NYC

 

Honestly, I am pretty scared. I started out with $23, and now have less than $20. Here I am… Long Island, New York. Granted, I brought food, warm clothing and entertainment, but I’m feeling the fear of not depending on capital. True, Life is beautiful and beauty should never cost or be about money, but my worries lead me outside to light up snipes. Why? Inexperience and stupidity. In all actuality this anxiety is elation so new I equate it to fear. I’m just beginning to be overwhelmed by excitement, unknowns and this mythical place of endless skyscrapers. When I was leaving Oklahoma I got to the airport an hour too late, but GOD smiled upon me with a miraculous flight departing an hour later. My cousin Jan is kind enough to let me crash at her place, so I am positive I will have many adventures. Sure no human being knows them yet, but regardless the future still has them hidden away. I casually stroll around the train station. The low temperature keeps nearly everyone inside the ticket shops and other various havens of monetary habit. Outside that, we exist. Braving the elements because we crave those real feelings, those adventures, and a glimpse of true emotion or merely duty. The phrase chills me, as I look at the camo covered men holding large machine guns posting up every few feet. I flash back to Russia as a youth, with the police and the same air swirling coldly around my face. I pass a guy who asks me for a quarter, fifty cents. I smile and give him the 50¢ change from my train ticket. Sure I require roughly $11 to get back home, but in reality 50¢ saved will help me much less than 50¢ invested in a human’s life other than my own selfish existence.

Inside the ticket office I listen in on incomprehensible conversations in languages so familiar to their speakers I forget where I am. Ah yes, Ronkonkoma. The difference I see between here and home is this train. I think wishfully about a monorail erected to join Oklahoma together. And here I am waiting for a train amidst cold and grey. And on the train I wait and wait and a beautiful girl boards the train. Her dark hair and stylish clothes make me realize how inadequately dressed for that cold she is. Brilliant visions of derail and being stuck for days while I give out peanut butter and honey sandwiches and tomato soup. Cell phone rings banish the thoughts as I return to the twentieth century in Long Island. I sit on the train endlessly amused by the cattle pouring in. “Is this the right train?” “Not sure, get on!!” Not that I know if this is the right train, but why worry? I am traveling, and regardless I will end up somewhere. And we ride and ride the rails as buildings metamorphose into big hulking buildings and slowly green dissipates to be replaced by more and more concrete. I’m in the city. Penn station. I slowly walk out trying to take in everything as I see a man toting a cardboard box stop walking. He bends over to pull out a small speaker and a mike. My eyes begin to twinkle and the corners of my mouth are drawn up like gravity has failed. Music explodes into the subway. I dance goofily as the homeless karaoke brightens the grey-black New York night. But it can’t hide the piles and piles of trash everywhere. Strewn on subway tracks and against walls and spilling out onto the streets. We all “love” New York. But is anyone IN love with New York? I am carried through the tunnels by involuntary legs as my eyes digest Starbucks, delis, pizza places, and omnipresent tourist trap gift shops with their quirky stickers and key chains. Then I see Jan.

We walk through these tunnels past guitar strumming bums and this city has just enough people. Too many, and I don’t have enough to give all of them. But my money is now nonexistent. My subway pass depleted me completely. Day one, and I’m done. And in complete irony we go to Times Square… Ground Zero in capitalism here. My words would only be cheap and ineffective at relaying the onslaught. Epileptic flashing lights, billowing multistory billboards, gargantuan TV screens, constant noise, and neon lights screaming into the cold night to buy this, or buy that, or be this, or be that. But nothing could explain every person I passed, every ad, or the unstoppable small tinge of agoraphobia the energy here produced. And soon we were happy underground on rails until we were climbing stairs to her loft and to her roof. It was the only roof I could have looked off of. A living, breathing photograph of New York. Panoramic picturesque Empire State, Chrysler, UN Skyline. The perfect ending to my weary day.

