liminal spaces

a hotel bathroom. your old bedroom in your parent’s house, a towel stuffed under the door so the noise doesn’t get out. the passenger seat of a shitty corolla, the backseat of a taxi as it rolls over the manhattan bridge. the big windowless building off the I-95 that glows red under moonlight. on the rare occasion i walk through times square I think of what it used to look like in the pre-guiliani years, with the girls out on the corners, probably smoking cigarettes and drinking bodega soda through clear plastic straws.

my favorite places are the ones where i can disappear, become nobody. i look at the shadow of my own reflection in the car window as a i pump my gas, a cup of black coffee and two lotto scratchers in my hand. i love it when no one cares who i am or the state of my worn sneakers as i shuffle across the parking lot to throw away the trash that’s accumulated on the floor of the passenger seat. little treasures from past lives.

at what point do the spaces we inhabit become a part of us? for eight years i’ve walked up and down these streets. climbed down the subway like a rat only to surface again on another island, tracing my hands on the cool bricks of the buildings that have stood over me through some of the worst moments of my life. some of the best moments of my life.

the cold vinyl seats of my favorite late-night diner, the glare of the florescent lights garish in the early morning. the brooklyn bridge, illuminated at night, where i walk in the summer when the weather is good rather than take the train. the grocery store at the southeast corner of union square where i used to steal my lunch when i worked at the massage parlor, slipping in and out of the crowds and hoping i never got caught. the pink door i pass on my daily walk around my neighborhood, tracing my steps over and over again.

in new york city you can be a ghost. you can keep walking until you hit the water, you can find new ways to get lost. you can escape behind the velvet rope, bathe in the glow of any neon sign you like. the city will share all her secrets, if you’re listening. or you can just keep rolling on the jackie robinson, windows down and music up, watching the tombstones turn into trees and wondering what it takes to get so free.