The blind man stood on the road and . . .

Last night I rode my bike to work. I left at about 10:15 p.m. and it takes me about an hour when it is dark out.

I have a blinking, red light on the back of my helmet in addition to the very bright headlight on the handlebar.

As I came out the gate of my apartment, I saw to men standing at the corner with their big Labradors, a yellow and a chocolate, the two dogs sniffing each other, though not the men, as far as I could tell. I got on my bike and headed toward the corner and I realized that I didn’t remember if I had turned on the blinker on the back of my helmet. Not wanting to get off the bike and take off the helmet to check, I slowed and said to the man on the corner with the yellow Lab, “Excuse me, can you tell me if the light on the back of my helmet is blinking?”

“I’m blind,” he said, “this is my guide dog.”

But he was jolly about it, “I’d like to help you,” he said with a chuckle.

I said, “Of all people for me to ask, right?”

Just my bicycle and me

I've never been known for being daring and aggressive. When I was a toddler, my parents entered me with my new tricycle in the tricycle race at the company picnic of Paoli Chair Factory where my dad worked. I can't say that I remember it but evidently I was so proud of myself on my new vehicle that I thought the race was about being seen and not winning. I hear that I rode casually along with a big smile wanting everyone to see me. Some things never change.

We grew up on bikes. In the summertime it seemed like we lived on the road. I guess traffic wasn't what it is now or maybe we just didn't think about it much. No helmets. It was also in the days when we didn't wear seat belts in cars. So I suppose we've just become more safety conscious. Incidentally, I won't even go around the block without my helmet. I figure the day I do is the day I finally have the big accident.

So when I moved to New York City, first to Brooklyn, I found this great bike path that ran along the harbor out to Coney Island. I bought a cheap Huffy and loved riding. On Saturdays I would even ride all the way up to Central Park and ride the loop through it.

It didn't take long to learn the ins and outs of biking in NYC. First of all, you have to spend almost $100 on a lock that will actually prevent theft. I only learned that after three stolen bikes. Also, sometimes even a securely locked bicycle isn't safe. One day I came out of work to find that apparently an elephant had taken a seat on my bike. I later learned that the bike rack where I parked was next to a loading dock and sometimes the trucks backed up on the sidewalk.

I also learned a lot of lessons the hard way. Even if you're only going 5 mph and you're not paying attention and the cab in front of you stops, it still hurts when you hit it. A lot. The day you don't ride your bike to work is the day that there will be a blackout all over the Eastern Seaboard and you'll be walking the 12 miles home instead of riding. If it looks like it is going to rain and you decide to ride anyway, it will certainly rain. A lot. If it normally takes you 40 minutes to ride to work but the wind is blowing against you, you will be late. Cars do not pay attention and the will turn across the bike path in front of you. And you will have to make a sudden jerk to not hit them and it will hurt. A lot. And you will swear at them. A lot.

I typically don't ride much on the city streets. There is a 12 mile bike path along the Hudson River from the top of Manhattan, where I live, to the bottom of Manhattan, where I work. But on occasion, I've been known to ride down Broadway through Times Square just for the thrill. I've gone up First Avenue in rush hour traffic.

This is where being daring and aggressive comes in. I'd say daring is still not smart but I think it takes a bit of daring to ride in New York City. But it is aggressive that is important. I learned that you have to be aggressive. The cabbies can tell if you're timid. You have to take your share of the street and let them know that you know you have as much right to be there as they do.

You also have to obey the traffic laws. I learned that the hard way. One day I safely ran two red lights in a row. It took me several blocks to realize that that siren was for me. $200 and points on my driver's license later, I no longer run red lights. Most of the time.

Biking in New York City is almost always exhilarating. I love it.

One more thing I've learned. If you wear those tight biker shorts (which I do because you kind of have to when you ride as much as I do), people always look down there, men and women. It is like there eyes are drawn to see if they can see something. Did I just get vulgar? Sorry. Anyway, I try to carry an extra pair of "normal" shorts to throw on over my bike shorts but sometimes, there just isn't time.

Rats!

I'm told that rats outnumber people 8 to 1 in New York City. That would make approximately 64 million rats here. I see them all the time. In a way, you get used to them in the subway tunnels. I see a lot of them when I ride my bike to work at night along the Hudson River. I've actually run over some of them. But in another way, you never get used to them and they give everyone the creeps.

