| Volume I, Issue IX -- dateline new york --
As I write this, history is being made. The Mets and Braves
have
just tied 3-for-3, bottom of the 15th, in the longest playoff game in
history. It’s a cold and rainy October night in Queens, where all
god-fearing people that couldn’t get tickets are glued to their
television sets and radios, clutching the edges of the bar, praying
for the impossible in Sunnyside pubs.
And why shouldn’t we? I don’t know jack about
sports, never
professed to. But what the possibility of a Subway Series has done to
this town is something I just can’t help but be wild about. It’s not
often that something brings a city together so brilliantly as a game
of ball.
So, WFAN is blaring out of my clock radio that doesn’t
work, and
all of a sudden, Gary Cohen is screaming.
Robin Ventura has grand-slammed the Mets to victory. How can
you not get excited about that? Cohen is about to have a
meltdown – "THE METS HAVE WON THE BALL GAME!!!!!
THE METS WILL SEND THE SERIES TO A GAME 6
TUESDAY NIGHT IN ATLANTA!!!!"
The best part of it all – they didn’t even let
Ventura finish out
the run – letting go of an additional, semi-superfluous extra 2
points, making the final score 4-3. Who cares! We won!
Beautiful. Let the nay-sayers and hatchet men say that this
is just
delaying the inevitable (a Mets loss), but do we care?
Not likely. Every victory is worth fighting for, when it comes to
the Mets, who refuse to die.
Take that, Atlanta. Hmmph.
------
The Dow is down. It had to happen.
I spent six of the most colossal months in the history of the
market
working for Merrill Lynch, undeniably one of the biggest dogs on
Wall Street.
Around there, it seemed as if the bankers and analysts
already knew
that they were racing against time, and that a drop was only just
around the corner.
They’d be pulling together presentations at a furious
rate, sometimes
5 or 6 bankers laboring at lightning speed, at 3 and 4 in the morning.
On a regular basis.
You can’t continue like that forever. And they knew it.
So to say that Greenspan’s "little talk" the
other week was
unexpected would be a little ridiculous.
Maybe, just maybe, this could be the beginning of the level,
following
what we’ve been told is the longest economic boom period in recent
history.
Does this mean that New York will become livable again? Does
this
mean that those of us who are unlucky enough to make less than
$75,000 will be able to sign leases on apartments?
While I don’t want to kick anyone while they’re
down, let’s just say,
it’s about time.
So bring on the bears – we’re so high now, it seems
as if it’ll take
forever to fall.
Maybe I’m just acting foolish, but honestly – let’s just say
economic boom isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, if you’re not among
one of the lucky few.
Maybe those first-year analysts at Merrill Lynch will finally get some sleep.
-----
Wow. What happened to the "new" Times Square? You
can glitz up
those storefronts all you want, but there’s something about the
streetscape in the Crossroads of the World there that refuses to give
itself over to the Disney mentality.
Walk through the neighborhood any weekend evening, preferably
after midnight, (do you dare!) and you can almost smell the early 80’s
again. Crowds of fashionably dressed teens lean against shuttered
stores and hordes of street-vendors hawk stolen jewelry, incense,
bootleg music and videotapes.
An entrepreneurial type waves his "500 Lovemaking
Positions -- $5"
placard high above the chattering throng, and the asian massage chairs
have waiting periods, as curious youngsters and bridge-and-tunnel
couples alike await their torture.
It feels damn good to be out here, on this Saturday night,
late October,
where hundreds seem to be daring the winter weather to ruin the fun.
For now, it’s kind of warm, and steamy too – the fog from the nearby
water reminds us that we are near a great deal of water – it hangs low
over the square, and steam rises from subway grates, with it’s special
blend of scented tunnel air, both nauseating and endearing at same breath.
I am accosted at least six times as I wander down the east
side of the
square – watches, strip club hawkers, can-I-get-a-cigarette – as I step
down into the subway to begin the journey home, I realize, through the
haze that comes from 14 hours of sameness (at work), that I am smiling
broadly. I can’t help it – this feeling that yes, things are just the way they
should be.
Email: dj140@hotmail.com
Next Update: 1 November
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