Archive Page 42

17
Feb
06

My Barber

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: New York and The People in Your Neighborhood
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Call me a tightwad, but I refuse to spend $40 on a men’s haircut. Changing the color or texture? Sure, I’ll pay for it. (In more ways than one. I am an ugly blonde.) But clipping me from one and a half inches to one inch? Sorry. A specialized skill, yes, but not rocket science.

This stubbornness has gotten me in trouble more than a few times. I lucked out with the nice Vietnamese lady at Cost Cutters back in Minnneapolis, where I paid $12. But sometimes she wasn’t in, and the sub would invariably screw it up. Sometimes if I was feeling adventurous, the nice moustachioed homosexual gentleman (who looked like a non-verbal Mark Twain — he seemed to communicate only with gentle grunts and the reassuring clicking together of his many gold bracelets), at Great Clips one strip mall over, would give it his best. But he usually went too short or trimmed up the back in a weird shape.

Not long after starting my job on the Lower East Side, I found my place. There’s a $9 barber — the least I’ve ever paid — about five blocks away. It’s a father-and-son operation. And typical of many small New York City businesses, these barbers also repair broken watches and replace batteries on the side.

Because … well, why not?

They’re from Uzbekistan, I think, or somewhere in eastern Europe. I once asked the son if they were Russian, and he said yes. But then the next time I saw him, he explained that they were actually Uzbek. Or whatever it was. (I wish I remembered.) So I don’t know. All I know is they are Jewish. Not that this fact is in any way remotely related to barbering.

These guys do a fine job, but they could use a little help keeping the place clean. I’ve seen occasional roaches crawling up the walls or across the sink. But they don’t wash my hair there. So who cares? I’ve seen roaches in my own kitchen, and I don’t shoo visitors away from it.

Plus: It’s Nine Dollars — for a perfectly functional haircut. (Still, it wouldn’t kill them to tidy up a bit.)

I prefer when the son cuts my hair. He’s probably in his mid-20s. Dark features. Heavy, but not fat. Robust. Thick arms and fingers. He was probably shaving once a day at age 13. He remembers me and always says hi when I step in on my lunch break. He does a better job than his dad.

When a bad barber’s chair is free, should I wait for another barber who I trust? Anyone would. It’s common. But it always felt rude to me. It’s just a haircut, and I’m kinda in a hurry, so why fuss? I’m pretty utilitarian about it. If it’s bad, I have my Detroit Tigers cap. And it’ll always grow back again.

The father is a big old bear of a man. When he leans in to cut, his ample belly presses against my arm and he has to stretch to reach. The main problem with this is the fog of body odor that tumbles out of his shirt sleeves whenever he raises his arms. He keeps his brow furrowed at all times, and he keeps his mouth firmly shut in a frown — which is a good thing, because his breath also smells terrible. Sometimes he sighs heavily through his nose, and I catch a whiff. I try to match his breathing so I don’t inhale when he exhales.

He’s quiet, unlike his son, who asks me about work, tells me about the new coffee shop in the neighborhood (right next door to his uncle’s shoe-repair shop — nudge, nudge — I love the Lower East Side), tells me about his sister-in-law who is having a baby. I’m not attracted to him, but I like being around him. He’s so comfortable. I guess I feel safe around him or something.

The last time the father cut my hair, everything looked good at the shop. But when I got back to my office and caught a glimpse in the mirror, I saw that the front part on the left side was about a half-inch longer than on the right. Combed over, as he had done, it all blended. But flat against my forehead? We had problems.

So, I wetted my hair down when I got home that night and took a pair of clippers and snipped a better line across my forehead.

Good as new.

Nine Dollars. What can I expect?

I’m totally going back.

