classon avenue

We walk at about 10pm or so, the dog and I. My hearing aid is off but I feel a tense energy. The people on the street are alert – all looking in one direction – and there are more of them than usual. Ambulances are rolling down Classon Avenue. I can’t hear them but I know what they sound like, screeching and moaning like a woman possessed.

I do not think much of this and neither does the dog. That is the way it is in New York, somebody always dying, somebody always getting hurt, the city always overreacting because they do not want to be all over the Daily News. She sniffs around, I put on the streamer and listen to CUB, but as I walk closer to the park, things are different. Lincoln is blocked off by cop cars. Families stand on their stoops with their arms folded. There is yelling, I can tell by the mouths stretching.

Across the avenue are maybe twelve white cops standing behind a cop car. They press a young black kid up against it. The whole scene is faces me like a play. I turn off the music, turn on my hearing aid, and let the real world of sound flood in. The kid is yelling something, I don’t know what. He doesn’t seem to be struggling much, not 12 cops worth of struggling, just mouthing off.

The trees are in full bloom casting shadows through street lamps. I’m staring at the dudes with my eyebrows cocked, all Occupied-up, waiting for something to call NY1 about. One of the cops catches my gaze. He’s an old-school Irish thing, stocky, black-haired, Danzig-armed.  The cops aren’t saying anything to the kid, just pinning him down and letting him yell, silent as monks. This goes on for many minutes before they put him in the car. They drive away. The people on the street shrink back into buildings and bars as if slurped. We finish our walk and I pack for Ghana.

gentrification

It is 1:30am. I’m at my desk in a room that smells of paint and varnish. We’ve been in Brooklyn two weeks and I think it is making me fat. There is food and light everywhere, coffee in every flavor, organic candy and farm-raised ice cream. We ate at this place that served $6 tacos and $15 cocktails, we drank at another that had 10,000 light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. Then there are the dessert trucks, the hand-made donuts, the pizzas made on pitas and the freeze-dried raw vegetables smothered in vegan cheese. There is a culture clash going on with the Jamaicans and the Trinidadians over here and the white girls named Cotton and Echo over there, and the Hasidim mechanic standing next to a sign that reads “Investigating the Mayan Calendar June 1st-14th” somewhere in between. Brooklyn must only annoy people so much because it is as close to Utopian as anything in this world has gotten.  Some call it gentrification when trendsetters move into economically depressed neighborhoods but it’s more like DIY gentrification, which is probably some kind of oxymoron, but whatever. I leave for Ghana in 5 days. These past two months have been a shitshow of crazytown in the state of looneytoons. I will try to blog more, cross my heart.

jamaica

We went to Jamaica last February for four days, two of those spent flying in and out of Kingston and Montego Bay. In the airport in Kingston, it felt just like the 1960′s. I couldn’t explain it until I saw “Dr. No” the other night. There was Sean Connery, running around the same damn airport, the cops in the film wearing the same Marine-like uniforms that they were when they took my suntan lotion.

doing it

After swaddling myself in phony down and fake fur, I gather up some liquor and go to Crown Heights. This is the first time I’ve ridden the subway in several weeks as I’ve either been out of town or cloistered in my hole, working. It’s as close to traveling alone as I’ve had since I visited S in DC a few months ago. I’m relishing in it with an enthusiasm that is very sad.  I look around, read, look around, read some more. Think of stuff, think of more stuff. It was great.

I had this dream of taking my laptop on a Bolt Bus to Raleigh or Boston working off their WI-FI, hanging out in the town in some Starbucks until work is done, then bumming around the city before taking the bus back home. I can do this, I guess. I just have to do it.

enthusiasm

At one of our Occupy meetings, I am yelled at for letting projects slide. I’d like to think this is not my fault because, hey man, there are ten of us in the group, why is starting and finishing projects somehow my responsibility? Still, yelling gets to me. If you want me to do something, but never love you again, yell. So, I dust off my reluctant-leader-hat and try to lead. It is awkward and weird but I have to get used to it because as much as I do not want to be the leader, was not voted the leader, was not announced to be the leader, I am still somehow the leader merely because I have, on occasion, exhibited enthusiasm.

emergency room

I have this friend that I have known since high school. We had a falling out a few years ago, mostly my fault. She recently moved to DC from St. Louis and that was my cue to get out my toolbox. I visited her twice, we exchanged e-mails. Saturday, she visits me in Hell’s Kitchen. We walk everywhere. She is a good walker and good walkers get a gold star in my book. We walk from Hell’s Kitchen to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, talking about music,  feminism, jobs, life, dogs, all that…everything but the thing we fought about. I don’t want to talk about that. Maybe she does, I don’t know. We talked about firemen too.

