Freddy's is fighting back and they're doing it on Fox News, baby

When I'm in Brooklyn, my local bar is Freddy's. Freddy's is a bar where you can walk in the door and meet friendly faces, have a pint and a chat, listen to a band play, watch Donald's all day long art video installations made of heavily edited film and tv archive footage, sit in peace and read, and talk to at least a dozen people you are likely to know there. Freddy's is the heart and soul of the neighbourhood of Prospect Heights. Freddy's is under threat from some louse called Ratner who wants to shit on everyone's parade and take everyone's home away and put up a large piece of concrete junk instead and the supreme court of the United States has put their judgements behind him. It's disgusting.

I posted a piece on Clusterflock today about it.

The Black Toad

The Toads

One of those Freddy's moments

Election night outside Freddy's

If this is sunday, it must be Dublin

I had a whole blog post paragraph written yesterday, and its topic was the American independence day. I didn't post it in time, and it's gone past its sell by date now, like an over-crispened trotter, or a squib left out in the overnight dew. God knows it's rare I write a blog post these days. I am drawn to capitalising, suddenly, BUT I KNOW IT MIGHT NOT COME TO ANY GOOD. OH. THAT FEELS GOOD. THAT'S SOME KIND OF A RELIEF. BUT IT PROBABLY MAKES ME LOOK HYSTERICAL. OH WELL. NOT THAT I MIND ABOUT THAT.

SO, NOW THAT I'M CAPITALISING HAPPILY, I NOTICE THAT CONTENT HAS DRIED UP ENTIRELY. I AM SATISFYING MY OWN SELFISH DESIRES AT THE EXPENSE OF ANY INTEREST TO MY LOYAL READERS WHO COME BY HERE DAILY, HOPING HOPING... AND THOSE OTHERS, WHO LATELY SEEM TO BE COMING IN ALARMING REGULARITY, IN SEARCH OF 'GAGGED LADIES'. LORD. OK, I THINK I AM now sated of capitals. not that i don't expect it to come flooding back again without so much as a by your leave. but for now, it seems that i've gotten capitalisation out of my system.

Yeah, that didn't last long. Ross is right now crossing Flatbush to Freddy's, where he will have a pint of Sierra Nevada, and chat with the regulars for an hour. I am a few thousand miles away, where it is LATE (yowza) and I must get up soonish to start my Big Trek To Dublin, and Back To Barcelona. I wonder how it will be when I return. I wonder what I will do there, this time. It's been a year of a lot of travelling. Ireland has functioned as a kind of return place this past year, for the first time since 2003. Over and back to New York, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Marseille, Milan, in various combinations, since last june. And I'm still on the move.

Time lags

Sometimes it's hard when you're living five or six hours behind most people you know. Especially when it's nine o'clock at night and you feel like a chat. And then you remember Freddy's. But you don't always remember to go.

Two funny things I've just discovered

1. Freddy's was recommended in Cara, the aer lingus (national Irish airline) in-flight magazine, which is just HILARIOUS. You'd have to see both Cara and Freddy's to truly appreciate the beauty of this one.

2. Somebody in Seoul googled or bloggered "armpit lick" and got through to my blog. Bliss.

Freddy's at 3.13 am

It is told in the toilets of Freddy's

Hear those engines soar above and
DANCE

AKA
Don't piss on the toilet seat. Fuckin' toddler.

Out of the dirt springs a miracle

I remember when I first lived in new york four years ago, I heard all these stories about where the new downtown was. In one version, the new downtown was some town out in the middle of Jersey, but I couldn't really fly with that. The point of it all was where the artist-scenes were happening, and how. I was looking for something, you know, something specific, and it was that kind of scene/community thing I blog and talk about sometimes, where something gorgeous rises up from the dirt and dances.

In this town you can take your pick of historical scenes that have fostered everything in the avant garde and popular culture of the past hundred years or more, ever since Walt Whitman sat on a stoop in Fulton street, jiving about leaves of grass and calling to human beings to get off their arses and FEEL.

But that's all just a bunch of stories, and you can so easily miss the incredible fucking beauty of the moment in the search for something else. The moment itself IS the edge. The moment is also all there is, and everything is jiving in it.

Way back in 2001, when I came to this city for the very first time, on a six day fly-through, I found myself sitting at a gig in the Zinc bar with about a dozen other people in the house including the band, and Alex Blake, the shamanic upright bass player, was getting down with piano, drums and a saxophone. It was a beautiful gig, a holy and dirty gig. I was sitting right in front, a bashful spit away from him.

And they came to the last song and he began to play an African circle song. It sounded like a sing-song to me, I grew up on sing-songs in Ireland, where everybody sang the songs they had in common, and then somebody got up, usually a man actually, and sang some ballad with a tender tenor voice and everyone went quiet and listened and then roared at the end and off we went again on another song.

Everybody knows a good chorus when they hear one. And Alex was encouraging people to sing, at least that's how I heard it, so I found a place and filled out a three part harmony with the bass and the saxophone. And we sang the chorus, over and over, until it was done. Until it was done.

