Yesterday was exploratory. Today I am trying this for reals.
Citi Building Public Space, Midtown
How about this, my cynicism is happily proven wrong. There is a pianist here today, playing on the piano I yeterday speculated served mostly as fuurniture and not for music.
This pianist is not especially inspiring, and I am expecting to find him annoying sooner or later. He is playing watered down 70s tunes. At present he is murdering the song that “Just when I thought it was goin’ alright, turns out I’m wrong when I thought I was right… It’s just a shame, that’s all.” Can’t think of the name of that song but it is almost familiar in this rendition.
A mostly corporate looking crowd today, surprisingly not crowded but it is minutes away yet from the noontime lunch ritual.
My sister said I could have my old room back at the house in Tampa. I considered that scenario some months ago, regarding it as one of the more hellish possibilities for where I would land should my finances truly evaporate. Thinking about it now, though, it doesn’t seem so bad. In fact it almost sounds awesome. Almost. The most coveted gift of living there again would be the silence, and the fact that no one would bother me. I would hole up in that room for days, just writing and working on things. The house is fully paid for so rent is not an issue.That would allow me time to catch my breath financially.
But it could be semi-hellish in all kinds of ways. The room is about the size of my kitchen. A king size mattress would fill half the space, and I would be a bastard about demanding that I have a king size bed. A foldaway could be arranged, I suppose. I am such a sleep sprawler that a twin or small size bed would probably land me on the floor for lack of space.
Of course I could and would get used to a smaller bed if I had to (prison, homelessness, etc.) but absent that type of urgency I would occupy half the freakin’ room with BED.
There is also a decent piano downstairs, or it was at least decent at one time. i don’t think anyone has worked on it for 15 years or longer. It is a Hyundai piano. That Korean car maker actually made damn good pianos for a while. I think they stopped making them some years ago. The piano is not really much of a draw, though. It would shatter the silence.
I would put a lot of stuff in storage here, anticipating eventual return but also admittedly using that as a crutch should the hellishness of things consume all benefit to living there for nothing. That is my house, after all, as much as it is hers. My name was taken off the deed as a formality but it remains legally half mine.
It is something to think about, and something that puts me a little bit more at ease should the roof over my head be taken away. I am genuinely and for good reason unhappy about even considering taking money from a retirement account to make it through the rest of the year. But it is a relatively small amount and I am young enough to make back in short order whatever money is lost to taxes and penalties. I am going to hold out as long as I can, though, as my confidence in my ability to turn things around is slowly returning. Some of the stuff I’ve done on the web side lately seems to be working.
Pianist has moved on to “Your Song”, Elton John’s most perfect song — by my sister’s estimation. I don’t think she would appreciate the sloppy attempts at jazzy flourishes this pianist is layering the song with… Or maybe she would. She would probably be surprised to know I remember her saying “Your Song” was Elon John’s most perfect song. I’d be surprised if she remembers saying it herself. We used to talk about “Daniel” and other EJ songs. She used to say she could not understand that song.
OK, this public space is filling up with lunchtime seekkers, people loping around looking for seats, moving chairs from table to table after politely asking ifi anyone was using the chair, carrying conspicuously oversized bags stuffed with sandwiches, salads, beverages, cookies, and heck knows what all else. These lunches are huge.
Same as yesterday I can barely make out what people are saying, the acoustics so absorbant that utterances from nearbyy rarely make it far intact, disintegrating into mush. The piano music intrudes upon the eavesdropping, too.
Just took a video game break. Zuma, or something.
The pianist seems to have perked up a bit as the crowd increases. He ha splayed non stop since i got here about 45 minutes ago. Gotta give him props for that, though his repertoire is not what I would call physically demanding. He has no sheet music, but a few small sheets of paper I spotted earlier could be lead sheets.
I would say the tables here are occupid half by individuals and half by groups of 2 or more people. Unlike yesterday there are no sleepers or obviously indigent folks.
Business include a Sushi-Teria, a Market Cafe, a 24hour Fitness (which I don’t think is actually open 24 hours), Barnes and Noble, Cucina Gourmet, a newsstand, and I assume other entities outside my purview.
A security guard passes. A woman whose lunch was but one slice of pizza picks up her empty single-slice cardboard pizza container and leaves, stepping onto the escalator and rising up to return to her office. Variously well-dressed individuals come and go, paying no mind to anybody but occasionally revealing something like pleasure in the atmosphere through which they briefly pass. Similar to the Rose Main Reading Room in some ways but more relzed and not so many tresome tourist groups. Not any tourists, as best I can tell, except for me. I’m new here, still potentially a mere transient.
Must keep writing. Took a Feedly break to read headlines about the insanity of NYC real estate. Citadel will pay $300 per square foot for office space on Park Avenue, a few blocks from here, in a building under construction. All the most expensive cities in the world are cheaper than NYC, read another headline.
i passed the Boro Hotel this AM, or as I call it, The New Ugly. That structure radiates constipation and architectural confusion. A story in CoolHunting showed a few interior shots, proving that the inside is as ugly as the outside, but in different, more psychotic ways. The pictures do not really show much, which could be telling in and of itself. But the accompoanying story reveals what I suspected, that the project was started by one firm and picked up by another, maybe 3 times. rates start at a ridiculous $299 a night, adding financial inaccessibility to the ugliness of the place.
I alwaays forget the a Holiday Inn opened down the street from me, 3 or so blocks over. Just for fun I could stay there and get points on my Priority Club Card.
For years I wrongfully thought that residents of New York were not allowed to stay in hotels nearby. I got this ludicrous impression from rules in Daytona Beach which forbid locals from staying in hotels. It is all about collecting tourist tax. Locals cannot be charged tourist tax, and at one time rooms were fairly scarce in Daytona Beach. So laws barring locals from staying at nearby hotels were enacted, much to the surprise of many. My dad learned of this when, for some reason, he could not stay at his house one night. Maybe it was being fumigated or something, but the reason was legitimate. I mean, he did not just have random desire to stay at a hotel for murky reasons… hah. Rebuffed by the nearby Thunderbird Motel (where I stayed after he died) he was forced to drive way the hell up to Ormond Beach, where motel rooms are even scarcer. Every time I visited Daytona Beach the hotel clerks asked if I was local. I mentioned this to others who live in Daytona Beach over the years and no one believes me. I was finally disabused of this law applying to NYC when I stayed at a hotel near Canal Street a week after 9/11, staying the night with a CNN crew to cover the opening of the Stock Exchange on Monday the 17th. Even then I thought the rules were being relazed on account of 9/11, but I
‘ve since learned that Daytona Beach might be unique in banning its locals from staying at hotels and motels. with far more hotel rooms available now compared to 20 years ago I would think the rule could be relaxed, but what do I know…
I should have brought a sammich. Bought cold cuts yesterday specifically for that purpose, to have a sammich here today. Forgot..
the walk took about an hour. Guess that’s like commuting from the suburbs, but marginally healthier with the 3.7 mile walk.
Woman sitting at the net table was here before I arrived and has remained fully engrossed in a book. I can’t tell what it is.
Every table is now occupied. The pianist flits from song to song, not always playing them in their entirety.
Getting antsy and need to walk. Have to hit the 181, someone sent me an ancient issue of “The Etude” that I need to pick up. <p.
