I was talking on the phone with a friend who told me about the heightened terrorist upgrades. We both agreed that it was hyperbole and that we didn’t care.
Then I realized that my entire family lives on Long Island and I have to go there for Thanksgiving. So does my friend. The Long Island Railroad is in Penn Station. My best friend, Big Luce, works in Penn Plaza over the station. She always lives in unconscious fear and me in unconscious fear for her.
82 percent of all Manhattanites voted against Bush and for Kerry for a reason. Bush doesn’t care about us. We are the people who were attacked and yet almost to a person we didn’t want the war in Iraq. If we had gone after Bin Laden, then yes, most of us would have supported it. Most of us learned from Viet Nam that it’s impossible to win a terrorist war. They’re spawned to believe in Jihad. Imagine a mother who thinks that the most noble thing her infant son could do when he grows up is to kill himself in the name of Jihad. I can’t.
W was trying to finish what his father couldn’t. Future historian/psychologists are going to have an incredible time analyzing that—if we survive for them to talk about it.
To all of you who voted for Bush because while you dislike his domestic agenda but think he’s good for terrorists I have one word: How? 9/11 happened under his watch.
President Clinton might have been a populist president; he might have a likable personality with some humanness mixed; he might have been a lot of things, but….
HE READ. He actually read all the memos given to him, and comprehended their meanings. Think it was just a coincidence that nothing bad happened on Y2K? Think nothing bad had been planned? Think again. President Clinton might have been too laid back for your tastes. He might have indulged in sex with a woman not his wife–Linda Tipp and Lucianne Goldberg made sure that you knew about it–but he was a great president. He took action so that the rest of us didn’t live in fear.
Personally I can’t imagine any woman wanting to sleep with or indulge in any type of sex with the man who occupied the White House for four years, and now might have been actually elected. I’m not sure about that;:I’m beginning to understand my mother’s generation of conspiracy theorists; and my generation of people I frankly used to think were crazy when they would talk about conspiracy’s. Now I think that they’ve watched too many X-Files re-runs but they just might be on to something.
I’m tired of writing about 9/11; tired of being unconsciously scared; tired of freaking each time I see an unattended package; tired of thinking each time I have to leave my neighborhood about the possibilities of a subway attack. We don’t consciously think these things; we don’t want to live in fear. We do anyway.
We don’t have the luxury of thinking about moral values. We live on top of each other. We’re so liberated that we can (and I do) complain that this new generation of gay men can be obnoxious and don’t respect their own history. Almost all of my gay friends died in a six year time period. It aged me; and made me wary about making new gay friends. I feel as if I should have a checklist of questions to ask, beginning with
1) Do you practice safe sex?
2) Do you have more than one sexual partner?
I would never ask those questions because they know the risks, and I never ask personal questions to people I’m not interviewing. If they choose not to practice safe sex, then.
In Manhattan we try to accept people as they are. Again we have to. As everyone knows we sacrifice to live here. Would anybody in any other part of the country who is my age and has some resources choose to live in two and a half rooms? I don’t think so.
I moved here because I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else–29 years ago this coming January. I moved here because the energy was incredible; I found a great studio–45 feet long–for $300 a month. In the sixteen years I lived there the rent only went up to $500. When I was 40 I was ready for a bedroom and moved. (Other reasons too that I won’t go into here.)
New York in the mid to late 1970′s and 1980′s was a great place to be young in. I’m middle aged now–though I try to stave that off by having younger friends, looking younger, eating properly, sleeping more, etc. Then I wonder why I do all these things if I’m going to be incinerated one day soon.
I’m tired of living in recessions and other events where the city becomes dangerous, subway maintenance is ignored as are subway schedules, the parks fall into disrepair and….I know we have conservatories and private groups that maintain these things now, but it’s already depressing.
It’s one thing to be poor in your 20′s or even 30′s but at 50 it’s downright sickening especially if you work all day, make what seems like a decent income, and still go into debt because the cost of living in New York goes up all the time while salaries remain stagnant or even go down.
I’m scared. I just heard that W wants Condee to be Secretary of State. They’ll sell New York to the lowest bidder in a second. What do they have invested here?
82% of all Manhattanites and way more than 70% of all people from the outer boroughs and Nassau County voted for Kerry or against Bush.
We’re every color, religion, ethnic group–and we get along! We’ve never had a major race riot. In the last black-out there was almost nil looting. I worked for Social Security in the Bronx. My office served 41 separate ethnic groups–the second most diverse in the country after Jackson Heights Queens.
I’m tired of beating a dead horse, but it’s better than being dead, and I’m scared that living in New York will kill me. And guess what? We normally live an average of seven years longer than the rest of Americans do. Whether it’s because we have access to great medical care or the ability to live in adverse crowded conditions helps a person become strong, a combination of the two or something else, nobody yet knows.
If we’re attacked again, we might never know the answer to that question, and I think that it’s important for future generations. However the man in the white house thinks that he has a mandate, but he can’t pretend it came from New York, New Jersey or Connecticut.
If he can’t beat us and make us compliant he can have these absurd warnings issued that only serve to scare us. The day the real attack happens we won’t know anything, because somehow that notice wasn’t given.
I’m not running to Canada–the weather doesn’t suit me. But as soon as I can I’m leaving New York. If a draft happens I will make sure that my Goddaughter, Little Luce and my niece move out of the country, because girls will be drafted.
I’m tired of writing about this; tired of thinking about this but this is life in New York these days.
For all of you who feel morally superior to New Yorkers–you’re so far inferior that it’s not worth talking about. Remember we’re a city that’s banned smoking from bars; we’ve cleaned up Times Square so that it looks like a futuristic area and there’s already a generation of New Yorker’s and tourists that don’t remember it any other way.
The Village, where I spent my high school years, hanging in is just another area where chain stores compete for attention.
We even have many Evangelists, but they’re mostly Black so I don’t know if W counts them.
W IS PROBABLY GOING TO BE ABLE TO PACK THE SUPREME COURT. I know that many historians and columnists believe that even Conservatives when they get onto the Court become less conservative and support women’s’ right to choose and civil rights but can we be sure? Look at the people he’s been picking for his cabinet.
I fear that W’s going to finish the job that Joe McCarthy began; my list of fears is long and none have to do with me
personally. That scares me. When somebody as self-centered as me no longer has any phobias or personal worries but is scared for my country, then it’s in deep trouble.
