When I first came to this country, .... (sorry, channelling my ancestors for a second, there)... when I first moved back to the US from a brief sojourn overseas, I moved to Queens, New York. I had 2-bedroom apartment in Woodside, with hardwood floors and a great cross breeze. There was a clothesline out the back window, and a fantastic Chinese takeout on the corner, in addition to yet another Irish pub in Woodside, not surprisingly filled with Irish. When I walked into the pub with one of my girlfriends, a row of Celtic construction workers at the bar would look up, one after the other, nod, and politely mutter "How are ya". It sounded like "How are ya, how are ya, how are ya, how are ya" as we passed the bar towards the tables at the end. Every once in a while, on a Saturday, around 4am, one of the locals would leave the pub and walk home, mournfully playing a bagpipe. The sound would come in through the open window and wake me, and I'd smile and fall back asleep. A short walk away was the Indian neighborhood. I shopped there on the weekends, for fresh vegetables, incense, bindi, and sag paneer in a carton. They had gorgeous Hindu festivals, full of color and music and things that just smelled good, and the sidewalks were filled with bright stains from red paan.
Like any other glimpse into a working person's life in New York, it wasn't a complete fairytale. The streets were dirty. The subway stairs smelled like piss. There were cab drivers that would rip you off, and men at the laundromat that leered, and $5 quarts of milk at the convenience store. But when you're young, and you live in New York, you tend to focus on the things that sparkle and simply accept the less-beautiful things for just the way things are.
Now I look around and wonder what happened to me. I am completely content, no, make that deliriously content to live in a perfect townhouse with perfect walls, with a perfect view of the lake. Last night I went for a walk with Malena on an unnaturally curved path, across a bridge, over a man-made canal that serves no apparent real purpose. I drive her to daycare down manicured streets, and I shop like a Stepford wife in a supermarket with wide, clearly-labeled, sparkling clean aisles. The other morning, I came home to find a landscaping truck filled with Hispanic guys, all wearing identical green landscapers' outfits, with bandanas around their heads in the 96-degree heat. They stopped working for a second to politely let me walk by, and as I got to my stairs, they started again, like indistinguishable ants frantically building a hill. If I leave my garbage outside the door, another truck of workers comes around at an hour where no one will see them, and magically whisks the garbage away.
Have I sold out? Did I go Stepford? Is this what it means to move up in the world?
Do I care?
Oh Joanna! My new dress! How could you do a thing like that? Just when I was going to give you coffee! How could you do a thing like that? I thought we were friends! Just when I was going to... how could you do a thing like that... just when I was going to give you coffee! Oh Joanna... I thought we were friends... I thought we were friends... friends... coffee... how could you do a thing like that? Like that? Like that? Like that? Friends... friends...
1 comment:
It all sounds lovely. If you want a dose of grit, come visit me.
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