On one of the mornings in New York, I got up early. Not wanting to wake the Benefactor, I strolled off to the corner coffee shop. The sunlight that morning was lazy and hung low. The people were slowly rustling out of bed and pouring onto the street. I sat in the window like a cat bathing in the sun, sipping on a dark roast coffee and watching life go by in Chelsea. This is what I wrote in my travel journal:
"Its Sunday morning & I'm sitting in the window of Starbuck's as if I am for sale. Like everywhere else in North America, this day is a little slower than the rest. Though I am in a different place, everything seems familiar - the puffy eyes, the dragging heals, the cups of coffee in less-than-sturdy hands. Dogs are walking their masters, girls are carrying heavy burdens hidden in designer naps sacks, and the occassional person seems aware enough to consider that there just might be someone, somewhere, in some cafe window writing something about them."
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For the most part, the little mom and pop coffee shop on the corner is a dead idea in New York. Like pretty much everywhere else, Starbuck's has gobbled them up. In Chelsea, where we stayed, there were three of them within about two blocks of each other. However, despite this hostel corporate take over, the citizens of the area seemed relatively uneffected by the carnage.
On two different mornings, I sat in the same Starbuck's and drank the same flavors of coffee out of the same paper cups as people all over the world. However, there was something idiosyncratic that transcended this coffee-based universalism. On those two mornings, I saw some of the same people come into the coffee shop. I saw their interactions with the people behind the counter and with other patrons in the room. First names were used, friendly jabs tickled the ribs till people laughed out loud, and there were nods of quiet acknowledgment exchanged.
With this, I realized that I was somewhere particular instead of universal and that this little collection of people in Chelsea were an actual, thriving and engaging community. I realized then that, long after I was gone from there, those people will still be there typing on their lap tops, sipping lattes, and reading the Sunday New York Times. They will see their friends come in, they will talk idle chit chat, and they will commune. It is their world and no tourist or major corporation is going to steal it from them. They will live their life in their own sense of place.
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On the plane coming home, I was filled with a little melancholy and began to reflect on the trip to New York. I realized then that much about the greatness of that City is unspeakable. In my travel journal, I wrote the following thoughts:
"The city of New York is so full of diversity that its only continuity seems to be the continuous dissipation of whatever centering thought someone decides to give it. It is a city that defies any truly meaningful attempt to give it some sort of coherent summation of its nature. Despite all of its overtness - its motion, sound, hustle, and bustle - the city's deepest part seems more of a mystery than anything. This mystery is unspoken by its inhabitants, but revealed in the way they go about their life."
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Miuccia Prada's Wonderland
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One day, we went to the much-touted Prada store in Soho. The store was half shop, half museum. Currently on exhibit there was an exhibition called "Waist Down - Skirts by Miucca Prada." It exhibited many of the haute couture skirts made by Prada over the past few years. The exhibition was excellent to see.
Besides wanting to see the spectacle of this now famous flagship shop for the designer, I also wanted to go to the Prada store to see the design of it. It was designed by famed dutch architect Rem Koolhaas. I looked forward to seeing the design that he would bring to such a commercial venture.
Traditionally, Koolhaas' designs embrace the contradictions of a discipline that struggles to maintain humanist ideals in a world given to universalizing concepts such as industrialization and globalization. He attempts to design with material honesty, the human scale and carefully crafted meaning in a world given to a rapidly-increasing and vulgarizing efficient productivity. His designs, to some extent, seek to curb the effects of the emerging world of the late 20th century which has espoused material economy, machine scale and random meaning.
Therefore, it was interesting to see what Koolhaas has done in taking on these Prada projects. With them he has faced his concerns head on and has attempted to fuse the ideals of his architecture with the fleeting world of fashion and its celebrity-driven ethos. I feel that, for the most part, he has succeeded. With the Prada store in Soho, he has created an ethos that is both rich and interesting. It is humanizing and upliftiing. Despite this, however, I could not escape the fact that it housed one of the most commercializing industries in the world. It was such a contradiction.
Later on, I will write something much more significant on the Prada store.
