Washington Square Park, July 5, 2014
I exit the cool air of the train at the Christopher Street station. Negotiating a heated wind tunnel to climb the
staircase from the platform, I emerge onto the sidewalk into blistering sun. I
squint and shield my eyes as they adjust to the light, slipping my hand into my
bag for my sunglasses, then head east toward Washington Square Park.
While walking, I adjust the straps of my backpack and slip
both arms back through for a better balance.
The bag isn’t heavy but its contents fit awkwardly in the space: phone,
wallet, a baggie of trail mix, a large bottle of water, pens and my journal, and
my new camera.
Most locals are out of town for the holiday weekend, leaving
Washington Square Park to us visitors and tourists. I am a visitor; not native to the city by any
means, but one who frequents the parks and shops and museums and restaurants
with a degree of ease and familiarity. A visitor takes no detail for granted,
but unlike the tourist, is not on a sole hunt to document these details via
selfies for Facebook. I have my pick of seats, and I choose a wide,
flat concrete bench so that my back is to the Arch and my view is set on the
fountain. An a capella doo-wop group
harmonizing behind me draws a crowd; the people sway and clap along with the tunes.
I sit down and jump up from the heat on bench’s surface that
threatens to sear my white skin. In the
summer sun my legs actually look a little nuclear in their glow. I sit again, gingerly, close the edge so my
shorts protect my legs. I take off my
white ankle socks and grey Converse All-Stars ®, but the ground is too hot for the
soles of my feet so I rest them atop the empty shoes.
The sun is almost directly overhead and the shadows are
harsh, so I decide to write instead of taking pictures. Do I seem a cliché as I observe here in the
park with my recycled paper notebook and gel point pen? Or does anyone even notice me? Probably the latter. The invisibility here in the park, among
other artists and citizens and visitors and tourists is a comfort, and I settle
into my space and have a closer peek.
Parents stroll past me, singly or coupled, swaddling babies
to their bodies with slings and pushing strollers. A precocious toddler breaks free of her
stroller, running ahead (not quite as far as it seems to her) with chubby legs
and a banana’d belly, stopping short and turning to let her dad almost catch
up. An older girl whizzes past on a blue
scooter.
A man stands next to the bench one down from mine, leaning
against his bike. He stares off in one direction, not idly but as if scanning a
crowd for someone to emerge. There is no
crowd where he is looking. His sneakers
are like mine, but black, and his socks were probably once bright white like
mine. Now they are mottled, clean but thrown in one too many times with a
washload of colors. He holds an iTouch
in his right hand and places the ear buds with his left. I wonder why he would choose the isolation of
a personal soundtrack over the streaming sounds of the fountain or the
silliness of people splashing in it or the voices and languages too numerous to
count and too comingled to identify, or the harmony of the doo wop group or the
beats of the drummer across the circle.
The wind carries spray from the fountain to my skin. I wish
I didn’t carry all this stuff with me so I could slip my feet in the fountain
without getting my supplies wet.
A man stops beside me. Hard-worn Nike flip-flops expose the most
weathered digits I have ever seen. They are
thick with elephant skin wrinkles and callouses. The yellow toenails curve on the edges a bit too
much, grotesque cookie cutters pressing into slabs of dough.
A kid with a guitar is sitting on another bench 15 feet away
from me. I sense the beat of his foot tambourine
and I see his mouth moving. He is strums
his guitar but his song is imperceptible from where I sit.
A Hispanic man with a
grandfatherly countenance sits across the fountain with two drums. A small boy, not his own, sits on the bench
next to him. The man is patient and
warm, smiling as he shows the boy how to add his beat to the man’s. Both look up and smile at the mom who snaps a
picture of the moment . They boy and the
mom say thank you and walk away but the boys hands are stinging with the
vibration of the skins (his and the drums and the mans) and his heart was
changed, just a bit, forever.
Suddenly, I am filled with longing and hot tears threaten to
overflow my lids. I wish I was brave enough, or hopeful enough, to walk over
and sit with the man myself.
A tiny girl walks by, probably a petite 2 ½ year old. She is VERY sure of her steps with her tart
lemony pants and sweet strawberry sandals.
When you were that little girl I
cared for your every need. Now that you
are gone I only feel the care I need.
An older woman wearing
orthopedic black shoes, a white blazer and black polyester pants walks
slowly through the park. She is tall,
upright in her shuffle, pretty with silver hair coiffed into pincurls and
lacquered, unmoving in the wind. She has been here before and will not cease to
return, although today she wears too many synthetic layers for this heat.
Soon it’s my time for me to board the train
that will bring me home. I tuck my notebook and my pen into the backpack,
finish the water in my bottle and discard the remains of the trail mix that has melted in my
pack. The sights and sounds of the park
fade into the distance as I descend the stairs to the platform below.
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