It was exactly one year ago. I was standing alone in the back of a big white box truck watching my things as movers lugged all the earthly possessions I had left up into my 3rd floor walk up. It had been a lonely year, but I think standing in that truck in the fading light of that late afternoon in December while ice rained lightly out of the chilly sky I may have felt the most alone I ever have. Up until then or since.
I was moving into a tiny, dilapidated, creature ridden studio apartment in Brooklyn. I had no hot water for about a week, no working stove for 4 months and no heat ever, at all. My landlord was in Jamaica for the first 3 months I lived there. I think I actually only saw him maybe 5 times during my entire year in Crown Heights. Initially, when I moved in it took over 24 hours to have a flushing toilet and a full week for running water in the bathroom. I peed at a beef patty joint down the block, I showered at the gym, and I cried. A lot.
At night I would stare up at the ceiling over my bed fighting claustrophobia in the 12 ft by 14 ft space that I reluctantly called home. Above my head, emerging snakelike from the center of my ceiling loomed a menacing tube, half coated in drywall paste and yellowed with old cigarette smoke. It taunted me, threatening to erupt the decades old refuse that lay within the walls behind it. I still wonder what the hell that thing actually was.
Each night I would lay in my bed freezing, listening to noises in the darkness and waiting to see what might join me. I’ll never forget the night I ambled through the tiny hallway into the bathroom, leaving the door open as I always did so there would be room for me to sit down. As I stepped down onto the ceramic floor (6 inches below the rest of the apartment – I’ll get to that in a moment) I felt a small scurried movement on my toes. Quickly I flipped on the light and and looked down at my nocturnal guest. This night was a little more special than most as the roach was really enormous. It looked back at me steadily and unafraid, I had invaded his space after all right? Until this point in my life I had lived under the assumption that insects were afraid of humans. No more. The creature was large enough that I would not have been surprised to see him flash me a gang sign if he only had the fingers to do so. In fact, with a little more mutation (which is the only thing that could possibly have accounted for his size) he might have been well on his way. I did all I could do at that point – I screamed and I stomped and I squashed him with all of my might. He pretty much exploded and I spent the next 10 minutes cleaning up that which usually resides within an exoskeleton and was now nestled goo between my toes and in the crevices of my shoes.
I cried some more that night.
Coming home from work was always an adventure. I would arrive at my front door which was neatly tucked between a Jamaican jerk chicken establishment and a Chinese takeout (bugs ahoy!). Four or five days out of any given week one of the Franklin Ave resident drug dealers would be posted up literally in front of my door. After a while he got to know me, but it was a little uncomfortable for the first couple of weeks when he thought I was looking and motioning to him in an effort to buy some of his wares. We eventually came to a friendly understanding but it might have helped if the Chinese takeout place didn’t encourage the situation by allowing him to cut out and distribute his drugs inside their restaurant. Gentrification is a messy business and my year in Crown Heights has led me to believe that neither side is ever really in the right. In many ways my heart goes out to the dealer, but at the time it was merely another obstacle in my day.
Life became a cycle. Hop on the train, work for 9 or 10 hours then off to the gym, back to the train then tiny apartment for a dinner perched on my bed and eating over the garbage can and then bed. Rinse off in a shower that smelled like shrimp fried rice (the exhaust from the restaurant downstairs was aimed at my window) and repeat. Day after day. Between the cold, and the short day light hours and the long hours at my new job I was exhausted. Time became a commodity in a way I had never known.
Weekends were a little better as most of the wildlife was nocturnal. Although my views were all of brick walls and others windows there was always the sounds of neighbors screaming, screwing and banging steel drums to keep me company. Occasionally I would gamble and give the radiator a try, just for fun. Inevitably it would begin to hiss and then steam and finally spray scalding hot water everywhere. Since there wasn’t much space it didn’t take very long to produce a flood. Remember the 6 inch difference from the floors to the tiled bathroom? Here’s why. It seemed that the floors had just been laid down haphazardly over the previous floors, and those above the ones before them, and so on and so forth. This actually came in bizarrely handy since the water would usually seep beneath the place where I could clean it up. Out if sight out of mind became a favorite mantra. The heat and moisture did hang around long enough to leave permanent water damage on the frame of my bed but never quite long enough to actually produce any heat. And last winter, right around mid January it got really, really cold. Colder than any winter I can remember living through. Though I’m sure my emotional state of affairs had something to do with the chill I can also tell you that it didn’t get over 20 degrees for that entire month. I would hide under my blanket and sheets and still see my breath while I listened to the patter of tiny footsteps inside my walls.
But I digress. The fact is, a year ago I was beginning something kind of wretched and incredibly difficult. I was alone in a very big kind of scary city, moving into a sketchy apartment in a sketchy neighborhood in the cold. But I did what I’ve always done in my life in the face of such things, I managed. The difficulties with the apartment went on and on, and perhaps I’ll divulge more detail later but through all of it I still somehow managed to make friends. I found great places to hangout. I discovered passions and talents and interests and I never let go of hope. Things were bad, but they were never completely unmanageable. In mid summer when it was 100 degrees and the fire department declared my building unsafe and disconnected the electricity for 2 days, I laughed. I wanted to cry but I didn’t and things got better, somewhat, with time.
I once read that the secret of life is to endure. If that is the case then the past year has exposed me to all new levels of that secret. In my opinion though, to really live is to experience. To experience all of it in its good and bad and ugly and freezing cold sweating hot awesome/terribleness. Then, if you’re lucky you get to move on, and leave much of what you’ve endured behind, but also take the lessons learned with you.
Then you find a beautiful apartment, in a lovely, safe neighborhood with more than enough room and a gentle kind roommate. You find peace in friends and daydreams and meditation and music. You find much more than ever before to feel thankful for on Thanksgiving. It it means so much more now.
You may read all of this and feel bad, or think that it couldn’t possibly be worth it. But I know it is. Every day when I appreciate the tiniest things in my life I am absolutely sure of it. A year later and I most certainly would not want to do it again. But if I had to I could, and I would. And I’m damn psyched that I did and that I’m still here.
It’s funny how I can’t seem to write about terrible things while they’re actually happening, it doesn’t much make for an interesting day by day blog. But I have a feeling things are going to be a little easier now. You know what they say. The first year in New York is the hardest. Well, it was. But I made it.
Cheers.
