on the flight over i was seated in the middle of a rambunctious group of new york locals returning from a boys' ski weekend. they cajoled eachother and talked out loud to their movies the whole flight. we also all enjoyed observing the antics of one of our flight attendants, who looked just like uncle frank from the "home alone" movies. (look what you did, you little jerk!) uncle frank's high point is a toss up between when he sat a bag of garbage right in the lap of the man sitting next to me and walked away with no explanation, and when he got into an altercation with the two women sitting in front of us about headphones.
i arrived on the upper west side thanks to the magical car service (after asking about five drivers if they were 1658. best response: "i wish i was") and crashed with my old roommate and dear dear friend, jane. the rest of the weekend was as follows.
on the subway with the man sitting next to me:
him: do you know where you're going?
me: yes, i think i'm all set, but thank you.
him: where are you visiting from?
me: i live in utah.
him: whereabouts?
me: salt lake city.
him: are you LDS?
me: yes, i am.
him: my daughter was married a year ago february in the mount pimpanooga temple.
silence and blinking.
me: um, the mount timpanogos temple?
him: yeah, that's the one. i was close. i spent a day in salt lake city at the family history library.
me: oh, that's wonderful.
(it has been my experience that people who go to the family history library do so on purpose, and are glad they did, so i thought this was a safe response.)
him: wonderful, are you kidding me? i was stuck there. i couldn't fly out because it was snowing in minneapolis. that's a real boring place you got there, salt lake city.
me: i think this is my stop.
lunch with carl.
he is so important he has a secretary and has to send e-mails while he is eating (he feels bad about it though, so you can't be mad). burgers, milkshakes and lots of laughing. just the way i like it.
walking to meet ryan i pass this intriguing place of worship, which shares a building with a mcdonalds.
i also walk past radio city music hall (how awesome would it be to be a rockette?)
and see a man carrying a comforter down the street like it ain't no thing.
ryan's apartment has a stunning view,
but a small kitchen.
a run of the mill subway ride turns exciting when a man rollerblades in.
we also spend some time debating this rather ill-advised tylenol ad campaign.
(if everyone starts getting massages to take care of headaches, then no one will buy tylenol, right? seemed like a bad strategy to us.)
at the strand bookstore (18 miles of books!) we play my favorite bookstore game: who can put together the most unlikely and/or hilarious combination of three book titles. i did pretty well with "radical christinity," "meetings, meetings and more meetings" and a book about wine tasting with "drunk" in the title, but ryan wins later with "a guide to building your own entourage" and "celebrity dads."
wandering down the street we come upon this costume shop, where the clerks say things such as, "bat wings? well, do you see the enormous red shoes? walk to those and then take a left..."
we also meet a harried young man searching for a regal looking coat for a jewish holiday. ryan didn't want his picture taken in front of the store because he said it could be mistaken for "one of *those* costume shops," but i made him.
we got lost around washington square park (where i get lost every single time i go to new york) but finally make it to pinkberry.
and see a fleshy and hairy man with a full body tattoo that may or may not have been a map of manhattan (i thought i saw chelsea on his arm). hot.
dinner was korean barbecue on the upper west side with jane and her betrothed.
they spent a lot of time whispering to eachother, so i made new friends with justin.
on saturday adam and i went to the moma. (note: i had not seen adam in three years, and it was too long.) people were scalping tickets outside the museum.
we found this strange. also strange? the "design and the elastic mind" exhibit we went to see.
the afternoon was sunny and delightful, so we walked along fifth avenue
and stopped in at the new york public library.
adam was temporarily drawn off track by some delicious-looking cornbread in a bakery window.
but he resisted and we made it to the east village and noodles with robin, fortuitously in town from san francisco.
after a wonderful performance of "the seagull," starring alan cumming and dianne wiest, robin and i headed to a wine bar (i had italian soda) to meet some friends of his.
it was great conversation and the time flew by, but by 3a.m., when the bar was closing, we were ready to go home.
but not before an early morning stop at the neighborhppd bodega.
sunday after church i met ben, who i have not seen in five whole years! he is like another version of myself and it was oh-so-wonderful to be reunited. we drank hot chocolate and talked about boys.
in the cab on my way to the airport my cab driver (who was "basically" from india) asked me how old i was. he was only 24, "but i've had experience." silence. "not with the woman. just with life." glad he clarified. that could have been awkward.
and then, good-bye nyc. i heart you.
2 comments:
Frances Dear,
Love the pics of your trip to NY. I wish I could say I had been there enough times to be able to go without an agenda...in fact I wish I could say I had been there period! Sounds like you had a GREAT TIME!! Love you!
Nan
That looks fabulous Frances! I actually took my first trip to NYC last month and loved every minute of it!! I had a mini-internship at the New York Public Library, and I of course also visited the Strand. Your photos made me wax nostalgic for a trip that was only a month ago!
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