Bushwick, Ho!
April 23, 2003
A friend of mine said she likes my new building because it's a real building. In my previous neighborhood, all the houses were hardly more than vinyl-sided cardboard shacks. Row houses glued together. Each street was like a sample chart of vinyl siding options. It feels like you’re walking around a movie set. Not because it's so romantic and picturesque, but because it looks like the buildings were all put up overnight by the set builder's union. Nothing is made to last more than a few days of shooting. Yet, people moved in and squatted the set, eking out as much life as possible from each rotting shell. Now that I've signed the lease to an apartment in a real building, I can't wait to start shooting. On location, no sets.
The coffee shop girl came over to my old place and took stock of all the things that my neighbor Jasmin and I are getting rid of. She's going to come by one day, load up a truck with the things she’s chosen, and drive into the sunset. Actually, she's driving northeast to Vermont, so I guess, technically, she’ll be driving into the sunrise, but you get the picture. Actually, it’s more apt since things aren’t ending for her, but rather just beginning. Jasmin excitedly showed the soffee shop girl her pile of castoffs — shelves, beds, chests of drawers. The coffee shop girl asked Jasmin where she was moving to.
"Malibu."
"Malibu!? That's not what I was expecting! I've never heard anyone say they were moving to Malibu before."
It's true. It doesn't sound real. But Jasmin has family there, so Malibu it is. I was glad everyone already knew that I’m moving to Bushwick, or it would have been awfully anticlimactic.
The coffee shop girl recently started a bartending gig at a new bar in the neighborhood, and she had to leave for work. Happy Hour. She said I should stop by. But it was a beautiful, warm, sunny day, so I didn't think I'd make it. Besides, that game is getting boring.
My friend Virgo called, and I met her instead. I hadn't seen her in what felt like forever, though it was probably less time than that. I walked into the dark bar and looked around, but didn't see her.
"Hey!" I heard her say.
"Hey, Virgo! I didn't see you. You cut your hair."
Jasmin cut her hair the other day, too, and I didn't recognize her either. Is it haircutting week?
I told Virgo her new cut was cute because it was, but I’ve learned “cute” is rarely the adjective a woman hopes to hear. Virgo’s sister is having a party. A crazy art party with little people and circus performers and things. "Are you coming?" Viro asked.
"Probably."
"I think she invited my ex-boyfriend."
“Of course, she did.”
Virgo couldn't stay out late for one reason or another, so we walked to the subway. I tried to cram in all the things I wanted to say to her as we walked along the street, down the stairs, and onto the platform, but her train went one way, and mine went the other. Hers was there at the bottom of the stairs, waiting. And these subway trains don't wait long. There was hardly time for a hug and a good-bye before she hopped on.
"Call me,” she said.
I don't sleep much these days.
I drove over to my new apartment last night. So dirty, dark, and desolate. Climbed up the dusty, pitch-black stairwell, ran my fingers along the old, dry bricks. Walked down the lifeless hall. Turned the key in the metal door and walked in.
Everything echoed.
I walked to the windows and looked outside. I tried to see into another building a block away. The lights were on and people were moving, but I couldn't tell if they were happy. I sat for a minute in the middle of the floor. I lay down. Sighed. Breathed in the polyurethane fumes and stared at the shadows on the ceiling. The electricity isn't on yet. I lay there forever. Spread my arms out wide and floated free. I might still be there, I don't know.
