Tag: i love new york

Monday in New York

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11:00 AM

I love New York!

Especially the subways. The train stations are so varied, some scary and filthy, others bright and white with beautiful mosaic work. And that distinct New York City station smell; the dormant, putrid concoction, intensified by excessive and oppressive heat. What is it? Piss, vomit, mold, rotting vermin corpses? But each trip on the train promises new people, new adventures, singers, panhandlers; who knows what awaits me today!  Nothing spectacular, just humanity, a connection in a way – superficial, of course, but so satisfying.  The rumble of the incoming train makes a plump rat scurry to safety amid the plastic bottles and wrappers.  I get on the train, a small part of this amazing crush of humanity.  I settle in for my ride…..   We’re still here…why aren’t we moving?

11:10 AM

Geez I hate this city.

The trains can be so challenging. My F train inexplicably turned into a G train.  F’ers get off and wait for the next train. When it arrives, we hurry in, cramming into each nook and cranny of the crowded train. We wait for the doors to close. It’s too long a wait…the doors are still open. I know that’s a bad sign. The conductor soon announces this train is suddenly going Express for reasons not shared with us.  My stop will be skipped.  We empty out, like a clown car, a hundred people piling out of the train. But these New Yorkers are not grumbling. It’s just the way it is. I’m from Minneapolis so I am grumbling (inwardly so no one suspects I’m not from here) and I decide to head outside to do who knows what. I just know I’m frustrated!!  Now it’s raining lightly, I’ve been at this station for 15 minutes. I stand outside in the rain. The day is dark, even though it’s late morning, and I’m annoyed. I’m talking to myself, gesturing and muttering. I will no longer judge those scary looking people in Union Square, mumbling and muttering aloud. They may be F train riders.  I soon realize that I have no options. I go back down (and pay another fare) and wait for another train.

11:29 AM

The F train arrives at last. It’s packed, but all is well..my ride into The City is quick, quiet and uneventful, normal. I arrive on 23rd and Sixth Avenue and it’s now raining steadily and seems even darker. Headlights are on, umbrellas up, heads down, braced against the blustery wind. It violently flips umbrellas inside out. (At least those poor, unfortunate souls with cheap, CVS umbrellas. Don’t ask me how I know this. ) I duck into a store, away from the wind, trying to salvage my umbrella.

1:40 PM

My errands completed, I walk to the train to head back to Brooklyn.  This trip would have taken 45 minutes in Minneapolis, back home in less than an hour, parking in my building’s climate-controlled garage.  Ahh, Minneapolis –  it’s so easy.  They should use that as the state motto.

One block to go, swapping my heavy bag from one shoulder to the other while trying to steady my umbrella, the rain is slowing to a spittle. The wind that once affronted now shoos the low hanging clouds quickly away. Brilliant sunlight emerges, blue sky, the rain refreshed the city. Umbrellas come down. Cabs begin to honk, headlights go off, we are all alive again, bustling here and there. It’s dazzling!  And that smell… that evocative, fresh, earthy rain on the pavement.

What a beautiful day. What a beautiful city!

A Little Extra Time

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Working as a background extra in New York City is really glamorous.

Last week, for example, I had to get to midtown at 5 am to catch a charter bus to Long Island. It’s amazing how much activity is around at that hour of the morning. We will be shooting some scenes for a tv series.   

50 minutes later we are in a quiet, residential area with very large lawns and brick fences. We check in to the holding tent, get our wardrobe, report to hair and makeup, and then hang around in this  big, hot tent for the next 4 hours. (Bonus: tons of free food and drink!!)  After awhile some of us head to set, which today is the front lawn of a mansion.  The house sits back from the water and a huge lawn leads down to the bay. A few sailboats drift slowly by. It’s very picturesque, tho we are not allowed to take any photos. The morning is beautiful but already very hot. In the 80s and it’s only 10:00. A large white wedding tent is set up on the lawn. There are white tables with white tablecloths and ‘champagne’ flowing from little fountains. The Production Assistant eventually assigns our starting point, a makeup artist rushes to refresh hair, droopy in the 80 degree heat. The show’s stars are cooled with battery fans and protected by umbrellas so nary a sweat mark will be seen. We are all in our places, dressed for another era, a previous century where they wore powder blue polyester.

“Background! First positions,”  the P.A. calls.  My ‘husband’ and I stroll slowly, arm in arm, among the partygoers, silently greeting our guests. We walk to the other side of the tent, and head back to the beginning. “Cut! Ok..regroup at first position.”  We stroll, smiling, nodding, along our same path.  “Cut! Regroup at first position.”   We stroll, we smile, we wave, we raise our glasses.  “Cut!”….

I could go on, but you get the picture.

I’m wearing a polyester pantsuit and shoes with teeny heels that sink in the grass. I step and sink. I have to pick grass and dirt off the little heels. We are all very, very hot.  The temperature is now in the 90s and we are wearing clothes that stick to our skin. But we’re all happy to be here.

Many hours of strolling and smiling later, of hanging out and eating huge amounts of carbs, the light is quickly fading and we hear those three little words, “That’s a wrap!”  We head back to holding, our tent away from home. We’ve had a 10 hour day. We are all happy with the day, chatty and full of energy.  But mostly, we are so excited to put away [burn on a giant pyre] the polyester suits we’ve lived in for the past two days.

