A Present from New York

On Wednesday I was practically tripping over myself with happiness all day because, well, that is what I do on my birthday. And not only was it my birthday, it was my birthday in New York, which is cause for even more celebration. So anything else great that happened on Wednesday was really just icing on the cake.

I walked into work and was greeted with a cupcake (topped with chocolate buttercream frosting and M&Ms) and a present, a beautiful art-deco candle that smelled like flowers and mimosas. My boss also said I could take off early because it was my birthday, so I’d actually be able to do my favorite walk home before it got dark.

On the walk home after work, I remembered that one of the things I really wanted to do on my birthday was go into a classic bar at a chic New York spot and have a drink. I sighed, I wish I could still do that. Then I remembered, uh, why can’t I? This is New York, for crying out loud. I could find any place like that in a stone’s throw, if I really wanted to. So I immediately made a right and went inside Petrossian.

Photo courtesy of The Wallman Report

Petrossian is known for its caviar, foie gras, smoked fish, and “French-influenced contemporary menu.” It is consistently placed in the prestigious Michelin restaurant guide. On the inside of the restaurant, up a small marble staircase, the seating area is made up of tables clothed in white linens. According to the restaurant, it was designed by Ion Oroveanu, and features “Lalique crystal wall sconces, bronze sculptures from the 1930s, Limoges china, and a Lanvin chandelier.” There is also a pink marble bar behind which the walls are mirrors etched with glamorous Erte drawings.

I went in, sat down at this bar, and ordered a glass of Nicolas champagne rose. The vested bartender removed the cork from the bottle with that signature champagne pop and poured the sparkling liquid into a triangular champagne flute. I sipped the fruit bubbly and smiled. This is what birthdays in New York are supposed to be like, I decided—simple, classic, fabulous. I think there are very few other cities in the world where you can just take a right and end up in such a place.

I left and continued on the walk home, up the Central Park side of Fifth Avenue. Leaves blew around my feet as I walked on the park’s cobbled sidewalk, past the avenue’s beautiful old structures on my right, the bristling park trees on my left. I was reminded yet again of how wonderful it is to be here. Thank you, New York, for a wonderful birthday present.

Halloween, Village Style

NP and I sat on the curb eating dumplings and scallion pancakes as we waited for the parade to start. We found a nice empty space, free of women in New York Yankees ensembles who would indignantly tell us no, we could not stand in the space next to them because they had been waiting there for an hour blah blah blah. Our spot was all our own, directly in front of the silver police barricades. The wind seethed through us like ghosts in some Harry Potter movie. I suppose it was fitting because it was Halloween, after all.

I had read about the Village Halloween Parade many times and decided that I would drag my roommate and GD along with me to go see it for our first Halloween in New York. The parade actually began in 1973, when a mask maker and puppeteer would walk from door to door with his children. A year later it was picked up and expanded by the Theater for the New City and a year after that the parade became its own freestanding non-profit organization. The parade is now a huge grassroots event in the West Village, drawing approximately 60,000 costumed participants. It is also broadcast on local New York television station WPXI.

The parade itself begins on Spring Street at 6^th Avenue and travels all the way up to 16^th Street in Chelsea. We stationed ourselves on the corner of 10^th and 6^th and had a nice side view of the action, on the street and on the sidewalk behind us. People were decked out as Elizabethan monarchs, superheroes, genitalia (yes, genitalia), biblical figures, Chilean miners, witches, Teletubbies, Elmo, and the list goes on.

Once the parade started, though, we forgot all about them. Puppets are such a large part of the parade’s history, and the legacy continues today. Not creepy ventriloquist puppets, though—awesome, Lion King on Broadway-type ones, all handmade by artists for the sheer pleasure of participating in the parade. Some of the most famous (and awesome!) puppets in the parade are the 20-year old skeleton puppets, all larger-than-life and not at all creepy. The skeletons are placed at the front of the parade coinciding with the Day of the Dead traditions, not to be “grim expressions of the morbid but rather joyful reminders of all that is vital.”

Beyond the puppets, anyone can be in the parade, from the volunteers who maneuver the puppets to the costumed participants, to bands to dance troupes to vehicles painted in crazy designs. There was a marching band that played Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance,” a dance troupe from the Broadway Dance Center doing “The Time Warp,” belly dancers, and oh so much more. One of my favorite things about the parade, I think, is that it’s so democratic—it is literally by and for the people of New York, no exclusions.

Once the parade started, it was definitely a neat thing to see, but next year I might try to actually be in it…

Here are some of my favorite costumes from the night:

This was actually on the train down to the parade, but it's still a favorite.