A few weeks ago as I was walking home one night, I passed a building about a block from where I live. It was a Sunday night and it looked like the tenants' garbage bins were full so they had just started putting it on the street. As I walked by I saw rats. Not one or two, but more like one or two dozen. I just went on my way with a shiver up my spine. A little too close for comfort and I live on a ground floor.

A few nights later I walked by there again and they were still there. So I decided it was time to do something. I called 311. 311 is the non-emergency version of 911. You can use it for everything from complaining about a noisy neighbor to asking what day to put out your recyclables. I called and explained to the nice lady that there were more than a dozen rats outside this building scurrying about and that there was garbage all over the sidewalk.

I did this every day for a week. I called and reported what I was seeing. About two weeks after my first report, I noticed that there were new bins outside that building and that the superintendent of the building was working like crazy cleaning up. I had never seen him outside before.

I haven't seen a rat since and I'm taking credit for getting rid of them.

The Partner

So last night I made the mistake of checking my phone and saw that a call had come from work while I was napping. It was Wednesday, which is supposed to be my day off. Of course, I listened to the message and they were asking if I could come into our Park Avenue office to work a special meeting. I really hadn’t had enough sleep to work all night but for some reason, I agreed.

This place is used for big meetings and I knew my job was going to be ordering food, putting out snacks, making coffee and in the end, doing whatever The Partner asked me to do. And The Partner in charge, well I can’t really describe him well among polite company so I’ll let you use your imagination. I’ll just say that the rule in dealing with him is “Give him whatever he wants.”

For some reason, I’ve never been afraid of him. One time a few years ago, I was down the hall away from the phone, which was ringing. He was standing over it yelling down the hall, “Hey you, the phone! The phone!” I’ve never done well with “hey you” when I’ve been working with you for months and you haven’t bothered to know my name. So I yelled back, “Well, pick it up. It’s probably for you.” He picked it up. It was for him. That was it. I never heard any more about it.

Anyway, last night, I knew I wouldn’t have to worry about falling asleep. I knew he’d keep me hopping.

I arrived before any of the attorneys or clients. What kind of people call a meeting for midnight?

I made coffee and raided the pantry to put out chips, nuts and cookies. I put out a modest amount. The Partner and a couple of other attorneys arrived and went into the conference room. The Partner came out and said, “If our hunger is any indication, we need to put out more food.” I went in and they, in about five minutes, had reduced the chips and nuts to crumbs. I put out more.

In came about twenty people, mostly all grumpy. A couple of the men I recognized from TV, New York City bigwigs. Immediately The Partner came out to me and said, “We’re going to move into the other conference room.” So, I had to move all the food, coffee, ice, sodas, plates and napkins into the other conference room. And these strange people started their meeting as soon as they got there and they looked at me like I was some kind of zoo animal interrupting their meeting.

Then The Partner came out and said, “It is really hot in here. Can you turn on the air conditioner?” I had to call the coordinator of the conference center (at home at 1:00 a.m.) to ask her how to turn on the air conditioner. It wasn’t in the handbook.

A few minutes later, The Partner came out again, holding out his hand full of Chex mix and said, “Can we get some of this crap in here.”

I said, “Yes, I’ll get some more crap.” Really, that’s what I said.

I went back into the pantry and found more chips, pretzels, Chex mix and Cheetos. Honestly, who wants to eat Cheetos when you’re reading lots of important papers?

I went into the conference room again and everyone looked at my again like I was a spy.

All of the bowls of “crap” still seemed to be overflowing. I’m not sure what he thought they needed more of but I put it all out.

Then I went back to my desk. I can't talk about what the deal was all about. By now it is all over the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. I know there was a lot of yelling and a lot of throwing around of phrases like “hundred million dollars” and “twenty thousand dollars a week.” A lady burst out of the door followed by The Partner. “I can’t stay here,” she said, “we’re handing this deal over to him. I can’t stay.”

So then there was a three-way split in the meeting. One group went into the original conference room where there was now no food. Evidently this group was “counsel for the other side” because The Partner didn’t seem to care if they had crap to eat or water to drink.

