The sidewalk was what was killing us. This part of Hudson St. had narrow sidewalks, with large cracks and worn concrete. At the end of the block we rolled down the handicap ramp and then swiveled out towards the middle of the street. We yielded to a biker, and then took a position behind him in the bike lane. It was not a smooth ride. The combination of occasionally harsh winters and the amount of traffic, some of which consists of heavy trucks barreling through after emerging from the Holland Tunnel heading uptown, wounds the tar. Compounding that is the fact that the five boroughs have nearly 20,000 miles of roadway, and when the city is strapped for cash, as it was now, street repair is high up on the list for cuts. Plus, we were out on the street, pointed against traffic and competing for the same commuting real estate as bikers, cars, cabs, and buses.
In the bike lane Brown and Co-Pop had begun to find their stride. We were moving down Hudson Street at a respectable pace, past Grove Street, past Barrow, and Morton, passing coffee houses, flower shops, grocers, all occupying the ground floor of brick and brownstone buildings. After studying the map I saw that Hudson Street was a commuting artery that ran along the west side and eventually met up with Chambers Street, which would permit us easy access to City Hall and finally the Brooklyn Bridge. Once we crossed the bridge the worst of it was over. It dawned on me that this feat that this crazy, beast of a man Co-Pop had dreamed up, might actually be achievable.
After a stop at the Hudson Grocery, DJ for a refill of his paper bag and Co-Pop and I for water, we were watching an intense pick-up soccer game going down at Hudson Park with a bunch of English guys, when our cheers were abruptly interrupted by a middle-aged woman with frizzy black hair.
"Excuse me, what you guys are doing, is this, like a new thing?”
"Uh, not sure, lady, we're just trying to move a couch."
"Well maybe this is going to be a new thing. You know, like people moving furniture all over the city." She had a wild excited look that permeated her face and she seemed to be shaking and even grinding her teeth, as she anxiously awaited our response.
I understood her excitement. New things were constantly popping up in New York City, one trend after the next. New fusion culinary experiments, new ways of commuting, like scooters or sneakers with wheels on the bottoms, new bohemian cultures, new hair styles, hats, types of, and lengths of, boots, color palettes, and shapes of facial hair. And these things seemed to rise spontaneously into the streets in great popularity as if it were perfectly timed and coordinated, and then fade almost as quickly as they began. It was as if we are all members of The Jets or The Sharks from West Side Story and had the ability to, without consultation, compose, write, sing, and dance, a complicated and meticulously choreographed performance without instruction or direction. What’s special about New York trends is that they are born and raised here, before migrating south and west across the states like a wave washing over the greater populous. Trends here are organic, birthed from the collective New York soul, and then merged with the elements of The City; the cityscape, architecture, sewer systems, theaters, and modern technology. The concoction is then boiled together into a vat, before emerging as art rendered into styles and practices. This fretted woman believed that she had finally, after years of mysteriously watching things come and go, that she was at-long-last borne witness to the fleeting window of conception, a new thing that was being done for the sake of the doing itself, before it could be copied, branded, and taken on by the greater populace. Though pushing a couch with dollies across a metropolis was so obviously not conducive to a city, or nationwide fad, and was perhaps a pursuit headed for a disastrous conclusion, who was I to crush the heart of this poor woman.
“Maybe ma’am,” I said, “you never know, you know?”
I hopped back on the couch and proceeded to guide us against traffic down towards the Holland Tunnel. We passed Clarkson and then West Houston and wheeled into SoHo passing a long line of multi-colored people waiting outside the immigration building. Then, we hit Vandam Street, where we were confronted with a build up of traffic, bumper to bumper. The pleasant weekend streets were now a parking lot of hate, with hostile horns and “Fuck Yous” filling the air.
“Wait here,” I said, rising off the sofa. I traversed through the cars to procure a better view of the obstruction. That's when I saw that one block up, Hudson Street was barricaded. There were work trucks and men with drills all over it. Perhaps a gas leak, or a busted pipe, but no matter, we were going to have to go a different way.
Steering through the gridlock, we booked it over towards the east side of the street, and hoisted the couch over the curb. Now on the sidewalk we banged a right onto Spring Street and crossed over Varick, gunning for a brief strip of carriage lane on 6th Avenue, next to the miniature triangular shaped Hudson Park. But the sidewalk was a mess of cracks and holes, and the street was still occluded with vehicles. As the puller, Co-Pop felt that if the couch were made to be heavier on his side then it would cease to come off the dolly as it had been doing.
