That Was Then…
Times Square. Monday. Mid-afternoon. Dizzy and clear, that’s how I am—off kilter from the lucidity of my memories. Has that ever happened to you? The past invades your present with such precision and credibility that you’re scared of it. “That was then and this is now,” like the title of that book we all read back in middle school…
The 42nd Street internet café—“$1.99 an Hour!”— was my home base once upon a time, “Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum” flanking one side, “Applebee’s” the other. Without a working computer or internet access in my apartment, and the “Kinko’s” and downtown café’s costing about as much as my hourly temp wages, I needed the cheap rates of that foul, halogen-lit space to write home, construct resumes and compose long, foolish letters to Spanish and Italian men that never really loved me. Look right, look left: a man logging on to his usual porno site, a blonde, back-packed Swedish couple checking airline rates to get back home.
And there I sat.
July 11th, 2006 at 11:51 am
I really enjoyed this post–it gives me hope about the future, that I still have chances to make something of myself.
July 11th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
I did the exact same thing, minus the part about love letters to European men. That shade of orange will forever be burned into my mind…
July 11th, 2006 at 1:14 pm
I also experienced a similar thing when I went back to Scotland–years after grad school. It was like a shade of myself waited for me there and then chased me everywhere I went…the pubs, the sands, the streets..there she was. Sublime, really…
July 11th, 2006 at 4:49 pm
I totally used to go there when I was an intern at Vera Wang and had to write papers..it was right around the corner. Such memories. The hussle and bustle of Times Square. I miss New York!
July 12th, 2006 at 12:14 am
Okay, I read this and worry about you. Are you alright?
July 12th, 2006 at 8:50 am
I looooove the baby-back ribs at Applebee’s. By far the greatest American restaurant. Toss in internet access and I am in heaven.
(Hatti-I believe Ms. Belle is waxing nostalgic)
July 14th, 2006 at 5:37 pm
All I have to see are images of Hawaii and I’m back to my carefree and restless days in my early twenties. Oh the memories….