seeyaladar

I woke up today and there was a change in the air. I walked to the subway and it was crisp. Overnight fall had fallen at our doorstep. It was a morning when I always think of boarding school 8ams. The first day you decide to wear stockings instead of socks. It is a late April day at home. And somehow here even the M train knew that something had changed this morning. No more pumped-up air-conditioning subway carriages. I stepped on to find a seat set at room temperature. New York City woke up this morning, sighed and breathed a cool breath of goodbye. I leave in two days. 

A lot of things have changed in three months. Probably not least of all me. I arrived thinking I could never get used to this noise. I could never walk down a street, staring straight ahead, with no care for anyone else. I could never be ok with the amount of people in my space. My only space being the millimetres surrounding my body, if that. But I did. I became a person who was capable of blocking out all sound, all annoyances, all accidents that had nothing to do with me. I could stride those avenues, dodging, running across streets without a look for cars, bikes, buses, taxis. I became the ever-hurried New Yorker, blank stare, get-outta-my-way-I-gotta-get-there-and-then-there.

It is not such a good thing at all. It is an absorption like only the very best wettex. I am not sure if it possibly only appears to be absorption but in reality is more like a facade. For me (I am new to this) it is absorption. I think for the seasoned professional though it is facade. New Yorkers quite easily drop their subway faces. They are used to the rat-race-rush, the anything goes this way or that. I am impressed with the way that New Yorkers will relax and have a chat. Just because. Just because you are a lonesome dove. Always. Under an awning waiting for the rain to soften. Small talk. At an opening against a wall. How are you? This never happens in Australia. We possess a laid-backness that comes with a side of reservedness. The Americans will always talk. And usually not with an accent of I-am-so-much-better-than-you. Not in my experience with strangers anyway.

racial profiling

Race is a huge issue here. 

I have spent the first two months here living in an area called Ridgewood. And as I have said before it is a largely Puerto Rican area. I am forced to think about my whiteness. My difference. My stand-outness. There are a few whities around, more and more...my flatmates were quite the trailblazers moving there 3 years ago.

The subway stop we get off at is Myrtle-Wykoff...it is on the L train which is nicknamed 'The Hipster Express'. This because the first stop when you cross over the river into Brooklyn is Bedford Ave. Think scene, think bad 80s gear, boys who perfectly waiver between gay and straight - so mysterious in their blurred lines! So the hipsters mostly haul out at Bedford, a few stick around to get off on the following stops but they don't like to stray too far, better to huddle around your hipster roots. This white settlement is so literal that my friend and I often play 'The L Train Game'.

How to play:

1. Get on the L Train, preferably in Manhattan so you can take some time to settle in. Remember if there are no seats (high probability) that most of the people will get off at Bedford Ave. Also remember to stand near a seated white person because they are getting off quickly, all other nationalities are in for the long haul.

2. Once everyone gets off at Bedford Ave. the game begins. Look around, what whities are left?

The majority of them are going to get off at the next stop Lorimer St. After that it is going to get a little more interesting.

3. You have 8 options:

Graham Ave.

Grand St.

Montrose Ave.

Morgan Ave.

Jefferson St.

DeKalb Ave.

Myrtle - Wykoff Aves.

After us (hardly ever comes into the game)

So look hard. Body language is important, you can sense the movement of someone ready to get off at the next stop. Dress, sexuality (there are gay stops), friends/no friends, children/no children. It is very complicated. Ooooo, but so much fun!

4. Name a person. Green hat = Morgan Ave. Lock in your bet and wait for the stop. The person with the most whitie wins, wins!

5. So try it for yourself. But remember practice makes perfect. My friend has been travelling to Myrtle-Wykoff for 3 years - she is well practised in the art of picking courageous whities and needless to say - she always wins.

you wanta cwofeee, tony?

I think you know you are finally fitting in somewhere when you are able to walk into a convenience store and just nod. Or like Carrie Bradshaw, 'Just the usual, thanks.'

