"My Window Faces the South"

“I LOVE your top,” the late twenty-something guy stated as he put his hand to his heart in reverence.  “My what, now?”  I replied.  “Your top, I LOVE your top.  The color teal has a special place in my heart…” he continues, reminiscent, “…because when I was younger, I had a teal Gameboy.”  First of all, this long and continuous piece of fabric covering both my top AND bottom is what we, here in 21^st century America, like to call a dress.  Secondly, is this guy OK?  I feel like maybe I should call his mom to come pick him up.   Lastly, GAMEBOYS ARE GRAY.  This is only my second time checking out the blues dance scene since I’ve been in NY and it has already exceeded my wildest expectations.  Other dancers at this particular Friday night dance include a guy who doesn’t actually like to touch you at all when you’re dancing with him, a guy who likes to touch you entirely too much when you’re dancing with him, and an older woman with a very serious face as she provocatively sashays across the dance floor.  Among others.  I personally love the grab bag of personalities you get at any social dancing scene.  I’ve almost forgotten what life was like before I started dancing.  It isn’t a particularly expensive hobby.  It CAN be expensive if you’re one of the ones that take it very seriously.  Of course, I want to do more, but when I almost over drafted my account to go to the $10 weekly Lindy dance last week, it gave me some perspective.

I realized when I woke up a few weeks back that I can see the sunrise in the reflection of an opposing window, as long as that neighbor hasn’t turned their light on yet.  I see vibrant pinks and blues scattered behind fluffy clouds, if I look hard enough.  While the windows in my kitchen/living room (a.k.a. the dungeon) simply open up to a brick wall, my bedroom windows afford me a breathtaking view of fire escapes and windows to other lives.  Most people have their curtains drawn, but not I.  I never close my blinds.  I look out and wonder mostly just one thing.  How can these people afford these apartments?  What do they do, harvest human organs for the black market?  Everyone told me this city was expensive, but I had to find out for myself. 

Yesterday, Saturday, I only had one commitment.  I had to be in Brooklyn from 12-2.  Because of those 2 hours, I returned home with 5 bruises.  Arriving to my destination, I fell coming up from the subway.  Matching bruises on both my knees.  There was a guy standing next to me who saw the whole thing.  Naturally, he offered no aid in my regaining composure as I struggle to get back on my feet, and believe you me, it was a struggle.  This is New York, where you are most alone when surrounded by a bunch of New Yorkers.  Coming back, I see a sign that my train has been re-routed (happens all the time) so I run to the other platform only to be faced with the decision of whether or not to fight the imminently closing subway car doors.  I’ve seen people do it many times.  And one thing I’ve always thought as I’ve seen them bravely stick a limb through the closing doors is, “Wow, it really kinda looked like they struggled with those doors.”  I now know that it’s because those doors close with about 8 trillion pounds of pressure.  Again, I had to find out for myself.  I didn’t just stick a limb through the door, however.  As I’m running towards the doors, people inside are watching, wondering if I will go for it.  I’m happy to entertain.  I thrust my whole body through, with my arms up beside my head to catch the brunt of it.  I let out a little squeal as the doors continue full speed ahead to squeeze the life right out of me.  It was not unlike those machines at Sea World that flatten and stretch pennies in order to stamp an orca on it for a souvenir.  The Metropolitan Transit Authority was determined to flatten and leave its stamp on me.  Everyone stands by.  When in a situation like this, the thirst for survival kicks in.  You don’t have the option of just giving up and hoping it all pans out in the end.  You HAVE to fight the doors.  No one is going to help you.  It hurts and it’s scary, but you HAVE to push back.  I muster up all the strength and energy I have and push back as hard as I can as I let out a painful groan.  “DING! Stand clear of the closing doors, please.”  I did it!  I’m glad I decided to have that second cup of coffee earlier.  I gasp a deep breath in, go to the nearest available pole to hold on to, the train takes off, and it’s business as usual.  I will examine my 3 new bruises (2 on left wrist, 1 on right) when nobody is looking.  Shit, I still got on the wrong train. 