Brilliant.

Edward Scissorhands!

The fiercest jellyfish I've ever seen.

The Happiest Tourist

I hate tourists, so a movie tour of the city was not at the top of my list of awesome things to do on a Sunday. But I went to support GD, who was writing a piece about it for her job, had an extra ticket, and was kind enough to invite me.

At 11:45am walked to meet GD at the corner of 51^st and Broadway. Somehow I missed the gigantic tour bus on the corner and called GD to ask her where she was. Upon seeing the massive vehicle, however, I scorned my mother for all those years of blonde highlights (what have those chemicals been doing to my brain for 16 years?) and promptly crossed the street.

We snagged ourselves some seats, and I looked around the bus. It reminded me of an awful middle school bus trip around New York and New England, except this time there were no smells of tween b.o. and LipSmackers. Instead, the front of the bus was moderately populated with quiet, not-bad-smelling adults, some, not all, of which were tourists. They all seemed happy to go around the Upper West and East Sides for three hours viewing spots from cinema classics.

I’ll admit, while I do love classic cinema, the three hour bit was daunting to me. I would be on a bus for three hours and technically I wouldn’t be going anywhere; in that much time I could hop on a flight back to Fort Lauderdale and, if we caught a nice tailwind, even arrive before the tour was over. But I kept my thoughts to myself.

The tour began. Our guide was a young actress/producer/stand-in who was really quite knowledgeable about the movies of which she spoke. We started almost right away, hearing about movies filmed on certain sites like: 1954’s It Should Happen To You! in Columbus Circle, 1978’s Superman on Central Park South, 1984’s Ghostbusters all up Central Park West. As we passed each site, we also saw clips of the films in which the sites appeared, doubling the impact of what we were looking at.

We stopped briefly in front of The Dakota, where Yoko Ono lives, just hundreds of feet from where her husband was assassinated. We were also able to leave the bus and visit John Lennon’s Imagine memorial. Then it was back up the West Side to Zabar’s, the fantastic gourmet food store (that is, incidentally, my favorite grocery store in Manhattan), where we picked up free-with-the-tour Zabar’s mugs and GD got a Nova bagel with cream cheese.

At this point, I was no longer skeptical—in fact, I would be quite happy to do this for three hours. Maybe I’m a huge film nerd, but learning about movies for three hours and getting to see some sites I wouldn’t normally see (and getting a free mug!) really is my cup of tea. I thought we would be packed in the bus like a herd of cramped cattle—instead, we were free-range cattle, moving about our stops as we pleased.

We traveled through Central Park to the Upper East Side, down Museum Mile, past the Guggenheim and sites from movies like 1981’s Arthur and 1976’s Marathon Man. One of my favorite stops on the tour, however, was the front of Holly Golightly’s brownstone from 1961’s divine Breakfast at Tiffany’s. It turns out the brownstone was chosen because it got enough natural sunlight—the filmmakers wouldn’t have to spend extra money to light it unnaturally with equipment. The sun really did hit it beautifully, and I was so happy to stand on the steps of the brownstone and take a picture like a big, huge tourist and be in the steps of the lovely Audrey/Holly even for a few brief moments.

Then it was back to the bus for a few more sites, then my absolute favorite part of the tour: the tiny little park/sitting area on the corner of 57^th and York where Woody Allen and Diane Keaton sit and look out onto the river in 1979’s Manhattan. That scene in Manhattan is one of those scenes in a New York film where you really get to feel what the city is like. It made my heart happy. Somehow, something in the universe went right and I was able to be here, just like Woody and Diane. “And we can come back any time we want,” GD said.

I think this idea was perhaps my favorite part of the entire tour (that, and standing on the very spot where Marilyn Monroe enjoyed the subway grate breeze in 1955’s The Seven Year Itch. Amazing.). The city was ours to do whatever we liked with it, be it visit movie sites, sit by the river, go to Zabar’s, or what have you. These aren’t things someone can tell you not to do—it’s just the city offering itself up to you, saying please, enjoy. Like the Giving Tree but hopefully much more long-lasting.

Seeing New York as a tourist made me appreciate it that much more. It reminds me of when I used to have to leave New York, not to return for months, if not years at a time. But now, along with so many others, the city is mine; it is my home, my workspace, my playground. It’s the scene of zillions of fictional and non-fictional stories—romances, dramas, tragedies, comedies, you name it—and every day there are only more and more. By some happy twist of fate, I get to be here too, and I don’t know if I will ever get over that.  

The SCAR Project

“Oh! Let’s go in here.”

