Goodbye to all that

The man in the bagel shop doesn’t think we should leave. After the now customary ritual of compliments and insults (‘You get more beautiful every day but him?’, shakes head, ‘why doesn’t he shave?’) some advice. ‘You could get a job and stay, I know there’s a recession on but there are still jobs. You get a job, they sort out the paper work.’ He asks Adey what he does, Adey says he’s a writer. The man says there’s loads of publishing houses around here and that Adey should drop in his resume and he’ll pass it around. I think he’s still joking and giggle but he is serious, apparently the wisecracking has just turned into kindness.  

‘What kind of stuff do you write?’

‘I write about TV, music’

shakes head.

‘You should do something romantic, for the women. They love that stuff. You know ‘Love Story’?’

‘Yes’

‘Then they made ‘Titanic’ 30 Years later. Every 20, 30 years there’s a big romantic movie. Why? Because of the women.’

We leave promising to stay longer next time.

I’m not very good at the endings of anything, this is true of both writing and exiting social occasions. In writing, my conclusions are always too brief, just ending abruptly. I also leave parties very fast. I want to be in something or out of it, I don’t like drawn out goodbyes. I’m saying goodbye to friends tonight but I don’t really know how to say goodbye to New York. If you’ll pardon the awful cliche, if London is my long term relationship then this has been an intense affair. I love the built environment of this place more than anywhere else I think. I still catch my breath looking down the wide avenues. People still talk of New York as a fast changing, futuristic city but for me it isn’t. It’s feet are so firmly planted in the early half of the twentieth century and its optimism and the promise of capitalism that never delivered, apart from for the very rich. I don’t want to romanticise too much – and if you’ve been following this blog (I hate the word blog, so ugly) you’ll know I have this tendency. It’s an unequal town and more segregated than London. Vicious tactics have unfolded over the years to keep some people out of public space. But unless you run these big cities like a total police state there’s always resistance, like the Right to the City coalition.

Being here has made me think about London a lot. I’ve been in London my whole adult life and it still is the place for me. I’m so sad to be leaving New York but I’m trying to focus on my first swim at the women’s pond with Isabel and drinks with my Goldsmiths friends and sitting in North London beer gardens with people I’ve known since I was a teenager. Being here has made me like London even more, maybe because it reinforces the idea that I should be in a big city. London and New York are harsh towns and not for the faint hearted or lazy. You have to put something in to get something back but I think it’s absolutely worth it.

So goodbye Benny the sheepdog, goodbye bagel shop, goodbye frozen margaritas, goodbye Tina (that’s a heartbreaking one, ouch), goodbye Carl, goodbye living in a block, goodbye Matt and Helen and Scout and Clover, goodbye old ladies of Midtown East, goodbye Chrysler (I would like to take you out for a dark and stormy or a dirty martini because you are my favourite), goodbye Nan and Matt … but not until tomorrow. Today we have a day in New York to enjoy. I better get ready.

(New York from my window, today)

Everything I’ve ever seen in the movies Part 2.

I know I’m labouring this point (it’s like the movies, blah blah), but listen folks here’s how it is. The city is currently full* of sailors in the Gene Kelly/Frank Sinatra get-up. The hat and everything. I haven’t seen anyone singing ‘New York, New York’ with outstretched arms. Yet. The posters on the subway inform me that it is ‘Fleet Week’. I’m not entirely sure (shore! oh dear) what this means but it’s certainly when the sailors come to town. They seem to be being greeted with enthusiasm. I saw an oldish lady stop and give a couple of sailors some sweets from a Duane Reade carrier bag yesterday. They didn’t seem surprised by this which makes me think people must just give them stuff all the time. The West Village is also showing its appreciation with some bars displaying ‘Sailors welcome’ signs. I need to speak to one just so I can legitimately say ‘Hello sailor’. The chance may not arise again. 