This train business is my greatest cause of stress.  My subway card is almost completely useless.  If I try to get home after 10 o’clock, coming from any direction, I average about 2 hours of travel time.  At least how that’s how it has been for the past 3 weeks.  And what’s worse is I usually end up having to get a car.  Coming home last Thursday, I went to 4 different stations.  I should say, I was re-routed to 4 different stations.  Each sign said to go to a different train or station that wasn’t running or wasn’t open.  In hindsight, I’m not sure those signs were hung by the MTA.  Someone HAD to have been having a laugh.  And then it was cold and started to rain, so I ended up getting a car, again, on top of a subway card I already paid for (but couldn’t use.)  This is me, throwing money out of all kinds of windows.  Powerless. 

With that being said, I walk a lot.  I usually have my ear buds in and I’m in my own Wes Anderson film as I walk by all the compartments.  The dry cleaners, the coffee shops, the nail and hair salons, the Turkish restaurants, the bodegas, the liquor stores, the yoga studios, the shoe shops, the doggy daycare where the dogs are separated by size…my neighborhood is actually pretty boring.  And while I like being able to walk to work, I signed a lease on the wrong apartment.  From home to work, it is 22 blocks.  That’s 15 street blocks and 7 avenue blocks.  It takes me 30 minutes from door-to door and there are obviously many different routes to take as long as I’m walking southwest.  The more west you go, the more soul-less the city becomes.  Park Avenue, Madison Avenue, 5^Th Avenue, etc.  I make jokes about not being able to pronounce the names of the designers, but I truly haven’t a clue, nor could I care any less.  I’m not a very swanky gal.  In fact, I think that part of New York is the very antithesis of who I am as a person.  Those dogs humping each other on display at the doggy daycare have better lives than the vast majority of children in the rest of the world, yet these people are consumed by thoughts about what handbags are “in” this season and what their next cosmetic operation will be.

Living in New York is constantly being reminded that you have to pick your battles.  Battles with your super, your management company, the MTA, the electric company, the bus driver, the panhandler, your radiator, your toilet, your breaker that trips when you use more than one electrical device at a time.  Oh the things I took for granted.  When it first started getting cold, I heard the question thrown around a lot, “Have they turned the heat on in your building yet?”  Central heat in a prewar building, get real.  We have radiator valves in our units that we can open or close, but it all comes down to whether or not the super turns on the main one.  I left a pathetic and frantic voicemail for him a couple weeks ago as I was recovering from yet another bad cold.  It was frigid in my apartment and I had the valves wide open.  I knew I probably wouldn’t get a call-back anytime soon, if at all, so I resolved to bundle up and get under all my blankets.  He apparently turned the heat on in the middle of the night, for the sound that woke me up was unlike any other I had heard before.  The clinking and clanking that ensued sounded as though a league of miniature banshees were playing roller derby in my pipes.  I might’ve been perturbed if I hadn’t been so grateful for the warmth.  Now when I hear the hiss of the radiator, I consider it a creature comfort.  Pick your battles.  Perspective. 

Don’t look up,

Courtney

Woodcreek Blog #3

23 September 2017

            Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle, it kind of worked.  I just got finished rubbing fresh lemon all over my feet in hopes that I will be able to get to sleep tonight.  From the waist down, I’m covered in fierce bug bites…but they’re mostly on my feet.  The thin skin.  When I awoke this morning to this discovery, I knew immediately that my life as I knew it was over.  Bed bugs.  Bed bugs are a real thing up here, a big problem.  You have to sign paperwork about them when you sign a lease.  There are signs in the subway warning you against them.  The super of my building is as good as useless (that’s an entirely different story), therefore the only solution to my problem is lighting a match to my place and walking away. 

            After comparing bug bites on Google images, it turns out they’re likely mosquito bites.  Calm down, Courtney.  But why did they bite me in my sleep?  The window in my bathroom stays permanently open at the very top, it’s about a 2-inch gap, because there is no fan.  There is also a small gap in the window screen in my bedroom.  Is my meat really so sweet that these mosquitoes are travelling from far and wide, bypassing literally millions of other people, to work their way into the all-you-can-eat buffet in my loft bed??  Or is it one giant, super-mosquito that has plans to ravenously feast on my blood night after night, gaining strength and bulk, until he can walk through the front door of my apartment and take over the world? 