I quickly swerved my pace into the stark white open space of the Openhouse Gallery at 201 Mulberry Street as TDS, ALiCo and Krito followed, curious, behind me.

I had seen a flyer for The SCAR Project as I stepped off the bus one day after work. Taped humbly on a lamppost, the small white flyer displayed a pregnant woman with a large scar where her breast had once been. As a member of a family twice afflicted with breast cancer, the exhibition was something I definitely wanted to see but, with friends visiting that weekend, I didn’t think I would be able to.

Somehow, though, as my friends and I were traipsing through SoHo, Little Italy and parts of Chinatown, we wound up heading north on Mulberry Street, right past the gallery. I saw the photo of the same pregnant woman, this time in a larger than life portrait, and dragged my friends inside.

On the stark-white painted brick in the Openhouse Gallery were a series of these portraits. Portraits of breast cancer patients and survivors diagnosed with the disease at age 35 or under who had undergone disfiguring surgeries like double or single mastectomies to get rid of it.

Courageous women who allowed themselves to be photographed shirtless, scars fully displayed. They were beautiful beyond the disease, even in spite of it. And the photos gave the women a persona beyond the disease—each woman was distinctive, whether it be with a pair of glasses, a special piece of jewelry, tattoos, makeup. The photographs allowed the women to be women again, to transcend disease and no longer be a patient or a number.

I was especially struck by the photograph of Cary G., a beautiful, raven haired woman with dark lips, porcelain skin, and eyelashes for days. She reminded me of my grandmother who passed away from breast cancer in 2004, a woman who spat fire and wore red lipstick until she couldn’t anymore. I paused in front of Cary’s photograph for a long time, eventually quietly crying in the middle of the gallery.

The project, ongoing, is the work of photographer David Jay, a fashion photographer based in New York. Jay began the project after a dear friend was diagnosed with breast cancer at just 32.

Subjects of the SCAR project are between the ages of 18-35, a group of women with breast cancer who are often overlooked. It is for this reason that the mission of the SCAR Project is to “raise public consciousness of early-onset breast cancer, raise funds for breast cancer research/outreach programs and help young survivors see their scars, faces, figures and experiences through a new, honest and ultimately empowering lens.”

The project is a challenging one to look at, especially if one or one’s family has experienced the effects of breast cancer. And it’s true, some people may not want to look. But that doesn’t mean breast cancer will stop affecting women early on. According to photographer Jay, “For these young women, having their portrait taken seems to represent their personal victory over this terrifying disease. It helps them reclaim their femininity, their sexuality, identity and power after having been robbed of such an important part of it. Through these simple pictures, they seem to gain some acceptance of what has happened to them and the strength to move forward with pride.”

If you get a chance, please visit the SCAR Project website at www.thescarproject.org or on Facebook. October is Breast Cancer Awareness month but, as the SCAR Project says, breast cancer is not just a pink ribbon.

Night Moves

“Is it weird that I like this smell?” asked TL as we stepped out of the D train and onto the corner of Chrystie and Grand. A stunning stench of wet paper, rotting fish and shitty pleather handbags, the streetcorner in Chinatown was no bucket of rose petals.

“…yes,” replied TDS while we decided which side of the street to cross. We were looking for 131 Chrystie Street, and tried to spot building numbers buried in a word search of Chinese characters (“Ugh, everything’s written in Asian,” joked our half-Chinese friend ALiCo). After a short jaunt in the wrong direction, we found our way there. Past closed up grocery stores, bundled up homeless men on benches and wet sidewalks littered with a smattering of early fall’s yellow leaves, was Home Sweet Home.

Every Friday night at Home Sweet Home is the funky fresh dance party called “Shakin' All Over Under Sideways Down!”, the brainchild of acclaimed DJ Mr. Jonathan Toubin (yes, both DJ and Mr.) The party features “maximum rock and soul dancing,” to grungy fifties and sixties (and occasionally seventies) blues, jazz, and R&B deliciousness. We’re talking for real old school, like Little Richard’s “The Girl Can’t Help It”—the kinda stuff our parents and grandparents weren’t supposed to listen to.

“Shakin’!” is just one of the parties Toubin runs almost nightly known as “New York Night Train.” All of the parties involve virtually only 45rpm records of the early rock and soul variety and a whole lotta dancing. I love me some dancing no matter what form, but New York clubs tend to be expensive ($20 cover? Ouch.). When I read that the Night Train parties are $5 or less, though, I simply had to get on board.

