‘We’re Getting The Hell Out Of This Sewer,’ Entire Populace Reports
That’s the heading for the latest to come out of the Onion, my new favorite news source.  I was laughing my buttocks off.  I won’t rehash the whole article, you can go to their site for that, but I did question whether Brooklyn could really be vacated in 90 minutes.  These are New Yorkers we’re talking about.  That kind of mass exodus would require everyone to move in an orderly fashion.

Within 90 minutes, the borough of Brooklyn had completely cleared out.

I have three anecdotes to share about my experience as a mother in this city.
First, I have a three-year-old who occasionally throws tantrums in very inconvenient circumstances (are tantrums ever convenient?). So one day, we’re in the subway going up the stairs and my daughter just flops. I don’t know why, all I know is that she wouldn’t budge. This man in a suit comes up the stairs behind me stands right up close, tsks, and says, “Not a good place.” If I were as rude as he, I would’ve said, “Yeah, because I came to this exact spot at this very moment with the express purpose of delaying you for a few precious seconds. Don’t you feel special?” There was no one coming down the stairs. He could’ve gone around us. In fact, there were three other staircases in the direction he was headed that he could’ve taken. But instead, he has to make a point about being snide to a young mother who’s obviously not having a good day. His kids must be perfect.
The same day as the Mr. Three-Piece-Suit incident, I was standing at the corner in a crowd of people waiting for the light to change when this guy makes a tiger face at this other kid in a stroller. I thought it was cute, but the kid’s mother says, in a REALLY loud voice, “Excuse me! Do not speak to my child!”
The last story isn’t really a story so much as a condition I’ve noticed. I take my daughter to the park every day and we stay there four to five hours.  This is what I’ve noticed:  The Russian Jew moms all come at the same time and they stick together in this little group, hovering over their children, dictating how they are to play.  My daughter spends this time looking at the children, far too intimidated to play with them–especially when the moms give her weird looks when she gets too close.  Then all the Russian Jew moms leave at the same time and then mothers of color–Indian, Latina, and black–trickle in throughout the day.  These moms sit on the benches on the periphery, talking and laughing while their kids run all over the place, and my daughter has a ball running and giggling with the rest of them.  I am usually the only white American mother–all the white American kids have nannies from another country.  I’m not complaining about being left out of the elite Russian Jew group, but I just think it’s so weird that this little park is so starkly segregated and that there’s such a difference between these races.

I had a revelation.

I was in Bushwick, which is apparently one of the most impoverished neighborhoods in New York, and I felt like I was seeing the city for the first time–like I could feel the city’s heart pulsing around me.  There were people on the streets acknowledging their neighbors–more than acknowledging them.  They were friendly and were clearly more than just acquainted.  People acknowledged me as a complete stranger.

You go to Manhattan and the very pavement radiates self-interest, and then Queens is just so blah.  The Bronx is dirty and scary and Long Island is just like every other suburbia.  But Brooklyn.  That’s a place with character and feeling.  I still hate New York, but I think I can stand Brooklyn.

I understand a reluctance to give money to guys in the subway peddling a story about how they’ve fallen on hard times, they can’t get a job, they can’t bathe, and they’re vets–especially when you see the same ones over and over again.  What I don’t understand is how people in the subway see a musician or other performer and immediately cast down their eyes and make irritated noises.  As if these people we just as bad as those just looking for handouts.  As if they were lazy, unproductive members of society.  How dare they interrupt the sacred commute with quality entertainment?!  These performers are trying to make a living with a skill that they have worked hard to develop in the only way the know how, and the downlookers can’t even be bothered to reward them with a little applause.  I may have a problem with handouts but I have no qualms whatsoever in paying a hardworking musician who’s just trying to get by.

So.  New York.  I know your lives are ruled by the almighty dollar and minute, but maybe you should temper that with a little heart.  Next time you see a musician in the subway, make eye contact.  Take a moment to enjoy their talent.  Favor them with one of your precious dollars so they can continue to be contributing members of society.  What is one dollar and one minute going to do to harm your sacred bottom line?

It’s so simple to get around New York.  The whole thing is laid out like a grid.  Even numbered streets run east; odd numbered streets run west.  Most avenues are numbered and run either north or south.  Lettered avenues run through bad neighborhoods.  Broadway slithers through Manhattan like a drunk.  But wait, what’s up with Jane Street?  And there’s a 31st street in at least four places.  Then you’ve got 63rd Road followed by 63rd Street and 63rd Avenue.  And how’re you supposed to know if you’re going north, south, east, or west?

Yep.  It’s a grid.

Picture clean streets and clean air.  Picture wildflowers and children playing outside.  Picture public transportation that doesn’t smell like urine.  Picture service with a smile and affordable housing.  Picture birds singing.

Let’s face it, with the possible exception of birds singing (but aren’t pigeons really rodents?), New York has none of these.

New York is potholes and barred windows.  New York is a crabby Indian at your local quicky mart.  New York is rotten smells from the subway, ornery guys in suits who work “in finance,” cars honking, sirens blaring, and people walking so fast they get arthritis in their knees when they’re not even thirty.

So many people feel required to love New York; it’s like a brainwashing mantra thrown at you from adverts in the subway, hats on tourists, and now Jay-Z and Alicia Keys are singing love from every sidewalk speaker in the city.  But really, you don’t love New York.  You hate New York.  Say it with me.  I.  Hate.  New York.  IhateNewYork.  I HATE NEW YORK!

Now don’t you feel better?

Suppose there were a city the whole world loved so much that people constantly wrote books and songs about it and printed millions of corny t-shirts proclaiming their obsequiousness.  Now suppose you were stuck there for three years.  What would you do?  Would you shut yourself away and never leave your apartment?  Would you go exploring and try to love this as so much of the world, who have actually never been to this city, seems so ready to do?  Or would you take it as your personal mission in life to debunk the myth, lampoon the façade, and disillusion the thronging masses who can yet be saved from hanging their hats on a disproportionately aggrandized hat stand?  What city, you ask, could foster such disdain?  Why Gotham, the Big Apple, the City that Never Lets Me Sleep:  New York.