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During the trip to New York, there were a few celebrity sightings. The first, ironically, was at the Vancouver airport.
There was this young woman who was sitting on the floor dressed in your hip, I-am-a-rock-star-like apparel. Immediately, I thought that she looked like either Tegan or Sara . Eventually, I drummed up the courage to go over and ask. It was Tegan!
She was on her way to NYC to be a DJ at a party on Sunday evening with a member of the No No Spots at a club called Pianos. We had a good talk in both the Vancouver and JFK Airports. She was very polite and very open. She exhibited plenty of intelligence and wit. She talked about how they were in the very early stages of production on a new album and how they went about that kind of thing. I was impressed with how she was in all ways.
While in New York, we had some spare time downtown so we went and saw the Ed Sullivan Theater were David Letterman is taped. We got to see all the poor saps standing in line waiting to get a shot at possibly, maybe, hopefully, getting in for the day. We went round the corner and I took my obligatory Rupert G. at the Hello Deli picture at Hello Deli.
It was there that we saw a crowd gathered waiting for some celebrity to arrive at the back door of the theater. Some guy got out of the I-am-a-celebrity-car and I snapped his picture. I have no real idea who he was. The guests that night were supposed to be Kanye West and Tom Hanks. This person looked like neither. Do any of you know who the third guest was that night?
Thus ends my celebrity sightings.
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We were on the plane from Vancouver to New York City with the man from New Jersey. He was working for a Canadian firm and was traveling home from a business meeting. During the flight, we managed to talk about plenty of things. Our conversation skipped over a series of topics like a rock skipping over water. However, he spoke post eloquently and passionately about one thing.
He spoke about his concern for where his nation was going politically and economically. He expressed concern about September 11th and how it might be repeated in that city again. He talked of losing his friends in that tragedy. He talked about how he was supposed to be in one of the towers that day, but wasn't because of a scheduling problem with the guy he was supposed to meet there. He talked while he showed us the picture of the devastation of September 11 he carried around with him in his briefcase. He expressed grief. There was nothing I could say to that. You could say nothing meaningful to him about that. His grief was his own. I only shared its burden on the plane.
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NEW YORK POET, GRACE PALEY
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This is a poem of Grace Paley, a poet I have just recently been introduced to. She is a New York (born in the Bronx in 1922). In the 1940s, she studies under W. H. Auden at the New School for Social Research (the same school as Ani Difranco) and writes interesting and captivating poems. Some, like this one, elude to New York City. I find it haunting and interesting to think about in regard to the city. It is written with the exact spacing as it was published.
FEAR
I am afraid of nature
because of nature I am mortal
my children and grandchildren
are also mortal
I lived in the city for forty years
in this way I escaped fear
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When I was in New York, I became very fixated on the Rockefeller Plaza. Though I was completely fascinated by its architecture and its general aesthetics, I also became very captivated by Rockefeller's apparent deep commitment to a very conscious perception of life and belief. I think that I will spend a great part of my life attempting to understand the world in which he life - the world that has, and continues, to effect our own.
In 1962, there was a plaque put up at the Plaza that records words which John D. Rockefeller stated on July 8, 1941, in a radio broadcast appeal on behalf of the USO and the National War Fund. This statement summarizes his thoughts and principles. I found this particularily fascinating. These thoughts have been widely reprinted under the title, "I Believe." I find the very last thought both interesting and ironic:
I believe in the supreme worth of the individual and in his right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty.
I believe that the law was made for man and not man for the law; that government is the servant of the people and not their master.
I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or hand; that the world owes no man a living but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living.
I believe that thrift is essential to well ordered living and that economy is a prime requisite of a sound financial structure, whether in government, business or personal affairs.
I believe that truth and justice are fundamental to an enduring social order.
I believe in the sacredness of a promise, that a man's word should be as good as his bond; that character -- not wealth or power or position -- is of supreme worth.
I believe that the rendering of useful service is the common duty of mankind and that only in the purifying fire of sacrifice is the dross of selfishness consumed and the greatness of the human soul set free.
