New York City

New York City. Here I am. Arriving on Friday late afternoon in a slog of rush hour traffic from JFK through Queens to Manhattan. Queens looked like any other city in the twilight under low rain clouds. Sure there were huge apartment complexes, but I’ve seen those in LA and Minneapolis too. But suddenly we descended into the white tiled Queens-Midtown tunnel after 45 minutes of stop and go traffic and arose in Manhattan and there was the New York I had imagined. Packed to the waterfront with buildings and crowded streets and taxi cabs honking and maneuvering. Every street full of shops and activity. Endlessly. Flying over Montana I saw the mountains below and thought, just let me off here, in the middle of nowhere with only snow and cold and elk and the starry night. Quiet and alone. It sounded so appealing. And here I was in the middle of Manhattan in a crowded bar with crying babies and office types in expensive clothes. Manhattan can certainly make you feel insecure if you are not dressed in dry-clean only attire. At the same time it has been stylishly disappointing. Flashy labels on dull clothes. I passed a woman on 5th Avenue in Midtown marveling at the designer window dressings of Cartier. “Can you imagine” she mused, “to just decide to go buy a new five thousand dollar watch on a Saturday?” Poor soul. Still it is invigorating to be here. To be able to take the subway anywhere with the swipe of an unlimited Metro Card. To stay out all night long with no worry of the town shutting down. There are ostentatious hotel bars on every corner in Midtown serving up ridiculously priced Bloody Mary’s. At the King Cole Bar at the St. Regis Hotel Bloody Mary’s were $18 each, but you are serenaded by a harp player and gaze boozilyat an oversized mural behind the bar. It was packed at 3pm. Last night a young man sat down at the bar next to his friend and said, “I propose a special toast, ‘To me still having a job.’ They’re laying people off like crazy at work right now.”