What’s Happening? (9 page)

Fortunately, she had not turned from Father. She ducked from the doorway as a plate hurtled through the air and splattered on the wall behind her. A spray of chips sprinkled on her as she ran blindly for the front door.

“Stay outta here,” thundered Father, standing in the kitchen doorway. “I don't ever want to see you again. I have no daughter.”

Rita heard Mother console Father, their voices fading to the background as Rita reached the bottom of the stairs and dashed out into the noisy, peaceful, lonely street.

5

The streets in the Village are laid out as if the mold of the city had softened over the fires of the kiln and the portion that was to be the Village had melted and twisted out of shape; Tenth and Eleventh Streets cross Fourth Street, Third and Eighth Streets reach a dead end at the Avenue of the Americas, Bleeker Street straddles the Village in a big arc that bisects the Avenue of the Americas then feeds into Eighth Avenue, and there's Little West Twelfth Street, Commerce Street, Cornelia Street, and Jones Street, each one block long, and Gay Street is the shortest block in the city, and a maze of crooked, short lanes and alleys crisscross between and behind the larger streets.

Patchwork streets and artist-supply shops, schools and theatres, a variety of handmade jewelry, shoe, and clothing shops, burger shops, studio skylights, and quiet tree-lined residential streets set the Village apart from the rest of the city. The mercantile hustle is not here; it is Uptown. Here, even the streets are separate and apart from Uptown, and people live differently, quietly, friendly, indulging themselves, both mind and body.

Small shops line the main streets. The variety of objects sold is profuse: rings and jewelry, leather goods, shoes, clothes, pottery, china, housewares, records, books, paintings, Mexican serapes, leotards, and thousands of other commodities. Many of the objects are actually made in the little Village shops by hands which stamp a veritable trade mark of style into them. The Village approach to style most often strives for newness, creativity. Many things are presumptuous and contrived, but with so many new ventures in style, many fine, interesting combinations of old formulae are arrived at by the miscreants in the Village, and are afterward acknowledged and accepted by the socially proper, avant-garde Uptowners.

In the evenings, during warm weather, the crooked streets of the Village tremble with the footsteps of roaming hordes. The sidewalks become so crowded, people walk in the streets. Tall, thin men with narrow pants emphasizing a gaunt stylistic elongation, casual shirts, and dark glasses veer between crowds of slower walkers, heading toward an espresso shop or a cafe. They falter momentarily to remark to girls strolling casually, lugging large Village-made handbags, wearing tight slacks or formless full dresses and sneakers, leather-thong sandals or dancing slippers, their faces chalky with pale make-up, their eyes heavily mascared, contrasting darkly. Often, the men who falter to chat with the strolling girls continue to the cafes, but occasionally they forego that activity for the night.

In the midst of this nocturnal rambling are the inevitable, curious, insatiable tourists. The tourists amble along, gaping into store windows, peering into the apartments at street level, nudging each other, suppressing amused smirks when a Villager strikes an odd or curious note for them. They rifle through the little shops, stare at the paintings, leaf through books, finger the hand-crafted leather, follow the strokes of painters painting in stores used as studios, buy mementos of their excursion, stop off at an espresso shop for coffee—they call it
expresso
—and return home entertained, with exotic tales to fill the halls of their uneventful lives.

Many girls from Uptown come to the Village to get picked up and be taken to a wild party, to meet the “weirdo” guys, to have some different, exciting kicks. Men from Uptown come to the Village to meet some wild, way-out women. Often, however, the Uptown men end up with some stray women from Uptown, but all of them are happier for it in their vivid minds. Uptowners are an intrusion, an invasion upon the privacy of the Villagers, yet their presence betokens an unspoken admiration for the existence, the vitality, the freedom of the Villagers.

While the weather permits, crowds of Villagers form outside coffee shops. Everyone waits for some friends to arrive, or for something interesting to happen. They wait outside because they can't afford to buy Rose Water and Lime at forty-cents a glass; they prefer dryness to support by their families. Usually, the roaming groups stop at all the popular spots, walk in, look around, stop outside for a while, and if nothing exciting happens, continue to the next spot.

