A New York Moment

We spent the weekend in New York and it was filled with the sensations you would want in such a visit: lots of bagels and lox, a smashing performance by Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig in “A Steady Rain,” French food, Cuban food, Italian food, and wonderfully visual (and tasty) jaunts through Soho and Chelsea. Through it all, you could not help but be so impressed by the diversity, energy, and sheer numbers of persons out on the streets soaking up all things New York. It truly is an amazing place. And, sharing it with our friends Maggie, Vernon, Leslie, Tom and Ellen only enhanced the pleasure.

While all of this sensory stimulation was exactly what we were looking for, I was not prepared for what appeared to be an inconsequential turn on Sunday. We had just parted company with our friends, Vernon and Leslie, and were headed over to Maggie’s office near Bryant Park. As we headed up Broadway, I mentioned how a thousand years ago, my father’s business was located at 1412 Broadway, on the corner of 39th Street. We decided to do a “drive-by” so I could peek into the lobby of the place that had once in my life been a very familiar haunt since it was not only my father’s place of business, but a place where I had worked a few summers as a messenger boy in my early teens.

We tried the front doors of the building but they were all locked….except one. We entered the lobby. Some of those old memories started reeling through my mind. At the elevator bank was the guard, a young fellow named Muhammad. I introduced myself and, when I told him how I worked there a half century ago, he leaned back, eyes widened, and looked at me as though he was talking to a living Civil War hero. I told him how way back then the elevators had human operators -- old guys who would spit on the floor if they could get away with it, and grumpy. When I asked Muhammad if we could take a peek at the old place -- up in the rooftop offices on the 25th floor -- he said that would not be permitted. But, a few moments later, he relented -- perhaps caught up in the moment. He locked the sole open door to the building and took us up the one elevator that went to the roof.

We emerged and there it was -- the old site of Victory Studios, Inc., the business that had paid for our family home, our college educations and the food on our table. Of course, the old business was long gone, now replaced by a beauty supply house. But, interestingly, a peek inside the door revealed essentially the same layout as the one I had known so many years ago. And, even better, there was actually someone working in there who spotted us and generously let us in to look around.

How weird. Now, all the old memories came flooding back. I noted the reception area where Helen, my father’s old secretary, sat. To the right and rear was the space where the designers worked, punching out their designs for sale to the garment district’s fabric firms. Then, the showroom where Oscar, Vic, and Paul would ply their skills in selling those designs. And, in the rear left, my father’s office. I walked in there and was thrilled and moved. It had all been so very long ago.

What I didn’t tell Muhammad was that so many years ago, I used to go out on the roof and look down on what was then the old site of the Metropolitan Opera House. Every now and then, they would host a posh roof top event at the Met -- an afternoon cocktail party for the cognoscenti of the city. My adolescent urges led me to make hundreds of paper airplanes with droll messages inscribed on them, like “I see what you’re doing” or, “what are you drinking anyway?” I would toss these airborne missives off in droves hoping that just one would sail amid the swirling air currents above Broadway and land across the street on the rooftop garden many stories below. And, in rare but wonderful moments, a plane would land among the partyers who would cast semi-frantic glances skyward, aghast that they were being spied upon.

It doesn’t get much better than that.