Ava's Second Derive
March 20, 2018, by Ava
The corner of Bleeker and Mercer Street is a corner I have grown very familiar with. It is a corner that I stand at anxiously waiting for the illuminated red hand to turn into the illuminated white walking man, sending me on my way, sprinting down Bleeker to make it to work. I had never stopped to take in the aura of the area, just because I did not have time. I feel like this is a common theme with New Yorkers in the city, or at least it is with me. I habitually pass the same streets and the same buildings every day, often times stand at the same red light, never taking a moment to look around. I decided to make that my focus during this dérive- becoming familiar what was already supposed to be “familiar.”
Instruction 1 sent me after something black. I looked around, and saw a Suburban and started walking west on Bleeker. I noticed how quiet the street was, especially for being right next to NYU’s campus. There were only a few people on the street, and they seemed to be in no rush, walking leisurely with a cup of coffee, which is a stark contrast compared to most city streets. I stopped at LaGuardia and Bleeker; card two told me to follow a dog. I saw a tiny dog in the distance, probably the size of a big hamster, and waited for him to walk past me so that I could follow him.
Following this dog was painful because its legs moved so incredibly fast but seemed to cover absolutely no ground whatsoever. The dog was pretty cute, and I decided to name him Elmo. Because Elmo was walking so slowly, I was once again forced to take in my surroundings on a more intimate level. I noticed how to my right, there was a strip of shops and restaurants that I had never paid attention to before. I had walked past them hundreds of times, and for some reason could not name a single shop there. While trying to recall the name of at least one of the shops, I was distracted by Elmo who was literally hissing as a squirrel. This reminded me of what I read in Account of the Terrific and Fatal Riot at the New-York Astor Place Opera House when Forrest’s supporters were heckling Macready during his performance by hissing at him and throwing food at him. Much like Forrest’s supporters, Elmo was not happy about something, and was signaling that he disapproved of something.
Elmo sounded like a rat, and I began to wonder if he was really a dog. I continued down LaGuardia Place and noticed my place of work from the other side of the road. I have been working at Cookie Dough Confections for over a year now. From inside, I have watched the lines to get inside the store wrap across the street and all the way down the block to where I was previously following Elmo. I wondered; what is it like to stand here, all the way over here, to wait to get in there. Why do people do this? I began to think that it was a bit of a disruption to the neighborhood and thought about its lack of authenticity as a “real village place” according to Gordon and Ann in Live at the Village Vanguard. As Ann states, a real village place is “a no bullshit kind of place,” (Gordon, 16). I know I’m not supposed to say this, but DO is a bullshit kind of place, if you will. It is very concerned with its profit and its image and most likely, understandably, does not care about the image of the area when its own image and profits are at stake. I believe that when Ann was talking about a “real village place,” she was thinking along these lines, that it was a place that put its people before its image.
The instructions brought me down to Sullivan street and I noticed how quiet the city was again. I found it interesting that I kept picking up on how quiet it was around me because it was something I had never noticed in this area of the city. The only quiet parts I had encountered were among the trees in Central Park, where the sounds of the city were muffled. I thought about why I had never noticed the quietness in the back streets of the West Village, and then I realized that it was because I had never taken in the area without the constant noise of music in my ears and my earbuds blocking out the lack of noise.
I walked past a bar and was stopped at a street corner when I overheard a conversation between two people inside. I heard a woman say, “do you want some more whiskey sweetie?” –seriously, at 3:20 P.M. on a Tuesday? This reminded me of the first chapter of Live at the Village Vanguard, when Gordon talks about how he would stay at the bar until very early in the morning, which was also an odd time to be at the bar, at least to me. He states that, “I’d go to Paul’s every night and hang around till closing time, four A.M., to walk Ann home,” (Gordon, 15). I thought that it was interesting that while some places can change so much over time, bars, and the people bars attract at odd times of the day, tend to stay the same.
As I walked down Sullivan, I noticed the smell of the weird combination of booze and coffee. The buildings that lined the streets were bright and colorful and for a second, I felt like I was in Charleston, South Carolina. I decided to embrace this feeling and imagined I was somewhere else, a little more relaxed, a little warmer, and everything around me moving a little slower. I found it interesting that certain icons in style and architecture, such as colorful buildings, can bring a person’s mind from one place to another, instantaneously, and can evoke certain feelings. After about thirty seconds, I was hit in the face with a strong gust of cold wind and was quickly brought back to reality at Houston street.
Instruction 10 sent me in the direction that was “the noisiest.” At this point, I was at MacDougal and West 4th street, with Washington Square Park right ahead of me. I could hear the sound of a trumpet in the distance, and the screaming of kids in the park. It was an unusually warm day in February, so there were a lot of people in the park making a lot of noise.
As I began my walk through the park, I noticed a man sipping something, what I assumed to be alcohol, out of a brown paper bag, which reminded me of how Max Gordon would put his alcohol in a paper bag whenever he headed over to Ann’s place. I noticed the men playing chess at the west end of the park. I must have walked past them hundreds of times before this dérive, but never really paid them any attention. I stopped in the middle of this space and just watched them for a while. Most of them were consumed in a game. I wondered who had time to sit down for a game of chess in the middle of the afternoon on a Tuesday. For the first time, I realized that the park was a place to see and observe all of the totally different types of people in the city: businessmen on the phones, tourists relaxing, artists, gamers, skaters, people who have no time for a break and use their “break” for work, people trying to escape work, students, dogs, homeless people, billionaires. I realized that there is no way to know who is who- but that the park is a commonality for all types of people.
Instruction 11 instructed me to walk along something edgy. I noticed the short small black barriers, blocking off the grassy areas and wondered why they were there; they are so small and seem unnecessary because anyone can just jump over them. I suppose they are meant to keep people out of the grassy areas, and homeless people from using the space to sleep or do other things. These small fences could be more than just barriers of space, but barriers and reinforcers of classes, norms, and regulations.
Instruction 15 told me to walk until I could overhear a conversation. At this point, I was out of the park and by Pizza Mercado, which was when I overheard a conversation between two men passing by. They said, “IDK I think there’s just two types of people on Thursday nights and me and her are just on two different universes.” I found this funny because it’s something that I think about most Thursday nights when I’m in my pajamas on the couch watching Seinfeld and doing homework while overhearing the bustling city streets and partiers stumbling the street six floors down. I stayed in this place for a while because I was instructed to find a place I could be alone. I sat on a wall outside of a building on the corner of Waverly and Mercer until two men who were older than me came up to me and asked if I wanted to buy any snacks to help support their high school basketball team.. I’m still not sure who they thought they were fooling, so I got up and walked away.
Instruction 20 told me to find a street light, and when I looked up at the corner of Broadway and Washington, I saw a red light, turned around and noticed that the F bus was waiting to leave, so I decided to hop on and go home.