All of the sudden it is the next day. I exercise, eat my orange and shower. I smile as I realize I have all of New York to play in. Where do I go? I decide not to decide. I walk, and walk and walk across a bridge and down streets and down a pier and into Queens until I’m at a bus stop waiting with people that seemingly ignore everything except their headphones (as if they even hear that). Soon enough a bus and a few trains carry me to 5th Avenue. My heart skips a beat as I see those beautiful words I have waited my whole life to see. Central Park. This park has been my fantasy. Erotic ideas of playing chess, reading books, or writing on benches. I’m ecstatically living them. The birds sing as old men chat about how old and predictable they have become. As more of their friends show up I decide it is probably for their betterment that they have become so. This fountain should be in a postcard, or a movie, and probably has been. A dad teaches his daughter to ride a bike in front of it. Pigeons fight and eat by it. A Clydesdale carting people circles it gracefully. Dogs walk their people past joyfully. Lovers hold hands around it. I wonder if this fountain forgets how lucky it is. That beautiful center of this concrete circle with benches lovingly facing it. Hilarious old men congregating, complaining and cussing around this fountain that sees this beautiful improv play day after day. “You don’t need to write a will this week… you need a hit of ecstasy and a disco this week.” I wish all parks had these old men. I’m tempted to stay and write their every word, but know they are just a few old men, and I’ve already missed far too much. Then I decide to get lost. I ride subways back and fourth and up and around and walk left and right and near and far out into the nether-reaches of skyscraperdom. Only to glance at a map and slink my way to meet up with Jan. We’re off to peruse Chinatown, little Italy and down to Pier 17 to gaze out at the Brooklyn Bridge and the sparkling lights. Cool breeze on a cool night with children waving at police boats, old women drinking cappuccino, and lovers kissing. And I miss love then. Wishing it we me kissing and being kissed… but the overpowering thoughts of New York banish those dreams into far off futures. Casually we take subways and walks back to that foldout couch resort in a New York loft that is everything dreams require and are made of.

This morning begins like most great mornings. We walk. And we meet up with Jan’s friend to hit up a beautiful breakfast place living in the same spot since the 1920s. The ornate metallic ceiling holds my attention as I sip my water. “The best things in life are free,” a subway bum’s words echo in my mind. He’s right, though. Had I spent money on food, I’d be intently eating as opposed to observing the beautiful place and listening to the conversations about the fact that most New Yorkers can’t drive a car. And Lofts costing way too much. And biking on bridges. My mind strays to panhandling. I long to play my harmonica lamely with my hat by my knee collecting my bounty of change and tracts and whatever New York gives a poor Okie like me. I admit I want New York in 100% absolute fullness for free. Or a lot of hard work. I ready myself to depart on the next adventuresome set of adventures. We head to the Upper East Side and walk and walk and walk and go into St. Patrick’s Cathedral for Palm Sunday Mass. Intense cathedral with amazingly ornate designs, statues and stain glass windows. Then the ornately robed priest or bishop (or whatever) spills a terribly long and boring speech about Christ only to be interrupted by the crowd’s dull participation part “my god my god why have you forsaken me.” And for some inexplicable reason we all start lining up. I reach the end of the line where a man holds a curious white circle. He babbles something odd and I repeat it to which he responds, “You are not Catholic, leave.” I am the essence of rejection. I wish I could exact revenge on all of Catholicism for their complete lack of understanding about what is claimed to be GOD. Popes stripped down to normal clothes and normal hats and shown to be as human as their subordinate child rapist bishops. Mary proven to be just another human like our own mothers. And Jesus shown to be GOD and supersede the pope completely eliminating him. I sit back in the terrible little pew with ridiculous kneeling bench. As if that is even kneeling. Face suspended dignified 3 feet above the earth in a quaint non-groveling position. Complete lack of humility…. Except, I am humiliated by rejection. And finally we walk and walk and walk and see hundreds of works of art that are skyscrapers blur past as we arrive at last in the Village. This is my area. This is where I can be a part of NYC. Tattoo parlors, piercing shops, bars, record stores, and restaurants all in these few streets making up a mini subculture town. We stop in at the Pizzeria and I watch a guy making pizza pour a beer into his coca-cola cup slyly. I am the only one who saw, so I scheme out this wonderfully ornate confrontation that ends with me being full of pizza and a few bucks richer… but realize it would only hurt him more than it could help me. So we walk and browse and walk until the girls feel the fashion bug biting and biding them to enter a shop. I sit outside and spange. Decrease pride for $2.25. And my harmonica playing is terrible but I am a bit closer to my goal. Tab, the driver of a limo, questions my intent and I sincerely try to make him understand my need to return to Oklahoma. And quickly we whisk ourselves away into Café Wha? Pinky, our waitress, shows and tells the single most graphic description of why the air conditioner needs to be turned down. But the pitcher of Sangria makes me forget about the cold and the fact that I can’t dance, and many other things. Then my hosts ask me why guys think like guys think. I decide to explain why I think like I do, since I do not know what all guys think, but realize in general we all think somewhat similarly. Simply put… every day is a new day, and as said by the Beatles, "let it be." And the Kung Fu playing on the TV screens distracts, and the band starts playing. Oh and they play and PLAY!!! They cover amazing songs. I am overcome by Weezer and Radiohead, and a billion other bands that life would be lame without. And this bar is filled with a bunch of us singing dancing fools. The Isle is much too tight to the point of the wait staff wading slowly through the bouncing mass sea of humanity. We all do the twist with gigantic smiles. Imperceptibly it dawns on me that I’ve been dancing for hours and walking all day. And the Sangria is wearing off so we head toward the subway to catch a few trains. And wait for a few. And walk to the loft discussing the extreme situation of capitalism. The hugely rich and the people that don’t have food. I fall face first into sleep.