At about 3:30 a.m., The Partner came to me and said, “Everyone is cold, can we turn up the heat.”

I told him I’d check into it. I went into the conference room, check the thermostats, which read 68º and turned off the a/c. There was some applause. I have to say, it was really chilly.

Five minutes later he came back, “Any luck on warming it up in here? They are talking about breaking up the table for fire wood.” And I’m thinking, “Who wanted it to be cool? This is not my fault.”

I checked the handbook and it clearly read, “There is no supplemental heating.” It was not going to warm up quickly.

Then I got a call from our downtown office from the lady sitting where I normally sit answering the phone that I normally answer. The Partner had called her to see if she could find someone who knew how to warm up the room. Normally, if he’d called this number, he’d have gotten me. But he got her. So she called me. She was going to call the guy who normally worked there. It was 4:00 a.m. I told her that she could call him if she wanted but I wasn’t going to wake him up.

A few minutes later, he called me, having been awakened, “There is no supplemental heating,” he said..

I sent The Partner and email that said, “There is no supplemental heating.”

All the parties came back together at about 4:30. There was some yelling and a lot of talk about “drawing up the contract” and more talking of “hundreds of millions of dollars.” I also heard the words “cold as a meat locker.”

And then at about 5:00 a.m., everyone walked out. One minute everyone was talking and “conferring” in general and then suddenly, everyone was walking out. Everyone seemed pretty happy. I know I was.

The Partner asked me to call him a car. I resisted the temptation to say, “You’re a car.”

I called cars for him and three others. Not two minutes later, the Partner came out and said, “Any word on the cars?”

I told him I’d called but I was still waiting for cars to be assigned. “Well, we’re going out to the street. Email me with car numbers.”

They left. The car company called with car numbers for the four attorneys. I emailed The Partner. He called and said, “We got yellow cabs. Cancel the cars.”

I canceled the cars.

I went into the conference room. The bowls full of “crap” seemed to be full. I think everyone must have had the same idea about Cheetos that I did. There were dozens of water bottles, half empty (or half full, depending on what kind of person you are) and lots of wadded napkins and a dozen or so half empty soda cans (all diet).

It was over.

Some of my co-workers refuse to work this conference center. They say, “I’m not a maid.” But I sometimes enjoy the clean-up when the lawyers are all gone. I have a Masters Degree but I don’t feel it degrading to play the maid every once in awhile. Believe me, I’ve seen these people throwing around their “hundreds of millions of dollars” and I know I’m a million times happier cleaning up after them than they ever are when they get up in the morning.

Rainy, Friday Rush

First of all, I'm just now getting used to rush hours.

For most of my time in NYC, I've worked the graveyard shift so I was always doing a reverse commute, mostly riding on a fairly empty train and always having a seat. Back in the days when I did work days, I generally rode my bike to and from work.

Yesterday, Friday, was a nasty, rainy day. I had to be at work at 4:00 a.m. and I don't ride my bike on rainy days. The subways were heaving with commuters and none appeared any too happy. It seemed to be raining everywhere, even underground. And the trains just seemed to be crowded and there seemed to be an epidemic of people doing all the things that are on my subway dos/donts list:

1) DON'T stand in the doorway of the train.

2) If there is space in the center of the train, DON'T move to the empty spaces.

3) If you have a backpack, carry it on the subway, DON'T wear it on your back. It is a weapon. And it is like carrying another person on your back.

4) If you're young, DO get up and give your seat to someone who needs it. This includes old people, pregnant women, blind people, people with canes or crutches and especially old women who are just too tired from a week of work.

5) DON'T crack you're gum. If you're cracking your gum and you get shot, well I'm not saying you deserved it but . . .

6) If you know you're getting off at the next stop (and you do) DON'T wait until the doors open and people start getting on before you decide to get up and move to the door.

This list is not exhaustive.

So yesterday, I had to push my way into the train because (1) people were standing in the door and (2) there was plenty of empty space in the middle of the train but people weren't moving in. So then I was stuck standing in the door, breaking my own rule!

I guess the dampness and crowd was just too much for someone. I couldn't see her but I could hear her just raging. I couldn't tell if she was talking to someone in particular or to us or to God or to anyone who would listen, or possibly, just to herself. But she was raging about everything. Her language was what you would call "colorful." She was just mad. In fact, it was only the "colorful" words I could even understand.

