\t\t\t\tTuesday night an elderly woman approached me at 34th Street and 35th Avenue. She wanted to know where 33rd Street was. I pointed toward the street, one block away. She seemed unsatisfied, or confused by my answer.<\/p>\n
I asked \u201cWhere are you going?\u201d<\/p>\n
She said \u201cI live on 33rd Street,\u201d adding that Key Foods and the 36th Avenue subway were right around the corner from where she lived.<\/p>\n
She started talking.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe gave me a lift. I went to the hospital to see my husband. Now he claims I didn\u2019t pay him enough. He wanted 30 dollars or so from here to 21st Street and Astoria Boulevard.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c$30 bucks for that?\u201d I asked. \u201c30 bucks is a lot for that trip. That\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, what a bastard. It\u2019s too much, huh?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe 12 to 15, I would think, and you tip nicely.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWow,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat a crook. I gave him $25 but he let me out right here, and now I\u2019m lost. You know I don\u2019t come out much at night and my husband\u2019s sick. I\u2019m on 33rd and, let\u2019s see, near the block with the Key Food. I get off the train there, where the Key Food is.\u201d<\/p>\n
A bit more back and forth in which I tried to assure her that we were on 35th Avenue and she wanted to go one block over toward 36th Avenue. She sadly replied \u201cI\u2019m not gonna find my way home.\u201d<\/p>\n
I asked if she knew her street address. I swear she said \u201c35-54\u201d which sounded about right for an address where she described it: on 33rd Street two blocks from the Key Food and the subway. I said \u201cOK, I know where we\u2019re going. I\u2019ll make sure you get home.\u201d She said \u201cOoooh, you\u2019re the best.\u201d I chuckled and said \u201cI don\u2019t know about that\u2026\u201d We started walking toward 36th Avenue. She kept talking.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat bastard took about $25. I never hand nobody that kind of money, not for that trip from the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n
I said \u201cI\u2019ve been walking all day. I feel a little lost myself.\u201d She asked \u201cWhat\u2019s your job?\u201d<\/p>\n
It was nice to have someone new to talk to. According to a GPS tracker app I use I had walked 17 miles that day before meeting this woman. This encounter would add another mile and about an hour to that trek.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe took me to hell. This is not home.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c35-54 you said?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, something like that. On 33rd Street.\u201d I chuckled under my breath at her reply \u201csomething like that.\u201d<\/p>\n
She had worked in the subways selling tokens underground for 27 years. She proudly showed me a lifetime pass given to her by the MTA for free subway and bus transit. \u201cI can go everywhere without paying.\u201d She said she took a cab home today because she did not like to take subways after dark. I said \u201cIt gets dark so early now,\u201d and that I didn\u2019t like the sound of this cab driver stiffing her for $30 fare from 21st Street. She responded that he was a middle-aged white guy.<\/p>\n
It occurred to me later that she might well have given the driver confusing directions, and that he did the best he could. I will never know.<\/p>\n
We got to 35-54. That was not her house. I didn\u2019t know what to do. I asked if she had identification on her that would contain\u00a0her street address. She kind of dodged that question by re-showing me her lifetime MTA subway and bus pass. She asked me to show her the Key Foods. That would help her get her bearings, she said, as she rarely comes out after dark and could barely recognize the neighborhood with the lights out.<\/p>\n
I had to agree. That stretch of 33rd Street leading up to 36th Avenue is pretty dark.<\/p>\n
We walked toward the Key Foods, past a bunch of loud drunks smoking cigarettes outside a bar. At 32nd Street she asked another passing stranger where 33rd Street was. He correctly replied that it was one block thattaway. I was growing impatient and had a thought that this person did what I should have done when she asked me for directions: Just point her in the right direction and keep walking. But I couldn\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n
We turned back toward 33rd Street.<\/p>\n
She entered a cell phone store and asked the man behind the\u00a0counter \u201cDo you know me? Do you know where I live?\u201d He smiled and said \u201cI know your name, you\u2019re Lucy right? What happened? You\u2019re Lucy. You live on 33rd Street.\u201d She let flow comments about her husband being in rehab and being stiffed by a cab driver. I took this man\u2019s recognition of this woman as a positive signal that Lucy (now I knew her name) was not demented and delusional, and that she would be able to find her home if she was not confused by the darkness and being dropped off at the wrong intersection.<\/p>\n
In response to her \u201cDo you know where I live?\u201d the cell phone store employee pointed in a general direction that proved to be accurate. He asked if I was with her. I replied \u201cI don\u2019t know her, just helping her get home.\u201d He smiled and responded something affirmative, implying that others had had similar encounters with her. Lucy, I took it, was a neighborhood character.<\/p>\n
