New York in 72 degrees in January–revised

i can feel guilty over the most stupid things. Just read Fodor’s five places for singles to cruise—something like that, but that sounds…anyway, all these places were exotic, different, interesting, and I would be making my parents proud. Instead, I chose Cancun.

Please visit Shayna and wish her in-utero baby great thoughts and prayers.

I put some pictures in my photo blog. If I ever learn to batch edit them I will put in tons.

Here’s a link to The New York Times article on the hottest January day.

Here’s a link to Al’s blog. Al has great maps, insights, and isn’t jaded like me. He lives in real downtown, which I have specifically defined and will save for another time as except for the very neighborhood Al lives in, there isn’t a real downtown anymore.
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When I was young everyplace below and including 14th Street was called downtown. Now it’s 23rd Street. Every person who grew up and remained in The Bronx calls all of Manhattan downtown. Drives me crazy as we who are from the other boroughs and suburbs would call Manhattan “the city.”

Here’s a link to one of the reasons I think of leaving. Yes I would love to afford to pay millions for a penthouse, but I can’t. And most people who have penthouses also have other homes. Many of my neighbors have summer homes that they haven’t closed yet and are there now.

Here’s a link to The Times article on the hottest January day on record.
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It’s so weird to walk the streets in a summer coat. At least I think that’s what you call a houndstooth lined cotton coat I could put a sweater under and a leather jacket on top with a skirt and leggings under, and think, didn’t I wear similar things in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s?

However today I just wore a tee and jeans. Most people looked bewildered as they headed for the park. Most people looked overdressed. They were wearing sweaters instead of unbuttoned summer coats.

A man, obviously a tourist was on his cell:
“I’m in New York and it’s 83 degrees.”

You idiot, I thought with the native New Yorker’s superiority. You’re standing across from West 83rd Street. If it were 83 degrees, all people would shed coats and sweaters and run for water. Or run out of New York.

And admit it, when people come to your towns and say something obviously wrong loudly on their cells, you have that second of superiority.

It’s not that we feel superior as people. We feel superior in our knowledge of our city and our hoods within the city.

Just like you do about your hometowns.

Gray’s Papaya, a store that I can’t physically go into because of the hot dog smell, used to have signs “we are polite New Yorkers.” We are. In a brusque but friendly manner.

If we seem brusque to you remember that we have never had a major race riot, and have undergone much

This summer will be the 30th anniversary of the summer of 77. It was the summer that would form a marker in my life as it did to so many other people. Hot hot weather, a serial killer who targeted young brunette girls, racial tension, a black out, and New York was still going through tough economic times. Very tough. The only city service that I used regularly and directly were the subways. They never came on time. The stations were stanky. I never personally felt in danger as I had developed a great street face in my late teens.

It’s a summer books, movies and myths are made of because it had every element needed. And I was there. Yes I was and remember every moment of it until I went to Switzerland to stay with an old friend and her boyfriend. They lived in Geneva, and I traveled to Paris, Bern and Venice. It was a lengthy stay

Hey, I didn’t know that David Berkowitz would look just like an old friend or that Elvis would die which, sorry Bone, wasn’t very important to me then. I hadn’t yet discovered the Sun Sessions. He was just an old bloated man who wore a truly gross white suit. And I use the word “old” on purpose because he looked it. Found out about the death and capture when I arrived in the train station in Bern. It was the most modern and functional station I had ever seen. Italy had more working ATM’s than we did. The summer of 77 was really the first time I became aware of backwards America was becoming.

People don’t usually know when living through cultural history that they are. I didn’t know how important that summer would be to history and my own life. I didn’t know that when I came back from Geneva at the end of September that I would get a temp job that would turn into a career.

Most of my adult friendships were formed at Summit Inc or through it, and I should probably thank the guy who told me about a six week temp job every day of my life. He was convinced that most workers were anti-Semitic. Not.

There were 240 of us, all around the same age and educational background. I was used to richer people but was looking for friends with great values. I found them there. There were so many of us, the 240 went down by half after a layoff, then up to 1200+ that I didn’t get to know Lucia well for a year. It was like a repeat of college and my earlier 20’s. So many people to meet.

Only we were paid a living wage to basically socialize. Lucia and I have had much more prestigious jobs, careers that we love, but we always talk about Summit with awe. I was promoted twice then went to a company formed by people from Summit.