Anyway, when I got off, it really started raining. It was raining horizontally and the umbrella was of now use.

It is a beautiful sunny day and I'm not going underground all weekend if I can help it.

Passover begins today

In honor of this Jewish holy day, I'm re-running this which some of you read several years ago. Someone asked me to reprint it. So here it is.

A few years ago I moved into a new apartment, which I’ve since left. One Monday morning I was doing some laundry and when I went down to the basement to put a load in the dryer, there was an old lady down there. She was trying to figure out how to use the new dryer and I showed her. She said she’d prefer to use the old one so I switched my clothes to the other dryer so she could use the dryer she was used to. “They keep putting new things in.” We started talking. She said she’d lived in that building for 45 years.

We both sat down on old, rickety chairs in this dark laundry room in the basement, she, because she wanted to wait for her clothes, I, because I wanted to hear her talk.

She was an elegant 83 years old. “I came to America in 1939 from Germany. You’ve heard of Hitler?” she asked, as if she truly thought I might not have heard of him. Then she continued, “I’m Jewish. My father sent me first to America to get a job and learn English and then I would send for them. My sponsor, the sister of my grandmother, lived in Wilmington, Delaware so I went there but after three months, my uncle in New York found a job for me and I moved to New York to work as maid.”

“I saved hundreds of dollars and in 1941 my parents were to go to the consulate in Stuttgart for the papers. But before they got there, Pearl Harbor was bombed, the war broke out and the consulate in Stuttgart closed. They then went to the Swiss border. I was told to send money to Switzerland and I sent all I had saved but they lied. I never saw my money again and my parents were not able to get through.”

“In the small town where we lived, the people were nice to us. There were only twelve Jewish families in the town. The people told my father, ‘Don’t worry. Nothing will happen to you here. We’ll watch out for you.’”

“But later as things began to get bad, no one could protect them. They moved to Frankfurt to try to maybe get lost. I never heard from them again. I married my husband and he was three years in the war in Europe. He went to my hometown after the war and went to Frankfurt to find word of them.

“He was told her that her family, her father, mother and 11 year old sister were listed as ‘lost in the east.’ That meant to Poland and the death camps.

“Roosevelt was like a god to us. But he was an anti-Semite. His advisors were more so. They could have raised the quotas but they didn’t want to get involved. They could have bombed the camps. They could have bombed the railroads to the camps. They knew. We know now that they knew.”

“I felt terrible guilt. Maybe I could have done more. Maybe I could have sent more money. But a good friend, my best friend, helped me more than any doctor. She said, ‘Do you think you’re the only one who lost someone? You’re not the only one. We all lost everyone.’ And that helped me to move on. We all have to move on.”

My new friend told me that she went back to Germany in 1990 and met the mayor, the burgermeister, of her small town. He is the son of the burgermeister of the town when she left as a girl. He said that his father had often spoken of her father as a wonderful, smart businessman.

We talked about how our neighborhood used to be largely Jewish but few Jews remain. She does go to synagogue just down the block in a very small building. It’s funny how I have ridden my bike past that little synagogue almost daily for five years and had never noticed it.

She said she hoped we would meet again as she enjoyed talking to someone young.

“My name is Marty”, I said.

“I’m Berta Stern but you can call me Berta.” I gave her my phone number and told her to call me if she needed anything at all. I’ve since moved and haven’t heard from her.

But it made me remember that there are still people alive who were personally devastated by the Nazis. It seems so long ago and far away but it wasn’t.

Taxi Tales

A couple of years ago I flew back to New York early on the morning after Christmas. I was meeting friends from England up on the Connecticut shore that morning so I was going straight from LaGuardia airport to the railway station in Harlem. It is a short ride, fewer than fifteen minutes, an easy ride on the bus but it was cold and snowy and I wanted to catch the earliest train possible.

So I got on the taxi line and got a cab immediately. In New York City, the law is that a yellow cab has to take you anywhere you want to go within the city limits. I got in. The driver took off and I told him my destination. He stopped and backed up to the dispatcher. He didn’t want to take me. The dispatcher asked me where I was going, “Harlem,” I said.

