I’ll write a book where people scavenge and socialize far from home and then, in the later hours, scurry back to their island. 
It’s going to be called Safe on the Island.
Tag Archives: New York City
Making Grilled Cheese for Claus Meyer
I am not a cook. I only make one thing: grilled cheese sandwiches. 
I mentioned my grilled-cheese sandwich abilities in passing during a party, and truth be told, I wasn’t really aware of who I was talking to, nor even really what I was talking about, but I did not tell the person before me, Claus Meyer, that I was good at making grilled cheese sandwiches.
Surprisingly, he seemed interested. “I would like to try that.”
Shortly thereafter I had learned who he was, that he was a famed chef and restauranteur, co-founder of Noma in Denmark, voted best restaurant in the world four separate years.
“You say it is a good sandwich. I would like to try them too.”
And so we invited Claus and his wife for dinner, and, yes, I made my grilled cheese sandwiches, or “cheese toasts” as he called them. 
And he liked them. “The bread is right. It is crisp. The cheese is perfectly melted.” 
He had three pieces. “Yes, they are very good.”
My secret you ask? Well, I’ve just started working on my book, Melted Just Right which should be ready in the fall of 2017.
Homeless in a Box
Two homeless men, young, lay side by side in matching boxes, asleep in the dull rising light. The shallow boxes, flat and wide, looking like they had just been delivered for the morning rush, gave no warmth or shelter, no comfort of any kind, just a lip, an edge a few inches up, as if it might keep the bugs and dust out. I had walked almost a full block past before I realized I had to go back to take a picture.
It was a funny image, striking how they looked they had been delivered and slept so soundly for the people streaming past. I had my camera out as I turned around for the shot and saw the young man was awake. 
I was caught in an awkward stance, looking down at him, mocking him, and dropped my arms and continued past.
“Yeah, that’s right.” The young man muttered after my receding steps. “No pictures.”
September 11, 2016
15 years after. 
Not clear blue. But gray and muggy. And quiet. 
Said Joe Quinn, brother of Jimmy Quin, killed in the North Tower, at today’s ceremony:
For one day, just one day, shut off your television, power down your phone and go outside. Say hello to your neighbor. Volunteer, Engage with your community. Do not sit on the sidelines. Be the inspiration we so desperately crave.
And then tomorrow, by dawn’s early light, put one foot in front of the other, and do it again. Be the unity that this world needs.
Only if.
Anori Outtake: In Custody
“Miss Sinclair.” Officer Duncan sat pert behind his desk and held out a blue index card. “You fill in one of these?”
“No.”
“I need you to fill it in.”
“I’ll wait for my lawyer.”
He hunched over the desk, his black pointy hair sticking out from his small features and hands, and turned away from her to Officer Manzoni at the desk beside him. “Processing the 10-64?”
Officer Manzoni, intent on his screen, his goateed chin pushed forward, wire-frame glasses tight against the bridge of his nose, took a moment to respond. “Series two.”
“It’s not Series two.”
Officer Manzoni shrugged.
Officer Duncan glanced down at Dee again, almost surprised she was still there, waiting like a child. “1151, you can have a seat.”
Dee waited, looking through the newspapers again and considered the picture of her jumping again, peering at her half exposed breast again and then her arms awkwardly out, her right leg almost straight out, like she had been pushed. It made her stomach turn, looking at herself, thinking how she could have broken her ankle and then remembering the tunnel and the dark and thinking she might actually still be in there, comatose, leaking toward her last breath. She looked around and saw Officer Duncan over her, Officer Manzoni just behind.
“This way.”
You Look So Alone
Being alone isn’t a bad thing. Not at all. It’s actually good. It’s a time to collect thoughts, reflect and be and all of that. It can even be reveled in.
That said, it’s not good to look alone, when someone is likely to approach with the dreaded words, “Oh, you look so alone.”
“I look alone? Really? Well, I am. We all are, don’t you know?”
What’s wrong with staring off into the distance? Why must standing apart be seen as a telltale sign of depression? What is so bothersome about being alone?
It’s sure as hell better than having to listening to someone else chatter on. “Can you give me a couple of bucks? I lost my bag. They took everything.”
The Hipster and the Orthodox
April 11th cover of The New Yorker:
My picture from 2010:
Should I sue?
Overhyped New York: Calatrava’s Oculus
Santiago Calatrava’s Oculus has finally been opened…sort of. Click here for video.
Accessible through a series of corridors winding through the construction, the cathedral-like commuter hub is populated solely by tourists. 
It will take more time – and money? – to make the $3.74 billion space accessible for commuters.
Overlooked NY: Downtown Chamber of Commerce
The Chamber of Commerce Building, at 65 Liberty Street, is one of many buildings in downtown Manhattan with doric columns.
Built in 1900-01 to house New York State’s Chamber of Commerce, it was vacated eighty years later. The building was restored in 1990-91 and now houses a pair of banks: The Megabank of New York and Bank of China, Taipei. 
In contrast to the heavy finance going on inside, the front of the building is consistently lined with rows of bikes for a local food delivery service.
Returning Home: A Movie
Mike told me to make a movie. 
And so I did. (Click here to see the film!)
It’s about the return home. 
That constant.
That cycle. 
And pause. 
That feeling of return. 
From where we left. 
To where we began.