and less-edgy European version of the Gap (if more drab and less edgy than Gap is even possible). Being as "fun sized" as I am, the employee discount program is not extremely beneficial considering few of their garments even come close to fitting well on my impish frame, so my favorite perk of the job is the opportunity to observe a steady trickle of confused tourists who try to avoid salespeople, like myself, at all costs. I'm learning that I am unable to convincingly lie to strangers to get them to believe that they look "great" in faux fur-hooded parkas that would look strange on even eskimos. I blame my mother for my inability to successfully tell mis-truths as I was never allowed to get away with it when I was younger which killed my chances to hone the skill. Instead I have to find unrelated statements that will sound better, like, "I bet you'll be the only person back in Arkansas with a giant man-bag like this one," or "I'm sure you'll really stand out in that plaid hat when you go back to Japan..." Perhaps if I really believed in what I was selling, I could more convincingly lie about it, much like a politician or televangelist. We'll see how far I go in my sales career, I'm keeping my fingers crossed and hope that I make it through the season unscathed.

Retail and unfriendly Russians aside, when all is said and done, New York is a beautiful place to be during this transitional time of the year, even when getting the stink eye from passersby, comparing outerwear. I now can vouch for all of those cheesy movies and songs based on this very phenomenon in the city. Between the beautiful leaves lining the gutters, preparations for window displays on 5th Avenue  and the smell of "a little something extra" in the coffee cups of certain businessmen walking out of Penn Station, there is a magical crispness that makes one feel truly alive.

Central Park Photo taken from http://www.kiamoy.com/?p=144

The view from the middle...

The view from my office window (à la my phone)

I'm pretty sure the tallest building in my rural hometown in Colorado was the hospital, which stood a whopping 4 stories in one of its small "wings." It was always exciting to visit sick or injured friends because of the rare opportunity to ride in an elevator, which was quite a novelty in a town full of staircases that only reached the second floor. I had heard rumors that if you jumped up and down while the elevator was descending, you could achieve weightlessness for a split second, but sadly, there was always some sort of "grown-up" around to thwart my plans of testing out this theory. I remember riding my bicycle past the towering structure, looking up to the very top and admiring its majesty. I wondered what it would be like to see the world from such great heights, in a room of one's own...

Structures like the Empire State Building were things only conceivable in films or the books I would read. I remember watching An Affair to Remember as a child, seeing Cary Grant wait and wait for Deborah Kerr on the observation deck while she lay crippled in the street down below, not knowing until the very end that she had tried to meet him until a car mangled her plans, as well as her legs. The thought of being high enough away from the street in a building that an event as big as a car accident could go unseen was unfathomable to my 5 year old brain. Sure, my hippie parents had dragged me up to steep mountain tops and pushed me off the sides of cliffs dangling from ropes, but the view of the endless San Juan mountains was vastly different than the cityscape of Midtown Manhattan. Had Deborah Kerr agreed to meet her clandestine lover on the top of Mount Sneffels, I'm certain she would not have been hit by that car, but something tells me that good ol' Debbie wasn't really the rugged type.

 A few weeks ago I began working in an office just a couple of blocks from Herald Square, with a great view of the Empire State Building right out the window. If you look really closely in the afternoons, you can see all of the tiny little people moving about on the observation deck, hopefully not waiting for injured lovers to whom they've made unrealistic promises. I see the world from a little perch on the 15th floor of an old brick office building whose 24 stories pale in comparison with many of the other mightier skyscrapers around it. The endless sirens and car horns from 6th Avenue act as an unsettling backdrop to my days, but never cease to keep me awake when my coffee buzz begins to fade away. Sometimes, when talking to clients on the phone, they ask if some catastrophic event is occurring just outside, and I simply explain that it's just a normal weekday in Midtown.

There are days when I pull myself out of my work coma and ponder what my 5 year old self would think about my life and my daily routine now. Waking up early, catching the express train in Harlem and coming up from the ground outside of Bryant Park is now just a way to get from point A to point B, but to a child would have seemed like a daily adventure. When I see children on the train, watching eagerly as the doors open and close at every stop, the contagious sense of amazement can make it through my impermeable exterior, if I allow it to. Most of the time my only amazement with the subway occurs when track maintenance or garbage fires stop the train underground, in the dark, for extended and unannounced periods of time. Perhaps I ought to search for my inner-child, or at least buy him an ice cream cone every now and then. Sometimes I still have the urge to test out the elevator theory while speeding down 15 floors, but now that I'm a grown up myself, I've become rather dull and predictable.

