Thursday, June 03, 2004

Buck Town 6.3.04

Today was the day of the NahWeYone fundraiser for the camp I’ll be putting together in a month.

I had cancelled lunch with Gurnifer. Ironed some black linen pants. A brown dress shirt (thanks, Selvadurai’s fruity closet!). Buffed the shoes from scuffed to black. Went to the NYU library to find a reserved course packet in vain—the construction/ rehab of the library means that the reserve items are in a smaller space, with fewer terminals dedicated to locating said items; and said terminals were being monopolized by two slow lazy people, drifting through records and articles and gobbledygook on chemistry, running their pen up and down sheets on the monitor’s left, circling, staring, as if those two line bibliographies had the solution to their research.

Left. Walked north. Walked 14th Street in search of a party supply store—who knew these kind of places were so difficult to find? It was about 80° and 3.30, about the time I said I would be at 103rd. Sweating, my bag, heavy on my back. And there is a crowd across 14th Street, peering in a window, shooting photographs. Being that the awning had some reference to stripping or nudity, I thought I’d get a free show.

The interior of the place was black and the crowd wasn’t thick but substantial enough that I had to work my way into a view. They were excited, but I couldn’t see any titty. There were two cops outside the place—one NYPD, one from the city of “Everett.” I’ve never heard of such a city.

The lights were flashing and I tried to smile and pretend I knew what was going on, as I cupped my hands around my eyes. And what I saw was out of Law & Order, not out of Nice Rack 8.

There was a man, face-up, stream of blood coming out of his mouth, eyes wide open, stiff like a mannequin, cop over him checking his pulse, crowd going “yo, I think he dead,” on the edge of a pole-dancing stage, in a room decked out in deep red.

I still don’t believe it was real; why wouldn’t the police cordon the place off? Still… that’s a little sick.

In case you were wondering I was still the first person up at 103rd to set up for the fundraiser. It was good times but I had to leave early of Conflict Management class.

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