Strolling Bedford Avenue on an unusually warm winter night, we stop into Vanessa’s for dumplings, Beacon’s for recycled shoes, and the Surf Bar for margaritas, a dirty bathroom, and a pile of sand in our shoes.  We hop the train back into the city for a late night Upright Citizen’s Brigade show (the bartender at the Surf Bar thought they were a band). The show is okay. I have never heard a single word said in that space. I still enjoy being there for some reason, or rather, I enjoy taking people there. I enjoy seeing people laugh, especially my people.

We head back to Hell’s Kitchen, meet Joe at a bar there. We drink. It is loud. My brain is flushed. Everything is bright and interesting, like a baby’s rattle. I watch it rattle, big-eyed and dumb-brained, babbling. It was probably a bad idea to go back upstairs and knock off a glass of imported rum, but we did. S and I leave to go get food and while stomping down the stairs I pass out – momentarily, but just enough. I don’t black out, but blur-out. The hall goes impressionist.

 S asks if I’m okay. I think I’m okay. But there is blood on the floor. Big droplets. I stare at them, mesmerized, trying to figure out where they came from. Is that my blood? Noooo. Can’t be. There was some fight in the hall, a gang fight, a crocodile fight, an accident with nail polish. S rushes past me, I stay and stare at the blood. But this is tiresome and I want to go to bed. Joe pushes at my shoulder. I tell him I just need a nap. He doesn’t see the blood, just drags me up the stairs. Then, I’m shuffled back down the stairs. He sees the blood now, on my chin, a throbbing, leaking mass of dying flesh on a bed of purple bruise.

Outside, it is night in New York and all the lights are blinking in the dark. The cabs are very yellow and swooshing by like big cats after a prey. Joe and S are floating beings, voices swaddled in Kenneth Cole outerwear. The voices are frantic, but they feel safe and knowing. I let them do their thing while I absorb the night.

I am not completely conscious again until I’m sitting in front of the triage at Roosevelt Hospital. I feel very guilty, that I’ve ruined the good time S and I were having. I cry. Joe tries to comfort me. He is good.

But there is a cop across the hall, slouchy at the hip, hands on holsters like a cowboy. He is maybe 5’8, rangy and fit; pugnacious. His smashed faced and bald head are protected by a thin, knit cap. This makes me happy. I wave at him. He waves back, smirking. I say out loud that he “looks like Sons of Anarchy.” He says “How so?” I say “Well, look at you!”

There is an older woman waiting with us. She is short and wire-haired, with red cat glasses; frumpy as the day is long. She reads a magazine with a squint. As the cop stops off, her expression that turns to me is one of begrudging respect from someone who doesn’t respect anybody.  I suddenly feel like a charmer. I ask her “What are you in for?” She says “I just got a foot thing, you go ahead.”

A young, Hispanic intern comes over and quickly tapes up my chin. He does not look at me in the eye, but his hands are skilled. I am overwhelmed with gratitude for this kid. I have this odd, religious feeling, like I’m looking at the Virgin Mary. I mean, thank the fucking powers that be for this kid, if it wasn’t for this kid, goddamn, where would we be night after night, with our bleeding chins?

In the triage, the kid and a young black woman are both at computers, typing my insurance information and trying very hard not to laugh at what I’m saying. I think I call the cop a douchebag. I congratulate them on being so great to the drunk assholes that come in night after night. Again, I’m awash with gratitude. I want desperately to make them laugh because it is all I have to give back.

For all they say about being drunk, they never talk about the beautiful surrender of gratitude that comes over you. When that social reserve comes tumbling down you might shit in the street, but you also might tell the guy at your deli that he is one in a million, and he needs to hear that (you can’t tell him that when you are sober because it would be awkward).

