Today was my kids' penultimate day of school. Effectively this means that after tomorrow, we shan't be doing our twice-daily trek through the East Village anymore. For the last nine months, my wife has been undertaking that twenty-five minute expedition through those decidedly stroller-phobic streets. When I started my sabbatical from the office in March, I took over the task. Being a Brit, Peg hadn't spent a great amount of time in that neck of the city, thus doesn't quite share my affinity for it. Having spent a large portion of my teens and twenties exploring the neighborhood (then a decidedly different place), I haven't minded the trips so much. Either way, I doubt either of us will miss the regular sneers from the crusties, hipsters and sullen teenagers in meticulously-weathered t-shirts that extol the merits of long-since defunct hardcore bands. Evidently, the mere sight of our stroller sullied their bohemian fantasyland, when the truth of the matter is that this neck of the woods sadly stopped being that sort of place a long, long time ago.
In any case, while my wife will probably never willingly set foot east of Third Avenue again (our kids are going to a different school next year), I'm positive I'll be back there, albeit in a much less frequent capacity. As such, after I dropped Charlotte off today, I decided another picture-taking stroll was in order. Herewith the fruits of that stroll.
A quick word about the above shot. Banana Fish Zero was a band in the 90's that was fronted by a friend of mine from college named John. They were originally called Bananafish -- a J.D. Salinger homage -- until some legal problems forced them to change the name. They put out a couple of discs and were a regular fixture on the live circuit for a while. I haven't seen hide nor hair of John in quite some time now. As far as I know, the band has long-since broken up (I think John's formed a new ensemble since then). I just love the fact that his old stickers can still be found.
I originally wasn't going to include the above pic, but it's a tiny patch of street that never fails to make my two kids giggle like hyaenas, so I figured I might as well put it up. Imagine the scenario: you're strolling along Fifth street in the East Village and you suddenly come across a fresh, virginal square of wet concrete. Pulled by the familiar urge to leave your mark, you grab the nearest pointy implement and scrawl something in the slowly-hardening pavement. It happened to me one drunken evening in 1996 on the corner of East 12th street & B'way in front of the Strand bookstore (I carved out "Kiss Rules" -- you can still faintly make it out today). In this instance, the anonymous party saw fit to simply spell out the word "POOP." The mind reels as to the reasons why.
Lastly, I thought I'd include the photo below to underscore the point that while I'm fascinated by certain graffiti and street art, it's not always a good thing. On the way to school this morning, I noticed that someone had painted (in rather large, white, dripping block letters) "THANKS, BITCHES & PRICKS!" on the facade of the block-wide public school between 6th and 7th streets and Avenue B. I found that to be somewhat profoundly sad. Later on that morning, I passed by again, finding this poor school attendant painstakingly removing it.
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