In The City

New York City, you ebb and flow.  You go from grimy to gritty to funky to artsy to gentrified to now...sleek.  There is good and bad in it all, and there are only, oh, a dozen cities on this Earth that have "it all" and you are one.  Springtime in New York, even better, yeah?  Of course, this view (or review, I guess) could have been created and judged in the dead of Winter...and I'm glad that's not the case.

It's been nearly 15 years since I've hit Fun City, and I don't have to get into the changes during that stretch: we're all familiar; we lived through it.  And, being an outsider from Dealville, who am I to say if what's new is better?

Discussions had, New York insisted suit removed, I walked.

Everyone was soaking it in, and why not?  Even more so, if you survive the winter, it's their rotation of life.  Dealville, it's a constant.  And admittedly it seemed difficult to not be an outsider, even Central Park.  Groups, couples were in their spots, dogs on their walk, overly-competitive softball games occurring for public entertainment.

This setting occurred during the first half of my trip, and then Mama Earth blustered and got grey enough for the attitude one from Goldland attributes to NYC...only I was wrong.  If there was an attitude, it would have confronted me one way or another, but it never did.  Consistantly: friendly or at least not negative, a lack of accosting attitudes, and general...well, fuck, what is the word?  Normal?  Is something even normal if you don't know what it is, or what to expect?  It sure seemed that way...and yet, I wanted a glimpse of the past.

So, remembering a subway stop is near the hotel, I looked at a map, randomly aimed at an area away from midtown, and got on the train.  Holy Shit - this one goes to Coney Island?  This is the train from The Warriors...

...except the subway was clean, and there was no graffiti, and there's no remnant of that era.  It's completely vanished.  Is it really, I thought?  Is there nowhere else left?  I felt utterly amazed that a city so large had so few windows back into that time.

I started to feel I made a mistake in my stop as I was roughly 6 or 7 blocks up on land and hadn't found a decent restaurant in the walk.  I was about to turn around when, after reading a happy hour menu, the hostess and I look (inadvertantly) at each other, square in the eyes.  Well, hello, I,,,you know what, yes, I'll stop here.  That, and I'd feel like a jerk if I kept walking.  And shit, the Happy Hour special was "Hamburger Taco and Beer, $5"  Sorry, anyone who really knows me knows I have to make that deal.

In all my solo meals on the trip, I was usually left to conversations with a friendly bartender.  If there was live music, that helped, but meals go at a quick clip in that plan.  Finally, and just my luck, the final night of my trip, was talk of a free comedy show.  And - it's right nearby!  Well I have time to kill, why not?

Saints be praised - there it was.  First good sign: I walk downstairs to the bar.  Immediately: an unidentifiable smell.  Mostly worn beer and booze.  It's just loud and rough in there, and they're blasting Gang of Four...YES.  YES!  It took days, and it might have even been accidental, but I found a slice of old New York.

The drinks were, well, they were weak.  And to be honest, they didn't taste good.  How anyone can make a drink taste bad is a lot of work, but what was I expecting in this place?  Had someone in there called themselves a "mixologist" I'd have left immediately.  Alas, the comedy show was delayed 30 minutes, and then delayed again, right to the point I was about to leave.  That's the moment I was told to go down to the basement: it's about to start.

That picture was my view from row 2.  I'm sitting in what appears to be re-purposed church pews.  They should have been tossed, but what's the difference?  I sit, and I sit...and, what, am I supposed to be here forever?  Is this a test?  Are all the "comedians" getting drunk?  High?  I had to break away.

On the train trip home, I slowly began to realize that what I wanted from NYC was what I got.  It was also all that was left: a taste.  A taste of those nutty times when life there was fast and cheap.  It's all that's left anymore, and riding that Coney Island train, my future fit perfectly with Joe Walsh's words, as The Warriors made it home:

But somewhere out on that horizon
Far away from the neon sky
I know there must be something better
I can't stay another night