The Tale of Three Great Cities
NEW YORK
You made a woman out of me, Manhattan. You – with your iron will, mammoth hands, and enchantingly unforgiving height. It’s no wonder you were a soldier in another life, possessing the best and worst of times, purple triumphs, and the most lurid crimes.
Unwittingly, I fell into your fold twice when I most needed lessons in humility. Fearless and unstoppable, I stomped through the hot heart-beating streets of SoHo with all my dreams in front of me. Two months later, I lost my innocence on the corner of Broadway and Houston, where the offices were just dorm rooms dressed in corporate blue.
I have never been so tired and tireless. I have never cried as much or ever been as humbled, surviving the dot com blood bath, and seeing the Towers crumble.
How I resented you and clung to you, Manhattan, for seducing me but not keeping me safe and warm. Being with you was like being romanced by a rock star, exhilarating and exhausting, enticing and extreme, decadent and deadly, and oh so much fun.
You are one giant magical organism, Manhattan, a microcosm of the Universe itself. The rats and cockroaches kept me company when I trudged along the subway tracks during the Blackout of ’03. And Times Square was so still and magnificent on Sunday night, as we sped through traffic lights on the back of David’s motorcycle until 4AM.
I will always love watching the boys shoot hoops on W. 4th Street, listening to the Sounds of Brazil, feeling the ghosts groove at Terra Blues, playing telephone through the secret passage ways of Grand Central, and smiling at my favorite fortune teller in Chelsea. I still think about that rock I perched myself upon in Central Park the day I sank into the ultimate pit of despair when Missing Person signs covered the City, and fumes from Ground Zero filled the air.
I cannot speak ill of you, Manhattan. You – the greatest survivor to teach me the art of survival.
LOS ANGELES
At the end of the day LA, you’re still the basin of all my aspirations, the stream of consciousness that keeps the wine in my blood flowing, the waterfall that cascades “This May be Love, “ so says Jimi like “one of those daydreaming fools.” I’ll come back to you someday, because anything worth doing once I do at least twice.
You’re still the line that runs down my center, keeping me close to the edge of surrender. I’m yours until we break off into the sea with all of our Hollywood secrets that even the spirits up on Mulholland Drive cannot forget. The coyotes and the black widows will someday spill my stories.
Guess what…they haven’t yet.
SAN FRANCISCO
We played hide and seek some years ago, the first time I left the east coast. And even though our time was brief, your expressions, your buildings and bridges, your sounds pierced me most. The first time we moved as one I thought I had to turn you into something you’re not, while I became someone I didn’t want to be, but had to be for a while in order to become who I am now.
So many places and spaces have sheltered me, but you – you feel like home. You’re the castle in Europe I daydreamed of as soon as I was old enough to read about romance and magic and elegant simplicity. You’re the sun-rayed dock in the lagoon in my backyard, where my father keeps the family sailboats. You’re long top-down drives along the Embarcadero on a summer night when half the city is starting to slumber and the other half is about to awaken. You’re the fog weaving from the Marin Headlands through the Golden Gate Bridge when the rest of the sky is clear. You’re a chance encounter that made me want to change for the better as soon as you opened the door.
It may be too soon to tell if this time around is merely a short-term visit or an era to keep record of in the books. Any way, no matter where I go, you’re my home. How groundbreaking it is to know I’m no longer a rolling stone. Experience, explore, embrace. I will try; even if it’s too dark to see.
And I will always be the lighthouse on your Bay.
