We're in Manhattan. A bar on the Lower East Side, to be precise. The liquor is
flowing, the music is pumping, and the night is young. Amid all the commotion sits a painting of two people in a quiet, empty bar. I guess in itself nothing unusual, but I couldn't help looking at it throughout the night.
The bar in the painting is dimly lit, but not so much that you don't notice the red
interior of the entire establishment. The effect is to give the place
the glow of an ember. That slow unassuming burn that hides behind it
the potential for a roaring blaze. A guy and a girl are sitting there
two or three bar stools apart. They're the only two at the bar, as even
the bartender has absented himself for the moment. They aren't talking
to each other. Not yet, at least.
The two of them are both dressed up, and you can tell immediately that
tonight is a night where they both desire to see and be seen. The girl
is wearing her trusty black dress. The one with the low back to show
off her toned muscles. I can't see her face, but by the way she's
standing it's clear to me she isn't meek. This is a girl who knows what
she wants, and tonight she wants to be old-fashioned; to be courted.
And so she holds her martini in hand and lazily watches the bottles
adorning the back wall. But we know she didn't come all the way out here to
inspect bottles (as if her gaze would somehow force them out of their inert state).
You can tell that the girl senses the guy sitting to her left. Probably as soon as he took his
seat. This evening, he's chosen to wear a well-fitted black pinstripe
suit. Red tie, white fedora. On his powerful frame, the combination
gives him a regal air. I can't see his shoes, but I assume they're
wingtips. Meticulously polished. He's holding a cigar in his right
hand, and his head is turned slightly to the right. The brim of his hat
hides his eyes, but you can tell he's looking at the girl. His
intentions are made clear to me when I see his wry smile. He's had just
the right amount of alcohol. Enough to jump-start his game but not
enough to dull his reflexes. The universe has brought these two souls
together into this space; into this moment. It's up to them now to
ascertain for what purpose. And so without taking his eyes off the
girl, he reaches over for his drink, turns toward the girl and . . .
Freeze.
The rest I don't know. The painting stopped the universe for these two
people in that magnificent moment when you first begin to take action and anything and everything are still possible. The outcome--good,
bad, or otherwise--is somewhat irrelevant at that point. What matters is that you've set yourself on a course
where there will BE an outcome--a cab ride home together, a phone number
on a cocktail napkin, a drink in the face. No matter what, there will be proof that you didn't just
do nothing.
Anyway, for some odd reason I felt this strange painting captured the magic of the city. I
don't know what it is about New York but it inspires a fire within to
take action (and I'm not just talking about spitting game). I think
maybe it has to do with how everything there is typically the best
of its kind. And of course if you believe yourself to be the best, New
York is the place to get confirmation, one way or the other. Pack
millions of believers onto a little island, and the result is pure
electricity.
As our party moved about from place to place last night, getting
mixed up in that electric current, I couldn't help but feel that energy
washing over me. A gritty grimy baptism of sorts. That in no way means
I'm packing up for New York or otherwise feel the need to determine the
status of my bestness. But I will say the collective energy of people who've
decided inaction doesn't suit them is truly infectious. And a little tingly.
-KM
"Concrete jungle where dreams are made of."
