It was October again. A most beautiful warm and sunny day kind of spring like thus changing the entire tone of my winter’s tale setting. Preparations were in order for the big event this evening. I had rented The Living Gallery, a very charming storefront just a few blocks east of The Market Hotel on Broadway. It was to be an opening for the lovely Jane, her artworks prominently displayed along with a few of her friends who she had carefully selected as participants. In addition, she had aggressively booked a band and I had agreed to sit in with Cum Blood, an improvised noise ensemble featuring a topless Chrissy pounding the bass guitar with a drum stick and fronted by the extremely charismatic Nyssa who was the proprietress of the Gallery, her radiant smile and extremely well teased blond hair made her a candidate to replace Jessica as the flashback to the old west woman of the year in addition to the fact that she wore what appeared to be an old school corset further accenting her fine well maintained shape.

Nyssa and Jane had performance styles that had a lot in common. First and foremost as redundant as I can possibly get away with being here, they were both comfortable throwing their bodies out to keep the audience occupied. They both utilized a megaphone to rant in one continuous screaming tone somehow believing that this had deep meaning. While Jane’s act was built around a Jessica Rabbit persona, Nyssa referenced years of feminist performance art in what I believed to be a calculating academic fashion thus making her inherent sexiness even more stunning since the earlier roots of this style involved so much alleged feminism (in the seventies) where the female form had to be contained.

I was busy preparing my bag: the big black and yellow knapsack with all the netting and hidden compartments. It was camping store style but I had made it super urban I had been attached to this thing throughout the year in Bushwick. This bag could hold everything it was magical like the legend of the mitten or the clown car trick. An entire list of the contents on this particular October day is going to follow as each of these objects is really a talisman into an entire other story. But before we get into the sticky details, I need to digress here and tell you several anecdotes that make this story so significant. The first one is a compressed version of a story my dear Bubbe used to tell me:

Back in the ‘old country’ as she called it (this would be The Ukraine outside of Kiev in the late 1800’s the southern end of the pale of settlement made Hollywood by the stories of one Shalom Alechem the creator of “the Teyve stories’’) there was a man who lived pleasantly enough on his sustainable farm with his wife and three lovely daughters. One day, his peaceful existence was shattered by the death of his father in law thus leading his wife’s mother to move in with him. As in so many dramas, this immediately drove him crazy as she tended to nag everyone and play at control freak type behavior. Without hesitation, he contacted the town Rabbi, the consigliore for all residents.

“Rebbe, I can’t stand it, what should I do?”

“You have chickens on your farm, yes? I want you to move them in the house with you right now!”

“What?! Rebbe, excuse me, are you fachachta?”

“Do you believe in the Lord God Hashem, Creator of the Universe?”

“Well, of course, Rebbe…but…”

“No butts…just do what I say!”

This story goes on for days but since we are in the century after the century after, let’s condense it. Each week the man goes back to the Rabbi, feeling even more manic and disturbed and still the master insists he bring yet another animal into the house. Finally, he shows up without an appointment storming into the temple office and demanding that he find an immediate solution to his breakdown.

“Okay…” the Rabbi stops to light his pipe before beginning. “Take all the animals out at once!”

“What?”

“I am sending my wife and son over to help you now. Remove all the animals and they will help you do a thorough cleaning of the place. Please report back to me tomorrow morning first thing…now GO!”

The very next morning the man shows up looking pleased as punch.

“Rebbe…you are a genius! It is so calm at home now, just me, my wife, my three lovely daughters and my mother in law…what do I owe you?”

Reader, if you are still with me I need to assume that you get this story. It is the essence of the entire Yiddish philosophy from Aleph to Final Tsuff. “It could be worse!’’ And believe me, this story could be longer as it was in my dear Bubbe’s time; name each daughter each time you go to the Rabbi with a description of her age, height weight, physical state and potential marriage partners. Name each animal with a long detailed analysis of their excrement. Thus I have saved you additional pain and suffering though you could simply skim or skip through it. Given the general shorter attention span of audiences in the one hundred something years that have elapsed, here is the Reform Jew version:

A young Rabbi is on his way to work in the village just after dawn. On the side of the road, he sees a young Jew who is crying out loud while clutching tightly to a small knapsack (the bag.)

