Bright Lights, Big City

Written and recalled for Magpie Tales:

Uptown, Midtown, Downtown, Chinatown...

Twenty-two years old, exploring alien world of concrete and skyscrapers, eyes drawn upward, jaw agape and dragging on the sidewalk.  I smell the exhaust of a thousand taxis, the acrid odor of burnt pretzels from the corner vendor, the sour steam rising through sidewalk grates from unseen subterranean passages. Getting the grand tour today from city-savvy friends--Penn Station, Broadway, top of the World, dinner in Chinatown. We take the subway to Canal Street, north lies Little Italy: south, we step into another country—bright little shops with neon signs boasting their wares in strokes and symbols. As we pass by one I pause and stare, amazed to see whole birds, plucked, smoked and ready for purchase, not neatly cut and packaged like in the supermarkets I am used to.

February 1978, New York City --"Toto, we're not in Vermont anymore!"

©  Ginny Brannan October 2011

 Photo courtesy Tess Kincaid for Magpie Tales            

Shared at Magpie Tales: http://magpietales.blogspot.com/

This photo reminded me of my first trip into NYC with some of my friends. I was assaulted with sights, sounds and smells the likes of which I had never witnessed before. To this day I remember the total amazement of it all!