The Strand:

New York, NY - Peter - Tuesday, June 25th, 2002 : goo

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I'm the only one in here right now, and I've managed to somehow get that Russian waitress who's a strange old flirt. As soon as I cross that threshold, we go through our usual schemes- I groan when I see that I'm alone here, and she dives to grab a menu and slowly guide me to a shady seat. I have a craving for corn on the cob, and order some; she repeats my every item back to me in her heavily draped accent, not entirely devoid of emotion, and having that erotic raspiness that trills in the voice of women who smoke too much. I shut my eyes and listen.

Her multi-syllabled renditions of my words sing out at me. "You'll yave the teee-aaa with lee-mo-ne, yessss"... "Ahh, and ze co-or-en cobs". My phone rings. Damn. "You. Get that", she exhorts, commanding with a quirky middle-aged smile. Stepping barely a foot away, she shifts her weight back and forth, hand on hip, every few seconds, pushing her bangs back atop her smooth forehead. "Blee-uuu cheeses on ze saaa-lad, yes. And you will have an or-an-geee", she recites, her incisors delicately nibbling the eraser of the pencil she uses to scratch my order onto her pad.

Today is so hot. Just walking across my small room to turn the fan to high is an exercise in stamina. Strangely enough, I've always enjoyed the heat; but not this urban stink, humid clouds and steamy sunsets. No, I've mused a thousand times that I'd be more content in a desert, I think, dry baking air lapping over me, dehydrating, my kidneys growing sluggish in the still air. I squeeze the lemon into my tea- its juice runs brown, but it turns the tea golden; oxidation at work, and the tea tastes plastic.

The way the sedans and cabs sit at the traffic light outside reminds me of some movie set- lighting unreal, searing, layout almost over-wrought, streets too clean. It all has an indoor look. Lately, I've been content to sit and watch traffic pass, to muse amidst the diesel bus fumes, to whistle the refrain of the bleating taxi horns, all this offered as some sordid urban prayer to the spirits of summer. A delivery truck passes, slips away west, enveloping me in its warm slipstream- just rewards. Oh, to be in the desert at this exact moment.

Children play and wade in the hepatitis-laden water sitting stagnant in the gutter outside, splashing it upon the curb, onto the sidewalk. A passing gypsy cab plays Barry White. "Deeper and deeper" I hear it fade down Broadway, "sweeter and sweeter".

And a woman stoops to pick up the discount blouse she knocked from the sidewalk-sale rack, cursing as it blows towards the gutter on the steamy breeze. And a child dips his finger into the gutter water and in a moist, lopsided script, writes his innitials on the back of the delapidated news-stand. And a man emerges from the door-less bodega, a burrito clutched in hand.

I stir another Sweet-n-Low into my tea and squeeze the softening lemon rind against the edge of the cup with my tarnished spoon. The waitress is stacking boxes of Raisin Bran up behind the counter, looking over her shoulder and smiling at me.

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