“Young Jew…what is troubling you?”

“Oh, Rebbe, thank you for stopping…I am so upset. I have worked so hard and yet I have nothing to show for all my troubles: everything I own, all of my work…it is all inside of this very small bag!!!”

“Is that it?” the Rabbi asks.

“Yes…that’s it!”

Immediately without any pause or hesitation, the Rabbi grabs the knapsack out of the young Jew’s hands and tosses it far far across the surrounding field into what may be a mudpile of cowdung. He turns and walks away, thus abandoning his latest charge (or client) by the side of the road.

Nine, ten hours later, the Rabbi is returning home from work, and approaches the same spot. His thoughts are consumed as he thinks out loud: “Ah…what is the fate of the young Jew I counseled only this very morning?” And just a small series of steps up the road, he spies the same young man:

He is dancing elated with what seems to be a recently acquired following of similar young Jew followers.

The Rabbi stops and addresses the young man plainly:

“Young Jew…praise Hashem! This morning I left you here despondent and yet now you are so content!”

“Ah yes, Rebbe…” he replies as his followers look on, “I found the bag!”

Well, I suppose I have beaten a dead horse here and I need to go on line now and find a good Yiddish translation of that phrase. I had planned to start and end this book using a Sunset Boulevard screenplay device. That is to say: bookends surrounding a flashback. The story begins where I lose my knapsack and I introduce myself as this cool, edgy Brooklyn guy now totally disrupted by the loss of the bag. You are probably wondering, dear Reader, how this could happen to a former member of the Flatbush four? Well the story begins in an illegal nightspot, on Kent Avenue, in the Chasidic part of Williamsburg…

But I abandoned that idea for the more simplified chronological method. After all, this is simply a treatment for an HBO Series and not some kind of real screenplay. Lord knows, if the quality is too literary it will fly right past the small minds of the Hollywood Producer types sitting in their windowed offices contemplating how much boost they can put into the actress who will be cast to portray Jane. How they will bring a black guy into the plot even though clearly there is not one in my version. Where is the chase scene where explosives must be utilized when the whole story involves peaceful behavior?

My bag had everything I needed and then some. See the Appendix in back for the full itemization!

Also my rain coat in case it got cold later I don’t think I put a microphone in but I may never know. The keys were the most stupid part. Wearing skinny jeans I hate the protrusion of all those sharp metal objects jutting out of my pants only one long thing will do so I had been keeping my keys in the bag. All through the year I had hidden this bag calculatedly everywhere I went. The initial meeting with Alexis was foreshadowed by me watching as she proceeded to hide her bag in a similar manner! Besides her sexy bony shoulders and glow in the dark eyes, this affectation naturally drew me towards her. I could go dancing for hours without any ninety second period where I did not lock my eyes on my bag.

I was not used to using my car. I certainly was not used to having this bag, a part of my subway based Brooklyn life in my car, the vehicle that was a part of my suburban period, a phase that had ended. It was the persistent persuasion of the lovely Ms Rosenthal that led to this tragic juxtaposition, having me take the fully loaded bag into the car to drive to her studio on Ingraham to pick her huge inventory of artworks up to transport her to The Living Gallery that set up the tragic situation that would lead to the loss of the bag, the property contained within and the sudden slap in the face that I was in big trouble that I had lost all of my control my senses my common sense for the simulated love of a woman who was born on the same day as my own Mother, the same year that I got married the same year that I turned double chai, the very lucky thirty six, the same woman who lived above the celebrated coffee shop where we would stop en route to the Gallery to pick up food at that time with the hatchback fully loaded I pulled out a huge wad of twenties to show off to her since I was fully done with the romance angle as I indicated earlier I was still entertaining the let me give you money to be nice approach.

