It's Only Temporary: The Good News and the Bad News of Being Alive (2 page)

Somewhere in my early to mid thirties I started, for the first time in my life, to date. I don’t mean I’d never socialized with women before, or that I’d never had an acquaintanceship grow into something deeper. Dating is a term that means different things to different people, with most of the variations determined by context. To some it simply means spending time with prospective partners. To others it’s the term used to describe an exclusive relationship. Still others use it as a euphemism for having sex. When I say that I started in my thirties “to date,” what
I
mean is it was the first time in my life that I started to ask women out regularly, and to go on a succession of dates with a variety of them. I mean it’s when I started to comparison shop.

I was feeling emboldened by several things, all of which concealed the fact that I had a serious lack of self-esteem. I’d already been a professional actor for about fifteen years, had made a bit of a name for myself in the theater by appearing in seven Broadway shows before I turned thirty, and had gained even more notoriety by quitting several of them. The quitting streak was initiated in 1985 by my first diagnosis with acute leukemia – which, in most circles, is considered unquestionable justification for leaving a job. A recurrence of the leukemia, after reappearing on Broadway in 1988, led to the second quitting episode, not to mention some additional unwanted notoriety. However, the closest I got to fame was from quitting a Broadway play in mid-performance. That premature departure wasn’t a result of serious illness: it was the result of being smacked across the ass with a three-foot stainless steel sword by an alcoholic costar. The rules governing such resignations are murkier than those regarding multiple diagnoses of almost-always-fatal blood disorders. I suspect a few figures in the theater community found my rationalizations for leaving the stage that night to be less than compelling – though many did call to congratulate me and invite me out to lunches where I was encouraged to tell them the whole story. People love to hear everything you’ve got to say on a topic before they turn on you. My stretch of seven Broadway appearances occurred over a period of just eight years. The production I quit after being attacked was the last Broadway play I did, and that was over twenty years ago. But my performance was undeniably awful in that play. Maybe I haven’t been hired since because, in that role, the theater world finally saw my limitations. Either that, or producers aren’t crazy about a leading man who walks off stage in the middle of a show.

Anyway, I had gained some degree of notoriety. In the early nineties, not enough time had passed for my dubious reputation to become passé (which is a fancy word for “forgotten”). If I so chose, I was able to stop backstage at an off-Broadway show I’d enjoyed, ask to say hello to a heretofore un-met actress, and get a raised eyebrow of recognition upon uttering my name. Famous for all the wrong reasons is still famous. Broadway producers may have had qualms about hiring me, but the average working-class actor – each of whom had dreamed of running a sword through countless alcoholic costars of their own – saw me as a bit of a folk hero. It took two cases of leukemia and one dose of being smacked on the ass in front of five hundred people to find it, but I’d finally gotten my first taste of what I then took to be confidence.

This is the tactic I put to use to meet Nancy. Nancy is a beautiful blond actress whose performance, and appearance, had impressed me in a play on Forty-second Street’s Theater Row. It was a gay-themed play, and Nancy portrayed a strong-willed, fiercely independent woman who glided effortlessly between a number of lovers. The dialogue was full of snappy ironic comments, and Nancy’s performance was honest, bold, and sexy as hell.

In the theater’s lobby after the show, the flirtatious and bawdy manner she carried back and forth between several groups of friends impressed me all the more. Nancy gave the impression of being a bit of a wild child. Or maybe I just projected that image onto her from her performance in the play. Though it’s a cliché, the fact that the character she’d played had sexual relationships with both men and women only increased my ardor. If I can’t actually
have
a bisexual girlfriend, I thought, I’d at least like to have a girlfriend who can portray one winningly.

After introducing myself, I spoke with Nancy briefly before leaving that night. The next day I returned to leave a note for her with the box office. I’m embarrassed to admit it (and with what I’ve already admitted, that’s saying a lot), but I think I even made some kind of whimsical design out of the typewritten text of the invitation to get together. In spite of my heavy-handed tactics, Nancy called to arrange a date. When we reached the “what do you want to do?” portion of the phone call, Nancy didn’t hesitate.

“I want to do something you’ve always wanted to do but have never done with anyone before.”