Up the road they are filming a new action film staring Angelina Jolie. No sign of the Ms Jolie. I’m keeping an eye out on behalf of my little sister who likes to watch Angelina running about in shorts on the silver screen, as do many people I’m sure. You see people filming all the time here, more than in London definitely. The other day my friend Helen and her daughter chanced upon Sesame Street being filmed in Tompkins Square Park (this will be funny to those of you who know the troubled history of that park -the transformation is complete). Forget Angelina, if I saw Big Bird I’d die. The scene being filmed involved one of the lesser known puppets counting lunch boxes with a class of school children. Helen was talking to one of the crew who said ‘If we had Elmo here we’d need security.’ She couldn’t tell if this was a joke or not.

* Not full exactly but definitely a sizeable smattering.

Footloose

New York is a contrary town. I feel like it is rubbing my nose in it – it being my imminent departure. 

It’s tempting to spend the last few days hurtling around doing all the New York things I haven’t done yet. This would be  bit ridiculous as I’ve lived in London for 12 years and am under no illusion that I’ve done all the things. Yesterday it was such a lovely day, I had to run away from the uber quiet, air-conditioned office. I could have done any number of New York things but I went to Washington Square Park . I needed to sit on my own and stop worrying about things like work and how to transport the fedora and the books. This was the scene and this is the sort of lunch hour I will miss:

The delicate woman sat next to me eats half a cupcake from a box of two while simultaneously carefully using a highlighter pen to make marks on a map of Manhattan. Two benches away a woman is shouting to her friend about her relationship with her mother and her identification with a female film character who kills everybody with a big sword. To my right a man with a bulging shirt pocket of pens sits down to read his newspaper. He takes a pen from his pocket and starts to underline passages – This reminds of Man on Wire when the French tightrope walker’s crew disguise themselves as Americans by putting pens in their pockets. Maybe pen man and the highlighter girl could be friends? Next to pen man another man is sleeping. Next to the sleeping man someone is feeding a pigeon on his shoulder. A passing woman shouts that he’ll get a disease. He is unperturbed. Somewhere under the mother issues woman’s voice and the cooing and flapping of pigeons and the honking of the car horns, I can hear a trumpet. I follow the noise.

The fountain area in Washington Square has just been reopened. Apparently they moved the fountain to be in line with the arch for photo opportunities which seems excessive but there you go. Anyway the scene is ridiculously idyllic, a miragey rainbow appears over the fountain. A dixieland jazz band play and children frolic in the fountain. It’s like the bit in the film Enchanted (I’ve lost at least half of the readership with this statement but Enchanted is quite good! The ending is very disappointing though) where everyone is singing and dancing around the park. Adey arrives and we sneak in a sly dance which probably contravenes a number of bylaws. New York has really repressive anti-dancing laws. It’s like in Footloose with Guiliani as Kevin Bacon’s girlfriend’s vicar dad (the quality film references are flowing fast today, n’est pas?).  The day continues in this preposterously nice vein. It’s the exact opposite of the day when I fell on my arse attempting to enter same park (see entry sometime in March). As I said, rubbing my nose in it…

My contribution to British/US relations

My Dad had a habit of halfway through our summer holiday, of sitting back in his chair sighing and proclaiming that it had ‘been a lovely holiday’. This used to drive the rest of us mad as we were just starting to get a tan and infiltrate the gang of cool Dutch girls hanging around on the French campsite (that’s the royal ‘we’). I have the same tendency to try and evaluate and adjust to something being over before it is and I’ve been fighting it. This feeling tends to be accompanied by resolutions about how things will be improved on returning home. Life will be more orderly. For my dad this took the form of talking about a better system for the family photos than being shoved in a carrier bag that fell out when you opened the cupboard in the sitting room. Me and Adrian have been talking about painting our bedroom. Don’t worry, I’m not going to spend the next week writing about that stuff (I’m planning on doing lots of things this next week and I’ll write about them). But this was not, sorry is not, a holiday. We’ve been living here, even if only temporarily. And so there’s other things to think about. What have I learned from New York? Lots. But here we’ll concentrate on – what have I learned about New York and London that could improve Anglo-American relations? Here are few hints for the Englishwo/man in New York and some for the American in London.