“Jesus Howie!” she uttered with an unusual alarm that had been observed earlier when I ran a stop sign.

“Where did you get all this cash?!”

“Oh, I launder money for marijuana dealers…” I said. “It is one of the reasons I can be so generous.”

Then came the key question:

“Why are you doing this?”

“To help them get legitimate…you know the tax laws…”

“No, no…why are you being so nice to me? I mean you are doing everything and you are spending all this money and you know I won’t sleep with you so I mean what is your motive here?”

“Well, Jane…I am glad you asked that question…yes…I am going to tell you now but you won’t believe me…I am sure of that…but I am relieved to see all this come out in the open. I am writing a series of stories about you and I want you to give me your permission to use your name and likeness. You see you are so intense a character that I just can’t change your name…and I believe people will really get the idea of you and fall in love with you too so I need you to read my stuff and give me your blessing!”

“You’re right!” she responded quickly with that pert tight lip that I wanted to lick all over.“I don’t believe you…”

We pulled up at the Gallery and there was an open driveway. This was the first mistake. I became comfortable as though as I was at a friend’s house in safe Long Island, not in the heart of a borderline zone between Black North Bed Stuy and South Latino land Bwick. It was prime time for crime even on this lovely sunny afternoon and I was obviously inviting it. While I may have passed for cool in the dark night with this car and this lovely babe beside me, I read white money lame all over, every which way. From the moment I parked the Honda I was doomed. But the warning sign was earlier that same day:

We were outside the studio building known as Brooklyn Fireproof Warehouse. The sun was at noon peak and instead of boots or a fashionable new jacket, I complimented Jane on her slick sunglasses. She took them off immediately and let me try them on. At that point, I pulled my ‘blues guy’ shades out of the green case in the knapsack and showed them off to her, quickly putting them in a compartment in the car door placing the empty case back in the knapsack. For a moment, I had a déjà vu flash hearing a voice saying, ‘well, that’s good, you won’t lose those, you’ll get to take them with you for sure’ I thought I was dreaming then again that was a frequent occurrence when I was around the lovely Ms Rosenthal so I brushed it off as the strong sun only accented what made her so attractive at that moment.

Later on, after unpacking at Nyssa’s gallery, I pulled the fancy audio cable out of the knapsack and told Nyssa I would be plugging my phone into her sound system when I performed. She told me to put it away since she already had such a cable set up and I did recall that from my last performance there but I always packed everything ‘just in case’ and again, for a second I got the same feeling that somehow that object was about to slip through my hands and that a foretelling was reaching out from beyond to warn me of what was to come. In retrospect, these signs are always easy to spot, if only we could see ahead:

After meeting Jess I frequented Skytown just to see her it would brighten my day and also I would indulge in their shot and beer happy hour prior to letting loose at the Market. I photographed myself one time that I was there and sent the picture around it was a rare moment where I was in a suit my shirt neatly starched my mustache at the time neatly trimmed in the background was what I thought was interesting wallpaper I had no idea at that time that it was Jane’s artwork. During the Bushwick Open Studios weekend where the first accidental introduction abruptly took place I was vainly chasing Samantha Keller around the whole zone, she kept texting me to meet her here and then when I got there she told me to meet her there for awhile I thought this goose chase worthy of its own chapter but I since got sober about it. However, there I was outside the Brooklyn Fireproof Warehouse feeling romantic for no reason at all feeling that déjà vu buzz feeling like this present was me having been there before as though everything that happened during the year was simply leading up to this climatic sunny October afternoon where all my planning all my just in case all my manipulating would just stop.

