Melinda Laffer (please see [1] below)
[1] Please see Here.
[2] And also Here.
President Barack Obama (please see [2] above)
Reading these news stories early this morning, I foundmyself thinking of them as two polar, but closely related in dynamic tension, aspectsof the Depression being provoked and stoked by the president and his political party. The first story takes place on Long Island and the second on its (geographically) close neighbor, Manhattan Island. Unspeakable, unjustifiable in any respect, and horrifying as the Laffers’ actions were, I still findmyself thinking about what their wedding pictures might have looked like, wanting to know about the details of Private First Class David Laffer's army service and its aftermath, and of a time when they had hope. Discontent though I am these days, these thoughts –all of them, about both stories and their implications (at $35,800 a ticket; that must have been quite a dinner at Daniel for the high-minded and corrupt) -- put my own situation in some limited but salient perspective.
Thursday I spent a few hours in Manhattan. My business these days normally seems to take me downtown to SoHo, Greenwich Village and TriBeca, but two days ago I was in the midtown precincts where I worked for so long, where we used to have an apartment and where we were married (oddly, it seems, and coincidentally, in the premises now occupied by Daniel).
The day was gray, pleasant and rainy, but Manhattan was like a ghost town. Everywhere I walked I saw a great deal of "tony" commercial real estate empty and boarded up, including fancy jewelers like Gioia and the lovely large Borders store at East 57th Street and Park (originally home to Le Pavillion, New York's first grande luxe French restaurant, and later to the First Women's Bank, which made a big publicity splash and had "presence" during the Carter years, the time when Ms. magazine was at its commercial zenith). The long commercial street front at the Trump Plaza apartment complex on Third Avenue is now utterly vacant and the former Loews Tower East cinema just up the avenue is a sad, abandoned wreck.
Window-gazing at Daniel Boulud's former place of employment, Le Cirque (now re-relocated to East 58th Street from its original Mayfair House location, which was where Caroline and I were married) said everything. At 1:15 pm on a weekday afternoon, acres of tables stood empty, adjacent to a desolated bar room populated by only a few jacketless young men in shirt collars with female companions in sundresses. No barman seemed to be on duty. Don't get me wrong -- I'm no Nancy Reagan/Betsy Bloomingdale nostalgist and Caroline and I didn't even like our wedding at the old, exclusive Le Cirque. I suppose it's possible that if you live and work in Manhattan every day, you don't notice the decay or you need to shrug it off in order to survive. To a current New York City outsider, however, but also someone who knows the city well, the scene was absolutely shocking and the mood reminded me of the days after 9/11. It was as though someone had dropped a bomb on the city.
And while most of us spend our 2011 "stay-cations" staying put during what CNBC has dubbed "Stay-cation Summer" (replacing last year's unsuccessful White House "Recovery Summer" offering ), others will "safari" in splendor en (extended) famille in Botswana, experiencing precious moments of personal growth on the public dime.
Borders store, East 57th Street at corner of Park Avenue, Manhattan (Defunct. Former site of Le Pavillon restaurant and First Women's Bank).
Left to right: Liz Carpenter (former aide to President Lyndon B. Johnson), Rep. Bella Abzug (D-NY) and Betty Furness at the opening of the First Women's Bank, New York City, October 1975
Mary Jane Russell photographed at Le Pavillon by Lillian Bassman. Harper's Bazaar, 1950
The day was gray, pleasant and rainy, but Manhattan was like a ghost town. Everywhere I walked I saw a great deal of "tony" commercial real estate empty and boarded up, including fancy jewelers like Gioia and the lovely large Borders store at East 57th Street and Park (originally home to Le Pavillion, New York's first grande luxe French restaurant, and later to the First Women's Bank, which made a big publicity splash and had "presence" during the Carter years, the time when Ms. magazine was at its commercial zenith). The long commercial street front at the Trump Plaza apartment complex on Third Avenue is now utterly vacant and the former Loews Tower East cinema just up the avenue is a sad, abandoned wreck.
Trump Plaza apartment complex, Third Avenue, Upper East Side, Manhattan. The ground floor formerly contained various prestigious commercial establishments.
Loews Tower East, Third Avenue, Upper East Side, Manhattan. Defunct.
Window-gazing at Daniel Boulud's former place of employment, Le Cirque (now re-relocated to East 58th Street from its original Mayfair House location, which was where Caroline and I were married) said everything. At 1:15 pm on a weekday afternoon, acres of tables stood empty, adjacent to a desolated bar room populated by only a few jacketless young men in shirt collars with female companions in sundresses. No barman seemed to be on duty. Don't get me wrong -- I'm no Nancy Reagan/Betsy Bloomingdale nostalgist and Caroline and I didn't even like our wedding at the old, exclusive Le Cirque. I suppose it's possible that if you live and work in Manhattan every day, you don't notice the decay or you need to shrug it off in order to survive. To a current New York City outsider, however, but also someone who knows the city well, the scene was absolutely shocking and the mood reminded me of the days after 9/11. It was as though someone had dropped a bomb on the city.
Two above images: Le Cirque, East 58th Street, Manhattan.
Current site of Restaurant Daniel; former site of Le Cirque. Mayfair Hotel (formerly Mayfair House), East 65th Street, Manhattan.
Haven Drugs, Medford, Long Island, New York
David Laffer (please see [1] above)
U.S. first lady Michelle Obama with daughters Sasha, 2nd right, and Malia, right (aka "Senior Staff"; see Update below), are welcomed by traditional dancers as they arrive in Gaborone, Botswana, Friday, June 24, 2011. Charles Dharapak / AP
No comments:
Post a Comment