We wait in line to check out, get forms signed for our lavish paycheck, and return our clothes to Wardrobe. Street clothes on, our space cleaned up, (grab some last-minute snacks), we eventually get on the bus for a quiet evening ride back to the city. The chatter and gaiety of today behind us, we retreat back into the 21st century, our phones, into our own spaces. It’s dark outside and peaceful and quiet in the bus. Perhaps many of us will see each other again – maybe in some other era, some other century.

So what makes this worthwhile? The enormous minimum wage ‘background talent’ get for a 10+ hour day? Maybe it’s the remarkable allure of being a tiny part of ‘show business.’  I think what makes it worthwhile is what we all give to it.  We show up – sometimes at 5 am –  knowing we may be thoroughly bored for hours, the day might be long and tedious at times, but we will also meet interesting people and enjoy a day filled with fun, food and surprises. Most of all, we all have a great time. I gotta go now, I have to get up at 4 am to do it all over again.

Being a real New Yorker

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I changed my Facebook ‘Lives In’ city to Brooklyn. I’m feeling like a real New Yorker. Had lunch in Chelsea with a friend and he, upper west side resident, remarked on my nascent noteworthy grasp of neighborhoods, train stops, landmarks, etc. I told him I like the challenge and discovering something new every day. Not that interested in the Statue of Liberty (except from the outdoor patio at Fairway) or popular tourist spots, I’m really more drawn to exploring interesting neighborhoods, architecture, pocket parks.  Had a picnic on the grass in Central Park last week, a trio of jazz musicians played close by. You just can’t find that everywhere! Nature, architecture, music, good company, outrageously expensive lunch from Whole Foods…

Being a real New Yorker means taking the good with the bad. The sublime with the irritating. Irritating: my refrigerator leaks. And, on a similar note, my door buzzer randomly goes off and it seems to be attached to the refrigerator somehow. It’s gone off several times today, startlingly long and loud, and reverberating through the refrigerator.  I’m serious.  It’s 10:00 in the morning, I’ve had nothing stronger than coffee (Dunn Brothers brew, sent from Minneapolis by a wonderful friend…I can’t find coffee like that here. New York has everything except Dunn Brothers.)  So, anyway – YIKES!! – just jumped out of my chair..buzzer, refrigerator thing.

Also irritating, I threw my back out yesterday morning. Ready to attend a film, I got up from my couch and something went pop. I know it’s related to the whole coughing thing from last month because I am out of align and my back is messed up. This did not prevent me from attending a party last night and Ubering back home through new streets and neighborhoods, ripe for exploring sometime soon.  I’m feeling very positive about my new city and my decision to come here, despite not having a job yet, or creating any worthwhile art, the buzzing and leaking…these are temporary irritations. Tomorrow, something sublime will come my way.

Challenging myself

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Thursday, April 16, 2015

I will admit it. My life in Minneapolis is great. But I think it’s important to test your spirit, go outside that comfort zone, and, through resistance, strengthen muscles you didn’t know you had. For example, just once, everyone should live in a place with cockroaches. I don’t have cockroaches in Minneapolis. I don’t know anyone who has them. When I first got to Brooklyn, I saw what I now know was one on the sidewalk. “Wow!” I said, in a sing-song voice to a little boy and his mom nearby, “look at this cool cricket!” Both raised their eyebrows with a pitying look in their eyes. Pity from a 5-year old who has undoubtedly seen many cockroaches.

I have not painted yet. My paints arrived in the mail and I had to schlep over to the post office and pick up the box. That was a challenge, too. I wasn’t sure if there was an actual line, nobody looked particularly queued up. So I picked a good spot to stand. It was a good spot because it was the front of the line. “Oh, hahahaha, is this the beginning of the line?” I said, backing away and bumping into a baby stroller. Many looks of pity.

I will learn. I will accept the looks of pity. I will accept the challenge that is New York.

Welcome to New York

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Tuesday, April 14, 2015

I’ve been in my new apartment for a week now. I wanted to write about all the surprises, expectations and experiences of my first week. Rather, I’ve spent it painting walls and gathering essentials (plates, knives, matches) and trying to remember why I left a beautiful, sunny loft in Minneapolis for a nice but decidedly darker and dirtier New York apartment. I wanted to write interesting posts and do lots of paintings of my beautiful neighborhood that (in my mind) I would be busily be cranking out.  But I had to hold off. Because the only thing I had to post was: Waited all day for the gas man to hook up my stove…

I’m learning a lot about customer service and the acceptable level of it here. The bar is sometimes low. I could have written about the noise or the dirt but that’s old news when you’re talking about New York. I wanted to wait – to be positive and upbeat about my new city. This is, after all, something I’ve wanted to do for years – move to New York. I’ve been here a week. The writing had to be put off – I had to wait until I didn’t feel like slitting my wrists (tho in fact, I forgot to pack a knife). I waited for the dust – wow, there is a lot of it – to settle. Getting my stove hooked up and making coffee and toasting a bagel this morning feels like I’m actually in my apartment, instead of a hostel. It’s getting better. Going out to buy a knife now, not to end it all, but for the cream cheese schmear on my bagel.