"I got an idea," Co-Pop said. He untied the bandana from his head and retied it over his lips and mouth, then darted over to the park, which was more of a construction site encased in highlighter orange barriers and a mesh fence. Among other things, it appeared they were refurbishing the statue of Jose Gervasio Artigas, as I could see through the fence that the Uruguayan hero was resting on the ground. Co-Pop gave a quick look around to make sure he wasn't being watched, then grabbed an area high up on the fence, kicked his feet into it, and hoisted himself up and over. Falling to the ground on the opposite side, Co-Pop went into a body roll. It wasn't pretty but it was successful. DJ and I scoured the area for onlookers. The coast was clear.
Through the mesh fence we watched Co-Pop scurry around the fallen symbol of Uruguayan independence and begin foraging around the grounds. Within a few seconds, we heard three Rafael Nadal-like grunts and following each one, was a an airborne sand bag just barely clearing the fence. Co-Pop was preparing to hop back over the fence when the lights appeared. They were blue and red and had flashed on suddenly from an unmarked Crown Victoria that happened to be parked right there on the corner of 6th Ave and Spring. The officers had had a front row seat for Co-Pop's entire performance. The doors opened and a big black bald headed cop in plain clothes emerged from the driver's side and a busty red-headed female cop from the other. Brown and I watched the scene unfold from the comfort of the couch.
Co-Pop's legs came over the top first, appearing out of nowhere like a plane falling out of the sky. Then the rest of him, a fur ball of glory sporting a bleach white grin, the same one he always displayed when he felt pride from his prowess. Though this one was short-lived.
As soon as he hit the pavement the officers took a position directly in front of him, simultaneously reaching down into their shirts and yanking out their bling that hung from a thin silver metal chain: NYPD badges. The black cop spoke first,
"Kid, what the fuck do you think you're doing?" Co-Pop got up slowly from his crash landing. The female cop reached into her back pocket with her right hand, while yanking Co-Pop out of her partner's hand with the other, and slamming him up against the back of the cruiser.
"I believe my partner asked you a question." This was the first, and only time I ever heard Co-Pop stutter.
"Well, look, I'm a carpenter, and, and DJ over here, see..." Co-Pop pointed between the officers to myself and DJ sitting on the couch behind them, "is an interior decorator, and him, well that's Nate, and his new couch."
"Save it kid," the cop woman barked, opening up her cuffs and grabbing Co-Pop's wrist, "You're under arrest for trespassing and..." Just then a sudden burst of static white noise flowed out of the cruiser's open rear window and then a voice, "We have a 305 in progress, all units respond, all units respond." The woman let out a heavy sigh, let go of Co-Pop, pushed him away from the vehicle, and pocketed her cuffs. The officers darted back into their vehicle, threw on their sirens, and screeched off. Brown and I looked at Co-Pop awaiting his reaction. He calmly collected the sand bags that lay on the sidewalk, placed them on the cushion by the armrest, bent down and adjusted the dolly, and then looked up at me.
"Nate, where to next?"
I was making it up as I went along. I am a born San Franciscan and raised Bostonian with little sense of direction. I might as well have been in Mexico City. Sure, a right on Broome Street, because, why the hell not. And let's cut through this parking lot and hit Wooster Street because my Dad grew up in a Worcester. So what's a few cobblestones anyway? And fuck the rain. We have trash bags. I ripped a hole in one of our spares, threw it over my head, and punched through the sides with my arms. Now a right on Grand. You're pushing well DJ, keep up the good work Co-Pop. Hey how about a little SoHo history from this guidebook. I'll read it aloud.
"Hard to believe but until the mid 18th century this wonderful shopping district was all farm land!!! But soon, the large farms were divvied up into smaller properties and by the 1800s, wouldn't you know it, the wealthy class had moved in and had brought with them hotels, casinos, and brothels. Horse drawn carriages, just like the ones you now see around Central Park, lined the cobble stone streets. But the industrial revolution changed the face of the neighborhood as factories and immigrant labor moved in while the rich fled uptown. On account of being a cheap metal that was easy to work with, architects began designing buildings with a brand new iron called cast iron. The cast iron permitted the builders to construct enormous windows and massive indoor spaces called lofts. However, in the early 1960s, a most controversial figure in New York's history, none other than urban planner Robert Moses, threatened to destroy it all in order to make way for the Lower Manhattan Expressway. But drawn by the lofts, which made for wonderful studio spaces, groups of visionary artists came together to block the construction of the highway, and the area was saved from its demise. Now SoHo has emerged as one of the most unique and cherished shopping districts in the nation!!!"
