The New York City Rhythm
New York City opened its arms to me with the temperatures in the high teens and even twenty and sunny one day. This made the walking very comfortable as it was not too hot but never needed anything heavier than a jean jacket or blazer.

Porter Airlines provided a very satisfying experience and even with the mess of construction on Front Street in Toronto the shuttle to the bottom of Bathurst Street for the very brief ferry ride to the Billy Bishop Airport worked fine in both directions. The flight went to Newark Liberty Airport in New Jersey and the trip into Manhattan on the Air train while on the airport site and three stops into Penn Station on N J Transit went without a hitch.

The station is only nine blocks from the Chelsea Savoy Hotel which is in a fabulous location for exploring the city without being in the chaos that is around Times Square but still being within easy reach when necessary.

There was little time spent in the Chelsea Savoy. The room was clean, and the bed was comfortable. There was a problem with access to the WIFI at certain times, but quite frankly being on a holiday is not a time to be attached to the computer for anything more than quick information gathering. The i phone was left at home and no critical information was missed. It was quite liberating. Seeing many people of all ages walking on the street staring at smart phone displays lead me to wonder how much they missed by not looking ahead or up.

The Chelsea Savoy is at 204 W23 St. and just down the block from the well known Hotel Chelsea at 222 W23. The Hotel Chelsea has quite a storied background as a residence for well known artists, writers and movie and theatre people. It is currently closed for renovation.

After unpacking, the first order of the day was to head to the theatre district for tickets to Broadway productions. Kinky Boots is the current hot ticket but it was sold out for all performances the week I was there. My first choice however was Pippin. It is a revival of a production I first saw in 1975. The new production is still selling out after Andrea Martin won a Tony for the role of Berthe, a ticket was available for Wednesday night. That is just one of the advantages of traveling alone. For Thursday night a ticket for The Glass Menagerie and Friday the Book of Mormon were available. This took care of Broadway, now the rest of New York was there for the taking.

Two other things on my “To Do” list were available today. The Fashion Institute of Technology and Mood Designer Fabrics are both within walking distance of the Chelsea Savoy.

Mood Designer Fabrics, at 225 W37St., as seen on Project Runway is a sewers dream world. There are three floors with fabric stacked up to eight or nine feet, as well as notions, lace, buttons, trims and embellishments. There are no sale bins, remnant tables or bargains available but many people were buying. After looking at shirt material and wandering around the more exotic silks, cashmeres, metallics, jersey knits, linens and many other fabrics I decided to return on Friday and make it an afternoon spent at MOOD.

While walking down Seventh Avenue the Fashion Institute of Technology came up at 227 W27 St. and the museum faced onto seventh avenue. The first featured exhibition is Retro Spective with displays demonstrating how “There is a universal tendency to borrow from the past.”

The second exhibition is A Queer History of Fashion – From the Closet to the Catwalk. “…is the first museum exhibition to explore in depth the significant contributions to fashion by LGBTQ……individuals over the past 300 years.”

The day was topped off with pizza and a visit to the g lounge at 222 W19St. where the music was loud, the draft beer not that cold and the mean age of most of the patrons was less than half my age or my age and hoping for a date. I wasn’t so I returned to the Chelsea Savoy and slept after a busy day.

On Wednesday I established my morning ritual of coffee and breakfast at Champignom at 200 7Ave. This is a routine I like to establish in a new city. It makes me feel like this new city is where I live, even if only for a few days.

An MTA Metro card seemed to make sense. The system works by loading a card with multiples of $2.50, the cost of a single ride. It can be used on subways and buses. The laminated street map of Manhattan I bought became my constant companion as it also had all the subway routes on it. The most difficult thing for me to wrap my head around was uptown – going north and downtown going south. When walking on the avenues which go north/south the distance between the blocks-streets going east/west is short making walking quite a few blocks N/S at a time not too labourious, and what appears to be a long walk not so onerous. The walks between avenues while longer didn’t prevent me from doing many of them.

The Museum of Modern Art MOMA was at the top of the list of thing to see on Wednesday. The featured exhibition was Magritte:The Mystery of the Ordinary, 1926-1938. Rene Magritte and the surrealists are not among my favourite artists or movements. I went to see it because it was there. After a quick trip through, I was amazed at the number of people taking photographs in the exhibition and the majority of them were using Smart Phones. I enjoyed the rest of the museum and the many superior examples of modern and contemporary art.