The cell phone store employee gestured again in the general direction of 33rd Street, adding that her house was on the east side of the street. 33-54, the address Lucy initially gave me, was on the other side.<\/p>\n
Heading back toward 33rd Street the drunks outside the bar gave me a particularly curious look as we passed them by a second time.<\/p>\n
She asked \u201cAre you cold? Do you want to be around me?\u201d I replied \u201cIt\u2019s not that cold.\u201d She said that she knew where she was now. She recognized the RIO Brazilian place, and that her place was right around the corner.<\/p>\n
Lucy grasped my coat sleeve as we crossed 33rd Street.<\/p>\n
I asked \u201cDid he say your name was Lucy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes! Lucy Miller. What\u2019s your name?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMark Thomas.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, what a nice name. Lucy Miller and Mark Thomas.\u201d Chitchat ensued as we traversed 33rd Street, passing the site of the former \u201cViking\u2019s Dungeon\u201d. She asked two women standing on 33rd Street if they knew Michael. They did not. I asked if Michael was her husband. No, she said, Michael owned the building in which she lived. She commented that nobody around here knows anybody. I responded \u201cNew Yorkers never know their neighbors.\u201d I asked how long she had lived in Astoria. I thought she said \u201c7 or 8 years\u201d but now I wonder if she didn\u2019t say \u201c78 years\u201d. Lucy, I learned, is 90 years old.<\/p>\n
We reached an apartment building and she produced a set of keys. My relief was immense\u00a0when I saw one of those keys slide into the lock\u00a0and open\u00a0the door to the building. I told her I could not stay but that I would go upstairs with her to be sure she got in safely. I looked at the mailboxes in the downstairs foyer to see if one of the boxes said MILLER. It did.<\/p>\n
Slowly she climbed the stairs to her 2nd floor apartment. She unlocked the door and ushered me in. I had fleeting images of this person pulling a mask off their face and revealing a middle aged transvestite, or that this was some kind of police sting operation. No such insanity occurred.<\/p>\n
\u201cCome on in,\u201d she said. \u201cAin\u2019t nobody here. Shouldn\u2019t be.\u201d<\/p>\n
We climbed the stairs and entered her 2nd floor apartment. The door closed behind us.\u00a0I heard the sound of Lucy\u00a0locking the door, making a mental note that just one turn of the lock was needed to reopen it. The apartment smelled a wee bit of pee but not so much that opening a window wouldn\u2019t relieve the odor. It was no palace but it looked comfortable and, save for the smell, tidy. She showed me every room. She showed me how her television worked \u2014 she turned it on, that is. \u201cWe got one of these gadgets, see. You press the red button and watch\u2026\u201d The TV turned on. I said \u201cNice. Very nice.\u201d The kitchen was roomy. A closet was filled with paper towels and day-to-day essentials. Commenting on a stack of blankets I said \u201cYou\u2019ve got lots of blankets for when it gets cold.\u201d She started asking \u201cWhat else do you wanna see?\u201d Four or five times she asked. Her clocks were off by an hour. I was going to offer to fix them for her but she got perked up, and started talking about going back to the rehab center to visit her husband. \u201cI\u2019m gonna go back. You wanna take me back to my husband?\u201d I told her to stay home. She had just walked a long distance and would be very tired. I told her the cab driver would stiff her for $25 again. She showed me her toilet. She showed me her refrigerator. \u201cI don\u2019t feel like going lay down. Can\u2019t I go back to my husband?\u201d I tried to change her mind but she insisted that she was going back to the rehab center. I asked if it was typical for\u00a0her to visit her husband having just seen him an hour earlier. She said \u201cYeah.\u201d I shrugged and said \u201cOK.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lucy is a free person and as such I was in no position to get in her way. As we exited the apartment she said \u201cI\u2019m going to leave that light on.\u201d<\/p>\n
We went back downstairs. As she slowly made her way down the steps she made some biting comments about how I must have thought she was lying. \u201cI wanted you to know I wasn\u2019t lying. You thought I was making all this up, didn\u2019t you? You thought I was some dopey old lady.\u201d I did not and do not know what she was talking about. I never thought she was lying. I just thought she was confused.<\/p>\n
I have not hailed a yellow cab in years but my memory of doing so in Astoria had me thinking it was impossible. On that account I contemplated calling her an Uber car. It is a good thing I did not. I suspect she gave the first cab driver confusing directions which landed her at the dark and unfamiliar intersection where we met. She might have told an Uber driver to take her to Portland on my tab!<\/p>\n
Cabs were plentiful on this early Tuesday evening. I hailed a cab from 36th Avenue, directing the driver to head north on 33rd Street. Lucy got into the cab and told me to come with her.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t mind coming?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not coming.\u201d<\/p>\n
I said nothing that should have made her think I would go with her to visit her husband at the rehab center. If she wanted to go back up there having returned from an earlier visit just an hour before then I was in no position to stop her.<\/p>\n
