Greenwich Village, Washington Square West at West Washington Place

It's vacation time for me. I'm off to Michigan for a week to visit Tom, Jeni, Nathan, Carrie and Ellen. Umm, vacation.

See you next Thursday night. Don't forget!


Mary Sargent © 2007 …………………………………….. click to enlarge

Here's the final photo of Saturday night's mini walk. Washington Square. Lots of things have happened here, going way, way back. But that's a story for another time.

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Greenwich Village, Washington Square West Between Fourth Street and West Washington Place

Mary Sargent © 2007 …………………………………….. click to enlarge

It's a little before 7 o'clock and look how dark it is already! Doesn't it seem just wrong that the longest day of the year is at the beginning of summer? It should come in the middle, don't you agree?

Aren't you glad you don't live at the equator where the days and nights are equal all year long?

MacDougal Street changes its name to Washington Square West as it runs alongside Washington Square which is where we are now, looking across at Hayden Hall. According to New York Song Lines, Hayden Hall was built in 1957 as a residence hall for law students at New York University, and incorporated the Holley Chambers Hotel, which I take to be the building to the left. Now first year students live in Hayden Hall. Welcome, all NYU students, drink responsibly.

Boy, did I love going to college. Can't say those were the happiest days of my life since I was mostly depressed, but I sure loved it.

Happiness isn't everything.

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Greenwich Village, MacDougal Street Between Third and Fourth Streets

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MacDougal Street. Coffeehouses. Beatniks. Dylan. Smoking. I'm talking cigarettes. Unfiltered.

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Greenwich Village, Sixth Avenue between Third and Fourth Streets

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Last night I went down to the Village to have dinner with my cousins. This is where I got off the subway at West Third Street, looking up Sixth Avenue at the ghostly Empire State Building 31 blocks away.

When you were a kid, did you call it the Umpire State Building?

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Hudson Heights, Fort Washington Avenue Between 183rd and 185th Streets

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That's the Hebrew Tabernacle of Washington Heights in the background.

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Hudson Heights, Fort Washinton Avenue between 183rd and 185th Streets

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This is the street running east along Bennett Park, a two-block long park containing the highest point in Manhattan.

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Hudson Heights, 181st Street at Fort Washington Avenue

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We were on this corner in April; these are the steps leading to this church.

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Washington Heights, 178th Street at Fort Washington Avenue

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And now, through the miracle of the subway, on the very same photowalk, I am in a completely different part of Manhattan. It's still last Friday and still fairly early in the day and I planned to pick up cat food on my way home from the therapist. As regular readers know, cat food means Washington Heights.

I took the C train to the A train to 177th Street and walked up Ft. Washington Avenue to 181st Street. This enabled me to pick up the last two blocks of Ft. Washington Avenue. Ft. Washington Avenue is Done!, halleluiah. As you may know, it edges out West End Avenue as being the dullest street in Manhattan.

This, of course, is the George Washington Bridge.

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Upper West Side, 85th Street Between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues

Mary Sargent © 2007 …………………………………….. click to enlarge

This is the Mannes School of Music Extension at New School.

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Upper West Side, 85th Street Between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues

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Pretty sedate. This is the Upper West Side.

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Upper West Side, 85th Street Between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues

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The lettering above the entrance on this unusual townhouse reads: The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Building. How sweet, I thought, they named their house after themselves. I began imagining a gold plaque on my doorway reading: The Mary Sargent Apartment. Hmm.

It turns out that they were philanthropists who set up a foundation (The Harry and Jeanette Foundatiion, Inc.) worth about 2 billion, with headquarters in Maryland. I could find no mention of this building on the World Wide Web. It is another mystery.

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Upper West Side, 86th Street Between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues

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Yesterday I had the day off so after early morning therapy on 86th Street, I went around the block and walked 85th Street to the park and then up Central Park West to get the C train.

This is on 86th Street.

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Midtown, Broadway from 55th Street

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So I turn the corner onto Broadway and zowie! Blam!

Hop on the subway and head home.

Glad I'm here.

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Midtown, Seventh Avenue between 55th and 54th Streets

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Midtown, Seventh Avenue at 55th Street

The famous (or infamous) Carnegie Deli, across the street on Seventh Avenue.

Long ago when I was a vistor here, seeking a job at the College Art Association convention at the Hilton close by, I ate at the Stage Deli just a block down the street here, not knowing it was but a pale imitation of the Carnegie. Now, of course, I know Katz's is the real deal.

And I didn't get a job. That's why I live here and not in South Dakota. It's true! I was a finalist for a teaching job in South Dakota.

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Midtown, 55th Street Between Sixth and Seventh Avenues

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This is looking back toward Sixth Avenue. That's the City Center marquee, maybe not the best fit for a neo-Moorish facade.

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Midtown, 55th Street at Sixth Avenue

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And now it's dark, after dinner. Here's a look at the back side of one of Robert Indiana's famous LOVE sculptures.

As for dinner, luckily there was another Chinese restaurant on the same block where I had a nice minimal dinner of shrimp and pea shoots with brown rice plus whiskey sour. I think a whiskey sour is perfect with Chinese food with its bonus of whiskey-soaked fruit for dessert, so satisfyingly retro. I would tell you the name of the restaurant if I could remember it.

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Midtown, 55th Street Between Fifth and Sixth Avenues

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Devoted readers will remember that I started this walk on September 2 with a visit to MOMA. Now, thinking of dinner, I looked for Imperial Dragon, an old-fashioned, faded Cantonese restaurant, never crowded, never rushed. Well, goodby to all that; it seems Imperial Dragon is being replaced by a hamburger joint.

This shot is across the street from the former Imperial Dragon. Notice the former Côte Basque. Psychic shops endure.

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Midtown, Fifth Avenue Between 53rd and 54th Streets

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Pedicabs are a relatively new phenomenon in New York. Here's an article from The Christian Science Monitor in 2003. I haven't taken one yet, but now it's in my mental list of must dos.

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Midtown, Fifth Avenue at 53rd Street

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Around the corner on the steps of St. Thomas Church.

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Midtown, 53rd Street between Sixth and Fifth Avenues

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Midtown, 53rd Street between Sixth and Fifth Avenues.

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And now crossing the street and looking back at MOMA.

I won't be posting for the next three nights, going to a family funeral in Mississippi.

Please come back Friday night.

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Midtown, 53rd Street between Sixth and Fifth Avenues

Mary Sargent © 2007 …………………………………….. click to enlarge

Yesterday I went down late to MOMA to see the Richard Serra show. For all you other laggerts, the show comes down on September 10. The museum closes at 5:30 on Saturday, so I arrived at 5:00. That's how I do it. It was impressive all right, but I'm thinking I was maybe more impressed when I saw one huge piece at Gagosian a few years ago. I'm still thinking about it.

This shot was taken looking across the street from the front of MOMA. It was after six, as I'd stopped in the gift store, which wisely stays open one hour after the museum closes.

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Upper West Side, Amsterdam Avenue between 104th and 105th Streets

Mary Sargent © 2007 …………………………………….. click to enlarge

I double love this photograph. I can't explain it.

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