And so it did. That morning in my apartment I had told myself not to drive. I had told myself enough was enough with Ms Rosenthal she could get a friend’s van she could hire a cab I was the producer the old man with the money behind the scenes I could not demean my role and be a delivery driver. She persisted in texting me she was consistent I knew it was a mistake the same way I knew when I first got struck by her that night at the Market that pursuing her would only lead to trouble but I went out with the fully packed fully loaded black and yellow knapsack and headed straight for the Honda. There I was driving down 58^th Street past the cemetery heading straight into fucking Bushwick, the radio blasting.

So I moved Jane and we ate outside Little Skips and once she got to the gallery she was done with me. I put the bag down in a safe place and chilled for awhile, in fact the same Sam Keller was there. Nyssa was always entertaining and always exciting to just stand next to but she would burst into fits of being busy she reminded me of Ginger Rogers particularly the role she played in “Lady in the Dark.’’ I became restless and began to explore my options. It was only like three o’clock – too early to start drinking. I could go park the car. I could go pick up Ariel. I could just drive home. I wanted to go back home. I needed to get an instrument. Really I did not feel comfortable leaving the car around once the party started. Later I had mumbled about buying beer for the kids but Nyssa was kind of like whatever and at first I thought I would leave the bag and drive over to the beer distributor and come back but then I took the bag and put it next to me in the front seat all propped up with its own seatbelt just like it was my daughter in the car.

I looked at the sun even under the J train and it was just a perfect day. I decided to drive home and chill out. I felt like I had accomplished something and it was complete. Everything good was next to me in the bag, I was proud I started cruising I made a left onto Bushwick Avenue and went past the Silent Barn. This was likely my second big mistake. I should not have done this alone. In music, in art, in catering: always bring someone along. They watch the car, they haul the stuff while you leave the engine running, their presence keeps you stable – someone to see you outside yourself. I did not have a plan – no specific route as to how to get home, no one waiting for me as it was when I had made the trip there earlier. So I was being impulsive. That works okay when you are walking but not when you are in a car there are one way streets, there are police blocks, there are certain sections of Brooklyn you should never drive through. I was too elated to think; those two or three ‘tells’ were taking over my entire frame of mind.

When I got to the street where the beer distributor was, I hung a left. I pulled up and was excited to buy a few cases of beer to fill up Nyssa’s fridge. At this point, I do not recall if I locked the car. The guy in the dark beer warehouse acted like he remembered me, in fact when I respectfully told him that I had never been there before he insisted. He brought the three thirty-can cases out to the car and loaded them in and I gave him a dollar. I happily slipped back into the driver’s seat and sped up towards Broadway once again under the din of the elevated train. I would have to make a tricky left turn and was nervous but a big bus driver heading east saw me and waved me to make the move in front of him. The timing seemed perfect so in that moment I sort of slapped five on the passenger seat. I am almost sure that the bag was there at that time and that I hit it, since I was not stoned. If it had been removed at the beer joint I would have noticed at that moment of the ninety degree turn even though I was so elated!

I pulled up to the Living Gallery and got back in the same spot. I was aware that the car doors were unlocked that the windows were wide open but there at that moment was Colin smiling and like a small child I wanted to show off the beer. I opened the hatchback and pulled out two cases quickly he held the door and I ran into the Gallery noticing that Jane and Nyssa were still there eyeing the spot where my bag had been earlier near the sound system. It is probably thirty feet from the door to the fridge I made it fast and ran back out and looked in the front seat and hey wait a minute, the bag was gone.

That was pretty much it, that’s my story. Three trips back retracing my steps. Speaking to the beer guy was pretty hostile. Saying you did not have a bag the hard left turn was very difficult and that’s when I tried to remember I had no keys to get into my apartment. I had lost the keys to all my storage lockers.   I had lost the keys to my friends in Greenpoint where I was planning to crash as a last resort. I had lost the keys to my friend’s loft in Lower Manhattan. I had lost my custom made night guard and oh yeah, my special favorite yellow caution tape guitar strap that was in the bag, too. Yes, like that young Jew everything I had had was in that bag but I wasn’t going to get it back and that was the big moment.