But now, winter enveloped the city rapidly. The weather grew colder, and the Villagers retreated into hibernation. The myriad of Village espresso shops which had witnessed the gaiety and color of summer and early fall with outdoor tables on the sidewalk, with people chattering casually on warm breezeless evenings, were all encased with shutters. Only rust marks remained outside the shops where the tables had been. Now the migration had decreased. Only by short, valiant treks, by braving the frigid blasts of wind which felt even colder because of the memories of the recent warm weather, did people migrate from one espresso shop to another. Yet the Village and its people continued their boiling, off-beat activity. The faces of the Villagers now decorated the insides of shops, and they sipped cafe espresso, cappuccino, or hot cider with cinnamon sticks. They sat and talked and read, sitting and waiting for something to happen.

The scenes of the Fall Outdoor Art Exhibition and thousands of brightly colored paintings hanging from the wire fences bordering parking lots on the Avenue of the Americas and on fences and walls of houses lining Washington Square Park were only memories rekindled about glowing belly stoves. This was the time for the preparation of collections which would be hung at the spring exhibition. The jewelry makers, the sculptors, the leather crafters, the painters, had all taken down their wares, stacked them in their homes and shops to await occasional, intrepid winter customers and the next outdoor exhibit.

Twice each year, in the spring and fall, there was an outdoor art exhibition for people to come to and admire and buy paintings and handicrafts, and spend enough money, it was always hoped, to keep the artist fed until the next show. People from all over Uptown flocked to the Village during the art exhibition to see the paintings and to have an excuse to see the picturesque people who, by legend, lived in the Village. Usually they were not disappointed.

Some artists came out for the show calculatingly resplendent in casual, dirty, paint-spattered attire, sat on the sidewalk or in little wicker chairs, occasionally barefooted, and sold their work for more than it was worth. Other artists were actually retired folks who had never made it and who would have looked more at home in quiet country scenes, rocking in chairs, but they were exhibiting paintings—still in there kicking. Some of the work was fine, but mainly it was the dabbling of people who wanted to be part of the great artistic confraternity and whose main achievement was keeping the art-supply stores and the Greenwich Village Outdoor Art Exhibition functioning.

At night, during the exhibitions, individual oil lanterns were lit, and crowds milled on the sidewalks around temporary jewelry counters and trinket booths, and in the streets, eating ice cream off the stick, gaping, nudging each other, and sometimes laughing at the painters. It didn't matter that most of the painting was wretched, since the taste of most of the spectators was worse. It was a side show for an invading horde of preying hypocrites, but the milling crowd warmed the hearts of the would-be artists.

While at the exhibition, many Uptowners had their caricatures sketched by artists who set up easels near the main flow of humanity. Some of the caricaturists were capable and did renderings which resembled their subjects. Some others were either just fooling themselves or were fakes who owned paper and pencil; they made everyone look the same. But the crowds wanted to pay $1.50 or $2.00 to see themselves drawn. It made them feel important, as if someone wanted their likeness to keep as a treasured memory. Crowds jammed around the caricaturists, and friends dared each other to have a rendering done, no one agreeing until all agreed to be drawn. Then each sat gladly. The others would stand around and watch their friend being drawn, and joked and poked fun. When each in turn was seated, he just grinned, embarrassed, as his standing friends laughed. The one caricatured laughed when he saw the rendering of himself, trying to show he thought it was a big joke.

The concerts in Washington Square Park were also only memories. There were no longer weekly concerts attended by people sitting on the benches, or reclining on the grass, listening to harmonious strains of music floating over the park on warm, rustling breezes. The loud-speakers and wires that had been strung through the trees to bring music to the far ends of the park had been taken down. The bust of Alexander Holley standing on a pedestal near the center of the park, around whose neck wire had been irreverently and chokingly wound, was also glad the wires were down.