I wake up disoriented and sore… but I feel great. Jan has to go take care of a situation with her friend, so I set off in hopes of getting my fare to Islip. I scrape up and down Central Park in hopes of the enormously rich helping a brother out. What I get instead is a delightful American Spirit with a very nice guy, and a Jehovah’s Witness tract from an odd lady. She doesn’t exactly know the Truth, and kinda spouts some nonsense here and there, but we gave each other things to ponder. I soon left and went on my quest. After continuously wandering with no spange luck I become discouraged enough to drop a buck on some hot food. I decide then to use a phone to see if I can catch out of LaGuardia, or JFK. No luck, so I sit organizing my thoughts into coherent actions. I know undoubtedly that I will get back to Oklahoma if GOD wills it. So I have 3 days to pick up 11-ish dollars. I did drop a quarter to a subway musician yesterday and a bone to a street vendor. So now I have $1, and need to get shuttle fare, and train fare. Ah, the niceties of vagabonding with GOD. I know you are out there and you know What’s Up, but I seriously need to chill. I keep this hope that some miracle will allow me the ability to take Jan out, and I can support some bums, and even have a decent meal. Alas, here I am trying to calm down and examine life, but I stress over 10 measly dollars. If it comes down to it I can work for 2 days or something. Sell some DIY zines, or really whatever it is that life actually brings me. I can’t hitch out, because it just isn’t the right time or place. I long for home… no, I long for Love. I love my home, but I just want the Love I feel around here. Not these faceless cold hunks of cement and hurried glances from innumerable amounts of people. Every pretty girl stabs my heart with their ability to fade into just an image created by clothes and make up. I dream of that one girl wearing them and being here, catching me totally off guard by sneaking up and kissing my neck when I need it most. But none of that exists. Only Travel, Love, and GOD… the triad that matters most to my existence. Sure, Art, Literature and music matter, but those are the forums for expressing those things. And I start to become overwhelmed by these thoughts and reflect upon different matters. I ran into a crusty on the subway earlier in the day, and decided to talk to him about grind core, because he was obviously a train hopper. The train stains and bandana screamed brutally like Saw Tooth Grin versus Assück. He said he’d been to jail for riding a few times. I am lucky (unlucky) enough to have only gotten a stupid fine. I offered him a brutal Calling Gina Clark 7” but being a transient he had no record player. We parted and I wandered as a stupid American consumer to the point of ice cream. Wonderfully unfulfilling ice cream. Soon another street musician had the end of my funds. It is humiliating and scary how incredibly capitalist this society has trained me to be, and how willingly I give into that. I ride the rails back defeated like a soulless dead creature feeling sick and end up alone. So I relieve my disappointment in self by doing martial arts. Flying off into sporadic shadow boxing and poses. Conditioning my hands against trees and stretching my limbs beyond my abilities. I push up taming tiger style and focus my breathing to the correct tempo and in through the nose out through the mouth. I slow down until I am sitting in meditation while doing isometric flexing of muscles at each IN breathe and relaxing at each OUT breathe. “WHAT IS MY PURPOSE IN LIFE!?!?!?!?!” I shout into the dark night. I wait for the answer to the question I have been asking since my eyes began to open as a child. But sadly none comes… and even worse I’ve always had the answer…. So the question becomes pointless. I walk to meet Jan at the end of the street. Soon enough I am asleep and very glad to be.