16
Feb
06

Objets d’Amour

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Life the Universe and Everything and People We Like
Tags: ,

I like to have objects around me that remind me of Jeff

When I’m tearing through the house in the morning, getting ready for work, making lunches (for both of us), replaying and rehashing the argument from the night before, rehearsing stupidly the things I SHOULD have said, I get stopped by a rose standing in the center of the dining room table. He brought that rose home the night before Valentine’s Day. It’s from Rite Aid or somewhere. Not a big deal. But it was a surprise. And it was after I’d sent him out after his own cigarettes when I’d refused to get them for him. It is a lovely single red rose, which always looks dramatic and beautiful by itself. I was so delighted by it, and if I could I would keep it forever.

It reminds me of what’s important. Not the stupid argument, which we were pretty much over by the time we went to bed — until I had my and-another-thing moment in the shower in the morning.

I certainly hope Jeff has a similar outlook about love-infused objects. After keeping him awake all last night by moving in my sleep, I feel terrible. And I’m kinda scared of what revenge lies in store for me. Maybe he’ll look at a photographn on his desk and remember that he loved me … once … well, heck, Eric isn’t all that bad, is he?

15
Feb
06

A Lesson Learned

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: New York Lessons
Tags: , ,

I walked into Kossar’s this morning on the way to work, asked for a single everything bagel, and dug out my wallet. To my horror, I discovered not a single one-dollar bill. Just the dreaded twenties. The blood drained from my face as the bagel lady grabbed a square of tissue paper and fished out a bagel.

“Nevermind,” I said. “I don’t have any small bills. Nevermind.”

“Huh?” she said.

“Nevermind,” I repeated. “No small bills.”

She glanced down at the bagel she was just about to stuff into a paper bag, looking somewhat put out, then back up at me. She seemed on teh verge of saying something. Rather than let her offer to give it to me on credit, as she had done once before to my humiliation, I threw open the door and leaped out onto the sidewalk.

As I high-tailed it the hell out the there, I hated myself quietly. So stupid! I thought. I almost didn’t even go in — why did I have to get a bagel anyway? Why didn’t I check my wallet first? As the self-admonishment faded, I recognized a weak buzz of pride from within. I can learn from my mistakes.

15
Feb
06

To the Dogs

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Animals and New York
Tags: ,

Walking from my gym to the E train at 8th avenue last night, I had occasion to pass Penn Station. I saw a dog shitting on the corner and its owner picking up the pieces. The wee thing was shivering violently and looking as if the cold were some kind of punishment. “Just give me the rolled-up newspaper!” I could hear him calling. “As long as it’s indoors!” Must be an out-of-town dog, I thought. New Yorkers love to dress their dogs in ridiculous outfits.

I passed by.

As I crossed 8th, there was another woman walking two dogs. I passed by.

Then there was a man holding a little bulldog. Carrying him across the street. Well, it’s slushy and cold. What a nice guy. I passed by.

Then I saw a great big cage on wheels. OK, a kennel on wheels. In it was a beautiful breed, though I’ll be damned if I know what it was.

OK, what’s going on here?

My eyes travelled along across the street ahead of me, from the kennel-on-casters all the way to Madison Square Garden. It was a surreal, orderly, linear exodus of dogs and owners. Some were caged. Some were carried carried. The majority were on foot. It all depended on their size and preciousness. The kennelled ones were witout exception skinny little things, shivering horribly, unused to such harshness. Great big ones lumbered by, sniffing all the random objects before them — the garbage can, the empty planter, the mailbox, other dogs — anything within leash range. One owner pulling a kennel was trying to surmount the snow drift between him and a taxi. The wheels were stuck and the dogs looked completely freaked out.

All these breeds, and there wasn’t a Siberian husky among them that would help pull?

It was like the Ark had just docked into a West-side pier. Not Noah’s, but rather his younger, less intelligent, rather more myopic brother. There were several varieties of terrier, a dalmatian, precious shih tzus, a robust English mastiff, a shaggy and ostentatiously tall Afghan, a couple enormous great Danes, French bulldogs in triplicate, several kinds of spaniels, border collies, bizarrely sculpted poodles (at least their haunches were warm, I thought), some creatures that looked like miniature greyhounds, or really big four-legged spiders, I couldn’t tell.