I started to think she was playing games with me, intentionally or not. She moved over in the back seat of the cab, patting the seat next to her and telling me to come with her. I said no, I had to get home. She turned more sour, and more sharp. She said \u201cI trusted you. I trusted you.\u201d I said \u201cTell the driver where you want to go\u201d and shut the door, heading toward 32nd Street and not looking back.<\/p>\n
The drunks outside the bar had retreated inside.<\/p>\n
I have not been in a woman\u2019s apartment for a good long while so that was something.<\/p>\n
Thinking about this encounter with Lucy I wonder what I could or should have done differently. One thing I think is certain: I should not have entered her apartment. She invited me and it was no pressure or anxiety but it could have gone horribly wrong. I mean, for it to have been a setup then the execution was pretty ham-handed. I did draw the line at getting into the cab with her. Even when it\u2019s a yellow cab and the person trying to lure you is 90 years old and probably harmless I think it is unwise to get into a car with a stranger.<\/p>\n
But I should not have raised her hopes of spending more time with her (if that is indeed what I did) by entering her apartment.<\/p>\n
She was no Alice, that\u2019s for sure. Alice was the elderly woman who lived 2 floors up from me on the Upper East Side. Alice one day appeared at my door as I was leaving for work, scaring the crap out of me. She said something about her freezer being broken, and asked if I could fix it. Or something like that. Her voice was kind of a hissing grab bag of words that almost made sense, but I seemed to get the gist of what she had said.<\/p>\n
I went upstairs\u00a0(it took many minutes as she moved up the steps at a glacial octogenarian pace). She opened the door. The apartment was just a carnival of cockroaches. The sunlight coming through the window cast long, moving shadows of cockroach bodies. Roaches seemed to form a vortex-like circle around the drain of the kitchen sink. The bed was covered with bugs,\u00a0roaches, chunks of food, and stains to explain.<\/p>\n
I stepped into the kitchen to inspect the freezer and felt my shoes crushing multiple hapless critters. I had to kick them off of me as they earnestly and matter-of-factly crawled up both the inside and outside of my pants legs. She opened the freezer door. Roaches poured out. I don\u2019t think the freezer itself worked, or else it was not plugged in, as no cool breeze belched from the compartment as one would expect. She said the ice tray was broken, and that it would not fit into the slot. Or something like. Once again with the hissingly obfuscated voice of near coherence. It was like she had an exotic foreign accent. In a way I guess she did. The accent of age.<\/p>\n
I slid the ice tray into the slot with no trouble. She reacted in a certain reverence, as if a great but obvious truth had just been made clear to here. It was a \u201cVery true, Plato\u201d kind of reaction.<\/p>\n
I got the hell out of there, pausing at the stairwell to swat any remaining roaches off of me.<\/p>\n
I wrote\u00a0a story about it<\/a>\u00a0that night for sorabji.com. The next day my boss at work read it. He said that if I had told him all this had happened that day he would have given me the day off, it was just that fucked up.<\/p>\n Interestingly I just re-read that story and see I omitted some of the memories that are crystal clear in my mind now, and which I recounted to others in the days that followed. Maybe I did not want to be\u00a0too<\/em>\u00a0 disgusting with the crunching sound of the roaches under my shoes. Or else I just wrote it in a hurry and left out some details.<\/p>\n I had roaches at that place but they were not really\u00a0that<\/em>\u00a0bad in my apartment.\u00a0509 East 78th St.<\/strong>\u00a0If I tolerated it better at the time than I would today I think it\u2019s because I was yet to shake the memory of the Parc Lincoln<\/a><\/strong>, where roaches routinely convened on my food the second I turned away from it, and where I would wake up in the middle of the night with roaches crawling into my mouth and pigeons standing on the window sill, clucking.<\/p>\n I later learned that the unfortunate folks one story up from me (and therefore directly downstairs from Alice) had it far worse. They told me they might have to report Alice\u00a0to the building management. Those guys worked at the 24\/7 convenience store around the corner, which I frequented almost every day. One day at the store one of them asked \u201cHave you seen Alice\u2019s apartment?\u201d I was like, hell yeah. We all shook our heads. I think those guys hesitated to report Alice because they had something like 7 people living in a tiny studio apartment, which is way in excess of occupancy laws.<\/p>\n I never thought of this\u00a0until now but I wonder if those guys actually served as a buffer between the roaches and me. With so many people living in that tiny space the apartment must have been occupied 24\/7, with somebody stomping out roaches all the live long day. What a strange scenario. Imagine a real estate broker selling my apartment with that \u201camenity\u201d: \u201cYou got yourself a small army of people upstairs protecting you from being showered with roaches!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Roaches aside I liked that place, and have often wished I never left that apartment complex. I gave it up for the guts and glory of moving to Atlanta and putting CNN on my resum\u00e9. What a difference that made in my life. Not.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n\n