Basically Amelie
I’ve always wanted to call a post “Not Necessarily Gay Sex” but I fear I’ll never have reason to
I’m in New York. I didn’t tell anyone I was coming; I was behind on writing and didn’t trust myself not to pseudo-accidentally try reenacting In the Heights Midnight Cowboy as a form of procrastination. There was a skosh of social anxiety involved, though I’ll deny it to my grave. (The point of my personality is pretending I’m the one person without social anxiety.)
In all seriousness, let’s hang out, hi.
I spent my initial, secret week in the city alternately bunkered in Red Hook and roving alone to movies and diners.
New York is built on leaving each other alone; my interactions with strangers, perhaps especially As A Dude/Guy, have been relatively rare. And yet.
Years ago on the subway, a woman swanned down the aisle as her friends giggled.
Nearing me, she asked for my birthday with a flourish. I told her.
“Taurus. He’s a Taurus...” She waltzed past. “Hitler was a Taurus.”
Meanwhile, I wouldn’t know a peak drug experience if Timothy Leary kissed me on the nose. Years before the subway encounter with the freelance astrologer, I was stoned at a random Williamsburg bar—and by stoned I mean I’d smoked cartoonishly too much, as always. Earlier that night, it had pleased me obscurely to peel the price sticker off a beer and press it on the back of my hand; impossibly, at the bar, a living woman gestured to the sticker and said, “Are you for sale?” My pause before responding spanned seconds, hours, John Berryman’s saying “She might as well be on Mars,” Matthew McConaughey is sobbing on his spaceship. Finally I said, “…Yes.” She turned away.
What I really want is a tourist to ask me for directions to Carnegie Hall. (“Practice, practice, practice.” “What?” “Practice. PRACTICE—” Ideally, J.K. Simmons appears in full Whiplash regalia, yelling at both of us.)
I haven’t been asked for directions this week, but I did help a rando back up his rental truck. “This is what an Amish barn raising feels like,” I thought. Then, walking under the BQE—an elevated highway—I saw a five-dollar bill on the ground. I didn’t grab it because I had a Dunkin Donuts iced coffee in each hand—both for me, don’t worry about it—and also because everything is logarithmically grody under the BQE. Half a block later I turned back: the children of a tourist family were waving the money excitedly—the same filthy money I could have taken myself. “I’m basically Amelie, from the movie Amelie,” I thought.
Overheard by Alex this week in New York:
· “Everybody’s fucking retarded except for you.” – Dude in a Yankees hat into his cell phone, warmly, as he paced the F train platform. (Guess who says this in the mirror every morning? That’s right, it’s M. Night Shyamalan.)
· “This [staircase] is what a Band-Aid smells like.” – Dude to his companion as they ascended the stairs out of Delancey-Essex ahead of me. This ruined my life with rare efficiency.
· “This ain’t the Matrix, n****.” – Someone on the street outside the house I’m crashing in.
Your regularly scheduled Elon Musk content will, in theory, continue next week.
Heed Sandra Bullock in Speed 2: Cruise Control:
SEE YOU NEXT FRIDAY—IF NOT SOONER—DEAR FRIENDS.
Oh I vibe with that back in NYC “who will hang w me?” anxiety