Adventure Part One: New York, Connecticut
This is part travel-log, part attempt to write well. Criticism welcome.
New York
I arrived in New York a day early, because I made a mistake with dates. Because my host (a good friend of mine who’s doing the same course as I here in St. Andrews, whom I shall pseudonymously call Sarah) was worried that her mother would not take well to my appearing a night early without forewarning, I wandered around central Manhattan for a few hours, my giant rucksack on my back, looking for somewhere cheap to stay. (I could have found an internet café and found somewhere more easily, I expect; but internet cafés were not themselves that easy to find, and in any case, I was quite happy wandering among these strange neon buildings and loud streets.) I eventually found one, really near the centre – 42nd St. and 7th, I think. It was a bizarre place: for $60 a night, you got a concierge behind a plexiglass window who was leaning back on a cheap swivel chair watching bad TV; a bare concrete stairs leading up to the concierge lit by a flickering blue light; hugely uneven bedroom and communal bathroom walls that look like they’re plaster for about a foot back; a bedroom mirror connected to these walls by more plaster (as are the little mirror fragments around its edge (why were they not just thrown away !?)); a very slightly damp bedroom carpet; a bedroom window so dirty there’s no seeing out; the cheapest pillow money can buy; and no duvet. I especially liked the toilet, which was in the middle of the bathroom, and had a cistern cover from a completely different toilet. It may not even have been a cistern cover – maybe it was just a piece of plastic appropriated when the original cover was broken or stolen. There was plaster everywhere – it kept the faucets to the sinks, the sinks to the walls, the walls to the ceilings… and it looked like it had been caked on with a spade: there was nothing like a right angle in the hotel, because the plaster turned all the corners into curves. By comparison, when I stayed in Queens between my flights from Jamaica and home to London, I paid around $90 for a king bed with a massive TV, elegant bathroom, coffee maker, and free shuttle to and from JFK. And I didn’t feel certain I was going to be mugged either.
However, the $60 hotel, for all its idiosyncrasies, was clean, and came with soap and a towel that was almost clean; so, given its location, I guess the price is fairly reasonable.
Nonetheless, I was glad to leave, and did so first thing in the morning. I wandered around the city for a while, gawking at the traffic lights, car registration plates, newspaper vending machines and skyscrapers before making my way to Sarah’s apartment building. Konrad, my travelling companion for most of the adventures, and friend from the M.Litt., arrived a bit later in the day. The three of us went wandering around the city, gawking at the fresh-food supermarkets and expensive boutiques, and playing virtual ping-pong in the PlayStation store.
Connecticut
The following day was Friday. We celebrated this fact by going through with our plan to spend the weekend in Sarah’s parents’ house in Connecticut. We stopped by what is apparently the best barbeque chicken place in the tristate area, and marvelled at the Halloween decorations. Thence we went to the house, and, because it was quite late, went more or less straight to bed.
The following morning, when I woke up, I saw that the house was situated on the side of a small hill, was surrounded by massive gold-leafed trees, was on the edge of a huge, slow, beautiful, gold-leafed-tree-lined river, was on a large grounds covered with myrtle and fallen golden leaves, had a wee stream running through it and a large pond as a rest stop for this stream, and, most of all, had a hammock. It was surely one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. The river probably astonished me most of all – we went rafting down it one day, and it was gorgeously slow, with little noise but our own mirth; and as far ahead as we could see, there was the gentle water, and reaching right to the shoreline the autumn-hued trees, and above them nothing but blue sky. Another time I was lying on the hammock, looking at this same blue sky through the distant yellow leaves of the tree above me, and the combination of colours made me almost upset because I couldn’t be closer to this… beautiful natural world. Yet another time we were driving through the area on even, wide roads, and there were white wooden houses with neon-lit American flags on the front walls surrounded by white picket fences hosting yard sales. Again: we had a bonfire every night by the river, and the stars were some of the clearest I’d seen. On leaving there for Boston, I had to change train, and the conductor, after telling us this, signed off, “And have a nice trip home on this gorgeous fall day,” and you could tell through the intercom that there was a half-smile and a glint in his eye (which was looking at the trees on a distant hill) as he said it.
In Connecticut and Massachusetts, I won’t say I fell in love with America, but I saw very very clearly how it is possible to fall in love with a country, and with America. I thought I loved Britain; the land of Monty Python and the BBCs 3 and 4; but having been in Connecticut, I see that it is only that I find some parts of Britain wonderful. In New England, a less intellectual or decided-upon emotional love, a heart in the throat, makes sense. There’s joy or contentment in the area, I think. It’s hard to describe; perhaps it’s more informative to say that it has the same soul as Joanna Newsom, whose first album is incredibly similar in spirit, and as Calvin & Hobbes, especially the big painted Sunday strips.
Sarah and her parents have quite a few friends in Connecticut, most of them gay. I didn’t really relate to any of them, although they seemed decent heads. Of note is Ann, who literally jumped through the door and threw off her coat before giving everyone kisses and hugs. I’ve barely seen thirty-year olds so sprightly, let alone people with Ann’s seventy years. Of note also is Adélie (pseudonym), who grew up in the area, travelled all over the world as a dancer and artist, but who by some amazing coincidence ended up right back here – to her surprise as much as anyone’s, I think, given how much she appeared to want to be always somewhere foreign. She was massively smitten by Konrad; I think that just by being the wonderful, honest, earnest person he is, he had a very deep impact on her, helping her move beyond a big and deep hurt in her life. (I keep good friends.) I believe she had the same effect on him, for the same reasons. I was sad not to get to know her better.
