Visual Madeleine

Last Saturday Cain and I were walking to Zakka to do some shopping (full disclosure...he was shopping I was looking/stealing graphic design ideas from their selection of books). As we were crossing Broadway at Grand St. and I looked over and noticed the homeless people that sell stuff on the Broadway from Grand to Houston St.

I am always intrigued at their selection of wares. One vendor may only have a Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt, an Atari videogame cartridge and baseball glove, while his neighboring vendor will be peddling a vast selection of out-dated cellphone antennae. There seems to be neither rhyme nor reason to the wares, and I wonder who the "target market" for such random items is.

Regardless, as we waited for the walk sign to turn in our favor I glanced over and noticed someone selling a navy blue quasi-velour kimono-style robe...very de riguer for suburban males circa 1979/1980. Instantly I was transported back to a circumstance I found myself in a couple of decades ago...

Cue dreamy memory sequence music...

When I was around 11 or 12 years old I "officially" inherited a paper route. I had helped my siblings deliver their newspapers for years, but then I took over a route from my brother Clay.

Other than having to get up at five in the morning to deliver the papers, the other huge downside to being a "paperboy" was having to collect the payments from the customers.

When I was around 13 I began delivering to a man named Mr. Robertson who lived about three blocks from my house. Mr. Robertson was recently divorced, his ex-wife and daughter (who was a grade ahead of me in school...ultra popular, pretty, and sweet) had moved out leaving him to become a born again bachelor at what I am guessing to be the age of 45.

While I was making my monthly rounds to collect money for the papers I had delivered, Mr. Robertson had always been very kind to me...which was not the case with many other of my clients. He was very friendly, and because I knew the situation with his departed family members I began to think sense that he was very lonely.

The first few times I entered his house I noticed that there were a few strategically placed Playboy magazines on the coffee table. A little bit odd I thought...but hey, now that he doesn't have a wife and daughter around...why not?

Then one month he answered the door wearing a navy blue quasi-velour kimono style robe. Kind of unusual for 6pm in the evening, but hey he is a "free-spirit"...

Mr. Robertson's look, I should note, was very low-rent Burt Reynolds. He was probably about 5'5" (about the same as me at the time) very skinny with a very hair chest. Maybe it was the new found bachelorhood, but his way of behaving around me was very amateur-swinger wannabe...Think Don Knotts as Ralph Furley on "Three's Company"

Anyway, so as I just mentioned he greets me at his front door wearing a robe...Then the next month he answers the door again in his robe, but this time as I enter the house his robe accidentally-on-purpose comes undone revealing Mr. Robertson in his tight bikini underwear. He makes no attempt cover himself up and I obviously not doing a very good job of hiding my curiousity...very awkward, but I am soon on my way...

The next month the exact same scenario happens regarding the accidental opening of his robe, but this time there is no tight bikini underwear seperating me from his manhood in all it's glory...

Needless to say, but one thing leads to another and....Oh, I should probably end the story right here and save some of the tawdry further details for my future memoirs (think of this post as a "teaser" for a book to be published several decades from now.)

Suffice it to say, the mere glancing in my peripheral vision on a street corner in New York City in 2007 tripped the wires in my brain to go way back in time. A simpler and sexier time.