Coney Island. I’m sitting on the Boardwalk, just zoning out. The sun is where it should be and that is in the sky at approximately 6:40 or rather 18:40. Feeling pretty good. 2 days in a row of doing things that are presently out of the ordinary whereas, a number of years ago were quite ordinary.
About 10 years ago I was at Summerstage most every time there was an event going on, and then stay until 11:00 or later relatively zooted and surprised to be traipsing through Central Park at what is usually an unsafe hour. By zooted I meant high from weed and drunk from beer, more than likely Heinekens. Some Mexican dudes would have their delivery bikes in the park running off to area delis and store to purchase as much cold beer that their bicycle baskets could hold.
There would usually be a crowd of maybe 20 people or so congregating around a loose group of drummers, all drinking and smoking and dancing and chanting into the night by the band shell which reverberated with hypnotic rhythms in the night. I was living in Weehawken at the time and would wander through the park into midtown and walk down to the bus terminal, more often than not, unmolested.
Coney Island was a different trip. It was also the first sighting of the Love Bubble that Bill and I occupied all those years ago. That’s a story and a half though. Some other time. I used to come here a lot in 2002. I was unemployed at the time and would spend my mornings online looking for a job then I would hop on a bus into the city to catch a train that would take me to the ocean.
It’s really a cheap and easy beach adventure that you don’t need a car to get to, though I’m sure if I had a car I wouldn’t be here. It is cool though. Quite a mosaic of different people and cultures. A nice mix and most are half naked though not necessarily the good half. A lot more Central Americans and Muslims in Burkahs. The Blacks, Whites and Latinos are scattered throughout.
A group of kids tossing a football back and forth and trying to hit seagulls as they throw the ball. An aging mother, trying to look younger with cornrows is screaming at her moody son, ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ The son walks away from his mother, silently cursing her under his breath. An older brother walks up to him and whispers something in his ear while tousling his hair, making his little brother smile.
Oliver Sachs kills me. I was thinking this the other day. I enjoy his writing, the way he breaks down theory in Neuroscience so that people like me can understand it and start to think that they have the symptoms that he writes so well about. I usually start to think that if I don’t have whatever it is he’s writing about, someday I will be suffering from the affliction.
I decided to avoid his writings thinking it would be good for my mental health.
This holiday weekend, since I can’t get Mojo or Uncut magazines from England, I have been catching up with the issues of the New Yorker I’ve been behind on. Being up to date is almost within my grasp. I’ve been going through the issues that I didn’t want to be caught short so I brought 2 issues.
I’m sitting on the beach reading a fine article on a Hollywood cinematographer when I turn the page and there is the byline of Oliver Sachs. I’m immediately sucked into a story about some visual affliction and how sight can be restored in some cases even after decades of non-use. Of course it was a great article.
A few hours later, I’m zoning out on the Boardwalk writing this. I look up and try to see the planes coming in for a landing at JFK at the point of horizon. It’s hazy and takes some effort when I see that if I focus a certain way I can see my eye itself. Little organisms floating around on the surface of my eyes.
I thought it was funny considering I was just reading about eye ailments by Oliver Sachs.