Who would go with me? My Etas (our college crew of  twentysomething disaster areas; short for Eta Alpha Mu, long for HAM, short for Hot Ass Mess) were coming to visit. And sometimes it’s just better to try something out with a bunch of people who simply won’t say no to a good time. So there we were: TL, TDS, EH, ALiCo, Krito, SC, JCB, and me (Eta President-for-Life RE sadly couldn’t be there).

“Is this 131?” I asked the brunette girl with the choppy bangs. “Yeah,” she laughed as she checked our IDs and sent us below street level, down the steel stairs to a brick alcove lined with darkly comedic taxidermy. A curly-haired girl stamped our hands and took our $5. Normally the party was $3 (if you know the password, so they can “root out the d-bags”), but tonight was special.

Punk legend David Johansen of the New York Dolls would be spinning along with DJ Mr. J, and I could barely contain my excitement. I would be in the same room as the voice of “Vietnamese Baby,” “Puss in Boots,” and countless other early punk gems, a man who was one of the unwitting godfathers of an entire music and cultural movement.

We entered the bar, which is about as close to the literal definition of “hole in the wall” as you can get, with walls of brick, a floor of concrete, and exposed pipe up above. A disco ball with the word “Wierd" happily misspelled on it spun over the dance floor while  cardiganed and plaid-shirted hipsters flapped their arms and feet in strangely cool-looking and jerky movements. We put a little Eta bump and grind into our steps because, well, that’s just how we roll.

DJ Mr. J was spinning when we got there but eventually David Johansen took the booth. “Ohmygodthereheis,” Krito and I whispered to each other, fully aware unlike many others that we were in the presence of greatness. He was a skinny thing, with shoulder length hair pressed into the shape of a perfect upside-down U, thick, round black glasses and a long-sleeved t-shirt that read “Village” instead of “College.”

He played some sweet jams, and I even recognized his voice on a couple of tracks. Comically enough, though, he wasn’t the greatest DJ, leaving a rather large pause between songs—an act at which the dance crowd repeatedly groaned. Well, okay, maybe punk gods weren’t meant to be DJs. But that doesn’t mean he’s any less cool when you go outside and end up standing less than 10 feet from him while he smokes a cigarette.

Overall, though, the party was great—I would gladly descend into a hole in the wall for some old school jams, riding the New York Night Train until it falls off the tracks.

If you’re interested, visit the New York Night Train site here or check it out on Facebook. Better start working on your night moves.

A City of Contrasts

Something that’s starting to become one of my favorite things about New York is its role as a city of contrasts. On any given day, you’ll come across innumerable scenarios that seem paradoxical but somehow end up making perfect sense. Because it is so big, I find New York allows me to see the beauty in the everyday, the mundane and the contradictory, almost like a landscape photograph of a beach that upon closer examination is made entirely of fruit.

This past weekend was filled with such contradictions. First, as I was walking to Central Park to see JA, HS, and HH (I will henceforth refer to the group as The British Ladies), I walked past the new Ralph Lauren store on Madison Avenue. Soon to have its grand opening, the store was still under some phases of construction. Workers in dingy navy t-shirts and jeans heaved wood from the sidewalk in front of the building, wiping sweat from their brows with canvas-gloved hands. Supervising the activity was the one man in a baseball cap, who sat inside a window display with a chicly attired female mannequin as if he was instead keeping the lady company. Ralph Lauren, known for his classic American leisure style, has probably never worn a dingy navy t-shirt in his life, and he certainly hasn’t heaved wood off of a sidewalk in a while. Nevertheless, men who might be unlike him in many ways slowly gave life to his new store, painting the inside displays, cleaning the windows and cleaning up the entrance to the premises. Sometimes what happens behind the scenes is more important than what happens in front of them.

Then, walking along the oh-so-posh Fifth Avenue, cluttered with quiet mansions and apartment buildings of traditional gray stone and concrete, I stumbled upon the National Hispanic Day parade. The parade was an explosion of color and sound, with each Hispanic country represented, its New York transplants delightfully waving flags down the avenue. People young and old in sparkling traditional dress waltzed along the street waving happily to watchers. As they exited the parade route, however, their smiles dissipated and they bent down to loosen their Nikes or Converse sneakers just a little bit to let their feet breathe. A man in full regalia ate a sandwich and sipped a beverage from a brown paper bag. Tattoos peeked out from behind a fallen shoulder of a dress. The costumed paraders almost instantly became human again when they were out of the public eye, perhaps as most people do. It’s almost like catching Mickey Mouse drinking a beer on the other side of the Disney fences (but definitely not upsetting).