I believe in an all-wise and all-loving God, named by whatever name, and that the individual's highest fulfillment, greatest happiness, and widest usefulness are to be found in living in harmony with His will.
I believe that love is the greatest thing in the world; that it alone can overcome hate; that right can and will triumph over might.
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When I was in New York, a theory I have was confirmed. When you live in a large urban center, it becomes impossible in your mind to sustain the thought of homogeneity. This determines the reality that you give up trying to promote, protect, and sustain a collectivist mentality. In other words, it determines that the hegemony, which is easier to sustain in the a small community, is not possible in larger urban centers.
Given the size, scope, and diversity of New York, the people there do not attempt in any sense to limit people's personal expressions. If anything, the people there seem not even to notice the individuality whatsoever. Though I definitely recognize that this can be as problematic as it is liberating, it is interesting to think about.
Much of the art produced by the New York School of art likely was born of this to some extent. The acceptance of diversity and difference in the city likely propelled the artists in that school to produce work that defied the mainstream and which reconstructed the nature of art itself. Though I recognize that the production of that art was born from a considerably more complex mileau than this, I am certain that it was a major factor.
Regardless, this is interesting to think about.
I have lived too long in an environment that is simple enough to wrap your mind around. In that, it is as oppressive as it is affirming. Though I will not get into that here, I am simply saying that I enjoyed the liberating atmosphere of NYC.
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Washington Square was built in the 1820's on the site of a former potter's field and then public gallows. It went through a whole series of redesigns and additions to achieve its current, well-known state.
The park has always been a famous 'beatnik' hangout popularized by the likes of Bob Dylan, Alan Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac. This is in part because of its natural vicinity to NYU and the cafes on many of the surrounding streets (i.e. Bleecker, Macdougal, and Sullivan Streets). These factors also made this park a favorite of West Village residents who, by nature of being from the Village, are very cool.
The night we were there was no exception. There were several buskers in the park that night. One small group of performing musicians were in one area. A circus-type performer was in another. A man playing an indiscriminate tune on an electric guitar off in an area without anyone surrounding him. There wer points of interest and eccentricity everywhere.
This was the only time during the whole trip that I was solicited to buy drugs. However, it made up for the absence in other places in that I was solicited at least 5 times in a half hour.
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I was very surprised at the complete absence of blind patriotism in New York City. If there was any place in America that I would have thought there would be people in favor of the Iraqi war and who I thought would be all "Rah! Rah! America!" it is NYC. However, it was very much the opposite.
Everywhere we were there seemed to be very open and thoughtful reflection on the nature of American foreign policies and political ideologies. In Slopehill, there were many protest signs questioning American political practice. The art galleries had exhibitions which explored America critically. The people leading various tours that I went on demonstrated a strong focus on critical analysis of various aspects of American popular thinking. There were many incidents where I got the distinct impression that there was a vibrant and thoughtful political dialogue going on amidst the people of New York. And I also found that Bush and blind patriotism was very much vilified in NYC.
Before going to NYC, I had a view of Americans as very blindly patriotic and blood-thirsty. However, being there suggested to me that this is more a "media fabrication" than a practical reality. I left there thinking that my problem is not with America in general, but with the mentalities of the American Midwest. In NYC, the practices and consideration of democracy was strong.
I left NYC with a much better feeling about the state of American than what I went with.
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A LITTLE DITTY ABOUT THE CITY
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These are images which I took "On Top of the Rock" (the highest building in the Rockefeller Plaza).
I loved this experience. Standing there looking at the grandeur and magnificence of New York. There are many people who deride the city (mostly those from the country). However, I find myself drawn to it. There are so many things that I love about city life. Mostly, I love the symbol of the city. It represents the greatness of what humanity can achieve. New York City is an amazing example of the beauty, aggression, creativity, and intelligence which humanity can bring forth when inspired and driven. It is a city which stands as a witness to the depths of our humanity - in all its glorious heights and awful depths.
There is a beauty you can see when you look down on this creation of man. Each building, each section, each crook and cranny holds a little sample of the creativity of people and demonstrates a sort of belief in beauty. I wish I had the time to explain what I mean in depth. |
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