Nowhere else am I safe from the question: Why here?
-Jonathan Franzen on his repeated moves back to NYC
The funny thing about New York City is that it can be so convenient, and so inconvenient. At any time of night or day, the bodega around the corner is waiting to sell me beer or food, but sometimes the simplest tasks can be an ordeal.I used to do my laundry at a place right around the corner from me. Then I went to do my laundry one day, and there was a sign saying "closed for renovations." I didn't know where any other laundromats were, so I had to walk around with all my clothes and laundry detergent until I found another one. Then the next time I went to do laundry I went back to my usual place figuring they would be done renovating. It had turned into a DRY CLEANERS instead. So I went back to the other place I had found the last time I'd done laundry.
Today, I set out to do my laundry once again. Before leaving, I went on the internet and looked up laundromats in the area, because I was sure there were others closer than the new one I had been going to. According to the internet, there was another one right around the corner from me, but when I walked by there it did not exist (yellow pages are not a reliable indicator in New York City, things change too fast). So I went back to the new one that I had been going to. However, when I got there, it was CLOSED for some mysterious reason. I don't know if it's closed for good or just temporarily.
So then I was really at a loss. I wandered around for a while with my bag of clothing and laundry detergent and breaking out into a sweat because it was warm out. Finally I found another laundromat and was able to wash my clothes. Then I went back to put my clothes in a dryer, and it was really busy there and all the dryers were full and there were people waiting to use them. I waited around for a few minutes but then I was just fed up and I took my wet clothing and headed home.
So here I am with my tiny room smelling like a laundromat and clothing hanging in every conceivable location like some sort of wild jungle with wet pantyhose slapping me in the face as I try to maneuver my way through.
On my way to work, going down the subway stairs, I see a dirty man wandering around yelling, "Coffee is a drug that rots the brain." Then he sees me obviously carrying a mug full of coffee and says, "Yeah, you do it every day, don't you." I nodded, and kept walking.
Friday night after work I met up with a girl I work with, a girl I used to work with, and their boyfriends to have a few drinks. We went to a bar near me that had just opened (replacing what was my favorite bar, Filthy McNasties) and in honor of its recent opening it features $1 beers between 5-9 every day this month. So of course I had a few beers there, and then I got convinced to go to a show featuring El-vez, a Mexican Elvis. I also saw what I can only describe as a mock-gospel group. There was a back-up band, and there was a blonde woman lead singer. She alternated between humorous improvisational preaching and religious songs that were dirty. It was so odd, and so awesome.
By the end of all this of course I am completely trashed, and then I went to visit my boyfriend, who didn't come out because he was studying for his law school finals. He made me a cup of strawberry tea, which I promptly burnt my tongue on, and then apparently we had a long discussion concerning Ralph Nader that I completely don't remember having. I know this because I brought up the same topic again the following night and made my boyfriend repeat what he had already told me because I really wanted to hear his opinion. The reason why I was so interested in talking about Ralph Nader is because I read an article in the Village Voice (A NYC free newspaper that one picks up primarily to find out what events are occurring over the weekend, but also includes articles) that accused Nader of wanting Gore to lose the last election because he wanted to punish the Democrats. The thing was, the article was completely crazy but completely convincing. So I felt that there had to be a lot of truth to what it said. But compared with my boyfriend I don't know anything about politics so I wanted to ask him. He agreed with me. If you are interested, you can read the article here.
My Mom works night shift part-time at a hospital, so I called her at work Sunday morning at 2 a.m. when I came home from the bar and when she answered the phone I yelled "HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!!!" in a booming voice and she said "Have you been drinking?" and I said "A few, yes."
When I went out to the bar it was already pretty late, probably around 12, but we were just going for a couple beers (I spent too much money the night before at El-Vez) and when we got there a NYPD car was parked outside, but we didn't think much of it since they do patrol the neighborhood sometimes. We were just about to leave the bar, and I was waiting in line for the bathroom, when suddenly a NYPD officer walked up to a plant right in front of me, shone his flashlight on it, and then walked out again. I looked across the bar at my boyfriend and we shrugged. When we left the officers were interviewing some guy. We postulated on what could have occurred. My boyfriend suggested that someone had hid a brick of cocaine in the plant. I thought perhaps the plant had injured someone.
Again I return to Franzen's comment: "Nowhere else am I safe from the question: Why here?"