We are waiting in a room with a curtain. I’m cracking jokes with the people who poke their heads in and want me to sign stuff. A deadpan Indian doctor with a messy ponytail glues my chin together. A white lady doctor comes in next, younger than me, tall with a fashionable haircut. She has an accent. I want to ask “Where are you from,” but instead I say “What are you…from London?”

She says she is from Cork, in Ireland. I say I was in Dublin for 24 hours. She says “That oughta count for something,” and gives me a tetanus shot.

2012 resolutions

This will probably be of interest to no one. Just so you know, I know. Still, it’s interesting to look back on last year’s resolutions. I think knocked out about half. Not a failing grade, but could do better.

• Resolution 1: Read more books. I finished ” The Hunger Games” last week  and it is everything I have not to download the next book in the series on my Kindle. I will not go down that road. I will let the first book sit and stew as a good book should.  “The Hunger Games” awakened the reader in me. I’m devouring others: more Dawkins, more Bukowski, my first McKewan. I need to read books by women. There is no good reason why I must awash my worldview with the white male experience; not as a feminist and a liberal. Even if I do relate to the booming loneliness that is so endemically male.
• Resolution 2: Get a driver’s license. This is a failed resolution from last year. I want to move. I can move by public transportation, but now I have a dog and I want to move with my dog. The goal is: to be Natty Gann. If I cannot hop trains with my wolf, I will go on road trips with my Puerto Rican street dog. It’s close enough for now.
• Resolution 3:  Go to Africa.  I am sick and tired of having not been to Africa. It must stop. There is a great possibility I can go to Ghana for my summer internship. If not, I’ll find some other way. Even if it means flying into Nairobi for four days on a $4,000 plane ticket purchased with a high-interest credit card. Fuck your 8 iPads.
• Resolution 4: Run 15 miles.  I had a goal last year of running a half-marathon with the intention this year of running the NYC marathon. I think it is unrealistic considering how busy I am. I really can’t commit to spending more than 90 minutes a day exercising, and even that is pretty hard during the school year. I made it to 12 miles last year, once. I’ll try to make it to 15 this year. Kind of a meh resolution, but it’s basically to keep me running regularly.
• Resolution 5:  Fix the mistakes I made with the Occupy Wall Street Archives Working Group. I don’t want to get into this too much, it’ll give me away. I started working with them through leading  another group on archiving the OWS narrative…but something didn’t go right. We didn’t mesh, didn’t have the same outlook, the same goals, they didn’t trust us being from an institution and I think it made me insecure. I should have just ignored their mistrust and kept talking to them. But I shut down and  phased out. I’m supposed to be leading this project but I feel like I’m walking a drugged dog, it’s all kind of wobbling behind. I need to put on my balls and my smile and go down to 60 Wall Street and just suck up all the awkwardness until it dries up.
• Resolution 6: Eat more efficiently. The amount of take-out I have swallowed this year is unacceptable. We are taking the garbage out near nightly, bags and bags loaded with Styrofoam, plastic knives, packets of ketchup, and cups of sliced oranges the Chinese place seem to feel is a courtesy. I am aware no good can come from this, for my health, for my pocketbook, or the environment. Cooking is not an option. I had such a resolution last year  but I cannot waste time on that shit. Organic TV dinners, salads, spaghetti, replacement meal juices. More of that.
• Resolution 7: Finish the thing T and I are writing. I can go into details, but I must finish it. Finish that thing you are writing too.
• Resolution 8: Blog at least four times a week. Why? I don’t know. This blog is pretty useless in the cultural record. But I think it helps my writing.
• Resolution 9: Sleep 8 hours a night. This really should be number one. Every single one of these resolutions will fall into place if I wasn’t taking every opportunity to be exhausted. I think there is some sad part of me that forgoes sleep on purpose. It means I can shirk responsibility by playing the exhausted card. I really do feel exhausted, but I tend to stop feeling exhausted about 8pm when most of the work for the day is done and I can fuck around on my personal electronic devices and I’m up until 2am. I then feel guilty and force myself to wake up at 6am to make up for it and the whole thing starts all over again.
• Resolution 10: Volunteer more. I’m usually pretty good about volunteering, but with school it hasn’t been easy. Still, I could have done more over the summer and didn’t. I don’t know what the fuck I did this summer. I seemed to be busy all the time; not sure what I have to show for it. Runner’s calves, I guess.

