on long walks in late afternoon:
THERE I WAS ON WEST 44TH STREET ON A TUESDAY AFTERNOON...
THERE I WAS ON WEST 44TH STREET ON A TUESDAY AFTERNOON...
PLUMP WITH SPRING. OUT ON THE SIDEWALKS WERE THE USUAL folks out for a stroll, young men and women holding hands, older folks taking a walk, an elated young man with a brand-new VCR from 47th Street Photo, a messenger from a commecial-art studio, rushing to pick up photostats, moving along the street and not seeing the man who, because of the way he walked, may have been going to consult his back doctor. Each day, the citizens of the street would pass one another and never connect. On that particular Tuesday, I happened to take a glance out of my apartment window at the famous Actor's Studio, which lay directly across the street; and there was Al Pacino talking with Paul Newman, while Shelly Winters sat on a step smoking a cigarette, as Fay Dunaway hailed a cab; and those who happened to be walking by took no notice, all of them inhabiting separate worlds and going their separate ways. I was far too old to be surprised, but not too old to be intrigued.
Sometimes I would wander the City of New York without plan or destination. More than once, I found myself on West End Avenue, staring up at old pre-war buildings, and wonder how I had arrived there because that had not been a part of my plan when I set out for an afternoon walk. The West End was like all vertical neighborhoods, the obvious symbols of the vertical city, with their penthouses snug and distant at the apex. And I would try to imagine the lives lived within there walls. Who is the guy with white hair and jaunty manner standing at the seventh-floor window? His hands behind his back. He looks down into the avenue, but occasionally his mouth moves to a grin. Two floors above, there are 5 windows so filthy that that the glass resembles a membrane. I conjure up an atmosphere of retreat and withdrawal, some final decision to avoid all further disappointments, to move until the end through loveless rooms full of shrouded furniture, dusty books, and old newspapers. Those apartments are part of the city, and therefore dense and layered and always filled with wonder.
That very density is always changing, those layers shifting, as soon as you think that you have figured out the city in which you walk, have located poles and its center of gravity, the city sshifts again. A restaurant that was suddenly hot only last year; a year later it's for sale. A city is simply too large, too dynamic, too infinitely various and mysterious; which is exactly why it needs to be walked. I once lived in a California city called Livermore, where one could see the Centennial Light Bulb which has burned since 1901, and traveled to the Lawerence Livermore Lab's Dicovery Center, filled full of marvelous displays of science and technology; taken a road-bike ride through the rolling hills of the wine country. All cities, both large and small, express themselves in a variety of ways. All inhabitants of every city can marvel at their amazing surroundings, if they only take the time to do so.
When I was younger, I used to wonder why so many middle-aged and older folks were always talking about old neighborhoods, about places gone and buried, and among the old New Yorkers, about Ebbets Field and Birdland, the Cedar Tavern and the old Paramount. The reason was probably simple: In those places, they were happy. Sentimentality is almost always a form of resentment. And now that I too have grown old, I understand. But in a very important way, this is terribly sad. By retreating from the new, we cut ourselves off from the throbbing engine of the present. And revitalization could well begin with a simple afternoon walk. We can go out on the streets to where the sky has not yet been blocked from our view, to see the emotional tides of our city, and there they are, they are there too...they are everywhere. They certainly cannot be found by staying home.
Sometimes I would wander the City of New York without plan or destination. More than once, I found myself on West End Avenue, staring up at old pre-war buildings, and wonder how I had arrived there because that had not been a part of my plan when I set out for an afternoon walk. The West End was like all vertical neighborhoods, the obvious symbols of the vertical city, with their penthouses snug and distant at the apex. And I would try to imagine the lives lived within there walls. Who is the guy with white hair and jaunty manner standing at the seventh-floor window? His hands behind his back. He looks down into the avenue, but occasionally his mouth moves to a grin. Two floors above, there are 5 windows so filthy that that the glass resembles a membrane. I conjure up an atmosphere of retreat and withdrawal, some final decision to avoid all further disappointments, to move until the end through loveless rooms full of shrouded furniture, dusty books, and old newspapers. Those apartments are part of the city, and therefore dense and layered and always filled with wonder.
That very density is always changing, those layers shifting, as soon as you think that you have figured out the city in which you walk, have located poles and its center of gravity, the city sshifts again. A restaurant that was suddenly hot only last year; a year later it's for sale. A city is simply too large, too dynamic, too infinitely various and mysterious; which is exactly why it needs to be walked. I once lived in a California city called Livermore, where one could see the Centennial Light Bulb which has burned since 1901, and traveled to the Lawerence Livermore Lab's Dicovery Center, filled full of marvelous displays of science and technology; taken a road-bike ride through the rolling hills of the wine country. All cities, both large and small, express themselves in a variety of ways. All inhabitants of every city can marvel at their amazing surroundings, if they only take the time to do so.
When I was younger, I used to wonder why so many middle-aged and older folks were always talking about old neighborhoods, about places gone and buried, and among the old New Yorkers, about Ebbets Field and Birdland, the Cedar Tavern and the old Paramount. The reason was probably simple: In those places, they were happy. Sentimentality is almost always a form of resentment. And now that I too have grown old, I understand. But in a very important way, this is terribly sad. By retreating from the new, we cut ourselves off from the throbbing engine of the present. And revitalization could well begin with a simple afternoon walk. We can go out on the streets to where the sky has not yet been blocked from our view, to see the emotional tides of our city, and there they are, they are there too...they are everywhere. They certainly cannot be found by staying home.
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