Grey(t) Love, Escape

“Grey(t) Skyline”

* * *

Whenever I'm back in New York for extended periods, which is becoming less frequent as I ripen like Käse, I'm reminded simultaneously of what still iron-grips me, keeps bringing me back here ... yet why I began to escape in the first place.

I've long said, in New York (in Manhattan, that is), there is no middle ground:  You're either perfectly young for it, or perfectly old.  You enjoy the clubs, lounges, (now corporatized) live music / night life scenes ... the all-nighters, 4am diner hangs ... or you're comfortably numbed.  You've learned where to go, what to see, who to do for your comforts, and you can afford these.

In the midlife, there is only flight ... from noise and Groundhog Day-like hassles, constant inconveniences, too many people (incessant noise!) and tourist price-gouging.  Add to this, a milennial sheen ... This privatized, Disneyfied, playground vibe ... This "service"-oriented age of "transparency", where everything's glass and in fact, nothing's private and even the taxi drivers pretend now to "like" you (transparent, indeed!) ...

Entering a pizza place last week, I'm greeted by a greasy apron caught up in this fantasy, all beaming as he asks me, "How are you, good gentleman?"

"Uh, yeah ... Gimme a slice," I grunt.  "Not hot.  Just like it is."

"It's cold!" shouts he with glee, imploring.

"Don't care.  That one.  With the cheese.  Not.  Burnt.  No, not that one!  Looks like ASS ... "

This happened last week.  Looking back, I think for a minute, I have no idea why I'm acting that way ... but then it occurs to me, Wait.  Yes I do.

I'm middle-aged now.  Gearing up for a thirtieth high school reunion (!) ... and New York -- in reality, a shoulda been transitional situation, where it's never been easy to live, just survive -- now feels to me like a burial ground.  My mood and spirit, hopes and humor, all but submerged, subsumed when I'm here ...

“Subsuming”, ©Jeff Glovsky

I have flown ... but can't yet keep too long away.

Until I can, long for the New York I was young in ... the mind your own business, out of my face place ... Grown up, Garbo-esque, I request at least that.  For now ... while I still can't fly too long away.

* * *

Where There May Be

On a train in France a couple weeks ago (thankfully, not this one), I dove into an unreserved seat beside a petulant clove cigarette - this fragrant, smoking thing named Zoé.

Seeing Zoé's golden legs up on the back of my neck the seat in front of her, spying the empty seat beside, I went sprinting down the train aisle toward it, only to be met by loud protestations as Zoé sensed her alone time getting squashed.

"There are plently of empty seats, Monsieur!" this angry bird actually snapped at me.

"Bone swa," I grunted.  "Like to sit here."

Once, twenty years or so ago, there wouldn't have been this French resistance ... my presence, and Zoé's together, would've formed a pièce de résistance!  Led to peace ... Would've spelled detente!

Of course, I was that much younger then ... and Zoé, newborn ... But the point I'm trying to make is that seasons, things and people change.  If I felt growing "old" back then, imagine being middle aged now - when in an equivalent number of years removed, I'll be pushing seventy ... then daisies ...

"The Death of Jeff Glovsky"

And so might you.

What isn't changing naturally, though, is the way strangers regard each other.  Like nuisances and interruptions ... With little real interest, attention or even eye contact ... With little compulsion felt to look away from whatever else they're doing, playing or listening to at the moment their worlds -- or Words with Friends -- are invaded.

I feel all ages feed this corruption.  It's no longer a "Millennial" thing.  Our need to be alone, in fact, be anti-social with each other, is as pervasive as it is desperate.  Ironic on so many levels:  when we're fed transparently empty "news", and have no one who's driving the apple cart as it careens ever faster toward onrushing traffic, the brakes and steering wheels useless, threadbare tires spinning off ...

We need each other!

Otherwise, no stories left to build upon.  No love, or lust -- potential! -- unrequited ... carried through the decades, firing dreams and weighting memories, and hope (yet hopeful.  Waiting);

for who or what will be there when our "friends" outgrow their sex machines?  "Devices", "apps" and glowing tubes ... their piracies, idiocies, "reality" (really?) ... forced "fails", "quirks", fakely "eccentric" idiosyncracies?

"Blu Jg (Blue.Period) ... in E Major"

Me, I prefer to tread cobblestoned streets of each city ... avoiding the parking lot choked  superhighways (especially our "information" one) to pave my own roads ...

For better or worse!  When young, or now old ... willing riders or empty seats beside me ... Not "alone"; ever lonely, though ...

I'll get there.

Wherever "there" may be.