5/7- My Baby, New York

I love my city. I didn't grow up in New York City and I haven't lived here since I left on my cross country walk back in March of 2003 with Ingrid, but that feeling of coming home hasn't drifted at all with any return I've made. I've come back at least once or twice a year since I left with every time having me feel like I want to go back to my apartment that no longer exists there. So returning to the city now with Todd brought me back to wanting to visit my haunts again.
Wednesday morning we caught the bus to Port Authority and wandered into Times Square around noon. The first stop for us was meeting up with an old roommate of mine, Stephanie, who would more accurately be described in relation to me as my former best friend's girlfriend from college. It was an interesting meet up to be the first in coming back.

Stephanie, like Trent, was someone I hadn't seen in about 10 years. After graduating SVA, I pretty much vanished off that scene to an immediate hiatus in Denver. Anyone I'd known then pretty much never saw me again other than a few close friends that I stayed in touch with despite returning to film a year later for my last hurrah when I moved back. The last time I'd hung out with Stephanie was when she was dating Dave and we all were drunken crazy maniacs. This, of course, was the topic of our reminesence. Things I hadn't thought about too much since I left. It was an interesting revisit to that period in my life through the eyes of someone else who was very much there. She even supplied the visual aids of pictures she'd found at Trent's 21st birthday, New Years of 1998/99 when I ended up with alcohol poisoning for three days, and her 24th birthday party at the shadiest dive bar I've still ever seen in my life.

Following lunch, we strolled down past our old apartment, then past my old clothing store on 24th St. and SVA on 23rd before she returned to work. From there I gave Todd the same brief personalized tour of New York I'd given my friend Ang last August. We walked past Chelsea Park, a gated private park I had a private battle with in school culminating in me topping their Christmas tree with an inflatable sex pig for the star (long story). Popped in at Shades of Green, the Irish bar on 15th and Irving that was home to me for my stay in New York. Then on down through Union and Washington Square to my old coffee shop, Auggies, in SoHo where I worked just before going off on my walk. Crazy Jess, a favorite regular of mine, remembered me completely six years later and held the introductions for me to the new folks who ran the place now as old regulars came and went saying it was nice to see me again.

All the while during this tour I was arranging to get together with both Ingrid and my friend Margo for different visits. Margo was in the midst of working down in SoHo, so as we were waiting for her to come out for a quick coffee we ended up going from Auggies, to my friend Craig's shop, Local, around the corner for coffee, then having a beer at another old haunt of mine, MiLadys where I'd taken Ang the summer before. It turned out Margo was swamped and wasn't going to emerge, so we swung by to just say hi quickly then made our way up to Ingrid way uptown at Columbia University. Having wandered about all this way we had decided to change our plans of staying over that night to having a drink with Ingrid, then getting a bus home that night back to my Mom's again to save our cash a bit. This all, of course, changed once again.

Finally, after much of my plan changing, calling and recalling Ingrid to update her periodically, we all met up at one of her favorite pubs near school, 1020. Since sending her home in Tennessee I've seen Ingrid once, fall of 2007, right before heading off to England for the winter. We'd had a good visit then, and that night would prove to be an even better one. After about half an hour of catching up with her Todd and I changed our minds once again and decided to hang out for the night and just have a good night out with her and her friends. We dove into philosophy, apologies, communication clarifications, and the old fashioned drunken ranting amongst friends. I've really missed Ingrid, and it was apparent that night. For all of you following along who may have met us on the walk, Ingrid says hi.

Long story short, we stayed over that night, and meandered about the next day in an utter laziness that was hung overly refreshing. Outside there was a nasty storm, and inside there were comfy covers and friends. It took us until about 3 or so to finally drag ourselves out for coffee and start making our way home. The sky opened up as soon as we left the building so we ducked in for coffee. There was just a really nice feeling in the air as the world got drenched and was watched it all through the window of a deli. Another one of those things I miss from the city.

Eventually we trudged out into it to the train and caught the subway down to Times Square. Feeling a bit more pepped up by the time we got there we decided to walk around a bit and see Times Square and the UN before busing back to Mom's. I'm not one for touristy things, but I must say it was a good time just wandering about in a misty haze that was coating the city. The bus home sedated us back into recline mode and soon enough we had returned to Jersey once more.

Click here for Todd's perspective.