1. Parties. On leaving a New York party you may wonder a few things. Was it just you or did everyone seem very well accomplished? Was everyone else a zoo keeping film maker who does a bit of dancing on the side, whereas you are just boring old you? No, my friend. You are just as interesting and multifaceted as they are. You know you do a bit of zoo keeping in your spare time, they are just telling you. Did you feel like no one asked you anything about yourself? They did. They asked one question and you were supposed to deliver a paragraph about yourself but you probably mumbled and looked at your drink. This came across as more cagey than charming and so they dropped it.

When my friend Kim moved to London from America she said she felt like people were very cold (she’s used to our ways now). Conversely here you might wonder why everybody is talking about themselves so much. This is just a difference in manners. We take things more slowly, we like to hold a bit more back (I’m generalising so wildly here, please feel free to have a go) so the third time we meet you we might tell you/hint at our zoo keeping activities. Another explanation is that Americans spend less time in the pub and so have more time to devote to film making/zoo keeping. 

2. Networking. In Britain taking ones self too seriously is seen as not a good thing, neither is being overtly networky or trying too hard. I’ve seen British academics really confused by confident American students who stride up to them and announce themselves, always by two names ‘Hi, I’m Jimmy Jones. I’m writing a dissertation on post-coloniality and the polar bear and would really love to talk to you about it ‘. The British academic is confused, they were just drinking a glass of wine and deconstructing last night’s episode of the Apprentice with some colleagues. The resulting exchange is awkward. Now I think I understand better. Here this is absolutely expected. Not only that but this is how you will get a job here. In the US part of the interview process for university jobs is hanging out over drinks and food. There is no split between working and drinks. Always working. I’ve bungled these interactions myself, muttering ‘I’m Emma’ and concentrating on the cheese platter. It’s just slicker here and more unabashed. 

3. Manners. New York is confusing as it is both American and different to America. Interactions with people on the street and in shops can therefore go one of two ways as exemplified by my two attempts at buying a metrocard from the kiosk in the station on different days. Attempt one, the woman refused to speak to me and just pointed at the machines while I asked ‘can I buy a Metrocard?’ until I got the message. Attempt two, ‘Of course you can! We can help you! Here you go, have a nice day sweetie!’ The unpredictability of this situation can be baffling to those used to the constant lukewarm customer service of the British Isles. So here, if you are sitting in the wrong place you are as likely to hear ‘Move! You’re in the wrong chair!’ as you are ‘It’s great that you’re feeling so comfortable in that chair but I was thinking it would be even more awesome if you could sit in the other chair.’ Now, the first is easy to deal with, the second takes more concentration. All you are hearing is friendliness and ‘awesome’ it’s easy to miss that you are actually being asked to move.

Right then, that’s that sorted.

Pigeon

The pigeon sits on a bin. The bin is next to a barbecue in the back area of Goodbye Blue Monday, a lovely ramshackle venue in Brooklyn. People are excited, the occasion is a taster of the OJ all day festival*. The back yard smells of lighter fuel and hotdogs. The pigeon is receiving lots of attention because it is standing very still. It was previously standing on a jar of mayonnaise. People snap away with their cameras. except cameras don’t really snap anymore, do they? They beep. A woman from a Brooklyn TV station is getting increasingly anxious about the pigeon’s precarious position. Two big bearded men are talking about music right next to it and wave their arms around to emphasise their points.   

‘They only stay that still when they haven’t got long left’, she says. ‘These people don’t realise … He’s going to get knocked off there.’ 

We watch the pigeon and the men closely. 

‘I used to have a pet pigeon’ says the woman. ‘I know birds. I want to move it, but where to?’

