Madison Avenue Meditations...

I headed down Madison Avenue towards the Gagosian Gallery to see the Girls exhibit by Roy Lichtentein. I took my time doing some window shopping, lolly-gagging and people watching. With school out there were many more kids on the sidewalks than usual all raw with excitement to have summer vacation (something everyone should have). At 79th and Mad. three boys with tennis rackets sword fought each other with a little more zeal than was needed. One boy with a tremendous blow knocked another boy's tennis racket from his hand onto Madison Avenue where it was struck by a truck and crushed. The truck driver did not stop and the boy dodging traffic ran to the destroyed racket lifted it up and the head of the racket flopped downward causing all three boys to laugh hysterically. I didn't quite find the humor in it instead imagining what might have happened. My scenario went a little like this: the truck dodging the racket crashes into another car that causes it to veer onto the sidewalk killing a half dozen people and destroying a storefront. My imagination running away with itself forced me to walk on and leave the laughing boys and their shenanigans. Before long I was in front of the building that the Gagosian Gallery is in but I decided not to go in and went instead to the Whitney where I went down stairs and had a small meal looking out at what is a created pond that was here a hundred years ago. It is pictured above. It was nice to sit by the ancient pond enjoy a cup of coffee and think about the beavers that used to wander around here with woodpeckers flying over head and frogs croaking. I fell into the reflection of the pond far away from walking down Madison Avenue that loomed above me. It was a brief but needed meditation...

My Keith Haring...

The day was tricky, just the right kind of day to go see a show of Keith Haring at the Skarstedt Gallery on 79th Street. By tricky I mean it was sunny but showers were predicted so I was in a quandary, should I take my umbrella or not...I did. I walked to the gallery looking forward to seeing the art of someone I had met many times in the early eighties. It was then that while riding the 6 train in a dilapidated subway system covered in graffito without air conditioning overcrowded and dangerous that I saw my first Keith Haring. It was graffiti but not spray painted pandemonium and tags that were splayed everywhere. Haring's simple chalk drawings on black ad boards were cartoonish, entertaining and inspiring and they seemed to sprout up everywhere. They were the most thing on the subways. Liking them so much I wanted to get one but they were impossible to remove because of the glue used by the MTA system (the only thing they did right in those days ) was so good. One day I noticed one of the posters with Haring's art on it at the 96th Street station had a corner that was loose. I took my time and started to loosen the art from the panel, it took me about an hour and I was only able to salvage about half of the poster but it is a prized piece of art that I have hung in my home for over 20 years. It is pictured above. But I digress, it started to rain before I got to the gallery so having an umbrella was the correct choice. The show was heartening and made me happy like Keith Haring's early works made me. One of the posters from the subway made the show but I think mine is much better. The show is to commemorate Keith's 50th birthday if he were alive. The first time I met Keith was at the nightclub called Area, he was funny and full of energy. We recreated talked about art and laughed. After that night I ran into him many times even after he became rich and famous he exuded and energy that was precious and is much missed. The show at Skarstedt is joyful and a good representation of all that Keith gave to the world in the short time he was with us. There's even a piece of subway art but I must admit I like mine better. Outside it was sunny again I twirled my umbrella with my fingers and was glad to have been in Keith's presence again...

Papaya King Priority...

Taking a walk to the Papaya King is ritual that I have performed for many a year, enjoying the Filet Mignon of hot dogs, the Papaya King frankfurter and a blended juice drink of my liking is a celebration of all things American not to mention continuing an age old tradition that started in 1931 on this same corner of Third Avenue and 86th Street. The history of the curbside eatery is quite incredible. A sixteen year old, Gus Paulos, a Greek immigrant, arrived in New York City in 1923 penniless but driven. He started working in a deli on the Upper East Side and within three years bought the deli lock, stock and barrel. With the success of the deli he decided to go on his fist vacation and headed to Florida and the beaches while there he imbibed in the local blended juice drinks and was hooked. He came home with the taste of exotic fruit juices still ripe in his mind. He sold the deli and opened his first juice store, The Hawaii Tropical Drinks, on Third and 86th Street in 1931, but with a store full of perishable fruit and nobody buying his blended drinks he hired a woman to dress up in Hawaiian costume and hand out the drinks for free outside the restaurant. It was a boom. The Upper East Side became addicted to the drinks and the rest is history. Gus opened places in Brooklyn and Philadelphia. In 1939 he did something as natural as smiling by putting the frankfurter on the menu mostly a homage to Yorktown's German population who frequented his restaurant and his wife who nursed him through a broken ankle he got while roller skating. In 1950 after a Brooklyn Dodger christened Gus the Papaya King the restaurant's name was changed. It has been frequented by the rich the famous and tourists from all over the world. The Beatles noshed there before they went on the Ed Sullivan show in 1965 and Zagat reviewed it as "the best, cheapest stand up lunch in the city". As I stood there biting into that perfect frankfurter and sipping on my papaya drink, watching people walk by wishing they were me, I lifted by papaya drink to the heavens and saluted Gus the papaya king ...

Hot, Hot, Hot...

The hottest day of the year so I headed out to work up a sweat and take in some culture, some local flavor and some ray catching. I stepped out the door into the 100 degree weather and was blown back by the humidity. I took a drink of water from my handy water bottle before I took a step and headed towards Madison Avenue to go to the Whitney to see the Mapplethorpe Polaroid show. I've always liked Mapplethorpe ever since he lit a flame under Jesse Helms' ass in the Eighties by having a show that some described as homoerotic and received the disdain of every conservative living and not living. If only these self proclaimed art critics ever looked at his photos of flowers that are beyond the ken beautiful as were the photos of the naked men. The Whitney was cool as a refrigerator. I took the elevator up and walked down the stairs to the small show with a ton of framed Polaroids that were too tightly framed as far as I was concerned. I would have loved to seen the raw Polaroid edges instead of the pristine cropped photos. And the photos were of everything from a pair of shoes to portraits of Patti Smith. It was a small but dense show. I expected more but it was still interesting. I walked out of the Whitney into the wall of heat and headed for the East River to catch some sun on my milky skin. As I walked I ran into the First Avenue Street Fair and the fair air was aromatic with fried food, sausage and peppers and caramelized nuts. I feasted on it all and had an ice cold lemonade. This unexpected diversion was just what I needed, refreshment and sustenance. I walked on to the Promenade where I staked out a bench and took off my shirt, read and sipped on a brown bagged Bud. The light breeze from the river was soothing. The river traffic of tug boats, sail boats, tankers and jet skis was a visual feast. And then a young woman with a bag of bread crumbs sat on the bench next to me and started throwing the crumbs on the ground and before I knew it there was a flock of pigeons (flying rats) swarming, flapping their wings and covering me in their dusty musk. It rose the temperature of the place by at least ten degrees and rose my aggravation by twice that. I wanted to tell the woman it was illegal to feed the feathered fiends but instead just got out of there. I walked home sweating and in need of a very cold shower...