 

Maybe the biggest contrast of the weekend, though, was Central Park itself. Wandering through the seemingly endless green space with The British Ladies, I had a new appreciation for the park. I had been in it a couple of times, to the zoo, to the Obelisk and whatnot, but never an extended walk as this time. Grass laid over small twisting hills and curves, a path following its curves to anywhere you could possibly want to go. We found ourselves discovering many statues and landmarks along the way, from fountains, ponds and boathouses to oversized sculptures of Hans Christian Andersen and depictions of Alice in Wonderland. October’s early sunset slowly eased orange into the sky as we made our way to a castle overlooking much of New York’s East Side. Central Park is a gift to New Yorkers, who every day make their way through or underneath the concrete jungle. It is a taste of nature available at any moment. The park is almost overwhelmingly large—inside it feels like there’s no way you could possibly ever see all of it. Maybe it’s better that you don’t, though. New Yorkers have a tendency to be very “been there, done that” about some things, but Central Park is one place in a city of perpetual display that will always retain a sense of mystery. I don’t know if there’s a better contrast one could ask for.

The Commute

At 8 a.m., RuPaul wakes me up. It’s going to be a good day. But I decide to put my head back down on the pillow for a few more minutes.

At 8:30, Nirvana is pissed that I’m still sleeping, so they throw a little “Mexican Seafood” at me and zap me to life. I have to leave by 9:15.

“Okay, okay,” I say, wiping sleep from my eyes as I sit up and look around my room. It’s a mess, probably. Handbags thrown left and right, yesterday’s rejected outfits piling up on my chair. I hobble into the bathroom and ask my roommate the weather report. Rain? Ugh. Sunshine? Sweetness. I start compiling my outfit in my head. Light colors, tan handbag; dark colors, black handbag. What heels? Boots? What color tights? 8:40 a.m.

I turn on my desk lamp and apply my makeup in the mirror that I sit on top of my pencils. Concealer to cover the number of minutes I should have already been sleeping the night before (30-60). Eyeshadow painted on in spritely strokes. Eyeliner glided smoothly across my lids. Mascara in thick Bettie-Page like swipes. 9:02 a.m. I always think I am going to be late, but that has only happened twice.

Then the clothes, the hair (down unless it’s greasy). I throw together a lunch—one day I brought a whole cucumber with me then cut it in the office and ate it with some hummus; it requires zero effort and it’s healthy—and grab a yogurt which I will then eat with a fork because I can’t seem to remind myself to go buy plastic spoons.

I run my fingers through my hair on my way to the bus stop, and the garbage man tells me “Your hair looks fine!” and smiles. The teamsters on the corner say, “Hey miss, how you doin’ this mornin’?” I smile and keep walking, stepping over the questionable substances on the ground because chances are great they were left by a dog.

As I keep walking, I see nannies taking their child charges to nursery school. The children stretch their hands upwards to hold onto Nanny as their Batman or Dora the Explorer backpacks thump happily on their backs.

The woman with the corgi walks her dog along the gates in front of the apartment building near the bus stop. It is the happiest dog, with its tongue hanging out of its mouth and its bright brown eyes. It always makes me smile, even when I am the most tired.

The bus will arrive 2-8 minutes late, which usually makes for an interesting morning. Especially in the rain when the bus is nearly exploding with people and the bus driver has to actually reject some passengers. But by 9:21 I am on the bus with the dental hygienist who never tucks in her shirt; the older woman with a bright auburn pixie haircut, red lipstick and purple eyeshadow who sits elegantly in her wheelchair as if she was on a sightseeing tour at Disney World; men in their early fifties who still wear pinstripe suits to work; younger men in slick tan trenchcoats; fashionista girls who read Women’s Wear Daily; and many an elderly person with whitish hair and glasses.

If we are not yet on Lexington Avenue by 9:40, I start to worry, but that has only happened twice. I sit and watch all the different people interchange stops—some bolt out of the bus as if they’re on fire, others solemnly press forward as if they’re about to slog through another day. I greet Seventh Avenue with a pulse in my step as I catch the walk sign and make my way toward 54th Street.

Tourists crowd the area, wearing fanny packs and sneakers and “I Heart NY” shirts, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk to read their guidebooks. I brush past them as I head to my building, past the old Chinese Restaurant that now holds a For Sale sign.

Inside the building, I step up the white marble stairs and head to the elevator. The operator presses the button for me, which is a luxury I will never truly get over. I press the button for the eighth floor and change into my heels as the elevator creeps higher to my destination. As the doors ding open, my shoes are on and I trot a few steps to my office. It’s five minutes to ten. My boss is not in yet, so I unlock the door, turn on the lights, and start my day.