The world I inhabit now is one I'd never have imagined was tangible while watching classic films on our old black and white TV set (my parents were proud Luddites in their own right). Things seem so different when elevated so high above the ground, and I've only made it to the 15th floor. Although the view from the middle is grand, I'll be anxious to one day see the view from the top.

Monks of the Order of Saint Marilyn...

Marilyn Monroe in a moment of divine revelation...

People often use the phrase "only in New York" to explain or pass off certain bizarre or peculiar things that, in any normal context, wouldn't happen. For instance, if you see a woman casually walking down the street wearing a pair of shoes on top of her head, you can awkwardly shrug and shake your head while saying "only in New York" as a means of both acknowledging and attempting to validate the experience. When the lunatic in the subway assaults himself in a manic state of paranoia, and then chases rats up and down the train platform while talking to God, this is another appropriate time to say "only in New York," as a means of dealing with the event. Recently, I was exposed to an apartment that chilled me to my very core, and the pair of old queens who inhabited it. Upon reflection, the only way to adequately deal with the trauma of the situation is to pass it off as an "only in New York" scenario...

During a brief period of non-gainful employment, I was required to spend two days per week in the home of two rather peculiar men. The environment one creates to live in can tell you a lot about somebody, or in this case, two somebodies. Generally, upon entering someone's apartment, one might notice an eye catching accent like an antique lamp, an oriental rug, a reclaimed barnwood table, or even a copy of Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard sheepishly tucked away on a bookshelf. In this particular apartment, the first association that entered my mind upon walking in the door was Liberace. Actually, I wondered if the person responsible for decorating this apartment had been possessed by the angry spirit of Liberace whilst indulging in a cocaine binge. There was not one single surface left unscathed by some sort of hideous object that was either golden, jeweled or red velvet and tasseled. Proudly admiring his monument to new money and poor taste, one of the inhabitants of the apartment who was bald on top and had a sad greasy little pony tail the size and shape of an arthritic thumb, explained that he and his partner are "collectors," which is just the term that the wealthy use for "hoarders" of very expensive garbage.

Each room in this palace of kitsch had a name, and I was to know the names and always use them when referring to various locations around the house. There was "the Library," which was really just a living room containing bookshelves filled with every volume of Danielle Steele, every 20th century film reference and various books on art history scattered about to give the suggestion of dignity and pretension. The perimeter of the room was lined with statues and figurines that grew up from the carpeted floor like stalagmites, making it impossible to maneuver in a straight line from one corner to the next. Any of these sculptures that had arms or other useful appendages had been either draped in strings of glass beads or covered in used pieces of masquerade ball costumes. Apparently these men would spend months each year planning and preparing their trips to Carnival in Venice, which was evident in the abundance of sequined masks littering any available space on the bookshelves not already inhabited by a figure of a fairy or a member of Alice's tea party.

There was also "the Garden Room," which was home to a number of potted ferns and dusty silk roses. The walls had been hidden beneath floor-to-ceiling beveled mirrors to accentuate the illusion that the abundance and importance of the home was indeed infinite in the reflections. Like the Library, there were hundreds of gaudy sculptures, many made of acrylic resin, that seemed to multiply themselves in the mirrored chaos. Even the windows had stained glass pieces stuck in front of them. The theme continued in "the Theatre" which was covered entirely in red velvet curtains draped between golden columns on each wall. An enormous blown-glass chandelier, much too large for the room, hung from the ceiling, and also had colored beads and feathers hanging from its massive arms. Three rows of actual theatre seats were crammed into this space, two rows being occupied by over-sized plush animals, and oddly enough, a bronze replica of the Winged Victory of Samothrace. The prized possession of the room was an original movie poster for the Italian release of "Some Like It Hot" with Marilyn Monroe, which had a special spotlight on it to amplify its significance. Among all of the collections of objects stockpiled in this one home, the only unifying facet of all of the rooms, aside from poor taste, was the presence of Marilyn.

From bits and pieces of conversations I had with the gentleman of the house, I was able to piece together reasons behind the necessity for dwelling in a world of fantasy. These two men, now in their sixties, seemed to be running away from some sort of disappointing and inadequate past while grasping on to a world of endlessly fabricated childhood dreams, now made attainable by a large disposable income. This home and these collections of hideous things were a Neverland, of sorts, and these two old men just lots boys caught up in fantasy. They revered their home as a cathedral, and as such, it was one dedicated to Marilyn: patron saint of lost boys. Her presence was like that of the holy virgin, ironically enough, and her elevated status of deity was unmistakable. From every corner of their home, she looked down from collectible plates, magnets, magazine covers, barbie doll effigies, photographs, coffee mugs, letter openers and even cookie jars smiling and offering hope. They even had a collection of ceramic Marilyn heads peeking out from between books in their Library shelves. This home, and all the objects in it, were a pretty hefty bandage meant to heal some type of pain I hope never to know in my own life. Although my time working in this home gave me a slight twitch, it made me grateful that I have not yet found the need to seek comfort in the arms of a dead movie starlet whose likeness can be purchased on the home shopping network in thousands of different forms. It also made me appreciate that, while I currently have nearly nothing to speak of, my living space does not induce visual migraines in myself or others. Like my mother always said, "money don't buy class..."

