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It’s a big city, right? What’s the tally? 8,000,000 people? Something like that?

Like many other NYC-centric bloggers (those of us who are left, that is), I am frequently prone to scouring through various search engines with random, abstract directives for images like “New York City” and “Punk Rock” or “NYC’ and “Record Shop.” The best results usually come when I just put in a year, like “1992” or something. I’m always curious what’s going to come up.

When images do come up, I’m always looking for period-specific minutia to write about, be that a particular landmark or storefront or evidence of some person, place or thing that is simply no longer there — but specifically one that will speak to my own experience. Unlike many other nostalgic blogs, I tend to exclusively couch my posts in personal anecdotes or associations. I’m sure a psychiatrist could have a field day with that. Maybe it’s the manifestation of my midlife crisis. Instead of buying a Porsche or getting a tattoo, I’m trying to keep my encroaching age at bay by keeping the past alive on my blog. So be it.

Anyway, blah blah blah. Nine times out of ten, these searches come up with images that don’t really resonate specifically with me (and I again wonder why people take so many damn pictures of Times Square). I also sometimes narcissistically wonder — despite the vast amount of people here and the strenuously unlikely chance of my happening upon it — if I’ve ever been inadvertently captured by a photographer. Wouldn’t it be a gas to suddenly find a picture of yourself from 1984 or something? One that you didn’t know about? Well, that’s yet to happen.

That said, I was stopped in my tracks this afternoon by a photo of a guy I actually know … or kinda know. Or kinda knew, I should say.

Back in the summer of 2007, those of you who were reading this blog will doubtlessly remember the epic saga of my sudden lack of employment. I’d been working for MTV News Online for about a year and a half, when I was suddenly, somewhat unceremoniously, laid off from the job. As these things tend to do, it really took the wind out of my sails, although, that experience was nothing compared to a lay off I’d experience six years later. But if you’re a New Yorker, y’know, like death, layoffs pretty much come for us all, at one point or another.

In any case, after getting the keys to the street from Music Television, I commenced searching for a job with the aid of a now ridiculously antiquated laptop the wife and I shared, and I undertook this endeavor largely within the confines of a short-lived local “internet cafe” (remember those?) called Gizzi’s on West 8th Street. Free WiFi still being a somewhat rarified thing at the time, I took full advantage of Gizzi’s hospitality, ordering cup after cup of coffee to earn the right to keep sitting in that place. By day, the spot was filled with laptop jockeys like myself, while by night, Gizzi’s endeavored to inject a bit of Greenwich Village bohemian history in the mix by hosting open mic nights. Not sure if that particular venture ever really took off, though.

So, anyway, as described in this ancient post, Gizzi’s was staffed by day by a duo of amiable youngsters. One was a comely, doe-eyed lass with a not-entirely-unpleasant penchant for wearing disarmingly form-fitting t-shirts, while her partner in coffee-slinging was a rail-thin, wiry metalhead whose name I, sadly, never learned.

I’m sure he initially dismissed me as just another annoying “normo” until I, one day, engaged him about his feelings for vintage Venom, which — in turn — led to a detailed discussion regarding the oeuvre of his favorite black metal band, that being Darkthrone. He was always dressed from head-to-toe in black, naturally, usually augmenting his togs with a bullet belt, spikes of some variety and the inevitable band t-shirt, offset by cascading strands of black, mossy hair. Despite his tonsorial and sartorial predilections, however, he was a very affable, chatty gent. 

I remained a regular at Gizzi’s for some time, until I finally landed a gig at MSN in March of 2008. After that, I pretty much never set foot in Gizzi’s again.

Eight years later, Gizzi’s is long gone. It’s now a joint I’ve never patronized called Cafe Nadery. I stayed at MSN for two years before decamping to TODAY.com, where I worked for another four and half years before also getting laid off. Over a year later, I mercifully landed the job I now hold (and love).

But, in perusing through images on Magnum Photos this afternoon, I came across the below photo by one Michael Christopher Brown, snapped in 2008 for a fashion spread in Ventiquattro Magazine. I’ll never know his name, nor will I probably ever see or speak to him again, but THIS was the wiry metalhead java-jockey from Gizzi’s on West 8th Street, presumably waiting on 14th Street for a Brooklyn-bound L Train…..