Mischief on the High Hudson

This is a post from weeks ago which I'm just now getting around to publishing.  Summer flies by in bouts of mischief.  (That's when I get behind on blog posts.)  Call me a poet.




















What happens in New York when you say "Why not?":

The Scene:  Yourself and four of your friends, all stragglers left over from a weekend hangout.  Tired of just sitting and talking philosophy and novels, you decide you're going to shake things up a bit.  "Let's go for a walk around the block, we'll just see what happens."  "Okay."

What Happens:
• You make up the rules as you walk.  Everyone must cross the streets only on the white pedestrian crossing marks.  You must run with an orange cone from that street median and place it somewhere interesting for the night.  You must not walk on the sidewalk cracks in the process!

• You spot that building on 10th near the Hudson River front.  The one with neon lights. You decide to see if you can get up to the roof.  Drew cracks the door code on his first try (it must just open, or he is simply that good with random digits).  You follow a resident once inside, he leads you to the elevators. The building is enormous and constructed like Alice's Wonderland. You press the button and ride all the way to the top only to discover that ---
the terrace doors are locked.  Not a huge surprise.  Plan B.  Find an apartment party to crash.  Everyone presses their favorite number in the elevator.  Easy to do when the building is 36 stories high.  You hear silence on most floors of this very nice building, but floor 25 has voices!  You decide you may come back here and ring the doorbell, but first, the group must ride out the other numbers as planned.  My floor, number 4, has a deck, gym, pingpong tables, and lit-up sofas with a view of the Empire State Building.  Everyone runs around on the giant checkerboard tiles and decides there's no going back, really, to floor 25.  The rule is, you have to keep moving.

• You see a double-decker Hummer limo around the next street corner.  You watch as very glamorous people exit and circumvent the line for some club and you ask the driver how much he would charge for a 10 minute drive around town.  If it breaks down to $25 per person, you say, you'll do it.
No dice. He costs $200 per hour, and an hour is the same as ten minutes to him.

•On foot, then, you end up at the Chelsea piers, try to get onboard the floating ship restaurant that is The Frying Pan but the employees are having a party amongst themselves and so you climb a sculpture on the waterfront, play a quick game of tag, and watch as Drew gets chased down and has to avoid being arrested by a park cop for running barefoot after dark.
• On the walk back to the train, you find a pile of old cassette tapes.  You string them along the block, creating impromptu street art, and then it's time for Artichoke Pizza and goodbyes.

It might not sound like much here, but if you were there, you would know how big the night felt because we owned it between the five of us just by saying yes.