But it’s obviously not a big moment. When I told Ariel later she had the kind of reaction my mother would have had. I would have called my mother right then and there if she was still alive. “Listen, you are okay, you did not get hurt so everything is fine, Howie!” As I am writing this now, I feel as though I wrote this before. Alexis just texted me “Jane R nude model tonite living gallery I dare you’’. I am one damned lucky son of a bitch man, the crew at my apartment were still there, I found a parking spot fast, they were able to get in through the special fire exit and open my door, they installed a new cylinder, I made it over to the Guitar Center and bought a lovely pink Squire guitar, I made it to the M Train, I met Ariel at the Trophy Bar for a drink and a burger and we walked to The Living Gallery. I promised myself to have a good time and act like nothing had happened. Ariel and I took one of the best photo booth shots I have ever taken. The gig with Cum Blood was fantastic. During Jane’s own performance I stared at her exposed upper back and paid no other attention to her. I felt so over her. All of her guests kept greeting me and thanking me as the donations piled in for the beer in the fridge. I reviewed in my head what the entire evening had cost me and it wasn’t really much. In the backyard, Alexis showed up. She had managed to catch the second half of the Cum Blood set and she introduced me to her mother. We had a very nice chat I sensed that Alexis was rigid and nervous with her mother I recalled the time she spoke to her on the phone the night we had made love and how her demeanor had deteriorated so quickly while they were talking to the point that her wool hat just slipped off her head onto my carpet. As she was leaving, her mother gave me a big warm hug and said, “take care of my girl for me…” “I will,” I said…”I am trying” I felt fantastic at that moment, Alexis left with her and I was missing her immediately. I had Chrissy and Nyssa around and then I met a new woman and asked her her name, “Alaina’’ she said my god she was cute she had nerdy glasses in a few minutes she agreed to meet me sometime for coffee when she returned to New York she was visiting from Pittsburgh.

My eyes changed my vision physically was altered but my actual vision remains the same much like the song. The same old song. That moment of eye contact. Yes, that’s all there fucking is. The compulsive addiction to romance, the constant state of desire, the moment you believe you have quit and that your interest has ebbed, another young lady walks across the hall, enters the room, smiles from the other side of the restaurant catching your eye, lifting your spirits you see a leg a thigh the soft impression of her behind against her fine silk dress the pressing of her shoulder strap against her muscles the glance the lowering of the sunglasses to get a better look the hard stare the licking of the lips the gaping mouth the lipstick being poured on the shoe strap adjustment the running of her polished nail finger along her bones the frightening sense as the mesmerizing lust sets in as time stands still there is nothing more! If this was Citizen Kane and I was Welles/Hearst you could take your beloved Rosebud your winter sleigh and substitute the one word I would utter as I passed out and dropped the ball, “Alexis!”

It was quite a year in Bushwick. I had a helluva time. I can recall every moment and that’s because I told everyone everything I could remember and then I went and wrote it all down. My life has improved. I will not stop pursuing young women. I have never felt better. When you least expect it, she will be there. Every lyric of every love song that you remember that makes you cry, it’s all true. So, how do I end this story? Lead in with a snide implication of the sequel, “A Year In Venice” “Another Year In Bushwick,” or perhaps a bit more Bay Area, “Tales From The Market Hotel?” The Autobiography of Sidney Bernstein (as told to Howie Seligman) featuring music by Connor Oberst? No, just quit while you are ahead. Reader, I need your feedback for this to work, I have had a lot of love and a lot of rage from a few of you but constructive criticism is always useful. By the time, YOU specifically are reading this all of the names may have been changed to protect you and I so hit me with your best shots now and tell me what you honestly think and exactly how you might fit in to the growing development of the hood!

Thank you, Drive Safely, Good Night!

 

Howie Seligman, Brooklyn, New York

 

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