Though I wasn’t promoted as quickly as most people thought that I should have been. There was a reason, and it’s a great story that I might have told somewhere here or might not have. It had everything to do with sex and alcohol. I did just say no, and was penalized for that. Actually it was the way I said it and the physical locale.

We partied most nights after work. Most people were really artists, actors, and writers, and we formed a community. That’s always what New York’s been about to me: People from disparate backgrounds having common interests and finding one another. When I think about Summit I know that I was privileged to know New York during a truly golden era.

Over half the employees were single straight males, there were many Gay men, and us girls know that girls didn’t usually get this much attention after college and during working hours. We took it for granted because that’s what people do. It’s only later….Any sit coms, comedic dramas, films or plays about work in a large temp document coding company in the 70’s to late 80’s were my idea.

I like writing stories about that time in both personal essays and fiction because it was so wondrous. We weren’t yet called YUPPIES for one thing, and there was a transition from a hippie lifestyle to something else. All of New York was our play ground. It wasn’t as manicured as it is now, but it had soul. Babyboomer wasn’t yet a dirty word, except to our parents.

Most of us hadn’t yet become living saints to our mothers and fathers. They worried about the subways, rock music and drugs. They worried because we seemed to eat out every night or have this new thing called “delivery.” They worried because we chose to live together, put off child bearing. Generally they just worried.

Younger generations don’t seem to realize that we spent our 20’s living through something that was called stagflation–or when a recession and inflation intersect.

Good jobs or jobs for the college educated became increasingly difficult to find. The stock market didn’t rally until August 1982, and had begun to dip in 1969 so it was a long recession. Most of us managed to rise above it, while still helping to end an unjust war, and helping inner cities be revived.

Most of my friends have an “hey we did our share, now it’s our children’s turn, and the generation in between,” I disagree but see their point. Our lives weren’t as easy as people believe.

There was affordable housing but I’m not convinced that many kids today would live in places we chose to. Don’t want to sound all preachy, but amenities were something many of our parents had and we were supposed to work our way up to.

When I read about babyboomers being respectful of authority, and the “old ways” of doing business I do laugh. The people that I knew had no respect for authority or “old ways,” but we needed to work. Unemployment was extended for eighteen months in New York and Boston because there were so many unemployed people. It was the first time that a college degree, even from a good school, assured nothing.

The one and only reason that so many people went to grad school then was because they didn’t want to work at a job like mine. I probably would have gone to law school if my father hadn’t begged so much, and if I didn’t have to study. I didn’t want anything cutting into my social life.

My apartment was centrally located and there was always easy parking at night. I turned into a great hostess by default. Bloomingdales had the only great take out around. There was a Jewish one owned by the man who invented Tofutti but it was all fried and not interesting.

New York was filled with bars that served free food. New York was filled with bars, clubs, after hours, fern bar places that were cleverly disguised as restaurants so you would feel that at least one night a week wasn’t spent in debauchery, but I remember some nights, and days….

I asked my father if he would take some of the money that he was saving for me–I didn’t trust myself to have it, and put a down payment on a coop as they were beginning to become popular.

He laughed. Knowing what we know now, it would have been my second smart business decision. My first was talking my Dad into investing heavily in Big Mac bonds for it was those bonds that gave New York the economic jolt it needed.

I do consider Felix Rohaytn to be both a saviour and a god. When Ford didn’t exactly tell NY to drop dead, Rohaytn devised the bonds. They paid up to eleven percent as they were considered to be so risky. Most were called way before their due date.

I know Manhattan and parts of all boroughs but Staten Island well. It’s always been home.

I can’t help it if I’m third generation New York, and spent my first sixteen years in Manhattan walking every block so that I could know New York from the street level, remain in shape, and oh I just love to walk. Broadway isn’t easy to walk on anytime, around here. When Loehmann’s opens it will be unbearable. Here’s a link to an article on the beauty of tops of buildings on my part of Broadway.

That’s why while this weather scares me something fierce I will savor it and go to Central Park tomorrow. If this weather was what’s supposed to be normal for New York in January and was like it all year round, I would never ever think of leaving. Though that last statement is open for speculation.
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On 3/19 it will be four years since we first went into Iraq. As D Roe organized a 2,996 tribute to 9/11, we should organize both a tribute to the troops who have died, been severely injured, and might die. As bloggers our voice is becoming more important. Let us unite in our belief that this war serves no purpose. If we learned anything from Viet Nam it should have been that we can never win a war like this and have no place in another country’s civil war. The best way we can support the troops is by bringing them home.