11,424. RUDIMENTS, pt. 545

RUDIMENTS, pt. 545

('hey, where you come from')

I used to buy macaroons,

somewhere down by Clinton

or Forsyth Street  -  the place

is gone now, a corner sort of

bakery. I'm not sure why I

just thought of that, but they

were really good. I'm not

even really a macaroons

sort of person, and I don't

think macaroons themselves

are particularly Jewish, but

this was a Jewish Bakery.

Not Gertel's, on Hester Street;

and not Jonah Schimmel's

on East Houston. They were

both good, and had their own

shtick, as it were, but this

was different. And don't get

me wrong  -  I didn't set out

on macaroon-buying trips; it's

just that, as I'd be up and walking

about, I'd get near the place and

then think to stop in. My friend,

Pauley, tended bar, of what it

was, at a place near there called

Lotus, or the Lotus. The Lotus

was cool. First off, it inhabited

an entire corner, at Clinton

Street and Stanton Street.

One side of it  -  same big

room  - was for sitting and

reading, books all around,

magazines, etc., and coffee,

and the other side, around a

half divide but still open and

connected, was the bar  -  where

Pauley worked. It was never

really crowded, in the times

we were there, off hours probably.

Any people I ever saw at the bar

side were high-class couples,

by dress and appearance anyway,

probably slumming an afternoon

away at a bar. Expensive date

types. Pauley was cool; short

and active. He was genial and

flip with his words; always

good stuff. There was always

a Guinness ready when I'd slink

in. He'd talk, hang about, watch

things. I did the coffee side too,

numerous times, but always ended

back over to him too, for another

Guinness  -  what we started

calling 'liquid bread.'

-

That was one clientele, let's say.

Another time, way uptown,

different spot entirely, we're

up in the east 70's, maybe

77th and Fifth, something

like that, by some French

School or French Embassy

or something. There's a nice

little Frenchy-pooh coffee shop

and crumpet place with tables

out on the street, etc. We walk

over, get a table, and walk inside

to get some coffee and whatever,

and, there's Pauley! In his apron,

at work  -  tables, coffee, etc.

It's mostly the Metropolitan

Museum of Art crowd, from

across the street and up a few

blocks. He comes over to our

table and sits a second, and I

say, 'OK, what's up? How's

this going on?' He smiles, and

says, 'It's my Sunday gig. Way

better deal, lots more money

floating around, and it's what

I do anyway. Some days I get

more here than I do in a whole

week downtown.' The guy was

living the high life, in style!

-

The mix was breathtaking.

Down on the lower east side,

I had a friend who used to live

right around there, where Pauley's

place was, and in 1978 it was all

one could do to safely arrive

home, let alone enter and

walk up the stairs to your

apartment. It was vicious

and brutal, a torrid no-man's

land for sure. As he used to

say : in New York you could

lose friends just because of

where you lived. That was

vividly true. It went, in the

same way, for uptown, for

after you passed the wealth

and the gloryland of upper

Fifth Avenue, once you

made it into the 90's,

eastside. I knew a girl, a

white girl, who lived alone,

in the higher east 90's, and

every time we parted it was

as if it was the last I'd ever

see her. Not just me, all of us.

We just felt she was doomed

and time was slowly on its

mission to her. Geography

back then operated on totally

different terms than what

anyone may think of today.

There was death and

delusion everywhere,

and the code word

was 'watch-out.'

-

Maybe only three or four

times did I think it was

over for me  -  the wrong

neighborhood, way out of

my own turf, wrong train

or stayed too long on the

train I was on. Once or

twice, it was truly dreadful  -

no man's lands of broken

glass, rubble, bricks and

abandoned buildings and

God knows what else. I

managed to survive. The

most funny part was, any

number of years back then

in any of those places the

worst things could have

happened to me, but it was

only later when, one time,

they taken over a portion

of east 11th street and faked

it up for look like Russian

immigrant lower east side

streets, ('Novy Mir Working

Man's Cafe') for the film

'Ragtime,' and I was there

on an off-day strolling

around with my camera and

stuff, and some security guys

comes flying out of his post

and says, 'Get out of here! Are

you crazy? Anybody sees you

with the camera equipment

around here, you're a dead

man. I warn you  - turn

around! Go back!' And this

was from a security guy no

less! We took heed, turned

heel, and walked off quickly.

But from that moment we

felt that anything - anyone

behind us or alongside of

us was terror. What a weird

feeling all that was until we

got the relative safety of

broader Second Ave. That

crazy guy had gotten us

way spooked!

-

Home turf, or traveling and

out, like Pauley, it mattered,

fir the return you'd get, what

areas you put the effort. Want

to die or get missed up? OK,

go there. A little less? Go there,

over that direction. Everything

was by degrees, and  -  should

you wish it  -  you could get,

in one night, all the trouble

and grief you'd normally get

in a week, there. At any forlorn

moment, one expected to hear,

'Hey, where you come from?'

-

In the 1970's era I'm speaking

of, two things mainly ran the

show  -  at the level of what

I'm speaking of anyway. Drugs,

and Sex. Men (and I speak only 

for that crustacean gender), of

the lower economic levels, 

in search of either of those

mentioned commodities, would

go to these base places, taking

life and limb in hand, as it

were, for satisfaction of their

momentary desires. A man 

with real money could 'buy' 

the services he sought in most

any, regular, higher tier,

midtown locale  -  brothel,

seedy hotel, whatever. But the

lower-tier guys, as I said,

seeking the say 25 dollar 

threshold of fun, would

actually, while in harm's way,

get themselves to such places.

Some never returned, others

were robbed blind, brutally

beaten, or simply castoff.

There would never be any

reckonings or accountability,

so it all little mattered, and

dumb is, most assuredly, dumb.

I'm probably off a little anyway, 

because there was an area, as

well, along by where is now Javits

Center, where you could get sex of

whatever sort you were after, at

even cheaper rates, if you didn't 

mind using your car. Morning after

morning, through the 70's and into

the '80's there, the God-forsaken

morning street would be littered

with used condoms.  They actually

had a name by which hey were 
referred to, but I forget it right now. 
Like 'Coney Island Whitefish,' but

that was for used condoms that
washed up on shore or littered the 
beach. A whole new meaning to 
'where you come from?'