Ah… of course. This is the after-party of the Westminster Dog Show. Funny how the show’s lustre is dimished somewhat as soon as the animals are forced to deal with the real outside world and everyone’s rushing back to the Hotel Pennsylvania for a rub-down in the doggie spa and a snausage night cap after such a long and tiresome day. Even at events where it’s the humans being judged, the red-carpet affairs, when everyone shows up individually to make a carefully timed appearance, is where the glitz and glamour play out. But at the end of show, when everyone has a kid to tuck in or a martini with their name on it, we are all reduced to cattle.

The canine queue stretched all the way into the loading bay of the Garden, far back into the innards of the building. These must be champions. They were all certainly well-behaved. With the exception of the first little pup I saw, who I’m nt concinved was with this crew, I saw not a single turd among them.

10
Feb
06

Sometimes You Just Find Yourself Backstage with a Stripper

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Bar Stories, Gay and New York
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Against my better judgment, late last night on my way home from the bar, we stopped in at our local. So close to the E train; who can resist? It was the typical “just one drink” scenario. But the hot bartender convinced me to get a second one. “But a stripper is coming out soon,” he said.

Ah, yes. They always do strippers on Thursday nights at this place. I might as well check it out, eh?

The barman was mixing extra strong. He poured the vodka for about 10 minutes and then splashed some cranberry on top and poured on more vodka. If I’d been near an open flame, it would have exploded. Then he gave us tequila shots out of nowhere. It’s nice to know the bartenders, because they let us kiss them on the cheeks, and they’re generous with us, and sometimes we can convince them to take their shirts off, but needing to wake early to work the next day, it was not a good night to receive this brand of generosity.

Having just finished lip synching a South American torch song, a drag queen was talking to the audience rapidly and breathlessly in Spanish. I comprehended nothing until I caught the word “stripper.” She wound up and pitched his name … “Willy.”

Willy emerged from behind a velvety red curtain and unceremoniously climbed on top of a box that was standing where the pool table usually is. He wasn’t much of a dancer, but he sure was extraordinary to look at. Typically overmuscled for my taste, but a fine example of male perfection and perfect for mindless entertainment.

They never go all nude here, which is fine. It’s vulgar enough as it is to have a stuffed thong flopping over your head and a stranger’s feet much closer to your drink than you’d prefer as a narcissistic straight man tiptoes by gracelessly in construction boots. The guys usually tease you with a quick tug on their overimagined underwear. Maybe they’ll wag themselves like propellers as they convulse to the Latin dance music. But this guy didn’t need to tease. He didn’t need to strip. It was all visible, because he was wearing knee-length britches (I can’t think of a better word) that were skin tight, but very expandable, red — and made from something that resembled macrame. It was all there, fully inflated, barely held in and pressed against his abdomen by the … well, special trousers.

I just don’t know what to do with a stripper. I like to watch from a distance and not participate. To my way of thinking, they are for viewing. I can gratify their egos just fine without touching them. I don’t touch the artwork at the Met. Plus they’re greasy. No one takes home a stripper, except his girlfriend, who is usually ostentatiously stationed nearby with a couple of gal pals drinking things with paper umbrellas. She glares over her drink. “Just here to keep an eye on that man. He’s mine, bitch,” her narrowed, over-eyeshadowed eyes seem to say.

You can have him, missy.

He was very popular. To each his own, I say, definitely, but the pawing of the spectators makes them seem doubly unsexy in comparison to the thing they’re worshipping. Honestly, don’t the dancers prefer not to be groped? If I happen to find myself too close to one, I know he’ll hover over me, dangling his engorged man-flesh, waiting for a couple bucks and a fleeting brush of fingertips against pubic hair. But I’m embarrassed and annoyed, not turned on.

I had to piss like a racehorse. But to get to the restrooms, I would have to walk past the stripper, into the spotlight, across the “stage” and behind the red curtain. “Just go,” said Jeff. But I couldn’t walk past that.

But I had to. I just kept my eyes forward, swept past the stripper and found a couple of people waiting before me in the cramped “back stage” space. The pool table had been shoved back there. And with three grown men, there was barely enough room to turn around and open the door to the men’s room. Then the show ended, and suddenly the stripper was off the box and on his way toward us to change into something else before his next act.