New York
I arrived in New York a day early, because I made a mistake with dates. Because my host (a good friend of mine who’s doing the same course as I here in St. Andrews, whom I shall pseudonymously call Sarah) was worried that her mother would not take well to my appearing a night early without forewarning, I wandered around central Manhattan for a few hours, my giant rucksack on my back, looking for somewhere cheap to stay. (I could have found an internet café and found somewhere more easily, I expect; but internet cafés were not themselves that easy to find, and in any case, I was quite happy wandering among these strange neon buildings and loud streets.) I eventually found one, really near the centre – 42nd St. and 7th, I think. It was a bizarre place: for $60 a night, you got a concierge behind a plexiglass window who was leaning back on a cheap swivel chair watching bad TV; a bare concrete stairs leading up to the concierge lit by a flickering blue light; hugely uneven bedroom and communal bathroom walls that look like they’re plaster for about a foot back; a bedroom mirror connected to these walls by more plaster (as are the little mirror fragments around its edge (why were they not just thrown away !?)); a very slightly damp bedroom carpet; a bedroom window so dirty there’s no seeing out; the cheapest pillow money can buy; and no duvet. I especially liked the toilet, which was in the middle of the bathroom, and had a cistern cover from a completely different toilet. It may not even have been a cistern cover – maybe it was just a piece of plastic appropriated when the original cover was broken or stolen. There was plaster everywhere – it kept the faucets to the sinks, the sinks to the walls, the walls to the ceilings… and it looked like it had been caked on with a spade: there was nothing like a right angle in the hotel, because the plaster turned all the corners into curves. By comparison, when I stayed in Queens between my flights from Jamaica and home to London, I paid around $90 for a king bed with a massive TV, elegant bathroom, coffee maker, and free shuttle to and from JFK. And I didn’t feel certain I was going to be mugged either.
However, the $60 hotel, for all its idiosyncrasies, was clean, and came with soap and a towel that was almost clean; so, given its location, I guess the price is fairly reasonable.
Nonetheless, I was glad to leave, and did so first thing in the morning. I wandered around the city for a while, gawking at the traffic lights, car registration plates, newspaper vending machines and skyscrapers before making my way to Sarah’s apartment building. Konrad, my travelling companion for most of the adventures, and friend from the M.Litt., arrived a bit later in the day. The three of us went wandering around the city, gawking at the fresh-food supermarkets and expensive boutiques, and playing virtual ping-pong in the PlayStation store.
Connecticut
The following day was Friday. We celebrated this fact by going through with our plan to spend the weekend in Sarah’s parents’ house in Connecticut. We stopped by what is apparently the best barbeque chicken place in the tristate area, and marvelled at the Halloween decorations. Thence we went to the house, and, because it was quite late, went more or less straight to bed.
The following morning, when I woke up, I saw that the house was situated on the side of a small hill, was surrounded by massive gold-leafed trees, was on the edge of a huge, slow, beautiful, gold-leafed-tree-lined river, was on a large grounds covered with myrtle and fallen golden leaves, had a wee stream running through it and a large pond as a rest stop for this stream, and, most of all, had a hammock. It was surely one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. The river probably astonished me most of all – we went rafting down it one day, and it was gorgeously slow, with little noise but our own mirth; and as far ahead as we could see, there was the gentle water, and reaching right to the shoreline the autumn-hued trees, and above them nothing but blue sky. Another time I was lying on the hammock, looking at this same blue sky through the distant yellow leaves of the tree above me, and the combination of colours made me almost upset because I couldn’t be closer to this… beautiful natural world. Yet another time we were driving through the area on even, wide roads, and there were white wooden houses with neon-lit American flags on the front walls surrounded by white picket fences hosting yard sales. Again: we had a bonfire every night by the river, and the stars were some of the clearest I’d seen. On leaving there for Boston, I had to change train, and the conductor, after telling us this, signed off, “And have a nice trip home on this gorgeous fall day,” and you could tell through the intercom that there was a half-smile and a glint in his eye (which was looking at the trees on a distant hill) as he said it.
In Connecticut and Massachusetts, I won’t say I fell in love with America, but I saw very very clearly how it is possible to fall in love with a country, and with America. I thought I loved Britain; the land of Monty Python and the BBCs 3 and 4; but having been in Connecticut, I see that it is only that I find some parts of Britain wonderful. In New England, a less intellectual or decided-upon emotional love, a heart in the throat, makes sense. There’s joy or contentment in the area, I think. It’s hard to describe; perhaps it’s more informative to say that it has the same soul as Joanna Newsom, whose first album is incredibly similar in spirit, and as Calvin & Hobbes, especially the big painted Sunday strips.
Sarah and her parents have quite a few friends in Connecticut, most of them gay. I didn’t really relate to any of them, although they seemed decent heads. Of note is Ann, who literally jumped through the door and threw off her coat before giving everyone kisses and hugs. I’ve barely seen thirty-year olds so sprightly, let alone people with Ann’s seventy years. Of note also is Adélie (pseudonym), who grew up in the area, travelled all over the world as a dancer and artist, but who by some amazing coincidence ended up right back here – to her surprise as much as anyone’s, I think, given how much she appeared to want to be always somewhere foreign. She was massively smitten by Konrad; I think that just by being the wonderful, honest, earnest person he is, he had a very deep impact on her, helping her move beyond a big and deep hurt in her life. (I keep good friends.) I believe she had the same effect on him, for the same reasons. I was sad not to get to know her better.