Good Sunday Stack November 30th
Cities giveth and cities taketh.
Good evening and greetings from East London.
My final Sunday in Brooklyn before departing eastward on a one-way flight was spent as groomsmen in the beautiful wedding of my dear friends Max and Emma.
The day began at their apartment in Clinton Hill, where the groomsmen gathered, mostly on time, to eat lunch and get ready together. Going into the day, I had one job: to order couple a classic NYC yellow cab home at the end of a night. About a half an hour before Max was set to leave for the first look, I was given a second. Nobody else had ever tied a bowtie before except me. All of the groom’s party had traditional neckties but the groom was classing up the joint. At least by wearing a bowtie, not by knowing how to tie one.
Now I wasn’t exactly carrying high society on my shoulders. I’d tied a bowtie once before. It took twenty minutes watching and rewatching a French guy on YouTube before I’d gotten it then, and it took thirty minutes and that same video this time around. I did my best, and Max looked dapper. His mom would have had the knot tenser if she could have. Sorry Mrs. B.
We sent Max off with cheers and he responded with clear instructions about cleaning up and locking the door. Fair enough.
As it was both the fastest way to our meeting point in Brooklyn Bridge Park and a bucket list item for me, the party took the subway. We got lots of smiles and second glances on our walk down Old Fulton Street. One crude joke from teenagers.
The first time I ever nervously asked someone to be my girlfriend was in that park. The first time I ever played hooky from a high school debate event, I went to that park. I’d humiliated myself in that park once. My friend Malcolm got dunked on there this past summer. I wrote my grad school admission essay about that park. Lots of memories but being there dressed to the nines with the wedding party takes the cake. It was the New York City gods shining a blessing down the kindest couple I know. Nobody deserved a perfect weather wedding more than these two.
Max and Emma met in college. The night when it was Max’s turn to nervously ask his crush to be his girlfriend, he had Emma over for a movie. By the end of the movie, he hadn’t quite worked up the nerve yet. So he put on another movie to steel his nerves.
As the sun started to hit the downtown skyline, we migrated to the venue – the back garden of a red sauce joint in Caroll Gardens. After us groomsmen and bridesmaids kicked off the ceremony, Max and Emma took it away with their vows. I and everyone else there heard two people meant to be together articulate as such. Theirs is a beautiful love, nothing else to it. May we all be so lucky.
During the ceremony, you could hear the rumbles of F and G trains across the block and faint traces of conversations from the Sunday evenings in the neighboring apartments. I remember stepping out for air at one point after dinner, seeing people walking their dogs and carrying groceries. Might have been the wine but I was enamored with there being this beautiful fleeting universe of the wedding carving itself a momentary existence amidst the city that never sleeps. I walked around the block smiling like an idiot looking for a place to pee because the venue only had two toilets. No luck.
The night was capped off with cheap cowboy hats, boas, and pop hits at the bar around the corner. The lads didn’t look quite as good as we had the start of the night, but we bore the smiles of a job well done. The groom had become the husband. They’d be on their honeymoon flight that time tomorrow.
That is, if I could get them a midnight yellow cab. In the age of Uber and green boro taxis, there were more wrinkles to this than there were twenty years ago. Or maybe it is easy and I’m just a nervous nelly. Regardless, one last blessing from the New York City gods sent a yellow one via the curb app.
Sometimes cities give us beautiful memories like this. Other times they screw you out of a movie.
This past Friday, I attempted to take advantage of being on a grad student’s schedule and go see a matinee showing of All the President’s Men at The Prince Charles Cinema. The bus ride normally takes 35-50 minutes depending on traffic. I left my flat at 11 for an 11:45 showing. They have ten minutes of previews, so I was set to have time to use the restroom and get settled.
London had other ideas. Between holiday traffic and construction in Holborn it took me an hour and half to get to Leicester Square. I was so late they wouldn’t even let me in. “I can get you into American Psycho”, the guy said. No thanks.
I got back on the bus for dejected ride home thinking about how long I’d wanted to see Redford and Hoffman on the big screen. It was one of my dad’s favorite movies, and we watched it all the time on his DVD copy growing up, but I used to think I was too good for it. Humbled by age, I was finally ready to give it an honest go. No, said London. I’m biking next time, I responded.
What I’m Watching
Not All The President’s Men
Working Girl
An instant entry into my top-tier of New York City rom-coms. Right from the opening credit sequence of a gorgeous continuing drone shot of the New York City Harbor as a gospel Carly Simon song plays, Mike Nichols’ Working Girl is too much fun. The 80s hairstyles on Joan Cusack and Melanie Griffith, the old school offices, sleazebag Staten Island Alec Baldwin and his boat. A blast of a movie that’s got depth, craft, and a perfect table setting Harrison Ford performance.
High Fidelity
Succeeds in spite of itself. More precisely, succeeds in spite of it being fifty percent John Cusack doing a sad sack schtick “why always me?” (it was 80 percent him). The other, more enjoyable, fifty percent is a hangout movie set in the great city of Chicago Illinois. Jack Black toes but ultimately ends up on the right side of the line. A reminder that a few clever quips of dialogue and a great soundtrack can patch up a lot of holes.
Fight Club
Both of last two movies to really grab me were directed by David Fincher. Last month it was Se7en, this month it was Fight Club. Twice this movie had my eyes bugging and muscles tensing, then an extended jaw drop to top it off. Awesome movie. Funny that it wasn’t taken seriously upon release given how prescient it ended up being.