Employment and other forms of self-betrayal...

"The Subway" by George Tooker

I can remember the excitement of having my very first summer job when I was 15 years old, back in my tiny hometown in Colorado. I still recall the giddiness of going to work for the very first time (I think my mom dropped me off), wearing my new and untarnished uniform complete with the clip-on name tag and over-sized bubbah hat, not to mention the thrill of conceptualizing making my very own money at a whopping $5.00 per hour. That lasted for about 5 minutes, and then the dinner rush started and I couldn't shove fried chicken into boxes quickly enough to satisfy the insatiable appetites of white trash families with rancid screaming offspring who critiqued my performance at every turn. I realized that day that sometimes being employed can be more important than having dignity...

Since moving to New York, I have applied for at least 200 different jobs, everything from being a gallery assistant to working retail to dog walking for rich white people. After dozens of interviews and correspondences with potential employers, I have come to two conclusions: I've over-educated myself beyond any possibility of practical employment, and I'm too inexperienced for anything that I'd actually enjoy, or hope to enjoy doing. I've also learned that I'm horrible at interviews and I'm not convincing at improving the truth.

One morning I found myself in an area of Brooklyn called Dumbo, which rests cozily beneath the great stone arches supporting the Manhattan Bridge. I walked down some newly gentrified street lined with once productive old industrial buildings now converted into "lofts" and bourgey retail spaces, approaching a job interview with a company called Royale Concierge (yes, spelled with the "e"). I knew it was a bad sign when the first thing I saw upon exiting the elevator was a piece of paper taped to the wall that said "Royale Concierge applicants wait in elevator area, DO NOT sit in the guest seating area." So I waited, leaning against a brick wall, trying to muster all of my good job interview charisma (which was not much) until a thin abrupt-looking man came out and hastily prodded me over to a small glass room where he and his stern-faced associate proceeded to ask me a barrage of questions about why I felt like I deserved to exist, much less seek employment as a desk attendant in a luxury condominium complex. By the end of the interview, feeling a bit violated, it was surmised that I am a person with "ambition," and people with ambition do not make very good front desk attendants in luxury condominium complexes.

Being ambitious, and desperate, I decided one day to attend an "open interview session" with a very trendy and upscale hotel in Chelsea next to the High Line. I had sent in a resumé in advance, and the posting mentioned "headshots appreciated, but not required," which should have clued me in a bit on what I was getting myself into. When I got to the building where the interviews were to be held, I was corralled into a room full of at least 100 of the most beautiful people I had ever seen up close. I was suddenly very self-aware and very conscious of my thrift store shoes, vest and tie that I had worn to look "professional" amid a sea of very up to the minute designer fashions. They brought us in groups of 10 at a time to a room with a long re-claimed barnwood table and two very suave-looking gentlemen sitting at the head. After making polite introductions, they explained that they were looking for people with "personality" and a "unique look" to match the character of their hotel and its clientele. The next few minutes seemed like some sort of bizarre Real-World audition special when they asked us to go around the table and tell them "our stories." I found out that a lot of out of work models and actors seek employment in hospitality and that in many cases, everything you were taught in grade school about inner beauty and self worth is bullshit when trying to obtain employment in Chelsea. Needless to say, I am too short and have too much of a receding hairline to have ever been considered as a viable contender.

It is amazing to find the limit of the depths to which you are willing to stoop when trying to become "employed." You really learn the amount of abuse you're willing to take before you just snap and run out of a room crying and cursing the day that money came into being. You also, at least in my case, learn just how many people from New Jersey are willing to commute long distances into the city, just to say they work in Manhattan. All in all, my great struggle paid off. I've finally obtained the title of "employed." I'm now selling my soul, 7 days a week, split between 2 jobs, to make enough money to pay my rent and eat sparingly and occasionally, sometimes. Thus my New York cliché continues as I starve myself into a loosely-sustainable Manhattan lifestyle. Ah, isn't life grande....