            I can’t shut the windows.  Despite this having been an incredibly mild end of summer up here, if I shut the windows I would perish.  Central air is for the disgustingly rich and famous.  Yes, I have a cute little window unit that I bought for my other bedroom window.  He tries, the poor little fella.  I mostly just use it for the fan.  I shudder to think what my life will be like in the dead of summer next year.  I feel sticky just thinking about it.  Needless to say, I cannot shut the windows.  So I just fill in the gaps with towels, put on full pants and socks, and cross my fingers that I don’t wake in the morning resembling a pubescent teenager with dots all over my face. 

            It’s amazing to me, that I was able to purchase the lemon at 1 o’clock in the morning anyhow.  There is a produce stand and the end of my quiet little block that seems to be open 24 hours.  Meaning a man just pulls his hat over his eyes while he tries to catch some Zs in a chair.  The walk to and from work today made me question if life was worth living.  The bites are on all the surfaces of my feet.  Each step, in my shoes and socks, igniting an insatiable flame. The guy who runs the pet store on corner is the one who told me the lemon trick.  I stopped in after work to buy more cat food and left an hour later.  It’s always an ordeal, buying cat food.  His name is Mic, short for Microphone, and he is from Jordan.  His dad obviously put a lot of thought into it when he named him.  Microphone is such a nice, traditional Arabic name.    Mic is a nice guy.  He’s an incredibly weird guy, but nice.  He told me a couple weeks ago that whoever ends up with me is one lucky fella.  That my smile could brighten the darkest days and that my positive energy radiates all around me…or something along those lines.  It was a beautiful thing to hear during this emotional journey.  He has a thick accent and he talks really fast.  He went on to say that he believed my spirit is the spirit of his dead best friend.  Sigh.  It was still really nice.  Today he gave me a gorgeous lavender rose for my birthday, and counseled me on my bug and super problems.  He actually knows my super and he gave me his apartment number so I can just go knock on his door at any hour of the day, should I need him.  ::Maniacal laugh::

            I’ve been in my apartment for 3 weeks now and I still don’t have anywhere to put my clothes.  It still looks like a natural disaster in here.  It’s hot in here.  My feet itch.  My hips are sore from all the walking.  My cat is throwing up everywhere.  My new job kinda sucks.  (There’s no place like Woodcreek.  ::clicks heels 3X::) Travelling short distances takes an eternity.  I can’t play loud music because – neighbors.  I can’t use my microwave and my teakettle at the same time without tripping the main breaker to half my apartment.  I’m legally required to rinse and sort my garbage.  I don’t know if I’ve ever been this happy.  The energy of this city is incomparable to anywhere I’ve ever been.  It’s far too expensive to sustain life, but it’s amazing.  I want to do all the things, all the time. 

Don’t look up,

Courtney

Woodcreek Blog #2

25 August 2017

Google Maps says it will take me 30 minutes to get to my destination, so I’m giving myself an hour.  New Yorkers are incessantly complaining about the subway, but it’s because you truly cannot count on your train to be there for you when you need it.  I have another “working interview” today, but I’m positive it is just another temp assignment my shady recruiter is sending me on as a way to make more money off me.  But at least my sickness is finally starting to subside. 

Yesterday morning as I sat on the train, (I’m often fortunate enough to get a seat on my long journeys from Brooklyn) an incredibly large, muscular, 30-something man sat down beside me.  His arm brushed mine and I realized how desperate I was for human contact.  I have yet to go dancing!  Before he sat down, I must have looked like a zombie.  I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in so many weeks, so tired, so stressed, so sick.  I wanted to lay my head on his gargantuan shoulder, close my eyes and go to sleep. I realized, sitting next to him, how much I needed human interaction. I needed someone to ask me how I’m doing.  I needed someone to hug me and tell me everything was going to be OK.  I needed to dance!  I was consumed by all of these thoughts when, all of a sudden, he got up and walked over to the other side of the train and sat down across from me.  Could he smell my desperation?  Was it billowing off of me like a dark cloud and he was afraid to breathe it in?  People are looking at me now!  They’re all wondering, just as I am, what I did to offend him.  I clenched my teeth not knowing what to do.  So I just sat up straighter and reminded myself that I don’t care.  He’s probably a terrible dancer anyhow. 

