(I’m cheating for last week by bringing you something old in order to do something new this week. Even though I’ve published this before it is still one of my favorites. My intentions wishlist for this piece is to add two stories I originally left out and for some reason didn’t want to amend until the last few weeks or so. One story involves Ground Zero and the other story involves little kids and danger and me subsequently using The Dad Voice for the first time. And a boat.
So I’m going to add those in.
This was written in 2003, the job I had was a drumline instructor for a high school band, and the trip we took was in 2002, 6 months after 9/11.)
All I’ve been able to think about today is how I’m going to quit my job, and New York City.
The vision of Central Park that I have fixed so strongly in my mind is an enigma: I’ve only been there in person once. Yet, although I do not have much personal experience with the city, the impressions I have of it are more firmly etched in my mind than that of say, a house I used to live in, or where I went to high school. This I do not understand.
My wife and I are on our honeymoon, and we are staying with Stephanie, an old friend of mine from college. She has a place on 54th Street, right in between a fire house and a police station in what New Yorkers call “midtown”, that mythical area of Manhattan which is, in fact, situated right in the middle of the island. It is just a few blocks from everything: Times Square, Rockefeller Center, and of course, Central Park. We can get on the subway and be at Battery Park, Lincoln Center, or the Empire State Building in no time at all.
At the corner of 51st and 6th is this place called Ess-a-Bagel. We go there for breakfast on the first day and summarily every day after that. It is always crammed with people, both customers and staff. There are about 12 people behind the counter, all doing something at a frantic pace, except for one old guy who is attending to everyone’s orders. Today, our second trip here, he recognizes me and my wife, and he already knows Stephanie.
He says “Back for more, eh? What do you want?”
I say “I’ll have a blueberry bagel with strawberry cream cheese, and could you go a little light on the cream cheese?”
He says “Are you in film school?” I’m perplexed by this question, half because its 6 in the morning and half because, well, no, I’m not going to film school.
I say “Uh, no, I’m not going to film school.”
“You aren’t going to NYU there, on the director track?”
“Not that I’m aware of, no.” I chuckle.
“Well, when you go to film school and get a degree in directing, you can tell me how to make my bagels. I know how they’re supposed to be, that’s why I work here!”
He takes my bagel and, rather defiantly, proceeds to slather on an in-human (although certainly not un-delicious) amount of cream cheese with what looks like some sort of masonry tool. He smiles.
“Enjoy your freakin’ bagel!”
(You see? This conversation is totally clear and unbroken in my head, even though it was pretty insignificant.)
When we go to Central Park for the first time, we come down into it by the tunnel over by Tavern On The Green that makes it into all the movies. We would see many more musicians and street performers throughout the day, but this would be the first and only time we would see a backpack with a speaker in it hooked up to a CD player laying on the sidewalk.
There is a hat in front of this rig, and I’ll be damned if there isn’t money in it.
We go to Lincoln Center and take a tour of Juilliard. I feel disappointed, because even though some of the world’s best living composers teach here, the guts of the buildings are not the shining, hallowed hallways I had built in my mind. The performance halls are amazing and beautiful, crafted specifically to convey what is I wish to do with my life, but the passages leading to them are cavernous, dark, and unpleasant. My wife is catcalled by a student as we walk by a group of them. In a loud voice he says “Man, I hope she’s coming here!”
We go to the Empire State Building and wait in line for almost 45 minutes to finally get out onto the observation deck. It is very cloudy and hard to see anything, yet it is still fulfilling.
We go to F.A.O. Schwartz. On the way there, walking down Park Avenue, we see a guy talking to himself and shooting at people with an imaginary gun. He shoots me.
We eat at a place on 49th called “The Around The Corner Cafe”. The menu features dishes like “Super Tasty Pork Chop Dinner” ($7.95) and “A Really Good Milkshake.” ($2.50)
They are not kidding.
As for the connection between quitting my job and New York City, I think it is buried somewhere within the recesses of situational relevance – right here and now, in the fluid present, I’m in this situation and unhappy with it. In the past and future (if they can be separated as such) I’m in New York City and I’m happy. What’s happening here is making me think of what’s happening there, right here and now.
We go the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We buy streetdogs outside and eat them on the steps. I mistakenly get a spicy one.
We get to see the first handgun made in America, numerous paintings (including John Singer Sargent’s Madame X) and it is all very enjoyable.
We come to the musical instrument wing, and around the corner from all the Stradivarius violins there 6 pianos. The first one is not actually a piano but a harpsichord, white ash with gold gilt. It belonged to one of Bach’s sons. The second is piano actually a piano, laquered natural. It was Napolean’s.
The third piano is a real, honest-to-god pianoforte, and it is stained and polished to an amazing wood grain burgundy finish. It belonged to Franz Liszt. He wrote some of his best work on it, including the one piece by Liszt that I just know you’ve heard somewhere. Trust me, you have.
The three of us have been pretty quiet throughout our stay in the music wing, and I look up in time to see Diana and Stephanie read the placard which tells them why the piano is there. They give me a knowing look, and our heads swivel around, looking for guards. No one is paying attention to us.
Without speaking, they place themselves between me and guard’s eyeline. I lean about a foot over the red velvet rope separating me from the past, and with one finger, briefly, I touch the body of Liszt’s piano.
Then we file out of the room, one at a time. Me first.
Right here and now, in the fluid present, I’ve got my arms crossed as I pass into Japanese Swords and Armor with my wife and my friend following not too far behind. I’m rubbing the tip of my right index finger with my right thumb.
I’m too happy to smile.