That sounded like quite an invitation. But just because my mind leaped to sexual escapades involving myself and anywhere from one to a couple of dozen others, that didn’t mean that’s what Nancy had intended to suggest.

“Well…I’ve always wanted to ride the Staten Island Ferry,” I said. And so it was settled.

It wasn’t as timid a suggestion as it seems. Or, maybe it was. But it wasn’t absent of romantic intent. I’d heard from scores of people over the years that riding the Staten Island Ferry at night was one of the great romantic experiences New York City had to offer. When I mentioned to a few friends my plans for a first date with an actress I’d just met, I got nods of approval in which innocence played no part. Judging from some of those smirks, I could have assumed I was in for the make-out session of my life – if not a hefty dose of barely concealed public sex – all in exchange for the fifty-cent round-trip fare.

Date night arrived, and Nancy and I met at a Japanese restaurant for a quick snack. It was already late, as Nancy was still working in the play and had finished her 8 P.M. performance. We then rode the subway to South Ferry, the closest station to the Staten Island Ferry dock. It was a cold autumn night, a Friday, already close to midnight. Instead of finding late-night revelers or spent partiers making their way home, the subway below Fourteenth Street held what seemed like a crowd of commuters. Business suits and corporate skirts dominated. Briefcases and portfolios boarded at stop after stop. But there was something slightly off-kilter about those nine-to-five folks. When we reached the last stop there was a rush-hour like scramble as everyone hurried off the train toward the boat terminal. Looking up at the schedule board, Nancy and I realized we were within seconds of missing one of the last late-night ferries. We hurried through turnstiles, rushed up an enormous gangplank, and boarded the back of the boat.

The ferry was crowded, but we didn’t discover that right away. We hovered on the back deck, watching the lights of Manhattan recede. It wasn’t even a deck, really – more a cold, slippery, metal platform at the base of a circular stairway leading to the chained-off upper regions of the boat. It was just Nancy and myself and a few other brave stragglers outdoors that night. We leaned against wooden railings and gazed at the eruption of man-made structures shrinking behind us. For a few frigid minutes, with the smell of diesel fuel and the spray of polluted harbor water tickling our senses, Nancy and I experienced the romantic splendor of the Staten Island Ferry. Finally, chased indoors by the chill, we walked a narrow, warped, red-floored corridor into the main hold of the ship.

The sudden warmth was startling. It wouldn’t have been unpleasant without the dampness that accompanied it. It was like entering a locker room after the team’s shower. The large hold’s center was filled with rows of chairs and benches, and more benches lined the perimeter of the room. All the seats were filled with people. These were the same people we’d ridden with on the subway, only joined by a lot more like them. Men and women in Burberry scarves and trench coats. People accompanied by attaché cases.

The uniforms we don unconsciously come suddenly into harsh relief when surrounded by those who wear a different one from us. Walking in midtown Manhattan, I rarely pay attention to what others are wearing, and I rarely feel anyone taking notice of me. But there on the ferry it was clear that Nancy and I were interlopers, dressed differently, and most likely living differently, than those around us. And in one of those shifts of perception that makes you wonder how you’d missed what you’re now seeing, I realized Nancy and I were separated from our fellow passengers in one other respect: we were sober.

There must have been three hundred people inside the boat, all of them something less cheerful than drunk. They were two or three hours
past
being drunk. Meaning they were still drunk, but they were now away from their friends, they were now queasy, and they were now at sea.

Young women were passed out, their mouths gaping, splayed legs stretching drooping pantyhose to their limits. They were wearing sneakers and had dress shoes poking out of their neglected backpacks. The skirts of several were skewed, zippers facing forward or sideways, as if they’d been groped over the course of the evening and had fled quickly, with no time to straighten up. Several of the men, foggy-eyed if awake at all, were dwarfed by mounds of plastic-wrapped dry-cleaning they’d picked up in preparation for the next work week, the crispness of the fresh clothes accentuating the disarray of everything around them. Staggering men slipped on spilled beer as they made their way back from the concession stand. Documents fell onto the wet floor from the laps of unconscious executives. The smell of hot dogs mixed with stale beer and bad breath. Women snored as loudly as men, as if finally free, in sleep, from the comparative constraints of their workweek existence.

