I’m consistently impressed with the ability of some (or, as I’ll argue, most) New Yorkers’ abilities to invent completely new realities and live within them. I suppose when a crush of citygoers surround you at all times, each forging their own path through a chaotic metropolis, there’s a certain compulsion to craft a narrative that places you on a different plain from “the masses.”
I’m reminded of one of my first visits to the city before becoming a native. It was my final year of high school, and our Social Studies teacher took us for a several-day trip into the city. I think she believed it would be some of my classmates’ last opportunity to become exposed to culture that was wholly different from their own.
I grew up in southern Delaware in an area that was characterized by short bursts of bustling seaside tourism in the summer juxtaposed against a rural sleepiness for the remaining nine months of the year. Indeed, our school year was structured with the needs of local businesses in mind. An elongated summer break was deemed necessary such that local seaside businesses might have the seasonal hands that they sorely necessary to feed and entertain the throngs of visitors during the year’s warmest months. Vacations tend to bring out the worst, most demanding behaviors in people, and I believe this left a sour taste in most of my classmates’ mouths for the world outside. Instead, they looked inward, romanticizing the simplicity and charm inherent in living along a single highway that could take you to any destination you could possibly want to reach.
As seniors, we were granted limited freedoms on our cultural pilgrimage to the Big Apple. For a few hours at a time, we were allowed to wander the city’s lush and diverse neighborhoods. We were released into lower Manhattan, where myself and a few friends made our way into Little Italy to find a place to enjoy some quality pasta. I was horrified to learn that a few classmates with similar ambition had gone out of their way to locate an Olive Garden. This same group would go on to dine on KFC in the East Village and Planet Hollywood in Midtown. They scorned and disparaged any and all opportunities to sample New York’s cuisine, and resultantly, it’s culture. That is, until an ambassador of New York-Caliber delusion forced his way into all of our lives.
We stood outside of Trinity Church, contented in the limited but informational brevity of our visit. A shuffling block of aimless-looking teens shivering in the cold, we waited for our bus. As its arrival grew later and later, the more pessimistically minded among us began to make their voices heard. That was when he arrived. A mustached man in a puffy black coat took a spot on the curbside and began to sing to us. Belting loudly and comically out of key, he treated us to a charmingly sloppy rendition of Annie’s “Tomorrow.” Long screeching notes had him reaching far outside of his register, making some of us shudder and others just laugh. Finished and satisfied, bearing a toothy grin that highlighted a few missing molars, he approached us and introduced himself.
Expecting to hear a plea for spare change or a sob story, we were instead regaled with a series of quippy anecdotes. No stone in the man’s life was left unturned. His grin ever-present, happy and happy, he described his ex-wife (who dressed up for Halloween 369 days a year), his brief Broadway engagement, and the savvy investments of the 80s that made him a tidy fortune. Though a few members of our group looked incredulously at his humble (if worn and scrappy) clothing, he continued on, undaunted. “They want me to be stand-up comedy” he proudly declared, followed by the reassurance “I can handle it.” By the time we boarded our bus, he’d earned my declaration of assurance that he could.
As we pulled away, I listened to classmates’ conversations as they attempted to summarize and bring closure to what had just transpired. Most wrote him off as “crazy, toothless hobo” and filed him away as a representative of New York’s workless class. Just like that, he was placed in tidy silo that would typify the New York experience for a set of a few dozen Delawarians. Aberrant and maddened, his experience and perspective lacked value, or even truth. In the years that have followed, I’ve not been able to characterize him so neatly. That nameless fellow was the hero of his own journey, an attitude that I’d note in many of the more flamboyant performers that Manhattan has offered up in the short time that I’ve called it my home.
On my commute less than a week ago, I had the distinct pleasure of sharing the car of three separate trains with a particularly vibrant saxophonist. He began each performance the same way, with a mumbling introduction that I couldn’t quite make out, even though I sat or stood nearer to him each time. He wore enormous horn-rimmed shades and glittering streamers in his hair. Each compressed concert began with a high-pitched squealing note that would wrench the attentions of every idle commuter. When he met eyes with one, he would waddle closer and blow more out-of-tune notes, alternately thrusting and stumbling around at each turn in the dank and otherwise silent tunnels. No two performances were identical save for their squeaky opener, the “improvisations” seemed inspired by whichever unfortunate passenger met eyes with him first. He mocked them by dancing to and fro, somehow interpreting whatever he saw in them through randomized music. He didn’t seem to know how to play that instrument, exactly, but he’d convinced himself that he was talented enough to perform for the unsuspecting public.
Like the mustached belter before him, this man asked for nothing in return. He offered another mumbly outtro before shambling his way to the next car (which, luckily for me, managed to be mine thrice consecutively) of which I made out only one sentence, written below.Though they’re extreme examples, I believe these men to be archetypical of a feeling that New York engenders in all of us. The more crowded areas of this city, particularly during commutes, have a distinctly de-humanizing feel. You blend with a crowd, slithering through narrow subway tunnels or hustling across teeming sidewalks. Coping mechanisms take the form of iPods, smart phones, books, newspapers, and magazines - all with the aim to distract. Or perhaps our minds wander to the location that we’re hurrying so quickly to and just what we’ll do when we get there. In this way we tell ourselves that our journey is different, separate from that of those around us. Unique and important. We ignore the common humanity or even local condition that unites us, however fleetingly.
These men rejected that premise. Forcibly, they attached themselves to my life, leaving a lasting impression and memory. On reflection, I find that their delusion is not so different from the subtle one that underpins my every commute, or the mantra that has structured my life in the city to date. In a frantic career hunt, I have told myself a story of unique importance. I have characterized myself and my talents as valuable, unique, and necessary. So I write and reflect, building a case for myself to present when the time is right. These men didn’t waste any such time. In an obnoxious, cloying burst of honesty, they got right down to business and performed, showing us all what they were made of;
“Here I am, New York. If you don’t dig it, fuck off.”
So say we all.