A sharp right onto Mulberry St. took us under the green, red and white awnings of little Italy where we went wheeling down the sidewalks flanked on both sides of the street by the famed Italian ristorantes. As we came to Canal Street and the entrance to Chinatown we hit a human wall.
The rain had passed and people were out in numbers getting their last daylight of the weekend in the waning summer. Sidewalks, streets, bike lanes, it didn't matter they were all jammed. It was strange that nobody acknowledged us. Not because I expected courtesy, I had lived next to Fenway Park for two years. But just for the oddity, or the spectacle of two dudes pushing a third dude on a wet couch through Chinatown. But they didn't. In fact not only were we not of any interest to anybody, we were a nuisance, just plain in the way, taking up more space than three pedestrians ought to be allotted. In any other city, we would have stuck out, but New Yorkers are not fazed by the outlandish, they expect it. Diversity and difference have been woven into the fabric of the city. And while initially I found fault in the way that nobody here pays any attention to their fellow eight million neighbors, I have come to think of it as a show of respect. Instead of staring at the un-ordinary, New Yorkers are much more fixated on their schedules than they are fazed by diversity, and really just couldn’t give a shit, so they keep on walking.
Wired to think in musical terms, DJ Brown solved this dilemma by purchasing an aerosol air horn for five dollars off of an ambitious Chinese fruit seller trying to call attention to his stand. We took turns tooting, dispersing the crowds and found our way from Mulberry to Center Street, our path illuminated in the waning light by florescent Chinese characters mounted to the storefronts.
Finally, after navigating the narrow, claustrophobic one-ways of lower Manhattan, where the sky felt like a low roof that hovered just above the buildings, we reached the open spaces of the Supreme Court and City Hall Plazas and took a gulp of fresher air. Then we proceeded towards the signs that pointed towards the Brooklyn Bridge.
We wheeled onwards up to its base and halted. None of us had ever been on the bridge before and were unpleasantly surprised both by the number of people clogging its foot and bike paths, and by the pitch of its incline. It was steeper than any of us had anticipated. Up until this point our journey had been flat. The illuminated suspension cables looked like a runway up to the sky. We dumped all the extra weight, the sand bags, a few jugs of water we purchased, and me; it was time to get up and work. I popped a few tylenol, took a swig of DJ's booze, tossed the empty bottle into a nearby bin, and wiped my lips clean with my hand. Co-Pop and I took DJ's position as the pushers and DJ became the puller. We started up the hill.
After a hundred feet or so the pavement gave way to wooden planks and our progress was noted by the thumping of the dollies' wheels as they traversed from one plank to the next. We were promptly educated by the bridge’s crowd dictated rules: Unless on a bike or skate board do not under any circumstances venture into the bike lane, if a whistle is blown immediately hug the side railing and flatten up against it (there is a biker with spandex and toe clips coming through), and walking or running speed is to be held constant.
The first few hundred feet of the bridge trail didn't feel quite that spectacular, it is just an elevated path over what was once Printing House Square, the life of the city until the early 20th century when the New York Times relocated to what became Times Square. However, as we approached the plane of the East River the city walled up around us.
To our left was a sea of public housing, one unit after the next, stretching north almost all the way to the Manhattan bridge dotting the sky in sporadic yellow lights. To our right loomed the towering office buildings of the financial district as dense Manhattan disappeared behind us and Brooklyn glistened on the horizon. But as the pitch of the hill increased, the dolly wheels began to lock up on us and the couch and the couch started to drag until it came to a full stop. Exhausted, we all gave in and took a seat, contemplating a termination of our mission. After all, Carroll Gardens was still almost two miles away. As we sat taking in the cityscape, we realized that not only had our environment transformed, but so had the people that surrounded us. They were bubbly and enthusiastic in a way that no New Yorker ever was, and they carried fanny packs rather than backpacks or brief cases. These were of course tourists, hundreds of them. And while they are normally quite a nuisance to be around, buzzing around mid-town and Times Square like locusts, here I didn’t mind them because they took notice of us. Cameras that were aimed off the sides of the bridge capturing images of the Statue of Liberty, Governor's Island, and the distant Verrazano bridge to the South and the Manhattan and Williamsburgh bridges to the North, all of a sudden began turning from the panoramic views to us; to myself, to Co-Pop, and to DJ Brown. And suddenly the couch began to move.