‘Maybe there?’, I point to a bit of wood away from the gesticulating men. The woman hands me her purse. She approaches the bird slowly, carefully cups it in her hands and moves it to safety.

When I look later the bird has gone.

*This is going to be great but we will be back in London by then. Other good things we will miss are The Grey Gardens Festival and the Mermaid Parade. Still, we”ll get to go to the pub with our pals, which in the end makes up for everything.

Up on the roof

Me and Marie are sat on the roof of the Metropolitan Museum drinking fizzy pop and eating cake. People come up here for the views over Central Park and the skyline. The views are very impressive but hanging out on the roof and looking at the people is just as much fun, better even. A sculpture called ‘Maelstrom‘ which looks like a massive silver tree winds over and around the roof garden. This means people are getting their photos taken with, it touching it, tripping over it. One man has the unenviable job of policing the interaction with the artwork. The rules here are quite strict and not immediately obvious. You can take photos but no video. You can touch it, but no sitting on the branches. Three precocious children and their matching Upper East Side mums are dancing about (‘No! I’m going in the middle. I want the photo to be perrrrfect.’). Another Mum is videoing her own matching toddler. They are both turned out in that ‘I’m rich and have access to a boat, yet choose to dress very badly’ way. I remark to Marie that generally people don’t seem to take as many fashion risks in New York as in London. Then a man wearing an elaborate head dress with chopsticks sticking out of the back walks past. ‘That’s definitely a risk.’ says Marie.

‘That’s a good look’, says Marie about two old ladies, ‘A nice scarf, trousers and a cardi… At what age do you think that you start to buy black cardis with jazzy buttons?’ The old ladies walk over. ‘You look comfortable.’ says one of them to us. ‘Very relaxed. You look cute. Can I take your picture? I’ll call it ‘a day at the museum”. We agree and she takes the photo.

I tell Marie that I’ve been called cute a few times in America, mainly because of the English thing. I find this funny as I am not ‘cute’. One of the times I was called ‘the cutest’ was over a misunderstanding in a Las Vegas toilets. It involved me moving a broom and getting mistaken for the cleaner followed by the pronouncement ‘As if Lily Allen would be cleaning the bathrooms! Aren’t you the cutest! Tell me, who is your favourite prince, William or Harry?’. I tell Marie that I just said ‘Neither’.

‘You should have said Prince, the purple sex dwarf’, says Marie. That’ll teach me for going to Vegas without Marie.

Hey ho. Let’s go.

Halfway around the Great Saunter when we were in John’s Doo-Wop Deli the Midge turned to me and said that she wished there was a sound equivalent of taking a photograph. This was prompted by the slightly crazed rock n roll cover version medley that played as I took photos of the Elvis shrine. When the sea lions at the Bronx zoo jumped out of their pool and let out a kind of ‘HA’ in our faces we again felt the lack of sound photograph technology. Of course you can actually take a sound photograph. I have a good digital recorder but the sounds that sneak up are hard to capture, no one could have seen the sea lion thing coming. I have already made a kind of sound photograph of the street though. One day sat in my favourite spot overlooking First Avenue at rush hour I could hear the honking of horns and the clatter of builders and the barking of dogs and the shouting of humans and wanted to keep it somehow. So I whipped out the old handy zoom and stuck it on the window sill for a bit.

I’ve gone off on a tangent, my point was going to be that last night at the Mets I had another sound photograph moment when a bon tempi organ version of a Gwen Stefani song came over the PA in the toilets. It was one of those American moments when you feel like you’re in the Simpsons.

I loved the baseball. I found it overwhelming in a similar way to the Las Vegas sensory overload. There was an 8th innings sing-a-long to Sweet Caroline. Now that’s my kind of sporting event. The nastiest the fans got was shouting ‘Morgan sucks’ at the Pittsburgh Pirates player who pulled a face at the crowd after catching out one of the Mets. And even that soon just turned into ‘Morgan!’. What else? The vendors who walk around selling beer and hotdogs wear a badge displaying the calorie content of their wares. The players have their own themes when they come up to bat. (I’ve decided mine would be Whole Lotta Rosie.) I couldn’t figure out if it was one of the players songs or just a Queens thing but sometimes the beginning of Blitzkreig Bop plays.

