The Names of the Roads

I'm sitting in the basement of a Victorian gothic castle, once a Greenwich Village courthouse, now the Jefferson Market Library.  Before that, I found Washington Square Park.  The history I learned about the founding of our country never mentioned New York as often as its influence is found here.  The names of the people who gave us America are embedded here, in a way that my Midwestern geography, familiar with landowners and governors and post-Civil War heros and politicians did not prepare me for.  I expected tributes to robber barons, Rockefellers and Astors and Carnegies and the legends of a city that grew up in the 30s, when nobody else had anything.  And they're here, but Jefferson, Washington, Lafayette, Hamilton, Franklin, those are the names on the streets and the buildings and the parks and the monuments.

Greenwich Village has something I haven't seen much in the city, even in greenspace:  flowers.  I've seen florists and produce markets and the occasional hanging basket, but the plants here grow out of the ground sometimes.  It feels like a different city.  I've heard that "city of neigubourhoods," phrase used to describe other cities, but it actually means something here.  When you come up from the subway, you can tell there's a difference, even if you don't know where you are.  I frequently don't know where I am.  

It matters more where you're going.  

Location, Location, Location

"You are a total badass!  You've never been here before?"
"Nope."
"And you have a job and you're looking for a place-"
"Part time."
"That's so fucking amazing.  Nobody does that.  People, like, crash on a couch with a friend for months and try to find work.  So, did you just graduate from college?"
"Hah, no."
"...Grad school?"
"How old do you think I am?"
"Oh, no, no, I'm not gonna guess that."
"I'm 33."
"Holy shit girl, you look, like, I mean, I guessed you had to be 23, but you don't even look that-"
"Yeah.  The 20 year olds I work with have no idea, and I'm not gonna tell them."
"Well, I'm 30, and I've never done anything that brave."

She lives in a decently nice apartment in a slightly sketchy part of Brooklyn.  It's not bad, but it's not where I'm living now, a neighbourhood with fancy restaurants and old Greek ladies that reminds me a little more of Toronto.  The Brooklyn neighbourhood feels like New York in the movies (which is ironic because New York in the movies is frequently Toronto).  It's more than I want to pay, but it's an enormous room, has a dishwasher, laundry in the building, she doesn't care about guests (if I ever had any, this room would be big enough for them) and the commute to Manhattan is a little better.

I had an offer I liked better, two theatre people who have worked on stuff I've wanted to see when I read about it.  Smaller room, further away, less expensive, but theatre people.  They reneged after a friend decided she would move to the city in September after all.  They're willing to let me sublet for August for pretty cheap.  I asked if I could let them know Tuesday.

There's another place I'm set to look at on Monday that's one I think I'd like.  It's in the area I'd rather live in, about $20 a month cheaper than the big room in the sketchy place, and might otherwise be a good deal.

I'm not going to move in to the really cheap place outside Brooklyn's Chinatown.  I understand that a lot of Asians started wearing face masks to combat swine flu and they became a fashion statement, but I think if I had to walk through Chinatown on the regular, I'd want to wear one, too.  Imagine the smell of hot garbage and fish markets alternating for over 12 city blocks, and more cigarette smoke than I've encountered in the entire city so far.  There are some other questionable things about that place, but the smell on that walk is not something I would get used to.

I got a couple weird messages from a guy I'm pretty sure is a terrible broker, but I messaged a friend who lives here, "Is he just bad at his job, or am I gonna die?"  "I'm pretty, pretty sure you're not gonna die."  "Thank you."  I do OK when I don't listen to my mother's anxieties, but the times I do...

I'll be OK.
"Hey, if it doesn't work out and you find someplace else, keep being a badass."
"I try.  I'm just sorta casually a badass."

Assumptions

"How long have you worked here?"  

"Almost three weeks."

"It must be nice to be inside today, instead of out on the ships."

"Oh.  I'm from Iowa, it doesn't bother me."  

"Iowa.  How long have you lived here?"

"Three weeks."

"Three weeks!?  And you already have a- three weeks.  From Iowa!  You must just be-" (vague gesture indicating I'm overwelmed)

"I'm from Des Moines, so..."

"Oh.  More progressive, then."

This is the line of conversation I resent.  It turns out the only thing I'm offended by is the assumption I'm an inexperienced, small-town conservative.  I'm tired of having to explain I'm not basically racist, that diversity is not new to me, that I've seen skyscrapers.  Sure, it's different, but mostly in the prices and transportation.  

I don't feel brave.  People keep telling me I am.  I'm just doing the next thing.  It occasionally feels really, really stupid, but not scary.  Some of the details are alarming; the things I'm not thinking about because if I did, I would be afraid.  I'm occasionally nervous, but something will happen.  It always does.  

