3rd + C

by Monk, New York City, NY, USA

Avenues A through D. Used to call it Alphabet City, until every Puerto Rican, Ukrainian, Jew, and Chinaman from Union Square to City Hall got cooked up and served at the same buffet. Chomp-chomp-chomp. New moneyed bastards filled their plates with refurbished tenements that cost millions of dollars per room or those glass and chrome things you wouldn’t wish your mother should live in. Weird little guys from the middle of nowhere. Middlebury, Connecticut. Webtoe, Minnesota. Pigsfoot, Virginia. Moved right in, never blinked at the cost, and set up shop. Natty little graphickers and webpeople at their little cafe’s with clever names, paying a fortune to live in gut-renovated slums. I lived on 3rd and C back then. My parents owned Hunan Cuisine, just downstairs, fourth generation Lower East Siders, second generation Alphabet City. Of course, the newbies already called it The East Village by the time I had short hairs, but we used the old name. Rent went up, of course. Happens when that type moves in. Broke my dad’s heart when he had to close the shop. Replaced it with a salon or something, Sold very clever t-shirts. Neat thousand dollar haircuts.

Anyway.

We were set to move, you know? Same as everyone else. Dad was all ready to open Hunan Cuisine II out in Sunset Park when the Little Big One hit. I know people say it’s bullshit, but I distinctly remember the tremors here in New York. Biggest quake in human history, so why wouldn’t I feel it all the way over here? Cracked California right off the map, they say. I know we like to talk about New York like it’s its own little world, but let me tell you, I felt it. One of the biggest economies in the world out there, wasn’t it? Kept the country afloat for a long time. Little Big One took all our Pacific ports, entertainment industry, links to Asia, Silicon Valley. Never mind the human cost. Economy crashed, yeah? All the pretty graphickers on Avenue A suddenly didn’t have jobs. And what were they going to do, move in with their parents? The ones whose pensions and social security just took a collective nose dive into the Pacific Ocean? Hell, you remember all the homeless senior citizens once the foreclosures started? No, sir, they were stuck with the rest of us.

They stayed right where they were, in those half-finished glass tower thingies. Squatters, yeah? I mean, the renters, they all got kicked out in droves. Whole blocks went empty. Boarded up. Those unfinished buildings? No one cared. Money wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on, so barter kicked in. Jewelry, gadgets, clothes. Hell, to eat, people were trading time with their kids. BAD time, if you know what I mean. We saw a market, so we stayed. American way, right? Capitalism at its finest. Hunan Cuisine and Pawn Shop.

Twenty years, right here on 3rd and C.

Same as the squatters.