It was on the way home yesterday that I realized how much better I was starting to feel.  That’s the way it is when you get sick.  You don’t get better overnight, but one day you realize that most of the suck is gone.  I’m taking the train back to Brooklyn when I come to this realization.  It was as if I became too cocky about my improving health.  I thought to myself, “Wow, I feel as if I could take on the world right now…except for this – uh, oh - this cough.”  Coughing on the subway is the equivalent of being a leper.  Last week, the girl next to me could have won an Oscar for her courageous display of disgust at my illness.  The trains at rush hour are like putting 10 lbs. of poop in a 5lb bag.  I was, of course, lucky enough to get a seat.  But this just means that instead of you sticking your butt in someone’s face, someone else is sticking his or her butt in your face.  Arms up – sweatboxes radiating.  People on all sides surround me and I feel that evil tickle way down in my lungs.  I’m at the point in my sickness where my lungs hurt less because all the mucus is finally breaking up.  This is the point where your cough is considered “productive.”  Gotta love the terminology.  I make the decision to hold the cough in as long as possible.  I made it through my interviews last week, cheeks clenched; I can make it through the remainder of this train ride without a volcanic eruption.  What happened next, however, was out of my control.  The cough could no longer be contained.  It was coming to a head whether or not I was on board.  Being the proud healthcare professional that I am, I used proper etiquette and coughed into my elbow instead of my hand.  It was loud.  It was disgusting.  It sounded as if something was alive in my chest and trying to escape.  I received the dreaded looks from ALL the nearby fellow passengers when I start to bring my arm down from my mouth.  As I do this, a long, thick strand of phlegm had shot out from my lungs and stuck to the inside of my arm.  The other end still attached to my mouth, creating a Myrtle Beach saltwater taffy-like experience for all the onlookers as my arm lowered and stretched the phlegm until it broke.  That’s what I get for privately boasting to myself about the improvement of my health.  What do I do?  The thick, yellow, sticky mess is just sitting in the crease of my arm.  Everyone else is asking themselves as well, “What will she do?”  What COULD I do?  I simply assumed a deadpan stare and pretended like I wasn’t there.  When I got to my stop, I wiped it on my clothes like a proper 4-year old.  But for the remainder of the subway ride, which felt like 525,600 minutes, I was catatonic. 

Anyhow, I’m feeling much better now!  Despite giving myself TWICE as much time as Google says I needed this morning, I was still 15 minutes late for my temp assignment.  Me?  I’m never late.  It took me an hour and 15 minutes to travel 6 miles.  This is the first time meeting these people and I’m terribly upset that this is their first impression of me, regardless of whether or not they have an available assistant position.  The Dr. comes out and says very loudly, “What kind of soldier are you?? 0800 means 0800!!”  Whew.  This means A) he looked at my resume, and B) he has a sense of humor.  It couldn’t have come at a better time. 

The assistant that helped me today was from Brazil and her name is Ana.  She was about 8 feet tall, spoke around 22 languages, and was quite possibly one of the funniest people I’ve ever met.  It came up in conversation that I liked Scotch, so at the end of the day after we closed up shop, she got the other Dr. to bust out his bottle of Glenlivet.  Needless to say, having skipped lunch, my train ride back today was incredibly pleasant, as I felt EVEN BETTER than yesterday.  And with zero mucus eruptions.  I walked out of my way before getting on the subway this time so that I could spend time walking and talking with Ana.  She tried her best to convince me that I could just work part-time at their office (they didn’t have a full time position), and supplement my income by bartending at a strip club.  She was talking a lot with her thick accent and I was laughing, all the while looking up.  At one point, she stopped and asked, “Have you ever been in Times Square before?”  “Er, yeah, uh, of course!”  But had I been in THAT part of Times Square before?  There was so much going on.  So much happening.  So much looking up to do.  New Yorkers really do get jaded after a while.  I think it is refreshing for them to have someone remind them of the wonders that surround them. 

We got to the subway and said our goodbyes.  We promised to go dancing and that I would come to her house for a BBQ and bring all my own food.  We hugged and I realized that today was the best day I’ve had in NY so far, and not just because I may or may not have been a teensy bit drunk.  Human interaction.  I’m on the up and up. 