Sharing the cramped space with us, he bent down to get his clothes from a bag. His macrame knickers were hanging loose, the tender globes of his soft, full butt peeking playfully over the waistband. (Sometimes I love overwriting!) It was like being in a locker room at the gym, but with attractive people.

And then his oiled ass was brushing against me.

“Excuse me,” he said shyly.

“Uh…” I said. “Sure … er, no problem.” My face flushed hot. I briefly considered skipping the bathroom. But soon he was bundled up in a heavy winter coat and a pair of warm-up pants. Apparently, he dresses as quickly as he undresses. He grabbed a pack of smokes from his pocket and hopped out back to light up.

Then someone stepped out of the men’s room, and I ducked in.

10
Feb
06

The Real Tragedy of Alcoholism…

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Gross
Tags:

…is the taste of non-alcoholic beer.

06
Feb
06

Left on the Tracks

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Nostalgia
Tags: , ,

I often wonder about the stuff that gets lost on the subway tracks. Not the bottles and bags and wrappers — who cares? But a child’s shoe? A stuffed animal holding a heart that says “I Love You”? A wrapped bouquet of flowers? These things meant something to someone at one time. Maybe they meant the wrong thing. (I’d like to see how the flowers ended up down there.) But they meant something.

It’s kind of crazy, the things we place emotional value on. When I was a little kid, I had a wooden toy dog on wheels. The axles were bent, on purpose, I think, to make the dog wobble as you pulled him along on his red string. His little plastic ears hung down on swivels and swung forward and back as he hobbled along.

I used to have recurring nightmares of dropping that dog into Lake Michigan (technically, the Straits of Mackinac) while crossing the Mackinac Bridge on foot. I’d dangle it over the edge and watch it swing. You know that way kids take risks with their toys — or their lives — dangling things in dangerous places. Some of us as adults continue to do this.

I’ve never been on that bridge on foot, and I don’t know if it’s even possible to dangle anything over the edge. (Though I’ve been on it plenty of times in a car, and I do know it’s possible to get knocked off that bridge without dangling anything.) Nonetheless, it was horrifying for me to consider.

06
Feb
06

With His Tail Between His Legs

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Other People's Stories
Tags: ,

Getting home after a quick outing to move Jeff’s Jeep to the Tuesday side of the street, I ran into a situation. Immediately after opening the door from the elevator, I saw my across-the-hall neighbor with her door wide open (where’s her cat? I thought) and a man standing in the hallway, leaning with his hand on the door jamb.

“And why are you sorry?” she asked, every bit the mother, leading her little boy through an apology to the neighbor whose goldfish pond he had just peed in.

“Because I called you a bitch,” he said.

Oh, my. I walked past as quickly as I could, trying to be invisible. I fumbled for the keys. Open the door fast, I thought.

“And why else?” she said, defiant, triumphant.

“Uh… I dunno. What else do you want me to say?”

It’s always best, I think, to conduct your private business on the inside of your doorway rather than the outside — or actually in — your doorway.

Unless, that is, you want to embarrass someone.

I spun through my doorway, avoiding eye contact with my neighbor and closing the door in a flash, shutting out the dirty laundry.

01
Feb
06

You Go Girl

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: Books, Celebrity and Words
Tags: , , , ,

I found this on the Editor and Publisher Web site:
Oprah “Freys” President Bush: Read It Here First

It’s an interesting idea: What if Oprah grilled Bush like she did James Frey, the published liar. (By the way, if you publish a memoir and change — even embellish — a few things, I have no problem considering it non-fiction if you follow the example of such confessors as Augusten Burroughs, author of Dry and Running with Scissors, and at least tell us so at the beginning. Frey did not do this, ergo, “liar.”)

I always find these “what if” columns to be a bit silly and unhelpful in the end. Mind you, I’d rather Oprah grill Bush on his criminally irresponsible tax-cut schemes or his unrealistic expectations of the future of the American health care system. But that’s just me.