During the summer, even on nights when there was no music, the park was filled. Talking groups would sit on the grass, and men sat under the lamp post playing chess on the cement chess tables. Crowds of young people gathered and talked and sang as they sat inside the empty circular fountain in the center of the park. A multitude of dogs was brought to the park and let loose to run and mate promiscuously, each adding its sound to the din. Many dogs were used as a conversation starter between fags looking for a pick-up. Dogless faggots sat on the railing, sometimes known as the meat rail, along the outside of the West end of the park and waited for other kindred souls to appear. But now, the dogs that had romped and played scurried hurriedly, steam puffing from their mouths, on the end of leather leads.

The police too were happy now that winter had come to the park, for they didn't have to scamper after singers and musicians congregating on the benches and in the fountain. In the summer, the colored cop had often chased groups of folk singers with guitars and an inverted wash tub from the fountain, as four mandolin players singing Italian songs started drawing a crowd on the other end of the park. The cop would rush there to stop them while yet another group's harmony might waver on the air from someplace else. Life had a will of its own.

But now it was winter. It was cold. The wanderers were inactive, quiet. But within the dark shops and cafes, the Villagers maintained their vigil.

6

Dani's coffee shop was warm inside—the belly-stove kind of artificial, thick, pleasing warmth. The winter sun, partially secreted behind the buildings, blazed a blinding, almost white, warm patch of brightness through the front of the coffee shop; the front consisted of two large windows separated by a double set of glass-paneled doors. Symphonic music filtered softly from loudspeakers located near the ceiling at the corners of the room. Only a few of the square, marble-topped tables were in use; the customers were sipping coffee, quietly reading or gazing at the people outside drifting past the shop. Occasionally, a page of a newspaper being turned fluttered the silence.

Ronnie sat at a table by one of the windows. He was an unhandsome white fellow. He constantly wore the same striped sweater and soiled chino pants; the clothes looked as if he constantly wore them. He had battered tennis sneakers on his feet. The table at which he sat was half bathed in the clear winter sun. He leaned back in his chair, a cigarette dangling from his lips, reading the latest issue of a theatrical newspaper.

Rita, carrying an armful of books, entered the shop. She was bundled in a heavy coat; a scarf was bound about her head, its long trailing ends hanging down over her shoulders. She looked around the coffee shop; no one she knew was there except Ronnie. He looked up and saw her. She approached his table.

“Hiya, baby. How ya doin'?”

“Hi, Ronnie. Have you seen Jeannie or Laura?” She put her books on a chair.

“No, not yet. What's happening?”

“Nothing much. Just cut out from school. We had an extra class today.” Ronnie furrowed his brow. “You know, that drama group on Sheridan Square,” she explained.

“Oh yeah. You go there?”

“Sure. Been going for months now.” Rita removed her long scarf, then her coat. Under it she wore a full, black, wool skirt, a heavy red sweater, and long black stockings.

“You're looking kind of nice,” Ronnie remarked, admiring her legs and bottom as she bent from the waist to put her coat on a chair.

“Thanks.” Rita sat and blew warm air on her hands. “Give me a cup of cappuccino will you,” she said to the waitress who had walked to the table.

The waitress noted the order on her pad and turned toward the back of the shop. Ronnie's eyes followed her the entire distance to the espresso machine.

“What's happening with you, Ronnie?” His attention was still at the espresso machine.

“Hmm, … oh, nothin' much.” He turned back to Rita. “School and studying by myself and like that. Nothing much else.”

“Have you been working lately? I mean, have any shows turned up?”

“Nah. Like things are slow all around. There's a show opening up next week at the Albee. A friend of mine is working in the chorus. He said there might be a spot for another chorus guy, but I don't know, … you know how it is.”

“It'll be real cool if you get it.”

“You're not just kidding—if I get it.”

He lifted his feet onto the chair in front of him, tilting his chair back against the wall, his thumbs thrust into his pants pockets.

They were silent for many minutes, gazing out the window.

The waitress brought Rita's coffee to the table.

“Want anything else?” she asked, her pencil poised to write a check.

“No. That's all Juanita. How're you today?”