what's in a word?: East Village early October

I take too damn long to get these things put together. I'm still sitting on the photos I took during a train ride from New York to Spokane, Washington and back, with a week in Idaho. The only things I published from that trip were a few shots of the partial eclipse of the sun shot from a train speeding across the northern plains.

But I try, really I try and so here are a handful of photos I took two weeks ago in the East Village. It was the day after I found myself surprised by the parade of costumed and otherwise interesting people streaming in both directions on West 34th Street while I waited for my son in front of the AMC movie. I was surprised because I didn't know that ComicCon was on, but seeing those folk I immediately knew why. Those photos are still unedited. At least the photos I took on my trip have been selected and I've begun the editing.

Anyway, small groups are easier. So here's a few.

And in the spirit of ComicCon, the last shall be the first. This young man's grandmother had no idea that there was anything that would get a random photographer's attention when I stopped to chat with him. Yes, he'd been at at the Con.

Parking the Citibike on East 7th Street and Ave. A, there's always at least one person I want to photograph. I liked this woman's tee-shirt. I like to read tee-shirts so I notice things such as seeing three people wearing tee-shirts with images of Jimi Hendrix one sunny weekday afternoon in September, none with the other, no two shirts or Jimi images the same. This woman's shirt is one of those ironic messages that says "I know what I did, but really, was it me?"

Larry and Ron are two gents I see frequently at the Sidewalk Cafe. I don't know if it's the $4.00 happy hour or that it's on the way home or a better place to hang out than the laundromat across Avenue A, but they are frequently there on Sunday afternoon.

Jenavieve is a musician and friend of Wayne, the Sunday afternoon bartender. Wayne's got a story that maybe I'll tell someday, but Jenavieve is from the same town and in a way she's become Wayne's adoptive niece: he watches out for her though I doubt she needs much watching out for. She seems to have things well in hand on her own.

Ron was complaining that I hadn't taken his picture. Not true, as he later admitted, but I hadn't gotten him outside and since he came out while Jenavieve was taking a smoking break, here they are.

One of the reasons I was there was because Dorothy Friedman was holding an impromptu, unofficial memorial to John Ashbery. I knew John a little back in my Strand days, but hadn't seen him in more than a quarter century (sheesh, time flies). Other Unbearables were there including Tom Savage and Ron Kolm. They read poetry, reminisced and quietly mourned one of the great voices of poetry in America.

There was a couple watching the football and the poets at the same time, not too difficult since the memorial was being held at a long table beneath a silenced tv set with a game going on. They asked me what was going on, I told them. The woman knew who Ashbery was and nodded, appreciating that this was going on. They were in town from Boston.

And finally, sort of, as I was heading back, I saw this trio loading their car with luggage. I stopped to ask where they were heading. The work in publishing and were off the the Frankfurt Book Fair. I hope they sold the rights to lots of good books.