A place where everybody knows your name.

The last time I knew this sort of community feeling was all those years ago when we all shacked up in Darlo - commonly referred to as The Glory Years or The Good Old Days. The days when we all smoked so we had a reason to go to the convenience store everyday. We also had 7 in the house so a daily run to the store for bread and milk was needed. None of us seemed to work either so to keep our brain cells a ticking we would also include the Sydney Morning Herald in our daily pilgrimage. So we knew Simon at the Victoria Superette very well. So well in fact we would often have beers with him at The Green Park. Where we also knew all the staff. A result which also stemmed from a daily pilgrimage of sorts. 

And now I have my little New York Simon. One day a week I work in a part of Brooklyn called Gowanus. It is currently straddling the industrial/gentrification divide. All the same in its purgatory it is a cool part of town. I get off the subway at Smith and 9th Sts and descend from the clouds - the train tracks are about 100 metres above the ground which makes for some lovely coal black Christo-wrapped industrial architecture - to find the usual bunch of junkies huddled, gossiping, screaming (no wonder it reminds me of Darlinghurst) outside my convenience store. Here called 'bodegas' - in essence the same as our convenience stores but usually with added deli, coffee and beer. So this morning I enter and nothing said but a coffee presented. 

Three sugars, right?

Huh?

Got ya, I know you are the no-sugar girl.

a stormy sunday

Today is grey. But definition gun metal grey. 

Not the usual smoking lounge 200% humidity non-existent visibility.

It is cool. Everything is clear, with an edge, colours are bright, trees are greener than green. 

I like it. It is dark.

You want to put the lights on at 3pm in the afternoon and play monopoly while the sky decides to crack.

If only a New York summer was like this. Generally there really isn't much cracking going on.

pool #1 hamilton fish pool

Hamilton Fish Pool Photography by Damon Winter / The New York Times

So the first cab off the rank is Hamilton Fish Pool. It is on the Lower East Side. I arrived there after work one hot, hot day to find it closed. This didn't really faze me because in my search for swimming pools I generally meet hurdles. Like the day I went to swim at Lasker Pool in Central Park only to find that the pool was closed. Because there had been an iddy bitty bit of thunder about. And the rule is: 'The pool will be closed for one full hour from the moment that you hear the last rumble of thunder.' I think the Germans built the swimming pools in NYC as there are rules upon rules upon rules. 

So at Hamilton Fish Pool I met the woman at the gate.

'Is the pool closed?'

'Yeah'

'Is it going to open back up?'

'Yeah, well I dunno. We've had a little accident. So we are closed while we clean the blood out of the pool.' 

She said this like it happened most days.

A little wait though and then it was into the no-longer blood-streaked pool. 

At 7pm some of the NYC pools close to the kids and allow the adults in for lap swimming. This seems to be a subtle form of racial segregation as it makes sure the blacks swim during the day and the whites swim in the evening. Because of course only white people swim for fitness. 

So in my lily whites hopped. 

Hamilton Fish Pool actually does have lanes. As well as black lines on the floor of the pool to keep you swimming in a somewhat straight line. We take this for granted in Australia.

I looked for a spare lane and decided to swim closest to the edge of the pool on the southern side. Pretty soon into the laps I realised my school boy error. I swam my first lap with relative ease and then the second I felt like I was swimming uphill. This is no mean feat. Imagine swimming uphill.

I was swimming and thinking and then I realised that the pool was so shallow (I would say about 3 feet) that with the amount of people swimming laps in the pool the water was being forced against the edges. Creating waves. Big waves that hit the sides and then engulfed me being the first thing they hit on their way back. Great for fitness. Not so great for pleasure. I felt a little like that child at the graduation.