Hey Ho! Let’s go!

I loved the baseball.

Even the Peas

‘Everything in America is big … even the peas.’ Auguste Bartholde

There are some afternoons where it’s a good idea, if at all possible, to go to a matinee. This was one of them. The rain poured down on New York City and I was tired and reckoned that any work done on the chapter would probably make it worse rather than better. On such afternoons it doesn’t really matter what film is playing, it’s about sitting in the dark and thinking about something else for a couple of hours, preferably accompanied by a packet of minstrels. The film was State of Play. If judged on its own this is an average thriller set in Washington, if watched with the BBC series on which it was based in mind it has an added humour. Have you seen Pee Wee’s Big Adventure? It’s Tim Burton’s first film and a work of genius. It ends with Pee Wee and friends going to the drive-in to see a Hollywood remake of his story. Pee Wee is played by a suave bearded man on a motorbike; ‘I know you are but what am I.’ Well, this is the relationship between the TV drama and the film versions of State of Play. The John Simm journalist character is played by a smug faced, hateable Russell Crowe and the David Morrisey MP character is played by Ben Affleck. There are helicopters. It’s as if the TV series took loads of steroids.

Many things in the USA are bigger than in the UK: Pharmacies, sandwiches, men and the weather. I suppose it’s natural that State of Play would also be inflated. Ok for a wet Thursday afternoon but ultimately unsatisfying.

The Great Saunter

We didn’t properly prepare for the Great Saunter. We (me, Adey, the Midge) agreed it would be a good thing to do but didn’t properly decide to do it until the night before. In a cosy bar with the rain pouring down outside in a decidedly noirish fashion (and after a few glasses of sangria) this seemed like a really good idea. It is called the ’saunter’ because the suggested walking speed is 3 mph. And ‘great’ because it involves a trek around the whole of the Manhattan coast, 32 miles. People drop in and out of the walk, although the hardcore do the full stretch. The walk is organised by a group called the Shorewalkers , a New York based walking/environmental group. 

We were never under any illusions that we would complete the whole thing. Starting at 42nd Street West our stated aim was to make it to the northern tip at Inwood Park (but my secret aim was to walk all the way home, some 22 miles). On registration we received a number and a booklet, including a song by Pete Seeger who is, apparently, a Shorewalker himself. The song advises against taking the subway or a taxi and advocates having a beer at the end. I didn’t hear anyone singing it. 

The first stretch on the Hudson is fairly (post)industrial but cleaned up. There is a melted metal pier and also chairs. I like it, it reminds me of Sunderland or Woolwich.  There are a lot of  cyclists and runners, including a woman running really fast while pushing a buggy. ‘That’s going too far.’ says the Midge. It starts to rain.

The Upper West Side turns into West Harlem where we get lost. Part of the riverside is closed and so we are routed through a park but not told how to get out. The park is elevated above the riverside and is full of children playing various sports, mainly baseball. We eventually find some steps, descend and walk back along the river. The riverside gets greener and hillier and soon (not that soon, the Midge swears the George Washington Bridge is getting further away) we are in Washington Heights. The section from Washington Heights to Inwood is quite lovely. It’s the only section where the path isn’t fenced off from the river. The sun comes out.

.

From Inwood we can see the Bronx across the water. We made it to the top. According to a sign the Dutch swindled the Native Americans out of Manhattan in this very park. We get hungry. We wander out of the park in search of food and find a deli, John’s Doo-Wop Deli to be more precise. Above shelves of cleaning products and food are records on the wall and a shrine to Elvis. I am happy. Two white haired men behind a counter sing along to a stars-on-45 style rock n roll compilation while a young woman makes the sandwiches. Two big cops with guns on their belts come in, one resembles Herc from the Wire and orders baloney on rye. Outside a construction worker asks me about the walk. I explain. ‘You from England?’ he asks.

