|
|
||
|
Doesn't Take Much and That's Messed Up - 2004-03-15 |
|
Jay Elias | You can take it with you
"I have wasted Time, and now doth
Time waste me"
- Richard II
2002-01-13- 4:55 p.m.
Outside Looking In
On days like this I’m madly in love. New York sometimes isn’t a beautiful city, but I love her. Some days, the air is cool and crisp, and the wind blows hard down tunnels created by buildings that reach up like fingers of delicate but utilitarian hands towards the skies. Every street in New York, even the quietest small ones on lazy Sunday mornings, buzz with electricity. There is an energy here that if one could manage to bottle, would alleviate the need to solve the mysteries of cold fusion.
Brunch in the East Village, and the early morning decorations on the sidewalks remind me of my old apartment the morning after a party; littered with empty beer bottles and cigarette butts, I don’t want to clean up right away because for once, the damage doesn’t weigh upon me but rather is like the lingering smell of a lovely woman’s hair on my shoulder after a romantic evening. She’s gone home, but the moment is still with me, a dalliance wrapped around my body before it files itself away in the cabinet of my memory.
A walk with friends over to Union Square, and we’re in the wind, smoking cigarettes and talking about real estate and it is a moment out of time. We could be together at any time in the last four years, still talking about the same things and going to the same places, but with coffee and french toast still warm in my belly and all of our current anecdotes are happy and full of promise. The punk kids still sit there on the steps across from the Virgin Megastore and the bizarre counter on the building still confounds us with its deeply pronounced lack of any logical explanation. We sing Pixies songs out loud, and watch as people look at us as if we’re crazy as we call out, “Oh Alexander, I see you beneath the archway of aerodynamics.” Sometimes, people can be oh so dense.
A warm hug and vague plans for the upcoming week later, and I’m in the bowels of the city, where I promptly get on the 6 train, and sit down for the ride uptown. I get my hair cut, and then walk towards Park, enjoying the feel of the wind on my bared neck as I walk past the perfect brownstones that usually fill me with envy but today fill me the promise that I’m young yet, even if I rarely feel it. There is time to see great things, to achieve much still undone. Life can be very long sometimes, and I’m happy to have so much of it left to go.
Stovepipe chimneys of orange peek out below Second Avenue, billowing smoke into the air. It is as if there was an infernal machine beneath the surface, making New York happen, and perhaps if I knew anything about engineering, I would be able to know that some equivalent was the truth. But for today, I’m mystified by it all. The future lies out there like the winding path of the FDR, and as it passes by Roosevelt Island, I see places I haven’t yet visited even though they sometimes look close enough that I could skip a stone across the water to it.
One day, I’m going to climb onto that cable car, and see up close what I’ve only been looking at from a distance until now. I walk on the grass, even if signs tell me not to. On days like today, when the air tastes so fresh it is hard to imagine that the whole world isn’t brand new, it is hard to believe that there could be a future where all of this potential goes unfulfilled.
Copyright © 2001, 2002 - EoZ
Productions
All Rights Reserved
If you want to make me
famous or just complain: Jay Elias -
jelias@diaryland.com
Older
Doesn't Take Much and That's Messed Up - 2004-03-15
Like Water Under Bridges - 2003-09-08
Jesus On The Dashboard - 2003-08-13
An Administrative Announcement - 2003-08-11
Don't Worry, It's Coming - 2003-08-02
Diaryland
join my Notify List and get email when I update
my
site:
email:
Powered by NotifyList.com
Email