I wake up to clean my body, some dishes and trashcans. I then sit in contemplation wondering the same question I always wonder. I can’t have some distorted answer so I continue on my day normally eating and grooming, walking and talking and sleeping. Jan and I went to Coney Island which oddly enough is not an island anymore. Apparently the city has swallowed up some of the water surrounding it like a fire. The boardwalk is empty. Empty in New York sense, meaning only a few hundred or thousand people, not multitudinous amounts. The ocean sang its ever-beautiful song of crashing and swaying as we sat on a pier of broken rocks stretching into the ocean where I bottled some water for a friend. The Coney fragrance assaulted me and I realize New York’s most amazing smells come from food. And I have been devoid of those experiences completely. Tomorrow I must deviate to Tomato soup and wheat thins… and a glass of (no longer bottled) water. Then…. After my food is gone, what? Only then will tell. I beg men for money and get nothing, and I beg GOD and get the same answer to all my current questions… WAIT! I tell men “No worries” when they tell me that they have no money as they chink and click away into Starbucks to sip their drug of choice. I finished my Distro project for Jean in a nice Greenwich Village shop. Which means I am closer to my goal of having the right amount of funds. “No worries…” am I telling them, or me? I sit in McDonalds sipping water, watching passers by from the window. A woman with bulging jeans torn in all the terribly wrong places stops pushing her stroller and lights a cigarette. I am thoroughly disgusted by the smoke ticking the second hand of an innocent child’s life away and instilling an unhealthy sense of addiction. Jan and I decided to go to Roosevelt Island. There it is almost not New York for a moment. Spacious development, no trash, beautiful plants, and a house… possibly the only house in that city. I think mischievously about squatting it, but consciously realize this is New York, and terrorists are very frowned upon. True, I am not a terrorist, but squatting is suspicious. A kid hands me a beautiful flower picked from a tree. And it is all so serene. And to completely shatter the serenity we head to the Empire State building to view the massive massiveness of this never-ending city. It is a beautiful… incredibly incredible expensive experience. I am King Kong on top of this enormous building with winds akin to Oklahoma and a 25-mile view that is not something a picture can take or even begin to emulate. No one can rival the conversations about Dim Sum, and road kill with a few locals. 86 stories and the most exhilarating urge to jump. And if I had base jumping equipment I would spend the night in jail smiling about landing on a cop car, and mooning him because I was going to jail for jumping anyhow… so, might as well. Instead I have a long line, and 53 seconds of ear pop pop pop popping to endure before hitting the street. And I’m in a subway and up a street and stairs in a couch with my paper and pen feverously recounting as always I do. Happily reflecting on my time eating out the big apple. If I didn’t recount these things I’d miss a grand portion of my life to the throes of time. I long for dreams of love and imagine that Dim Sum make out sessions are much needed.

I wake wondering if I dreamt of anything notable. I woke up much earlier than I’d imagine, so relaxation was definitely the order of the moment. A long bath and a long shit are some of the best parts about being a human. I finished half of my tomato soup, and my wheat thins. Then I returned to my question. I put on all black to symbolize my internal lack of understanding, as dark is a lack of light. I hopped on completely random subways trains, and followed random people, and watched random feet to find a random path. I ended up in a Catholic Church, where there were no people or open doors inside. So I asked aloud once again for purpose. I left and walked aimlessly searching intently until I heard someone behind me say something, I wasn’t sure I heard right. “Fuck you bitch!!” I ignored it for a second. Until it was obvious he was talking to me. So I turned to be greeted by a kind “Don’t fucking look at me.” So as he passed me by I said “You don’t have to be that way,” while staring intensely at him. He decides to retort with more nonsensical insults and I decide to follow him, to which he responds that I should not. For the safety of others I decide I will follow him, with ready fists in case a poor hapless soul decides he has gone much too far. He is now shouting at a man in a doorway. The guy tells him angrily he’d better be careful whom he pops off to, and I verbally agree with him only to be greeted with an “I thought I fucking told you to stop following me or I’d kick your ass.” This evokes my adrenaline to flow in mass amounts through my veins and my muscles to tense in readiness. I wish I could actually stop the process, but in the fight or fear dilemma, I cannot force fear of a mere human. Fortunately for his medical insurance, and my police record, the worst case scenario fades into nonexistence as he leaves into an apartment, and I into the subway to breath out aggression and let the adrenaline run its course and out. So I get lost again amidst the twisting tubular tunnels. I am fast approaching my breaking point. Tomorrow means I get half a container of soup, breakfast and lunch and dinner. Unless I can acquire enough funding to get my ticket, and have enough extra to eat some bomb food. I crave an answer to this constant question… nothing said all night, nothing said in all my life (hope’s the CARROT). And that is how it is. I am like the horse running around chasing this insurmountable goal of enlightenment. But I am still running, and walking sometimes, and sitting, and sprinting. I often think I should return to the system, plug myself into the television and turn off my mind. I’ve been separated for what? So far it seems just to ask this question constantly to the avail of being bettered by lack of an answer. Here am I, where are you GOD? I can’t blame You, though if I were GOD, I’d probably be in Hawaii instead of New York right now. So I give in to the future. That’s right, hello capitalism, hello credit card, and hello stuff. And Dojo is the best restaurant I’ve been too. Beautiful veggie burger in a pita with a salad and potato pieces. No improbable sign to wait for, because I am as much a part of my destiny as GOD. Inseparably we are 2 halves of the same being. But I am just Kevin Luke Dahl, no saint and no devil. I no longer bum stogies, and purchase a pouch of American Spirit to roll for the bums that need one. Then I went to Starbucks, that loathsome place I had mocked. That’s right I got a giant café latte with soymilk and cinnamon syrup to boot. No more shouting needlessly for an answer. Here’s to just being alive and making it as I am, no more, and no le$$. Here’s to music as I am, literature as I am, art as I am, love as I am, philosophy and religion and everything else exactly as I am. “Who am I?” Me! “What is my purpose?” to be and not care what anyone thinks in judgment of my life. I will take Jan out, I will help out bums, I will get back to Oklahoma. I’ll kick the crap out of that jerk-ass if he starts messing with anyone while I’m around. GOD, you’re Existence and give to those who ask, or take or pursue… and I’ve asked and now I’m grabbing life once and for all. Let’s go! The world is an oyster and seafood is something I’ve forgotten my love of for much too long. So cook it up, and let’s eat. Repercussions are there to be dealt with. I cannot cope, unless there is something to cut out. I’m cutting out all the bullshit society deems nessecary and keeping the rest… or I’ll die trying. And everyone else can deal with it, or realize they are just humans like me, and then they can be someone vastly different than I am.