Nevermind what you think of her. I love the way Oprah wins no matter what she does. At first, she declines to slam Frey, instead taking that bizarre middle ground: The book is good and important and meaningful whether it’s non-fiction or not. And people coo and sigh and say, “She has such personal integrity.” (However, it must be noted, some of her biggest critics were fans of her show.)

Then she changes her mind and rips Frey a new one on her couch, on TV, in front of millions of housewives and unemployed gay waiters, and people coo and sigh and say, “She has such personal integrity.”

Her couch is truly a hot seat. What a crazy world that she is among the most powerful and feared in media and the American press corps is continually disrespected and emasculated by our government. Let’s send Oprah after Scott McClellan. I’d love to have seen her go after Ari Fleischer, too.

24
Jan
06

Climbing Boy

By Eric Leave a Comment
Categories: New York Minute and Strangers Observed
Tags: ,

Scaffolding is as ubiquitous in New York as it is mysterious. Usually it serves no discernable purpose. It merely is. Like parasitic architectural lampreys, these collections of metal and particle board cling to their host buildings, waiting … for something.

They spring up out of nowhere, as if thrown together by teams of industrious elves overnight. On a routine walk somewhere or other, one might stare at a freshly ensconsed building and think, “Hunh… What’s different?” Then over time it becomes part of the building, the texture of the neighborhood. Tress are rerouted and split. Birds and small mammals make their homes. Then just as suddenly, months later, it disappears. And like a brainless goldfish that forgets its surroundings the moment it swims onward, you stand in the same spot thinking: “Hunh… What’s different?”

I can completely understand how a young boy would look at one and see nothing of its supposed true purpose or benefit — but instead see … a king-size jungle gym. How many video game-inspired Kung-Fu dreams could be fulfilled with a posse of scrappy friends and a Saturday afternoon on one of those things? Oh, consider the possibilities. The ultimate graduation in the School of Found Toys: The refrigerator box is left far behind in our erstwhile childhood, giving way to the glorious Scaffolding.

Today I saw a boy climbing on a scaffolding outside of a deli near where I work. The woman who was minding him said firmly but encouragingly, “You be careful. That thing’ll fall down right on top of you. Get down, now.”

The kid replied, “Aw… Why? What’s gonna happen?” He stopped climbing, but sort of lingered, a leg wrapped around a post out of reluctance and defiance, marking his territory.

“What you climbing that for?” she asked.

“What’s gonna hap—”

“I never touch those things, and you’re climbing all over it.”

“What —” he began, but she interrupted again with a string of admonitions. Repeatedly, he could say no more than “What &#8212?” before she interrupted again. “What —? What —? What —?” he said

“What what what!” she mocked. “Do you understand English?”

Then slowly she repeated: “Why. Are. You. Cli. Ming. On. That?”

What started out as mere concern for his safety quickly and weirdly escalated to a personal grudge about syntax. Her mood had completly changed in an instant. The original question had been rhetorical. “What you climbing that for?” If he had just stepped away and not answered, she would not be challenging the poor kid’s linguistic affinity. But because he annoyed her, the question became something that demanded an answer — long after he had stopped climbing and stepped away.

Ironically, it was she who misunderstood him. He had already asked her “What could happen?” as in “Get a grip, lady. This thing ain’t gonna fall. What do I have to worry about?” True, it’s little more than simple, boyish bravado that probably should be corrected. But he is a boy. Talk to the kid about what’s dangerous. Don’t stand 10 feet away barking at him.

She had a greater chance of breaking her nose on the door of the deli in front of her than he had of being crushed under a ton of aluminum pipes. But she is the Adult, and therefore has the apparent moral authority to not only ignore his curiosity but also to insult him. I understand the concept of enforcement through fear: Look both ways before crossing the street, and all that. But a scaffolding is not a house of cards. It seems to me there are limits to the amounts of disbelief a kid is willing to suspend after a certain age, and one needs something better than unrealistic fears of death and dismemberment to get his attention.

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the untallied hours