315. DEAD HIPPIES
It doesn't always
take a magician to
make magic. Things
have a way of doing
it themselves : the
magic of disappearance,
or the magic of appearing,
coming back, returning,
if even in a different
guise. At 85 W. 3rd
Street was the house
in which Edgar Allen
Poe had lived, with his
wife, I think, when he
he wrote The Raven.
He lived in other
locations over time
as well, but this one
was nearby, quite
accessible to me,
and, I thought,
welcoming. In
addition to the
old Northern
Dispensary, of
which I've also
written, here, early
on, these two places
formed, amidst these
streets I was living
upon, my own small
circle of place. It
was always very
warming for me
to have this. I'd
go here, and just
sit - across the
street there was
some sort of a
fire house or
something, and
there were a
few places to sit
- not benches
or anything,
because in 1967
the world wasn't
yet quite that 'all-
welcoming' and
open, but parts of
the stonework and
foundations of the
buildings which
had places to sit
on. I'd just do
there; lost in my
own references.
That was '67, '68,
long back. In
about 2005 NYU,
as it usually does,
gobbled this up
to - rapacious
land-users that
they are. Local
and neighborhood
opposition went
on for a while,
but the University
won. Funny thing;
their idea of solving
this puzzle was to
re-erect, on the
front portion of
their new construction,
what they call a
'reconstruction'
of the old Poe House.
It's right there; I
guess the same
bricks and windows
and all, which they
must have saved. It
looks like that
anyway, but it's
all false - just a
fake front wall
of what-once-was,
slapped right onto
the new construction
- offices, doorway
and school stuff.
Pretty funny. Ersatz
as all get-out, but
it still passes itself
off as historic,
and not everyone's
the wiser for it.
-
Now all NYU need
do is make up some
good, walloping
stories about the
place, and ring
up some student
guides who like
to talk and babble
about made-up
stuff, and they
could have a real
go of it. If everything
reaches an eventual
plateau enough of
unreality, then they
could own that
'narrative' pretty
darn well and
near to complete,
as well.
-
Over at the
Studio School,
I used to revel
in the atmospherics
of the past therein.
That was a real
humdinger of a
building : a
joining of what
was once three
brownstones,
into one, and
an adjoining
building which
was used as a
Youth Hostel.
The Studio School
portion of it all,
those three
interconnected
buildings, you'd
maybe never know
about, except for
the endless and
twisty, long
stairways and
the sort of
non-directional
way a lot of the
halls and spaces
went. There wasn't
a real 'road map'
for the unified
building, so at first,
for me, a lot of it
was hit or miss,
or hit and miss,
or whatever is
said in that phrase.
Mysteries abounded
- plus there was
the usual assortment
of 'haunted' and
'ghosts' and 'noises'
in the night. None
of it true, of course.
I should know because
I lived there, in the
basement, for a
good period of
my time there -
having been blasted
out of my own
place on e11th
when the cops
busted it and took
everything and
everyone away.
I had already moved
out because they'd
turned the whole
place into a mess
of people. 16 at
last count, AWOL
military kids, running
off to Canada. We'd
been running it as
a safe-house of
sorts, and it
blossomed into
a mass-evacuation
center for people
on the run from
Vietnam service.
A lot more too,
but I'm not going
into that now. I
sensed the end
was near, and
just stopped
going back -
after the one
time that no one
knew who I was.
I had to say,
'Well, fine fellows
and gals, it's actually
MY apartment you
see.' That was it
for me. I let Andy
Bonomo run with
it, and eventually
so many bad things
started happening
that they all got
taken away and
the stupid apartment
was police-taped
like a God-damned
murder scene.
Which it was too,
but I'm not going
there right now either.
So I started staying
in the basement of
the Whitney, I mean
Studio School,
where, after Mercedes
Matter and other
got wind of my
plight, it was
realized that they,
suddenly, really
would like a 'night
watchmen' on
premise. There
were all sorts
of creaks and
noises, but I
never saw any
untoward visages,
ghosts, spirits,
ghouls or vampires
either, for that
matter. But, man
oh man, if I had a
narrative of my
own made up,
I could'a been
as big as
P. T. Barnum.
-
That's all this life
is; a fiction. It's a
piece of this and
a piece of that,
all stuck together
and given a scene
in which to play.
How strange it
all is. In a way,
at one level, I always
wanted to either
'tell' my story, or
'sell' my story. I
never did sell it, and
am still pretty much
a pauper; but I sure
do tell it, I guess.
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