Don’t look up,

Courtney

Woodcreek Blog #1

17 August 2017

Well, I think this is it.  The time where I actually poop my pants in public.  It couldn’t be at a more inopportune time.  I’m sitting on a park bench just outside of Central Park on 5^th Ave and I am in between job interviews.  There is a storm percolating in my innards and it isn’t because of nerves.  No, this is just another unfortunate event that has taken place recently, me getting sick.  My only hope at this point is to make it through the interview without soiling myself.  And I don’t want to be greedy, but I would also like the audible roaring of the angry beast inside to cease so that I do not have to explain myself to my interviewer. 

            I listen to my voicemail from Hessy again as the tears sting my eyes.  I don’t know why I listened to it a second time.  I think I wanted to feel something other than the pain in my stomach, chest, sinuses, head, and soul.  She told me she loved me and to “embrace the suck.”  There has been a fair amount of suck recently, so this statement made me smile.  I put my phone away and start to walk to my interview.  It is then I see a smiling monk in a Dijon-colored robe making a beeline towards me.  THIS is it, my moment of spiritual awakening, my reprieve.  We lock eyes and I smile back.  He places a bracelet around my wrist and hands me a gold card that says, “Work Smoothly, Lifetime Peace.”  In broken English, he asks me to write my name in a book.  In the next column, my desire.  The people in the rows above me asked for peace, which he suggested I ask for as well.  Peace, of course!  Breathe!  Everything will be OK!  When I get to the last column, I have my Ah-Ha moment too late, the donation column.  He suggested $20 dollars.  Sigh.  When I gave him the only 2 dollars I had on me, he harrumphed with frustration and shuffled off.  Is an angry monk still a monk?

            I somehow made it through the interview and they asked me to stay and observe a procedure.  What?  No.  No, no, no, no no.  ::Tummy Rumbles::  But I have to.  I had a conversation with one of the assistants before the procedure about old movies.  It turns out she still watches movies on VHS too and that we should be best friends.  During the procedure, which happened to be an implant placement, Frank Sinatra came on the radio singing, non other than, New York, New York!  I close my eyes for a second as tears start to sting them again.  I’m momentarily brought back to the warmth of my goodbye lunch at Woodcreek, surrounded by loved ones who are there for me when I have a crappy day – pun definitely intended.  I open my eyes and for a moment cannot believe that I am here.  Steps from central park, interviewing with an innovative and world-renowned periodontist, listening to Sinatra.  Go me.  I have overcome obstacles; I have kept going when my body said to stop.  I have fought tears, and I have embraced them.  I have learned that  “If I can make it here, I can make it anywhere.”

            As I’m walking to the train for my 3^rd interview of the day, I pass a good-looking boy that hands me a CD.  I’ve been given tons of free CDs in my life.  Chances are I will hate the music, but it’s easier to just take the CD than it is to avoid them.  It didn’t hurt that he said, “Here ya go, beautiful!” as he handed it to me in passing.  He thinks I’m beautiful!  How on earth could he see past my sickness, stress, and lack of sleep to see anything that even remotely resembles beauty??  “Where ya from?” (We’re still walking away from each other) “South Carolina!” I holler back with a proud (flipper) smile.  Then he starts walking back towards me and insists on signing the CD for me.  And then it came, his request for a donation.  Genius work, really.  I applaud him.  I told him I gave my last 2 bucks to an angry monk.  He says, no problem – he accepts cards.  Of course he does.  Sigh.  He wants 10 dollars for an R&B CD.  R&B!!! I don’t even like R&B, I tell him.  I give him 5.  At this rate, I won’t be eating come Christmas. 

            I continue walking and I know I have a ridiculous grin on my face.  I somehow, despite myself, feel good.  I mean, I feel absolutely awful, but I feel good.  I’m grinning because Dr. Hunt’s words come back to me every time I walk in the city, “Don’t look up.”  Words of wisdom, so as not to look like a tourist with a Bullseye on my forehead.  Shout out to my angry monk and R&B boy! 

            I miss my loved ones already, but am excited to take off my training wheels and put on my big-girl britches.  I realize now more than ever that there is opportunity in every nook and cranny of life.  It lies in mistakes, in mishaps, and even in fear.  I learn more about myself and other people everyday.  My brother once told me that my biggest fault was that I think I’m indestructible, fearless.  That isn’t entirely true.  I’m really afraid to walk over subway grates. 

Don’t look up, 

Courtney