And then the swim was over. Refreshing. Only a few band-aids seen. The change rooms were kinda like subway dungeons. Damp, definately rats living in every odd numbered locker. But then again it is free. And rats live in New York too.

the pool tour

Photo: Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times

Swimming pools in New York City. I arrived here and basically they immediately pumped up the heat. June saw a week of 40 degree days. Welcome to the city.

So I was on the search for a swimming pool. I would have been happy with any puddle but my inquiries were continuously met with, 'Oh, no when I'm hot I just take a shower.' Cool.

Sometimes Australians seem really naive overseas. I know I look like this all the time. We expect things to be the same as home. Hot = swim. Simple. We live good lives.

Anyway it turns out that there are swimming pools in New York City. They are outlandish, romanesque, palatial. And for a very good reason. Public swimming pools are free in NYC. They are for the poor. The poor who don't leave the city during the summer. The poor who don't have a house in The Hamptons, let alone a caravan park site in Lorne.

The really lovely Olympic pools were built in the 1930s when the WPA decided it needed to get the kids out of the East river. Too many were drowning, dying from parasites, diseases, rats...
So they built 11 huge pools, spread out over the 5 boroughs. And they were visions. Visions of European splendour, architectural escapism from the slums. The message being that even the working class could swim like royalty.

So it all seems so Robin Hood - the poor getting even, getting given castles. But something doesn't quite stick. Unless I am so much a product of pay-as-you-go that I couldn't possibly understand a time and a place when governments provided. Either way we are going to go on a little tour.

I am going to swim in every public swimming pool in NYC.

And then I will report back.

kind years and not so kind years

The other night I watched Pretty in Pink for the first time in a long time...
So my 2 favourite Pink bits:




But please, I warn you...if you feel the same flutter for my little Andrew try to resist the google temptation. The years have not been kind. So we are just going to pop him in the freezer circa 1988.

PS. Who knew he had an alcohol problem and was hung-over for all of Pretty in Pink? I thought that awkward smile was oh-so coy and yet it looks like he was just trying to keep his breath in his mouth...

The other great thing about that movie was this song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVNivk0_3_c

Enough said.

runner's thighs

The other day I was trudging up the steps and steps that are at every subway station in this city...God help disabled people..

I came across an older man with a trolley...trolleys are like substitutes for cars here...it is even called 'the pony'...it is a modern day packhorse for moving house on the subway...anyway I asked him if he needed some help with his trolley...

'Oh no, mumma, I couldn't let you. It's a macho thing.'
I thought fine, suffer in your pride...

So I was on the platform about 5 whole minutes before he got to the top and then he said to me,

'Could I ask you a question?'

'Sure'

'Are you a runner?'

And I thought like 'Are you married?' that my lie would shorten the conversation...so
'Nooooooo...'

'Oh. I think you should give it a go. I think you would be really good. Look at those thighs. They are real runner's thighs.'

i want a cool rider...

I went to a high school graduation on the weekend. They are never riveting unless you are in fact the one graduating BUT it was interesting just to see how the Americans do it.

Let me set the scene.

Total chaos. There were superb black ladies in white hats dressed for New Orleans Sundays and men so crisp in their red, oversized, jazz clubs suits. Shiny shoes an' all. And the rest it seemed had only just remembered to lace their sneakers. Some credit though for the whiteness of their shoes.

And a procession of bag pipes. They love to think that they are Scottish and Irish over here. I understand that they can lay claim but it amazes me how we turned out. And how they turned out. And a ripple of whispers, 'Do we stand up?' So the room resembled a graveyard. Some tombstones toppled, others half up, half down - 'Oh I just don't know', some standing tall because they knew the national anthem was coming soon.

The most amazing aspect of Americans to me is the fact that - rite of passage or not - most occasions are an open invitation to talk amongst yourselves.

And 1500 people involved in a low murmur is kinda like living inside a substation. Excellent atmosphere for a graduation. And even greater fodder was the fact that the family behind us had brought their two year old. Don't know how to entertain your two year old during a graduation? Bring a portable television! Cartoons are great for keeping them quiet! I am not kidding. Then the kid vomited. Motion sickness?

