The Day After

"Old age, believe me, is a good and pleasant thing. It is true you are gently shouldered off the stage, but then you are given such a comfortable front stall as spectator."

-Confucius

This blog has become sort of vapid, hasn't it? I mean, what insights emerge here (as if they ever did)?

Yesterday I turned 62. I've been in sort of an anhedonic grump for a while now, and P was determined that a trip to Manhattan might pull me out of this funk. Returning to the recent site of a period of great joy is a risky thing, to be sure. It's never going to be the same. Would the old town have that talismanic effect on our souls with no goal in mind, or class to attend?

We drove the hour and some change down from Peekskill after marveling at the enormous population of diminutive South Americans, mostly from Ecuador, who make up nearly half of the city's population. It's every MAGA person's nightmare--a leafy, red brick, Norman Rockwell downtown with trash on the sidewalks and grocery store signs in Spanish. Still, we found some wonderful Chilean coffee for our morning drive, and overall the place seems to be doing just fine.

Arriving in the City, I drove to our reserved parking space in a structure on 44th Street, across from the Algonquin Hotel where the likes of Dorothy Parker and Gertrude Stein once held court. From there we rode the subway down to our old stop on Second Avenue, a few blocks from Sione. Peg had found an ad for a studio apartment coming available there, and wanted a look. When we walked into the lobby, the young man at the front desk (the only one whose name we couldn't recall, of course) and the assistant super recognized us immediately. We inquired about whether the vacant apartment faced Houston Street, as had ours, or the alleyway behind the building. The assistant super assured us it was on the Houston side, and proceeded to take us upstairs for a look.

The view brought back a pining for our brief sojourn there.

Peg took photos and paced off the very, very small dimensions.

On impulse, I texted the agent and sent a rather large deposit, pending approval of our application. We'll see--we may have a place down there by the end of the week. Which is going to create conflicting pressures between heading to the lake or the Lower East Side on Fridays.

Afterward, we walked one of our routes from the apartment to NYU, stopping for a glass of wine along the way at an old haunt.

For lunch we had a reservation at Benoit, a fabulous French restaurant with hundreds of offerings on its wine list, prices ranging from $125 to $4,000 a bottle. We stuck with a decent house selection, by the glass.

We feasted on foie gras (the real kind, from goose liver) and cassoulet, and then for dessert they brought out a French torte with candles and "62" on top, because P had called ahead. It was a wonderfully cadenced, authentically French dejeuner.

Around the corner we paid a visit to the Penn Club. It seems that being an NYU graduate makes me eligible to join the Penn Club, one of maybe a half-dozen snooty Ivy League clubs that dot midtown Manhattan. Think oak paneling, a dining room that requires a jacket and tie, and lots of memorabilia about their longstanding, heated rivalry with Princeton. We've come a long, long way from Hemet and Blue Grass.

Next door is the rather imposing New York City Bar Association building. Peg thinks I should join. At $212 a year, why not?

And just like that, we were barreling through the Lincoln Tunnel and back through New Jersey, Scranton, and Binghamton on our way back to Corning. All in all, quite a day.