The last time Clinton and I we were in New York City together was in 1985 when I was a single, club hopping, hipster living in Manhattan and he was a college student visiting me from Missouri. I took him to all the hottest night spots and left him to tour the city by himself during the day while I did my day job at Morgan Stanely to support my groovy lifestyle. So being back together after 27 years in the city was rather daunting. Not only am I no longer a hipster but I wasn't sure how I was going to recreate the fun and excitment of our youth.
Clinton has an awesome son, Blake, who helped us move into tiny our apartment on West 80th Street last summer when he was doing a college internship in Albany. So we were looking forward him visiting again and seeing our awesome, new,(spacious) apartment on 108th Street. He appeared to be appropriately impressed and we were glad to have made it through the year to show him that his moving skills last summer had not been in vain.
The trip was a college graduation gift to Blake who just graduated from Kansas State. They made their plane reservations and built on that. Actually, after all was said and done they only set aside the Saturday of their visit to spend with us. They had a big picture plan of what they wanted to see. Of course that is always about 50% more than what is humanly possible to see in city like New York, but they made a valent effort. Blake also had some friends that he wanted to see, so we were not the only tour guides on their agenda.
Now to begin the fun.
I told my brother not to deviate from the plan of getting from Laguardia Airport to my apartment on 108th and Manhattan Avenue (an estimated $30 yellow cab ride). All he had to do was stand in the yellow cab line at the airport and he would be ushered into a cab and dropped off at my doorstep in 20 mintues. At one point I called and asked where he was. Answer "yellow cab line". Second call I asked where he was and he answered "in a cab headed to your house." Third call, 30 mintues into the ride, I asked where he was and he said, "Near Bloomingdales, we took the Midtown Tunnel." Third call I asked where he was and he said, "In front of your apartment." $55 later - a gypsy cab delivered him to my doorstep. PEOPLE - don't get in a gypsy cab!!! Clinton and Blake stuck to the "but he was a really nice driver and the black sadan was really clean" story the whole time they were here. Secretly, I think they learned their lesson when the yellow cab ride back to the airport took 20 minutes and $30 back on the return trip.
Anyone who reads my blog knows that I work two jobs (blah, blah, blah), but in this case I have to mention it to explain why I took them on a tour of Central Park in the dark. The little time that I did have off during their stay I felt compelled to show them the sights of our neighborhood. So after work one day we set off into Central Park. I had taken a wonderful shot of Clinton 24 years ago in front of the San Remo Apartment and Clinton wanted to reinact the photo. But there were resevoirs to see and bicyclist to dodge, and swing sets to swing on (Cameron) to get down to the West 70's before dark, so excuse the dark shot, but we did our best. By the time we reached Bethesda Fountain it was pitch dark. Lovers and tourist still filled the area and the lights from the Boathouse shimmered off the water, but I was disappointed that we weren't able to see more.
We were so hungry. Big Nick's was just three avenues and three blocks away, so I kept the focus on walking. In the defense of all NYC tourist, a block to a New Yorker and a block to a tourist are vastly different. Hunger, thirst and tired feet keep the tourist going towards the promised land and it is up to the local to keep the conversation and visual tour guide ("oh, here his the Dakota where John Lennon was shot. Let's take some photos.")going. Big Nick's is a local favorite and a real bargain in the scheme of the city prices, so I knew that if I could just get them there we would enjoy a much needed sidewalk cafe seat to enjoy the sights of the sidewalk traffic and a large (if not re-fillable iced tea). We made it! And Clinton was so relieved to have found a seat and sustanance that he treated us all to dinner. Thanks again, Clinton!
Clinton and I got up early one morning and went to the Hungarian Cafe a few blocks from my apartment. It's a famous literary cafe that I knew he would appreciate since he is such an avid reader. Our waitress was a beautiful, Hungarian gypsy girl making the experience complete. The bathrooms are usuallyf full of graffeti, except that they just white washed the walls so when Clinton went in with the pen I gave him he had to begin anew. When Cameron and I were there the other night for a late night pastry I forgot to go into the bathroom to see if Clinton's autograph was still the lone name on the wall or if he had spurred the tradition on.
Since Jeff and I were both working during the day Clinton and Blake made their own plans. They met a friend of Blake's for lunch one day in the East Village at a Cuban retaurant, and another day they had went to the Lower East Side to see the Tenament Musuem and have lunch at Katz's deli. Their big outing was going to Yankee Stadium to see a game that Friday night. Anyone who knows Clinton understands what a giant check off his bucket list that was.
I had Friday off so at long last I was able to spend a day with them from beginning to end. We started with standing in line for bagels at Absolute Bagels on Broadway and 108th and ended the day eating dinner at a mofia run restaurent in Little Italy. In between I tried to remember "don't over walk". Taxi's are expensive and waiting for a bus or a subway to go 10 blocks (half a mile) is a waste of time, so overwalking is par for the course if you want to see all that you want to see. We had to walk to the marina to go kayaying because getting to the Hudson River is really only accessible via a pedestian path.
Some of the best sightseeing of landmarks is from Columbus Circle to Lincoln Center (and both were on their to do list),and then walking the Highline was a one mile walk were the whole idea is to "walk". So we walked and walked. We spent twenty minutes in front of the Trump residential towers creating our own story based on real estate photos that were posted. We ended up walking near Cameron's new high school so we took a detour so that they could get a glimpse at where Cam would be spending the next four year. And when we finally made it to Lincoln Center we came across a rehearsal for an outdoor theater performance. It was a bizarre aerial silk acrobatics performance with a woman with no legs and her male partner (yes, he had legs). We watched in amazmennt and afterwards Clinton and Cameron tried to explain what we had seen, but nothing can really describe it. But again, it's all about walking and stumbling upon things that you never expected that make New York such a gem.
We went to Little Italy for dinner. Everyone knows that you don't go to Mulberry Street to get good Italian food, but there is no denying the festive atmosphere of the neighborhood. We had a medicore dinner, but we got prime seating in an outdoor cafe and "Joey" the matridee was a hoot to watch strong arming the tourist into choosing his restaurant over the numberous others that lined the street. I had heard Kelly Ripa talking on her show about an wonderful gelato shop in Little Italy and so after dinner we set off on a misson to find it. We never did find the elusive "La Cremeria", but we found one eqaully as refresshing on a sticky New York City summer night.
They had wanted to do so much more. But we got home around midnight and they had a 7 a.m. flight. I think they did a fraction of what was on their list, but Clinton was already planning their second annual trip to NYC for next summer. I'm sure he will need to consult the Yankees schedule before booking his flight, but I'm sure they will be back sooner than later.
Oh, so what was the secret to them being the best tourist? They came to see New York. They were outfitted with subway maps, they had researched what they wanted to see, they were able to let go of things that were too expensive or lines were too long (Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island), they were flexible, and they were game for new adventures (the Highline). And they walked, slowly, but they walked.