My eyes were tight tight shut, but I remember his voice, hissing at me, "feel it! feel it!", making my heart soar for the next round. It felt so intimate in there, all I heard were the three voices and this flying free.

I was at another three part gig last night, in the Delacorte in Central Park, where I last went to see Shakespeare in the Park. Right in the middle of it was this shining vision of a woman singing her songs of beauty and hip, of sexy and sacred, speaking my tongue and the sound she made doing it felt like the most gorgeous vibration I have ever heard come out of a human being this side of Christy Moore. It's easy to get hyperbolic in new york city, but this gig felt like a homecoming. And there was singing-along, sugar. There was a sing-song in Central Park last night.

I love where I live. I have a strong desire to continue to live here and explore. I love the work I'm doing. I have a strong desire to keep exploring that, too. I am so utterly humbled by all this jivin' good stuff.

I'm feeling it, Alex. I'm feeling it, Walt. It's going on.

Brief glimpses inside another human being

What is it that happens to a man or a woman who catches a bare glimpse of another, and without anything else to go on, feels their heart sing? Is it some kind of look in the eye that resonates somewhere? Is it purely energetic? Physical? The way she holds herself? The way he smiles? Some reminder of someone lost somewhere.. or an unexpected feeling of coming home, right there, across the room, with nobody saying anything?

Of course, it's only actually remarkable when it happens between two people who are not in a sexed-up or exotic landscape, who are fully clothed, and who are not flirting with each other. Sexual fantasies are like invisible mosquitoes in the air in new york city. The air is full of endless opportunity, like mirages made out of diesel dust on a hot humped road.

I opened the missed connections craigslist page yesterday, and typed in "Freddy's". A post came up for a night I had been there (like shooting fish in a waterless barrel, this past couple of weeks). Up came a mention of a woman who was actually sitting in front of me (there were less than 20 people in the backroom at the time). The post was written by a man "on the other side of the room, wearing a red shirt". He said:

"We spoke briefly while passing on the stairs, and I should have asked then. So, I'm asking now."

And I wonder if she'll ever see it. It's a peculiar thing, typing in some general information into the missed connections section to see if anyone has felt a connection with you, missed. And even when the room is narrowed down as far as 20 in Freddy's Backroom, it's still new york city.

Thousands of people come between one meaningful connection and the next friendly face, here. People get worn down by that, and retreat into their small worlds. Then suddenly they look out, and see something beautiful, and feel its loss when it goes. They also know that because it's new york, the odds on ever meeting that particular beauty again are staggeringly high against it. And yet it happens.

It can be a desert, sometimes. And then a flower pops up when you least expect it.

I got a guitar today! I've just been singing some tunes, trying out my 7th chords. Barres are next. Phew!

Hurrah! Hurrah!

I heard a man talking on the phone in an Irish accent

along 5th avenue.

"Irish!" I called after him, the way I do here, sometimes.
He didn't turn around.

It's irresistible to me, when I hear it. It sounds so beautiful. I have had a number of conversations with people in the street purely on the basis of hearing my home accent. And it's interesting, because there is a relationship between the amount of time a person has been living away from their home country, and the strength of their desire to talk to another Irish person purely because of the resonant music of Irishness.

A thought struck me last night, walking home (from Freddy's: look, any time you see me writing about the thoughts I have on the way home, just know it happened after Freddy's, I think I'll have to make a new label: walking home from Freddy's) and it was very simple: love for one's country grows in exile. That has been my experience, and while exile is a grandiose kind of a word, I like it for what it signifies to me underneath and before the grandiosity.

And it's true in my case. I have found myself having a sense and feeling of Ireland that is entirely new, a love for the place that has actually only really come into existence since I moved away from it. It grows inside you. I think that's probably just the natural way of things. When you're in a place, the tendency is to take it for granted, and crib about the small stuff, and then when you're away from it, the broad strokes come into relief. I think age has a lot to do with it, aswell, though maturity and age do not often, actually, dovetail.

One of the things I love about new york city (and there are many, and I want to write about all of them, ultimately) is the ubiquity of the English language. It's just so easy to understand and be understood by people here. And you get to hear all kinds of interesting stuff, stuff you can understand. I only have this particular appreciation for the fact that I hear English everywhere because I lived in Denmark for three and a half years, and one of the things I missed very much about living there was that I felt so shut off from streetlife in that way, so shut off from the overheard joke, and the generalness of things.

Also, the more you speak English to people for whom it is not their native tongue - no matter how fluent they are - your own language skills start going down the toilet fast. You lose your slang, you lose your jive, you pick up bad habits in your own language that are prevalent in non-native speakers. And when you speak their language, you're only ever able to express yourself mediocrely, at best. However, despite all this, I had some profound and beautiful moments of connection with people through Danish. In particular, the old people I visited and cared for, during my last months there. That was where it all happened, with Danish, for me.