‘Yes’

‘How’s the queen doin?’

‘She’s doing alright, last time I checked.’

‘Good, you tell her I said hello.’

‘Will do.’

And off we go again past the man trying, unsuccessfully, to give away free bibles, shops selling dresses, shops selling live poultry. Back to the river. There’s a long stretch where we are sandwiched between FDR (I don’t know the right American terminology but it’s like a dual carriage way that goes up the east side of Manhattan) and the river until the path closes and we are rerouted through East Harlem. According to my guide book ‘West Harlem is the Harlem of the popular imagination’. On this route we don’t see the hustle and bustle of the centre of Harlem. The east side near the river is largely made up of housing projects. Weaving in and out of them, between more baseball games, old men playing chess and broken glass you get the impression that whoever is responsible for the infrastructure of New York doesn’t really give a shit about the people who live in this neighbourhood. There are no pedestrian crossings, holes in the road and no access to the riverside. When we eventually cross the pedestrian bridge at 120th (to be sandwiched between FDR and the river again) the projects continue on the other side of the road, but there is a disjuncture between them and the river. This riverside doesn’t feel like it belongs to Harlem. It feels more like an extension of the Carl Schultz park where middle class looking white people walk their dogs. It’s far easier to get to this stretch from the Yorkville section than from above 120th.

By this point my co-walkers, who opted for stylish shoes, are suffering. I am physically fine but feeling a little … delirious. We are distracted by the dogs in the park and then before long we are crossing over to First Avenue. And home.

Dogs And Psychics

‘Need answers in career, health, marriage, lost love … Find your soulmate … Reunite with your lost love … Need guidance and direction on your path to achieving your true goals in life … Change in your pet’s behavior, is there change in their eating patterns, no longer playful … Tina can help you with your pet.’

From an advert for ‘Spiritualist Consultant Tina’

New Yorkers are generally considered a hard bitten bunch, fast talking and ambitious. They are allegedly cynical. But I don’t buy that. How could a cynical people support so many dog services and psychics?

Where we live, the top of East Midtown, there are psychics everywhere. I don’t want to over play the psychogeography of it, but the location makes perfect sense to me. A few avenues back from Madison, Park and Lexington where business gets done and people stride confidently, the psychics, dotted among the Irish pubs and dry cleaners, belie the instability of it all. I wonder if they’ve had a boom in recent months? I’m guessing that psychics fare well in times of  recession. I never see anyone going in or out but I imagine a ruffled man in a suit (a Don Draper style character) lit by neon, with loosened tie communing with the spirits to help him get that account and turn around his ailing fortunes.

The dogs and their services (doggie gyms, pet chauffers and grooming parlours) must surely be hit by the economic downturn. How to justify buying a ‘poochini’ from Union Square Shake Shack – ice cream, peanut butter and dog biscuits at $3.50 a pop – now (or, you might say, ever)? Dogs in New York are generally small. The small dogs are more suited to the small apartments in which people live. You do see enormous dogs (those two Great Danes that roam the East Village) which are presumably a status symbol, signifying space, that most precious of commodities in this town. There are lots of Pugs, Yorkshire Terriers, Dachshunds. Twice a year the Dachshund owners take their pets to Washington Square Park, many in costume (dogs not humans) for the biannual Dachshund Parade where they sing a special song (humans not dogs). You see, not a cynical people. 

I’ve mentioned Benny the Old English Sheepdog before. Benny lives in our block. I’m not that bothered about dogs as a whole but I like individuals. I’ve hurtled across First Avenue risking life and limb just because I could see Benny on the other side and wanted to pat his giant face, for comfort and almost for luck. Benny moves like a Jim Henson creation, a bit of furry ridiculousness in the middle of an unfluffy city. So maybe that’s why dogs are so popular here. And psychics.