i was patting myself on the back yesterday when i saw that a call i made
to 311 got pretty immediate results. oh yeah.
a crosswalk signal at 21st Street and 34th Avenue was turned completely
the wrong way. if you crossed from one corner you would see no crosswalk
signal at all. but the more dangerous one is the one i saw, which faced
anyone attempting to cross in the east-bound direction. the sign was
perfectly aligned, and it fooled a couple of elderly folks who saw the
WALK signal and walked right out into oncoming traffic. the cars were
whizzing past and i heard one of the two folks crossing ask why all these
cars were coming at them, can’t they see we have the light, and so on. it
was, seriously, pretty scary. i mean, i had my wits about me and at
first even i thought the WALK signal was accurate. 21st Street is very
wide, too, and cars come down fast. they managed to get across the street
safely but i would bet that those old folks spent the rest of the day
asking each other “why the heck were all those cars coming at us?”
so i called 311 to explain the situation, which the operator there seemed
to take pretty seriously, and within a couple of days the crosswalk signal
was fixed.
yay me… though i expect someone else would have reported it soon enough,
too.
strangely enough, later that day i saw a gathering of ambulances and
emergency vehicles at a nearby intersection. at first i imagined that this
was some response to something related to the errant crosswalk signal, but
it was not. a pretty grim sight to see, though.
…..
i made it over to Port Morris, in the Bronx yesterday. i don’t really know
the Bronx as well as I’d like to. that section, for as little as I saw of
it, seemed low-key. i didn’t have time to explore the streets, but I
wandered briefly around Cypress Avenue and 130-something Street before
returning to Randall’s Island via the pedestrian walkway that passes over
Bronx Kill. it was a bit of an adventure, like the ones i used to make,
the hours-long directionless rambles through parts unknown to me years
before but increasingly familiar as I repeat myself, and repeat myself.
i had intended to find the walkway to Manhattan, which I saw signs for a
couple of weeks ago. but i got distracted and sidetracked, and happened to
find that there is a walkway to the Bronx, which I did not know about.
the ramps were narrow and the atmosphere was gritty. the bridge felt old,
1960s-era New York. there are two sides of pedetrain pathways over that
bridge. on the way over i saw a giant WELCOME TO THE BRONX sign. on the
way back i exchanged smiles with an older gentleman. from his stride and
his demeanor i gathered that he, like i, was simply outside enjoying the
beautiful day.
i made it back over to Randall’s Island, a place which kind of baffles me
for its inactivity and idyllic tranquility. beautifully manicured parks
and fields that seem to never to get much use. maybe i am just not there
at the right times, but the place is weirdly uninhabited when i am there.
having failed to find the way to Manhattan i was tantalized by the Bronx,
and will try to get over there again. i didn’t even intend to go all the
way to Manhattan, I just wanted to see the walkway.
a somewhat strange thing happened on my way back to the Triborough Bridge.
i walked across a large and mostly empty parking lot when a car pulled up
right next to me. Creepy, until I realized it was my friend Don, who works
on Randall’s Island. He said he saw me a few minutes earlier but couldn’t
get his car near to me, as i seemed to be evading him. in fact i was just
trying to get off the roadways and away from vehicular traffic, for there
appears to be very little in the way of sidewalk paths in that part of the
island. i was under the Hell Gate Bridge, where the Acela trains race
past. i noticed the symmetrical forms of the sequence of arches and
remembered Stacy, a girl from high school who was all kinds of nice and
who i think had a thing for me at some point. one day she started rattling
off names of architectural elements, like Squinches and Piers and Arches
and Voussoirs. I was 16 or 17 and it made my cock hard to hear her say
those words, which were new to me. i think it was the first time mere
words had that effect on me. and she had a beautiful look on her
face, too, as she looked around the place, naming the architectural
elements and pointing at them as she called them out.
i should have fallen in love at that moment but she was dating a guy named
Nick. even as a youth i knew the code. you just don’t mess with girls once
they’re taken.
anyway, Don cruised around long enough that he was able to intercept my
path. i told him i was just out and about, enjoying the beautiful day. he
replied that that sounded like an excellent idea, though i sensed a bit of
melancholy or even disdain in his voice. he had no opportunity to do as i
do, which is wake up at noon, masturbate, make coffee, look at
e-mail, and then contemplate where i want to go before heading to the pub
at 5pm to swill beers and play video games. the decisions are sometimes
surprisingly laborious. yesterday i couldn’t decide among Randall’s
Island, the cemetery, the 181, or sitting on the couch. Even walking
toward Randall’s Island felt noncommital. Don works long, long, long hours
at his job.
I got into Don’s car and we cruised around Randall’s Island for a few
minutes. Reality looks very different from inside the pod-like vessel of
an automobile. i learned a few new things about the island. i never knew
there was a homeless shelter there. i thought that structure was just an
old abandoned school building.
i wish Randall’s Island was a little more accessible.
oops, i gotta go…