central park

At Midnight, Tasha and I went to Central Park where leash laws are not recognized from 9am to 9pm. As we walk, I can feel her ears perk, her movements become expectant. When she is certain of where we are going, she starts to pull, shrinking only from the blaze of headlights as we pass Columbus Circle. At the mouth of the 59th Street entrance, I let her go. She leaps after the rats that dart from one shadow to the next like snipers. With her fawn colors and white rump, she can resemble a deer.

The park is safe now. It teems with other dog owners, mostly purebreds from West Side homes: Greyhounds and Dobermans, Corgis and Norwegian Terriers, Stockbrokers and Playwrights. We follow our usual route under a bridge, over a swath of muddied lawn, down a stairwell of rock imagined by Olmsted 150 years ago. Tonight, the ball field is emptied of the late-night walkers who have made it a de facto doggie playground. Sometimes they bring beer and sit on a bench, talking politics while their dogs sniff each other like crazed inmates. I avoid them. Usually I’m either turned off or deep in an episode of WTF (thanks to the Oticon bluetooth streamer, which sends Marc Maron’s alluring whine directly into my brain cells).

If one of them speaks to me, I smile like I barely speak English. My choice is to either go through the whole thing about my being deaf  – this damn conversation that neither of us want to have – or turn away. Others perceive this as rude. I think I’m being incredibly polite, saving them the trouble of having to repeat themselves, speak up, know more about a stranger than they really wanted to after having asked “what breed is your dog?”

(I have to remember this when I to feel others are being rude, like when an old lady shoves me on the subway to get by. Maybe she is actually protecting me from being coughed on with her sick, old-person phlegm. Who knows. Who knows why people do rude things).

Deaf folk more positive than I use their deaf as a means to teach and fascinate. Every now and then I make a concentrated effort to be one of these people. But I am not. I am cynical, insular, and prefer the company of dogs. But I also live in deep, profound fear of not being liked. When I see those dog owners on the bench, making indecipherable noises in my direction of which I have no response, I already know in that instance that I am not liked. They call this insecurity, but it feels like a virus, a 24 second flu. From experience, I know that if I walk away, the sick will go away…but if I stay it will get worse before it gets better. So, I walk away. But what I forget is that when I do that to a stranger without explanation, I’m passing that virus right back to them.

Whatever, I’m rambling.

two birds with one stone

Last night, I had this idea that I could lift 5 lbs weights while showering. I went as far as bringing the weights into the bathroom and dropping them into the sink while I undressed. Something stopped me from taking them any farther. Exercising while showering feels like eating while showering. Also, am I really this busy?

the end

I can’t sleep. I pace around my parent’s house, floorboards creaking under each step. Infused with manic energy, I do laundry, make coffee, change a dead light bulb in the bathroom, write the previous blog post, get up, walk around, just merry-go-rounding the house, floorboards creaking, turns lights off and on, stick my face in the Christmas tree, looking for that rocking horse ornament I bought at Wal-mart in 1989 and wrote “1989″ on in 11-year-old-scrawl. I pack, do work. Suddenly, it’s 11am. It’s Noon. I race to turn work in. Dad drives us to the airport. There is a man at the airport with a dark beard that I am almost sure I know. I start reading “The Hunger Games.” Some lady sees me next to a bunch of little kids and says “are you all together?” We get on the plane. We are in Chicago. We get on another plane. I pass out face-down in Joe’s lap and stay that way for 4 hours. At Newark, our baggage comes quickly. I’m halfway through “The Hunger Games.” We are on the AirTran, we are on New Jersey Transit, we are in Penn Station, we drag our luggage behind Port Authority, pass the soup kitchen and the shuttered cake store. We are in Hell’s Kitchen, rising up two flights of stairs, open a door. The dog wag her tail and nuzzles our faces. The end.