The talk worked both ways. We had speeches after speeches. And this is not particular to America but high school speeches love a good metaphor. We had the growth of independence and experience from K-12 compared to the evolution of school lunches. We had the importance of failure in success as exemplified by Thomas Edison. We also had Richard Rogers of Rogers and Hammerstein fame thrown in as the graduation was being held on his birthday. This was a good giggle as we had had positive affirmation after 'live your dreams' after 'reach for the stars' and yet this particular speaker decided to conclude with 'Now, none of you will turn out to be Richard Rogers but...'

And then for diploma time. Parents ran to the front of the stage so as to make sure they got the best shots. We were now at a concert with the mosh pit and the whoops and the woo hoos and the screaming and the 'right on, Tahnee' and 'we love you, Kelsi'. American names are excellent. Storm, Shawn, Kiara, Kayleigh. I have been introduced to a Chantelle and then heard, 'Ooo, it is so French.'

So that is about it. We did have one pin-up for a drug overdose at 25. Patrick.
All American baby face.
Captain of the football team.
Head of the Track team.
Outstanding Athlete of the State award.
Top of French, Maths, Science, Social Studies.
Valedictorian. Voice of an angel.
An OD or gay.
But he had so much potential...

bag lady

Excuse me. Do you mind if I ask you a question?
Sure.
Where did you get your handbag?
Oh. Tokyo.
Oh. Ok. Thanks.

Each week someone stops me. On the subway. On the street.
And it is not the ladies asking.

It's the boys.

keys cut

Doing anything Thursday night?
I know a little love who would love to see you see his work...

talk

I think a lot about the drama of this city. It is about talk.

I am not someone who has to talk so I find this a little difficult to take.

Often - and I am not sure if this is because I never take public transport in Sydney - I overhear conversations on the subway which are not really conversations but more like arguements. At first I thought this was all about a level of communication not innate to Americans. But I think it is much more than this.

More often than not I hear lovers bickering about someone who was meant to meet someone here or there, or someone who was meant to say something, or someone was meant to call someone at some time..and it goes on. And then not just on the subway but on the street. I guess perhaps I am not used to the publicity of all things that seem like private things to me.

And then the other day I picked up a copy of Evelyn Waugh's The Loved Ones. I am reading it on the subway because no reading gets done in the sauna that is my house, let alone the temptation of 1000 plus cable channels. It is about some Englishmen in Hollywood circa 1940s and quite nicely points this out:

"I've never regretted coming away. The climate suits me. They are a very decent, generous lot of people out here and they don't expect you to listen. Always remember that, dear boy. It's the secret of social ease in his country. They talk entirely for their own pleasure. Nothing they say is designed to be heard."

There is much more to said about this...another day.

you gonna get some?

I have never craved green so much in my life.
And space like I want to stretch out my forty metre long arms.
So this evening, like playtime-after-dinner in the best light of dusk I ventured out to find a park near my house.
And I feel like I hit the jackpot..
Not just space. Not just green. But too a hill. Looking down on the old island across the river..
And a little conversation..

'What you doin' here?'
'I live here.'
'This is Ridgewood.' (Ridgewood is the sorta place where if you are not Polish, Puerto Rican or African American you are few and far between. My whiteness > His disbelief)
'Yep.'
'What you doin' afta dis?'
'Going home.'
'You live here?'
'Yesss.'
'You married?'
'Yep.' (for obvious reasons)
'How long?'
'Couple of years.'
'Three?'
'Two.'
'You have a husband and kids?'
'No kids. A husband.'
'No kids?'
'No.'
'But you been married two years?'
'Yeah.'
'You gonna get some?'
'Some day.'
'How old are you?
'27'
'You're young yet. You still got time.'
'Yeah. Thanks.'
'Ok. Seeya.'
'Bye.'