There is a Muji Design store directly across the street from MOMA. Muji and Uni Qlo are two stores with origins in Japan. They now have stores in major centres such as New York, London and Paris and are always a great place to shop.

It was mid afternoon by this time so after wandering in the direction of the Chelsea Savoy, with side journeys off to look at something that caught my eye, I had a nap before showering and getting dressed for the theatre-oh that does sound grand.

Pippin, at The Music Box Theatre, was everything it was supposed to be. There was singing, dancing, magic, gymnastics and underlying it all a story about Charlimaign(sp?) and his son Pippin. I had little recollection of what I had seen in 1975 but it could not have been better than the current production.

After Pippin and a Ben and Jerry’s ice cream cone I returned to the hotel, changed my clothes, and headed out for the Eagle. Every city of any size surely has a gay bar called some form of The Eagle, and they are all similar with lots of unfinished wood on the deck and industrial feel throughout the interior. New York’s Eagle is at 554 W28St.

Thursday was another terrific day weather wise and after breakfast and coffee at Champignom, that morning and all future mornings, and a ride uptown on the C train to W81St., what was supposed to be a simple traverse of Central Park became an expedition. It could have been a simple walk across the 79St. Transverse but became a follow your nose east trek. It was a good way to see Central Park and a lovely day to do it. Although it had not been planned it was time well spent.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was a disappointment for me, partly because there was construction on the exterior and entry was through a side door and partly because the Janet Cardiff installation was at another site much further uptown and out of reach for this trip. I saw the Modern and Contemporary Art section and left. Another visit next time, devoted solely to the Met is in order.

The ride on the fifth avenue downtown bus was a great way to see the famous avenue without having to deal with the crowds. The expensive shopping starts with Bergdorf Goodman’s and goes south from there. I saw it all without being tempted to go in and was not enticed into returning. I did discover a Marimekko shop at 5th Ave. and 24 or 25St. and did go in and did shop.

Thursday night’s production of The Glass Menagerie at the Booth Theatre was brilliant, after which I stopped for a hot chocolate and M & M cookie at the deli on my corner before going to bed.

Friday was meant to be a shopping day but because the Guggenheim was closed on Thursday it was not possible to take it in with the Met although they are close together on the Museum Mile. The Frank Lloyd Wright designed Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is just as impressive on the inside as on the outside. The gallery space inside the circular ramp was closed for the installation of a new show but the remaining gallery space had two exhibitions. The works of Vasily Kandinski and Robert Motherwell were all worth seeing and as I was not aware of Motherwell his collage work was a treat to discover.

Almost next door to the Guggenheim at 1083 Fifth Avenue and 89 Street is the National Academy Museum and School. The exhibition there is “See It Loud: Seven Post War American Painters”. Among the seven painters Paul Resika’s work and Albert Kesch’s still lifes kept my attention of a long time. The other impressive aspect was the building in which the NAM&S is housed. It is the Archer M. Huntington Townhouse and made me feel like I had stepped into a fantasy taking place at the beginning of the twentieth century.

From the posh Upper East Side I made my way back downtown, first to Uni Qlo for some Japanese socks, underwear and t shirts, all of them unlike any others available. Then it was off to MOOD where the Visa card took a bit of a beating but I don’t think unreasonably so.

It was back to the Chelsea Savoy and nap and a shower before seeing The Book of Mormon at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre. I wonder if it meant the same to others in attendance who had not lived in southern Alberta and who had not had to deal with Mormon school officials in rural areas of the province.

The last day in New York City was fairly relaxed. The return flight from Newark was not until 18:15 so I had a final leisurely breakfast at my spot around the corner. There was an actress sitting on the patio who I recognized but whose name I cannot recall. From breakfast I went to the Highline Park. It is an abandoned elevated train track that has been converted into a pedestrian park. There is also a Muji store in Chelsea so I went to visit and came away with stationary products as only the Japanese seem to be able to design and package. There was still time for a brief exploration of Greenwich Village and a resolve to spend at least one day exploring there on my next trip.

The shuttle back to Newark went without a hitch and I arrived two hours before departure and thought of how Ron and Prash would have been impressed. The Porter experience was better and faster than leaving, probably because it was Saturday evening instead of rush hour Tuesday morning.

This trip to New York City was so positive that I am considering shortening my planned UK trip in the spring to conserve some travel budget for another New York City adventure.