saturday night drive

Driving into Manhattan late at night, jazz on the CD player --

lit up buildings everywhere, cars going 50 miles per hour.

The river is on my right, a black Bentley is directly ahead, and to my left, a bright neon blur of apartments and coffee shops. Traffic is pouring in from off the George Washington, that tricked-out-Halloween-happy bridge covered in spooky lights. Cars, vans, Uhauls. Gas and wheels, siphoning off into the city. Manhattan, one big set of lungs, inhaling everything that passes by.

This north part of the city is cold looking, closed off and bricked in. No one is out in their cars, on their feet, with dogs to be walked or dates to be led home. It's quiet.

In the background a tribute to Miles Davis is playing, a performer blowing out sounds in rushes of hot air. Note after note after note afternote. Kind of like this upper Manhattan landscape -- building after building after building.

Further towards Midtown, things start to feel more alive, more energetic. The road is jumping beneath the car, bumping me one way, tossing me another. A man driving with New Jersey plates rushes by, cutting off traffic, meeting the honks of others with a raised fist.

Signs for Lincoln center start showing up. This way, this way -- herding tourists into the right direction. Follow the arrows to Balanchine and Mahler, to the cultural mecca of the Western world.

Down in the West 60's I see a sign advertising a living messiah, a man promoted by the Jewish Women's Council. He looks down at the cars -- at me -- with heavy lidded eyes, airbrushed and happy, fifty feet high.

The cars keep passing, the jazz keeps playing, and I stay in my seat, looking out the window. At the Chelsea Piers, where a rich looking woman in bitch boots is walking a poodle. At an Asian couple looking at the water, holding hands.

Canal Street. City Hall. Brooklyn Bridge.

Turn to the left and I'm out of Manhattan again, as quickly as I entered it. Jazz still crooning, cars still rushing at 50 'per hour.

Things go quiet once again, and as I sit back in my seat to close my eyes, I think --

"and this is the way to spend a Saturday night."