“We’ve stumbled upon a ritual,” I whispered to Nancy. “Look. It’s ‘The Retreat of Friday Night’s Defeated.’ These are the people who didn’t get picked up by anyone. Who don’t live in Manhattan. Who
have
to get home. The ones who still live with their parents.” Two strangers’ heads flopped toward each other. They nuzzled briefly, then shifted away.

I looked to my right and immediately wished that I hadn’t. A young man in his twenties, dressed in the ubiquitous blue suit, was on the verge of getting ill. He was as disheveled as the others, tie undone, shirt wrinkled, sweat stains in all the appropriate places. I’m not sure if my fascination would have been as complete if he’d been more alert, but he was alternately nodding off, then snapping awake with each wave of nausea. Eventually, the queasiness sobered him somewhat, and his eyes registered a brief hint of alarm. He looked surprised, rocked himself back and forth, trying, apparently, to appease the beast eager to escape from within. We were pulling toward the Staten Island dock, and the queasy young executive stood, keen to disembark.

Then I saw what I saw. Still to this day I wish I hadn’t. Just like you’ll wish I hadn’t described it to you. It was one of those things that are so vivid, so visceral, that you know the memory will be with you as long as you live, as if you’d experienced the sensations yourself. A wave of nausea took the young executive by surprise. His cheeks puffed out and his lips clamped shut. He froze, mouth full.  He looked furtively once to his left, once to his right, chewed twice and swallowed. He stood slack-jawed, a mixture of relief and confusion on his face. The way a fighter looks on the canvas after being knocked down, the worst having come and gone. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, then stared dumbly at his skin, examining whatever he’d smeared there.

Watching his struggle was only the first in a series of mistakes. The second was looking back to Nancy. As soon as I met her eyes I knew she’d witnessed the same thing I had. Still, I found myself starting to form the question.

“Did you…?”

“Yes,” she interrupted. And we didn’t speak again until we were off the boat.

The next mistake was getting off the boat at all. Before we knew it the ferry pulled away, heading back toward the island of opportunity across the water. Nancy and I found ourselves in the grimness of Staten Island’s Staten Island Ferry terminal, with more than an hour to kill before the next boat would depart. We walked outside thinking we might find something to explore, but all we could make out was an expanse of parking lot stretching into the distance. Beyond that was darkness.

We wandered back into the terminal, taking in the surroundings for the first time. They weren’t cheering. The room was bathed in fluorescent light so bright I thought it might deep-fry food. The waiting room wasn’t full, but it wasn’t empty, either. Scattered on benches and the floor were homeless people and drunks; junkies, punks, and punk junkies; goth teens and their pets, and various other life forms that were neither advanced nor owned by those claiming to be. Our first date had come to a crushing halt in a dank holding cell. We were the only travelers, surrounded by those who had nowhere else to go.

I then made the ultimate mistake of the evening. I somehow convinced myself it would be an impressive gesture if I were to lean over and kiss her. Right there. Within the vector of heat wafting off the rank bodies. Such defiance, I thought. After all we’d seen together that night, what an assertion of our good health, our good fortune. What a demonstration of the power of her appeal. The fact that even Calcutta-like conditions could not transcend my desire. The perversity will make me seem so…dashing. I was oblivious to what the real lure was. Forget what the atmosphere proved about Nancy’s appeal to me. If I could get her to accept my kiss in the midst of the homeless, the drug-addicted, and the peculiarly pierced, imagine what that would mean in terms of
my
appeal to
her
. The real motivation in kissing Nancy in the Staten Island Ferry terminal was to conquer my doubts about the desirability of
me
.

I gazed at Nancy a moment too long. I leaned over and placed my lips on hers. We kissed, and we kissed again. We kissed for some minutes. I thought about all the things that had led me to kiss her there, and I even whispered some of them to her. But it didn’t work. In the long run it was okay. We dated for a few weeks and had some good times (though that’s not really “the long run,” is it? Okay, in the medium run). But there in the terminal of the Staten Island Ferry, at the end of a long workweek, in a city where a room, a facility, a building, a borough, can absorb all the exhaustion of its million or more inhabitants, we kissed, and it was less pleasant than one would hope. The gesture might have been impressive, but it was inappropriate. The conditions might not have transcended my desire, but my desire didn’t transcend anything.