Being There

The Yan­kees won the World Series, and yes­ter­day the city was cov­ered in pinstripes.  The rev­el­ers in blue and white were bril­liantly coor­di­nated and chaotic in their homage to the base­ball heroes. Everyone was proud to be a New Yorker. They were proud of the power and glory of this city, which is really a coun­try unto itself. Seeing all the sports fans assert­ing their cit­i­zen­ship with head-to-toe Yan­kees gear was pretty sur­real. Their ver­ti­cal pin­stripes aligned per­fectly with the con­verg­ing lines of stone, steel, and glass of the tall tow­ers all around. Those tow­ers rep­re­sent an incred­i­ble amount of power, and the aspi­ra­tional nature of life in New York and the United States in general.  Too bad I missed the parade.

It seems fit­ting that I’ve had too much cof­fee. This city is hyper.

Instead I spent the after­noon in The Strand. What a fan­tas­tic book­store. My best friend’s father worked in New York for some time, and when I asked him what I should do here (the last time I was here, in 2005), all he had to say was “go to Strand.” I could spend all day and all of my money there, perus­ing their 18 miles of books. Among the gems I’ll be bring­ing home is The Pho­tog­ra­pher, a book by the graphic nov­el­ist Emmanuel Guib­ert about the French pho­tog­ra­pher Didier Lefèvre’s trip to Afghanistan with MSF in 1979. The book is an inter­est­ing com­bi­na­tion of pho­to­graphic con­tact sheets over­laid by graphic pan­els. It works well, the story is funny and engag­ing. The art­work by both men is sub­tle and evoca­tive. I’m look­ing for­ward to read­ing more on the flight home. Funny that the sub­ject most inter­est­ing while I’m here in New York is the focus of the “War on Ter­ror” and the most un-urban of places.