The Ragged Edge of the Universe

Noticing I had tabs open for housing on Craigslist, jobs on Playbill, and dudes on OKCupid, I thought,  "If I can just solve these three problems, I'll have a life at the end of it."

What do I have now?

A life.  In transition.  

Which I think I'm more OK with than I think.  I *like* figuring out my own problems.  I like having this much going on.  I mean, the reason I'm here is because I was bored working four jobs and devoting all my time to the one the most draining and the least artistically challenging.  

It's nice not having to smile and nod to everybody on the street.  I like not being expected to make small talk with the cashier.  I really like the minute that New Yorkers just decide to tell you their whole life story and they don't scimp on the details.  In some ways, I think my personality is probably better suited here, where I can turn on Iowa Nice when I need to, and the rest of the time it's OK that I work in service industries and actually don't care that much for humanity.  

Every day is an adventure in doing something I'm afraid of.  Today's was going out after dark.  I rode out to Brooklyn to see an apartment.  It happens some places in Queens, but in Brooklyn, a lot of the train lines are outdoors and elevated.  Came out of the tunnel and, since I happened to be sitting by the window, saw the Statue of Liberty lit up in the harbour.  A ways off, but I hadn't seen it before and was not expecting to.  I still don't live here.  

I need to re-read The Great Gatsby.  I never understood why they drove so much when they were in New York.  The subway was that old.  Now I understand, they were *way* out in Queens, where a car is the fastest way in to the city, and also, rich people don't ride the subway.  

I'm in the way of being Nick.  Older than he is.  Nearly older than Gatsby.  But alive, and without any past I'm reaching back to.  And I'm no Daisy, and don't want to be Jordan Baker.  So Nick.  Except I'm not likely to meet the man who fixes the World Series.  

Or maybe I will.  The place I'm in now, I Googled the guy, because of course I did.  He's a mildly famous musician.  The guys I see on OKC have written books, travel the world with the intention of saving it, and do a lot of otherwise wild and vaguely intimidating things that leave me out of their league.  

Only inasmuch as even with my resume inflated, those things didn't even matter much in Iowa.  If you want to be somebody, you have to do the work.  There are just as many opportunities to be nobody here, but there are a few more to be somebody.  

Live from Lincoln Center

I wonder when my feet will stop hurting.  And then I realise I keep taking these 10 mile or more forced marches across the city and go, "You're in charge of the itinerary, you know.  You don't have to see three things in vastly different parts of the city every time you have a day off, you know."

I think if I don't go out when it rains, if I don't try to walk everywhere, I won't be prepared for winter.  

I need this to work.  I need to realise it's going to feel like it isn't working for a very long time.  Which is fine, actually.  If I have to keep doing things, I can't get bored.  

The city has no "backstage."  No alleys for garbage collection; the subway runs 24/7 so it can't shut down for total system maintenance; event set-up, tear down, they don't close, just set up barricades.  The only places you can't go, it seems, are behind pay walls.

Oh.  Wait.  The entire city is backstage for a group of rich people who have never seen it like the rest of us do.

New Yorkers don't wear flip flops, which I like.  They sit in the shade on a 75 degree day and complain about the heat and humidity.  They expect you to cut them off, to interrupt, to explain your problem is not their problem and they can't help.  I've heard so many times, "well, I don't know anything about that," when if they'd let them get to the end, they know perfectly well how to help, they just don't want to.  So when you let them talk, you hear a lot.

I've never travelled anywhere I couldn't wait to get back home from.  Home is mutable.  So people who ask me, "Do you like it?  Do you miss home?" how do I say, "It doesn't matter if I like it, this is home because I'm here."  

Defeated by the R Train

I hate screwing up public transportation.  Hate it.  I have no one to blame but my own inability to read and follow instructions and, generally, I believe I'm pretty good at that.  So when I get lost in a train station I've been in before, going a way I have gone before, I hate myself for it.

And a little mistake becomes a big one quickly.  Ride one stop too far and you can't always get back.  Walk three blocks in the wrong direction when you're tired and you're twice as exhausted.  And you can't just give up and decide you live here now, because it doesn't work that way, you have to keep going, you have to figure it out.  And when you already feel like you've lost the public transportation game, and it's only going to be harder now you've started losing...

I'm trying to move.  In two trips this time because I can't carry it all alone.  I have to be at work at 1pm.  I started this journey at 9:30 and am not half done.  I will not be making it to work on time.  I hate this.  I hate this.  I hate this.  But I will do it anyway because I don't have any other options.