You can hear every language being spoken here in new york city. I have an appreciation for people who come to a strange place without knowing the language. I was stopped for directions on Prospect Park West by a middle aged man with almost no English, who I could just about make out was looking for Montgomery st., and he was rolling a delivery trolley. I didn't know where it was, but I shouted to the people behind, and they didn't know either. Anyway, I bade him good luck on his way. Jesus, though, I thought, and turned around to the people behind again, and said,

"Jesus. Imagine not being able to speak English and coming to new york city, and trying to survive?" That is just unfuckingfathomable. And it happens, thousands of times every day. Anyway, it turns out that the people behind were from Namibia and Germany, had been living in the city for a long time, and they had their own stories to share.

Learning a new language in situ is challenging, under any circumstances, especially if you have no choice but to speak it through the day, to be in that mode of trying to understand, all the time. It's like a switch that is permanently on, in your brain. You're reaching out, in some inexplicable way, constantly, to catch subtle inflections, throwaway vowel sounds, a look in the eye. You get used to spending entire years of your life catching 10, 15, 20% of conversations, of never getting the joke even when you understand it, of constantly being, to a greater or lesser extent, out of things, outside of the culture. Because you are. I think you need a very strong anchor to keep you in a monoculture that is not your own, and one that is so strongly based on its own traditions, like Denmark is.

And I've met people who have that anchor, they found it through love, through marriage and family. I didn't find anyone who was not Danish, who found that anchor through love of the place itself, there. But I'm sure there are people who have settled there, particularly along the west coast, who found that kind of love, that kind of devotion, to the place, the landscape. People find that feeling every day in Ireland. The place is jumping with every nationality in the world. It's like a mini-new york.

I find it here.

Back in Whippet City

I'm whippet-sitting for the week.

God, it was such a gorgeous day today. It is definitely autumn, and though there are still a few valiant flip-floppers grooving around still, in their shorts, the time for the summer is past past past. The leaves are already crinkly and covering the ground.

I brought the ladies, as I call them, for a walk in the park and then up to my flat, and back home through the park. It's like walking around with a pair of supermodels, or mother teresa. They spread joy and happiness where e'er they go. Handsome men turn to smile fondly as they speed through the park on their high tech racing bikes; groups of 13 year old black children feel they can make contact. All sorts of people stop to marvel at the Amazing Whippets. Especially today, because they were out in their green sweatshirts, which make them look a bit like supermodels slumming it, or those incredibly rich old people you sometimes see wandering around the upper east side in their knickers with several nurses attending them. God save us from yes-men.

But with two sanguine whippets at hand, you get to talk to so many people you probably wouldn't otherwise. The funny thing is, most people say, knowingly, "Italian greyhounds, right?" with a little wink. They screw up their noses when they hear "Whippets, actually."

I've been through this drill so many times I should seriously consider making an application as some sort of tour guide to the International Whippet Association. People ask if they're friendly, as the ladies strain at the leash to get away. "Well, they're not really that bothered, as far as I can tell. They're not either friendly or unfriendly, most of the time. I think they usually don't notice other living things. Except squirrels. They are passionate about squirrels. They sort of do their own thing, you know?" I like to think I'm doing my bit for Global Whippet Consciousness Raising. Sometimes it Feels Good to Capitalise.

Overheard this evening, in the park:

Elderly Austro-German type, full white head of hair and full white beard, speaking in a thick Austrian accent, complete with the hugely enjoyable Germanic zz's. He's talking very quickly and very very enthusiastically to a delighted, giggling elderly lady.

Zo I vonder, what do zey vant viz me, vhen ze place eez zo full of zientists.. And zen I figured it out! I landed in August, and zix monthz later zey land on ze moon - ZAT is why zey vanted me! Of course!!

Some people you just want to make friends with on the spot. Even if just for a short while.

Tonight I am off to the great Entertainment Soup Kitchen that is Freddy's Backroom bar. This evening's sustainence is a comedy stew, with a light chat for afters.

Stranger seen, unmet

I had a new york moment on the F train. I recognised a bloke sitting on the train and I had no idea where from, or what country, or context. Could have been anywhere. I just have a strong feeling that I've met and talked with him before. Young, college-looking, with wiry red hair and a wiry red beard, very American looking in a thin, malnourished kind of way, baseball cap.

And he got up to exit the train at Carroll Gardens. I wasn't in the mood to go and find out the scoop. And so he disappeared back into the new york ocean, teeming with every kind of sealife in its 300 square miles.

They have sealife in Freddy's, also. Underwater swimming toads in a water tank, with human arses. I freaked one out. He saw me and jumped. Underwater.

In the background, ladies sang arias and men sat at the bar, chugging whiskey.

Knock on wood, baby. oooh.

I've just been involved one of those conversations that felt like we were rollerblading at speed through the boroughs of new york city. One of those conversations that had us. Tonight, at Freddy's. We drank of that conversation like two thirsty feckers, jugs and jugs of it, half afraid to stop in case there mightn't be more of it for ages. Beautiful.

Here's something I started writing in the street earlier tonight, and finished it just before that conversation happened.

Did you ever get the feeling that nobody likes you? I mean, nobody. I've had the feeling that nobody likes me. Just now. It's kind of still sticking around a bit. Yes. It's still here. The more people I meet, the more unfriendly things seem to be getting.

People keep sending me away. I must have some strange magnetism this evening. Even the bartender told me to get served by somebody else.

Knock, knock, knock on wood.