“Then go!” the dispatcher said to the driver.

One of the other laws is that if you’re going anywhere in the city limits, the cabbie must use the meter. “It would be better for you to play a flat fare,” he said. He must have thought I was from out of town. I knew better but I said, “How much?” He said, “$20!” “No way,” I said, “Turn on the meter.”

He turned it on but started yelling in some South Asian language. I’m sure it was swearing because if it wasn’t, what was the point? He was really angry. He turned to me and said, “I’ve been waiting in the taxi line for two hours and now I get a ten dollar fare. Why didn’t you take the bus?”

I said, “I didn’t take the bus because I didn’t want to and if you don’t like driving a cab, maybe you should do something else.”

He drove recklessly and kept yelling in his native tongue. We crossed the bridge but when we came near the train station, he stopped about a block short and turned off the meter, indicating it was time for me to get out. The fare came to $15 and change. I wanted to give him exact change but I didn’t have it and I was a little afraid to ask for change so I gave him $16.

“You’re not tipping me!”

“Are you kidding me? Of course I’m not tipping you. You don’t deserve a tip. But I am writing down your number.” I actually had already written it down.

I got out of the car and to give myself a head start in case he decided to come after me, I left the back passenger-side door open so that before he could move the car, he’d have to get out and close the door. That didn’t make him any too happy and he was still yelling at me when I entered the station. I called and reported him and took him to taxi-cab court. The day of the trial, I couldn’t get there because of work but I hope he took time out of his busy day to appear.

One of the perks of my job is that I get picked up every night to go to work in a Lincoln Towne Car or something similar. The fare from my house to work is $36 at that time of night. The firm pays the tab. It is a pretty decent fare and the drivers jockey for it since it is a quick trip, about 20 minutes.

One night I got the usual call telling me my car number and what time it would arrive. I went out at the right time and there was no car. I waited for about five minutes and then I called. The dispatcher told me that the driver said he was in front of the building. “Well I’m in front of the building and I promise he’s not here. Can you find out what street he’s on?”

The dispatcher came back and said, “He’s on 133rd street.” I was between 204th Street and 207th Street at number 133. It was going to take the driver about 30 more minutes to get there. So I called work and told them I’d be late. Forty-five minutes passed. I called again, “He’s still not here.”

When the found the driver, he was at my old address about four blocks away. How he got that address, I have no idea. I had them patch me through to the driver and I told him how to find me though his English was nearly non-existent. I finally saw him at the end of the street.

I got in and he turned to me and started yelling. Though his English was bad, I could understand him saying, “Don’t you know where you live?”

“You’re not going to blame me for this,” I said, “I’ve been in the right place all the time. Now, we need to turn around.”

So he gunned the car and went into the next intersection and made a dangerous u-turn, recklessly close to an oncoming car.

“Okay, stop,” I said, “I’m not riding with you.”

He pulled over and I got out. He kept trying to get me to get back in, obviously not wanting to lose the fare (after more than an hour) but I wasn’t getting back in with him. I called for another car and got to work about two hours late.

But one of my favorite cab stories happened just last weekend. It was early Saturday morning and I was going to work. I had called for a car. It was raining when I went out and I didn’t see the car. I went out into the street and looked up the block and I could see a black car sitting about a block up the street. I knew it was mine because what are the odds that someone else on my little block would have a car coming that early on a Saturday morning?

I waved for him but he didn’t budge. So I gave in and walked up the block to him.

“What address do you have?”

“Number 70.” He said confidently.

“Then why did you stop outside of number 58?”

“Oh, sorry sir, GPS tell me I reach my destination.”

You can’t really argue with that, can you?

To be fair, I’ve met some amazing cabbies. I’ve met men who were doctors, lawyers, architects and molecular biologists in their birth countries but they can make a better life for their families as cabbies in New York City. I even met one man who told me he gave up a multi-million dollar grant in nuclear physics at a university and became a cabbie. I believe him.

Just last week a driver who took me home looked like he came straight out of the mountains of Pakistan. He looked like a Pakistani country bumpkin. But he emigrated to Spain in 1973, lived there and learned fluent Spanish, then came to American 15 years later and learned to speak very good English too.