Friday, October 13, 2006

EAST VILLAGE



I live in the East Village on the island of Manhattan. The East Village is one of the most expensive and desirable areas in the big apple - but it wasn’t always like that.

When I moved here 12 years ago, the neighborhood could best be described as dicey. Drug dealers and prostitutes were a common thread in the urban bohemia. Now, fortunately or unfortunately, fancy restaurants and stores litter the streets with spoiled Connecticut cunts Jimmy Chooing about with caramel lattes and Marc Jacob’s handbags.

I kinda miss the old days and all the crazy characters.

Pascal was a fearless old French lady who would walk her decrepit old poodle at four in the morning wearing sunglasses, a nightgown and armloads of rhinestone bracelets. She would regularly stop me to inquire about my sex life. In her opinion, sex was something a young person should have morning, noon and night – much like meals. She would entertain me with grand old tales of Paris in the 1950s; and all the sexual shenanigans that took place in the gender bending back rooms.

A few years back, her son put her in nursing home in Long Island, but before she left, she gave me her old black beret. Pull it over your eye, she winked at me, and imagine you’re in Paris dancing with a sweet boy.

I miss her.

One character I don’t miss is Bud – a legless wheelchair bound drug dealer who slept in the vestibule of my building. Often times, while he slept, he would shit his pants, and the smell, well, was rancid. Holding my nose, I would open the door and shove him out onto the street. I once pushed his chair a tad too hard and he rolled into the street and tipped over. I shut the door and didn’t look back.

I wish I could do the same to many of the new residents.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

" well, there goes the neighborhood". Mr. Makeup, this is one of your finest,most eloquently written pieces. You have a great voice, keep on singing. Your, susan G. from Maryland

Kristen said...

you do an awesome job of displaying the dichotomy of colorful city characters. Sounds a lot like the "transitional" neighborhood I live in. But sometimes it can't decide which direction it's "trainsitioning" in.