The city knows you better than any living person because it has seen you when you are alone. It saw you steeling yourself for the job interview, slowly walking home after the late date, tripping over nonexistent impediments on the sidewalk. It saw you wince when the single frigid drop fell from the air conditioner twelve stories up and zapped you. It saw the bewilderment on your face as you stepped out of the stolen matinee, incredulous that there was still daylight after such a long movie. It saw you half-running up the street when you got the keys to your first apartment. They city saw all that. Remembers, too.
Consider what all your old apartments would say if they got together to swap stories. They could piece together the starts and finishes of your relationships, complain about your wardrobe and musical tastes, gossip about who you are after midnight. 7J says, So that’s what happened to Lucy— I knew it would never work out. You picked up yoga, you put down yoga, you tried various cures. You tried on selves and got rid of them, and this makes your old rooms wistful: why must things change? 3R goes, Saxophone, you say— I knew him when he played guitar. Cherish your old apartments and pause for a moment when you pass them. Pay tribute, for they are the caretakers of your reinvention.
Colson Whitehead, “City Limits”
Jen handed this to me last night for my birthday, which was in July but who’s counting, and said the first essay always makes her cry and then I opened it up and read the first line and knew it was gonna be good, then looked at her and she was about to cry, so I put the book away and couldn’t wait to come home tonight to read it (and yes, I finished “the mediocre polemic that no one will read” (and yes, we later fought about that via gchat) underground this morning while being held captive on the uptown 6 so that they could, presumably, peel someone’s body off of tracks, ie ‘we have a sick passenger on 42nd st’).
anyway I have admittedly never read old CW but I like him so far, if not only for his flagrant use of the 2nd person (soulmates!) (so workshoppy!) (ha god).