Startled, the three of us jolted and turned around to find four large Aryan men pushing the couch from behind and screaming to one another in German. We didn't budge much on account of the jammed wheels, but one of them, the resourceful bastard, reached into his pocket and yanked out a swiss army knife. He knelt down and began tinkering with the wheel and before we knew it we were moving, and not only by the power of the Germans. The commotion got the attention of two Israeli girls, a French couple, and a Japanese dude. And together they delivered us from Manhattan and we found ourselves floating over the water at a decent speed, hooting and hollering at the crowds in front to make way.
The hill leveled off and we began picking up even more helpers from Australians, to Norwegians, to Russians. The thumping sound of the wheels against the wood increased in volume and frequency. All of sudden, Brooklyn was right there in front of us. The Watchtower building, the piers, the downtown, Dumbo, and the cars whipping around interstate 278, together formed a collage of twinkling light that was getting closer and closer.
As we reached the second half of the suspension the slope began to dip down. Pop, DJ, and I emerged from our seated positions so we could guide the sofa safely down the increasingly steeper decline. Our crew piled onto the couch, taking whatever space they could find, and we pushed them down the hill, picking up speeds that rivaled the slow-moving vehicle traffic on the roadway below us. The three of us looked at each other and smiled, signaling for a full throttle, a green light to go for it all. We threw all our weight into the push with more people joining behind us and then we let go and sprinted beside the wheeling sofa and jumped into the international stew. We screamed, laughed, and blew the air horn, clearing the way for the out of control vehicle which was now thumping louder and louder, more people jumping on top of us as we whisked by. There was no stopping us now, we were bombing down the last section of the bridge over the cobbled streets of Dumbo, Brooklyn. We were like the first ever international bobsled team, only on wheels instead of ice, until…BAM. At the bottom of the hill we struck the railing, a definite whiplash for all and numerous splinters for most, but everyone got up, hugged, and compared scrapes, and blacks and blues. A quick goodbye, a pose for a picture, and onward.
Once in Brooklyn, we emerged at the end of the Brooklyn Bridge trail, banged a right onto Tillary Street, met up with Henry, and then it was smooth downhill couch surfing from there. We rode the bike lane, passing one extravagant brownstone after the next in Brooklyn Heights, crossed over Atlantic Avenue to the neighborhood of Cobble Hill, where the bigger the wheels of your kid’s stroller the higher up in the social system you are, and finally to the old pizza shop-ridden gentrifying Italian neighborhood of Carroll Gardens.
The couch came to a standstill in front of one of the more decrepit brownstones, home sweet home. I opened the front door with my key, then the door to my apartment and watched Co-Pop and DJ carry the sofa up the two flights of steps. The two of them set it down it its new home against the baby blue wall I had just painted. And then they left. Co-Pop for Seattle or Portland, he hadn’t decided which yet, and DJ for Austin.
I lay down on the sofa, inhaled a deep one and let it out slowly, tuning my mind into my lower back. Immediately, I became aware of an impression of healing. The pain was still very much present, but I detected a transformation in its character, and after a few more breaths and moments of reflection, I understood. This endeavor was an uncharted one that was fraught with a host of potentially dreadful outcomes, some of which were barely averted, and yet I had persevered. And I had done so, not by myself, but by that which was outside of myself. It was not only my generous friends, Co-Pop and D.J. A. Brown, who had wheeled me and my new couch to safety, but it was also the support of the city itself, of New York City, which had provided us with the wood we needed to lift the dolly, a guide book I had found on the ground, bike lanes to navigate the streets, crime that diverted the cops from arresting Pop, neon lights that illuminated the way through Chinatown, and the helping hands of the Brooklyn Bridge tourists. In order to nourish myself and remove the pain for good I would have to learn to be mindful of this support, to trust that as long as I was willing to thrust myself into the clutches of the city, to make myself vulnerable to its grip, this city would hold me, it would have my back.
