Out to the Prow

My little one had a friend in town.  She went down to NYC to see him with my wife last night.  They had a good time, but it ended too quickly.  And it left a homesick taste in her mouth.  Couldn’t she head back down to see him again today?  I hadn’t gone yesterday and was fine to accompany her for the day, today. 

Predictably I pressed hard for a visit to the Brooklyn Museum.  “You have that paper coming up on civilizations of Africa.  Let’s go to see the remarkable . . .”  “No!”  “OK.  OK.  The bus ride was fast enough and soon we were, alas, walking through Port Authority and after an espresso and a tamarind ball, (it was all they had) we were standing in Bryant Park waiting for her friend to descend from his nearby hotel.  I tried to point out that, what I didn’t know at the time was once the “American Radiator Building” and was now the Bryant Park Hotel, designed by Raymond Hood and André Fouilhoux in 1924 was strikingly similar to Shanghai’s Park Hotel, designed by the Hungarian, László Hudec, which became the tallest building in Asia in 1934. 

“What would you guys like to do?”  “I don’t know.”  “I don’t know.”  This went on for a while.  There was the hint of rain.  It was chilly, but not freezing.  And when I pitched the Circle Line it was readily taken up.  “Do you feel that warm and fuzzy feeling?” I asked, as we approached the Chinese Embassy 42^nd and 12^th Avenue.  Across the street we discovered that the ninety-minute trip was leaving soon.  I grabbed a seat for three, downstairs, by the window.  They took to the roof, and as suspected they came downstairs not long thereafter. 

I tried to give them some time to hang and went out to the prow of the boat.  A Chinese couple were photographing one another.  I offered, to photo them both, in Chinese and they accepted without a lot of fanfare.  And that felt lovely.   Liberty.  I hadn’t counted on this ironic mediation.  Governors Island and then three bridges.  I just kept shooting and shooting photos.  Interrupting Chinese couples to photo them, ingratiating myself once and once again. 

It was drizzling by the time we docked.  Dinner was possible.  Perhaps a French place to allow my daughter a chance to show off her budding language skills.  I checked and was shocked to see that the remarkable Kenny Barron was playing at the Village Vanguard this evening.  Would they like to see?  And they shrugged and said: “OK.”  Thrilled we headed down to the village, were told to return by 7:00PM, had a lovely faux rustic French dinner in Greenwich Village and then back to the Vanguard only to discover, standing in the rain that this line was only for folks who already had tickets.  “Sold out folks.”  Ahh.  Well, then, with that, we went home. 

Sunday 12/29/19