Bruekelen Part 2

The next few days I engaged in some pretty general rompage and adventuring. I visited the Freedom Tower, which is where the World Trade Center used to be. It has transformed into a full-blown tourist orgasm, with 9/11 t-shirts and coffee mugs and tours and whatever, all of which were overpriced. I decided to listen to Wolves in the Throne Room as I set my eyes on the Statue of Liberty for the first time and popped my Wall Street cherry. I giggled maniacally as the rest of the tourists eye-balled me wondering what I was laughing at. I ate New York style bagels and pizza. My favorite records to listen to while wandering around the epic streets of Manhattan were Three Rounds and a Sound by Blind Pilot, Gorilla Mansion by Local Natives and Labor Days by Aesop Rock.

A girl I met in Brooklyn - Maria - told me story about how a frustrated woman working at a laundry mat had yelled at her these beautiful words of advice (or something) - "You live in hope garden? YOU DIE IN BROOKLYN!" I decided to rank that amongst my favorite quotes of all time. At night, a very junkie looking fellow in Crown Heights stopped Gabe and I on our way home and drooled his terribly depressing life story all over us. His wife died in Katrina, he jumped out of a window, he survived, he moved to Brooklyn, his baby was starving. His only request was that we buy him some powdered milk for his hungry baby girl. We did. It was $20. We decided it was worth it.

On Monday I did errands. I bought an old wool military coat from an awesome thrift store in Park Slope, got a Portuguese phrase book from a strictly travel bookstore called Idlewild and picked up a bitchin' set of headphones in Williamsburg at a good price. Everything was dandy smandy. That night, however, things started to get super duper sketch. A group of migrant workers had been hastily replacing the stairwell in Gabe's apartment complex for the past week or so and the conditions were super unsafe. It was pretty much just the skeleton of a staircase with plywood covering the missing parts. Gabe, his roommate Maya and I were all chillin' in his room when I noticed some flashing red lights on the buildings outside the window and some commotion in the stairwell. I opened the front door and smoke rushed into the apartment. I went into survival mode. I discovered the things I would save in the event of a disaster - my boots, my guitar, my computer and my water bottle. We rushed down the skeleton stairwell to find some fire men promptly putting out a little fire in the new wooding of the stairwell on the first floor. I said "should we roll?" and they said "no, it's cool". I thought that was a very Brooklyn way to quell my fears of dying in an apartment fire.

The next evening, before leaving the apartment, I was greeted by a Housing Enforcement guy who informed me that everyone had to evacuate the building that night because of unsafe conditions and building violations by the landlord. Gabe wasn't home, nor were any of his roommates. He gave me the number of the Red Cross in case we needed a place to stay. I packed up all my things and left hastily because I was scheduled to meet Sophie for a show she had invited me to. It was in an art gallery called the Clocktower in Manhattan. All we knew was that a band called Prince-arama would be giving a presentation on their philosophy dubbed "the Now Age". We were intrigued. I was running a bit late to the venue. Upon emerging from the subway I had no idea where the street I was looking for was. I ran around anxiously searching for Financial Parkway and found nothing. I looked into the skyline and saw an epic motherfucking clock tower in the distance. I decided to give it a go. I ran over to the base of the clock tower and saw security checking people inside. I thought that was strange and second guessed my intuition. A voice behind me cried, "it's the Clocktower! Go inside!" I glanced behind me but saw no obvious source of these instructions. I went inside and saw Sophie behind security. The guard asked me "what floor?" and I said "the Clocktower" and he said "uhhhh...what?" and then Sophie said "12th floor!" and we were cool. Out the elevator, we made our way through a silly maze of nondescript hallways, following signs for "the Now Age". We came upon a hallway with flashing lights and a tape loop of someone mumbling. This was a little unsettling. We wandered into another hallway, but it wasn't just a hallway, it was a fucking cave! A realistic looking cave made out of paper-mache and other arts and crafts. It was incredibly well done and it totally tripped us out. This led to the gallery where we were served free wine and watched a crazy artsy Spaghetti Western style movie that was filmed in the cave while we waited for the presentation to begin.

The band started the performance and I instantly realized this was going to be hilarious. Prince-arama was two girls dressed like futuristic Amazonians. Airy synths and a straight pounding floor tom was the backdrop for the presentation, accompanied by a powerpoint presentation and synth girl speaking epically with tons of echo and reverb. The Now Age presentation was bullshit - something about how modern music uses ancient imagery to communicate the coming utopia where we will all get together in huge stadiums and do molly or something and rock out and watch the band "sacrifice" themselves to the Gods. They threw glitter all over the room and got down to War Pigs by Black Sabbath and pulled all of us up to dance with them. Tons of dancers came out of the cave and one of them fake-killed synth girl. She stumbled to the ground next to this record player and gave a silly epilogue about how the circle of life is like a vinyl or something. She "died" at our feet. All this was good fun, but the icing on the cake was the ending. They invited up the lead singer from the hipster Black Metal band Liturgy and some other popular Brooklyn socialite to have a guided discussion with a professor from Columbia University about the spirituality of digitized music. Sophie and I laughed and laughed and laughed. We left early. I explained to her my sleeping predicament and she let me crash at her place. She lives with some excellent artists so I admired the works on the walls and promptly hit the hay.

The next morning, I awoke early and prepared myself for the flight to Lisbon, Portugal. I got coffee and a PB&J at a cute little coffee shop in Bushwick called Little Skips. I still felt like a granola with my backpack and guitar, looking like a confused mountain climber in the dirty streets of Brooklyn. In Manhattan, I bid a farewell to the wonderful Mr. Gabe. How I love him so. We ate hummus and bread and talked about the future. I decided to pick up a book at Strand before getting on the train towards Newark airport. Sophie recommended me a novel by the musician and poet Patti Smith called Just Kids about growing up a struggling artist in New York City. I was quite enamored with the dark dirty mortal yet uniquely inspiring vibe of the town and the book was on sale so I purchased it. I started devouring it on the train. It is an amazing read. I love her gab - punchy, aggressive, crude yet graceful and beautiful in all the right places. I loved knowing what the streets looked like described in the book. I was so distracted that I had no idea how far the train had gone and how close to the airport we were. I asked a young guy who just got on the train if this stop was the airport. He said "yeah man you better go!" I grabbed my stuff and the door closed on me just as I was about to leave. The guy said "you're fucked man! Let's go talk to the conductor." He ran down the aisle and I followed him with my big old stupid backpack and awkward guitar case. The conductor gave me a mouthful about how I am "the stupidest piece of shit" and how I will "never survive when the shit hits the fan" before opening the door and pushing me out. I laughed, sitting on the ground, loving how temporary everything was. There would be moments on this trip where situations would get hairy but it was okay because I was on the move. I would never see that conductor ever again and I would never get to thank that dude for helping me not miss my flight. But it was okay, the moment had passed and I was getting increasingly better at living inside the present. I made it to my terminal just as boarding began. I felt deeply grateful and counted my blessings. The sun set on New York as the plane picked up and I blew a kiss out the window. An older Indian woman sitting next to me looked at me funny. I smiled at her. She didn't smile back. Hahahahahaha.