I go sit in Astor Place next to the black cube and smoke a stogie until a raver comes up and bums 2 from me for a couple swigs of HG800. Then I go make a few collages for Todd, Shelby, Joleen, Matt, and Eric. Then I watch some breakers spinning and flipping, and sliding and gliding until Jan walks up so we can hit the road. We walk to Taco Bell, because she decides Taco Bell is the bomb… I decide to go with her venture and purchase the meal happily. Then we stroll through the village until we decide to walk from 550 Huron down to 32 Huron where the Real World was filmed. Tasie text messages me, and I let my sis know how Jan and New York are. As Jan and I walk we discuss the inner workings of existence and end up at the WTC site. There is a giant cross-made of some cross beams found in the rubble. The former Trade Center Towers now look like some ruins from the Holy Roman Empire out of a grade school textbook. The Army men stand restlessly around the place clutching their murder devices menacingly. And they are in the substations and finally we get back home. I sleep upside down, which is oodles better than the other way and wish I had turned my life around days ago. Ah well… c’est la vie (that’s life). Jan dyes her hair and I drift into the comfortable arms of sleep.

I woke up finished my collages, made Jean a brutacular poster and packed to leave this wonderful, terrible, beautiful, tragic place. I wrote Jan a note, and stepped out into the infinity. D’OH, I forgot my toothbrush and towel. Heh heh. I none-the-less take the subway to 6th Ave and go get some crullers and coffee… I mean cwaffee. I love dipping donuts into cwaffee. Oddly the cup o’ Joe came with cream already inside it. Jan rung my cell and told me about my moment of stupidity, and we decide to meet at Penn Station, where I’ll be buying my ticket. At the train station I sit in a cubical bathroom with airplane toilet and read a street sheet I got from some nice bum called BIG news. It has some amazing articles about Truth, and lies. As I leave the cubicle my pocket vibrates telling me Jan is nearby and we chat until we realize we are less than 10 feet apart and can’t see each other. I spot her brown sweater and we chat about a few things before I must depart. She has friends coming soon to stay next week, but they are scared of New York and their parents are afraid they will die or something atrocious. I muse on the fact that I told Jan I was coming from a Chicago airport, a few hours before I’d arrive, and my wanderings alone through Queens. We quickly say our goodbyes and I’ speeding towards Ronkonkoma reading my BIG news. I read on and am elated by the respect for Truth the issue gives. I tire of reading and decide to hum out grind core and obnoxiously tap my feet rapidly and scream quietly. I think of Wade being in New York and think he’d love the trip and chance to play music on the streets and sing his heart out to the mass throngs of uncaring and occasional emotive soul. Soon I am walking toward the shuttle and soon I am walking towards the airport. I wait in line with my carryon and snicker as a man tries to check chicken on the plane…, which becomes an amazing checked chicken fiasco. Wonderful!! Then through the security x-ray, pat down points and onto my destiny… Pizza! The food I have craved most here on account of some amazing reptilian martial artists wearing shells, who as it appears, are not really in New York. I swig the thought down with a cherry coke, and recap my trip in my head and know I have forgotten to write some of the best parts, because really that is for me and me alone.


For beauty is nothing, but the beginning of terror, which we are all, barly able to endure, cause we are all so awed by false serenity, as it disdains to annihilate us…
And so I hold myself back and swallow the call-note of my dark sobbing.
Ah, whom can we ever turn to in our need?