LSRHS > History & Culture > Trips > New York 'Last Waltz'
Christine Stott...
Before this trip, I never knew New York. I thought I did, but I didn’t. We had only met in passing—a quick glance thrown over the shoulder, a scurrying back to separate lives. New York always seemed so overwhelming, the rush and pace of it. It seemed almost inaccessible. But finally, New York and I stopped in our tracks, staring wide-eyed, staying that way for days.
It’s been a week already and I haven’t forgotten a thing. I still see MoMA and that giant statue of Balzac, head thrown high, and below him Pilch running around excitedly and talking about art, about painters, about different periods and all her classes and times spent dreaming of brushstrokes here and there. We got stuck on the fourth floor and barely made it to the fifth. Pilch told us how her mom would have loved it there, would have loved to see the movement of the paintings, how your eye skips from one place to the next. I hadn’t looked at art that way before.
I still see Chinatown. Sushi and Fosca’s famous line, “You dirt my white shirt.” Wandering around buying cheap sunglasses. Forming ‘Hat Club’ in the basement of Louis Vuitton. And Central Park—I still wish I were lying in the sunshine listening to Sarah’s harmonica, listening to that friendly guy’s guitar. I still remember Wheylan, the most talented hula hooper. He did some tricks for a lady taking pictures and we danced in the background. I bet it was a great picture.
On the ferry to Staten Island, watching the water shining all around us, I remember thinking that I wouldn’t mind staying, indefinitely maybe, who knows. The Brooklyn bridge falling away from us, the distance growing, New York majestic and illuminated against the night. That night we saw the statue of Liberty with fresh eyes, the eyes of relatives and immigrants with dreams laid out before them, tears behind them, small suitcases resting at their feet. We wished dreams like this could always be realized, not torn apart and fallow. We wished for that vision of liberty to become reality. We dropped our wishes into the water like a wishing well.
And then that last night in SoHo, it seemed to me like one vast sea of life, with all the craziness and suggestiveness washed upon its shores. Galleries, bookstores, real food for the first time in days. And more than that, real feelings. These days it seems like anything too real is frightening; I watch people shrink from the truth like it’s poisonous. But we didn’t, that night. We sat on a couch in SoHo, tears hot against our faces and the city stretched out like a sparkling glowing blanket.
This trip was honestly “daaa best,” to quote a famous French Italian. There really isn’t any other way to describe it, is there?