plum three
the loop, chicago, re: nyc
John Updike has a pithy little line that goes like this:
The true New Yorker secretly believes that people living anywhere else have to be, in some sense, kidding.
This quote has been stuck in my head since the beginning of February when I arrived in NYC. It’s an irritating, paternalistic, incurious, and generally pigheaded sentiment. The thought bouncing around my head has generally made my life unpleasant and I hope that someday I get to spit on John Updike’s Pennsylvania grave, a resting place that is so obviously not serious.
But I do, at some deep level, get it. Cites are magnetic, seductive, gravity-bending things! And New York City is a High Vibration Place with a lot of gravity to it.
To some extent I get that Updikefeeling every time I arrive in any city of substantial size. There is a centripetal force generated by groups of more than, say, a couple hundred thousand people that pulls me into believing if it’s not in front of me, it’s not actually real. And to be honest, that’s a little bit true! I’m not shooting for solipsism here, but rather a grounded, place-centered POV. Consider: the intimacy of hearing a musician play for the 100th time, the food grown in the garden down the block, the mutual aid group passing out “Here’s what to do when you see ICE” flyers. I find it very important to remind myself of my surroundings and my neighbors and to hold them up as the center of the universe, no matter what anybody else thinks, says, or does.
Of course, you can only hold this thought for a little while if you are a Chicagoan — a fundamental difference between NYC and Chicago is that New York dominates international attention. As the cultural and financial capital of the Empire In Which We Live, you just have to look at it every once in a while. That’s fine. Fun even! This is something I love about Chicago — it’s the underdog.
But, reader, I have to confess, I liked New York City. It’s a cool place. It’s a complicated, overwhelmingly polyphonic, needlessly provincial, and really fun place to be. I quite liked taking the subway.1 I had some very good food at honestly a reasonable price. I went dancing and realized I’m older than I thought I was.
The city has all the seductive and beautiful, exciting parts of being American — the sheer diversity of experience! The optimism! The sense that if the right person sees my show, I’ll take the next big leap in my career! There are artists everywhere! Jazz is alive! Experimental theater!2 The melting pot!
It also has the terrible parts of being American! My Illinois medicaid doesn’t work in New York state! Everyone is trying to sell me something everywhere all the time! There is the lingering sense that if I don’t have $20 I can’t participate in civic life! Nobody cares about my show! The melting pot is a villainous lie!
And then there are the gently European things about it which just felt novel and delightful — a walkable city, a distinct culture of local delicacies (floppy pizza, lox, something I’m told is a “chopped cheese”), a stunningly bare collective id — I literally watched somebody YELL, “Were you born in a barn?!”
Anyway, all of this to say: I am back from New York.3 It has been twelve days since touching back down in IL and I’m only just now starting to feel stable again. There is lots to say about that — mostly that having a routine and a secure paycheck is a very wonderful way to live a life and I’m sad to see that go.
I’m combing through all of the recordings and journals and photos that I took out there and I hope to share some of that in the coming weeks. Right now, though, I’ve got two important videos to humbly offer your eyeballs….
~ONE~
The first night I got into the city, I went to the club around the corner to see Kahil El’Zabar and the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble.4 Please please please please please please please please please please please please please please please please listen to this video of El’Zabar’s solo, which is certainly my favorite musical moment of the past five years:
~TWO~
I brought my trusty field recording equipment out east with me and snagged some great sounds from everywhere, including the daily construction of our ice puppet. Here’s a bit of Oedipus’ Legs ASMR for you, courtesy of Mark Blashford’s steady hand:
more soonlove you
c
My own two legs and the El are my only modes of transportation in Chicago and, while I love my legs and the train, I sometimes feel quite ostracized by this reality. This is a city that, in spite of all of its density and infrastructure, has chosen the car. That is especially true on the South Side, where I have lived for the past six years. Here you end up walking on streets with no people on them, waiting for buses that never come, crawling on the too-small sidewalk next to the six-lane neighborhood-street-cum-highway.
And to be clear, the CTA itself isn’t unsafe — public transit is remarkably safer than cars in certain BIG ways — but it does have the feeling of being unsafe. Being alone en route, having to be aware onboard. The subway in New York has the immense benefit of so many people everywhere all the time. I’m not saying anything Jane Jacobs hasn’t said before, this is “Eyes on the Street” in the underground.
Blah blah blah. A mid-thirties urbanite complains online about American public transit. Whatever — it was a very welcome change of pace to not feel like a freak for relying on trains and buses to get around.
Okay, I’ll be real for a second: I was…not terribly impressed with the state of experimental theater in New York City. We were BLOCKS from the Wooster Group’s homebase and we still got multiple reviews that were entirely perplexed by our plotless imagistic show. (Did you know that you can make a puppet show that is…not for children?) Embarassing for them! I guess even in the heart of it, you still have to teach American audiences not to freak if there isn’t “a story.”
That’s mean. Maybe a cynical thing to say. But this is just between you and me, footnote-reader. Thanks for being here. :)
To be clear: I am a Chicago booster through and through. Although many have been swayed by New York City’s charms, I remain steadfast in its inadequacy. Chicago is the special city, the greatest city in the world, the only Truly American City in this deeply disturbed country. By that I mean it is both city AND parking lot.
True to form, I went to New York and the first thing I did was listen to musicians from Chicago. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