June 17, 2004
wetness and wistfulness
6/17/04
Yesterday we went to the Farmers Market at Union Square to pick up some seedlings for the great Tomato-rific Plantathon at our farm on Saturday. You bastards are lucky I stopped writing on the weekends, or you'd be forced to hear about my new tomato heirlooms: the Pink Brandywines, the Yellow Zebras, the Abe Lincolns, and all the other rare finds that are going to be enjoyed – in about ten weeks – with goat cheese and basil.
The Farmers Market at Union Square is a bizarre beast: there are all these little kiosks selling organic cilantro and pear cider, but they are dwarfed by Sony's tent labs, where you can fiddle with the latest 7 megapixel camera-phone-videorecorder and the Plasmatron 4000. In a way, that's my fantasy. I want to live in a house that was built in 1673 and has drafty transom windows – but also has a 87" LCD television and T3 wifi. We've tried to do that with our humble little farm, but there's only so much you can do with rural DSL. The farm behind us doesn't even have that.
Speaking of technology getting ass-reamed by nature, Sean, Tessa, Jordana and I went to the Apple Store in Soho for some iBook TLC (and so Tessa and I could ogle all the cool shit) and we got caught in the kind of delirious rainstorm downpour that would have cost a movie production $75 million in cost overruns. I'd say five inches of water fell in 45 minutes, and as my wife and I jumped 18-inch-deep puddles on the way to Mulberry Street, I marveled at how much I've missed rain since spending spring in Los Angeles.
At the indoor church hoops court, my buddies and I changed clothes and promptly got sopping wet again with the sweat of each other – it's sweltering in there, and the humidity offers no respite.
As the game ended, I made the miserable trek back to Brooklyn, and I longed for the days of 1995 or so, when Scotty and I were living in Chapel Hill, and we'd just sneak into Royal Park Apartments and swim off the day's sweat in their giant pool. We had nowhere to go, enough money for a decent beer (or in my case, hard cider, cuz I'm twee), grab a slice of "cheddar and broccoli" at Pizza & Pasta and see what the night would bring.
We always smelled of chlorine, but we were in good shape and had a marvelous time. Even Chip lost weight that summer. Now we are all spread out again, and I find myself missing the commune.
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Scotty in our room, Pink House circa '95
Hey, I remember when I came to visit the Pink House in '96, that was Jiffer and Zia's room. Right where the football is, there's suppose to be a bed, right? Maybe it's just covered up in the photo?
Anyway, that little nook was Jiff's bed and I thought it was the coziest, most comfy place at the time, especially when the sun came in the morning.
Such a great house- is it still afloat?
Dude, I lived in Royal Park in 1995. I'm glad someone made use of the pool.
Scott. You were HOT!!!!
i was also a member of the 1995 park royalty and only went swimming once. actually, i think it was with dan (and johnny knight). dan?
I, too, get painfully nostalgic for those early Pink House days--how many times, seeking respite from the slings and arrows of erratic and one-sided love, did I plod upstairs to U-turn into Ian and Scott's room (although the only evidence that Scott actually lived there are Ian's pictures) and plunk down on the bed to moan a few bars of the neverending blues, while Ian tap-tap-tapped away with the industry that seems as though it might have finally earned him something, somewhere (our fingers are crossed for y'all!)...Even though I'm still here Chapping my way through my thirties, no set of memories will ever replace the summers of the mid-90s.
Yeah, it's funny how certain eras coalesce together - through a variety of circumstances - to make a general "fun time." There's a picture of Annie and I from that same bed:
http://www.xtcian.com/arch/001047.phpCarla - yes, the Pink House is still there, still full of kids, except now that have AIR CONDITIONING and WIRELESS BROADBAND INTERNET. That is so fucking unfair!